I’ve come across something very troubling, it has to do with someone I hold in high esteem. Colin Gunton believes that Thomas Torrance is (was) a foundationalist and rationalist. I’m reading a book entitled: Revelation And Reason, Colin Gunton (edited by P. H. Brazier). The book is 
posthmously published as lectures that Gunton gave to his Masters students at King’s College in 1999 (Colin Gunton went to be with the Lord May 2003, I actually met him at a lecture series he gave at my school in 2002); so they are his lectures that have been transcribed and put into book form. It is in this book, and thus lecture by Gunton, that he asserts that in fact T.F. Torrance along with Schleiermacher and Locke, no less, is a foundationalist; and quite the rationalist really. Let me quote the question given to Gunton, and then his response:
Q. Do you think Torrance is actually trying to do that trap? [meaning fall into the foundationalist camp]
[Gunton’s response] Oh yes! Torrance, you see, is, I believe, definitely falling into this trap! Interestingly enough this is the thing that people ask in this group year after year [the Masters seminar he is teaching]. When Torrance talks about intuition he doesn’t mean a leap out of foundations to Revelation. It is intuitive in that sense. By intuition Torrance does mean, well, integrity, a kind of integration of data rather than leaping into another world. There is a very rationalistic side to Tom Torrance; he would use a foundationalist argument if he could. [brackets mine, throughout] (Colin E. Gunton, “Revelation And Reason,” edited by P.H. Brazier, 35)
This is troubling to me. I want to avoid foundationalism; I want to avoid me, and “start” with Jesus; I want to, in a principled way, methodologically think from a center within Jesus. But I don’t wan’t to be Barthian π ; and of course this is what they seek to provide, beyond Torrance, and back with Barth — viz. the possibility to move beyond thinking from a center in myself. A possibility to truly think out of the center of God’s life in Christ. That’s what the Barthian proposal is; it’s to get postmetaphyscial with it, you know get actualised! Gunton is saying what Bruce McCormack says about Torrance; that he’s still got some larceny metaphysicalism lurking around, and it ought to be rubbed out if its truly going to offer a way to know God’s being in becoming (a way to move beyond any foundations in myself by those so called foundations actually being constuitive of God’s self-giving being in His election to not be God without us). Ah, man, this is troubling news for a Torrancean π .
P.S.
Here’s something else from Gunton on why he calls Torrance a foundationalist:
There is the influence here of Torrance’s teacher A. E. Taylor from the 1920’s. Taylor called for the locating of authority neither in individualism nor in institutionalism, but in a reality that is wholly given and trans-subjective and is simply and absolutely authoritative. If knowledge is to be more than personal opinion then there must be limits placed on our personal intellectual constructs by something that is not constructed but received. This is a typical objective view. Now, by intuition Torrance means not a leap but a Polanyian integration. What a scientist does according to Polanyi is to bring together all the various clues in a problem and integrate them by an act of bringing them together, seeing them make sense.
This is what Torrance is doing with theology, using these tools for Revelation, integrating them intuitively, as it were, into a whole. Torrance comes after Kant, Locke is before Kant; that seems to me to be important, crucially important as we shall see. (pg. 50).
P.P.S I use the language of ‘Lament” for rhetorical purposes. I knew that many claimed that T.F. Torrance was a rationalist/foundationalist, I just hadn’t heard Gunton make these claims, specifically, before. I believe that TFT’s ‘stratified knowledge’ and the way he frames things anthropologically provide a way forward with Torrance that still offers a way to think out of the center of God’s life in Christ without becoming post-metaphysical (so to speak).
Btw, the picture I use of TF Torrance in the post was sketched by Adam Nigh’s talented wife, Rachel Nigh (Adam is a good brother, fellow Torrancean, and friend; you can find his blog in my blogroll “Draw Nigh To God”).
It’s ok, many good theologians were foundationalists. Are you done with Torrance now that you found out he was so naive to believe in a foundation other than christ for knowledge of christ.
No, Kenny, I’m not done with Torrance; I knew of this charge before, I didn’t know though that Gunton made it too. I’m going to add to the body of the post a little more; something else that Gunton provides to explain why he says this about Torrance. If Christ is the foundation, then we’re still doing okay (I Cor 3.11) π .
“I want to avoid me, and βstartβ with Jesus; I want to, in a principled way, methodologically think from a center within Jesus.”
Do you seriously believe this is a possibility for humans. You you really believe you can bi-pass your humanity in search for the truth about an object. This just isn’t even a possibility, you have equipment in your head that constricts any knowledge so of course one needs to start with “me” and that me is doing all the work through the senses and faculty of embodied reason. at the most basic level of christianity jesus did come to be seen and was handled and said things that had to be thought about him with the minds that the simple disciples had, he just didn’t mystically reveal a story about himself with all the subjective warrant supplied to the receiver so they can be sure they aren’t in any way constructing the knowledge of Christ on anything but Christ. I think that term (only on Christ) by the way is based in false humility, it sounds good, but it is wrong for so many reasons. I guess I’m dubious on the desire to by-pass the subject (Me and you, humans) in the search for who Jesus was. We believe because of the long history of witness to the fact of jesus’ life and resurrection. it as started by people who saw and handled the word of life and then they testified to us – to believe this has to be based on some foundations.
Kenny,
You’re sounding like Locke. Here’s how Gunton summarizes Lockean foundationalism (all kinds really):
Kenny, I’m committed to “Revelational Theology,” which means that epistemology does not precede soteriology; but soteriology (and thus Christ and Trinity) is where it starts for me. I don’t want to construct something of my own making (even collectively with other viatores) as the agreed upon ground upon which I can then rest “my voluntary faith;” so if this is what you mean by asking me if I can bypass my “humanity” to know God, then yes. But that’s too overstated, how could I honestly mean that? In fact, that’s not what I said when I was sketching the Barthian thing in the post (the context you took that from). That’s not what I mean at all, and the Incarnation itself undercuts that kind of gnositicism (i.e. bypassing my humanity); in fact the Incarantion (the homoousion), the idea of Jesus as Mediator, means that in fact humanity is the very place where my knowledge of God begins, but not in myself (at least myself by myself or in my old self). No, instead, “in Christ’s” divine person (God and Man consubstantiated). So yes, I do believe that. And I do believe it’s really late here (like 12:45am), and I need to go to bed; more talk tomorrow for me π .
Bobby, I wonder what kind of foundationalism Gunton is referring to and where he sees that in Torrance’s writings. Does he provide a reference?
Since Torrance drew significantly from Polanyi’s epistemological work, would Gunton consider Polanyi to be a foundationalist as well?
I am not as up to speed on this issue as I would like to be, but I found this article that raised some interesting questions for further inquiry.
http://curdev.blogspot.com/2008/02/revelation-and-non-foundationalism.html
Jon,
I’m heading to bed, but maybe you asked your question before I supplied the quote in the “P.S.” Does that quote help provide a little more context for you to understand why Gunton would call TFT a foundationalist? Night . . . see you all in the morning or aftertoon sometime.
@Jon,
Still up π . Yeah, I just read the link, that correlates to what Gunton is getting at; in fact Gunton is appealing to Thiemman as well. My instinct is to say that TFT, as your “blog author” asserts, is that TFT is not truly a foundationalist (at least not in the Lockean sense). In the “P.S” quote, that’s exactly how Gunton leaves us hanging as well; he sees a decisive distinction between Locke and Torrance. Yet, Gunton still seems to think that TFT is some ‘form’ of a foundationalist; which I think is because of TFT still has conceieved of God’s inner life actually functioning back behind Jesus somehow; even if Torrance claims to only come to this by thinking from within the constraints provided by Jesus. So Jesus then becomes reduced to that “epistemological bridge” (per the quote to Kenny above) that Gunton believes is inimical to a foundationalism, one way or the other. In this way, Jesus’ person becomes the causal justification for our belief in the inner life of God; and on this basis I think Gunton holds that TFT is a foundationalist and even rationalist (albeit within a Thomist like framework of faith and reason). Okay, now I’m going to bed.
In a way, then, Gunton is saying that for TFT, Jesus’ person is instrumentalized in a way that gives “our reason” justification for saying that we know x,y,z about God; Gunton is saying that the dualism that TFT is seeking to overcome; that he doesn’t. That Jesus is reduced down to a principle to justify “our beliefs” about God.
I don’t know as much as I’d like about Torrance’s epistemology since I went straight to his doctrinal works! There is a difference in being a foundationalist in terms of knowledge in general and a foundationalist when it comes to knowledge of God. In fact, this is what McCormack argues for in relation to Barth: he says Barth was a foundationalist, holding to universal categories as Kant, when it came to knowledge in general, but when it came to knowledge of God it was more complicated than that. Yes, as Kenny argues there was something tangible, historical that everyone could see. No one is denying that I don’t think. But at the same time, through the Spirit, God reveals the fullness of Jesus Christ subjectively to the believer. Christ in his historical person is still “hidden” until the Spirit reveals Him completely. Thus, Jesus is the objective pole of knowledge and the Holy Spirit subjectively reveals to us that He is God. That subjective point in time is as Bobby says soteric.
Bobby, how does Torrance differ from this? I’m very interested in this topic…
Bobby,
For some reason, I never thought of you as really caring about the bogeyman, “foundationalism.” I’ve yet to find a good definition, or at least one that doesn’t undermine all general epistemology, as Kenny was saying. It just seems like Gunton here is following his typical po-mo leanings. Barth, by contrast, never really disparaged general epistemology or philosophy, since they are indispensable to the theological task, even as they are relativized by revelation. Torrance is just following Barth here.
Bobby,
I won’t add much here really, save to say how really profound TFT was! But the charge of foundationalism can be made for also for many of us that use and think in epistemological forms. We really cannot escape the combination of experience and reason. And myself even as a Thomist, I am somewhat bound to a certain voluntarianism, that sees reason and even intellect as subservient to the will. But in srict theology of course voluntarianism is that theological position that all values are so through being chosen by God. And of course too there is a charge of a certain fideistic position here, which we cannot really escape either. But, yes always “epistemology”! π
Here’s a comment sent to me anonymously on TFT. I totally agree with whoever this commenter is on Gunton assessment in re. to Barth and TFT; in fact just preceding Gunton’s comments on TFT, he made the point that this commenter makes on Gunton’s view that Jesus is a Augustinian/neo-Platonic form for at least TFT (and by implication Barth).
Thanks for the feedback, guys; I must say, Gunton caught me off guard. I genuinely disagree with him in relation to TFT. I lieu of that, I am going to be reposting 3 short essays by Myk Habets on TFT’s critical realism; which in line with the mystery commenter, further develops how TFT was a critical realist and not a foundationalist!
“Critical realist verses foundationalist”.. in the end, what’s the difference? Christ is the ideal realist, and also the foundationalist Himself! π
How do we know it is a revelation from god which we can then build a theology from? What criteria gives it warrant, if you say it’s it’s own validation how is this not revelational foundationalism and if this is, why is it any better than other foundationalisms? it just seems that if you read a text which was translated into English which then is reflected on 2000 years removed from it’s context you would have to be, by necessity, some kind of foundationalist in order to even begin the task of understanding. One has to move from the known to the unknown to know what Is unknown, which awaits to be known. All to say, foundationalism is unavoidable. Even if Jesus appeared to you personally you would have to trust your senses to mediate the object before you, this is foundationalism. We don’t have this luxury so how much more are the foundations of reason to be trusted in our knowledge of Christ?
“Christ Himself is the objective ground and content of charis in every instance of its special Christian use… [in the NT] charis refers to the being and action of God as revealed and actualised in Jesus Christ, for He is in His person and work the self-giving of God to men …Grace is in fact identical with Jesus Christ in person and word and deed … neither the action nor the gift is separable from the person of the giver.” (TFT, The Doctrine of Grace, p.21, quoted in Paul Monar’s book: Thomas F. Torrance, Theologian Of The Trinity, page 10)
@Kenny,
This is where EC gets its “C” insofar as it appropriates something akin to TFT’s critical realism. The assumption is, and its an assumption come to only after the fact, is that we don’t have the noetic equipment available in some sort of nascent left-over intellectual prowess post-Fall. It’s the idea that no-one can say Jesus is Lord w/o the Spirit (I Cor. 12.3 “repentant thinking” as TFT is so fond of saying).
@Fr Robert,
Amen. And its that kind of stuff with TFT that really runs around the foundationlist critique levied by Gunton and others (in a way fideist, but not irrationalist or rationalist . . . “Scientific” in fact “Theological Scientific”).
I’m going to post all of those essays by Myk Habets on TFT’s critical realism now; that ought to go much further in rehabilitating Gunton’s “Foundationalist/Rationalist” TFT π .
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@Bobby,
Yes, I love the man of God Thomas Torrance! And as I have noted what I can “understand” of his theology? π “Theology is the unique science devoted to knowledge of God, differing from other sciences by the uniqueness of its subject which can only be apprehended on its own terms and from within the actual situation it has created in our existence in making itself kown.” (Theological Science, TFT, Oxford 1969)
Bobby, I will let “you” unpack that! π
Just check my recent post (its’ only 12,000 words π ). But yes, I like TFT’s theological science, in fact that’s really what my chapter is on for our book (more as an introduction prolegomena word).
@Kevin,
I’m curious why you thought I wasn’t interested in this particular bogeyman?
@Randy,
Well put!
Bobby: You gotta do that Ph.D. mate! π But TFT just has to be one of the most “Theo-logic” guys around! He even moves well beyond Barth in a certain way & depth! But this is hardly “biblical” theology, as more “depth” theology if I can use the word. π @Bobby Grow
I’m just an old pastor-teacher, that still loves theology, but my best mental days are behind me. But I keep at and after it some! π@irishanglican ~ Fr. Robert
Bobby: Btw, forget the degrees, without the “passion” they mean little before the Throne! π But I am glad I chased mine back when. Again, you must chase yours!
Fr Robert,
Thanks for the encouragement! You can call it “depth”, you know TFT has a book “Depth Dimension”, which is basically his offering of his hermeneutical approach. Adam Nigh has been doing his PhD work under John Webster on this very issue; and Nigh’s Chapter 3 (for our book), which is excellent, is on this very issue — here’s the title to Adam’s chapter: The Depth Dimension of Scripture: A Prolegomenon to Evangelical Calvinism. It’s good stuff!
As soon as I can get the funds raised I’m off and running on that PhD with Myk! Thanks.
Bobby: Yeah I remembered “depth” something in TFT. As I get older however, I am being pressed by God I feel pastorally, to a more simple “Biblicism”. There really is something so profound about the bare Text itself! But theology helps “tune” that wave if I can say it! But also with my experience in war, I am always pressed back toward the God Who is always Totally Other! To use Barth here. Why I survived, and others did not? will always be with me until the glory! @Bobby Grow
Fr Robert,
Yes, that is always my drive and inclination too! I spend more time reading the Bible in a day than I usually do any theological texts π . It’s interesting what suffering of any kind can do for the perspective. When I was dealing with cancer the only thing I really read, when I did read, was the Scriptures. That’s still it for me, and my heart is still pastoral; but then I still like all of the theology stuff and see how it’s a necessary thing (to help read the Bible better sometimes).
Bobby,
Yes, this reminds me of reading Augustine’s Confessions, which is really more about God, than Augustine. But, Augustine certainly loved the Word of God, with the theological doctrine of God! And ‘Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee!’ But this is always a constant need and place, for faith.
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Amen.
Iβm curious why you thought I wasnβt interested in this particular bogeyman?
Oh, I just meant that I figured you would see it (Gunton’s “foundationalist” rhetorical ploy) as a bogeyman, which apparently you have…so all is well. π
@Kevin,
Yes, but his ploy took me a second to figure out I must admit. I was somewhat weighted toward Gunton in my past life, still trying to shake that off a bit π . But no, I never really bit full force on Gunton here; it just took me a second to figure out what it was that was aloof about his evaluation of TFT. I know from reading TFT that what Gunton was saying was amiss; alas, a perfect set-up for Myk Habets to come in on a white horse π .