Open AccessFrom Satan’s Wager to Eve’s Gambit to Our Leap: An Anselmian Reply to the Problem of Divine Hiddenness
Author(s) -
Travis Dumsday
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
roczniki filozoficzne
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.128
H-Index - 3
eISSN - 2450-002X
pISSN - 0035-7685
DOI - 10.18290/rf21693-5
Subject(s) - gambit , philosophy , argument (complex analysis) , narrative , epistemology , problem of evil , existentialism , atheism , theology , computer science , linguistics , medicine , fluent , computer simulation , simulation
While St. Anselm does not supply us with an explicit discussion of the problem of divine hiddenness (PDH) as it is typically conceived today—namely, as an argument for atheism—he is keenly aware of the existential difficulty posed by our seeming lack of access to God. Moreover, he provides the ingredients for an interesting and heretofore neglected approach to the PDH, one rooted in multiple Christian narratives about lapses from knowledge-infused states of grace, both angelic and human. The goal of this paper is to draw out that Anselmian approach explicitly, and to provide at least a rudimentary assessment of it.