not many wise blog on TAG

[JM]

A critic of TAG, the blogger asks, "Why not state why it is the case that if logic exists, God exists?"

http://notmanywise.blogspot.com/2006/06/transcendental-argument-for-existence.html

 

[Magma2]

Originally posted by JM
A critic of TAG, the blogger asks, "Why not state why it is the case that if logic exists, God exists?"

http://notmanywise.blogspot.com/2006/06/transcendental-argument-for-existence.html

All in all I think the author did a good job of assessing TAG. I never quite understood why those employing it don´t start with Scripture alone explicitly rather than merely implying it? I suppose if they did they wouldn´t have any warrant for many assertions Van Tilians make for which they cannot account for per the Scriptures (which is generally the main objection against the presuppositionalism of Gordon Clark). Of course if they did restrict their positive statements to only those things either expressly set down in Scripture or necessarily inferred from them, they would be arguing as Scripturalists and not from TAG.

Anyway:

John 1:1 In the beginning was the LOGOS, and the LOGOS was with God, and the LOGOS was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

Which answers the above objection which is not exactly framed correctly. The argument isn't if logic then God, the argument being made from Scripture if God then logic for God is Logic. Or, as Clark wrote:

The well-known prologue to John´s Gospel may be paraphrased, "In the beginning was Logic, and Logic was with God, and Logic was God.... In logic was life and the life was the light of men."

This paraphrase"”in fact, this translation"”may not only sound strange to devout ears, it may even sound obnoxious and offensive. But the shock only measures the devout person´s distance from the language and thought of the Greek New Testament. Why it is offensive to call Christ Logic, when it does not offend to call him a word, is hard to explain. But such is often the case. Even Augustine, because he insisted that God is truth, has been subjected to the anti-intellectualistic accusation of "reducing" God to a proposition. At any rate, the strong intellectualism of the word Logos is seen in its several possible translations: to wit, computation, (financial) accounts, esteem, proportion and (mathematical) ratio, explanation, theory or argument, principle or law, reason, formula, debate, narrative, speech, deliberation, discussion, oracle, sentence, and wisdom.

Any translation of John 1:1 that obscures this emphasis on mind or reason is a bad translation. And if anyone complains that the idea of ratio or debate obscures the personality of the second person of the Trinity, he should alter his concept of personality. In the beginning, then, was Logic.

 

[beej6]

Are we to call this "LAG"? (Logical Argument for God)

I like this approach. I will defer to the Greek scholars (of which I am not) to parse out Logos = Word = Logic (or maybe 'Word' contains 'Logic'? Don't want to get neo-orthodox here). But I'm a simple man and this is simple.