The topic of my Annointed Bibliography was “Why Do People Deny A Creator?” I was interested in this topic for quite some time because I used to interact with people of different faiths. When this ideology of denying a creator came up it felt intimidating but after doing this research I have been able to solidify my stance on there being a Creator and also better understand why others deny a Creator, their reasons and the arguments against them. My inspiration for this research was Imran Hussain who explained that there is no need to feel intimidated by such an ideology and the burden of proof is upon the ones who deny a Creator as they have to argue against a self evident truth which is belief in a Creator.
In my research I tried my best not to delve into philosophical concepts as its rhetoric is complicated and requires an in depth explanation. I tried to convey the research I conducted in a simple manner so that the regular public can grasp and comprehend what I have to convey. I decided to write in this genre so that both theists and atheists can understand the reasons why people deny a Creator and some of the main arguments they bring forth. I chose this audience because that is how the most of the population is divided, people who either believe in a higher power or they do not. For my research I used one argument for each paragraph and conveyed how athiests and theists respond to those arguments, I used this strategy because that is how many atheists disbelieve in a Creator, they bring up these arguments and state them as their reason for disbelief in a Creator. The pupose of my piece is to allow atheists to reflect on their position about a Creator and also inform the theists of the arguments against a Creator and how they could respond to them.
The genre I chose to condense my research of 4000 plus words is a non-written document, a video. I chose this genre because of the digital era we live in where many people prefer to watch videos instead of reading long articles. Also I felt that this is the best way to explain such a complex topic, the explanation is done by credible people who have studied this topic in depth and explain them in the best manner. I hope that I can present my research in a complete manner without leaving out any key points and at the same time keep it interesting.
The research topic was interesting and it was definitely worth spending my time conducting this research. Although I had difficulty finding more material from the atheists’ side and I hope I did not misrepresent their position. I feel that I have been able to explain such a complicated topic about which there are many debates and discussions held throughout the year, in a simple manner that does not get the audience confused. I feel there are many things that could have been done in a different manner and it would help to give a wholistic understanding of the concept. I could have used more sources from the atheist’s side, but that would be difficult as many of them use philosophical language which is hard for the masses to comprehend. Also if I could organize my research in a cohesive manner that would be better and the audience would not get distracted while reading my research.
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A very well thought out and well stated argument on god and religion. Your research is an argument that has prevailed ever since the creation of religion and faith. However, I fail to understand the fact that the creator was just ‘there’ from the beginning. It’s like saying that a pizza pie was just ‘there’. Someone has to make the pizza right? And also if god was just there, the perceiver of the god which is us also have to be ‘there’ from the beginning which is not the case because we are supposed to be creation of this entity. Could you please elaborate?
Sorry for the late reply. To your first question about someone making a pizza, then we would then ask who is the person that created that pizza and who is the creator of the creator of the pizza and so on…..
For God, “He neither begets nor is born” (Al-Ikhlas 112:3).
As for your second statement about us already being there from the beginning, in Islamic theology all of our souls were assembled in front of God and we took a covenant to worship him alone which is still manifest today in the form of the fitrah or the innate disposition of the belief in one creator. So we are also a creation of God and the children of Adam the first human being. If you are interested you can read the Qur’an first and foremost and a great book written by Hamza Tzortzis, The Divine Reality.
You also mention that humans have an innate ability to have faith in god. If that is so, is it not true that god is only our perception? Because we have the innate ability to have faith, it was not really based on a truth or a truly existing factor, it was only our perception which we seemed to have.
Well the fact that we have the innate disposition to believe in One God proves the existence of a Creator. There are many other proofs for God which you could look into in the books I referenced above. Also for Islam there are many proofs and prophesies for the Qur’an and Prophet Muhammad being the truth. You just have to look in the correct places.
Well the fact that we have the innate disposition to believe in One God proves the existence of a Creator. There are many other proofs for God which you could look into in the books I referenced above. Also for Islam there are many proofs and prophesies for the Qur’an and Prophet Muhammad being the truth. You just have to look in the correct places.
The innate disposition to believe in a god is but a belief correct? It’s in our minds. Even if we do not believe in god, we are blindly believing in the fact that there is no god. My next question to you would be, how can there be a god separate from our minds? God cannot exist if we don’t make him exist right? So then god is just like believing blindly that there is salt in the salt shaker. What is the assurance of having salt in the salt shaker? What if someone put sugar in it? I hope you are getting my point. The innate disposition shows that we are innate believers, we believe without questioning, which is foolish. We once believed, innately, without argument, that the earth is flat right?
The main thing is you barely find people believing that there is no God. Belief in a God exists cross culturally, it is untaught, natural and intuitive. Whereas disbelief in a creator is something that requires to be taught to a person. Also I don’t understand what you mean by a God seperate from the mind. The main thing I would ask you is, what evidence do you have to reject the existence of a Creator?
You must be taught to believe. You must be taught to believe that stealing is bad. You must be taught that education is good. You must be taught that there is a god. Which brings me to the point of education. If we do not pay attention to the way we are educating ourselves and especially our children, we will have produced machines that follow algorithms and blind beliefs, not an open minded, compassionate human being. What I mean by a god separate from the mind is that the mind, our human mind, has the ability to know. If we did not have a mind we would not know that there was a god or that stealing is wrong. God separate from the mind is non-existent because without the mind knowing about the god, the god cannot exist. If you want evidence for the rejection of god, you say that we are his slaves, do we eat to fill his belly? Do we work to get paid for his expenditure? I do not want to reject god, but blind faith is what creates separation between different ideas and culture. If there is a god, and his wisdom is more far reaching than ours, then he should know that the world needs reasons to believe in him existing a separate entity.
The prophet Muhammed, was told by an angel to recite the words of the god. These words of god, from the Qur’an, state, ” Freeing of human beings from bondage” now this negates the concept of a god. Believing that there is a god is a bondage, bondage to the fact that there is a god and that there is a person who is inferior to the god.
Yes that is correct, we are slaves of Allah (God), not slaves of the dollar or our desires. We are told to be his slaves but at the same time not enslave ourselves to the creation. The reason why we are his slave is because he knows what is best for us, Allah (God) has the picture we have only the pixel. So, therefore us humans with our inferior minds we cannot comprehend on many of the wisdoms of God.
Also these are just side questions which I would recommend not to delve into, the advice I would give to you is to acknowledge that there a creator of the universe, accept his oneness, understand his message i.e. revelation and lastly understand the message of the messengers. Btw I like you enthusiasm about the topic. Thank you for engaging.
If he knows what is best for us, why do we not let him decide what we shall have for breakfast or what subjects we must take in college? This is demeaning the human conscience.
You also mention that humans have an innate ability to have faith in god. If that is so, is it not true that god is only our perception? Because we have the innate ability to have faith, it was not really based on a truth or a truly existing factor, it was only our perception which we seemed to have.
Well as I said these are side questions, I would like you to challenge the existence of the creator. In other words answer the question, Why you deny God? Just to answer your question briefly, the choices we make are our own choices, God sets the regulations in his book and tells us what is prohibited and what is allowed for us. When we take our choices in this life we check if it is in line with God’s regulations. I eat food that is made lawful by God, I take college courses that will benefit me in this life and not caused me to against the bounds set by God. By the way my point of view is based on the Islamic Theology.
Who appointed him to set rules for us? Our rules must be based on compassion for all beings without bias and they should be practical. If you eat food made by god, you are disrespecting the animals that dies in the slaughter house, the people that work in food production and why would god set a boundary? You must be able to set your boundary and help people as much as you can because you have been with yourself from birth and you know yourself best.
Why do I deny god? God, I believe, was an idea to bring people together. A lot of ideas and philosophies were introduced with the same intent but they must change with time as the people change their ways of thinking. We must find a new way to create peace and compassion in the world. God was a great method to unite people in the past, but now it’s not answering questions. We suffer from anger and desire, we must find a way to free ourselves. If god is the answer, god is but another desire as we long for his presence. We must go beyond our desires and fears.
Well if you cannot accept the creator of the worlds to dictate the rules, then how do You know what is right and what is wrong? Who decides what is right or wrong?
This is simple. When someone hits me I feel pain. Thus I do not want others to experience the pain. We now know that inflicting pain is wrong. If someone cheats me and fools me for material gain, I know how it feels and thus come to a conclusion that cheating is wrong because it feels unpleasant being cheated upon.
I’m sorry if i sound rude, I am only trying to understand your ideology more.
No thats alright I love having these discussions.
Feel free to express yourself.
For some reason I do not have the option to reply to your comment above.
Belief in God is not just blind faith, for Muslims we have very good reasons to believe in God. Also we are his slaves in the sense that we worship him, not eat to fill his belly because God is not like us
Nor is there to Him any equivalent.” Al-Ikhlas 112:4. Allah is worthy of our worship because he is the one that has created the universe. This is a reason for whorshipping him.
Who created him? Who knows that he created the universe? Or even better, where is the proof?
Also on the topic of blind belief, there are many things we believe blindly without having evidence , like the fact that you are conscious, what evidence do you have that you are conscious?
I know I am conscious because I can feel cold. I can feel hurt by words. You have to be conscious to do such things. If I insulted a rock, it wouldn’t feel anything because it is not conscious.
Well that is your subjective experience. Lets take for example me eating a strawberry, no matter how much you study my brain you can never find out the experience I have when eating a strawberry. This is called the hard problem of consciousness.
You know you are eating strawberry, that is conscience. Theres no need to study the brain. You know that you are eating a strawberry, or that you are eating, that is conscience. Also, you can find the neuron pathways reconnect and rearrange and you can also fins the receptors in your tongue sending signals to the brain if studied.
Ok, does that still explain what it is like for me to eat a strawberry? Can a scientist explain the experience I have when I eat a strawberry. The most they can do is find some electrochemical neuroactivity that says that I am eating something or maybe even eating a strawberry, but the scientist cannot explain what it is like for me to eat a strawberry.
Me being conscious is a belief that is backed by reasoning. It is not blind. Blind belief is thinking someone created the universe. Someone has to know the creator and the creator must exist only after the knower in order for the knower to tag the creator and acknowledge him for creating the universe.
What kind of reasoning do you have other than your subjective experience for your consciousness?
If there was no consciousness, there is no god because in order for god to exist we have to be conscious of him. Your god cannot exist without human conscience. Conscience is not subjective, experience is subjective. You are conscious of this argument. You are conscious of your ideas. Consciousness is not reasoning, consciousness is the very reason we are able to reason out our ideas. You are conscious that you are having a discussion with me. If you weren’t conscious, you would be a rock like I said and would not reply.
Exactly! Thats is the only way to explain consciousness by saying that there is a Creator who created us and gave us consciousness.
There is no need for a scientist. You know what it feels like to eat strawberry just like you know that you exist as a person. This knowing is conscience. The scientist does not have to explain how you feel. You know how you feel. That is conscience. If you didn’t have conscience you wouldn’t feel anything.
So what I am trying to convey is that we believe we have consciousness without having any evidence for it.
I just gave you evidence for consciousness. Please read fully.
“Evidence” is not your own subjective experience, you can look up the hard problem of consciousness, even scientists accept that there is no empirical evidence for conscience all they can do is speculate and say “you know its possible we are in a matrix controlled by some teenager”
You see the problem with a god creating us and giving us a conscience is that, in order for us to know the god, we should have existed before him. The strawberry has to exist before you eat it and feel how you feel when eating it.
Well IF we existed before God and saw the God that existed before us, then who created us and the universe? This is just a circular argument and could go on forever.
Or were they created by nothing, or were they the creators [of themselves]?Or did they create the heavens and the earth? Rather, they are not certain.
At-Tur 52:35-36
The easy answer to this is God created us and gave us the innate disposition to recognize him.