[RD] Ask a Theologian V

[timtofly]

Would irresistible grace not be a concept that is given to a subjective feeling? What is the basis for it found in Scripture? Most verses that I can think of seem to indicate that grace was free and available to all. Being irresistible would be a personal effect. Now some people could be pre-destined to receive this grace, but that would not be irresistible grace that would be a irresistible reception to grace. You are then back to being predestined to receive such grace. Given free will, and God knowing who would be more receptive, there would be no need for predestination. Predestination is just the foreknowledge of such a predisposition.

Now if satan knew everything, then it would seem that God would have to predestinate certain people to counteract the schemes of satan. But that would seem to be pushing conjecture to the limits.

 

[SeekTruthFromFacts]

I suppose that makes sense if you think it's possible to be saved without irresistible grace. If that's so, then God could decide to save some people via irresistible grace and leave it to others to sort out their own salvation or not, as they see fit. But has anyone actually held this? Surely people who believe in irresistible grace generally think that that's the only way to salvation, don't they? In which case, if God decides to bestow it on some people, he is in so doing also deciding not to bestow it on others, which means he's predestining some people to salvation and others to damnation.

The position rests on the concept that humanity is already condemned at a logical stage prior to salvation.

A thought experiment that might help: assume everybody owes income tax (for simplicity, a flat tax). The government then decides to grant a 100% deduction to a certain group (single mothers, whether rich or poor). At the latter stage, does the decision to favour single mothers necessarily imply condemnation of everyone else?

A real-life (and therefore messy) parallel: in the UK, universities are entitled to charge tuition fees. In Scotland, the Scottish government pays the fees for Scottish students, whether or not their results suggest they deserve it. Is that an act of condemnation of Welsh students? Obviously this example muddies categories, but hopefully you can see what I'm getting at.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Yes, selective tax breaks most certainly do involve a condemnation of all tax payers who are not given equal special treatment but must still foot the bill. Selective subsidies are equivalent to penalties imposed on those whom they do not benefit.


Of course, it is entirely unreasonable to assume that everyone owes an income tax. I find the idea that there could ever any real duty to pay such a tax to be ridiculous. (Perhaps income tax payment might be a way to avoid some greater evil, but then the duty is to avoid the greater evil by either that means or any other believe to be equally effective.) Income taxes, like most taxes, are just a form of robbery or extortion. The exceptions would be for Land Value Taxes and Pigouvian taxes intended to internalize negative externalities. In those cases the duty to pay must be based on how much harm each party is doing to his neighbors, and if this amount is equal for everyone then there is no reason anyone should pay. If the tax is justified to begin with, then relieving any justly taxed party of the obligation to pay is inherently unjust.


You cannot justify one injustice by analogy to other injustices which you have been conditioned to find tolerable. The stronger the analogy then, the stronger it works against you.

 

[SeekTruthFromFacts]

So you feel that you are not your brother's keeper?

 

[timtofly]

The position rests on the concept that humanity is already condemned at a logical stage prior to salvation.

A thought experiment that might help: assume everybody owes income tax (for simplicity, a flat tax). The government then decides to grant a 100% deduction to a certain group (single mothers, whether rich or poor). At the latter stage, does the decision to favour single mothers necessarily imply condemnation of everyone else?

A real-life (and therefore messy) parallel: in the UK, universities are entitled to charge tuition fees. In Scotland, the Scottish government pays the fees for Scottish students, whether or not their results suggest they deserve it. Is that an act of condemnation of Welsh students? Obviously this example muddies categories, but hopefully you can see what I'm getting at.

The problem is that God does not demand anything from humans. Accepting grace is not accepting favor. It is more a thought experiment on Trust. If you trust God, then grace is not resisted. While it is true that all are condemned, God is not asking for any one to pay for their redemption, so there could be no analogy to taxes. It would be akin to someone trusting the government to not tax them at all. Since God does not expect taxes, the analogy falls apart. The tax would be eternal death, and paying that would not get you where you want to be.

 

[Takhisis]

All what are condemned?

 

[Arakhor]

So, only people who don't trust in God are condemned to eternal damnation? What's this - Hellfire Lite?

 

[timtofly]

All what are condemned?

So, only people who don't trust in God are condemned to eternal damnation? What's this - Hellfire Lite?

All humans are condemned to pay taxes. It is in the after life though, not this life. The accepted consensus states that all humans are both condemned and will receive grace equally. That does not work out logically, especially since the result is not known until death. Which some would view as final and unchangeable while others believe that can be changed by the living. The problem with that is the living do not even know their own fate, much less those who have died. Yes it is a thought exercise in Trust.

 

[RFC_Viceroy]

I suppose that makes sense if you think it's possible to be saved without irresistible grace. If that's so, then God could decide to save some people via irresistible grace and leave it to others to sort out their own salvation or not, as they see fit. But has anyone actually held this? Surely people who believe in irresistible grace generally think that that's the only way to salvation, don't they? In which case, if God decides to bestow it on some people, he is in so doing also deciding not to bestow it on others, which means he's predestining some people to salvation and others to damnation.

I do know that in one of RC Sproul's articles on double predestination, he mentions the viewpoint that you describe here, and he refers to it as "a qualified form of Arminianism." That said, he mentioned it as a hypothetical viewpoint that someone could hold, not linking it to any individual in particular. I can say that there was a brief time when I believed something like this, but then, I'm nowhere near a professional theologian.

Anyway: I did have a question. I have heard numerous different interpretations of Romans 13:1-7, but few if any of them really deal with the fact that the passage was written when Nero was emperor. I have seen people mention that fact to prove that Christians are called to obey even monstrously evil governments, but such people completely ignore Romans 13:3-4 more often than not.

What exactly do you think Paul meant when he wrote this passage? And, (from a Christian standpoint) could his intended meaning be different than the correct meaning?

 

[timtofly]

Does not grace work before predestination? Grace comes before foreknowledge? Grace is the "nudge" that pushes one's will towards God, but it is God's love that pulls one towards God. When a person does not feel worthy it would be grace that changes that feeling, but not enough to make it irresistible. Most people reject God, not because they feel unworthy, but they reject God because they claim they do not need him. It is the human condition itself that is used to make humans feel unworthy. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, works in pointing that out, but then you risk loosing the image of a merciful and loving God, and it cannot be overused.

Romans 13 was written with no hidden agenda. Even the "evilest" of dictators are there for God's purpose. There is honor among thieves, until one gets stabbed in the back. There is truth in the statement, "Hold your friends close and your enemies closer". There is still the command to render unto Caeser, but to obey God even in the face of danger will win out. It may be hard to find where a cruel dictator will give a direct command that would cause a believer to have to directly disobey God.

 

[Perfection]

I've heard some people say that we reside in the mind of God as if reality is a figment of the Lord's imagination. Is that taken seriously in Christian traditions or by any theologians?

Malebranche said something a bit like this, or at least it sounded a bit like this, and of course so did Berkeley. I don't know of anyone who takes it seriously today, though.

Is there any works that you could point to that would highlight this?

I'm interested in parallels between God's mind, and simulation arguments.

A problem with a view like this, from the viewpoint of Christian orthodoxy, is that it would seem to collapse the distinction between the Creator and the creation. You're meant to have God on the one hand and the stuff he's created on the other - otherwise you have something like pantheism. But if the world is within God then you lose that idea.

I've always thought this to be an interesting argument against many conceptions of Gods.

Consider the following argument

Given...God knows how my life will unfold

Q. How does God know how my life will unfold?
A. He had thought of it before.

Q. How did he think it before?
A. He had a concept of me that behaves the same way as me, that he imagined in a world just like ours.

Q. Did he know how my life would unfold then?
A. No, he is thinking this so he can know how my life, if I were to exist, would unfold.

Q. How can I be sure I'm the actual person not merely the figment of God's imagination?
A. You can't?

Well if that's the case I can't really say whether or not God knows how my life will unfold.


Have you ever heard anything like that?

 

[Mouthwash]

If you reject a physicalist theory of identity (which pretty much everyone does), this becomes very plausible.

 

[timtofly]

Is there a difference between knowing something exist, and thinking it into existence?

 

[Takhisis]

I've always thought this to be an interesting argument against many conceptions of Gods.

Consider the following argument

Given...God knows how my life will unfold

Q. How does God know how my life will unfold?
A. He had thought of it before.

Q. How did he think it before?
A. He had a concept of me that behaves the same way as me, that he imagined in a world just like ours.

Q. Did he know how my life would unfold then?
A. No, he is thinking this so he can know how my life, if I were to exist, would unfold.

Q. How can I be sure I'm the actual person not merely the figment of God's imagination?
A. You can't?

Well if that's the case I can't really say whether or not God knows how my life will unfold.


Have you ever heard anything like that?

I can't remember who it was, but someone (a Church Father, I'm almost sure) said that God existed otuside of time, watching our universe from the outside. Plot'll probably know better.

Is there a difference between knowing something exist, and thinking it into existence?

I know that the computer I'm typing this post with exists. It does not cease to do so when I am not thinking of it.

 

[Mouthwash]

I can't remember who it was, but someone (a Church Father, I'm almost sure) said that God existed otuside of time, watching our universe from the outside. Plot'll probably know better.

That was Aquinas.

 

[timtofly]

I can't remember who it was, but someone (a Church Father, I'm almost sure) said that God existed otuside of time, watching our universe from the outside. Plot'll probably know better.

I know that the computer I'm typing this post with exists. It does not cease to do so when I am not thinking of it.

Did it exist before you thought you needed one and took possession of it? Are humans just concepts? I do not see how physical things exist within a concept. It is the concept that outlines the physical, but the physical exist on it's own merit after the concept has taken on physical form. God is considered the entity that came up with the concept of humanity, however once the physical took on form, it was no longer a concept but an existence. Humans don't think and thus exist. Humans think and create concepts that are their own creation, but they do not think out their own existence and creation. Once a concept becomes physical it no longer exist only in the mind of the creator, but exist outside of that mind. Neither do I think that one can pinpoint where a mind exist. It may not be physical, but exist outside of the physical as a concept that works without actually existing. Time is linked to the physical and may exist as a concept but only in relation to the physical. If there was no physical need for it, it could also loose it's need as a concept.

 

[Agent327]

I can't remember who it was, but someone (a Church Father, I'm almost sure) said that God existed otuside of time, watching our universe from the outside.

Hm. I wonder during what time God is watching the universe. The universe being everything we know to exist. Since time basically is another dimension of space, God exists outside time and space, i.e outside our universe.* But outside our universe there is nothing known to exist. If God exists outside of time and space we cannot know God to exist. I wonder if this can be reduced to a paradox or that it is simply a contradiction.

*The spacetime continuum doesn't have an outside Everything is inside. It's lke asking the question: What will I see when I arrive at the edge of the universe? Well, nothing. Firstly, because you can't go there (the universe doesn't have an 'edge'), secondly, because nothing is there. I'm ignoring the concept of a multiverse here, but that doesn't principally change anything.

 

[timtofly]

Hm. I wonder during what time God is watching the universe. The universe being everything we know to exist. Since time basically is another dimension of space, God exists outside time and space, i.e outside our universe.* But outside our universe there is nothing known to exist. If God exists outside of time and space we cannot know God to exist. I wonder if this can be reduced to a paradox or that it is simply a contradiction.

*The spacetime continuum doesn't have an outside Everything is inside. It's lke asking the question: What will I see when I arrive at the edge of the universe? Well, nothing. Firstly, because you can't go there (the universe doesn't have an 'edge'), secondly, because nothing is there. I'm ignoring the concept of a multiverse here, but that doesn't principally change anything.

Unless one can comprehend what it is to think "outside the box", it may seem like a contradiction. The concept of such thinking has been around for thousands of years. The practicality of it is relatively new. Are any of the laws of physics more than concepts or do they only exist in context to the physical? A concept seems to be able to exist outside of the physical, although some may argue that God is more than a concept, but not physical in the point of existence.

 

[Perfection]

I can't remember who it was, but someone (a Church Father, I'm almost sure) said that God existed otuside of time, watching our universe from the outside. Plot'll probably know better.

I know that the computer I'm typing this post with exists. It does not cease to do so when I am not thinking of it.

I should note I'm not, in particular, looking for conceptions of God that do not follow my line of argument. I'm not really interested in proving or disproving God but in the nature of causality, information, and personal identity. That's why I asked plot if he's seen that line of argument before, not if he thought it to be valid.

Anyways, as for the idea that God is outside of time I don't find it that compelling to my argument. It seems to me that if God does exist outside of time, there are two options:
1. God has his own sort of super-time that exists beyond ours (think of super-time versus regular time as analogous to the timeline of an author to the timeline inside his novel), to which my line of argument would seem to still apply.
2. God does not have any sort of timelike character. In that case it seems to me that we cannot describe Him as doing things (watching, creating, thinking, etc.) because those don't really make sense without causality.

@timtofly

So may I characterize your view as follows?

The difference between me and God's concept of me is that I am physical whereas God's concept of me is not.

If not what do you think differentiates me from God's concept of me?

 

[Agent327]

2. God does not have any sort of timelike character.

That would seem to be more in the line of Aquinas' meaning. But I'm interested to hear Plotinus's thoughts on this.

Are any of the laws of physics more than concepts or do they only exist in context to the physical? A concept seems to be able to exist outside of the physical, although some may argue that God is more than a concept, but not physical in the point of existence.

I have no clue what you are saying here.

At any rate, it seems fair to assume that what Aquinas meant was that time is irrelevant to God. Which doesn't quite amount to the same thing.