A Christian Thinker

By L. R. R.

 Ontology is the study of being (Gk. ontos). Or it is the study of reality and of the existence of God. Better yet, the ontological argument for the existence or being of God proceeds from the mere idea that God is an absolute perfect or Necessary Being. I think the most infuental formulation of the ontological argument and was first formed by Anseln of Canterbury (1033-1109) which is found in the first three chapters of the Prologium. Anselms argument may look like this:

1. God is, by definition, a Being, greater than which nothing can be concieved.
2. It is greater to exist in reality than to exist only in mind.
3. Therefore, God must exist in reality. If he didn’t he wouldn’t be the greatest being possible.

The first premise, Anselm is telling us that such a Necessary Being (= God) exist since we have a concept of God: we understand God to be the highest perfection and the standard of goodness, justice and beauty, something than which nothing greater can be concieved. Because we have this concept, God at least exists in our minds as an object of the understanding. Either this Necessary Being exist only in our minds or else exist both in our minds and extramental reality.

By L. R. R.

The argument from morality is perhaps one of the most effective argument among arguments for the existence of a moral God. Imagen a universe without a moral law giver such as God, morality of what is good or evil or what is right or wrong, morality would be subjective not objective. The moral argument appeals to the existence of moral laws as evidence of God’s existence. According to this argument, there couldn’t be such a thing as morality without God.

Argument from morality can be summarized as follows:

a) If God does not exist, then objective moral values do not exits.

b) Objective moral values exist.

Therefore, God exist.

Premise a tells us that no god, no good. What this implies is that if God does not exist as a moral absolute and moral law giver, then this would logically follow that goodness is arbitrary and relative. What is intrisincally good value for you might intrinsically evil value for the other person. If you think that cannibalism is inherently evil to you, eating human flesh could be an appetizer for someone else! If there is no moral God, then there is neither good nor evil. Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky once said, “If there is no God, everything is possible.”

read Atheism and morality

The second premise b, that moral values exist is undeniably true. All of us, or at least most of us, have an inborn and ineradicable knowledge of basic morality. For instance, it is always wrong and evil to torture infants for the fun of it. We all know that torturing infants for fun is wrong and the statement above expresses an objective moral value. Let me make another example, stealing from anyone is always wrong anytime anywhere. One does not need to believe in a moral God to know that stealing is wrong. We know this intuitively. We know something to be wrong because a moral God endowed it into our hearts. So, the best explaination why there is morality is because a good, and unfailing objective morality exists and this we call God.

Again, if there is no God as atheists agressively propagates then there would be no objective goodness.Philosopher atheist, J. L. Mackie agrees,

“Moral properties constitutes so odd a cluster of qualities and relations that they are most unlikely to have arisen in ordinary course of events without an all-powerful God to create them.” [The Miracles of Theism, J. L. Mackie, Oxford:Clarendon Press,p.115]

By L. R. R.

The design argument is formally called the teleological argument. The word Telos in Greek means, meaning, purpose or ultimate end. Quite simply, it states that a designer must exist since the universe and living things exhibit marks of design in their order, consistency, unity, and pattern. Historically, the design argument actually predate Christianity. Ancient Greeks such as Plato and Aristotle argued for the existent of a supernatural Being based on their observations of the celestial body.

In his unforgettable book Natural Theology, William Paley used an analogy to make his point that an intelligent designer exist. A typical analogy of this is the Watchmaker Argument Watchmaker Argument.

“But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think of the answer which I had before given,–that, for anything I knoew, the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch as well as for the stone?…For this reason, and for no other, viz,. that, when we come to inspect the watch we perceive (what we could not discover in the stone) that its several parts are famed put together for a purpose….[Description of watch omitted.] This mechanism being observed… the inference, we think, is inevitalbe, that the watch must have had a maker….who comprehended its construction, and designed its use.”

Paley’s Argument can be summarized as follows:

Human artifacts are products of intelligent design.
1. The universe resembles human artifacts.
2. Therefore the universe is a product of intelligent design.
3. But the universe is complex and gigantic, in comparison to human artifacts.
4. Therefore, there probably is a powerful and vastly intelligent designer who created the universe.

We must bare in mind that the argument from design is far from foolproof. For instance, the notion that the universe is designed is pretty much subjective.  Different observations in the natural world can produce different theories to account for their existence.  Also, this argument is built upon an analogy.  If we find things in the universe that are chaotic, then by analogy, that would imply there is no designer. So teleological argument, as such can only best explained as a highly probable but not 100 percent certain argument for the existence of God.

Although the argument from design is far from perfect, it it however eminently logical. But evolutionists would object against the idea of an intelligent designer by, for example, the ice crystal formation of sophistication that comes randomly i.e. design without a designer. Does this objection be extrapolated to organic life? Frank J. Sherwin a Zoologist gives his insiteful comment,

“Although ice crystal do follow the law of physics and chemistry giving repeated order (that is, they are formed from vapor in which the water molecules are oriented and moving according to random process), they do not convey any information. An ice crystal is composed of water, whereas something like enzyme (a large protein molecule) is composed of hundreds of stragically placed amino acid molecules. No so an ice crystal, which is simply a repeated order of identical water molecules¹.

Source

1 The Big Arguments: Does God Exist? Master Books, p.74

By L. R. R.

 What Is The Cosmological Argument?

This article is intended to those who haven’t been yet exposed to the cosmological argument and hopefully I’ll get them acquainted with it. What is the Cosmological argument? Well, let me put my answer in this way; the cosmological argument argues for the existence of a being such as God and it tries to demonstrate that because something exists there must be someone who caused the universe came into existence.

In other word, without a cause such as God there could or would be no effect such as the existence of the universe. Someone at this moment might object, “what if the universe came into existence by its own, hence no need in explaining that god or gods caused it in the process?” This is quite valid objection, but misleading. For example, did the universe caused itself into existence from nothing? Did it just popped out into existence?

Remember the old maxim, “nothing comes from nothing” or “nothing cannot produce something” is scientifically true. The universe could not have came into existence out from nothing since nothing (by its definition) cannot cause something into effect. Pretty easy isn’t it? So, if nothing (nada) cannot cause something to exist such as the universe, then there must be a being; a necessary being that cause something to exist. Also, the cosmological argument tries to show that the effect such as the universe is not a necessary being and therefore there must be a prime cause.

To put this quite simple, the cosmological argument is to prove that the universe was caused by some agent that was neither part of the universe nor itself was caused.

Leibniz once ask this question, “why is there something rather than nothing?” in which the cosmological argument try to to give a cogent, reasonable answer.

Three Types of Arguments

The Kalam cosmological argument

The Kalam cosmological argument may be formulated as follows:

A) Whatever begins to exist has a cause,

B) The Universe began to exist

C) Therefore, the universe has a cause

The first premise (a) seems logical and reasonably consistent since something cannot come into existence from nothing. Our second premise (b) shows and confirm the fundamental law of science, the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which affirms that the universe is running out of usable energy, and therefore, the universe, cannot have existed in infinity. Other supportive evidence is affirmed most by astrophysicists that the universe has a beginning, and that the universe is expanding. Other philosophical argument for a beginning can be formulated as follows,

A) If an infinte number of moments occured before now, then now would never have come, since it is impossible to traverse an infinite number of moments.

B) But now has come.

C) Hence, there was a finite number of moments before now; the universe had a beginning.¹

Thomistic Cosmological Argument

Thomistic cosmological argument owes its origin to a philosopher theologian Thomas av Aquinas (1225 – 7 March 1274)  . His “Five Ways” arguments for the existence of the ‘first cause’ or ‘unmoved-mover’ which we call God goes something like this,

The Argument From Motion: Motion is an effect and as such, needs a cause. This mean to say, whatever is moved must in turn be moved by another agent. This chain of one thing moving another that moves another cannot be regress infinitely. There cannot be an infinite regress of movers. First Mover, there can be no chain of motion, since all chain of motion depends on prior movers for its motions.

The Argument from Effinient Cause: Everything that comes into existence owes its existence to something else. We cannot cause ourselves to exist. Therefore, there must be a first cause, efficient Cause of all efficient causality in the world and this Cause is what Christians call God.

The Argument from Possibility and Necessity: It is possible for God to exist witout the existence of the universe, but it is impossible for the universe to exist without God. It is possible that beings that began to exists would cease to exist since they are possible beings. But not all can be possible beings (such as you and me), because what come to exist does so only through what already exists. Nothing cannot cause something (remember?). Therefore, there must be a Being whose existence is necessary, one that never came into being (self created) and will never cease to be. Again, there cannot be an infinite regress of Necessary Beings each of which  has its necessity dependent on another because an infinite regress of dependent causes is impossible. A Necessary Being cannot be a dependent being.

The Argument from Gradiation (perfection in things): The argument goes, There is a gradation to be found in things: some are better or worse than others. Or since not all are perfect or less perfect, there must, therefore exist a perfect Being that is causing the perfections of the less-than-perfect beings.

The Argument For a First Cause of Being: This argument is quite simple. Since there cannot be an infinite causes from being to another being, there must be a final explanation for our existence.  Therefore, there must be an independent, first uncaused Cause of the existence of every dependent being. And this independent Being is what Christians call God.

The Leibnizian Cosmological Argument

The argument comes from a German philosopher and mathematecian, Gottfriend W Leibniz. Leibniz wrote, “The first question which should rightly be asked is this: why is there something rather than nothing?”

The argument runs as follows:

1. Every existing thing has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.
2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.
3. The universe is an existing thing.
4. Therefore the explanation of the universe is God.

What does the Bible say about the cosmological argument? The Scripture is pretty clear the universe has a beginning and that He created it, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). “. . .the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain him”. We also know that “the LORD, the everlasting God” (Genesis 21:33) “The LORD made the heavens” (1 Chronicles 16:26). We know that God is not Himself a physical part of the universe. 2 Chronicles 2:6 states:  is eternal and infinite. “His mighty power rules forever” (Psalm 66:7). The Bible teaches very clearly that God is the uncaused First Cause who created the universe by willing it into existence.

recommended reading

1. Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics, Norman L. Geisler, p. 399 Baker Books

Guide To Christian Apologetics, Doug Powell, Holman Reference.

By L. R. R.

 British philosopher and skeptic David Hume propounded, “If God is all powerful, all-presence, and all good God exist then whence is evil?”

    Indeed, if a good, and power God exist then, why is there evil, pain and death in the world? Why does our loved one dies?

    To be honest these questions is not at all simple to answer. Bright-minded philosophers, theologians, and apologists has wrestled with this age-old question.

    Yet nothing seems to satisfy our mind as to what is the correct answer to this all common objection, namely the problem of evil. (see Problem of evil) The problem of pain, and suffering is not at all easy to handle since this question involves more on emotional than intellectual. For instance, how can we defend the problem of pain and suffering to a person who has just lost his beloved family through a airplane crash, or a beloved daughter who suffers from leukemia and is dying.

     Or a teenage girl who is going through a therapy because of her past experiences being raped and molested by her own father? What about other atrocities, genocide etc, etc. These evil in the world are not to be taken lightly. Nor should we ignore as Christians the suffering of a child.

    Sometimes our intellect does not suffice with those who suffer with pain, and lost loved ones. All we can do is to offer, love and compassion, just as Jesus Christ would do.

    However, with all the evil in the world and all unbearable pains we sometimes or perhaps often times experience are just temporary. This is the hope believers in Christ can look forward in the near future.

Atheism And The Meaning of Life

    I’m in accord with those who believe that evil exist because God has an ultimate purpose. But what is the purpose and hope for life in Athiesm? Can atheism give us an suitable answer as to why there is evil and sorrow? Let us see examine briefly what atheism has to offer us in this question.

    In the non-purposeful, mindless, dog eat dog world cannot have any meaning and purpose in life. Pain, evil and suffering just part of our existence. No use asking why all these suffering exists.

    We live our lives the way we want it to be and if we die we are gone into oblivion forever. That’s it and that’s that period. Atheism as a worldview is far from being rational.

    Atheists who flatly denies God’s existence has no business in raising this question against Christians, since after all “what is evil” or “what is good” to atheists?

    Isn’t this universe just-so randomly processed and life is nothing but red in tooth and claw? My point is this, if God does not exist, then life is objectively meaningless. Knowing that life has no meaning, man cannot live consistently.

    Of course, Knowing that life has no purpose, atheists would pretend to be happy and believe that life has meaning. Atheists kind of hope about life amounts to self-delusion. Is this the best hope atheists can offer to mankind a let-us-pretend kind of hope?

    This is not so with Christianity. According to the Christian worldview, God does exist, and mans life does not end at the grave and to oblivion. God will bodily resurrect man may enjoy eternal life and fellowship with God almighty. See Atheism and the meaning of life.

The Cause And Effect

    We may not find satisfactory answers by our skilled philosophers, theologians, and apologists etc, we may, however, find comfort in their rigor explanation, and have more broader understanding as to why evil, death, suffering exists.

    Christians theodicists must be very careful not to engage this problem much too deep hoping to find a “formula” that will knock-down skeptics arguments against the existence of an all benevolent God.

    I believe that only God can give a satisfactory answer since His thoughts are higher than our thoughts (Isa. 55:9).

In The Beginning

    Christians must come to mind that this cosmos and earth we live in is not as is was in the beginning God intended it to be. 

    In the beginning just about a few thousand years ago, God the Creator created the universe and everything in it, and at the end of His creative process, God saws everything He had made was “very good” (Gen. 1:31).

    The statement “very good” as we should understand it, cannot contain, defects, such as pain, evil and death.

    If the opposite is true then I don’t see or understand why it is “very good” to have an unbearable headache, or a lamb, just about to be eaten by a lion for breakfast, yet God would state that it was very good.

    As a matter of biblical truth both humans and animals were vegetarians at the time of creation (Gen. 1:29-30).

Adam and Eve Sinned

    We have read and heard about Adam and Eve on the account of Genesis of the Old Testament. Undoubtedly God created Adam and Eve to be a perfect, obedient, couple. God placed them in a perfect garden (Garden of Eden) with the full capacity to chose between being obedience and disobedience (free will).

    God commanded our first parents not to eat the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or they would suffer death (spiritually) as a consequence (Gen. 2:17). 

    Instead of heeding to God’s warning they did exactly the opposite. They took the Serpent’s lie and ate the “forbidden fruit” in which God clearly forbid. Because of Adam’s defiance by disobeying (cause) his Maker, death, pain, suffering enter into this world (effect). 

    “Thorns and thistles” were now part of this world. all were cursed including plants and animal. The heaven and the earth in which God created was no longer “very good” or perfect.

    Suffering and death now abounded as a terrible consequence thanks to our first parents, Adam and Eve. By Adam’s sin the whole world and everything in it, now under sin-cursed.

    Ever since Adam and Eve sinned, (humans, animals, plants) has been groaning and travails (Rom. 8:22). In addition it was through Adam sinful act that death, suffering etc, affected the whole human race,

“Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned” (Rom. 5:12).

    Not only thistles and thorns, pain and sin became reality, suffering and the most dreadful death- is now part of our existence. Because of death nothing, humanly speaking, is forever. Life would slowly decay. Death, evil, suffering, and pain now reigns in sin-cursed universe. 

A New Heaven and A New Earth

In case you didn’t know, Adam was a head representative of the human race. We are therefore counted guilty because of his sin

    Because of Adam’s sin, All men sinned (Rom. 5:12). And this is not very good to hear, or is it?

    We might think that this is unfair. Let us examine this whether or not this is fair.

    Adam was the representative of human race this means as I have noted earlier, we sinned and died in Adam. As in Adam all are cursed. All are now under the judgment of God. Paul wrote,

“Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation” (Rom. 5:18). As a head representative of the whole human race Adam failed.

    But then came the second Adam namely Jesus Christ. Through Adam’s disobedience all were made sinners, Christ’s obedience on the other hand “shall many be made righteous” (Rom. 5:19).

    The bottom line is this Adam brought suffering, and death, while Jesus Christ brings eternal life (Rom 5:21). In Christ all will be made alive,

“For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Cor. 15:22).

    Does this still sound unfair to you? The first Adam was made by dust, while Jesus Christ was not created and came from heaven (1 Cor. 15:47). 

    Remember, sinners (that is to say unbeliever) are still under condemnation by God. Only those who have trusted their salvation in Christ Jesus will be made alive and have eternal life (John 3:15).

New Creation

    War, victims of war, rape, murder, incests, infant genocide, hunger, poverty, sickness, pain, suffering, are death is obvious in our daily lives. This is so because of one man’s sin.

    To make the matter worse, Satan as for this moment is the god of this world (2 Cor. 4:4; John 12:13). He and his hordes of demons is at work full time! No such thing as part-time job here.

    Nevertheless, all suffering, death (Rev. 20:14) and even Satan will be wiped out (Rev. 20:10) in the future. All of these maladies will be eradicated. The once paradise lost will be new paradise found.

    In Revelation 21:1,4 We read this, 

“And I saw a new heaven and a new earth…And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.”

    Isn’t the passage above comforting, and wonderful? Imagen a new heaven and new earth. New holy city, new Jerusalem, with no tears of sorrow, or crying because of a painful situation, and death itself will be no more.

    No matter what you are going through right now, pain, sorrow, death by which we all experience are temporal. But the promise of God is forever! The Book of Revelation is the final chapter God wrote. 

    This is a wonderful message and an eternal joy for those who are with God. We do not know as yet how it is to be with our Creator and Redeemer. But, one thing is certain, to know that we will be in eternity with God will be more glorious and wonderful!

    Before closing this subject let me quote shortly one of my favorite Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga concerning God and suffering:

“As the Christians sees things, God does not stand idly by, coolly observing the suffering of his creatures. He enters into and shares our suffering. He endures the anguish of seeing his son, the second person of the Trinity, consigned to the bitterly cruel and shameful death of the cross…”

Conclusion

The world around us as it is now is under cursed by one man’s sin Adam. Sin, pain, evil, and suffering reigns supreme. God did not intentionally created this present world.

Atheism cannot possibly be the right answer to our question. If atheism is true (which is not) then our question to the problem of evil make no sense. To atheists we simply live in a dog eat dog world.

The first Adam brought sin and death upon humans yet the second Adam which is Jesus Christ brought new hope, salvation, and life.

Christians believes that this present world with all its maladies will someday be erased, thus a new heaven and new earth is created. In it pain, sorrow, death will nolonger exists.

(With a special preface for Christian thinkers from different disciplines)
Professor Alvin Plantinga

copyright © 1995-2007 Leadership U. All rights reserved.
Updated: 14 July 2002

Preface.

In the paper that follows I write from the perspective of a philosopher, and of course I have detailed knowledge of (at best) only my own field. I am convinced, however, that many other disciplines resemble philosophy with respect to things I say below. (It will be up to the practitioners of those other disciplines to see whether or not I am right.)

First, it isn’t just in philosophy that we Christians are heavily influenced by the practice and procedures of our non-Christian peers. (Indeed, given the cantankerousness of philosophers and the rampant disagreement in philosophy it is probably easier to be a maverick there than in most other disciplines.) The same holds for nearly any important contemporary intellectual discipline: history, literary and artistic criticism, musicology, and the sciences, both social and natural. In all of these areas there are ways of proceeding, pervasive assumptions about the nature of the discipline (for example, assumptions about the nature of science and its place in our intellectual economy), assumptions about how the discipline should be carried on and what a valuable or worthwhile contribution is like and so on; we imbibe these assumptions, if not with our mother’s milk, at any rate in learning to pursue our disciplines. In all these areas we learn how to pursue our disciplines under the direction and influence of our peers.

But in many cases these assumptions and presumptions do not easily mesh with a Christian or theistic way of looking at the world. This is obvious in many areas: in literary criticism and film theory, where creative anti-realism (see below) runs riot; in sociology and psychology and the other human sciences; in history; and even in a good deal of contemporary (liberal) theology. It is less obvious but nonetheless present in the so-called natural sciences. The Australian philosopher J. J. C. Smart once remarked that an argument useful (from his naturalistic point of view) for convincing believers in human freedom of the error of their ways is to point out that contemporary mechanistic biology seems to leave no room for human free will: how, for example, could such a thing have developed in the evolutionary course of things? Even in physics and mathematics, those austere bastions of pure reason, similar questions arise. These questions have to do with the content of these sciences and the way in which they have developed. They also have to do with the way in which (as they are ordinarily taught and practiced) these disciplines are artificially separated from questions concerning the nature of the objects they study-a separation determined, not by what is most natural to the subject matter in question, but by a broadly positivist conception of the nature of knowledge and the nature of human intellectual activity.

And thirdly, here, as in philosophy, Christians must display autonomy and integrality. If contemporary mechanistic biology really has no place for human freedom, then something other than contemporary mechanistic biology is called for; and the Christian community must develop it. If contemporary psychology is fundamentally naturalist, then it is up to Christian psychologists to develop an alternative that fits well with Christian supernaturalism-one that takes its start from such scientifically seminal truths as that God has created humankind in his own image.

Of course I do not presume to tell Christian practitioners of other disciplines how properly to pursue those disciplines as Christians. (I have enough and to spare in trying to discern how to pursue my own discipline properly.) But I deeply believe that the pattern displayed in philosophy is also to be found in nearly every area of serious intellectual endeavor. In each of these areas the fundamental and often unexpressed presuppositions that govern and direct the discipline are not religiously neutral; they are often antithetic to a Christian perspective. In these areas, then, as in philosophy, it is up to Christians who practice the relevant discipline to develop the right Christian alternatives.

1.Introduction

Christianity, these days, and in our part of the world, is on the move, There are many signs pointing in this direction: the growth of Christian schools, of the serious conservative Christian denominations, the furor over prayer in public schools, the creationism/evolution controversy, and others.

There is also powerful evidence for this contention in philosophy. Thirty or thirty-five years ago, the public temper of mainline establishment philosophy in the English speaking world was deeply non-Christian. Few establishment philosophers were Christian; even fewer were willing to admit in public that they were, and still fewer thought of their being Christian as making a real difference to their practice as philosophers. The most popular question of philosophical theology, at that time, was not whether Christianity or theism is true; the question, instead, was whether it even makes sense to say that there is such a person as god. According to the logical positivism then running riot, the sentence “there is such a person as God” literally makes no sense; it is disguised nonsense; it altogether fails to express a thought or a proposition. The central question wasn’t whether theism is true; it was whether there is such a thing as theism-a genuine factual claim that is either true or false-at all. But things have changed. There are now many more Christians and many more unabashed Christians in the professional mainstream of American philosophical life. For example, the foundation of the Society for Christian Philosophers, an organization to promote fellowship and exchange of ideas among Christian philosophers, is both an evidence and a consequence of that fact. Founded some six years ago, it is now a thriving organization with regional meetings in every part of the country; its members are deeply involved in American professional philosophical life. So Christianity is on the move, and on the move in philosophy, as well as in other areas of intellectual life.

But even if Christianity is on the move, it has taken only a few brief steps; and it is marching through largely alien territory. For the intellectual culture of our day is for the most part profoundly non- theistic and hence non-Christian- more than that, it is anti-theistic. Most of the so-called human sciences, much of the non-human sciences, most of non-scientific intellectual endeavor and even a good bit of allegedly Christian theology is animated by a spirit wholly foreign to that of Christian theism. I don’t have the space here to elaborate and develop this point; but I don’t have to, for it is familiar to you all. To return to philosophy: most of the major philosophy departments in America have next to nothing to offer the student intent on coming to see how to be a Christian in philosophy-how to assess and develop the bearing of Christianity on matters of current philosophical concern, and how to think about those philosophical matters of interest to the Christian community. In the typical graduate philosophy department there will be little more, along these lines, than a course in philosophy of religion in which it is suggested that the evidence for the existence of God-the classical theistic proofs, say-is at least counterbalanced by the evidence against the existence of God-the problem of evil, perhaps; and it may then be added that the wisest course, in view of such maxims as Ockham’s Razor, is to dispense with the whole idea of God, at least for philosophical purposes.

My aim, in this talk, is to give some advice to philosophers who are Christians. And although my advice is directed specifically to Christian philosophers, it is relevant to all philosophers who believe in God, whether Christian, Jewish or Moslem. I propose to give some advice to the Christian or theistic philosophical community: some advice relevant to the situation in which in fact we find ourselves. “Who are you,” you say, “to give the rest of us advice?” That’s a good question to which one doesn’t know the answer: I shall ignore it. My counsel can be summed up on two connected suggestions, along with a codicil. First, Christian philosophers and Christian intellectuals generally must display more autonomy-more independence of the rest of philosophical world. Second, Christian philosophers must display more integrity-integrity in the sense of integral wholeness, or oneness, or unity, being all of one piece. Perhaps ‘integrality’ would be the better word here. And necessary to these two is a third: Christian courage, or boldness, or strength, or perhaps Christian self-confidence. We Christian philosophers must display more faith, more trust in the Lord; we must put on the whole armor of God. Let me explain in a brief and preliminary way what I have in mind; then I shall go on to consider some examples in more detail.

Consider a Christian college student from Grand Rapids, Michigan, say, or Arkadelphia, Arkansas-who decides philosophy is the subject for her. Naturally enough, she will go to graduate school to learn how to become a philosopher. Perhaps she goes to Princeton, or Berkeley, or Pittsburgh, or Arizona; it doesn’t much matter which. There she learns how philosophy is presently practiced. The burning questions of the day are such topics as the new theory of reference; the realism/anti-realism controversy; the problems with probability; Quine’s claims about the radical indeterminacy of translation; Rawls on justice; the causal theory of knowledge; Gettier problems; the artificial intelligence model for the understanding of what it is to be a person; the question of the ontological status of unobservable entities in science; whether there is genuine objectivity in science or anywhere else; whether mathematics can be reduced to set theory and whether abstract entities generally- numbers, propositions, properties-can be, as we quaintly say, “dispensed with”; whether possible worlds are abstract or concrete; whether our assertions are best seen as mere moves in a language game or as attempts to state the sober truth about the world; whether the rational egoist can be shown to be irrational, and all the rest. It is then natural for her, after she gets her Ph.D., to continue to think about and work on these topics. And it is natural, furthermore, for her to work on them in the way she was taught to, thinking about them in the light of the assumptions made by her mentors and in terms of currently accepted ideas as to what a philosopher should start from or take for granted, what requires argument and defense, and what a satisfying philosophical explanation or a proper resolution to a philosophical question is like. She will be uneasy about departing widely from these topics and assumptions, feeling instinctively that any such departures are at best marginally respectable. Philosophy is a social enterprise; and our standards and assumptions-the parameters within which we practice our craft-are set by our mentors and by the great contemporary centers of philosophy.

From one point of view this is natural and proper; from another, however, it is profoundly unsatisfactory. The questions I mentioned are important and interesting. Christian philosophers, however, are the philosophers of the Christian community; and it is part of their task as Christian philosophers to serve the Christian community. But the Christian community has its own questions, its own concerns, its own topics for investigation, its own agenda and its own research program. Christian philosophers ought not merely take their inspiration from what’s going on at Princeton or Berkeley or Harvard, attractive and scintillating as that may be; for perhaps those questions and topics are not the ones, or not the only ones, they should be thinking about as the philosophers of the Christian community. There are other philosophical topics the Christian community must work at, and other topics the Christian community must work at philosophically. And obviously, Christian philosophers are the ones who must do the philosophical work involved. If they devote their best efforts to the topics fashionable to the non-Christian philosophical world, they will neglect a crucial and central part of their task as Christian philosophers. What is needed here is more independence, more autonomy with respect to the projects and concerns of the non-theistic philosophical world.

But something else is at least as important here. Suppose the student I mentioned above goes to Harvard; she studies with Willard van Orman Quine. She finds herself attracted to Quine’s programs and procedures: his radical empiricism, his allegiance to natural science, his inclination towards behaviorism, his uncompromising naturalism, and his taste for desert landscapes and ontological parsimony. It would be wholly natural for her to become totally involved in these projects and programs, to come to think of fruitful and worthwhile philosophy as substantially circumscribed by them. Of course she will note certain tensions between her Christian belief and her way of practicing philosophy; and she may then bend her efforts to putting the two together, to harmonizing them. She may devote her time and energy to seeing how one might understand or reinterpret Christian belief in such a way as to be palatable to the Quinian. One philosopher I know, embarking on just such a project, suggested that Christians should think of God as a set (Quine is prepared to countenance sets): the set of all true propositions, perhaps, or the set of right actions, or the union of those sets, or perhaps their Cartesian product. This is understandable; but it is also profoundly misdirected. Quine is a marvelously gifted philosopher: a subtle, original and powerful philosophical force. But his fundamental commitments, his fundamental projects and concerns, are wholly different from those of the Christian community-wholly different and, indeed, antithetical to them. And the result of attempting to graft Christian thought onto his basic view of the world will be at best an unintegral pastiche; at worst it will seriously compromise, or distort, or trivialize the claims of Christian theism. What is needed here is more wholeness, more integrality.

So the Christian philosopher has his own topics and projects to think about; and when he thinks about the topics of current concern in the broader philosophical world, he will think about them in his own way, which may be a different way. He may have to reject certain currently fashionable assumptions about the philosophic enterprise-he may have to reject widely accepted assumptions as to what are the proper starting points and procedures for philosophical endeavor. And-and this is crucially important-the Christian philosopher has a perfect right to the point of view and prephilosophical assumptions he brings to philosophic work; the fact that these are not widely shared outside the Christian or theistic community is interesting but fundamentally irrelevant. I can best explain what I mean by way of example; so I shall descend from the level of lofty generality to specific examples.

II.Theism and Verifiability

First, the dreaded “Verifiability Criterion of Meaning.” During the palmy days of logical positivism, some thirty or forty years ago, the positivists claimed that most of the sentences Christians characteristically utter-”God loves us,” for example, or “God created the heavens and the earth”-don’t even have the grace to be false; they are, said the positivists, literally meaningless. It is not that they express false propositions; they don’t express any propositions at all. Like that lovely line from Alice in Wonderland, “T’was brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gymbol in the wabe,” they say nothing false, but only because they say nothing at all; they are “cognitively meaningless,” to use the positivist’s charming phrase. The sorts of things theists and others had been saying for centuries, they said, were now shown to be without sense; we theists had all been the victims, it seems, of a cruel hoax-perpetrated, perhaps, by ambitious priests and foisted upon us by our own credulous natures.

Now if this is true, it is indeed important. How had the positivists come by this startling piece of intelligence? They inferred it from the Verifiability Criterion of Meaning, which said, roughly, that a sentence is meaningful only if either it is analytic, or its truth or falsehood can be determined by empirical or scientific investigation-by the methods of the empirical sciences. On these grounds not only theism and theology, but most of traditional metaphysics and philosophy and much else besides was declared nonsense, without any literal sense at all. Some positivists conceded that metaphysics and theology, though strictly meaningless, might still have a certain limited value. Carnap, for example, thought they might be a kind of music. It isn’t known whether he expected theology and metaphysics to supplant Bach and Mozart, or even Wagner; I myself, however, think they could nicely supersede rock. Hegel could take the place of The Talking Heads; Immanuel Kant could replace The Beach Boys; and instead of The Grateful Dead we could have, say, Arthur Schopenhauer.

Positivism had a delicious air of being avant garde and with-it; and many philosophers found it extremely attractive. Furthermore, many who didn’t endorse it nonetheless entertained it with great hospitality as at the least extremely plausible. As a consequence many philosophers-both Christians and non-Christians-saw here a real challenge and an important danger to Christianity: “The main danger to theism today,” said J. J. C. Smart in 1955, “comes from people who want to say that ‘God exists’ and ‘God does not exist’ are equally absurd.” In 1955 New Essays in Philosophical Theology appeared, a volume of essays that was to set the tone and topics for philosophy of religion for the next decade or more; and most of this volume was given over to a discussion of the impact of Verificationism on theism. Many philosophically inclined Christians were disturbed and perplexed and felt deeply threatened; could it really be true that linguistic philosophers had somehow discovered that the Christian’s most cherished convictions were, in fact, just meaningless? There was a great deal of anxious hand wringing among philosophers, either themselves theists or sympathetic to theism. Some suggested, in the face of positivistic onslaught, that the thing for the Christian community to do was to fold up its tents and silently slink away, admitting that the verifiability criterion was probably true. Others conceded that strictly speaking, theism really is nonsense, but is important nonsense. Still others suggested that the sentences in question should be reinterpreted in such a way as not to give offense to the positivists; someone seriously suggested, for example, that Christians resolve, henceforth, to use the sentence “God exists” to mean “some men and women have had, and all may have, experiences called ‘meeting God’”; he added that when we say “God created the world from nothing” what we should mean is “everything we call ‘material’ can be used in such a way that it contributes to the well-being of men.” In a different context but the same spirit, Rudolph Bultmann embarked upon his program of demythologizing Christianity. Traditional supernaturalistic Christian belief, he said, is “impossible in this age of electric light and the wireless.” (One can perhaps imagine an earlier village skeptic taking a similar view of, say, the tallow candle and printing press, or perhaps the pine torch and the papyrus scroll.)

By now, of course, Verificationism has retreated into the obscurity it so richly deserves; but the moral remains. This hand wringing and those attempts to accommodate the positivist were wholly inappropriate. I realize that hindsight is clearer than foresight and I do not recount this bit of recent intellectual history in order to be critical of my elders or to claim that we are wiser than our fathers: what I want to point out is that we can learn something from the whole nasty incident. For Christian philosophers should have adopted a quite different attitude towards positivism and its verifiability criterion. What they should have said to the positivists is: “Your criterion is mistaken: for such statements as ‘God loves us’ and ‘God created the heavens and the earth’ are clearly meaningful; so if they aren’t verifiable in your sense, then it is false that all and only statements verifiable in that sense are meaningful.” What was needed here was less accommodation to current fashion and more Christian self-confidence: Christian theism is true; if Christian theism is true, then the verifiability criterion is false; so the verifiability criterion is false. Of course, if the verificationists had given cogent arguments for their criterion, from premises that had some legitimate claim on Christian or theistic thinkers, then perhaps there would have been a problem here for the Christian philosopher; then we would have been obliged either to agree that Christian theism is cognitively meaningless, or else revise or reject those premises. But the Verificationists never gave any cogent arguments; indeed, they seldom gave any arguments at all. Some simply trumpeted this principle as a great discovery, and when challenged, repeated it loudly and slowly; but why should that disturb anyone? Others proposed it as a definition-a definition of the term “meaningful.” Now of course the positivists had a right to use this term in any way they chose; it’s a free country. But how could their decision to use that term in a particular way show anything so momentous as that all those who took themselves to be believers in God were wholly deluded? If I propose to use the term ‘Democrat’ to mean ‘unmitigated scoundrel,’ would it follow that Democrats everywhere should hang their heads in shame? And my point, to repeat myself, is that Christian philosophers should have displayed more integrity, more independence, less readiness to trim their sails to the prevailing philosophical winds of doctrine, and more Christian self-confidence.

III.Theism and Theory of Knowledge

I can best approach my second example by indirection. Many philosophers have claimed to find a serious problem for theism in the existence of evil, or of the amount and kinds of evil we do in fact find. Many who claim to find a problem here for theists have urged the deductive argument from evil: they have claimed that the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, and wholly good God is logically incompatible with the presence of evil in the world-a presence conceded and indeed insisted upon by Christian theists. For their part, theists have argued that there is no inconsistency here. I think the present consensus, even among those who urge some form of the argument from evil, is that the deductive form of the argument from evil is unsuccessful.

More recently, philosophers have claimed that the existence of God, while perhaps not actually inconsistent with the existence of the amount and kinds of evil we do in fact find, is at any rate unlikely or improbable with respect to it; that is, the probability of the existence of God with respect to the evil we find, is less than the probability, with respect to that same evidence, that there is no God-no omnipotent, omniscient and wholly good Creator. Hence the existence of God is improbable with respect to what we know. But if theistic belief is improbable with respect to what we know, then, so goes the claim, it is irrational or in any event intellectually second rate to accept it.

Now suppose we briefly examine this claim. The objector holds that

1. God is the omnipotent, omniscient and wholly good creator of the world
   is improbable or unlikely with respect to
2. There are 10E+13 turps of evil
   (where the turp is the basic unit of evil).

I’ve argued elsewhere that enormous difficulties beset the claim that (1) is unlikely or improbable given (2). Call that response “the low road reply.” Here I want to pursue what I shall call the high road reply. Suppose we stipulate, for purposes of argument, that (1) is, in fact, improbable on (2). Let’s agree that it is unlikely, given the existence of 10E+13 turps of evil, that the world has been created by a God who is perfect in power, knowledge and goodness. What is supposed to follow from that? How is that to be construed as an objection to theistic belief? How does the objector’s argument go from there? It doesn’t follow, of course, that theism is false. Nor does it follow that one who accepts both (1) and (2) (and let’s add, recognizes that (1) is improbable with respect to (2)) has an irrational system of beliefs or is in any way guilty of noetic impropriety; obviously there might be pairs of propositions A and B, such that we know both A and B, despite the fact that A is improbable on B. I might know, for example, both that Feike is a Frisian and 9 out of 10 Frisians can’t swim, and also that Feike can swim; then I am obviously within my intellectual rights in accepting both these propositions, even though the latter is improbable with respect to the former. So even if it were a fact that (1) is improbable with respect to (2), that fact, so far, wouldn’t be of much consequence. How, therefore, can this objection be developed?

Presumably what the objector means to hold is that (1) is improbable, not just on (2) but on some appropriate body of total evidence- perhaps all the evidence the theist has, or perhaps the body of evidence he is rationally obliged to have. The objector must be supposing that the theist has a relevant body of total evidence here, a body of evidence that includes (2); and his claim is that (1) is improbable with respect to this relevant body of total evidence. Suppose we say that T is the relevant body of total evidence for a given theist T; and suppose we agree that a brief is rationally acceptable for him only if it is not improbable with respect to T. Now what sorts of propositions are to be found in T? Perhaps the propositions he knows to be true, or perhaps the largest subset of his beliefs that he can rationally accept without evidence from other propositions, or perhaps the propositions he knows immediately-knows, but does not know on the basis of other propositions. However exactly we characterize this set T, the question I mean to press is this: why can’t belief in God be itself a member of T? Perhaps for the theist-for many theists, at any rate-belief in God is a member of T. Perhaps the theist has a right to start from belief in God, taking that proposition to be one of the ones probability with respect to which determines the rational propriety of other beliefs he holds. But if so, then the Christian philosopher is entirely within his rights in starting from belief in God to his philosophizing. He has a right to take the existence of God for granted and go on from there in his philosophical work-just as other philosophers take for granted the existence of the past, say, or of other persons, or the basic claims of contemporary physics.

And this leads me to my point here. Many Christian philosophers appear to think of themselves qua philosophers as engaged with the atheist and agnostic philosopher in a common search for the correct philosophical position vis a vis the question whether there is such a person as God. Of course the Christian philosopher will have his own private conviction on the point; he will believe, of course, that indeed there is such a person as God. But he will think, or be inclined to think, or half inclined to think that as a philosopher he has no right to this position unless he is able to show that it follows from, or is probable, or justified with respect to premises accepted by all parties to the discussion-theist, agnostic and atheist alike. Furthermore, he will be half inclined to think he has no right, as a philosopher, to positions that presuppose the existence of God, if he can’t show that belief to be justified in this way. What I want to urge is that the Christian philosophical community ought not think of itself as engaged in this common effort to determine the probability or philosophical plausibility of belief in God. The Christian philosopher quite properly starts from the existence of God, and presupposes it in philosophical work, whether or not he can show it to be probable or plausible with respect to premises accepted by all philosophers, or most philosophers at the great contemporary centers of philosophy.

Taking it for granted, for example, that there is such a person as God and that we are indeed within our epistemic rights (are in that sense justified) in believing that there is, the Christian epistemologist might ask what it is that confers justification here: by virtue of what is the theist justified? Perhaps there are several sensible responses. One answer he might give and try to develop is that of John Calvin (and before him, of the Augustinian, Anselmian, Bonaventurian tradition of the middle ages): God, said Calvin, has implanted in humankind a tendency or nisus or disposition to believe in him:

“There is within the human mind, and indeed by natural instinct, an awareness of divinity.” This we take to beyond controversy. To prevent anyone from taking refuge in the pretense of ignorance, God himself has implanted in all men a certain understanding of his divine majesty . . . Therefore, since from the beginning of the world there has been no region, no city, in short, no household, that could do without religion, there lies in this a tacit confession of a sense of deity inscribed in the hearts of all.[2]

Calvin’s claim, then, is that God has so created us that we have by nature a strong tendency or inclination or disposition towards belief in him.

Although this disposition to believe in God has been in part smothered or suppressed by sin, it is nevertheless universally present. And it is triggered or actuated by widely realized conditions:

Lest anyone, then, be excluded from access to happiness, he not only sowed in men’s minds that seed of religion of which we have spoken, but revealed himself and daily disclosed himself in the whole workmanship of the universe. As, a consequence, men cannot open their eyes without being compelled to see him (p. 51).

Like Kant, Calvin is especially impressed in this connection, by the marvelous compages of the starry heavens above:

Even the common folk and the most untutored, who have been taught only by the aid of the eyes, cannot be unaware of the excellence of divine art, for it reveals itself in this innumerable and yet distinct and well-ordered variety of the heavenly host (p. 52).

And now what Calvin says suggests that one who accedes to this tendency and in these circumstances accepts the belief that God has created the world-perhaps upon beholding the starry heavens, or the splendid majesty of the mountains, or the intricate, articulate beauty of a tiny flower- is quite as rational and quite as justified as one who believes that he sees a tree upon having that characteristic being-appeared-to-treely kind of experience.

No doubt this suggestion won’t convince the skeptic; taken as an attempt to convince the skeptic it is circular. My point is just this: the Christian has his own questions to answer, and his own projects; these projects may not mesh with those of the skeptical or unbelieving philosopher. He has his own questions and his own starting point in investigating these questions. Of course, I don’t mean to suggest that the Christian philosopher must accept Calvin’s answer to the question I mentioned above; but I do say it is entirely fitting for him to give to this question an answer that presupposes precisely that of which the skeptic is skeptical-even if this skepticism is nearly unanimous in most of the prestigious philosophy departments of our day. The Christian philosopher does indeed have a responsibility to the philosophical world at large; but his fundamental responsibility is to the Christian community, and finally to God.

Again, a Christian philosopher may be interested in the relation between faith and reason, and faith and knowledge: granted that we hold some things by faith and know other things: granted we believe that there is such a person as God and that this belief is true; do we also know that God exists? Do we accept this belief by faith or by reason? A theist may be inclined towards a reliabilist theory of knowledge; he may be inclined to think that a true belief constitutes knowledge if it is produced by a reliable belief producing mechanism. (There are hard problems here, but suppose for now we ignore them.) If the theist thinks God has created us with the sensus divinitatis Calvin speaks of, he will hold that indeed there is a reliable belief producing mechanism that produces theistic belief; he will thus hold that we know that God exists. One who follows Calvin here will also hold that a capacity to apprehend God’s existence is as much part of our natural noetic or intellectual equipment as is the capacity to apprehend truths of logic, perceptual truths, truths about the past, and truths about other minds. Belief in the existence of God is then in the same boat as belief in truths of logic, other minds, the past, and perceptual objects; in each case God has so constructed us that in the right circumstances we acquire the belief in question. But then the belief that there is such a person as God is as much among the deliverances of our natural noetic faculties as are those other beliefs. Hence we know that there is such a person as God, and don’t merely believe it; and it isn’t by faith that we apprehend the existence of God, but by reason; and this whether or not any of the classical theistic arguments is successful.

Now my point is not that Christian philosophers must follow Calvin here. My point is that the Christian philosopher has a right (I should say a duty) to work at his own projects-projects set by the beliefs of the Christian community of which he is a part. The Christian philosophical community must work out the answers to its questions; and both the questions and the appropriate ways of working out their answers may presuppose beliefs rejected at most of the leading centers of philosophy. But the Christian is proceeding quite properly in starting from these beliefs, even if they are so rejected. He is under no obligation to confine his research projects to those pursued at those centers, or to pursue his own projects on the basis of the assumptions that prevail there.

Perhaps I can clarify what I want to say by contrasting it with a wholly different view. According to the theologian David Tracy,

In fact the modern Christian theologian cannot ethically do other than challenge the traditional self-understanding of the theologian. He no longer sees his task as a simple defense of or even as an orthodox reinterpretation of traditional belief. Rather, he finds that his ethical commitment to the morality of scientific knowledge forces him to assume a critical posture towards his own and his tradition’s beliefs. . . In principle, the fundamental loyalty of the theologian qua theologian is to that morality of scientific knowledge which he shares with his colleagues, the philosophers, historians and social sciences. No more than they can he allow his own- or his tradition’s-beliefs to serve as warrants for his arguments. In fact, in all properly theological inquiry, the analysis should be characterized by those same ethical stances of autonomous judgment, critical judgment and properly skeptical hard-mindedness that characterizes analysis in other fields.[3]

Furthermore, this “morality of scientific knowledge insists that each inquirer start with the present methods and knowledge of the field in question, unless one has evidence of the same logical type for rejecting those methods and that knowledge.” Still further, “for the new scientific morality, one’s fundamental loyalty as an analyst of any and all cognitive claims is solely to those methodological procedures which the particular scientific community in question has developed” (6).

I say caveat lector. I’m prepared to bet that this “new scientific morality” is like the Holy Roman Empire: it is neither new nor scientific nor morally obligatory. Furthermore the “new scientific morality” looks to me to be monumentally inauspicious as a stance for a Christian theologian, modern or otherwise. Even if there were a set of methodological procedures held in common by most philosophers, historians and social scientists, or most secular philosophers, historians, and social scientists, why should a Christian theologian give ultimate allegiance to them rather than, say, to God, or to the fundamental truths of Christianity? Tracy’s suggestion as to how Christian theologians should proceed seems at best wholly unpromising. Of course I am only a philosopher, not a modern theologian; no doubt I am venturing beyond my depths. So I don’t presume to speak for modern theologians; but however things stand for them, the modern Christian philosopher has a perfect right, as a philosopher, to start from his belief in God. He has a right to assume it, take it for granted, in his philosophical work-whether or not he can convince his unbelieving colleagues either that this belief is true or that it is sanctioned by those “methodological procedures” Tracy mentions.

And the Christian philosophical community ought to get on with the philosophical questions of importance to the Christian community. It ought to get on with the project of exploring and developing the implications of Christian theism for the whole range of questions philosophers ask and answer. It ought to do this whether or not it can convince the philosophical community at large either that there really is such a person as God, or that it is rational or reasonable to believe that there is. Perhaps the Christian philosopher can convince the skeptic or the unbelieving philosopher that indeed there is such a person as God. Perhaps this is possible in at least some instances. In other instances, of course, it may be impossible; even if the skeptic in fact accepts premises from which theistic belief follows by argument forms he also accepts, he may, when apprised of this situation, give up those premises rather than his unbelief. (In this way it is possible to reduce someone from knowledge to ignorance by giving him an argument he sees to be valid from premises he knows to be true.)

But whether or not this is possible, the Christian philosopher has other fish to fry and other questions to think about. Of course he must listen to, understand, and learn from the broader philosophical community and he must take his place in it; but his work as a philosopher is not circumscribed by what either the skeptic or the rest of the philosophical world thinks of theism. Justifying or trying to justify theistic belief in the eyes of the broader philosophical community is not the only task of the Christian philosophical community; perhaps it isn’t even among its most important tasks. Philosophy is a communal enterprise. The Christian philosopher who looks exclusively to the philosophical world at large, who thinks of himself as belonging primarily to that world, runs a two-fold risk. He may neglect an essential part of his task as a Christian philosopher; and he may find himself adopting principles and procedures that don’t comport well with his beliefs as a Christian. What is needed, once more, is autonomy and integrality.

IV.Theism and Persons

My third example has to do with philosophical anthropology: how should we think about human persons? What sorts of things, fundamentally, are they? What is it to be a person, what is it to be a human person, and how shall we think about personhood? How, in particular, should Christians, Christian philosophers, think about these things? The first point to note is that on the Christian scheme of things, God is the premier person, the first and chief exemplar of personhood. God, furthermore, has created man in his own image; we men and women are image bearers of God, and the properties most important for an understanding of our personhood are properties we share with him. How we think about God, then, will have an immediate and direct bearing on how we think about humankind. Of course we learn much about ourselves from other sources-from everyday observation, from introspection and self-observation, from scientific investigation and the like. But it is also perfectly proper to start from what we know as Christians. It is not the case that rationality, or proper philosophical method, or intellectual responsibility, or the new scientific morality, or whatever, require that we start from beliefs we share with everyone else-what common sense and current science teach, e.g.-and attempt to reason to or justify those beliefs we hold as Christians. In trying to give a satisfying philosophical account of some area or phenomenon, we may properly appeal, in our account or explanation, to anything else we already rationally believe- whether it be current science or Christian doctrine.

Let me proceed again to specific examples. There is a fundamental watershed, in philosophical anthropology, between those who think of human beings as free-free in the libertarian sense-and those who espouse determinism. According to determinists, every human action is a consequence of initial conditions outside our control by way of causal laws that are also outside our control. Sometimes underlying this claim is a picture of the universe as a vast machine where, at any rate at the macroscopic level, all events, including human actions, are determined by previous events and causal laws. On this view every action I have in fact performed was such that it wasn’t within my power to refrain from performing it; and if, on a given occasion I did not perform a given action, then it wasn’t then within my power to perform it. If I now raise my arm, then, on the view in question, it wasn’t within my power just then not to raise it. Now the Christian thinker has a stake in this controversy just by virtue of being a Christian. For she will no doubt believe that God holds us human beings responsible for much of what we do-responsible, and thus properly subject to praise or blame, approval or disapproval. But how can I be responsible for my actions, if it was never within my power to perform any actions I didn’t in fact perform, and never within my power to refrain from performing any I did perform? If my actions are thus determined, then I am not rightly or justly held accountable for them; but God does nothing improper or unjust, and he holds me accountable for some of my actions; hence it is not the case that all of my actions are thus determined. The Christian has an initially strong reason to reject the claim that all of our actions are causally determined-a reason much stronger than the meager and anemic arguments the determinist can muster on the other side. Of course if there were powerful arguments on the other side, then there might be a problem here. But there aren’t; so there isn’t.

Now the determinist may reply that freedom and causal determinism are, contrary to initial appearances, in fact compatible. He may argue that my being free with respect to an action I performed at a time t for example, doesn’t entail that it was then within my power to refrain from performing it, but only something weaker-perhaps something like if I had chosen not to perform it, I would not have performed it. Indeed, the clearheaded compatibilist will go further. He will maintain, not merely that freedom is compatible with determinism, but that freedom requires determinism. He will hold with Hume that the proposition S is free with respect to action A or S does A freely entails that S is causally determined with respect to A-that there are causal laws and antecedent conditions that together entail either that S performs A or that S does not perform A. And he will back up this claim by insisting that if S is not thus determined with respect to A, then it’s merely a matter of chance-due, perhaps, to quantum effects in S’s brain- that S does A. But if it is just a matter of chance that S does A then either S doesn’t really do A at all, or at any rate S is not responsible for doing A. If S’s doing A is just a matter of chance, then S’s doing A is something that just happens to him; but then it is not really the case that he performs A-at any rate it is not the case that he is responsible for performing A. And hence freedom, in the sense that is required for responsibility, itself requires determinism.

But the Christian thinker will find this claim monumentally implausible. Presumably the determinist means to hold that what he says characterizes actions generally, not just those of human beings. He will hold that it is a necessary truth that if an agent isn’t caused to perform an action then it is a mere matter of chance that the agent in question performs the action in question. From a Christian perspective, however, this is wholly incredible. For God performs actions, and performs free actions; and surely it is not the case that there are causal laws and antecedent conditions outside his control that determine what he does. On the contrary: God is the author of the causal laws that do in fact obtain; indeed, perhaps the best way to think of these causal laws is as records of the ways in which God ordinarily treats the beings he has created. But of course it is not simply a matter of chance that God does what he does-creates and upholds the world, let’s say, and offers redemption and renewal to his children. So a Christian philosopher has an extremely good reason for rejecting this premise, along with the determinism and compatibilism it supports.

What is really at stake in this discussion is the notion of agent causation: the notion of a person as an ultimate source of action. According to the friends of agent causation, some events are caused, not by other events, but by substances, objects-typically personal agents. And at least since the time of David Hume, the idea of agent causation has been languishing. It is fair to say, I think, that most contemporary philosophers who work in this area either reject agent causation outright or are at the least extremely suspicious of it. They see causation as a relation among events; they can understand how one event can cause another event, or how events of one kind can cause events of another kind. But the idea of a person, say, causing an event, seems to them unintelligible, unless it can be analyzed, somehow, in terms of event causation. It is this devotion to event causation, of course, that explains the claim that if you perform an action but are not caused to do so, then your performing that action is a matter of chance. For if I hold that all causation is ultimately event causation, then I will suppose that if you perform an action but are not caused to do so by previous events, then your performing that action isn’t caused at all and is therefore a mere matter of chance. The devotee of event causation, furthermore, will perhaps argue for his position as follows. If such agents as persons cause effects that take place in the physical world-my body’s moving in a certain way, for example-then these effects must ultimately be caused by volitions or undertakings-which, apparently, are immaterial, unphysical events. He will then claim that the idea of an immaterial event’s having causal efficacy in the physical world is puzzling or dubious or worse.

But a Christian philosopher will find this argument unimpressive and this devotion to event causation uncongenial. As for the argument, the Christian already and independently believes that acts of volition have causal efficacy; he believes indeed, that the physical universe owes its very existence to just such volitional acts-God’s undertaking to create it. And as for the devotion to event causation, the Christian will be, initially, at any rate, strongly inclined to reject the idea that event causation is primary and agent causation to be explained in terms of it. For he believes that God does and has done many things: he has created the world; he sustains it in being; he communicates with his children. But it is extraordinarily hard to see how these truths can be analyzed in terms of causal relations among events. What events could possibly cause God’s creating the world or his undertaking to create the world? God himself institutes or establishes the causal laws that do in fact hold; how, then, can we see all the events constituted by his actions as related to causal laws to earlier events? How could it be that propositions ascribing actions to him are to be explained in terms of event causation?

Some theistic thinkers have noted this problem and reacted by soft pedaling God’s causal activity, or by impetuously following Kant in declaring that it is of a wholly different order from that in which we engage, an order beyond our comprehension. I believe this is the wrong response. Why should a Christian philosopher join in the general obeisance to event causation? It is not as if there are cogent arguments here. The real force behind this claim is a certain philosophical way of looking at persons and the world; but this view has no initial plausibility from a Christian perspective and no compelling argument in its favor.

So on all these disputed points in philosophical anthropology the theist will have a strong initial predilection for resolving the dispute in one way rather than another. He will be inclined to reject compatibilism, to hold that event causation (if indeed there is such a thing) is to be explained in

terms of agent causation, to reject the idea that if an event isn’t caused by other events then its occurrence is a matter of chance, and to reject the idea that events in the physical world can’t be caused by an agent’s undertaking to do something. And my point here is this. The Christian philosopher is within his right in holding these positions, whether or not he can convince the rest of the philosophical world and whatever the current philosophical consensus is, if there is a consensus. But isn’t such an appeal to God and his properties, in this philosophical context, a shameless appeal to a deus ex machina? Surely not. “Philosophy,” as Hegel once exclaimed in a rare fit of lucidity, “is thinking things over.” Philosophy is in large part a clarification, systematization, articulation, relating and deepening of pre-philosophical opinion. We come to philosophy with a range of opinions about the world and humankind and the place of the latter in the former; and in philosophy we think about these matters, systematically articulate our views, put together and relate our views on diverse topics, and deepen our views by finding unexpected interconnections and by discovering and answering unanticipated questions. Of course we may come to change our minds by virtue of philosophical endeavor; we may discover incompatibilities or other infelicities. But we come to philosophy with prephilosophical opinions; we can do no other. And the point is: the Christian has as much right to his prephilosophical opinions, as others have to theirs. He needn’t try first to ‘prove’ them from propositions accepted by, say, the bulk of the non-Christian philosophical community; and if they are widely rejected as naive, or pre-scientific, or primitive, or unworthy of “man come of age,” that is nothing whatever against them. Of course if there were genuine and substantial arguments against them from premises that have some legitimate claim on the Christian philosopher, then he would have a problem; he would have to make some kind of change somewhere. But in the absence of such arguments-and the absence of such arguments is evident-the Christian philosophical community, quite properly starts, in philosophy, from what it believes.

But this means that the Christian philosophical community need not devote all of its efforts to attempting to refute opposing claims and or to arguing for its own claims, in each case from premises accepted by the bulk of the philosophical community at large. It ought to do this, indeed, but it ought to do more. For if it does only this, it will neglect a pressing philosophical task: systematizing, deepening, clarifying Christian thought on these topics. So here again: my plea is for the Christian philosopher, the Christian philosophical community, to display, first, more independence and autonomy: we needn’t take as our research projects just those projects that currently enjoy widespread popularity; we have our own questions to think about. Secondly, we must display more integrity. We must not automatically assimilate what is current or fashionable or popular by way of philosophical opinion and procedures; for much of it comports ill with Christian ways of thinking. And finally, we must display more Christian self-confidence or courage or boldness. We have a perfect right to our pre-philosophical views: why, therefore, should we be intimidated by what the rest of the philosophical world thinks plausible or implausible?

These, then, are my examples; I could have chosen others. In ethics, for example: perhaps the chief theoretical concern, from the theistic perspective, is the question how are right and wrong, good and bad, duty, permission and obligation related to God and to his will and to his creative activity? This question doesn’t arise, naturally enough, from a non–theistic perspective; and so, naturally enough, non-theist ethicists do not address it. But it is perhaps the most important question for a Christian ethicist to tackle. I have already spoken about epistemology; let me mention another example from this area. Epistemologists sometimes worry about the confluence or lack thereof of epistemic justification, on the one hand, and truth, or reliability, on the other. Suppose we do the best that can be expected of us, noetically speaking; suppose we do our intellectual duties and satisfy our intellectual obligations: what guarantee is there that in so doing we shall arrive at the truth? Is there even any reason for supposing that if we thus satisfy our obligations, we shall have a better chance of arriving at the truth than if we brazenly flout them? And where do these intellectual obligations come from? How does it happen that we have them? Here the theist has, if not a clear set of answers, at any rate clear suggestions towards a set of answers. Another example: creative anti-realism is presently popular among philosophers; this is the view that it is human behavior-in particular, human thought and language-that is somehow responsible for the fundamental structure of the world and for the fundamental kinds of entities there are. From a theistic point of view, however, universal creative anti-realism is at best a mere impertinence, a piece of laughable bravado. For God, of course, owes neither his existence nor his properties to us and our ways of thinking; the truth is just the reverse. And so far as the created universe is concerned, while it indeed owes its existence and character to activity on the part of a person, that person is certainly not a human person.

One final example, this time from philosophy of mathematics. Many who think about sets and their nature are inclined to accept the following ideas. First, no set is a member of itself. Second, whereas a property has its extension contingently, a set has its membership essentially. This means that no set could have existed if one of its members had not, and that no set could have had fewer or different members from the ones it in fact has. It means, furthermore, that sets are contingent beings; if Ronald Reagan had not existed, then his unit set would not have existed. And thirdly, sets form a sort of iterated structure: at the first level there are sets whose members are non-sets, at the second level sets whose members are non-sets or first level sets; at the third level, sets whose members are non-sets or sets of the first two levels, and so on. Many are also inclined, with George Cantor, to regard sets as collections-as objects whose existence is dependent upon a certain sort of intellectual activity-a collecting or “thinking together” as Cantor put it. If sets were collections of this sort, that would explain their displaying the first three features I mentioned. But if the collecting or thinking together had to be done by human thinkers, or any finite thinkers, there wouldn’t be nearly enough sets-not nearly as many as we think in fact there are. From a theistic point of view, the natural conclusion is that sets owe their existence to God’s thinking things together. The natural explanation of those three features is just that sets are indeed collections-collections collected by God; they are or result from God’s thinking things together. This idea may not be popular at contemporary centers of set theoretical activity; but that is neither here nor there. Christians, theists, ought to understand sets from a Christian and theistic point of view. What they believe as theists affords a resource for understanding sets not available to the non-theist; and why shouldn’t they employ it? Perhaps here we could proceed without appealing to what we believe as theists; but why should we, if these beliefs are useful and explanatory? I could probably get home this evening by hopping on one leg; and conceivably I could climb Devil’s Tower with my feet tied together. But why should I want to?

The Christian or theistic philosopher, therefore, has his own way of working at his craft. In some cases there are items on his agenda- pressing items-not to be found on the agenda of the non-theistic philosophical community. In others, items that are currently fashionable appear of relatively minor interest from a Christian perspective. In still others, the theist will reject common assumptions and views about how to start, how to proceed, and what constitutes a good or satisfying answer. In still others the Christian will take for granted and will start from assumptions and premises rejected by the philosophical community at large. Of course I don’t mean for a moment to suggest that Christian philosophers have nothing to learn from their non-Christian and non-theist colleagues: that would be a piece of foolish arrogance, utterly belied by the facts of the matter. Nor do I mean to suggest that Christian philosophers should retreat into their own isolated enclave, having as little as possible to do with non-theistic philosophers. Of course not! Christians have much to learn and much of enormous importance to learn by way of dialogue and discussion with their non-theistic colleagues. Christian philosophers must be intimately involved in the professional life of the philosophical community at large, both because of what they can learn and because of what they can contribute. Furthermore, while Christian philosophers need not and ought not to see themselves as involved, for example, in a common effort to determine whether there is such a person as God, we are all, theist and non-theist alike, engaged in the common human project of understanding ourselves and the world in which we find ourselves. If the Christian philosophical community is doing its job properly, it will be engaged in a complicated, many-sided dialectical discussion, making its own contribution to that common human project. It must pay careful attention to other contributions; it must gain a deep understanding of them; it must learn what it can from them and it must take unbelief with profound seriousness.

All of this is true and all of this important; but none of it runs counter to what I have been saying. Philosophy is many things. I said earlier that it is a matter of systematizing, developing and deepening one’s pre-philosophical opinions. It is that; but it is also an arena for the articulation and interplay of commitments and allegiances fundamentally religious in nature; it is an expression of deep and fundamental perspectives, ways of viewing ourselves and the world and God. Among its most important and pressing projects are systematizing, deepening, exploring, articulating this perspective, and exploring its bearing on the rest of what we think and do. But then the Christian philosophical community has its own agenda; it need not and should not automatically take its projects from the list of those currently in favor at the leading contemporary centers of philosophy. Furthermore, Christian philosophers must be wary about assimilating or accepting presently popular philosophical ideas and procedures; for many of these have roots that are deeply anti-Christian. And finally the Christian philosophical community has a right to its perspectives; it is under no obligation first to show that this perspective is plausible with respect to what is taken for granted by all philosophers, or most philosophers, or the leading philosophers of our day.

In sum, we who are Christians and propose to be philosophers must not rest content with being philosophers who happen, incidentally, to be Christians; we must strive to be Christian philosophers. We must therefore pursue our projects with integrity, independence, and Christian boldness.[4]

NOTES

1. “The Probabilistic Argument from Evil,” Philosophical Studies, 1979, pp. 1-53.
2. Institutes of the Christian Religion, tr. Ford Lewis Battles (Philadelphia: The Westminister Press, 1960). Bk. 1, Chap. III, pp. 43-44.
3. Blessed Rage for Order (New York: Seabury Press), 1978, p. 7.
4. Delivered November 4, 1983, as the author’s inaugural address as John A. O’Brien Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame.

Copyright

Reprinted from Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers vol. 1, permanently copyrighted October 1984. Used by permission of the Editor. New preface by author. Journal web site: www.faithandphilosophy.com

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By L. R. R.

The argument I will present is not my own argument and it is being argued by J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig and find this argument quite interesting and probably be useful. I address this article to both seekers and Christians. No serious attack against Christianity can amount to the problem of evil. The theodicy problem somehow become synonymous to Christianity. This is probably the most effective weapon in arguing against the existence of a sovereign and good God. 

    If God is all-good and all-powerful then why is there evil, pain and suffering the world? asked the sincere yet confused skeptic. My purpose for this article is not to refute the problem of pain, suffering and evil. My main concern here is to somehow explain why evil exist. 

    There are lots of good articles, essays and books that deals with this problem more effectively. These books, articles even refutes the false assumption that a good God cannot coexist with evil etc, etc. In the bottom of this, the theodicy problem is really not a hard-knock argument in favor for atheism. 

    On the contrary, the problem of evil, pain and suffering point to a God who is good and sovereign. Theodicy as such is inevitable in Christians apologetics. If you are a Christian studying apologetics whether in university or at home, it is important for us to be able to answer this problem to seekers and skeptics alike in sincerity and with respect.

In What Area In Our Lives We Face Suffering and Pain? 

The first problem from moral evil* 

The second problem is the natural evil 

The third problem is the intellectual problem from evil 

The fourth and last is the emotional problem of evil 

I am not going to deal with all these “four points” problem of evil here in this article, my main purpose, however, is to give you a brief overview and recognize each of these problems. 

Most moral evil that occurs in our lives are really because of bad choices we make. We always if not often point our fingers at God blaming Him as if He forced us to do bad things! 

Natural evil has something to do catastrophes, famine, tornadoes, tidal waves (the Tsunami incidence for instance), earthquakes etc. 

Intellectual problem from evil have something to do with whether it is coherent or incoherent that God coexist with evil. The emotional problem of evil is difficult to deal with because it is something to do with psychological make up. 

For example, people who live emotionally distress and in hopelessness state for whatever reason, cannot be argued for the cosmological argument. All we can do is to give him/her the comfort and love they need.

What Caused Pain and Suffering to Exist? 

    We must remember that God did not intended to create the world the way it is now. God created the universe and the world perfect;And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good (Genesis 1:31). No suffering, no pain and no death. 

    The problem of evil started in the Garden of Eden when, our first parents Adam and Eve used their God-given free will to transgress God’s simple command. By their choice they brought the whole package of evil into this world. Now, don’t start blaming our first parents, because they happen to have freedom to choice between obeying God or disobey Him,it would be unfair to God. 

    The whole cosmos never did stay the same ever since. Paul wrote, The whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now. In short, the cause of evil, pain and suffering is because of human sin. In case you didn’t know, prophets, apostles also suffered from evil and pain. 

Prophet Jeremiah wrote, “Why is my pain unceasing, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed.” King David complained, “Evil have encompassed me without number.” 

    So, if you are a Christian who wonders why you suffer remember that you are not alone in this problem. We all suffer Christians or non Christian alike. As Christians, it is important to remember that pleasure is not the only purpose here in life. While here on earth we will face challenges, pain, evil and hardships in our walk with Christ. 

    The only thing we have to be sure is that we do not suffer because of bad choices or bad consequences by disobeying God’s will for us. Godly sufferings, hardships helps and even strengthens the individual’s character.

Unnecessary For Innocent People to Suffer? 

    What do we mean by “innocent” people? Do we mean “innocent” by human standards of innocent? What is innocence in a materialistic and naturalistic universe in which life happened only by random process? What is innocent human within the “survival of the fittest” universe? 

    I may not satisfy you with my explanation why “innocent people suffer.” But it is really okay for me. What’s important though, is that you understand at least what I’m saying here. Why do innocent people suffer? And the answer is that, by God’s standard there really ain’t no such thing as innocent suffering. 

    The Bible tells us that, All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not (Ecc 7:20). From a Christian point of view we all have sinned and are not really good nor innocent. The way the world it is now, no one is exempt from pain, suffering and pain.

Why Free Will? 

    Why did God created humans with free will if He knew that they will abuse their freedom? Think about this for a moment, would you have a son/daughter programmed to love, care, obey, and to cherish you? Or would you rather prefer a son/daughter with all their freedom to chose to love, care, obey and cherish you? 

    What if God just created humans in such a way that they would never be able to sin? Again, this question is incoherent since creating such characteristic of “human” would not really be human. But a robot-like being. A robot-like being would not have the capability to choice to love, care etc, etc. 

    Further, this kind of being cannot learn what’s right and wrong without consequences of its actions. It only does the way it is programmed to do. What if God took away all evil that exists? Then it would follow of course that God have to stripped our freedom from choice and freedom from thought away from us! But what if God stop some evil for example rape? We all know that rape is not a thoughtless deed. 

    Since, thinking about raping someone or somebody is evil, God would have to take his/her freedom of thought, thus become a mindless person or worst a zombie! In addition to this God can and have no problem eradicating the evil in the world if He wanted to. 

    Further more, since God is perfect and holy no sin can ever coexist with Him, then, this would mean that no one of as will be here to exist tomorrow! Seriously, the reason why evil exist is because of our freedom to choose. No evil NO freedom! “Whereas God created the fact of freedom, humans perform the acts of freedom. God made evil possible; creatures make it actual.”

Miscellaneous Evil 

Not all pain are necessarily evil or a curse in the moral sense. In fact this kind of pains can help us to understand more about our body and its functions. 

God created us with different nerve endings that use pain to signal and protect us from further harms. Pain keeps us from burning ourselves. feeling hungry can keep us from starving to death and so on.

Conclusion 

First, the world wasn’t created the way it is now. Nor God intended it to be in such a mess. Second, the reason why evil, pain, and suffering exist is because of human sin. The third reason is that God allows evil for the sake of our freedom. No evil, no freedom. 

There are other reasons why God allows evil to exist. At last, God will eradicate evil when He comes back! Evil will eventually be destroyed. 

The Bible tells us; And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away (Revelation 21:4).

Notes and References_________________________

* Most of these arguments I have written here are a adaptation from the book  Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview

Scaling The Secular City; J. P. Moreland, Baker Publisher 

Christian Apologetics; Norman Geisler, Prince Press 

Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (Hard cover); William Lane Craig, J. P. Moreland, InterVarsity Press

All men by nature desire to know – Aristotle (384-322 B.C) 

By L. R. R.

I remember when I did my English oral presentation on John Locke 1632-1704 (an English philosopher and proponent of empiricism) in front of the whole class. I wasn’t really feeling quite comfortable standing right there in front of my classmates and I was too nervous and feeling stupid speaking to them. 

    The worst part of this scenario was that my teacher in English was there listening and participating with the class about John Locke. I’m a shy person so I hoped that my teacher didn’t mind my uneasiness.

     While doing my oral presentation a classmate of mine asked me why I study philosophy. This question looks to easy to answer but answering this question to her without going through all the details about philosophy, turned out to be more complicated than it appeared to be. I told her that the reason why I study philosophy is that I want to know whether knowledge can be known (epistemology). 

    I also want to know whether truth is objective or relative. I also told her that I am interested in knowing the existence of time (whether time is dimensional) or the existence of soul and mind (metaphysics). As a Christian it is of vital importance to me to know what is good and what is virtue (ethics). I hope she understood my simplistic and rather naive explanation on why I study philosophy. My main reason for this page is to introduce you to these major philosophical disciplines such as epistemology, metaphysics, ethics and logic. 

    Philosophy as a discipline is huge and more often complicated. But philosophy per se as a discipline is fun, engaging, illuminating and encouraging in a lot of ways. There are many things people know (empirical cognition) and by the same token knows nothing about most of the thing. 

    For instance, we all know that earth is spherical but what we do not know is why the earth has to be spherical. Or why triangles had to be three sided. Further, we all know what logic means, but did humans created logic or is logic discovered and so on.

What is Philosophy? 

    Defining the whatness of philosophy is not easy nor simple to describe. For the sake of our study in philosophy, let us just define philosophy as understood by the great thinkers such as Aristotle, Plato and Augustine. First, philosophy is thinking straight about thinking. Second, philosophy means loving being wise and/or love of wisdom in Greek (Philo = love, Sofia = wisdom). Wisdom should not to be confused with knowledge (Gr. gnosis). 

    Humans are philosophers by nature whether professionals or amateurs. We all ask the why, what, how questions in our daily lives. We may ask, for example, “what is the purpose getting up early in the morning”? or “why do I have to work today”? Academics and scholars alike asks more abstractly questions such as “Why is there pain and evil if a benevolent God exist (theodicy)” or “how can we be certain with our cognitive faculties”? 

    These questions may sound childish and humorous but these are still questions that requires sophisticated answers. Since, we are not all-knowing, yet we can be assured that there are adequate answers to our questions. All we have to do is to be sober to search for answers to our troubling questions. What we have to remember however, is that professional philosophers may have answers but they can also be mistaken in their case of providing us lay persons adequate answers to our questions about life, death and God. 

    God exist or not. If you ask an atheist about the existence and nature of God, he would very much provide you answers such as the none existence of God, while if you ask a theist he’s answer would definitely oppose the atheist. While both can be wrong with their answers they cannot both be right. 

    One of them are in error! Philosophy as a discipline is diverse and frequently attached to some various studies; philosophy of education for instance is not to be equated in the discipline of philosophy of religion. The former is more on educational system, while the latter deals more with God’s existence and theodicy.

The Relevance of Philosophy 

    Is there any relevance studying philosophy? Of course there is! As I asserted above, it is of critical importance for me as a Christian to learn how to think straight in many areas within the scope of ideas or concepts, and be able to comprehend clearly about my own worldview (as a Christian). 

    I want to use my God-given mind to see and detect false ideas (specifically the ideas that undermines Christian orthodoxy). In 1 Peter 3:15 we read, ” But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense (Gr. apologia) to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear.” In order for me to answer and defend my faith, I have to study it thoroughly. 

    Apostle Paul warns us not to participate in bad and worldly philosophies (Colossians 2:8), yet he must have studied and well versed in the philosophy of Stoics where he argued and used philosophical reasoning (Acts 17:2-4, 17-31; 18:4; 19:8). 

    But how can we (as Christians) detect false ideas or bad thinking if we are incompetent and ignorant about philosophy? Certainly, only by studying it can we be prepared and effective to tear down the strong hold of false worldviews. 

    We all have our presuppositions in our way of thinking, whether it be religion, philosophy, science,ethics or astronomy. But do we have a correct presuppositions by which we rely upon our ideas? Does, your ideas correlate with realities (the belief from a mechanistic universe for example)? or, does your worldview interacts with mathematical certainties (13 = 1+ 1+ 1)? These and many other relevant questions can exclusively be studied within the inquires of philosophical discipline.

Disciplines in Philosophy 

    There are lots of discipline within the philosophical studies. What I’m interested here in our course is mainly to usher you a short list (though not extensive) and a short expositions each of these absorbing disciplines such as epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics and logic. 

    I’m quite sure that there are important and relevant studies within philosophy, namely, politics, and law. But, let us not be overwhelmed and be dumbfounded, so, we must proceed with our main course in this studies. Let us not delay and proceed with our adventure in philosophy right away.

Epistemology

     “Philosophers have identified various species of knowledge, philosopher Robert Audi writes, “For example, propositional knowledge (that something is so), non – propositional knowledge of something (e.g., knowledge by acquaintance, or by direct awareness), empirical (a posteriori) propositional knowledge, non empirical (a priori) propositional knowledge, and knowledge of how to do something.” Not only that there are myriads kinds of “knowing” there are also myriads kinds of questions that relates to it, for instance,”How do you know”? 

    Are you familiar with this question? If you are, then you have encountered the very nature of the epistemological discipline which is the study of the nature of knowledge and justification. 

    The studies of epistemology (Gr. episteme, ‘knowledge’ and logos, ‘explanation’) includes the questions such as, “how do we know what we know”? “Is there any warrant to hold fast to our knowledge in which we apply to our daily activities”? “Is truth objective or relative”? “Can we be certain about reality” “Do minds have innate ideas,” “Is truth knowable”? 

    These questions are just tip of the ice-berg within the scope of epistemology. A good epistemologists can counter the arguments of skepticism in our post-modernistic era.

Metaphysics 

    The main issues of metaphysics is to know about reality or as philosopher Peter Kreeft explains, “Metaphysics is that division of philosophy which investigates what reality is.” There are relevant questions in the metaphysical spectrum, for instance, “what is real”? “Do physical objects exist,” “Is there such a thing as free will”? “Is there cause and effect” and “Does God exist”? 

    Metaphysics as a discipline is discarded by a materialistic way of thinking, because, these theories are not empirically verifiable and therefore cognitively meaningless. According to a physicalist, “Science alone provides us genuine knowledge.” Whether science alone can give us genuine knowledge, we cannot, however, reject these thought-provoking metaphysical questions. 

    Metaphysical studies is just as vital in the studies of epistemology. There is an ongoing debate between realism and anti-realism within metaphysics. Metaphysics deals also with properties, relations, universals, numbers, and propositions. As stated earlier, metaphysics is an ontological (being or reality) theory. The most basic aspects in metaphysics is called general ontology. 

    For me as an amateur metaphysics is difficult and sometimes dry and boring. Yet the studies of metaphysics is really exciting and very practical. Metaphysics as a discipline has been pioneered by Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, René Descartes and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. It has been said that metaphysics has been a long-standing friend of theology.

Ethics 

Ethics concern is morality mainly the general study of goodness and right action. Of course, ethics deals also with questions such as, 

“What is the nature of good and evil,” “Is ethics objective or subjective,” Is capital punishment justifiable” “what is the norm for moral activities” and “what is right” and “Does might and position decides what’s right? 

Whether one believes in a benevolent God or not, we cannot be justified by denying the questions either we be good or maliciously evil. The fields of theoretical ethics are broad. These theories are diverse and contradictive to compare one moral theory over other. 

For instance, ethical absolutism does not apply its theory to ethical relativism and ethical pragmatism is not compatible to ethical utilitarinism. In addition, the Divine Command theory is not harmonious to ethical hedonism and so fort. These diverse theory on ethics are worth reading and worth pondering. 

In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle wrote, “not in order to know what virtue is, but in order to become good.” There are lot’s of excellent Christian ethicists and other secular ethicists I want to suggests for further studies in ethics.

Logic 

    Studying logic is necessary if our brain were created by an Intelligent Being. However, if the universe including our brains are just a product of mindless process or just a mere product of chance, then logic as a discipline would be unthinkable and useless to study, this is because since my brain evolved differently from your brain, and therefore our reasoning process would not be precise nor reliable. 

    But, we all know that God the Creator of the universe (including our brains) exist, and since God is logical, logic then is advisable. There are other kinds of logic. What I aim here is the Aristotelian (Western) logic. Keep this in mind, Aristotle did not invent logic, rather he discovered it!

(Categorical Syllogism)

     As students of logic, we should not to be contempt in our studies if we haven’t came across the categorical syllogism. Categorical syllogism is an argument consisting of three categorical propositions, with two premises and a conclusion. Further, there are three kinds of statements that can be used as premises in a syllogism. (e.g. hypothetical, disjunctive and categorical). The hypothetical deals with “If then…then that” statement. 

    The second kind is an “Either this or that.” My main objective is to show you an example of categorical proposition. The propositional categorical syllogism contains four terms: the subject term, the predicate term, the copula, and quantifiers. For example;

1. All (quantifiers) men are mortal (subject) 

2. Socrates is a man (predicate) 

3. Therefore, Socrates is (copula) mortal

quantifier All, Subject A copula Is predicate B. If we put all parts together, they will look like this: “All A is B” If you are good in grammar you will have no problem understanding all these written examples. 

Of course, logic is not exclusively confined to Aristotelian, there are other logical disciplines out there such as Symbolic logic, Mathematical logic, Hindu logic etc, etc. 

But I prepare Aristotelian logic. Like mathematics, studying logic takes time and lots of hard thinking, at least for those who are not bright minded (like me). But, if we do not want to study logic, then we better stop thinking, because, thinking is logic. 

Likewise, if we are one of those who uncritically live our lives and let somebody think for us, then our life would be useless to live, because, we are then no better than potatoes. Unfortunately, we are living in an anti-intellectual age. Post-modernism, militant religions, cult leaders, media, and so on, wants us what to think in instead of how to think.

Conclusion 

The father of protestant Methodism John Wesley remarked, 

Ought not a Minister to have, First, a good understanding, a clear apprehension, a sound judgment, and a capacity of reasoning with some closeness…Is not some acquaintance with what has been termed the second part of logic (metaphysics), if not so necessary as (logic itself), yet highly expedient? Should not a Minister be acquainted with at least the general grounds of natural philosophy? 

As we read John Wesley’s word, it is clear that he exhorted us to acquire skills in mastery in logic and philosophical studies. 

This is a sound advice for Christians who are willing to face, reasons contrary to biblical teachings. Epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and logic ought to be studied in conjunction to our theological and biblical studies. 

Epistemology helps us to understand the nature of knowledge and truth, while metaphysical inquires can enhance our understanding of what exist and what reality is. Likewise, since our Bible is not a book on ethics, ethics as a discipline can make us more aware of our actions and behavior.

Logic, is to be critically studied. A right mind and sound thinking can help see and detect through unsound arguments that being pushed in our local medias, liberal churches and Cultists against Christian orthodoxy. Study hard and learn well!

Resources —————————— 

Introduction to Philosophy: A Christian Perspective, Norman Giesler and Paul D Feinberg; Baker Publishing. 

Philosophy Made Slightly Less Difficult: A Beginner’s Guide To Life’s Big Questions, Garrett J. DeWeese and J. P. Moreland; Inter Varsity Press. 

The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Robert Audi; Cambridge University Press. 

Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview, J. P. Moreland and William Lane Craig; Inter Varsity Press.