Apologetics and reason

Some look at apologetics with mistrust as they are under the impression that depravity includes reason. I hold to the position that man's reason has remained intact after the fall, although its functioning has been hampered by the sinful nature of man. Here are a couple of reason why I believe reason still functions properly:

I do hold to the utter depravity of man. However to say that reason has become imperfect as a result of the fall is not the same as saying that reason is dominated by sinful nature. Reason functions well, but put in a corner the sinful nature will try to escape, mock, deny or do whatever in order to suppress what reason tells it. This is what I think Paul teaches in Romans 1. Fallen mankind has knowledge of the eternal God, but it is suppressed.

There is I think an interesting analogy with the will. What does the gospel message say? It says: repent and believe, for the Kingdom of God is at hand. Now, if the human will is so fallen that it doesn't function anymore, why preach and call to repentance? Yet, the call is there including the human responsibility to act upon that call. If the evangelist calls on the fallen human will cannot the apologist in the same way call on the mind? In fact the latter makes more sense as I believe that the will is the very center of man's rebellion toward God whereas the capacity to reason is merely a function of being human and thus subject to the sinful nature. The will is fallen, reason is merely subject to fallenness.

In addition there are a few biblical examples of reason being used in order to persuade men toward God. (A) In the OT God says to his people: Let us reason together. God does reason through the mouth of the prophet with propositions and showing the logical falacies of idolatry. (B) Jesus used logic on his adversaries (his argument on the Messiash being the son of David and named Lord by the same / his argument of paying taxes to Ceasar, etc.). (C) Look at Paul's use of logic, i.e. apologetics in the various settings where he confronted men with the gospel, esp. Mars Hill.

If you look at Eastern Orthodoxy you will find they have a interesting take on the creation of man. They hold that man made in the image of God is not the same as man made in God's likeness. One of my relatives wrote to me this on it: 'Orthodox affirm that Adam was perfect not so much in an actual but in a potential sense. Made in the image (icon) of God means that he possessed rationality, freedom, moral responsibility, etc: everything that marked him out as different from the animals, and he had these from the moment of his creation. Made according to the likeness of God, on the other hand, means that he had the potential to be assimilated to God through virtue, by which, if he had made proper use of this facility for communion with God, he could have become like God, deified.' When Adam sinned the likeness was affected not the image. If that is true it gives us yet another argument in favor of my position on reason.

Is faith as evil as smallpox?

This is an interesting exchange of views that took place in blogworld:

Today I read pc.blogspot.com where the statement was made that Faith is as evil as smallpox. I responded by saying that:

"Funny enough Richard Dawkins is a believer too. He believes in naturalism. And you really need quite a big faith to believe that the material reality that we experience is all there is. The very statement that 'faith is evil' requires a set of presuppositions that can't be proven themselves and thus require belief."

The response I got was the following:

'Yossman, to apprehend this world all you have to do is look around. But to try and explain what we do know, ie., all this that we see and experience, by means of something we neither see nor experience requires a leap in the dark. Literally, a leap of faith. The difference is clear enough.'

I gave the following response:

No, I don't agree.

First. We do not know for sure that what our senses perceive is really true. If there is anything out there at all. In order to prove it rationally we have to use our logical thinking, the effectiveness - or rather truthfullness - of which we can only prove by using the very logic we try to prove, thus creating circular reasoning. (This is rather Kantian I suppose.) What I am trying to say is that we have to believe our senses and logic in order to interact with the world and interpret the world. By giving a rational/material explanation of all that is, we are already taking huge steps of faith. Believing in a God might be just a higher form of believing than believing the senses.

Secondly looking around doens't explain for a lot we see and experience. For instance our morality, or the big bang, or the apparent mind-boggling design on both macro and micor levels, or consciousness, or beauty and our ability to perceive it. It might actually be a very logical thing to postulate the existence of a powerful Being that has brought everything about.

Thirdly, the material worldview runs aground trying to build a lasting basis for morality for instance. How on earth can we derive an 'ought' from the 'descriptive' fact of zillions of atoms that are out there?

Truly, saying that faith is an evil thing is an illogical thing to say. The statement itself is based on faith as it can't be proven. It's a self-refuting claim.

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I got a lot of feedback on that post and gave the following reply. I'll leave it at that.

Apparently you don't seems to understand that to interpret data is so much as to impose a mental (ie. invisible) mental structure upon those data. To arrive at any origin from a given amount of perceivable states you have to take a leap of faith. Postmodernism has shown us that much.

My point is to argue not in favor for a leap of faith, however, but to show that any position that interprets the world takes certain steps of faith. To believe in God is therefore not less rational than not to believe in Him. My interpretation of the facts at hand has led me to believe there is a God (in fact just by looking around me).

Furthermore I would like to point out that 'faith' as such (whatever it really means) can neither be wrong or good. It is rather the content of faith - and very often the way in which it has been working out in people's actions - that has led to destructive consequences. As has the content of non-religious 'isms'.

Islam for instance holds to the idea that unbelievers have to be converted by force. Although it needs to be said that most muslims would not advocate this at the present.

I know that many self-proclaimed Christians have done horrible things even in the name of their religion (slavery, crusades, imperialism, etc.)

As far as naturalism goes, here is an 'ought' derived from evolutionary naturalism that is not very nice either:

Nazism cannot be condemned by means of a naturalistic morality. The nazis were trying to advance their race and were doing the logical thing in order to diseminate their genes as widely as possible.

Mind renewal

Tough thinking for beginners
I have recently started a biblestudy series for beginners in the faith. It took me a while to get started as I wanted to do it differently this time; get it right. The series I developed this time (and that is still under development) is actually very tough. Instead of getting right away into the scriptures to analyze the message of salvation I decided to do a bit of culture engagement, i.e. to address issues non-christians bring up during conversations like: why the Bible? Is there a God? etc. Apologetics precedes biblestudy I thought.

After giving the first study I was a bit apprehensive about the results but not in the least doubtful in my opinion that such philosophical questions and their answers from a Christian viewpoint are important.

Yesterday at the beginning of the second meeting I found my audience very excited. Yes they found it hard stuff, but did not find it odd that even a 'beginners' biblestudy deals with the heart of the matter at hand. One of them used whatever little apologetics I provided in his classroom to defend his newly found faith over against the entire group, and succesfully!

All of this has confirmed my resolve to bring hard thinking back to the pulpit. The way I see it revitilization of the church (which is something of a prerequisite to revival) needs two components:

(A) An earnest searching of the Lord to restore ALL the gifts of the Holy Spirit to the church. This entails perseverance in sanctification, prayer and fasting. Let's take Jesus' words for real for once.

(B) A lifelong quest for intellectual excellence, like Groothuis, JP Moreland and others advocate. This will be fed by four things: (1) A realization that all creation is God's creation and thus points to Him. (2) A dedication to the reality of the historicity of the NT. (3) That faith in God is not an existential leap in the dark but the logical consequence of hard and honest thinking. (4) Good arguments for the case of God take people by surprise, because they don't expect Christians to have a coherent worldview that bears on reality.

De NVD - hoe fout is fout.

Nu even over de NVD.

Opnieuw wordt de discussie over morele normen en waarden actueel. Wanneer christenen moord en brand schreeuwen over euthanasie en abortus legt men ze in Nederland het liefst het zwijgen op. Nu het over (potentiële) legalisering van pedofilie gaat lijken wij Nederlanders allen (op de NVD na) in hetzelfde kamp te zitten.

Maar wat is de grond om het een af te keuren en het andere toe te staan? Hoe komt het dat er een diversiteit aan morele standaarden is? is er wel zoiets als een obsolute standaard voor goed en fout? Als de NVD ter sprake komt is bijna iedereen het erover eens dat dit absoluut fout is. Men maakt intuïtief aanspraak op een universele wetmatigheid die dit afwijst. Waarom?

Laten we eens twee wereldbeelden toetsen m.b.t. dit verschijnsel van een innerlijke wet waarop we universeel aanspraak kunnen maken. Ten eerste het in Nederland meest wijdverbreide wereldbeeld: humanisme. Humanisme leert dat de mens van binnen goed is, dat hij zelf de norm van zijn gedrag bepaalt, dat mensen samen een maatschappij kunnen vormen die werkt, d.m.v. onderlinge afspraken. Humanisme gaat onvermijdelijk gepaard met naturalisme. Naturalisme leert ons dat alleen wat empirisch waarneembaar is daadwerkelijk is. Materie is de enige werkelijkheid, de ultieme werkelijkheid. Het atoom is god. Dit is onlosmakelijk verbonden met het evolutionistisch denken: Alles wat is, is door toeval en spontane mutatie ontstaan, middels het mechanisme van 'survival of the fittest'.

Wat heeft dit alles over moraal te zeggen. Volgens het evolutionaire denken is moraal eveneens het product van een evolutionaire ontwikkeling. Het is een middel om samenlevingen in stand te houden en te structureren. Moraal is daarmee 'situational', d.w.z. wat op een gegeven moment werkt om het evolutionaire proces in stand te houden. Dit houdt tevens in dat moraal kan veranderen. Gisteren vonden we iets slecht, maar in de toekomst gaan we het misschien goed vinden. Niets staat absoluut vast.

Maar het gaat verder. Als we naturalistisch denken consequent doorvoeren, is moraal niet meer dan een ingewikkeld, maar random, gevolg van atomaire constellaties. Niets is daadwerkelijk goed of fout, want atomen zijn niet goed of fout - ze zijn gewoon - en aan hun existentie kan geen morele verontwaardiging of goedkeuring ontleend worden.

Consequent doorgeredeneerd betekent dat de NVD met haar verlangen om kinderporno uit het strafrecht te halen niet fout zit. Fout bestaat niet, want 'ethics is situational'. Misschien zijn we aan een volgende episode in onze evolutionaire ontwikkeling gekomen waarin het voor de ontwikkeling van de mensheid nuttig is om pedofilie te bedrijven. Misschien is de NVP een voorhoede van een geëvolueerde mensensoort. Vanuit het naturalitische gedachtengoed kan ('mag niet' kun je niet zeggen, maar wel 'kan niet', want het is logisch onjuist) de NVD niet veroordeeld worden. Het gaat immers maar om brainstates en atomaire constructies. Dus waar praten we over?

Deze redenering moet serieus genomen worden. Dit IS namelijk wat er gebeurt. Niemand wil de consequenties aanvaarden van het atheïstische-humanistische gedachtengoed waar het Westen zich sinds de eerste helft van de 20-ste eeuw aan overgeleverd heeft. De NVD is echter zo'n consequentie, net als nazisme, marxisme, euthanasie, abortus, kapitalisme, etc.

Wat is het alternatief? Het alternatief is het tweede wereldbeeld dat ik wil bespreken. Als het naturalisme niet leefbaar is, duidt dat er mogelijk op dat materie niet de enige realiteit is. De universele morele verwerpeljkheid die we ervaren (behalve een klein pervers groepje mensen) t.a.v. pedofilie en kinderporno verwijst naar een transcedente morele wet die het universum regeert en in ons wezen gegrift is. Ik bedoel dat God bestaat en ons gemaakt heeft en in ons hart kennis van zijn morele karakter heeft gelegd.

Vanuit de postulatie van een transcedent Wezen in wiens karakter wij de absolute grond van moraal vinden en daarmee het onderscheid tussen goed en kwaad is het mogelijk de uispraak te doen: de NVD is fout. Zonder dat uitgangspunt is zo'n uitspraak NIET mogelijk.

Dit is slechts een van de vele redenen waarom ik in God geloof.