Indus Apologetics Journal

Dehumanization: The Humanistic Agenda, P. Andrew Sandlin

Humanism has been around since Genesis 3. It is the belief that there is no God or, better yet, that man himself is a god. The temptation of the serpent to Eve was simple: If you establish your own moral standards, and act on them, you can be as God (Gen. 3:5). The history of depraved man is the history of an unending quest for an ever more consistent humanism. From the ancient world empires - Egypt, Babylon, Persia, Rome - to the Italian Renaissance to the European Enlightenment to Romanticism and finally to today’s “postmodernism,” man’s root sin is humanism - the desire to be his own god.

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Envy , Pavel Bartos

Thou shall not envy! Thou shall not fear envy, nor shall thou feel guilty for the envy of others!

While there are several theories suggested as to the motivation of the suicidal killers who destroyed the lives of thousands in New York and Washington on September 11, very, very seldom do I hear the word “envy” uttered in the official pronouncements from the government authorities, the media, or even in the expert opinions of professional psychologists, sociologists, or theologians in this respect. Yet, I am not only convinced that it was ultimately a certain kind of envy standing behind these terrorist acts as the most fundamental cause, but also that there is a causal relation between envy as the ultimate motivational ground and the horrors of World War I, Hitler’s national socialism, Stalin’s international socialism, as well as all other wars and revolutions, civil or international, all around the world now and in history. In other words, I suggest that envy reaches way back to the original sin representing the main constitutive element thereof, as well as the main perpetual constitutive factor, of the hereditary sin of mankind. This seems to be the main reason for the linguistic tabooization of the term “envy” in human popular speech and communication, especially in the twentieth century and onward.

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Doin’ Good Ain’t Bad, Shawn T. Roberson

Sola Gratia! Sola Fide! Reformation battle cries, these two phrases show the emphasis placed upon a correct view of justification. With Paul, the Reformers declared that salvation is solely by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8). Their fight continues today, as many still attempt to give man credit for some small contribution to the work of salvation. Salvation is sometimes illustrated by pictures of a dying man simply having to open his mouth to accept a healing medication from the hands of Christ, or of a drowning man reaching for a lifeline thrown his way by Christ. Problems with these illustrations arise when we consider the fact that Paul says we were dead in our trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1) — not sick or dying. Dead men cannot open their mouths or swallow medicine. They cannot reach out for a rope. All they can do is lie motionless. The condition of death itself prohibits action. If anything is done for a dead man, someone other than himself must do it.

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Apologetics And Polemics: An important companion of Apologetics is Polemics. While Apologetics deals with objections and attacks originating from people outside the Christian faith, Polemics deals with attacks originating from within the Church. Many of the readers might be surprised when we mention attacks from “within” the church because none of us expects our own people to attack our blessed faith. However, people have always existed within the Jewish and the Christian faith who have attacked the Old and the New Testament.

These attacks come in two forms. First, in the form of distorted Bible interpretation. Second, through those false cults who claim that they are a true Christian group.

People who attack the Bible from inside the Church would include everyone who teach perverted doctrines. During the New Testament period this included the Ebionites, Pelegians, Montanists, Nestorians, Arians, and many others from within the Church. At the dawn of the twenty-first century this would include the radicals, the ecumenists, the Christian New Agers. This would also include those who teach salvation through baptism, those who attack the person of Christ (Smithism/Poonenism), and those who Hinduize Christian doctrines (Prajapati Proponents, Christian Vedantists), etc.

False Cults which claim to be Christian but who still attack the fundamentals of the Christian faith include, Jehovah Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Mormons, TPM (Ceylon Pentecostal Mission), Roman Catholics, The Toronto Movement, etc. Their number is growing constantly, and the leaven of their erroneous teachings is also spreading.

Though Apologetics and Polemics are two different activities, their ultimate purpose is one and the same: to refute error and to establish truth. Till a few decades ago they could easily be separated from each other so that those who practice Apologetics did not need to know about Polemics, and those who specialized in Polemics did not have to study apologetics. But no more ! All kinds of attacks against the Christian faith now borrow insights from each other, so that today every apologist must be an expert in polemics, and every polemicist must be an expert in apologetics.