The Problem of the Criterion: A Christian’s Thoughts by Jimmy Stephens

The problem with particularism is spelled out by philosophers who try to handle the problem of the criterion. Namely, it is subjectivism. When the epistemologist calls one of his beliefs or a set of his beliefs a clear item of knowledge from which to begin thinking, he has no principle by which to distinguish that belief from others. It is arbitrary, an example of prejudice or caprice.

Each of the three traditional answers to the problem is self-refuting. Particularism is self-refuting because the given particular has no principle or system in which its justification is verifiable, rendering all beliefs fair game, including the opposite to any given belief, including contradictory beliefs. Methodism is self-refuting for much the same reason. Because there is no particular justifying the method in a way that satisfies the method, all methods are fair game, including subjectivism, including claiming contradictory things. Skepticism is self-refuting in that it requires much knowledge to be skeptical: e.g., knowing that skepticism is not particularism, knowing that it’s possible to be wrong, etc.

Revelational epistemology is brilliant in that it cuts through the horns of particularism and Methodism. Unlike Methodism, the primary and ground object of knowledge and environment of human consciousness is God (in His covenant revelation), which can be said to be a particular item of knowledge. Unlike particularism, the revelation of God contains in itself a covenant program, a system in which our minds participate as human subjects of the Lord, which can be said to be a method of knowledge. The need for a principle and particular of knowledge are needs satisfied by the more ultimate reality of knowing God as part of a covenant creature in His revelatory story of redemption.

This is fairly comparable to Bahnsen’s comment on theories of truth. Most philosophical theories have a kernel of truth to them (budum tss), but ultimately miss the essence of truth. It seems obvious that truth involves correspondence. It also seems obvious that truth involves coherence. It further seems obvious that truth has inherent practical value. The trouble comes when we try to reduce truth to any one of these features.

Correspondence faces the trouble of defining the state of affairs in such a way as to provide a link between truthmakers and truth-bearers. Coherence faces the trouble of identifying a system as a coherent whole. Pragmatism ends up smuggling in other theories to do its explanatory work. There are also (I think, successful) arguments for thinking these theories can’t preserve the merits found in others.

But, if instead of reducing truth to one of its merits, we rest our theory of truth on our Christian metaphysic and cash it out in terms of God’s creative and redemptive dealings, in adherence to Scripture with its creature-Creator distinction, then we see that truth has primarily to do with God’s self-reflection and its grounding of the universe as a reflective manifestation of God’s plan. Such a covenant theory of knowledge preserves the merits of all the other theories without tripping over their reductionism.

Such is the genius of men like Dooyeweerd and Van Til. Dooyeweerd for noticing how again and again, unbelieving thought tries to reduce the underlying fabric of God’s work down the the surface-level gifts that it supplies man. The unbeliever is taken to a restaurant to be fed by God, and the unbeliever busies himself with trying to thank the food, trying to know the food without thankful acknowledgment of his divine Host, and so ends up explaining away the food itself.
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Van Til for noticing that unbelieving thought pays no heed to the creature-Creator distinction. For unbelievers, there is one nature and rule of knowledge, one conceptual framework, one truth, one social network, one universe which, if God is a part, He’s merely another player in the game. In this way, the unbeliever has presuppositionally ruled out any appearance or evidence of Christianity from the outset. Such evidence requires a holy, transcendent God who is before the universe, outside it, and who ontologically precedes and controls everything about it.
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Sorry for the long line of text. To return to the topic of the criterion problem and summarize, the way philosophers handle the problem is similar to the way philosophers handle definitions of knowledge or truth. They face two interlocked problems. (1) They reduce the underlying reality of the Creator’s gift to the surface-level provision it supplies. The more consistently this reduction is carried out, the less of the provision can be supplied at all. (2) They try to found analysis of knowledge without first respecting God and what He has told us, taking for granted that whether or not God exists, whatever is true about knowledge is a matter of an overarching reality of which He is merely another subject.
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That is why we end up in an unsolvable trilemma. Some philosophers prefer to reduce the gift of knowledge to the joy of instances. Some philosophers prefer to reduce the gift of knowledge to the glory of systemic principle. In both cases, knowledge cannot be rationally preserved, and so the joy and glory of the one gift are both lost for not recognizing the gift itself. This is inevitable given that those philosophers tried to think about a gift from God as if it were just an accident of an impersonal universe of which God, if he exists, can only be a relatively special citizen.

On the contrary, Christians have the privilege of recognizing Proverbs 1:7 for what it is: the true theory of knowledge. Knowledge is the gift of God, a provision grounded in its reflection of God’s original natural and free knowledge, and which takes place as a transaction in the sphere of God’s covenant with mankind. In that sphere, the gift provides awareness of the Lord and His covenant in one act of knowledge, thus providing particular and method in one instance of knowledge.

I wish to add that Chris Matthew statement about the problem of the criterion:

That said, I think I’ve talked to him long enough (on revelational epistemology, that is) to give an answer on his behalf.

The so-called “problem of the criterion” (as articulated by Chisolm and some early schools of epistemological scepticism) belongs to what Van Til called the historical dialectic, which involves dilemmas that arise out of neglecting Christian theology.

Notice that, on RE, our innate knowledge of God provides us with both a particular and a system. We know God as our Creator and Sovereign, ourselves as His sinful creature, and this system of relationship which we might call a covenant. In principle, the problem of the criterion is therefore answered. More relevantly and importantly, because RE locates the criterion of justification in the particular revelation not constrained to but formational of our belief-set, we need not beg the question or commit special pleading as foundationalists must.

You see, foundationalism locates its criterion for epistemic justification in its basic beliefs. The foundationalist’s knowledge concerning what constitutes knowledge is part of or derived from his basic beliefs. The basic beliefs then are either unjustified or justified uniquely. This is why the problem of the criterion defaces foundationalism.

That’s the brief answer, anyway.

http://spirited-tech.com/2018/04/03/presup-before-dessert/

Further Thoughts:

Meals on Wheels

Parsing Revelational Epistemology