Theological Term of the Week

 

For the next few weeks, the theological terms will be the names of some traditional arguments used to justify belief in the existence of God. As you might imagine, there is quite a bit of disagreement about the validity and usefulness of these proofs.

 

Teleological  Argument

An argument for the existence of God that begins with evidence of order, complexity, pattern and purpose in the universe and argues from that evidence that the universe must have an intelligent and purposeful designer.

 

• From William Paley’s Natural Theology (1802), a bit of his watchmaker analogy, which is an example of a teleological argument.
  

  In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had lain there forever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be inquired how the watch happened to be in that place; I should hardly think of the answer I had before given, that for anything I knew, the watch might have always been there. (…) There must have existed, at some time, and at some place or other, an artificer or artificers, who formed [the watch] for the purpose which we find it actually to answer; who comprehended its construction, and designed its use. (…) Every indication of contrivance, every manifestation of design, which existed in the watch, exists in the works of nature; with the difference, on the side of nature, of being greater or more, and that in a degree which exceeds all computation.     

Learn more

1. Teleological Argument from Theopedia
   
2. The Teleological Argument from Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry
   

This series of theological terms was suggested by Kim of Hiraeth. The graphic at the beginning of the post was also done by Kim. See more of her work at Bookworm Bookmarks.

 

Have you come across a theological term that you don’t understand and you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.

Theological Term of the Week

For the next few weeks, the theological terms will be the names of some traditional arguments used to justify belief in the existence of God. There is disagreement about the validity and usefulness of these proofs.

 

cosmological argument

An argument for the existence of God that begins with the existence of the universe and argues that the universe must have a cause, and that cause is God. 

• An example of a cosmological argument from Thomas Aquinas.
  

  The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. It is certain and evident to our senses that in the world some things are in motion. Now, whatever is moved is moved by another, for nothing can be moved except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is moved; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thus that which is actually hot, as fire, makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and thereby moves and changes it. Now it is not possible that the same thing should be at once in actuality and potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot simultaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cold. It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e., that it should move itself. Therefore whatever is moved must be moved by another. If that by which it is moved be itself moved, then this also must needs be moved by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and consequently no other mover, seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are moved by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is moved by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at the first mover, moved by no other, and this everyone understands to be God.       

• John Frame on the validity of cosmological arguments:

  [E}ven Aquinas’s view requires assumptions, namely that nothing exists or happens without a sufficient cause, and that causes (including the cause of the universe) are accessible to human reason. Many skeptics of the past and present would not grant those assumptions.
  
  My conclusion is that our concepts of cause, reason and infinite series depend on worldviews, on ontological and epistemological assumptions. They are insufficient in themselves to serve as grounds for worldviews. A Christian theist will think differently from a skeptic about these matters. His Christian theism will govern his concepts of cause, reason, and  infinity, rather than the reverse. 

Learn more:

1. Theopedia: The Cosmological Argument 
2. GodQuestions.org: What is the cosmological argument for the existence of God?
3. Wikipedia: Cosmological Argument
4. Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry: The Cosmological Argument
   
5. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: Cosmological Argument
6. Ronald Nash: The Cosmological Argument (audio)
   

Related links:

• moral argument
• ontological argument
• teleological argument
• trancendental argument for the existence of God

This series of theological terms was suggested by Kim of Hiraeth.

 

Have you come across a theological term that you don’t understand and you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.

Theological Term of the Week

inerrancy of scripture
The principle that the Bible as it was originally written is completely true and without error.

• From scripture: 
  

  God is not man, that he should lie,
  or a son of man, that he should change his mind. (Numbers 23:19 ESV)

  The words of the Lord are pure words,
  like silver refined in a furnace on the ground,
  purified seven times. (Psalm 12:6 ESV)

• From The Chicago Statement on Inerrancy:

  1. God, who is Himself Truth and speaks truth only, has inspired Holy Scripture in order thereby to reveal Himself to lost mankind through Jesus Christ as Creator and Lord, Redeemer and Judge. Holy Scripture is God’s witness to Himself.

  2. Holy Scripture, being God’s own Word, written by men prepared and superintended by His Spirit, is of infallible divine authority in all matters upon which it touches: it is to be believed, as God’s instruction, in all that it affirms, obeyed, as God’s command, in all that it requires; embraced, as God’s pledge, in all that it promises.

  3. The Holy Spirit, Scripture’s divine Author, both authenticates it to us by His inward witness and opens our minds to understand its meaning.

  4. Being wholly and verbally God-given, Scripture is without error or fault in all its teaching, no less in what it states about God’s acts in creation, about the events of world history, and about its own literary origins under God, than in its witness to God’s saving grace in individual lives.

  5. The authority of Scripture is inescapably impaired if this total divine inerrancy is in any way limited or disregarded, or made relative to a view of truth contrary to the Bible’s own; and such lapses bring serious loss to both the individual and the Church.

• From John Frame in Is the Bible Inerrant? :

  Other things being equal, I would prefer to drop all extra-scriptural terms including “infallible” and “inerrant” and simply speak, as Scripture does, of God’s Word being true. That’s all we mean, after all, when we say Scripture is inerrant. But modern theologians won’t let me do that. They redefine “truth” so that it refers to some big theological notion, and they will not permit me to use it as meaning “correctness” or “accuracy” or “reliability.”

  …Now what is our alternative? Even “accuracy” and “reliability” have been distorted by theological pre-emption. “Correctness” seems too trivial to express what we want to say. So, although the term is overly technical and subject to some misunderstanding, I intend to keep the word “inerrant” as a description of God’s Word, and I hope that my readers will do the same. The idea, of course, is more important than the word. If I can find better language that expresses the biblical doctrine to modern hearers, I will be happy to use that and drop “inerrancy.” But at this moment, “inerrancy” has no adequate replacement. To drop the term in the present situation, then, can involve compromising the doctrine, and that we dare not do. God will not accept or tolerate negative human judgments concerning his holy Word. So I conclude: yes, the Bible is inerrant.

Learn more:

1. Blue Letter Bible: What is the Doctrine of Inerrancy?
2. Roger Nicole: Questions and Answer on Biblical Inerrancy
3. Kevin DeYoung: What Inerrancy Is Not
4. Greg Bahnsen: The Inerrancy of the Autographa
5. John Piper: Is the Bible Without Error? (mp3) 
6. D. A. Carson: What does inerrancy mean? Is it essential to Christian belief? (video)
   

Related terms:

• authority of scripture
• autographa
• infallibility of scripture
• inspiration of scripture

Filed under Scripture.

Have you come across a theological term that you don’t understand and you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.