Can The Transcendental Argument for Christian Theism Be Refuted?

The central claim of the Transcendental Argument for Christian Theism (TACT) is that Christian theism is transcendentally necessary. What this means is that Christianity is necessary for intelligible human experience to obtain. If human experience is intelligible, then Christianity must be true. This transcendental programme, as developed by Van Til and Bahnsen, is worldview-directed. That is, we are dealing with entire worldviews and not just isolated tenets or facts. So, it is the entire Christian worldview that is necessary for the intelligibility of human experience. Various arguments have been provided to support this central claim of the transcendental necessity of Christian theism (see: here, here, here, here, and here). However, one may be inclined to ask what exactly would disprove this central claim and refute all the arguments that have been put forth in favor of it? 

The answer is simple. As it turns out, this central claim is so strong and ambitious that it is easy to refute (at least in theory). The claim asserts the necessity of Christian theism, so all it takes to refute it is to offer an alternative that does everything that Christian theism does in terms of securing the intelligibility of human experience. If a workable alternative can be provided, then one can apply a kind of Moorean shift to show that there must be something wrong with all the arguments used to support the central claim. This sounds easy enough. In fact, it sounds so easy that it has led so many opponents of TACT to believe the argument is garbage because of how easy it is to refute. In order to demonstrate just how easy it is to refute, opponents of TACT sometimes provide alternatives to Christian theism in the form of clearly contrived and absurd hypotheticals, or actual worldviews that supposedly do the same philosophical heavy lifting as Christianity. This alternative can be provided in different ways:

One way is to provide an alternative principle/doctrine that solves a particular philosophical problem that the proponent of TACT claims arises as a result of denying Christianity. For example, you may hear something like:

“A binary god (god with only two persons in the godhead) solves the problem of the one and the many as well as Trinitarian Christianity does, so TACT does not establish Christianity”

There are two ways such an objection can be answered. One way is to show that the alternative doctrine, in principle, cannot solve the philosophical problem. For instance, someone like Brant Bosserman has done some good work showing why a binary god cannot solve the problem of the one and the many. A second way is to point out that such an objection fails to appreciate the worldview-directed nature of TACT. Simply presenting a doctrine/principle (binary god) that allegedly solves a philosophical problem does not refute the central claim of TACT. And this is because only a robust and fully fleshed out worldview can serve as a possibe alternative to Christian theism. For a binary god to be an alternative, it must be situated in a robust network of presuppositions. 

It is easy to miss this worldview-directed nature of TACT because, as a finite being, the proponent of TACT can only talk about one thing at a time. Hence, the various instances where TACT is presented may involve the presentation of only one argument or philosophical problem. However, this should not distract from the fact that the argument is over entire worldviews. Solving an isolated philosophical problem is insufficient to refute the TACT.

Another way alternatives to Christian theism are presented is in the form of hypotheticals. You may hear something like:

“I presuppose the Flying Spaghetti Monster who created the world and provides a foundation for logic, morality, and all of human experience. Everyone knows the FSM because he revealed himself to everyone.”

There are multiple issues which such proposals. First, it is rarely explained how exactly such hypothetical views solve the problems they allegedly solve or provide the preconditions they allegedly provide. Whereas the proponent of TACT takes great pain to explain exactly how the Christian doctrines of providence, creation, revelation, God, etc. make human experience intelligible, the proponent of such hypotheticals rarely ever does the heavy lifting. The underlying assumption seems to be that the central claim of TACT—that Christianity is transcendentally necessary—is asserted without argument by the proponent of TACT, and as such one can make a similar assertion for any system no matter how contrived. But this assumption is clearly wrong since there have been various defenses of TACT’s central claim offered by proponents of the argument. Second, such hypotheticals are often times poorly thought out. Once questions are asked about exactly what views the hypotheticals espouse and how exactly they all fit together, the proponents of such hypotheticals either end up making the hypotheticals more and more similar to Christianity, or end up arbitrary assertions that have no place in rational debate. Third, in the very nature of the case, a hypothetical worldview cannot serve as a viable alternative to Christian theism. This is due to the fact that there must be a coherent and workable worldview which provides the context and preconditions for rationally positing hypotheticals in the first place. 

Another way that opponents have aimed to refute TACT is through the so-called Fristianity-styled objections. Such objections posit a hypothetical worldview that is similar to Christianity in every respect with the exception of one small detail. But as we have mentioned already, by being a hypothetical, such a worldview is disqualified as a possible contender from the outset. Furthermore, one can ask what accounts for the difference between Christianity and this hypothetical worldview. As Michael Butler pointed out, due to the coherence and interconnectedness of the Christian system, altering even one aspect of that system produces a radically different worldview. 

The final way one may aim to refute TACT is to appeal to actual worldviews that allegedly do the job Christianity does. In this instance, the opponent usually points to some religious worldview that has so much in common with Christianity that it can offer similar solutions to the philosophical problems that Christianity solves. But if the central claim of TACT is true, and Christianity is in fact transcendentally necessary, then it should be no surprise that the more tenets a worldview shares with Christianity, the more it would seem that it provides the various preconditions necessary for intelligible human experience to obtain. However, once again, we have to remember the worldview-directed nature of TACT. Failure at even one point would render the entire worldview incapable of providing the preconditions of human experience. As such, the proponent of TACT can simply examine the various points at which the religious alternative rejects Christianity and demonstrate its failure in those respects. 

In conclusion, can the transcendental argument for Christian theism be refuted? The answer is “yes”. In fact, it is theoretically very easy to refute. However, the various attempts to do so have failed miserably.