Exactly what is Deism?

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Charlemagne_III

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Exactly what is Deism, and what is the rationale for being a Deist?

Your thoughts?
 
From what little I’ve read and heard from Deists:
  • the order to the complexity that is the universe and the fact that we can reason and discern its nature clearly demonstrates a Creator
  • God created the natural order which is pretty much the sum total of creation
  • God does not intervene in His creation
  • the supernatural does not exist: miracles, revelations, dogmas are superstitions/illusions
It makes sense to people who are really into science and the philosophies that came with the “Age of Enlightenment”, and have some awareness that this could not all happen randomly.

Not being a Deist, I’m looking at it from the outside.
 
Aloysium said:
It makes sense to people who are really into science and the philosophies that came with the “Age of Enlightenment”, and have some awareness that this could not all happen randomly.
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But why does it makes sense that God would create us and then have nothing more to do with us?
 
It makes little sense if one looks thru a human set of glasses-if we created something -a business or organization or a family structure we would be unlikely to abandon it-

yet thru the eyes of the Divine who knows?-some say the Divine can be found in the physical laws that govern the Universe-

What they can’t explain is those who have had a direct encounter with the living God
 
I was a Deist for a little while (though I still went to Mass).

My rational to be one was believing that God created the universe, but hasn’t been involved since after Christ. (I still believed in Christ’s divinity so my form of Deism would be fundamentally flawed). The main reason why I considered being a Deist was because I looked up to Thomas Jefferson and Ben Franklin, which reflected on me wanting to be multi talented (renaissance man).

However thanks to Fr Barron and some reading and research I reverted and became a more fervent and devout Catholic. (I know that sounds rather bland, but I’m not going to go into specific detail of what happened)
 
I always thought of it as believing in concrete evidence of a God without a religion.
 
VanSensei said:
I always thought of it as believing in concrete evidence of a God without a religion.
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Yes. That was always my sense of it. Reason sufficient, revelation not needed. But the coldness of the reason never appealed to me. I think Franklin and Jefferson also finally came around to something more than a merely absentee Landlord.
 
I was a Deist for awhile on my journey. It’s Catholic teaching that the existence of God can be known from reason only. Deists are people who, through reason, have recognized the existence of one God. Without revelation, which they don’t believe for a variety of reasons, they can’t know much about this God except some generalities - omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, etc. Thus, they (being without revelation) only know this much about God. Most Deists believe God no longer is involved with His Creation. There really isn’t a rational basis for that belief, it is just a byproduct of the scientism worldview which reduces reality to natural causes.

I finally grew out of Deism when I was forced to look at the evidence for Christ.
 
As adawgi pointed out, Jefferson and Franklin are often referred to as Deists.

At the Constitutional Convention, 1787, James Madison recorded the following remarks made by Benjamin Franklin to the president of the Convention:

"I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth – that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that ‘except the Lord build the House they labor in vain that build it.’ I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better than the Builders of Babel; We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing Government by Human Wisdom and leave it to chance, war, and conquest.

"I therefore beg leave to move – that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the Clergy of this City be requested to officiate in that service.”

And here is a poem written by Jefferson to his daughter several weeks before his death.

A Death Bed Advice from T.J. to M.R.

Life’s visions are vanished, its dreams are no more,
Dear friend of my bosom, why bathed in tears,
I go to my fathers, I welcome the shore,
Which crowns all my hopes or which buries my cares.

Then farewell my dear, my loved daughter adieu,
The last pang of life is parting from you.
Two seraphs await me long shrouded in death,
I will bear them your love on my last parting breath.

The two seraphs referred to are Jefferson’s other daughter and his wife, both deceased.
 
PietroPaolo said:
I was a Deist for awhile on my journey. It’s Catholic teaching that the existence of God can be known from reason only. Deists are people who, through reason, have recognized the existence of one God. Without revelation, which they don’t believe for a variety of reasons, they can’t know much about this God except some generalities - omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, etc. Thus, they (being without revelation) only know this much about God. Most Deists believe God no longer is involved with His Creation. There really isn’t a rational basis for that belief, it is just a byproduct of the scientism worldview which reduces reality to natural causes.
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I am not a deist myself, but the bolded part is false. Deism is e.g. a logical consequence of an Aristotelean worldview and I wouldn’t describe Aristotle’s worldview as scientism.
 
belorg said:
I am not a deist myself, but the bolded part is false. Deism is e.g. a logical consequence of an Aristotelean worldview and I wouldn’t describe Aristotle’s worldview as scientism.
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I was referring only to the aspect of Deism that rejects the supernatural. There is, of course, logical basis for believing in one God.

Deism is not a “logical consequence of an Aristotelean (sic) worldview” as Aristotelians such as St Thomas Aquinas prove.
 
Charlemagne_III said:
But why does it makes sense that God would create us and then have nothing more to do with us?
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If we accept that God is intervening in human affairs, there are contradictions that are difficult or perhaps impossible to explain.

A couple that I can think of off the top of my head, that I assume appeal to Deists:
  • If the world requires constant intervention by God to set things right, it would seem to be an imperfect creation.
  • If the Lord is all just, any acts of mercy on his part would seem to undermine that justice.
 
PietroPaolo said:
I was referring only to the aspect of Deism that rejects the supernatural. There is, of course, logical basis for believing in one God.

Deism is not a “logical consequence of an Aristotelean (sic) worldview” as Aristotelians such as St Thomas Aquinas prove.
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That’s one of the things Aquinas was wrong about.
 
Digitonomy said:
If we accept that God is intervening in human affairs, there are contradictions that are difficult or perhaps impossible to explain.

A couple that I can think of off the top of my head, that I assume appeal to Deists:
  • If the world requires constant intervention by God to set things right, it would seem to be an imperfect creation.
  • If the Lord is all just, any acts of mercy on his part would seem to undermine that justice.
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The answer to the first objection is that anything less than God is necessarily imperfect because only God is perfect.

The answer to the second objection is that justice does not preclude mercy. A just God would mercifully forgive our sins on the condition that we repent.
 
belorg said:
That’s one of the things Aquinas was wrong about.
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Huh? Even though he followed Aristotelean methodology, and drew almost all of his ideas from Aristotle, he wasn’t an Aristotelean?
 
I doubt that you would have to agree with everything Aristotle said to be considered Aristotelian.
 
belorg said:
No, he wasn’t. Because then he would have been a deist, like Aristotle.
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There are many Existentialist and Kantian atheists, but then, that’s impossible, by your logic, because neither Kierkegaard nor Kant were atheists.
 
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