THEISM & OTHER WORLDVIEWS

What is Theism?
Theism can be generally defined as a belief in God, irrespective of what I believe about God.
However, in the strictest sense it refers Theism to monotheism.

1. The belief in a personal God who is both transcendent and immanent and exists in only
one person. This is the Jewish, Mohammedan, and Unitarian conception of God, and is
opposed to atheism, polytheism, pantheism, and deism.

2. The belief in one personal God, both immanent and transcendent, who exists in three
personal distinctions, known respectively as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Christian
holds that since all the other beliefs mentioned have a false or incomplete conception of
God, this view is the only true theistic view.

OTHER WORLD-VIEWS
There are several other world-views that opposes and challenges a believer of Jesus Christ
and Biblical world-view. A study of these numerous world-views in their many forms and beliefs
could take a lot of time. So, it is prudent to group them based on their underlying beliefs and
common characteristics. A basic understanding of these world-views is important for primarily
three reasons:

1. To appreciate the fullness and richness of our faith.

2. To defend and safeguard our faith against onslaught of these views.
3. To preserve our faith against these views infiltrating our faith and theology.

The primary groups of other world views that we shall look into are:

1. Atheism 2. Agnosticism 3. Pantheism 4. Polytheism 5. Dualism 6. Deism

1. ATHEISM (OR ATHEISTIC WORLDVIEW)

Generally speaking, atheism rejects the very idea of God, and or super-natural in any way. In
restricted sense the term applies to three distinct types.

i. Practical Atheism: Though acknowledging God somewhere, they live and act as if there
is no God to whom they are responsible or accountable. They are simply indifferent. All
secular people can be grouped as such.

ii. Dogmatic Atheism: These are those who openly rejects God. They say there can be no
God. Communists profess dogmatic atheism.

iii. Virtual Atheisms: holds principles that are inconsistent with belief in God or wrongly
defines the term “God”. Most naturalists are virtual atheists. Those who define God in
such abstractions as “an active principle in nature,” “the social consciousness,” “the
 unknowable,” “personified reality,” or “energy” are atheists of the second of these
varieties.

Replying Atheism

Theissen writes:

“The atheistic position is a very unsatisfactory, unstable, and arrogant one. It is

unsatisfactory because all atheists lack the assurance of the forgiveness of their sins; they all
have a cold and empty life; and they know nothing of peace and fellowship with God.

It is unstable because it is contrary to man’s deepest convictions. Both Scripture and history
show that man necessarily and universally believes in the existence of God. The virtual
atheist testifies to this fact in that he adopts abstraction to account for the world and its life.

It is arrogant because it really pretends to be omniscient. Limited knowledge can infer the
existence of God, but exhaustive knowledge of all things, intelligences, and times is needed
to state dogmatically that there is no God.”

AGNOSTICISM (OR AGNOSTIC WORLD-VIEW)

Unlike dogmatic atheism agnosticism does not reject God. However, an agnostic neither believes
nor disbelieves in a god or religious doctrine. Agnostics assert that it’s impossible for human
beings to know anything about how the universe was created and whether or not divine beings
exist.

Positivism in science and Pragmatism in philosophy are two theories closely related to
agnosticism.

Positivism accepts nothing as true beyond the details of observed facts (that which can be
scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof). Since the idea of God
could not be subjected to examination, thus is unknowable.

Pragmatism evaluates beliefs in terms of the success of their practical application. It also rejects
special revelation. So according to pragmatist God is unknowable, but it is good to have religion
for moral reasons and other beneficial results.

So, an agnostic will say that it is impossible to know God, and yet he may keep some religious
beliefs because it serves some practical purpose.

Replying Agnostic View

Thiessen says that the agnostic position, too, is highly unsatisfactory and unstable, and often

displays a false humility.

It is unsatisfactory in that it suffers the same spiritual impoverishment as does the atheistic, but
it is unsatisfactory also from the intellectual standpoint. It says God is not knowable being
immaterial, but accepts several abstract concepts such as that cannot be explained positively,
such as love, compassion, justice etc.

It is unstable because it admits that it has not attained to absolute certainty. And agnosticism
often displays a false humility in that it claims to know so little. Others, some agnostics charge,
haughtily pretend to have a superior understanding, but we frankly recognize man’s true
limitations in knowledge. Now, from the Christian standpoint, this is a false humility, for
Christians regard the evidence for the existence of a personal, extra-mundane, almighty, and holy
God as ample and conclusive.

PANTHEISM

Pantheism is that theory which holds that all finite things are merely aspects, modifications, or
parts of one eternal and self-existent being. It regards God as one with the natural universe. God
is all; all is God. It appears in a variety of forms today, some of them having in them also atheistic,
polytheistic, or theistic elements. The devotees of pantheism usually look upon their beliefs as a
religion, bringing to them a kind of reverential submission. For that reason, the inadequacy of
pantheism needs to be all the more clearly apprehended.

Replying Pantheism

Here only pointers are given. I suggest that you read through Lectures in Systematic Theology by
Thiessien (Page 36-38) and do your own study for a detailed refutation.

 Pantheism is necessitarian. Necessitarianism is a belief that human conduct is dictated

by force of circumstance (as opposed to free will). Everything exists and acts out of
necessity. This means that no one is really accountable for his/her conduct.

 Destroys the foundation of moral: If all things are necessitated, then error and sin are
also necessitated. This means:
i. Sin is not that which absolutely ought not to be, that which deserves condemnation.
It is just a weakness.
ii. If we do all things of necessity, then how can we tell when we do wrong and when
right! Morality is a matter of convenience.
iii. God himself is sinful, for if all things are necessitated by him, then he must be ignorant
or evil at heart. This has led to deifying evil and to honor and worship the deities who
best represent evil.

 Pantheism denies personal and conscious immortality. If man is but a part of the
infinite, he is also but a moment in the life of God. When the body perishes, the personality
ceases. Thus, there is no conscious existence for man after death or without the material
body, and no personal responsibility of good or evil.

 Pantheism deify man by making him a part of God. If everything that exists is but a
manifestation of God, and if God does not come to consciousness except in man, then man
is the highest manifestation of God in the world. Therefore, flatters man and it encourages
human pride.

 Pantheism cannot account for concrete reality. Material Pantheism (one of the forms
of pantheism) assumes material universe to be eternal, and spontaneous generation of
life, both of which is illogical and discarded scientifically. Another form of pantheism
called idealism, assumes that the reality exists only in the mind, either of the individual
mind or of the infinite mind. If everything exists only in the mind, then other people and
God also exist only in the mind. Indeed, logically one must conclude that oneself alone
exists, which reduces the theory to an absurdity.
Polytheism

Polytheism is a belief in many gods and goddesses and no one absolute God. Polytheism, most
probably started with nature worship; with worship of sun, moon, stars, fire, air, and water. At
first, they were merely personified; then men came to believe that personal beings presided over
them.

Replying Polytheism:

Polytheism has a strong affinity for fallen human nature. Men join themselves to idols (Hos. 4:17)
and find it most difficult to break away. Idolatry not only leaves the heart empty, but also debases
the mind. Paul speaks of how men “professing to be wise, . . . became fools, and exchanged the
glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four
footed animals and crawling creatures” (Rom. 1: 22f .). The Thessalonian believers are
represented as having “turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God” (1 Thess. 1:9).
John exhorts, ” Guard yourselves from idols” (1 John 5:21). In the Bible the gods of the heathen
are sometimes declared to be of no account and futile (Isa. 41:24; 44:9-20), and at other times,
the representatives, if not the embodiment, of demons (1 Cor. 10:20). This seems to mean that
the worship of idols is the worship of demons.

Dualism

Conceptually “dualism” is the division of something into two opposed or contrasted aspects, or
the state of being so divided. Such as mind and matter, good and evil, right and wrong. Paul talks
about two natures as the flesh and the spirit (Gal 5:17). A good God and an evil Satan is also in a
way a dualistic thought.

However, the religious dualists believe that the good and evil eternally co-exist. This thought
originates from Persian Zoroastrianism. Early heretic teaching of Gnosticism and Manicheanism
were influenced by this. Gnostics tried to solve the problem of evil by postulating two gods-a
supreme God and a demiurge. There is a constant conflict between these two gods, a conflict
between good and evil. Mani, the founder of Manicheanism set to work to eliminate all Judaistic
elements from Christianity and to substitute Zoroastrianism in its place.

Recently, the problem of the origin and presence of evil in the world has again forced itself to the
front, leading to some to return to an ancient form of dualism. God and matter, some might say
God and Satan, are both eternal. God is doing the best he can with the recalcitrant world and will
ultimately triumph completely over it. Man ought to assist God in this struggle and hasten the
complete overthrow of evil. God is considered as growing and as finite.

Replying Dualism

Theissen writes, The problem of evil is difficult one, but doctrine of dualism is not the solution. A
finite God cannot satisfy the human heart, for what guarantee does such a God offer for the final
triumph of good? Something unforeseen may come up at any time to frustrate all his good
intentions; and how shall the believer keep up faith in prayer on such a theory?

Further, finiteness does not any more absolve God of responsibility for evil than does the
traditional view. Most adherents of this theory would teach that God somehow creates, although
they make it an eternal process.
Believing that to create involves the necessity of evil, they cannot clear God of the act of creating
such a world. Furthermore, the doctrine involves the belief in a developing, growing God; he
succeeds more and more, and perhaps becomes better and better. But this is a clear disregard of
the many biblical indications that he is perfect and unchangeable in his wisdom, power, justice,
goodness, and truth, and it does not satisfy our idea of God.

And finally, it ignores or denies the existence of Satan, the archenemy, who in Scripture is
represented as having much to do with present-day evil.

Deism

For deism, God is present in creation only by his power, not in his very nature and being. He has
endowed creation with invariable laws over which he exercises a mere general oversight; he has
imparted to his creatures certain properties, placed them under his invariable laws, and left them
to work out their destiny by their own powers.

Deism denies a special revelation, miracles, and providence. It claims that all truths about God are
discoverable by reason and that the Bible is merely a book on the principles of natural religion.

Replying Deism:

The Christian rejects deism because he believes

 that we have a special revelation of God in the Bible;

 that God is present in the universe in his being as well as in his power; that God exercises
a constant providential control over all his creation; that he sometimes uses miracles in
the accomplishment of his purposes; that God answers prayer;
 and that the deists obtain much of their religious dogma from the Bible, and not from
nature and reason alone.
 He holds that a deistic, absentee God is not much better than no God at all.