The Character of God is Changeless

[Aloysium]

It is not a matter of this or that, but this and that.
God is transcendent and He enters into temporality, His creation.
God is not totally transcendent, nor is He totally temporal.

 

[puzzledtoo]

Thank you Susanlo. I find what you’ve offered helpful.

 

[James_Tyler]

Well the idea that God lives “outside of time” is something the Church teaches but this must be based in some way on the scriptures. So whoever solidified that doctrine must have also been aware of the scriptures that lead to believe that God is more human like and does indeed seem to change in the same way as a human.

So question is, where is the documentation and writings of those people who already went through this discovery process and can we read that?

Because it is very true that it is difficult to think of “time” as something that one can get away from. It is much easier to think of “eternal” as infinite time rather than timeless. Lol. You know what I mean. It is basically incomprehensible to really understand my own life in that way and so the doctrine only teaches me that I should not compare myself or any other to God. In this regards it would be implausible to ever say God is my role model because God is not comprehensible really. Jesus maybe but not God the Father because he seems more like I really don’t know what. More like a principle, concept, or idea rather than a being that is relatable and that is an unhappy thought.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . Because it is very true that it is difficult to think of “time” as something that one can get away from. . .

You think it’s hard to get away from time, try to get away from the moment. Whenever you are, whenever you will be, it will be “now”.
I’m writing this now. You are reading it now. I will reread it now. It’s all now, which has no boundaries, even though it is finite and does not encompass all time for us.
Now is when everything happens and changes. Time passes but this now has no dimensions.
While I began in the vagueness of the past, and I will end at some point, in some manner, but I can’t say this now begins or ends, or lasts a certain amount of time, it simply is.
Time as the collection of events in which we participate will keep going. We will get away from it as it draws to an end for us in this world.
I would suggest that this now is our connection to God, who brings everything, this moment and every moment that was, is and will be, into existence.

 

[Vico]

Well the idea that God lives “outside of time” is something the Church teaches but this must be based in some way on the scriptures. So whoever solidified that doctrine must have also been aware of the scriptures that lead to believe that God is more human like and does indeed seem to change in the same way as a human.

So question is, where is the documentation and writings of those people who already went through this discovery process and can we read that?

Because it is very true that it is difficult to think of “time” as something that one can get away from. It is much easier to think of “eternal” as infinite time rather than timeless. Lol. You know what I mean. It is basically incomprehensible to really understand my own life in that way and so the doctrine only teaches me that I should not compare myself or any other to God. In this regards it would be implausible to ever say God is my role model because God is not comprehensible really. Jesus maybe but not God the Father because he seems more like I really don’t know what. More like a principle, concept, or idea rather than a being that is relatable and that is an unhappy thought.

Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, Ludwig Ott, pp. 36-37.

§ 18. God’s Eternity

Eternity is a duration without beginning and without end, without sooner and later, a “permanent now” (nunc stans). The essence of eternity is the absolute lack of succession. Boethius gave the classical definition: Aeternitas est interminabilis vitae tota simul et perfecta possessio (Eternity is the perfect and simultaneous total possession of interminable life) (De consol. phil. V. 6). From eternity in the strict sense must be distinguished the “aevum” or the “aeviternitas,” that is, the duration of the created spirits, which have indeed a beginning, but no end, and which, in their substance, are subject to no mutation.

God is eternal. (De fide.)

“The dogma asserts that God possesses the Divine Being without beginning and without end, and without succession in a constant undivided now. The Symbolorum Quincumque declares: Aeternus Pater, Aeternus Filius, Aetemus Spiritus Sanetus et tamen non tres aeteruni, sed unus aeternus. (Eternal Father, Eternal Son, Eternal Holy Ghost and yet not three eternal beings but one.) D 39. The 4th Lateran Council and the Vatican Council attribute to God the predicate” eternal" (aeternus). D 428, 1782.

Holy Writ bears witness to the individual grounds of the Divine eternity. The negation of beginning and end is expressed in Ps. 89, 2: II Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world were formed: from eternity and to eternity Thou art God." The absolute lack of succession is seen in Ps. 2, 7: “The Lord hath said to me: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.” Jo. 8, 58: “Before Abrahatnm was made, I am.” Cf. Ps. 101, 27 et seq.; 89, 4; 2 Peter 3, 8.

The Fathers, in their conflict with the heathen world, familiar ,with the genealogies of gods, expressly attest God’s eternity. Cf. Aristiotle’s, Apol. 1.4; Tatian, Or. 4,3 ; Athenagoras Suppl. 10; St. Irenaeus, Adv. haer. II 31, 2. St. Augustine says that God’s eternity is a constant present: “The eternity of God is His Essence itself: which has nothing mutable in it. In It there is nothing past, as if it were no longer, nothing future, as if it had not yet been. In It there is only , is,’ that is, the present” (Enarr. in Ps. 101, 2, 10).

 

[James_Tyler]

Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, Ludwig Ott, pp. 36-37.

§ 18. God’s Eternity

Eternity is a duration without beginning and without end, without sooner and later, a “permanent now” (nunc stans). The essence of eternity is the absolute lack of succession. Boethius gave the classical definition: Aeternitas est interminabilis vitae tota simul et perfecta possessio (Eternity is the perfect and simultaneous total possession of interminable life) (De consol. phil. V. 6). From eternity in the strict sense must be distinguished the “aevum” or the “aeviternitas,” that is, the duration of the created spirits, which have indeed a beginning, but no end, and which, in their substance, are subject to no mutation.

God is eternal. (De fide.)

“The dogma asserts that God possesses the Divine Being without beginning and without end, and without succession in a constant undivided now. The Symbolorum Quincumque declares: Aeternus Pater, Aeternus Filius, Aetemus Spiritus Sanetus et tamen non tres aeteruni, sed unus aeternus. (Eternal Father, Eternal Son, Eternal Holy Ghost and yet not three eternal beings but one.) D 39. The 4th Lateran Council and the Vatican Council attribute to God the predicate” eternal" (aeternus). D 428, 1782.

Holy Writ bears witness to the individual grounds of the Divine eternity. The negation of beginning and end is expressed in Ps. 89, 2: II Before the mountains were made, or the earth and the world were formed: from eternity and to eternity Thou art God." The absolute lack of succession is seen in Ps. 2, 7: “The Lord hath said to me: Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee.” Jo. 8, 58: “Before Abrahatnm was made, I am.” Cf. Ps. 101, 27 et seq.; 89, 4; 2 Peter 3, 8.

The Fathers, in their conflict with the heathen world, familiar ,with the genealogies of gods, expressly attest God’s eternity. Cf. Aristiotle’s, Apol. 1.4; Tatian, Or. 4,3 ; Athenagoras Suppl. 10; St. Irenaeus, Adv. haer. II 31, 2. St. Augustine says that God’s eternity is a constant present: “The eternity of God is His Essence itself: which has nothing mutable in it. In It there is nothing past, as if it were no longer, nothing future, as if it had not yet been. In It there is only , is,’ that is, the present” (Enarr. in Ps. 101, 2, 10).

Yeah. Here it says eternal is without succession but the definition I knew was simply without end. But if something, like God, had always been eternal then it had no beginning or end. But There was still succession through time. The Catholic definition views the eternal presence of God as without succession but you can’t also say that he exists throughout time simultaneously because that word implies that time is a factor. It’s just a completely different concept and something that I can’t relate to or really understand. I wonder how these folks ever conceived of it in the first place. What does it mean to exist as a being but not experience the passage of time. No idea.

 

[Vico]

Yeah. Here it says eternal is without succession but the definition I knew was simply without end. But if something, like God, had always been eternal then it had no beginning or end. But There was still succession through time. The Catholic definition views the eternal presence of God as without succession but you can’t also say that he exists throughout time simultaneously because that word implies that time is a factor. It’s just a completely different concept and something that I can’t relate to or really understand. I wonder how these folks ever conceived of it in the first place. What does it mean to exist as a being but not experience the passage of time. No idea.

Boethius:

Aeternitas est interminabilis vitae tota simul et perfecta possessio

Boethius used the words tota simul which means all at once. Eternity is not made up of time.

 

[fisherman_carl]

God is also eternal and omniscient so He cannot learn something new.

Or perhaps it is more precise to say that he already knows everything. So that there is nothing new to him.

 

[James_Tyler]

I guess it’s one of those “Can God make a rock so big he can’t move it?” questions. Except it is a statement. “God can’t create something new to himself either even though we call him a creator.” Is that what you are saying? It is in fact misleading then to say that anything God ever created was new to him. So in fact, if that is the case, then the world always existed for God because he was always on the cross in agony and always will be because nothing is ever over for him either. He will always be witnessing the brutality of the world for ever and ever because there is no times past for God. I’m sorry but it seems kind of stupid.

 

[Rohzek]

Well some are objecting on the changing factor based upon an old notion of time insofar that time has an existence in and of itself. There is now reasonable cause to believe that time is only relative and not absolute (see Einstein’s Time Dilation). This feature depends entirely on the materiality of a person. However, since God is not material, but Spirit then him changing his decisions, etc. in no way compromises his eternality. Just food for thought.