"The greatest question of our time is not communism versus individualism, not Europe versus America, not even the East versus the West--it is whether man can live without God." (Will Durant, humanist historian) "God is dead." (Nietzsche); "Nietzsche is dead." (God) [Graffiti in NYC subway]
"Men have forgotten God." (Alexander Solzhenitsyn) "A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts." (Historian Paul Johnson)
"With the exception of certain mathematicians and physicists, all authors of the Great Books are represented in the chapter on God." (Mortimer Adler, The Great Ideas Syntopicon)
"We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God..." (2 Cor. 10:5, ESV).
"Where is the philosopher? Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of the age? Hasn't God made the world's wisdom foolish?" (Cf. 1 Cor. 1:20).
It isn't how much faith you have, but the object of the faith that matters: faith doesn't save, Christ does, though! Jesus mentioned faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains. It is better and more advantageous to have faith in the right direction, no matter how small it is ("O ye of little faith"), than to have misdirected, but strong faith in the wrong object--God desires sincere, unfeigned faith, not perfect faith (cf. 1 Tim. 1:5). This can be illustrated by having a lot of faith in the Pope or the church, but none in Christ alone. Your faith, no matter how much, must be solely in Christ (the Reformers' formula: Faith alone, Christ alone, grace alone, brings salvation, by the authority of the Scripture alone [not the authority of the church or Pope!]). You are adding to the grace of God by trusting in your merits or adding to your faith by adding a little trust in your church. Don't add to the gospel's simplicity!
The spiritual man is no less a person of reasoning power than the natural, secular man. The dispute is not faith versus reason, but faith versus faith! Faith is not to blame, but blind, misinformed faith. It is not a conflict between faith and reason, but which set of presuppositions or assumptions you willing, knowingly accept. Christians start with the faith that God has supernaturally revealed the truth or special revelation, while the secularist denies the supernatural as his assumption! It is prima facie everyone has faith in something, even themselves: but faith is necessary for knowledge of any kind (Augustine). The key to knowledge is the fear of the Lord, not evolution (cf. Prov. 1:7).
To today's Secularists, science has become a sort of religion (with the answers!) but faith in science is still faith! Science has become a universal language! They believe all man's problems can be solved by science, but you cannot prove this presupposition by the scientific method! This is not science, but harnessing science unscientifically for unscientific purposes and is "scientism!" (An example of this: Carl Sagan said, "The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.") "Scientism" espouses the tenet that the only reliable source of truth is science. Science cannot make philosophical or religious pronouncements, period. Without God, you cannot have a metaphysical answer to a physical world since only matter exists (materialism) and everything can be explained by natural causes (naturalism).
Science has been wrong--scientists make mistakes, period; there's no such thing as perfect objectivity and flawless induction. And Science cannot make value judgments: it can tell us the "know-how", but not the "know-why" or meaning of reality (metaphysics)--this knowledge is not in the realm or domain of science. (That is, some things cannot be defined by, or confined to, laboratory conditions, and cannot be measured, repeated, or observed!)
However, everyone starts with some presupposition they cannot prove logically or empirically (by reason or experience--a priori, a posteriori). All-knowing, then, necessitates faith, which precedes knowledge! Though faith precedes knowledge, knowledge must be intelligible or understood by the reasoning power. N.B. that the presuppositions one brings to the data determines one's deductions or conclusions. We commence with a presupposition no one can prove. Christian faith steps beyond the reason and isn't contrary to it. But faith in God is a reasonable proposition--we don't kiss our brains goodbye--"'Come now, let us reason together,' says the LORD" (cf. Isaiah 1:18). (I refer to A Reasonable Faith, by William Lane Craig.) N.B. that there is no fundamental strife between true science and the Bible--Francis A. Schaeffer wrote No Final Conflict to prove this.
Theology is the "queen of sciences" (according to Thomas Aquinas) and Christianity is the "mother of science" (it couldn't have evolved under any other worldview)--Sir Francis Bacon invented the scientific method and is the father of modern science, and all the first scientists were Christians, who believed a divine Lawgiver would create a predictable law-abiding universe worthy of study: Sir Francis Newton was a Bible scholar, Nicolaus Copernicus, Johannes Kepler and Galileo Galilei jump-started scientific endeavor and discovery. In contrast, Secularists deny the supernatural as their presupposition and rule God out of the equation even before beginning it--they are blinded by Satan (cf. 2 Cor. 4:4) and don't see the big picture of God at work.
Be ready for the skeptic's challenge! When they say, "Where is God?" Answer: "Where isn't He?" I would like to see the skeptic go to somewhere on earth untouched by the gospel and declare himself an atheist! If someone says you cannot prove God, you must counter: "You cannot disprove Him either, for logic says you can never prove a universal negative unless you are omniscient and omnipresent." If someone says, "I don't believe in God," ask them if they think their belief makes any difference to God: "God doesn't believe in atheists!" You should always turn their objections or smokescreens back on them as a weapon they cannot fight. Ask them for the evidence! They will realize, then, that they cannot defend their position and it's pure, blind faith. They don't believe the Bible not even fathoming its main message! Do you see the evil and say, "Why," or the good and say, "Why not?" Note that the Bible says that a fool has said in his heart [not mind--his heart's in the wrong place!] that there is no God (cf. Psalm 14:1). "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them" (Rom. 1:19, ESV).
There's no hard, definitive evidence that God exists or doesn't exist, but if you want to believe, and are an honest seeker, not a trifler, then God will find a way to authenticate Himself to you personally. God wants to be found by faith because only faith pleases Him (cf. Heb. 11:6). There is enough evidence in nature (His fingerprints and imprint) and in Scripture (His revealed will and testimony), that anyone with an open mind, willing spirit, and needy heart will believe. If they tell you to prove the Bible is the Word of God, tell them to prove it themselves by exposing their soul to it by a sincere perusal.
Scholar Norman Geisler wrote a book, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist, and he is implying that it takes more faith to be an atheist than a believer; there's simply more evidence in God's favor and He answers more questions while having more unanswered questions for the atheist. It's simply easier to believe that be a skeptic--go with the preponderance of the evidence! Descartes said, "Cogito, ergo sum" or," I think, therefore I am!" He went on to conclude that God was, by the same logic--thinking requires a thinker, who, by definition, exists, and God is defined as the ultimate, final, higher thinker--the Higher Mind or Supreme Mind or Being. Sir Francis Bacon, the so-called father of the scientific method, said, "A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion." Amen to Goethe, who said, "Tell me your certainties, I have enough doubts of my own."
Note that the vast majority of philosophers (including the Greek triumvirate of antiquity: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the philosopher) have expressed belief in God. Since ideas have a special impact and natural consequences, whether right or wrong, here are some men and one woman who changed history through atheism. As you read this carefully, notice that Pandora's box of horrors was opened with the denial of God's reality, just like it says in Romans that God gave them up. Give a passing thought or cursory reading to the manifold can of worms that has been opened! Note the havoc that atheists have wreaked on the social and moral order: "If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? (Psalm 11:3, ESV). A few famous, notable, great minds have been influential, or should I say militant atheists either in fact or in effect, though throughout history (no specific order):
Epicurus and his Epicurean philosophy ("eat, drink, and be merry"); reformer of Hinduism Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha--the Enlightened One), said if there was a God He can't help you find enlightenment--you must attain that on your own; philosopher Confucius; Greek philosophers, skeptic Democritus and existentialist Heraclitus; Roman Lucretius; skeptic David Hume, known for saying that miracles are a violation of natural law, but science cannot forbid miracles--their truth depends upon the veracity of the witness and credibility and dependability of the historical records; John Stuart Mill, along with David Hume and Bertrand Russell, he tried to disprove and discredit Christianity, and was the so-called most intelligent man who ever lived; Frederick Engels, philosopher, and coauthor of Communist Manifesto with Karl Marx; Ethan Allen, American patriot, said only science gives reliable ethics; Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, philosopher of "dialectic [historical] idealism" or materialism, the basis and foundation of communism and Utopian theory, who said, "Everything is in the process of historical change," and who said that everything moves in stages to increased complexity, even societies and ideas [a state of flux]; Karl Marx, utopian with PhD in philosophy and author of Das Kapital, because he believed evolution gave the scientific basis for communism and wanted Darwin to write the intro, who said "Morality is only the expression of self-interest," and "Religion is the opiate of the people," and who became midwife to Lenin, Stalin, and Mao Zedong;Charles Dawin, credited with being the promoter of evolution and naturalist-biologist with an interest in uniformitarian geology influenced by Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology, which he took along- and turned philosopher--whose grandfather Erasmus Darwin originated evolutionary thought in Zoonomia, known for The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859 (hailed as "one of the most important books ever written" because it attacked the most important book ever written, the Bible, because it gave atheists a way to explain the universe without God in the equation, or to have academic and intellectual freedom), Darwin set sail on board The Beagle in 1831 to do empirical research and who thought that evolution, not God, was the ultimate truth or reality; Darwin's Bulldog Thomas Huxley; humanist Aldous Huxley, who said that atheism allowed for "sexual liberation," and the author of the "philosophy of meaninglessness"; social Darwinist Herbert Spencer, and a popularizer/promoter of agnosticism; the famed Great Agnostic Robert Ingersoll, who was known for his anti-Christian oratory; existentialist Martin Heidegger; journalist at the Scopes trial, also known as the Monkey trial H. L. Mencken; the redoubtable Madalhyn Murray O'Hair, famed and infamous activist, who said ironically that nothing good ever became of Christianity and then succeeded in getting prayer banned from public schools in 1963, and was murdered by a former employee; Lord Bertrand Russell, philosopher-mathematician, who wrote iconic Why I Am Not a Christian, who ironically said that "what the world needs is more Christian love," while trying to disprove God's very existence and said there needs to be more evidence; philosopher Francois Marie Voltaire, who, on his death bed, died in despair and bemoaned the fact that he had to die without Jesus and enter hell forsaken, also said that "man created God in his image"--he was a Deist and mason, but a practical atheist and enemy of Christ; Jeremy Bentham who believed in the "greatest good for the greatest number" as the state's ethic (utitilitarianism); William James, who said there's no universal truth, but you can only determine an idea's usefulness; Jean-Paul Sartre, French popular litterateur and teacher; Friedrich Nietzsche, philosopher who deemed himself the Antichrist, was a homosexual, wimp, and anti-Semite, was also author of Ubermensch" or superman, Hitler's model for Aryan supremacy and a master-race, and philosopher of evolution and professor of philology; Ivan Pavlov, Russian behaviorist and psychologist, known for experiments with dogs' saliva; Sigmund Freud, psychiatrist and psychologist-neurosurgeon-anthropologist (who made Vienna the center of psychoanalysis) and was the father of psychoanalysis, who said religion and belief in God was a neurosis or even a psychosis and God was a throwback to our need of a father-figure--he came into vogue and was the most influential psychiatrist of the twentieth century; famed author Ernest Hemingway, who committed suicide; Richard Wagner, composer of Hitler's favorite, Thus Spake Zaruthurstra; humanist historians, H. G. Wells and Will Durant; John Dewey, psychologist and educator, revolutionizing American public schools, and along with Charles Pierce and William James architect of pragmatism, whose ideas led the way to relativism, and who wrote the manifesto A Common Faith and contributed to the first Humanist Manifesto, to delineate humanism as religion without God, and was the champion of pragmatism: "The test of an idea is not whether it's true, but whether it works"; John Kenneth Galbraith, former Humanist of the Year and socialist; French cynic Albert Camus, who said that "the only philosophical question worth considering is suicide;" Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, who said that he didn't attribute to man any more significance than a baboon" and that "Law is the majority vote that can lick all others"; psychologist B. F. Skinner, pioneer of Behaviorism, and who wrote Beyond Freedom and Dignity implying we don't have responsibility, dignity, nor freedom (that "freedom is a illusion and dignity a lost cause"); humanist, and socialist John Kenneth Galbraith; humanist psychologist Erich Fromm, who wrote You Shall Be As Gods, saying belief in sin is our downfall, and we can become gods; philosopher-author Julian Huxley, who rendered evolution unequivocally as fact and that history is in a process of evolution, and who wrote Religion Without Revelation postulating that we don't need God for ethics; humanist psychologist Carl Rogers, known for popularizing the "self" or the "soul" and who denied that man was inherently evil; scientist and humanist Isaac Asimov; Carl Sagan, astronomer, author of Cosmos, and humanist-of-the-year, promoter of "scientism ("The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be:)"; entrepreneur Ted Turner, who said Christianity is for losers and that the Ten Commandments are obsolete and proposed the Ten Voluntary Initiatives, such as treating the earth with respect; author Richard Dawkins, who wrote The God Delusion, saying believers catch belief like a fever and "Religion is a mental virus"; and finally, Stephen Hawking, brilliant scientist-professor-author, who wrote A Brief History of Time, and is an avowed enemy of God.
However, these examples only prove there is always the exception which proves the rule and these men's lives demonstrate their lack of faith in God and the fruit speaks for itself. "... [There] is none that doeth good" (cf. Psalm 14:1, 53:1, KJV). Just like it says: "Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge" (cf. Rom. 1:28); "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie" (cf. Rom. 1:25). If you study the above list, you will see what evil has been perpetrated by introducing atheism and setting it loose on mankind. "[If] the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" (Psalm 11:3, ESV). Why such animus aimed and directed toward God? God is good and His fruits are good (cf Psalm 34:8: "Taste and see that the LORD is good,..."). What evil has Christianity done, that they hate it?
There is always room for honest doubt but not a spirit of skepticism (cf. "I believe, help thou mine unbelief," Mark 9:24), but God still welcomes the skeptic, because there are answers to any honest scrutiny, which will be contravened by the Truth, which is absolute and timeless. Christians have naught to fear from honest inquiry or scrutiny! The Greeks invented skepticism, and dogma was their enemy--they didn't want to know anything for certain! This is where Postmodernism puts us: "You can know nothing for certain." This truth claim has no truth value since it is a self-contradiction of truth relativism! Actually, the only truths they hold relative are the Christian ones! How can they know that statement for sure anyway? Atheism is a bankrupt, irrational, and invalid philosophy that cannot be defended, and the only motives for espousing it are moral rebellion and intellectual arrogance.
The problem is that the conclusions these men drew were prejudiced by their subjective presupposition that there is no God. They ruled out His very existence before they even made any investigations because God is not palatable to their way of living; it wasn't suitable to their mores and didn't fit their lifestyle. In other words, they didn't want to believe, not they couldn't believe--for this is man's problem (his intellectual arrogance, not his intellectual integrity). You don't have to commit intellectual suicide to become a believer, for there is enough evidence for anyone willing to believe (If you are willing, you will know for sure, according to Jesus in John 7:17). The Jews had this problem, for they had seen many signs and miracles, and still would not believe, not could not (cf. John 12:37, NIV; Psalm 78:32, NIV).
No one can be argued into the kingdom--you cannot rationalize God, through His presence is seen everywhere--His imprint from atoms to the galaxies shows His laws and nature at work! Infidels are seldom convinced by argument--they just want to play mind games or power trips, to stump the Christians with unanswerable queries. It is the skeptic that has the facts to fear, though! Because Jesus is the personification of Truth (cf. John 14:6: "I am the Truth...")!
We should note that in antiquity there was no sharp distinction between science and philosophy--they saw no contradiction, and indeed there is "no final conflict" (according to Francis Schaeffer), as the Bible has no scientific absurdities, has proved over and over again to be ahead of scientific discovery, and wherever it makes a scientific statement it is accurate--you don't have to be an atheist to be a good scientist, contrary to modern thought science has not disproved the Bible or God. In the final analysis, the only truth that counts is that which is according to reality--as Locke puts it: that which corresponds to reality. This is called the "correspondence theory of truth" or "true truth" as Francis Schaeffer terms it). In summation, don't put your faith in the moving train of science, but in the eternal, immutable, infallible, inerrant Word of God as the definitive, final arbiter of truth!
But just notice how atheism is the ultimate irony: order minus an "Orderer"; design minus the Designer; purpose minus any "Purposer"; justice minus a Judge; art minus an Artist; laws minus the Supreme Lawgiver; matter without a Creator (they don't refer to creation--this is like a building without a builder!); thought without a Supreme or Ultimate Thinker or Superior Mind; can there be good without the Ultimate Good or standard of goodness? Time without any beginning and no Beginner; no Big Bang because that implies and necessitate a Beginner, too, and a beginning of time! They believe in the laws of nature, but not in nature's God or a Lawgiver! They believe in naturalism, or that there are a natural reason and explanation for anything, and anything can be explained away in terms of the natural, not the supernatural. They believe in matter and materialism (or that only matter exists), but see no meaning behind it; they say we've come from nothing, have no meaning, and are headed nowhere! They deny a beginning and an ending of history--matter is eternal and "uncreated"! If you saw beauty what good is it without someone to appreciate it and to be designed for someone to be enjoyed? How can you believe in thought if you believe everything is material/energy/quanta and there is no supernatural or immaterial? You cannot believe in rationalism without a rationale behind the cosmos!
Atheists take a leap of faith based on sentiment, not reason ("The fool has said in his heart that there is no God"). Atheists are the ones with great faith and out on a limb, with no defenses! Most atheists just feel like atheists and haven't thought it out--they are atheists by consequence not a conviction and they don't want to believe the inconvenient, uncomfortable, or unpalatable. Most atheists cannot defend their faith and thus have blind faith by definition, not knowing why they don't believe. Atheism is a bankrupt philosophy that cannot answer the basic questions of life and gives nothing but a bleak outlook on our purpose and meaning, to the point of despair. It raises many more questions than it asks and can challenge people of faith that should be able to answer them (cf. 1 Pet. 3:15). Soli Deo Gloria!
"Men have forgotten God." (Alexander Solzhenitsyn) "A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts." (Historian Paul Johnson)
"With the exception of certain mathematicians and physicists, all authors of the Great Books are represented in the chapter on God." (Mortimer Adler, The Great Ideas Syntopicon)
"We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God..." (2 Cor. 10:5, ESV).
"Where is the philosopher? Where is the scholar? Where is the debater of the age? Hasn't God made the world's wisdom foolish?" (Cf. 1 Cor. 1:20).
It isn't how much faith you have, but the object of the faith that matters: faith doesn't save, Christ does, though! Jesus mentioned faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains. It is better and more advantageous to have faith in the right direction, no matter how small it is ("O ye of little faith"), than to have misdirected, but strong faith in the wrong object--God desires sincere, unfeigned faith, not perfect faith (cf. 1 Tim. 1:5). This can be illustrated by having a lot of faith in the Pope or the church, but none in Christ alone. Your faith, no matter how much, must be solely in Christ (the Reformers' formula: Faith alone, Christ alone, grace alone, brings salvation, by the authority of the Scripture alone [not the authority of the church or Pope!]). You are adding to the grace of God by trusting in your merits or adding to your faith by adding a little trust in your church. Don't add to the gospel's simplicity!
The spiritual man is no less a person of reasoning power than the natural, secular man. The dispute is not faith versus reason, but faith versus faith! Faith is not to blame, but blind, misinformed faith. It is not a conflict between faith and reason, but which set of presuppositions or assumptions you willing, knowingly accept. Christians start with the faith that God has supernaturally revealed the truth or special revelation, while the secularist denies the supernatural as his assumption! It is prima facie everyone has faith in something, even themselves: but faith is necessary for knowledge of any kind (Augustine). The key to knowledge is the fear of the Lord, not evolution (cf. Prov. 1:7).
To today's Secularists, science has become a sort of religion (with the answers!) but faith in science is still faith! Science has become a universal language! They believe all man's problems can be solved by science, but you cannot prove this presupposition by the scientific method! This is not science, but harnessing science unscientifically for unscientific purposes and is "scientism!" (An example of this: Carl Sagan said, "The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be.") "Scientism" espouses the tenet that the only reliable source of truth is science. Science cannot make philosophical or religious pronouncements, period. Without God, you cannot have a metaphysical answer to a physical world since only matter exists (materialism) and everything can be explained by natural causes (naturalism).
Science has been wrong--scientists make mistakes, period; there's no such thing as perfect objectivity and flawless induction. And Science cannot make value judgments: it can tell us the "know-how", but not the "know-why" or meaning of reality (metaphysics)--this knowledge is not in the realm or domain of science. (That is, some things cannot be defined by, or confined to, laboratory conditions, and cannot be measured, repeated, or observed!)
However, everyone starts with some presupposition they cannot prove logically or empirically (by reason or experience--a priori, a posteriori). All-knowing, then, necessitates faith, which precedes knowledge! Though faith precedes knowledge, knowledge must be intelligible or understood by the reasoning power. N.B. that the presuppositions one brings to the data determines one's deductions or conclusions. We commence with a presupposition no one can prove. Christian faith steps beyond the reason and isn't contrary to it. But faith in God is a reasonable proposition--we don't kiss our brains goodbye--"'Come now, let us reason together,' says the LORD" (cf. Isaiah 1:18). (I refer to A Reasonable Faith, by William Lane Craig.) N.B. that there is no fundamental strife between true science and the Bible--Francis A. Schaeffer wrote No Final Conflict to prove this.
Theology is the "queen of sciences" (according to Thomas Aquinas) and Christianity is the "mother of science" (it couldn't have evolved under any other worldview)--Sir Francis Bacon invented the scientific method and is the father of modern science, and all the first scientists were Christians, who believed a divine Lawgiver would create a predictable law-abiding universe worthy of study: Sir Francis Newton was a Bible scholar, Nicolaus Copernicus, Johannes Kepler and Galileo Galilei jump-started scientific endeavor and discovery. In contrast, Secularists deny the supernatural as their presupposition and rule God out of the equation even before beginning it--they are blinded by Satan (cf. 2 Cor. 4:4) and don't see the big picture of God at work.
Be ready for the skeptic's challenge! When they say, "Where is God?" Answer: "Where isn't He?" I would like to see the skeptic go to somewhere on earth untouched by the gospel and declare himself an atheist! If someone says you cannot prove God, you must counter: "You cannot disprove Him either, for logic says you can never prove a universal negative unless you are omniscient and omnipresent." If someone says, "I don't believe in God," ask them if they think their belief makes any difference to God: "God doesn't believe in atheists!" You should always turn their objections or smokescreens back on them as a weapon they cannot fight. Ask them for the evidence! They will realize, then, that they cannot defend their position and it's pure, blind faith. They don't believe the Bible not even fathoming its main message! Do you see the evil and say, "Why," or the good and say, "Why not?" Note that the Bible says that a fool has said in his heart [not mind--his heart's in the wrong place!] that there is no God (cf. Psalm 14:1). "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them" (Rom. 1:19, ESV).
There's no hard, definitive evidence that God exists or doesn't exist, but if you want to believe, and are an honest seeker, not a trifler, then God will find a way to authenticate Himself to you personally. God wants to be found by faith because only faith pleases Him (cf. Heb. 11:6). There is enough evidence in nature (His fingerprints and imprint) and in Scripture (His revealed will and testimony), that anyone with an open mind, willing spirit, and needy heart will believe. If they tell you to prove the Bible is the Word of God, tell them to prove it themselves by exposing their soul to it by a sincere perusal.
Scholar Norman Geisler wrote a book, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist, and he is implying that it takes more faith to be an atheist than a believer; there's simply more evidence in God's favor and He answers more questions while having more unanswered questions for the atheist. It's simply easier to believe that be a skeptic--go with the preponderance of the evidence! Descartes said, "Cogito, ergo sum" or," I think, therefore I am!" He went on to conclude that God was, by the same logic--thinking requires a thinker, who, by definition, exists, and God is defined as the ultimate, final, higher thinker--the Higher Mind or Supreme Mind or Being. Sir Francis Bacon, the so-called father of the scientific method, said, "A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion." Amen to Goethe, who said, "Tell me your certainties, I have enough doubts of my own."
Note that the vast majority of philosophers (including the Greek triumvirate of antiquity: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the philosopher) have expressed belief in God. Since ideas have a special impact and natural consequences, whether right or wrong, here are some men and one woman who changed history through atheism. As you read this carefully, notice that Pandora's box of horrors was opened with the denial of God's reality, just like it says in Romans that God gave them up. Give a passing thought or cursory reading to the manifold can of worms that has been opened! Note the havoc that atheists have wreaked on the social and moral order: "If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? (Psalm 11:3, ESV). A few famous, notable, great minds have been influential, or should I say militant atheists either in fact or in effect, though throughout history (no specific order):
Epicurus and his Epicurean philosophy ("eat, drink, and be merry"); reformer of Hinduism Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha--the Enlightened One), said if there was a God He can't help you find enlightenment--you must attain that on your own; philosopher Confucius; Greek philosophers, skeptic Democritus and existentialist Heraclitus; Roman Lucretius; skeptic David Hume, known for saying that miracles are a violation of natural law, but science cannot forbid miracles--their truth depends upon the veracity of the witness and credibility and dependability of the historical records; John Stuart Mill, along with David Hume and Bertrand Russell, he tried to disprove and discredit Christianity, and was the so-called most intelligent man who ever lived; Frederick Engels, philosopher, and coauthor of Communist Manifesto with Karl Marx; Ethan Allen, American patriot, said only science gives reliable ethics; Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, philosopher of "dialectic [historical] idealism" or materialism, the basis and foundation of communism and Utopian theory, who said, "Everything is in the process of historical change," and who said that everything moves in stages to increased complexity, even societies and ideas [a state of flux]; Karl Marx, utopian with PhD in philosophy and author of Das Kapital, because he believed evolution gave the scientific basis for communism and wanted Darwin to write the intro, who said "Morality is only the expression of self-interest," and "Religion is the opiate of the people," and who became midwife to Lenin, Stalin, and Mao Zedong;Charles Dawin, credited with being the promoter of evolution and naturalist-biologist with an interest in uniformitarian geology influenced by Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology, which he took along- and turned philosopher--whose grandfather Erasmus Darwin originated evolutionary thought in Zoonomia, known for The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection in 1859 (hailed as "one of the most important books ever written" because it attacked the most important book ever written, the Bible, because it gave atheists a way to explain the universe without God in the equation, or to have academic and intellectual freedom), Darwin set sail on board The Beagle in 1831 to do empirical research and who thought that evolution, not God, was the ultimate truth or reality; Darwin's Bulldog Thomas Huxley; humanist Aldous Huxley, who said that atheism allowed for "sexual liberation," and the author of the "philosophy of meaninglessness"; social Darwinist Herbert Spencer, and a popularizer/promoter of agnosticism; the famed Great Agnostic Robert Ingersoll, who was known for his anti-Christian oratory; existentialist Martin Heidegger; journalist at the Scopes trial, also known as the Monkey trial H. L. Mencken; the redoubtable Madalhyn Murray O'Hair, famed and infamous activist, who said ironically that nothing good ever became of Christianity and then succeeded in getting prayer banned from public schools in 1963, and was murdered by a former employee; Lord Bertrand Russell, philosopher-mathematician, who wrote iconic Why I Am Not a Christian, who ironically said that "what the world needs is more Christian love," while trying to disprove God's very existence and said there needs to be more evidence; philosopher Francois Marie Voltaire, who, on his death bed, died in despair and bemoaned the fact that he had to die without Jesus and enter hell forsaken, also said that "man created God in his image"--he was a Deist and mason, but a practical atheist and enemy of Christ; Jeremy Bentham who believed in the "greatest good for the greatest number" as the state's ethic (utitilitarianism); William James, who said there's no universal truth, but you can only determine an idea's usefulness; Jean-Paul Sartre, French popular litterateur and teacher; Friedrich Nietzsche, philosopher who deemed himself the Antichrist, was a homosexual, wimp, and anti-Semite, was also author of Ubermensch" or superman, Hitler's model for Aryan supremacy and a master-race, and philosopher of evolution and professor of philology; Ivan Pavlov, Russian behaviorist and psychologist, known for experiments with dogs' saliva; Sigmund Freud, psychiatrist and psychologist-neurosurgeon-anthropologist (who made Vienna the center of psychoanalysis) and was the father of psychoanalysis, who said religion and belief in God was a neurosis or even a psychosis and God was a throwback to our need of a father-figure--he came into vogue and was the most influential psychiatrist of the twentieth century; famed author Ernest Hemingway, who committed suicide; Richard Wagner, composer of Hitler's favorite, Thus Spake Zaruthurstra; humanist historians, H. G. Wells and Will Durant; John Dewey, psychologist and educator, revolutionizing American public schools, and along with Charles Pierce and William James architect of pragmatism, whose ideas led the way to relativism, and who wrote the manifesto A Common Faith and contributed to the first Humanist Manifesto, to delineate humanism as religion without God, and was the champion of pragmatism: "The test of an idea is not whether it's true, but whether it works"; John Kenneth Galbraith, former Humanist of the Year and socialist; French cynic Albert Camus, who said that "the only philosophical question worth considering is suicide;" Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, who said that he didn't attribute to man any more significance than a baboon" and that "Law is the majority vote that can lick all others"; psychologist B. F. Skinner, pioneer of Behaviorism, and who wrote Beyond Freedom and Dignity implying we don't have responsibility, dignity, nor freedom (that "freedom is a illusion and dignity a lost cause"); humanist, and socialist John Kenneth Galbraith; humanist psychologist Erich Fromm, who wrote You Shall Be As Gods, saying belief in sin is our downfall, and we can become gods; philosopher-author Julian Huxley, who rendered evolution unequivocally as fact and that history is in a process of evolution, and who wrote Religion Without Revelation postulating that we don't need God for ethics; humanist psychologist Carl Rogers, known for popularizing the "self" or the "soul" and who denied that man was inherently evil; scientist and humanist Isaac Asimov; Carl Sagan, astronomer, author of Cosmos, and humanist-of-the-year, promoter of "scientism ("The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be:)"; entrepreneur Ted Turner, who said Christianity is for losers and that the Ten Commandments are obsolete and proposed the Ten Voluntary Initiatives, such as treating the earth with respect; author Richard Dawkins, who wrote The God Delusion, saying believers catch belief like a fever and "Religion is a mental virus"; and finally, Stephen Hawking, brilliant scientist-professor-author, who wrote A Brief History of Time, and is an avowed enemy of God.
However, these examples only prove there is always the exception which proves the rule and these men's lives demonstrate their lack of faith in God and the fruit speaks for itself. "... [There] is none that doeth good" (cf. Psalm 14:1, 53:1, KJV). Just like it says: "Even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge" (cf. Rom. 1:28); "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie" (cf. Rom. 1:25). If you study the above list, you will see what evil has been perpetrated by introducing atheism and setting it loose on mankind. "[If] the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?" (Psalm 11:3, ESV). Why such animus aimed and directed toward God? God is good and His fruits are good (cf Psalm 34:8: "Taste and see that the LORD is good,..."). What evil has Christianity done, that they hate it?
There is always room for honest doubt but not a spirit of skepticism (cf. "I believe, help thou mine unbelief," Mark 9:24), but God still welcomes the skeptic, because there are answers to any honest scrutiny, which will be contravened by the Truth, which is absolute and timeless. Christians have naught to fear from honest inquiry or scrutiny! The Greeks invented skepticism, and dogma was their enemy--they didn't want to know anything for certain! This is where Postmodernism puts us: "You can know nothing for certain." This truth claim has no truth value since it is a self-contradiction of truth relativism! Actually, the only truths they hold relative are the Christian ones! How can they know that statement for sure anyway? Atheism is a bankrupt, irrational, and invalid philosophy that cannot be defended, and the only motives for espousing it are moral rebellion and intellectual arrogance.
The problem is that the conclusions these men drew were prejudiced by their subjective presupposition that there is no God. They ruled out His very existence before they even made any investigations because God is not palatable to their way of living; it wasn't suitable to their mores and didn't fit their lifestyle. In other words, they didn't want to believe, not they couldn't believe--for this is man's problem (his intellectual arrogance, not his intellectual integrity). You don't have to commit intellectual suicide to become a believer, for there is enough evidence for anyone willing to believe (If you are willing, you will know for sure, according to Jesus in John 7:17). The Jews had this problem, for they had seen many signs and miracles, and still would not believe, not could not (cf. John 12:37, NIV; Psalm 78:32, NIV).
No one can be argued into the kingdom--you cannot rationalize God, through His presence is seen everywhere--His imprint from atoms to the galaxies shows His laws and nature at work! Infidels are seldom convinced by argument--they just want to play mind games or power trips, to stump the Christians with unanswerable queries. It is the skeptic that has the facts to fear, though! Because Jesus is the personification of Truth (cf. John 14:6: "I am the Truth...")!
We should note that in antiquity there was no sharp distinction between science and philosophy--they saw no contradiction, and indeed there is "no final conflict" (according to Francis Schaeffer), as the Bible has no scientific absurdities, has proved over and over again to be ahead of scientific discovery, and wherever it makes a scientific statement it is accurate--you don't have to be an atheist to be a good scientist, contrary to modern thought science has not disproved the Bible or God. In the final analysis, the only truth that counts is that which is according to reality--as Locke puts it: that which corresponds to reality. This is called the "correspondence theory of truth" or "true truth" as Francis Schaeffer terms it). In summation, don't put your faith in the moving train of science, but in the eternal, immutable, infallible, inerrant Word of God as the definitive, final arbiter of truth!
But just notice how atheism is the ultimate irony: order minus an "Orderer"; design minus the Designer; purpose minus any "Purposer"; justice minus a Judge; art minus an Artist; laws minus the Supreme Lawgiver; matter without a Creator (they don't refer to creation--this is like a building without a builder!); thought without a Supreme or Ultimate Thinker or Superior Mind; can there be good without the Ultimate Good or standard of goodness? Time without any beginning and no Beginner; no Big Bang because that implies and necessitate a Beginner, too, and a beginning of time! They believe in the laws of nature, but not in nature's God or a Lawgiver! They believe in naturalism, or that there are a natural reason and explanation for anything, and anything can be explained away in terms of the natural, not the supernatural. They believe in matter and materialism (or that only matter exists), but see no meaning behind it; they say we've come from nothing, have no meaning, and are headed nowhere! They deny a beginning and an ending of history--matter is eternal and "uncreated"! If you saw beauty what good is it without someone to appreciate it and to be designed for someone to be enjoyed? How can you believe in thought if you believe everything is material/energy/quanta and there is no supernatural or immaterial? You cannot believe in rationalism without a rationale behind the cosmos!
Atheists take a leap of faith based on sentiment, not reason ("The fool has said in his heart that there is no God"). Atheists are the ones with great faith and out on a limb, with no defenses! Most atheists just feel like atheists and haven't thought it out--they are atheists by consequence not a conviction and they don't want to believe the inconvenient, uncomfortable, or unpalatable. Most atheists cannot defend their faith and thus have blind faith by definition, not knowing why they don't believe. Atheism is a bankrupt philosophy that cannot answer the basic questions of life and gives nothing but a bleak outlook on our purpose and meaning, to the point of despair. It raises many more questions than it asks and can challenge people of faith that should be able to answer them (cf. 1 Pet. 3:15). Soli Deo Gloria!