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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 10/21/2004 9:06 AM (GMT -6) |   | Lock: Isaiah 55:8,9 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher that the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” When we are created in God's image, what do you think this all entails?
Tom: Well, that’s a big question that needs a thread devoted to it itself. But I’d start by assuming there is enough of a fundamental likeness or similarity between us and God to make such passages as the one you quoted meaningful. God can only say to us about himself that his ways are not our ways if the word “ways” means for God basically what it means for us, otherwise the claim itself, the language itself, cannot be a vehicle God is able to use to describe himself truthfully to us. But if it’s true that the gulf between us and God is both infinite and qualitative (which you haven't yet told me if you agree with), then we can know nothing about God, period. That’s where I’d start. I think the next step I’d take would be attempting to show that when God tells Israel his ways are not their ways, etc., that there’s a context of historical events that delimits what God is talking about, a context to which this divine claim speaks, out of which it speaks to us, and in which such claims are to be understood and conditioned. You however, typically perhaps, see a passage like this one pointing out where God and we are different and remove it from its historical context and absolutize it. How's it feel?
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Tom: I don’t even understand this, Lock. The “decisive" theoretical reasons fail to persuade? If they’re “decisive” then they’re just that, decisive. They can’t “fail to persuade.” If they fail to persuade then they are by definition NOT decisive.
Lock: Your posts are proving the author's point! He is saying that even with ample proof refuting the notion of LFW, one is not persuaded because it does not fit with how they "feel".
I looked for a link or quote from some author in this thread and couldn't find it. Sorry ‘bout that. In any case, if it’s objectors to LFW that feel THEIR reasons for denying LFW are decisive, well, no doubt they assume they are. Whether they in fact are is another question.
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Tom: So, do us the favor of proposing a scenario from real life in which we justly hold a person morally responsible for behavior that (s)he was determined to do (or choose) by factors outside his/her will. Make sense of your claim for me, because without some analogy from the real world to give meaning to it, your claim is simply incoherent to me.
Lock: Why do you need a "real life" analogy?
Because all meaning is analogous. Your claim about freedom and resopnsibility thus far is incoherent and so meaningless to me.
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Lock: Is the bible and what it says not proof anough?
Oh yes, quite. The Bible is fine. But since what you’re claiming the Bible means gives every evidence to me of being incoherent and meaningless, I need an analogy to even figure out what it is you're saying.
Lock: Still, I will use a good parenting example. We both know that our children will make mistakes. For whatever reasons we hold to, we both know that it is a fact our child(ren) will at sometime or another sin. When your child makes a mistake, do you "punish" them just for the sake of punishing? No, we correct our child, with the goal of our child learning right from wrong. The benefit of the correction is for the child not the parent. Even though we know our child cannot perfectly keep the standard we have set for them we still must correct them when they miss the mark we have set. God treats us as His children. Even though He knows we are incapable of meeting His mark (due to the weakness of the flesh, which influences our will), He still must correct all that we have done wrong in order for us to understand His righteousness.
Tom: This is not an analogy of what I asked for. This doesn’t amount to a denial of LFW as I understand it. It amounts to an affirmation of it. Agreeing that over time my kids will make wrong choices doesn’t mean that it’s not the case that in each case they aren't able and free to make the right choices. The certainty that they will choose wrongly is distributed over time. In such cases, we do hold them responsible for their choices precisely because we believe they were free to do otherwise.
What I’m looking for, Lock, is an example of agent A unconditionally determining agent B to choose to commit some evil in such a way that agent A is responsible for determining B's choice while B is justly held morally accountable for the choice. Give me an example of THAT. I'm saying that in the absence of any analogy illustrating such a meaning for "just," "free," and "accountable" (to the contrary, in the presence of every evidence against the meaningfulness of such concepts), your claims (your reading of Scripture) is not "coherent but wrong," it's rather "incoherent and so meaningless."
But hey, you find it meaningful. So you must have a sense of justice and moral accountability that makes sense of holding people accountable for such choices. You grew up on the same planet we did and had similar experiences, so it shouldn’t be too hard for you to find an example from your expereicne that makes sense of this to others who struggle to understand you.
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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lock
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 701
| Posted 10/21/2004 4:08 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
What I’m looking for, Lock, is an example of agent A unconditionally determining agent B to choose to commit some evil in such a way that agent A is responsible for determining B's choice while B is justly held morally accountable for the choice. Give me an example of THAT
Once again, Tom, I do not find it needful to stray away from the examples given in the bible (namely Pharoah; Romans. 9), but if it useful for you, here is another example...
Consider this fictional situation based from real life. A young Palastian boy (Agent B) is raised his whole life being told that the Israelis should be killed. He is rasied to idolize suicide bombers. Agent A in this young man's life is the outside circumstances he cannot control; i.e. being born into a Palastinian family, being born after the year of 1967 in Palestine, being a male, The constant propaganda he hears in his home, public television, school, at the mosque, etc. Then, in an effort to please his fellow countrymen, family, and alla, he straps on a pack of explosives and blows himself up in a popular Jewish area, killing, men, women and children alike. In the eyes of the world, he is responsible for his actions, even though most would claim his actions are directly related to his upbringing.
Before you respond, in your last post you tossed in "unconditional" and this adds a new thread. When you say unconditional you are assuming my view is that the person CANNOT choose otherwise, but that is not what I am saying. Back to our young palastinian man above; he is capable of choosing not to be a suicide bomber, that is a possibility, BUT being that, in this young man's perspective being a suicide bomber is choice for him, in that this is what he prefers. My stand is not that God unconditionally determines our "choices". But God does has a hand is determining what we percieve as choice or what is preferred. This is where our disposition comes in. If our dispostion is of the flesh, then we will consider the things of the flesh as choice, being what we prefer. If our disposition is of the spirit, then we consider the things of the spirit choice over those things of the flesh. Upon vivification (being "made alive" in Christ) we will no longer have to contend with the flesh, we will no longer percieve the desires of the flesh as "choice" or what we prefer. Instead we will have a spiritual body, and we will prefer the things of the spirit. The possibility of choosing not to obey God is there, but we will choose to do what we prefer or percieve as "choice".
His achievement are we, being created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God makes ready beforehand, that we should be walking in them. | | Back to Top | | |
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WormBowedB4TerribleGod
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Date Joined Feb 2004
Total Posts : 43
| Posted 10/21/2004 4:53 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by lock
Consider this fictional situation based from real life. A young Palastian boy (Agent B) is raised his whole life being told that the Israelis should be killed. He is rasied to idolize suicide bombers. Agent A in this young man's life is the outside circumstances he cannot control; i.e. being born into a Palastinian family, being born after the year of 1967 in Palestine, being a male, The constant propaganda he hears in his home, public television, school, at the mosque, etc. Then, in an effort to please his fellow countrymen, family, and alla, he straps on a pack of explosives and blows himself up in a popular Jewish area, killing, men, women and children alike. In the eyes of the world, he is responsible for his actions, even though most would claim his actions are directly related to his upbringing.
Then imagine that boy going against the "determination" of his upbringing and surrendering instead:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1177325,00.html
Or a man who had even LONGER to be ingrained with hate against the Jews:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2922981.stm
Genesis 4:6 Then the LORD said to Cain, "Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen?
7 "If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door; and its desire is for you, but you must master it."
They mastered it.
Who are you, oh worm, to question the living God? | | Back to Top | | |
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JEE
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Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 1466
| Posted 10/21/2004 5:03 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by lock
Isaiah 55:8,9
For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher that the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.
In context, Is. 55:9 is definitely not a statement concerning the transcendance at all:
Is 55:6 ¶ Seek the LORD while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near.
7 Let the wicked forsake his way And the unrighteous man his thoughts; And let him return to the LORD, And He will have compassion on him, And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon.
8 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," declares the LORD.
9 "For {as} the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.
The prophet is saying, "My ways and thoughts are not your ways and thoughts--but they SHOULD BE! It is a call to repentance, not, "You dumb mortals just can't figure me out."
http://revivaltheology.net | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 10/22/2004 1:43 AM (GMT -6) | | Lock: Once again, Tom, I do not find it needful to stray away from the examples given in the bible (namely Pharoah; Romans. 9)…
Tom: Once again you mistake the sort of analogy we’re looking for. There is no proof in the Bible that Pharoah’s hardening was “unconditional” (i.e., that God didn’t choose to make compatibilistic use of him in response to the sort of person he was). Where does the text say God unconditionally predetermined, before creation, to harden Pharoah? It doesn’t. But that’s the sort of analogy we want, one in which agent A predetermines, unconditioned by anything in agent B, that B commit some evil such that A is recognized as being responsible for determining B but B is recognized as morally responsible for the crime.
Romans 9? There are plausible readings of that which are not deterministic.
Lock: ...but if it useful for you, here is another example...Consider this fictional situation based from real life. A young Palastian boy (Agent B) is raised his whole life being told that the Israelis should be killed. He is rasied to idolize suicide bombers. Agent A in this young man's life is the outside circumstances he cannot control; i.e. being born into a Palastinian family, being born after the year of 1967 in Palestine, being a male, The constant propaganda he hears in his home, public television, school, at the mosque, etc. Then, in an effort to please his fellow countrymen, family, and alla, he straps on a pack of explosives and blows himself up in a popular Jewish area, killing, men, women and children alike. In the eyes of the world, he is responsible for his actions, even though most would claim his actions are directly related to his upbringing.
Tom: This is not an example of that demonstrates that libertarian free will is absent. On the contrary, this young Palestinian is free to do other than he does, perhaps not after being brainwashed by fanatic religious leaders, but he had a libertarian choice to pursue or back away from such influence. This is easy to prove. Having lived on the West Bank among Palestinians during the uprising for eight years and having worked among them, I can show you any number of Palestinian young men who grew up in the same neighborhoods, heard the same sermons, etc., who chose NOT to follow the path of violence, who mourn that their society is spinning out of control, and who actually stand against the tide.
Lock: Before you respond…
Tom: Oops. Already did.
Lock: …in your last post you tossed in "unconditional" and this adds a new thread. When you say unconditional you are assuming my view is that the person CANNOT choose otherwise, but that is not what I am saying.
Tom: Oh but it IS what you’re saying. A chain of causal events which determine a particular outcome are themselves not conditioned by the effect. Quite the contrary, they are the conditions which determine the effect. That's the whole problem, Lock.
I know you recognize that the Palestinian actually engages his will and makes a choice and that he does so in agreement with his disposition, but in all this the actual choice is the effect of a chain of causal factors which are themselves not conditioned by the effect that's put out at the end of the line. So the determining factors that determine the choice to blow myself up precede me, stand outside of me, and are what they are without respect to any “condition” in me. That the choice is actualized at the end of the line by my engaging my will in agreement with disposition doesn't negate the unconditionality of the determination anymore than ANY outcome of a causal chain of events negates the unconditionality of the determining causes.
So in what meaningful sense can it be said that B is “able” to other than he does? In what sense can it be said that ANY outcome may possibly be other than it is given the preceding causal influences? Not in any sense that grounds moral accountability. I suppose one could say that if the determining factors were different, then he would be “able” to choose differently. That’s rich. So, there’s one view of freedom that affirms a person’s ability to do other than they do given the same history of events leading up to the choice itself, and that’s LFW.
Lock: Back to our young palastinian man above; he is capable of choosing not to be a suicide bomber, that is a possibility
Tom: Again, it’s a "logical possibility" in the sense that his doing other than he does describes a logically coherent state of affairs. Had the causes been different, the outcome would have been different, and this difference describes a logically contingent state of affairs. But this sense of possible is the weakest sense of the word and applies to all logically contingent states of affairs. It cannot itself ground any just account of moral responsibility.
Lock: …BUT being that, in this young man's perspective being a suicide bomber is choice for him, in that this is what he prefers.
Tom: His preferring it is the effect of a causal chain of events that stand outside him.
Lock: My stand is not that God unconditionally determines our "choices". But God does have a hand is determining what we percieve as choice or what is preferred. This is where our disposition comes in. If our dispostion is of the flesh, then we will consider the things of the flesh as choice, being what we prefer. If our disposition is of the spirit, then we consider the things of the spirit choice over those things of the flesh.
Tom: The denial of LFW doesn’t cause problems because it does or doesn’t see “God” as the one determining our choices. It’s not what explanation you DO give of choice that creates the problem, it’s the mere fact of denying that agents are causes in and of themselves that creates the problem. But as you describe it, God’s involved. Disposition determines choice. God (and other causal factors not under the agent’s control) determines disposition. But God doesn’t determine the choice?
Lock: Upon vivification (being "made alive" in Christ) we will no longer have to contend with the flesh, we will no longer percieve the desires of the flesh as "choice" or what we prefer. Instead we will have a spiritual body, and we will prefer the things of the spirit. The possibility of choosing not to obey God is there, but we will choose to do what we prefer or percieve as "choice".
Tom: I actually have some hope (small, but some) that universalism is true. That would be nice. But since no account of universalism can be given which explains what grounds the certainty that every person without fail "will" make a libertarian choice for God, I don't yet see universalism.
Just to save you the time and effort in your search of an analogy of B determining A's morally significant choices while A is justly held accountable for the choice, there is no such analogy.
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 10/22/2004 2:45 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
JEE: In context, Is. 55:9 is definitely not a statement concerning the transcendance at all: “Is 55:6 Seek the LORD while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near.
7 Let the wicked forsake his way And the unrighteous man his thoughts; And let him return to the LORD, And He will have compassion on him, And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon. 8 For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," declares the LORD. 9 For {as} the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.”
The prophet is saying, "My ways and thoughts are not your ways and thoughts--but they SHOULD BE! It is a call to repentance, not, "You dumb mortals just can't figure me out."
Hey there JEE. I agree that context decides. Interesting isn’t it? That in v. 7 it’s the wicked person’s “ways” and “thoughts” that are contrasted with God’s “ways” and “thoughts.” Nothing about divine metaphysical transcendence at all. Quite the opposite. God is pointing out what is immanent and discernible about his “ways” and “thoughts.” We might also add, then, that God’s ways/thoughts are “higher” than ours not in the sense of being beyond understanding (much less being categorically beyond description by humans as Lock argues), but in the sense of being profoundly good, righteous, and compassionate—unlike our “wicked” and “unrighteous” ways. That’s the text working for us. So the distance involved in God’s ways/thoughts being “higher” than ours is one of comparative moral superiority, not absolute metaphysical otherness, for God’s thoughts are “thoughts” (as we generally understand them) and his ways are “ways” (as we generally understand them).
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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lock
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Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 701
| Posted 10/25/2004 7:32 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by JEE
quote:
Originally posted by lock
Isaiah 55:8,9
For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher that the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.
In context, Is. 55:9 is definitely not a statement concerning the transcendance at all:
Is 55:6 ¶ Seek the LORD while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near.
7 Let the wicked forsake his way And the unrighteous man his thoughts; And let him return to the LORD, And He will have compassion on him, And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon.
8 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," declares the LORD.
9 "For {as} the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.
The prophet is saying, "My ways and thoughts are not your ways and thoughts--but they SHOULD BE! It is a call to repentance, not, "You dumb mortals just can't figure me out."
Later revelation, given through Paul, shows us that man is unable to figure God out, unless revealed to us by His spirit (1 Cor. 2:6-16).
Exaclty what state does God save us from? Are we not unrighteuos and wicked when God saves us? The only way our thoughts and ways will ever line up with God's is when His spirit makes its home in us.
His achievement are we, being created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God makes ready beforehand, that we should be walking in them. | | Back to Top | | |
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lock
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Date Joined Jul 2004
Total Posts : 701
| Posted 10/25/2004 8:11 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
If He put us in that state, then He doesn't need to "save" us from that state, we're were He wants us.
For us to truly appreciate and love God, do we not need a knowledge of good and evil? Did Adam and Eve truly know how good they had it in the garden? How could they? What did they have to compare? Our appreciation and love for God is influenced by our experiences during this lifetime.
quote:
Then why are you trying to explain God to us? You claim that you can't understand God, then try and explain Him to us. A free will agent, willfully and freely trying to prove he isn't a free will agent, is like a Hindu trying to prove reality is an illusion all the while stopping at all red lights.
Do not confuse the knowledge about God, with eperiencing God in our life. Anyone, saved or unsaved, can know that there is a god. They might even know about the message of salvation. My claim is that of the bible's, that I am God's achievement, walking in the good works that God has prepared beforehand (Eph. 2:10).
quote:
You'll never know whether that spirit in you is God's or a lying spirit fooling you into believing it's God's spirit.
Is it possible for a person who is saved to be decieved? Will one's theology always be 100% perfect? Do I have to believe I am a free agent in order to be saved? Do you have to believe in that God is a trinity to be saved? Does one have to believe in infant baptism? Predestination? Hell?
Because it is God and His spirit Who leads me does not mean that I do not spend time in the scriptures. We are entreated to study and present ourselves qualified, unashamed before God (2 Tim. 2:15).
How do you know it is not a lying spirit convincing you that you are a free agent, that you made the decision to accept God's offer of salvation?
His achievement are we, being created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God makes ready beforehand, that we should be walking in them. | | Back to Top | | |
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Tom
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 10353
| Posted 10/25/2004 9:35 PM (GMT -6) | | Back and forth, back and forth...
Lock, your question is pointless, for this reason; you have no basis upon which to assure yourself that you ARE saved. If you HAD such a basis, THEN your question would be a good one. That is, your question is a good sort of question to ask people who believe it's possible to possess assurance that they're saved. But since I've heard you argue (correct me if I'm wrong--Laika, you got the quotes to verify this I'm sure), that God gives the reprobate a false sense of security for a time, you cannot know you are not such a one. Merely believing that God does this sort of thing destroys all hope of assurance. You can offer yourself not a single reason for believing you're "saved and not deceived" and not "not saved and deceived that your saved and not deceived." It's entailed in your own system. Sorry.
Tom | | Back to Top | | |
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