The sacrifice of the intellect (sacrificium intellectus, sometimes rendered in Italian, sacrifizio dell'intelletto) is a concept associated with Christian

Christian

A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

 devotion, particularly with the Jesuit

Society of Jesus

The Society of Jesus is a Catholic male religious order that follows the teachings of the Catholic Church. The members are called Jesuits, and are also known colloquially as "God's Army" and as "The Company," these being references to founder Ignatius of Loyola's military background and a...

 order. It was the "third sacrifice" demanded by the founder of the Jesuits, St. Ignatius Loyola, who required

besides entire outward submission to command, also the complete identification of the inferior's will with that of the superior . [Loyola] lays down that the superior is to be obeyed simply as such and as standing in the place of God, without reference to his personal wisdom, piety or discretion; that any obedience which falls short of making the superior's will one's own, in inward affection as well as in outward effect, is lax and imperfect; that going beyond the letter of command, even in things abstractly good and praise-worthy, is disobedience, and that the "sacrifice of the intellect" is the third and highest grade of obedience, well pleasing to God, when the inferior not only wills what the superior wills, but thinks what he thinks, submitting his judgment, so far as it is possible for the will to influence and lead the judgment.

The concept was taken up in a more individualistic sense by the Jansenist thinker Blaise Pascal

Blaise Pascal

Blaise Pascal , was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and Catholic philosopher. He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen...

, and particularly by the existentialist thinker Søren Kierkegaard

Søren Kierkegaard

Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish Christian philosopher, theologian and religious author. He was a critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel...

, who thought that the act of faith requires a leap into the void, which amounts to a sacrifice of the intellect and reason. This was quintessentially expressed in the traditional dictum, credo quia absurdum

Credo quia absurdum

Credo quia absurdum is a Latin phrase of uncertain origin. It means "I believe because it is absurd"It is derived from a poorly remembered or misquoted passage in Tertullian's De Carne Christi defending the tenets of orthodox Christianity against docetism, which reads in the original Latin:It has...

, "I believe because it is absurd." This view of faith is rejected by the Catholic church, which regards reason

Reason

Reason is a term that refers to the capacity human beings have to make sense of things, to establish and verify facts, and to change or justify practices, institutions, and beliefs. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, language, ...

 as a path towards direct knowledge of God.

The phrase is often used in a pejorative sense in writings on the psychology

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

 and sociology

Sociology

Sociology is the study of society. It is a social science—a term with which it is sometimes synonymous—which uses various methods of empirical investigation and critical analysis to develop a body of knowledge about human social activity...

 of religion - e.g.:

• Max Weber
  Max Weber
  Karl Emil Maximilian "Max" Weber was a German sociologist and political economist who profoundly influenced social theory, social research, and the discipline of sociology itself...
  
  states: "There is absolutely no 'unbroken' religion working as a vital force, which is not compelled at some point to demand the credo non quod, sed credo quia absurdum - the "sacrifice of the intellect.""

• According to Paul Pruyser, "Sacrifice of the intellect, demanded by a good many religious movements and blithely if not joyously made by a good many religious persons, is surely one of the ominous features of neurotic religion."