Thread: Purgatory: Was John Calvin a Calvinist? Board: Limbo / Ship of Fools.
To visit this thread, use this URL:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=11;t=000788
Posted by Unitarian1986 (# 15908) on
:
I have heard it said that John Calvin himself would not have subscribed to many of the points of the theology that today bears his name. I would like to know: is this true? If so, which parts of Calvinism are later additions? What did Calvin actually believe/teach?
[ 10. November 2014, 18:49: Message edited by: Belisarius ]
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
Calvin's Institutes are notoriously hard to read, AND he continuously revised them throughout his life, so it's hard to pin him down and say what he would'would not have agreed with.
the infamous "TULIP" configuration of Dort fame is, of course, derived from Calvin, it is the natural progression of his line of thought. However, Calvin never spells it out as specifically as Dort does-- e.g. limited atonement. Given that Calvin is a pretty intelligent guy, surely he would have seen the implications, logical progression. So I'm gonna hypothesize that he didn't connect all the dots on purpose. That when you do so, you end up in a place that is really dark and IMHO unbiblical.
So it is my opinion that not everything you find in Dort would be approved by Calvin (but there is way more to "Calvinism" as it's presented today than that) But that is to a large degree speculative on my part.
Posted by daisymay (# 1480) on
:
We had a good lecture re Calvin and Calvinism, and that gave us the info that Calvin thought more, wrote more, got more done - much of it differing from what he'd originally thought - and one important one was that he didn't teach/believe that people were automatically sent to hell as he'd thought earlier.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
No.
(reply to OP - just for clarity, even if it does make my response rather verbose.)
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Before we go too far with divorcing Calvin from Calvinism, I gotta point out that while Calvin may not have advocated Calvinism as it later developed, he certainly advocated the doctrine of predestination.
Really, predestination gets a bad rap these days for little reason. It merely posits that God is sovereign over the process of Salvation. Salvation is founded on God's free act of mercy. Any resulting conclusions from that first premise is tinted with the joy and hope of that that first premise. If any of that sounds terribly controversial, imagine how it would have sounded to a medieval Christian. Earnest seekers like Martin Luther went to confession every hour terrified that they might get hit by a bus or something and die with unconfessed sins on their souls. A corrupt Church actually fostered this behavior if it kept the indulgence money rolling in. Then the Protestants came along saying "Forget all that bric-a-brac. Our God is a God of Mercy, and salvation is in His hands. Rejoice in the grace God has given you." People flocked to Protestantism for reason. For the medieval Christian predestination was a joyful, liberating doctrine.
Zach
Posted by Unitarian1986 (# 15908) on
:
Zach82, thanks for that inspiring post. I have always had a problem with the doctrine of predestination even though it seems to be backed up by the Bible. However, I have never heard it put quite like that in the context of what the church used to teach and it shed a whole new light on God's grace. Thank you.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Unitarian1986:
I have heard it said that John Calvin himself would not hav subscribed to many of the points of the theology that today bears his name. I would like to know: is this true?
On my reading of the Institutes, no, it's not true.
Calvin starts from the principle that in any controversy, the answer is to be preferred that most glorifies God. It is most glorifying to God to ascribe to him credit for everything that is praiseworthy - and therefore any claim that any creature is responsible for anything good robs God of the glory that is his. God is responsible for all of ‘my' merits. The only reason for me not to be sinning (or not to be sinning worse) is that God is restraining me from it. Left to myself, I should be absolutely wicked - to deny that proposition would be to claim that there is some goodness in me for which God is not wholly to be praised.
From there, it is clear that if I am to be saved, the initiative must come entirely from God, and cannot be a response to anything good in me (there is nothing good) but be an act of unconditional grace. Since I would resist God's salvation if I could (because being evil I must do necessarily resist) he has to restrain me irresistably from rejecting him. And because God fail or cannot act in vain, his grace can only be extended to those whom he in fact saves, and those who are saved cannot fail to be saved.
All of that is in Calvin. The only thing in TULIP that is not in the Institutes is the acronym.
There is, of course, a hell of a lot more to Calvin's theology than TULIP. And there's a fair bit of Calvin's theology that is not uniquely his and can be found in Augustine. If anything, though, I would say that Calvin's thought was more hard-line than many Calvinists today. I have for example, rarely heard a Calvinist expound total deptravity without qualifying it by saying that this does not mean that we are as bad as we can possibly be, but that we are deeply (not superficially) flawed, depraved in our totality, and in need of radical fixing from outside, not self-improvement. Calvin's take (ISTM) is exactly that we are as bad as we can possibly be. The only reason that I am not at present commiting genocide, blasphemy and treason is that God's hand is on me to prevent that - if God let the reins slip, there would be no end to my evil (because to say that there is the slightest virtue or restraint of evil that I am responsible for is to deny the glory of that good thing to God).
Calvin was most definitely a Calvinist.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
Zach is correct in asserting that the original intent underlying Calvin's doctrine of the sovereignty of God was good. Unfortunately in some quarters, predestination had less charitable aspects.
Because of its strict dichotomy between the elect and the reproprate, which was settled before time began according to Reformed doctrine, it resulted in a smug arrogance among some Calvinists that they were the true godly elect and thus were both morally and intellectually superior than the damned. Forgetting that Reformed doctrine states that we all remain broken sinners before an infinitely holy God, some Calvinists took their election as an excuse for pride and dogmaticism.
On the flip side, Calvinist doctrine did not erase completely the medieval anxiety over salvation. Some people feared so greatly that they were not part of the elect, that they worked really hard to made sure that they could produce good works as "evidence" of their predestination. Astonishingly, from a tradition that attacked Roman Catholicism for being a religion of works-based salvation, there were some Calvinists who ended up embracing a moderate form of Pelagianism as a result of their embrace of predestination.
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
I need to check this, with a Calvin Scholar, but my recall is one point Calvin would have rejected outright and one is dubious. The rest he would likely want to nuance but on the whole thinks similarly.
Reformed theology has never been a one theologian tradition. The synod of Dort therefore when it drew up the five points in response to Arminius was not solely drawing on Calvin.
Predestinarianism, Arminianism and Universalism are all branches of Reformed theology. The debate does not exist in these terms outside of the tradition.
What calls itself Calvinism today owe one a portion of its thought to Calvin. If you don't believe me go and look at Calvin on the Sacraments, he really has far more in common with Anglo Catholicism than many would like.
Jengie
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Are you denying then, Eliab, that virtue is a function of God's grace?
Zach
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Are you denying then, Eliab, that virtue is a function of God's grace?
Not in the least. I'm not asserting or denying anything about my own views, merely setting out my reading of Calvin's Institutes.
Not being a Calvinist of any sort, I disagree with the second premise - that sole responsibility and praise must be given to God for every good thing, and none to any creatures. The reason is that I accept the first premise - that we should give God the most glory possible - and I think it is scarcely flattering to God to say that either he is incapable of making a truly good creature, or that he botched every attempt at it. By way of analogy, I would much prefer to hear you comment that my son or daughter was well-behaved without reference to my parenting skills, than have you congratulate me on how well I manage to restrain their inner wickedness. I have no doubt at all which gives me the most glory - I am more honoured if their virtue is truly theirs, than if it is wholy mine, because it ought to be my whole aim as a father to inspire and nurture true goodness. I would apply the same consideration to my own father in heaven.
It seems to me, though, that if I am wrong about that, then the case for Calvinist theology would be absolutely compelling. The idea that God should be solely acknowledged as responsible for goodness, and no praise or credit bestowed on any creature for it, is foundational. That granted, TULIP necessarily follows.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
[QUOTE]
All of that is in Calvin. The only thing in TULIP that is not in the Institutes is the acronym.
While it is true that the foundational principles that TULIP is based on are all drawn from Calvin's Institutes, you will not see all of them spelled out with the specificity you find in TULIP. Limited atonement in particular ("L") is not found in the Institutes, although it is the logical progression of his argument re: the elect and the reprobate. There is a greater restraint in the Institutes than is found in Dort, appropriately so.
I would agree that the central issue for Calvin is glorifying God and proclaiming his sovereignty over all of creation, and that that is the key to understanding his doctrines.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Every Christian I have ever known accepts that God is Love. It follows from this that any knowledge about Love is knowledge about God. At this point, we either believe that God wills that we know Him, or we know God against His will. Since I assume that all Christians accept that God wills that we know him, then they must follow that path to concluding that love is only known because God revealed it to us or allowed it to be revealed, in a process we usually call grace. This seems, I think, to bring us very close to something like Total Depravity, since without God's grace we would have no knowledge of Love whatsoever.
Indeed, you insist that God is capable of creating a good creature, and that is precisely what Calvinism is saying. Good creatures do exist, because God Himself has willed it. Why that has been so controversial, and is always defined in the most vicious terms, is beyond me. It seems to follow from universally accepted premises and agree with universally held conclusions.
Zach
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Every Christian I have ever known accepts that God is Love. It follows from this that any knowledge about Love is knowledge about God. At this point, we either believe that God wills that we know Him, or we know God against His will. Since I assume that all Christians accept that God wills that we know him, then they must follow that path to concluding that love is only known because God revealed it to us or allowed it to be revealed, in a process we usually call grace. This seems, I think, to bring us very close to something like Total Depravity, since without God's grace we would have no knowledge of Love whatsoever.
Indeed, you insist that God is capable of creating a good creature, and that is precisely what Calvinism is saying. Good creatures do exist, because God Himself has willed it. Why that has been so controversial, and is always defined in the most vicious terms, is beyond me. It seems to follow from universally accepted premises and agree with universally held conclusions.
Zach
I don't think total depravity has ever been all that controversial. Indeed, as Chesterton quipped, it's the only Christian doctrine that can be empirically verified. Limited atonement would be the element of TULIP that is most controversial-- quasi-blasphemous IMHO.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
On the contrary-- total depravity has been denied on this very thread.
As for Limited Atonement, everyone but the universalists believes in hell, and that the damned will not share in God's Kingdom. Does Limited Atonement say anything past that? I honestly don't know. I am more versed in Luther's predestination than Calvin's.
Zach
[ 11. October 2010, 16:48: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by mdijon (# 8520) on
:
I've understood the doctrine of total depravity to be saying something more than that humans are thoroughly bad.
I thought it meant that humans are so utterly bad they can't accurately perceive the offer of grace through Jesus except by an act of God. Hence explaining why God necessarily chooses those who are saved and those who are not.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
As for Limited Atonement, everyone but the universalists believes in hell, and that the damned will not share in God's Kingdom. Does Limited Atonement say anything past that? I honestly don't know. I am more versed in Luther's predestination than Calvin's.
Zach
Limited atonement goes far beyond saying that there are some who will not share in the Kingdom. Limited atonement suggests that Jesus did not die "for the whole world" (as the gospels say) but rather ONLY for "the elect" (hence the "limited").
This is NEVER explicitly found in any of Calvin's writings. It is however, the logical progression, and makes sense when read through that Calvinistic lens of emphasizing God's glory and God's sovereignty. Because God is sovereign, it is impossible for anything God does to be ineffectual. If Jesus dies to save the whole world, but some end up not being saved, then that means Jesus' death was, at least in part, ineffectual. Therefore Jesus could not have died for all, but only for the elect. (Of course, another way to handle that is to go universalism).
It makes perfect, logical sense and conforms to the key propositional truth of Calvinism-- God's sovereignty. But IMHO it does so at the expense of defining God in terms that seem completely out of the character of God as revealed in Scripture. IMHO it makes "logical consistency" the prime driving agenda-- and comes up hopelessly bankrupt in the process.
But again, that's Dort, not Calvin.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
We may not like the conclusions drawn, but we cannot dismiss them purely on the basis of that dislike. Was the cross of Christ ineffectual? For myself, I hardly see how Calvin departs from mainstream Christian teaching. Indeed Christ died for the whole world, but the elect share in God's Kingdom, and the damned don't. Clearly the atonement is limited by something.
Zach
[ 11. October 2010, 17:07: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
I thought it meant that humans are so utterly bad they can't accurately perceive the offer of grace through Jesus except by an act of God. Hence explaining why God necessarily chooses those who are saved and those who are not.
As it was always explained to me, it's not that humans are so totally bad. It's that humans are so totally tainted by sin -- infected, one might say -- that even when humans act out of the genuine impulse to do good, the good that humans do will go awry but for the grace of God.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
We may not like the conclusions drawn, but we cannot dismiss them purely on the basis of that dislike. Was the cross of Christ ineffectual? For myself, I hardly see how Calvin departs from mainstream Christian teaching. Indeed Christ died for the whole world, but the elect share in God's Kingdom, and the damned don't. Clearly the atonement is limited by something.
Zach
This sounds like Calvin, but not like Dort. Calvin I think goes just as far as you have gone-- saying it is limited by something but getting no more specific than that. Which I think has the appeal of saying only what has been revealed to us w/o speculating beyond revelation. Dort, otoh, goes beyond this more modest statement to assert that there is a limitation, and that the limitation is entirely on God's end (not ours) and is intentional, eternal, and irrevocable. Again, while I think that has the virtue of logical consistency, it is speculating beyond what has been revealed, and in doing so presents a picture of God's character that is markedly different than what has been revealed.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
But the Calvinists aren't positing a different character for God. They still believe that God is perfectly good, and that the limitation of the atonement must be motivated from that goodness. If you are demanding the Calvinist must explain why God doesn't save the damned in their system, then you have to explain the same thing in yours. The way I see it, they're just leaving the unrevealed space in a different place than you are.
Either their way or yours we have a space between the elect and the damned, with God's justice and mercy in between.
Zach
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
But the Calvinists aren't positing a different character for God. They still believe that God is perfectly good, and that the limitation of the atonement must be motivated from that goodness. If you are demanding the Calvinist must explain why God doesn't save the damned in their system, then you have to explain the same thing in yours. The way I see it, they're just leaving the unrevealed space in a different place than you are.
Either their way or yours we have a space between the elect and the damned, with God's justice and mercy in between.
Zach
But there is a difference between simply resting in that space-- as Calvin does-- acknowledging it, and trusting it to God, trusting in his goodness-- and defining that space as something God eternally ordained and willed-- as Dort does.
Again, I'm not attributing that position to "Calvinists" in general as you are suggesting in your first sentence. I don't think most Calvinists are Dortians, and I don't think Calvin himself would affirm everything in Dort/TULIP. But I do believe that Dort is presenting a very different picture of the character of God than that which is found in Scripture and in historic Christianity.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
I am pointing out that the space is eternally willed and ordained by God either way. Are you saying that God didn't know the damned would be damned from eternity? Are you denying that God could have granted the damned salvation, but chose not to? Are you disagreeing that God's decision is good if inscrutable? I hope I am not presuming to much to say that of course you accept all of the above. If you do, then I don't see that you have much space to reject the Dortists. You are, in fact, in precisely the same place as the Dortists.
Zach
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I am pointing out that the space is eternally willed and ordained by God either way. Are you saying that God didn't know the damned would be damned from eternity? Are you denying that God could have granted the damned salvation, but chose not to? ... I hope I am not presuming to much to say that of course you accept all of the above. .
Well, my position is far more Wesleyan (really radical Arminian) than a classic Calvinist position, so yeah, for me personally you are presuming too much-- what I would say would be yes to most of those questions. But that's off track since we're really talking about Calvinism here, not Arminianism. My point was that most classic Calvinists and Calvin himself would agree with this much-- what you've said so far-- and leave it at that. They would not specify beyond that to what Dort has said about limited atonement, because when you do so you are presuming too much. You are presuming to know what hasn't been revealed in Scripture. And to continue the logical progression of thought takes you to a place that is contrary to what has been revealed.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Are you disagreeing that God's decision is good if inscrutable?
I'm not saying that-- Dort (implicitly) is. Calvinists & Calvin himself are laying out what they believe is revealed in Scripture, then leaving the loose ends loose-- not tying up all the logical conclusions-- but simply agreeing that God's decision is inscrutable, but it is good. It is Dort who can't leave the loose ends loose, who can't leave the unknowable unknown, but seeks to parse out the logical conclusions, and so ends up with IMHO very unbiblical ends.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
If you do, then I don't see that you have much space to reject the Dortists. You are, in fact, in precisely the same place as the Dortists.
Well, again, I don't agree with your "ifs" so your "then" is misplaced. But again, it's the process that's as faulty as the conclusion, where Dort is concerned.
[ 11. October 2010, 19:58: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Seems to me that if you agree with the premises and can't object to the argument, then you have no real basis for rejecting the conclusion. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
Zach
Posted by Sober Preacher's Kid (# 12699) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
I need to check this, with a Calvin Scholar, but my recall is one point Calvin would have rejected outright and one is dubious. The rest he would likely want to nuance but on the whole thinks similarly.
Reformed theology has never been a one theologian tradition. The synod of Dort therefore when it drew up the five points in response to Arminius was not solely drawing on Calvin.
Predestinarianism, Arminianism and Universalism are all branches of Reformed theology. The debate does not exist in these terms outside of the tradition.
What calls itself Calvinism today owe one a portion of its thought to Calvin. If you don't believe me go and look at Calvin on the Sacraments, he really has far more in common with Anglo Catholicism than many would like.
Jengie
Indeed, once you accept the fact that predestinarianism, arminianism and universalism are all just schools of thought in one theological debate, and that Calvin did not teach memorialism, you can understand why it has been possible to achieve full union between Presbyterians, Congregationalists and Methodists in Australia and Canada.
The United Church of Canada's Twenty Articles of Faith, our official doctrine, is silent on the matter of the manner of salvation. Nobody in 1925 was bothered by multiple positions on the matter (aside from the dissenting Presbyterians).
This also explains the grandmother in the Observer recounting how her two grandfathers, one a former Presbyterian and another a former Methodist, both United Church ministers, would entertain her at family gatherings by trying to explain to her whose system of theology was better.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Seems to me that if you agree with the premises and can't object to the argument, then you have no real basis for rejecting the conclusion. You can't have your cake and eat it too.
But if the conclusion is contrary to what has been revealed in Scripture-- which I believe it has-- then it must be rejected. So one either rejects the premises (which is pretty much what I do), or retain the premises with some degree of "mystery" about how it all works out (which is what Calvin does).
Posted by Bullfrog. (# 11014) on
:
There's probably another difference in our view of justice.
I think for medieval and even reformation thinkers, the punishment of wickedness is seen as a Good Thing, so the existence of hell as a place of punishment is just.
Nowadays, I think most liberals at least don't accept the necessity of punishment, or even think it's counterproductive, choosing instead a vision of rehabilitation at all costs.*
I bet that's one thing that's made TULIP and indeed any dogma involving Hell hard to stomach for moderns when medieval folks would've assumed it, probably likewise with Anselmian PSA.
* Though some may shrink away in terror when they see the price tag.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Bullfrog.:
There's probably another difference in our view of justice.
I think for medieval and even reformation thinkers, the punishment of wickedness is seen as a Good Thing, so the existence of hell as a place of punishment is just.
Nowadays, I think most liberals at least don't accept the necessity of punishment, or even think it's counterproductive, choosing instead a vision of rehabilitation at all costs.*
I bet that's one thing that's made TULIP and indeed any dogma involving Hell hard to stomach for moderns when medieval folks would've assumed it, probably likewise with Anselmian PSA.
* Though some may shrink away in terror when they see the price tag.
I think you are probably right about the distinction in Medievil and Modern views (to say nothing of ancient) of justice, and that being problematic re: a discussion of hell. But I don't think that's the issue here. The issue with TULIP is a justice issue precisely because it's NOT about "punishment for sin", but rather a seemingly capricious predetermined act of the divine will. It's that part (limited atonement) that proves problematic not only for modern readers, but for most others from prior eras as well.
Posted by Alogon (# 5513) on
:
I can't forget the tagline seen years ago:
Anyone who doubts total depravity has only to look at my e-mail inbox.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
The Dortists aren't saying that God's choice of election is capricious. They are steadfast that the choice is motivated by His goodness.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
He didn't espouse limited atonement or its euphemisms "definite atonement" and "particular redemption", he DID swallow the pagan Augustinean lie of predestination of which limited atonement is an inescapable corollary via the reprobation in double predestination.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
From there, it is clear...
That seems to be what distinguishes Calvin from Calvinists. You are making assumptions from Calvin's doctrines. The difference with Calvin was that, while he did the same, he always left room for mystery and he also stopped short where he could not justify the logical conclusion of a doctrine from scripture.
Dort took things much further than Calvin did himself. Or let me put it this way, Calvin was a Calvinist in trajectory but not in destination.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Calvin was most definitely a Calvinist.
For that to be the case you'd need to find all 5 points clearly and explicitly articulated in the Institutes. The Reformed doctrine is clearly there but I'm not convinced all of Dort is.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
he DID swallow the pagan Augustinean lie of predestination of which limited atonement is an inescapable corollary via the reprobation in double predestination.
Er, Martin, 'inescapable corollary' is exactly the kind of thing I was talking about in my last post. Your point is only correct if your doctrine places human reason above divine revelation - something JC (both of them!) never did.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
The Dortists aren't saying that God's choice of election is capricious. They are steadfast that the choice is motivated by His goodness.
Zach
Yes, I understand that. But the way it is articulated by Dort-- but again, ONLY by Dort, not by Calvin or Calvinists in general-- it really IS capricious-- precisely because Dort choose to try to spell it all out and leave nothing to "inscrutable mystery" as Calvin and most others do.
iow, just sayin' it's not capricious doesn't make it so.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
From there, it is clear...
That seems to be what distinguishes Calvin from Calvinists. You are making assumptions from Calvin's doctrines. The difference with Calvin was that, while he did the same, he always left room for mystery and he also stopped short where he could not justify the logical conclusion of a doctrine from scripture.
Dort took things much further than Calvin did himself. Or let me put it this way, Calvin was a Calvinist in trajectory but not in destination.
Yes, well said. Although I would differentiate between "Calvinists" and "Dortians" since, as has been noted, there are a lot of different varieties of Calvinists. I don't find very many Dortians these days.
Posted by ken (# 2460) on
:
What a great thread so far! I've nothing really to add to what. Zach & Jengie wrote. It seems to me that Calvinism is really just facing up to some of the inevitable corrolaries of what many, perhaps most, Christian theologians had been teaching since Athanasius, maybe since the New Testament. Its where mediaeval scholasticism meets the beginings of modern thought. A restatement of eternal truth in the language of its time.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Then you're blind to it like JC was JS.
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
It's a bit of a daft question isn't it? I mean there's no denomination called "The Calivinist Church" and so that most obvious meaning of the term Calvinist is "a follower of the teaching of Calvin", and many C's that I knew thought his contribution to Christology was his main original line of thought (to some - near Nestorian) whereas he regurgitated Augustine mostly on soteriology.
Plus . .there have always been C's and still are who think that some C teachers try and make everything too neat. So it's often point out that Calvin read "God who wills all men to be saved" in the common sense view. But so do many other C's. The most strident tirade againt limiting that text that I heard was by the arch-calvinist Peter Masters (he does good tirades).
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Then you're blind to it like JC was JS.
Which one?
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Limited atonement in particular ("L") is not found in the Institutes, although it is the logical progression of his argument re: the elect and the reprobate.
Calvin does say (quite insistently and more than once) that saving grace in Christ is most definitely not offered to all. The explicit ‘limited atonement' formulation may not be made, but the case for it being correct is, I think, irresistible given Calvin's views on how salvation works.
quote:
Originally posted by Nick Tamen:
[On total depravity] As it was always explained to me, it's not that humans are so totally bad. It's that humans are so totally tainted by sin -- infected, one might say -- that even when humans act out of the genuine impulse to do good, the good that humans do will go awry but for the grace of God.
That's how I've heard it explained, too, but Calvin himself puts it more strongly than that. And he needs to - plenty of other (non-Calvinist) Christians can agree that our depravity is total in the sense that it affects the whole of us. Calvin's view of depravity (or to be more accurate his view of goodness) is that every good must be entirely ascribed to God, and it is that which supports his distinctive theology.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I am pointing out that the space is eternally willed and ordained by God either way. Are you saying that God didn't know the damned would be damned from eternity? Are you denying that God could have granted the damned salvation, but chose not to? Are you disagreeing that God's decision is good if inscrutable? I hope I am not presuming to much to say that of course you accept all of the above.
For me the controversial part is "God could have granted the damned salvation, but chose not to". If "salvation" simply means going to heaven and not hell, then yes, God could do it as he can do anything. But if salvation means making a choice for God, accepting his grace, being willing to become like him, and doing all that without compulsion, then it's not obvious that God could do that for someone who loves the darkness.
There are, of course, serious problems with that view - what free will means in the context of a fallen nature, why God makes the damned suffer rather than merely enjoy some lesser degree of natural bliss, why suffering is to be preferred to compulsion anyway. But(contra Zach and ken) it is not the same type of problem as the one Calvinism raises, because it at least provides a reason why God cannot do the same for all as he does for some - some creatures cooperate with his will and others resist it. For Calvin ALL humanity must resist God, unless God decrees otherwise - God must supply everything, even passive cooperation with God's plan requires him to restrain the depraved will to rebel, and the reason why he chooses not to do this for all is unanswered and unanswerable.
It is possible that a Christian might reasonably prefer either sort of unanswered question over the other, but to me they are plainly different, and leave different sorts of curiosities unsatisfied. It seems wrong to suggest that there is nothing to choose between Calvin and his critics on this issue.
[ 12. October 2010, 10:17: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
If you get back to that debate about the workings of Salvation I am technically a third form perhaps best characterised as aphophatic Reformed. Within the debate no position is a good reflection of what God actually is like. Therefore you need either to address the presumptions of the debate or say that there is no satisfactory solution.
I am not original in this thought, as I was taught it at University by I think D.W.D. Shaw although it may have been one other of the lecturers. It may have surprised some, but it was for me the first inkling that the subject needed a completely fresh approach.
Jengie
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
There are, of course, serious problems with that view - what free will means in the context of a fallen nature, why God makes the damned suffer rather than merely enjoy some lesser degree of natural bliss, why suffering is to be preferred to compulsion anyway. But(contra Zach and ken) it is not the same type of problem as the one Calvinism raises, because it at least provides a reason why God cannot do the same for all as he does for some - some creatures cooperate with his will and others resist it. For Calvin ALL humanity must resist God, unless God decrees otherwise - God must supply everything, even passive cooperation with God's plan requires him to restrain the depraved will to rebel, and the reason why he chooses not to do this for all is unanswered and unanswerable.
That's not a problem for Calvin at all, since no where is there any sense of compulsion in his view of predestination. Indeed, it is very much the same. The elect are conformed to the image of God, while the damned reject that image to their own destruction.
This remains baffling to me. Calvin and the Dortists merely think through the basic premises of the Christian religion all the way to the end, and let the reason for it all rest in the mystery of God's inscrutable goodness. Yet on all sides it is admitted that there is mystery to be had and that part of faith is living with that mystery. The Calvinists simply put their mystery where there actually is mystery rather than putting in a place they would prefer not to explore.
Zach
[ 12. October 2010, 12:26: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
That's not a problem for Calvin at all, since no where is there any sense of compulsion in his view of predestination. Indeed, it is very much the same. The elect are conformed to the image of God, while the damned reject that image to their own destruction.
Depends what you mean by compulsion.
A Calvinist once explained it to me thus. Free will is the ability to carry out one's desires. The Elect have free will because God causes them to desire salvation and then grants them the means of attaining it. One is not free, however, to choose what one's desires actually are, and it is not even clear what freedom would mean in that sense.
I believe this is philosophically known as "compatibilism". Arminians take a more "libertarian" view of free will and say we really can choose our desires, and God grants us salvation or damnation accordingly.
One can argue that either position is incoherent, or that the Arminian position is merely a restated version of Pelagianism, but they are not the same.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
I like free will plenty, yet I've taken enough philosophy of mind to know that it is a bizarre concept that has yet to be explained to practically anyone's satisfacation. So it must be asked of those who must defend free will so fiercely against predestination what free will actually is. Doesn't it mean that we are free to choose what we desire against compulsion? But where do our desires come from? Does it mean that our decisions can be based on nothing? But wouldn't that mean our free decisions are totally arbitrary?
To be totally honest, we don't really have to explain free will to assert its existence. Yet until we understand what it really is, we really have no basis for asserting that it is contrary to predestination. Which is where my view comes in. Yes, we have free will and are responsible for our actions. Yes, the Lord foreknows and predestines the elect and the damned. They work together in some way that I have yet to figure out. The answer rests somewhere in God's goodness and mercy and can only be discerned if God chooses to reveal it to us.
Zach
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
New word- "satisfacation" The principle of being satisfactory enough for working philosophical principles. ![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif)
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Zach: "Good creatures do exist, because God Himself has willed it."
Who are they ? Are you one ?
Who are the bad creatures that God Himself (who else?) has willed ?
Am I one ?
Posted by Gurdur (# 857) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
New word- "satisfacation" The principle of being satisfactory enough for working philosophical principles.
I can't get no
Any bloody how, the philosopher Harriet Baber is quite fond of playing on the word and concept.
Posted by Bullfrog. (# 11014) on
:
Hmm...
I think I was told by a prof in seminary that Wesley also had a notion of predestination, but it was a predestination of faith and not of people. The faith and those who adhered to it would persevere, which is a kind of predestination but different than saying that particular people would persevere.
Did God decide that some random bunch of somewhat self-selecting people would go onto punishment, or did God decide ahead of time that certain particular persons would be sent to hell regardless of what they tried to do?
Does Calvinism accuse God of creating the flaming pile of rubbish that people fall into or does it accuse him of actively pushing people into said flaming pile of rubbish?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
The latter.
The greatest Satanic lie since the first one.
Posted by ken (# 2460) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Who are the bad creatures that God Himself (who else?) has willed ?
Well, exactly. Are there creatures that God has not created? Does not love? That's the point.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Calvinists are always ashamed of their damnationism when it's exposed, but never repent of it, nurturing it in their darkened hearts.
Other Augustineans; Romans, Muslims, are more robust and some of the latter will still even kill you for it.
Happy days eh ! They'll return. It is written.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
I don't understand the concept that all of the precursors to limited atonement were there in Calvin but he didn't press the point home. In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Calvinists are always ashamed of their damnationism when it's exposed, but never repent of it, nurturing it in their darkened hearts.
Other Augustineans; Romans, Muslims, are more robust and some of the latter will still even kill you for it.
Happy days eh ! They'll return. It is written.
Good grief, Martin. Nice of you to expose my hidden damnationism. I never knew! I suppose the fact that I am a near-universalist, a position which is entirely consistent with Calvin, and even consistent with Dort, will not persuade you that my heart is not utterly darkened. Funny how Calvin's thinking has space to envisage the salvation of all, where the 'fluffier' Arminianism with its lovely doctrine of free will still sends the majority of human souls to hell. And what's more, it's their own wicked choice! Damned and doubly damned.
You seem to have missed the compassion at the heart of Calvin's theology, and of the modern mainstream Calvinist churches. There is a deep awareness that on a fundamental level, people are not free. Yes, they have choices - and if the doctrine of free will is about choice between A and B, then fair enough. But a choice between A and B is not a free choice. It is a highly restricted choice. And when it comes to choosing God, how can a slave choose freedom? We need someone to give us freedom, to win us freedom, before we can choose freely.
I don't deny there are some mad idiot Calvinists out there - just as there are mad idiot choose-your-denomination-or-creed. They embarrass and anger me. I am sorry if they have been your main experience of this rich, balanced, and compassionate strand of theology.
I suspect Zach and Jengie are more than capable of answering you. But assertion is not debate, and lobbing grenades across the barriers of understanding is a futile endeavour. If you genuinely want to understand why my entire denomination and all associated Reformed churches hold to Calvin, then come in peace: ask, debate, read, engage. I'll be happy to respond to the best of my ability, by PM if you prefer.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I don't understand the concept that all of the precursors to limited atonement were there in Calvin but he didn't press the point home. In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
Calvin's formulation might have been: "Jesus died to save sinners, but saving grace is not extended to all".
An explicit Limited Atonement formulation might be: "Jesus died to save some sinners, but he did not die for those to whom saving grace is not extended".
It doesn't seem to me that the two are very different. There really isn't a meaningful sense in which Jesus can be said to have died to save me, if it was never part of the plan to give me the grace needed to avail myself of that salvation. Calvin may not have explicitly limited the atonement in the way that modern Calvinists might, (and there's no reason why he should - it isn't irrational not to draw out every logical conclusion that could be made from your theology, and in any case Calvin had a better stab at doing that than most of us) but I think it would very hard indeed to accept the Institutes and deny limited atonement.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Can I be honest in Purgatory? I didn't reply to your comments because they didn't seem like intelligent objections given with any real interest in engaging the conversation. Indeed, I continue to believe that.
quote:
In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
You know, maybe he was? It seems to be the habit for many Christians. Everyone but the universalists agree that Christ's atonement is limited, yet there is so much opposition to the phrase "Limited Atonement." I don't get it.
It seems much in vogue in many circles to divorce Calvin from Calvinism. One of my theology professors proposed it all the time. I don't get that either.
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
And when it comes to choosing God, how can a slave choose freedom?
You ask Harriet Tubman. Clearly all of her passengers were told to choose freedom by their owners.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Believe what you will Zach, including in the lie of predestined damnation. If you believe that you will believe anything. How intelligent do you have to be to do that ?
Posted by Bullfrog. (# 11014) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Calvinists are always ashamed of their damnationism when it's exposed, but never repent of it, nurturing it in their darkened hearts.
Other Augustineans; Romans, Muslims, are more robust and some of the latter will still even kill you for it.
Happy days eh ! They'll return. It is written.
Good grief, Martin. Nice of you to expose my hidden damnationism. I never knew! I suppose the fact that I am a near-universalist, a position which is entirely consistent with Calvin, and even consistent with Dort, will not persuade you that my heart is not utterly darkened. Funny how Calvin's thinking has space to envisage
If I may ask, why only a near-universalist?
Posted by Bullfrog. (# 11014) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Can I be honest in Purgatory? I didn't reply to your comments because they didn't seem like intelligent objections given with any real interest in engaging the conversation. Indeed, I continue to believe that.
quote:
In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
You know, maybe he was? It seems to be the habit for many Christians. Everyone but the universalists agree that Christ's atonement is limited, yet there is so much opposition to the phrase "Limited Atonement." I don't get it.
It seems much in vogue in many circles to divorce Calvin from Calvinism. One of my theology professors proposed it all the time. I don't get that either.
Zach
Wesley argued for unlimited atonement, meaning that it's hypothetically possible for everyone to be saved. You could be a universalist in either camp, methinks. There's always the "God will give everyone the option once they first step into the afterlife" camp...
Really, I do think eternal damnation is the problem either way you look at it, but that's another thread...
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Everyone but the universalists agree that Christ's atonement is limited
No we don't. We believe that it can fail, or that it can be rejected, not that it is limited. There's a difference.
A non-Calvinist can believe that Christ's death and resurrection was and is sufficient to save absolutely everybody, and that he fully intended to do just that. A consistent Calvinist can't, and Calvin certainly didn't.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I don't understand the concept that all of the precursors to limited atonement were there in Calvin but he didn't press the point home. In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
Calvin is anything but irrational. But he is much more modest than Dort in his assertions.
Calvin accepts and articulates fully the precursors/ foundational prepositions of limited atonement, but does not articulate it. That's different than rejecting it. I and others may explicitly reject it but Calvin does not. Rather, he just declines to "tie up" that particular loose end. It appears to me that he is simply affirming what he believes to be true from Scripture, but declining to say how it all works out beyond what has been revealed, especially when what appears to be the logical conclusion leads to a doctrine that is contrary to Scripture.
Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Bullfrog.:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Zach and Jengie daren't comment Ken.
Calvinists are always ashamed of their damnationism when it's exposed, but never repent of it, nurturing it in their darkened hearts.
Other Augustineans; Romans, Muslims, are more robust and some of the latter will still even kill you for it.
Happy days eh ! They'll return. It is written.
Good grief, Martin. Nice of you to expose my hidden damnationism. I never knew! I suppose the fact that I am a near-universalist, a position which is entirely consistent with Calvin, and even consistent with Dort, will not persuade you that my heart is not utterly darkened. Funny how Calvin's thinking has space to envisage
If I may ask, why only a near-universalist?
Indeed you may!
I am universalist in the sense that I believe absolutely in the unconditional grace and mercy of God. I also hold to the ultimate irresistibility of that grace. But just because I think God ought to save everyone does not give me the right to demand that he does. Nor can I trap God in a logic that says: God is able to save everyone; God wants to save everyone; ergo God will save everyone. God will always break out of any such logical or systematic formulation.
Therefore, I am with Barth when he says that universal salvation is something we can rightfully hope and pray for, but not demand of God. What cliffdweller has been trying to explain about mystery holds here. The mystery is the freedom of God: God will do what God will do, and I just have to trust.
When I said that even Dort is consistent with a near-universalist position, I was referring to the Limited Atonement part of the doctrine. This isn't what I am basing my own conclusions upon (not really buying into that aspect of Dort), but the point is that they have not defined how limited that atonement might be, or where the limit line might be drawn. Logically, the limit could be, say, everyone but Ghenghis Khan! Or even, you could argue that it is indeed limited to the Elect, but that everyone is elect. Even Dort was willing to leave the drawing of the limits to God.
I'm not saying that this is what Dort meant, or what Calvin envisaged. But Calvinism is a tradition, not just one set of dogmatic beliefs. And what modern-day theologians have found, is that the tradition contains the tools and the permissions within itself for its own continual rethinking.
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
I'm not saying that this is what Dort meant, or what Calvin envisaged. But Calvinism is a tradition, not just one set of dogmatic beliefs. And what modern-day theologians have found, is that the tradition contains the tools and the permissions within itself for its own continual rethinking.
Exactly. There's a reason, I think, that unlike the Lutheran churches, the churches that grew out of the Swiss/Genevan Reformation have historically branded themselves as Reformed rather than Calvinist.
Just as Calvinism is as much a tradition as it is the teachings of Calvin himself, the Reformed Tradition is a tradition that, while heavily influenced by Calvin and Calvinism, is not limited to Calvinism. Indeed, there is a sense in which the Reformed Tradition is most Calvinistic when it weighs and critically re-evaluates Calvin's teachings in the light of Scripture.
Ecclesia reformata semper reformanda secundum scripturas.
[ 13. October 2010, 17:41: Message edited by: Nick Tamen ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Spot on Eliab. Orthodoxly - with three little ohs of course - I can and MUST be ohnly universal in atonement, as Jesus is no less.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
No we don't. We believe that it can fail, or that it can be rejected, not that it is limited. There's a difference.
A non-Calvinist can believe that Christ's death and resurrection was and is sufficient to save absolutely everybody, and that he fully intended to do just that. A consistent Calvinist can't, and Calvin certainly didn't.
Pardon me, but it sure seems that, unless you are a universalist, then you indeed believe that Christ's atonement doesn't extend to everyone. Or are you saying that the souls in Hell are enjoying the fruits of the Atonement? If they are, then perhaps the Atonement does apply to everyone.
I don't see any reason to assume that it follows from limited atonement that a certain damned soul couldn't have been saved though the Atonement. Only that it wasn't saved.
Zach
[ 13. October 2010, 19:22: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
What souls in hell ?
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I don't see any reason to assume that it follows from limited atonement that a certain damned soul couldn't have been saved though the Atonement. Only that it wasn't saved.
But that is not how "limited atonement" is usually defined.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
And who wasn't ?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Martin, these one liners of yours are really not coming across as profound and relevent as you seem to imagine. Maybe if you just said what your objections are?
Zach
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
Good points, cottontail. Your comments re: universalism reminded me of this statement by very much Reformed body, PCUSA:
"Jesus Christ is the only Savior and Lord, and all people everywhere are called to place their faith, hope, and love in him. No one is saved by virtue of inherent goodness or admirable living, for "by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God" [Eph. 2:8]. No one is saved apart from God's gracious redemption in Jesus Christ. Yet we do not presume to limit the sovereign freedom of "God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth" [1 Tim. 2:4]. Thus, we neither restrict the grace of God to those who profess explicit faith in Christ nor assume that all people are saved regardless of faith. Grace, love, and communion belong to God, and are not ours to determine."
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Telepathy isn't one of your strong suits Zach. Along with a joined up theology.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Oh, er, and, er Zach and even Cottontail, these are MY objections to the lie of limited atonement:
John 1:29: The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
John 12:32: But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.
Romans 3:22-24 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
Romans 5:18 Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for all men, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for all men.
Romans 6:10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all.
Romans 8:32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?
1 Corinthians 15:22 For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.
2 Corinthians 5:14-16: For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.
2 Corinthians 5:18-19 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
Colossians 1:19-20: For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
1 Timothy 2:3-6: This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men.
1 Timothy 4:9-10 This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance (and for this we labor and strive), that we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, and especially of those who believe.
Titus 2:11 For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.
Hebrews 2:9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.
1 John 2:2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.
1 John 4:14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Drop the pompous comments and stick to an argument please. Are you a universalist, Martin?
Zach
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I don't see any reason to assume that it follows from limited atonement that a certain damned soul couldn't have been saved though the Atonement. Only that it wasn't saved.
On Calvinist premises, we are all equally and utterly unable even to cooperate in our salvation. God does it all. Whatever degree of faith, commitment, acceptance, whatever is necessary to be save, it all comes from God. We are totally depraved and contribute exactly nothing good to the process. So God must make salvation irresistible, because if it were resistible, we would resist it. Those whom God chooses to save, those Jesus died to save, necessarily are saved. Jesus did not die to save anyone else. Christ’s work is fully effective: everything he set out to accomplish, he did accomplish. So if anyone goes to Hell, Jesus did not die for him.
The contrary position is that Jesus died for the whole world and those who accept that are saved. Those who do not give the minimal level of consent to the process are not. But they could have been – Jesus still died for them – they were still people he came to earth to redeem, but they failed to attain that salvation. Salvation is unlimited in scope but unlike the Calvinist view, God can fail. He can be ineffective in what he sets out to accomplish. He can be resisted successfully by those he has chosen.
Those are different positions. They raise different moral problems. They appeal to different temperaments. Both have the difficult task of accounting for damnation – to suggest that this is only a Calvinist problem would be untrue – but it is a different task for each. The Calvinist has to live with the problem of a God who (on some important level) didn’t choose to save everybody, and the non-Calvinist has to live with the problem of a God who wants to save everyone, but lets his plans to do it be frustrated and foiled for ever.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I don't understand the concept that all of the precursors to limited atonement were there in Calvin but he didn't press the point home. In other words he accepted the premises and the argument form, but denied the conclusion? Is Calvin irrational?
Not at all. He was just wary of taking arguments to their (possible) logical conclusions when said conclusions weren't warranted by scripture (in and of themselves).
Christian scripture and doctrine is full of different theological points, some of which are in tension with each other. Calvin actively encouraged applying human reason to these points but was also aware of the limitations of simply taking one or two and running with them as far as you can go.
This is like a pupil progressing through physics at school - at first things are simple and the cannon ball is accelerating in a certain direction due to a certain force, but in later years they also have to take into account gravity and wind resistance ... and and ... and even then they are taught that there may well be other factors that, while we can assume they are negligible, still exist.
IMHO Dort (and some more recent discussion!?) is a bit like applying year 8 maths to Calvin.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
1 Timothy 2:3-6: This is good, and pleases God our Saviour, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men.
FWIW this is also why I reject Limited Atonement - however, Zach is right unless you are a universalist everyone is modifying that word 'all' in someway.
(And, of course, I'd reject universalism because of the many specific passages of scripture that do so - i.e. there is plenty of warrant to modify 'all' in some way.)
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Once again, Eliab, you say all that like Calvin is implying some sort of compulsion in the affair. Which simply isn't the case. In his system, the damned yearn for damnation and the elect strive for righteousness. Yet, since all good comes from God's grace, and desire for grace is good, then anyone that desires God's grace certainly has God's grace. The damned hardly regret their lack, since they don't even have the grace to regret the lack.
Why does God allow these sorts to go on not regretting their lack of grace? I really don't know, and Calvin doesn't pretend to know either. It seems to be wrapped up in why God allows evil at all.
Zach
Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on
:
Martin, thank you for that list of biblical quotations, and for engaging at least to that extent. I actually agree with you that the doctrine of limited atonement as expounded by Dort is contrary to the main thrust of scripture. And I agree with you as a Calvinist.
However, you seem to be arguing against something that no one on this thread is arguing for. The following points are being made:
a) Calvin's theology does not specify limited atonement. On the contrary, and as your biblical quotations emphasise, Calvin saw Jesus' death as sufficient for all. This is absolutely central, and whatever puzzle is posed by the empirical existence of non-Christians cannot be solved by means of limiting this sufficiency. The all-sufficiency of Jesus' death is a non-negotiable.
b) Where later Calvinists did specify limited atonement, people on this thread have so far rejected or reinterpreted this move. Limited atonement as expounded by Dort is understood by most Calvinists of the mainstream Reformed churches as bad theology. No one is arguing that God made people for hell.
c) Calvinists can reject Dortian limited atonement without ceasing to be Calvinists.
Once again, please please do me the honour of crediting me with good will and intelligence, and meet with me on that level. It is always possible that we don't disagree as much as you think. As it is, your anger at a doctrine which no one here is espousing makes it hard to find good will in your replies.
Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
And when it comes to choosing God, how can a slave choose freedom?
You ask Harriet Tubman. Clearly all of her passengers were told to choose freedom by their owners.
Sorry if I wasn't clear, but Calvin envisages us as slaves to Sin, not to God. We can't choose freedom (God) because we are owned by Sin. Thus the second part of your analogy doesn't work. Harriet Tubman's passengers being told to choose freedom by their owners would be analogical in this case to us being told to choose freedom from Sin by Sin. Which is clearly nonsense.
But there is a good question in here which I am pondering, and wonder if you could confirm if this is what you are asking: if a slave like Harriet Tubman can choose freedom for herself, by analogy, can we slaves-to-Sin choose freedom for ourselves? In other words, is the choice to be free within our power, as opposed to the utter helplessness envisaged by Calvin?
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Once again, Eliab, you say all that like Calvin is implying some sort of compulsion in the affair. Which simply isn't the case. In his system, the damned yearn for damnation and the elect strive for righteousness. Yet, since all good comes from God's grace, and desire for grace is good, then anyone that desires God's grace certainly has God's grace. The damned hardly regret their lack, since they don't even have the grace to regret the lack.
And that is simply begging the question as to what free will means.
On an Arminian understanding of free will, then yes, Calvinism implies compulsion, whether or not Calvin or Calvinists themselves would use the word.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
Sorry if I wasn't clear, but Calvin envisages us as slaves to Sin, not to God.
Right, sorry, I got the wrong end of the stick on that one.
quote:
But there is a good question in here which I am pondering, and wonder if you could confirm if this is what you are asking: if a slave like Harriet Tubman can choose freedom for herself, by analogy, can we slaves-to-Sin choose freedom for ourselves? In other words, is the choice to be free within our power, as opposed to the utter helplessness envisaged by Calvin?
Well that's what I believe. I think that's why God made us, and made the world as it is, so that we would be able to choose, and not merely have it chosen for us. Call it the "scandal of freedom" if you will. God is all-mighty, and yet carves out room for our wills -- retracts his all-encompassing will to allow us a small scratching spot where we are free to choose or not choose to love Her. I don't believe in utter helplessness.
But maybe my version is wrong and all that's the matter with what you said is that the slavery thing isn't a very good analogy. Harriet Tubman, and her passengers, did choose freedom while yet slaves. That doesn't necessarily mean that humans in slave to sin can choose freedom; Calvin's vision could be right, and either God is a horrid ogre, or "freedom" means something other than what we think it means.
I think the Calvinist methodology of guarding God's glory and power above all other considerations is flawed. We are told "God is Love". We are never told "God is power" or "God is glory". If you have a dilemma and have to pick one horn or the other, I think the higher principle is love, not glory or power.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I think the Calvinist methodology of guarding God's glory and power above all other considerations is flawed. We are told "God is Love". We are never told "God is power" or "God is glory".
Er, actually we are.
In 1 John 1 we are told that 'God is light' - the context being clear that this is about his holiness / glory (lack of sin).
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
And are they independent of Love ? Like Calvinist 'Sovereignty' ? Or ASPECTS of Love ?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
You're projecting just fine Zach.
And Zach, what would a parsimonious orthodoxarian say to your question ?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
And that is simply begging the question as to what free will means.
On an Arminian understanding of free will, then yes, Calvinism implies compulsion, whether or not Calvin or Calvinists themselves would use the word.
That's not what "Begging the question" means. I am only saying that we are predestined and then concluding that, if the phrase "Free Will" has any meaning, it must fit into that system some how. Really, until we figure out what "Free Will" even means, we're just playing games with words which Calvin has no need to bother with.
I really meant it way up the thread when I said I liked Free Will, even if the concept remains a mystery. It sure seems like I have a choice. Yet I haven't seen any reason to reject predestination either. So I just conclude that, somehow some way, the two are compatible. I don't think Arminius quite had it right, but I join him in his suspicion that Predestination, even if it's right, isn't the whole story.
quote:
We are told "God is Love". We are never told "God is power" or "God is glory". If you have a dilemma and have to pick one horn or the other, I think the higher principle is love, not glory or power.
Yet we've already established that, if God is Love, then we can only know what love is if God reveals it to us. From that it seems reasonable to conclude that if he didn't reveal love to us, there is no possible way we could ever discern what it means under our own power. That sure looks like exactly what Calvin was saying to me.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Cottontail - I take full responsibility for misunderstanding that any here espouse limited atonement and fully accept your assertion that none here do.
I apologize.
Can you also assure me therefore, that as none here espouse that, that none here espouse the lie of double predestination ?
For a start ?
Posted by Unitarian1986 (# 15908) on
:
Of course God is supremely powerful and supremely sovereign, but it seems that God could choose to limit His power in the sense that while Christ died for every human, not every human will be saved because God in His sovereignty has chosen to limit His power and allow only those people who have faith in Christ to be saved. Choosing to limit one's power for a greater purpose would not be a slight on ultimate absolute power and sovereignty.
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
And that is simply begging the question as to what free will means.
On an Arminian understanding of free will, then yes, Calvinism implies compulsion, whether or not Calvin or Calvinists themselves would use the word.
That's not what "Begging the question" means.
No, I chose the expression deliberately.
That said I think I've lost the thread of what we are actually arguing about. Your position seems to be that Calvinist limited atonement shouldn't matter to an Arminian because Arminian atonement is also limited.
An Arminian would respond that it does matter, because in Arminianism atonement is limited by human free will, and in Calvinism it's limited solely by God's choice. In other words, as I said before, it's fundamentally an argument about what free will means.
The post to which I was responding seemed to presuppose a certain concept of free will, hence begging the question.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
And are they independent of Love ?
'Course not.
MT was the one trying reduce God down to only one fundamental attribute. No one on this thread (and no Calvinist I've ever heard of) ever tries to reduce God down to just 'sovereign'.
[ 14. October 2010, 14:01: Message edited by: Johnny S ]
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Unitarian1986:
...Choosing to limit one's power for a greater purpose would not be a slight on ultimate absolute power and sovereignty.
To suggest that God must do everything He can do is unreasonable.
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Good points, cottontail. Your comments re: universalism reminded me of this statement by very much Reformed body, PCUSA:
"Jesus Christ is the only Savior and Lord, and all people everywhere are called to place their faith, hope, and love in him. No one is saved by virtue of inherent goodness or admirable living, for "by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God" [Eph. 2:8]. No one is saved apart from God's gracious redemption in Jesus Christ. Yet we do not presume to limit the sovereign freedom of "God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth" [1 Tim. 2:4]. Thus, we neither restrict the grace of God to those who profess explicit faith in Christ nor assume that all people are saved regardless of faith. Grace, love, and communion belong to God, and are not ours to determine."
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
c) Calvinists can reject Dortian limited atonement without ceasing to be Calvinists.
In this regard, it seems appropriate to note that The Canons of Dort have never, so far as I know, been accorded any confessional status in Presbyterian churches. Their official use has, so far as I know, been mainly limited to the Dutch Reformed, both in the Netherlands and in diaspora.
The Westminister Standards do seem to follow Calvin's course of going so far but no further; they could be read as at least allowing the idea of limited atonement. The Heidelberg Catechism on the other hand does not seem to go in that direction, and the Second Helvetic Confession (Chapter X) warns against speculation as to whether many or few are chosen. And at least in America, Presbyterians adopted amendments to the Westminster Confession that clearly state that salvation is offered to all. Ditto the statement quoted above.
I think one would be very hard-pressed to find many Presbyterians (except in the most conservative of Presbyterian groups) who would espouse limited atonement. Yet Presbyterians remain Reformed and Calvinist.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
And are they independent of Love ?
'Course not.
MT was the one trying reduce God down to only one fundamental attribute. No one on this thread (and no Calvinist I've ever heard of) ever tries to reduce God down to just 'sovereign'.
I didn't say they did; you are twisting my words (as usual). I was responding to what Eliab said:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Calvin starts from the principle that in any controversy, the answer is to be preferred that most glorifies God.
That's a bad starting place.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
No, I chose the expression deliberately.
Well, you've chosen deliberately but incorrectly, because "Begging the Question" means reaching a conclusion by inserting that conclusion in the premises. It would have been begging the question if I has said "We clearly have free will... because we have the ability to choose." Expecting that a given concept must comply with conclusions established by reasonable arguments from commonly held premises is only "Rational."
Zach
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
I know what begging the question means. I read you as saying, in effect, "the difference between Calvinism and Arminianism is insignificant because free will works in a particular way", when the debate is precisely about how free will works. Hence, begging the question.
That said, I'm not 100% confident I've correctly understood your position.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
That said, I'm not 100% confident I've correctly understood your position.
I'm not either.
This:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
In his system, the damned yearn for damnation and the elect strive for righteousness. Yet, since all good comes from God's grace, and desire for grace is good, then anyone that desires God's grace certainly has God's grace. The damned hardly regret their lack, since they don't even have the grace to regret the lack.
would seem to be to need some serious unpacking and qualification to fit with any mainstream Christian tradition, Calvinist or not.
Save for the anhiliationists, most Christians (Calvin included) think that Hell is either a punishment or at least something experienced as unpleasant. No one is commonly supposed to want Hell. The reprobate might yearn for something which will in fact damn him, and might consciously reject what God offers as an alternative to damnation, but not yearn for damnation per se. The idea that the damned have no regrets because they never imagined or desired anything better seems highly controversial to me.
But I suspect that's a tangent. The issue I was raising isn't primarily about "compulsion". It's that in a salvation economy where God does absolutely everything, such as Calvin's, damnation is a fundamentally different sort of problem to the question of damnation in a salvation economy where we get to contribute or cooperate. I'm arguing against what you seem to be saying (and what I'm pretty certain that ken is saying) that a proper Calvinist response to Arminian perceptions of injustice, caprice and cruelty is "Well, it's the same for you". It isn't the same for us at all. It may be better for us, it may be worse, but it is not the same problem, because we have fundamentally different understandings of what God is up to.
Compulsion is a red herring. I don't think that God (generally) compels at all. Calvin, as I understand it, saw God not so much as compelling us to act, as restraining us from acting badly. We don't need compulsion to sin - sin is what we do, what we always and inevitably do, when left alone. For Calvin, we steer right when God's hand is on the tiller, and wrong every other time. If it was good, he did it, if not, we did. Calling that "compulsion" would be forcing it into a category which doesn't apply.
Similarly (and I think this is similar to Ricardus' point) if you call some characteristic of Calvin's system "free will" you aren't using the phrase in anything remotely resembling the sense that a non-Calvinist might use it. There's not much point trying to reconcile the two, or discuss which is the 'best' meaning. We aren't talking about the same mental faculty at all.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
That's not what I'm saying. I am saying that it is not impossible for free will and predestination to work together in some way. I haven't said how or even what free will is, so it's actually impossible for me to beg the question here. Indeed, I don't recall anyone anywhere on this thread even attempting to define free will. It seems like a magical code that makes predestination impossible as far as I can tell.
Zach
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
What's controversial about the damned marching down to hell? They don't want God or His Kingdom at all. Otherwise they would take God up on his offer of free grace. Clearly they much prefer the alternative. Was it CS Lewis that proposed that the gates of hell are locked from the inside?
Zach
[ 14. October 2010, 20:34: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Does God know if it's going to rain tomorrow ?
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
What's controversial about the damned marching down to hell? They don't want God or His Kingdom at all. Otherwise they would take God up on his offer of free grace.
I don't think that follows. It could be that they don't understand the offer of free grace, or don't believe the offer exists. You can't choose something you don't believe exists.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Yet we've already established that, if God is Love, then we can only know what love is if God reveals it to us.
I don't think you did establish that. I assume you're referring to this argument:
quote:
It follows from this that any knowledge about Love is knowledge about God. At this point, we either believe that God wills that we know Him, or we know God against His will. Since I assume that all Christians accept that God wills that we know him, then they must follow that path to concluding that love is only known because God revealed it to us or allowed it to be revealed, in a process we usually call grace.
It seems to me to rely on a number of false dilemmas and non sequiturs.
In particular you've moved from 'God wills that we know him' to 'we only know God because God has revealed it'. That is faulty in two ways: firstly it imports an 'only' without any support, and it also equates 'God willing us to know something' with 'God reveals it to us'.
I know that I am sitting in a room in London. It is certainly not true that I know this against God's will. It does not follow that God has revealed it to me, and it certainly does not follow that I would not know it if God had not revealed it to me.
The word 'love', like any word in any language, only means something because it has a meaning and use in human intercourse. The advent of revelation may refine that meaning. But it cannot completely replace it. In order for the statement 'God is love' to mean anything to us we must already have a rough working understanding of what love is. And the revelation that God is love cannot so alter the meaning of the word 'love' that it means something contradictory to how we used and use the word 'love' of human beings.
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
quote:
In order for the statement 'God is love' to mean anything to us we must already have a rough working understanding of what love is. And the revelation that God is love cannot so alter the meaning of the word 'love' that it means something contradictory to how we used and use the word 'love' of human beings.
Good point but is it totally true? I'm not sure.
We use "love" in various ways, but mostly it includes some aspect of "finding attractive". Is that true of God's love? We tend to look down on "cold" charity, because it reminds us of self-righteous Lord and Lady Bountifuls looking down on the objects of their pity, and I believe agape was rather looked down on in greek culture in a similar way. How far would we apply that to God's love?
I'm by no means orthodox. But I can see the argument that we only see through a glass darkly, so that if scripture were to state that God loves us, but also clearly state other aspects of God's behaviour which fit badly with our concept of love, then it is quite legitimate to say that christian doctrine is modifying our view of love.
Of course, you do are only saying their has to be a limit to this, and that is fair. But we know all to well how some people can have totally inappropriate ideas of love, justifying overprotection, possessive control and the like.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I didn't say they did; you are twisting my words (as usual). I was responding to what Eliab said:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Calvin starts from the principle that in any controversy, the answer is to be preferred that most glorifies God.
That's a bad starting place.
I don't see how that makes any difference to the fact that you made a statement that was demonstrably false.
Since scripture gives us both 'God is love' and 'God is light' taking either as a starting point is both legitimate and arbitrary.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
What did I say that was false? Do you mean I said the bible didn't say "God is glory"? Well, yes. It doesn't. "God is light" is not the same thing at all. It is plain from the context that "light" here is referring to moral uprightness, not "glory".
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
I don't think that follows. It could be that they don't understand the offer of free grace, or don't believe the offer exists. You can't choose something you don't believe exists.
That is indeed a problem- for everyone but Calvin. Everyone but Calvin has to explain why a perfectly good and all powerful God failed to reveal Himself and thoroughly explain what grace was to those souls. Calvin already has an explanation-- Deus Vult. Usually the Arminians say that God's grace is open to everyone anyway, so they say these people you propose don't exist. Either way there are souls that accept God's grace at least in the smallest degree, and those who reject it-- with no one in between.
quote:
It seems to me to rely on a number of false dilemmas and non sequiturs...
I could say the same of your rebuttal. You say I am making leaps by ignoring my intervening sentences and qualifying clauses!
You fail to really think through the turn in the argument when I say "Either we know God according to his will or against his will." Surely you think it is God's will that we know him. I share in your sacramental worldview- that we can know God through the world. Yet surely you don't believe that God is known purely by accident, as if God's actions (ie his revelations of Himself) weren't deliberate!
You protest that we already know what love is, and this argument doesn't doubt that. It only insists that you know it because God has revealed it to you through His grace.
Zach
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
What did I say that was false? Do you mean I said the bible didn't say "God is glory"? Well, yes. It doesn't. "God is light" is not the same thing at all. It is plain from the context that "light" here is referring to moral uprightness, not "glory".
There you go, it is much easier to engage with your position when you actually spell out your argument rather than simply dismissing those you disagree with.
Actually I'd argue that 'God is light' does carry OT connotations about the heaviness of God's glory. (Even ridiculous Hollywood portrayals like Indiana Jones at least get their inspiration from the shekinah glory of God.)
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
So "God is light" really means "God is heavy"?
Heavy, man.
But really it's hardly fair complaining I didn't properly respond to what you said before you said it.
[ 15. October 2010, 08:59: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
So "God is light" really means "God is heavy"?
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
Cute.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
What's controversial about the damned marching down to hell? They don't want God or His Kingdom at all. Otherwise they would take God up on his offer of free grace. Clearly they much prefer the alternative.
It may be the case that, on the day of judgement, I discover that I would rather cling to my resentment of someone who has hurt me, and suffer forever, than forgive him and be happy. That is not the same thing as yearning for damnation.
quote:
Was it CS Lewis that proposed that the gates of hell are locked from the inside?
Yes, but in the passage in which he says it, he does (IIRC) specifically make the point that he is not saying that the damned do not wish that they were happy or that they would not rather be saved, just that they are unwilling to take the step towards God that is the precondition of salvation. The narrative illustration in The Great Divorce is similar - no one is depicted as liking the grey town that stands for Hell. No one really wants to live there. Fear, shame, greed, bitterness, dishonesty, selfishness or whatever disqualify the damned from being able to enjoy the only sort of happiness that heaven offers, but there seems to me no way of reading Lewis such that damnation is not a personal and cosmic tragedy. It is a loss, a failure, something vile and to be feared. It is not the happy consummation of the desires of one sort of person, in contrast to a heaven which caters for different tastes: it is a dumping ground for misery. On this point, Lewis seems to me to be saying something completely contrary to the thesis that "the damned yearn for damnation" (and I think his view is much more reflective of all mainstream Christian traditions on that - limited - point).
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Actually I'd argue that 'God is light' does carry OT connotations about the heaviness of God's glory. (Even ridiculous Hollywood portrayals like Indiana Jones at least get their inspiration from the shekinah glory of God.)
There are different ways to use "glory".
There's the sort of reputational sense - anything that does God credit increases his glory. Related to that is glory in the sense of victory over something, or for having achieved something (a similar idea but concerned more with acts of power than acts of good repute - although the two plainly overlap).
Then there's the sense of "glorious to behold", radiant. Related to that is the sense of God being majestic and unapproachable and all-consumingly dangerous and awesome (which brings in ideas of holiness and power to supplement the idea of light, or perhaps treats the light as a metaphor for holiness and power).
I think that Calvin starts with ‘glory' in the first sense, that of "honour and glory": to give God glory is to praise, and theology should prefer whatever makes God more praiseworthy.
I don't actually think that that's a bad place to start, provided we know what is really praiseworthy - and the reason I'm not a Calvinist is that I don't think the Calvinist account of salvation and virtue does God as much credit as the alternative.
[ 15. October 2010, 09:58: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
quote:
It seems to me to rely on a number of false dilemmas and non sequiturs...
I could say the same of your rebuttal. You say I am making leaps by ignoring my intervening sentences and qualifying clauses!
Maybe. I don't see an intervening sentence or qualifying clause that would make a difference to my argument, but perhaps I'm overlooking something.
quote:
You fail to really think through the turn in the argument when I say "Either we know God according to his will or against his will." Surely you think it is God's will that we know him. I share in your sacramental worldview- that we can know God through the world. Yet surely you don't believe that God is known purely by accident, as if God's actions (ie his revelations of Himself) weren't deliberate!
As an aside: I think the word 'sacramental' is over-used to the point of sentimentality when used to refer to something other than certain ritual actions of the church.
You think something important follows from 'it is God's will that we know him'. I don't think that it is sufficient on its own to give you any substantive conclusions. Moreover, I think that if we accept your argument, the conclusions that it draws are not the ones you think it draws.
quote:
You protest that we already know what love is, and this argument doesn't doubt that. It only insists that you know it because God has revealed it to you through His grace.
Let me rephrase my objection then in terms of a distinction between general revelation and special revelation.
If your argument is accepted then all human knowledge, of anything whatsoever, is a form of general revelation. (I personally think that makes the term 'revelation' redundant, but put that to one side.) So I would therefore restate my argument:
Special revelation cannot redefine our understanding of love derived from general revelation. On the basis of our general understanding of love, prior to special revelation, we can reject any interpretation of special revelation that requires us to give 'love' a meaning at odds with our understanding based on general revelation.
Your argument equally abolishes the category of nature altogether. There are only types of grace. This means that you leave nothing there to be totally depraved. Everything that exists exists by God's grace. Without God's grace, what we call nature simply ceases to exist at all. Therefore to say that the damned without God's grace reject the image of God to their own destruction doesn't make sense: without God's grace they would be incapable of rejecting anything. Thus your argument abolishes total depravity.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by anteater:
Originally posted by Dafyd: quote:
And the revelation that God is love cannot so alter the meaning of the word 'love' that it means something contradictory to how we used and use the word 'love' of human beings.
Good point but is it totally true? I'm not sure.
We use "love" in various ways, but mostly it includes some aspect of "finding attractive". Is that true of God's love? We tend to look down on "cold" charity, because it reminds us of self-righteous Lord and Lady Bountifuls looking down on the objects of their pity, and I believe agape was rather looked down on in greek culture in a similar way. How far would we apply that to God's love?
(I'm not convinced of your claim about Greek culture, but I can't argue that here.)
If we describe God as love and we don't describe Lord Bountiful's attitude as love, then we're implying that there are relevant differences between God and Lord Bountiful. In particular, we're saying that the justifications for withholding the word 'love' from Lord Bountiful don't apply to God, or that they don't have the effect when applied to God that they do when applied to Lord Bountiful. By using the word 'love' we're saying that Lord Bountiful is not our best available model for understanding God. Now it might be that all the other things we say about God make that untrue - but if so then that makes 'God is love' untrue.
quote:
I'm by no means orthodox. But I can see the argument that we only see through a glass darkly, so that if scripture were to state that God loves us, but also clearly state other aspects of God's behaviour which fit badly with our concept of love, then it is quite legitimate to say that christian doctrine is modifying our view of love.
It's possible that it's modifying our view of love. But then it modifies it in our secular use as well. So it might modify our view of love so that we decide that Lord Bountiful is in fact a good example of love. (I don't think it does, but for the purposes of argument...) But I don't think it can totally reverse our understanding. If it wants us to take what we thought was a paradigm of love as being not love or what we thought was a paradigm of not love as love, then it had better give us a reason why this is a better understanding than before.
(A non-religious example: we can explain the psychological processes that might motivate a man to kill his wife and her lover out of jealousy as arising from love in some sense. But we don't just redefine the word 'love' so that it means 'murderous hatred'. We explain how murderous hatred can arise from a starting point of love.)
quote:
Of course, you do are only saying their has to be a limit to this, and that is fair. But we know all to well how some people can have totally inappropriate ideas of love, justifying overprotection, possessive control and the like.
Again, we can explain why those ideas of love are wrong and inappropriate. We're not arbitrarily redefining love so that they are inappropriate. (Nor for that matter are the people who hold those ideas about love completely redefining the term. They have some grounding in the common usage of the word.)
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
It is not the happy consummation of the desires of one sort of person, in contrast to a heaven which caters for different tastes: it is a dumping ground for misery.
It seems to be the habit to dismiss Calvinism by adding clauses never proposed! I never said damnation was a happy consummation. Only that they prefer their misery to the alternative of serving in Heaven. I hardly doubt that they avail temselves of the gratification of blaming God for their predicament as well. I imagine they are gnashing their teeth at the imagined injustice of it all, cursing the servile sheep that were rewarded with eternal life. Does that seem dismal enough for your tastes?
quote:
If your argument is accepted then all human knowledge, of anything whatsoever, is a form of general revelation.
Insofar as "revelation" is only a fancy word for "seeing" or "coming to know," I would be inclined to agree. Yet I am not proposing, in this argument, that any old knowledge is knowledge of God. I am saying that knowledge of Love is knowledge of God. A chair or a tree has no say in the matter when I come to know what they are. But I cannot imagine, perhaps you can, that when I come to discover something about God that it was all a big accident that God had no part in.
quote:
Special revelation cannot redefine our understanding of love derived from general revelation. On the basis of our general understanding of love, prior to special revelation, we can reject any interpretation of special revelation that requires us to give 'love' a meaning at odds with our understanding based on general revelation.
"God is Love" is not proposing a new definition of love, so put your mind at ease. It is a mere matter of identification. That which we call love is indeed God Himself in His creation. An infant that feels the warmth of his mother is coming to know something about God. The love a poet has for truth and beauty is encountering God. Even lovers doing their thing in bed are learning about God's nature. Forgive me for concluding that was beyond doubt or without controversy.
Consider that Lois Lane knows things about Clak Kent, and she knows things about Superman. Yet she doesn't know Clark Kent is Superman. In the same way, without the revelation that God is love, we know things about love, and we know things about God, but we don't know that God is love. Just like it is still possible for Lois to have intellectual and social discourse about about Superman without knowing he is Clark Kent, we can have the same about love without knowing that it is God.
quote:
Your argument equally abolishes the category of nature altogether. There are only types of grace. This means that you leave nothing there to be totally depraved. Everything that exists exists by God's grace. Without God's grace, what we call nature simply ceases to exist at all. Therefore to say that the damned without God's grace reject the image of God to their own destruction doesn't make sense: without God's grace they would be incapable of rejecting anything. Thus your argument abolishes total depravity.
Don't be silly. There is still Nature, only that nature is how God runs His creation.
Anyway, how is that a problem for me? It is agreed on both sides that life itself is a function of God's grace. You've only further asserted the dependance of creation on God. Without God's grace we have nothing, not even life itself. How is that not Total Depravity?
Perhaps I was sloppy, or maybe just being overly general, when I said the damned do not have God's grace altogether. They lack God's grace to desire salvation, sure, but they still live and breath by His agency. The arminians posit all sorts of grace themselves, and why not let the Calvinists avail themselves of the concept as well? It hardly changes my argument. The damned refuse the grace of salvation and perhaps even despise the grace that gives them life. It sounds very poetic put like that, really.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Does God know if it's going to rain tomorrow ?
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Does God know if it's going to rain tomorrow ?
Even I know it is going to rain tomorrow.
It is just that God knows where, I can guess where, and weather forecasters have no idea where.
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
..."God is Love" ...
The unfortunate thing is that some people take this to mean, God is defined by what I think love is.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Consider that Lois Lane knows things about Clak Kent, and she knows things about Superman. Yet she doesn't know Clark Kent is Superman. In the same way, without the revelation that God is love, we know things about love, and we know things about God, but we don't know that God is love. Just like it is still possible for Lois to have intellectual and social discourse about about Superman without knowing he is Clark Kent, we can have the same about love without knowing that it is God.
...
Once you know that Clark Kent is Superman, you must then admit that all you know about the two must be consistent.
Likewise, if we understand that God is love, all we know about God must be encompassed in our understanding of love. Where our definition of love and God differ, we must make corrections. The question then becomes, do I change my understanding of God to suit my understanding of love, or vise versa? If we believe that God is revealed in scripture, we should define love in terms of the scripturally-revealed nature of God.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
From his comments, I get the impression that Martin fancies himself a sort of Zen master that brings the discussion to a climax simply be throwing in profound yet paradoxical aphorisms at just the right moment. Could it be that I simply don't understand the master's koans because I am not enlightened enough?
quote:
The unfortunate thing is that some people take this to mean, God is defined by what I think love is... Once you know that Clark Kent is Superman, you must then admit that all you know about the two must be consistent.
You are perfectly right. The revelation of the identification of Love and God does change our understanding of God and our understanding of Love. Yet the example still shows how it is possible to have general discourse about love without knowing that God is love. Furthermore, since Lois "knows" that Clark Kent can't fly, and can still talk about him, clearly it is possible to have discourse about Love that contradicts the truth about Love. To say that revelation can't contradict our knowledge of love on such grounds is clearly false.
Zach
[ 15. October 2010, 15:00: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
For the record, the talk about Superman refers specifically to the Intensional Fallacy. One has to cite his sources if he is to remain credible after all.
Zach
[ 15. October 2010, 16:29: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
If your argument is accepted then all human knowledge, of anything whatsoever, is a form of general revelation.
Insofar as "revelation" is only a fancy word for "seeing" or "coming to know," I would be inclined to agree. Yet I am not proposing, in this argument, that any old knowledge is knowledge of God. I am saying that knowledge of Love is knowledge of God. A chair or a tree has no say in the matter when I come to know what they are. But I cannot imagine, perhaps you can, that when I come to discover something about God that it was all a big accident that God had no part in.
First, I don't think it is of any relevance to the structure of your argument that knowledge of love is knowledge of God.
Second, I still don't see why any sort of substantive relevant conclusion is supposed to follow from it not being a big accident.
quote:
quote:
Special revelation cannot redefine our understanding of love derived from general revelation. On the basis of our general understanding of love, prior to special revelation, we can reject any interpretation of special revelation that requires us to give 'love' a meaning at odds with our understanding based on general revelation.
"God is Love" is not proposing a new definition of love, so put your mind at ease. It is a mere matter of identification. That which we call love is indeed God Himself in His creation. An infant that feels the warmth of his mother is coming to know something about God. The love a poet has for truth and beauty is encountering God. Even lovers doing their thing in bed are learning about God's nature. Forgive me for concluding that was beyond doubt or without controversy.
I can think of people who would disagree - many traditional Calvinists for example - but I'm not one of them.
quote:
quote:
Your argument equally abolishes the category of nature altogether. There are only types of grace. This means that you leave nothing there to be totally depraved. Everything that exists exists by God's grace. Without God's grace, what we call nature simply ceases to exist at all. Therefore to say that the damned without God's grace reject the image of God to their own destruction doesn't make sense: without God's grace they would be incapable of rejecting anything. Thus your argument abolishes total depravity.
Don't be silly. There is still Nature, only that nature is how God runs His creation.
I'll rephrase slightly: you've abolished nature as a category that can be opposed to grace. I take it you agree.
quote:
Anyway, how is that a problem for me? It is agreed on both sides that life itself is a function of God's grace. You've only further asserted the dependance of creation on God. Without God's grace we have nothing, not even life itself. How is that not Total Depravity?
Total depravity is usually a description of actually existing human beings who haven't repented and received the gospel. It's not a description of non-existent human beings.
If you're arguing that there is a 'natural' knowledge of God via the natural medium of human love apart from any special revelation then I'm quite happy to agree with you. (And this is not an accident, because God has ordained that this knowledge be generally available.) It follows however that total depravity is not an accurate description of any actually existing human being.
quote:
Perhaps I was sloppy, or maybe just being overly general, when I said the damned do not have God's grace altogether. They lack God's grace to desire salvation, sure, but they still live and breath by His agency. The arminians posit all sorts of grace themselves, and why not let the Calvinists avail themselves of the concept as well? It hardly changes my argument. The damned refuse the grace of salvation and perhaps even despise the grace that gives them life. It sounds very poetic put like that, really.
We're supposing here that God is specifically giving grace to the damned in order that they may refuse the grace of salvation. That is, God is being made directly responsible for sin.
(I'm not sure that sounding poetic is a good thing here.)
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
First, I don't think it is of any relevance to the structure of your argument that knowledge of love is knowledge of God.
That is extremely peculiar for you to say, since that is my argument. If you reject the premises of the argument, then quite naturally the argument itself has nothing to do with you. If you reject the premise that God is love, then I have nothing to argue with you about. You have a faith totally other than mine and there is nothing to compare between our faiths. For your second point, I know nothing else to say if you do not imagine that revelation of God is an accident, and you do not conclude that revelation of God is on purpose. Am I missing some other possibility?
quote:
It follows however that total depravity is not an accurate description of any actually existing human being.
Total Depravity only supposes that no soul has any good in it apart from the grace of God. Are you supposing that Total Depravity ends with God's grace arrives? An elect soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. A damned soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. They are both totally depraved.
quote:
We're supposing here that God is specifically giving grace to the damned in order that they may refuse the grace of salvation. That is, God is being made directly responsible for sin.
(I'm not sure that sounding poetic is a good thing here.)
Another thing that is not a problem for me any more than it is for any other orthodox Christian. The Arminians also think God provides people grace to disobey his will.
Zach
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
Where our definition of love and God differ, we must make corrections. The question then becomes, do I change my understanding of God to suit my understanding of love, or vise versa? If we believe that God is revealed in scripture, we should define love in terms of the scripturally-revealed nature of God.
As an absolute rule? Might it not be more likely, where the scriptures would change our concept of God a little, but stand our concept of love on its head, that we have slightly mis-interpreted the Bible than that our moral intuition is utterly unreliable?
For instance, if I'm asked to believe that 'love' is consistent with creating a sentient who is never given the slightest chance of salvation, and then hurting them for ever*, it means concluding that I am utterly unable to judge anything at all, the authority of scripture included. I am more certain that such conduct would be unloving than I am about pretty much anything else. If I'm wrong about that, I could be wrong about anything.
*I'm not suggesting that you believe (or disbelieve) this, but some Christians do.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
It seems to be the habit to dismiss Calvinism by adding clauses never proposed! I never said damnation was a happy consummation. Only that they prefer their misery to the alternative of serving in Heaven.
Your comment was that the damned “yearn for” damnation. That’s not the same thing as thinking that Heaven comes at too high a price to be desired. My whole point was that what you appeared to be saying, that there is a positive desire for Hell, is no more Calvinism than it is any other common sort of Christianity. But I now get that you aren’t really saying that, so this is a tangent.
quote:
I hardly doubt that they avail temselves of the gratification of blaming God for their predicament as well. I imagine they are gnashing their teeth at the imagined injustice of it all, cursing the servile sheep that were rewarded with eternal life. Does that seem dismal enough for your tastes
FWIW, the idea that if there is a Hell, and anyone goes there, they will be as happy as possible given their wrong choice, and Heaven and Hell do basically cater for different sets of tastes, is highly congenial to me, and the idea of Hell as miserable is extremely obnoxious.
However I’m stuck with the fact that almost all revelation, authority and reason point to Hell as a bad place, and I’m stuck with the problem of why God would let anyone go there. “He doesn’t”, “He doesn’t want to, but they choose to reject him” and “It’s his sovereign will that some will not be saved” seem to be the answers up for selection, and the third is (for me) the least satisfying, and least worthy of God.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
I was not aware that hell was really a worked out concept at all. What are your sources?
Zach
Posted by The Revolutionist (# 4578) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
The word 'love', like any word in any language, only means something because it has a meaning and use in human intercourse. The advent of revelation may refine that meaning. But it cannot completely replace it. In order for the statement 'God is love' to mean anything to us we must already have a rough working understanding of what love is. And the revelation that God is love cannot so alter the meaning of the word 'love' that it means something contradictory to how we used and use the word 'love' of human beings.
The problem with the word "love" is that it's a transitive verb... it needs an object. "God is love" raises the question "what does God love?" And love of one thing implies the hatred of its opposite - for example, if God loves goodness, then he hates evil.
I semi-seriously describe myself as a freewill Calvinist. Calvin didn't deny that we have free will in the sense of freewill vs determinism - rather, he affirmed that we have freewill, but that apart from grace it is completely incapable of bringing us to God.
In the Institutes, Calvin says: quote:
Institutes of the Christian Religion, II, ii, iv.:Now in the schools, three kinds of freedom are distinguished: first from necessity, second from sin, third from misery. The first of these so inheres in man by nature that it cannot possibly be taken away, but the two others have been lost through sin.
See that? Freedom "from necessity" - i.e. freedom from determinism "so inheres in man by nature that it cannot possibly be taken away", according to Calvin. But for Calvin, freewill is the problem, not the solution, because our will is corrupted and so always, but without compulsion, chooses sin.
Whoever called the concept "limited atonement" had no sense of marketing! I know some Calvinists who prefer "definite atonement" or "particular redemption". Most Calvinists I know are happy with the formula that the atonement was "sufficient for all, efficient for the elect".
Most Christians limit the efficacy of the atonement in some sense, unless they're universalists. If you believe, firstly, that not everybody will be saved, and secondly, God knows the future, including who will and will not be saved, then logically, it follows that in sending Jesus to die and rise, God knew for whom salvation would be effective.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
The problem with the word "love" is that it's a transitive verb... it needs an object. "God is love" raises the question "what does God love?" And love of one thing implies the hatred of its opposite - for example, if God loves goodness, then he hates evil.
Saint Augustine identified the Lover as God the Father, the Beloved which He loves as God the Son, and the Love itself as God the Holy Ghost. The Father loves the Son for a specific reason-- the Son contains everything that is worthy of love, which is the fullness of God Himself.
Zach
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by The Revolutionist:
But for Calvin, freewill is the problem, not the solution, because our will is corrupted and so always, but without compulsion, chooses sin.
I have to be honest: unless you take a determinist definition of free will, I can't see how that sentence is not oxymoronic. How can something be a freewill decision if it is also inevitable?
(Let me put it this way. There are lots of things I might inevitably want, such as food or water or clothing. This is not really compulsion, but neither is it free will. Likewise, if you ask me "What is the capital of Wales?" and I believe it's Swansea, I will inevitably say "Swansea". That is not a matter of compulsion, but nor is it free will. I cannot think of any case in which something is both a matter of free will and necessity without taking a determinist concept of free will.)
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Total Depravity only supposes that no soul has any good in it apart from the grace of God. Are you supposing that Total Depravity ends with God's grace arrives? An elect soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. A damned soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. They are both totally depraved.
By this argument a fully perfected saint in heaven is still totally depraved. I don't think that accords with how the term is normally used.
Indeed, if it describes all humans, it's completely worthless as a term. Unless you're comparing humans to some other species. But even then the term "human" suffices.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
For instance, if I'm asked to believe that 'love' is consistent with creating a sentient who is never given the slightest chance of salvation, and then hurting them for ever*, it means concluding that I am utterly unable to judge anything at all, the authority of scripture included. I am more certain that such conduct would be unloving than I am about pretty much anything else. If I'm wrong about that, I could be wrong about anything.
Exactly.
quote:
Originally posted by The Revolutionist:
I semi-seriously describe myself as a freewill Calvinist. Calvin didn't deny that we have free will in the sense of freewill vs determinism - rather, he affirmed that we have freewill, but that apart from grace it is completely incapable of bringing us to God.
But any Arminian would say that too. Because the "apart from grace" means very different things to the two camps. The Arminian believes all are given that grace, and the person chooses or not to accept it. I don't think the Calvinist believes that -- at least no Calvinist I've met.
quote:
Originally posted by The Revolutionist:
Most Calvinists I know are happy with the formula that the atonement was "sufficient for all, efficient for the elect".
Then I'd have to say that most Calvinists you know don't know what the word "sufficient" means. If something is sufficient, it's all that is needed. You can't have everything sufficient for salvation and not be saved. It is a contradiction.
quote:
Originally posted by The Revolutionist:
Most Christians limit the efficacy of the atonement in some sense, unless they're universalists. If you believe, firstly, that not everybody will be saved, and secondly, God knows the future, including who will and will not be saved, then logically, it follows that in sending Jesus to die and rise, God knew for whom salvation would be effective.
That, however, is quite different from saying that those who are saved are only saved because God gave them something (prevenient grace) that he didn't give to others. Foreknowing and causing are not the same thing at all.
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
Definition problem ALERT! (sirens here)
Total depravity does NOT mean there is nothing good in a person; what it means is that every faculty of human nature has been to some degree tainted, corrupted, by sin (= the totality of the human being). Think of it as cockroach clusters sprinkled over your dinner plate. Not everything on the plate is cockroach, in fact the bulk of it is something else; yet everything (potatoes, meat, veg) has been touched by cockroach and tainted by it.
And on THAT lovely image I'll ooze away now.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Definition problem ALERT! (sirens here)
Total depravity does NOT mean there is nothing good in a person;
"Total depravity" as used by Calvinists (and others) now, or "total depravity" as a description of what Calvin believed?
I agree with you as to much current usage, but "there is nothing good in a person" is (by my reading) a foundational point in Calvin's theology and the later TULIP formulation which (IMO) is compellingly derived from Calvin. You need total depravity in the hard sense to explain why election must be unconditional, grace irresistible, and the atonement limited - they follow necessarily on God being solely responsible for all that is good.
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
We're supposing here that God is specifically giving grace to the damned in order that they may refuse the grace of salvation. That is, God is being made directly responsible for sin.
(I'm not sure that sounding poetic is a good thing here.)
Another thing that is not a problem for me any more than it is for any other orthodox Christian. The Arminians also think God provides people grace to disobey his will.
But, as has been pointed out, the two cases are not the same.
The Arminian case is as though the British Parliament granted independence to Scotland, and the Scots passed a law saying fat Glaswegians should be shot.
The Calvinist case (at least as presented above) is as though the British Parliament passed the anti-fat-Glaswegian law all by itself.
In both cases the law arises as a result of acts by the British Parliament - if Britain hadn't granted Scotland independence the Scots couldn't have passed the law - but only in the second case would we actually hold Britain responsible.
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
If you really want to be mean on Arminians the attack is they have a dice playing God and in the OT he seems to behave like a cat playing with a mouse. There appears to be a chance of salvation but it really is mythical.
The old ditty
quote:
I would rather be a Baptist
with a smile on my face
than be a Methodist
and always fall from grace
Captures just what such a doctrine does. It becomes a salvation by works as you have to sustain faith to be saved. To the Calvinist, salvation is due to God and God alone, that you maintain faith is simply a sign of this. To misquote Calvin's idiosyncratic translation of Augustine on sacrament; keeping the faith is an outward sign of an eternal reality.
I dislike gambler god as much as I dislike dictator god, they both seem to me wrong pictures of God.
To pick up Ricardus, the Arminian God, is the God who gives Freedom to the Scots knowing that there is a 99.9% chance they will pass laws to shoot fat Glaswegians.
Jengie
[ 16. October 2010, 09:53: Message edited by: Jengie Jon ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
How does God know it's going to rain tomorrow ?
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How does God know it's going to rain tomorrow ?
What does Omniscience mean?
Jengie
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
First, I don't think it is of any relevance to the structure of your argument that knowledge of love is knowledge of God.
That is extremely peculiar for you to say, since that is my argument. If you reject the premises of the argument, then quite naturally the argument itself has nothing to do with you.
There are lots of true statements that you could have asserted as a premise. You could have asserted that Jesus was born in Palestine at the end of the first century BC, for instance. But it wouldn't have affected the rest of your argument.
My point is that, regardless of what you think, God is love is not playing any role in getting from your other premises to your conclusion. The heavy lifting is being done by the (false) dilemma about accident / on purpose.
So, you maintain that there is a relevant difference between saying that our knowledge of trees and our knowledge of love. Namely that our knowledge of love is knowledge of God, and our knowledge of trees isn't. But the dilemma about accident/on purpose is either sufficient to get us to both or sufficient to get us to neither.
quote:
For your second point, I know nothing else to say if you do not imagine that revelation of God is an accident, and you do not conclude that revelation of God is on purpose. Am I missing some other possibility?
You're trading on considerable flexibilities in the words 'accident' and 'on purpose'.
Suppose I scratch my nose. I don't scratch my nose by accident. My fingers don't suddenly jerk into the middle of my face. But I don't scratch my nose on purpose either. On purpose to do what?
An advertiser puts up an advert to be seen from the railway. Someone looking out of the window of the train sees the advert. Is it an accident that that particular person saw the advert? No. Did the advertiser put up the advert on purpose that that particular person saw the advert? Again, no.
A man is a killed by a bomb. The bombers didn't kill that man on purpose - they had no idea of who he was. But it's not an accident - the bombers can't claim they were peaceably letting off a controlled detonation.
quote:
quote:
It follows however that total depravity is not an accurate description of any actually existing human being.
Total Depravity only supposes that no soul has any good in it apart from the grace of God. Are you supposing that Total Depravity ends with God's grace arrives? An elect soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. A damned soul has no good in it apart from the grace of God. They are both totally depraved.
We already have a word for that: created. We don't need another.
quote:
quote:
We're supposing here that God is specifically giving grace to the damned in order that they may refuse the grace of salvation. That is, God is being made directly responsible for sin.
(I'm not sure that sounding poetic is a good thing here.)
Another thing that is not a problem for me any more than it is for any other orthodox Christian. The Arminians also think God provides people grace to disobey his will.
No. Arminians think God provides people grace with the intention that they obey his will. Foreknowledge is not at all the same as intention.
(I know that I will not get out of bed in time tomorrow if I don't set my alarm clock properly. That does not mean that I intend to stay in bed late unless I set my alarm clock properly.)
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Does it mean knowing what the spin on a pair of electrons was before you looked at them ?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
Suppose I scratch my nose. I don't scratch my nose by accident. My fingers don't suddenly jerk into the middle of my face. But I don't scratch my nose on purpose either. On purpose to do what?
On purpose to stop the itch? That has to be the most gobsmacked turn in an argument I have ever heard. Of COURSE you scratched your nose on purpose. What do you think "On Purpose" means?
quote:
An advertiser puts up an advert to be seen from the railway. Someone looking out of the window of the train sees the advert. Is it an accident that that particular person saw the advert? No. Did the advertiser put up the advert on purpose that that particular person saw the advert? Again, no.
A man is a killed by a bomb. The bombers didn't kill that man on purpose - they had no idea of who he was. But it's not an accident - the bombers can't claim they were peaceably letting off a controlled detonation.
You don't seem to know what "accident" means either. If something happens completely beyond the control of everyone involved, and is the result of random chance, what shall we call it? The particular person that saw the ad or was injured by the bomb was the result of random chance and completely beyond the advertiser and bomb maker's control. That is, an accident.
quote:
We already have a word for that: created. We don't need another.
Now you're just being deliberately obtuse. Total Depravity is just a commentary of how we are created and have our being. It points out that we aren't as independant and free as we imagine.
Zach
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Definition problem ALERT! (sirens here)
Total depravity does NOT mean there is nothing good in a person;
"Total depravity" as used by Calvinists (and others) now, or "total depravity" as a description of what Calvin believed?
I agree with you as to much current usage, but "there is nothing good in a person" is (by my reading) a foundational point in Calvin's theology and the later TULIP formulation which (IMO) is compellingly derived from Calvin. You need total depravity in the hard sense to explain why election must be unconditional, grace irresistible, and the atonement limited - they follow necessarily on God being solely responsible for all that is good.
Yes. Lamb Chopped's depiction is really the Arminian position. It's usually distinguished as "complete depravity" (nothing untouched) as opposed to "total depravity" (nothing of any worth).
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
So does God know what the spin of an electron is ?
And weather it's going to rain tomorrow ?
And from eternity that the sperm of the one hundred million at the time would fertilize the egg that both make me utterly uniquely me for a start ?
Posted by W Hyatt (# 14250) on
:
Is God overwhelmed by large numbers or long time periods?
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How does God know it's going to rain tomorrow ?
God, being outside of space and time, can see all of spacetime as a single object, including things that from OUR point of view are in the future. There is no future to God because God isn't in time. Quite simply God knows it's going to rain tomorrow because God sees it raining tomorrow.
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Total Depravity is just a commentary of how we are created and have our being. It points out that we aren't as independant and free as we imagine.
We were created depraved? At this point you have stretched the word so far that it broke. Everything God created was good. (Sez so in that book thing in the pew-back rack.) "Depraved" cannot possibly be applied to something that is good without stripping the word of any and all meaning. You might just as well call it "blork" which in fact would be better because "blork" doesn't already have a meaning, so you wouldn't be sneaking in connotations of the REAL meaning of "depraved" into your new use.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So does God know what the spin of an electron is ?
And weather it's going to rain tomorrow ?
And from eternity that the sperm of the one hundred million at the time would fertilize the egg that both make me utterly uniquely me for a start ?
Yes times three.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How does God know it's going to rain tomorrow ?
God, being outside of space and time, can see all of spacetime as a single object, including things that from OUR point of view are in the future. There is no future to God because God isn't in time. Quite simply God knows it's going to rain tomorrow because God sees it raining tomorrow.
Leaning toward open theism, I believe that God is present in time, not outside of it. But I also (like most open theists) believe that God "knows everything about the future that can be known". He can't know the free choices of his free creatures, but he does know the effects of the various natural factors effecting the weather that he created. Therefore, unless one of God's creatures has invented some sort of device with an immediate effect on weather, God knows when & where it will rain tomorrow.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
'Blork' has no meaning when written down but if you said it aloud it might have meaning to some South Walians because that's how they tend to pronounce 'bloke' down there.
I think Mousethief is sufficiently Anglophone to understand what 'bloke' means.
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
Tangent over ... back to the debate ...
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
'Blork' has no meaning when written down but if you said it aloud it might have meaning to some South Walians because that's how they tend to pronounce 'bloke' down there.
I think Mousethief is sufficiently Anglophone to understand what 'bloke' means.
Tangent over ... back to the debate ...
Did I miss something???
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
You must have missed where Mousethief wrote this:
'You might just as well call it "blork" which in fact would be better because "blork" doesn't already have a meaning, so you wouldn't be sneaking in connotations of the REAL meaning of "depraved" into your new use.'
Sorry, I can't do the quotes thing. Must go into the Styx or whereever it is and practice. Like as if I can be bothered ...
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
An advertiser puts up an advert to be seen from the railway. Someone looking out of the window of the train sees the advert. Is it an accident that that particular person saw the advert? No. Did the advertiser put up the advert on purpose that that particular person saw the advert? Again, no. [...]
You don't seem to know what "accident" means either. If something happens completely beyond the control of everyone involved, and is the result of random chance, what shall we call it? The particular person that saw the ad or was injured by the bomb was the result of random chance and completely beyond the advertiser and bomb maker's control. That is, an accident.
Dafyd's point is perfectly clear.
Accidentally / deliberately is a false dichotomy.
If I put up an advertisement, I want SOMEONE to see it. However, I don't specifically will for Mousethief (say) to see it.
If Mousethief sees it, then that result was both deliberate (in that SOMEONE saw it) and accidental (in that MOUSETHIEF saw it).
Or to put it the other way round: if Mousethief doesn't see it, nothing has happened that is contrary to my will. If Dafyd doesn't see it, that's not contrary to my will. If x doesn't see it, where x is a person in the universe, then nothing has happened that is contrary to my will. However, if nobody in the universe sees it, then that is contrary to my will.
So there can be results which are simultaneously deliberate and accidental.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
We were created depraved? At this point you have stretcheWe were created depraved? At this point you have stretched the word so far that it broke. Everything God created was good. (Sez so in that book thing in the pew-back rack.) "Depraved" cannot possibly be applied to something that is good without stripping the word of any and all meaning. You might just as well call it "blork" which in fact would be better because "blork" doesn't already have a meaning, so you wouldn't be sneaking in connotations of the REAL meaning of "depraved" into your new use.
Seems to be a problem for Christian theology in general, since God creates us and gives up being with full knowledge that we would sin and fall into hell without His intervention.
Just to keep things straight, are we denying total depravity because we think we can obtain righteousness and salvation without God's intervention?
Zach
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
Dafyd's point is perfectly clear.
Accidentally / deliberately is a false dichotomy.
If I put up an advertisement, I want SOMEONE to see it. However, I don't specifically will for Mousethief (say) to see it.
If Mousethief sees it, then that result was both deliberate (in that SOMEONE saw it) and accidental (in that MOUSETHIEF saw it).
Or to put it the other way round: if Mousethief doesn't see it, nothing has happened that is contrary to my will. If Dafyd doesn't see it, that's not contrary to my will. If x doesn't see it, where x is a person in the universe, then nothing has happened that is contrary to my will. However, if nobody in the universe sees it, then that is contrary to my will.
So there can be results which are simultaneously deliberate and accidental.
So, you're admitting that the Great Advertiser put the ads of salvation in the world on purpose... and that without Him doing so we would lack salvation altogether? Or is that taking the metaphor too far?
Zach
[ 16. October 2010, 19:38: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
To pick up Ricardus, the Arminian God, is the God who gives Freedom to the Scots knowing that there is a 99.9% chance they will pass laws to shoot fat Glaswegians.
Where do you get the figure of 99.9% from? Are you saying that the Fall (whatever it was) was 99.9% likely to happen? Or that the ratio of saints to sinners is 1:999?
Either way, I'm not convinced that Gambler God is morally distinct from Gambler Parents, who make babies despite knowing there is a significant chance those babies will turn into evil reprobate unsaved sinners.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Just to keep things straight, are we denying total depravity because we think we can obtain righteousness and salvation without God's intervention?
That depends entirely on what you mean by "God's intervention." Do I think God reaches inside a person and flips a switch that allows them to choose God, which previously they were not able to do? No. (It's a crude analogy but I don't think totally inaccurate.) I do believe however that salvation is made possible by Christ's incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension, and that that is what saves us.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Just to keep things straight, are we denying total depravity because we think we can obtain righteousness and salvation without God's intervention?
Not at all.
Think of, say, an Orthodox Christian, in a state of grace and filled with love for Christ, kissing the icon of a saint. He considers the saint to be good and holy – so holy that even a painting intended to represent him can be an object of veneration. But he does not imagine that the saint became holy without God’s grace. The goodness of the saint comes from God, and helps to reveal what God is like. He can thank God wholeheartedly for the saint’s goodness, and he can thank the saint wholeheartedly for showing him God’s goodness. The saint would never have been holy without a holy God, but the saint still chose that holiness. He could have ignored or hindered, or even rejected, the grace that God gave. He is honoured because instead of that, he chose (and struggled) to do God’s will. His virtue wholly belongs both to him and to God.
Total depravity (in the hard sense) implies that we cannot really be good ourselves – God’s grace works to restrain our wickedness and acts through us. Sanctity implies that God’s creatures can own goodness, can be genuinely holy and praiseworthy in themselves, and that (contra Calvin, they can be given glory and honour for their goodness in a way that increases, not diminishes, the glory and honour given to their creator. No Christian, as far as I know, imagines that God is uninvolved in any good work.
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
So, you're admitting that the Great Advertiser put the ads of salvation in the world on purpose... and that without Him doing so we would lack salvation altogether?
I don't know why you use the word "admit".
I am saying there is a difference between:
1. The Great Advertiser puts out a series of ads, and Elijah and Enoch respond to them.
2. The Great Advertiser puts out a series of ads, and causes Elijah and Enoch to respond.
In both cases the outcome is a result of actions by the Great Advertiser, but the extent of the Great Advertiser's responsibility is different.
If you don't mind me saying so, you appear to be defending Calvinism by stripping Calvinist terms of any distinctive Calvinist meaning.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
I would add that the good that resides in a non-Christian person (as well as the equivalent good in a Christian person, i.e. good that is not imparted through the means of grace made available to the Christian) is a remnant of the good that was placed into us at the creation of the race. The fall didn't eradicate all good. We are still in the image of God (although not much in her likeness, the regaining of which is a large part of what theosis is about).
I have no time for people who say that those without Christ are incapable of really doing any true good, which has always been part and parcel of any definition of "total depravity" I've ever heard (until this thread). It is quite clear that there are people who do wonderfully good things, and for the right reasons (Ghandi comes to mind), who are nonetheless not Christians.
"There's good in everyone" is really true (although it will be in different amounts, and in different levels of intentional smotherification, depending on the person), because that good was placed there, built into us, by God in the beginning, and in most people it has not been eradicated.
I'm not sure and not willing to speculate if in special cases like Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, etc., the good is gone, or merely smothered. Often somebody who is brutally evil in some ways can also be kind and loving in others. Consider a mafia kingpin buying nice gifts for his goddaughter.
(eta paragraph breaks)
[ 16. October 2010, 21:39: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
I have no time for people who say that those without Christ are incapable of really doing any true good, which has always been part and parcel of any definition of "total depravity" I've ever heard (until this thread). It is quite clear that there are people who do wonderfully good things, and for the right reasons (Ghandi comes to mind), who are nonetheless not Christians.
Then, without Christ, be good. If we could have been good without the intervention of Christ, it doesn't seem to me that an act of God was necessary.
Zach
[ 16. October 2010, 21:56: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
I have no time for people who say that those without Christ are incapable of really doing any true good, which has always been part and parcel of any definition of "total depravity" I've ever heard (until this thread). It is quite clear that there are people who do wonderfully good things, and for the right reasons (Ghandi comes to mind), who are nonetheless not Christians.
Then, without Christ, be good.
You may have missed the part where I said that although we are still in the image of God, we have mostly lost the likeness. And the quote you quote here says nothing about being good. It's entirely about doing good things. Your challenge would have to be, "Then do good things without Christ."
Well I haven't been without Christ (although I have alternately sought out his company and pushed him away) for the last 30 years. Yet before I became a Christian, I did some good things, and looking back it seems like for the right reasons. As do most people.
When someone says, "Oh my gosh, those people need me" and then goes and does whatever it is that those people need, that's a truly good deed. I think that, barring Calvinism, this is blindingly obvious. If you have to twist it into being bad because they're not Christians, there is something f'd up with your theology at a very basic level.
quote:
If we could have been good without the intervention of Christ, it doesn't seem to me that an act of God was necessary.
Being good and being perfect (by which the church means as much like God as a finite being can get) are two different things. Christ didn't die so we could be good enough to do some good things. He died to perfect us. Someone can do many good things, wonderfully good things and for the right reason, with being wholly and completely God-like. Even when someone becomes a Christian that doesn't make them wholly and completely God-like. That is the work of a lifetime and beyond. Salvation isn't a light switch.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
You know, I don't really make much of a distinction between being good and doing good. Neither do I make much of a distinction between righteousness and salvation. Perhaps you do make these distinctions-- though in that case you are proposing the possibility of a totally wicked person that has never done a wicked thing in his life. Furthermore, if there is a difference between righteousness and salvation, you are proposing that Hell has nothing to do with justice at all. You are admitting the possibility of a righteous yet unsaved person. Now that really would make God seem arbitrary! A spotless soul cast into hell merely because she didn't have water splashed on her by a priest!
I am far from saying that only Christians can do good. I think God's grace fills the whole world and is much wider than the Church. Whether we know the name of Christ or not, He is our savior. You are imposing a sort of sectarianism on me that I never proposed. To say you did good and were good before coming to Christ is only begging the question-- I am arguing that Christ was with you all along, giving you the grace to do good and become a better person.
If we can simply choose to be good, like you propose, then we can choose to be perfect. It's simply a matter of choosing to do good and never do evil. Now, I am not saying it would be easy. No doubt it will be very difficult. Since there are moral grey areas, it would probably involve a good deal of luck too. But salvation is a worthy enough goal, I dare say. Luck and free will could indeed take us to heaven if you are right.
But I can't believe that salvation is merely difficult. I don't think Christ died merely to make perfection easier. I think, without Christ, it would be impossible.
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
You know, I don't really make much of a distinction between being good and doing good. Neither do I make much of a distinction between righteousness and salvation. Perhaps you do make these distinctions-- though in that case you are proposing the possibility of a totally wicked person that has never done a wicked thing in his life.
You're not paying attention. There is no such thing as a totally wicked person.
quote:
Originally written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn:
Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either, but right through every human heart, and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. Even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained; and even in the best of all hearts, there remains a small corner of evil.
quote:
Furthermore, if there is a difference between righteousness and salvation, you are proposing that Hell has nothing to do with justice at all.
Absolutely. There is nothing just about infinite punishment for finite crime.
quote:
You are admitting the possibility of a righteous yet unsaved person.
This depends a great deal on what you mean by "righteous". I don't think I'm positing what you think I'm positing.
quote:
Now that really would make God seem arbitrary! A spotless soul cast into hell merely because she didn't have water splashed on her by a priest!
Glad I don't believe that. Whew. Ready to stop twisting my words? Whenever you're ready.
quote:
I am far from saying that only Christians can do good.
Then you don't believe in total depravity as normally defined.
quote:
I think God's grace fills the whole world and is much wider than the Church. Whether we know the name of Christ or not, He is our savior.
I believe that also. Word for word.
quote:
You are imposing a sort of sectarianism on me that I never proposed. To say you did good and were good before coming to Christ is only begging the question-- I am arguing that Christ was with you all along, giving you the grace to do good and become a better person.
Then Christ is with every man (and woman). So saying "you can't do good outside of Christ" is meaningless because nobody is outside of Christ.
quote:
If we can simply choose to be good, like you propose, then we can choose to be perfect.
We don't "simply" choose to be good. What goodness we have is imparted by God, either at the creation of the race, or somewhere along the line in our own development.
Further why does it follow that if we can sometimes choose to do good things, we can always choose to do good things? That evil which is in us (cf. Solzhenitsyn, above) is at war with the good that is within us. (St Paul again.)
I never said we can choose to be good. I said we can choose to do good. It is you who have conflated these, not I. And if by "good" you mean "perfect" then I don't think we can "choose" to be perfect. That's like saying you don't have free will because you can't will to jump off the roof and fly upwards. I can choose to do good, I can choose to do evil. As can every human being.
I can't perfect myself without God. I never said so. If you were reading for content you would already know I believe that. It is God who works in us. What's that line from St Paul? "Continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his purpose." As Donnie and Marie sang, "it takes two, baby."
quote:
It's simply a matter of choosing to do good and never do evil.
Well, yes, rather. Someone who always chooses to do good and never to do evil is a long ways down the road of salvation. Waaaaaaaay down. Farther than I'll ever get in this lifetime, to be sure. Why is this problematic? It seems axiomatic.
quote:
Now, I am not saying it would be easy. No doubt it will be very difficult.
You've got that straight. It is only as we cooperate with God working within us that we make steps in that direction, as God meets us in prayer, in the Eucharist, in our fellow human beings, especially in the Church.
quote:
Luck and free will could indeed take us to heaven if you are right.
If your distortion of my words is right. Which I assume it isn't.
quote:
But I can't believe that salvation is merely difficult. I don't think Christ died merely to make perfection easier. I think, without Christ, it would be impossible.
Absolutely. But you have already said nobody is without Christ. And nobody IS without Christ. In him we live and move and have our being. Christ is, as we say in our prayers, "everywhere present and fills all things."
Christ died on the cross to save the whole world (to save sinners of whom I am chief). His salvific energies are already at work in the world. Again as I believe it's St Paul prays, "The Lord Jesus direct you by his Spirit to think and do that which is pleasing in his sight." You are grossly distorting my words to try to make me a Pelagian.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I can't perfect myself without God. I never said so. If you were reading for content you would already know I believe that.
Um, don't believe that. Sorry.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Really, MT. Twisting your words? Distortion? You're the one that said there is a difference between being good and doing good, and what I pointed out is a natural consequence of that. I might have gotten you wrong, or you weren't clear, but I'm not twisting anything.
And for that matter, you might as well argue with what I am saying instead of what you imagine I am saying. So no more of this "Total depravity as normally defined" business. You clearly have some sort of objection to my posts, so you'll only cloud the issue by posting against things no one is posting.
Whether there has actually been a wicked person that has never done wicked things is besides the point. The question is whether it is logically possible. If you like we can look at it the other way around. It is possible that there is a perfectly good person that has only done wicked things his whole life. Why not? Being good isn't doing good after all, and vice versa.
The way I see things, "being good" is perfectly meaningless less if it doesn't mean "doing good things," or "Living life well" if we want to get platonic about it.
quote:
Further why does it follow that if we can sometimes choose to do good things, we can always choose to do good things? That evil which is in us (cf. Solzhenitsyn, above) is at war with the good that is within us. (St Paul again.)
If I can choose to do good and reject evil this moment, then why not the next moment? And the moment after that? To the very end of my life. Perfection could happen right now through mere force of will. Christ need not have died for that.
quote:
What goodness we have is imparted by God, either at the creation of the race, or somewhere along the line in our own development
What were we disagreeing about again? Once you get over this untenable "being good" and "doing good" distinction of yours, I'm just saying we can do good only because God has given us the grace to do good. You've just said as much yourself.
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
I think the problem is that you appear to be using "being good" for "being perfect". All of us are a little bit good. Therefore we can sometimes do good. I am fighting against an understanding of "being good" which means being all the way good. If you didn't say that then I was mistaken and I apologize.
Yes, we do good because of good within us. We do evil because of evil within us. I think we agree on that. But also, doing good makes us more good (when coupled with God's grace). This is all in Screwtape; it's hardly strictly Orthodox.
Re. total depravity, you are using the term in a way that nobody else uses it. A way which twists "total" beyond all recognizable meaning. If someone is TOTALLY depraved, that means there is nothing undepraved. That's what "total" means.
Anything I missed?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
I think the problem is that you appear to be using "being good" for "being perfect". All of us are a little bit good. Therefore we can sometimes do good. I am fighting against an understanding of "being good" which means being all the way good. If you didn't say that then I was mistaken and I apologize.
Yes, we do good because of good within us. We do evil because of evil within us. I think we agree on that. But also, doing good makes us more good (when coupled with God's grace). This is all in Screwtape; it's hardly strictly Orthodox.
I am proposing that a person that always does good and never does evil is, by definition, perfect. The work of salvation in this person is done. They are the image of Christ already and they only await the final consummation of His Kingdom.
I am not saying that anyone that does good is perfect, or anyone that does something evil is evil. As you said, salvation is worked out over a life time. Yet, the proportion of good actions to bad actions in a person is a measure of how great their goodness or wickedness is.
I am further saying that the work of Christ is the work that makes this possible. Without Christ, there would be no salvation, and therefore no righteousness. That may not be the definition of Total Depravity you like, but it sure sounds like those words to me.
quote:
Re. total depravity, you are using the term in a way that nobody else uses it. A way which twists "total" beyond all recognizable meaning. If someone is TOTALLY depraved, that means there is nothing undepraved. That's what "total" means.
Yet I don't see a single Calvinist on this thread saying that, or a single quote from Calvin saying that.
Would you believe I don't consider myself a Calvinist? Besides believing predestination to be true, I hardly make anything of it in my spirituality and thinking. I read too my Kierkegaard and spend all my time thinking about fear and trembling, striving, and leaps of faith.
Zach
Posted by Wesley J (# 6075) on
:
[aside]
Thanks, guys - you've inspired me to go and read the French 1560 original of the 'Institutes of the Christian Religion/Institution de la religion chrétienne'. Which I've always wanted to do!
Post Tenebras Lux - After darkness, light. ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
[/aside]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
I'll forego the "humans are entirely and wholly bad" thing. Although I reserve the right to come back to it.
The repository of all knowledge and wisdom says of a totally deprived person "even the good which a person may intend is faulty in its premise, false in its motive, and weak in its implementation" (Wikipedia). Since I don't know what is meant for "faulty in premise" I'll concentrate on the other two.
The article goes on to say, "Thus, even acts of generosity and altruism are in fact egoist acts in disguise." In other words it is not possible to do good for good reasons. I think this is plainly and obviously wrong. If I see a person drowning and think, "Oh my God! That person is drowning" and immediately go to work to save them, in what way is this for false motives? There weren't any motives involved at all -- a need was seen, and responded to. I didn't stop to think, "hmm, what will I get out of this?" or anything of the sort. I saw a person drowning, got a hit of adrenaline, and went to work saving them. Further, if I successfully save them, then "weak in implementation" is also absurd.
Yes, we can't choose God without God's help. But we have God's help, in being created in his image, and in the grace of the cross. The Calvinist says those aren't enough, we each need a special nudge, and without the special nudge we are incapable of choosing God. Which gets us into the whole thing of who gets or doesn't get the nudge, and what that says about God's love and who is responsible for someone's not being saved.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
[aside]
Thanks, guys - you've inspired me to go and read the French 1560 original of the 'Institutes of the Christian Religion/Institution de la religion chrétienne'. Which I've always wanted to do!
[/aside]
When we were dating, my husband-to-be shared that he was doing his morning devotions from the Institutes-- in the Latin. It's amazing we ever got to a 2nd date after that.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Whiskey Hotel - what, INDERTERMINATE numbers ?
Crunchless numbers ?
Numbers THAT DON'T EXIST ?
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Numbers THAT DON'T EXIST ?
Square root of negative one?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Now THAT'S just not REAL EmmTee ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
These Augustinean kids just don't have the FAINTEST idea what they're dealing with do they my dear ?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
As I was driving to church today, I discovered that some random asshole had bent my car antenna all to hell for absolutely no gawddamn reason. Then, while driving back from church, some other asshole honked at me and swore loud enough for the whole block to hear because I had stopped my car in order to not run down an old couple crossing the street.
So, having been the innocent victim of both senseless, random cruelty and random, petulant fury I find myself quite ready to accept the absolute wickedness of humankind this morning.
Zach
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
Suppose I scratch my nose. I don't scratch my nose by accident. My fingers don't suddenly jerk into the middle of my face. But I don't scratch my nose on purpose either. On purpose to do what?
On purpose to stop the itch? That has to be the most gobsmacked turn in an argument I have ever heard. Of COURSE you scratched your nose on purpose. What do you think "On Purpose" means?
If I have registered an itch and think about what to do about it, then I've scratched my nose on purpose. But if I haven't registered any itch, then what?
If the argument doesn't convince you, I just folded my hands (without thinking about it) after I'd finished typing the last sequence. On purpose or by accident? I'm sitting sideways on my chair with one leg up? On purpose or by accident? Neither applies.
quote:
quote:
An advertiser puts up an advert to be seen from the railway. Someone looking out of the window of the train sees the advert. Is it an accident that that particular person saw the advert? No. Did the advertiser put up the advert on purpose that that particular person saw the advert? Again, no.
A man is a killed by a bomb. The bombers didn't kill that man on purpose - they had no idea of who he was. But it's not an accident - the bombers can't claim they were peaceably letting off a controlled detonation.
You don't seem to know what "accident" means either. If something happens completely beyond the control of everyone involved, and is the result of random chance, what shall we call it? The particular person that saw the ad or was injured by the bomb was the result of random chance and completely beyond the advertiser and bomb maker's control. That is, an accident.
Yet it's not an accident that the advertisement was seen by somebody, and it's not an accident that the bomb killed somebody. The advertiser has no reason to wish that anyone who actually saw the advert hadn't seen it; ditto for the bomber who, having decided to drop a bomb on a group of soldiers, doesn't care who those soldiers are. Did the advertiser take an action with the intent that some person saw the advert? Yes. Did the advertiser achieve the result intended? Yes. Odd use of 'accident' to describe someone achieving their desired result by their desired means.
(I think what you're doing is an example of a particular cause of error in philosophy and theology. The problem is that people in argument think they can use words such as 'accident' in a a forced metaphysical sense unconnected with the live meaning. However, they forget that this is a forced metaphysical meaning and proceed to argue as if the implications of the live meaning were still active.)
Anyway, this is a bit of a side issue. We're both agreed that any instance of learning to love is in some sense learning about God. Our question is whether this has any implications for the interpretation of special revelation.
You think that it means that the Calvinist interpretation of special revelation must override our secular understanding of what love is - or else that we must be wrong to think that they're in conflict; while I think the implication holds the other way around - Calvinism must be a misinterpretation.
quote:
quote:
We already have a word for that: created. We don't need another.
Now you're just being deliberately obtuse. Total Depravity is just a commentary of how we are created and have our being. It points out that we aren't as independant and free as we imagine.
That is either what 'created' means, or else some special set of implications is being imported into 'we aren't as independent and free as we imagine'.
There is a difference between:
* human beings are not capable of either good and evil without God because held in existence by God, and;
* human beings are solely capable of evil without God.
You can't treat the first as implying or having the implications of the second.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
But God made them assholes Zach. Surely ? From eternity. Or is it just from Augustine ?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
EmpTy put this reply to me on the wrong thread:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How does God know it's going to rain tomorrow ?
EmpTea: God, being outside of space and time, can see all of spacetime as a single object, including things that from OUR point of view are in the future. There is no future to God because God isn't in time. Quite simply God knows it's going to rain tomorrow because God sees it raining tomorrow.
This is imparsimonious. God can be as much 'outside' spacetime as He likes (whatever that - outside - could mean), the future hasn't happened.
And the present, now, which is all there ever IS, is indeterminate NOW. The past is utterly irretrievably so. The future even more PASSIVELY indeterminate.
To God. That's how He thinks it.
The childish, pagan, ignorant belief that every tick of the Bender God is spooled on the floor of His infinite chest is ... pathetic. Worse. Psychotic. Deluded. Less excusable than in Augustine, Muhammad and Calvin.
Even if such a Satanic joke were true, how does God know the spin of an electron ? Him knowing what it is because at some future date WE found out means what about His knowledge of its spin NOW ?
Let alone what YOU Zach or YOU Jengie would be now seconds before you were conceived decades ago, let alone let alone more than 15 Ga ago.
Put away childish things kiddies.
Try a grown up, sane definition of omniscience. You can then build a grown up, redeemed, undiabolical theology on it.
Posted by Dave Marshall (# 7533) on
:
I wouldn't have put it quite that, Martin, but yes. It does rather mess up millenia of theology.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
I, otoh, would put it precisely like that. Well done.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Why am I the only one that can't figure out what the crap Martin is trying to say?
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
This is imparsimonious. God can be as much 'outside' spacetime as He likes (whatever that - outside - could mean), the future hasn't happened.
Not to you, no. You're looking at this from your own point of view rather than from God's.
quote:
Even if such a Satanic joke were true, how does God know the spin of an electron ?
Because he's God. God knows every hair you have on your head. You think electrons are too small for Him to see?
And please stop calling me anything other than my name or "MT".
[ 18. October 2010, 04:40: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Why am I the only one that can't figure out what the crap Martin is trying to say?
You almost certainly are not the only one.
However if you start from the assumption that his posts are intended to (and often do) mean something pertinent, it's easier to start to guess what that might be than if you hold to your first impression that they are gibberish.
The last point was (I think) that God does not know the inherently unknowable. He doesn't know the future because the future is undecided. He doesn't know the spin of an electron because (I think) that only exists when observed, and God apparently does not count as an observer.
No actual reasons are given for this view except the assertion that if we adopt it, it solves some moral problems about God creating people to be damned (which it doesn't, as far as I can see - hiding the identities of the damned from God doesn't make their damnation any more palatable). Which is a strange reason for Martin to assert as he has previously given the impression that he doesn't believe in damnation anyway. In addition, this view is asserted as grown-up, and most of Christian theology dismissed as childish.
So, on balance, that one wasn't much worth translating. But some of them are.
Posted by Dave Marshall (# 7533) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Because he's God.
As defined by who, though. The parsimonious view, as Martin puts it, the one for which only necessary attributes can be assumed, does not require God to 'know' other than now. The 'childish, pagan, ignorant belief that every tick of the Bender God is spooled on the floor of His infinite chest' is not supported by any real-world evidence.
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
Eliab
The problem with that the classic tradition God is creator of everything, including time. Therefore he is not subject to time the same way that we are.
In fact even science does not have the straightforward linear idea of time that most humans function under. How much more incorrect is it to assume that God does.
Jengie
[ 18. October 2010, 10:22: Message edited by: Jengie Jon ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
The last point was (I think) that God does not know the inherently unknowable. He doesn't know the future because the future is undecided.
I used to believe that the future is undecided, but I realised that it's incompatible with modern science.
In relativity (AIUI *), events are simultaneous if they can't exert causal influence on each other. That means that in order for something to get from one event to the other it would have to move faster at the speed of light.
Light is reaching us now from Alpha Centauri. It set out 4.37 years ago. The light setting out from us now will reach Alpha Centauri in 4.37 years time. From our point of view here, all the events in between might as well be happening at the same time as us. Before someone objects, it's natural to think that 'now' on Alpha Centauri must be happening at the halfway mark. But that's not true, because what point in time on Alpha Centauri makes the half way mark depends on how and when you measure it. In particular, it depends on how fast Alpha Centauri is moving relative to us.
There are various other situations that you can describe in which two events happen in one order from one point of view and in another order from another point of view.
Consider: Darth Vader watches the Millennium Falcon trying to escape through the slowly closing door of the Death Star. The Falcon is approaching at a steep slant.
.................MMMMM
___ _______D
(M is the Millennium Falcon coming in steeply, the _ is the wall of the Death Star, and D is Darth Vader watching.)
The Death Star door is now narrower than the Millennium Falcon. But the Millennium Falcon is travelling at half the speed of light. That means that from Darth Vader's point of view its length has shrunk to three quarters of what it is at rest. The Millennium Falcon just scrapes through.
On the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo watches the door approaching. From his point of view, the door of the Death Star is approaching him at half the speed of light. So from his point of view, the door has shrunk to three quarters of its width and is too narrow for the Millennium Falcon to fit through. So why doesn't the Falcon crash? From Han Solo's point of view the nose goes through first and then the tail. So the Falcon goes through at an angle and there's no problem.
Now from Han Solo's point of view the nose went through first and then the tail. From Darth Vader's point of view, the two things happened at the same time. Now suppose the future doesn't exist. From Han Solo's point of view, the nose goes through - but the tail going through doesn't yet exist. From Darth Vader's point of view though, both events happen at the same time. So the one event - the tail going through both exists and doesn't exist at the same time. This is impossible.
Conclusion: the future does exist. That means some of the future can exist at the same time as now from other points of view where bits of the future happen before bits of now.
Now God, if God is anything, is responsible for creating every point of view that there is. So for God all time must exist. If you take all events that exist in all possible points of view you include all events past and future.
quote:
He doesn't know the spin of an electron because (I think) that only exists when observed, and God apparently does not count as an observer.
I can believe that God is not an observer in that sense. Our knowledge of the electron is caused by the electron's state; it's the result of a chain of physical causes and effects. God's knowledge is not caused by physical cause and effect. It follows that God's knowledge needn't collapse the waveform.
(*) Disclaimer: I'm not a physicist. If Alan Cresswell comes along and contradicts me, go with him.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
I've been thinking some more about this:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
Likewise, if we understand that God is love, all we know about God must be encompassed in our understanding of love. Where our definition of love and God differ, we must make corrections. The question then becomes, do I change my understanding of God to suit my understanding of love, or vise versa? If we believe that God is revealed in scripture, we should define love in terms of the scripturally-revealed nature of God.
How does that work out, in practice, for someone who holds that scripture teaches the hardline hyper-Calvinist theology of TULIP/Dort? What impact does that have, or ought it to have, on how they try to love?
I have two children. Would it be loving for me instruct my daughter in moral conduct, reward her lavishly when she does well, and forgive any failings, while instead beating my son savagely for any infractions of not-very-well explained rules? Ought I to tear up the anniversary card I have written praising my wife's virtues, and replacing with one thanking God for restraining the innate ugliness and depravity of her character? If she were to take that amiss, and doubt the sincerity of my love, would it be better to comfort her by promising that I will always be true to her, or should I express the hope that God will prevent me from acting on my natural desire to desert her and commit adultery?
The problem is that the love of Calvin's God doesn't translate into human terms. Every conscientious parent I know could serve as an (imperfect) icon of an Arminian or Universalist deity as they try to encourage responsible free choices while holding out unreserved acceptance. I don't know a single parent who plays the part of a domestic divinity which is remotely Calvinist - and that includes the Calvinists.
If what Calvinism says about God's conduct is true, and if it is loving, then it is only loving if there are special reasons that apply to God and no one else that make it so. No one thinks that Calvinist theology is a warrant to "go and do likewise". A Calvinst parent, or teacher, or politician, who divided those under their care into ‘elect' and ‘reprobate' groups for different treatment unrelated to actual conduct or character would be as monstrous and incomprehensible to other Calvinists as they would be to everyone else.
It seems to me that Calvinists don't, in actual practice, use their distinctive understanding of scripture to modify their understanding of love. They (being for the most part decent and principled Christians) understand love in much the same way as everyone else. They merely believe (in an act of faith which may be commendable) that if God does something that seems to us to be strange or even cruel, then it must be loving, for reasons and under conditions that are mysterious to us. They don't apply that to human loves, or a general understanding of love, at all, and they shouldn't.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Why couldn't Martin just say that instead of tossing in nonsense for whole 4 pages?
Golly, getting rid of God's omniscience does untangle problems on this thread. Dispensing with his omnipotence and perfect benevolence would untangle matters even more, come to think of it.
Zach
Posted by Dave Marshall (# 7533) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
In relativity ... events are simultaneous if they can't exert causal influence on each other.
Relativity is about generalising from within time. It is a model that describes (as far as I know *) how to predict what would be observed at some point in spacetime given other conditions also within spacetime. God (AIUI) is precisely not within spacetime, so the now of God is neither how it appears to Darth Vader nor to Han Solo but the fact that the Millenium Falcon did not crash.
(*) Disclaimer: I'm not a physicist either, but I think this is a metaphysical question.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Eliab
The problem with that the classic tradition God is creator of everything, including time. Therefore he is not subject to time the same way that we are.
In fact even science does not have the straightforward linear idea of time that most humans function under. How much more incorrect is it to assume that God does.
Jengie
The scientific community is much more nuanced on the matter than that.
In terms of God, the open theist position (or rather one of them-- there are several) would be that God chose to place himself within time in order to relate to his creation. That if he were outside of time he would be unable to be in relationship w/ us.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
In terms of God, the open theist position (or rather one of them-- there are several) would be that God chose to place himself within time in order to relate to his creation. That if he were outside of time he would be unable to be in relationship w/ us.
Why not?
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Well I haven't been without Christ (although I have alternately sought out his company and pushed him away) for the last 30 years. Yet before I became a Christian, I did some good things, and looking back it seems like for the right reasons. As do most people.
When someone says, "Oh my gosh, those people need me" and then goes and does whatever it is that those people need, that's a truly good deed. I think that, barring Calvinism, this is blindingly obvious.
I don't know anything in Calvinism that would deny that these are good deeds. That sidesteps Calvin's point, which relates back to the first paragraph quoted -- what's the right reason?
For Calvin, as I understand him, the only right reason is to glorify God. As noted in this thread, for better or worse, that is the starting and ending point of most if not all of Calvin's approach. Thus, for Calvin, even the best, most altruistic acts (to use the words of the article you quoted), while they may be of great good and even save lives, fall short of true goodness if God is not part of the equation for the actor. That's the sense in which they are egotistic -- because they become what we have done on our own, rather about what God has done through and with us and how we respond to the grace of God.
[ 18. October 2010, 18:39: Message edited by: Nick Tamen ]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
Yet Jesus' summation of the Law & Prophets was "Love God and love neighbour" -- nothing about glorifying God. Unless you want to say love=glory, which makes the whole argument kinda moot.
Posted by Nick Tamen (# 15164) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Yet Jesus' summation of the Law & Prophets was "Love God and love neighbour" -- nothing about glorifying God.
A valid response to Calvinism.
But not really a relevant response to my post, which has to do not with whether Calvinism is right or wrong, but with what Calvin and Calvinists mean by total depravity.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
The problem is that the love of Calvin's God doesn't translate into human terms. Every conscientious parent I know could serve as an (imperfect) icon of an Arminian or Universalist deity as they try to encourage responsible free choices while holding out unreserved acceptance. I don't know a single parent who plays the part of a domestic divinity which is remotely Calvinist - and that includes the Calvinists.
The Arminians don't have the same problem? We live in a world where earthquakes kills thousands, tidal waves kill tens of thousands, famines kill millions... all of which our loving God either caused or could have stopped, but didn't.
So, again, Christian theology in general has a problem here, not just the Calvinists.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Because Zach God IS omniscient about that which is determinable.
Not that which isn't.
God can determine if it will rain tomorrow, God can determine YOUR conception from eternity.
By His omnipotent will.
Only.
He won't.
He didn't.
The knowledge of an electron's spin prior to being observed is as unknowable, apart from being indeterminate, to Him as to any observer. It will NEVER be known. Cannot be. Apart from as indeterminate. Even once its spin after observation is known. Even though that determines the opposite spin in it's twin (like coppers, they come in quantum entangled pairs) no matter how separated, spookily instantaneously.
The fact that He wills it in to indeterminate, superpositioned existence makes Him no more able to 'know' its spin other than indeterminate then He is able to know that an apple is an aardvark.
There is NO SUCH THING as absolute, determined physical reality. Period.
As the spin of a coin is determined by indeterminate photons, how can your indeterminate personhood be known an eternity before indeterminate conception ?
Eliab: how can I not believe in damnation ? Your logic is appalling. How can omniscience being of that which is 'merely' determinable obviate damnation ?
EmmTea, you sensitive old sausage you, about your 'name', bless, you speak for God your imparsimonious pagan way and I'll speak for Him parsimoniously.
You are ALL pagan Augustine's pagan children. Including Alan and IngoB.
Why ?
The latter two of you in particular. You seem to believe that there is a 'better' model of electrons in God's head somewhere of which ours are a mere projection on a cave wall.
Why ?
Why do you ALL proliferate entities to such an absurd, mindless degree to conform with the pagans Plato and Ptolemy and make some disgusting variant of 'predestination' inevitable in a meaninglessly Sovereign God-bot ?
There is only one predestined, as His name says on the tin.
He saves, as it says too.
And He isn't a clock.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
I am pretty sure that "parsimony" doesn't mean what Martin thinks it means.
Zach
[ 18. October 2010, 19:52: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Well does it, or doesn't it ?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Well does it, or doesn't it ?
I'm pretty sure it doesn't.
"Parsimonious" means "exercising excessive frugality," or "Stinginess." "Imparsimonious" means "Not stingy." I have no idea what that has to do with Augustine, Mousethief, or me, since it sure doesn't seem that you mean to compliment us.
Though, like I said, I don't understand most of what you say.
Zach
[ 18. October 2010, 20:32: Message edited by: Zach82 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
No you don't.
Go and read widely.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
You are ALL pagan Augustine's pagan children. Including Alan and IngoB.
You're doing it again. Stop deliberately smearing people.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
And Dafyd, I'm not a physicist either but we don't need Alan to say, "What ?"
[ 18. October 2010, 21:27: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Apparently no_prophet said this somewhere:
"The specifics of electrons and tomorrow's rain and which sperm wins are governed by physical laws and specific occurrences from our human perspective. We have a sequential, within time, perspective. God seems to have an 'all times at once' perspective, not caught in the cause and effect of time that we have."
Not to the parsimonious He doesn't. And I bet you believe in freewill too.
A friend got REALLY angry, as usual, at church telling me that God created us to be free, to choose.
Uh huh.
He's a damnationist too.
It's time to grow up kiddies, up from the pit of hell, the abyss where this insane joke originated.
Is there are true raving liberal out there anywhere ? I feel more at home with you guys than all these damnationists.
Alan isn't one, although IngoB is, and yet they're both Deus ex machina, God the eternal spoken clock men, how do you do that Alan ? Don't worry, I'll work it out.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
In terms of God, the open theist position (or rather one of them-- there are several) would be that God chose to place himself within time in order to relate to his creation. That if he were outside of time he would be unable to be in relationship w/ us.
Why not?
Well, obviously the point is arguable. But Open Theists would say that's intrinsic to the nature of time-- that if you are inside of time then you're not going to be able to know (on an intimate level) a being that is outside of time-- you can only know of them. Just like we can't experience Mars w/o going there. We can know of it, we can see it from a distance. But we can't relate to Mars the same way we can relate to say, Hawaii by going there and really experiencing the place.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Before you say "Just can't," Cliff, ponder the mystery of the Incarnation. We can know God because we can know Jesus. Jesus is both God and Man, without being any less God than He was before the Incarnation.
I maintain God's omniscience (and, for that matter, His omnipotence) so I can maintain His perfect benevolence. If God doesn't know the future, then He doesn't really know the outcome of his actions. If He doesn't know the outcome of His actions, then He can't make an informed decision about what the most moral action is in any given situation- He can only make His best guess. Furthermore, God not being able to know the outcome of His actions opens the door to God making mistakes, which I cannot accept.
No omniscience, no perfect benevolence, no God.
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
But Open Theists would say that's intrinsic to the nature of time-- that if you are inside of time then you're not going to be able to know (on an intimate level) a being that is outside of time-- you can only know of them.
But that wasn't the question -- the question was whether a being outside of time could know a being inside of time.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
Before you say "Just can't," Cliff, ponder the mystery of the Incarnation. We can know God because we can know Jesus. Jesus is both God and Man, without being any less God than He was before the Incarnation.
The incarnation is the best argument for my point. When God wanted to make himself known to us, he did so in the person of Jesus Christ-- who was very much "in time".
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I maintain God's omniscience (and, for that matter, His omnipotence) so I can maintain His perfect benevolence. If God doesn't know the future, then He doesn't really know the outcome of his actions. If He doesn't know the outcome of His actions, then He can't make an informed decision about what the most moral action is in any given situation- He can only make His best guess. Furthermore, God not being able to know the outcome of His actions opens the door to God making mistakes, which I cannot accept.
None of that though is really the Open Theist position.
God knows everything that can be known. He knows everything about the past and present. He knows his own actions and choices, he knows what he intends to do and has the power to accomplish-- therefore all of his promises/prophesies are sure. While he cannot (by definition) know the future choices of his free creatures, he can and does know ever possible option available to them, and all the possible permeations from each potential choice. Thus he is able to envision/anticipate every possible future, and have a plan to accomplish his ultimate purposes in every contingency.
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
But Open Theists would say that's intrinsic to the nature of time-- that if you are inside of time then you're not going to be able to know (on an intimate level) a being that is outside of time-- you can only know of them.
But that wasn't the question -- the question was whether a being outside of time could know a being inside of time.
No, actually the question was:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by cliffdweller:
[qb]In terms of God, the open theist position (or rather one of them-- there are several) would be that God chose to place himself within time in order to relate to his creation. That if he were outside of time he would be unable to be in relationship w/ us.
Why not?
A relationship means it has to be two-way. To be in relationship w/ us he needs to know us but we also need to know him. Otherwise it's not a relationship. So if it is in fact the case that one who is "in time" cannot know one who is "outside of time" (whatever that means-- I don't think we really know) then in order to be in relationship w/ us, God would first need to enter into time so that he could be known by us.
On your newer question (can one who is outside of time know one who is inside of time, even if the reverse is not true)... my head is now hurting and I gotta go to bed. I'll think about that, like Tara, tomorrow.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Eliab: [...] Your logic is appalling.
From you, I will take that as a compliment.
quote:
You are ALL pagan Augustine's pagan children.
That, though, is an insult. As I am a professed Christian, if you want to call me a pagan, please do it in Hell.
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
[For info only]
I was tempted to stick my Host hat on, Eliab and mousethief (even though I'm on holiday) but on reflection I took the comment as hyperbole. Maybe I'm just being too tolerant. Happy to be corrected by Martin if I've misread him, in which case I'll happily call him.
Hell is always open of course (at least hereabouts). You can never tell who might end up there.
[ 19. October 2010, 06:46: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Cliffdweller (are you an auk? Gannet ?), I should have acknowledged the possibility of grace in you way above. Graceless that I am.
Eliab. Virtually all Christians, West, East and sideways have been fundamentally pagan since Augustine. You are in exalted company.
All predestination beliefs beyond the One Predestined are pagan.
Belief that Bender is God and His chest is full of the infinite Planck ticks of the happened Futurama is a tad imparsimonious.
Hell's biggest joke.
In nuclear physicists and quantum chromodynamicists it is doubly heterodox.
Have a nice predetermined day. With freewill of course!
Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Eliab. Virtually all Christians, West, East and sideways have been fundamentally pagan since Augustine. You are in exalted company.
Well, well. The gates of hell have prevailed, except for St. Martin and his remnant of true disciples who carry the torch of faith forward towards the Last Days...
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
Well, well, he meant it!
Martin
Kindly back off these insulting generalisations. You're entitled to your critical opinion (which many Christians share) about Augustine, and also the effects of Augustinian thought in the development of the church. But please do not to tar Shipmates with the same pagan brush. Pagan is also a pretty offensive description to apply to those Shipmates who see Augustine differently. These are steps a little too far along the C3 line.
Other Shipmates
You may have missed it because of the title, but this thread is already open in Hell if you are personally cheesed off with these comments.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I maintain God's omniscience so I can maintain His perfect benevolence. If God doesn't know the future, then He doesn't really know the outcome of his actions. If He doesn't know the outcome of His actions, then He can't make an informed decision about what the most moral action is in any given situation- He can only make His best guess.
I do think God knows the future, but this inference seems to me faulty. Human beings are imperfectly moral not because they don't know enough of the outcomes of their actions, but because they don't care enough.
To say that God is perfectly benevolent would mean that God takes the most benevolent course given God's knowledge rather than saying that God takes the course that is most benevolent given the way things turn out.
Having said that, I think it is a mistake to see God's benevolence as taking one possible course through pre-existing conditions, as human agents do. God is not an agent. Since God is outside time then God's 'decisions' consist of actualising creation all at once. It's misleading to understand that as God making the best possible choice based on knowledge of possibilities.
[ 19. October 2010, 09:30: Message edited by: Dafyd ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
God knows everything that can be known. He knows everything about the past and present. He knows his own actions and choices, he knows what he intends to do and has the power to accomplish-- therefore all of his promises/prophesies are sure. While he cannot (by definition) know the future choices of his free creatures, he can and does know ever possible option available to them, and all the possible permeations from each potential choice. Thus he is able to envision/anticipate every possible future, and have a plan to accomplish his ultimate purposes in every contingency.
As has been said elsewhere, it's not really clear that options and permutations from each potential choice or possible futures are things that are available to be known. It seems to me that phrases like 'what would have happened if' don't have any referent, which means they aren't there to be known by God or anyone else.
quote:
A relationship means it has to be two-way. To be in relationship w/ us he needs to know us but we also need to know him. Otherwise it's not a relationship. So if it is in fact the case that one who is "in time" cannot know one who is "outside of time" (whatever that means-- I don't think we really know) then in order to be in relationship w/ us, God would first need to enter into time so that he could be known by us.
I am somewhat puzzled by the idea of knowing God that well. It's hardly as if God being outside time is the only obstacle that makes the relationship between us and God unbalanced.
Even if I put to one side for a moment as much as possible (and more) of traditional philosophical understandings of God, it remains the case that God is supposed to be in relationship equally with all the blessed at once. I can't understand how the blessed could be. I just don't see how you can have a perfectly mutual two-way relationship when the relationship is one-to-many.
[ 19. October 2010, 09:43: Message edited by: Dafyd ]
Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
You may have missed it because of the title, but this thread is already open in Hell if you are personally cheesed off with these comments.
Is this some kind of Zen koan? ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
(I'm guessing you wanted to link to this...)
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
The Arminians don't have the same problem? We live in a world where earthquakes kills thousands, tidal waves kill tens of thousands, famines kill millions... all of which our loving God either caused or could have stopped, but didn't.
So, again, Christian theology in general has a problem here, not just the Calvinists.
On that issue I fully agree. That's a general problem for Christians (indeed, theists).
My point to Sharkshooter was more this:
If you think that the Bible teaches Universalism, you can let that view of God inform your view of love. You can try to be non-judgemental, unreservedly kind and generous to all, forgiving even to those who do not (and never will) repent, and letting no injury whatever excuse you from a failure to love and accept your fellow humans.
If you think that the Bible teaches Arminianism, you can let that view of God inform your view of love. You can place a high premium on free choice and responsibility. You can promote politicl and legal freedoms. You can take the tough decision of respecting someone's autonomy even when they make decisions which hurt both you and them. You can try to encourage, persuade, warn and counsel people as best you can, but never coerce, even when moved to do so by compassion.
If you think that the Bible teaches Calvinism, you can't (as far as I can see) use it to inform your view of love at all. If you think that God ‘elects' some people for bliss and not others, for reasons which may be wise and good, but are (to us) so inscrutable as to appear arbitrary, then all you can do is take it on faith that God is still good. You don't know, and don't purport to know, what makes God's scheme loving, when any analogous human behaviour would not be, you merely trust him to do right.
That's not an argument against Calvinism being either Biblical or true. There may well be things about love that we do not know, and can never know, and all we can do is trust God. What it is, is an argument against Calvinism being useful in giving a distinctive teaching about love, in the way that Sharkshooter implied that it did.
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by IngoB:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
You may have missed it because of the title, but this thread is already open in Hell if you are personally cheesed off with these comments.
Is this some kind of Zen koan?
(I'm guessing you wanted to link to this...)
Thanks, IngoB, quite right. [This keyboard is a bit spongey, but a bad workman always blames his tools]
[ 19. October 2010, 10:12: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Eliab. Virtually all Christians, West, East and sideways have been fundamentally pagan since Augustine. You are in exalted company.
I've responded on the Hell thread. I have also invited you to take up the argument (if you wish to have one) on the Much Ado board.
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
...If you think that the Bible teaches Calvinism, you can't (as far as I can see) use it to inform your view of love at all. ...
And I think you are dead wrong. I guess we are done.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
I do think God knows the future, but this inference seems to me faulty....Human beings are imperfectly moral not because they don't know enough of the outcomes of their actions, but because they don't care enough.
I never denied the possibility of someone knowing the right choice and consciously rejecting it. Why is is that practically every reply I make on this thread starts with me dispelling notions which I never propose?
I am denying the possibility of God making a mistake, and if God can't know the outcome of His actions, it is possible for God to make a decision that does not bring about the best possible world. That He would would never intentionally being about a less than best world is beyond question. That He would never do it on accident is, for me anyway, equally beyond question.
Or you can say that carrying out the best possible action has nothing to do with actually knowing the results of that action. Is that what you want to say? Not even Kant wants to say that the results of our action are to be disregarded to such a degree. And that's saying something.
Before we say it, whether or not humanity must be guided by teleology is another question. I rather believe our moral actions must be guided by faith, since God knows the results of actions beyond a doubt, why we can only guess about the results of our actions.
quote:
If you think that the Bible teaches Calvinism, you can't (as far as I can see) use it to inform your view of love at all.
Arminians have a God that does lots of things we humans cannot and must not emulate too. Your argument against Calvin is an argument against Arminius. It's not a very good one, though. It's that intensional fallacy again- just because was don't know, precisely, what love is doesn't mean we can't have meaningful discourse about it.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Certainly Barnabas. Might I ask what a C3 line is ? Happy to apologize to all and each for crossing it.
Posted by goperryrevs (# 13504) on
:
Good man, Martin. B62's referring to Commandment 3 - "attack the issue, not the person".
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
We all have our obscure moments. Mind you, C3, as shorthand for Commandment 3, is in pretty common use around here. But I'm happy to confirm that was my message.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
[ 19. October 2010, 13:36: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
...If you think that the Bible teaches Calvinism, you can't (as far as I can see) use it to inform your view of love at all. ...
And I think you are dead wrong.
Well you could explain why.
It seems to me that the good things Calvinism says about God's love (that it is undeserved, effective to save, utterly secure, and truly attested to in Scripture) are not unique to a Calvinist understanding (albeit that they are given a special emphasis). Those do translate to human love, of course. What I don't (at the moment) see as translating is the distinctive features of Calvinism which to an outsider seem unloving: that election and reprobation seem capricious. You can, of course, believe that it is not capricious but good, for reasons that we don't presently know: but how do you even start trying to apply that to your own attempts to love?
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Cliffdweller (are you an auk? Gannet ?),
I have no idea what this means, so I'm guessing the answer is no.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
quote:
I do think God knows the future, but this inference seems to me faulty....Human beings are imperfectly moral not because they don't know enough of the outcomes of their actions, but because they don't care enough.
I never denied the possibility of someone knowing the right choice and consciously rejecting it. Why is is that practically every reply I make on this thread starts with me dispelling notions which I never propose?
It's because you make a habit of misunderstanding other people's arguments. (As when I said in an earlier post that 'God is love' wasn't playing the structural role in your argument that you thought it was, and you took me to be denying that 'God is love'.) I never suggested you'd denied the possibility of someone knowing the right choice and consciously rejecting it.
I simply said that (incorrigible) lack of knowledge is in no way a moral fault.
quote:
I am denying the possibility of God making a mistake, and if God can't know the outcome of His actions, it is possible for God to make a decision that does not bring about the best possible world.
If someone makes the best possible decision on the probabilities, and the probabilities turn out wrong, they have not made a mistake. They'd have made a mistake if they'd got the probabilities wrong.
Language about best possible worlds seems to me confused. There aren't any possible worlds that God hasn't created, and if God has created them, then they're no longer merely possible.
You're trying to argue a reductio ad absurdam against a view that neither you nor I agrees with. However, I think that by the time you talk about God making a decision on the basis of information you're already getting yourself into confusion. God doesn't compare two options and decide which one to take; there aren't any options at all until God takes one.
quote:
Or you can say that carrying out the best possible action has nothing to do with actually knowing the results of that action. Is that what you want to say? Not even Kant wants to say that the results of our action are to be disregarded to such a degree. And that's saying something.
The goodness of the action is to be considered from what is available to the agent. Assessing an action is different from assessing an outcome or a state of affairs. (I don't actually think it's intelligible to talk about states of affairs except implicitly as intended outcomes of imagined actions.) An agent is good if they take good actions, rather than if they bring about good states of affairs.
(And I don't agree that Kant would supports you here. The outcome that matters to Kant is the possible outcome should all rational beings adopt the maxim of the action as their maxim.)
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
If someone makes the best possible decision on the probabilities, and the probabilities turn out wrong, they have not made a mistake. They'd have made a mistake if they'd got the probabilities wrong.
It's stronger than this. The possibilities don't have to turn out wrong, just not pan out. If I step out into the street because there's only a .01% probability that a car will come screaming around the corner and hit me, it's still a good decision even if one does. It doesn't mean the probability was wrong. It just means that it was that one in 10,000 time.
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
Dafyd, as I said to MT, either you were unclear or I misunderstood, but I'm not out to willfully misinterpret you. I actually had a very good reason for wondering if you really accepted the premise that God is love. I proposed it because you did and continue to question if God really is love according to our everyday discourse about love. You keep harping that we have an everyday discourse about love as if it invalidates the statement that God is love. If you are saying this because you merely think that everyday discourse about love invalidates something I am saying about God, you are falling into the intensional fallacy. Your argument is simply unsound.
Now, on the issue of God's foreknowledge, I held no question about the blame of God for being mistaken about the best course of action. If God doesn't know the future, then He can hardly be blame for making hapless mistakes. Though I do question whether God does make hapless mistakes, and I cannot believe he does. And, I think, God would need to know the outcome of His actions indubitably if He were to be beyond making hapless mistakes. To be perfectly benevolent, God must be able to bring about the best possible world, and bring it about indubitably.
Zach
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Nor a twitcher then SeaDee!
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
Well, I got it, Martin. But please remember Purgatory Guideline 3. Dial down the social banter.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Sir.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I proposed it because you did and continue to question if God really is love according to our everyday discourse about love.
I never did.
I would certainly question whether the Calvinist interpretation of special revelation is compatible with our everyday discourse about love, but that's because I think Calvinists are wrong about God.
quote:
If you are saying this because you merely think that everyday discourse about love invalidates something I am saying about God, you are falling into the intensional fallacy.
Now that would be what I am arguing. You can't just assert that it's an intensional fallacy without addressing the details of my arguments. (See my reply to Anteater in particular, since my replies to you are confused by having to deal with the odd misreading above.)
quote:
Now, on the issue of God's foreknowledge, I held no question about the blame of God for being mistaken about the best course of action. If God doesn't know the future, then He can hardly be blame for making hapless mistakes. Though I do question whether God does make hapless mistakes, and I cannot believe he does. And, I think, God would need to know the outcome of His actions indubitably if He were to be beyond making hapless mistakes. To be perfectly benevolent, God must be able to bring about the best possible world, and bring it about indubitably.
Now you see, there's that word 'benevolent' in your last sentence. It hasn't occurred in any of your previous sentences.
The question I have been posing is not whether God makes mistakes, or whether God has to have perfect knowledge of the future in order to not make mistakes. (Since I think God is outside time I don't think those are interesting questions.) I'm put off by your either-or insistence that someone who doesn't have perfect knowledge makes 'mistakes' - but that's not my main objection.
The question is whether any agent (including God if we think of God as an agent) can be perfectly benevolent if that agent doesn't have perfect knowledge of the future. Does a perfectly good will entail the perfect ability to predict the outcome of one's actions? And the answer to that is surely no. It rules out carelessness, of course, but benevolence is something different from predictive competence.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
It's stronger than this. The possibilities don't have to turn out wrong, just not pan out.
That's what I meant. What I said was self-contradictory nonsense. My bad.
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
Dafyd:
quote:
What I don't (at the moment) see as translating is the distinctive features of Calvinism which to an outsider seem unloving: that election and reprobation seem capricious.
OK so maybe I should not involve in this because I am no calvinist, although I used to be. But this line of argument illustrates exactly the problems in any dialogue. I'm pretty sure that you know quite well that no calvinist things of any action of God as capricious. So why bring in this red-herring?
I suppose it's because in your mind, you would have to draw this conclusion. Just like other people are driven to the conclusion that pre-destinated conversion somehow robs it of it's human spontaneity.
Normal calvinists believe none of that, so maybe you and they are of different mindsets, (pre?)-destined always to talk past each other.
quote:
You can, of course, believe that it is not capricious but good, for reasons that we don't presently know:
Which is exactly what Calvinists do believe, but it seems that you can't.
quote:
but how do you even start trying to apply that to your own attempts to love?
This could only happen when the one you love is not your equal in terms of understanding, or because of some special circumstance. Is that so hard to believe of God? Is it not imaginable that an action can be done out of love, for the best possible reasons, but that those reasons cannot be explained? This adds to the poignancy of the situation, because in performing a loving action, you have to accept that it will be misunderstood, and resented.
As to what I do believe, I am with those who say that the real problem comes with a belief in final damnation to hell. Most people can cope with predestinarian universalism, and I flirted with that myself.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
God has NO foreknowledge of anyone's salvation or damnation.
Posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras (# 11274) on
:
That's very unequivocally stated, Martin. Care to unpack that a bit?
Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on
:
quote:
Now that would be what I am arguing. You can't just assert that it's an intensional fallacy without addressing the details of my arguments. (See my reply to Anteater in particular, since my replies to you are confused by having to deal with the odd misreading above.)
If the argument is a fallacy, that means that the argument is unsound no matter what premises you stick in it. Go read all that stuff about Lois Lane and Superman to see why it is fallacious. Either way, your conclusion is self defeating all by itself. Arminian God's love is just as unpracticable by humanity as Calvinist God's.
quote:
Now you see, there's that word 'benevolent' in your last sentence. It hasn't occurred in any of your previous sentences.
It actually has- I checked. The problem with the questions you pose is that they don't have much to do with my arguments, but spend their time quibbling about definitions. And since I have taken care to make it clear what I mean by benevolence, that ability to bring about the best possible world indubitably, you need not waste my or your time making an argument that hinges on what you think benevolence is.
Zach
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Zach82:
I have taken care to make it clear what I mean by benevolence, that ability to bring about the best possible world indubitably,
This strikes me as a rather idiosyncratic definition of benevolence. By this definition, (a) humans cannot be benevolent, and (b) God doesn't have to actually ACT benevolently, just be capable of it.
Where did you get this definition?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
No unpacking is necessary Kaz.
Love predestines NO ONE but Itself.
No one Kaz.
To suggest otherwise is to suggest insanity, evil on the part of Love. That black is white.
Makes the Killer God who came to be killed subtly nuanced.
There is NOTHING to unpack.
To suggest that omni{scient-pathic,potent,present} God magically knows that the indeterminate is determined is irrational. Meaningless.
To suggest that God's now includes anything more than ours with regard to ours (the past of our now, the future of our now or anything's now) is included in that.
There is no 'missing' information that He has that makes the indeterminate determinate, the unreal real, the unhappened happened.
There is therefore NO meaningful basis for believing in a framework in which predestination is passively inevitable.
And without that and independent of that there is NO basis in Love for believing that God decided from eternity who to determine actively by will to save and not.
Without those two premisses, of parsimony and love, there is no theology. There is no reason. No meaning. At all.
Unpack that mate.
And notice what I DON'T say.
Can you do that ?
Can you at least try ?
Never mind.
[ 23. October 2010, 00:56: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by anteater:
Dafyd:
quote:
What I don't (at the moment) see as translating is the distinctive features of Calvinism which to an outsider seem unloving: that election and reprobation seem capricious.
OK so maybe I should not involve in this because I am no calvinist, although I used to be. But this line of argument illustrates exactly the problems in any dialogue. I'm pretty sure that you know quite well that no calvinist things of any action of God as capricious. So why bring in this red-herring?
It wasn't me; it was Eliab.
But as I think his argument is sound, I'll pick it up. It is true that no Calvinist would use the word 'capricious' to describe God. On the other hand, from our point of view acting for reasons that we don't and can't ever understand is effectively acting capriciously. It amounts to the same thing from our point of view. Now if the only reason that Calvinists don't use the word 'capricious' is its negative connotations, that begins to be problematic.
quote:
quote:
You can, of course, believe that it is not capricious but good, for reasons that we don't presently know: but how do you even start trying to apply that to your own attempts to love?
This could only happen when the one you love is not your equal in terms of understanding, or because of some special circumstance. Is that so hard to believe of God? Is it not imaginable that an action can be done out of love, for the best possible reasons, but that those reasons cannot be explained? This adds to the poignancy of the situation, because in performing a loving action, you have to accept that it will be misunderstood, and resented.
This is just slightly skew of Eliab's point. He's not arguing that, say if we love animals or people who have permanent mental disabilities, that we can't treat them in ways that they might not immediately realise is loving. What he's arguing is that it doesn't make sense to arbitrarily love some people and refuse to love others. As you say, you also think the real problem is final damnation to Hell. That's not the same as giving your dog an injection that it doesn't like.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Dafyd, EmmTee, keep up the good work, exposing the meaningless non-sense of God's ineffable sovereign arbitrariness.
Even though you in particular Emm are handicapped by the infinite ball and chain of Bender-God having to know the infinite future in which all are determined, predestined passively to salavation or damnation (although not for you personally as you are a universalist).
At least you know that love would never actively predestine any to hell. You just need the other hand to hear the clapping.
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
Dafyd:
quote:
On the other hand, from our point of view acting for reasons that we don't and can't ever understand is effectively acting capriciously.
Absolutely, but to apply this to God, you would have to believe that he is acting for reasons that He cannot understand, not that we cannot understand.
In reality Calvinists are more likely just not to enter the discussion, unless they are overly simplistic or hyper - which of course quite a few are.
When I was a Calvinist I believed as much as anyone that God wanted all to be saved, and that "he accomplished all things according to the counsel of his will". This results in a flat-out contradiction, and the whole subject was well covered in Jim Packer's once v. popular book on the subject, in which he admitted this was more than a paradox, it was just contradictory.
But why are theologians the only ones not allowed to live with contradiction? Physicists will try to explain things, but basically, their belief is their equations, and when these lead to an impasse, as they often to, they just say that this is because an explanation is simply not possible. So to take maybe an old-fashioned example, light is a wave and light is particles and we cannot bridge that contradiction. At present.
The Calvinists equivalent to the physicists equations are Bible passages. Hopefully not isolated texts. And it will lead to contradiction, but you don't solve that by denying one set of texts.
Now I'm not denying that some Calvinist's do a fair bit of scriptural shoe horning. But the best don't.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
There is no contradiction.
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
Finally checked with the Calvin scholar, the problem for Calvin would have been Limited Atonement. So he would have TUIP at best.
Calvin's position was Christ died for all people but it only availed for the elect. So basically the same position as Aquinas.
Jengie
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Finally checked with the Calvin scholar, the problem for Calvin would have been Limited Atonement. So he would have TUIP at best.
Calvin's position was Christ died for all people but it only availed for the elect. So basically the same position as Aquinas.
hey, I said that back on the first page.
Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
To suggest that omni{scient-pathic,potent,present} God magically knows that the indeterminate is determined is irrational. Meaningless.
The problem here is likely that you have a wrong conception of God. Namely, that He is some kind of agent in the world, a popular idea among believers and unbelievers alike. Basically, one takes a human, strips away the body, increases all cognitive abilities to infinity, removes all weaknesses like sinful impulses, boosts His powers, etc. and that is then "god". This is however not what classical Christianity considered as its God. It's more akin to a Platonist demiurge. And in fact, the incarnation of such a "human written large" into an actual human being, Christ, is not particularly remarkable. That's like Neo entering the Matrix, an interesting fairy tale. The Incarnation of the actual God of classical Christianity is however near incomprehensible, it's like seeing a category error in the flesh.
Next time you watch TV, consider the different levels of causality and understanding involved. The people in the TV show certainly cause and understand within their story, but it is different from how you cause and understand this event. And again, that is different from how the playwright and the TV engineer cause and understand the action in that show. It is difficult to capture God in human analogy, but it is not so difficult to see that there can be a lot more depth to the question of determination than the statement "I do not know what will happen next." If someone in the TV show says that, it may well be perfectly true in the context of the show but not binding on you, the playwright or the TV engineer.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Nice rhetoric Ingo.
So there HAS to be a better Platonic electron, with absolutely, fundamentally determined spin somewhere else in God's head, shone around with lux Delux so that the mere shadows that we're made of can be indeterminate?
(What do you call a figure of speech in Greek that takes away, reduces, obfuscates meaning?)
Strangely YOU are projecting - whilst standing on 1600 year old Christian shoulders - caging God in a Bender clock writ infinite to accommodate the eternal Futurama of fixed nows.
I'm just being parsimoniously orthodox in reason and faith. Liberating God from even passively having to know who's damned and who isn't for the endless increase of His government.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Dafyd, EmmTee, keep up the good work, exposing the meaningless non-sense of God's ineffable sovereign arbitrariness.
I've asked you before to not call me anything other than my name, or the initials MT. I meant it.
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
Host Hat On
Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard
I issued a mild correction for playing with the names of others on another thread here.
I note that you apologised to mousethief in Hell just a few days ago for messing around with his name. And have now done it again in this thread.
This is a formal warning. Mess around with the name of any Shipmate in a future post and you'll get reported to Admin for ignoring a Host ruling on posting standards in Purgatory.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
Host Hat Off
[Edited to clarify final paragraph]
[ 25. October 2010, 06:55: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by anteater:
quote:
You can, of course, believe that it is not capricious but good, for reasons that we don't presently know:
Which is exactly what Calvinists do believe, but it seems that you can't.
quote:
but how do you even start trying to apply that to your own attempts to love?
This could only happen when the one you love is not your equal in terms of understanding, or because of some special circumstance. Is that so hard to believe of God? Is it not imaginable that an action can be done out of love, for the best possible reasons, but that those reasons cannot be explained?
I'm afraid that you've misunderstood my point. I've done the "Why I am not a Calvinist" thing a few times on the Ship, but that's not at all what I'm saying here. This is not argument that Calvinism is untrue or that Calvinists are inconsistent - it is directed solely at one point made by Sharkshooter.
Sharkshooter's contention (my summary): God is love. The Bible is true. If the Bible (correctly understood) says that God is like X, then that should inform our view on what we think is loving.
My contention: That doesn't work for what is distinctive about Calvinism, because as you (anteater) say, Calvinists believe that God acts in ways which are good and loving but (to us) incomprehensible. It DOES work if you're a Calvinist and all you need to do is accept and trust. I'm fine with that. But if you really want to adjust your view of love and COPY God, and you're a Calvinist, you can't. You can't copy what is incomprehensible and beyond our capacity to understand. If you tried, you would be making capricious decisions about who and how to love, because even if we trust that God has reasons which would make his decisions not capricious, that information is not available at our security clearance.
You COULD come to the Bible, read (if such is your interpretation) about a Universalist God and resolve to adjust your view of love to imitate him in what is distinctive about Universalism ("I see now that I must love everyone and never ever punish or condemn"*). You could do the same if you read the Bible and found an Arminian God ("I see now that I must respect other people's autonomy and never force or coerce them, even if their choices hurt them"). We can see what the principles at work there are, and make them more prominent in how we judge what is loving. I don't see how you could do that for what is distinctive about Calvinism: a Calvinist has to love within exactly the same parameters of ethical principle as everyone else.
I am arguing that Sharkshooter's "change your view of love" has no general application. All it can mean, for a Calvinist, is "Trust that God is loving even if what you know of God seems to conflict with what you know of love". Which is not an argument that Calvinism is untrue, merely an argument that it is not useful for one specific purpose.
(*something very like which is actually in the Bible, of course)
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
...I am arguing that Sharkshooter's "change your view of love" has no general application. All it can mean, for a Calvinist, is "Trust that God is loving even if what you know of God seems to conflict with what you know of love". Which is not an argument that Calvinism is untrue, merely an argument that it is not useful for one specific purpose.
...
If God is Love, then we should try to love as God loves, for that is true love. How do we know how God loves? It is revealed in the Bible, both Old and New Testament.
And, yes, if the way I love is not the way God has shown love, it is me that needs to change, not God, for I should love as God loves.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Sorry! Wilco. Thought I had. Full name or literal initials only. Anyone can call me what they like.
Momma Poppa right Charlie etc
Posted by Cottontail (# 12234) on
:
Can I offer the participants here a sincere and heartfelt apology for suddenly disengaging from this thread, especially after urging Martin to engage. I am very very sorry - Real Life became suddenly very urgent, and took all my attention for a while. I will read through the rest of the thread, and hopefully get back to anyone who has addressed me directly. Thanks all for your patience.
And Martin - your PM box is full!
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Cleared for you Cottontail.
Looking forward to the public and private.
Martin
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
quote:
I am arguing that Sharkshooter's "change your view of love" has no general application.
OK So I get what your getting at and agree.
I'm tempted to say more, since there are interesting points at issue, but I suspect it would become an exercise in BS. We spend so much time arguing the incomprehensible, that you would have thought we'd have seen the joke by now.
So I'll obey the Wittgenstinian injunction and STF up.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
If God is Love, then we should try to love as God loves, for that is true love. How do we know how God loves? It is revealed in the Bible, both Old and New Testament.
And, yes, if the way I love is not the way God has shown love, it is me that needs to change, not God, for I should love as God loves.
But what in concrete terms does this mean if you think calvinists are right about what is revealed in the Bible? Eliab has spelt out what it means if you think it's universalist. He's spelt out what it means if you think it's arminian.
But what could it possibly mean to say we should love as God loves if you're a calvinist?
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
I don't have the time nor the patience to do it justice, but...
Love is shown through grace. Grace is giving/receiving even when not deserved. So, God is showing love to us when he spares us from the proper result of sin. That is, "... the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Grace offered is worthless unless accepted, like any gift.
That is love.
To expect us to accept the gift is not unreasonable. However, as sinners, many choose not to accept. It is those who will not be saved.
Being sovereign, God understands that many will not choose to accept the gift of life, and in so knowing, has predestined them to eternal damnation.
It is clear to me that I have no special understanding of who has been so predestined, either to eternal life or death (other than myself, you understand!) By their fruits we will know the hearts of men, whereas God know the hearts directly. The fruits can be deceiving, but the realit of the heart will eventually be revealed.
So there you go. With that, having explained how I understand things, I will take my leave. I do not expect to change anyone's opinion. Nor do I think it is important to do so. In the end, God is God. We each see Him through a different set of glasses, each one colored by our own experiences and understandings, and await the next life to see Him in His fullness.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
But what could it possibly mean to say we should love as God loves if you're a calvinist?
Your love should be covenantal. Like in marriage. Covenantal love must be exclusive, that is the point. It doesn't mean that you do not love others but it does mean that there is a commitment to the one you have covenanted to love.
Of course the analogy breaks down when you move from a husband and wife to God and lots of people, but I think that is where a Calvinist would start.
Actually it is the universalist and arminian who need to explain how it works out in practice. For them loving like God is just motherhood and apple pie. When I, as a human being, say "I love everyone" in reality it is meaningless. But when I say "I love my wife" I mean that I express my love in someway by preferential treatment of her over others.
The amazing thing with God though is that this covenantal love is not shown to me (or anyone) because I am beautiful, or lovable in anyway. So if I'm going to love like God then I have to live up to that example of love - covenantal love towards the unlovable.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
So God can't love everyone because that's not covenental? Hence the need to create vessels of wrath?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
It's all right Mousethief: '...covenantal love towards the unlovable.' means EVERY ONE.
Although the word 'covenantal' is of course redundant and more is always less.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
So God can't love everyone because that's not covenental? Hence the need to create vessels of wrath?
That is why I said that the analogy breaks down when you move to God --> lots of people.
However, Eliab has asked the question and I've offered the start of an answer.
IF we are talking about notions of love that apply to everyday human life then my question (putting it the other way round, as it were) still stands - what does it mean to say "I love everybody"? I think I could say that with some measure of sincerity but, in practice, it means nothing to anyone living in Greenland. For any mortal, love means choosing to act towards someone, but therefore not towards everyone else.
Now, at this point one might want to say something like "but it's different with God, he can love everybody in an active manner, 'cos he's God." If so, then it seems Eliab is wanting to have his cake and eat it - analogies will always break down when we move from the divine to humanity. This applies to universalism as much as to calvinism.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
So God can't love everyone because that's not covenental? Hence the need to create vessels of wrath?
That is why I said that the analogy breaks down when you move to God --> lots of people.
However, Eliab has asked the question and I've offered the start of an answer.
IF we are talking about notions of love that apply to everyday human life then my question (putting it the other way round, as it were) still stands - what does it mean to say "I love everybody"? I think I could say that with some measure of sincerity but, in practice, it means nothing to anyone living in Greenland. For any mortal, love means choosing to act towards someone, but therefore not towards everyone else.
Now, at this point one might want to say something like "but it's different with God, he can love everybody in an active manner, 'cos he's God." If so, then it seems Eliab is wanting to have his cake and eat it - analogies will always break down when we move from the divine to humanity. This applies to universalism as much as to calvinism.
Then what has been said above is true -- you can't learn about human love from God's love.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
But what could it possibly mean to say we should love as God loves if you're a calvinist?
Your love should be covenantal. Like in marriage. Covenantal love must be exclusive, that is the point. It doesn't mean that you do not love others but it does mean that there is a commitment to the one you have covenanted to love.
That's not what 'exclusive' means. Exclusive does mean that you don't love others.
Also, I don't know about you, but I don't find my wife unloveable. You can say that what we learn from God's love is that we should love the unloveable, or you say that it has to be exclusive and covenantal on the model of marriage. But you can't say both at the same time.
Also: it's not news to arminians and universalists that we can't love all humans indifferently. It's part of our condition as created beings. We learn to imitate God within our condition, not outside it. You, however, want to treat that not as part of our condition but as an instruction (as if we were somehow tempted to try to love everyone equally).
Also: you have heard it said "you shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy". But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. (Matt 5:43-45)
The idea that our love (agape) is supposed to be exclusive and covenantal doesn't appear there. Not at all.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Then what has been said above is true -- you can't learn about human love from God's love.
Possibly. In which case that would apply to both sides of the discussion.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
That's not what 'exclusive' means. Exclusive does mean that you don't love others.
Fine, let's use a different word then.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Also, I don't know about you, but I don't find my wife unloveable. You can say that what we learn from God's love is that we should love the unloveable, or you say that it has to be exclusive and covenantal on the model of marriage. But you can't say both at the same time.
Yes you can. I may be initially attracted to my wife because I find her lovable, but once the covenant is entered into I am called to love her equally when I find her lovable and when I don't.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Also: it's not news to arminians and universalists that we can't love all humans indifferently. It's part of our condition as created beings. We learn to imitate God within our condition, not outside it. You, however, want to treat that not as part of our condition but as an instruction (as if we were somehow tempted to try to love everyone equally).
So I was right earlier - you do want to have your cake and eat it. Apparently arminians are allowed to factor in the difference that our created state makes but not calvinists.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Also: you have heard it said "you shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy". But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. (Matt 5:43-45)
The idea that our love (agape) is supposed to be exclusive and covenantal doesn't appear there. Not at all.
Quite right. The bible talks about God's love in all sorts of different ways. Something like Don Carson's The difficult doctrine of God's love might be a good place to start. So either we try to reduce all depictions of God's love in the bible down into meaningless vanilla or we try to remain faithful to all the nuances.
As I said initially the idea of covenant would be a start to how a calvinist might answer's Eliab's initial question. I never said it would be the full story.
[ 02. November 2010, 02:01: Message edited by: Johnny S ]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Apparently arminians are allowed to factor in the difference that our created state makes but not calvinists.
Or is it that their theology precludes it, whereas Arminian theology does not?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Apparently arminians are allowed to factor in the difference that our created state makes but not calvinists.
Or is it that their theology precludes it, whereas Arminian theology does not?
Doesn't that explain why this thread keeps coming to a premature stop?
It does feel as if this has become one of those threads where one group are told what they really believe so that another group can bash them over the head with a stick.
And this coming from someone who isn't even a proper calvinist - I don't accept Limited Atonement for a start - there is too much sauce for both goose and gander.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Your love should be covenantal. Like in marriage. Covenantal love must be exclusive, that is the point. It doesn't mean that you do not love others but it does mean that there is a commitment to the one you have covenanted to love.
It seems to me that you are drawing on that part of Calvinism which is common to most Christians. Unless I've misunderstood you. We all have the Hebrew scriptures in our Bibles, and it would be hard to read those and not notice at least a vaguely covenanty theme.
quote:
Actually it is the universalist and arminian who need to explain how it works out in practice. For them loving like God is just motherhood and apple pie.
Now I'm certain I've misunderstood you. What apple pie has to do with the price of fish, I have no idea. Motherhood, though, is a pretty good picture of the sort of deeply personal and deeply unconditional love that I would have thought that God shows in his covenants, so I am baffled as to the implied contrast.
I think you are saying that to a universalist and arminian love means something wishy-washy, abstract, and sentimental. But it doesn't. I don't know where you get that from at all.
quote:
When I, as a human being, say "I love everyone" in reality it is meaningless.
That's only because we don't actually love everyone. We can see what it might mean for God to love everyone, and we can start to copy that. We can start by trying to love everyone with whom we come into contact. We can try to be considerate and caring to people whom we would be inclined to despise or ignore. There's nothing wishy-washy about that.
quote:
So if I'm going to love like God then I have to live up to that example of love - covenantal love towards the unlovable.
Again, that's something that most any universalist and arminian could agree with (if it means what I think it does).
I'm not at all sure whether you're saying that the Calvinist should try to copy that sort of love towards "everyone" (ie. everyone he comes into contact with and so could potentially love in a practical and non-abstract way) or only an exclusive subset of that group. If he tries to love "everyone" then he clearly isn't, even in his limited scope, seeking to copy what is distinctive about Calvinism. If he has to love only some of that "everyone", then he's aping God, not copying him, because he has no idea at all how God elects those with whom he has this covenant relationship, and cannot even begin to imitate that.
I do accept that there is much more to a Calvinist's faith than the points on which Calvinism is distinctive. There's a vast amount about God's grace and faithfulness which is common to Christendom and even that Calvinists especially emphasise, and this certainly inspires a great deal of very real and costly Christian love. However it is precisely those distinctive Calvinist teachings that challenge our view of love (because they are inscrutable even to Calvinists, and appear to other Christians to be contrary to anything that might be loving at all) that don't translate. We couldn't love in a way that reflects that even if we tried. When Calvinism says "Jesus did not die for these people - God has not chosen to save them - they will suffer for ever and have not been given the grace to have had any chance of escape - they were made for destruction"* it seems unloving to me. I can get a theology which believes that and says "nonetheless trust that God has his good reasons". I can't get a theology which believes it and says "change your view of love so that this seems a good thing to you". How could I even begin to do that?
(*If you call yourself a Calvinist and would repudiate that belief as strongly as I would, then you aren't one of the Calvinists I'm arguing with.)
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
...
It does feel as if this has become one of those threads where one group are told what they really believe so that another group can bash them over the head with a stick.
...
It always does:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
When Calvinism says "Jesus did not die for these people - God has not chosen to save them - they will suffer for ever and have not been given the grace to have had any chance of escape - they were made for destruction"* it seems unloving to me.
...
(*If you call yourself a Calvinist and would repudiate that belief as strongly as I would, then you aren't one of the Calvinists I'm arguing with.)
See, here Eliab is doing just that.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
See, here Eliab is doing just that.
The whole point of my note was to acknowledge that there are Christians who see themselves as Calvinist (and I'm certainly not saying that they shouldn't) who would not assent to that quoted summary or wouldn't express it in that way. I am not telling anyone what they "really believe". The note is there to make that exact point.
![[brick wall]](graemlins/brick_wall.gif)
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by sharkshooter:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
When Calvinism says "Jesus did not die for these people - God has not chosen to save them - they will suffer for ever and have not been given the grace to have had any chance of escape - they were made for destruction"* it seems unloving to me.
See, here Eliab is doing just that.
Which part of Eliab's summary do you disagree with?
It seems to me that one can't disagree with Eliab's summary without also disagreeing with at least one of the points of TULIP.
(If you're arguing that God knows who wouldn't choose to accept the grace given to them and therefore predestines those people to damnation, that disagrees with the I. If someone can not accept the gift of grace, then grace is not irresistible.)
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on
:
Well Calvin would disagree with the statement
"Jesus did not die for these people"
So you could well be a Calvinist and disagree with that.
Jengie
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
That's not what 'exclusive' means. Exclusive does mean that you don't love others.
Fine, let's use a different word then.
As Eliab says, we're supposed to be discussing what is distinctive about Calvinism (read TULIP).
If you're not saying 'loving some people means not loving others' what about what you're saying isn't the common property of all Christians?
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Also, I don't know about you, but I don't find my wife unloveable. You can say that what we learn from God's love is that we should love the unloveable, or you say that it has to be exclusive and covenantal on the model of marriage. But you can't say both at the same time.
Yes you can. I may be initially attracted to my wife because I find her lovable, but once the covenant is entered into I am called to love her equally when I find her lovable and when I don't.
There's something of a problem in saying that you find someone unloveable
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Also: it's not news to arminians and universalists that we can't love all humans indifferently. It's part of our condition as created beings. We learn to imitate God within our condition, not outside it. You, however, want to treat that not as part of our condition but as an instruction (as if we were somehow tempted to try to love everyone equally).
So I was right earlier - you do want to have your cake and eat it. Apparently arminians are allowed to factor in the difference that our created state makes but not calvinists.
So all that you've been saying about love being covenantal and "exclusive" derives from the difference that our created state makes? So it doesn't derive from the way in which God loves? We're not learning anything from how God loves?
You've missed the point of my last sentence.
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
(Matt 5:43-45)
The idea that our love (agape) is supposed to be exclusive and covenantal doesn't appear there. Not at all.
Quite right. The bible talks about God's love in all sorts of different ways. Something like Don Carson's The difficult doctrine of God's love might be a good place to start. So either we try to reduce all depictions of God's love in the bible down into meaningless vanilla or we try to remain faithful to all the nuances.
There's remaining faithful to all the nuances, and then there's tying yourself up into knots by creating false difficulties. This isn't just a matter of complementary nuances - this is Jesus directly telling us to imitate God in a way quite contrary to the way in which you're saying imitating God leads us.
(By the way, natural vanilla flavouring is one of the most expensive substances on earth by weight.)
[code]
[ 04. November 2010, 01:13: Message edited by: John Holding ]
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
It seems to me that you are drawing on that part of Calvinism which is common to most Christians. Unless I've misunderstood you. We all have the Hebrew scriptures in our Bibles, and it would be hard to read those and not notice at least a vaguely covenanty theme.
True - but my argument is that our understanding of covenant in western culture has been heavily influenced by Augustinian Christianity. For example, since marriage is a ubiquitous metaphor for the divine covenant in the scriptures, we tend to retain residual 'calvinistic'* overtones to our understanding of marriage. Sure, society is frequently reacting against that definition but it is still fairly common currency.
Hence, I think you need to demonstrate that there is such a concept as covenant that is totally devoid of any calvinistic nuance. Most of us are highly inconsistent in our views (I quite probably am) it is quite easy for armininians to simply unconsciously appropriate elements of calvinism and vioce-versa if they like them.
* calvinistic is in quotes here to refer to a more general reformed augustinian tradition within church history rather than specifically TULIP and 16th century councils.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
I think you are saying that to a universalist and arminian love means something wishy-washy, abstract, and sentimental. But it doesn't. I don't know where you get that from at all.
quote:
When I, as a human being, say "I love everyone" in reality it is meaningless.
That's only because we don't actually love everyone. We can see what it might mean for God to love everyone, and we can start to copy that. We can start by trying to love everyone with whom we come into contact. We can try to be considerate and caring to people whom we would be inclined to despise or ignore. There's nothing wishy-washy about that.
Yes, you have misunderstood me. I'm not saying that arminianism must be wishy-washy. I'm merely trying to reflect back the way you are handling calvinism and trying to show what it might look like if the same argument was applied in reverse.
Here you are using the word love is many different ways. I'm not saying that it is wishy-washy but I would argue that it is meaningless. The devil is in the detail - given my finite human state and lack of resources how do I show love to everyone I come into contact with?
Obviously a loving act towards everyone will look very different depending on who it is and my relationship to them. Most of us, whether consciously or not, prioritise our relationships. And then we act accordingly. So, for example, I give away food to homeless people who live in my area when they come calling but I would make sure that I have enough food for my family first. To choose a more controversial example I love my wife and children equally but I prioritise my relationship with my wife over them as an expression of covenant faithfulness. Or put it this way, I love my children by loving my wife - especially when they were younger and needed the assurance of my love they could see that I would always love them because I am faithful to their mother. Loving my wife is loving them.
I've probably expressed this rather clumsily but I would argue that the principle I'm trying to get at comes from the calvinistic concept of covenant faithfulness.
I'm happy to expand on this if you are interested but I think this is one of the central points of Malachi. "I have loved Jacob, Esau I have hated" is about covenant faithfulness. In the same way that Jesus does not literally want us to hate our family I think here it is about priorities, about putting someone first. Then in chapter 2 Malachi makes the link between the breakdown of the covenant and the breakdown of marriage.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Now the danger of this approach is that it can be an excuse for tribalism (as indeed happened with Israel) - so I put my family or my church first and ignore everyone else. I don't think this is the fault of calvinism though. If I put God first in my life then I know that he calls me to show practical compassion to my neighbour. Likewise if I put my family first I know that it is loving them to welcome strangers and outcasts into our midst.
When Calvinism says "Jesus did not die for these people - God has not chosen to save them - they will suffer for ever and have not been given the grace to have had any chance of escape - they were made for destruction"* it seems unloving to me. I can get a theology which believes that and says "nonetheless trust that God has his good reasons". I can't get a theology which believes it and says "change your view of love so that this seems a good thing to you". How could I even begin to do that?
(*If you call yourself a Calvinist and would repudiate that belief as strongly as I would, then you aren't one of the Calvinists I'm arguing with.)
I get that you are not particularly arguing with me because I do not hold to Limited Atonement. However, on a thread entitled 'Was John Calvin a Calvinist?" (where JJ has just answered "No!") it does seem as if you are trying to marginalise calvinism.
Put me straight if I'm misunderstood you but your argument looks to me like this:
1. Calvinism has a rigid definition of TULIP.
2. People who don't agree fully with TULIP cannot really be calvinists.
3. The large sub-set of 'calvinists' who don't accept TULIP fully share so much in common with arminians we might as well just call everyone arminians.
4. Yeah, the wicked witch of Geneva is dead!
5. The old debate is over, arminianism has won.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
As Eliab says, we're supposed to be discussing what is distinctive about Calvinism (read TULIP).
If you're not saying 'loving some people means not loving others' what about what you're saying isn't the common property of all Christians?
If everyone who is not a calvinist has to sign up to all Five Articles of Remonstrance (without any quibbling) then you have a point. Otherwise, you don't.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
something of a problem in saying that you find someone unloveable
What is the problem? (BTW I said when (i.e. on the occasions) I find her unlovable.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
So all that you've been saying about love being covenantal and "exclusive" derives from the difference that our created state makes? So it doesn't derive from the way in which God loves? We're not learning anything from how God loves?
No, I am saying we learn from how God loves, but I am also saying that we cannot copy him exactly since he is God.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
There's remaining faithful to all the nuances, and then there's tying yourself up into knots by creating false difficulties. This isn't just a matter of complementary nuances - this is Jesus directly telling us to imitate God in a way quite contrary to the way in which you're saying imitating God leads us.
Come on Dafyd that is crass proof-texting of the worst order. Jesus also told us to 'hate our father and mother". Sun and rain are completely impersonal - and yet you admit that love is not supposed to be indifferent. Indifference is surely the logical conclusion from Matthew 5?
Oh, just perhaps, it is slightly more complicated than that.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
I've probably expressed this rather clumsily but I would argue that the principle I'm trying to get at comes from the calvinistic concept of covenant faithfulness.
Actually, I think you expressed it very well. I'm happy to concede that covenant faithfulness is important in Calvinist thought, and might well influence (to the good) how a Calvinist defines ‘love'.
However covenant faithfulness is not exactly a challenge to ideas about love in the way that hardline-TULIP theology often is. This line of discussion started with Sharkshooter answering the objection to Calvinism "but that's not loving" by (as I understood it) saying that if you find TULIP principles in the Bible as a description of God, then it must be, and our definition of love needs to change. My point is that it can't, not in any practical sense, because TULIP can only be loving if there is stuff going on that we just don't understand and can't copy.
quote:
Put me straight if I'm misunderstood you but your argument looks to me like this:
1. Calvinism has a rigid definition of TULIP.
2. People who don't agree fully with TULIP cannot really be calvinists.
3. The large sub-set of 'calvinists' who don't accept TULIP fully share so much in common with arminians we might as well just call everyone arminians.
4. Yeah, the wicked witch of Geneva is dead!
5. The old debate is over, arminianism has won.
1. Yes. Also (contra Jengie Jon) I think TULIP can be argued compellingly from the exegetical principles used by Calvin in the Institutes, that it is not at all a departure from his theology, and if TULIP believers are included in what we mean when we say "Calvinist", then Calvin himself must be too.
2. No. Calvin's clearly bigger than that. Also, it's not as if Calvin claimed to be writing Scripture. I think that if one is a member of a church in the Calvinist reformed tradition, and/or draws significantly on that body of theology for inspiration and guidance, one has every right to call oneself a Calvinist whether one believes every word of a particular formulation, or not.
3. Ish. I actually have no idea what Arminius believed. "Arminian" is (AFAICS) almost exclusively used to mean "A-Christian-who-is-not-a-Calvinist-particularly-not-in-the-TULIP-sense". And as it's a useful word for that purpose, I propose to employ it thus. So, yes, there are lots of Calvinists differing very little from Arminians.
4. No. There's more to the Reformed tradition than that. I'd happily see TULIP dead and buried, but I could not possibly wish that the whole Calvinist enterprise of engaging with the Bible and proclaiming the grace of God should cease.
5. I wish. However previous discussions I've had on the Ship about Calvinism persuade me that the "rigid definition of TULIP" is alive and well, and that there are even people prepared to say that if you believe that there is any human element whatever in accepting salvation, then you are trusting in your own works and thus not saved. Although it's fair to say that the Ship's intelligent and thoughtful Calvinists seem to adopt a distinctly Jebusite defensive strategy when we've had that sort of discussion, and leave it to the morally blind and lame to hold the walls.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
So who's damned and who's saved ?
What proportion of the one hundred billion of us ?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
However covenant faithfulness is not exactly a challenge to ideas about love in the way that hardline-TULIP theology often is.
But I think it is.
God chose to bless the whole world by entering into a covenant firstly with one man (Abraham) and then with one nation (Israel).
Love means choosing someone over someone else. In our experience we know that already - those we love want 'special time' with us (to the exclusion of others); when the homeless ask for food they asking that we feed them and not someone else (even if they are not aware of that); when talking to someone we feel especially valued when they are not distracted but make us feel as if we have their full attention. And so on ...
It is not loving to listen to everyone equally at the same time. It is loving to give full attention to each person we meet, but that will mean giving more to some than to others.
I'm arguing that love means choosing X over Y and that we get that notion from the strand of church tradition in which calvinism stands. Also I'm arguing that acting like this is actually loving towards the whole world.
What I'm saying may sound obvious and you will think that it is shared by all Christians but my point is that we owe the calvinist stream for this insight. (Whether we are calvinists or not.)
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
This line of discussion started with Sharkshooter answering the objection to Calvinism "but that's not loving" by (as I understood it) saying that if you find TULIP principles in the Bible as a description of God, then it must be, and our definition of love needs to change. My point is that it can't, not in any practical sense, because TULIP can only be loving if there is stuff going on that we just don't understand and can't copy.
I know that you said that but I don't see how your criticism sticks. Ever since the beginning Christians have wrestled with what we emulate from God and what we can't (just because he's God). In all our theology we reach limits where this kind of question comes into play.
The most obvious example is the WWJD? bracelets. IMO they are simply an excuse for lazy thinking and simplistic answers. Integrity demands that they should renamed: What would I do if I were Jesus? Of course we should all try to copy Jesus - but does that mean turning water in to wine? What about dying for the sins of the world?
In practice all of us filter our desire to imitate Christ through our own hermeneutic. Calvinists and non-calvinists alike. I don't try to copy God's predestination, I do try to copy the principles about love that I learn from it though.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
1. Yes. Also (contra Jengie Jon) I think TULIP can be argued compellingly from the exegetical principles used by Calvin in the Institutes, that it is not at all a departure from his theology, and if TULIP believers are included in what we mean when we say "Calvinist", then Calvin himself must be too.
Guilty by association? Are you really putting that out as an argument?
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
3. Ish. I actually have no idea what Arminius believed. "Arminian" is (AFAICS) almost exclusively used to mean "A-Christian-who-is-not-a-Calvinist-particularly-not-in-the-TULIP-sense". And as it's a useful word for that purpose, I propose to employ it thus. So, yes, there are lots of Calvinists differing very little from Arminians.
Thanks for clarifying that - I thought you were saying this but wanted you to confirm it first.
I agree completely that most people use arminian in this way, but my point is that it is a rather disingenuous form of argument. By using an opposing term you make it sound as if you are criticizing one systematic theology and putting forward a better one. You aren't. You're just taking pot shots from a safe distance.
That is fair enough. Obviously I wouldn't be on the Ship if I thought theology was above criticism. I just don't think it is fair to compare apples with oranges. IMO any systematic theology is going to have weaknesses (since it is impossible to box in an infinite God) but it is one thing to point out said weak points but it is another all together to put up a better, more coherent, systematic theology of your own.
It is easy to take the same kind of pot shots at Dafyd's quote from Matthew 5. If we really tried to love everyone the way the sun and the rain does we would be impersonal and indifferent. Now, of course that is not what Jesus meant - because we need other definitions of love (like the notion of choosing from calvinism) to add nuance.
BTW You may be interested in some of the Five articles of Remonstrance (with which you are siding):
quote:
Article III — That man has not saving grace of himself, nor of the energy of his free-will, inasmuch as he, in the state of apostasy and sin, can of and by himself neither think, will, nor do anything that is truly good (such as having faith eminently is); but that it is needful that he be born again of God in Christ, through his Holy Spirit, and renewed in understanding, inclination, or will, and all his powers, in order that he may rightly understand, think, will, and effect what is truly good, according to the word of Christ, John xv. 5: "Without me ye can do nothing."
Article IV — That this grace of God is the beginning, continuance, and accomplishment of an good, even to this extent, that the regenerate man himself, without that prevenient or assisting; awakening, following, and co-operative grace, can neither think, will, nor do good, nor withstand any temptations to evil; so that all good deeds or movements that can be conceived must be ascribed to the grace of God in Christ. But, as respects the mode of the operation of this grace, it is not irresistible, inasmuch as it is written concerning many that they have resisted the Holy Ghost,—Acts vii, and elsewhere in many places.
There's a very good case for arguing that this is much more calvinistic than this large group of people you want to put a hoop over would be happy with. You might want to rethink the labels you reach for.
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
5. I wish. However previous discussions I've had on the Ship about Calvinism persuade me that the "rigid definition of TULIP" is alive and well, and that there are even people prepared to say that if you believe that there is any human element whatever in accepting salvation, then you are trusting in your own works and thus not saved.
Too true.
Are all Muslims terrorists? Are peaceable Muslims just inconsistent in their faith?
quote:
Originally posted by Eliab:
Although it's fair to say that the Ship's intelligent and thoughtful Calvinists seem to adopt a distinctly Jebusite defensive strategy when we've had that sort of discussion, and leave it to the morally blind and lame to hold the walls.
I'm really sorry that I wasn't there when Samuel anointed you with oil - it must have been quite a spectacle. Do you really think that you have what it takes to unite all Israel?
Thanks for making me think about this more.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So who's damned and who's saved ?
What proportion of the one hundred billion of us ?
God knows.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Love means choosing someone over someone else.
I'm sorry - I don't see this. It's not of the definition of love that love doesn't mean that you do not love others.
[ 03. November 2010, 23:27: Message edited by: Dafyd ]
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
<cough>
Ahem.
Drum roll please.
... and the winner of the 2010 triple negative is ...
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Love means choosing someone over someone else.
I'm sorry - I don't see this. It's not of the definition of love that love doesn't mean that you do not love others.
I think that you are taking the apophatic tradition a little too far here Dafyd.
I have always agreed that we are called to love everyone. What calvinism brings to the party is that it is actually loving to everyone to choose to show love to some over others, at different times.
So, for example, when I choose to go out for a night with my wife I am choosing her over my children but I still think I am showing love to them as I do so. Loving my wife is loving my children.
What calvinism brings to the definition of love is that frequently my actions may be perceived as unloving at the moment of action - e.g. when I refuse to give cash to a guy who I know really wants it for grog or when I invest time training a community worker because I know that, although I'm not spending that time directly with people who need care, the worker will be able to spend more time (in the long-run) than I can.
All of this, I would argue, flows from the doctrine of election.
IMO the general statement 'we are called to love everybody' quickly turns into 'I will love those I find easy and convenient to love.' However, Election carries with it the sense that I am committed to love people regardless of whether I find it easy or convenient. Which is why any definition of love that completely jettisons any sense of election is so much poorer as a result.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
So, for example, when I choose to go out for a night with my wife I am choosing her over my children but I still think I am showing love to them as I do so. Loving my wife is loving my children.
I think this is a serious misuse of the concept of "choosing over" -- you are in essence equivocating on that term and trying to import implications of one meaning into the other.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
So, for example, when I choose to go out for a night with my wife I am choosing her over my children but I still think I am showing love to them as I do so. Loving my wife is loving my children.
I think this is a serious misuse of the concept of "choosing over" -- you are in essence equivocating on that term and trying to import implications of one meaning into the other.
I'm surprised that you cannot see the irony of this comment MT.
Eliab and Dafyd have argued that our definition of love does not need calvinism. My point all along has been that such a position is only possible by equivocating and importing implications from elsewhere.
Instead I'm conceding that all of us do that - but that we need to import all the various scriptural nuances to love into our definition,a nd be upfront about so doing.
For example, I'm trying to be fair to the OT concept that God is 'jealous' - indeed, in Exodus 34: 14 he says that his very name is 'jealous'. (I'm sure you know that in Hebrew someone's name is much more than just a label it conveys part of their very presence.)
We all know petty human jealousy and how selfish and controlling it can be. And yet, there is a sense in which true love must be jealous - it would not be a good reflection on my love for my wife if I was not jealous if she was spending more time with another man than me. It would reveal that my love for her is very shallow.
In 2 Corinthians 11: 2 the Apostle Paul says that he is trying to imitate this 'godly jealousy' and he uses the same word that the LXX uses in Exodus 34. Clearly Paul was able to make the step from 'God loves me with a jealous love' to 'I must love others with a jealous love'.
Of course I'm not justifying all jealousy (the NT itself reflects this tension) but any Christian definition of love must surely incorporate something of this concept of jealousy.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
What it sounds like is that you find some word in the Scriptures that is taken to describe God, and you cast around looking for something in our peer-to-peer human life that you can possibly glom it onto.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
What it sounds like is that you find some word in the Scriptures that is taken to describe God, and you cast around looking for something in our peer-to-peer human life that you can possibly glom it onto.
Unless you are also saying that Paul is doing this as well then it is a pretty weak response.
If that is all I'm doing then it should be very easy to demonstrate from scripture, tradition and society.
(Qanah is hardly 'some word' - it is everywhere in the OT. And, as I said, it is something that Paul tries to emulate.)
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
Hmm. Immediately before he says he's jealous for the Corinthians, Paul says "I hope you'll put up with me in a little foolishness."
How seriously do we take the very next verse? He goes on to talk about preparing the church for Christ, and nothing beyond that first sentence is the least bit foolish. Except for the idea that a man can have a godly jealousy? How do you read 1 Cor 11:1?
Does "weak" answer mean "one that contradicts me"?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Does He now Johnny ?
And He loves conditionally ?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Hmm. Immediately before he says he's jealous for the Corinthians, Paul says "I hope you'll put up with me in a little foolishness."
How seriously do we take the very next verse? He goes on to talk about preparing the church for Christ, and nothing beyond that first sentence is the least bit foolish. Except for the idea that a man can have a godly jealousy?
He spells it out in black and white what he is referring to as foolishness in verse 17 - 'self-confident boasting'.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
How do you read 1 Cor 11:1?
I read it the same way you do. And unless you've suddenly become arian in your view of the trinity you'd likewise say that the Father and the Son have the same character and same substance.
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Does "weak" answer mean "one that contradicts me"?
It could do, but in the case it doesn't. Here it just means weak.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Does He now Johnny ?
Does he what? (Or were you just channeling Are you being served? or Frankie Howard?)
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Know who He's saved and who He's damned.
Missus.
Posted by sharkshooter (# 1589) on
:
If He doesn't, He is not God.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Why ?
How ?
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
I've been mostly reading this fascinating thread for Host reasons, but maybe I could say something at this point that I know I've said before on "atonement" threads.
I do not believe that God's love is conditional nor do I believe that He shows favouritism. In the Acts account, the shift of church emphasis from "a chosen people" to "a light to the Gentiles" centres around Peter's encounter with Cornelius, within which we have this "step 1" central revelation to Peter that God does not show favouritism.
quote:
Acts 10:34 Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism 35 but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right.
But I call it a step 1. Note that in Peter's eyes at that point, God's acceptance is conditional.
Now there is also a "step 2" - and this is an example of that step 2.
quote:
2 Corinthians 5: 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The direction of reconciliation is "us to God", not "God to us". We are the ones who are alienated.
Yet, studying the Institutes Book 3 Chapter 14 para 11, we find this summary.
quote:
Moreover, the message of free reconciliation with God is not promulgated for one or two days, but is declared to be perpetual in the Church (2 Cor. 5:18, 19). Hence believers have not even to the end of life any other righteousness than that which is there described. Christ ever remains a Mediator to reconcile the Father to us, and there is a perpetual efficacy in his death—viz. ablution, satisfaction, expiation; in short, perfect obedience, by which all our iniquities are covered. (My emboldening)
You will see that, in this place at least, Calvin has the direction of the reconciliation wrong. He says that Christ reconciles the Father to us, whereas the scripture he quotes urges us to be reconciled to the Father. Much follows from that (IMO) misunderstanding by Calvin, but perhaps the most obvious contrast is with the picture of God the Father in the parable of the Prodigal - the lost son. This Father of the lost son does not need to be reconciled to his son at all. His love is clearly unconditional. He loves His son, even though that son is lost. The son does not realise just how much until he returns.
I do not believe that God needs to be reconciled to us in order to love us. He loves us first. It may be that we also need to be reconciled to Him to appreciate the fullness of His love, but that is another matter.
[ 04. November 2010, 16:38: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Exactly oh 62nd Son of Encouragement.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
Hi B62. I thought you'd find this interesting.
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Moreover, the message of free reconciliation with God is not promulgated for one or two days, but is declared to be perpetual in the Church (2 Cor. 5:18, 19). Hence believers have not even to the end of life any other righteousness than that which is there described. Christ ever remains a Mediator to reconcile the Father to us, and there is a perpetual efficacy in his death—viz. ablution, satisfaction, expiation; in short, perfect obedience, by which all our iniquities are covered. (My emboldening)
I think you're right here - Calvin is wrong in the way he handles 2 Corinthians 5 at this point. (Although I'd argue that he should have gone to Ephesians - but that is another story!)
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I do not believe that God's love is conditional nor do I believe that He shows favouritism.
I feel like reformation history is being repeated here. Calvin was trying to put forward a view of God's lvoe that was truly unconditional - he argued that (what we would call arminianism) made God's love conditional.
You have made God's love dependent on the PS repenting. We must not divorce that third story from the other two Luke puts into Luke 15. Jesus seeks the lost coin and lost sheep - he doesn't just wait for them to come to him. That is truly unconditional love.
I love the parable of the PS but I do think it's popularity in western culture arises, in part, from how it perfectly matches our contemporary definition of love. If we are to say that the Father loved the son unconditionally when he was still far off then our definition of love will soon turn into sentimentalism. Divine love is active. Otherwise I'm excuse to sit on my butt all day and thinking nice thoughts about people but I don't have to do anything until they come to me.
<ummm> There. I just loved the whole population of India.
<Urrg.> Wow, that's Chine loved too.
My argument is that only a calvinistic view of love can really be unconditional. Please note that I'm agreeing with you that God loves everyone in the sense that the Father loved the PS when he was far away, but if we are to have a divine view of love we need this extra element too.
Now, Eliab is right to raise the question of the unknown - how can we copy decisions based on the mind of God? Well this is where I become all apophatic and say that we know from scripture that his love is not capricious, nor self-seeking and so we are called simply to love unconditionally by 'putting' on love on others. It is this commitment or covenant that I think Calvin brings to the discussion. Arminianism fits much better with our culture where I tihnk I'm loving people but actually I'm doing nice things at my convenience and preference.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
How ?
How did Jesus turn water into wine?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
<Urrg.> Wow, that's Chine loved too.
And look, I can love several billion people without even spelling their name correctly.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Er, so being in control of matter supernaturally equates to knowing all individual human fates before there was matter ?
How ?
Why ?
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I do not believe that God's love is conditional nor do I believe that He shows favouritism.
I feel like reformation history is being repeated here. Calvin was trying to put forward a view of God's lvoe that was truly unconditional - he argued that (what we would call arminianism) made God's love conditional.
Indeed he was, but he ended up with a condition anyway. And on the way, he seems to misunderstood the ministry of reconciliation, as we agree I think.
quote:
You have made God's love dependent on the PS repenting. We must not divorce that third story from the other two Luke puts into Luke 15. Jesus seeks the lost coin and lost sheep - he doesn't just wait for them to come to him. That is truly unconditional love.
You lose me at this point. God may choose to seek, by the convicting power of the Holy Spirit or the agency of the Church. Or He may choose to wait. His love is not dependent on His means.
quote:
I love the parable of the PS but I do think it's popularity in western culture arises, in part, from how it perfectly matches our contemporary definition of love. If we are to say that the Father loved the son unconditionally when he was still far off then our definition of love will soon turn into sentimentalism. Divine love is active. Otherwise I'm excuse to sit on my butt all day and thinking nice thoughts about people but I don't have to do anything until they come to me.
I think you are right about the dangers of confusing love and sentimentality. And of course Divine love is active. Even when waiting!
I think it is love of God and others which provides the cutting edge of all human outreach. But it had better be expressed unconditionally! Surely you have been in the situation when you know "in your knower" that you must wait for the penny to drop? I'm armed by the old saying that a man persuaded against his will is of the same opinion still. Time and circumstances can be very effective, often much more effective than human activity. Sometimes we follow Jesus in seeking to save that which is lost. Sometimes we follow Jesus in encouraging folks to seek for themselves. And sometimes it seems best to trust that the Spirit of God will work through time and circumstances. Or others of course. We may need to recognise that we're not the right person, not in the right place, and it's not the right time. Patience and kindness are fruits of love.
[ 05. November 2010, 00:01: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Er, so being in control of matter supernaturally equates to knowing all individual human fates before there was matter ?
No.
I was merely pointing out that there are plenty of areas where Christians are happy to trust that God can do something without knowing how he does it.
Oh yes, and I was trying to make that point without mentioning the word 'parsimony'.
Crap. You just made me do it. ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Indeed he was, but he ended up with a condition anyway.
In an attempt to remove the even more obvious conditions of arminianism, possibly.
If you are saying that it is turtles all the way down then I'm happy with that. However, If you are trying to say that arminianism promotes unconditional love while calvinism does not then that is clearly not true.
Both systems have turtles all the way. In my simplistic view it only comes down to whether the last turtle is God or mankind - me, I'd put a lot more confidence in God.
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
You lose me at this point. God may choose to seek, by the convicting power of the Holy Spirit or the agency of the Church. Or He may choose to wait. His love is not dependent on His means.
I think I lose you because you are stuck in a 16th century debate. Eliab has already explained how he is using the term arminian - in a kind of catch-all reaction against calvinism.
I concede that there are some hardline 5 pointers out there who might struggle with your point above but my 'tradition' would normally self-identify as 'reformed' and yet we'd totally agree with your statement here.
Bearing in mind we are not in Geneva and we are not in the 16th century, I'd say that an arminian theology is going to tend towards the agency of the church and a calvinistic theology is going to tend towards the power of the Holy Spirit. (Again I'm not using the terms historically but rather how they are being bandied around on this thread.)
Of course, as you say, we need both - but IME that is exactly what the vast majority of reformed Christians would say too. If you are fed up with arminians being tarred with the brush of pelagianism then back off doing the same in reverse to calvinists. (That wasn't a reference to 'you' B62 but rather to a general 'you'.)
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I think it is love of God and others which provides the cutting edge of all human outreach. But it had better be expressed unconditionally! Surely you have been in the situation when you know "in your knower" that you must wait for the penny to drop? I'm armed by the old saying that a man persuaded against his will is of the same opinion still. Time and circumstances can be very effective, often much more effective than human activity. Sometimes we follow Jesus in seeking to save that which is lost. Sometimes we follow Jesus in encouraging folks to seek for themselves. And sometimes it seems best to trust that the Spirit of God will work through time and circumstances. Or others of course. We may need to recognise that we're not the right person, not in the right place, and it's not the right time. Patience and kindness are fruits of love.
Exactly. You have expressed a calvinistic confidence in the sovereignty of God here. If I was fully arminian I could never sit back and trust that the Spirit might work in his perfect timing.
So, as you say, you have to be a calvinist to show this kind of unconditional love.
Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on
:
Now you know why I try to avoid labels. There is much more I could say, but you cannot bear it now! And anyway, I'm off on a grandchildren visit in a couple of hours. Must avoid the wrath of my wife and allow time for final preparations and car-loading. Certain issues of trust and sovereignty there!
I may get some online time, depending on whether there is a hotspot near enough in the cottage we've booked. Otherwise "I'll be baaaaaack" in about a week.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Arminianism fits much better with our culture where I tihnk I'm loving people but actually I'm doing nice things at my convenience and preference.
I'm sorry - you objected when we tried to define Calvinism. In the same way, you can't define Arminianism to include whatever negative traits you want to impose upon it.
Covenant theology is not unique to Calvinism. It's absolutely central to most forms of Judaism, for example, and the Jews are not by any reasonable definition Calvinists.
Let me try to restate my main objection to your argument by way of analogy.
God knows everything. In so far as I know, I imitate God. But I can't know everything. If I come to know one subject I can't be coming to know another subject at the same time. I can't learn French and learn Spanish at the same time. I can't study Chinese history and study organic chemistry at the same time.
So when I study Chinese history, I imitate God in coming to know in a manner appropriate to being a creature by not being able also to know chemistry.
I imitate God according to my powers as a creature.
Let's divide that up for logic's sake:
1) I imitate God;
2) according to my powers as a creature.
In so far as I know I am imitating God. In so far as knowing one thing precludes me from knowing something else I am a creature. As this pertains to me as a creature, in this respect I am not imitating God. God is not a creature.
So applying the same analogy to love.
I imitate God by loving everyone as I can.
1) loving everyone - imitating God;
2) as I can - being a creature.
Now my objection is that you are confusing 1) and 2). You're putting what belongs to us in our capacities as a creature into the imitating God element. Basically the implication of what you're saying is our created nature doesn't modify our ability to imitate God. The implication of your theology is God is just like a creature only bigger. On your interpretation of covenant theology - I don't call it Calvinism because it's not unique to Calvinism - God is just another creature like yourself.
And no, it's not true that Arminianism makes love conditional. Some varieties of Arminianism may say that the mode in which God expresses love is conditional, but that love is not. Compare child-rearing: Calvinists have not historically been noted for their permissive approach to child-rearing. Historically, Calvinists have not said that love of one's children requires one not to punish them when they've done wrong. A parent does not cease to love his or her child when the parent tells the child off for their actions.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Johhny, we know that God has complete power to change His mind over any material phenomenon that He is thinking, to change the way it 'naturally' works, to change His thought processes of which every indeterminate quantum perturbation of material reality is an aspect.
He can determine any future configuration He wishes by making it happen that way then or via now or at any point of suspension of the laws of natural indeterminacy which are independent of Him.
Like truth and goodness. Indeterminacy is the only possible way that material reality, at least, works. That God's thinking works with material results.
Nowhere in God's thinking is there a record of the spin of electrons that He is thinking before that spin is observed. And their indeterminate, superpositioned spin - which He creates and sees and sustains with full knowledge, will and power - is unobserved otherwise. By Him.
Unless we claim that there is a realm of existence, of information in which the spin of each electron IS known by God and at the same time is utterly indeterminate by every other criterion and worse ... by Him. That there is data - i.e knowledge, that which the all-knowing must know, now, that says what the spin of an electron will be whenever it is measured despite the fact that such knowledge ... does not exist. That He doesn't know. As well as knows.
Which, of course, is not just imparsimonious.
It is meaningless.
Sharkshooter says that God HAS to do that.
Which LIMITS God.
The way round that meaninglessness is to be even more imparsimonious and say that it's all happened in the future.
What tense is that ?
Missus ?
That constrains God completely to being a clock.
Deus ex machina.
Augustine's. Muhammad's. Aquinas'. Calvin's. Arminius'.
A damning machine. Unless you're a universalist.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
quote:
Originally posted by Johnny S:
Arminianism fits much better with our culture where I tihnk I'm loving people but actually I'm doing nice things at my convenience and preference.
I'm sorry - you objected when we tried to define Calvinism. In the same way, you can't define Arminianism to include whatever negative traits you want to impose upon it.
Yes, exactly right. That is my problem with Eliab's definition of arminianism. It's not even that I'm being forced to compare the worst of calvinism with the best of arminianism - actually arminianism is now a fluid term which can take whatever we want from the rest of Christendom.
If we are going to be vague in our definitions of arminianism then we have to take the hits when generalisations are made. You can't have it both ways.
Perhaps I need to spell out more clearly what I've been doing - it has probably only been clear to me! Since Eliab asked (what I think is a good question) how God's electing love can possibly translate into human ethics I have taken the doctrine of election as a nexus for calvinism. So when I talk about covenant love I am speaking particularly of God's choosing of Israel - a monergistic covenant if you will. That is what is peculiar to calvinism.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Covenant theology is not unique to Calvinism. It's absolutely central to most forms of Judaism, for example, and the Jews are not by any reasonable definition Calvinists.
It is unique in the way I've been using it.
And as for the Jews - haven't you heard of Zionism? The concept of God's election of Israel as both people and land is still common among Jews. Of course it is anachronistic to apply the term calvinism to those Jews who hold to this but they share the same theological parenthood - where do you think calvinists get the idea of election from?
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
Now my objection is that you are confusing 1) and 2). You're putting what belongs to us in our capacities as a creature into the imitating God element. Basically the implication of what you're saying is our created nature doesn't modify our ability to imitate God. The implication of your theology is God is just like a creature only bigger. On your interpretation of covenant theology - I don't call it Calvinism because it's not unique to Calvinism - God is just another creature like yourself.
No, that is not what I'm doing. I was replying to Eliab's questions about electing love. Taking the calvinistic concept of electing covenant love I merely gave some examples in human society that, it could be argued, are a legitimate application of a quality of God's love.
Once more you are moving the goalposts - first of all it is said that it is impossible to move from God --> mankind and then when I give some possible examples you accuse me of going from mankind --> God.
Surely the one thing you cannot say about Calvin is that his view of God is just man writ large. If anything, as Eliab has said, the problems are in the other direction.
quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
And no, it's not true that Arminianism makes love conditional. Some varieties of Arminianism may say that the mode in which God expresses love is conditional, but that love is not. Compare child-rearing: Calvinists have not historically been noted for their permissive approach to child-rearing. Historically, Calvinists have not said that love of one's children requires one not to punish them when they've done wrong. A parent does not cease to love his or her child when the parent tells the child off for their actions.
You've lost me here. I've no idea what this has got to do with our discussion.
My point earlier was that it is mildly ridiculous to accuse calvinists of having a conditional view of love. What do you think the 'U' in TULIP stands for? Feel free to make accusations of inconsistency or point out where calvinism falls down; but when you start saying that calvinism has, at its heart, a conditional view of love then you haven't understood calvinism. Can't have.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
Martin - I don't claim to be an expert on science but having a degree in Chemistry means that I do know a little about quantum mechanics. Suffice to say that you are talking with absolute certainty about things that scientists don't. It is called the Uncertainty principle with good reason.
Don't you see any irony in the fact that you are importing all this determinism from science to prove the fact God cannot be deterministic?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
I am talking with absolute certainty about the uncertainty principle. Which is scientific of me. I too studied chemistry, including physical chemistry at university.
Your response is merely rhetorical Johnny. And counter-factual. Reality is NOT deterministic. There is no uncertainty about that. It cannot be in theory and it isn't in fact. Fancy that! Reality - creation - is panentheistic. An aspect of God. It is not determined. Therefore He isn't.
God does play dice. Period. He can't not.
Apart from by His will. In which He is all but irresistably determined. He lives with, thinks His indeterminate thoughts - typified by electrons, indeterminate concretizations of the indeterminate abstract - and wills the best possible outcome regardless. In His will is 'YES'. In Him is 'YES'. Despite reality being fundamentally, by definition, indeterminate. Reality is that which is, of itself, indeterminate. Just as the theory says.
So your salvation, remains unknown in fact as it hasn't happened yet. Any more than your conception was known by God seconds before it happened. Let alone from eternity. Whatever 'you' are. Because even at conception 'you' were not determined. Any more than you will be tomorrow. Which is even less than you are now. Which isn't much.
That's SCIENCE Johhny. Reality. Imparsimoniously believe what you want. Why I don't understand. Beyond fear and disbelief which I know right well. It adds nothing and takes away everything. As infinitely more is totally, completely less. It cages, constrains and forces God in to being an infinite, static box with NO degree of freedom whatsoever. A dead box.
And unless one is a universalist it makes one a damnationist.
The language of predestination is ours. Is rhetoric. It has no meaning apart from that. With one exception. Christ. The Chosen (One).
God is not a clock. Not infinite Bender containing infinite spooled eternal Futurama. Not determinate. Except insofar as indeterminacy is.
He's determined, YES.
Salvation is all but utterly inexorable in Christ who deifies us all by becoming human. We are like God, divine, because God is human. ALL are included, ALL are predestined in Him for atonement, for forgiveness, for mercy, for love. NONE are predestined to damnation.
Some may choose damnation as Lucifer apparently has. Despite omnipotent Love. Which can no more make a created being accept love and allow love than It can passively know what the spin of an electron is or whether it's going to rain tomorrow. Or how the King of the North will fare against the King of the South.
To KNOW any of these things before they happen is to MAKE them happen. That cannot be done to a mind.
Just as there are limits to omniscience, there are limits to omnipotence. They are linguistic, logical, propositional, semantic and THEREFORE real.
Love makes indeterminacy irrelevant, forces through it: Jesus saves. Not by putting every tick in the clock by winding it up before it was made.
Ah well.
Just a thought.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I too studied chemistry, including physical chemistry at university.
Did you pass though?
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Your response is merely rhetorical Johnny. And counter-factual. Reality is NOT deterministic. There is no uncertainty about that.
Says who?
Says Martin. Which is just rhetoric too.
There are are whole branches of sociology / biology / psychology which assume some level of determinism. The debate is a current one. Did they fail to get your memo explaining that we now possess exhaustive knowledge on this subject?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
What ?
Go back to your studies until you understand.
Or better yet, submit. Understanding will follow.
Are are you trapped like Einstein ?
Your theology, as is all Augustinean theology predicated on a wooden interpretation of predestination, is compounded by that error.
You are denying reality. I.e. the indeterminate.
Even IngoB, who DOES know better, DOES acknowledge his imparsimony. He chooses imparsimony over the FACT of indeterminate reality (which is redundant phraseology which reduces to the FACT of indeterinacy: reality). Not for reasons of faith or intellect, but disposition.
We ALL do.
This battle is a battle of will, of ego all the way down to the depraved id, of vanity.
I'm parsimoniously right. But have I charity ? That's my battle. In opposing damnationism (mandatory arbitrary determinism: God the Bender), do I damn and am therefore damned ?
And Johnny, who has God helplessly HAD to save from eternity and who has He HAD to damn ?
Why ?
How ?
Did He play dice ?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
I take it you failed then.
(Simply repeating assertions and repeating questions doesn't exactly encourage more discussion Martin.)
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
How?
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
PS I knew in advance that you would use the word 'imparsimony' in your previous post.
[ETA - damn, indeterminism creeped in with your cross-post.]
[ 06. November 2010, 11:24: Message edited by: Johnny S ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
:0) yeah, God's that smart too. He can work stuff out. And will it to be otherwise.
So what course material, what academic reference can you cite to overturn the immutable, quantifiable, scientific fact of uncertainty as NOT a lack of occult information ?
Where are the better, Platonic electrons that God projects our shadow ones through ?
I suspect that you are struggling to be the nicest possible Augustinean-Calminian it is possible to be Johnny.
And you're doing better than I EVER will, as I ain't nice.
But I'm right.
And God is.
As I wish your day to be, mine will be. Cheers for now.
[ 06. November 2010, 11:35: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
So what course material, what academic reference can you cite to overturn the immutable, quantifiable, scientific fact of uncertainty as NOT a lack of occult information ?
As it happens I've just finished reading The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking.
In the chapter where he discusses the Uncertainty Principle he makes this statement - quote:
"Quantum physics might seem to undermine the idea that nature is governed by laws, but that is not the case. Instead it leads us to accept a new form of determinism: given the state of the system at some time, the laws of nature determine the probabilities of various futures and pasts rather than determining the future and past with certainty."
What fascinates me about that statement is that he still insists on using the word determinism. Of course he has to. His quest for the unifying principle is grounded in his attempt to reconcile Newtonian and Einsteinian physics.
The thing about science is that it has to be (at least to some degree) deterministic for it to work.
When was the last time you saw a brickie down tools to calculate the probability of the location of all the electrons in his bricks?
To my mind the quest for the unifying principle is what philosophers would call compatibilism - the attempt to reconcile (however imparsimoniously) determinism with indeterminism.
[ 06. November 2010, 12:32: Message edited by: Johnny S ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Indeterminism is determined. Uncertainty is certain. These, THIS is not commutative. Hawking is yesterday's man, spent and has NO chance any more than Einstein did. Less.
As I do not understand free will - it's not an attribute of God in any way and explains nothing of any significance and is not accepted, needed in science - in the slightest, I find it meaningless, just as I do predestination (determinism), then I have no need for compatibilism to reconcile two meaningless concepts.
But there again I'm a VERY simple minded man.
Posted by Jahlove (# 10290) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
But there again I'm a VERY simple minded man.
good for you, mate - perhaps you could post in terms that the even simpler-minded amongst us could comprehend?
Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Even IngoB, who DOES know better, DOES acknowledge his imparsimony. He chooses imparsimony over the FACT of indeterminate reality (which is redundant phraseology which reduces to the FACT of indeterminacy: reality). Not for reasons of faith or intellect, but disposition.
The problem is that you lecture passionately about things you have not understood much. Parsimony is not a part of nature. Nature is so fundamentally imparsimonious that it requires modern science, the best human minds of a huge population chained together in a Babelian effort spanning centuries, to impose it on nature. Somewhat. But never ever is nature without another trick up her sleeve. I've been an elementary particle physicist. It's a zoo of particles, Lagrangians and Lie groups. Our attempts to unify, simplify, breed ever more complexity. Every time we crank up the energy and look deeper, there is more. It's like a fat fractal of observables. And compared to the neuroscience I do now that was almost ridiculously straightforward. Parsimony is our last lease on sanity. It's what keeps us afloat on the dark sea of science. Yet not so because that's what nature is like, and by extrapolation what God is like, but because of what we are like. Nature is deep, we are shallow.
Furthermore, you have not understood indeterminacy much, and hence also not how it relates to God. Indeterminacy is a specific statement about the world. B does not follow from A. But B is and A is and therefore God necessarily creates B and A in indeterminate relationship to each other. Now, this is impossible precisely as long as one has a false, demiurge, conception of God. An agent cannot arrange matter to be non-arranged. However, it is dead simple - parsimonious even - once one understands God a bit more correctly. You will note that both you and I did create B and A in indeterminate relationship to each other, in our imagination, without the slightest problem. God's imagination is reality. The indeterminacy of the world in fact proves the existence of God, and I will spell that out in another thread. Yet what is important to realize now is that it simply does not follow from indeterminacy in the world that God doesn't know what is going to be the case. That's just a category error, and it turns God into a demiurge, into a part of the world. Einstein indeed saw deeply, much deeper than the young quantum mechanics he was critiquing. His only problem was that he tried to stick to physics when God was staring him into the face...
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
All clear now Jahlove?
Posted by anteater (# 11435) on
:
IngoB:
quote:
Now, this is impossible precisely as long as one has a false, demiurge, conception of God. An agent cannot arrange matter to be non-arranged. However, it is dead simple - parsimonious even - once one understands God a bit more correctly.
Well I can see the direction of travel here and will read the pre-plugged thread with interest, but aren't you close to saying "Now that we understand the incomprehensability of God, we can . . ."
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
I'm bloody impressed anteater if you can see the direction of this: 'An agent cannot arrange matter to be non-arranged.', let alone what it means. Makes me look positively cogent.
IngoB baby, come down, stoop to conquer. I ask AGAIN. Your rhetoric and claims of superior understanding of anything just don't reach me, especially when accompanied with straw men, category errors, irrelevancies. Projection.
The bewildering proliferation of entities at higher energies comes under the heading of indeterminacy, not imparsimony.
What's the problem ? Why bluster ?
You CANNOT blind me with science - particularly as you're not actually using it, with pseudo-intellectualism. Or even the real thing, which you're not actually using correctly even if you have it. You need to beat me up, club me to the ground with A is for Apple. Patronize me please, but do not use second rate rhetoric and think that I'm intimidated by it. I'm offended, certainly, by your claims to intellectual superiority and understanding and wisdom over my third rate versions not because you make the claims which are all true I'm sure, brain as big as two planets as you have, but because you don't and therefore CAN NOT actually do it.
If you could, you would.
DO IT. Don't just claim to be able to. I'm third rate mate, on a good day.
My understanding of fundamental, hypostatic, essential indeterminacy is fine, thank you, you haven't TOUCHED it.
There is NOTHING demiurgical about God being constrained by it. Any more than He's constrained to be good.
You'll claim you don't have the time. What, to even START ? I'll wait forever mate, I'll treasure the start of the catechism, when it happens and wait longingly for as long as it takes once you've given me the first bead for the next.
Please START.
If you can. If you can spare the time.
Otherwise, mate, the floor, the gutter is unassailably mine.
God is not a clock wound up forever forever ago. God is not infinite Bender with all of eternal Futurama spooled inside Him. He does not HAVE to be known gnostically thus. He didn't know you from Adam eternity ago. Not that there's much to know.
PLEASE give me the first bead of your truly superior understanding that I HAVE to accept?
Or am I just tooooooo stupid? It can't be done? I have to be left in my savage's ignorance? A wolf-child too old to learn to speak? I cannot become as a little child, rabbi?
In that case mate, I will come back at every predestinarian, every Ptolemaic-Augustinean here every time, whether damnationists like yourself or universalists like Mousethief.
At least you have the courage to damn despite Jesus' promise of salvation.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
As I do not understand free will - it's not an attribute of God in any way and explains nothing of any significance and is not accepted, needed in science - in the slightest, I find it meaningless, just as I do predestination (determinism), then I have no need for compatibilism to reconcile two meaningless concepts.
I don't get this Martin.
You seem to be saying that you cannot believe in black and white because all you can see is grey?
[ 08. November 2010, 03:10: Message edited by: Johnny S ]
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
I never beat my wife Johnny.
Posted by IngoB (# 8700) on
:
Martin, I have seen little evidence that you deserve any particular effort of mine - at least as far as the topic of predestination is concerned. There was plenty of meat in what I wrote above, and indeed elsewhere on the Ship, but your only response is a lengthy list of "ad hominem"s and the insistence that you, only you, will be the judge of which of my arguments makes sense. There's no point - and no joy - in arguing with someone being that destructive.
As it happens, I've thought about randomness quite independently of your latest attempt to shout down dissenting voices with that weirdly transparent combination of intellectual arrogance and self-deprecation. So I have posted on that now elsewhere. FWIW.
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
You've got NOTHING mate.
I'd get off the pot if I were you before you burst a haemorrhoid.
Posted by Johnny S (# 12581) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
I never beat my wife Johnny.
What phony dog poo?
Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on
:
Tuesday.
© Ship of Fools 2016
UBB.classicTM
6.5.0