Cramer & The Cause of Sin - Pt. 2

Although there is, at this point in the discussion, no significant material to respond to on Cramer's blog (he is undoubtedly still buried in class work), there are some items worth noting.

First of all, Cramer is now aware of my blog, which is why this can now be referred to as a 'discussion'. Although he mistakenly thinks I followed him here, the reality is that I have been with Blogger for over five years; this particular incarnation (Itinerarium Mentis) is somewhat new, but my former blog (Apologia) was around for a while and, at one point, had even garnered the attention of Jared Wilson and the boys at The Thinklings, and also Austin R. Cline, a Regional Director for the Council for Secular Humanism. I have been around for a while.

Secondly, I wish to make something clear to Cramer personally: Please do not feel obligated to respond to my blog posts. I certainly appreciate your thoughtful responses and the challenges they present, and I do admire your commitment to growth in the knowledge of Christ and your passion for the purity of the gospel, but I know you have a good deal on your plate as a student so I do not want you feeling as though you have yet one more thing to deal with. My blog is a place where I like to share my thoughts and experiences as I likewise grow and mature in my Christian walk; some of those encounters occur on IRC, some of them on message boards, and some through reading other people's blogs and critically examining their content. Your views on Frame's argument grabbed my attention. I look forward to engaging you in a discussion, I just do not wish for you to feel burdened.

And thirdly, back to the readers now, Cramer makes a couple of statements I wish to briefly respond to. He maintains, first of all, his rather unfavourable characterization of John Frame's argument—quite expectedly, I should think—here calling it "theologically abominable." What I wish the readers to note is this: It is not yet clear that he is properly understanding Frame's thesis in the first place, and it will not be clear until Cramer has some time available to write more fully on the matter. So for the time being, the reader is really encouraged to take Cramer's comments with a proportionately sized grain of salt. I am familiar with Frame's argument on this point and I know there is nothing "theologically abominable" about it, as surely does Frame himself.

Also, it certainly is not enough to call a spade a spade, but that has nothing to do with today's pluralistic society. It has to do with sound reason, critical thinking, and our moral duty toward our brothers in Christ; to "simply call a spade a spade" is only so much ipse dixit (i.e. "any unsupported rhetorical assertion that lacks a logical argument") and will not compel anyone. If he is going to assert that Frame has strayed from the truth of the gospel, then he should expect that his readers will want to know how and why this is so. (And so would Frame himself, should he have ever happened upon the post. An unlikely event, but a good principle to consider.) Cramer is entitled to call Frame a "spade" but his academic discipline should inform him that doing so shoulders the burden of exposing the argument that produces such a conclusion. If he did not have the time to provide even an outline thereof—and he admits to not having the time—perhaps he could have expressed his reaction with less censure for the time being. Or saved it as a draft until it did include the outline. My only point is that if one is going to make such a terrible accusation against someone who has established himself as a God-fearing apologist and critically acclaimed Christian philosopher, it should include one's reasoning. My passion is fueled by the conviction that we, as Christians, are bound by a higher moral rectitude toward the members of God's family.

Cramer also states he is not claiming that Frame has "rejected the gospel" or "does not affirm the gospel message." True, but he is claiming that Frame here strays from the truth of the gospel. That is a very, very serious charge, is it not?

For now Cramer rightly has his academic responsibilities to attend to. Both myself and his readers, I am sure, can wait with due patience until he has the requisite time to elaborate.

Cramer & The Cause of Sin - Pt. 1

David Cramer, a Facebook friend of mine from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, wrote an interesting (albeit brief) piece on his blog this earlier afternoon. Cramer, it would seem, is quite shocked about something theologian John Frame had argued in his scholarly work The Doctrine of God; specifically, that Frame would dare to argue in favour of the idea that God is the cause of sin. Cramer said that this excerpt from Frame's book is "quite chilling" and that it shows "how far from the truths of the gospel we can stray while still maintaining strict adherence to biblical authority." That is a very serious charge for Cramer to level against Frame, so how does he support such a statement?

He doesn't.

Despite the deep respect for Cramer I have—or perhaps as a result of it—I am obligated to call him on such irresponsible negligence. He admits candidly enough that his current homework load does not permit him to write very extensively, but here is the crucial point: if he had the time to level such a critical charge against Frame then surely he had enough time to provide a brief outline showing why he thinks Frame has strayed from the truth of the gospel. Frame himself, in the excerpt Cramer linked to, made a reference to the book of Job (1:20-22); at a minimum there is a starting point Cramer could have commented on. But he did not. He provided his readers with his emotional reaction but nothing more.

What Frame discussed, and Cramer neglected to comment on, is the distinction between cause and authorship, insofar as God is the ultimate 'first cause' behind the existence of sin, "referring to God’s agency in bringing evil about," Frame notes. But God is never guilty of sin, he does not commit sin. Humans are responsible for sinning, but God is responsible for creating beings capable of sinning; Frame recognizes the difference between "God as the 'remote cause' and human agency as the 'proximate cause'." Does Cramer offer a scholarly response to any of these things? Does he tell his readers why things like this compel him to "reject the Calvinist framework as a whole"? No, he does not. It is very disappointing and irresponsible.

I titled this post "Pt. 1" because if Cramer should subsequently write more on this, perhaps shouldering his burden of proof and making his case, I will critically examine his arguments here.

Sin and Freedom

David: God is absolutely responsible for the behavior we choose to do. Why? Because he can stop it, and in select cases he has done so. That makes him responsible; when he can stop it—and has at times—but let's it continue. And he does not stop sin because he has a glorious purpose in it. It's why he created the world in this way in the first place.

Richard: So I can go ahead and sin, because if I can do it, it's God's fault anyway? Can't be sure I agree.

David: Just because God is causally responsible for the world he created, that does not absolve us of our responsibilities. You can sin, sure—and you will be held accountable when you do.

Richard: Okay.

David: The difference is this: We are responsible for sinning; God is responsible for sin.

Richard: Oh.

Garrett: I think you need to re-word that.

David: I doubt it, although I may need to clarify it.

Garrett: For God to give you freedom, He had to allow for the potential of sin.

David: Freedom? From what?

Garrett: Light and darkness.

David: We are free from light and darkness? What does that mean?

Garrett: Good and evil as potentials.

David: What is it we are free from?

Garrett: To choose. If you cannot sin, then you are not free.

David: So in heaven we will not be free? Or we can sin there?

Garrett: Discussion over. Enjoy.

David: Heheh. I bet it is, yeah.

You can lead a horse to water...

I probably would not be so hard on atheists if they did not make such a fuss about how 'rational' they are. Seriously, people: If you are going to proclaim how rational you are, then be rational!

Take my discussion on IRC the other night as one example. And this will be an abridged version of the discussion. There was an atheist whom I shall call Terry. He did not like the fact that his demand for evidence resulted in my calling his epistemology into question, essentially because he did not see the relevance. So I had explained to him, "Your demand for evidence is a product of your epistemology—which furthermore dictates what constitutes acceptable evidence."

"Okay, but why is this a problem?" he asked.

"Because I do not subscribe to your chosen epistemology, sir," I answered. "That is your worldview. Mine is very different. And here you are simply assuming that my argumentation must conform to your worldview, but there are two rather serious problems with this: (1) my argument does not work under your worldview, but more importantly (2) I emphatically reject your worldview because it is completely untenable in the first place."

"How come your argumentation does not work under my epistemology?" he asked. (Here is where I am skipping past a good deal of initial gratuitous invective he had offered up first.)

"Because our worldviews are antithetical at the most basic level," I replied. "My epistemology has a vastly different presuppositional starting point than yours does, one that your worldview would not accept." He then asked what my starting point was, and I answered, "It is that propositional revelation known as Scripture."

There is nothing wrong, rationally, with presupposing the truth of your own system of thought and tacitly insisting that your opponent work within the framework of that system. However, if it is permissible for the atheist to presuppose the truth of his system of thought and expect the Christian to work within the framework of that system, then it is also permissible for the inverse of that situation. Otherwise, the atheist would shoulder the epistemic responsibility for explaining why the only presuppositions permitted in the field of debate are his own.

"How do you know that Scripture is a valid starting point?" Terry asked me.

"Do you not see? That very question assumes that logic has priority rather than Scripture. Perhaps under your worldview logic is prior to everything else, but that is very different from mine. In other words, sir, your question is yet again expecting my argumentation to conform to your worldview. Under my worldview, God, not logic, is prior to everything else, and Scripture is that by which we know anything about God. In other words, the foundation of our epistemological infrastructure is Scripture, which propositionally reveals that which is prior to everything else, even logic—God."

"Nothing else can be prior to logic," he objected, "otherwise logical contradictions could prevail in that domain which is prior to logic."

"That statement is consistent with your worldview," I replied, "not mine. Under my worldview, that result would not occur. But this now raises a relevant and very interesting question: When another worldview is competing against yours, how do you evaluate them?"

"Whichever worldview demonstrates consistency, evidential support, predictive value, and simplicity."

"But those epistemological virtues are derived precisely from your worldview!" I replied. "To assume the truth of your worldview when evaluating a competing worldview against your own is to beg the question! One of the systems under question is assumed to be true before the evaluation process even began. That is a fallacious exercise."

"I have not assumed the truth of my worldview," he objected.

"Really? If you have not established in your mind whether your worldview is true or false, then why was it serving as the evaluative criteria?"

A slight pause. "I guess I did."

"And begging the question is not rational, under your view, Terry. What a dilemma."

It was an enjoyable discussion but it ended there because he had to leave for dinner. Terry usually makes a good deal of fuss about how rational he is, but there is nothing rational about fallacies and refusing to meet your burden of proof.

Introductory Post

As the profile widget says, this journal will follow my religious and intellectual pursuits as I delve ever deeper into my personal relationship with God, a course charted through confronting new challenges, gaining new insights, and discovering or developing my understanding of propositional revelation in or exegetical analysis of Scripture. I will also publish here my thoughts and perspectives on debate encounters—which are usually informal (e.g. an IRC or Facebook discussion)—or material I have read on other blogs.

(Note: When I publish material that originated from a discussion either in person or on IRC, I will use fictitious names. Since the content of the discussion is not accessible to the general public, they will be treated as private and no one will be personally identified. If the material originates from an online blog, article, or discussion group, the author's real name will be used, since it is available to the general public already.)