Apologetics (from Greek language ) is the religious discipline of defending religious doctrines through systematic and discourse. Early Christian writers (c. 120–220) who defended their beliefs against critics and recommended their faith to outsiders were called Christian apologists. In 21st-century usage, apologetics is often identified with debates over religion and theology.
In the Koine Greek of the New Testament, the Apostle Paul employs the term apologia in his trial speech to Porcius Festus and Agrippa I when he says "I make my defense" in Acts 26:2. A cognate form appears in Paul's Letter to the Philippians as he is "defending the gospel" in Philippians 1:7, and in "giving an answer" in 1 Peter 3:15.
Although the term apologetics has Western, primarily Christian origins and is most frequently associated with the defense of Christianity, the term is sometimes used referring to the defense of any religion in formal debate involving religion.
Christian apologetics has taken many forms over the centuries. In the Roman Empire, Christians were severely persecuted, and many charges were brought against them. Examples in the Bible include the Apostle Paul's address to the Athenians in the Areopagus ( Acts 17: 22-34). J. David CasselJ. David Cassel. "Defending the Cannibals: How Christians responded to the sometimes strange accusations of their critics." gives several examples: Tacitus wrote that Nero fabricated charges that Christians started the burning of Rome.Tacitus, Annals XV.44 Other charges included cannibalism (due to a literal interpretation of the Eucharist) and incest (due to early Christians' practice of addressing each other as "brother" and "sister"). Paul the Apostle, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and others often defended Christianity against charges that were brought to justify persecution.
Later apologists have focused on providing reasons to accept various aspects of Christian belief. Christian apologists of many traditions, in common with Jews, Muslims, and some others, argue for the existence of a unique and personal God. Theodicy is one important aspect of such arguments, and Alvin Plantinga's arguments have been highly influential in this area. Many prominent Christian apologists are scholarly philosophers or theologians, frequently with additional doctoral work in physics, cosmology, comparative religions, and other fields. Others take a more popular or pastoral approach. Some prominent modern apologists are Douglas Groothuis, Frederick Copleston, John Lennox, Walter R. Martin, Dinesh D'Souza, Douglas Wilson, Cornelius Van Til, Gordon Clark, Francis Schaeffer, Greg Bahnsen, Edward John Carnell, James White, R. C. Sproul, Hank Hanegraaff, Alister McGrath, Lee Strobel, Josh McDowell, Peter Kreeft, G. K. Chesterton, William Lane Craig, J. P. Moreland, Hugh Ross, David Bentley Hart, Gary Habermas, Norman Geisler, Scott Hahn, RC Kunst, Trent Horn, and Jimmy Akin.
Apologists in the Catholic Church include Bishop Robert Barron, G. K. Chesterton,
Scott Hahn, Trent Horn, Jimmy Akin, Patrick Madrid, Kenneth Hensley, Karl Keating, Ronald Knox, and Peter Kreeft.John Henry Newman (1801–1890) was an English convert to Roman Catholicism, later made a cardinal, and beatified in 2010. In early life, he was a major figure in the Oxford Movement to bring the Church of England back to its Catholic roots. Eventually his studies in history persuaded him to become a Roman Catholic. When John Henry Newman entitled his spiritual autobiography Apologia Pro Vita Sua in 1864, he was playing upon both this connotation, and the more commonly understood meaning of an expression of contrition or regret.
Christian apologists employ a variety of philosophical and formal approaches, including ontological, cosmological, and teleological arguments. The Christian presuppositionalist approach to apologetics uses the transcendental argument for the existence of God.Apologetics: A Justification of Christian Belief. John Frame-Joseph Torres - P&R Publishing - 2015 p. 67f
Tertullian was an early Christianity apologist. He was born, lived, and died in Carthage. He is sometimes known as the "Father of the Latin Church". He introduced the term Trinity () to the Christian vocabulary A History of Christian Thought, Paul Tillich, Touchstone Books, 1972. (p. 43) and probably the formula "three Persons, one Substance" as the Latin "tres , Consubstantial" (from the Koine Greek "treis Hypostaseis, Ousios"), and the terms Vetus Testamentum (Old Testament) and Novum Testamentum (New Testament).
Several well known apologetic organizations of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, such as the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (a group of scholars at Brigham Young University) and FairMormon (an independent, not-for-profit group run by Latter Day Saints), have been formed to defend the doctrines and history of the Latter Day Saint movement in general and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in particular.
In the early 18th century, Christian missionary Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg engaged in dialogues with several Tamil language-speaking Malabars Hindu priests, and recorded arguments of these Hindu apologists. These records include German-language reports submitted to the Lutheran headquarters in Halle, and 99 letters written by the Hindu priests to him (later translated into German under the title Malabarische Korrespondenz from 1718 onwards).
During 1830–1831, missionary John Wilson engaged in debates with Hindu apologists in Bombay. In 1830, his protege Ram Chandra, a Hindu convert to Christianity, debated with several Hindu Brahmin apologists in public. Hindu pandit Morobhatt Dandekar summarized his arguments from his 1831 debate with Wilson in a Marathi-language work titled Shri-Hindu-dharma-sthapana. Narayana Rao, another Hindu apologist, wrote Svadesha-dharma-abhimani in response to Wilson.
In the mid-19th century, several Hindu apologist works were written in response to John Muir's Mataparīkṣā. These include Mata-parīkṣā-śikṣā (1839) by Subaji Bapu of Central India, Mataparīkṣottara (1840) by Harachandra Tarkapanchanan of Calcutta, Śāstra-tattva-vinirṇaya (1844-1845) by Nilakantha Gore of Benares, and a critique (published later in 1861 as part of Dharmādharma-parīkṣā-patra) by an unknown Vaishnava writer.
A range of Indian philosophers, including Swami Vivekananda and Aurobindo Ghose, have written rational explanations regarding the values of the Hindu religious tradition. More modern proponents such as the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi have also tried to correlate recent developments from quantum physics and consciousness research with Hindu concepts. The late Reverend Pandurang Shastri Athavale has given a plethora of discourses regarding the symbolism and rational basis for many principles in the Veda. In his book The Cradle of Civilization, David Frawley, an American who has embraced the Vedic tradition, has characterized the ancient texts of the Hindu heritage as being like "pyramids of the spirit".
In response to modern Christian missionaries, and congregations that "are designed to appear Jewish, but are actually fundamentalist Christian churches, which use traditional Jewish symbols to lure the most vulnerable of our Jewish people into their ranks",Simon Schoon, "Noachides and Converts to Judaism", in Jan N. Bremmer, Wout Jac. van Bekkum, Arie L. Molendijk. Cultures of Conversions, Peeters Publishers, 2006, , p. 125. Jews for Judaism is the largest counter-missionary organization in existence, today. Kiruv Organization (Mizrachi), founded by Rabbi Yosef Mizrachi, and Outreach Judaism, founded by Rabbi Tovia Singer, are other prominent international organizations that respond "directly to the issues raised by missionaries and cults, by exploring Judaism in contradistinction to fundamentalist Christianity." About Us, Outreach Judaism website. Accessed January 9, 2011.J. Gordon Melton, "The Modern Anti-Cult Movement in Historical Perspective", in Jeffrey Kaplan, Heléne Lööw. The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization, Rowman Altamira, 2002, , p. 285, note 4.
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