James!!! It’s so good to see you here! And I’m glad, glad if I said anything that blessed you, dear brother. I agree that our Father is big enough and wise enough and loving and powerful enough that He need not discard any part of His creation.
Incidentally, I can resonate with your experience. I’m not sure either, whether I got those ideas via teaching or just in my own head. Even to a small child, something doesn’t sit right about the whole traditional hell doctrine and you have to, in your mind at least, mitigate it to some degree. The problem is that none of it is enough. It’s putting a bandade on an amputation. If God is good (and He is) then He doesn’t throw people (or other precious things) away.
Thanks for the lovely welcome back, Cindy It was indeed a blessing. I thought it profound, and it led me to that next bit about God being the God of dead ends, and broken things, which gives me immense hope.
Yes, mitigating hell even into a tiny corner of creation where They Had Their Chance and really it’s not so bad still means that in some corner of God’s universe, He has to put up with evil existing. It makes no sense to me. Worse, it seems to contradict the mercy we know He is capable of. Mercy trumps judgement every time.
Talbott addresses this in Inescapable, starting on p. 92. That said, here is a post on that topic I wrote a couple of years ago. Eternal Destruction from the Presence of God, in case you don’t have Talbott’s book. The revision is due out sometime soon, so I understand any reluctance to buy it just yet. There are several posts: a couple on the meaning of “eternal,” then a short story that’s not relevant to the topic at hand, and then one final post on the Thessalonians passage. I’m not a scholar like WLC or Talbott, but they’re short and might be of interest if you have the inclination.
WLC says:
For this to be true, God would have to rescind the sinner’s free will permanently, in order for the sinner to forfeit, forever, his free will to choose salvation by failing to choose salvation at any certain point in time. This makes no sense to me. If God holds our free will in such reverence (as I believe He does, and I think WLC thinks too), then how could we say He puts an end to it at some point in time, never to restore it?
WLC says:
I think I’ve probably addressed this to the best of my ability in the above post. It seems a weak argument to me. WLC may be correct in stating that we can’t say for certain that creating a world in which all will freely accept salvation is a possibility, but he can’t say for sure that it IS impossible either. Given that we’re told unequivocally, by no less personage than Jesus Himself, that with God all things are possible, I think the argument slants toward God’s ability to bring about that which He has clearly stated He desires – that all men repent and believe the gospel.
WLC says:
I don’t think there’s been any mention here of torture. I don’t remember specifically what Talbott’s view of purgatory is, but it seems unlikely that he views it as torment by literal flames. Beyond which, while there are narratives in the OT in which God apparently commands genocide (though I would argue with this view of the meaning of these scriptures) there are no commandments to physically torture enemies. Nothing of the sort, anywhere at all. If I’ve missed something, please do point it out, but I can’t think of even one off-hand. If God’s punishment consists of allowing the sinner to experience the pains he has inflicted on others, I suppose that might in fact involve a form of torture, but I suspect it will be a spiritual and not a physical thing, and inflicted by shame rather than by some brute method that physically repeats what the brute has done to others. “You will bear your shame,” God says to Israel.
What’s more, when a child repeatedly goes back to school and bites another classmate, we repeatedly remove him from that situation and do our best to show him why this is wrong. Is that manipulative? Hardly, imo. We will continue to set the child on the right course until we succeed. If we fail, we’ll eventually be incarcerating him for some greater abuse, again to prevent (and we hope, to cure) his propensity to hurt his fellow beings. The goal is that he will stop doing that. We will manipulate and manipulate in this way and yet we will never see it as shameful to do so. We consider it shameful if we eventually are forced to surrender and place the offender under a sentence of death. God however has no such necessity. Should He ever be brought to such shame? I honestly don’t think so. I think He wins. He doesn’t have to quit just because WLC thinks He’s too manipulative.
WLC says:
I think he’s contradicting himself here. He wants it to be possible that a rational being resist God’s will forever, yet he has to resort to irrationality to make that coherent. If a being is irrational, then that being is not free. I agree that for some it could take a very, very long time to submit to rationality. Nevertheless, I look at the length of eternity and I shake my head. God can (and must if He is to uphold free will) bring rationality to the most irrational, and rationality will submit to perfect love. I don’t know what WLC is going for here. He even agrees (it seems) that MAYBE God could do it without acting (as he deems it) with impropriety. Yet he insists on believing that in fact God probably cannot do it. Why get off on that side of the horse when we know from scripture that “nothing is impossible with God?”
WLC quotes Poe:
I don’t want to make myself out as anything special at all – but this mystifies and horrifies me. I can’t think of a time when I’ve done this. Probably I have done it at some time, though. I’m old enough to have forgotten a great many things. That said, this is so offensive to my nature today that I can’t conceive of doing a vile thing simply because it is vile. I might do it because I want the results of it, but even then it wouldn’t be worth it because I would (in my experience) torture myself incessantly for months and even years after doing even a vile thing that others might consider minor. The shame is excruciating. A person who would do this sort of thing just “because,” with tears streaming down his face as he did it, is NOT fully sane. The man in the story is, I suspect, not sane at all, which is probably the point. Poe is a wonderful writer, but I can’t stand to read him.
And yet Jesus has the keys. “Fear not, for I have the keys to death and hades.” Why would He get the keys, if hell can only be locked from the inside, and if it is improper to use the keys? All those who want out can and may come. The others may and can remain within. He has the keys, but is powerless to use them because it would be an intrusion? I am so not buying that. If my daughter locked herself in her room for months and years, yet I, having the keys, failed to enter and do my best by my own and others’ resources to draw her out, and it were found out? Would you think I should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law for abuse and neglect? And aren’t God’s ways higher and better than ours?
Furthermore, if God has not the power to save, then it’s His obligation (as One whose mercies endure forever) to at least put the sinner out of his misery. The philosophical classic, “Ol’ Yaller” comes to mind. The beloved dog cannot be saved and therefore, as a matter of mercy, must be annihilated. It would be obscene to maintain him in a miserable life separated from the family and with no hope of ever recovering from his disease. See how pompous I sound after just a little bit – reading WLC? I never read him because the little I do read, he just grates on me. Maybe he’s kinder and less autocratic to the atheists he debates with. I hope so.
WLC says:
Here again, WLC resorts to insanity. Need I repeat? The insane are NOT free. They are slaves to their defective minds, and if their minds are defective, God must heal them if He wants them free. If He heals them, they will no longer BE insane. Thus they will no longer eternally resist every solicitation of the Holy Spirit. It would be insane to do so. Craig says so himself, and I agree with him. The mystery to me is that some resist every hope that God is greater than our hearts, greater than our sin, and desires that all men freely repent and believe the gospel. I don’t get this guy; I truly don’t.
As for the mystery of iniquity, I think that refers to the man of lawlessness, not necessarily to anything Craig is talking about here. People have been arguing for centuries as to what this phrase means. It seems to me Craig is just using it as a convenient figure of speech (though no doubt unconsciously) to lend apparent scriptural authority to his argument. People do this all the time. I think they figure they’re right, so it doesn’t much matter if they take scripture out of context – besides they’ve been hearing it and doing it for so many years that it’s as unnoticed as breathing. You see? I think I may have done the same thing in the paragraph above with “greater than our hearts,” though I’m not sure it doesn’t fit. I’ll leave it as an example in any case.
Hmm . . . maybe Talbott did express himself poorly here. I’m not sure of that though. I think that the illusion of the self-benefit of moral evil IS probably self-destructive/self-corrective. The longer we remain in evil; the longer we try to benefit ourselves by it; the more we will inevitably see our efforts fail. Eventually the illusion cracks. It does not follow that hope is the result of that. Without Jesus’ destruction of sin and death on the cross, there would be no escape whether or not we recognized the dungeon into which we’d placed ourselves.
WLC says:
No. This is incoherent in so many ways I don’t even know where to start. God obliterates the knowledge of a lost and beloved spouse from your mind? Really? How many holes would that leave in your memory of your life? Does He obliterate the knowledge of the loved one from the minds of people who didn’t love her? Sheesh! How many holes would that leave in your life and the lives of others? How could we have any cohesive memory of our lives in this world at all? This is the reason the RC church posited that very thing. There is no recollection in heaven. But then why go through this whole painful exercise at all? If there’s no recollection there can be no learning. All the lessons we’ve learned through such suffering will necessarily be gone, for the memory of the experiences is absolutely essential to the lessons learned. We won’t even be able to remember that Christ died for us. That would open up the whole painful affair of sin and the need for redemption. What’s more, God holds this secret in His heart of hearts: that most of the people He created are now tormented in hell and will be for all eternity – and it is He who is tormenting them and has ordained their never-ending agony. Either that or, as WLC doesn’t hold, He’s destroyed them and that portion of the image of God is permanently obliterated. And THAT is what WLC calls beautiful? AARGH!
WLC says:
This is only marginally better. Yes, the joy of a moment can make us forget (for a moment) the sufferings of a loved one. I suppose it’s possible that the beauty of Christ could drive the thought from our hearts for all eternity. That said, this is hardly scriptural. It’s nothing but speculation. And more than that, the whole commandment of Christ to love even our enemies is contradicted here. If we love our enemies, how can we never even think of them or inquire after their well-being? God will distract us so that we’ll never think about those we love – not even limiting this to our enemies, but those we have naturally loved in this life? He’s never going to allow us the space to think about this – for our good? Is this truly respectful of the free will of the saved? Is it not manipulative and deceptive? The more I think about it the more offensive it becomes. I think of a man keeping a woman continually in a drunken haze so she won’t reflect on the fact that he’s killed her miserable snotty little brats and buried them under the cellar. He’s doing it for her good of course. The children were ruining their lives. She was clueless as to how to raise them, and while he might have saved them, it would have violated their free little wills, so he did the best he could – and she kind of knows they’re gone, but he won’t ever let her come to herself enough to allow the horror to float to the surface of her mind.
Conclusion: This is the first of Craig’s works that I’ve read clear through. Maybe his other stuff is better. It sounds like he badly wants his side to win as opposed to wanting to know the truth – whatever the truth might be and whether or not the truth agrees with the things he already knows.
Not to minimize your ideas at all, Myshkin. I just disagree with this article. I know it’s not my business to defend Father, but I dislike Him being spoken of this way. I’ll read the other two as well, but I probably won’t comment on them tonight. Jason would do a better job – this is more his line than mine – but I’ll do the best I can. I’d like to see Talbott’s response to this. I looked in the TOC of his book but didn’t see anything. Maybe it’s on his blog – I think he has one . . . .
I was also thinking about God in that example of our memories being blanked. Who blanks His memory? How is HE supposed to cope with that knowledge forever?
A lot of these “answers” to universalism don’t take God’s feelings into account at all, and i find that even more offensive than any of the other monstrous suggestions, as monstrous as they are.
WLC does talk about God. I probably just didn’t post that bit – it’s a long article. He says that God knowing of the damned but sheltering us from that knowledge is His ongoing sacrifice for our joy. He will bear that sorrow alone, according to Craig’s speculations. Hell, He’s CAUSING the sorrow in that view. If He can’t save them He ought at least to annihilate them. Craig seems very fond of his view, defending it beyond all reason that I can see. But he’s a brilliant man I guess – only I wonder if he’s not just a little too fond of “winning.” His arguments don’t seem to me to be very cogent. After having read Talbott’s reply, they seem even less so – but I haven’t read the third link which is, I suppose, Craig’s rebuttal.
Wow! I think yours is a most hearfelt plea for universalism. I very much want univ. to be T. I’m sorry you are disquieted by WLC’s ideas. I don’t find myself to be advocating them especially, only in the sense that, we must, as champions (or would-be champions such as myself) of the view that seems “too-good-to-be-true”, be willing to subject them to criticism, even if only to prove to those who are the fence that universalism can withstand the critique of “traditional” (though this a loaded word, if universalism was prevalent among the original disciples) Christianity’s best mind.
WLC perhaps is fond of winning. Many are afraid to debate him, thinking his oratorical skills will get the better of them. However, I think he is fair, and rarely takes cheap shots or shies away from the tougher questions. Talbott conceded that Craig was at least willing to commit himself to all the logical entailments, good and bad, of his view. Talbott, I think, is a very intelligent and creative philosopher, and raised a number of excellent points, but is slightly less focused IMO than Craig. (Though sometimes Craig uses “focus” a way of keeping the exchange on his level.)
I think there is a great deal, as you powerfully described, abhorrent in the traditional view, and perhaps Craig, being staunchly traditional, is insensitive to this. It is an extremely difficult debate, tho, in the sense that both views pull in opposite directions convincingly - should one prefer free will or universal happiness as the greatest good? If you prefer free will, you’ll side with Craig; if universal happiness, you’ll side with Talbott. (There is a sense you could side with both, for Craig admitted that all persons could freely come to Christ - that “soft” universalism is possible, however unlikely). I believe, that at least from a human standpoint, that the compatiblist #3 choice, though defensible, usually practically reduces to determinism or free will, and often conveniently shuttles from either. Talbott, I think, tries to have his compatibilist cake and eat it, too, by asserting that a free rejection of God is intrinsically impossible. I think that Talbott showed that, if we do have post-mortem opportunity to change our minds, then the inexplicability of rejection is increased to an almost absurd level. But I don’t know if he has shown that rejection is logically impossible. Though perhaps Talbott’s Congruism (or “hyper-Congruism” as Craig dubbed it), where God’s grace perfectly preserves human freedom and yet infallibly secures our salvation, is a viable soteriology.
Well, I doubt you’ve ever felt the need to do a vile action a la Poe. Your reflections on universalism make it plain that you are an exceptionally moral person. Yet, I think Craig’s point, which Talbott subtly dodges in referring to human imperfection, is that the Bible holds that sin is offensive to God, and that, according to that traditional reading, we are all sinners and are at least capable of inexplicable behavior and culpable for it (though not, as we both tend to think, with infinite punishment). CS Lewis argued that many of us simply haven’t been really tempted to realize our darker sides, either due to affluence or genetic gifts of niceness. In Lewis’ words, “we are all rebels that need to surrender”. Universalists, I think, tend to downplay the more traditional sense of sin; yet, I think, if you hold like Craig does, that we are “in bondage to sin”, then it is reasonable to ask if we really have true freedom. Craig, though a “rational” believer, upholds the more paradoxical Lutheran soteriological view that, though we are in bondage to sin (unfreely?), we are yet responsible for it. Calvinism, I think, though more revolting on this point, is more consistent, by affirming that God determines destiny. (period)
Despite Craig’s intuitions about sin, I don’t think universalism is entitling or humanist and I don’t think he showed that universalism is unBiblical (though he dogmatically declared this at several pts in the exchange), nor did Craig show that universalism isn’t the better option for God, if God has a wide freedom of choice as to what world to actualize. The only thing I believe Craig demonstrated was that Talbott couldn’t assert that the traditional view was demonstrably or incoherently false. Talbott maintained that it is impossible to freely choose against God b/c that would be, in effect, a spiritual suicide, but, as we know, sadly people prefer that, though I suppose Talbott was arguing, in the afterlife, that this choice would shown to be more and more futile (whereas people who sin on earth aren’t thoroughly disillusioned as to the futility of their sin). Lewis, I think, made a powerful argument that Craig neglected: imagine just an averagely prideful person in the presence of God, a being infinitely more beautiful, intelligent, noble, etc. Just as even average people (except for you ) are envious and jealous on Earth, just think how painful God’s presence would be to an insecure person, and how great the urge might be to run and hide instead of trust. To what extent would God have to hide Godself to avoid this reaction (would such hiddenness be “freedom-removing” as Craig mentioned?)
Regardless of one’s stance on sin, I think a deterministic eternal Hell is monstrous (and, in effect, Craig holds, despite being a Molinist, a deterministic Hell by saying our freedom to accept/reject JC ends at death) b/c the punishment far exceeds the crime. But a Lewisan Hell is more plausible (let’s say without the deadline of the sun as in the Great Divorce), and Craig’s arguments toward freedom bolster Lewis’ position I think. Do you think that Talbott has shown that Lewis’ Hell is logically incoherent (or unlikely)?
I don’t remember that Talbott even talks about a Lewisian view of hell, though it’s been a while since I read through his book. He may have. I have a tendency to internalize ideas and then forget where the seeds came from. My view of Lewis’ hell is that, if you’re going for scriptural, it doesn’t match anything you’ll find there. It’s a completely understandable means of mitigating the horror of the idea of hell, and I used to buy it, but I don’t any more. Jesus and John talk about hell as though it’s a place of torment – outer darkness, weeping and gnashing of teeth, a lake of fire and brimstone. I think people in hell WILL be in agony, though I don’t think visualizing literal flames is reasonable.
In scripture fire is almost always symbolic of purification. Actually, there are probably some places where it doesn’t symbolize purification, but I’ve never been able to think of any of them. Back when I was trying to come up with excuses for God – sending people off to never-ending torture – it occurred to me that God suspends something of our apprehension of His presence now, but in the future He won’t do that. There really will be no shelter from His presence (a shelter which Lewis does allow in his version of hell). I said to myself that if the holiness of God’s presence “burns” and torments those who hide iniquity in their hearts, is that His fault? You understand, I desperately wanted to get Him off the hook for hell. But what if His presence burns away all the nastiness – and the faster we let it go, the faster it will be destroyed? The lake of fire is depicted on at least one occasion as being in the throne room of God (the sea of fire and crystal) and we’re told that the wicked are tormented in the presence of God and His holy angels. Is it the presence of God that torments them? I think this is highly likely. What we experience as delight and joy and peace, the sinner clinging to his sin experiences as fire and anguish.
To be honest, I think Craig gives us a great deal more credit for being free than we can rightly claim. I think we can have meaningful freedom without having a completely libertarian free will. We’re influenced by so many things (forgive me if I’ve already said any of this) – our genetics, our place of birth, our childhood and our adult experiences, the situations in which we find ourselves, our physical and mental health and more. We have little if any control over any of these things. Many scientists contend that we have precisely no free will at all, but I find their arguments ridiculous. If we have no free will, they’re wasting their time discussing or even thinking about that or any other topic. That said, I doubt we have quite the vast expanse of free will that Craig would like to believe. As I said, I think our freedom comes with developing maturity.
This works so well for me that I admit I’d be loathe to let it slide, but with sufficient evidence I would do that. I always used to wonder whether our free will would be suspended in “heaven,” because if it wasn’t, how could we be sure we’d always make the right choices. But that’s not the way it is at all! When we’re free, we DO make the right choices. We can be sure that we’ll continue to live according to love precisely BECAUSE we are finally free enough to do that. We’ll have no fears, no sorrows. There will be no chance of suffering lack or loss, and so no motivation to steal or cheat (especially as, being free from sin, we’ll not want to do unloving things).
If we’re not ready yet for that degree of freedom, well there’s hell for that. I think there’s an element of punishment there, but I also think that the punishment is simultaneously the treatment. Jesus’ sacrifice makes it possible for us to be free, but we still have to grow into His image. We still have to work out our salvation. He’s opened the door; it must be walked through, but there’s no other direction to go. Walking through that door will be a hell of fire for some, and for others, just a salting of fire. But once anyone is able to abide His presence, it will be fullness of joy.
I think Craig misses this process in his obsession with free will. He says that Talbott is begging the question by implying that if a person chooses against his own best interests, he must not be rational enough to make a truly free decision. I’ll concede that any angry hateful person may in fact so choose, and may even do so for quite a long time. Craig’s hypothesis only works, though, if the time is kept limited. Unless we toss in the idea that the sinner will continue to fester and become more and more virulent and hardened in his sin (a hypothesis that’s incoherent with all things being summed up in Christ, imo), any rational, free person will eventually concede. And yes, if they don’t concede, they’re not rational – because that is not a rational thing to do.
A common rock that Arms throw at us URs is ‘what’s the point of evangelism if everyone is going to get saved in the end?’. (To which, of course, we reply that true salvation only comes from knowing God, through Christ, hence it is imperative that we all get to hear - and freely accept - the Gospel, either in this life or the next.)
But if Craig’s particular brand of ECT Arminian Molinism is true, soteriologically, then *all *attempts at evangelism are fundamentally unnecessary. Indeed, the Great Commission itself becomes redundant. If God knows in advance who will accept the Gospel and who won’t, and makes eschatological decisions on the unevangelised on this basis, then - despite Craig’s insistence that the evangelised must make a decision for Christ *before * death, and if they don’t, they’re damned eternally - evangelisation is, in fact, unnecessary for salvation. All those Arminian missionaries forging trails into the remote parts of the world to bring Christianity and a shot at salvation to the heathen are wasting their time (the Calvinist missionaries were *always *wasting their time regardless ).
Taking this line of argument to its absurd, but logically consistent conclusion, most people would be better off *not *being evangelised: if they’ve never heard the Gospel, they can’t be damned for rejecting it, and will instead be judged on their *potential *for accepting it - and surely a just, righteous and loving God will give them plenty of leeway in this area. In other words, the only non-evangelised damned souls are those who God knows, through his middle knowledge, would *definitely *have rejected the Gospel.
Excellent point, Johnny.
In a way, Arminianism crosses over and enters Calvinist territory there. Predestination becomes true.
Doesn’t sound like my God, and doesn’t sound like the freedom we do have.
I can see us being judged by the measure of freedom we have, and i can see freedom being given and taken like the talents in that parable.
but i still don’t see it being forever, and i don’t see it being hopeless.
Good point, Johnny! (And very good to see you ) You’re right – Arminianism does so easily cross over into Calvinistic territory, and vice versa, I think. It doesn’t seem to me that it works – if you think it through – but it’s necessary because neither camp is really coherent on its own. The Arms have a weak God with no elements of Calv, and the Calvs have a monster God without the influence of Arm. We on the other hand (preen, preen) have Baby Bear’s God – He’s j.u.s.t r.i.g.h.t! That sounds like we’ve refined Him to fit our preferences, but I don’t think it really works that way. He is what He is, but scripture testifies He is both all powerful and all loving and that His justice is a corollary of His essence – which is love and light.
Myshkin,
I was thinking about your post as I was resisting getting up this morning. It occurs to me I didn’t do a very good job of answering it. You (and Craig) probably do have a point about the native perversity and unwillingness to bend one’s will to another. I think maybe you and WLC see this as a battle of wills. I’m not sure Father sees it that way. I don’t think He’s like that – to roughly insist on imposing his will on another. He’s our Father. He wants to build us up. If we perversely insist on opposing His desires for us simply for the sake of willfulness even though it hurts us horribly, that’s probably immaturity, but it could go to the level of madness in extremes. That’s my opinion – I suspect Talbott shares it in at least some degree or form.
The concept of cutting in line because one can or cutting someone off in traffic doesn’t resonate with me. I’ve known people who brag about similar things and I just don’t get it – because these are people I know – people whom I know to be otherwise quite acceptable people. Why do they think this is fun or gratifying? It’s a mystery to me. They’re all male, so maybe it has something to do with that, although I’m sure there are females with similar tendencies. Is it nature? Nurture? I have no idea. My besetting sins fall more in the realm of “niceness” as you so gently put it. Hypocrisy, for fear of giving offense even where offense would be the greater kindness. Always wanting people to think well of me. People pleasing. It’s hard to resist that because I do have a strong need for acceptance and people seem less likely to accept you if you offend them. Yet sometimes you MUST offend others, or by refusing to do so, sin against them and God. If they reject you because of it, well that’s the price you pay. You have no choice. The bewildering part for me is to know where to draw the line. Since I’m a moderator here I’ve had a chance to practice this at a distance (safer?) but I still struggle with knowing when to move in, when to ignore, and when to back down.
That said, I agree that none of us know the depth of depravity to which we might go, given the opportunity, power, motivation, etc. We might well do it for the sake of what we see as righteousness as I expect Calvin and Luther and others – probably some of the papacy as well – have done. Or it might be we would even do it for ourselves without needing to disguise our selfish ambitions even for our own personal consumption. Some people do horrible things for “love” of their children. How many of us could slot right in beside Hitler, given the opportunity? If we have that inside us, it has to be destroyed for our good and the good of others. No root of evil can remain buried in a child of heaven – like some hideous amoeba waiting to overtake us, causing destruction and pain and displaying what we’re really capable of. If I’m not envious or jealous (and I hope I’m not – perhaps I would be so in the wrong situation) it’s only because, being old, I’ve had time for Father to purge most of that out of me. At least I hope so. It’s painful getting rid of that sort of thing.
I think you’re right about the reaction of the prideful person to God’s presence. I guess that would be the shame He speaks of in Isaiah “You will bear your shame” at things we’ve done, at our own minuteness, dinginess, not even spectacular wickedness but only mediocre, petty badness, perhaps. The thing is, we’re sort of His project (though it takes humility to appreciate that as a good thing) and we’re to be conformed to the image of Jesus – who is the exact image of God. He desires to make us glorious and He’s up to the job. So the person who attempts to run isn’t quite grasping the humility and the goodness of God. What’s more, I kind of think that God hides Himself for the present, but that at some point in the future He’s going to stop doing that. The wicked are tormented in the presence of God and His holy angels. Is it His presence that IS the torment? His holiness meeting our remaining filth? Jesus said we would all be salted with fire – is this part of what He meant by that?
Anyway – sorry for writing you another book, Myshkin. I hope I’ve done a bit better than I did at first.
I think you’re arguing that universal happiness is a greater good than libertarian free will (and even doubting that, given our creaturely condition and God’s omnipotence, that libertarian free will is possible). I am inclined to agree with you; I want everybody to be happy and reconciled to God and, clearly, we aren’t free in the way God is free. I want to be fair Craig’s position. It is not implausible. Though “free will” has been debated throughout the two millienia of christian thought (think of Luther-Erasmus exchange, or Augustine and Pelagius), I think most, to some degree, think that human freedom is a great gift of God, perhaps the best gift. Craig’s modern appropriation of Molinism is actually quite an interesting solution (or attempted solution) to the predestination-free will dilemma.
Rejecting God, as Talbott argues, is a special case, for if we understand that God has our best interest’s at heart, then rejection of God is akin to self-destruction. But isn’t it still possible for a fully rational person to say “No”? What if that person is like many atheists, who reject God b/c they think God has allowed too much suffering. What if the person rejects God precisely b/c they can’t stand that God is God? Do you buy Sartrean despair, in that everybody fundamentally wants to be God and can’t be? If Sartre is right, then fully rational people might permanently resent not being God, even though God loves them. I hope and want to Talbott to be right that eventually all will see that resentment of God is futile, but I don’t know if Talbott has proved that people won’t react negatively to God’s greatness. I studied theology in a milieu that was somewhat dismissive of the classical attributes of God, and many had adopted process theology, and I think process theology is a popular move borne of out of a resentment of a being having so much power over us. But despite my disagreement with process theology, I wouldn’t be prepared to say that process theologians are irrational, they just think that for the world to be fair, God shouldn’t be “above” (though I think their apprehension of the classical God is due to a pessimism that even God can be corrupted by absolute power).
Peter Kreeft has argued that different religions and philosophies all point to the T, but are incomplete next to Christianity. Pertinent to this discussion, Kreeft said that Socrates, only having a Deistic notion of God, argued that ignorance was the greatest sin, but Christ came along four hundred years later and defined sin as not a deficit of the intellect or knowledge but as an act of the will. Would you say Talbott is more Socratic in his notion of sin as being due to irrationality? If sin is fundamentally willful, then would full rationality make a difference to our acceptance of salvation?
(BTW, I am curious to read Talbott’s The Inescapable Love of God, but it is not in any of my local libraries, nor can I find it even used for much less than $20-25. Yes, I am a cheapskate , but it is hard to justify $25, when most books are $10-$15 on Kindle. I am aware that maybe universalism, being an unpopular idea, costs a little more to publish, so maybe I should consider as a donation to the cause, but any ideas on where to find it cheaper?)
Johnny:
It is hypocritical for non-universalists to accuse universalists alone of making evangelism moot. Craig is aware that Arm. Molinism might be perceived as vulnerable on this point and has written on the subject. reasonablefaith.org/molinism-and-evangelism. I can’t say that I buy the reasoning totally, but he has interesting ideas, such as the tendency to confuse indicative and subjunctive conditionals (e.g. Craig says it is fallacious to think we know what God would do providentially based on what we actually do.)
I’ve decided I’m going to be both a Calvinist and a Universalist. Reality is a paradox. Paradoxes are both/and. When I transcend the rational mind of either/or thinking into the both/and all opposites hold together. The rational unites with the heart as it becomes both either/or and both/and. I love good and hate evil. God is both in control and we are responsible. Christ commands obedience from the heart so that we don’t feel obligated. God both loves and hates His enemies. He both punishes and purifies. This is what we see at the cross. As we enter into a faith union with Christ the old self is destroyed by God’s wrath as grace brings to life a new self. This is what happens to those in the lake of fire. They are both punished and purified. The old self is destroyed as a new self is created. The elect for whom Christ died are the few who find life in this lifetime. The second fruits are those who will be baptized in the Lake of Fire. Both God’s chosen and the reprobate will be purified as all is reconciled to God. The first will be last and the last will be first. This is why I’m both a Calvinist and a universalist.
It is possibly possible, Myshkin. For whatever reason, a rational person may say “no.” He may be angry – incensed – that God’s allowed so much suffering in the world. The thing is, this rational person is lacking information. He doesn’t fully know and understand that God is good (unless of course God ISN’T good, in which case we’re all in a lot of trouble!) He may say “NO!!! I want nothing to do with a God who would allow X to happen!” But then, on seeing that the victims of X are now filled with joy, no longer suffering even in recall, reconciled with their former oppressors (or healed from any emotional/mental/physical trauma from a natural disaster, etc., and even made richer by the experience, all out of proportion to the suffering they endured) and that X or the possibility of things of X’s sort were always necessary in order to preserve freedom – once he’s truly seen this to the point that he’s satisfied it’s true, the rational thing would be to relent. Maybe he would refuse at first, but for him to continue to refuse for all eternity would seriously be irrational.
Wanting to be God is possibly a large chunk of the theme of the Garden narrative, but this is sin that Christ died to set us free from. God’s presence alone should purge away that residual – probably faster if the person willingly lets it go. If he’s unwilling, then I think it has to be taken anyway, just as you’d pull your little boy out of the ring at the local drag races if he somehow managed to get in there. He might be rebelling, kicking, screaming, but out he would go, quite completely contrary to his little willfulness. As he matures, he’ll no longer desire to enter that ring (except maybe as a bonafide participant), but if he does continue to try to enter the ring unauthorized, during races, then adult authorities (and possibly mental health professionals) will continue to keep him out of there whether he wills it or not. We don’t always get what we want. Sometimes we don’t even get to continue to want it, if wanting it is irrational and/or harmful.
I’m not sure disagreeing with process theologians, yet still considering that thy are rational is quite the same as what we’re talking about. They’re not holding their theology out of petty willfulness, but because they think they’re right. (Or I hope that’s the case – I guess it isn’t always.) They’re holding their beliefs because that’s how they interpret the scriptures or evidences of their preference. Theoretically, they should be willing to come to a different conclusion based on additional information that would prompt such a change.
But even if a sane and fully informed person does have the capacity to hold on to his willfulness, and Father knows that this will continue forever, I think He’s obligated out of love to heal that person. We are what we are, and that is not necessarily a choice we’re able to make. If it’s possible to continue, being of sound mind, etc., to resist God’s gracious will for our lives, then there’s something very wrong in the spirit of us – something evil – and the something evil has to go. Whether or not your child agrees to go to surgery to have a malignant tumor removed, it’s your duty as the parent of a minor child to do what seems the best thing for her even if that means going against her will, even in this extreme and intimate a situation. You are forcing her to submit to her body being sliced open to remove a toxic presence that is in fact a native part of her own body – a procedure not even guaranteed to succeed. Most children probably trust their parents enough to willingly allow this even though they’re afraid, but if your child is unwilling, it’s still your duty to do your best for her with or without her blessing.
We’re made in the image of God, and God submits. He’s humble. He listens to His creatures, and if we can take it literally, allows them to change His mind – Abraham, Moses, David – these men all begged God to change His mind, and God submitted to their pleas. Jesus submitted to the Father, and I think it’s likely that (given He’s willing to submit at least in some way to His creatures) God the Father also submits to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, and the same all round. Granted this is a limited submission – a submission that doesn’t contradict His will and that probably is fully within what He wanted in the first place – nevertheless, would He have changed if they hadn’t asked Him to? If God asks a man to submit to what is in service of that man’s natural will – to be free and happy – and that man refuses, well, there’s something wrong with that boy! And if there’s something wrong, and God is who we believe Him to be, then He will have to fix it. No one else can, after all, and if the man’s broken, it’s not because he sat down one day (sound of spirit and mind and body) and said to himself, “What I really want to be when I grow up is a sorry, miserable, tormented, twisted SOB.”
I don’t agree with Socrates, but I’m not sure Jesus defined sin as an act of the will. I’m open to it – it’s just that I’ve never heard that and it seems to contradict what Paul said in Romans about our being slaves to sin, and doing the thing he hated – therefore it was no longer he who did it but sin that dwelt within. Jesus obviously expected His followers to exercise their wills to obey Him, but is sin an act of the will? It’s an interesting question. Sometimes it is, but whether that defines sin – or all sin – I’m not sure that’s true. In your example of jealousy – is that an act of the will, or does it rather take an act of the will to stop it? I suspect that much of the sin we commit is more an act of the flesh in general than of the will specifically (though you might justifiably include the will in the flesh). Jesus died to set us free from sin and its consequent death. We can now (in His strength) will not to sin. It still needs working out, but it’s possible. We can also yield our members as servants of sin whether because we so choose, or because we aren’t paying attention and end up back in the old rut by default. That said, I didn’t pay a lot of attention to Talbott’s view of sin. Mine is closer to the idea of it being an act of will. If we do things in ignorance, then do they bring guilt? I think probably not – where there is no law, sin is not imputed. If we have an intrinsic knowledge that what we’re doing is wrong, then that’s a law of sorts, but if we’re truly ignorant, I think that scripturally, it isn’t charged. Just glancing through Talbott’s book, he also seems closer to Keeft.
I understand your reluctance to pay so much for a book. I found this link while trying to find out when the new revision is due out – sometime this year, I think. I was trying to find out and came across this little website: thomastalbott.com/index.html . Some of the chapters are available for free pdf download on the front page, and he has a link to a pdf copy of the book which he says will be $6, but when you get to the page is $24, so I’m not sure what that’s about. They’ll let you have the first 25 pages free, so that’s worth something. I suspect Talbott doesn’t update this site very often. Anyway, you can get part of the book free. And if you decide you want the whole thing, let me know. I have an extra copy somewhere but I dread trying to find it!
I’ve read Craig’s arguments at the link you posted, and find them pretty feeble. He starts off by trying to dodge the question with some diversionary spin about a positive impetus for evangelisation (“I can bring souls to Christ”) being preferable to a negative impetus (“I’d better evangelise because if I don’t some souls might end up in hell”) - to which I say a resounding ‘so what’? While this may be perfectly true, it isn’t germane to the question at hand.
He then continues to drop a trail of chaff in dodging the real question - the redundancy of evangelism, given God’s middle knowledge. It may well be true that some of us, me included , confuse our indicative conditionals with our subjunctive conditionals, but this - once again - has no bearing on that real question.
If you ask me, the whole concept of God’s middle knowledge is incoherent - at least when welded to an Arminian theology. As both James and Cindy (hi guys ) have pointed out, Craig’s brand of Arminianism is, viewed through his Molinist lens, well nigh indistinguishable from Calvinist determinism.
Consider Craig’s attempt to refute the assertion that a Christian shouldn’t feel bad for failing to evangelise a particular individual:
There are a myriad of problems and contradictions within this short paragraph extract. For example:
“God may have arranged for”? Doesn’t sound very Arminian to me. And even if it were, why should God not have “arranged for” the non-evangelistic Christian to do the evangelising?
" … it may be that had he been obedient and gone, then God would have used him to bring them to salvation". Of course. But the fact that he was disobedient and didn’t go is irrelevant, because if, under his middle knowledge, God knows that the person *would have *responded positively to being evangelised, then the person will not be lost regardless.
" … [if he had been obedient and evangelised, God] would have created other, different people who would have been even more responsive to his message, so that even more people would have been saved!" This statement is meaningless, nonsensical. How can it be that God’s creating a particular person or persons is contingent on the actions of any pre-existing individual?
Craig continues in this nonsensical vein by trying to convince us that evangelism is actually worthwhile, because the very existence of the people we fail to evangelise might be dependent on our evangelising them. In other words, something we don’t do might lead to the person we don’t do it to not existing in the first place! That sort of contradictory metaphysical sleight of hand would be laughed off screen in an episode of Dr Who. And in any case, has Craig forgotten in the space of two lines that just because we don’t evangelise a particular person it’s a simple matter for God to “arrange for” somebody else to do the evangelising, so our lethargy is of no ultimate import.
And still the original question - what’s the point of evangelising real people (not imaginary might-have-beens) if God has middle knowledge? - remains unanswered.
Craig is a brilliant apologist, and I admire him in many ways. But on this subject he flaps around like a drunken seagull and then disappears up his own backside, methinks. And he does so because he is trying to do the impossible, to square a philosophical circle, to have his doctrinal cake and eat it. If he were honest he would either admit he cannot justify the necessity of evangelism, given the reality of God’s middle knowledge, or give up the idea of God’s middle knowledge. But if he did that he’d be stuck with the deeply unpalatable fact that God damns millions of people eternally simply because they were unlucky enough not to have heard the Gospel. Of course, if he gave up the idea that God damns people eternally at all, his problems would vanish at a stroke. And then he could join our forum .
I admit i’m speeding through a bit at this point, but wanted to echo what you say in response to the statement that Jesus defines sin as an act of will.
I feel that Jesus defines sin as something we do by default. He points out sin that we commit that we either think is fine (in our thoughts), or in ways we may not have thought of sin before. For example, the Pharisees thought they kept ALL the law and were far from being sinners. Jesus said they sinned in their hearts and that they were hypocrites…possibly a totally new sin to them. Furthermore, He “sinned” by healing on the Sabbath.
Jesus to me redefined sin, not as doing something on a tick list of “bad things”, but as a default way of being. He told us we are evil, but have enough good in us and enough knowledge not to give our children bad things when asked for good things (undermining Total Depravity as a doctrine, i might add…we are clearly capable of recognising good in His own words). However, we sin by default, in all aspects of our being. Paul (as Cindy says) shows that we are slaves to it. We are thus NOT free.
I would say that future happiness and reconciliation = total true libertarian freedom. We are not free now, but the truth will set us free, and one day we shall know the truth (even as we are known). Who could possibly hold onto some grudge or even their pride in the face of that? Some for a bit, maybe…but God knows how to get them. God is infinitely wise, and the best debate opponent in the universe.
Whatever measure of freedom we have now will respond in joy to His persuasiveness, and we will become even more free: free to know and do all that is good, and free to escape from all the evil we could not even perceive before.
Oh, that is tragic, I don’t think anybody wants, in their heart-of-hearts, to be unfaithful, unloving, destitute of God, etc. I think a big part of the pain that hurting people have is the comparison they inevitably make to the better person they could be. And sometimes they (or we, b/c I think even faithful people have had this exp, but again, perhaps you’ve haven’t had this sort of experience ) just cannot see how to get there from where they are. Maybe they are dogged by insecurity and defeatism. Maybe they are too “scientific” or “commonsensical” to believe in the supernatural. Maybe they are resentful.
Hmm… it is circular… we are accountable for sin (and this accountability would seem to put us on a relatively high level with respect to God, though far from equal); yet, we are also in bondage to sin, so that we are far more immature than God.
And Jesus compared Himself to a physician. O.K. You are winning me to your view … but I think we have to be careful, b/c we have to ask the following ?s if we throw away, or mostly sweep aside, freedom:
If we aren’t free, then why would God subject us to the “veil of tears”? Why not Heaven immediately?
If we aren’t free, then why are their many Biblical references to our responsibility for sin?
If we aren’t free, then what sense does it make to evangelize (I’ll borrow this from JohnnyP)?
I guess for me, if we through out (or significantly discard free will), and arrive at deterministic universalism, I am utterly stumped by #1. If God loves us all unconditionally and God will guarantee our salvation, what reason would God have to allow anybody, esp. sometimes the best of people, to doubt that love or to just be soaked with pain their entire lives? That seems unnecessarily cruel. We have, I assume (please forgive me if I am wrong), relatively comfortable lives, with time to meditate on God. Yet, we know that millions and billions strive and have striven and often die b4 having time to reflect on the meaning of their pain. Why, then, if God is a universalist and a determinist, would God allow many lives to be full of gratuitous pain? Now, I realize that Paul wrote about our earthly suffering not meaning anything in the joy of eternity, that all our Earthly pain will be retroactively cancelled or transmuted. That is a beautiful and hopeful teaching. Yet, I also believe, just as Christ experienced the totality of Hell in a finite period, so also can human beings have tremendous despair - a whole eternity of Hell, in finite moments, so intensely that it seems impossible to cancel or transmute. We talked about Craig being silly or wrong to argue that the Beatific vision would remove our memories of loved ones, but should we be hypocritical and say that it will nevertheless remove memories of all earthly sufferings?
Johnny:
I share your perplexity with Craig’s Molinism (though I am very intrigued about his, or Molina’s, of God’s providence encompassing His knowledge of the counterfactuals of our freedom), but, I think we should be charitable to him, for he is trying to square the circle, or reconcile something that does appear irreconcilable in our binary logic: determinism and free will. It may be a hopeless task, but it is also wrong IMO to deny that both determinism and free will seem true. Are you a 100% believer in determinism, or 100% believer in free will?
First, I really think the veil of tears is part of becoming. That’s a very long topic and I posted recently on the problem of evil or pain or something similar, so I’ll try to find that and post the link. Not that I could ever have the definitive answer. As you know, many long books have been written to address that topic and I wouldn’t even think of classing myself with the scholars who’ve written them (especially since I haven’t even read most of them!)
Second, I wouldn’t say we aren’t free at all – just that we aren’t free enough. Even a slave has some responsibility for his actions. I do think the responsibility for sin is limited though. To whom much is given, of that one much is required. Father wants us free from sin. That requires a fundamental change in our very persons. I think the help for this has always been available. Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Moses was the friend of God. Tamar was faithful to her relationship, desiring to produce an heir for her husband who was dead and Judah said she was more righteous than he. Was she? Maybe – even despite her dubious methods. Rahab believed and hid the spies who came to her and became an ancestress to Jesus. David was a man after God’s own heart. Elijah ascended in a chariot of fire. These people were all BC, but they had a measure of freedom from sin – some more than others. I think what Father wants from us is that we grow and develop and strive toward the truth. If we do that, He can and will help us.
Because of the systemic disease of Adam’s race though, none of us can achieve satisfactory headway against unrighteousness. We’re swimming upriver and we haven’t the strength for it. We’re responsible to give it our best effort, but Father understands we won’t make a lot of progress. Maybe part of the point is that we see how much progress we can’t make. Since Jesus came to set us free, I think we’re responsible to follow Him. If we don’t, and we’ve had the opportunity but refused it out of willfulness, we’re going to smart for it. That might be a chastisement or simply the natural result of our actions. Either way, it’s bound to be unpleasant.
Third, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. He sent His Word and healed them of all their diseases. His Word will not return to Him empty but will accomplish all that He sent it out to do. The word and the Word have power. People encounter the Word mostly through the word in our mouths or from our pens or keyboards or whatever means of communication we use. Evangelism is planting the word. It helps to start the process of making people free.
So . . . I’m off to try and find my last theodicy post . . .
You guys are chipping away admirably at an immensely profound and difficult subject - one many of us here have debated before, as have far greater minds than ours for millennia (or mine, at least ). I think you all make excellent points, and ask excellent, challenging questions. And my honest belief is that some of those questions are, quite simply, unanswerable - this side of the veil. In much the same way as I think a full explanation for the so-called ‘problem of evil’ is beyond our finite minds, I think a full understanding of the necessary corollaries of a truly free creation is beyond us also.
(One of my favourite observations on this subject is Bob Dylan’s song Tempest, about the tragedy of the Titanic. Dylan pictures the anxious relatives waiting for news of their loved ones, trying to make sense of the disaster: “They waited at the landing / and they tried to understand / but there is no understanding / for the judgement of God’s hand”.)
And vitally, I do think we inhabit a truly free creation. If creation is not free, then, as you imply in your first question to Cindy, Prince, what’s the point of this vale of tears, what’s the point of existence full stop? None that I can see. If strict determinism is true, then God is a moral monster, and a twistedly sadistic one at that - or at least he would be, were such a being even possible, which it isn’t, in my opinion. Hence my contempt for, and dismissal of, the doctrines of hard-core Calvinism. No, freedom is essential to theodicy.
I would go so far as to say that a truly free creation is both the only one worth living in, and the only one worthy of our magnificent, righteous and loving God. By which I mean a creation in which everything - people, animals, viruses, cancer cells, plants, rocks, rivers, oceans, hurricanes, comets, stars, everything - is free to act according to its created nature. From the macro to the micro, from a supernova or a volcano to a subatomic quark or lepton, every non-living thing is free to be itself, to do what it does in its own nature - hence the sometimes deadly destructiveness of the natural world.
Things start to get very problematic once we talk about living things, animals who are able to make decisions about their behaviour, and hence about the destruction they cause. And of course they get even more problematic when we talk about moral animals, ie us. Our moral freedom is a wonderful gift from God, and an essential attribute of our privileged status in creation. But oh it is a terrible, terrible burden, and more dangerous than any earthquake. Was God right to give us that freedom, you ask, given the terrible things we have done in abusing it? My answer is yes. But I confess I speak it through lips quivering with doubt.
Of course, as your question to me implies, Prince, there is no such thing as 100% freedom. The Bible holds in tension the concepts of God’s sovereignty over events and our powerlessness to save ourselves, and our responsibility in our actions, our culpability for our sins. Determinism and freedom, they are there in the Bible, and surely they are there in nature too:
While I consider myself ‘free’ to act as I wish, I do not believe in strong libertarian freedom, because I am predisposed, preconditioned if you like, to act in a certain way, to make the choices I do, by all sorts of factors over which I have little or no control - my genes, my upbringing, my environment, my life circumstances. And of course my conscience.
Consider this question: am I free to torture and murder a child? In a very important sense I am. If nobody else intervenes to stop me, I am free to do that heinous thing, as long as I am prepared to accept the consequences if I am caught (imprisonment and the utter opprobrium of society). But in another very important sense I am not, because my conscience forbids it. For me, it is inconceivable that I could or would ever do such a thing. Obviously there is no reason for me to want to do so, but to take an absurd hypothetical example, if a philosopher challenged me to do it to ‘prove’ that I had strong libertarian free will, with a cast iron guarantee that nobody else would ever find out about it, and I would suffer no repercussions whatsoever, I still wouldn’t be able to do it. Neither, I suspect, would he.
And lest we forget, that freedom - the freedom to torture and kill children - is the freedom God gives us. For me, there is no understanding of that.
Two more thoughts and I am done, for now. James, you say that “future happiness and reconciliation = total true libertarian freedom. We are not free now, but the truth will set us free, and one day we shall know the truth (even as we are known).” I would question that. I have come to believe that the sort of freedom we will have in the eschaton is freedom from the burden of moral choice. I’m not sure, but I think it was Jurgen Moltmann who articulated this concept, that as long as we have to make moral choices we are not truly free. This doesn’t mean that we will become moral robots in heaven, but that once having truly and freely embraced God in all his benevolent omnipotence we will effectively hand over that burden of moral choice to Him, and give up the power to sin (a power which was an essential component of our getting to that point of free acceptance in the first place).
And lastly, on Prince’s point that rational people may choose to reject God eternally, out of some sort of Sartrean despair, Thomas Talbott makes the point that what God wants for us is, at bottom, what we also want for ourselves - ie our own complete, total happiness. Surely anyone who does not desire her own happiness is not truly rational, is still in bondage to sin, or illness, or whatever, and hence still in need of God’s grace, or more of God’s grace? That’s how I see it anyway.
It was indeed a blessing. I thought it profound, and it led me to that next bit about God being the God of dead ends, and broken things, which gives me immense hope.
I never read him because the little I do read, he just grates on me. Maybe he’s kinder and less autocratic to the atheists he debates with. I hope so.
I just looked at your second link and I see it’s from Talbott. Thilly me!
But he’s a brilliant man I guess – only I wonder if he’s not just a little too fond of “winning.” His arguments don’t seem to me to be very cogent. After having read Talbott’s reply, they seem even less so – but I haven’t read the third link which is, I suppose, Craig’s rebuttal.
) are envious and jealous on Earth, just think how painful God’s presence would be to an insecure person, and how great the urge might be to run and hide instead of trust. To what extent would God have to hide Godself to avoid this reaction (would such hiddenness be “freedom-removing” as Craig mentioned?)
At least I hope so. It’s painful getting rid of that sort of thing.