I am often left astonished that people in the believing community shun fellow believers for their foray into the discipline of philosophy. With so many of the "village type" atheists claiming logic as a weapon when belittling believers on Youtube or various other forums, philosophy and subsequent branches such as logic and reason have become four letter words for a large portion of the body of Christ. I am unsure if this is due to a lack of faith or anger, but one thing I am sure of, is that it is misguided. If you have ever heard the expression "fight fire with fire" then you should be able to follow my point I am trying to make.
When a skeptic says that the arguments for God's existence are "weak", they usually forget to mention that the arguments for their position are even more "weak" than ours. They usually will counter with "you can't prove a negative" but this is simply false, all one has to do is show that something is self-contradictory, - i.e. a married bachelor - to prove it doesn't exist. If they say they still don't understand, then point them in the direction of a group of arguments called the "Incoherence of Theism" which tries to show the various attributes of God are self-contradictory; the omnipotence paradox for example. What has also been demonstrated is why the "I lack belief" card gets played. Here is a blog entry from PZ Myers addressing that. But let's stay on point.
Now what I did there was use what I have learnt in my ongoing study of philosophy - like there is any other kind - to answer something you hear and read so often. You can prove a universal negative! But I didn't learn that in the Bible, just like I am sure you didn't learn the many skills you use at the workplace or at home, such as cooking for instance. Philosophy is a discipline like any other, and Christian philosophers (and there are lots of them) are members of the body of Christ too.
So "fight fire with fire"? Well a lot of people cite Colossians 2:8 to try and drive the point home: See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. Here is the kicker to this, as William Lane Craig so eloquently put it (although I am unsure if he can lay claim to this quote),"The man who claims to have no need for philosophy is the man who is most apt to be deceived by it." In other words, if you want to ensure that you are not fooled by hollow and deceptive philosophy, you have to fight fire with fire. Or put your fingers in your ears, literally or figuratively, either way is fine.
We are all philosophers whether we realise it or not, we can be good at it and reap the benefits, or we can be bad at it an be conned out of the incredible gift that God gave to us, when His precious Son died on the cross for our sin.
In Christ
P.L.
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