tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post3536873982859754916..comments2024-03-15T17:06:31.642-05:00Comments on The Piety That Lies Between: A Progressive Christian Perspective: Authority Without Inerrancy? Part II: The Argument from Eroding TrustEric Reitanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06135739290199272992noreply@blogger.comBlogger22125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-11343354453094917722012-10-13T11:43:32.577-05:002012-10-13T11:43:32.577-05:00From UnEz
I so deeply appreciate Dr. Reitan's...From UnEz<br /><br />I so deeply appreciate Dr. Reitan's contribution to discussions of inerrancy and the scholarly and gracious responses to this important debate. I come so late to this argument that my contribution probably may not be seen. I admit a lack of sophistication in philosopy of religion and a certain trepidation in questioning inerrancy. Nonetheless, one of my concerns is that arguments for inerrancy appear to assume inerrancy before defending or asserting inerrancy. If important arguments for inerrancy are indeed circular in this way, then another basis for recommending inerrancy has to be offered.<br /><br />It seems then that inerrancy is a belief that parallels other beliefs, such as belief in the trinity. The belief can be offered as providing coherence to the Christian faith but cannot ultimately be proved, without invoking a supernatural origin. In other words, the bible can only be inerrant because it was divinely transmitted by God, and final confirmation for inerrancy cannot be settled by argumentation or through scriptural proof texts. Inerrancy can only be settled through some a supernatural event or miracle, which the inerrantists must also posit as the origin of scripture (miraculous inspiration of writers).<br /><br />Certainly, I may be completely off-track but if inerrancy can only be offered at the level of doctrine, then argumentation and questioning of inerrancy is legitimate. If any doubt about inerrancy constitutes heresy then to me the narrow path could become treacherous to the point of being impassable. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-56054487333087532642009-06-13T11:41:20.925-05:002009-06-13T11:41:20.925-05:00Unfortunately, the introspective faculty sucks, to...Unfortunately, the introspective faculty sucks, to put it bluntly. What Descartes was doing was experiencing thought and logically deducing that by its existence it showed that he existed in some sense as well. The content of the introspection made no difference whatsoever- he could have been convinced that we was an unthinking blob of slime, or a bird.<br /><br />If we have learned anything, we have learned that while the experience of introspection is powerful and immediate, its contents are typically narcissistic and imaginary. Not that that is bad thing- it just is not veridical. Ditto for the Bible (and sensus divinitatus) which is simply introspective and narcissistic (and gloriously patriarchal) imagery writ large. Indeed, its correspondence to your own introspective experience (“Yes, yes. That’s it! That’s what I’ve been sensing!”) is the surest tip-off that it is not describing an "other" world of so-called reality, but our communal world of human interiority and imagination, shared by virtue of common ancestry and upbringing- narcissism defined, in short.<br /><br />Conversely, the trust we put in our outer-directed senses can be calibrated, not only by agreement with others, as you rightly deride, but by agreement with that reality itself, by way of logical deductions about internal consistency- both in terms of the whole, as you say, but also in terms of small deviations and critical exceptions. If we see a flower, then we smell it, then we feel it, taste it, and then we run it through a lab apparatus, etc.. all these corroborating senses, based in turn on more basic calibrations of our senses through development, indicate that this flower and world we live in is at least self-consistent. And this is the most we can expect of our world, or the superb Matrix-like facsimile which would be its equivalent, introspection or no introspection.Burkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11158223475895530397noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-32266904560309379762009-05-29T14:55:16.287-05:002009-05-29T14:55:16.287-05:00To be fair, you're right, I never explicitly asked...To be fair, you're right, I never explicitly asked that question, and I made undo assumptions about your answers to that question. Also to be fair, your answers to it are pretty much the answers I assumed you'd give, though it's quite possible I didn't clearly express them. The point is this (and thanks Dr. Reitan for *hopefully* clearing the water a bit) you assume certain things. These assumptions have implications. One of the implications is a fact about morality that most people find intuitively repulsive. You recognize that fact and give reasons why you think the idea is both not repulsive and in fact the only possible answer to the questions of morality at hand. Cool. I get it, I just think it's silly. Pretty much as you think materialism is silly.<br /><br />I fear our discussion here isn't doing anything to help either of us or anyone else who might be paying attention think through these issues. I suspect we have essentially different goals for engaging in this process anyway, so it's probably a good moment for me to say my last. Enjoy your certainty, I sincerely hope it leads you well.cheeknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-83850583253973083752009-05-29T14:02:16.753-05:002009-05-29T14:02:16.753-05:00(Cont.)
-The main gist of my criticism is that whe...(Cont.)<br />-<I>The main gist of my criticism is that when I ask why you believe God is and is what you say he is, you offer evidence that I find unsatisfactory and circular.</I>-<br /><br />Well, to be fair, you didn't ask that exact question. I believe that <A HREF="http://rhoblogy.blogspot.com/2009/02/bahnsen-on-skeptics-worldview.html" REL="nofollow">b/c of the impossibility of the contrary</A>, since you ask here.<br />My response to what you've actually been saying is basically twofold:<br />1) God is the final and ultimate standard. What He says goes b/c His character and nature define what good and right objectively are.<br />2) The alternative is internally inconsistent and is without any foundation. ESPECIALLY materialism - it can't answer even the most basic of questions regarding why we should listen to what it has to offer. <br /><br /><br />-<I>I'll just point out that none of the criticisms I offer assume materialism or any other comprehensive worldview. </I>-<br /><br />Sure it does, come now. It assumes at least a naturalist worldview, b/c a supernaturalist worldview has to deal with the ramifications of the existence of higher beings, authority, expression, revelation, our relationship to them, etc. And if your worldview can't even answer these basic questions, why would any thinking person subscribe to it?<br /><br />Peace,<br />RhologyRhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-68926713924477324972009-05-29T14:01:56.278-05:002009-05-29T14:01:56.278-05:00Yes, precisely. It's the latter option.
But "Go...Yes, precisely. It's the latter option. <br />But "God's nature is good" is not an empty statement at all. Why would it be? I mean, if we're at the end of a long conversation on metaethics like we are here, "good" in this sentence means, as you said, "consistent with Himself". But we're also saying in this conversation that God's nature and character are the standard by which we can thus judge all other beings, actions, thoughts, etc. Without this standard, we have the infinite regress. If there's another standard, there is some major philosophical heavy lifting to be done, explaining how God could be good but also infinite but also subject to some other principle outside of Himself, and even better, explaining the origin and nature of that principle, how we can know anything about it, etc. <br />The thing is, the vast majority of talk about morality and ethics is NOT in the context we find here in this convo. Instead, we're constantly asking "Is this right or wrong and how can I know?" In these everyday cases, "God's nature is good and He has revealed Himself" is the best answer! So it's not useless at all; it informs every single decision one has to make. <br /><br />Dr Reitan said:<br />-<I>Now of course, the traditional theist is going to claim that the divine nature is necessarily, by virtue of what it is, opposed to such things as gratuitous baby torture. </I>-<br /><br />The ishy-squishy type, probably, b/c they haven't thought it thru. <A HREF="http://rhoblogy.blogspot.com/2008/07/abraham-and-isaac.html" REL="nofollow">But I have thought it thru.</A> My answer is slightly different, nuanced here, b/c most evanjellyfish types can't conceive that baby torture could possibly be wrong at all, and so call into the Euthyphro dilemma. But God could perhaps command baby torture (He won't, b/c He has revealed that He won't, but just hypothetically speaking) and it would be the right thing to do. Indeed, God has in many instances commanded things that have offended the sensibilities of people receiving the command and/or modern people, and their offense doesn't change the fact that doing what God says is objectively right and good and disobeying is objectively wrong and bad. <br />That's why I hold to the moral theory I do - precisely b/c it DOES solve those conundra that plague other moral theories. <br /><br /><br />cheek,<br /><br />-<I>possibly absurdly different (eg. bashing babies' skulls against the city walls, or, if that example is getting old, raping all vulnerable women).</I>-<br /><br /><A HREF="http://atheismisdead.blogspot.com/search/label/rape%20morals" REL="nofollow">He never commanded raping anybody</A>, but yes, see above. If the command were different, then there you go, it would be good. But it's not and will never be. <br />Contrast this with your own worldview on which NOTHING is good. Nor bad. There just is. So the bullet isn't ugly for you at all. you're just biting something, and that something could as well be a strawberry pie. <br /><br /><br />(cont.)-->Rhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-70753025153258816212009-05-29T13:15:15.999-05:002009-05-29T13:15:15.999-05:00Rhology and Cheek:
To some extent, at least, I th...Rhology and Cheek:<br /><br />To some extent, at least, I think you may be talking past each other here. Rhology's position sounds at first blush like a divine command theory of ethics, except that he doesn't ultimately root morality in divine decree alone since there is a reason why God decrees what He decrees--one that is rooted in the divine nature itself. <br /><br />And so what we have is a theory of morality that tries to escape the arbitrariness of "pure" divine command theory (according to which morality is just whatever God decrees, and God could decree anything at all since any limits on legitimate divine decrees would entail a moral standard outside of divine decree). The escape: make morality depend on the eternal and unchanging nature of God, rather than on God's decrees alone. God's decrees follow God's nature, which is what it is necessarily.<br /><br />This view of morality is piggy-backing on the cosmological argument, insofar as that argument holds that in order to end an infinite regress of causal explanations, one needs to posit a being that in some mysterious way explains itself--a being whose very nature somehow demands existence, a nature such that it could not have failed to exist. <br /><br />According to this version of the cosmological argument, the question, "But who made God?" reduces to the question, "But how did that which cannot have failed to exist come to exist?" The question misses the point and isn't really coherent. With respect to this argument, the question the critic needs to ask, instead, is whether there is any coherence to the idea of a nature which is such that it could not have failed to exist.<br /><br />But let us set that question aside and suppose that it is coherent. If this nature (call it the divine nature) exists necessarily, then this divine nature is eternal. Were we to suppose that only one nature is such that its existence is necessary (the Ontological Argument is often invoked in an attempt to establish this as well as the coherence of a necessarily existing nature), then it follows that the divine nature could not be other than it in fact is. And so we have something that eternally and necessarily possesses this nature and no other. <br /><br />If this divine nature is the ground of morality, then morality will be what it is necessarily. So far so good for Rhology's case (although I'm not sure how it translates into a case for BIBLICAL inerrancy! Much more argumentation needed...). But there are problems.<br /><br />In effect, we might ask the following (a variant on the Euthyphro Question): Is God's nature morally perfect because it measures up perfectly to an independent standard of goodness, of is God's nature THE standard of goodness by which all value is measured?<br /><br />It seems that for Rhology to make his case, he needs to go with the latter option. But the latter option is not without problems. If God's nature is THE standard by which all value is measured, then "God's nature is good" becomes a rather empty statement. When we say that God's nature is good, and that God is morally perfect, all we're saying is that God's nature measures up to God's nature. And this would be true even if it happened to be the case that the nature which exists necessarily were such that baby torture measured up to the standard it sets.<br /><br />Now of course, the traditional theist is going to claim that the divine nature is necessarily, by virtue of what it is, opposed to such things as gratuitous baby torture. And that may be so. But if THIS fact about the divine nature is offered as a reason to think that the divine nature is worthy of devotion, then we are immediately drifting over to the other side of the modified Euthyphro Question above--God's nature is meaningfully good by virtue of its perfect conformity to some independent standard of goodness.<br /><br />In any event, it isn't clear to me that this path is going to offer us a clear and decisive escape from the problems that beset other moral theories.Eric Reitanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06135739290199272992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-3577038381600148792009-05-29T13:13:01.279-05:002009-05-29T13:13:01.279-05:00"Again you mistake my position. Why are you doing ..."Again you mistake my position. Why are you doing this?"<br /><br />Sorry if you think I'm creating strawmen for the sake of demolishing them. That is certainly not my intent. I may have gotten your arguments wrong, but if I did, it was an honest mistake. Let me clarify a bit.<br /><br />While I'm sure that had I thought about it, I would have assumed you believed in an immutable deity, I don't think it's relevant to the argument I made. The presumed fact that God does not change does nothing to remove the problem of making the meaning of 'goodness' relative to God's desire. God doesn't change. Fine. If he were different (still unchanging, just with different unchanging desires), then on your theory of goodness, goodness would be different too, possibly absurdly different (eg. bashing babies' skulls against the city walls, or, if that example is getting old, raping all vulnerable women). That's my argument that you have to bite an ugly bullet. In fairness, all theories tend to need bullets somewhere along the conceptual pathway. Bullet-biting is not a logical fallacy, it just doesn't fit with general intuition. Most people think that raping women is always bad. If your theory implies that it might have been good or even obligatory, then you had better come with some big time evidence for why we should bite down anyway.<br /><br />"Ask "Why?" all you want. My position is self-justifying and has a satisfactory end - an overriding and self-existent standard that actually accounts for good and bad."<br /><br />Again, I'm sorry if I misrepresented your theory, but I honestly don't understand how claiming your position is "self-justifying" is anything other than question-begging. I mentioned the Biblical evidence because you gave Biblical evidence to support your argument that God is the final because. You quoted Hebrews. It was a secondary point, anyway. The main gist of my criticism is that when I ask why you believe God is and is what you say he is, you offer evidence that I find unsatisfactory and circular. "I believe because the Bible says so," or "I believe because there must be a primary cause." <br /><br />I'm serious about the materialism debate. I'm done, and you can feel free to declare yourself the "winner." If you think the fact I hold a set of beliefs that you find untenable is a good reason to disregard all arguments I make here, well, do what you need to do. I'll just point out that none of the criticisms I offer assume materialism or any other comprehensive worldview. In fact, to consider the arguments that you or others make, I typically assume the argument is correct and then look through it's implications.cheeknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-73503076813928390342009-05-29T12:31:53.052-05:002009-05-29T12:31:53.052-05:00Craig,
In my experience, Kant is always going to ...Craig,<br /><br />In my experience, Kant is always going to be relevant in discussions about epistemology. I'm not a Kant scholar, but I've wrestled with his ideas over the years, and I'd be happy to do so again in this context.Eric Reitanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06135739290199272992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-55280502847407690402009-05-29T12:08:33.248-05:002009-05-29T12:08:33.248-05:00cheek,
Remember what I said. Just ask one more "...cheek,<br /><br />Remember what I said. Just ask one more "Why?"<br />-<I>Most of them base the 'ought' that you lament in benefits to the community which in turn provides a benefit to the individual. </I>-<br /><br />"Benefit" is begging the question. You need to define it, not assume it.<br />Why is "benefiting" the "community" good and ought-ful/obligatory? <br />Who is the community? What % of the people? How do you judge between parties who want contradictory things? On what basis? Don't say "on the basis of benefit to the community", b/c that's not an answer; that's navel-gazing.<br />Besides, does "benefit" exist in the material? Of what elements is it composed? What is its atomic weight? How many moles is the average deposit? Where is it found? <br />You simply have not shown that you can answer these serious questions, so there's not much reason to put any weight to your thoughts here.<br /><br /><br />-<I>Now I'm pretty much done arguing about materialism with you.</I>-<br /><br />That's wise, but it doesn't do wonders for anyone's confidence in your intellectual honesty in discussions around here.<br /><br /><br />-<I>Your theory requires you to bite one huge bullet in relativizing 'goodness' to make it mean whatever God wants it to mean.</I>-<br /><br />Not at all. That's the very opposite of relativising. It means what God wants it to mean b/c God never changes and His character is the very definition of good. You need to make sure to deal with my actual position, not a strawman.<br /><br /><br />-<I>When I ask you why, you say because you can't or because the Bible says something that you think supports your case. </I>-<br /><br />Again you mistake my position. Why are you doing this?<br />Ask "Why?" all you want. My position is self-justifying and has a satisfactory end - an overriding and self-existent standard that actually accounts for good and bad. So, to every "why?" you eventually stop the buck. Otherwise, we'd be in an infinite regress like your position, and that means you have no answers.<br /><br /><br />Peace,<br />RhologyRhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-81927012599462559112009-05-29T12:01:20.358-05:002009-05-29T12:01:20.358-05:00There are plenty of physicalist and materialist co...There are plenty of physicalist and materialist conceptions of morality. Most of them base the 'ought' that you lament in benefits to the community which in turn provides a benefit to the individual. Now there are problems with these theories just as there are problems with pretty much all theories of justice. The fact that there are problems no one has solved yet does not mean solutions are impossible. What is a problem (most people would call it a fatal problem) for a theory of justice is if that theory fails to meet the demands of our most basic expectations for normative behavior. Your theory requires you to bite one huge bullet in relativizing 'goodness' to make it mean whatever God wants it to mean. Put succinctly, if 'goodness' is meaningful at all, it seems like it can't really apply to bashing in the skulls of infants. It may be that there is a God who mandates certain kinds of behavior, but that mandate can't make that behavior good. At most it seems to make it rationale in the sense that by doing it I avoid pissing off an omnipotent being.<br /><br />Now I'm pretty much done arguing about materialism with you. You're not interested in a careful investigation of the theory, I'm not particularly concerned with whether you believe it or not, and it's pretty far afield from the current debate.<br /><br />By the way, when I ask, "Why can't I ask one more why after God," it's not a particularly compelling answer to say, "God is the final because." You haven't given me a reason for believing that particular assumption of yours. If I do question it, then your theory falls apart. You criticize me and, inexplicably, Voltaire (I wasn't offering him as an authority on this issue. I just thought his caution was appropriate to the discussion. In retrospect, it was probably confusing to include the reference to him.) for failing to follow through with the next why, but then refuse to do the same yourself when it comes to God. When I ask you why, you say because you can't or because the Bible says something that you think supports your case. Just so you know, neither your opinion nor the Bible are final epistemic authorities for me. If your goal is to convince me, then you may want to switch tactics. (I've heard the sermon about scripture being a double-edged sword and swords cutting whether they're believed in or not. That may be right. Few people, though, have read or heard as much scripture preached as I have, and none of it has eviscerated me yet.) If your goal is to convince various onlookers, I'd say that while your goal is perhaps noble, few if any people ever abandon core beliefs because of discussions like these. Finally, if your goal is to convince yourself, well, isn't that a bit like whistling in the dark?cheeknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-22542937552385459342009-05-29T09:19:22.906-05:002009-05-29T09:19:22.906-05:00Dr Reitan,
After reflection, Ive decided that my...Dr Reitan, <br /><br />After reflection, Ive decided that my arguments need no further elaboration.<br /><br />I am curios though as to what Kant would say about your post. Im a big fan of Dinesh DSouza, and he seems to really like Kant. And from what little I know, it seems that Kant would be relevant to our discussion. If hes irrelevant just say so, theres no need to elaborate.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06269406662901556027noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-17002869798512584492009-05-29T07:33:01.833-05:002009-05-29T07:33:01.833-05:00Wrong, cheek. It resolves all the problems that y...Wrong, cheek. It resolves all the problems that your worldview has no answer to. <br />Where did you observe that smashing childrens' skulls is wrong? Of what material is wrongness made? What is its atomic number? Where does it grow? Is it found in strip mines in Colorado? <br />We don't have an infinite regress b/c it all stops with God. God is the final "Because". He is the final authority. "It is good b/c He said so" or "It must be b/c He said so" is not only the final answer available, it is also in and of itself a good answer. <br />Hebrews 6:13For when God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, saying, "I WILL SURELY BLESS YOU AND I WILL SURELY MULTIPLY YOU." <br /><br />Compare that with your joke of a worldview, where nothing is good, or bad. Everything just IS, and there is no way to derive an OUGHT from what IS. <br />So yes, if God said X, then to do not-X is wrong and sinful. And yes, we absolutely should imitate this behavior. Voltaire had a sharp pen, but at least on this issue (as well as on others), he was not the deepest of thinkers, as he never thought to ask one more "Why?" One who stops short of asking the best questions is hardly a freethinker.<br />Finally, "murder" has no meaning in your worldview, for murder means "unjustifiable killing of a human". Yet on materialism, there is no justification, for anything, b/c there is no OUGHT. Nor does "human" have any great significance outside of your question-begging humanistic assumptions, which show that you haven't thought the thing thru either.<br /><br />Peace,<br />RhologyRhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-10311309341850744932009-05-28T21:43:35.103-05:002009-05-28T21:43:35.103-05:00"[U]nless your moral foundation comes down to "God..."[U]nless your moral foundation comes down to "God said so, and He said so b/c His character is the very definition of good", it's very, very, distressingly easy to find the weak spot, the grand and empty assumption in the moral framework. And that is to ask just one more "Why?" So I too will be drawing that out in later comments."<br /><br />The problem with this particular line of reasoning is that there is no obvious reason why you can't ask one more why about God as well. If you think this infinite regress spells the end of morality, then morality is over no matter how many god machines you invent. It's the same as with creationists who demand to know what came before the big bang without realizing that it is just as easy to ask what came before the creator.<br /><br />Furthermore, even if this weren't the case, saying that good is good because God said so and because it is God's nature raises more problems than it solves. What if God's nature dictated that he smash the skulls of the children of a certain tribe against the city walls? Would this then be good? Should we imitate this behavior? Of course not. If there is morality, then it's safe to say that murdering babies is wrong. Any moral system (or book!) that suggests that it isn't is either deeply flawed or outright despicable. Voltaire said that he who can make you believe absurdities can also make you commit atrocities.cheeknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-38274052077618903422009-05-28T19:18:48.301-05:002009-05-28T19:18:48.301-05:00Dr Reitan, after reading (and reading) this post, ...Dr Reitan, after reading (and reading) this post, I think I finally understand what you mean by errant.<br /><br />I still disagree, and there are more comments to follow.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06269406662901556027noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-50914618941419442432009-05-27T13:56:15.260-05:002009-05-27T13:56:15.260-05:00Dr. Reitan - thanks for the reply. I look forward...Dr. Reitan - thanks for the reply. I look forward to the next post!C.P.O.https://www.blogger.com/profile/16880429004171251097noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-7102614492395474162009-05-27T13:31:29.577-05:002009-05-27T13:31:29.577-05:00That's well and good. Thing is, unless your moral...That's well and good. Thing is, unless your moral foundation comes down to "God said so, and He said so b/c His character is the very definition of good", it's very, very, distressingly easy to find the weak spot, the grand and empty assumption in the moral framework. And that is to ask just one more "Why?" So I too will be drawing that out in later comments.<br /><br />Peace,<br />RhologyRhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-8006770231476008692009-05-27T12:47:29.678-05:002009-05-27T12:47:29.678-05:00Rhology,
You raise an interesting question about ...Rhology,<br /><br />You raise an interesting question about the relationship between epistemic authority and moral authority. The two are interrelated, but I don't think the relationship is a simple one. When we ask about moral truth, and how we determine the truth about morality, we are asking an epistemological question. At the same time, issues about what are legitimate and illegitimate strategies in belief formation can be usefully construed as moral questions. And then there is the whole issue of whether morality is ultimately about submitting our will to some law giver that has a claim on obedience, or whether morality is better construed in a different way (for example, the Kantian model which holds that morality is about submitting our will to laws that we establish for ourselves through the right exercise of our reason). Which beliefs we should hold about the nature of morality may hinge upon epistemic questions pertaining to belief formation.<br /><br />These issues may come into clearer focus in later posts.Eric Reitanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06135739290199272992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-85890028423290044502009-05-27T12:47:03.453-05:002009-05-27T12:47:03.453-05:00Craig,
The view of biblical authority I gesture t...Craig,<br /><br />The view of biblical authority I gesture towards here doesn't make sense at all if the Bible is IDENTIFIED with God. The core question is precisely this (with a bit of oversimplification for the sake of highlighting the core point): Is the Bible the inerrant word of God, or is it an authoritative but fallible human testament TO God? <br /><br />The point of the Aristotle analogy is that construing the Bible as a fallible human testament does not entail that it's stripped of authority in every sense. No one claims that Aristotle is infallible or is anything but a human author--and yet Aristotle is an important authority of a certain kind for me and others.<br /><br />So, I'm not saying that God is merely a philosopher/ teacher/mentor. I'm saying that the BIBLE can be so construed--but only if it is NOT construed as the inerrant Word of God. The point is to show that even if the Bible is NOT construed in those terms, one might still treat the Bible as a kind of authority.<br /><br />C.P.O.,<br /><br />The issue you raise has been addressed in discussions on this blog, although I don't remember now precisely where. My understanding is essentially this: Passages such as 2 Timothy 3:16 and 2 Peter 1:20-21, both of which were intended by their authors to reference the Jewish Scriptures, need to be understood in the light of the historical struggles that were going on in the early Church. <br /><br />One of those struggles had to do with the relationship between the emerging Christian sect and Judaism, and by implication its Scriptures. There were those who thought the God in Jewish Scriptures was too tyrannical and cruel to be the same God of love revealed in Jesus, and so they wanted to distance themselves from these scriptures and from Judaism. Others insisted on continuity, and that Jesus was the fulfillment of prophesies found in these scriptures. <br /><br />Those who were in the latter camp often felt the need to insist on the divine origins of the Jewish scriptures in their letters...and since this latter camp won the theological debate, letters that (among other things) insisted on the divine origin of the Jewish scriptures made it into the canon.<br /><br />Of course, we cannot simply assume that these comments are correct since they made it into the canon, not without begging the inerrancy question. And even if we accept that "all scripture is God-breathed" and that "prophesy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit," we still need to ask, "What things are authentic scripture in this sense of being God-breathed? And how do we decide? What things are prophecy, in this sense of being motivated by the Holy Spirit rather than by human will? And how do we decide?"<br /><br />What I question is the practice of using the following assertion to decide: "If it happens to be contained in the inherited canon of writings within tradition X, then it is scripture/prophecy; if not, then not." To put it in the terms developed in this post, the truth of this assertion doesn't seem to be properly basic--it doesn't "just seem right to me" in something like the way that the beliefs generated by my sensory faculties just seem right. <br /><br />When I sift through the beliefs that DO "just seem right to me" in this way, and hence might arguably be properly basic, I can't derive this assertion from them. On the contrary, this body of evidence does more to support views about the nature of the Bible that are at odds with such an absolute identification between this particular collection of writings and what is "God-breathed" Scripture.<br /><br />What arises here is the question of hubris. I am basing my decision about whether to judge ALL the contents of the Bible to be "God-breathed" Scripture on the evidence available to me. But then, am I not making myself and my own faculties of judgment the ultimate authority in my life? And isn't this problematic for someone who wants to be a follower of God?<br /><br />This is the question I intend to take up in my next post.Eric Reitanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06135739290199272992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-64419608050163900632009-05-27T11:06:22.523-05:002009-05-27T11:06:22.523-05:00Dr Reitan said:
The kind of authority Aristotle w...Dr Reitan said:<br /><br />The kind of authority Aristotle wields is less potent in some ways, but far more intimate and meaningful. Aristotle is a mentor, a teacher, a wise guide on issues that really matter for how we live our lives—but, in some ways, he is also a deeply flawed one. He is, in short, a conversation partner with whom we can debate issues that touch on the very purpose and meaning of existence, and who will often lead us to see things we never would have noticed on our own. He is the kind of authority that the best philosophy teachers aspire to be in the classroom—not tyrants who shut down original thinking, but wise guides who helps students uncover insights they wouldn’t have otherwise had, and who are open to learning from their students in turn.<br /><br />Can the Bible be, for Christians, that kind of authority? Not only do I think it can, but I think that is precisely the way that received scriptures were treated for much of the history of Judaism and Christianity<br /><br />I say:<br /><br />Dr Reitan, <br />I am truly confused. Surely you dont mean that there are things that God has never thought of. And surely you dont mean that God can learn from us. And certainly you didnt intend to say that they Bible is incomplete and it is up to us to fill in the blanks. <br /><br />But I am concerned that you did intend to say that God is merely a philosopher/teacher/mentor. <br /><br />Enlighten me, please.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06269406662901556027noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-68424504835187723102009-05-26T21:23:41.828-05:002009-05-26T21:23:41.828-05:00Dr Reitan,
God is not a tyrant, but God is sovere...Dr Reitan,<br /><br />God is not a tyrant, but God is sovereign. <br /><br />God is at war with Satan (Eph 6:11-12). <br /><br />Phil 2:13 says For it is God who works in you, both to will and to act according to His good purpose.<br /><br />1) God has a purpose.<br /><br />2) His purpose is good.<br /><br />3) He uses us to accomplish His purpose.<br /><br />He has a right to organize circumstances in our lives to accomplish His purpose.<br /><br />Now, Im going to employ a sports metaphor. God is the coach. We are players. When the coach calls a play, it hardly makes sense for a receiver to ignore the coaches instructions and run the route that he would prefer. And if he does the coach will not just stand on the sideline and demand the player obey. Instead, if a player disobeys, the coach will put him on the bench and use someone else. <br /><br />And in this war, God is the only one who sees the entire battlefield. It only makes sense to obey God unquestioningly because a wrong maneuver could send us into the teeth of an enemy tank battalion. <br /><br />And if God is infallible, there would never be the need to question His commands. IOW if the coach always calls the perfect play in every situation, the players will never doubt him.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06269406662901556027noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-60232462154860868312009-05-26T17:21:45.743-05:002009-05-26T17:21:45.743-05:00CPO, are you sure you want to be asking Dr Reitan ...CPO, are you sure you want to be asking Dr Reitan that question? I don't think it's a challenge to his own position. Wouldn't it be better to pose the question to an inerrantist?<br /><br /><br />Dr Reitan,<br /><br />I too read the post thru. I also read most of your book, just FYI.<br />There are some serious problems with the reasoning you've employed here, as far as the post goes, but that's not really been the point of my questions directed to you in these recent times. You spent, istm, the entire post discussing epistemology, but the challenges I've been raising relate mostly to moral authority, meta-ethics. And questions of epistemology inevitably boil down in a major part to such questions anyway, since one must answer the question: Now that I think I know what is true, why SHOULD I believe it? What obligation do I have to believe what is true?<br /><br />So, I don't see any answer to my questions here, not yet.<br /><br />Peace,<br />RhologyRhologyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14245825667079220242noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6215077578479252542.post-65757693261319713342009-05-26T15:18:26.857-05:002009-05-26T15:18:26.857-05:00Well, that is quite a substantial post, and I made...Well, that is quite a substantial post, and I made it through to the end. One of the issues that came up for me is how you would deal with the inevitable questions regarding NT scriptures that make claims about the Hebrew scriptures, and what that means for scriptural authority (i.e. 2 Tim. 3:16 "all scripture is God-breathed...", and 2 Peter 1:20-21, etc.), and how this relates to your Aristotle example. Maybe you are getting to this in the hubris post. But some would claim that the Bible itself makes [circular] arguments about its own authority. What would you say to those people?C.P.O.https://www.blogger.com/profile/16880429004171251097noreply@blogger.com