Van Til Schaeffer Studies

It was good yesterday to be at the John Owen Centre for the first of five days of study on the apologists Cornelius Van Til (see here) and Francis Schaeffer. The lecturer is Bill Edgar from Westminster (accompanied by his wife Barbara – sat mostly quiet in the corner knitting). We are in the newly refurbished Kensit Library (or whatever it will be in future. There are 8 students present (3 for credit, 5 of us auditing). We began surprisingly with Schleiermacher (the father of liberalism), a giant figure who set the tone for 19C apologetics. Apologetics (rationalistic, anthropological, humanistic) became an academic discipline through his influence. In 1799 he wrote The Essence of Christianity. His aim was to win over “cultured despisers” of Christianity. He tried to show Christianity is the best observable religion. He ended up re-inventing the Christian faith. His central argument was that there are feelings in all of us – a need for something transcendent. The Christian God is the one most worthy of this. He redefined the elements of Christianity. Sin is not transgression but selfishness, Jesus is just the best example, etc. He was uncomfortable with the Trinity. By the time you came to Ritschl, etc, such redefinition is common. The trend can be identified as horizontalisation. It was not wholly anti-supernatural but it was horizontal. (He also mentioned the social gospel especially in USA 20C). There was a general feeling of optimism by the beginning of the 20C. It was felt that “free examination” would be enough to lead people to maturity and social improvement. This was all unravelled by WWI and various revolutions. Eventually Barthianism came to the fore. Barth emphasised the transcendence of God not the horizontal approach of Schleiermacher and his successors. He had no room for apologetics or for natural revelation (he famously disagreed with Brunner over this). He said God is his own apologist, his own point of contact. Some evangelicals thought in the same way. Eg Spurgeon's anti-apologetics remarks (just let the lion out). Lloyd-Jones too sometimes. Dr Edgar then named three alternative approaches 1. Liberalism or neo-liberalism. Paul Tillich, etc. (Method of correlation – gospel fits needs). He recommended studying culture to identify these needs (Munch's Scream – where we are at). Basic problem alienation not sin. Return to the ground of being gives power to be. Quite unchristian by the end. 2. The mainly British movement led by C S Lewis and including other inklings. The myth come true. 3. Movement begun in the 19C and that crystallised in Kuyper, Orr, Hengstenberg and that is usually called presuppositionalist. These are not the only strands. Evidentialist and classical apologetics has continued to grow stronger over the years. Eg the ID movement. Cf the way the resurrection is dealt with by J N D Anderson, etc. Also theistic proofs (cf Aquinas based on Aristotle, cosmological arguments). W C Lane, J P Moreland, R C Sproul, etc. The good news today is that there is a lot of interest in apologetics again. The bad news is the confusion over ways of doing it and the need for clarity. We then looked at the background and life of Cornelius Van Til including the dispute with Gordon Clark and Van Til's advocacy of analogical knowledge. A stimulating day.