Challenging Unbelief
and Exposing self-Refuting Contradictions by
Jack Kettler
Positions claiming absolute certainty:
Consider the assertion: “there is no God.”
First, the Christian must point out that the
unbeliever has not looked and cannot look
everywhere for God. The unbeliever would have
to possess the divine attributes of
omniscience and omnipresence in order to make
an assertion of this nature with any
credibility. Moreover, since the unbeliever is
finite, he cannot be certain of his assertion
because proof for God's existence may be in a
place where he has not looked. Therefore, the
unbeliever has no ground to claim his
assertion is correct because he in reality
cannot be absolutely sure about his assertion.
The unbeliever is saying; “You can’t know
anything for sure.” The unbeliever cannot be
sure of his own assertion without
contradicting himself. Said another way the
unbeliever is saying; “You can’t know anything
for certain.” You reply by asking, are you
certain of that? As you have just seen, the
unbeliever has refuted himself.
The following comments by Cornelius Van Til
on atheism are most instructive:
Even making the statement “God does not exist”
would be impossible if God did not exist. No
statement can be made about chaos, abstract
plurality. Without any order to the world,
words would never have a consistent meaning.
“This is x” would be equivalent to “This is
not x.” “God does not exist” would be
equivalent to “God does exist.” The words
“God,” “does,” “not,” and “exist” would suffer
the same possibility of becoming their
opposites, or anything else; nor would there
be any relationship between any of the words.
To say that God does not exist is to make a
universal negative claim, yet on the basis of
a plurality that excludes all unity, universal
claims are not possible. On the other hand, on
the basis of an abstract unity as ultimate, no
words would have any content. Once again, “is”
would be equivalent to "is not." All would be
a blank. God, as a concrete universal, must
exist in order for the statement “God does not
exist” to be intelligible. Antitheism
presupposes theism. One must stand upon the
solid ground of theism to be an effective
antitheist. Finally, agnosticism is morally
self-contradictory since it pretends to be
very humble in its insistence that it makes no
sweeping conclusions, while as a matter of
fact it has made a universal negative
conclusion in total reliance upon itself. The
“natural man” is at enmity against God. (1)
Positions claiming absolute uncertainty:
“We cannot know whether God exists or not.”
The Christian must show the unbeliever that
though his position may seem safe and neutral
on the surface, it is actually a bold
statement about God and His world. The
assertion is claiming that God has not made
himself known in a way that should be accepted
by everyone. The Christian must respond by
explaining to the unbeliever that he has not
searched everywhere to see if there is any
clear evidence for God's existence. Moreover,
the unbeliever is in reality unable to look
everywhere without possessing divine
attributes. The unbeliever is saying; “There
is no certainty.” He cannot be certain of that
without contradicting himself? Therefore, the
unbeliever cannot be sure about his
agnosticism and therefore, his position and
objection is not valid. Again, as you have
just seen, the unbeliever has refuted himself.
Cornelius Van Til speaking of Agnosticism
says:
[Agnosticism] is, in the first place,
psychologically self-contradictory upon its
own assumptions. Agnosticism wants to hold
that it is reasonable to refrain from thorough
epistemological speculations because they
cannot lead to anything. Nevertheless, in
order to assume this attitude, agnosticism has
itself made the most tremendous intellectual
assertion that could be made about ultimate
things. In the second place, agnosticism is
epistemologically self-contradictory on its
own assumptions because its claim to make no
assertion about ultimate reality rests upon a
most comprehensive assertion about ultimate
reality. . . . the alternative is not between
saying something about ultimate reality or not
saying anything about it, but that the
alternative is rather between saying one thing
about it or another. Every human being, as a
matter of fact, says something about ultimate
reality.
It should be noted, that those who claim to
say nothing about ultimate reality not only do
say something about it just as well as
everybody else, but they have assumed for
themselves the responsibility of saying one
definite thing about ultimate reality. They
have assumed the responsibility of excluding
God. We have seen again that a God who is to
come in afterward is no God at all [i.e. a God
that is not sovereign over all existence –
M.W.]. Agnosticism cannot say that it is
open-minded on the question of the nature of
ultimate reality. It is absolutely
closed-minded on the subject. It has one view
that it cannot, unless its own assumption be
denied, exchange for another. It has started
with the assumption of the non-existence of
God and must end with it. Its so-called
open-minded attitude is therefore a
closed-minded attitude. The agnostic must be
open-minded and closed-minded at the same
time. In addition, this is not only a
psychological self-contradiction, but also an
epistemological self-contradiction. It amounts
to affirmation and denial at the same time.
Accordingly, they cancel out one another, if
there is cancellation power in them.
Incidentally, we may point out that, in
addition to being psychologically and
epistemologically self-contradictory, the
agnostic is morally self-contradictory. His
contention was that he is very humble, and for
that reason unwilling to pretend to know
anything about ultimate matters. Yet he has by
implication made a universal statement about
reality. He therefore not only claims to know
as much as the theist knows, but he claims to
know much more. More than that, he not only
claims to know much more than the theist, but
he claims to know more than the theist’s God.
He has boldly set bare possibility above the
theist’s God and is quite willing to test the
consequences of his action. It is thus that
the hubris of which the Greeks spoke so much,
and upon which they invoked the wrath of the
gods, appears in new and seeming innocent
garb. (2)
As seen in the above self-referential
statements by unbelievers asserting total
certainty or agnostics in arguing for total
uncertainty, we see that their statements are
self-refuting. It is amazing to see how many
times these kinds of statements are made by
unbelievers.
Some of the numerous examples and responses
to self-refuting contradictions made by
modern day unbelievers and irrationalists:
“Only knowledge that can be empirically
verified is true.” Can you empirically verify
that statement?
“There are no absolute truths.” Is that
statement absolutely true?
“All truth is relative.” Is the supposed truth
you just asserted relative?
“You should be skeptical of everything.”
Should we be skeptical of that statement?
“You ought not to judge.” Is that a judgment
you just asserted?
Van Til best sums up the folly of modern
unbelieving assertions about reality:
“Modern science boldly asks for a criterion of
meaning when one speaks to him of Christ. He
assumes that he himself has a criterion, a
principle of verification and of
falsification, by which he can establish for
himself a self-supporting island floating on a
shoreless sea. But when he is asked to show
his criterion as it functions in experience,
every fact is indeterminate, lost in darkness;
no one can identify a single fact, and all
logic is like a sun that is always behind the
clouds.” (3)
Also, it problematic
for non-believers, when they assert moral
absolutes and omniscient statements within the
framework of a materialistic system that does
not allow absolutes. When finite man without
Biblical authority asserts moral absolute
omniscient statements, it is indefensible.
Moreover, it should be noted the absurdity of
atheism's claim when asserting, “there is no
God.” The absurdity is this; it is impossible
to prove a universal negative. Furthermore,
when the atheist asserts that “there is no
God.” When using the second question of the
Socratic technique, “how do you know that?”
reveals the failure of this unverifiable
claim. With that, we can dismiss the
non-believer's demand for verification, which
they always demand of Christians. In regards
to the agnostic claims of ignorance concerning
the existence of God, it should be noted that
this claim of ignorance is not an argument
against the existence of God. Rather, it is a
sign of epistemological bankruptcy and what
could be described as a deficiency of
knowledge.
Unbelievers argue in ways that are truly
rational only based on the Christian
world-view:
We cannot do without God any more when we wish
to know about physics or psychology than when
we wish to know about our soul’s salvation.
Not one single fact in this universe can be
known truly by man without the existence of
God. Even if man will not recognize God’s
existence, the fact of God’s existence none
the less accounts for whatever measure of
knowledge man has about God….Now if every fact
of the universe is created by God, and if the
mind of man and whatever the mind of man knows
is created by God, it goes without saying that
the whole fabric of human knowledge would dash
to pieces if God did not exist and if all
finite existence were not revelational of God.
(4)
In closing, as Van
Til observes:
It is the firm
conviction of every epistemologically
self-conscious Christian that no human being
can utter a single syllable, whether in
negation or affirmation, unless it were for
God’s existence. Thus, the transcendental
argument seeks to discover what sort of
foundations the house of human knowledge must
have, in order to be what it is. (5)
Van Til goes on to say:
We
must point out that reasoning itself leads to
self-contradiction, not only from a theistic
point of view, but from a non-theistic point
of view as well... It is this that we ought to
mean when we say that we reason from the
impossibility of the contrary. The contrary is
impossible only if it is self-contradictory
when operating on the basis of its own
assumptions. (6)
Let it be widely known that:
"The fool hath said in his heart, There is no
God..." Psalm 14:1
“The heavens declare the glory of God; and the
firmament shows His handiwork.” (Psalm 19:1)
Notes:
1. Cornelius Van Til, A Survey
of Christian Epistemology,
(Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed
Publishing Co., 1970), xii.
2. Cornelius Van Til, A Survey
of Christian Epistemology,
(Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed
Publishing Co., 1970) pp. 213,214.
3. Cornelius Van Til, Christian-Theistic
Evidences (Phillipsburg, NJ:
Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co.,
1976), pp. 147-48.
4. Cornelius Van Til, An
Introduction to Systematic Theology,
(Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1978), 14.
5. Cornelius Van Til, A Survey
of Christian Epistemology,
(Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed
Publishing Co., 1970) p. 11.
6. Cornelius Van Til, A Survey
of Christian Epistemology,
(Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed,
1970), p. 204).
“Blessed art thou, O LORD: teach
me thy statutes.” (Psalm 119:12)
“Study to shew thyself approved
unto God, a workman that needeth not to be
ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”
(2 Timothy 2:15)
“To God, only wise, be glory
through Jesus Christ forever. Amen.” (Romans
16:27) and “heirs according to the promise.”
(Galatians 3:28, 29)
Mr. Kettler has previously
published articles in the Chalcedon
Report and Contra
Mundum. He and his wife Marea attend the
Westminster, CO, RPCNA Church. He served as an
ordained ruling elder in the Orthodox
Presbyterian Church. He worked in and retired
from a fortune five hundred company in
corporate America after forty years. He runs
two blogs sites and is the author of the book
defending the Reformed Faith against attacks,
titled: The
Religion That Started in a Hat.
Available at: The
Religion That Started in a Hat