A redated post.
Shulamite made a comment about my reference to "just plain snobbery" as as reason why Lewis is not taken seriously amongst philosophers. It reminds me of when I was in my first year of teaching introductory philosophy at the University of Illinois. I informed my students that there were about 18 full-time teachers at the U of I, and as best as I could tell 17 of them were atheists. One student raised his hand and asked "Those atheist teachers, do they think of themselves as the supreme beings?" I didn't answer the way I should have, which would have been to say "well, not all of them."
1 comment:
Claims of "snobbery" don't settle philosophical disputes. In fact, nothing does. Each philosophical worldviews is more flexible in more different ways than anyone's attempts at "disproving" that view en toto, allows for. The most you can get another philosopher to hopefully acknowledge is in which precise areas the most questions lay. That is true of biblical studies as well.
As for snobbery, I'd say Vic's high view of his AFR along with McGrew's disdain for all the questions that even his fellow Evangelical biblical scholars admit concerning synoptic comparisons, are both excellent examples of snobbery.
In fact, I am appalled at Lewis' repeated reliance on examples from nature to try and illustrate "supernature by analogy," as if he has proven anything in the exercise. I am also appalled at his lack of knowledge concerning biblical studies and questions, especially concerning the Gospel of John, that he sweeps under the rug with the words, "it doesn't read like fiction to me." Well, bully for him and his "nose." Maybe he ought to have qualified it with, "doesn't read like medieval tales to me." What an exacting thorough methodology he has concerning ancient manuscripts and the questions their differing stories may raise as in the synoptics, and comparing the synoptics with John. At least Lewis admitted he was no inerrantist, and that Jesus made an all too human error in predicting "this generation shall not pass away until all these things come to pass," including the gathering together of people for the world's final judgment.
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