Question: Who Created the Creator?

The kalam cosmological argument is a simple yet profound argument for the existence of God. It goes as follows:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

After establishing that the universe has a cause, Christian theists would go on to argue that God is the cause of the universe coming into being. But some skeptics are unsatisfied with this answer, claiming that if the universe itself was caused by God then one is justified in raising the question "What caused God?" or "Who created the Creator?" This is similar to Richard Dawkins question "Who designed the designer?"1

There are several problems with this line of inquiry:

First, who exactly is asking the question “Who created the Creator?”2 Not atheists like Richard Dawkins. Dawkins does not believe in God, let alone a created god. However, Christians are not asking this question either, for Christians hold that God is an eternal, self-existent Being, i.e., the uncaused first cause. To whose belief does this question apply then? Neither. This leads us to the second problem.

Second, the question is fallacious, committing what is known as a “category mistake.” A category mistake is committed when two ideas or categories are mixed together that do not belong.3 For example, asking “What does the color blue smell like?” or “How much does the number 3 weigh?” commits a category mistake. Smell is not something that can be applied to color and weight is not something that can be asked of numbers. In the same manner, asking “Who created the Creator?” applies the concept of “created being” to a Being who is not created, namely, the Christian God. In other words, if an atheist wants to ask the question “Who Created the Creator?” he needs to ask someone who believes in a finite, created god. But to ask Christians “Who created the Creator?” is essentially the same as asking “Who created the Uncreated Creator?” which is nonsensical. To raise this question shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the Christian view of God.

Finally, the question “Who created the Creator?” commits a second fallacy known as a “complex question.” A complex question is a form of question begging, combing two questions into one while presuming the existence of a certain condition.4 In this case, the condition that is presumed is that God was created. The question “Who created the Creator?” can really be broken down into two questions: (1) “Was the Creator created?” and (2) “Who created Him?” The fallacy lies in the fact that the questioner assumes the answer is “yes” to the first question and masks this assumption in the form of a complex question. Since Christians answer “no” to the first question, the second question "Who created the Creator?" should not even be raised.

In short, not everything has a cause; only those things which begin to exist have a cause, as the kalam cosmological argument states in premise one. God had no beginning and therefore needs no cause.

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1 See Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006), 188.

2 Thanks to Greg Koukl for this insight.

3 Norman L. Geisler and Ronald M. Brooks, Come, Let Us Reason: An Introduction to Logical Thinking (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1990), 108.

4 Patrick J. Hurley, A Concise Introduction to Logic, 10^th ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2008), 152.

Question: Who Created the Creator?