How to read these. In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other. Each thing a book can do in a debate is a move, and most moves carry a real quotation — the words the book puts on the table when it uses that move.
Strong against lists the opposing books and arguments a move was written to answer. Used against one of them, it hits much harder than usual: ×2 means twice the normal force, ×4 four times. It is the game’s way of saying: this is the sentence that answers that argument. Open an entry to read why.
“That there exists in the human minds and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity, we hold to be beyond dispute, since God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead…”
Calvin, Institutes I.3.1 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Some Sense of Deity
Natural TheologyArgument · power 80 · 100% accurateIn the gameNot an argument for God’s existence — an argument about the person you are talking to. Nobody starts from zero, and the ignorance in front of you is a thing being maintained rather than a thing being suffered.
Strong against
×3Émilea book · why?
Calvin and the Vicar start from the identical observation — a sense of God native to every mind — and part company on what it delivers: enough to leave nobody excused, Calvin says, not enough to save anybody unassisted.
×3The Five Common Notionsan argument · why?
Calvin agrees that every mind has a sense of God. That sense leaves people without excuse. It does not bring them home to God, which is why God has spoken.
×3The Savoyard Vicaran argument · why?
Calvin and the Vicar start from the identical observation — a sense of God native to every mind — and part company on what it delivers: enough to leave nobody excused, Calvin says, not enough to save anybody unassisted.
×2.5Nein!an argument · why?
Calvin says God has planted a sense of himself in every person. It does not save anyone. It leaves them without excuse, and that is why the gospel has a place to land. Barth’s refusal removes the ground the preaching stands on.
×2Man Is Born Freean argument · why?
He wants the natural man good and the institutions corrupt. Turn it over: the ache for God is native, and the man buries it.
×2The Demand for Miraclesan argument · why?
He wants a wonder. There is something older than a wonder already in him.
×2Totem and Tabooan argument · why?
Freud says the idea of God was copied from a human father. Calvin had already claimed it is there before any copy, including in people whose fathers were worth copying nothing from.
“But though experience testifies that a seed of religion is divinely sown in all, scarcely one in a hundred is found who cherishes it in his heart, and not one in whom it grows to maturity so far is it from yielding fruit in its season.”
Calvin, Institutes I.4.1 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
A Seed of Religion
AnthropologyArgument · power 76 · 100% accurateIn the gameAnd immediately the honest half, which is why it is not a cheap argument: the seed is in everyone and it comes to nothing in almost everyone. Hardly one in a hundred cherishes it, and not one brings it to fruit.
Strong against
×2Totem and Tabooan argument · why?
It grants him the universality outright and gives it the other cause — then adds the half he never has to account for: almost nobody does anything with it.
“The word is not received in faith when it merely flutters in the brain, but when it has taken deep root in the heart… there is more distrust in the heart than blindness in the mind; and it is more difficult to inspire the soul with security than to imbue it with knowledge.”
Calvin, Institutes III.2.36 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Not Brain, But Heart
FaithArgument · power 90 · 100% accurateIn the gameBelieving a doctrine and trusting it are different acts. A mind can hold the right answer for years while the heart still will not risk resting on it.
Strong against
×2.5Room for Beliefan argument · why?
Kant clears a room reason cannot enter and calls it faith’s. Grant him the room. Calvin asks what is actually standing in it — a proposition safely stored is not yet a heart that has settled on anything.
×2.5The Critique of Pure Reasona book · why?
Kant clears a room reason cannot enter and calls it faith’s. Grant him the room. Calvin asks what is actually standing in it — a proposition safely stored is not yet a heart that has settled on anything.
“justification, as the acceptance with which God receives us into his favor as if we were righteous; and we say that this justification consists in the forgiveness of sins and the imputation of the righteousness of Christ.”
Calvin, Institutes III.11.2 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
Imputed Righteousness
SoteriologyArgument · power 95 · 100% accurateIn the gameCalvin defining the verdict in two halves, and the second half is the one Trent condemned by name. Sins forgiven, and a righteousness that is not the sinner’s own CREDITED to him. Not poured in, not grown into. Reckoned.
Strong against
×4The Canons of Trenta book · why?
Canon XI condemned this by its own name. Here it is said plainly, by the man whose book they were answering.
×3The Colloquyan argument · why?
A sentence two doctrines can shelter under is answered by saying exactly what yours is.
“…our conviction of the truth of Scripture must be derived from a higher source than human conjectures, Judgments, or reasons; namely, the secret testimony of the Spirit.”
Calvin, Institutes I.7.4 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
The Secret Testimony
PresuppositionArgument · power 88 · 100% accurateIn the gameGrants that the evidences are good and refuses to rest on them. If your certainty that God has spoken is only as strong as your best argument, then it is exactly as unstable as your worst afternoon.
Strong against
×2.5Before Lutheran argument · why?
He is asking you to rest your certainty on a list. There is a older place to rest it.
×2.5The Charge of Uncertaintyan argument · why?
Calvin asks the same question and answers it the same way.
×2The Canons of Trenta book · why?
Certainty was the real quarrel. Trent condemns assurance because it thinks assurance is presumption.
“Wherever we see the word of God sincerely preached and heard, wherever we see the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there we cannot have any doubt that the Church of God has some existence, since his promise cannot fail.”
Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion IV.1.9 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
Where the Word Is Preached
EcclesiologyArgument · power 93 · 100% accurateIn the gameRefuses to produce a lineage, because a lineage was never the test. Look for preaching and sacraments; where you find them you have found the church, and where you do not, a list of bishops will not supply one.
Strong against
×4Before Lutheran argument · why?
It does not produce a lineage. It changes what would count as one — and the church turns out to have been in a great many buildings that were flying his flag.
×3.5The Charge of Schisman argument · why?
Refuses to produce a lineage, because a lineage was never the test.
×2The Sentence of Constancean argument · why?
Where the Word is preached and heard, there is a church. That is the test, and a decree is not it.
×0.5The Indulgence Stallan argument · why?
A definition of the church, aimed at a market stall. True, and nowhere near it.
“For in him we live, and move, and have our being. As some of your own poets have said.”
Acts 17:28 (WEB) — Paul at the Areopagus, quoting the Athenians’ own poets back to them.
In the gamePick the part of the opponent’s case that is true and affirm it. That point can no longer be used against you, and the opponent’s Defend falls sharply. It deals no damage. Affirm something false and you have only agreed with an error.
“What was destined only to confirm the truth, shall we misapply to the confirmation of lies? The proper course, therefore, is, in the first instance, to ascertain and examine the doctrine which is said by the Evangelist to precede; then after it has been proved, but not till then, it may receive confirmation from miracles.”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
Doctrine Before Miracles
RationalityArgument · power 88 · 100% accurateIn the gamePuts the two in the right order and the demand collapses. A wonder cannot certify a teaching, because wonders attend lies too; the teaching is examined first, and only then may a sign confirm it.
Strong against
×4The Demand for Miraclesan argument · why?
Puts the two in the right order and the demand falls apart: the teaching is examined first, and only then may a sign confirm it.
×2.5On Baptisma book · why?
Calvin answers his opponents’ miracles with the answer Augustine gave the Donatists. Augustine would agree.
×2Christianity Not Mysteriousan argument · why?
He makes reason the judge of revelation. Put it back under: reason reads what God has said, it does not vote on what He was allowed to say.
×0.5Known by Its Fruitsan argument · why?
He has not asked for a sign. He has pointed at a burnt village.
“The Academy was solemnly dedicated on June 5, 1559, in the church of St. Peter, in the presence of the whole Council, the ministers, and six hundred students.”
Schaff, History of the Christian Church VIII §161 (1892), public domain.public domain
Six Hundred Students
EthicsArgument · power 84 · 100% accurateIn the gameThe Academy’s argument, and it is not an argument at all. Do not be the best debater in the room. Be the reason there are nine hundred more of you next year, in countries where saying it is fatal.
Strong against
×2Before Lutheran argument · why?
He trained the best apologists in Europe and would be the first to tell you that this is the right answer.
