Why should that source be trusted?

Because it is preserved exactly as revealed, foretold things that came true, cannot be imitated, contains no contradiction — and came through a man everyone called trustworthy, who gained nothing worldly from it.

Because it corrects itself and it works: scientific claims are tested against the world, wrong ones are discarded, and the method's fruits — medicine, flight, electronics — are visible to everyone regardless of belief.

Because it is self-correcting and open to inspection: anyone can re-run the argument or the experiment. Agnostics add that this source earns trust precisely by admitting what it cannot reach — the only source, they argue, that does.

Because, Christians argue, God confirmed it inside history: the resurrection of Jesus vindicated his claims, and the apostles testified as eyewitnesses at the cost of their lives (1 Corinthians 15:3–8; Acts 2:32). Later thinkers add the faith's inner coherence and its power to transform lives.

Because, Judaism argues, the Sinai revelation was national — an entire people saw and heard, not one private visionary — and the memory was handed from parents to children in an unbroken chain. Judah Halevi's Kuzari made this public testimony the tradition's chief argument for trust.

Because it invites verification: the Dhamma is described as «come and see for yourself» (ehipassiko), to be confirmed here and now by the wise. Trust grows as the practice delivers what it promises — calmer, clearer, less grasping minds.

The Mimamsa school argues the Veda is apaurusheya — authorless and eternal — and so carries no human error to begin with. Vedanta adds a practical test: what the texts teach about the self can be verified in one's own realized experience, and generations of sages are said to have done so.

Because, Sikhs answer, the bani is God's own word, not the Gurus' opinions — and because it visibly transforms lives. They add a textual argument: the Gurus compiled the scripture themselves, so what is trusted is exactly what they taught.

Because it is checkable by everyone: a law justified by public evidence can be examined by believer and unbeliever alike, while a law justified by one group's revelation can only be obeyed or resisted by everyone else. That shareability, secularists argue, is what makes state power legitimate in a plural society.

Because it corrects itself: claims can be checked by anyone, tested, and revised when wrong. Humanists point to the track record — medicine, technology, expanding knowledge — as the method’s credentials.

Because it is self-correcting. Reason exercised in freedom exposes its own mistakes — censors do not; Mill's case is that silencing any opinion robs everyone, since the silenced view may be true, or may sharpen the truth by opposing it.

Because its claims are public and checkable: Mill argued that women's subjection rested on custom never tested by evidence, and invited the test; feminists point out that where equal education and rights were tried, the failures predicted by opponents did not come.

Nationalists argue the nation is confirmed by lived experience: people everywhere feel it, sacrifice for it, and organize by it, and Smith's ethno-symbolism finds real ethnic pasts beneath modern nations. Critics answer that strong feeling proves attachment, not truth.