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Misotheism is the "hatred ofGod" or "hatred of thegods" (from theGreek adjectivemisotheos (μισόθεος) "hating the gods" or "God-hating" – a compound of,μῖσος, "hatred" and,θεός, "god").
A related concept isdystheism (Ancient Greek:δύσ θεός, "bad god"), the belief that a god is not whollygood, and is evil.Trickster gods found in polytheistic belief systems often have a dystheistic nature. One example isEshu, a trickster god fromYoruba religion who deliberately fostered violence between groups of people for his own deeds, saying that "causing ire is my greatest happiness." Manypolytheistic deities since prehistoric times have been assumed to be neither good nor evil (or to have both qualities). Likewise, the concept of thedemiurge in some versions of ancientGnosticism is often portrayed as a generally evil entity. Inconceptions of God as thesummum bonum (the highest good), the proposition of God not being wholly good would be anoxymoron. Nevertheless, inmonotheism, the sentiment may arise in the context oftheodicy (theproblem of evil, theEuthyphro dilemma) or as a rejection or criticism of particular depictions or attributions of the monotheistic god in certain belief systems (as expressed byThomas Paine, adeist). A famous literary expression of misotheistic sentiment isGoethe'sPrometheus, composed in the 1770s.
A historical proposition close to dystheism is thedeus deceptor, "evil demon" (dieu trompeur) ofRené Descartes'Meditations on First Philosophy, which has been interpreted byProtestant critics as theblasphemous proposition that God exhibits malevolent intent. ButRichard Kennington[1][2] states that Descartes never declared his "evil genius" to be omnipotent, but merely no less powerful than he is deceitful, and thus not explicitly an equivalent to God, the singular omnipotent deity.
Thus, Hrafnkell, protagonist of the eponymousHrafnkels saga set in the 10th century, as his temple toFreyr is burnt and he is enslaved, states that "I think it is folly to have faith in gods", never performing anotherblót (sacrifice), a position described in the sagas asgoðlauss, "godless".Jacob Grimm in hisTeutonic Mythology observes that:
It is remarkable that Old Norse legend occasionally mentions certain men who, turning away in utter disgust and doubt from the heathen faith, placed their reliance on their own strength and virtue. Thus in theSôlar lioð 17 we read of Vêbogi and Râdeyá sjálf sig þau trûðu, "in themselves they trusted".[3]
Dystheistic speculation arises from consideration of theproblem of evil — the question of why God, who is supposedly omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, would allow evil to exist in the world. Koons notes that this is a theological problem only for a eutheist, since a dystheist would not find the existence of evil (or God's authorship of it) to be an obstacle to theistic belief. In fact, the dystheistic option would be a consistent non-contradictory response to the problem of evil. Thus Koons concludes that the problem oftheodicy (explaining how God can be good despite the apparent contradiction presented in the problem of evil) does not pose a challenge toall possible forms of theism (i.e., that the problem of evil does not present a contradiction to someone who would believe that God exists but that he is not necessarily good).[citation needed]
This conclusion implicitly takes the first horn of theEuthyphro dilemma, asserting the independence ofgood and evilmorality from God (as God is defined inmonotheistic belief). Historically, the notion of "good" as an absolute concept has emerged in parallel with the notion of God being the singular entity identified with good. In this sense, dystheism amounts to the abandonment of a central feature of historical monotheism: the de facto association of God with thesummum bonum.[citation needed]
Arthur Schopenhauer wrote: "This world could not have been the work of an all-loving being, but that of a devil, who had brought creatures into existence in order to delight in the sight of their sufferings."[citation needed]
Critics ofCalvin's doctrines ofpredestination frequently argued that Calvin's doctrines did not successfully avoid describing God as "the author of evil".[citation needed]
Much ofpost-Holocaust theology, especially inJudaic theological circles, is devoted to a rethinking of God's goodness. Examples include the work of David R. Blumenthal, author ofFacing the Abusing God (1993) and John K. Roth, whose essay "A Theodicy of Protest" is included inEncountering Evil: Live Options in Theodicy (1982):
Everything hinges on the proposition that God possesses—but fails to use well enough—the power to intervene decisively at any moment to make history's course less wasteful. Thus, in spite and because of his sovereignty, this God is everlastingly guilty and the degrees run from gross negligence to mass murder...To the extent that [people] are born with the potential and power to [do evil things], credit for that fact belongs elsewhere. "Elsewhere" is God's address.[14]
Thedeus deceptor (dieu trompeur), "deceptive god", is a concept of Cartesianism.Voetius accused Descartes of blasphemy in 1643.Jacques Triglandius andJacobus Revius, theologians atLeiden University, made similar accusations in 1647, accusing Descartes of "hold[ing] God to be a deceiver", a position that they stated to be "contrary to the glory of God". Descartes was threatened with having his views condemned by asynod, but this was prevented by the intercession of thePrince of Orange (at the request of the French Ambassador Servien).[15] The accusations referenced a passage in theFirst Meditation where Descartes stated that he supposed not an optimal God but rather an evil demon "summepotens &callidus" ("most highly powerful and cunning"). The accusers identified Descartes' concept of a deus deceptor with his concept of anevil demon, stating that only an omnipotent God is "summe potens" and that describing the evil demon as such thus demonstrated the identity. Descartes' response to the accusations was that in that passage he had been expressly distinguishing between "the supremely good God, the source of truth, on the one hand, and the malicious demon on the other". He did not directly rebut the charge of implying that the evil demon was omnipotent, but asserted that simply describing something with "some attribute that in reality belongs only to God" does not mean that that something is being held to actuallybe a supreme God.[15]
The evil demon is omnipotent, Christian doctrine notwithstanding, and is seen as a key requirement for Descartes' argument by Cartesian scholars such asAlguié, Beck,Émile Bréhier, Chevalier, Frankfurt,Étienne Gilson,Anthony Kenny, Laporte, Kemp-Smith, and Wilson. The progression through theFirst Meditation, leading to the introduction of the concept of the evil genius at the end, is to introduce various categories into the set of dubitables, such as mathematics (i.e. Descartes' addition of 2 and 3 and counting the sides of a square). Although the hypothetical evil genius is never stated to be one and the same as the hypothetical "deus deceptor," (God the deceiver) the inference by the reader that they are is a natural one, and the requirement that the deceiver is capable of introducing deception even into mathematics is seen by commentators as a necessary part of Descartes' argument. Scholars contend that in fact Descartes was not introducing a new hypothetical, merely couching the idea of a deceptive God in terms that would not be offensive.[15]
Paul Erdős, the eccentric and extremely prolificHungarian-bornmathematician, referred to the notion ofdeus deceptor in a humorous context when he called God "the Supreme Fascist", who deliberately hid things from people, ranging from socks and passports to the most elegant of mathematical proofs.[citation needed] A similar sentiment is expressed byDouglas Adams inThe Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy in reference to the temptation ofAdam and Eve by God:[citation needed]
[God] puts an apple tree in the middle of [the Garden of Eden] and says, do what you like guys, oh, but don't eat the apple. Surprise surprise, they eat it and he leaps out from behind a bush shouting "Gotcha." It wouldn't have made any difference if they hadn't eaten it...Because if you're dealing with somebody who has the sort of mentality which likes leaving hats on the pavement with bricks under them you know perfectly well they won't give up. They'll get you in the end.
There are various examples of arguable dystheism in theBible, sometimes cited as arguments foratheism (e.g.Bertrand Russell 1957), most of them from thePentateuch.A notable exception is theBook of Job, a classical case study oftheodicy, which can be argued to consciously discuss the possibility of dystheism (e.g.Carl Jung,Answer to Job).
Thomas Paine wrote inThe Age of Reason that "whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the word of God."[16] But Paine's perspective was adeistic one, critical more of common beliefs about God than of God himself.
TheNew Testament contains references to an "evil god", specifically the "prince of this world" (John 14:30,ὁ τοῦ κόσμου τούτου ἄρχων) or "god of this world" (2 Corinthians 4:4,ὁ θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου) who has "blinded the minds of men".MainstreamChristian theology sees these as references toSatan ("the Devil"), butGnostics,Marcionites, andManicheans saw these as references toYahweh (God) himself.[citation needed]
Misotheistic and/or dystheistic expression has a long history in the arts and in literature.Bernard Schweizer's bookHating God: The Untold Story of Misotheism is devoted to this topic. He traces thehistory of ideas behind misotheism from theBook of Job, viaEpicureanism and the twilight of Romanpaganism, todeism,anarchism,Nietzschean philosophy,feminism, and radicalhumanism. The main literary figures in his study arePercy Bysshe Shelley,Algernon Swinburne,Zora Neale Hurston,Rebecca West,Elie Wiesel,Peter Shaffer, andPhilip Pullman. Schweizer argues that literature is the preferred medium for the expression of God-hatred because the creative possibilities of literature allow writers to simultaneously unburden themselves of their misotheism while ingeniously veiling their blasphemy.[17]
Other examples include:
In more recent times, the sentiment is present in a variety of media:
The characters in several ofTennessee Williams' plays express dystheistic attitudes, including the Rev. T. Lawrence Shannon inThe Night of the Iguana.[citation needed]
Robert Frost's poem "Design" questions how God could have created death if he were benevolent.[citation needed]
Peter Shaffer's playAmadeus (1979) has the characterSalieri rebel against a God he feels neglected and humiliated by.[citation needed]
In Jewish authorElie Wiesel's playThe Trial of God (1979), the survivors of apogrom, in which most of the inhabitants of a 17th-century Jewish village were massacred, put God on trial for his cruelty and indifference to their misery. The play is based on an actual trial Wiesel participated in that was conducted by inmates of theAuschwitzconcentration camp during theNaziholocaust, but it also references a number of other incidents in Jewish history including a similar trial conducted by theHasidicRabbiLevi Yosef Yitzhak of Berdichev:
Men and women are being beaten, tortured and killed. True, they are victims of men. But the killers kill in God's name. Not all? True, but let one killer kill for God's glory, and God is guilty. Every person who suffers or causes suffering, every woman who is raped, every child who is tormented implicates Him. What, you need more? A hundred or a thousand? Listen, either he is responsible or he is not. If he is, let's judge him. If he is not, let him stop judging us.[citation needed]
In Alan Parker's Oscar-winning 1980 feature filmFame, one of the main characters (played by Barry Miller) makes an explicit statement against God. Playing an aspiring stand-up comedian who is asked in an acting class to talk about an experience that has affected him deeply in order to sharpen his skills as a performer, he delivers an extended uncut monologue (rare for a mainstream Hollywood film at that time) that heavily criticizes both modern capitalism and religion, concluding with the line "and then we can all go pray to the asshole God who fucked everything up in the first place".[citation needed]
Several non-Jewish authors share Wiesel's concerns about God's nature, includingSalman Rushdie (The Satanic Verses,Shalimar the Clown)[citation needed] andAnne Provoost (In the Shadow of the Ark):
Why would you trust a God that doesn't give us the right book? Throughout history, he's given the Jewish people a book, he's given the Christians a book, and he's given the Muslims books, and there are big similarities between these books, but there are also contradictions. ... He needs to come back and create clarity and not ... let us fight over who's right. He should make it clear. So, my personal answer to your question, "Should we trust [a God who can't get things right]", I wouldn't.[19]
The writing ofSir Kingsley Amis contains some misotheistic themes; e.g. inThe Green Man (God's appearance as the young man), and inThe Anti-Death League (the anonymous poem received by the chaplain).[citation needed]
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A number ofspeculative fiction works present a dystheistic perspective, at least as far back as the works ofH. P. Lovecraft andOlaf Stapledon's influential philosophicalshort novelStar Maker.
By the 1970s,Harlan Ellison even described dystheism as a bit of ascience fiction cliché. Ellison himself has dealt with the theme in his "The Deathbird", the title story ofDeathbird Stories, acollection based on the theme of (for the most part) malevolent modern-day gods.Lester del Rey's "Evensong" (the first story in Harlan Ellison's much-acclaimedDangerous Visions anthology), tells the story of a fugitive God hunted down across the universe by a vengeful humanity which seeks to "put him in his place". "Faith of Our Fathers" byPhilip K. Dick, also from the same anthology, features a horrifying vision of a being, possibly God, who is all-devouring and amoral.Philip Pullman's previously mentioned trilogy,His Dark Materials, presented the theme of a negligent or evil God to a wider audience, as depicted in the 2007 filmThe Golden Compass based on the first book of this trilogy.
The original series ofStar Trek featured episodes with dystheistic themes, amongst them "The Squire of Gothos", "Who Mourns for Adonais?", "For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky", and "The Return of the Archons". In "Encounter at Farpoint", the pilot episode ofStar Trek: The Next Generation, CaptainJean-Luc Picard informsQ, atrickster with god-like powers similar to the antagonist in the aforementioned "Squire of Gothos" episode, that 24th-century humans no longer had any need to depend upon or worship god figures. This is an amplification of the tempered anti-theistic sentiment from "Who Mourns for Adonais?", in which CaptainJames T. Kirk tellsApollo that "Mankind has no need for gods, we find the one quite adequate." A later episode, "Who Watches the Watchers", depicts accidentally reviving theistic belief in a more primitive species as a negative thing which must be stopped. InStar Trek: Deep Space Nine it is revealed that the Klingon creation myth involves the first Klingons killing the gods that created them because, "They were more trouble than they were worth."
In the filmPitch Black, anti-hero protagonist Richard B. Riddick stated his own belief, after animam accuses him ofatheism: "Think someone could spend half their life in a slam with a horse bit in their mouth and not believe? Think he could start out in some liquor store trash bin with an umbilical cord wrapped around his neck and not believe? Got it all wrong, holy man. I absolutely believe in God... and I absolutely hate the fucker."
Robert A. Heinlein's bookJob: A Comedy of Justice, which is mostly about religious institutions, ends with an appearance by Yahweh which is far from complimentary.
The Athar, a fictional organization from theD&D's Planescape Campaign Setting denies the divinity of the setting's deities. They do, however, tend to worship "The Great Unknown" in their place. In thePathfinder universe, the nation of Rahadoum bans the worship of the setting's deities. They do not deny the deities' power or divinity, but instead believe that worshiping a deity is akin to enslaving ones' self and that mortals' problems are best solved without the interference of higher powers.
In the 2013 filmPrisoners, Holly Jones and her husband Isaac lost their faith in God after their son died of cancer. Since then, they have been kidnapping and murdering children in order to make other parents lose faith in God and turning them into revenge-driven hollow shells of their former selves, i.e. spreading their misotheism to other people. As Holly Jones states to Keller Dover near the end of the film: "Making children disappear is the war we wage with God. Makes people lose their faith, turns them into demons like you."
In theDC Extended Universe filmBatman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,Lex Luthor has a misotheistic view of God, believing that if God was omnipotent, then he logically could not be omnibenevolent and vice versa (the theologicalproblem of evil), thereby solidifying his belief that power cannot be innocent. He has a penchant for constantly implementing allusions to major figures of both pagan and biblical theology, with him notably comparing himself to Prometheus,General Zod toIcarus, andSuperman toZeus,Horus,Apollo,Jehovah andSatan. He even compares himself to the biblical God in one way, claiming to hate "the sin, not the sinner", and plays God by creating the monsterDoomsday.
In theseason 1 ofLuke Cage,Willis Stryker's misotheism seemed to enforce his revenge mission against his half-brotherLuke Cage, quoting several Bible verses that directly link to Lukes's supposed betrayal against Stryker. The Judas Bullet was designed to symbolize this act of treachery; stating "one Judas to another" before shooting Luke in the abdomen and vowing to repeat the same words thatCain said to hisfather after killingAbel when he finally did kill Cage.
Misotheism is a 2008album by Belgianblack metal bandGorath.
Dystheistic sentiment has also made its way into popular music, evincing itself in controversial songs like "Dear God"[20] by the bandXTC (later covered bySarah McLachlan) and "Blasphemous Rumours"[21] byDepeche Mode, which tells the story of a teenage girl who attempted suicide, survived, and turned her life over to God, only to be hit by a car, wind up on life support, and eventually die. A good deal ofGary Numan's work, specifically the albumExile, is laden with misotheistic themes.
The output of Oscar-winning songwriter/composerRandy Newman also includes several songs expressing dystheistic sentiment, including the ironic "He Gives Us All His Love" and the more overtly maltheistic "God's Song (That's Why I Love Mankind)",[22] both from his acclaimed 1972 albumSail Away. In the latter song, Newman bemoans the futility of dealing with God whose attitude towards humanity he sees as one of contempt and cruelty.
The song "God Made" byAndrew Jackson Jihad proposes dystheism and has an implied hatred for God. More specifically, their song "Be Afraid of Jesus" is about a vengeful Christ although this could be a critique of fundamentalist hate speech.
"God Am" byAlice in Chains from theirself-titled album has many misotheistic themes about the perceived apathy of God towards the evil in this world.
"Godwhacker" bySteely Dan from theirEverything Must Go album developed from a lyric frontmanDonald Fagen wrote a few days after his mother died of Alzheimer's. "It's about an elite squad of assassins whose sole assignment is to find a way into heaven and take out God", he later explained. "If the Deity actually existed, what sane person wouldn't consider this to be justifiable homicide?"[23]
In the song "Terrible Lie" by Nine Inch Nails, Trent Reznor expresses anger, confusion, and sadness towards God and the world he created.
"Judith" by A Perfect Circle is a satirical song that places blame on God for the illness of the lead singer's mother, Judith. Despite her deteriorating condition, Judith never questions why she has been placed in her predicament but instead continues to praise and worship God. Her son angrily mocks god and presents arguments as to why she shouldn't have to suffer.
Marilyn Manson's "Fight Song," "Say 10," and others have direct and indirect misotheistic themes.
Americandeath metal bandsDeicide andMorbid Angel base much of their lyrics around misotheism in name and in concept. Many bands in theblack metal genre, such asMayhem,Emperor,Gorgoroth andDarkthrone express extreme misotheism in their lyrics.
In 2006, Australian artist Archie Moore created a paper sculpture called "Maltheism", which was considered for aTelstra Art Award in 2006. The piece was intended as a representation of a church made from pages of theBook of Deuteronomy:
...and within its text is the endorsement from God toMoses for invasion of other nations. It says that you have the right to invade, take all their resources, kill all the men (non-believers) and make no treaty with them.[24]
