Abstract

Our focus, like Plantinga's, is on the rationality of belief in God. Thus, Plantinga's argument, in God and Other Minds and through to the present, is an apology for belief in God. Apologetics, therefore, plays a significant role in this process and in the dissertation. ;In Chapter 2 we seek to lay out Plantinga's argument for a Reformed epistemology. As an apology, Plantinga argues that belief in God can be basic for a cognizer, and properly so. ;In Chapter 3 we work through Plantinga's latest notion of warrant as set forth primarily in Warrant and Proper Function, but not until other dominant views of warrant are found wanting in Warrant: The Current Debate. ;Criticisms of Plantinga's Reformed epistemology proposal, which will be transcendental in their thrust, begin in Chapter 4. We begin first by showing that Plantinga himself has, elsewhere in his writings, set forth an adequate approach to his own epistemology, but has neglected to follow it. We seek to provide some approximate parameters to the notion of a presupposition, and then to show that the Reformed rejection of natural theology was along presuppositional lines rather than a rejection of a certain epistemological structure and then how Plantinga's neglect of presuppositional argumentation gives way to a false view of religious neutrality. ;Chapter 5 attempts to show Plantinga's Reformed epistemology as explained in Chapter 2 to be in need of serious revision. It provides, at best, for metaphysical agnosticism and epistemological relativism, neither of which Plantinga would want to affirm. ;Chapter 6 is an attempt to put Plantinga's notion of warrant within the proper epistemological framework, that of creation, the fall and redemption in Jesus Christ. It attempts to show the necessity of revelation in any and all reasoning about knowledge, belief, etc. ;Chapter 7 speculates on Plantinga's forthcoming third volume and tries to place the notions of the sensus divinitatis and the testimonium Spiritus Sancti, both with which Plantinga promises to deal within their proper Christian framework