Jordan Peterson's Thoughts on God

Added: 2026-05-12

[00:00:00]I'm not an atheist anymore >> [music] >> cuz I don't look at the world that way anymore.

[00:00:06]I'm not a materialist anymore.

[00:00:08]I don't think the world's made out of matter.

[00:00:11]I think it's made out of what matters.

[00:00:13]The facts are that the the the world of experience as it presents itself to us is literally and not metaphorically complex beyond our capacity to understand.

[00:00:25]And that [music] means that people deal in a real sense on an ongoing basis with the infinite. And I believe that that fact is the reason why religious experience is essentially >> [music] >> and belief is essentially endemic to mankind. Partly what has to be provided to individuals as they mature into an adult adults is some kind of [music] ordering structure.

[00:00:48]And this is one of the facts that people who [music] criticize the dogmatic element of religious belief don't really understand. They They don't [music] understand that you have to provide people with a determinate structure of some type, even if it's constricting and and restricting [music] and and crushing for that matter. You have to pass through a disciplinary structure before [music] and even in principle you could be free.

[00:01:11]You can't live without it. You die. You get stultified. You get cynical. You get nihilistic or you adopt some wild belief system if you don't have the attachment to some genuine life-giving meaning in your own life. I don't care what you think. Doesn't matter what you think. The world is such a terrible [music] place that no interpretation whatsoever can possibly suffice. That's nihilism. No meaning system whatsoever can possibly suffice.

[00:01:39]Well, what's the flaw? Well, the flaw is well, of course no system of coherent belief can suffice because most of the world's transcendent. You can't encapsulate everything that is in your sphere of belief. And what you might say then is that if you ever believed that what you believe is what should support you, the facts you know say, or the interpretation you place in the world, then your faith is badly misplaced. It's easier for me to believe in the reality of malevolence and evil and to be terrified about that getting a grip on me than it is to be optimistic and naive about the possibility of transcendent good. I mean, I've taken the idea of God seriously for a very long time.

[00:02:23]And I've said on multiple occasions that I try to act as though God exists and that that's essentially my definition of belief. When people say, "Do you believe in God?" There There's a question you hate.

[00:02:33]And it's do you believe in God?

[00:02:35]>> People what people usually want, Christians [music] do this to me mostly, what they really want is they want me to validate their theory of belief. [music] And they don't even know they have a theory of belief because they think what belief is is [music] obvious and it's not obvious at all. Like, is belief your willingness to verbally assent to the reality of a set of facts? [music] Does you're a Christian?

[00:02:57]You say that. I haven't claimed that.

[00:02:59]Either you're a Christian or you're not.

[00:03:01]Which [music] one is it? I I could be either of them, but I don't have to tell you.

[00:03:05]>> be you. That isn't a helpful question.

[00:03:07]It's not formulated properly. And then there's many other forms of belief. You can say one thing and do another.

[00:03:14]Right? Then you might say, "Well, then what do you believe? Do you believe what you say or do you believe what you did?"

[00:03:19]And I mean, people are full of contradictions like that.

[00:03:21]>> [music] >> Belief is a multidimensional word >> Mhm.

[00:03:26]and the question one question is, "Well, what do you mean by believe?" And for me, the proof of belief is to be found in action. And And this has nothing to do with belief.

[00:03:36]Whatever God is is ineffable and beyond being and becoming, beyond.

[00:03:41]>> Yeah. Right? And Moses himself, he gets a glimpse of God in the burning bush and he gets another glimpse. All he sees is God's back between, you know, a narrow portal through two rocks cuz that's all he can stand.

[00:03:52]>> Yeah. I am who I am. I am who I was. I am who I will be. That's all in that phrase. It's the spirit of It's the spirit that underlies being and becoming itself. The difference, and C.S. Lewis pointed this out as well, the difference between those mythological gods and Christ was that there's a there's a representation of there's a historical representation of his of of his existence as well. Now, you can debate whether or not that's genuine.

[00:04:19]There's a sense in which it doesn't matter because there's still a historical story, and so what you have in the figure of Christ is an actual person who actually lived plus a myth, and in some sense Christ is the union of those two things. What is the god you believe in?

[00:04:35]I think that the claim that Christ [music] is the embodiment of the prophet and the laws, I think that's true. Okay.

[00:04:41]Yeah.

[00:04:43]That's That's complicated. It's very, very complicated, but I think it's true.

[00:04:47]The problem is is I probably believe that, but I don't know. I don't I'm amazed at my own belief, and I don't understand it. Like because I've seen >> [snorts] >> sometimes the objective [snorts] world and the narrative world touch.

[00:05:14]You know, that's the Union synchronicity.

[00:05:17]And I've seen that many times in my own life.

[00:05:21]And so in some sense, I believe it's undeniable. You know, we have a narrative sense of the world. For me, that's been the world of morality.

[00:05:28]That's the world that tells us how to act. It's real. Like, we treat it like it's real. It's not the objective world.

[00:05:36]But the narrative and the objective world touch, and the ultimate example of that in principle is supposed to be Christ. But I still don't know what to make of it. It's too It partly cuz it's too terrifying a reality to fully believe. I don't even know what would happen to you if you fully believed it. Well, then you look at what are What are you called upon?

[00:05:57]Let's say if you're going to proclaim yourself as a believer, you know. Here's what you're committing to. Painful unjust death accompanied by betrayal, the perversity of the mob, and the dominion of the tyrant.

[00:06:11]And you're going to welcome that.

[00:06:13]And that's not all because Christ harrowed hell. That's not all. That's just where it starts. Full confrontation with malevolence. That's what Christ calls upon people to do. That's the imitation of Christ that's at the core of a genuine Christian commitment.

[00:06:28]Crucified voluntary confrontation accepted in in good faith with joy and courageously.

[00:06:37]Bring it on. Make the proper sacrifices.

[00:06:40]That's the Cain and Abel story. It's like maybe you sacrifice your children to God. That That was the story. Um that's the one of the next stories that comes up, of course. And you think, "Well, that's pretty damn barbaric." And the way the story's laid out, of course, it is. But you get your ark in order.

[00:06:57]That's your family, let's say, so that when the storms come, you can stay above water for the 40 days of flooding. And you're capable of leading your people through the desert when the desert makes itself manifest. And you can escape from tyranny properly cuz you're wise enough to see it. And you take the full burden of being on yourself, all the suffering that's that's part and parcel of that.

[00:07:20]You accept that voluntarily, let's say.

[00:07:23]And you do everything you can [music] to confront the malevolence that's part of you and that's part of the state and that's part of the world. And you you you make a garden around you. That's the paradise, a walled garden. It's a walled well-watered place, so the forces of nature and society exist together in harmony. And you place your family in that so that they can live properly, and you treat your enemy as if he's yourself, and the same with your brother. And well, then you can say then maybe you can say maybe then you have the right to say that you believe in God.