An Introduction to Apologetic Systematics
Supplmentary
Christ on the Sea of Galilee
Nelson-Adkins Museum
Photo Credit: JAC
Section 2 apologetics is aimed at calling attention to the nature of what we call systematic apologetics. In so far as we know we’re coining this term to express a discipline within apologetics that has already existed...the discipline of keeping your answers consistent with each other in a variety of ways. Taking time to be coherent and consistent at the deepest levels of your thinking and apologetics is valuable in and of itself, but it also has the instrumental virtue of helping one avoid switching ground in the middle of an argument. It takes time and discipline to work through a very large number of complicated issues, but its fruit ensures mature thinking and mature communication. To eschew this discipline will open you up for criticism from all kinds of audiences because people have a pretty intuitive sense of consistency that is often critically honed in one’s academic career.
Level 2 differs from Level 1 in that Level 1 was aimed at the helping you to discern good answers from among the many answers given by Christians to serious questions. Level 2 is aimed at acquainting you with the nature of apologetics generally and specifically the need to answer apologetically in a systematic way. That is, answers to apologetic questions typically carry implicit deeper commitments to certain philosophical and theological positions and you need to know that and what they are. That should help you tweak and fine tune the answers you develop in Level 1.
Of course, it makes sense to reflect on the those philosophical and theological positions themselves, but at least you should be consistent in your answers with those
positions.....mixing and matching the underlying philosophical and theological commitments is the fast way to paint yourself into a very undesirable and incoherent corner.
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Photo Credit: JAC