Reformed epistemology
is a unique justification for the belief in God as it, fundamentally requires
no need for justification. The reformed epistemologist position is that the
belief in God is “properly basic” and does not need to be inferred from other
truths in order to be reasonable. To a reformed epistemologist, the existence
of God is as obvious to them as my existence is to my friends and family. The
core of the belief comes from a branch of Calvinism in which he called sensus divinitatis or sense of divinity,
this ‘sense’ allows people to have an external knowledge of God’s presence.
Some people argue
that everyone has this sense of divinity, this is used to argue that there are no true atheists,
Calvin himself believed there was no reasonable non-belief. However reformed epistemologists believe that atheists are, in a realist sense wrong.
They would also agree that other religions are also wrong or at least less
right. This is because they believe that only they have their noetic structure
(noetic structure here means “the sum total of a person’s belief”) properly
ordered, and that others who do not share their belief do not, either because they
refuse to see the truth or their view of the world has been tainted by sin.
Critiques of this position
are that almost all religions claim that they alone have the ultimate truth, all religions can argue that they have their noetic structure properly
ordered, what makes a reformed epistemologist different from an orthodox Jew or
a militant Islamist? Who all claim that they alone have the ultimate truth of
God.
One can take this point further still; I could claim that I believe that
my dog is in fact the son of the creator
dog of light and that all those who believe in him will receive
eternal life and that only I have my noetic structure in the correct order as I
am the only one who can see the divine truth in Noodle, son of Dog.
Other arguments against reformed epistemology are that it claims that
there is an ultimate truth, but makes no reference or justification for it,
which if one accepts makes the difference between justified and unjustified obsolete.
Christians who prefer natural theology are often cynical of reformed epistemology
as they believes that it undermines what they consider to be a rationally inferred
realist God.
While non-believers
and Christians who disagree with the position would maintain that reformed
epistemology stands on flimsy grounds, a reformed epistemologist would see no
reason to make a counter claim as that would involve justifying their belief
which is fundamentally wrong.
“A man
can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can
put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell.” –
C.S Lewis.
