“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). For centuries Christians have taken this Bible verse to teach the doctrine of creation ex nihilo. Before the creation of the world, there was only God: the eternal Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. When God freely decided to create, he created ex nihilo, out of nothing. But this classical Christian doctrine leads to some perilous conclusions when taken in conjunction with Alvin Plantinga’s assertion that propositions exist necessarily. In this paper, I will exposit this problem and attempt to show that there are good reasons to think that propositions exist contingently, and that Plantinga offers no convincing reasons to think they exist necessarily.

First, I will present Alvin Plantinga’s understanding of the nature of propositions and their necessary existence. Second, I will attempt to show that one cannot cogently bring together both a Plantingalian belief in the necessary existence of propositions and a classical Christian doctrine of God and creation. Third, I will elaborate a weakness of Plantinga’s argument for the necessary existence of propositions and further contend that propositions exist contingently. Finally, I will acknowledge some implications of the contingent existence of propositions.

A preliminary word must be said about the philosophical method I will implement in the following paper. I take it that the goal of Christian philosophy is the acquisition of wisdom about God, the world, and humanity. I also take it that an essential component of gaining wisdom is discovering truth, and that, by the grace of God, some of the most important truths have been given to man in the “rule of faith” revealed in the Scriptures and summarized in the statements of ecumenical Christianity.^[1] Furthermore, I take it that important truths have been revealed to man through his pre-theoretical intuitions, and that it is additionally important for Christian philosophers to make philosophical systemizations that are grounded in their intuitions. However, when the latter pair (our pre-theoretical intuitions and philosophical systemizations) come into conflict with the former pair (the Scriptures and ecumenism), the latter pair must be reoriented and sometimes jettisoned.

I will attempt in the following paper to examine Plantinga’s understanding of propositions with a high value for philosophical rigor and a deep devotion to the Scriptures and creeds of Christianity, but also with a strong conviction that these two paired elements of Christian philosophical investigation must be properly related. Our pre-philosophical seemings and philosophical speculations must be made subordinate to the authority of the Scriptures and their ecumenical interpretation. I think this is nothing more than to say that we Christians must philosophize by faith, and not by sight (cf. 2 Corinthians 5:7).[2]

 “Necessity” in Plantinga’s Construal of Propositions

Plantinga recognizes two different ways a proposition can be necessary: a proposition can be necessary with respect to its truth value, and a proposition can be necessary with respect to its exemplification of the property being existent.[3] The former has to do with modality de dicto (modality with respect to a proposition’s truth value), and the second has to do with modality de re (modality with respect to a thing’s exemplifying a property). Plantinga uses possible world semantics to further clarify the two different ways a proposition can be necessary. A possible world, according to Plantinga, is a possible maximal state of affairs, or a complete way that things could have been. We can then say that a proposition, p, is necessarily true if and only if p is true in every possible maximal state of affairs. Furthermore, a proposition, p, necessarily exists if and only if p exists in every possible maximal state of affairs. While in the former case the truth of p cannot fail to obtain in a possible world, in the latter case it is the proposition p that cannot fail to obtain in a possible world. While Plantinga does not think that all propositions are necessarily true—indeed, he thinks that some propositions are necessarily false and still others are contingently true—he does think that propositions necessarily instantiate the property being existent; he thinks all propositions exist in every possible world.

Plantinga believes that propositions have many distinctive characteristics besides necessary existence, two of which are particularly significant for our discussion: their status as primary bearers of truth (and falsity) and their abstract nature.[4] For propositions to be the bearers of truth and falsity means that propositions are those items that can be true or false; they are those entities that can receive and sustain a truth value. For propositions to be abstract means that propositions are not concrete entities; at the very least, they differ in some substantial ways from material items, like the furnishings of a bedroom. Plantinga seems to take the truth-value-bearing nature of propositions for granted, without any serious argumentation. He does present one argument for both their abstract nature and their necessary existence. This argument is meant to show that, “propositions…cannot be concrete objects of any sort—at any rate, they can’t be concrete objects that do not exist necessarily.”[5] He means to demonstrate that propositions exist necessarily by establishing that their non-existence implies a contradiction. His argument can be construed in the following way:

(1) Propositions do not exist.

(2) If propositions do not exist, then it is true that propositions do not exist.

(3) If propositions do not exist is true, then it exists.

Therefore,

(4) If propositions do not exist, then at least one proposition exists.

Since (1) is assumed for the sake of argument, (2) and (3) seem obviously true, and (1), (2) and (3) entail the contradiction (4), Plantinga concludes

(5) It is impossible for propositions not to exist (i.e., propositions necessarily exist).

Plantinga uses this argument for the necessary existence of propositions to prove that propositions cannot be contingent concrete objects (like human mental acts).[6]

The Proposition Problem

It seems that a Plantingalian belief in the necessary existence of propositions comes into conflict with some basic tenets of the Christian faith. Call this the Proposition Problem. Before we draw out the Proposition Problem in the form of a reductio, we must first make the ecumenical definition of creation ex nihilo more explicit. Put simply, the ecumenical doctrine of creation ex nihilo asserts that God freely created out of nothing. God created out of nothing because only God existed before he created, and God freely created because God had no compulsion to create beyond his own free choice.[7] As Colin E. Gunton points out, the Athanasian understanding of God and creation ratified at the first Council of Constantinople affirms on the basis of Genesis 1:1 that there is “an absolute ontological distinction between creator and creature” such that for any thing, that thing is either God or God’s creature.[8] Furthermore, while those at the first Council of Constantinople affirmed that God necessarily exists, they equally affirmed that the “creation is contingent.”[9] For our purposes, we can say that the ecumenical doctrine of creation ex nihilo implies

(6) Necessarily, something exists in every possible world if and only if it is numerically identical with God.

An initial problem herein is manifest: the conjunction of a Plantingalian belief in the necessary existence of propositions with the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo leads to a series of implications that come into crass conflict with a traditional Christian doctrine of God. Consider the following reductio:

(6) Necessarily, something exists in every possible world if and only if it is numerically identical with God (from the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo).

(7) 7 + 5 = 12 exists in every possible world (from the Plantingalian affirmation of the necessary existence of propositions).

Therefore,

(8) 7 + 5 = 12 is numerically identical with God.

The above argument shows that if 7 + 5 = 12 necessarily exists, and if the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo is true, then the proposition 7 + 5 = 12 is numerically identical with God. Given the Indiscernibility of Identicals (“a principle than which none sounder can be conceived”[10]), any property that God has, the proposition 7 + 5 = 12 has also, and vice versa. If (8) is true, not only would 7 + 5 = 12 be responsible for my redemption and worthy of worship, but God would also be a mathematical truth. This seems to me to be patently false. The Lord God is the Redeemer of Israel, not 7 + 5 = 12 or any other proposition for that matter. 7 + 5 = 12 is necessarily true, not God. Moreover, if all propositions exist necessarily in the way Plantinga claims, then we can replace 7 + 5 = 12 in (7) and (8) with any other proposition, including the contradiction p & ~p. If Plantinga is right, not only would God be a mathematical truth, he would also violate of the law of non-contradiction. It is clearly absurd, then, to numerically identify God with any proposition, and much more so to numerically identify God with propositions in general. If we know anything from Scripture and our commonsense intuitions, it is that God and propositions cannot be the same thing.[11]

Since creation ex nihilo—including its affirmation of (6)—is a vital ecumenical truth grounded in Scripture that underpins the Christian faith,[12] the only way to avoid the above reductio in an orthodox fashion is to deny that propositions exist necessarily. Propositions, therefore, do not exist in every possible world; (7) is false, and it would be false if we replaced “7 + 5 = 12” with any other proposition. But even if propositions do not exist in every possible world, they clearly exist in some possible worlds, and they certainly exist in this possible world—in the actual world.[13] Since propositions exist in some possible worlds but not all possible worlds, they exist contingently. We can borrow some Athanasian language and conclude that propositions are God’s creatures, distinct from him, freely brought into existence by God’s divine power. Or, in other words, propositions are created objects that exist contingently and are not numerically identical with God.

A Respondeo to Plantinga’s Argument for the Necessary Existence of Propositions

What about Plantinga’s argument that the possible non-existence of propositions implies a contradiction? There is a vital weakness in Plantinga’s argument that significantly reduces the force of his reasoning: (2) is false. If propositions do not exist, then it is neither true nor false that propositions do not exist. This retort at first might seem to violate the law of bivalence, which states that for any proposition, p, p is either true or false. Upon closer inspection, this response to Plantinga leaves bivalence intact. In the words of Toner: “Certainly we insist on bivalence for propositions that exist. But if there is no proposition there at all, why scruple at denying ‘it’ a truth value?”^[14] Surely, if p exists it must be either true or false—but surely it is not the case that p must be either true or false if p does not exist.

It seems that Plantinga’s argument for the necessary existence of propositions is a subtle case of question-begging. This can be seen by further examining Plantinga’s position on actualism and the de dicto/de re modal distinction. Plantinga is a champion of serious actualism: “the view that necessarily no object has a property in a world in which it does not exist.”[15] Plantinga has also argued that “modality de dicto [is] a special case of modality de re”; this is because truth and falsity are properties of propositions.[16] Plantinga’s own work in the metaphysics of modality implies that non-existent propositions cannot be either true or false because non-existent objects cannot have properties, and truth and falsity are properties of propositions. The consequent of (2) is not entailed by the antecedent; it denies the antecedent. By asserting (2) Plantinga has merely assumed that propositions exist in every possible world, instead of proved it.

There is a possibility that I have misconstrued Plantinga’s argument for the necessary existence of propositions. Instead of a formal argument intended to establish that the possible non-existence of propositions implies a contradiction, Plantinga may intend to point out that it is counterintuitive to affirm that propositions could not exist. On this interpretation, Plantinga is arguing that it seems wrong to affirm that it is possible for propositions not to exist. If this is indeed the proper representation of Plantinga’s argument, then the easy response to Plantinga is that we do not share his intuition, and, furthermore, that what seems true to him by intuition comes into frightful conflict with the Christian doctrine of God and creation. We are safe to conclude, therefore, that neither reading of Plantinga’s argument for the necessary existence of propositions causes problems for Christians who wish to affirm that propositions are created, contingent entities.

Three Implications of the Contingent Existence of Propositions

There are a series of implications for many of the philosophical disciplines that result if propositions are created, contingently existent realities. Take philosophy of religion, for example. If propositions did not exist before God created, then it was not true that God exists before he created. This implication for philosophy of religion is not as radical as one might initially expect. Technically we can truly affirm that God existed before he created now that propositions have been created by God, even though no truth-value bearers (i.e., propositions) existed that corresponded to God’s existent reality before he created. Sure, if propositions did not exist before God created, then before God created it was not true that God exists—but neither was it false. This seems to be no serious issue, however. The basic content of the Christian doctrine of God still remains, even if we must change its articulation when speaking philosophically.[17]

Another implication for philosophy of religion stemming from the created and contingent existence of propositions is in regard to the nature of God’s knowledge. Theology proper typically calls God’s self-knowledge his necessary knowledge.[18] God’s self-knowledge is necessary because God exists necessarily, and he has his self-knowledge essentially; in every possible world in which God exists he knows himself, and since God exists in every possible world, he knows himself in every possible world. However, if propositions do not necessarily exist, then it follows that God’s necessary knowledge is not necessarily propositional. God did not know himself propositionally before he created, and he never would have if he did not create. Moreover, if God is immutable (as I think he is) such that his self-knowledge is the same in nature across every possible world, then his self-knowledge is essentially non-propositional. We might be tempted to think that it limits or reduces the dignity of God’s intellect for him to lack propositional self-knowledge. But that would be the case only if propositional self-knowledge is required for intellectual dignity, and there is no obvious reason to think that it is. In fact, since God is essentially supremely glorious (cf. Romans 11:36), if he lacked propositional self-knowledge, we should conclude that propositional self-knowledge is not required for intellectual dignity.

Finally, I would like to note an entailment of the contingent existence of propositions for modal logic. If all propositions exist contingently, including necessarily true propositions, then it is not true that whatever is necessary is necessarily necessary; in other words, the formal modal logic systems S4 and S5 are incorrect. Necessarily true propositions are not true in every possible world; they are only true in those possible worlds in which they exist. Many metaphysicians might follow Plantinga[19] by finding this implication the most startling, and it may indeed be. A number of advances in metaphysics and other disciplines have been made by philosophers implementing modal logics and possible worlds semantics that depend on S4 and S5 models. Nonetheless, it seems to me better to piously deny S4 and S5 (and be satisfied with the weaker modal system T), than to deny creation ex nihilo or embrace the absurdity of (8). Whatever S4 and S5 appear to add to our understanding of modality and other philosophical matters, they are misguided. The Christian must accept philosophic godliness over modal ingenuity.[20]

Conclusion

In this paper I have exposited Plantinga’s understanding of propositions. What I have found is that Plantinga’s affirmation of the necessary existence of propositions does not jibe well with an orthodox Christian conception of God and creation. The result is that we must deny that propositions necessarily exist—lest we confuse them with God—and instead affirm that they exist contingently as created entities. To assert that propositions exist contingently does require that a slew of changes be made to commonly held positions on philosophical and modal matters, but all of these changes seem to me quite worth the reward of an orthodox and pious conception of God and creation.

Notes

[1] Thomas F. Torrance, The Trinitarian Faith (New York: T&T Clark, 2006), 34–46.

[2] The point of this paragraph is not that Christian philosophers must deny some truths in favor of others, but rather that we should have an incomparably larger sum of trust in Scripture and its ecumenical interpretation than in our intuitive seemings (cf. Romans 1:18; 1 Corinthians 2:2; Galatians 1:6-10; Colossians 2:2–3, 2:8; 1 Peter 1:10–11).

[3] Plantinga’s understanding of propositions and modality can be found in his book, The Nature of Necessity (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), and summarized by one of his followers in Kenneth Konyndyk, Introductory Modal Logic (Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1986).

[4] Alvin Plantinga, “Why Proposition Cannot Be Concrete,” in Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality, ed. Matthew Davidson (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 229. This article originally appeared in Warrant and Proper Function (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 117–120.

[5] Plantinga, “Propositions,” 229. Emphasis in original.

[6] See ibid., 229–233. See also Patrick Toner, “Contingently Existing Propositions?,” Philosophical Studies 129 (2006), 422–423 for a nice summary of Plantinga’s argument.

[7] See Torrance, Trinitarian Faith, 76–109. See also Colin E. Gunton, The Triune Creator: A Historical and Systematic Study (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1998), 65-96 and Robert Letham, The Holy Trinity (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2004), 425–457. This is the understanding of creation ex nihilo first ratified by the Constantinopolitan theologians, although the idea of creation ex nihilo has its roots in the intertestamental period (Torrance, Trinitarian Faith, 95–98). The Reformational theologians continued the Constantinopolitan theological tradition by adopting this ecumenical understanding of creation ex nihilo (See Herman Bavinck, God and Creation [vol. 2 of Reformed Dogmatics; 4 vols.; ed. John Bolt; trans. John Vriend; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008], 416–420 and John Murray, “Calvin’s Doctrine of Creation,” Westminster Theological Journal 17, no. 1 [1954]: 21–430). Not only does creation ex nihilo (as defined above) have unprecedented historical impetus, there is good reason to believe it is at the heart of ecumenical Christianity. As Torrance has shown in his magisterial presentation of patristic theology, creation ex nihilo (again, as defined above) is a central article of the ecumenical “rule of faith” (Torrance, Trinitarian Faith, 96).

[8] Gunton, Creator, 67.

[9] Ibid. It is worth emphasizing at this point that, according to Gunton and Torrance, the Constantinopolitan theologians not only taught that created things are ontologically dependent on God, but also that since all created things owe their origin to God’s free will, created objects do not necessarily exist.

[10] Alvin Plantinga, “Transworld Identity or Worldbound Individuals?,” in Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality, ed. Matthew Davidson (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 75. This article originally appeared in Logic and Ontology, ed. Milton Munitz (New York: New York University Press, 1973), 193–212.

[11] I am inclined to think that a similar reductio could be run if we replaced “7 + 5 = 12” with any abstracta Plantinga thinks is necessary, whether it be “numbers, properties, pure sets” or “states of affairs” (Alvin Plantinga, “Actualism and Possible Worlds,” in Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality, ed. Matthew Davidson [New York: Oxford University Press, 2003], 110. This article originally appeared in Theoria 42 [1976]: 139–160).

[12] Torrance, Trinitarian Faith, 96.

[13] Propositions clearly exist in this possible world for no less a reason than that this sentence itself expresses a proposition; namely, that propositions clearly exist in this possible world.

[14] Toner, “Contingently Existing Propositions?,” 423.

[15] Alvin Plantinga, “On Existentialism,” in Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality, ed. Matthew Davidson (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 167. This article originally appeared in Philosophical Studies 44 (1983): 1–20.

[16] Plantinga, “Actualism,” 110.

[17] What I have suggested in this paragraph in regard to the proposition God exists can be generalized to be true of any necessarily true proposition about God.

[18] See Richard A. Muller, The Divine Essence and Attributes (vol. 3 of Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725; 4 vols.; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 411–432.

[19] See Plantinga, “Propositions,” 230–231.

[20] See Torrance, Trinitarian Faith, 38.

In this short essay, I want to draw out the nature and downfalls of a salient principle of analytic philosophy: the primacy of rational intuition.

Philosophers think of rational intuition as the capacity in human persons to believe (and know) certain propositions immediately, that is, without basing their belief on other evidential beliefs or logical inferences. Propositions like what is known must be believed, it is necessary that 2+2=4, and murder is wrong are intuitive because we find ourselves convinced of their truth simply by reflecting on them; we believe them because they seem to us to be true.

In his important book, Naming and Necessity, Saul Kripke argued that for something to be intuitive is “very heavy evidence.” He went on to say, “I really don’t know, in a way, what more conclusive evidence one can have about anything, ultimately speaking.” For Kripke, then, there is a definitive priority given to our intuitive seemings.

Analytic philosophy has shared Kripke’s belief in the primacy of rational intuition for much of the twentieth century, and it has definitively characterized how analytic philosophers have argued for their theories of knowledge, reality, and morals. For example, in analytic epistemology philosophers design test cases to invoke intuitions in their peers that either support or undermine various analyses of knowledge. The most famous use of test cases was by Edmund Gettier in his three page article, “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?”

Arguably, the most widely accepted understanding of knowledge in the modern period was the justified-true-belief model. Knowledge was thought to be justified belief in a true proposition. Gettier, however, presented two test cases where a person has justified true belief, but does not seem to have knowledge. Gettier’s small paper was thought to be so powerful because of the way it showed that our intuitions contradict a prominent theory of knowledge.

The problem for philosophers since has been to develop an analysis of knowledge that does not fall prey to critiques similar to Gettier’s. So far, a multitude of philosophers have presented accounts of knowledge only to be met by a plethora of published test cases that undermine their analyses. As a result, many philosophers are now skeptical about whether it is possible to analyze knowledge.

The apparent inability of philosophers to account for the nature of knowledge has also led to skepticism about whether our intuitions are reliable indicators of the truth. This skepticism with regard to our intuitions has been additionally supported by surveys that suggest our intuitions are in some sense culturally affected.

Last month I was able to attend the American Philosophical Association’s central meeting in Saint Louis, Missouri. Although it was a common theme running through many of the lectures, the question of the reliability of our intuitions was at the forefront of the secession on philosophical methodology. Studies were presented of how people from different cultures and of different genders answered philosophical questions. These studies were intended to help determine whether intuitions are universally shared or relative to particular groups of people.

Maybe the only time everyone in the room came into agreement was when a participant paraphrased the following quote from philosopher, Peter van Inwagen: “There is no established body of metaphysical results. . . . In metaphysics . . . you are perfectly free to disagree with anything the acknowledged experts say.” It was clear from the discussion that those in the room thought that van Inwagen’s statement held true not only for metaphysics, but for philosophy as a whole.

If we are perfectly free to disagree with anything the acknowledged philosophical experts say, then perhaps it would be best to disagree with the priority they have placed on rational intuition. Any ultimate source of evidence that allows for such widespread confusion and disagreement is clearly not doing its job.

What if philosophers used Scripture as their ultimate source of evidence, and rational intuition as a subordinate source? Philosophers could then rely on the perfect Word of God to build an epistemological, metaphysical, and moral framework—like the theological framework set forth in the Westminster Confession of Faith—from which they could then address the ancient problems of philosophy. I think this is the most productive way forward for contemporary philosophy, primarily because it is the only way we can avoid being taken “captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ” (Col. 2:8).

I am not suggesting that Scripture is the only source of evidence that God has given to man. Rational intuition is clearly essential to everyday life and to philosophy as a discipline. What I am suggesting is that Scripture provides us with the most conclusive evidence possible, ultimately speaking, because “it is the Word of God” (WCF 1.4).

Sources — The quote in paragraph three is from Saul Kripke, Naming and Necessity (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1972; reprint, 2013), 42. The quote in paragraph nine is from Peter van Inwagen, Metaphysics [Boulder: Westview Press, 1993], 13–14. Edmund Gettier’s article was originally published in Analysis 23 (1963): 121–123. I also consulted Alvin I. Goldman, “Philosophical Intuitions: Their Target, Their Source, and Their Epistemic Status,” Grazer Philosophische Studien 74 (2007): 1–26; Robert Audi, Epistemology (New York: Routledge, 2011); and William G. Lycan, “Epistemology and the Role of Intuitions,” in The Routledge Companion to Epistemology (ed. Sven Bernecker and Duncan Pritchard; New York: Routledge, 2014), 813–822.

The idea of a concrete universal is a complex concept that originated with the founder of absolute idealism, G. W. F. Hegel (1770–1831). Historian of philosophy Robert Stern defines a concrete universal as a property that all individuals have whereby they are “related with one another in a system of mutual interdependence.” Stated simply, a concrete universal is something that connects everything together and thereby gives everything meaning. The absolute idealists identified the Absolute—an all-inclusive mental subject—as their concrete universal.

Van Til was highly critical of absolute idealism. As I alluded to in a previous post, Van Til thought that the absolute idealists’ neglect of the Christian God and his revelation led them to a plethora of philosophical dilemmas for which “there is no answer . . . from a non-Christian point of view.” For example, absolute idealists posited the existence of both an Absolute and a world driven by chance, but they never sufficiently explained how these two can coexist. On the one hand, the world of chance seems like it should reduce the absoluteness of the Absolute. On the other hand, the Absolute seems like it should absorb the world of chance. Absolute idealism’s unifying element (the Absolute) appears to swallow its plural element (the world of chance), and vice versa.

In contrast to absolute idealism, Van Til held on the basis of Scripture that the triune God is the true concrete universal, in time and in eternity.

God is the concrete universal in eternity by virtue of his triune ontology, i.e., via his nature as the self-existent God in three persons. Father, Son, and Spirit fully interpenetrate one another, and therefore share in the same divine essence. The one divine essence does not erode the distinctions between the three divine persons, and the distinctions between the three divine persons do not divide the one divine essence. Father, Son, and Sprit are “one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory” (Shorter Catechism, Q&A 6).

God is the concrete universal in time by virtue of his triune economy, i.e., via his free eternal decree as worked out by his temporal acts of creation, providence, and redemption. When the triune God created, he gave each object a distinct nature and a covenantal relationship with himself and the rest of the world. God did not provide objects with these natures and relations in abstraction from his design for the rest of history. Rather, objects are created, preserved, and governed by the wise power of God in expectation of his final purpose for the world in Jesus Christ.

Van Til’s Reformed method of philosophy successfully identified a concrete universal that is able to connect everything together and thereby give everything meaning—namely, the triune God in his ontology and economy. Unlike in absolute idealism, there is an equal ultimacy between the unifying elements (the divine essence/covenantal eschatology) and the plural elements (the divine persons/individual created objects) in Van Til’s theory of reality.

Furthermore, Van Til thought that his Christian theory of reality implied a Christian theory of knowledge. Since God created and controls all things according to his triune counsel, we must submit all our thinking to him and his eschatological plan, as culminated in Jesus Christ. Thus, Van Til insisted that Christians must think concretely; we must always remain mindful of the triune God’s great plan of heavenly redemption.

It seems to me that Van Til’s trinitarian understanding of the concrete universal is a promising philosophical integration of Reformed theology. Even if his trinitarian formulations are idiosyncratic in the sense of being personal and unique in some limited respects, they are nonetheless worthy of deep consideration and admiration. In my mind, Van Til’s interaction with absolute idealism’s search for a concrete universal is a wonderful example of how to address philosophical questions with Reformed theological answers.

Sources— The quote in the first paragraph is from Laurence R. O’Donnell, III, “Kees Van Til als Nederlandse-Amerikaanse, Neo-Calvinistisch-Presbyteriaan Apologeticus: An Analysis of Cornelius Van Til’s Presupposition of Reformed Dogmatics with Special Reference to Herman Bavinck’s Gereformeerde Dogmatiek” (Th.M. Thesis, Calvin Theological Seminary, 2011), 157–158. The quote in the second paragraph is from Robert Stern, “Hegel, British Idealism, and the Curious Case of the Concrete Universal,” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 15, no. 1 (2007): 122. The quote in the third paragraph is from Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith (ed. K. Scott Oliphint; 4^th ed.; Phillipsburg, N. J.: P&R, 2008), 49. I also consulted Van Til’s Common Grace and the Gospel (Nutley, N. J.: P&R, 1977) and his “My Credo” (in Jerusalem and Athens: Critical Discussions on the Philosophy and Apologetics of Cornelius Van Til [ed. E. R. Geehan; Phillipsburg, N. J.: P&R, 1980]).

Cornelius Van Til (1895–1987) completed his Ph.D. dissertation entitled, “God and the Absolute,” at Princeton University in 1927 under the Scottish idealist philosopher, A. A. Bowman (1883–1936). Van Til began his dissertation in medias res, like a piece of epic literature:

In many quarters the idea seems to prevail that the God of Christianity and the Absolute of modern idealistic philosophy are identical. . . . The alliance thus formed is hailed by philosophers and theologians alike as prophetic of a glorious dawn of peace and progress. Clasping hands we have stopped our wrangle and at last have found an outlet for our energies in the improvement of the human race. Yet there are some murmurings to be heard here and there that all is not gold that glitters. Now since I find myself among the group of malcontents who have not joined their voice to the applause of peace, peace, because there is no peace, I am here called upon to give an account of the faith that is in me. I still believe in the God of Christianity and not in the Absolute of Idealism. Believing my faith to be a “reasonable faith” I shall in this paper attempt to prove that the apparent similarity between Idealism and Christianity covers a fundamental diversity, that consequently we must make a choice between them and that the choice for Christianity is philosophically the more tenable.

What a tremendous statement of Christian fortitude to his dissertation examiners! Van Til went on to state his argument with equal Christian conviction: “To do this it will be sufficient to take the pivotal conception of God which lies at the basis of all Christian theism and contend that it is the only conception that can offer a possible unity to human experience. The only alternative to belief in this God is scepticism [sic].”

Both the Van Tilian tradition and the analytic tradition can trace its roots back to the response its earliest proponents gave to absolute idealism. Nonetheless, Van Til’s response was quite different from the ones given by the early analytic philosophers. G. E. Moore (1873—1958) and Bertrand Russell (1872—1970) responded to absolute idealism by insisting that it did not give proper attention to the necessity of logical rigor, linguistic analysis, and commonsense for philosophy. Van Til responded to absolute idealism by insisting that it did not give proper attention to the necessity of the Christian God and his revelation for philosophy.

As I showed in my previous post, the use of logical rigor, linguistic analysis, and commonsense has led analytic philosophers like John Searle to a materialistic universe in which free and meaningful human mental activity seems impossible. The hopelessness of materialism does not logically follow from analytic philosophy’s method. However, those practicing an analytic philosophy that does not incorporate the necessity of Scripture into its methodology are bound to arrive at similar wrongheaded conclusions. Man was never meant to experience or reflect upon anything without subordinating his cognition to the norm of God’s special revelation, and since sin has corrupted man’s heart, he needs special revelation all the more—even when doing philosophy.

If John Searle repented from his materialism, converted to Reformed Christianity, and accepted the necessity of Scripture for philosophy, then and only then could he make sense of the deep conviction of freedom we all have as human persons. Searle needs the Holy Scriptures to teach him that far from being incompatible with free will, God’s sovereign determination of the created universe toward “a purpose for Himself” (Van Til’s phrase) is the necessary precondition for all meaningful human activity (Cf. John 19:11; Acts 2:23, 4:27-28; Romans 11:36; WCF 3.1).

Sources — All quotes from Van Til appear in his, “God and the Absolute,” accessed through Logos Bible Software 4, The Works of Cornelius Van Til (40 vols.), which unfortunately has no page numbers. The opening biographical information is from John R. Muether, Van Til: Reformed Apologist and Churchman (Phillipsburg, NY: P&R, 2008), 57-58. I also consulted Cornelius Van Til, A Survey of Christian Epistemology (Phillipsburg, NY: P&R, 1969), 1-13.

In this post, I plan to give a brief historical sketch of the movement from nineteenth century absolute idealism to twentieth century analytic philosophy. In a follow-up post, I will survey the response Cornelius Van Til gave to absolute idealism, and then examine the analytic tradition in light of Van Til’s Reformed insights.

Absolute idealism held a tempestuous sway over philosophy in Britain, America, and the European continent during the nineteenth century. This philosophical system was initiated by the prominent German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel (1770–1831), and then further developed by philosophers like F. H. Bradley (1846–1881), J. M. E. McTaggart (1866–1925), and Josiah Royce (1855–1916). Absolute idealism’s central tenet was that all of reality is a single mental subject. The absolute idealists’ metaphysic—their theory about the nature of ultimate reality—was tied to a distinctive epistemology or theory of knowledge. They believed that reason was the proper source of knowledge, not empirical observation. Whenever we sensibly experience an object as having spatiotemporal location or some other physical property “we are perceiving it more or less as it really is not.” Rationally consider any particular thing, the absolute idealists taught, and you will rather find that that thing is necessarily involved in a higher, all-inclusive, organic thought-complex.

Just as soon as absolute idealism reached its highest point of influence, two of its most promising young practitioners, G. E. Moore (1873–1958) and Bertrand Russell (1872–1970), proposed a decisive revolt. This revolt at the start of the twentieth century constituted the beginnings of what is known today as the analytic school of philosophy.

Analytic philosophy’s defining characteristic was its rigorous commonsense philosophical method. Analytic philosophers usually dealt with individual problems, and attempted to solve those problems by appealing to logic, intuition, and experience. For example, G. E. Moore in his essay, “Proof of an External World,” famously argued that he had two hands by gesturing with them while saying, “Here is one hand and here is another.”

Analytic philosophers also put a premium on linguistic clarity, primarily because of the ambiguity that they thought riddled the writings of absolute idealists. Analytic philosopher John Searle points out that as a result “for most of the twentieth century the philosophy of language was ‘first philosophy.’ Other branches of philosophy were seen as derived from the philosophy of language and dependent on the results in the philosophy of language for their solutions.”

Near the end of the twentieth century, another philosophical shift occurred, this time from within analytic philosophy itself. The philosophical method of analytic philosophy remained, but, to use once more the words of John Searle, “the center of attention has now moved from language to mind.” One of the many reasons Searle gives for this recent development is that numerous philosophers “working in the philosophy of language see many of the questions of language as special cases of questions about the mind.” Searle also mentions another likely culprit for the recent reorientation of the philosophical disciplines:

For many of us, myself included, the central question in philosophy at the beginning of the twenty-first century is how to give an account of ourselves as apparently conscious, mindful, free, rational, speaking, social, and political agents in a world that science tells us consists entirely of mindless, meaningless, physical particles. (p. 7)

Although it should be debated whether empirical science truly supports the weighty doctrine of materialism, many analytic philosophers follow Searle in thinking that it does. So, in Searle’s circles, he has sufficient justification for writing his book, Mind, wherein he attempts to give a materialistic explanation of the mental. Searle’s whole project is to account for how we can have meaningful mental capabilities as purely material agents, and this requires for Searle to account for human freedom. But Searle cannot account for human freedom, he says so himself: “We really do not know how free will exists in the brain, if it exists at all. We do not know why or how evolution has given us the unshakable conviction of free will. We do not, in short, know how it could possibly work. But we also know that the conviction of our own freedom is inescapable. We cannot act except under the presupposition of freedom” (p. 164).

As has been the case throughout the history of philosophy, we have come full-circle. At the beginning of the twentieth century, analytic philosophers revolted against absolute idealism, along with its insistence upon the mental nature of ultimate reality, in order to follow the dictates of commonsense and to account for material reality. At the end of the twentieth century, analytic philosophers like Searle have followed their intuitions and gained their material world at the seeming expense of meaningful human mental activity.

Sources — The quote in the first paragraph is from J. M. E. McTaggart, “Time,” in Metaphysics: The Big Questions (eds. Peter van Inwagen and Dean W. Zimmerman; 2^nd ed.; Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2008), 123. McTaggart used this phrase in reference to our experience of things as in time, but the phrase also captures the way many absolute idealists addressed our experience of things as having any distinctively physical property. All quotes from Searle appear in his Mind: A Brief Introduction (New York: Oxford University Press, 2001). Other sources I consulted were E. D. Klemke, ed., Contemporary Analytic and Linguistic Philosophies (2^nd ed.; Amherst, NY: Prometheus, 2000) and Frederick Copleston, Modern Philosophy: Empiricism, Idealism, and Pragmatism in Britain and America (vol. 8 of A History of Philosophy; New York: Image Books, 1994),