Apologetics Questions (From book, notes, and others) Flashcards
How does Van Til define apologetics?
Apologetics is the vindication of the Christian philosophy of life against the various forms of the non-Christian philosophy of life.
What does Van Til believe about neutrality?
There is no neutrality. Cannot prove the gospel simply by appealing to evidence or logical demonstration
Why is Van Tillian apologetics called presuppositionism?
Unless one supposes God, it is impossible to make intelligible predications
What is the sense of deity?
All men are in contact by God’s revelation. Creation in the Imago Dei, and the creation itself. Self-consciousness presupposed God-consciousness
What is antithesis?
The covenantal and ethical chasm between believers and unbelievers.
Why covenantal (presuppositional apologetics)?
Must proceed on the basis of reality and not the basis of illusion. Not what opponents assume is appropriate, as other approaches typically do
What passage is essential for Reformed apologetics?
Romans 1:18-23, as all men know God exists (not just “a God”)
How can man be said to be irrational?
We sinfully and deceptively convince ourselves that what is actually true about the world is not true….
Where should apologetics begin?
With the Triune God, because any defense without the Triune God is a defense of a false theism.
Where do we find in Scripture that all people know the true God, yet suppress this knowledge?
Romans 1:18-20, as it says that all people know God
Argument for the Resurrection
- Jesus was a historical person
- Tomb empty after 3 days
- Best explanation is that he was raised from the dead.
Innerancy
As coming from God, the Bible is inerrant.
- “Inerrant in all its real affirmations”
How do we know that the Bible is reliable?
- Ultimately, we know from the witness of the Holy Spirit in the Scriptures
- Manuscript evidence
- Early writings
- Quotations of Church Fathers, etc….
What is Classical Apologetics?
Emphasizes the use of logical criteria.
- Starts using logical proofs for theism and then moves to Scripture afterwards
- Aquinas is seen as the foundational person in this apologetic method
- Reason is a more neutral ground on which to start.
- Faith and logic. Conclusions that follow from certain premises.
- The Ontological argument from Anselm or Aquinas Unmoved Mover Argument
- Aimed with showing why the faith is reasonable.
- Unbeliever made in the image of God and shares in that world with beleivers.
What is the Ontological Argument for the existence of God?
- God is being greater than nothing that can be conceived
- God exists as an idea in the mind
- A being existing in reality greater than what we can conceive in the mind
Get more….
- Aquinas
Unmoved Mover Argument for the Existence of God
- Unchanged Changer 2. Effects must have a beginning 3. God is self-caused 4. God cause of all things.
Evidential Apologetics
Seeks to ground the Christian faith primarily on empirically and historically verifiable facts
- Argue that high degree of probability based upon the facts. Use the evidence of creation, inspiration, and divine identity of Christ
- Proponents: Joseph Butler is the pioneer. Most recent is John Warwick Montgomery
What is Fideism?
Faith as something private and internalist, not about externals. Subjective and about feeling
- Proponents: Kierkegaard and Lutheran Pietism, Neo Orthodox
The Problem of Evil
The problem of evil is something that can only really be discussed by theists, as other accounts for evil’s existence tend to downplay it. Problem of evil assumes God’s existence
What is Privation?
The idea that evil, strictly speaking, does not exists. Only God exists. Many Reformed went this route
What are Thomas’s five ways to demonstrate God’s existence?
- From motion
- From cause/ effect
- From contingency/necessity
- From gradations of being
- From design
What is the Ontological Argument for God’s existence?
The ontological argument reasons from the idea of God as the greatest, most perfect, or necessary being to the existence of that God.
- First formulated by Anselm of Canterbury
What is the cosmological argument?
Reasons from the existence of the world to the existence of God
- Made most popular by Aquinas, though William Lane Craig is a very prominent voice in this more recently
What is the teleological argument?
Reasons from the evidence of design in the world to the existence of God as the one who created things with a specific purpose or goal
What is the moral argument?
Reasons from the objectivity and absolute character of moral judgments to the existence of a transcendent God as the ground of morality.
How do evidentialist usually argue from creation to God?
They rework the teological argument, usually saying that the factors had to be just right for their to be existence. This is evidence for God
Is there a place for evidence in apologetics?
Evidences are valid, yet should not be left to the interpretation of individuals who reason to serve their own desires. Should emphasize how God interprets these facts in Scripture
