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aquinas
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2003
Total Posts : 36
| Posted 9/2/2003 3:12 PM (GMT -6) |   | Laika,
"You said God is not chronologically prior to creation. So creation and God have the same eternity."
What do you mean??? Laika, I apologize, but there is a great deal of
ambiguity in your statements. You may be right, but I don't know what
you are getting at. "creation and God have the same eternity"???? What does that mean?
"Do you think God caused creation?"
Yes
"Then He had to exist chronologically prior to creation."
Not necessarily. Only if He is in time prior to creation would this be true. But this is exactly what I am denying.
"Causes ALWAYS exist prior to their effects, chronologically."
This simply begs the question. Laika, I would like to ask you something that may be seemingly unrelated to what we are talking about. How is it that you argue for the existence of God? What line of reasoning do you give someone that asks you why you believe in God?
POW,
Are you espousing voluntarism? (divine command theory)
"His will is the reason for his character (not the other way around)."
If so, how do you avoid Euthyphro's dilemma?
If we allow pious feelings to decree what nature should be, we are bound to wrong nature, for how could we find in piety a principle of self-restriction? In theology, as in any other science, the main question is not to be pious, but to be right. For there is nothing pious in being wrong about God! --Etienne Gilson | | Back to Top | | |
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SIM
Registered Member
Date Joined Nov 2002
Total Posts : 90
| Posted 9/4/2003 2:52 PM (GMT -6) | |  This is the third attempt posting after losing 2 I had already finished!
This is an answer to Tom and Laika from another thread.
aquinas Posted - 08/02/2003 : 11:36:26 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In "God of the Possible", Dr. Boyd states that "... if God foreknows a future event, it must either be because he determined it or because it is an inevitable effect of past or present causes."
Do these two categories exhaust all possibilities? How would the
OV respond to a third possibility, namely that God knows everything
from one eternal now? Also, how would the OV view respond to the
charge that they are placing God IN time? (as opposed to outside
of time, "eternity")
My son, Dan, can't respond to your post because he is finishing up a big project at work, so I'm typing some of his messages he sent me.
Dan says: "In studying about n-dimension mathematics (which involve the representation of infinite dimensions, of which space and time are only dimsensions 3 and 4),and also in personal study of the physics of time, it is obvious that Time and Space are linked. There is a one-ness of space and time. If Time were somehow an eternal immutable fact that could not be manipulated by anything in the universe, then Tom might be able to cling to God being in time. or somehow captive of it. However, time is not immutable, it changes throughout the universe, and began with the Big Bang.
God does not possess anything "timeless" We think of timelessness as being unchanging, something fixed in place forever. Timelessness only has meaning in reference to a timeline. God has meaning exclusive of any timeline and he can exist exclusive of a timeline. He must, because being outside of the universe also means being outside of any timeline since time and space are one.
Time depends on space to exist.
SIM
Psalm 139:4 "Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD." | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 9/4/2003 7:20 PM (GMT -6) | | SIM
Thank your son for us SIM. Sounds like a nice guy. He must know of course that there are modern scientists who disagree with him. Again, I can’t think of a book that reviews this and argues its point better than William Lane Craig’s “Time and Eternity.” Craig argues that God is timeless in the absence of creation but temporal since creation. So “atemporality” and “temporality” are contingent attributes of God, and Craig's arguments against claiming that God remains timeless since creation yet able to act in time are excellent. One can agree with your son that time depends on space to exist and that creation involved a permanent change in God's mode of existence. God chose to no longer be atemporal for the sake of creation much the way the incarnation permanently and irrevocably affected the Son. Does this make God time’s “captive”? I find the term a little pejorative. If a temporal mode of existence is freely chosen by God and not forced on him from without, then it would be inaccurate to say God is time’s “captive.”
Now, you son is also correct about time’s relativity. We’re all familiar with Einstein. However, this doesn’t prove divine timelessness since creation. There are good reasons to heed Lorentz here. He agreed with Einstein on the math, but realized that relativity applies only to finite observers in space. No two finite observers will share the same time. No problem. But the math is perfectly consistent with the existence of an infinite, omnipresent observer not limited to the constraints of space or the speed of light for the transfer of information. Such an omnipresent observer would simultaneously relate all events in the universe in absolute time.
So when your son suggests that I’d have a point only “if time were somehow an eternal immutable fact that could not be manipulated by anything in the universe” he is not far off. It doesn’t require that time be an “eternal fact." Just a reality since creation. One could agree that time is created but that creation involved a genuine change in God’s mode of existence.
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Laika
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Date Joined Mar 2003
Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/6/2003 6:44 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by aquinas
Laika,
I have been talking with a friend about this issue and I think
he brought up several good points. I will get back to your questions
about God and creation and state 1 and state 2 implying time later.
I really need to hear your answers to these questions.
1. Did God have a beginning?
I don't think so. Genesis 1:1a "In the beginning God"
(do you even read what we've been posting?)
quote:
2. Is time infinite in duration?
I think that God experiences sequences eternally. cause-->effect works in one direction only, but will go on forever
You know of any effect-->cause or
cause
effect
examples?
quote:
3. Is there a difference between the "time" that God is in, and the "time" that we are in? If so, how are they different?
How could God's experience of cause-->effect be different from ours?
quote:
4. Do you believe that the Kalam Cosmological Argument is a sound argument?
I haven't read about that yet, but I could, using current units of measure, count back a long ways, mark it and denotate a sequential region back there. If that isn't far enough back, I could do it again, even further back. I could do this infinitely. If it's never far enough back, I could keep doing it.
quote:
5. Was God always in time?
I don't think time is something you're "in" or "out of". That's akin to saying that God is "trapped in logic" or God exists "outside of logic".
quote:
These questions need to be answered before we continue, otherwise I think we will end up arguing in circles.
Will you start answering questions then?
1. God's logic may be beyond ours, as calculus is beyond simple math. But does God's logic contradict ours? Is (2 + 2 = 4) NOT true to God?
2. Can these both be true to God simultaneously? (There is NO creation) AND (There is a creation)
3. Hey, let's see you and your backers' state diagram of God creating the world.  A sequenceless state diagram, this I gotta see.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
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Paul5388
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Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/6/2003 7:17 AM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
Is the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross in payment for sins a cause that brings a certain effect in the future? I always thought the sins prior to His death were paid for as well as those after His death. Therefore, cause comes after effect for Abraham, Moses and etc. The sequence is out of sequence! | | Back to Top | | |
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aquinas
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Date Joined Jul 2003
Total Posts : 36
| Posted 9/6/2003 7:24 AM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
Thanks for your response. Yes I do read the posts. The problem
is that we are approaching the issue from two very different
methods. Given the way you approach the problem, my direct answers
to your questions will not be terribly meaningful.
The problem here is this: All of your examples assume that we can
talk about our experience and God's experience in the same way. I.E. "I can only know the future through prediction (based on past and present causes) therefore God can only know it this way." Or "I can only guarantee an outcome if I cause that outcome to take place or set up conditions so as to guarantee its happening, so that must be the only way God can do it." Of course I understand that you think that God is more powerful and more intelligent and such, but God is still only able to know things the way we know things, according to your view.
NOTE: I am not saying that God can create square triangles. God's logic is not different from ours. The law of non-contradiction certainly applies to all of our statements about God.
It is my view that we can only speak of God analogically. That is, when we say something about God there is a univocal element to what we are saying about Him and an equivocal element. The univocal element is the meaning of the term applied to God, the equivocal element is the way we predicate our statement. If you want to talk more about this I would certianly enjoy that.
The reason I speak analogically about God is because I claim to know something about God, namely that He is infinite, eternal, etc. This being the case, finite concepts (that is concepts of finite things) cannot adequately inform us of what God is actually like. However, they can inform us of true things about God.
This is why I do not directly answer your questions at this point. We are not on the same page about things that are more fundamental to our converstation.
Let me give you answers to your questions.
"1. God's logic may be beyond ours, as calculus is beyond simple math. But does God's logic contradict ours? Is (2 + 2 = 4) NOT true to God?"
2 + 2 = 4 is true for God.
2. Can these both be true to God simultaneously? (There is NO creation) AND (There is a creation)
No. Creation cannot be and NOT be at the same time and sense.
3. Hey, let's see you and your backers' state diagram of God creating the world. A sequenceless state diagram, this I gotta see.
This is not a question, but I will respond to it anyways. You can't see an adequate "diagram" of God's relation to time. Even if there were helpful illustrations, there would still be serious problems with it. You yourself admit that God is beyond logic. And I agree that all our statements about God must not be contradictory. I am telling you of the "beyond our logic" aspect of God.
Speaking of God's relationship to time is in some ways like talking about the Trinity. We can make true affirmations about the Trinity, but you can't draw a diagram that adequately helps us conceptualize Three Persons in One Being.
If you could, would you read the Kalam Cosmological Argument by Craig. If you think that it is a sound argument for the existence of God, then there are some interesting dilemmas that appear for anyone who thinks that God has existed for an infinite amount of time. I would be interested in hearing your responses to these dilemmas.
God Bless!
If we allow pious feelings to decree what nature should be, we are bound to wrong nature, for how could we find in piety a principle of self-restriction? In theology, as in any other science, the main question is not to be pious, but to be right. For there is nothing pious in being wrong about God! --Etienne Gilson | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 9/6/2003 3:14 PM (GMT -6) | | aquinas-
Check it out: http://www.gregboyd.org/gbfront/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=515
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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Laika
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Date Joined Mar 2003
Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/8/2003 1:42 AM (GMT -6) | | 1. I read the Kalam Cosmological Argument this weekend.
2. You agree that God won't contradict our logic, good.
3. God made us in His image, in a way He can communicate with us. "Come now and let us reason together" God says. In order to reason together, we have to have language/logic/thought processing that is compatible.
4. God once existed without creation, now He exists with a creation. Since you agree that God won't contradict our logic, this shows God experienced a sequence.
5. You've been trying to steer the argument in a certain direction from the beginning. But if "timelessness" about God is true, shouldn't you be able to answer this simple creation/sequence argument?
Craig, himself, holds that once creation started, God is temporal. So God has been experiencing sequences ever since then in his view.
We don't need to use the no creation/creation moment to show God experiencing sequence, use any cause-->effect since then.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
the ghost in you she don't fade | | Back to Top | | |
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Paul5388
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Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/8/2003 10:13 AM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
You keep using sequence and yet you failed to respond to the sequence being out of sequence that I posted a couple of days ago.
In regard to propitiation, time is irrelevant and sequence is also irrelevant. It was predicted, if you accept bruise his heel (Gen 3.15) or coats of skin(Gen 3.21) as a Messanic prediction, from the beginning. Propitiation was evident in the transfiguration, with Moses and Elijah being present, even though the act of propitiation had not happened yet. The propitiation was effective prior to the act/cause just as it has been effective since the act/cause. Sequence and time are meaningless, since God has acted in time, but the effects are applicable regardless of time or sequence. | | Back to Top | | |
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Laika
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Date Joined Mar 2003
Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/8/2003 12:04 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by Paul5388
Laika,
You keep using sequence and yet you failed to respond to the sequence being out of sequence that I posted a couple of days ago.
Genesis 3:15
And I will put enmity <---future tense
Between you and the woman,
And between your seed and her seed;
He shall bruise you on the head, <---future tense
And you shall bruise him on the heel." <---future tense
If the propitiation for Moses' sins, for example, were in effect before Calvary, circa 33 A.D., then Christ didn't need to die on the cross, circa 33 A.D.
And if Christ had chose not to go to Calvary (that was a real wrestling match in the garden), then would God have undone the propititation for Moses' sins?
And what were the purpose of all the sacrifices under the old covenant?
Gen4:4 Abel, on his part also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and for his offering;
Job 1:5 When the days of feasting had completed their cycle, Job would send and consecrate them, rising up early in the morning and offering burnt offerings according to the number of them all; for Job said, "Perhaps my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts." Thus Job did continually.
Job 1:8 The LORD said to Satan, "Have you considered My servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil."
Hebrews 9:13 For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh,
The old covenant sacrifices sanctified those under the old covenant, just not as well as Christ would do for those under the new covenant.
No, there are no examples of effect---->cause.
If I borrow money in 1978 and don't pay the debt off until 2001, then for all those years from 1978 to 2001 I still owed the debt. This is so simple and intuitive I can't believe I have to explain it.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
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Paul5388
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Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/8/2003 2:57 PM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
You're right, it is very simple and I don't know why I have to explain it to you.
1) Jesus Christ had been chosen to be the propitiation and would fulfill that function 1Jo 4:10 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. If you want to believe He wrestled in the garden and could have chosen different, more power to you, but the scripture says "to be" not "might be". 2) The sacrifices of the Old Testament never completely satisfied the penalty for sins, since they were only a figure/type of the future propitiation. Heb 10:4 For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins. The blood Jesus Christ shed on the cross is what has always propitiated and continues to propitiate. 3) What if you borrowed money in 1978 and found out it was paid for about 2000 years ago? However, sin isn't like borrowing money. It pays wages/penalties and the wages/penalties are death! Again, the penalty was paid about 2000 years ago, long before my time (even though I am getting on up in age, I was not with Noah on the boat  ). However, Noah's sins were paid for long after he rotted in a grave and they weren't paid for with the blood of bulls or goats. I repeat, time and sequence have no meaning in regards to propitiation.
EDIT: BTW, you might want to check the meaning of propitiate. Expiate comes much closer than sanctify. | | Back to Top | | |
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aquinas
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Date Joined Jul 2003
Total Posts : 36
| Posted 9/8/2003 3:02 PM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
Thanks for your response.
1. Eternity and everlasting are two different things. You seem
to use them interchangably. Everlasting is a sequence of moments
that keeps on going. (potentially infinite) Eternity refers to
timelessness. Timelessness is without sequence.
You yourself realize that Craig believes that God was Eternal before creation and temporal after creation. I have heard one of his earlier talks on the subject at the Univerity of Iowa. He did espouse that God is timeless before creation but enters into a relationship with a temporal realm.
I suspect that Craig would not argue that God was temporal before creation because Craig believe that an actually infinite series of moments is impossible. If God had existed in a temporal series "before" creation, then it would seem that God could not have been around for an actually infinite amount of time.
You, on the other hand, state:
I think that God experiences sequences eternally. cause-->effect works in one direction only, but will go on forever
How would you deal with this problem. Even if there is a sequence during the creative act, how does it follow that God is temporal?
Perhaps you have reasons for this, but thus far they haven't been elaborated on.
You also state:
4. God once existed without creation, now He exists with a creation. Since you agree that God won't contradict our logic, this shows God experienced a sequence.
Perhaps this reveals my ignorance more than anything, but I don't really get what you are aiming at. I think I have a general idea but I don't see a contradiction involved in an eternal God creating a temporal world. I ask that you be patient with me. I will read what you send, but to be honest I am still not getting your logic here.
The closest I have come to getting what you are saying is when you said:
"So what's the confusion? Could state1 and state2 be simultaneous?
Then God would hold two truths, (there is a creation) AND (there is NO creation). This is a logical contradiction. Hence, state1 and state2 are not simultaneous, they are sequential. God experienced a sequence."
I will have to look into this more and think about it more. I have some preliminary responses to this, but I want to think it through more. It would help if you elaborated on this a bit more. I know you have been explaining your position, but I would be very interested in more explination. Thank you for your patience.
God Bless!
If we allow pious feelings to decree what nature should be, we are bound to wrong nature, for how could we find in piety a principle of self-restriction? In theology, as in any other science, the main question is not to be pious, but to be right. For there is nothing pious in being wrong about God! --Etienne Gilson | | Back to Top | | |
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Newcomb
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 116
| Posted 9/8/2003 6:36 PM (GMT -6) | | I wish I had been on the board when this started, but reading only page one and the previous entry from aquinas, let me address a few issues. I like your inquisitive spirit, you seem to be truly trying to understand.
You will have to go through my section on TIME to get the full thinking behind this and the proofs I show to back up what I am about to say. I don't want to repeat it all, so I'll be brief here:
God is the only necessary being, however, for him to exist requires certain things. Dimensions and domains are two of those things. Time is a dimension.
A dimension is a fundamental thing that may have a unit of measurement that can apply to it. In this sense, all fundamental things are necessary, that is, the must exist.
To have a domain you must have at least two dimensions. Real things must exist in some domain. God is a real thing. Please note I did not say these things pre-existed God, he has always existed, however, dimensions and domains have always co-existed with him.
(Position statement here: I am a Baptist trinitarian, young earth creationist, raised under LaHaye, Bible is the Word of God and an absolute, and I came to OV by reading the Bible 15 years before I met Boyd, the first OV guy I knew of. Didn’t even know what it was called, and heck, I would have called it something else anyway.)
Do not confuse a dimension with the quantitative measurement of that dimension. Einstein screwed this up also when he said “time is what you see on a clock.” However, he was a relativist in all senses, trained by Mach to be a materialistic naturalist in a philosophical sense and this drove him to make certain errors. He believed in NO absolutes of any kind.
So, because time can be measured, it does not follow that time is that measurement any more than the dimension of length is actually an inch or a foot because length can be measured in those arbitrary ways.
Craig was pretty good, but I disagree on the idea that God is “now” temporal. He has always been temporal, he always will be, regardless of the state of creation.
God cannot know the free will choices before the will making the choice makes the decision. He might have created a world in which no free will beings existed, but he choose not to. He choose to make this one and in it we make free will choices even if that choice is to directly violate his will (=sin).
Aquinas:
quote:
1. Eternity and everlasting are two different things. You seem to use them interchangably. Everlasting is a sequence of moments that keeps on going. (potentially infinite) Eternity refers to timelessness. Timelessness is without sequence.
You have just reinvented eternity. Remember the emblem used for it? An endless circle? “Eternity means endless time, not the state of being without time. Now the word “timeless” can be used romantically as endless time, but your phrases indicate this is not the way you use it, you use it correctly to mean “without time.”
If God is without time then you cannot use any time stamped phrase, and tensed word on or about him. It would make all the Bible verses that use tensed statements false. Obviously that cannot be, so we must conclude that the tensed statements in the Bible are true, and God is, therefore in time in the same manner as we are.
You are correct that the two terms “eternity” and “everlasting” are different but not for the reason you stated, it is that “eternity is the time set that includes all time, which, of course, does not end or so would the set, in which case God’s gift of eternal life is useless because the set of moments would end.
quote:
. . . Even if there is a sequence during the creative act, how does it follow that God is temporal?
Perhaps you have reasons for this, but thus far they haven't been elaborated on.
Back to the tensed statements about God: Is it valid to ask what God was doing before he created, even, say, 1 day before Genesis 1:1? I believe it is because I God must be temporal. You believe it is invalid (to be consistent) because there was no time and a tenses statement has no meaning, there was no “before” creation.
The problem you have is that without time there can be no sequence to create anything, including time. You cannot sequence at all. Zero, nada, zip. So God could not have started creation if he were not temporal. Even if you say he first created time, he didn’t have sequencing available to him to do so.
This is a bit of a verbal trap in that it makes it appear that time is dependent of sequencing, but the opposite is true, time is requisite to sequencing.
As for the false theological idea that nothing about God changes, some have already talked about him changing his mind, now think about this:
What was the second member of the trinity like in, say, 25 BC? How about twenty minutes after he was born? Then at 30 years old? How about on the cross?
Classical view comes very close to heresy in trying to describe how nothing can change but the second member went through this radical alteration of adding a new nature to his preexisting one. And the change is permanent at that. So, let’s say from an angel standing the “gate” of heaven, the second member of the trinity walks out the gate and comes back through the gate some 33 years later as Jesus the Christ (titles he gained while here) with a body that had been birthed, grew, eat, drank, et al, was beaten and crucified, still has holes in the wrist and feet: would the angel turn to his fellow angels and say, “Nope, hasn’t changed a bit!”
We would question the sanity of the angel. He experienced more radical changes that we can, to the point that I would insist that if he didn’t “change” then we never change either because we cannot add a new nature to our being, we can merely have the spiritual nature renewed.
My time is short for this list, so If you would like more info, e-mail me.
Blessings.
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Laika
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Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/9/2003 1:18 AM (GMT -6) | | Paul5388, you still haven't explained this:
1. They had blood sacrifices under the old covenant, thus the effect of Christ's propitiation wasn't available yet.
Hebrews 9:13 For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh,
14 how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
2. Causes are necessary for effects, if the effect of Christ's propitiation existed before Calvary, then Calvary was not necessary.
3. Looking back at creation, you still haven't proved how creation existed before God created it. First there was God, Genesis 1:1a, then God created the heavens and the earth, Genesis 1:1b. That is a sequence. God was necessary for the creation, He existed before the creation, He experienced the creation.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
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Laika
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Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/9/2003 2:05 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by aquinas
Laika,
1. Eternity and everlasting are two different things. You seem
to use them interchangably. Everlasting is a sequence of moments
that keeps on going. (potentially infinite) Eternity refers to
timelessness. Timelessness is without sequence.
The American Heritage dictionary says Eternity is:
"1. Time without beginning or end; infinite time."
Wordreference.com says Eternity is:
"1. endless or infinite time"
Hyperdictionary.com says Eternity is:
"1. Infinite duration, without beginning in the past or end in the future; also, duration without end in the future; endless time."
then quotes Isaish 57:15
"The high and lofty One, that inhabiteth eternity."
NASB has:
Isaiah 57:15 "For thus says the high and exalted One
Who lives forever, whose name is Holy"
Realdictionary.com has:
1) n :a state of eternal existence believed in some religions to characterize the afterlife
2) n :time without end
3) n :a seemingly endless time interval (waiting)
So the common understanding of eternity seems to be a everlasting time
In fact, I contend that eternity needs time in order to have meaning.
quote:
You yourself realize that Craig believes that God was "timeless" before creation and temporal after creation. I have heard one of his earlier talks on the subject at the Univerity of Iowa. He did espouse that God is timeless before creation but enters into a relationship with a temporal realm.
I suspect that Craig would not argue that God was temporal before creation because Craig believe that an actually infinite series of moments is impossible. If God had existed in a temporal series "before" creation, then it would seem that God could not have been around for an actually infinite amount of time.
Yeah, I'm in the slow process of reading Craig's articles on eternity. I understand his Kalam Cosmo argument for proving the existence of God and certainly don't want to take that away (as if I could!). But Craig does contend that God is currently temporal and that is how scripture portrays Him.
quote:
You, on the other hand, state:
I think that God experiences sequences eternally. cause-->effect works in one direction only, but will go on forever
How would you deal with this problem. Even if there is a sequence during the creative act, how does it follow that God is temporal?
Because God experienced a sequence. He went from the state of NO creation to the state of experiencing a creation. That took a duration. There are those who say God is "timeless" and experiences everything all at once in some "eternal now" state. All we have to do is show God experiencing one sequence to refute that argument. We could show thousands of examples in scripture of God experiencing sequences but that would be redundant.
quote:
4. God once existed without creation, now He exists with a creation. Since you agree that God won't contradict our logic, this shows God experienced a sequence.
Perhaps this reveals my ignorance more than anything, but I don't really get what you are aiming at. I think I have a general idea but I don't see a contradiction involved in an eternal God creating a temporal world.
Let's look at some experiences and imagine God experiencing them all simultaneously:
experience A (I am alone in my triune state, there is NO creation, Genesis 1:1a)
experience B (I am currently making planets and stars and grass and creepy crawly things, Genesis 1:1b)
experience C (I am talking with Noah)
experience D (I am cursing Israel for disobeying Me)
experience E (I am blessing Israel for obeying Me)
experience F (I am SEPARATED from My son who is bearing the sins of the world)
experience G (My son is seated at my right hand, we are no longer separated due to the sin of the world)
Stack all these experiences on top of each other and imagine God experiencing them all AT ONCE, SIMULTANEOUSLY. Now look at the inherent contradictions:
God holds it TRUE that there is NO creation (A) AND
holds it TRUE that there is a creation (B-G).
That's a contradiction. X and ~X
Another contradiction, experiences F and G.
God is SEPARATED from His son AND NOT separated from His son.
Since we are made in the image of God AND
I believe He made us in a way He can communicate with us AND
I don't believe He would contradict our logic AND
Scripture only presents Him in temporal terms AND
There's no logic to explain "timelessness" AND
There's no scripture that presents "timelessness" AND
Augustine brought the idea of "timelessness" in from pagan Greek thought
I reject the "timeless" idea of God.
I don't believe that God is "timeless". And when they can't explain what "timelessness" is or what "in" time means or what "outside of" time means and use emotional words like "trapped" and "captive of" or appeal to some "mystery", I can tell they don't understand "timelessness" either.
You're doing good aquinas, it's a fascinating subject. I started reading the book on four views of time and Paul Helm's "defense" of "timelessness" would have been enough to make me abandon it.
And then there's the problem "timeless" advocates have with God's personality.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
the ghost in you she don't fade | | Back to Top | | |
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Paul5388
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/9/2003 5:09 AM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
I have already explained #1, the sacrifical system was a picture/type/figure of the actual propitiation. There is no cleansing available from the blood of bulls and goats. It is only through the finished work of Christ on the cross that propitiation is accomplished.
#2) Your view of time has biased your reasoning ability. The effects are only available because of the events on Calvary, regardless of time. I have tried to get you to see time has nothing to do with propitiation, an event almost 2000 years ago is still just as effective for me as it was for Paul or even Moses. The necessary cause was thousands of years after the effect for some, since you surely don't believe the blood of bulls and goats caused anyone's salvation. If the effects of propitiation weren't actually available prior to Calvary, how did Moses and Elijah show up on the mount of transfiguration?
#3) Creation existed in God before it was able to be seen and may have always existed in Him. You are assuming He has changed when He actualized what was already in existence, just like you probably assume He changes everytime He actualizes the birth of someone known from the foundations of the earth. If Christ was known to experience normal maturation before the earth ever was, is there actually a change when it happens in time? | | Back to Top | | |
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Laika
Registered Member
Date Joined Mar 2003
Total Posts : 2433
| Posted 9/9/2003 5:34 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by Paul5388
I have already explained #1, the sacrifical system was a picture/type/figure of the actual propitiation. There is no cleansing available from the blood of bulls and goats.
Then why say how much more in Hebrews 9:14?
Much more than zero? Doesn't make sense.
Much more than something else? Makes sense.
Job 1:5 When the days of feasting had completed their cycle, Job would send and consecrate them, rising up early in the morning and offering burnt offerings according to the number of them all; for Job said, "Perhaps my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts." Thus Job did continually.
8 The LORD said to Satan, "Have you considered My servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, fearing God and turning away from evil."
quote:
how did Moses and Elijah show up on the mount of transfiguration?
What's their appearance got to do with what we're talking about? God made a demonstration to the disciples showing the Old Covenant (the Law and the Prophets represented by Moses and Elijah respectively) and the New covenant represented by Jesus.
Why did Christ go to hell during His three days in the earth?
quote:
#3) Creation existed in God before it was able to be seen and may have always existed in Him.
And your proof?
So you think creation is co-eternal with God and as uncaused as He is uncaused?
quote:
You are assuming He has changed when He actualized what was already in existence
Genesis 22:12 He said, "Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me."
Yep, God is a quick learner.
That's one of the attributes of personality, the ability to have new experiences.
inside you the time moves and she don't fade
the ghost in you she don't fade | | Back to Top | | |
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jlreed
Registered Member
Date Joined Sep 2002
Total Posts : 17
| Posted 9/9/2003 1:09 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
God is the only necessary being, however, for him to exist requires certain things. Dimensions and domains are two of those things. Time is a dimension.
This is a strange statement. What do these concepts of 'dimensions' and 'domains' mean? Newcomb explains:
quote:
A dimension is a fundamental thing that may have a unit of measurement that can apply to it. In this sense, all fundamental things are necessary, that is, the must exist.
What is it about things that requires they have these properties of units of measure? For example, material things have spatial dimensions and therefore can be measured according to methods appropiate for material items. However, not all existents are physical. Here I am afraid the notion of dimension is unclear and requires a fuller explanation. That is, in what sense do ALL things have dimensions? How are the dimensions of spiritual beings to be understood?
quote:
Real things must exist in some domain. God is a real thing.
Why? This begs the question. What is a domain? Do domains exist? If domains don't exist, then why think non-existents have anything to do with real things? If yes, does each domain exist in another domain? Is there an ultra-domain? Is this ultra-domain God or is it greater than God?
quote:
[Einstein] was a relativist in all senses,
This is false. Einstein believed all things were relative to an absolute Spirit.
quote:
Craig was pretty good, but I disagree on the idea that God is “now” temporal. He has always been temporal, he always will be, regardless of the state of creation.
Then do you affirm that God has existed in a beginningless series of temporal events? Is there no beginning to the time in which God is in?
If you say yes that there is no beginning to the time in which God is in, then you affirm the existence of an actual infinte number of things. Thereby undermining the Kalam argument. Do you, then, see how your views undermine a very fine argument for the existence of God?
quote:
He might have created a world in which no free will beings existed, but he choose not to.
Why think that God created the world?
quote:
You have just reinvented eternity. Remember the emblem used for it? An endless circle? “Eternity means endless time, not the state of being without time.
For anyone who knows something about the History of Christian Doctrine knows that the definition of Divine Eternity has as its locus classicus Boethius' famous saying: "Eternity is the simultaneous position of life all at once." Aquinas comments on this and says that you can't distinguish time from eternity by saying eternity has no beginning or end. This is an accidental difference. For eternity to be distinguished from time 'immutibility' is required. The classical understanding of Eternity entails the denial of befores and afters. The denial of successive moments in Eternity is how the concept has been traditionally understood. Hence, it is false to say Eternity as been reinvented.
quote:
If God is without time then you cannot use any time stamped phrase, and tensed word on or about him. It would make all the Bible verses that use tensed statements false.
"God is without a physical body so you cannot use any physical stamped phrase on or about him. It would make all the Bible verses that are use physical statements false."
This is the same logic. We can show based on this logic that Christ is a door; God is a chicken; God is a rock; God has a back; God has feet; God has a retina; etc. This is a poor argument against Divine Timelessness.
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Paul5388
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/9/2003 4:36 PM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
I suppose the entire context should be consulted, Heb 9.12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us Redemption is much more than sanctification, because the blood of bulls and goats was not sufficient for the task and only the blood of Christ fit the bill. Redemption was purchased ONE time and was applicable for all of time. So, redemption is much more than just sanctification.
Moses and Elijah didn't get to the mount through being sanctified. They were there because they were already redeemed.
Since you like Job, consider my redeemer liveth is in the present tense, Job 19:23-26 23 Oh that my words were now written! oh that they were printed in a book!
24 That they were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!
25 For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:
26 And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: That's why Jesus could say, Joh 8:58 Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. Most people consider Abraham and Job to have been contemporaries, and they certainly predate Moses. So, was their redeemer bulls and goats or was it Christ?
quote:
Why did Christ go to hell during His three days in the earth?
Anything I say here is conjecture, as it would be for anyone else, since hell isn't specified in the two verses I am aware of. I Pet 3.19 By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; I Pet 4.6 For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. However, the only reason I can see is to tell the inhabitants of Abraham's Bosom the redemption they anticipated was completed. Being mindful that Abraham's Bosom wasn't such a bad place to be, as the rich man could attest to.quote:
And your proof?
So you think creation is co-eternal with God and as uncaused as He is uncaused?
Joh 17:24 Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world.
Eph 1:4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
1Pe 1:20 Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, Let's see, if Christ was foreordained before the foundation of the world and we were chosen in him before the foundation of the world, I don't think we could be chosen without being known. How can you choose something or someone that doesn't exist or that you don't know about? Of course, we didn't actually exist in the flesh at the time of our being chosen, so why would the world have to actually exist before it was known? After all, do you think God intended for us to float around in limbo instead of this world we are on? Of course, God could have been unaware that a parking place was needed for what He had chosen. | | Back to Top | | |
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Paul5388
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 295
| Posted 9/10/2003 7:43 AM (GMT -6) | | Laika,
You did real good! My redeemer liveth was present tense for Job, but His manifestation in the flesh was future. The only thing that would change was the ability to see Him. He has always been the Redeemer, and always will be. Effect <-- Cause --> Effect. The cause is effective and time is meaningless! | | Back to Top | | |
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