AOG: OMNISCIENCE Flashcards
What is the meaning of omniscience?
God knows everything; there is nothing he cannot know. God has no false beliefs and cannot be mistaken.
What do St Paul and Isaiah say about God? What approach is a solution to this?
Say that God has never learned.
Apophatic approach is the best solution.
What does Kant state in opposition to God’s omniscience?
Without freedom there can be no moral choices so, if God’s omniscience determines our choices, then God cannot justifiably punish us when we do wrong.
What does Flew state about God’s omniscience?
If God could foresee the consequences of an action, it ought to be possible to create free creatures who always choose to do right.
What is the Apophatic Approach?
A form of theological thinking and religious practice which attempts to approach God, the Divine, by negation.
What does Psalm 139 write?
“Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely.”
How does the Bible support Calvin’s argument?
‘In love He predestinated us.” Ephesians.
What is predestination as a part of Calvin’s argument?
Before creation God determined the fate of the universe throughout all of time and space.
What does Calvin state about the ideas of reward and punishment?
“ordains eternal life for some and eternal damnation for others”.
What is the issue for Boethius?
This future cannot change otherwise what God sees is just “fallible opinion”.
Why do we have to be the author of our actions according to Boethius?
Because it would be pointless to reward and punish if our actions are not free/voluntary.
How does Boethius justify God having full knowledge but humans also having free will?
In order for reward and punishment to make sense, God cannot have predetermined our actions.
What is Boethius’ argument to the issue of freewill?
God is eternal.
How does God’s eternity explain how God can be omniscient and humans have freewill?
God does not see past, present and future, but all of time together as the “eternal present”.
What does God have according to Boethius?
A ‘bird eye’ - the whole of history is theocentric.
How does Swinburne support the notion that God’s omniscience is limited to what is logically possible?
An omniscient being knows every true proposition but a future action isn’t ‘true’ or ‘false’ until it has happened.
How do Vardy and Macquarie support the notion that God makes the deliberate decision to limit what he knows?
Explore the idea of self imposed limitations on omnipotence.
What analogy does Schleiermacher give to support the idea that God is aware of all possible choices but we are free to decide which one to choose?
The analogy of the knowledge that close friends have of each others future behaviours = omniscience but still freewill.
What does Augustine argue about God’s omniscience?
God simply knows our choices.
What is one of the main philosophical problems related to divine foreknowledge?
How can humans still be held responsible for their actions? (links to Kant’s idea)
What is the issue of divine foreknowledge related to Epicurus?
Does this make God responsible for our suffering? (link to inconsistent triad).
How is Boethius limited in terms of the idea of ‘one glance’?
But even if God just sees events not on a timescale are we truly free?
How does Boethius limit God in classical theism?
If God cannot see the future, even if it is logically impossible to see, does that take away God’s omniscience/omnipotence?
