I'll take on any determinist (Calvinist, Thomist, Molinist) right here

[TheOpenTheist]

The violently incorrect Augustinian wrote

Time applies to changes in matter. God is a spirit, and thus immaterial. Therefore, God is not within time.

If that is the case then we could have no effect on the Holy Spirit then, could we. Wait, hmmmm, a passage is coming to me out of…yes, its out of Ephesians. Here it is

Ephesians 4:30 And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.

Ohhhhh! Truth smack-a-lack-a!! The Augustinan’s premise is knocked out of the ring and splits open its head and dies!

Let me explain for anyone that isn’t following: If we can grieve the Holy Spirit, which is not made of “matter”, then that shows that God can experience changes in His emotional life and demolishes that premise that you just made up without thinking apparently.

Look, we can bandy about these things if we like, but if we don’t accept basic logic like that, then we won’t be getting anywhere.

Its not basic logic that change only occurs in matter. If it were, then Eph 4:30 contradicts basic logic. You do know what a real contradiction is, right? A = -A for example. Sound familiar?

Quoting me bible verses won’t work either, because even the devil can quote the bible, and well, even.

Jesus quoted the Bible too. Perhaps that is WHY I should quote it as the basis of my faith and doctrine instead of throwing away Scripture because the Devil has quoted it before. Of course,I realize taht you cannot refute what the Bible says and that you have no other reasonable interpretation of passages that show God suffering many changes, like becoming angry, getting frustrated, being grieved, changing His mind as a result of prophets interceding or new knowledge coming about. So, of course you want nothing to do with Scripture since it all goes against your view and is a big pain for you to explain away.

You wonder

In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.

If time existed beforehand, how could it be the beginning?

Yeah, that necessarily follows. NOT!

Let me spell out what God is revealing to us here. God is not saying its the beginning of time or sequence or duration. There is no such language in the first chapters of Genesis. God is telling us that it is the very beginning of His special creation of the universe. In the beginning of His creating the universe. Thats what the beginning is. He begins the first day which is followed by the second day and so on. He creates with purpose, in sequence.

There is no such thing as a time before time. Such talk is completely irrational.

BTW, before the beginning of creation the Father was loving the Son and the Son the Holy Spirit and so on, and such give-and-take relationships require sequence. They require responsiveness. We know this because we were created in God’s image and likeness and the image of God is not timeless or anything like that from what we read in Scripture.

you claim

A timeless, changeless God is perhaps imcomprehensible to us, but it is philosophically and theologically correct.

Prove it. No one has shown me an intelligent outworking of such a belief that shows that it is “philosophically and theologically correct”. Its proven to be utterly false. If God is timeless and changeless then the incarnation did not occur and the Scripture lies to us when it tells us that God experienced emotion or changed His mind.

you blathered without providing any evidence at all as is your custom

The trouble with Open Theism is that by presenting the answer to one question, it opens up a million others.

Open Theism answers many questions and explains how God can claim that He will do something and then respond to His creation and not go through with it. In other words, it explains how God is able to relate with us.

It is not coherent.

Emeritus Nolloth Professor of the Philosophy of the Christian Religion, University of Oxford , disagrees with you vehemently. Read his The Coherence of Theism to discover how coherent Open Theism is. Nicholas Wolterstorff, Noah Porter Professor of Philosophical Theology at Yale , also strongly disagrees. Read his God Everlasting, which appears in God and the Good: Essays in Honor of Henry Stob to understand why timelessness and eternality are contrary to the God of the Bible.

 

[RyanL]

You continue to persist on a flawed assumption. Your idea that time is entirely separate from space is a superceded idea, thanks to science. You may want to read up on Einstein-Minkowski Spacetime, and the implications it has on “time without matter”. Then you need to ask yourself if God created the universe from nothing. If he did, you must reject your idea that God (who is all powerful according to the scriptures) is Himself a subject to time, and therefore not “all” powerful, as he is controlled by the limitations of time (i.e., time is His master). If God did not create everything from nothing, you must ask youself who created the “stuff” before the universe if not God.

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.

You may be interested in a work from dear old Notre Dame professor, Alfred J. Freddoso:
THE “OPENNESS” OF GOD:
A REPLY TO WILLIAM HASKER

While this is not a work you cited, Freddoso addresses some of your citations in the paper.

I would also caution you against following the winds of doctrine that come out of Yale’s Philosophy department.

God Bless,
RyanL

 

[john_doran]

TheOpenTheist:

Molinists are indeed determinists. They believe that God looked at the possible worlds He could create and that this one is “the best of all possible worlds”. John Sanders goes over Molinism in The God Who Risks. Also, you can ask William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga if they believe their view is deterministic if you doubt that Molinism is a form of determinism.

this just isn’t true - molinists are (typically) libertarians when it comes to free choice.

i’m not sure what you’ve read to make you think otherwise, but i can assure you that neither plantinga nor craig (nor molina, for that matter) are determinists.

try reading “divine providence: the molinist account” by thomas flint, perhaps the most thoroughgoing contemporary defense of molina’s position.

ps. there’s also nothing about molinism that commits its adherents to the belief that this is the best of all possible worlds.

 

[john_doran]

TheOpenTheist:

And according to the Thomists near my home at Notre Dame, they are determinists. If you have evidence that they are not, then share it.

i’m not sure that anyone can provide proof that the thomists near your home are or are not determinists, but aquinas wasn’t a determinist…

witness his affirmative response to the question “is there anything voluntary in human acs?”:

newadvent.org/summa/200601.htm

 

[Mordocai]

In the beginning God spoke one Word.
The Eternal Word.
Jesus Christ.

That’s a lot to say
Thought I’d throw that in there.

 

[Michael_Francis]

Thanks to all who participated in this discussion.
This thread is now closed.