# Why Anthony Flew rejected Atheism



## SemperFiDawg (Jun 7, 2013)

I thought this an interesting read

http://www.biola.edu/antonyflew/


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## bullethead (Jun 7, 2013)

SemperFiDawg said:


> I thought this an interesting read
> 
> http://www.biola.edu/antonyflew/



Been covered on here before. He was in his 80's and had dementia. In one interview he would say one thing and something completely different in another. I tend to think his lifelong stance outweighs an interview in his final months.


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## ddd-shooter (Jun 7, 2013)

Or perhaps there really are no atheists in the trenches...


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## SemperFiDawg (Jun 7, 2013)

bullethead said:


> Been covered on here before. He was in his 80's and had dementia. In one interview he would say one thing and something completely different in another. I tend to think his lifelong stance outweighs an interview in his final months.



He seems cogent enough here.


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## bullethead (Jun 7, 2013)

SemperFiDawg said:


> He seems cogent enough here.



If your really interested in his condition I'll let you look into it further Doc.


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## JFS (Jun 7, 2013)

Probably just more evidence of how the fear of death affects reason.


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## bullethead (Jun 8, 2013)

The Deathbed De-Conversion of Antony Flew
Posted on April 16th, 2010 by Staks

When I was in grad school, I was already a vocal atheist and was pretty knowledgeable about the greater atheist community. One day a fundamentalist Christian friend of mine was excited to tell me that the most famous atheist in the world had just converted to Christianity. Antony Flew was so famous that I had never heard of him.

On April 8th of this year the most famous (and possibly only) ex-atheist died. To me, Flew’s fame came more when he announced that the vague higher power concept of a creator deity can’t be ruled out and so some kind of god might exist. Christians immediately took Flew’s statement as a declaration of his conversion to Christianity.

Flew found out that Christians were claiming that he had converted to Christianity and wrote a short response titled, “Sorry to Disappoint, but I’m Still an Atheist!” The title says it all, but there were still a few Christians who remained undeterred. Postmodern Philosopher Gary Habermas, Physicist Gerald Schroeder, and others flew to Flew’s side to make the case that God is real.

In 2007, the book titled, “There is a God” reached bookshelves all over the world. The book was authored by Antony Flew… sort of. The book was actually written by ghost writer Roy Abraham Varghese because Flew was starting to literally lose his mind.

Flew was now in his mid-80s, didn’t know much about the internet, started to show signs of senility and memory loss, and was being bombarded by Christian intellectuals who were feeding him inaccurate information which he did not have the ability to fact check.

Richard Carrier, long time friend to Flew had been in snail mail correspondence with him. Carrier is a member of the Jesus Project and a well known atheist. According to an article in HumanistLife:

    “Flew wrote back to say he had been mistaken in trusting his Christian correspondents; that Schroeder and his modern-science-is-Genesis theory obviously wasn’t up to date, and that he would withdraw the forthcoming introduction to a new edition of one of his books.”

He continues to say,

    “The statement which I most regret making during the last few months was the one about Habermas’s book on the alleged resurrection of Jesus bar Joseph. I completely forgot Hume’s to my mind decisive argument against all evidence for the miraculous. A sign of physical decline.”

Another long time atheist friend of Flew’s, Mark Oppenheimer visited Flew to get a sense of his mental stability:

    In “There Is a God,” Flew quotes extensively from a conversation he had with Leftow, a professor at Oxford. So I asked Flew, “Do you know Brian Leftow?”

    “No,” he said. “I don’t think I do.”

    “Do you know the work of the philosopher John Leslie?” Leslie is discussed extensively in the book.

    Flew paused, seeming unsure. “I think he’s quite good.” But he said he did not remember the specifics of Leslie’s work.
    “Have you ever run across the philosopher Paul Davies?” In his book, Flew calls Paul Davies “arguably the most influential contemporary expositor of modern science.”

    “I’m afraid this is a spectacle of my not remembering!”

    … As he himself conceded, he had not written his book.

    “This is really Roy [Varghese]’s doing,” he said, before I had even figured out a polite way to ask. “He showed it to me, and I said O.K. I’m too old for this kind of work!”

Antony Flew was 87 when he died and had never accepted Jesus in his heart as his lord and savior. The story of Antony Flew is not one of an atheist converting to Christianity, but rather the tragic story of how the brightest minds in Christianity conspired to take advantage of an old atheist who was losing his mind. While this hasn’t been confirmed, it wouldn’t surprise me if Antony Flew’s last words were, “There is no God… Oh my.”


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## bullethead (Jun 8, 2013)

http://richardcarrier.blogspot.com/2007/11/antony-flew-bogus-book.html


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## Ronnie T (Jun 8, 2013)

Words of a former atheist.

My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line. What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust? If the whole show was bad and senseless from A to Z, so to speak, why did I, who was supposed to be part of the show, find myself in such a violent reaction against it?... Of course I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if i did that, then my argument against God collapsed too--for the argument depended on saying the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my fancies. Thus, in the very act of trying to prove that God did not exist - in other words, that the whole of reality was senseless - I found I was forced to assume that one part of reality - namely my idea of justice - was full of sense. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never have known it was dark. Dark would be without meaning.
CS Lewis


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## bullethead (Jun 8, 2013)

RonnieT
There is no doubt that those types of writings are very good reads. They do make a lot of sense but they make just as much sense in the reverse.
See if he was an atheist he would not argue against a god because he would not have believed in a god. What or which God is he comparing anything else to? His ideas are private ideas of his own just like god(s) are the private ideas of individuals. It really does make for a great read but the whole premise assumes something godlike is responsible. A real atheist never lets it get that far.


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## bullethead (Jun 10, 2013)

Words from a former christian.

My first mind-blowing experience came in February 2008. That was the day my life began to change. However, before I tell you the events of that day, a little background is necessary.

My childhood was idyllic. I grew up in a wonderful, loving environment. My parents raised my siblings and I as conservative Christians. Going to church was part of our way of life in the south. We knew God was our loving creator and Jesus was our savior, who sacrificed his life for our sins. After my wife and I married, we were very involved with our local church as youth pastors. I was also a member of the church board. Even though we eventually were forced to move due to my being laid off, we carried our love of God, Jesus and his Word to our new city. It was during this time that I became even more conservative in my views. There was no doubt that the Bible was the infallible, everlasting Word of God. I often listened to well-known ministers on CD in the car during my commute and while sitting at my desk at work. I loved talking to my coworkers about Jesus. I felt he was using me as his servant, doing the work of the Lord. It was during this time in my life, when my relationship with God was at its peak, that my beliefs were shaken.

One day in February 2008, I was listening to a minister’s message online. I did this nearly every day. I believed there was no better way to spend my time while I’m working than to bolster my faith by listening to good, solid bible teachers. The minister’s message focused on the passage concerning the Tower of Babel. Early on during his message, the minister read the passage in its entirety.

1Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. 2And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. 3And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. 4Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth." 5And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. 6And the Lord said, "Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech." 8So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth. (Gen 11:1-9).

After hearing the minister read the story of the Tower of Babel, I sat there, eyes wide, in stunned silence. It hit me like a baseball bat in the chest. Sitting at my desk, I said “This sounds like a children’s story I would read to my son before he goes to bed”. The realization slowly sank in. I must’ve sat there, immovable, for a minute or two. I continued to say over and over in my head “This sounds like a fairy tale, a fable, a kids’ bedtime story”. The reason I was in shock is because I considered the Bible to be completely true, down to the last letter. In my mind, there was no doubt it was the infallible Word of God. Yet, there I was, faced with the sudden realization that something in the Bible was possibly not true. My long standing faith told me it was true, but my rational mind was saying something else. It was too simplistic. For the first time, it sounded allegorical. I realized the Tower of Babel was a story, something made up to teach a lesson.

Anxiously, I began to search the internet, looking for proof that the Tower of Babel was a legitimate historical event. I visited every reputable Christian website I could think of but none of them provided what I was hoping for: solid proof that the Tower of Babel story was a real historical event. Unable to find what I wanted, I went back to the Bible itself. I read and re-read the passage. Instead of providing answers, I came up with more questions. Why was God afraid that “nothing that they purpose to do” will be beyond their abilities? Did God believe the people could actually build a tower to heaven? How is that even possible when the sky doesn’t have a “roof” but it is limitless? Didn’t God know these things? The more I read the passage, the more it seemed that the story was there to describe how people should serve God instead of try to be like him. It also began dawning on me that the whole point of the story may be to explain how different groups came to speak different languages. After all, the very first verse in the passage mentions that the whole earth had one language and the passage ends with God confusing the people’s language and dispersing them over the earth. It became more and more clear to me that the tower of Babel passage was written as a simple story to explain how the different people groups had different languages.

Over time I was able to answer my own questions. The Tower of Babel story can’t be true because we know that the sky doesn’t have limits. There is no ceiling to reach where heaven is located. Different people groups couldn’t have received their different languages all at once from God because we know languages and forms of writing develop over thousands of years. I realized the Tower of Babel story was just that: a story to help explain the unknown to an ancient people.
This discovery devastated me. If the Tower of Babel story wasn’t true, were there other stories in the Bible that weren’t true either? This began my passionate search for truth and my determined attempt to prove the validity and infallibility of the Bible.


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## jmharris23 (Jun 11, 2013)

http://www.albertmohler.com/2010/04/29/the-death-of-a-former-atheist-anthony-flew-1923-2010/


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## BANDERSNATCH (Jun 21, 2013)

Good article, Jim.

Something that the article points out -- and I think is note-worthy -- is that many atheists-turned-theists (including Flew) had for a long time been fighting their own mind battle inside, even while actively proclaiming and defending atheism.  

_Second, Flew’s intellectual pilgrimage underlines the fact that the boldest atheistic arguments are often put forth by people who are closer to belief in God than may first appear. In retrospect, Antony Flew had dropped hints of openness to belief in God, even as he was recognized as one of the world’s most famous atheists. Many prominent Christians, now and in the past, were once fervent atheists. Atheists, we should note, at least consider the question of the existence of God to be consequential and important. _

Also, it wasn't a lack of evidence that sways atheists towards God; it's evidence.    No doubt many on here are also having these mind battles, as we've already witnessed with the conversion of one of the AAA forum's former most notorious atheists.  

bandy


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## bullethead (Jun 25, 2013)

I guess many guys just stick to the stories that tell the tales they want told and totally disregard the stories that prove that other stuff wrong.


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## JB0704 (Jun 26, 2013)

bullethead said:


> For the first time, it sounded allegorical. I realized the Tower of Babel was a story, something made up to teach a lesson.



It was the story of Job that got me to think there might be a little more allegory in the Bible than what the Sunday School teachers supposed.

However.....



bullethead said:


> I realized the Tower of Babel story was just that: a story to help explain the unknown to an ancient people..



....there is some huge assumptions in the above statement.

1. The motive of the story is speculation.
2. The inspiration of the story is speculation (allegory does not rule out God).
3. The author might have been onto something with his first conclusion, that the story is about serving God rather than self.  However, he eventually abandons it in favor of a less "graceful" interpretation.  Either makes sense.


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## JB0704 (Jun 26, 2013)

bullethead said:


> I guess many guys just stick to the stories that tell the tales they want told and totally disregard the stories that prove that other stuff wrong.



You picked a side yourself, and, coincidentally, it was the one that met your liking.

The C.S. Lewis quote is a great example of reason and logic leading one to conclude there is a higher power.  It does not lead to Christianity, but deism.  Christianity is all faith.


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## bullethead (Jun 26, 2013)

JB0704 said:


> You picked a side yourself, and, coincidentally, it was the one that met your liking.
> 
> The C.S. Lewis quote is a great example of reason and logic leading one to conclude there is a higher power.  It does not lead to Christianity, but deism.  Christianity is all faith.



Actually and like I do with everything else, I read as much as I can about the subject at hand and make a rational decision based off of the facts.
When I first heard of Flew's conversion I was very interested in his decision and hoped to hear some in depth reasons on the who/what/why/how's of it all. Thought maybe something would ring a bell with me. But as I researched the situation more, there was more information than what was being told and sold about his conversion and that information came right from Flew and a few of his closest friends.
I can totally accept his decision either way and am not leaving out information so that it looks like something happened that did not. Flew in fact, by his own admission, did not convert,recant, or switch from atheist to deist or certainly theist. I am using all of the available information by the best sources to determine what really happened. I am not using one article from one guy based off of an interview that left out information and was then scooped up by every pro-religious organization and re-distributed on every pro-religious avenue available touting it as some kind of religious victory. It just did not happen that way and anyone that continues to tout that side of the story as if it were the truth is just plain wrong and purposely trying to spin a story to their liking. It takes away from their credibility.


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