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 and
Abraham Kuyper to devise a novel Reformed approach to
Christian apologetics, one that opposed the traditional methodology of reasoning on the supposition that there is a neutral middle-ground, upon which the non-Christian and the Christian can agree. His 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 particular, he argued that the
Trinity is of indispensable and insuperable value to a Christian philosophy. In
Van Til: The Theologian,
John Frame, a sympathetic critic of Van Til, stated that Van Til's contributions to
Christian thought are 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 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 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". 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."
Kuyper–Warfield synthesis It is claimed that
Fideism describes the view of fellow Dutchman
Abraham Kuyper, whom Van Til cited as a major inspiration. Van Til is seen as taking the side of Kuyper against his alma mater, Princeton Seminary, and particularly against Princeton professor
B. B. Warfield. But Van Til described his approach to apologetics as a synthesis of these two approaches: "I have tried to use elements both of Kuyper's and of Warfield's thinking."
Greg Bahnsen, a student of Van Til and one of his most prominent defenders and expositors, wrote that "A person who can explain the ways in which Van Til agreed and disagreed with both Warfield and Kuyper, is a person who understands presuppositional apologetics." With Kuyper, Van Til believed that the Christian and the non-Christian have different ultimate standards, presuppositions that color the interpretation of every fact in every area of life. But with Warfield, he believed that a rational proof for Christianity is possible: "Positively Hodge and Warfield were quite right in stressing the fact that Christianity meets every legitimate demand of reason. Surely Christianity is not irrational. To be sure, it must be accepted on faith, but surely it must not be taken on blind faith. Christianity is capable of rational defense." And like Warfield, Van Til believed that the
Holy Spirit will use arguments against unbelief as a means to
convert non-believers. Van Til sought a third way from Kuyper and Warfield. His answer to the question "How do you argue with someone who has different presuppositions?" is the
transcendental argument, an argument that seeks to prove that certain presuppositions are necessary for the possibility of rationality. The Christian and non-Christian have different presuppositions, but, according to Van Til, only the Christian's presuppositions allow for the possibility of human rationality or intelligible experience. By rejecting an absolutely rational God that determines whatsoever comes to pass and presupposing that some non-rational force ultimately determines the nature of the universe, the non-Christian cannot account for rationality. Van Til claims that non-Christian presuppositions reduce to absurdity and are self-defeating. Thus, non-Christians can reason, but they are being inconsistent with their presuppositions when they do so. The unbeliever's ability to reason is based on the fact that, despite what he believes, he is God's creature living in God's world. Hence, Van Til arrives at his famous assertion that there is no neutral common ground between Christians and non-Christians because their presuppositions, their ultimate principles of interpretation, are different; but because non-Christians act and think inconsistently with regard to their presuppositions, common ground can be found. The task of the Christian apologist is to point out the difference in ultimate principles, and then show why the non-Christian's reduce to absurdity.
Transcendental argument in 1981.The substance of Van Til's transcendental argument is that the doctrine of the
ontological Trinity, which is concerned with the reciprocal relationships of the persons of the Godhead to each other without reference to God's relationship with creation, is the aspect of God's character that is necessary for the possibility of rationality.
R. J. Rushdoony writes, "The whole body of Van Til's writings is given to the development of this concept of the ontological Trinity and its philosophical implications." The ontological Trinity is important to Van Til because he can relate it to the philosophical concept of the "concrete universal" and the
problem of the one and the many. For Van Til, the ontological Trinity means that God's unity and diversity are equally basic. This is in contrast to non-Christian philosophy in which unity and diversity are seen as ultimately separate from each other: Pure unity with no particularity is a blank, and pure particularity with no unity is chaos. Frame says that a blank and chaos are "meaningless in themselves and impossible to relate to one another. As such, unbelieving worldviews always reduce to unintelligible nonsense. This is, essentially, Van Til's critique of secular philosophy (and its influence on Christian philosophy)."
Karl Barth 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 Calvinist 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. Van Til lays out his case against Barthianism and
Neo-orthodoxy in
The New Modernism: An Appraisal of the Theology of Barth and Brunner (1946),
Christianity and Barthianism (1962), and
Karl Barth and Evangelicalism (1964). ==Influence==