Maltheism Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Maltheism is the belief that a deity (or deities) exist, but instead of being benevolent, that deity is actually a cruel, arrogant, abusive, and untruthful being who is not worthy of worship. The problem of evil does not prove to a maltheist that God does not exist, as some atheists claim; instead, the maltheist would say, it leaves the door open to the possibility that God does exist but is not what he claims to be.
In general, maltheists believe that there is an entity calling itself God and imputing unto itself the benevolent characteristics that most people associate with the word "God", but that this entity is not benevolent, does not have our best interests at heart, and is in fact selfish and egotistical to the point of autocratic bullying. They note that God claims to offer salvation, but what he offers salvation from (in exchange for our devotion and worship) is his own wrath. They point out that it makes no sense that a truly benevolent deity demand such worship, nor would a truly benevolent deity create a world with evil in it, and then blame us for the existence of evil. They denounce the idea that "miracles" where people are saved from a natural disaster (an "act of God") demonstrate God's goodness—a good God, they say, would have prevented such a disaster from happening in the first place, not performed miracles for a select few to glorify himself through their selective testimony. In short, they examine the many theological contradictions acknowledged even by proponents of various religions (see theodicy and the problem of evil) and say that they are only contradictory or paradoxical if God is assumed to be good. Shirking that assumption, they say, leads one to consider the possibility that God might not be good, and from that vantage point one would see that this explains more about reality and God's likely nature than the opposite point of view.
Many maltheists believe that God is dependent on the worship and adoration of human beings for his existence, and hope that if he is deprived of humanity's worship, he will wither up and die, leaving humanity better off. (This is akin to the belief that whatever we worship is given a sort of spiritual substance through the act of worship. Thus, according to this belief, those who believe in the tyrannical God of the Bible give him life and form through their worship, and thus they create a world where such a God influences life on earth. In contrast, those who withhold worship of that God, or who offer worship not to a controlling incorporeal alien entity but to the core principles of love, brotherhood, and cooperation among human beings, produce a world where those ideals evince themselves.)
Maltheism seeks to encourage people of all religious persuasions to see God as he truly is, as opposed to how we might wish him to be or how we might have been taught to believe him to be. They would see it as a good thing if theophiles (those who worship God) were to stop worshipping him in any form, as this would lead to true human freedom. If God is indeed evil, as the maltheists say, and if his goal is not the benefit of mankind but rather his own glory (something such people actually agree with), worshipping an evil God is a treasonous act against oneself and the entire human race, since it feeds the force that enslaves people in general, even if it might cause the worshippers to gain some short-term benefit for themselves. Note, however, that maltheists do not advocate forcing God worshippers to give up their beliefs, they only wish for such people to cease their efforts to force others to believe as they do and comply with the wishes of their God. To do that, to force their beliefs on others, would in their thinking make maltheism no different than all the theophilic religions that preceded it, which historically have preached the belief of peace but sought to spread it, ironically enough, through violence and war, and which have spread their supposed ideals about tolerance and inclusion by being intolerant and excluding those who did not share in their "one true way" of believing.
Maltheists describe the opposite point of view to theophilia, a term which refers to all those belief systems claiming that God is good. The term makes a distinction between “theists” and “theophiles,” to distance maltheists from the presumptive conclusion that anyone who believes in God must believe that he is good and worthy of human devotion. Theists are simply those who believe that God exists, and maltheists of course qualify by this definition as theists. Theophiles are theists who believe that God is good, who (to take the term literally) love God. (Strictly speaking, those who agree with maltheists that God is not good—or who do not care whether or not God's actions qualify as good—but choose to love him anyway, perhaps out of misplaced devotion, or out of fear, or to curry favor, also qualify as theophiles.) The point is that not all “theists” love God, and the term “theophile” explicitly distinguishes those who love God from those who do not.
According to maltheists, the theophiles (who comprise the vast majority of people in the world) have come through a process of indoctrination that teaches them to believe that God is good, to the point where they do not even think to question this idea. This system of indoctrination is so historically ingrained in our culture that most societies cannot even envision a belief system like maltheism that questions the goodness and authority of God, assuming that any such belief system should of necessity be considered evil, even if its adherents never perform any objectively evil acts and advocate positive attitudes and behaviors between people.
Maltheists compare theophilia to the Stockholm syndrome, wherein victims of kidnapping or long-term abuse come over time to think of their captor/torturer in a positive way. To maltheists, this explains the seemingly irrational behavior of theophiles, which they consider similar to that of abused children who still love their abusive parents. Such parents frequently hurt their children both physically and emotionally, berate and belittle them, take credit for good things their children have accomplished, and blame their children for acts they themselves are responsible for, all the while trying to convince those children that they should think of this abuse as love. Maltheists contend that this is exactly what God tries to do to do the human race: he blames us for the existence of evil in a world he created, he tells us that we are inherently sinful and evil, he tries to teach us that we need salvation because of our supposed unworthiness, and he threatens us with eternal torture if we do not comply with his demands—but at the same time, he tells us that he is a benevolent loving God who cares about us deeply. (This may remind some of George Carlin's rant on the subject of religion.)
Maltheist belief is nothing new. There is historical precedent in a variety of belief systems for the notion that perhaps God is not as good as he is depicted to be in today's mainstream religions.
Maltheists and theophiles (at least those of the Judeo-Christian persuasion) do agree on one thing: that the Bible is the word of God. But they differ in the conclusions they draw from reading the Bible. Theophiles use circular reasoning to conclude that if God says in the Bible that he is good, he is good, because it says so in the Bible, which is the word of God, which is true because it says in the Bible that…
On the other hand, maltheists read the Bible and note glaring contradictions and hypocritical statements made by God about his actions and his nature. They see God telling people one thing and doing another. They see that God does not live by the standards he sets for others. They see him call people evil for no particular reason, using this declaration as justification for slaughtering those people (or having his minions do the slaughtering for him).
Does the fact that an author says in his book that he is omnipotent and benevolent make this so? Is he exempt from following standards he might set for others in his book simply because he says he is, or because his view is greater than that of the reader? Obviously not, but theophiles would argue "yes, because in this case the author is God", which of course is easily recognized as circular reasoning, as well as another logical fallacy known as special pleading. God is given special status by theophiles: his word is accepted on faith (because he is God), and he doesn't have to live up to the standards he would demand that others live up to.
If God is what he says he is, then perhaps this sentiment is justified. But what if he isn't? What if he is lying? (This is like trusting whatever the President of the United States says because he is the President—something we've learned is not the wisest course of action several times in American history.) This is the argument that the maltheist makes about the nature of God—that if the only proof that God is good is his own say-so, and if simultaneously there is evidence of God being hypocritical, contradicting himself, and hurting people for no reason other than promoting his own glory, then perhaps this God is by definition not good and not worthy of worship.
What follows are examples from the Bible that maltheists cite as evidence of God's evil nature.
The best known example in the Bible of God demonstrating explicitly (at least to maltheists) that he is not good is the Book of Job, which has probably sparked more controversy and debate than any other tale in the Bible. In this story, God makes a bet with Satan that his loyal servant Job would continue to worship him even after he is plagued by God's agents with devastating tragedies. Obviously a deity who makes bets with his "friends" that he could deliberately hurt someone and that this person would remain faithful and devoted despite this does not qualify by any objective standards as good. Nonetheless, theophiles have expended a lot of energy trying to rationalize away obvious consequences of the Book of Job by providing explanations for God's apparently malevolent behavior and attitude towards us.
To maltheists, and even to many theophiles, the Book of Job makes clear that God is not good (at least from our perspective of what is good), that he does not have our interests and well-being at heart, and that ultimately neither we nor any idea we have about what is good matter to him. Theophiles who agree with this conclusion seem to approach it with resignation, saying that it doesn't matter how we might define good, God has the power to do whatever he wants, so we'd best just give in to his whims. (Obviously an accession to a neanderthal "might makes right" moral code.) Maltheists, in contrast, see this as a fundamental reason not to worship him.
(Some believe that the authors of the Bible knew God's nature all along and sought to placate him through their praises, but that the Book of Job has a not-so-hidden subtextual message for those who read it carefully—that the God whose praises were being sung throughout the Bible isn't really as good as he is made out to be. There are certainly precedents for these sorts of "hidden messages" in the Bible and other religious texts.)
Another well-known example of this is the story of the Tower of Babel. In this tale, the people in the city of Babel (Babylon) work together to build a tower that "will reach the heavens". God sees this as a threat to his authority, and goes down to confuse human language so that these people would not be able to work with each other.
While this story is often interpreted as an admonition about rebelling against God, it's not clear that these people were doing anything wrong—unless working together towards a common goal was considered wrong. What is clear is the relative importance of values this story conveys: God's glory and ego are more important than humanity working together. Is it any wonder, say the maltheists, that religion since this time has been plagued with division and fractionalism? God talks about how following his way will lead to peace, but each group is told a slightly different "way", and the end result is interreligious hatred and violence. To most theophiles, according to maltheists, it is more important to glorify God (in the way they were instructed to do so) than it is to bring human beings together.
In Genesis, we read that God told Adam and Eve, the first humans, not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, warning them that on the day they eat from this tree they will surely die. A serpent (often associated with Satan) convinced Eve to partake of the tree's fruit, and she in turn convinced Adam to do so. God punished them for doing this, banishing them from the supposed paradise known as the Garden of Eden.
While this story is clearly metaphorical in nature, it raises questions about God's nature. Why would a God who created humans to be curious and knowledge-seeking punish them for being curious and seeking knowledge? What is the "lesson" to be learned from this parable?—that seeking knowledge is wrong? Furthermore, God clearly lied when he said that Adam and Eve eating this fruit would cause them to die.
Additionally, we see Satan (the serpent) once again used as God's agent to be blamed for things God himself does not want to be associated with, just like in the Book of Job. In this case, according to the maltheist perspective, God sets things up to entrap Adam and Eve, using Satan as a patsy. Maltheists believe that Satan is just an alias God uses to point fingers at when he (God) does evil things. (See the section below on comparison to other beliefs for explanation.)
To the maltheist, the Bible is rife with contradictory hypocritical statements and actions by God, leading to an inevitable conclusion that he is not what he claims to be—a benevolent deity—but rather an autocratic self-aggrandizing bully greedily feeding on human worship. God tells people that it's wrong to kill, but then exhorts them to do so in his name. As examples throughout history, maltheists cite the slaughter of the native inhabitants of Canaan, the Christian Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the missionary practices of colonial Europeans, the Nazi Holocaust, and today's Muslim Jihad. The list of atrocities committed or commanded by God is very long indeed.
Maltheism is often compared with Satanism, because it advocates rebellion against God, and with some forms of Gnosticism, which hold that the God that many worship really is tyrannous or evil but is not actually the ultimate God. It is also contrasted with atheism, in that maltheists and atheists come from the same place in noting the inconsistencies of many religious beliefs but reach very different conclusions. Although maltheism shares many aspects with all of these belief systems, each of them is quite distinct and different.
The maltheist would say (to the Satanist, or to anyone believing in the existence of Satan) that Satan is just an alias God uses to point fingers at when he (God) does evil things, much like Big Brother in George Orwell's 1984 would blame all the evil in the world on imaginary insurgent Emmanuel Goldstein, who was really just a fiction invented by the Party as a scapegoat. Examples can be found both in the Book of Job and in Genesis.
Similarly, to the Gnostic who believes that the God many worship is not the "real" God but just a demiurge standing between humanity and the true benevolent God, the maltheist would question why, if this true God was really more powerful than the demiurge and was truly benevolent, he didn't step in and do good by crushing the efforts of the demiurge to hurt us. (A response might claim the demiurge takes all credit for the true God's actions.)
Finally, both atheists and maltheists note the obvious contradictions and hypocrisies found in religious texts such as the Bible. But while atheists say that these contradictions and hypocrisies demonstrate that God simply does not exist, maltheists believe that they don't rule out the possibility of God's existence. Instead, they say, they only prove that if God exists, he's a duplicitous liar and an autocratic bully. (The comparison has been made to Richard Nixon's memoirs: the erroneous self-serving spin found in Nixon's description of his own political career do not prove that Nixon did not exist, but rather confirm his nature as a rationalizing power-monger.) Maltheism has been described as the position an atheist would hold if it were proven to him logically that the God of the Bible really did exist and was indeed as autocratically cruel as he is depicted to be in the Bible.
This is an Article on Maltheism. Page Contains Information, Facts Details or Explanation Guide About Maltheism What do maltheists believe?
Maltheism contrasted with theophilia
Historical perspective
Evidence from the Bible for the maltheistic viewpoint
The Book of Job
The Tower of Babel
The Garden of Eden and The Tree of Knowledge
God's other atrocities
Comparison to other beliefs
Satanism
Gnosticism
Atheism
External links