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richschmidt
Registered Member
Date Joined Aug 2002
Total Posts : 4
| Posted 8/20/2002 11:37 AM (GMT -6) |   | First, I like the Open View. It appeals to me. I think it's my view, too. :)
I'm having a hard time reconciling two things: the idea of God's "infinite intelligence" and Jer. 32:35, where it says: "though I did not command them, nor did it enter my mind that they should do this abomination."
My quick understanding of God's infinite intelligence is that he knows all the options. In other words, none of the "open" future surprises him because God foreknew it as one of a nearly-infinite potential futures.
How does that jive with the idea that it didn't enter his mind that his people would disobey him in such a horrible way?
If this has already been answered somewhere, feel free to point me toward it. I'm pretty new & certainly haven't read it all yet.
Peace,
Rich
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 8/20/2002 6:22 PM (GMT -6) | | Rich-
Welcome aboard, and good question too. I think the Infinite Intelligence argument is a great insight. We did discuss this a while back. Try the search feature. I think the name of the thread was simply “Infinite Intelligence.”
I actually am not comfortable approaching the phrase “nor did it enter my mind” equally as literal as, say, the descriptions of God as changing his mind or experiencing unfulfilled expectations. Since it DID enter his mind as at least a possible outcome, the only sense I can make of it is as a hyperbole meant to impress God’s amazement at the improbable happening. We can’t claim that Israel’s sinful action never entered God’s mind “as a possibility,” so I don’t see that we can take this phrase as literal. I take it as an exaggeration that expresses Israel God’s response to the sheer stupidity and irrationality of Israel’s behavior.
I think we speak this way too and that’s partly why I’m inclined to go in this direction. My kids do something really dumb and I reply, “It never even crossed my mind that you’d do this!” Hyperbole. Actually, I was in possession of the knowledge that such behavior does exist, that kids sometimes do such things, and that my kids are as capable as other kids of doing such things. But the improbability of their acting this way was so great, and my surprise and disappointment so deep, that it gets expressed with hyperbole: “I never asked you to do this! It never even entered my mind! What were you thinking? Cotton-pickin kids!”
So, the open view, because of Infinite Intelligence, has this option for understanding this passage. The classical view, however, doesn’t. God didn’t know this was a possible outcome, he eternally knew it would happen. On such grounds, claiming that Israel’s behavior never entered his mind is, I think, only misleading. You need a partly open future to allow for the use of hyperbole here.
Tom 
"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde | | Back to Top | | |
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richschmidt
Registered Member
Date Joined Aug 2002
Total Posts : 4
| Posted 8/20/2002 7:08 PM (GMT -6) | | TGB:quote:
So, the open view, because of Infinite Intelligence, has this option for understanding this passage. The classical view, however, doesn’t. God didn’t know this was a possible outcome, he eternally knew it would happen. On such grounds, claiming that Israel’s behavior never entered his mind is, I think, only misleading.
richschmidt:
I guess it seems misleading to me either way. Or else, either way, it simply expresses God's dismay & displeasure as a result of their behavior.
I guess "the Open View answer" is something like "But how could God feel dismay if he knew it was going to happen?" Is that right? It gets back to the basic question of God's experience of temporality, etc.
Thanks!
But... I think we'll get in trouble if our hermeneutic is as muddy as all that. It seems like it may boil down to "No, this one is definitely not literal, because it just doesn't fit." Which is the same hermeneutic that classical theism uses, right?
Peace,
Rich
PS - Sorry, I didn't realize that there were threads before the ones I could see on the screen. Ahhh... there it is. A drop-menu. It was automatically set to only show discussions from the last 30 days. Thanks!
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BJS
Registered Member
Date Joined Dec 2001
Total Posts : 587
| Posted 8/21/2002 4:29 AM (GMT -6) | | Great question, Rich! I would ditto what Tom said. I think there is more reason to interpret this statement hyperbolically. I understand your concern that this is a "muddy" hermeneutic, but as you know, much of our interpretation of Scripture (and language in general), is not always black and white. In my mind, the classical theist is compelled to exercise much more “acrobatic” hermeneutics than the open theist, which is why I eventually came to believe in open theism. But that’s just me. It’s certainly a tough issue.
Great to have you here!
Brett
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Starkman
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 1747
| Posted 8/21/2002 7:09 AM (GMT -6) | | Hey richschmidt,
You said this in response to TGB's post: "I guess it seems misleading to me either way. Or else, either way, it simply expresses God's dismay & displeasure as a result of their behavior."
Wait! Now remember, part of the reason why those of us hold to the open view is because of a two-fold side: 1) it is how WE as people operate--TGB's example he used with regard to children's ways; and 2) it is, THEREFORE, how we believe God operates.
Yes, God can read the heart, the mind, the soul. Yes, God can see our propensities in which way we are most likely to act and proceed, but still, just as we express amazement with each other when someone does something so surprising in the eyes of another ("Gads, I can't believe you would do this,"), so it is with God.
The slight difference between the God and me when it comes to amazement is that God can read the heart. So, when I express amazement over something someone has done, I have done so perhaps with little thought, if any at all, to the idea that someone could have done something that would so amaze me. Does that mean that I believed it impossible that the person could have done what was so amazing? No. Does it mean that just because I didn't think about it that I didn't know it was a possibility that the person could have done this amazing thing (with all things considered, man is quite capable of a lot of things!)? No.
God is similar in our thinking but possesses the ability to read the heart, so He's much more aware of what's both going on and can go on in the future. But that doesn't take away from the fact that He can be both amazed or upset by something. He would much rather wish, as we do amoung ourselves, that it were not the case.
In Jeremiah, God is expressing of a lot of emotional in His relationship with Israel. This expression transcends foreknowledge both in our relationships with each other as well as between God and us, because relationship is of the heart, not the mind. It is, therefore, only expectant that God would express amazement with Israel's actions and . . . in our own lives, I'm sure!
For the heart,
Starkman
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 8/21/2002 10:19 PM (GMT -6) | | Rich-
Try this: http://www.gregboyd.org/gbfront/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=865
Tom
"Every saint has a history and every sinner a future." Oscar Wilde | | Back to Top | | |
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