A Place To Stand
A Practical Guide to Christian Faith as a Solid Point From Which to Operate in Contemporary Living

© 1969  David Elton Trueblood

Harper & Row, Publishers — New York, NY

1. Apologetics
BT1102 .T7 ||  LC: 69010474 || Dewey: 239/.09/04 || OCLC: 35952 || 128 p.

A Place To Stand is presently held by 504 libraries including the Library of Congress and Yale University.

Table of Contents

Preface       7

I. Rational Christianity       13

II. A Center of Certitude       37

III. The Living God       59

IV. The Reality of Prayer       82

V. And the Life Everlasting       106

*     *     *     *     *     *     *

To Eli Lilly, who because he has found a place to stand, has been able to lift many burdens.

From the Back Cover and Jacket

"This book is of such pivotal importance that it is difficult not to over-praise it . . . What will surprise the skeptic (and this is an excellent book to give to doubters) is how logical biblical Christianity can be made."   — Eternity

"The items of belief he treats are the living, personal God; the centrality of Christ for humankind; the reality of prayer; and everlasting life. People who find these articles of faith attractive but unbelievable, and people who believe them but cannot defend them intellectually, will find A Place To Stand a useful little volume." — Presbyterian Life

*     *     *     *     *     *     *

   This is a serious effort to provide a basic and reasoned guide for a solid Christian faith necessary to encounter the world today. It is addressed to those who recognize the need for a strong stand from which to operate in the confusion of contemporary thought.

   Ours has become an age, says Dr. Trueblood, in which people simply do not know what to think. Men have always broken laws; that is nothing new. Far more disturbing is the prevailing notion that all moral laws are limited to subjective reference.

   Dr. Trueblood is convinced that there is an objective truth about everything. This includes nature, man, and God. Though this objective truth cannot be known in its fullness, it is possible by careful examination of the evidence to find, in many matters, a ground of credibility. What is important, he feels, is the acceptance of truth as an absolute value.

   Proceeding point by basic point, the author explains what Christians believe and why.

   Dr. Trueblood is convinced that part of the weakness of the Christian movement in this age has been the relative lack of emphasis upon belief. However good and important service to humanity is, it loses its motivating power when the sustaining beliefs are allowed to wither.

   In A Place To Stand the author shows that it is possible, without contradiction or confusion, to hold a Christian position which is both evangelical and rational.

ELTON TRUEBLOOD is Professor at Large of Earlham College, Richmond, Indiana. A prolific author who has frequently dealt with philosophy and practical Christianity, this is his first book of theology. 

Preface

Because committed Christians are so obviously a minority today, it is important that they tell their neighbors what they believe and why. This book is my attempt to accept a portion of this responsibility. It represents the outcome of more than forty years of mental struggle. The book is, therefore, akin to autobiography, though it deals with ideas rather than with events. I have tried to express, forthrightly, the conclusions I have reached on the most important questions men can face, and I have tried, also, to explain the thinking processes which have led to these conclusions. My hope is that as a consequence readers, and particularly younger ones, will find something solid amidst the perplexities and confusions of the modern world.

   As the careful reader will soon observe, my search for an honest answer to the deepest questions that perplex us has led me to a concrete faith which, for lack of a better term, may be called Basic Christianity. Though this can, I am convinced, be expressed in highly contemporary ways, it is no discovery of our age. I am well aware that the more "up to date" a book is, the sooner will it be dated. Though I am trying to speak to my own age, I hope that I am not overimpressed by it. If we

Page 8

discover anything which is really true, it will be equally true in succeeding centuries.

   In the attempt to give the reader a frank explanation of the reasons that have led me to adopt a position which makes more sense than does any alternative known to me, I have tried to be clear. Part of the shame of the theology of the recent past is that sometimes it has been made deliberately foggy, under the fatuous assumption that what cannot be understood is somehow more profound. Because the chief secret of clarity is that of logical order, the sequence of topics is of the first importance. Therefore the order of chapters in this book is meant to reflect the order of thought.

   Though by faith I am a Christian, by profession I am a philosopher, and I have tried to remember the latter while writing the former. Always, as I write, I try to keep in mind the arduous standard which my teacher, Professor Arthur O. Lovejoy, demonstrated and expected. After his death, one of his former students said, "With his eyes upon you, you would weigh your words twice before uttering them. His presence discouraged laxity of thought, intellectual bravado, and facile talking."¹ Because the issues are of such magnitude the philosopher, when he shares his thoughts on the Christian faith, must set for himself standards which are not less, but even more rigorous, than those expected in other areas of intellectual inquiry.

   Ever since I first encountered the mind of Blaise Pascal I have been intrigued by his ambitious purpose. Day after day he gathered notes for a book he hoped to write, in which he would try to tell the ordinary thoughtful seeker why he had found a center of stability in the midst of his perplexity. My book, of course, is far different from the one Pascal would have written had he lived to complete his self-appointed task,

1. Ludwig Edelstein, "In Memory of A.O. Lovejoy," Journal of the History of Ideas. Vol. XXIV, No. 4, p. 451.

Page 9

but the purpose is the same. My hope is that the book will be of assistance to the ordinary seeker who is trying to be intellectually honest.

D. Elton Trueblood              

Earlham College
Labor Day, 1968

BEGIN READING AT CHAPTER ONE

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