Week 1: Introduction
We will focus on Hitchens’s general argument against religious belief, and more particularly his definition of “anti-theism.” We will hear his reasons for his rejection of organized religion, many of which anticipate his greatest opposition to believing in God – the moral life.
Week 2: Are There Rational Reasons for Religious Belief?
We will look at Hitchens’s response to the classical arguments for God’s existence. This will include his response to modern attempts to argue for Aquinas’s arguments for the existence of God. How do other popular arguments for belief in God fair for Hitchens?
Week 3: Why Believe?
We will look at popular arguments for and against belief. What did Hitchens mean by defining himself as an “anti-theist?” We will explore morality and interrogate Plato’s question: “Is it good because God says it is good, or, does God say it is good because it is good?”
Week 4: Morality and Religion: A Closer Examination
The relationship between morality and religious belief is important in Western culture. Is Dostoevsky’s formulation “If God does not exist, then everything is permissible” a reasonable moral/philosophical proposition? How did Hitchens understand and respond to this claim?
Week 5: “Good” Non-Believers
Atheists can be as morally depraved as those who apparently are or believe themselves to be deeply religious. Hitchens argued that while it is often supposed that “atheistic” regimes like Communist Russia or Mao’s China were terribly brutal because of their unbelief, the contrary was the case.
Week 6: Summary and Conclusion
We will conclude by considering a variety of topics Hitchens raised in his critique of belief and will look at his views on religion as his life came to its end. Was a deathbed conversion possible for him? And finally, what is the legacy he leaves us as regards religion?
