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UNIVERSAL NEGATIVES

By JAMES AKIN

This Rock Volume 4, Number 10   October  1993     Up Front By Karl Keating   Letters   Dragnet   CAN YOU STOUP (SIC) TO CONQUER? By KARL KEATING   THE WHITE MAN’S BURDEN By PATRICK MADRID   Sidebar Universal Negatives By James Akin   Sidebar Material and Formal Sufficiency By James Akin   Classic Apologetics My Conversion to the Catholic Faith By Most Rev. Duane G. Hunt   Fathers Know Best Old Testament Canon   Old Testament Guide Job By Antonio Fuentes   Verse by Verse   Quick Questions    Subscribe    Permissions

ONE tactic Protestant debaters use when discussing sola scriptura, the "Bible alone" theory, is to shift the burden of proof to their Catholic opponents. A common dodge is their claiming that there is a sense in which it is impossible to prove sola scriptura and it is thus unfair to ask them to do so. Instead, they insist, the Catholic must prove his position on revelation.

This argument implicitly admits that the Catholic wins the debate, since nobody would make this move if he felt he had adequate proof for the doctrine of sola scriptura. By saying that it is impossible for anyone to prove sola scriptura, the Protestant admits it is impossible for him to prove sola scriptura. Hence he loses the debate automatically.

There is another problem with this argument. It is usually developed by saying that sola scriptura cannot be proven because it is a "universal negative" proposition. A universal negative is a proposition which can be stated in the form "No X are Y." In the case of sola scriptura, the proposition might be "No things which are not Scripture are norms for our faith." Universal negatives are difficult or impossible to prove.

The proposition in the Madrid/White debate, "The Bible teaches sola scriptura,"is an affirmative proposition, fitting the form, "The Bible teaches X." It doesn't matter what X is. Xcan be affirmative or negative, universal or particular. In order to win the debate, White would need to show that the Bible teaches X.

Imagine White speaking to Mormons (who are polytheists) during one of his visits to Salt Lake City and saying, "I don't have to prove there is only one God. In fact, I can't prove there is only one God, because to do that I would have to search the entire universe to see if there were a second god."

White would be laughed out of Temple Square for using such an argument. To prove there is only one God he merely needs to show that the Bible says there is only one God, just as in the debate with Patrick Madrid he merely needed to show that the Bible says there is only one rule of faith and that it is Scripture.