Post 2: The Elsewhere, Elsewhen Objection (John Hick, “The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism”

In this post I will discuss the merit behind John Hick’s “The Epistemological Challenge of Religious Pluralism” and pose a question to which I have no answer.

Here is the segment of Hick’s argument which was provided by my Philosophy of Religion Professor, Tomas Bogardus:

“Religious allegiance depends in the great majority of cases on the accident of birth: someone born into a devout Muslim family in Pakistan is very likely to be a Muslim, someone born into a devout Hindu family in India to be a Hindu, someone born into a devout Christian family in Spain or Mexico to be a Catholic Christian; and so on. The conclusion I have drawn is that a ‘hermeneutic of suspicion’ is appropriate in relation to beliefs that have been instilled into one by the surrounding religious culture.”

Professor Bogardus formats the argument like this:

“Your religious beliefs were instilled in you from childhood.
And/so, if you had been born and raised elsewhere, elsewhen…
Therefore, you don’t hold your religious beliefs because they’re true. You hold them (primarily) because of factors irrelevant to their truth.
Therefore, your religious beliefs aren’t knowledge.”

First, let me say that Calvinists may simply say that premise three is not true: that where/when one grows up is not an accident and instead one is placed in a Christian family because they were predestined to heaven. However, as a non-Calvinist, I do not support this counterargument.

Here is one counterargument that was discussed in class:
“1 and 2 don’t entail from 3. It’s possible to hold a belief for TWO reasons, one good, one bad. Like if you believe in climate change BOTH because you like to fit in AND because you’ve correctly evaluated the evidence. Either one could be ‘primary’. Or they could be equal.”

I have a few problems with this counterargument, that as a Christian, I hope can be proven wrong. I want to side with the counterargument, but this specific counterargument does not seem true. First, I am inclined to believe that most of the time, people do not believe in Christianity for the “good” reason, but rather simply because they grew up in a Christian home. I think this is a problem, because it casts doubt on the truth of Christianity. I may not be a Christian because I believe Christianity is true, but instead because I have been conditioned to believe that it is true.

This leads me to my second problem, which is that many people, including myself, say that they genuinely believe in Christianity because they have experienced it and reasoned through the logic behind the religious beliefs themself, not just because they grew up as a Christian. In other words, I believe in Christianity in part because that is how I grew up, but more so because I think my morality must come from somewhere, and this is evidence of the truth of Christianity. However, couldn’t Hindus or Muslims make the same argument as to why they believe their religion is true? If this is the case, this makes one’s religion entirely dependent on the where and when one grows up, as long as they have a religion that makes some sense of their morality, and generally makes sense. This casts extreme doubt on my faith as a Christian.

There is one argument for Christianity that has circulated my brain, but I think it is weak. First, I always responded to this doubt of other people growing up in non-Christian families by saying “this is why God calls us to spread the Gospel”. However, I realize now that this response isn’t even an argument. It just avoids the problem altogether.

The question I would pose, with Hick’s argument in mind, is why does the Christian God put certain people in situations where they are not exposed to Christianity? Does this mean Christians must accept that people are predestined? Additionally, I am questioning if what I believe really is because I believe it. How much is simply due to the environment I was raised in?

Defense for Soul-Making Theodicy

Western culture has made the mistake of glorifying comfort. Progress in life is simply a means to increase ease and comfort–in other words, to escape discomfort. What kind of life is this? Is this a truly fulfilling life?

These are the questions that St. Irenaeus and John Hick attempt to answer with their “Soul-Making Theodicy”.

Their argument goes something like this:

The world is designed by God as an environment in which people, through their free choices, can undergo spiritual growth that will ultimately fit them for communion with God.
Soul-making is a great good, and God would therefore be justified in designing a world with that purpose in mind.
Our world is very well designed in that regard, and thus that, if one views evil as a problem, it is because one mistakenly thinks that the world ought, instead, to be a hedonistic paradise.

Opponents to this argument can foolishly take the argument out of context and argue that the Soul-Making Theodicy posits that suffering ought to be encouraged and even produced if it is good.

This might be true, but I am not concerned with defending against such arguments. I am only concerned with attempting to find what is true. In the case of suffering, there is almost no definitive way one ought to approach suffering. Of course, one ought to endure the suffering of losing weight if they are overweight, but no child ought to experience the suffering of starvation. However, I do believe that there is something to be said about the importance of suffering and how it can bring one closer to God–something that seems to have been lost in modern society. So, that is exactly what I will do.

Roosevelt Montas, Professor at Columbia University, writes in his book Resurrecting Socrates,

“...the idea that a long life of comfort and ease should be the ultimate goal for a human life is atheism–the denial of God.”

Montas argues that the life God calls people to live is one of vows to God. And in the Christian view, vows to God involve continual suffering. Citing the work of Gandhi, Montas mentions that “in order to ‘see God,’ to know Truth, one must be prepared to die in the effort. A vow is an explicit declaration of this intention. It’s as if only by committing to a value that is higher than life itself does one meet the condition for a revelation of God. God enters a human life through the opening created by settling on terms with death.” There is certainly something about suffering that connects humans to God on a deeper level. One that cannot be explained, but only experienced. However, I will do my best to rationalize through this connection.

Suffering, in some sense, is the purest form of truth. Even happiness can be faked. Suffering cannot. Suffering is the only undeniable truth of the world–it will occur no matter what and one's willingness to accept this suffering defines the character of the individual. Montas continues with Gandhi’s philosophy of suffering saying, “the acceptance of suffering in upholding a just cause unleashes an irresistible power, the very moral force that…sustains the universe.”

Van Inwagen’s “Rescue Operation"
The purpose of this post is to support Van Inwagen’s “Rescue Operation”.

Below is a link to some of Inwagen’s ideas:
https://www.scielo.br/j/man/a/y7sLnLDW6xzwh7d8FYrH8Gz/

In summary, Van Inwagen argues that “since love essentially involves free will, love is not something that can be imposed from the outside, by an act of sheer power. Human beings must choose freely to be reunited with God and to love him, and this is something they are unable to do by their own efforts. They must therefore cooperate with God. As is the case with many rescue operations, the rescuer and those whom he is rescuing must cooperate. For human beings to cooperate with God in this rescue operation, they must know that they need to be rescued. They must know what it means to be separated from him. And what it means to be separated from God is to live in a world of horrors. If God simply "canceled" all the horrors of this world by an endless series of miracles, he would thereby frustrate his own plan of reconciliation. If he did that, we should be content with our lot and should see no reason to cooperate with him.”

Here is the link to the quote:
https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1025532-the-problem-of-evil-the-gifford-lectures-delivered-in-the-university-of

The argument would go as follows:

If God ended suffering, humans would not know what it means to be separated from Him.
If humans did not know what it means to be separated from God, they would not know that they need to be rescued.
If humans did not know they needed to be rescued, they would have no reason to cooperate with God.
Suffering is necessary for humans to cooperate with God.

I believe this is an extension of my previous post. In my previous post, I briefly mentioned that a world where gratuitous evils do not exist would be quite weird because it would eliminate the purpose of the world. I strongly believe God would not want a perfect world, or even one where a perfect world exists. I believe that it is possible that God created forms of gratuitous evil to prevent this very case. If it was the case that humans could attain perfection, they might as well live in Heaven. There is a very real and concrete purpose for being in this world: to suffer, and in a world where suffering ceased to exist or there was even a possibility to end all suffering, all meaning would be lost. In the Christian doctrine, there is a very apparent call to suffering. A call to fast, a call to participate in lent, a call to reject one’s internal desires, a call to “pick up one’s cross daily”. This suffering brings the individual to a state of dependence–a state of reliance on God, and it is only when one is brought to this state that they can learn to comprehend the necessity of the offering that God has made.

Romans 5:3-4 says, “we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”

The Bible encourages Christians to “rejoice in our sufferings,” because the unavoidable nature of suffering is a blessing in two ways. When Christians are brought to a state of dependence, it lures them towards the grandeur of God, inspiring us to find Him and develop a relationship with Him. And this is the only moral way God can offer this gift; He cannot force this gift upon us, or else it would not be a gift. Acceptance of this gift is an act of humility, not only bringing human “character” closer to the image of God, but also giving us “hope”: hope that the sacrifice of our fleshly desires, will lead us somewhere greater. And this is the beginning of faith.

Let it not be confused that humans should then create evil to cause suffering. I believe this would be imitating God–attempting to take away the power that is meant for God. The mission to end suffering is obviously a righteous cause, one that ought to continue being pursued. However, the point is, despite human effort, suffering is inevitable: and our mission on an individual level ought not to be to suffer as little as possible, but instead to choose to suffer in the hope that it develops character and brings us closer to God. If this opportunity is available, it ought to always be chosen. I will continue this discussion in my next post.

Evidential Problem of Evil

In this post, I will develop some of my thoughts surrounding the debate on the problem of evil.

To start, I will outline the Evidential Problem of Evil. It seems to go something like this.

In many sad events, we can’t see what good features would outweigh the bad features. There are some apparently gratuitous evils.
Therefore, it’s likely that there are unjustified sad events (the good features do NOT outweigh the bad). Probably, there ARE gratuitous evils.
Therefore, it’s likely that: if God exists, then he allows unjustified and sad events, or gratuitous evils.
God would never allow unjustified sad events, or gratuitous evils.
Therefore, it’s likely that God does not exist.

I think premise 1 is sound. There are quite clearly some “apparently gratuitous evils”. This would reasonably lead one to question why God would allow these things to happen or at least why so creully.

On one hand, I believe an argument could be made against premise 4, arguing that a God would allow “unjustified sad events, or gratuitous events”, because it is the only way to preserve the consequences of human free will. There are obviously some gratuitous evils that are caused by humans, the Holocaust being just one example. If God were to intervene in this event and forbid consequential suffering from happening, He would be preventing the natural consequence of human free choice. It would essentially be God saying, “you humans can do whatever you want, but I control the consequences of your actions. Only positive consequences can materialize, even if the action is evil.” I think we can all agree that this would be quite strange. Thus, God does allow (human caused) gratuitous events to happen; otherwise, it would be infringing on human free will.

Now, even if this is true, one might ask, “what about the evil that is not caused by humans–natural disasters for example?” Let me first state that no one can definitively say that there even exists a sort of evil that humans did not cause. Humans can cause evil even if they do not intend to; even pure intentions can result in evil consequences. It is possible that an earthquake may be caused by the imperfect way humans have interacted with the world for thousands of years. Of course, this seems outrageous to say, but it is possible.

Nonetheless, let us say that there are indeed evils that are solely caused by the hand of God–that even if humans were perfect and lived just like Christ, there would still be gratuitous evils.

Let us, for a moment, consider a hypothetical world where God does not permit gratuitous evils. This means every event must produce more good than bad or simply be purely good without any bad. This is important to point out because this means a world of purely good is possible in this hypothetical. If there are no events where the bad outweighs the good, and only events where the good outweighs the bad, then the spectrum of possible worlds include only worlds that have more good than bad, or worlds that are only good. Thus, a perfect world is possible without gratuitous events. Of course, this possibility would only materialize if humans lived as perfect images of Christ. Nonetheless, this perfect world is still possible. What if God never intended for this world to be even possibly perfect? What if that would actually be counterintuitive to human purpose. If God wanted humans to be perfect, this world would not be necessary. Humans would simply exist eternally in heaven. Thus, it is possible that God would allow gratuitous evils.

In response to Devans99:

“I think God is needed to explain the state of the universe but I have difficulties fitting him into any viable model of the universe. Would you have God sharing our time dimension or does he have his own time dimension? Or if you have God as timeless, how does he manage to change things (like creating universes)?”

In this post I will specifically focus on the last question. I believe in the form of an argument, the question would go something like this:

If things change, time must pass.
So, if someone changes things, they must do so while time passes.
If someone does things while time passes, they operate in time.
If someone operates in the dimension of time, they are not timeless.
God operates in time.
God is not timeless.

My objection would be against premise four:

Two dimensions are side to side and up and down.
Three dimensions are side to side, up and down, and forward and backward.
If a figure is three dimensional, it still has the ability to move in the dimensions of side to side and up and down.
A three dimensional figure can operate in two dimensions.
If a figure operates in two dimensions, it does not exclude the figure from being a figure of a higher dimension.
Thus, if God operates in the dimension of time, it does not exclude Him from being timeless.

The original question: “If God is timeless, how does He change things?”

When we say God is “timeless”, I believe we make the mistake of thinking this means God cannot change things while time passes, or that God is unable to move in the dimension of time. God being a higher dimensional being does not mean He cannot function in time, but instead, that there are more dimensions which He has the option to move through.

Some will argue that even if this is true mathematically, it is illogical to assume the same for the dimension of time.

In response, let us consider a hypothetical. Let us say that time froze. Everything in the universe stopped, pausing at point A and resuming at point B. For all we know, this could have happened five minutes ago. And let us say that time indeed froze–time did not exist between A and B. Would it be illogical to say that God did not freeze? If God created time and is timeless, it would be reasonable to say that God, indeed, can exist in this gap between A and B. But God is not moving through the dimension of time. Rather, He is operating in a higher dimension.

If this is the case, God can obviously exist without time. To create universes, God must have existed independent of time, in another, unknown dimension, by which humans cannot comprehend the laws of. The moment God creates the universe, time begins. But, God still has the option to move through time or independent of time.

In response to Walter Pound:

“God is understood to be changeless, and therefore timeless, but God is also understood to be the creator of time.

If God creates the physical world along with time, then God experiences a change - from existing alone to existing along with time.

Can anyone explain how God is the creator of time and remains changeless?”

In this post, I will attempt to formulate a response to the question posed and explain how God can be changeless while still being the creator of time.

This question seems to take the form of two arguments. The first argument seems to go like this:

Change constitutes the passing of time. (Newtonian view)
If something does not change, it is timeless.
God does not change.
So, God is timeless.

The second part of the question seems to be an objection to premise three:

If the creator creates the physical world and time, the creator must experience a change–from existing alone to co-existing with time.
God is the creator of the physical world and time.
God does indeed change–from existing alone to co-existing with time.

I will start by deconstructing each of these arguments, to hopefully come to a conclusive answer to the question posed, by the end. First, I will object to the first premise of the objection made in argument two.

I create a sculpture.
I go from a state of existing alone, to a state of existing with this sculpture.
I have not changed.
Premise one of Mr. Pound’s objection fails simply because a change in the environment does not necessarily change the being involved. I think a modification to this premise would be something like this:

If the creator creates the physical world and time, the creator must enact some change.

Though I believe this modified premise is true, it would not lead to the conclusion that God does change. Overall, my objection to the objection is really just support for premise three of the original argument that God does not change.

There seems to be some misunderstanding in the statement, “God does not change”. Here are some references to the Bible that speak to this idea.

https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/God-Is-Unchanging

The meaning of “God being unchanging” is testifying to God’s character being unchanging–not the conditions in which He lives. While God can create and change existing things, He himself does not ever change who He is. Take for instance:

James 1:17– “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”

James seems to clearly indicate here that though God is unchanging, He still enacted some change by sending “good things” and “perfect gifts”. This makes sense, considering that giving a gift to someone does not necessarily mean that the giver changes in character. And to go back to the original wording of the argument, because God must go from existing without a perfect gift, to co-existing with a perfect gift, does not directly change God.

So, because God can change things without changing Himself, it is possible that God created both the physical world and time while still being changeless.