William Lane Craig

William Lane Craig is the most prominent Christian apologist working today. A Research Professor of Philosophy at Talbot School of Theology and Houston Baptist University, he holds doctorates in both philosophy and theology from universities in Birmingham and Munich. He has spent decades doing something unusual: making the case for God’s existence not through scripture or personal testimony but through formal philosophical argument.

Whatever you think of his conclusions, Craig is a formidable debater. He is disciplined, well-prepared, and fluent in the technical literature of analytic philosophy. Atheists who underestimate him on stage tend to regret it. His debates with Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harrisare widely studied, and not always to Craig’s disadvantage.

The Debates

Craig has debated most of the leading voices in secular philosophy and science, including Hitchens (2009), Harris (2011), Austin Dacey, Lawrence Krauss, and many others. He has challenged Richard Dawkinsto a debate on multiple occasions. Dawkins declined, arguing that debating Craig would give undue credibility to a position not worthy of a scientific platform — a decision that itself became a point of controversy. Craig’s supporters called it evasion. Dawkins maintained that a scientist has no obligation to provide a stage for theology.

Craig’s debating method is deliberately structured: he typically opens with five arguments for theism, then challenges his opponent to rebut each one. This “Gish gallop” approach — presenting multiple arguments in rapid succession — puts his opponents under pressure to cover ground rather than develop any single counter in depth. Critics argue this is a rhetorical strategy as much as a philosophical one.

Where his arguments fall short

Craig’s arguments are taken seriously precisely because they are not easy to dismiss. But several structural problems recur across his case:

The Kalam relies on the premise that “whatever begins to exist has a cause” — a rule derived from everyday experience. Whether that principle applies to the origin of the universe itself, which may not have “begun” in any ordinary sense, is precisely what is at issue. The argument also smuggles in personhood: even if the universe has a cause, nothing in the argument establishes that this cause is a thinking agent rather than, say, a prior physical state.

The moral argument assumes that objective morality requires a divine grounding — but this is a contested philosophical claim, not an obvious premise. Sam Harris, Peter Singer, and others have offered accounts of objective morality that do not appeal to God. And the argument faces the ancient problem Plato identified in the Euthyphro: is something good because God commands it, or does God command it because it is good? Either horn of that dilemma creates difficulties for the theist.

The resurrection argument faces the methodological challenge that historical reasoning generally excludes miraculous explanations as the least probable account of any event. To invoke a miracle as the “best explanation” requires first establishing that miracles are possible and probable enough to enter the explanatory competition — which is exactly what is in dispute.

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