Introduction to Apologetics
By
Peter Hsin
Part I: Theology and Philosophy
Introduction to Apologetics
By
Peter Hsin
I. Introductory Remarks
A. Introduction
1. 3 Part series
2. Part I on the Theology, Philosophy
3. Part II on Science
4. Part III on History
B. Theology of Apologetics
Why study apologetics?
1. Obedience to direct command
1 Peter
a. “Answer” Gr= Apology. A logical defense
b. reason Gr = Logos. Logical
c. Always being prepared
d. Heart of submission to Christ as Lord
e. An attitude of gentleness and respect
2. Direct Evangelism to Unbelievers: remove obstacles to the gospel
a. 1 Cor 1,2 are clear that the heart of evangelism is through the Holy Spirit and not good argumentation.
1cor 214 The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned
b.
c. But the HS can use apologetics to bring people to saving faith
d. Modeling: Logical argumentation from shared premises
-explain shared premises
-Jesus himself always answered objectors sharply. He frequently argued from the evidence of his miracles or the testimony from a legal standpoint.
-Mt 22:31 But about the resurrection of the dead--have you not read what God said to you, 32 `I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob' ? He is not the God of the dead but of the living."
-As a last resort, he even gave doubting Thomas strong evidence so that he would believe.
-Paul’s ordinary method of evangelism was argue and reason with proofs
(Acts 17-20.) To the Jews he used scriptures. To the philosophers in
-AC 26:24 At this point Festus interrupted Paul's defense. "You are out of your mind, Paul!" he shouted. "Your great learning is driving you insane."
-Personal experience with Pat and Chris
e. Personal experience with Jay, Dave, Justin: the combination of prayer, the miracle of a changed life, and apologetics.
3. Edification of Believers
a.
MT
b. Apologetics helps us to see more of God in the world. We can see more of God in truth, goodness, science, and history. Integrated worldview.
c. Understanding the Bible: Logos, Doctrine (Trinity), historical background
d. Knowing that Christianity is rational and there is evidence to support its claims can strengthen the believer’s convictions.
-boldness in witness regardless of success.
-boldness in obedience. No hedging.
4. Cultural Effects
a. “Even a bad shot is dignified when he shows up at a duel.” -G.K. Chesterton
b. Christianity is struggling to remain a valid contender as a reasonable point of view in our culture. Failing to engage in the intellectual marketplace forfeits the legitimacy of our claims on the personal level.
“To be ignorant and simple now- not to be able to
meet the enemies on their own ground-would be to throw down our weapons, and to
betray our uneducated brethren who have, under God, no defense but us against
the intellectual attacks of the heathen.
Good philosophy must exist for no other reason, because bad philosophy
needs to be answered.” C.S. Lewis
c. Power of Ideas and the Church’s Trojan Horse
-Ideas and their effects: Aristotle/Alexander, Nietzsche/Hitler,
-Existentialism/Fideism, Subjectivism and the loss of influence
-until the 1800 the minister was the intellectual center of society
-philosophically, the error began with Descartes, and the loss began with Hume
d.
Why I was not a Christian: the failure of the church and escaping the
spirit of the age.
II. Theology of Natural Theology
A. Biblical basis of Natural Theology –General Revelation
1. Natural Theology is the use of reason and evidence to come to conclusions about the existence and attributes of God from general revelation.
2. General revelation refers to God’s revelation apart from scripture: that is from basic observations of the world around us.
Rom 1:18The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
3. Therefore, Natural Theology should be able to argue for God’s “eternal power” and his “divine nature.”
4. The Cosmological Argument argues for a creator with eternal power
5. The Moral argument points to God’s divine nature.
III. Kalaam Cosmological Argument
P1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause
P2. The universe began to exist
Conclusion: The universe has a cause
A. Defense of P1. It is a very intuitive principle upon reflection.
1. Ex nihilo, nihil fit! Out of nothing, nothing comes
2. The world would not make sense, much less science.
Illus: Imagine a wife coming home to her husband to find him sleeping next to some strange woman. Waking her husband up, she demand to know, “who is this lady!” Her husband replies, “I don’t know. She must have just come into existence next to me.” Shocked by his brazen defense, his wife asks, “how could she have just come into existence next to you?!” Indignantly, the man replies, “I don’t have to answer that. You only assume that anything that begins to exist has a cause.”
B. Defense of P2
1. Impossibility of Actual infinities -not covered
2. Impossibility of traversing an actual infinity by successive addition
R1. The nature of
causal sequences requires that for an event to take place, the entire chain of
causal antecedents must have already occurred and be actual. (The rest of R1 is question-begging, but the
stated claim is used in R2 and R3.)
R2. The present is
the last member of a series of past events formed by successive addition. A series formed by successive addition is a
potential infinite and is therefore always finite. (An actual infinite would require the series
of past events was formed all at once)
R3. It is impossible to count from
negative infinity and reach zero (the present.)
This is because it is impossible to even start counting.
3. Scientific Support
The Big Bang Cosmology
Argument
Feature1. The
universe began from a large explosion about 15 billion years ago and has
continued to expand ever since.
Feature2. The original configuration of the big bang was a
state of maximum density where all of the mass, energy, space, and time were
contained in a single mathematical point with no dimensions.
Implies. The
universe sprang into existence from nothing a finite time ago.
-Red shift, sky black at night, homogeneity, etc… lots of
evidence outside of my ken
The Second Law of
Thermodynamics
1. The universe has
a finite stock of order
2. The second law of
thermodynamics means it is irreversably decreasing in order.
L1. Given enough
time, the universe will eventually reach a state of maximum entropy.
L2. If the universe
had existed forever, that would be enough time to reach maximum entropy. However, we are not at that state. (1.)
Conclusion: The
universe has not existed forever.
C. Nature of
the Cause
Conclusion: there is a creator with eternal power.
1. As the
cause for the universe beginning to exist, we can call it the Creator
2. It existed
ontologically prior to t=0, the first moment of time, therefore the
cause is eternal.
3. Anything
capable of creating the universe is extremely powerful.
4. Uncaused
cause, prime mover. “I AM” / Aseity.
Rom 11:35"Who
has ever given to God,
that God should repay him?"[11]
36For from him and through him and to him are all
things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.
IV. Moral
Argument: Inferring God’s Divine Nature.
A. C.S.
Lewis’ Argument for a Divine Lawgiver:
evidence from within
1. O1. Morality exists: called by Lewis: Law of
Right and Wrong, the Law of Nature, and the Law of Decent Behavior
2. Those who
deny P1 are hypocrites when they argue or complain “that’s not fair,” “that’s
mine,” or “I was here first,” since they are implicitly appealing to some sort
of moral law. Lewis considers
differences in moral opinion minor.
3. O2. Morality is non-physical. It is not like the laws of physics. It is prescriptive, not descriptive.
4. It is also
non-descriptive in that we do things we know we should not do all the
time. (We lie, cheat, steal. We are selfish, lazy, and greedy.)
5. O3. Our knowledge of morality does not come from
observation of behavior alone, but from within.
6. We were
created with the capacity for moral understanding. The goal of this must be to have an impact on
our behavior/character.
7. Therefore,
this hints that the origin of our moral understanding is a being that has a
non-physical component (“divine mind”) that is interested in our
character/behavior… A Divine Lawgiver.
8. Immanuel Kant argued for a
Divine Judge:
9. It’s not fair that really,
really evil people die before they receive what’s due to them.
10. So there must be an afterlife
of sorts otherwise the story ends too soon.
11. It would take an omniscient
being of divine power to be able to fairly know a person’s intention and
properly dole out proportionate punishments.
B.
Anti-Dualism of Good/Evil
Reductio ad absurdum
1. This is
another argument C.S. Lewis uses. It had
a profound impact on
2. Lewis
argues that Good must exist in a way that Evil does not. Good must be better than evil is bad. The existence of Good must come logically
prior to the existence of Evil.
3. If Good
and Evil existed only as polar opposites, then it would be arbitrary to choose
one over the other (ie Good over Evil.)
But if it is arbitrary, then there would be no reason to believe “We
should do what we know is good.” This is
absurd.
4. Therefore,
in order for Good to exist at all. It
must exist in a way Evil does not.
5. Therefore,
the proper view is that Evil does not exist on its own, but as a
privation/perversion of good.
6. Analogy of
Truth / Lies, Light / darkness. Lies do
not exist on their own. They come about
by straying from what is. E.g. Truth
exists on its own.
7.
Consequence: in order for something to be really evil, it must have a
lot of good… polluted.
8. The
opposite of Satan is the archangel Michael, not God.
9. The
conclusion of Plato, Lewis is that of a Perfect Good of supreme existence.
9. Only God
is good (Lk