Joy in Submission

Painting of Jesus Washing Peter’s Feet by Ford Madox Brown

“Some things are so important”, wrote Søren Kierkegaard,  “that they cannot be communicated directly.” Joy in submission is one of those things. How would Kierkegaard attempt to indirectly explain this issue? I do not know. But I am willing to attempt an impossible task of thinking in Kierkegaardian manner as I address how serving is reigning in God’s kingdom. The concept I named, ‘Joy in Submission’.

We were made to reign. We were made to reign through serving. We were made to serve. The objects to which we serve define who we are. Some objects bring intrinsic joy and life when served. Others bring despair and death. Those that bring despair and death often promise intrinsic joy and life but deliver despair and death. Fame, sex, and money are objects that often promise intrinsic joy and life. When they serve us, they do deliver what they promised. But when we serve them, they bring despair and death.

Submission, in God’s kingdom, brings intrinsic joy and life. Submission is serving. Serving is reigning. Thus reigning is submission. Submission is a way of life. It is a way of life worth living. A life worth living is a passionate life. A passionate life glorifies God by enjoying Him now and forever. Enjoying God now and forever is a passionate living that rejoices in serving God through serving others. Serving others is submission.

Cosmological Dialogue Concerning God’s Existence

Jane: Leibniz stated that “[w]hatever is not from something else is from itself, or from its own essence.”¹ Would you agree with the axiom that everything that exists has an explanation of its existence either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause?

 John: Yes. Given the Principle of Sufficient Reason, I would agree with that axiom.

Jane: Would you also agree that if the cosmos has an explanation of its existence, then that explanation is in an external cause?

John: No. I side with Peter Atkins on this one. Are you familiar with his Cosmic Bootstrap?

Jane: Cosmic boostrap! No. I am not. Please, enlighten me with his view.

John: Atkins hold that “[s]pace-time generates its own dust in the process of its own self-assembly.”² The cosmos caused itself.

Jane: How is that possible?

Dialogue Concerning God’s Existence

Jane: What is red?
John: It is a concept.
Jane: What are concepts?
John: They are the constituents of complete thoughts.
Jane: If concepts are constituents of complete thoughts, where do they exist?
John: They exist in our minds, of cause.
Jane: Are there eternal concepts?
John: What do you mean by eternal concepts?
Jane: I mean concepts that are independent of our minds for their existence.
John: Do you mean concepts that are true even if there was no contingent rational being?
Jane: Yes, John. Example could you say that 2 = 2 or the law of non-contradiction is an eternal concept?
John: Yes, I believe so.
Jane: So, if there are eternal concepts, would you agree that there is at least one eternal mind?
John: Mmh!
Jane: If there exist eternal concepts, and concepts are the constituents of complete thoughts, are we not rational to believe that there is transcendental mind?
John: I am persuaded to think it is rational, Jane.
Jane: Well John, monotheists would call this transcendental or eternal mind, “God”.

Those in doubt about any of Jane’s assumptions (e.g. conceptual realism & Platonism) may take her main conclusion conditionally. Is Jane’s argument for existence of God as an eternal mind persuasive? It depends on whether or not you share her assumptions. For those who do not, it is not a persuasive case. Why present such a dialogue then if it persuades only those who share Jane’s assumptions. My aim is not so much to persuade all, mostly atheists, to reconsider their position on the existence of transcendental mind. I do not believe in transcendental mind because of such arguments. My aim is to show that belief in God, a transcendental mind, can be rationally justified. Monotheists can (and do) have rational reasons to believe in such a being.

Armchair Proof of Existence of God

Does a being that is God¹ exist? Before we can disagree on whether or not a being that is God exists, we need to agree on what a being that is God is. There cannot be any disagreement unless there is an agreement on what is that is disputed.

What is a being that is God? A being that is God is a being that there could not be other than that which nothing greater nor equal could be conceived². Such a being, if exists, must exhibit maximal perfection. Therefore, a being that is God, borrowing Alvin Plantinga’s insightful words, is a being “having an unsurpassable degree of greatness—that is, having a degree of greatness such that it’s not possible that there exist a being having more.” (Plantinga 2002: 102 emp. removed).

My first premise in my attempt to answer the dispute of whether or not a being that is God exists, is thus:

(1) If a being-that-is-God exists then that being-that-is-God could not be other than that which nothing greater (or equal) could be conceived.

Anselm of Canterbury (1033—1109) argued that, if there was such a being then it is absurd to hold that such a being exists in our thoughts alone but not also in reality. According to Anselm, both atheists and theists can agree with (1) (Anselm 2009). Atheists would argue that such a being exists in our minds alone. Theists, however, would argue that such a being exists both in our minds and in reality.

Shand’s (Mis)conception Of Omnipotence

In Probing Shand’s Refutation of the Existence of God, I contended that John Shand, associate lecturer in Philosophy at The Open University, attacked a Straw God and committed an informal fallacy of composition. In this article I addressed his (mis)understanding of omnipotence. His (mis)understanding of omniscience and omnipresence are addressed in the next article.

Unnaturalness of Atheism

The idea that atheism ought be assumed by default is a chimera. Atheism cannot be assumed by default, it must be demonstrated. The belief that given the failure of theistic case for God, atheism ought be assumed does not only commit an appeal to ignorance but is also against the picture painted by modern discoveries in Cognitive Science of Religion (CSR).

Several recent researches in CSR shows that children naturally hold certain universal religious ideas such as belief in divine agents and belief in mind-body dualism. Similar to universals of language, universals of religious belief include principles that are shared in all culture and time, the belief in supernatural beings.

Paul Bloom explained that it was believed that those beliefs in Gods, the afterlife &c., could not have been a result of innate but social and cultural learned beliefs. Observing a recently growing body of literature on this field, however, Bloom affirmed that such a view is no longer entirely right. Though culture plays a certain role, “some of the universals of religion are unlearned”(Bloom 2007: 149) Jesse M. Bering concurs with Bloom’s observation. He wrote:

Although conventional wisdom tends to favor a general learning hypothesis for the origins of after-life beliefs, recent findings suggest a more complicated developmental picture (Bering 2006: 454).

Dissecting ‘One God Less’ Meme

“I contend we are both atheists,” signed Stephen F. Roberts, “I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” Roberts is believed¹ to be the person who crystallized and popularized this increasing reechoed sound bite when he began signing his online post with it in 1995.

Richard Dawkins in A Devil’s Chaplain reechoed this sound bite. Dawkins contended that:

[M]odern theists might acknowledge that, when it comes to Baal and the Golden Calf, Thor and Wotan, Poseidon and Apollo, Mithras and Ammon Ra, they are actually atheists. We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further. (Dawkins 2004, 150)

Paraphrasing Socrates, let us examine this sound bite together, and see whether it is a real sound advice or a mere wind-egg. (Plat. Theaet. 151e). Contrary to Daniel C. Dennett (2006, 210), this is not “some sound advice”  offered by Dawkins but a mere wind-egg because it confuses the conceptions of God with the concept of God.