Author: Christopher

By Christopher on Ethics, Government, Politics tagged ,

The Conservative Agenda: Its Basis and Its Basics

The Conservative Agenda:

Its Basis and Its Basics


by Norman L. Geisler


Introduction

As I listen to liberals articulate their agenda, I am struck by the stark contrast between true conservatism and liberalism. In point of fact, I am struck by the unAmerican nature of political liberalism. Indeed, the basics of conservativism are identical with the basis of Americanism. The natural birth of conservativism is the same as the national birth of America: “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” There are numerous basic principles of conservativism contained in our National Birth Certificate: The beliefs in 1) a Creator, 2) Creation, 3) God-given moral absolutes; 4) Governments are ordained of God; 5) the Providence of God, and 6) a final day of judgment. Other principles, like 7) the freedom of speech, 8) the right to political dissent, 9) the right to bear arms, 10) a government based on the consent of the governed, and 11) freedom against tyranny are also implied in The Declaration of Independence.

However, the most fundamental principles of conservativism are the first three: Creator, creation, and God-given moral absolutes. These are the foundation of our country, our constitutions, our courts, and our conservative agenda. And the erosion of these principles in the courts portends the condemnation of our country, as the prospects of restoring them offers hope for our preservation.


The Basis of Conservativism

A conservative is someone who wishes to conserve the basic principles on which our country was founded. He wants to protect, preserve, and achieve the application of these principles to our country. So, the basis of conservativism is the grounds for the basics of conservativism. This being the case, let me speak first about the origin of conservativism.

The Origin of Conservativism

Conservativism is firmly rooted in the principles of The Declaration of Independence which is the basis of Americanisms. That The Declaration of Independence is our founding document and the birthday of our country has been firmly established in a recent brilliant Amicus Brief before the High Court titled Gonzales v. Planner Parenthood (2007).

The Original States

Gonzales demonstrates that all the original states endorsed The Declaration, and every state since has been required to form a government that is in conformity with the U. S. Constitution “and the principles of the Declaration of Independence.” As late as August 21, 1959 Hawaii was admitted to the United States based on the same basis, namely, that it concurred with “the principles of the Declaration of Independence.”

The Articles of Confederation (1781)

In the pre Constitution Articles of Confederation document drafted in 1777 and ratified in 1781 all agreed in “cooperation between the States” and sent “delegates of the United States of America” to participate. This acknowledges that the country already existed before this time and had delegates to send. Indeed, following the spirit of The Declaration of Independence, these Articles spoke of the “Great Governor of the world” who “authorize[d] us to ratify the said Articles of Confederation and perpetual union.”

The Northwest Ordinance (1787)

Likewise, in The Northwest Ordinance was created in 1787 to serve for those territories that would seek thereafter to become States of the already existing United States. It too borrowed from The Declaration of Independence, insisting that “religions, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government…shall forever be encouraged.” In its introductory legal document it insists that “the fundamental principles of civil and religious liberty… formed the basis whereupon these republics, their laws and constitutions are erected….”

The U. S. Constitution

In 1789 The Articles of Confederation were replaced by The United States Constitution and thus became the national government mandated by The Declaration of Independence. It begins, “We the people of the United States…do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” Clearly, the “United States” already existed or they could not be doing this “for” the nation. Indeed, as The Constitution says, they were only making “a more perfect union” than the one already in effect for 13 years. The new Constitution did not create a new nation. It simply created a new document to govern the already existing nation. This new Constitution was “for the United States of America.” It was not the creation of the United States. Article VI makes it clear that it was only providing a better government for the nation that already existed. It affirms that the nation already existed and had an initial form of government under The Articles of Confederation which in turn was based on The Declaration of Independence. For The U.S. Constitution affirms that “all the debts contracted and engagements entered into before the adoption of this Constitution shall be valid against the United States under this Constitution as under the Confederation….”

Indeed, the draft of The Constitution (1787) ends with a reference to the ratification of the Constitution, speaking of “the Independence of the United States of America” as the “twelfth” years before it (in 1776).

As late as 1961 in McGowan v State of Maryland, Justice Douglas wrote: “The institutions of our society are founded on the belief that there is an authority higher than the authority of the State; that there is a moral law which the State is powerless to alter; that the individual possesses rights, conferred by the Creator, and which governments must respect.” It then refers to the familiar words of The Declaration of Independence as a basis of this affirmation, saying, “We hold these truths to be self-evidence, that all men are created equal….” Justice Douglas adds, “And the body of the Constitution as well as the Bill of Rights enshrine those principles.”

On the Jubilee of The U. S. Constitution, President John Quincy Adams wrote: “This act [i.e., the Constitution] was the compliment to the Declaration of Independence; founded on the same principles, carrying them out into practical execution, and forming with it, one entire system of government….”(1).

Indeed, the Founders and presidents dated their government from the time of The Declaration (in 1776), rather than from The Constitution [in 1789]. This included Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Jackson and even Abraham Lincoln. In his famous Gettysburg Address (1863) Lincoln said: “Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation….” But eighty seven years before 1863 when Lincoln gave the famous address was 1776, the year of The Declaration of Independencewhen America was born.

The Implication of Conservativism

If The Declaration of Independence is our founding document, then its principles are our founding principles. And a conservative is one, who by definition, wants to conserve these principles. As already noted, the most basic of these are the first three. So, we will concentrate on them and their implications for a truly conservative agenda.

Creator

Contrary to current judicial shyness about recognizing God, our founding document and our founders had no reluctance to acknowledge the Creator. This is obvious in numerous way. First, The Declaration itself refers to the “Creator” and “Nature’s God.” Also, The Articles of Confederation speak of “the great Governor of the World.” Further, the father of the Constitution, James Madison, declared that “Before any man can be considered as a member of Civil Society, he must be considered as a subject of “the Governor of the Universe” (Memorial & Remonstrance, 1785).

What is more, Congress has been opened by prayer to God from the very beginning. And presidential oaths have been taken in the name of God, adding “so help me God.” This is to say nothing of “In God we trust” on our coins, above the head of the president of the House of Representative’s, and in the fourth stanza of our National Anthem.

Further, early presidents with the consent of Congress invoked “God” in their thanksgiving proclamations, such as Washington, Adams, and Madison. The First National Thanksgiving Proclamation in 1777 was signed by Henry Laurens, President of the Continental Congress. It affirmed that: “…it is the indispensable duty of all men to adore the superintending Providence of Almighty God; to acknowledge with gratitude their obligation to Him for benefits received, and to implore such further blessings….” Later, George Washington declared that “…it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favour” (Oct. 3, 1789).

What is more, the Constitutions of many States refer directly to God. In my own State the Constitution begins: “We, the people of the State of North Carolina, grateful to Almighty God, the sovereign Ruler of Nations, for the preservation of the American Union … do ordain and establish this Constitution.”

Like other States, the Tar Heel Constitution even went so far as to disqualify atheists from holding office, saying, in Article VI, Section 8: “Disqualifications of office. The following persons shall be disqualified for office: First, any person who shall deny the being of Almighty God.” There is no scarcity to official references to God by our Founders and in our founding documents. And a conservative is someone who wishes to confess openly and conserve perpetually this God-given and God-acknowledged heritage, including our Pledge of Allegiance “under God.”

Creation

Further, in addition to acknowledging “the Creator and Ruler of the world,” a conservative is one who believes that “all men are created equal.” He does not believe, as the Scopes evolutionary textbook did in 1925, that the “Caucasians” are the “highest type” of human beings (2). Nor does he believe as Charles Darwin did (in The Descent of Man) that vaccinations and laws to help the poor should be eliminated because it preserves the weaker breed that natural selection would have eliminated. Darwin wrote: “We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination; we build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed, and the sick: we institute poor laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small pox”(3).

Nor does a conservative believe, as Hitler did in Mein Kampf, that “If Nature does not wish that weaker individuals should mate with the stronger, she wishes even less that a superior race should intermingle with an inferior one; because in such a case all her efforts, throughout hundreds of thousands of years, to establish an evolutionary higher stage of being, may thus be rendered futile”(4). In short, there are moral implications to Darwinian evolution, namely, if natural selection explains common ancestry, then there is nothing wrong with eliminating the weak and undesirable among us.

In short, if there is not a Creator and Moral Law-Giver, then man is just an animal without any God-given rights, and those in power are under no moral obligation to preserve these rights. A true conservative finds Darwinianism and its social consequences to be contrary to every fiber of his being and loudly proclaims with our founding Fathers and documents that “all men are created equal” and, hence, are “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,” foremost among them are the rights to life and liberty.

God-given Moral Laws

Nietzsche was right: If God is dead, then there are no God-given moral laws. As the French atheists Jean Paul Sartre put it: As a person without God, “I was like a man who’s lost his shadow. And there was nothing left in heaven, no right or wrong, nor anyone to give me orders…. I am doomed to have no other law but mine”(5). The simple truth is that if there is no absolute Moral Law Giver, then there are no absolute moral laws. Or, in Jeffersonian terms, “Nature’s Laws” come from “Nature’s God.” Both logic and history inform us that we cannot separate the Moral Law from the Moral Law-Giver and that we cannot have good government or society without an absolute standard for good.

The Destruction of the Declaration

Liberals are deconstructionists. They want to deconstruct the Constitution. Conservatives are reconstructionists. We want to reconstruct the Constitution the liberal courts have deconstructed to conform with the way the framers constructed it. Sadly, liberals, to borrow the title of Ann Coulter’s excellent best seller, are truly “Godless.” Of course, this is not necessarily true in their private lives, but it is in their public policy. For they would eliminate God from government and government schools. But a government less God is literally a God-less government. Mark Twain said it well: “ The American Christian is a straight and clean and honest man, and in his private commerce with his fellows can be trusted to stand faithfully by the principles of honor and honesty imposed upon him by his religion. But the moment he comes forwards to exercise a public trust he can be confidently counted upon to betray that trust in nine cases out of ten, if ‘party loyalty’ shall require it….” He continues, “There are Christian Private Morals, but there are no Christian Public Morals, at the polls, or in the Congress or anywhere else–except here and there and scattered around like lost comets in the solar system”(6). The more recent godless trend in our government can be demonstrated by the Supreme Court decision between 1961 and 1987 discussed later. First, lets look at the historical record.

The Humanist Manifestos

Beginning with the first Humanist Manifesto in 1933, Secular Humanism declared itself a “religion” with three fundamental principles(7): No Creator, no creation, and no God-given moral absolutes. In their own words, they declared there is–

No Creator.–“Religious humanists regard the universe as self-existing and not created.” In brief, there is no Creator of the world or of mankind.

No Creation.–“Humanism believes that man is a part of nature and that he has emerged as the result of a continuous process.” In short, mankind was not created but evolved by natural processes.

No God-Given Moral Absolutes.–“Humanism asserts that the nature of the universe depicted by modern science makes unacceptable any supernatural or cosmic guarantee of human values” That is to say, there are no God-given moral absolutes.
So here we have a self-proclaimed religion of Humanism that is opposed to three fundamental principles of The Declaration of Independence. But since The Declaration is the founding document of America, The Humanist Manifesto is at the core an anti-American religion. And since it is a religion less God, then it is a God-less religion.

But one may argue that the First Amendment permits freedom of religion–even for Humanist religions. In response, a serious case can be made against the thesis that by freedom of religion was meant also freedom from religion. And it may also be argued that “religion” as meant by the founding Fathers was not intended to include atheism. Indeed, many States incorporated anti-atheist statements in their constitutions. Even the Supreme Court of Massachusetts ruled in Kneeland, 1838 that “[The First Amendment] embraces all who believe in the existence of God. This provision does not extend to atheists because they do not believe in God or religion.”

Be this as it may, even granted that Humanism (without belief in God) is a religion (asTorcaso v. Watkins said in 1961), nonetheless, neither Humanism nor any non-theistic religion has the right to be the established (i.e., favored) religion in government schools.

The Humanist Courts

A Humanist culture will ultimately produce humanist courts. It took a generation or two to do it, but it eventually happened. And granted that Humanism is a religion, then it would follow that Humanism–or at least its central religious beliefs–have become the established beliefs in our public schools. Just how this happened is a matter of record.

1925–At the Tennessee Scopes Trial ACLU attorneys argued that teaching evolution was part of their religious rights, claiming that permitting the “teaching of a particular doctrine that comes from a particular religious book…contravene the provision of our constitution”(8). But, as we have seen, evolution is a particular doctrine from a particular religion called Humanism.

1933–John Dewey signed Humanist Manifesto I (1933) which proclaims a religious point of view that denies the fundamental beliefs of The Declaration of Independence – Creator, creation, and God-given moral absolutes.

1934–John Dewey wrote a book called the A Common Faith in which he declared: “Here are all the arguments for a religious faith that shall not be confined to sect, class, or race. Such a faith has always been implicitly the common faith of mankind. It remains to make it explicit and militant”(9). During the next decades Dewey concentrated on training teachers in this militant Faith to indoctrinate our children in our tax-supported government schools. Within a generation Humanist had achieved their first major victories in the Supreme Court.

1961–In Torcaso v. Watkins the High Court proclaimed that “Among religions in this country which do not teach what would generally be considered a belief in the existence of God are Buddhism, Taoism, Ethical Culture, Secular Humanism, and others” (emphasis added). Then in rapid-like decisions the Supreme Court began to make ruling after ruling that eliminated the Creator, creation and God-given moral absolutes as an official part of our government school programs.

1962 (Engel)–State required devotional prayers were banned from public schools. We had been praying in American schools for some 300 years before that with no perceivable damage to our children or our freedoms.

1963 (Abington)––State required devotional Bible-readings was barred from public schools. It is worthy of note that our earliest schools were started to teach children to read the Bible with the 1647 “Old Deluder Satan Law”(10).

1968 (Epperson)–Laws forbidding teaching evolution was declared unconstitutional. This was done in spite of the fact that evolution is opposed to creation, a doctrine embedded in our American Birth Certificate and at the basis of our freedoms.

1973 (Roe and Doe)–De facto abortion on demand was approved by the High Court in these two decisions. This too flies in the face of the fundamental constitutional right to life stated in The Declaration of Independence and in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of The Constitution.

1990 (Stone)–-The display of the Ten Commandments was forbidden in public schools. With this ruling, not only was the legal history of the these moral principles reversed but so was the moral foundation necessary for good government and education called for by our early Fathers.

1987 (Edwards)–Laws requiring teaching creation, if evolution is taught, were struck down. This ruling not only enshrined naturalistic evolution and eliminated teaching the crucial creation pillar of our founding document, but it established (contrary to the First Amendment) a crucial tenet of non-theistic religions.

Thus ended a generation of liberal, High Court rulings that in effect established the central tenets of Religious Humanism in our tax-supported institutions of learning. For they favored the central teachings of non-theistic religions, like Secular Humanism, over the opposing tenets of other religions, namely, orthodox theistic religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Indeed, these Court rulings favored religious beliefs that were opposed to the foundational documents of America. All true conservatives cringe at these anti-American conclusions.

The Tragic Conclusion

Religious Humanist John Dunphy summed up their Humanist strategy well in his 1983 article in The Humanist journal:

“I am convinced that the battle for humankind’s future must be waged and won in the public school classrooms by teachers who correctly perceive their role as the proselytizers of a new Faith: A religion of humanity…. These teachers must embody the same selfless dedication as the most rabid fundamentalist preachers. For they will be ministers of another sort, utilizing a classroom instead of a pulpit to convey humanist values in whatever subject they teach…”(11).

Indeed, this is precisely what happened between 1961 and 1987 when the Supreme Court ruled that government cannot endorse teaching Creator, creation, or God-given absolutes in America’s public schools, even though these are the basic principles of The Declaration of Independence on which our government is based. So, in effect the courts ruled that teaching the great truths of The Declaration of Independence is unconstitutional! These judicial decisions are not only unconstitutional, but they are unAmerican. Thus, if Thomas Jefferson returned today, he would discover that he was being forced to pay taxes to public schools that were teaching his children that The Declaration of Independence is unconstitutional. I have no doubt what the proclaimer of “Taxation without representation” would do: He would start a second American revolution!


The Basics of Conservativism

The basic principles of conservativism are the basic principles of Americanism–those embedded in our Birth Certificate–The Declaration of Independence. It is from these principles that we derive the conservative agenda. Foremost on the list are the beliefs in a Creator, creation, and God-given moral absolutes. Let me briefly comment on each area.

The Creator

If we are ever going to be successful in reestablishing the conservative agenda in America, then it cannot be done without overcoming the hostility to invoking God in the public square and overcoming the antagonism toward acknowledging Him in our schools. Contrary to the tragic ruling against teaching creation along side of evolution in public schools, our founders had no such problem in giving due credit to the Creator.

Fortunately, the vestiges of our religious heritage can still be found in our culture. Last time I looked God’s name was over the president’s head in The House of Representatives in the phrase “In God we trust.” Nor has it been minted out of all our coins. Indeed, it is still found in the last stanza of the National Anthem, though it is seldom sung outside of churches. Yes, his name is still invoked to call Congress into session. Ironically, the US Marshall still invokes God’s blessing at the opening session of Federal Court when he prays: “…God bless the United States and this honorable Court.” Yes, we still pay military Chaplains who can use God’s name, and presidents still take oaths in God’s name. And liberals have not yet physically deconstructed the Jefferson or Lincoln Memorials–even though they may wish to do so if they could.

A certain tragic irony emerges from eliminating God and any prayer to Him from our public school. After the Virginia Tech massacre, someone put the following on the internet which I summarize: “Dear God: Why don’t you do something about all the violence in our schools like the mass slaughters at Columbine and Virginia Tech. Signed, Johnny.” To his surprise He received a reply: “Dear Johnny: Sorry, I am not allowed in school anymore. Signed, God”!

Actually, there are at least ten good reason for prayers in the public school which I wrote to the editor of The Charlotte Observer, and my then honorable Senator Jesse Helms put into the Congressional record. We should have voluntary class prayer because:

1) Our government was based on religious principles (of which prayer was a part) from the very beginning.

2) The First Amendment does not separate God and government but actually encourages religion (which includes prayer) in the Free Exercise clause.

3) Early Congressional actions such as The Northwest Ordinance (1787) encouraged religion in public schools of which prayer was a part.

4) Early Presidents, with congressional approval, made proclamations encouraging public prayer.

5) Congress has prayed at the opening of every session since the very beginning.

6) Schools had prayer for some three hundred years before the Supreme Court ruled that State mandated class devotional prayers were unconstitutional (Engel, 1962).

7) Since the High Court outlawed state mandated class devotion prayer and Bible reading the nation has been in steady moral decline.

8) Morals must be taught, and they cannot properly be taught without religious sentiments like respect for the Creator since both logically and practically there will not be respect for an absolute moral law without respect for an absolute Moral Law Giver.

9) Forbidding prayer and other religious expressions in public schools establishes in effect the religion of Secularism.

10) To forbid the majority the right to pray because the minority objects, is to impose the irreligion of the minority on the religious majority.

If theistic children who do not believe in Darwinian evolution, sex education, and homosexual life-styles are exposed to these contrary beliefs without violation of their rights, then why can’t the tiny minority of atheist’s children to be exposed to voluntary prayers?

Creation

My experience as the lead expert witness for teaching creation alongside of evolution in the 1981 Arkansas “Scopes II” trial taught me invaluable lessons. The State had passed a “balanced treatment” law which was the reverse of Scopes I (1925). It read in essence, if you teach evolution, then you must also balance it off by teaching creation, but one does not have to teach either. The evolutionists at the Scopes I Trial (1925) spoke in favor of teaching both views. John Scopes said: “Education you know, means broadening, advancing. If you limit a teacher to only one side of anything, the whole country will eventually have only one thought, be one individual. I believe in teaching every aspect of every problem or theory”(12). ACLU attorney Malone pled: “For God’s sake, let the children have their minds be kept open–close no doors to their knowledge; shut no door from them…. Let they have both. Let them both be taught. Let them both live”(13). The irony is that creationists were called “bigots” many times at the Trial. But let not the kettle call the pot black. If it was bigotry in 1925 when only creation was taught in schools, then it is still bigotry in 2007 when only evolution is being taught.

God-Given Moral Absolutes

The Conservative agenda is a moral agenda. Yes, we believe in legislating morality. In fact, really everyone does, even those who deny it(14). Since virtually all good laws prescribe some behavior as good and others as bad, there are really no such laws that do not legislate morality. No civil society is without legislation on moral issues, forbidding theft, abuse, rape, and murder. Indeed, even liberals favor these laws, as well as others condemning racism, hate crimes, and genocide. The truth is that everyone favors legislating morality. The only question is whose’s morality will be legislated. The conservative answer has always been “God’s”! From the very beginning our founding document spoke of “Nature’s Laws” that come from “Nature’s God” or “the unalienable rights” of the “Creator.” Among these are the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Indeed, most all of the Ten Commandments have been put into law at one time or another.

Laws Protecting Life

First and foremost on the list is the right to life. For the right to life is the right to all other rights. Those who are not allowed to live, are not allowed to have any other rights. And this right to life extends to both ends of life, thus opposing both abortion and euthanasia. At the time of The Declaration abortion was forbidden by both English Common Law from which our law was derived and an early American law which in 1716 forbid midwives to perform abortions(15). And the unborn were defined in the dictionaries of the day as a “child in the womb” and a child as a “very young person”(16). This leaves no doubt about the framers views against abortion.

Historically, being against abortion was not a uniquely Christian view for even the ancient pagan Hippocratic oath opposed both abortion and euthanasia, pledging, “I will neither give a deadly drug to anyone if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly, I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy.” Whatever minor intramural debate there may be about capital punishment for guilty criminals, there should be absolutely no doubt about the wrongness of giving capital punishment to innocent babies by abortion!

Resetting the Conservative Agenda

There are some who wish to refocus the conservative agenda away from the life and death issues of abortion, euthanasia, terrorism, and pro-family values to other things like poverty, privacy rights, Gay rights, animal rights, and environmental concerns. The conservative response is based in our founding national documents and its fundamental principles.

On Pro-Life

1. We believe in the unalienable right to life of all humans, born and unborn, young and old–whatever their ethnic orientation..

2. We believe there is no right to do a wrong, and that it is wrong to intentionally kill innocent human beings of any size, age, color or creed. The unalienable right to life takes precedence over questionable right of privacy. Killing innocent human beings in private is no more justifiable than killing them in public.

3. We believe it is hypocritical to focus on saving baby seals while we destroying baby humans at the rate of over 3000 per day by abortion.

4. We believes in the unalienable right to life of the born and unborn, not in alienating the unborn from their right to life.

5. We believe that the right to privacy of the mother does not take precedence over the right to life of the child.

On Civil Rights

1. We believe in civil rights for all persons, but we do not believe in uncivil actions against any person.

2. We believe that abortion is the worst violations of civil rights because it violates the very basis of all civil rights–the right to life itself. The right to life is the right to all other rights. Hence, those who are not allowed to live are deprived of all their civil rights.

3. We believe that homosexuals have civil rights but that homosexual activity is a civil wrong against themselves and their society. We do not believe there are any rights to do a wrong. Likewise, polygamist, pedophiles, and rapist have civil rights, but their activities as such are not civil rights; tey are uncivil wrong. And we believe is wrong to give rights to do a wrong.

4. We believe the evident truth that “all men are created equal” opposes slavery, racism, and ethnic discrimination.

On The Family

1. We believe that our domestic constitution should begins with “We the parents of our children, in order to form a more perfect society, establish the family to insure domestic tranquility, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”

2. We believe that a family consisting of one male and one female, and whatever children with which God blesses us. And we pledge ourselves to preserve the family as the basic unit of society, the teacher of social skills, moral values, and the duty of good citizenship.

3. We believe that since the roots of most social problems begin in the family that we should be doing everything we can to strengthen the family, not to weaken it. To be pro-family is to be pro-society, and to degrade the family by approving of distorted unions is destructive of our society.

4. We believe that divorce is generally harmful to the family and should be discouraged and diminished.

On Homosexuality

1. We believe that civil rights for homosexuals should not be a pretext for civil wrongs done by homosexuals–both against themselves and society. We believe that if laws against smoking can add seven years on the average to ones life, then laws restraining homosexual activity, which can add some 20-30 years to their lives, should be welcomed as well(17).

2. We believe that uncivil behavior is not the basis for a civil union. In the beginning God did not unite Adam and Steve but Adam and Eve.

3. We believe that since no homosexual union has ever produced a child, then only babies produced by homosexual unions should be adopted by homosexuals.

On Education

1. We encourage home schools, private schools, and parental control of public schools, not government control of our tax-supported institutions.

2. Since we firmly believe that taxation without representation is tyranny, we believe that the majority view of creation, held in some form by over 75 percent of Americans, should be represented in public schools. And we thank Judge Antonia Scalia for his brilliant defense of this in his dissenting opinion in the 1987 Edwards case.

3. We believe that sex education is best done by parents, not the schools. If the school is to be involved, it should be with parental permission and review of the curriculum. We believe children should not be taught a sex course in “how to” but, if any, they should be taught one in “why not” to get involved in sex before marriage.

4. We believe that no child should be left behind and that, if necessary we should spank their behind to help accomplish this. We believe discipline is a necessary condition for proper education and the moral law (as expressed in the Ten Commandments) is necessary for proper discipline.

5. The Ten Commandments are represented on the East end of the Supreme Court, over the Chief Justice’s head, and on the upper wall, and we see no reason the same Court should forbid our school children from having them on their walls.

6. We believe that no harm was done for 300 years of school classes talking to the Creator in public schools and much harm has been done in the generation since prayer has been locked out of school classes.

7. We believe that the Bible, the world’s best seller, should be read, not banned, from public school classes.

8. We believe that if it was bigotry in 1925 to teach only one view of origins in public schools when only creation was taught, then it is still bigotry today to teach only one view of origins when only evolution is being taught.

On God and Government

1. We believe in government based on God, not a government without God.

2. We believe civil laws should be based on unchanging Divine principles; , not on changing human precepts.

3. We believe in the cooperation of religion and state and in the encouragement of religion by the state, not in the separation of religion from the state or in the antagonism against religion by the state.

On Poverty

1. We believe that poverty cannot be voted out of existence but that it should be worked out of existence. We believe poverty is better addressed by private compassion than by public compulsion.

2. We believe in making a living by working, not in making a living at not working.

3. We believe our economy is best served by capitalism, not collectivism. We believe that the economy is best served by private entepenureship, not by public ownership.

4. While we are concerned about the poor life of those born, we are even more concerned about those who by abortion were never allowed to be born.

On Crime and Punishment

1. We believe the punishment should fit the crime and that it is fit to punish a crime.

2. We believe that focusing on criminal rights to a fair trial should not overshadow the need to protect non-criminal’s rights to happy life.

3. We believe in the rights of innocent citizens to be protected from the wrongs of guilty criminals.

4. We believe criminals should be treated as persons to be punished, not patients to be treated. We believe forced “rehabilitation” is a violation of personhood. We believe proper punishment is the best form of rehabilitation.

5. We believe it is a gross inconsistency to protest capital punishment for guilty criminals while one engages in capital punishment on innocent babies.

On War

1. We believe in the right to protect our right to life.

2. We also believe that fighting terrorist is better done on their soil than ours and that we must fight fire with fire, not with mere fiery anti-war rhetoric.

3. We are more concerned about actual global terrorism than debatable global warming. Indeed, I believe that alleged global warming could be significantly diminished by circulating less liberal hot air used in attacking the Commander in Chief in his fight against global terrorism.

4. Yes, we still believe in the Second Amendment and the old NRA slogan that “when guns are outlawed then only outlaws will have guns.”

 

Conclusion

In summation, conservatives believe in life, liberty, and happiness based on God’s law and achieved in a context of freedom of religion and speech. In short, we believe in a godly, not a God-less government. Put another way, we believe The Declaration of Independence.

I close with a quote from its author. My favorite line on any monument in our nation’s capitol is from the Jefferson Memorial. Standing in front of the magnificent statue of Thomas Jefferson and looking over the water toward the White House one can read these words engraved in large marble letters: “God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed the conviction that these liberties are the gift of God?”

Notes

1. Robert C. Cannada, America’s Rule of Law (National Lawyers Association Foundation, 2002).

2. George William Hunter, A Civic Biology (New York: American Book Company, 1914), 196.

3. Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, in The Great Books edition, 323.

4. Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1939),162.

5. Jean Paul Sartre, No Exit and Three Other Plays:The Flies (New York: Vintage Books, Random House, 1947), 122.

6. Mark Twain, Christian Science (NY: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1906), 359-361.

7. It added other principles, but these are among the first and most basic listed in theHumanist Manifesto I (1933).

8. The trial transcript is published in The World’s Most Famous Court Trial: Tennessee Evolution Case (Cincinnati, Ohio: National Book Company), 51-52.

9. John Dewey, A Common Faith (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1934), 87.

10. This was so named from its first line of the law which goes on to affirm that if our children are taught to read the Bible they will have the best defense against Satan who wishes to deceive them.

11. Paul Kurts, The Humanist (Jan/Feb., 1983), 26.

12. Cited in P. William Davis, The World of Biology, 2nd ed. (NY: McGraw-Hill, 1979), 610.

13. Cited in T. C. Mercer, ed., The World’s Most Famous Court Trial (Cincinnati: National Book Company, 1925), 299.

14. See Norman .L. Geisler and Frank Turek, Legislating Morality (Eugene, Or: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 1998).

15. See James Witherspoon “Reexamining Roe: Nineteenth-Century Abortion Statutes and the Fourteenth Amendment.” St. Mary’s Law Journal 17 (1985), 32.

16. See Dennis J. Horan, “Abortion and Midwifery: A Footnote in Legal History,” in Hilger, Horan, and Mall EDS, New Perspectives on Human Abortion (Frederick, Md.: University Publications of America., 1981), 199.

17. See Geisler, Legislating Morality, Chap. 9.

 

By Christopher on Government, Politics tagged , , ,

An Evaluation of the “Evangelical Manifesto”

An Evaluation of the “Evangelical Manifesto”

By Norman L. Geisler

May 15, 2008

Introduction

Moses is dead, and there are many candidates vying for Joshua’s position. Or, to put it another way, Jerry Falwell is gone. Adrian Rogers is also with his Maker. D. James Kennedy has gone to his reward. Pat Robertson’s political aspirations failed, as has much of his influence. James Dobson officially retired as president of Focus on the Family and, despite his widespread pro-family influence, has never really had much of a taste for political activism. The former NAE president has fallen from grace, and the chair of evangelical leadership is wide open!  Enter, the Evangelical left with a handful of self-appointed leaders who propose a “Manifesto” which could be described as “the Evangelical Left strikes back.” Released on May 7, 2008 from the Nation’s Capitol, Fuller Seminary’s Richard Mouw, Os Guiness, Christianity Today’s David Neff, and others led the attempt to redefine Evangelicalism with a distinctive list to the left.

Don’t get me wrong; there are many admirable and even eloquent statements in the Manifesto. Indeed, there is enough truth in it to draw many floating in the middle waters of evangelicalism into the vortex of the left. For example, they claim to be historic Protestants, holding to the essence of the early creeds, the divine authority of the Bible, and maintaining a pro-life and pro-family posture. They claim to hold to the Protestant principles of the Bible alone, faith alone, and grace alone, as well as being Trinitarian. They speak out against the errors of both the far right “theocrats” and the far left “liberals.” They plead for a middle road between the “naked public square” and the “sacred public square” to be found in a “civil public square.” They claim the latter is viewed as one that acts on principles of “civility,” “justice,” “fair[ness],” and the “Golden Rule.” Their stated purposes are to redefine evangelical identity, refine its behavior, and rethink its place in public life.


Concerns About What is Not Said in the Manifesto

But beneath the polished rhetoric and catchy phrases, there lurks a deep danger, both in what they affirm and in what they do not affirm. First, a look at what they do not include in their admittedly “mere Christianity.” Nothing is said about the infallibility and inerrancy of the Bible, the very basis for all evangelical truth. Instead, we hear about the Bible’s as an undefined “supreme authority” or “final rule of faith and practice” which to neo-evangelicals and neo-orthodox means it is not without errors in history and science.

Second, the fundamental doctrine of the physical bodily return of Christ is watered down to a merely “personal return”–something that even liberals and heretical full preterists could sign.

Third, the critical doctrine of the physical bodily resurrection (called “the resurrection of the flesh” in the creeds) is reduced to an undefined “resurrection”–which could include neo-orthodoxy, liberals, and even Jehovah’s witnesses.

Fourth, while it is commendable to stress that Evangelicals are “for something” rather than “against something.” Nevertheless, it is logically naïve to say so since every proposition is opposed to its opposite. Being pro traditional family means, as Homosexuals readily perceive, that one is thereby against homosexual relations and union.

Fifth, while the Manifesto speaks against “politicizing faith.” Nonetheless, it never spells out how this can be accomplished without privatizing faith and, thereby negating, its rightful influence in the public square.

Finally, one can agree that Evangelicalism should not be defined politically but theologically. If so, the National Press Club was strange place to introduce the Manifesto, rather than a theological forum. In any event, the document is thin on theology in general. It does not represent a historic or robust Evangelicalism. It is a rather minimalist view of true orthodox beliefs.

So, in spite of its claim to be truly evangelical, it does not embrace some of the fundamental doctrines of orthodoxy that have been expressed in the early creeds, councils, and Fathers of the church down through the centuries. And despite of its claim to be “Protestant,” it shows no signs of agreeing with either of the Protestant reformers Luther or Calvin on the inerrancy of Scripture, the physical resurrection of Christ, or His physical bodily return to earth.


Concerns About What is Said in the Manifesto

Further, what the Manifesto does say is also troubling. First of all, it has no real ground for its moral beliefs in civility and justice. It rightly rejects the “theocrats” who ground it in the Bible as the divinely prescriptive basis for civil law. But they show no appreciation of fundamental doctrines of our republic which are God-given, “unalienable” rights come from “Nature’s Laws” which are given by “Nature’s God.” Without a Natural Law (cf. Rom. 2:12-15) there is no non sectarian objective moral basis for social laws. On the other extreme, they defend the rights of “secularist” who does not even believing in the God of The Declaration of Independence, nor that “all men are created….”

Second, while speaking of “creation” without definition, and of harmony of “science and faith,” it does not speak explicitly against evolution and its accompanying social evils. Indeed, it does not make clear that it is not condemning creationist and/or intelligent design views when it speaks of a “false hostility between science and faith.”

Third, the framers of the Manifesto reveal their (left) hand–when they speak against “Fundamentalism” which is a code word for conservative Christians and most evangelicals who hold to the historic fundamentals of the Faith expressed in the early creeds. In their “sixth” of the “defining features” they list “conservative Fundamentalism” as an extreme to be avoided like “liberal revisionism.” They also list “Christian Fundamentalism” as an extreme to be avoided (like “secularism”) because of its alleged “diminished Christian content and manner.” Their leftist leanings and historic misunderstanding are clearly revealed in their erroneous statement that “fundamentalism was thoroughly world-denying and politically disengaged from its outset.” Further, the fact it has attracted socially liberal radicals like Jim Wallis reveals that it is not a mainstream evangelical document. This is confirmed also by the refusal of James Dobson, Chuck Colson, Al Mohler, and many other top evangelical leaders to sign it.

Fourth, the Manifesto rejects “single-issue politics, such as abortion and marriage,” this in spite of the fact that the right to life is the right to all other rights, and the family is the foundation for society. If these are not the single most important social issues, then it is difficult to see what are.

Fifth, it is not hard to see the hidden agenda behind the partial truth in the statement that evangelicalism has a “duty never to be completely equated with and party, partisan ideology, [or] economic system.” For an evangelical has a duty to promote the candidates and parties that best exemplify Christian principles.

Finally, placing “Islam,” “communism,” and “democracy” in the same camp is neither accurate nor acceptable. For the latter, at least in its American form, cannot fairly be described as “coercing others” to “believe their way is the only way” and are prepared to “coerce others” to believe it is. This betrays an underlying anti-Americanism strain.


Conclusion

As leaders from the evangelical right have faded, a handful of the evangelical left have made their move to fill the vacuum. However, they do not rightfully represent historic evangelicalism, nor do they have an objective moral basis for meeting the needs of our culture. So, we should take them at their word when they say, “We speak for ourselves” and “no one speaks for all Evangelicals.” And, hopefully, few will listen to their voice as that of full-fledged and genuine Evangelicalism.

While they are commendably not theonomist, their undefined and unfounded “civility” doctrine is too little and too late to meet the challenges facing America today. Only a robust evangelicalism can provide the motivation and a full-fledged Jeffersonian natural law basis for government (which as C. S. Lewis showed in The Abolition of Man, is common to all decent peoples) can withstand the threat of Islamic theonomist on the right and secular relativists on the left.

What can we do in response to this subtle attempt to shift the center of Evangelicalism to the left? For starters, let’s reread and return to our National Birth Certificate, The Declaration of Independence. And the next trip to Washington, D. C., stand in front of the imposing stature of Jefferson. Then look out over the water toward the White House and look up to the big letters engraved in marble and meditate on these words: “God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed the conviction that these liberties are the gift of God”! And for a more full-fledged response to the Manifesto’s doctrinal anemia and social inadequacy, we recommend a look respectively at our books, Conviction without Compromise and Legislating Moraity.

By Christopher on Bible Difficulties, Biblical Criticism / Higher Criticism, Biblical Studies, Book Review, Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics, Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, Clark Pinnock, ETS, Genre Criticism & Historical Criticism, Greg A. Boyd, Matthew 27's Raised Saints, Neo-Theism, Open Theism, Process Theology tagged , , ,

Open Theists and Inerrancy Clark Pinnock on the Bible and God

Open Theists and Inerrancy:

Clark Pinnock on the Bible and God

by Norman L. Geisler

Pinnock on the Bible

The Bible is not Completely Inerrant

“This leaves us with the question, Does the New Testament, did Jesus, teach the perfect errorlessness of the Scriptures? No, not in plain terms” (Pinnock, SP, 57).

Although the New Testament does not teach a strict doctrine of inerrancy, it might be said to encourage a trusting attitude, which inerrancy in a more lenient definition does signify. The fact is that inerrancy is a very flexible term in and of itself” (Pinnock, SP, 77).

“Once we recall how complex a hypothesis inerrancy is, it is obvious that the Bible teaches no such thing explicitly. What it claims, as we have seen, is divine inspiration and a general reliability” (Pinnock, SP, 58).

“Why, then, do scholars insist that the Bible does claim total inerrancy? I can only answer for myself, as one who argued in this way a few years ago. I claimed that the Bible taught total inerrancy because I hoped that it did-I wanted it to” (Pinnock, SP, 58).

“For my part, to go beyond the biblical requirements to a strict position of total errorlessness only brings to the forefront the perplexing features of the Bible that no one can completely explain and overshadows those wonderful certainties of salvation in Christ that ought to be front and center” (Pinnock, SP, 59).

The Inerrancy of Intent, not Fact

“Inerrancy is relative to the intent of the Scriptures, and this has to be hermeneutically determined” (Pinnock, SP, 225).

“All this means is that inerrancy is relative to the intention of the text. If it could be show that the chronicler inflates some of the numbers he uses for his didactic purpose, he would be completely within his rights and not at variance with inerrancy” (Pinnock, SP, 78)

“We will not have to panic when we meet some intractable difficulty. The Bible will seem reliable enough in terms of its soteric [saving] purpose,… In the end this is what the mass of evangelical believers need-not the rationalistic ideal of a perfect Book that is no more, but the trustworthiness of a Bible with truth where it counts, truth that is not so easily threatened by scholarly problems”(Pinnock, SP, 104-105).

 

The Bible is not the Word of God

“Barth was right to speak about a distance between the Word of God and the text of the Bible” (Pinnock, SP, 99).

“The Bible does not attempt to give the impression that it is flawless in historical or scientific ways. God uses writers with weaknesses and still teaches the truth of revelation through them” (Pinnock, SP, 99).

“What God aims to do through inspiration is to stir up faith in the gospel through the word of Scripture, which remains a human text beset by normal weaknesses [which includes errors]” (Pinnock, SP,100).

“A text that is word for word what God wanted in the first place might as well have been dictated, for all the room it leaves for human agency. This is the kind of thinking behind the militant inerrancy position. God is taken to be the Author of the Bible in such a way that he controlled the writers and every detail of what they wrote” (Pinnock, SP, 101).

The Bible is not Completely Infallible

“The Bible is not a book like the Koran, consisting of nothing but perfectly infallible propositions,… the Bible did not fall from heaven…. We place our trust ultimately in Jesus Christ, not in the Bible…. What the Scriptures do is to present a sound and reliable testimony [but not inerrant] to who he is and what God has done for us” (Pinnock, SP, 100).

He Rejects Warfield’s View of Inerrancy

“Inerrancy as Warfield understood it was a good deal more precise than the sort of reliability the Bible proposes. The Bible’s emphasis tends to be upon the saving truth of its message and its supreme profitability in the life of faith and discipleship” (Pinnock, SP, 75).

He Rejects ICBI View of Inerrancy

“Therefore, there are a large number of evangelicals in North America appearing to defend the total inerrancy of the Bible. The language they use seems absolute and uncompromising: `The authority of Scripture is inescapably impaired if this total divine inerrancy is in any way limited or disregarded, or made relative to a view of truth contrary to the Bible’s own’ (Chicago Statement, preamble). It sounds as if the slightest slip or flaw would bring down the whole house of authority. It seems as though we ought to defend the errorlessness of the Bible down to the last dot and tittle in order for it to be a viable religious authority” (Pinnock, SP, 127).

He Holds a Dynamic View of Inspiration, not Plenary Inspiration

“In relation to Scripture, we want to avoid both the idea that the Bible is the product of mere human genius and the idea it came about through mechanical dictation. The via media lies in the direction of a dynamic personal modelthat upholds both the divine initiative and the human response” (Pinnock, SP, 103).

“Inspiration should be seen as a dynamic work of God. In it, God does not decide every word that is used, one by one but works in the writers in such a way that they make full use of their own skills and vocabulary while giving expression to the divinely inspired message being communicated to them and through them” (Pinnock, SP, 105).

 

He Redefines Inerrancy and Rejects the Prophetic Model

“The wisest course to take would be to get on with defining inerrancy in relation to the purpose of the Bible and the phenomena it displays. When we do that, we will be surprised how open and permissive a term it is” (Pinnock, SP, 225).

“At times I have felt like rejecting biblical inerrancy because of the narrowness of definition [!! See previous quote] and the crudity of polemics that have accompanied the term. But in the end, I have had to bow to the wisdom that says we need to be unmistakably clear in our convictions about biblical authority, and in the North American context, at least, that means to employ strong language” (Pinnock, SP, 225).

“Paul J. Achtemeier has called attention to the inadequacy of the prophetic model for representing the biblical category of inspiration in its fullness-The Inspiration of Scripture: Problems and Proposals” (Pinnock, SP, 232, n. 8).

He Holds that there are Minor Errors in the Bible

“The authority of the Bible in faith and practice does not rule out the possibility of an occasionally uncertain text, differences in details as between the Gospels, a lack of precision in the chronology of events recorded in the Books of Kings and Chronicles, a prescientific description of the world, and the like” (Pinnock, SP, 104).

“What could truly falsify the Bible would have to be something that could falsify the gospel and Christianity as well. It would have to be a difficulty that would radically call into question the truth of Jesus and His message of good news. Discovering some point of chronology in Matthew that could not be reconciled with a parallel in Luke would certainly not be any such thing” (Pinnock, SP, 129).

“I recognize that the Bible does not make a technical inerrancy claim or go into the kind of detail associated with the term in the contemporary discussion. But I also see a solid basis for trusting the Scriptures in a more general sense in all that they teach and affirm, and I see real danger in giving the impression that the Bible errs in a significant way. Inerrancy is a metaphor for the determination to trust God’s Word completely” (Pinnock, SP, 224-225).

 

He Holds that The Bible Contains Myth and Legend

“In the narrative of the fall of Adam, there are numerous symbolic features (God molding man from dirt, the talking snake, God molding woman from Adam’s rib, symbolic trees, four major rivers from one garden, etc.), so that it is natural to ask whether this is not a meaningful narration that does not stick only to factual matters” (Pinnock, SP, 119).

“On the one hand, we cannot rule legend out a priori. It is, after all, a perfectly valid literary form, and we have to admit that it turns up in the Bible in at least some form. We referred already to Job’s reference to Leviathan and can mention also Jotham’s fable” (Pinnock, Sp, 121-122).

“Thus we are in a bind. Legends are possible in theory–there are apparent legends in the Bible–but we fear actually naming them as such lest we seem to deny the miraculous” (Pinnock, SP, 122).

“When we look at the Bible, it is clear that it is not radically mythical. The influence of myth is there in the Old Testament. The stories of creation and fall, of flood and the tower of Babel, are there in pagan texts and are worked over in Genesis from the angle of Israel’s knowledge of God, but the framework is no longer mythical” (Pinnock, SP, 123).

“We read of a coin turning up in a fish’s mouth and of the origin of the different languages of humankind. We hear about the magnificent exploits of Sampson and Elisha. We even see evidence of the duplication of miracle stories in the gospels. All of them are things that if we read them in some other book we would surely identify as legends” (Pinnock, Sp, 123).

He Holds Robert Gundry’s View of Midrash in Matthew

“There is no mythology to speak of in the New Testament. At most, there are fragments and suggestions of myth: for example, the strange allusion to the bodies of the saints being raised on Good Friday (Matt. 27:52) and the sick being healed through contact with pieces of cloth that had touched Paul’s body (Acts 19:11-12)” (Pinnock, SP, 124).

“There are cases in which the possibility of legend seems quite real. I mentioned the incident of the coin in the fish’s mouth (Matt. 17:24-27)…. The event is recorded only by Matthew and has the feel of a legendary feature”(Pinnock, SP, 125). [Yet Gundry was asked to resign from ETS by 74 percent of the membership.]

Pinnock on God

The Bible Has False Prophecy

“Second, some prophecies are conditional, leaving the future open, and, presumably, God’s knowledge of it” (Pinnock, MMM, 50).

“Third, there are imprecise prophetic forecasts based on present situations, as when Jesus predicts the fall of Jerusalem (Pinnock, MMM, 50).

“…despite Ezekiel, Nebuchadnezzar did not conquer the city of Tyre; despite the Baptist, Jesus did not cast the wicked into the fire; contrary to Paul, the second coming was not just around the corner (1 Thes. 4:17)” (Pinock, MMM, 51 n.66).

 

Even Jesus Made a False Prophecy

“…despite Jesus, in the destruction of the temple, some stones were left one on the other” (Mt. 24:2)” (Pinnock, MMM, 51 n.66).

 

God is not Bound to His Own Word

“God is free in the manner of fulfilling prophecy and is not bound to a script, even his own” (Pinnock, MMM, 51 n.66).

“We may not want to admit it but prophecies often go unfulfilled…” (Pinnock, MMM, 51, n.66).

God is Limited and Corporeal

“But, in a sense, creation was also an act of self-limitation…. Creating human beings who have true freedom is a self-restraining, self-humbling and self-sacrificing act on God’s part” (Pinnock, MMM, 31).

“As regards space, the Bible speaks of God having living space in the heavens:… Let’s not tilt overly to transcendence lest we miss the truth that God is with us in space” (Pinnock, MMM, 32).

“If he is with us in the world, if we are to take biblical metaphors seriously, is God in some way embodied? Critics will be quick to say that, although there are expressions of this idea in the Bible, they are not to be taken literally. But I do not believe that the idea is as foreign to the Bible’s view of God as we have assumed” (Pinnock, MMM, 33).

” The only persons we encounter are embodied persons and, if God is not embodied, it may prove difficult to understand how God is a person….Perhaps God uses the created order as a kind of body and exercises top-down causation upon it” (Pinnock, MMM, 34-35).

 

God’s Foreknowledge is Limited

“It is unsound to think of exhaustive foreknowledge, implying that every detail of the future is already decided” (Pinnock, MMM, 8).

“Though God knows all there is to know about the world, there are aspects about the future that even God does not know” (Pinnock, MMM, 32).

“Scripture makes a distinction with respect to the future; God is certain about some aspects of it and uncertain about other aspects” (Pinnock, MMM, 47).

“But no being, not even God, can know in advance precisely what free agents will do, even though he may predict it with great accuracy” (Pinnock, MMM, 100).

“God, in order to be omniscient, need not know the future in complete detail” (Pinnock, MMM, 100).

 

God Changes His Mind

“Divine repentance is an important biblical theme” (Pinnock, MMM, 43).

“Nevertheless, it appears that God is willing to change course…” (Pinnock, MMM, 43).

“Prayer is an activity that brings new possibilities into existence for God and us” (Pinnock, MMM, 46).

 

God is Dependent on Creatures

“According to the open view, God freely decided to be, in some respects, affected and conditioned by creatures…” (Pinnock, MMM, 5).

“In a sense God needs our love because he has freely chosen to be a lover and needs us because he has chosen to have reciprocal love…” (Pinnock, MMM, 30).

“The world is dependent on God but God has also, voluntarily, made himself dependent on it…. God is also affected by the world.” (Pinnock, MMM, 31).

God is not in Complete Control of the World

“This means that God is not now in complete control of the world…. things happen which God has not willed…. God’s plans at this point in history are not always fulfilled” (Pinnock, MMM, 36).

“Not everything that happens in the world happens for some reason,…. things that should not have happened, things that God did not want to happen. They occur because God goes in for real relationships and real partnerships” (Pinnock, MMM, 47).

“As Boyd puts it: ‘Only if God is the God of what might be and not only the God of what will be can we trust him to steer us…'” (Pinnock affirming Boyd, MMM, 103).

“Though God can bring good out of evil, it does not make evil itself good and does not even ensure that God will succeed in every case to bring good out of it” (Pinnock, MMM, 176).

“It does seem possible to read the text to be saying that God is an all-controlling absolute Being…. but how does the Spirit want us to read it? Which interpretation is right for the present circumstance? Which interpretation is timely? Only time will tell…” (Pinnock, MMM, 64).

God Undergoes Change

“For example, even though the Bible says repeatedly that God changes his mind and alters his course of action, conventional theists reject the metaphor and deny that such things are possible for God” (Pinnock, MMM, 63).

“I would say that God is unchangeable in changeable ways,…” (Pinnock, MMM, 85-86).

“On the other hand, being a person and not an abstraction, God changes in relation to creatures…. God changed when he became creator of the world… ” (Pinnock, MMM, 86).

“…accepting passibility may require the kind of doctrinal revisions which the open view is engaged in. If God is passible, then he is not, for example, unconditioned, immutable and atemporal” (Pinnock, MMM, 59, n.82).

 

He Admits Affinity with Process Theology

“The conventional package of attributes is tightly drawn. Tinkering with one or two of them will not help much” (Pinnock, MMM, 78).

“Candidly, I believe that conventional theists are influenced by Plato, who was a pagan, than I am by Whitehead, who was a Christian” (Pinnock, MMM, 143) [Yet Whitehead denied virtually all of the attributes of the God of orthodox theology, biblical inerrancy, and all the fundamentals of the Faith!!!]

 

 

All italic emphasis in original, bold emphasis this author’s emphasis.

SP–Clark Pinnock, The Scripture Principle (San Francisco, Harper & Rowe: 1984).

MMM–Clark Pinnock, The Most Moved Mover (Grand Rapids, Baker: 2001).

Did Clark Pinnock Recant His Errant Views?

By Norman L. Geisler

December 1, 2003

It Would Seem That He Did

It is widely believed that Clark Pinnock changed his views on whether the Bible has errors in it and thereby convinced the ETS Executive Council and Membership that his views were not incompatible with the inerrancy statement of the ICBI. As a result, both the Executive Council recommended and the membership voted on November 19, 2003 to retain him in membership.

It would seem that Pinnock did in fact recant his earlier view for several reasons. First, his restatement satisfied the Executive Committee who examined him. Second, his restatement convinced the membership of ETS who gave him a 67 percent vote of approval. Third, the paper he read at ETS left the impression that he had changed his view. Fourth, his written statement indicates that he made a “change.” Fifth, he wrote in his paper and said orally to the membership that he accepted the ICBI statement on inerrancy which would indicate a change. Finally, upon reading the Executive Committee report and hearing Pinnock’s paper, I too got the impression he had changed his view.

To cite the ETS Executive Committee about their decision, “This is a direct result of extensive discussion with Dr. Pinnock, including his clarifications of many points, and his clarifying and rewriting of a critical passage in his work, retracting certain language therein” (Letter October 24, 2003 from Executive Committee to ETS membership, p. 1, emphasis added in all quotes). They added, “The day ended with Dr. Pinnock disavowing– voluntarily and unprompted–some of the affirmations in note 66 [of Most Moved Mover which claimed that a number of biblical prophecies, including one by Jesus, were not fulfilled as predicted] (ibid., 3). Thus, “the Committee reveals its belief that, in the light of Dr. Pinnock’s clarifications and retraction of certain problematic language, the charges brought in November 2002 should not be sustained” (ibid., 3-4). They also said “Dr. Pinnock…has clarified and corrected parts of what he wrote” (“ETS Executive Committee Report on Clark H. Pinnock October 22, 2003,” p. 2).

On The Contrary

In spite of all of this, there is good evidence that Pinnock never really recanted his views on inerrancy. First, he never used the word “recant” of his views in either written or verbal form. Second, he never used any synonyms of recant when speaking of his views on this matter. Third, even if it could be shown that he actually changed his view on prophecy, he has never recanted his position on numerous other statements that are incompatible with the ETS statement on inerrancy.

When one reads carefully what the ETS Executive Committee said of their decision to approve of Pinnock’s views, it does not really say he recanted his views but only his way of expressing them. It wrote: “This is a direct result of extensive discussion with Dr. Pinnock, including his clarifications of many points, and his clarifying and rewriting of a critical passage in his work, retracting certain language therein” (Letter October 24, 2003 from Executive Committee to ETS membership, p. 1). Likewise, as we will see below, what Pinnock said was only a recantation of how he expressed his view, not of the view itself.

I Answer That

Once we understand Pinnock’s view, it is not difficult to explain why he appeared to change his view when in reality he did not. It grows out of his view of truth.

Pinnock’s Intentionalist View of Truth

When Pinnock speaks of the truth of Scripture, he does so in terms of the author’s intention. An error is what the author did not intend. Hence, an intended “truth” can actually be mistaken or not correct and still be “true” by Pinnock’s definition. This came out clearly in Pinnock’s answer to a question after his paper. When asked whether he would consider an inflated number in Chronicles an “error,” he responded, “No,” since exaggerating the numbers served the intention the author of Chronicles had in making his point. So, what is incorrect, mistaken, and does not correspond to reality, is not considered an “error.” Of course, by this intentionalist view of truth all sincere statements ever uttered, no matter how erroneous they were, must be considered true. Clearly, this is not what the ETS framers meant by inerrancy. Ironically, even the Executive Committee itself disavowed such a view in principle when they excluded “various forms of views explicitly affirming errors in the text (though condoned by appeals to so-called ‘authorial intent’).” See the “Executive Committee Report on John E. Sanders October 23, 2003,” p. 6. Unfortunately, they did not apply what they said to Pinnock himself.

That Clark Pinnock holds an intentionalist view of truth is clear from his many statements on the matter. He wrote, “All this means is that inerrancy is relative to the intention of the text. If it could be shown that the chronicler inflates some of the numbers he uses for his didactic purpose, he would be completely within his rights and not at variance with inerrancy” (Pinnock, The Scripture Principle (hereafter SP, 78). Again, “We will not have to panic when we meet some intractable difficulty. The Bible will seem reliable enough in terms of its soteric [saving] purpose…. In the end this is what the mass of evangelical believers need–not the rationalistic ideal of a perfect Book that is no more, but the trustworthiness of a Bible with truth where it counts, truth that is not so easily threatened by scholarly problems” (Pinnock, SP, 104-105). Finally, “Inerrancy is relative to the intent of the Scriptures, and this has to be hermeneutically determined” (Pinnock, SP, 225).

It is important to note that the ETS Constitution implies a correspondence view of truth when it speaks of one making “statements” that are “incompatible” with the Doctrinal Basis of the Society (Articles 4, Section 4). Further, even the Executive Committee affirmed a correspondence view of truth (“ETS Executive Committee Report on John E. Sanders Oct 23, 2003,” p. 2). But if this is so, then their action was inconsistent since on a correspondence view of truth Pinnock has unrecanted statements that claim the Bible affirms things that do not correspond to the facts (see below under nos. 4, 9, 10).

Pinnock’s Statement About ICBI is Misleading

Both in his paper and verbal presentation at ETS (11/19/03) Pinnock said he affirmed the ICBI statement on inerrancy. Many took this as an indication of his recanting. However, this is not the case since Pinnock is on record as viewing statements on “truth” as being what the author intended. But this is clearly not what they meant. But Pinnock seems unaware that the ICBI framers explicitly ruled this intentionalist view of truth out in favor of a correspondence view of truth. They wrote, “By biblical standards of truth and error is meant the view used both in the Bible and in everyday life, viz., a correspondence view of truth.” It adds, “This part of the article [13] is directed toward those who would redefine truth to relate merely to redemptive intent, the purely personal or the like, rather than to mean that which corresponds with reality.” It goes on to claim, contrary to Pinnock [SP. 119], that “the New Testament assertions about Adam, Moses, David and other Old Testament persons” are “literally and historically true” (R.C. Sproul, Explaining Inerrancy: A Commentary, Oakland, CA: ICBI, p. 31). But Pinnock clearly denied this (see no. 14 below).

So, Pinnock does not believe the ICBI statement on inerrancy which emphatically repudiates his view. In point of fact, Pinnock does to the ICBI statement what he does to the ETS statement; he reads them through his own intentionalist view of truth. In both cases, Pinnock is clearly in conflict with the meaning of the framers. On a correspondence view of truth, which is what the framers of both ETS and ICBI held, Pinnock’s view embraces errors in the Bible, that is, statements that do not correspond to the facts.

Further, Pinnock’s alleged recantation is not all encompassing. Pinnock did say that he was willing to make “changes” in his writings, but he did not tell us which ones. Indeed, he did not even say clearly that any of these changes would involve the admission of errors. He wrote: “I am 100% certain that, were we to sift through the text of The Scripture Principle as we did with the Most Moved Mover, some phrases would have to be improved on and some examples removed or modified.” Indeed, he added, “I am sure, were we to go through it carefully, changes would be in order” (“Open Theism and Biblical Inerrancy” a paper given on November 19, 2003 at the ETS annual meeting, p. 4). He spoke only of removing or modifying illustrations, improving phrases, and the like. There is not a single definitive word about admitting any error to say nothing of recanting four pages of quotations we presented the ICBI Executive Committee from Pinnock’s writings.

As to the ETS Executive Committee’s decision, a careful look at its language will reveal that Pinnock never recanted any of his views. Consider again the statements of the Committee. It speaks only of “clarifying and rewriting of a critical passage in his work, retracting certain language therein” (Letter October 24, 2003 from Executive Committee to ETS membership, p. 1). Notice that the only thing that was “retracted” was “certain language,” not his view. Indeed, Pinnock claims that his view remained the same, for he said, “I was not intending to violate it [the ETS inerrancy statement]. My clearing away the ambiguity is what made possible a positive verdict in my case. And I could do it sincerely since it had never been my intent to violate inerrancy here or elsewhere in my work” (Pinnock, ibid., 3). Pinnock said the same of statements he made in The Scripture Principle: “It was not and is not at all my intent to deny inerrancy…” (Ibid., 4). By this logic, no sincere author has ever made any error either in any of his or her books since they never intended to do so.

The Committee also said, “The day ended with Dr. Pinnock disavowing–voluntarily and unprompted–some of the affirmations in note 66 [of Most Moved Mover in which he claimed that a number of biblical prophecies, including one by Jesus, were never fulfilled] (October 24, 2003 letter from the ETS Committee to the membership, p. 3). Thus, “the Committee reveals its belief that, in the light of Dr. Pinnock’s clarifications and retraction of certain problematic language, the charges brought in November 2002 should not be sustained” (ibid., 3-4). But here again the only retraction was only of “problematic language,” not of his actual view on the matter which remains unrecanted.

The same is true of another use of the word “corrected” by the Committee with regard to Pinnock. They wrote: “Dr. Pinnock …has clarified and corrected parts of what he wrote” (“ETS Executive Committee Report on Clark H. Pinnock October 22, 2003,” p. 2). But here again it is not a correction of his view which was in error but of the language he “wrote,” that is, the way he expressed it.

Conclusion

In summation, although at first blush it would appear that Pinnock recanted all previously held views incompatible with the ETS inerrancy statement, the contrary evidence demonstrates that he did not recant any of these views. Certainly, he nowhere recants all of them. And even one of them is sufficient to show that he embraces a view that is incompatible with the ETS statement on inerrancy. Rather, using his intentionalist view of truth he claims he believes in inerrancy as understood by the ETS and ICBI framers, when in fact he does not.

But if Pinnock did not really recant his errant views, then what of the validity of the ETS acceptance of them as compatible with its inerrancy statement. It is bogus.
There is a way Pinnock can clear the air. All he has to do is to repudiate in unequivocal and unambiguous language all of the following statements he has made that are contrary to the ETS framers view of inerrancy:

1) “Barth was right to speak about a distance between the Word of God and the text of the Bible” (Pinnock, SP, 99).

2) “The Bible does not attempt to give the impression that it is flawless in historical or scientific ways” (Pinnock, SP, 99).

3) “The Bible is not a book like the Koran, consisting of nothing but perfectly infallible propositions…” (Pinnock, SP, 100).

4) “The authority of the Bible in faith and practice does not rule out the possibility of an occasionally uncertain text, differences in details as between the Gospels, a lack of precision in the chronology of events recorded in the Books of Kings and Chronicles…, and the like” (Pinnock, SP, 104).

5) “Did Jesus, teach the perfect errorlessness of the Scriptures? No, not in plain terms” (Pinnock, SP, 57).

6) “The New Testament does not teach a strict doctrine of inerrancy…. The fact is that inerrancy is a very flexible term in and of itself” (Pinnock, SP, 77).

7) “Why, then, do scholars insist that the Bible does claim total inerrancy? I can only answer for myself, as one who argued in this way a few years ago. I claimed that the Bible taught total inerrancy because I hoped that it did–I wanted it to” (Pinnock, SP, 58).

8) “For my part, to go beyond the biblical requirements to a strict position of total errorlessness only brings to the forefront the perplexing features of the Bible that no one can completely explain” (Pinnock, SP, 59).

9) “All this means is that inerrancy is relative to the intention of the text. If it could be shown that the chronicler inflates some of the numbers he uses for his didactic purpose, he would be completely within his rights and not at variance with inerrancy” (Pinnock, SP, 78).

10) “We will not have to panic when we meet some intractable difficulty. The Bible will seem reliable enough in terms of its soteric [saving] purpose…” (Pinnock, SP, 104-105).

11) “Inerrancy as Warfield understood it was a good deal more precise than the sort of reliability the Bible proposes. The Bible’s emphasis tends to be upon the saving truth of its message and its supreme profitability in the life of faith and discipleship” (Pinnock, SP, 75).

12) “The wisest course to take would be to get on with defining inerrancy in relation to the purpose of the Bible and the phenomena it displays. When we do that, we will be surprised how open and permissive a term it is” (Pinnock, SP, 225).

13) “Paul J. Achtemeier has called attention to the inadequacy of the prophetic model for representing the biblical category of inspiration in its fullness–The Inspiration of Scripture: Problems and Proposals” (Pinnock, SP, 232, n. 8).

14) “I recognize that the Bible does not make a technical inerrancy claim or go into the kind of detail associated with the term in the contemporary discussion…. Inerrancy is a metaphor for the determination to trust God’s Word completely” (Pinnock, SP, 224-225).

15) “In the narrative of the fall of Adam, there are numerous symbolic features (God molding man from dirt, the talking snake, God molding woman from Adam’s rib, symbolic trees, four major rivers from one garden, etc.), so that it is natural to ask whether this is not a meaningful narration that does not stick only to factual matters” (Pinnock, SP, 119).

16) “On the one hand, we cannot rule legend out a priori. It is, after all, a perfectly valid literary form, and we have to admit that it turns up in the Bible in at least some form. We referred already to Job’s reference to Leviathan and can mention also Jotham’s fable” (Pinnock, SP, 121-122).

17) “The influence of myth is there in the Old Testament. The stories of creation and fall, of flood and the tower of Babel, are there in pagan texts and are worked over in Genesis from the angle of Israel’s knowledge of God, but the framework is no longer mythical” (Pinnock, SP, 123).

18) “We read of a coin turning up in a fish’s mouth and of the origin of the different languages of humankind. We hear about the magnificent exploits of Sampson and Elisha. We even see evidence of the duplication of miracle stories in the gospels. All of them are things that if we read them in some other book we would surely identify as legends” (Pinnock, SP, 123).

19) “At most, [in the NT] there are fragments and suggestions of myth: for example, the strange allusion to the bodies of the saints being raised on Good Friday (Matt. 27:52) and the sick being healed through contact with pieces of cloth that had touched Paul’s body (Acts 19:11-12)” (Pinnock, SP, 124).

20) “There are cases in which the possibility of legend seems quite real. I mentioned the incident of the coin in the fish’s mouth (Matt. 17:24-27)…. The event is recorded only by Matthew and has the feel of a legendary feature” (Pinnock, SP, 125). [Yet Gundry was asked to resign from ETS by 74 percent of the membership.]

21) “God is free in the manner of fulfilling prophecy and is not bound to a script, even his own” (Pinnock, MMM, 51).

In short, the ETS framers would not affirm any of these and Pinnock has not denied any of them. If he really wants to clear the record, then all he has to do is deny all 21 of these in clear and unequivocal terms. If he does not, then his unrecanted written views are contrary to what the ETS statement really means since the framers would not agree with any of them. And it is an evangelical tragedy of great magnitude that the Executive Committee of ETS and a majority of its members have retained Pinnock in what has now become the formerly Evangelical Theological Society.

 

All italic emphasis in original, bold emphasis this author’s.

SP–Clark Pinnock, The Scripture Principle (San Francisco, Harper & Rowe: 1984).

MMM–Clark Pinnock, The Most Moved Mover (Grand Rapids, Baker: 2001).

 

By Christopher on Book Review, Creation, Evolution, Genetics, Intelligent Design, Science, Theistic Evolution tagged ,

A Review of Michael Behe’s The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism

A Review of Michael Behe’s The Edge of Evolution:

The Search for the Limits of Darwinism

By Norman L. Geisler

Introduction

This book is the follow up of Behe’s revolutionary work, Darwin’s Black Box. Like the first volume, this 307 page tome will also created a stir in the perennial creation-evolution debate. Unlike the first book, the emphasis here is on the limits of evolution rather than the need for intelligent design. Behe’s general conclusions are based largely on the Malaria and HIV studies which enable scientists to determine the rate of “helpful” chance mutations (13) for micro evolution. When this is applied to mutations in living things, Behe believes the mathematical odds eliminate the Darwinian belief that the origin of all living forms can be explained by random mutations and natural selection. This attempt to define the limits of Darwinism provides a way to determine the borders for micro-evolution within an overall intelligent design framework. It is one of the most sophisticated attempts to define the border between macro and micro evolution. The previous effort was by Ray Bolin’s book, The Limits to Biological Change (1984). Much of Behe’s work deals with a technical microbiological discussion of the nature of the cell. However, because of the use of good illustrations, even the scientifically untrained reader can understand the overall argument.

The Central Thesis

Behe concludes that everything from biological classes, types, and phyla clearly need a designer. Everything from species, varieties, and individuals can be explained by purely natural processes like “random mutations, natural selection, and common descent” (1). The Line, then, between, Darwin and design is somewhere in the area of orders, families, and genera (218), though he thinks it is likely that even the orders are designed (193, 199).

In other words, micro evolution (changes within different types) can be accounted for Darwinian processes without any intelligent design. Before that level, however, only an Intelligent Designer can account for the irreducible complexity in living things. Thus, the origin of new life forms cannot be accounted for by a completely Darwinian random processes of chance mutations, and natural selection.

Theistic Evolution

Creationists who missed the fine print in Behe’s first book, acknowledging that he held an overall evolutionary common ancestry thesis, will be disappointed with The Edge of Evolution. For here Behe makes it clear that he is a theistic evolutionist (166, 182, 232). He says: “I’ll show some of the newest evidence from studies of DNA that convinces most scientists, including myself, that one leg of Darwin’s theory–common descent–is correct” (65). He adds, “when two lineages share what appears to be an arbitrary genetic accident, the case for common descent becomes compelling …. This sort of evidence he sees in the genomes of humans and chimpanzees” (70-71). “More compelling evidence for the shared ancestry of humans and other primates comes from …a broken hemoglobin gene” which they share (71). Creationists, however, have shown that a common Creator explains this same data as a result of intelligent design (see Fazale Rana and Hugh Ross, Who Was Adam?, 2005, Chapter 14).

Behe seems to favor the position that “intelligent design is quite compatible with the view that the universe operates by unbroken natural law, with the design of life perhaps packed into its initial set-up” (166). Thus, “the bottom line is this: Common descent is true; yet the explanation of common descent … is in a profound sense trivial” Why? Because “It does not even begin to explain where these commonalities came from, or how humans subsequently acquired remarkable differences” (72). Behe believes that it comes from pre-planned and pre-set intelligent design, perhaps from the moment of the Big Bang.

Random Changes are Inadequate

As one would suspect from his first work, Behe reaffirms his initial thesis that “Random duplicating a single gene, or even the entire genome, does not yield new complex machinery… [or] novel, complex forms of life” (74). Indeed, he insists that the studies since his first book show that “the problems of its [cilium’s] irreducible complexity has been enormously compounded” (94). And “The cilium is no fluke. The cell is full of structures whose complexity is substantially greater than we knew just ten years ago” (95). He also points to the incredible timing it takes to construct a cell, comparing it to the preparation and execution of the material and machinery necessary to erect a large building (96).
Returning to the bacterial flagellum (motor mechanism), he calls it “mind-boggling complexity” (101) since we know there are control switches that exert control over its construction. Citing noble laureate Francis Crick, Behe concludes that “An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going” (216).

Possible Divine Interference

In spite of his common descent thesis, Behe allows for the possibility of divine “interference” after the initial creation at the Big Bang. He concludes: “The bottom line is that, if one allows that a being external to the universe could affect its laws, there is no principled reason to rule out a priori more extensive interaction as well” (210). In short, “If there really does exist an agent who tuned the general laws of nature with the goal of producing intelligent life, then it’s reasonable to think the agent would have taken whatever further steps were necessary to achieve its goal” (213). However, typical of evolutionists, with or without and initial Creator, Behe agrees with the party-line criticism that this positing a series of creative events after the beginning is an unnecessary God-of-the-gaps move.

The Anthropic Connection

Behe skillfully ties his intelligent design thesis in with the anthropic principle (207-208), saying, “It’s reasonable to conclude not only that the universe is designed, but that the design extends well beyond general laws, at least down into particularities of the physical and chemistry of certain molecules” (210). This has the advantage of showing that the designer is beyond the world and that He preplanned emergence of complex life before the Big Bang. He declares that “the hard work of many scientists across many scientific disciplines in the past century unexpectedly demonstrated that both the universe at large and the earth in particular were designed for life. The heavens and earth–and life itself–alike are fine-tuned” (210). In spite of this, Behe strangely allows the view that the Designer may be within the universe like Fred Hoyle proposed (228). However, this is not consistent with the fact that the Designer preplanned the original Big Bang event before the natural world existed and pre-packed it with the necessary conditions for human life to emerge.

The Evidence for Intelligent Design

Behe posits two criteria for an intelligent cause. First, the odds against a natural cause must be great. Random mutations cannot explain the irreducibly complex nature of life for “the majority of even helpful mutations are lost by chance before they get an opportunity to spread in the population” (111). In short, the complex structure of the cell makes it unreasonable for blind Darwinism to navigate the maze necessary for life (113). For both the necessary parts and the action to achieve cell construction make it highly improbable that it would occur naturally (121).

By comparison with the HIV virus in which nothing “significantly new or complex” (155) developed in 1020 copies, Behe concludes that the likelihood of even simple helpful changes for complex cell construction are virtually nil. It is in this connection that Behe offers a helpful distinction between mere theoretical possibility (which Darwinian evolution depends on to make its case) and biologically reasonable expectation (103), namely, something that is likely to occur in nature (which Darwinians is not).

Second, the evidence of purpose is necessary to posit an intelligent cause. Indeed, Behe defines “design” as “the purposeful arrangement of parts” (168). Rational agents can coordinate things into a large system like a ship. Such an arrangement is not only highly unlikely to occur by chance, but we know from previous experience that an intelligent agent can organize things in this manner. All necessary parts must not only fit together but they must stick together (124-126). Even two new useful properties need an intelligent cause since the odds are 1040 against it. This is more than all the mammals that ever lived (135). This is so unlikely that it calls for an intelligent cause at the outer edge of evolution (145-146).

The Role of Chance (220).

The design thesis is not extended by Behe to every detail of the universe. He asks: “Is nothing left to chance? No, there is no reason to think that any but a minuscule fraction of the details of the universe or life are intended” (219). So, “we have no scientific evidence of the design of the details of most inorganic matter” (220). Hence, “Explicit design appears to reach into biology to a certain level, to the level of the vertebrate class, but not necessarily further, Randomness accounts perfectly well for many aspects of life. Contingency is real” (220). In making this claim, Behe is not discounting that even the tiniest cells are elegantly designed. He insists that random mutations can not take many coherent steps by purely natural processes (179).

Addressing Objections
Behe addresses several objections to His view. One deals with the possibility of numerous universes of which this one is the lucky shot that turned up where life emerged, as improbable as it may have been in a single universe.

The Multi-Universe Hypothesis

Behe addresses the atheistic response that this universe is only an isolated oasis of apparent design in a vast dessert of chance involving multi-universes (221) which make this unusual universe in which we live a plausible result of chance. He believes this hypothesis actually undercuts Darwinism for the models are purely speculative and iffy. That is, there is no observational evidence for such an hypothesis–which is the very basis for science. Further, on such a scenario only a bare-bones universe would be produced, not the lush one we have (223). Science can only deal with what is–not with what one imagines or wishes there to be.

Behe struggles with the infinite universes possibility which would explain this one as one of the many that would actualize in that amount of time and space. However, being unarmed with solid philosophical reasoning, he does not seem to realize that one cannot have an actual infinite number of actual universes (but only abstract ones). He does note that an infinite universes hypothesis would undermine both any meaningful sense of evidence and the fact that all false thought will appear endlessly in such a scenario. More fundamentally, he asserts that science is based on the premises that the universe is real and our senses are reliable. Without this even the first steps of reasoning are impossible (226). But granted these, the infinite universe scenario is unfounded.

The Religious Connection

In answer to the objection that the design position leads to God, Behe quotes Nick Bostrom with approval, affirming that “The ‘agent’ doing the designing need not be a theistic God …,” even though that is one possibility (228). He believes–I think wrongly–that “To reach a transcendent God, other nonscientific arguments have to be made–philosophical and theological arguments” (229). Much of the book deals with a technical microbiological discussion of the nature of the cell. However, by the use of good illustrations even scientifically untrained readers can understand the overall argument.

The God of the Gaps Objection

This reasoning, Behe insists, is not “God of the gaps” because non-randomness “encompasses the cellular foundation of life as a whole” (147). In short, it is not the lack of evidence for a natural cause but the presence of an all-permeating presence of purpose that points to a designer. According to Behe, “purposeful designer” is taken in a broad sense (229) to include either a supernatural cause beyond the universe or one inside the universe. For “the designer need not necessarily even be a truly ‘supernatural’ being.” Thus, he argues that “if one wishes to be academically rigorous, he can not leap directly from design to a transcendent God” (228). But this conclusion is unnecessary in view of Behe’s own argument since the anthropic evidence points to a supernatural cause beyond the universe, as does the evidence for the Big Bang to which he alludes. For the cause of the whole natural universe cannot be part of the universe. And the only Cause beyond the natural universe is by definition a supernatural Cause. Indeed, on his own definition of science as a conclusion relying on physical evidence, “plus standard logic” (233) one can logically infer a supernatural cause from the Big Bang origin of the entire natural universe, as we just did.

Common Ancestor or Common Creator

Behe argues that: “If mammals and flies use the same switching genes, it is reasonable to think that they inherited them from the same ancestor or ancestors” (182). Indeed, it is true that “every Hox gene seen in the fruit fly has a very similar counterpart in humans!” (180). However, Behe forgets that from this we need not infer common ancestry. For it is also reasonable to conclude that they have a common Creator. For common design points more reasonably to a common Designer than to a common ancestor. For example, the progressive models of airplanes from the Wright brothers to space ships are not evidence of a common ancestor but a common creator. And in many case a function that worked well in a previous model was incorporated into a later one.

Is the Bible Scientific?

Behe claims that it is “silly” to treat the Bible “as some sort of scientific textbook” (166).
However, while the Bible is not a systematic science text on the various sciences, nonetheless, there is no evidence to demonstrate that it is not scientifically accurate when it speaks on matters of origin. Indeed, modern science has confirmed the basic facts of Genesis one: 1) There was a Creator of the universe (Gen. 1:1). 2) First life was created (Gen. 1:21). 3) The basic kinds of multi-cellular life “exploded” on the scene in the Cambrian (Gen. 1:21-24). 4) All forms of life appeared fully formed from the beginning. 5) These forms of life remain basically the same throughout their geological existence, producing after their kind (Gen. 1:24). 6) Human beings are unique creatures with distinctive intellectual and moral capacities, even God-consciousness (Gen. 1:27). Even the Agnostic astronomer Robert Jastrow concluded, “”Now we see how the astronomical evidence leads to a biblical view of the origin of the world. The details differ, but the essential elements in the astronomical and biblical accounts of genesis are the same: the chain of events leading to man commence suddenly and sharply at a definite moment in time, in a flash of light and energy” (God and the Astronomers, 14).

Does Nature Self-Organize?

Darwinian evolutionist claim that nature performs self-organizing acts such as hurricanes. But, as Behe points out these systems are not like “complex genetic systems” (159). They have no irreducible complexity, nor do they have any specified complexity such as the DNA has. Hence, this Darwinian analogy is fallacious.

Origin vs. Operation Science

Behe shows no evidence that he understands the distinction between origin and operation science distinction that we made in our book, Origin Science (1987). In fact, he seems to blur them in his definition of science as “any conclusion that relies heavily and exclusively on detailed physical evidence, plus standard logic” (233). But this is too broad and does not bring out the distinctives of each domain. Operation science deals with observed regularities in the present, but origin science treats unobserved singularities in the past. The first one is an empirical science which includes micro-evolution, but not macro evolution. It relies on observation (and experimentation) and repetition. Each theory, therefore, must be measured against a recurring pattern in the present.

However, origin science operates like a forensic science. It involves neither repetition nor direct observation of events. Rather, it relies on two other principles: causality and uniformity. The first principle posits that there is a cause for every event. The second principle declares that the kind of causes know by repeated observation in the present to produce certain kinds of events in the present are assumed to be the same kind of causes to produce like events in the past. And the two basic kinds of causes are intelligent and non-intelligent natural causes. Sciences that deal with intelligent causes in the past includes both forensic science and origin science. Had Behe explicitly used this distinction, he could have solved more problems more readily. Likewise, speaking of “testing” (233-234) an origin hypothesis is misleading in the normal sense of an empirical test. In a forensic situation, being a singular unobserved past event, there is no such way to “test” the event. One can only posit a certain kind of cause (known from repetitions in the present) as the most likely cause of that past event of origin, whether a non-intelligent natural cause or an intelligent cause.

Prediction or Retrodiction?

Failing to distinguish origin science form operation science, Behe labors to explain how intelligent design can make predictions better than Darwinian evolution (188-189, 234). But neither theory as such is primarily concerned with making predictions, though some may be inferred from them. Origin science, such as macro evolution and creation, deals with projecting back (retrodiction) from present evidence to past causes based on uniformity (the present is the key to the past). Hence, the main concern is not with verifying the theory by predictions, but with identifying the proper cause for the specific events, whether non-intelligent natural one or an intelligent one.

Suffering and Design

Behe briefly tackles the painful problem of suffering (237f.). He responds to the argument that “because it is horrific, it was not designed” by pointing out that the “revulsion is not a scientific argument.” Indeed, he insists that “denying design simply because it can cause terrible pain is a failure of nerve, a failure to look at the universe fully in the face” (239). Of course, this is a less than satisfying answer to the problem. A more direct response would be to point out two things. First, suffering does not negate the strong evidence for design. At worst, it only raises questions about the nature and purposes of the Designer. Second, the attempts to disprove the Creator based on the apparent lack of purpose for suffering are notoriously unsuccessful. At best they boil down to this: “The Creator cannot have a good purpose for allowing suffering because the creature cannot think of one.” But clearly if the Creator is infinite in knowledge, then we would expect that He would know infinitely more than we do. And if He is absolutely good (which He must be or else we could not know the world is not-perfect without this absolute standard of Perfection by which to measure it), then He must have an absolutely good purpose for everything, even if we do not know it (Deut. 29:29; Rom. 11:33).

Purpose for Apparent Randomness

Behe seems to lack a full understanding of the relation of randomness and design. They are not mutually exclusive. There is a purpose or design for randomness. For example, the random mixing of carbon dioxide which humans exhale has a good purpose, namely, it keeps them from inhaling the same poison because it did not mix with the air we inhale. Likewise, random natural selection has a good purpose: It enables various kinds of animals to survive by adapting to adverse circumstances. In short, it helps the race survive when weaker individuals are eliminated. Just as a saw mill uses the “wasted” saw dust to make other products, even so there is a purpose for the “wasted” animals who did not survive. They provide food and fertilizer for those who do survive.

Likewise, Behe’s argument for common ancestry based on alleged common mutations in genes between primates an humans is fallacious. Just as the once 180 vestigial organs of Darwin’s day have diminished to virtually none, even so, the recently so-called “junk” genes are now known to have a crucial purpose in the development of life. Any alleged “ waste” in God’s universe is probably a byproduct of a good purpose such as higher life living on lower forms. But even this byproduct of a good process (like saw dust from cutting logs) has a good use. Darwin’s view of nature that is “red in tooth and claw” was not the paradise God made in Eden (Gen. 2), nor will it be the Paradise regained in the end (Isa. 65:25; Rev. 21-22). It is the Paradise lost because of man’s sin (Gen. 2:16-17).

Conclusion

In summation, Behe’s work is a mixed blessing to the creation and intelligent design movements. It is a blessing in that: 1) It strengthens the already good argument from specified complexity to an intelligent Designer; 2) It provides a scientific basis for the limits of biological change known as micro-evolution or variation within created kinds or types of life. On the down side: 1) Behe does not seem to understand the difference between operation science and origin science (see my book Creation in the Courts (Crossway, 2007), Chap. 8); 2) He does not see how the scientific evidence leads to a supernatural Cause; 3) He buys into the unfounded argument that similarity shows a common ancestor, rather than a common Creator; 4) He wrongly assumes that some apparent mutations are evidence for common ancestry when they are really highly complex means produced by an intelligent Designer. Thus, so-called “junk” genes are not really junk. Crucial roles have been discovered for them in the increasing complexity of life. And not all apparent mutations are real ones. Granted that it took a supernatural and super intelligent Cause to produce this world (as the Big Bang and Anthropic evidence shows), there is good reason to believe that “God does not make junk!” And if it looks like junk, then scientists need to take another look. For the history of science has shown that apparent left-over organs and junk genes have turned out to have important functions. Any One who can pre-plan and produce a highly complex universe as this one should not be charged with purposeless activity. It is more likely that we are dumb than it is that a supernatural Creator is dead.

By Christopher on Clark Pinnock, Doctrine of God, ETS, Greg A. Boyd, Neo-Theism, Open Theism, Philosophy & History of Philosophy, Process Theology, Theology

Neotheism: Orthodox or Unorthodox? A Theological Response to Greg Boyd

Neotheism: Orthodox or Unorthodox?
A Theological Response to Greg Boyd

by Norman L. Geisler

Introduction

Professor Boyd’s view is part of a broader movement called “Free Will Theism” or the “Openness View of God,” a position embraced by some noted contemporary evangelicals like Clark Pinnock.1 A more descriptive name for the view is neotheism, since it rejects crucial aspects of classical theism in favor of neo-classical theism also known as process theology.2Indeed, Pinnock placed the view “Between Classical and Process Theism.”3

Some chief characteristics of neotheism as embraced by Greg Boyd are: 1) A libertarian views of free will (which entails the power of contrary choice); 2) a limitations on God’s infallible foreknowledge to non-free acts; 3) a partially open (non-determined) future, namely, one where free acts are involved; 4) the belief that God’s nature can change; 5) that God is temporal, and 6) the implication that God is not simple (indivisible) His essence.

A Response to Boyd’s Neotheistic Attack on Classical Theism

Classical theism, as embraced by St. Augustine, St. Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, and virtually all the great Fathers and Teachers of the Christian Church is rejected by neotheism. Particularly under attack are God’s attributes of Pure Actuality (with no potentiality), Immutability, Eternality (Non-temporality), Simplicity (indivisibility), Infallible Foreknowledge of everything (including free acts), and Sovereignty (complete control of the universe and future). The central charges by neotheists against classical theism include the following:


The Charge That Classical Theism is Rooted in Greek Philosophy

Statement of the Charge.–Boyd claims that classical theism is based, not on Scripture, but on Greek philosophy (Boyd, 17, 24, 85, 115, 109, 144).4 He writes: “My fundamental thesis is that the classical theological tradition became misguided when, under the influence of Hellenic philosophy, it defined God’s perfection in static, timeless terms.” That is, “All change was considered an imperfection and thus not applicable to God.” He adds elsewhere that “…we simply must free ourselves from the Hellenistic philosophical assumptions that God must be unchanging in every respect and that time is an illusion….” (Boyd, 17, 85) That is, that change and time are “less real” and less good than the unchanging timeless real (Boyd, 130).

A Response to the Charge.–In response, several important observations need to be made. First of all, it is not correct to attribute this view to Greek philosophy. No one was more Greek than Aristotle, and he believed time involved real change.5 Further, “less real” and an “illusion” are not the same. Plato held the former, namely that this temporal world was not an illusion but a “shadow”6 of reality (but not a non-reality).7

Second, even if Boyd called the classical view of God “platonic” philosophy, it would still be wrong. For Plato never identified God (the Demiurgos) and the Good (the Agathos), his absolutely unchanging metaphysical principle. Identifying God with the ultimate metaphysical principle was the unique Judeo-Christian contribution to philosophy of religion.8 Thus, the reverse of the traditional objection is the case. It was the Judeo-Christian concept of God as Self-Existent, Pure Actuality (based on Ex. 3:14) that transformed Greek metaphysics!9

Third, the attempt to blame philosophy cuts both ways. One can equally argue that neotheistic interpretations of the biblical texts resulted from the influence of contemporary process philosophy. Although Boyd notes some differences between his views and process theology, nevertheless, he clearly buys into much the “dynamic” process view of God espoused by Alfred North Whitehead and followers (Boyd, 31, 107).10

Finally, there is nothing wrong as such with having a philosophical influence on biblical and theological studies. Philosophy is necessary to do both exegesis and systematic theology. One should only be sure that he is utilizing good philosophy. So the question is not whether it is Greek thinking but whether is good thinking. It is not a matter of whether the view is Hellenic but whether it is authentic. After all, the Greeks also believed in the law of non-contradiction which cannot be discarded in theological thinking without engaging in self-defeating statements.11

Even fellow neotheists admit that “No one should criticize the Fathers for trying to integrate current philosophical beliefs and biblical insights. If the God of the universe and of truth is one, theologians should try to integrate all of the truth that they know from any quarter.”12

The Claim That God is Temporal

Statement of the Claim.–Like other neotheists, Boyd affirms that God is temporal. God not only looks ahead, but He even changes His mind about the future (Boyd, 16, 30, 45, 69). Indeed, the part of the future yet to be determined by free acts is so open to God (Boyd, 123) that He even takes “risks” (Boyd, 156). Although Boyd wishes to place God in some unexplained sense beyond time (Boyd, 131), he admits that God both changes and is in is temporal in the sense of experiencing things in a temporal sequence (Boyd, 131). Unlike fellow neotheists, Boyd puts forward no formal argument for God’s temporality but, rather, he generally assumes 1) from his interpretation of the biblical text that God literally changes; 2) from his belief that God’s non-temporality is a “Greek,” “static,” and outdated view of reality (Boyd, 17), and 3) from the fact that “every verb applied to God in the Bible testifies to this” (Boyd, 131-132).

A Response to the Claim.–Boyd’s comments call for response. First of all, not every verb in the Bible used of God is tensed so as to make God temporal. In fact, when God speaks of Himself in Exodus 3:14 is in the eternal non-temporally “I AM.” And Jesus, disregarding the normal grammatical past tense expected in His famous “before Abraham was” statement, repeated that God, whom He claimed to be, was the same “I Am” (Jn. 8:58). As for the usual references to God in Scripture from a temporal human point of view, one would expect that they would be tenses in a temporal sense because they are from a human point of view. And for the statement of God manifest in angelic form in the Angel of the Lord (e.g., Gen. 18; Jud. 13), here too the angel is in finite form in a temporal world. In this case one would expect the statements to be tenses, as all other statements made by beings in the temporal world. After all, Jesus made all his statements as a man in the past present or future, but even Boyd would have to admit that this in no way means it was not also God who existed before the temporal world.

Second, behind the denial that God by nature is beyond time and change is the neotheist’s argument that God changes and undergoes temporal sequences. One form of the implied argument assumes the cause of a temporal act must itself be temporal. But this clearly is not the case, for the reasoning used proves only that the effect must be temporal, not the Cause. By the same kind of reasoning neotheists should conclude that God is a creature since He made creatures. Or, that God is finite because He made finite things, etc.

Further, another way to state the problem is to note that process and neotheist thinkers who use this argument confuse God’s attributes and Hisacts. His acts are in time, but His attributes are beyond time. There is no reason why the Eternal cannot act in the temporal world. Just as all the radii of a circle are many and yet the center from which they come is one, even so God can have multiple acts without being multiple Himself. Likewise, there is nothing logically incoherent about a timeless God acting in a temporal world.

What is more, if God is in time, then Boyd’s protest to the contrary (Boyd, 133), God cannot think faster than the speed of light which is the fastest movement in the space-time world.13 If God’s nature is in time, then He is temporal. And if He is temporal by nature, then He is also spacial and material. For time, space, and matter are correlative in the contemporary view of physics which Boyd seems to accept.

What is more, if God is spacial-temporal-material, then, according to contemporary astro-physics, He must have come into existence with the Big Bang. That is, He must have had a beginning, since, as the Kalam argument demonstrates, an infinite number of actual moments before today is impossible. In infinite number of actual moments (as opposed to an abstract infinite number) could not have occurred before today, since today is the end of the series of all moments before it. But an infinite number of moments has no end. Hence, there can only be a finite number of actual moments before today.14 In short, Boyd’s view of God’s nature would not be God at all but a finite creature created by God!15

Boyd’s attempt to avoid this conclusion is in vain. He says, “Of course God is `above time,’ for our concept of time is simply the way we measure change” (Boyd, 131). But he goes on to speak of a “God who experiences things, thinks things, and responds to things sequentially.” But he cannot have it both ways, if God is really beyond time and change, then he does no experience temporal change. And if He experiences temporal change, then He is in time. Boyd simply cannot have it both ways, unless he posits two nature in God, one that is non-temporal and unchanging as classical theists do and another that is changing. But we have already shown that this other “nature” is not really God at all but a creature. This leads to another claim by Boyd, namely that God is not simple.

The Claim that God is Not Simple in His Being

Statement of the Claim that God is not Simple.–Boyd’s view clearly entails the denial of God’s simplicity–a crucial attribute in the classical view of God. For if, on the one hand, Boyd claims that God changes and is in time (Boyd, 44, 63, 96) and yet, on other hand, he claims God has aspects of His nature that do not change, God must have a least two aspects, dimensions, or poles to His nature–the very position held by process theologians.

Now it appears that this is precisely what Boyd affirms. For on occasion, he says God has unchanging holiness, and unchanging character (Boyd, 78, 80), is eternal in form and structure, and necessary in his love (Boyd, 110, 111). But the only way to hold both this and also that God changes is to deny God’s simplicity, which is precisely what most neotheists do.

A Response to the Claim.–Several comments are in order here. First of all, if God has two dimensions or poles, then neotheism is really a form of process theology, since classical theism, like process theology, is monopolar and neotheism is bipolar in its view of God. Thus, in its overreaction, to what it believed to be the “frying pan” of classical theism, neotheism has landed in the “fire” of process theology. In making Plato their enemy, they have made Whitehead their friend (or vice versa). By attempting to avoid the alleged pitfall of Greek philosophy they have fallen into the bottomless pit of process philosophy. 

Second, there is a way of escape for neotheism, but it is one they seen reluctant to take. They could affirm that what is changing is really not part of God’s nature, but only reflects God’s actions that are in time. That is, God is unchanging and non-temporal in His essence but engages, nonetheless, in changing activities. But since this is precisely what classical theism asserts, neotheists are faced with a painful dilemma: either 1) they can admit they hold a bipolar process view of God as does process theology, or else 2) they can return to classical theism’s insistence that God’s nature does not change, but only the results of His actions do.

Third, lest neotheists are tempted to take the first horn of the dilemma and admit they have a bipolar process view of God, consider this: upon analysis of the other “nature” or “pole” of God that can change, it turns out to be a creature and not part of the Creator at all. For the Creator has no beginning, yet this changing nature must have a beginning since it is temporal, and an infinite series of actual moments is not possible.

2) This same logic applies to other characteristics that a temporal, changing, “nature” of God would have. For whatever is temporal is also spacial. And whatever is spatial is material. And whatever is spacial-temporal-material is subject to the II Law of Thermodynamics, namely, it both had a beginning and is decaying. Surely, no one who claims to be a Theist (as neotheism wish to be) can believe there is a nature in God that had a beginning and will have an end. Such a nature is by definition a finite creature and can not be part of the Creator.

3) Further, this supposed changing “nature” of God would be finite, yet neotheists admits God is infinite. But whatever is finite needs a caused. Hence, this limited nature would not be God but a creature made by God. In short, it would not be another part or pole of God, it would be a creature God created, which is exactly what classical theism contends. Thus, neotheism’s belief that God has a changing temporal nature (along with an unchanging one), reduces logically to classical theism.

The Claim That God Must Change If His Relationships Change

The Claim Stated.–Noetheists like Boyd assume that God must change when His relationships do (Boyd, 44, 63, 77, 82, 83, 96). Their argument can be put like this: 1) God is related to a changing world; 2) Whatever is related to a changing world undergoes change; 3) Therefore, God undergoes change.

A Response to the Claim.–Given what neotheists believe about God, this argument against classical theism is clearly invalid. First of all, premise 2) is untrue. As classical theist’s have pointed our for centuries, God no more changes when the world changes in relation to Him than the pillar changes when the person changes in relation to a pillar by moving from one side to the other. The person changes in relation to the pillar, but the pillar does not change in relation to the person.16 God has an eternal, unchanging knowledge about the changing relationship the world has with Him. But this no more makes God changing than creating a dependent world makes God dependent on it. Or, that God making a creature demands that He thereby becomes a creature. It is an strange logic that insists that the Creator must take on the characteristics of a creatures because He creates them or relates to them in some way.

Second, the same point can be made using by neotheist’s own beliefs. For they do not believe the Creator becomes a creature simply because He creates one. Nor do they believe the beginingless God acquires a beginning simply because He creates something with a beginning. Likewise, they do not accept that God becomes contingent or finite upon making a contingent or finite thing. Why then does God have to become temporal and changing because He made a temporal and changing world.

What is more, Boyd fails to recognize is that creating the world does not change the nature of God. Certainly, God does not change “internally,” that is, in his essence, when He creates something else. If He does, then Boyd and neotheists will have to give up their belief that there an essential core of attributes in God that do not change (see Boyd, 44, 78). The only thing that changes is “external,” namely, the world’s relationship with God. And, contrary to neotheists, this change is not a change in God’s nature, for the change is in something that is finite, dependent, has a beginning, and is subject to decay. In fact, it is a change in the creation, not a change in the Creator. So the change in relationship with God is not due to a change in the Creator but in His creation. Prior to creation, there was no world to have a relationship with God, so there could be no relationship between it and God. But when the world was created, the change was not in God but the world and its relation to God.

At creation there was a new relationship to God but not any newattributes in God. However, He did not change in His essence; only an external relationship to Him changed. And when the external relationship changed, it was not because a change occurred in God but, rather, the change was in the external thing related to Him. At creation there was no change in what God is but only in what He did. Failure to make this distinction leads to the neotheistic confusion of speaking of God changing in his non-essential nature. It assumes that to act in time is to be temporal. But it does not demonstrate that the Actor is temporal; only that the results of His acts relating to the temporal world are temporal.

Furthermore, God cannot have a “non-essential” nature. “Non-essential” means something one has, but it is not essential for Him to have it. Buy “nature” is meant what is essential to a thing. For example, human nature is essential to humans. Without it we would not be human. So, a non-essential nature is a contradiction in terms. Since nature means essence, it would be a non-essential essence, which is nonsense.

The Claim That A Proper View of Free Will Demands that God Can Change

A Statement of the Claim.–Neotheist like Boyd claim that free will must be understood in a libertarian sense of self-determination, namely, the power to do otherwise (Boyd, 57, 63, 65, 96, 99, 122, 135). This being true, Boyd concludes that God cannot know future free acts with certainty. If He did, they would be determined. And if they are determined, then they cannot be free (Boyd, 16, 111, 123, 147).

A Response to the Claim.–First of all, the classical theist’s reply is that God’s will cannot be changed. For He is omniscient, and so what He knows will be, will be. God’s will is in perfect accord with His knowledge. Therefore, God’s will is as unchangeable as is His knowledge. This does not mean that God does not will that some things change. It means that God’s will does not change, even though He will’s that other things change.17 Of course, the Bible speaks of God repenting. But God repents only in a metaphorical sense, as man views it. Even Boyd admits anthropomorphisms are used of God in the Bible (Boyd, 118-119). And his test of “rediculousness” for when references to God should be taken as anthropomorphic is both subjective and inconsistently applied by him. For Boyd admits that speaking of God as repenting (which he believes is literally true) strikes some as rediculous (Boyd, 118).

Second, Boyd acknowledges that even anthropomophisms can tell us something literally about God, but rejects that this can be true of God’s alleged “mind change.” Classical theists have long observed that human repentance tells us something about God, namely, that God has more than one attribute upon which He must act consistently. Hence, before a person repents, he is under God’s attribute of wrath, and after he repents he is under God’s attribute of mercy.18 God is really both wrathful and merciful, and when one repents there is a real change in his relationship with the unchanging God.

Third, classical theist believe that God knew from eternity who would repent. And God’s will includes intermediate causes such as human free choice. So God knows what the intermediate causes will choose to do. And God’s will is in accord with His unchangeable knowledge. Therefore, God’s will never changes, since He wills what He knows will happen.19 That is to say, what is willed by conditional necessity does not violate human freedom, since what is willed is conditioned on their freely choosing it. God wills the salvation of men only conditionally (2Peter 3:9). Therefore, God’s will to save them does not violate human free choice; it utilizes it.20

Of course, while God’s will does not change, the effects of His will in time do change. For God wills unchangeably from all eternity that many different and changing things will happen at different times so that eventually His sovereign purpose will be accomplished. Just as a doctor knows and wills in advance to change the patient’s medicine when their condition changes, even so God wills unchangeably from all eternity to meet the changing conditions of His creatures in order to accomplish His ultimate purposes. An omniscient Mind cannot be wrong about what it knows.21

The Claim That God Cannot Have Unlimited Omniscience

A Statement of the Claim.–The new theism also rejects the classical concept of omniscience in favor of a limited form of omniscience.22 In principle, omniscience is defined the same, namely, that God can know anything that is possible to know. However, Boyd claims that with regard to future free acts, God can change His mind; God can only speak in conditional terms, and it is logically impossible for Him to know them. Boyd writes: “…if people are genuinely free, by logical necessity God cannot foreknow as settled their future freely chosen actions.” Why? Because, total foreknowledge of the future would imply a fixity of events. The future is a “done deal.” The “snapshot” of the future was taken in God’s mind from eternity. Hence, nothing in the future needs to be decided (Boyd, 44, 69, 120, 121).

Boyd’s argument can be put in this form: 1) If God knows the future, then it is determined (otherwise God would be wrong about what he knows). But we are not free to change anything about God’s knowledge. Hence, we are not free to change the future. However, true freedom is the ability to change the future. Hence, if humans are free to change the future, then God cannot know their future free acts in advance.

The argument can also be stated this way: If God knows already what will happen in the future, then God’s knowing this makes it impossible for it to change. That is, since God is infallible, it is impossible that things will turn out differently than God expects them to turn out. So if God knows that a person is going to perform an act, then it is impossible that the person fail to perform it. Thus, he does not really have a free choice whether or not to perform it.23

A Response to the Claim.–In response to this claim, classical theists point out several things. First of all, it is not true that nothing in the future needs to be decided. All future free acts need to be decided. But God foreknows for sure exactly how they will be decided.

Second, true freedom is not, as Boyd claims, the ability to change the future–not in the sense that what God knows will change, for God knows for certain what will freely happen. Rather, true freedom is the ability to do otherwise. But since God knows what will be chosen, then what is chosen by free agents will not be contrary to what God foreknew for sure (=determined) would occur.

Third, one of the greatest classical theist of all time, Thomas Aquinas, keenly observed why there is no contradiction between God knowing future free acts and their being freely chosen. It is simply because a contradiction occurs only when something is both affirmed and denied of the same thing at the same time in the same relationship. But the relationship here is not the same. For “Everything known by God must necessarily be” is true if it refers to the statement of the truth of God’s knowledge, but it is false, if it refers to the necessity of the contingent events.24

Since God is an omniscient being, He knows with certainty what we will do freely. The fact that He knows “in advance” from our temporal perspective does not mean that the event can not happen freely. For God can know for sure that the event will occur freely. The necessity of His knowledge about the contingent event does not make the event necessary (i.e., contrary to free choice). It simply makes His knowledge of this free event an infallible knowledge. In brief, the same event can be viewed in two different relationships; one in relation to God’s foreknowledge and the other in relation to man’s free will. Since the relationship is different, the law of non-contradiction is not violated.

Furthermore, if God is a timeless being, then He knows all of time in one eternal Now.25 But the future is part of time. Therefore, God knows the future, including the free acts to be performed in it. So the problem of not knowing future free acts is inherent in a temporal view of God but not in a non-temporal view. God sees (in His eternal present) the whole of time; past, present, and future (for us). But if God sees our future in His present, then our future is present to Him in His eternity, as an effect pre-exists in its cause. In this way there is no logical problem as to how He can fore-see free acts. He does not need to fore-see; He simply sees. And what He sees in His eternal Now includes what free acts will be performed in our future.

Finally, classical theism offers several arguments for God’s total omniscience, including future free acts. For one, an omniscient God knows all the states of reality, both actual and potential. God’s knowledge is not simply of the actual; He also knows the potential. He knows both what is and what could be. He knows what will be and what can be. For God can know whatever is real in any way it can be known. And both the actual and the potential are real. Only the impossible has no reality. Thus, whatever is potential is real. This being the case, it follows that God can know what is potential as well as what is actual.26 This means that God can know future contingents, that is, things that are dependent on free choice. For the future is a potential that pre-exists in God. And God knows whatever exists in Himself as the cause of those things.27

 
Is Boyd’s Neotheism Heretical?

Boyd seems especially sensitive to the charge of heresy, since he denies it repeatedly in his book (Boyd, 8, 9, 12, 19, 20, 84, 115, 116, 172). To use the less emotive word, let us ask whether neotheism is “unorthodox”? In response, several points are significant.

Some of Boyd’s Grounds for Orthodoxy are Questionable

For starters, one must reject Boyd’s statements that Christians should not divide over issues like this, since they are only a “peripheral” matter (Boyd, 8, 9, 19, 20). The nature of God is no peripheral matter. It is fundamental to virtually every other essential Christian teaching. Furthermore, it is possible to have heretical views of God, as even Boyd acknowledges from his former beliefs as a Oneness Pentecostal (who deny the Trinity).28

Furthermore, Boyd’s stated criterion for orthodoxy is faulty. He contents that “No ecumenical creed of the orthodox church has ever included an articles of faith on divine foreknowledge” (Boyd, 116). First of all, this misses the point, since there are other things about Boyd’s view other than divine foreknowledge that can be challenged, namely his denial of God’s eternality, immutability, and simplicity which the creeds do address.

Second, the creeds do no need to contain an “article” on a matter for it to be included and clear as to their view. Third, the test is too narrow, since the creed did not contain an article on the Inspiration and infallibility of Scripture and, but it is clear that it was entailed in all their pronouncements.29

Likewise, his implication that unity at any price should be achieved falls short of the mark (Boyd, 8, 9, 19). The same logic could be used with a Mormon, Jehovah’s Witness, or with an evangelical who denies the infallibility (and inerrancy) of the Bible.

The Importance of Separating the Questions

Before proceeding to answer the million dollar question of whether Boyd’s neotheism is unorthodox, it is necessary to make two distinctions. First, a person can be orthodox on every other Fundamental Christian doctrine and still be unorthodox on one. Many evangelicals, for example, accept the other fundamentals of the Christian Faith and deny inerrancy. Hence, they are orthodox in general but unorthodox in this particular doctrine.

Also, it should be pointed out that someone can be unorthodox on some particular doctrine (such as inerrancy) and still be saved. Salvation is dependent on believing certain soteriological doctrines, such as the death and resurrection of Christ for our sins (1Cor. 15:1-4) but not on explicitly believing all essential evangelical doctrines (e. g., the inspiration of Scripture and the Bodily Return of Christ). Our knowledge of Boyd’s belief has not yielded any evidence that he is not evangelical on the other essential doctrines of the Faith.

Defining Orthodoxy on the Nature of God

Implicit Unorthodoxy

Typically, an unorthodox doctrine is a denial of a fundamental doctrine of orthodox Christianity as judged by the orthodox Fathers and confessions of the early Church. Taking this as a standard to evaluate neotheism, the question of Boyd’s doctrinal orthodoxy is another matter. Here, it appears that two points must be made before we can arrive at a conclusion. 

First, there is a difference between explicit unorthodoxy and implicit unorthodoxy. The former is a formal denial of some fundamental doctrine of the Christian Faith, and the later is a denial by implication. That is, it is a position that logically entails the denial of a fundamental teaching of the Faith.

With this definition in mind, it appears that neotheism, as embraced by Boyd and others, is implicitly unorthodox on its doctrine of the infallibility and inerrancy of Scripture. For if Boyd is right, then the Bible contains unconditional predictions about the future that could be wrong. For example, the Bible predicted that the Devil is free but that his ultimate fate in Hell is predetermined (Rev. 20:10). But according to neotheism, this prediction cannot be infallible. Hence, at least this part of the Bible is not infallible. The same logic would apply to all unconditional predictive prophecy of which there were many about Christ (e.g., Dan. 9:24f; Psa. 16:10 cf. Acts 2:30-32; Micah 5:2).30 Even Boyd admits that God made an infallible prediction of the Cross (Boyd, 46), but how is this possible on neotheistic grounds when Jesus said He freely chose to go to the Cross (Jn. 10:18).

Neotheist’s attempts to avoid this conclusion are inadequate. Clearly not all biblical predictions are conditional, and God’s knowledge of the character of individuals is no guarantee they will not change (Boyd, 160, 171). And if God can know for sure in advance they will change, then He has infallible foreknowledge of free will, which is exactly what Neotheists deny.

So the minimum that can be said of Boyd’s view is that it logically undermines a crucial tenet of orthodoxy (and possible others). Some object to taking implicit unorthodoxy as test for orthodoxy, since there are other things (like a bad theological method) that seem to do the same. Yet many evangelicals are unwilling to label these methods as unorthodox, at least not in the sense they would other unorthodox beliefs.

However, this stance seems to be theologically myopic, since a bad theological method it can be equally devastating to the Christian Faith as outright denials of major doctrines. For example, certainly the Evangelical Theological Society would not tolerate in its membership someone who claimed to be believe in inerrancy, but utilized a method of interpretation that totally allegorized all literal, historical truth away, including the death and resurrection of Christ. Indeed, some years ago some 75% of the ETS membership voted from its ranks a New Testament scholar who utilized a Midrash method of interpretation of Matthew that denied the historicity of only parts of that Gospel, not including the death and resurrection of Christ.31 Along with the vast majority of ETS members, we conclude that orthodoxy can be both implicit as well as explicit, methodological as well as confessional. Indeed, the former can be as harmful to orthodoxy as the latter.

Explicit Unorthodoxy

This leaves one more question to answer: does Boyd engage in more than implicit or methodological unorthodoxy. That is, does he explicitly deny a fundamental tenet of the Christian Faith? The answer to this seems to depend on the answer to two other questions: 1) Is the nature of God a fundamental tenet of the Christian Faith? and 2) Are the early Creeds, Councils, and Confessions of Christianity a test for orthodoxy?

Early Statements of Orthodoxy on the Doctrine of God
Inasmuch as the early pronouncements of the Christian Church were an expression of the beliefs of the great Fathers of the Church, their views on these matters are also a test of orthodoxy.

Statements of the Fathers Behind the Creeds

Ignatius of Antioch (A.D. 107). The earliest known precreedal statement of a Church Father, reveals crucial elements of a classical view of God. It reflects a predictive prophecy from Scripture that implies God’s infallible foreknowledge that Christ is waiting in heaven “till his enemies are put under his feet” (Schaff, CC32 II, 12). Ignatius added, Look for Him who is above all time, eternal and invisible [Schaff, ANF, I, 94]. He also spoke “…of the nature of God, which fills His works with beauty, and teaching both where God must be, and that He must be One [Schaff, ANF,33 II, 131].

Justin Martyr (c. A.D. 100-c 165). Justin concluded that God, therefore, is…an uncompounded intellectual nature, admitting within Himself no addition of any kind; so that He cannot be believed to have within him a great and a less (Schaff, ANF, IV, 243). He added, For Moses said, He who is…. But either of the expressions seems to apply to the ever-existent God. For He is the only one who eternally exists, and has no generation (Schaff, ANF, I, 282).

Clement of Alexander (A.D. 150-215). He declared that All things, therefore, are dispensed from heaven for good…according to the eternal foreknowledge, which He purposed in Christ (Schaff, ANF, II, 319, 320). For He shows both things: both His divinity in His foreknowledge of what would take place, and His love in affording an opportunity for repentance to the self-determination of the soul (Schaff, ANF, II, 228).

Tatian (c. A.D. 160). He declared: I was led to put faith in…the foreknowledge displayed of future events, the excellent quality of the precepts, and the declaration of the government of the universe as centred in one Being [Schaff, ANF, Vol II, 77].

Irenaeus (A.D. 180). Philip Schaff calls Irenaeus “the most important witness of the doctrinal status of the Catholic Church at the close of the second century.” Irenaeus affirmed there was “one God” (a reference to God’s unity and possibly His simplicity) who “made the heaven and the earth” “out of nothing” and who made predictions of Christ’s “birth from the Virgin,” of His “passion,” “the resurrection from the dead,” His “bodily assumption into heaven” and His “appearing from heaven” at the Second Coming. That God’s foreknowledge is infallible is seen in the fact that “His Son…was always heard in the prophets…” (Schaff, CC, 12-19).

In his seminal work Against Heresies, Irenaeus declared that: God alone…(remains) truly and forever the same.34 And in this respect God differs from man… [who] is made and He who makes always remains the same.35 God is referred to as “the Father invisible” (denoting His immateriality). He also implies God’s infallible foreknowledge that the angels would never change their will and thus will be sent into “eternal fire.” Likewise, the “Rule of Faith” is said to be “immovable and irreformable,” thus reflecting the character of God whose Word it is.

Irenaeus also wrote: He also ascended to the heavens, and was glorified by the Father, and is the “Eternal King.36 Now what has been made is a different thing from him who makes it. The breath then is temporal, but the Spirit is eternal [Schaff, ANF, I, 538]. He also added of God that He is a simple, uncompounded Being without diverse members, and altogether like, and equal to Himself (Schaff, ANF, I, 374]).

Athanagoras (2nd Cent). The early athenian Christian thinker Athanagoras affirmed that “It is evident That we are not atheists, therefore, seeing that we acknowledge one God, uncreated, [and] eternal [Schaff, ANF, II, 133].

Tertullian (A.D. 200). He replies to Marcion by noting we must vindicate those attributes in the Creator which are called into question namely, His goodness, and foreknowledge, and power [The Five Books Against Marcion, Chap. 5]. Moreover, he affirms the eternality of God when he states, This rule is required by the nature of the One-only God, who is One-only is no other way than as the sole God; and in no other way sole, than as nothing else [co-existent] with Him. So also will He be first, because all things are after Him; and all things are after Him, because all things are by Him; and all things are by Him, because they are of nothing [Against Hermongenes, Chap. 17].37

Tertullian also declared that, As God, because He is uncreated, (He) is also unalterable. Citing Scripture, he also said: “`Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail…’ pointing out plainly…who it is that doth endure for ever God.”38

Origen of Alexandria (A. D. 230). Although Origen embraced some unorthodox teachings, He did not appear to deny the classical attributes of God. He declared: For God, comprehending all things by means of His foreknowledge, and foreseeing what consequences would result from both of these, wished to make these known to mankind by His prophets [Schaff, ANF, IV, 594]. He also wrote of “One God” who “created and framed everything” as well as God’s omnipotence in Christ’s birth of the “Virgin” and “resurrection” from the dead (Schaff, CC, 23).

Novatian of Rome (A.D. 250). He speaks also of God as “Almighty” and “Maker of all things,” including this temporal world (which places Him beyond time) (Schaff, CC 21).

Gregorius Thaumaturgus of Neo-Caesarea (c. A. D. 270). He belief embraces “one God” with “eternal power” who has the power which “produces all creation.” This God is both “Invisible,” “Immortal,” “Incorruptible,” “Everlasting,” “a perfect Trinity,” and “not divided,” having both “eternity” and “sovereignty.” God is “ever the same, unvarying and unchangeable.” Here we have almost all the attributes of classical theism most of which are rejected by neotheism, including immutability, eternality, and simplicity (indivisibility) (Schaff, CC 24, 25).

Alexander of Lycopolis (3rd Cent) In truth I think it to be more accurate doctrine to say that God is of a simple nature [ Of the Manicheans, Chap. 10, Vol. 6]

Lucian of Antioch (A.D. 300). He confessed belief in “one God the Father Almighty, the maker and Provider of all things.” God is “unchangeable,” “unalterable,” and “immutable.” He then “anathematizes all heretical and false doctrine” (Schaff, CC 26, 27).

Arius (A.D. 328). Even though his view of Christ was unorthodox, nonetheless, in the “Private Creed of Arius” he confessed that God was “Almighty” and that by him “all things were made.” Noteworthy is the phrase “before all ages” which reveals His belief that God is before time, namely, non-temporal which is another attribute rejected by neotheism (Schaff, CC 28-29).

Eusebius of Caesarea (A.D. 325). Like others before him, Eusebius affirmed the central attributes a the God of classical theism, declaring: “We believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible.” God is also described as “Light,” “Life.” The resurrection and ascension of Christ are also acknowledged as manifestations of God’s omnipotent power (Schaff, CC 29-30).

Cyril of Jerusalem (c. A.D. 350) confession agreed in almost every point with Eusebius, saying: “We believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth; and in one Lord Jesus Christ,… begotten of the Father before all ages, very God, by whom all things were made.” Thus affirms both God’s unity and eternality (Schaff, CC 31).

The Creeds of Epiphanius (A.D. 374). In his first formula he confessed: “We believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and all things visible and invisible….” God and His Son are eternal, existing “before all worlds [ages].” He speaks of God’s one “substance” or “essence” which Christ shared. He adds the attribute of “perfection” as well as the ability to make predictions through the “Prophets” and denies that Christ is “changeable” or “variable” in “substance or essence” from God the Father (Schaff, CC 33-34; 37-38).

Since it is well known that the views of St. Augustine,39 St. Anselm (1033-1109)40 and Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274)41  are clear statements of classical theism, they need not be added here. Likewise, it is well known that the Reformers were also classical theists.42 Indeed, no major Father up to and through the Reformation deviated from the central attributes of the God of classical theism.


The Statements of the Creeds Themselves


The Creed of Nicaea (A.D. 325)

This creed refers to one God the Father All-sovereign, maker of all things one substance. And those who say God is created, or changeable, or alterable, these the Catholic and Apostolic Church anathematizes (Bettenson, DCC, 36].43

The Dedication Creed (A.D. 341)

This creed refers to one God, Father all sovereign, framer, maker and providential ruler of the universe, from all things came into being before all ages unchangeable and immutable (Bettenson, DCC,44 57-58).

The Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan Creed (A.D. 381).

Like its precursors, this creed confessed “one God the Father Almighty; Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.” Likewise, God was “before all worlds.” He has “one substance (essence).” God’s omnipotence is manifest not only in His ability to create the world, but to perform the miracle of the virgin birth, bodily resurrection, and ascension of Christ (Schaff, CC, 58-59).

The Chalcedonian Creed (A.D. 451).

Although stressing the deity of Christ, this creed refers to God as “perfect,” existing “before all ages,” having a “nature,” producing the supernatural “Virgin” birth, and making prediction through “the prophets from the beginning” (Schaff, CC, 62-63).

The Athanasian Creed

This creed by a noted defender of orthodoxy begins by declaring that “Whosoever will be saved: before all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic Faith. Which Faith except every one do keep the whole and undefiled: without doubt he shall perish everlastingly.” This includes believing that there is “Unity” in God’s “Substance (essence)” without “dividing”; that each member of the Trinity is “eternal,” “uncreated” and “incomprehensible” or “unlimited.” God is also “Almighty.” He is not “Three Gods” but “one.” He is also “perfect God.” God’s power to “raise the dead” is also mentioned (Schaff, CC, 66-69).

Conclusion

It is evident that the early Creeds and Confessions of the Faith embraced classical theism on the crucial attributes denied by neotheism such as simplicity, eternality, immutability, and infallible foreknowledge of all events, including future freely chosen ones. What is more, the teachings of the Fathers behind these creeds and confessions is unequivocally on the side of classical theism and opposed to neotheism.

Further, it is clear that the doctrine of God is a crucial doctrine of the Christian Faith by any adequate standard for a fundamental doctrine. For it is essential to almost every other, if not every other, doctrine of the Faith.

Therefore, if this is the case, then neotheism is explicitly unorthodox on its view of God. To consider it otherwise, is to create a new test for orthodoxy.

One thing is certain, whatever term one chooses to use of neotheism’s view of God, the minimum that can be said is that: 1) It is contrary to the great orthodox creeds, confessions, and councils of the Christian Church, as well as the virtually unanimous teachings of the Fathers of the Church up to and through the Reformation into modern times; 2) It is internally inconsistent; 3) It reduces logically to process theology, and 4) It undermines the infallibility of the Scriptures. If these are not sufficient to merit the charge of unorthodoxy, then we are left to ask: what deviation on the fundamental doctrine of God would qualify as unorthodox and by what standard.

1. Clark Pinnock et. al. eds., The Openness of God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1994).

2. See Norman L. Geisler, Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1999), 526-527.

3. This is a title of Clark Pinnock’s chapter in Ronald Nash ed., Process Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1987).

4. Greg Boyd, God of the Possible: A Biblical Introduction to the Openness View of God [GP] (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2000), 17, 24, 85, 115, 109, 144.

5. See Aristotle, Metaphysics, Book XII in Richard McKeon ed., The Basic Works of Aristotle (New York: Random House, 1941).

6. See Plato, Republic, Book VII.

7. Plato was not a pantheists (like Shankara) or a monist (like Parmenides). Rather, Plato believed in a finite God and a real cosmos that has been eternally formed by the this Demiurgos (God). This world is only a “shadow” in comparison to the world of Forms which is a higher reality, being spiritual and immaterial substance. The relationship in Plato, then, is between substance and shadow, not between substance and non-substance, or reality and non-reality (illusion).

8. See Etienne Gilson, God and Philosophy (New Haven, CN: Yale University Press, 1992), Chap. 1.

9. The linguistic meaning of “I AM” as used of God in Exodus 3;14 is in accord with the understanding of the early Fathers who took it to mean the self-existent One. See Geisler, Creating God in Man’s Image (Minneapolis, MN: Bethany House, 1998), 79.

10. Other neotheists admits that “process theology [to which they acknowledge some strong affinities–Pinnock, OG, 140] itself is vulnerable to criticism for excessive deference to philosophy–in this case, to the process philosophy of Whitehead” (ibid., 141).

11. See Norman L. Geisler, “First Principles,” in Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1999), 250.

12. Clark Pinnock et. al. The Openness of God (Downers Grove: Intervarsity, 1994), 106.

13. See the excellent treatment of this point by a former process thinker, Royce Gruenler, The Inexhaustible God: Biblical Faith and the Challenge of Process Theism (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1983).

14. See William Lane Craig, The Kalam Cosmological Argument (London: Macmillan, 1979).

15. Other neotheists address this same problem by claiming that when God changes, nevertheless, His “essential nature” remains unchanged (Pinnock, 28). What then is changing God must have two parts, dimensions, natures or poles–one which changes and one which does not. But this is process theology–the very view neotheist claim not to hold. For if God has “part” of his essence that can change and another “part” that cannot, then God is not an indivisible being. He must have at lest two “parts” or poles, one that is changing and another that is unchanging. But this view is not theism but the heart of bipolar panentheism–the very thing the new theism disclaims.
Or, to put the objection in another way, if God is necessary in the unchanging part (pole) and not necessary (i.e., contingent) in the changing part (pole), this raises a whole nest of metaphysical problems. Which attributes of God are necessary and which are not How do we know which are which How do we know God’s moral attributes (love, purity, truthfulness, etc) are part of His unchanging nature. Further, if God is contingent in one part, then this means it has the possibility not to be. (Only a Necessary Being has no possibility not to be.) But no mere potentiality for existence can actualize itself. For it cannot be in a state of actuality and potentiality at the same time. In other words, the potentiality to be cannot actualize anything. Only what actually exists can actualize anything.

16. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae trans. by Anton Pegis (New York: Random House, 1944) 1.13.7.

17. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1.19.7.

18. See Stephen Charnock, Discources upon the Existence and Attributes of God (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996 reprint of his 1682 work), 341-342.

19. Further, what God wills to happen, He knows will happen. For both willing and knowing are coordinate and eternal acts in God.

20. See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae 1.19.7.

21. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1.14.2-7.

22. Of course, in one sense of the term, even classical theists place “limitations” on God’s foreknowledge, namely, He can only know what is possible to know. God cannot know what is contradictory (like square circles). But this is not really a limitation; it simply says God knows in an unlimited and consistent way, since His nature is both unlimited and consistent.

23. See Pinnock, Openness of God, 147.

24. Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae 1.14.4.

25. It is important to observe here that it is a category mistake to argue that the future does not yet exist and so it cannot yet exist in God’s Now. For the way the future exists in God Now is not the same as the way it will exist in man’s future. For God knows what we know but not the way we know. The way the future exists for us is temporally. But the way it exists in God’s knowledge is eternally. In fact, the future pre-exists in God’s knowledge (which is identical to His nature) eternally as an effect pre-exists in its cause. So, when God knows the future, He knows it in Himself from all eternity, since that it were it existed as He has known it eternally.

26. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1.14.9.

27. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1.14.13.

28. See Boyd’s excellent refutation of this heretical view in his book, Oneness Pentecostals and the Trinity (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1992).

29. See Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1983 reprint), Vol. II (Hereafter CC) and Norman L. Geisler, Decide for Yourself: How History Views the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1982), Chaps. 2-3.

30.

31. In defending his view in The Journal of The Evangelical Theological Society (March 1983, p. 114), Gundry agreed that no one who confesses belief in inerrancy should be eliminated from ETS because of an unorthodox method, even if it were the method of total allegorization of Scripture (such as held by the founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy)!

32. All Schaff citations are from his The Creeds of Christendom: With a History and Critical Notes (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1983 reprint), Vol. II (Hereafter CC).

33. Philip Schaff, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1976), hereafter ANF.

34. Irenaeus, Against Heresies in Ante Nicene Church Fathers ed. by Philip Schaff (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1956)I.411, hereafter ANF.

35. Irenaeus, in Schaff, ACF, I, 474.

36. Irenaeus in Schaff, ANF, I, 577.

37. See Schaff, ANF, 162f.

38. Tertullian, in Schaff, AFC, II, 95.

39. See Norman L. Geisler, What Augustine Says (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1982), Chap. 3 for citations.

40. For Anselm’s views see St. Anselm, Anselm of Canterbury: Trinity, Incarnation, and Redemption, trans. by Jasper Hopkins and Herbert Richardson (New York: Harper Torchbook, 1970), especially 152-199.

41. See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae 1.1-19.

42. See John Calvin. Institutes of the Christian Religion (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1957), Vol. I.

43. All Bettenson citations are from his Documents of the Christian Church (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971)

44. Henry Bettenson, Documents of the Christian Church (New York: Oxford University Press, 1961), hereafter DCC.

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By Christopher on Biblical Criticism / Higher Criticism, Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics, Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, Clark Pinnock, ETS, ICBI, Matthew 27's Raised Saints, Mike Licona tagged , ,

Methodological Unorthodoxy

Methodological Unorthodoxy

by Dr. Norman L. Geisler

2003

 

Is unorthodoxy limited to doctrine or does it also include methodology? Or, to focus the question: Is there ever a time that one should be disqualified from an organization committed to inerrancy (such as the Evangelical Theological Society) because his theological method is inconsistent with his conscientious claim to believe in inerrancy?

  1. Methodology Examined

We will limit our discussion to the doctrine of inerrancy, although the same reasoning could be applied to other doctrines.

  1. Is confession a sufficient test for orthodoxy? Let us consider the question: Is conscientious confession of the doctrine of inerrancy solely in terms of what the confessor takes it to mean a sufficient grounds for determining orthodoxy on this doctrine?[1] We suggest that the answer to this is negative for several reasons.

First, making conscientious confession of inerrancy the only test of orthodoxy is tantamount to saying that sincerity is a test for truth. But as is well known even the road to destruction is paved with good intentions (Prov. 14:12).

Second, a statement does not mean what the reader takes it to mean to him. It means what the author meant by it. If this is not so, then a statement can mean anything the reader wants it to mean, including the opposite of what the author meant by it. If this were the case then neo-orthodox theologians and liberals could also belong to ETS, since many of them believe that the Bible is inerrant in some sense (usually in its purpose).

Third, no theological organization has integrity without some objective, measurable standard by which its identity can be determined. In the case of ETS the standard is the stated doctrine of inerrancy: “The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs.” But if anyone can take this statement to mean that the Bible is true in any sense he wishes—as long as he believes it sincerely—then our organization has no doctrinal integrity.

So we conclude that sincerity is an insufficient test for orthodoxy. In addition to sincerity there must also be conformity to some objective standard or norm for orthodoxy, for truth is conformity with reality.[2] And without such conformity one is not truly orthodox, regardless of his confession to the contrary. Our Lord made it clear that mere confession of him was not enough, for he denied those who confessed “Lord, Lord” but did not “do the will of the Father” (Matt 7:21). Likewise, saying “I believe, I believe” (in total inerrancy) is not sufficient. One’s beliefs must truly conform to the fact that all of Scripture is true before he is considered orthodox on this point. So it is not mere subjective confession but objective conformity that is the sufficient test for orthodoxy.

  1. Are there unorthodox methods? By doctrine we mean what one believes, and by method we mean how one arrives at this belief. The question, then, is this: Can one’s method be contrary to his doctrine? Can one deny de facto (in fact) what he affirms de jure (officially)? If so, then would not the methodology he utilizes undermine or negate the theology he confesses?

Let us take some examples. The first two cases will be taken from Church history, and then three examples from contemporary evangelicalism will be used.

(1) The Averronian double-truth method. Thirteenth-century followers of Averroes were condemned for holding a double-truth methodology whereby they could confess the truth of revelation at the same time they held truths of reason that contradicted it.[3] Should an Averronian belong to the ETS? That is, should one belong to ETS if he holds that the Bible is wholly true from the standpoint of faith, yet from the standpoint of reason he also holds many things to be true that contradict truths of Scripture? I should hope we would say “no,” simply because this methodology contradicts the theology (i.e., bibliology) he confesses. Despite the fact that they could confess revelation to be inerrant, Averronians held things to be true (by reason) that were contradictory to this revelation. Thus the alleged confession to inerrancy is actually negated by other beliefs, and the denial of inerrancy flows logically from their method.

(2) The allegorical method. How about Origen? He confessed the inspiration of the Bible. In fact he can be understood as believing the inerrancy of Scripture, for he said:

That this testimony may produce a sure and unhesitating belief, either with regard to what we have still to advance, or to what has been already stated, it seems necessary to show, in the first place, that the Scriptures themselves are divine, i.e., were inspired by the Spirit of God.[4]

On the other hand Origen claimed that to take the story of Adam and Eve as literal is absurd and contradictory.[5] He believed this because he adopted an allegorical methodology. Could an Origenian, then, belong to ETS? I should hope not, because his methodology is contrary to his theology—that is, while he confesses a belief in total inerrancy his actual beliefs (resulting from his allegorical method) do not conform to an adequate understanding of total inerrancy, for he denies the truth of some parts of Scripture. In short, his methodology undermines his bibliology. He claims to believe what the Bible presents as true, but as a matter of fact he does not believe everything in Scripture.

The same logic could be applied to a modern allegorist—for example, a Christian Scientist. There is no reason that Christian Scientists could not sincerely confess to believe the ETS statement of inerrancy. Yet by their allegorical method they deny the humanity of Christ, the historicity of the resurrection, and many other Biblical teachings. Let us ask again: Should we allow a Christian Scientist to join ETS? If not, is it not because his methodology is inconsistent with his confession? Does he not, in effect, take away with his left hand (hermeneutically) what he confesses with his right hand (bibliologically)?

Now let us discuss three contemporary examples: Jack Rogers, Paul Jewett and Robert Gundry. Let us ask whether their methodology is consistent with their theology (particularly their bibliology). All three of these men confess to a belief that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. At least two of them deny that there are any errors in the Bible (Rogers and Gundry), and one (Gundry) belongs to ETS.

(1) Jack Rogers believes that the Bible is wholly true. He even went so far as to say that he was “in agreement with the view of inerrancy set forth in the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy [1978].”[6] However, Rogers really denies inerrancy and allows for the possibility of factual mistakes in the Bible.[7]Would we allow Rogers to join ETS? If not, why not? If so, then the ETS statement is vacuous, for it would be possible to believe that the Bible is without error and yet that is has errors in it. Again, is not the reason for excluding Rogers that he denies in practice what he confesses in theory? He has a theological procedure that allows him to believe that the Bible is true, even though not all statements in Scripture need to represent things as they really are—that is, some statements in Scripture may be mistaken.

Indeed, Rogers disavows the classic statement of inspiration: “What the Bible says, God says.”[8] This means that the Bible could affirm what God denies. So if there is significant content in the ETS statement, then someone like Jack Rogers should not be included in its membership.

(2) Paul Jewett is another case in point. Jewett claims to believe in the inspiration of the Bible. He also acknowledges that the apostle Paul affirmed that the husband is the head of the wife (1 Cor. 11:3). However, argues Jewett, Paul is wrong here—that is, God does not affirm what the apostle Paul affirms here. Indeed, God denies it, for according to Jewett the truth of God is that the husband is not the head of the wife as Paul affirmed him to be.[9]

What implications does Jewett’s view have for inerrancy? Simply this: He has denied in principle the classic statement of inerrancy: “What the Bible affirms, God affirms.” For he believes this is a case where Scripture affirms as true that which is not true. If Jewett is right, then in principle when the interpreter discovers what the Bible is saying he must still ask one more very significant question: “Hath God said?”

In view of this denial that “what the Bible says, God says,” surely we would not allow Paul Jewett to join ETS. But why not? Again the problem is methodology. Despite Jewett’s claim to orthodoxy he has a method that is inconsistent with his confession. What he gives with the right hand confessionally he takes away with the left hand hermeneutically. His unorthodox methodology belies his confession to orthodoxy (on the doctrine of Scripture). Indeed, we would say that he is methodologically unorthodox.

(3) The case of Robert Gundry is interesting and more crucial to ETS because he not only confesses to inerrancy but he also belongs to ETS. Yet like the other examples he holds a methodology that seems inconsistent with the ETS doctrine of inerrancy.

In many respects Gundry holds a limited form of the allegorical method. Like Origen, he confesses that the Bible is inspired. Yet like Origen, when there are parts of the Bible that if taken literally seem to him to contradict other parts of Scripture, Gundry rejects their literal truth and takes a kind of allegorical (i.e., midrashic) interpretation of them.[10] For example, Matthew reports that wise men followed a star, conversed with Herod and the scribes, went to Bethlehem, and presented gifts to Christ. Gundry, however, denies that these were literal events. He denies that Jesus literally went up on a mountain to give the sermon on the mount as Matthew reports it. He denies that the saints were literally resurrected after Jesus died as reported in Matthew 27, and so on. So while Gundry confesses to believe that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, he denies that these events reported by Matthew are literally and historically true.

But to deny that what the Bible reports in these passages actually occurred is to deny in effect that the Bible is wholly true. As the 1982 “Chicago Statement on Hermeneutics” declares, “We deny that any event, discourse or saying reported in Scripture was invented by the biblical writers or by the traditions they incorporated” (Article XIV). This is precisely what Gundry does—namely, he claims that some events reported in Matthew did not actually occur but were invented by the gospel writer.

The question, then, naturally arises: Should Gundry be a member of ETS? Is not his actual methodology inconsistent with his confessed bibliology? Does it not also, like those previously discussed, take away hermeneutically what he confesses theologically? And if others with unorthodox methodologies would be excluded from membership in ETS, then the question arises: Why should Gundry be included?

Surely it is insufficient to say that Gundry should be included because he conscientiously confesses inerrancy whereas others do not. For, as previously noted, it is not mere confession of a doctrine that is the test for the truthfulness of a belief but actual conformity to what that doctrine means.

Neither will it suffice to point out that Rogers and Jewett officially deny the classic formula of inerrancy—”What the Bible says, God says”—but that Gundry does not officially deny it, for Origen and Christian Scientists could hold this formula too. Denial of the formula renders one unorthodox, but affirmation of the mere formula does not necessarily make one’s view orthodox.

As a formal principle, “What the Bible says, God says” is empty and content-less, for it leaves wide open the question of just what the Bible is saying. The mere formula means only that “if the Bible affirms something, then God affirms it too.” As a mere formula it does not imply that the Bible actually affirms anything in particular. But surely the ETS doctrinal statement is not a mere empty formula. The very name “Evangelical Theological Society” implies that we believe the Bible affirms an evangelical theology, which implies that certain basic content is included in our confession.

Nor is it sufficient to point out that while others deny inerrancy de jure,Gundry does not. Gundry’s is a de facto denial of inerrancy, for he denies that some events reported in Scripture did in fact occur. But our ETS statement insists that we believe the entire Bible is true.

We summarize the argument this way: (1) The ETS statement demands belief in the entire Bible; (2) Gundry denies part of the Bible; (3) therefore Gundry’s view does not really conform to the ETS statement.

Still, some may insist that the implied evangelical content as to what the Bible is affirming should not exclude those whose method does not entail the denial of any major doctrine of Scripture. But Gundry affirms all major evangelical doctrines, such as the deity of Christ, his atoning death, his bodily resurrection, etc. Surely, then, Gundry’s unorthodox methodology is not tantamount to unorthodoxy. Or is it? In response let us note several things.

First, the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture is a major doctrine, and Gundry’s method is a de facto denial of the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture. Even if his method never leads him actually to a denial of any other doctrine, it does deny one important doctrine, the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture. In fact, as far as ETS is concerned this is the only explicitly stated doctrine by which one is tested for membership. So Gundry’s denial of the occurrence of some events reported in the gospel of Matthew is a denial of the ETS doctrine that all Scripture is true.

Further, it can be argued that Gundry’s position does lead logically to a denial of other teachings of Scripture even if Gundry does not personally draw these conclusions. It should be remembered that Jewett’s methodology has yet to lead him actually to deny any major doctrine. The method itself, however, leads logically to a denial of a major doctrine—i.e., the doctrine of Scripture. For Jewett’s method denies the principle of inerrancy that “what the Bible says, God says.”

Just because Jewett did not apply his own implied principle (“What the Bible says, God does not necessarily say”) elsewhere does not mean it is not applicable. The fact remains that the principle is applicable, and if it is applied it will lead logically to denial of another major doctrine. For example, if Paul can be wrong (because of his rabbinical training) in affirming the headship of the husband over the wife, then logically what hinders one from concluding that Paul is (or could be) wrong in the same verse when he affirms the headship of Christ over the husband? Or if rabbinical background can influence an apostle to affirm error in Scripture, then how can we trust his affirmations about the resurrection in the same book (1 Corinthians 15)? After all, Paul was a Pharisee, and Pharisees believed in the resurrection. If he had been a Sadducee perhaps his view on the resurrection would have been different. How then can we be sure that Paul is not also mistaken here on the major doctrine of the resurrection?

Now what applies to Jewett seems to apply also to Gundry. Although Gundry does not apply his allegorical (midrashic) interpretation to any major doctrine, the midrash methodology seems to be applicable nonetheless. For example, why should one consider the report of the bodily resurrection of the saints after Jesus’ resurrection (Matthew 27) allegorical and yet insist that Jesus’ resurrection, which was the basis for it (cf. 1 Cor. 15:23), was literal? By what logic can we insist that the same author in the same book reporting the same kind of event in the same language can mean spiritual resurrection in one case and literal bodily resurrection in another case? Does not Gundry’s method lead (by logical extension) to a denial of major doctrines of Scripture? And if it does, then there seems to be no more reason for including Gundry in ETS than to include Origen, Rogers or Jewett. They all do (or could) affirm the inerrancy of Scripture, and yet all have a method that actually negates or undermines inerrancy in some significant way.

Even if one could build safeguards into the midrash method whereby all major doctrines are preserved from allegorization, there is another lethal problem with Gundry’s view. The ETS statement on inerrancy entails the belief that everything reported in the gospels is true (“the Bible in its entirety”). But Gundry believes that some things reported in Matthew did not occur[11] (e.g., the story of the wise men [chap. 2], the report of the resurrection of the saints [chap. 27], etc.). It follows therefore that Gundry does not really believe everything reported in the gospels is true, despite his claim to the contrary. And this is a de facto denial of inerrancy.

It will not suffice to say that Matthew does not really report these events, for he reports them in the same sense that he reports other events that Gundry believes actually occurred. In fact some stories that seem more likely candidates for midrash (for example, the appearance of angels to the Jewish shepherds in Luke 2) Gundry takes as literal, whereas the earthly pilgrimage of astrologers following a sign in the sky he takes as purely imaginary (i.e., midrash). Regardless, the fact of the matter is that Gundry denies that certain events reported in Scripture (Matthew) actually occurred. This means in effect that he is denying the truth of these parts of Scripture. And if he denies in effect that the Bible is true “in its entirety,” then he has disqualified himself from ETS.

  1. An Objection Considered

Does not the above argument prove too much? Granted the finitude and fallibility of man, is it not a reasonable presumption that we are all inconsistent in our beliefs in some way or another? Therefore should we not all be excluded from ETS?

Several crucial differences between common inconsistency of belief and a conscious commitment to a methodology that undermines our beliefs should be noted, however. First, the common inconsistencies with which we are all plagued are unconscious inconsistencies. When they are brought to our attention we work to eliminate them. On the other hand a theological method such as Gundry’s midrash method is a conscious commitment on his part.

Further, and more importantly, common inconsistencies are not recommended as a formal method by which we are to interpret Scripture. Hence they have no official didactic force. They do not purport to teach us how to discover the truth of Scripture. Gundry’s method, however, entails a crucial truth claim. It claims that by using this method we will discover the truth that God is really affirming in Scripture. After all the mere formula, “What the Bible says, God says,” is empty in itself. Gundry’s method proposes to tell us what it is that the Bible is actually saying and thus what God is actually saying. This makes a conscious commitment to a theological method a very serious matter, for a hermeneutical method purports to be the means by which we discover the very truth of God.

Further, there is another possible difference between common inconsistencies and the serious inconsistency in which Gundry engages. The former do not necessarily lead logically to a denial of major doctrine, but the latter can. As was noted earlier, unorthodoxy in methodology leads logically to unorthodoxy in theology. This is true regardless of whether the proponent of the method makes this logical extension himself. For example, a double-truth method or an allegorical method leads logically to a denial of the literal truth of Scripture.

III. Conclusion

Assuming that there are some methods that are inconsistent with a belief in the ETS statement on inerrancy, where should we draw the line and why should we draw it there?

In the above discussion I have offered a criterion for drawing such a line—that is, for determining methodological unorthodoxy. Briefly it is this: Any hermeneutical or theological method the logically necessary consequences of which are contrary to or undermine confidence in the complete truthfulness of all of Scripture is unorthodox. The method can do this either de jure or de facto.

It seems to me that if we do not accept some such criterion we are admitting the emptiness of our ETS confession. For if the ETS statement of faith does not exclude any particular belief about Scripture, then it includes all beliefs about Scripture. And whatever says everything, really says nothing.

My plea, then, is this: In order to preserve our identity and integrity as an evangelical group that confesses an inerrant Word from God, we must define the limits of a legitimate methodology. If the one I have suggested is inadequate, then let us find a sufficient one.

One thing seems safe to predict: Granted the popularity of evangelicalism and the degree to which the borders of legitimate evangelical methodology are now being pushed, the Evangelical Theological Society will not long be “evangelical” nor long believe in inerrancy in the sense meant by the framers of that statement unless we act decisively on this matter.

In short we would argue that, since methodology determines one’s theology, unless we place some limits on evangelical methodology there will follow a continued broadening of the borders of “evangelical” theology so that the original word “Evangelical” (in “Evangelical Theological Society”) will have lost its meaning. After all, even Barth called his neo-orthodox view “evangelical.” Is this what the word “evangelical” meant to the founders of ETS? Or have we already conceded so much to the “new hermeneutic” that it does not really matter what the words “evangelical” or “inerrant” meant to the authors of the statements, but only what they mean to us? On the other hand, if we reject this kind of subjective hermeneutic (and we most certainly should), then it behooves us to draw a line that will preserve our identity and integrity as an “evangelical” theological society. Such a line, we suggest, need not entail a change in (or addition to) our doctrinal statement but simply the explicit acknowledgment (perhaps in the by-laws) that the denial of the total truth of Scripture, officially or factually, de jure or de facto, isgrounds for exclusion from ETS.[12]

 

[1] It is assumed, however, that a conscientious confession is a necessary condition for membership in ETS even though it is not a sufficient condition.

[2] That truth involves conformity to reality is argued in our article, “The Concept of Truth in the Inerrancy Debate,” Biblioteca Sacra (October-December 1980) 327–339, reprinted in The Living and Active Word of God (ed. M. Inch and R. Youngblood; Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 1983) 225-236. The 1982 “Chicago Statement on Hermeneutics” has a clear and succinct statement on this point: “WE AFFIRM that the Bible expresses God’s truth in propositional statements, and we declare that biblical truth is both objective and absolute. We further affirm that a statement is true if it represents matters as they actually are, but is an error if it misrepresents the facts. WE DENY that, while Scripture is able to make us wise unto salvation, biblical truth should be defined in terms of this function. We further deny that error should be defined as that which willfully deceives” (Article VI).

[3] In 1277 Siger of Brabant and followers were condemned by the Church for teaching that “things are true according to philosophy but not according to the Catholic faith, as though there were two contradictory truths.” See “Averroism,” The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (ed. F. L. Cross and E. A. Livingston; Oxford: University Press, 1974) 116.

[4] Origen, De Principiis 4.1.1, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 4 (ed. A. Roberts and J. Donaldson; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1957).

[5] Ibid., 4.1.16-17.

[6] Cited in Christianity Today (September 4, 1981) 18.

[7] Rogers is able to claim that the Bible is wholly true and yet it may contain some mistakes because he redefines “error” to mean what misleads rather than what is mistaken. See the article in n. 2 for a refutation of this position.

[8] J. B. Rogers and D. K. McKim, The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible (New York: Harper, 1979) 315.

[9] See P. Jewett, Man as Male and Female (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975) 134, 171.

[10] See R. Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Literary and Theological Art (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982).

[11] Since a “report” is “a statement of facts” (Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary,unabridged), Gundry has denied the fact stated in the report. It is futile to say that Matthew does not report these events, for he reports them in the same sense that he reports other events (sometimes in the same chapter) that are taken to be literally true by Gundry.

[12] vol. 26, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society Volume 26, 1 (Lynchburg, VA: The Evangelical Theological Society, 1983), 86-94.

 

 

Copyright © 2013 Norman L. Geisler – All rights reserved

By Christopher on Chicago Statement on Biblical Hermeneutics, Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, Clark Pinnock, ETS, Genre Criticism & Historical Criticism, ICBI, Neo-Theism, Open Theism tagged

A Band-Aid on Cancer: Comments on the Recent ETS Decision to Accept ICBI Statement (2004)

A Band-Aid on Cancer:

Comments on the Recent ETS Decision to Accept ICBI Statement

by Norman L. Geisler, former president of ETS

November 29, 2004

 

At its November 2004 meeting in San Antonio, the members of the Evangelical Theological Society voted to approve the following statement:


For the purpose of advising members regarding the intent and meaning of the reference to biblical inerrancy in the ETS Doctrinal Basis, the Society refers members to the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy (1978). The case for biblical inerrancy rests on the absolute trustworthiness of God and Scripture’s testimony to itself. A proper understanding of inerrancy takes into account the language, genres, and intent of Scripture. We reject approaches to Scripture that deny that biblical truth claims are grounded in reality.


While on the surface this may appear to be a significant clarification of the ETS understanding of inerrancy, in reality it is little more than a Band-Aid on cancer for many reasons.

First of all, the statement is not binding on members since it is not part of the ETS bylaws. At best it is only informative, not normative.

Second, even if it became part of the Bylaws, it is not binding. In its own words it is only “advising” members. Good advice is nothing more than a bite without teeth. Members need to be instructed, not merely advised, about its expressed meaning.

Third, the statement contains the ambiguous word “intention” which leaves the door open for those, like Pinnock, who affirm only the inerrancy of intention, not all facts, in the Bible. But this is clearly not what either the founders of ETS mean or the framers of ICBI. “Intention” often means merely purposed or unexpressed intent, neither of which is what is meant by inerrancy.

Fourth, it does not address the real problem, namely, that ETS knowingly allows people to be members who do not hold what the framers meant by its statement. Why then should they accept the framers meaning of the ICBI statement.

Fifth, a new statement was not necessary. ETS needs only to enforce the framers meaning of the statement it has. But ETS refused to do this when all the living framers petitioned ETS a few years ago, insisting that the Open Theism view on inerrancy is not what the framers meant. That should have ended the issue right there. It is like rejecting the understanding of the Gospel by Peter, Paul, and John while they were still alive in favor of a broader view by some younger converts.

Sixth, both Clark Pinnock and John Sanders were on record in advance, saying they would sign the ICBI statement on inerrancy. As a framer of the ICBI statement who has read carefully Pinnock’s writings, I can assure you that he does not agree with the ICBI meaning of its statement. Indeed, the ICBI expressed what it meant by its Chicago Statement in an official commentary: Explaining Inerrancy: A Commentary by R.C. Sproul. It defined truth as “a correspondence view of truth,” namely “that which corresponds to reality” (p. 31). Pinnock flatly denies this of the Bible as I documented in the four pages of unrecanted quotes presented to the ETS at its annual November meeting in 2003.

If ETS desires to do something useful and not just put a Band-Aid on cancer, it should embrace a statement like this:

For the purpose of instructing members of the official and binding meaning of its inerrancy statement, ETS adopts the ICBI Chicago Statement on Inerrancy as understood by the ICBI framers and expressed in its official commentary: Explaining Inerrancy: A Commentary by R. C. Sproul. All members are required to accept the ICBI statement as meant by its framers and expressed in its official commentary or be subject to dismissal from ETS membership.

Don’t hold your breath on this one. It would take a miracle to get the needed two-thirds vote to add this to the ETS Bylaws. And the membership could not even muster that many votes to oust Pinnock and Sanders who denied what its framers meant by its inerrancy statement.

The sad truth of the matter is that passing this statement was worse than doing nothing because it gives the appearance of doing something when in fact it is doing nothing–except leaving the wrong impression that something important was done. It is in fact doing nothing more than perpetuating the hypocrisy of allowing members to sign a statement and belong to an organization which claims to believe in inerrancy when in fact they do not.

This is not to say that there are not many other worthwhile organizations that do not have inerrancy statements. It is simply to point out that it is a matter of integrity to insist that all members of an organization actually believe that for which the organization stands. And when any member can no longer in good conscience sign the statement as meant by its framers, then integrity demands that they leave or be asked to leave.

 

By Christopher on Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, Clark Pinnock, ETS, Greg A. Boyd, ICBI, Neo-Theism, Open Theism

Why I Resigned from The Evangelical Theological Society (2003)

Why I Resigned from The Evangelical Theological Society

Norman L. Geisler

November 20, 2003

Today, I tendered my resignation from ETS.  It was a painful decision for many reasons.  First, I have been attending the Society for forty-four years.  In addition, I served as a past president, and I was founder and first president of a daughter organization, the Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS).  What is more, I love the organization and that for which it once firmly stood–the total factual inerrancy of the written Word of God.

Many things occasioned my decision to leave ETS, all of which came to a climax at the annual conference of ETS in Atlanta.  Since many will wonder why I resigned, I would like to make it clear to all.

1.  ETS Has Lost Its Doctrinal Integrity

First and foremost among my reasons for resigning is that ETS has lost its doctrinal integrity.  For decades it has had a single “Doctrinal Basis”: “The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs.” With the official decision to retain in membership persons who clearly deny what the ETS framers meant by this statement, ETS has lost its doctrinal integrity.  By a vote of 388 to 231 (nearly 63%) Clark Pinnock was retained in the Society.  John Sanders was also retained but by a lesser vote.  In view of Pinnock’s blatant and unrecanted written views that contradict the meaning of the ETS framers, this is the straw that broke the camel’s back.

2.  ETS Has Adopted a Revisionist Interpretation of Its Own Doctrine.

Further, the society has knowingly adopted a revisionist hermeneutic that undermines all for which it stands. For the report of the Executive Committee, confirmed by the membership vote, knowingly allows in its membership persons who do not hold the same view on inerrancy as that of the framers of the doctrinal statement.  This they have knowingly done since 1976 when the Executive Committee confessed that “Some of the members of the Society have expressed the feeling that a measure of intellectual dishonesty prevails among members who do not take the signing of the doctrinal statement seriously.”  Other “members of the Society have come to the realization that they are not in agreement with the creedal statement and have voluntarily withdrawn. That is, in good conscience they could not sign the statement” (1976 Minutes, emphasis added). By this criterion then we now have nearly 63 percent of the Society who approve of persons who are not signing the statement “in good conscience,” since they voted to retain Clark Pinnock whose views are clearly not in accord with what the ETS framers meant by their Doctrinal Basis.  For in November 2000, all the living Founding Fathers signed a statement that “The denial of God’s foreknowledge of the decisions of free agents is incompatible with the inerrancy of Scripture.” 

Further, an ETS Ad Hoc Committee recognized this problem when it posed the proper question in 1983: “Is it acceptable for a member of the society to hold a view of biblical author’s intent which disagrees with the Founding Fathers and even the majority of the society, and still remain a member in good standing?”  The Society never said No.  And now in effect, the Society has given a resounding Yes in response with a 63% majority vote to retain Clark Pinnock in its membership.

3.  ETS is Now Operating Contrary to Its Own Historic Precedent

The 1970 Minutes of ETS affirm that “Dr. R. H. Bube, who [sic] has for three years signed his membership form with a note on his own interpretation of infallibility. The secretary was instructed to point out that it is impossible for the Society to allow each member an idiosyncratic interpretation of inerrancy, and hence Dr. Bube is to be requested to sign his form without any qualifications, his own integrity in the matter being entirely respected” (emphasis added). This makes it clear that members cannot give their own meaning to the statement but are bound by what the framers meant by it.  But Open Theists hold views contrary to what the Founders meant by the doctrinal basis of ETS, and they have just received strong approval of the Society.

4.  ETS is Logically Inconsistent with Its Own Doctrinal Basis

The ETS statement affirms: “The Bible alone, and the Bible in its entirety, is the Word of God written and is therefore inerrant in the autographs” (emphasis added).  The word “therefore” logically connects the word of “God” and “inerrant” to make it clear that neither God nor the Bible errs.  This meaning of the word “therefore” is confirmed by the living framers of the statement.  But Open Theists confessed both God and the Bible err in the sense understood by the framers of this doctrinal statement, namely, they believe that the Bible affirms some things that are not factually correct.  John Sanders agrees that there are unconditional prophesies that go unfulfilled.  And Pinnock confessed that Chronicles gives exaggerated numbers that do not correspond with the facts.  But these count as errors according to the understanding of the ETS founding fathers.  All the living founders expressed this in writing to ETS and those not living have expressed this same view in their writings.

5.  ETS Acted Inconsistently with Its Long-Standing Journal Policy

In 1965 ETS Journal policy demanded a disclaimer and rebuttal of Dan Fuller’s article denying factual inerrancy published in the ETS Bulletin. They insisted that, “that an article by Dr. Kantzer be published simultaneously with the article by Dr. Fuller and that Dr. Schultz include in that issue of the Bulletin a brief explanation regarding the appearance of a viewpoint different from that of the Society” (1965).  But with the favorable vote on Pinnock’s and Sander’s membership, ETS has now officially approved views similar to and even more radical than Dan Fuller’s denial of factual inerrancy.

6.  ETS Has Acted Contrary to Previously Approved Presidential Decisions

Speaking of some who held “Barthian” views of Scripture, the Minutes of the ETS Executive Committee read: “President Gordon Clark invited them to leave the society” (1983).  But Clark Pinnock holds an unrecanted Barthian view of Scripture.  He said flatly: “Barth was right to speak about a distance between the Word of God and the text of the Bible” (The Scripture Principle, 99, emphasis added). But if Barth was right, then the ETS statement is wrong since it claims the Bible is the written Word of God.  Even the minority of the ETS Executive Committee who refused to vote to expel either Pinnock or Sanders from the Society admitted that a Barthian view of Scriptures would be grounds for dismissal (October 23 Report, p. 6).  Yet Pinnock expressed this unrecanted written view, and they refused to expel him.

7. ETS Refused to Consider Pinnock’s Major Work on the Topic

While many praised the Executive Committee for the fairness of their procedure, they turned a blind eye to the arbitrariness of it.  The Committee knowingly refused to consider any quotations from a major work of Clark Pinnock on the topic, The Scripture Principle. In spite of the fact that a former president (me) provided them in advance with four pages of damning quotations from this book, any consideration of it was ruled out of order in considering Pinnock’s innocence or guilt.  Whatever the alleged technical merits of the decision, it was a practical disaster.  Their decision to exclude citations from this work because they were not presented in the original complaint is akin to claiming that the testimony of a prime witness of a murder cannot be allowed to testify since they were not cited in the original brief to the court.  This was a tragic and arbitrary decision that led to the Pinnock exoneration of the charges and made a sham out of the proceedings.  How can a man be considered innocent of the charges when a prime work of his on the topic was knowingly and deliberately not considered?  This is an especially grievous error since this work contains at least four pages of citations which show the incompatibility of his views with that of the framers of the ETS doctrinal statement.

Other reasons could be stated, but these suffice to provide the grounds for resigning from an organization that I have loved and served for forty-four years.  It is for me a tearful and tragic day; I deeply regret the moral compulsion to resign, but it had to be done.

By Christopher on Ethics, Morality / The Moral Argument tagged , , ,

Rick Warren on Gay Marriage (2009)

Rick Warren on the Gay Marriage (Union) Issue

By Norman L. Geisler

September, 2009

A Brief History of the Facts As We Have Them

Recently there has been controversy over Pastor Rick Warren’s views on the Gay Marriage (Union) Issue. First, let’s state the facts as we have received them.

In the Fall of 2008 Warren told his church: “We support Proposition 8 [which opposed Gay marriages]– and if you believe what the Bible says about marriage, you need to support Proposition 8.” Warren informs us that this was only after being prodded by members of his congregation to give them guidance and state his views on the issue. This was in view of the impending vote in California on Proposition 8.

On Monday night (April 6, 2009) on CNN’s Larry King Live, Pastor Rick Warren said: “I never once went to a meeting, never once issued a statement, never — never once even gave an endorsement in the two years Prop. 8 was going.”

The next day Warren appeared on the Hugh Hewitt show and said this: “First place, anybody who knows me knows I am not a political activist. I am not an anti-gay activist. When the Prop. 8 issue thing started a year and a half earlier before the thing, I never made a single statement, I never went to any meetings, never released an endorsement. It’s just not my agenda. Everybody has an agenda they’d like for me to promote, but my agenda is the Peace Plan, and the churches and the training, and all of the stuff we’re working on, and it just wasn’t my agenda” (from the Show’s transcript).

Further, Warren said, “On the very last week before the vote, I had five or six letters come in from members saying Pastor Rick, how do you want us to vote on this? What do you think? Give us the basis. Well, I do a video newsletter for our own people. And in that, I said I don’t believe that the historic definition of marriage should be changed. Okay, I’m not saying that people of the same sex don’t love each other. I’m sure they do. I’m saying marriage is a term that historically should not be redefined, because if you redefine it once, it’s going to get redefined over and over. For an example, if there is gay marriage, what does that do for a bisexual person?”

What is more, Warren tells about being on Belief Net where Steve Waldman who asked Warren “…would you consider gay relationships a marriage. And I said no, I said no more than I would consider incest to be a marriage, or no more than I would consider, and I just gave him a bunch of other relational things. And his follow up question was so you consider those things all to be the same? And I said oh, of course I do. Well, it sounded like I was equating homosexuality with pedophilia and… HH: Incest. RW: …incest, which I totally disavow. I don’t believe that at all, never have believed it, and don’t believe it.”

Then Warren acknowledged: “Obama called me the first week of December” and ask him to pray at his inauguration. Warren agreed. Then Warren said, “I was thrilled to be a part of it. But I knew I was going to take shots. And so what I did is I made a commitment [to whom?] that I would not publicly speak about any reaction, I wasn’t going to fan the flames between that offer when it got out, and I didn’t put it out, he put it out, and when I actually did the inauguration.”

Then Warren said, “And so I didn’t say anything about it. I did write an apology to the major gay leaders that I happen to know personally, friends of mine, and I said hey guys, this thing about me saying I believe gay relationships are the same thing as pedophilia and incest, I do not believe that and never have believed that, and I don’t. I don’t believe you should call gay relationship marriage. I would oppose that. But that’s not the same thing. And somehow, we’ve got to learn that you can love somebody and still disagree with them.”

Sorting Out the Apparent Conflict

When I received all this information, I wrote Rick Warren and asked him to explain the apparent conflict between his two statements:

  1. In Oct, 2008 Warren told his church: “We support Proposition 8 — and if you believe what the Bible says about marriage, you need to support Proposition 8.”
  2. On Monday night (April 6, 2009) on CNN’s Larry King Live, Pastor Rick Warren said: “I never once went to a meeting, never once issued a statement, never — never once even gave an endorsement in the two years Prop. 8 was going.”

I have not yet heard from him, but to be charitable one could interpret the second statement as meaning he had not released any public statement on the issue but merely spoke privately to his own church. Other may challenge whether a pastor’s statement to his whole church-which includes how they should vote-is merely a private pastoral statement.

What is Warren’s View

First of all, it seems clear that Warren is opposed to Gay marriage and that he was opposed to legalizing it in California. He has not changed on this issue.

Second, in the above statements Warren leaves open the door for legal Gay unions as long as they are not called “marriages.” He needs to clarify his position on this matter since, for there is little more than a semantical difference between the two. After all, the “union” would provide virtually all the legal privileges that a “marriage” would.

Third, Warren’s claims not to be “a political activist” is problematic at best. For one thing, he informed his whole congregation how to vote on this Gay marriage issue. Not only is this one of the largest congregations in the country, but through this grape vine Warren’s views went out to much of the rest of the country. What could be more effective political activism than this! For another thing, if it is viewed as a non-public statement, it reveals a lack of moral courage not to take a public stand on crucial moral issues of the day. Warren has one of the biggest “bully pulpits” in the land. After all, he is viewed by many as “America’s pastor.” He was chosen to give the prayer at the presidential inauguration. Not to use his pulpit to America for moral good is moral cowardice.

Fourth, it does not take much reading between the lines of what Warren said in these interviews to see that he is more concerned about making peace between opposing moral view points than taking a stand on the one he believes is right. After all, he admits not being a “political activist” on the issue. He admits not attending any meetings of the anti-Gay marriage groups. He admits trying to appease Gay leaders on his view. He admits not releasing any statement to the public on the issue. In his own words, “I never once went to a meeting, never once issued a statement, never — never once even gave an endorsement in the two years Prop. 8 was going.” Well, shame on him. Indeed, Warren admits not even giving his congregation guidance until after he was prodded to do so by members of his congregation. But as Edmund Burke said, “The only thing necessary for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing.” For better or for worse, Rick Warren is the de facto leader of evangelicalism. And, in my humble opinion, I would much rather have someone with the convictions and courage of Jerry Falwell emerge on the scene. As far as evangelicalism’s public voice is concerned, Moses is dead and there is as yet no Joshua to replace him.

Update

On Sunday September 6, 2009 I met with Rich Warren in his office after the morning service at his Saddleback Church in California. I found him to be a very friendly, gracious, and generous man. We had a friendly conversation about several things. I asked him about the conflict in his views on the Gay Marriage issue (mentioned above). He explained that he did not consider a private communication to his church to be a political campaign. He said he did not wish to get involved in political issues since he was an evangelist. As such, he wished not to take partisan views so as not to alienate any whom he wished to win to Christ. I found him a man passionately concerned about evangelizing the whole world. Indeed, his church has a ministry in over 160 or the 190 some countries in the world.

I pointed out that homosexuality and abortion were not politically partisan issues but were moral issues on which Christians should speak out. He agreed. He brought up the issue of speaking to non-Christian groups as part of his evangelistic outreach. I pointed out that I believed that it was not wrong to go to these groups, provided that we give them a Christian message when we are there. Again, he agreed.

My own conclusion to the conversation is essentially what I concluded in the above article, namely, that Christians do have a moral obligation to speak out publicly on these moral issues, such as homosexuality and abortions. And I believe this is possible without being politically partisan. Thus, a man with such as national and global pulpit as Rich Warren has could have a tremendous influence, should he chose to exercise it more vigorously and extensively. This could be done without taking political sides or closing the door for the Gospel.

 

Copyright © 2009 Norman L. Geisler – All Rights Reserved

By Christopher on Dispensationalism, Eschatology, Problem of Evil, Prophecy, Theodicy, Theology

God, Evil, and Dispensations

God, Evil, and Dispensations

by Dr. Norman L. Geisler

1982

One of the neglected values of the dispensational approach to Scripture is the light it casts on the problem of evil.  Theodicy (a vindication of God’s goodness and justice despite the presence of evil in the world) is both a fascinating and difficult topic in any theology, but a dispensational approach offers unexpected help for this old problem.

For the limited nature of this discussion it will be necessary for this writer to begin by assuming what he believes the Scriptures teach, namely, that there are seven dispensations.[2] That is to say, there are seven successive and different divine economies between creation and the new heaven and the new earth (Rev. 22). Granting this perspective one may ask, Why seven different dispensations? What is God’s overall plan for these periods? And, can one discern anything of the divine purposes throughout these ages?

DISPENSATIONAL CHANGES NOT SOTERIOLOGICAL

Most dispensationalists have been careful to point out that there are not several different plans of salvation corresponding to the various dispensations.[3]  Despite the unfortunate wording of the footnote on John 1:17 in the old Scofield Bible,[4] dispensationalists consistently repudiate the charge that they accept the existence of many plans of salvation. There is only one way of salvation (Gal. 1:8), and it was preached to Abraham (Gal. 3:8) and is to be preached to the whole world (Matt. 28:18-20).  That one gospel, which applies to every age, is simply this: Persons are saved “by grace through faith in the revealed will of God.”

To be sure, dispensationalists hold that the content of the revealed will of God has become progressively more explicit. Progressive revelation is a central tenet of dispensationalism. For instance, the content of the gospel preached by the apostle Paul (1 Cor. 15:1-8), that Christ died, was buried, rose and was seen of many, is surely more than the pagans on the streets of Nineveh heard from Jonah (Jonah 3:4). However, neither Ninevites nor first-century Corinthians (nor twentieth-century Americans) are saved apart from faith in a gracious God who acts in view of the atoning work of Christ (1 Tim. 2:5; Heb. 9:22). The point is that people were saved in every age through the work of Christ, even though they did not have the knowledge of that work which believers have today. So, in brief, dispensationalists do not believe that there are seven different dispensations because God had seven different plans of salvation. There is really only one common gospel that unites all dispensations soteriologically.

What then is the purpose of seven different dispensations if it is not soteriological? It is my suggestion that there are at least three purposes of God in having seven different dispensations. One is doxological (having to do with God’s glory), another is anthropological (having to do with God’s goodness to man), and the last is theological or dispensational (having to do with the ultimate defeat of evil).

THREE REASONS FOR SEVEN DISPENSATIONS

Often dispensationalists have rested their case for justifying God in view of the problem of evil (called theodicy) almost completely on the glory of God. Although the overriding importance of the doxological answer cannot be disputed, it should be affirmed nonetheless that there are at least two correlative points that also should be stressed. Each of the three is essential in helping one formulate an adequate solution to the problem of evil.

DOXOLOGICAL REASON FOR EVIL

The glory of God is central to dispensationalism. Ryrie considers it the unifying theme for all of God’s plan.[5]  It alone is all-encompassing, spanning from eternity to eternity and covering both pre-Fall and pre-creation periods. In that sense it is important to point out that those covenantal schemes of theology that make redemption the unifying theme of God’s eternal plan miss the mark “and fall short of the glory of God.” The glory of God is eternal; redemption has a beginning point in time. Also, the glory of God applies to unredeemed beings as well as to redeemed ones. Thus glory is a far more inclusive and comprehensive theological theme than is redemption. Only a doxological theology, as dispensationalism truly is, can possibly be a systematic theology in the proper sense of the term.  Systematic theology must be a comprehensive and consistent correlation of all revealed truth about God and His relation with His universe.

Before discussing God’s glory as it relates to evil, a definition of glory is in order. An examination of the scriptural data will reveal that glory means “manifest excellence.” Glory is the outward radiation of the inward perfections of God. No one can see God’s essence (Exod. 33:20; John 1:18); and yet God’s glory was often seen (Exod. 16:7, 10; Isa. 40:5). Indeed, the incarnate Christ is “the radiance of His [God’s] glory . . .“ (Heb. 1:3). So glory does for God what a magnifying glass does for a fine jewel; it does not change His nature, but it does enlarge it for His creature’s view.

Granting that description and the centrality of the glory of God to dispensations, how does God’s glory relate to the answer of the problem of evil?

Very simply put the answer often goes like this:

1. The glory of God is the ultimate good in the universe.

2. God is glorified by everything in the universe, including evil.

3. Therefore, even evil redounds to the glory of God.

Since most dispensationalists have Calvinistic leanings, the doxological purpose of evil is frequently justified in terms of an emphasis on the sovereignty of God. Verses such as the following are often used.

“For the wrath of man shall praise Thee” (Psalm 76:10).

“The Lord hath made everything for himself: yea even the wicked for the day of evil” (Prov. 16:4, KJV).

“I am the Lord and there is none else. . . . I make peace, and create evil” (Isa. 45:6-7, KJV).

“What if God . . . endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction? And He did so in order that He might make known the riches of His glory. . .“ (Rom. 9:22-23).

Those and like verses have been used by some to pronounce boldly that in the sovereign will of God even evil brings glory to God. It is that conclusion that must be rejected. To argue that God is glorified by evil is biblically unsound, dispensationally untrue, and theologically unfounded.

First, a comment needs to be made about the above verses, which are often used to “prove” that God is glorified by evil. As to the Lord creating evil (Isa. 45:6-7), the Hebrew word means “evil, distress, misery, injury, calamity.”[6]Although the word sometimes means evil in a moral sense, it need not have any direct moral connotations at all. It may mean no more than that God sends a plague. There is certainly no support here for the idea that God can do anything that is morally evil, since the Scriptures are clear in their assertion that He is absolutely good (1 John 4:16; cf. 1:5) and cannot even look on evil (Hab. 1:13).

Regarding Proverbs 16:4, the New American Standard Bible translates it, “The Lord has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil” (italics added). Delitzsch renders the first part of the verse “Jahve hath made everything for its contemplated end” and adds appropriately, “the wickedness of free agents is comprehended in this plan and made subordinate to it.”[7] In Romans 9 it is noteworthy that the passage does not say that God is glorified by the vessels of wrath. What it actually says is that His power is manifested on the vessels of wrath (y. 22). Then in the next verse it says God’s glory is made known through the vessels of honor. In point of fact, there is no passage of Scripture that teaches that God is praised or glorified by evil. God is good and only what is good brings glory to Him. What is evil is contrary to God and cannot possibly complement Him.[8]

If God is not glorified by evil, then in what sense is evil included in God’s all-encompassing plan that brings glory to Him? The answer can be more readily understood once one understands God’s purpose in allowing evil. Although God is not glorified by evil, He is glorified by His attribute of love in permitting the freedom that caused the evil. Further, God is glorified by His attribute of justice that punishes the evil. This is no doubt the meaning of the phrase, “the wrath of man shall praise Thee” (Psalm 76:10). Man’s evil wrath does not bring glory to God directly but only indirectly in that it occasions His just wrath. God is actually glorified by His own attributes of goodness and justice in the face of (and in spite of) man’s wrath. Yes, evil does have a doxological purpose; God does and will receive glory throughthe evil He has allowed. But God can never receive glory from evil. That is to say, God is not glorified by evil itself but only by means of using evil to manifest His own good attributes. This distinction is necessary to preserve one’s theology (theodicy) from blasphemy. It is morally impossible for man’s moral imperfections to reflect the glory of a morally perfect God.

THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL REASON FOR EVIL

There is another danger in a purely doxological theodicy.  Not only do some, in their enthusiasm to capture the glory of God in all things, wrongly claim that evil brings glory to God, but they also separate the glory of God from the good He in intended for man. In other words, by separating glory from good they are able to claim that God is glorified even when He does not produce all the good possible in the circumstances.

The Scriptures make it clear that God glorifies Himself (Isa. 44:23; Ezek. 39:13), that He is glorified in Christ (John 1:14; 2 Cor. 4:4), and that He is even glorified by natural creation (Psalm 19:1). In addition, God is glorified in His sanctuary (Exod. 40:34), by man’s redemption (Exod. 14:17; Psalm 96:2), in the cross and resurrection (Rom. 6:4), by believers (John 17:22; Eph. 1:18), by Christ’s second coming (Matt. 24:30; Phil.3:20) and in His righteous judgments (Exod. 14:4, 17; Ezek. 28:22; Rev. 15:4). Indeed, God is glorified in every realm: the natural world, the human world, and the angelic world.

God receives glory from virtually everything — everything, that is, except evil. God does, however, receive glory through evil. That is, by permitting evil (suffering, etc.) God is glorified.  Peter wrote, “But to the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing; so that also at the revelation of His glory, you may rejoice with exultation. If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you” (1 Pet. 4:13-14). A few verses later Peter adds, “But if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not feel ashamed, but in that name let him glorify God” (y. 16).

Paul also claims that God is glorified through suffering, saying, “. . . but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope” (Rom. 5:3-4). Thus he can say, “. . . and we exult in hope of the glory of God” (Rom. 5:2). A few chapters later the apostle writes, “. . . if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Rom. 8:17-18). Indeed, despite his own tremendous suffering (cf. 2 Cor. 11:23-28), Paul could confidently say, “For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison” (2 Cor. 4:17).

By building on those biblical truths one can see how God permits all suffering for His glory. Suffering is God’s instrument for producing both God’s and man’s greater glory. But if that were all to be said one might inquire as to whether God were merely interested in His glory but not His creature’s good.  Surely it would be slander to the nature of God to suggest that He is not really interested in His creatures’ welfare. No, there is more to biblical theodicy than God’s glory; there is also man’s good. It is true that God is glorified through suffering and evil, but it is also true that man isperfected through it. Job cried out, “When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold” (Job 23:10).  James wrote, “You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings . . .“ (James 5:11). What was the outcome of Job’s suffering? It was that “the LORD restored the fortunes of Job. . . . And the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning . . .“ (Job 42:10, 12).

There are numerous indications in Scripture that the purpose for permitting suffering and evil is to produce a greater good. It is in the context of suffering that Paul uttered perhaps his most famous line in this regard. “And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God . . .“ (Rom. 8:28; cf. vv. 17, 23). Indeed, only a few chapters earlier Paul made one of the boldest statements in Scripture on the role of evil in producing a greater good. He wrote, “But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more” (Rom. 5:20, italics added). It is undoubtedly true that, like discipline, all suffering “for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful: yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Heb. 12:11, italics added).  That is why James could say, “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. . . . that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4). In point of fact, even the sinless Son of God was made perfect “through sufferings” (Heb. 2:10). How much more can sinful creatures learn and be perfected through suffering!

There are two forceful illustrations in the book of Genesis of how and why God permits evil in order to achieve a greater good. The first is found in Joseph’s gracious word to his brothers who had sold him as a slave to Egypt. “You meant evil against me but God meant if for good . . .“ (Gen. 50:20, italics added). The fact that God was able to save Joseph and his family through the brothers’ evil in no way made the evil good. But it does show how a sovereign God can bring good even out of evil.  So it is with the universe as a whole. God allows men to sin, and when they do He is somehow able to bring about good results through their evil.

The other illustration is found in two seemingly contradictory commands of God to the chosen line of Abraham. First, God said, “Do not go down to Egypt; stay in the land of which I shall tell you” (Gen. 26:2). Later God said, “Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt. . .“ (Gen. 46:3). The full explanation for this later concession is found in the prophet Hosea who wrote, “Out of Egypt I called My son” (11:1). In brief, the first command was God’s prescriptive will (do not go); the second was His permissive will (you may go), and the last verse reveals God’s providential or overruling will (I will bring a greater good out of your suffering).

In accordance with this pattern a model for a biblical theodicy may be developed. First, God’s prescriptive will is that sin and suffering should not occur at all. God is not a cosmic sadist; He takes no pleasure in suffering or death (Ezek. 18:32). Second, God’s permissive will is that suffering occurs. That is, He sovereignly wills to permit evil, even though He forbids that anyone commit evil. Finally, since God knows the end from the beginning (Isa. 46:10), He determinately foreknew (cf. Acts 2:2 3) that He would bring a greater good out of evil, namely, the redemption of all who will believe. In short, what brings glory to God also brings good to mankind. Good and glory cannot be separated. God is interested in bringing good to men—the greatest good possible.[9] The truth is that God is concerned about man’s greatest good, that “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son . . .“ (John 3:16), that Christ “died for all” (2 Cor. 5:15) by giving Himself as “the propitiation for our sins; and . . . for those of the whole world” (1 John 2:2).[10] It is because of this that God “desires all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim. 2:4).[11]  Indeed, God would save all men if He could for the Lord is “not wishing for any to perish, but [wants] all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). The fact that some do not choose to repent, and so will not make it to heaven, cannot veto the God-given right of others to be there. God will achieve the greatest number in heaven that He possibly can. He does not love just some men; He loves all and will do everything within His loving power to save all He can. If some are not saved it is because, to quote the Lord, “I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling” (Matt. 23:37, italics added).

When the statement is made that God will achieve the greatest good “possible” it does not mean the greatest number of people will be saved that is logically possible (that would be 100 percent). What is meant by that statement is that God will save the greatest number of people that is actually achievable without violating their free choice.[12]  A loving God will not force anyone against their will to love Him or to worship Him. Forced love is not love; forced worship is not worship. Heaven will not be composed of robots. God is not a kind of “Cosmic B. F. Skinner” who believes in manipulating people into certain behavior patterns which are pleasing to Himself.[13] God does not, as Skinner wishes, go “beyond freedom and dignity.” In short, God will not save people at all cost—not if it is at the cost of their freedom and dignity—for that would mean at the cost of their humanity. God will not dehumanize in order to save. To dehumanize is to de-create, since that is what God created — a human. In fact, to dehumanize man would be to strip man of the image of God (Gen. 1:26), which image even fallen man has (Gen. 9:6). If God did that He would in an indirect sense be de-deifying Himself! So just as surely as God will not attack His own image in man whom He created, even so God will not force a man against his will to go to heaven. God is love, and love works persuasively but not coercively. Those whom God can lovingly persuade have been foreordained to eternal life. Those whom He cannot are destined in accordance with their own choice to eternal destruction (2 Thess. 1:7-9; Rev. 20:11-15).  The net result will be the greatest good achievable for mankind and the greatest glory obtainable for God. Good and glory are inseparably related because God is not only sovereign and self-sufficient (which obligates men to glorify Him), but He is also loving and merciful (which obligates Him to do all the good He possibly can in the moral world that He has willed). While there is nothing in fallen man that demands that God redeem, there is something in God that demands that He do so, namely, His unmitigated goodness.

Now if God actually achieves the greatest good possible by allowing evil, then the theodicy is sufficient. All that is necessary in a theodicy is to show how, in spite of evil, God will (in the end) bring about the greatest possible good. And if good cannot be separated from glory, then the greatest good of glorifying God will be in concert with the greatest good of saving man.

THE THEOLOGICAL (DISPENSATIONAL) REASON FOR EVIL

Several loose ends to most theodicies are tightened up by a dispensational perspective. First, there is the problem of why God permitted so much suffering for so long (thousands of years of human history). Second, there is the problem of how men can be truly free in heaven while guaranteeing that evil will never break out again. A dispensational perspective casts new light on these age-old problems.

Many dispensationalists accept the following tenets: 1. there are seven dispensations that are commonly labeled the ages of innocence, conscience, human government, promise, law, grace, and the kingdom; 2. each age tests man under a new and specific condition; and 3. man proves to be a failure under all of these conditions. Now if all of that is true, what would be the point of it? The point may very well be that God is trying to accomplish several things through His plan for the ages. First, He wants to prove to the universe (of rational creatures) that creatures always fail and bring evil (not good) on themselves when they disobey God’s commands. Second, and conversely, God wants to prove that it is always right to obey His commands, for when individuals do they bring good and blessing on themselves. In that way heaven can be full of free creatures and yet justly rule out any rebellion again.

The sevenfold test is given so that man can be tested concerning good and evil under every major condition. Seven is not an arbitrary number of dispensations for two reasons. First, seven is a number of completion or earthly perfection. God did appoint seven days in a complete earthly week (Gen. 1). Second, each dispensation provides a different condition under which man is tested. Indeed, one could speculate that these are all the necessary conditions for testing man. For example, man was tested when he did not know either good or evil by experience (the age of innocence in the Garden of Eden), but even here he chose to do evil. Then men, knowing good and evil, were tested as to whether they would now follow the good and shun the evil (the age of conscience). But here too men failed and did more evil than good, thus filling the world with violence (Gen. 6:13). After this men were given the more explicit commands of government to restrain evil and promote good (the age of human government, Gen. 9:6; Rom. 13:1-7). But here again men used even the intended good of governmental power to exalt themselves against God, which climaxed at the Tower of Babel (Gen. 11). After the failure at the Tower of Babel God gave to certain men a special promise (the age of promise) by which they could guide their nation in separation from the contamination that had come on the nations at large. God could then through that nation ultimately bless all nations and eventually pick out a people from all nations who could experience the good God intended for all men (Gen. 12:1-3). Here too, however, the patriarchs failed to stay in the land of promised blessing and ended in bondage in Egypt. Following that failure the people needed more explicit directions from God (called the age of law). The Bible records that even with all that explicit, divine direction men still rebelled against God and brought evil on themselves. That then would seem to call for a more gracious and less judicial approach (called the age of grace) under which man is tested as to whether he will respond purely and simply to the grace of God. But amazingly enough, even here men refuse the grace of God and bring condemnation on themselves. Thus ends the age of grace. But throughout all those six ages there has been one common and sinister figure who has sanctioned evil—Satan. Hence, there is always the possibility that men could blame him for their evil, saying, “The devil made me do it!” To ward off this possibility, God in His wisdom designed one dispensation wherein the devil would be bound and man would be freed from his temptation (called the kingdom age). But inconceivable as it seems, even after a thousand years of Christ’s perfect reign without satanic intervention, man proves again that he is a failure when innumerable people turn against God at the end of the Millennium (Rev. 20:7-9).

Now if that is true, as the foregoing Scriptures would indicate, what does it prove? It seems to indicate exactly what every complete theodicy would like to show, namely, that God surely has just grounds before all His creatures to put away sin forever, because He has proved to all that it is never right to disobey His will. God has tried evil in every age and condition and has proved how evil it is. Or, to put it another way, the only way to defeat evil is to permit it. The only way to defeat it completely is to try it completely. One cannot defeat an opponent unless he is willing to get into the “ring” with him. Hence, God allowed evil into the ring of human history for a seven-round (seven dispensation) championship bout, winner take all. It was in the sixth round that a knockout punch was given (by the cross and resurrection), and the staggered foe was floored forever at the end of the seventh round.

In this dispensational drama, God is the victor and all good men are the benefactors. Evil is defeated, God is justified, and the universe is secured forever from another outbreak of evil. What makes it justly secure? God makes it secure. He is omnipotent, and He will not allow another outburst. What makes the universe justly secure from evil? The redeemed do—the redeemed of all ages who can stand to testify from every dispensation, no matter what the conditions, that it is always right to obey God’s sovereign will, which they have willingly pledged to do for all eternity. How about those who do not will to do God’s will? To them God will justly say, “Thy will be done!”[14] Thus according to the will of each, God has determined the eternal destiny of all. The only just way to bring about the greatest good in a free universe is first to assign each his destiny in accordance with his freedom (forced freedom is not freedom). And the only just way to bring inpermanent good is to separate each according to his free choice. What really hinders good men is evil, and what really bothers evil men is good. So it is that God has a place where there will be no more evil to hinder good men (called heaven) and a place where there will be no more good influence to bother evil men (called hell).[15]  The wheat and the tares must be separated; there will be a final harvest (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43). And when the end comes God will have achieved: (1) His greatest glory, (2) His creatures’ greatest good, and (3) the most just and lasting security of the universe against evil. Evil will have been completely tried and proven entirely wrong. It will have been permitted and defeated. William James once observed that the world is better for having the devil in it, if men have their foot on his neck. It is better yet that God has His foot on his head and has crushed the serpent’s power (Gen. 3:15). What really happened, then, at the cross of Christ, by which both evil and the evil one were defeated, is that Satan was definitively conquered and ultimate victory over his kingdom was triumphantly assured (Col. 2:15). Praise God that evil is defeated and the universe is being forever secured. The fact that it will take seven dispensations and thousands of years to do it should offer no real problem. For the suffering caused by evil in this short span called time is, by comparison with the eternal good and glory, more than worth it. As Paul said, “For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison” (2 Cor. 4:17). That point was summed up beautifully by Patterson.

The question is often asked, Why did God permit the fall. . . . It is enough for the believer to know it was the will of God. God’s will needs no defense. It is the standard of righteousness. This is to be fully demonstrated before all the universe, but now we must believe it to be so by faith. We are not left wholly in the dark, however, as to the purposes of God, and he invites our inquiry that we may see and learn and believe. We say, and in a sense correctly, that God does all things for his own glory. But to think of this glory apart from the welfare of the beings of his creation, is not the Scriptural idea of the glory of God. . . . The purpose undoubtedly was to settle eternal problems. In some world, if not in this, in some time, if not at this time, the question was sure to arise whether the will of God was best and right. . . . God could have met it by a display of power and might and silenced all opposition, but that would not be an answer but a suppression. It would not be worthy of the plan which God had before him as seen in the ages. To silence by authority is not to settle the question. . . . Better this issue fully and fairly met now, and the questions answered at once, than that it should be left open, a constant danger ever threatening the universe, hanging like an avalanche over the future, to break forth perhaps when the universe was filled with holy, happy beings. . . . There seems to have been but one way—to permit an actual experiment and demonstration of the whole question. To this end sin must be allowed to present itself in all its hideous nature and effects; suffering must follow, and sorrow deep and widespread must be felt and endured. When this great experiment is over, every question will be forever settled. Every alternative opposed to the will of God will have been solved. It will be apparent as the noon-day sun to all intelligences that all has been passed through the crucible of actual demonstration. The verdict from this will be that there is but one standard of right, but one way of happiness, but one way of holiness, and that is the will of God. The participants in this struggle are to be rewarded for their part in this sad stage of suffering by correspondingly and vastly increased benefits hereafter. They are to have the highest state in that kingdom to come.[16]

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

Dispensationalists stress several things. Among them is that God has an eternal plan that He is working out for His glory and for the good of the universe. That plan includes the permission of evil. This article has suggested that God permits evil in order that He may produce a greater good that will redound to His great glory. That is, God does indeed have a good purpose for permitting evil. He has permitted it in order to defeat it.[17] But He has defeated evil without destroying the good He has created, namely, free creatures made in His image and likeness.

Each creature is free to accept or reject the grace of God in salvation. Of course, God determinately knew from all eternity who would and who would not believe. Hence, God elected “according to [His] foreknowledge” (1 Pet. 1:2). And as many men as have been so ordained to eternal life will believe (Acts 13:48). Indeed, it is necessary that they believe.[18] It is necessary because God cannot be wrong about what He knowingly determines (or, determinately knows). However, that necessity is notcompulsive. Divine love is never coercive; it is only persuasive. God knows with necessity who will and who will not respond to His overtures of love. Hence, God wills their salvation necessarily but He does it through their free choice. As many as will are sovereignly chosen by Him to eternal life. They are not chosen on the basis of their free choice (as Arminians believe); they are chosen on the basis of God’s sovereign love but in accordance with their free choice.[19]

Redeemed men are given the grace to overcome sin. They can overcome sin in this life progressively (sanctification) and will overcome it by God’s grace in the next life permanently (glorification). Likewise, God is overcoming evil in His universe both progressively (through seven dispensations) and permanently (in the new heaven and new earth, Rev. 22). God is doing that in order to secure the universe once and for all from all evil influence and to produce a permanent and greater good—all in accord with His eternal glory.

Like anything else, a tested and proved world is better than an untested and unproved one. But since suffering and evil are necessary conditions for producing a greater and permanent good, God permitted this brief “moment” of affliction (called human history) in order to produce an eternally secure universe. God, as it were, allowed the race to catch the disease (of evil) but sent His own Son to wound the virus fatally (through the cross) so that all who will to be inoculated can be forever immune from its contamination. And just as a broken bone is stronger after it heals than before it was broken, so too, a redeemed man is stronger than an innocent one. Likewise, a redeemed universe is better, for in it God can freely save and permanently cure those who come to Him. All who reject the cure will be forever quarantined (in hell), so that the contaminating influences of their disease can never spread. In that way the purposes of a loving God will have been achieved through the ages by overcoming evil and obtaining the greater good. And the plan of a just God to punish evil and to separate good and evil (so that one cannot unfairly hinder the other) will be accomplished. Justice demands “to each according to his due.” And it is not just forever to inflict good on men who desire evil, or forever to inflict evil on men who choose good.  Sooner or later there must be a final separation. It is fairer this way for all. In this connection it is worth noting that the problem with universalism is that it turns out to be a dehumanizing form of determinism in which God forces a cure on patients without their informed consent. The permanently secure universe with its eternally redeemed people (and final quarantine of evil) will redound to the everlasting glory of God. The universalist’s God treats free creatures like objects to be manipulated rather than as men in God’s image to be respected.[20]

In brief, the scheme of dispensations provides a significant insight into the purposes of God in testing man in various ways through various days. These ages are all part of a complete (sevenfold) and progressive plan to defeat evil both fairly and finally without destroying the good but in the process to bring about a greater good.

Notes

[1] This article originally was originally published in 1982 as a chapter in the book Walvoord, a Tribute.  (ISBN O-8024-9227-4 AACR2.) It has been reproduced here on NormanGeisler.com with permission from Moody Publishers. A similar chapter can be found in Norman Geisler’s Systematic Theology.

[2] Ryrie is correct in stating that the number of dispensations is not crucial (Charles C. Ryrie, Dispensationalism Today [Chicago: Moody, 19651, p. 48). However, this writer personally believes there are seven dispensations (as divided by Scofield, Sauer, Ryrie et al.). This fits with the symbolic significance of the number seven in Scripture (as earthly completion or perfection); but one should not press this point, since the Bible does not explicitly say there are seven dispensations.

[3] Ryrie, Dispensationalism Today, pp. 130-31.

[4] Speaking of the age of grace in contrast to the age of law, Scofield wrote, “the point of testing is no longer legal obedience as the condition of salvation, but acceptance or rejection of Christ, with good works as a fruit of salvation” (C. I. Scofield, ed., The Scofield Reference Bible [New York: Oxford, 1917], p. 1115). This was an unfortunate wording which seemed to imply salvation by works in the Old Testament. Actually, Scofield did believe that Old Testament saints were saved by faith (as is plain from his notes on Gen 15:6 or Psalm 32:1, which he acknowledged are quoted in Rom. 4, as well as Gal. 3:8), as did Chafer (Lewis Sperry Chafer, “Inventing Heretics through Misunderstanding,” Bibliotheca Sacra 102 [January-March 19451:1) and Ryrie (Dispensationalism Today, pp. 110-31).

[5] Ryrie, Dispensationalism Today, p. 46.

[6] Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, reprint (Oxford: Clarendon, 1974), p. 948.

[7] Franz Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Proverbs of Solomon, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, trans. M. G. Easton, reprint (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 1975), pp. 336-3 7.

[8] It is a sad fact that many Christians have been urged to believe that the height of spirituality is the ability to praise God for evil (see Merlin R. Carothers, Power in Praise [Plainfield, N.J.: Logos, 1972], pp. 1, 5, 9, 130, 139). First Thessalonians 5:18 tells believers to praise God “in everything.” No verse in the Bible exhorts any one to praise God for evil. The “all things” for which believers are to give thanks does not state or imply that evil is to be included (Eph. 5:20). It is to be done in fellowship with the light (Eph. 5:13), being filled with the Spirit (Eph. 5:18), and by renouncing evil (Eph. 5:11), not by approving evil in calling it good. Indeed, Scriptures pronounce condemnation on those who “call evil good, and good, evil” (Isa. 5:20).

[9] For an elaboration of this “greater good” aspect of theodicy see myPhilosophy of Religion (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1974), pp.349-79, andRoots of Evil (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1978).

[10] Contrary to the opinion of five-point Calvinists, this cannot mean Christian world or world of the elect, since verse 16 defines the world as the evil world of “lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes and pride of life.”

[11] It is instructive to see what abuse Augustine gave this verse as he became more deterministic in his later years. In On the Spirit and the Letter (413) he held that God desires all men to be saved but not at the cost of their freedom. By the time of the Enchiridian (421) Augustine interpreted the “all men” as all ranks and varieties of men. It is interesting to note that by this time he is claiming that infants are saved apart from their will by baptism and that heretics can be forced to believe against their free will (cf.On the Correction of the Donatists 3. 12).

[12] Many years ago Warfield attacked the common myth that the Bible clearly teaches that only a few people will be saved in a perceptive article entitled, “Are They Few That Be Saved?” (Benjamin B. Warfield, Biblical and Theological Studies, ed. Samuel G. Craig [Philadelphia: Presbyterian & Reformed, 19521, pp. 334-50).

[13] For a discussion of the determinism of Jonathan Edwards and B. E Skinner see the article “Human Destiny: Free or Forced?” in The Christian Scholar’s Review 9 (1979): 99-120.

[14] C. S. Lewis makes this point in The Great Divorce (New York:Macmillan, 1946), p. 69.

[15] Technically speaking there will in a sense still be good in hell since men in hell are still men, which means they still have the remnants of God’s image. But the good that is there cannot influence evil men nor can it be salvaged. It is unredeemable good. Hell is the “dump” (Mark 9:45-48) of the universe, the cosmic scrapyard where all unsalvageable human wrecks eventually go. That is, even if they are dimly recognizable as men, nonetheless their lives are beyond repair.

[16] Alexander Patterson, The Greater Life and Work of Christ (Chicago: Moody, n.d.), pp. 74-79.

[17] In view of the greater good that God can produce by permitting evil (than by not permitting it), one can speculate that even if God could have made a world wherein Adam would not have fallen that He would not have done so. This may be supposed on the premises that: (1) God must do His best whenever He decides to undertake something and that (2) a world where sin is not defeated would not be as good as one where it is defeated (even if there are casualties in the process of victory).

[18] This “necessity” for men to believe is the element of truth in “irresistible grace.” There is no way for anyone not to do what God has ordained will be done. The “necessity,” however, does not mean God forces them to do so. It means rather that He who is never mistaken determinately knows that they will receive salvation freely with the aid of His grace.

[19] Dr. Walvoord’s concept of the coextensive nature of election and foreknowledge is very helpful (Major Bible Themes, rev. ed. [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1974], p. 233).

[20] See my comments on John Hick ill “Human Destiny: Free or Forced,” pp. 99-120.

 

Copyright © 1982 Norman L. Geisler – All rights reserved

Want to dig deeper? Consider these books by Dr. Geisler:

  • If God, Why Evil?
  • The Roots of Evil
  • Systematic Theology: In One Volume or Systematic Theology: Four Volumes