Pushing The Antithesis – Part 5 – Alternative Worldviews

Posted on August 11, 2019 by jra

The fifth chapter of the book focuses on comparing and contrasting various worldviews outside of the Biblical worldview of Scripture. The purpose for doing this is to demonstrate different characteristics that some of the more popular worldviews hold to and how they contrast to the Christian one.

There are two central tenets that are the focus of this chapter:

Examples of several worldview options.
The presuppositional cores sustaining those worldviews

Particular Worldviews

Hinduism

The author expounds that Hinduism is a family of merged religions arising out of a thoroughly pagan backdrop. One source describes Hinduism as, “Scholars regard Hinduism as a fusion or synthesis of various Indian cultures and traditions, with diverse roots and no founder.” Another key attribute of this worldview is the belief in millions of deities that are typically derived from objects found in nature. Hinduism aligns well with the New Age movement and mysticism and views all reality as relative since Hinduism believes that reality is an illusion.

Behaviorism

Behaviorism is school of psychological thought developed by B.F. Skinner. The key concept in this school of thought that all human behavior can be attributed to the concept of “operant conditioning”. This basically says that human behavior is the result of of response to pure environmental factors such as our experiences and our senses. The material world is the ultimate endgame and all our motivations revolve around getting the most fulfillment from the material world. Since man is simply the result of his conditioned environment, there is no responsibility for actions taken since there is no moral code attached to this system of thought.

Marxism

The next world view is the infamous worldview of Marxism. Marxism is an atheistic, socio-political belief system that teaches the material world is the ultimate reality and that religion is an illusion. The author quotes the American Heritage Dictionary’s definition of dialectical materialism on which Marxism is based as,

“The Marxian interpretation of reality that views matter as the sole subject of change and all change as the product of a constant conflict between opposites arising from the internal contradictions inherent in all events, ideas, and movements.”

Adam Schaff summarizes the maxim of Marxism as, “Mans is a product of society…it is society that makes him what he is.”

Existentialism

The last worldview system that the author examines in this chapter is existentialism. Existentialism is concerned above all else with freedom and self-expression. This system essentially boils down to feeling over thought, experience over logic, and the like. The author leaves some valuable quotes:

“To kill God is to become god oneself: it is to realize on this earth the eternal life of which the gospel speaks.” –Albert Camus
“If God exists man cannot be free. But man is free, therefore God cannot exist. Since God does not exist all things are morally permissible.” –Jean Paul-Satre

The author is trying to get the Christian apologist to think through the foundational beliefs of these various systems to understand how they oppose Christianity and how they are internally inconsistent.

Christian Apologetics – Interpretation of Facts

Posted on December 20, 2014June 30, 2016 by jra

From Van Tils Apologetic by Greg Bahnsen:

As Van Til goes on to say, if one does not begin with some such general truths (universals) with which to understand the particular observations in one’s experience, those factual particulars would be unrelated and uninterpretable -i.e., “brute”. In a chance universe, all particular facts would be random, have no classifiable identity, bear no predetermined order or relation and thus be unintelligible to man’s mind.

I recently ran across what I consider a good use case for applying this principle of Christian apologetic’s; On the Reformed Theology G+ forum someone posted the following question: Do you accept the idea of objective morality? If so, what is your criteria for morality that isn’t subjective (open to interpretation)?

Christianity asserts that it is the law of God as revealed in the Bible. This is not a subjective response as it’s an assertion of worldview and is not bound in a single subject or a few peoples opinion. We can also not treat the question of morality as say the shooting average of Lebron James. The rules of interpretation of shooting averages facts do not conflict with opposing worldviews, but of a basic understanding of mathematics.

When we interpret the facts of morality we are dealing with transcendence in that the object is not bound by space or time. For the non-theist that believes everything is essentially ‘matter in motion’ this is antithetical to his presuppositions for which he interprets reality.

So it’s not simply a matter of providing an argument that isn’t open to interpretation, but comes down to how one interprets the facts for which they are observing. And the method of interpretation is driven by their presuppositions.

Fall from Grace – OPC Pastor Converts to Roman Catholicism

Posted on September 4, 2012September 4, 2012 by jra

Former OPC pastor Jason Stewart decided to leave the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) as a pastor for full communion into the Roman Catholic Church. His blog post outlines his reasons and I must say they would not be surprising for someone that was raised Roman Catholic, but I find them untenable for a former pastor of the Reformed Faith.

Continue reading →

The Mystery of Providence

Posted on July 30, 2010 by admin

I just finished reading an excellent book by John Flavel, entitled “The Mystery of Providence” and I think he offers some very relevant advice for Christians in the 21st century. One of the most profound maxims is how important and a great means of sanctification that Christians do go through afflictions and trials. One of the great examples he gives of Christians growing cold and in love in the world is that if they go any length of time without any trials whatsoever.

I would highly recommend this book as it causes the reader to reflect much on all the providences that a believer has been blessed with from the protection of your life in the womb of your mother to the employment that you are currently blessed with to the apex of graceful providence and that being salvation in the only begotten Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ.

He concludes with the importance for the Christian to make a written account oof all of the providences that you have provided. The reason is to give you a greater appreciation for the all of God’s providences that you been blessed with as well as to leave a record to others to bless them with the knowledge of God’s grace in your life.

What Justin's Thinking

Christianity