Sunday, February 12, 2023

Gordon Clark: Notes on A Reply to the Paper by Mr. Hamilton (PCA Archives)

The following are Gordon Clark's personal notes on a reply written to a paper by Mr. Hamilton on Total depravity and regeneration, which can be found in this scan. Since Hamilton's paper was written in August of 1946, this paper and Clark's notes must have been written sometime thereafter. In several places, I have made his shorthand clear for ease of reading.

Post Aug. 1946. Notes on A Reply to the Paper by Mr. Hamilton

i.e. avoid the issue N. B. in the Complaint content = meaning

it was “by wisdom[?] that they know such[?]

they still know innate[ly?]

Here Hodge equates feeling (emotion?) with knowledge. We connect knowledge only with truth

N. B. Jonathan Edwards also centers the difference in feeling, a sense, a taste

Note emphasis on beauty and sweetness, not on objective truth

Shedd actually contrasts and understanding and feeling. Sensation can illusion

How understanding a single word. This must be a proposition

Always evil, but not always intellectually incorrect. 2+2=4

Does this mean they are completely ignorant of ?

Sophistry: But Rom 1:19-21 says the unregenerate know and understand. These authors choose a colloquial wide meaning and try to apply all its implications to a specific restricted meaning

This does not say he cannot understand the words.

When these authors say an understanding, what is this understanding they speak of. Define it. What else but an understanding of the meaning of the words?

Is darkness synonymous with ignorance?

It is the application that is the blindness. Men know but do not worship.

Prejudices to not prevent a man from understanding the meaning of the words.

Faculty understanding the words

Not an understanding of words. A man may understand the words and believe this but ? the truth

This does not say must[?] can not understand the meaning of the words

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