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PTE > Attributes Of God - Philosophy > Flashcards

Attributes Of God - Philosophy Flashcards

1
Q

Qualities

A

Omnipotence

Omniscience

Omnibenevolence

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2
Q

Anselm’s ontological analysis of God

A

‘That which nothing greater can be conceived’

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3
Q

What does it mean if God already knows the future

A

That it is fixed and when it gets to the moment of choice, one doesn’t really choose as a choice necessarily requires there are alternative possibilities and that one is able to decide which possibility to pursue

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4
Q

What does omniscience seem to necessitate

A

Foreknowledge (knowledge of future)

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5
Q

What does it mean if God knows the future

A

That my future is fixed and God’s knowledge seems to restrict my freedom

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6
Q

What does Calvinism rely upon

A

The assumption Adam and Eve were free, but if they weren’t then the fall wasn’t our fault and so God seems evil

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7
Q

What happens to the Elect in Calvinism

A

They are remade in the image of Adam to get free will

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8
Q

What state does Augustine believe we are made to be able to be

A

Free

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9
Q

Did Calvin believe in the importance of Free Will

A

Yes

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10
Q

Did Augustine believe in the importance of Free Will

A

Initially, but switched up out of humility following the Pelagian Controversy, leading to the Doctrine of OG sin

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11
Q

Adam and Eve eating from Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil

A

God must’ve known so He would’ve just let it happen, unless he wasn’t omniscient

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12
Q

Schleiermacher Christian Faith 1831

A

‘In the same way, we estimate the **intimacy between two persons **by the foreknowledge one has of the actions of the other, without supposing that in either case the one or the other’s freedom is thereby endangered.

So even the divine foreknowledge cannot endanger freedom’

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13
Q

Evaluation of Schleiermacher

A

He is being disanologous - people might change and people can lie, so we might be incorrect; we don’t truly know but can make an educated guess. God truly knows

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14
Q

A definition of knowledge

A

True belief

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15
Q

Implication of knowledge = true belief

A

God can hold no false beliefs

All beliefs God holds are true

Simply by knowing it, he makes it so

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16
Q

What is an analysis of God’s beliefs becoming true

A

That He cannot hold beliefs, as all His beliefs become knowledge

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17
Q

What happens when God thinks about the future

A

It becomes the reality we must endure because God cannot be wrong about the future as He can hold no false beliefs; an Omniscient being cannot be wrong, by believing it what it believes must be true

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18
Q

Weak challenge to God determining the futrure

A

There are possibly no facts about the future and so may not count as knowledge

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19
Q

Counter to the challenge of the future holding no facts

A

God would at least hold a belief about the future or guess about it and due to his Omniscience, it must be true and so would transpire the way He believed it to be

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20
Q

Issue created by God’s creation of the future

A

He knew exactly what would happen over the course of the existence of the world - it seems He is the author of the world (not just limiting freedom by passively knowing the future), had he made the world differently from the outset, different events would occur. Therefore, He chose this world to unfold and so is responsible for all good and bad things that ever happen.

Kind of like God writing a script for a film and then sending it off to be made - the characters make choices, but their choices were already made for them.

Our lives thus seem futile

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21
Q

‘Nothing in all creation is…

A

… hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to whom we must give account’ - Hebrews 4:13

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22
Q

‘That which is now judged most…

A

… equitable, the punishment of the wicked and the reward of the good will be seen to be the most unjust of all; for men are driven to good or evil not by their own will but by the fixed necessity of what is to be’ - Boethius

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23
Q

Analysis of Boethius’ quote

A

People are not deciding what happens by themselves but merely acting in a way to fulfil the fixed necessity.

We think of God’s judgement as being the most fair thing (judged most equitable), but if we believe in God’s omniscience then it becomes the most unfair thing

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24
Q

Solution to the issue of God’s Omniscience posited by Aquinas and Augustine

A

Atemporality - God is outside of time (atemporal)

Immutability - He does not change

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25
Q

Aquinas’ Beatific vision

A

A single eternal moment, face to face with God in an atemporal state

The reason heaven is just a singular moment is because God doesn’t change - immutable

So, God doesn’t hold beliefs about the future because he does not think like that

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26
Q

‘His knowledge, too, transcends all…

A

… temporal change and abides in the immediacy of his presence - Boethius

God looks down on us and our temporal existence ‘as though from a loft peak above them’

27
Q

Impact of Aquinas’ defence

A

God doesn’t think about past or future so cannot be to blame - He exists in a similar state to the Beatific vision, in a singular simultaneous moment

This resolves PoE, to a degree

28
Q

How is our notion of time limiting

A

As to how we view suffering, death is not something that ends a person as God would still someone’s entire life at points at once

29
Q

Problem created by Aquinas’ defence

A

God is so far away from us that it becomes impossible for God to be a person and therefore have a relationship with Him

It makes it impossible for God to be Omnibenevolent in the saving of Omniscience

30
Q

Who does Anselm aim to improve on and how

A

Boethius’ theory

He argued that God’s eternity followed from the definition of God as ‘that which none greater may be conceived’

31
Q

Issue of humans being within time

A

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

32
Q

Anselm’s four dimensionalist approach

A

Anselm believed this issue of temporality was with our “presentist” approach. We think of the past as gone and the future as yet to happen

In his view, past, present and future all exist simultaneously but we only get to see the present. God sees all three and he sees how our free choices were, are and will be made

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.

33
Q

‘That he is not in…

A

… place or time, but all times and places are in him’ - Anselm

The past is as real to God as the present and the future

34
Q

Who does this version of God seem similar to

A

Plato’s world of forms (immutable and eternal)

Aristotle’s Prime Mover (immutable and eternal, yet impersonal)

35
Q

What did Swinburne say about an atemporal and immutable God

A

It cannot be a person or be said to have a ‘life’, as relationships require ‘changeability’ and responsiveness

36
Q

‘If God did not…

A

… change at all, He would not think now of this. His thoughts would be one thought which lasted forever’

37
Q

Problem then with Aquinas’ beatific vision

A

God is no longer a human if immutable

Prayer becomes useless if God cannot be changed by your words - His mind cannot be changed

38
Q

Can God’s mind change?

A

God heard King Hezekia’s plea: ‘I have heard your prayers and seen your tears: I will add fifteen years to your life’

So, Swinburne claims Platonic views have misunderstood God as unchanging

39
Q

Omniscience summary

A

Problems
- Free will

  • God becomes evil

Solution
Boethius’ claim that God is atemporal and immutable

Issue
Swinburne thinks God is depersonalised by this view, as Jesus is in fact mutable

Conclusion
Perhaps bite the bullet that God allows all to happen but has good reason - Plantinga’s free will defence

40
Q

Problem of evil

A

Evil exists

God is omnipotent (able to stop it), omniscient (knows of it) and omnibenevolent (would not want us to suffer)

Mackie’s inconsistent triad - been around since Epicurus, developed by Hume and reiterated by Mackie

41
Q

Theodicy

A

A solution to the problem of evil by Christian Apologists, explaining why it’s not contradictory

42
Q

Logical problem

A

Deductive argument (premises guarantee conclusion) - any evil is incompatible with God

43
Q

Evidential problem

A

Inductive argument (seek to heap evidence in support of a conclusion, demonstrating a conclusion is most likely) - characterised by the idea there is too much suffering for God to exist

44
Q

Iranaean Theodicy

A

Soul making
• Imperfect humans mean individuals can develop themselves and their virtues through suffering
• Unless you earn something yourself, it’s not praiseworthy and therefore reward in the afterlife would make no sense - why God doesn’t make us perfect

45
Q

Hick’s Theodicy

A

• Vale of Soul Making
• Avoids dysteological evil - everyone gets as long as they need to make themselves virtuous through reincarnation
• We get virtuous through the suffering of others and our reaction but we all get time to develop due to this reincarnation

• Makes this life arbitrary
• Little scriptural basis

• Hick is critical of Mr Iranaeus

46
Q

Augustine’s free will defence

A

• God allows suffering because He gave us Free Will.
• The relationship is because people’s choices can be not good - evil is a privation of goodness GOD DID NOT CREATE EVIL
• Freedom vs Safety
• Natural Evil was caused by the Fall - the fabric of everything changed, death and disobedience came into the world
• If my choices don’t matter, then my choices are not meaningful - if there is no evil then choices are meaningless
• If death did not exist, what would be the point of anything

47
Q

Rowe

A

• Fawn in the Forest - a random fawn dies pointlessly in a forest fire
• Says that if one instance of pointless suffering occurs, then God doesn’t exist
◦ All other things are trade offs, if he allows more suffering than necessary then he is EVIL
• God doesn’t intervene with every little detail, as it is the loving thing to stay out of it - he has created the world with the possibility of suffering for human growth

• But a responsible parent would step in eventually where the suffering is so great that it exceeds any improvement that can be had e.g a dog mauling a child

• Plantinga returns that there is no such thing as dysteological evil, epistemic distance prevents us from understanding he uses example of trying to sniff gone off milk with a blocked nose
◦ Following the holocaust, the Human Rights was signed - in the long run it leads to improvements
• Our limited perspective means that we cannot understand how God sees our suffering due to his atemporal nature

48
Q

How is God’s will orientated and what does it mean

A

Towards human beings and so every action has to be motivated by love

• The Fall through to Jesus; the whole narrative is demonstrative of God’s love
• The covenant (promise) that is made with Abraham that Israelites are the chosen people
• Old Testament God seems to be more partial with his love - kills innocent firstborns in Exodus to get Jews out of Egypt
◦ More parental type of love where there is an expectation that there are responsibilities on the part of humans, so when we fail to do our responsibility then God has to discipline us

49
Q

What does God do as seen as he leads the Israelites from Egypt

A

Immediately gives them the Decalogue

So God’s love is inextricably linked to judgement and justice; His punishment seems a natural outpouring of his love

50
Q

‘You only have I chosen of…

A

… all the families of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your sins’ - Amos 3:2

• Problematically makes the Holocaust, for some theologians like Rabbi Shach, a righteous punishment from God
◦ Not only permissible by God but that God is fundamentally responsible for it
◦ Taken to logical extreme, seems God was punishing the Israelites prior to Exodus
◦ God repeatedly takes away the reward for Jewish suffering and keeps giving them punishment - hard to say it is just punishment

51
Q

The disciplinarian that God is shows his love, yet…

A

Perhaps He becomes an abusive father; for a punishment to be justifiable it can’t cause lasting harm so it seems to become absurd - love from God becomes absurd

52
Q

What does God choose at the crucifixion

A

Not to punish people but chooses to punish himself - seemingly offering us love to avoid suffering and punishment

53
Q

What does the New Testament focus on

A

Reconciliation with the attitude that it doesn’t matter what you do

E.g the prostitute in Matthew who becomes personified throughout to become a friend and mother to Jesus

54
Q

What type of Love is seen in the New Testament

A

Agape love - His expression of love has changed from a focus on justice to a focus on mercy

55
Q

Problem with unrequited mercy in NT

A

It leads to antinomianism

If love is complete forgiveness then nothing matters - what is the point of the decalogue?

56
Q

How does Hick get around inconsistencies between OT and NT

A

He calls the OT a myth; a human account of our experience with God

Thus, Moses is not a historical figure

57
Q

How is Hick’s Vale of Soul Making not antinomianistic

A

It’s not God forgiving sins, rather Him giving endless chances to get it right and your mistakes don’t stop you moving forward; yet He does not turn a blind eye to your actions

Therefore Hick’s theology isn’t antinomian because in the long run your actions matter as you can’t access heaven until you are ready for it

58
Q

How does Hick arguably undermine the whole purpose of Soul Making

A

By not allowing anyone to go to Hell as it undermines moral development and raises the question as to why God put us through this - it seems arbitrary

59
Q

How is Hick’s Vale futile and tedious

A

If there is no way you can go wrong, it seems like a prison sentence having to serve your time in suffering

60
Q

Swinburne vs Hick’s God

A

Swinburne says a loving God would allow you to choose not to be with Him, whereas Hick’s God is an overbearing parent who needs His children to be with Him for the rest of time

61
Q

Regardless of God’s Omnibenevolence, what does it seem if we make God into a parent

A

Anthropomorphic to see our relationship with God as akin to our relationships with humans

62
Q

Why might our understanding of God’s love always be flawed

A

Because love is a human feeling

63
Q

Common metaphor in Christianity

A

Jesus is the Groom and the Church is the Bride - very human relationship

PTE (12 decks)

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