Philosophia Christi

Volume 14, Issue 1, 2012

Alvin Plantinga's New Argument Against Materialism

John Jefferson Davis
Pages 145-164

Buddha, the Apostle Paul, and John Hick
The Challenge of Inter-Religious Epistemologies

This paper proposes four postulates for assessing, in the context of Buddhist-Christian dialogue, the respective understandings of the nature of the Metaphysical Ultimate (MU): the postulates of Internal Coherence; Depth of Soteric Efficacy; Breadth of Epistemic Warrant; and Breadth of Explanatory Power. It is argued that the application of these postulates supports the conclusion that the notion of the MU exemplified in Christian theism, where the MU is conceived of as being characterized (analogically) as personal in nature, not strictly and completely ineffable, and cognizable by conceptual distinctions, has stronger and broader. epistemic warrants than that concept of the MU exemplified in Zen Buddhism.