Discussion thread: One on One: AMR and JCWR on the Temporality of God

[P8ntrDan]

It says no such thing!

Creation was the beginning of us and the physical universe.

Creation wasn't the beginning of....

God
Love
Power
Intelligence
Time

And any other inherent attribute of God. God is the living God, therefore as long as God has existed (eternally) there has been a sequence of events for Him, that's what makes Him a rational being.

Think about what you are asserting....
If before creation there was no passing of events how did God get to creation??? How did that event come to pass if events didn't transpire? :idunno:

Golly Gee Batman!

Before the beginning, there was a sense of 'time', or the passing of events/thoughts.


If creation was the beginning of us, then it would also be the beginning of time as we know it.

Therefore, I'm NOT stating that creation was the beginning of 'time' for God. So what are you saying?

 

[P8ntrDan]

It says no such thing!

Creation was the beginning of us and the physical universe.

Creation wasn't the beginning of....

God
Love
Power
Intelligence
Time

And any other inherent attribute of God. God is the living God, therefore as long as God has existed (eternally) there has been a sequence of events for Him, that's what makes Him a rational being.

Think about what you are asserting....
If before creation there was no passing of events how did God get to creation??? How did that event come to pass if events didn't transpire? :idunno:

On second thought....

God is the beginning and the end. So why do there need to be events before creation? There has to be a first event for God, so why not creation? It does say that in the Beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

(NOTE: This is a musing, not an invitation for obliteration, but rather a question. :chuckle

 

[Nathon Detroit]

Therefore, I'm NOT stating that creation was the beginning of 'time' for God.

Great. :up:

So what are you saying?

I am stating that time is not something that God created, and time is not something that God can be outside of. Time is a description of rational reality. I.e., the ever passing moment.

 

[P8ntrDan]

Great. :up:

I am stating that time is not something that God created, and time is not something that God can be outside of. Time is a description of rational reality. I.e., the ever passing moment.

Excellent. Glad we're on the level now.

Lesson Learned: FULLY and CLEARLY explain yourself the FIRST time. (and don't make analogies...)

 

[CabinetMaker]

It's true that parts of the future are settled but that is because God has determined to bring certain events to pass.

Do you think that the only way for God to get a desired outcome is to have seen the end of the table? Or is He powerful enough to bring an event to pass?

This is one of those mysteries that I cannot fully grasp or explain. To my very human mind, the table analogy works for me. It works for me because it makes sense to me that God is not constrained by time. I do not know how God knows the things He knows, but I fully trust that He does.

 

[CabinetMaker]

So..... what is your answer?

Did God create love or not?

No, love is not a created thing. We were created in God's image thus we have the ability to love.

 

[CabinetMaker]

Again that simply isn't true.

Time is the idea that reality happens sequentially i.e., one event follows another event and so on. There is NO biblical evidence or necessary logical argument that suggests God needed to create that type of reality.

Maybe...
What you are thinking of is our ability to measure time which is of course effected by physics and therefore creation.

Let me ask you this....
Do you believe there was a time when God didn't experience one event after another event and so on?

There is no way for us to know that. The Bible states that in the Beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth. Therefore, the BIBLE states that the beginning of time (as far as we are concerned) started with creation. As to your question, I would assume that God experienced things as they happened, but for an omnipresent omnipotent God that would look different for him than it would for us. Before the beginning, there was a sense of 'time', or the passing of events/thoughts. Will that suffice?

It says no such thing!

Creation was the beginning of us and the physical universe.

Creation wasn't the beginning of....

God
Love
Power
Intelligence
Time

And any other inherent attribute of God. God is the living God, therefore as long as God has existed (eternally) there has been a sequence of events for Him, that's what makes Him a rational being.

Think about what you are asserting....
If before creation there was no passing of events how did God get to creation??? How did that event come to pass if events didn't transpire? :idunno:

I've got to agree with P8nterdan on this. The beginning of time, as we understand it, started with the creation of the universe as we know it. How time might of existed before then is unknowable. We may not have the language to discus a place that is not subject to time.

 

[Nathon Detroit]

No, love is not a created thing. We were created in God's image thus we have the ability to love.

Correct, love is NOT a created thing.

Which answers your own original "dilemma" that you raised several posts ago.

Earlier you stated....

The alternative is somewhat frightening. If God is limited by time, then time existed before God and limits God. It raises the question of who created time.

Time is like love, in that it is an attribute of a living, rational, God. God didn't create time, or love, yet neither love, or time, limit God or requires being created by somebody other than God.

Fill in the blanks time....
God has existed an eternity past. Which means He has existed an infinite amount of _______ into the past.

 

[Nathon Detroit]

I've got to agree with P8nterdan on this. The beginning of time, as we understand it, started with the creation of the universe as we know it. How time might of existed before then is unknowable. We may not have the language to discus a place that is not subject to time.

So... if you are not sure if time existed before creation why are you staunchly arguing that it DIDN'T exist prior to creation? In essence you are asserting.... "I don't know that time existed before creation but I am sure it didn't exist prior to creation." :dizzy:

Why not assume that things were rational then, just as they are now?

It seems to me that if you don't know the answer you shouldn't take an illogical, irrational, unbiblical leap of faith. :idunno:

 

[godrulz]

I do believe that God knows the future but has not settled the future. I have always thought that time is like a table. Men live on that table and move through their lives limited as I noted above. God lives above that table and He can see all of our lives spread out before Him so He knows where we have been, where we are and where we are going. Again, it is a far from perfect analogy, but it has always helped me understand how God can the future without perdetermining it.

If God knows the future as settled, then it is inherently settled and determinism is true (timelessness is a loophole to try to get around this). He knows reality as it is. If free will, contingencies, uncertainties, possibilities, novelty are part of the nature of His chosen creation, then the future is actually known as partially unsettled. The issue is the nature of the future (settled or not), not whether God is omniscient (He is, knowing all that is knowable and reality as it is) or timeless (He is not if He is personal/dynamic vs static).

 

[godrulz]

Parts of the future are settled. God has described to us the end of the table in Revelations. God has told us what He will do and He will do it. But that does not mean, at least to me, that God had to determine each and every action of each and every thing to get to the end of the table.

God's intentions and ability to bring things to pass over time does not mean the future is actual, settled, or a possible object of real knowledge before it happens.

The potential future becomes the fixed past through the present. Saying that the future is as real/known/settled as the past or present blurs the fundamental distinctions between unidirectional time. It is incoherent and unnecessary. To say that the future is real and settled and seen by God even though it has not come into existence for us is science fiction and requires bizarre speculation and Einsteinian theories, not biblical, logical, philosophical facts.

 

[godrulz]

I think that time could be described as a creek flowing from it's source (creation) to it's end (the ocean of infinite bounds). Therefore, God would be able to be completely outside of time, such as a man standing beside the creek, watching it and knowing where it will go.

If a stick dropped in the creek at it's beginning was described as the way the actual events went from the beginning to the end, then the stick could float anywhere it needed to on the creek (allowing many different possible futures, but with the same destination), but God could also force that stick to go through certain places (events) by either moving it or changing the creek itself.

Time is a concept and more fundamental than space. C.S. Lewis' timeline with God seeing the whole line from above errors by using spatial analogies (cf. creek) for the issue of time.

Just because Einstein proposed space-time continuums or 4th dimensions, etc. does not mean it is fact or coherent. Subjective perceptions of time (relativity) also do not answer the questions about God's relationship to time and eternity before and after creation. The issue is more philosophical than speculative, theoretical, material physics.

 

[godrulz]

Ok, so I may have expressed it poorly, but my first sentence in the previous post was trying to point out that we can't explain how God exists on our terms. He isn't outside of reality, but rather controls what is reality, making the impossible (such as healing a blind man or prophesying the future) possible.

In God's divine temporality, He can and does intervene in our space-time reality. Timelessness is problematic and not necessary to explain the supernatural touching the natural.

 

[godrulz]

And neither did I.

I was saying that God created time as we know it. (which of course came about by creating a the physical reality in which we live in).

You are confusing our subjective measure or metric of time (sun, moon, stars) with time itself. Time is an aspect of God's experience. Like love, it is not created, but part of His reality.

AMR is probably influenced by Aquinas, Anselm, etc. He focuses more on metaphysics/ontology/being than the personal, volitional aspects of God. He thinks that time cannot be a part of the being of God if He is eternal. This is confusing categories and making love essential vs volitional, time a thing instead of simple duration even experienced by an eternal triune God who is not locked into a nonsensical eternal now simultaneity (makes creation co-eternal with God?).

 

[godrulz]

This is one of those mysteries that I cannot fully grasp or explain. To my very human mind, the table analogy works for me. It works for me because it makes sense to me that God is not constrained by time. I do not know how God knows the things He knows, but I fully trust that He does.

This is begging the question and finding an analogy that supports a preconceived idea, even if not true.

It is a myth that time (duration, sequence, succession) is a limitation on God like it is for us. He is infinite, not mortal; omnipotent, not weak; omnipresent, not confined to to one place like we are, omniscient, not limited in knowledge, etc. He can do endless things, unlike us, does not die, unlike us, etc.

Just because creation and incarnation and Second Coming are not experienced as a simultaneity/eternal now by God does not mean He is limited. Timelessness would limit God because He could not respond to or change anything, but would be trapped in a static, fixed, unchanging reality that cannot be reconciled to our parallel, changing reality.

 

[CabinetMaker]

So... if you are not sure if time existed before creation why are you staunchly arguing that it DIDN'T exist prior to creation? In essence you are asserting.... "I don't know that time existed before creation but I am sure it didn't exist prior to creation." :dizzy:

Why not assume that things were rational then, just as they are now?

It seems to me that if you don't know the answer you shouldn't take an illogical, irrational, unbiblical leap of faith. :idunno:

I am staunchly arguing that God is not bound by our perception of time.

 

[CabinetMaker]

This is begging the question and finding an analogy that supports a preconceived idea, even if not true.

It is a myth that time (duration, sequence, succession) is a limitation on God like it is us. He is infinite, not mortal; omnipotent, not weak; omnipresent, not confined to to one place like we are, omniscient, not limited in knowledge, etc. He can do endless things, unlike us, does not die, unlike us, etc.

Just because creation and incarnation and Second Coming are not experienced as a simultaneity/eternal now by God does not mean He is limited. Timelessness would limit God because He could not respond to or change anything, but would be trapped in a static, fixed, unchanging reality that cannot be reconciled to our parallel reality.

It is speculation about the mysteries of God. It is not doctrinal and plays no role in whether a person is saved or not. It is nothing more than trying to come up model of something the Bible is silent on.

I don't agree with Knight that time is part of God. I think time is something God created for us. And I don't agree that knowing what will happen in the future unchangeably settles that future. As I said, it is one of God's deeper mysteries for me.

 

[P8ntrDan]

So... if you are not sure if time existed before creation why are you staunchly arguing that it DIDN'T exist prior to creation? In essence you are asserting.... "I don't know that time existed before creation but I am sure it didn't exist prior to creation." :dizzy:

Why not assume that things were rational then, just as they are now?

It seems to me that if you don't know the answer you shouldn't take an illogical, irrational, unbiblical leap of faith. :idunno:

Which brings me back to my earlier musing, what if creation was the first event for God? Essentially, there wouldn't have been time before that first event correct? We don't know what happened before creation other than that God was.So why not have creation be the first rational event?

However, on a side note, depending on what version you're reading, it might not be considered unbiblical to believe that there wasn't order before creation.

Jeremiah 4:23
I looked at the earth— it was back to pre-Genesis chaos and emptiness. I looked at the skies, and not a star to be seen. I looked at the mountains— they were trembling like aspen leaves, And all the hills rocking back and forth in the wind. I looked—what's this! Not a man or woman in sight, and not a bird to be seen in the skies. I looked—this can't be! Every garden and orchard shriveled up. All the towns were ghost towns. And all this because of God, because of the blazing anger of God. (MSG)

However, I believe The Message is trash, so that point is moot.

 

[Lon]

So what you are saying is....

Prior to creation God did NOT experience one event after another and so on. And if God wasn't experiencing reality sequentially prior to creation how could He get from there... to here?

Time requires a sequential reality. Rational existence requires a sequential reality.

God is real, rational, and Living. He experiences one event after another event and so on. There is no logical, or biblical reason to deduce that God isn't rational.

LOL, there is more dialogue going on here than in the 1 on 1 at the moment

Let me ask this: If God is restricted to sequential duration, then how would a 'now' ever appear with an eternal past? GR seems to think it is answerable by Lucas' Time Essays but I don't believe it is. He uses segment (measurements) for his definition and proofs that simply cannot apply to an eternal past. GR and Lucas liken it to dividing space for an arrow to reach a target such that the division are eternal in halving the distance. The problem I see, is this: Lucas and GR assume a starting point for their target. That is the archer is at one point and the target is at the other. With God, we have His past with no starting point. The target is always moving further and further away because God never had a beginning. Finite Language, math, segments cannot adequately address God's duration.

What is at stake? OV and Traditional Theology, EDF vs an unknowable future, etc.

 

[Gurucam]

No.

Time isn't a thing that needs to be created.

Time is merely the notion that reality is sequential i.e., one event follows another event and so on.

Indeed time is a matter of perception.

Some perceive time in seconds, hours, days, etc.

However to those who cannot perceive the factors which identify seconds, minutes, hours, days or nights there are none of these. Everything would seem to happen in one continuous present moment.

And indeed for those who cannot perceive the divisions which are years, centuries, millenniums, etc. then time is simply a never ending in-differentiable present moment.

Think of your self without your physical sense perceptions, but still alert and aware within your body. Would you, that entity within, be timeless? Or would you be outside of time?

Think of yourself in a love driven association where blissful hours pass unnoticed and seem like a moment in time, until one check the time.

Then imagine a person (with or with out a physical body) lost in bliss for centuries, indeed such centuries will in effect be a moment.

What then is a few minutes or a few hours, in reality, when a few hours can be perceived to be a few minutes under one circumstance and differently under another?

It seems therefore when one is in bliss a day is like a second and the same period is different under another situation. In fact a day can be a week.

Then therefore if one can achieve the circumstance of perpetual bliss, then one will remain in a perpetual present moment. That is one will be simply lost to what is perceive to be time or the passage of time. Indeed one may live outside of time.

Some confirm that in a blissful state atrophy stops. Therefore both time and atrophy stops. Is it possible that everything stop in a ''perpetual state of bliss' which is often said to be a quality of God, if not God?