Criticism of Zanchius on Romans 8:32 in 500 words or less

I know that technical logic can be oppressive. So I'm going to make a brief summary of the objections I posted in my previous blog posts on Zanchius's misuse of logic and his error on Romans 8:32 in particular.

Zanchius made this comment about Romans 8:32:

In the same chapter Paul asks, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all [i.e., for all us elect persons], how shall He not, with Him, also freely give us all things?" i.e., salvation and all things necessary to it. Now, it is certain that these are not given to every individual, and yet, if Paul says true, they are given to all those for whom Christ was delivered to death; consequently He was not delivered to death for every individual.

In this paragraph, Zanchius makes the following two-step argument:

Argument 1:
Major premise: All elect are regenerated
Minor premise: All elect are died-for (here "died-for" means those atoned-for, those for whom Christ was delivered to death, the redeemed, however you wish to express that concept);
Conclusion: All died-for are regenerated.

Argument 2:
Major premise: All died-for are regenerated (this is the conclusion of argument 1)
Minor premise: Some men are not regenerated;
Conclusion: Therefore some men are not died-for.

(See "Zanchius: Logic gone awry - Part II" to see how I arrived at these statements of Zanchius's argument and a more complete analysis of the logic involved.)

Argument 2 is valid and powerful. But the whole two-step argument (which includes both Argument 1 and Argument 2) is unsound because of a fallacy in Argument 1. The fallacy is called illicit process. Look at argument 1 again. He has said nothing about all "died-for" in the premises, but then, in the conclusion, says something about all "died-for." This violates the laws of categorical syllogisms.

If you do the following exercise, it will help you see Zanchius's error. (Use a pencil and paper.) In Argument 1 above, substitute "bananas" for "elect," "yellow things" for "regenerated," and "sweet things" for "died-for." Funny, isn't it?

Here's another illustration:

Major premise: All snow is cold;
Minor premise: all snow is white
Conclusion: therefore all white things are cold

You can make all manner of similar silly arguments using Zanchius's flawed logic.

I draw two conclusions from this. First, Zanchius's argument on Romans 8:32 does not work to prove that Christ did not die for some men. I do not believe there is another verse in the Bible that can even remotely be used to prove that Christ did not die for some men.

Second, Zanchius has proven himself to be untrustworthy in his use of logic. From now on, whenever I read Zanchius, he will have to prove himself to me. Zanchius's logic is on probation.

Zanchius: Logic gone awry - Part II

Immanual Kant said, "Fallacious and misleading arguments are most easily detected if set out in correct syllogistic form." [Quoted in Copi and Cohen, "Introduction to Logic," 10th ed., p. 256.]

Kant was certainly correct, and it is just this procedure that I hope to apply to the argument of Zanchius in respect of Romans 8:32. In part I, I made a critique of the logic of Jerome Zanchius in the argument he used to reach the conclusion that Christ did not die for every man. He committed a fairly egregious error in logic, which shows that he was capable of making such errors. I say that to prepare the reader's mind to accept that Zanchius might have made a similar error in his analysis of Romans 8:32. Some readers will be strongly tempted to try to rehabilitate Zanchius as if his logic were not really flawed — as if it were all just a big misunderstanding. No; Zanchius could — and did — commit logical errors of the most obvious kind.

Here is Zanchius's comment on Romans 8:32 (which is in the paragraph following the paragraphs I criticized in part I:

In the same chapter Paul asks, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all [i.e., for all us elect persons], how shall He not, with Him, also freely give us all things?" i.e., salvation and all things necessary to it. Now, it is certain that these are not given to every individual, and yet, if Paul says true, they are given to all those for whom Christ was delivered to death; consequently He was not delivered to death for every individual.

This is a two-step argument, consisting of two categorical syllogisms. The second argument is a good and powerful one, and I'll set it out first.

All died-for are regenerated,
Some men are not regenerated;
Therefore some men are not died-for.

I use the term "died-for" as a short way of expressing "those for whom Christ died." I use the term "regenerated" as referring to those men who are given salvation and all things necessary to it — who one day come to faith. This is a valid argument, and if the premises are true, then the conclusion must be true. I suspect many have been convinced of the truth of limited atonement by this argument. We can analyze this argument using Venn diagrams. The major premise looks like this:

We add a cross to the diagram to represent the minor premise, "some men are not regenerated."

The cross must go somewhere outside the "regenerated" circle (as required by the minor premise) and somewhere outside the "died-for" circle as required by the major premise (the major premise shaded out as empty all the area within the "died-for" circle that is outside the "regenerated" circle). The only place the cross can be placed is in an area that indicates that there are some men (at least one man) who is outside the "died-for" circle, and thus Zanchius's syllogism is confirmed. There is at least one man (probably Judas — and many more beside) who is not died-for.

The conclusion follows ineluctably from the premises. Where does Zanchius get these premises from? The minor premise is universally believed to be true — at least by conservative Christians. But what of the major premise? That premise comes from the first argument in the two-step chain of argumentation.

This premise is contained in the clause, "and yet, if Paul says true, they are given to all those for whom Christ was delivered to death...." The word "if" indicates to us that Zanchius has reached this conclusion as the result of a previous argument. (If such and such is true, then such and such proposition follows.) Zanchius claims to get the proposition from the apostle. But since the verse does not contain this proposition explicitly, it must come as the result of an argument.

So what is this step-one argument? Here it is, taken from Zanchius's paragraph, paraphrased and set down in syllogistic form:

All elect are died-for,
all elect are regenerated;
therefore, all died-for are regenerated.

Before we turn to the Venn diagram, let's confirm that we have represented Zanchius accurately. The first premise (it is actually the minor premise) says "all elect are died-for." This comes from Zanchius's statement, "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all [i.e., for all us elect persons]...." To paraphrase, Christ was delivered up for all us elect persons. Or — even shorter — all elect are died-for.

The second (major) premise comes from Zanchius's statement, ""how shall He not, with Him, also freely give us all things?" i.e., salvation and all things necessary to it." As a paraphrase we could say, "He will regenerate all elect," or "all elect are regenerated," which is our minor premise.

As one last minor housekeeping matter, we should reverse the order of the first and second premises to put the major premise first. (The major premise contains the predicate of the conclusion.) So the final form of the argument is:

All elect are regenerated,
all elect are died-for;
therefore, all died-for are regenerated.

Let's look at the Venn diagram. The major premise, "all elect are regenerated looks like this:

Now we add the minor premise, "all elect are died-for:"

We are left with a diagram showing that all the elect are both died-for and regenerated. But look at that diagram. Somehow Zanchius arrives at the conclusion from this argument that all died-for are regenerated. How does he do that? Look at that big old space of died-for folks who are outside of the elect and regenerated circles. Zanchius's argument is a complete flop — again.

Argument 1 being a big flop, argument 2 (which was sound up til now) becomes a big flop as well. Even if we interpret Romans 8:32 in the way Zanchius wants us to, the logic doesn't work out favorably for his argument.

As before, we've seen the diagrams, but it is also useful to consider a parallel argument to illustrate the fallacy. So here is a parallel argument:

All bananas are yellow,
all bananas are sweet,
therefore, all sweet things are yellow.

As ridiculous as that looks, it is the very argument Zanchius used as the first step of his two-step argument. The only difference is in the terms used. Just to round things off, let's illustrate the valid step-two argument:

All sweet things are yellow,
Some candy is not yellow;
therefor some candy is not sweet.

The step-two argument is perfectly valid; the problem lies in the false major premise that was taken from the conclusion of the fallacious step-one argument.

Technorati Tags: Calvinism, John Calvin, limited atonement, unlimited atonement, Zanchius, Romans 8:32

Zanchius: Logic gone awry - Part I

I have criticized, previously and in another forum, Jerome Zanchius's treatment of Romans 8:32. I was going to brush up the criticism in order to publish it here. In researching the article, I found that Zanchius's logic is worse than my first impression told me, so I decided to make this a two-part article.

I refer to Zanchius's argument in chapter 2 (entitled "The Will of God") in his work, "Observations on the Divine Attributes." In Position 9, he says this:

As God doth not will that each individual of mankind should be saved, so neither did He will that Christ should properly and immediately die for each individual of mankind, whence it follows that, though the blood of Christ, from its own intrinsic dignity, was sufficient for the redemption of all men, yet, in consequence of His Father's appointment, He shed it intentionally, and therefore effectually and immediately, for the elect only.

This is self-evident. God, as we have before proved, wills not the salvation of every man, but He gave His Son to die for them whose salvation He willed; therefore His Son did not die for every man.

The argument (contained in the second paragraph, which is intended to prove the assertions contained in the first paragraph) is a syllogism and can be set out as follows:

All willed-for are died-for;
Some men are not willed-for,
therefore, some men are not died-for.

Here "willed-for" means "those men whom God wills the salvation of." "Died-for" means "those who God gave His Son to die for." I switched the order of Zanchius's first and second premises in order to put the major premise first. It looks strong, but it's a fallacy. We can see this if we set out the argument using Venn diagrams.

The major premise, "all willed-for are died-for," looks like this:

The part of the circle representing the willed-for that is not also part of the died-for circle is shaded out to represent that it is empty. That is, there are no willed-for who are not died-for.

To show the minor premise, "some men are not willed-for," we will put a cross in the men circle but outside the willed-for circle. The cross means that there is at least one man whom God has not willed to save. But notice that we have a couple of choices. We can put the cross either inside our outside the died-for circle. We can legitimately put the cross within the intersection of the men and died-for circles because that part of the circle has not been shaded. It would look like this:

The diagram shows a cross in the section of the diagram that represents men who are died-for, but are not willed-for. This diagram demonstrates that Zanchius's argument does not prove what he wants it to prove. In order for Zanchius's argument to be confirmed, the cross would have to be placed in the section of the men circle that lies outside the died-for circle, and this placement would have to be required by the terms of the major premise. The diagram would have to look like this:

The diagrams show the fallacy. But we can also see the fallacy by making a parallel argument using more familiar terms. Examine this precisely parallel argument:

Some brain surgeons, as we have before proved, are not geniuses, but a high IQ is possessed by all geniuses; therefore a high IQ is not possessed by every brain surgeon.

Hopefully you can see how bad this reasoning is. And Zanchius's argument is just as bad.