To talk of 'God' one must understand the concept of 'God'

First, in order to understand talk about God, whether or not that talk takes the form of a proof, one must be able to understand the concept “God.” But there are very different possible conceptions of what it is to understand the concept “God,” in a way that has no analogue in the case of, say, a mathematical proof.

Secondly, even if one understands the concept “God,” to accept any of the traditional proofs, one has to find a connection between that concept and the highly theoretical philosophical principles involved in those proofs, premises about conditioned and unconditioned existence, and about what sorts of necessity there are.

Some of the most profound religious thinkers of the last two hundred years (particularly the religious existentialists from Kierkegaard to Buber) have had no use at all for this sort of philosophizing;

 What the traditional proofs of the existence of God in fact do is connect the concerns of two different salvific enterprises: the enterprise of ancient and medieval philosophy, which, after all, is the source of the materials for these proofs, and the enterprise of monotheistic religion. While it is certainly possible to have a deeply worthwhile religious attitude that combines these two elements—indeed, the effort to do so has contributed profoundly to Judaism as well as to Christianity and Islam—it is also possible to have a deeply fulfilling religious attitude while keeping far away from metaphysics. A second familiar response to religious skeptic