On March 25th, 2019 the New York Times published the following Op-Ed column by Peter Atterton, a professor of philosophy at San Diego State University.

A God Problem

If you look up “God” in a dictionary, the first entry you will find will be something along the lines of “a being believed to be the infinitely perfect, wise and powerful creator and ruler of the universe.” Certainly, if applied to non-Western contexts, the definition would be puzzling, but in a Western context this is how philosophers have traditionally understood “God.” In fact, this conception of God is sometimes known as the “God of the Philosophers.”

As a philosopher myself, I’d like to focus on a specific question: Does the idea of a morally perfect, all-powerful, all-knowing God make sense? Does it hold together when we examine it logically?

Let’s first consider the attribute of omnipotence.

You’ve probably heard the paradox of the stone before: Can God create a stone that cannot be lifted? If God can create such a stone, then He is not all powerful, since He Himself cannot lift it. On the other hand, if He cannot create a stone that cannot be lifted, then He is not all powerful, since He cannot create the unliftable stone. Either way, God is not all powerful.

The way out of this dilemma is usually to argue, as Saint Thomas Aquinas did, that God cannot do self-contradictory things. Thus, God cannot lift what is by definition “unliftable,” just as He cannot “create a square circle” or get divorced (since He is not married). God can only do that which is logically possible.

Not all philosophers agree with Aquinas. René Descartes, for example, believed that God could do absolutely anything, even the logically impossible, such as draw a round square. But even if we accept, for the sake of argument, Aquinas’ explanation, there are other problems to contend with. For example, can God create a world in which evil does not exist? This does appear to be logically possible. Presumably God could have created such a world without contradiction. It evidently would be a world very different from the one we currently inhabit, but a possible world all the same. Indeed, if God is morally perfect, it is difficult to see why he wouldn’t have created such a world. So why didn’t He?

The standard defense is that evil is necessary for free will. According to the well-known Christian philosopher Alvin Plantinga, “To create creatures capable of moral good, [God] must create creatures capable of moral evil; and He can’t give these creatures the freedom to perform evil and at the same time prevent them from doing so.” However, this does not explain so-called physical evil (suffering) caused by nonhuman causes (famines, earthquakes, etc.). Nor does it explain, as Charles Darwin noticed, why there should be so much pain and suffering among the animal kingdom: “A being so powerful and so full of knowledge as a God who could create the universe, is to our finite minds omnipotent and omniscient, and it revolts our understanding to suppose that his benevolence is not unbounded, for what advantage can there be in the sufferings of millions of the lower animals throughout almost endless time?”

What about God’s infinite knowledge — His omniscience? Philosophically, this presents us with no less of a conundrum. Leaving aside the highly implausible idea that God knows all the facts in the universe, no matter how trivial or useless (Saint Jerome thought it was beneath the dignity of God to concern Himself with such base questions as how many fleas are born or die every moment), if God knows all there is to know, then He knows at least as much as we know. But if He knows what we know, then this would appear to detract from His perfection. Why?

There are some things that we know that, if they were also known to God, would automatically make Him a sinner, which of course is in contradiction with the concept of God. As the late American philosopher Michael Martin has already pointed out, if God knows all that is knowable, then God must know things that we do, like lust and envy. But one cannot know lust and envy unless one has experienced them. But to have had feelings of lust and envy is to have sinned, in which case God cannot be morally perfect.

What about malice? Could God know what malice is like and still retain His divine goodness? The 19-century German pessimist Arthur Schopenhauer was perhaps the first philosopher to draw attention to what he called the “diabolical” in his work “On Human Nature”:

For man is the only animal which causes pain to others without any further purpose than just to cause it. Other animals never do it except to satisfy their hunger, or in the rage of combat …. No animal ever torments another for the mere purpose of tormenting, but man does it, and it is this that constitutes the diabolical feature in his character which is so much worse than the merely animal.

It might be argued, of course, that this is precisely what distinguishes humans from God. Human beings are inherently sinful whereas God is morally perfect. But if God knows everything, then God must know at least as much as human beings do. And if human beings know what it is like to want to inflict pain on others for pleasure’s sake, without any other benefit, then so does God. But to say that God knows what it is like to want to inflict pain on others is to say that God is capable of malicious enjoyment.

However, this cannot be true if it really is the case that God is morally perfect. A morally perfect being would never get enjoyment from causing pain to others. Therefore, God doesn’t know what it is like to be human. In that case He doesn’t know what we know. But if God doesn’t know what we know, God is not all knowing, and the concept of God is contradictory. God cannot be both omniscient and morally perfect. Hence, God could not exist.

(I shall here ignore the argument that God knows what it is like to be human through Christ, because the doctrine of the Incarnation presents us with its own formidable difficulties: Was Christ really and fully human? Did he have sinful desires that he was required to overcome when tempted by the devil? Can God die?)

It is logical inconsistencies like these that led the 17th-century French theologian Blaise Pascal to reject reason as a basis for faith and return to the Bible and revelation. It is said that when Pascal died his servant found sewn into his jacket the words: “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob — not of the philosophers and scholars.” Evidently, Pascal considered there was more “wisdom” in biblical revelation than in any philosophical demonstration of God’s existence and nature — or plain lack thereof.

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The following is an Op-Ed response I will be sending to the New York Times (I’m guessing it will not be published)

A Problem with A God Problem

I would like to humbly respond to Professor Atterton’s Op-Ed published on March 25, 2019.

There are a great number of Christian academics who are vastly more qualified to debate the plausibility of our “Western” God. I am simply an intellectual “commoner” with no formal theological or Bible training. My only training is by personal study of the Bible and striving to follow Jesus. For me, this pursuit goes way beyond satisfying my soul and spirit, as well as my intellect. I wouldn’t bother with it if it didn’t.

Here’s a ‘layman’s’ shot at responding to some of Professor Atterton’s assertions:

Atterton questions, “Does the idea of a morally perfect, all-powerful, all-knowing God make sense?” He first challenges the notion of omnipotence by presenting the age-old conundrum of, “Can God create a stone that cannot be lifted?”

This is a fun little mind-bender but my simple response is that if God wanted to create something that God couldn’t lift or change after God created it, God absolutely could. It would be God’s choice. It would be self-limiting because it would serve God’s purpose.

According to the Bible God is immutable. By God’s choice, who God is will not change. For eternity God’s very nature was set in stone. God will not lift it from its place.

Personally, I can accept that everything God does is for a purpose whether or not it is within my capacity to understand it. God created something we call a square and something we call a circle. If there was a purpose for ‘squircle’, then God would create it.

The professor then asked, “Can God create a world in which evil does not exist? if God is morally perfect, it is difficult to see why he wouldn’t have created such a world. So, why didn’t He?”

According to the Bible, God did. God created a world that was intended to be without pain and evil – full of peace and harmony. Is it so difficult to comprehend the concept of God’s love allowing for free-will with the consequence being that things will get messy as man chooses a path away from God’s intended design? (much like loving parents allowing adult children to go out on their own. Risky Business)

It is clear to me that we live in a world that is not the world God intended – full of selfishness, pain and chaos. Jesus stated, that there is “another” who rules over this world and who’s bent on our destruction. (Even the professor acknowledged the “diabolical” in man’s behavior) Whether you believe that or not, our free will allows us to rule over our own lives. Our bad and nefarious decisions create rippling chaotic consequences – human pain, animal suffering, wars and even ‘natural’ disasters (famines, earthquakes, etc. Hmm? Much of these many people now assert are catastrophic results of “man-made” Climate Change)

I understand that the professor takes issue with certain supernatural aspects of Jesus’s life. Things like “the incarnation” that cannot be reasoned but requires faith. So, let’s consider something a bit more factually concrete. Mathematicians Stoner and Newman wrote a book entitled Science Speaks. It set out the odds of any one man in all of history fulfilling even eight of the 60 major Biblical prophecies (and 270 ramifications) about the Messiah. All of these were fulfilled by the life of Christ. The probability that Jesus could have fulfilled even 8 such prophecies would be 1 in 100, 000, 000, 000, 000, 000. To fulfill all would be literally impossible odds.

I can accept the above fact as a good “reason” to believe in Jesus’ own assertion that he was/is the Son of God and that His life on earth was the human reflection of God’s perfection even though it’s hard to reason with my pea-brain how God came down to be a man.

Mr. Atterton then questions God’s infinite knowledge — His omniscience being challenged to know all things including sinful thoughts thus making God sinful and morally imperfect.

Actually, the Bible does not say that being tempted by a lustful or envious thought is sin. Dwelling on and acting upon those feelings is sin. So, when the Bible says that Jesus was tempted/enticed in every way as a human but never sinned, we can know that God knows something of those thoughts.

Aha! Then God does not know of the painful results of sin having never experienced sinning and its consequences! But, Jesus, as the Son of God, once again defeats that argument. Though he never sinned, he bore the burden of humanity’s sin and experienced the consequences. He experienced it all.

Personnally, I believe that God has always been perfectly good and righteous even while having perfect knowledge of all things, including sin. I don’t know how that works. God likely knew that someday some philosopher would argue that God doesn’t know of human pain and suffering, and as part of God’s plan, God crushed that argument with the life of Jesus.

The professor argues that Evil is necessary for Free Will to exist. I would simply flip the perspective to say that Free Will is necessary for authentic love to exist. Evil then comes from wanton rebellion and bad choices. The God that I know, let’s us go where we wish but does not give up. God does not impose but pursues to win back God’s creation to God’s goodness.

What about malice? Malice is an extreme form of hate. Does God hate anything? Yes, God hates evil. (in many cases hate is not a sin) But, I’m not sure that God experiences malice when judging man righteously and even lovingly. Justice is good. We all should want justice but even more so forgiveness and grace. If people do not want forgiveness and grace then they will get righteous judgement – with no malice involved. The Bible says that God does not take joy in our suffering but feels/understands our pain.

These challenges the professor raises are good questions but really nothing new. Over the centuries many brilliant Christian scholars have addressed these questions (better than I ever could) using logic to arrive at really good answers. (more recently names like C.S. Lewis, Dallas Willard and Timothy Keller come to mind)

These answers satisfy my intellect and strengthen my faith but likely will not satisfy those who want to argue God‘s existence by human reason alone. The limited intellect of man can take us down the bottomless pit of endless rabbit trails leaving us with no good answers, only doubt and confusion.

As for Pascal, he did not reject “reason” but only as a sole basis for discovering God. The words sewn into his jacket saying, “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob — not of the philosophers and scholars” is evidence Pascal realized that there was more “wisdom” in discovering God through faithful pursuit using the mind, body and spirit as these “Fathers of Faith” did than through any solely philosophical or academic endeavor.

Pascal’s revelation echoes the Apostle Paul’s words written to the believers in Corinth, “Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world through wisdom did not know God, it pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe. For Jews request a sign, and Greeks (the philosophers) seek after wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.” I Corinthians 1:20-25

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I welcome any and all comments and feedback before I send this off to the NY Times