Free will, and original sin --a discussion continued

Mark Quayle · Jan 2, 2020

Clete said:
Your implication here is that he is doing what God says against his will but that isn't what Calvinism teaches!

What God says against whose will? I was not saying that Satan does what God says against Satan's will, (though I will say that if God tells Satan specifically, to do some specific thing, or to not do something, Satan is bound to do whatever God says.)

Clete said:
It isn't merely his actions that God predestined, every thought in his head. Read the quote again!...

“The devil, and the whole train of the ungodly, are in all directions, held in by the hand of God as with a bridle, so that they can neither conceive any mischief, nor plan what they have conceived, nor how muchsoever they may have planned, move a single finger to perpetrate, unless in so far as he permits, nay unless in so far as he commands, that they are not only bound by his fetters but are even forced to do him service” (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 17, Paragraph 11)

Notice, above, his use of "command". Maybe there is your main indigestion. He is not referring to moral commandment, his law. He is referring to decree, or maybe even God's particular decree concerning Satan alone at that particular point. Satan WILL comply precisely with what God has made him do or not do. Yet he does choose to do it.

I'm having a real hard time understanding your logic. You claim that God predestining means no free will. AGAIN --If you are influenced, biased, genetically predisposed, whatever, you will do what you do. Do you honestly think you will do what you don't want to do? Of course you will do some things you would rather not do --that isn't what I'm talking about-- you will do what you want, even if that means going against what you might call your natural inclinations. (If you want, for example, to love your neighbor, you might choose to not beat up that guy who desperately deserves it.) Adding God to those influences --even saying that he Causes those influences-- doesn't change the effect of those influences one whit.

You will insist that you 'could have' done the other choice; but you really cannot prove this. You do indeed choose, but to declare that any other thing can happen is not in your purview. But you don't stop with, 'It could have happened' --you say the other option had equal chance of happening-- something you really do not know; it only seems that way to you, because you considered options. Only when God says that a thing could have happened, do we know that there was an actual possibility --no, even then, it may be said that he is speaking to us according to our worldview (he can do that without lying).

You keep showing your view, that God only wills so much, and depends on us for the rest. I'm sorry, but that is not Omnipotence. He may cause us to will the rest, but it makes no sense to think humanity is not a pawn in his game.

Clete said:
I will no doubt read the conversation to be what the words of the text indicate it to be, which is that God asked a question and someone answered it and God liked the answer and commanded it to be done. It's a really clear passage that even small children could understand. You have to be a Calvinist to misunderstand it.

You say "it is not said to be so". Why? Because you say so?

The only reason you say so is because it conflicts with your doctrine!

No, Clete. You may think God would be lying to "speak according to our ignorance". One of the best refutations of those who claim the Biblical God was ignorant of the facts, therefore at least not omniscient, since he was speaking as though he was as ignorant as those to whom he was speaking, (as though we have the real facts nowadays, anyhow, haha), is that God can speak according to the worldview of his audience, and it is not lying to do so. Likewise, regardless of how a child, or you, take a thing, there is usually a lot more to an event than what is written about it.

On top of that, I find it astonishing to hear you actually believe you can read and interpret without bias. I claim no such thing concerning myself.

JAL said:
He owes us nothing if we legitimately fell via libertarian freedom (as my theory of Adam allows). But as for your deterministic system: Clete's post 497 and his post 502 are excellent rebuttals here.

(Sigh). Yes, for the 32-bi-zillionth time, we are dead in sin. We have a sinful nature. The question is WHY do we have a sinful nature? For deterministic reasons?

P.S. And as for your repeated assumption that man and God are metaphysically different, just bear in mind that's a purely philosophical conclusion without clear biblical support. At least that fact should give one pause. And since this puts us on the topic of philosophy, recall that Occam's Razor is a very solid principle of rational thinking. Occam's Razor holds that the simplest possible solution is probably the correct one. Thus for example, I outlined earlier how the 26 apparent contradictions still unresolved in Reformed thinking can EASILY be resolved by moving from a multi-metaphysics to a simple uniform metaphysics. This success is precisely what Occam's Razor predicts.

I remind you of what I said before: Your 26 contradictions are all wiped clear by the fact that they are the result of your mistaken worldview. They do not contradict Scripture, nor the other tenets of Reformed Theology, except if you accept as fact that free will means x,y,z contrary to Scripture.

We have a sinful nature because God willed it to be so. That does not mean that he is to blame, nor that we are not delighted participants in our own sin. We are not innocent victims here.

Clete said:
What's so bad about the idea of God learning about the future?

Genesis 18:21
I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”

Genesis 22:12
And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”

Four thoughts here: 1. Even your theory of God knowing all by virtue of foreseeing denies what you are saying here --if he foresees, then he need not go down and learn, he need not test Abraham to find out. (I speak here, according to your logic, not mine, that if God causes all things, then he need not put us through all this temporal mess.) 2. As I have said, God can speak according to our worldview, and do so without lying. 3. The words "see" and "know" are not the same in Hebrew (nor Greek for that matter) as we take them in today's English. The sense here is much like the current legal use of "find". The context is testing; the words relate to "proving", and perhaps even to knowing intimately --not learning. 4. God can be saying, "Now I have demonstrated that you fear God", or even, "Now I have caused, (taught, trained) you to fear God." This interaction is much like prayer, where we learn more about God, than he does about what we want or think.

Clete said:
Mark: "Again, God causing what he does is nothing like us causing what we do."

I seriously cannot understand how it is even possible for a grown man who understands the English language to write such an insane sentence!

Where in you doctrine is there room for such a distinction between what God causes and what we cause?
At the very least you must believe that everything in the later category is included in the former! Calvinism teaches that everything is caused by God's own command! That whatever happens does so as a result of not only God's will but because He commands it to be. It isn't just "the Devil and the whole train of the ungodly", it's every single event that happens anywhere at any time. There is no "us causing what we do", according to Calvinism!

Mark: "He is not like us --we are like him, only not very much."

Again, I am simply stunned that any adult human being is capable of letting something this silly escape their lips. If we are like Him then His is like us, by definition! Not in every way, of course, but we are created in His image for the express purpose of relating to Him and more than that, actually loving Him and being loved by Him. Your doctrine has God so totally transcendent as to be completely unrelatable in any meaningful way. You don't believe that even the way God's thinks is anything we can hope to understand or relate to. You believe that God being arbitrary is Him be just. You think that God creating human beings for no reason at all other than to punish them is somehow God being kind. You think that the God of Love is somehow incapable of being moved by love (impassibility). It's complete utter nonsense that is born not out of scripture but out of the mind of a homosexual pagan Greek philosopher.

Insane sentence? Ha. I was using a bit of poetic hyperbole, perhaps. Yes there are many ways our causing is like his causing, and vice versa. I wasn't denying that. But the "place" from which he causes, is not like the "place" from which we cause, any more than he is like us. Again, I am not saying he doesn't have similarities to us and vice versa. I am saying there is no contest --to describe him is not to refer to us. He is Creator, we are created. We are made in his image --therefore we are incomplete beings without him, incapable of the free will you claim, apart from him; and with him, possessed of free will only according to his will and enabling, his work. (See John 17 concerning the one-ness of God and his Son).

You say that I think God is arbitrary? That is your word, not mine. How, by any stretch, can God making a choice be said to be made arbitrarily? He made the whole of Creation for a purpose, and each choice that we might conceive of as being subsequent to that Creation is hardly Arbitrary!!! There is only one thing that happens with "each step" (as we might consider them) and they are accomplished perfectly. He uses no plan B.

You want a tame God, who kisses the rosy hind parts of blessed free will. You want independence from God, who doesn't stint in his giving of the indwelling Spirit, from whom are all the virtues of the saved --faith, love, obedience. There is no such independence for the regenerated that we should come up with faith, love and obedience on our own. And as for the lost, they are DEAD in their sin. You want to make God a fellow living soul, as if he was one of us, rather than the giver of life.

I feel like I can almost predict your responses. Don't bother. After all this time, it has become apparent we are getting nowhere. I am sorry for that.

JAL · Jan 2, 2020

Mark Quayle said:
Your 26 contradictions are all wiped clear...

No point in reading the rest of this garbage statement. These issues are not resolved and deserve to be resolved individually. This is mere hand-waving. Don't pretend to have addressed issues as yet even unmentioned by you, except during this kind of hand-waving.

They do not contradict Scripture

Actually many of them do, but that's not even the primary objection. The primary objection is internal self-contradiction. You say I'm starting with the wrong world view. Obviously you're not paying attention - the actual claim is that if we START with the Reformed assumptions, their doctrines are mutually conflicting. For example if we start with the Reformed assumption of omnipresence defined as plenal Presence, it contradicts the Reformed assumption of outpourings (outpourings are also called The Procession of the Holy Spirit from the throne). Or if we start with the Reformed assumption of immutability, it contradicts the idea that God became man.
Or if we start with the Reformed assumption of foreknowledge, it contradicts divine freedom.

And that's only 3 examples. I listed 26 - and that list didn't even include (27) the problems with the Reformed doctrine of Sola Scriptura and (28) the problems with the Reformed doctrine of Adam. If you can LEGITIMATELY resolve these 28 issues, then do so one by one. Instead you insult me with your random hand-waving. That's disrespectful and intellectually dishonest.

Mark Quayle · Jan 2, 2020

JAL said:
In other words you think there are two possible disservices here:
(1) Presenting Him as more kind, honest, and fair than He actually is.
(2) Presenting Him as an evil, dishonest monster when He is in fact perfectly kind and honest.
I'm surprised you think #1 is a major cause for worry. I'd be a bit more concerned about #2.

(Sigh) As I made clear about 400 posts back, and several times since then, I do not deny election and predestination. The problem is that you're only willing to consider the REFORMED version/theory of predestination. This is a tunnel-vision that presumes itself an infallible interpreter of Scripture.

He owes us nothing if we legitimately fell via libertarian freedom (as my theory of Adam allows). But as for your deterministic system: Clete's post 497 and his post 502 are excellent rebuttals here.

(Sigh). Yes, for the 32-bi-zillionth time, we are dead in sin. We have a sinful nature. The question is WHY do we have a sinful nature? For deterministic reasons?

P.S. And as for your repeated assumption that man and God are metaphysically different, just bear in mind that's a purely philosophical conclusion without clear biblical support. At least that fact should give one pause. And since this puts us on the topic of philosophy, recall that Occam's Razor is a very solid principle of rational thinking. Occam's Razor holds that the simplest possible solution is probably the correct one. Thus for example, I outlined earlier how the 26 apparent contradictions still unresolved in Reformed thinking can EASILY be resolved by moving from a multi-metaphysics to a simple uniform metaphysics. This success is precisely what Occam's Razor predicts.

Wow, Ok, enough of your continued misrepresentations of what I think. This conversation is going nowhere. I am sorry I have been unable to get through to you what I do believe, but so for your returning it back to me in your words has been a total fail. Good day to you, nonetheless.

Mark Quayle · Jan 2, 2020

JAL said:
No point in reading the rest of this garbage statement. These issues are not resolved and deserve to be resolved individually. This is mere hand-waving. Don't pretend to have addressed issues as yet even unmentioned by you, except during this kind of hand-waving.

Actually many of them do, but that's not even the primary objection. The primary objection is internal self-contradiction. You say I'm starting with the wrong world view. Obviously you're not paying attention - the actual claim is that if we START with the Reformed assumptions, their doctrines are mutually conflicting. For example if we start with the Reformed assumption of omnipresence defined as plenal Presence, it contradicts the Reformed assumption of outpourings (outpourings are also called The Procession of the Holy Spirit from the throne). Or if we start with the Reformed assumption of immutability, it contradicts the idea that God became man.
Or if we start with the Reformed assumption of foreknowledge, it contradicts divine freedom.

And that's only 3 examples. I listed 26 - and that list didn't even include (27) the problems with the Reformed doctrine of Sola Scriptura and (28) the problems with the Reformed doctrine of Adam. If you can LEGITIMATELY resolve these 28 issues, then do so one by one. Instead you insult me with your random hand-waving. That's disrespectful and intellectually dishonest.

Good day to you sir. I am done with your misinterpreting and misrepresenting what I say. I am sorry I can't get it through to you.

As Bilbo Baggins says, Good Day!

JAL · Jan 2, 2020

Mark Quayle said:
Good day to you sir. I am done with your misinterpreting and misrepresenting what I say. I am sorry I can't get it through to you.

As Bilbo Baggins says, Good Day!

As expected. No resolution of 28 issues - because you don't have any solution.

Clete · Jan 2, 2020

Mark Quayle said:
What God says against whose will? I was not saying that Satan does what God says against Satan's will, (though I will say that if God tells Satan specifically, to do some specific thing, or to not do something, Satan is bound to do whatever God says.)

Notice, above, his use of "command". Maybe there is your main indigestion. He is not referring to moral commandment, his law. He is referring to decree, or maybe even God's particular decree concerning Satan alone at that particular point. Satan WILL comply precisely with what God has made him do or not do. Yet he does choose to do it.

I'm having a real hard time understanding your logic. You claim that God predestining means no free will. AGAIN --If you are influenced, biased, genetically predisposed, whatever, you will do what you do. Do you honestly think you will do what you don't want to do? Of course you will do some things you would rather not do --that isn't what I'm talking about-- you will do what you want, even if that means going against what you might call your natural inclinations. (If you want, for example, to love your neighbor, you might choose to not beat up that guy who desperately deserves it.) Adding God to those influences --even saying that he Causes those influences-- doesn't change the effect of those influences one whit.

You will insist that you 'could have' done the other choice; but you really cannot prove this. You do indeed choose, but to declare that any other thing can happen is not in your purview. But you don't stop with, 'It could have happened' --you say the other option had equal chance of happening-- something you really do not know; it only seems that way to you, because you considered options. Only when God says that a thing could have happened, do we know that there was an actual possibility --no, even then, it may be said that he is speaking to us according to our worldview (he can do that without lying).

You keep showing your view, that God only wills so much, and depends on us for the rest. I'm sorry, but that is not Omnipotence. He may cause us to will the rest, but it makes no sense to think humanity is not a pawn in his game.

No, Clete. You may think God would be lying to "speak according to our ignorance". One of the best refutations of those who claim the Biblical God was ignorant of the facts, therefore at least not omniscient, since he was speaking as though he was as ignorant as those to whom he was speaking, (as though we have the real facts nowadays, anyhow, haha), is that God can speak according to the worldview of his audience, and it is not lying to do so. Likewise, regardless of how a child, or you, take a thing, there is usually a lot more to an event than what is written about it.

On top of that, I find it astonishing to hear you actually believe you can read and interpret without bias. I claim no such thing concerning myself.

I remind you of what I said before: Your 26 contradictions are all wiped clear by the fact that they are the result of your mistaken worldview. They do not contradict Scripture, nor the other tenets of Reformed Theology, except if you accept as fact that free will means x,y,z contrary to Scripture.

We have a sinful nature because God willed it to be so. That does not mean that he is to blame, nor that we are not delighted participants in our own sin. We are not innocent victims here.

Four thoughts here: 1. Even your theory of God knowing all by virtue of foreseeing denies what you are saying here --if he foresees, then he need not go down and learn, he need not test Abraham to find out. (I speak here, according to your logic, not mine, that if God causes all things, then he need not put us through all this temporal mess.) 2. As I have said, God can speak according to our worldview, and do so without lying. 3. The words "see" and "know" are not the same in Hebrew (nor Greek for that matter) as we take them in today's English. The sense here is much like the current legal use of "find". The context is testing; the words relate to "proving", and perhaps even to knowing intimately --not learning. 4. God can be saying, "Now I have demonstrated that you fear God", or even, "Now I have caused, (taught, trained) you to fear God." This interaction is much like prayer, where we learn more about God, than he does about what we want or think.

Insane sentence? Ha. I was using a bit of poetic hyperbole, perhaps. Yes there are many ways our causing is like his causing, and vice versa. I wasn't denying that. But the "place" from which he causes, is not like the "place" from which we cause, any more than he is like us. Again, I am not saying he doesn't have similarities to us and vice versa. I am saying there is no contest --to describe him is not to refer to us. He is Creator, we are created. We are made in his image --therefore we are incomplete beings without him, incapable of the free will you claim, apart from him; and with him, possessed of free will only according to his will and enabling, his work. (See John 17 concerning the one-ness of God and his Son).

You say that I think God is arbitrary? That is your word, not mine. How, by any stretch, can God making a choice be said to be made arbitrarily? He made the whole of Creation for a purpose, and each choice that we might conceive of as being subsequent to that Creation is hardly Arbitrary!!! There is only one thing that happens with "each step" (as we might consider them) and they are accomplished perfectly. He uses no plan B.

You want a tame God, who kisses the rosy hind parts of blessed free will. You want independence from God, who doesn't stint in his giving of the indwelling Spirit, from whom are all the virtues of the saved --faith, love, obedience. There is no such independence for the regenerated that we should come up with faith, love and obedience on our own. And as for the lost, they are DEAD in their sin. You want to make God a fellow living soul, as if he was one of us, rather than the giver of life.

I feel like I can almost predict your responses. Don't bother. After all this time, it has become apparent we are getting nowhere. I am sorry for that.

You could have saved yourself a lot of typing if you had simply said...

"Hey Clete! Your arguments against Calvinism are all wrong because Calvinism is true."

That's what this entire post amounts to.

JAL · Jan 2, 2020

Once again you argue that free will makes no sense because you say, we all do whatever our nature wants to do:

Mark Quayle said:
AGAIN --If you are influenced, biased, genetically predisposed, whatever, you will do what you do. Do you honestly think you will do what you don't want to do? Of course you will do some things you would rather not do --that isn't what I'm talking about-- you will do what you want, even if that means going against what you might call your natural inclinations. (If you want, for example, to love your neighbor, you might choose to not beat up that guy who desperately deserves it.) Adding God to those influences --even saying that he Causes those influences-- doesn't change the effect of those influences one whit.

You will insist that you 'could have' done the other choice; but you really cannot prove this. You do indeed choose, but to declare that any other thing can happen is not in your purview.

But as pointed out before, if freedom is incoherent, then divine freedom is incoherent as well. And each time you replied that God is the exception because He is somehow (metaphysically) "different" than man.

But the focus here isn't the difference, if any, between God and man, but rather on the nature of freedom. If freedom is an incoherent concept, that should be the case for any moral agent whether man, God, or angels. Basically your whole position is an argument from special pleading - whenever you get charged with a contradiction you call for exceptions to the rules, exceptions that favor Calvinism. Therefore I once again have to agree with Clete's assessment that your "debating" boils down to:

Your arguments against Calvinism are all wrong because Calvinism is true."

WebersHome · Jan 7, 2020

.
FAQ: According to Jer 31:29-30 and Ezek 18:20, the father's guilt is not laid to the account of his posterity for the evil he has done. So then, how was it legal for God to condemn the entire human race to death for what Adam did?

A: According to Deut 5:1-3, Rom 4:15, Rom 5:13, and Gal 3:17, the laws of God do not have ex post facto jurisdiction; viz: they aren't retroactive. So at the time of the forbidden fruit incident, God was at liberty to impute the guilt of Adam's transgression to his entire posterity, which of course began with Eve seeing as how according to Gen 2:21-23, her flesh and bones were made of his flesh and bones. In effect; Eve was Adam's first child; and from her came everyone else. (Gen 3:20)
_

JAL · Jan 7, 2020

WebersHome said:
.
FAQ: According to Jer 31:29-30 and Ezek 18:20, the father's guilt is not laid to the account of his posterity for the evil he has done. So then, how was it legal for God to condemn the entire human race to death for what Adam did?

A: According to Deut 5:1-3, Rom 4:15, Rom 5:13, and Gal 3:17, the laws of God do not have ex post facto jurisdiction; viz: they aren't retroactive. So at the time of the forbidden fruit incident, God was at liberty to impute the guilt of Adam's transgression to his entire posterity, which of course began with Eve seeing as how according to Gen 2:21-23, her flesh and bones were made of his flesh and bones. In effect; Eve was Adam's first child; and from her came everyone else. (Gen 3:20)
_

Ezek 18 isn't a 'law'. Meaning, it isn't expressing a circumstantial law, a regulation whose particulars can vary with changing circumstances. It rather articulates the definition of justice - only the soul who sinned should die. This is the very nature of justice known to all of us even apart from the Bible. Therefore if you say there was a time when God deviated from that definition, it would mean He was an unjust God during that period.

WebersHome · Jan 8, 2020

.

JAL said:
Therefore if you say there was a time when God deviated from that definition, it would mean He was an unjust God during that period.

To the human mind; God does lots of "unjust" things; like for instance condemning Adam's entire posterity to death for something they didn't do.

Another (to the human mind) is sending one man to his death to atone for the sins of the entire world when justice demands that each atone for themselves instead. (Jer 31:29-30 and Ezek 18:20)
_

JAL · Jan 8, 2020

WebersHome said:
.
To the human mind; God does lots of "unjust" things; like for instance condemning Adam's entire posterity to death for something they didn't do.

God did no such thing.

Another (to the human mind) is sending one man to his death to atone for the sins of the entire world when justice demands that each atone for themselves instead. (Jer 31:29-30 and Ezek 18:20)
_

Incorrect. Atonement fits perfectly well within the human concept of justice, as long as it is freely volunteered. For example suppose your son has a speeding ticket. You pay it off, using the money you earned by shedding your own blood, sweat, and tears to earn that paycheck. You've literally shed your own blood to atone for the sins of your son.

If God and man had different concepts of justice, love, kindness, etc, we'd have no eternal hope.

WebersHome · Jan 8, 2020

.

JAL said:
For example suppose your son has a speeding ticket. You pay it off, using the money you earned by shedding your own blood, sweat, and tears to earn that paycheck. You've literally shed your own blood to atone for the sins of your son.

I might literally shed my blood to earn my son's fine, but in order to satisfy God; I'd have to literally die too because blood alone isn't enough. A sin atonement has to give not only it's blood, but also its life because the soul that sins; it shall die. (Ezek 18:20, Jer 31:29-30, Rom 6:23, Rev 20:11-15)

And besides: your scheme doesn't work with felonies like grand theft auto, rape, kidnapping, arson, first degree murder, assault with a deadly weapon, et al. There are no fines that I know of for those crimes; only prison and/or death row. No matter how much blood, sweat, and tears you shed to earn your pay, it would be worthless in court except maybe to hire a defense attorney.

Now if perchance the judge were a crook, and/or you had solid mob connections; perchance you could buy your son's way out of his felony crimes, but you could never earn enough to buy his way out of answering to God, nor could you take his place in the lake of brimstone where losers are on track to be terminated by a mode of death akin to a foundry worker falling into a kettle of molten iron.
_

JAL · Jan 8, 2020

WebersHome said:
.
I might literally shed my blood to earn my son's fine, but in order to satisfy God; I'd have to literally die too because blood alone isn't enough. A sin atonement has to give not only it's blood, but also its life because the soul that sins; it shall die. (Ezek 18:20, Jer 31:29-30, Rom 6:23, Rev 20:11-15)

You're actually oversimplifying it. Technically speaking, death isn't really what atones. Think about it. For Christ, the moment of actual death is when - His suffering STOPPED !!!!! That was the easy part !!!! It's actually everything EXCEPT death which atones! I stand by what I said.

And besides: your scheme doesn't work with felonies like grand theft auto, rape, kidnapping, arson, first degree murder, assault with a deadly weapon, et al. There are no fines that I know of for those crimes; only prison and/or death row. No matter how much blood, sweat, and tears you shed to earn your pay, it would be worthless in court except maybe to hire a defense attorney.

Now if perchance the judge were a crook, and/or you had solid mob connections; perchance you could buy your son's way out of his felony crimes, but you could never earn enough to buy his way out of answering to God, nor could you take his place in the lake of brimstone where losers are on track to be terminated by a mode of death akin to a foundry worker falling into a kettle of molten iron.
_

Human justice systems are imperfect. You're wasting your time drawing inferences from them.
I was merely illustrating, by the speeding ticket, that all men believe in the CONCEPT of atonement. This is in rebuttal of some atheists, for example, who claim that atonement is not a valid concept.

Free will, and original sin --a discussion continued

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