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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 7/23/2007 12:53 AM (GMT -6) |   | Corey:(emphasis mine)
Anyway, this seems like an awfully nice both/and. What's bothered me during this whole conversation are echoes from the Garden of "your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." But that's clearly impossible in the Essence/Energies model -- there remains an infinite essential difference between God and Man: God's transcendance. Yet at the same time, we can truly KNOW God, i.e. his immanence.
I am SO glad that you see this, Corey. Just fantabulous! 
Tom, you betta just come on IN'
"Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began."
"Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them." | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 7/23/2007 8:01 AM (GMT -6) | |
PLANIS said...
Your comments about “merit” are almost unintelligible to me POW. “Merit” (if by the term you mean “responsibility”) not prominent in the NT?
Are we in the same conversation here?
I don't know. But please join THIS conversation. The podcast said:
"Western went of track because of notion of merit. Merit is not prominent in NT. God actively present in us enabling us to perform works that are pleasing to him. That is natural -- and you don't earn anything additional for doing so. Not a form of merit, but it is a form of cooperation."
PLANIS said...
We hold agents, persons, responsible for their choices. Why? Give me a satisfactory ontological account for such responsibility. I personally don’t see how a satisfactory account of individual (as opposed to shared universal) personal responsibility can lie outside individual personal agency, and I don’t see how the requisite individual personal agency exists apart from an individual personal ontology. If I’m responsible for my choice, then the agency that tells us the responsibility stops with me must rest in an ontology of human personhood that stops with me, and all I mean by that is an ontology that’s sufficiently discrete and other than God and all other agents. Responsibility follows agency and agency follows ontology. If I’m not other than God, I can’t be a chooser who is other than God. And if I’m not a chooser who is other than God, then God is the only real chooser in the game, in which case God is solely responsible for all choices. To distribute responsibility, you have to distribute agency; and to distribute agency you have to distribute ontology, at least enough to ground agency. But when you call people divine, or God/god, you’re conflating ontology, in which case you destroy individual agency and responsibility. I'm not talking about the so-called divinized state. I'm talking about who we are right now as rational self-determining agents.
But the narrative is one of cooperation, not independence on the part of God or on our part. (Let alone the body of Christ struggling with us.) Here's clips from my typing a transcript of the podcast. We are in Paul's discussion (below) in his verses.:
Colosians 1:29
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striving according to Christ's working/energy, which is being made effective/energized within me. (two forms of word energy two times in the verse.)
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Paul is not made a pupet -- it is still his own life. Christ's energy as present in him is ALSO his own energy. Synergy -- union of energy between God and man.
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God working, and we're working through God.
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Not the same thing as partners. Our activity is not equal to God. Not two beings who are otherwise equal and separate. Anything that we do is going to be ultimately what we received the power and energy from God to do that.
Philipians 2:12-13
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"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh/energy in you God who is active in you both to will and to do/energy of his good pleasure." (same verb twice)
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Not either/or, but both/and. Exhorting Philipians to do this. Synergy.
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Work out...because it is God who is working in you. God imparts to them the energy to work out their own salvation.
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But it has to be *appropriated* by them, they have to *respond* freely as free agents, become, like Paul, a *vessel* of grace.
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They do not lose, in any way, their own reality as creatures.
Synergy.
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It is God who is the ultimate source of this reality, but we are capable of appropriating it and making it ours.
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E/W grace/works.......... Fully understanding the ENERGIA solves those debates.
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Grace must be there before man is even in a position to cooperate. Always preceeds the so-called works.
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Western went of track because of notion of merit. M. is not prominent in NT.
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God actively present in us enabling us to perform works that are pleasing to him. That is natural -- and you don't earn anything additional for doing so. Not a form of merit, but it is a form of cooperation.
1 Cor 12
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gifts of the spirit. God works/energies - performed by God. Include: faith, or ability to call Jesus Lord. Even those are gifts of the Spirit. From the ground up, from our first response to God,from that first act of faith, it is God reaching out to God. God's presence enabling us and leading us to respond to God.
Synergy.
That's the narrative. The philosophical description has to fit that. Otherwise you will be in a different discussion.
Tom, so long as you make what you say fit the above data I'll be OK with it. (Corey does a nice job below.)
(o)Post Edited (PotOnWheel) : 7/23/2007 8:13:58 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 7/23/2007 8:48 AM (GMT -6) | | | TOM,
How would you describe or sum up this? What summary statements would you make about what is described here?
Colosians 1:29
-
striving according to Christ's working/energy, which is being made effective/energized within me. (two forms of word energy two times in the verse.)
-
Paul is not made a pupet -- it is still his own life. Christ's energy as present in him is ALSO his own energy. Synergy -- union of energy between God and man.
-
God working, and we're working through God.
-
Not the same thing as partners. Our activity is not equal to God. Not two beings who are otherwise equal and separate. Anything that we do is going to be ultimately what we received the power and energy from God to do that.
Philipians 2:12-13
-
"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh/energy in you God who is active in you both to will and to do/energy of his good pleasure." (same verb twice)
-
Not either/or, but both/and. Exhorting Philipians to do this. Synergy.
-
Work out...because it is God who is working in you. God imparts to them the energy to work out their own salvation.
-
But it has to be *appropriated* by them, they have to *respond* freely as free agents, become, like Paul, a *vessel* of grace.
-
They do not lose, in any way, their own reality as creatures.
Synergy.
-
It is God who is the ultimate source of this reality, but we are capable of appropriating it and making it ours.
-
E/W grace/works.......... Fully understanding the ENERGIA solves those debates.
-
Grace must be there before man is even in a position to cooperate. Always preceeds the so-called works.
-
Western went of track because of notion of merit. M. is not prominent in NT.
-
God actively present in us enabling us to perform works that are pleasing to him. That is natural -- and you don't earn anything additional for doing so. Not a form of merit, but it is a form of cooperation.
1 Cor 12
-
gifts of the spirit. God works/energies - performed by God. Include: faith, or ability to call Jesus Lord. Even those are gifts of the Spirit. From the ground up, from our first response to God,from that first act of faith, it is God reaching out to God. God's presence enabling us and leading us to respond to God.
(o)Post Edited (PotOnWheel) : 7/23/2007 9:50:01 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 7/23/2007 9:06 AM (GMT -6) | | Theoria: Please help me know the level of metaphysical distinction that you believe that needs to occur for things to be workable.
Planis: Why turn the question back to me? I'm asking you and POW to provide us with a level of metaphysical/ontological distinction necessary for the distinction between agency required for the attributing of responsibility to individuals. If the agency I call "Tom" is just God-the-agent-contingently-expressed, then God-the-agent is the one to whom we should be attributing responsibility for my choices.
The question is how to attribute responsibility to me BUT NOT TO GOD. It's similar to the problem of attributing agency/responsibility for some movement o fan eddie TO THE EDDIE BUT NOT TO THE RIVER. You can't do it. Whatever the eddie does the river does. That's the problem of agency that you face.
Tom
Post Edited (PLANIS) : 7/23/2007 9:31:07 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 7/23/2007 9:11 AM (GMT -6) | |
PLANIS said...
I'm asking you and POW to provide us with a level of metaphysical/ontological distinction necessary for the distinction between agency required for the attributing of responsibility to individuals.
I don't compose "metaphysical/ontological distinctive" definitions. I don't know how.
But I do--and did--provide descriptive narrative. And that narrative is straight from Paul in the Bible. The best!
So the ball is in your half of the court, Tom. Answer the question, please.
(o) Post Edited (PotOnWheel) : 7/23/2007 9:14:53 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 7/23/2007 9:15 AM (GMT -6) | | | POW: I don't compose "metaphysical/ontological distinctive" definitions. I don't know how.
Tom: And neither do I know how to answer your questions of me.
I think I'll carry on a conversation regarding my concerns with D and Corey, POW. I don't know why you and I can't get on the same page. That's cool.
Have a nice day.
Tom
Post Edited (PLANIS) : 7/23/2007 9:29:45 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 7/23/2007 9:45 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom, I merely want to see a definition from you that fits the relevant passages of scripture.
I'm saying that either I'm not understanding your complicated definitions, or that your definitions don't fit the narrative.
The legacy of scholasticism is that definitions mutually reenforce one another--but this leads at times to loose touch with reality.
IT HAPPENED IN SCHOLASTIC MEDIEVAL ARCHITECTURE!
I'm just expecting you -- as a "Joe on the street" -- to begin with the scriptures that belong to us all, and work with it from there to get to the technical terms of metaphysics or ontology.
I'm just saying that as a layman I expect Christian philosophers, like you, to square what you say with Colosians 1:29, Philipians 2:12-13, and 1 Cor 12. AND to show me how that has been done.
...SINCE you don't want to do that...
Corey and D., since you both speak "philosophy" would you please translate for me?
Thanks.
B.
(o)Post Edited (PotOnWheel) : 7/23/2007 9:48:58 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 7/23/2007 9:53 AM (GMT -6) | | Corey:
The podcast pointed out that without the transcendance of God, we have pantheism. I think that's the alarm bell that keeps going off with all this "One" talk: transcendance is neglected. If we don't empasize ontological transcendence, we're practical pantheists.
This is EXACTLY why panentheism is the way that it is. It holds to God's transcendence where God is not equivalent to the world. Now that you see the essence/energies division maintains the transcendence, do you see any real problems with my description of things?
*****************************
Tom:
I'm asking you and POW to provide us with a level of metaphysical/ontological distinction necessary for the distinction between agency required for the attributing of responsibility to individuals. If the agency I call "Tom" is just God-the-agent-contingently-expressed, then God-the-agent is the one to whom we should be attributing responsibility for my choices.
The question is how to attribute responsibility to me BUT NOT TO GOD. It's similar to the problem of attributing agency/responsibility for some movement o fan eddie TO THE EDDIE BUT NOT TO THE RIVER. You can't do it. Whatever the eddie does the river does. That's the problem of agency that you face.
1) If God actually empowers every being to do what they self-dispose towards doing (good or bad), what does that say? Ask yourself this question, who gives Satan his abilities and the power to actualize his self-disposition? Isn't that God? Given the way we are created, creaturely beings have no totally independent action...because God empowers ALL to be what it is...and what it chooses.
2) I've told you, Tom. If what you are looking for is to say that "YOUR" self-disposition forms the final causality of "your" hypostatic (personal) existence, then it's already there. I already have all of the distinctions to give you what you want (absolute/relative; essence/energies; necessary/contingent; creator/created; higher-level/lower level; Logos/logoi) I don't understand what more you want.
If this is a language thing where you feel uncomfortable calling yourself "divine" in any kind of way...then I suppose that's your issue.
"Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began."
"Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them." Post Edited (Theoria) : 7/23/2007 10:05:25 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 7/23/2007 10:14 AM (GMT -6) | | Corey:
Unfortunately I don't think I'm up-to-speed on the whole conversation. In general, extrapolating from myself, I think we're concerned of the slippery slope toward pantheism. I'm remember Tom remarking once, "Nice Hinduism there bro!"
Well, if that's the case, then hopefully a more informed understanding of the essence/energies concept may be what's in order. The essence/energies concept (particularly elaborated using dispositional concepts) REMOVES this from pantheism into panENtheism. From the little that you've been seeing,would you say that, Corey? | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 7/23/2007 10:35 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom:
The question is how to attribute responsibility to me BUT NOT TO GOD. It's similar to the problem of attributing agency/responsibility for some movement o fan eddie TO THE EDDIE BUT NOT TO THE RIVER. You can't do it. Whatever the eddie does the river does. That's the problem of agency that you face.
Let's think this out. Let's say that there is an orange object that is "trapped", as it were, in the current of an eddie. Meaning that it is just going around in a circle within that eddie. The eddie's internal current is strong enough to keep the orange object within the eddie...and not flowing out to the rest of the river.
Now, if we were specifically to ask about the final causality of the particular way that the orange object was behaving in the river...which would be more appropriate: given more "responsibility" to the eddie's current (which, by definition is at some variance with the rest of the river's flow) or directly to the river itself, completely bypassing the contributions of the eddie? You couldn't completely separate the activity of the eddie from the activity of the overall river, but some healthy distinction can be made.
Tom?
**********************************
Corey:
Yes, I see that now. But I do think the language of "One" downplays or even neglects God's Otherness, his transcendance.
If one has certain presuppositions about what "oneness" is, then I could see this being an issue. But not all concepts of being "One" deal with an absolute lack of transcendence. Not even in Hinduism does that happen. Perhaps you can help give me better language that would work for people who have such a issue. I thought that UNISON was a good word, because I thought it kept "oneness" and "differentiation" in a constructive tension, where both supported each other. But then there were problems with THAT...
"Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began."
"Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them." Post Edited (Theoria) : 7/23/2007 10:38:32 AM (GMT-5) | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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Date Joined Jan 2003
Total Posts : 13888
| Posted 7/23/2007 10:47 AM (GMT -6) | | Tom:
Does this come down to "justice" for Mr. Belt?
I think it comes down more to "HOLINESS" for Tom. Not letting God be touched in any way by creaturely misrelation. Letting responsibility for sin lie on someone who is NOT God. Isn't that right, dude? | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 7/23/2007 11:51 AM (GMT -6) | | | Theoria: I think it comes down more to "HOLINESS" for Tom. Not letting God be touched in any way by creaturely misrelation. Letting responsibility for sin lie on someone who is NOT God. Isn't that right, dude?
Tom: That's a big part of it, yes. Not that I don't think God is affected by our misrelation. I'm just not going to say our misrelation IS his misrelation, even indirectly.
And there's no real difference I can see between pantheism and panentheism as you're articulating things, D. Picture two circles of the same size. One is God and one is Creation. Now overlay them. They're perfectly co-terminus. That's how you're envisioning pantheism. I agree. In pantheism God and the world are co-terminus. God just is the world, and visa-versa. And there's no more to God than there is of the universe. Now picture two circles one larger than the other. The larger one is God and the smaller one is Creation. Place the smaller one inside the larger one. Now we have panENtheism. There's more to God than there is of the world. But D, and everybody else, this isn't essentially different from pantheism, for with panentheism there's no substantial difference between God and the world so far as the world's perception of itself and its identity are concern. The world IS God in panENtheism. It's just not ALL the God there is. So, as far as who and what WE are, there's no real difference. Whether there's more to God than there is to the God that I and the rest of creation are, it's still the case that what I am is God.
POW, we're cool. Don't read too much into me. Maybe it's just a personality thing. I dunno. You don't have a lot of patience with people who don't assume your starting points. I came in here intending to have a theological/philosophical conversation, not a strictly biblical one.
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Tom
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| Posted 7/23/2007 11:57 AM (GMT -6) | | Theoria: 1) If God actually empowers every being to do what they self-dispose towards doing (good or bad), what does that say? Ask yourself this question, who gives Satan his abilities and the power to actualize his self-disposition? Isn't that God? Given the way we are created, creaturely beings have no totally independent action...because God empowers ALL to be what it is...and what it chooses.
Tom: I'm not trying to say we have to be absolutely self-sufficient agents before we can be responsible agents. I'm say we have to be more than eddies in a river.
If whatever the eddie does the river does, you don't have enough space there. If 99% of the river if flowing East and the eddie is flowing West, all that means is that 99% OF THE RIVER is flowing East and 1% OF THE SAME RIVER is flowing West. If we're eddies in God, then however infintely more there may be to God than there is to us, it remains that case that a percentage of God is misrelated, privated, evil, and fu**ed up! ;o)
Theoria: 2) I've told you, Tom. If what you are looking for is to say that "YOUR" self-disposition forms the final causality of "your" hypostatic (personal) existence, then it's already there. I already have all of the distinctions to give you what you want (absolute/relative; essence/energies; necessary/contingent; creator/created; higher-level/lower level; Logos/logoi) I don't understand what more you want.
If this is a language thing where you feel uncomfortable calling yourself "divine" in any kind of way...then I suppose that's your issue.
Tom: Maybe it's just my issue then.
Tom
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PotOnWheel
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| Posted 7/23/2007 12:57 PM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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