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Electra
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Total Posts : 611
| Posted 9/4/2003 6:15 AM (GMT -6) |   | Brett
I believe God chooses love, not as a mechanical, robotic process, but rather as a genuine free-will choice to love.
Electra
So you reduce personhood to sheer will, rather than granting that it is constituted by both nature and will (regardless of which aspect you believe is logically prior to the other)?
In your view, has God made the choice to love enough times that God's nature has been resolved as love? If so, in what sense is God still free, according to your understanding of freedom (i.e. as requiring the capacity to choose the opposite)? If not, then I don't see how you can avoid an ontological dualism--anti-love must be just as eternal as love in order for God to freely choose. Free will is an important concept to me, but not THAT important.
Realists can affirm that "God chooses love, not as a mechanical, robotic process, but rather as a genuine free-will choice to love." All this requires is that God chooses among many different loving possibilities, not that God must choose between loving and anti-loving possibilities.
Iconoclast and Brett, you seem to be either unwilling or unable to conceive of the realist position without reducing it to "God is an object." Fine. But out of respect for those who hold this position, can you at least grant their affirmation of the personhood of God, even if you can't conceive of how they can do so consistently?
Electra
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 6:34 AM (GMT -6) | | Electra:
quote:
Iconoclast and Brett, you seem to be either unwilling or unable to conceive of the realist position without reducing it to "God is an object." Fine. But out of respect for those who hold this position, can you at least grant their affirmation of the personhood of God, even if you can't conceive of how they can do so consistently?
I hear what you are saying, but I don’t think that they are intending on being disrespectful or anything like that. And I don’t think that they are saying that people with my position are DENYING the personhood of God. I think that are, more than anything, expressing the dissonance between their conception of personhood and what my position views as personhood.
In other words, I’m not interpreting the “mechanical” rhetoric as pejorative, but as the way they SEE my view. It shows the dissonance. There’s good faith all around, I believe. 
Cool,
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 6:52 AM (GMT -6) | | Electra:
quote:
In your view, has God made the choice to love enough times that God's nature has been resolved as love? If so, in what sense is God still free, according to your understanding of freedom (i.e. as requiring the capacity to choose the opposite)? If not, then I don't see how you can avoid an ontological dualism--anti-love must be just as eternal as love in order for God to freely choose.
Great stuff, Electra. What I think is being said by Iconoclast et al. is this: Following the primal choice to love, God, as an act of will, functionally solidified his “nature”…in that God made the self-covenantal decision to ALWAYS choose love and God always remains faithful to that primal choice. But all this is is applying Doc’s ideas to God. Bottom line: As long as the ULTIMATE GROUND for “solidification” is found in the person’s choice, then things are ok and the love is genuine. That’s how Doc says that compatibilistic freedom post probationary period is genuine. Doc assumes that ALL human soldified natures were ultimately the product of FREE CHOICE. Taking this idea to God, since God’s loving nature was ultimately the product of the “primal choice”, it is genuine love…even though God is not free, by either self-soldification or self-covenant, to do otherwise. Being honest, I think this would be a powerful argument would work if God were a MONAD…
HOWEVER…
The thing that kills this idea is the notion of the perichoretic Trinity. Scripture and tradition largely attest that the Father, Son, and Spirit have ALWAYS been in love relationship with each other, sharing life and knowledge among all members. To assert that a primal choice was made by all members to do this is EXTREMELY problematic. Why? Because you could easily assert that there was a state of reality in the absence of Creation LOGICALLY PRIOR to this “primal choice” being made, sequentially speaking. And what was the state of the Trinity in THIS state of reality? Morally blank? Indifferent? One would at least have to say that at that particular state of reality, it was genuinely POSSIBLE for the Father to NOT love the Son and vice versa. Big, BIG theological problems.
It’s exactly like what Ross said:
quote:
Icon says that you can't argue that there was a time before God made the choice to love because he is eternal. But the question still remains what is ontologically prior-
1. God existing in Trinity THEN the choice to love,
OR
2.God existing in Trinity and love because that is who he is in his esence
If God exists in trinity and could choose not to love, then doesn't that lead to all kinds of trouble for the Trinity (the Father not loving the Son, the Son not loving the Holy Spirit... etc.)
Exactamundo.
And everyone here DOES hold to the orthodox, historical view of the Triune God...right?  | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 7:16 AM (GMT -6) | | Backing up a bit.
Ross said:
quote:
But I would still say that love for a contingent being metaphysically necessitates the choice to not love, while for a necessary being this is not the case. God IS love, and if we are distinct created creatures, we must become love.
He said elsewhere…
quote:
I agree with you Mephi that God loves from his very being and that his love is unconditional. God is LOVE. But I think that it is problematic to think that God could have created a human being whose essence was to love, a contingent being whose nature was love.
Here are some scattered thoughts on the issue. First, God is the creator, he is the standard of what is good, what is beautiful, he is in his very being LOVE. Also, (this has been discussed many times before) God is not necessitated to any action because he is Love. He can act in many ways, all of which are loving (the doctrine of the Trinity allows us to not see creation of the world as necessary for God to express his love) Now, God decided to CREATE beings who he could enter into a loving relationship with- humanity. As such these beings must be distinct from God, even though they are held in existence by Him. So these beings have no purpose, no life, no beauty apart from their relationship with God. But because they have been created as distinct from God, their choices cannot be loving in the same way that God's are. I mean, if God had created humans who were love in their essence, then I don't see how they could be distinct from God-- it would entail a type of pantheism.
So I don't think that Doc's distinction is arbitrary, I think that it is true. (I hope you can kind of understand my ramblings above, I know what I'm thinking but it's difficult to write it down in a way that captures my thoughts on the subject)
Let’s talk about this. We agree on the God BEING love idea…but divide on the “necessary/contingent” thing. What I see you saying is this:
Ontological distinction from God requires that there be a differentiation between how God loves and how human beings love. Because God loves from God’s nature, human beings can’t do so…otherwise they would not be sufficiently distinct from God.
I can see what you are saying, I think. Here’s something. There are a number of things that make us distinct from God. First thing is our being continent while God is necessary. Second, (and kinda tied to the first), God is self-existent while we are not. Next, is our NATURES, or more particularly our essential existences are distinct from God's. Each person is UNIQUE. No two beings are completely alike nor have the same essential existences. (This even holds for persons who would be genetically identical. I could get into this, but that’s a discussion and a half!) I’d like to submit to you that even IF all human beings loved from their natures, there would still be ample distinction from God due to the two things mentioned. Thus, God creating a world where all people loved from loving natures would NOT compromise ontological distinction from God, nor create any type of pantheism.
What do you think?
PS: Ask yourself this question, at the end of Consummation, when all beings love compatibilistically, will there be a pantheism or will genuine distinctions exist between God and others?
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Iconoclast
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| Posted 9/4/2003 11:09 AM (GMT -6) | | rossfadeinout
Icon says that you can't argue that there was a time before God made the choice to love because he is eternal. But the question still remains what is ontologically prior-
1. God existing in Trinity THEN the choice to love,
OR
2.God existing in Trinity and love because that is who he is in his esence
Iconoclast
If you accept my definition that God is self-determined then there is no question regarding what is ontologically prior. And how exactly COULD we as finite non-eternal beings even begin to try and answer what is ontologically prior to God's nature? Why, the only way we could possibly answer this is in accordance to what is ontologically prior to OUR nature. But THIS is the key issue to begin with. We all agree that HUMANS need to choose love. We are trying to understand what it means for an eternal being to choose love which is part of His nature. How can we possibly base an answer to this on logic that we lift from our own nature and what is ontologically prior to it?
My #1 claim in this argument is that there is no valid basis to suggest that Love is NOT chosen by God based on the phrase "God is love." That to try and do so is rampant speculation about the author's intent of this phrase and about the ontological meaning of an eternal being.
My #2 claim in this argument is that since we CAN postulate a rational concept of how an eternal being could choose love as part of His nature then there is no reason to even speculate that love is not necessarily chosen.
The primary objection to this is the assertion that there MUST be a "logical point" where love was not chosen in the ontological development of God.
John Earp and I both assert that this logic presupposes an “objectness” to God because it forces Him into an “ontological development” process through a sequence of “growth”.
Here is how John says it:
quote:
And what you would have us to believe, Meph, is that God is not eternal, for you require him to be "in sequence" for him to choose to love. Therefore it is your own presupposition that requires your conclusion; i.e., for God to freely choose love he necessarily must have at some time been a moral blank slate.
and Meph’s response is:
quote:
The eternality of God is not the issue. We are talking about LOGICAL, SEQUENTIAL states of reality in God’s eternal existence. That’s the difference. We cannot speak in terms of time when speaking about God in the absence of Creation. We can only talk about LOGICAL SEQUENCE. Because in talking about sequence, we doesn’t NEED the idea of “time” for our discussion to be coherent, necessarily.
The fundamental disconnect here is what the meaning of “eternal” is. “LOGICAL, SEQUENTIAL states of reality in God’s eternal existence” is a phrase that is compatible with Meph’s concept of eternal whereas it is not compatible with John’s or my concept of eternal.
In my view “LOGICAL, SEQUENTIAL states of reality” IS the very definition of TIME. Time by definition IS a sequence of states of reality. Thus, when I hear this phrase it immediately puts God’s ontological development into time and thus denies that God is eternal. Moreover it presupposes a LOGICALLY FIRST state of reality whereby God has some primal characteristics without His other characteristics. These primal characteristics seem to me to be described as “object-like” characteristics rather than “person-like” characteristics.
thanks,
Iconoclast
"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 11:09 AM (GMT -6) | | Iconoclast:
quote:
I think the key problem here is in the conceptualization of "necessary" being.
I would like to hear a definition of what this concept means.
Sure. Simply put, God is the only being that IF can be conceived, can only be conceivable as existent. God exists necessarily. Restated, God is the ONLY necessary existent. [There’s a LOT of discussion that has taken place with this thought. TONS. Ask Doc.]
Now, the thing with a necessary being is this. Concerning it’s essential existence, it CANNOT be other than what it is. Why? Because it’s a NECESSARY existent. For the being to be capable of being fundamentally OTHER than what it is would make that being CONTINGENT. Now, does this mean that said being cannot have any aspect of contingency? Not at all. What is being said is that there IS no contingency with respect to its essential existence.
So, insofar as we say that a “loving nature” is linked to God’s essential existence, we must say that God, the necessary being, God, has this loving nature NECESSARILY.
I hope this is kinda clear.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 11:35 AM (GMT -6) | | For Iconoclast:
Render coherent the idea of the TRIUNE GOD (A being with ONE essence and THREE persons) who ALWAYS naturally loved and shared love in an interpenetrating fashion…being reconciled with the idea of the Triune God CHOOSING to love which BECOMES God’s nature.
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 11:38 AM (GMT -6) | | Ross:
quote:
PS Doc said in an earlier post that Tatian had shown that love for a contingent being required freedom. I was hoping to read the original document at Christian Classics Etheral Library.
Ross, I didn’t know if you knew, but I argued against this idea on page 1 of this thread. You can find the gist of Tatian’s argument there. 
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Electra
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Total Posts : 611
| Posted 9/4/2003 11:43 AM (GMT -6) | | Iconoclast
If you accept my definition that God is self-determined then there is no question regarding what is ontologically prior. And how exactly COULD we as finite non-eternal beings even begin to try and answer what is ontologically prior to God's nature?
Electra
I have no idea how to begin to answer the question of “what is ontologically prior to God's nature?” However, I have been suggesting that pursuing the question of whether nature or will has logical priority within God’s personhood might yield some fruitful results.
Iconoclast
Why, the only way we could possibly answer this is in accordance to what is ontologically prior to OUR nature. But THIS is the key issue to begin with. We all agree that HUMANS need to choose love. We are trying to understand what it means for an eternal being to choose love which is part of His nature. How can we possibly base an answer to this on logic that we lift from our own nature and what is ontologically prior to it?
Electra
Leaving aside the issue of what is ontologically prior, as I have said before, since human nature is unresolved, our choices both reflect this ambiguity and serve to reinforce our natures one way or another insofar as we are creatures of habit. But since God’s nature is and always has been love, all of God’s free choices perfectly reflect and reinforce this.
Iconoclast
My #1 claim in this argument is that there is no valid basis to suggest that Love is NOT chosen by God based on the phrase "God is love." That to try and do so is rampant speculation about the author's intent of this phrase and about the ontological meaning of an eternal being.
Electra
This is very confusing to me. Who is suggesting "that Love is NOT chosen by God"? People from both views have speculated about what "God is love" means, but I don't see anyone basing their case on an appeal to authorial intent. People from both views have speculated about ontology and the meaning of an eternal being. These speculations—on both views—seem valid enough to me (indeed, how are they avoidable, given the topic?). And they by no means exhaust or even represent the arguments that have been offered in support of the realist view.
Iconoclast
My #2 claim in this argument is that since we CAN postulate a rational concept of how an eternal being could choose love as part of His nature then there is no reason to even speculate that love is not necessarily chosen.
Electra
No one denies that God chooses love. Whereas nominalists hold that God could choose NOT to love, realists claim that love is all God ever could or would choose.
Electra
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John Earp
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| Posted 9/4/2003 12:21 PM (GMT -6) | | As the Bible clearly and consistently represents ALL the members of the Trinity as acting in unity (with the possible exception of Jesus' apparent hesitation and then resolution of his previous submission to the will of the Father in Gethsemane), I don't see that the perichoresis/interpenetration of the members of the Trinity presents a more difficult problem for this issue than simply saying "God always has chosen to love." If it is true of one it is true of all three. To say they could have chosen not to love each other is to deny their essential unity of mind and will. In my view, they are ONE in essence (which is Spirit--John 4:24), and ONE in mind, will, and emotion.
I affirm the traditional doctrine of the trinitarian nature of God.
I also second Iconoclast's points above. My thoughts exactly. This issue, to my mind, has enormous consequences for one's concept of personhood, morality, Christian holiness, etc. If God tells us "be holy for I am holy," when in fact that would be utterly impossible due to our lack of a holy nature, I honestly do not see how God's moral commands to us are in any way possible to be obeyed or coherent. He may as well tell us "be everywhere present for I am everywhere present" if one confounds his moral attributes with his natural attributes.
P.S. I am sorry if my comments have recently appeared rude. This afternoon I realized that I was probably allowing myself to get too worked up about this, and when that happens I often tend to overlook the feelings of others. Being heavily weighted in my personality towards rationalism, I sometimes don't realize how I come across to people. Anyway, I am sorry if my comments have come across as unloving or unkind.
"The Discovery of new truth will modify old views and opinions, and there is perhaps no end to this process with finite minds in any world." Charles G. Finney, Systematic Theology.
revivaltheology.net
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 5:59 PM (GMT -6) | | John:
quote:
This issue, to my mind, has enormous consequences for one's concept of personhood, morality, Christian holiness, etc. If God tells us "be holy for I am holy," when in fact that would be utterly impossible due to our lack of a holy nature, I honestly do not see how God's moral commands to us are in any way possible to be obeyed or coherent. He may as well tell us "be everywhere present for I am everywhere present" if one confounds his moral attributes with his natural attributes.
How about instead of saying “moral” and “natural” attributes, you say “communicable” and “incommunicable” The communicable attributes of God are those that we have some way of emulating, like love, wisdom, kindness, etc. The incommunicable attributes are those things that no one but God can possess, like omniscience, omnipresence, etc.
Now here’s the problem, John. You seem to want to say that love is an INCOMMUNICABLE attribute of God. That to the extent we say God's nature is loving, it puts being loving out of our reach. But love is NOT an incommunicable attribute...even though it is a part of God's nature. So, just because we say that love is a part of God’s essential existence does NOT cause problems. As far as “holiness”, we DO understand that holiness has multiple meanings, right? Holiness can refer to the COMPLETE OTHERNESS of God (which would of course be incommunicable). But it can also refer to purity of some kind, which IS somewhat communicable.
But I want to make sure we get things right on the MAIN issue for this discussion: love. God’s moral attributes CAN BE part of God’s nature AND be communicable to human beings. So, it should not cause you a problem to say that God’s nature is loving, on this score.
*******************************
Iconoclast:
quote:
Meph, what are the implications if what you are saying is true? Is one of the implications that God CAN indeed turn people who have not chosen to love God into people who do love God? Is this your target?
My intent was to go about dealing with BJS’s question
Implication 1: It is UNQUALIFIABLY true that after the Consummation, when we are no longer able to choose anti-love because we will only be compatibilistically free, our love will DEFINITELY be genuine.
Implication 2: The free-will defense doesn’t work ultimately to solve the theodicy problem.
Implication 3: God’s choice to create an open Creation was NOT a matter of metaphysical necessity concerning the nature of love in context of contingent beings (The driving assumption of the free-will defense) It was a matter of God’s will and desire to have an open Creation exist.
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 6:07 PM (GMT -6) | | Iconoclast:
quote:
Meph's argument is entirely based on the assumption that it is valid to condition the meaning of love based on "God is love."
I contend that it is NOT CORRECT for Christians to contour their understanding of love on our CURRENT human experience. Let’s be honest. The MAJOR reason that people hold to the “love requires freedom” thing is because this is where our human intutions lead us. And I would agree with that. BUT, it is completely erroneous to judge how love works by our current human experience…especially when we have reason to believe that we are ESCHATOLOGICAL creatures who have not yet experienced humanness to the full. Check my earlier post when I said this. When Christ comes, we shall be LIKE him. We are talking radical transformation. We will EXPERIENCE what it’s like to love God without being ABLE to choose anti-love. We MUST keep this in mind. So, between our eschatological experience and God’s experience of love within the Trinity, I believe that we have AMPLE reason to at least question the “love requires freedom” thing.
At base, all I’m trying to argue is that, given EVERYTHING, we have good reason to believe that love does not NECESSARILY require the freedom to choose against love.
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BJS
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| Posted 9/4/2003 6:16 PM (GMT -6) | | Sheesh, people. How is I s'posed to catch up? 
Electra
No one denies that God chooses love. Whereas nominalists hold that God could choose NOT to love, realists claim that love is all God ever could or would choose.
BJS
But if love is the only option that God ever had, how was it a choice? A choice between what and what?
Iconoclast
And from THERE Meph will then argue that since we know of one case where love is love even though it was NOT chosen that therefore such a thing as "compatibilistic love" CAN exist and therefore God CAN make "loving robots."
Which is a good question to ask here.
Meph, what are the implications if what you are saying is true? Is one of the implications that God CAN indeed turn people who have not chosen to love God into people who do love God? Is this your target?
BJS
A very good question.
BJS
Meph has made a strong case for inconsistency in the TWT 1 thesis. I.e., if God can genuinely love without freedom, then why can't humanity?
But I wonder if we are mistaken to try to apply the same definition of "genuine" love to both God and man? Can we say that God's love does not require freedom, but ours does? Let me put it this way: As created beings, our moral capabilities were at some point fashioned. That is, the Creator decided what our moral capabilities would be. If our only moral capability was to choose God, we would be moral automatons and could not be considered to genuinely love him. THerefore, God had to give us the moral capability to NOT choose love (freedom) if he wanted the possibility of genuine love from us.
But God, as the only eternal and preternal being, was never "fashioned." God's moral capabilities were never at some point in time decided. They just were. [I know, I know, maybe I'm a realist after all. . .I'm just thinking out loud here!] Therefore, God's love did not require freedom in the way that our love requires it, because God's love is original. It was not dictated by anything other than Godself.
So, created beings require freedom to choose love, because if they did not have freedom, they would necessarily be being forced by their Creator. But the CreatOR's love does not require "freedom" because there is no other higher being that it needed the freedom from.
Am I making any sense at all? Don't answer that. I need sleep.
Brett
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Iconoclast
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| Posted 9/4/2003 6:29 PM (GMT -6) | | MephEternal
Now, the thing with a necessary being is this. Concerning it’s essential existence, it CANNOT be other than what it is. Why? Because it’s a NECESSARY existent. For the being to be capable of being fundamentally OTHER than what it is would make that being CONTINGENT.
...
So, insofar as we say that a “loving nature” is linked to God’s essential existence, we must say that God, the necessary being, God, has this loving nature NECESSARILY.
Iconoclast
Lets say love = "chosen for'ness" = being for others out of choice.
Then we could say that God is necessarily "chosen for'ness" and that He could not be other than this. Thus God could not be for Himself or others without having chosen to be for Himself or others. And God could not be against Himself or others out of choice or non-choice.
I have no problem conceptualizing this. It makes sense to me.
It seems that it would NOT make sense to someone only under the assumption that a "choice" requires a clear sequence of states whereby in the first state one had clearly not chosen and in the second state one had clearly chosen.
I think the key disagreement is about the nature of choice related to an eternal being.
If choice requires a sequence of states then choice can never be a part of God's essential existence. Why? Because God's essential existence can never include any choice. All choices God made CANNOT be part of His essential existence. Thus, God can in no way be self-determined in His essence. God essence just WAS. It did not come from God.
Every choice God made is then NOT part of His essential existence. Thus, God cannot change His essence. God cannot self-determine Himself for God's essence cannot be made up of anything that God determined.
So, God just found Himself with the potential to be alive and then started living by making choices.
I wonder if God ever wonders where He came from.
This really gets down to the question, is God self-determined or not.
I say an eternal being that by definition IS life and IS love (which I think are inseparable) MUST be self-determined.
God's necessary essence is that He is self-determined AND that He has self-determined that He is life and He is love. God cannot be other than self-determined - He cannot be other than self-determined life and self-determined love.
thanks,
Iconoclast
"The benefit overran the merit the first day, and has overrun the merit ever since. The merit itself, so-called, I reckon part of the receiving." - Ralph Waldo Emerson | | Back to Top | | |
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One Love
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| Posted 9/4/2003 7:32 PM (GMT -6) | | BJS:
quote:
Can we say that God's love does not require freedom, but ours does? Let me put it this way: As created beings, our moral capabilities were at some point fashioned. That is, the Creator decided what our moral capabilities would be. If our only moral capability was to choose God, we would be moral automatons and could not be considered to genuinely love him. THerefore, God had to give us the moral capability to NOT choose love (freedom) if he wanted the possibility of genuine love from us.
and…
quote:
So, created beings require freedom to choose love, because if they did not have freedom, they would necessarily be being forced by their Creator. But the CreatOR's love does not require "freedom" because there is no other higher being that it needed the freedom from.
But see where the presupposition comes in? “If our only moral capability was to choose God, we would be moral automatons and could not be considered to genuinely love him.” ON WHAT GROUNDS can this be said? Do you know for CERTAIN that God wouldn’t be able to accept this love as genuine…as genuine as God’s OWN love? I think this line of thinking betrays our OWN ideas of love that are completely immeshed with freedom. Think about it, Brett. There’s no reason truly to say that God wouldn’t accept the love of a created being who had an unchangably loving nature. No reason at all. EXCEPT our presuppositions about what God SHOULD not accept.
Look at the language. “automatons” “forced” See that? Those presuppositions governed by our intuitions!
Get some sleep. Heh.
"I've been converted three times. The first was to traditional Christianity; the second to honesty and the third was to the Love of God and man (humanity) The third was the real conversion. The first two were preliminary."
--Nels Ferre, a theologian speaking of his spiritual journey with the Triune God
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GregBoyd
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| Posted 9/5/2003 3:03 AM (GMT -6) | | [Icon: God cannot be other than self-determined - He cannot be other than self-determined life and self-determined love.
Doc: Note the paradox: If God cannot be other than self-determined, he must have self-determined that he would be self-determined, which means he could have been non-self-determined, which means it is false that "God cannot be other than self-determined."
Consider this: If God could have been non-loving, by what standard would he have been judged so? What ontologically GROUNDS this standard?
I submit that once we logically separate "love" or "life" from the essential nature of God, we fall into ultimate pluralism of a rampantly irrational sort, for we posit a) a plurality of ultimate realities which b) have no ontological grounding. I, with Meph, would argue it makes more sense, especially for monotheists, to understand the ultimate standard of love, goodness, life, etc… as being IDENTICLE with God’s essential nature.
Meph: I contend that it is NOT CORRECT for Christians to contour their understanding of love on our CURRENT human experience. Let’s be honest. (Doc: NO, we want to be DISHONEST! ) The MAJOR reason that people hold to the "love requires freedom" thing is because this is where our human intutions lead us. And I would agree with that. BUT, it is completely erroneous to judge how love works by our current human experience…
Doc: The fact that that the notion of contingent beings necessarily loving is strongly counterintuitive is one reason to judge the notion mistaken. But I think it is more than that. I think it is logically incoherent. Perhaps I could get at the contradiction this way.
I) The meaning of being a non-necessary (contingent) person involves being a center of volition. That about which you cannot be otherwise is that about which you cannot be personal.
2) Love can only come from persons.
Erog: Contingent persons must choose love for their love to be personal.
The analogy that demonstrates this is this: Suppose I secretly put a nueron-controlling micro-chip in my wifes brain while she slept. It is programmed to cause her to think only loving thoughts, feel only loving feelings and thus engage only in loving behavior to me. And it is so sophisticated, it leaves in tact her SENSATION of being free in tact. Would I consider her love for me to be genuine?
On your scheme, Meph, NOTHING essential has changed. Chosen love and programmed love are both genuine. But "lets be honest,"  has not EVERYTHING changed. SHE is no longer loving me. The micro-chip is loving me. And since I programmed the microchip, this means that I am simply loving myself through her.
Tell me how things are different for God if God "programs" a contingent being to love him. And why? Because she is no longer a "person" who is choosing to love me.
BJS: Can we say that God's love does not require freedom, but ours does? Let me put it this way: As created beings, our moral capabilities were at some point fashioned. That is, the Creator decided what our moral capabilities would be. If our only moral capability was to choose God, we would be moral automatons and could not be considered to genuinely love him.
Doc: Bingo. See above.
Icon: I think there is a HUGE difference between being ABLE to make an eternal choice (make a choice "stick") and being UNABLE to choose differently.In one case you are AT CHOICE and able to maintain that choice. In the other you have had your brain removed and are now a robot.
Doc: Bingo again. Hence there is a world of difference between beings who have ARRIVED at a loving character and beings who are CREATED with a necessarily loving character.
.
Meph:
Implication 1: It is UNQUALIFIABLY true that after the Consummation, when we are no longer able to choose anti-love because we will only be compatibilistically free, our love will DEFINITELY be genuine.
Implication 2: The free-will defense doesn’t work ultimately to solve the theodicy problem.
Implication 3: God’s choice to create an open Creation was NOT a matter of metaphysical necessity concerning the nature of love in context of contingent beings (The driving assumption of the free-will defense) It was a matter of God’s will and desire to have an open Creation exist.
Doc: The hypothesis that love need not be chosen is not needed for implication #1 if you admit that as a matter of fact (if not necessity) at least one being can be created with libertarian free will regarding love and end up being eternally resolved as a loving being.
Regarding implication #2 and #3: What you are asking us to buy is a way of thinking which
a) you admit is counter-intuitive, at best
b) destroys the only adequate explanation for evil (the free will defense)
c) renders unintelligible the fact that God created a risky open creation when he could have done otherwise
d) renders unintelligible the fact that God created beings who may be lost when he could have ensured their salvation – though he desperately WANTS all to be saved.
The main reason we adopt views is that they render intelligible aspects of reality that would be otherwise intelligible. And on this score, good friend, I must say that I see no reason to adopt your view. Even if it WAS coherent to suppose that contingent beings could love necessarily, I would think it reasonable to assume that it must not be so if for no other reason than the fact that assuming they MUST choose love explains so much, whereas assuming they don’t have to choose explains nothing and in fact creates more problems.
What an interesting discussion. I find myself agreeing with Meph on the necessity of love in God, and with Icon and John on the necessity of love being chosen among contingent creatures. But for this very reason, I find myself disagreeing with Meph on the necessity of love being chosen among contingent creatures and with Icon and John on the necessity of love being libertarianly chosen by God.
Doc
"The responsibility is with the chooser -- God is blameless." Plato, Republic, 10. | | Back to Top | | |
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Electra
Registered Member
Date Joined Feb 2002
Total Posts : 611
| Posted 9/5/2003 4:17 AM (GMT -6) | | Doc
I) The meaning of being a non-necessary (contingent) person involves being a center of volition. That about which you cannot be otherwise is that about which you cannot be personal.
2) Love can only come from persons.
Erog: Contingent persons must choose love for their love to be personal.
Electra
I agree with #2, but I can’t go with #I. I agree that “being a non-necessary (contingent) person involves being a center of volition.” But I would not reduce personhood to will.
Do you deny that both nature and will are constituative of personhood? Does the doctrine of creation (that God created human beings “good”) or the doctrine of original sin (that human beings became “fallen”) have any bearing on my personhood? I did not choose either of these things.
Does the fact that I am a white, female, middle class, firstborn, midwestern American have any bearing on my personhood? I did not choose any of these things. In fact, I did not have a say in many of the things that make me “me.” Does the fact that I chose to wear blue jeans this morning—just like millions and millions of other people have done for decades—make me a person whereas all these unchosen factors are just meaningless “programming”? [Note: Now that I know what it is like to be on the other side of it, I will never resort to this robot rhetoric again.]
I agree that love can only come from persons. But even if I could not do other than love, the fact that “I” am doing the love makes it genuine. It is up to me to decide how I will express my love. My distinctiveness means that no matter how many other people love my neighbor, no one else will love him the way I will. And no matter how many opportunities I have to express my love for my neighbor, it will never be “robotic” insofar as “I” am deciding how I will love him—over and over again.
On top of this, my distinctiveness is not the only factor—so is my neighbor’s. If I love him I will express my own distinctiveness in a way that cherishes and empowers his distinctiveness. If a person is loving by nature, their will contends with endless possibilities for expressing and reinforcing this nature. I don’t see how the added drama of having to be able to choose anti-love jeopardizes the personhood of someone who is loving by nature.
Electra
Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing. ~ Dostoevsky | | Back to Top | | |
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