Just off target

I think Schaeffer's art history lesson really didn't serve the purpose of this book. So any and all criticism of him in that regard seems fair. I also objected to his selective use of history to bolster his arguments for Reformation thinking. There was a reason he avoided talking about the religious wars in Europe in this era (I'll get to that in a second).

I agree with Tom's take on Schaeffer as a Christian Triumphalist to some extent. However, the book reads like it was written for a Christian audience. In addition, I think the point Schaeffer was making was a Christian point, because that was the historic context from which he drew, keeping in mind that this book is centered on "Western Thought and Culture," exclusively. The heart of Schaeffer's message is the importance of absolutes in defining the way people think. He hits that point pretty hard at the very beginning of the book. Drawing on a strictly Western viewpoint, the primary model for an "absolute" way of thinking is a Judeo-Christian model. I think illustrating Christianity's stand-alone position in this regard is point of the first 3/5ths of the book. Unfortunately, this argument is both too drawn out and too brief at the same time.

But back to his point, I created an analogy to make sense of what he was saying. Starting with the parallel histories Schaeffer gives us, one a Reformation History, and the other a Renaissance history, imagine the following scenario. Each of the two groups approach a piano for the first time. Sitting atop the piano is a "how to" book on playing the piano. The Reformation group holds high the book as the absolute authority on how to play. They learn to do what the book says, they succeed at it, and following the principles set out in the book, the group pioneers advances in playing guitar and tambourine. Faith in the book gives what they do meaning and purpose. The Renaissance group disregards the book's position of authority. They are self-taught. Without a structure, they value abstraction. While the Reformation group finds meaning in the belief that they are playing "music", the Renaissance group, because it never submits to the book, bangs around on the keys creating what it can, but eventually despairs at the lack of definition. One can imagine the Renaissance group saying, "what is music? does it exist? how can I know that what I have crafted is music?" And maybe the Renaissance group eventually starts taking LSD. At some point, without the definition provided by the book, the Renaissance groups creates rules and order on its own. Perhaps the biggest guy in the group decides what music is, and what it isn't. It all seems, in the end, arbitrary.

Painted in this light, just submitting to the book sounds like a better plan. This is how Schaeffer paints Christianity, at least in my view.

Now on to selective history: Go back to my above scenario. Imagine the Reformation group has disputes on how to interpret the book. Imagine they fight a bloody war over it, for thirty years, that nearly tears the continent of Europe apart. Imagine that at the end of the day, at the end of all this fighting, you still have to trust that somebody interpreted correctly, if that is even possible or knowable. Maybe there are 200 different Reformation camps, each claiming to be the authority on how to play. Are you any better off than the desperate existentialist? Or the California Hippie? Is society better off? I think Schaeffer would say yes, and he might pass off the 30 years War (1618-1648) as a by-product of some other line of thought, but by pointing the finger at the French Revolution and the Bolshevik Revolution as the result of non-Reformationist thinking, while simultaneously not owning all of the problems and consequences of the Reformation, he comes across as disingenuous.

So I guess my primary critique was that his argument was incomplete.