Steve

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~mcgrath/nattheo.html

“Dr. Bahnsen argued that the Islamic doctrine of “tanzih” (or transcendence) – which says that no human language can positively describe Allah because he is allegedly “incomparable” (Surah 42:11) – would render it logically impossible for the Koran to be what it claims to be, a positive revelation and description of Allah.”

http://www.cmfnow.com/articles/pa123.htm

I would be more interested in Robert Morey’s book simply because we have never doubted his orthodoxy. I will never forget, Dr. Morey. what the last John Gerstner wrote about your work on Death and the Afterlife… I am paraphrasing, but he said it was so thorough in its refutation of annihilationism is was like going after a fly with a cannon!

TMS Jenison, MI

…saying, “someone else could claim the same thing” isn’t a defeater for the truth of what Christianity claims.

No, it’s a defeater for the claim that your beliefs have any more credibility than anyone else’s claims about anything. Any number of other religious believers could use exactly your methods of argument to defend with exactly as much power a set of claims which contradict yours. So why should anyone believe yours? Or trust this whole argument-by-assertion methodology you promulgate?

And no matter how many times you say these truths are grounded only in our own personal authority, it doesn’t make it so. As Plantinga likes to say, an argument is needed.

In this case, I agree with Plantinga – but I think the person who needs to provide an argument is you. Despite your claim on another thread that ” no one here makes the argument that we’re right because we’re really sure we’re right”, that’s essentially all your compatriots have done so far – to assert over and over that in fact their arguments for God work because God is really real. In other words, they have been telling me that I should believe in their God, not because there are good reasons to, but because I should trust their authority when they tell me who God is.

And yes, other belief systems claim to be God’s word, but if God is who he says he is then his word and his creation by his word will match up, won’t they?

One problem with this that I don’t have access to “who [God] says he is”, I only have access to who you say he is – and who other people say he is. Another problem is that I don’t know which “word” is actually God’s, or how I would be able to tell. Yet another problem is that matching your interpretation of “word” up to with your observations about “creation” does not actually imply that either the “word” or the “creation” belong to any particular god.

If all claims really are just everyone’s own personal authority…

I don’t know where you got the idea that I’m saying that – I’m absolutely not. In the real world, people do sometimes defer to authority, but they also consider arguments, past experience, and new evidence. They consider conflicting claims and try to choose the claims that meet certain shared standards like logical consistency, parsimony, and source reliability. It’s true that some standards are subjective, but some are objective – logical consistency, for example, is an objective standard. You claim to make the Bible your objective standard (which strikes me as absurd, given the myriad contradictory creeds your “objective standard” has spawned) but you seem to be unable to give any reason why taking your (minority) understanding of the Bible as a standard would be a good idea.

As for your closing questions, I’ll defer to Voltaire:

Formerly there were those who said: You believe things that are incomprehensible, inconsistent, impossible because we have commanded you to believe them; go then and do what is unjust because we command it. Such people show admirable reasoning. Truly, whoever is able to make you absurd is able to make you unjust. If the God-given understanding of your mind does not resist a demand to believe what is impossible, then you will not resist a demand to do wrong to that God-given sense of justice in your heart. As soon as one faculty of your soul has been dominated, other faculties will follow as well. And from this derives all those crimes of religion which have overrun the world.

There are going to be a lot of claims that Christianity makes that look similar to other religions and other philosophies, and a lot of claims that Christianity makes that other religions *could* make as well. Of course anyone can formally just say that they’re right. That formal claim doesn’t make anything true. But saying, “someone else could claim the same thing” isn’t a defeater for the truth of what Christianity claims. Personally, I think the problem of “the one and the many” is a problem for Greeks under their metaphysic – not a problem for Christians. So if you don’t buy the Greek schema, you probably won’t care about the proposed solution.

And no matter how many times you say these truths are grounded only in our own personal authority, it doesn’t make it so. As Plantinga likes to say, an argument is needed. Of course the beliefs are our own personal beliefs, but they are grounded in Scripture, which is God’s word. And yes, other belief systems claim to be God’s word, but if God is who he says he is then his word and his creation by his word will match up, won’t they? Without claiming God’s word as the final authority (we can argue over being consistent with that claim another time), your final authority will always be yourself. It will only be your personal opinion. Telling us, “hey, you do it too!” really doesn’t change the fact that it’s just your opinion, does it? If all claims really are just everyone’s own personal authority, why even care if we’re ‘wrong’, when ‘wrong’ incorrectly (or correctly?) assumes objectivity? If that’s the case, you’d be completely fine with Christians having our epistemic preferences, regardless of whether you share them formally or substantially.

By the way, part 1 of your Theology on the Go video, where it seems you explain why the problem is a problem, seems to have vanished. I could only find part 2.

You wrote,

I’m not standing on my own authority, but on the authority of God’s authoritative revelation…

…Fundamentally I don’t believe in Jesus Christ because of rational argumentation, but because in his grace he has revealed himself in creation and the Bible and he has been pleased to save me from my sin.

The problem is, Camden, that if you’re not convinced by rational argumentation, you only have your own authority – the authority by which you say to yourself (and others), “This book is God’s word, and that book is not.” Once you’ve made that authoritative declaration, you can go on to say that you’re following God’s authority… but on whose authority did you decide that you possessed God’s revelation? Only yours. No rational argumentation, no evidence, no reasons – just your feeling, hunch, intuition, whatever. Talk about autonomous!

It feels orthodox.

That’s also easy to say, Camden. But anyone else can say the same thing about their own gods – or even about the non-existence of certain gods. It’s very easy to say. And even if you say it all day every day it won’t attain any more epistemic power than your own personal authority.

I’m not standing on my own authority, but on the authority of God’s authoritative revelation.

Let me make a brief response to your comments of other gods. Islam in particular espouses a monistic metaphysic which at root won’t support intelligibility and basic predication. Solve the problem of the one-and-many without the Triune God revealed in the Bible and then we can talk more about my feelings.

Methodologically, we engage in apologetics via the impossibility of the contrary. This, however, isn’t the basis of Christian belief. Fundamentally I don’t believe in Jesus Christ because of rational argumentation, but because in his grace he has revealed himself in creation and the Bible and he has been pleased to save me from my sin.

I, of course, would no more rely on the Muslim’s authority than I would rely on yours, Nick. Or Camden’s. Or the men who wrote the book you claim to draw your authority from, or the men who wrote the Muslim’s book. You all have exactly the same level of authority when it comes to claims about God or gods, and that level is exactly the same as mine. Why do you pretend you have more?

I’m interesteded in reading your book and perhaps getting a copy for the library at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. Is there anyway we can get a free copy.

Jeff Downs

“We cannot properly set off the Reformed faith against the Roman Catholic Faith unless natural theology be rejected as springing from the autonomous man’s efforts to keep from facing the claims of his Creator Redeemer God. We cannot even set off the Protestant view of faith unless we distinguish God’s clear revelation speaking to us in man and in nature and man’s false response to this clear revelation in his natural theology.”
-Cornelius Van Til

Unfortunately, you continued with, “That’s where, in the methodology, it’s helpful to use the transcendental method to say, ‘There’s no other way the world could exist as it does, except according to the God that’s revealed himself in nature and in Scripture.’”

That’s also easy to say, Camden. But anyone else can say the same thing about their own gods – or even about the non-existence of certain gods. It’s very easy to say. And even if you say it all day every day it won’t attain any more epistemic power than your own personal authority.

How is it that you can grasp a concept – that claims of revelation are easy to make – and yet not apply it to your own arguments and positions? What does that feel like?

Jamin H