At last years the conference of the American Academy of Religion I participated in a panel discussion on the topic “Just War as Deterrence Against Terrorism”. The papers from this symposium have now been published in issue 18: 21 of Philosophia Christi The abstract to my article “Thank God for the New Zealand Anti-Terrorist Squad” […]
Entries Tagged as 'Ethics'
Video: The Smith-Flannagan Debate “Morality Does Not Need God”
July 6th, 2016 Comments Off on Video: The Smith-Flannagan Debate “Morality Does Not Need God”
On Wednesday 21st May at the University of Waikato retired Philosophy and Political science lecturer Dr Ron Smith and Dr Matthew Flannagan (of this blog) debated the resolution “Morality Does not need God”. Here is the video of that debate.
Tags: Debates · Divine Command Theory · God and Morality · Ron Smith · Waikato University
Richard Carrier and the “Infantile” objection to God’s command’s
October 27th, 2015 1 Comment
In his article, “Why Traditional Theism Cannot Provide an Adequate Foundation for Morality”, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argued that a “Divine command theory makes morality childish.”[1] In my response to Armstrong, “Is Ethical Naturalism more Plausible than Supernaturalism?”[2] I made two points. First, I addressed a tangential point: that Armstrong’s argument caricatures divine command theory (“DCT”) by tacitly assuming that […]
Tags: Autonomy · Divine Command Theory · God and Morality · Hell · Richard Carrier · Walter Sinnott-Armstrong
John Corvino on Liberals and Being Judgemental
October 25th, 2015 2 Comments
Recently I have been reading John Corvino’s book, “What’s wrong with Homosexuality?” Corvino describes himself as a religious sceptic and is one of the leading defenders of the moral permissibly of homosexual conduct, and also an articulate defender of what is commonly called “gay rights”. In terms of the conclusions we each have, Corvino and I are […]
Tags: Bad Reasoning · Homosexual Conduct · John Corvino · Judging
Did God Really Command Genocide? Summarised at Moral Apologetics
October 24th, 2015 Comments Off on Did God Really Command Genocide? Summarised at Moral Apologetics
Over at Moral Apologetics, David Baggett and Mark Foreman, are undertaking the task of writing chapter summaries of Paul Copan’s and my book, “Did God Really Command Genocide?” The chapter summaries are available here.
Tags: Canaanites · David Baggett · Did God Really Command Genocide? · Paul Copan
Randal Rauser’s Interview: “Matthew Flannagan on God and Genocide”
April 15th, 2015 6 Comments
When Matt was in San Diego for the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) and Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS) meetings in November 2014, Randal Rauser interviewed him for his Podcast, The Tentative Apologist. The interview was for episode 58 and is entitled “Matthew Flannagan on God and Genocide“; you can listen to it by following the link. (It is […]
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A very belated report on my trip to San Diego
April 12th, 2015 Comments Off on A very belated report on my trip to San Diego
With trips to the US, Christmas, New Years, the summer break, Madeleine’s work, my preaching and juggling the family and the launch of my book, it has been a while since I blogged. Since the last post was about me going to the US I figured I should start by giving a very belated update on the trip […]
Tags: Evangelical Philosophical Society · Evangelical Theological Society · Society of Biblical Literature

A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.




