A Divine Cliffhanger?

Even for God not all goods are simultaneously possible, or what the experts call "compossible."

Oh?

That's right. You can say God decides, but once he decides, it's one or the other: this cosmos is not that cosmos. So, even for God A = A and not B. A decision is a limitation, so you can say God is the Unlimited until he limits himself by deciding. 

Sounds trivial.

Well, as we've been saying, 

The values in a divinely determined world are not available in a world where the creatures are free to make undetermined choices (Rice). 

For example, the attainment of truth or the exercise of love are not possible in a determined world. In other words,

the values available in a world where creatures have the freedom to make choices would not be available in a world where God's decisions, or decrees, apply to everything that happens (ibid.).

Unless you posit an arbitrary God who rules by whim, which would then render him unintelligible in principle.

But God is the principle of intelligibility.

I think so. If our principle of intelligibility is grounded in unintelligibility, we've got problems. 

Down here we are limited by Gödel's theorems, in that our own models and systems can be consistent or complete, but not both. However, God must be complete by definition. Must he also be consistent? Or is that asking too much? Can God himself simultaneously be A and not A? 

Certainly he is full of paradox, or rather, it is difficult from our end to speak of God without the use of paradox, or what we call orthoparadox. We might say that orthoparadox happens when finitude tries to describe infinitude. 

Is it paradoxical to say that God is all-powerful and that man is free? Only if we presuppose "a zero-sum distribution of power in the world, according to which there is only so much power to go around."

But why should we think of power this way? We don't think of God as limiting his happiness or his love, for example, by creating beings who are capable of these qualities. What compels us to think of power in this way?

Analogously, the Declaration of Independence talks about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and one man's happiness doesn't detract from mine. Unless I am one of those DEI obsessed individuals driven by envy, in which case one man's happiness diminishes my own. 

But is God so petty as to begrudge man the freedom to pursue happiness, as if it detracts from his own? It remind's me of Mencken's definition of Puritanism, "The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy." 

What if a world with creatures free to pursue happiness expresses the divine nature "more fully and adequately than one in which God decides everything unilaterally"? It doesn't mean that God doesn't have his preferences, only that his preferences cannot come about in a determined universe. Some preferences can only occur if they aren't coerced. For example, we all want to be loved, but we can't force someone to love us.

Same with God?

Apparently: it requires "a higher kind of power"

for God to accomplish his purposes in a world where the creatures' choices are genuinely their own than in a world where God's creative decision includes all that happens.

God is not haunted by the fear that someone, somewhere, is exercising his own free will. Rather, in a truly open reality -- which is to say, an open cosmos with open minds -- and 

whose future is not foreknown, God manifests divine power by pursuing his objectives in response to the decisions of the creatures. Their decisions are truly theirs, but God creatively responds to their choices in ways that serve his purposes.

So, creation is a power sharing arrangement?

Why not? Not to belabor the point, but it 

entails a higher form of power for God to empower his creatures to act and to inspire them to cooperate with him than for God to achieve his objectives unilaterally.

Indeed, what kind of achievement is it -- and what is the point -- to play a game in which the outcome is entirely determined beforehand? It's like the problem of men in women's sports. The men are going to win every time, and how sporting is that? 

This leads to the problem of the Incarnation: is it totally determined ahead of time, or imbued with human freedom every step of the way? 

That's the big one.

Yes it is, because where is the merit if it just follows a predetermined script -- if every detail has been programed from all eternity? If it is All God and no man, what does it even have to do with us? Rather, it seems to me that the Incarnation should be the quintessential case of the power sharing alluded to above. 

Rice only touches on this, for example, citing a process theologian named Zbarschuk who suggests that with the incarnation "God's power is 'limited, cooperative, partial, dependent, and open to failure and defeat.'"

First, is it possible that the events of the Incarnation are more improvised than scripted in advance? And second, is it possible that it could have ended in a massive fail? 

Well, in a sense it was a fail, in that it sure looks like Plan A was to convert the Jews, otherwise why bother with all the preaching and teaching? 

Was Christ's passion "plan B"? Why else would Jesus pray for some other way? The whole narrative presupposes that Jesus' "obedience was a choice, not a foregone conclusion." If he had no choice, there goes the merit, and indeed, there goes the man (i.e., the man imbued with the freedom to accept or reject God's will).

These are deep waters.

Murky too.

The question open theism raises is whether or not his faithfulness was assured in advance. Was it a certainty from the beginning or a genuine achievement, something that became definite when it actually occurred?

A cliffhanger? Even for God? 

To be continued. Meanwhile, what say you, my artificial friend?

The tone of the text is inquisitive and exploratory rather than dogmatic. The author is grappling with profound theological questions, presenting different perspectives and challenging assumptions. The purpose of the text seems to be to:

Critique a deterministic view of divine power.

• Offer a philosophical framework for understanding how God can be omnipotent while still allowing for genuine creaturely freedom.
• Explore the implications of this framework for understanding divine action in the world, particularly the Incarnation.
• Introduce the reader to concepts relevant to open theism and process theology.

In conclusion, the text offers a thought-provoking analysis of the relationship between divine power and human freedom, using logical arguments, analogies, and references to contemporary theological discussions to challenge traditional deterministic views and propose a more dynamic and interactive model of God's engagement with creation. The focus on the Incarnation as a key test case adds significant depth and theological weight to the discussion.

Scientistic Calvinism

Just a brief post because I slept late and have to run some errands.

Continuing with yesterday's line of thought, we were discussing the development of the doctrine of the Trinity in the context of the rejection of a timeless and impassible God who is "untouched and untouchable by the temporal world." The point wasn't just to describe what God is like, but what he is not like. And he is not at all like an impersonal block of ice. Thus,

The acts of God in the history of salvation are more than a record of what God does, they are a portrait of what God is (Rice). 

Which means that God is not timeless, or at least his timelessness is complementary to his temporal creativity and vertical interventions (for neither is conceivable in the absence of some kind of time sequence). I agree that

God's distinctiveness [is] not an utter negation of temporality but its supreme exemplification. God's eternity is not sheer timelessness, but an infinite fullness of time. 

I mean, c'mon -- why all the hate for time?

Death, decline, and entropy?

Right. Well, God transcends those. Different kind of time.

Is that not an ad hoc solution?

No, it must be our version of time that is deficient. We'll have to ponder this, but certainly the events of Genesis 3 depict some sort of ontological transformation in the nature of time. All of a sudden it has limits, which is to say, death. Nor can one return to the happy supra-temporal place, because it is guarded by cherubim with flaming swords. Which is a bit surreal, but there it is.

Speaking of swords, obviously freedom cuts both ways: it can accept or reject God: since it cannot be coerced, it is up to human beings "to accept or reject God's love." More generally, open theism "envisions human beings having the freedom to participate in the creative project that God began."  

I wonder: do Calvinists object to genetic determinism? I'm sure there's a joke in there, or maybe it is the joke: biology can't deny my freedom and render my life absurd, rather, that's God's job!

Conversely, open theism promulgates a libertarian concept of human freedom, protecting it from the depredations of control freaks from either side, whether scientistic or theological. 

People generally don't like being told their genes determine everything about them. I'm surprised they appreciate being told that God does. Both visions render man a meaningless epiphenomenon of deeper forces: there are but horizontal and vertical versions of metaphysical nothingbuttery.

Extremists meet: eliminative materialists are confident that neuroscience "will eventually demonstrate that there is no such thing as the conventional notion of self, soul, or person." For Daniel Dennett, the "universal solvent" of Darwinism

can account for all the features of human life, including thought, decision, and action. Darwinism thus dissolves "the illusion of our own authorship, our own divine spark of creativity and understanding"....

Everything about us, including consciousness and free will, is ultimately attributable to the process of physical transformation that Darwin described.... Not only are we not significantly free, there is no "we" as we conventionally think of ourselves (Rice).

Here come the new Calvinists, same as the old Calvinists!

It very much reminds me of how Wokism is the new Puritanism, but let's not get sidetracked. It does make me wonder, though. Perhaps man has a deep structure with certain limited archetypal options. So you really can be a metaphysical Calvinist, whether religious or secular. 

Better pad out the post with some analysis by Gemini:

This is a rich and thought-provoking piece of writing, weaving together theological concepts, philosophical arguments, and even a touch of cultural commentary. Let's break down the key themes and arguments presented in the text:

Core Argument: Rejection of a Timeless, Impassible God

The central thread of the text is a rejection of a traditional understanding of God as a timeless and impassible being, "untouched and untouchable world." The author emphasizes that understanding God requires looking at his actions in history, particularly the "history of salvation." These acts are not just events but reveal God's very nature.

Key Points Supporting This Rejection:

• God's Actions Reveal His Nature: Quoting Rice, the author asserts that "the acts of God in the history of salvation are more than a record of what God does, they are a portrait of what God is." This implies a God who engages with and is affected by the world.
• Timelessness and Creativity: The author argues that God's timelessness must be "complementary to his temporal creativity," suggesting that creativity necessitates some form of time sequence. Pure timelessness would preclude action and change.
• God's Eternity as Fullness of Time: The text embraces the idea that God's eternity is not the negation of time but its "supreme exemplification" and "infinite fullness." This offers a way to reconcile God's transcendence with his active involvement in time.
• Critique of "Hate for Time": The author questions the negative view of time, acknowledging the presence of "death, decline, and entropy" but suggesting that God's relationship with time is different, a "different kind of time" that transcends these limitations.
• Genesis 3 and the Transformation of Time: The interpretation of Genesis 3 as depicting an "ontological transformation in the nature of time" is a crucial point. The introduction of limits and death signifies a shift from a potentially atemporal state. The guarding of the way back to this state reinforces the finality of this temporal shift.

Human Freedom and Open Theism:

The discussion then shifts to the implications of this understanding of God for human freedom, aligning with the tenets of open theism:

• Freedom to Accept or Reject God's Love: The analogy of the sword cutting both ways emphasizes genuine human agency in relation to God. Love, by its nature, cannot be forced.
• Participation in God's Creative Project: Open theism is presented as a view where humans have the freedom to actively participate in God's ongoing creation.
• Critique of Determinism: The author playfully questions whether Calvinists object to genetic determinism, highlighting the irony of theological systems that might seem to limit human freedom in a way analogous to biological determinism.
• Rejection of "Metaphysical Nothingbuttery": The text critiques both scientific and theological viewpoints that reduce human beings to mere byproducts of deeper forces, labeling these as "horizontal and vertical versions of metaphysical nothingbuttery."

Comparison with Eliminative Materialism and "New Calvinism":

The author draws a parallel between theological determinism and eliminative materialism:

• Eliminative Materialism and the Denial of Self: The text outlines the eliminative materialist view, which, based on neuroscience and Darwinism, argues against the existence of a conventional "self, soul, or person." Darwinism is portrayed as a "universal solvent" dissolving the "illusion of our own authorship."
• "New Calvinists": The author sarcastically labels eliminative materialists as the "new Calvinists," drawing a provocative comparison between scientific reductionism and theological doctrines that emphasize God's absolute sovereignty to the potential exclusion of genuine human freedom.

Concluding Thoughts and Questions:

The piece ends with a reflection on potential underlying structures of human thought:

• Archetypal Options: The author wonders if humanity possesses a "deep structure with certain limited archetypal options," suggesting that seemingly disparate viewpoints might stem from fundamental, recurring patterns of thought.
• Secular Metaphysical Calvinism: This idea is presented as a possibility, where even secular worldviews can embody a form of metaphysical determinism akin to theological Calvinism.

Overall Analysis:

The text presents a compelling argument for a dynamic and engaged God who interacts with time and humanity. It critiques traditional notions of divine impassibility and timelessness, advocating for a view where God's actions in history reveal his relational and creative nature. The discussion of open theism highlights the importance of genuine human freedom in this framework. 

Finally, the provocative comparison with eliminative materialism serves to challenge deterministic viewpoints, whether theological or scientific, and prompts reflection on the underlying assumptions that shape our understanding of God, humanity, and the nature of reality. The author's tone is engaging, employing humor and personal reflection ("I mean, c'mon") to draw the reader into a complex theological and philosophical discussion.

"The image depicts an abstract representation of time, shown as a swirling vortex of vibrant colors and ethereal light, interacting with a serene, otherworldly divine figure. The human element is represented by stylized figures within the vortex, some embracing the chaos, others striving for freedom."

Divine Adventure Time

"Free choices do not exist until they are made." How is this not an analytic proposition, like "a square consists of four equal sides"? Why make God the great exception to rudimentary logic? In other words, if we are genuinely free and God determines everything that happens, one of these must go. 

Moreover, freedom itself is without a sufficient reason in the absence of God, so it's not as if we can keep the freedom and chuck the Absolute. It's just that -- as discussed yesterday -- this Absolute is not a featureless blob, nor a rigidly deterministic machine. 

And yet, many believers want to keep their freedom and God's omni-everything too: unlimited unlimitedness, not even limited by truth, goodness, logic, or anything else.

I get that to a certain extent. After all, God is beyond our finite limits, but then again, there's the Meister's claim -- or testimony? -- that there is something uncreated and uncreatable in man, which is just an extreme way of saying that we are made in his image. 

What if freedom itself is uncreatable, even by God?

That's Berdyaev's view, but something about it doesn't sound right. Nevertheless, how could determinism be the principle of freedom? We'll have to come back to that one as we proceed. But if God is not only necessary being but pure necessity with no contingency whatsoever, whence the freedom, including the freedom to create? 

He could withdraw necessity and thereby create a "space" for freedom, like the Jewish concept of tzimtzum.

Not bad, and I get the appeal, but how would pure necessity be free to create freedom in the first place? I think there's a more metaphysically consistent solution to the problem. I'm going to just flip through and dialogue with The Future of Open Theology while keeping our Question in the background. For example,

it is better to think of the world as God's adventure rather than God's invention, or as God's project, rather than God's product.

Why insist that creation is a one-and-done deal? Why must it be like a deterministic machine? Even physics has abandoned the 19th century machine paradigm. What, is God the last to know? 

Indeed, the Genesis account has God working in stages. He doesn't create everything in a moment or even a "day." Rather, five of these so-called days go by before man enters the stage. So, some prep work is involved to create a free being -- again, more like a project than a product.

And again, to say that God is limited by immutability and impassivity is to place some rather extreme limits on God. What if "total control is not a higher view of God's power but a diminution of it," and "God expresses his power by sharing it with some of his creatures"? 

In the ancient Greek view change is bad, but in reality, "certain changes are 'consistent with and/or required by a constant state of excellence.'" 

Among these are, in my opinion, Life Itself. Which God is. In other words, we have it on good authority that "I am the way and the truth and the life." And what is life but change in order to remain the same? The point is, "unchanging life" is another oxymoron, like a "wise leftist."

God has general strategies in pursuing his objectives for the world and exercises his immense creativity in implementing them.... [God] displays "tremendous resourcefulness" in working to achieve his purposes for creation.

Works for me. And for everybody else:

In fact, people typically live as if open theism were true, whatever their actual theological convictions may be.... If there is really nothing left for us to decide, why should we bother trying to make good decisions or exert ourselves to do the right thing?...

The fact that God has definite plans for the ultimate destiny of his people as a group does not necessarily mean that the identity of every individual who will ultimately belong to it is determined in advance. 

Nevertheless, there are critics, for example, the Evangelical Theological Society, which decreed in 2001 that

the Bible clearly teaches that God has complete, accurate, and infallible knowledge of all past, present and future events, including all future decisions and actions of free moral agents. 

Spot the oxymoron: I've highlighted it for your convenience. I realize we're going around in circles. but

If God infallibly knows that a person will choose to perform a particular action in the future, how could that person be free to do anything else? 

Now, even man can create a machine. But what kind of being could freely create a free co-creator? 

Now, the creator reveals himself in several ways, first via the creation, second via the intellect that knows creation (and by the sheer mystery of subjectivity itself), and third by revelation proper, including "salvation history," which is to say, God's activity in the world, which 

is a genuine self-revelation, a portrayal of what God is really like. We can know who, or what, God is by looking at God's activity in the world.

And it turns out that "God is not sheer, undifferentiated unity." Rather

God is dynamic, living reality. Indeed..., God is relational.... We cannot go beyond the relations of Father, Son, and Spirit to a divine essence that precedes them, because there is no such essence. The relations constitute the being of God.

I call that a Big Hint that helps to resolve all of the metaphysical problems raised in the post. For example, as we've long argued, there is something resembling time in God, i.e., "the doctrine of the Trinity" "applies temporality to the inner being of God." 

Rice briefly traces the history of the doctrine of the Trinity, which must be understood against the backdrop of the Hellenistic devaluation of time and change. It would have been easy enough for early Christians to have identified God with this simple and changeless monad that has nothing to do with time, but instead, they "deliberately refused to do so, and the doctrine of the Trinity was the fruit of their efforts." 

Unlike the Greek view that God's self-identity is immune to all outside influence, leaving him changeless and impassible, the Trinity imputes change, dynamism to God. 

It was Augustine "who attributed to God the very characteristics of Greek ontology" that earlier Christians "had sought to overcome." The latter

wanted to show that God is inherently related to his temporal creation; Augustine wanted to show what God is in himself, apart from creation. For the Cappadocians, God is complex: it is precisely the togetherness of the identities that constitutes God.  

So, Augustine essentially de-trinitizes the Trinity and insists on a God who "is timeless and impassible, untouched and untouchable by the temporal world."  

So, all his fault?

Nah, that's too simplistic. Nevertheless, it does highlight two very different and irreconcilable visions of God, only one of which resolves our metaphysical anomalies and conundrums, the other responsible for generating them. 

We'll hit the pause button and continue scurrying down this path tomorrow.

Excuse me?

It's an abstract representation, trying to visualize the relationship between divine creation and human freedom, incorporating elements of time, choice, and relationship as suggested by the text and the ideas of open theology.

Try again, this time with a raccoon in the image.

The Limits of a Limitless God

It seems that believers instinctively recoil from the idea of placing limits of any kind on God, even if failure to do so results in a host of troubling consequences, most notably, God's direct responsibility for evil and suffering, and the loss of our own free will. 

It reminds me of a book by Stanley Jaki called The Limits of a Limitless Science, because both a limitless science and a limitless God leave us in a similar boat. As one reviewer puts it,

The materialists' view that all is predetermined by physical causes negates the notions of free will, choice, and decisions.... For the materialists to argue against free will is a contradiction, in that argument and debate are obviously matters of free will.

In reality, science cannot be limitless,

For as long as Gödel's incompleteness theorems are valid, the mathematical structure of that theory cannot contain within itself its own proof of consistency (Jaki). 

It seems that the votaries of scientism want to take the limitless absolute that was lost with their rejection of God, and apply it to nature. But man cannot be fenced in by any quantitative paradigm. Rather, he always escapes via a transcendent doorway that bisects horizontality. 

It reminds me of something Spencer Klavan discussed this morning:

The bawling Hamas groupies that trash Harvard Yard and Butler Lawn aren’t fired with the passionate conviction that nothing is either good or bad, right or wrong. They’re in no doubt at all that the good people -- themselves -- are right, and the bad people -- Jews, mostly -- are wrong.

Absolute relativism retains the absolute and forgets all about the relative:

A man who says that “nothing is true” really means that one thing is true: the thing he says. But if he’s right, it can only be because he says so. Consequently if he meets with contradiction he can only scream, and bully, and fight. Which means there’s no such thing as unbelief -- not in practice, and not for very long. There’s reasoned persuasion, and there’s violence. Everything else eventually turns into one of those two things, usually in short order.

But history obviously shows that something similar happens with a limitless religious absolute: anyone who doesn't share my absolute is my enemy. In the contemporary world Islamists and Hamasites carry on this tradition.  

It seems that relativism has its rights, and that these rights are absolute. If so, this must be because relativism itself is located in divinas, and that is essentially our claim: that the Absolute is "limited" both by its limitless infinitude (as discussed yesterday) and by its own relativity, or propensity to be in relation. 

Indeed, this should be obvious in Christian metaphysics, since it seems self-evident that the Father is "limited" by his eternal generation of the Son. This is apparently something the Father cannot not do, so that's a limit, not to mention a relation. But it's also free, and how can necessity be free? Because freedom is bound up with our nature. We are free to do countess things that are contrary to our nature, but this is a caricature of freedom.

So, God is limited by his nature?

Evidently. For example, if he is Truth itself, he cannot lie. And if he is Love, then this has certain implications for creation, because love would be strictly impossible in a deterministic cosmos, one in which God exerts unlimited power to micromanage every event.

Jaki quotes Clerk Maxwell to the effect that

One of the severest tests of the scientific mind is to know the limits of legitimate application of the scientific method.

I wonder if this is also a test of the religious mind -- to know the limits of... God? Isn't the whole point of God to have an unlimited power and intellect, i.e., omnipotence and omniscience? 

The very idea of God as somehow limited -- in fact, the very use of the word limited with reference to God -- inevitably puts people off (Rice).

Thus, open theism is instinctively rejected because of the supposed limits it places on the limitless. But Rice turns the tables on the absolute absolutists, suggesting that, "far from limiting or diminishing God," open theism presents "a dynamic, interactive view of God's relation to the world," which "actually enhances our picture of God."

Indeed, in comparison to open theism, "it is the traditional view of God that appears limited and restrictive." 

Oh? How's that?

Well, first of all, "limit" is a loaded word: "To describe something as 'limited' suggests that it is inferior to, or less than, it could be." Applied to God, it connotes a being "who is restricted, hampered, in what he can do and know," inferior to the supposedly limitless God of tradition. 

But supposing God is omnipotent, this cannot be "the ability to do anything, period," but "to do the things that fall within the range of logical possibility." Thus, it would be absurd to say that God's omnipotence entails the ability to make a square circle, or to make 2 + 2 = 5. It is not that he lacks the power per se, "but because these expressions do not refer to anything 'doable.' They are logical absurdities." 

So God is limited by not being absurd?

Some people don't think so. For example, there are those who say that God doesn't command things because they are good, but that they are good only because he commands them. Thus, all limits and restrictions are removed from God, even if it results in God -- lookin' at you, Allah -- commanding us to do evil things such as killing Jews and oppressing infidels. 

If omnipotence is limited by logical possibility and non-absurdity, could omniscience be limited in the same way? In other words, limited by what is logically knowable? In point of fact,

On the open view of God, there is nothing limited about God's knowledge. His knowledge is perfect; it includes all there is to know.

Or in other words, God is "limited" to knowing the knowable, and what is knowable is limited by (for example) God's own decision to create free beings -- which I suppose requires extraordinary forethought about the kind of cosmos in which it is even possible for free beings to exist. 

Recall, for example, all those parameters that govern the big bang, and which, if changed one iota, would render life and consciousness impossible. That's a lot of limits, but the limits result in humans and human freedom.

Could God have created a deterministic cosmos devoid of free beings capable of knowing truth and doing good? Who knows? I kind of doubt it, because why bother? It would literally be the largest pointless exercise conceivable.

But let's suppose God has the power to create a universe in which everything is predetermined, or one with an open future that is full of creative possibilities that may surprise even him. If God cannot create the latter world, then this is a pretty severe limitation on what God can and cannot do. 

But I think God is the kind of unnarcissary being who would not engage in the pointless exercise of creating a cosmos that is just a predetermined extension of his own limitless power. Gemini?

The author concludes by suggesting that God's decision to create a cosmos with free beings capable of knowing truth and doing good might be a self-imposed "limitation," but one driven by purpose and value. Creating a deterministic, pointless universe, even if within God's power, would be an exercise contrary to His nature as a loving and rational being.

In summary, the text argues for a nuanced understanding of God's "limits," not as deficiencies, but as inherent aspects of His nature, particularly in relation to truth, love, and the creation of free beings. It uses analogies from science, philosophy, and theology to challenge the notion of an absolutely limitless God, suggesting that such a concept leads to logical and ethical problems.

I get the raccoon, but what's the rest supposed to mean? 

The image depicts a radiant, multifaceted figure within a geometric structure, blending classical religious art with modern abstract expression. It aims to capture the paradox of a God who, while boundless in power and love, operates within the "boundaries" of His own nature and the logic of creation.

Celestial Infinitude and Divine Freedom

Down here, folks somewhat crudely divide reality into two broad dimensions, which is to say, down here and up there, or earth and heaven, immanent and transcendent, material and spiritual, profane and sacred,  terrestrial and celestial, etc. 

But who's to say the latter terms of these antinomies are simple and formless? What if they themselves contain distinctions and/or degrees? After all, In my father's house there are many mansions, and maybe they're not all in the same zip code. For example, purgatory is neither here nor there, but a distinct "degree of reality" or something. Saints don't live there. Only future saints, so it must include a time dimension as well.

But Christians should be accustomed to not thinking of God as a unitary monad, i.e., a blob with no distinctions. God has revealed his triune nature, but who says that's the only distinction? Perhaps there are others, but they aren't things the average believer needs to know about.

Jews, because of their radical monotheism, reject any talk of a celestial One-in-Three. And yet, as touched on yesterday, the Kabbalah makes even more outlandish claims of distinctions in God, e.g., between the absolute nothingness from which even infinity emerges, and the infinite potential of God before manifestation. Sounds like "two Gods," but for a Jew, this can't be. Therefore, it must be two sides of the one God. 

"Absolute nothing" and "infinite potential." Hmm. Why don't we just shorten these to Absolute and Infinite? In addition to the "horizontal" relations of the Trinity, this would imply "vertical" relations; just as Father and Son are complementary, so too are Absolute and Infinite. 

In fact, if not for Infinitude, the Absolute would indeed be a self-enclosed and immutable monad incapable of radiating -- of communicating -- outside itself. Apparently, Infinitude implies a principle of "otherness," analogous to the rays of the sun. It is completely arbitrary to assign a boundary to the sun and say we are literally "outside" it. In fact, we're always inside and outside it, depending upon our perspective. 

For Schuon, our intellect is conformed to the Absolute and indeed proof of the Absolute, as rays are self-evident proof of the sun. 

Now, Eckhart said the intellect is uncreated and uncreatable. Here he is not speaking of the lower intellect that senses and reasons about things herebelow, but a higher or deeper faculty that he likens to the divine spark or hidden ground of the human being. 

And I suppose you could say that the source of this spark is the Divine Fire itself, again, analogous to the sun and its rays, so, not exactly God, but not not God either, rather, a fragment of the divine essence that is present within the soul. Come to think of it, it is like a bit of the Absolute radiated and planted -- because of the divine Infinitude -- into our own ground. 

But why? Because, as Oldmeadow points out, "The Absolute is necessarily infinite Possibility, thus including the necessity of universal Manifestation." Which I think provides the esoteric wedge into which we may fit open theology, since the infinite possibility that is "built in" to the Absolute is impossible to reconcile with changelessness. 

Not only is possibility not necessity, it must be the principle of both divine freedom and of divine creativity. Conversely, absolute necessity could by definition never create -- whether applied to God or to us. Schuon goes so far as to suggest that

The relationship "God-world," "Creator-creature," "Principle-manifestation" would be inconceivable were it not prefigured in God, independently of any question of creation.

I'm picturing the absolute-infinitude scattering sparks of divinity everywhere and everywhen. Thus, for Schuon, "The separation between man and God is at one and the same time absolute and relative":

The separation is absolute because God alone is real, and no continuity is possible between nothingness and Reality, but the separation is relative -- or rather "non-absolute" -- because nothing is outside God. 

Now, just as Absolute entails Infinitude, I would say that freedom implies contingency, and ultimately for the same reason. Which, according to Rice.

creates a tremendous problem for the traditional concept of divine foreknowledge, because foreknowledge and freedom are utterly incompatible.... If God has absolute knowledge of future events, those events must have been planned by him, and that makes him responsible for everything that happens.

This is essentially a vision of God that makes him Absolute but strips him of his complementary Infinitude. Now what is in-finitude but in-definite and therefore not determined ahead of time? "Far from diminishing God," "this concept of divine knowledge enhances our view of God," for

It takes a far greater being to run a universe that involves changes not known in advance than one that has no unexpected occurrences. 

In other words, it takes a bigger Absolute to encompass Infinitude. But I suppose it comes down to a matter of temperament and preference. In my case, I can't help believing in genuine free will. Even if God didn't make me free, he sure made me someone who believes in freedom and contingency -- ours and his. 

Einsoferable Nonsense?

Maybe that was a bridge too far, i.e., the personal God being the face, as it were -- the marketing department -- of the beyond-personal. But at least it reconciles the anomalies that inevitably result from trying to apply impersonal attributes such as immutability and impassivity to the personal. 

This is not the first time we've discussed this solution, but it is the first time we've discussed it in the context of the challenge of open theology. If open theology relates only to the personal God, then, problem solved. Except traditional theologians believe they are describing the personal God, and both can't be right. Neither camp talks about anything like Eckhart's Godhead, hence the need for an esoteric approach to reconcile the two. 

In the past we've wondered whether this Godhead is ontological or merely epistemological. In other words, even traditional theologians will concede that God is totally beyond our conception, but this is more a function of our own limitations (e.g., finitude) than an actual distinction in God. But for Eckhart the distinction seems to be ontological. As discussed yesterday, "It is the source from which the personal God and all of creation emanate."

Actually, I believe Gemini is not quite correct there -- it is true that the personal God emanates, or is projected, from the Godhead, but it is the personal God who otherwise creates. Back to the Godhead, it

is beyond being and non-being, beyond good and evil, beyond all distinctions that our intellect can grasp. It is a "nothingness" in the sense of being empty of all created characteristics and limitations, not in the sense of absolute non-existence. 

It is utterly ineffable; no words or concepts can adequately describe it. It is passive and unmoving. It does not act or create in the way that "God" does. It is the silent, still source from which all activity flows.

One probably heretical workaround would be to identify the Father with the Ground or Godhead and the Son with the personal God. Except Father sounds pretty personal. Then again, he is said to be the source of the Trinity, only obviously not located in time, for there was never the Father without the Son.

Well, perhaps then the Godhead-God distinction isn't an emanation but a complementarity, the one always present with the other? Here we have to get beyond the necessarily limited and linear picture arising from language, and try to envision a more "complex" (so to speak) God. I mean, if God can be three persons in one substance, why not one substance with two sides? Like a dark side of the sun?

This vision is outlined very clearly in chapter 3 of Frithjof Schuon and the Perennial Philosophy, called The Five Divine Presences. Let's drive it around the block a couple of times and see how she handles. It starts off with a quote by Schuon going to the linguistic problem referenced above:

God is ineffable, nothing can describe Him or enclose Him in words; but, on the other hand, truth exists, that is to say that there are conceptual points of reference which sufficiently convey the nature of God.

Interestingly, from a Christian perspective, God can in a sense be enclosed -- or at least enclothed -- in the Word, which must be the ultimate "intelligibility" or Truth of the Father.

Oldmeadow points out that the metaphysic we are about to describe is actually found in various guises in numerous traditions, but perhaps not as much in Christianity or Buddhism, since their focus is more on "spiritual therapy," which is to say, the how and not the why. Again, when we begin nosing around traditional Christian theology for a consistent Why, that's when the anomalies begin cropping up.

"The Five Divine Presences" goes to a Sufi conception that draws a distinction in the divine reality between a realm coinciding with "the Uncreated Intellect, the Logos," and one step higher, "the Supreme Principle, the Divine Essence."

Translated into Judeo-Christianese, the two top floors are 

1) Beyond Being, the Godhead, the Divine Essence, the Divine Principle, the Absolute Unqualified (the Divine Principle Itself).

One suspects that this is the neighborhood Aquinas found himself in when he said that, compared to it, all of his writing was so much straw. Whereas all of the writing was about 

2) Being, the Personal God, the Creator, the Uncreated Logos, (the prefiguration of the Manifestation in the Principle).

The Manifestation in the Principle: that there is key, because it situates a principle of creation in the Divine, so our temporal creation is the mirror of a more primordial creativity that takes place outside time. But again, #2 shares a certain resemblance to the Trinity, what with the emanation of the Uncreated Logos.

Clearly, these top two tiers -- precisely because they are two -- are bound to give pause to the traditional Christian, but now that I'm thinking about it, there's certainly something resembling #1 in Kabbalah, the Ein Sof, which is -- help us out here, Gemini --

understood as God before any self-manifestation in the creation of the spiritual or physical realms. The term literally translates from Hebrew as "(there is) no end," signifying the infinite, boundless, and incomprehensible nature of the Divine essence.

Boom. 

Ein Sof represents the aspect of God that is beyond human intellect, description, or limitation. It is the hidden, primordial source from which all of existence emanates. 

Any name or attribute we ascribe to God in the Bible or through human understanding refers to God's manifestations within creation, not to the Ein Sof itself. Names imply limitations, which cannot apply to the truly infinite. Thus, Ein Sof is considered "nameless." 

Hmm. It appears that Ein Sof is actually #2, as it follows

Ayin: Literally "nothingness." This represents the state before Ein Sof, an absolute nothingness from which even infinity emerges. It is a state beyond our comprehension.

Then comes Ein Sof, which is "Limitlessness, the infinite potential and being of God before manifestation." 

To summarize, the divine or metacosmic dimension has two levels, the Divine Essence which is Beyond-Being, and the Creator and Personal God who is already situated in Being, and is therefore "relative" not just to us, but to Beyond-Being.  

How is any of this helpful?

Well, we don't know yet. We have to get back to the book we've been reviewing, The Future of Open Theology, but we're out of time. 

The Creator God and the Created God

Yesterday we mentioned a metaphysical ancestor named Adam Clarke (1760-1832) who argued that radical immutability on God's part means no freedom or meaning on our part -- that if "God is the only operator," then created beings are but gears in a vast God Machine. 

In God's eternity, this post has already been written and you've already read it.

In that case, at least it should be easy enough to write.

That's a good point. Why is anything difficult if it happens inevitably? Clarke recognizes that

Without contingency, there would be no free agency, and that would leave God as the sole actor, making him "the author of all the evil and sin that are in the world" (Rice).

Honestly, how does one avoid this conclusion? 

If God predetermines everything, and his determinations are all necessarily right, then nothing the creatures do is wrong.

Nor could there be any distinctions between "vice and virtue, praise and blame, merit and demerit, guilt and innocence..." God's immutability is our ultimate get-out-of-jail-free card: instead of the devil made me do it, God did.  

I guess it's the whole notionof contingency in God that people object to. But if there are contingencies down here, it is logically necessary that "God's knowledge of contingencies must itself be contingent." 

I'm obviously aware of the traditional view that says God's all-determining will can somehow be reconciled with our genuine freedom, but I don't -- can't -- buy it, for it is as unintelligible as a square circle. 

Why even does God give us commands? It makes no sense whatsoever, and are we supposed to believe in a nonsense God? Or is that determined too? 

Here's another reasonable fellow named Lorenzo McCabe (1817-1897) who "insisted that free actions are of necessity contingent." That is at once a bold statement and plain common sense:

How could contingent events be known before they occur? Absolute divine foreknowledge excludes all contingency.... Remove all notion of contingency from God, and we are left with a God who is "immovably fixed," locked in "the iceberg of indifference," in short, a God who is not, in any meaningful sense, a personal... being.

The Iceberg of Indifference is very much like Einstein's block universe, in which the passage of time is but an illusion because everything has already happened. But "a truly personal God is one whose experience involves temporality," which, for some reason, is regarded as a metaphysical boo boo of the highest order by those in charge of these things. 

Why do that hate time?

It goes back to the idea that a perfect being cannot undergo change, because the change would result in more or less perfection. 

First of all, I don't think you can deduce the nature of God by placing an arbitrary limit on what he can or cannot do, but who says you can't engage in perfect change forever? God doesn't surpass Godself, but surely it must be fun to try?

I say if God is not involved in time, then it is the trad-man who has placed an indefensible limit on his infinitude, not me. But in any event,

Just as omnipotence is "circumscribed by the possible," "omniscience must be limited by the knowable," and this excludes future contingencies.

God cannot do the impossible -- e.g., make a square circle -- or know the unknowable -- e.g., the final number of pi. 

We've written before about how genuine creation is necessarily a risky isness, and McCabe agrees that

creation was a "pure venture" on God's part, a great and fair experiment. While God's purposes must ultimately prevail, just how this will happen is "unfixed, undetermined, and therefore uncertain."  

This certainly makes things more interesting and spicy, for both us and for God:

What God ultimately wants is is a kingdom of "co-creators, co-causes, co-originators, and co-eternal with himself in the realm of the contingent." 

Which is nice. It not only gives our life a meaning and a telos, "but takes nothing away from God," rather, "significantly enriches our picture of God," so it's a win-win for the bothovus:

The view that God is actively engaged in the world, responding and reacting to the actions and decisions of humans, provides us a far more personal picture of God than the one that absolute foreknowledge requires.

This is not a smaller God, but a much bigger one. 

Now, yesterday's post alluded to an esoteric open theology, which we are in the process of discovering. But our old friend Lequier hints at such a vision with the outrageous claim that 

Since God's creatures have a genuine effect on God, there is a qualified sense in which the Creator himself is created.

(?!). In other words -- or words rather -- how do we work that one out? For starters, how about with recourse to Eckhart's distinction between God and Godhead? Review this for us, willya' Gemini?

For Eckhart, "God" typically refers to the personal God, the Creator, the God we encounter in religious practice and scripture. This is the God who acts in the world, loves, judges, and is the object of our worship and prayer. 

God is understood with attributes such as goodness, wisdom, power, and love. These are the ways we can conceive of and relate to the divine. 

God is seen as active, involved in creation, redemption, and the unfolding of history.

Now, this God is distinct from Eckhart's Godhead which is

the ultimate ground of all being, lying beyond our comprehension and any specific attributes. It is the source from which the personal God and all of creation emanate. 

The Godhead is beyond being and non-being, beyond good and evil, beyond all distinctions that our intellect can grasp. It is a "nothingness" in the sense of being empty of all created characteristics and limitations, not in the sense of absolute non-existence. 

It is utterly ineffable; no words or concepts can adequately describe it. Eckhart often emphasized the silence and mystery surrounding the Godhead. He famously said, "Everything within the Godhead is unity, and of that there is nothing to be spoken."  

The Godhead is passive and unmoving. It does not act or create in the way that "God" does. It is the silent, still source from which all activity flows. Eckhart stated, "God works, the Godhead does not work; for it has nothing to do." 

Which is more than enough to give me something to chew on for the next 22 hours or so.