> The remark is a conundrum and, if not deliberately farcical, insulting.
I don't think he was being either farcical or insulting. I think he was using an unanswerable conundrum as a way of challenging his listeners to expand their thinking.
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“If one believed that the universe had a beginning, the obvious question was, what happened before the beginning,” Hawking said. “What was God doing before He made the world? Was He preparing hell for people who asked such questions?”
According to Hawking, the origin of the universe can be depicted as bubbles in a steam in boiling water.
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There are a number of implied preconditions in the "God" paragraph that rely on the natural thought process of accepting sequential time based events as factual constructs of our reality and likewise the ultimate reality of all things including God's place in time. It's a silly paragraph and the 'hell' reference is curious. The article reports that Hawking is apparently committed to the idea of the ultimate beginning, or as stated, an 'origin'. If he does in fact believe there was a 'beginning', then there can be no God unless God created Godself from nothing.
I have no idea what Hawking's views are regarding God. I'm making comments on the article in isolation of anything else. Furthermore, I mean not to challenge your point of view on the subject in general.
One thing that has to be recognized about Hawking, is that all he can do for himself is think. He's not hung up on his sex life, his tennis serve, high-powered sports cars, or the latest gourmet kitchen design. We should pray for him, and not attach evil connotations to things he says.