Argument from nonbelief

The problem of evil.

The problem of divine hiddenness.

The success of naturalism.

The argument from religious diversity.

Well done.

Second lightning round question.

The problem of divine hiddenness.

If God wants a relationship with everyone, why are so many sincere, open-minded people unable to believe in Him, unable to even believe in His existence to therefore give their life to Him?

Awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome.

So how would you guys respond to problem of divine hiddenness? I don't think I'm going to formulate the argument like – formulate the argument in terms of like premises and all that stuff but you know there's that concept of a non-resistant non-believer basically a person that hasn't come out yet

I mean, my book deals with this.

I haven't made a video talking about it in depth.

Gotcha.

So there's a bunch of different responses that you can give to this.

For one, I think the overwhelming majority of the literature on divine hiddenness just vastly underappreciates human psychology.

So I actually made a reel.

things like that.

Are you, uh, are you familiar with the concept of divine hiddenness? Explain it to me.

So, uh, I guess the notion is if God is real and wants us to know him, why is he so hard to find?

Well, I think that, you know, the Bible would say in Romans chapter one, that God's righteousness is displayed throughout all of creation so that humanity is without excuse.

I should have done this earlier.

No, you're okay.

Um, yeah, no, it's, uh, it is, um, you know, it's, I, I was having this conversation with, uh, you know, some, my nephew and produces about this kind of divine, divine hiddenness and, and, I kind of look at, I look at belief in God, faith, whatever.

I think it's something that, in just my opinion, it doesn't just come to you.

right.

Now, His next objection has to do with divine hiddenness.

And Ryan, you know about this topic.

We've talked about it before, but let's take a listen to...

Oh, yeah.

We've talked about it quite a bit.

But here is Todd Phillips' objection around divine hiddenness.

the narrative of the bible god supposedly establishes this clear precedent of making himself known in very clear objective ways like burning bushes pillars of fire he walks with adam and eve in the garden eventually he comes to earth supposedly as jesus to perform undeniable miracles to prove who he is right if those stories are true then they prove one thing that god is fully capable of providing objective physical evidence of his existence without overriding our ability to choose him.

For many sceptics, it is the strongest evidence against a benevolent ruler of reality.

Divine hiddenness is a related but distinct challenge.

Philosopher J. L. Schellenberg developed the argument from non-resistant non-belief.

Its core claim is that if a perfectly loving personal God wants a relationship with human beings, sincere people open to such a relationship should not remain unaware that God exists.

Classical theism holds that reality comes from an eternal conscious intelligence.

Its advocates see the existence of the universe, mathematical intelligibility, apparent fine-tuning, consciousness, morality and religious experiences mutually supportive.

It faces severe challenges from suffering, divine hiddenness, religious diversity, unclear mechanisms, and the absence of universally accepted empirical evidence of divine intervention.

Naturalism or physicalism holds that physical reality is fundamental.

And I will tell you the moment why.

Uh, well, there was one moment I remember you were talking about divine hiddenness, and your analogy for understanding how one could have interaction with God while not formally knowing God, and so overcoming the hiddenness objection, you made an analogy to, uh, The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis.

Um, if you wanna catch people, uh, up on that.

Yeah.

Right.

He was kind of in a sort of implicit relationship.

Um, so that's just like a, an illustration of, of something that is like one approach to divine hiddenness.

You know, one approach to divine hiddenness, this problem of like, well, uh, why are there so many people who don't seem to know that God exists? Why does God seem hidden to so many people? Um, well, maybe for at least some people, they are at least in some kind of implicit relationship with God's existence.