3. Even if a strong probable case for atheism is difficult to work out, because of the vastness of the range of relevant evidence as well as conceptual problems in quantifying relative likelihoods in this domain, suspension of judgment (such as is advocated by agnosticism) would not be warranted as long as the theoretical plausibility of belief in God is weaker than the plausibility of disbelief. A belief becomes implausible when it is gratuitous or redundant or arbitrary, even if probabilities cannot be exactly counted. In the spirit of Laplace’s retort to Napoleon, that he had “no need for the hypothesis” of God, modern atheists find no need compelling them to introduce references to the divine in their accounts of reality. Jacques Monod, for example, argues that a complete story of living things can be told with reference only to molecules operating according to chance and necessity. Paul Edwards asks why we should be asked to suspend a negative judgment in connection with gratuitous claims about the Jewish and Christian form of theism any more than we should continue to suspend such judgment about similarly gratuitous claims concerning the gods of Mount Olympus or about the devil or witches.
Arguments for dismissal. The most radical form of atheistic argument in the twentieth and now the twenty-first centuries has been the dismissal of theistic language as empty of possible belief-content. The characterization of this position as atheistic is sometimes rejected on the ground that, if theism cannot be affirmed, then neither can its contradictory. But this objection is somewhat mischievous, at best, since if the logical dismissal of theism succeeds, then what is left is a world devoid of God-talk and full of science-talk—which is exactly the outcome sought by more traditional atheistic arguments.
The classic statement of the argument for dismissal was made by A. J. Ayer as part of his general condemnation of metaphysical discourse on behalf of logical positivism. The key doctrine of logical positivism is the equation of factual meaning with actual or possible verifying experience. Mere tautologies do not carry factual significance, since they are true under all factual circumstances; all true sentences in logic and mathematics can be classified as more or less elaborate tautologies. Likewise, mere emotional outbursts do not carry factual significance, since they simply express the feelings of the utterer. Nonemotive, nontautological language will have to carry any factual significance, and this will turn out to be exhaustively expressible in terms of the sorts of experience that would tend to verify the assertion of a fact if it is true. This can be expressed in a principle: namely, that the meaning of a factual proposition is equivalent to the method of its verification.
But it is clear that language about God has no ready method of verification. If anything is verified, it will be by mundane human experience. “God”—if more is intended by the term than such actual or possible experiences as the regularity of seasons, or the orderliness of the astronomical bodies, or the feeling of satisfaction upon performing certain actions mandated by ecclesiastical organizations—is never verified as God. Anything that could be so verified would be indignantly denied as truly God by theists; thus, by making God transcendent in principle, theists remove all factual meaning from God-language. And if it is impossible to assert truths about God in a philosophical tone of voice, it is equally impossible to “believe” them “by faith.” According to this doctrine of meaning, there is literally nothing to be believed.
This verificational analysis of meaning fell onto hard times in the later part of the twentieth century, since (among other problems) it could not account for its own nontautological, nonemotive, apparently assertive (but not empirically verifiable) meaning. But a closely related challenge to the unfalsifiability of theistic claims forced careful rethinking by theists. If, as Antony Flew demanded, every possible state of affairs is compatible with theistic belief—if, that is, nothing could conceivably falsify such claims—then is anything definite being claimed at all? What is the “bottom line” difference between a theist and an atheist? Has theism died the “death of a thousand qualifications”?
A remarkable episode in twentieth-century Christian theology occurred when certain theologians took all these criticisms to heart and embraced the “death of God” within their theological work. The movement, extending mainly through the decade of the 1960s, was highly diverse in method and content. Gabriel Vahanian was misunderstood if considered an atheist at all; Paul M. Van Buren blended dismissive elements from logical positivism with Barthian neoorthodoxy; Thomas Altizer affirmed genuine atheism of a most unusual sort, holding that God had in fact died at a point in history in order to set human history free and to save it; Bishop John A. T. Robinson spoke of the absence of God “out there” but retained an impenetrable Tillichian ambiguity about what might be real “deep down” at reaches of being accessible only by subjectivity.
Atheism, though mainly a minority opinion, has flourished in different forms since the rise of critical thought in human history. Various atheisms abound in our own time. It is wise to remember that by the standard that condemned Anaxagoras to exile we would all be declared atheists. That the moon is made of rock is not, after all, religiously shocking in the setting of theism today.
The circumstances of theistic belief are constantly changing, though the changes are often too slow or complex for a living generation to notice. One of the agents of this change within any historical context is the atheism of its time. Atheism, as primarily a counterattacking position, is the critical voice that constantly opens new possibilities for thought about the ultimately real. When this voice is heard with care, new possibilities of theism may be suggested. What shall “God” mean in the future? Every meaning of “God” presupposes a theoretical framework of some sort, old or new, familiar or alien. Within these frameworks, whether derived from A. N. Whitehead, Charles Hartshorne, Teilhard de Chardin, or some other source, God-talk is provided its function and is related to other domains of thought and life. Atheism is the rejection of some specific sort of God-talk, whether by disbelief or dismissal. As long as such rejection is encouraged to be clearly articulated, theological dross is subjected to cleansing fires of criticism, and the human project of relating cognitively and practically to the most high and the most real is advanced.
FREDERICK FERRÉ
Bibliography
Thomas J. J., Altizer, The Gospel of Christian Atheism.
A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic.
Paul Edwards, “Atheism,” The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Volume 1.
Antony Flew, and Alasdair Maclntyre, eds., New Essays in Philosophical Theology.
David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, Section XI.
Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology.
Cross-Reference: Agnosticism, Ambiguity, Death of God Theology, Evil, God, Language–Religious, Theism.
ATONEMENT
Atonement (“atonement,” a sixteenth-century coinage) is the reconciliation of sinners with God, especially through the cross, as communicated through the gospel and the sacraments. The cross is proclaimed as somehow resolving the human predicament; but the predicament and its resolution can be understood in quite different ways. Is the problem in humans’ relation to the powers of evil, in their relation to God, or within themselves?
1. The patristic emphasis was on the first of these, the powers of evil. If human beings are in bondage to the devil (collectively the “powers of evil”), then they must be redeemed by paying a “ransom.” But how? to whom? by what? In using the metaphor of the devil’s being lured by the bait of Christ’s humanity, patristic writers suggested that the powers of evil overstepped their authority and discredited themselves. Although the powers