Quasi-fideist Presuppositionalism: Cornelius Van Til, Wittgenstein, and Hinge Epistemology

Abstract I argue that the epistemology underlying Cornelius Van Til’s presuppositional apologetic methodology is quasi-fideist. According to this view, rationality of religious belief dependent on absolutely certain ungrounded grounds, called hinges . further quasi-fideist apologetics explains why method neither fideist nor problematically circular: are rational in sense they partly constitutive rationality, and all beliefs (not just ones) depend hinges. In addition, it illuminates something may strike one as a misguided or uncompelling method: instead starting by tackling comparatively minor epistemic commitments nonbeliever, directly approaches their deepest surest commitments.