Presuppositional Apologetics: Stated and Defended by Greg L. Bahnsen

Author:Greg L. Bahnsen
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3
Tags: apologetics
ISBN: 9780915815555
Publisher: American Vision, Incorporated
Published: 2008-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

CONSISTENT PRESUPPOSITIONALISM.

the problem of materialistic epistemology, Clark holds that, despite the

need to reconstruct some points, Collingwood could perhaps have the

final theme that can save history.29 In all this Clark has not made the

truth of Scripture an absolute and necessary presupposition, a genuine

transcendental of meaningfulness for all science, history, etc.

Indeed, by contrast, one could easily be led to believe that logic per

se is his transcendental rather than Scripture. Instead of the attempt to

be independent of God's Word, "the denial of the law of contradiction,

or even the failure to establish it as a universal truth, was the downfall

of secular philosophy."30 For the absolute presuppositionalist, God and

His revelation guarantee the possibility of epistemological fruitfulness,

for He who is the truth has deigned to give us a revelation of knowledge.

Clark, on the other hand, concludes his chapter on epistemology in A

Christian View of Men and Things by saying that it "has tried to show by an

application of the law of contradiction—a law that is not merely formal

but is itself an integral part of the system of truth—that truth exists and

that knowledge is possible."31 The impression that the truth of Scrip-

ture is not the grounding for logic, but that the law of contradiction is

methodologically more primitive than Scripture for Clark, is apparently

confirmed when he says,

Just how it could be possible to formulate reasons prior to

any logic remains unexplained. It seems evident to me

that any set of reasons or any argument for creation ought

to make use of and therefore presuppose logic.32

The issue here is not whether, de facto, one makes instrumental use of

the law of contradiction in all his thinking (that is readily granted), but

whether, in principium, logic or the truth of Scripture is your absolute

presupposition. Clark's comment either makes an illegitimate separation

of epistemology from metaphysics or posits logic as prior to the presup-

position of Scripture. (Both errors will be treated infra)

29. Clark, Historiography: Secular and Religious, 214, 220.

30. Clark, "The Axiom of Revelation (Wheaton Lecture II)," The Philosophy of

Gordon H. Clark, ed. R. H. Nash, 64.

31. Clark, A Christian View of Men and Things, 323.

32. Clark, "Reply to Gilbert B. Weaver," The Philosophy of Gordon H. Clark, ed. R.

H. Nash, 460.

144

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