Can Any Being Be Worthy of Worship?
In this paper I shall present an a priori argument against the existence of God which is based on the conception of God as a fitting object of worship. The argument is that God cannot exist, because no being could ever be a fitting object of worship.... [T]he idea that any being could be worthy of worship is much more problematical than we might have at first imagined. For in admitting that a being is worthy of worship we should be recognising him as having an unqualified claim on our obedience. The question, then, is whether there could be such an unqualified claim.... In fact, there is a long tradition in moral philosophy, from Plato to Kant, according to which such a recognition could never be made by a moral agent. According to this tradition, to be a moral agent is to be an autonomous or self-directed agent.... On this view, to deliver oneself over to a moral authority for directions about what to do is simply incompatible with being a moral agent. --James Rachels, "God a