Oh yeah, I've heard of that: it's where you just assume Christianity is true because it has to be, right? Or where you say the Bible is the word of God because it says it's the word of God, and since it's the word of God, it must be right? That's just question begging and circular reasoning.
I see that kind of misconception a lot. So here is a short primer (in the form of an introductory reading list) on what Presuppositional Apologetics (PA) really is.
NOTE: These are all fairly short papers, I'm not loading you down with 50 folio-sized tomes in 10pt! ;)
- John Frame's entry on Presuppositional Apologetics from the IVP Dictionary of Apologetics.
- Cornelius Van Til's My Credo, which roughly sketches Van Til's apologetic program.
- Cornelius Van Til's Why I Believe in God, which roughly sketches Van Til's argument.
- Cornelius Van Til's A Defense of Reformed (biblical) Apologetics, same.
- Frame's Presuppositional Apologetics: An Introduction (Part I), fleshing things out some more, circularity.
- Frame's Presuppositional Apologetics: An Introduction (Part II), fleshing things out some more.
- Greg Bahnsen's Van Til and Self-Deception, unbelievers both know and don't know God?
- Greg Bahnsen's A Critique of the Evidentialist Apologetical Method of John Warwick Montgomery, deals generally with common objections like possibility of common ground, circulatiry and uniqueness proof and critiques classical apologetics.
- Mike Butler's The Transcendental Argument for God's Existence, looks very specifically at the formal structure of transcendental arguments (TAs) (and examines them in recent secular philosophy, from Kant to Strawson, to Grayling, &c), then looks at the TAG, and answers the objections that Bahnsen left vague, unsatisfactorily answered, or just unanswered.
More free online resources can be found at:
- http://www.vantil.info - Many writings from presuppositionalist authors, several full books from Van Til.
- http://www.monergism.com - Lots of papers from Frame and others and some written debates.
- http://www.reformed.org/ - Several papers and some written debates.
- http://www.cmfnow.com - Lots of papers from Bahnsen on all kinds of philosophical and apologetical issues.
The very nature of an ultimate presupposition is that it is held with certainty. An ultimate presupposition is an ultimate criterion of truth, and therefore it is a criterion by which all other alleged certainties are tested. There is no higher criterion by which the certainty of such a presupposition can be called into question. Thus by its very nature, such a presupposition is the most certain thing that we know.John Frame, The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1987), 5.A.(8), p. 135.
The complaint will he heard that, if we are arguing over whether God exists and has final authority, we may not take that authority for granted while we are arguing about it. But the complaint is reversible, is it not? The Christian can reply: "If we are arguing about whether God exists and has final authority, we may not take for granted that He is not the final authority; the attempt to authorize (substantiate) His authority by some other standard would amount to the ruling that whatever authority He has it cannot be final." A Person's presuppositions are (as such) presupposed even when someone is discussing or arguing about them. For example, philosophers who argue for the truth or validity of the laws of logic do not put aside logic while arguing for it.Greg L. Bahnsen, Van Til's Apologetic: Readings and Analysis (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1998), p. 92, n. 8.
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