John Frame’s Use of Perspectivalism: A Critical Analysis of Collapsed Distinctions in Meaning, Application, and Theological Method

By William M. Brennan, Th.D.

John Frame’s tri-perspectival epistemology—normative, situational, and existential—is often praised for its integrative power and its ability to dissolve false dichotomies by showing the unity of human knowledge under the lordship of Christ. Properly deployed, perspectivalism can illuminate the multifaceted nature of theological questions by demonstrating how divine normativity, the created order, and human response are mutually implicative. However, the model only functions coherently if the perspectives remain genuinely distinct in their contributions. In several key areas of his theological method, Frame fails to preserve this necessary diversity. He emphasizes unity to such an extent that he collapses distinct perspectives into one another, producing conceptual ambiguity where the model itself requires clarity. This essay argues that Frame’s misapplication of perspectivalism, particularly in relation to the meaning and application of Scripture, reveals a methodological inconsistency that undermines both exegesis and classical theological distinctions.

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1. Perspectivalism Requires Diversity Before Unity

Frame’s perspectivalism is rooted in Van Til’s insight that Christian epistemology demands both unity and diversity. Each perspective provides a distinct vantage point:

• Normative: God’s authoritative revelation and commands

• Situational: facts, contexts, and the created order

• Existential: the human subject, motives, and response

These perspectives are mutually implicative, but not mutually identical. Their unity is meaningful only because their diversity is real. If the perspectives collapse into indistinguishability, the model reduces to a rhetorical restatement of a single viewpoint rather than an analytical framework.

A functional perspectivalism must therefore maintain the following:

1. Clear distinctions between what belongs uniquely to each perspective.

2. Irreducibility, such that each perspective contributes insight the others do not.

3. Interdependence, showing their coherence without erasing the legitimate differences.

These methodological safeguards are too often abandoned in Frame’s application.

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2. The Collapse of Meaning and Application

Nowhere is this failure more apparent than in Frame’s treatment of the meaning and application of Scripture. In The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, Frame famously asserts that “meaning and application are not essentially different.” This move results from an ambiguity in his use of the word meaning. Historically, theologians and linguists alike have distinguished between:

• Semantic meaning (the author-intended content of the text)

• Significance or application (the subjective appropriation by a reader in a given situation)

Classical hermeneutics—from Augustine to Calvin to the Reformed scholastics—always maintained this distinction. Meaning is fixed, public, and textual; application is personal, contextual, and variable. Frame, however, uses “meaning” to refer both to semantic content and to existential appropriation, and he then collapses these two under the rubric of perspectival unity.

This is a methodological oversight. Meaning belongs primarily to the normative perspective: what God (and the human author) intended. Application belongs primarily to the existential perspective: how I must respond. Their interconnection is undeniable, but their distinction is essential. By collapsing them, Frame removes the analytic space needed for exegesis, theological argumentation, and pastoral guidance. If meaning is not distinguished from application, then the text’s message shifts with the reader’s circumstances, thus risking a subtle form of subjectivism that classical theology avoids.

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3. Confusion of Metaphysical and Revelational Categories

A similar collapse occurs in Frame’s handling of the communicable and incommunicable attributes of God. Classical theology distinguishes these categories metaphysically: some divine perfections are uniquely God’s (simplicity, aseity, eternality), while others are mirrored analogically in creatures (goodness, wisdom, power). Frame rightly insists that God “communicates” all His attributes in revelation, but he confuses this revelational, normative sense of “communicable” with the ontological, metaphysical distinction. Again, the perspectives (normative and ontological vs. existential analogical reflection) are blended instead of analyzed distinctly. The result is terminological equivocation and the erasure of classical doctrinal boundaries.

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4. The Consequence: Loss of Analytical Power

Ironically, Frame’s perspectivalism becomes least effective precisely where it was meant to be most helpful. By failing to identify the genuine differences among the perspectives, he undermines his ability to show how they integrate. Instead of revealing the richness of a doctrine from multiple angles, the model devolves into a conceptual flattening.

A perspectivalism that preserves diversity before unity can illuminate theological questions. A perspectivalism that collapses diversity into unity loses explanatory power.

The problem is not perspectivalism itself but Frame’s inconsistent application of it. He frequently reaches immediately for unity—“meaning is application,” “communicable attributes are communicable in every sense,” “ethics, knowledge, and being are one perspective”—without first articulating the distinctions that unity is meant to harmonize.

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5. A More Coherent Perspectival Method

A corrected approach would follow three methodological steps:

1. Define the perspectives distinctly
   e.g., semantic content (normative), historical context (situational), personal appropriation (existential)

2. Identify the specific contribution of each
   What does this perspective reveal that the others cannot?

3. Then demonstrate their coherence
   Unity is the final result, not the starting point.

This preserves the strength of perspectivalism without sacrificing classical clarity.

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Conclusion

Frame’s perspectivalism contains valuable insights, but its misuse—particularly in the conflation of meaning and application—reveals a significant methodological fault. By failing to distinguish the genuine diversity within the perspectives, Frame undermines the explanatory and hermeneutical power of his own model. A more precise and disciplined application of perspectivalism would preserve the distinctions necessary for clarity while still showing the unity of Christian knowledge under the lordship of Christ.