The Problem of Divine Hiddenness

Divine hiddenness is a problem that has for some years in modern theology interested those of a skeptical preference. As ever, definitions are required: What is meant by “Divine Hiddenness”? For this, it would first be useful to do a brief dive into Christian theology.

Within the typical Christian worldview, there exists a God that created this Universe we inhabit and all the flora and fauna that exist on Earth, including humans. God created the first human beings (Adam and Eve) in his own image with the intention of having a loving relationship with him/her/it in a garden paradise forever. However, these first humans disobeyed God by eating the fruit of the “Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil,” thereby bringing sin into the world. Humans were thereafter doomed to pass this “original sin” to all their descendants and to suffer death.

However, because God is a loving God, he tried to remedy this situation by sending himself down in human form as Jesus of Nazareth. Through his death and resurrection, he took the sins of humans upon himself, such that those who accepted his death and resurrection would have eternal life in heaven after death. This is encapsulated in the famous Bible quote of John 3:16—“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”

To achieve this salvation, one must, at the very least, accept that God exists. The God (of Classical Christianity) is believed to be all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful. Therefore, he would want all humans to be saved (all-loving), would know what they needed to accept that God existed (all-knowing), and could achieve what was required for each human to accept that God existed (all-powerful).

However, throughout Christian history, there have been people who have doubted the existence of God, and who have maintained that they had not received enough evidence to establish that the Christian God exists. He has, to all intents and purposes, seemed “hidden.” And this is the case even for those who would have otherwise entertained the idea of his existence.

This is what is known as “The Problem of Divine Hiddenness.”

The Problem of Divine Hiddenness

It seems this was a problem right from the earliest times of Christianity. Consider Romans 1:20 “Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. So they are without excuse.” There would be no need to make such a statement if everybody believed in the truth of Christianity; Obviously, the “they” in this quote were doubters.

Now, God could just show himself to every human so that his existence would be unambiguous, but Christian apologists say “If God just appeared to everyone, that would take away their free will, and God wants people to freely choose to believe.” Apologists also need for humans to have free will as a defence of the problem of evil and suffering, so they want to take that option off the table, and it serves as a good excuse for why God doesn’t make any appearances. Of course, they ignore all the times that God unambiguously appears to or interacts with humans throughout the Bible, especially in the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible).

In 1993, J. L. Schellenberg made a more formal philosophical argument in his book Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason. I am not fully conversant with all the nuances of his argument, but I believe the main thrust of it is that, if “non-resistant non-believers” exist or have existed at any time, then God cannot exist. In this argument, a “non-resistant non-believer” is defined as “Someone not resisting God, capable of a meaningful conscious relationship with God, and yet who does not believe that God exists.”

In other words, if there are non-believers that seriously entertain the idea that God could exist, and earnestly and diligently seek evidence of God, but cannot find any, this is sufficient reason to assert that God does not exist. As seen previously, with God's attributes of being all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful, it would follow that God would provide sufficient evidence for a “non-resistant non-believer” to “find” God. Obviously, this argument works only for the classical view of God (all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful). Other concepts of God would not be addressed by this argument.

Rebuttals

Unsurprisingly, Christian apologists cannot accept this argument, and try to rebut it. One such popular apologist is Mike Winger, who attempts to undermine this argument in this YouTube video. (Two YouTubers have responded directly to Winger's claims, MindShift here, and Prophet of Zod here.) Essentially, Mike Winger is “attacking” the notion that a non-believer can sincerely seek for God for several reasons.

• Although non-believers may think they are sincerely seeking God, they have an unconscious bias, which motivates them to not be sincere in seeking God’s existence.

Response: This is both presumptuous and offensive. and amounts to “victim blaming.” The implication is that someone knows your mind better than you do, which is just a ridiculous suggestion. One could also claim that Christians have an unconscious bias that motivates them not to be sincere in seeking evidence for the falsity of Christianity, especially with the threat of eternal damnation hanging over them.

• Non-believers may indeed go through the motions of seeking God (e.g. attending Church, praying and reading the Bible). However, when nothing happens, they can say “I looked for God, but I just got crickets,” but this is just a ruse by them to reinforce their pre-held belief that God does not exist.

Response: This seems very unlikely. Maybe a few atheists have done something like this, but for the most part, atheists come to their disbelief through an earnest seeking of truth.

• Non-believers may be “blinded” by sins that they have committed in their past.

Response: This does not stand even superficial scrutiny. Christians love it when a “sinner” (e.g. a drug addict, prostitute, criminal, etc.) repents, accepts Jesus, and turns their life around. They broadcast this extensively so that everybody knows about it. So this objection is nonsense.

• Non-believers just don’t want to submit to the authority of a divine being, because they don’t want to have to change their lifestyle.

Response: I’m sure if someone discovered that God actually existed, their worldview would fundamentally change even if they did not want to worship that God. At the very least they would have to acknowledge God’s existence.

The two aforementioned video critiques of Winger's arguments are interesting because they are both former Christians who do not accept his claim that they were insincere in their search for evidence of God’s existence when they were assailed with doubts about their faith.

Brandon, of “Mindshift,” found it offensive of Mike Winger to question his sincerity and integrity. He made the pertinent point that if he (Brandon) were to assert that a “non-resistant believer” who sincerely sought the truth of Christianity would end up finding Christianity was false, then Mike Winger would be also similarly offended.

And yet, it's still here...

With all this said, why is Christianity so pervasive in society? That is quite a complex issue, but I offer a couple of suggestions:

Geography

It is no accident that religion around the world seems to have a geographical distribution.

If someone was born in America or Europe, the likelihood that their religion of choice would be Christianity. Similarly, someone born in the Middle East would likely be a Muslim or Jewish. Someone born in India would most likely be a Hindu, Sikh, or Jain.

It is normal for children of religious parents to be raised in that same religion, and once established, it is sometimes difficult to reason oneself out of a religion that you didn’t reason oneself into in the first place. Thus, countries with a majority Christian cultural identity will tend to have generations of Christian believers following the religion of their parents or the surrounding culture.

Low risk, high reward

Another factor is that not much is required to be a Christian—attend Church, sing a few hymns, and say a few prayers. For this, you are rewarded with forgiveness of all your sins, however heinous, and the promise of eternal life in heaven, where you can reunite with all your departed loved ones. Some also find comfort in the notion that someone is looking out for them, giving them hope, and also to be part of a supportive community. Even when a person adopts Christianity, they could still follow their former sinful lifestyle. They just have to sincerely repent, and put their sins onto Jesus, to be forgiven. From a Christian perspective, why would anyone not want this? I guess it is hard for a committed Christian to understand why anyone would reject such an offer, especially when such rejection could lead to eternal torment.

I think it is summed up by William Lane Craig's (aka “Low-Bar Bill” so named by Brian Dalton) response to a Christian (named Kyle) who suggested that, since adopting Christianity involved a whole lifestyle change, then the epistemic level required to believe in it, should be high. This is Dr Craig’s response:-

DR. CRAIG: When I first heard the message of the Gospel as a non-Christian high school student, that my sins could be forgiven by God, that God loved me, he loved Bill Craig, and that I could come to know him and experience eternal life with God, I thought to myself (and I'm not kidding) I thought if there is just one chance in a million that this is true it's worth believing. So my attitude toward this is just the opposite of Kyle's. Far from raising the bar or the epistemic standard that Christianity must meet to be believed, I lower it. I think that this is a message which is so wonderful, so fantastic, that if there's any evidence that it's true then it's worth believing in.

The intellectual dishonesty is mind-blowing. He tried to walk back his remarks, but the damage to his reputation as a premier Christian apologist has been tremendous. He has, in the past, claimed that there is a mountain of evidence for the truth of Christianity, but in reality, it is just his post-hoc rationalization for the emotional decision he made to become a Christian.

On the downside, Christians should worry about Matthew 7:21: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” And also Matthew 7:14: “For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it..” So, has the Christian chosen the right “flavor” of Christianity, and worshipped God correctly, or maybe Judaism/Islam/Hinduism/Sikhism/Mormonism is the “one true faith”? The Christian may think he or she is “saved” but may end up in hell suffering eternal torment.

I think the divine hiddenness of God is a powerful argument for God’s non-existence.

For further reasons to doubt the existence of God, I highly recommend Jonathan MS Pearce’s excellent book “30 Arguments against the Existence of God; Heaven, Hell, Satan & Divine Design.” [Thanks! - JMSP]

David Austin is a retired Englishman now living in Australia. He is a life-long atheist who moved from being more of an apatheist when he was a guest in a church and was harangued by the pastor. He felt he needed to understand the arguments concerned that he has now studied at great length. As a former Senior Electronics Engineer working mostly in Digital Technology (with a Bachelor of Technology degree), and working in computing for so long, logic is important to his work. He is passionate about church and state separation and is active in secular groups to try to reduce the negative influences of religion in society.