Nature Of God Flashcards
What 4 attributes does the God of Classical theism have?
- Omnipotence
- Omniscience
- Omnibenevolence
- Eternal
What did Descartes believe about God’s omnipotence?
- Voluntarism: God’s omnipotence involves the power to do absolutely anything, even the logically impossible. God existed prior to the laws so should not be bound by them.
- “It would be rash to think that our imagination reaches as far as his power”
- e.g While it may be difficult for us to imagine a square circle, we are applying our logic to God and he transcends temporal logic. He could therefore make a square circle.
What are the logical, philosophical and theological problems with Descartes view? How would Aquinas rebut?
- His voluntarism is incoherent, as by attributing the power to do the logically impossible to God, voluntaristic omnipotence destroys logical necessity. Nothing would be logically impossible if it were possible for God to do it.
- Circular argument: if God can perform an action that is logically impossible, it is no longer logically impossible. The argument is self defeating.
HOWEVER - Aquinas: logically impossible actions (e.g 2+2=5) are not ‘proper’ actions that can be done.
- CS Lewis: “Meaningless combinations of words do not suddenly acquire a meaning because we prefix to them two other words: God can”
What is the paradox of the stone? How can this be used to rebut Aquinas? How can the rebuttal be rebutted?
Paradox of the Stone:
- Can God create a stone so heavy he cannot lift it? Logically possible, but defies his nature (omnipotence).
- MAVRODES SOLUTION: If the task is defined as ‘to create a stone that G-d cannot lift and G-d, by definition, is a being of unlimited power, this would make the idea of a stone He could not lift self-contradictory. So to create such a stone is a logically impossible task for an all-powerful being.
William of Ockham came up with a solution that distinguishes between the two powers of G-d:
The ‘absolute power of G-d” refers to the options available before G-d committed Himself to a particular course of action.
Prior to creation, G-d could have done anything- He could have created the world or not created it.
The ordained power of G-d’ refers to the options currently available to G-d. Now that G-d has created the world He can exercise His power over it in many ways but he cannot ‘uncreate it’ once He has chosen to create it in the past.
How would Anthony Kenny and Plantinga redefine God’s omnipotence? What are the rebuttals?
“A narrower omnipotence, consisting in the possession of all logically possible powers which it is logically possible for a being with the attributes of God to have.” God can do anything consistent with his attributes, like Bible says impossible for God to lie.
- Plantinga: an omnipotent being may not have omnipotence as a necessary quality - may choose to limit his powers to preserve human free will (e.g Hick’s epistemic distance - God limits his display of benevolence to allow us to make bad decisions. Cannot know his true intentions). Augustine says ‘He is called omnipotent because He does what He wills’. God can self impose limitations that are contrary to his nature, such as creating evil.
- However, critics have argued that this is a meaningless statement - Kenny is essentially saying that God can do everything that God can do.
How does God’s omniscience conflict with human free will (and also omniscience and omnibenevolence)?
- If God is omniscient, this means he knows the past, present and the future. Therefore, every action you take is supposedly predetermined By God, which seems to contradict human free will.
- This is divine foreknowledge. Boethius stated this needs solving, as if we don’t have free will, how can God judge us fairly and send us to Heaven or Hell? Questions his omnibenevolence.
- Anthony Flew + John Mackie: if God could have foreseen the consequences of creation, he could have created free creatures who always chose to do the right thing.
Thus, omniscience seems to conflict with free will which then conflicts with omnibenevolence.
What are the ethical issues surrounding God’s omnibenevolence?
The word itself means ‘well-wishing’ - this implies a desire which God cannot fulfil. Well doing is greater than well wishing. This contraducts the Bible: ‘God is love’ John 4:8
CAN GOD DO EVIL?
- Some argue that God’s goodness is of lesser value if he has to do good, and is not freely choosing to do good actions.
- For others, goodness is part of the essential nature of God and it is logically impossible for God to do evil. Links to omnipotence - is the inability to do evil a genuine limitation?
SHOULD A GOOD GOD REWARD AND PUNISH?
- Hick: Good for us to learn from our mistakes.
- FINISH THIS
What was Boethius’ solution to the conflicts between omniscience, free will, omnibenevolence and time?
God is eternal - outside of time, he experiences past present and future simultaneously in the ‘eternal present’.
- Therefore, his eternal omniscience does not interfere with our free will - he simply sees the results of our free choices in our future in his eternal present.
- Omnibenevolence: solves criticism that divine foreknowledge means its unjust for him to judge us on our moral actions. God’s knowledge is not ‘foreknowledge’ – it does not exist ‘prior’ to our action as it exists outside of time.
If God knows what we are going to do, wouldn’t this make him (at least in part) responsible for something bad?
- Boethius refers to God’s providence (foreknowledge). There is a difference between KNOWING and CAUSING. (I know there will be an assembly tomorrow, but knowing it does not cause it to happen).
He differentiates between 2 types of necessity: simple and conditioned.
SIMPLE NECESSITY: something that is simply the case, e.g mortals will die.
CONDITIONED NECESSITY: something that becomes necessary after being caused by a choice. E.g walking: if I choose to walk then when I am walking, I cannot not be walking.
- Boethius therefore thinks we maintain free will, as we perform the conditions to make the necessities.
What are the criticisms of Boethius’ view on God’s eternity?
- Sidgwick: we feel conscious of our own decision making, ‘experience’ the process of choosing. Appeals to both logic and experience of real world (but Descartes says can’t trust our senses: feeling isn’t enough)
- Anthony Kenny (Swinburne supports) that God knowing all time simultaneously is incoherent and seems illogical: “on this view, the great fire of Rome is simultaneous with the whole of eternity”.
- This might be illogical for us, but not for God. Epistemic distance (Hick).
- Falsification principle: if we claim we cannot disprove God as we cannot fully understand him, then we are not allowing anything to falsify our belief. Cop out.
- Paul Helm rebuts: we should think of God as ‘time free’ and not constricted by time, rather than him experiencing all of time at once. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed - fits with the idea of energy being present at all times.
- If God exists outside of time, how can he interact with the world? Biblical evidence of God intervening in the world (e.g miracles and religious experience).
- God is not a person, so the extenr to which he can be described to have a personal relationship with mankind is debatable.
- Sam Harris: we can never make a ‘free choice’ since all our actions are ‘determined’ by earlier events (determinism)
What are Boethius’ views and responses to divine foreknowledge and how it interacts with free will?
If God knows what we are going to do, wouldn’t this make him (at least in part) responsible for something bad?
- Boethius refers to God’s providence (foreknowledge). There is a difference between KNOWING and CAUSING. (I know there will be an assembly tomorrow, but knowing it does not cause it to happen).
He differentiates between 2 types of necessity: simple and conditioned.
SIMPLE NECESSITY: something that is simply the case, e.g mortals will die.
CONDITIONED NECESSITY: something that becomes necessary after being caused by a choice. E.g walking: if I choose to walk then when I am walking, I cannot not be walking.
- Boethius therefore thinks we maintain free will, as we perform the conditions to make the necessities.
What is Anselm’s four-dimensionalist approach?
- Also thinks God exists outside of time but goes further than Boethius and claims God exists in a ‘fourth-dimension’- not radically disconnected from time. Eternity is a non-temporal concept.
-He defines God as ‘that than which nothing greater can be conceived’. Being eternal is greater than being temporal, so God is eternal. This shows that God’s eternity comes from his omnipotence, as a God restricted by time would be ‘less great’ than one that was eternal. - What God ‘foreknows in His eternity is immutable, in time is is mutable before it happens’, distinguishes between God’s eternal present and our present. Like Boethius, we have free will since we are freely choosing in the moment.
- Free will for Anselm is linked to doing the right thing (rectitude): we have free will if we are free to do the right thing. Accepts Augustine’s view that evil ‘privatio Boni’, cannot choose evil as to choose wrongly is to do nothing at all. Choosing rightly is what good people do. Thus God has free will: does good because he chooses to.
What are the criticisms of Anselm’s four-dimensionalist approach?
PROS:
- Language: awareness that it is almost impossible to describe nature of God’s eternity since in doing we often imply aspects of time e.g ‘predestined’. Difficult for any person to grasp, so limitation in language not his theory.
- The four-dimensionalist approach aligns well with the theory of relativity, which treats time as a dimension intertwined with the three spatial dimensions to form spacetime. This scientific coherence lends credence to the philosophical view.
CONS:
- Tillich: a God existing in a 4th dimension could not interact with the human world or be personal, therefore ‘lifeless’ and unlike ‘living God’ Christians believe in. Therefore does not apply to God of Classical Theism.
o However could communicate with our world via soul
- Anthony Kenny: there is a causal relationship within sequences in time e.g construction of Pyramids of Giza and invention of the computer. Anselm’s view is ‘radically incoherent’.
o Difference between temporal simultaneity and eternal simultaneity
- Cannot falsify since God is not fully ‘knowable’ through our understanding of time
- Jesus: in this form God was born, grew up, and died all within the human world. Contradicts God in the 4th dimension.
What is Swinburne’s theory of an everlasting God?
- God is everlasting, exists at beginning and end of time and experiences passage of time as we do. ‘There was no time at which He did not exist’.
- Believes idea of a timeless God is incoherent with scripture: ‘God does this, now that’ shows God acting according to human passing of time, also idea of ‘humans repent’ then ‘God forgives’ shows interaction. Also the idea that God could witness two events simultaneously.
What are the criticisms of Swinburne’s theory?
PROS:
- Paul Tillich: a timeless God would be a lifeless God, and Christians believe in a living God.
- Karl Barth: refers to example of Jesus - God acting within human history. Clearer and more logical to understand how God would interact with our world; can answer prayers.
- Avoids problem of divine foreknowledge and its implications for free will: God sees our choices as we make them.
- Dalferth: God is, above all else, omnibenevolent so the most accurate model of his existence is one in accordance with this: Swinburne’s.
CONS:
- Questions his omniscience: if God experiences time as we do, he will not know the future as it does not yet exist. Omnipotence: surely an all-powerful God would know the outcomes of our actions.
Georgia
- God exists outside time: he is not ‘everlasting’, he is ‘eternal’ and ‘timeless’: all time is ‘now’ to God, he sees all of time in ‘one glance’ and therefore is omniscient (cannot learn new things)
o Divine foreknowledge (or ‘providence’ since fore-knowledge implies time) - Realised that this seemed to contradict free will and thus God’s omnibenevolence: cannot be ‘all-loving’ if people are ‘pre-ordained to eternal life or damnation’ (Calvin). So ‘God’s foreknowledge does not impose necessity on things’, he knows what will happen without causing them to e.g like we know the sun will rise.
- Our actions are ‘conditioned necessities’: begins with a choice that leads to a necessity.
Therefore, God is aware of these necessities coming from a choice but we still have free will in the moment of choosing e.g choosing to walk leads to necessarily walking. Decisions become ‘immutable’ to God once they are made
Contrast simple necessities: a necessity inherent in the thing, cannot be altered by an act of will e.g mortals cannot ‘not’ die.
