Quotes About Presuppositional

Cornelius Van Til, under whom Schaeffer studied at Westminster for two years, used Kuyper's notion of the antithesis (i.e., that an absolute antithesis exists in all of life between the believer and unbeliever) to develop his presuppositional apologetics.

Non-presuppositional defenses of the faith tend to be too concessive to the unbeliever's aim and aim to simply show Christianity as probably true. They do not leave the unbeliever "without excuse," but suggest implicitly that he has the prerogative and ability to stand in judgement over God's own Word.

Van Til's presuppositional approach: (a) locating his opponent's crucial presuppositions, (b) criticizing the autonomous attitude that arises from a failure to honor the Creator-creature distinction, (c) exposing the internal and destructive philosophical tensions that attend autonomy, and then (d) setting forth the only viable alternative, biblical Christianity.