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Divine Hiddenness: New Essays

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"Truly you are a God who hides himself, O God of Israel, the Savior" (Isaiah 45:15). Why is God's existence not more obvious? Why do so many fail to believe in God? For this most part, this collection of essays is a response to J. L. Shellenberg's Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason in which he argues that a perfectly loving God would provide sufficient evidence to render reasonable unbelief impossible. In his opinion, God does not offer compelling proof, and thus he concludes that a perfectly loving God does not exist. Numerous authors challenge Shellenberg's thesis and conclusion. Perhaps our experience of the hiddenness of God is one consequence of human sinfulness: "Critics like Schellenberg consistently underestimate human corruption and sinfulness. Given our perversity, and tendency to idolatry, it is likely that even a fuller divine self-disclosure would be corrupted by us, and would thus not help us. What is needed isn't more evidence or a fuller revelation but a new heart to appreciate the evidence and revelation we have" (104). In this case God's hiddenness is actually human blindness. Perhaps divine hiddenness is related to human freedom (overwhelming proof would coerce in a manner incompatible with love), or the nature of faith (God doesn't simply desire belief, but trust, faithfulness, and love). Perhaps God desires that we believe for the right reasons: "God's desire for why people believe in His existence may well be much more important to Him than that they believe in Him in the first place. It may well be that God wants people to believe in His existence for certain reasons and not for others, that He prefers that they do not believe at all if the only option is to believe for the wrong reasons" (12). Perhaps it is because intentional divine limitations, or conversely, because of God's great transcendence and the inherent difficulty of communicating this to finite creatures. Perhaps there is a good reason that we do not and cannot know - that is at least a plausible option. Regardless of one's answer to the question of divine hiddenness, our experience of it continues to challenge us in regard to God, ourselves, the meaning of life in this world, and the nature of faith. This was a great book, pregnant with provocative and challenging ideas.

There is some really good material in this book, but the selections are profoundly one-sided. There is only one atheist article in the entire book. There is also one from an agnostic, but he is as critical of the atheist position as the theists are. Even were I a theist, this one-sidedness would certainly detract from the book's value as an even-handed treatment of a controversial issue. Additionally, I found it odd that nothing from Ted Drange was included in the book, particularly since his work is often criticized by theists in the book (one article is even devoted almost entirely to criticizing Drange). This book is a must have, however, if you are really interested in divine silence, as there are many articles from extremely important thinkers contained in the book.