Van Til and the Foundation of Christian Ethics: A God-Centered Approach to Moral Philosophy

“This is a unique book. And it is uniquely important. Few people have elaborated on Cornelius Van Til’s approach to ethics. And yet it is an indispensable part of his output. Using Alasdair MacIntyre’s insights, Hatch shows how ethics has needed to move beyond the failures of the Enlightenment mindset and become more self-consciously authentic; this parallels Van Til’s entire outlook. Van Til centers his reflections on the summum bonum, which is the glory of God. Hatch comments on all the major players in this field. Most of all, he centers ethics on biblical essentials. This unique and important book should be read by every thoughtful Christian.”

“For understandable reasons, Cornelius Van Til is best known for his contributions to Christian epistemology and apologetics. In contrast, his writings on Christian ethics, and especially metaethics, have been largely overlooked and underutilized, even by those Reformed ethicists who studied under him and acknowledged his influence. This is a great shame because Van Til developed some profound insights on how Christian moral philosophy should be shaped by the distinctive Reformed doctrines of God and man. Scott Hatch has done us a tremendous service by retrieving and expounding these insights for a new generation of Christian thinkers. The two appendices, which document the development of Van Til’s ethics syllabus over the early decades of his career, add further value to the volume. While I might not agree with every jot and tittle, this book is in a class of its own as a systematic study of Van Til’s approach to Christian ethics, and it deserves to be widely read.”