Divine hiddenness or de jure objections to theism: You cannot have both

Abstract

Abstract De facto objections to theism purport to show that theism is false, whereas de jure objections to theism claim that, whether or not theism is true, belief in God is irrational. Divine hiddenness – the (supposed) fact that there are people who non-resistantly lack belief in God – is sometimes used as an argument against theism. In this article I will show that accepting the argument from divine hiddenness carries a high cost: it eliminates all de jure objections to theism. So atheists can either have de jure objections to theism or the objection from divine hiddenness, but they cannot have both.