Why would God hide?

The hiddenness argument

J. L. Schellenberg born 1959If a perfectly loving God existed, no one would be a non-believer in good faith.

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What it claims

No perfectly loving God exists, and so there is no God.

Why

A perfectly loving God would be open to everyone, yet some blameless people do not believe in him and cannot seek him.

The same idea through history

Blaise Pascal1670In the Pensées, Pascal starts from the same fact, that God is hidden, but makes it a mark of the true religion: God shows himself to whoever seeks him with all their heart.

J. L. Schellenberg1993First form of the argument: a perfectly loving God would leave no one in blameless ("reasonable") nonbelief.

Theodore M. Drange1998Drange suggests dropping the word "reasonable": blameworthy or not, widespread nonbelief is enough, if God wants everyone's love.

J. L. Schellenberg2015Recent form: a perfectly loving God would always be open to a relationship with everyone; so there would be no "nonresistant" nonbelief.

In short

"Why would God hide?" is an argument by J. L. Schellenberg (Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason, 1993, 1993) on the question "Does God exist?" (answer: atheism). Its claim: No perfectly loving God exists, and so there is no God. According to AskPhilosophy's logic check (Z3 solver), the argument is valid only if one grants a premise the author leaves unstated (P3). AskPhilosophy presents 3 objections, 2 of them with a documented reply, and the original text behind each premise, checked word for word.

Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason, 1993

Valid with an implicit premise

Many people seek God sincerely and do not find him. For the Canadian philosopher J. L. Schellenberg, this silence is no detail: it is an argument against God. A parent who loves a child does not hide from it for its whole life. If God loved us perfectly, he would at least make sure that everyone who does not refuse him could know that he exists. The argument is not about suffering, like the problem of evil, but about silence.

click a premise to reject it

If you accept every premise, logic forces you to accept the conclusion. So the debate is about the premises.

Checked by a logic solver: the premises cannot all be true while the conclusion is false.
Without the implicit premise: Without P3, the computer finds a world where God is loving and open to the relationship, and where people disbelieve through no fault of their own: for instance if one could relate to God without believing he exists.

Valid with P3, which Schellenberg develops but the short form of the argument leaves unstated. Believers mainly attack P4 (does all nonbelief hide some fault?) and P2 (might God have good reasons to wait?).

Analogy. A mother who loves her child may leave it alone for a while, so that it learns. But if the child calls her sincerely for years without ever knowing whether she exists, we would no longer say she loves it perfectly.

Objections

Each objection is a conversation: click to see who replies and where the debate stands.

Pascal (the traditional answer) 1670 · attacks premise 4

God does not show himself so as to force everyone. He lets himself be found by those who seek him with all their heart, and stays hidden from those who flee him. If someone does not find him, deep down they did not want to see: nonbelief always comes from a disposition of the heart.

Schellenberg replies

J. L. Schellenberg 1993

That is exactly what experience denies. Schellenberg devotes a whole chapter to showing that many people have searched honestly, without fleeing God, and find no sufficient reason to believe.

Theodore Drange 1998

And even if every case of nonbelief were somehow a fault, it would make no difference. A perfectly loving God would set vindictiveness aside and still want to help nonbelievers, by giving them signs of his existence.

The debate goes on (our summary) Some believers doubt that the truly blameless nonbelief the argument needs exists, or that one could ever be sure of it (for instance Douglas Henry, in the journal Faith and Philosophy, 2001 and 2008). Its defenders note that the argument needs only one real case, and that otherwise a great many sincere seekers would have to be suspected of bad faith.

Richard Swinburne (and Michael Murray) 2004 · attacks premise 2

God, like a good parent, wants us to become good by our own choice. If his existence and eternal reward were certain, we would do good to please him and gain heaven, not out of love for others. A little uncertainty leaves room for a free goodness. Michael Murray ("Coercion and the Hiddenness of God", 1993) puts it differently: an obvious divine presence, with its promises and threats, would weigh on us like coercion.

Schellenberg replies

Theodore Drange 1998

Believers say they already have enough evidence to believe, with their freedom intact. If there is a level of evidence sufficient for belief but too weak to interfere with freedom, God should give that level to everyone. Nonbelievers would then be where believers are, and just as free.

The debate goes on (our summary) Defenders of Swinburne and Murray answer that the right degree of uncertainty may differ from one person to another, and that only God knows it. The argument's defenders reply that believing in God forces no one to love him: even knowing he exists, everyone would remain free to turn away.

Paul Moser (in Howard-Snyder and Moser, eds.) 2002 · attacks premise 2

God is not an object to be observed out of curiosity. He makes himself known to transform those who welcome him, and may hide from those who demand evidence on their own terms, without being ready to change their lives. Demanding that he show himself as we wish is a kind of "cognitive idolatry". This collection of essays, edited with Daniel Howard-Snyder, gathers the main replies to Schellenberg.

no reply

Schellenberg did reply, but that text is not yet in our corpus.

The debate goes on (our summary) Schellenberg answers that this reason only holds for those who resist God. But his argument is precisely about those who do not resist: people ready to welcome God if he showed himself. For them, Moser's reason does not apply.

What today's voices say

Defend it

Alex O'ConnorSays religion varying by birthplace is what we would expect if it is a man-made cultural phenomenon, not if God made himself equally accessible.

Matt DillahuntyIf a morally good God wanted people to know him, he says, he should provide compelling evidence and show what he expects.

Criticize it

William Lane CraigHe answers divine hiddenness by saying that merely getting people to believe God exists is not what matters most to God, whose aim is a loving relationship.

Trent HornHe says an obvious God would compromise our moral freedom, and that God allows epistemic mistakes so that we can freely choose him.