When people hear the word philosophy, their minds often leap to ancient Greece, where the towering figures of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle continue to cast a long shadow, so much so in fact that the term philosophy has become almost synonymous with “Greek thought.” Others who move in business or political circles might think of “a company’s philosophy”—its guiding principles or its way of doing things. But these common uses of the word do not take us to the heart of what philosophy truly is.
At its core, philosophy is a theoretical enterprise. It is a science—not merely one discipline among many, but, as scholars have long noted, “the discipline of the disciplines,” the mother of all sciences (sorry, Thomas Aquinas, it’s not theology). Philosophy asks the most basic questions that stand beneath every field of human knowledge: What is science? What is knowing? What is the nature of the world? What is right and wrong? The moment we begin to ask such questions, we are already “philosophizing.” And whether we acknowledge it or not, this activity is unavoidable. We are always operating with some understanding—however implicit—of knowledge, reality, and morality.
We see this clearly in the example of an architect. To design a building, an architect must engage with mathematics, physics, engineering, cultural patterns, and aesthetic principles, to name a few. Yet none of these sciences can explain themselves. Geometry cannot account for the nature of number, physics cannot justify the rationality of natural laws, and engineering cannot articulate the meaning of design. To probe these deeper foundations requires a different kind of inquiry—philosophy, the science that examines what makes the sciences possible in the first place. In this way, philosophy is inescapable: anyone who practices any science already assumes philosophical answers, whether they recognize them or not.
Is Christian Philosophy Possible?
In our secular age, the very idea of a Christian philosophy sounds contradictory. The modern sacred–secular divide insists that “religion” belongs to the private sphere while philosophy and science belong to the supposedly neutral public arena. By this thinking, theology can speak, at best, about personal values, but philosophy is expected to operate without religious influence.
Yet this division is “artificial,” that is to say, it is not grounded in reality. There is no such thing as a religiously neutral zone of thought. Every person approaches life with basic commitments that shape how they perceive the world. These commitments are not peripheral—they lie at the root of our thinking, they are our heart commitments. This means that even the most sophisticated philosophical system rests upon something deeper than philosophy itself.
The key question, then, is: If philosophy is the foundational science, what is philosophy itself founded on?
The answer is not another discipline. Rather, the answer is worldview—a network of presuppositions concerning knowledge (epistemology), reality (metaphysics or ontology), and morality (ethics). The lens from which we see and interpret the world, in other words. Yet even worldview has a still deeper root: faith.
Faith: The Deepest Root of Thought
Faith, in this context, does not refer simply to the Christian religion. Nor does it refer merely to beliefs or doctrines. Faith is supra–rational—it transcends reason and is not to be confused with irrationality. It is the deepest moral and spiritual posture of the human heart. Faith, to put it succinctly, belongs to the ego, the human core—“beyond which there is nothing.”
This is why every person is, inescapably, religious. Not necessarily in ceremonial terms, but in the sense that everyone places ultimate trust in something. As Paul explains in Romans 1, we either worship the true Creator God revealed in creation and Scripture, or we worship some absolutized aspect of creation. This Ultimate Ground—be it the Triune God, human reason, matter, chance, or a pantheon of gods—functions as the foundational principle by which a person interprets all of life.
Presuppositional thinkers like Cornelius Van Til, Greg Bahnsen, and John M. Frame have consistently argued that no one can understand reality rightly unless the Triune God stands behind everything. Evidence, facts, logic, the intelligibility of the cosmos—none of these make sense unless grounded in the God of Scripture. A person may know many things, like the composition of stars or the laws of physics, but unless their Ultimate Ground is true, they cannot account for why such knowledge is meaningful or coherent. They do not, to use Van Til’s terminology, have true knowledge.
Thus, the structure of human knowing is layered:
- Scientific knowledge rests on
- Philosophy, which rests on
- Worldview, which rests on
- Faith.
Faith sets the direction—either vertical (toward God) or horizontal (toward creation). There is no third option. As the late American Christian philosopher H. Evan Runner summarized, “Life is religion.” Every aspect of human life and reasoning flows from the religious orientation of the heart.
Why Christian Philosophy Matters
If every philosophy is religiously motivated, then a specifically Christian philosophy is not only possible—it is necessary. But we must avoid two misunderstandings:
First, simply being a Christian does not mean one holds a Christian philosophy. Many believers unknowingly adopt secular or pagan assumptions in their thinking. A Christian outlook on life is not automatically the same as a Christian theoretical foundation.
Second, a Christian philosophy does not mean turning the Bible into a scientific textbook. The doctrine of Sola Scriptura does not claim that Scripture gives technical information on every topic. Rather, it means that the Bible is the ultimate authority for all knowledge and the proper interpretive framework for every discipline. A physician does not expect Scripture to teach surgical technique, but he does turn to Scripture to understand the nature of mankind, the meaning of human dignity, and the moral responsibilities of healing.
In this way, Scripture provides the normative context for Christian worldview, and Christian worldview provides the foundational context for a Christian philosophy.
This is precisely what the Reformational tradition has developed with remarkable clarity. The Dutch philosopher Herman Dooyeweerd, whom some have hailed as more original than Spinoza, constructed a truly Christian theoretical framework—one rooted in the authority of Scripture, free from contamination with pagan metaphysics, and capable of explaining the diversity and coherence of creation. His work, together with that of Van Til and Runner, provides a robust foundation for Christians who wish to think deeply and faithfully about the world.
Conclusion
It can thus be said that philosophy is not an optional pastime for intellectuals—it is woven into the structure of human thought. Every person operates from basic assumptions about knowing, being, and morality. These assumptions flow from one’s worldview, which rests ultimately upon one’s faith— the deepest spiritual commitment of the heart.
Because faith is always religious, all philosophy is religious. The question is never whether a philosophy is religious but which religion grounds it. For Christians, this means that a Christian philosophy is not only possible but essential. It enables believers to articulate a coherent understanding of the world, to build upon the true Ultimate Ground, and to engage every discipline—science, art, politics, medicine, and more—in a way that honours the Triune God of Scripture.
In an age captivated by the illusion of neutrality, recovering a distinctly Christian philosophy is not merely an academic exercise; it is an act of faithfulness. For the Christian, thinking is never an autonomous pursuit—it is an act of worship, grounded in the Word of God, shaped by a biblical worldview, and directed toward the glory of the Creator of all things.
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