Deism

{{bronze}}{{religion}}
{{cquote|If you like, you can say the laws [of physics] are the work of God, but that is more a definition of God than a proof of his existence.|||[[Stephen Hawking]], Brief Answers to Big Questions<ref>[https://www.livescience.com/63854-stephen-hawking-says-no-god.html Stephen Hawking's Final Book Says There's 'No Possibility of God in Our Universe], ''livescience.com'' accessed on 04/27/2019</ref>}}
'''Deism''' is a belief that [[God]] created the [[universe]], but left everything else to its own devices.

Some views differ in specifics. Many deists believe that the [[Big Bang]] was initiated by a god (of their choice) and that everything that happened since is the consequence of [[scientific]] laws "created" at the same time. In other cases, deism implies that said God set in motion all the events needed to make [[life]] on [[Earth]] inevitable, and thus is still responsible. They may or may not believe in an afterlife. Deistic beliefs tend to differ from normal [[religion]] by the fact that the creator god is either not worthy of worship, or worship is completely unnecessary. This gives deism a greater overlap with [[atheism]] and [[freethought]] compared to most forms of religion.

==The rise of deism==
Deism arose and came to prominence during the [[philosophical]] change of the [[Enlightenment]]. As scientific [[knowledge]] increased, a climate of greater [[freedom of religion|religious freedom]] developed in [[Europe]], and inconsistencies in the [[Bible]] were more freely discussed. A result of this process was an increasing belief that the universe followed [[philosophical naturalism|naturalistic]] principles and God's active intervention (and by extension, traditional religious praxis like [[prayer]], [[priest]]s, and [[scripture]]) was not necessary.

===The Age of Reason===
The classic text for deism is probably [[Thomas Paine]]'s work ''The Age of Reason,'' where he states:
{{quotebox|I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life.

I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavouring to make our fellow-creatures happy.

But, lest it should be supposed that I believe many other things in addition to these, I shall, in the progress of this work, declare the things I do not believe, and my reasons for not believing them.

I do not believe in the creed professed by the [[Jewish]] Church, by the [[Roman Catholicism|Roman]] Church, by the [[Eastern Orthodox|Greek]] Church, by the [[Islam|Turkish]] Church, by the [[Protestant]] Church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.

All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.

I do not mean by this declaration to condemn those who believe otherwise; they have the same right to their belief as I have to mine. But it is necessary to the happiness of man that he be mentally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists in professing to believe what he does not believe.<ref>[http://manybooks.net/titles/painethoetext03twtp410.html Paine's ''The Age of Reason'']</ref>}}

==Deistic beliefs==
An analogy frequently used for the deist God is a '''watchmaker''' &mdash; the watchmaker assembles the pieces and winds up the mechanism, but then just lets the watch run without interfering with it.

So, why did deists believe in a god at all? Partly because they were raised in a [[Christian]] milieu; partly because they thought of god as a natural focus and director of a seemingly [[rational]], ordered universe. An [[first cause|argument from first cause]] thus seemed more plausible than it does in the light of modern [[science]], which is now describing a universe that is more [[random]] and unpredictable than classical deism might have suspected.  In short, they were raised in an environment that assumed the universe must have a creator, and science didn't know enough at that point to plausibly suggest that it could have come about without one.

===Differences between deism & Christianity===
The deist God is quite different from the God of traditional [[Abrahamic religion]]s &mdash; it has no known personality, for example, and does not communicate with [[human]]s &mdash; and deists tend to see God as an abstract [[logic]]al principle rather than an anthropomorphic being with wants and desires and a burning urge to control what we do [[sex|with our pants off]].

Rather than believe the [[Bible]] to be the [[Word of God]], deists generally view the [[Old Testament]] as (at best) a historical novel with added [[supernatural]] trappings, and the [[New Testament]] as a straight religious screed. They view [[Jesus]] and [[Paul]] as philosophers, with no special trappings from an Almighty.

Unlike members of major [[revealed religion]]s, many deists do not worship God, as they see no evidence that God (whatever form it takes) even ''wants'' to be worshiped. Deists who still wish to enjoy the trappings of church services will often attend [[Unitarian Universalist]] congregations, where lack of belief in the Bible is not generally stigmatized.

===Deism vs. Pantheism===
[[Richard Dawkins]] described the difference between these two systems of thought in his books. Deism, he suggested, is stripped-down theism, whereas [[pantheism]] is dressed-up atheism. Perhaps the main difference between them is that deists believe in an actual deity but don't talk about him much, whereas pantheists talk about God all the time but aren't referring to a deity when they do so.

===Differences between deism & atheism===
Deism holds a lot more common ground with atheism than it does with Abrahamic religions. Both hold the Bible and other religious works to be written mostly as human [[political]] works instead of being the holy word of any god. Both positions believe in naturalistic explanations for every phenomenon around them: except Deists use "[[goddidit]]" to explain the origin of the universe.

In fact, the only real difference lies in their explanation for the origins of [[time]] and [[space]]. Deists claim that a god created the universe and its rules, but did (and does) nothing else. Atheists are unconvinced by the arguments or evidence in favor of the existence of any gods and therefore do not count them as likely explanations for the existence for anything else until or unless these gods' own existence can be demonstrated.

==Famous deists and deism today==
Well-known deists throughout history include [[Voltaire]], [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]], [[Benjamin Franklin]], Thomas Paine, and for much of his adult life, [[Thomas Jefferson]]. The fact that a number of [[Founding Fathers]] were deists remains one of the most common rebuttals to those espousing [[The United States as a Christian nation]].

[[Anthony Flew]] repudiated atheism and became a deist at age 81—and oh boy, did Christians make hay about that!  They quietly ignored the fact that he didn't convert to Christianity, but [[Bait-and-switch|tried to make it look as if he had]].

Deism still exists but in a form distinct from the "classical" deism of the Enlightenment which was philosophically closer to present-day atheism.

==Ceremonial deism==
The term "ceremonial deism" originated in a speech by Eugene Rostow in 1962, a dean of the Yale Law School. He used it in reference to exceptions carved out of the [[Establishment Clause]] of the [[United States Constitution]] for "government-sponsored religious speech that was 'so conventional and uncontroversial as to be constitutional.'"<ref name="Brown">[https://www.au.org/church-state/march-2015-church-state/featured/symbols-and-civil-religion Symbols and Civil Religion: Courts Have Tended To Uphold ‘Ceremonial’ Uses Of Religion By The Government, But Critics Say It’s Time To Reassess] by Simon Brown, ''Church & State'', vol., 68, no. 3, 2015.</ref> At the time of his speech, the main exceptions were the addition of "Under God" to [[The Pledge of Allegiance]] in 1954, and the creation of "In God We Trust" as the national motto in 1956, both during the height of the Red Scares.<ref name="Brown"/> Many dominionists conveniently forget that these are recent phenomena and instead like to think that [[The United States as a Christian nation|the USA was founded as a Christian nation]].

In 1984, the US Supreme Court decided that a "government-sponsored nativity scene that also included reindeer and candy canes was constitutional."<ref name="Brown"/> This was the first time that the Supreme Court used the term "ceremonial deism" in a decision.
{{Cquote|I would suggest that such practices as the designation of "In God We Trust" as our national motto, or the references to God contained in the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag can best be understood, in Dean Rostow's apt phrase, as a form a "ceremonial deism," [Footnote 2/24] protected from Establishment Clause scrutiny chiefly because they have lost through rote repetition any significant religious content. See Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. at 463 U. S. 818 (BRENNAN, J., dissenting). |20px|20px|Lynch v. Donnelly 465 U.S. 668 (1984)<ref>[https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/465/668/case.html Lynch v. Donnelly 465 U.S. 668 (1984)]</ref>}}

It's revealing that this sort of argument is made quite frequently by individuals who happen to be Christian, and very rarely by anyone who isn't… ''almost'' as if it were a transparent attempt to slip references to the locally popular god past the [[First Amendment]].

Since the Supreme Court decision, Christians have tried to ceremonially-deism everything from the [[National Day of Prayer]] to Judge [[Roy Moore]]'s erection of the [[Ten Commandments]] at a courthouse. The problem with this is that it's a double-edged sword: it subjects non-Christians to seeing Christian-sponsored trappings at every government office, while at the same time it dilutes Christian symbolism to meaninglessness, lacking "any significant religious content".

Law professor Martha C. Nussbaum wrote in 2008 that "'Ceremonial Deism' is an odd name for a ritual affirmation that a Deist would be very reluctant to endorse, since Deists think of God as a rational causal principle but not as a personal judge and father."<ref>[http://www.law.uchicago.edu/alumni/magazine/fall2008/undergod "Under God:" The Pledge, Present and Future] by Martha C. Nussbaum</ref>

== Deism in Turkey==
{{main|Turkey}}
The Turkish Republic's secularist founder [[Mustafa Kemal Atatürk|Atatürk]] possibly was a deist.<ref>Reşat Kasaba, "Atatürk", ''The Cambridge history of Turkey: Volume 4: Turkey in the Modern World'', Cambridge University Press, 2008; {{isbn|978-0-521-62096-3}} p. 163.</ref><ref>''Political Islam in Turkey'' by Gareth Jenkins, Palgrave Macmillan, 2008, p. 84. {{isbn|0230612458}}</ref> In the recent years, religious officials in Turkey have stated that deism is an interesting "[[persecution complex|trap designed]] to lead Muslim youth [[apostasy|away]] from [[Islam]]".<ref>[https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkeys-top-religious-official-labels-deism-very-interesting-trap-138510 Turkey's top religious official labels deism ‘very interesting trap’]" - ''Hürriyet Daily News''. Published Nov 2, 2018.</ref><ref name="ahval">[https://ahvalnews.com/islam/what-pushing-half-turkey-towards-deism "What is pushing half of Turey towards deism?]" - ''Ahval News''</ref> Religious doubts have been increasingly taking hold amongst Turkish youth. These doubts are pushing many of Turkey's youth towards deism rather than Islam.<ref name="ahval" /> Apparently, the [[Turkish nationalism|faux]]-[[Islamist]] crap [[Recep Tayyip Erdoğan|Erdoğan]]'s been pushing has been causing many people to question the government's ethics, and by extension, Islam's.<ref name="ahval" />

The religious and political establishment's reaction to this is an unsurprisingly unwelcome one. Erdoğan himself is quoted in the ''Ahval News'' article as saying "this is completely unacceptable."<ref name="ahval" /> Given the Wannabe Sultan's Islamist agenda, this reaction isn't too surprising.

==See also==
*[[Theism]]
*[[Atheism]]
*[[Pandeism]]
*[[Humanism]]
*[[God of the gaps]]

==External links==
*[http://www.deism.com/ The World Union of Deists]
*[http://www.kashfence.com/ Kashfence Philosophy]

==References==
{{reflist|2}}

[[Category:Paradigms of religion]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]

Categories: Paradigms of religion, Philosophy