Is There a God?
I have some good news for you, gentle reader: I can recommend to you a wonderful apologetics book by a distinguished Oxford philosophy professor, it’s only 123 pages long, and you can read it right now for free since the whole book is online here [link: https://ia801904.us.archive.org/13/items/RichardSwinburne/RichardSwinburne-IsThereAGod.pdf ].
I was led to the book by a comment a reader made on the National Review Online post I made this summer. In the post, I described myself as a fan of Pascal’s Wager, and the comment read: “Richard Swinburne’s (University of Oxford) probabilistic approach is a strong update to Pascal’s wager.” I’m glad the reader made the comment, but note that the book itself does not mention the Wager.
Here’s how the author himself summarizes the book (120-21):
The conclusion of this book is that the existence, orderliness, and fine tunedness of the world; the existence of conscious humans within it with providential opportunities for moulding themselves, each other, and the world; some historical evidence of miracles in connection with human needs and prayers, particularly in connection with the foundation of Christianity, topped up finally by the apparent experience by millions of his presence, all make it significantly more probable than not that there is a God.
The author describes his subsequent book, Was Jesus God?, as a sequel to this one (112), and I discuss it next on this post. Note that, as is often the case, a two-step approach is taken to evangelism: first arguing that there is a God, and, second, that Jesus was divine.
I’m not sure how much detail I need or should go into regarding the first book, since it is so short, it is so accessible, and the author has just summarized it for you. I think the strategy I’ll adopt is to leave it at that for Is There a God? and go into (lots) more detail for the somewhat longer Was Jesus God? (which does include some of the first book’s arguments).
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Was Jesus God?
Here is a link to the online version of the sequel (author’s word (“This book can be read as a sequel to Is There a God? or independently of it” (1); he also calls it a “short companion book” (16)) [link: https://www.academia.edu/42070586/Was_Jesus_God_Richard_Swinburne ].
I made a note that the last paragraph of first chapter (26-27) is a “good roadmap” of the book, and here it is:
In the next five chapters of Part I, I shall elucidate these theological doctrines [i.e., the Nicene Creed]; and also lay out the a priori reasons for believing them to be true. That is, I shall consider how far it is made probable by the nature of God as described so far (and by very general facts about the human race and its history) that God would have the further nature and act in human history through some human person and community in the way that these doctrines claim that he acted through Jesus and his church. Then, in Part II, I shall analyze the posterior evidence, the relevant historical evidence which we need in order to show that these doctrines are true of Jesus and the Christian Church—in particular that Jesus was not merely a human person but God living among us. So I shall be discussing each of the doctrines contained in the Creed both in Part I (to consider the a priori reasons for believing them) and in Part II (to discuss the a posteriori reasons.) I have entitled Part I “God Loves Us” because I shall argue that God would have shown his love for humans by acting in human history in the way described. I have entitled Part II “God Shows Us That He loves Us” because I shall be arguing that (given the prior evidence) the posterior (historical) evidence shows that God has acted in this way. But before coming to the issue of how we may expect God to act towards us, I argue that we may expect God to have a certain nature beyond that which I have described so far, a nature asserted by the Creed in the doctrine of the Trinity.
This paragraph from the book’s cover sheet also does a good job of summarizing the book:
Richard Swinburne sets out powerful philosophical arguments for the truth of Christian doctrine. In his earlier book Is There a God? he argued that the orderliness of the universe and the existence of human beings already provide some reason for believing that there is a God. Swinburne now takes the discussion further, and argues that it is probable that the main Christian doctrines about the nature of God and his actions in the world are true. In virtue of his omnipotence and perfect goodness, God must be a Trinity, live a human life in order to share our suffering, and found a church which would enable him to tell all humans about this. It is also quite probable that he would provide his human life as an atonement for our wrongdoing, teach us how we should live and tell us his plans for our future after death. Among founders of religions, Jesus satisfies uniquely well the requirement of living the sort of human life which God would need to have lived. But to give us adequate reason to believe that Jesus was God, God would need to put his “signature” on the life of Jesus by an act which he alone could do, for example raise him from the dead. There is adequate historical evidence that Jesus rose from the dead. The church which he founded gave plausible interpretations of his basic message. Therefore Christian doctrines are probably true.
Here’s the table of contents:
Introduction
Part I: God Loves Us
Chapter 1 – God
Chapter 2 – God Is Love
Chapter 3 – God Shared Our Human Nature
Chapter 4 – God Atoned for Our Wrongdoing
Chapter 5 – God Teaches Us How to Live
Chapter 6 – God Offers Us Heaven
Part II: God Shows Us That He Loves Us
Chapter 7 – The Life and Death of Jesus
Chapter 8 – The Resurrection of Jesus
Chapter 9 – Provisional Conclusion
Chapter 10 – The Church
Chapter 11 – The Bible
Chapter 12 – Final Conclusion
And the first part of the first paragraph of the book’s chapter “Provisional Conclusion” (128) is also a helpful summarization:
I argued in Part I that we would expect God (if there is a God) to become a human prophet and lead the kind of life and give the kind of teaching considered in Chapter 7, and to put his signature on that life by a miraculous event, such as a resurrection of that human prophet from the dead. I argued in Chapter 7 that there is significant evidence that Jesus led the kind of life and gave the kind of teaching which we would expect God Incarnate to live and give; and I argued in Chapter 8 that (given the existence of God and the life and teaching of Jesus) that there is significant evidence that Jesus rose from the dead, and that his Resurrection constituted God’s signature on his life and teaching.
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Here are some other good passages to give you a flavor of the book and some idea of its scope:
The concluding paragraph in its chapter on the Trinity (38):
The argument which I have given in this chapter for the necessity of God being a Trinity may seem a very sophisticated one. But it depends on two very simple moral intuitions: that perfect love requires total sharing with an equal and requires cooperating in spreading that love further, so that anyone you love has someone else to love and be loved by. The first of these intuitions was, I think, one of the two reasons why Christians came to believe this doctrine. (The second intuition had to wait a thousand years for someone to state it explicitly.) The other reason why Christians came to believe the doctrine was, they held, that the doctrine had been revealed by the teaching of Jesus recorded in the New Testament and proclaimed as central Christian doctrine by the Church which he founded. I shall be arguing in due course that we also have this latter reason.
The conclusion to chapter 5, “God Teaches Us How To Live”:
I have argued in this chapter that we might well expect God to give us a propositional revelation both about the matters considered in Chapters 2, 3, and 4, and about moral truths (both necessary truths which we have proved unable to discover for ourselves, and contingent truths in the form of obligations which God is imposing on us for the good of others and of ourselves). I have argued that the central moral claims of the Christian tradition and one or two less central claims are either necessary truths or are such as God would have reason to impose on us. I have given a third reason (additional to the reasons of sharing our suffering and making atonement for our wrongdoing) why God might choose to become incarnate—that is, to show us by example how we should live, and thereby to encourage us to do so. In doing so he might be expected himself to give us the propositional revelation at the same time. And I have claimed that God must provide a Church at least in order to interpret his revelation, and probably also in order to encourage us to become saints.
The interesting and somewhat unsettling introductory paragraph to the next chapter, “God Offers Us Heaven” (with the subheading, “The End of the World”):
I claimed earlier that the creation of humans with their great potentiality to do evil as well as good and their great liability to suffer evil as well as good was a mixed blessing; God had perhaps as much reason to bring it about as not to bring it about. Maybe instead he should have created people who were naturally good and so had no real responsibility for each other or choice of the kind of people they were to be (and perhaps God has created such people in another world). Creating humans was taking a great risk; and so, in the light of all the evil as well as the good that humans have done, God has as much reason as not to bring this risky experiment to an end. In expressing the belief that God the Son “will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead” the Creed affirms a belief that, sooner or later, this world order will come to an end.
The “Conclusion to Part I” (which is also a good summary of it) (83-84):
At the beginning of this book I made the assumption that the reader has some reason to believe that there is a God of the traditional kind: essentially omnipotent, omniscient, perfectly free and so perfectly good, and eternal. This reason might be provided by arguments of “natural theology,” or in some other way; and it might make the existence of God as probable as not, or maybe more probable or less probable than that. In Chapters 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 I have argued that, if there is such a God, there are a priori reasons (reasons following from the very being of that God) for supposing that he has the nature (being a Trinity) which Christianity claims, and that he would act in history to do the things which Christianity claims that he has done. I claimed that necessarily God is a Trinity, and necessarily—since (for good reasons) he makes humans suffer a lot—he would take a human nature and share those sufferings, and found a Church to tell cultures and generations other than those in which he lived on earth about what he had done. I also argued that it was quite probable that he would live a perfect life and make that life available to us as a means of atonement for our sins. I argued that it was probable that he would reveal to us important moral truths, and truths about how our life after death (including Heaven, or ultimate separation from God) will depend on how we live our present life. And, of course, in so far as he does these things, he would need to ensure that the Church told us what he had done.
The concluding paragraph of chapter 6, “God Offers Us Heaven” (87; the two pages preceding are also useful in the transition from part I to part II):
One such reason for God to bring about a violation of laws of nature would be (since God alone could bring this about or permit it to occur) to provide his signature on the work and teaching of a prophet. To do that, the particular violation must be of a kind which the culture in which the violation occurred would recognize as God’s signature. I shall argue in Chapter 8 that a violation of laws of nature which led to events predicted by the prophet and forwarded the prophet’s work is the kind of violation which the Jews in the time of Jesus would recognize as God’s signature on the prophet’s work. Hence, I shall argue, if the Resurrection of Jesus occurred in anything like the way described in the New Testament, it was God’s signature on the life and teaching of Jesus, and so God’s guarantee that the teaching of Jesus (and the interpretations put upon it by his Church) are true—when we also take into account the other evidence that I have described or will describe. The other evidence that I have already described is any evidence which makes it to some extent probable that there is a God (such as the evidence of “natural theology,” to which I referred in Chapter 1), and the consequent a priori reasons for a view about what God is like and how he would act in history (described in Chapters 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6). The other evidence that I will describe is the historical evidence about the life of Jesus and his teaching and that of his Church, and their uniqueness (to be described in Part II). And, given all this, I shall argue (provisionally in Chapter 9 and finally in Chapter 12) that the historical evidence does show that the Resurrection occurred in the way described in the New Testament and so is God’s signature on Jesus and his Church.
An important paragraph that is also a roadmap to the rest of the chapter on “The Life and Death of Jesus” (99):
So, given that, as I have argued, the New Testament is a basically reliable source of information about the life of Jesus, I am going to show that our historical evidence is such as we would expect if that life were characterized by the non-miraculous features which I listed at the beginning of this chapter. These features are the features which it was (at least) probable that a prophet’s life would show if he were God Incarnate: that he led a perfect human life in which there was much suffering; that he claimed to be God Incarnate; claimed to be making atonement for our sins; gave plausible purportedly revealed teaching about the nature of God, how we should live our lives, and his plans for our future; and founded a Church to continue his work. ( There was also the further feature that the Church which he founded should give plausible interpretations of his teaching, and I will come to consider that later in the book.)
A really good point near the end of the chapter on “The Resurrection of Jesus” (119; see also 126-27 as interesting and characteristic of the author’s reasoning):
And there is one crucial largely unrecognized piece of evidence in favor of the women having visited the tomb on the first Easter Day and having found it empty. Christian communities spread out from Jerusalem very quickly—within three or four years of the events of the Passion. They took with them their customs, including the custom of celebrating a eucharist; and all the evidence we have suggests that there was a universal custom of celebrating the eucharist on a Sunday, the first day of the week. This must have pre-dated the “spread”; otherwise we would have heard of disputes about when to celebrate, and some instructions being given from on high (analogous to the way in which disputes about circumcision and eating sacrificial meat were resolved by the “Council of Jerusalem” described in Acts 15). All references in early Christian literature to when the eucharist was celebrated refer to a weekly Sunday celebration. And the one apparent explicit reference in the New Testament to a particular post-Ascension celebration of the eucharist (Acts 20:7) records a “breaking of bread” on a “first day of the week.” (“To break bread” was the expression used by St. Paul in I Corinthians for what Jesus did at the Last Supper, and was always used later as a description of the common Christian meal which included the eucharist.) This verse is one of the “we” passages in Acts (see p. 93). I Corinthians 16: 2 implies that Christian communities met together on Sundays; and Revelation 1:10 calls Sunday “the Lord’s day.”
The key, concluding paragraph to the “Provisional Conclusion” chapter (133):
So my provisional conclusion is that if there is a moderate prior probability on other evidence that there is a God, it becomes very probable indeed when the historical evidence discussed in Chapters 7 and 8 is added, and so very probable on the total evidence that Jesus was God Incarnate. It will also be apparent that, even if the prior probability of the existence of God is quite a bit less than 1/4 , the historical evidence will still make it more probable than not that Jesus was God Incarnate.
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Here are some other notes I took on Was Jesus God?:
- There is “Praise for Richard Swinburne” on the back cover by, inter alia, Alvin Platinga and William Hasker; also, he cites Bruce Metzger and N.T. Wright for further reading (171-72); William Lane Craig is cited in Is There a God? (124).
- He uses boldface type (rather than italics? to obviate the need for more subheadings?) in both books.
- Uses “A.D.” and “B.C.” instead of “B.C.E.” and “C.E.”
- One of the first posts (number six, as I count) on this blogsite was “If I Were God, How Would I Run the Universe?” Much of this book follows this theme — although, of course, it is much more thorough and scholarly.
- He believes in free will. Indeed (9): “Generally it looks as if it is not logically possible for God to know infallibly beforehand what a free agent will do ….”
- These two sentences (96, near the beginning of chapter 7, “The Life and Death of Jesus,” which is the first chapter in part II) are important: “I emphasize that at this stage in the argument I am treating the Bible, and in particular the New Testament, simply as an ordinary historical document written by ordinary human authors whose truth or falsity is to be assessed by normal historical methods. Later in the book we shall consider whether and how far it should be treated as having a much higher status, as ‘inspired Scripture.'”
- I liked this sentence from his chapter on “The Bible” (157): “So I suggest that it is plausible to suppose that, whether indirectly through the natural forces which developed the religious sensitivity of its human authors or by a more direct intervention into their conscious life, God inspired the writing of the Bible, to convey both the very limited message comprehensible at the time a passage was written and the deeper message comprehensible later.”
- In his books, I don’t think that Swinburne endorses Catholicism versus Protestantism versus Orthodoxy, but I found a YouTube interview in which he discusses why he chose to leave the Anglican church and become Orthodox (and not Catholic). [link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NIcfDtxyVY ] So I’ll just cite a few pages where he makes points that might be of interest on this topic: 79, 82-83, and 158. Relatedly, for the record I’ll note that I don’t agree with him on every point: e.g., his “supererogatory” category of good works (compare Romans 7:15-20); I think he views character formation as more fixed than I do, and that he understates the importance of Heaven as an incentive (on the latter, see especially his chapter on Heaven; but see the very interesting paragraph on page 131 in a later chapter); I think his chapter on the Bible and truth is more complicated than it needs to be, and I don’t see the Mark and John gospels respectively as belonging to different genres; see also chapter 4 (must a person cite Jesus’ atoning death specifically in order to be entitled to the resulting reparation?); 102-03 and 167, 168-69.
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A Bit More on Richard Swinburne and Blaise Pascal
- Any discussion of God and probability immediately brings to mind Pascal’s Wager, but let me make a distinction here. What Swinburne is discussing in these two books is whether or not there is probably a God and whether or not Christ was probably God. Pascal’s Wager, as I understand and use it, is not really about those issues: It is about whether we should cultivate our faith in God given those probabilities. The two are related insofar as, as the two probabilities become greater and greater, it becomes more and more reasonable to cultivate one’s Christian faith — especially given the relative rewards and risks for betting right and betting wrong.
- In this YouTube interview, Swinburne makes an argument close to Pascal’s Wager [link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exsmSlxnbHQ ].
- Pascal was also brought to mind in a paragraph where Swinburne discusses the relationship between Christ’s coming and Old Testament prophecy (125-26).