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OrthodoxBerean
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2001
Total Posts : 82
| Posted 9/19/2004 2:41 AM (GMT -6) |   | I was reading an article from CARM and they had quoted from John Sanders where he states, "this does leave open the possibility that God might be "mistaken" about some points, as the biblical record acknowledges. "
Do open view theist generall agree with this?
The article is at http://www.carm.org/open/mistakes.htm | | Back to Top | | |
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Newcomb
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 116
| Posted 9/19/2004 6:18 AM (GMT -6) | | Forgive the political analogy, but OV:republican, classical view:democrats in the one single sense that the republicans disagree about particulars, and dems often seem to be in locked phase. If you step out of line, you are thrown out. So, in OV there are differing views more so that in classical theism where (in both cases, political and theological) there is a smaller range of views in classical theism. This is partly caused by the amount of time the classical views have existed, which in any system tends to solidify certain views and edge out others.
But I digress. . .
It is according to what type of 'mistake' you mean.
It is not a moral error, or "sin" to change a decision or to make a misjudgment.
Repeatedly in scripture God repents, or turns around and away from something he had previously decided to do. This is usually due to some response he has received from the other free will beings, man. This happened in both directions, God repenting of the bad thing he intended to do, and God repenting of the good thing he intended to do.
This alone can indicate an error or merely a conditional response.
Often threats or promises are conditional to the response of free moral agents. "Unless you repent" "If you do good" "If you do evil" and so on. These are conditional promises or threats.
Other times, according to his Word, he indicates he was surprised, taken back, angered, or experienced a myriad of emotions over the behavior of free willed beings.
This is what Sanders was saying in the article, God can be surprised by man's free will. Man can choose to disobey or choose against God. This is what sin is.
Part of the problem here is the Hellenistic concept of perfection that was brought into the early church by Greek trained pastors and teachers, and which persists today. The scriptural view of perfection deals with completeness. The Greek view deals with the inability to change simple because it insists that perfection is a certain set of ideals. Then this is applied to God.
This is backwards, we are to look at the scripture and derive our view from his Word not from Greek ideals, or anyone else’s.
So God can be perfect in the complete sense, and make judgment errors about the response of other free willed beings without being less than perfect.
So, yes, at least certain OV people believe God can make error or mistakes in judging the responses of free will beings.
The article takes security in the idea that God can’t make mistakes, but if he can’t, why does the Bible tell us many times that God repented? The article quotes a verse saying God knows all things. OV affirms this but defined it rationally, that is, God knows all things that are knowable and does not know anything that is not knowable.
The future does not exist at any given point in time, therefore, it is unknowable unless it is determined.
If it is determined, than the idea of free will is false, as Luther claimed.
If there is no free will, then God determines that most people will sin and die in sin (he is the responsible agent for the action because he predetermined it before the being who did it existed), and are punished in hell for that sin.
The moral responsibility is inescapable.
If there is free will, then the decisions I make tomorrow might be predicted by God, but they are not determined, and are therefore unknowable except as probabilities.
If there are only probabilities, then there will be errors in judgments made about them. This is what we see in the scriptures.
"Neuk'em" | | Back to Top | | |
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Lee Merrill
booted
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 723
| Posted 9/19/2004 11:42 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
The article takes security in the idea that God can’t make mistakes, but if he can’t, why does the Bible tell us many times that God repented?
There are astonishing implications, though, in most of these cases! Can we believe that God thought Moses would not pray for the Israelites, after he had done so on many prior occasions? Can we believe that God really thought Hezekiah would not pray to be healed? And here are my Jonah questions:
Why didn't God destroy the Ninevites right away, if that was his plan?
Why did God send Jonah, and spoil his plan?
How can we trust God, if he can take action, and spoil his own plan himself?
How can we say that God didn't lie to the Ninevites, if he threatened unconditional destruction, yet he knew it might not happen?
Why did Jonah seem to have a better grasp of the situation than God did? He thought the Ninevites would probably repent, and thus he ran.
Why did the Ninevites seem to know better than God did? They thought they could repent, and God, apparently, did not.
Why didn't God keep the Ninevites from repenting after Jonah preached to them, like he did with the sons of Eli (1 Sam. 2:25) and with Amaziah (2 Chr. 25:16)?
quote:
If there are only probabilities, then there will be errors in judgments made about them. This is what we see in the scriptures.
Doesn't this undo all the prophecies, and promises, that involve free will, though? That's most of them, actually, and most of what concerns us.
Blessings,
Lee
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"Even now we seem to have dim glimpses into regions
from which we receive no word to bring away" (George MacDonald) | | Back to Top | | |
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feelinahole
Registered Member
Date Joined Jan 2004
Total Posts : 754
| Posted 9/19/2004 5:26 PM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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Tom
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 9/20/2004 4:26 AM (GMT -6) | | OrthodoxBerean: I was reading an article from CARM and they had quoted from John Sanders where he states, "this does leave open the possibility that God might be "mistaken" about some points, as the biblical record acknowledges." Do open view theist general agree with this?
Tom: No. And I’m pretty sure Sanders would not express himself today this same way. In fact, he has said as much on this forum in response to this same question.
Divine knowledge of possibilities and changes of mind we see in Scripture do not amount to “errors in judgments” or “mistakes” by any definition of word. I think people might be assuming that God’s not getting what he wants in situations that are foreknown as contingent means such knowledge involves an error in judgment. But this isn’t the case. For example, I pursue a purpose that involves S. I know there’s a 90% probability that S occur and 10% probability it not occur. I also have a contingency plan prepared. So no surprises. When S doesn’t occur I say “I’m grieved that S didn’t occur. Now I’ll change my mind and pursue P.” There’s no error in judgment involved in believing S would “likely” occur but having to deal with its not actually occurring. An error in judgment would have been to believe that S had a probability of occurring other than 90%, contrary to reality.
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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