Paul Distance Witness

Did Long Distance Make Paul’s Witness List Unfalsifiable?

By Evan Minton

In chapter 8 of my book Inference To The One True God, in my blog post “The Minimal Facts Case For Jesus’ Resurrection PART 1” and in my blog post “A Quick Case For Jesus’ Resurrection”, I make the case that we know many people had experiences of the risen Jesus appearing to them because the creed cited in 1 Corinthians 15 dates back so early, well within the lifetimes of the eyewitnesses (i.e it dates to 5 years after Jesus’ death), that anyone curious about whether or not Paul was telling the truth could have traveled over to Jerusalem and interviewed the people mentioned in the creed to see if they really did believe Jesus appeared to them. If Paul were lying about these people and they really hadn’t seen Jesus, the cat would have been out of the bag and the resurrection would have been exposed as a falsehood. Given how fragile a faux resurrection would be in this case, the best explanation is that the twelve disciples, James, and 500 people actually did have postmortem Jesus experiences.

On two different occasions, people have read my argument for the historicity of the postmortem appearances and have responded with the following rebuttal: “Paul is writing his letters to churches far removed in distance from where the events are said to have occurred. It would be highly unlikely anyone from his church in Corinth would travel to Israel and seek out these apparent witnesses.” The argument is that Jerusalem and Corinth were so far that it would have been very difficult for Paul’s readers to trek all the way over to Jerusalem in order to interview the people Paul was talking about. It was too inconvenient for them, so most probably never did it and never would have done it. So the they-could-have-checked-it-out argument fails. Is this true? Was Paul’s resurrection eyewitness list really protected from falsification due to large travel distance?

I don’t think this is a successful argument. There are 3 reasons why the resurrection claims could have been checked out.

1: The Corinthians Had An Invested Interest In Knowing If It Was True

 The reason why Paul was even mentioning the list of resurrection appearances in 1 Corinthians 15 is because  we see in the context of the passage that there were people denying that Christ had risen from the dead, implicitly at least, because they were denying the bodily resurrection in general. They were denying that anyone would rise from the dead. Paul said if the dead are not raised then Christ isn’t raised either if Christ isn’t raised, our faith is useless and our sins remain unatoned for (1 Corinthians 15:12-14), but fortunately, Christ has been raised (verse 20). Paul argued for this by listing the various postmortem appearances of Christ in verses 3-8 via the creed he had received earlier. Now, given that the Corinthians were skeptical of the resurrection, wouldn’t they have an invested interest in knowing whether Paul was telling the truth? Of course! And given that they had an invested interest if they didn’t take Paul at his word, wouldn’t they have traveled to Jerusalem to talk to the people mentioned in the creed even if it was a rather long journey? While it might have indeed taken them a while to get there, it wasn’t impossible for them to arrive in Jerusalem. It’s not like they were traveling to New York or anything. It was certainly feasible for them to go to Jerusalem to interview the witnesses in the creed even if it wasn’t a hop, skip, and a jump from their church.

And given that this was a topic of immense interest to them, it would be difficult to argue that they wouldn’t have. Besides, we know that Paul traveled to Jerusalem to Corinth. Why wouldn’t the Corinthians travel from Corinth to Jerusalem?

2: The Resurrection Occurred During Festival Time

Moreover, the resurrection was during a festival time. The witnesses would have been from all over the place, seen the appearances, and gone back home. It’s very likely some of the 500 that Jesus appeared to were from the city of Corinth. It very well could have been the case that there were some Jewish eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Christ living in the very midst of Paul’s readers. In that case, the Corinthian resurrection doubters wouldn’t have had to travel very far at all. There were likely witnesses in their own backyard.

It was certainly the case that those reading Corinthians included Jews who may have traveled to Jerusalem for Passover. This would provide an opportunity to verify Paul’s assertion.

3: Mail From Snails 

 It is also the case that even if no one physically visited the twelve disciples and James, that they could have gotten verification via correspondence, i.e snail mail. The Corinthian resurrection doubters could have written letters to the disciples asking them “Hey yo, Pete mah BOIII! It’s ya boi Zechariah from Corinth. My homie Paul sent me a letter saying Jesus appeared to you after He died. This true, bro?” (first-century folks totally talked like this). And Peter, John, or whichever of the eyewitnesses received the letter, could have sent a reply saying either “He is risen! He is risen indeed!” or “What? Who told you this? I haven’t seen Jesus sent they crucified him.”

Conclusion 

 Given these 3 reasons, I think it is still the case that having the 1 Corinthians 15 creed dating within the lives of all the eyewitnesses provides good grounds for concluding that these postmortem sightings occurred. If they didn’t, the eyewitnesses could have talked to these people themselves, by either journeying over to Jerusalem despite it being a long journey, because they had a highly invested interest in knowing whether they occurred. Or they could have had postmortem witnesses in their own midst that they could have talked to, or they could have at least gotten verification or falsification via correspondence. Any of these scenarios would have either falsified the resurrection if it didn’t occur or vindicate it if it did occur.

 Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2s3304I

/by
God Eutyphro Dilemma

God’s Love & the Euthyphro Dilemma

By Tim Stratton
Question

Dear Tim,In your article The Omnibenevolence of God you pointed out that on the Islamic view, Allah is quite similar to some Calvinistic views of God. Regarding this view, you said: “God is not all-loving, and whatever Allah does is simply called “good,” even if it is really hateful.”

I agree with you, but an atheist recently objected to your statement with the following:

This sounds like the Christian view point too. If God is the standard of ‘good’ then whatever God does is by definition good. By that argument then hatefulness would by definition be ‘good’. What makes benevolence inherently ‘good’ if you’re getting the standard of ‘good’ from God? By that argument, if God is benevolent then benevolence is good, but if it turns out God is hateful then one has to call ‘hatefulness’ good rather than benevolence. Unless you’re saying that benevolence is inherently good, apart from God, and therefore benevolence is a necessary trait of an ‘all-good’ God. But that would mean God has these traits because he is good, and their goodness stands apart from his possession of them – they’d be good irrespective even of God’s existence.

He went on to claim that the ‘zombie argument’ dismissing the Euthryphro dilemma (I think referring to the article written by Timothy Fox) fails and thus the Euthyphro dilemma “isn’t actually so dead after all.” How would you respond to this atheist’s argument?

– Melissa

Tim’s Response

This is a good question and one that I have been considering for a while. Thank you for sending it my way, Melissa. I believe the atheist’s objection might be a problem for Calvinists to deal with (Check out Sakr’s “Calvinism and Euthyphro’s Horns”); however, the article I wrote was based on a Molinist perspective. The atheist failed to grasp this distinction and seems to conflate Christianity with Calvinism — a move I adamantly oppose! His response, unfortunately, missed the main point of the entire article, and thus, goes on to attack a straw man. This can be seen when we first understand what God is like.

God’s Nature is LOVE

The main thing to consider is that God’s nature is perfectly loving, just as He is perfectly powerful and perfectly knowledgeable. One is free to assert that these properties are not “good” (call these whatever you would like); however, if God does possess love for all people, then my argument stands.

Not only does the Bible specifically say that “God is love” (1 John 4:8), but the fact that God loves all persons is implied in verses such as John 3:16, 1 Timothy 2:4, and 2 Peter 3:9. Moreover, if Jesus’ commands reflect the nature of God, then it is rational to infer that God loves all people (even those who consider God to be an enemy). It would be quite odd for God to command humans to love all people (from our neighbors to our enemies) if God Himself did not possess this love for all people. In fact, this perfect love is specifically referred to in Matthew 5:48:

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Jesus even provides the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37) to demonstrate the love we ought to have for those who despise us. Jesus makes it clear that we ought to go out of our way — even if it inconveniences us — to make it possible for even our enemies to thrive and flourish. Scripture is replete with data affirming the perfect love of God. In fact, I have argued that we can infer God’s universal love and desire for all to be saved from the first book of the Bible. With this in mind, the main thing to grasp is that God is omni-loving! That is to say, God genuinely loves ALL people!

This raises another question…

What is love?

Besides the title of a catchy 90s pop song the Bible is clear what love is in 1 Corinthians 13:

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. . .

The Bible goes on to clarify what maximal love is willing to do in John 15:

13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

The Bible reveals that God loves all people and that all people are called to love all people too. In fact, we can surmise that this is the objective purpose of human existence given Christ’s greatest two commands! Consider Matthew 5:44; 22:37-39:

1- Love God first!
2- Everybody love everybody (from your neighbors to your enemies)!

Moreover, the Bible seems to describe genuine love as desiring the best for another person even if it comes at a cost to the one who loves the other person. Not only is this biblical — it is self-evident and intuitively obvious! With this in mind, we can summarize love as a genuine desire for the best of another person and a willingness to self-sacrifice (even one’s own life if need-be) to ensure this other person can flourish by achieving the best possible life.

It is important to note that my “omnibenevolent article” referenced in the objection was written primarily with certain Calvinistic theologians in mind, like Arthur Pink and Matt Slick, who deny that God loves and desires the best for all people. The objection above, however, is written from an atheistic perspective hoping that the Moral Argument for the existence of God will fall prey to one of the horns of the Euthyphro dilemma. Be that as it may, my point is immune to this objection as it stands strong by merely pointing out that God is essentially loving and is ALL-loving. One is free to argue that loving people is not a “good” thing or not. However, even if it is not good to love (as crazy as that sounds), the point remains: God loves all people — His nature is love!

Now that we have an understanding of God’s loving nature, and we know what love is, now we can contemplate the meaning of life.

The Objective Purpose of the Human Existence

Your life has objective meaning! You might not know this yet, or perhaps you subjectively disagree, but this changes nothing. The fact of the matter remains that God created humanity on purpose and for the specific purpose to know, love, and enjoy a relationship with Him and all people for eternity. This is why you exist. This is the objective purpose for which we were all created.

God created a world filled with creatures who can enjoy a true love relationship with Him (which is the ultimate eternal flourishing). This is the objective purpose of human life — to love and be loved by God and all people for eternity. It is vital to grasp this truth: God created each and every one of us on purpose and for the specific purpose to be in a full-flourishing/true-love relationship with Him for eternity.

If God desires to create a world in which true love can be attained, He must provide His creatures with genuine freedom (libertarian free will) so that it is possible for humanity to experience genuine love relationships with God and others. With this freedom in mind, humans are free to approximate to the objective purpose of life — LOVE — or not.

To help understand why God’s goal in creating humanity grounds objective purpose, consider the following argument:

1. If a truth corresponds to reality, it is objectively true [apart from human opinion].
2. If God created humanity for a purpose, then this purpose is a truth that corresponds to reality.
3. Therefore, if God created humanity for a purpose, then this purpose is objectively true.
4. God created humanity (on purpose and) for a purpose.
5. Therefore, God’s purpose for creating humanity is objectively true (apart from human opinion).

For a more detailed argument click here.

What is “Good”?

Once we grasp the objective purpose of human existence we can understand what it means for humans to be “good.” When we approximate to our objective purpose (which is true apart from human opinion) it is objectively “good.” To a degree that a thing approximates to its objective purpose, to that same degree it is “good.” To a degree that something misses the mark (the goal) of its objective purpose to that same degree it is sinful (“bad”). That is to say, something is objectively good when it helps to achieve or corresponds to the objective purpose of its existence.

Since God by His nature is love (even if love is not a “good”), He created a world where genuine love is possibly attained. God created humanity on purpose and for the specific purpose to love Him and to be loved by Him (and all people) perfectly into the eternal future. This also leads to ultimate and eternal human flourishing. One is free to call eternal human flourishing “good,” “shmigood,” or whatever they would like.

To do anything other than love all persons (from each person of the Trinity to all humans) is to miss the mark (sin). Since free will is required for love, and if free will is really free (and not some word game), it follows that one can freely choose to approximate to the objective purpose of his or her existence (what we call “good”) — or not.

Conclusion

God is all-loving by nature. It is irrelevant if one wants to argue if love is “good” or “bad.” I am not making a case that loving all people is “good” or “bad” so my case simply avoids Euthyphro’s horns. I am simply pointing out the way things are (the definition of reality). God is love!

God is “good” in the sense that He always freely acts consistently with His perfectly loving plan for humanity. God also sets the standard that we humans strive for as “the goal.” Humans are “good” when we freely choose to approximate to the objective purpose in which we were created. We are “bad” or morally sinful when we freely choose to “miss the mark” or fail to miss the goal we were created to attain.

The choice is up to you!

Stay reasonable (Philippians 4:5),

Tim Stratton

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2snBRXz

/by
Skeptic God Evil

Skeptics Can’t Have It Both Ways

By

Former L.A. County District Attorney and agnostic Vince Bugliosi believes that the problem of evil is fatal to believing in Christianity.

“I’m an agnostic only on the issue of whether there is a God, a supernatural being who created the universe. I’m not an agnostic on the Christian God… while God can be all-powerful or all-good, he cannot be both, since these are irreconcilable virtues in a world overflowing with the bloody crops of evil. Even eliminating all the other supposed attributes of God, if he is all-powerful, and hence capable of preventing evil, for him to cause, or do nothing to stop, the unbelievable suffering and horror in this world immediately tells one that God cannot be all-good, as Christianity believes its God to be.” ¹

But then, in a later chapter in his book he mentions numerous parts of the Bible where God actually does something to put a stop to evil, and he is furiously outraged at Him for doing so. Ok, technically, he doesn’t say it that way. But he argues, as skeptics increasingly have in recent years,

“So Christians and Jews call God all-good and all-perfect, but when they get around to printing their bibles that describe his conduct, they describe someone who would make history’s greatest villains look like very pale imitations by comparison. Would even Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Mao Zedong, Pol Pot, Osama bin Laden, or Tomas de Torquemada do the things the God of Jewish and Christian scriptures did?” ²

Of course, he is referring here to events like The Flood and the destruction of Jericho, among others.

But let’s think about this a moment. What if God hadn’t sent the flood? No doubt, Bugliosi and other skeptics would cry out something like this –

“God created humans, and within a short time, the earth was filled with violence. Violence, violence everywhere! And where was God in all this? Why didn’t he do something about it?”

And if God hadn’t wiped out Jericho and other cities and kingdoms around Israel, we’d no doubt here the complaint that –

“The Caananites were sacrificing children to their gods generation after generation. It had gone on for 400 years at one point, but God just let it continue! How can God be considered all-loving and all-powerful at the same time?”

One might object that God has no right to take the life of innocent children who haven’t done anything wrong, as scripture records God doing in these cases. But what about the possibility that the children of the flood and of Jericho could easily have gone on to be as savage as their parents? I wonder what Bugliosi would say if Adolf Hitler had died in a house fire in Austria in 1890, when he was 1 years old. Probably something like this –

“An innocent baby named Adolf Hitler, who had done nothing wrong, nothing at all, was allowed by this supposedly merciful God to die in a fire. Why didn’t God stop it? Couldn’t He have easily stopped it with an impromptu rain shower?”

We have no way of knowing if a particular baby would have grown up to be a mass murderer or worse. But perhaps if Bugliosi was God, he would have let the child grow old enough until it had actually done something wrong, was no longer innocent, and then taken its life. But then, he’s just allowed evil to take place, and some skeptic would blast him because he could have stopped it. Oops!

But perhaps Bugliosi has a better idea on what to do with evil people. Instead of taking the life of those who will commit evil, perhaps he would keep them permanently suspended in a perpetual force field that keeps them from moving. But how long before this becomes sheer torture of boredom, if nothing else? How would Bugliosi respond to the skeptics who would no doubt complain that this is cruel and unusual punishment?

When all is said and done, God is merciful and has decided to withhold His wrath in many cases precisely because He isn’t the cruel, uncompassionate monster skeptics thinks He is. Yet, His goodness means that He won’t withhold it forever, and He does choose to intervene – even if skeptics call him a monster for doing so.

¹ Bugliosi, Vincent. Divinity of Doubt, pp. 25-26

² Bugliosi, Vincent. Divinity of Doubt, pp. 156

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2qt3G3u

/by
Morality Meaning Hope

Does Scripture Ground Morality, Hope, and Meaning?

By Luke Nix  

Introduction

I saw this meme on social media the other day. It states “Scripture abandoned in the culture leads to relative morality, hopelessness, and meaninglessness.” It caught my attention because of how its author attempts to ground morality, hope, and meaning. Even though skeptics of Christianity do not have the correct worldview, they still have the ability to identify contradictions, unsound arguments, and false claims made by adherents of other worldviews (in virtue of their being created in the Image of God). If a defender of the Christian worldview attempts to ground morality, hope, and meaning in an invalid source and defend that incorrect grounding, a knowledgeable skeptic will be able to identify the faulty claim and use that as a reason to remain skeptical of the claims of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, this meme offers the incorrect grounding for morality, hope, and meaning. It is important that we understand how the grounding is incorrect, the implications of its being incorrect, and what the proper grounding is, so that we can be prepared to give a reason for the hope that we have when a skeptic challenges the claims of this meme.

Grounding Morality, Hope, and Meaning in Scripture Morality, hope, and meaning are important components of any religious worldview. They provide a worldview’s adherents an explanation for their existence and a framework by which to fulfill their purpose, according to that worldview. For any worldview adherent, these components come with deep, emotional connections that are difficult to overcome.

Almost every religious worldview has some kind of “holy writings” commonly called “scripture.” Christianity has the Bible; Islam has the Qu’ran, and Hinduism has the Vedas, just to name a few. All these “holy” books speak about morality, meaning, and hope (to some extent). But they all make conflicting claims about each of these, and adherents to each may make the claim that meaning, morality, and hope are all grounded in their “holy” book(s). So, adherents to each of these worldviews logically also make the claim that a culture that abandons their scripture (for another scripture, or nothing at all) is doomed to live with relative morality, hopelessness, and meaninglessness.

The Problems and Implications

For the defender of a worldview, appealing to an abandonment if their scripture is not believed and followed seems logical because they know that others seek these things as they do. But, if all the worldviews are making the same claim (that their scripture grounds morality, hope, and meaning), what is to keep a skeptic from going to one of the other worldviews to find the same type of claims that have content that seems more palatable (such as a different ethic or different way to heaven or nirvana)? What is the reason that a person should believe and follow any one particular scripture?

If the Christian is to claim that morality, hope, and meaning are grounded in the Bible, then our claims are on even ground (ontologically speaking) with all the other worldviews from the perspective of the skeptic. This appeal does provide a reason to not abandon the Bible, but it provides the same to not abandon the Qu’ran, Vedas, etc. From the perspective of the skeptic, since all these “holy” books make claims about morality, hope, and meaning, and none of them are grounding them outside their cultural/relative “holy” books, it appears as though these actually are relative. And, logically, if the appeal is dependent upon a warning to avoid what is real, then that is more reason for the skeptic to run the other direction (and they know it and often do).

Further, all writings must be interpreted by the reader; in order to find the correct interpretation of the writing, the reader must attempt to discover what the original author meant. If morality, hope, and meaning are grounded in the writing, then the grounding is also tied to the interpretation (whether right or wrong). So if we have a Christian who interprets the Bible incorrectly and they ground morality, hope, and meaning in the Bible, then they will naturally confuse their interpretation for providing the grounding for their (likely wrong views of) morality, hope, and meaning. This would make all three not just relative (changeable/different based upon the cultural “holy” book) but subjective (changeable/different based upon the individual who is interpreting that “holy” book). A conflation of the reader’s interpretation with the author’s intent leads to this extra level of potential problems with the meme.

The Proper Grounding and the Proper Role

Let’s look at the claim again. “Scripture abandoned in the culture leads to relative morality, hopelessness, and meaninglessness.” The reason the problems that I just described exist with this claim is because the claim simply is not true. Morality, hope, and meaning do not find their grounding in the Bible (or any other “holy” book, for that matter). That is not the claim of Christianity. The Christian claim is that these find their grounding in God. God is independent of cultures and interpretations, thus there is no way that morality, hope, and meaning are relative or subjective if Christianity is true.

Now, this affects the defense of the Christian worldview from two different directions. First, the defense of objective morality, hope, and meaning grounded in God (the biblical view) can take place by providing the evidence for the existence of the Christian God to relativists. This is presented by taking the claims of the various “holy” books of the world and putting them to the test against reality. Scientific evidences for God’s existence, and for the idenfication of the Creator as the Christian God, by necessary implication are then arguments for objective morality, hope, and meaning.

Second, for an atheist who holds to objective morality, hope, and meaning, they must find the grounding for those in something that is independent of cultures or individuals. The claim that these are grounded in the Bible does not satisfy that ontological requirement; however, the claim that these are grounded in God does. Then the fact that the atheist already recognizes the objective morality, hope, and meaning, by necessary implication becomes a logical reason for them to believe that God exists. And combined with the other arguments for God’s existence and the specific identification of that God as the Christian God, provides a powerful case for the truth of the Christian worldview.

A Necessary Clarification

The implication of my critique is that it is not the abandonment of the Bible that leads to relative morality, hopelessness, or meaninglessness. Rather it is the abandonment of the Christian God that leads to those things. But I must be clear that the abandonment of the Bible will put us at a great disadvantage to discover what is true about objective morality, hope, and meaning. While scientific and philosphical arguments may be presented to demonstrate that God does exist, that would only establish that these three also exist (and may point us in the general direction of the correct content); it would not necessarily say anything about what is right or wrong (morality), why we are here (meaning), or our hope (what is wrong with us and the solution). We do need the Bible to learn the content. But we do not need the Bible to ground the content. This is the difference between the philosphical categories of ontology (what is real) and epistemology (how do we know what is real). Misunderstanding this distinction is likely the reason for the claim of the meme. It is important that we recognize this distinction and not conflate the two categories; otherwise, we run the risk of making the same mistake as the author of the meme.

Conclusion

The claim in the meme that the Bible is the ground for morality, hope, and meaning cannot stand when placed side-by-side against the same claim of competing worldviews. Because of that, it actually works against the very intended purpose of the meme. By recognizing that morality, hope, and meaning are not grounded in the Bible but in the God of the Bible, all the negative implications can be avoided and a reason for the hope that we have can be provided and demonstrated.

To Further Investigate This Grounding, I Recommend:

Can Man Live Without God?– by Ravi Zacharias

Christian Ethics: Options and Issues– by Norman Geisler

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2r5rSpE

 

/by
Student Apologist Listener

How to Become a True Student and a Better Apologist

By Michael C. Sherrard

This is a bit exaggerated, but I’m not sure that anybody is actually interested in learning anything anymore. We live in a political and religious playground filled with thumbs in ears and shouts of “nah nah nah nah, I can’t hear you.” Most people are guilty of this. You are likely guilty of this. Of course the extreme examples are the “safe spaces” on college campuses and the slanderous biased media reporting. But there is also the simple thing that you do everyday: you don’t listen. Nobody listens. If you heard me, you know this is true.

Rather than listen, what do you (and everyone else) do when someone else is talking? You’re thinking about what to say next. This is true of conversations of agreement and disagreement. As a pastor and a teacher, I’m routinely amazed and frustrated by the inability of one to actually hear what I’m saying, be it a friend or a foe. Stop doing this. Listen. You don’t really know as much as you think you do, and you don’t actually know the position one holds until you hear it from them. Develop the discipline to hear, really hear what someone is saying. It is respectful, and it is prudent for only in actually understanding a position can you engage it.

Understand that when you stop listening you do so because you have assumed something, and living in a land of assumptions is dangerous. You have either assumed that you perfectly understand the position being talked about or that you perfectly understand the way someone holds the position. Both are likely not to be true. And this is quite arrogant. This kind of arrogance is the luxury of the expert, not the student. And I suppose that is the problem. Everyone today thinks they are an expert. But the true expert only became such because of their ability to be a true student.

True students understand the value of listening. Arrogant, simple minded folk think they are always to be the teacher. You know, that guy you sat next to in college. The one who thought he should be teaching the class and took every chance to do so. You know, Frank, who now works at Chili’s. That’s who I’m talking about. But I digress.

“When everyone thinks they are the teacher, no-one ever learns. And if that does not describe our world today, I don’t know what does.

What is needed in this highly charged political atmosphere is a bit of humility, humility expressed in the form of listening with the goal of understanding. Persuasion is still needed, but let persuasion come after understanding. If all commit to this, we will have truly safe spaces. They won’t be safe because of the absence of opposing viewpoints, but safe because of the presence of humility and respect and true learners. A world that freely discusses important issues and listens is a world where progress is possible and freedom reigns.

Those of you who seek defend the truth of the gospel will become a much better apologist if you learn how to listen. You will continue to grow in knowledge as you will learn how and why people hold their beliefs, not just what their beliefs are. People do not hold beliefs as nice and neat as your textbook. So embrace the mindset of a student and listen as much as you speak, and you will become more effective making the case for our reasonable faith.

Read “4 Ways to Become a Better Listener and a Better Apologist.“

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2r3YZx5

/by
Worldview Assertions Philosophy

The Difference Between What A View Asserts And Implies

By Luke Nix 

Introduction

In any discussion in which we are defending a particular view, we must present both a positive case and the negative case. The positive case shows the evidence for the view we are defending, while the negative case shows the problems with the alternative being presented. Both are necessary in the overall case. The negative case is necessary because the adherent of the other view needs a logical reason to abandon their view for an alternative. The positive case is necessary because if an adherent is provided a logical reason to abandon their view, the other view being presented may not be the only option. The way that a view is shown to be incorrect is that its claims are put to the test against reality and reason. If the claims are found to not reflect reality or they are not logical, then the view is false. However, the claims of a view can be of (at least) two different types that require a different approach. Today I want to discuss the differences in the assertions and the implications of a view or model. Understanding the differences will help us be more aware of how to properly address them in other views, and the understanding will also assist us in our formation and critique of our own views. This applies to worldviews, scientific models, philosophical theories, and really anything view that makes claims about reality, regardless of which area of reality it is.

Assertions are propositions that a view or model explicitly claims to be true. When we are talking about worldviews, a worldview’s assertions are the collection of propositions that it claims are true about reality. This collection is explicitly stated and defended by the adherents to the particular worldview that makes those claims.

When critiquing a worldview, it is important that we properly understand the assertions of that worldview. If we fail to understand the assertions correctly, then we run the risk of arguing against a misunderstanding of the worldview- a strawman. If we argue against a strawman, then we have not shown the worldview we are attempting to critique as having any issues. Thus our critique has not provided the adherent of that worldview a valid reason to reject it in favor of an alternative. Our critique simply does not apply to the debate at hand, and we sound like some crazy person who has decided to just start telling a story that has no applicability to the discussion at hand. Unless we are willing to take the time to properly understand what a worldview asserts, there is really no point in attempting to argue against it.

Some assertions are essential to the worldview, so if they are shown to be false, the entire worldview falls apart. While other assertions are not so essential to the worldview, and if they are shown to be false, they can either be adjusted or removed altogether. What gets really interesting and often causes great disagreements among adherent to the same worldview is that they do not always agree upon what is essential to the worldview and what is non-essential. For details on this, see my post “Zombies of Christianity.”

Testing the assertions of a worldview or model is a direct way to test for its ability to accurately describe reality (truthfulness). If one of the essential propositions is found to be false, then the whole worldview or model may be rejected and an alternative needs to be found. If an assertion that is non-essential is found to be false, the worldview or model simply needs to be adjusted to accommodate the new data; however, that adjustment must not violate (it must be logically consistent) with the rest of the worldview or model. Sometimes what seems to be a minor adjustment affects the whole worldview or model, but not necessarily to the point of changing the essentials. As long as the essential assertions are not compromised, the main worldview or model remains intact, just with some different details. For those who are committed to a basic worldview (such as mere Christianity), the discovery that they need to adjust the details of their theology, science, or another part of the worldview does not undermine the historic event of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, so there is no need to be afraid or even resistant to change the detailed assertions of our worldview when the evidence demonstrates a non-essential detail to be incorrect.

What Are Implications?

While attacking the assertions of a worldview or model is a more direct challenge, one can use a more indirect method that is just as powerful. Many critiques of worldviews or models come in the form of critiquing, not the assertions of the view but, the implications. Implications are the collection of propositions that the assertions of a view necessarily leads to when the logic is carried to its end (or just a few steps from the assertion). Implications are not explicitly claimed by the worldview or its adherents, and in some cases, certain implications are not even held by the adherents because the adherents have not worked the logic through to discover them.

Necessary implications can be discovered using the assertions of the view and deductive reasoning. Any sound conclusion that results yet is not explicitly claimed, is an implication of the view. Since implications are necessarily dependent upon the assertions, it is, once again, extremely important to ensure that we properly understand the assertions of a worldview before attempting to deduce its implications.

As I mentioned earlier, implications can be used to critique a worldview indirectly but just as conclusively as testing assertions. If a validly concluded implication is false, then that indicates that one of the premises in the deductive argument is false. If that premise is an assertion of a worldview, then that worldview has been demonstrated logically to be false (as it is currently held- both essentials and non-essentials included). If an adherent wishes to maintain that worldview consistently, the false assertion would either need to be adjusted, so as to not lead to the false implication, or it would need to be removed from the worldview altogether. Of course, this flexibility would only apply to assertions that are not essential. If the false premise is an essential assertion, then the worldview has been completely falsified, and even the basic worldview cannot be believed reasonably, only emotionally- against reason, logic, and evidence.

Now, as I mentioned, not all implications are held by adherents to different worldviews or models. So it is extremely important to understand what an adherent believes. They may very well agree that a particular implication is false, but they may insist that they are being consistent. This is usually an opportunity to get them to go into further details of their worldview or model. If they are correct that they are being consistent with rejecting the implication, then it is likely that there is another assertion (or collection of assertions) that place a nuance on the “false” premise that adjusts it to avoid the implication (see my post “Providing Alternative Explanations“). The newly discovered nuances of the view may also make the implication not one that is necessary but one that is optional, which, of course, the adherent would simply avoid. Now, clarification does not always undermine a false implication; the adherent may simply not understand the deductive argument, or they are more committed to the false assertion than they are committed against the implication- they may be actually willing to accept the implication as true, which would demonstrate that they are actually more committed to a view than committed to truth.

Conclusion

The differences in assertions and implications are important to analyzing and addressing both properly. In our own views, the understanding will help us identify where a view can be flexible to follow the evidence where it leads. This allows us to adjust our own views as necessary and allows us to be more reserved and pointed, where applicable, in our claims of showing an opposing view to be inaccurate (which helps keep discussions cordial and respectful). In my discussions with people about different views, I try to identify if what I’m arguing against is an assertion or an implication; simply saying something like “I know you may not hold to this particular claim, but if you allow me to show you how your view logically leads to it by necessity, you may be able to more clearly see why I reject that view and why I think you should also, based upon your rejection of it.” In the effort to be more careful thinkers, recognition of the distinction between assertions and implications will also help in our effort to be more persuasive presenters and defenders.

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2r59CLN

——————————

/by
Facebook Christian Parent

How Facebook Can Make You a Better Christian Parent

,

By

I’ve finally wrapped up my next book, taken a couple of weeks to recover, and am ready to get back to blogging! I have a lot to tell you about my new book, but it doesn’t come out until October, so I’ll wait a bit to share more about it.

As I worked against my writing deadline in the last few weeks, I spent a lot less time on Facebook. I just had too much to do to check in and engage as regularly as usual. But being away from it has been a good thing because it made me realize something a bit surprising:

Being on Facebook can make you a better Christian parent.

I know that’s not the conclusion of most who take social media breaks. Usually people step back for a while and then conclude their life is better without Facebook or Twitter distractions. And, to be sure, there are aspects of social media that can be tiring and soul-draining. If you’re at the point where you can’t possibly scroll past one more person talking about how blessed they are without wanting to punch your screen, you probably do need a break.

But for Christian parents who want to raise faithful kids in a secular world, Facebook can be an invaluable tool for gaining some much-needed perspective for the job.

The Generational Disconnect

In the last year, I’ve had the opportunity to speak at churches and conferences across the country about the importance of parents teaching kids apologetics, the biggest faith challenges parents should address with their kids (I walk through 5 of the 40 in Keeping Your Kids on God’s Side), practical ideas for teaching apologetics at home, and how to teach kids good critical thinking skills.

In my talks, I use quotes from atheist authors/bloggers, memes and snippets of online conversations with skeptics as examples of claims kids will encounter today. I regularly find that parents are surprised by what I present.

I often ask how many have heard the claim I’m addressing—for example, that the Bible is unreliable because it’s been copied so many times—and only a few hands go up.

Or I ask how many have heard of influential atheists/agnostics like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Bart Ehrman—and even fewer hands go up (if any).

Then, when I talk to parents after an event, a common thread of conversation is that the presentation was eye-opening because they haven’t had their own faith challenged in such ways.

Meanwhile, at least 60 percent of kids raised in Christian homes are walking away from Christianity by their early 20s, due in large part to the intellectual challenges to faith they encountered.

I think’s fair to say there’s an enormous disconnect between what kids and parents are exposed to today.

Being on Facebook is one way that Christian parents can gain better perspective. I say that for three key reasons.

1. Being on Facebook can expose you to views and conversations you may not hear elsewhere.

Last month, I shared an article on my personal Facebook page and simply said, “Here are some interesting statistics.” One Facebook friend—an acquaintance from high school—was so appalled that I held a different view on a hot issue that she commented, “You aren’t worthy of being in my Facebook news feed. Consider yourself unfriended. Goodbye.”

Within seconds, she was no longer in my friend list.

Just because we have different views.

Honestly, there are certain people I’m connected to on Facebook who post things that make me want to scream. But—and I mean this in all seriousness—for the sake of my kids, I don’t unfriend them. These Facebook friends and I couldn’t be more opposite in our worldviews, and that’s a good thing for me to experience.

I need to understand what they’re saying and why they believe what they do.

I need to see the arguments and articles they find compelling.

I need to read how they interact with others.

I need to know what they’re teaching their kids about the world, because those kids are going to be the adult peers of my kids someday.

Those whose online comments bother you most are those you can learn the most from. Don’t be tempted to unfriend them. Chances are, you’re not being challenged in the same ways by people you interact with in person.

And if you don’t have Facebook friends who post things you disagree with, that’s a sure sign you’ve built yourself a worldview silo. It’s time to expand your Facebook connections and start following pages that post things you disagree with.

2. Being on Facebook can give you a better understanding of “street-level” logic.

Parents are often intimidated by the idea of learning about and teaching their kids apologetics (how to make a case for and defend their faith). They think it involves reading a towering pile of academic books that would put a “normal” person into a coma of boredom. But it doesn’t need to be that way.

For intimidated parents, I often share the results of the Fixed Point Foundation’s study of college students who are members of Secular Student Alliances or Freethought Societies. These college groups are the atheist equivalents to Campus Crusade for Christ. They meet to fellowship, encourage each other, and even proselytize. In a nationwide study, researchers found that most of these students had had not chosen their beliefs from neutral positions, but rather in reaction to Christianity. When students were asked to cite key influences in their conversion to atheism—people, books, seminars, etc.—the responses overwhelmingly indicated their loss of faith was due to what they had read in website forums or videos they had watched on YouTube.

Just everyday stuff kids see online.

The kinds of stuff parents can easily see too—then proactively take the time to discuss with their kids—if they’re on social media and are using it effectively.

There’s certainly a time for book learning, but there’s no substitute for seeing the worldview battle firsthand.

3. Being on Facebook can give you a sense of Christian parenting urgency.

The change I noticed most in myself after being away from Facebook for a few weeks was the emotional complacency that started to set in. Of course, I was still intellectually aware of all the faith challenges in the world—after all, I wasn’t on Facebook because I was writing a book about those challenges! But I didn’t feel the everyday sense of urgency that I normally feel when I’m regularly exposed to all that’s out there.

That’s not a good thing.

The more you’re exposed to, the more you realize how important your job is as a Christian parent…and how much you need to do to raise your kids with a deeply rooted faith today.

There are many ways parents can be educated about faith challenges without being on social media, so none of this is to say everyone needs to use it. But I do think Facebook in particular makes it easy to gain some of the perspective that many Christian parents lack. If you’re on Facebook and not seeing a good mix of worldviews in your news feed, try following some of these pages:

And balance it out by following some great Christian apologetics pages that post a wide variety of articles:

———————–

/by
God Gaps Apologetics

What About God of the Gaps?

,

By

If you present the cosmological or design arguments to skeptics at least a few times, it’s extremely likely that you’ll hear the words “That’s a ‘God of the gaps’ argument.” This objection is rooted in the idea that because a number of things throughout human history have been wrongly attributed to the supernatural activity of God or gods, we can now safely dismiss God as a cause behind anything else we observe. These previous misfires include primitive myths like lightning bolts being signs from Zeus and Thor to the universally admired Isaac Newton positing God as a mechanic to straighten out errant orbits. We later learned that lightning has to do with electrical qualities, while wobbly orbits turned out to be the result of other bodies in orbit around the sun. ¹

So, in the mind of many skeptics, this trumps any theistic argument. Because science has previously found natural causes behind assumed supernatural events, it will do so in the future. “So”, says the skeptic, “you have a gap in knowledge, and you just arbitrarily insert God into the gap.” There are problems with this argument, one being that not all proposed gap fill-ins are equal. As John Lennox discusses here, there are arguments for God’s existence that are based on what we do know, rather than what we don’t.

Indeed, both the cosmological and design arguments rely on the same method of inductive reasoning that the anti-supernatural position relies on. After observing that natural causes have replaced miracles as an explanation for a number of events, the inference is drawn that all events will be explained by natural causes. Likewise, the design argument is based on the observation that complex specified information (such as that found in DNA) has never been shown to originate from anything other than an intelligent mind. The cosmological argument also relies on the same logic, that every time we observe something that comes into existence, there is always a cause behind it.

Well, not exactly. There is one very important difference. The anti-miracle conclusion is not by any means the only obvious or plausible way of interpreting the data. For example, 19th century scholars were often highly skeptical of claims made by ancient historians. However, archaeology has revealed that these historians were correct on a number of doubted claims key. But it would be totally illegitimate to infer that archaeology will vindicate them at every point someday. It just means that they were more reliable than previously thought. Likewise, natural causes to certain events would only show at best that the universe has less supernatural activity than previously believed. The origin of information and the necessity of causality conclusions that belong to their respective theistic arguments also have far more instances of observation, without any reasonable alternative rearing its head.

But in the case of false supernatural claims, there is another alternative that presents itself. To illustrate, let’s ask the question “Does this really tell us more about the universe, or more about humanity?” For example, there are many cases of UFO sightings turning out to involve something more down to earth. Does this tell us anything about what is “out there” in space? No, it tells that humans are curious and prone to believing that aliens do exist. But this has not stopped the search for intelligent extraterrestrial life from being a live area of scientific research. As a total hypothetical, let’s say an alien space craft did land and interact with several people. Once they told others, it is pretty likely that others would start to see moving objects in the sky and jump to unjustified conclusions about them being a sign of alien life. False reports about aliens would be almost certain feature of a universe where they actually have visited earth. False reports could also be a feature of a universe where they don’t exist at all. The existence of false reports doesn’t tell us much by itself. We’d have to decide based on other evidence.

But in the same way, in a universe where God has put a spiritual desire for Himself in the human heart, it is to be expected that some humans would falsely attribute some or even a lot of phenomena to the divine. This is an almost certain feature of what a theistic universe with fallible humans would look like. This by itself doesn’t prove that God exists or acts in the universe, but by itself it also doesn’t point in the opposite direction, either.

One other point is worth mentioning. It wasn’t because of science that people began to disbelieve that Zeus was throwing lightning bolts from the sky. It happened because, unlike paganism, which saw the gods as not being distinct from the creation, Christians saw God as being separate from it. ² There was no need to see a god behind virtually every force of nature.

¹. Wiker, Benjamin. Moral Darwinism, pp. 127-28
². Carroll, Bruce and Shiflett, David. Christianity on Trial. p. 58-59

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2pQVTMj 

/by
Image God Christianity

Why Is The Image of God So Important?

By Luke Nix

Introduction

Those who follow this blog are aware that I not only defend “mere” Christianity, but I also defend specifics in the Christian worldview. As I have written before, I believe that if a Christian is defending an incorrect detail of their worldview to a skeptic, that skeptic can easily use that incorrect detail as an excuse to reject the entire worldview (even though this is not logically reasonable). Over the last few years of interacting with fellow Christians regarding the details of our worldview, one of the doctrines that are not discussed explicitly very often, but other debates directly affect, is the doctrine of the Image of God. I have noticed that some positions in the other debates imply different views of the Image of God, and these different views of the Image of God can be used to test the positions in the other debates. But before I get into those debates, we need to know why this Judeo-Christian doctrine is so important in the first place.

What Is At Stake?

The Image of God provides the grounding for several essential characteristics of humans that set us apart from the animal kingdom. Without appropriate grounding for these characteristics, a worldview cannot explain these characteristics, thus it is forced to deny that they even exist…with dire consequences, as we shall see. What are these characteristics, though? While the Image of God grounds several characteristics, I want to examine four of them today:

  • Intrinsic Value
  • Free Will
  • Moral Responsibility
  • The Ability to Reason
 Intrinsic Value

It is common today to think that a person’s value is based upon their race, sex, age, religion, intelligence, economic status, physical ability, entertainment ability, or a whole host of other “useful” things to a society. All of these, though, are relative and fleeting. Anytime that one of those are different (between persons or even in the same person at different times in their lives) their value goes up, down, or disappears. Intrinsic value is value that is not based on any of those accidental characteristics. Intrinsic value is value that is objective, found outside the societies, groups, or other individuals who are judging a person’s worth. This is an objective value that people possess simply in virtue of being human.

No human is intrinsically more or less valuable than another. This concept provides the ground for the idea of “equal rights” regardless of sex, race, age, ability, or status. If you are a human, you are intrinsically valuable, period. Since animals do not possess the Image of God, they do not possess such intrinsic value; they are valuable based upon whatever someone else needs them to accomplish. Animal value is relative and subjective, but human value is objective. If someone violates (harms) an intrinsically valuable thing, it is a moral evil. Specifically, an attack on a possessor of the Image of God is a direct attack on God Himself. If humans do not possess the Image of God, no act against us for any reason is evil. In fact, if humans do not possess the Image of God, it is permissible (if not obligatory) that humans be treated no different than any other animal (and vice versa). Just as a house fly may be killed because it is irritating us, so may a human be killed because he or she is irritating us, and if a human’s life is to be protected by the law, then so should the life of every animal be protected by the law also.

Free Will

When I say “free will” I am talking about the ability to choose to do something other than what we actually do, given the same circumstances (called “libertarian” free will). For instance, you have a choice to continue reading this post or not. Sure, some things will influence that choice, but ultimately you are choosing whether to accept those influences and act upon them or not; the circumstances (or your desires) do not determine your choice, though they do influence your choice. What allows us to do this is the fact that we are “agents” or “souls.” These (and we) are beings that exist independent of physical reality, thus we are not 100% governed by its laws (though our bodies are, which many of our decisions require us to take into account). Because an agent is not physical, it must have a non-physical source- the Image of God provides that source for humans. If humans do not possess the Image of God, then we do not possess free will and all our “choices” are determined by something else, not us.

The animals do not possess the Image of God, thus they do not possess free will. They are beholden to their environment for their behavior. Their surroundings are what determine how they act. The fact that humans have free will means that humans are capable of choosing how to act towards one another, nothing or no one else makes the choice for us, we are responsible.

Moral Responsibility

Taking the two previous characteristics provided by the Image of God, we discover that humans have moral responsibility. If humans are not intrinsically valuable, then no act committed against them is evil. If humans do not have the ability to choose to do otherwise, then they cannot be held responsible for such an evil act. Thus both intrinsic value AND free will are necessary for moral responsibility. This makes us moral beings. Something that animals are not. If an animal kills another animal, we do not call it “murder” because “murder” is “killing” plus a moral element. Animals do not possess intrinsic value (so the killing is not a violation of God’s Image) and animals are not morally responsible beings. On the other hand, man is both intrinsically valuable AND a moral being, so if a human kills another human it is a moral act based on the Image of God in both the victim and the killer. And the morality of that act must be justified by the Moral Law that God has written on the hearts of every human (via His Image) and in His further revelation of Scripture.

This means that if humans wish to hold other humans morally responsible for their actions, the Image of God is necessary on two accounts. Without the Image of God, there is no ground for moral responsibility, no ground for reward or punishment. In fact, if either intrinsic value or free will are missing from the equation, moral responsibility (and reward and punishment) cannot do not make sense; they are meaningless.

The Ability to Reason

Often times it is difficult to distinguish between what is true and what is practical because the two do not always seem to align. What is practical is derived from what allows us to survive and thrive in any given environment. We act and react, according to what stimulates our senses, with those two purposes as the end goal. This is the mode of operation of a creature that not only does not possess free will but also one that does not possess reliable reasoning faculties. If our ability to reason is grounded in a process or object that is focused on survival, then that is exactly what it will do, and the misalignments between what is practical and what is true will never be detected. We are forced to conflate truth with practicality, on this view, because as the environment changes, what is necessary for survival also changes (think of living in Saudi Arabia vs. living in the United States).

On the other hand, if our reasoning faculties are grounded in something that is essentially concerned with what is true, then that faculty can be trusted to be able to detect the difference between a belief that is merely practical for an environment and one that is true (independent of the environment). The Image of God provides this grounding in the Creator, who IS omniscient and desires that humans come to know what is true and not just what is practical for their given environment. In being made in the Image of God, humans not only possess the ability to freely choose among options, we have a reliable tool to identify which option is the correct option. Thus this makes our moral responsibility even more binding.*

The Origin and Current Status of the Image of God

Because all four of those characteristics are tied to the Image of God, it is important that in our defense of the Christian worldview, and specifics within the worldview, that we consistently hold and defend a specific view regarding its origin and status.

Testing Origins Views Via The Image of God

Regarding its origin, some people believe that the Image of God came about by natural processes- it is a functional distinction between us and the animals based upon our evolution from the lower species. This view is most commonly found in the origin position called “theistic evolution” or “evolutionary creationism” (but not all of them hold this view of the Image of God; I’ll address that important distinction in a minute). This cannot be the way the Image of God appeared because it is merely a difference in degree of development between animal and human rather than a difference in ontological essence (“kind”). A difference in degree is not an ontological difference, but the Image of God, in order to be an ontological ground for the four characteristics I described above (and the many others I didn’t), must be an ontological difference. If one holds that the Image of God is not a difference in kind, then all the implications of the above-described characteristics’ absences are actually the reality- human intrinsic value does not exist, free will does not exist, moral responsibility does not exist, and the ability to reason does not exist.

While I do not defend common descent of humans with any animal (I’m not an evolutionary creationist), I must understand that not every evolutionary creationist holds to this view of the Image of God because of its dire philosophical and theological (biblical) implications. These theistic evolutionists hold, just as much as any creationist (young-earth or old-earth), that the Image of God appeared suddenly in history (as a special creative work of God) and that sudden appearance is evident in the fossil and archaeological record.

Where things get difficult, though, is that many naturalists insist that all features of humans appear gradually in the fossil and archaeological records. If that is true, then even the Image of God appears gradually. That would imply that the Image of God is merely a difference in degree and not in kind. So, if a Christian theistic evolutionist wishes to maintain common descent of humans with prior animals (and they wish to avoid the implications of merely a functional Image of God), then they must reject the interpretation of the historical records that naturalists offer regarding the Image’s features appearing gradually (descending from “lower” species).

What is really interesting is that the more that the data is reinterpreted to be consistent with an ontological Image of God (a sudden appearance), the more the line is blurred for the theistic evolutionist between the sudden appearance of the Image of God and the sudden appearance of humans. Perhaps a persuasive case for the rejection of common descent between humans and animals (and the acceptance of humans as a special creation of God independent of His other creations) is found in our defense of the proper view of the Image of God and its endowments (e.g. intrinsic value, free will, moral responsibility, and the ability to reason) upon humans. Our maintaining the proper view of the Image of God helps us to test and guide our view of human origins. If this has intrigued you, I highly recommend reading the book “Who Was Adam” by biochemist Dr. Fazale Rana to see the scientific evidence for the sudden appearance of the Image of God (and humans) in the scientific record.

One More Thing- Abortion and Active Euthanasia
Before I leave the origins debate, though, I do want to bring up one more implication for holding that the Image of God is merely a difference in the degree of development. If you are familiar with some of the more common defenses for abortion, you will know that one of the reasons offered to deny the unborn intrinsic value (and the intrinsic right to life) is the degree of their development. (Now, I have to be extremely careful not to equivocate on the term “degree of development,” because if the terms do mean the same thing in both the common descent view and the abortion view, then we have a serious problem.) Simply put, the argument for abortion from the degree of development points to the lack of certain features in the unborn that a fully developed human being possesses. The pro-abortion advocate uses this lack of development to conclude that the unborn are not really human, thus do not possess intrinsic value (which means that killing the unborn is perfectly acceptable).

In the book “The Case For Life,” pro-life apologist Scott Klusendorf points out that the “degree of development” argument, applied consistently, also removes intrinsic value (thus justifies intentionally killing) from those living with health issues, including physical handicaps, degenerative diseases, mental disorders and others. If the Image of God is merely a matter of degree of development, then any human who manifests cognitive, creative, or physical limitations akin to those of our pre-human ancestors (on the theistic evolutionary view), they too necessarily lack the Image of God. This would include the unborn (abortion would be morally permissible) and the born (active euthanasia would be morally permissible).

This is one more way that we can use the proper view of the Image of God to test our view of human origins. Unfortunately, it can also be used in the opposite direction to justify abortion and active euthanasia- which is one more reason why maintaining the proper view of the Image of God is so important. We must hold to the proper view of the Image of God to guard against such logically fallacious and morally reprehensible (sinful) views from entering our worldview (even if we insist on maintaining the belief in the common descent of the physical human body).

Testing The Current Status of the Image of God

In the on-going debate about how God’s sovereignty and man’s free will work together, some Christians have opted to deny that man has free will at all by positing that the Image of God was destroyed at the Fall of Adam and Eve. However, when the implications I described above are explained, the Christian usually quickly changes their position, but in many cases the change holds that the Image of God was damaged specifically in a way to destroy human free will but maintain the other traits. While this may seem like an acceptable position, it poses a severe problem.

If intrinsic value does exist, but free will does not, then punishment is a moral evil because it is a violation of (attack against) the intrinsically valuable human, created in the Image of God, who did not have a choice to not commit the crime against another intrinsically valuable human, created in the Image of God. This means that if free will does not exist, God’s punishment of those who commit sin is His attacking Himself- a moral evil. However, we know from the Bible that God cannot sin, that He cannot deny Himself, that a house brought against itself cannot stand, and that God does punish the wicked. If a Christian is to maintain the doctrine of eternal conscious punishment (or even the heterodox view of annihilationism), yet deny free will, then they are saying that God is sinning in virtue of His immoral attack against a creature created in His Image.

Some have attempted to say that God can do whatever He wants. However, this then enters into the debate about God and morality. A common objection to God’s existence comes in the form of the Euthyphro dilemma. This poses the question, “Is God good because He says what is good, or because He is subject to good.” The dilemma is that if the first option is selected then morality is subjective and arbitrary (not objective) because God could simply change His mind about what is good, while if the second option is selected then God is not the highest being, thus He cannot be God. If it is not obvious, the attempted escape from the implication of denying free will but affirming intrinsic value fails because it is the first option of the dilemma- morality is then arbitrary and subjective, thus there is no objective standard by which God can judge, which adds another level of problems because without objective morality, nothing is evil, even an act that attacks a bearer of the Image of God (so, murder, abortion, rape, and every other “sin” is not objectively evil- it is merely God’s opinion at the moment that they are or are not)- moral responsibility essentially was destroyed if free will was also.

The only way to avoid this implication is to affirm that man’s free will is still intact regardless of how we view the effects of the Fall of Adam and Eve. Because of that, we can use the proper view of the current status of the Image of God (intact) to test our views regarding the coexistence of God’s sovereignty and man’s free will.

Conclusion

The Image of God is an important doctrine of Christianity. It provides the ontological grounding for intrinsic value, free will, moral responsibility, and the ability to reason. Without these characteristics in place in humans, Christianity is, at worst, false, and at best unknowable and indefensible. So, it is important that as we defend the truth of the Christian worldview that we do not also defend a scientific or theological position that either asserts or implies that the Image of God is not ontological or was damaged in a way to destroy free will. If we do, then we are defending contradictory claims, and the unbeliever can use that as a reason (because they are made in the Image of God) to freely choose to reject the truth of the Christian worldview.

Recommended Books for More on this Topic

*Of course, mere observation of reality and reason do not always lead to the correct conclusion. The Image of God also provides the Moral Law that is written on all humans’ hearts (since all humans are made in the Image of God). Further, God has given us His special revelation that gives us explicit moral codes. But He did not just give us a book without establishing that it was divinely inspired by the Source of the Image of God. The Bible contains numerous claims about reality, and especially history when no human was present to observe the events (thus eliminating any reasonable natural explanation [e.g. that the author saw it or guessed it). Dr. Hugh Ross explains these in his numerous books on the scientific evidence for the inspiration and authority of the Bible. So, there are two additional tools that solidify man’s moral responsibility and the fact that all men “are without excuse” (Romans 1:20).

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2q1OxlG

/by
Personhood Human Abortion

When Does Personhood Begin? Part II

By 

Previously we looked at some of the arguments and assumptions made to assert that the unborn either are not humans or are not “persons”.

But now we’ll look at another kind of objection. Some pro-choice advocates know that the unborn are biologically human from fertilization. However, they’ll argue that while the unborn are humans biologically, they are not full-fledged humans in a “morally relevant” sense. While they may be a member of the species Homo Sapiens, they should not be considered a member of the human community until they fulfill certain criteria, or reach a certain stage of development.

In my previous entry, I looked at why we can’t use the immediately exercisable capacity for consciousness or the ability to feel pain as criteria for acceptance into the human community.

Remember that the right to life is a categorical property; you either have it or you don’t. As such, it can’t be tied to a property that comes in degrees (such as consciousness).

A natural right, like the right to live or to defend yourself, should not be confused with legal rights, such as the right to vote or drive. A natural right is a right that every human has by virtue of our common human nature, whereas a legal right is a right that the government grants based on our common status as citizens. These rights are gained through maturity or ability. When we say that an embryo is no morally different than you or me, we recognize that they have obvious differences. An embryo can no more drive a car than a toddler should be trusted to vote for president. However, the right to life is an intrinsic right shared by all humans, regardless of their maturity level or instrumental value to society.

So if not at fertilization, when should our natural rights be attributed to us? There are several stages along human development that are offered, but none of those stages succeed as an appropriate line to draw between a state of having no natural rights and a state of acquiring natural human rights. Let’s look at those.

1) Implantation/Quickening.

Once the mother’s egg is fertilized by the father’s sperm, both egg and sperm cease to exist and conception has occurred, bringing into existence a new, unique human individual. It takes about a week for the zygote to be propelled down the fallopian tube (via hair-like structures called cilia) and implant in the uterus.

The important thing to take note of is the fact that the entity that implants is the same entity that was conceived just a week ago. There is no grounds for considering the implanted embryo as a member of the human community, but not that same entity before it implanted itself there. Embryologists consistently agree that the embryo from fertilization is a living, human organism.

Doctor Bernard Nathanson [1] argues that at the moment of implantation, the unborn “establishes its presence to the rest of us by transmitting its own signals — by producing hormones — approximately one week after fertilization and as soon as it burrows into the alien uterine wall.” For Nathanson implantation is significant because prior to this time the unborn “has the genetic structure but is incomplete, lacking the essential element that produces life: an interface with the human community and communication of the fact that it is there.” [2]

Francis Beckwith notes that there are two flaws with this argument. First, you are who you are regardless of whether anyone notices you’re there. Being noticed does not change one’s nature. One interacts with a human being, one does not make a being human by interaction.  Second, this does not explain humans conceived through IVF in a petri dish. Just as there is no difference between a Bill Clinton in a possible world who pumps gas in Little Rock, and the Bill Clinton in the actual world who is the former president of the United States, there is no essential difference between an embryo in a petri dish and an embryo implanted in the womb.

Quickening is the point in pregnancy at which the fetus’ movements can first be felt by the pregnant woman. I have grouped it here because the objection to this criterion is essentially similar to the objection for implantation. Aside from showing that the entity is the same living human organism before it quickened, one’s nature does not change once they have been noticed.

Additionally, if movement is necessary for full-fledged humanity, then this argument proves too much. This would disqualify the paralyzed from full-fledged humanity.

2) Viability.

Viability is the point in a pregnancy after which the unborn fetus can realistically survive outside the womb. Currently, viability is considered to be at about 24 weeks’ gestation, although some babies have been born at 21 weeks and survived.

A major flaw with this argument is that it’s arbitrary. Fifty years ago, viability was considered to be at 28 or 29 weeks’ gestation. So one would have to argue that an unborn child is a full-fledged human at 24 weeks now, but fifty years ago that same child would not have been a full-fledged human. Viability is a moving target that changes as technology improves.

Also, Siamese twins depend on each other for their survival but both are considered to be persons. People on life support are also completely dependent on the machine for their survival, but if viability were necessary then we could kill them for any reason even if they have a good chance of recovery. It simply makes no sense to use viability as your criterion for establishing basic human rights.

3) Birth.

There is nothing “mystical” about birth that suddenly bestows upon an entity “humanity” or “personhood.” As I mentioned in my previous article, an eight-inch journey down the birth canal does not change the nature or value of the entity.

Many pro-choice people believe abortion should remain legal because of bodily rights arguments, and if they are right, then birth would be the sensible place to draw the line. After birth we would be obligated to keep you alive, but not before. This argument will be addressed in my next article.

4) After birth.

Some pro-choice philosophers (e.g. Michael Tooley and Peter Singer) support infanticide because there is no morally relevant difference between a child inside the womb and a child outside the womb. They are correct, even if their conclusion is repugnant to our moral intuitions. They are simply being consistent and allowing the pro-choice position to lead to its natural conclusion. I’ll plan on writing more on “after-birth abortion” in the future, but essentially the entity outside the womb is the same one inside the womb.

There simply isn’t any reason for these criteria to suddenly establish value or change the nature of the unborn. We know that the unborn are human from fertilization. As there is no morally relevant difference between a zygote, embryo, fetus, or toddler (or later stages of development), then all humans should be protected, even very young ones.

[1] Doctor Nathanson is a former abortionist and founder of NARAL, who later converted to the pro-life position.
[2] Dr. Bernard Nathanson (with Richard Ostling), Aborting America, (New York: Doubleday, 1979), p. 216, as quoted in Francis J. Beckwith, Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice, (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, New York, 2007), p. 73.

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2pUNPJH

/by