Letters to Doubting Thomas: A Case for the Existence of God

289 Pages·2007·13.55 MB·English

by  C. Stephen Layman

Letters to Doubting Thomas
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Letters to Doubting Thomas
A Case for the Existence of God
C. STEPHEN LAYMAN
Seattle Pacific University
New York Oxford
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
2007
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Layman, Charles S., 1950-
Letters to Doubting Thomas : a case for the existence of God / by C. Stephen Layman.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-0-19-530814-3 (cloth)
ISBN-10: 0-19-530814-X (cloth)
ISBN-13: 978-0-19-530815-0 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 0-19-530815-8 (pbk.)
1. God—Proof. 2. Theism. 3. Naturalism—Religious aspects. I. Title.
BL200.L39 2006
212M—dc22
2006040083
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 21
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
Contents
PREFACE vii
Introduction 1
1. Theism and Naturalism 10
2. Religious Experience and Interpretation 38
3. Is Religious Experience Reliable? 57
4. A Cosmological Argument 79
5. A Design Argument 110
6. An Argument from Free Will 138
7. Theism and Evil 174
8. Naturalism and Evil 206
9. A Moral Argument 229
NOTES 251
INDEX 273
v
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Preface
Some people never doubt the existence of God. And they may find a
discussion about the existence of God puzzling or useless (or both).
We may call them true believers.
For some other people, the belief that God exists is a relic of the
past and completely irrational—a stubborn superstition nurtured by
ignorance and fear. We may call them true disbelievers.
This book is likely to be of little interest to either true believers or
true disbelievers. I hope it will be of interest to that very large group
of people, believers, agnostics, and atheists, for whom the existence
of God is a vital issue worthy of our best thinking.
In the course of my adult life, I have held widely different opin-
ions about the evidence for God's existence. Early in my undergrad-
uate years, before I studied philosophy, I was impressed with sev-
eral arguments for the existence of God. A few years later, during my
graduate studies, I thought that all of the arguments for God's exis-
tence failed badly. I was for some years tortured by doubts, shifting
opinions so rapidly that I fell into deep confusion. In short, I am
among those who have found it extremely difficult to sort through
the various lines of reasoning about God's existence and to come to
any sort of considered view.
In the past fifty years, philosophers of religion have done an enor-
mous amount of work on the question of God's existence and na-
ture, with the result that the philosophical "landscape" has changed
dramatically. Many very fine contributions have appeared, and they
have been tried in the fire of vigorous debate. My goal in this book is
vii
viii PREFACE
to set forth a case for the existence of God that incorporates some of
the best of the new developments—as many of them as I know how
to mold into a coherent, sustained argument.
In part, then, this work attempts to synthesize a number of argu-
ments developed by others. I make no apology for relying on the ex-
cellent work of others in building a cumulative case for theism. But I
think those who know the literature will see many points at which I
have approached the issues in a new way or introduced significant
refinements.
Philosophy is never easy, but I have tried to write a book that can
be read by those without philosophical training. Perhaps I can best
indicate the level of difficulty in this way: I believe any university
student or college-educated person can read and understand this
book if he or she is willing to proceed at a moderate pace, ponder the
key concepts, and occasionally reread closely reasoned paragraphs. I
have developed my arguments in the form of a correspondence be-
cause I think this approach is engaging and breaks the material
down into manageable bits.
It is often claimed that arguments are of little value where reli-
gion is concerned. I believe this claim to be false. Of course, people
seldom change their minds immediately upon hearing an argument
about an important religious issue. But the same can be said for ar-
guments about controversial issues in general, for example, in poli-
tics or morality.
The analogy with politics is worth exploring a bit further. Obvi-
ously, people are influenced by many things besides arguments in
regard to their political beliefs, e.g., upbringing, social status, and
temperament. But over the course of their lives, many people change
or develop their political beliefs significantly, at least in part because
they hear arguments on radio or TV, read them in editorials, or en-
counter them in discussions with friends. I think argument plays a
similar role where religion is concerned, or at least it does when peo-
ple are exposed to it with some regularity.
In my line of work as a philosophy teacher, I frequently hear peo-
ple confess to being at a loss as to how to approach the question of
God's existence. And often, when people first encounter an argu-
ment for God's existence, it raises more questions than it answers.
My goal in this book is to provide at least one way of approaching
the issue of God's existence—a way to organize what can seem a
chaos of claims and concepts. If I have provided a helpful frame-
work for thinking about the existence of God, one that brings some
clarity to matters that often cause confusion, then I'll have achieved
my purpose.
Preface ix
Acknowledgments
In the final chapters of this book I have made use of previously pub-
lished material. In Chapters 7 and 8, on the problem of evil, I have bor-
rowed both argumentative strategies and occasional brief passages
from "Moral Evil: the comparative response," International Journal for
the Philosophy of Religion, v. 53, n. 1 (February 2003), 1-23, and from
"Natural Evil: the comparative response," International Journal for the
Philosophy of Religion, v. 54, n. 1 (August 2003), 1-31. In Chapter 9 ("A
Moral Argument"), I have borrowed the main argument and several
paragraphs from "God and the Moral Order," faith and Philosophy, v.
19, n. 3 (July 2002), 304-16.1 thank all of the publishers and editors in
question for permission to use this material.
I owe a great debt to the philosophers who have commented on
and critiqued the various chapters of this book. Andrew Jeffery pro-
vided me with extensive written comments on every chapter of the
first draft. Phillip Goggans, Kenneth Einar Himma, and Patrick Mc-
Donald not only read most of the chapters, but also met with me to
discuss them. Terence Cuneo read drafts of many of the chapters
and sent me thoughtful responses via email. Whatever the value of
the book, it is much better for having undergone the careful scrutiny
of these friends and colleagues.
I also wish to thank the students in my philosophy of religion
class, spring of 2004, for reading the manuscript in its entirety and
for making many helpful suggestions about ways to improve it.
I am grateful to Seattle Pacific University for a sabbatical in the
fall of 2003 that enabled me to complete an initial draft of this book.
Special thanks are due to the editors at Oxford University Press,
Robert Miller, Sarah Calabi, and Emily Voigt, for their support and ad-
vice throughout the project. I also wish to thank the reviewers who
provided me with both encouragement and helpful suggestions for
improving the manuscript: Michael Beaty, Baylor University; James
W. Eiswert, Northwest Missouri State University; Noel Hendrickson,
James Madison University; Ian Markham, Hartford Seminary; Wesley
Morriston, University of Colorado-Boulder; Thomas Senor, Univer-
sity of Arkansas; and William Sweet, Saint Francis Xavier University.
I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge a special
debt to the teachers through whom I came to love the philosophy of
religion: Alvin Plantinga, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Marilyn Adams,
and Robert Adams. I hope that this work honors these remarkable
teachers and philosophers. I owe them a lot.
It remains for me to dedicate this book to my siblings, John, Daun,
and Rick, who gave me my first lessons in the art of argument.