20th Century Jewish Religious Thought: Original Essays on Critical Concepts, Movements, and Beliefs

Atheism

Atheislll Gershon Weiler A theism is an intellectual position derivative of and parasitic upon theism. Its exponents hold that the thesis "God exists" is false. Thus the varieties of atheism largely correspond to the kinds of theism professed and these, significantly, include the varieties of religions. The character of any version of atheism essentially depends on the kind of answer that its theistic rival gives to the question, What is meant by God? or put differently, Under what description is the term God to be understood? God is a logically troublesome term, for it is not readily classifiable either as a proper name (like Churchill) or as a class-name (like table); the difficulties that follow from this circumstance are well highlighted in the doctrine of Maimonides about the negative nature of divine attributes. By reason of this ambiguity, various doctrines of theism and various religions fill the term God with different content and meaning; hence, the varieties of atheism. Against theists who hold that God is the creator, the atheist argues for the eternity of matter and the absurdity of thinking that something could come from nothing, with the consequence that creation ex 24 ATHEISM nihilo cannot be a true account of the origin of anything. Against theistic attempts to explain away evil by asserting that it is only apparent and that, in truth, the world in its entirety is a manifestation of God's infinite wisdom and kindness, the atheist argues that evil in the world is real and that, therefore , it is impossible that there should exist a God who is infinitely good and infinitely powerful. Against the cosmological arguments of the theist, according to which God is the First Cause and the First Mover, the atheist points out that these alleged proofs for the existence of God rest upon obsolete Aristotelian physical theory. Against the teleological arguments allegedly supporting theism, the atheist follows David Hume's classic refutations in his Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (1779) and holds, for example, that it is a mistake to think of the world-as-a-whole as if it were an artifact, and thus exhibits design by an intelligent being, since artifacts are no more inherently intelligible than the production of organisms by biological generation . The atheist will also adopt Hume's observation that the world bears no more witness to the existence of a creator than it does to a committee of designers. Of particular philosophical interest is the atheistic proof for the nonexistence of God invented by John Findlay. This consists of an inside-out version of the ontological proof for the existence of God, itself the most impressive of all proofs for God's existence. Findlay's disproof, in brief, is this: The theist is right in holding that only a God whose existence is necessary could be a worthy object of worship; however, since all existence is factual and contingent and thus nothing satisfies the theistic requirements, it is therefore impossible for God to exist.1 Atheism is often sharply distinguished from agnosticism; however, both positions overlap to a considerable extent. The agnostic claims not to know whether it is true or not that God exists, but this position can be understood in two different ways. The agnostic can be taken to mean that he is aware of considerations for and against the truth of God's existence and that he cannot make up his mind. But he can also be taken to mean that while he has no proof to offer that "God exists" is false, yet he has no reason either for believing it to be true. This second interpretation is but a variety of atheism . To elucidate, consider the following: "There is a little green man somewhere in the Himalayas who exercises telepathic influence over the doings of all mankind." Now, the truth of this assertion is neither entailed nor contradicted by all we know, and indeed, it can be made consistent with all we know. Yet most people would not say that they are agnostics with respect to the existence of the little green man, but rather would flatly deny ATHEISM 25 that there is any such thing, meaning thereby that they have not the slightest reason for holding that he exists. It is perfectly rational, and thus quite common , to take the same attitude toward the God of established religion and hold that there is no more reason for...