The injustice of election

[AMR]

Too many do not mind God sitting on His throne, they just do not want Him ruling while doing so. Sigh.

 

[ronathanedwards]

Let’s suppose that if predestination is true, then men are equivalent to artificially intelligent robots. We do whatever we’ve been programmed to do. We can’t break our programming.

Suppose I design a sociopathic robot, like Lore or the Terminators. It kills without compunction.

Suppose, after a killing spree, I destroy my robot. Is that unjust?

Even though my robot lacks the freedom to do otherwise, it’s still a bad robot. A robot that perpetrates evil.

Now, you might say the robot isn’t culpable or evil, for it lacks the requisite freedom to be a morally responsible agent. And suppose we grant that contention for the sake of argument.

If the robot is amoral, then I’m not wronging the robot by destroying it after it did exactly what I designed it to do. It’s not blameworthy. But by the same token, it doesn’t deserve to be treated any differently. It has no rights or responsibilities. It’s just a clever machine.

I destroy my robot the same way I’d shoot a mad dog or a cougar that threatened my five-year-old. I’m not blaming the dog for having rabies. But that’s irrelevant. The dog is vicious, dangerous. And since the dog (or cougar) is not a moral agent, innocence and guilt don’t apply. It’s not deserving or undeserving of whatever fate I mete out to it.

 

[A New Dawn]

Let’s suppose that if predestination is true, then men are equivalent to artificially intelligent robots. We do whatever we’ve been programmed to do. We can’t break our programming.

Suppose I design a sociopathic robot, like Lore or the Terminators. It kills without compunction.

Suppose, after a killing spree, I destroy my robot. Is that unjust?

Even though my robot lacks the freedom to do otherwise, it’s still a bad robot. A robot that perpetrates evil.

Now, you might say the robot isn’t culpable or evil, for it lacks the requisite freedom to be a morally responsible agent. And suppose we grant that contention for the sake of argument.

If the robot is amoral, then I’m not wronging the robot by destroying it after it did exactly what I designed it to do. It’s not blameworthy. But by the same token, it doesn’t deserve to be treated any differently. It has no rights or responsibilities. It’s just a clever machine.

I destroy my robot the same way I’d shoot a mad dog or a cougar that threatened my five-year-old. I’m not blaming the dog for having rabies. But that’s irrelevant. The dog is vicious, dangerous. And since the dog (or cougar) is not a moral agent, innocence and guilt don’t apply. It’s not deserving or undeserving of whatever fate I mete out to it.

Perhaps reading the scriptures would help you understand what predestination is and what place it has in salvation.

 

[ronathanedwards]

Nice empty statement, New Dawn. I teach theology, I'm pretty sure I have a solid grasp on it. And considering it happens BEFORE time, you might want to say what place salvation has in predestination and not the other way around.

 

[A New Dawn]

Nice empty statement, New Dawn. I teach theology, I'm pretty sure I have a solid grasp on it. And considering it happens BEFORE time, you might want to say what place salvation has in predestination and not the other way around.

I'd say either you don't have a solid grasp on it, especially the Calvinist view of it, or you have selected the wrong faith icon.

 

[ronathanedwards]

Considering I went to" The Bethlehem Institute" .... I think I have a very good reformed grasp on it. At least John Piper thought I did....

 

[A New Dawn]

Considering I went to" The Bethlehem Institute" .... I think I have a very good reformed grasp on it. At least John Piper thought I did....

Then I am confused that you speak about it in the manner you do. Why do you misrepresent the Reformed view?

 

[AMR]

Then I am confused that you speak about it in the manner you do. Why do you misrepresent the Reformed view?

A good question. Perhaps he is mounting a reductio ad absurdum argument to show that the sovereign is well within His rights to dispose of His creatures as He sees fit to do so for His own glory. But it would be more fruitful to just come out with the underlying equal ultimacy argument rather than create this sort of tension.

 

[ronathanedwards]

I am merely arguing from his misunderstood position. That God's "dealing with robots" silly argument, is still inherently flawed and is an invalid accusation concerning God's justice.

It's not reductio ad absurdum, just a logical position, not to the absurd extreme, but plainly showing his assertion is merely subjective and not logical. In other words "EVEN IF God did make robots that way (which He doesn't), He would be justified to destroy them if He wanted"

AMR, I can see how my argument could bleed into the error of equal ultimacy, but no analogy is perfect. I could have said something to the effect to keep some of the reformers here from insinuation, but I didn't. For that I am sorry.

 

[Anoetos]

The injustice of election?

How is it unjust for God to punish sinners? How is it unjust for Him to save them?

How is it unjust for Him to punish some seeing they (and we all) deserve it, and save others out of pure mercy and grace?

Is mercy unjust?

How about just punishment?

Is it because He does both? Who are you to question, o man?

 

[hedrick]

Let’s suppose that if predestination is true, then men are equivalent to artificially intelligent robots. We do whatever we’ve been programmed to do. We can’t break our programming.

Suppose I design a sociopathic robot, like Lore or the Terminators. It kills without compunction.

Suppose, after a killing spree, I destroy my robot. Is that unjust?

Even though my robot lacks the freedom to do otherwise, it’s still a bad robot. A robot that perpetrates evil.

Now, you might say the robot isn’t culpable or evil, for it lacks the requisite freedom to be a morally responsible agent. And suppose we grant that contention for the sake of argument.

If the robot is amoral, then I’m not wronging the robot by destroying it after it did exactly what I designed it to do. It’s not blameworthy. But by the same token, it doesn’t deserve to be treated any differently. It has no rights or responsibilities. It’s just a clever machine.

I destroy my robot the same way I’d shoot a mad dog or a cougar that threatened my five-year-old. I’m not blaming the dog for having rabies. But that’s irrelevant. The dog is vicious, dangerous. And since the dog (or cougar) is not a moral agent, innocence and guilt don’t apply. It’s not deserving or undeserving of whatever fate I mete out to it.

Interestingly, it's not clear that predestination is actually equivalent to rigid determination. Many people treat them as similar, and I've certainly done so myself. But predestination was originally about the activity of God's grace. Augustine's concept was that without grace we were doomed, because of our character. What grace did, in his concept, was actually to restore a freedom that was lost at the Fall. Of course once we are no longer slaves to the dark, we'll follow God. But the basic concept isn't actually that God determines everything, but rather than he moves us from a situation where we can do nothing that will save us to a situation where we are able to respond to God.

I will say that it's difficult to come up with a logically consistent view of the world given Reformed presuppositions, and not end up with something like determinism. But I do worry about replacing Augustine's concept of God's personal grace with a kind of Newtonian determinism.

 

[ronathanedwards]

What grace did, in his concept, was actually to restore a freedom that was lost at the Fall. Of course once we are no longer slaves to the dark, we'll follow God.

Hedrick, can you give me a citation from Augustine that supports this statement?

Augustine's opponent Pelagius believed in "tabla rasa" which sounds EXACTLY what is mentioned in your statement.

 

[hedrick]

Hedrick, can you give me a citation from Augustine that supports this statement?

Augustine's opponent Pelagius believed in "tabla rasa" which sounds EXACTLY what is mentioned in your statement.

No, Augustine's concept of freedom is not a tabula rasa. Quite the contrary. The human will on its own is double-minded and bound to sin. True freedom comes from faith.

I've spent an hour looking for a good on-line source describing Augustine's whole view. I've found excellent secondary sources, but not any simple citations from Augustine. One of the best secondary sources is this:
Prof Piper: The Meaning of Freedom: Augustine’s “Two Wills”
though it's trying to put his views in modern terms.

However here's a very well-known quote (it's quoted in a recent Papal Encylcical), from Tractates on the Gospel of John, Tractate 41, section 10:

The first stage of liberty, then, is to be free from crimes [sinful conduct]. And so the Apostle Paul, when he determined on the ordination of either elders or deacons, or whoever was to be ordained to the superintendence of the Church, says not, If any one is without sin; for had he said so, every one would be rejected as unfit, none would be ordained: but he says, “If any one is without crime” [E.V. blame],762 such as, murder, adultery, any un- cleanness of fornication, theft, fraud, sacrilege, and others of that sort. When a man has begun to be free from these (and every Christian man ought to be so), he begins to raise his head to liberty; but that is liberty begun, not completed. Why, says some one, is it not completed liberty? Because, “I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind;” “for what I would,” he says, “that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.” 763 “The flesh,” he says, “lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh; so that ye do not the things that ye would.”764 In part liberty, in part bondage: not yet entire, not yet pure, not yet full liberty, because not yet eternity. For we have still infirmity in part, in part we have attained to liberty. Whatever has been our sin, was previously wiped out in baptism. But because all our iniquity has been blotted out, has there remained no infirmity? If there had not, we should be living here without sin. Yet who would venture to say so, but the proud, but the man unworthy of the Deliverer’s mercy, but he who wishes to be self-deceived, and who is destitute of the truth? Hence, from the fact that some infirmity remains, I venture to say that, in what measure we serve God, we are free; in what measure we serve the law of sin, we are still in bondage. Hence says the apostle, what we began to say, “I delight in the law of God after the inward man.”765 Here then it is, wherein we are free, wherein we delight in the law of God; for liberty has joy. For as long as it is from fear that thou doest what is right, God is no delight to thee. Find thy delight in Him, and thou art free. Fear not punish- ment, but love righteousness. Art thou not yet able to love righteousness? Fear even punish- ment, that thou mayest attain to the love of righteousness.

Actually, you might want to read that whole tractate. See http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf107.pdf, starting on page 378.

Both Jesus and Paul say, in one way or another, that we are either servants of sin or of God. No one is free in the sense of making decisions with no basis for them (at least no one but someone who is insane). But Christians typically speak of sin as holding us in bondage and faith as freeing us. (The best NT citation is probably John 8:32-36, on which the quotation below is based.) Of course, as Paul well knows, in this life we are all double-minded, having been in principle freed from bondage, but not yet perfectly serving God.

What Pelagius believed is that we are not fully in bondage to sin, and thus that God's grace helps us, but doesn't need to free us in the sense that Augustine thinks is needed.

But my original point is that for Augustine, grace is about freeing us from bondage, not about determinism. It may well be that if you combine this concept of grace with other ideas such as providence and omniscience, it's hard to avoid full determinism, but predestination itself is really about saving us, not turning us into robots.

 

[ronathanedwards]

But Augustine didn't believe that God gave grace to every single person to "allow" every individual (prevenient grace) to have the ability to choose good or evil.

Posse Peccare - Posse NON Peccare
AFTER the fall Posse Peccare - NON Posse NON Pecare

AFTER REGENERATION Posse Peccare - Posse Non Peccare
In heaven NON Posse Peccare - Posse Non Peccare

"Nature is commong to all, but not grace."

"Man when he was created received great powers of free will, but lost them by sinning."

"We know that God's grace is not given to all men. To those to whom it is given it is given neither according to the merits of works, nor according to the merits of the will, but by free grace. To those to whom it is not given we know that it is because of God's righteous judgment that it is not given."

There are many more quotes like that from Augustine. What do you think?

 

[hedrick]

But Augustine didn't believe that God gave grace to every single person to "allow" every individual (prevenient grace) to have the ability to choose good or evil.

Posse Peccare - Posse NON Peccare
AFTER the fall Posse Peccare - NON Posse NON Pecare

AFTER REGENERATION Posse Peccare - Posse Non Peccare
In heaven NON Posse Peccare - Posse Non Peccare

"Nature is commong to all, but not grace."

"Man when he was created received great powers of free will, but lost them by sinning."

"We know that God's grace is not given to all men. To those to whom it is given it is given neither according to the merits of works, nor according to the merits of the will, but by free grace. To those to whom it is not given we know that it is because of God's righteous judgment that it is not given."

There are many more quotes like that from Augustine. What do you think?

Augustine certainly believes that God determines who is saved, by giving grace only to some. But that's not the same as turning everyone into robots, which is what I was responding to. Grace allows them to follow Christ. But they do that with their whole heart, mind, and soul, as human beings. This activity of grace does not say that God determines every act that they do.

There are reasons why most people who believe in predestination do think God determines everything that happens, but that has more to do with providence than predestination. And remember that these folks also believe in compatibilism. So they don't think that God works by forcing people to do things, or by bypassing their will. It's probably best to say that God's plan includes everything that happens, but his plan includes and relies on human choice. That's not to remove God's responsibility for the choices, because a person chooses according to their character and the situation around them, and the development of our character and the events around us are all part of the plan. But the plan works through human choice, it doesn't bypass it.

I think it's a mistake to combine grace and providence too much. The two doctrines are consistent, and work together. But the activity of God's grace is a more personal interaction with us. Providence is normally more indirect.

 

[ronathanedwards]

Yes, okay... gotcha, I agree...