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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/27/2001 9:06 AM (GMT -6) |   | quote:
If we are so often encouraged by God to envision God's power differently than by quantities of control, it seems we ought to take that to heart and demote the "implications" in terms of finite power in some way. It is ALWAYS true that one idea ties into many related ideas, but this does not mean that we should sacrifice the coherence of what we know for sure with regard to the original idea being spoken of, here, of course, I refer to omnipotence as discussed above.
Strikes me that you are describing an icon: "envision God's power differently than by quantities of control". These pictures are "windows" insofar as they show two things together: the saint triumphant; the Virgin conceived; the waiting Simeon having "seen".
quote:
There's an intuition here that I am trying to express, but apparently not well. I think I am starting to see why so much of the church historically was involved in apophatic theology. Words just don't cut it for so much of theology. Don't get me wrong!! I am not recommending this stuff as an apologetic strategy! Far from it! But eventually, people will come to see that to some extent, if they came to faith through logical argumentation, then they were "decieved into the truth" as SK was found of saying.
Yup! You are describing an icon. They are pointed in what they ARE saying; and they leave out every non-essential that might mislead. Also and therefore, any little detail that is inserted carries great power.
Modes: "I am not recommending this stuff as an apologetic strategy!" No, apologeticisms are for everything-else. On what matters it is pointed and powerful, unfettered.
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Modes of Thought
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Total Posts : 817
| Posted 10/27/2001 9:24 AM (GMT -6) | | 
Is there such a thing as a verbal icon?
Is that what a parable is?
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/27/2001 5:26 PM (GMT -6) | | Modes: Is there such a thing as a verbal icon?
Boy, what a question! I'd like to think of a way to say yes. Hmmmmm. (Stay tuned!)
Mostly for parables what comes to mind is the literary form -- having one single point. That's not helpful of me. But I won't give up on considering verbiage.
How's this, Modes. What if we include liturgy, and see whether there is any "verbal iconography" in liturgy. Maybe. But how will we know? How to not lower standards just to get a false positive!
Well, to do that we begin with a joke, of course. (a dumb one) Liturgy, worship and iconography are probably at least a little bit like that lightbulb in the psychiatrist's office -- gotta really want to...... [sound of mouses clicking, browsers searching, etc.]
What do I mean? Well, it is not just a matter of how much people want something to be an icon. Nor is it how emotional something is. And icon, in my humble definition above functions as a window to reality not otherwise evident. Not "a" reality. The reality.
A Cross is a nice example of an icon. Sometimes. When people process to the front of the church and kiss a cross and hear the priest say "Christ is among us" and they reply "He is and ever more shall be." a LOT is happening! Here is the contradiction (WHICH IS WHY IT FITS WITH YOUR ABOVE POSTS, MODES.) of an instrument of death proclaiming life. The Cross is celebrated liturgically as the "Life Giving Cross." During the Pascal season the Priest says, "Christ is Risen." and the laity (which is also an office) reply, "Indeed he is risen." We worship a risen Lord. The rest of the year the "among us" of Christ is proclaimed. As an icon, then, we can understand how Christ's presence (even while we live and work in the world) and his Resurrection Life are made present by the two-or-three who gather, and their movements, positions, words, and the icon--all together. They ALL "really want to change." 
Another icon is the two-or-three gathered. THERE is Christ's body, right there. Not limited to there. But neither are they just a "symbol" (I had to get that in!!!) of Christ's body. Go to your local Orthodox church--say on a Saturday evening Vesper's service, and you will likely be treated as an icon, complete with being "censed"--not censored, but having incense blown toward you and being bowed to. BUT IT IS NOT MERELY YOU who is being "venerated." (NOT adored! "Worshiped" in the sense of honor being shown like in old England when you call a judge "your worship" / we say "your honor." But ONLY God is adored!!!) But you've "really gotta wantta change!"
The test is whether it is GOD who is being worshiped IN you. That's taking the part about "as much as you do it to one of the least of these" very seriously!
So, can you say or hear "life giving cross" in a way that makes all the other senses transform the event into a "window"? If so....then you probably have an iconic moment. (if that is really a phrase)
NICE QUESTION, Modes.
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Modes of Thought
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817
| Posted 10/27/2001 5:38 PM (GMT -6) | | Nicely done POW, now you got me thinking.
[longish pause....]
I'll have to come back after the smoke clears.
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 10/28/2001 10:19 AM (GMT -6) | | HERE IS AN INSTANCE WHERE I FOUND THE PHRASE "VERBAL ICON" ACTUALLY USED, REFERING TO A PSALM. RIGHT IN FRONT OF OUR NOSES! (THE CONTEXT WAS AN ORTHODOX FUNERAL.)
quote:
Psalm 119, the verbal icon of the righteous man who has total trust in God and total devotion and love for his Divine Law -- the verbal icon of Jesus Christ --is chanted over the departed, with its praises and supplications for life in God. It is this same psalm which is chanted over the tomb of Christ on Great Friday.
It is the psalm which sings of the victory of righteousness and life over wickedness and death.
My soul cleaves to the dust, give me life according to Thy word. (119:25)
Turn my eyes from looking at vanities; and give me life in Thy ways. (119:37)
Behold, I long for Thy precepts; in Thy righteousness give me life. (119:40)
Thy testimonies are righteousness forever; give me understanding that I may live. (119:144)
Plead my cause, and redeem met give me life according to Thy promise. (119:154)
This entire psalm together with the verses and prayers that go with it, the canon hymns of the service, and the special funeral songs of St John of Damascus all are a meditalion on life and death. They are, in the context of the new life of the Risen Christ who reigns in the Church, a lesson of serious instruction for those who are immune to the full tragedy of sin and its "wages" which are death.
Edited by - PotOnWheel on 10/28/2001 3:22:20 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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Modes of Thought
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Total Posts : 817
| Posted 10/29/2001 11:29 AM (GMT -6) | | Hey, we're not done here right?
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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GregBoyd
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Total Posts : 1818
| Posted 10/29/2001 6:08 PM (GMT -6) | | Modes, I'm afraid I'm just not tracking with you on this one. (I think you've been reading to much Kierkegaard!!!). It seems to me you have two issues you're grappling with.
1) The definition of omnipotence.
2) The role of logic in understanding God.
The issues are related, but I don't see how their related in your thinking on this thread.
On the one hand, you seem to want to argue that God goes beyond logic (e.g. creation ex nihilo and incarnation). Yet you want to argue for a redefining of omnipotence on logical grounds.
If you stuck with the "God beyond our logic" motif, then it seems you should be comfortable saying (what Meph suggests you could say) that God can predestine free agents, love all and send the majority to hell, create us independent while controlling what we do, etc...
But it also seems that you don't want to go there. You don't want to say God can do the logically contradictory. And you want to argue that we need to redefine God's omnipotence because it doesn't logically fit with the facts of experience or of Scripture.
So, basically, I'm not exactly sure what you're arguing for.
You want to define omnipotence as God's ability to accomplish his will. Shouldn't you then be a total Calvinist (especially if you push the motif that God's activity transcends our logic)? If God wills all to be saved (which I think you hold), and yet all are not saved, does this not indicate that omnipotence does not entail that God always accomplish his will?
And in this case, isn't the only way we can salvage the idea of omnipotence by making a distinction (a la Mephi) between first order and second order omnipotence? And, if you grant that God created the world ex nihilo, then there seems to be no reason NOT to make this distinction. God's will (first order) is to create a world in which he may not always get his will (second order).
I just don't get the problem you see in this. Sorry.
later bro
Doc
"Three is the magic number, oh yes it is, it's the Magic Number" - De La Soul | | Back to Top | | |
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Modes of Thought
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817
| Posted 10/30/2001 5:10 AM (GMT -6) | | Trust that I am not simply being obscurant here :
Here's my delimma, we say we believe in omnipotence, and of course, I concur. But what do we mean and how is that most honestly expressed?
On the left we have Pannenberg and Shults who say we must affirm God's infinitude.
On the right we have Boyd and Sanders who say God's omnipotence need only be true formally, that God had all the power, but then delegated some. Denying infinitude.
SK says power is defined in making others free and is defined moreover in the ability to accomplish what one wills. But if we're talking about power correctly, then we are still only talking about the ability to make others free.
My point is that if we stick with the distinctions we can and should say that:
1. Like God's intellegence, God's power is infinite.
2. This is true because like God's intellegence, God's will is infinite and God has the ability to accomplish God's will. And insofar as we are discussing power, we are speaking of God's ability to make others free. (see below on the biblical redefining of power)
C. in this way God's omnipotence is God's infinite use of power to make others free and this can always be said and maintained as a glroious attribute of God. Precisely because it takes true omnipotence to make others independent as SK's journal entry indicates.
4. All of this is particularly biblical if we consider Jesus as the paridigmatic point of reference for power, liberation, salvation, etc. He has come to set the captives free! Power is violence when it is used to "lord over" others and instead is modeled as empowerment.
5. All uses of power to make others free are given meaningfulness by GOD'S idea of what it means to make others free. (Romans 6:20-23 comes to mind but is not exclusive in its definition here, rather illustrative.)
The problem as I see it. Boyd and Sanders run the risk of saying God's power is now finite because of the zero-sum-game perspective they assume. This is no longer properly omnipotence and it seems to come into tension with SK's assertion that omnipotence must be had and maintained in order create other free/independent beings. Initial omnipotence isn't enough.
Shults and Pannenberg of course affirm the infinitude of God, but they locate it in the future, where  the being of God is actual. That has confessional truth to it but runs the risk of confusing dogma and metaphysics. But in that way they can say that God's power is unlimited because it is what draws us with the power of the inevitable arrow of time. I am not sure that they would concur, but that's my attempt to make some sense out of it. Proleptic logic has the determinitive power which corresponds to our perspective on the past wrapped up in it, but doesn't grant that power full actuality yet. What I am drawn to here is the force of the statements Pannenberg was making recently at a conference where he was rebuking process theologians for not admitting God's omnipotence! That admonition was haunting and what I know about Pannenberg via Shults leads me to suspect that somehow infinitude must play into this discussion somewhere.
SK, of course, offers that passage and seems to open some possibilities as I tried to enumerate above. Am I simply confused? My options seem to be either: A. deny eternal omnipotence of God via Open Theism; B. affirm infinitude via confessionalism or a Theology of Hope that eludes me at this point; C. or something like what I said above.
Help:
Someone please assess the proposal on the terms given here. Ask clarifying questions for my sake and let me know if it works formally or not.
Meph, I know you will want to see power and control linked. Help me see how that relates specificly to what I proposed above regarding power. When it comes to influence and control, SK agrees, and I would concur, that decisions that God makes are binding with the force of omnipotence. Even for God (but then he throws in clauses about speaking foolishly). Perhaps it has to do with the question of paradox as per below.
The one other piece I wanted to integrate but haven't yet is the paradoxical aspect of God's power. I say "paradoxical" not "contradictory" intentionally. God creating something out of nothing is a paradox, God becoming a finite human being is paradoxical, if these are essential to what it means for God to will our independence as indicated above, then we have to start permitting paradoxes (not contradictions) as revelatory, not obscurant. This point is particularly important with regard to power precisely because of how counter-intuitive God's use of power is to us. This is not anti-rationalism, but it does point to the limits of our use of the rational.
Am I making ANY progress explaining myself here?
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK
Edited by - ModesofThought on 10/30/2001 10:20:28 AM | | Back to Top | | |
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GregBoyd
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818
| Posted 10/30/2001 12:46 PM (GMT -6) | | Modes, how can God create an agent free and still ensure that he can accomplish all that he wills?
However you answer this question, how does appealing to the "infinitude" of God help make your answer meaningful?
If you grant that power is not control, then why do you have a problem with the Openness proposal that God has limited his control for the purpose of creating free agents? You above all should be able to affirm that God is STILL omnipotent, though he does not control everything.
What you cannot do is say that God's power is sufficient "to accomplish all that he wills" in this framework -- UNLESS you make a distinction between God's first and second order wills. Unfortunately, you don't seem to want to grant this.
So you're left with the following very tough dilemma:
1. God's power is sufficient to accomplish all that he wills
2. He wills agents to be free
3. He wills agents to choose him
4. Because they are free, they can choose against him., which God does not will.
*** #1 conflicts with 2-4.
Good luck buddy!
Doc
"Three is the magic number, oh yes it is, it's the Magic Number" - De La Soul
Edited by - GregBoyd on 10/30/2001 5:50:59 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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Modes of Thought
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Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 817
| Posted 10/30/2001 1:20 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Modes, how can God create an agent free and still ensure that he can accomplish all that he wills?
In defining power as the ability to make free, I need not account for more than that.
quote:
However you answer this question, how does appealing to the "infinitude" of God help make your answer meaningful?
This isn't an "appeal to" infinitude but the ability to acknowledge "where" infinitude fits in the thinking. Can you do that?
quote:
If you grant that power is not control, then why do you have a problem with the Openness proposal that God has limited his control for the purpose of creating free agents? You above all should be able to affirm that God is STILL omnipotent, though he does not control everything.
Bingo. That's the pay-off. I completely agree with this statement.
quote:
What you cannot do is say that God's power is sufficient "to accomplish all that he wills" in this framework -- UNLESS you make a distinction between God's first and second order wills. Unfortunately, you don't seem to want to grant this.
Yes, I can if I, staying with the context of metaphysics suggest that God's will is simply to make free/independent.
quote:
So you're left with the following very tough dilemma:
1. God's power is sufficient to accomplish all that he wills
2. He wills agents to be free
3. He wills agents to choose him
4. Because they are free, they can choose against him., which God does not will.
*** #1 conflicts with 2-4.
Good luck buddy!
Doc
3. and 4. lie outside the purview of this thought experiment. And even if they didn't, I would agree that God desires for us to chose God, but reserve the phrase of God's "willing things" to those acts which make free, or in a secondary meaning of willing those things which are necessary to the making of things free, "free" as defined by God.
By now you will have noticed that I am using "will" in a much narrower sense. I would have to use another word that doesn't violate the metaphysics of the system, like "desires" to account for those things which God "wants" that are not under God's control.
This is still very much a thought experiment for me. Just checking it out in discussion form.
I am seeing that this parallels many of the things you what to say, doc, but I am still able to maintain that "space" for an important theological confession: infinitude (which lends credibility to the confession of "omnipotence"). That is worth something. My guess is that Meph want to preserve the same (omnipotence, that is), perhaps, but would go about it differently. I hope he shares.
"Christianly understood, truth is obviously not to know the truth but to be the truth. Despite all modern philosophy, there is an infinite difference here..." SK | | Back to Top | | |
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GregBoyd
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Total Posts : 1818
| Posted 10/30/2001 3:45 PM (GMT -6) | | Okay, got it. You are granting that God's "will" to make free and (though this is not part of the thought experiment) that this entails that God will not necessarily get all that he "desires." Where your problem lies, it seems, is with the idea that God has LIMITED his power by creating agents free. You WANT to be able to affirm the "infinitude" of God's power even though -- and precisely because -- he creates people free.
I have no problem with that whatsever. Its a matter of terminology. The "limits" I'm concerned to articulate concern (in your lingo) what God desires. As you define matters, I would indeed affirm the "infinitude" of God's power as its displayed by creating free agents. But this entails that he may not get all he "desires".
Got it. (I think)
Doc
"Three is the magic number, oh yes it is, it's the Magic Number" - De La Soul | | Back to Top | | |
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