[/COLOR]I have a question for any of you serious Clark fans. I'm sure you have heard the argument against Clark's views that if he denies knowledge through the senses then how how does he understand his bible. Now part of the reason why I read everything by him that I could was to find an answer in his writings to this problem but I never found one, which quite probally was my fault and not his. My question is this; is that his standered reply to that question that he gave in the reply I posted at first? Now I couldn't find this interview I read with Gary Crampton on his book, I wanted to post that too.
In the interview Gary is asked this question and he replies that Clark was more Augustinian in his views and therefore beleived that the senses were like a stimulation for the mind to intellectual intuition. This would basically make the problem merely semantical. But does Clark give a better answer in the philosophy of Clark book?
Mr. Wright,
Here is a bit more argument given by Gordon H. Clark in his reply to Ronald Nash on this subject, found in "Clark And His Critics" (which also includes Clark's reply to Mavrodes that you linked to)
". . I may mention that once Augustine faced a similar difficulty. To be sure, he dealt rather with individual terms, whereas my interest centers on propositions; but there is an instructive parallel. Augustine asked whether sensations such as spoken or written words could communicate truth. The negative is supported by several considerations: 1. The word
caput is a sign. If I do not know its meaning to begin with, the word will not explain itself; and if I know, the word has not taught me; 2. the same sentence changes its truth-value from one mind to another; as,, for an example, when an Epicurean discusses the immortality of the soul, he may convince his listener that the soul is indeed immortal; 3. there are innumerable instances of ambiguity.
Augustine is so little enthusiastic about written or spoken words that he can say, 'To give them as much credit as possible,words possess only sufficient efficacy to remind us in order that we may seek things, but not to exhibit the things so that we may know them.' (
De Magistro, XI, 36; Cr. XII, 39) No doubt someone will immediately point out the context of this quotation and remark that Augustine attributed a greater role to sensation than I do. Quite possibly that is the case. But if I have gone further than the great bishop, it only adds emphasis to his concessions. . .However this may be, note in addition that he did not learn the story of the three young Hebrews who were cast into the fiery furnace from linked names on a manuscript. 'Has this story been transmitted to us otherwise than by means of words?' he asks. 'I answer that everything signified by these words are already in our knowledge.' (
De Magistro, xi, 37)
Passing on from sensible to intelligible objects, Augustine gives us his solution to the problem of knowledge. 'When things are discussed which we perceive through the mind, that is, by means of intellect and reason, these things are said to be things which we see immediately in the interior light of truth by virtue of which he himself who is called the interior man is illumined . . .Even though I speak about true things [even though Clark states true propositions] I still do not teach him who beholds true things, for he is taught not through my words but by means of the things themselves which God reveals within the soul.' (
De Magistro, xii, 37) . . ."
