Talk:Christian apologetics

Origins

I saw there was a Mormon apologetics and so I thought a "Christian apologetics" was a excellent category to create and such a category has precedence. User:128.205.191.60

Plato's Apology

My understanding of the translation of the greek into apology in the title "Plato's Apology" is typically more like "Plato's Explanation". --Cplot 07:44, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

No...it's Plato's "Apology," as in, Plato wrote it and it is titled Apologia. The most accurate translation of the Greek word is "defense," since the work purports to record Socrates' defense of himself at his trial.

Questions/Suggestions

This subject is long overdue for an article; glad its here...I altered the category to "Christian theology" rather than just "theology". I might suggest a trim in some ways; C.S. Lewis, for instance is the pre-eminent apologist of the 20th century, and yet is kind of just granted a passing mention. Also, the bibliography is far too long; I might suggest a second article be created called "Christian apologetics bibliography" or something. But most of this has to go. KHM03 18:08, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Bibliographies will be vfded and deleted. I agree though that Christian apologetics can be a subpage of apologetics, (and likewise the subjects Jewish apologetics, Muslim apologetics, Buddhist apologetics, etc). I hope that there are enough users around here with the appropriate knowledge and ability to adhere unwaveringly from the NPOV policy for this article to be improved. I do not think that the vfd trolls will bite this one though. Dunc|☺ 21:19, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

I reduced the size of the bibliography to a few key texts by a few key authors (Lewis, Ramm, Schaeffer, et al - the giants, really). We can edit that as needed. KHM03 21:35, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

The section on Criticisms is rather sloppily written. Could someone with knowledge of this area take a whack at it? For example, I know of at least one website devoted to fisking Josh McDowell, but I don't have it bookmarked.

I strongly agree with the above. It needs to be sharpened up considerably as it is rather muddled at the moment. Starless and bible black 22:20, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

to KHMO3

I agree the subject is long overdue. Please feel free to make changes as this was just a rough draft. I may make some revisions myself today perhaps.

ken 18:18, 22 August 2005 (UTC)kdbuffalo

I reformatted things so the page didn't look ugly anymore.

By the way, great contribution. I added a few books plus created a category for people who want additional reading with the bigger book list. I also reworded things so things flowed better. That was a great idea to get rid of the huge list as the main reading list. Better to have classics and introductory works.

ken 00:17, 23 August 2005 (UTC)kdbuffalo

Looking good

The page is taking shape and starting to look a whole lot better. Could probably still use a trim here or there but I will gladly leave that up to you experts. Looking good. KHM03 20:02, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

"Conservative Christianity and its Critics"

I removed this section. Why was it part of this article? There are more liberal apologists, and criticism of conservative Christianity belongs on the articles for fundamentalism, evangelicalism, dispensationalism, etc....not here. KHM03 21:39, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

Ontological argument

There is as yet no statement of the ontological argument in the article. The quotation there from Anselm has nothing to do with the ontological argument. Jeremy J. Shapiro 15:22, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

About List of Christian apologetic works

This is article is nothing more than a bibliography of several 20th century works, with no explanation why these works were included -- & others excluded. And only this article links to this list; so its existence is puzzling.

It has been sitting on Cleanup now for several months, but this has drawn little attention shown to improving it (after 2 months an anon editor removed the tag, but it was restored a month later). Can someone who believes in this article take it under her/his wing, add the details needed to improve it -- or merge it into an appropriate article? Continued neglect will only lead to it being listed on AfD. -- llywrch 22:11, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

I think it is fine. I removed the cleanup tag. ken 00:52, 19 June 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo

As the creator of that article, of course you consider it to be fine. I have added the tag back. I think AfD should be a definite consideration for it. ju66l3r 23:10, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Removal of James Orr

I removed James Orr in regards to defending the historicity of the Bible as he was a theistic evolutionist. [1][2] [User:Kdbuffalo|ken]] 00:57, 19 June 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo

Creationism is not required for defending the historicity of the Bible. For example, someone can argue for the existence of a historical Jesus while freely admitting that humans evolved from other primates. For this reason, I am restoring Orr. Thank you for understanding. Al 01:11, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Genesis chapters one and two are historical. [3][4] Reverting. ken 01:18, 19 June 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo

With all due respect, this is your personal view, and one shared by many conservative Christians. However, it is quite possible to defend the historicity of the Bible while excluding Genesis from the list of historical sections. Some sections are instead understood as metaphorical or as literture literature. Please separate your personal POV of "all or nothing" from the issue at hand. I'm reverting again, and hoping you don't turn this into an edit war. After all, you've tried to make this change a few times now and multiple people have reverted yoru attempts. Please take this as a sign that the consensus weighs against your actions. Thank you for understanding. Al 01:30, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

I would be much more impressed with your post Alienus if you could spell the word literature. ken 01:42, 19 June 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo

See, that was just a personal attack, and not at all constructive. People make typos on occasion, and I'm as guilty as the next person. Often, I notice my errors and correct them. Sometimes, I don't. This is one of those times. Thank you for understanding. Al 01:44, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Criticism and weasel words

I added the weasel and unsourced templates as I counted 5 unsourced statements, 4 weasel phrases, and 2 POV (so-and-so should do so-and-so) in this section. There may be valid content here, but as written it is very weak. Would suggest that the editors involved read up on WP:WEASEL. The Crow 03:49, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Have removed all controversial unsourced statements, reduced wordiness of non-controversial statements, reduced the unsourced "apologists say X but critics say Y but apologists say X", and remove the "apologists ought to..." statements. In addition to being unverified, this kind of language and style is not appropriate for an encyclopedia. The Crow 14:37, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

It seems that the page is lacking content with respect to criticism. Specifically the notion of falsifiability. This is critical to Creationist ideals and is a reason for lack of scientific responses to Christian apologists’ claims. In addition I didn’t notice much reference to debate within the apologist community such as with reference to evolution’s role in creation. These seem vital so as to point out the lack of homogeneity within the various facets of the phenomenon of intellectualized religious beliefs.

Tertullian

Shouldn't Tertullian be mentioned as one of the major early Christian apologists?

(FJA)Yes, I think the History section is weak in general. Not only Turtullian, but also, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus of Lyons, Origen, and Jerome should be mentioned along with who they wrote to, what they wrote about, and why. Some of these wrote to government officials to show that Christianity was good, consistent with the philosophy, and should be tolerated, others to expose what they considered unorthodoxy/non-catholic forms of Christian belief, i.e. Gnosticism. As Christianity became legal and promoted within the Roman Empire, the latter type was more generally employed. During the Reformation, Catholic and Protestant writers used apologetics against the other; this still continues. In addition, in modern times, Christian apologitics is used to show that the religion and science are compatible, or that the Bible is right and science is wrong.

The early church fathers should be included. I added a sentence in the history of apologetics section. 136.183.146.137 10:05, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Paul on Philosophy

I suggest the removal of the sentence in the History section which says: "The apostle Paul, who was well-educated, said to beware philosophy (Colossians 2:8), though there is evidence that he was acquainted with Greek philosophy himself (Acts 9:29)." The full text of Colossians 2:8 says: "See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ." (NAS) There's no explicit "beware philosophy!" content, and even if some think it's implicit it needs to be in its own talking point and not asserted as an aside. c0bra 22:15, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I tried to fix it up. Jonathan Tweet 15:36, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

scientific apologetics

I added this line, which was prmptly deleted as "unneeded."

Historically, Christian apologists have also defended the flat earth, geocentrism, heliocentrism, the extraordinary life spans of people in Genesis (e.g., Methuselah), the Flood, the Tower of Babel, Joshua halting the sun and moon, and the division of humanity into three races based on descent from the sons of Noah [5].

This statement seems both true and relevant to scientific apologetics. Jonathan Tweet 05:07, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

The use of the word "extraordinary" above is prejudicial in my estimation. I also believe it is unclear to readers how prevalent the three race theory based from the sons of Noah was. I also believe that there are many miracles in the Bible and focusing on just a few is not helpful. Lastly, the flood link above is poor. I believe the whole section should be scrapped as it is unneeded. ken 02:12, 26 November 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo

I deleted this line as POV. "proven science has never contradicted the Bible in any way, which is certainly true" A better take might be something like Most modern-day scientific apologists assert that the Bible does not teach flat earth or geocentrism. They regard evolution as not yet proven and in fact plainly false. As to the age of the earth, they debate among themselves whether the earth is "young" or "old." Jonathan Tweet 05:32, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

No one has raised an objection to the material that another editor deleted. If someone else would revert it for me, I'd owe you one. Jonathan Tweet 05:32, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

lead paragraph

Changed lead paragraph in accordance with Wikipedia guidelines. Jonathan Tweet 15:35, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

KD, if you don't like my lead paragraph, write a better one. See above link on what a lead paragraph should be. Jonathan Tweet 15:34, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I think we achieved a compromise regarding the articles introduction. ken 02:18, 26 November 2006 (UTC)kdbuffalo