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For the Eastern Church, God is never the primary cause, but the Creator. It is creation "in the image" of the Creator which places the "second freedom" outside any causal determinism, and the patristic conception of humankind as autexousia, self authoritative, rightly defines its mysterious capacity to transcend every necessity and the very condition of the creature over against divine freedom: to see oneself as microtheos, as God-in-miniature. One can even say that God, the Lover of humankind, is much more determined himself by his creation and his covenants than the creature by his Creator: "The Lord has sworn and he will not change his mind" (Ps 110:4). The Incarnation appears as God's reply to his own promise: the divinizing of his creature. The fall of man reveals the titanic fullness of our freedom, which in turn, determines our own destiny. Satan did not lie in saying: "You will be as gods." Man has created something which never existed before. We created evil and introduced it into our innocent nature. What is more, our salvation determines the shape of the Incarnation as Love crucified. Divine blood has been shed to safeguard our freedom in grace, for, according to the Fathers' saying, "God is not able to force anyone to love him."

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POW, I think this is a very interesting statement. Does the author mean what I think is meant? On another thread I was trying to differentiate between two types of "freedom": (1) freedom as "power" to do X or not-X versus (2) freedom as God-given ability to "create". Or as the author of the above quote says: freedom as "second cause" versus "second freedom" ("second creators"?)

JET

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Reading someone who's from a background different from mine proves very interesting. Getting a handle takes time, over a period of time. Maybe he is saying that, Jet. But we also need to get a handle on why he is saying that: why it is important.

Why do you think?

He does touch on the "cause"/"freedom" issue two times in that post: once pre-fall, and one post.

For me, I'm caught up by Evdokimov's use of "Creator" juxtaposed to "cause." I'm guessing that for rocks and ice crystals "cause" is fine. *** But WAIT; maybe there is even something deeper there, as mankind as prophet, priest and king of creation, offering all back to God eucharristically...maybe nothing should be "reduced" down down to mere "effect" of cause. So as to God being "Creator" -- maybe there is LOTS to mine from Evdokimov's message.


BTW - I've read of his: In the World, Of the Church, and Women and the Salvation of the World. I'm also re-reading The Sacrament of Love. He is deceased now. SVS Press handles them.

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Now, as to your indignation at the Chaplain saying "God writes straight with crooked lines.", and claiming that he coldly regurgitate ... indoctrination ... received at seminary, you disrespect him greatly.

Should you believe an artist when he talks about art? Should you respect a Chaplain when he is ministering.

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Chuck Swindoll said the other day on a radio message: "God is in control", a phrase I have heard and also said many times reaffirming God's soverignity. And I thought to myself... according to Open Theists, no He is not. What a dreadful thought it was!

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I'll tell you a more dreadful thought. A God in, TOTAL, control of this world. ...must not be doing that job good enough. And I think you misunderstand the open theist position. God doesn't possess unilateral control, so in that sense, no He is not in TOTAL control. But God is in control by actively working in his creation and persuading it with Love. I would find a coercive God to be an ultimately weak God as would the majority of open theists on this board.



"The 'sovereignty' of God is not, I suggest, a very biblical idea, especially if one has a low opinion of the respect of sovereigns for the freedom of their subjects."
~Charles Hartshorne

Edited by - A_Theist on 04/14/2003 02:28:37 AM

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MephEternal

Here's a question for you, bob. If what I've said in the post above is feasible, isn't it possible that OTHER creational factors that God interacts with besides HUMAN free-will can account for God's inability to do certain things? Like say, demons and THEIR power of influence? Just a thought.

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I have read the comments and listened to the explanations of how God "can't" do something, of how God doesn't know all the future, etc. I have said several times it does not sound like the God I know.

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Ms. Bob, can God make a four-legged tripod?



Edited by - Laika on 04/14/2003 07:24:13 AM

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Chuck Swindoll said the other day on a radio message: "God is in control", a phrase I have heard and also said many times reaffirming God's soverignity. And I thought to myself... according to Open Theists, no He is not. What a dreadful thought it was!

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If you have children, are you in total control of them? Or do they have some level of freedom?

_________________________

• Ms. Bob, can God make a four-legged tripod?


• If you have children, are you in total control of them? Or do they have some level of freedom?

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For the Eastern Church, God is never the primary cause, but the Creator. It is creation "in the image" of the Creator which places the "second freedom" outside any causal determinism, and the patristic conception of humankind as autexousia, self authoritative, rightly defines its mysterious capacity to transcend every necessity and the very condition of the creature over against divine freedom: to see oneself as microtheos, as God-in-miniature. One can even say that God, the Lover of humankind, is much more determined himself by his creation and his covenants than the creature by his Creator: "The Lord has sworn and he will not change his mind" (Ps 110:4). The Incarnation appears as God's reply to his own promise: the divinizing of his creature. The fall of man reveals the titanic fullness of our freedom, which in turn, determines our own destiny. Satan did not lie in saying: "You will be as gods." Man has created something which never existed before. We created evil and introduced it into our innocent nature. What is more, our salvation determines the shape of the Incarnation as Love crucified. Divine blood has been shed to safeguard our freedom in grace, for, according to the Fathers' saying, "God is not able to force anyone to love him."

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WHICH LEADS NATURALLY TO LAIKA'S SECOND, VERY REAL POINT!!!

"If you have children, are you in total control of them? Or do they have some level of freedom?"


I think it is worth considering this about the same way that we do the "four-legged tripod." HAD God created the world in such a way that kids were to be totally controled, all of the time and in every way by parents, then it would be so. (And the kids could sit on their assigned "four-legged tripods" too.) But it just ain't that way, now. Is it?

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That's one reason that JET and I (at least I'll speak for me) are interested in the quote from Paul Evdokimov (from "In the World, Of the Church").

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Divine blood has been shed to safeguard our freedom in grace, for, according to the Fathers' saying, "God is not able to force anyone to love him."

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"God is not able to force anyone to love him." There's something God can't do. He's a limited God, He's not in total control? If He is in total control, why can't He force everyone to love Him? A flaw in His plan.

I created my kids, yet I can't force them to love me. If I could, would their love be genuine? So why is God limited if He can't force us to love Him? He's not limited if He can't do the un-doable.
By the same token, He's not limited if He can't know the un-knowable.



Edited by - Laika on 04/14/2003 09:00:58 AM

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The Inconceivable is
conceived in the womb of a Virgin
the Unmeasurable becomes three cubits high,
the Unqualifiable acquires a quality;
the Undefinable stands up, sits down, and lies down;
He who is everywhere is put into a crib;
He who is above time gradually reaches the age of twelve;
He who is formless appears with the shape of a man,
and the Incorporeal enters into a body. . . .
Therefore, He is describable and indescribable.

(Theodore the Studite)

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Laika, when you wrote "A flaw in His plan." at the pivot between your paragraphs, it looked at first like you meant it. But when I saw how the two paragraphs fit together I decide that you meant it for suspence. Care to clarify for me?

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I'm responding to this:

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I have read the comments and listened to the explanations of how God "can't" do something, of how God doesn't know all the future, etc. I have said several times it does not sound like the God I know.

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1. The God Bob knows, evidently, can do anything, can know everything.
2. You posted a quote by Paul Evdokimov that says: "God is not able to force anyone to love him."

So there is something God can't do. Yet we all believe God is not limited. So saying God can't do something, doesn't limit Him.




Edited by - Laika on 04/14/2003 10:09:31 AM

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2. You posted a quote by Paul Evdokimov that says: "God is not able to force anyone to love him."

So there is something God can't do. Yet we all believe God is not limited. So saying God can't do something, doesn't limit Him.

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But, as to the matter of "saying God can't do something, doesn't limit Him" we should not say that God "couldn't" make us to have to love Him. Rather, we can say that God freely chose to make us to be who we are: beings that can Love God freely by natural will.

....and that is not to say that inventing other things about God wouldn't represent imposing limitations on God...

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Yes. God could have created us as robots, following a script, but He didn't. We agree on that.

So the choice to love God resides with us. We make the choice, and that choice doesn't exist until we make it.

As Paul Evdokimov said:

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Satan did not lie in saying: "You will be as gods." Man has created something which never existed before.

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So we create something that never existed before and knowledge of it before existence is not possible.




Edited by - Laika on 04/14/2003 11:15:01 AM

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Yes. God could have created us as robots, following a script, but He didn't. We agree on that.

So the choice to love God resides with us. We make the choice, and that choice doesn't exist until we make it.

As Paul Evdokimov said:

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Satan did not lie in saying: "You will be as gods." Man has created something which never existed before.

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So we create something that never existed before and knowledge of it before existence is not possible.

Edited by - Laika on 04/14/2003 11:15:01 AM

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In your post, Laika, a CERTAIN kind of knowledge is talked about. Its almost the only kind that we can know. I'm wondering whether creating is a different sort of knowing. (Creating has an interesting temporal quality, where before and after blend together.) But how can you say that God is limited to what can be "known" in time. YOU CAN'T.

ALL that we can say is, that WITHIN time, WE are the unique creations of God and have the calling to hold a unique office. And that nature, calling and office say that what Evdokimov is saying is true. That's ALL.

Your thoughts above circumscribe God exclusively within time.

That is not the only thing I have against the Open-view. The really BIG problem hides on the flip side of that. It reduces THIS creation and THIS time to "refer back unto itself" -- which is a kind of Agnositicism.


To see what I mean, look at the Church's witness as to the truth of Time and Eternity.

Of "Fixed Feasts" like Christmas and all the events which are set on particular dates are "specific redemptive interventions of God in the history of man." But they also all point to "the presence of eternity within time itself" (Mantzaridis, "Time and Man"). They "serve to sanctify time and transform it in the light of the kingdom of God. And the "Movable Feasts like Easter/Pascha, like Pentacost, Ascension all "stand apart from historical time and fuide man above and beyond it, pointing to and "fashioning a new dimension of time as through suspended above that temporality to which history is subject, offering vast vistas to man who is shackled by time." (Mantzaridis)


Honestly, Laika, what is emitted from this obsession with "what God knows" is the over-ripe "fruit" of the old Calvin/Arminus and Pelagius/Augusting fuedes. That's all. It is a search for fareness, a fair "chance" as equal as the next guy.

It tries to protect God from charges of "predestining" in a manner Paul never meant, and saving God from human wrath for damning us for what we haven't done yet (ala Minority Report). Its not Biblical. God does not need protecting from it. I wish we would all stop trying to protect him.

As you see in Evdokimov, God "damned" himself (I'm speaking VERY loosely here) by choice to take up His own cross and lay down His live. AND WE STILL TRY TO PUNISH HIM BEYOND THAT?

- - - - - - - - - - - -


P.S., It was JOB who "argued with God for God." His arguement went like this: "I know that my redeemer lives..." That does not need to be argued any more. Just preached.




Edited by - PotOnWheel on 04/14/2003 1:00:13 PM

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In your post, Laika, a CERTAIN kind of knowledge is talked about. Its almost the only kind that we can know. I'm wondering whether creating is a different sort of knowing. (Creating has an interesting temporal quality, where before and after blend together.) But how can you say that God is limited to what can be "known" in time. YOU CAN'T.

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I'm talking about the origins of a choice. If it resides with me, then I am free. If it originates with God, then I am a robot.

If there is another kind of knowledge available, and we can't know it, why even bother discussing it? Same with time. Scripture never shows God as living "outside time". So why entertain that idea?


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