Caught in the Matrix: The Power of Worldview

The following is the text of a sermon preached at Edmonton Chinese Baptist Church (Edmonton, Alberta, Canada) on Sunday, June 27, 2010.


Caught in The Matrix: The Power of Worldview – ECBC, June 27, 2010

Romans 12:1-2 reads: Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Eleven years ago, the remarkable movie, The Matrix, was released. It was followed by two sequels in 2003, and ranks as one of the most successful Hollywood franchises. The Matrix is built around the premise that the world as we experience it is an illusion—the result of an intricate computer simulation. Human-created artificial intelligence have taken over the ‘real world’ and enslaved human beings to suck the heat and energy out of their bodies. The real world sees human bodies ‘grown’ in vast fields, hooked up to electrical inputs to harvest their resources, and also hooked up to visual simulators that treat them to a virtual reality. This virtual reality, known as ‘The Matrix’, resembles human life on earth as we know it (in 1999, when the movie was released). Human beings who are in reality hooked up to machines have the vivid experience of working normal jobs, having relationships, and so forth. The virtual reality is so accurate that people do not realize they are being manipulated and deceived.

However, a group of humans has been awakened to the true nature of reality, and they wage a quiet rebellion against The Matrix. In the movie, the focus is on Neo Anderson, a computer hacker who questions his reality but has no idea of what is out there. Morpheus and Trinity, two ‘liberated’ humans, seek to enlighten Neo. They offer him two pills, one of which will return him to his virtual reality life, the other of which will show him what is really real. Neo famously takes the red pill, and his world is forever changed. He will never look at things the same way again.

This morning I want to talk about the power of worldview. In particular, I want to suggest that each of you can comprehend the importance of cultivating a Biblical worldview by identifying three key ways that worldview affects our thoughts and perceptions. Before we get to the influence of worldview, however, it is necessary to lay some foundational groundwork.

What is a worldview? A worldview is a lens through which we view the world around us. Our worldview contains a set of fundamental assumptions and understandings about how the world works. Our worldview is a person-specific matrix—a perception of reality, a filter through which everything flows as we seek to make sense of external data. Every worldview answers at least five fundamental questions: 1. Where did we come from? (or: the existence and nature of God); 2. What is the nature of reality? (or: the nature and character of the physical world); 3. What is wrong with us? (or: the origin and nature of man); 4. What is the solution to the problem? (or: the nature of salvation); and 5. Where are we going? (or: the nature of life after death). Every worldview makes assumptions in each of those four areas. For example: the atheist worldview claims that the universe sprang into existence from nothingness with no explanation, life arose on primordial earth through random chemical reactions, and human life evolved through random mutation and natural selection; our primary problem is enslavement to a superstitious worldview that promotes religious belief; the solution to the problem is intellectual evolution; and after we die we entirely cease to be. The Christian worldview has substantially different answers. In the beginning was God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All that is was created by Him out of nothingness; at its creation, everything was declared good by God. The problem with the world is the result of man’s rebellion and fall into sin. Instead of harmony and communion, mankind now experiences broken relationships with God, with self, with fellow human beings, and with God’s creation. God provides the means for redemption through the atoning death of Jesus—broken relationships can be healed and reconciled in Christ. After death, all men are judged on the basis of their relationship with God in Christ—believers experience eternal life in the presence of God. The difference between these two worldview matrices is significant, and greatly affects the way that we perceive the world around us.

Every person has a worldview—worldview is ubiquitous and universal. Some worldviews are consciously acknowledged; some are unconsciously entrenched. For example, I consciously hold a Christian theistic worldview which proclaims and worships God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Many, however, unknowingly embrace a worldview which precludes the very possibility of God’s existence. Some worldviews are critically analyzed; others are unquestioningly embraced. For example, Gary Habermas grew up in a Christian home, but had his faith shaken by trials and tribulations, and by atheistic university professors. Dr. Habermas was forced to critically examine his worldview, and after years of philosophical and emotional searching, he concluded that Christianity was correct. He remains a vibrant Christian today, and a world-class philosopher and professor as well. Finally, some worldviews are challenged and eventually rejected; others are held firmly for life. For example, Billy Graham and Charles Templeton began their adult life on the same path—as promising and powerful Christian evangelists. In their mid-20s, they simultaneously went through a deep crisis of faith and belief. Billy Graham remained on the Christian path; Charles Templeton questioned and eventually rejected the Christian worldview, and is now an elderly agnostic.

So worldviews can be conscious or unconscious; examined or unexamined; rejected or maintained. But worldviews are like souls—everyone has one, even if they think they don’t. Unfortunately, the worldview of many (perhaps most) Canadians is unconscious and unexamined. The Greek philosopher Socrates declared, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” To modify Socrates’ wisdom, I would also argue that the unexamined worldview is not worth holding. As Christians, we need to consciously hold and examine our worldview, and seek to see reality through the correct interpretive lenses. My purpose is not to argue for or establish the Christian worldview in its entirety. Rather, I want us to look at the importance of worldview in general, and draw some conclusions. Particularly, I suggest that each one of us can understand the necessity of cultivating a Christian worldview by understanding three essential ways they influence our interpretation of evidence and arguments. Through examining the three ways that worldview influences our interpretation of external data, I pray that we will understand how we should critically examine worldviews—our own and other peoples’.

I love detective shows, like Law & Order, and particularly Monk. When cops or crown attorneys have a working thesis concerning a particular crime, the way they treat evidence is affected by how that evidence relates to their governing thesis. For example, if they have a suspect who they think committed the crime in question, tiny bits of evidence will strengthen their position. In one Monk episode, called Monk and the Astronaut, Adrian Monk investigates the murder (a staged suicide) of a former call girl who was about to publish a revealing autobiography. Monk quickly becomes convinced that the murderer is a prominent NASA astronaut and rising politician. During the investigation, it is suggested to Monk that the woman’s autobiography was going to include a chapter relating how the suspect was intimately involved with the dead call-girl earlier, and was arrested at one point for beating her to a pulp. When Monk hears that, it supports his thesis that the astronaut is “the guy”. It provides “motive” for the murder. The evidence is not airtight—there are no surviving manuscripts of the autobiography, no solid proof that the woman was going to “out” the suspect, no concrete evidence that the call-girl was beaten up by the suspect. But it doesn’t take a big piece of evidence to support or maintain Monk’s theory.

As it is with criminal theories, so it is with worldview. It takes relatively less evidence (or less persuasive arguments) to support an existing worldview. This is the first way in which worldview affects the way we treat external data. Tiny shreds of external confirmation support our worldview and are clung to accordingly. You can see this with proponents of evolution. According to Darwin’s original theory, the fossil record should be replete with multitudes of examples of intermediate species, transitional fossils which highlight the evolution from one distinct species into another. While evolutionists acknowledge that the vast fossil evidence predicted by early Darwinists is simply not there, the theory persists. And every year or two, you hear about the proclamation of a new fossil discovery of a professed “transitional species”. There are not many of these intermediates, certainly not as many as predicted; but proponents of an evolutionary worldview cling to each new proposed discovery as “proof” of the truth of the theory. Alternatively, Christians who believe in life after death, that this physical life is only the introduction to eternity, can point to near-death experiences as proof that there is at least a minimal existence and consciousness after death. It doesn’t take a significant amount of corroborating evidence to support or reinforce an existing worldview.

A second way that worldview affects our interpretation of evidence and argumentation is in the accommodation of new, relatively neutral evidence. Simply put, worldviews interpret new data or arguments in a self-affirming manner. One example is the layers evident in the Grand Canyon. Mainstream geologists look at the data, carbon-date the rocks within the layers, and conclude quite logically that the various layers are the product of layers of sediment laid down millions of years after one another. This fits quite nicely within their basic worldview assumption that the earth is billions of years old, and that events on earth have progressed over time through predictable and lengthy physical processes.

A minority of geologists (known as young-earth creationists), however, look at the same physical data and come to radically different conclusions about what it means. From their perspective, the layers and even the ancient appearance of the Grand Canyon is not the result of millions of years of erosion, but rather represents the catastrophic effects of a global flood described in Genesis 6. The dire consequences of the flood, in their view, explains the inaccuracy of carbon-dating the rocks in those sediment strata—the flood changed the composition of the atmosphere, thereby rendering long-term past carbon dating useless. Young-earth geologists begin with a radically different set of assumptions, and thus interpret the same physical data in a radically different way. It must be emphasized that both groups of geologists cannot possibly be right. The data of the Grand Canyon cannot mean both that the earth is billions of years old and the rocks are layers of sediment laid down millions of years after one another; AND that the earth is only thousands of years old and the evident layers are the result of a single catastrophic flood. One camp is correct in their interpretation and the other is incorrect—or, perhaps, both camps are incorrect and some other explanation is the right one. For our purposes, it is not important who is right—what’s important is to note the power of worldview in determining how physical data is interpreted. The point is that worldviews interpret new data or arguments in a self-affirming manner. Young-earth geologists accommodate the data to fit their prevailing worldview; old-earth geologists do the same. If at all possible, people will accommodate new data within their worldview, rather than altering their worldview to suit new data.

For example, in Matthew 12:22-24, the Pharisees have a negative response to Jesus’ miraculous ministry. Then they brought to Jesus a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute, and Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk and see. All the people were astonished and said, ‘Could this be the Son of David?’ But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, ‘It is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons.’ Jesus proceeds to rebuke them for their incoherence and their spiritual closed-mindedness. But what we often miss when we read this passage today is that the Pharisees were doing what comes entirely naturally to us as human beings. They were seeking to accommodate new data, new evidence, within their existing worldview presuppositions. They presumed that God worked through the established religious leadership and channels of second-temple Judaism – the rabbis, priests, temple sacrifices, and daily prayers. Jesus certainly did not fit that model – he proclaimed authority over the Sabbath, healed and taught in his own name and on his own authority. He was a rebel against the religious system. The Pharisees could not fit Jesus within the legitimate religious structure of Israel, hence they had to lump him in with illegitimate religious powers—Satan. Thus, they did not acknowledge the divine origins of Jesus or His ministry. Jesus’ power was unmistakeable; they had to attribute that power to something. The something could not be God, since Jesus was not one of them. Therefore, the power had to be Satan. While we rightly critique the Pharisees for missing the inbreaking of the Kingdom of God in the person and ministry of Christ, let us also notice that they are simply applying their worldview to new and difficult data. The point, again, is that we seek to accommodate new data or information within our existing worldview.

Sometimes this requires a minor adjustment to the worldview. For example, the absence of transitional species in the fossil record has not led evolutionary theorists to abandon their commitment to random mutation and common descent. Rather, the underlying worldview is tweaked to explain the lack of supporting evidence. Hence, Stephen Jay Gould proposed punctuated equilibrium, whereby new species arise very quickly with a large number of mutative changes present in them. Punctuated equilibrium is not the same as Darwinian evolution, which required the changes to occur over long periods of time. But the fundamental worldview remains the same; evtolution is not governed by any type of intelligent designer or Creator.
That is an example of a slight alteration to worldview, and it leads nicely to the third influence of worldview upon our interpretation of evidence and arguments: worldviews can only be defeated or replaced by strong or overwhelming evidence, powerfully persuasive arguments, or significant experiential data. Worldviews represent core assumptions about the world. Such beliefs are not easily altered—especially when they have been critically examined.

For example, let’s go back to Monk and the Astronaut, the episode where Monk suspects an astronaut of murdering a former call-girl who was writing an autobiography. Monk’s primary obstacle in solving that case was the little problem of the suspect’s alibi—he was in a spaceship orbiting the earth at the time of the woman’s death. Alibis really don’t come much more airtight than that! How does Monk deal with that alibi? Does he say, “Oh well, the guy’s got a pretty solid alibi—he must not be the guy”? No—rather, Monk says, “I don’t know how he did it, but he did it. He’s the guy.” It would take more than an apparently air-tight alibi to convince Monk to abandon his thesis. As it happens, Monk was right—he Monk eventually figures out how the astronaut set conditions up for the woman to die while he was in space. The point is that Monk was not dissuaded by pretty powerful evidence that contradicted his thesis.

As it is with crime, so it is with worldview. Worldviews, particularly if they are consciously held, are held tenaciously. A little bit of contrary evidence of argumentation doesn’t do much to challenge a deeply-held worldview. One of the best examples of this that I have come across involves John Dominic Crossan, a scholar with the Jesus Seminar in the 1980s. Crossan once engaged in a public debate with William Lane Craig, one of my favorite Christian scholars and apologists, about the resurrection of Jesus. During their dialogue time, there is a fascinating and very revealing exchange.

First, Craig asks Crossan: “What evidence would it take to convince you [that the resurrection really happened]? Or are your preconceived ideas about the impossibility of the miraculous and so forth so strong that, in fact, they skew your historical judgment so that such an event could never even be admitted into court?” Craig is asking Crossan, what type and amount of evidence would convince you that Jesus really was raised from the dead? Is your worldview so set against the very possibility of such things that you could not be convinced no matter how powerful the evidence? Crossan’s reply is revealing, and worth quoting:
“But it’s a theological presupposition of mine that God does not operate that way. … What would it take to prove to me what you ask? I don’t know, unless God changes the universe.” In other words, there is no type or amount of evidence that could convince Crossan of the literal truth of the resurrection of Jesus. It’s a theological presupposition of his that God would not do such things. It is a part of his worldview. He is absolutely closed to the possibility of Jesus’ resurrection, because it does not fit within his worldview. In order to accept the historicity of Christ’s resurrection, Crossan would have to alter his entire worldview, which holds that there is absolutely no possibility of life after death, and that God never involves Himself in the affairs of the world.

For many people, like Crossan, worldviews are very stubbornly held. Contrary evidence does not convince them to abandon their worldview and adopt a different one. Another way of putting this is to say that worldviews are inherently conservative. They are not changed except under extreme duress. Nonetheless, worldviews do sometimes change. This happens when many formerly Christian students abandon the faith in university—they convert from an unexamined, unconscious Christian worldview to an unexamined but conscious atheistic or agnostic worldview. On the other hand, C. S. Lewis was an atheist until well into his professional adulthood, when he converted to Christianity. In 2004, Antony Flew, Britain’s leading intellectual atheist for the past 50 years, abandoned the atheistic worldview which he had defended quite consciously and critically.

Biblically, the apostle Paul serves as a paradigm example of a worldview conversion. Paul affirms in Philippians 3:4-6 that he a zealous and convinced Jew. He persecuted the early Christian church because he perceived it as blasphemy against the God of Israel. It took an overwhelming personal encounter with the risen Christ, narrated in Acts 9:1-19, for Paul to see that Jesus was the Messiah promised in the Old Testament. He had heard the sermon of Stephen at his martyrdom in Acts 7, but was not swayed. Only a personal encounter with the living God enabled a worldview change and a conversion to Christ.

This is why it is vitally important to cultivate our biblical Christian worldview—to allow God’s Word to shape the way that we view the world and interpret that data and arguments that we come face-to-face with. The worldview that we hold influences the way we interpret the world around us. It takes less evidence to support an existing worldview; new data is interpreted to fit within an existing worldview; and it takes overwhelming evidence or arguments to overturn a consciously-held worldview. It is important that we as Christians consciously hold our Christian worldview, understanding what we believe, why we believe it, the logical and evidential support that confirms our faith. It is easier to share our faith with others if we know what we believe and why we believe it. It is difficult to share Christ with others if we’re not precisely sure what our Christian worldview is or why we hold it to be the truth. Our desire to share our faith with others requires that we know what we believe and why. But it also requires that we engage opposing worldviews.

Many non-Christians are consciously committed to an anti-Christian worldview. If we desire to reach them with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, then we need to expose the weaknesses and flaws in their worldview. For example, many non-Christians deny the existence of any transcendent Being; simultaneously, they promote vibrant moral standards which all people ought to embrace and follow. However, they cannot provide an adequate foundation for the moral standards they promote. This is a flaw which we can pursue to demonstrate why an atheistic worldview is lacking and needs to be replaced by a coherent, liveable (Christian) worldview.

Other non-Christians are unconsciously operating under a worldview which excludes the possibility of God. If we desire to reach them with the Gospel, then we need to highlight their core worldview assumptions. Often they will reject these assumptions when they are forced to admit them, because the unspoken assumptions are untenable. For example, many people today unthinkingly embrace moral relativism—the view that what is right for me could be wrong for you, and vice versa. When pursued, however, such folks will almost always admit that there are some things which are actually and fundamentally wrong—rape, child abuse, torture, cold-blooded murder. But their admission that there are some things that are objectively wrong undermines their professed acceptance of ethical relativism. When you uncover the weaknesses and flaws in others’ non-Christian worldviews, you can begin to bring down their opposition to the Christian faith. Looking back, that was instrumental in my own conversion. I had friends who were willing to challenge my atheistic worldview, and put the truth of Christianity forward for me to consider. Over time, it sunk in, and I became open to considering Christianity.

It is important that followers of Jesus are able to both cultivate a conscious Christian worldview and engage with the non-Christian worldviews of neighbors and friends. The Christian worldview acknowledges that there is something fundamentally wrong with the world. The world that God created perfectly good is marred as a result of mankind’s fall into rebellion and sin. We can be redeemed only through faith in the atoning death and glorious resurrection of Jesus Christ. If we hold to this worldview consistently and consciously, it will affect the way that we interpret the world around us. It is also essential to understand that the contrary worldviews that others hold affect the way that they see and interpret the world around them. It will also enable us to understand how others see the world differently, and thus must interpret We need to have a conscious, well-thought-out worldview, and be willing to challenge the worldview of our non-Christian friends. This is a part of both defending our faith, and of presenting the glorious truth of Jesus Christ to those who do not yet know Him. In Matthew 6:22, Jesus says: The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! Worldview exerts great influence upon how we perceive and understand the world. It is essential to ensure that your worldview is a lens, a matrix, which will enable you to see the world God’s way.

Book Review - Stark, For the Glory of God

Here is a brief summary and critique of Rodney Stark's intriguing historical work, 'For the Glory of God.' Enjoy!

Stark, Rodney. For the Glory of God: How Monotheism Led to Reformations, Science, Witch-Hunts, and the End of Slavery. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. 488 pp.

Rodney Stark, a sociologist of religion with no eminent sympathy for the Christian faith, wants to set the record straight. World historians have, for the past two centuries, maligned and reviled the historic Christian Church for its perceived sins of the past. Stark insists that Christian monotheism has been an incredibly positive force, mobilizing millions of Europeans to achieve admirable goals (11). He deplores the efforts of historians “to dismiss the role of religion in producing ‘good’ things such as the rise of science or the end of slavery, and the corresponding efforts to blame religion for practically everything ‘bad.’” (12) For the Glory of God is his ‘humble’ attempt to provide a balanced account of Christian history—conveying the worthy accomplishments of the Church as well as noting its more sinister side. He pursues his goal by surveying four broad ‘events’—the Protestant Reformations (Chapter 2), the rise of modern science (Chapter 2), witch-hunts (Chapter 3), and the abolition of slavery (Chapter 4).

Chapter 1 – The Protestant Reformations

Stark begins by provocatively insisting that the Protestant Reformation launched by Luther’s 95 Theses in 1517 was not new. He defines reformations as “efforts to restore or renew standards of religious belief and practice to a more demanding level, within a religious organization.” (16) If such attempts are thwarted (as Luther’s ultimately was), the reformation turns outward and becomes a new sect. The need for reformations is the tendency of religious organizations to become lax and lower-intensity over time (17). Hence, reformations are a fairly constant presence within religious bodies. Stark briefly discusses early Christian reformation movements—the Marcionites (27-28), Montanus (28-29), the Donatists (36-37), and Arians (39). He argues that the latter two groups were repressed out of existence, an occurrence which is inherent to monotheism wherever it possesses the power to do so. Stark claims that “religious intolerance is inherent in monotheism,” because “those who believe there is only One True God are offended by worship directed toward other Gods.” (32)

Stark’s main concern throughout this chapter is to challenge popular myths concerning the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. First, he insists that medieval Europe was not a highly religious, consistently Christian entity, as most modern historians claim (17). On the one hand, the majority of the population of northern Europe (Germany, Scandinavia) was only nominally Christian, often combining belief in Christ with residual pagan beliefs and practices. On the other hand, the medieval Catholic Church was often perfectly content with that situation, so long as the coin continued to flow into its coffers (46). Second, he argues that reforming movements were not new in the sixteenth century, despite protestations to the contrary. Stark argues that the Catholic Church had long been divided between the governing Church of Power, and the energizing Church of Piety (40). The former ran the show, while the latter sought to bring greater religious vitality to the clergy and laity alike. Furthermore, there were numerous reforming movements both within and without the Catholic Church. Stark mentions numerous pre-12th century heretical movements (46-47), the Cathars (53-55), the Waldensians (56-57), Free Spirit heresies (58-59), the Flaggelants (60-61), Wyclif and the Lollards (64), and John Hus (65-67). The reforming movement ran deep and wide throughout the medieval Catholic Church. This leads Stark to debunk a third popular medieval myth—that the Catholic Church was peopled by fanatically religious monks, priests, and bishops who sought to instill oppressive religious requirements upon the lay population of Catholic Europe (17). Stark argues that, on the contrary, the priesthood of the Catholic Church was depressingly “immoral and indolent,” and that most sincerely religious Europeans were burdened by the rampant immorality and impiety of the Church.” (68) However, reform-minded popes were unable to achieve the results they sought.

The Protestant Reformation was not, in Stark’s opinion, a successful reformation. Rather than reforming the church from the inside, Luther ended up with a new sect altogether (79). His original goal was simple reform, particularly concerning the sale of indulgences (82). However, as Catholic opposition to his reforms intensified, and he was branded a heretic, Luther was radicalized, and proposed “a complete religious revolution.” (83-84) Luther’s reforms were not theologically innovative—indeed, most of them were represented in the Hussite movement in Bohemia (86-87) generations earlier. Why then did the Protestant Reformation succeed where earlier movements had not? First, Luther framed the religious doctrines in a clear, concise fashion: “salvation by faith alone . . . the priesthood of all believers.” (85) This summation allowed his views to be widely disseminated, a process greatly aided by the newly-invented printing press. Second, Protestants (especially Calvinists) were remarkably effective at sharing their new-found faith with friends, neighbors, and family (95-96). In this way, the spread of Calvinist Protestantism resembled the spread of early Christianity. Stark spends the most time, however, discussing three other factors which determined where Protestantism succeeded, and where it failed to make long-term inroads.

First, the degree of Protestant success was directly proportional to the degree of local Catholic weakness (104). Some newly-Protestant areas (e.g. Denmark, Scandinavia) had been more recently Christianized, and Stark rightly indicts the Church for being satisfied with surface conversion. Other newly-Protestant areas (e.g. southern France, Germanic principalities) were marked by long-standing hostility to agents of the Catholic Church. For example, southern France still retained strong memories of the extermination of the Cathars, and there were still Waldensian communities who had been (and were being) repressed by Catholic France (105-07). Both of these factors led to “local Catholic weakness,” and enabled Protestant success.

Second, “other things being equal, to the extent that local governments responded to popular preferences, they turned Protestant.” (108) Protestantism was a popular movement, and if the government was responsive to popular demands, it was more likely to turn Protestant. Third, “some regimes had much to gain in terms of wealth and power from turning Protestant, while some regimes had far less to gain, having already minimized Church authority and exactions.” (105) German princes, like the Danish and Swedish kings, had both wealth and power threatened by the position of the Catholic Church, giving them strong incentive to embrace Protestantism (114). Spain and France, meanwhile, already exerted strong control over the Church, including its offices and finances, and had little incentive to turn Protestant (112-13).

Chapter 2 – The Religious Origins of Science

Most schoolchildren today are taught that modern science was the result of an “Enlightenment” in which the shackles of religious superstition were thrown off by courageous skeptics. The Christian Church fought the advance of scientific knowledge tooth and nail, but eventually the power of the truth won out, and Christianity receded while science pushed on. Stark refreshes the tableau and sets the record straight. His thesis in this chapter is fairly simple: “not only that there is no inherent conflict between religion and science, but that Christian theology was essential for the rise of science.” (123) Pursuing this thesis requires the debunking of another set of powerful public myths.

First, Stark refutes the ‘Columbus myth,’ which teaches that Columbus had to fight against an oppressive Church which believed that the world was flat, not round. This myth, like so many others, originated in Andrew White’s magisterial work of deception, A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (122). All of Columbus’ contemporaries, including the learned Christian Scholastics, believed that the world was round—their dispute with Columbus was over the circumference of the earth. [Incidentally, on that score Columbus’ opponents were correct; Columbus was fortunate that there was a Western Hemisphere—otherwise he would not have lived to tell his tale!] However, the myth presented by White is a necessary part of the militant atheistic Enlightenment tale—hence its enduring power.
Second, Stark refutes the myth of the “Dark Ages,” presenting medieval Europe as a hotbed of technical innovation (130-33) and Scholastic learning (134-43). Proponents of the Enlightenment require a ‘Dark Ages’ to contrast their own views; but the proposed perspective of medieval Europe is simply mythical. Stark notes that medieval Europe not only created technical innovations of their own, but rapidly implemented innovations derived elsewhere (133-34). Meanwhile, the universities, founded and endowed by the Church, promoted scientific learning and theorizing.

Third, Stark refutes the myth that the advance of science required the discarding of Christian theism. Rather, science required a Christian foundation on which to build. “Christianity depicted God as a rational, responsive, dependable, and omnipotent being and the universe as his personal creation, thus having a rational, lawful, stable structure, awaiting human comprehension.” (147) Christian theology presented a positive framework in which scientific hypotheses could be tested with confidence. Stark notes that neither China (149-52), Greece (153-54), nor Islam (154-55) contained sufficient theoretical and theological boundaries for modern science. Christian doctrine alone provided the key: nature is because it has a transcendent Creator; God’s laws govern natural regularities; knowing nature enables deeper comprehension of God (157). Further supporting Stark’s thesis, an examination of the most prominent scientists in the 16th and 17th centuries uncovers a remarkable degree of pious, devout Christian faith (162-63).

Fourth, Stark builds upon earlier arguments and rejects the mythical “Enlightenment.” (166) Just as the hypothesized ‘Dark Ages’ were non-existent, so too was the ‘Enlightenment.’ On the one hand, the Greek classics did not have to be rediscovered—they were already known, discussed, and generally rejected by Scholastics throughout the universities of Europe (156). On the other hand, the emergence of science was built upon the earlier insights of medieval Scholastics (166). Even in the 18th and 19th centuries, Christian theologians and scientists were mutually willing to adopt and acknowledge one another’s insights (176). Christians were active in natural theology (173) and astronomy (173-74), and eagerly sought to unite science and theology (174).

Fifth, Stark refutes the myth that evolution is a battle between science and religion. Rather, it is “an attack on religion by militant atheists who wrap themselves in the mantle of science in an effort to refute all religious claims concerning a Creator—an effort that has also often attempted to suppress all scientific criticism of Darwin’s work.” (176) There is no inherent contradiction between Darwin’s theory itself and Christian theism—Stark demonstrates that numerous Christians had adopted some type of natural selection and intra-species deviation through evolutionary means long before Darwin published Origin of Species (176-77). But Darwin’s theory is marred by numerous difficulties, improbabilities, and unproven assertions (178-83). Nonetheless, atheists seized upon Darwin’s theory as the best one yet put forward, and presented it as categorically disproving the existence of the Christian God (185). In belated response to continual harsh rhetoric, many Christians eventually adopted a defensive stance and rejected Darwinian evolution wholesale (187). Christians were not being asked to accept the simple scientific hypothesis that life had evolved; rather, they were ‘required’ to “agree to the untrue and unscientific claim that Darwin had proved that God played no role in the process.” (187)

Finally, Stark disputes the argument that scientists have become increasingly hostile to religion. He presents surveys from throughout the 20th century demonstrating both that belief in God is surprisingly robust amongst natural scientists and that such belief has not altered over the past century (193-94). Despite the hopes and claims of militant skeptics, theism continues unabated.

Chapter 3 – Witch-Hunts

The tragedy of witch-hunting in late medieval Europe is a tremendously misunderstood phemonenon. First, it is often asserted that millions of people, particularly women, were executed during the persecutions. The truth, Stark insists, is that only 60,000 – 100,000 people were executed, one-third of whom (at least) were men (202-04). Second, modern historians generally attribute the extent and brutality of the witch-hunts to the fanatically religious Inquisitors. The truth, however, is that ecclesiastical authorities were much more hesitant to prosecuted accused witches than were secular courts, and that punishments handed out by Inquisitors tended to be considerably lighter (204). Third, today’s students are taught that the witch-hunts were ended by the triumph of secular rationalism. The truth, Stark argues, is that no atheistic voices were raised in protest against witchcraft until after the witch-hunts had ceased—the witch-hunts were stopped by other factors (286-87). Stark endeavors to set the record straight, proposing a model for causes of the witch-hunts, as well as factors in their cessation.

To set the necessary framework, Stark begins with a brief discussion of magic (205), sorcery (205-06), and Satanism (206-07). Only the latter could result in charges of witchcraft and the associated death penalty—and such charges could only arise in monotheistic cultures (206). Stark then debunks eight common assertions of why the witch-hunts occurred (208-23). A brief discussion of magic in the Greco-Roman world establishes that when the Christian Church “came to power, magic was everywhere. Virtually everyone believed in it.” (226) The later rejection of witchcraft was not a return to the golden age of Greek rationalism; rather, it was something entirely new. Throughout the Middle Ages, the Church struggled with the reality that all types of magic—Church and non-Church alike—sometimes succeeded and sometimes failed (230). Church authorities acknowledged that pagan magic sometimes worked, and struggled to understand how this could be so (236). Eventually, Scholastics deduced the only logical, rational conclusion: non-Church magic worked through the power of evil spirits, particularly Satan (237). “There was no place in their worldview for causation that was neither natural nor fully supernatural. … Thus did logic and reason lead the best minds of the time into catastrophic error.” (238) Stark is remarkably lenient toward the Scholastic authorities who concluded that non-authorized incantations, potions, and spells necessarily relied upon satanic power!
Stark then builds a theoretical model to account for the rise, occurrence, prevalence, and intensity of witch-hunts in various geographic locations. He posits three key factors to account for “when and where” witch-hunts occurred (245). Each factor is necessary but not sufficient—only the combination of all three factors was sufficient for witch-hunts to occur (254). The first factor is the continuing practice and efficacy of magic (246). The second factor is the presence of “intense and constant religious conflicts.” (246) Stark notes that the time of the most intense witch-hunts, 1590-1640, also marks the height of the Catholic-Protestant wars, as well as severe incursions of Ottoman Turks in Europe (246-50). The third factor is the lack of strong, centralized political or ecclesiastical authority (251). Local officials easily got carried away by witch crazes; central authorities, where able, continually reigned them in (251-54). In times and places where magic was effectively practiced (particularly parts of Europe that had never been effectively and thoroughly Christianized), religious conflicts were prevalent, and central authorities were weak or non-existent, witch-hunts took strongest form and shape.

Case studies bear out Stark’s hypothesis. Spain, France (except the “borderlands”), Italy, and England were generally devoid of intense witch-hunts (256-62). The lowlands of Germany, as well as the Scandinavian countries, were marred by severe and intense persecutions and executions of accused witches (263-73).
Stark then proposes four factors which contributed to the cessation of the witch-hunts. Notably, the rise of skeptical Enlightenment materialism is entirely and consciously absent from his list (277). First, witch-hunts could easily target and eliminate marginal members of society; but once those “socially inexpensive” members of society were executed, the costs of witch-hunts rose to “unsustainable levels.” (279) Arresting and prosecuting acknowledged outcasts and misfits was easy; when prominent members of society were implicated by new accusers, witch-hunts became in-credible and unsustainable (278-79). Second, the establishment of religious peace through the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 removed ongoing warfare as a contributing factor in witch-hunts. “Just as the outbreak of severe religious conflicts brought on the search for witches, the end of the religious wars and the implementation of treaties of toleration brought it to an end. In nation after nation, witch-hunting collapsed after the Peace of Westphalia.” (282) Third, the strengthening of central political authorities following 1648 placed stricter guidelines of prosecutions of accused witches (282). Finally, increasing skepticism concerning the existence and practice of witches led to the demise of witch-hunts (283). However, this skepticism did not arise from atheists who disbelieved in magic. Rather, Scholastics and Inquisitors led the charge against the accuracy of accusations of witch-craft (283-86). Well-trained and deeply committed Christians, “responding to the evidence of their sense,” brought the witch-hunts to an end (287).

Chapter 4 – Slavery

The typical school textbook of Western history presents slavery (explicitly or implicitly) as a novel invention of colonial Christian Europe, and insists that the abolition of slavery was achieved not by moral suasion but by Enlightenment humanism (291-92). Sadly, though happily from a Christian perspective, this widespread myth is entirely fictional. In this final chapter, Stark sets out to tell the story of slavery the way it really happened.

First, slavery has been an institution in human cultures since before the Egyptian pyramids, and has permeated every area of the globe. North American Indians, those ‘noble savages’ of Western romantic imagination, engaged in intense slavery (293-95). Greece and Rome, so admired as the ‘classical civilizations’ by Renaissance and Enlightenment secularists, were built on the backs of slaves (295-99). Slavery was institutional in Islamdom (301-03), partly based upon the personal example of the Prophet Muhammad, who owned, captured, and traded slaves himself (338). Enslavement of Africans was not initiated by Christian colonialists, but had long standing between African tribes themselves (304), and was furthered by Muslim incursions. In fact, Christian European nations relied on long-established African slave runners for their continual supply of slaves (307). However, when European nations founded colonies in the ‘New World,’ they captured and utilized slaves as a primary labor force (309-23).

Second, while European nations did delve into widespread slavery, the Church was hardly complicit in the practice. On the contrary, Christian theology had outlawed slavery since early in the Middle Ages (291). Thomas Aquinas could speak of slavery as a quaint and obsolete institution, no longer practiced by Christian Europe (329). While the occasional pope (e.g. Innocent VIII) ignored canon law and possessed slaves, such violators were generally guilty of ignoring the rest of canon and biblical law as well (330). The papacy in general condemned slavery, and considered an excommunicable offense (331). As Stark proclaims, “The problem wasn’t that the Church failed to condemn slavery; it was that few heard and most of them did not listen.” (332) There were indeed some clergy who sent (or lived out) mixed messages; but they were exceptions to the rule (337).

Third, monotheism alone possessed the moral suasion to condemn and outlaw the institution of slavery. Stark makes a fascinating side foray into the issue of morality and religious theology, arguing that monotheism alone is capable of promulgating a strong, binding, effectual system of morality. Plural gods do not have the authority; impersonal gods cannot sustain the notion of ‘sin’ at all; philosophy on its own conveys no moral weight (324-25). Only monotheism can provide a concerned, personal, omniscient, omnipotent God who enacts moral laws and expects conformation (325). Some Jewish sects developed abolition movements (328-29), and Christianity in general was directly opposed to slavery from the outset.

Stark develops this last thesis as the fourth pillar of this chapter. He proposes the thesis that abolitionist movements arose when three factors coincided. In the first place, anti-slavery movements required an appropriate moral disposition (339). This was provided by Christian sects—particularly Quakers and Methodists in America, and Methodists, Quakers, and the Clapham sect in Britain (340-41, 349-51). In the second place, anti-slavery movements could only arise when they were proximate to the practice of slavery itself. Thus, abolition movements were strong in the northern States, which though they did not practice slavery themselves, were intimately familiar with the plight of slaves in the South (not to mention Caribbean colonies). (347) In the third place, the proximity and moral persuasion of anti-slavery movements needed to be distant from any perception of self-interest (339). Stark develops this thesis quite persuasively, but the key assertion he is making, which runs contrary to the trends of modern historians for the past two hundred years, is that it is Christian moral persuasion which was responsible for the abolition of slavery (353, 365).

Fifth, and finally, Stark refutes the widespread belief that Enlightenment secularism (rather than Christian conscience) was responsible for abolition. Having already established that Christian ethics were a necessary element of anti-slavery movements, Stark proceeds to debunk the first part of the equation. He presents a list of prominent Enlightenment thinkers—Hobbes, Locke, Voltaire, Montesquieu, Burke, and Hume—who “fully accepted slaver.” (359) Indeed, it was very much not the philosophical intellectuals “who assembled the moral indictment of slavery, but the very people they held in such contempt: men and women having intense Christian faith, who opposed slavery because it was a sin.” (360)

Postscript – Gods, Rituals, and Social Science

Stark closes with a fascinating postscript in which he debunks the sociological axiom (based upon Durkheim’s theses) that religion is fundamentally about ritual, not belief in supernatural Gods (367-68). Stark shows that, to the contrary, “Gods are the fundamental feature of religions.” (376) Furthermore, not all religions can underwrite a moral order (373); but rather only “images of Gods as conscious, morally concerned beings.” (374) Hence, Christianity possessed the moral resources to oppose slavery, where secular rationalism, polytheism, and impersonal religions did not.

Worldview Comprehensive Exam - Question 3

NOTE: This is the final one of my comprehensive exam responses. Like the rest, it is unedited, was written in 80 minutes with no resources at hand. I placed this one last because, along with the first one, it serves as a framework for my own understanding of apologetics and my personal apologetic strategy. I hope you enjoy it, and as always, comments are welcome.

Question #3. Discuss and defend against major objections your view of the role of using evidences and presuppositions in apologetics.

My fundamental approach to apologetics, what I will ‘discuss and defend,’ is an “integrative classical apologetic” approach, illustrated most powerfully in the ministry of William Lane Craig (reasonablefaith.org). I will defend an approach that begins with rational argumentation and demonstration of the probable truth of Christianity.

Apologetics rightfully begins as a personal encounter with another person. There are, of course, impersonal apologetic encounters – over the internet, through written works, etc. – but each of them presume a personal encounter at least on the intellectual sphere. More frequently, our apologetic encounters are truly personal – engagement with another person, a skeptic, seeker, or doubter on a personal, one-to-one (or small group) level.

As such, apologetics must recognize certain truths about the person we are engaging. First, they, like us, are created in the image of God. They are endowed with reason and intellect. They contain within themselves an inherent desire to know and worship God. They are endowed with the freedom to choose, the ability to make real, meaningful choices between good and evil.

Second, they are, like us, radically fallen. The fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden has consequences for all their offspring, which includes every human being. The fall has affected not only their relationship with God (which is irreparably broken), but also their religious and intellectual capacities. Thus, whereas pre-Fall our religious desire was oriented toward God, post-Fall our religious desire is opposed to God.

However, third, the results of the Fall do not result in a total and complete lack of common ground between believer and unbeliever. Christians and non-Christians share a great deal in common, and the common ground establishes the possibility of dialogue and discussion. In personal encounters, however, we will often have to identify the common ground that exists between us and our friend. It will not always be the same!

A. Awakening Religious Desire

A next step in apologetic encounters is awakening religious desire within our partner. Why ought they even to listen to appeals to consider Christianity? I am convinced that within our culture, people are spiritually hungry, but often do not even realize it. Thus, I begin with an account of my own religious experience of growing up a convinced, but empty atheist. The worldview without Christ, particularly the naturalistic modern worldview, is an empty, hopeless, meaningless, purposeless existence. I experienced it, and I felt its powerful nihilism.

However, most contemporary functional atheists do not consistently think through the consequences of their worldview. They see life without God, but seek to retain meaning and purpose within it. Like Loyal Rue, they embrace (or proclaim) a “Noble Lie,” something to retain a semblance of purpose even though it’s a myth. Or, like Richard Dawkins, they seek to proclaim that, despite the fundamental meaningless of life, we can construct something meaningful out of it. Or, like Camus and Sartre, they insist that we must simply act and existentially make life meaningful. But thinking it through, the naturalist must end in a Nietzschean nihilism. If there is no God, there is no eternal life, there is no ultimate purpose in life, there is no meaning in life. There is no hope. There is only bleak, hopeless, infinite darkness in the universe of man. What is man, in the absence of God? An insignificant and doomed member of an insignificant and doomed race on an insignificant and doomed planet within the immense scope of a boundless universe (which itself may then be but an insignificant and doomed member of an infinite multiverse).

But God has created us such that we are existentially incapable of living within that framework. Man matters, and we all know it. We all live that way, even if our worldview denies it. Thus, the Christian apologist will seek to uncover the presuppositions of the one he is engaging, demonstrating the logical end of their worldview. If they embrace a thorough materialistic naturalism, they end up with no purpose, no meaning, no life after death. Nothing of substance or hope. But they cannot live that way. Schaeffer calls this taking the roof off – removing the hedge of protection that people seek to erect to insulate them from the logical extensions of their worldview. Alternatively, he calls it identifying the point of tension within their worldview. Van Til calls it showing the irrationalism and unliveability of the non-Christian worldview. Each way of putting it is correct. Essentially, the apologist must uncover and explain the full nature and scope and consequence of the worldview presuppositions that our friends have and hold. While on its own, this seems (according to Schaeffer) a cruel and cold act, it is actually an act of self-giving love – bringing the other person to the point where they recognize the emptiness of their own worldview, and may consequently be open to considering the truth of the Christian worldview.

B. The Place of Evidences and Proofs

Having (hopefully) brought our apologetic referent to a place where they are willing to consider the faith that is within us, we can turn to demonstrating the truth of the Christian faith on the basis of theistic proofs and evidences.

For the modern naturalist, mere consideration of the existence of God may be a difficult intellectual step. Thus, utilizing the theistic proofs is helpful in showing the rationality of belief in basic theism. That is, before considering Christianity per se, it is often necessary to help people see the probability of the existence of God. Of these, the cosmological, moral, and experiential are the ones that I consider to be the most powerful and persuasive.

The cosmological argument for the existence of God stems from a basic argument: (P1) Everything that begins to exist has an external cause; (P2) The universe began to exist; (Conclusion) Therefore the universe has an external cause. The first premise has been historically unquestioned. It is self-evident that things which begin to exist have a cause outside of themselves. Some insist that contemporary quantum mechanics call this premise into question; however, the products of quantum vacuums are not the result of something coming from nothing. Rather, quantum vacuums themselves contain a rich structural environment which permits the production of quantum particles. The self-evident truth is that nothing comes from nothing, and nothing ever has or will.

The second premise has historically been rejected. Greeks and modernists alike posited the eternality of the universe in a steady state. If the universe had always existed, it did not have a beginning point as such; therefore, there is no need to posit and external cause (creator) for it. On logical grounds, medieval Islamic and Christian theologians argued that there could not be a literal infinite past to the universe – that it was logically incoherent. Examples like Hilbert’s Hotel help to illustrate the difficulties inherent within an actual infinite series.

However, it was not until the rise of Big Bang cosmology in the 20th century that Christian apologists came to take hold of the cosmological argument as a primary proof for the existence of God. Big Bang theory (derisively named by Hoyle) points to a singularity in the past, a point at which the density of the universe was infinitely high, and the space it occupied infinitesimally small, such that all known laws of physics break down at that point. The evidence provided by red shift, cosmic background radiation demonstrate that there is a beginning to the universe – a point at which the space-time continuum begins, exploding into existence out of, literally, nothing. The point is, the scientific evidence demonstrates that there is a beginning to the universe, or that, according to the second premise, “the universe began to exist.”

Granted, some physicists and astronomers seek to avoid the implications of Big Bang theory by positing an oscillating universe, or a Hawking-type imaginary time/no boundary condition; but these are attempts to avoid the obvious implications of what seems self-evident in Big Bang theory – the universe had a beginning, and therefore requires an external cause to bring it into existence.

The moral argument for God’s existence works from the innate moral consciousness of mankind, combined with our acknowledgment of our own failure to live up to our own moral standards, and argues that there must be an external law-maker who gives the moral law. C. S. Lewis nicely summarize the moral argument in his Mere Christianity; Timothy Keller explains it succinctly for a 21st-century audience in his Reasons for God. Man cannot live amorally. We all acknowledge the existence of a moral code. Yet the moral code cannot originate within ourselves (individually) or our society (as a collective), because in either case, the source of the moral code would be insufficient to ground a truly objective morality.

However, we all acknowledge not a particularistic morality, but rather a transcendent morality that applies to all people at all times, whether they like it or not and whether they admit it or not. Hence, Lewis famously argues that morality must be transcendent, otherwise there would be no point in having fought the Nazis. If Nazi morality was simply different than British, then why send all those Brits to France or Holland to die trying to eradicate Nazi morality? If the Holocaust was simply the expression of a different social contract, why react so viscerally and violently against it? Again, our inherent and innate crying out against the injustice and horrors of events like the Holocaust are evidence of a transcendent moral code which we expect all human beings in all times at all places to live up to.
Such a moral code cannot find a suitable foundation in either sociobiology or social contract theory – the two major alternatives to theistic ethics. If morality depends upon us, then it may change tomorrow. The Holocaust might be right tomorrow. Rape might be right tomorrow. Self-sacrificial love could be wrong tomorrow. Or, when we achieve our next “evolutionary step,” morality could change. Thus, perhaps the Nazis were more highly evolved than the rest of us, and we all wiped out the next manifestation of human evolution in World War II. Yet this approach is simply implausible and unliveable. That is not the way we approach ethics. The only sufficient grounding for objective morality is a transcendent moral source – something outside of human morality which grounds our ethics; namely, God.

The argument from religious experience is twofold. First, it points to the religious experience of billions of people throughout the ages, stating that the vast majority of human beings have been incurably religious. All those billions of spiritual human beings could not be wrong; but a naturalistic worldview requires them all to be wrong if there is no God. Second, it points to the unquenchable religious desires that exist within all of us – the drive to know and worship the divine, and the yearning for eternal life. Both these desires are evident from the dawn of human civilization; all human societies have had religious expression and the desire for eternal life. Again, if all there is is stuff, this is incomprehensible.

Critics of such classical / evidential apologetics will argue two things: (1) the cosmological (and moral and experiential) argument is not conclusive or certain; and (2) the cosmological argument does not establish Christianity itself, only a bare theism, or even deism. On both counts, they are right. However, their criticism is simply irrelevant, for the argument is not intended to be or do either. Theistic arguments and proofs are used when someone is open to the possibility of theism. Alternatively, they are useful when someone insists that it is irrational, stupid, or otherwise irresponsible to believe in the existence of God. In the first case, theistic proofs give people strong, persuasive (though admittedly not iron-clad) reasons that they ought to believe God exists. In the second case, theistic proofs show skeptics that there are rational demonstrations of our faith, that we are well within our epistemic rights in assenting to such proofs as the cosmological argument as rational support for our Christian faith.

In reply to the second criticism, I must again admit that they are absolutely correct. But the theistic proofs do not exist in a vacuum either. We use them as a tool in our toolbox; one part of a personal apologetic which is intended to also consider evidences related explicitly to the truth of the Christian faith. If we use the cosmological argument in isolation from everything else, then yes, the criticism is valid and telling. However, since we do not, but rather move on from such theistic proofs to consider the reliability of Scripture and the proofs of the resurrection of Jesus, the objection is muted.

The theistic arguments for theism can be helpfully supplemented by two things: (1) a response to the problem of evil (a defense or theodicy); and (2) a philosophical case for the possibility of miracles. Both are helpful, but are beyond the scope of this essay (and particularly the time I have remaining!).

Supplementing the theistic proofs and rational arguments, my apologetic approach moves on to consider specific evidences for the truth of Christianity. First, the defense of biblical reliability (outlined in answer to Question #2 above) is essential. Christianity is founded upon the inerrancy, inspiration, and authority of Scripture. Thus, we must be able to point to the reliability of Scripture as the source of our faith.

Of course, at this point, Van Til or some comparable presuppositional apologist will turn red in the face. “How can you argue FOR the reliability of Scripture?!?!?! You must begin with the authority of Scripture! It is not a conclusion of apologetic argument, but rather the beginning point.” However, a presuppositional apologist will need to make an argument for adopting Scripture as the starting point for apologetics himself. And on what basis do they do so? Often they insist (as does Van Til) that nothing makes sense unless we do accept Scripture as the starting point. That is, all other starting points for human thought and discourse end up providing insufficient basis for rationality. But why should this matter? Why is reason important? The presuppositionalist is simply acknowledging what the classical apologist uses as an essential starting point – we have to acknowledge the legitimacy of human reason in order to have an apologetic conversation at all! The presuppositionalist is concerned about elevating human reason to autonomous magisterial status – a legitimate concern, but not a flaw that the classical apologist is committed to falling into. I just think it is ironic that presuppositional apologetics object to the classicist’s use of reason, when their only method of establishing the sufficiency of Scripture as an apologetic starting point is, itself, reason.

Nonetheless, there is some merit in the presuppositionalist’s concern that we argue for, rather than from, the reliability (inerrancy, inspiration, and authority) of Scripture. However, their criticism misses some of the existential point of modern apologetics. The impact of higher biblical criticism over the past 300 years has been devastating, both within and without the church. The vast majority of non-Christians are avowedly convinced that the Bible is an unreliable, mythical, figment of early Christians’ imaginations. Many even within the church (Strauss, Reimarus, Schleiermacher, Crossan all think they are saving the church, not destroying the faith) have bought into the unreliability of Scripture. To approach the average nominal Christian or convinced non-Christian (e.g., the Muslim who thinks Scripture to be corrupted) and simply say they should believe this because the Bible says it is so, is insufficient to begin with. That is, we cannot legitimately use Scripture as our starting point, when the person we are conversing with disavows the reliability of Scripture. They simply will not listen to us. If that is our goal, then perhaps we can go ahead and speak to ears that are unhearing. But that is not the apologetic method we observe in the New Testament. Yes, Paul frequently gets frustrated with the Jews in the synagogue when they refuse to listen, refuse to repent, continue stridently in their opposition to the Gospel. But he continually begins with where people are at, and seeks to bring them to a rational acknowledgment of the truth of the Gospel. When evangelizing Jews (giving them the reason for the hope he has), he uses Scripture liberally and continually; when evangelizing Gentiles (giving them the reason for the hope he has), he does not refer to Scripture near so frequently, indeed often beginning with their own poets or religious expressions (e.g. Acts 17).

In short, before many of our contemporary skeptics and seekers will listen to what the Bible has to say, they need to be convinced of why they should listen to what the Bible has to say. Why is it trustworthy? How historically reliable is it? Once we have demonstrated that, we have removed rational obstacles to them considering the claims that the Gospel makes upon them.

From the argument for biblical reliability, it is essential to move on to two fundamental points: (1) the self-understanding of Jesus Christ; and (2) the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Again, both elements are crucial, but time prevents me from deep consideration of them herein.

The self-understanding of Christ is examined in order to demonstrate who Jesus thinks He is. The need is to show that Jesus cannot be considered just a prophet, just a teacher, or a wandering cynic (Crossan), or an eschatological prophet (Schweitzer), but rather that Jesus presents Himself as being God in the flesh. This is established on the basis of the titles used by Jesus to refer to Himself: (a) Son of Man (the divine figure of Daniel 7:13-14); (b) Messiah; and (c) Son of God (in unique intimate fellowship with God the Father in most un-Jewish fashion). It is further confirmed by Jesus’ actions, which assumed divine prerogatives: (a) forgiveness of the sins of others (e.g. Mark 2:1-12); (b) teaching with authority reserved for God (e.g. Matthew 5-7), even correcting rabbinic misunderstanding of Torah; (c) healing without regard for temple procedure or sacrifice; (d) claiming to determine men’s eternal destiny. The claims made through Jesus’ words and works is what ultimately gets Him crucified. The sissy Jesus of the Jesus Seminar and other liberal scholarship simply isn’t radical enough to bother with! Furthermore, the self-understanding of Jesus is confirmed through the understanding of the first generations of Christians, who immediately began to worship Jesus as equal to Yahweh (in most un-Jewish fashion). Why?

Because of the resurrection of Jesus on the third day after His crucifixion. The resurrection is unquestionably the pivotal historical event in the Christian faith, and (from a Christian perspective) in all of human history. Jesus Christ is crucified, but on the third day, so the Christian claims, was raised from the dead, and 40 days later ascended into heaven. The resurrection precipitates a radical change in the worldview of the 1st-century Jewish disciples of Jesus. They begin to worship Jesus as God; they begin worshiping not only on the Sabbath day (the seventh day of the week), but also on the Lord’s Day (the first day of the week); they no longer consider the temple the pre-eminent focal point of worship and faith.

The culmination of Christian apologetics, then, is pointing to the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Thus, Craig concludes his Reasonable Faith with a lengthy chapter on the truth of the resurrection; thus, I conclude apologetic arguments and series with the resurrection as well. If Jesus is raised from the dead, this is the crowning confirmation of the truth of Christianity. However, the resurrection is also highly doubted today, again, even within the Christian Church. In our generation, the scholarship and public appearances of John Dominic Crossan have been powerful in persuading many that the resurrection is a ‘metaphor,’ speaking of the continuing empowering presence of Jesus with his disciples community, rather than a literal concrete historical fact in space and time. The metaphor of resurrection is, in my view, the dominant understanding of the resurrection in Canada today, including in most segments of the Christian Church.

Thus, pointing to a historical argument in support of the historicity of the resurrection is crucial. Certain historical facts are crucial in making this argument.

(1) The crucifixion and death of Jesus. Not really doubted by anyone outside of Muslim circles. Nonetheless, it is good to be able to point to Gospel and secular sources which confirm that Jesus died by crucifixion.

(2) The burial of Jesus by Joseph of Arimathea. Crossan disputes the burial, arguing that Mark invents Joseph and the other gospel-writers extrapolate from Mark’s invention. However, there is literally no documentary evidence in support of Crossan’s thesis, and no good reason to dispute the burial story.

(3) The discovery of the empty tomb by women on Easter Sunday. This is most frequently doubted, sometimes through a surface reading of 1 Corinthians 15:4, which does not explicitly mention the discovery of an empty tomb. However, as that passage goes on to discuss the appearances of the risen, physical, Jesus to many witnesses, the empty tomb is clearly presumed.

(4) The appearance of Jesus to many, including the skeptic James and the opponent Paul and a large group of about 500 people. The appearances demonstrate that the resurrection was not a hallucination (hallucinations don’t happen to large groups at the same time). The conversion of James demonstrates that Jesus appeared not only to friends, but also to doubters. And Paul’s conversion is instrumental.

(5) The transformation of the disciples, from fearful cowards into bold proclaimers.

(6) The early preaching of the resurrection in Jerusalem, the very place where the crucifixion occurred. It is striking that there is absolutely no historical record of anyone denying the existence of the empty tomb, despite the early preaching of the resurrection in Jerusalem.

N. T. Wright concludes (rightly) that the birth and growth of the Christian Church in the first century is entirely inexplicable unless Jesus Christ truly was raised from the dead. He is correct. However, it is a fact that many people, despite knowing the arguments and acknowledging the evidence, deny the conclusion. Why?

This is where presuppositions come into play. After examining the theistic proofs and considering the evidences for the truth of the Christian faith, if our conversation partner does not acknowledge the truth of Christianity, it is necessary to consider the impact of their worldview presuppositions. Van Til and other presuppositionalists rightly emphasize the role of worldview in preventing people from being able to consider and embrace the truth of Christianity. Once we work through our apologetic, and demonstrate that Christianity is fully rational and embraceable, we can turn and show someone the reasons why they personally find it difficult or impossible to accept it. Here, the presuppositional insight into the noetic effects of sin, and man’s desire to be autonomous, is helpful and essential.
Thus, in a well-rounded, comprehensive apologetic strategy, it is essential to emphasize the use of reason and evidences. However, it will also become necessary to consider presuppositions, and expose the faulty presuppositions of people who will not accept the evidence for the faith.

World Religions Comprehensive Exam - Question #3

NOTE: This is the final of my three world religions comprehensive exam questions. Early next week I will post the third of my worldview & apologetics exam questions. As a reminder, these are unmodified versions of essay exam responses - I had 80 minutes for each question, with no resources at hand. This one was fun to work through - hope you enjoy it!

QUESTION C. A few scholars and any number of anti-cult activists see parallels between Islam and the LDS Church. Compare and contrast the rise and development of these two movements and then evaluate the potential of the LDS as a “new Islam”.

About a month ago, I talked to a friend in Edmonton who is now the youth pastor at a small Baptist church. Years ago he led a student mission trip to Utah, and has engaged in significant research into the history and doctrine of the LDS Church. I mentioned to him that I was researching the comparisons between Islam and Mormonism. His response was immediate: “Oh yeah, there are such close parallels; it’s so obvious!”

Two days ago, I had a conversation with a neighbor who is studying at the seminary, and mentioned that I was preparing to write on the parallels between Islam and the LDS Church. His response was just as immediate: “I don’t see it; what are you talking about?”

Is there a legitimate parallel? In this essay, I will argue that there are a number of historical and theological parallels between Islam and the LDS Church, both in their origins and development. However, I will conclude that the discontinuities are greater than the parallels, and that the LDS actually has the potential to be a stronger, more influential Islam.

I. Historical Context

Islam and Mormonism both arose in a context of significant religious turmoil. Mohammad’s Arabia had been dominated by polytheism for centuries; small communities of monotheistic Jews and Christians were present, but relatively unimportant on the Arabian peninsula. There was also, however, a smattering of emerging Arabic monotheists. The global Christian community during Mohammad’s day was fractured and divided – Nestorians, Monophysites, Greek Orthodox, and Roman Catholics viewed each other with considerable suspicion. The powerful Empires persecuted the Nestorian and Monophysite ‘heresies’. It also seems that the form of Christianity with which Mohammad was most familiar was some unknown perversion of the faith, which worshiped God the Father, Mary his sexual consort, and Jesus his biological offspring (a distinctly unorthodox trinity, to be sure).

Joseph Smith’s American context was similarly embroiled in religious upheaval. Christian monotheism was the unquestioned truth of the day, but Protestant America was divided and fragmented. The Restoration movements (Campbellites) were getting underway, and millenarianism (resulting eventually in the Seventh-Day Adventist Church) was strong as well. Yet there was considerable spiritual hunger in both historical contexts: monasticism and mysticism were powerful in 7th-century Arabia; spiritism and superstition in 19th-century America.

II. Founding Prophet & Revelation
The similarities between the founding prophet and revelation of Islam and the LDS are quite striking. Both men receive messages from angelic visitors – the angel Gabriel for Mohammad, the angel Moroni for Smith. On the other hand, Mohammad is a mature man of 40 at the time of his first revelation, while Smith is a youth of 14. Angelic visitations continue for both men, eventually leading to divine revelations.

Here the differences begin to emerge. Mohammad, who tradition holds was illiterate, receives divine revelation in distinctly oral form – the Qur’an is a command to ‘recite’, a recitation. God’s Word is dictated to and through Mohammad, and is later written down. Smith, on the other hand, is guided to uncover buried golden tablets, which contain the written Word of God preserved for him. Smith is then led to translate the divine revelation through the use of special glasses. God’s Word is already written down for Smith; he only needs to translate it.

Nonetheless, for both Mohammad and Smith, the angelic visitations and divine revelations are the beginning of something new, but simultaneously the recovery of something old and lost. Mohammad held that he was restoring Abrahamic monotheism, which had been revealed through the previous Scriptures, but was then corrupted and violated by later generations of Jews and Christians. Smith held that he was restoring primitive Christianity, which had been revealed through the New Testament, but was then compromised and corrupted by philosophical Greek Christians (Platonic Christianity).

Both Mohammad and Smith, then, viewed the former Scriptures as valuable but corrupted. Hence, the former Scriptures were now being supervened through God’s further revelations. The precise words of divine revelation were crucial in both cases – being particularly revealed through recitation to Mohammad and through inscribed translation to Smith.

A significant difference exists, however. Smith’s Book of Mormon (the golden tablets translated with the glasses) was a one-time revelation, which Smith transcribed and translated and then kept. Mohammad’s Qur’an was revealed over the remainder of his life (610 – 632 A.D.), one Sura (chapter) at a time. Smith did receive further divine revelations during the remainder of his life as well – they were recorded in additional books, particularly the Doctrine & Covenants.

Significantly, however, Muslims hold firmly that divine revelation ceased with the death of Mohammad. The revelations he received from the angel Gabriel were divinely-inspired and sanctioned; but there is no continued revelation through other prophets. Smith, on the other hand, insisted that he was not alone within the Mormon community in receiving divine revelation. Indeed, he emphasized that other Mormon leaders would continue to receive divine revelation after his death. Revelation, in LDS theology, is an ongoing process; revelation, in Muslim doctrine, is complete. This difference cannot be overstated – it represents a chasm between Islam and the LDS Church which cannot be bridged. The parallels have their limits, at which point the discontinuities rise up and outstrip them.

Scholars and (particularly) anti-cult activists often focus on the place of polygamy as a central parallel between Islam and the LDS Church. Indeed, both religions, in their early years, permitted polygamy. But even here there are strong differences. In the first place, Islam did not command polygamy; it merely permitted it within certain restraints and guidelines. It was not considered the norm. Early Mormonism, however, actively promoted polygamy as the rightful natural family relationship. Furthermore, Islam was always open with regards to its permission of polygamy (although many now argue that the Qur’an implicitly tells Muslims that they ought not to engage in such practice). Smith, on the other hand, clandestinely instituted polygamy within the Mormon community, and even denied that it was practiced for a time. Polygamy was viewed in 19th-century America as a bane of devilish intent, and open admission of polygamous practice would have been the death knell for early Mormonism. Finally, the LDS adherence to the doctrine of continuing revelation allowed the Church to outlaw polygamy in the 1890s in order to avoid extinction at the hands of the United States army. Islam never had the resources or the need to eradicate polygamy from its scriptures. To sum up: Islamic polygamy was the exception to the rule, not normative, always open and never denied; Mormon polygamy was hidden and denied at the beginning, then promoted as normative and spiritually healthy, and finally banned by further divine revelation. If this were the sole (or even primary) parallel between Islam and the LDS Church, I would insist that the parallel is so weak as to be meaningless in the end.

A final discontinuity with regards to the founding prophet and revelation of Islam and the LDS Church is with regards to the issue of succession. Mohammad quite clearly did not designate a means of secure succession. He did, apparently, appoint his immediate successor; but beyond that it was entrusted to the wisdom of the umma as a whole to determine future leaders. Smith, on the other hand, developed an elaborate hierarchy of priests and leaders from which future leaders would emerge quite naturally. The consequences of this difference is evident down to the contemporary situation, where LDS leadership is strongly institutionalized and organized, while Islamic leadership is fairly diffuse and localized.

III. Rise and Development

Both Islam and the LDS Church spread and grew rapidly. The political growth of Islam is well-marked through their conquests of Persia, Byzantium, and North Africa. The numerical growth of the LDS Church has been similarly remarkable. From inauspicious beginnings, the LDS Church has emerged as a major religious force in the world – what Rodney Stark calls the most recent successful New Religious Movement. There are evident parallels between the growth and development of Islam and the LDS Church; but again there are also significant discontinuities that throw the significance of the parallels into question. I will look first at the historical development, then at the theological development, of Islam and Mormonism.

A. Historical Development

Islam and the LDS Church began with a common perspective on the nature of the faith. Both desired to integrate faith with a full economic, political, and social system. Mohammad viewed the Islamic umma as the integrated, unified people of God; Smith viewed the LDS Church as the purified church who would live corporately in obedience to His revealed commands. Mohammad and Smith shared a vision of a comprehensive, cohesive, this-worldly faith. Their faith provided all that was needed for the political, economic, and social leadership of a corporate body.
Both Mohammad and Smith pursued the implementation of that corporate vision. Both initially met with considerable opposition from the established powers that be – the polytheistic pagans of Mecca and the unsympathetic Protestants of America. Both then fled to perceived safer havens – the hijra to Medina and the Mormon establishment of Nauvoo. Muslims mark their calendars by the hijra (A.H. – after hijra), because that is when Islam was able to take full effect upon a corporate body. The Mormon flight was a little more elaborate. Nauvoo proved to be vulnerable to external opposition as well, and after Smith’s death the LDS community began a long trek to present-day Utah. The Mormon calendar is marked by that trek – July 24 being the day that the Great Salt Lake came into the view of the pilgrims. There is certainly a strong parallel between the LDS and Islam with regards to the founding corporate vision, and the commitment to move to a place where that vision could be pursued and actualized.

But the parallel ends with the Mormon trek to Utah. Mohammad’s Muslim community immediately engaged in aggressive warfare with the polytheistic powers of Mecca and the Arabian peninsula, and emerged victorious. After solidifying their hold on Arabia, Muslim armies swept out of Arabia and conquered the tired armies of Persia, Byzantium, and North Africa. The LDS Church has no parallel for the Muslim conquests. Instead, the geopolitical circumstances that the young LDS Church encountered was not that of a decadent, declining world empire; but rather that of a strong, vibrant American nation flush with manifest destiny. When gold was discovered in the west, Utah became of significant interest to the American government. The Mormons were not left alone to achieve their utopian religious vision; federal troops interfered. After the conclusion of the civil war, the federal government turned its full attention to Utah, and the LDS Church found itself under siege, particularly due to the now-open practice of polygamy. Under intense pressure, and the threat of financial and corporate extinction, president Woodruff (?name?) ‘received’ a further ‘revelation’ that the time for polygamy within the LDS Church was now past. Polygamy was renounced and ‘abandoned’, at least officially (unofficial polygamy persisted for some years).

Thus, while the budding Islamic empire established its pre-eminence in its homeland and burst forth from there to expand a unified political-religious empire; the fledgling LDS Church withdrew to Utah, where it was besieged and eventually had to capitulate to the dominant federal government. In other words, Islam achieved its vision of a unified church-state; Mormonism failed to do so.

B. Theological Development

(1) Theology: The Muslim and Mormon conceptions of God are not only discontinuous, they are contradictory. The only parallel they have is heterodoxy with regards to traditional Christianity. The Muslim God is absolutely unitary, and fundamentally transcendent. The Mormon God is definitely triune, and fundamentally immanent. Allah created man; the Mormon God began as a man, and progressed to divinity. Muslims cannot intimately know God (setting aside the Sufi quest for the time being); Mormons can not only know God, they can become God themselves.

(2) Revelation: The Muslim and Mormon conceptions of divine revelation differ in a similar fashion. To Muslims, God’s revelation is complete and final. There is no need of further revelation, since God’s revelation through the Qur’an is complete. What is needed now is obedience and right practice. To Mormons, however, God’s revelation is continuous. God continues to speak to the elders and prophets within the LDS Church, and the body of Scripture thus continues to grow – this is anathema to Muslims! Furthermore, Mormons (like Christians) believe that the Holy Spirit speaks to believers to provide immediate divine guidance throughout daily life. Again, to Muslims, this is blasphemous.

(3) Founding Figures: Speaking ill of Mohammad is a capital offense in many Muslim countries. The prophet is held in high reverence. Indeed, the shahadah (declaration of faith) is not solely “There is one God, Allah,” but also, “and Mohammad is his messenger.” A Muslim will not smile upon reviling the name of Allah; but a Muslim will not tolerate reviling the name of Mohammad. Through the development of the hadith and sunna (the traditions of the further teachings and practices of Mohammad), the example of the prophet is held up as the perfect Islamic ideal. Mohammad never claimed to be sinless, but later Muslims make that claim for him. The situation is considerably different within the LDS Church. When apologists like Stephen Robinson try to emphasize the similarities of Mormonism and evangelicalism, they tend to avoid speaking of Joseph Smith at any length. Smith is not rejected or renounced; he is merely ignored and downplayed. He certainly does not hold the pre-eminent place in contemporary Mormonism that Mohammad continues to hold in contemporary Islam. (Indeed, I hear that the status of Joseph Smith has been removed from the main floor of the temple in Salt Lake City, and placed in hidden recesses of the basement.) Furthermore, Mormons emphasize that Smith admitted his own sinfulness and imperfection, a contrast to Islamic idealization of the prophet Mohammad.

(4) Priesthood: A final discontinuity in theological development has already been alluded to. Mohammad never established a priesthood, or a body of learned followers which would perpetuate the leadership of the Islamic umma. Smith, on the other hand, established orders of priesthood that would continue after his own death. Mormon hierarchy reaches its apex in the Order of the Twelve Apostles, who must have obtained to the highest level of priesthood (Melchizadek?) – it is from the Twelve Apostles that the future president of the LDS Church must arise. Succession in the LDS Church is organized and established; not so in Islam – hence the early split between Sunni and Shi’a over succession to Ali (the 4th caliph). Along the same lines, the LDS Church is a highly-structured, highly-institutionalized faith – a radical difference from the diffuse nature of worldwide Islam.

IV. The LDS Church as a New Islam?

Christian apologists and anti-cult activists are often strongly influenced by the relationship of Islam and the LDS Church to evangelical Christianity. From an orthodox Christian viewpoint, there are undeniable parallels between Islam and the LDS Church.

(1) Both arise in contexts where we can bemoan the failure of the Church to be the Church of Christ. The fragmentation, disunity, and disputation within Christianity in 7th-century Byzantium and 19th-century America is a blight upon the reputation of Christ’s Church, and fed the rise of new religious movements in Islam and Mormonism.

(2) Both faiths begin with male prophets who receive angelic visitations leading to new divine scriptures.

(3) Both faiths repudiate the corruptions within and deviations of contemporary Christianity.

(4) Both faiths contain misunderstandings of, or misrepresentations of, orthodox Christian belief.

(5) Both faiths represent ‘Christian heresies’.

(6) Both faiths grew with incredible rapidity, becoming worldwide faiths within 100-150 years.

(7) Fundamentally, both faiths are rejections of biblical Christianity, and are thus part of the ‘broad road’ of Matthew 7.

It is this last parallel which often dominates the mindset of Christian apologists – both Islam and the LDS Church draw people away from saving faith in Jesus Christ and into the false hope of a false religion.

If we get past those similarities and parallels, however, we discover (as I hope I have shown) that the discontinuities (and even contradictions) are far greater than the parallels.

What is the potential of the LDS Church as a ‘new Islam’? I think it is evident that there is no hope for the LDS Church to become a new Islam. Islam was, from the very beginning to the current day, a drive for a unified expression of religion, politics, and society. Islam is a way of life which governs an entire society. Islam expanded its reach through military conquest. Mormonism has not done any of that, nor is there any hope or expectation of its doing so in the future. The LDS Church has grown in the 20th century and beyond through evangelistic means. The dream of a utopian Mormon society has been replaced by the drive for a sanctified Mormon community within society.

From that perspective, however, the potential of the LDS Church in the contemporary world is perhaps even greater than that of Islam (aside from the incredible inferiority of numbers). The LDS Church is well-suited to accommodate itself to the reigning political philosophy of the society in which it exists. The emerging patriotism and political activism of Mormons in America is astounding, especially in comparison to the anti-American rhetoric of Mormonism in its first 50 years. The LDS Church can exist contentedly as a distinct minority in whatever context, seeking to grow through persuasion and evangelism, and not expecting to take political control or power. It remains to be seen whether Islam can do the same.

Is Mormonism a new Islam? No. There are undeniable parallels; but the discontinuities far outweigh them.

Philosophy Comprehensive Exam - Question #2

NOTE: Again, these are unedited responses from comprehensive exams, answers given with no resources or materials at hand. This one was an exhilerating experience for me ... a topic I do not always have opportunity to address.

QUESTION 2. Apply the Ten Commandments to environmental ethics. Which commandments apply – and how, and why?

Scarcely a single secular ethics textbook is written today which does not include a lengthy discussion of environmental ethics or ecology responsibility. On the other hand, many lengthy treatises on Christian ethics avoid or minimize discussion of the same topics (thus, for example, Oliver O’Donovan’s Resurrection and the Moral Order contains no discussion whatsoever, while John Frame’s 930-page Doctrine of the Christian Life contains a mere two page discussion). I find this exceedingly strange, as I believe that Christians should be at the forefront of the movement toward environmental responsibility and ethics. In this essay, I will argue for the necessity of a vibrant Christian environmental ethic, based primarily upon the Ten Commandments, but supplemented by the doctrine of creation and the cultural mandate of Genesis 1. First, I will address the continued applicability of the Ten Commandments within Christian ethical discussion. Second, I will observe the intertwined nature of the Ten Commandments. Third, I will address environmental ethics from the foundational framework of the doctrine of creation and mankind’s cultural mandate. Finally, I will demonstrate how and why seven of the Ten Commandments relate, directly or indirectly, to a Christian environmental ethic.

I. The Continued Applicability of the Ten Commandments in Christian Ethics

At the outset, it is necessary to address the applicability of the Ten Commandments. While some Christians question whether the entire breadth of God’s law revealed in the Pentateuch (Genesis – Deuteronomy) continues to inform and direct Christian ethics, the continued applicability of the Ten Commandments is almost unquestioned amongst Christian theologians. The sole exception is the fourth commandment – the Sabbath. On this front, many Christians argue that the command to respect the Sabbath day as a day of rest and worship has been abrogated by the new covenant in Christ and the institution of the Lord’s Day as the proper day of Christian worship. There is, however, no mention in the New Testament of any of the Ten Commandments (or other aspects of the Mosaic law) being abrogated or replaced – indeed, Jesus insists (Matthew 5:17ff) that he has not come to abolish the law. Aspects of the Old Testament law are indeed fulfilled in Christ, but it is difficult to see how the Sabbath commandment (or any of the other Ten Commandments) is fulfilled in Christ and therefore no longer binding. It is easier to note that commandments regarding the appropriate temple sacrifices and offerings have been fulfilled through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ – the book of Hebrews makes this quite clear. Thus, we no longer bring doves or bulls or goats or grain offerings or drink offerings or wave offerings to church on Sunday mornings – although I must admit that it would certainly enliven our contemporary worship services if we did! Furthermore, some of the ritual cleanliness laws regarding the appropriate measures to take before approaching the presence of God in the tabernacle or synagogue or temple have been fulfilled in Christ.

Regarding the Sabbath commandment, however, I do not see how Christ has fulfilled what was commanded, thereby removing the obligation to honor the fourth commandment (observe the Sabbath Day – in six days you shall do your work, the seventh day is to be a day of rest, holy to the Lord your God; for in six days he made the heavens and the earth, and rested on the seventh day). Jesus certainly does make it clear that some of the Sabbath regulations that had been built up through the rabbinic tradition were not particularly honoring to God; he also insists that “the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” But nowhere does he insist or even insinuate that the Sabbath is somehow abrogated through his life, death, and resurrection. Quite the contrary. I agree with John Frame, who argues that the Sabbath is a ‘creation ordinance’ – presented by God as a commandment not just through the Decalogue of Exodus 20, but even implicitly commanded in the beginning of Genesis 2. “Thus, in six days the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array; on the seventh day God rested. He looked at all he had made, and behold, it was very good.” [rough paraphrase; please forgive inaccuracies of transmission!] As a creation ordinance, the Sabbath is something which will never be abrogated; thus, it remains incumbent upon Christians today to consider how the Sabbath ordinance applies to them. This will become important as we consider the application of the Ten Commandments specifically to the question of environmental ethics. For now, however, it is sufficient to note that the Ten Commandments do indeed continue to apply to Christians. They are a part of God’s Old Testament law, an expression of His holy character and moral nature, and a binding part of our covenant with the Lord God Almighty.

II. The Nature of the Ten Commandments

When asked for his opinion of the most important of God’s laws, Jesus sums up the Ten Commandments: “The first is this: to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. And the second is like it: to love your neighbor as yourself.” Christian theologians have long noted that the Ten Commandments can be effectively, though imprecisely, summed up by designating commandments one through four as “love God,” and commandments five through ten as “love your neighbor.”

However, it is essential to note that the separation, helpful and effective as it may be, is entirely artificial. We cannot separate love of God from love of neighbor. Note the question that Jesus is answering when he gives the ‘two’ greatest commandments: “Teacher, which one is the most important of God’s laws?” Jesus is being asked for a single commandment which sums up or epitomizes God’s law. Instead, he provides what looks like two commandments: love God AND love your neighbor. He does so because there is and can be no distinction between the two. The Apostle John writes that he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot truly love God, whom he has not seen (1 John 3). Furthermore, John writes that people will know that we love God by observing the love that we have for one another (John 13?). The clear correlation is that a sincere and vibrant love for God will necessarily result in a sincere and vibrant love for our neighbor; on the flip side, a life that demonstrates a lack of love for our neighbor is a clear indication that we lack a sincere and authentic love for God.

Thus, we should not artificially distinguish the Ten Commandments, thinking that we can somehow be in faithful obedience to nine of them, yet be lacking in one. As the apostle James writes, one who fails to keep the law at one point, fails to keep the entire law (James 2). Faithfulness to God’s law is a complete package. Each of the Ten Commandments has a bearing upon the other nine. This, again, will be of importance when we come to consider the implications of the Ten Commandments for a Christian environmental ethic.

Another helpful distinction regarding the Ten Commandments is what the Reformed tradition (e.g. the Westminster Confession) calls the broad vs. the narrow implications of each commandment. Each of the Ten Commandments (particularly numbers 6 through 9) has, on the surface, a very specific application. For example, we are commandment (#6) “Do not murder.” That is, do not exercise unauthorized lethal action upon another human being. If I am mad at my brother Abel because he offers a better sacrifice than me, I cannot express that anger by striking out and killing Abel. Doing so is a violation of the sixth commandment. That is the specific, narrow, implication of the sixth commandment. However, the broad extrapolation of the sixth commandment uses the initial principle, that of respecting and honoring the life that God has breathed into our fellow man, and their creation in the image of God; and applies it to further circumstances. Thus, the Westminster Confession also urges us to refrain from speaking slanderously against our neighbor or against our enemy, as doing so expresses our contempt for a fellow creature of God.

John Frame supplies a helpful matrix through which to apply the Ten Commandments in both their broad and their narrow contexts. He argues for a tri-perspectival approach, which seeks to uncover the normative principles contained within God’s inspired Word (the normative approach), understand the contemporary circumstances to which those principles apply (the situational approach), and elucidate how God desires for us to respond in obedience (the existential approach). The normative-situational-existential approach to ethics reminds us that God’s Word does indeed provide all of the normative principles that we require to engage in a robust Christian ethic, that we must apply Christ’s wisdom in understanding how those principles apply to our situation, and that the indwelling Holy Spirit guides us into faithful obedience in our ethical lives. Again, this tri-perspectival approach will be helpful when we apply the Ten Commandments specifically to environmental ethics.

III. Environmental Ethics, the Doctrine of Creation, and the Cultural Mandate

Before considering the impact of the Ten Commandments themselves upon Christian environmental ethics, it is necessary to begin at the beginning. A Christian environmental ethic must start with a doctrine of Creation. The universe is God’s, and everything within it. Genesis 1 speaks clearly of God creating the heavens and the earth ex nihilo – out of nothingness (a creation account which, incidentally, coheres quite closely with contemporary astrophysical models of the origins of the universe). Whereas other Ancient Near Eastern creation myths involve the gods taking pre-existent matter and forming or shaping it, the Hebrew creation account uniquely insists that Yahweh made the stuff itself. All of Christian ethics must begin here, with a firm doctrine of God as the Creator and sustainer of all that is; but it is particularly important than environmental ethics begins at this point. When we talk about ‘sustaining’ the earth, or ‘protecting’ the environment, we need to acknowledge that we are not seeking to maintain something which we have created, or something which is just randomly here, or something which is itself the lifeforce of the universe. Rather, we are seeking to protect, sustain, or maintain something which is the unique and special creation of the Lord God Almighty.

Indeed, we endeavor to do so because God has commanded us to do so. In Genesis 1:28, after creating human beings, God commands them to: ‘Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue (or control) it. Rule over (or reign over) the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the creatures that walk along the ground . . .’ [again, forgive the rough paraphrase]. This passage is often designated as “the cultural mandate,” and involves a multifold imperative given to mankind. (1) Be fruitful and multiply – enjoy the sexual reproductive capacities that God has endowed you with. (2) Fill the earth – it is not a bad thing to have many children. (3) Subdue or control the earth – we are not only permitted, but even commanded, to take charge, and to actively subdue the earth. This has immense implications for environmental ethics. Many people are inherently opposed to the building of dams on rivers, as it impedes the migratory path of spawning fish, and affects sedimentary buildup in the riverbeds. I sympathize with the concerns (more on that shortly), but must also insist that the cultural mandate suggests that the building of dams, which reduce the frequency and destructiveness of flooding along major river systems, is generally pursued in accordance with the cultural mandate. (4) Rule over (reign over) the fish of the sea, etc. Man is not simply to control or subdue the earth; man is to exercise sovereign leadership over all of creation.
Secular environmentalists often insist that Christian theology gives a carte blanche to environmental degradation and destruction, because of the cultural mandate. After all, they argue, Genesis 1 gives us permission to “rule over” the rest of creation. First off, let me acknowledge that they are entirely right – Scripture not only gives us permission to rule over the rest of creation, but explicitly commands us to do so. However, the understanding of sovereignty or lordship which secular environmentalists have in mind is (or at least ought to be) fundamentally different from a biblical understanding of lordship. What does it mean to rule over creation, from a biblical perspective? What is our theology of Lordship?

(1) First and foremost, our lordship over creation is not absolute, but is rather derivative. We are not the absolute sovereigns of the earth. Our sovereignty is given to us by God, and He is the ultimate ruler of all that is. We are underlords, not overlords.

(2) Second, biblical lordship is not destructive or self-oriented. Jesus provides us with the picture of biblical lordship in John (10?), contrasting a Godly model of leadership with the model of leadership followed by fallen man. ‘You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them; not so with you. Rather, he who desires to be the greatest must be the servant of all. For the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.’ Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, is the ultimate example of biblical lordship; and his lordship is not oriented towards himself or his own needs. Rather, it is a self-sacrificing, self-giving, other-oriented leadership. Sadly, the effects of mankind’s fall into sin (Genesis 3) has a powerfully destructive effect, not just upon our relationship with God, but also upon our relationship with fellow human beings and with the created order itself. Thus, the exercise of authority within the fallen human order is often selfish and destructive. Examples of totalitarian political regimes have proliferated throughout human history, but the 20th century saw the rise of perhaps the most destructive totalitarian regimes ever witnessed – Nazi Germany, Communist Russia, and Maoist China. Other totalitarian regimes have presided over injustices and oppression in central America, the Caribbean, Africa, and Southeast Asia. For many contemporary proponents of secular environmentalism, therefore, the notion of ‘lordship’ or ‘ruling’ over creation brings to mind purely negative connotations. They perceive authority through the negative framework of fallen human political structures. Thus, we need to recover and promote a biblical meaning of lordship in order to stress that the cultural mandate of mankind as a ruler over creation is not a mandate to pillage, rape, and destroy.

(3) Third, Biblical lordship is nurturing and other-oriented. God is Lord over the lives of Christians, but we understand that God does not rule over us in order to oppress us, or to prevent us from achieving our own good. Rather, we acknowledge that God has our best interests at heart, and indeed He alone knows what is best for us. Thus, God rules over us, commanding us in the ways that will lead to life, and forbidding us from paths that lead to destruction. God’s lordship is a loving sovereignty, and provides the model for biblical human authority and rule. The kings of Israel were commanded to have the best interests of the people at heart, and not to rule selfishly. They didn’t work that out very obediently, for the most part; but the ideal was clear and evident to them. When we seek to construct a Christian environmental ethic, we must insist that our cultural mandate is enunciated along those same lines. We do not have the right to degrade God’s created order for our own selfish purposes. Rather, we have the responsibility to exercise stewardship over what God has created and graciously entrusted to our care. Yes, we are commanded to subdue and control the earth, and to rule over it. But that is not a green light to pursue our selfish interests at any environmental cost. Quite the contrary.

(4) Finally, the cultural mandate commands us to respect the environment as God’s creation, and to sustain and preserve it. Just as a biblical husband is to exercise authority within the home, but not in a domineering, abusive, or selfish manner; so too humanity corporately is to exercise authority over creation, but not in a domineering, abusive, or selfish manner. Husbands are to love their wives; mankind is to love creation. Husbands are to nurture their wives; mankind is to nurture creation. Wives are not the property of their husbands; creation is not owned by mankind.

With the framework of a robust doctrine of creation and an appreciation of the cultural mandate in hand, it is time to turn to the Ten Commandments themselves, and assess how they apply to environmental ethics.

IV. Environmental Ethics and the Ten Commandments

It is important to keep in mind that the Ten Commandments are strongly intertwined, and have a bearing upon one another. Nonetheless, my discussion of environmental ethics will focus on the first and tenth commandments, with brief discussions of others.

A. Avoiding the Excesses of Contemporary Environmentalism: The First Commandment

The first commandment states simply: “You shall have no other gods besides (or before) me.” In Matthew 6:24, Jesus reminds his audience that no man can serve two masters. Bruce Thornton, an irreverent and contrarian agnostic, argues (in Plagues of the Mind) that the ecological movement has become explicitly religious. He is certainly not alone in making that observation. The avowed atheist, Carl Sagan, regularly spoke of nature with the divine capital letter (“Nature”); primary school textbooks regularly talk about the importance of cherishing and protecting “Mother Earth.” The influence of native American religious traditions has been powerful in urging contemporary environmentalists towards a spiritual understanding of rocks, trees, animals, and the rest of the created order. Even when talking about the weather in casual conversation, people will often comment on the ‘mood’ of ‘mother nature’ or ‘nature’, as if nature were personified.

Certainly, a lot of such talk is innocuous and innocent, and bereft of explicit theological undertones. However, it must be acknowledged that in many circles, such talk has explicit religious meaning. Panentheism (God in everything) and pantheism (God is everything) are prominent worldviews within contemporary culture, but are nowhere so evident as in environmental activist groups. As Christians, we share with environmentalists a dedication to exercising caring stewardship over creation; but we must part ways when it comes to our understanding of what it is that we are caring for!

The first commandment concerns the nature of God, and hence also addresses the nature of nature itself. Nature is not God. There is a qualitative distinction between Creator and Creation. God is not contained within what He has made. When we exercise environmental stewardship, we are not taking care of God Himself; rather, we are caring for what God has made and entrusted to us, in obedience to His cultural mandate to us.

Thus, we must be careful as engaged Christians in how we talk about our environmental goals and pursuits. We must not allow the unbiblical worldview of non-Christian environmentalism to affect us; we must keep in our conscious mind the sharp distinction between God and Creation. This includes the obvious narrow implication of refusing to worship Creation. But it also involves a broader extrapolation from the first commandment and the third commandment (‘Do not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.’). The third commandment prohibits us from using God’s name in vain. This would include, I would argue, speaking of things other than God with terms we ought to use only for God.

What words do we use to refer to our environmental concerns? What terminology do we utilize? From my observations, we often fall into the contemporary default of referring to ‘the environment’, ‘nature’, ‘the earth’, ‘ecology’, or even ‘mother earth’. All of these terms, I would argue, are either explicitly or implicitly governed by the assumptions and definitions provided by panentheism and pantheism. Hence, we should not regularly use those terms. Instead, we should consciously use the more appropriate Christian terms: ‘creation’, ‘created order’, ‘God’s world’. Even in expression the goals of our environmental ethics, we should consciously differentiate our position from secular or pantheist ecologists, by talking explicitly about ‘stewardship’ or ‘lordship’ rather than simply ‘protection’ or ‘maintenance’. Ideally, our ‘Christian environmental ethics’ should not be called that at all – rather, we should talk about being engaged in ‘Creation stewardship’. Yes, this will require a regular definition of our terminology, but is that such a bad thing? After all, it will ensure that we are being faithful to God’s commandments (we are honoring His name, and not referring to His things in irreverent ways) and will offer opportunities to explain our deepest Christian convictions (we are stewards, caretakers, of what God has made). Thus, precision in our terminology can open the door to Christian witness, and helps us resist the temptation to slide into casual secular conversational terminology.

B. The Implications of the 4th, 6th, and 8th Commandments

My focus in this essay is upon the first and tenth commandments. However, each of the Ten Commandments has a bearing upon Christian environmental ethics, and it is worthwhile to note how three commandments in particular apply.

The fourth commandment has been discussed briefly earlier in this essay – “Honor the Sabbath Day. For six days you shall labor and do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest.” The Sabbath commandment is an ordinance of God’s created order, given originally in implicit form at the beginning of Genesis 2, and expanded considerably in God’s covenant with Israel. The Sabbath is connected to God’s act of creation, and his resting on the seventh day; it is also connected to God’s bringing the Israelites out of Egypt in the Passover event. The notion of ‘rest’ is crucial to the Sabbath – completing our work in six days, and engaging in a holy rest on the seventh day. Of course, the Sabbath anticipates the eschatological Sabbath, wherein our earthly labors will be complete and we will enter our eternal rest prepared for us by God. But our exercise of Sabbath here and now is not merely an anticipation of the eschatological Sabbath; it is also integral to how God has created us and the rest of the created order.

A part of the larger extrapolation of the Sabbath was a Sabbath for the land. God commanded the Israelites to practice ‘crop rotation’ – to grow crops on their land for six years, but on the seventh year to allow the land to ‘rest’ from its labors. Modern agricultural practice has acknowledged the inherent wisdom of the Sabbath approach, and crop rotation is a common practice in most Western nations today. Sadly, crop rotation is not practiced in many developing countries, where the pressures to produce crops now compels subsistence farmers to clear land, plant crops, and continue to grow crops until the soil is no longer capable of sustaining plants. Lack of crop rotation leads to soil exhaustion and environmental degradation. This is not only an environmental catastrophe; it is also a violation of the 4th commandment. A robust Christian ‘Creation stewardship’ ethic will include the notion of environmental Sabbath – something which can apply not only to crop rotation, but also to fishing and hunting.

The 6th commandment is fairly straightforward in its narrow application – ‘Do not murder.’ John Frame argues that the prohibition against murder does not preclude the taking of another human life in all circumstances, noting that (1) the very next chapters in Exodus include specific case studies of an Israelite killing an intruder, and (2) the Old Testament is replete with discussions of warfare, wherein Israelite soldiers kill enemies without apparently violating the 6th commandment. I appreciate the Anabaptist commitment to pacifism and avoidance of taking others’ lives even in warfare (as exemplified, e.g., by Stanley Hauerwas); nonetheless, I must admit that Frame’s analysis is correct. There are (very rare) times when individual humans are authorized to (regrettably and regretfully) take the life of another person, and there are also (more frequent) times when human authorities (governments, judiciaries) are authorized (regrettably and regretfully) to take the life of others.

Nonetheless, the Reformed and Anabaptist traditions are agreed that the 6th commandment involves a radical call to the preservation of life. We are to respect the life of others, for human beings are made in the image of God, and are created and loved by God. We are to do all we can to avoid taking a life. This extrapolation of the 6th commandment applies to Creation stewardship ethics in two ways.

First, we are to acknowledge that certain human actions have negative environmental consequences which may (possibly or probably) result in the death of others. For example, clear-cutting the entire forest cover of the Canadian Rockies would almost certainly result in a proliferation of floods and mudslides in both the mountains and the foothills, as the land would be far less capable of absorbing large amounts of precipitation. Those floods and mudslides would most likely result in a large loss of property and of life. Hence, a respect for the 6th commandment, which compels us to avoid causing the death of others to the greatest extent possible, requires us to acknowledge the sinfulness of total or widespread clearcutting. The Christian argument is not simply that clearcutting is ugly (though it is that), that it is economically unsustainable in the long run (though it is that) – rather, the practice is an actual violation of God’s express command to protect and nurture life.

Second, the commandment to respect, cherish, and protect life extends beyond our fellow human beings to the other living creatures which God has made. The creation mandate of Genesis 1 calls upon us to rule over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, etc. While Christians certainly do not believe that animals have rational souls capable of sinning against God and experiencing redemption through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ; we nonetheless acknowledge animals as fellow members of God’s Created order. Moreover, we acknowledge that we are their stewards, their sovereign lords. Just as political ‘lords’ are biblically intended to rule in the best interests of their human subjects, so too we as ‘Creation stewards’ are to rule in the best interests of the animals that are entrusted to our care. Thus, many Christians are committed to a vegetarian lifestyle out of principled conviction. Others avoid eating meat because they are appalled at the way that animals are treated in chicken farms or large cattle operations. It is easy to abuse or misunderstand this aspect of the 6th commandment, but we must acknowledge (with Hauerwas) that sometimes vegetarianism will be an authentic act of obedience to the 6th commandment.

The 8th commandment prohibits stealing from our neighbor. As time and space are running short, I must limit my observations of this commandment to the following: to what extent do our economic and environmental practices ‘steal’ from current and future generations of human beings? If British Columbia were to build further dams and reservoirs on the Columbia River, diverting its waters before it can flow into the United States, I argue that we would be ‘robbing’ our southern neighbors of their water supply. Similarly with the Jordan River in the Middle East. As fresh water becomes more scarce and precious, disputes over the flow and control of rivers will become increasingly contentious. We must acknowledge that the 8th commandment has a strong statement upon our responsibility.

C. The Heart of Creation Stewardship: The Tenth Commandment

The tenth commandment might seem an odd one to label as the heart of Creation stewardship (environmental ethics). “Do not covet your neighbor’s wife or oxen, . . .” However, I argue that the prohibition of covetousness actually strikes at the heart of the major cause of environmental degradation today – materialism and consumerism. The prohibition against coveting our neighbor’s possessions does not merely forbid our actively seeking to take what rightfully belongs to our neighbor (as in the moving of boundary stones or using false weights). Rather, as the Westminster Confession notes, it involves further things. When Jesus applies the Ten Commandments to his audience in Matthew 5, he always brings the outward commands to bear upon the inward state of our heart. “Do not murder … I tell you do not be angry with your brother without cause. … Do not commit adultery … I tell you that he who lusts after a woman has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” The Ten Commandments are not just speaking to outward obedience to the letter of the law. Rather, they speak to the condition of our heart, and the source of the outward obedience (or lack thereof). Thus, the Westminster Confession acknowledges that the 10th Commandment speaks to the primary motivations of covetousness: greed and envy. In common parlance, the problem is that of ‘wanting’ – not just wanting to have what belongs to somebody else, but always wanting more. I remember reading of a major CEO, I believe it was either Iacocca or a Rockefeller, who was asked by a journalist (concerning their incredible wealth), “How much money will be enough?” His response: “Always just a little bit more.” This nicely encapsulates the fundamental sin of the human heart – covetousness; always wanting a little bit more than we have right now. The newer car; the newest electronic gadgets; the newest fashion lines; the bigger house; the bigger car; the vacation home.

The excess of human ‘wanting’ has wreaked havoc upon God’s created order. We now possess the technological capacity to extract more resources from Creation, and produce more consumable goods, than ever before. The positive consequence of this has been a steady and remarkable rise in the living standards of most people around the world – a lower proportion of the world’s population lives at a subsistence level today than ever before. The negative consequence has been a steady degradation of God’s Creation. Fisheries around the world are exhausted, depleted by unconscientious fishing strategies and policies. Several species of birds, reptiles, and mammals have been hunted to extinction, their feathers or hides or fur being coveted for fashion accessories (or innards being valued for medicinal or superstitional benefits). Human agricultural has been pushed out to the margins of arable land, using techniques that have exhausted the soil and resulted in increasing desertification. The root cause of much environmental degradation, in a word, is materialism. Human greed, the constant ‘wanting’ for more, has serious environmental side-effects. I am not ignorant of the positive contributions of that same human technological advance; here I merely point out the consequences it has had upon God's creation.

The cultural mandate to be faithful stewards of God’s creation commands us as Christians to live differently, and to consume differently. Do we really need Al Gore’s 6000 square foot home? Can we responsibly justify the consumption of energy and resources that it requires? We are neither commanded nor permitted to ‘want, want, want’. Indeed, the biblical mandate is twofold: (1) Be content with what you have, whether little or much; and (2) Do not let the love of money (stuff) become a snare. Regrettably, many in the Western church have been consumed by consumerism; materialism has such a strong sway over us. Creation stewardship requires us to renounce the ways of the world, including the drive to accumulate and consume more, in favor of a simpler, more contented lifestyle.