While I most honestly respect the great point you've made with that Dustin, I want to caution you with quoting the Bible because much of it was not written to be taken literally.

To some degree all faith is without understanding, therefore according to your logic all faith is arbitrary - personally I disagree with that. If we understood everything about that which we believe, what purpose would faith serve? None whatsoever.

Faith is subjective; the only person it's meant to be helpful for is the individual who believes. I don't see the point of complaining how it isn't helpful to anyone, when truly by nature faith isn't meant to be helpful to anyone other than the individual.

Shouldn't we first establish what the faith is before we can determine if it's harmful or not?

The key being "to some degree". We can only understand to some degree, and that is hardly reason to suggest that all understanding is arbitrary. Much less is it a correlary of my logic.

Faith without understanding is arbitrary. That was the claim. I did not claim that we must understand absolutely everything in order for our faith to be something other than arbitrary.
If we have faith, and some understanding about that faith, our faith is no longer arbitrary because we, at least to some degree, understand that faith. We might be misguided, and our faith might change as our understanding deepens.

And arbitrary faith is not helpful to the individual. Arbitrary faith is unquestioned faith. Arbitrary faith tends to lead to violence, both mental and physical. Both towards the individual and towards others.

Shouldn't and individual's faith be helpful to others? It seems to me that faith should cultivate what is good, and therefore, make the person of faith a better person. And certainly, if I'm a better person, I am more helpful to others.

We already have established what faith is.

But the problem with that is one individual's faith is not meant to be helpful to others, it's meant to be helpful to the individual that's why faith is subjective

Nothing about an individual's faith in God or any higher power is meant to serve the greater good of his or her surrounding community.

If it were faith wouldn't be subjective at all, but faith is subjective.

What someone chooses to do with their faith is something totally different that can and ought to be used for the greater good of his or her surrounding community, but that is not the same as having faith - that is simply what one does with one's faith.

Moreover, it is impossible to prove that their faith is arbitrary simply because they don't act based on the good of the community.

I get an impression of what you mean to say but so far your argument seems to lack this important distinction

I was actually supporting you. To help clear things up, I meant we should first establish if the particular faith / belief is harmful to another.

But in what way is it supposed to help the individual? If faith helping the individual does not help the individual help others, I think we'll have to rethink what we call faith.

"Love thy neighbor as thyself"

I think just the opposite of what you say here is true. Jesus did not preach a selfish doctrine, quite the opposite.

Why does a subjective faith demand that faith cannot be of benefit to others?

Sure, we might have some faith that causes us to be inconsiderate of others, but this does not mean that faith must be inconsiderate of others.

I would suggest that faiths which tend towards being inconsiderate are probably arbitrary, and held by people with very little understanding.

Maybe it's impossible to prove such a thing, but I think we will notice a close relation between faith with little understanding, and faith which cultivates inconsiderate styles of living.

What distinction? Between being able to prove something, and being able to notice patterns, specifically, that violence and ignorance go hand in hand?

A little common sense would answer this question rather easily. Since religion is a spiritual matter, obviously faith would help the individual in a spiritual way. I don't think drawing a picture to illustrate this is necessary. Faith is solely the individual's passionate belief in the objective uncertainty (i.e. God). There's no need to rethink what we call faith, because at the end of the day that is what faith is.

Faith has nothing to do with how the individual helps others, that is solely the individual's personal responsibility. Wheter or not someone believes in God has nothing to do with how they treat people, they have to do with how they treat people.

his is true Jesus did not preach a selfish doctrine. However the Golden Rule can be applied to individuals regardless of whether or not they have faith in God. It is not a religious doctrine, it is a humanistic doctrine that has been preached in a multitude of different ways by many different people over the past 2500 years. Jesus did not doctor this up, this can be traced back likely to the time of Socrates or earlier. Not only that but it has since been preached by a multitude of figures throughout history. It is a humanistic doctrine and not a religious one and therefore has nothing to do with whether or not an individual has faith in God.

Subjective faith demands that an individual's faith cannot be of benefit to others because if it were it would not be characteristic of subjectivity. The very nature of subjectivity does not care the least about the benefit of others, only the benefit of itself. Therefore since faith is subjective an individual's faith cannot be of benefit to others.

Having faith in God has nothing to do with being considerate of others. Having faith in God simply means the a passionate belief in the existance of God on an individual basis. Wheter or not someone is considerate of others has nothing to do with a person's faith, it has everything to do with the person just simply being inconsiderate.

Faith doesn't cultivate anything.

you've been frequently refusing to acknowledge an individual's personal responsibility for their actions, and instead blame them on something that is completely unrelated - their faith in God. The only ones we have to blame for our shortcomings are ourselves, not our faith.

No, being able to distinguish between subjectivity and non-subjectivity. If something is subjective then the only one that stands to benefit is the individual alone since that is the very nature of subjectivity.

Plainly spoken, I believe Didymos Thomas is trying to say that our beliefs can have an effect on others, since we might make decisions based on a particular belief system.

Dancinginchains, I believe is trying to say that having faith in God is not really going to harm anyone, and seems to be saying that he mainly keeps his faith to himself.

But if believe something like we should fight for God or something along those lines, this would seem harmful, and I'm not sure if many would disagree.