Wednesday, July 08, 2015

Is Scripturalism unscriptural?


Scripturalism has an unscriptural epistemology. Ironic. Take this definition:
A consistent Christian worldview avers that the epistemological starting point is that the Bible…has a monopoly on truth…Since all knowledge must come through propositions (which are either true or false), since the senses in interacting with creation yield no propositions, knowledge cannot be conveyed by sensation. - See more at: http://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=276#sthash.yV59J0U1.dpuf

Let's compare this claim to…Scripture. One function of the celestial luminaries is to enable humans to keep track of time:

14 And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years (Gen 1:14).

If, however, you deny the general reliability of the senses, then how can the celestial luminaries perform their divinely-assigned function? 

Likewise, you have the quarantine laws in the Mosaic code, where (to take one example) the priest is to perform periodic physical examinations on a patient with a skin condition, to see if it has cleared up.

13 The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, 2 “When a person has on the skin of his body a swelling or an eruption or a spot, and it turns into a case of leprous disease on the skin of his body, then he shall be brought to Aaron the priest or to one of his sons the priests, 3 and the priest shall examine the diseased area on the skin of his body. And if the hair in the diseased area has turned white and the disease appears to be deeper than the skin of his body, it is a case of leprous disease. When the priest has examined him, he shall pronounce him unclean. 4 But if the spot is white in the skin of his body and appears no deeper than the skin, and the hair in it has not turned white, the priest shall shut up the diseased person for seven days. 5 And the priest shall examine him on the seventh day, and if in his eyes the disease is checked and the disease has not spread in the skin, then the priest shall shut him up for another seven days. 6 And the priest shall examine him again on the seventh day, and if the diseased area has faded and the disease has not spread in the skin, then the priest shall pronounce him clean; it is only an eruption. And he shall wash his clothes and be clean. 7 But if the eruption spreads in the skin, after he has shown himself to the priest for his cleansing, he shall appear again before the priest. 8 And the priest shall look, and if the eruption has spread in the skin, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean; it is a leprous disease (Lev 13:1-8).
If, however, you deny the reliability of the senses, then a priest can't trust his eyesight. 

Here's another example:

9 After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was (Mt 2:9).
The star was a sensible object that was divinely tasked to guide the Magi to the home of the Holy Family.
Scripture isn't the epistemological starting-point for Scripturalism. No one who took passages like Gen 1:14, Lev 13, or Mt 2:9 as their epistemological point of departure would conclude that knowledge can't be conveyed by sensory perception. No one who began with passages like this would deny the general reliability of the senses. 
Rather, Scripturalist epistemology originates in extrabiblical philosophical objections to sense knowledge. 
You must wonder why Scripturalists think we have five different senses in the first place. Why are eyes different than ears, why did God endow us with both, if sense knowledge is impossible? 
BTW, I don't think all knowledge derives from the senses. I don't subscribe to blank slate empiricism. Take Poincaré's withering critique of logicism. But my immediate point is the witness of Scripture to sense knowledge. 

32 comments:

  1. If sense knowledge is unreliable, then it's difficult if not impossible to obey the Bible. For example:

    There are arguably appropriate and inappropriate (if culture-bound) dress codes. At the least, short of making a case for nudism, it would be imprudent if not immoral to walk around naked.

    Normally sensory neurons receive signals from external (or internal) stimuli via sensory receptors. There are different types of sensory receptors and each type conveys a different type of sense (e.g. vibration, pressure, pain, temperature). Take fast-adapting sensory receptors like Meissner corpuscles or Pacinian corpuscles. These sensory receptors quickly generate action potentials which then diminish soon after the onset of the stimulus. This explains why we can't feel our clothes any longer shortly after putting them on.

    However, if reliable sense knowledge isn't possible, then how could we know we're wearing clothing? Besides the fact that we can't trust what we think we see we're putting on, we can't reliably feel whether we are putting on clothing or not.

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  2. I think Scripturalists would have to hold to two different kinds of knowledge. Knowledge based on sense perception would remain fallible and unreliable, but knowledge from Scripture would be on the level of true knowledge. These divisions are not parsed out rigorously, but those who hold to the above scheme have in mind Gen 1:14, Lev 13: 1-8, and Matt 2:9 as knowledge that points to the first kind of knowledge, fallible and unreliable, which is conventionally used to work out life's tasks during the day, but they then write polemics claiming Scripture as the only knowledge available, the higher knowledge. It seems paradoxical.

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  3. Why do Scripturalists write or argue with anything other than block quotes of Scripture? Unless their words are direct quotes from Scripture then they are part of the created order, and hence cannot convey propositional truth.

    They argue themselves into a logical corner.

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  4. "Why do Scripturalists write or argue with anything other than block quotes of Scripture?"

    CR,

    I've argued the same thing. We can even take it one step further. Since the marks on a page are not defined by the propositions contained in the corpus of special revelation, their arguments shouldn't take written form. And, since the meaning of word-sounds aren't defined in that same corpus of revelation, spoken arguments deny Scripturalism. Lastly, laws of immediate inference aren't disclosed in special revelation, though indeed it's presupposed we are endowed with that equipment. We might then ask, why do Scripturalists argue at all? In the final analyses, if Scripturalism were true, we couldn't know it...

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    1. I just wrote this post on language and communication earlier today. Your criticisms, those in the original post, and others like them are persuasive against the vast majority of Scripturalists who implicitly arbitrarily restrict the meaning of knowledge to internalist, infallibilist justification, and I appreciate them insofar as they have pushed me to develop Scripturalism beyond popularization of it. And while I'm sure there does come a point at which a philosophy has been developed to such an extent that it becomes something other than what one started with, I just don't think that point has been reached yet.

      http://unapologetica.blogspot.com/2015/07/challenges-for-scripturalism.html

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    2. "And while I'm sure there does come a point at which a philosophy has been developed to such an extent that it becomes something other than what one started with, I just don't think that point has been reached yet."

      Ryan,

      Are the vast majority of Scripturalists to which you refer wrong to consider themselves Scripturalists? If not, then why isn't a refutation of their position a refutation of Scripturalism?

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    3. IOW, do you think that one can develop Scripturalism to the extent of adding tenets that Scripturalism denies?

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    4. "Are the vast majority of Scripturalists to which you refer wrong to consider themselves Scripturalists? If not, then why isn't a refutation of their position a refutation of Scripturalism?"

      Fair questions. I think there is room for variation within philosophies. One can be a Christian even if his defense of Christianity is refuted or refutable. The same applied to Scripturalism. One can be a Scripturalist and have a wrong conception, say, about what the word "knowledge" is capable of meaning.

      "...do you think that one can develop Scripturalism to the extent of adding tenets that Scripturalism denies?"

      Of course not.

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    5. Ryan,

      I'll let you reconsider before responding. :)

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    6. I'm arguing Clark's metaepistemological views must be developed to support his epistemology. I'm not sure what the catch is.

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    7. I think there is room for variation within philosophies. One can be a Christian even if his defense of Christianity is refuted or refutable.

      Ryan,

      Indeed, a sufficient condition for salvation can obtain when one’s defense of his beliefs are refutable. One might truly trust in Christ as offered in the gospel while articulating false doctrine that would even undermine Christianity. Notwithstanding, such a one would be understanding, believing and trusting in enough to be a Christian. Beliefs and defense of beliefs are vastly different things. A child can believe a bird is outside her window without being able to defend adequately her belief.

      The same applied to Scripturalism. One can be a Scripturalist and have a wrong conception, say, about what the word "knowledge" is capable of meaning.

      To actually “be a Scripturalist” only requires that one believe certain things about knowledge. Whether a Scripturalist has a “wrong conception” of what knowledge is “capable of meaning” is irrelevant to whether one has the sufficient beliefs to qualify him as a Scripturalist. To have a “wrong conception” of what knowledge is “capable of meaning” can perhaps imply that one hasn’t thought about other epistemologies hard enough. But, a lack of philosophical reflection cannot disqualify one from being a Scripturalist. In fact, it seems to be a prerequisite for being one.

      Correct me if I’m wrong but your 11:29 a.m. post suggests to me that you would like to “develop Scripturalism” in order to salvage Scripturalism. Yet that same post seems to concede that the popularized view of Scripturalism incorporates an unworkable theory of knowledge, hence your desire to develop Scripturalism further. Yet it also seems to me that you think you can salvage Scripturalism without it becoming “something other than what [you] started with.” That, I believe is a fool’s errand, and that is what I’m addressing.

      You yourself wrote: “Your criticisms, those in the original post, and others like them are persuasive against the vast majority of Scripturalists who implicitly arbitrarily restrict the meaning of knowledge…”
      Your task is to salvage an epistemology that at its very core posits that knowledge can only come through propositions contained in Scripture and that which can be derived from those propositions. I believe you reject that core theory of knowledge. If so, you cannot salvage Scripturalism. You can only redefine it.


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    8. I don't really have much to say to this long reply. This appears to be the real relevant point:

      "...its very core posits that knowledge can only come through propositions contained in Scripture and that which can be derived from those propositions."

      The question is what "knowledge" means here as well as what the adherents to this core belief additionally believe "knowledge" can mean. The original post refers to sense knowledge, but I very much doubt what Steve has in mind when he mentions that is what Scripturalists have in mind when they speak of what knowledge is only attainable via divine revelation.

      So the question then becomes whether there can be different kinds or types of knowledge. I think so, many Scripturalists, following Clark, do not. But this disagreement is not essential to the agreement we do share and which is the "core" of Scripturalism, i.e. that a certain kind of type of knowledge is only attainable via divine revelation.

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    9. "But this disagreement is not essential to the agreement we do share and which is the "core" of Scripturalism, i.e. that a certain kind of type of knowledge is only attainable via divine revelation.

      I can't see anything distinctively Scripturalist about holding this position. Indeed, it appears on its face to be a basic Christian dogma (special revelation). On this definition every Bible-believing Christian is a Scripturalist.

      But maybe you're implying more than what's stated, or maybe I'm misunderstanding.

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    10. Maybe, maybe not. In a recent blog post, I did say I hope for rapprochement along these lines and that there has just been a good deal of talking past one another. I'm defining "knowledge" here in reference to infallibilist, internalist justified belief.

      I'm discussing this with several other Scripturalists, and they don't seem opposed to, say, externalist justification - only that it might be clearer to refer to that as some kind of "warranted belief" rather than "knowledge." I disagree, as I think it will lead to confusion when talking with contemporary epistemologists and so forth, but I also take it as a step in the right direction.

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  5. Was it impossible in the realm of ordinary providence that those who believed they saw Jesus after the resurrection actually knew it was Jesus? Were the "eyewitnesses" to the risen Christ not capable of knowing it was Christ? Surely they were culpable for what they witnessed. Should Thomas have kept on not believing that he knew he touched Jesus after he had touched Jesus? Or, did he not know at all that he touched Jesus and, therefore, should have remained skeptical? Or maybe he knew only way after the fact, when it became a proposition of Scripture that he had touched Jesus. In the like manner, do the heavens declare the glory of God only after learning they do from special revelation? If so, then it would not be the *heavens* that declare God's glory. Wouldn't it have been ill advisable for the saints under both economies to affirm miracles they couldn't have known happened? Isn't that what Rome requires of its subjects, to believe that which cannot be known?

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  6. The hearing ear and the seeing eye, the LORD has made them both.- Prov. 20:12

    He who planted the ear, does he not hear? He who formed the eye, does he not see?- Ps. 94:9

    10 But Moses said to the LORD, "Oh, my Lord, I am not eloquent, either in the past or since you have spoken to your servant, but I am slow of speech and of tongue."11 Then the LORD said to him, "Who has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the LORD?12 Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak."- Exo. 4:10-12


    To the Scripturalists out there, what do you recommend as the best responses and refutations to Aquascum's critique of Vincent Cheung's modified Clarkian Scripturalism? More critiques HERE.

    Maybe I'm just not visiting enough websites to find good responses to such critiques. If they exist, where are they? I'm genuinely interested. Until I encounter good responses, I think I'm justified in continuing to reject Scripturalism.

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    1. Ryan (above) wrote in a recent blog in May [bold added by me]

      It’s been nearly a decade since a short but well-constructed critique of Vincent Cheung's philosophy appeared. I’m referring to an article by a pseudonymous author, Aquascum, entitled Top Ten Reasons to Reject the "Scripturalist Package." This and a few of Aquascum’s more substantial papers are posted on the website of James Anderson, who apparently didn’t write them.........- and Aquascum makes some good arguments. In fact, I have yet to read a decent Scripturalist rebuttal. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough.

      Apparently, I'm not the only one who's having trouble finding decent Scripturalist rebuttals to Aquascum's critiques. That's coming from a Scripturalist himself.

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  8. Ryan,

    Scripturalists I've dealt with mock the idea that the Holy Spirit justifies belief when knowledge obtains. They have likened such confirmation to indigestion. For them, it's God's word alone that justifies belief. For them, we are justified in believing x because God has said x. The problem is, apart from the Holy Spirit their justification is not from God but Nelson publishers and the like. Apart from the Spirit they can't distinguish the theology that comes printed in a book from the theology that comes from God. Flesh and blood is their source and not the Father by the Spirit. Accordingly, this impasse goes beyond the semantic realm. We cannot even agree on the knowledge of Scripture, let alone knowledge that comes through general revelation.

    Yet, if they concede the Spirit's work in believing Scripture.then why can't the Spirit give me the same confirmation to the proposition "I am saved"?

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    1. That's a pretty seriously entanglement, I think, in the way you've formulated the problem - assuming it's representative of the Scripturalist's actual position - in that the Bible never objectively states anything like "John Smith is redeemed".

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    2. CR,

      In this thread https://godshammer.wordpress.com/2014/11/26/john-robbins-quick-quote-10/#comment-15059 this transpired:

      I was asked: “No the question I asked is how do *you* know the personal proposition is true in your own case?”

      My response: The same way I know Jesus lives. God persuades me of the truth. Now prove me wrong. Prove that God has not granted me warrant sufficient for knowledge of my salvation... demonstrate from Scripture alone that you only can know what Scripture states or implies. Prove also how this verse: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” can possibly make room for one to know propositions from Scripture given that it’s being used as a proof-text for the denial knowing things not contained in Scripture. Does the verse distinguish between objects of knowledge?

      It was said to me: “The thief had Christ’s own words directly to him about him.”

      I responded: This scenario does not remain true to Scripturalist strictures.. According to Scripturalist strictures, how did the thief know it was the Son of God on the cross? How did the thief know the Son was actually addressing him? How did the thief know that he even existed or wasn’t dreaming? For the thief to know these things requires knowing things not contained in Scripture...what we call “Scripture” does not contain most of the revealed preconditions that must be known in order for Scripture itself to be intelligible. God’s forms of revelation work together, including revelation of one’s self. For *me* to know from Scripture that Jesus lives presupposes I must know that I exist. The intelligibility of special revelation presupposes knowledge acquired through general revelation. Let someone show that I can know that Jesus exists without knowing I exist.

      I wrote: “The pertinent question would seem to be whether the Spirit ever testifies salvation to the believer, which He does not with respect to the unbeliever. The distinction is that deception does not come with the same robust affirmation that accompanies the Spirit’s testimony when knowledge obtains.”

      Scripturalist response: “Now, does the Spirit testify salvation to the believer in terms of additional propositions not found or deducible from Scripture? I have no idea and Ron doesn’t tell us, but he assures us that those who are deceived have not received the same “robust affirmation” that those who are God’s legally adopted children receive. So, what is this “robust affirmation”? Is it a feeling? Does it make you wake up at night in cold sweats? Is it akin to indigestion? Or, the feeling you get when you watch “It’s a Wonderful Life”? Well, Ron doesn’t tell us this either, but he assures us that there is a difference.

      Well, that person wasn't trying very hard, now was he? Regarding the proposition “Ron knows he has savingly believed in Jesus,” that too is a proposition that exists in the mind of God, just like 1 John 5:13 does. (I couldn’t otherwise know that the proposition existed if it did not first exist in God’s mind.) Now of course God knows whether the personal proposition is true, just like he knows whether 1 John 5:13 is true. The only question is whether God ever bears witness to one’s personal salvation based upon promises contained in Scripture. I guess one’s answer to that question would at least in part depend upon what he thought of Romans 8:16: “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.” At any rate, if God were to persuade a person that an affirming proposition as it pertains to personal salvation is in fact true, then the subject would have an illumination of the truth of a personal application of a revelatory promise of God - that whosoever believes… shall be saved.
      Either Scripturalists allow for the Spirit to grant justification for some propositions and not others (which is arbitrary) or else the Scripturalists deny the Spirit's justification altogether and in turn are basing things only on what the publisher says is God's word.

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    3. Ron,

      "Yet, if they concede the Spirit's work in believing Scripture then why can't the Spirit give me the same confirmation to the proposition "I am saved"?"

      Is this a question of means and sources of knowledge? I don't know why a Scripturalist would deny the work of the Spirit in coming to believe Scripture, I've consistently defended both doctrines and done so in the context of self-knowledge as well. I have defended self-knowledge for years, by the way. I also used an extremely similar counter to Sean's citation of Jeremiah (as if it is somehow opposed to self-knowledge) back in January 2013:

      http://unapologetica.blogspot.com/2013/01/scripturalism-and-self-knowledge.html

      See here for more:

      http://unapologetica.blogspot.com/2013/02/communication-of-first-person-knowledge.html

      http://unapologetica.blogspot.com/2013/02/illumination-and-self-knowledge.html

      http://unapologetica.blogspot.com/2013/05/clark-on-self-knowledge.html

      Again, there is no Scripturalist consensus here. I know Scripturalists who agree with me and Scripturalists who agree with Sean.

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    1. Does Scripture itself use the word "knowledge" in different senses? More specifically, is it used in different epistemic senses? I think so, do you?

      A "mere warranted belief" - which was used in reference to externalist justification - indeed cannot be as robust or certain as infallibly and internally justified belief, because externally justified beliefs aren't justified in virtue of reflection or defense. But both internally and externally justified beliefs can be referents of knowledge without its being the case we must conflate them, so I don't see a problem.

      "Within the set of such warranted beliefs can be inferences that are only slightly probable and beliefs that come through general revelation. For the Reformed, those latter sorts of beliefs are considered no less "knowledge" than those things known through special revelation because God testifies to both."

      Wait, are you saying general revelation can yield beliefs - whether justified inferentially or autonomously (i.e. foundationally) - which are capable of being infallibly, internally justified as opposed to probabilistically? I would disagree with that, although I have no problem with the idea beliefs respecting general revelation can be referred to as knowledge - it's just a question of what you mean by "knowledge." I think self-knowledge is rooted in Scripture, so that isn't really an issue here.

      Obviously, many Scripturalists have internal inconsistencies in their positions. That's not the question. The question is whether these inconsistencies are resultant of the "core" tenets of Scripturalism or the incidental ones.

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  11. "Again, there is no Scripturalist consensus here. I know Scripturalists who agree with me and Scripturalists who agree with Sean."

    Ryan,

    You're making S ism into a wax nose. At a fundamental level, it posits that the only things we can know are propositions contained in Scripture and deducible from Scripture.

    Your 7:14 post tries to make these long standing differences merely semantic. However, there's a vast *qualitative* difference between what a S ist will relegate to a what you've called "warranted belief" as opposed to what he's wiling to call true knowledge. Relabeling things won't bring resolution to the differences. For them, the epistemic justification for a mere warranted believe can never be as robust and consequently certain as a belief that rises to knowledge. Within the set of such warranted beliefs can be inferences that are only slightly probable and beliefs that come through general revelation. For the Reformed, those latter sorts of beliefs are considered no less "knowledge" than those things known through special revelation because God testifies to both. So, it's not so trivial as to be a matter of what each camp might be willing to label knowledge but rather a matter of whether there is a *qualitative* difference in epistemic justification between Scripture knowledge and those other beliefs Reformed folk will call knowledge - like knowledge of one's own existence. What's more, there are the internal inconsistencies of their position, which even undermines their claim on knowledge of Scripture-propositions!

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  12. Do you think the quality of one's knowledge is in all cases a function of his being able to give a defense of that knowledge? Regardless, we're taking about a binary consideration of God's witness that makes belief warranted. I think you're conflating knowledge of one's knowledge with strength of belief when knowledge obtains.

    As for your claim that your self knowledge is revealed in Scripture, even if that were correct, no true Scripturalist would agree.


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    1. "Do you think the quality of one's knowledge is in all cases a function of his being able to give a defense of that knowledge?"

      No, I've already said several times now I think externally justified beliefs are capable of being legitimately referred to as "knowledge." I'm also a foundationalist, so even with respect to internalist justification, some beliefs are non-inferentially justified, i.e. not a product of "defense" or proof or evidence.

      "Regardless, we're taking about a binary consideration of God's witness that makes belief warranted. I think you're conflating knowledge of one's knowledge with strength of belief when knowledge obtains."

      I'm not following. What do you mean by "strength of belief"? Probabilistic vs. infallibilistic justification? If so, I don't see how I'm conflating that with internalist justification. Internalist justification is compatible with variously strengthened beliefs.

      Also, when you say God's witness makes a belief warranted, you're going to have to specify what you mean by that, because I'm not sure. What does it mean to say God testifies to both special and general revelation? Does He use different means in producing true beliefs or knowledge in us? Surely all knowledge is a kind of true belief. The question more does it take for something to be able to be legitimately referred to as knowledge. There are a variety of answers to this question, and while some of these answers may differ, that doesn't imply only one answer is legitimate. It's just a matter of whether one's answer in fact allows for him to make certain claims.

      For instance, say my answer to the above question is that knowledge consists of true belief plus that belief's having been the effect of a causal process God designed to be generally reliable. That's a legitimate answer given by externalists, and perhaps this is a way in which God testifies or witnesses to general revelation, but only insofar as they don't also claim that this causal process alone allows me to claim "I know that my belief is known." That sort of claim is internalist in character. The justification of that sort of claim doesn't solely rely on external causal factors. The means of acquiring different kinds of knowledge differ according to the justificatory character of the answer given to the above question.

      "As for your claim that your self knowledge is revealed in Scripture, even if that were correct, no true Scripturalist would agree."

      And why is that? I know several people who at least identify with Scripturalism and also accept self-knowledge. Why aren't they true Scripturalists?

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  13. Ryan,

    I can't afford to spend anymore time on this. I'm a ROI guy and the upside vs cost is not attractive. For one thing, your use of a probabilistic concept is too tangled for me to begin deconstructing. Search my blog.

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    1. Too bad. We've had some pretty good conversations before, like when you convinced me faith involves dispositional commitment.

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    2. Well, I for one was enjoying and benefitting from the interaction, so perhaps for the first time ever I'm siding with a self-professed Scripturalist.

      Not that there's anything wrong with that of course...

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  14. We posted a response to this post and Gordon Clark's response to a similar objection on our website here: http://scripturalism.com/sensation-and-knowledge/

    I take this to be a convincing refutation of the objection. I'd be grateful for any comments and interaction.

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