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Christus
Rex
Presuppositional Primer
Maurice Hagar
“Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs…in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment…to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover that materialism is absolute for we cannot allow a divine foot in the door.”
–Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin
fact (fakt) n. 1. a thing which can be admitted without being explained.
- G.K. Chesterton
“The facts, ma’am, just the facts” implored Sergeant Joe Friday week after week on the syndicated television program Dragnet. But just what are the facts? And how do we know, as Francis Schaeffer put it, “true truth?” And how do the answers to these questions change how we live? Such concerns are the age-old quest of philosophy: metaphysics, knowing the fundamental nature of reality and being; epistemology, understanding the nature and grounds of such knowing; and ethics, living out our moral values and obligations in the light of who we are and what we know. Rousas John Rushdoony reminds us:
Each philosophy differs as to what constitutes a fact. The conception of the physical world and the facts thereof vary radically in Augustine, Spinoza, Hume, and Kant. The ‘facts’ vary from philosophy to philosophy; they are precisely the point of difference, in that each begins with certain basic assumptions and presuppositions…a person’s conception of what constitutes a fact is thus governed by his starting point (51-52).
The starting point for every one of us, whether or not we are willing to admit it, is a basic, objective knowledge of God and His creation ordinances (Ps. 19:1-3; Rom. 1:18-21). Christian theologians call this general, or natural, revelation—Calvin’s sensitus divinitus. The noetic effects of mankind’s plunge into sin, however, are a depraved mind (Rom 8:7) and an incessant struggle to suppress the objective truth and knowledge of God in rebellious unrighteousness (Rom 1:18). This we do by formulating our own subjective theories of reality consisting of corrupted presuppositions—facts, assumptions, commitments, biases, and prejudices. As we venture out into the world of depraved minds these autonomous principles are confirmed, refined, reinforced, and synthesized into humanistic, inter-subjective (communal) philosophies and traditions of men (Col. 2:3-8) that are explicitly or implicitly at war with God, His revelation of “true truth,” and His sovereign rule, or theonomy.
The implications of all this for Christians are enormous and enormously important to understand. Gary DeMar explains:
All of us think in terms of worldviews. A worldview is the way each of us looks at and evaluates everything that is seen, experienced, or thought about…As worldviews develop and mature over time, they sort and interpret familiar information instantaneously. New information is evaluated in terms of what is already known and thought to be true. If some new facts or experiences do not fit within the boundaries of our already established worldview, they are either rejected, ignored, or reinterpreted to make them conform (41-2).
Andrew Hoffecker and Gary Scott Smith elaborate further:
Christian and non-Christian leaders alike acknowledge that their fundamental ideas directly or indirectly shape their thoughts, choices, and actions. Worldviews thus are not only total in scope but also totalitarian in their daily, even hourly, impingement on life. Like the incessant ticking of a clock, our basic ideas continually intrude into our living…Thus we must not draw back from the conclusion that all of life is religion—that all people are religious…all world views are religions, not just those expressed by theologians (319-20).
Yes! At the very core of every system of thought from philosophy to science to education to economics to politics (whether conservative or liberal) and so on lies a bedrock, a priori faith commitment to humanism of one sort or another that, like a pair of good sunglasses, unconsciously filters and colors all our perceiving, thinking, and knowing. And any of these presenting itself as “neutral” or “values-free” is nothing other than a wolf in sheep’s clothing seeking whom it may devour—most likely the naïve kids of unsuspecting Christian parents (the simpletons of Proverbs).
Make no mistake about it. The City of God is at war with the City of Man and the primary battlefield is the human heart/mind. God forbid that we would violate His first and greatest commandment (Mt. 22:37-38) by bowing in deference to the idols of secular, humanistic thought. No, we will not “tolerate” the futile reasoning of those who, professing themselves to be wise, have become utter fools (Rom. 1:22-32; 1 Cor. 1 19-20), self-deceived and deceiving, blind leaders of the blind—in politics, education, media, the arts, et cetera, even our churches! We unapologetically refuse to “keep an open mind” to the “facts” and “evidence of those who tempt us with forbidden fruit that promises to make us wise (Gen. 3:6)!”
By the grace of God who calls His covenant people to spiritual transformation through the renewing (versus removing) of our minds (Rom. 12:1-2; Eph. 4:17-23; Heb. 5:14), the starting point for Christians is the Triune I AM who created mankind in His image—our metaphysical foundation—and God’s Word/Christ and word/Scripture—our epistemological foundation (Gen. 1:1; Ex. 3:14; John 1:1, 8:58; 2 Tim. 3:16). Greg Bahnsen says it all so well:
God’s word… has absolute epistemic authority and it is the necessary presupposition of all knowledge which man possesses. All our knowledge must be a receptive reconstruction of God’s primary thoughts; the Lord is the originator of all truth. God’s word must then be taken as the final standard of truth for man. Those who would feign intellectual self-sufficiency and refrain from presupposing the word of Christ in Scripture are led into foolish ignorance. One must begin with Christ in the world of thought or else surrender any hope of attaining knowledge—about himself, the world, or God (29).
Secular thinking implores us to clear our minds of Christian presuppositional clutter and open up a clean slate, a tabula rasa, to life’s rich empirical experiences in the hope of attaining true knowledge. Christian beware! Godly thinking reminds us that “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” (Prov. 1:7) and that “in Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col. 2:3). The difference all comes down to one’s presuppositions, which are in turn a product of one’s a priori faith commitment to either autonomy, self-rule, or theonomy, God-rule.
Bibliography & Suggested Reading
Building A Christian Worldview—Vol. I. Ed. W. Andrew Hoffecker and Gary Scott Smith. Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1986.
Bahnsen, Greg L. Always Ready. Ed. Robert R. Booth. Atlanta: American Vision; Texarkana, AR: Covenant Media Foundation, 1996.
DeMar, Gary. Thinking Straight in a Crooked World. Powder Springs, GA: American Vision, 2001.
Lewontin, Richard. “Billions and Billions of Demons,” New York Review of Books, January 9, 1997.
Rushdoony, Rousas John. By What Standard? Vallecito, CA: Ross House, 1995.
Christ
the King - Gregory Soderberg
The Testimony of the Human Will - Robert Nash
Shepherding Family and Church - Marcus
Rench
Presuppositional Primer - Maurice Hagar
Verbi - Various Reformers
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