Cornelius Van Til

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Cornelius Van Til
Cornelius Van Til

Cornelius Van Til (May 3, 1895 – April 17, 1987), born in Grootegast, the Netherlands, was a Christian philosopher, Reformed theologian, and presuppositional apologist.

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[edit] Biography

Van Til was the sixth son of Ite Van Til, a dairy farmer, and his wife Klazina. He was the first of his family to receive a higher education. In 1914 he attended Calvin Preparatory School, graduated from Calvin College, and attended one year at Calvin Theological Seminary, where he studied under Louis Berkhof, but he transferred to Princeton Theological Seminary and later graduated with his PhD from Princeton University.

He began teaching at Princeton Seminary, but shortly went with the conservative group that founded Westminster Theological Seminary, where he taught for forty-three years of his life as a professor of apologetics. He was also a minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church from the 1930s until his death in 1987, and in that denomination, he was embroiled in a bitter dispute with Gordon Clark over God's incomprehensibility known as the Clark-Van Til Controversy in which, according to John Frame, neither man was at his best and neither quite understood the other's position.

[edit] Thought

Van Til drew upon the works of Dutch Calvinist philosophers such as D. H. Th. Vollenhoven, Herman Dooyeweerd, and Hendrik G. Stoker and theologians such as Herman Bavinck to bring together a fresh approach to Christian apologetics, which opposed the traditional methodology of reasoning on the supposition that there is a neutral middle-ground, where the non-Christian and the Christian can agree (James N. Anderson, Van Til Frequently Encountered Misconceptions, I.3, 2004). He did not particularly care for the label describing his approach as "presuppositional," which more accurately represents the apologetical method of Gordon Clark, but he (and his students) accepted it as a matter of convention because it is at least useful in grouping methods into those which deny neutrality and those which do not. His attempted contribution to the Neo-Calvinist approach of Dooyeweerd, Stoker and others, was to insist that the "ground motive" of a Christian philosophy must be derived from the historical terms of the Christian faith. In other words he argued that, a Christian philosophy must be grounded in the Christian faith as such, and as such the Trinity believed according to Scripture is of indispensable and insuperable value to a Christian philosophy.

In Van Til: The Theologian, Frame, a sympathetic critic of Van Til, describes Van Til's contributions to Christian thought as comparable in magnitude to those of Immanuel Kant in non-Christian philosophy. He indicates that Van Til identified the disciplines of systematic theology and apologetics, seeing the former as a positive statement of the Christian faith and the latter as a defense of that statement – "a difference in emphasis rather than of subject matter." Frame summarizes Van Til's legacy as one of new applications of traditional doctrines:

Unoriginal as his doctrinal formulations may be, his use of those formulations – his application of them – is often quite remarkable. The sovereignty of God becomes an epistemological, as well as a religious and metaphysical principle. The Trinity becomes the answer to the philosophical problem of the one and the many. Common grace becomes the key to a Christian philosophy of history. These new applications of familiar doctrines inevitably increase [Christians'] understanding of the doctrines themselves, for [they] come thereby to a new appreciation of what these doctrines demand of [them].

Similarly, Van Til's innovative application of the doctrines of total depravity and the ultimate authority of God led to his reforming of the discipline of apologetics. Specifically, he denied neutrality on the basis of the total depravity of man and the invasive effects of sin on man's reasoning ability (as per the usual Calvinistic understanding of the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans), and he insisted that the Bible, which he viewed as a divinely inspired book, be trusted preeminently because he believed the Christian's ultimate commitment must rest on the ultimate authority of God. As Frame says elsewhere, "the foundation of Van Til's system and its most persuasive principle" is a rejection of autonomy since "Christian thinking, like all of the Christian life, is subject to God's lordship" ("Van Til and the Ligonier Apologetic," p. 282). However, it is this very feature that has caused some Christian apologists to reject Van Til's approach. For instance, D. R. Trethewie describes Van Til's system as nothing more than "a priori dogmatic transcendental irrationalism, which he has attempted to give a Christian name to" (A Critique of Cornelius Van Til, p. 15).

Van Til was also a strident opponent of the theology of Karl Barth, and his opposition led to the rejection of Barth's theology by many in the Reformed community. Despite Barth's assertions that he sought to base his theology solely on the 'Word of God', Van Til believed that Barth's thought was syncretic in nature and fundamentally flawed because, according to Van Til, it assumed a Kantian epistemology, which Van Til argued was necessarily irrational and anti-Biblical.

Many recent theologians have been influenced by Van Til's thought, including John Frame, Greg Bahnsen, Rousas John Rushdoony, as well as many of the current faculty members of Westminster Theological Seminary and other Reformed seminaries.

[edit] Writings

Some of Van Til's writings (ranked in order of importance by K. Scott Oliphint) include:

  • A Survey of Christian Epistemology (In Defense of the Faith, vol. II; available online for free) ISBN 0-87552-495-8
  • Introduction to Systematic Theology (In Defense of the Faith, vol. V) ISBN 0-87552-488-5
  • Common Grace and the Gospel ISBN 0-87552-482-6
  • A Christian Theory of Knowledge ISBN 0-87552-480-X
  • The Defense of the Faith ISBN 0-87552-483-4
  • The Reformed Pastor and Modern Thought ISBN 0-87552-497-4
  • Christian-Theistic Evidences (In Defense of the Faith, vol. VI), Phillipsburg, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1978
  • The Doctrine of Scripture (In Defense of the Faith, vol. I), Copyright denDulk Christian Foundation, 1967
  • The Sovereignty of Grace: An Appraisal of G.C. Berkouwer's View of Dordt, Nutley, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1975
  • The New Synthesis Theology of the Netherlands, Nutley, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1976
  • The Case for Calvinism ISBN 0-87552-476-1
  • Essays on Christian Education ISBN 0-87552-485-0
  • Psychology of Religion (In Defense of the Faith, vol. IV) ISBN 0-87552-494-X
  • The New Hermeneutic ISBN 1-112-86264-1
  • The Intellectual Challenge of the Gospel (pamphlet) ISBN 0-87552-487-7
  • Why I Believe in God (pamphlet; available online for free), Philadelphia, Pa.: Westminster Theological Seminary, no date
  • Paul at Athens (pamphlet), Phillipsburg, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1978
  • Karl Barth and Evangelicalism (pamphlet), Nutley, N.J.: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1964

Additionally, Eric Sigward has edited The Works of Cornelius Van Til, 1895-1987, CD-ROM (ISBN 0-87552-461-3), a comprehensive collection of Van Til's writings in digital form that also includes images and extensive audio recordings of Van Til.

[edit] Books about Van Til

  • Van Til : defender of the faith : an authorized biography by William White, Jr ISBN 0-8407-5670-4
  • Jerusalem & Athens: Critical Discussions on the Philosophy and Apologetics of Cornelius Van Til a Festschrift edited by E.R. Geehan ISBN 0-87552-489-3
  • Cornelius Van Til: An Analysis of His Thought by John Frame ISBN 0-87552-220-3
  • Van Til’s Apologetic: Readings and Analysis by Greg Bahnsen ISBN 0-87552-098-7
  • For a Time Such as This: An Introduction to the Reformed Apologetics of Cornelius Van Til by Jim S. Halsey. (1976) Philadelphia, Penn : Presbyterian and Reformed.
  • By what standard? : an analysis of the philosophy of Cornelius Van Til by Rousas John Rushdoony, (1959) Philadelphia, Penn : Presbyterian and Reformed (Reprint by Chalcedon Dec 2003) ISBN 1-879998-05-X
  • Van Til and the Use of Evidence by Thom Notaro, Presbyterian and Reformed (1980). ISBN 978-0875523538

[edit] References and external links