Biblical Landmarks

What mental image comes to mind when you hear the word “worldview”? It’s a popular word and one that should be used often.

But what does that word “worldview” mean to you?

And what does it mean to your neighbor, especially if that neighbor is not a Christian?

More importantly, how do you even begin to put a worldview together? What are the key principles? How do you even begin to assemble a worldview? What is the starting point of a worldview?

For more than two decades now, it is common to hear the phrase “Christian worldview”. This implies a worldview is governed by its religious foundations. Thus, a Christian worldview would be different from an Islamic worldview. Or is it?

This question needs to be asked: Is a worldview defined by its detail or by its starting points? Thus, a Christian worldview and an Islamic worldview could conceivably agree on many points, yet they are not the same thing. For example, both worldviews might think stealing is wrong. But does this make them ultimately the same — or very close to the same — thing?

In putting together a worldview, the most critical step is to define the starting point. Descartes understood this when he attempted the idea of a worldview, and came up with cogito ergo sum – I think, therefore I am. Now Descartes was grappling with answering the big question: How do I know God exists? Two corollary questions followed: How do I know I exist? And, How do I know other things exist?

Here is the jungle in which contemporary philosophy and theology finds itself ensnared. It is the epistemological attempt to see everything clearly when the horizon is studded with trees, short and tall, thick and thin, and undergrowth that obstructs or blurs the vision. Here and there are droplets of sunlight drifting through the dense undergrowth, but there is not enough light for those in the forest to be able to find their way out.

This was Descartes problem: trying to find a way out of the thick epistemological undergrowth. Instead, he got himself further into the thicket.

Thinking he had found the exit path, Descartes instead found another trail that led nowhere. Just because he was thinking was an insufficient reason for the conclusion: I think, therefore I must exist. How did he know that his thinking was even rational? Come to think of it, is there any such thing as rational? Are thoughts coherent, or are they just a sequence of unrelated . . . . I was going to say “thoughts” but I hope you see the problem. How do you know your thoughts are even thoughts?

So when you attempt a worldview, now you are faced with a similar problem. How do you know there is even a worldview to comprehend?

And if there are worldviews to comprehend, how will the worldview called “Christian” be different from one that might be labeled Islamic or Humanistic, Western or Eastern, Greek or Hebrew.

To have you read thus far in the e-zine I’ve assumed a worldview about myself and you. I’ve written on the assumption that my method of communication really communicates, even though it may not communicate perfectly. I’ve assumed that my thoughts are rational, and that you are sufficiently rational to understand them.

In order to communicate with another human being it’s necessary to assume — or presuppose — something about a worldview that incorporates Man and the way he thinks and acts. In so doing, you also assume that the mind receiving the communication thinks in similar categories. I’ve assumed that you might agree or disagree with these comments. I’m assuming you also have the ability to understand the communication and figure out if the ideas and images portrayed are true or false.

These are some of the key presuppositions that allow debate about a worldview to even begin. They are the prerequisite conditions that are accepted, even though they may not be thought about very much. My old piano teacher use to say, “There is no such thing as truth.” One day, I figured it out, and next time I heard the statement, I asked, “Is that true?” He smiled. He was willing to concede one contradiction to his generalization in order to make his point, but in so doing he admitted his view was a failure to explain anything meaningful.

That there are no truths is the mantra of the modern world. Similarly, there are no moral standards that all should adhere to. There are, it appears, only opinions. Opinions stated as if the person making the statement is like God on Mt. Sinai, insisting that his view of the world be carved in stone and accepted by all as divine revelation.

This is the worldview that the Bible — Old and New Testaments — challenges. In the beginning . . . . So there was beginning, was there? And who started this beginning?

The simple answer is God . . . and Man made in God’s image comes shortly thereafter.

There is no worldview, therefore, that does not begin with the Old Testament’s declaration found in the first three chapters of Genesis. Any other beginning leaves Man buried in the forest of dense trees, thick undergrowth, and pale streams of light casting shadows on imaginary exits. It leaves him buried deep within the Kantian jungle with its inability to establish a pathway or connection between the phenomenal world (objects of the senses), and the noumenal world (objects known to the imagination only, independent of the senses).

To the extent that any worldview adopts the Old Testament’s view of “the beginning” is the extent that worldview can begin to answer questions and make categories for discussion. It is the basis to be able to disagree with ideas that are not our own.

Thus in the very first instance, it is not a choice of worldviews. It is the acceptance that the Genesis account is the only framework for rational discussion so that you might disagree about worldviews.

Since only the biblical worldview allows the discussion to take place, it really is not proper to speak of alternative world views. There are none. Those that pretend to be worldviews are ideas borrowed from the Judaic/Christian scriptures without giving recognition to the origin.

It is in the clash of worldviews, then, that we see the real dilemma of contemporary Christian thought. It tries to play intellectual games predicated on their opponent’s view of the world. This is, that ideas are just a matter of intellectual debate. That mankind, unaided by divine revelation can determine the meaning about anything.

You and I, on the other hand, must insist that everything hinges on the presuppositions that make rational and meaningful discussion. Cogito ergo sum? Only if we are willing to put the Triune God of Scripture at the back of all things.