Question from Joanne:
I’m doing an assignment on different religious beliefs on angels and I want to know if atheists believe in angels and what are atheist perspectives on angels? Does each person’s viewpoint differ based on personal belief or is there a general perspective? Also, what arguments/proofs are there to back up the atheist viewpoint on angels?
Thank you so much.
Answer by SmartLX:
I’ve had an awful month moving house, Joanne, I hope this isn’t too late to help you.
Atheists usually don’t believe in supernatural beings including angels, for the same reason they don’t believe in gods: there’s no good evidence that they’re real. Like with gods their non-existence is not certain, but you need a good reason to positively believe in something so exotic.
That said, through this site I have spoken to some atheists who believe in a few such beings, such as ghosts. They come to these beliefs through personal experiences they interpret as supernatural, even though they don’t sound very convincing to the rest of us. Angels are a special case however, because as defined in the lore of any religion they are created by a god and sent to participate in the affairs of humans. An atheist by definition does not believe in any gods, and therefore would not believe in any creature that can only have been created by gods. So while atheist viewpoints on ghosts, cryptozoology (e.g. Bigfoot) or supernatural forces like karma do vary, their attitude toward angels is a very general one of denial and dismissal.
5 thoughts on “No God, But…Angels?”
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You made my day. I laughed at your silly question for half an hour and then I thought of WHAT gives YOU the right to think that YOU without any significant scientific education in physics, chemistry and biology, can discuss such issues as is the origin of matter, because this is the point where god delusion starts, not knowing where matter came from.
It basically it is the same as if I would start discussing mathematics, having no mental ability, knowledge, or intelligence to fathom how two parallels meet in the infinity of space. Yet, they do. Or, how tho minuses equal a plus. I have no idea, but I accept both of the mathematical notions, because I accept the fact that I am not equipped with the appropriate knowledge nor IQ for understanding SUCH THINGS.
Nor have you, for understanding how the material world, starting from cosmic bodies, you know, planets and stars and later living matter developed from apparent nothing, thou it has never been nothing.
If you want to read the explanation, find on Google the article of STEPHEN HAWKING explanation on how something, that is matter, CAN become out of apparent nothing in the Universe, WITHOUT GOD.
Hawking gave it at an American university a few years ago. Don’t ask me for the link, thou I know how to find it again, do your homework on your own. Ask a real expert, not just a well informed, highly knowledgeable and intelligent atheist, as SmartLX is, and myself, for that matter, thou not to such a degree as he is.
Or, google the question on the origin of matter, and then read.
AND R E A D …
Joanne, the short answer is that atheists don’t hold beliefs in anything that has zero empirical evidence and data supporting it. In other words, if there aren’t any facts behind the claim, then it isn’t considered real. All supernatural phenomena fall into this category for most atheists (but not all as LX noted).
Right, but can somebody answer me how it is possible that somebody does not believe in the existence of any gods, which are supposed to be supernatural, and can do things that science holds impossible, but at the same time these people believe there are supernatural phenomena, so, in their opinion, who is it that DOES these supernatural actions, without any gods existing, and being the only ones that ‘can’ do supernatural things?
Pretty simple really. They are open to the existence of the supernatural, but reject the existence of a singular all-powerful entity such as a god, preferring the idea of ethereal and shall we say “intimate” forces like ghosts, karma, chi, supernatural versions of luck and so on. This is compounded by personal experiences they interpret as evidence of these things. They don’t have to know exactly how these things can exist without a god, but they accept it nonetheless.