Question:
This was the handout at our discussion group last time. I figured it might spark some conversation.
Proving The Existence of God
A common project among Christian apologists is to produce arguments which will prove the existence of God to non-Christians. No one can deny this clear logic, it is said, and so clearly once all of the Christians’ proofs have been heard others will be compelled to become Christians. Thomas Aquinas made use of some of Aristotle’s arguments in order to provide us with the so-called cosmological arguments, which are based on causation:
Everything in the world has a cause.
Therefore, the world must be caused from something outside of it.
That cause is God.
This is a simplified version, of course, so if there is a minor error then please ignore it. The basic idea is this: Doesn’t there have to be some reason, some cause for the world? Why is there something rather than nothing?
This has been persuasive to some extent to many people. However, in the end it only works if all sorts of Christian assumptions get smuggled into the argument. For instance, who says that there must be a first cause? What if there is a chain of infinite causes? Similarly, who says that the world as a whole must have a cause, just because particular things in the world have causes? And who said that this cause must be God? What if it is an impersonal force or law of nature? These questions do not end.
Another common argument is the teleological argument, the argument from design:
The world is very orderly.
Order does not come from chance, so the world must have been designed.
That designer is God.
Again, this is a bit simplified, but focus on the basic idea: Doesn’t the world seem to “work” a bit too well to be simply the product of chance?
An older response to this argument is the Darwinist counter-interpretation: Things appear orderly because of naturalistic evolution, the fundamental principles of which may serve to explain anything from biodiversity to the formation of galaxies. However, more recently the “design” argument has been based on the apparent order or design in basic constants in physics, which are not said to be determined by any type of evolutionary hypothesis, so the Darwin-inspired counter-interpretation will not work in the end. Of course, at this point we are no longer dialoguing with anyone who is amazed merely by the beauty of trees and stars, but instead only to scientists who are impressed with the mathematical precision of obscure scientific constants.
Even so, this argument still requires that all sorts of Christian assumptions be smuggled in in order to get anywhere. For instance, if God is so great, who designed him? Who says that this designer was personal? What if it is just the impersonal forces and laws of nature? Who says that there was only one designer? What if there were all sorts of competing designers? Who says that this designer is good? After all, isn’t there all kinds of evil in the world, from hurricanes to murder?
I will spare you the ontological argument, but suffice it to say that all of these arguments are embarrassingly inadequate at proving anything meaningfully Christian on truly non-Christian grounds. They can always be re-interpreted to prove whatever the re-interpreter already believes about the world, even for the atheist who believes the world is governed by impersonal forces and chance. And if they can at all be salvaged, it will only be after such prolonged debate that no one will be convinced.
What About Christian Theology? What Do Christians Already Know About God?
At this point I hope the Christian will stop for at least a moment to reconsider the motivations in this so-called natural theology (basically, proving God’s existence on “naturalistic” terms). After all, the cosmological arguments come to us from Aristotle, and today’s great proponents of the teleological argument are Deists! If we are trying to do something Christian, why are we just using shoddy, question-begging versions of arguments that are owned by prominent non-Christians?
Now, the proofs are about knowing God, so what does Christian theology have to say about how we come to know God? In Christian theology we come to know of God by means of divine revelation. There are two kinds of revelation – general (revelation in all of creation) and special (the Bible). The following is a prominent text about general revelation which is often cited to promote natural theology.
The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. (Psalm 19:1)
This text has been used as the basis for the design argument. Upon further inspection, however, it has nothing to do with the design argument. It says that the heavens declare and proclaim God’s glory, not that they serve as evidence which can be used as the primary premise in the teleological argument. The text says that they themselves reveal God, not that there is an argument that reveals God which uses them as evidence. While God reveals himself to us where we are, it is not on our terms.
Instead of agreeing that we come to know about God by means of God’s revelation, the “proofs” say that we know about God by means of arguments we form using God’s revelation as evidence. This is very hostile to the doctrine of divine revelation. After all, is God’s revelation insufficient; did God accidentally forget something crucial? Is God’s revelation superfluous; did God give revelation even though we could have reached him on our own steam? Is God’s revelation not authoritative; is there some human standard by which it is best to judge God? Is God’s revelation unclear; does God need to speak using anti-Christian structures (naturalism) in order to say Christian things?
Yeah, But That Just Isn’t Working
But, we still have to ask, why does a bald appeal to God’s revelation, whether special or general, not prove effective when arguing with non-believers? Here we discover that natural theology uses a faulty doctrine of man (anthropology) in its project, because natural theology treats humans as basically thinking machines. We are, it says, led around by our “reason” alone. Notice how this works just as well for a flesh-and-blood human as it would for a very advanced computer; this is an overly narrow understanding of humanity. Instead, as philosophers are recognizing more and more, it is less that we are thinking machines and more that our reasoning abilities serve to direct and focus our actions. Much more basic are our ethical commitments or values; these drive the use of our reason.
The cash value is this: According to the doctrine of sin, all people are fundamentally committed against God in an ethical way, and if these ethical commitments prevent “neutral” reasoning then the proofs will never and can never work because they do not get to the core issues which divide the “believer” and the “unbeliever.” More broadly, natural theology treats man as the sufficient judge of truth in and of himself, meaning that man has some sort of ultimacy or autonomy. But if God is truly to be God, the sovereign creator and governor of all, then man cannot be ultimate or autonomous, for if man is ultimate then God is not. If man can make sense of the world on his own terms without reference to God, then God is not truly the sovereign creator and governor of all. If man can truly understand the world while considering the cross foolishness, then the cross cannot be the summary narrative of the entire world. For this reason, if the “proofs” for God’s existence work then Christianity is false, because the “proofs” only work if humanism and not Christianity is true.
What, then, can the Christian do? The Christian can reason with non-Christians, and often intellectual confusions about Christianity are important to discuss, but the Christian can never redeem someone from the ethical commitments which drive his reason against God – only God can do that. Does this sound like, ultimately, we can do nothing? Of course, that’s the point; God is ultimate, not man, and so man is not capable of reaching out and grabbing God on his own; God must grab man.
Answer:
Originally Posted by John Roberson This was the handout at our discussion group last time. I figured it might spark some conversation.
Proving The Existence of God
A common project among Christian apologists is to produce arguments which will prove the existence of God to non-Christians. No one can deny this clear logic, it is said, and so clearly once all of the Christians’ proofs have been heard others will be compelled to become Christians. Thomas Aquinas made use of some of Aristotle’s arguments in order to provide us with the so-called cosmological arguments, which are based on causation:
Everything in the world has a cause.
Therefore, the world must be caused from something outside of it.
That cause is God.
This is a simplified version, of course, so if there is a minor error then please ignore it. The basic idea is this: Doesn’t there have to be some reason, some cause for the world? Why is there something rather than nothing?
This has been persuasive to some extent to many people. However, in the end it only works if all sorts of Christian assumptions get smuggled into the argument. For instance, who says that there must be a first cause? What if there is a chain of infinite causes? Similarly, who says that the world as a whole must have a cause, just because particular things in the world have causes? And who said that this cause must be God? What if it is an impersonal force or law of nature? These questions do not end.
This is why I prefer Leibniz's argument.
It's not what caused X, Y, or Z (which as you mentioned can be dismissed by saying the universe is infinite and an infinite chain of events ) but rather why do X, Y, and Z exist at all. Moving it from individual cause for individual entities but to a bigger question why do dependent beings exist at all? It cannot be another dependent being, because that would need a cause and be already included in the whole. Thus, it must be something outside of the dependent realm.
The rest is just showing the inadequacy of arguments from autonomic-self and a push for presuppositional apologetics which I tend to agree with.
But this also seems like it's denying the un-regenrate man's ability to reason at all. I mean if a unbeliever comes to find murder as wrong using, say, Kant's catagorical imperative is it any less true than a Christian who believes murder is wrong based on the Bible? What I'm trying to say, I think I'm doing it rather poorly so forgive me, if man is totaly depraved does this mean he can find no truth, not do no good, without the Holy Spirit? I know it means man's will is completely enslaved but is his logic? If God created us, he gave us logic, and even it reflects some of him.
I don't know maybe I'm just grasping at air here.
Answer:
Originally Posted by acrossthesirion This is why I prefer Leibniz's argument.
It's not what caused X, Y, or Z (which as you mentioned can be dismissed by saying the universe is infinite and an infinite chain of events ) but rather why do X, Y, and Z exist at all. Moving it from individual cause for individual entities but to a bigger question why do dependent beings exist at all? It cannot be another dependent being, because that would need a cause and be already included in the whole. Thus, it must be something outside of the dependent realm. This is the cosmological argument that modern-day Thomists take from Aquinas, but it seems to me to be precarious for exactly the same reasons. For instance:
1. Who says the universe is contingent?
2. Who says contingent beings need a "cause" (ground for their being)?
3. Who says the "cause" isn't just chance or impersonal forces?
4. Who says there isn't an infinite chain of "causes"?
Even if you move from "A caused B" to "A is the ground of B's being," these questions don't go away.
Originally Posted by acrossthesirion But this also seems like it's denying the un-regenrate man's ability to reason at all. I mean if a unbeliever comes to find murder as wrong using, say, Kant's catagorical imperative is it any less true than a Christian who believes murder is wrong based on the Bible? What I'm trying to say, I think I'm doing it rather poorly so forgive me, if man is totaly depraved does this mean he can find no truth, not do no good, without the Holy Spirit? The Kantian is refusing to be irrational or refusing to treat a human being as a means; the Christian is respecting what God made good. Therefore, though they both agree that "murder" is wrong, "don't murder" means very different things for both of them. In this vein it's worth saying that the Christian lives in God's world and tries to understand it God's way, whereas the non-Christian lives in God's world but tries to interpret it in an anti-God way (Rom 1:18ff). For that reason, the non-Christian will "agree" with the Christian in some respects because he lives in the same world that the Christian lives in, however because the non-Christian interprets the world as something completely different from the Christian the non-Christian does not truly agree with the Christian.
Originally Posted by acrossthesirion I know it means man's will is completely enslaved but is his logic? If God created us, he gave us logic, and even it reflects some of him. That's where Thomism comes in. It understands man's heart or will to be fallen but his reason to be (to some extent) "above" total fallenness. But if this is true then not all of the creation is fallen, or man's reason is not part of the creation. So this implies either that man is, with respect to his reason, God, or that there is a bit of light still untouched by sin, which makes us wonder why a redemption so radical would be needed. (It also makes us wonder if man's reason is truly part of him, considering that man fell wholly and therefore his reason must have if reason were a part of him.)
Answer:
Originally Posted by John Roberson This is the cosmological argument that modern-day Thomists take from Aquinas, but it seems to me to be precarious for exactly the same reasons. For instance:
1. Who says the universe is contingent?
2. Who says contingent beings need a "cause" (ground for their being)?
3. Who says the "cause" isn't just chance or impersonal forces?
4. Who says there isn't an infinite chain of "causes"?
Even if you move from "A caused B" to "A is the ground of B's being," these questions don't go away. No, the question Leibniz asking is "Why should there be contingent beings at all? (Why should there be A, B, C...etc at all)" It's not about individual entities but about the whole.
Originally Posted by John Roberson The Kantian is refusing to be irrational or refusing to treat a human being as a means; the Christian is respecting what God made good. Therefore, though they both agree that "murder" is wrong, "don't murder" means very different things for both of them. In this vein it's worth saying that the Christian lives in God's world and tries to understand it God's way, whereas the non-Christian lives in God's world but tries to interpret it in an anti-God way (Rom 1:18ff). For that reason, the non-Christian will "agree" with the Christian in some respects because he lives in the same world that the Christian lives in, however because the non-Christian interprets the world as something completely different from the Christian the non-Christian does not truly agree with the Christian.
That's where Thomism comes in. It understands man's heart or will to be fallen but his reason to be (to some extent) "above" total fallenness. But if this is true then not all of the creation is fallen, or man's reason is not part of the creation. So this implies either that man is, with respect to his reason, God, or that there is a bit of light still untouched by sin, which makes us wonder why a redemption so radical would be needed. (It also makes us wonder if man's reason is truly part of him, considering that man fell wholly and therefore his reason must have if reason were a part of him.)
I'm a little confused. You first say that Christians and non-Christians may "agree" because we live in God's world this seems to mean that humans are not completely lost if they can at least find some truth by themselves. Even if you say that it's only because they unknowingly admit God into their world view at the same time they reject it, they still have found truth without being regenerate. But this seems impossible according to your second statement.
I have a feeling I'm not really understanding what your trying to say, sorry.
Answer:
Originally Posted by acrossthesirion No, the question Leibniz asking is "Why should there be contingent beings at all? (Why should there be A, B, C...etc at all)" It's not about individual entities but about the whole. Most of them are, which is why one of the questions to ask is, "Even if particular parts of the world need causes or are contingent, why must the world as a whole need causes or be contingent?" The problem with abstracting to "the whole" is that you've lost the crucial attributes of the parts (say, "needs a cause," whether "cause" here means ground of being or something else). The problem with not abstracting to "the whole" is that you need to show why the particulars don't explain themselves by infinite regression. And the problem in general is that the "cause" in the back of this doesn't have to be God -- it could be an impersonal principle or force, chance, etc.
Originally Posted by acrossthesirion I'm a little confused. You first say that Christians and non-Christians may "agree" because we live in God's world this seems to mean that humans are not completely lost if they can at least find some truth by themselves. Even if you say that it's only because they unknowingly admit God into their world view at the same time they reject it, they still have found truth without being regenerate. But this seems impossible according to your second statement. I originally put 'agree' in scare quotes -- we "agree" but we don't agree.
Answer:
I feel this is pertinent to discussion.
Rom 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness,
Rom 1:19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them.
Rom 1:20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.
Answer:
- a great text which demonstrates why natural theology is not only unnecessary but also misguided.
Answer:
The cash value is this: According to the doctrine of sin, all people are fundamentally committed against God in an ethical way, and if these ethical commitments prevent “neutral” reasoning then the proofs will never and can never work because they do not get to the core issues which divide the “believer” and the “unbeliever.”
In talking about "core issues" do you mean arguing presuppositionally?
If so, couldn't the same criticism be applied: that, arguing presuppositionally entails some sort of appeal to the unbelievers (I assume you're using scare quotes due to Paul's reasoning in Romans 1:21?) use of reason?
Answer:
Originally Posted by John Roberson - a great text which demonstrates why natural theology is not only unnecessary but also misguided. Well, it shows that we SHOULD be able to come to the conclusion that God exists through nature. That is all. It is basically saying that all unbelievers should at least be deists.
The problem is, Natural Theology doesn't prove that the our God is God. Just that He exists.
Answer:
Originally Posted by ddts In talking about "core issues" do you mean arguing presuppositionally?
If so, couldn't the same criticism be applied: that, arguing presuppositionally entails some sort of appeal to the unbelievers (I assume you're using scare quotes due to Paul's reasoning in Romans 1:21?) use of reason? Basically, yeah. Since presuppositions are pre- (before), they're more at the core of belief structures.
If we are to be prophet, priest, and king, then we must be:
- prophet by proclaiming the error of sin's re-interpretation of the world, not playing the game by its rules
- priest by guarding God's world and revelation from those who believe that it is equally accessible to everyone on the basis of autonomous human reason
- king by thinking according to God's revelation, growing and developing intellectually according to what we know in Christ the world is
Answer:
Originally Posted by Lightknight Well, it shows that we SHOULD be able to come to the conclusion that God exists through nature. That is all. It is basically saying that all unbelievers should at least be deists.
The problem is, Natural Theology doesn't prove that the our God is God. Just that He exists. Romans 1:18 says that God is known, not that God can be known through revelation in creation. Everyone knows the truth about God, but sinfully rebels against that. So this text says first that natural theology is unnecessary because everybody already knows that God exists, so we don't need to prove it to them. Second, this text says that natural theology is misguided because people take this knowledge and suppress it in sin, worshiping and serving the creature rather than the Creator, so what is needed is not new information ("God exists") but a change of heart away from commitments to sin.
Answer:
Ah, so then what purpose did God putting His nature in people and nature serve? I think it was legitimate evidence. Just that natural theology is ultimately useless by itself. It is useful, but it requires proper implementation and the only way to do that is to pair it with that which is Christian theology.
Answer:
Originally Posted by John Roberson Basically, yeah. Since presuppositions are pre- (before), they're more at the core of belief structures.
If we are to be prophet, priest, and king, then we must be:
- prophet by proclaiming the error of sin's re-interpretation of the world, not playing the game by its rules
- priest by guarding God's world and revelation from those who believe that it is equally accessible to everyone on the basis of autonomous human reason
- king by thinking according to God's revelation, growing and developing intellectually according to what we know in Christ the world is
In arguing presuppositionally should we advance arguments to positively argue for the christian worldview? ie. TAG?
If we are to do this does that not mean we are appealing to the use of the unbeliever's reason, which we believe is totally fallen and hence useless in gaining a true understanding of the the world.
Or are we to merely proclaim the truth claims of Christianity and tear down the the unbelievers understanding of the world?
Answer:
Originally Posted by John Roberson I originally put 'agree' in scare quotes -- we "agree" but we don't agree.
I think I understand what your saying now. This analogy came to mind, tell me if I'm the right track:
1) One person is playing basketball, shoots and makes a basket.
2) Another person accidently throws the ball in the basket while trying to throw it somewhere else
Number one represents the Christian and 2 represents the non-Christian. Even though they made a basket, they weren't playing basketball, nor does it count in the same why the first did. It is an accident cause by being around a basketball hoop (like being in God's world). They both "made a basket" but only the first really did.
Answer:
I'm guessing you've read Newbiggin's "The Gospel in a Pluralist Society", John?
I'm part-way through it now, and it's deep! It's like being back in Uni - I feel like I should have a highlighter out and be writing notes in the margins...