Posted by: Andrew | May 15, 2008

What is revelation for?

Explore with me what belief in God entails:

  • If there is a God (rather than “God” being merely a code name to refer to our own best ideas)… and
  • If God reveals himself and his will (rather than merely putting a rubber stamp on our most sincere decisions)… and
  • If we are in real need of this revelation if we are to be saved and guided (with ignorance and a warped will both being characteristics of the unaided–classical theology would say “fallen”–human state)…
  • Then it is logically inevitable that the revealed will of God will be, at least at some points, different in its form and substance from what human beings would otherwise have thought on the same subject.

There must therefore be a limit set to the applicability of human common sense and the right to calculate right and wrong. We must expect that there will be points where the will of God will simply have to be taken on the authority of revelation. [from John Howard Yoder, "The Pacifism of Absolute Principle," in Nevertheless: Varieties of religious pacifism, rev. and exp. edition (Waterloo, ON: Herald Press, 1992), 32-33]

Yoder goes on to describe a version of pacifism which is grounded on these points, but I wanted to draw out a broader point here: if Yoder is right, then this applies not only to revelation about violence in specific, but about justice and truth in general. It seems to me that if he is right, then Christians need to be ready to hold to unpopular opinions simply on the grounds that “God says so”. Any theology which ultimately denies that revelation carries a higher authority than our best pragmatic answer (in the field of ethics, or in the case of any inquiry into factual matters) seems to deny that either God has in fact revealed himself, or, worse, that God actually exists.

Posted in Ethics, Philosophy, Politics, Quotes, Theology | Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

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Responses

I agree that revelation has a higher authority than our (combined) pragmatic answers in any field. However, Yoder’s argument is deeply flawed.

First, it is invalid. The conclusion simply does not follow from the premises. Suppose that God really exists, he reveals his will and himself and man is currently fallen and ignorant. Suppose further that this revelation is needed for human salvation. What follows from that is only that revealed will of God could be different from human opinions and revelation will have greater warrant than our opinions in any case of conflict.

Second, even if I were to make Yoder’s argument valid, there are still problems. His argument will assume that our opinions will speak about every area that revelation addresses. It will assume that the fallen human state will either be self-consistent or inevitably reject the same features of revelation. It assumes that fallen humans will have no basic commonalities with revelation on any subject. All of these assumptions are dubious at best.

By: Matthew on May 16, 2008
at 11:41 am

“What follows from that is only that revealed will of God could be different from human opinions and revelation will have greater warrant than our opinions in any case of conflict.”

How this differs from his point, I don’t know…

“Second, even if I were to make Yoder’s argument valid, there are still problems.”

I guess you’ll have to make clear exactly how you’ve adjusted his argument so that it will reach those conclusions, because it’s not evident to me that they would follow, nor that there is a problem with the original argument…

By: Andrew on May 16, 2008
at 12:56 pm

“How this differs from his point, I don’t know…”

Yoder claims that “it is logically inevitable that the revealed will of God will be…different in its form and substance from what human beings would otherwise have thought on the same subject”. That does not follow. There is no logically inevitability from those premises. That is why the argument is invalid.

As to how I have adjusted his argument, I would alter is as follows (trying to make the adjustments as close to his intents as possible):

1) God exists
2) God reveals himself and will
3) Human beings need this revelation in order to be saved and guided because (subargument follows)
a) Human beings need to know God and his will in order to be saved
b) Human beings are currently ignorant of that will and do not have reliable means to seek it on their own terms
c) Therefore, human beings need divine revelation in order to be saved
4) If human beings do not have reliable means to know the will of God on their own terms, then if they have an opinion on matters that divine revelation has an opinion on, those opinions will diverge at some point
5) Human opinion and divine revelation both have opinions on some of the same matters
6) Therefore, revelation will have a different opinion from human opinion on at least some matters

That is the weakest form of the argument that still ends up with the conclusion Yoder gives in his argument. Premises 4 and 5 were added in order to make the argument valid. If one wished his comments on issues of right and wrong to follow from his argument then either premise 4 or 5 would need to be made stronger.

My arguments were against the stronger version of his argument. There is still an argument against this version though. There is no good reason to assume that human opinion will be unified in any attack against the content of divine revelation. Yet that is exactly what premise 4 has. I believe that premise 4, even in this weakened state, is false for that reason.

By: Matthew on May 16, 2008
at 1:29 pm

“Yoder claims that “it is logically inevitable that the revealed will of God will be…different in its form and substance from what human beings would otherwise have thought on the same subject”.”

I think you are reading a bit into what he is saying; I doubt very much that by logical he means deductively necessary. He is talking about probabilities, and it seems entirely reasonable to me to grant his point if we also grant that we actually do need divine revelatory guidance in life…

“4) If human beings do not have reliable means to know the will of God on their own terms, then if they have an opinion on matters that divine revelation has an opinion on, those opinions will diverge at some point…

There is no good reason to assume that human opinion will be unified in any attack against the content of divine revelation. Yet that is exactly what premise 4 has. I believe that premise 4, even in this weakened state, is false for that reason.”

Then you are essentially denying his point: we need divine guidance. And I’d say human depravity is a good reason to think human opinion will be against divine revelation at some points, at least (otherwise, it would be not depraved, which is not how the Bible describes humanity… ;)

By: Andrew on May 16, 2008
at 1:53 pm

“I doubt very much that by logical he means deductively necessary.”

In that case, he is being most unclear. Deductively necessary is precisely what “logically inevitable” means. If he meant something else, then he should have said what he meant.

If one were to treat his conclusion as being probabilistic then it still requires a probabilistic version of 4. That version would still be unwarranted.

“Then you are essentially denying his point: we need divine guidance. And I’d say human depravity is a good reason to think human opinion will be against divine revelation at some points, at least (otherwise, it would be not depraved, which is not how the Bible describes humanity…”

I do not believe that I am denying human depravity, I am simply denying that human depravity means that human opinion will be unified in its rejection of any divine truth. All that human depravity requires is that human opinion will not be unified in its acceptance of divine truth. Between unified acceptance and unified rejection there is the possibility of varied acceptance - which is precisely what we see.

By: Matthew on May 16, 2008
at 2:12 pm

“In that case, he is being most unclear. Deductively necessary is precisely what “logically inevitable” means. If he meant something else, then he should have said what he meant.”

Not for most people outside of philosophers… logic is not limited to ‘demonstration’ in the classical sense for the average English speaker…

“All that human depravity requires is that human opinion will not be unified in its acceptance of divine truth.”

Let me put into practice your recommendations for coming to truth together: could you explain how this is significantly different from what Yoder said? I’m sure you have some very technical and precise point in mind, but I think I’m missing it…

By: Andrew on May 16, 2008
at 3:36 pm

“Not for most people outside of philosophers… logic is not limited to ‘demonstration’ in the classical sense for the average English speaker…”

It is not so much logically as “logically inevitable”. According to the OED, inevitable means:

That cannot be avoided; not admitting of escape or evasion; unavoidable. In extended use: that cannot fail or is bound to occur, appear, be used, etc.; that is inherent (in) or naturally belongs to

So if Yoder does not mean deductively necessary, then he is not using standard English. If he wants to be understood, then he should.

“Let me put into practice your recommendations for coming to truth together: could you explain how this is significantly different from what Yoder said?”

Certainly. I will use an example. Let’s suppose that the Bible declares that God is the Creator. Some non-believers do believe this, while others do not. Those that do believe it will reject something else instead. No non-believer will accept every part of divine revelation. But that does not mean that they will reject all of it. I do not know of anyone who rejects everything in revelation!

I also think that it is extremely doubtful that unbelievers share some premises or set of premises in opposition to divine revelation. As long as this is true, there is no unity in depravity. So some human opinions will agree with divine revelation and some will not, but it will not be the case that everyone rejects divine revelation on any issue. Acceptance of human depravity does not require any more than that.

By: Matthew on May 17, 2008
at 9:59 pm

“So if Yoder does not mean deductively necessary, then he is not using standard English. If he wants to be understood, then he should.”

Well, I think when he said “or at least some of the time,” it indicates he didn’t mean it always follows, which would imply he wasn’t making a deductive argument. I agree it was perhaps confusingly phrased, but I think his meaning can be discovered on a charitable reading.

As for the rest: I agree with your point, and I don’t think Yoder would disagree; he wasn’t trying to prove that all unbelievers would reject any particular given doctrine, and I don’t believe that that do.

By: Andrew on May 18, 2008
at 8:24 pm

In that case, I will just agree that Yoder needs to phrase things better.

I do wonder what the point of his argument is then. Is he trying to say that we cannot use arguments against pacifism from outside of Scripture? If so, then his argument will not prevent that. If not, is he just saying that Scripture is the final authority on moral issues?

By: Matthew on May 19, 2008
at 1:06 pm

The book is all about him giving different reasons/kinds of pacifisms, with their drawbacks, and showing that even with these drawbacks they have advantages over correlative kinds of non-pacifism.

In this case, he’s talking about a kind of pacifism which appeals in simple way to commands not to kill as justification for pacifism. His point with the comments about revelation is that we can’t just assume God will always agree with our calculations about what actions will have the best consequences, and thus we must be open to going against where prudential judgments might lead us if indeed we believe there is a God and that we need his revelation to act rightly. I think that point still stands (even non-pacifists use it, for example, in response to pro-choice arguments that “some children born to, e.g., lower-class parents, would be better dead than alive”; the response is always: “you have no right to make that judgment”, “life is sacred” (an absolute principle), etc.).

By: Andrew on May 19, 2008
at 1:22 pm

If that is all he is trying to argue, then that is certainly sufficient. One cannot overturn moral principles with prudential reasons! (As a side note, I do not believe that God commands not to kill, but that he commands not to murder. Murder is a proper subset of killing, therefore not all killing is forbidden.)

One could extend his argument to say that our trust in God should lead us to do the right thing. It is never a wise decision to do something wrong. It is also never right to do something wrong. In no sense is it ever necessary to do something wrong either. Without belief in divine providence though, such beliefs would not be warranted.

By: Matthew on May 19, 2008
at 1:56 pm

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