(For my review of this debate see Bahnsen vs Sproul - God or Absurdity Blog).
Dr
Richard Dewitt:
The fact that so many are here this evening
is an indication of some at least some degree of interest (audience laughing)
in the subject matter to be handled. I tell my students that one of the glories
of the reformed faith is just its catholicity, its freedom from partisan
peculiarity and idiosyncrasy, and so on. (audience laughing). They do not all
agree with me (laughing) as a recent batch of examinations will attest.
(laughing) That’s all right, they don’t need to.
We are however this evening to have a
demonstration of reformed catholicity and I think that there will be evidence
of that catholicity of our faith. We have two distinguished, keen minded,
young-ish defenders of the faith who are to speak to us and to lead us in the
discussion this evening. And they take rather different points of view, but
both of them have noble pedigrees in the reformed tradition. We ought to
remember that, I think, that the reformed family is a great family and that
there are different streams and different currents of thought in the reformed
tradition.
One of the difficult things for students to
learn, I find, is that there can be legitimate differences of opinion about
certain aspects of the reformed faith, that there is no one single position on
some points. Happens to be the truth. Our speakers this evening are, of course,
Professor Greg Bahnsen of Reformed Seminary, professor of apologetics and ethics,
known to us all. And Dr RC Sproul, president and theologian in residence of the
Ligonier Valley Study Center.
I’ll never forget my first meeting with Dr
Sproul. Few years ago now. We were met by Jack Austere (?) … Remember that RC?
Sproul: Sure.
Dewitt: In the airport, in Chattanooga. And within 30 seconds, maybe 60
seconds, we were already arguing (audience laughing). Mind you, at that time, I
was only a country preacher and he was already a theologian in residence
(audience laughing).So I hadn’t a chance in the world. The subject of our
argument, nota bena, was Rom 1:18 and following, especially, as I recall, Rom
1:21. I don’t know that I would stand now, RC, where I stood then. Hope I have
developed a little, and I’m now too a theologian in residence (laughing and
clapping).
But I’m glad this evening that, as a
theologian in residence, I can occupy the untouchable ground in the middle in
what is going to take place. We are going to have a presentation, 15 min each,
by Prof Bahnsen and Dr Sproul of their points of view and there will be
opportunity for questions from the group here and responses on the part of
these two apologists for the Christian faith. And because he is our guest, we
are going to ask Dr Sproul to speak first and he will be followed without any
further announcement unless he goes overtime by Prof Bahnsen who promises that
he won’t go overtime.
Sproul:
Thank you very much Dr Dewitt. I remember
that conversation in the taxi cab too, and I don’t remember it as an argument.
It was a delightful and stimulating conversation. I remember the suit, I think,
more than I remember the …… (audience laughing).
Well, I told my wife that I didn’t dare wear
a turtleneck to this place, anywhere where Dr Dewitt was around. And tomorrow
I’ll have a vest, ok? (audience laughing).
Before I start, and you can deduct this from
my time if you will, but I think this is vitally important to underscore what
Dr Dewitt said about the different strands within the Calvinistic tradition
particular with respect to apologetic methodology. It never ceases to amaze me
how sometimes the zeal of discipleship can tear us apart and hurt us very
deeply. I think we always have to keep this whole question of apologetic
methodology in its historical perspective, that the
(5 min mark)
difference that we’re about to be viewing
this evening really has its roots in the differences that was articulated
between Dr Benjamin Warfield of Princeton and Dr Abraham Kuyper of the
University of Amsterdam.
Dr Warfield had such a high regard and
respect for Dr Kuyper that he learned the Dutch language solely for the purpose
of being able to read Dr Kuyper’s work, not to criticize it, but to learn from
it. And those men set an example from two apologetic traditions that we’re
discussing here tonight that I think needs to come before us always, that this
debate or difference of approach is an intramural one between men who are
passionately committed to Calvinism and to the reformed faith.
I had initially thought that this was going
to be a more lengthy presentation and I wanted to go in more directly into my
initial remarks into some kind of a case for the classical synthesis. But
rather than doing that, I’m sure that can come out in the discussion afterwards,
I have found it always helpful to go
behind the method and the arguments themselves to see if we can find out what
people are really concerned about. By way of example I will be going to CA in a
few weeks to meet behind closed doors with David Hubbard, Jack Rogers and Dan
Fuller because Greg and I both are very much involved right now in a national
question of the authority and inerrancy of the Scripture, which is an even more
serious split in the evangelical world, about which I am sure that you are all
very much aware, and we are having some of these meetings behind closed doors
with gentlemen of the different persuasion, not because we hope to resolve the
differences but that we can have a better understanding of what the concerns
are, what’s all the fuss about in a question such as this.
So what I would like to do is to state
briefly the things that we are concerned about, those of us who represent what
we call the classical synthesis, or the evidentialist school, or the term I
prefer: the analytical school of apologetics. What were concerned about in
terms of apologetic methodology, and why we are concerned about it.
First of all, what I am very much interested
in and deeply concerned about is a complete reconstruction of natural theology
in the 20th century. That is what I am all about, trying to call for
a reconstruction of natural theology, and with that, what I believe to be a
reconstruction of classical Calvinistic apologetics. Why do I have that
concern?
These are few of the reasons why I’m concerned
for reconstruction of natural theology:
1)
I am very much concerned about
the problem of the loss of natural law as a cohesive force for the well being
of man in his society. If you are aware of jurisprudence, and questions of
political matters in our country today, you are aware certainly that the whole
idea of natural law as a ground basis or foundation for legislation is one that
is not taken very seriously at all in the higher courts or in the academic
institutions of jurisprudence. I think there is a direct correlation between
the loss of the natural law concept in jurisprudence with the loss of natural
theology in the realm of theology and metaphysics. Now if we can talk about the
implications of that more later and some of the historical developments of it..
that I think the practical ramifications of the loss of the natural law system
in this country are extremely destructive.
2)
Second of all, I am deeply
concerned about the loss of the intellectual credibility of Christianity. I
believe that we are living in the most anti-intellectual age in the history of
western civilization, not the most anti-academic, not the most
anti-technological, but anti-intellect: anti-intellectual in the sense that we
have lost confidence in the ability of the mind to be used as a tool for
testing and achieving truth.
3)
Third, I am deeply concerned
about the loss of Christian influence on the general culture of our society.
This, if I can speak in Calvinistic terms, is a concern of common grace,
(10 min mark)
not a concern so
much for evangelism or winning souls, but it is a concern of our responsibility
for the general welfare of mankind and also, negatively stated, as a restraint
of evil in this world. And I think that we have seen very evidently the loss of
the church as a powerful influence in the shaping of our culture.
4)
Fourth, I am concerned about
the loss of, what I would call, the purity of classical and historical
Calvinism with respect to the relationship of faith and reason and the
intrusion, of what I consider to be, a neo-orthodox methodology into Calvinism.
5)
Fifth, and this is perhaps, #5
and #6 are probably my two greatest concerns about this whole question of
methodology. #5 is the concern of the problem of the intimidation of Christians
in our culture. I know from being a college student and a college professor and
seminary professor that I find that students in this day and age have been very
much intimidated by the skeptical assault of the intellectual credibility of their
faith, and though it may not rob them of their own salvation, we’re Calvinists,
we don’t think that could happen, but nevertheless, it makes them less active,
less aggressive, less bold in the confrontation that they are called to have
with the world because they feel that the tools of intelligence, of intellect,
of sense perception, have been negotiated and granted as the province of the
pagan.
6)
And finally, I am deeply
concerned about a methodology that might lead us into a Christian ghetto, where
a Christian community is left with conversation with itself, we’re living in a
secular society that is assigned to us a reservation, where we can live in
peace, as long as we understand the religion and theology is a matter of faith
and is divorced and separated from questions of science and questions of
rationality and a whole field of empirical investigation, we’re allowed to have
the province of faith, if we be good boys and girls and stay over on the
reservation and mind our own business, they’ll leave us alone and that way we
can become less and less and less as a driving force in the changing and
shaping of this world. I am very much afraid of an apologetic that would lead
us to isolationism, rather than direct confrontation with the world on its own
terms.
Now, I still have three, four minutes here. I
want to briefly outline on the board, if I can do this quickly, the way I
understand the process by which John Calvin himself, understood the
relationship between revelation, reason, apologetics etc…
We begin first of all with an affirmation of
general revelation. Calvin clearly confirms, so I don’t think there is any
dispute about that among Calvinists. And general revelation is objective, it
exists apart from us. It comes as part of God’s self disclosure. That general
revelation, in Calvin’s terms, is of two kinds. And this is a crucial point and
it is a point that in the interchange that we had in the afternoon, Greg, I
didn’t get a chance to respond to a comment that you made. But we will get at
it later tonight I hope. And that is that that general revelation can be
defined under two sub-headings: one of which we call mediate and the other of
which we call immediate.
Classic roman catholic apologetics of course
rejects the notion of immediate general revelation as being heretical, mystical
subjectivism and endorsed Thomas Aquinas’ view of mediate general revelation.
Mediate general revelation meaning simply that our knowledge of God, this
general revelation comes, it gives us a means by which we can know the God who
stands behind that general revelation.
Immediate revelation would be a priori
knowledge of God, a knowledge of God that is planted basically within the heart
and soul and the mind of man. Immediate revelation is what we call the sensus divinitatus, that Calvin speaks
of in the Institutes, this inner knowledge and awareness of God, direct and
immediate without any kind of external means to stand between man and God. But
also, Calvin has a view of mediate general revelation by
(15 min mark)
which nature and, Calvin called it, creation
and providence, which we can call history, serve as a means by which God is
known. All right, that’s the thomistic notion of mediate general revelation,
there is an intermediate stage, we don’t have a direct apprehension of God
through nature but by studying the works of nature, nature becomes a means of
pointing to the God beyond nature.
So we have general revelation which is both
mediate and immediate, which produces natural theology. What I mean by natural
theology is a knowledge of God that derived from nature itself, a knowledge of
God that is derived from nature. The point that I want us to point out and
stress, pretty much what we talked about with you in the taxi cab, is that
knowledge of general revelation gets through. Rom 1 tells us that simply that
there is a general revelation there, objective, available, anybody wants to see
it, can read it but then we go around with our eyes closed so that it never
gets through, no. It is perceived by man, it is understood by man, and the sin
of man by which he is held inexcusable is not that he fails to get that
knowledge, but the sin by which he is judged universally in Rom 1 is the fact
that he knows God, knowing God, he does not honor him as God neither is he
grateful. So the Bible tells us that man does in fact know God through the
things that are made, the means or median of creation.
Ok, that natural theology for comment is
there. However, Calvin says, that knowledge, that natural theology is always
met immediately by the problem of the noetic effects of sin. We all know what
that is. It’s the effects of sin upon our minds. It clouds our reasoning and
thinking process. Because of the noetic effects of sin, that general revelation
produces the natural theology that gets through, nevertheless immediately
becomes distorted and so it is ineffective to do anything other than to leave
us without excuse. It’s just enough knowledge to send us to hell, not enough
knowledge to send us to heaven, because of the noetic effects of sin. It is
ineffective in terms of salvation. The only thing that happens is that man
distorts it and turns it into idolatry. You know Calvin’s famous statement that
man is a fabricam idolorum… a maker of idols. That is his natural propensity.
All right, so because of that, inadequacy or ineffectiveness of this
revelation, we need special revelation. And so he speaks of special revelation,
and specifically about the Bible. Now, when Calvin speaks about the Bible, he
says that the Bible itself also has objective, an objective basis for its
credibility and truthfulness both internal and external indicia, as he calls
it, evidences of its truthfulness.
But again, even the special revelation runs
head on into man’s wickedness, corruption, depravity, noetic effects of sin,
that we refuse to submit to the clarity of the evidence. So, in order for even
special revelation to bear salvific fruit in the soul, something else has to
happen. And that of course is what Calvin calls the internal testimony of the
Holy Spirit. Right? The internal testimony of the Holy Spirit adds no new
content, no new argument, no new revelation but what it does, to quote Calvin,
is that it gives us now the moral ability to acquiesce into the indici, that is
the subjective transformation that the Holy Spirit gives to us, gives me the
moral power to submit to the objective evidence. Now as a Calvinist, I agree
from the outset that all the evidence in the world, presented in with all the
cogency of the world, will never lead a man to Jesus Christ. But there are
other reasons for reconstruction natural theology, which I have already
indicated apart from evangelism, and one that Calvin himself mentions that the
evidence is there and is powerful enough to “stop the mouths of the
obstreperous” who slander Christ with their attacks that there is no objective
basis for the hope and the faith that lies within us. The evidentialist is
working on the situation of calling attention to the objective ground basis for
the subjective response of faith that we have that is evoked in our hearts by
the Holy Spirit. That’s what we’re about, those are what our concerns are. We
can talk more about it after Dr Bahnsen has his opportunity to give his
presentation.
(20:18 mark)
Bahnsen:
Not only do we have a lot of points of view
in common, we have ….. and entangled as well. I want to begin just with a brief
personal remark to reinforce what has already been said twice just to let you
know how thoroughly I am in agreement with the fact that we are all Calvinists
in this here adventure here of apologetics and we all have an awful lot of
common concerns. In fact, while I have promised not to respond to the first
talk, I think that it should be made clear that RC is talking for more than
simply one school of apologetics at many of those points, of which I won’t
mention until the question period. But we certainly have a lot in common and RC
and I had a very pleasant plane ride for about 3 hours together last winter in
which we had a chance to get down to the mat on some of these things and find
out that we aren’t really so far apart as one might provisionally think.
And so, there is a lot in common however,
this evening it is my job to try and set before you what is a distinctive point
of view in apologetics. And I’ll try to do within my time limit. You all know
my prevailing sins in that area (audience laughing).
I’m going to say two things apologetics is
not. I’m going to give you Scripture verses and then I want to tell you what I
see as the apologetical situation, secondly, the requirements of the apologist
and finally, the procedure for defending the faith.
An awful lot in 15 minutes
First
thing that apologetics is not
First, two things apologetics is not.
Apologetics is not mere persuasion. Much of the popular literature in the area of theistic and anti-theistic
apologetics consists of highly polemical and emotional efforts at converting
others. And to be sure it is often our duty to seek to convince others of our
own position.
Sadly, however, these efforts too frequently
take a form that substitutes psychological persuasion for
careful and fair argumentation. Both
believers and unbelievers are guilty of this, at least in my
estimation.
And it is a sad fact of life that logically
poor arguments are often psychologically effective in convincing people of the truth of a position.
Conversely, good arguments can be psychologically ineffective. And we may consequently find ourselves confronted by
a moral dilemma when we discover that certain bad arguments and glib slogans will be found more
convincing by a larger audience than what are in fact really good arguments.
And when we, on top of this, judge the issue
that is being disputed to be one of high importance in our lives, such as in the case of apologetics, we
are especially tempted to put these bad arguments in the service of the truth.
The Christian apologist ought to be the one
person on earth who will resist this temptation. For we only dishonor the truth
and ultimately dishonor the Lord of truth when we use fraudulent and suspicious
forms of argument in promoting the truth. So the first quest of apologetics is
not mere persuasion. We may persuade a lot of people to become Christians on
the basis of very bad arguments. But our task as apologists is to find good
arguments; one which will not be found out later to be fraudulent when somebody
with greater intellectual talent comes along to investigate.
Second
Thing It Is Not
Secondly, apologetics does not merely deal in
probabilities. This is an important point. Apologetics is not merely persuasion. Secondly, apologetics is
not merely dealing with probabilities.
We are to have a reasoned defense of the
conviction, the hope that is within us, according to 1 Peter 3. And basing our
thinking on the apostolic word we can, according to Acts 2:36, know assuredly.
In the Greek word, know without any doubt whatsoever, that God has made Jesus
both Lord and Christ. Indeed, the Gospel comes to us that we might, quote,
“know the certainty of our Christian teaching” – Luke 1:4.
The Gospel comes not in word only, but also
in power and in the Holy Spirit and full assurance – 1
Thessalonians 1:5. And the word there for
“full assurance” … means full conviction, assurance, certainty, perfect faith not marred by any doubts
whatsoever. The Bible speaks of our full assurance of understanding –
Colossians 2:2; and our full assurance of hope in Hebrews 6:11.
(25 min mark)
Abraham is called the father of the faithful
and Paul says that he was not weak in faith but had full certainty with respect
to God’s word – Romans 4:19 & 21.
And thus Hebrews tells us to draw near with a
true heart in full assurance of faith – Hebrews 10:22. And then verse 23 goes on to exhort us to hold
fast the confession of our hope unyieldingly in Christ. We surpass human probabilities. And we can have
bold access and confident faith, Paul says, in Ephesians 3.
And so while the confidence of the godless is
like a spider’s web, Job 8:14, in the fear of the Lord is
strong confidence, Proverbs 14:26. And the
reason Proverbs says that is that it begins by saying that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all
knowledge – Proverbs 1:7. And we who put our confidence in Jehovah may, quote, “know the certainty of
the words of truth” – Proverbs 22:17-21.
And thus, I maintain it is wrong to think
that certainty in epistemological matters is limited to formal
logic and mathematics. Certainty, full
certainty, full confidence without doubt, without yielding, without qualification, pertains to the matters of the
Christian faith.
John’s purpose in writing his first epistle
was especially that his readers might have confident knowledge of their salvation. And therefore, our
confession of faith teaches us that believers “may in this life be certainly assured that they are in
the state of grace.” And it goes on to make very clear what the meaning is when it says this certainty is not
a bare conjectural or probable persuasion grounded upon a fallible hope but is an infallible assurance
of faith.
And so, apologetics is dealing with the hope
that is in us; the full conviction, not probabilities – full
assurance, full demonstration. By the way,
talk of moral persuasion and moral certainty at this point is simply a cop out. For whatever that strange
state of mind called moral assurance is supposed to be, it certainly cannot be compatible with mere
rational probability. Moral assurance is to be based on the
apprehended strength of the evidence. And as
all philosophers who have spoken of this suspicious state of mind have said, it is to be proportioned
to the certainty of the evidence itself.
So apologetics is not merely persuasion and
it’s not merely dealing in probabilities. Well what is it? It
won’t get us very far to say what’s not. I
want to make very clear; we are not talking about how to
persuade people. We’re talking about the
grounds for Christian truth. And we’re talking about not
“probably true” but “fully true”,
“unyieldingly true”.
What is apologetics?
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1:20, “Where is
the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world (or of this
age)? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?” In one phrase, I
think that’s the battle cry of presuppositional apologetics. “Hath not God made
foolish the wisdom of this age?”
And our twofold apologetical procedure can be
found in Proverbs 26:4-5. This is how we show the
foolishness of the wisdom of this age.
Proverbs says, “Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou be likened to him”. Don’t answer a fool
according to his approach to things; according to his folly; according to his assumptions and
presuppositions (if I can import that term). Don’t answer him that way, because then you’re going to be like
him. You are going to be an enemy behind lines.
Proverbs goes right on to say, though,
“Answer a fool according to his folly”. Not a violation of the law of contradiction; a twofold procedure. First,
don’t answer him according to his folly lest you fall into the same pit with him. But then, answer him
according to his folly. Why? “Lest he be wise in his own conceit”. You must show him that he has no
grounds for conceited knowledge. You must show him that God has made foolish the wisdom of this age.
Paul says in Colossians 2, “They in Christ
are hidden all treasures of wisdom and knowledge”. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge; be they
pertaining to logic or to causality or to natural science or morality or whatsoever. All knowledge is
deposited in Christ and thus Paul goes on to say since, “All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are in
Christ see to it that no one robs you” – through what? – “vain
philosophy and empty deception”. And how does
he describe vain philosophy? [It is] that which is
according to the traditions of men, according
to the elementary principles of worldly learning, rather
than according to Christ.
A presuppositionalist says, “Answer not a
fool according to his elementary principles of learning because you’ll become like him. Rather, answer him
according to your own presuppositions, those which are according to Christ.”
(30 min mark)
And then you will be able to conclude with
Paul, “Hasn’t God made foolish the wisdom of this world”.
IV.
Apologetical Situation
And the nature of the apologetical situation
can be briefly put this way. The controversy between the
believer and the unbeliever is in principle,
I say in principle, an antithesis between two complete
systems of thought. And one’s factual evidence
will be accepted and evaluated in light of those
governing presuppositions.
Thirdly, all chains of argumentation,
especially over matters of ultimate personal importance, will trace back to and will depend on starting points
which are taken as self [authenticating???]. Thus, circularity in debate will
be unavoidable. But that is not to say that all circles that are intelligible
are valid.
Fourthly, in that case, appeals to logic, and
appeals to fact, and appeals to personality may be necessary in apologetics but they are never
apologetically adequate. What is needed is not piece meal replies; probabilities; or isolated evidences. But,
rather [it is] an attack upon the underlying presuppositions of the unbelievers system of thought.
And fifthly, the unbeliever’s system of
thought can be characterized as follows:
1) By nature, the unbeliever is the image of
God and therefore he is inescapably religious. His heart
testifies continually to him, as does also
the clear revelation of God around him, that God exists
and He has a certain character.
2) Secondly, the unbeliever exchanges the
truth of God for a lie. He is a fool, who refuses to begin his
thinking with reverence to the Lord. He will
not build on Christ’s self-evidencing words. He will
suppress the unavoidable revelation of God in
nature.
3) Third, because he delights not in
understanding, but chooses to serve the creature rather than the
creator, the unbeliever is self-confidently
committed to his own ways of thought. Being convinced that he could not be
fundamentally wrong; he flaunts perverse thinking and challenges the
self-attesting word of God.
4) Consequently, fourthly, the unbelievers
thinking results in ignorance. In his darkened, futile mind, he actually hates knowledge and can gain only a
knowledge falsely so-called, as Paul says at the end
of 1st Timothy. To the
extent that he actually knows anything, it is due to his unacknowledged
dependence upon suppressed truth; the
suppressed truth of God within him. And this renders
the unbeliever intellectually schizophrenic.
By his espoused way of thinking, he is actually opposing himself and showing a
need for a radical change of mind, that he might have a genuine knowledge of
the truth.
5) Next, the unbeliever’s ignorance is
nonetheless a culpable ignorance because he is excuse-less for his rebellion
against God’s revelation. Hence he is, as Paul says, “without an
apologetic”. [This is] the literal
translation of the Greek – “without an apologetic” for his thoughts.
6) And finally, the unbelief of the
unbeliever does not stem from a lack of factual evidence, but from his refusal
to submit to the authoritative word of God from the beginning of his thinking.
V.
Requirements of the Apologist
Now I say that’s the nature of the situation
into which we are tossed as apologists. That is the nature of the world, God, revelation and the
unbeliever. What are the requirements of us as apologists now?
1) Well, I would say first of all the
apologist must have a proper attitude. He can’t be arrogant or
quarrelsome. He must, with humility and
respect, set forth his arguments in a gentle and
peaceable fashion.
2) Secondly, the apologist must have a proper
starting point. He must take God’s word as his self evidencing presupposition;
thinking God’s thoughts after him, rather than attempting to be neutral in his
debate. And viewing God’s word as more sure than his personal experience of the
facts.
3) Thirdly, the apologist must have a proper
method. Working on the unbeliever’s unacknowledged presuppositions and being
firmly grounded in his own presuppositions, the apologist must aim to cast down
every high imagination exalted against the knowledge of God by aiming to bring
every thought, his own, as well as his opponents (by the way, every thought)
captive to the obedience of Christ.
4) Fourthly, the apologist must have the
proper goal; securing the unbelievers unconditional surrender without
compromising the apologist’s fidelity to the Word. The word of the cross must
be used to expose the utter pseudo-wisdom of the world as destructive
foolishness. And Christ must be set apart as Lord in one’s heart, as Peter says
in 1 Peter 3. Thus acknowledging no higher authority than God’s word, and
refusing to suspend intellectual commitment to the truth of that Word.
Well, that’s the nature of the situation.
Those are the requirements on the apologist; how does he do his work?
VI.
Procedure for Defending the Faith
Lastly, I’ll speak on the procedure for
defending the faith – five points.
(35 min mark)
1. One, realizing that the unbeliever is
holding back the truth in unrighteousness, the apologist should reject the
foolish presuppositions implicit in critical questions and he must rather
attempt to educate his opponent.
2. And that will involve presenting the
facts, secondly, within the context of the biblical philosophy
of fact. Notice we do present the facts; we
are evidentialists. But we present them within a presuppositional framework
where they make sense. And that framework is that God is the sovereign determiner
of all possibility and impossibility. A proper reception and understanding of
the facts will require submission to the Lordship of Christ. The facts will be
significant to the unbeliever only if he has a presuppositional change of mind
from darkness to light. And Scripture has the authority to declare what has
happened in history and to interpret what has happened. Not simply to declare
that Jesus rose from the dead, but that He did so to secure our justification.
3. Thirdly, the unbelievers espoused
presuppositions must be forcefully attacked asking whether knowledge is even
possible given those espoused presuppositions. In order to show that God has
made foolish the wisdom of the world, the believer can place himself on the
unbeliever’s position and answer him according to his folly lest he be wise in
his own conceit. That is, demonstrate the outcome of unbelieving thought with
its assumptions. The unbelievers claim should be reduced to impotence and
impossibility by what I call the internal critique of his system. That is, we
must demonstrate the ignorance of unbelief by arguing from the impossibility of
anything contrary to Christianity – full assurance of the faith.
4. Fourthly, the apologist should appeal to
the unbeliever as the image of God who has the clear and inescapable revelation
of God to him, thus giving him an eradicable knowledge of his Creator. And this
knowledge can often be exposed by indicating unwitting expressions in the
unbeliever or by pointing to the borrowed capital, his un-admitted
presuppositions which can be found in his system.
5. And then finally, the apologist should
declare the self-evidencing and authoritative truth of God
as the precondition of intelligibility and
man’s only way of salvation from all of the effects of sin, be they ignorance
or intellectual vanity. Lest the apologist become like the unbeliever, he
should not answer him according to his folly but according to God’s word.
The unbeliever can be invited to put himself
on the Christian position in order to see that it provides the necessary
grounds for intelligible experience and factual knowledge, thereby concluding
that it alone is reasonable to hold and that it is the very foundation for
proving anything whatsoever.
And finally, the apologist can also explain
that Scripture accounts for the unbeliever’s state of mind, his hostility, and
the failure of men to acknowledge the necessary truth of God’s revelation.
Moreover, Scripture provides the only escape from the effects of this hostility
and failure, be they intellectual futility or eternal damnation.
Dr
Dewitt
Thank you. Now we will have opportunity for
questions. I wasn’t going to do this, but I am going to take the prerogative as
chairman of the meeting and ask one question before I turn the opportunity of
asking questions over to you.
Dr Sproul, did I hear you say that the
presuppositionalist apologetic represents an abandonment to neo-orthodox
methodology?
Sproul: An abandonment?
Dewitt: Well, an adoption of their methodology, in other words an
abandonment of classic reformed….(???)
Sproul: You might have it on tape, but I want to…
Dewitt: Something like that, I’d like for you to expatiate on that a
little bit, what you meant by that.
Sproul
All right. What I had originally prepared for
tonight, but with time did not permit to do, was to give a brief historical
reconnaissance of the historical rise of fideism as an alternative to natural
theology as a method, metaphysics, philosophy and theology. What I was having
in mind there was that from a methodological perspective, neo-orthodoxy is
noted, particular Barth, for its very stringent rejection of natural theology
and by its replacing natural theology with a fideistic approach or defense of
the Christian faith. I am very much afraid of that method’s broader
implication. I don’t know how exactly I said that and enumerated my concerns.
But to state the differences as sharply as I can, in terms of the statement of
concern, Patrick Dar……….. my words carefully here because I am not saying, I am
glad that you asked this question, that anybody who is a presuppositionalist is
neo-orthodox, as a crypto-neo-
(40 min mark)
orthodox, crypto-Barthian, or
crypto-existentialist. I don’t mean to say that at all. I want to make that very very clear. But I am
afraid of the implications of the method. For these reasons, I think that,
first of all that the presuppositionalist approach gives the pagan an excuse
for his rejection of God because the pagan is sharp enough to see the fallacy
of circular reasoning upon which presuppositionalism is established.
I don’t like this to have the pagan to have
that excuse to say “Hey God, the reason I didn’t believe in you is because all
those that were defending you gave me an argument that violated formal canons
of logic.”
Second of all, when we start our argument by
the direct affirmation and assertion and existence of God, we are in a real
dangerous bind of subjectivism. Well, I just say “God is”. That’s my starting
point. There is a God. The authority by which I say that, humanly speaking, in
terms of the argument, is the fact that I am the one that who is saying it.
Now, if I don’t have an objective, evidential basis for that, that we call
“subjectivism”. It’s a matter of decision of a faith that is not resting upon
objective criteria of evidence. That is what I meant by an intrusion of an
existential or neo-orthodox method into theology and philosophy. God forbid
that I should ever call Dr Van Til or any of his disciples existentialists! I
don’t believe they are, by any means. But I think that it’s is a happy
inconsistency at that point. And this is a fear, a concern. That’s why I said
it is important for us to see what is… I know that Greg is gonna have the
opportunity, I hope he will take the time to say their concerns. Their concerns
is that we are yielding too much to the humanists, we’re gonna to end up in
autonomy, the human mind end up in Cartesian rationalist, and all that sort of
thing, and compromise the assuredness that he’s already mentioned about the
word of God.
But the only argument I hear so far in the
presuppositionalist’s apologetics is “I start with the assertion of the
existence of God” which assertion is precisely the issue under dispute! And I
offer no evidence! I just say that’s the way it is!
That’s good evangelism. But I think it’s the
death blow, it’s fatal to apologetics as a reply to the pretenders of the truth
that Greg has so beautifully described. I think we have another problem of the
confusion of ontology and epistemology, which I’m sure this discussion will get
at sooner or later. But that’s answering your question.
Dewitt:
Do you wish to say something, Prof Bahnsen?
Bahnsen:
Yes. (audience laughing). In the first place,
I want to make very clear that the position I hold in apologetics and the
position advocated for over 40 yrs by Dr Van Til is by no means whatsoever, and
it is highly inappropriate to use the word in the same room, fideism. It is not
subjectivism, it is not anti-rationalism, it is not a denial of objective criteria
and grounds for belief. In fact, you will find strenuous statements in Dr Van
Til’s literature, as you will find in my limited literature, to the fact that
there is an objective argument for the existence of God, that it is inescapable
and no man has rational grounds to think that he can reject it. So that’s not
fideism at all, not at all. It doesn’t come close to subjectivism, it doesn’t
give the pagan an excuse either because it doesn’t say to him that we have one
circle here and another circle there and well, I guess it’s different strokes
for different folks, take the one you want.
That isn’t the presuppositionalist argument!
The argument is “you’re reasoning in a circle. And it is a destructive circle.
And I may be reasoning in a circle but it is one which it encompasses your
thought and everything valid in your thought as well as other things. It gives
science a foundation.
Now, this word about presuppositional and
circular argumentation needs to be expanded just a bit more. Let us say that I, as a Christian, am dealing
with a man who is a committed and exhausted empiricist. He believes that sense
perception is the test of all truth, whatsoever. So, his ultimate
presupposition is that sense perception is the standard of truth.
Now consider a man who wants to debate with
the empiricist at this point. And he brings an argument, we will call it
argument A, to bear on the empiricist.
(45 min mark)
And another man comes into the room and he
uses argument B with the empiricist. Now if argument A is in fact predicated on
an ultimate presupposition which denies that sense perception is the standard
of truth and the empiricist buys argument A, would you please notice that he
can only buy that argument by rejecting his presupposition? That is, he can't
buy that argument and keep his presupposition because this is predicated on the
denial of that as the ultimate standard of truth.
On the other hand, if somebody arguing on the
basis of sense perception being the standard of truth goes along with his
argument, and the empiricist buys it, he buys it because he is already
committed to sense perception as being the standard of truth.
Now, nobody is talking about what has been
referred by RC as the elementary logical fallacy of circular reasoning. Nobody
says that A is true because A is true. We’re talking about transcendental
thinking and that’s a very important area of epistemology. It goes far beyond
elementary (modal?) logic, far beyond Helean empiricism. And in fact, if
anything, it has its roots in what is really the continental tradition of Kant
of asking about the preconditions of all knowledge, be it logic, or sense
perception or whatever.
And what the presuppositionalist says is you
must recognize that an ultimate standard is just that: ultimate. And if you
have an argument for that ultimate standard that is other than the ultimate
standard, then that other argument is your ultimate standard. Do you
understand, that you can’t establish your ultimate point by going behind it,
because if you could go behind it to find some grounds for it there, that would be your ultimate standard.
And so then the question is how do you argue
to this (pointing to chalkboard)? And the fact is the only way you can argue is
in a way consistent with your presuppositions. And the only way that you can
establish your presuppositions is transcendentally. And that is circular
argumentation. It has nothing to do with the flat line circularity of begging
the question.
And then finally, the objective criteria and
evidence of the presuppositionalist is precisely the revelation of God, which
gets through. I agree with RC, it gets through to every man. And I want to
maintain it gets through to every man whether he has been to college or not,
whether he has a junior high diploma or not, whether he knows anything about
Aristotelian logic or symbolic logic or knows anything about Hume or any
philosopher, I don’t care if it’s Sophie the washwoman, she knows God, and Paul
says, is without excuse for her rejection. And I must have a method of
argumentation which meets those facts, not simply of mediate, natural theology,
but an argument based upon the clear, perspicuous, and certain revelation of
God that comes through to everybody though nature.
Sproul: Would you please repeat that last? I didn’t hear whether you said
mediate or immediate.
Bahnsen: The knowledge which all men have is immediate.
Sproul: And not mediate?
Bahnsen: And not mediate.
Sproul: Do you differ with Calvin at that point?
Bahnsen: I’m not going to debate the historical exegesis of Calvin, really.
I don’t think I differ with Calvin, but that’s really a question for the church
history department.
Dewitt: Oh, I wouldn’t have …. (audience laughing). I think you’re both
wrong on Calvin. (audience laughing). Greg Fresnoll (audience member), stand up
when you ask your questions and tell us your name.
Audience
member: My name is Greg …. RC, you recall in
Atlanta, asking a question, which I think is perhaps not right along this lines
of argument, but it has to do with mediate and immediate logic, what is your
standard for making a decision, thinking God’s thoughts after him. And I asked
you the question that if Satan came up and tempted Eve and said “Did God tell
you….” And she looked at it and she looked at the tree and instead of saying
“Yeah, I’ll take it” she said, “No, I’m getting fat. I better not take it.” I
asked you that question, and you said that you would ponder it. I would ask …..
the same question …… when I return (????)
I think that it deals with the question on
what standard should she have made her reply. Now I did make the mistake then,
when I said, as far as my communication to you, that she was simply to make
this reply…. It had to be her reply. But on what standard does that reply be
made? So, if she had said, “Nah, I’m getting fat. I won’t take it.” Would she
have sinned? Now I know that granted that this is not how it happened. But this
is the point of the argument. And I would also like to ask Dr Bahnsen.
(audience laughing, for unknown reason).
(50 min mark)
Sproul: Well, before she ate the forbidden fruit and was fallen, I figured
that she had the most fantastic figure in the world and she wasn’t the least
bit worried about getting fat. (audience laughing).. That’s right…
(unintelligible discussion)…
Greg, I’m actually not sure I understand that
question. You know? Did you understand that question?
Bahnsen: Yeah.
(audience laughing)
Sproul: Did you? Could you help me with it a little?
Bahnsen: I’ll give you something to shoot at. Ok? I’ll give an answer and
then...
Sproul: We’re going to hear him first, and then that maybe will clarify
the questions in my mind..
Bahnsen: As I understand it, Greg is asking about the moral foundations of
epistemology. You see, Eve is confronted with a situation. Satan says, “Take
the fruit.” God says, “Don’t take the fruit.” She’s gotta make a decision. On
what grounds ought she to make the decision? And by grounds here, we mean what
rational grounds should she use, and by “ought” we mean, what morally was her
duty?
And I was searching quickly here, and I’m
afraid the exact address escapes me, but Paul warns the church at one point,
that he doesn’t want the church to be deluded by the, how does he put it now
exactly…. As I recall, it’s something to the effect with the subtlety with
which Eve was led astray. The subtlety with which she was led astray. That is,
it’s not simply that she was led astray, but it’s the very subtle reasoning by
which she was led astray. And what was the subtle reasoning of Satan? “Hath God
said that?” That is, he questioned the authority of God’s self attesting word.
And I would answer, as a presuppositionalist, as much as it is the heretical
hypothetical “What if Eve would have done this, that or the other”, if Eve
would have remained pure in the sense that… in the external sense she did not
eat the fruit, but wouldn’t have done it because she was afraid that would lose
that marvelous figure she was given a creation, she would have in fact have
sinned, because the question of the fruit wasn’t the question of some magical
potent or anything like that. It is a question of obedience to the Lordship of
God alone. In this case, CS Lewis has made so very clear, he is not a
presuppositionalist, Lewis says that that command was totally arbitrary on
God’s part. It wasn’t because the fruit was poisoned or anything like that. It
was just to see whether she would have an obedient frame of mind and so I’d say
that if she in fact didn’t eat the fruit in order to save her figure, she would
have then shown that she was using a criteria which was immoral because the
real issue is whether she would be submissive to God’s thoughts, and not her
own.
Sproul: That really helps me understand the question and I would certainly
agree that in the conclusion that Greg just gave about she just refrained
because of her figure and rather than out of this genuine desire to please God
in obedience that that would have been sin even though she would have external
conformity to the law, her internal motivation would have been corrupt. I agree
with that completely.
However, I just wanted to comment a little
bit about the context about that particular situation. First of all, Eve did
have direct and immediate communication with our Creator, which we do not have
in the same way: face to face, verbal communication.
I think the subtlety of what Satan did was
not asking…. he was not asking anything about how do you know this was God who
told you to eat or not eat of this tree. You remember the full quotation, when
Satan said “Hath God said that you should not” what “eat of any tree in the
garden?” There is the subtlety, because God had not said that and Satan knew
very well God had not said that.
Here, enter Jean-Paul Satre who is telling us
every day that unless we are autonomous, we are not really free. If we are answerable
on any single point to anyone or anything beyond ourselves, we are not free. In
fact, he turns around the classical arguments for the existence of God and uses
them as an argument against the existence of God: if man is, God can’t be…. because God would destroy the essence of our
humanness which is subjective freedom and autonomy.
Now the subtlety of Satan is he’s putting the
idea in her mind that if God made one restriction on you, you are really not
free. But I don’t think that there was anything going on there in terms about
the debate about the existence of God. I don’t think that was in question at
all.
(55 min mark)
Let me finish this, ok? Let me respond.
But how does she know the truth? Greg’s heard
me talk about this on other occasions, from the neo-orthodox perspective where
they glory in contradictions and (……) you’ve heard the statement.. Fruehner
made it. Contradiction is the hallmark of truth, ok? Let’s assume that that’s
the case.
Contradiction is the hallmark of truth.
-And now, God says “Don’t eat of the tree”.
-Serpent comes along and says “You know, eat
of the tree.”
-God says “if you eat of the tree, you will
die. If A, B will follow.” Ok?
-Satan says “If you eat of the tree, you will
not die, but you will be as God.”
-Now God says “If A, then B”. Satan comes
along and says “If A, then non-B” ok?
Now, he’s pretty sharp. He’s got out of the
noetic effects of sin, that’s …… (unintelligible)
And she says “That’s a contradiction. Satan
is speaking in direct contradiction to what my Creator, I know to be God, has
commanded me to do. Ok?
“But” says Eve “contradiction is the hallmark
of truth. So, the serpent must be speaking the truth. God is the truth. The
serpent must be a representative of God. It’s my moral duty to eat of the tree.
That’s how neo-orthodoxy works with that one. Ok? So, what I’m saying is
rationality and the law of contradiction was built in to that very first……..
(audio cut off)..
Dewitt: You gotta be brief. Very brief. (audience laughing).
Bahnsen:
Ok. Without a doubt, reason was built into what she
was doing. The question becomes an apologetic: what are the foundations of that
proper reason she used? After the fall, those foundations are now called into
question. And the Scripture text that I was searching for is 2 Cor 11:3. Paul
says “I’m afraid lest as the serpent deceive thee by his craftiness that your
minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion which is
to Christ.”
Dewitt: I’m sure there must be many questions. Yeah, Bill?
Bill: (unintelligible) …. Is that based on reason or experiential faith
or a combination of both?
Bahnsen: Experiential faith meaning what in your question, Bill?
Bill: (unintelligible)…
Bahnsen: No, that’s all right. You’ve said enough. I know what ballpark you
are in. I would say it’s neither. That it’s not reason, if you mean by that,
manipulation of the laws of logic as we might do our homework as seminary
students. Or experiential faith in that we have put it to the test in
experience and found out that it works out. By the way, neither one of those
can give you the assurance, the infallible assurance that you are saved that
the Bible offers us. I would say rather that God has given a clear revelation
which can be defended because it is the only foundation for knowing anything
whatsoever and that that clear revelation in conjunction with the internal
testimony of the Holy Spirit gives us an infallible assurance of our faith. But
I do not believe that the Holy Spirit takes probable evidence or uncertain
evidence and turns it into certain evidence or certainty or infallible
assurance in our hearts. I think he takes certain evidence, infallible evidence
and with his infallible moral persuasion turns it into infallible faith in our
hearts.
Dewitt: Ok.. Identify yourself.. Josiah…
Audience member: You said something that I
just wanted to know what you meant by it. You said…. confrontation with the
world on its own terms…
Sproul: What I meant by that is apologetics in the classical sense of an
ad hominem response where the world is coming from, where we come off the
reservation and we duel with them in their own backyard.
(1:00 mark)
Now I think what I meant by that, Josiah, I
don’t want to put words in Greg’s mouth, but I would assume that that is not a
point of controversy between us. I hope not. I’m always looking for more
agreement than disagreement. I hope we are not going to uncover more
disagreement.
What I mean by that is that the concern at
this point is to show, we both agree, that the whole life and world view of the
pagan is a built on a lie. God reveals himself clearly to all men. Men have
that knowledge. They exchange the truth for the lie, therefore their thoughts
become futile. We see brilliant men in the world. We see the Satre’s and the
Hume’s of the world and their formidable minds, intellect, and they construct
fantastically complex and intricate philosophical systems. And they are very
intimidating to us sometimes to us. Very very clever. But we know that in the
final analysis, their whole systems are an exercise in futility. And wouldn’t
that be the case if their starting point is a rejection of God’s revelation, if
they refuse to acknowledge what they know to be true at the beginning of their
thinking, and Greg and I both agree, there is an objective general revelation,
we are both agreeing that there is an objective natural theology. Gene…
Gene: I thought I heard you say that the noise gets through. (audience
giggle).
Bahnsen: Objective general revelation. But natural theology is taking
knowledge about nature, which does not itself have anything to do with
presuppositions of God and all the rest, and moving from them independently and
autonomously to another conclusion, namely that there is a god. …. What we are
talking about is objective argument for God’s existence, but I don’t happen to
think that it is natural theology. I think it is a transcendental argument.
Sproul: What I mean about natural theology, is, what I mean by theology is
the knowledge of God. What I mean by a natural theology, is a knowledge of God
that comes through nature. You don’t buy that?
Bahnsen: Oh, I am willing to buy that. But there is a distinction within
what you are calling the knowledge of God, whether it is mediate or immediate.
And there is also a distinction between types of arguments.
Sproul: Ok.. So… well anyway.. forget it. I just thought that we had a
point of agreement there, which obviously we don’t. (audience laughing)..
because… you’re rejecting the mediate dimension?
Bahnsen: No, I am rejecting the nature of argument that the old Princeton
school used to substantiate that knowledge of God.
Sproul: Ok.. But we are not into that at this point right now, Greg. We’re
just talking just simply about whether or not we agree that there was a natural
theo… a natural knowledge of God that all men have.
Bahnsen: Again, I would say that it is immediate.
Sproul: Ok. (unintelligible)
Bahnsen: No, I would also say that the apologist can get an immediate,
transcendental and an objectively valid proof of God’s existence. But that is
not what Aquinas is doing.
Sproul: Alright. Aquinas was going for mediate. Mediate, not immediate. He
wanted to prove a mediate… That is what
I am trying to do. That’s what Calvin believed in, and we are ready to go. I’ve
got the quotes here if you want me to document that. I’m not just saying that..
Calvin uses those very terms… mediate.. when he speaks of Rom 1:18-21, check
it, look it up.
But the other point I want to get across here
is that what we are both trying to do is show that those pagan systems which
proceed from a rejection of general revelation, be it immediate or mediate,
skip that for a minute, they still know that there is God. And they refuse to
acknowledge God as God. Grant that. Ok? They all know that there is a god.
Satre knows very well that there is a god. Hume knew that there was a God. Now,
their starting point then, from the construction of their philosophy, is based
upon a refusal to acknowledge what they knew to be true.
Paul calls that foolishness and if you were a
careful exegete, you would realize that “fool” in the New Testament is not
merely a judgment of one’s intellectual capacity, it’s a moral judgment.
Foolishness is a sin from the NT perspective. So we have a moral problem of man
now in this repression-suppression cycling, holding down… whatever you want to
call it, of this general revelation. So, what the task of.. one of the tasks of
the apologist is to expose the lie and the bankruptcy of this system that is
built upon an initial refusal to acknowledge what man believes to be true. His
starting point is a lie. Now on the basis of that lie, he can build very sophisticated
and clever worldviews.
(1:05 mark)
Both of us are trying to show the foolishness
of it and expose the foolishness of it. I might, let me say this about the
presuppositionalist school, in particular Westminster Seminary. I don’t think
that there is any other school in the history of the Christian church that has
produced a more devastating, scintillating, and effective critique of alternate
worldviews to Christianity than the advocates of the presuppositionalist school
in general and Westminster Seminary in particular. Let me say it again. I don’t
think that there ever has been, in the history of the church, a single school
or, I mean, an institution or a school of thought than the disciples of Dr Van
Til and company of the presuppositionalist school, have been more effective in
exposing the weaknesses, and the fallacies in terms of comprehensive critiques
of all alternate systems to Christianity. I have no dispute there. When it
talks about challenging the grounds upon which these other life and world views
are established. There, we are very very close, I think. Where our disagreement
is on how we then replace what we have demolished with a positive presentation
of the truthfulness of the Christian faith.
Now, getting back to the question about what
I meant, Josiah, you were the one asking that, about going out and beating them
on their own grounds. What I mean by that is to go out and show them and they
say “We have ration... we have reason.. we believe that only that which is
rationally demonstrative is true.” Their presuppositions is rationalistic, or
empiricism that Greg is talking about over here. Now, what I am going to try to
show, by arguing on their own grounds is they can’t have their cake and eat it
too. I’m going to say: If you were really an empiricist, and have any
cognizance whatsoever in sense perception, I am going to try to drive them to
show them that sense perception as a method of knowing demands that they submit
to a notion of God. Because without God, there is no guarantee whatsoever that
sense perception has any correspondence to reality.
And if he is a rationalist who is vying for
the law of contradiction, who is saying, “When I’m gone, there is no guarantee
that reality will correspond to reason.” So I’m trying to show him, my argument
is … valid in an ad hominem fashion, that he can’t have a viable sensory system
or empirical system without God. And I am trying to show the rationalist that
he can’t even have his reason that he is trying to use to critique Christianity
without God, because he is ultimately presupposing the existence of God as the
basis for his rationality or sense perception without acknowledging that.. Ok?
(In the background, Bahnsen says amen).
Now there is where we are in total agreement.
Now when he talks about a transcendental argument in Kantian terms about what
is necessary for any of these things to make sense or to be meaningful,
ultimately, in Kantian categories: transcendental doesn’t mean transcendent in
the normal ways that we use it, but he is just asking the question: what are
the preconditions of knowledge? In that sense, Dr Van Til himself makes a
distinction between ultimate and proximate presuppositions. You’re asking me or
any advocate of the evidential school… that God must be the ultimate
presupposition of any knowledge, fact and truth, we say “Yay and amen, of
course. Obviously.” Unless there is a God, rationality is meaningless. Unless
there is a God, sense perception ... blends into the type of skepticism Dr
Clark talks about. We know that. We grant that. We’re not dummies. We
understand that rationality, for it to have any meaning, has to be based
ultimately on God. We believe that and we know that.
The dispute takes place in how we proceed to
argue over it. We want to move simply from epistemology to ontology. We must
maybe misunderstand the presuppositionalists and this is why we’d like to get
together and try to get this because I only know Dr. Van Til from reading his
books. I’ve met with him and had conversations but I haven’t sat in his class
and asked him a thousand questions like Greg has and others.
(1:10 mark)
That’s why I like to talk with advocates of
the presuppositional school as much as we possibly can to clarify these
differences, if they are, and maybe they’re just tempest in the teapot. I don’t
know. But the point we’re trying to get is we want to start with epistemology
and move to ontology. They want to start with ontology and then show that all
of epistemology is built upon that.
(audience laughing for unknown reason..)
Bahnsen: Can I give my version of that?
Sproul: Sure.
Sproul: Sure.
Bahnsen: We’re getting somewhere when we talk about what we have in common
and what we don’t. And boy, the last few minutes of what RC just sounds like
pure presuppositionalism and it’s just grand, and he’s right. (audience
laughing).
The question is, after you’ve done the
internal critique, and you’ve shown the foolishness of unbelief and you’ve
driven the man to his skepticism and his nihilism and all the rest, how do you
then go about showing that it is not simply, you know, a shot in the dark? You
know, he will say, “Well, now I want to be a Christian because it is pretty
uncomfortable to be a nihilist and all the rest.” That is, what is the nature
of the positive argument for Christianity? By the way, that is the sort of
thing that really encouraged me when RC and I had this plane trip and we were
kind of going back and forth because it is quite evident that he and I want to
both do that: destroy the unbeliever’s system of belief and leave nothing to
stand on.
But now if I can just.. what is the type of
argumentation that is first morally required and epistemologically sound in
dealing with a positive presentation of the Gospel? And I would say that the
reason that I have this problem with accepting the term “natural theology” is
that natural theology says that on autonomous grounds, that is, without ANY
commitment to there being God or not, taking the neutral perspective, we can
take some fact about the universe, for instance that every event has a cause
and from that, we can reason to there being a god.
Now RC’s presentation of the cosmological
proof this afternoon for all of its detailed philosophical intricacies we may
be talking about, my real problem has to do with this: one, I don’t believe
that the argument is sound. And secondly, even if it were, it would only lead
to probability. And consequently, it is not an adequate apologetical tool. One,
because good philosophers can in fact disprove that form of argumentation and
secondly, even if they didn’t disprove it, it would not give us, in fact, this
full assurance we’ve been talking about.
On the other hand, there is a form of
argumentation that’s called “transcendental” that would say “nobody is
autonomous and nobody is neutral and in fact, while we all pretend to be
autonomous and neutral, we couldn’t even say that the grass in the field is
green, we couldn’t even do predication, as Van Til says, we couldn’t predicate
one thing of another if we didn’t already depend upon the knowledge of God
which we have immediately in creation, in conscience and all the rest. And so
the transcendentalist says, “What are the preconditions of knowledge?” He doesn’t
argue from an immanent platform up to a transcendant God. He argues that in
fact you couldn’t know anything, you couldn’t even argue at all one way or
another, up, down, or sideways without a God. And so, that’s why it is not
moving from metaphysics to epistemology or epistemology to metaphysics that
separates us. Let me explain that because I know some of you have not been in
the technical courses where those terms are used.
Metaphysics is the doctrine of being, what is
real, what is true, what is the structure of and what does actually exist in
the universe. Those things which have existence: metaphysics. And the doctrine
of God is a metaphysical doctrine because we are talking about there being a
God, especially a trans-physical being, be it God or laws of logic, whatever it
is. Metaphysics.
Epistemology asks, “how do you know what you
know, what are the criteria of knowing, what is the belief state and the
questions having to do with knowing and the knowing process.”
Now RC is saying that he wants to start with
epistemology and move to ontology, or metaphysics. Let’s just start with the law
of non-contradiction, the basic reliability of sense perception and the law of
causality. And from those epistemological platforms, from that platform, move
to the existence of God.
What I want to say is you can’t begin even
with that platform if you don’t already have the existence of God and that’s
not an ontological statement because we have agreed ontologically that there
wouldn’t be any logic or sense experience if God hadn’t created the world
unless there is a coherent God. I am making an epistemological point that it
doesn’t even make sense to use mathematics or empiricism or natural science of
any sort without already knowing that there is a God that is the context in
which interpretation and predication is possible. That’s the transcendental argument,
saying that the precondition of intelligibility and knowledge is already… the
existence of God. And that does not purport to be a probable argument for God’s
existence but a certain argument, a necessary argument, an inescapable
argument.
(1:15 mark)
And so, we may not be able to play this out,
we may not be able to do our homework very well but what the program and what
the criticism are, formally, is that natural theology, Thomas Aquinas, the old
Princeton approach, one, does not use good philosophically sound reasoning, and
two, if it did, it would only lead to probability and therefore would leave the
unbeliever with an excuse for his unbelief, because there is only probability.
Whereas the transcendental or presuppositional approach doesn’t move from an
autonomous, natural premise to a transcendent conclusion but says that in fact,
that it is a transcendental or precondition of all knowledge that you can’t
prove anything, you can’t even prove that your car is out there in the parking
lot without first ultimately presupposing that there is a God. And RC is right,
Dr Van Til distinguishes between ultimate and proximate presuppositions.
Dewitt: Prof Bahnsen, how is that an argument?
Bahnsen: The transcendental argument?
Dewitt: How is what you have said now an argument?
Bahnsen: I will give you an example of a transcendental argument.
Dewitt: May I explain that? You’ve described it as a precondition and
presupposition and an argument. I can understand that it is a presupposition
and a precondition. But I would like a little clarification as to how it’s an
argument. How it’s an argumentative form.
Bahnsen: Yeah, of course, Kant’s not the subject of discussion of tonight
that, you can be very sure that Immanuel Kant thought that he was arguing in
his Critique of Pure Reason and when he set forth his transcendental
philosophy. But I’ll give you a simpler thing to follow transcendentally that
was much prior to Kant and something which neither RC or I would dispute with,
I would imagine, in Aristotle.
Aristotle says “how do you prove the law of
non-contradiction?” And in his short paragraph, and it’s very short and it’s
devastating, Aristotle says “Well, you can either try to argue for it on its
own grounds, in which case it is circular reasoning. Or you can have an
argument that goes to other premises and other premises and other premises
which lead to eternity and never settle the issue, because neither one of those
are going to be….work. But, he says, we can argue for the law of non-contradiction
from the impossibility of the contrary. He says “Pretend that you don’t hold to
the law of non-contradiction. What are the effects?” In fact, you can’t even
argue if you don’t hold to the law of non-contradiction. And for all this talk
about rationality and logic and all that, Dr. Van Til, Frame, Bahnsen and
Poythress and all the rest, we’ve never denied that for a moment. The question
is, whether the law of non-contradiction is in fact its own ground
epistemologically, or whether there must be something beyond that, and I would
argue that there is. But Aristotle has a transcendental argument from the
impossibility of contrary and that’s exactly Van Til’s language when he says we
can prove that God exists from the impossibility of the contrary.
Sproul: At that point it’s an argument of necessary beings. Let me ask him
a question here that may help everybody. When you talk to me about a
transcendental argument a la Kant, I said this to you on the plane and we never
got a chance to really speak about it.
Are you saying, Greg, that, or what I am hearing, is that your
understanding of Van Til is that what Van Til is coming up with here is a very
sophisticated and somewhat subtle restatement of the ontological argument?
Bahnsen: In my apologetics classes, I have what is called a reconstruction
of the ontological argument along presuppositional lines. The difficulty is
most of this is developed by John Frame and myself and you don’t find it
anywhere in Van Til’s literature. In a sense, you can call it a reconstruction
of the ontological argument. But you see in another sense, it is a
reconstruction of the cosmological argument. And ultimately, I think some
interpreters of Van Til are right when they say that it is really a
reconstruction of the teleological argument. What it’s saying is basically, in
Van Til’s little pamphlet “Why Do I Believe in God” which is really perhaps the
best single statement of what he does in apologetics, you can find (1) it shows
the character of the man, a precious Christian gentleman that he is and
secondly, it shows the nature of his reason, from the impossibility of the
contrary. Van Til says, “You know, on your presuppositions, you cannot account
for either order or disorder. That is, unity or disunity in this world. You cannot--you
can’t, uh, show me why there is unity or disharmony in anything. Why everything
is not the same or why everything is not ultimately diverse.” He says, “On the
other hand, on my system of thought, I can give you the basis for unity and
diversity, the one and the many.” And therefore, that’s a transcendental
argument.
But you see, in a subtle sense, that sounds like the teleological argument. I can--I can show you the rational or the intellectual epistemological order of all things if you start with my God, the revelation of my God. It's certainly not teleological in the--in the traditional, natural, theological sense but it has a parallel or an analogy, something of a reflection of that. But you’re right, there’s elements of the ontological movement in that, uh, transcendental thing as well. By the way, that’s, as a philosopher what fascinates me so much: it is a very subtle but powerful argument.
But you see, in a subtle sense, that sounds like the teleological argument. I can--I can show you the rational or the intellectual epistemological order of all things if you start with my God, the revelation of my God. It's certainly not teleological in the--in the traditional, natural, theological sense but it has a parallel or an analogy, something of a reflection of that. But you’re right, there’s elements of the ontological movement in that, uh, transcendental thing as well. By the way, that’s, as a philosopher what fascinates me so much: it is a very subtle but powerful argument.
Dewitt:
You have a question? Somebody back--Craig, yes.
(1:20 mark)
Craig: [Unintelligible]. I’d like to go for a moment to the ontological argument. That’s a separate point, uh, forcing this man or helping this man to [unintelligible] out of his system [unintelligible] is there anything at that point which out of necessity forces him or drives him to move to special revelation [unintelligible] so that he might say “I accept then that the chances of self-existence are greater [unintelligible]”.
Sproul:
I think that’s an excellent question, and the uh, I
sort of quickly alluded to the answer to that today but it was so quick that
maybe you didn’t pick it up, but what I was getting at, in apologetics, defense
of the Christian faith, I’m not interested in stopping at this self-existent
eternal something. Ok? We want to get to the Cross. And that’s why I said
where--He says, “Ok, that’s all there is.” Then we go, as Calvin would say,
from creation to providence, which means dealing now with special revelation as
it occurs in history and specifically as it’s recorded in the Scriptures. So
the next major item of apologetics has to be the defense of the historical
integrity and reliability of Holy Writ. Ok? So that’s where I would take him
next because general revelation only gives us general knowledge of God. It
doesn’t give us the Trinity; it doesn’t give us the redemptive process and all
of that.
Can I finish this? And then you can respond.
And of course, as soon as we get into
questions of history, as I was saying today, you get more and more and more and
more and more into induction. And that’s what everybody seems to be all uptight
about. Because induction involves the problematics of sense perception and this
whole thing that Dr. Bahnsen has been stressing, and that’s the question of
assurance and certainty. And I’m not--I’d like to take three minutes and
connect the answer to your question and at the same time be responding to some
of the things that Greg has pointed out, because this whole question of
certainty is one that I keep getting all the time. One of the cheap criticisms
we get is that all we leave people with are probabilities. Whereas, the
Presuppositionalist’s approach leaves us with certainty. And I certainly am the
first one prepared to say that I can get very muddle-headed at times and miss
things that I shouldn’t miss. But I still have not been able to see how a
higher degree of certainty comes through Presuppositionalism than through our
system because it looks to me like we get less certainty.
And let me explain why I’m getting into this and why we get into history and [unintelligible] and the whole thing. Let me use the standard syllogism as an example of the basic problem of, of uh, object/subject, epistemology, and ontology. Let’s take the old one. “All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore Socrates is mortal.” Now. Let’s look at the conclusion, “Socrates is mortal.”. Have I proven that Socrates is mortal in this syllogism?
Bahnsen: If your premises are true, yes.
Sproul: If my premises are true, then I have given you demonstrative compelling argumentation for the truth of the conclusion, “Socrates is mortal.” That I call philosophical certainty. It’s compelling. Rationally compelling. But what is the problem with it? The truth of the conclusion depends on the truth of the premises. How do we know that all men are mortal? Can we ever know with certainty that all men are mortal? I’m talking about philosophical certainty. What would it take for us to know that all men are mortal? All men would have to die. And for me to know that all men are mortal, the only way I can know it is posthumously, [Audience laughing] all right? I can look at ten zillion examples of mortality but,
And let me explain why I’m getting into this and why we get into history and [unintelligible] and the whole thing. Let me use the standard syllogism as an example of the basic problem of, of uh, object/subject, epistemology, and ontology. Let’s take the old one. “All men are mortal. Socrates is a man. Therefore Socrates is mortal.” Now. Let’s look at the conclusion, “Socrates is mortal.”. Have I proven that Socrates is mortal in this syllogism?
Bahnsen: If your premises are true, yes.
Sproul: If my premises are true, then I have given you demonstrative compelling argumentation for the truth of the conclusion, “Socrates is mortal.” That I call philosophical certainty. It’s compelling. Rationally compelling. But what is the problem with it? The truth of the conclusion depends on the truth of the premises. How do we know that all men are mortal? Can we ever know with certainty that all men are mortal? I’m talking about philosophical certainty. What would it take for us to know that all men are mortal? All men would have to die. And for me to know that all men are mortal, the only way I can know it is posthumously, [Audience laughing] all right? I can look at ten zillion examples of mortality but,
(1:25 mark)
and from an empirical perspective, an
inductive perspective, I’ll never be able to know that this side of the grave.
Bahnsen: Unless God told you before you...
Sproul: Unless God told me. Ok? But then I have to face the question, “How do I know that
Bahnsen: Unless God told you before you...
Sproul: Unless God told me. Ok? But then I have to face the question, “How do I know that
the voice I heard in my ear was the voice of
God?” Because I’m still dependant upon my sense perception and induction at
that point of distinguishing that voice from the voice of the devil. So,
anyway, in terms of my syllogism here, my primary premise is dependant to some
degree on induction, which throws me into a level of uncertainty. How do I know
Socrates--even if I do know that all men are mortal, how do I know that this
particular fellow, Socrates, is a man? Maybe he’s a clone. See? [Audience
laughing]. Maybe he’s a bi--you know, a first century or fourth century BC
bionic reconstruction. You know. There were a lot of good slight of hand magicians
in those days. How do I know for sure he’s a man? For absolute certainty? No.
The evidence is pretty strong, empirically, that he is, but I don’t know that
for certainty. I don’t know all there is to know about that individual. All I
can say is that if all men are mortal, if Socrates is a man, then certainly
he’s mortal. I can tell you that much. Ok?
That’s where I was trying to get to actually today, that if something exists now, I can tell you this much: something’s always existed ‘cause something can’t come from nothing. That I’m certain about. Ok? Now. But the fact that something exists, that anything exists, that even I exist, involves induction, and that gives us uncertainty. The only way we can have absolute philosophical certainty about anything is in the pure formal realm. [Audio issue; repeats last two sentences]. Now unfortunately that doesn’t get us into the real world. And as soon as we get into induction, we get into the level of uncertainty. Ok?
That’s where I was trying to get to actually today, that if something exists now, I can tell you this much: something’s always existed ‘cause something can’t come from nothing. That I’m certain about. Ok? Now. But the fact that something exists, that anything exists, that even I exist, involves induction, and that gives us uncertainty. The only way we can have absolute philosophical certainty about anything is in the pure formal realm. [Audio issue; repeats last two sentences]. Now unfortunately that doesn’t get us into the real world. And as soon as we get into induction, we get into the level of uncertainty. Ok?
And here’s the problem with that word “certainty.
That word “certainty” is used in at least three different ways. One, in terms
of philosophical, rational, demonstrability, that is compelling. Ok? My
assertion is only formal logic and deduction can do that. That doesn’t help us
in terms of getting to the real world. Two, the term “certainty” is used to
describe a feeling state that is associated with an idea or an assertion. Here
I think David Hume has done us a great service in his analysis of the nature of
belief. You can say to me, “Do I believe in God?” and I can say to you, “No!”,
or I can say to you, “No”, or I can say, “I don’t think so”, or I can say, “I
don’t know”, or I can say, “Maybe”, or I can say, “I think so”, or I can say,
“Yeah”, or I can say “Yes! And I’m ready to die for it”. All those are
different degrees of statements of feeling state that associate with an idea.
We talk about surety or an assurance, the anchor that holds our souls, that
makes us go the way they go.
Then the other kind of certainty we talk about is what we call---that Greg called moral, er, a cop-out, and that’s moral certainty. I don’t think it is a cop-out. We use it very effectively in our society. Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. Guy comes into a courtroom, he’s on trial for murder. Let’s take Jack Ruby. On a television screen fifty million people watch him shoot down Lee Harvey Oswald in a Dallas Police Station. Not only fifty million people see it on tv and record it on video-tape, but there’s fifty people in the room that see him do it in person. The gun is in his hands, his fingerprints are all over the gun, the bullet in the body, and the ballistics matches the chamber of the gun and the barrel of the gun and all of that stuff. Ok? Now we come to the courtroom with the evidence
Then the other kind of certainty we talk about is what we call---that Greg called moral, er, a cop-out, and that’s moral certainty. I don’t think it is a cop-out. We use it very effectively in our society. Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. Guy comes into a courtroom, he’s on trial for murder. Let’s take Jack Ruby. On a television screen fifty million people watch him shoot down Lee Harvey Oswald in a Dallas Police Station. Not only fifty million people see it on tv and record it on video-tape, but there’s fifty people in the room that see him do it in person. The gun is in his hands, his fingerprints are all over the gun, the bullet in the body, and the ballistics matches the chamber of the gun and the barrel of the gun and all of that stuff. Ok? Now we come to the courtroom with the evidence
(1:30 mark)
that Ruby shot Oswald. Is it absolutely
certain that Jack Ruby shot Lee Harvey Oswald? Certainly not. Certainly not.
The whole thing could have been staged by NBC to delude fifty million people.
And the fifty guys in the station could have been corroborative or they could
all have been on an acid-trip while it was going on and it was done with
mirrors. But you say, “Wait a minute, the guy’s fingerprints were all over the
gun, and we know that no two people in this world have the same set of fingerprints”.
We don’t know that no two people in this world have the same set of
fingerprints any more than we know that all men are mortal because we haven’t
examined every set of fingerprints. No two that we’ve found yet are exactly the
same, but maybe one that we’ll find tomorrow.
See this is the probability quotient of skepticism
that Hume gives us would show that, that maybe Lee Harvey Oswald--or that Jack
Ruby didn’t, in fact, fire the gun. So
here, I’m the defense attorney and I stand up in court and say, “Maybe the
whole thing was a massively contrived deal by NBC, mass illusion by the people
there, they were all on LSD, and Jack Ruby’s fingerprints may match the ones on
the gun, but they’re not the same guy”. And I can argue philosophically that the
court can not prove his guilt. That’s why we have a category in this world of
reasonable doubt, of moral culpability. How much evidence is required for God
to give the world before He holds us accountable? Who says that we have to have
rationally inescapable arguments before we’re morally culpable to respond to
Jesus Christ? Who ever added that into the game? The Bible doesn’t say that.
The Bible says that God is holding us accountable for the evidence He has given
us. That it’s sufficient to cause us to acquiesce to the evidence that has been
brought forth.
Now if you want philosophically perfect
evidence of perfect knowledge, of anything, including your own existence not to
mention the Word of God or the existence of God, I’m going to tell you what
you’re going to have to have. You’re going to have to do better than a
transcendental presupposition. Because you always face a choice that your own
presupposition of the existence of God is arbitrary. And sure, it’s the only
thing that makes sense out of the world, it’s the only thing that makes
rationality out of the world, but what if maybe the world doesn’t make sense?
Big deal if that’s the only one that’ll work. That’s where the nihilist comes
back and says, “Sir I’ll tell you what. Don’t give me that stuff about ‘We
start with God”. You don’t have any certainty there, you have a preference. You
have a personal assertion, philosophically”. You have not certainty because
it’s subjective than you have when you have objective data to support this.
Now let me finish this, ok, before you get
all excited. [Audience laughing]. [Unintelligible].
The problem we’re dealing with here is the
problem of creatureliness. The only way I can think of to have absolute
certainty about anything is to have omniscience. And that we don’t have. That
belongs only to God. We’re creatures who deal on the basis of the information
and the testimony by which God gives us. And what kind of evidence does God
give to the world by which He holds the world culpable? Does God just give presuppositions?
Or does He raise Jesus Christ from the dead and have eyewitness testimony in a
manner of history and says therefore, you know, these former days of ignorance
did God overlook but now God commands all men everywhere to repent? ‘Cause He
has shown that He has judged people [unintelligible] by this one whom He has
proven, you see, by resurrection. And I consider the resurrection of Jesus
Christ as evidence that makes the whole world morally culpable to it. Sure we
don’t have perfect certainty. We’ve got enough to send us to Hell if we don’t
submit to it.
Bahnsen:
I think that, uh, a lot more needs to be said about
certainty and we’re not going to get to a lot of questions if I say as much as
I’d like to, but let me give just a few very quick points about certainty as R.
C. as mentioned it. He says that certainty applies only to deductive certainty
like that. I’d like to say it doesn’t even apply to that. As strange as it may
seem in terms of modern logic, and in terms of transcendental argumentation,
(1:35 mark)
I can show you that, in fact, that’s not even
a certain proposition. I mean, give you the truth of the premises, notice that
this is a form of the argument
Sproul:
Rationally certain, that’s all.
Bahnsen: Not even rationally certain. “All A is B. C is A.” And therefore what? “C is B”. Now there’s two reasons why that, in fact, is not deductively certain. First of all, if this is certain, it must be an application of the law of modus ponens. Alright? That’s a basic law of logic. “If A, then B. A, therefore B.” Now, do I know that this is an application of the law of modus ponens? Well, we’re pretty sure, seems rather simple. We couldn’t be wrong. Until you take your analogy of logic to mathematics, and start saying, “Well, is two plus two four?” Are we certain of that? Well, we seem to be because it seems, you know, fairly easy, it’s low-level and all that. But now, very quickly, if I had to give you a five digit number and a five digit number and then give you an answer and say, “Now, is that also true?” Well, we might look at it quickly and say, “Yeah, that’s true, too.” And then, lo and behold, you go back and you say, “As much as I know the rules of math, and as much as I know what those figures are, my senses didn’t deceive me, in fact, I made a mistake in math.” So it’s not a question about the laws of math it’s a question of whether I have applied the laws of math. And even in low-level cases of, you know, all men being mortal and Socrates being a man, the question arises, even for logicians, “Are you applying your formal laws?” You can be mistaken in identifying a case of modus ponens.
Bahnsen: Not even rationally certain. “All A is B. C is A.” And therefore what? “C is B”. Now there’s two reasons why that, in fact, is not deductively certain. First of all, if this is certain, it must be an application of the law of modus ponens. Alright? That’s a basic law of logic. “If A, then B. A, therefore B.” Now, do I know that this is an application of the law of modus ponens? Well, we’re pretty sure, seems rather simple. We couldn’t be wrong. Until you take your analogy of logic to mathematics, and start saying, “Well, is two plus two four?” Are we certain of that? Well, we seem to be because it seems, you know, fairly easy, it’s low-level and all that. But now, very quickly, if I had to give you a five digit number and a five digit number and then give you an answer and say, “Now, is that also true?” Well, we might look at it quickly and say, “Yeah, that’s true, too.” And then, lo and behold, you go back and you say, “As much as I know the rules of math, and as much as I know what those figures are, my senses didn’t deceive me, in fact, I made a mistake in math.” So it’s not a question about the laws of math it’s a question of whether I have applied the laws of math. And even in low-level cases of, you know, all men being mortal and Socrates being a man, the question arises, even for logicians, “Are you applying your formal laws?” You can be mistaken in identifying a case of modus ponens.
And you see that’s one of the things that
pagan man, that Willard Van Orman Quine, the logician at Harvard, has pointed
out so tellingly, that nobody can be purely formal, and nobody can have
deductive certainty of that sort. And secondly, there’s this question: why is
the law of modus ponens to be
accepted? Well I’ll give you a very “black-box” explanation of it. Modus Ponens, this “If A, then B. A,
therefore B” is to be accepted on these grounds. If this black box is true, and
I’m not going to fill in all the technical philosophy for you because it’d just
bore you and probably, you know, send you home, but whatever it is, if that is
true, then modus ponens holds. Second
premise, all those things said in the black box are true. Conclusion, modus ponens holds. Now how do you know
that modus ponens is a valid form of
logical argumentation? Well, this is my argument for modus ponens, simply put. What’s the problem? The very argument is
using modus ponens to prove modus ponens. Even though there’s
something beyond modus ponens, in a
sense, it still has to be cast in this form. And therefore, that argument, in
fact, is uncertain in the most radical sense. In two senses, one ‘cause I’m not
sure it is a case of modus ponens,
because I can always make mistakes in math and logic, and secondly, even modus ponens cannot be argued for
without modus ponens. And so, if it’s
the case that only logic and math give us certainty, my answer is, just playing
the part of the devil’s advocate, even they don’t give you certainty.
Well, what does give you certainty? Well,
it’s been a Reformed distinctive, you know, for these four hundred years, sola Scriptura. Not my reasoning. Not my
identification of the green grass. Nothing is certain in this world, not even
my apologetical arguments, for that matter. The only thing that is certain is
the Word of God.
Sproul(?):
How’s that certain?
Bahnsen: It’s certain because the One who speaks it can make no mistakes.
Bahnsen: It’s certain because the One who speaks it can make no mistakes.
Sproul:
How do you know it’s the Word of God?
Bahnsen:
Well, now we’re going to get to that. [Audience
laughing]. Let me see, as Calvin put it, there is this, uh, objective general
revelation and the self-attestation of the Scripture, and as the Westminster
Confession says, that “By all these means it does show itself to be the Word of
God”, and Paul says that, in fact, all men are without excuse if they don’t
accept the preaching of the Gospel. Now what kind of argument could Paul have
been thinking of? Well, in the, in Romans and in 1 Corinthians where he makes
these kinds of statements, he talks about the foolishness of unbelief and what
happens if you reject those statements. I daresay that that is a primitive form
of the transcendental argument. He’s arguing from the impossibility of the
contrary.
By the way, I have an article entitled, um,
“Pragmatism , Prejudice, and Presuppositionalism” which talks about
philosophical or epistemological certainty and how Presuppositionalists deal
with that, and I’m just going to refer you to that. If you have only
probability, as, uh, if you have only probability that the Bible is the Word of
God or that God exists or all the rest, that must mean at least this: that
while there are many reasons to think that the Bible is the Word of God, there
are some to think that it’s not. Because if there were no reasons to think that
the Bible’s not the Word of God, it wouldn’t be probability it’d be certainty.
And so when R. C. or any
(1:40 mark)
old Princeton apologist says that very
probably the Bible is the Word of God, he is also saying there’s a slight
probability that it’s not. Slight--you may think that the probability that it
is is greater than the other, although, I daresay nobody knows how to rate
probability when it comes to those kind of arguments, so saying one is more
than the other doesn’t get anywhere. Everybody’s lost in a sea of skepticism if
it’s only probability. But even if you could say there’s a greater probability
that the Bible’s the Word of God than it’s not, you’re still saying that
there’s some reason to think that it’s not. And I daresay that you haven’t met
Paul’s condition of leaving the believer without excuse, because on the day of judgment
he could say, that, “Lord, don’t you see there was some reason to think that
the Bible wasn’t the Word of God.” Paul says there is no reason to think that,
that the man is without an apologetic. And that’s why I say we’ve got to press
the man back, back, back to see that if he doesn’t have a transcendental
foundation, he doesn’t have anything, and that is a form of certainty.
Sproul:
Greg?
Bahnsen:
One last point, and then I really want to let
another question come. Is the Resurrection evidence, and is it God’s proof that
Jesus is divine? Without a doubt. God has given us evidence of all sorts. You
know, from the five hundred witnesses of the Resurrection to the millions of
stars in the sky, everything that exists, every fact is proof that God exists
and holds us morally accountable, and the Resurrection is evidence par excellence. But notice what Peter
says, “Let the house of Israel know with full assurance,” not just probably
that He rose from the dead, “with full assurance.” The apostolic word gives us,
in fact, absolute certainty of the Resurrection and not just moral persuasion,
not simply probability. And I’d say that’s possible because the apostles
realized that sola Scriptura, the
Word of God is the foundation of all certainty, and to deny that one had to
deny the very conditions of intelligibility.
Sproul:
Greg, how do you know the Bible’s the Word of God?
I haven’t a single response to that question. You’ve quoted the Bible, but you
haven’t answered--
Bahnsen:
I know it from the impossibility of the contrary.
Dewitt:
James, you--
James: Mr. Bahnsen, I wonder if you might give us your evaluation of
Paul’s apologetical method that he used on Mars Hill. I think you will try and
show us that he was a Presuppositionalist, and I wonder then if you would allow
R. C. to respond to that.
Dewitt:
Uh, we have, uh, twelve minutes, that’s a
formidable project--
Bahnsen:
Let me just say that I have a published essay that
deals with that question that’s available in the bookstore and R. C.’s going to
speak on that subject tomorrow night, so maybe that will suffice.
Dewitt: You had a chance, now, David?
David:
[Unintelligible]. [Audience laughing].
Dewitt:
Identify yourself, Sir.
David:
[Unintelligible]. [Audience laughing]. If you know
nothing, uh, for certain, empirically or inductively, right? That’s what you’re
saying? Then you can’t know anything at all for certain, right? It seems to me,
though, that Scripture, and I’m hearing, in fact, the same argument, that
Scripture does say you can know certainly, that over and over again in
Scripture the writers are saying these things are written so that you can know
certainly, and that, uh, we are, uh, you say men know certainly that God
exists, uh, but you can’t know for certain that men know that God exists. It
seems you show [?] the same skepticism that Gordon Clark does, and I would
wonder what your response to that would be.
Sproul:
Again, let me repeat the difference between how the
word “certainty” is used. The Bible speaks of having assurance. I have a
blessed assurance. But my knowledge of what the Bible is and what the Bible
says is fallible. ‘Cause I’m less than omniscient. When I’m talking about
certainty, I’m talking about philosophical certainty in a very technically
defined manner. And in that sense, I don’t have certainty about anything. Even
that I’m right here. Deduction, I think, can give us far more certainty than
Greg allows, in terms of the relationships of propositions and the laws of
mediate inference and that sort of thing. But, I grant, that that’s even then
only if rationality is valid. And the only way you can have rationality as
valid, I’ve already yielded, is that, ultimately, that God exists. But I cannot
know for certainty, by, you know, that God exists. I can have full assurance of
heart when the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit comes--see, I look at the
evidence, all the evidence is overwhelming, Holy Spirit tells me, “Hey, that
evidence is true. That’s for real.” You know? Cool. How will I know for sure
that the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit isn’t indigestion? I’m playing
devil’s advocate now. I have to deal with pagans everyday. And not just Christians.
And I’m not going to go up to them and say, “Because I say so.”
(1:45 mark)
(1:45 mark)
And that’s what you’re left with. And that
gives you precious little certainty. Because then, in the final analysis, all I
have is the autonomy of your presuppositions about the boldest assertion the
world has ever heard, the existence of God. And I want to know how you escape
subjectivism, I want to know how you escape fideism, I haven’t heard it yet. I
keep hearing denials about fideism. Fideism historically means the rejection of
natural theology, by definition. You know, historically, going all the way back
to [unintelligible] right up through the history of, of, uh, philosophy, the
term “fideism” has meant that any knowledge of God must come not through
natural theology but through faith. I’ve heard all night that we don’t come
through natural theology, we do come through faith, but we’re not fideists. I’m
absolutely bewildered at that point.
Bahnsen:
Could I, could I answer before you go any further?
That in fact the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit has nothing to do with
rational argumentation, it has to do with subjective persuasion.
Sproul:
Right.
Bahnsen:
And that it’s the objective evidence that the
apologist has to deal with. And then we must pray, you know, God-willing in His
grace that the subjective testimony of the Spirit accompanies that making a man
pliable to the evidence. But Van Til and the Presuppositionalists have, are not
saying, that we know it’s true because of the internal testimony of the Holy
Spirit. They’re saying there’s a self-attesting revelation of God that, if it
is denied, you have denied the grounds of rational argumentation.
Sproul:
But how do you know that your presupposition is
true? Where does your certainty come from? That’s what I keep trying to ask.
Bahnsen: From the impossibility of the contrary.
Bahnsen: From the impossibility of the contrary.
Sproul:
Alright, how is the contrary impossible?
Bahnsen:
Well, want me to go through a few of the schools of
philosophy and show you?
Sproul:
How is it, is it utterly impossible, utterly
impossible and unthinkable that there be no God?
Bahnsen:
We have one school of thought, Rationalism.
Rationalism says that anything that is true has got to be coherent. Alright? You
have another school of thought, empiricism. Anything that’s true has got to
meet a standard of sense experience. Then there are other schools of thought
that try to combine Rationalism and Empiricism in any number of ways--a lot of
permutations of the combinations. Now I’m saying that we know the Bible is the
Word of God from the impossibility of the contrary. If somebody denies that the
Bible is the Word of God and that the sovereign, triune God of Scripture
doesn’t exist, and he wants to be a Rationalist, then we can we start asking
him about the possibility of coherence in a chance universe. Because as R. C.
as shown, if nothing else, in his lecture this afternoon, those are the
alternatives.
Alright. We can show, in fact, that the
Rationalist has to be a pure Rationalist to get his Rationalism going. How
‘bout the Empiricist? Well, he says sense experience, it won’t do any good to
be up here in the clouds with all these formal systems that don’t do anything
material for us. Empiricist says sense experience is the criterion of truth.
And then you say, “Well, do you know that sense experience is the criterion of
truth because you validated that through sense experience?” “No, I haven’t.”
“Well, then, you don’t know that it’s true, and so you’ve undermined your
ultimate presupposition”. And then there are people who say, “Yeah, but what if
we try to put the two together and prop them up and make, you know, some sort
of epistemology that way?” And as Anthony Flew says, what good is it going to
do you to take one leaky bucket and add it to another leaky bucket? You’re just
going to have a twofold leaky bucket now. And so all of those things are just
the same thing.
That’s the history of philosophy in a thumbnail
sketch. From the impossibility of the contrary, you can’t have logic, you can’t
have sense experience without something that goes beyond them, a transcendental
foundation.
Sproul:
Time-out. That’s not the impossibility of the
contrary.
Bahnsen:
It is.
Sproul:
That’s what--what you have done is shown us that
without God, we’ve got leaky buckets. Ok?
Bahnsen:
Without God you can’t even--
Sproul:
What you haven’t shown me, is you haven’t shown me
why we can’t be in one big leaky bucket.
[Audience laughing].
Dewitt:
Identify yourself.
Unidentified
man: [Unintelligible]of uh, presuppositionalism
[unintelligible] in neo-orthodox thinking. It seems to me to get away from the
historical findings and what happens with Platonian thinking on apologetics.
How they allowed it to, uh, seep into their, uh, systematic theology
[unintelligible] how they allowed their natural theology to be the basis of
their proving of Scripture, particularly [unintelligible] and even as far as Thornwell
and all the Presbyterians, uh, fall into the same trap. If you’re going to
follow, uh, your natural theology you’re going to have to cut it off at some
point, uh, of where it’s going to be just your apologetics and your apologetics
is not able to be linked to your systematic theology. And in my opinion, you
don’t have that problem with, uh, Presuppositionalism [unintelligible].
(1:50 mark)
Dewitt:
One observation before I let you answer. I think we
ought to be careful of saying, of men like Thornwell and others that they “fell
into a trap”. If they thought something, we had better take it seriously even
though we come to the conclusion that they were wrong. Dr. Sproul.
Sproul:
I’m perfectly delighted with what the Princeton
school did with their defense of Scripture. I think it’s the best defense of
Scripture that the world has ever seen. I don’t think it’s been improved upon
and I wish we’d get back to it. I have no reason to apologize for B.B.
Warfield’s defense of the infallibility of Scripture because it does provide
objective evidence and not just a gratuitous assumption that this is the Word
of God. That the, that it’s--I’d like to know the difference between how a
Presuppositionalist defends the Scripture as the Word of God and a Muslim
defends the Koran. Now, I know how Gordon Clark does it: this is the Word of
God, it says it’s the Word of God, since it is the Word of God, and it says the
words “Word of God” it must be the Word of God. That’s, that’s--you know you
may call that a beautiful circle. I call it a vicious circle, and that does
give the pagan an excuse for rejecting it.
Bahnsen:
I agree.
Sproul:
Good.
[Audience laughing].
Dewitt:
Go ahead.
Unidentified:
Uh, I, in the midst of my question I’m going to ask
you a “yes or no” question. [Audience laughing]. What you’re saying is that,
philosophically, men cannot be certain. You’ve said that, right?
Sproul:
Ultimately, yes.
Unidentified
man: And could God therefore, since He is the
source of all logic, the source of truth and wisdom, is He certain?
Sproul:
Can God be certain?
Unidentified
man: Yes.
Sproul:
Yes.
Unidentified
man: Ok, I knew you would say yes to that.
[Audience laughing]. Well, then, what I really want to know, is, I want to be
sure of your position, I want to know exactly what you meant. Are you saying
then that the only one that is philosophically certain is God?
Sproul:
Yes.
Unidentified
man: And therefore, for us to have any certainty at
all, you know, and, and not, not the philosophical, but the, the feeling
certainty you were talking about, is to look at God’s revelation of Himself and
that gives us, uh, the certainty and the Holy Spirit working within us? That
those together give us that feeling certainty that you were talking about, and
therefore that the only way we can have that feeling certainty is to look to
God’s revelation in nature--
Sproul:
Nope.
Unidentified
man: That’s not what you were saying?
Sproul:
No, I’m saying that God has created us as
creatures, now I’m talking as a Christian now, obviously. I think He’s created
us as creatures, He’s giving us, He’s given us finite capacity for learning.
I’m not a skeptic with respect to meaningful knowledge and meaningful
discourse. I am a skeptic with respect to the technical concept of absolute
philosophical certainty. But I’m not a common sense skeptic, you know, I think
that God has given us creaturely ability to learn things. He’s given us a mind
by which we can learn that two and two are four. He’s given us, uh, not perfect
sense perception. Our senses can, in fact, be deceived. Nonetheless, when I see
a truck coming down the street, I get out of the way. You know?
[Audience laughing].
I have enough trust in the basic reliability
of my sense perception on a common sense level. I am a creature, created in the
image of God, finite, limited in my perception, dim and dull in certain aspects
of my, uh, abilities. Nonetheless, I have a talent for knowledge that is
workable, it is practical, for which I am culpable of making creaturely, moral
decisions. All I’m saying at that point is that I’m not omniscient. I don’t
think that warrants at all the kind of skepticism that Hume was talking about
or even that, uh, Dr. Clark talks about. And I--and, and it’s almost unfair to
say that what we say is “Well, probably God exists”. There’s an emotive
connotation to that word. And it’s one thing for me to say, “Ah, yeah, probably
God exists”. It’s another thing for me to say, “I grant, that I’m not
infallible, and I’m not omniscient, and I can’t give you the kind of certainty
that God can speak with, but I’ll tell you what, pal, the evidence for the
existence of God is so overwhelming that you better repent in a hurry”, you
know. I’m not saying “Probably there’s a God”, I’m saying “Surely there’s a
God! I’m sure there’s a God, here’s why I’m sure.” I think the evidence is
overwhelming
(1:55 mark)
that there’s a God, and that you have to flee
from reason, and flee from normal sense perception in order to escape the
evidence for the existence of God. We’re saying that the evidence of the
existence of God is so overwhelming that if a man denies the existence of God
he’s flying in the face of moral, you know, it’s an immoral decision. Not
because there’s a deficiency of the objective evidence. Calvin never says the
evidence is insufficient to make us culpable. The insufficiency rests with our
moral disposition against God.
(Transcription provided by Chris Lee and Adam
Dean.)