Divine love and nonbelief › What the original book claimed, and what changed

The original book speaks of reasonable or inculpable nonbelief. Here, reasonable does not simply mean that an argument for atheism sounds persuasive. It concerns nonbelief not culpably produced by the person. Schellenberg's later formulations focus more narrowly on nonresistant nonbelief. His retrospective “Précis” explains why the change matters: general faultlessness is a stronger requirement than the argument needs. The relevant resistance is resistance to God that causes the person's nonbelief. Schellenberg, “Précis,” author-hosted version, pp. 2–4.

Someone may be careless about an unrelated obligation yet not be avoiding God. Conversely, someone may sincerely report openness while their nonbelief partly results from avoidance they do not recognize. The later category concerns the causal role of resistance, rather than whether a person has an otherwise admirable character. We should therefore avoid equating nonresistance with an absence of conscious hostility, or with an impressive record of religious effort.

In the account that follows, the original book supplies the starting point and the later writings clarify the formulation. This distinction prevents us from silently assigning every later term to the earlier text. Schellenberg also later makes the intended necessity of the central conceptual premises more explicit: he regards them as requirements of perfect love, rather than as predictions based on what God usually prefers to do.

That last distinction broadens the inquiry. Schellenberg discusses former believers whose investigations eroded a belief they wanted to retain. He also discusses people for whom theism has never been a live option. A lack of acquaintance with the concept of a perfectly loving creator does not automatically exclude someone. The question is whether the person has the relevant capacities for relationship, not whether their culture has already supplied the required theological vocabulary. “What Divine Hiddenness Reveals,” section I.