While Kuyper describes the antithesis in absolute terms, as we see in (K2), he does allow for aspects of science that are not affected by the fall such as weighing, measuring and the use of logic.¹ He also allows for a neutral zone within the context of common grace where believers and unbelievers can meet with equality and determine common principles of knowledge. This may be related to his territorial view of common grace in which spatial analogies govern. Van Til will improve on Kuyper with his temporal/historical formulation of the doctrine of common grace.

Another factor in Kuyper’s apparent inconsistency here may be his discussion of a formal faith.² Kuyper wants to account for why we believe in the existence of ourselves (i.e., the existence of the “ego”) and in the trustworthiness of the delivery of the senses. He desires to explain how it is that we can know things. In other words, Kuyper is discussing the subject/object relationship and developing his epistemological theory.³

Van Til’s problem with this discussion is Kuyper’s apparent failure to include the essential role of God in his consideration of epistemology. Specifically, Van Til notes Kuyper’s failure to bring into the discussion the sensus divinitatus which pervades all human knowledge.

There can be no awareness of ourselves without an immediate awareness of our Creator nor can there be an awareness of objects which exist outside the mind without an awareness of their Creator as well. ⁴

Kuyper’s concern is with the fact that we cannot successfully demonstrate the existence of an “I” nor can we explain why it is we trust the deliverances of senses. We must have faith in our own existence and in our senses. However, Van Til is correct to note that this faith is not an answer to skepticism when abstracted from God and the covenantal context of creation and revelation.

As far as the exceptions to the antithesis for which Kuyper allows, the question remains: why does he allow for the exceptions of weighing, measuring, and the use of logic and why does he have a notion of common grace which allows him to have a limited neutral zone?

Perhaps his discussion of how the physical sciences differ from the spiritual sciences enter in at this point. ⁵ If I understand Kuyper correctly here, he sees the very physicality of the objects of physical science as constraining how we are to understand them. Kuyper’s larger discussion of the differences between the physical or natural sciences and the spiritual sciences revolves around the subject/object distinction.

In the physical sciences, the physical object constrains the notions the subject has about it to a greater extent than the object of the spiritual science. Kuyper here is neither denying the real existence of spiritual objects as over against physical objects, nor is he suggesting that in there is no subjective element involved in the assessment of physical objects in the natural sciences. Quite to the contrary. In both the natural (i.e., physical) and spiritual sciences, there exists both the object and the subject. The difference has to do with the physical-ness of the object of the natural sciences and how that in itself somehow constrains the subjective element in the understanding of what Kuyper calls “elements” and “relations” in the human mind with its corresponding “representations” and “conceptions.” The object of the spiritual science (say, the soul in psychology) is not tangible (although no less real for that fact) and so there is greater room for the subjective element to be creative. ⁶

If this is a fair and accurate reading of Kuyper’s epistemology, then one can see how he might see the antithesis working itself out in greater detail in the spiritual sciences than in the natural sciences. In other words, things like weighing and measuring are physical activities that can be checked and verified quite easily and, in fact, believers and unbelievers use the same procedures.

While logic would seem to be closer to the spiritual science, it is, I believe, what he would label a “mixed science” insofar that once a thought is put down on paper it becomes physical and can be checked. It would seem to be the case that Kuyper’s area of limited neutrality and the practices of measuring, weighing and use of logic overlap at this point. Van Til recognizes that logic, for instance, has not been obliterated by the fall. But it has been affected nonetheless.

Given Kuyper’s emphasis on the absolute nature of the antithesis, it is not surprising that he would think that apologetics has little value or that it has a minor role to play within the theological encyclopedia (K3). ⁷

Since belief and unbelief operate on different principles (the natural on the one hand, and the spiritual on the other), there is no point in entering into debate or dialogue. At first it might appear that Kuyper’s inconsistency of recognizing areas unaffected by the fall and the limited neutral zone within common grace might make space for apologetics. But given the very specific nature of areas not affected by the fall or the limited neutral zone (assuming that these are not the same or don’t overlap in some way), apologetics would seem to have no room in which to move around.

Kuyper does have a place for apologetics though. He sees it as a way for Christianity to respond to philosophical challenges and within his theological encyclopedia he places it as a subdivision of the dogmatical sciences, which itself is divided from the bibliological, ecclesiological, and diaconological sciences which are all part of the theological discipline. ⁸

End Notes
1. See Kuyper, Principles, 157-159.

2. This is not to be confused with the Roman Catholic doctrine of “formed faith.”

3. Kuyper, Principles, 125-146.

4. See Van Til, Defense, 286-290.

5. Kuyper, Principles, 89-105.

6. Kuyper, Principles, 63-89.

7. Kuyper, Principles, 154 and 160.

8. See Kuyper, Principles, 627-639. A fuller discussion of the place of apologetics is found in the untranslated third volume of Kuyper’s Encyclopaedie.