Atheist use to present to me the problem of starting points. They use to argue that we must start with ourselves or we must start with logic. That is because if we start anywhere else we would enter incoherence. You would have Christianity without logic and you wouldn’t know Christianity was your starting point because you didn’t know that you exist. The Christian says that he starts with God. How could he start with God at the expense of your own existence and laws of logic?
The issue with this criticisms is that they confuse what is meant by “start with”. They think it means you temporally start with the belief that God exists and move from there. The phrase actually means that the belief in God takes preeminence over our other beliefs. The beliefs should be looked at in a non-temporal way and more a logical order.
The question can be turned on the objector. What does he start with? Does he start with himself? Or does he start with logic? The objector cannot start with himself because he would not have logic. It means that he simply starts with him and not himself. Well, who starts with logic? This is the problem with understanding the phrase “start with” in temporal terms.
The objector probably will also proclaim that TAG is a failed argument because we can’t make the argument without first presupposing the preconditions of intelligibility. That we need not account for those things because we must already assume them in any conversation. This person in his wisdom points out that you need your senses to read the Bible and you need logic to understand it.
This response doesn’t seem satisfactory and is just a deceptive fideism. We simply have to trust that they will one day be able to justify the preconditions of intelligibility at a later date. This worldview simply assumes that it can do those things by taking all these ultimate issues on faith. Furthermore, it is not incorrect to ask one to show how they can believe in a certain metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics with their worldview and still maintain that their worldview is rational. This leaves them with begging the question. It also commits the fallacy of conflating the preconditions for making a claim with the preconditions for the proposition of the claim. The proposition exists apart from it being claimed. That doesn’t deal with the issue of what are the preconditions for intelligible experience to be the case. That doesn’t deal with either the metaphysical or epistemological issue for such a thing as logic. The opponent has simply pronounced the obvious. We know that in order to claim God account for intelligible experience is to presuppose that very experience. That doesn’t tell us what must be the case for that kind of experience to be the case. We’re asking the question of whether such things like intelligibility comport with such a worldview.
The last thing I will say is that “start with” means that we don’t only start with an epistemology, but a corresponding metaphysic. That is to say, to “start with” God is to start with the Christian worldview. That includes things like logic, a reliable mind, and truth. The nature of the case is that you simply can’t start with an epistemology. In order for something to be known requires a knower and an object of knowledge. Those deal with things that exist.
Robin Ingles-Barrett is a scholar on Van Til and he comments about this issue here. He borrows from Van Til a distinction between Ultimate and Proximate starting points. He stated:
The hangup you have here is a common one as well. Your use of the word “first” is ambiguous. It can mean first in order or first in importance. While we may first presuppose that presupposing is rational temporally, that does not mean that the first presupposition is of first importance. Calvin avoids this mistake in the first chapter of the Institutions by showing that man’s knowledge of himself and his knowledge of God are inextricably related by virtue of man knowing himself as a creature and knowing God as creator.
“As a help to clarification of the subject we may perhaps suggest a distinction between an immediate and an ultimate starting point. By an immediate starting point is meant the place where knowledge of facts must begin. It is of course quite consistent with a theistic position to say that we must start with the ‘facts’ as that term is understood ordinarily. Neither Augustine nor Calvin would have objected to saying that knowledge of self-was their immediate and temporary starting point. But when the question of an ultimate starting point is raised the matter is different. In that case Augustine and Calvin would both have to say that their ultimate starting point is God. That is, they could intelligently think of their own non-existence but were unable to think intelligently of God’s non-existence” – CVT “A survey of Christian Epistemology”
I think a helpful analogy is that of a story or a book. In a story, you start with a select few details. You have it evolve and a plot begins to form. The best authors write a story with a unifying thesis that hangs over the entire story and the entire story presupposes that thesis even though you don’t temporally start with that idea. The book of Judges exercises a certain theme in which is expounded through the turmoil of a savage unbelieving culture lacking any knowledge of God’s law. The book of Judges’ thesis is when man departs from God’s statues and don’t believe in his promises they reduce to wickedness, moral anarchy, and express their depraved natures. This is shown through various stories through this period of time. This is why the book ends on this:
Judges 21:25:
“In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”
Further reading:
The Council 