Presuppositional and Evidential Apologetics

Jeff Clinton at the Dawn Treader has done a couple of posts on presuppositional apologetics (I referenced them in my prior post) which you can read here and here. I commend those posts to you again and would especially commend the comments to you on the first post. Jeff got into a dialogue with Joe Carter from Evangelical Outpost and Roger Overton of Res Cogitans on the subject of whether or not there is a moral component to apologetic argumentation.

Jeff says: Finally, I never thought of arguments as having moral components; as in, this approach is morally superior to that approach. It is an interesting thought. I lean more toward pragmatism when it comes to deciding which approach to use.

Roger says: I don't think arguments have a moral import either, but that is what presups (generally) claim. I asked Greg about that a month or so ago and he agreed. There is no moral component to arguments. I agree as well that the best approach is pragmatic.

Joe says: I have to disagree with you on that one (though not for the reasons you might think). Arguments are essentially actions and all actions have moral importance. Like all moral actions, a moral apologetic argument is one that is the right argument, at the right time, for the right reasons. If I use an evidentialist argument simply because I am more comfortable with it even when I know that my audience will find it unconvincing, the argument would lack a sound moral footing. It would not only be the wrong argument but it would also not be for the “right reason” (i.e., to glorify God by presenting the truth to an unbeliever). I think that is the sense in which we should judge the “morality” of arguments.

In a comment on my last post Jeff kindly invited me to chime in on the debate so I did by leaving a lengthy comment on his blog. I figured I would use that comment as the basis for a post here, so here goes.

First of all, the debate centers arond the two main schools of thought in apologetics - presuppositional and evidential apologetics. Just to whet your appetite, here is a very short definition of presuppositional apologetics from Wikipedia.

Presuppositional apologetics is a school of Christian apologetics, a field of theology which attempts to (1) present a rational basis for the Christian faith, (2) defend the faith against objections, and (3) attack the perceived flaws of other worldviews. Presuppositional apologetics is especially concerned with the third aspect of this discipline, though it generally sees the trifold distinction as a difference in emphasis rather than as delineating three separate endeavors.

The key discriminator of this school is that it maintains the Christian apologist must assume the truth of the supernatural revelation contained in the Bible (i.e., the Christian worldview) because there can be no set of neutral assumptions from which to reason with a non-Christian. In other words, presuppositionalists say the Christian cannot consistently declare his belief in the necessary existence of the God of the Bible and simultaneously argue on the basis of a different set of assumptions (presumably those of the non-Christian) in which God may or may not exist.

Advocates of presuppositional apologetics are mostly from the reformed community, although not exclusively. Cornelius Van Til is called the "father of presuppositional apologetics" and his method has been popularized by folks like John Frame, Richard Pratt and Greg Bahnsen. There is a division within the presuppositional school of thought between what Ron Nash would call inductive and deductive presuppositionalists with Van Til representing the inductive presuppositionalists and Gordon Clark representing the deductive presuppositionalists. It would get us way off track to get into that, but the Wikipedia article talks about some of the differences between Van Til and Clark.

The other approach is evidential apologetics. The Xenos website defines evidential apologetics this way:

Evidential Apologetics are the product of the rise of modern science and modern historiography. During the period of the enlightenment, Christians were eager to show that a scientific approach to Christianity was possible.

The type of scientific method used was a forensic, or inductive approach, which is similar to courtroom evidence. Forensic science collects evidence after the event (e.g. an autopsy) and seeks to find the most plausible explanation for the event. Such an argument does not claim to "prove" Christianity, but only to render it probable.

Evidentialists seem to divide between those who seek to prove Christianity based on historical evidences a la Josh McDowell and his evidences for the resurrection and the like, and philosophical apologists like R. C. Sproul and others who major on proofs for God's existence. This is not a hard and fast division because many of the major apologists use both.

I'm more in the presuppositional school of thought, and getting back to my comments on Jeff's post here are a few things I shared. One of the comments said that presuppositionalists object to evidentialism because it can only argue that God "probably" exists.

My understanding of Van Til is that he isn't so much arguing that evidentialists are wrong in arguing that God "probably" exists, although that may be a component of his argument. He is saying that use of evidential arguments gives away the farm. Evidential arguments presuppose that man can approach the knowledge of God as if man is morally neutral. This presupposition of moral neutrality is the presupposition of an atheistic worldview. In other words, the atheist worldview assumes that man is alone in the universe and is capable of making independent, autonomous judgments about the world around him, with no reference to God. So, the presuppositionalist argues that this assumption of neutrality is at the heart of an atheistic worldview. Thus, if we begin with atheistic presuppositions we can never attain true knowledge of God.

It's at this point that Van Til's critics get him for circular reasoning. Van Til is, in effect saying that we have to presuppose the existence of God to prove that God exists. I think this is a valid criticism, especially from a pragmatic point of view. I think there is a better way of expressing the idea behind this.

A better way would be to simply acknowledge that we all bring our own presuppositions to the table when we come to examine any kind of evidence for anything. We aren't tabula rasa's in a debate. Our presuppositions form a kind of grid by which we will interpret any data and the interpretive grid we bring with us is going to determine what we do with the evidence. Hence, an atheist and a Christian look at the same set of data and come to radically different conclusions. It's obvious that, in that case, it's not the data that caused the difference, its the presuppositions.

Van Til's greatest strength is getting people to acknowledge those things and to get below the surface of debating the evidences themselves to examining the presuppositions.

At this point, I think presuppositionalism's greatest strength comes into play and that is where we begin to examine which set of presuppositions comport the best with reality. I know that Van Til unfortunately had some disagreements with Schaeffer, but Schaeffer's tests of a worldview are very helpful here. One of Schaeffer's tests is does the worldview comport with reality? A Van Tillian approach would say that the Christian worldview does and the atheist worldview doesn't. Doug Wilson, who is in the Van Til tradition has a great little pamphlet where he begins with a study of buying a gallon of milk in the grocery store.

In fact, people's actions often reveal more about their likely deception than their words. For example, whenever you do something like go to a grocery store to buy milk, you reveal many things about yourself. When you first walk up to the grocery store, you assume that you and the store are two different things, not one, thus showing your rejection of most Eastern and New Age religions. When you walk down that same dairy aisle and select the same kind of milk, you assume that the world is not chaotic, but orderly, regular, and divided into set kinds of things. When you stand in line with others, expecting others to respect your space and person, you reveal your rejection of moral relativism and your deep trust in absolute ethical norms. When you calculate your available change, compare the price of the milk, and make the exchange with the clerk at the register, you engage in a complex array of thought processes involving nonmaterial rules of reasoning, thus showing your rejection of materialism and evolution.

In short, when you do something as mundane as buying milk, you accept and reject all sorts of views. You act like you reject many popular religions and scientific claims. In fact, given the sum of what you assume and reject just when buying milk, you act like you believe that you live in the world described by Christianity. The world depicted above suggests complexities and contours of reality that are only supplied in Christianity. If Christianity weren't true, then such things as simple as milk buying would appear to be impossible. Now, you may openly reject Christianity, but you certainly act like it is true and that your non-Christianity is false. Why such self-deception? Why don't you just confess what you appear to assume?

I'll admit that I've shared that one with folks before and they've rejected it out of hand, but I think Wilson is on to something here. There are assumptions we all make in everything we do, even buying milk at the store, which assume a Christian worldview.

This is the essence of the presuppositional approach - going beyond the evidences to the presuppositions that govern the way we look at the evidences for and against the existence of God.

Having said that, I don't think we should reject evidentialism out of hand. And, the truth is that in this debate we tend to make some hard and fast distinctions that aren't helpful. Presuppositionalists don't completely dismiss evidences and evidentialists don't completely dismiss presuppositions. Gerstner, Sproul and Lindsley wrote their book Classical Apologetics as a defense of their own approach and negative critique of Van Til's approach. When John Frame reviewed the book he awarded them the titles of "honorary presuppositionalists" because in disagreeing with Van Til, they still acknowledged the importance of presuppositions. My point is that both the evidentialists and presuppositionalists have strong points.

In getting back to the debate over whether or not it is more morally permissible to argue one way or the other I would say that it is permissible to argue evidentially from a defensive standpoint. I Peter 3:15 would justify this was we "give an answer" to those who question us about the hope that is within us. If someone says "why do you believe in the resurrection," I would answer first of all because the Bible teaches that the resurrection is the foundation of my faith, without which I have believed in vain, but if someone pressed me and said that there is no historical evidence for the resurrection I would have no problem pulling out arguments from McDowell's Evidence that Demands a Verdict. I would add that my faith is based on the witness of the Word of God, not the extra-biblical evidence. But, since they brought up a historical argument I would have no problem answering it.

In one of my seminary classes, one of the professors made a negative comment about Josh McDowell. Pat Morley of Man in the Mirror was in that class and he said something to the effect of "I keep hearing you guys criticize McDowell, but he's out there winning people to Christ, and you guys are staying safely here in your classrooms." Pat was right about that, and the professor acknowledged that he was right also.

In and of itself this does not morally justify evidentialism, the ends doesn't necessarily justify the means. A good example of this is Paul's statements in Philippians 1:15-18 where he rejoices that the gospel is preached, even though it is preached by those who preach it out of envy and rivalry. Paul's rejoicing over the fact that the gospel is preached does not morally justify envy and rivalry. Similarly, the fact that sometimes people come to Christ through evidential apologetics would not morally justify evidential apologetics if it could be proven that such kind of argumentation was wrong in and of itself.

Even though I lean presuppositionalist I don't think you can say that arguing evidentially is morally wrong, in and of itself. I Peter 3:15 morally justifies evidential type arguments. The presuppositional critique of evidentialism should be that evidentialism is insufficient, not that it is morally wrong.

I think that this kind of understanding would go a long way to bridging the gap between presuppositionalists and evidentialists. Plus, I think that both sides intuitively know this. As mentioned before evidentialists like Sproul acknowledge the place of presuppositions and the better presuppositionalists don't completely dismiss the use of evidences in argumentation.

For my money, evidential argumentation has a place as a defensive maneuver. If someone argues against the Christian faith based on some kind of historical or philosophical argument, then it is proper to answer it by showing the logical, historical, philosophical or other kinds of fallacies in their argument. But we can't stop there. The reason that this or that particular historical or philosophical argument is so persuasive to the atheist is not because of the mountain of evidence, it is because of the underlying presuppositions that cause the atheist to view the data, or the evidence, in a certain way.

At this point, I think we can and should go on the offensive via a presuppositional approach and get at the underlying assumptions that form their worldview. Romans 1 teaches us that no one disbelieves in God for a lack of evidence. There is plenty of evidence for the existence of God, but the crux of the matter is that men suppress the truth. The heart of apologetics is not marshalling evidences for God's existence, but getting to the heart of why a person suppresses the truth.

One of the main problems of presuppositionalism is that it has been great food for thought and debate in seminaries and philosophy classes, but no one has really done a good job of taking it to the streets. I know that Greg Bahnsen, Richard Pratt and John Frame have tried to do so and have had a bit of success in debates with atheists but it really hasn't been successful in bringing people to Christ.

On the other hand, I don't know that evidentialism has fared any better. I always hear of debates between atheists and believers and in each case, each side claims to have won. I don't hear much in the way of people changing their minds one way or another. It seems that both sides usually grow more hardened in their own positions through these debates.

Dr. Frank James once told us that the philosophical proofs for the existence of God have been almost universally rejected by non-believers and almost universally embraced by believers. These are persuasive to believers as confirmations of their faith, but they haven't been all that successful in bringing unbelievers to Christ.

In that vein, its worthwhile to consider the value of apologetics. Apologetics have value to believers in strengthening their faith. Furthermore, they have value in shutting the mouths of the obstreperous. But they aren't particularly persuasive in moving an unbeliever to faith. Also, I am reminded of the words of Will Willimon who said that apologetics always fail because they take unbelieving thought too seriously.

A couple of years ago I met Henry Krabbendam from Covenant College and he has been working on some new approaches to apologetics that go beyond presuppositionalism and evidentialism. I'll try to dig up some of his material and post it at another time. But, I do recall one comment he made to me to the effect that there is no intellectual objection to Christianity that a conversion won't cure. He is ultimately affirming the power of the gospel to convert. As far as apologetics pave the way for the gospel, they may have some value, but it's helpful to keep in mind that it is the power of the Holy Spirit working through the proclamation of the gospel that is ultimately persuasive and powerful to convert.