Journal: Grace Theological Journal
Volume: GTJ 09:1 (Spring 1988)
Article: The Validity of Human Language: A Vehicle for Divine Truth
Author: Jack Barentsen

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GTJ 9:1 (Spr 88) p. 21

The Validity of Human Language:
A Vehicle for Divine Truth

Jack Barentsen

Doubts have arisen about the adequacy of human language to convey inerrant truth from God to man. These doubts are rooted in an empirical epistemology, as elaborated by Hume, Kant, Heidegger and others. Many theologians adopted such an empirical view and found themselves unable to defend a biblical view of divine, inerrant revelation. Barth was slightly more successful, but in the end he failed. The problem is the empirical epistemology that first analyzes man’s relationship with creation. Biblically, the starting point should be an analysis of man’s relationship with his Creator. When approached this way, creation (especially the creation of man in God’s image) and the incarnation show that God and man possess an adequate, shared communication system that enables God to communicate intelligibly and inerrantly with man. Furthermore, the Bible’s insistence on written revelation shows that inerrant divine communication carries the same authority whether written or spoken.

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As a result of the materialistic, empirical scepticism of the last two centuries, many theologians entertain doubts about the adequacy of human language to convey divine truth (or, in some cases, to convey truth of any kind). This review of the philosophical and theological origins of the current doubts about language lays a foundation for a biblical view of language.

The Contemporary Problem

One recent writer stated the problem of the adequacy of religious language in these words:

The problem of religious knowledge, in the context of contemporary philosophical analysis, is basically this: no one has any. The problem of

GTJ 9:1 (Spr 88) p. 22

religious language, in the same context, is this: can we find an excuse for uttering these sentences we apparently have no business saying?1

The writer highlights two important aspects of the debate on the adequacy of language. First, the problems of religious knowledge and language arise primarily in the context of contemporary philosophical analysis. Second, the problem of religious language is inherent in the current sceptical view of religious knowledge: if we have no knowledge of transcendent realities, how could we speak about them in any meaningful way?2 What philosophical currents have led to such a bleak view of the possibility of religious knowledge and language?

Philosophical Background

Hume’s Empiricism

David Hume (1711–1776) believed that all knowledge is derived f...

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