ARGH!!! Calvinism makes me furious!!!

[Lighthouse]

Is God omnipotent enough to be able to work His will without knowing the future exhaustively?

 

[seekinganswers]

Granted, I have not thought this through on a philosophical level. The Bible portrays God as passible, not impassible. There is a place for the ivory tower, but on the basic character and attributes of God, we should affirm simple revelation.

You would like this book. It is as hard to understand as you are, but also contains key nuggets:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/083082734X/ref=sib_dp_pt/002-3642675-6705650#reader-link

(click next page for contents)

I figured out the problem: I'm stoopid :dunce: :idea: and u r smart

Godrulz,

You're not stupid. Your inability to understand me only shows how weak my intelligence is (for what good is it for me to understand things when I cannot communicate that understanding to others?).

Have I tried to portray God as impassible? Because I hope that I have not. God suffers in this world (most definitely in Christ). God shares in our suffering. But please understand that this does not consist in "emotions" (a self-dellusion); God suffers with us in compassion (that is in taking on our suffering in the flesh). Emotions as toted by us to define our "personality" are cheap. They have defined relatedness within the individual, and I think that this is absurd. How can one be "personal" in one's self? Personality only has significance in the context of the other (God's personal quality only has significance within the context of the Creation; how can God be personal in Godself?).

God is relational, meaning that God relates to us as other than God, so that God can invite us to share in God's very life (in God's self). God opens a space for the other so that God might dwell with(in) us. God is personal in God's relationship to us (not in some stagnant ideal of personality held within God).

Thanks for the suggestion on the book. Barth is a great interest for me.

Peace,
Michael

 

[godrulz]

I do not know much about Barth's views, but he may not be the bad guy he is made out to be. It seems he has some important ideas.

Does not a triune understanding of God provide the 'other' and relational aspects for personality/emotions? Emotions do not have to be a negative thing. The Father heart of God involves will and emotions. He delights over us with joy, but He can also be grieved by us. Before creation, could He not contemplate and experience 'feelings' in fellowship as Father, Son, Spirit?

It is a challenge to simply communicate truth to a wide variety of audience. We do not have to dumb down to the lowest common denominator, nor should we purposely speak above everyone in arrogance. I think your heart is good. I have the same problem when I might understand something, but do not effectively communicate it to those who have not wrestled with the ideas for as long.

Keep hammering it home. We will eventually understand your views, even if we disagree with them. Forgive me if I get frustrated and make uncharitable comments about ivory towers, etc. Motive is the key. Apparently, your motive is to share your understanding, not confuse or brow beat.

 

[seekinganswers]

I do not know much about Barth's views, but he may not be the bad guy he is made out to be. It seems he has some important ideas.

Barth is one of the theologians (like Bonhoeffer) who in the context of liberal-protestant German Scholaticism refused to simply accept the rise of the Nazis in Germany (and absolutely detested the role of the liberal protestants in allowing the Nazis to take hold in Germany). He is prolific in his writing, and though he is not always understandable, his theology was absolutely necessary for Germany and for the rest of the world in the time of WWII and what followed. Christianity was going to take a huge hit after WWII, when the world would look at the Protestant Church of Germany (from where most of the world's Protestant Christian Theology was coming) and ask how could the church ever let such a thing happen and worst of all, how could they be complicit in it (this would even extend to the Catholics, who had produced their fair share of anti-semitism)?

Some call Barth an idealist, who wants to return to a Jesus that we cannot really rediscover. But Barth in a very real way refocused Christian Theology away from the liberalism in which it had been entrenched (that is its anthropological foundations and questions) back to a focus on Christ (Christological foundations and questions). In a very real way the New Paradigm movements of the US, which are reactions against the liberalism inherent to Democracy, owe a great debt to Barth.

Does not a triune understanding of God provide the 'other' and relational aspects for personality/emotions? Emotions do not have to be a negative thing. The Father heart of God involves will and emotions. He delights over us with joy, but He can also be grieved by us. Before creation, could He not contemplate and experience 'feelings' in fellowship as Father, Son, Spirit?

The problem I have with such a view of God is that otherness blows appart unity. God cannot be other to Godself and be one at the same time. The union of the triune God is at odds with any otherness we might ascribe to God in Godself. God is one (even as God is triune) so that there is no otherness within God (that which is within God is unified, that union being love itself). So love is the union of God (it is also what unites us to God and to our neighbor). Since God is love, all otherness in God is wiped out. This is most excellently demonstrated in God's love for humanity, in that while we tried to be other than God, God did not treat us as others, but as friends. We in our sin tried to divorce ourselves from God, and God in Christ only revealed how intimately we are related to God (for God became a man; the fullness of the Spirit of God became incarnate in a man, and we as human beings reflect this same union of God with the flesh; our life is not our own, it is a gift from God, that we must learn to use from the one who gave it, or we risk losing it).

Contemplation is not compassion. Empathy is not sharing in suffering. Empathy is the guarded compassion of distance, which looks at suffering and thinks, "Oh, how awful," and is powerless to do anything about it. God is not an empathizer; God is compassionate, so that if there is suffering in the world, God is present in the midst of the suffering; God suffers along with us.

Emotions are the depiction of reality when reality is being threatened. So I find that emotions within God are not possible, since God's reality is never threatened. God never needs to comunicate his own reality to himself (he doesn't need to ask existential questions about his own existence). God is God, and that actuality is unquestioned. Emotions within the Godhead are a communicative reality, in which God reveals himself to the truly other (the Creation). Emotions are not ideas that forever exist in the mind of God; emotions are an incarnational reality, the very word spoken in the Creation, by which God gives of Godself for another, in order that the other might share in what is of God, and rejoice with God because of it (the incarnation of Christ is prefigured in the Creation; Christ is the expression of the Word that Creates in the Beginning). Emotions are incarnational, and are therefore not held eternally within the Godhead (anymore than the incarnation is held eternally within God). The Creation is bounded by time (a head or source and a telos or drive). God is not bound by such realities, but encompasses them within Godself. The incarnation is not eternal, but it is held within God (and is God in a very real way). In the same way, the Creation is an incarnational reality, held within certain bounds; but even the Creation is held within God (for God's Spirit imbues it with life, so that even the Creation can reflect God in worship, in rest). Sanctification of the flesh is what makes it divine (a mediator of grace). It doesn't become God, but its reality is indebted to God; it has a life that is not its own.

This is where I love Augustine, and I think that we ought to listen to him more and more. He speaks of grace, that infusing of life into inanimate flesh. It is only in grace that we are saved from the nothingness that we are. It is grace that gives us life, and grace that sustains that life. And in that grace we reflect God. The Protestants forgot grace (they made God into a truly other; they made God so transcendant that he ceased to by immanent). They exchanged grace for faith (sola fide). And today in our present liberal context, faith becomes that spiritual grounding that is found in all people (and we see this most asuredly in expressions like the Muslim faith, the Christian faith, the Budahist faith, ect.). Faith has become grace in our world (the spiritual capacity of men to know God). And our Godlikeness has become inherent to us, so that we have become like gods, only we are like gods that are other than God. Our likeness to God is not grounded in God himself; our likeness is grounded in our own being, in our own "life."

The sin of the garden is repeated, and we have not learned its lessons. We continue to listen to the lies of the serpent, who makes us believe that God is other than who God is (that God is witholding something from us; that God has a need of his own). God in giving us life has given us of God's very self (God feeds us in the garden; we do not give anything to God, as if he needed our work, needed us as slaves). God is forever revealed as the ruler of the Creation not by the "power" of force used to control it; God is master because God is the one who feeds (we are not the ones who feed God, which is a very different view of God than what would have been learned from the Grecian gods). And human mastery of the Creation only comes when we learn to serve the Creation in the likeness of God (to become masters by caring for the Creation, so that we do not need to be fed by it; we are fed by God through it). God's mastery over us is truly liberating, as we are able to share in God's mastery (to become lords over the Creation).

Is this not beauty? Is God not right in calling this good (tov) or, in fact, very good?

Peace,
Michael

 

[Clete]

SeekingAnswers,

I want first to apologize for the length of this post. I wanted to be a thorough as possible because of the incredible degree to which misunderstanding is obviously prevailing on this issue. In spite of its length, I really think its worth reading in its entirety and I thank you in advance for doing so. I really think (at least I really hope) that it will serve to clear up the muddy water around here.

Logic was created in the first three days, where God makes space for life; space is the grounding for the Created order; God makes light (and orders that light in day and night, where greater lights reign in the day and lesser lights in the night); light is the realm of the heavenly bodies (things that had life in the ancient world); God created the air and the seas which God fills with birds and sea creatures; God makes the land and inhabits the land with animals and human beings. Logic is the grounding space in which the Creation which is other than God is able to respond to God's Creation (which culminates in rest and worship on the Shabat of the seventh day.

Without space there is no logic (for there is nothing other than God without space; there is chaos and darkness that "reigns," which can only be defined in the presence of God's Spirit which is wind and breath and life). Logic is the grounding for how we relate to God, and since we have a beginning (a head), there is no logic before the Creation. Once God makes space for the other, that is when logic is produced (when things can begin to relate to one another and to God). Of course, once again, logic is not a universal for me, so in this context it is the very form which the Creation takes. Animals have a logic that governs them as do humans (in their will), while the Creation as a whole is governed by the logic of God's will. Logic is a multiplicity in the scriptures that united only in love (God's will and Jesus' will are not the same; our will is not absorbed into God's will when we submit to God; we remain distinct from God, and love allows the wills to be brought into harmony, the logics to be brought into peace with one another

SA,

I didn't ask you to restate your position, I asked you to establish it. Please do so Biblically.

I will ask you a couple of questions based on what you said here though.

Do you believe that God planned the creation before creating it?

Do you believe that God the Father, God the Son and the Holy Spirit had a relationship prior to the creation? That is, did they relate to one another; speak to one another; fellowship with one another, etc?

You see, I do see an order between justice and love. God's love precedes justice (for it is love that produces justice not vice versa). God is equated to love within the scriptures, not to justice. So God's Son is sent before the rectification (dikaiosyne) of the world. God's love produces a space for life (justice). Justice is contingent upon love, not vice versa. So before the Christian is concerned about dikaiosyne he or she is much more concerned with love (for love must come first, and only within that grounding can justice be produced). In a very real way the disciple of Christ is the grounding for justice in this world only in as much as the disciple is grounded in love (that is love for God first and love for the neighbor). Love is grounded ontologically in itself (for God is love); justice is grounded contingently in that love, so that what is justice is grounded in love (what is rectified is contingent upon the love of God). We become God's righteousness as we submit ourselves to God's love (just as Christ is the dikaiosyne of God.

Agape and dikaiosyne are not the same in the scriptures. One is an initial action entirely grounded in God the Creator, the other is how humans are called to respond to that love (even as love begins to define them).

Deuteronomy 32:4 He is the Rock, His work is perfect; For all His ways are justice, A God of truth and without injustice; Righteous and upright is He.

Psalm 7:11 God is a just judge, And God is angry with the wicked every day.

Isaiah 30:18 Therefore the LORD will wait, that He may be gracious to you; And therefore He will be exalted, that He may have mercy on you. For the LORD is a God of justice; Blessed are all those who wait for Him.

Isaiah 45:21 Tell and bring forth your case; Yes, let them take counsel together. Who has declared this from ancient time? Who has told it from that time? Have not I, the LORD? And there is no other God besides Me, A just God and a Savior; There is none besides Me.​

Were you aware that 'righteous' and 'just' are translated from the same word in the Bible?

When you say that God is righteous you are saying that God is just. Can you be righteous without love or justice? NO, of course not. It seems almost as if you are intentionally trying to miss the point. I never intended to suggest that love and justice are perfectly interchangeable synonyms but that they are ESENTIALLY the same thing.

es·sen·tial
adj.
1. Constituting or being part of the essence of something; inherent.​

In other words they are that which describes God. They both find their definition in the character of God. They are thus interconnected and part of each other. Justice is what it is because of what love is and vise versa. In fact, justice is applied love. There is no attribute of God's character that is more important than another. God is love, God is righteousness, God is justice and God is logic. In fact love, righteousness, justice, etc, would make no sense if God were not logical. If God could be self-contradictory, for example (which is implied by your position) then how could justice have any meaning? Can God say "Do not lie." today, and then command perjury tomorrow? In fact, while the question seems rhetorical, I would like for you to answer that question directly, please. Can God contradict himself and if not, why not?

When you say that God is the source of revelation, I don't doubt that this is very much your understanding of the world (no Christian could deny it). But when you go on to submit revelation to logic, you have succeeded in subverting it to the unified logic that has been envisioned by humanity in our Modern age (Logic as a singular and "rational" approach to the world is a Modern ideal, it is not a biblical one).

So you keep saying. Should we then also reject the law of gravity because it too is "modern"?

First of all logic is hardly modern. The three laws of logic were discovered and described some 400 years before Christ and that's just the earliest that we know of. Further, logic works whether you describe it or not. If you stand out in the rain, you get wet. When people speak, the words mean something. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. If I kick are rock with my bare foot, it hurts. If I disobey God, it hurts worse (in the long run). That's logic SA. Logic is everywhere, it is inescapable. In fact, you cannot even say that there is no logic, without using logic to say it. You cannot even begin to refute logic without using the very thing you are trying to refute (of which your posts are excellent examples).

Further still, even if logic where modern, how modern something is does not speak to its truthfulness or validity. The concept of gravity is more modern than the wheel. Does that mean the wheel is more true than gravity? Neither the concept of the wheel nor of gravity can be said to be strictly Biblical in the sense you seem to insist logic needs to be (which it is actually) should we then reject the wheel and gravity in favor of something more "Biblical"? Your arguments here are simply fallacious.

The work of the Spirit (revelation) is hardly singular or unified in itself (like the Muslims would have us believe). It is expressed in a plethora of gatherings of people, who understand the world in very different ways, and yet are unified in Christ (the revelation is always incarnate, united to the contingencies of those to whom it comes; and if it is to be carried on, it cannot be divorced from those contingencies for we only know God as incarnate, not in God's invisibility; the Spirit is known by the fruit it produces, not within itself).

Okay, whatever.

Even within the canon of the scriptures you find this clash of logic (the worldview of the ancients is not the same worldview held by the writers of the New Testament, and certainly neither one of them is anything like our Modern understanding of the world around us. Logics and rationalities change throughout time, for that is the nature of humanity, which is here today and gone tomorrow. Empires rise up for a time in their greatness, and are destined to wane once again, fading into the dust of history. Our mortality constantly reminds us that we are mortal and even dependant upon God for continued life; we are not eternal but contingent beings on this planet.

Two things here.

First, I think you are still not understanding what it is that I am referring to when I use the term "logic". I'm not talking about "logics and rationalities" as in various philosophies and religions or worldviews or whatever you want to call them. I am talking about the principles of necessary inference, which makes any of those things possible in the first place. I am talking simply and only about that which either includes or is derived from the three laws of logic, which, once again, are as follows...

1. The law of identity states that if any statement is true, then it is true; or, every proposition implies itself: A implies A.
   
2. The law of excluded middle states that everything must either be or not be; or, everything is A or not-A.
   
3. The law of contradiction states that no statement can be both true and false; or, A and not-A is a contradiction and always false: thus, not both A and not-A.

Anything that you posit that is in contradiction to any one or more of these three laws is false, period.

Secondly there is no conflict between the Biblical worldview and logic. In fact, the Biblical world view is the ONLY rational world view that exists. More than that, it is the only world view that can possibly be rational because rationality itself is based upon it.

Indeed there could be no "clash" between the Scripture and logic. In fact, the former could not exist without the latter. There is, however, a clash between rationalism and Scripture, but I am not talking about rationalism, I'm talking about rationality. There is a humungous difference! Rationalism is, I think, what your real objection is against. Rationalism is thinking that does not start with God and with Scripture. Any such thinking necessarily leads nowhere because without God there can be no rational discourse in the first place. Rationalism denies that which is it own foundation and thus destroys itself (a point that was established quite skillfully in Battle Royale IX, in case you’re interested).

Francis Schaeffer says,

Christianity has the opportunity, therefore, to speak clearly of the fact that its answer has the very thing modern man has despaired of—the unity of thought. It provides a unified answer for the whole of life. It is true that man will have to renounce his rationalism, but then, on the basis of what can be discussed, he has the possibility of recovering his rationality. You may now see why I stressed so strongly, earlier, the difference between rationalism and Rationality. Modern man has lost the latter (Escape from Reason, p.82 emphasis added).​

And if this doesn't convince you then I offer the following in which Gordon H. Clark does what you have failed to do which is to establish this position Biblically.

Logic and Scripture

There is a minor misunderstanding that can easily he disposed of before discussing the relation of logic to the Scriptures. Someone with a lively historical sense might wonder why Scripture and revelation are equated, when God's direct speech to Moses, Samuel, and the prophets is even more clearly revelation.

This observation became possible simply because of previous brevity. Of course God's speech to Moses was revelation, in fact, revelation par excellence, if you wish. But we are not Moses. Therefore, if the problem is to explain how we know in this age, one cannot use the personal experience of Moses. Today we have the Scripture. As the Westminster Confession says, "It pleased the Lord ... to reveal himself ... and afterwards ... to commit the same wholly unto writing, which maketh the holy scripture to he most necessary, those former ways of God's revealing his will unto his people being now ceased." What God said to Moses is written in the Bible; the words are identical; the revelation is the same.

In this may be anticipated the relation of logic to the Scripture. First of all, Scripture, the written words of the Bible, is the mind of God. What is said in Scripture is God's thought.

In contemporary religious polemics, the Biblical view of the Bible, the historic position of the Reformation, or––what is the same thing––the doctrine of plenary and verbal inspiration is castigated as Bibliolatry. The liberals accuse the Lutheran's and Calvinists of worshipping a book instead of worshipping God. Apparently they think that we genuflect to the Bible on the pulpit, and they deride us for kissing the ring of a paper pope.

This caricature stems from their materialistic turn of mind––a materialism that may not be apparent in other discussions––but which comes to the surface when they direct their fire against fundamentalism. They think of the Bible as a material book with paper contents and a leather binding. That the contents are the thoughts of God, expressed in God's own words, is a position to which they are so invincibly antagonistic that they cannot even admit it to be the position of a fundamentalist.

Nevertheless we maintain that the Bible expresses the mind of God. Conceptually it is the mind of God, or, more accurately, a part of God's mind. For this reason the Apostle Paul, referring to the revelation given him, and in fact given to the Corinthians through him, is able to say, "We have the mind of Christ." Also in Philippians 2:5 he exhorts them, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus." To the same purpose is his modest claim in 1 Corinthians 7:40, "I think also that I have the Spirit of God."

The Bible, then, is the mind or thought of God. It is not a physical fetish, like a crucifix. And I doubt that there has ever been even one hillbilly fundamentalist ignorant enough to pray to a black book with red edges. Similarly, the charge that the Bible is a paper pope misses the mark for the same reason. The Bible consists of thoughts, not paper; and the thoughts are the thoughts of the omniscient, infallible God, not those of Innocent III.

On this basis––that is, on the basis that Scripture is the mind of God––the relation to logic can easily be made clear. As might be expected, if God has spoken, he has spoken logically. The Scripture therefore should and does exhibit logical organization.


For example, Romans 4:2 is an enthymematic hypothetical destructive syllogism. Romans 5:13 is a hypothetical constructive syllogism. 1 Corinthians 15:15-18 is a sorites. Obviously, examples of standard logical forms such as these could be listed at great length.

There is, of course, much in Scripture that is not syllogistic. The historical sections are largely narrative; yet every declarative sentence is a logical unit. These sentences are truths; as such they are objects of knowledge. Each of them has, or perhaps we should say, each of them is a predicate attached to a subject. Only so can they convey meaning.

Even in the single words themselves, as is most clearly seen in the cases of nouns and verbs, logic is embedded. If Scripture says, David was King of Israel, it does not mean that David was president of Babylon; and surely it does not mean that Churchill was prime minister of China. That is to say, the words David, King, and Israel have definite meanings.

The old libel that Scripture is a wax nose and that interpretation is infinitely elastic is clearly wrong. If there were no limits to interpretation, we might interpret the libel itself as an acceptance of verbal and plenary inspiration. But since the libel cannot be so interpreted, neither can the Virgin Birth be interpreted as a myth nor the Resurrection as a symbol of spring. No doubt there are some things hard to be understood which the unlearned wrest to their own destruction, but the difficulties are no greater than those found in Aristotle or Plotinus, and against these philosophers no such libel is ever directed. Furthermore, only some things are hard. For the rest, Protestants have insisted on the perspicuity of Scripture.

Nor need we waste time repeating Aristotle's explanation of ambiguous words. The fact that a word must mean one thing and not its contradictory is the evidence of the law of contradiction in all rational language.

This exhibition of the logic embedded in Scripture explains why Scripture rather than the law of contradiction is selected as the axiom. Should we assume merely the law of contradiction, we would he no better off than Kant was. His notion that knowledge requires a priori categories deserves great respect. Once for all, in a positive way––the complement of Hume's negative and unintentional way––Kant demonstrated the necessity of axioms, presuppositions, or a priori equipment. But this sine qua non is not sufficient to produce knowledge. Therefore the law of contradiction as such and by itself is not made the axiom of this argument.

For a similar reason, God as distinct from Scripture is not made the axiom of this argument. Undoubtedly this twist will seem strange to many theologians. It will seem particularly strange after the previous emphasis on the mind of God as the origin of all truth. Must not God be the axiom? For example, the first article of the Augsburg Confession gives the doctrine of God, and the doctrine of the Scripture hardly appears anywhere in the whole document. In the French Confession of 1559, the first article is on God; the Scripture is discussed in the next five. The Belgic Confession has the same order. The Scotch Confession of 1560 begins with God and gets to the Scripture only in article nineteen. The Thirty-Nine Articles begin with the Trinity, and Scripture comes in articles six and following. If God is sovereign, it seems very reasonable to put him first in the system.

But several other creeds, and especially the Westminster Confession, state the doctrine of Scripture at the very start. The explanation is quite simple: our knowledge of God comes from the Bible. We may assert that every proposition is true because God thinks it so, and we may follow Charnock in all his great detail, but the whole is based on Scripture. Suppose this were not so. Then "God" as an axiom, apart from Scripture, is just a name. We must specify which God. The best known system in which "God" was made the axiom is Spinoza's. For him all theorems are deduced from Deus sive Natura. But it is the Natura that identifies Spinoza's God. Different gods might be made axioms of other systems. Hence the important thing is not to presuppose God, but to define the mind of the God presupposed. Therefore the Scripture is offered here as the axiom. This gives definiteness and content, without which axioms are useless.

Thus it is that God, Scripture, and logic are tied together. The Pietists should not complain that emphasis on logic is a deification of an abstraction, or of human reason divorced from God. Emphasis on logic is strictly in accord with John's Prologue and is nothing other than a recognition of the nature of God.

Does it not seem peculiar, in this connection, that a theologian can be so greatly attached to the doctrine of the Atonement, or a Pietist to the idea of sanctification, which nonetheless is explained only in some parts of Scripture, and yet be hostile to or suspicious of rationality and logic which every verse of Scripture exhibits? Source​

What does it mean for God to be logical?

It means that God is God, that He does not both exist and not exist or do and not do the same thing, and that God does not contradict Himself in thought, word, or deed.

Do you not agree with that? If you do, then you are in agreement with me because that's what logic is.

Are you going to subject God to a set of rules and limits that make God finite?

Is limiting God's character to that which always looks to the good of others limiting God? Is that what you are suggesting? Is it a limitation of God to insist that He not be self-contradictory in His thoughts, words, or actions? Surely you cannot believe that!

Logic requires finitude in order for it to work (there have to be limits in order for us to approach the world in a rational manner; closed systems are the joys of science, and the headache of science and the scientific method and rational approaches are multiple variants that cannot be controlled). So to talk about God as logical is to set limits about God. Even though you do not define those limits they are still very much there; and by using the term logical you set those limits not only around God but around the Creation as well (uniting both God and the Creation within the same limits). God is not a finite being. God is eternal and God is Spirit (Spirit being by definition a lack of boundaries that are well defined in the flesh).

The finite is not a necessary condition of logic. If that were so, mathematics wouldn't work nor could you even discuss infinity.
Further, as I've said a half dozen times, God is the very source of logic, the very personification of it. Logic is no more finite than infinity is.

Truth is not defined by logic; truth is defined by life and by breath and by the Spirit; God is truth, not logical assertions.

Satan is alive. Is he therefore true or is he not the father of lies?

Logic is truth. It's the same thing. Logic has to do with why something is true and it defines the parameters of truth. Even your own statement here attempts to use logic to define truth. Indeed no definitions of anything are possible without the use of logic. To say "God is truth." is a logical statement. You defeat your own position every time you say something.

God is truth! That is the posit that is given to us in the scriptures. It is not qualified by anything else.

I agree completely! You clearly are not understanding my point. You are defeating your own position by saying this. Here is effectively what you are saying...

Premise 1: The Scripture is true.
Premise 2: The Scripture posits that God is truth.
Conclusion A: God is truth.

That logic SA! That's modus ponens! You cannot escape logic - no matter how hard you try. The very act of trying to escape it utilizes it. How very appropriate it is that the Bible likens God to logic!

Whether God is logical or not, God is truth (for all of reality consists in God).

Now here is where you completely jump totally off the deep end into the abyss of irrationality and confirm that my reaction toward your position has been dead on correct this entire time.
I ask you again...

CAN GOD CONTRADICT HIMSELF? If your answer yes, then we're back to believing that the Moon is made of green cheese and defeat your own position by affirming that anything at all, including my position, might be true. If you answer no, then you affirm logic and still defeat your own position.

You pick.

You make an assumption that I am not willing to agree with. You define God as logical, and that is a statement I have yet to comprehend let alone concede. What does it mean for us to define God by God's limits? It only assumes that we have seen the world around us and thought that this world is just as real as God, in itself,

Can you not see that you just stated the law of identity here? You affirm logic at every turn SA. I don't understand why you can't see it!

...and we have conceived of another manifestation of God that we must protect ourselves from. The God of nominalist theology (the omni-God) is a God who seems to be able to go either way, for we assume that goodness and evil are equally based in their own ontologies (and that power is a neutral reality that can be used for either good or for evil). We define evil within itself, so that evil takes on a substance of its own, then we project this onto God.
The problem is that our ontology is messed up so that it also messes up our view of God. Evil has no ontology (it has no reality). The only way in which evil gains substance is parasitically through the Creation. Evil is the lacking of good, it is not the opposite (anymore than 0 is the opposite of infinity; the opposite of infinity is negative infinity). And as soon as we give evil an ontology, we submit ourselves to a view of the world that is not Christian. There is a reason why eastern values are becoming so popular among the people of the west, because this ontological breakdown has led us to affirm the reality of evil as much as we affirm the reality of good, and in fact, we have shed all values, so that evil and good become a subjective matter that is really only a reflection of one's own values.

You seem fixated on this point. It is irrelevant to the discussion about logic and so I will ignore it except to say that for righteousness to have meaning it is not necessary to presume the existence of evil but only the potential for it. There is nothing about what you are saying that contradicts that. You create light, you instantly have the potential for darkness. You create sound, you instantly have the potential for silence. And note that before light and sound were created, darkness and silence would have had no meaning (speaking only of the physical created order of course).

To define God as logical for me is as absurd as defining God as "non-contradictory." We define God by the Creation, rather than seeing that the opposite must be true; we only have reality in as much as we are grounded in God, and when we cease to be grounded in God we cease to have reality (we are corrupted; we die; we are destroyed). Sin is not the opposite of the good; sin is the absence of it.

False dichotomy. The absence of good is the opposite of the presence of good. You are truly making a mountain out of a mole hill.

So I do not want to talk about God as "logical." God is God; anything is a lie. God is self-defined (not defined by limits we try to tease out of God).

But God is not both self-defined and not self-defined (the law of excluded middle). Do you disagree with that? I bet you don't! And if you do, you defeat your own position because in agreeing with it you affirm the second law of logic in relation to God defining Himself.

I really hope this is getting through. You are nailing your own coffin shut on this.

Once again, you fail to see why I detest your exegesis of John. When John speaks of logos, it is not a universal and singular logical framework for the world and for God; logos is Jesus of Nazareth who proceeds from the Father in the incarnation within Mary's womb, who walks and talks with his disciples on the earth, who is killed and who is raised, who ascended to the Father and who will come again. Logos is forever incarnate (made flesh) for us.

I completely agree but you cannot escape the simple fact that logos is Greek for logic. It is precisely the same word with precisely the same definition. In fact, the English word logic isn't even a translation of logos but rather a transliteration. It is the exact same word.

It is never to be abstracted into logic, for logic by definition cannot face the world in an incarnate matter, but must always abstract the world into simplified truths that easy to manipulate and to handle.

You simply have no idea what logic is, that's clearly what the problem is here. Hopefully this post has served to clear that problem up.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[sentientsynth]

SA,

I think we're getting toward an understanding of one another.

Talk just a wee bit more about this statement, please.

These are two statements, which do not allow us to define God by condradiction (because as I said before, I would never define light by calling it non-darkness).​

It isn't my intention to define God by contradiction. I agree that "defining light by calling it non-darkness" is silly. One could just as easily define darkness as non-light. One has to step outside of the antitheses and make positive descriptions.

1. God and what God has created and to which God gives life is truth.

2. Anything that is not grounded the truth is a lie.

3. God's revelation perfectly reflects the truth of God to us, so that it is truth as well (for God's revelation to us is God's very self, Jesus the Christ; God's revelation does not merely possess truth, it is truth, just as Christ is the truth).

#2 defines "lie" as "not-truth." This is "definition by antitheses" to which you yourself have objected. It's alright, though. There's nothing wrong with a simple codification of terms for the purpose of communication. Hence the codified laws of discursive logical analysis.


Thanks for the chat.

SS

 

[seekinganswers]

SA,

I think we're getting toward an understanding of one another.

Talk just a wee bit more about this statement, please.

These are two statements, which do not allow us to define God by condradiction (because as I said before, I would never define light by calling it non-darkness).​

It isn't my intention to define God by contradiction. I agree that "defining light by calling it non-darkness" is silly. One could just as easily define darkness as non-light. One has to step outside of the antitheses and make positive descriptions.

Now I am starting to understand your thinking. You see, God is truth (substance/reality). Lies aren't something of substance (they are a lacking of truth, they lack substance). Therefore, God cannot be defined using contradiction, because contradictions are by nature a lacking (an ontological absence). Lies as something without substance in themselves can never be described by an ontology inherent to themselves. The reality of a lie is always contingent upon the truth. A lie can only be understood in presence of the truth.

You see, it is not possible to define darkness as the absence of light. Darkness is not a substance from which there can be an absence (that would be to define darkness as the opposite of light; oposites do not lack substance but are a different substance. I am defining light as 2 and darkness as zero; in defining darkness as non-light you would define darkness as -2 instead of zero; darkness is not the opposite of light, it is absence of light, and can only be defined in the presence of the light).

#2 defines "lie" as "not-truth." This is "definition by antitheses" to which you yourself have objected. It's alright, though. There's nothing wrong with a simple codification of terms for the purpose of communication. Hence the codified laws of discursive logical analysis.

This is the only way a lie can be understood. How would I define a lie as such? Is there something inherent to a lie that gives it substance? In fact, anything of substance within a lie is the truth, and the lie distorts that truth. So a lie can never be understood as something with substance in itself; a lie is always a manipulation of what already is. Thus, you can't have a lie unless there is truth. If there is no truth, than there is no lie. But the converse of this statement is not true. One does not understand truth through lies. Truth is self-evident (it has its own substance). Light is not understood through the darkness, you just see the darkness (absence of light) when you look into the light.

Does this help at all?

Peace,
Michael

 

[godrulz]

The Borg are merging Clete and Seeking as they scare the rest of us with long, thoughtful posts :hammer:

 

[seekinganswers]

The Borg are merging Clete and Seeking as they scare the rest of us with long, thoughtful posts :hammer:

I've improved my length! I went from pages to paragraphs. :angel: :angel: :angel:

Peace,
Michael

 

[M7nyc]

It is incredably ignorant to think people are't responsibility for eternal life...

It is incredably ignorant to think people are't responsibility for eternal life...

Adam was certainly responsible for death in the Garden of Eden, and the subsequent reign of sin in the heart of every person born. It's futile to get into a rational debate with Calvinists. Most of them have seen very little change in their lives, after all, their belief system tells them their not responsible; however, I will quote some scripture that they easily overlook to maintain their viewpoint.

2 Timothy 3:16 All scripture is God breathed and useful for training in righteousness.
John 10:10 says the theif comes to steal, kill, and destroy. Jesus came that we might have life abundant. If God is laying sickness on some and healing others, that image of our God is one of a god in conflict with himself.
1 Timothy 2:4 says God desires all to be saved. Since we know some aren't, god must somehow be weak and unable to fulfill his desire.
Mark 6:1-6 says Jesus (God) could not do a mighty work, except heal a few sick. It sounds like we're responsible for obtaining God's blessings in our lives, unless you want to argue whether Jesus was God. I won't even go into that stupidity. Are we Christians? While I'm talking about God Incarnate, I can't find any place in the gospels where the sick did not receive healing when they came to Jesus with expectations. Jesus had a favorite phrase in the many situtations where people were healed: "...your faith (Mark 9:29, Matthew 9:22, Luke 17:19)." Jesus even commended faith (Matthew 8:5-10).
What about Hebrews 6:4-9? It talks of those enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift, partakers of the Holy Spirit, tasted of the good word of God, and powers of the age to come. Would you say they never received salvation? Yet, God warns us they can fall away. What about the Prodigal Son parable in Luke 15:11-32. That prodigal son was with God, left Him, and returned again. If you want to about that parable being about the human race as a whole or whether that's speaking of an individual, look at verse 10. Jesus just got done saying "one sinner who repents." Sounds to me like free will is integral to God's salvation. Jesus chose Judas Iscariot to be an apostle, Judas afterward chose Jesus' betrayal. If God's will is absolute like the Calvinists would have you believe then no one can be blamed for sin. Imagining God destined some for eternal damnation makes Him out to be cruel. While God certainly has the right to do this, let's not distort the truth of these scriptures: (1 John 1:5) there is no darkness in Him, and (1 John 4:8) God is love. Some well meaning Christians are ignorance of God's word, but I trust if they really search the scriptures instead of listening to misinformed church leaders, the Holy Spirit will reveal the truth. You can't build Christian theology on one portion of scripture and be in conflict with the rest. There's a lot more I can quote and say, but I won't make this forum my pulpit. Study the word for yourself!
Again, 2 Timothy 3:16, "All scripture is God breathed..."

 

[Jefferson]

M7nyc:

Great first post! Hey, I guarantee you that someone like you will really appreciate reading through THIS thread. Enjoy!

 

[Poly]

M7nyc:

Great first post! Hey, I guarantee you that someone like you will really appreciate reading through THIS thread. Enjoy!

Wow. I have to agree about that being a great post.

M7nyc, I'm hoping to see you and looking forward to your engaging in threads around here having to do with Calvinism, predestination, OV vs. SV., etc.

Welcome to TOL!

 

[thelaqachisnext]

All of the Creation is grounded in the Creator (that is all physical Creation). God has decided to reside in the Creation through humanity (not as singular and individual persons) but as a people imaged after the God of Creation (that is humans [plural], members united in a singular body [flesh], male and female, were made after the image of God; marriage being the image of the church, according to Paul). Human beings as individuals do not bare the image of God in themselves. It is only in as much as they love God by also loving the neighbor that they truly image their Creator.


Michael

Not Scripturally true, Michael;
Adam was made in the tupos of Jesus Christ -who was to come in flesh and is come in flesh.
Romans 5:14.

Jesus Christ pre-incarnate, was the 'similitude' of YHWH whom Moses saw and was 'YHWH SEEN', whom Abraham understood was to come as the Lamb of God, to 'Mount Moriah', which he named 'YHWH SEEN', in Genesis 22, when He was given the living oracle of the Day of Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God, slain as the 'only begotten Son' -the living One, when he rejoice in the Day of Jesus Christ as the sacrifice for our sins as the Lamb of God.

God is 'not seen' [the Father and the Holy Spirit], and God 'is seen', in the Person of the Word, who is come in human flesh [which created New Man flesh He donned as one dons a garment, to be our Kinsman in, to redeem us by shedding the blood of it for the payment of our redemption, as Kinsman [Isaiah 59], by shedding His New Man blood on His New Man body, as our Mercy Seat] as second created Son of God.
And Adam was made [formed] in His very image as a 'tupos'.

http://www.blueletterbible.org/tmp_dir/words/5/1150522805-1817.html
tupos;
1) the mark of a stroke or blow, print

2) a figure formed by a blow or impression
And God the Father chooses to reside in individual persons in Christ, who together make the city of Zion, or heavenly Jerusalem, which is being built one living stone at a time adopted into Christ and added to Zion, above.
To be a living stone, the Living Spirit must reside individually within each born again person in Christ -But His Spirit is One Spirit into which we are adopted and regenerated as sons of God in Christ, in.
.

 

[Philetus]

'similitude'

Jesus, that clears everything up!

I can't wait to use that one on the street. The wretched will be blown away with that one.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

She explained that she was diagnosed with Leukemia on her child’s first birthday. She explained that she was treated with intense chemotherapy.
Can you imagine that?
That is just plain sick!

What ever happened to understanding that it was man’s sin (our rebellion) that brought sickness and death into the world? What ever happened to placing the responsibility for bad things with mankind? So now God is a disease dispenser?

People are just plain stupid.

:dunce:

yep
that is just plain sick (mankind, society, chemotherapy)
ppeople believe what they've been told
so
they go along with death
instead
of
finding out the truth
that
is
the
wide road that leads to destruction
that
is
the popular road, hand in hand, arm in arm with the rest of 'friends' / society / the world
.
.
.
sick, sick, sick, death, death, death.
.
.
.
The Creator Gives Life, and Gives Life FREELY

.
.
.
the absolute known and proven 1,000,000 times cure
for leukemia
is
the opposite of the cause of leukemia
and
is
forbidden by the dungbeatles(politicians,bankers,pharmakea)
from
being acknowledged
even
though
THEY knew it and proved it long ago.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Not Scripturally true, Michael;
Adam was made in the tupos of Jesus Christ -who was to come in flesh and is come in flesh.
Romans 5:14.

Jesus Christ pre-incarnate, was the 'similitude' of YHWH whom Moses saw and was 'YHWH SEEN', whom Abraham understood was to come as the Lamb of God, to 'Mount Moriah', which he named 'YHWH SEEN', in Genesis 22, when He was given the living oracle of the Day of Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God, slain as the 'only begotten Son' -the living One, when he rejoice in the Day of Jesus Christ as the sacrifice for our sins as the Lamb of God.

God is 'not seen' [the Father and the Holy Spirit], and God 'is seen', in the Person of the Word, who is come in human flesh [which created New Man flesh He donned as one dons a garment, to be our Kinsman in, to redeem us by shedding the blood of it for the payment of our redemption, as Kinsman [Isaiah 59], by shedding His New Man blood on His New Man body, as our Mercy Seat] as second created Son of God.
And Adam was made [formed] in His very image as a 'tupos'.

http://www.blueletterbible.org/tmp_dir/words/5/1150522805-1817.html
tupos;
1) the mark of a stroke or blow, print

2) a figure formed by a blow or impression
And God the Father chooses to reside in individual persons in Christ, who together make the city of Zion, or heavenly Jerusalem, which is being built one living stone at a time adopted into Christ and added to Zion, above.
To be a living stone, the Living Spirit must reside individually within each born again person in Christ -But His Spirit is One Spirit into which we are adopted and regenerated as sons of God in Christ, in.
.

not Scripturally accurate -
"God is 'not seen' [the Father and the Holy Spirit],"
but
it takes a
pre-schoolers faith and knowledge of Hebrew life and language to know and accept the Truth.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

the adjective holy is always an adjective and is never, ever, not ever, a name.
search
putting in quotes "holy is an adjective" and "holy spirit" to find the accurate Jewish and Hebrew understanding of Jewish and Hebrew Scripture.
the gentiles have screwed up the translations badly.

 

[godrulz]

the adjective holy is always an adjective and is never, ever, not ever, a name.
search
putting in quotes "holy is an adjective" and "holy spirit" to find the accurate Jewish and Hebrew understanding of Jewish and Hebrew Scripture.
the gentiles have screwed up the translations badly.

Huh? 'Holy Spirit' is a legit Greek translation, just as Father, Son, Jesus, God, Lord is.

 

[Nydhogg]

Clete writes:My question is how does the Open Theist worship a god who would not prevent this from happening?

Free Willers at least don't affirm God casually and selfishly harm folks and do horrible things to them just to stroke his own ego.

Sorry to weigh in there while not being a Christian, but I just had to say it.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Huh? 'Holy Spirit' is a legit Greek translation, just as Father, Son, Jesus, God, Lord is.

...
'holy spirit' or maybe even 'holy Spirit' may be right.
'Holy Spirit' is incorrect, inaccurate, and used deceptively to trick people into accepting and/or calling on some other name besides the One Name under heaven by which a man may be healed(saved).
A vast majority even of chr.st..ns have been tricked into worshiping an image that can never help them, but they (most of them it looks like) will tenaciously cling to their gangrene rather than turn to the Creator of all life to get His help while it is still (for some) possible to get His help..
email to follow up.