The fifth letter can be found here.

Dawkins’ basic problem in this chapter is that he doesn’t really know what he’s talking about. At least that’s Robertson’s take on things. Here’s a collection of his comments.

‘Your understanding of Christian theology is shockingly bad!’ p53

‘I can hardly believe that a professor at Oxford wrote such a juvenile argument!’ p53

‘You state this argument really badly’ p55.

The fact that you neither understand nor agree with it hardly constitutes a rational argument against it’ p56.

‘You also seem to be having enormous difficulty with this argument’ p56.

‘Furthermore you completely misstate the argument from personal experience’ p57.

‘You also illustrate the truth of the saying that ‘a little learning is a dangerous thing’ p59.

‘In this regard I am astounded at how out of touch you are with modern biblical scholarship’ p60.

These are not minor quibbles! And it’s disastrous to Dawkins’ cause because this is the chapter where he wants to undermin the theistic arguments for God’s existence. If he’s refuting the wrong arguments then it’s an exercise in atheistic futility!

In passing it’s worth saying that Robertson is unpersuaded by Anselm’s Ontological Argument and he says nothing about Aquinas’ proofs. He reckons it’s philosophically neat but hardly conclusive proof of God’s existence.

But what’s got under Robertson’s skin to cause him to point our Dawkins personal intellectual inadequacies in the area of theology?

1. Dawkins misrepresents the Argument from Beauty

Robertson contests that the appreciation and creation of beauty is insufficiently unaccounted for by atheism. It’s not enough to say that our sense of beauty is a chemical reaction. He argues that, ‘Beauty is part of consciousness and it remains one of the great unanswered questions in evolutionary philosophy - where does consciousness come from?’ p55. Robertson puts great store by this argument. He reckons that, ‘the argument from beauty remains one of the most powerful arguments for God’.

2. Dawkins misrepresents the Argument from Personal Experience

This section doesn’t begin promisingly because as Robertson points out ‘personal experience’ appears to be limited to be voices and visions. The vast majority of Christians are not believers because they heard a voice or have seen a vision. They’re believers because as C.S. Lewis put it, ‘I arrived where I now am, not by reflection alone, but by reflection on a particular recurrent experience. I am an empirical theist. I have arrived at God by induction’. Robertson rightly tries to expand what’s included under the rubric of ‘personal experience’ so that it’s not so limited. He broadens the scope of the definition to include answered prayer, being filled with the Spirit, living by the Bible, the sense of the presence of God and so on. And then he concludes with this wonderful sentence, ‘I for one would not argue that I believe in Jesus Christ solely because of any one of them. But the accumulation of these experiences in addition to the truths of the Bible, and the observation of history, creation and society, add up to a very powerful personal apologetic’ p58.

3. Dawkins misrepresents the Argument from the Bible

Robertson will return to this in chapter nine. But he can’t let some of the stuff Dawkins comes out with fly by without having a swing. Dawkins states that ‘there is no good historical evidence that he ever thought he was divine’. What!? As Robertson states, ‘the historical evidence for the claims that Jesus made is quite clear. The Gospels make it explicit. And it was after all the reason he was crucified - because he ‘blasphemed’ by claiming to be God’ p59. And he doesn’t stop there. After taking Dawkins to task for ignorance of the two census solution to Luke’s material he continues, ‘The problem is that you, with all the certainty of the fundamentalist delighting in proving his opponents wrong, seize upon the flimsiest of evidence and, without any further investigation, make sweeping statements that this proves the Bible wrong’ p59. In order to prevent Dawkins making an even bigger fool of himself in the area of New Testament scholarship Robertson encourages him to go and have a word with Alistair McGrath becaue ‘I am sure it would be enormously helpful and prevent you making the kind of gaffes that you pour out here’ p60. The overwhelming view of modern biblical scholarship is how reliable the Gospels are as sources of reliable history. But don’t expect to hear that from Richard Dawkins.

4. Dawkins misrepresents the Argument from Scientists

Dawkins seems to think that Christians use the existence of eminent Christian scientists as sure proof that God exists. He argues that these scientists only continue as believers for social or economic reasons. Robertson points out that Christians do use the existence of eminent Christian scientists to attest that science and Christianity need not necessarily be in conflict with one another but indeed can be complementary ways of understanding the universe.

Conclusion

Robertson concludes with a warning. He argues that the alliance of science and atheism is potentially catastrophic. Without God there’s no way to account for evil and there’s no way to defend against it. But it’s his conluding paragraph that undermines almost everything that Dawkins asserts in this book. Any old idiot can assert that God’s a delusion if they won’t deal with Jesus Christ. Or as Robertson puts it, ‘Let me finish by pointing out that you missed out the most important argument of all for the existence of God - the person and work of Jesus Christ. By far the number one reason I believe and trust in God is becasue of Jesus Christ’ p63. Amen.  

This chapter can be found online here.

Robertson opens with a scathing attack on Dawkins’ atheistic evangelistic approach. Essentially Dawkins thinks that the ‘God Hypothesis’ is a provisional explanation offered by those with an intuitive religious sense to plug the gaps of our knowledge. This worked well for a time. But now we have Darwinian evolutionary theory. This proves that God is a delusion. Those who accept this view have gained a higher consciousness. And so, as Robertson writes,

‘the only thing left to do is write a book which tells people that is the case, and encourages the enlightened to ‘come out’ and organise politically so that the virus of religion and the old ways can never be used again’.

He’s got a point. Chapter two of TGD is a long one. Robertson doesn’t like it. He asserts,

‘It is a rambling incoherent chapter, the worst in your book, and is probably the reason that your book has received such a critical slating.’

Ouch! And I thought that the problem was me! I assumed that I must be stupid not to understand how a chapter entitled the God Hypothesis could spend its time looking at secularism, agnosticism, Thomas Jefferson, the founding fathers, little green men and so on. I was faintly reassured by Robertson’s brutal take on it. He takes issue with Dawkins on the following subject matters

1. Dawkins’ treatment of the ‘God Hypothesis’ is deceitful

In a chapter entitled, The God Hypothesis, you’d have thought that what you’d get is an in depth discussion of the evidence for God. Not in this book. Dawkins doesn’t discuss the ‘God Hypothesis’. He defines it. Then he dismisses it. But he doesn’t deal with it. The definition we’re offered is,

‘There exists a super human, supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed the unniverse and everthing in it, including us’.

Well, I’d want to say more than that and probably get rid of ’super human’ but I can live with this insofar as it goes. But he dismisses the ‘God Hypothesis’ with this,

‘any creative intelligence of sufficient complexity to design anything, comes into existence only as the end product of an extended process of gradual evolution’.

Unless I’m very much mistaken that’s an assertion not an argument.

2. Dawkins’ depiction of God is a caricature

Dawkins opens with a vicious attack on the God of the Bible. Except that it’s not. The God he lays into is a convenient caricature. The God that Richard Dawkins doesn’t believe exists is one that most Christians don’t believe in either! How did he get here? Robertson suggests,

‘It is only by a very selective citation out of context, ignoring all the passages and teaching about God, that you could come anywhere near the caricature you propose.’ p46

He also writes,

‘It is your attack on a distorted and perverted version of Christian teaching about God which provides you with the most entertaining smokescreen for your lack of substantial argument on whether God exists in the first place or not.’ p48

3. Dawkins’ assertion that Christians are polytheistic atheists is nonsense

Dawkins makes the clever point that Christians are atheists with regard to the polytheistic gods but that atheists go one God further. It’s neat. But it’s nonsense. It fails to deal with whether it’s sensible for Christians to reject belief in polytheism. Christians are quite prepared to agree that there are myths, false gods and delusions. They just don’t think that this applies to the God of the Bible. Robertson’s illustration is an apt one,

‘Your point has no more validity than a man who announces that a Rolex cannot be real because he once bought a fake watch, or a woman announcing that love does not exist because she once had a bad experience’. p47

4. Dawkins’ dismissal of NOMA is inadequate

NOMA [non overlapping magisteria] is the idea that religion and science are two seperate spheres. It’s an idea that was expounded by Stephen J. Gould when he said,

’science gets the age of rocks, and religion the rock of ages; science studies how the heavens go, religion how you got to heaven.’ p48

Dawkins is unhappy with that. He wants religion to be annihilated. Robertson is also unhappy with that. He wants the possibility of overlap. He argues,

‘There are things that science cannot and possibly never will be able to prove, and there are things that religion does not comment on. Gould’s example is correct - the Bible says nothing about the age of rocks and science can tell us nothing about the Rock of Ages - Jesus Christ. However there are places where the two link. For example, if someone claims a miracle that they have been healed from cancer, then science is able to judge whether or not the cancer has gone.’ p49

5. Dawkins’ mathematical probability has been proven wrong

Dawkins delights to tell us that,

‘even if God’s existence is never proved or disproved with certainty one way or the other, available evidence and reasoning may yield an estimate of probability far from 50 per cent.’ p50 TGD

But according to Robertson he’s got his sums wrong! On 20 November 2006 the Times carried a report suggesting that the mathematical probability of the existence of God was just over 62%. You couldn’t make it up! For no other reason than I get a kick out of saying it Robertson concludes that Dawkins has been ‘hoisted by your own petard’. You may find this useful!

6. Dawkins’ report of the Great Prayer Experiment is irrelevant

In response to Dawkins’ report of the findings of the ‘Great Prayer Experiment’ I want to say ’so what’. If you start with a duff view of prayer you’re going to have some unrealistic expectations and end up with predictably unpersuasive results. And in so doing you’ve established nothing of any substance. And to think that trees were felled for this.

7. Dawkins’ mention of the tooth fairy is utterly misleading

Dawkins implies that the Christian claim that there’s a God should be taken no more seriously than anyone who claims that there’s a tooth fairy. But that’s utterly misleading. As Robertson writes,

‘Do you seriously think that the evidence for the God of the Bible is on the same level as the tooth fairy? You have not, for example, written a book on the Tooth Fairy Delusion. The evidence for God is on a completely different level.’ p51

As he points out,

‘If the only evidence that existed for Jesus Christ was the same as that which exists for the Flying Spaghetti Monster [changing the illustration] then I and millions of others would not believe in him.’ p51

But Dawkins never really deals with Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

Robertson turns the tables in his concluding comments. He agrees with Dawkins’ distinction between the atheistic and theistic view of the universe. But then he compares them. And this is what you end up with,

‘You live in a universe which appears from nowhere, is going nowhere and means nothing’. p52

How awful.

This chapter can be found online here.

This is really a chapter about methodology. At least I think it is.

Robertson accuses Dawkins of six things.

1. Your central thesis is unsubstantiated

Robertson suggests that Dawkins has one unproven central thesis which is surrounded by a number of secondary supporting arguments. His central thesis is that science proves that God does not exist and that belief in him is a delusion. The supporting arguments are the nature of religion, supposed errors in the Bible, hypocrisy in the church and so on. Throughout The Dawkins Letters Robertson attempts to deal with the secondary arguments. But though he hasn’t yet responded to the central thesis neither has Dawkins defended it.

2. Your conditions of proof for God’s existence are unreasonable

Atheists demand that theists prove that God exists. That’s not an entirely unreasonable request! But the conditions they attach are. If your starting presuppositions are first, that there is only the material and that secondly, the only thing that can be called proof is material proof then it’s pretty hard to prove the existence of something non-material! But, as Robertson points out, the assertion that everything is material is an unproven assumption and doesn’t even fit with the observable facts. The theist faces the impossible task of trying to prove the existence of something that atheists presuppose is non-existent. Impasse.

3. Your discussion of tactics is revealing

Robertson accuses Dawkins of failing to prove the assertion that there is no God because everything is material. Dawkins’ failure to do this is masked by his apologetic defence of atheism and his aggressive treatment of detractors. In this Robertson detects something of an ‘in house’ atheistic disagreement about tactics. On the one hand there are the ‘nice’ atheists who want to gently point out the stupidity of theism in order to win people. On the other hand there are the ‘nasty’ atheists who want to aggressively mock the stupidity of theism in order to win the argument. Robertson has some sympathy with Dawkins’ aggressive stance because there’s biblical and divine precedent for addressing and prosecuting unbelief.

4. Your treatment of respect is naive

Dawkins’ main point is that it’s unfair and illogical that just because something is religious it should be treated with kid gloves. At the end of chapter one of The God Delusion he quotes with approval H.L. Mencken who said that,

‘we must respect the other fellow’s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart’. p27 TGD

Robertson agrees that ‘just because someone cites their view as religious does not de facto entitle it to respect’.  It’s all very well for Dawkins to profess to want genuine discussion about the big issues of life. But he’s naive if he fails to recognise that every society has its unquestionned and unquestionable assumptions. There are simply some things that we’re not allowed to debate openly; sexuality for example. What’s striking is that this is especially true of a secular society which is increasingly aggressively censorious of Christian views. It seems as though we’re allowed to hold any view as long as it’s the secular one. This would seem to explain the secularist intolerance of various Christian Unions.

5. Your summary of religious conflict is simplistic

Robertson very ably deals with an old chestnut; the so-called religious conflict. He writes,

‘Whilst I fully agree that religion is sometimes the cause of the most appalling behaviour in people, it is more often the case that religion is the excuse rather than the cause for ethnic divisions and wars.’ p39

In other words he accepts that religious affiliation may be a contributory factor in conflict but most often it is a convenient excuse to express a more deep seated hostility. But he goes further than trying to distance genuine faith from religious conflict. He points out the inconsistency of Dawkins’ poisition. You can’t on the one hand attribute the existence of gods to the delusion of the human imagination and on the other say that the existence of gods is to blame for religious infighting. You can’t say the gods are to blame when you’ve just said that humans invent the gods! Robertson puts it more eloquently,

‘Which is it? Do people invent religions so that they can fight one another, or do religions create peoples who will, because of their religion, hate and fight one another? You can’t have it both ways - unless you are someone who accepts the Bible’s teaching that human beings are inherently selfish and prome towards war, and that they are equally idoloatrous, seeking to create ‘gods’ in their own image - and that the two often come together.’ p40

6. Your appeal for free speech denies responsibility

Dawkins is all for free speech. Good man! But Robertson argues that with this right of open expression comes the requirement to use this privilege responsibly. Dawkins uses it as justification for caricaturing and ridiculing religion instead of dealing with it fairly, telling the truth and encouraging genuine enquiry. Going on the attack, Robertson says,

‘The trouble is that your ridicule, combined with an atheist fundamentalism and the bitterness and irrationality of some of your supporters, leads to persecution and intolerance.’ p41

He evens dares to suggest that this approach is on the same trajectory that led to the intolerance, coercion and vicious tyranny  of Stalin’s Russia, Mao’s China, Pol Pot’s Kampuchea and Hitler’s Germany. That’s where atheistic secular fundamentalism can lead us. Christianity, on the other hand, has nothing to fear from free and open debate. Persuasion and not coercion through the frank exchange of views is how people will be convinced to become Christians. Christians shouldn’t be yielding political power to impose its views on anyone.