Full Text for The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism (Text)
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Published for the
Ev. Luth. Synod of lttissouri, OhiO, and Other States
CONCORDIA. PUBLlSHIN'G HOUSE, St. Louis, Mo.
The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism. 889
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The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism::-
I.
The question to be investigated now is whether Scripture regards
atheism as possible; whether atheism is viewed by the Biblical writers
as a reality or merely a state of mind and a matter of imagination.
It is necessary, first of all, to determine what is meant by atheism.
atheism is the opposite of theism. It could not have come into
existence without there having been previously theism, of which it is
logically and etymologically the negation. In other words, there must
have been theists before there could have been atheists. Theism is the
belief in {Jeo" a personal divine Being, independent, self-determining,
self-conscious, infinite, and eternal, who is the causating Principle of
all that exists, and transcends and governs all things and beings out-
side of Him. The Ohristian religion is pure theism, and since the
God whom it professes is the only true God and besides Him there is
no other God, it is the only genuine theism. Atheism is the denial
of the existence of this God of Ohristian theism.
Other meanings have occasionally been attached to the term
atheism. "Atheism is sometimes said to be equivalent to pancosmism,
that is, the theory that the universe consists of nothing but those
physical and psychical existences which are perceptible by the senses
or are cognizable by the imagination and finite understanding,
Pancosmism, however, is a positive doctrine, while atheism, both by
etymology and by usage, is essentially a negative conception and exists
only as an expression of dissent from positive theistic beliefs. Theism
is the belief that all the entities in the cosmos, which are known to
us through our senses or are inferred by our imagination and reason,
are dependent for their origination and their continuance in existence
upon the creative and causal action of an Infinite and Eternal 8elf-
consciousness and Will; and in its higher stages it implies that this
* This paper, too, like the paper on "Atheistic Diagnoses," etc., was
read a few years ago before the St. Louis Eintagskonferenz, except ref-
erences to recent occurrences.
890 The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism.
self-existent Being progressively reveals His essence and His character
in the ideas and ideals of His rational creatures and thus stands in
personal relationship with them. In its earlier stages theism conceives
of God simply as the Oause and Ground of all finite and dependent
existences; but as it develops, it realizes the idea of God as immanent
and self-manifesting as well as creative and transcendent. Until it
attains to this consciousness of felt personal communion with the
immanent Oause and Ground of the universe, it is more appropriately
described as deism.
"As was said above, atheism presuppuses the existence of theism .
.And it is not when the theistic idea is actually present that real
atheistic negation becomes possible. If a Hindu or a Greek came
to disbelieve in one or all of the deities of his national pantheon, he
would not necessarily be an atheist; for it often happened that this
scepticism, which the vulgar called atheism, arose simply from a more
or less clear apprehension of the one supreme object of worship. Max
Mueller well says in his Gifford Lectures on Natural Religion (p. 228) :
'We must remember that to doubt or deny the existence of Indra or
or Jupiter is not atheism, but should be distinguished by a separate
name, namely, adevism. The early Ohristians were called a{ho.,
because they did not believe as the Greeks believed nor as the Jews
believed. Spinoza was called an atheist because his concept of God
was wider than that of Jehovah, and the Reformers were called
athp,iqt" hP,r.flllRA they would not deify the mother of Ohrist or worship
the saints. This is not atheism in the true sense of the word; and if
a historical study of religion has taught us that one lesson only,
that those who do not believe in our God are not therefore to be called
atheists, it would have done some real good and extinguished the fires
of many an auto da 16.'
"Atheism, as we have seen, is not, like theism or pantheism,
a positive belief the phases of which can be depicted in their relation
to one unifying conception. It has no organic character. The history
of it is little more than a collection of the instances in which doubt
and negation in regard to some essential element in theism have
arisen. And the occasion and cause of this atheistic frame of mind
will generally be found in some new scientific or philosophical ideas,
which have, for the time being at least, appeared to be incompatible
with the CUl'rent form of deistic or theistic belief." (Charles Barnes
Upton, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy in Manchester Oollege,
Oxford; in ERE, II, 173 f.)
Our interest is chiefly in what Scripture declares concerning
atheism.
In the first place, the Bible denies that such a thing as the rejec-
tion of the existence of God is possible to any human being still in
possession of his ordinary mental faculty and obeying the prompting
The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism. 891
of his conscience. "That which may be known of God," says Paul,
Rom. 1, 19, "is manifest in them." The apostle is speaking of pagans,
who had no written revelation of God. He had just declared, v.18,
that these people "hold the truth in unrighteousness"; that is, they
hold it down, throttle it, by their immorality. And now Paul proceeds
to show why the anger of God is revealed against these people: what
they did they did not do in ignorance; else they might be to a certain
extent excusable. For there is in them "that which is known," or may
be known, "of God" (Luther: dass man weiss, dass Gott sei, the
knowledge that God is). They have with them some perception of
God which requires no special revelation and to which their inner
consciousness testifies. The reason for this is, God has clearly laid
it before them in the general revelation of the universe. When view-
ing this evidence, the heart in every human being responds to it.
The evidence has been "made to lie openly before them as an object
of knowledge." (Meyer.)
The natural intelligence of a pagan, the apostle further asserts,
grasps not only the fact of the existence of God, but it apprehends
even some of His attributes. The attributes themselves indeed are
"invisible things"; but in contemplating and meditating on "the
things that are made," that is, the created works of God, the human
mind cannot fail to grasp such facts as these, that the Maker of these
myriad creatures must be an eternal, all-powerful, and altogether
divine Being. Clearly this text teaches the continuous presence of
God with the works He created, or, rightly understood, His i=anence
in the universe, however, as a Being distinct from all other existences,
or His transcendent character.
In Ps. 19,1-3 we have a passage that describes how the things
that are made serve as agents for a message to man. HThe heavens,"
that is, the sphere outside the earth, which, as far as human vision
is concerned, is lost in infinite space, "declare," that is, make plain,
"and the firmament," that is, this transparent vault which is stretched
out overhead far and wide, "shows," that is, sets out to men's view
conspicuously, "the glory of El," the Almighty. How do they declare
and show it? "Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night
showeth knowledge." What does this mean? Are we to think of
Pythagoras's "music of the spheres," the inaudible symphony which
some mystic, dreaming, imagines he is hearing as he watches, fasci-
nated, the revolving heavens? No; by their mere existence the
heavens and the firmament force upon man information concerning
God. This is what the older expositors have called obiectivum vocis
non articulatae praeconium, an objective announcement given without
articulate voice, the voiceless heraldry of the heavens. They speak of
the God who made them; and since they, though only creatures, are
so glorious, He, their Creator, must be still more glorious. That is
892 The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism.
what they silently witness to all men, and no person can escape this
testimony of theirs; fOT they do this forever and ever. The verbs
"declare" and "show" are participles, expressing the idea of con-
tinuance and perpetuity. This idea is expanded in v.2, where the
sublime discourse of the heavens and the firmament is represented
as being carried on in an uninterrupted line of transmission. "Day
unto day uttereth speech," literally: gusheth forth a tale, as from
a deep, inexhaustible fountain, "and night unto night showeth knowl-
edge," that is, exhibits things that may be known, viz., regarding Him
who made day and night. "Each day reveals works which God does
by day and each night such as He performs during' the night, and this
diurnal and nocturnal testimony of His creatures is continuous and
parallel. Each dawning day continues the speech of that which has
declined, and each approaching night takes up the tale of that which
has passed away." (Delitzsch.) Our physical ear is not reached by
this testimony. The psalmist does not wish to be misunderstood as
having said so; therefore he adds in v. 3, literally rendered, this
thought: "There is no language, and no words, whose voice is
inaudible." The meaning is: "The discourse of the heaver N n'1d the
£l'mament: the day, namely, the sky by day, and the night, namely,
the sky by night, is not a discourse uttered in a corner; it is a dis-
course in a speech that is everywhere audible, and in words that are
understood by all." Thus Paul's declaration: "It is manifest," has
been anticipated by the psalmist. Incidentally Delitzsch by this
interpretation has justified Luther's rendering: "Es i.st keine Sprache
noch Rede, da man nicht ·ih1'e Stimme hoere."
Scripture also furnishes an argument against atheism by declar-
ing that man is possessed of an inalienable moral knowledge. The
works named in the Decalog, says Paul in Rom. 2, 14. 15, are "written
in the hearts" of the Gentiles; for "they do by nature the things
contained in the Law." Their nativa indole.s, their congenital dis-
position, is such that "without any extraneous training, culture, or
any other influence beyond the endowments of nature and their
natural development" they comply with requirements of God's Moral
Law. Paul does not assert this of the entire Law as we have it in
the Scriptures, but he speaks of "concrete actions which correspond
to particular portions of the Law." Thus the Gentiles "are a law
unto themselves." "Their moral nature, with its voice of conscience
commanding and forbidding, supplies to their own ego the place of
the revealed Law possessed by the Jews. Thus, in their doing of the
Law, they serve for themselves as a regulator of the conduct that
agrees with the divine Law." (Meyer.) They obey a law that is not
exhibited in visible characters of human writing; it is really an un-
written law; but in a sublime, inscrutable manner it is written in
their hearts, indelibly inscribed in their moral faculty, and they cannot
The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism. 893
escape its testimony; for their conscience cites it to them and rivets
upon them the sense of their personal responsibility for all their
actions, and in their mutual intercourse with one another, in the ac-
cusations and vindications that are carried on between Gentiles and
Gentiles, they reveal the fact that their thoughts are ever busy with
questions of right and wrong, that they court approval and seek to
escape disapproval, both of the moral voice in them and the same
moral voice in their fellow-men.
Accordingly, ScrilltUl'e pronounces the profession of atheism the
act of a fool, Ps. 14, 1. We are told that "the etymology of the Hebrew
word S::D leads to the idea of something withered and without sap
and th~t the usage of the word in the Old Testament implies spiritual
dulness, banenness, and worthlessness (Is. 32, 5. 6), in contrast with
the religious freshness and moral ability of the truly wise man. But
the expression does not refer to intellectual weakness." (Lange-
Schaff.) Barnes thinks that the word "is designed to convey the idea
that wickedness, or impiety, is essentially folly, or to use a term which
will, perhaps more than any other, make the mind averse to the sin-
for there is many a man wIlO would see more in the word 'fool' to be
hated than in the word 'wicked,' who would rather be called a sinner
than a fool." Penowne finds another idea hinted at in this word:
The fools, he says, "are those whose understanding is darkened; who,
professing themselves to be wise, became fools. Such men, who make
a hoaRt of their reason and would walk by the light of their reason,
prove how little their reason is worth. The epithet is the more cutting
because persons of this kind generally lay claim to superior discern-
ment." Spurgeon remarks: "The atheist is the fool preeminently
and a fool universally. He would not deny God if he were not a fool
by nature; and having denied God, it is no marvel that he becomes
a fool in practise. Sin is always folly; and as it is the height of sin
to attack the existence of the Most High, so it is also the greatest
imaginable folly. To say there is no God is to belie the plainest
evidence - which is obstinacy; to oppose the common consent of
mankind - which is stupidity; to stifle conscience - which is
wickedness."
Bacon remarks shrewdly: "A little knowledge inclineth man to
atheism." Young in his Night Thoughts says: "By night an atheist
half believes a God." (V, 177.)
The consensus gentium, that is, the universal affirmation of all
races of men that there is a God, is an ancient and by no means
inferior argument. Oicero employed it in his Tusculan Disputations,
where he says (lib. I): "There is not a race so rude, nor in all the
world an individual so crude, that the idea of gods has not entered
their minds. Many conceive depraved thoughts concerning the gods,
for that is usually done where vice prevails; however, all hold that
894 The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism.
there is a divine force in nature. This opinion is not produced by
the consentient talk of men, nor is it con:firmed by ordinances and
laws. Rather in every matter the consentient opinion of all races
must be regarded as a law of nature." Again, in his Nature of the
Gods (lib. II) he says: "The notion of gods is innate in all and, as it
were, graven on their hearts." It was, in part, for the purpose of
defeating this argument that Darwin went in quest of a race of
natural, born atheists, and failed to End it.
Hollazius has made an attempt to define the innateness of the
notion of God in the human mind. He says: "That there is a God,
or the real existence of a knowledge concerning God, is a fact; how-
ever, what it is or how to define its quality is not so clear. Hence it
is that it has been differently defined even by orthodox theologians ....
Whatever this thing is, which in their opinion can be said to reside
in the intellect by nature or to be connate to it, all have to go back
to a certain inborn perfection or light in the intellect by the aid of
which the truth of the common notions concerning God, when the
terms in which they are set forth have been apprehended, is im-
mediately perceived without debate. On this point they are nearly
agreed. . .. However, we do not deny that the knowledge of God
lodged in man is a certain perfection, analogous to a habit,us, that is
inborn in man during his earthly pilgrimage. The analogy consists
in the following points: 1. As the divine image in the first men was
a habitus, so the rew..nants of the samo, to which belongs the law o£
nature which enjoins the worship of God, somehow come close to being
a habitus, since homogeneous parts are of the same nature as the
'Whole. 2. As a habitus is a certain perfection, superadded to nature,
which facilitates its operation, so the natural knowledge of God has
been superadded to the faculty of cognition, inclining it in every pos-
sible way to the apprehension of God. 3. As a h-abitus is difficult to
unsettle, so that natural knowledge of God is deeply inherent in the
soul and is never eradicated entirely." (Examen, etc., P. I, c.1, q.5,
p.189 sq.)
If, then, we understand by atheism "most intimate convictions of
the heart" that there is no God, the possibility of atheism must be
,denied pointblank by everyone who accepts the Scriptures, also by
· the translators of the En-
glish Bible, adopting Luther's view, render the term "haters of God."
Meyer wants {}eoorvysfC; understood in the passive sense, "hated by
God," as the Vulgate does, which translates the term by Deo osibiles.
But the active meaning has been adopted by a long line of com-
mentators from Theodoret down to Tholuck, all of whom render the
word by Dei osores. Some, like Grotius and Reiche, point out that
wrath against the gods was a common heathen vice. Tholuck refers to
Prometheus, whom Jove chained to a rock for his opposition to the
The No and the Yes of Scripture on Atheism. 897
gods, and regards these God-haters as "Promethean characters."
Ewald views these men as "blasphemers of God"; Calvin as men
"who have a horror of God on account of His righteousness." Luther
in a gloss to this text calls them "the real Epicureans, who live as if
there were no God." The Scriptures have elsewhere l'ecorded in-
stances of defiance of God, and the state of antitheism as well as
atheism was known to the holy writers.
The Gentiles are referred to in 1 Thess. 4, 5; 2 Thess. 1, 8; Gal.
4, 8; Rom. 1,28; Eph. 2, 20, as people "who know not God," that is,
the only true God, whom the prophets, Ohrist, and His apostles had
proclaimed. Origen did not hesitate to call the polytheism of the
pagans atheism.
As a matter of fact, then, the Scriptures recognize atheism, just
as they recognize heresies, insanity, diseases, and the like. While no
man in his senses and with the approval of his conscience will deny
the existence of God, or while no one professing himself an atheist
can really believe in his atheism, still the attempt to rid the mind of
th, 'h01 ':It·" Gc ' is: .de Re~~,,;ions like the :Buddhist are built up
on atheism, and atheistic movements have sprung up even in ce:rtain
parts of the Ohristian world and have developed an astonishing
strength. Accordingly, the actual existence of atheism, understood as
men's voluntary divorcement from the notion of God, cannot be
denied.
Ps. 14,1, to which reference was made previously, is useful in
another way, viz., as showing how atheism originates. The fool "has
said in his heart, There is no God"; that meaus, in his secret, private
cogitations he begins to embrace this delusion. It is that way with
every other sin; is it not ~ Man's fancy begins to cherish some for-
bidden thing; the fancy is not bridled, but nursed; the person wants
that particular wrong thing and finally gets it. This text, then, does
not set forth atheism as "a fixed theory or an understood and conscious
opinion," a religious system of non-religion fully reasoned out, - all
that follows much later, and in most instances it does not follow at all,
because most atheists do not take that much trouble with their
atheism, - but it describes the rise of the disposition to atheism, which
then becomes revealed in the atheist's practise, or life. The psalmist
therefore adds: "They are corrupt; they have done abominable works."
A person's morals are always determined by his inward convictions,
his heart's creed. In this case which the psalmist has reviewed the
desire for an unrestricted, unrestrained mode of living has induced
the desire: Wish there were no God! Next came the thought: Pos-
sibly there is no God. Finally, the person decrees to his own satisfac-
tion: There is no God. The personal history of atheists, if it were
written, would bring out in most instances the correctness of the
psalmist's view.
57
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Hollazius sums up the case of these atheists very aptly, thus:
"It is possible that there are atheists who are such in a speculative
manner. They are such, not by nature, but because God has justly
abandoned and the devil blinded them. Not that their natural light
as regards the habitual knowledge of God has been totally extinguished
in them, but it has been smothered as far as its actual exercise is
concerned. Nor does this take place for the entire space of a person's
life and permanently, but only for a season, due to some passing
paroxysm. For a law of nature does not permit the valid and firm
belief that there is no God to become lodged in anyone. Although
the mind of a wicked person may drop off into a lethargic sleep, so
that the person gives no thought to God, still there cannot be anyone
in whom the conscience does not finally vindicate itself and, at least
in the hour of death, accuse the person of his neglect of God."
(Examen, etc., P. I, c. 1, q. 5, p.194.)
While closing this article, the Oakland Tribune for June 8 ar-
rives, with the following interesting editorial:-
Ohurch statistics recently released proved definitely that during
the years of greatest economic stress enrolment in places of wor-
ship steadily increased. The churches have larger attendance now
than ever.
An opposite story is told with the announcement that the Amer-
ican Association for the Advancement of Atheism has been hit so
sharply by thfl depression that it is threatened with extinction for
want of funds. The annual report shows membership has declined
steadily and income has been reduced by one half.
All of this, says the Stockton Reco1'd, sheds an interesting little
side-light on human nature. It's easy enough to be an atheist, militant
or otherwise, when everything is going swimmingly and every stock-
market flurry increases the size of your bank account. But when the
bottom falls out of things and you find that you weren't quite as
all-wise and eternally lucky as you had thought - well, atheism be-
comes a non-essential luxury then, in short order.
Berkeley, Oalifol'l1ia. W. H. T. DAU.
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