What Caused/Who Made God?
Posted: August 13, 2005
Individuals of all ages ranging from small children to adults have asked “Who made God?” Although this question can appear quite puzzling, there are good answers. This question can be addressed utilizing several methods. Both science and logic can be used to shed light on this question.
Dr. Norman Geisler and Peter Bocchino wrote:
“In his argument concerning a First Cause, Bertrand Russel also posited that if Christians want to be so adamant about pressing the causality question in seeking a cause for everything, then the First Cause (God) must have also had a cause. He said his father taught him that the question ‘Who made me?’ cannot be answered, since it is immediately followed by another question: ‘Who made God?’ If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause. If something can exist without a cause, it may just as well be the world as God.
Russell’s objection can be answered by noting that he incorrectly defined the causality principle and committed a logical fallacy called a category mistake. The causality principle does not say that everything needs a cause. Rather, that which is finite and limited needs a cause; that is, anything that had a beginning must have had a cause. Russell confused two distinct and separate categories.
For example, seeing and tasting represent two different categories. Color is sensed by sight and is irrelevant to the sense of taste; therefore, the question ‘How does the color green taste?’ is meaningless. The same is true with the question ‘Who made God?’ This confuses the finite category with the infinite category. Only finite things, or entities, need a cause; they have had a beginning and come into existence. An infinite being, such as God, does not have a beginning. An infinite being must have always existed and is, therefore, uncaused. If it turns out that the universe has always existed, then it would not need to have had a cause. However, if it can be shown that the universe is finite and had a beginning, then we can conclude that it must have had a cause” (UF:78).
Dr. Hugh Ross wrote:
“ For anyone willing to stretch his or her mind a little, an answer is available, one that represents both the truth of Scripture and the facts of nature. Both sources affirm that the universe, with everything it contains, is confined to a single time line (or dimension) and is further confined to moving in one direction along that line. Even if we were to experience the stretching, or dilation, of time by moving at velocities approaching the speed of light, we could neither stop nor reverse time’s arrow. The question of God’s beginning reflects our understanding of these principles: Whatever exists has a starting point along the line of time and was caused by something or someone with an earlier starting point. In other words, any entity confined to a single line of time, in which time cannot be stopped or reversed, must have a moment of beginning or creation.
An uncaused effect, a beginningless anything or anyone, contradicts our experiential knowledge of reality-but not reality itself. For both the Bible and scientific investigation present us with the reality of a Being who has the capacity to create our time dimension and fix its direction, a Being who possesses apparently unlimited time capacities.
If time were two-dimensional rather than one-dimensional, it would be some kind of plane rather than a line. If this were the case, one could have an infinite number of time lines (A) running in an infinite number of directions. This, according to general relativity and the Bible, is the situation with the Creator. If the Creator were to so choose, He could move and operate for infinite time, forwards and backwards, on a time line (B) that never intersects or touches the time line of our universe (C). As such, He would have no beginning and no end. He would not be created.
For our limited imagination’s sake, however, we can consider what is possible for Him in a two-dimensional time frame, which would constitute a time plane. Just how many time dimensions, or their equivalent, God accesses we do not know, but we do have theoretical, observational, and theological proofs for these two dimensions. A plane of time offers the possibility of an infinite number of time lines running in an infinite number of directions. God has the capacity, thus, to move and operate backwards and forwards along an infinitely long time line, or along as many time lines, infinite or otherwise, as He chooses. He can operate, if He desires, on a time line parallel to our time line or on one intersecting our time line, but He is not compelled to do either. Thus, God has the capacity to cause effects for infinite time on innumerable time lines that never intersect or touch our time line. As such, we could point to no beginning and no end for Him. Since beginnings only make sense where time in some way is linear, God must be a beginningless Being. He has always existed and will always remain. He never had a creation event.
This illustration helps us to picture more clearly how the words of John 1:3 and Colossians 1:16-17 can be true. Just this one extra time dimension releases Him from the necessity of a beginning-and an ending, for that matter. As these verses declare, He and He alone was not created” (BTC:73-75).
