The Logical Fallacies Of Hick 's Position

Great post. I do agree with you that Hick’s do acknowledge religion as valid as long as it has a transformational aspect in a person life. I also agree with his claim that religions are worshiping the same God and acknowledge God by different name.

He juxtaposes the high hopes he had held for the church based on its supposedly moral standing with its actual state of hypocrisy in which it worships God but turns a blind eye to racial injustice. King then emphasizes this hypocrisy using parallel structure and rhetorical questions to support his argument. By addressing the clergymen directly and using positive words like “hope”, “justice”, and “moral”, he also appeals to pathos to remind his audience of the values that the church stood for and call it to return to those values. Next, King alludes to the early church to show the church’s “powerful” beginnings. He uses a metaphor comparing the early church to a thermostat instead of a thermometer, emphasizing the active role the church must take in standing up for its beliefs and influencing society. By referring to the early Christians as “disturbers of the peace” and “outside agitators”, King links himself to them, increasing his credibility, and rebukes the clergymen for criticizing him using similar terms. He also explains that the early Christians “pressed on” despite resistance from society because they were “called to obey God rather than men”, further connecting his work with God’s will and implying that anyone who challenged him was challenging God Himself. King then continues to describe the present state of the church. He juxtapositions the strength of the early church with the weakness of the contemporary church and uses negative words like “weak”, “ineffective”, and “uncertain” to show his audience how the church has degraded from its original status. King’s subsequent declaration that the “judgment of God is upon the church as never before” invokes the authority of God to evoke a sense of fear from his audience, thus appealing to pathos. He supports his claim with a cause-and-effect statement that appeals to logos

To start off, Joseph Strorm has control over the people of Waknuk. For example, “He still continues to preach frequently on Sundays and to explain with practical clarity the laws and views … Upon a variety of matters… For the rest of the time, he saw to it that he, and all within his control, continued to set a high example to the district” (Wyndham 17). Joseph preaches words from Nicholson’s Repentances about how differences are terrible. This book is what the society of Waknuk has developed their religion from, so the citizens don’t have any other ideas to believe in. Joseph has manipulated the way the people of Waknuk think, using the Repentances and it has gotten to the point where families will go at each other's throats to report a deviation. Of course, this is what he wants; everyone divided, so they will not rally against him. Unity is true power.

Longenecker thoroughly represents the key theme of understanding by replicating the procedures and beliefs that first-century Christians held. The Lost Letters of Pergamum claim that understanding is exemplified throughout every page and letter of the work despite Antipas’ constant struggle to find acceptance. This would also appear to be the catalyst for the challenges and misunderstandings Christians regularly faced, according to Antipas’ initial reaction to Luke’s Gosepel: “you might be somewhat uncomfortable in your association with Christians. Their reputation throughout the empire is suspect” (41). This section demonstrates the fact that Christians were confronted

Tom, who is on the largest amount, "is the feeling of being the most acculturated" shows "a tacky sentimental manufactured human progress." Huck's dad investigates every possibility in attempting to get Huck's cash from judge Thatcher. Religion is one of the key casualties of Twain's parody. He talks through Huck pronouncing it, in any event as it was instructed, to be unimportant to the normal individual's life, "Here she was a-worrying about Moses, which was no kinfolk to her, and no utilization to anyone, being gone, you see...". Very little later Huck finds that petition has never benefited him in any way, and he can't see that it has helped numerous others either. Through Huck's eyes we see that Twain contradicts the visually impaired

Ronald H. Nash begins his book responding the position of pluralism in regards to the exclusivity of Jesus Christ, mainly directed at John Hick, who was a leading proponent of pluralism until his death earlier this year. Nash was an evangelical Baptist theologian and apologist, who subscribed to the Calvinist tradition. Within his book, Nash tackles several of Hick’s arguments relating to the pluralism and universality of Christianity. Nash reveals in chapters 1-6, the evolution of Hick’s philosophy of pluralism and understanding of pluralism, which conflicts with the Christian’s view of the

At the conclusion of his presentation, how does Tim Goeglein discuss the Christian’s job in light of these 3 attacks?

Hick believes that one can only become "morally and spiritually mature" through their relationship with their creator2. Hick says, one must go through the suffering and pain that God allows oneself to endure, to give them the chance to become "a perfected child of God"2. One cannot say that the freedom and responsibly God gives a person to take on is intolerable if one truly wants the priceless relationship God offers2. The relationship with God, "could never be attained without" the choice between bad and good. Essentially one cannot say how much suffering one can endure, or put a price on the prize of God's love, because God's gift with him in heaven is priceless3.

Chapter five is a very interesting chapter. Nash writes that Hick continues attack the Christian faith. Often, Hick seems to be torn in between the two. Hick recognizes that the central point of the Christian faith is centered around Jesus

One component of these chapters that I felt was extremely prevalent was the character development of Huck. There were multiple instances when Huck had to make certain decisions that would effect him in the long run, and with most of those decisions came a moral struggle. It seemed as if within these chapters, Huck is trying to find out who he truly is as a person. One example of these moments is in chapter 16 when he is having an internal battle, trying to convince himself that helping Jim gain his freedom is in fact the right thing to do. The quote reads, “I couldn't get that out of my conscience, no how nor no way. It got to troubling me so I couldn't rest; I couldn't stay still in one place…I tried to make out to myself that I warn't to blame, because I didn't run Jim off from his rightful owner” (Pg. 87). In the quote stated above you can clearly see the internal struggle that Huck goes through, trying to find himself along the way. He looks at the situation with 2 different perspectives, one of them being that taking Jim to gain his freedom is immoral and the wrong thing to do, the other being taking Jim to gain his freedom is the right thing to do. Although Jim knows that either way he will feel guilty but he ends up choosing to take Jim's side because of his loyalty. Jim shows his appreciation to Huck by saying things like, "Dah you goes, de ole true Huck; de on'y white genlman dat ever kep' his promise to ole Jim”(Pg. 92), causing Huck

Hick challenges theologians to transform Christian Religion to address effectively the modern world, which is now undoubtedly pluralistic. He both criticizes what he considers outmoded Christian in light of recent developments in religious epistemology, while simultaneously suggesting new possibilities for the enrichment of Christian experience as religious experience. While some of these suggestions are certainly open to debate, it is nonetheless certain that Hick, like Columbus, has discovered the "new world"—a new pluralistic world—which all future theology must take into account (although it is clear that, despite this recent discovery, the Indians—though this time the real Indians—have long since beaten us here as well). In light of his

Hick devotes an entire chapter in An Interpretation of Religion to discussing them, noting three levels on which religious traditions disagree: (1) matters of historical fact, (2) matters of trans-historical fact, and (3) differing conceptions of the Real.

Exploiting worship. (p. xii) “For the Glory of God” makes very good observations as you journey through the book. While reading, Block makes a completely true statement in the sad fact that, “Instead of worship uniting God’s people, conflicts over worship have divided them.” (p. 2)

The Christianity problem follows him since then, because, as his character Tom Sawyer, has to memorize passages from the Bible that emphasis on God’s power, know-all and anger; so that “The Bible’s imprint on his mind remained indelible under the palimpsest of later scientific knowledge. ”(Fischer, 57) Later, when he marries Olivia, he doesn’t continue to read the Bible and starts to doubt of its power to save his soul, because he sees it as a source of myths and unreal stories. These sentiments, first of worship and then of renouncement, are hidden in Huckleberry Finn’s character to whom he imprints his hesitation, whether to be or not a religious person, whether to believe in God or in magic and signs. So Huck is an independent soul, who takes his own decisions that are guided by his own system of values. “Through the character of his beloved Huck, Clemens could indulge his old values of independence, self-indulgence, laziness, skepticism, irreverence and forthrightness.”

In doing this McGrath lets our minds have enough backstory to more easily understand the information given. After giving historical background McGrath breaks down the topic in a very clear format. When talking about Jesus (pg. 58-76) He talks about why Jesus is important “Christology”, but then he educates us by breaking down the considerably large topic of Jesus into more manageable categories such as the names of Jesus; Messiah, Lord, Son of God, Son of Man, God. After going through the names of Jesus he then educates us on other important theological discussions of Jesus like: Functional statements about Jesus, Early Christological Models, The Council of Chalcedon, The incarnation and icons, and Christ as mediator. Then after discussing the ‘meat’ of the topic he then gives us an opportunity to “Engage with a text” at the end of every topic. These texts give different examples and opinions for each topic and then McGrath gives the reader a short series of questions for individual or small group discussion about the text/topic he had given.