Divine revelation

[Doug Shaver]

Oh, so it's my original question that you're changing your answer to then?

Yes.

Great! Please tell me one thing you know for sure, and how you know it.

I'm not answering any more of your questions until you've answered mine. Please tell me whether my new response to your original question answers your original question.

If your response does not include an answer then you beg the question against my worldview and my argument.

If I'm not yet making an argument, I cannot be begging any questions.

[Mr. Black]

I'm not answering any more of your questions until you've answered mine. Please tell me whether my new response to your original question answers your original question.

Your evasion of a fair and valid question has been noted. As intelligent as you are (and I'd say it's safe to say you're at least twice as intelligent as me) you must have realized that the point of my argument is to get you to either (1) concede that you can't know anything for sure on your worldview since you've rejected God as the foundation of your thinking, or else (2) demonstrate that knowledge is possible without reference to Him. You initially conceded, but have since gone back on that. That's fine, but if you're to avoid begging the question against my argument and my worldview, you need to explain how knowledge is possible in your view of reality. That involves providing an ontic base to ground the preconditions of intelligibility, and an epistemology to make that base known. Any response from you that ignores this crucial challenge begs the question by merely assuming (rather than demonstrating) that knowledge is possible without reference to God. Until you provide such an ontic base and epistemology from your worldview any statement you make and any question you ask is not rationally justified.

If I'm not yet making an argument, I cannot be begging any questions.

Nonsense. I just explained above how you've begged the question against my argument and my worldview.

[Truthseeker]

Mr. Black, I understand that the Bible contains an ontic base. Indeed, it is THE ontic base for Christianity. IOW, the Bible is the basic "textbook" for it. Could you give an example of an ontic base that is for something other than Christianity?

[Doug Shaver]

Your evasion of a fair and valid question has been noted.

I offered an answer to your question. I am asking whether you agree that it does answer your question. I don't think I am the evasive one.

[Mr. Black]

I offered an answer to your question. I am asking whether you agree that it does answer your question.

You have not answered the challenge. You posted this thread asking for reasons why you should believe that anyone has ever received any knowledge about God by divine revelation. I provided an argument (If God did not exist and reveal Himself to man already, we couldn't know anything, and therefore if we don't start with Him at the base of our reasoning we couldn't prove anything. That left 2 options for you: (1) concede the point, and thus give up the debate from the start, or (2) disagree, which amounts to claiming that knowledge is possible apart from God's existence and revelation to man. You initially conceded, but then, when the consequences of that became clear, you changed your answer---which means you now bear the burden of proof. You still haven't answered the challenge.

I don't think I am the evasive one.

Please look above. I just provided an explanation.

[Mr. Black]

Mr. Black, I understand that the Bible contains an ontic base. Indeed, it is THE ontic base for Christianity. IOW, the Bible is the basic "textbook" for it.

The Bible is definitely the basic textbook for it, but much more than that, which I'll explain below.

Could you give an example of an ontic base that is for something other than Christianity?

An ontic base would have to be something in reality that makes the preconditions of intelligibility (laws of logic, uniformity of nature, moral absolutes, basic reliability of senses, memory, cognitive faculties, etc) what they are. Hypothetically, one could posit a deity to ground them, but that's not enough. They need an epistemology to make that deity known. This epistemology would have to be revelation from an all-knowing entity. As a visual aid, think of two circles: one very large circle, and one tiny circle. The large circle contains all facts which man is not aware of, and the tiny circle contains everything man claims to know---let's say that man claims to know a whopping 1% of all facts. The question comes: "How do you know that none of the facts in the large circle will contradict anything (or everything) you claim to know (Including the claim that contradictions are impossible)?" The facts in the large circle are, by definition, unknown by man, so how can he be sure of what they are, or are not, and what bearing they would have on his knowledge claims?
To know anything for sure he would either have to (1) know everything, so that he can guarantee that there's no fact(s) "out there" that would contradict any/all of his knowledge claims, or else he would have to (2) have revelation from someone who does know everything, who cannot lie, and who can, and has, revealed some things to us such that we know them for certain.
Atheists, agnostics, and other secularists don't have this in their system. Deists don't either, as they've rejected revelation. Generic theists could arbitrarily claim that the god they profess grounds them, but they have nothing objective to back it up with, whereas Christians have explicit written revelation from God detailing these things.
Muslims could attempt to claim Allah grounds them, but the Qur'an admits not only that Allah is capable of lying, but that he actually did lie to Muhammad (Surah 8:43-44), which means that Allah cannot "the truth, as Surah 22:62 claims, because the truth doesn't contradict itself. Therefore Allah can't ground the law of non-contradiction, because the law of non-contradiction doesn't self-contradict.

This is why I said the Bible is so much more than the basic textbook for grounding the preconditions of intelligibility in the Christian worldview. The worldview that's articulated in it is the actual state of affairs, which means that any who abandon it in their argumentation have literally rejected reality in their thinking. No other worldview can provide such a base, nor an epistemology. Since only the biblical worldview can account for the preconditions, and everyone---even Christinity's critics---has to use those very preconditions, non-christians have to borrow those principles from the Christian worldview in order to argue against it. So any criticism of Christianity is self-refuting and only serves to demonstrate its truth and reinforce its argument.

[Truthseeker]

Mr. Black, I am going to reread your post (just above), but a question did occur to me. What about the Jews? Your post didn't mention them.

[Truthseeker]

Does anyone know about Shuny? He's not posted in a while.

[Mr. Black]

Mr. Black, I am going to reread your post (just above), but a question did occur to me. What about the Jews? Your post didn't mention them.

Since Jews don't reject God's revelation (at least not in whole), in some sense of the word, they accept God (accepting at least one Person in the Godhead), but they reject the Son, so they're in desperate need of a Savior. This is why Paul specifically made a point of saying that "all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" are "in Christ" (Colossians 2:2-3). Jews accept the notion of the one true God, yet reject the Person of the Godhead who created all things (John 1:1-3). One of the preconditions of intelligibility is a system for dealing with guilt. That system is Christ's sacrifice on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins. Since Jews reject the Messiah prophesied about all throughout the OT, they're stuck with the idea that works will get them to heaven and accrue forgiveness, contra Genesis 15:6's clear statement that it was faith alone, and reiterated by Paul in both Romans 4:3, and Galatians 3:6.

[Mr. Black]

Does anyone know about Shuny? He's not posted in a while.

I don't like the sound of that. I hope he's ok. I'll be sure to pray for him.

[NormATive]

Since Jews don't reject God's revelation (at least not in whole), in some sense of the word, they accept God (accepting at least one Person in the Godhead), but they reject the Son, so they're in desperate need of a Savior. This is why Paul specifically made a point of saying that "all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" are "in Christ" (Colossians 2:2-3). Jews accept the notion of the one true God, yet reject the Person of the Godhead who created all things (John 1:1-3). One of the preconditions of intelligibility is a system for dealing with guilt. That system is Christ's sacrifice on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins. Since Jews reject the Messiah prophesied about all throughout the OT, they're stuck with the idea that works will get them to heaven and accrue forgiveness, contra Genesis 15:6's clear statement that it was faith alone, and reiterated by Paul in both Romans 4:3, and Galatians 3:6.

Judaism describes a different G-d from the one the Christians worship. Since Truth was given to Abraham (as you admitted in the post above), then it is YOU who are basing all of your "truth statements" on a lie. The Christian heresy has deceived and shielded your mind from the Truth.

Everything you have posted in this thread - indeed, on the entirety of T-Web - has been from the basis of your allegiance to the heresy (according to the G-d of Abraham) of Christianity.

Therefore, we must all reject everything you "claim" is truth.

Pity.

NORM

[Doug Shaver]

You have not answered the challenge.

What challenge?

You posted this thread asking for reasons why you should believe that anyone has ever received any knowledge about God by divine revelation. I provided an argument

No, you asked a question. I responded to that question and asked whether you would accept that response as an answer to your question. You apparently do not want to tell me whether I have answered your question.

You initially conceded, but then, when the consequences of that became clear, you changed your answer

I conceded nothing, but you agreed to (1) let me change my answer and (2) ignore everything I had said up to that point of our conversation.

[robrecht]

Judaism describes a different G-d from the one the Christians worship. ...

I don't think so. I once recommended to you The Incarnation of God by Jacob Neusner. Did you ever read it?

[shunyadragon]

I don't like the sound of that. I hope he's ok. I'll be sure to pray for him.

No problem, ah . . . the last I checked I still had a pulse. At times I just read.

[shunyadragon]

I think you mean, God does not argue my case. But He does. Since my argument is taken from Scripture, though I'm the tool by which He does it, God effectively argues my case (or really, His own case).

Problem here, there are too many different arguments 'taken from scripture.' Yours is only one of many. What is your justification that yours is correct?

As normative pointed out your view is heresy from the Jewish perspective.

In a recent reply to me in thread, "rational justification to avoid investigating miracle-claims:, you said, "I do not claim to 'know' in any absolute sense. It is possible that any and all possible human views of the nature of our physical existence could be wrong, and a figment of our imagination". And in a recent reply to MaxVel, you said, "True my skepticism applies pretty much to all areas of human knowledge."
Would not your skepticism apply to your claim from your last reply, which I've quoted above, then (not to mention anything else you say below)?

Yes, of course, but healthy skepticism does not preclude sound judgment and knowledge at its foundation. The problem with your argument it has no justification outside what your assert as true among hundreds of different interpretations of scripture.

Setting aside the fact that you've given up any rational justification for this claim of yours,

No.

my view is that all know God in their heart of hearts, because God has made them to know Him, and yet many suppress this truth in unrighteousness. You know just as well as I do that God exists. But, wanting to be your own God, you reject Him and in so doing insist upon eternal damnation for breaking His law. I don't want that for you. Please turn back, bud.

Your argument is too anecdotal to be real and one of hundred different from the same scripture. You still have failed repeatedly to justify why I should believe you over the hundreds of conflicting views where 'God made them to know him.'

To say that something is, or is not "likely" assumes a standard of absolute certainty against which to measure the relative "likelihood" of any given proposition. What is this standard in your worldview? What is the ontological base which grounds it in your worldview? What is the epistemology which makes it know in your worldview? And how do you plan to justify your answers given your admission that you don't claim to know anything in an absolute sense?

Your problem is you have not understood what it is to 'know.' To 'know' would claim a level of absolute knowledge that cannot change, and represents 'absolute truth.' You may make this claim, but in all humility, which seems to be lacking from your perspective, I will not make this arrogant claim to 'know.'

By the witness of the history of humanity knowledge evolves and changes, and arrogant absolute claims, ah . . . like yours,' end up in lost clinging to the illusions long past.

That's not an ontic base. What you're appealing to is the appearance of how things seem to be from your perspective. An ontic base would be something that controls the universe such that it guarantees that nature is uniform (that the laws of physics, for example, apply everywhere---even places we haven't looked---and that they will continue to do so in the future without fail). That's what God does. Since He created all things and upholds all things by His power (Hebrews 1:3), and promises regularity in the external world (Genesis 8:22) we can know for certain that nature is uniform, and therefore the biblical worldview provides a rational basis for science.
But leave out of the picture and what guarantee do you have? How do you know that the laws of physics apply everywhere? How do you know they'll apply tomorrow, or even 10 seconds from now? Be careful to note what I'm asking you here. I essentially asking, "How do you know that the laws of physics are such that they do not change?". So if you reply, "They've always been that way, so i trust they'll be that way in the future" that would beg the question, as you can only conclude that the laws of physics will be that way in the future because they were that way in the past by assuming that they are of such a nature that they do not change---which is the very thing you're supposed to be proving.

It remains the ontic case by the definition I presented that Natural Law is by the physical evidence throughout the history of science is consistent and verifiable. There is one consistent science based on ontic evidence which virtually all scientists agree. On the other hand your view lacks any consistent with your claim of an ontic basis, because of the many hundreds of interpretations of scripture that very greatly from your view.