Here’s another typically reckless post by a modern egalitarian Christian apologist who has jettisoned the rational defense the faith in preference for apologizing for the faith of our fathers. The matter of contention was the doctrine of Kinism, which, like many other true doctrines once universally embraced by Christendom, has been betrayed by the Church for the 30 silver pieces of trendiness and political correctness. It’s more important to align with and please liberals, Communists, Talmudists, homos, lesbians, liberals, and all other Bible thrashers than to agree with every elect soul that existed before 1960.
There is an aberration in Presbyterianism that seems to rear its head now and again by a few individuals that jump into our chat channel. This aberration is called Kinism. It is not a view held by many within Presbyterianism and those that do hold it seem to follow from the Rushdoony line of thought. This post and those in this series will be asking questions for clarification and or addressing issues delineated at the so-called Christian Kinism blog.
So askew is this apologist that he calls Kinsim a Presbyterian aberration. At least that stalwart defense of the faith was worth a good laugh! But after the chuckle, I wondered: What’s involved in the sort of thinking that dares call something an aberration when that aberration was mainstream in all denominations from the church’s inception until about 50 years ago? Indeed, the novel belief and practice that the 5th commandment doesn’t apply (you may dishonor your father’s restrictions on whom you may choose for a mate) and that we can amalgamate all races contrary to divinely sanctioned tribalism and ethnonationalism (Deut. 32:8; Eccles. 17:17; Acts 17:26-27; Rev. 21:24, 22:2) is the historical aberration. Moreover, if time were spent researching the Kinist movement, one could find Baptists like John Weaver and Lutherans like David Opperman (who was the first to comment on the Apologist’s post) who affirm Kinism. Hardly a Presbyterian aberration.
The Apologist then goes deep by objecting to a point of affirmation from Kinism.net’s About page, which reads:
2. That all people are essentially humans, created by the hands of Almighty God and therefore they have a portion of common rights, implicits and summarized in the Mosaic Decalogue;
Buckle up and behold the craft in the Apologist’s laser rebuttal:
The second point of Ten Theological Principles of Kinism listed on the linked page has the phrase “all people are essentially humans.” The word ‘essentially’ in this phrase brings about one glaring question: Are there people that have more [or different] ‘peopleness’ than other people that are ‘essentially’ human? One will immediately notice there is no biblical prooftext for this point so one has to wonder where this phrase is derived. What standard is being used for determining ‘peopleness’? It seems quite arbitrary.
Which the first commenter, David Opperman, immediately shelves as juvenile:
Of course the solution is to understand that the word essential means in essence. In other words we believe that all people, regardless of their race are human in their essence. I notice that you don’t actually cite any kinist who discusses levels or degrees of “peopleness,” so your complaint is a classic straw man. Kinists believe that all people are descended from Adam and Eve.
Can’t anyone actually just critique kinism as it stands? Do you really have to venture into infinite and unsubstantiated speculation of what we could possibly believe? Rhetorical questions of course.
The Apologist replies:
That does make it much more precise, but why even mention it at all?
BTW: it is pretty difficult claim that this was a strawman argument (or even a complaint) when the post was a question for clarification and statement of how I view Biblical anthropology.
Why mention it at all? First, because many make the doctrine that all races are made in the image of God the implication for the novel notion that we should therefore have no special loyalty or preference for racial kin. Second, history has shown that while all men are (theologically and ontologically) inherently equal, they don’t demonstrate equal functional equivalence. There is a glaring racial disparity in the areas of intellectual ability and moral proclivity that only ax-grinders and blind men can’t appreciate.
Next, the Apologist says this his inadvertent equivocation on the word ‘essentially’ can’t be taken as a straw man because he was simply asking for clarification. Not really. It’s not as if he asked, “What do Kinists mean by ‘essentially human'”? Rather, he made the error of assuming that that phrase implies degrees of peopleness, calls it an arbitrary Kinsits assumption, and then asks for clarification as to the prooftext for “degrees of peopleness,” not the meaning of “essentially human.” So much with that escape.
More stupidity from the original post (and this is how he ends his article):
One clear solution to this would be a biblical anthropology. One that looks back to the first family and sees that there were only people that were humans, or to put it another way, there were only humans that were people. There was no degree of peopleness.
Solution to what? In his reply to Opperman he claims he was merely asking for a clarification. But here he is offering a solution to a real problem he sees with Kinism, not showing inquisitiveness as to a unclear thesis. So much for that cop out, too.
But, we’ll let Francis Nigel Lee (RIP) answer him anyhow:
Notice that the original Greek of Acts 17 literally suggests that God, out of one man, made each ethic group of mankind in order that each ethic group may make itself at home in its own part of the face of the the earth after God himself had predetermined both the times that each ethnic group would flourish, as well as the national boundaries of its abode.
I almost regret devoting an entire post to such sophomoric responses to Kinsim. The performances of these anti-Kinist new kids on the block are more embarrassing than Danny Walberg singing Hanging Tough. But it’s worth demonstrating how they’re easier to refute than Catholics who challenge Sola Fide. At least from the Papists we get arguments that reveal familiarity with their opponents’ literature. With these odd “Christians” geeked out with unbridled desire for racial suicide, there can be no such appraisal; their preference is shooting from the hip, even if the target is their ancestors.
The Apologist tells us he will be a offering series interacting with Kinism.net. I doubt it. But that’s more likely than his interacting with real Kinists (read Christians) at ChristianKinism, SpiritWaterBlood, Shotgun’s site, FaithAndHeritage, and others. It’s easier to blurt from your own headquarters where you can censor the debate when you’re bested. Though he writes for ChosingHats.com – which produces quality articles that defend Van Til’s unique epistemological awesomeness – the Apologist and all other Kinist naysayers have chosen more than new hats. In rejecting their fathers’ faith by questioning whether their extended family has a right to exist, they’ve chosen the entire wardrobe of the infidel and declared themselves the enemy within.