Sunday, February 13, 2011

A Response and Argument Against Dr. William Lane Craig's Argument that the Christian god is Morally Perfect and Worthy of the Attitude of Worship

Recently I was on Youtube, listening to one of Dr. Craig's Videos, which prompted me to construct this logical argument against what was said.  He said that a morally perfect god is one worthy of worship, and the ancient gods of the Greeks and other peoples were morally flawed, and therefore not worthy of worship.  


He is very wrong about the Christian god, as the Christian god Yahweh has almost identical attributes to the gods of the Greeks and Romans. 

"...for the Lord your God, who is among you, is a jealous God and his anger will burn against you, and he will destroy you from the face of the land"  Deuteronomy 6:15

Being angry and jealous and threatening to destroy people is not virtuous.

P1 If Yahweh (the christian God) is worthy of the attitude of worship, then Yahweh would meet the conditions of the greatest conceivable being. (Craig set those conditions, and being morally perfect is one of those conditions.)
P2 If Yahweh is the greatest conceivable being, then Yahweh would have to be morally perfect.
P3 If Yahweh is morally perfect, then he would be perfectly virtuous.
P4 If Yahweh is perfectly virtuous, then he would have no vices.
P5 Yahweh has vices. (angry, jealous, vengeful, narcissistic, murderous, sadistic)
P6 Yahweh does not not have vices. (By the rule of double negation)
P7 Yahweh is not perfectly virtuous.
P8 Yahweh is not morally perfect.
P9 Yahweh is not the greatest conceivable being.
C. Yahweh is not worthy of the attitude of worship.

So Yahweh is not worthy of the attitude of worship, for the same reason, as Craig points out, that all the other little 'g' gods are not worthy of worship.

Christians such as Dr. Craig need to construct better arguments than merely asserting the Christian god is "the greatest conceivable being" as there is too much "evidence" in the bible which shows that the Christian god Yahweh is nothing short of a narcissisitic, sadistic, masochistic, angry, jealous, vengeful god.--and NOT worthy of worship. 

I got a resonse to my argument from the guy who owned the channel, and then he immediately blocked me. He said:


"P5 just begged the question, genius. Honestly, throw the Dan Barker stuff in the trash."

Here is the reply I would have posted, if he had let me, but since he didn't, my husband posted it instead:


P5 does not beg the question-It is supported by biblical passages such as the one below:

"..for the Lord your God, who is among you, is a jealous God and his anger will burn against you, and he will destroy you from the face of the land." Deuteronomy 6:15

"The people of Samaria must bear their guilt, because they have rebelled against their God. They will fall by the sword; their little ones will be dashed to the ground, their pregnant women ripped open.”Hosea 13:16 (MURDER OF UNBORN)


After this, my husband was blocked.  These types of Christians obviously are unwilling to argue for their beliefs, but maintain them by blocking out anything that contradicts them.  It matters not, it is easy to create new accounts and keep posting, which is what I did below:

According to Craig, for any being to be worthy for the attitude of worship they must meet the criteria of the greatest conceivable being, and one of those conditions is being morally perfect.  According to the bible,Yahweh was angry and jealous, which are vices, and if vices do not count against Yahweh, then they do not count against any other being. Therefore, Zeus, or any other of the Gods would be worthy of the attitude of worship too. Yahweh must meet the same conditions, and he does not.  Therefore, Yahweh is not worthy of the attitude of worship.

You cannot waive the conditions for Yahweh that Craig set out for being worthy of the attitude of worship, ie. for being a god.  Otherwise, you are begging the question for Yahweh being a God in the first place.  Yahweh must meet the same standards that Craig set out for being worthy of the attitude of worship. So either Craig is wrong, or the bible is wrong about Yahweh being jealous and angry and therefore having vices.  Just because you prefer Yahweh does not count. 

1 comment:

  1. For this argument to be persuasive you need to provide a definition of "vice" and show that such vices are incompatible with perfect virtue (which you also haven't defined) and perfect morality.

    For example, it is not at all obvious that anger is a vice. There is surely such a thing as righteous anger. If a person is truly wronged by another, that person may be perfectly justified in becoming angry.

    Further, it's not clear to me that jealousy and narcissism (as typically applied to human beings) are even coherent with the concept of a perfect being. If there is such a perfect being, that being would be truly deserving of worship and admiration. Therefore, a demand for worship and admiration--which you have expressed as "jealously" and "narcissism"--would not appear to be vices.

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