# Circular Argument



## Toasty (Jun 25, 2015)

If someone says that the Bible tells us that there are fulfilled biblical prophecies so this proves that the Bible is inspired by God, would this be a circular argument? Some people think that this is a circular argument because the arguer is using the Bible to prove the Bible. Others think that this is not a circular argument because different human authors were used to write the words of Scripture. The human author wrote about a biblical prophecy is not the same human author who wrote about its fulfillment.


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## Justified (Jun 25, 2015)

Not necessarily. If you can prove the Bible made said prophecy before it was fulfilled, then there is no "circularity." However, the unbeliever may deny that the prophecy was before the fact on account that prediction of the future is impossible. Moreover, if you give further evidence of the earlier date of the prophecy, and he still denies that specific date of the book because miracles are impossible, then he is the one arguing in circles.


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## RamistThomist (Jun 25, 2015)

If you tried to pin all your hopes on this argument, and your opponent was hostile to the Bible in general (having read higher criticism), then yes this is a circular argument.

However, it can function as providing a minor source of evidence that can work as a cumulative case argument. Be careful, though, most people today probably won't see how Jesus fulfills Hosea 11:1. It will then hinge on larger questions of plausibility structures and social imaginaries and how stories work in general.


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## JimmyH (Jun 25, 2015)

Just for one example, the scroll of Isaiah found in 1947 in Qumran is virtually identical to the AV translation from what I've read. It has been carbon dated to 335 BC, and is 1,100 years older than the Leningrad Codex, according to the Wiki article. Point being that those prophecies were not written after the fact. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaiah_scroll


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## Nicholas Perella (Jun 25, 2015)

Circular argumentation is not necessarily irrational. In the case of God, He is the ultimate authority and He defines everything as He is the Creator. So yes, listening to what God has to say about God and what God has to say about His creation is the only certain and true way. Arguing from reason does not regenerate a person, but faith comes by the hearing of His written Word preached (Ro. 10), and is a gift of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:22).


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## TrustGzus (Jun 25, 2015)

Not only were different authors involved in writing Scripture, for many centuries they weren't bound together under one leather cover and viewed as one "book" called the Bible. Each was its own individual work thus removing the charge of circularity.


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## God'sElectSaint (Jun 25, 2015)

I think there is a great case that can be made apologetically for the Word and many have been but like Nicolas said apart from regeneration it will remain "foolishness unto them". I think this is why Paul determined to know nothing save Jesus Christ and him crucified. Of course I do love apologetic's and think they serve a great purpose and in my view are biblical. I don't think your reasoning has to be necessarily circular. You can most certainly make a good case from bible prophesy about the authority of scripture and as long as the goal in mind is to lead people to repentance and faith in Christ I think it's a good thing. Many folks just don't really care what sort of reasoning or evidence you present they will suppress the knowledge of God as deeply as they can in unrighteousness and falsehood. Being a former let's say "atheistic thinker" that I was I understand how irrational I used to be.


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## MW (Jun 25, 2015)

A circular argument, strictly speaking, requires the reasoner to begin where he aims to end. The argument from prophecy begins at one point and ends at another point, so it is not circular.

The problem in relation to apologetics is that it requires the acceptance of historical facts, and the historical facts must be accepted on the basis of authority, so the argument usually ends up being an ad verecundiam.

As with all evidential arguments, they rest on the acceptance of the Bible's authority in the first place, which is one of the basic reasons why an overt presuppositional approach was developed.


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## Ask Mr. Religion (Jun 26, 2015)

_Begging the question_ has traditionally been thought to be a fallacy because it is a breaking of the rules of the old-fashioned game of _elenchus_ (two-person contestive question-reply argumentation as found in Aristotle). Each participant has a conclusion (question) to be proved, and one of the rules was that a question must not directly ask for conclusion. This rule makes sense _within the framework of the game of elenchus_, but argumentation on a serious matter is trying to get at the truth, to _know_ something. 

Aristotle's question-answer games were irrelevant, as serious models of knowledge-seeking, and the prohibition of begging the question is not a law of logic, but only the rule of an old-fashioned competitive game. As some have said, "_To appeal to it when engaged in the scientific search for truth is as irrelevant as to obey the Queensbury rules when attacked by a murderer_". In short, the fallacy of begging the question has no relevance to any pragmatic knowledge-seeking inquiry into the truth of a matter, as a proper criticism or alleged fallacy of argument.

The fallacy of begging the question always presupposes a context of disputation, and we can take this to imply that question-begging by one party in the disputation only occurs where his argument is directed to another party in the disputation who disbelieves the conclusion. The central purpose of argument is to show that something is worthy of belief. But this purpose can be accomplished even if the conclusion was initially neither believed nor disbelieved, or if the conclusion has been believed all along.

There are two levels of reasonable dialogue. At the abstract level, a game of dialogue is a normative model - a precisely stated set of rules forming an abstract structure that may or may not correspond in greater or lesser degrees to realistic contexts of argumentation. _At the practical level, a game of dialogue is a sequence of speech events - a regulated sequence of questions and answers that represents interactive persuasive argument exchanges between two parties on a controversial or disputed issue_.

Real life is seldom either as simple or as reasonable as the ideal of the critical discussion, where the roles and rules of discussion are defined by rules that order and regulate permissible moves and replies.

In persuasion dialogue, the increment of knowledge is not only in coming to learn the strengths and weaknesses of an argument, but the deepening of the understanding of both one's own position and that of one's opponent. _It is a curious paradox of persuasion dialogue that real knowledge of one's position in argument comes only through the process of learning that one did not really know as decisively as one thought in the beginning that one's convictions are true._ In persuasion dialogue, the strength to defend a position is achieved through learning the worst weaknesses in it. 

For more, see:
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/226155441_Begging_the_question_as_a_pragmatic_fallacy

Per Van Til, a circular argument of a kind is unavoidable when we argue for an ultimate standard of truth. One who believes that human reason is the ultimate standard can argue that view only by appealing to reason. One who believes that the Bible is the ultimate standard can argue only by appealing to the Bible. Since all positions partake equally of circularity at this level, it cannot be a point of criticism against any of them.

See:
http://www.frame-poythress.org/presuppositional-apologetics/
http://thirdmill.org/files/english/html/pt/PT.h.Frame.Presupp.Apol.1.html
http://thirdmill.org/files/english/html/pt/PT.h.Frame.Presupp.Apol.2.html


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## timfost (Jun 26, 2015)

If I recall correctly, Bavinck does a really good job on this subject in his _Prolegomena_. I can't tell you what part because I had to give the book back after reading it.


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