
Francis Schaeffer was influential during his lifetime. His challenge for the Christian community to defend the lives of the unborn helped to spark the Christian Right movement. He wouldn’t likely support the movement in its current form due to its theonomist tendencies, a concept Schaeffer clearly opposed in A Christian Manifesto. Schaeffer died in 1984 after battling lymphoma cancer for six years.
His approach to apologetics was primarily built upon a clear presentation of the Gospel borrowing from both the presuppositionalist mindset as well as evidentialism. Basically, Schaeffer, began by pointing out how the unbeliever’s logic is built upon a faulty presupposition. But his main goal was to bring them to the realization that their theory is bankrupt. In order to do this he would utilize whatever evidence of their inconsistency he could point to. Illustrating his point, Schaeffer runs through several means he would use in evangelism.
To the extent that the individual is illogical we have a point of contact. Therefore, to a certain type we preach of sin and point out to him that by his sin he has been brought down to the gutter. To some we give Dr. Machen’s book, The Virgin Birth. To some we appeal to fulfilled prophecy. To some we use the classical arguments. To some we use the philosophical approach. We show them the alternatives, whether it is the man in the gutter or the philosophically minded unbeliever. We use what point of contact we can get. If they flee from the nearer contacts into the distant we pursue them there. In either case it is Christ or death. It is Christ or Diana, Christ or Modernism, Christ or irrationality, Christ or suicide. So it goes. The last step back to which we press them is into the blackness of irrationality, and if they are already there we ask them why they haven’t committed suicide. (A Review of a Review)
Schaeffer also founded L’Abri Fellowship International, an informal school that allowed people to have a place to stay where they could discuss their questions about God and the significance of life. There are currently eight study centers operating throughout the world continuing in Schaeffer’s tradition. Needless to say, Francis Schaeffer left an enduring legacy.
In Escape from Reason, Schaeffer writes with excellent clarity on a subject that too often contains overly complicated arguments. His simplicity is a rarity in the field of philosophy. Escape from Reason is probably the first book in this genre that I was able to read without constantly needing to backtrack and re-read several pages out of confusion.
However, just because the logic was easy to follow, it was in no way amateurish. Each chapter builds upon the first adding greater certainty to his analysis. I found myself wanting to write it all down somewhere so I wouldn’t too quickly forget. This is a book you will want to re-read just to be able to apply it’s content to your own philosophical discussions.
Schaeffer’s goal is quite ambitious. He attempts to prove that once men reject the Biblical God they also lose their foundation for reason. He explains what he terms a “two story” division of knowledge that every philosopher must deal with. The “upper story” contains faith while the “lower story” contains reason. Beginning with Thomas Aquinas and ending with modern man, Schaeffer reveals how everyone was struggling to answer the same questions. Yet, apart from a Biblical foundation, the questions remain unsolved.
Escape from Reason contains a mere 96 pages. Schaeffer perfected the art of removing superfluous words from his writing making each one count. College students will find this book especially helpful when philosophy classes deal with theories that are the very antithesis of the Bible. Plus, did I mention the book is short? I wish I would have found this book sooner than I did. It would have helped me provide more thorough critiques of the epistemology of every philosopher we studied in class.
Purchase Escape from Reason by Francis A. Schaeffer at Westminster Bookstore for $7.60 (5% Off) or you can purchase Trilogy (which contains 3 books by Schaeffer including Escape from Reason) for $16.25 (35% Off).
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