Robert D. Knudsen's Calvinistic Philosophy lectures (Disks 7)

This is a continuation of the class lectures on Calvinistic Philosophy given by Robert D. Knudsen at Westminster Theological Seminary.  As before, the information in the audio recordings have not been validated for accuracy (use at your own risk).
 

Stoker, part 2, Vollehoven, part 1 (disk 7)

Stoker indeed criticized Vollenhoven and Dooyeweerd for advocating the idea of Law as the boundary between God and the cosmos and he substituted his own idea of creation as the boundary between God and the cosmos.  Knudsen did mention a type of criticism of the law idea as being formal and empty from a Christian point of view.  Stoker did not critique from this point.  It was not because he thought the V & D advocated that the law as abstract from creation.  That possibility is already excluded in that Stoker allows for the law to be a legitimate boundary idea (God is one side and the cosmos on the other).

J.M. Spier (Introduction to Christian Philosophy) comments on Stoker’s substitution of law idea with creation.  One should not think that there is an opposition here because the idea of law includes the idea of creation.

Stoker’s reason for questioning V & D use of law as boundary lies elsewhere, their view (particularly D) it involved the idea that there is nothing in the cosmos that is not subject to law.  Freedom is freedom in subjection to law. 

Now Stoker took another path, he wanted to assert that the being of the cosmos is not exhausted in being subject to law, there is something more.  The service of God is not simply obedience but free activity with one’s own sphere of competency.

When Stoker uses creation in this way he attempts to make it philosophical relevant that is questionable.  How do you make the creation idea philosophically relevant?  Stoker associates the creation idea with an area of freedom, it acts as his guarantor; we are not only subject to law but to freedom in the sphere of competency as well.  The problem enters in where you address this “more than” mean.  To what is law conformity to be contrasted?  And this thing we’re contrasting can it have any meaning apart from law conformity?  The creation involves everything including law conformity.  Freedom is just as created as law.  Creation applies to the entire cosmos.

How is this universal creation idea philosophically relevant?  How does it present us with criteria for the formation of religious concepts?  Stoker has contrasted his view with law as if it were a question of one boundary idea over against another.  Dooyeweerd from the first held to the notion that creation idea is encompassed by the law idea. 

Dooyeweerd began he philosophical reflections in a conscious effort in the spirit of Abraham Kuyper to make relevant the reformed world and life view in particular to the formation of Christian statecraft.  To this end he chose the idea of law as the instrument.  He sought a philosophical relevant criterion, which could be used as a universal principle for the interpretation and criticism of philosophical positions.  The criterion had its point of origin and point of reference in a radically Christian worldview.  This was the idea of law.  For V & D the law was the boundary between God and man.  Dooyeweerd held that every philosophical position is ruled by a law idea.  This law idea was first of all an idea of origin and the coherent of the cosmos.  Later on he developed that radical unity was a part of this law idea ruling every philosophical system.

For Dooyeweerd the Archimedean point was not the law.  It was the point from where the entire cosmos could be viewed as it came to its point of concentration in the heart of man standing before his origin.  A key to Archimedean point is understood in terms of the redeemed humanity in Jesus Christ.

Knudsen believes that Vollenhoven does not have a clear distinction of what the boundary is.  God à Law à Cosmos for Vollenhoven were just 3 analytical distinctions.  Does the boundary belong to God or the Cosmos.

Interestingly enough (as far as Knudsen understands it) Van Till holds that God is the Archimedean  point.

Dirk Hendrik Theodore Vollenhoven (1892 – 1978)

Vollenhoven was born in Amsterdam November 1, 1892.  In 1918 he became a pastor in the GNK in Oostkapelle.  In 1920 he took Psychology lectures in Leipzig and in December of 1920 he came back to the Netherlands and became a pastor in Den Haag in May of 1921.  In 1926 he was called to be a professor of philosophy and theoretical psychology at the Free University.

Important in the development of Vollenhoven was contact with Antheunis Janse , between 1918 and 1921.  Janse was head of the school in Biggekerke.  Janse read Vollenhoven’s doctoral dissertation and wrote Vollenhoven a letter.  Vollenhoven and Janse wrote a paper on the activity of the soul in the teaching of arithmetic.

The two became in more intimate contact when Vollenhoven moved to Den Haag.  Discussions continued to a discussion of  anthropology.  In the interm Janse came to a different insights concerning the soul.  Vollenhoven said, Janse freed him from many fruitless speculations.  Janse began to gain new insights into God’s revelation.  Janse held that the scriptures speak in concrete language and not in a theoretical fashion.  This insight increased his regard for the Bible.  Janse believed this gave him insight into every situation without having to theorize.  This view was not regarded to replace child-like faith with inner experience. 

Vollenhoven’s dissertation had been on the theme of the philosophy of mathematics from a theistic point of view.  He began with a study of the foundation of mathematics; the principles that would rule in the sphere of mathematics.