Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

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njd83
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Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Sun Aug 21, 2016 2:46 pm

I have been trying to understand Open Theism topics and want to ask if anyone has quotes from early fathers about this topic. I can only think of one off the top of my head in Justin Martyr.

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by Paidion » Sun Aug 21, 2016 6:39 pm

Hi njd,

Would you quote Justin Martyr on the subject?

It is also important to understand the essence of open theism. The understanding of some is restricted to the view that the future cannot be known by anyone (including God), because the choices of the many free-will agents (including God) determine the future, and those choices have not yet all been made.

However, the main issue in open theism, is that man's response to God's intentions influences God. For example, Abraham "bargained" with God concerning God's decision to destroy Sodom, and God responded.

God had wanted Israel to be ruled by judges, but they insisted having a king like other nations to rule over them, and so God let them have one, but He warned them that there would be trouble because of it.
Paidion

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Sun Aug 21, 2016 7:28 pm

I underlined the main idea of free will and foreknowledge talked about here. Some helpful interesting points imo.

Justin Martyr - Dialogue with Trypho - Chapter 140-141
CHAP. CXL.—IN CHRIST ALL ARE FREE. THE JEWS HOPE FOR SALVATION IN VAIN BECAUSE THEY ARE SONS OF ABRAHAM.

“Hence also Jacob, as I remarked before, being himself a type of Christ, had married the two handmaids of his two free wives, and of them begat sons, for the purpose of indicating beforehand that Christ would receive even all those who amongst Japheth’s race are descendants of Canaan, equally with the free, and would have the children fellow-heirs. And we are such; but you cannot comprehend this, because you cannot drink of the living fountain of God, but of broken cisterns which can hold no water, as the Scripture says. But they are cisterns broken, and holding no water, which your own teachers have digged, as the Scripture also expressly asserts, ‘teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.’4 And besides, they beguile themselves and you, supposing that the everlasting kingdom will be assuredly given to those of the dispersion who are of Abraham after the flesh, although they be sinners, and faithless, and disobedient towards God, which the Scriptures have proved is not the case. For if so, Isaiah would never have said this: ‘And unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we would have been like Sodom and Gomorrah.’ And Ezekiel: ‘Even if Noah, and Jacob, and Daniel were to pray for sons or daughters, their request should not be granted.’6 But neither shall the father perish for the son, nor the son for the father; but every one for his own sin, and each shall be saved for his own righteousness. And again Isaiah says: ‘They shall look on the carcases 8 of them that have transgressed: their worm shall not cease, and their fire shall not be quenched; and they shall be a spectacle to all flesh.’ And our Lord, according to the will of Him that sent Him, who is the Father and Lord of all, would not have said, ‘They shall come from the east, and from the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the children of the kingdom shall be cast out into outer darkness.’10 Furthermore, I have proved in what has preceded, that those who were foreknown to be unrighteous, whether men or angels, are not made wicked by God’s fault, but each man by his own fault is what he will appear to be.


CHAP. CXLI.—FREE-WILL IN MEN AND ANGELS.

“But that you may not have a pretext for saying that Christ must have been crucified, and that those who transgressed must have been among your nation, and that the matter could not have been otherwise, I said briefly by anticipation, that God, wishing men and angels to follow His will, resolved to create them free to do righteousness; possessing reason, that they may know by whom they are created, and through whom they, not existing formerly, do now exist; and with a law that they should be judged by Him, if they do anything contrary to right reason: and of ourselves we, men and angels, shall be convicted of having acted sinfully, unless we repent beforehand. But if the word of God foretells that some angels and men shall be certainly punished, it did so because it foreknew that they would be unchangeably [wicked], but not because God had created them so. So that if they repent, all who wish for it can obtain mercy from God: and the Scripture foretells that they shall be blessed, saying, ‘Blessed is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not sin;’ that is, having repented of his sins, that he may receive remission of them from God; and not as you deceive yourselves, and some others who resemble you in this, who say, that even though they be sinners, but know God, the Lord will not impute sin to them. We have as proof of this the one fall of David, which happened through his boasting, which was forgiven then when he so mourned and wept, as it is written. But if even to such a man no remission was granted before repentance, and only when this great king, and anointed one, and prophet, mourned and conducted himself so, how can the impure and utterly abandoned, if they weep not, and mourn not, and repent not, entertain the hope that the Lord will not impute to them sin? And this one fall of David, in the matter of Uriah’s wife, proves, sirs,” I said, “that the patriarchs had many wives, not to commit fornication, but that a certain dispensation and all mysteries might be accomplished by them; since, if it were allowable to take any wife, or as many wives as one chooses, and how he chooses, which the men of your nation do over all the earth, wherever they sojourn, or wherever they have been sent, taking women under the name of marriage, much more would David have been permitted to do this.”
When I had said this, dearest Marcus Pompeius, I came to an end.

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by Paidion » Sun Aug 21, 2016 8:44 pm

Thank you njd; that's a good quote.

It certainly indicates that Justin believed that people do wrong through their own choices, and not because God made them that way or predestined them to be that way.
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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Mon Aug 22, 2016 11:44 am

OK Paidion:

So we know (right?), that at the very least, God knows every possible out come of every free will decision for all time. And he knows every possible DNA combination from Adam. But the question is whether He knows every exact free will decision we will choose, right?
according as He did choose us in him before the foundation of the world, for our being holy and unblemished before Him, in love, having foreordained us to the adoption of sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will. - Ephesians 1:4-5,
My question is this, does he only know which free will decisions lead to which humans (choices/influences and dna) which ultimately he chose those combinations which he knew would be His(choose Him) out of all possible combinations? But then the other factor you brought up about God influencing us, his world, and us influencing Him also. Hmmm... complicated

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by Paidion » Wed Aug 24, 2016 5:18 pm

I say that there is a genuine ability for every normal human being to choose, independent of dna, etc. For that reason, no one can know in advance what a free-will agent will choose. For to know in advance implies that statements about that future choice are NOW true. But if they are NOW true, then at that future time they will not really be choices, but will have been determined in advance.

To give a simple example, if it is now true that you will not drink a chocolate milk shake at 3 P.M. tomorrow, then it is impossible for you to drink a chocolate milk shake at 3 P.M. tomorrow.

Conclusion: Future actions of free will agents are possibilities, and statements about those future actions are neither true not false NOW.
Paidion

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:08 pm

I was thinking about that after I posted and I got the thought that maybe our souls are put into our bodies and not necessarily totally related to our DNA. In that way, if God created our souls, he knew what souls he would create from Adam, even if the DNA isn't exactly perfectly know by God, but he certainly knows a lot about all possibilities. And maybe the DNA doesn't effect the soul as much as we think. When i am talking with the Lord, I don't think of myself much as a body but more in a spiritual sense as a soul essence with emotions and anger and love and tears and responses to his love etc etc. like, my soul doesn't think along the lines of biology when its in communion with God really, but more along the lines of spiritual sense. so maybe he knew what souls he would create or something.... biology being more free will determining outcomes. just a thought

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Thu Aug 25, 2016 12:12 pm

to respond ahead-of-time...

Maybe Satan was a test. God created Satan a certain way as a high angel wanting him to be tested as an example to all the other angels, having made him with a certain personality than others, God not wanting him to fail the test, but wanting him to lay all his pride down when/if he starts failing (since in this idea he would more naturally due to his personality and position and beauty be prone to self will and pride), instead of choosing to high-handedly rebel after starting to slip. as an example to all creation to humble themselves if they stray (because otherwise Jesus was going to need to do it and die). So Lucifer could have been an example to all in humbling himself by him choosing to become a "nothing" after starting to stray misusing his high position and beauty and power...... and then God raising him up! like his own child

(I mean even humans have certain personalities that are unique, and that is good, but the aionion lesson would be to not let our uniqueness become badness and sin etc. keep it in check by humility )

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by Paidion » Thu Aug 25, 2016 5:57 pm

Hi njd,

The very concept of our "having souls" that were somehow plunked into our bodies at conception, or at birth, or some time in between, has arisen from Greek philosophical thought. We don't have souls; we ARE souls.

Genesis 2:7 (AV) And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became living soul.

If a soul is something separate from the body, then it should read that man received a living soul. But in fact, the word translated as "soul" (nephesh) doesn't mean "soul" in the Greek philosophical sense, but means "being." And that is exactly how most modern translators render it:

Genesis 2:7 NKJV And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

Indeed, if the word nephesh meant soul in the Greek sense, then it would be possible to touch a dead soul:

Numbers 19:11 ‘He who touches the dead nephesh of anyone shall be unclean seven days.

In the New Testament, the word ψυχη (psuchΑ) means self. Strangely nearly every translation renders it "soul" in the following verse:

Luke 12:19 NKJV ‘And I will say to my soul, "Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry."

If your soul is the "real you" that inhabits your body, then how could this man talk to his soul? Who was doing the talking?
But if "soul" means "self" there is no problem. The man is talking to himself.

If the soul is separate from the body, why should body changes affect the soul? For example, many aged people have dementia.
Why should the soul, the conscious person, be affected by age?

The apostle Paul indicated that our great hope is not in dying and going to heaven, but it is in the resurrection—that if there is no resurrection, we might as well eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we'll die (and remain dead).

1 Corinthians 15:32 What do I gain if, humanly speaking, I fought with beasts at Ephesus? If the dead are not raised, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”
Paidion

Man judges a person by his past deeds, and administers penalties for his wrongdoing. God judges a person by his present character, and disciplines him that he may become righteous.

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Re: Open theism, can you help with quotes from Early Fathers

Post by njd83 » Thu Aug 25, 2016 6:18 pm

Soul psuche is the you inside you. when your souls talks to itself, you are talking to yourself. same thing. Paul said Spirit Soul Body, three parts. the hebrew is different. the greek is better probably in my opinion.

like the Tabernacle, outer court, holy place, most holy place. Flesh, Soul, Spirit.

In acts 2:27 he says "you will not abandon my soul to Hades", what goes down to Hades? not the flesh. =) Jesus' flesh was in the tomb. David's decaying flesh and bones are somewhere in the ground/tombs in Israel, still today.

Basically the idea is that there is a "you" behind the "fleshly you" called the soul. its scriptural and early churchical.

Numbers 19:11: "He who is coming against the dead body of any man—is unclean seven days;" YLT

"any man" is nephesh. "dead body" is corpse in hebrew.

Septuagint: “ ‘The one who touches the corpse(thnesko) of any human being(psuche) will be unclean for seven days."
Last edited by njd83 on Thu Aug 25, 2016 10:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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