Questions on God's Nature, Abstract Objects, and Evangelism

KEVIN HARRIS: Welcome to Reasonable Faith with Dr. William Lane Craig. Hey, it's Kevin Harris, and a quick reminder that our annual matching grant is now in effect. Whatever you give to the work and ministry of Reasonable Faith will be doubled thanks to some very generous donors who have agreed to double every dollar you give up to $300,000. This is going on from now until the end of the year. So double your impact for the Kingdom of God through the work of Dr. Craig and Reasonable Faith. Give securely online at ReasonableFaith.org, and thank you so much. Now, let's head to the studio and talk to Dr. Craig.

Bill, we have some great questions that listeners and viewers have sent to us. We've got one from Facebook here that we'll ask you about. Nick from Facebook says,

Could someone offer some clarification for me on Dr. Craig's argument for God's goodness? Multiple times in videos, articles, and in Philosophical Foundations the only justification I see Craig give for thinking that God must be good is that God by definition is a being worthy of worship, and if God were not perfectly good then he would not be worthy of worship. Two questions arise. One: where does Craig get the idea that God is by definition worthy of worship?

Would you like to take that one first?

DR. CRAIG: Sure. It seems to me that this is ordinary usage; that when we speak of God we are talking about a being who is properly worshipped, and if a being is not properly worshipped then that being is not God. So I think that is true by definition – that God is a being worthy of worship. This would also be reinforced by the concept of God as a maximally great being. As a maximally great being, God must be a perfect being and therefore be perfectly good. Goodness is obviously a great-making property and therefore a being that was maximally great would be perfectly good.

KEVIN HARRIS: The second question he says,

Why think that God is only worthy of worship if he is perfectly good? This again would suffer from the arbitrary problem. My definition of God is worthy of worship, and my definition of worthy of worship is all-good; therefore God must be all good.

DR. CRAIG: Yes. It seems to me very clearly that an attitude of worship as opposed to mere admiration or awe or respect requires that the object of worship be perfectly good. I think if someone doesn't see that then he really has failed to understand the concept of what it is to worship someone else. Anything that is less than perfect, anything that is morally flawed, might be good enough that you would really admire that person, really look up to him, but you wouldn't worship him in the sense of giving yourself wholly to that person in abandon and adoration. It seems to me that the idea that goodness – perfect goodness – belongs to God is very plausible if not undeniable in virtue of the fact that God is a being worthy of worship and to be worthy of worship you have to be perfectly good.

KEVIN HARRIS: Would you recommend some Anselm to Nick maybe if he wants to further . . . ?

DR. CRAIG: Yes, I would say that. St. Anselm’s writings like the Monologion and the Proslogion would be very helpful because it's there that we have so-called perfect being theology so powerfully expressed.

KEVIN HARRIS: Next question, short and sweet: “What is the difference between soul and spirit?” Eric in the United States.

DR. CRAIG: Well, I would say that the difference is merely semantic. It's just a verbal difference. The soul and the spirit designate the same thing – the immaterial part of man, in addition to our bodies. I would say the only difference would be perspectival – that the soul could be that immaterial element considered in mundane earthly relations and affairs whereas the spirit could be taken to be that immaterial element in relationship to God. But ontologically I think they're the same thing. We're not talking about two different things.

KEVIN HARRIS: OK. Next question.

Dr. Craig, would Platonism entail the universe be an abstract object? Mathematical objects are paradigmatic cases of abstract objects; however fields of mathematics like geometry deal with seemingly concrete objects like manifolds and different types of spaces. Spaces would be a concrete object because we are experiencing and interacting with it. Would that mean space is an abstract object or is the concept of space an abstract object?

DR. CRAIG: I would say the latter. It's the concept of space that is an abstract object. Geometers can talk about different mathematical spaces having different dimensions, different topologies, different geometrical properties, and it's an empirical question as to what actual mathematical properties real space has. So the answer to the question is “No, Platonism does not entail that the universe is an abstract object.” But, as he says, these concrete objects have mathematical properties and mathematical structures and that's the basis for this argument that I give that the applicability of mathematics to the physical world is best explained by the fact that the physical world is the product of a transcendent God who designed it on the mathematical structure that he had in mind.

KEVIN HARRIS: Next question from Joshua in the United States. He says,

I've been convinced for some time now that we should adopt an anti-realist view of abstract objects like math and propositions [similar to the question we just answered] because of your convincing theological case for nominalism. I have defended it with honor, but I recently came across the work of James N. Anderson and Greg Welty on the argument of God's existence from propositions as thoughts in the mind of God or divine conceptualism which I found to be very powerful. My question is: what makes propositions as thoughts in the mind of God unattainable in your view [not that you said that, but I think that is implied] given that propositions seem to be what our statements are expressing? But the proposition itself, if it is the truth bearer, would seem to exist independently of our statements yet closely related to our thoughts for our statements to have truth content. I know that I'm probably mistaken in my train of thought so please help me find my mistakes and my strawmen. Thank you for everything, Dr. Craig.

DR. CRAIG: Sure. Well, I would say in response to Joshua that conceptualism is a viable position that one might hold and indeed it would be my fallback position if anti-realism proves unsuccessful. But I have some worries about conceptualism. The main problem would be I just don't see any reason to think that propositions are real existing objects. Joshua seems to be familiar with my work, and I would invite him to review what I say in the book God Over All about that criterion of ontological commitment that would commit us to the reality of propositions just because we can refer to them and quantify over them. I simply see no reason to think that those sorts of linguistic arguments are compelling and justify realism. On the other hand, it seems to me there are some worries. One would be, as Graham Oppy has said, saying that propositions are thoughts in the mind of God means that God must constantly be entertaining an infinite multitude of trivial, baudy, disgusting thoughts that seem unworthy of the Supreme Being. Remember for the conceptualist all of God's thoughts have to be what are called a current. He has to actually be thinking them in order for them to be the truth-bearers. And this postulates, as Oppy said, an infinite multiplicity of thoughts in the mind of God that seems quite unworthy of God. So I would be resistant to this understanding of what propositions are.

KEVIN HARRIS: The next question says,

Hi, Dr. Craig. Your answer to question 747 in the Q&A section of Reasonable Faith brought me some questions that I think you can answer. What is the reason to interpret the descriptions of God the Father sitting on a throne as being anthropomorphic? Could he, not even being omnipresent, reveal himself spatially in the heavens just as Jesus revealed himself spatially on Earth? Many biblical passages describe Jesus as seated at the right hand of God when he ascended into heaven and Stephen himself saw Jesus on his Father's right hand when he was dying. There's also a passage in Jesus that says that the angels who are in heaven see the face of the Father who is in heaven. In the face of such passages, it does not seem to me that the New Testament writers understood God the Father seated on a throne as merely anthropomorphic descriptions. What would you say about such biblical passages?

This is from Rodrigo in Brazil.

DR. CRAIG: I would say to Rodrigo that he has a very naive hermeneutic for interpreting these biblical passages. Christian theology has always affirmed the spirituality and incorporeality of God unlike the pagan gods of Israel's neighbors. God doesn't have a body. He is invisible, spiritual, incorporeal. You see that already in Genesis 1:1 where God brings into existence the entire physical universe. He transcends the universe and is not part of it. Jesus, in speaking to the woman at the well, said, “God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.” Moreover, if you take these bodily descriptions of God literally then what you will have is an inconsistent monstrosity – a fire-breathing monster with smoke coming out of his nostrils riding on the chariots of heaven. You can't get a consistent image of God if you take these anthropomorphic descriptions literally. Now, certainly Christ had a body. That's the doctrine of the incarnation. And he ascended with his human nature into heaven. That we agree with. But we're talking here about God apart from the incarnation, and there I think God is spiritual and invisible and incorporeal. Now, certainly there are theophanies in the Bible in the Old Testament where God will appear, for example, to Abraham or to Moses in human form. But these are mere appearances. These are visions. It’s not that God has an actual physical body. When it talks in Scripture about things like the right hand of God where Jesus is seated, this means a position of authority. The right hand of the king is the position of authority, and so it's a saying that Jesus in ascending into heaven is assumed this position of authority, not that there's an actual chair some place located in space where Jesus is sitting on it, or where the Father is sitting on it. Also, when it talks about the face of God, the face of God is a metaphor for the presence of God. The arm of God is a metaphor for God's strength. God's ears is a metaphor for saying that God is attentive to our prayers. All of these bodily metaphors when used of God have a clear literary meaning referring to things like God's presence, God's strength, God's attentiveness to our prayers, God's knowing what will happen when it says “his eyes are upon the righteous” for example. So I would just tell Rodrigo please do not succumb to this sort of neo-pagan nonsense that God has a physical body and is located spatially someplace in the world.

KEVIN HARRIS: Final question today. He says,

I am a teenager who is very interested in apologetics but not at all interested in evangelism. I love the philosophical arguments for God's existence, but I don't think I would be good at evangelism. Do I still need to get good at it and go out and evangelize or can I just be someone who is prepared for someone to make objections to God and then I can give a defense? I've been having some arguments with people online like on YouTube and Reddit and even a little bit in virtual reality but that's way harder because you have to be really quick on your feet. I have marching band coming up so I won't be able to do that very much and school is also coming up. I go back and forth with atheists for a while and usually they give up at some point, but I'm always afraid that I just have annoyed them. When it comes to evangelism I just genuinely don't think I would be able to do it, and I don't want to do it at all. Is arguing with people online every once in a while enough, or do I need to go door to door and pray with people and annoy all my family members and yell in their face about the Gospel and tell them to believe in Jesus?

This is Braden from the United States.

DR. CRAIG: As I've read Braden's question, I thought, “I wonder what his definition of evangelism is?” What does he mean by evangelism? And then I got to that last sentence. Braden thinks evangelism is going door to door and praying with people and annoying your family members and yelling in their face about the Gospel and telling them to believe in Jesus. Well, Braden, if that's what you think evangelism is, certainly you're not called upon to do evangelism. But that's not what evangelism is. As he says earlier in his question, he says, “Can I just be someone who's prepared for someone to make objections to God and then I can give a defense?” If you're prepared to share with someone how to come to know Christ and become a Christian then that is doing evangelism. It's not enough just to present philosophical arguments for conclusions. And I'm really concerned when he says, “I think I'm just annoying these people” that he interacts with. That's not a good sign. He needs, I think, to have a genuine love for the people that he's talking with. I'd encourage Braden to ask God to soften his heart and to give him a genuine love for those that he's interacting with so that he is happy to share with them when they ask about how to know Christ as your personal Savior. That was how I became a Christian. There was a girl who sat in front of me in my German class who was a radiant Christian, and she was prepared when I asked her why she was always so happy to share the Gospel with me. And as a result my life was changed. So that's all Braden has to do – just be prepared when someone asks him about how you can come to know God, find the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. I want to say to Braden that there is no greater joy that you can have than leading another person to Christ. I would encourage him to learn how to use tools like The Four Spiritual Laws or Knowing God Personally to bring a person right up to that place of making a commitment to Christ, and then praying with that person to give his life to Christ. This is just a tremendous privilege and joy. So what he's talking about here isn't real evangelism. This is a caricature that he should not engage in. But he should be ready to share out of genuine love with someone who is interested in finding a personal relationship with God and forgiveness of sins and eternal life.

KEVIN HARRIS: Go get ‘em Braden!^[1]