In chapter eleven, Cosmological Arguments: A Cause for The Cosmos, Groothius states that the question to be answered is “Why is there anything at all, rather than nothing?” This is the question asked by Christian theist Gottfried Leibniz and atheist Martin Heidegger.
The Cosmological argument does not advocate that everything that exists must have a cause. But everything that had a beginning must have a cause. God did not have a beginning.
Groothius discusses three versions of cosmological argument.
The Principle of Sufficient Reason and The Existence of God
1. If God is not the sufficient explanation of the universe, then either (a) it has no explanation or (b) it is self-explanatory
2. The universe is not without explanation (which would entail nihilism).
3. The universe is not self-explanatory (pantheism)
4. Therefore, God is the sufficient explanation of the universe.
The cosmological argument of G. W. F. Leibniz (1646-1716) is that God is the Sufficient Reason not just the cause.
Leibniz wrote, “The first question which should rightly be asked will be, why is there something rather than nothing? Because nothing happens without a sufficient reason.”
Daniel Dennett caricatures this argument with a strawman argument, “Everything that exists must have a cause. What caused God?” The cosmological argument says only that every being which begins has a cause. God did not have a beginning. In fact, Dennett himself recognizes that a being “outside of time … is nothing with an initiation or origin in need of explanation. What does need its origin explained is the concrete Universe itself” (Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, 242-244.
The Kalam Cosmological Argument
William Lane Craig presents the Kalam Cosmological argument as simple and elegant:
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause. Even though nothing can come from nothing, atheists like Quentin Smith claim that everything can come into existence out of nothing without a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.
4. The cause of the universe is God.
The kalam cosmological argument promoted by Islamic theologian al-Ghazali (1058-1111) reasoned that “every being which begins has a cause for its beginning; now the world is a being which begins; therefore, it possesses a cause for its beginning.”
Scientific Confirmation of the Creation: The Big Bang
Craig and others have sought epistemic support for creation ex nihilo through the scientific evidence for big band cosmology. Stephen Hawking, the renowned physicist and atheist, said that “almost everyone now believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning at the Big Bang.”
1. If the universe were eternal and its amount of energy finite, it would have reached heat death by now.
2. The universe has not reached heat death (since there is still energy available for use).
3. Therefore, (a) the universe is not eternal.
4. Therefore, (b) the universe had a beginning.
5. Therefore, (c) the universe was created by a first cause (God).
Based on Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity (GR), the Russian mathematician Alexander Friedman and the Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaitre predicted in the 1920s an expanding universe. In 1929, Edwin Hubble showed that the light from distant galaxies is systematically shifted toward the red end of the spectrum. This redshift was taken to be a Doppler effect indicating that the light sources were receding in the line of sight. The distances separating the galaxies were becoming greater. As one reverses the expansion and extrapolates back in time, the universe becomes progressively denser until one arrives at a state of infinite density at some point in the finite past. Now many cosmologists are identifying this past point with the big bang which is the creation not only of all the matter and energy in the universe, but also of space-time itself. In other words, there was a creation ex nihilo and matter is not eternal.
Question: “What banged in the Big Bang if matter is not eternal?” Daniel Dennett answers for the atheist. Never fear, atheists, have a response. Daniel Dennett argues that the universe created itself out of nothing. “It… does perform a version of the ultimate bootstrapping trick; it creates itself ex nihilo” (Breaking the Spell, 244). Aquinas, however, argued, self-creation is metaphysically absurd, since in order to cause itself to come into being, the universe would have to already exist.
A second evidence that matter is not eternal Is the second law of thermodynamics which states that in a closed system the processes in that system will tend to run down and quit. Therefore, in time our universe will cease to be. But if this is true and the universe is eternal why has it not already run down? Like a ticking clock, it should by now have run down. The answer is, the universe is not eternal and it was wound up.
These scientific views substantiate the cosmological argument that the universe had a beginning and therefore needed a cause. Who, we believe, was God.
If the universe had a beginning and it is absurd to believe the universe created itself, who or what did create the universe?
This transcendent cause had to be beginningless, uncaused, changeless, immaterial, and personal. This, as Aquinas was wont to remark, is what everybody means by “God.”
If the universe began with a divine miracle (creation ex nihilo) could there not be ore? Asks Norman Geisler.
Christian Reluctance to Accept the Big Bang
Some Christians object that the big bang is the big bust, since the Bible teaches that the universe is far younger than the several billions of years indicated by big bang cosmology. Groothius defends the Big Bang cosmology by attempting to refute the six-24-hour days of creation. His refutation is exegetically weak. Groothius gives four weak arguments in one paragraph after pages of in depth philosophical research. In other words, Groothius is much more committed to philosophy than to theology.
I will address only Groothius first weak argument for accepting the Big Bang theory of science over the Genesis One account: "First, the Hebrew word day in Genesis 1 can mean an indeterminate or long period time." That is sloppy scholarship.
Wayne Grudem deals both with the old and young earth views and concludes in a summary statement: “At present, considerations of the power of God’s creative world and the immediacy with which it seems to bring response, the fact ‘evening and morning’ and the numbering of days suggest twenty-four-hour days and the fact that God would seem to have no purpose for delaying the creation of man for thousands or even millions of years, seem to me to be strong considerations in favor of the twenty-four-hour day position.”
What Grudem mentions in passing, “the numbering of days” he does not explain in showing support for the 6-24-hour-day creation. He did explain the other supports he mentions in his summary. This is one of strongest biblical argument for the 6-24-hour-days of creation. Did he intentionally leave out this strong argument to weaken this view?
Despite this Biblical evidence, he reveals the power of modern science on biblical theologians, when he adds, “But even here there are good arguments on the other side” (Systematic Theology, 297). At least, Grudem gives the arguments of both side in pages 262-309 and then gives his preference (not one paragraph).
His conclusion: “Therefore, if the Bible does not demand a young universe and earth, we should not press the point in the face of a well-established and large scale scientific theory that also lends strong support to creation ex nihilo.” Again, the mesmerizing influence of science on biblical interpretation.
Theologian Robert Reymond biblically and scholarly defends the six-24-days of creation and mentions the argument Grudem fails to discuss: “In the 476 other cases in the Old Testament, yom, “day” stands in conjunction with a cardinal or an ordinal number, e.g., Exodus 12:15;24:16; Leviticus 12:3, it never means anything other than a normal, literal day. Dr. Reymond provides six other strong biblical justifications for 6-24-days of creation (A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith, 393).
Groothius’ basis for believing the Big Band view is scientific theory. Groothius says there is good theological incentive for this strategy as well. He then gives two sentences and four biblical references to support his “good theological incentive.”