Does Presuppositional Apologetics Claim that Nonbelievers cannot know things?

There was a recent debate this past week on on apologetics methodology one of the debaters wrote on Facebook that Presuppositionalists claims that nonbelievers cannot know anything.  If “Presuppositional apologetics” is new to you I recommend checking out our Ultimate Collection of Free Presuppositional Apologetics Lectures and listening to anything on there under Greg Bahnsen.

Is it true that Presuppositionalists claims nonbelievers do not not know anything?

First I want to give an operating definition of knowledge that this critic of Presuppositionalism used.  Knowledge is defined in this conversation as justified true beliefs.  When we know a statement obviously that statement must be true, but how we come to know that statement is true matters and if we come to know that knowledge coincidentally then we normally don’t say that person “knows” that statement is true.  For instance it is true that as I am tying this it is 11:10 AM Pacific Standard time (I’m writing this post much later today than usual!).  But let’s say while that is true and I looked at a dead analog clock that happens to be dead and “resting” at the position where the hands of the clock points to 11:10 AM we would say that while I am correct with the statement as true yet I wasn’t justified in coming to that conclusion.  In this instance the claims are true but I didn’t know it (since the criteria of justification of that claim wasn’t met).

So going to the question: Is it true that Presuppositionalists claims nonbelievers do not not know anything?

I think nonbelievers can know things.  I think it is an inaccurate statement to accuse Presuppositonalists that we think nonbelievers cannot know anything at all.

Presuppositionalists makes two claims and the two shouldn’t be confused:

1. According to the unbelievers’ professing unbelieving worldview: They cannot know things.
2. According to the truth about God which an unbeliever suppresses within himself/herself: They can know things.

According to the unbelieving worldview they professed they shouldn’t know anything (their worldview is a self-defeater of the possibility of knowledge). But nonbelievers know the living God which they suppressed. The Presuppositionalist believes this to be the case in light of Romans 1 that the unbeliever does know the real Christian God exists.  Its according to that suppressed view of God which we call the Christian worldview that is the actual basis for them to know things. Unfortunately nonbelievers are mistaken with what worldview is operating that can allow them to know things, not wanting God to give the credit.  In suppressing the truth the nonbeliever is self-deceived. Specifically the nonbeliever has a false belief about his beliefs about what worldview is operating when he or she knows things.

This point is not something I came up with.  It is taught in the literature by Presuppositionalists.

In summary form Cornelius Van Til the father of Presuppositional Apologetics states “Unbelievers can very well count. but they cannot ‘account for counting'” (Greg Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetics, 407).

Van Til further explains:

The point I am interested in is to show that all the knowledge of non-Christians have, whether as simple folk by common sense, or as scientists exploring the hidden depths of the created universe–they have because Christianity is true.  It is because the world is not what non-Christians assume that it is, a world of Chance, and is what the Christian says that it is, a world run by the counsel of God, that even non-Christians have knowledge”

(Source: Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith, 286.  1955 edition)

You see the above Van Til clearly saying “even non-Christians have knowledge.”  But this knowledge is NOT based upon what the non-Christians SAY what ultimate reality is like (in contradiction to what God says it is).

Greg Bahnsen, one of Van Til’s student and a well known advocate of Presuppositional apologetics have also taught the same thing as Van Til did.  He writes

Secondly, because all men know God from HIs works of creation and providence, even those who will not profess and glorify Him are able, and actually do, gain considerable knowledge about themselves and about the world.  Their knowledge of God justifies their logical and empirical reasoning.  It provides the needed philosophical context and the personal operational basis for their coming to know anything else.  Thus, unbelievers actually possess a knowledge of God (His sovereign power, holy character, etc.) and extensive knowledge of the world (history, science, art, etc.).

Thirdly, because unbelievers personally deny knowing God (that is, they repudiate the first point above), they are unable to give an epistemological or philosophical account of their knowledge of the world and of themselves that is intelligible.  The knowledge of God is necesary in order to justify any knowledge of the world”

(Source: Greg Bahnsen, Van Til’s Apologetics, 407).

So from both Van Til and Bahnsen you have seen what they said in their own words.

One last note of clarification: When we say nonbelievers knows truth about God that does not mean they are saved; one need to trust in Christ as Savior to be saved which the nonbeliever has not done (and if they have trusted in Christ to say them, then they are of course converted and become believers).  Its because they don’t have a saved knowledge of Christ and God that we evangelize and engage in apologetics with those who are not Christians.  Let us not forget the Gospel.

Why does matter for the every day Christian who might not be heavy into apologetics and theology?  I think this analogy capture what biblically driven apologetics like Presuppositional apologetics is trying to do: Apologetics Sermon Illustration #51: The Person who denied the Sun.  When nonbelievers try to use intellectual arguments against the faith I find it practical and tactical to probe the unbelievers’ worldview to see if it is self-defeating of their own claims and also self-defeater of their attacks against Christianity.