The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Essential Qualities of Personhood

Theology Philosophical
#41

Michael,

I love those “Closer to Truth” videos! They rock. Really nice site. If you check out Greg Boyd there, he’s got a few videos explaining open theism.

M: if “God The Father Almighty” is the maker “of all things, visible and invisible” (and this “quasi time” is unmade) quasi time would have to be part of God Himself. So God is both personal and impersonal.

T: Maybe I’m not tracking what you mean by “impersonal.” The Orthodox would balk at the idea of God having “parts.” But be that as it may, what if we say that what WE are CALLING “time” is a feature of interpersonal relations, so that time is more like the “how” of loving relations? That avoids claiming that “time” is some THING that’s part of God but which is an impersonal thing, as if God was composed of this and that “part” and were a “composite” being. The Orthodox have (rightly I think) objected to the idea that there are more fundamental “parts” to God that God can be reduced to so to speak. But maybe you’re not getting at that.

Tom

#42

Oh, hey, Michael, you may really enjoy Alan Rhoda’s blog. Alan is a Christian philosopher. He used to teach at UNLV but is now a research fellow (or something like that) at Notre Dame working on open theism. God/Time is one of his specialties. He has several posts on his blog about it. He hasn’t posted in a while, but there’s a lot of great stuff there to rumage through. And he’s really accessible and good about emailing if you wanted to chat with him (besides knowing Dean pretty well). I can share his personal email with you via a PM. Heads up!

www.alanrhoda.net/blog/

Tom

#43

That might make sense (and I think Jason would agree with you), but I think it might also make sense to say that there’s an impersonal feature of interpersonal relations.

One of the arguments for the Trinity is that self-awareness involves distinguishing one’s self from some “other than.”"

To be aware of yourself as a person, you’d have to distinguish yourself from some other person, but doesn’t personal self awareness also involve being aware of your own personal consciousness, and might that not involve distinguishing one’s self from the impersonal and the unaware?

Time (as we know it) is impersonal and unaware–and maybe quasi time is an impersonal aspect of God’s interpersonal relations.

#44

M: That might make sense (and I think Jason would agree with you), but I think it might also make sense to say that there’s an impersonal feature of interpersonal relations.

T: Are you familiar with the Orthodox distinction between ‘nature’ and ‘person’? Maybe this is all you’re getting at. There are ‘natural capacities’ (reason,volition, emotion) which are no in themselves persons or personal. They’re just dispositional qualities, the ‘what’ of nature. But they only exist concretely in some individual ‘hypostasis’. They have to be hypostocized as it were. So in that sense, yeah, we can speak of ‘impersonal’ qualities of God. But they have no concrete existence per se apart from the very personl exercise of them, always in love, etc.

M: One of the arguments for the Trinity is that self-awareness involves distinguishing one’s self from some “other than.”

T: Right. And this is where Process theists (who are not trinitarian) say God is personal becuase the “other” God contemplates and relates to is the World, where Orthodoxy says God’s personal qualities subsist in self-reflection, by which the Son is generated, etc. So in a sense God is his own “other” and thus does not need a world to render him a personal being.

Tom

#45

Yes.

I don’t see how this is a necessary point of view at all. Each moment is not necessarily an “island” of its own not intrinsically connected to any other moment. The way I view it, there are very many layers to reality. Underlying the whole scheme of time is a soulish layer. Underlying many of the actions that I’ve performed is the same soul, until I change at least. We’ve all heard someone say, “I’m not the man I used to be.” Or Shakespeare’s Seven Ages of Man. A soul CAN change - this is universalistic dogma. However, that doesn’t follow that it changes entirely from each moment to the next, does it? So, while every moment is different from every other one, there is, in my view, another layer underneath that of consistency. Not everlasting consistency, necessarily, at least in the moral sphere, since people can change from good to bad or vice versa, but consistency nonetheless. And then underneath that I imagine that there is even a deeper layer of the “spirit” which encompasses our spiritual identity or DNA which NEVER changes. That means our potential for greatness is always the same despite whatever our actions may dictate.

I would also invoke Emerson’s essay History for further insight on this matter:

Even if they were related sideways, we would not be morally culpable, because it would not involve the soul, but external, physical events. Perhaps I am simply having a hard time conceiving of your viewpoint, but it seems to me that the A theory breaks down at every point. How can one even determine where the past ends and the present begins? As a demonstration, if you wave your hand in front of your face very rapidly, you cannot clearly tell where your hand is at any “moment” of time as all that you see is a very fast blur. Surely people have different consciousnesses of the span of the moment they are in. Some have better memories of past events or better premonitions of the future than others who live in only a tiny sliver of time populated by immediate sensory perception.

Secondly, if this moment is the only one that truly exists, then the past doesn’t exist anymore at all, and people are not culpable for events that don’t exist, are they?

Anyways, putting all of this aside, just because God is ultimately the cause of every moment does not mean that, in fact, he is the direct cause of everything that happens. Remember, there is a soulish consistency behind every action. It’s the B theory that allows for an endless chain of connected events, not the A theory, since it states that past moments and future moments don’t exist, unless I misunderstand somehow.

#46

Here’s an interesting t.v. interview with William Lane Craig.

#47

Hah, most of that discussion was completely pointless and ridiculous.

Craig points out that it’s self-contradictory to say that God was timeless before suddenly creating time, but didn’t carry that through to its logical conclusion. I imagine he was seeing timelessness as mere motionlessness for most of the discussion, but he betrays his definition of timelessness by saying that God wasn’t existing without time before he created it.

Therefore, there’s no problem of limitations on God becoming timeless again because if he is temporal, then he always was, since nothing happened before time. Thus, he must be timeless right now, even as we speak, if he ever was at all. Especially since “timelessness” implies a lack of change.

But how can God be both timeless and temporal at the same time?

Again, this is where trinitarians have something to say on the matter. :mrgreen:

#48

Mr. Craig is Trinitarian, and He didn’t say God was timeless before creation.

If you listen, he said God “is timeless beyond creation, and is temporal since creation.”

There’s a reason he distinguished that from saying God was timeless before creation.

#49

Exactly Mike. Craig is trinitarian all the way and is well-known for his arguments that the temporal status of God’s existence is a ‘contingent’ property (as opposed to God’s being trinitarian, which is a ‘necessary’ property). Stellar, you’ll see Craig using the little French word “sans” (“without” or “apart from”) like Mike said. Craig won’t say God is timeless “before” creation because “before” implies time, and there’s no time before time. That’s his point. So he says God is timeless “sans” (“without” or “apart from”) creation (as opposed to “before” creation) to avoid the problem. He’s on record too for saying that God cannot be both absolutely timeless and temporal.

Personally, I still don’t find moving from an absolutely atemporal state to a temporal one any easier than a temporally eternal past to account for. Both options seem mind boggling to me.

Tom

#50

Mind boggling, yes.

That’s because we’re creatures of time and space.

The question is whether Craig’s hypothosis makes it any less incomprehensible, and for me it does.

I can conceive of an ever growing straight line proceeding from a point (or a circle–linear time proceeding frome atemporality, or quasi-time), but I can’t conceive of an infinite straight line.

Also, the difference between Craig and Zimmerman seems to be that Craig would conceed God’s absolute atemporality sans-creation (Leftow’s changeless, instantaneous flash), and Zimmerman allows the possibility of some change (but whatever change there was would be the only “time” there was, because he allows that time was “in some sense” created.)

#51

I understand what he stated, but I was talking about the pseudo-problem that seemed to rise as a result. There was a seeming issue that said, ‘once’ God decided to become temporal, he couldn’t take it back anymore because that would be logically inconsistent. He repeated that part several times. But since he’s timeless, there was no ‘once’ in which he made that decision. It was no moment in time because there’s no point in time in which time didn’t exist. THAT would be logically inconsistent. Thus time is, in an ironic sense, eternal. (Thus why it makes perfect sense that the temporal aspect of God, the Son, is the creator of time, or at least contributes to its creation.)

So, since there was no point in time, no ‘once’ in which God decided to create time, it always was, and is thus an essential part of his being.

THUS the problem of God being limited by his own choice vanishes. He is limited only by his own being, which is not a limitation at all. Unless one believes (and perhaps he is saying) that it has always been a non-necessary choice, regardless of the fact that God has always been temporal (which means that if the Son is inherently temporal, God makes a non-necessary choice to produce and sustain His own Son, which feels heretical).

Yes, perhaps God does choose the nature of his own existence, being self-sustaining and all (though of course, at least for some attibutes, it would be a necessary choice). But my point is that God’s timelessness is not a past attribute even while being a present one. God’s timelessness, even his timelessness in ‘the past’ is always NOW. It cannot be past tense because there IS NO past in the timeless realm. It is ALWAYS NOW, thus why He is called the I AM and the God of the resurrection and the life and why Jesus said that Abraham saw His day, because in God, ALL is alive, and all is NOW.

We only experience time and death, which are not essential realities of existence at all, being on the outer edge of God’s universe. The center where God is, is where everything is alive and thriving and ALWAYS present. And the closer one comes to God, the more one experiences this eternity, the more mortality is clothed with immortality. :smiley:

#52

“God has always been temporal”?

#53

In the Son, yes. Why not?

#54

Stellar: I understand what he stated, but I was talking about the pseudo-problem that seemed to rise as a result. There was a seeming issue that said, ‘once’ God decided to become temporal, he couldn’t take it back anymore because that would be logically inconsistent.

Tom: Right. But he has a good point here. If a temporal reality comes into being and endures for some time, then God subsequently annihilates it and returns to a pre-creation state in which God is the only reality there is, then it would be the case that this final state ‘followed’ the closure of time, or more simply, the ‘temporal’ status of the creation God created and then annihilated would remain temporal and, as such, be known by God temporally. That is, the temporal status of the annihilated world as “past” would by definition be “remembered” by God and THAT is something a timeless God cannot do. It’s Craig’s argument (and he’s convinced me) that temporal truths and temporal realities can only be ‘known’ (i.e., experienced) temporally.

Stellar: So, since there was no point in time, no ‘once’ in which God decided to create time, it always was, and is thus an essential part of his being.

Tom: Craig would disagree that God’s decision to create IS the first temporal moment (and not timeless), so that there was a point in time (namely, the first moment of time) at which point God chose to create, and this choice of course brings the world into being.

Here’s the thing (and Craig argues this as well). Let G = God. Let d = God’s choice to create. Let C = the coming into being of creation. Here’s the argument:

Gd —> C (If Gd then C, or IF God chooses to create, then creation comes into being).

It seems just that simple to me. If God chooses or determines to create (that is, if God says “Let there be…”) then it follows necessarily that what he calls into being comes into being. God cannot call X into being (as an act of creation) and X fail to come into being. So if God’s calling X into being (or his creative command) is a ‘necessary’ or ‘essential’ part of his being, then so does that which he calls into being exist necessarily.

Aquinas tries (succeeds some think) to argue that God’s creative command or decision to create can be an essential or necessary part of his being while creation exists contingently. I can’t get it to work, so it’s not an option for me.

Stellar: Yes, perhaps God does choose the nature of his own existence…

Tom: But choice itself PRESUMES a concrete nature and set of dispositions BY WHICH one chooses.

Stellar: But my point is that God’s timelessness is not a past attribute even while being a present one. God’s timelessness, even his timelessness in ‘the past’ is always NOW. It cannot be past tense because there IS NO past in the timeless realm. It is ALWAYS NOW…

Tom: The problem is, Stellar, that in a timeless realm there is no “now” either (no past, no present, no future).

Those who employ the “eternal now” perspective talk about divine timelessness, but what they really mean is something more like Hugh Ross’s ‘supratime’ in which God has a real temporal existence that somehow incorporates the entirety of our past, present, and future. But at some point I just have to ask myself why come up with such elaborate schemes? What’s motivating it? Are we multiplying explanations needlessly?

Stellar: …thus why He is called the I AM and the God of the resurrection and the life and why Jesus said that Abraham saw His day, because in God, ALL is alive, and all is NOW.

Tom: God is also described in Scripture as the God “who was, and is, and is to come.” That sure looks like a straightforward ascription of temporal existence to God. God has a past, a present, and a future. When I think of God as the great “I am” I don’t imagine at all that the writer is speculating on the temporal status of God’s essence or anything like that. I think, far more simply, God wants to reveal himself as an ever-present, abiding and sufficient reality for his people.

I don’t at all get your reasoning for (first) ‘why’ the Father should exist timelessly but the Son temporally and then (secondly) ‘how’ the relation is real and experienced by the Father. Can you tell me again what this is supposed to explain?

Tom

#55

Of course, the whole question of whether God could annihilate all created entitites and revert (assuming God is timeless sans creation) to a timeless mode of existence is pointless. We know God is intent upon the unconditional pursuit of creation and its fulfillment and enjoyment. Furthermore, in light of the incarnation, such a question is utterly beside the point. The hypostatic union which is the incarnation of God and the assumption of human nature by the Logos is an irrevocable, irreversible union with the temporal creation. God will forever be incarnate.

Tom

#56

For any creature who exists in time, God “was, is, and is to come,” but “I AM” does seem to imply more than that to me.

Also, I don’t think even Zimmerman would ascribe an endless temporal past to God.

He speaks of there being “a sense in which time had a beginning,” and a prior “quasi time” (consisting only of whatever actual change in mental states God experienced priour to the creation) before an immeasurable and amorphus block of “dead-time.”

If actual, linear time (as we know it) existed endlessly before creation, how would God have transversed this endless past to arrive at the point of creation?

How would He remember His first thought, when there was no first (because there’d be no “first” in an actually infinite series)?

Remember that the future is only a potential infinite, not an actual infinite (and it’s never actually transversed, so there’s no problem there)–but if the past is an actual infinite, God would have to have transversed it to have arived at the point of creation.

The problem this raised has been framed by asking the question “why not earlier, or later,” but that’s not the real problem.

The real problem is that there’s no way out of an infinite past

If the past is represented by an infinite timeline, there’s no point on that timeline at which creation could have ocured, because there’s no point at which that timeline ends (and another timeline, representing time since creation, could begin.)

Put another way, there’s no present (and there was no time at which the moment of creation became present) because the infinite past never ends.

That’s the problem Leftow, Zimmerman, and Craig are addressing.

And that’s why simply saying that God has a “straightforward temporal existence” (and created the universe at a point in time as we know it) is a logical inconguity.

I think there’s truth in what all three men say, but there must be some sense (as they all say) in which time had a beginning.

Do you disagree Tom?

If not, who do you think gives the bast solution to the problem (or could the best solution be a combination of two or more of their views)?

Anyone?

#57

I didn’t say he could take it back, that wasn’t my point. My point is that the FACT that he can’t take it back is not an issue like the interviewer seemed at first to think it was. Furthermore, Craig’s solution is not the most efficient one and doesn’t even seem to incorporate his own viewpoint. To fully incorporate his own viewpoint, all he would’ve had to say is that there was never a “time” that God was timeless, because that would require a sequence, or in other words, “TIME” - obviously. If God is timeless at all it must be at the same time as being temporal. Make sense?

Well yes, I did make a SLIGHT misstatement because technically God’s decision to create time would be a part of time as well. His decision to create time was time, which demonstrates how tightly God’s decisions (in the bible, His “words”) and the resulting effects of those decisions are - they are, in fact, simultaneous realities that cannot be divided from each other. At the very least, in this case.

Let’s put it this way. God’s nature is unconquerable and undivided love. It is the supreme state of existence for a being. Therefore his decisions are not indecisive (divided in thought, as choosing between options) but absolute sovereign preferences that would not be any other way. Thus, God being love, his decisions are irrefutable reality and non-arbitrary. To put it concisely, being what He is, He would not have made any other decision. Thus in a sense His decisions are an essential or necessary part of His being. I would say the same therefore for His creation, yet of course both His creation AND His decisions are reliant upon both His nature and His being, thus both are contingent upon Him.

Right, but God is self-sustaining. I don’t claim to know for sure the answer to this mystery, but somehow God is sovereign over everything and His nature is not dictated to Him (and something must dictate). OR, perhaps we could say that the trinity even solves this issue. God is dependent upon the existence of His Son to even be what He is - a Father. Therefore their relationship is interdependent upon each other - and the Spirit of their relationship and interdependence is a third Person upon which they are both reliant. And yet of course, the Spirit is dependent upon their existence to even exist. Thus it’s an unending cycle and might even be like what some say the cell is like - an interdependent set of parts which cannot exist without each other.

Thus each of the persons in the Trinity wills the other to be what they are out of pure, undiluted love - the Son perfectly and absolutely submitting to the Father, yes, but the Father requiring this submission to even remain what He is.

Not necessarily. The whole point is to paint the picture of a God who is beyond all limitations, even that of the future. A God who has access to all things at once. I see nothing wrong with painting the picture of a supratime - in fact, I think it gives a much more dynamic, real and personable God.

That latter statement is exactly what I was trying to express. Why do you think that God described Himself as He who was, is and is to come? Do you think it’s because He wanted to express His own limitations? Or to show just how limitless He is? From our perspective, YES - God was, and is, and is to come; however, this does not mean that from God’s perspective, the past is not in present tense. Make sense?

It’s supposed to explain how

A) God is limitless, and
B) How God is limited

Now that I think about the supratime scenario, though, I don’t suppose there’s a “need” for limitations as I was thinking before when the Father was “stuck” in a static state with only the Son to express Himself (as the scriptures say he does). I’ll have to do some more thinking about this… fascinating, really…

EDIT: Quickly, though, I see a solution… God must be limitless. God must also be limited enough to be able to have a relationship with creation which causes Him to become, as it were, limited. So God must have a limitless ‘side’ in order to have these relationships. And this ‘side’ of God is, in that being which is the essence of all life, another person completely. So the Son partakes of the Father’s limitless nature, while the Father partakes of the Son’s limited nature as they interact. The ultimate loving relationship. And God the Father creates through His Son a world - creation - which is within, and held together by, their relationship. That last part would take some stringing together of verses to corroborate, but it is most beautifully illustrated by scripture (namely John 1 and Colossians 1).

So, in short I guess my solution is that they are not helplessly and statically shut off in their own modes of existence, limitlessness and limitation, respectively, but partake of each other’s natures. But each is the essence of their own mode of existence that they take a part of (God being limitless because He is the Everlasting Father, and the Son being limited because He is the Perfectly Submissive Son).

#58

M: For any creature who exists in time, God “was, is, and is to come”…

T: But where do you get that, Michael? The text doesn’t say it. It’s making a claim about God. HE is the God who was, is, etc. I’m not saying it’s impossible that the meaning is contextually limited as you suggest, but that position should be motivated by something in the text or by unambiguous claims made about God elsewhere, and I don’t see that we have either here. Besides, how’s God really viewed by us as temporally (as past, present, and future) realted to us if we all KNOW God to be timeless? If we know God is REALLY timeless and has no past, present or future, then shouldn’t that truth prevail and determine our faith? I think so. But once we’re given over to the truth that God is timeless, it’s difficult to see the relevance in describing him as the GOD WHO was, is, and is to come. If divine timelessness works for a person, I wouldn’t try to take it away. But it jus doesn’t solve any problems for me.

M: …but “I AM” does seem to imply more than that to me.

T: How does one DO this, i.e., tease out the implications for such an important question, based on this text? I mean, how does one argue that the writer intends to imply something about the temporal status of God’s existence given the context? By what hermeneutic is this accomplished? What would even be the point (in context) for God (or the author) to introduce the consideration of God’s timelessness?

M: Also, I don’t think even Zimmerman would ascribe an endless temporal past to God.

T: I don’t know. Maybe not. But no text in Scripture that I know explicitly takes up the question of God’s relation to time sans creation. These verses are describing a God in relation to the World, i.e., God ‘since’ creation. That’s our context, right?

M: If actual, linear time (as we know it) existed endlessly before creation, how would God have transversed this endless past to arrive at the point of creation?

T: Seems like I’ve heard that somewhere before! ;o)

M: How would He remember His first thought, when there was no first…

T: Well (to just play along), if there was no first thought then he WOULDN’T remember any particular thought as his first.

M: Remember that the future is only a potential infinite, not an actual infinite (and it’s never actually transversed, so there’s no problem there)–but if the past is an actual infinite, God would have to have transversed it to have arived at the point of creation.

T: I feel the force (well, ‘some’ force) of the argument. But again, find the notion of an atemporal God freely choosing to abandon timelessness for a temporal mode of existence equally (well, moreso actuall) unacceptable. I’m just working from what I ‘DO’ know (or believe)—i.e., that God is now temporal and related to the temporal world—and working back from there. I don’t know HOW to get God from this back to the frozen solid stare of primordial timelessness.

M: The problem this raised has been framed by asking the question “why not earlier, or later,” but that’s not the real problem. The real problem is that there’s no way out of an infinite past.

T: As there seems to be no way “out of” an atemporal existence. So where do we go?

M: If the past is represented by an infinite timeline, there’s no point on that timeline at which creation could have ocured, because there’s no point at which that timeline ends (and another timeline, representing time since creation, could begin.) Put another way, there’s no present (and there was no time at which the moment of creation became present) because the infinite past never ends. That’s the problem Leftow, Zimmerman, and Craig are addressing.

T: Right. I get all the arguments against an infinite past.

M: And that’s why simply saying that God has a “straightforward temporal existence” (and created the universe at a point in time as we know it) is a logical inconguity.

T: Oh well there I wasn’t talking about God sans creation at all. I was just quoting John’s description of God. I don’t think John had God’s temporal status SANS creation in mind at all. I think he was worshipping the REVEALED God—who speaks, acts, saves, chooses, etc. Whatever God is SANS creation, given John’s description, I’d say God is at least now (since creation) temporal. That much is Craig’s view too. No more atemporal anything since creation.

M: I think there’s truth in what all three men say, but there must be some sense (as they all say) in which time had a beginning. Do you disagree Tom?

T: I can’t adjudicate my way through to a firm convinction on it. I wouldn’t mind buying Craig’s arguments against temporal eternity IF he or someone could really make sense of God’s fully personal, loving existence as timeless sans creation AND also how an atemporal God freely and contingently chooses to create. Basically I’m more troubled by ‘atemporal personhood’ than I am by an ‘infinite past’.

Tom

#59

Stellar: If God is timeless at all it must be at the same time as being temporal. Make sense?

Tom: Not really. Sorry! I’m pretty familiar with Craig’s arguments on God and time, but I’m not following ya. Craig believes that God is timeless sans creation and temporal since creation. He doesn’t think that God is timeless AT ALL now. That is, when God decided to create, when he let go the “Let there be…” God abandoned a timeless mode of existence and irrevocably embraced temporal existence for our sake. He doesn’t think there’s anything “timeless” about God now that creation exists.

Stellar: Let’s put it this way. God’s nature is unconquerable and undivided love. It is the supreme state of existence for a being.

Tom: Then my default position is that God is temporal, for I believe temporal existence (for a being like God) to be superior to timeless existence in every conceivable way.

Stellar: Therefore his decisions are not indecisive (divided in thought, as choosing between options) but absolute sovereign preferences that would not be any other way.

Tom: Why in the world think that Stellar? If you take that view, then you’re bound to embrace the ‘necessity’ of creation. But why believe God can’t be faced with EQUALLY loving/good options?

Stellar: To put it concisely, being what He is, He would not have made any other decision.

Tom: Then we have different intuitions and beliefs about God’s “being,” for I can easily imagine God being the fullness of loving triune relationality and choosing NOT to create at all. Nothing about God’s nature or essence, as I understand it, ENTAILS his choosing to create.

Stellar: …but God is self-sustaining. I don’t claim to know for sure the answer to this mystery, but somehow God is sovereign over everything and His nature is not dictated to Him (and something must dictate).

Tom: Right. I don’t think God’s nature is dictated to him by someone or something outside God. But neither do I think it makes sense to say God “chooses his nature.” For volition (to choose) IS already nature.

Stellar: The whole point is to paint the picture of a God who is beyond all limitations, even that of the future. A God who has access to all things at once. I see nothing wrong with painting the picture of a supratime - in fact, I think it gives a much more dynamic, real and personable God.

Tom: I guess we have different intuitions and values motivating us, and that’s cool. Overall we’re standing within Orthodoxy, so I’m not passionate about changing other peoples’ views. BUT…I don’t think we make God greater by attributing to him concepts and statements that don’t mean anything to us (well, to me at least)—and supratemporal existence is as meaningless as it gets. It’s like wanting to avoid limiting God by saying he can draw a square circle or make a married bachelor, you know? Are we really ascribing greatness to God by saying he can do these things? I don’t think so. In short, I don’t find God’s being a fully temporal being to be a “limitation” upon him at all. I find timeless existence to be the ultimate straight-jacket and then I find Ross’s super-time to be quite limiting as well besides being providentially useless.

Tom: When I think of God as the great “I am” I don’t imagine at all that the writer is speculating on the temporal status of God’s essence or anything like that. I think, far more simply, God wants to reveal himself as an ever-present, abiding and sufficient reality for his people.

Stellar: That latter statement is exactly what I was trying to express.

Tom: But we can express it without supposing God to be timeless (or supratemporal).

Stellar: Why do you think that God described Himself as He who was, is and is to come?

Tom: To differentiate God for US who were not, who came into being, and who might not be here tomorrow because we’re created and frail beings. God never came into being and cannot pass out of existence. That, I take it, is the point. But that’s doable without supposing God to be supratemporal. Just plain temporal gets the job done as well, and fits the context better.

Stellar: From our perspective, YES - God was, and is, and is to come; however, this does not mean that from God’s perspective, the past is not in present tense. Make sense?

Tom: I totally understand your point, Bro. Really. Been on this for a long time. The whole “eternal now” view is very popular too. ;o) I’m just disagreeing.

Tom

#60

Only Lefow might be saying that God is really (and solely) timeless, and has no past, present or future.

I think you’ve misunderstood him.

That would be saying God was atemporal BEFORE creation, not that He is atemporal BEYOND creation.

I’m sure Craig would agree that God could no more wipe out His atemporal sans-creation existence by creating a temporal universe, than He could wipe out His temporal existence by annihilating this universe.

And “was” (having a temporal past) doesn’t necessarily mean having an infinite temporal past.

Science would suggest that God’s temporal past (in the time He created with space) is at least 14 billion years long.

Is that long enough to qualify as He who “was, is, and is to come”?

I think it is.

The fact that you don’t see the logical difficulties involved in an infinite past eternity somehow leading up to the moment of creation (or that your able to shelve them so that they don’t cause a problem for you) doesn’t justify pretending that they don’t exist.

Any theology (be it process or open) that would require us to believe in a God who exists only in time, and already existed for an unending eternity before He decided to create anything (when the logical difficulty here has been recognized for millennia) would in effect shut the door of heaven to anyone who was able to see the difficulties.

It’s like saying “forget Gallileao, you must believe a stationary earth is at the center of the universe.”

That’s what you’re doing here Tom.