Fristianity Refuted

Here’s a really rough thumbnail sketch of a non-question begging argument refuting Fristianity (written from my phone).

In Christianity, the categorical three term syllogism (“Barbara”) is grounded in the intratrinitarian relationships within the Godhead:

1.) All that belongs to the Son (B) belongs to the Father (A).
2.) All that belongs to the Spirit (C) belongs to the Son (B).
3.) Therefore, all that belongs to the Spirit (C) belongs to the Father (A).

1.) All Bs are As.
2.) All Cs are Bs.
3.) Therefore, all Cs are As.

The Fristian quadrinity, even with a mysterious role for the fourth person, by the nature of the unity in the quadrinity would produce a four term syllogism, which is formally fallacious. The Fristian god cannot provide the necessary preconditions for logic.

Thoughts?

(Argument inspired by Vern Poythress.)

Adventures in Humility

“The success of a ministry is always more a picture of who God is than a statement about who the people are that he is using for his purpose.” -Paul Tripp, Dangerous Calling p. 28

The Liar Paradox and Presuppositional Apologetics 4: Defending Classical Logic

This post will be an overly-brief thumbnail sketch of a response to a broad and complex philosophical topic: dialetheism. From SEP: “A dialetheia is a sentence, A, such that both it and its negation, ¬A, are true… dialetheism opposes the so-called Law of Non-Contradiction (LNC),” (i.e. for any A, it is impossible for both A and not-A to be true).

The Liar Sentence (“This sentence is false.”), considered as a semantic paradox, is the most common example of a proposed dialetheia, and has been the subject of my most recent blog series. A notional objection to presuppositional apologetics was proposed by atheist philosopher Patrick Mefford, roughly stating that the Liar Paradox presents a problem for the presuppositional apologist’s use of the LNC in arguing for the existence of God. Mefford proposed that the adoption of a multi-valued logic (rather than the classical binary logic) might blunt the force of the apologist’s reliance on the LNC in his argumentation. (Or possibly the objection was that if there are true dialetheias then God must believe falsehoods or create contradictions or some other such untrustworthy or nefarious thing… as I said, the objection wasn’t clearly stated).

In response to the objection, I proposed that the adoption of a multi-valued logic wouldn’t be as problematic as Mefford supposed (and I criticized his proposed solution as well).

However, there seems to have been some confusion surrounding what a multi-valued logic actually is. (This seems to have been due to Mefford’s recent familiarity with the subject, as evidenced by his acknowledged unfamiliarity with dialetheism and paraconsistency.) So, to be clear:

A classical binary logic has two truth-values: true and false.

A multi-valued logic (MVL) contains multiple truth-values: true, false, and at least one other value – such as “both,” “neither,” “undefined,” “unknown,” etc.

There are also infinite-valued logics, such as fuzzy logic, with truth-degrees between 0 and 1.

There are many different multi-valued logics and I have neither the time, desire, nor the expertise to discuss them all at length here. I would simply note that even Asenjo’s Logic of Paradox (promulgated by the foremost dialetheist Graham Priest) doesn’t deny the LNC outright, but seeks to outline a logic which incorporates the LNC with sentences that are inconsistent with it (i.e. dialetheias). To attempt to put it more simply, a classical, binary logic seeks to maintain logical consistency in light of the LNC, while certain multi-valued logics seek to maintain a kind of logical consistency (paraconsistency) which takes into consideration the LNC and certain, specific dialetheias – while not succumbing to the problem of trivialism (the undesirable view that all contradictions are true) through logical explosion (when the truth blows up and gets everywhere).

Dialetheism is an extreme minority position in the history of Western philosophy, but in its more robust forms it is a difficult theory to overturn. There are many complex and thorny philosophical issues in this regard which, again, go beyond the scope of a blog post. While there are many motives proposed for adopting dialetheism, it would not be inaccurate to say that the Liar Paradox is the central reason proffered for the position.

The most common (and misbegotten) objection to dialetheism is that it entails trivialism via logical explosion – that any sentence can be materially implied from a contradiction via disjunctive syllogism.

An example:

Assume that (A) “All cats go to hell” and (¬A) “All cats do not go to hell” are both true. From this we can validly infer anything, such as (B) “David Hume is David Bowie.”

(P1) Either all cats go to hell or David Hume is David Bowie (A v B)

(P2) All cats do not go to hell (¬A)

(C) Therefore, David Hume is David Bowie. (B by DS)

If dialetheism produces these sorts of logical conclusions then it would appear to be deeply flawed. However, paraconsistent logics are constructed purposefully to avoid triviality. So the argument that dialetheism entails triviality fails because paraconsistent logics are non-explosive (though the details in this regard can be quite technical and are not entirely uncontested).

A stronger response to paradoxes of self-reference is the proposal of MVLs which can account for sentences which appear to be both true and false (or neither true nor false, by intersubstitutivity). So a sentence like the Liar is accounted for by giving it a third truth-value (as described above). However, these MVLs all ostensibly fall prey to various “Revenge Paradoxes,” such as the “Strengthened Liar.”

The Strengthened Liar accepts the truth-values of whatever multi-valued logic may be proposed, but then reproduces the paradox of self-reference within the truth-values of that logic (i.e. “This sentence is not true” or “This sentence is neither true nor false nor both,” etc.). So even the adoption of MVLs with truth-value gaps (neither true nor false) or gluts (both true and false) falls prey to various Strengthened Liars. Whatever truth-values a given logic may contain, a Liar Sentence can be produced for those values. These sentences have been called “Revenge Paradoxes,” in that they respond to proposed solutions to the semantic paradoxes with a reformulation of the original paradox, seeking semantic vengeance on their objectors. (“Semantic Vengeance” would be a pretty good band name for a progressive metal group, don’t you think?)

To summarize, semantic paradoxes (such as the Liar) provide evidence for the dialetheistic cornerstone position that there are true contradictions. The paradoxical characteristics of sentences like the Strengthened Liar(s) are due to the ordinary features of natural language, such as self-reference and the presence of truth predicates (i.e. “is true”). Various proposed solutions fail, such as Tarskian metalinguistic hierarchies, since they only produce languages that are expressively weaker than English. MVLs are non-explosive but still fall prey to Strengthened Liars. Several other solutions have been proposed, but most simply beg the question in favor of classical logic. As I said, dialetheism is a difficult theory to overturn.

So what recourse is there for the defender of classical binary logic in the face of the Liar Paradox?

Recently, a defense of monaletheism has been advocated by Benjamin Burgis, in his doctoral dissertation (HT: Paul Manata). The essence of Burgis’ argument, as I understand it, is that sentences with truth-value ascriptions are meaningless unless they are “grounded-out” in sentences which contain no truth predicate (p. 112f., esp. n. 101).

The problem for the Liar is that this semantic paradox doesn’t ground its truth attributions in extra-semantic reality. Burgis alternatingly (and somewhat confusingly) calls this the “meaningfulness solution” or the “meaninglessness solution.” He states it more explicitly as the “Kripke/Tarski Thesis: We are making some sort of mistake when we attribute truth or falsity to a sentence that isn’t (directly or indirectly) about something other than truth” (p. 116). He argues that sentences like the Liar are actually meaningless (and thus not true dialetheias), though they give an initially plausible appearance of meaningfulness because they contain many of the characteristics of meaningful sentences, such as being grammatically well-formed, self-referential, truth-ascribing, etc.

The argumentation he presents is extensive and I would commend it to any with the time and interest in reading it. He seems to have a good case for a non-question-begging response to dialetheism, which is easier stated than demonstrated. Given our discussion above, it seems best then to briefly consider whether or not Burgis’ defense of monaletheism falls prey to any sort of Revenge Paradoxes.

A Revenge Paradox to Burgis’ meaningfulness solution could be formulated as: “It would be a mistake of some sort to call this sentence true.” If we say the sentence is true, we are mistaken – since it’s meaningless (per Burgis’ solution). If we say it is false, then we commit no mistake when we say it is true – but that’s exactly what the sentence says is a mistake. We make one kind of mistake in ascribing truth to a meaningless sentence, and another kind of mistake in ascribing falsehood to a true sentence. If it’s true, then we’re mistaken, if it’s false, then it’s true (and we’re mistaken), and if it’s meaningless then it’s true (and we’re still mistaken). There doesn’t appear to be a non-mistaken way to refer to the truth-value associated with this Revenge Paradox sentence.

So, given this analysis, a way of reformulating this sentence would be “This sentence is either false or meaningless.” It’s this disjunction which allows Burgis’ meaningfulness solution to escape the Revenge Paradox, since the first disjunct (“This sentence is false”) is meaningless and a disjunction must have two meaningful disjuncts in order to ascribe truth-value to it (per the meaningfulness solution). So if the disjunct is meaningless and it is saying the same thing as the Revenge Paradox above, then this Revenge Paradox is also meaningless (or begs the question against the meaningfulness solution).

So if the strongest candidate for a proposed dialetheia, the Liar Paradox, is meaningless, then one (the?) major objection to classical logic has been de-fanged.

In my limited and humble estimation, Burgis’ proposals give the strongest non-question-begging, non-ad hoc, intuitively plausible defense of monaletheism (and concomitant critique of dialetheism) available for pursuing a defense of classical binary logic in the face of semantic paradoxes such as the Liar.

So, to conclude this series, Mefford’s original objection can be answered by the presuppositional apologist through (1) demonstrating his dilemma is hornless by adopting a multi-valued logic (maintaining the same thesis-antithesis approach which incorporates the LNC but adopting an MVL as concerning the semantic paradoxes where necessary) – this is not problematic since the presuppositionalist in particular understands the relationship between divine and human logic as analogical; (2) criticizing his proposed solution in the Tarskian hierarchy; and (3) by defending classical logic, arguing that the semantic paradoxes like the Liar are meaningless.

In any case, it would hardly seem that the presuppositional apologist (or any apologist in general, I think) need fear anything from a consideration of the Liar Paradox.

The Liar Paradox and Presuppositional Apologetics 3: A “Final” Reply to Patrick Mefford

A good link-history of the recent discussion surrounding the Liar Paradox and presuppositional apologetics can be found at the beginning of Chris Bolt’s latest post. So I won’t re-tread any of that here.

It appears that Patrick Mefford has decided to take his ball and go home. Entirely his prerogative. We salute your service, Mr. Mefford, and wish you a happy new year.

In his final post to Chris Bolt, he did respond to me as well – so I’ll give some final thoughts in return. ‘Tis the season for giving and all…

Misreading Paul?

There was a bit of exegetical back-and-forth between Chris and Patrick over Titus 1:12-13a, specifically regarding whether or not Paul presents a case of the Liar Paradox when he quotes a Cretan prophet stating, “Cretans are always liars.”

Given that the broader context of Titus 1 has to do with the careful selection of church leaders according to certain character qualities, it makes the best sense to understand Paul’s quotation of Epimenides as proving his point – that close evaluation of men from Crete would be necessary in choosing church leaders. Cretans were notorious scoundrels, and even their own prophets (whom one might expect to evaluate their own heritage and culture patriotically) can be called as witnesses to the fact – “we’re all liars, gluttons and monsters.” This seems more in line with the whole letter to Titus – rather than the introduction of dialetheism without further commentary of any sort from the author.

However, I don’t think Patrick intended to get into an extended exegetical debate over the issue. His point seems to me to have been an attempt at providing a stronger reason for a Christian apologist to want to resolve the Liar Paradox – “look, it’s even in the Bible.” I’ll give Patrick credit for trying to bring some further rhetorical force to his objection, but his conclusion (unfortunately) requires a rather forced interpretation of Titus – which Chris, to his credit, resisted.

Regardless of the exegesis of Titus, the Liar Paradox remains an issue for both parties, since Chris desires to maintain a classical binary logic and there’s a few problems with Tarski’s position (which Mefford has proposed).

Misreading me?

Patrick quotes a section of this post, where I’m attempting to summarize Tarski’s semantic hierarchy as relevant to the issue of the Liar Paradox. He quotes me summarizing Tarski, then points out that “this does not accurately describe what I laid out.” Nor was it meant to. It’s a summary of Tarski, not Mefford.

Admittedly, my summary borders on an oversimplification of Tarski, but it was an attempt to break things down to laymen’s terms (as much as I might be able); but to criticize it for not being something it was never intended to be is hardly appropriate. So he misread me.

Misreading me… or Tarski… or himself?

Regarding his own formulation, Mefford states: “There is no bottom level object language that does not contains (sic) words like ‘true’ or ‘false’. This is made explicit.”

However, quoting Mefford’s original post, he formulates the Liar Sentence within the hierarchy as:

(A1b) “P2 is false” [lⁿ] is true [Tⁿ⁺¹] if and only if P2 is false [lⁿ]

He explains, “The liar paradox cannot be stated in this hierarchy, because any language it is written in will not have the proper truth predicate.”

So, on the one hand, he says: (X) the bottom-level object language (l^n-1) does not contain the proper truth predicate (i.e. words like ‘true’ or ‘false’), which is how the hierarchy eludes the paradox.

Or, on the other hand, he says: (Y) “there is no bottom level object language that does not contains (sic) words like ‘true’ or ‘false’.” So which is it, (X) or (Y)?

These propositions exist. They are a contradiction. How do they stand in relation to Patrick Mefford?

Well, most likely, he has either misread me or Tarski (or himself?) or some combination thereof. I don’t know which.

(Let me make the point more explicitly: if Mefford’s object language contains a truth predicate then it is susceptible to the Liar Paradox; if it does not contain the relevant truth predicate then he has no basis for his objection to my summary.)

Misreading me again?

Mefford goes on to quote my point regarding the infinite nature of Tarski’s hierarchy. But for some reason he thinks I’m raising this as a “mistake or problem.” He says, “…asking me where the hierarchy stops is to assume to (sic) the collection is finite instead of infinite.” But I never asked where the hierarchy stops. I didn’t ask, because that’s a dumb question. I was merely pointing out that Tarski’s hierarchy is infinite. I agree with Mefford when he says, “An infinite regress isn’t a mistake or a problem. Infinite regression is fine n dandy in mathematics…” So, I’m not sure why he disagrees with me, unless it’s due to the jocular reference to “turtles all the way down.”

It’s my understanding that the phrase “turtles all the way down” has specific historical reference to the infinite regress problem within the domain of cosmology – but when used outside of that domain it can refer to an infinite regress of whatever kind (in this case a non-problematic infinite regress). Since we weren’t at all discussing cosmology, I assumed Mefford would know that I was merely referencing a colorful illustration of the infinite recourse within Tarski’s hierarchy.

However, if Mefford objects that I shouldn’t have borrowed a term from cosmology for illustrative purposes, then I’ll simply point out (in good fun) that his illustration from Tristram Shandy is a pure cock and bull story.

Bottom line

Unfortunately, Mefford chose not to interact with any of my actual criticisms of Tarski’s hierarchy (such as that the semantic hierarchy is incapable of useful self-reference, it relies on natural language in a problematic way, and that it doesn’t resolve the Liar Paradox for natural languages). Rather, it would appear that his engagement with presuppositional apologetics in general could be characterized by the sorts of misreadings outlined above.

Since C.L. Bolt was kind enough to “leave the rest” to me, I’ll be following this post with a (brief) defense of classical logic, Lord willing.

The Liar Paradox and Presuppositional Apologetics 2: A Critique

The Pinocchio paradox. When Pinocchio says “My nose grows now” it creates a Liar sentence and makes Pinocchio’s nose to grow if and only if it does not grow. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Pat Mefford has said that “conventional notions of truth and falsity in our natural language and in our everyday discourse are what I consider to be a useful fiction.” He proposes the adoption of Alfred Tarski’s semantic conception of truth, an artificial hierarchy of languages whereby the truth predicate for an initial “object-language” is only found in a “meta-language” (neatly escaping the Liar Paradox, i.e. “This sentence is false.”). However, as we’ll see momentarily, if the intuitively appealing use of “true” and “false” in our natural language is a “useful fiction,” as Mefford put it, then Tarski’s hierarchy could be considered a “useless fiction” in contrast.

Tarski’s proposal is that we can save consistency in the face of the Liar Paradox, not for natural languages, but for restricted and regimented artificial languages, wherein no language contains its own truth predicate. At the bottom level, we have the “object language,” which does not contain words like “true” or “false” at all. Above that we have the “meta-language,” which contains such words, but where they can only be applied to object language sentences. It really is a very clever way of avoiding the Liar, since no self-referential, truth-value-ascribing sentences are possible within any given language.

However, if we want to contend with the truth-value of an assertion made in the meta-language, we would need further recourse to a meta-meta-language to consider whether or not the truth predication of the meta-language (regarding the object-language) is correct. What if there’s a question regarding the truth ascribed in the meta-meta-language? Well, we need a meta-meta-meta-language. See the pattern? It’s turtles all the way down.

Consider the following example:

(1) All dogs go to heaven.

(2) It is true that “all dogs go to heaven.”

(3) It is false that “all dogs go to heaven.”

Sentence (1) is written in the object-language while (2) and (3) are in the meta-language. How do we express the disagreement between (2) and (3)? If we were allowed to do that in the meta-language, then the meta-language would contain its own truth predicate, and we could construct a meta-language sentence like (1), but the problem of the Liar wouldn’t have been avoided. So we have to step up into a meta-meta-language to make a statement like:

(4) It is false that “it is true that ‘all dogs go to heaven.’”

Note that most explanations of Tarski’s linguistic hierarchy are commonly made in our natural language, not within the hierarchy itself. This isn’t clearly self-refuting, since such a project appears possible, but it would seem awkward and impractical to parse out each sentence’s place within the hierarchy while explaining the hierarchy itself; consistency would require such a task though. So, while this hierarchy of languages presents a resolution for the special case of the semantics associated with the Liar Paradox it makes the semantics associated with the rest of discourse cumbersome and unnatural.

Further, there are statements which seem intuitively true and which would be useful in discussing Tarski’s hierarchy but which simply can’t be said in any of his artificial languages. For instance:

(5) No sentence anywhere in the hierarchy says of itself that it is false.

(6) No sentence anywhere in the hierarchy is both true and false.

Sentences like (5) and (6) are commonly used in persuading someone to employ Tarski’s hierarchy, but have no place within the hierarchy itself. There is no “ultimate-meta-language” or “trans-meta-language” which can use a truth predicate in reference to itself (much less to the entire hierarchy). This is a severe problem for the theory, since the principle which helps it to escape the Liar Paradox also prevents it from being useful in broader discourse, especially when attempting to demonstrate the value of its proposed solution.

To add insult to injury, the Liar Paradox may not be predicable in Tarski’s hierarchy, but it is still present in English – and Tarski’s solution says nothing about that.

In fact, some* interpret Tarski to be a “proto-dialetheist” of sorts, in that he believed semantic paradoxes of self-reference within natural languages were inescapable (he famously, and controversially, stated that natural languages were “inconsistent”). This may be why he was willing to abandon natural languages to preserve logical consistency (albeit of an artificial sort). (*See The Law of Non-Contradiction: New Philosophical Essays by Graham Priest, et al, p. 118f.)

So, with regard to Mefford’s proposed solution to the Liar Paradox (which he raised as an objection to Chris Bolt’s presuppositional/covenantal apologetic) there are some severe problems which leave him in the regrettable position of having no answer for his own objection.

As I said in my last post, (if I get the time and people seem interested) I’ll propose a solution to the Liar Paradox, as well as some ethical considerations on the whole issue.

The Liar Paradox and Presuppositional Apologetics

So Pat Mefford has raised an objection (here, here, and here) to Chris Bolt’s presentation of VanTilian Presuppositional (sometimes voguely referred to as Covenantal) Apologetics. Chris asked Pat for clarification, then responded here and here. Pat raises the “Liar Paradox” as an objection to Chris’ account of logic, specifically the Law of Non-Contradiction (LNC), as grounded analogically in the divine thoughts.

(His original objection was that Chris was “smuggling” classical binary logic into his account of logical laws – something which Chris’ opponent may not be willing to grant. Instead, Mefford proposed the adoption of Kleene’s ternary logic, which is paracomplete (it denies the Law of the Excluded Middle (LEM), not the LNC). Then he presented the Simple Liar Paradox (i.e. “This sentence is false.”) as the basis for adopting a (presumably paraconsistent) multi-valued logic (MVL). Initially, it was unclear which objection Mefford was proposing: the adoption of Kleene’s MVL (denying the LEM) or the acceptance of the Liar Paradox (denying the LNC). His follow-up posts have focused exclusively on the Liar Paradox, possibly because I pointed out that Mefford’s original argument was self-refuting, since he argued for denying the LEM via disjunction – a philosophical solvent which dissolves itself.)

Laying all of that to the side, I must admit that (despite Mefford’s clarifications) I’m still not sure what the substance of the objection is. To quote Mefford:

In what way does Chris’ simulacrum of God’s divine system answer this paradox? In what way are we thinking God’s thoughts after him when think (sic) of this scriptural passage that was at the top of my original post?… This proposition exists. It is a contradiction. How does it stand in relation to the Triune God? How is this proposition grounded in Almighty God? How does Chris account for it?

To my reading, it seems that Mefford is merely asking for an account of the Liar Paradox from the perspective of the Presuppositionalist (specifically one who holds to a classical, binary logic as Chris does). I don’t see how this is a very significant objection, but that may be a reflection of my poor reading skills rather than Mefford’s argumentation.

For example, Mefford believes Tarski’s semantic conception of truth solves the Liar Paradox. So Chris might say (arguendo, at the very least) that Tarski’s hierarchy more closely reflects God’s thinking with respect to the Liar. (I might suggest to both of them that Saul Kripke’s partial predicate T-schema seems to be a less problematic resolution. Kripke’s construction seeks to maintain classical binary logic with the Liar falling into a “truth-gap,” rather than outside of Tarski’s overly-restrictive semantic hierarchy.) Does this result in some wholesale denial of classical logic? Hardly. It simply provides a semantic “extension” of classical logic which “subsumes the binary apparatus into the new system” (to use Mefford’s own terms). Whether Tarski’s or Kripke’s or some other account is best is irrelevant to answering Mefford’s objection, since the Presuppositional Apologist is only committed to viewing human logics as analogs of divine “Logic” anyway.

Further points to consider:

Mefford’s treatment of Titus 1:12-13 is superficial. To prove this is a biblical example of affirming the Liar Paradox would require Mefford to establish that Paul intends to say that “absolutely every Cretan lies every time he speaks.” It seems much more natural to interpret Paul as hyperbolically generalizing about Cretans, citing one of their own poets as an authoritative source. Chris made this point quite clearly.

For the sake of argument, however, let’s assume Mefford’s interpretation. So Paul says the Liar Paradox is true. This would simply be a proto-affirmation of Graham Priest’s contention that there are true dialethias. This interpretation would put Christians in the minority in the history of Western philosophy, but dialetheism is not as easily refuted as some might like to think. So the Christian might just say that a paraconsistent, non-explosive logic is the most accurate way of thinking God’s thoughts after him. Mefford’s objection is again refuted.

Mefford seems to think that the adoption of a non-classical logic would dull the sharpness of the Classical Presuppositionalist’s double-edged Thesis-Antithesis approach to apologetics. However, he’s never demonstrated why this must be the case, and I’m not interested in doing the heavy lifting for him. To the contrary, the adoption of a classical-logic-with-truth-value-gaps may serve to strengthen the Presuppositionalist’s case in certain ways, a la Peter Strawson‘s conception of presupposition.

However, my intent is not to elaborate on that point right now, but rather to show that Mefford’s dilemma is hornless. Chris could defend classical, binary logic (hardly a losing proposition in my mind) or adopt a non-classical, multi-valued logic without losing any ground to his interlocutor. In my estimation, a VanTilian apologetic could comport with the more classical monaletheism or with a robust form of dialetheism, having a well-formulated paraconsistent logic.

If I get the time, I may attempt to present a reasoned defense of classical logic in this context – or Chris may beat me to the punch; I’d be willing to give it a shot, if others would find such an endeavor useful.

Finally, I find it interesting that Mefford sees the Liar Paradox as “rooted in epistemology and metaphysics,” but does not mention ethics. Being a good tri-perspectivalist, I think there must be some ethical aspects to any explanation for the Liar, which I may also consider at a later date. Remember, lying is a sin…

Tullian Tchividjian, Rick Phillips and Total Depravity

So the evangelical blogospheric dust-up last week between Tullian Tchividjian (TGC) and Rick Phillips (Ref21) over the relationship between justification and sanctification in the Christian life appears to have settled somewhat. Tullian wrote an article responding to the question “Are Christians Totally Depraved?” His answer, in short: Yes – in a sense.

Rick Phillips criticized Tullian’s article in his own blog post, “Thank God that Christians Are Not Totally Depraved.” Tullian responded with a post which was largely an exercise in missing the point, quoting extensively from various Reformed confessions while turning the discussion away from the question of depravity and to an argument about the relationship between justification and sanctification. Phillips responded with a comparatively irenic post, attempting to clarify his own and Tchividjian’s positions. Meanwhile, the TGC combox brought the usual heat rather than light, with Tullian’s fanboys and girls rallying around their hero.

Several have commented that the issue seems like two sides of the same coin, arguing about differences of emphasis (rather than substance) in relating justification and sanctification. Phillips rounded out this discussion by posting on common misconceptions in that regard.

While it appears accurate to see both Phillips and Tchividjian as orthodox in their views of justification, sanctification, and the relationship between the two, the heart of the disagreement is regarding total depravity, not justification and sanctification.

Bottom line: Tullian misused the term “total depravity” when he applied it to Christians. He says Christians are totally depraved “in a sense,” that sense being half of the standard theological definition of total depravity. And “half-totally depraved” is a confusing concept.

A definition of total depravity incorporates (at least): (1) the radical corruption of every human faculty by sin and (2) a complete inability to not sin (non posse non peccare; cf. Berkhof p. 246-7, Reymond p. 450f., Grudem p. 497f., Shedd p. 601-2). Tullian stipulates that he is using the term only to refer to the first half of the definition – but this is a confusing misuse of the term. While it may carry rhetorical force in illustrating his point regarding the pervasive nature of sin even in the life of a Christian, it is ultimately a confusing rather than clarifying way of teaching the doctrine of indwelling sin in the life of a believer.

Sermon Manuscript: Romans 2:6 (Part 10)

(This is a section of a manuscript of the first prepared sermon I ever preached, which was in 2009 at the Evangelical Church of Fairport.)

Romans 2:6, “He will render to each one according to his works…”

So, if it is indeed the case that we are justified by faith apart from works of the law, how can we then be judged according to our works as our text so clearly states?

The first key in understanding the role of works in judgment and justification is that Christ’s death in our behalf removes our guilt, but not our responsibility. We remain perpetually responsible for our actions, even though the shame and penalty for those actions have been absorbed by another.

So, will the sins of believers be made public on the last day? There are theologians and commentators who argue that since the sins of Christians are covered by the blood of Christ, they cannot be a subject of discussion at the judgment. Although the Bible teaches that believers have the guilt and penalty of their sins removed and are clothed with Jesus’ perfect righteousness and thus are not in danger of being cast into hell, Scripture does teach very clearly that all Christians will have to give an account on that day. The reasons for this assertion are manifold.

First, one cannot avoid the biblical passages that speak of the judgment as an event that includes both the saved and the unsaved (e.g., Eccl. 12:14; Mt. 13:30, 36-43, 47-50; 25:31-34, 41; Ac. 17:30-31; Rev. 20:12-13).

Second, the evaluation of a believer’s works on the day of judgment is explicitly taught in the epistles and is used by Paul to urge believers to greater diligence in doing good: “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil..” (2 Cor. 5:10) “For I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then each one will receive his commendation from God.” (1 Cor. 4:4-5). “Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.” (1 Cor. 3:12-15). “Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God… So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.” (Rom. 14:10,12). An account cannot be given, however, except by a careful disclosure of one’s entire conduct, and thus the imperfections and failures of the faithful will of necessity also be made public.

Third, passages which warn believers that “God will judge the secrets of men” (Rom. 2:16); that men will give an account on the day of judgment “for every careless word” they speak (Mt. 12:36) cannot (given the context and audience) be restricted to unsaved sinners. Statements made by Jesus and the apostles, which are intended to spur Christians on to greater obedience, lose all their force if they do not apply to believers!

This view of the judgment raises a number of objections. First, if Jesus paid for all our sins why would He bring them up again on that day? Would this not bring shame upon the saints? Is not such shame incompatible with the joy of that day, when sinning will be no more? One must keep in mind that the sins evaluated are forgiven sins. A passage of Scripture that teaches that genuine believers will not experience shame at Christ’s coming is 1 John 2:28. “And now, little children, abide in him, so that when he appears we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.”

“Believers do not turn in shame from Christ for they know that their sins have been forgiven. They are free from shame. But those who have pretended to be Christians cannot stand in the revealing light of his coming. They cannot hide their shame.” (Simon J. Kistemaker) They are brought up not to shame the believer but to magnify God’s grace and determine a suitable reward. Further, all saints who appear before the Son of God in their glorified bodies will be happy to confess all their sins to Christ. Being perfected in sanctification, Christians on that day will not feel shame but rather will experience the sweetest type of spiritual joy. They will evaluate their own works not from a standpoint of selfishness, ego or self-glorification, but from the standpoint of having the mind of Christ. Thus, even the most faithful of saints will throw their crowns at the pierced feet of the Savior (Rev. 4:10).

Second, doesn’t the Bible say that the sins of believers are covered (Ps. 32:1), washed away (Ps. 51:2), cast into the depth of the sea (Mic. 7:19), taken from us as far as east is from west (Ps. 103:12), never to be remembered by God (Isa. 43:25)? Indeed, it does say these things. However, these statements must be understood within the full context of Scripture. A reading of the Bible reveals that not only are the sins of believers such as Moses, Abraham, David and Peter remembered by God, but they are recorded in Scripture and published before all for eternity (Isa. 40:8). When the Bible speaks about God removing and forgetting sin it means that the guilt and penalty of our sins have been removed. God no longer holds the sin against the sinner for Christ has paid the price. The passages regarding God forgetting sin must be applied to guilt and punishment for it is impossible for them to mean that an omniscient being forgets our sins.

So, how do we live in light of the knowledge that we are justified by faith but will be judged according to our works? Scripture abounds with admonitions and examples in this regard, but I will choose one which I think is both easily overlooked and remarkably vivid when correctly understood. Ps. 23:4-5a says, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.”

Picture two armies arrayed for battle, facing each other several hundred yards apart. A scene right out of Braveheart or The Patriot or Glory. The captains of the armies traditionally meet on the battlefield to discuss the possibility of a truce, the rules of engagement, the expectations of the battle. When our Lord declares us justified he prepares a victory feast for us in the presence of the world, the flesh and the devil rather than a negotiation table. The enemy arrives to negotiate the terms of battle and finds that we are already celebrating victory! In justification we are declared victorious and begin to enjoy the spoils of victory before the battle has been waged. It is completely counterintuitive. “You are victorious! Now go fight the battle! Fight like a champion! Be what you are in Christ!” This is one of the keys to understanding gospel-centered Spirit-empowered faith-driven obedience to God: be what you are in Christ. God has declared you righteous, sinner, now live righteously. You need fear no evil, not your own sins, not the sins of others, nothing. Everything you do is permanent and you are responsible for everything you do, but everything which Christ has done is just as permanent and has been credited to you and your guilt to Him. We are declared justified, though the final judgment has not yet taken place. Court is not yet in session, but a verdict has been rendered and all of the charges have been “dismissed with prejudice.” We are declared to be what we will become, what God will make us. He will complete the good work he began in you, working in you to will and to do according to his good pleasure. The law is then no longer a curse to us which we cannot obey, but a promise of all that we are and are becoming and will be in Christ. “You will not kill. You will not steal. You will not lie. You will love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and your neighbor as yourself.” Now go and live in the fearless, risk-taking, self-sacrificing love of your Savior; go live in the freedom of the righteousness of Christ given to you, so that you won’t be ashamed on the day of judgment. Freely you have received, now freely give.

Sermon Manuscript: Romans 2:6 (Part 9)

(This is a section of a manuscript of the first prepared sermon I ever preached, which was in 2009 at the Evangelical Church of Fairport.)

Romans 2:6, “He will render to each one according to his works…”

Now, I don’t want to get too sidetracked, but I do want the glorious immensity of this doctrine of God justifying and sanctifying sinners, of declaring sinners righteous in Christ and making sinners righteous by Christ, to be magnified in your heart and mind before you leave here tonight. So think closely for a moment about the idea of creation ex nihilo, creation out of nothing. God created the world out of nothing. If this is not the mystery of all mysteries, it is certainly a strong candidate for that position. He doesn’t create the world out of himself and he doesn’t create it out of pre-existing material, it’s not a soup or pottery. He makes everything out of nothing and everything was good.

And yet, in regenerating, justifying and sanctifying rebel sinners God is, in fact, doing a greater work than making the good creation out of nothing, if that can be imagined. He is creating good out of evil. We expect good to come from good and evil to come from evil. But where only evil exists, God brings out good. He does not make evil good or confuse good with evil in the process. This is, in fact, the mystery of all mysteries, the paradox at the center of God’s revelation. The creation of Adam was a declaration of God’s almighty power. But the new creation of humanity in the second Adam, Jesus Christ, through election, redemption, regeneration, justification and sanctification unto glorification is a still greater testimony to God’s incomparable perfections.

Worship him! Love him! Be in awe of the God who not only creates all things good, but when we have broken it he makes all things new! He miraculously brings good out of evil, and he so graciously intertwines the good of those who love him with his own glory, such that the one will never be sacrificed at the expense of the other. In Christ we can know that our own good is as sure to come from the depths of our greatest suffering as we can be that God is working out the purpose for everything, his own glorification. We can be assured that our final good on judgment day is as certain as God glorifying himself; and God is in his very nature glorious. In this way we are guaranteed to become the righteousness of God.

But that’s a whole other sermon unto itself.

A Response to “Catholic Nick” on Imputation

This is a response to a paper recommended in a comment on this post:

Thanks for taking the time to read and comment, Nick.

I’d be glad to take some time to give you my thoughts. However, as much as I might enjoy the discussion, my “internet play time” is severely limited these days. I hope you understand.

I enjoyed reading your paper (twice). Basically, I think you are clearly an intelligent fellow, so don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t really understand the subject about which you’ve chosen to write. Now, before you go accusing me of ipse dixitism (I noticed you’re quite fond of asserting that others have committed various logical fallacies), allow me to support my conclusion.

1.) You don’t understand Koine Greek.

In “Part II” you state, “The good news is, knowledge of Greek is not crucial for understanding logizomai, since we have the aid of Bible dictionaries and lexicons.”

Let me rephrase slightly to show you the problem with this idea: “The good news is, knowledge of Greek is not crucial for understanding (a Greek word), since we have the aid of Bible dictionaries and lexicons.” Doesn’t that just sound wrong to you?

This is akin to thinking you could be dropped into the heart of Tegucigalpa with a Spanish dictionary and that you would thrive… which is foolish because Honduras has the highest murder rate per capita on earth. You would want to be intimately familiar with the language and culture of that city before attempting to walk its streets – it could cost you your life otherwise. But you’re quite cavalier about not needing to understand the language of the New Testament in order to draw correct conclusions about issues of eternal importance. My friend, this simply should not be so.

This leads you to make some fairly obvious mistakes. An example:

In “Part III” you state, “Philemon 1:18 speaks of having a debt ‘charged to’ Paul’s account. This text is important because it is one of the most appealed to passages by Protestants (throughout their history) when ‘proving’ their doctrine of Imputation from Scripture. But what isn’t well known – and there’s no good excuse for this – is that the term logizomai does not appear in this text! Rather, it is an other Greek word, ellogeo, which appears only here and in Romans 5:13. This is quite an astonishing revelation, for why would Protestants be looking to an obscure Biblical term when the term Paul used throughout Romans 4 appears numerous times throughout Scripture?”

Ellogeo is the lexical form of the verb in verse 18, not the actual word that appears in Philemon 1:18. There is a textual variant here, but the textual traditions differ between the active and middle imperative forms of ellogeo (elloga or ellogei). The difference is insignificant for our purposes, but you don’t even know what word is written in the text, much less that there’s a variant, even less which one is correct, and still even less the significance of the difference between the two. Beyond that you don’t recognize that the root of logizomai is logos and the root of ellogeo is lego. So you also couldn’t know that logos is just the verbal noun of lego, so logizomai and ellogeo practically share the same root word. To clarify, the difference between logizomai and ellogeo in Greek is analogous to the difference between reckon and account in English – there is no significant difference. They’re synonymous.

Yet you claim this as an example of Protestants looking to “an obscure biblical term” to prove the doctrine of imputation from Scripture. Your mistake here is plain – you’ve equated the English word “impute” with the Greek word “logizomai” and since you don’t see the magic word in Philemon 1:18 you impute all sorts of wrong-doing to Protestant scholars (pardon the pun) for seeing imputation in this verse.

Since I know you’re a fallacy fan (as am I) I thought you’d be interested to know that this is what D.A. Carson called the terminus technicus fallacy, investing a given term with heavy doctrinal weight then viewing it’s every appearance (or in this case, absence) like a technical term for that doctrine, rather than understanding the term within its various contexts. Which leads to my second point…

2.) You don’t understand the relationship between systematic theology and exegesis.

There are significant differences between the Protestant doctrine of imputation and the biblical term imputation. You repeatedly conflate the term with the doctrine (i.e. “The Bible never uses the term logizomai (or any similar term) in regards to the three-fold imputation of Adam’s sin to mankind, our sin to Christ, or Christ’s Righteousness to the believer.”) and collapse the doctrine into the term (“…logizomai is the lynchpin of Protestantism”).

To get to the heart of the matter, even if your understanding of every single use of logizomai in the NT is correct, the doctrine of imputation isn’t entirely derived from the mere usage of this term. This is a methodological criticism, not a theological one. This method may only (at best) undermine the doctrine, not refute it. You’ve done an awful lot of work, but I think you’ve unintentionally set your sights mighty low in this regard.

Finally, a minor point…

3.) You don’t sufficiently substantiate your criticisms; they’re superficial.

By this I mean, you assert many times that various Protestants and scholars are guilty of various fallacies, “admissions,” errors, etc. but you don’t demonstrate that your criticism is accurate. The accusation seems to be enough for your purposes at times. (I especially enjoyed this riff on D.A. Carson: “Carson would not say this if he actually opened up a lexicon and examined the verses where it appears.”)

However, when you do attempt to substantiate your accusations, they fall short of the mark. An example would be your accusation that the Westminster Confession equivocates in Chapter 11 in its use of “imputing.” But this simply isn’t true – substitute “accounting” or “reckoning” for “imputing” in both uses of the term and you see that there’s no equivocation between the two (“… nor by accounting faith itself… as their righteousness; but by accounting the obedience and satisfaction of Christ unto them…”).

Thank you again for taking the time to comment, Nick. I’ll look forward to hearing your thoughts, if you’ve the time and desire to respond. Cheers!