View source for Philosophy:Problem of the creator of God

{{Short description|Philosophical problem}}
In [[Philosophy:Philosophy|philosophy]], the '''problem of the creator of God''' is the controversy regarding the hypothetical [[Causality|cause]] responsible for the [[Philosophy:Existence of God|existence of God]], on the assumption God exists. It contests the proposition that the universe cannot exist without a [[Religion:Creator deity|creator]] by asserting that the creator of the [[Astronomy:Universe|Universe]] must have the same restrictions. This, in turn, may lead to a problem of [[Infinite regress|infinite regress]] wherein each new presumed creator of a creator is itself presumed to have its own creator. A common challenge to [[Philosophy:Theism|theistic]] propositions of a [[Religion:Creator deity|creator deity]] as a necessary first-cause explanation for the [[Astronomy:Universe|universe]] is the question: "Who created God?"<ref>''The God Book'', Michael Arnheim, 2015, p. 18.</ref>

Some faith traditions have such an element as part of their doctrine. [[Unsolved:Jainism and non-creationism|Jainism]] posits that the universe is eternal and has always existed. [[Religion:Isma'ilism|Isma'ilism]] rejects the idea of God as the ''first cause'', due to the doctrine of God's incomparability and source of any existence including [[Philosophy:Abstract and concrete|abstract objects]].<ref>Arzina R. Lalani Degrees of Excellence: A Fatimid Treatise on Leadership in Islam I.B.Tauris 2009 {{ISBN|978-0-857-71202-8}} page 3</ref>

==Perspectives==
[[Biography:Rajneesh|Osho]] writes:
{{blockquote|No, don't ask that. That's what all the religions say – don't ask who created God. But this is strange – why not? If the question is valid about existence, why does it become invalid when it is applied to God? And once you ask who created God, you are falling into a regress absurdum.<ref>''The God Conspiracy: The Path from Superstition to Super Consciousness'', [[Biography:Rajneesh|Osho]], 2010.</ref>}}

John Humphreys writes:
{{blockquote|... if someone were able to provide the explanation, we would be forced to embark upon what philosophers call an infinite regress. Having established who created God, we would then have to answer the question of who created God's creator.<ref>''In God We Doubt'', John Humphrys, 2008. {{isbn|978-0340976739}}</ref>}}

Alan Lurie writes:
{{blockquote|In response to one of my blogs about God's purpose in the creation of the universe, one person wrote, "All you've done is divert the question. If God created the Universe, who created God? That is a dilemma that religious folks desperately try to avoid." The question, "Who created God?", has been pondered by theologians for millennia, and the answer is both surprisingly obvious and philosophically subtle{{nbsp}}[...] whatever one thinks about the beginnings of the Universe, there is "something" at the very origin that was not created. This is an inescapable given, a cosmic truth.<ref>Alan Lurie, ''The Rabbi Who Believes in Zeus: Popular Myths About Religion, Faith, and God'', 2013</ref>}}

[[Biography:Joseph Smith|Joseph Smith]] stated in the King Follett discourse:

{{blockquote|God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret. If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by His power, was to make himself visible—I say, if you were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form—like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man{{nbsp}}[...] it is necessary we should understand the character and being of God and how He came to be so; for I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil{{nbsp}}[...] It is the first principle of the gospel to know for a certainty the character of God, and to know that we may converse with Him as one man converses with another, and that He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did{{nbsp}}[...] Is it logic to say that a spirit is immortal and yet has a beginning? Because if a spirit has a beginning, it will have an end.{{nbsp}}[...] All the fools and learned and wise men from the beginning of creation who say that man had a beginning prove that he must have an end. If that were so, the doctrine of annihilation would be true. But if I am right, I might with boldness proclaim from the house tops that God never did have power to create the spirit of man at all. God himself could not create himself. Intelligence exists upon a self-existent principle; it is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it. Moreover, all the spirits that God ever sent into the world are susceptible to enlargement.}}

==Responses==

Defenders of religion have also countered that, by definition, God is [[Philosophy:Unmoved mover|the first cause]], and thus that the question is improper:

{{blockquote|We ask, "If all things have a creator, then who created God?" Actually, only created things have a creator, so it's improper to lump God with his creation. God has revealed himself to us in the Bible as having always existed.<ref>Steve Husting, ''Doubt Busters'', 2017, p. 20. {{isbn|1387312820}}.</ref>}}

[[Biography:Ray Comfort|Ray Comfort]], author and evangelist, writes: 

{{blockquote|No person or thing created God. He created "time," and because we dwell in the dimension of time, {{em|reason}} demands that all things have a beginning and an end. God, however, dwells outside of the dimension of time. He moves through time as we flip through a history book...He dwells in "eternity," having no beginning or end.<ref>Ray Comfort, ''The School of Biblical Evangelism: 101 Lessons How to share your faith simply, Effectively, Biblically...the Way Jesus Did'', 2005, p. 1467. {{isbn|0882709682}}</ref>}}

Atheists counter that there is no reason to assume the universe was created. The question becomes irrelevant if the universe is presumed to have circular time instead of linear time, undergoing an infinite series of big bangs and big crunches on its own.<ref>Paul Gabler, ''Slices of a Life'', 2015, Ch. 30 {{isbn|1504960645}}.</ref>

[[Biography:John Lennox|John Lennox]], professor of Mathematics at Oxford writes:<ref>John C Lennox, ''God's Undertaker: Has science buried God?'', 2009, p. 20. {{isbn|978-0745953717}}.</ref>

{{blockquote|Now Dawkins candidly tells us that he does not like people telling him that they also do not believe in the God in which he does not believe. But we cannot afford to base our arguments on his dislikes. For, whether he likes it or not, he openly invites the charge. After all, it is he who is arguing that God is a delusion. In order to weigh his argument we need first of all to know what he means by God. And his main argument is focussed on a created God. Well, several billion of us would share his disbelief in such a god. He needn't have bothered. Most of us have long since been convinced of what he is trying to tell us. Certainly, no Christian would ever dream of suggesting that God was created. Nor, indeed, would Jews or Muslims. His argument, by his own admission, has nothing to say about an eternal God. It is entirely beside the point. Dawkins should shelve it on the shelf marked 'Celestial Teapots' where it belongs. For the God who created and upholds the universe was not created – he is eternal. He was not 'made' and therefore subject to the laws that science discovered; it was he who made the universe with its laws. Indeed, that fact constitutes the fundamental distinction between God and the universe. The universe came to be, God did not.}}

==See also==
* [[Philosophy:Creator in Buddhism|Creator in Buddhism]]
* [[Philosophy:Demiurge|Demiurge]]
* ''[[Astronomy:Ex nihilo|Ex nihilo]]''
* [[Unsolved:Intelligent design|Intelligent design]]
* King Follett discourse
* [[Astronomy:Nothing comes from nothing|Nothing comes from nothing]]
* [[Religion:Theotokos|Theotokos]]
* [[Philosophy:Turtles all the way down|Turtles all the way down]]
* [[Philosophy:Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit|Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit]]
* [[Why there is anything at all]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

[[Category:Arguments against the existence of God]]
[[Category:Metaphysics of religion]]

{{Sourceattribution|Problem of the creator of God}}