Assessing the Necessity of Open Theism 2
Posted: Thu Sep 12, 2013 8:09 pm
Assessing the Necessity of Open Theism: 2- respecting Omniscience and Free Will
According to John Sanders Open Theism website, http://www.opentheism.info/, “the only wise God has chosen to exercise general rather than meticulous providence, allowing space for us to operate and for God to be creative and resourceful in working with us. It was solely God’s decision not to control every detail that happens in our lives. Moreover, God has flexible strategies. Though the divine nature does not change, God reacts to contingencies, even adjusting his plans, if necessary, to take into account the decisions of his free creatures…. Finally, the omniscient God knows all that can be known given the sort of world he created…. We believe that God could have known every event of the future had God decided to create a fully determined universe. However, in our view God decided to create beings with indeterministic freedom which implies that God chose to create a universe in which the future is not entirely knowable, even for God. For many open theists the “future” is not a present reality-it does not exist-and God knows reality as it is…. Our rejection of divine timelessness and our affirmation of dynamic omniscience are the most controversial elements in our proposal and the view of foreknowledge receives the most attention.”
At the Theos.org website, mattrose provided the following clarification regarding the Open Theism viewpoint on omniscience:
“John Sanders
"God's knowledge of the future contains knowledge of what God has decided to bring about unilaterally, knowledge of possibilities, and those events which are determined to occur... God is not caught off guard." (From "Perspectives on the Doctrine of God" page 199)
Greg Boyd
"The only reality that exists for God to know concerning our future action is the possible directions we may take." (From his book which is literally titled "God of the Possible" page 66).
Clark Pinnock
"God knows all the possibilities and is, therefore, never caught off-guard." ("Most Moved Mover" page 103)”
How can it be that humankind has freedom of choice (Many times in the Bible, God exhorts people to choose to follow God, e.g., Deuteronomy 30:19-20.), when God is said to know all. From the Open Theism website description and the email interaction between Sanders and Christopher Hall, a proponent of Classic Theism, which was recorded in the May 2001 Christianity Today, under the title “Does God Know Your Next Move?,” it can be seen that the three main areas of contention between these two viewpoints are God’s immutability, including His immanence and impassability, His omniscience in light of humankinds’ freedom of choice, and His goodness given the existence of evil. Posting 1 dealt with immutability and impassability, and posting 3 will deal with goodness.
Sanders raises this type of issue in his exchange with Hall cited above. Hall notes that the Open Theism view allows for God to make mistakes, a view which he terms “flawed.” However, Hall does not propose an alternative view which addresses these Open Theism issues. Saunders raises valid questions on this topic.
Again, from the Classic Theism viewpoint, it is error to say that God is not omniscient. The Bible tells us that God is all-knowing (e.g., Genesis 15:13-14; Exodus 9:13-16, 12:40; Psalm 139: 16; Psalm 147:5; Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32; Hebrews 4:13.). God has nothing to learn or to discover; He experiences no surprise in what happens. Also, God tells people in the Bible that they are free to choose their own way of life, and God repeatedly urges them to choose God’s way (e.g., Deuteronomy 30:19-20; Joshua 24:14-16.). But if God knows all, then, on the surface of it, it would seem that God knows the choices we’ll make before we make them, so we’re not really free to choose, because the God who designed and made us did it with our life choices fully predetermined! To resolve these issues requires an amplified alternative rendering, within the context of Classic Theism, of the notion “God knows all.”
The Classic Theism understanding of God’s omniscience is that God knows the life path choices of each person from prior to their birth until their death (see Psalms 139:13-16.). If this is so, then peoples’ freedom of choice is more apparent than real. Some Classic Theists have argued, similarly to Saunders, that with respect to human choice, the omniscient God is akin to a cosmic meteorologist, only forecasting how people will behave. But omnipotent Creator God is also the cosmic weather-maker, not merely the omniscient weather-forecaster. If God has made people knowing full well how they would behave, including sinful behaviour, then people do not have freedom of choice! It would appear that Open Theism addresses a weakness inherent in Classic Theism by claiming that God only partially knows the future. It does so as a way of preserving human freedom of choice and God’s goodness. This Classic Theism weakness exists because of limitations in our human conception of God’s knowledge, or, more accurately, His foreknowledge.
Classic Theism conceives of God as foreknowing the one life path that each and every human takes. Yet Scripture frequently articulates more than one course of action from which people can choose in both the Old and the New Testaments, and exhorts people to make the godly choice (For instance, Proverbs: 5:21 says “For a man’s ways are in full view of the Lord, and he examines all his paths.” and 16:9 states “In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” This means that our life “paths” or “steps” – the choices available to us – are established by God, but the “ways” or “course” we take – our actual choices – are determined by our decisions. Similarly, Jeremiah 6:16 states “This is what the Lord says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; …ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.’” See also Matthew 6:19-24.). After the choice is made, of course, there is only one life path direction up to that point, but prior to that choice being made, and after it, there are multiple life path choices available to each person. I term this the Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge view of God’s omniscience. In human hindsight and from a time-based perspective, the Single Life Path model of God’s omniscience makes sense. However, from the perspective of eternal divine foresight and humankinds’ free will, the only reasonable model of God’s omniscience is Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge. This view preserves both God’s omniscience and humankind’s freedom of choice. A department store analogy provides intuitive support for this model.
Imagine you are at a moral choice point in your life. You have a number of possible choices that you can make. Now relate this to a shopping excursion in a department store. There are many items from which you can choose. All of the choices are real possible choices for you. You make your choices and leave the remaining items behind in the store – real items which you could have chosen, but decided against. It is similar when you make a moral choice. You can choose from a variety of options ranging from completely good to totally evil. God knows all the choices that are available to you – choices which He preordained at Creation. All of these choices are real. None of your choices can surprise God, because God knows them all in the eternal now. But God allows you the freedom to make that choice for yourself in time – a choice that God has not predetermined for you – a choice for which you are accountable!
The decision tree represents an analogy with more similitude for multiple life path omniscience than a department store shopping excursion. The omniscient God foreknows the multiple choice-filled life decision tree for every person who might ever be conceived from the time of Creation until the Second Coming – an incredibly awesome omniscient God of possibilities!
With this understanding of omniscience, we can accommodate the apparent inconsistencies, cited in posting 1 under Immutability, both of God’s immanence in the face of a future that has not yet occurred, and in His answer to prayer, suspending of punishment in the face of repentant behaviour, and giving choice of punishment for sin. If we look at the three choice situations, we see these are real choices divinely ordained and foreknown by the omniscient God. They are part of those peoples’ multiple life path possibilities.
So God’s immanence with respect to the future that has not yet occurred in time is made clear. The Multiple Life Path model of omniscience, which is equivalent to the Open Theism position, lets us appreciate that God foreordains all possible choices for every human at Creation. As noted earlier, human hindsight suggests the Single Life Path model for God’s omniscience, but divine foresight commends the Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge model.
Conclusion 2
Open Theism exposes shortcomings in Classic Theism, for which we can be thankful. I believe the reason for these errors is our temporal nature. It biases our viewing God’s omniscience from a human hindsight, rather than a divine foresight, perspective. This bias will be with us until we are ushered into Eternity. However flawed is the Open Theists’ proposed handling of the dilemmas of God’s immutability, impassability, and goodness, it provide a solid catalyst for a Classic Theism resolution. The first posting dealt with immutability and impassability. In posting 3, I’ll deal with God’s goodness.
I believe all the original insights in this posting were divinely inspired.
Ken Tunstall, PhD.
Retired Management Consultant, Student of the Bible, Lay Apologist
According to John Sanders Open Theism website, http://www.opentheism.info/, “the only wise God has chosen to exercise general rather than meticulous providence, allowing space for us to operate and for God to be creative and resourceful in working with us. It was solely God’s decision not to control every detail that happens in our lives. Moreover, God has flexible strategies. Though the divine nature does not change, God reacts to contingencies, even adjusting his plans, if necessary, to take into account the decisions of his free creatures…. Finally, the omniscient God knows all that can be known given the sort of world he created…. We believe that God could have known every event of the future had God decided to create a fully determined universe. However, in our view God decided to create beings with indeterministic freedom which implies that God chose to create a universe in which the future is not entirely knowable, even for God. For many open theists the “future” is not a present reality-it does not exist-and God knows reality as it is…. Our rejection of divine timelessness and our affirmation of dynamic omniscience are the most controversial elements in our proposal and the view of foreknowledge receives the most attention.”
At the Theos.org website, mattrose provided the following clarification regarding the Open Theism viewpoint on omniscience:
“John Sanders
"God's knowledge of the future contains knowledge of what God has decided to bring about unilaterally, knowledge of possibilities, and those events which are determined to occur... God is not caught off guard." (From "Perspectives on the Doctrine of God" page 199)
Greg Boyd
"The only reality that exists for God to know concerning our future action is the possible directions we may take." (From his book which is literally titled "God of the Possible" page 66).
Clark Pinnock
"God knows all the possibilities and is, therefore, never caught off-guard." ("Most Moved Mover" page 103)”
How can it be that humankind has freedom of choice (Many times in the Bible, God exhorts people to choose to follow God, e.g., Deuteronomy 30:19-20.), when God is said to know all. From the Open Theism website description and the email interaction between Sanders and Christopher Hall, a proponent of Classic Theism, which was recorded in the May 2001 Christianity Today, under the title “Does God Know Your Next Move?,” it can be seen that the three main areas of contention between these two viewpoints are God’s immutability, including His immanence and impassability, His omniscience in light of humankinds’ freedom of choice, and His goodness given the existence of evil. Posting 1 dealt with immutability and impassability, and posting 3 will deal with goodness.
Sanders raises this type of issue in his exchange with Hall cited above. Hall notes that the Open Theism view allows for God to make mistakes, a view which he terms “flawed.” However, Hall does not propose an alternative view which addresses these Open Theism issues. Saunders raises valid questions on this topic.
Again, from the Classic Theism viewpoint, it is error to say that God is not omniscient. The Bible tells us that God is all-knowing (e.g., Genesis 15:13-14; Exodus 9:13-16, 12:40; Psalm 139: 16; Psalm 147:5; Matthew 24:36; Mark 13:32; Hebrews 4:13.). God has nothing to learn or to discover; He experiences no surprise in what happens. Also, God tells people in the Bible that they are free to choose their own way of life, and God repeatedly urges them to choose God’s way (e.g., Deuteronomy 30:19-20; Joshua 24:14-16.). But if God knows all, then, on the surface of it, it would seem that God knows the choices we’ll make before we make them, so we’re not really free to choose, because the God who designed and made us did it with our life choices fully predetermined! To resolve these issues requires an amplified alternative rendering, within the context of Classic Theism, of the notion “God knows all.”
The Classic Theism understanding of God’s omniscience is that God knows the life path choices of each person from prior to their birth until their death (see Psalms 139:13-16.). If this is so, then peoples’ freedom of choice is more apparent than real. Some Classic Theists have argued, similarly to Saunders, that with respect to human choice, the omniscient God is akin to a cosmic meteorologist, only forecasting how people will behave. But omnipotent Creator God is also the cosmic weather-maker, not merely the omniscient weather-forecaster. If God has made people knowing full well how they would behave, including sinful behaviour, then people do not have freedom of choice! It would appear that Open Theism addresses a weakness inherent in Classic Theism by claiming that God only partially knows the future. It does so as a way of preserving human freedom of choice and God’s goodness. This Classic Theism weakness exists because of limitations in our human conception of God’s knowledge, or, more accurately, His foreknowledge.
Classic Theism conceives of God as foreknowing the one life path that each and every human takes. Yet Scripture frequently articulates more than one course of action from which people can choose in both the Old and the New Testaments, and exhorts people to make the godly choice (For instance, Proverbs: 5:21 says “For a man’s ways are in full view of the Lord, and he examines all his paths.” and 16:9 states “In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” This means that our life “paths” or “steps” – the choices available to us – are established by God, but the “ways” or “course” we take – our actual choices – are determined by our decisions. Similarly, Jeremiah 6:16 states “This is what the Lord says: ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; …ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.’” See also Matthew 6:19-24.). After the choice is made, of course, there is only one life path direction up to that point, but prior to that choice being made, and after it, there are multiple life path choices available to each person. I term this the Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge view of God’s omniscience. In human hindsight and from a time-based perspective, the Single Life Path model of God’s omniscience makes sense. However, from the perspective of eternal divine foresight and humankinds’ free will, the only reasonable model of God’s omniscience is Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge. This view preserves both God’s omniscience and humankind’s freedom of choice. A department store analogy provides intuitive support for this model.
Imagine you are at a moral choice point in your life. You have a number of possible choices that you can make. Now relate this to a shopping excursion in a department store. There are many items from which you can choose. All of the choices are real possible choices for you. You make your choices and leave the remaining items behind in the store – real items which you could have chosen, but decided against. It is similar when you make a moral choice. You can choose from a variety of options ranging from completely good to totally evil. God knows all the choices that are available to you – choices which He preordained at Creation. All of these choices are real. None of your choices can surprise God, because God knows them all in the eternal now. But God allows you the freedom to make that choice for yourself in time – a choice that God has not predetermined for you – a choice for which you are accountable!
The decision tree represents an analogy with more similitude for multiple life path omniscience than a department store shopping excursion. The omniscient God foreknows the multiple choice-filled life decision tree for every person who might ever be conceived from the time of Creation until the Second Coming – an incredibly awesome omniscient God of possibilities!
With this understanding of omniscience, we can accommodate the apparent inconsistencies, cited in posting 1 under Immutability, both of God’s immanence in the face of a future that has not yet occurred, and in His answer to prayer, suspending of punishment in the face of repentant behaviour, and giving choice of punishment for sin. If we look at the three choice situations, we see these are real choices divinely ordained and foreknown by the omniscient God. They are part of those peoples’ multiple life path possibilities.
So God’s immanence with respect to the future that has not yet occurred in time is made clear. The Multiple Life Path model of omniscience, which is equivalent to the Open Theism position, lets us appreciate that God foreordains all possible choices for every human at Creation. As noted earlier, human hindsight suggests the Single Life Path model for God’s omniscience, but divine foresight commends the Multiple Life Path Foreknowledge model.
Conclusion 2
Open Theism exposes shortcomings in Classic Theism, for which we can be thankful. I believe the reason for these errors is our temporal nature. It biases our viewing God’s omniscience from a human hindsight, rather than a divine foresight, perspective. This bias will be with us until we are ushered into Eternity. However flawed is the Open Theists’ proposed handling of the dilemmas of God’s immutability, impassability, and goodness, it provide a solid catalyst for a Classic Theism resolution. The first posting dealt with immutability and impassability. In posting 3, I’ll deal with God’s goodness.
I believe all the original insights in this posting were divinely inspired.
Ken Tunstall, PhD.
Retired Management Consultant, Student of the Bible, Lay Apologist
