Christians have made many mistakes. Churches have made many mistakes. These are points on which Mr. Russell hammers away, and to which we as believers must stand up and face. Churches and Christians have fought the wrong battles, been on the wrong side of important issues and have missed the mark on many doctrinal points in which we should never waiver. It's interesting as I write this that an article in the local paper just this morning announced an astronomy exhibit opening at the Vatican. The article stated, "The ruling (of the Catholic Church against Galileo) helped fuel accusations that the church was hostile to science - a reputation teh Vatican has been trying to shed ever since." I am not a Catholic and am not here promoting or denouncing Catholicism, just reinforcing the point that some mistakes are not quickly forgotten.
These facts are black marks on Churches and Christians alike, and many, like Mr. Russell, have capitalized on it to build a case against Christ. Many times believers lash out in the face of such criticism fearing that their faith is somehow being compromised. Nothing could be farther from the truth. I for one thank Mr. Russell for being true to his worldview and bringing these shortcoming to light. Why would any Christian say something like that? What is the central message of the Christian faith, if not that man is fallen, broken and sinful; incapable of curing the disease of sin in his/her own life; and lives with a desire for forgiveness and a need for salvation. Jesus offers this forgiveness and salvation through faith in His condescention to become human, suffer and die on the cross, and to raise Himself to defeat sin, death and Hell. What has Mr. Russell done here but prove our point? Pointing out the mistakes of the Church only highlights the fact that man is fallen and actually stipulates the sinful nature of all humankind. Mr. Russell has not reached the end of the Christian faith, he has just found the beginning. Paul reminds the church in Rome of Psalm 14 which states, in part,
"The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.' They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good. The Lord looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. All have turned aside, they have together become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one." (emphasis mine).
Churches will continue to make mistakes so long as it consists of humans. Christians will continue to make mistakes because Christians are first people. Thankfully we are not presenting the Church or ourselves as the answer. As believers, we should be constantly pointing to Jesus as the solution to the sin problem, not people we know, actions we can take, or groups we can join that will 'save us from ourselves'.
Finally, I must point out what should already be obvious, that Christians have not cornered the market on bad behavior. Churches do not have a monopoly on atrocities. Stalin, Mao, Hitler, Bin-Laden - surely these names cannot be ignored. Further, if each and every person looks into their own heart, what explanation do they have for the evil they find lurking there. We can never judge a worldview by its abuses. I discount Atheism because of what I see as untenable core priniciples, not because Stalin was an Atheist and he oversaw the killing of millions of his own people. When discussing the efficacy of Christianity, we must always be cognizant of this principle and look not to what people who call themselves Christians do, or what churches do, rather we need to investiagate the claims of Jesus and decide if they correspond to reality and are coherent and consistant. I believe that they are, I believe in Jesus, and that is why I am a Christian and why I try to persuade people to walk with me in following Christ.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Critique One - Part Five - A Truth Ignored
"I now want to say a few words upon a topic which I often think is not quite sufficiently dealt with by Rationalists, and that is the question whether Christ was the best and the wisest of men...Then you come to moral questions. There is one very serious defect to my mind in Christ's moral character, and that is that He believed in Hell. I do not myself feel that any person who is really profoundly humane can believe in everlasting punishment...I cannot myself feel that either in the matter of wisdom or in the matter of virtue Christ stands quite as high as some other people know to history. I think I should put Buddha and Socrates above Him in those respects." Having believed to have dealt a serious enough blow to the existence of God and to immortality, Mr. Russell moves on to Christ in his paragraphs entitled The Character of Christ, Defects in Christ's Teaching and The Moral Problem. As a Christian I must admit I was pretty upset at my first reading. A number of assertions were made and scriptures cherry-picked and taken out of context or with complete misunderstanding to press his point. I did read the section a few more times, however, as I myself only desire a hearing for the Gospel of Christ and felt the least I could do was not dismiss these ideas out of hand. I spent a day and a half thinking of his assertions and how to address them. It finally occurred to me that in all three of these sections there was common glaring void, a proverbial elephant in the room being ignored, Truth.
I capitalize Truth intentionally with respect to Francis Schaeffer who spoke extensively about true-truth and its necessity. Mr. Russell bases his entire criticism of Christ on whether in his mind Christ was "...the best and wisest of men." He then looks at bits and pieces of scripture and summarily decides he doesn't like Christ's viewpoint on several issues. Mr. Russell's fatal mistake here is never considering the question, "Is what Christ said true?" In simplest terms, truth is correspondence. If I say the grass in my yard is green, then the truth or falsehood of that statement is found by witnessing if the grass in my yard is in fact green. This is the question at hand with regard to Christ. Mr. Russell is not alone in his dislike of the idea of Hell, and he sees Christ's discussion of it as cruel. What if Hell is a reality, what if Hell is an actual place of eternal torment? If that is true, then cruelty would be not to tell people of its existence and provide a way of escape.
A full and exhaustive defense of Jesus as the Messiah is not possible here due to space and has been dealt with in much finer form in other works. I would offer two things for consideration. First, Jesus said he was the way, the truth and the life. He did not say He knew of the truth, He said He was the truth. If truth is correspondence, then Jesus was saying that He corresponded completely with every prophecy of what the Messiah would be when he came as foretold in the Old Testament. I will leave it to each reader to find out what those prophecies were and if Jesus in fact fleshed out each one. I believe that He did.
Second, Jesus forgave sins. I only recently gave serious thought to what that actually means. If someone were to yell at me for no reason and later realize their error and then ask to be forgiven for the offense, then I could acknowledge my forgiveness. It is an entirely different matter for me to approach someone on the street and tell them that I forgive them their sins. I have no idea against whom they have sinned! Furthermore, I am not the one offended! For Jesus to speak with people and during the discourse pronounce their sins forgiven, He was saying that they had sinned against Him, that He was the party offended, and further that He had the authority to forgive them.
Who is the man who could be so audacious as to make these pronouncements. Philip Schaff puts it this way: "Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mahomet, and Nepoleon; without science and learning, He shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and schools combined; without the eloquence of schools, he spoke words of life such as never were spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of any orator or poet; without writing a single line, He has set more pens to motion, and furnished more themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art and sweet songs of praise, than the whole army of great men if ancient and modern times. Born in a manger, and crucified as a malefactor, He now controls the destinies of the civilized world, and rules a spiritual empire which embraces one-third of the inhabitants of the globe. There never was in this world a life so unpretending, modest and lowly in its outward form and condition, and yet producing such extraordinary effects upon all ages, nations and classes of men. The annals of history produce no other example of such complete and astonishing success in spite of the absence of those material, social, literary, and artistic powers and influences which are indispensable to success for a mere man."
Jesus was the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament. He was the fulfillment of the promise long before made to the world, and the one identified by the man from the wilderness who said He was the One to be followed. He was fully God and fully man. Malcolm Muggeridge in his "Jesus: The Man Who Lives" says, "Jesus had previously told the disciples that whatever was prayed for sincerely in his name would be granted, to that point that mountains could be made to move themselves by prayer. If, therefore, he had truly asked God to deliver him from betrayal by Judas and all its consequences, his prayer would surely have been answered, and he have been spared the agony and bloody sweat that lay ahead. But, of course, there was the proviso; it must be, not as he willed, but as God willed. And it was God's will that he should be nailed to a cross, and thereby, as the victim of this, perhaps the cruellest form of execution ever devised, provide mankind for ever after with a fount of joy and hope, an inspiration to high endeavor, and a certainty of salvation."
This is the Jesus in whom Mr. Russell chose to disbelieve. Not merely a man like you or I who didn't measure up to his personal subjective preferences for stature or wisdom, but the way, the truth and the life. We must all set about looking at this Jesus and either accepting who He claimed to be and the evidences of what He said and did or denying Him.
Once again, i'd like to close by considering the outworking of Mr. Russell's worldview with regard to Jesus. We must always take a worldview and its assertions to their logical conclusion. Again, Mr. Muggeridge is much more eloquent in making these outworkings plain, "If, as often seems to be the case, we have driven Jesus away, or at any rate back to the catacombs, then we are totally at the mercy of our rulers, whoever they may be and whatever their ideology on behalf of which they purport to govern. The only antidote to the poison from Caesar's laurel crown comes from Jesus's crown of thorns. He alone can deliver us from the monstrosities and buffooneries of power, as has been discovered by the most perceptive spirits of our time, such as Sozhenitsyn. Faced with power at its most unbridled and most brutal, they turn for help and comfort, not to Universal Declarations of Human Rights and other pronouncements, solemn undertakings, Covenants and Charters in a similar vein, but to the man wearing a crown of thorns, decked out in a red robe of absurdity and with a court of jeering soldiers. There alone the sting of power is drawn and its pretensions are exploded, and the princes of this world have no recourse but, like Judas, to flee into the night."
I capitalize Truth intentionally with respect to Francis Schaeffer who spoke extensively about true-truth and its necessity. Mr. Russell bases his entire criticism of Christ on whether in his mind Christ was "...the best and wisest of men." He then looks at bits and pieces of scripture and summarily decides he doesn't like Christ's viewpoint on several issues. Mr. Russell's fatal mistake here is never considering the question, "Is what Christ said true?" In simplest terms, truth is correspondence. If I say the grass in my yard is green, then the truth or falsehood of that statement is found by witnessing if the grass in my yard is in fact green. This is the question at hand with regard to Christ. Mr. Russell is not alone in his dislike of the idea of Hell, and he sees Christ's discussion of it as cruel. What if Hell is a reality, what if Hell is an actual place of eternal torment? If that is true, then cruelty would be not to tell people of its existence and provide a way of escape.
A full and exhaustive defense of Jesus as the Messiah is not possible here due to space and has been dealt with in much finer form in other works. I would offer two things for consideration. First, Jesus said he was the way, the truth and the life. He did not say He knew of the truth, He said He was the truth. If truth is correspondence, then Jesus was saying that He corresponded completely with every prophecy of what the Messiah would be when he came as foretold in the Old Testament. I will leave it to each reader to find out what those prophecies were and if Jesus in fact fleshed out each one. I believe that He did.
Second, Jesus forgave sins. I only recently gave serious thought to what that actually means. If someone were to yell at me for no reason and later realize their error and then ask to be forgiven for the offense, then I could acknowledge my forgiveness. It is an entirely different matter for me to approach someone on the street and tell them that I forgive them their sins. I have no idea against whom they have sinned! Furthermore, I am not the one offended! For Jesus to speak with people and during the discourse pronounce their sins forgiven, He was saying that they had sinned against Him, that He was the party offended, and further that He had the authority to forgive them.
Who is the man who could be so audacious as to make these pronouncements. Philip Schaff puts it this way: "Jesus of Nazareth, without money and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, Caesar, Mahomet, and Nepoleon; without science and learning, He shed more light on things human and divine than all philosophers and schools combined; without the eloquence of schools, he spoke words of life such as never were spoken before or since, and produced effects which lie beyond the reach of any orator or poet; without writing a single line, He has set more pens to motion, and furnished more themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, learned volumes, works of art and sweet songs of praise, than the whole army of great men if ancient and modern times. Born in a manger, and crucified as a malefactor, He now controls the destinies of the civilized world, and rules a spiritual empire which embraces one-third of the inhabitants of the globe. There never was in this world a life so unpretending, modest and lowly in its outward form and condition, and yet producing such extraordinary effects upon all ages, nations and classes of men. The annals of history produce no other example of such complete and astonishing success in spite of the absence of those material, social, literary, and artistic powers and influences which are indispensable to success for a mere man."
Jesus was the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament. He was the fulfillment of the promise long before made to the world, and the one identified by the man from the wilderness who said He was the One to be followed. He was fully God and fully man. Malcolm Muggeridge in his "Jesus: The Man Who Lives" says, "Jesus had previously told the disciples that whatever was prayed for sincerely in his name would be granted, to that point that mountains could be made to move themselves by prayer. If, therefore, he had truly asked God to deliver him from betrayal by Judas and all its consequences, his prayer would surely have been answered, and he have been spared the agony and bloody sweat that lay ahead. But, of course, there was the proviso; it must be, not as he willed, but as God willed. And it was God's will that he should be nailed to a cross, and thereby, as the victim of this, perhaps the cruellest form of execution ever devised, provide mankind for ever after with a fount of joy and hope, an inspiration to high endeavor, and a certainty of salvation."
This is the Jesus in whom Mr. Russell chose to disbelieve. Not merely a man like you or I who didn't measure up to his personal subjective preferences for stature or wisdom, but the way, the truth and the life. We must all set about looking at this Jesus and either accepting who He claimed to be and the evidences of what He said and did or denying Him.
Once again, i'd like to close by considering the outworking of Mr. Russell's worldview with regard to Jesus. We must always take a worldview and its assertions to their logical conclusion. Again, Mr. Muggeridge is much more eloquent in making these outworkings plain, "If, as often seems to be the case, we have driven Jesus away, or at any rate back to the catacombs, then we are totally at the mercy of our rulers, whoever they may be and whatever their ideology on behalf of which they purport to govern. The only antidote to the poison from Caesar's laurel crown comes from Jesus's crown of thorns. He alone can deliver us from the monstrosities and buffooneries of power, as has been discovered by the most perceptive spirits of our time, such as Sozhenitsyn. Faced with power at its most unbridled and most brutal, they turn for help and comfort, not to Universal Declarations of Human Rights and other pronouncements, solemn undertakings, Covenants and Charters in a similar vein, but to the man wearing a crown of thorns, decked out in a red robe of absurdity and with a court of jeering soldiers. There alone the sting of power is drawn and its pretensions are exploded, and the princes of this world have no recourse but, like Judas, to flee into the night."
Monday, October 12, 2009
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.
(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.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Critique One - Part Three - An Eternal Choice
Mr. Russell spoke briefly concerning the Natural Law Argument and the Argument from Design as continued support for why he chose not to follow Jesus. He indicated that advances in science had convinced him that chance was a better explanation for why things are exactly the way they are than is the Biblical creation account. Mr. Russell admittedlly spent a short amount of time on this point because of the vast amount of detail involved. Likewise, my comments in response will be brief. There are only two points i'd like to present for consideration.
First, science is an explanatory agent. Science is observation. We believe something to be true, we devise a way to test that explanation and observe the results of the test then make a judgement to the validity of the first premise. Therefore, if science were perfected then we would have an explanation for how everything in the universe works. We quickly see the limitation here. Science can never explain why things are the way they are because we cannot observe origins. True scientists would admit as much. This means that science can have nothing to say about origins, only untestable, unobservable premises. This is why I believe advances in science only make clearer the case for creation. The more we discover, the more difficult it is to explain the intricate details by time and chance. If one looks at just two recent proposals for intellegent design, namely irreducible complexity and specified complexity (look briefly at the make-up and operation of blood clotting and DNA, for example) one would easily see that the passage of time makes ideas of chance as moving beyond the limits of plausibility.
"I am told that that sort of view is depressing, and people will sometimes tell you that if they believed that they would not be able to go on living. Do not believe it; it is all nonsense. Nobody really worries much about what is going to happen millions of years hence. Even if they think they are worrying much about that, they are really deceiving themselves...although it is of course a gloomy view to suppose that life will die out...it is not such as to render life miserable." I am glad Mr. Russell at least recognizes that people have real problems with the outworkings of his views, although he quickly dismisses those individuals concerns. We cannot waive our hand at the reality that people are miserable. If one holds that everything came to be via time and chance then there is nothing to hope for. Death is the end. We'd have to consider whether considering anything important (origin, meaning, morality, destiny) was worth consideration. The Bible is clear that man is immortal, and will spend an eternity in one place or the other. This gives the Christian an unswerving hope no matter the situation, and the skeptic despondency and hopelessness even in the best of times.
Mr. Russell has missed the logical conclusion of his arguments against natural law and design. If we are all here as a result of time and chance, then man is just an accident, an unexplainable phenomena in the universe. If this is the case, then why should I as an accident care one whit what another accident thinks about anything? In other words, Mr. Russell's worldview discourages anyone from even considering his worldview. What Mr. Russell rejects, and disciples of Christ offer, is the peace, contentment, joy and hope that comes with belief that we are created in the very image of God, for the glory of God who makes available salvation, justification, sanctification and an eternal home in His presence through faith in Jesus Christ. It is a choice each of us must make.
First, science is an explanatory agent. Science is observation. We believe something to be true, we devise a way to test that explanation and observe the results of the test then make a judgement to the validity of the first premise. Therefore, if science were perfected then we would have an explanation for how everything in the universe works. We quickly see the limitation here. Science can never explain why things are the way they are because we cannot observe origins. True scientists would admit as much. This means that science can have nothing to say about origins, only untestable, unobservable premises. This is why I believe advances in science only make clearer the case for creation. The more we discover, the more difficult it is to explain the intricate details by time and chance. If one looks at just two recent proposals for intellegent design, namely irreducible complexity and specified complexity (look briefly at the make-up and operation of blood clotting and DNA, for example) one would easily see that the passage of time makes ideas of chance as moving beyond the limits of plausibility.
"I am told that that sort of view is depressing, and people will sometimes tell you that if they believed that they would not be able to go on living. Do not believe it; it is all nonsense. Nobody really worries much about what is going to happen millions of years hence. Even if they think they are worrying much about that, they are really deceiving themselves...although it is of course a gloomy view to suppose that life will die out...it is not such as to render life miserable." I am glad Mr. Russell at least recognizes that people have real problems with the outworkings of his views, although he quickly dismisses those individuals concerns. We cannot waive our hand at the reality that people are miserable. If one holds that everything came to be via time and chance then there is nothing to hope for. Death is the end. We'd have to consider whether considering anything important (origin, meaning, morality, destiny) was worth consideration. The Bible is clear that man is immortal, and will spend an eternity in one place or the other. This gives the Christian an unswerving hope no matter the situation, and the skeptic despondency and hopelessness even in the best of times.
Mr. Russell has missed the logical conclusion of his arguments against natural law and design. If we are all here as a result of time and chance, then man is just an accident, an unexplainable phenomena in the universe. If this is the case, then why should I as an accident care one whit what another accident thinks about anything? In other words, Mr. Russell's worldview discourages anyone from even considering his worldview. What Mr. Russell rejects, and disciples of Christ offer, is the peace, contentment, joy and hope that comes with belief that we are created in the very image of God, for the glory of God who makes available salvation, justification, sanctification and an eternal home in His presence through faith in Jesus Christ. It is a choice each of us must make.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Critique One - Part Two - Bad Assumptions
"'Who made me?' cannot be answered, since it immediately suggests the further question, 'Who made God?' That very simple sentence showed me, as I still think, the fallacy in the argument of the First Cause. If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause."
This treatment of the First Cause Principle by Mr. Russell appears at first blush to be pretty logical, but there seem to be some bad assumptions behind his position. Namely the following:
(1) Mistaken Equality. In mathematics we understand the simple formula, If A=1 and B=1 then A=B. In this case, A and B are equivalents because the have the same value, and are therefore interchangeable. Saying A equals unity is the same as saying B is equal to unity. Unfortunately Mr. Russell makes this assumption about God and man, namely that they are equal with regard to causation. It could be stated thus, "If man has a cause and man is equal to God with regard to causation, then God must have a cause." Once we make the assumption that man is somehow on the same footing with God we are no longer discussing Christianity.
(2) Necessity. Man is not a necessary being. Human existence is not a pre-requisite for the function of the universe. We are dependent, this is why we must have a cause. The Bible is not confused here. God is a necessary being, independent and eternal. There has never been a time when God was not. This exposes a small part of the beauty of the Trinitarian view of God, the three-in-one (and we bring in Christ here). God didn't have to create anything because there was community in the Trinity from eternity past. Hence, "In the beginning God created..." He was necessarily there eternally before the "beginning" and created because He chose to do so.
I am not here trying to make a defense of the First Cause Principle in all its detail. I am concerned only with the usage of it in Mr. Russell's line of argument against the existence of God. I believe the assumptions inherent in the First Cause Principle as described by Mr. Russell are not valid and therefore cast no doubt or shadow on the existence of God.
This treatment of the First Cause Principle by Mr. Russell appears at first blush to be pretty logical, but there seem to be some bad assumptions behind his position. Namely the following:
(1) Mistaken Equality. In mathematics we understand the simple formula, If A=1 and B=1 then A=B. In this case, A and B are equivalents because the have the same value, and are therefore interchangeable. Saying A equals unity is the same as saying B is equal to unity. Unfortunately Mr. Russell makes this assumption about God and man, namely that they are equal with regard to causation. It could be stated thus, "If man has a cause and man is equal to God with regard to causation, then God must have a cause." Once we make the assumption that man is somehow on the same footing with God we are no longer discussing Christianity.
(2) Necessity. Man is not a necessary being. Human existence is not a pre-requisite for the function of the universe. We are dependent, this is why we must have a cause. The Bible is not confused here. God is a necessary being, independent and eternal. There has never been a time when God was not. This exposes a small part of the beauty of the Trinitarian view of God, the three-in-one (and we bring in Christ here). God didn't have to create anything because there was community in the Trinity from eternity past. Hence, "In the beginning God created..." He was necessarily there eternally before the "beginning" and created because He chose to do so.
I am not here trying to make a defense of the First Cause Principle in all its detail. I am concerned only with the usage of it in Mr. Russell's line of argument against the existence of God. I believe the assumptions inherent in the First Cause Principle as described by Mr. Russell are not valid and therefore cast no doubt or shadow on the existence of God.
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