Fristianity Refuted!

Welcome back to another episode of Revealed Apologetics. I'm your host Eli Ayala, and we're back again. And there's also going to be another live stream tomorrow, so don't miss that. I'll share a little bit about that, but we're we're back again to talk about a topic that you don't normally hear about if you do presuppositional apologetics, and you're familiar with Transcendental arguments and things like that you might be familiar with what we call the Christianity objection To the transcendental argument for God's existence.

Big scary fancy words. But not a big deal. We want to talk about it today. I have a friend of mine on with me today a Joshua Pillows. I've had him on before. He actually did a debate on my channel. I moderated a debate between himself and David Paulman on the issue of Presuppositionalism versus evidentialism it was a debate On apologetic methodology, which I highly recommend if you're interested in apologetic methodology and you want to see what a An evidentialist approach looks like that is represented by David Paulman and a presuppositional Methodology which is represented by Joshua Pillows you want to check out that debate.

It's I probably should have put it in the comments somewhere in the description. But you can just type in presuppositionalism versus evidentialism and it will pop up. Excellent respectful discussion and I think it displays both of the methods quite well, so Totally check that out now a couple of things on September 22nd I'll be having dr. Lane Tipton on from Westminster Theological Seminary.

We're going to be discussing his new book on Vantill and Vantill's Trinitarian theology, so that's gonna be super awesome now all the way in December I will I'll be having pastor Jeff Durbin on and so I'm super excited about that.

It's a little far off. You know, I shared the thumbnail a little early and people like oh my goodness. That's so far away. Why'd you share it? I don't know. I tried really hard to get him and when he said yes I made the thumbnail and I was super excited to share.

So there you go. And so tomorrow I also will have Someone who was on the show once before if you remember that super awesome episode we did Entitled the apologetics. I'm sorry, not the apologetic smorgasbord.

I think it was called The epic presup Roundtable or something like that where I had a bunch of different apologists on to discuss everything presuppositional apologetics. We had Jimmy Lee. Jimmy Lee is well known in the Facebook world.

There is a Facebook page on on Facebook entitled reformed presuppositional Apologetics and he posts regularly. They're a pretty sharp guy knows his stuff and tomorrow. I will be having him on to discuss The topic of the Old Testament and the Philosophy of evidence the Old Testament and the philosophy of evidence now from what I gather.

He suggested this topic because he thought it might be interesting and it sounded super fascinating. I'm if I'm not mistaken I think he's going to try to show that the Old Testament kind of creates a good context for us to have Develop a philosophy of how we should interpret Evidence and data and things like that.

So if it has nothing to do with that my bad, all right, so. So that's it. So we have an episode tomorrow as well. You want to you know, check that out when it comes now? I do know that there are some students here of mine.

I teach at a Christian private school and sometimes they Pop in on live stream. So before I invite invite my guest I would like to say hi to Tatiana hello. How are you? And I hope this discussion is not too far over your head.

But this definitely requires a little bit of background on the topic so our topic is presuppositional apologetics Transcendental argument, okay for the existence of God and we're going to be addressing a specific argument Against the transcendental argument as us presuppositionalists like to use it and that argument is called the the objection of.

The.

Christianity objection. So if that sounds weird, we're gonna explain it in just a few moments. So without without further ado I'd like to introduce my guest Joshua pillows. How's it going, man? I'm good.

How are you, bro? I'm doing well, and I'm super excited that you were able to come back on me too. I'll always love being here. It's always a pleasure. Well, that's awesome. I enjoy. I've been there I've had you on a bunch of times.

But I totally recommend folks to look up revealed apologetics Joshua pillows. And he's been on a couple of times and they have been excellent discussions. So, um, you and I are proponents of a school of apologetic methodology known as presuppositional apologetics.

To narrow that down we come from what we would call a Vantillian flavor of presuppositionalism. There's kind of a broad spectrum as to where someone could land on that and that you know methodology. Why don't you explain to everyone very briefly?

What is presuppositionalism in general? What is the transcendental argument in particular and then from there? We'll kind of branch off into addressing this.

This.

Christianity objection against the transcendental argument.

Sure, so presuppositionalism broadly speaking argues over presuppositions foundational assumptions about one's view of ethics about one's view of reality one's view of knowledge and. What we Attempt to do in our apologetic is to compare our foundational assumptions with our unbelievers.

Foundational assumptions. And we ask the question. Well, which world you can make sense? Out of why experience is intelligible to begin with, you know, why is nature uniform? Why can we do science? How can we make sense out of human consciousness laws of logic and so forth and.

So broadly speaking a presuppositional approach analyzes the presuppositions of the Christian and then of the non-christian.

And.

Puts both of them under scrutiny to see which world you can make sense. Out of intelligible experience. And so that is what we call the transcendental argument. Which is a proof that the God is the necessary precondition for the intelligibility of human experience the Christian God specifically.

And it is through his existence and his creative power that we can make sense out of. The uniformity of our experience the intelligibility of our experience. And so while we do analyze presuppositions.

And we utilize a reductive argument. We try to show that the other non-christian position is reduces to absurdity. What we're ultimately arguing is world views in general which one can supply these necessary preconditions for you know.

This very discussion we're having right now, let alone anything else that we ascribe intelligibility to in our experience. Sure.

Okay, so when we talk about Presuppositionalism as an apologetic methodology and the transcendental argument as a specific argument. Do you see a presuppositionalism and transcendental argumentation essentially and necessarily connected?

For instance, I had a discussion with a brother a few episodes ago over this very topic. Do you see the transcendental argument as an essential feature to the broader methodology of presuppositionalism?

Yeah, because if we take out transcendental considerations And we're just analyzing presuppositions. All we're really doing is in analyzing presuppositions. We're just showing that The our opponent's position is absurd.

Okay, and if we leave it at that it's like oh, okay. So what I mean how what's left of our apologetic? Oh, we've shown is the opponent we're debating his position reduces to absurdity. But that says nothing about Christianity in and of itself.

And so that's why we need to argue Transcendentally, which is to argue for necessary preconditions and we tether that we tether that to Presuppositions can the unbelievers presuppositions make sense of intelligibility these preconditions or kind of Christians.

Okay, so when.

Pardon when we talk about pardon. Almost choked on something. I don't know what Words, you know, I don't want to have a debt an ugly death on the live stream, you know. We don't want that to happen. Can you show us then what is the transcendental argument?

I know we make a distinction between transcendental arguments in general and then there's the unique transcendental argument that is utilized by Vantillian's Greg Bonson, of course comes to mind. What is the specific argument?

Transcendental argument that demonstrates the truth of the Christian worldview so someone will someone will make a distinction between say a transcendental argument that demonstrates that a God is the necessary preconditions for knowledge.

How would you demonstrate that? It's the triune God. How does what does that argument look? How is it defended? How is it laid out and then maybe we can kind of talk we can kind of shift into the discussion of some possible objections more specifically the objection that comes from Christianity as we'll explain it in a bit.

Yeah, our our our apologetic our argument is predicated off of.

Revelation from God and so immediately there's a huge antithesis a contrast so someone wants to say I can make sense out of X Y Z if I Conceive of this particular God. It's like, okay great. But all you're giving me is some conceivable hypothetical almost purely formal Scenario but as Christians we start with an actual Bible a concrete material Substantive proof and revelation from the triune God.

Can I interrupt you real quick? I do apologize just to clarify.

So you're saying when we as presupposition list who are arguing transcendentally? We are not positing the truth of the triune God as a hypothetical Entity that may or may not exist. Let's go and prove him together.

You're starting with he's there and Here. Now we need to ask the question why he must be there in order for anything else. Is that what you're saying?

Yeah, he's there. Specifically because he's revealed himself to me and to you and to everyone else. And so that we are as Paul says without excuse. Okay, so we are starting. Bantle was adamant throughout his career and it's all his writings.

We start with this God this triune God. Concretely with the actuality of the book. He says I think that's in Common grace. He says that we start with the actuality of the Bible. So we're not starting with speculation.

We're not trying to find logical consistency and coherence or you know, abductive reasoning. What's the best explanation for this intelligible experience we experience? We're starting concretely. God has revealed himself.

He's shown himself. And so we're going to predicate our argument off of that revelation.

Okay. So so what does the argument look like? Do you? Do you typically present the argument in like a deductive form is. With premises that lead to a conclusion. Is there a way you can lay that out and kind of just in a thumbnail sketch demonstrate to us?

Venus the transcendental necessity for the triune God.

Yeah, I I tend to personally I tend to avoid a deductive formulation. Okay, not because it's defective but because if you formulate it in a deductive form whether it's modus ponens or whatever. People who don't fully understand this line of argumentation will assume oh, so it's a deductive proof.

But it's not it's a transcendental proof, but we just formulated that deductively and okay. So it kind of muddies the water so to speak. I have a particular syllogism a particular argument. I use that's More or less cater to a transcendental proof.

But I don't formulate it as like a modus ponens. If P then Q sort of thing.

All right, so so what does it look like. So proof to us that the triune God exists transcendentally. And then we'll talk about the. The objection that is the topic of our discussion today.

Well, if if we strip the argument of any contents and we just left it at variables P and Q the transcendental form or a transcendental form would be. Premise one would be for P to be the case. Q needs to be the case because Q is a necessary precondition for P.

The second premise the minor premise is well P is the case and so the conclusion is therefore Q has to be the case. Since it's necessary for P. And so that would be the syllogism. I use that's that was what was championed by Bonson later in his life.

Mm-hmm, and it's just distinct. It's not a oh, it's modus ponens. It's deductive. No, it's it's distinct but when we incorporate the Christian worldview, we would then just insert the Components of that so we would say in order for intelligibility to be the case Christianity must be true or you could say More narrowly God must exist the triune God must exist in order to make sense out of intelligible experience.

He's a necessary precondition. Okay, then the second premise is well, we have intelligible experience. So then the conclusion is therefore the triune God of Christianity exists or Christianity is true.

Sure.

Okay, and so okay, so we often hear when the argument is presented well saying saying that doesn't make it so right. So if we say, you know, if Intelligibility is possible Christianity is true. Okay, that's the claim, right?

So I'm not asking you for a fully robust like right now at the top of your head lay out the whole thing. But if you can give us again in a thumbnail sketch, what does the defense of that premise look like?

It's a good question because I didn't tell you this but I was on Clubhouse last night in a room full of atheists.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I.

Was slightly Out of it because I'd already taken like some stuff to help me fall asleep. But then I got carried away and I was just timeout. You went on Clubhouse while on drugs. And I really hope that's not gonna get end up on YouTube or somewhere because it's not a good picture of who I am.

I'm.

Let me tell you.

Because of that they were so open to everything. I said like because I wasn't being Obscurantist or arrogant or whatever because I was you know under some, you know sedate state of drugs but we had a very fruitful discussion and That was that kept coming back over and over again because there were other presupposition lists that would come and go in that room.

While just saying it doesn't prove it. Yeah, so who cares? I mean, it's just a tautology at that point I where's the substance behind it? So it's a good question. The answer to that is simple and it lies in the fact that All you have to do is stand on the Christian worldview on the Christians presuppositions the Christian worldview as it stands from the Bible.

And when you analyze the Christian worldview You all you see That Wow all of a sudden everything makes sense we can make sense out of consciousness reliability of sense perception. Excuse me. You know formity in nature.

So science causality laws of logic and Moral absolutes and stuff like that. So the proof of that the illustration of that is to ask our unbelieving opponent. Well stand on my worldview for a second and and let's just go over what my worldview entails.

I mean, you'll see that Christianity supplies these preconditions for intelligible experience. And now if we step into your worldview and and apply what it entails you're reduced to absurdity. But not only are you reduced to absurdity?

You have to assume my worldview in order to even argue against it or bring it into question. So the answer to the criticism of oh, well just asserting it doesn't make it. So the answer is we'll stand on the Christians worldview for the sake of the argument, right be charitable.

We want to be charitable. That's how you refute in another position. You have to assume that what they're saying is true. Stand in our position and you'll see wow, we supply the transcendentals we can make sense out of intelligible experience.

Mm-hmm.

So what? Okay, so I say this all the time people say well, wait a minute, bro. All right. This is my always do I do my impression of the opponent, right? Every time apparently every atheist is from like, California.

You're asking me to step into your worldview, but you haven't demonstrated. I don't want to step into your world that you demonstrate to me. So that's a lot of times people will shift it and say so they don't.

They don't want to participate in Your attempt to demonstrate it. Because your attempt to demonstrate it requires that they hypothetically step into your worldview. So that they can see the coherency how it works that it in fact account accounts for the things that are under discussion.

How would you respond to someone who says I'm not gonna step in into your worldview right now because I want to see you. Demonstrate your God. You're trying to shift. You're trying to get me to throw out my worldview so that you don't have to defend your perspective.

I'm sure you've heard something along these lines. That was also in that in that chat. I mean, I love it because it really shows the climate of today. This was not a thing back in Bonson's day. We didn't have social media.

We didn't have all these connections. And so you see that lacking in his work. Mm-hmm. Excuse me. Yeah, so if someone wants to say well, I want demonstration I don't want to stand in your worldview, right because I don't accept it.

Well, I can respond to that to that in one of two ways I could say Okay. Well, I don't accept it. I don't want you to. I don't want you to argue for it because I don't accept it and if I have to assume it That's not proof.

So in other words, I can just turn it back on the atheist or whomever I'm talking to if that's the game we're playing. Mm-hmm, but the demonstration is straightforward. It's simple stand in my worldview.

What are the metaphysical and epistemological implications of Christianity and you'll see that it supplies the preconditions. But if an atheist wants to say no, no, that's not legitimate. I want you know, some Objective neutral demonstration or proof, of course, we know neutrality is impossible.

But that is the demonstration and for anyone who wants to reject that wants to reject the principle of charity. Which is what everyone should be doing. That's how you reduce a position to absurdly. Like I said earlier you have to assume your opponent's correct for the sake of the argument if you're going to assume something different than What your opponent's espousing then you're not critiquing your opponent internally.

It's going to inevitably be external, right? So the demonstration is just through stand on my world.

Okay.

And so that that's what the argument will look like regardless if you're talking to an atheist if you're talking to an agnostic if you're Talking to a Hindu if you're talking to a Buddhist if you're talking to a platonist.

Regardless, the conversation will be generally the same. If you want me to show you that my position is true Hypothetically grants its truth and I will show you grant granting its truth. Look it actually provides those preconditions.

And then do the same for the other perspective and show look on its own terms this internal critique, right. On its own terms. Things don't work out and of course, you know. That's where the debate is gonna have to be now.

That is not the main topic Today, so I want to take a moment to shift now.

Okay.

I'm assuming that everyone listening here and everyone that will listen will be somewhat familiar with the Transcendental argument you laid out and the sorts of discussions related to that. So I want to shift then to our main point under discussion and that is the issue of Christianity, but before we do that, I'd like to thank glass Dean Russell former student of mine.

Thank you so much for your $5 Super chat glass Dean says hey, mr. Ayala. I'm an official college student now. That is so awesome. I was her 12th grade teacher and she's an awesome awesome student. Just hope all is well many blessings to you and your family.

Thank you so much. Just to throw it out there for people who are listening if you have any questions about presuppositional apologetics. Specifically apologetics more generally or the transcendental argument or Christianity which we're about to go through now.

Please feel free to leave a question in the comments and preface your question with Question so that we could differentiate it from the normal run-of-the-mill discussions that happen in the comment section.

All right, Joshua. Okay, I gotta I gotta put my glasses back on again. Listen. Okay, you're telling me that Only the Christian worldview can provide the preconditions for intelligibility.

Okay again.

We're assuming people are familiar with this and you say as a Trinitarian that only the triune God can account for unity and plurality and somehow this is related to intelligible experience and knowledge so on and so forth, but Suppose you have a worldview that is similar to Christianity in almost every single way.

Except in just a small, you know, just little features here and there that are different. Suppose we have a triune God. But it's not the Christian worldview. So you have a metaphysical grounding for unity and plurality these sorts of things.

How do you avoid? What we would call the the counterexample of the Christian worldview. Christianity you have one in the many accounted for metaphysically because the first and God is both a one in the many He reveals himself.

There is an epistemological link between his creation and his revelation and so we could account for epistemology, right? We have a coherent epistemology our metaphysic. We have a trying personal God.

We have an epistemology that trying personal God reveals that we could know have knowledge intelligible experience so on and so forth. How would you respond to that objection to the transcendental argument the objection from?

Christianity.

Right, well, yeah, I thought you're gonna let me explain it. So I was like, oh, I'm sorry. Yes easy. No, no, no.

It's okay. Yeah. So yeah, the Christian says well feel free to expand if you think I've left any significant. No, no, you got it.

No, I don't want to be like, oh, I've got it. I'm arrogant or I don't want to be like that. But um, yeah now the first should basically says Vantill you've got it, right? You have a great argument. It's solid it gets the job done.

You can make sense out of intelligibility. But the problem is it gets the job done. Which means it's sufficient but that doesn't mean it's necessary. Because another conceivable world boot can come along like you say an ape Christianity in every way except for one or two fundamental points or premises and Come to the same conclusion.

We can make sense out of one and many in science and so forth and It's like so there you go until I commend you but it's only sufficient. It's necessarily true.

And.

So the first thing that.

I.

Would say to a Christian critic. Whatever it may be and and Mike Butler and his thesis Bonson's student refers to Christianity as being a quadrinity and I kind of just like sticking to one example because it doesn't really matter but Let's just say God is four in one.

Okay, and the first one says well Vantill I can conceive of another worldview that answers it in every single way. So therefore yours is not necessary. It's only sufficient. Now right off the bat the irony in all of this is that is is the phrase I can conceive of because what Vantill is arguing is Metaphysical.

He's arguing for the actuality of Christianity. It's not some merely conceptual transcendental argument. That's more modest. He's ambitious in his attempt. Like I said for I don't know was it here was before we went live anyway Vantill argues concretely.

Absolutely, we start from the authority of the Bible the actuality of the book and So immediately we have a problem because Vantill is up here in metaphysics land giving an ambitious transcendental argument.

The Christian comes along and he says well I can conceive of another worldview. Well, that's great. But we're not talking about conceiving things up here. We're talking about actual actual states of affairs.

And so before we even settle the dispute with a Christian we have to pull him up and say no. No, we're not conceiving anything if you're going to refute Christian theism as it's been Posited in an orthodox fashion.

You have to likewise argue metaphysically. So basically you have to correct the critic from the outset before you can attempt to refute him. You have to help him out. You have to pull him up by his bootstraps, so to speak.

So you first have to make it clear that the Christian needs to be arguing metaphysically that he says. Oh, well, I can conceive of a similar worldview doesn't say anything against Vantill's because we're not on the same playing field.

We're not even playing the same ballgame at that point. We need to get to the same stadium before we can hash this out. So the problem already is a difference in transcendental.

Arguments, so so the freshman is arguing in hypothetical conceptual land. Where Vantill is not arguing in hypothetical conceptual land. He's saying no I'm starting with the metaphysical reality of the Christian God and arguing on that basis.

He's not a theory out there. He's not what some people would call The God hypothesis, right? Right. That's not what Vantill is arguing. Oh, okay. Well, someone might say well, wait a minute. You can't start with the actuality of God here.

It comes Joshua. All the time. You can't start with the metaphysical reality of God because that is Begging the question. No way. Wait a minute. We have to do the home alone ready? I've never heard that one before.

No. Yeah, it's okay. So we'll return back to some different variations of Christianity. But what do you say to someone to say? Well, wait a minute. You can't just start with the metaphysical reality of God.

What's wrong with that assertion? What is the misunderstanding of the nature of transcendental argumentation when someone says? Something along those lines I.

Love that we get this drought. The shrouds my favorite of a favorite criticism of all, okay. Yeah, so basically it's it's illegitimate to start with a Christian metaphysical schemes. We have to start with ourselves and then work outward.

So there you go Vantill. That's the legitimate. Well, the come back to that is says who. I'm sorry. That was just completely taken for granted. Now. How about you prove that for me? Mr. You know critic or whoever it may be.

Because as it turns out the person giving that criticism is himself or herself starting out with her own metaphysical picture. Namely something of a Kantian divide or an egocentric picture. We have to start with ourselves before we can work out.

And as as Christians are starting with God and us together We're starting with an external world. And so we have two antithetical worldviews. And so for one to say well, it's illegitimate for you to start with your metaphysical schemes.

Well, then why is it legitimate for him to start with his metaphysical scheme? Everyone starts metaphysically somewhere and this type of critic just completely takes it for granted. Everyone starts somewhere and the question is which worldview makes sense so to criticize a starting point is just a moot point in and of itself and moreover itself contradictory because he's taking his position for Granted doing the same thing.

He's he's doing the very thing. He says we shouldn't do right.

So it's not it's not you either start with God or you start with with self. That's a false dichotomy. The presupposition list will say we start with both we start with a worldview that is That constitutes the the metaphysical actuality of God and myself as a knower as a conceiver.

Yeah, and and even Sproul for instance just would not get this and I could link the video of where he says we can't start with God Consciousness because we have to start with self-consciousness. Mm-hmm, and it's like okay.

Dr. Sproul I love you, and I know you're a Vantillian right now. But that's just a false dichotomy really how do we know it's an either-or because given my worldview given the Imago Dei We're made in God's image.

Quite everything we do quite literally reflects God thinking. Man thinking is God thinking. Revelation is permeable everywhere. It's inescapable. So we start with God and man, that's the metaphysical picture we begin with and therefore the metaphysical picture We begin with starts with an external reality.

We don't start with ourselves and work out. Well, I don't know Joshua.

It looks like you're confusing ontology with epistemology. Why don't you address that real quick. We'll get though we'll get some of the elephants in the room out of the way and then we'll turn back to Christianity.

Okay. Yeah. How would you engage that because this will inevitably come up if you're discussing presuppositionalism with someone who's familiar with these kinds of discussions? And you see the the major talking points come up.

I mean, that's fair. These are good. These are good questions. They're not dumb questions. Like why are you asking that? How could you think we're confusing ontology with epistemology or that? We're begging the question.

These are perfectly legitimate questions that Though they should come up and we should address them as presuppositionalist. So so how would you engage that? Yeah.

Well, yeah I just want to say I I love these objections because it shows that the critic has at least a basic Understanding of the transcendental program Bantill has given us right? It's not something like oh Bantill was an idealist or Oh precepts hate evidence.

It's heresy or whatever. And it's just like come on man, like seriously, but these kinds of criticisms. I love it because it's more philosophically rigorous and I respect and commend the critic for actually having some knowledge of this program.

But to answer that question It's a legit it is a valid criticism not because the apologetic is guilty of it but because apologists are guilty of it. Particularly those who are less learned and I don't mean to belittle any presuppositionalist who are learning but it is very common For that to be the case.

Well, you start with an epistemic premise and then you conclude God exists. Well that doesn't follow at all, right? So, how do you rectify that? Well the rectification or the solution lies in the fact that Bantill himself endorsed both.

So we can talk about metaphysics, but ultimately or I'm sorry We can talk about epistemology, but it ultimately is going to entail metaphysics because the two are inextricably linked. So we could start with either one.

But as long as we propound and stress the metaphysical implications the existence of God. Not just that we have to believe in him the existence of God that we're not confusing anything. Bantill's argument can be purely conceptual if you want to put it that way.

But I can quote Bantill directly where he says that God's existence is necessary for X Y Z. So while presuppositionalists may confuse it and that is very true. The apologetic itself does not succumb to that criticism.

Mm-hmm.

Alright, well, let's kind of backpedal then to our Christianity objection and this idea that there could be similar similar worldviews. Would you say the worldview in which a triune God exists and reveals himself through a scriptures and the Bible?

Yet the Bible lacks a couple of books. Would that be a completely different worldview as I know we argue and as a worldview system and part of our system is that? God has in fact revealed himself in the 66 books of the Bible.

How would you say? Well, there's a triune God. He's revealed himself in nature and scripture, but his scripture lacks the book of James and let's go with.

Philemon Titus. Yeah, um, this was brought up in Clubhouse to last night and again, I.

What is clubhouse. I don't want to answer that question.

I'll answer it. I'll answer it some wise man told me and I'm not gonna say who but a wise man once told me it's the underbelly of discord, it's just like a cesspool of Intellectual and moral degeneracy and there's some good people there, but but there are some good people there.

The internet it's yeah, so it's like discord but down a tier and yet people still go to it anyway. So that's basically what it is. It's free if you want to join it is. What are we talking about? Oh, okay.

Yeah, so if some of the books were taken out right and this is where we have to draw a fine line between a Christian objection and a non-christian objection because If the book of Philemon or Titus or Judah or whatever was taken out It has no significant bearing on the Christian worldview as a whole.

In fact, I wouldn't help the critic like I had to help the Christian get up to metaphysics, right? It's not conceivable. It's metaphysical. So I will help this critic now and say guess what? The canon wasn't completed till the fourth century.

Oh, well. That's not good. We didn't have a full revelation until then. So I guess this is just some late, you know unbiblical apologetic that we're giving. Well, the answer to that is and even in the Old Testament The Israelites had revelation that we don't have today.

They had special, you know privileges that they had and witnessed and experience that we don't have today. In the time of Paul when he gives his apologetic in Acts 17 he had revelation from God, especially on the road to Damascus and onward and.

So what's the point? Well, the point is God's revelation permeates everywhere. It's permeated everywhere since Adam and Eve let alone the Old Testament the early church before the canon was compiled and even today.

So if someone says well, I believe in the Apocrypha or I don't believe in in Titus or whatever. It has no significant bearing on the Christian worldview as a whole. I get the Apocrypha has some contradictions.

Maybe I wouldn't allow that but in terms of removing a small book here or there It's nothing significant because what we're arguing for is the metaphysical structure of Christianity. And so if I have a one-page book in the Bible that doesn't necessarily contribute or add anything To that metaphysical scheme in any significant sense then if it's removed or if God, you know from eternity past said I won't have the book of Jude in the Bible.

That's nothing significant to the Christian worldview.

So those are. You know, yeah, but you would say that some books contain content of the metaphysical situation. That would be so. So for example If God gave us a Bible that didn't have the Gospels or didn't have some portions of Paul.

Yeah or Genesis.

Yeah, yeah, then that would be a different that would be a different situation totally different ballgame at that point. Yeah, that's a big problem. But yeah, I like that objection. You can have some books removed not saying you should because it's permissible that God has given his given us his canon.

But yes, you can have some books removed without significantly affecting the Christian worldview in any sense like that.