Stephen Hawking is no longer an atheist

Hawking is no longer an atheist

(Article credit Creation.com)


From a human perspective, it’s sad to see anyone go into a Christless eternity, and indeed God Himself has “no pleasure” in it (cf. Ezekiel 33:11). But we can’t escape the truth: “it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment …” (Hebrews 9:27).

While living to 76 might seem like a decent lifespan, death in reality is “the last enemy” (1 Corinthians 15:26). This is true no matter how long this was postponed—even the prodigiously long lifespans of our ancestors recorded in the chronogenealogy of Genesis 5 couldn’t change that fact. Indeed, after the lifespan of every patriarch (except Enoch who escaped death), we are reminded over and over, “and he died”.

However, atheists naively regard death as a natural part of the evolutionary process. Indeed, Hawking himself gave a defiant interview to the leftist British newspaper, the Guardian, back in 2011.1 He was reported as claiming:

The belief that heaven or an afterlife awaits us is a ‘fairy story’ for people afraid of death.

You must show that a man is wrong before you start explaining why he is wrong. The modern method is to assume without discussion that he is wrong and then distract his attention from this (the only real issue) by busily explaining how he became to be so silly.—C.S. Lewis on the Bulverism fallacy

Unfortunately, this commits a fallacy rife in atheopathic agitprop, what C.S. Lewis called Bulverism:

you must show that a man is wrong before you start explaining why he is wrong. The modern method is to assume without discussion that he is wrong and then distract his attention from this (the only real issue) by busily explaining how he came to be so silly. In the course of the last fifteen years I have found this vice so common that I have had to invent a name for it. I call it “Bulverism”.

In Hawking’s case, he tries to explain away why (he thinks) people believe in an afterlife before demonstrating that this belief is wrong. However, similar arguments can always be turned back on their user, which is one reason this is a silly mode of argumentation. I.e. “The belief that no afterlife awaits us is a ‘fairy story’ for those afraid that there really might be a God who is also a righteous Judge.” Also, Hawking’s account is demonstrably wrong for many people, e.g. C.S. Lewis again:

I didn’t go to religion to make me happy. I always knew a bottle of Port would do that. If you want a religion to make you feel really comfortable, I certainly don’t recommend Christianity.

It’s now unfortunately too late for Hawking, but it’s not too late for anyone reading this—there really is Good News

Stephen Hawking Died

Stephen Hawking