Jane: Leibniz stated that “[w]hatever is not from something else is from itself, or from its own essence.”1 Would you agree with the axiom that everything that exists has an explanation of its existence either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause? John: Yes. Given the Principle of Sufficient Reason, I would agree with that axiom. Jane: Would you also agree … [Read more...]
A Look At Messianic Prophecy
Note: See Part One Here: Introduction One of the most prominent themes throughout the Bible is the kingdom of God. The framework of Israel’s existence and self-understanding was formulated from God’s covenant with Israel and Israel’s servant to God the King. Israel is the people of the king, and the holy land is the land of the king’s rule. Given the Messiah is supposed to be … [Read more...]
Who is the One True God? A Look at Prophecy as a Verification Test
Introduction The skeptical issue in our culture mostly enters into the religious dialogue in the following way: “In the case of God, who isn’t some physical object but a divine being, what kind of evidence should we expect to find? [1] There is a tendency to forget that the Bible stresses that sin can dampen the cognitive faculties that God has given us to find Him. … [Read more...]
Malignant Demon, Atheism and Search For Truth
“Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey's mind,” rhetorically asked Charles Darwin, “if there are any convictions in such a mind?” (Darwin 1881) In Darwin’s July 3rd 1881 letter to William Graham, we encounter a problem of epistemological uncertainty of our cognitive faculties. Darwin believed that Graham had accurately portrayed his conviction that “the Universe … [Read more...]
The Naturalness Of Narrative
If I told you that South Korean soap operas can teach us something useful as Christian apologists, you might call me crazy. Please prepare to do so although somewhat indirectly. A story was written in the New York Times on January 24 by Choe Sang-Hun about the appeal of smuggled South Korean soap operas in the oppressive North Korean regime. The North Korean government has … [Read more...]
A List of My Recorded Interviews, Debates and Talks To-Date
Over the past couple of years, I have been privileged to have the opportunity to participate in a number of radio and podcast interviews and debates, as well as present a number of lectures on subjects of interest to Christians. Those that have been recorded lie scattered around the internet, and so I thought it would be a good idea to compile the links to these resources into … [Read more...]
On The Eternality Of The Soul
Isn’t time a perplexing thing? As we celebrate another year that has gone into the archives of our past and look forward to our immediate future in 2015, it made me think about how fast time goes by. It seems like just yesterday that I was an eight-year-old kid sitting in my living room waiting to see if Y2K was really going to shut down our national infrastructure. I had my … [Read more...]
Argumentum ad Malum
“It’s not that I don’t accept God, you must understand,” said Ivan Karamazov, one of Fyodor Dostoevsky novel’s characters in The Brothers Karamazov, to his younger brother, Alyosha, “it’s the world created by Him I don’t and cannot accept.”(Dostoevsky 2007, 257) The world created by God is overflowing with horrifying and repugnant evils. Ivan vividly captured some of the moral … [Read more...]
Answering Jewish Objections: “Jewish People Don’t Believe in a Suffering/Atoning Messiah”: Part Two
To See Part One, Click Here Peter uses Old Testament prophecy in Acts 3:18, where he declares: “But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets, that this Christ should suffer, he thus fulfilled.” Where in the prophets are we told that God’s “Christ (or Messiah) should suffer”? Isaiah 53 is probably what Peter is alluding to. Probably the most explicit case for Isaiah … [Read more...]
3 Considerations for the Ontological Argument
For those of us familiar with the ontological argument, we may also be familiar with Immanuel Kant’s “textbook critique” of the Anselmsian proof. To be clear, Kant’s criticism is two-fold: (1) A concept cannot be formed to guarantee its own instantiation (i.e., have an instance) in extra-mental reality. For instance, whether or not the idea of a supreme being corresponds to any … [Read more...]