Everything Presup with Eli Ayala & Brian Knapp (Choosing Hats)

Revealed Apologetics Introduces Brian Knapp and Upcoming Guests

Welcome back to another episode of Revealed Apologetics. I'm your host Eli Ayala and today I am excited to have Brian Knapp on. And Brian Knapp was a co-founder of Choosing Hats. So if anyone is familiar with presuppositional apologetics back in the day There was this super cool website and actually it's still around where they had some really good presuppositional material that went a little beyond kind of the Popular level very surfacy way of using presupp.

There was some depth there that I really appreciated and some really good writing especially from Chris Bolt who I had on I think twice in a couple of past episodes and so I'm excited to have Brian Knapp here.

Who is a co-founder of Choosing Hats and he's a pretty bright guy an awesome guy. And he's a become a recent friend of mine, and hopefully we can have a great conversation in today's episode. But before we do that, I just want to make a couple of announcements by way of future guests.

On the.

26th I do apologize if that's the wrong date don't have it in front of me, but I think it's 26 I'll be having Michael Preciado who is the author of the book a reformed view of free will. He's a Calvinist philosopher a very sharp guy.

We're gonna have him on to talk about free will. I know a lot of people are interested in those sorts of discussions and I also am going to have on a woman Who caught my attention by an article she wrote her name is Scarlet Clay and She wrote an article talking about her experience at Biola University Taking an apologetics course there and how how apologetics was taught at Biola University.

She wrote an article as to how that kind of led her to presuppositional apologetics. Now if you know anything about Biola Biola is really the The center of gravity for Biola is apologetics from a Classical approach an evidential approach and so it's kind of a strange thing to to hear someone say they went to Biola took an Apologetics course there and was drawn to presuppositional apologetics.

So when I read that article, I was like, huh, you know. That would be an awesome thing to get this this woman on and share her story because I think it's very interesting because her story centers on the God-centeredness of Presuppositionalism which she felt when she learned about it.

She kind of was drawn to that idea and what appeared to be kind of a drawing away of a God-centered approach to apologetics in the classical Approach now granted, you know that it also depends on the person to how they present their apologetic, you know.

Or what have you but I thought her story was really interesting. So we'll be having her on in May. And of course everyone knows I like to play fair, okay I'm a hardcore presuppositionalist, but I do like to get our evidentialist and class of the classical brothers on so on May 3rd I'll be having dr Michael Icona on to talk about evidence for the resurrection which by the way is Important for presuppositionalist to know, you know, you don't get away with simply saying by what standard that is a perfectly valid thing to say a thing to ask.

But you do need to know the ins and the outs of the Christian faith too. And I think knowing the evidence for the resurrection is very important. So hopefully dr. Michael Icona will be Very helpful in that regard as he is highly studied in that specific area.

Okay, and again for those hardcore purist presuppositionalist. Yes, you don't have to private message me about the areas in which you know You disagree with dr. Like Ona. Yes, we don't agree on everything.

We don't agree on epistemological issues. We don't even agree as to how you interpret Evidence and things like that but that being said I do think he has a lot of helpful things to say and so I'm having him on for well so that I could learn and also for your benefit if you're wondering how to Gather the facts and make an argument for the resurrection.

Perhaps we can take what? An evidentialist or a classic list. Well, I would say Michael Icona is an evidentialist, but I don't quote me. How can we take the hard work of our evidentialist brothers whom we disagree with in their apologetic methodology.

How do we take that important information and contextualize it within a consistent presuppositional framework? I think that's fair game if we want to be consistently presuppositional and Deal with evidences, so it's not an either-or Situation.

So looking forward to having dr Michael like Ona on and so I'll let you guys know when I have some other guests kind of wing it. You know, I'll be flipping through Facebook and like I you know, I might want to have that person on so I'll keep you guys Updated but all that aside just one more thing and then we'll invite.

Brian on.

If you guys are interested in learning presuppositional apologetics, I teach an online course called pre sup you. You can sign up for that course on revealed apologetics.

Calm.

And I've been getting a lot of messages from people about the date. So like when you click on to sign up for the course, it looks like the course is taking place within a certain Timespan like a date from this date to that date.

Completely ignore that if you want to sign up sign up and it is a work at your own pace and so you could sign up right now and I'll send you all of the lectures the PowerPoint slides all the the outlines and notes and you can do that and we've already done that with a Group a couple of months ago and they they really enjoyed it, especially when we had kind of that face-to-face interaction when I did the When I did that sort of classroom right now if you sign up you just get the class but I'm gonna be letting folks know when the Premium package will be available and that includes kind of a face-to-face with me and the other students in which we can kind of go A little deeper into the content.

So definitely if you're interested in that revealed apologetics calm. All right, all that out of the way. Alright good that that's kind of filler because I want to wait some people coming in and listening.

Brian Knapp’s Background in Software, the Internet, and Presuppositionalism

So now we have some listeners. So with that said let me introduce Brian Knapp. How's it going Brian? It's going good Eli. Very good. I just want to give you a heads up. I say this to everyone I'm looking at you, but it doesn't look like I'm looking at you.

Okay, so I have my camera in front of me here and then I have my laptop. So when I'm looking at my laptop, I'm looking right at you. So I don't want you to think I'm playing Candy Crush while you're going, you know.

When you're going into your responses to my questions, all right. So as we start why don't you tell people a little bit about you that goes beyond what I've already shared.

Sure. Well, I'm a I'm a software engineer by trade and a contractor and have been doing that Ever since I got out of high school, basically, but it wasn't until Maybe about 20 or so years ago, and I'm already dating myself 20 or so years ago that I got into precept and it was based on being involved on the internet like, you know That's a great fertile ground for interacting with people of all different beliefs.

And I found my way into I think it was called the MS NBC religion and ethics board and I was all excited and you know, but I just walked in completely unprepared and Got hit with a couple of different arguments that really got me Trying to think more critically.

I really didn't have any background in critical thinking or philosophy either and so I went to a local Lifeway bookstore and met a fellow who's a dear friend of mine now and Has been for many years and he was just learning about presuppositional apologetics and so we We would get together at his house or my house and and sometimes with the third fella and listen to Bonson Tapes at that point literal cassette tapes.

Yes that we had Gotten from Covenant Media and then we would sit around in and discuss them and so the more The more I learned about precept the more I realized my theological commitments were were not what they should be as well a lot of people Come to precept as a result of you know, a reformed view of Scripture whereas for me it was just the opposite I got into precept and and began to realize the power of it.

And as I looked and listened to Dr. Bronson going to scripture and sharing, you know his foundation And Van Til's foundation. It became apparent to me that I needed to adjust my theological commitments as well.

So So at that point You know, I found my way on to Into dr. White's James White's chat channel and met up with a whole bunch of other people Chris bolt and other people who have contributed to choosing hats and From that point on it's it's mostly been just Interacting with different groups online, you know teaching classes at my church.

Those types of things so I don't have a full-time ministry by any means doing precept. But I do take the opportunities as God gives them to me to share this particular method very good.

I'm being told that you perhaps you need to turn your volume up just a little bit.

I mean, it's not like people can't hear you. Okay, so this any better. Oh, why you gotta yell man?

That's a little too much. I'm just kidding. You're good. Okay, um what I what interests me about what you said there is that you don't have any formal training in apologetics. Which I think is for some people that might be a minus.

And for other people that's actually a plus and I do think there is a sense in which it's a minus and a plus. It is a minus in the sense that perhaps without formal training You know, we may lack the ability to be as precise as we need to be with our language and our argument form.

But that's not necessarily true. I mean you could be. You don't need formal training to be good at that. But typically that's the case if you're not formally trained those things. We can run into those sorts of things.

However.

The fact that you're not formally trained, but you're able to use this apologetic quite effectively. I think speaks a lot to Really what first Peter chapter 3 verse 15 is getting at where all of us every Christian Is called to give a reason for the hope that's in them.

And so Have you have you found? that in your interactions with people that you kind of Are able to stand back and see the effectiveness of this method even when you feel perhaps intellectually. And I'm not saying you're not a smart guy.

But you know what? I mean when we don't have that formal training there there there can be kind of a timidity that goes into like Approaching these debates and these arguments. Have you found the strength of the presuppositional approach and encouragement?

Because you've been able to use it effectively even without that training.

I guess that's what I'm trying to ask. Yeah. Yeah, good great question. And the answer is yes, definitely, you know, I I've heard dr. Bonson say it before that at the end of the day. Everybody has to answer the same questions, right?

Yeah, everybody has a philosophy. They have to be able to account for the Criticisms or the value judgments that they make and sometimes you're interacting with somebody who is speaking a different language entirely and there's absolutely nothing wrong with saying, you know, I I Don't know the words.

I don't understand the words you're using. Can you dumb them down for me?

Sure.

The the method itself and this approach to apologetics is so very powerful for that reason That it really addresses the core underlying Implicit or explicit belief that that somebody holds to Regardless of what their field of study is what level of education they have that type of thing.

So, yeah, I've I've definitely come up against individuals with with a lot more training and and and again, that was one of the ways that I I was motivated to be able to go and defend my faith is because I was speaking to Atheists PhDs in philosophy on a daily basis just getting hammered to death.

So.

Well, it's a good point. You said that we all have to answer the same questions. If you teach people a believer to taught what questions to ask they can be effective, right? Knowing your worldview knowing what all worldviews hold in common and the weaknesses of certain worldviews I think it's important to you know.

What what I like about the presuppositional approach is that it's a worldview approach and in a sense That makes their job a lot easier. And I don't want us. I don't want to substitute that for like hard study because we do want to know the ins and outs Of someone's perspective, but it's actually quite encouraging to know that the presuppositional approach is effective.

Even if you don't know every detail of another person's worldview when you're doing apologetics. And you're maybe you're talking to an atheist or whoever you're talking to. Since you don't know every single detail of their perspective.

What are some things you look for as a presupposition list? What is your presuppositional thinking? What are you looking for in? What the unbeliever says to kind of give you a foundation to then as we say in popular parlance presep them, right?

Listening for the Unbeliever’s Presuppositions and the Socratic Method

Yeah, I mean there's there's a couple things for me at least that go on one is I just I sit there and listen to Him and I will try. You know positionalist listen to people we do. It's not a well-known fact, but yes.

And also asking questions, right? The Socratic method is a great a great way to get people to maybe stop and think about what. You know things they haven't thought about before. But what I'm generally doing is I want to draw out of them.

What the issues they have with Christianity, right? What are your criticisms or what are you skeptical of? What are you unsure of or what do you claim that you're unsure of and that you don't know, right?

So for me, it's it's just letting them share things with me and Honestly the more you do it the more you realize that generally you're gonna get the same kind of of Criticisms, right? You're gonna get the problem of evil Packaged in a lot of different ways.

You're going to get. You know science versus God so talking about, you know evolution those types of things and then you you will quite often get much more specific criticisms, you know about trying to.

You know.

Figure out, you know, how many days which was Jesus in the ground or how do you how do you put together? These two different passages in the Gospels that that don't seem to fit. The other thing I'm doing is I'm I'm looking for areas where they either Explicitly bring up or it's kind of implied.

Something about Christianity that I don't believe because in my experience one of the biggest challenges with.

With.

Discussion or debating anybody else is making sure that you know What they believe and that they have a proper representation of what you believe and like you said, you know Presupp works at the at the worldview level which can make it really challenging for other people who don't have Familiarity with it and are debating with you.

They they don't understand that you want to talk about everything, right? You can't do it all at once, but it's all relevant. So you you know most Criticisms that I've heard of Christianity will pick a couple things here and there and then they will take their own Their own presuppositions their own worldview and usher those Bits and pieces from Christianity along and come to no surprise a conclusion that doesn't match.

You know, what what is somewhere else in Scripture for instance?

Absolutely now. Now what I think is important to keep in mind it made me think about it because you you were you said that you were looking for things that the unbeliever was going to say that you don't believe as a Christian and I think that kind of just made it flash my mind.

The importance of knowing systematic theology is actually knowing doctrine so that you could identify things that are aliens of Christianity, but the you're into Interlocutor thinks that it's an essential feature and in many cases his misconception is a stumbling block to him.

So when people ask me, you know, what's the best book to learn presuppositional apologetics. Now, don't get me wrong I'll point you to Bonson. I'll point you to Van Till but Sometimes the best books in my opinion, maybe you could speak to this the best books on apologetics are not apologetics books.

There are books on basic Christian doctrine. Bible commentaries the Bible itself.

Right. Do you agree with that? Oh, oh definitely. I mean, you know To put it sort of I don't know maybe crass, you know. If if you have a product you want to sell you got to have product knowledge, right?

And obviously we're not selling it in the same sense, but I little known fact. I saw I did sell cars. I actually sold you used cars. I was a used car salesman. No, I Did this for eight months and the the biggest challenge for me was learning, you know.

Because at that point I wasn't into cars at all. I really didn't have Much understanding of the different types of vehicles. And so when they would come in to bring in a trade I really wouldn't know, you know.

I recognized what they were driving but I didn't know enough about it to be able to help, you know. Put a value on it. Sure. So by analogy same same thing with with Christianity or anything else you are trying to defend, right?

That's the thing about An apologetic we think of it in terms of defending Christianity but the word just means, you know a reasoned defense of whatever it is. You happen to be defending and you have to know.

You have to know what it is. You're defending from a practical perspective. I mean, we're called as christians to Um to know god's word for other reasons as well, but definitely As an apologist. Yeah, you you've got to know you've got to know scripture.

It's a never-ending thing.

That's right. Now, um, I wanted to get back to something. You said. You said something, uh to the effect that you you want to listen to. What the unbeliever says now. Presuppositionalists have a a bad reputation online.

Other various contexts. Presuppositionalists are perceived to be the sorts of people that listen Only for the purpose of responding. When you say you're listening Why don't you unpack that for us? What do you mean listening?

Are you just listening so that you could hop on something? Are you genuinely listening to what the person has to say see? What is the heart behind that. So that people because I here's what I hear. Maybe you've heard this.

Presuppositionalism is a disingenuous apologetic method. You ever hear that? Yes. Um, how would you respond to that?

Well, I I think there are probably some examples of individuals who present.

Um.

Uh, one of two things either they they don't. You know, it's a two-step approach which we can we can talk about and they only do one step and that step Is primarily trying to tear down the other person, um, and not necessarily in a bad way.

Like, you know trying to beat them into the ground, but just trying to to pick apart, you know, their particular belief system um, and yeah saying by what standard, um, you know, i've seen way too many memes and and way way too many gifs and just.

It's an important thing to say.

Um.

At the right time. It shouldn't be the goal of your apologetic encounter to be able to say By what standard. Ha ha and that's it right? No that you know, we're we're trying to help them.

Um.

Understand. We're we're trying you know, we're not supposed to quarrel Uh with them we're supposed to have you know. A reasonable discussion with them. And as christians we're supposed to be loving. Um, but what i'm what i'm looking for is things that they Are saying that lead me to believe they don't understand what I believe.

What I actually believe. Right. And that that can come out a couple different ways either. It's just buried down in there like they're they're making all these surface level claims.

But.

In order for those claims to be meaningful or for them to have warrant to hold the the beliefs There have to be other things underneath them.

Um.

Or behind them or or whatever terminology you want to use. And and so a lot of it is is listening for them to say something that allows me to start to dig deeper. And and and it may just be well by what standard like there's a friend of mine who I I I talk with um, he's not a christian by any means, but he's he's a great guy and We have great discussions.

Um about scripture and he knows what presuppositionalism is because I I laid it out for him. And so sure i'll joke with him when he makes some sort of a value judgment and say by what standard right? But but generally speaking, that's that's not what i'm doing.

I I might I might say something like well I agree with you. That that particular thing is wrong. But can you tell me why you think why you think it's wrong?

That's just a wordy way of saying.

By what standard. And and I and I put it that way because it's going to depend on the person you're interacting with, right? I mean some people have um some Apologists have the ability to read the person they're talking to Body language and listen to what they're saying.

Um for others that's a skill they are are working to develop right now. Yeah, um, but in either case The the key is to listen to what they're saying look at them and and try and understand. You know, what is the what is the pain point as it were?

I I like the way what you just said there and I think that's a lot of people don't talk about this enough in apologetic books and things like that, but knowing body language. And and tethering your responses your questions your statements to the body language of the individual I think is a very important apologetic strategy not just a communication.

Apologist are communicators. We're communicating the truth and it's not always within the context of a formal debate or online atheism or or whatever, you know, whatever the case may be we're talking to regular people right and um I'm going to i'm going to speak to someone who's struggling with you know some kind of uh Traumatic experience.

I'm going to speak with them in a different way then i'm going to speak with you know, the you know, the Annoying teenage kid who thinks he you know evolution is the fact and the bible is stupid, you know.

We need to learn to read people so that we respond appropriately. I think that's a very important aspect of apologetics instead of just living here. We need to be able to kind of identify. You know, what what's this person all about?

Where are they coming from? I think you could you can tell a lot through someone's body language.

Yeah, i'm not i'm not trying. Well when i'm doing it, right i'm not trying to win an argument i'm not looking for for an opportunity to slap them down and and and take away their ability to argue and.

Um, although that's part of what we try to do presuppositionally is take away any. You know, it's like the the analogy bonson used where you know. If you're in a room with a guy and he's got a gun with bullets in it.

You can get you can learn to dodge bullets or you can learn to take the gun away. And and I think that's what presupp is about is is taking away ultimately their ability to make meaningful arguments. Yeah, but there's a lot of groundwork to be laid and and.

Understanding that person and how much time you're going to have with them and certainly not making them upset to the point where you Can't continue the conversation another day, right? I mean it's it is Sharing the gospel.

Ultimately, right? It's just it's doing it from it's the other side of the coin. It's um. It's doing it from a defense perspective or addressing criticism, but but the goal is the same it's to bring it's to bring glory to god and to.

And to do whatever we can by sharing god's word to see their them get saved. That's that's the goal.

I like what you used there. Dr. Bonson is really good at you know, creating those mental pictures, you know, you can learn to dodge bullets.

Um.

Or you can learn to take the gun out of the guy's hands. I like where he spoke about the difference between proof and persuasion and he said that when you shoot a bear And the bear keeps coming at you.

Uh, that doesn't mean your gun doesn't work. Some some bears take more than one shot. Uh, so just because a person is not persuaded by your argument doesn't mean you did not give um a valid and good argument so.

Um, those are those are fun ways that that help us remember some key aspects of the apologetic interaction. So I appreciated that. Um real quick for people in the comments. Um, if you have any questions, please leave them there.

I know patrick sue has left a bunch of questions. Dylan mcphee Um has left a bunch of questions and I really appreciate that you uh prefaced your question with the word question. That's definitely super helpful and we already have some really good questions.

Um in the in the chat here. So keep asking away um, you can just totally uh Bombard the comments with a bunch of questions and we'll get to as many as possible. Um, and uh, yeah. So chris bolts in the chat.

He says why do you say that chris bolts? Let me see. Let's get let's get him up here. Why do you say that chris bolt is the greatest living christian apologist? Oh my goodness.

That's an example of a particular fallacy, which is why he asked it that way. The uh complex question or the loaded question, um. Oh man, I I we can break it down.

But he's not great. I didn't say he's the greatest. I say he's the most humble.

You're not helping him.

Let's not let's not encourage him. All right, so keep those questions coming. We'll we'll get to them eventually. But uh, definitely preface continue to preface with the word question. That's super super helpful.

Um, okay. So let's talk a little bit about some standard.

Well, let's not jump into objections just yet that that we often can. I can I just add one one thing to what I was Saying before. Sure. Sure. Absolutely. Um. You know learning, um Systematic theology really important learning some critical thinking skills really important also very important is um Rhetoric and I hate to say it but Not necessarily to use it but to be able to recognize it when somebody says well, obviously Everybody knows this right or somebody um makes a um draws a conclusion that doesn't follow up from the premises or whatever it's it's good to be able to separate.

What tends to be the emotional language which is the more rhetorical stuff or the use of rhetoric? versus the actual Um removed from passion removed from emotion. Argument, um, it doesn't mean that we shouldn't be passionate or emotional.

That's that's very important, especially dealing with certain topics um, but it's always critical to be able to separate and sort of just toss away and and and not be rattled by certain um Statements that you're you know that the person that you're talking with might throw at you.

And.

My my skin is much thicker now way thicker now than it was.

20 some years ago. Um, well that I think that's a very important point. I'm a teacher and so for many years I taught apologetics.

To um.

High middle school high school students and I usually start the class with Coming from an atheistic perspective and asking them tough questions. Um, and then I later explained to them. Um, and this is a good way to do with like small groups and people who are just getting started apologetics.

I like to help people feel. Or help them know what it feels like to be Uncomfortable in hearing objections. Yep within a. I don't like to use this terminology because it's loaded but within a safe space.

You know, we don't want to go there. But um when we're training people who are just getting into apologetics yeah, creating a safe space and Helping them know what it feels like to be uncomfortable. So that when they actually go out into the world, they're not frazzled by you know.

Rhetoric you're able you're able to get past A lot of the word salad that people are throwing out there that sound convincing. But really they're not really giving you an argument or anything like that.

I think that's um a huge part in doing apologetics. Well is being able to not just get Hot under the collar every time someone says something that is is filled with emotion and rhetoric. I think that's a very important important thing to keep in mind.

Presuppositional, Classical, and Evidential Apologetics Compared

All right. Um, okay. So let's talk a little bit about um apologetic methodology. So we have presuppositional apologetics and then we have the evidential and classical apologetics for people who perhaps don't know the difference.

Um, do you think you can summarize? Um, just real briefly you don't have to go into you know, yeah. Um into great detail, but what is the difference between a positional approach classical approach and the evidential approach?

So precept is the biblical approach and the others aren't here here.

That's right.

Yeah, i'm gonna i'm gonna upset some people with that. But hey, we're having fun, right? Um I mean for me going back to my experience. I had a really hard time adapting to thinking presuppositionally um, so the reason I say that is because I think the evidential or um other other approaches that are akin to it are.

What seem to be? You know approaches that make the most sense at first. Um, because We are we are used to when somebody's asking us, you know, is there a box of crackers in the pantry? You know, there's a particular approach that we take to answer that question.

Um, but.

From the perspective of christianity. It is again. It's a it's an entire worldview and you can't answer that question the same way. So the precept approach is one that's going to look more at. Uh, you know what makes something a fact.

Or. What makes something? An evidence that can be used to draw a conclusion. Versus just presenting the fact as if we don't need to worry about those things.

Um.

I think there's a very strong philosophical case for why. We should argue presuppositionally and think that way and I think there's a strong biblical case for it as well.

So what you're saying is that facts don't speak for themselves?

Yeah, there are no brute facts. That's right. Um, what advanced else. Very helpful. What did van till say about brute facts?

I read that car.

I I give up eli what.

What come on. I love I love it helped me it helped me a lot when I remember. Brute facts are mute facts.

I have not heard that. You've never heard.

Man, it's catchy. I like that. Well van till was good at those gadgets. So brute facts are are mute facts. Right, you need a model of interpretation. You need a worldview context. When I teach my students I always speak in terms of like words in a sentence.

So the only way you know What a word means is it's context. You know the other what are the other words around that word? You know, you need a context to make sense out of the particular thing. So their facts don't just speak to us, you know, they require an interpretive model.

So so yeah, so. And and addressing those foundational issues really gets us to the issue of presuppositions, but you said what are the foundations there? But go ahead. Why don't you continue, uh with the different methodologies there?

So I mean a more specific Example would be you know, a an evidential model is going to be somebody who who says, you know. We can we have a good reason to believe that that christ rose from the dead. Here are the evidences both.

From the perspective of how the story or the narrative is told in scripture. Plus extra biblical evidence those types of things. A presupposition list is not going to concentrate so much. I mean, it's not that they shouldn't or aren't going to Bring the same evidence, you know up but it's going to be it's going to be presented always from the perspective that.

The.

Foundations for thinking. The philosophical foundations that make those facts meaningful at all. At the end of the day is the christian worldview and so.

To.

Not keep that in mind and not leverage that to me um doesn't. Doesn't really make sense. Um. Because you're you're giving you're giving um the non-christian um an excuse essentially and and you know God tells us they are without excuse.

Everybody You know knows that god exists and I know that's a point of a topic for another discussion perhaps. But um. We we have to we have to understand as christians That the world is a certain way because god made it that way.

So we certainly don't want to go about presenting arguments that don't keep that in mind that don't depend or rely on that. Because our ability to even discuss apologetics depends on the world the universe and Us being the way that we are You know being created in such a way that we can even have a meaningful discussion.

Now what would you say is the key just so someone says okay, so I kind of i'm tracking with you. But like what's the main difference? So you got presuppositionalism and say classicalism, for example, okay.

What is the nugget that differentiates them?

I think. One really important difference is direct versus indirect. Okay. In other words, we're I think an evidential approach is going to be more um direct. Um discursive I think is the right word.