The reason why I don't like to use the word, "believe", in this context is due to the religious colouring and definition that it has been given by Christian Literalists. The word, "believe", has come to be associated with stubborn devotion to a conviction or idea as factual in the face of all evidence and facts to the contrary. In fact, the more the conviction is contradicted by the evidence of reality, the more holding it is seen as being a virtue. Convictions like; the earth is only 6000 years old, humanity appeared fully formed with no ancestors on October 23, 4004 BC, or that a catastrophic global flood occurred in the year 2304 BC. Used in this way, the word, "believe", is the antithesis of rationality and has no place in any discussion of science.
Christian Literalists also use the word, "believe", as a weapon to legitimize their own narrow interpretation of faith and exclude others. The question, "Do you believe in the Bible?", or, "Do you believe in God?", is interpreted by them as involving whether a person accepts myths, metaphors, and allusions in the Christian Scriptures, meant to express important truths, as being historically true and factual, as things that could be verified by data and physical evidence, as things that can be subject to quantification, measurement, and experimentation. If it is not factual, then to them it is not "true". Those who do not accept this view, do not have a legitimate faith in the Scriptures, or in God, by their definition. The sad thing is that in only accepting the literal or factual as "true", they often miss the real truths that these stories were meant to express.
This interpretation of the word, "believe", as associated with physical evidence and factuality, only came about relatively recently in response to the scientific revolution towards the end of the Renaissance period and into the late 18th century. Before that period, the meaning of this word was primarily associated with relationship, who you put your trust in, or gave your allegiance to. You, "believed", in your nation, your king, or your leader. This is the interpretation of the word that I have a love relationship with.
Probably the best known verse in the New Testament that mentions belief is John 3:16:
For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
The original Greek word in this passage for "believes" is "πιστεύων ", or pisteuōn. This same word is translated in other passages as, "trusts", "have faith", "entrusted", and "remain faithful". Strong's Greek defines it as the following:
4100 pisteúō (from 4102 /pístis, "faith," derived from 3982 /peíthō, "persuade, be persuaded") – believe (affirm, have confidence); used of persuading oneself (= human believing) and with the sacred significance of being persuaded by the Lord (= faith-believing).
http://biblehub.com/greek/4100.htm
So, what is the meaning of, "believes", in the context of the John 3:16 passage? Some Christians take it to mean that one must hold the conviction that Jesus is literally a supernatural being who is all knowing and all powerful, and that being convinced of this is one's ticket from being eternally punished and tortured in the afterlife. Much of this comes from later Christian baggage and would not have been the interpretation that the writer of the Gospel or his readers would have understood. To this audience, "God's Son", was a title that referred to someone having legitimate authority, someone who was felt to be, "anointed by God as his chosen leader and representative". This is the title that was used for Israel's kings and for the expected messiah. Son of a god was also the title Caesar used to legitimize his authority. We also need to couple this with the understanding that to the early Christians at the time of the Gospels the name of Jesus and his teaching were interchangeable. They called themselves followers of, "The Way". Jesus, as the teacher of this Way, was seen as its personification and his name was substitutable with the teaching he represented. Seen this way, believing in Jesus, the Son of God, means affirming as legitimate and trusting in the teaching of Jesus. In the time and place of the Gospel, this would have meant rejecting as legitimate the Roman philosophy of the rightness of power through military dominance and violence, or the doctrine of the Pharisees (remember these words were addressed to Nicodemus, a leader of the Pharisees) of Holiness and "salvation" through the careful observance of religious laws, and instead endorsing a teaching of Truth through emulation of a God characterized as primarily loving, generous and forgiving. Believing in Jesus means turning away from trusting in military force and violence, or wealth and social status, as what we find legitimate, and having confidence in love, generosity, and peace as truth. What you are persuaded is factual or literal is beside the point when you are persuaded to live in this spirit.
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