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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 2/5/2003 9:42 AM (GMT -6) |   | In reviewing Hasker’s God, Time, and Knowledge, Alfred Freddoso speaks (favorably) of the “…traditional understanding of divine providence, according to which every event that transpires in the universe, including every free action, is either knowingly intended or knowingly permitted by God prior to creation.”
My question is, cannot the open view embrace this understanding of providence? While an open theists would argue that human actions cannot be knowingly “intended” by God prior to creation and remain free, would not the infinite intelligence of God, as argued by Doc and other open theists, permit the view that “every future free action is knowingly permitted by God” prior to creation? Of course, they are known as possible future free actions. But is it not the case that in deciding to create the world God created, with all the foreknown possible evil choices entailed in the decision to create this specific world, God knowingly permits those evil choices? That is, in permiting possibile evils, God permits the possibility that these evils will come to pass in spite of all God may do to prevent them given the rules of engagement that govern his relationship to this specific world. Freddoso’s “knowingly permitted” seems to me to allow for the insights of believing God to be infinitely intelligent, in which case permitting possibilities as opposed to permitting certainties is hardly different than foreknowing possibilities as opposed to foreknowing certainties.
I’m not striking the center here. Let me try it this way. What fundamental difference is there between God knowingly permitting CERTAIN evils and knowingly permitting POSSIBLE evils? Freddoso might argue that God has a specific preplanned good reason for permitting each specific evil. But isn’t it true on the open view that in deciding to create the world he did, God decided he could live with, triumph over, bring good out of, any of the possible evils that were required (as possibilities of course) by his creating the specific world he created?
Freddoso wants to argue that God previewed all the possible worlds he could have created and then chose one specific world with that world’s specific good and evil events. Open theism argues (only slightly differently perhaps?) that God previewed all the possible worlds he could have created and then chose several possible worlds from among these with the specific good and evil events entailed in those possible worlds. In the former creation is God choosing one of many possible ways to get where he wants to go. In the latter, creation is God choosing several of many possible ways to get where he wants to go. Whereas in the first God plans the trip out ahead of time, in the latter God determines that he's more comfortable deciding which of the routes included in his decision to create would be the specific way he’ll go. As far as I can see, there’s no providential advantage of the former over the latter. In fact, the former, that is, the traditional understanding of providence which Freddoso defends, seems to me to be nothing more than “pre-recorded open theism”?
Tom 
Love never ends
Edited by - TGB on 02/05/2003 2:54:35 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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JET
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Total Posts : 397
| Posted 2/5/2003 11:59 AM (GMT -6) | | Good observation, Tom.
I hear you saying this:
1. At the moment of creation, God knowingly permited certain evils by choosing to create this world with its set of possibilities rather than another world with a different set of possibilities.
And perhaps implying this:
2. In the course of the history of providence, God knowingly permits certain evils in choosing how to respond to counterfactuals of freedom.
(I.e., in choosing response "A" rather than "B", God is choosing the set of future possibilities that is entailed by "A" instead of "B".)
Am I right?
Edited by - JET on 02/05/2003 5:03:20 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 2/5/2003 1:29 PM (GMT -6) | | I think you're right on the money, Tom. Good thinking!
Another way to get at the same point (I think) is to see possible worlds arranged in a nested tree structure. Each time a choice is made, one branch of the current tree becomes active and the other branches cease to be real possibilities. At the top of the tree is God's choice as to what kind of world he will create. What God chooses in creating is what branch of the whole possibility tree will become active. Subsequent choices, both by God and by his free creatures, prune branches off of that branch, and so on.
In choosing some branch of the possibility tree over others God effectively takes a permissive stance toward the remaining possibilities, which includes everything that ever was, is, or will become actual. Given God's infinite intelligence, everything that happens is therefore knowingly permitted by God.
God bless,
Alan | | Back to Top | | |
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GregBoyd
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| Posted 2/5/2003 7:32 PM (GMT -6) | | NOT ONE of the critics of open theism to date has addressed what TGB, JET and ALAN have so succinctly articulated here!
Its a "Choose Your Own Adventure" model of providence. God sets the parameters of possibilities and grants us a domain of freedom to actualize the ones we will. I like the "nested tree structure" metaphor as well.
But HERE is the crucial difference between the neo-Molinist and Molinist accounts (a la Freddoso): in the Open View, to say that God permits each particular evil DOES NOT entail that God permitted THIS particular evil over OTHER ALTERNATIVES. It means, in other words, that we need not assume THERE IS A SPECIFIC DIVINE REASON as to why God permitted A SPECIFIC EVIL. There IS a reason why God permitted a set of possibilities, and the answer is simply FREE WILL. But there is no further specificity to God's reason for permitting the free will to play itself out as it does -- for this is simply what free will MEANS.
And this alteration, I submit, both helps alleviate the problem of evil AND render free will coherent.
Doc
"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6 | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 2/5/2003 8:59 PM (GMT -6) | | Thanks guys!
I like the tree analogy! Cool.
I think what seems intolerable for Freddoso and others who believe in exhaustively definite foreknowledge (thank you Doc for coining that phrase; it is so helpful!) is the open view claim that God may attempt to prevent some evil and fail. This thought sends chills up the spine. I remember my systematic theo teacher in school saying “Whatever God tries to do he does.” And it is this belief which the open view challenges, and where people’s trust and confidence are in the perceived advantage God gains from this being the case, the open view appears to undermine confidence in God. If it is ever the case that God doesn’t get what he wants, then God can guarantee nothing of what he wants and we have assurance of nothing.
This is why I think the infinite intelligence argument is so crucial, and with it the belief that might-counterfactuals have a truth-value independent of would-counterfactuals. I think these two have the greatest chance of making sense of the open view to folks like Freddoso and Craig. At one point Doc issued a call for help in constructing an argument for the independent truth-value of might-counterfactuals. I hope it’s going well.
For those of you who were present in Toronto for the jam session to discuss “What next?” what sort of ideas were offered for future plans?
Tom
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GregBoyd
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| Posted 2/6/2003 4:14 AM (GMT -6) | | I think that if you could trace back every incoherence that floats around in evangelical culture, 84.3% could be traced back to the incoherence of believing...
a) God's will can never be thwarted
b) people have free will and sometimes act against God's will.
From this oozes common incoherences such as
* blaming the drunk driver for killing the child wild telling the mother that "her time was up."
* saying "God's timing is the right timing" when a deal doesn't come through while getting mad at the person who stood you up and caused the deal to fall through.
OR
* saving "theres a reason for everything, nothing happens by accident" while decrying a child kidnapping and rape as "a tragedy that God rails at".
And we could go on and on.
Now, about the "where do we go from here" discussion in Tornoto, all I can say is CVM is in preliminary stages of planning a (hopefully) annual openness symposium/seminar/forum at WHC. Clark Pinnock agreed to presenting chapters of his (distantly) forthcoming Systematic Theology for criticial dialogue. That could happen in 2004. There's some tentative discussion right now about hosting a seminar with other openness spokespeople earlier than this. We'll keep you posted!
Doc
"In Christ...the ONLY THING that matters is faith energized by love." Galatians 5:6 | | Back to Top | | |
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Starkman
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Total Posts : 1747
| Posted 2/6/2003 5:28 AM (GMT -6) | | That God's will can be thwarted is so clearly seen in the most mundane, daily activities. What has to be defined, however, is what we mean to resist God or thwart His will: in the general or ultimate sense. Every day we thwart God's will, but the argument against this will resort to the ultimate: God will ultimately get His way, and no one can thwart that. But this still leaves the fact undealt with that under a given circumstance God's will can be thwarted or resisted, even if it's not ultimately.
I go back to Jonah here. Initially Jonah resists God's will; he heads out in the wrong direction of which he was told to go. Ultimately he arrives where he was supposed to be and preaches the message to Nineveh he was supposed to preach. However, when things didn't go quite the way Jonah wanted them--Nineveh doesn't get wasted, and Jonah's prophecy is left wanting--he laments this, stating that he knew God was a merciful God, and, well, he (Jonah) could only have expected God to display His mercy. Jonah reveals the fact that he already has a framework of the God he serves. It's not that Jonah could not have thwarted or further resisted God's will, it is that it's not ultimately (in this case) his desire to do so.
But what of those people who don't care about God, or who resist his will, ultimately? "And do you think this, O Man, you who judge those practicing such things, and doing the same, that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knwoing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God" (Romans 2:3-5).
Yes, even Jonah, as any of us, could have ultimately said, if he freely thought it to be in his better interests (not that it would have been), "No, God, I'm afraid I'm simply not going to do this." In return, God doesn't make too many people become robots--one's body and mouth suddenly moving and speaking without any control whatsoever. We can resist God's will. What's so amazing is that even though there are those who do, God does get what He wants, ultimately, but 'ultimately' does not mean without loss; the most senstive loss being that not everyone will believe and follow His will.
Starkman
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 2/6/2003 12:57 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
I think what seems intolerable for Freddoso and others who believe in exhaustively definite foreknowledge ... is the open view claim that God may attempt to prevent some evil and fail. This thought sends chills up the spine. I remember my systematic theo teacher in school saying “Whatever God tries to do he does.” And it is this belief which the open view challenges, and where people’s trust and confidence are in the perceived advantage God gains from this being the case, the open view appears to undermine confidence in God. If it is ever the case that God doesn’t get what he wants, then God can guarantee nothing of what he wants and we have assurance of nothing.
Tom, I don't think open theism need be committed to the view that God may try to prevent evil and fail, though that is certainly a natural way of speaking given the commitments of open theism. The issue turns on what exactly it is that God is trying to do. Is He trying to prevent the evil? (Everyone grants that He COULD do this, if necessary by overriding free will.) Or is He trying to influence matters in a manner that preserves freedom such that evil acts are less likely than they would have been without His influence? My point is that the disagreement between open theists and classical theists isn't really over whether or not God always gets what He wants. Rather, the disagreement is over what it is that God most fundamentally wants. If preserving the free will of His creatures is of fundamental importance to God then He won't "try" to do things that would negate that freedom.
Vaya con Dios,
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Alan Rhoda
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Total Posts : 680
| Posted 2/6/2003 1:13 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
I think that if you could trace back every incoherence that floats around in evangelical culture, 84.3% could be traced back to the incoherence of believing...
a) God's will can never be thwarted
b) people have free will and sometimes act against God's will.
I agree with you that there are a lot of incoherences surrounding how we talk about God's will with respect to creaturely choices, but I think your point needs a little more precision.
(a) and (b) are perfectly consistent if we recognize that (a) is refers to God's "sovereign" will and (b) to His "permissive" or "moral" will. I think that may have been Starkman's point. Incoherence arise only when we either (i) fail to observe this distinction or (ii) make God's sovereign will all-inclusive. For if God's sovereign will is truly all-inclusive, then the distinction between His sovereign will and His permissive will is moot.
That's why I've never understood how Calvinist theologians can think that invoking that distinction accomplishes anything. For Arminians and OVers, however, the distinction between God's sovereign will and His moral will has real significance.
Alan
PS: Always appreciate your insights, Doc. More than anyone else you've really helped me to understand open theism, and it's really helped my devotional life, especially with respect to the importance of prayer.
Edited by - Alan Rhoda on 02/06/2003 6:14:36 PM | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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| Posted 2/8/2003 9:09 PM (GMT -6) | | Good points Alan. You clarified what I was trying to say! God’s “attempts” to prevent evil are, by his own design, limited to moving and influencing in ways that respect our free will. Like you said, where free will folk and determinists differ is in their understanding of the design (= “what it is God is trying to do”).
Tom
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