God's Sovereign Will(s?)

Faith & Science Conversation
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I’ll answer your earlier/other question later, when I have more time. But this is an easy and fun question to answer…, I think compatiblism is easily explained by considering almost any fictional time travel event. The Star Trek deep space nine episode “trials and tribbleations” is a great example:

Captain Sisko and his team go back in time and witness the events of Captain Kirk and his crew. They Use their historical records to determine all sorts of Details about where Captain Kirk, the Klingons, and the others will be and what they will be doing at any particular time.

Therefore, on the one hand, From Captain Sisko’s Perspective, Captain Kirk’s actions were written in stone, predetermined, and he knew unerringly exactly what Kirk would be doing at certain points (assuming they did not interfere with the timeline.) There was zero possibility that Captain Kirk would deviate, and do something else. His actions were certain, predetermined, set in stone.

at the same time, no one I have ever seen or read who discussed that episode objected on the basis that Captain Kirk had magically been turned into a puppet, his actions being forced, his free will being completely taken away from him… No, instinctively I think we all understand that absolute foreknowledge of an event is completely compatible with free will on the part of the individuals involved.

QED: Captain Sisko’s absolute, unerring foreknowledge of a person’s choice was completely compatible with that individual having genuine free will.

But what about predestination itself, where someone actually chooses or actively determines the course of events? To illustrate this I would go back to the original Star Trek episode. “city on the edge of forever”: very briefly, due to all the time travel science fiction, Captain Kirk had a unique opportunity to choose between two alternate timelines. He had unerring knowledge of which way history would proceed based on the choice he had to make. He essentially had the ability to choose whether the allies won or lost WWII. He chose for the allies to win that war. but is there any way whatsoever that we would think that Kirks ability in that moment to decide which way history would proceed in someway magically took away the free will of Roosevelt, Stalin, or any of the actors or individuals in either the moment or in later history? of course not. Kirk’s knowledge of later events, and his decision for one particular Timeline to proceed rather than an alternate one, had no impact whatsoever on the free will of the individuals involved.

QED: Captain Kirk’s choice of one particular timeline out of two was completely compatible with all the individuals In that timeline having genuine free will.

Now, if we imagine that an infinite, omniscient, and omnipotent creator God who exists outside of time has the ability to shape the timeline of the Universe at every moment, in every situation in much the same kind of way That James Kirk was able to do in that one particular moment… Shaping the timeline, or even choosing one path to proceed among the infinite number of possible, alternate competing timelines… Then it becomes obvious to me that such a God could absolutely predestine and plan whatsoever comes to pass for his purposes, in such a way that does absolutely no violation to the free will and free choices of any individual person.

QED: God’s choice of one particular timeline out of the literal infinity of other “possible worlds” is completely compatible with all the individuals In that timeline having genuine free will.

essentially, compatiblism maintains that something happening can have two entirely separate yet compatible “causes.” Did the allies win WWII because of all the individual free choices that Hitler, Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchhill, and all the other people made? Or because James Kirk chose that outcome over an alternate one? both.

Did Joseph’s brothers betray him because of their freely chosen intent to harm him? or because God chose to send Jospeh into Egypt in order to save their lives from the famine? both. Was it Joseph’s brothers, or God, that sent him into Egypt? both. “It was not you who sent me here, but God.” “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good.” Was it God, or desert raiders, that took away Job’s livelihood? “The Lord gave, and The Lord took away… shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” both. both, both, both.

And was Jesus executed because of the free, uncoerced choices of lawless men? or because it was according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God? both.

both.
Both.
BOTH!

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Well explained! Thank you. And I’m totally on board with all that - in fact, I’ve never really understood what the difficulty was about foreknowledge somehow being incompatible with free-will. Even though you’ve already given excellent examples - and from Star Trek no less! - I can’t resist yet one more simple example: If I’m re-watching any movie, I already know how it unfolds - it’s all scripted from my perspective. But that doesn’t mean I’m the one dictating said events. No - I just happen to have narratorial “omniscience” as far as that film is concerned. [Of course then we could talk about scripts and actors and authors and who really had ‘free will’ in all that. - but the original point still stands.]

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Well, while we are discussing Star Trek, we have been watching Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and Capt. Pike has foreknowledge of his and several cadets death in later years, and has the opportunity to warn the cadets to not be at that place and time, but was given the opportunity to see what would happen if he changed that timeline, which was the death of Spock and intragalactic war, so he elected not to interfere with cadets choices to join Starfleet, even with the knowledge that they would die under his command in the future.
That leads to the question of not whether the past is fixed, but whether the future is fixed as well. God knows all that is knowable, but are there some things God only knows are likely, given the decisions we have yet to make? Are prophecies of future events sometimes conditional? what does that say about God’s foreknowledge?

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@Daniel_Fisher ignores a key distinction here, though, in his presentation of “compatibalist freedom”. It ignores the Calvinist claim that God not only determines events, but also the wills, natures, desires and “choices” of the actors in play… So, counter to the analogy, it is not only just like Sisko going back in time to observe what Kirk had done, but of Sisko creating captain Kirk’s character, inner desires and nature, and then watching Kirk behave according to those desires and wills that Sisko had determined Kirk would necessarily have! Sure…from Kirk’s perspective he may “feel” he is making an unconstrained choice, but in reality, this is just an illusion because he could not have behaved otherwise because God created his desires.

A shorthand definition of compatibalist free will is “the freedom to do what one desires” with the proviso that in a Calvinist system, God predetermines and creates everyone desires and wills. But a Calvinist actor cannot behave against God’s will by definition, because God has decreed all.

In contrast, Libertarian free will stresses that the person has his own inner agency that arises within him/herself (not determined by God) to choose A versus B. In other words, Libertarian free will holds that the actor had the true ability to have chosen otherwise (and even behave against God’s will if one so chooses).

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Hi Jim,
This gets into the philosophy of an “Open Future” and links in to one’s definition of time, and God’s relationship to it. As a presentist --a believer in the A-theory of time (one who believes that only the present time exists), I think the future is not fully settled and there are some contingent events in the future that simply can’t be known until they occur. So yes, as an “Open Theist”, I affirm that God is omniscient (knows all that can be known about the past and present, and knows some aspects of the future based on that, and the knowledge of how he can act and determine some events) but that he simply can’t know future contingent events with certainty.

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And I will have already jumped ship before this point too (Of course, I’m not a Calvinist to begin with…); but what I hear @Daniel_Fisher saying is that the “Sisko controlling Kirk like a puppet” would be only a caricature of Calvinism (or compatibilism) and not an accurate understanding of it. But I’ll leave him to answer your charge for himself - or to correct me here if that actually isn’t a caricature. It seems to me that this moves beyond “mere” omniscience to omnipotence; but doesn’t stop there either - must move beyond omnipotence toward an irresistable will to use that omnipotence for complete control [as in … just as there is no such thing as an insignificant jot or tittle in ‘the Word’ - so also there is no insignificant or non-ordained event of reality]. Several exit ramps exist along that whole way.

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This reduces predestination to foreknowledge.

Yes, as in when David asked God if the people of a town would surrender him to Saul, and God said “Yes” – but David left the town, so it didn’t happen.

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In other words, Kirk has less freedom than an actor following a script – he can’t choose even so much as gestures or do an ad-lib!

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I am sorry but although the examples explain your position they do not fit with God.

Basically you are claiming that once the action has happened you can predict it in retrospect. That is all very well except that ordaining or predestination is not looking backwards. Yo are saying that Jesus knew what would happen because it had already happened to Him which produces a temperal paradox. (and there are several of those in Star Trek as well.)

In your examples the people who knew were not involved themselves. Jesus cannot know what will happen the first time around, that is the paradox. There has to be a first time.

This means that God is not controlling or ordaining, He is just knowing. and Jesus , on earth only knows what The Father reveals, not the details, otherwise Jesus would be able to change what happens and therefore it would not be the happening God sees. (You see the paradox)

The Net result is that God is not in control, or even able to change anything. He is not omnipotent as much as impotent. compatibilism doesn’t work.

Richard

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I recently had to do a book review of Kathryn Tanner (a prominent reformed theologian) for the theology class I was taking. She argues for the Tomistic understanding of compatibalist free will. This has some strange implications for prayer IMO. Here’s a clip of what I wrote in my review:" (according to Tomistic theology) The causal chain between creator and creature moves only in one direction. In a theology committed to defining sovereignty as all-controlling, God must be said to creatively will (cause) the prayers of people, knowing he will act in accordance with them. In Tanner’s view, prayers are just God determining, prior to creation, that he plans to let himself be determined by a creaturely petition that he arranges.

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Well, not exactly ignoring it, but one can only say so much at a time.…

The problem is, in any conceivably practical way, if this is what people want when they say “libertarian free will” that is simply not such a thing.

Something predetermined our nature, and thus desires, and that something wasnt we ourselves. Even in an atheistic universe, devoid of God entirely, then it was the laws of physics, chemistry, the initial composition of the universe, the gravitational, constant, the entire evolutionary process, our ancestors choices, our mother’s diet when we were in utero…

All these things created our natures, and innate desires, no? (Or did I on my own, In a sheer act of free choice, decide that I would start desiring food every time my stomach got empty?) So bottom line is that in the compatibilitist sense I am describing, our choices are just as truly free as they would be had there not even been a God predetermining anything.

When people demand this level of utter and complete autonomy in this most extreme libertarian sense for us to have free will, and suggest that absolutely nothing be permitted influence our choices, not even our very nature, that seems utterly absurd to me. By very definition, any entity or being that is neither self-existent, nor self-created did not determine its own nature. something Created our nature, that nature that shapes our wills and choices …and that something was not us.

There simply does not exist in any conceivable universe the kind of libertarian free will that you seem to be demanding if we are to have real “free will”.

*edit to add:

So, rather, Calvinism, at this point, is not making some kind of novel claim, as much as simply acknowledging the completely obvious, axiomatic, and inescapable fact and reality that something determined our nature, and that said something was indeed our creator God.

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if God exists outside of space and time, as both the Bible strongly suggest, and as his nature would demand, then he, by definition, knows the past present and future. Otherwise, by definition, then time is a power greater than he is, and God is limited to it, which is especially strange, given our understanding that the flow of time is not something rigid.

prophecies of future events can certainly be conditional, Search planes are all over the Bible, Nineveh is perhaps the best example. I know some people like to try to suggest that this was an example of where God was taken by surprise and changed his mind… But the point is that both the Ninevites and Jonah certainly understood and interpreted said prophecy as conditional or contingent or tentative. If the Ninevites had believed it to be 100% certain, then what is the point of repenting? Either just eat drink and be merry for 40 days, or pack up your stuff and move elsewhere. Jonah, likewise, was completely not surprised by God’s changing course, and even complained loudly about it… “I knew you were going to change course and not punish them!”

I don’t know if that says anything specific about God’s foreknowledge, though. He had for knowledge of Ninevah’s eventual repentance, but also had the foreknowledge to know what they needed in order to spur them to repentance, hence why he sent Jonah With the message of judgment in the first place.

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No. Libertarian free willers (:slight_smile: would recognize that God created matter and physical laws but would reject that these factors operating deterministically (which you are assuming they do) are sufficient to account for the conscious choices of free agents (such as humans) in the universe.

You seem to be assuming a “strawman” definition of Libertarian Free will. Holding to Libertarian freedom does not mean to say that our choices occur in a complete vacuum with no influences whatsoever. The range of options that one may choose is indeed limited by many factors like laws of physics and where one was born. But the fact that I can’t follow my desire to fly because I didn’t evolve wings wouldn’t negate the existence Libertarian free will, as defined. It only means that I have the true deciding option (based on my own desires and deliberations as an independent agent from God–i.e., with a will not fully determined by God’s creative act) to chose between alternate courses of action.

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Well … okay … If that was all Calvinism was claiming, then there wouldn’t be much to quibble over. But to say that our agency and free will have been influenced and even circumscribed by prior circumstances (and/or including God) is a rather trivial claim. Of course I can’t fly or run 60mph or hold my breath for hours on end. But that’s hardly any kind of knock against the conviction that humans have at least some agency (free will). It was always agency within physical limitations. But if God pre-ordains that I should make a choice that brings harm to my neighbor (something that falls well within what we do accept agency and responsibility about), and then I’m indeed held respsonsible for the “choice” - that’s what people would object to. I have no objection to God who, knowing me perfectly well, knows that I will make a bad choice and then folds that into his ultimate plan - that’s what I believe God actually does. But God left it to me to make that choice - I wasn’t forced into it. That’s where I object. A God that orchestrates or is the architect of evil would not be the loving God of Christ, in whom no darkness is found at all and who we are called to be perfect just like him - and shown what that perfection looks like by Christ himself.

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i think i understand what you mean there, however, perhaps we should try to paint it in a positive light…that we are Gods because He created us (whether by Darwinian Evolution or YEC) and He seeks to redeem us unto himself?

Isnt the idea that God tries to “defend/protect” us in the same manner as a shepherd tends to his sheep? So in this way, we are His possession…God owns all creation.

its a rather funny twist that whilst He owns us, we have the choice to condemn ourselves . Seems to me that if one thinks of it this way, its not such a wide gap between Christianity and Communism :thinking:

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great point Mervin…great point :heart_eyes:

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I count myself as some sort of supporter of Libertarian free will - not totally free will but free to choose between the few alternatives we are given at a moment.

Free will does not exclude the possibility that God knows what will happen. I think the Star Trek example given by @Daniel_Fisher (Captain Sisko going back in time) shows the possibility that a time traveler can know what happens if he travels backwards in history. In a similar manner, God can know what happens if He is not bound to a fixed point in time. The key question then becomes: is God tied to a fixed point in time?

‘God is’ is a profound statement about God, with multiple meanings. If we think about time, ‘God is’ suggests that God is present in all the points of time. If we assume that even time was created by God, God should not be tied within time in the same way as those He created. My current interpretation (hypothesis) is that God is present at all the points of time, simultaneously (not tied to one point in time). That gives Him the possibility to know what the free agents choose, like a person reading about past history. At the same time, He is present at the moment when the choice is done and the previous time points, giving a possibility to affect the choice of the free agent if His plan demands it. Foreknowledge and overall control (God) with limited free will (humans).

We do not really know the relationship between God and time, so my interpretation is based on an assumption. Yet, I do not see any necessity that would tie the Creator of time to a given point in time. The different hypotheses about time are interesting but until someone can prove what time really is and we have a solid explanation about how the Creator is related to the time He created, we have just assumptions and hypotheses.

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These questions are interesting to ponder and speculate about, I agree! This post may take the thread a little off-topic so I won’t dive into a lengthy response here. Just to say, I used to think the same thing (that free will was compatible with God’s foreknowledge of contingent events) until I bumped into some work by Dr. Alan Rhoda (a Christian philosopher and Open Theist) which convinced me that it is logically impossible. I hate to foist a youtube video on people, but this one is excellent in the way it is structured with diagrams etc., and it explains three models of the future: Determinism, Open Theism, and Non-open Free Will in a way that is fairly clear (for a very complicated topic!).

Who says God created time? Other analytic philosophers say that time is an inherent property of God (that God as a relational Trinity has existed eternally as a succession of moments), i.e., God has always experienced time. Just not in the same (limited) way that we do, perhaps.

oh, the placemarker for where he addresses the simple foreknowledge model and shows how it can’t work starts at 23:50 However, some of the terms may be difficult if you don’t watch the intro of the video…

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Hum. Perhaps so, but if we consider creation as an ongoing process, then perhaps the future has yet to be created, thus God’s foreknowledge is that of knowing the possibilities and being omnipotent, his ability to act within those possibilities to effect his will.
One related thought is whether God can change the past. I remember reading an essay where someone was commenting on prayer for a result on something that had already happened, but that they did not know, and whether that was theologically possible. The event in question was the fate of a lost purse, but you could make the same argument for a biopsy result. The tumor is or is not malignant, and the biopsy only gives knowledge of what it is and has been for awhile. It is not Schodinger’s cat. We can of course pray for miracles and for healing, but that is a little different. Any thoughts? I cannot think of any examples in the Bible where God changed the past, but maybe have missed something.

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Yes, Open Theists would say that God knows the (as yet nonexistent) future as it is…which is partly as contingent events that are not yet decided. If you have time, I recommend the video by Alan Rhoda in my previous post. Classic theologians have difficulty with the concept of God experiencing time because it runs up against the doctrine of “impassibility and immutability” which states that God cannot change. However, in my mind, those are ideas are based more on Plato and Greek Philosophy which got incorporated into theology, rather than being based on the picture of God from scripture (or modern analytical thought of what a relational being must be like)…

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