An Important Event in San Francisco

Transcript An Important Event in San Francisco

Kevin Harris: Glad you're here. It's the Reasonable Faith podcast with Dr. William Lane Craig. Dr. Craig, you've been the past president of the Evangelical Philosophical Society – or the EPS, as we call it – and they have an event coming up. Let's talk about the event coming up and the importance of EPS. What do they do? What kind of work do they do in the area of philosophy?

Dr. Craig: The Evangelical Philosophical Society is the fruit of the revolution in philosophy that's been going on over the last fifty years. Both the Society of Christian Philosophers as well as the Evangelical Philosophical Society are specifically Christian professional organizations of philosophers. We have an annual meeting every year that's held in conjunction with the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, and so it meets in various cities around the year. We publish a journal called Philosophia Christi which has emerged, I think, as one of the finest professional journals of philosophy in philosophy of religion. This is a society that has well over a thousand members, which makes it one of the largest philosophical societies out there. I think it is the largest society of Christian philosophers that exists.

In order to bring this material that is so beneficial and revolutionary down out of the ivory tower and into the hands of the average layman, in conjunction with our annual convention every year we like to have a conference in a local church which will feature various EPS scholars as speakers. And they all donate their time, they don't receive any honorarium, and moreover since they're in town for the conference anyway the church has no expenses to pay for their transportation, their room or their board, and so the only expenses the church has to pay is really for the publicity and the conference notebook and the facilities and so forth. As a result we can offer truly, truly extraordinary conferences in Christian apologetics to folks for a song. They are so cheap, it's like twenty-five, thirty dollars to come and hear more than twenty of the finest evangelical scholars in the world. There's really nothing like it because for any ordinary conference to have these kinds of speakers it would cost hundreds of dollars to register in order to pay all of the expenses. And in this case the expenses are all borne by the scholars themselves or their institution, so the host church simply doesn't have to pay a lot. So it's a wonderful opportunity for folks to come and get trained in apologetics and hear some really great speakers at really just the cost of travel for themselves.

Kevin Harris: Dr. Craig, we refer often to this revolution that has taken place in Christian philosophy, and just a cursory observation will show much of that. But to what do you point those who would question that, who would say: “Why are you saying that? Why are you making that claim?” Where would you point them?

Dr. Craig: Well, I think you can point to hard evidence, Kevin. One would be the very existence and the size of these professional organizations like the Society of Christian Philosophers, the American Catholic Philosophical Association and the Evangelical Philosophical Society. At least the SCP and the EPS didn't even exist prior to the 1960s; it was unheard of to have an organization of professional philosophers that was Christian in orientation and yet now both of these are huge organizations.

I would point to the journals that both of these publish, which are fine professional journals and feature the work of some of the most prominent philosophers in the world. I would list the names.

I would point to people like Alvin Plantinga, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Richard Swinburne, Peter van Inwagen, Dean Zimmerman, Trenton Merricks, Dallas Willard, and on and on and on. You can point to the people that I'm talking about and the institutions at which they teach to illustrate this revolution.

And finally I think I would point to the books that are being published. Quentin Smith, who is an atheist philosopher, a few years ago did a count of the books published by Oxford University Press in various areas. And what he found was that there are more books published by Oxford University Press in philosophy of religion than in epistemology, or in metaphysics; [1] and many of those books in epistemology and metaphysics were by Christian philosophers dealing with topics of religious significance. It's quite remarkable the number of books published by these top academic presses that are done by Christian philosophers.

I myself have published an anthology in philosophy of religion that is published in the U.K. by Edinburgh University Press and here in the Unites States by Rutgers University Press; it's recently been picked up now by Columbia University Press instead of Rutgers. Now these are Ivy League Eastern universities publishing Christian material. And when I spoke to the editors at Rutgers University Press several years ago I said to them, “Why do you want to publish this book? It's very conservative, you know?” And they said, “That's exactly why we want it. There's money to be made because there's a market for these Christian books.” And so Oxford and these other academic presses are picking up this material.

So the hard evidence is there for anybody who doubts that there has been over the last half century a revolution in Anglo-American philosophy that has raised the prominence of Christian philosophers.

Kevin Harris: Would the layman benefit from subscribing to Philosophia Christi, as a journal?

Dr. Craig: Well, I would like to think so. This material is difficult; it's written for other philosophers and theologians. So it's on a high level. But I think what the layperson would find very valuable would be particularly the book review section. We always have an extensive section that features book reviews of the most recent literature in these various areas, and that's a very good way to keep yourself abreast of what's going on in the field; what's being published, and can also then give you a quick synopsis of what it's about and often some critical interaction with it. So I do think there are materials that are helpful to the layperson who has some training.

Kevin Harris: The next conference is November 17^th through 19^th, 2011, at Berkeley. Let's talk a little bit about what will go on at that conference.

Dr. Craig: This year the conference is being held in San Francisco, and our host church for the event is Grace Point Church, which is a church in Berkeley, California. However their facilities are not really fully adequate for the apologetics conference so it will actually be held in the building of the First Presbyterian Church in Berkeley. So the conference will be physically held at the First Presbyterian Church there in Berkeley and will feature a number of really excellent speakers.

Kevin Harris: What will you be speaking on this time?

Dr. Craig: I'm going to be speaking on Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow's new book The Grand Design and their critique of a creator and designer of the universe. I will be part of a workshop session dedicated to the subject of God. We have various parallel workshops so that people can pick from one of about five choices. We have one track that deals with God and then we have another track that deals with the historical Jesus; then there's another track devoted to comparative religions; and then this year we have an unusual track dealing with Old Testament issues in apologetics; and then finally there's a track devoted to cultural issues. And these run concurrently so that nobody can attend all the sessions in the conference; you have to pick one of these five sessions to attend. You don't have to stay with the same track during the entire conference – you can jump about as you find speakers and topics of interest to you – but they are grouped thematically into God, Jesus, comparative religions, Old Testament, and culture; and my talk is part of the God track.

Kevin Harris: Bill, it occurs to me that many of our listeners – and I've spoken to them, as well – their minds have been so turned on by God, by this material, and by a realization of their need for defending the faith and going deeper with God in the area of the intellect, and so forth. And yet they have not really had much of a college career. And so often collegiate terms, university jargon and things like that, kind of go past them. Now, on one level they see that they really need to support this and be a part of it in their learning because that's where the learning centers are and that's where important work is being done. But, for instance, what does it mean when someone presents a paper at a conference?

Dr. Craig: Let me emphasize, Kevin, that this conference that we're talking about now is not a professional conference for other scholars. [2] This is for laypeople. This is going to be for that person who doesn’t have a collegiate education much less advanced degrees, who doesn't have the big vocabulary. This is designed to bring this material down out of the ivory tower and make it accessible to the average man in the streets. So I want to emphasize, this is not for eggheads, this is for ordinary people because we want you to benefit from the scholarship of these great thinkers. And so we have emphasized to them to make it accessible, make it simple, we're going to have a notebook that has a structured outline for each lecture so that people can follow along and take notes. But in answer to your question, at an academic conference such as is being held in San Francisco concurrently with this, we often talk about reading a paper. And what that means is giving a prepared lecture which is written out typically word for word and the scholar gets up and simply reads his lecture aloud to the audience and then they're allowed to ask questions and interact with him on it. Sometimes there will be a commentator on the paper, and he will also have an advance copy of the lecture, and then prepare in advance his own brief response which is typically sent to the paper presenter, and then the paper presenter is given, usually, a couple of minutes to respond extemporaneously to his commentator. So that's the way it goes at the academic conferences, but that's not what we're talking about here.

Kevin Harris: I wanted to make sure that we distinguish the two, but we also wonder what all you eggheads do when you get together. Is this a form of peer review?

Dr. Craig: Well, there is peer review in that there is a great deal of demand for a slot on the program in these academic conferences, and so not just anybody can present. You have to pass a panel of peer-reviewers who pick the best papers to be presented at the academic conference. For this conference that we're holding at the First Presbyterian Church, I have put together the program myself. I have selected scholars that I knew would be in town for the academic conference, whom I know to be good communicators, who are experienced in speaking to lay audiences and have important things to say. And so we have a terrific program here of speakers, both plenary speakers who will speak to the whole conference assembled, and then also in these five different tracks.

Kevin Harris: It just brings up a very important point, Bill, in that we as laypeople can benefit from the work that is going on, very important work in this area – there is philosophy, theology, Christian apologetics. And so to make this available is just a great service.

Dr. Craig: Right, I think of it as our gift to the church. We are a part of the body of Christ, one might say, the brain or something of that sort, and we want to make this available to the church free of charge.

Kevin Harris: And isn't that exactly what Paul said, that God has gifted the church with teachers?

Dr. Craig: Yes.

Kevin Harris: I see people get in trouble when they become kind of an island. And unfortunately a lot of people are just wacko who do this, but people who are even not so wacko suddenly get a burst of energy from insight that they have, and they kind of alienate themselves from any kind of peer review or any kind of critique or anything like this and say “This is God's way. This is the way it is.” And they gather a following to themselves. One thing that academia does, one thing that the balance of the New Testament church providing teachers and so on, is to keep people out of those nether regions that often lead to heresy.

Dr. Craig: Right, I do think that being part of a community of scholars is a kind of check on you because you will be forced to interact with their ideas and their criticisms.

Kevin Harris: You've set up the lineup. Who are some of the speakers, then?

Dr. Craig: Well, for our plenary speakers that will address the whole conference we have Dallas Willard.

Kevin Harris: And by the way, that's another one of those words—'plenary'. [laughter]

Dr. Craig: Oh, this is the whole conference assembled, everyone together will meet in the main auditorium at first press. And Dallas Willard – fine philosopher and minster – will speak to us there. He'll be on Thursday night. Then on Friday night J.P. Moreland will address the entire group. And then on Saturday Craig Hazen and Greg Koukl will address the entire group. So the meetings are Thursday night, Friday night, and Saturday morning, so no one has to miss work to come to this conference. [3] You can go to your regular work and then in the evenings take in the conference on Thursday and Friday night and then Saturday morning. So those are the plenary sessions, and then after the plenary sessions we have these various tracks. And in the track on the existence of God, besides myself, we'll have Bob Stewart, Matt Flanagan from New Zealand will talk about 'can God command evil?'—God's apparently unjust commands in the Old Testament; Michael Horner who is a Canadian apologist and speaker will be addressing misunderstandings and objections to the moral argument. I mentioned Bob Stewart: he'll look at the latest atheistic arguments that are out there. And then in the track on the historical Jesus we have people like Gary Habermas talking about the resurrection; Ben Witherington on who Jesus thought himself to be; Mike Licona on dealing with New Testament contradictions. In the comparative religions track we have a terrific speaker Mark Foreman who talks about Jesus and pagan mythology and deals with this ubiquitous myth on the internet that the New Testament narratives of Jesus are derived from pagan mythology like sun-god worship in Egypt and so forth, and Foreman just hits this one out of the park. Paul Owen on Mormonism.

Kevin Harris: Oh, that will not go away; that will not just go away, by the way. I mean, I think a lot of work has been done – I'm seeing a reduction – but it still comes up.

Dr. Craig: You've got to answer it in every generation. I mentioned Paul Owen on Mormonism; Josh Lingal on Islam; Chad Meister is going to talk about the Christian doctrine of Hell, which has come under criticism, as you know, in recent days. Is this doctrine unconscionable?

Kevin Harris: Yes, we've done a podcast on that, as well, because of a book by Bell.

Dr. Craig: Right.

Kevin Harris: Okay.

Dr. Craig: Then under the Old Testament track we have Paul Copan talking about 'did God sanction slavery in the Old Testament?' John Bloom is going to talk about Old Testament archaeology and how this bears on the reliability of the Old Testament text. Richard Hess will address the question 'Did God command the killing of non-combatants in the conquest of Canaan?' And then Clay Jones has a very interesting talk: 'Were the Canaanites really so bad?' And he looks at what Canaanite culture was like prior to Israel's conquest of the land of Canaan, and it is very shocking. This talk is eye popping.

Kevin Harris: They were pretty bad hombres, weren't they?

Dr. Craig: Yeah, as you can guess, the question is, yes, they were pretty bad, and Clay goes into very interesting ancient documents – I didn't even know this kind of literature survives – to show what Canaanite culture was like. And then the final section will be our workshops dealing with Christianity and contemporary culture. And we've got people here like Frank Beckwith talking about the challenge of same-sex marriage. I asked Beckwith to do this in San Francisco – you know – this is where the meeting is, and so Beckwith is a guy who is not afraid to get in your face and challenge people. And so Beckwith is going to address same-sex marriage at this conference in San Francisco. Doug Geivett will be talking about Jesus and film—he's been doing good work on cinema, lately.

Kevin Harris: He really has. He's got a great book that I started reading. I'm interested in cinema, as well. And get a hold of it if you are interested in film and cinema and so on.

Dr. Craig: Douglas Geivett. And they Holly Ordway is going to be joining us for the first time at the EPS. She is a professor of literature and will be talking about literature as apologetic. So I think you can see, Kevin, we've got a very rich and varied lineup. If a person isn't interested in, say, philosophy, he may be interested in cultural apologetics or historical Jesus or someone else might like comparative religions or is curious about the Old Testament. There is just a wide diversity of important topics here. And they will all be recorded on audio CD so that people can buy the entire conference and listen to the workshops that they were unable to attend.

Kevin Harris: By the way, I can do a workshop on how to make a good barbecue, a good barbecue biscuit; if you guys need me to do that. [laughter]

Dr. Craig: You could do a good workshop on how to do a good podcast, Kevin.

Kevin Harris: The plenary sessions—what will Dallas Willard, J.P. Moreland and Greg Koukl be speaking on?

Dr. Craig: You know, I do not know their topic yet.

Kevin Harris: Well, they'll be good—I'll tell you that.

Dr. Craig: Greg Koukl will be speaking on putting into practice what you've learned. We always have him or another speaker as the final plenary give some real practical shoe leather to what folks have learned. So he will typically speak about conversational apologetics and putting it into application. But I don't know for sure the other speaker's topics, yet, for the plenaries.

Kevin Harris: Very good. I hope as many people as possible can make this conference in San Francisco in November. But we will do a podcast afterward and give a full report.

Dr. Craig: Great.

Kevin Harris: Right here on Reasonable Faith. [4]