The assault on deduction

The reason modern thinkers have a problem with deduction is that the major premise in a syllogism is a universal and that universal may be false. Obviously uneasy with "the constraints of universals," many modern thinkers believe "we cannot wait for the assurance of pending universals" (Walter Brueggemann). In deduction the conclusion is a necessary consequence of the premises and necessity is odious to autonomous man. Descartes started the assault in holding that systematic doubt can only properly reason from self-evident premises. Many leading thinkers have mounted the attack (Toulmin, Hamblin, Habermas) and too many preachers now feel uneasy with deduction. The conclusion in deduction contains no information not present in the premises and this creates a kind of disquietude among those whose relativism has nullified the very idea of truth.

But what about the believer's theistic a priori? Isn't Biblical preaching an argument from the revealed universals of Scripture? Isn't this all a part of the supernatural scandal of Biblical faith? Isn't any sermon which assumes Biblical authority esssentially deductive as soon as the inspired text is read? Isn't God the guarantee of the truth of the premises? How can convinced theists look askance at deductive patterns? We will use induction particularly in our introductions as we begin where the people are. "Taste of the Lord and see that he is good" is basically inductive. Our truth systems need to be both vertically consistent and horizontally fitting the facts (E.J. Carnell). Thus effective preaching is a wise blend of both deduction and induction. The preaching of Biblical narratives is inductive and this explains why narrative preaching cannot yield doctrinal principles but only illustrate them. Without the universals there really cannot be strong application. Authoritative application is deductive.

An advisory on pulpit communication today

Voices among us continue to urge the preferability of induction even though some homileticians of the left express a caution (William H. Shepherd, Jr.'s "A Second Look at Inductive Preaching" in Christian Century, September 19, 1990). If we suppose that inductive patterns guarantee rapport with the contemporary mood, we need to face the fact that induction is also most uncongenial to the postmodern. Deduction may be most unacceptably suspect, but induction does not escape radical doubt because the study of history does not yield "facts" but only interpretations of which no one is superior to another. History is actually fiction. Historical context is not in fact external to the work considered.

For the postmodern, "no discourse imaginative or archival, gives access to unchanging truths or expresses human nature" (Aram Vesser). We can know nothing of "universal predicaments" because "there are no unchanging truths" (Keith Windschuttle in The Killing of History). Not even "large generalizations" or anything like "scientific law," the product of serious induction, can be admitted. All such is simply "deducing conclusions from within their own pre-existing theoretical framework." So primary focus on "inductive experience" is not the answer either.

The Christian communicator operates within the miracle factor of the ongoing and faithful ministry of the Holy Spirit who is ever "in, with and under the Word of God." Using appropriate and inescapable deduction and employing inductive elements to strategic advantage, the Christian communicator speaks "as one speaking the very words of God" (1 Peter 4:11), "not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words" (1 Corinthians 2:13). We have significant univocal contact with postmoderns in our common exasperation with scientism but we do not share their disdain for linear reasoning and for meta-narrative. In fact, we have a pretty good meta-narrative at bottom line — the story of Jesus and his love. When the great Alexander Maclaren (whose motto was LOGIC ON FIRE) invited Gypsy Smith to preach a series to his congregation in Manchester, the little Gypsy felt deep inferiority to the "great one." Yet he preached Jesus and five hundred came to the Savior. Ad gloriam dei.

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David L. Larsen is Professor Emeritus of Preaching, Associate Director of the Professional Doctoral Programs, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.