The Internet was never a bastion of sound reasoning, so I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that stuff like this comes out of it. However I thought this particular product of fallacious thinking was rather fun:

So what are they saying here? It’s a rather simple point. Christianity has varied wildly over the centuries while atheism has remained simple and unchanged. Then they (incorrectly) apply Occam’s Razor to shave off Christianity and leave Atheism, thus invalidating Christianity as a viable theory; voila!

Well what’s the problem? Again, it’s a simple point. Considering the branches and divisions in Atheism and Christianity as a point of contrast creates a false comparison. In this sense they are treating atheism as a philosophical proposition and Christianity as a religion or worldview. A proper comparison of propositions would be between atheism and theism. Here’s a fixed edit of the image:

What’s more, Atheism can be treated as worldview as Christianity was in the first image, and then we can see that it, too, shares the same fate of schism and division as Christianity has. The atheism of some ancient Greek sects is very different from the atheism of Bolshevism, or the atheism of Bertrand Russell. To say that their atheism is the same is to treat it like a proposition. To do the same for Christian groups would be to say that their theism is the same, which is true.

A question was brought up recently on a forum I frequent about whether or not Muslims and Christians worship the same God. It’s hardly a unique or uncommon question, and has been (adequately, I think) dealt with several times over in published works. There were a couple interesting questions brought up, though, that I think deserved to be covered here. The original statement is as follows:

1) Christians and Muslims worship the same god.

My rebuttal was based on the identity of indiscernibles, which states:

For every property P, if P is true of X and P is true of Y, then X is identical to Y.

Or less formally,  “two or more objects or entities are identical (are one and the same entity), if they have all their properties in common” [wikipedia]. What this means for us is that in order for two deities to be identical they have to have the same properties.  I used the example of triunity, the property of being three persons in one god:

1) The Christian god and the Muslim god are identical.

2) The Christian god is triune, while the god of Islam (Allah) is singular. Indeed, it is heresy in Islam to suggest that Allah is anything but purely singular.

3) For the Christian god and Allah to be identical,  for every property that is true of the Christian god it must also be true of Allah, and vice versa.

4) Therefore, 1) is false.

Further objections (what, you expected an internet debate to be resolved?) took two routes: a) the Christian god and Allah are the same because they stem from the same source, and b) the Christian god is not triune, in facty the trinity was a later formulation of the post-apostolic ecumenical councils. We are not here concerned with b), but a) is interesting, and it’s where we get to the title of this post.  Ignoring the principle of the identity of indiscernibles (since all my detractors did) are they the same because they are both offshots of the same Abrahamic root?

My retort would be an analogy. Consider that there are two baseball teams in one town. There was once one team years and years ago but the demand for baseball became so great that the team was forced to split in two.  Two stadiums replaced the one (or one was built and the other left as is, still resulting in two),  two staffs replaced what was once one staff, etc. Does it then follow that because both teams stem from the same original team, they both share the same coach? Of course not, such a statement is a non sequitir. The detractor might reply, “Ah, but they ONCE both had the same coach!” However that is also a non-starter, as either one of the original teams or both of them did not exist prior to the split, therefore there was no team to have that original coach. And even if the one team did have that coach, it does not follow that both teams must. The might but they also might not.

Consider an actual example from the history of Christianity. In the 2nd century AD, a heterodox Christian group arose called the Marcionites. Among other things they held that the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament were not same. They deemed the OT God to be a tyrranical demiurge who, after creating the world and tormenting its denizens for a while, wandered off and left the Earth to be inherited by the God of the New Testament, whom the Marcionites identified with Jesus. Now Marcionism and Christianity at the time of Marcionism shared the same root religion: Christianity. Or if you preferred to go further back: Judaism. But it does not follow that because Marcionism and Christianity stemmed from the same religion, they necessarily worshipped the same deity. Indeed, it was essential to orthodox Christianity that the God of the NT was identical with the God of the OT, whereas in Marcionism the exact opposite was true. The two groups were in perfect conflict on this matter. So we see that sharing a common background or source does not necessitate the sharing of other properties in common. Some sharing would be expected, certainly, but not necessarily so.

But then what about Christianity and Judiasm? Certainly (most) Christians hold that the God of Judaism and the God of Christianity are identical. As a matter of fact I think it is a necessary requirement for the Christian religion to work. However there are, some say, properties of the two gods that differ: the God of the Old Testament was vindictive, and genocidal, and jealous, and so on, whereas the God of the New Testament is presented as being loving and all-accepting. Furthermore certain realities about God are said to be revealed in the New Testament, triunity being one of them. If the God of the Old Testament is not triune and the God of the New Testament is, then they cannot both be the same God.

I would respond by pointing out that many scholars point towards the OT containing teachings which coincide with the doctrine of the trinity. Furthermore they point out that the NT contains new revelations about God’s nature, that is, teachings that are new that concern details about God, but not teachings that concern new details about God. The God of the OT had always had these qualities, but they were not revealed until the NT covenant. Consider for example the salvation of the Gentiles. Prior to the NT and specifically the gospel teachings of Paul, it was not held that the God of Judaism would allow for gentiles to attain salvation (at least in the same sense as a Jew would). With the new revelation, however, it was held that God did not desire that anyone should be lost, and salvation was open to both Jew and Gentile.

If we go back to the example of the baseball teams., we might say that it was widely held that the original team had one coach and one of the new teams had another, different coach. Then one day the coach of the new team takes off a mask to reveal that he is indeed the old coach. Neither coach was distinct but only appeared to be because of a “misunderstanding” (if we want to call it that): “his face looks like X,” when in fact it is the mask that looks like X and his face looks like Y, and the old coach’s face also looks like Y. This could be loosely said to be the case with Christianity and Judaism. The same cannot be said of Christianity and Islam. There is no “revelation” in Islam that says while it was once held that God was triune he is now revealed to be purely singular. No they hold that he was always thus.

I’m not sure that anyone will find this convincing, or even useful. I know that there is quite a lot dealing with the nature of identities and properties that I did not cover nor do I fully understand them. But I thought it was an interesting thought experiment anyway, and hope you did as well.