LIBERTY UNIVERSITY

THE GOD-IS-DEAD THEOLOGY

A RESEARCH PAPER SUBMITTED TO DOCTOR RICHARD ELLIGSON PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF CHURCH MINISTRY

BY EL-FATIH J. AJALA (25927535) THEO 510 LUO

LYNCHBURG, VIRGINIA JULY 21, 2013

Introduction

Paul Enns in his book The Moody Handbook of Theology states of theologians who profess this theology, “deny all forms of traditional ontology and allow for no sovereign and unconditioned Being but only a ‘God’ who at some point in the dialectic wills His own self-annihilation” and that, “man must learn to live without God.”[1] The lack of
What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?[5]

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche lamented in his fictional account of a madman running about town declaring God is dead, was moved to write the above in that narrative. Nietzsche's story was to demonstrate the new movement of atheism spreading through intellectual circles during the late nineteenth and into the early twentieth centuries, but which never really found its roots in society as a whole. This idea, however, of the death of the God, did not die: A following of theologians chose to resurrect the idea of Nietzsche's thesis during the 1960s, along with other radical thinking which became popular at the time. This movement was becoming so popularized during the decade that Time magazine on April 8, 1966 had emblazoned, in bold print, on its cover, the question Is God Dead? The years that followed showed a distinct rise in religious fundamentalism within many Christian and Muslim sects along with a Jewish restoration of traditionalist thinking. According to the Gallup Poll dated May 5-8, 2011, 92% of Americans profess a belief in God. That equates to more than 9 out of 10 Americans.

Science and