Antony Flew’s Deism, and Other Theologies

This note isn’t written to be my final verdict on the formerly-atheist philosopher Antony Flew. I haven’t yet read his last book (in fact, I haven’t read any of his books) and so I am not able to say for sure what I think about his conversion from atheism to deism. I can say that I have read a little ABOUT his book, and so I can give an opinion on his thoughts as expressed by someone other than him. If my impression of his deism is correct, then Flew makes the same mistake that many other theologians make in supposing God’s benevolence.

My criticism of Antony Flew’s deism refers to one paragraph of a review published by the Evangelical Philosophical Society. This paragraph reads:

In "Open to Omnipotence" (chapter 10), Flew summarizes that his case for God's existence centers on three philosophical items - the origin of the laws of nature, the organization of life, and the origin of life. What about the problem of evil? Flew states that this is a separate question, but he had two chief options - an Aristotelian God who does not interfere in the world or the free-will defense. He prefers the former, especially since he thinks the latter relies on special revelation (156). [End quote]

According to Flew and other deists, the problem of evil can be resolved by supposing that God only CREATED the world and that he does not control every single detail in it. Since God doesn’t control every single detail, he can’t be blamed for the evil that happens in the world. He does not oversee every single event, and so he cannot be responsible in the way that a negligent proprietor is liable. And he does not intervene to bring about pain and suffering, so he cannot be guilty in the way a criminal is. According to deists, God is a laissez-faire God, and so he is blameless and worthy of praise despite the existence of evil.

One criticism that might be leveled against Flew’s deism is that Flew’s laissez-faire defense of God fails, since Flew attributes to God qualities that are not laissez-faire in the least bit. Flew supposes that God is or can be omnipotent, and that he intervened not just to create the universe but also to create life (or at least that is my impression of what I read about his book). If God is or can be omnipotent, and if he intervened to create life in the world, then surely he must be able to intervene to create or prevent atrocities. I cannot put my name next to this criticism, since I don’t know exactly what Flew believes about how God could have created life. Many deists believe God laid out a kind of blueprint for life and everything else before he created the world, and then after the moment of creation stepped back and watched everything unfold. If that is Flew’s idea of how God created life, then Flew’s God would not have intervened in the world to create life, and the God imagined here would still be laissez-faire. In that case, the laissez-faire defense would still hold. But any view of creation which shows God acting in the world after the very first moment of the world’s existence presents an intervening God, and is not covered by the laissez-faire defense.

My criticism of Flew’s deism, and of conventional theology, can be introduced in a few questions. Why suppose that God is good? Why can’t God be a little bad? Or despicable? Why can’t the Creator of this world be seen as someone who gets stimulated by studying the effects of evil that he brings into the world? Why can’t God be a mad scientist, or a tyrant?

Classical deists suppose that the Creator must be a good God because the world he created is good. But why say that nature is good? From what I see, nature is a mixed bag. I’m glad I exist. I’m glad there are pleasures that I can enjoy. I’m distraught that I won’t live forever. I’m disgusted that the world progresses through a system that involves the expenditure of weaker organisms. I’m disgusted that many animals can’t live without killing and eating other animals. If that really is what God intended, then God designed a world that involves the premature and violent deaths of countless beings. Maybe God saw this blueprint as the necessary method to create human beings and to bring about the joy of being in communion with humans. Or maybe God saw it as the only way to get the thrill of a creative act. If that is the case, then God is a violent utilitarian who causes the violent deaths of numerous non-aggressors in order bring about some “greater good”. A God like this isn’t faultless. Intelligent, yes, but not faultless.

It is one thing to say that God exists. It is another to say that God is good, or that God cannot have committed actions that brought about the bad things. Do my parents exist? Yes. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for my parents. But can you say that my parents are faultless? Of course not. The fact that a being exists is completely irrelevant when it comes to that being’s praiseworthiness.

I get the impression that most theologians try to justify the Creator because they want to justify the world. They want to be able to embrace the world in its entirety. They don’t want to stand back and point out parts of it that they detest. It’s okay to not embrace every aspect of a thing. I can say that I love my parents. But that doesn’t mean that I think they’re faultless. I can embrace them without condoning my dad’s almost physical addiction to erudite radio and television programming, or my mom’s complete inability to watch a movie. I don’t have to pretend that my dad ever spends a minute in the car not listening to KPFA or BBC news or KCBS or NPR, or that he has no itch to watch book talks and press conferences and Congressional Committee hearings on C-SPAN, or that his complete submersion in those things is justified as a necessary means to a just end. Just as I can love my parents while knowing that some things about them are ridiculous, so too can I love things about the world while knowing that parts of it are inherently flawed.

I also get the impression that when theologians finally do admit that the world is inherently flawed, they rummage about for something that they CAN say is perfect and benevolent, something that they CAN look at with awe and adoration and consider as their “source” or beginning. They desperately want something to identify with their own existence and call perfectly good, because they want to justify their own world. So they call God perfectly good, and insist that anything that isn’t good must not have been done by God. “September 11th? Couldn’t have been God! God is perfectly good! What kind of God would ordain planes filled with civilians to be slammed into office buildings at the busiest time of the workday?” This is like the Nazi Holocaust-denier exclaiming: “The Fuhrer couldn’t have done that! That’s despicable! No civilized leader would order the systematic slaughter of European Jews, fags, and Gypsies!” Or like the big-sparkly-eyed college student wearing those pathetic shirts emblazoned with the mottos “Hope” and “Change” saying: “Obama murder civilians in Afghanistan? Can’t be so! His Excellency LOVES brown-skinned impoverished children living in stone shacks in the mountains of south-central Asia! He would NEVER bomb civilian targets! Obama bought out by the state-capitalist elite? Not so! Obama stands for Change! Obama sign laws selling my generation into debt slavery? Never! Obama believes in equal opportunity and self-determination!”

Deism happens when a theologian looks at the implications of conventional theology and says: “Well THAT’s a mean kind of God. I don’t want to believe in THAT kind of God. I want to believe in a God who can’t be held responsible for the bad things in the world.” It’s like when the Holocaust-denier says “Well that’s a BAD Hitler. I don’t want to believe in a bad Hitler, I want to believe in a GOOD Hitler.” And when the hope-riddled college student says “I don’t want to believe in a Keynesian trickle-down Obama, I want to believe in an Obama who stands for Change.” Or when the all-American historian says: “I don’t want to believe in a Lincoln who took control of the printing press, imprisoned journalists and editors who spoke against him, completely did away with habeas corpus, put ‘problematic’ judges under house arrest, ignored the rulings of the Supreme Court, forced men by threat of imprisonment to join the army and fight in a war where whole cities were flattened and civilians randomly executed, and funded that war by inflating a currency that a whole nation was forced to accept. I want to believe in a kind and somber man who was born in a log cabin and who fought to free the slaves.”

Deism is denial. Rather than change one’s opinion of a being to accord with morality, it changes the very definition of that being to fit morality. WHAT IF God turns out to be something other than our Footsteps on the Beach and Lily of the Valley and In the Garden sun-drenched paintings show him as? If it is a fact that God does some horrendous things in the world, then we would all be fools to insist that God can’t possibly intervene to punish nations or do other harsh things. We would be living on the canvass of pretty paintings, denying that anything but soft glows and gentle curves exists.