Is Humanist Philosophy Circling the Drain?
Do you find humanistic philosophy really crazy and pointless?
Are you, like me, convinced of the seeming uselessness of humanistic philosophy? Humanists for several hundred years have explored every avenue of possible thought attempting to find higher truth. They pursue metaphysical questions seeking access to that universe by means of things that are seen. Their quest has proven to be useless, for the phenomenal world, by its nature, can shed no light on the neumenal realm. Studying the stars or the atoms will never unlock truth about the existence or nature of God. It will never show us what is right morality or what is justice.
It’s All Been Tried
Philosophers have tried everything over the centuries. Rationalism has been explored through likely millions of pages but found unable to explain anything with assurance. Irrationalism is being propounded but also leads nowhere. Philosophers may equally assert morality or immorality, freedom or tyranny, wealth or poverty. With each gyration they remind me of a bi-plane circling loops but going nowhere. To use a now out-dated phrase, they are captured in an endless do-loop. They process information but have no way to apply any of it with assurance.
Shutting Out the Light of Truth
I am convinced that the value of studying humanistic philosophy is in seeing the painful lack of assurance offered on its premises. By removing Christian scripture and theology from all discussion they have shut off any possible light of truth. They ponder aimlessly in the dark while proclaiming, “I see, I see.” But, every trail they explore dies against the mountain of God. They have no tools to ascend its heights.
God, by His very nature, can only be known if He chooses to reveal Himself. He necessarily is self-authenticating. God swears by Himself since there is no one greater by which to swear. If we want to know God, if we want to find truth, we will only discover it by understanding what God reveals. If He does not show Himself to us we will be forever ignorant of Him.
Humanist philosophy then, drives us to God, or, it drives us insane. Unbelieving theology does the same, but that is a discussion for another time.
For Christian Culture,
Don Schanzenbach 7-25-13
Note: This was taken from my study notes on Bahnson on Van Till’s Apologetic
Another Note: In a few months I am hoping to return to my weekly Christian Culture articles – ’till then you just get what you get.
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Suspender Man™, Don Schanzenbach, has long been an outspoken advocate of recapturing culture for Christ. He holds a MA in applied Biblical studies and a doctorate in applied theological studies in the field of political philosophy and government from New Geneva Seminary. He has been thinking, writing and speaking on Christian culture for two decades.
So very true! The irony is that today’s “great” humanists minds are invariably at odds with yesterday’s and tomorrow’s “great” humanists minds:
One of the best illustrations of this fickle inevitability of autonomous (self law or governed) man versus theonomous (God’s law or governed) man is found in the following illustration:
“Two people could have walked down any U.S. street in 1930 – one with a bottle of whiskey under his arm and one with a bar of gold in his pocket, and the one with the whiskey would have been a criminal whereas the one with the bar of gold would have been considered a good law abiding citizen. If the same thing happened in any U. S. city in 1970, the one with the whiskey would be the law abiding citizen and the one with the gold bar would be the criminal.” (W.W. Turner, The Amazing Story of the British Sovereign (Nashville, TN: 1970) p. 4)
In a mere forty-year period (one generation) man’s “morality” had completely reversed itself.
Thanks Don! I’m glad you’re out there ambassadoring for the KING of kings!
Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after the Messiah.