From the article: https://www.rzim.org/read/just-thinking-magazine/stephen-hawking-and-god/?inf_contact_key=43e265dddcaf61a9bd18a674ba2ade87#5.
…the statement “the universe can and will create itself from nothing” is self-contradictory. If I say, “X creates Y,” this presupposes the existence of X in the first place in order to bring Y into existence. If I say “X creates X,” I presuppose the existence of X in order to account for the existence of X. To presuppose the existence of the universe to account for its existence is logically incoherent. One might add for good measure the fact that when physicists talk about “nothing” they often mean a quantum vacuum which is manifestly not nothing.
Stephen Hawking and God by John Lennox