# Van Til Quote Base



## RamistThomist

Even though he may be hard to read, Van Til has a masterful way with words. His illustrations (usually martial in nature) are masterful. I started this thread so that people could post/find very good Van Til quotes. 

From Defense of the Faith,
Van Til: "He [Christ] came to bring peace, to be sure, but the peace that He came to bring must be built upon the complete destruction of the power of darkness." 

From The Great Christian Revolution  by Otto Scott
(Actually, this is Michael Selbrede quoting Van Til. This is probably my favorite at the moment. I quoted this to an Arminian on a humanist message board and got him livid. That was pretty cool)



> To the extent that Calvinism has languished and Arminianism has waxed ascendant, to that extent have the issues of history been decided by the only means remaining TO DEAL WITH AXES THAT BOAST THEMSELVES against the One Who wields them. As Cornelius van Til observed so strikingly, there remains nothing between God and such man except a test of strength" (Selbrede, *The Great Christian Revolution*).


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## RamistThomist

*On Agnosticism*

"Agnosticism is epistemologically self-contradictory on its own assumptions because its claim to make no assertion about ultimate reality rests upon a most comprehensive assertion about ultimate reality."


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## crhoades

> _Originally posted by Draught Horse_
> *On Agnosticism*
> 
> "Agnosticism is epistemologically self-contradictory on its own assumptions because its claim to make no assertion about ultimate reality rests upon a most comprehensive assertion about ultimate reality."



This concept was what I was driving home to my friend the other day in the thread in Defending the Faith. He was desiring to hide behind the "we can't know about ultimate origins/reality"...Which is in itself an absolute claim about ultimate reality...

Good one Jacob!


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## RamistThomist

> "He came forth "To destroy the works of the evil one." He came to bring peace, to be sure, but the peace he came to bring must be built upon the complete destruction of the power of darkness. "I came not to bring peace upon the earth but to bring a sword." Such was the message of the Prince of Peace. To herald this message he sent prophets before him and apostles after him. When most enveloped in this message, when most enthusiastic about this peace, the Psalmist cries out, "Shall I not hate those who hate thee? I hate them with a perfect hatred."
> 
> When he was on earth Christ entered the arena with Satan singlehanded and triumphed. He is seen by John the Apostle, riding upon his white horse, conquering and to conquer. When he sees his armies languish, weary of the fight, his clarion voice bids them put on the whole armour of God. They may not waver, it is the church militant, this people of God. Only those who fight to the end receive the crown. And then there is peace indeed. In the "regeneration of all things" he that sits upon the throne is surrounded by the 24 elders and the four living creatures. The whole creation is there; the whole creation is redeemed. No discordant voice is heard. All sing the great song of the redeemed creation. Through redemption creation's purpose is accomplished. Where are the enemies? They are sealed in a soundproof exclusion chamber. Satan has lost the struggle; God is God.


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## Apologist4Him

"I was brought up on the Bible as the Word of God. Can I, now that I have been to school, still believe in the God of the Bible? Well, can I still believe in the sun that shown on me when I walked as a boy in wooden shoes in Groningen? I could believe in nothing else if I did not, as back of everything, believe in this God. Can I see the beams underneath the floor on which I walk? I must assume or presuppose that the beams are underneath. Unless the beams were underneath, I could not walk on the floor." - Dr. Cornelius Van Til giving a brief synopsis of his book Why I Believe in God from the pamphlet "Toward A Reformed Apologetic" 

"A preliminary survey of epistemological terminology brings out that this terminology itself has grown out of a milieu which has colored its connotation. It will not do to speak of the inductive and deductive methods as though theists and non-theists meant the same things when they use these terms. The term induction means one thing for a theist who presupposes God and another thing for a non-theist who does not presuppose God. For a theist induction is the implication into God-centered "œfacts" by a God-centered mind; for a non-theist it means the implication into self-centered facts by a self-centered mind. The same difference prevails in the case of such terms as analysis and synthesis, correspondence and coherence, objectivity and subjectivity, a priori and a posteriori, implication and linear inference and transcendental versus syllogistic reasoning. A non-theist uses all these terms univocally, while a theist may use any or all of them analogically." - Dr. Cornelius Van Til from the Chapter 1 table of contents of "A Survey of Christian Epistemology"

I like the first quote because Dr. Van Til is talking presuppositionalism in non-technical terms. And I like the second quote because Dr. Van Til brings to the readers attention an important distinction in what Theists and non-Theists mean when they use the term induction.


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## nonconformist

Jacob


> I quoted this to an Arminian on a humanist message board and got him livid. That was pretty cool)


:bigsmile::bigsmile::bigsmile:


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## RamistThomist

My personal favorite from Defense of the Faith:

"The Reformed apologist throws down the gauntlet and challenges his opponent to a duel-to-the-death."

From page 113, I think


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## RamistThomist

> _Originally posted by Draught Horse_
> My personal favorite from Defense of the Faith:
> 
> "The Reformed apologist throws down the gauntlet and challenges his opponent to a duel-to-the-death."
> 
> From page 113, I think



I was discussing something like this with an arminian one time (it was a friendly discussion and I liked the guy) and I asked him had he heard the Bahnsen/Stein debate and he said he had. I asked him what he thought of it and he replied,

"It just didn't seem fair for Dr Stein. Bahnsen just won the debate in the first thirty minutes. I mean, his TAG eliminated any chance of Stein coming back."

Me: So?


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## VirginiaHuguenot

"Christians are in themselves no wiser than are other men. What they have they have by grace. They must be 'all things to all men.' But it is not kindness to tell patients that need strong medicine that nothing serious is wrong with them. Christians are bound to tell men the truth about themselves; that is the only way of bringing them to recognize the mercy, the compassion, of Christ. For if men are told the truth about themselves, and if they are warned against the false remedies that establish men in their wickedness, then, by the power of the Spirit of God, they will flee to the Christ through whom alone they must be saved."

Cornelius Van Til
_The Intellectual Challenge of the Gospel_


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## Bryan

"Without the interpretation of the universe by man to the glory of God the whole world would be meaningless"

-Van Til. The Defense of The Faith, pg 43


Bryan
SDG


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