Flew embraced Aristotle’s concept of “the unmoved mover” similar to the French Enlightenment’s god that doesn’t directly intervene in human history. In it, Flew describes his journey from belief in atheism to belief in Deism or more precisely “Aristotelian Deism.” Flew denied having converted to Christianity or any other religion.
His book is boldly titled: There is a God: How the World’s Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind (Harper Collins, New York, 2007). Over the next few years, however, he hardened his stance against atheism and went so far as to co-author a book declaring his belief in God. Flew gave a number of interviews in 2004 in which he affirmed his new found belief in God but then backtracked a bit and made some ambivalent and even contradictory remarks. The atheist community was stunned into silence but quickly found its voice and questioned Flew’s conversion. He made headlines around the world in 2004 when he publicly declared that he changed his mind and believed that there is a God after all.
Some considered him to be the world’s leading atheist.
He was a British scholar and college professor who wrote dozens of books arguing for atheism or on other philosophical subjects, writing from a perspective of atheism. Once upon a time two explorers came upon a clearing in the jungle. A man was there, pulling weeds, applying fertilizer, trimming branches. The man turned to the explorers and introduced himself as the royal gardener. One explorer shook his hand and exchanged pleasantries. The other ignored the gardener and turned away: “There can be no gardener in this part of the jungle,” he said “this must be some trick. Someone is trying to discredit our previous findings.” They pitch camp. Every day the gardener arrives, tends the plot. Soon the plot is bursting with perfectly arranged blooms. “He’s only doing it because we’re here-to fool us into thinking this is a royal garden.” The gardener takes them to a royal palace, introduces the explorers to a score of officials who verify the gardener’s status. Then the skeptic tries a last resort: “Our senses are deceiving us. There is no gardener, no blooms, no palace, no officials.Antony Flew (1923-2010) was an atheist of atheists.
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