So, because of a decidedly boring lack of substance from most everyone here on TOL who doesn't already agree with me, I've not posted here in the last couple of weeks. It was my intention to stay away for at least the rest of the summer and that may still be what I do because it has been a nice break. But, when I sat down at my computer this morning, I hit the link to TOL just due to the force of habit and, since it was up on the screen, I decided to look to see what I'd missed. I found (obviously) the Psychlo's post, which gave me hope that a substantive discussion was possible and, since this happens to be one of my favorite topics, I've decided to pick up the discussion and see what happens!
This turned out to be quite a long post and I don't have time at the moment to do any proof reading! My apologies for any typos. I'll go through and fix them later!
Hello all,
I just found this forum and have thoroughly enjoyed reading through the conversation. I've probably only read 90% of the postings (skipped through some of the reiterations), so please forgive me if I missed something stated previously.
90% is way more than most people read through a thread before responding so, you're ahead of the game on that score.
Pro-omniscience claims which are not
explicit in the Bible:
- God created time
- God exists outside of time
- God is not bound by time
- God can control time
- God exists in the eternal present
- God's unchangeableness applies to His nature and His will
I'm glad that you used the term "claims" here rather than the word "assumptions" that you had started with. These are definitely claims that these folks make but I don't think that "assumptions" is quite accurate. They do not merely assume that these ideas are true, they are derived logically. Their logic is flawed and we can discuss that but I just wanted to make clear that I don't think these folks are just making this stuff up out of whole cloth.
Also, typing out the term "Pro-omniscience people" once is one time too many, if you ask me so we need to figure out a more common and easier way to refer to those on this side of the debate. My preference is to refer to them as either "Calvinists" or "Augustinians". The latter is more technically accurate because there are other groups, such as Arminians and Catholics, that believe and teach that God is immutable (i.e. that God cannot change in any way
whatsoever), and so I'll try to stick to using "Augustinians" but, if you catch me using the term "Calvinist", understand that I'm using that term out of habit and am referring to anyone who believes that God is immutable, which is the fundamental premise upon which all of these doctrines concerning time are based.
Anti-ominiscience claims which are not
explicit in the Bible:
- God must be rational as WE perceive rationality
- God cannot operate in a way that is outside of our own experiential knowledge or understanding
- God must be logical as WE perceive logic
- God's unchangeableness applies to His nature only. His will can change.
- God cannot control timed
Okay, so since I am an Open Theist, you won't be surprised to find out that I disagree with this list. In fact, I'm sort of baffled as to how anyone who can think as clearly as you seem to be able to could compile this particular list. It seems to me to be overly self-defeating list. Let's take them one at a time...
- God must be rational as WE perceive rationality
- God must be logical as WE perceive logic
That's not one at a time, you're thinking right now! Well, yes it is, right? Rationality is nothing other than our use of logic. It's the equivalent of making a distinction between speaking vs. the use of language.
There is LOTS to say on this particular topic and I won't even try to cover it all here in this post. I'll just make three quick points and leave it at that for now and we can go as far down the rabbit hole as you want to go in later posts.
First, I would refer you to an essay I wrote that covers some important ground in this area. It's entitled "Our Moral God" and can be found
HERE. I strongly urge you to read it. In it I establish that the bible IS explicit about God's rationality to the point of teaching the He IS Reason itself.
Second, and more fundamentally, rationality and logic are absolutes. No intelligible communication, of any kind, can occur without the use of reason. The very fact that the bible is a book that can be read and understood at all is explicit endorsement of the use of reason. The first letter of Genesis 1:1 could never have been penned without the use of reason.
Thirdly, there could be no such thing as "super-logic" nor could God be "supra-logical". The concept is utterly meaningless because anything you might say in attempt to explain it must necessarily use logic to do so, which an obviously self-defeating thing to do. It is the ultimate example of attempting to have your cake and eat it too.
Lastly, there is Isaiah 1:18.
Isaiah 1:18 “Come now, and
let us reason together,” Says the Lord,....
It can't get too much more explicit than that.
Okay, lets move on to the other claims in your list....
- God cannot operate in a way that is outside of our own experiential knowledge or understanding
No Open Theist that I know of has ever made such a claim. On the contrary, the bible seems undeniably explicit that God very definitely can, has, does and will continue to operate in ways that are well outside of our own experiential knowledge or understanding. As proof, I give you the single most quoted sentence of the entire bible, and perhaps of all literature....
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
Just take half a moment to consider the vastness of that teaching. We humans cannot create one single gram of earth (we can assemble the already existent ingredients that make up earth but that isn't the same thing), much less Earth itself or any of the mind boggling vastness of even our solar system, which is just an inconceivably tiny portion of what God created within the first hour of the first day of the creation week.
In addition to Open Theists acknowledging God as the Creator, we also obviously acknowledge everything else that the bible records that God has done, is doing, and will do in the future that is supernatural, all of which is outside of our own experiential knowledge or understanding.
Having said that, I think what this point of yours is really driving at is more or less a repeat of the point about God being rational. This is evidenced by the fact that it sits inbetween the points about reason and logic. If that is, in fact, the case, then my statements about those two point apply equally to this point and I'll add to it by simply asserting the rationally undeniable fact that God cannot do the rationally absurd - by definition. That is to say that God cannot do the rationally absurd because the rationally absurd cannot be done at all. God, for example, cannot be in a place that does not exist. Nor could God create a perfect sphere with 14 sides.
To assert otherwise is to exit the realm of reality and so open the door to the validity of anything wacky thing that one might conjure up. If God can do the absurd and logic does not apply to our theology proper (i.e. our doctrines about God) then by what means could any doctrine ever be disproved?
Moving on....
- God's unchangeableness applies to His nature only. His will can change.
Once again there are gigantic volumes of material that could be brought up on this point and since this is already becoming a long post I'll restrain myself to simply proving that the bible IS explicit on this point by quoting it outright...
One thing that you should note about the following quotations. I quote almost entirely out of the New King James but I have, on purpose, changed the word "relent" to the word "repent" in the following passages. The word in the original language is nāḥam (pronounced naw-kham') and it absolutely does mean "repent". The use of the word "relent" is indefensibled and evidence of the translator's Augustinian doctrinal bias. The King James Bible correctly uses the word "repent" but is otherwise harder for to read than the New King James and so think of this as a hybrid between the two translations....
Exodus 32:11 Then Moses pleaded with the Lord his God, and said: “Lord, why does Your wrath burn hot against Your people whom You have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians speak, and say, ‘He brought them out to harm them, to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from Your fierce wrath, and repent from this harm to Your people. 13 Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your servants, to whom You swore by Your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants as the stars of heaven; and all this land that I have spoken of I give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’ ” 14 So the Lord repented from the harm which He said He would do to His people.
Psalms 106:40 Therefore the wrath of the Lord was kindled against His people,
So that He abhorred His own inheritance.
41 And He gave them into the hand of the Gentiles,
And those who hated them ruled over them.
42 Their enemies also oppressed them,
And they were brought into subjection under their hand.
43 Many times He delivered them;
But they rebelled in their counsel,
And were brought low for their iniquity.
44 Nevertheless He regarded their affliction,
When He heard their cry;
45 And for their sake He remembered His covenant,
And repented according to the multitude of His mercies.
46 He also made them to be pitied
By all those who carried them away captive.
Jeremiah 15:5 “For who will have pity on you, O Jerusalem?
Or who will bemoan you?
Or who will turn aside to ask how you are doing?
6 You have forsaken Me,” says the Lord,
“You have gone backward.
Therefore I will stretch out My hand against you and destroy you;
I am weary of repenting!
There are several others but I'll stop with one last quotation from Jeremiah chapter 18, which just so happens to be one of the most important chapters of the entire bible....
Jeremiah 18:7 The instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, to pull down, and to destroy it, 8 if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will repent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it. 9 And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, 10 if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will repent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it.
And lastly, I'll briefly address your last point...
I'd agree with the simple assertion that this concept is not explicitly stated in scripture but, as I said at the beginning of what has now become entirely too long of a post, this is NOT a mere assumption on our part. Further, this objection isn't valid against the Open Theist in the first place as it tacitly implies a need for us to prove a negative or to make an argument from silence. There is no evidence that God can control time, either biblical or otherwise. Indeed, there is no evidence that time is even an ontological thing that can be controlled in the first place. Time is an idea. Time is a convention of language that is used to communicate information about the sequence and duration of events relative to other events. It does not exist outside a thinking mind.
Alrighty then! That's way more than enough for now! It seems that my break from TOL has given me a case of diarrhea of the mouth (or whatever the text form equivalent of that would be)!
But I have no strong convicton either way on the issue of omniscience. Even though I strive for an answer, I find no compulsion to settle on one if the evidence is not convincingly conclusive. That goes for any topic.
