One of the most difficult questions for Christians to answer, especially when posed by adherents of other religions, is the question of what happens to those who have never heard of Jesus. In this post, I will explain how progress in the field of philosophy of religion has given us a possible (and Biblical) solution to this thorny question.
First, Christianity teaches that humans are in a natural state of rebellion against God. We don’t want to know about him, and we don’t want him to have any say in what we are doing. We just want to appropriate all the gifts he’s given us, do whatever we want with them, and then have eternal bliss after we die. We want to do whatever we want and then be forgiven, later.
Along comes Jesus, who, through his sinless life and his death on the cross, heals that rift of rebellion between an all-good God and rebellious man. Now we have a real understanding of the fact that God is real, that he has power over death, and that he has very specific ideas on what we should be doing. If we accept Jesus’ atoning sacrifice and follow his teachings, we can avoid the penalty of our rebellion.
The only problem is that in order to appropriate that free gift of reconciliation, people need to actually know about Jesus. And there are some people in the world who have not even heard of him. Is it fair that these other people will be sent to eternal separation from God, just because they happened to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time?
Well it turns out that Christian scholars know about this problem and they have solutions. William Lane Craig’s solution to this problem is that God orders the world in such a way that anyone who would freely choose to acknowledge Jesus and appropriate his teachings in their decision-making will be given eternal life. God knows in advance who would respond to him in certain circumstances, and chooses the time and place of their birth so that they will freely respond. The solution is called Molinism or “middle knowledge”.
And this agrees with what the Bible teaches. The apostle Paul says this in his apologetic on Mars Hill in Acts 17:22-31:
22 So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.
23 “For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘ N D ‘ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.
24 “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands;
25 nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things;
26 and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation,
27 that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
28 for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’
29 “Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.
30 “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent,
31 because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.”
In this research paper, Craig explains in detail how God foreknows how people will choose in every set of circumstances, and how God uses that knowledge to get everyone where they need to be without violating their free will. God wants the best for everyone, and has ordered to whole universe in order to give each of us our best opportunity for eternal life.
Here is a summary of the what is in his paper:
The conviction of the New Testament writers was that there is no salvation apart from Jesus. This orthodox doctrine is widely rejected today because God’s condemnation of persons in other world religions seems incompatible with various attributes of God.
Analysis reveals the real problem to involve certain counterfactuals of freedom, e.g., why did not God create a world in which all people would freely believe in Christ and be saved? Such questions presuppose that God possesses middle knowledge. But it can be shown that no inconsistency exists between God’s having middle knowledge and certain persons’ being damned; on the contrary, it can be positively shown that these two notions are compatible.
Go read this paper and equip yourself to answer this common question!
Wes from Reason to Stand also posted this video explaining counterfactuals:
Some people encounter philosophical problems like the hiddenness of God, or the problem of evil, or religious pluralism, and they respond by stopping their search for solutions. They seem to take it as an article of faith that no one has ever written anything to solve the problems. But Christians do have solutions – you just have to ask and investigate to find the solutions.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
What happens to people like me who believe the flying spaghetti monster has embraced me with his noodley appendages?
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You can spend some time here – it is for comedians who need new jokes.
http://www.mustsharejokes.com/page/Jokes+by+Famous+Comedians#fbid=kiq6yCt4mCK
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In the following I’m presenting another attempt of an answer to this question:
Matthew 11,20-24 makes clear that those who have failed to accept the Gospel due to a lack of opportunity are much less severely punished than those who have had such an opportunity. The same idea can be found in Luke 12,47-48.
Moreover, from Luke 16,25 one can draw the conclusion that (involuntary) suffering in this life reduces the amount of suffering in the afterlife by subtracting the amount of suffering in this life from it. Now one cannot rule out the possibility that with respect to someone who has never heard the Gospel it may be the case that his lack of knowledge of the Gospel together with the suffering he endures in this life reduces the amount of the suffering in the afterlife to such a degree that the respective suffering he would deserve due to his way of life is neutralized by it. Consequently he or she would be saved without having to accept the Gospel.
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There are a lot scriptures that come to mind. Here are a couple of points:
Rev 22
15 And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
Basic reasoning holds that the book is ‘FULL OF NAMES”.
Rom 2
6 God “will repay each person according to what they have done.” 7 To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. 8 But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger
Notice is how a person acts and not what they believe (see Matt 7:21-23)
Here is a very interesting passage about a group of people who make it into the “Kingdom” and “eternal life” without knowing Jesus but based on how they treated the servants of Christ.
Btw, what is one to make of a passage like this ? Jesus refers to them as “righteous” and they don’t know Him or anything about Him (v.37 ).
Matt 25
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’
44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
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Just listening to Dr. James White talking about foreknowledge… might help with this stuff about counterfactuals, etc. http://www.aomin.org/podcasts/20110712.mp3 (about 27 min in). While Dr. Craig is a brilliant guy and a great apologist, I think he needs to do some more work on all this Middle Knowledge stuff. It just doesn’t square theologically with a full doctrine of God. Is God in control? Or, does He just read the future well?
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It’s important for you to listen to James White in debates:
https://winteryknight.wordpress.com/2011/06/14/calvinism-versus-foreknowledge-which-view-of-gods-sovereignty-is-true/
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I’m so bad about listening to stuff that isn’t in my podcast downloads…. OK, I need to finally download this and get it on my iPod. BTW, I’ve been listening to Dr. White for years now and to Dr. Brown for maybe 6 months or so.
Also, my answer to your original question would be that salvation comes through Christ, but that we don’t know what workings the Holy Spirit is doing among people who Christian evangelists have not reached. Remember, the OT folks didn’t know Jesus by name either, but were repentant and trusted in what God would provide. I’ve also heard missionary stories of people who, after hearing the Gospel, identified that with dreams and visions they had had prior to the missionaries arrival.
Also, you say:
“Is it fair that these other people will be sent to eternal separation from God, just because they happened to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time?”
This is a common mischaracterization of the problem I’ve heard used by many Arminians. What is fair is if we’re all sent to hell. If God wanted to pick 25 people from Tasmania to save, there would be nothing unfair about that. God is under no obligation to offer salvation to everyone. You started out by saying, “First, Christianity teaches that humans are in a natural state of rebellion against God.” Correct… then what happened? Here are those two sentences strung together…
“First, Christianity teaches that humans are in a natural state of rebellion against God.” “Is it fair that these other people will be sent to eternal separation from God, just because they happened to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time?”
See the problem?
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Huh. I’ve never heard Craig’s view explained in that way before. I have wondered if God arranged the time of people’s births based on foreknowledge of what they would do.
For instance, a tribe that has 100 generations of people before hearing of Christ by a missionary coming. God knows every individual and what they would do if confronted with Christ, and God sees their response to natural revelation. So, he has those who would accept Christ born in that 100th generation.
It makes good sense to me, but still seems speculative. I should read Craig’s article and see what supports there are for it.
But what do you think of Luke 10.13? It says Tyre and Sidon would have repented if they saw the miracles done as were done by Jesus.
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Hey PB! I think you have the right understanding of Craig’s theory.
I think the passage in Luke 10:13 is extremely relevant to middle knowledge – it shows that God does have knowledge of what people would do in other circumstances if he were to put them in those circumstances.
Going back to your earlier point about it being speculative. I think there are cases where Christians can make a case based on scientific evidence, like the Big Bang and the fine-tuning and the origin of life. And there are other cases where we have to play defense, like on the problem of evil, divine hiddenness and the sovereignty/freedom question. The objective when you are on defense is not to score – it’s to neutralize the attack. All you have to show is a way that ideas that appear contradictory are in fact compatible. And middle knowledge does that. I also happen to think it’s true, based on Bible passages like Acts 17:27 and Luke 10:13.
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I see what you’re saying, except Luke 10.13 still seems a problem. If they would have repented at Jesus teaching, why didn’t God have the Tyre/Sidon populations born at Jesus’ time so they could be saved, if they really would have repented?
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Oh I see what you are saying now, I will have to think about that. What a great question. Perhaps I will ask Dr. Craig.
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That’s illustrative of what I (and my theology prof as well) see wrong with Middle Knowledge (though I admit I’ve not studied it in depth). You still end up predestination and a form of soft-determinism, you just shift some aspect of the responsibility a bit.
In the above example, if I understand MK correctly, that was a decision God made to maximize the number saved. Tyre/Sidon were sacrificed because the world God actuated was set up to maximize the saved. One of the consequences, was probably that these cities lost out in that particular world. (On that view, given that passage, obviously God was unable to actualize a world where ALL who would believe would be saved.)
So, as I’m understanding it… Calvinism teaches all are fallen and God decides which to save, based on nothing about any of the people He saves. With MK, God looks at what all the people would do in every situation, then sets up a world where the maximum are saved. However, once that world is actualized, the outcome will be the outcome, but it is working in concert with ‘free will’. Calvinism just never has free-will in the first place, but only free-choice. Once the will is changed by God (so they no longer hate Him), then that person also works in concert with God, and is saved. In some sense, one could say the will is freed up.
IMO, the only view which actually solves the mystery is Open Theism, which I don’t see as Biblically compatible. While I lean towards Calvinism, my Lutheran background kind of drives me to almost sit on the fence a bit between Calvinism and Arminianism though, as I think both might go a bit too far beyond our understanding in trying to work out the details. One of the reasons I lean more towards Calvinism though, is that many Biblical passages really do seem to support the view, where as MK seems to be more philosophically driven (and while as an apologist, I use both, I’ll always put more weight on the Bible). That said, I think Arminians do make a good point about the general theme in the Bible of exhorting us to choose, etc. (Though, the exhortations stand regardless to how free our will is. If you hate me, I can still exhort you to love me… even though unless you stop hating me, you’re essentially predestined not to obey my exhortations. If we are ‘dead’ in sin, a valley of ‘dry bones’, etc. it would seem God has to breath some life in or our wills would not change. That doesn’t change the validity of the exhortation.)
Hope that helps. I’ve really only recently gotten serious about working through this at a deeper level. I admit I need to read and listen to MUCH more of Craig’s position though, as I’m much more educated in Calvinism.
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Fair enough, but I would say Calvinism is just as philosophically driven as MK. St. Augustine, Luther, Calvin, etc. were influenced by philosophy in their articulations of theology, as well as their individualism.
How you interpret passages for Calvinism or Arminianism really depends on presuppositions, it seems to me. Through much prayer and study, someone will come out of Rom. 9 a stronger Arminian, some a stronger Calvinist. It’s such a grey area, I’m not sure if the Bible thinks about it as important as we do. Both sides admit it’s mystery out of one side of their mouth, then start explaining it with the other side.
Luke 10.13 and such has always been a curiosity to me, and gives trouble to Calvinists as well, since Jesus places the locus of their repentance on seeing the signs rather than prior election. I wonder if Jesus is just being hyperbolic, or the repentance is a more national one for avoiding temporal destruction rather than eternal destruction. But at this point… I don’t know.
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Hey PB! I think you have the right understanding of Craig’s theory.
I think the passage in Luke 10:13 is extremely relevant to middle knowledge – it shows that God does have knowledge of what people would do in other circumstances if he were to put them in those circumstances.
Going back to your earlier point about it being speculative. I think there are cases where Christians can make a case based on scientific evidence, like the Big Bang and the fine-tuning and the origin of life. And there are other cases where we have to play defense, like on the problem of evil, divine hiddenness and the sovereignty/freedom question. The objective when you are on defense is not to score – it’s to neutralize the attack. All you have to show is a way that ideas that appear contradictory are in fact compatible. And middle knowledge does that. I also happen to think it’s true, based on Bible passages like Acts 17:27 and Luke 10:13.
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