Celebrating Christian Centenaries
Southwestern Journal of Theology
Volume 68, No. 1 - Fall 2025
Editor: Malcolm B. Yarnell III
By Greg Welty. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2023, 208 pp., $15.99.
Author Greg Welty is a professor of philosophy at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. This book is in the series of Great Thinkers edited by Nathan D. Shannon. Bill Davis, a professor of philosophy at Covenant College and a doctoral student of Plantinga provides a Foreword. From his observation, Davis testifies that Plantinga’s Christian faith is deep and genuine. He thinks Plantinga is a “great thinker” because of his impact on the professional world of philosophy. Welty, in his preface, mentions that although he was a student of British philosopher Swinburne, he appreciated Plantinga and defended him before his British audience.
This book has eight chapters. It gives a very good summary of many of Plantinga’s works. In the first chapter, “Why Another Book on Plantinga,” Welty discusses Plantinga’s significance, his personal background, and the purpose of writing this book. Plantinga attended Harvard for one semester, then returned to Calvin College. Later in his intellectual biography, he commented, “There is no such thing as a serious, substantial, and relatively complete intellectual endeavor that is religiously neutral.” Plantinga taught at Wayne State University (1958-63), Calvin College (1963-82), and the University of Notre Dame (1982-2010).
Chapter two, “Plantinga on Faith and Reason,” explains his faculty-based approach to faith and reason. He proposes that faith and reason are two different ways of knowing. Faith is based on the sensus divinitatis which is similar to reason’s empirical perception. Plantinga provided a unified theory of how the information obtained by either sense can be counted as warranted true belief and as knowledge, hence there is a similarity between faith and reason. His approach is called “Reformed epistemology.” Plantinga also shows that classical foundationalism, which is based on logical positivism, is false and incoherent.
The third chapter describes the free will defense proposed by Plantinga to deal with the problem of evil. To defeat the logical problem of evil, he finds a possible world in which God and evil could coexist. In his argument, he assumes that human beings have libertarian (true) free will. To counter the evidential problem of evil (where evil is evidence against God’s existence), he adapts the free will defense to show there is no possible world that God could have created that has a better balance of moral good to moral evil.
Plantinga’s view on theistic arguments is the subject of the fourth chapter. Welty summarizes in two sections: belief in God isn’t proved false by argument, and belief in God is proved rationally permissible by argument. Plantinga uses the parity argument from other minds to show that believing in God is reasonable. He even revives the modal ontological argument for the existence of God, first proposed by Anselm. He also resorts to natural theology to provide “two dozen theistic arguments.”
“Plantinga on the Divine Attributes” is the title of the fifth chapter. Could God be metaphysically simple? His answer is no. Could God have foreknowledge while we remain free? His answer is yes based on Molinistic theory of divine providence. Could God know everything despite various paradoxes about the infinite? His answer upholds the omniscience of God. Could God’s transcendence preclude our knowing anything about Him? His answer is no.
Plantinga’s view on religion and science is the subject of the sixth chapter. In his book, Where the Conflict Really Lies, Plantinga defuses any alleged conflict between science and religion and points out that a real conflict exists between science and the theory of evolution if naturalism is assumed. He argues that if not assuming metaphysical naturalism, then biological evolution does not undermine the doctrine of divine creation, physics does not undermine the doctrine of divine providence and miracles, and evolutionary psychology does not undermine the truth of Christian belief.
Chapter 7 is a reflection on Plantinga’s philosophical method. He proposes five methodological principles and four activities: Christian apologetics, philosophical theology, Christian philosophical criticism, and constructive Christian philosophy. Welty expands Christian apologetics into five ways: transcendent truth, proof, support, rational acceptability, and coherence. He faults Plantinga for lacking any work in the first two ways of Christian apologetics: take Christian truth as a premise and provide proof of distinctive Christian claims. He points out that Plantinga’s work mostly concerns theism, instead of specific Christian beliefs, such as the Trinity, incarnation, and atonement.
In the last chapter, Welty evaluates Plantinga’s work from the Reformed perspective. He concludes that Plantinga’s appeal to libertarian free will and Molinism does conflict with the Reformed position, but matters like effectual calling, classical natural theology, Van Til’s transcendental argument, and classical theism can be added to Plantinga’s positions.
Welty provides a sympathetic, accessible, yet serious overview and commentary on Plantinga’s work. It combines philosophical accuracy with theological evaluation and guides a student to appreciate and understand Plantinga’s major works. This book is a good introductory text for pastors and theological students; it can serve as a supplemental reading in seminary courses on apologetics and the philosophy of religion. It ends with a Glossary, References, Recommended Reading, and an Index of Subjects and Names.
One would wonder why Plantinga did not do the offensive apologetics by taking Christian truth as a premise and providing proof of distinctive Christian claims. One answer was provided by James Beilby in his essay on Plantinga in The History of Apologetics, 2020 (696-711). Beilby points out that Plantinga’s experience at Wayne State formed his apologetic methodology in a highly defensive and minimalist direction.
Regarding Reformed epistemology, it seems sensus divinitatis can only provide broad direction but not give detailed specifics precisely. This could be due to human fall.
There is one area not mentioned by Welty. Plantinga thinks there is no serious scholarly work that can be religiously neutral, he even argues that science can involve religious belief or commitment, so he is against methodological naturalism. Does this apply to all areas of science? This reviewer was a mathematics major in college and finds that methodological naturalism works well in mathematics and physical sciences, which could be due to the lesser impact of human fall.
Plantinga is the main contributor in changing the professional philosophy world to become hospitable to the Christian worldview. From the Christian point of view, he is a great thinker by his influence. His contribution was mentioned by John Laing in a special SWJT issue on new atheism (SWJT, 54, no. 1, Fall 2011, pp. 6-12).
