Critique One - Part Four - Intellectual Ascent

"Now we reach one stage further in what I shall call the intellectual descent that the Theists have made in their argumentations, and we come to what are called the moral arguments for the existence of God." One could spend a lifetime with all the entailments of the ideas Mr. Russell presents in the two short paragraphs on morality and justice. Again I will be brief and present only three points for consideration.

(1) Unfounded Beginnings. Once again it seems Mr. Russell is content with his own, and other individuals interpretations of God instead of actually investigating what the Christian position on God actually is. He singles out goodness and justice to present his case, but the Bible actually presents many names for God. The significant point here is what the Bible is and what it does not say. The Bible is the revealed Word of God (or God describing Himself to us) where we see who God is and how He operates. The Bible does not say that God exhibits certain qualities, but rather that He is Almighty, Most High, Everlasting, Provider, Banner, Peace, Lord of Hosts, Sanctifier, Shepherd, Righteous, Ever-Present, Master, Transcendent, Savior, Father. This is significant because to prove God doesn't exist you would have to prove that He is not those things (not just that He appears to not be those things in some situations). This is, I believe, the fatal flaw with Atheism; namely, the affirmation of a negative in the absolute. More on this later.

(2) As regards goodness in particular, I would only do injustice to the topic if I were to do anything but reiterate C.S. Lewis from his 'Mere Christianity': "In other words badness cannot succeed in being bad in the same way that goodness is good. Goodness is, so to speak, itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled...Put it more simply still. To be bad, he must exist and have intelligence and will. But existence, intelligence and will are in themselves good. Therefore he must be getting them from the Good Power: even to be bad he must borrow of steal from his opponent. And do you new begin to see why Christianity has always said that the devil is a fallen angel? That is not a mere story for children. It is a real recognition of the fact that evil is a parasite, not an original thing."

(3) As regards justice, again I defer to Mr. Lewis: "But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line...A man feels wet when he falls into water, because a man is not a water animal: a fish would not feel wet...Thus in the very act of trying to prove that God does not exist-in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless-I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality-namely my idea of justice-was full of sense. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be a word without meaning."

As I mentioned before, this topic is deep and requires much thought. Ultimately, the Christian knows that God is good and He is just. He created and it was good. He created man and woman for man and it was very good. Mankind chose sin and with the entrance of sin it went bad. Only an unjust, unloving, bad God would leave us to our own devices and not do everything He could to set things right (like sending His only Son to suffer and die to defeat death and the grave so all humankind would have the opportunity of salvation). This is precisely what He has done, why we should fall on our face before Him as those unworthy of such mercy, and why He has every right to command our exclusive faith, love and worship.