Apologetics Anonymous

Deuteronomy 30:14

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 20:52:00 +0000

I had a conversation not too long ago with some friends of mine at church. I am one of the few Calvinists at the predominantly Arminian church, and naturally, that leads to a little tension (which is not necessarily a bad thing, if handled gracefully). One evening we were talking about human ability in salvation. As a Calvinist, I have a rather negative view of it. One of my friends, on the other hand, pointed out that Deuteronomy 30:14 says that we are in fact able to obey God's word.

Now right away, I should point out that this friend of mine wasn't even defending Arminianism, but rather Pelagianism. I am sure that my friend had good intentions (I commend Arminians for their desire to preserve human responsibility, although I disagree with the reasoning by which they defend it). But even Arminius acknowledged that humans cannot obey the law, but need Christ's atoning sacrifice to cover their sins. In the Arminian view, human ability comes into play in the matter of receiving the offer of the gospel, not in the matter of meeting the demands of the law.

But we are still stuck with that verse in Deuteronomy, which certainly seems to support a Pelagian view, at least at first glance. But we need to take this passage in its proper context. According to the broader text, there are two things necessary for obeying God's law: (1) knowing what the law is, and (2) having a desire to obey it. Obedience is not possible without both conditions being met. Now in 30:14, the author is saying that because God has condescended to reveal his word, we meet condition (1). We don't have to strive to seek out God's word, because it is not beyond our reach (it is even written on the hearts of unbelievers, cf. Rom. 2:14-15). It was given for the purpose of enabling us to obey. As such, it is a necessary but not sufficient condition for obedience.

Condition (2) must also be met. Verse 6 speaks of the need for having a circumcised heart. Nowhere in the Old Testament do we find people with uncircumcised hearts being able to obey God's law. The reason they cannot is because they would not (cf. Rom. 8:7). And as verse 6 clearly states, it is God, not us, who circumcises our hearts. This terminology is equivalent to the New Testament's terminology about being "born again" (cf. John 3). When God changes our hearts, he gives us a desire to obey. When this happens, we are able to obey, insofar as the Spirit gives us strength over the flesh.

Is the Lord's Supper for unbelievers too?

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 05:41:00 +0000

Earlier this summer I was at a Bible study where we discussed the issue of whether unbelievers could partake of the Lord's Supper. I thought this was a no-brainer--no, the Lord's Supper is for the Lord's people. But I was the only one in the group defending that view. Now my desire is first and foremost to conform to the teachings of God's Word. So I thought I would lay down some of the relevant passages, and why they have convinced me that the Lord's Supper is only for baptized believers.

1 Corinthians 10:21 - "You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons." The context here has to do with eating foods sacrificed to idols (what Paul refers to here as demons). Paul tells believers that there is nothing wrong with eating such food, for we ourselves are not worshiping the idols. But if we were, then we could not participate in the body of the Lord. Meaning, we could not have communion. Nowadays, unbelievers do not normally give sacrifices to pagan gods, but they are nevertheless guilty of idolatry. And this is the equivalent of serving demons. This passage alone should be sufficient to show that unrepentant unbelievers should not be allowed at the Lord's table.

1 Corinthians 11:27-29 - "Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself." How can an unbeliever possibly partake of the Lord's Supper in a worthy manner? He denies the very lordship of Jesus! For an unbeliever to eat the bread and drink the cup would be to incur God's judgment on him. Now some at the aforementioned Bible study said that unbelievers are already under judgment, so what difference does it make? I would reply that Scripture teaches that even unbelievers are judged according to what they do, so that some are judged more severely than others. Dishonoring the Lord's Supper is a sure way of heaping further judgment on yourself.

One final question: what about believers who have not yet been baptized? Well, first of all, I would want to know why a believer would delay being baptized. But let's suppose, for the sake of argument, that someone converts in the middle of a worship service. They have not yet had a chance to confess their faith or be baptized. Well, if we were to follow the regulative principle of worship, I would say that the scriptural precedent is that believers always get baptized before taking communion. Further, we could make an argument on the grounds of the covenantal nature of the sacraments. Because the Lord's Supper signifies inclusion in the body of believers, you must first be a part of the body. And baptism, not communion, is the sign of entrance into the body (Romans 6:4, Colossians 2:12). Baptism signifies our union with Christ in his burial and resurrection. This union is the new birth. And only those who are born again may come to the Lord's table. That is why I am convinced that communion is only for baptized believers.

Agnosticism is functional atheism

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 22:24:00 +0000

What we think is inseperably linked to how we live. We cannot make day-to-day decisions in any area without our beliefs informing those decisions. I step on the brake pedal because I believe it will stop my car. I brush my teeth because I believe it will keep me from getting cavities.

When it comes to agnosticism, the the only possible practical outcome is paralysis. We cannot base any decisions on "I don't know." So in reality, being agnostic amounts to the same thing as being atheistic. That's why the lifestyle of the former is essentially indistinguishable from the latter. The agnostic says to himself, "I can't know if God exists, so I will live as if he doesn't," while the atheist says, "God doesn't exist, so I will live as if he doesn't." There is no practical difference.

Why do I bring this up? Becuase often agnostics will fool themselves into thinking that their position is somehow more neutral and less dogmatic than the atheist. Pleading ignorance on God's existence sounds more modest than denying it altogether. But such a neutrality is an illusion, for the aforementioned reasons.

I used to be an agnostic. I was never comfortable calling myself an atheist, although I did let that word slip from my lips a couple of times. I prefered the label "agnostic," because I thought it sounded more open-minded, and deep down I was also a little fearful that denying God's existence was pushing the envelope too far. But the fact of the matter was that my life was the same as that of an atheist. I was deluding myself into thinking that my position was more humble, more neutral, more open-minded, or whatever.

In saying this, I mean no disrespect to agnostics. I would simply urge them to think through their beliefs, and take a more consistent position. Either affirm God or deny him; there is no middle ground.

Presuppositionalism and Internalism/Externalism

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 17:38:00 +0000

I am currently considering the possibility that Christian presuppositions may be necessary to both an internalist and externalist epistemology. Here's why:

On internalism, the factors that justify a belief are internal to the mind of the knowing subject. That means that when I ask myself what gives me reason to believe that Paris is the capital of France, all I have to do is think about the evidence I have for that belief. Perhaps I read it in my geography textbook, or perhaps a trustworthy friend has told me, or perhaps I have even seen Paris with my own eyes. If I am aware of such evidence, I have internal justification for believing that Paris is the capital of France.

Now the major motivation for adopting an internalist (as opposed to externalist) epistemology has to do with deontologism (a fancy word that basically means "duty-ism"). On this view, I have an ethical responsibility to form true beliefs and reject false beliefs. Moreover, my beliefs cannot simply be true by accident. I can believe that I will win the lottery tomorrow, and it might turn out that I actually win the lottery tomorrow, but in that case I am right by accident. I have not fulfilled my epistemic duty in forming the belief that I will win the lottery tomorrow, because I have no justification for believing it.

Naturally, I can ask, whence the duty? Where does this standard come from, and how could I be held accountable to it? Why does it apply to me as a thinking person? And what norm do I submit to in determining what counts as justification and what does not? A Christian has a very simple response to this: the duty comes from God, and the norm to which we submit is his Word.

On the other hand, we may adopt an externalist epistemology. On this view, that which gives our beliefs warrant (externalists prefer to say "warrant" over "justification") is that they are causally related to the object of belief, or that they are formed by a properly functioning belief-forming mechanism. For example, if I believe that I see a tree, that belief is warranted if there actually is a tree, and light waves travel from the tree to my retinae, and the data is sent through my optic nerves to my visual cortex, and my cognitive faculties properly interpret the data in my visual cortex. Most people throughout history have never even heard of light waves, visual cortices, and so on. Yet we would still say that all those people were warranted in their beliefs. That's what makes it externalism, because they don't need to be aware of the grounds that confer warrant on their beliefs.

Now on externalism, we are forced to ask, what guarantees that our cognitive faculties function properly for the purpose of producing true beliefs? And how can we be sure that our beliefs correspond to the world as it actually is? For example, it is logically possible that my senses are being deceived by a Cartesian demon, or because I am plugged into the Matrix, or because I am simply a brain in a vat, etc. And because I cannot step outside my mind to verify the reliability of my senses, how can I really be sure that those bizarre scenarios aren't true? Again, these questions readily find answers in Christian theism. For a Christian can say that we are made in God's image, and God's desire is that our minds form true beliefs about the world as it actually is. Further, God is the one who can guarantee that our minds function properly according to his design plan for them. Without God, there is no design plan.

All this is to say that both internalist and externalist epistemologies need to be grounded in Christian presuppositions. In other words, our metaphysic precedes our epistemology. I am not taking sides here in the internalism/externalism debate. I think there is a good argument for both, and I'm not so sure that they are mutually exclusive.

It might sound as if I vacillate between classical and presuppositional approaches to apologetics, and that's because I am. I haven't yet made sense out of all of the issues involved, but I'm doing my best.

Hume and Necessary Things

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 20:25:00 +0000

I am continuing to wrestle with David Hume's critique of cosmological arguments (CA's). One of his main objections has to do with the possibility of necessary things. For him, "necessary thing" means that the non-existence of such a thing would entail a logical contradiction, and it seems to be the case that no contradiction is entailed by our imagining the non-existence of anything. Ergo, nothing can be necessary. Ergo, we cannot use a CA to demonstrate the necessary existence of God.

On the other hand, if we could succeed in proving the possibility of necessary things, that might actually work against the CA. For the critic of the CA could argue that the universe itself exists necessarily. How can a theist respond to this? Perhaps we could try to argue against this possibility by saying that for every concrete thing in the universe (say, my running shoes), we could imagine its non-existence without entailing a logical contradiction. But then we would be falling into Hume's objection to the possibility of necessary things in general. So here's the dilemma: either we accept Hume's objection (in which case nothing is necessary), or we deny it (in which case the universe itself might be necessary). How can we escape this dilemma?

Well, there is strong intuitive force to the statement that my running shoes are contingent. In fact, I think we could extend this intuition and say that all the matter of the universe is contingent. I don't think anyone would really see a logical contradiction here. And this fact might in itself might seem to support Hume's objection. But I think there are other grounds for denying his objection.

Given the existence of contingent things, and given the existence of a causal principle (all contingent things have causes), we can show that denying the existence of a necessary cause actually does entail a contradiction. For if all causes are contingent, then there can be no cause for all causes, and we will have contradicted our causal principle.

Now Hume himself suggested that if the chain of causes were infinite, that would obviate the need for a necessary first cause. But I think he was mistaken. Imagine standing in front of a moving train that is so long that you cannot see either end. You can ask, what is causing this boxcar to move? Naturally, you could say that the car in front of it is pulling it. And the car in front of that one is pulling that one, and so on. But without the engine at the front of the train, none of the cars would be moving. Even if you had an infinite number of boxcars, you still can't get them moving without an engine. Therefore, Hume's objection to the possibility of necessary things doesn't seem to hold water. There is at least one thing—the cause of all contingent things—whose non-existence would entail a contradiction.

Principle of Causation

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 23:28:00 +0000

In my continuing studies on cosmological arguments (CA's), I came across a little book by David Conway, entitled The Rediscovery of Wisdom. He devotes several pages to a critique of Hume and Kant's objections to the CA (pp. 105-116), and I'm scratching my head on a few points. In particular, I am looking at his treatment of the causation principle (CP), which is a foundation of many CA’s, the simplest of which is (in my view) the Second Way of Thomas Aquinas (so we may call it the Thomistic CA). The causal principle goes like this:

CP: Every contingent thing must have a cause for its existence.

That seems intuitively true. For every concrete object that exists in the universe (shoes, apples, planets, etc.), there is a cause. [Update: by "contingent," I mean that its non-existence is possible. Contrast this with necessary things, such as the laws of math and logic, whose non-existence is impossible. We could debate whether these kinds of necessary things actually "exist," but I'm not so sure that's relevant here, since the CP is only concerned with contingent things.] But there are a few objections to the CP:

1) One might say that such things as shoes are not literally brought into existence by their cause. For example, a shoemaker doesn't make a shoe ex nihilo, but rather the shoe comes from pre-existing materials. This is one of Kant's main objections, and I think it has the support of the law of conservation of energy. For the theist, I see three ways out of this, two of which involve giving up the CP as stated above, and the last of which requires adding a premise to our CA.

a. One way is to re-phrase the CP in terms of changes in state rather than existence. I see some appeal in this move, for it allows us to concede the possibility that matter has always existed in some form, but if its form is to change in any way, there must be a cause. I suspect that Mormons would really like this approach, since their cosmology affirms the eternality of the universe (though its structure is caused by God). This might also more faithfully represent Thomas Aquinas's intent, since apparently he thought that reason alone could not prove the finite age of the universe. His CA's are thus compatible with the universe being infinitely old.

b. The other way, which seems to be what Conway himself calls for, is to adopt a Principle of Sufficient Reason (à la Leibniz) and replace the idea of cause with explanation. [Update: by making this move, we shift the focus from a thing's being brought into existence, to the factors that explain why that thing is the way it is. The PSR is sometimes used to prove a necessary cause as opposed to a first cause. This is a subtle distinction, but still an important one.] But this is a different CA altogether—the Leibnizian one—and if that is the case we might as well abandon the CP altogether, in favor of the PSR. So on this option, the Thomistic CA appears insufficient in itself.

c. A kalam CA might disprove the eternality of matter, thereby necessitating a cause of its existence. We can keep the CP in this case, but we would have to add the premise that matter has not always existed. Again, the Thomistic CA is insufficient in itself.

2) One might say that quantum phenomena disprove the CP. Subatomic particles, it might be argued, can come into existence causelessly. Three considerations come to mind:

a. It might be the case that quantum phenomena do have a cause, and we just don’t realize it. For example, there is no logical contradiction in the proposition that God directly causes all quantum phenomena. [Update: while this proposition may be logically possible, I'm not so sure that it is empirically demonstrable.]

b. On the macro level, things seem to operate consistently according to the CP, so the exception doesn’t nullify the rule entirely. But the point remains that there are exceptions, at least when it comes to quantum phenomena. Such an exception becomes very important when dealing with something like the Big Bang. Should the Big Bang be treated as macro due to its mass (in which case the CP applies), or micro due to its size (in which case the CP might not apply)?

c. Quantum phenomena are not entirely free of causal constraints. For example, these particles can only come about in a prior existing energy field. So they have a necessary cause, if not sufficient. And this might just be enough to keep the CP afloat. We really don’t have any empirical justification for saying things can come into existence from nothing and for no reason.

3) Hume suggests that we can easily imagine/conceive of something coming into existence causelessly. And since there is no logical contradiction in imagining such a thing, Hume argues that we should reject the CP. Some considerations here:

a. Conway quotes approvingly of Haldane, who suggests that when we imagine something (say, an apple) popping into existence spontaneously, our intuition is to ask how it happened, or where it came from.

b. It may be the case that something is logically possible (i.e. it entails no contradiction) but nevertheless metaphysically impossible. After all, I can imagine a hungry tiger popping into existence in front of me, but that doesn’t make it possible in real life.

Cosmological Arguments (Part 2)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 23:36:00 +0000

Here I describe the particular logical challenges that face any cosmological argument (CA). I give credit to Alexander Pruss for succinctly categorizing the problems as follows:

1) The Glendower Problem. The name comes from a dialogue in Shakespeare's Henry IV, 1.3:

Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man; but will they come when you do call for them?

In terms of the CA, the theist will normally observe that the existence of our universe cries out for an explanation. The naturalist, on the other hand, will respond that just because the universe cries out for one, that does not mean we will get one. What they mean by this is that either the universe has no explanation, or (more likely) if there is one, we have know way of finding it out.

2) The Regress Problem. This comes from David Hume, who suggested that for every effect, there is a finite cause, for which there is another finite cause, and so on ad infinitum. In other words, we can have an endless chain of causation, which eliminates the need for any uncaused First Cause.

3) The Taxicab Problem. This suggests that a CA will invoke a causal/explanatory principle to get us to the First Cause, but then this principle is conveniently sent away, like a taxicab. But this raises the question why the causal/explanatory principle does not apply to the First Cause itself. Or as Bertrand Russell put it, "If God made the universe, who made God?"

4) The Gap Problem. Naturalists will be quick to point out that a CA, even if successful, will only prove a first cause, not the God of theism (let alone the Christian God). A theist will have to have to do some maneuvering to show that the First Cause of the CA has more attributes in common with a personal God. (But I think anyone would admit that even a bare First Cause is a step, however so slight, in the direction of theism.)

I don't intend to present these problems as an attempt to undermine the validity of CA's. On the contrary, I am somewhat persuaded that CA's can work, if formulated properly (although I need to do some more research). But we theists need to know what we are up against if we seek to defend God's existence via this route.

Cosmological Arguments (Part 1)

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:20:00 +0000

Studying cosmological arguments (CA's) is an area of great interest to me, although admittedly I am still only an amateur. I hope to say more on them in the future, but I thought it would be appropriate for me to start my discussion of them with a brief description of a CA, the value of a CA, and its three most popular formulations.

First, a CA is any argument that takes the existence of the universe (or at least some feature of the universe, such as effects or contingent states of affairs) as its premise, and then argues via some kind of causal/explanatory principle to prove the existence of a self-existent First Cause. This First Cause is then described as sharing many of the attributes of the God of theistic religions.

The value of a CA is in establishing a theistic worldview. According to classical apologetics, a solid argument for Christianity will begin with a broadly theistic argument (such as is provided by a CA), then proceed to support Christianity on the basis of particular facts (most often the evidence for the resurrection of Christ). That's why the classical method is also called the 2-step method. The classical apologist will argue (against the evidential apologist) that the first step of establishing theism is necessary, otherwise the particular historical evidence marshalled in support of miracles will inevitably be misinterpreted.

The three basic forms of the CA are as follows:

1) Thomistic. This gets its name from Thomas Aquinas, and its modern defenders would include Norman Geisler and R.S. Sproul. There are actually a number of ways to formulate the Thomistic CA, but the simplest one will argue simply go like this:

I) There are some effects.

II) Every effect has a cause.

III) An infinite regress of causes is impossible.

IV) Therefore, there is a First Cause.

2) Leibnizian. This gets its name from Gottfried Leibniz, and its modern defenders would include Alexander Pruss and Joshua Rasmussen. It goes like this:

I) There are contingent facts (that is, facts that are true, but don't have to be).

II) For every contingent fact, there is a sufficient explanation for that fact that is external to that fact.

III) Therefore, there is a sufficient explanation for the conjunction of all contingent facts.

IV) This explanation cannot itself be contingent (or else it would be a part of the conjunction of all contingent facts, and the explanation would not be external to the fact).

V) Therefore, the explanation for contingent facts is necessary.

3) Kalam. This gets its name from medieval Islamic philosophy. Its strongest modern defender is William Lane Craig. It goes like this:

I) Everything that begins to exist has a cause.

II) The universe began to exist.

III) Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Book Review: Faith Has Its Reasons by Ken Boa and Robert Bowman

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 16:42:00 +0000

For the past week I have been reading Faith Has Its Reasons, and 530 pages later, I feel like I have made quite an accomplishment! This book is perhaps the best survey of apologetics that I have ever read. It is divided according to the main different approaches to apologetics: Classical, Evidential, Reformed, and Fideist. The final part looks at ways of integrating these approaches. Each part that is devoted to a particular method is further divided into subsections.

1) In the first subsection of each part, the authors trace the history of the particular approach in question, looking at the life and teachings of the major representatives of that approach.

2) In the following subsection, the authors look at how the particular approach in question deals with the relationship between apologetics and truth, theology, philosophy, science, history, and personal experience. This field of study is called meta-apologetics.

3) The next subsection examines how the particular approach deals with certain apologetic questions: Why should I believe the Bible? What's makes Christianity unique? How can I know if God exists? How do we deal with the problem of evil? How should we interpret the miracles of the Bible? And what should we think about Jesus?

4) In the last subsection of each part, the authors present a fictitious dialogue between a representative of a particular apologetic approach and two unbelievers: Sarah and Murali. Sarah is an ex-Christian who has become skeptical of any religious claims, while Murali is more of a pluralist who believes in the validity of all religions. In these dialogues, the authors give us an idea of how we might apply the approach in question to real-world situations. Finally, the authors assess the strengths and weaknesses of the approach.

The last part is particularly useful by developing an integrative approach, not as an alternative to the other approaches, but as a means of synthesizing the best of each into an effective whole.

As to what approach I personally favor the most, I would have to say Classical, even though my theology is more Reformed. But I really appreciate the insights of all the other approaches.

Trilemmas

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 19:38:00 +0000

In C.S. Lewis’ fictional book The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, there is a scene where a young girl named Lucy walks through a wardrobe and finds herself in a magical land called Narnia. After spending some time there, she returns through the wardrobe to relate her adventure to her older siblings. They are understandably incredulous. But when they discuss the matter with the professor in whose house they are staying, he makes them think twice.In light of Lucy’s otherwise honest and trustworthy character, the professor asks them what possible explanation there could be for her seemingly sincere conviction that she had traveled to Narnia. If she is not lying, and she is not deluded, what else could they conclude but that she was telling the truth?

In essence, Lucy's siblings are faced with a trilemma. C.S. Lewis makes the same point about Jesus' claims to be the Son of God. He was either lying, or he was deluded, or he was truly the Son of God. Since most people aren't willing to call Jesus a liar or a lunatic (he is still regarded as a basically good moral teacher), this puts unbelievers in an awkward position--assuming that Lewis's trilemma presents us with all the options. As it turns out, this isn't quite the case.

Many historical Jesus scholars--and notably Bart Ehrman--have pointed out that there is another possibility. Perhaps Jesus never claimed to be the Son of God. Perhaps his disciples made that part up later, and that's why we find those words on the lips of Jesus in the gospels. So Ehrman would present us with a quadrilemma--Lord, liar, lunatic, or legend. My experience has been that most unbelievers prefer the latter option. That being the case, it then becomes the Christian's responsibility to make a case that the New Testament documents are generally reliable historical documents. And this tends to move the debate into the scholarly arena, in which case you will lose a large bulk of your non-Christian audience. I suspect that most non-Christians won't be interested in following the academic debates over the reliability of the New Testament.

And to top it off, others have suggested that there might even be a fifth option regarding Jesus' claims about himself--he was a kind of Eastern pantheistic guru, who meant that he was God in the sense that everything is divine. This view would have us interpret Jesus' words mystically rather than literally. Peter Kreeft has therefore suggested that we start talking about a Quintilemma: Lord, liar, lunatic, legend, or lama. Now personally, I don't take this fifth option too seriously, for two main reasons. First and foremost, Jesus was a Jew. There is simply no plausible connection between him and the teachings of Eastern religions. Even the most skeptical New Testament scholars acknowledge that Jesus believed in the Hebrew Scriptures, the God of Israel, the prophecies, and the resurrection of the dead. My second reason is that the "lama" option glosses over all of the passages where Jesus suggests that his position and relationship to God are in some sense unique. For example, Jesus claims to have the power to forgive sins, to judge humanity, and to usher in a new eschatological era. So I think the real batttleground is going to be over whether Jesus actually made such grandiose claims. Back to the "legend" option.

But let's not throw out the Trilemma just yet. There is one other way that we can apply it: to the disciples of Jesus. We can say with confidence that Jesus' disciples proclaimed to have seen Jesus risen from the dead, and it was this very message that they spread throughout the Roman Empire. Now either these disciples were all part of some grand conspiracy, or somehow all deluded, or they really did see the risen Jesus. Truth be told, the first two options have had their share of followers, but in my view these options fall apart under the weight of serious analysis. It is hard to imagine what could have motivated the disciples to lie, considering they had nothing to gain and much to lose by doing so. And I don't think I could buy into any sort of mass hallucination theory. One single deluded disciple, maybe. But all of them? Even skeptics like James, and opponents like Paul? That's too much of a stretch. By process of elimination, that leaves us with the view that the disciples really did see the risen Jesus. I can't think of any other options, can you?

The Pro's and Con's of Fideism

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 22:19:00 +0000

I think a lot of people (myself included) have tended to see fideism as the "F-word" of Christian apologetics. Or at best, we tend to see fideism as a last resort. That is, if all the philosophical and factual arguments for Christianity fail, then you can just fall back on faith--"I believe because I believe." But I've lately come to see that fideists have some worthwhile things to say in regard to apologetics.

First of all, I should clarify what I mean by fideism (from the Latin fide, meaning "faith"). It is not simply blind irrationalism or uncritical credulity. True, fideists don't believe that faith can be supported by rational arguments, but they give reasons why this is so. They will say that God is so transcendent that he cannot possibly be confined to a syllogism. Or simply, God is beyond reason. This is a sort of rational defense for rejecting rational defenses for faith.

Moreover, fideists can also give a sort of indirect argument for the believability of Christianity. To borrow a statement (mistakenly) attributed to the early Christian apologist Tertullian, credo quia absurdum est, or "I believe because it is absurd." This does NOT mean that absurdity or rational incoherence is some sort of condition for belief. Rather, it means that because the message of the Gospel is so contrary to our human inclinations and sensibilities, this serves as evidence that the Gospel could not have been a merely human invention. This echos the apostle Paul's teaching about the weakness or foolishness of those who preach the message of the cross (cf. 1 Cor. 1,2; 2 Cor. 4). Perhaps we could call it the argument from absurdity (not to be confused with reductio ad absurdum).

An interesting observation: evidentialist apologists make a very similar sort of argument. An oft-repeated line of evidence in support of Jesus' empty tomb is the fact that the gospels portray women as the first witnesses to the fact. It is argued that since women had such a low social status in ancient Palestinian Jewish culture, no one would have ever thought to make up a story of the empty tomb on the basis of women's testimony. Another argument in favor of the reliability of the gospels is the fact that the disciples, in reporting their testimony, did not try to "fix the picture" of themselves. Rather, the gospels portray the disciples as ignorant, fearful, foolish, and doubful. If you were going to make up a story, why include such details that could undermine your credibility? Arguments of this sort have been categorized under what apologists have called the "criterion of embarrassment." That is, if a text presents facts that would embarrass its source, those facts are probably true. My point in saying all this is that the fideist's argument from absurdity sounds a lot like the evidential apologist's criterion of embarrassment. But what the evidentialist applies to particular historical facts of the Bible, the fideist applies to the Gospel as a whole.

There is a lot about fideism that I really appreciate. Firstly, fideists rightly point out that people are not guided purely by rational factors in forming beliefs. In fact, I would suspect that on the big issues of life, most people's beliefs are not based on logic and evidence, but on personal experience. I could give myself as an example. When I rejected Christianity at the age of 20, I thought I was doing so on the basis of a reasoned assessment of the evidence. What I only realized much later was that my rejection of Christianity had more to do with my unresolved resentment toward my father. Likewise, my later reconciliation with my father has served as a great personal confirmation of the truth of Christianity. I would suspect that the vast majority of Christians do not embrace the faith because of arguments. Rather, they are either raised in a Christian family, or they convert later in life as a result of some kind of experience with suffering or loss.

But to say that people don't normally base their religious beliefs on evidence is not to say that evidence has no role to play whatsoever. A person might initially form a belief by non-rational factors, only to have that belief later confirmed by the evidence. For the Christian, the primary justification for faith is and always should be the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit (cf. 1 John 4, 5). Any other grounds would be less than the full assurance that Scripture promises us. But external evidences can still play a supporting role, and this point is especially important in evangelistic dialogue. I can't make another person hear what the Spirit speaks to my heart, but I can point them to the various external evidences, like the signs of an Intelligent Creator, the reliability of the Bible, the resurrection of Jesus, etc.

When it comes to the notion of truth, fideists have some worthwhile things to say. For them, truth is not a worldview or a particular set of propositions. Rather, truth is a person. And one person in particular: Jesus Christ (cf. John 14:6). Likewise, there is a difference between knowing about God and knowing God. For this very reason, logical proofs can never be sufficient grounds for Christianity.

Unfortunately, I think fideists take that point too far. Although knowledge of God is not exclusively propositional, much of it is. Take the very first sentence of the Bible: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen. 1:1). Like many other things about God, that is a proposition. It can be described using words, and it has truth value. There is much about God that can be so described, and in my opinion fideists minimize this fact. And because propositional knowledge is different from knowledge by acquaintance (although knowledge of God consists in both), the former carries with it its own unique set of epistemological rules, which can include the rules of logic and evidence.

Another important objection that I have to fideism is the fact that the apostles themselves did not practice it in preaching the resurrection of Christ. They appealed to eyewitness testimony to an empty tomb and the postmortem appearances of Jesus. That is, they gave concrete, logical, evidentiary reasons for their faith. So why shouldn't we follow suit? In sum, let's not beat up on the fideists. They have a lot of good things to say, and we can learn from them. But we should be open to any apologetic approach that helps bring people into God's kingdom, and if reason and evidence can do that, so be it.

Book Review: Historical Genesis by Richard Fischer

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 19:36:00 +0000

In the book Historical Genesis, Richard Fischer attempts to place the first 11 chapters of Genesis within the historical context of ancient Mesopotamia in such a way as to preserve the doctrine of Scriptural inerrancy while at the same time taking seriously all of the relevant scientific evidence. He does so by making some pretty radical claims--ones which may bother those more committed to the historic confessions of Christianity.

Perhaps the most novel claim of the book is that Adam, although a real historical figure, was not the father of the entire human race. Rather, he was only the first Semite (or, more properly, "Adamite"), the first human to have a covenant relationship with God, and the first federal representative of humanity, whose fall and subsequent guilt have been imputed to the rest of us. Fischer believes that this view of Adam is necessary, given both the biblical evidence that places Adam in a Neolithic context (about 6,000 years ago), and the scientific evidence that traces the origins of modern humans back 50,000 years (by contrast, Hugh Ross would argue--against the apparent biblical evidence--that Adam and Eve existed 50,000 years ago).

Surprisingly, the Bible is not as explicit as you might expect about Adam being the progenitor of the human race. But I have come across one passage in particular that poses a challenge to Fisher's position. In Acts 17:26, where Paul is giving his address at the Aereopagus, he says that God made every nation of men "from one." One what? Most translations say one man, but the KJV says one blood. In truth, the Greek text doesn't say. It merely says ex henos, which could be grammatically masculine or neuter. So we could get nit-picky and say that this passage is not referring to Adam (perhaps it refers to one original nation), but I think that most would agree that the commonsense, straightforward interpretation does imply Adam, thus posing a problem for Fischer. And if that prima facie interpretation is right, Fischer would have to either admit that Paul's theology was wrong, and/or that the Bible is not inerrant.

Nevertheless, that is only one passage, and its clarity is at least somewhat suspect. But where the Bible is ambiguous, later Christian confessions (especially the Westminster Confession, cf. WCF 6.3) leave no room for doubt. Even if Fischer's theory is compatible with Scripture, it is clearly incompatible with later Christian teaching. This might not be a problem if you don't believe that creeds and confessions must be infallible, but it would be a problem for someone like me, who hopes to be ordained by the PCA!

Fischer's book does have its weak points. Firstly, Fischer should have taken more time to explain how the pre-Adamite theory affects the doctrine of original sin. If humans existed before and alongside Adam, how did Adam's fall affect them? The traditional Augustinian interpretation has been that pre-Fall Adam was posse peccare posse non peccare (able to sin and not sin) and post-Fall Adam was non posse non peccare (unable not to sin), with the rest of humanity (excepting Jesus) inheriting the latter condition from birth. Is such a radical distortion of the human will possible if the pre-Adamite hypothesis is true?

The second weak point is Fischer's treatment of the story of the Tower of Babel. He rightly recognizes the difficulty of reading this story as an explanation of the origins of all human languages. There is apparent evidence that multiple languages were spoken throughout the world long before Babel, and perhaps at least two languages (Sumerian and Akkadian) were spoken in the region of Babel itself. However, his own explanation seems equally unconvincing. He tries to argue that the Babel story isn't about language at all, but merely about the people's unity with regards to the prevalent topic of conversation (tower-building). That seems like too much of a stretch for me. But the Babel story shouldn't worry us too much anyway, since the Bible doesn't fix its chronology with any precision. Perhaps the event took place before the Sumerians came along?

All in all, I thought this was an outstanding book, and it deserves more attention. And even if his theories go against the grain of traditional Christian thinking, Fischer should be commended for his honest attempt to reconcile special revelation (scriptural witness) with general revelation (scientific evidence).

Whatever happened to common sense?

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 22:38:00 +0000

Have you ever heard of of Thomas Reid? I hadn't until a few weeks ago, when I started reading some books on epistemology (the study of what we know and how we know it). He was a Scottish Presbyterian minister in the 18th century who attempted to rescue philosophy from the skeptical attacks of his fellow countryman David Hume. Reid called for taking a commonsense approach to knowledge--hence his philosophy has come to be called Common Sense Realism. The "realism" part is meant to contrast with the notion of idealism, which says that everything we think we know about the world is really just a bunch of ideas in our own heads. And supposedly, since we have no way of cross-checking our ideas with reality (we can't step outside of our own heads!), we can't really be certain of our knowledge about the world. Sound like the Matrix, anyone?

Idealists seemingly leave us with no way of finding out the answers to philosophy's biggest questions, such as the existence of God. But realists, on the other hand, adopt a different approach to knowledge altogether. Reid in particular argued that we (rightly) take for granted a great deal of things about the external world, such as the reality of other minds. You might say that realists take an innocent-until-proven-guilty stance toward knowledge. They call this the principle of credulity, which means that if our senses or our intuitions lead us to believe something, we should accept that belief as true, unless some other bit of information comes along that calls that belief into question.

For Reid, what guarantees that our ideas match up with reality is the fact that God designed our minds to produce true beliefs. This doesn't mean we have to believe in God to know anything; rather, we can properly hold to our most basic beliefs (such as the existence of other minds), even if we don't know the actual reason why our beliefs are true. Alvin Plantinga, the most respected Christian philosopher in America today, takes up this idea in his Reformed Epistemology. But Plantinga would take Reid's thinking one step further and argue that our very belief in God is itself a basic belief, coming from our innate awareness of the divine (what John Calvin calls the sensus divinitatis).

Now I understand that a non-believer might object to taking belief in God as basic, or as a necessary foundation for other basic beliefs. But it still seems to me that the Common Sense Realist approach to knowledge is very, well, commonsensical. I would like to think that we are indeed justified in taking for granted a great many things as constituting knowledge. I know that I am sitting in a chair; I know that I am listening to music, etc. From these obvious instances of knowledge, we can make a list of epistemological rules (for example, if I am in a right state of mind, what I believe on the basis of my sense perceptions is probably true). I would further argue that some of those rules might potentially help the natural theologian build a case for the existence of God (for example, a law of cause-and-effect might prove a First Cause). That part might get a little more controversial, but my main point is that Reid was onto something. His epistemology was really popular in the nineteenth century (especially in Princeton), but he seems to have fallen out of favor (Plantinga being a notable exception). I call for bringing back a little common sense to philosophy!

Natural theology is NOT works-based salvation

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 06:05:00 +0000

One criticism that I have heard repeatedly about natural theology (or philosophical theism) is that it amounts to a sort of works-based righteousness. Supposedly, if we can attain to faith in God by our own mental efforts, then we have no need of grace. Thus, Martin Luther in his Heidelberg Disputation distinguished between a theologian of glory (who looks for God via his own reasoning) and a theologian of the cross (who looks for God in the crucified Christ). Now don't get me wrong; I love Martin Luther. I'm just not so sure he gave natural theology a fair hearing.

The key lies in distinguishing between a natural knowledge of God and a saving knowledge. A natural knowledge of God involves knowing of God's existence, his power, and his moral perfection. A saving knowledge of God involves knowing of God's plan of redemption, and receiving the Gospel in faith. Natural knowledge is based on general revalation (which is non-verbal, and available to all), while saving knowledge is based on special revelation (which is verbal, and must be heard). Once this distinction is recognized, it becomes clear that natural theology could never be sufficient for salvation, since salvation comes through believing the Gospel. Rather, natural theology is supposed to provide sufficient grounds for conviction. Since God's existence is evident in nature (Romans 1:20), the unbeliever is held morally responsible for his unbelief. But if one correctly reasons from nature to the existence of God, he may become aware of his own moral failings, and thus recognize his need for the Gospel (incidentally, I came to believe in God before I believed in Christ). In this way, natural theology can serve as a sort of pre-evangelism.

(By the way, Romans 1 comes up a lot in apologetics discussions. This won't be the last time you hear me mention it!)

The Pro's and Con's of Theistic Proofs

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 17:02:00 +0000

I didn't know much about theistic proofs (arguments for God's existence) until after I became a Christian, at the age of 23. Since then, I have learned that they play a vital role in the classical/traditional method of apologetics. The reasoning goes something like this:

1) Demonstrate the plausibility of a theistic worldview (i.e., give evidence for God's existence).

2) Given a theistic worldview, demonstrate the possibility of objective historical knowledge and the possibility of miracles.

3) Given objective history and the possibility of miracles, demonstrate the plausibility of Christianity (e.g., give evidence for Christ's resurrection).

One could further argue from the truth of Christianity to the inspiration/authority of the Bible (the reverse approach of the presuppositionalists, who begin with the authority of Scripture).

Obviously, this whole approach hinges crucially on the soundness of the traditional theistic proofs. The more popular ones are as follows:

1) Cosmological: argue from the existence of the universe to the existence of God, via some principle of causation or principle of sufficient explanation.

2) Teleological: argue from the apparent design of the universe to an Intelligent Designer who created it for a purpose/goal.

3) Moral: argue from the existence of objective moral values to a moral Lawgiver.

4) Ontological: argue from the idea/concept of God to the reality/existence of God.

There are other arguments as well, but the above four are generally representative of most classical apologists. Now for a while, many of these theistic proofs fell out of favor, thanks in no small part to the writings of David Hume and Immanuel Kant. Concerning the cosmological argument, for example, Hume said that no principle of causation can actually be proven, while Kant said that causation is only a construct that our mind imposes on our sense experiences, and therefore isn't applicable beyond the phenomenal (or physical) world.

Philosophers since that time have been able to respond to the objections of Hume and Kant. Antony Flew, for example, argued that Hume's account of causation doesn't match up with our experience. And fifty years ago, Stuart Hackett showed that Kant's restriction of causation to the phenomenal world is self-contradictory. Some of the present-day defenders of cosmological arguments include Norman Geisler, William Lane Craig, R.C. Sproul, and Alexander Pruss.

My personal opinion is that the traditional theistic proofs are sound--not in the sense that they prove God's existence with any sort of Cartesian certainty, but rather that they make God's existence more plausible than not.

But how helpful are they? Here I am a little more ambivalent. They might just be enough to make an open-minded philosopher change his/her mind, but what about the ordinary Joe on the street? Principles of causation and finely-tuned physical constants are a little too complex and abstract for a lot of people to follow. So as an evangelistic tool, I find them to be of very limited value.

But their psychological value is very great. When Antony Flew, one of the greatest atheistic philosophers of the 20th century, converted to theism (or perhaps, more accurately, deism), it created massive shockwaves. It showed that thinking people can believe in God on the basis of evidence. And just last year, Richard Dawkins, the most popular atheist today, admitted in a debate with John Lennox that a serious case could be made for a deistic god. Coming from such a hostile opponent of religion, that's a big concession!

In the final analysis, I can think of at least three reasons for doing apologetics:

1) It serves as an evangelistic tool.

2) It encourages believers struggling with doubt.

3) It silences the critics.

As I mentioned above, I'm not so sure how useful the theistic proofs are with respect to (1). But they are immeasurably useful with respect to (2) and (3). For that reason, I am in favor of them.

Mithraism and Early Christianity

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 05:04:00 +0000

Sensationalistic portrayals of Jesus seem to be a dime a dozen these days, but rarely do these portrayals ever carry much force. Some people, such as the members of the Jesus Seminar, attempt to depict Jesus as an egalitarian wisdom teacher who never made any remarkable claims about himself. Others, such as novelist Dan Brown, have tried to make the case that Jesus had a child with Mary Magdalene. But the most extreme approach of critics of Christianity has been to deny the existence of Jesus altogether, relegating him to the realm of myths and legends. According to this view, the New Testament authors borrowed from contemporary pagan mystery religions and wove their teachings into a fanciful story about the life and death of a mythical messiah. One of the most frequently cited of these mystery religions is Mithraism, a Roman militaristic cult that is claimed to have striking parallels with Christianity. But on closer inspection, the parallels are not so striking after all, and where they do exist, the borrowing probably occurred in the other direction. I will begin by looking at the particular beliefs and practices of Mithraism, then consider theories concerning its origins, and finally evaluate arguments about its influence on early Christianity.

It is difficult to say exactly what Mithraists believed, because we have no surviving texts from them. What we do have are the writings of a few contemporary outside sources, although these sources are generally dismissed as biased and misinformed. Additionally, we have the archaeological remains of several Mithraic temples scattered throughout what used to be the Roman Empire. These temples usually look like caves, and contain statues of the god Mithras in the act of slaying a bull. Members of the cult (men only) would commemorate this act by sharing in a ritual meal, symbolizing the “blood and body” of the slain bull.[1] Critics of Christianity have also claimed that Mithras was believed to have been born of a virgin on December 25th in a cave, to have had twelve disciples, and to have been buried in a tomb and raised from the dead three days later.[2] The alleged parallels with Christianity are so numerous that one might be tempted to infer a direct relationship between the two religions. And since it is argued that Mithraism is several centuries older than Christianity, it must be the latter that borrowed from the former.

However, this interpretation is flawed on multiple levels. To begin with, it assumes that Mithraism is in fact older than Christianity. But this assumption rests on scholarship that is outdated by more than a century. In particular, it is based on the writings of the one individual who dominated Mithraic studies from the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth century, Franz Cumont. Cumont tried to make the case that Mithraism was a single, monolithic cult that existed in continuity from its earliest form in Iran until the Roman era. To be sure, we have written evidence of an Iranian god named Mithra that goes back at least as early as 1400 BC. But this pre-Christian Mithra of Iran had little in common with the later Roman god Mithras, other than their similar name and some kind of association with the sun (which many gods of the ancient world had in common). As a matter of fact, there is no evidence at all that the Iranian Mithra ever killed a bull, which is the most defining characteristic of the Roman Mithras. When the First International Congress of Mithraic Studies met in the early 1970’s, they reached the conclusion that the Romans had borrowed the name of an Iranian god, along with a couple of other peripheral details, and repackaged it all in a new religion of their own creation.[3] Therefore, when dealing with questions of the relationship between Mithraism and Christianity, one needs to differentiate between two very distinct religions called Mithraism—one early and Iranian, the other late and Roman.

Once this distinction is made, two things become clear. First, there are no significant similarities between Iranian Mithraism and Christianity. Second, any similarities between Roman Mithraism and Christianity are simply irrelevant, since Roman Mithraism was not established until well after the birth of Christianity. The worship of Mithra gradually moved westward from Persia after the conquests of Alexander the Great, adopting several features from local traditions along the way. Mithraism borrowed ideas and practices from the Phrygian cult of Attis and Cybele in Asia Minor,[4] as well as astrological symbolism from the Greek Hipparchus. Mithra was first depicted as a bull-slayer in Pergamum in the second century BC, around which time Mithra may have been introduced to the Romans by the pirates of Cilicia.[5] But the first reference we have to the Roman worship of Mithras is from the poet Statius, writing circa 80 AD.[6] Additionally, there is no archaeological evidence of Roman Mithraism before this time. All of this goes to show that Mithraism underwent a radical transformation throughout the centuries, and its pre-Christian forms in no way bore any resemblance to Christianity. All of the alleged parallels come from a form of Mithraism for which we find no evidence until well after the birth of Christianity. So if copycatting did occur, it was probably the other way around.

Moreover, the parallels between Roman Mithraism and Christianity have been grossly overstated. For example, some have argued that Mithras was born of a virgin in the presence of shepherds. This is a serious distortion of the facts. According to archaeological evidence from a century after the New Testament period, Mithras was born as a full-grown adult out of solid rock, and shepherds helped pull him out when he got stuck.[7] This is a far cry from the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ birth. And even if Mithras was born on December 25th, this in no way undermines the historicity of Jesus. The Bible never claims that Jesus was born on December 25th. Rather, later Christians chose to celebrate Christmas on that day as part of a broader attempt to supplant pagan festivals with Christian holidays. As for Mithras’ death and resurrection, the only evidence comes from the late second-century Christian Tertullian, who mentions his vague recollection of Mithra introducing an “image of a resurrection.”[8] But Mithra himself is not the one who is raised from the dead. And it is true that Mithraists shared in a ritual meal similar to the Eucharist, but what follows from that? Ritual meals are common to many religions, but that does not imply copycatting. In sum, the parallels between Mithraism and Christianity are either non-existent or far too generic to suggest that one borrowed from the other.

Finally, the genre and theological content of the Gospels stand in sharp contrast to Mithraism. The story of Mithras falls into the category of a creation myth, whereas the Gospels most closely resemble the ancient literary genre of historical biography.[9] Mithras never existed as a historical person, whereas Jesus had many followers who later served as eyewitnesses.[10] Mithras saved the world by slaying a bull, while Jesus atoned for the sins of the world by offering himself as a sacrifice. There is just no substantial overlap between these two religions. In the final analysis, the Christianity-as-pagan-copycat thesis hardly deserves anyone’s attention. It rests on a foundation of bogus century-old scholarship that has long since been discarded.

[1] http://members.optusnet.com.au/gakuseidon/God_Who_Wasnt_There_analysis_Part2.htm

[2] S, Acharya. The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold, p. 119

[3] http://www.tektonics.org/copycat/mithra.html

[4] http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10402a.htm

[5] http://www.farvardyn.com/mithras.php

[6] Statius. Thebaid, Book I. 719, 720

[7] Jones, Timothy Paul. Conspiracies and the Cross, p. 105

[8] Tertullian. Prescription against Heretics, ch. 40

[9] Blomberg, Craig. The Historical Reliability of the Gospels, pp. 298-303

[10] Cf. Bauckham, Richard. The Gospels as Eyewitnesses

About Me

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 04:32:00 +0000

I am a M.Div. student at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri. I have a B.A. in History, a B.A. in French, and an A.A. in Arabic. I served as a military linguist (Arabic and Kurdish) for four and a half years before being accepted into the Navy Chaplain Candidate Program. I am under care of Savannah River Presbytery (PCA), and endorsed by the Presbyterian and Reformed Joint Commission for chaplain ministries.

As for my personal beliefs, you could describe me as (from general to specific) Christian, Protestant, Evangelical, Reformed, Presbyterian. I prefer the label Evangelical, since it strikes the best balance between doctrinal orthodoxy and ecumenical unity.

I am particularly interested in the topics of theology, philosophy, apologetics, science/faith issues, and world religions.