I'll comment on Rauser's reply:
Two days ago I posted a short video summarizing a thought experiment that I present in my book You’re Not as Crazy as I Think, pp. 137-140. The video elicited an online rebuttal from Steve Hays of Triablogue. He begins in his first sentence by poisoning the well as he describes the thought experiment as me posing a “trick question” to serve as a “wedge tactic.”
i) It's just a fact that some people pose trick questions. Take lawyers who pose trick questions: "It's a simple question–yes or no?" Only it may be actually be complex question, and a yes or no answer is misleading. And the lawyer wants to elicit a misleading answer.
In confirmation hearings, Senators often pose trick questions to trip up a nominee. "That's not what I asked! Just answer the question!"
Some questions don't have good answers because there's something wrong with the question, and it's necessary to reformulate the question. Rauser is smart enough to know that but he pretends not to.
ii) Likewise, it's just a fact that some people use wedge tactics. And there's nothing necessary wrong with wedge tactics. It depends on the cause.
Here's a recent example of Rauser's wedge tactics:
Rauser uses that to instill disbelief in the binding of Isaac (Gen 22).
I understand Rauser's agitated reaction. As an ambush predator, he resents it when I strip away his camouflage.
Next, he states that I rig “the debate by stipulating a false dichotomy”. Steve is confused. A false dichotomy obtains when a person falsely state that there are only two options. I don’t make that claim. Rather, I pose the question, given these two options which would you choose?
Dissimulation is a wonder to behold. Rauser cast the question as if there were only two options. And a false dichotomy isn't confined to interrogative statements. It can take the form of questions:
Rauser's question poses a false dichotomy by limiting the respondent to one or the other of the two tendentious answers he proposed–despite the fact that there are other alternatives.
Later, Steve claims that I “brazenly” endorse “salvation by works alone”. That’s utterly false on two counts. First, I don’t endorse anything. Rather, I pose a question — how do belief and conduct function in right relationship with God and other people? — and invite each listener or viewer to ponder that question for themselves.
Rauser continues to dissemble by feigning that you can't use trick questions and leading questions to promote your agenda. But it's obvious, by his chosen illustration, and the way he frames the question, that he's manipulating the issue so that respondents will take the Muslim side. And it's equally obvious that that's the side Rauser is rooting in this case.
But folks like Steve view people who don’t give you the “right answer” with suspicion.
Notice that Rauser is addicted to prevarication. It's not as if he's a neutral party. He does think there's a right answer. It's a setup so that the respondent will agree with Rauser's implicit position.
They believe that encouraging people to think for themselves is a subversive act which is clearly intended to undermine that which they believe to be true.
Rauser's aim is to get people to think like Rauser.
Why is that? Is it because they themselves have been indoctrinated and they know nothing else? Is it because deep down they are insecure about what they believe and find such questions to be existentially unsettling? I don’t know. But either way, it is a disturbing phenomenon.
i) Isn't that droll. This is from the same guy who began the post by alleged that I poisoned the well. Rauser then resorts to psychoanalyzing my motives: either I've been indoctrinated or I'm intellectually insecure. Gee, why isn't that "poisoning the well". BTW, this is yet another one of Rauser's false dichotomies–as though there couldn't be a different explanation.
ii) And two can play that game. Why is Rauser so defensive about my original post? Is it because deep down he's intellectually insecure, and feels threatened by my critique?
Next, let’s consider Steve’s claim that by allegedly valuing Muslim Diagne’s works over Christian Ntakirutimana’s beliefs, one is thereby endorsing “salvation by works alone”. This too is utterly false. One may simply believe that works are indictative of salvation obtaining in the life of the individual, not that works are thereby saving. And of course, Jesus himself often taught on the centrality of spiritual fruit in the life of an individual as a key indicator of the work of salvation in that individual.
i) To begin with, Rauser is retrofitting his initial presentation by adding ex post facto caveats he didn't originally say.
ii) In addition, this was never simply a question of valuing one set of actions over another set of actions. Instead, Rauser is comparing two different paired claims:
Would you rather be a Muslim who acts like Jesus or a Christian who doesn’t?
Not just would you rather do what the Muslim did in this situation compared to what the SDA pastor did, but would you rather be a Muslim who did that rather than be a Christian who didn't?
Likewise, Rauser asks which of those two people you'd rather be if you stood before the throne of God.
So, as he frames the issue, this isn't just about comparative actions, but comparative religious identity. Rauser insinuated that there are situations where it's better to be a Muslim than a Christian. And not just temporarily but ultimately: standing before the throne of God.
We could recast the choice this way: Is it better to do what the Muslim did in this situation or what the SDA pastor did? That's easy to answer.
But Rauser makes it a choice between Christian identity and Muslim identity. He doesn't make it a question of whether or not the SDA pastor is a real Christian. That would spoil his comparison.
As bad as all that is, Steve ends on an even worse note by suggesting that Jesus’ response to the Rwandan genocide was nonintervention.
Rauser is so deep into his progressive agenda that he can't bring himself to be honest. I wasn't the one who made the behavior of Jesus the basis of comparison. That's how Rauser formulated the issue. Is Rauser telling us that Jesus intervened in the Rwandan genocide? Can he point to the time and place when Jesus put a halt to the Rwandan genocide?
Rauser said the Muslim acted like Jesus. So how did Jesus act during the Rwandan genocide? It's Rauser, not me, who invited that comparison.
This bizarre comment ignores the fact that the church is now called to be the presence of Christ in the world, to behave in the manner he would behave if he were here.
Watch Rauser is doing a bait-n-switch. Yet another example of retrofitting his presentation by adding ex post facto caveats he didn't originally say.
And that includes, among other things, protecting the innocent from harm.
When Jesus was here, how often did he protect the innocent from harm? Was there a moratorium on harming the innocent when Jesus was here? Did Jesus step in to prevent crimes of violence when he was here?
For that matter, the Son of God doesn't have to be here to protect the innocent from harm. And in ever so many situations, Christians are in no position to protect the innocent from harm. So by Rauser's logic, why doesn't Jesus take up the slack? The glib appeal to WWJD? doesn't remotely match reality.
It also includes attempting to understand those with whom you disagree with charity and accuracy, qualities that Steve Hays knows nothing about.
i) Like when Rauser threw Christian college prof. Nicholas Meriwether to the wolves.
Or when he threw the Covington students ("punks," "idiots", "punchable face," "detestable instincts") to the wolves:
Is Rauser charitable and accurate when he rails against Trump supporters? Rauser is only charitable to people and positions he's sympathetic to.
ii) Keep in mind that out of the other side of his mouth, Rauser thinks Jesus was a child of his times. An unreliable guide.
Telling that the theological trajectories of so many Arminian theologians is a nose-dive out of even the barest of orthodoxy.
ReplyDelete"Rauser continues to dissemble by feigning that you can't use trick questions and leading questions to promote your agenda."
ReplyDeleteWhat? Isn't it obvious that questions cannot smuggle in a rhetorical point because they are questions? Why don't you just permit all questions to be questions instead of assuming some of them are making arguments in disguise? Clearly, if I wanted to hide a point and trick people, wouldn't it make the most sense NOT to couch it in the form of a question? If you just use questions, isn't that a tacit assumption that you are asking for more data and not, as is claimed, trying to prove something else?
Shouldn't it be obvious to everyone that it is literally impossible to make any point just by asking questions? If it were possible, wouldn't someone have done it by now?
Lol, Peter. :)
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