6th, defendingfaith
More on causality which leads into the reliability of sense perception
Welcome again to Christian apologetics. We are in the middle, now, of looking at those elements of knowledge, of the science of epistemology, that are essential to coming to a sound defense of the truth of theism.
Last time we dealt with the Law of Causality and we were careful to show that the proper definition was very important. Which is defined in this way, that for every effect there must be an antecedent cause.
Today we will look at the more critical analysis of this Law that was offered by an 18th century Scottish philosopher David Hume. In his inquiry into these matters of causality made some important observations.
Customary relationships or relationships of contiguity
What we observe when we see things happening around us are what he calls relationships that he calls customary. Customary relationships or relationships of contiguity. As a property line between to pieces of property are said to be contiguous along that line of the two different properties.
So when we see events take place or transpire in the external world, when one thing follows another, and we assume that the one thing causes that which follows it. Because they follow in sequence on a regular basis. So for example, on a regular basis it rains and when it rains the grass gets wet. So there is a customary relationship between raining and wet grass. It happens in such regular intervals that we come to the conclusion that the causes of the grasses becoming wet is the rain which precedes it.
Now you look at me and think to yourself, Is this guy (Sproul) really raising such an obvious conclusion. Because everybody knows that the rain is the cause of wet grass. In ordinary experience that is the way we think because that it is the way it seems to us with our naked vision. We also are accustomed to thinking in this way.
But how do we know that in between -- the falling of the rain and the dampening of the grass -- some invisible cause comes in and intercedes for the rain and is the real cause for the effect of the grass becoming wet.
Isn't this an utterly stupid assumption to make? Isn’t it obvious?
From a philosophical consideration and in light of 17th and 18th century penetrating questions that were being asked about understanding external reality and the forces that are in effect -- making happen what makes it happen. In regard to Descartes school and his theory of Interactionism or Spinoza or Leibniz in other areas of the world. For they postulated invisible causes that were not seen for that which you observe empirically. There was and is a great controversy, in philosophy, about actual causes.
Let’s try an illustration: What is it that makes us sick from time to time?
When this happens we might go in to get blood tests , throat cultures and such which are placed under microscopes. Where we find that antibodies are at work infecting our well being that are invisible to the naked eye. Without the discovery of microscopes we would of never imagined that the causes for our diseases were what they are presumed to be today. It was not that long ago that people were talking about animal spirits invading our bodies and going up and down our arms and so forth.
The microscope has opened up a whole new world to realities that are truly there and are making an impact on our lives. But is a ‘bug’ we pick up seen by us? No.
What Hume was doing, from a scientific analysis was -- there are all sorts of things going on that we don’t perceive. We don’t ever see from our senses.
So we make assumptions -- because one thing follows another -- therefore that is the cause.
Causal thinking, ladies and gentlemen, is at the heart of the scientific inquiry. It is at the heart of medicine also. We are asking a medical staff, when unknown circumstances hit, to determine and ascertain what is the cause of our illness. We want a determination of the cause so they can come up with a treatment that will cure the disease we have. If we can’t determine what is wrong and don’t have a proper diagnosis it is very difficult to find the proper remedy. This is also the case in biology and chemistry and astronomy.
The principle of Causality is presumed… constantly.
To say it another way, Casual thinking is at the heart of natural sciences. Now you can imagine the crisis that came about in the 18th century when this very learned scholar in Scotland raised questions about scientific ability to determine and isolate causes. Hume used a famous illustration that is called the “pool ball illustration.” Which if you can imagine the flat green table with pockets in the corners and sides and a queball and the object ball. You get this ball in the corner pocket by your arm swinging the stick which strikes the que which strikes the 8-ball which is deposited in the pocket that you aimed for. A sequence of causal actions was necessary for this to happen. Does anybody see the invisible force from stick to ball? Do you see a force when the one ball strikes another? No. What we see is one thing following another. This is what is called a Customary or contiguous Relationship.
What Hume is saying is you don’t see causality. You see actions in sequence. The example you may have heard, which is a fallacy, is when a rooster crows and, then, the sun comes up. The farmer, oddly, thought the sounds of the rooster was the cause of the sun rising. Is the farmer wrong?
post hoc ergo propter hoc
This is the informal fallacy in logic called ‘post hoc ergo propter hoc.’ Which translates, after this therefore because of this. Just because something happens after something else does not mean that the previous thing had anything to do with that which came after. Things seem connected but that doesn’t establish a relationship of causality!
This is a brief analysis of David Hume’s work on the problems with types of causality. Since then, you have had all sorts of people assuming (a leaping and attaching meaning in their minds from the events of Hume; in itself a possible fallacy) what Hume did with his analysis was demolish the very Law of Causality. Which, Sproul states, he did not do. He actually came to the conclusion… It is one thing to say that there are forces that I can’t see or that I don’t know are causing something. But it is another to say that ‘nothing’ caused this thing to happen.
When we apply the Law of Causality to the external world we have to face the limitations of sense perception that David Hume sets forth. We don’t have to jettison the principle of cause and effect because of perception limitations. It still is a fact that if something is an effect then, indeed, it was caused by something other than itself. That has to be true no matter how many experiments you make. This is a formal argument (from the last paper).
On to the third principle: Basic reliability of sense perception
This is the 3rd principle we will talk on, the basic reliability of sense perception. We can show that we don’t have ‘perfect’ perception of reality. This is why machines are used to heighten our senses in perceiving things. Why Sproul describes here what Hume worked out is he shows these very limits of human sense perception and the power of that ability. Hume shows those limits.
So we find we cannot penetrate to the invisible realm. Where, perhaps all sorts of unseen forces are at work. Not the least of which is the power of God. Scripture says in Him we move and breath and have our being. Take the part where “in God we move…” One of the assumptions of Christian truth is the principle that ‘nothing can move in this world apart from the power of God.’ We can say that I, as a human, have the power to drop something out of my hand down onto the floor but I am, at best, a secondary cause. I can’t even open my finger to start my action apart from the power of God. The power of God is invisible.
So this analysis of Hume is compatible to Christian theism in that there are limits to human perception thru the senses. There can be no power except for God, which is the power-supply for all motion and because he is invisible no amount of empirical research will get to the heart of the matter. That’s it , the statement is -- to get to the heart of matter -- to get to the heart of the motion of matter.
So this analysis of Hume is compatible to Christian theism in that there are limits to human perception thru the senses. But he took it to a place where he tried to reduce it to a place where all science that depends on sense perception to a place of outright skepticism. It is said of Hume that he was the graveyard of British empiricism. Hume’s description of the skepticism of perceiving forces went to the demolition of causal thinking.
For if you take away causal thinking, you take away both Christian theism but you take away science also.
These factors made Immanuel Kant spend the latter parts of his life in resurrecting the validity of causality and basic reliability of sense perception as it related to science and theism.
My senses cannot give me a comprehensive view of reality.
BUT, the only link I have, though, from the interior chamber of my mind -- my thinking part -- to the external world, the only transition I have from the mind to you (the external world) is through my senses. My body is the bridge from my body to my mind to the world.
What is Mind?
Dr. Gartner used to answer that question with his quip, “what is mind?…no matter… what is matter, then?…never mind.” This thought says there is a fundamental distinction between materiality or corporal reality and that which is nonphysical. And an idea or thought in mind maybe linked to a physical cause with it’s physical stimulation of synapses’ and the like in the physical part of the brain but it is one thing to say that the physical brain gives rise to thinking it is another to say that thinking itself is physical. We don’t want to do that.
My thinking, my conscious awareness of things is nonphysical. I cannot have any thoughts about you (in the external world) or about the world outside in my mind except through my senses. So as imperfect as my senses maybe that is the only avenue I have to physical reality outside of myself.
I can retreat into my own mind and make deductions about what may or may not be out there. But I have no real contact with the world out there except through my senses. That is why it is axiomatic that in modern science and Biblical studies is to operate with the assumption that our basic equipment, that we have, the faculties of knowing, that God has given us; such as the five we might have in their full abilities, is reliable enough for us to act upon. I might think that this or that caused a yellow light is going to turn red but I trust my senses and their reliability that I well stop for the light, even if I think that a demon turned it red.
This is the way the Bible speaks when Peter refers to the reason not to believe in craftily and cleverly devised myths and fables. But we believe what we have seen with our eyes and heard with our hears. Here is a biblical presentation of this basic reliability of our senses being able to be trusted. Even the assumption, in scripture that we can see causal relationships in this world. It is assumed throughout the entirety of scripture.
These 3 principles, we have discussed so far, are non-negotiable to Christian apologetics.
Addendum: and to use for everyday situations and thinking
Post hoc ergo propter hoc, It is often shortened to simply post hoc and is also sometimes referred to as false cause, coincidental correlation or correlation not causation. It is subtly different from the fallacy cum hoc ergo propter hoc, in which the chronological ordering of a correlation is insignificant. Post hoc is a particularly tempting error because temporal sequence appears to be integral to causality. The fallacy lies in coming to a conclusion based solely on the order of events, rather than taking into account other factors that might rule out the connection. Most familiarly, many superstitious beliefs and magical thinking arise from this fallacy.
Showing posts with label defending faith6-10. Show all posts
Showing posts with label defending faith6-10. Show all posts
Friday, August 28, 2009
4th Principle of Knowledge
7th, defendingfaith, 09-26-08
The fourth principle of knowledge: the analogical use of language
Welcome back to our pursuit of Apologetics. There is in this journey, a basic aspect of necessary conditions for knowledge that we haven’t covered yet. Today we will discuss the Analogical use of language. You might think this is a most esoteric term to the lay person as it relates to knowledge and apologetics in our day. So today what is this issue all about. Remember that these studies came out of our inductive study of atheism. The classic arguments that the greatest minds have waged against Judeo-Christianity. And that there are certain elements of their thinking that were consistently present in the critics, which were the denial of one or more of these four principles of knowledge.
Now we come to the last of the four, the aspect of language.
In the 20th century in the contemporary philosophy of this period we saw a shift to a concern with human language. And in the midst of this shift came a controversy that is know as the God-talk Controversy. You may not be familiar with this but what came out of this is was a movement in theology called “Theothanatology “ or the “death of God movement.” All sorts of philosophers and theologians were announcing this death declaration. What was behind this concept was a crisis in the philosophy of language. It had it’s roots, first of all, with a group in Great Britain which was called Logical Positivism. In this movement one of the central theses was the central principle of the law of verification. Well, we all know how to verify something. But this word comes from the word “truth” and it means to authenticate and show that something is true. If I make a claim and I don’t back it up my claim is not verifiable. If I can prove the claim then I have verified it.
This principle stated that only those statements are deemed to be true and can be verified must be done so -- empirically. Or, only statements that can be verified are empirically true statements. Now to show that something is true on can use sense perception to show it is true. So for example, if I say there is gold in Alaska the only way I can prove that this is true is to go to Alaska and find some gold. Then I can demonstrate that it is empirically true. The five senses determine that it so.
This had a tremendous influence on these communities of thinkers. Until somebody said, with what should have been obvious from the out set, that the law of verification, itself, can not be verified empirically. It is simply a gratuitous premise. And with that this school of thought somewhat retreated. But not completely, for in spite of that stumbling block, the guns of ‘verification’ and their criticisms were to take aim on historic theism. With their emphasis to the respect, in their minds, to language about God.
analogy of gold in Alaska
Critics were saying that statements about God cannot be proven in anyway scientifically. Because no one can see or touch God. You can’t subject God to a test either in the laboratory or other analysis. The idea of God remains unprovable, unverifiable, but also un falsifiable. (As an aside; a lot of Christians use this technique also to not have to reckon with logical thinking) Many Christians take comfort in the idea that things that they say they believe cannot be proven false. But something that cannot be proven false does not mean that it is true. For example, if I tell you I believe in ghosts and someone asks me if you have seen some and I say of course. Do we have any scientific evidence for ghosts? You might say no but there is a reason for that, ghosts don’t like scientists. Any time that scientists come around with measuring devices to detect the premise of ghosts the ghosts leave because it is apart of their ghostly nature to flee from scientists. Therefore scientists have never been able to verify them. That somebody deposit’s a believe like this can neither prove or disprove the truth of his premise. But neither can anybody prove him wrong. The impossibility of falsifying his statement is built into the premise. That is what you would call cheating in the theoretical realm of thought. In this vocation it is harder to falsify a statement than to verify one. Let’s revisit our analogy of gold in Alaska. We have stated how we can prove there is gold there. But what if he says there is no gold up there. How would you falsify that claim? Go up there and look around a while? Does that prove that the statement is false? But what does it take to prove the false case; that you must search all of the territory and at every depth. And if you excavated the whole area and said there was no gold, therefore, we (the scientists) falsified the statement that there is gold in Alaska. But they will say you missed a grain in Denali. Go search again you haven’t proven you case. Anyway, it is much harder to falsify than to verify.
However with logic it is an other matter
So this is what they say; since there is no physical prove for God’s existence and following basic rules of verification statements about God are at best emotive. That is, language about God is emotive. When I say I believe in God I am not saying anything meaningful about what exists outside of me all I’m doing is telling you something about me. That I believe and have emotion or passion bound up with the idea that God exists.
There was a discussion Sproul had with a student some years ago who asked him if he believed in God. Sproul said yes and the student went on to say do you pray and sing and read about God? The answer was yes. And all these things are meaningful? Yes Sproul said. The student’s conclusion was that for Sproul, God exists. But I don’t believe in God. And find nothing meaningful about the existence of a God. So for me God does not exist. Sproul says then, this is relativism with a vengeance. He says, to the student we are not talking about the same thing. When I assert the existence of God I am asserting the existence of a being that is apart from me. Outside of me and not apart of my subjectivity and emotional makeup. All my singing and praying and attending does not have the ‘power’ to create him. If it did, I’m simply diluted and wrong. But if the God I’m talking about does exist all of your unbelief and disinterest in him does not have the ‘power’ to annihilate him.
an extremely skeptical approach to the idea of God
Let’s keep this in view. When we talk about God we are talking about the objective existence of God and not my subjective feeling about him. This movement reduced ‘talk of God’ to human emotions. Therefore they claim, statements about God say nothing meaningful about objective reality outside of the people who are making the claims. Now that is an extremely skeptical approach to the idea of God. You have to ask what is behind that. Well, one of the main things behind it was the struggle in the 19th and 20th century to redefine what religion was. With movements having a massive impact in trying to change historic Christianity. In naturalistic terms. Remember, the single most important affirmation of the Enlightenment of the 18th century was, the very key to the Enlightenment, that the God-hypothesis (the idea of God) is no longer necessary to explain the presence and the origin of the universe or the origin of human life. Before the Enlightenment most secular people were very impressed with the classical arguments for the existence of God and as a necessary postulate to explain the universe and human life. The Enlightenment produced a believable alternative for creation and made an impact on western culture and thinking to this day. Not everyone certainly agreed with all these new principles but the emphasis was that they no longer needed to affirm the existence of God. The second key was, science makes known that life and the universe came and come about through a process called ‘spontaneous generation.’ That became the scientifically acceptable alternative to creation. The claim that things just pop into existence on their own. (later in this course we will take a close look at this concept.) But, here, I’m trying to explain how and where this crisis of language came from. The 18th century, following on the heels of this original criticism, sought to accommodate this criticism by reconstructing Christianity in naturalistic terms. Then 19th century liberalism rejected anything supernatural in historic Christianity. They used revision tactics to state that the old testament was written not before an event but after and as an after action report. No real supernatural events just editorial comment. All aspects of intervention were rejected as mythological accretions into the historic documents. The emphasis, then, as it matriculated into society, became for Christianity just the platitudes of love of others and a sociological agenda of humanitarianism. All this taking place on the natural sphere with no need to have a vertical need for believe in a creator. This was the concept of a naturalized religion. This was then married to the philosophy of the 19th century to the rising establishment of evolution or what is called immenetistic. The theology, then, that came to prevail was pantheistic. God is not something that is beyond and distinct from the universe but, if God exists, he exists as a part of this universe. We understand pantheism in it’s simplest form to mean: everything is God, God is all and all is God.
If everything is God and all is God, then, the word God does not refer to anything in particular
Now think of that statement linguistically. If everything is God and all is God, then, the word God does not refer to anything particular. If it refers to everything in general it refers to nothing in particular. The word has no particular significance. This concept of immanence brought a crisis of language. Whether you could speak meaningfully about God at all. This provoked a crisis in theology and philosophy in the 20th century against liberalism and there was an attempt to reconstruct the ascendance of God. A sense in which God is above and beyond the universe and the stream of history. This renewed emphasis of trying to redeem Christianity from liberalism and restore the supernatural. Now when one attempts to correct the errors of your predecessor you can make the pendulum swing too far in the other direction and to an over correction. This is what happened when they came up with the notion of ‘Wholly Other.’ God is so different from the universe we must flee from identifying God at all with the universe, as pantheism does. He exists totally away from nature. God is completely different from the human.
Now as well meaning as this may seem, it paved the way for an even worse crisis of how one uses language about God. So in our next session we will see how this came to pass.
The fourth principle of knowledge: the analogical use of language
Welcome back to our pursuit of Apologetics. There is in this journey, a basic aspect of necessary conditions for knowledge that we haven’t covered yet. Today we will discuss the Analogical use of language. You might think this is a most esoteric term to the lay person as it relates to knowledge and apologetics in our day. So today what is this issue all about. Remember that these studies came out of our inductive study of atheism. The classic arguments that the greatest minds have waged against Judeo-Christianity. And that there are certain elements of their thinking that were consistently present in the critics, which were the denial of one or more of these four principles of knowledge.
Now we come to the last of the four, the aspect of language.
In the 20th century in the contemporary philosophy of this period we saw a shift to a concern with human language. And in the midst of this shift came a controversy that is know as the God-talk Controversy. You may not be familiar with this but what came out of this is was a movement in theology called “Theothanatology “ or the “death of God movement.” All sorts of philosophers and theologians were announcing this death declaration. What was behind this concept was a crisis in the philosophy of language. It had it’s roots, first of all, with a group in Great Britain which was called Logical Positivism. In this movement one of the central theses was the central principle of the law of verification. Well, we all know how to verify something. But this word comes from the word “truth” and it means to authenticate and show that something is true. If I make a claim and I don’t back it up my claim is not verifiable. If I can prove the claim then I have verified it.
This principle stated that only those statements are deemed to be true and can be verified must be done so -- empirically. Or, only statements that can be verified are empirically true statements. Now to show that something is true on can use sense perception to show it is true. So for example, if I say there is gold in Alaska the only way I can prove that this is true is to go to Alaska and find some gold. Then I can demonstrate that it is empirically true. The five senses determine that it so.
This had a tremendous influence on these communities of thinkers. Until somebody said, with what should have been obvious from the out set, that the law of verification, itself, can not be verified empirically. It is simply a gratuitous premise. And with that this school of thought somewhat retreated. But not completely, for in spite of that stumbling block, the guns of ‘verification’ and their criticisms were to take aim on historic theism. With their emphasis to the respect, in their minds, to language about God.
analogy of gold in Alaska
Critics were saying that statements about God cannot be proven in anyway scientifically. Because no one can see or touch God. You can’t subject God to a test either in the laboratory or other analysis. The idea of God remains unprovable, unverifiable, but also un falsifiable. (As an aside; a lot of Christians use this technique also to not have to reckon with logical thinking) Many Christians take comfort in the idea that things that they say they believe cannot be proven false. But something that cannot be proven false does not mean that it is true. For example, if I tell you I believe in ghosts and someone asks me if you have seen some and I say of course. Do we have any scientific evidence for ghosts? You might say no but there is a reason for that, ghosts don’t like scientists. Any time that scientists come around with measuring devices to detect the premise of ghosts the ghosts leave because it is apart of their ghostly nature to flee from scientists. Therefore scientists have never been able to verify them. That somebody deposit’s a believe like this can neither prove or disprove the truth of his premise. But neither can anybody prove him wrong. The impossibility of falsifying his statement is built into the premise. That is what you would call cheating in the theoretical realm of thought. In this vocation it is harder to falsify a statement than to verify one. Let’s revisit our analogy of gold in Alaska. We have stated how we can prove there is gold there. But what if he says there is no gold up there. How would you falsify that claim? Go up there and look around a while? Does that prove that the statement is false? But what does it take to prove the false case; that you must search all of the territory and at every depth. And if you excavated the whole area and said there was no gold, therefore, we (the scientists) falsified the statement that there is gold in Alaska. But they will say you missed a grain in Denali. Go search again you haven’t proven you case. Anyway, it is much harder to falsify than to verify.
However with logic it is an other matter
So this is what they say; since there is no physical prove for God’s existence and following basic rules of verification statements about God are at best emotive. That is, language about God is emotive. When I say I believe in God I am not saying anything meaningful about what exists outside of me all I’m doing is telling you something about me. That I believe and have emotion or passion bound up with the idea that God exists.
There was a discussion Sproul had with a student some years ago who asked him if he believed in God. Sproul said yes and the student went on to say do you pray and sing and read about God? The answer was yes. And all these things are meaningful? Yes Sproul said. The student’s conclusion was that for Sproul, God exists. But I don’t believe in God. And find nothing meaningful about the existence of a God. So for me God does not exist. Sproul says then, this is relativism with a vengeance. He says, to the student we are not talking about the same thing. When I assert the existence of God I am asserting the existence of a being that is apart from me. Outside of me and not apart of my subjectivity and emotional makeup. All my singing and praying and attending does not have the ‘power’ to create him. If it did, I’m simply diluted and wrong. But if the God I’m talking about does exist all of your unbelief and disinterest in him does not have the ‘power’ to annihilate him.
an extremely skeptical approach to the idea of God
Let’s keep this in view. When we talk about God we are talking about the objective existence of God and not my subjective feeling about him. This movement reduced ‘talk of God’ to human emotions. Therefore they claim, statements about God say nothing meaningful about objective reality outside of the people who are making the claims. Now that is an extremely skeptical approach to the idea of God. You have to ask what is behind that. Well, one of the main things behind it was the struggle in the 19th and 20th century to redefine what religion was. With movements having a massive impact in trying to change historic Christianity. In naturalistic terms. Remember, the single most important affirmation of the Enlightenment of the 18th century was, the very key to the Enlightenment, that the God-hypothesis (the idea of God) is no longer necessary to explain the presence and the origin of the universe or the origin of human life. Before the Enlightenment most secular people were very impressed with the classical arguments for the existence of God and as a necessary postulate to explain the universe and human life. The Enlightenment produced a believable alternative for creation and made an impact on western culture and thinking to this day. Not everyone certainly agreed with all these new principles but the emphasis was that they no longer needed to affirm the existence of God. The second key was, science makes known that life and the universe came and come about through a process called ‘spontaneous generation.’ That became the scientifically acceptable alternative to creation. The claim that things just pop into existence on their own. (later in this course we will take a close look at this concept.) But, here, I’m trying to explain how and where this crisis of language came from. The 18th century, following on the heels of this original criticism, sought to accommodate this criticism by reconstructing Christianity in naturalistic terms. Then 19th century liberalism rejected anything supernatural in historic Christianity. They used revision tactics to state that the old testament was written not before an event but after and as an after action report. No real supernatural events just editorial comment. All aspects of intervention were rejected as mythological accretions into the historic documents. The emphasis, then, as it matriculated into society, became for Christianity just the platitudes of love of others and a sociological agenda of humanitarianism. All this taking place on the natural sphere with no need to have a vertical need for believe in a creator. This was the concept of a naturalized religion. This was then married to the philosophy of the 19th century to the rising establishment of evolution or what is called immenetistic. The theology, then, that came to prevail was pantheistic. God is not something that is beyond and distinct from the universe but, if God exists, he exists as a part of this universe. We understand pantheism in it’s simplest form to mean: everything is God, God is all and all is God.
If everything is God and all is God, then, the word God does not refer to anything in particular
Now think of that statement linguistically. If everything is God and all is God, then, the word God does not refer to anything particular. If it refers to everything in general it refers to nothing in particular. The word has no particular significance. This concept of immanence brought a crisis of language. Whether you could speak meaningfully about God at all. This provoked a crisis in theology and philosophy in the 20th century against liberalism and there was an attempt to reconstruct the ascendance of God. A sense in which God is above and beyond the universe and the stream of history. This renewed emphasis of trying to redeem Christianity from liberalism and restore the supernatural. Now when one attempts to correct the errors of your predecessor you can make the pendulum swing too far in the other direction and to an over correction. This is what happened when they came up with the notion of ‘Wholly Other.’ God is so different from the universe we must flee from identifying God at all with the universe, as pantheism does. He exists totally away from nature. God is completely different from the human.
Now as well meaning as this may seem, it paved the way for an even worse crisis of how one uses language about God. So in our next session we will see how this came to pass.
Analogical Language
8th, Defendingfaith
Analogical Language
Our study of analogical language is a chance to break a mental sweat for God's glory and our sanctification. Words to keep in mind:
Analogical Language
Our study of analogical language is a chance to break a mental sweat for God's glory and our sanctification. Words to keep in mind:
Analogia Entis, the example of Chairs, Wholly other, univocal, equivocal, analogical
Today we are going to continue our discussion in the crisis of language and how certain people refer to “God talk.” Last time we talked over the problem of pantheism posed about meaningful talk or discourse about God and we talked about the reaction in the 20th century as they tried to reconstruct the “supernatural.” We ended with the introduction of this concept that God was, “Wholly Other.” This was popularized by the theologian Karl Barth which gave a massive critic against “natural theology” which is an attempt to learn something about God from deductions drawn from nature. Barth was opposed to the intrusion into theology of categories of reason. He is one who as we mentioned before with respect to the Law of non-contradiction, said “until a Christian is able to affirm both poles of a contradiction that person has not reached maturity. “ Sproul would revise this to say that, when a person is able affirm both poles of a contradiction that person has reached insanity. Beside Barth’s antipathy against reason and natural theology he also leveled a radical assault on a concept that was deeply rooted in Christian history. Particularly as it was articulated by Saint Thomas Aquinas. Which concept is called the “analogia entis.” It is a technical term but is critical to this whole discussion. What it means is from Latin to English is ‘analogy of being.’ Barth attacked that by saying their was no such thing as an analogy between God and man because God is ‘Wholly other.’ He completely transcends us. He is totally different from us.
Story about Wholly Other
Let’s illustrate this and what this problem poses to Christianity. Sproul’s favorite story on this happened to him a few years ago when, in Canada, and speaking to a conference there of people who were theologians and opposed to natural theology and rationality. They saw in Sproul’s thinking and theology a heavy influence on Thomas Aquinas, Aristotle and general logic and the like. So the group asked a question stating their problem with Sproul’s view. They believed the God was ‘Wholly other.’ (WO) So, Sproul said, if God is WO then how do you know anything at all about him? And this person responded just as Karl Barth had responded that we know God not thru rational speculation or deduction but we know him through revelation. This transcendent God reveal Himself to us. Yes, Sproul said, but how does He do this revealing? And this person said, through history, the Bible and through Christ. Well, Sproul said, I must not be getting my idea across here. 1. You say there is no analogy between this Being and me, so how can he communicate anything to me or reveal to you and me what he is like? For He is totally ‘other’ than us and therefore has no means of contact between us. Because we are utterly dissimilar beings and what possible ground for communication could there be? Finally the light came on for this person. He literally hit his hand on his forehead and said, “hmmm, maybe I shouldn’t have said that He is “totally other.” Yes, that is good for once you say that He can’t communicate then the skeptic can come in and say that your language about God is meaningless and you don‘t know what you are talking about. Because if there is no similarity between you and God then there is no common ground and no possible forum and avenue for communication.
So, from this example we can say, let’s get rid of ‘Wholly other.’
In the movie ‘Cool hand Luke’ we see Newman as the ‘Christ figure’ and at points in the movie we have this expression, “what we have, here, is a failure to communicate.” Which was one of the key lines in the movie.
Some form of common ground
Well, there has to be in communication some form of common ground for people to have discussion. If you go to Russia and you try to communicate over there and you don’t know this language you are going to have a real hard time getting your thoughts and questions out for they won’t get what you are saying. We have to speak the same language. Churchill was to have said, that “the Americans and the British were two people separated by a common language.” Yes, we like the humor but the simple fact is we have to understand what the other is saying.
You have seen maybe millions of chairs in your life. You have come to know what a C-h-a-i-r represents. Plato called it ‘chairness’ that particular experience of all the chairs that you have come in contact with. So all these chairs that you have come in contact with brings you to understand what a chair is. But no two people have had the exact same experience with regard to particular chairs. A different background from one person to another. So when Sproul says chair, each of us is going to have a different picture or understanding of what that “chair” is. This comes from each one’s personal experience. To the extent that we have different thoughts about chairs then we will have some form of miscommunication. Or differing assumptions. But overwhelmingly we have a greater degree of similarity to what chairs are than to our differences. Even though our ideas are not 100% similar. They carefully approximate each other to an extent that it isn’t significant. Or irrelevant to our ability to dialogue and have meaningful conversation.
What does this have to do with God and apologetics?
What of words and language that we might not be familiar with. Such as transcendence or imminence or immanence? If we don’t know these we can’t talk about them. So these are the type of ways that language can break down because of a lack of common understandings. So if God is ‘Wholly other’ then their in NO common ground for understanding.
When we talk of omnipotence we might not be able to get our thinking around all power but we have a limited ability of power so we have some way of imagining what it might be like. When God says that he is all-powerful we can have some idea of this. This wrestling with language is not new to the 20th century.
3 kinds of descriptive language
Univocal is language that describes things between two parties in an exact, one to one, identification. If your understanding of chair is exactly mine to, then we are in univocal communication.
Equivocal is the idea that a term or word changes in the course of the conversation. In logic there is a fallacy of equivocation. You can demonstrate this with a syllogism. Or you can demonstrate it with the changing of the meaning of ‘no cat’ at the start and making it mean a different idea later. The example of ‘bald’ means no hair on the head. But you stretch it out from its original to mean no pizzazz or boring.
Analogical means that a word changes in proportion to beings that are being described. An example would the statement; Do you have a ‘good’ dog? Or Fred is a ‘good’ guy. Each reference to good means a different thing in each context. So when we say the ‘goodness of God.’ We mean that it is like ours but not exactly the same as ours. And we fill in the ideas where they are different. When we say this we are not using ‘good’ in a univocal sense but an analogical sense. And this is made meaningful because God makes us in His image. He gives to us the very grounds and possibility of having meaningful communication between us, as far as this meaning can go.
Words and their meaning:
Imminence; The quality or condition of being about to occur
Immanence; taking place or remaining within, of the Deity - indwelling the universe and time
Transcendent; going beyond ordinary limits, exceeding, supreme, of the Deity - beyond the universe and time
Some extra reading if you want to seek what language is to mean
1. Was Jesus worshiped? http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=5379
2. Proof-texting perils and determining if a statement is univocal or equivocal. http://www.str.org/site/DocServer/11-12_SG_2007.pdf?docID=2381
3. Probably more than you want but you might want to skim over this. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/analogy-medieval/
4.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
General Revelation and Natural Theology
9th, Defending faith
General Revelation and Natural Theology
Welcome, we are continuing on in defense of Christian faith. What we have been looking at in the last few sessions are some of the important epistemological principles. Principles of knowledge that are critical to understanding an apologetic case and defense. Through the four foundational types of epistemological premises and then through some concepts of mystery, antimony and paradox that are so often misused in our language today.
Now we shall turn our attention to a different direction. We shall take on the very important ideas that are central to our defense of Christianity. Which is called natural theology. In modern times this has come under severe attack. Where for many centuries it had been well worked through and developed and given clarity. Many theologians of our time reject the whole idea of natural theology (NT). When NT is discussed the first one you think of is Thomas Aquinas. Some people labor under the impression that the science of NT was invented by him. But when he developed these principles he was standing on the shoulders of Augustine. And he was indebted to the teaching of Apostle Paul.
Our beginning definition is: Natural Theology is a knowledge of God that is gained by nature. In addition to and distinct from the knowledge of God we receive from the authority of scripture. NT is another source for the character of God from nature itself. Now from the outset there have been different views of NT which explains the controversy of the this term.
Historically within the Christian church tradition it was seen to be based on something else. Which we call General Revelation (GR). But many times we confuse what this is as compared to NT. GR refers to something God does. NT refers to something we do. NT is the result of General Revelation. When we talk about revelation, that is general, we are distinguishing this from the word ‘special.’
General Revelation is called this for two reasons: 1) because it given by God to all human beings. The audience to GR is universal. Every one in the world received GR. Not everyone has had the benefit of hearing special revelation as it is found in the scriptures. 2) is because of it’s content. What GR reveals is the knowledge of God -- in general -- . We don’t get from GR the nature of God himself. Just basic substantive information about the existence of God.
Now one more distinction; there are two kinds of GR. 1) Mediate GR is that which God gives by some medium. From an indirect source. An example would be in Psalms when it is written that the atmosphere and space display not God but what he made. Something of the glory of its maker. Just as a great painter leave his own mark on the canvas. So the universe is a medium that proclaims something about the nature of God. 2) Immediate GR is direct and without an intervening medium. Romans 2 says that laws about God which our senses can pick up that God plants in the soul. By virtue of being human we have an internal sense of the reality of God. It is built into the mind and is not a deduction from nature. The sensus divinitus.
Now, when the discussion comes up about GR among Christians there is the question posed, “What does the Bible say about that?” If one believes the Bible is true one will also understand this other form of revelation. And we will embrace both these different forms of information. We find this in the first chapter of Romans. And it comes as a shocking and jolting manner in it’s indictment of us.
The Indictment
For Paul says that there is a reason for why the Gospel (good news) is necessary in the first place. Why with this mediate and immediate knowledge we all are found lacking as to how we measure out what is expected to the Creator. This is not about rejecting this person called Jesus that Paul is speaking to the Roman churches about. No, he is talking about the knowledge of God that they do possess. He quotes Paul in Romans starting at 1:17 and states that mankind suppresses the truth. But not just truth in general but it is a particular truth that is in view here and being suppressed. The manifest knowledge of God being clear and evident for all of human kind. Then Paul’s discussion gets worse. At verse 19 God clearly as given what is necessary for all humans to understand something about his divinity. This God doesn’t hide little clues and that only the alert and super intelligent can find and discern. Maybe we can or maybe we can’t. No, it has nothing to do with how clever we are in arriving at some great conclusions about that how God exists. Here Paul says it is so plain and so manifest that everybody sees it. And therefore, it leaves all without any excuses.
Paul is appealing to those who will try to find the excuse that if I had only known about who you were. If I had of only known you were there my life would have been different. Then I would have been loyal and obedient. But here in this dialogue Paul says that this thinking wont fly. Why, because you did know. You knew my eternal power. You knew my very deity because I showed it to you. And plainly at that. The notion you didn’t come after me is not because of ignorance, no, but because you hated me. You wouldn’t have me in your thoughts.
But there are those who will say that there is a divine revelation but that mankind is not capable of capturing its essence because we beings are shielded from its truth because of a corruptible part in us.
Natural revelation produces Natural Theology which is the central and foundational for the universal guilt of mankind.
I am always getting the question about various tribal clans and people groups which are hidden away from these ideas. Well, my answer is slightly glib. Does not having Aquinas and others make you innocent? Is that the requirement? The question should be; ‘how many innocent tribal peoples are there scattered around the various continents of the earth?’ If we are reading Paul correctly he is saying there are no innocents anywhere. All have received the revelation of the Father Creator. And everyone, every last on of us and them, have repressed that knowledge and exchanged it for a substitute lie. This results in all of us choosing the activity of idolatry rather than the worship of the only true God. So this whole world, so to speak, is under indictment and that God sends a savior into this very world to bring a life line. This GR that the Father has given places us under this indictment and this revelation is clear and plain. At least in 66 books of scripture.
So NT, in its most rudimentary sense, is that knowledge of God that every human being has as a direct result or consequence of GR. The knowledge of God we have from nature.
When Augustine talked and wrote about NT he went to Romans 1 for his definitions. Centuries later when Aquinas was developing is system of NT he went to both Romans and to Augustine’s writings and quoted him often. They said because of Romans 1 and GR there is a universal knowledge of God. Now some people think what Aquinas was really saying was that man, with the use of his unaided reason, without any assistance from Divine revelation, has the intellectual capacity to ascend into the heavens and arrive at a knowledge of God. But that is not what Aquinas taught by a long shot. Both of these leaders and writers said was that we have NT through the means of Divine revelation.
The consequences of these ideas are massive for the science of apologetics. As I hope we will see in the coming sessions.
General Revelation and Natural Theology
Welcome, we are continuing on in defense of Christian faith. What we have been looking at in the last few sessions are some of the important epistemological principles. Principles of knowledge that are critical to understanding an apologetic case and defense. Through the four foundational types of epistemological premises and then through some concepts of mystery, antimony and paradox that are so often misused in our language today.
Now we shall turn our attention to a different direction. We shall take on the very important ideas that are central to our defense of Christianity. Which is called natural theology. In modern times this has come under severe attack. Where for many centuries it had been well worked through and developed and given clarity. Many theologians of our time reject the whole idea of natural theology (NT). When NT is discussed the first one you think of is Thomas Aquinas. Some people labor under the impression that the science of NT was invented by him. But when he developed these principles he was standing on the shoulders of Augustine. And he was indebted to the teaching of Apostle Paul.
Our beginning definition is: Natural Theology is a knowledge of God that is gained by nature. In addition to and distinct from the knowledge of God we receive from the authority of scripture. NT is another source for the character of God from nature itself. Now from the outset there have been different views of NT which explains the controversy of the this term.
Historically within the Christian church tradition it was seen to be based on something else. Which we call General Revelation (GR). But many times we confuse what this is as compared to NT. GR refers to something God does. NT refers to something we do. NT is the result of General Revelation. When we talk about revelation, that is general, we are distinguishing this from the word ‘special.’
General Revelation is called this for two reasons: 1) because it given by God to all human beings. The audience to GR is universal. Every one in the world received GR. Not everyone has had the benefit of hearing special revelation as it is found in the scriptures. 2) is because of it’s content. What GR reveals is the knowledge of God -- in general -- . We don’t get from GR the nature of God himself. Just basic substantive information about the existence of God.
Now one more distinction; there are two kinds of GR. 1) Mediate GR is that which God gives by some medium. From an indirect source. An example would be in Psalms when it is written that the atmosphere and space display not God but what he made. Something of the glory of its maker. Just as a great painter leave his own mark on the canvas. So the universe is a medium that proclaims something about the nature of God. 2) Immediate GR is direct and without an intervening medium. Romans 2 says that laws about God which our senses can pick up that God plants in the soul. By virtue of being human we have an internal sense of the reality of God. It is built into the mind and is not a deduction from nature. The sensus divinitus.
Now, when the discussion comes up about GR among Christians there is the question posed, “What does the Bible say about that?” If one believes the Bible is true one will also understand this other form of revelation. And we will embrace both these different forms of information. We find this in the first chapter of Romans. And it comes as a shocking and jolting manner in it’s indictment of us.
The Indictment
For Paul says that there is a reason for why the Gospel (good news) is necessary in the first place. Why with this mediate and immediate knowledge we all are found lacking as to how we measure out what is expected to the Creator. This is not about rejecting this person called Jesus that Paul is speaking to the Roman churches about. No, he is talking about the knowledge of God that they do possess. He quotes Paul in Romans starting at 1:17 and states that mankind suppresses the truth. But not just truth in general but it is a particular truth that is in view here and being suppressed. The manifest knowledge of God being clear and evident for all of human kind. Then Paul’s discussion gets worse. At verse 19 God clearly as given what is necessary for all humans to understand something about his divinity. This God doesn’t hide little clues and that only the alert and super intelligent can find and discern. Maybe we can or maybe we can’t. No, it has nothing to do with how clever we are in arriving at some great conclusions about that how God exists. Here Paul says it is so plain and so manifest that everybody sees it. And therefore, it leaves all without any excuses.
Paul is appealing to those who will try to find the excuse that if I had only known about who you were. If I had of only known you were there my life would have been different. Then I would have been loyal and obedient. But here in this dialogue Paul says that this thinking wont fly. Why, because you did know. You knew my eternal power. You knew my very deity because I showed it to you. And plainly at that. The notion you didn’t come after me is not because of ignorance, no, but because you hated me. You wouldn’t have me in your thoughts.
But there are those who will say that there is a divine revelation but that mankind is not capable of capturing its essence because we beings are shielded from its truth because of a corruptible part in us.
Natural revelation produces Natural Theology which is the central and foundational for the universal guilt of mankind.
I am always getting the question about various tribal clans and people groups which are hidden away from these ideas. Well, my answer is slightly glib. Does not having Aquinas and others make you innocent? Is that the requirement? The question should be; ‘how many innocent tribal peoples are there scattered around the various continents of the earth?’ If we are reading Paul correctly he is saying there are no innocents anywhere. All have received the revelation of the Father Creator. And everyone, every last on of us and them, have repressed that knowledge and exchanged it for a substitute lie. This results in all of us choosing the activity of idolatry rather than the worship of the only true God. So this whole world, so to speak, is under indictment and that God sends a savior into this very world to bring a life line. This GR that the Father has given places us under this indictment and this revelation is clear and plain. At least in 66 books of scripture.
So NT, in its most rudimentary sense, is that knowledge of God that every human being has as a direct result or consequence of GR. The knowledge of God we have from nature.
When Augustine talked and wrote about NT he went to Romans 1 for his definitions. Centuries later when Aquinas was developing is system of NT he went to both Romans and to Augustine’s writings and quoted him often. They said because of Romans 1 and GR there is a universal knowledge of God. Now some people think what Aquinas was really saying was that man, with the use of his unaided reason, without any assistance from Divine revelation, has the intellectual capacity to ascend into the heavens and arrive at a knowledge of God. But that is not what Aquinas taught by a long shot. Both of these leaders and writers said was that we have NT through the means of Divine revelation.
The consequences of these ideas are massive for the science of apologetics. As I hope we will see in the coming sessions.
the Apologetics of Aquinas
10th, defending Faith
The Apologetic of Aquinas
We have been looking at the concepts of Natural Theology (NT) as it relates to general revelation. As I mentioned earlier that though it is taught by Paul in Romans 1 and explained in depth by Aurelius Augustine in the 3rd and 4th century it is mostly recognized for it’s development by Thomas Aquinas. R. C. Sproul says the Protestants have had an allergy to NT because it was seen as somehow too Roman Catholic. But he sees this as a bias on their part and not a problem in the least. NT has suffered in modern times, also, as it relates to Secular philosophy. Francis Schaffer, a splendid thinker, had a differing understanding of Aquinas. Schaffer made the case often that it was Aquinas that separated nature and grace. So let’s explain this idea of grace as it relates to nature. Aquinas thought that there is no barrier but union in grace and nature though a distinction.
What problem was Thomas Aquinas trying to solve?
To answer this we have to go back and get the historical circumstances in which he labored as a Christian apologist. He was writing at a time when the greatest threat to Christianity was the onslaught of Islam. Muslim philosophy was being advanced at this time in history. These philosophers were promoting ‘integral Aristotelianism.’ A synthesis between Muslim philosophy and Aristotle. Merging the best of Aristotle with Islam. One of the central thesis they tried to establish was the ‘Double Truth Theory.’ What Aquinas was wrestling with in his time is similar to our time. The definition being, Something could at the same time be true in philosophy but false in religion. Or true in religion but false in philosophy. Or true in science but false in theology. And so on.
If I can take that idea and transfer it to our own day it would be like this.
1. We have many people in this day that believe in ‘macro-evolution’ theory of how life came to be here. The human race and the universe has come to pass through the gratuitous collision of atoms and that man has come up and emerged from the sludge and slime as the result of a cosmic accident with no definitive or no ultimate purpose in view. While also being destined to annihilation. So the origin of humanity is in meaninglessness and the destiny in meaningless.
2. But we are of the stance that it came to be by an omniscient self-existent being. That God, through His wisdom and power, intentionally created human beings in His own image for and eternal purpose. This destiny and purpose in these two opposing views, I think, could not be more farther apart in their approach to human significance.
Now today, if we adopted the ‘Double Truth Theory’ (DTT) it would look like this: A Christian on Sunday would say I believe in the Divine Creation of all that exists. On Tuesday and the other days I believe I am a cosmic accident. A highly developed germ with no designer but chance. I believe both of them equally. The DTT as characterized by Muslim thinkers was thought to validate both believes could be held at the same time. To both affirm and deny conclusions about universal truths. And from which ever perspective you are coming from, at a particular time of the week, they are true, both at the same time. This is the meaning of DTT. Absolute opposites can be held as true at the same time. Antithetical and irreconcilable concepts are both true but it is how you have perspective at the time; either scientifically or religiously.
It is against this developing theory of ‘pure relativism’ that was threatening Christianity and science in his day that the Aquinas developed his apologetic of natural theology. In order to refute the DTT onslaught. What he did in order to address this problem was to distinguish between nature and grace and between reason and faith between religion and science. It is one thing to distinguish between them but it is another thing to separate them.
One of the most important things he tells his seminary students they will ever learn in theology is; the distinction between a distinction and a separation. If I distinguish between your body and your soul I have brought no harm to you. If I separate your body from your soul I have killed you. If that is clear, then Aquinas said you must distinguish between nature and grace. And what he meant is this; there are certain things that we can learn from nature that we can’t learn from grace. What is meant is there are certain truths that we discover from study of this earth, an inquiry into mechanisms of science, that we can learn things by examining the physical things around us that we will never read in the books God says are His words to us. We will never read and find a thing about the circulatory system of the human body or molecular biology. We only find these truths by studying the reality of nature. The results of these multiple independent studies results in knowledge we will never find in the Bible. But at the same time there are things that we learn from grace and scripture that we can’t learn in a laboratory. God’s determination about the state of the human condition comes from God’s revelation in the text and the truth of it is one’s ability to understand it correctly. Aquinas has distinguished between different arenas of knowing truth.
There is a 3rd category; which is called the ‘Articulus Mixtus.’ Or in plain English the ‘Mixed articles.’ They refer to those truths that can be known or learned, either from the Bible or from the study of nature. Chief among those articles that can be known, from either nature of scripture, is the existence of God. In other words, you don’t have to read the Bible to know that God exists. Why would he say that? Because he was already a proponent of NT. He was saying that the Bible, itself, was telling us that there is another way to know that God in fact exists.
What happens when you turn to the very first page of the Bible you find; In the beginning God…
There is assumed a God in the first sense. There is no need to prove the presupposition that God is other than the worker of the next set of events. Some say that statement in itself is the ‘death blow’ to apologetics. There is no need to argue for God’s existence because the Word God says it is already know by nature. The Bible, doesn’t defend the notion that God exists. It assumes it at the start of everything. To try and explain the necessary proof would be like ‘brining coals to Newcastle.’ Creation has proved His case conclusively through nature. The person who comes to the Bible to find more revelation as to who God is has to come to this source already determining that nature has already proved this God. They have already received the general revelation of God that He gives in nature. God doesn’t have to prove Himself twice as it were.
So Aquinas and Augustine are saying that God’s existence is proved both by nature and by grace. These two spheres of influence, both science and religion, are not separated and opposed to one another but are actually in agreement. Following Augustine, Aquinas said that all truth is God’s truth. All truth meets at the top. If something is true in science it must also be true in theology. If it is true in theology it must be true in science.
If God reveals Himself, both, in nature and scripture and the principle textbook for the theologian is the Bible and the principle textbook for the physicist or biologist or astronomer is nature, and God has both these spheres as His means of revelation, and God is the God of Truth, then, in an ideal world there would never be conflict. But history has shown that there are seemingly every decade a controversy between science and the text of scripture. Between the reason of what is known and faith in what is hidden but the same source being the Creator.
But we don’t live in an ideal world. This is the point that Aquinas was making. We have theologians in one corner reading and deciphering the text but making mistakes in understanding what the scripture says. In the 16th century virtually everyone believed that we were in a geocentric universe. That the earth was the center of the solar system. Not just the Pope or the cardinals and bishops in Rome but it was a point of faith for Martin Luther and John Calvin who saw Copernicus as an agent of the Devil to undermine the integrity of the sacred. What Copernicus did was not only prove that the Ptolemaic system was wrong but he also proved conclusively that the Church’s understanding of astronomy was wrong. Here is a clear case where the scientific community in the process of ascertaining the truth of nature found the Church wrong and corrected the Church. They didn’t correct the Bible but the Churches understanding of what the Bible was saying. The conclusion is that theologians can be wrong when they study the scripture. On the other hand when scientists speak and say that ’things can come out of nothing’ then scientists would have to be held up as using bad science. They are talking nonsense.
Aquinas was saying these two spheres are not separate. In our time there is, again, the desire to separate the two. It’s said that you can believe in your religious customs in your private cupboard and sing your hymns and pray, to find emotional satisfaction, but don’t call it science. Don’t call it truth and knowledge. Intelligent people don’t acquiesce to that sort of thing.
Aquinas explained that to be rational you will be driven to the conclusions in nature of the compelling knowledge that there is an existent God. Only a fool would not use this knowledge other wise. To say there is no God. Both science and biblical text, together, proclaim the same truth. They support one another and are united. Distinguished but not to be separated. So Francis Schaffer did Aquinas a disservice when he said that Aquinas separated the two. The culture stresses the need to separate the two but don’t leave that at the door of Aquinas. He was trying to show the harmony between reason and faith -- science and religion -- nature and grace. The affirmation being; “All truth is God’s truth and all truth meets at the top.”
Augustine made a challenge to his students that they should learn as much as they can learn about as many things that they could study because wherever they found truth they were finding God’s truth. They were discovering the truth of God.
The Apologetic of Aquinas
We have been looking at the concepts of Natural Theology (NT) as it relates to general revelation. As I mentioned earlier that though it is taught by Paul in Romans 1 and explained in depth by Aurelius Augustine in the 3rd and 4th century it is mostly recognized for it’s development by Thomas Aquinas. R. C. Sproul says the Protestants have had an allergy to NT because it was seen as somehow too Roman Catholic. But he sees this as a bias on their part and not a problem in the least. NT has suffered in modern times, also, as it relates to Secular philosophy. Francis Schaffer, a splendid thinker, had a differing understanding of Aquinas. Schaffer made the case often that it was Aquinas that separated nature and grace. So let’s explain this idea of grace as it relates to nature. Aquinas thought that there is no barrier but union in grace and nature though a distinction.
What problem was Thomas Aquinas trying to solve?
To answer this we have to go back and get the historical circumstances in which he labored as a Christian apologist. He was writing at a time when the greatest threat to Christianity was the onslaught of Islam. Muslim philosophy was being advanced at this time in history. These philosophers were promoting ‘integral Aristotelianism.’ A synthesis between Muslim philosophy and Aristotle. Merging the best of Aristotle with Islam. One of the central thesis they tried to establish was the ‘Double Truth Theory.’ What Aquinas was wrestling with in his time is similar to our time. The definition being, Something could at the same time be true in philosophy but false in religion. Or true in religion but false in philosophy. Or true in science but false in theology. And so on.
If I can take that idea and transfer it to our own day it would be like this.
1. We have many people in this day that believe in ‘macro-evolution’ theory of how life came to be here. The human race and the universe has come to pass through the gratuitous collision of atoms and that man has come up and emerged from the sludge and slime as the result of a cosmic accident with no definitive or no ultimate purpose in view. While also being destined to annihilation. So the origin of humanity is in meaninglessness and the destiny in meaningless.
2. But we are of the stance that it came to be by an omniscient self-existent being. That God, through His wisdom and power, intentionally created human beings in His own image for and eternal purpose. This destiny and purpose in these two opposing views, I think, could not be more farther apart in their approach to human significance.
Now today, if we adopted the ‘Double Truth Theory’ (DTT) it would look like this: A Christian on Sunday would say I believe in the Divine Creation of all that exists. On Tuesday and the other days I believe I am a cosmic accident. A highly developed germ with no designer but chance. I believe both of them equally. The DTT as characterized by Muslim thinkers was thought to validate both believes could be held at the same time. To both affirm and deny conclusions about universal truths. And from which ever perspective you are coming from, at a particular time of the week, they are true, both at the same time. This is the meaning of DTT. Absolute opposites can be held as true at the same time. Antithetical and irreconcilable concepts are both true but it is how you have perspective at the time; either scientifically or religiously.
It is against this developing theory of ‘pure relativism’ that was threatening Christianity and science in his day that the Aquinas developed his apologetic of natural theology. In order to refute the DTT onslaught. What he did in order to address this problem was to distinguish between nature and grace and between reason and faith between religion and science. It is one thing to distinguish between them but it is another thing to separate them.
One of the most important things he tells his seminary students they will ever learn in theology is; the distinction between a distinction and a separation. If I distinguish between your body and your soul I have brought no harm to you. If I separate your body from your soul I have killed you. If that is clear, then Aquinas said you must distinguish between nature and grace. And what he meant is this; there are certain things that we can learn from nature that we can’t learn from grace. What is meant is there are certain truths that we discover from study of this earth, an inquiry into mechanisms of science, that we can learn things by examining the physical things around us that we will never read in the books God says are His words to us. We will never read and find a thing about the circulatory system of the human body or molecular biology. We only find these truths by studying the reality of nature. The results of these multiple independent studies results in knowledge we will never find in the Bible. But at the same time there are things that we learn from grace and scripture that we can’t learn in a laboratory. God’s determination about the state of the human condition comes from God’s revelation in the text and the truth of it is one’s ability to understand it correctly. Aquinas has distinguished between different arenas of knowing truth.
There is a 3rd category; which is called the ‘Articulus Mixtus.’ Or in plain English the ‘Mixed articles.’ They refer to those truths that can be known or learned, either from the Bible or from the study of nature. Chief among those articles that can be known, from either nature of scripture, is the existence of God. In other words, you don’t have to read the Bible to know that God exists. Why would he say that? Because he was already a proponent of NT. He was saying that the Bible, itself, was telling us that there is another way to know that God in fact exists.
What happens when you turn to the very first page of the Bible you find; In the beginning God…
There is assumed a God in the first sense. There is no need to prove the presupposition that God is other than the worker of the next set of events. Some say that statement in itself is the ‘death blow’ to apologetics. There is no need to argue for God’s existence because the Word God says it is already know by nature. The Bible, doesn’t defend the notion that God exists. It assumes it at the start of everything. To try and explain the necessary proof would be like ‘brining coals to Newcastle.’ Creation has proved His case conclusively through nature. The person who comes to the Bible to find more revelation as to who God is has to come to this source already determining that nature has already proved this God. They have already received the general revelation of God that He gives in nature. God doesn’t have to prove Himself twice as it were.
So Aquinas and Augustine are saying that God’s existence is proved both by nature and by grace. These two spheres of influence, both science and religion, are not separated and opposed to one another but are actually in agreement. Following Augustine, Aquinas said that all truth is God’s truth. All truth meets at the top. If something is true in science it must also be true in theology. If it is true in theology it must be true in science.
If God reveals Himself, both, in nature and scripture and the principle textbook for the theologian is the Bible and the principle textbook for the physicist or biologist or astronomer is nature, and God has both these spheres as His means of revelation, and God is the God of Truth, then, in an ideal world there would never be conflict. But history has shown that there are seemingly every decade a controversy between science and the text of scripture. Between the reason of what is known and faith in what is hidden but the same source being the Creator.
But we don’t live in an ideal world. This is the point that Aquinas was making. We have theologians in one corner reading and deciphering the text but making mistakes in understanding what the scripture says. In the 16th century virtually everyone believed that we were in a geocentric universe. That the earth was the center of the solar system. Not just the Pope or the cardinals and bishops in Rome but it was a point of faith for Martin Luther and John Calvin who saw Copernicus as an agent of the Devil to undermine the integrity of the sacred. What Copernicus did was not only prove that the Ptolemaic system was wrong but he also proved conclusively that the Church’s understanding of astronomy was wrong. Here is a clear case where the scientific community in the process of ascertaining the truth of nature found the Church wrong and corrected the Church. They didn’t correct the Bible but the Churches understanding of what the Bible was saying. The conclusion is that theologians can be wrong when they study the scripture. On the other hand when scientists speak and say that ’things can come out of nothing’ then scientists would have to be held up as using bad science. They are talking nonsense.
Aquinas was saying these two spheres are not separate. In our time there is, again, the desire to separate the two. It’s said that you can believe in your religious customs in your private cupboard and sing your hymns and pray, to find emotional satisfaction, but don’t call it science. Don’t call it truth and knowledge. Intelligent people don’t acquiesce to that sort of thing.
Aquinas explained that to be rational you will be driven to the conclusions in nature of the compelling knowledge that there is an existent God. Only a fool would not use this knowledge other wise. To say there is no God. Both science and biblical text, together, proclaim the same truth. They support one another and are united. Distinguished but not to be separated. So Francis Schaffer did Aquinas a disservice when he said that Aquinas separated the two. The culture stresses the need to separate the two but don’t leave that at the door of Aquinas. He was trying to show the harmony between reason and faith -- science and religion -- nature and grace. The affirmation being; “All truth is God’s truth and all truth meets at the top.”
Augustine made a challenge to his students that they should learn as much as they can learn about as many things that they could study because wherever they found truth they were finding God’s truth. They were discovering the truth of God.
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