Anselm Flashcards
what does anselm contribute to ?
eternity and omniscience
what is anselms concept of eternity?
the present is no more real than anything else
all of time is equally existant
time is relative to the person percieving it
God is not restrained by this time and can be in everything at once
space and time are also in God
we have free will because he doesnt experience time in the same way
what is anselms view called
four dimensionalist view
anselms view (driven from ontology)
‘God is the greatest being that can be concieved of ‘
eternal is better than temporal, we cannot deny this, so he must be atemporal
did anselm think God was inside/outside of time?
outside
what theory did anselm add to?
Boethius’ argument that God is in an eternal present
how do humans experience time?
Humans are within time, so we perceive time unfolding moment by moment. Being within a particular time/place is a limitation which ‘confines’ a being to having certain parts of itself existing at one time/place and other parts of itself at others. So, as an unlimited being, God cannot be within time like we are.
how does anselm differ from boethius?
Anselm does not think that God is radically disconnected from time, as Boethius seems to suggest. Anselm wants to reconcile the eternal view with God’s action within time, for example with God being the sustaining cause of every place and time.
anselms book?
’ proslogion’
anselm quote
“That he is not in place or time, but all times and places in in him” – Anselm.
how does God still have a relationship with time even though he is not in it?
All of time is in God.
For us, time unfolds moment by moment.
For God, all the moments of time, whether in our past, present or future, exist in divine eternity. God is eternally present with all moments of time and everything that happens within time, not by merely ‘perceiving’ all of time from outside of time as Boethius says, but by all of time actually being in God and thus eternally present to and with God.
what is the fourth dimension?
The fourth dimension is time, which involves duration and change of spatial things.
how is God’s whole being with all places and all times?
- The crucial thing to understand is that a dimension contains dimensions lower than it within it.
- So too is it with space, time and eternity. All of 3 dimensional space is contained within four-dimensional moments (time), and all the moments of time are contained within eternity.
- All times and everything in time exists within God’s eternal present and thus exists with God in eternity.
so how does anselm resolve the theological dilemma?
Our future actions do not yet exist within time, but in eternity they always exist. So, God knows our future actions because he exists simultaneously with them in eternity, though within time they are not yet fixed.
how does anselms concept of eternity relate to the idea of Christ?
This is similar to how Christ was ‘eternally begotten’ by the father in the Nicene creed. It is important to the idea of the trinity that the Son is somehow derived from the Father; that the Father begat the son. Yet it is also important that the son has always existed (since he is God). So, if Christ is eternally begotten by the Father, then there was no time when Christ did not exist, despite his existence being derived from the father. There was no point in time when Christ was derived; the derivation is eternal. Similarly, God’s learning of our future actions is eternal.
