About this sermon
A Morning Instruction class on Cornelius Van Til’s apologetics and his relationship to J. Gresham Machen and old Princeton. The lesson asks whether Van Til’s presuppositional method contradicts Machen’s evidential emphasis or complements it. It traces Van Til’s first published article, a critique of A. N. Whitehead in the Princeton Theological Review, and his position on the theistic proofs: natural revelation leaves people without excuse, but there is no neutral natural theology, and facts cannot be interpreted apart from God’s word.
Sermon transcript
Very good. And your other finger. How about that other finger? Let’s see. Acts 26 and Luke 16. Okay, Acts 26. We’ll read secondly. Let’s begin with Luke chapter 16, verses 19 through 31. If you’ll be pleased to turn with me and your Bibles. Luke chapter 16, and we’ll read verses 19 through 31.
There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen, and who feasted sumptuously every day, and at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels at Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried, and Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side.
And he called out, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and sent Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame. But Abraham said, child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus and like men are bad things, but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you, a great chasm has been fixed in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us. And he said, then I beg you, Father, to send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.
But Abraham said, they have Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And he said, no, Father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent. He said to them, if they do not hear Moses and the prophets, Neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.
And now Acts chapter 26 verses 22 through 29. Acts chapter 26 reading verses 22 through 29. And the Apostle Paul is giving these events before Felix. And he says, to this day, I have had the help that comes from God, and so I stand here testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would come to pass, that the Christ must suffer, and that by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim life both to our people and to the Gentiles.
And he was, I’m sorry, Festus. And as he was saying these things in his defense, Festus, said with a loud voice, Paul, you are out of your mind. Your great learning is driving you out of your mind. But Paul said, I am not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, but I am speaking true and rational words, for the king knows about these things. And to him I speak only, for I am persuaded that none of these things has escaped his notice, for this has not been done in a corner. King of Rippa. Do you believe the prophets? I know that you believe. And Griffith said to Paul, in a short time, you would persuade me to be a Christian. And Paul said, whether short or long, I would to God that not only you, but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am, except for these chains.
Let’s pray. Dear Heavenly Father, please bless our time together as we prepare for worship and as we would also prepare to faithfully and convincingly and credibly give a defense for what we believe to those who would ask us. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
Today’s class There’s a distillation and explanation of Greg Barneson’s essay, Machen, Van Til, and the Apologetical Tradition of the OPC, which constitutes chapter 17 of the OPC’s 50th anniversary commemorative collaboration, Pressing Toward the Mark, edited by Charlie Dennison and Rick Gamble. Unfortunately, this is currently out of print. There should be a copy near you somewhere in the library, I believe. All right? OK.
So Bonson argues, and Bonson would tell us that apologetics gave birth to the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, because the OPC formed as a result of defending the true historic biblical faith, not against a variant of biblical Christianity, but against the unbelief of modernism or liberalism, a new, different, false religion that had so infected and dominated the PCUSA. The Orthodox Presbyterian Church has a reputation for apologetics.
In Bonson’s estimation, the preeminence in the 20th century defense of biblical faith belongs to the labors of J. Gresham Machen and Cornelius Van Til.
And while both distinguished themselves in the field of apologetics, they did so in different emphases or different scholarly specializations. Machen in historical studies and Van Til philosophical studies as they related to Christian theology. Alright, now does this constitute a house divided? Did this difference in specialization or apologetic emphasis between the historical defense of Machen and the philosophical defense of Van Til, does this difference constitute or represent two opposing apologetic methodologies or traditions as some contend? Or one might ask if William Wyndham Machen understand how far from the old Princeton apologetic, the new Westminster apologetic, as now represented by Van Kilt’s presuppositionalism, really was. And insofar as Machen did, one might further ask, did Machen simply put up with Van Kilt’s presuppositionalism for the sake of their common cause for historic biblical Christianity, as exemplified in Westminster Theological Seminary and the OPC, against unbelief that gripped Princeton Seminary and the PCUSA, or perhaps as Alan McRae, that renowned critic, antagonist, and sadly, mal-interpreter of Van Tilt alleged, did Machen suffer from a sort of buyer’s remorse with regard to Van Tilt, wishing that he had instead recruited someone subscribing to the apologetical approach of B.B. Werfel in the old school Princeton, or not the old school Princeton, the old Princeton apologetics. And finally, did Machen and van Kiel’s differences in apologetic emphasis indicate contrary and even irreconcilable methodologies, or were they rather complementary?
Any questions about the question? Okay, good, let’s move on quickly. To address these questions responsibly and with intellectual honesty, it behooves us to first consider the following points. Point number one, Machen and Van Til represented two different scholarly specializations. Machen devoted himself to the detailed historical challenges to the Christian faith with works such as The Origin of Paul’s Religion and The Virgin Birth of Christ. I hope we have copies back here.
He would write, Christian piety must be grounded firmly in historical knowledge. Van Til, on the other hand, wrestled with the underlying philosophical challenges. mounted against Christian understanding of reality, knowledge, and ethics, as in such works as a survey of Christian epistemology, or the knowledge of why we know what we know, and Christianity and idealism, idealism dealing with the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, on which was based liberal theology. He would write, the conflict between those And those who do not cannot be carried by a discussion of facts without at the same time discussing the philosophy of fact. One has to go back at the facts of history to a discussion of the meaning of history.
Point two, Machen and Van Til represented two different sets of intellectual temperaments, preparation, and interests. While Machen on one hand was fascinated and absorbed with the particulars of classical languages and literature, he no-wise felt at ease in the field of philosophical speculation. As a student, he distinguished himself in classics, but he once relayed to his older brother, Arthur, an offer of $1,000 for a satisfactory exegesis or interpretation of a single page of the idealist philosopher Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Poor Reason, not his cup of tea. On the other hand, Ben Thiel, as a doctoral candidate at Princeton University, mastered the complete works of Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Hegel in their original languages.
And while he later would write about the fact that historical investigation bolstered the work of apologetics, he would add this autobiographical note, I do not personally do a great deal of this because My colleagues in the other departments of the seminary in which I teach are doing it better than I could. Point three, while Meacham had an immense admiration and commitment for the grand theological reputation of Princeton Seminary, from which he was a student and where he was a faculty member, and he openly identified with the outlook and scholarship of B.E. Warfield, at least he was consistent in his systematic theology, when it came to apologetics, Meacham’s own perspective on and pursuit of defending the faith apologetics, moved away from the old Princeton conception of apologetics in a presuppositional direction. And I hope we can show you some of that later, Lord willing, if we have the time.
Point number four, Van Til could applaud and support Machen’s historical defense of the faith, says Boston, even as Machen could appreciate and approve the developments in methodology and philosophical defense by Van Til. Now, our question here is, was Van Til aware of Machen’s historical defense of the faith and its deviation from old Princeton towards presupposition? Consider the history.
How much would Machen really know about Van Til before he actually recruited and hired him? Consider that in 1906, when Van Til was 11 years old, Machen joined the faculty of Princeton Theological Seminary, such that during Van Til’s teenage and college years, Machen distinguished himself as an intelligent and defender of the historical Christian faith, with articles such as Jesus and Paul, Christianity and Culture, and History and Faith. In 1921, the year that Van Til entered Calvin Theological Seminary, Machen’s first major book and apologetically masterpiece, The Origin of Paul’s Religion, was published. in 1922, being impressed with the faculty of Princeton Seminary, consisting of the likes of Machen, Boss, Charles Hodge, Dean Wilson, and the international prestige of Princeton University. Van Til transferred there to later earn his THM from the seminary in 1925 and his PhD from the university in 1927. While a seminary student, Van Til lived on the same floor with Machen in Alexander Hall. During his five intellectually intense years at Princeton, Van Til came to know and respect Machen on a personal basis.
He was there when Machen was embroiled in the theological and ecclesiastical controversy over Fawcett’s notorious address, Shall the Fundamentalists Win, in 1922. and with the signing of the Alberta Affirmation in December of 1923. Machen often preached fervently in defense of the faith as stated in supply in the First Presbyterian Church of Princeton from 1923 to 1924. It was also during this time that Machen wrote his two books, Christianity and Liberalism in 1923, And what is faith in 1925? In addition to articles defending the faith such as Is Christianity True in 1923, The God of Early Christians in 1924, The Modern Use of the Bible in 1925, The Relation of Religion to Science and Philosophy in 1926. And is the Bible right about Jesus in 1927?
In light of Van Til’s admiration for Machen, Machen’s personal proximity, right there down the hall, and the obvious bearing of Machen’s scholarship on Van Til’s chosen interest in apologetics, argued Lawson, it is unreasonable to think that Van Til could be unaware of Machen’s position and the details of his method of defense. Given Van Til’s brilliance, it is unreasonable to think that he did not understand them.
He knew what he was getting into. What about Mason? Point five, Machen could appreciate and approve the developments in methodology and philosophical defense by van Gogh. And Watson argues this. Was Machen aware, this is the question, was Machen aware of van Gogh’s presuppositional apologetic methodology before he recruited him to teach apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary? Once again, consider the history.
Upon entering Princeton as a middler, that is a second year student, Van Til began to make a strong impression on his professors, and on Machen in particular. Consider the fact that Van Til had already studied under W.H. Jellema at Calvin, and he had read the works of Abraham Kuyper in the Dutch language. Being, as Machen’s esteemed mentor at Princeton, B.B. Warfield had published a critique, I’m sorry, published a critical discussion of Kuyper’s view of apologetics while Machen was a seminary student. Could Machen have missed this in his personal contacts and conversations with Van Til? Van Til had demonstrated his philosophical proficiency before the faculty by writing the prize-winning student papers for both the 1923, on evil and theodicy, and for 1924, on the will and its theological relations, as well as by his taking simultaneous philosophy courses at the university each semester, with Machen hearing of A. A. Bowman’s high praise for Plato’s competence in metaphysics. And having thus gained Machen’s attention as a seminary student, Two months before the granting of his doctorate in 1927, Van Til published in the Princeton Theological Review a critique of A.N. Whitehead’s 1926 lecture series entitled Religion in the Making.
In this article, Van Til identifies the author’s presuppositions. He exposes his denial of a creature-creature distinction. He exposes his subjection to God, the author’s subjection to God, to man’s autonomous judgment. He identifies the internal contradiction and inadequacy of the author’s worldview. And Van Til explains why biblical Christianity alone provides the solution to the author’s conundrum.
So in this, Van Til’s first published article, no less in the Princeton Theological Review, his presuppositional direction of thought was displayed before the faculty of Princeton. including, of course, J. Ressa Machin. Any questions so far? We’ll move on. In 1928, the following year, Princeton Seminary invited Van Til to take a leave from his new pastorate and serve the seminary as an instructor in apologetics. This was quite an honor, making him the youngest member of the faculty. This is what his hero and friend, Das Machin, in a letter to his mother had to say about Van Till’s invitation to teach at Princeton. He wrote, makes him wrote to his mother, the best piece of news for some time is that Mr. Van Till, a recent graduate of the seminary has, despite Dr. Stevenson’s vigorous opposition, been asked by the director’s curriculum committee to teach the classes in apologetics during this year and has accepted. It is the first real forward step that has been taken in some time. Van Til is excellent material from which a professor might ultimately be made.
And in January… What is Marcus Stevenson objecting? Stevenson was, he might have been on this, yeah, but he was of liberal persuasion. I do believe, if I’m not mistaken about that. But I’ll look it up and try to find an answer for you. In January 1929 Banfield published a review of two books by Hermann Bobing and in this review Banfield called for abandoning the impossible notion of neutral territory in truth or study and insisted on the necessity of schools that are self-consciously Christian in their starting point and in their goal, and I quote, if we would truly employ all the means given us for the propagation and defense of the faith, end quote. And in writing this, Banfield publicly rejected old Princeton’s cherished assumption of neutral or common ground with the unbelievers in apologetic dialogue. More about this later.
Could Machen, a scholar of excellent perception who had the previous year maintained a close personal relationship with Van Tilt and his wife, could he have missed this? And when in the spring of 1929 the board of Princeton Seminary elected Van Tilt to occupy the very chair of apologetics at Machen to turn down because he saw the writing on the wall where Princeton was going. As Stonehouse writes, Machen expressed his intense gratification at this development. Speaking of Van Til’s special equipment for the work and his great success with the students. From this, it is evident, says Bonson, that Machen was conscious of, interested in, and personally applauded the character and quality of Van Til’s apologetic location.
Any questions here? So you can see Bonson’s thesis. Now let’s see if we can back it up in terms of put some meat on the bones here and try to understand some of the particulars. First of all, let’s take a brief look, cursory look, at Van Tillis’ apologetics. Is that possible?
Fortunately, we’ve just been through a quarter in apologetics, so I wouldn’t even address it had we not OK, so the notion of apologetical incompatibility between Machen and Van Til apparently springs from, or definitely springs from, harboring misleading assumptions about Van Til’s view of the use of empirical or historical evidence, arguing for the evidence from history that Paul was converted before that, the resurrection took place, and such things.
And on one hand, and also, Banquo’s use of theistic proofs, they characterize, or I’m sorry, they caricature that. They get it wrong. What did Banquo believe with regard to using theistic proofs in defending the faith? Unless, of course, this error, thinking that Minkin and Banquo are, you know, opposed to one another, it may spring from an equally misconceived notion of what Machen thought about them as well, about van Til’s view of using historical evidence and using mystic proofs. Now these misrepresentations are unfounded in the light of the published works of Machen and van Til, which we shall see, but arise from faulty preconceptions of what their positions must imply and from inadequate familiarity with their teaching.
To take just one of many, sadly, lamentably, many available illustrations of this, Clark Pinnock, the apologist, has portrayed Van Til as maintaining that, quote, it is not only useless, but wrong to appeal to theistic arguments or historical vindications in defense of the Christian faith. Unquote. That’s what Clark Pinnock thinks that Van Til is saying. He’s not.
As opposed to or standing over against Van Til, he erroneously thinks, Pinnock teaches that a, quote, a philosophy of Christian evidences which employs argument and historical evidence is needed, lest the gospel be discredited as a grand and unwarranted assumption.
Okay, Van Til, there are at least parts of that that Van Til would be in hearty agreement. to explain this sort of thing, and I trust we can unpack that. Efforts must be made then to clarify and explain just where van Gogh stood, looking first at the issue of theistic proofs, and second, at the issue of empirical evidence for Christianity. Now, first of all, the objective proof of Christian theism according to Van Til. Point one, Van Til’s criticism of the theistic proofs has always and only been directed against the proofs as they were traditionally formulated, understood, and applied.
That is, as presupposing man as ultimate or autonomous. See my credo. for this, and I hope we’ll get to that. I hope we’ll have time to study my credo during this quarter, which we shall see. But just in summary, before we go any further anyway, let’s take a look at two worldviews. Autonomous man, on the one hand, which would be your presupposition, or what we would call biblical Christianity, or Christian theism.
Biblical Christianity, some call it the Reformed Faith or Calvinism. Now this should be familiar to some of you. This circle represents God and this is the created universe and all that it contains. Things seen and unseen, heaven and hell included. Everything, this is the universe, this is God.
And of course God How does God execute his decrees? God executes his decrees in the works of creation and providence. The decrees of God, what are the decrees of God? His eternal purpose according to the power of his will, whereby for his own, let’s see, he foreordain whatsoever comes to pass for his own glory. Creation and providence here.
All right, and as opposed to this, There is what we might call paganism in its various degrees of sophistication. And here, in the midst of this chance universe, which is completely irrational, it just happened to roll out there for no particular reason, we have man. And man is kind of a crown, man is king. Man measures all things. Man is the ounce of rationality. and reason and logic in the midst of all this chaos.
You look at that and say, how can this of a chance universe. What’s more, it doesn’t seem to work, does it? Because you have all these repeatable, eternal, unchangeable laws of nature, natural law, laws of physics, laws of other schools of science, past, present, and future.
And he’s wearing a red shirt. And we all look at him and say, he has a red shirt. Why do we all recognize red is red? Why do we all write down the words R-E-D, or letters R-E-D, and say, that’s red. And we all understand that. We can translate that. And why is it that tomorrow, we’ll say the same thing? And the next day, and we look in the past. There’s continuity. Think about these things. Van Til thought about these things. And he said, you cannot justify that in a system like that. Why? Because anything new can come. and mess it up. Now what’s the difference between sophisticated paganism, or paganism in unsophisticated form, and Arminianism? That.
You just add God to the picture, that’s all. This God is too small. This God does not control all things. For example, There’s something out here that could be the will of man, and that’s something that is outside of God’s reach. God does not determine, according to the Arminian, what man will do.
Man is still wearing that crown. There’s a problem here. So if you come and make an argument, you’re giving up the goose. You’re giving up the farm here. Because what happens is you’re saying, OK, man, what do you think of of the law of God, or what do you think of these things? And he’ll say, well, has not God said, well, let me be the judge of that. And man has an axe to grind. More about this, you see. In other words, man is sinful and fallen, and he will always give you an answer that he likes. After all, if he’s the judge and you give him that share as judge, then you’ve completely given up the argument. More about this later, but point number two, any questions about this? I hope you have questions, but later on. Point number two with regard to Van Til’s use of the theistic proofs and such. Van Til realized that there is no natural theology.
Now according to Romans 1, the created realm of nature simply provides uninterpreted raw data which merely makes possible, provided men rationally reflect on it correctly, which they don’t, a natural knowledge of God as the eventual conclusion of the reasoning. Alright, you might say, okay, well, look, there’s all these forces of nature, maybe there are little gods here, you know, a god of the sea, a god of the sun, a god of the sky, who brings rain and everything, and that sort of thing, maybe that’s what it is, but that’s all the best they can come up with, and they may even say, like Aristotle, there’s an unmoved mover, yeah, that’s it, yeah, he brings order to everything. all of the universals, but he knows none of the particulars.
And we can’t know him. We’re still here, in our own right, untouched by him. Alright, is this the best we can do for natural theology? This is the best that the fallen man has come up with. There is no natural theology. Even Adam in the garden needed to have special word revelation. Look at Genesis 2, verses 16-17. Adam needed to be told. See that tree over there, Adam? That’s the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. See that tree over there, Adam? That’s the tree of life. Adam could not have known that on his own.
And two, fallen man by his sinful nature twists the truth of God as revealed in nature through his own destruction and must be made alive and indwelt by the spirit of God to reflect upon it correctly. Romans 1 verse 18 of course says that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against ungodliness of men who by their ungodliness suppress the truth.
They don’t want to hear it. Why? Because every time they look in the mirror they say What have I done to the image of God? Because, again, Romans 2, verse 15, the law of God, the work of the law of God is written on the hearts. And those conflicting thoughts accuse them.
They realize, I know the law of God because I have moral indignation when I see it broken, and in fact I know that I myself have broken the law of God. But they try to efface the inevitable truth that God has created them, because they do know God, as Romans 1 verse 21 would say. Although they knew God, They did not give thanks to him as God. And they know they should have, so they’re guilty. They know they’re covenant breakers.
Point number three, Vancho’s apologetic is based upon confidence in natural revelation, not natural with the word of God. Van Kiel insists upon the objective validity of the argument for the existence of God and for the truth of Christianity in another form. But he gives a valid argument more about this later. Anything, any questions thus far? This is very deep stuff.
Ed. Would you go so far as to contend that the philosophy of Dorfield and Princeton? I would say that Dorfield and Princeton had an apologetic that was more consistent with this. They were Calvinistic, but for some reason they just dropped the ball completely and picked up an Arminian view of apologetics. Good question.
Another point, Van Til forcefully refutes the notion that it is useless for the regenerate to reason with the unregenerate insisting that we must. This is how he deviated from Kuiper. Kuyper was saying, don’t waste your time with the unbelievers. I mean, let them hear the word of God preached that they may be made alive, but why even bother?
And Dan Kill says, no, we have to remove, we have to take every thought captive. We destroy arguments and every proud obstacle to the knowledge of God and take every thought captive to the way of Christ. He has to be shown. He has to be shown that his argument is invalid, even though he’ll disagree with you, and yet you have to leave him with his tongue clinging to his jaw. Point number six, Van Til is decidedly critical of the theistic attitude.
What’s that? which comes to expression frequently in the statement of the experiential proof of the truth of Christianity, people will say that they know that they are saved and that Christianity is true no matter what the philosophical or scientific evidence for it, against it may be.
Now God says it, I believe it, that tells it, or put it another way, as the hymn says, remember that hymn that you won’t find in your Trinity hymnal, you ask me how I know he lives, he lives within my heart. okay, there is the witness of the spirit, but there’s more than that, isn’t it? God has not left himself without a witness, has he? The word of God, okay, and yes, it naturally follows that if the word of God is true, then the evidence will fall into line with regard to the resurrection of Jesus Christ and other such things, that the Bible speaks of very clearly, all right?
But Emanuel is, ironically, he’s accused of being a fetus, you know, one who says, well, just faith alone. It doesn’t matter what the intellect says. You have to believe what the Bible says unquestionably. Do you understand what the Bible says, even? Do you even question your own interpretation of the Bible, Christian? But you understand that in seeking to believe something that the Bible says is true no matter what philosophy or science or evidence for it or against it may be, you realize that in thus seeking withdrawal from all intellectual argument, such fetuses have virtually admitted that the validity of the argument against Christianity is, you know, they’ve admitted the validity.
They’re saying it is a valid argument, it is a true argument. They will have to believe in their hearts what they have virtually allowed to be intellectually indefensible, if they often are defensible. Alright? Any questions? Van Til insists that the argument with the unbeliever must be regarding the preconditions of all intelligible experience, logic, science, ethics and such, an argument from the impossibility of the contrary. and the irrationalism of how it came to be. The universe, that is, and all things. Matter in motion. How does matter in motion beget love? How does matter in motion beget the laws of physics? How does matter in motion beget the moral truths? Why is your conscience stricken if you kill someone? Matter in motion.
No, there’s something wrong here. creation, nothing can come in and surprise him. No boogeyman can be out there. No other, you know, God called will, ho, ho, ho, ho, you know, coming to attack God. If you allow anything outside of God’s control, you’ve opened a terrible Pandora’s box. You don’t know what else, what is out there, because God doesn’t know what’s out there. we just say that they are inconsistent talents. Okay? Get with the program! Come on! And so we would encourage them accordingly. Alright, time’s fleeting here.
What about evidences, according to Van Til? Would Van Til, indeed, as his critics claim, refuse to have anything to do with presenting verifying evidence for the Christian faith and dismissing the unbelievers’ questions without even hearing? The truth is that Van Til did not in the slightest reject the proper use of inductive reasoning and verbal evidences and apologetics. That’s the truth.
Listen to what Van Til says about the phenomenon of scripture and the use of historical evidence in the defense of the Bible. He says, the point is we are told that, and I quote, an infallible Bible, there shouldn’t be any discrepancies. There should be no statement of historical fact in scripture that is contradictory to a statement of historical fact given elsewhere. Yet higher criticism, that is the biblical critics, has in modern times found what it thinks are facts that cannot possibly be harmonized with the idea of an infallible Bible.
What shall be the attitude of the Orthodox believer with respect to this? Shall he be an obscurantist and hold to the doctrine of the authority of Scripture, though he knows that it can empirically be shown to be contrary to the facts of Scripture themselves? it goes without saying that such should not be his attitude, and listen to what Banto says about the use of experimental inductive study according to the scientific method. What does Banto say about the validity of the scientific method? He says it’s quite commonly held that we cannot accept anything that is not the result of a sound scientific methodology.
With this we can as Christians heartily agree, the Christian position is certainly not opposed to experimentation and observation. The greater amount of detailed study and the more carefully such study is undertaken, the more truly Christian the method will be.
Let’s skip ahead a little bit here, and let’s take a look at Van Til’s view of evidence as valuable. as both offering the Godís children the answers and he so as not to be intellectually troubled when hearing of learned objections of non-Christian scholars and silencing the futile empirical objections of unbelievers to the claims of Christianity and clearing away the mental debris that could cause intellectual prejudice. So the believers can open the Bible and say, OK, well, what does the Bible say? What I’ve heard about the Bible is not true. Though valuing the evidences as indispensable, historical evidences, or the work of Machen, Van Til would insist that evidences can never stand on their own in Christian apologetics.
This should be obvious enough from what God the Word teaches us. What people think about the observed evidence is affected by non-observational beliefs. Of course we know that. Why else would the Jewish leaders have the evidence of the resurrection and tell the people that the disciples came by night and stole this body while we guards were asleep? In dealing with the claims of Christ, nobody is truly detached and uncommitted one way or another. No man can serve two masters. And he who is not with me is against me, says our Lord.
In Matthew 6.24 and 12.30 respectively.
The non-observational commitments, or that is the presuppositions of the unbeliever, They exchange the truth about God for lie and worship and serve the creature rather than the creator, Romans 1.25. These presuppositions of the unbeliever are objectively foolish and lead to the destruction of knowledge.
They became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened, Romans 1.21.
And for all men inescapably do you have an inner knowledge of God, Romans 1.21-22, which we quoted in 2.15. The work of law is written on their hearts. One, the one who’s of sovereign power and plan uphold the universe’s regularity. They know he exists, working all things after the counsel of his own will. Look at the order in the universe. Ephesians 1 verse 11 explains that to them. That’s in consonance with what Pentecostal politics is.
Five, yet unbelievers are deeply hostile to this knowledge. and suppress it in unrighteousness, as we said, preferring to walk in the vanity of their minds and darken their understanding, like Ephesians 4, verses 17-18 says, and 6, that explains why it is that regarding such empirical evidences and the resurrection, if they do not believe Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone should rise from the dead, Luke 16, verse 31.
Nevertheless, the objective revelation provided by God and the evidence of history in scripture is such that we can, through the resurrection, know for certain that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ, Acts 2, verse 36, and also Paul and Mars Hill. God has proven that he will come to judge the world by raising this Christ who will be the judge from the dead. We can know the certainty of the things in which we have been instructed, Luke 1, verse 4. And according to the Apostle John, 1 John 2, verse 3, we know that we know.
So Bantow insisted that the evidences which are innumerable must be presented in a manner which compels a return to the true nature as the confirmatory of Christianity. And how is this done? Bantow says it’s indispensable to present empirical evidence to non-believers. You have to do that. But he immediately adds, I would not talk endlessly about the facts and more facts without ever challenging the non-believers’ philosophy of facts. So traditional apologetics doesn’t do it because it separates the general defense of theism as step one. We’ll use the natural theology to say that there is a God. And then we’ll convince people with other proofs that Christianity specifically is true. And it is the God who exists. God of Christianity. Any questions so far? Time’s almost up.
A few examples from Machen. Machen did believe in the use of presuppositions, for example. As early as 1926, Machen recognized that presuppositions controlled the divergent implications which would be drawn from the evidence. In other words, your worldview, be it Christian, historical evidence.
There is no such thing as neutrality from philosophical bias. Machen said, if the separation of science from religion is unwarranted, so also it may be remarked in passing is the separation of science from philosophy. Dr. Mullen seems to be supposing that there is such a thing as modern scientific criticism of the New Testament, which is independent of philosophical presuppositions, or neutral. the results of which can be safely accepted by men of different shades of philosophical and religious opinion. As a matter of fact, we do not think that such a neutral, purely scientific criticism exists.
The study of the New Testament, even in the sphere of literary criticism, and certainly in the sphere of historical criticism, cannot get along without presuppositions. Says Machen, in the Relation to Religion to Science and Philosophy in the Princeton Theological Review in 1926, three years before he hired Cornelius Van Hill.
And our time is up. I wish I could say more. But again, please, please, when the morning instruction is over, run. Don’t walk, run. And pick up this copy from the library before somebody else gets it. And you can see this for yourself. All right? Well, very good. Then let us prepare for worship.
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