Omniscient Research Articles

A DEFENCE OF SKEPTICAL THEISM

According to The Evidentialist problem of Evil, the existence of disproportionate, prima facie gratuitous evil and suffering in the world is enough evidence against the existence of the Omnipotent, Perfectly Loving, Omniscient God of Classical Theism. A contemporary way of dealing with this argument is Skeptical Theism , for which the very fact that there is an huge amount of evil that looks gratuitous to us does not mean that we can reasonably believe whether this evil is indeed gratuitous or not . In this paper, I present and discuss a number of influential criticisms against this view according to which a proponent of Skeptical Theism will be forced to accept a number of unpalatable skeptical conclusions. I argue that this is not the case.

The Aloneness Argument fails

AbstractSchmid and Mullins present what they call ‘the Aloneness Argument’ for the inconsistency of four theses from classical theism: the doctrine of divine simplicity, the doctrine of divine omniscience, the claim that God is free to create or not to create, and the claim that it is possible that God and nothing but God exist. We deny that they have shown an inconsistency between these theses. We maintain that, depending on how certain premises are interpreted, one or another premise is false. We also offer a positive proposal regarding a simple God's knowledge that he is alone in a world where he doesn't create anything.

The Challenge of Evil in Islamic Thought: A Brief Survey

Abstract The challenge of evil to rational Abrahamic religions has clearly been articulated in modern philosophy of religion predicated on the incompatibility of the omnipotence, omnibenevolence, and omniscience of God with the existence of evils. Even within the Islamic theological and philosophical traditions, there is a venerable history of theodicies and defences of a good God and the efficacy of human free will. That is the context in which we wish to locate the contributions in this special issue that examine the ways in which evil is considered in Islamic philosophical accounts (particularly of the Šiʿi traditions) from the classical period to the present.

The Absence of Divine Ideas in the Summa Contra Gentiles

AbstractIn the 20th century, some prominent Thomists questioned whether St. Thomas Aquinas is really committed to a theory of divine ideas. There is no doubt that Aquinas articulates such a theory in his Sentences Commentary, Disputed Questions on Truth, and Summa theologiae. Still, he seems to omit an account of divine ideas in the Summa Contra Gentiles. If St. Thomas thinks divine ideas are necessary for understanding God's knowledge, why would he skip discussing them in this ex professo work? This paper will argue two points. First, St. Thomas does articulate a theory of divine ideas in the Summa Contra Gentiles, even though he changes his terminology. His account of divine reasons (rationes) is equivalent to a theory of divine ideas. Second, Aquinas changes his vocabulary because of the more apologetic aim of the work. Use of the term ‘ideas’ would be less effective in dialogue with his Muslim and pagan interlocutors.

Gregory Boyd Open Theistic Perspective: A Critical Analysis

Gregory Boyd was a major proponent of open theism. He made outstanding and significant contributions to the openness model. Boyd was a pastor and claimed that his view of open theism does not contradict his vocation as a pastor. He rather maintains that the open view has practical theological relevance and agrees more with many Christian practices. The open view came to be known as a challenge to the traditional view of God. The traditional and classical notion of God presupposes a God who has exhaustive, complete and comprehensive knowledge of the future. God in the classical sense is all knowing. But open theism insists that God is omniscient but such omniscient knowledge does not include knowledge of the contingent future. For the open theists, divine foreknowledge is incompatible with human freewill. Boyd claims that he holds the notion of omniscience tenaciously but depending on the type of omniscience that is referred to. But do we have different types of omniscience? From the Biblical texts and from our practical and lived experiences, do we think that the open view is more a plausible model than the traditional view? Does the open view agree with Biblical texts? What is the philosophical implication of the open view? Does the open view actually unburden God with the problem of evil? If the future is open, can God be said to be in control? Gregory Boyd and E. Boyd enunciate their open view which we have analyzed in this study. But their view seems to contradict the basic perspective of the open modelanchored on the freedom of human action. This isdue to their position that God sometimes overrides the freedom of man to achieve his purpose. Also, their claim that they believe in Omniscience while they deny God’s knowledge of the contingent future is implausible because to be omniscient is to know all things.

Counter-Discourse on The Criticism of Ibn Rushd Toward al-Ghazali

Al-Ghazali's intellectuality and capabilities have been recognized worldwide until he was nicknamed H{ujjatul Isla>m. Therefore, if there are people who refute his thinking in many ways, then the refutation needs to be investigated further. In this case, Ibn Rushd rejected and blamed al-Ghazali's criticism of the peculiarities of the philosophers on three things, namely the nature’s immortality, God's knowledge, and physical resurrection. This study aims to find a clear position regarding the controversial discussion between Ibn Rushd and al-Ghazali. Both had different views on these three issues. This qualitative discussion with a critical hermeneutic approach presents various analyzes of the arguments of the two figures, especially concerning Ibn Rushd's criticism toward al-Ghazali. This study resulted in a conclusion that Ibn Rushd's criticism toward al-Ghazali can be said to still have gaps in his argumentation. When Ibn Rushd presented a proposition in the form of verses of the Qur'an, the verse he delivered supported al-Ghazali's opinion if analyzed in more depth, and was cross-checked with other verses.

Pastoral challenges experienced by the Biblical character Job and a brief ‘Theology of Suffering’

In this paper the researcher investigates the pastoral challenges experienced by the biblical character named Job. The main message of the book of Job is the theme of theodicy or why do bad things happen to good people. The central inquiry of theodicy is to clarify how an omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient God allows bad things to transpire in the world and this applies equally to those in anguish or to those observing suffering. In times of suffering, Jews and Christians alike may turn to the Book of Job where God permits Satan to test Job. Satan submits that Job would not adore God if God did not defend him. This research paper also sought to sight challenges encountered by Job with their description and analysis in the light of Job’s faith in God. The research critiques the various pastoral care interventions offered to Job by different characters in this book of Job. Finally the researcher develops a theology of suffering and he focuses on this in the conclusion.

Франсиско Суарес о знании Богом будущих контингентных событий

The problems of contingency, free will, omniscience and omnipotence of God, possible worlds, posed by the famous representative of the second scholasticism, the Spanish philosopher Francisco Suarez (1548–1617) in his work “On God’s knowledge of future contingent events” are discussed in the historical, philosophical and theological context. Suarez (unlike, for example, Spinoza) recognizes the existence of contingent events in the world, shows that the existence of contingent events does not diminish the omnipotence of God. Suarez, following Thomas Aquinas, shows how it is possible to reconcile the existence of free will, the main source of contingency, with the omniscience of God. As Luis Molina, Suarez recognizes God’s knowledge not only of real, but also of possible future. The originality of Suarez manifests itself in solving the question of how God knows possible future events and, accordingly, possible worlds. Attention is paid to the influence of Suarez’s philosophy on the philosophy of modern times, including Descartes and Leibniz. The reader is also offered a translation of the first chapter of the second part of the essay of the Spanish philosopher and theologian Francisco Suarez “On God’s knowledge of future contingent events”, in which Suarez on the basis of the hermeneutics of the Biblical texts proves the thesis about God’s knowledge of future contingent events, which could have happened, but in reality had not happened and will not happen in the future, disproving the arguments of Catholic theologians Ambrogio Catarino Politi (1484–1553) and Jansenius of Ghent (1510–1576), who questioned the assertion that God possesses such knowledge. The translation is provided with comments, an introductory article and a list of references.

Is Human Freedom Compatible with Divine Foreknowledge?

If God is omniscient and exhaustive knowledge of the future is possible, then God knows (and in fact knew a long time ago) what we will do in the future. But is this compatible with our future actions being free? I address this question by responding to an argument that claims that these things are incompatible. At the heart of this incompatibility argument is the idea that God’s past beliefs about our future actions are “accidentally necessary”—can’t be changed—and that this necessity transfers to our actions. I consider four main responses to the argument: Brian Davies’ claim that God’s past beliefs about our future actions are properly characterised as beliefs about what we will freely do; Alvin Plantinga’s view—stemming from the work of William of Ockham—that God’s past beliefs about our future actions aren’t wholly about the past and so aren’t accidentally necessary; Trenton Merricks’ idea that our having a choice about God’s past beliefs doesn’t require us to be able to change the past; and Alfred Freddoso’s claim that the accidental necessity of God’s beliefs doesn’t transfer to our actions. My response, like that of Merricks, focuses on the idea that God’s past beliefs are dependent on, and to be explained in terms of, our future actions; rather than vice versa. I support this view by appealing to the idea that God’s foreknowledge is simple (an idea I defend against several William Hasker—inspired objections). I argue that neither God’s beliefs, nor their accidental necessity, should be thought of as a threat to our freedom; and that in any event, the accidental necessity of God’s beliefs isn’t something that can coherently be thought to transfer to our actions. I conclude that God’s past beliefs about our future actions are perfectly compatible with our freedom.

Assensum in mente prophetae: William of Ockham and Walter Chatton on Prophecies

The subject of this article is the intertwining between Walter Chatton and William of Ockham’s theories about the cognitive nature of prophetic statements, a topic in the theological debate of the early 14th century. Starting from recent interpretations of Chatton and Ockham’s cognitive theory in terms of the distinction between externalism and internalism, and from a reading of some sources where the topic of prophecy is crucial (for Chatton: Reportatio Super Sententias, I, dd. 38-39, the less investigated d. 41 and Quodlibeta, qq. 26-29; for Ockham: Tractatus de praedestinatione et de praescientia Dei respectu futurorum contingentium, q.1 and Quodlibeta, q. 4) we apply the externalism/internalism distinction to the case study of prophetic statements. Starting from epistemological questions about prophecies, future contingents and divine foreknowledge, we’ll show the outcomes as pragmatic rules of this kind of statements in both conceptual frameworks analyzed.

Swedenborg’s Religious Rationalism

This article argues that contrary to a received interpretation, Emanuel Swedenborg’s doctrine of correspondences (scientia correspondentiarum), according to which each empirical reality has a corresponding spiritual reality, is closer to Spinozistic monism than Neoplatonic idealism. According to the former, there is only one substance: God, which we can cognize through its spir­itual and material aspects. According to the latter, the material world consists of substances that receive their form through participation in the ideas of the spiri­tual world. The article will show that although some of Swedenborg’s claims can appear as expressing Neoplatonic idealism, his reading of the Bible as a guide for moral improvement, his rejection of the religious mysteries that cannot be rationally understood, his various examples of correspondences, his view that we can cognize God by studying the correspondences, and his definition of God as the only substance, make evident that he does not consider the spiritual realities ideas in the Neoplatonic sense. The article will interpret Swedenborg to think that the spiritual realities are learned concepts that enable us to describe and experience the world as having spiritual significance and thus acquire a fuller cognition of God.

Confessional Divides, Cross-Confessional Connections, and Jewish Responses: Menasseh ben Israel and Daniel Levi de Barrios on De auxiliis and Dordt

Abstract Studies in the Jewish reception of Christian theological discussions beyond the proper field of polemics are rare and only in their beginnings. Until now, scholars have often argued that Portuguese Jews discussed Christian concepts of divine foreknowledge and human free will because they were either struggling with their own Christian past or sought to help their ‘New Jewish’ coreligionists to turn into reliable members of the Amsterdam Sephardic community. This article uses the example of the Catholic Controversia de auxiliis, and the Protestant fight over Predestination before and after the Synod of Dordt (1618-1619) to argue that Portuguese Jews such as Menasseh ben Israel and Daniel Levi de Barrios recognised the cross-confessional dimension of the Christian debates on divine grace; they used their Iberian background and knowledge to order and explain what they observed; and they displayed their position as outsiders to deconstruct religious boundaries, imagine alternative religious landscapes, and finally re-insert themselves into their newly created religious maps and orders. The argument is based on a close reading of one chapter of the last volume of Menasseh ben Israel’s Conciliador (1651) as well as Daniel Levi de Barrios’s poem Libre Alvedrio y Harmonia del Cuerpo, por disposicion del alma (1680).

The Certaintists

The Certaintists Gary Saul Morson (bio) We see that both deliberation and action are causative withregard to the future, and that, to speak more generally …there is a potentiality in either direction. Such things mayeither be or not be; events also therefore may either takeplace or not take place. … It is therefore plain that it is notof necessity that everything is or takes place; but in someinstances there are real alternatives. —Aristotle, "On Interpretation" "I WAS NOT TO BLAME" For the past ten years, I have been co-teaching a course with Morton Schapiro, a professor of economics and the president of Northwestern University. That course led to a book we wrote, Cents and Sensibility: What Economics Can Learn from the Humanities. We are currently working on a sequel, on what humanists can learn from economics. That book will of course be called: Price and Prejudice. Our course focuses on a theme many disciplines share: the nature of decision-making. Every model of decision-making is implicitly a model of time or, as Mikhail Bakhtin would say, it presupposes a [End Page 575] chronotope, so our course is also about temporality. For decisions and choices to be real, rather than resembling Soviet elections in which voters chose among one candidate, there must be more than one possible outcome. That is why determinists can offer at best a pale, sickly version of choice. By definition, a determinist is someone who believes that at any given moment one and only one thing can happen. Or, as William James phrased the point, for an indeterminist there are more possibilities than actualities and for a determinist there are not.1 Choice, chance, and contingency all demand an indeterminist view of the world. If we do have choices, how do and how should we make them? As we structured the course, disciplines are distinguished by how they answer this question. One can define economics as a discipline about how people choose to allocate scarce resources. Theologians have asked how choice can be real if God foresees what we do and made the world knowing everything that would happen. How then can we be held responsible for our choices? In what sense are they choices (and in what sense are they not choices)? If one substitutes "natural laws" for an omniscient God, the same question arises. Once again everything is determined in advance. As Omar Khayyam wrote, "And the first Morning of Creation wrote / What the last Dawn of Reckoning shall read" (1120, st. 73). Again we can ask whether people can be held responsible for outcomes dictated from all eternity. Realist novels, my own specialty, explore the inner world in which choices are made (or avoided). The concerns of several disciplines appear in Anna Karenina when Stiva, caught by his wife in infidelity, thinks: "It's all my fault—all my fault, but I'm not to blame, that's the whole point of the situation" (Tolstoy 1965, 4). How can it be one's fault (vina) and one not be to blame (vinovat)? What Stiva means is that although the act happened through his choice, there was no other choice that he, a healthy, susceptible thirty-four-yearold man, could have made. It's just nature. When people want to excuse their behavior, they argue they could have done nothing else. Determinism is the first refuge of a scoundrel. Later in the novel Stiva's sister Anna tells Stiva's wife Dolly: "But I was not to blame. And who is to blame? What's the meaning of being to blame? Could it have been otherwise? What do you think? Could it possibly have happened that you didn't become the wife of Stiva?" "Really, I don't know" (Tolstoy 1965, 664) answers Dolly, who recognizes an evasion when she hears one. [End Page 576] THE HOLY GHOST OF ATHEISTS One must understand time to understand choice because every choice involves predictions. The chooser entertains what Bertrand de Jouvenal famously called "futuribles," possible futures that could take place, depending on what we do or do not do. We often have a hazy sense of futuribles, and so we must...

Freedom to Choose Between Good and Evil: Theological Anthropology in Discussion with Philosophy

After a brief discussion of the terms determinism and free will, the paper sets out to compare some recent philosophical approaches to the problem of free will with a theological anthropology account of the notion. It aims to defend the claim, that even though different kind of questions are asked on both sides, they tackle similar issues and a complementary approach is needed. Recent philosophy considers the problem mostly from the standpoint of logic, naturalist evolutionary ontology and cognitive science. In the Christian theological tradition, the idea of free will has been discussed mostly from the perspective of the problem of sin and grace, thus on the grounds of soteriology, hamartiology and theological ethics. The paper shows similarities between the approaches, mainly between the problem of physical determinism and theological determinism and also divine foreknowledge.

«Філософ» і «філософія» в києворуських пам’ятках ХІ–ХIV ст.: історіографія термінологічних та концептуальних інтерпретацій

It remains largely unknown what was knowledge of philosophy by writers in Kyivan Rus’ of the 11th – 14th centuries. Moreover, there are no methodological foundations of resolving the issue. I suggest the key to the solution is the analysis of the meanings of words “philosophy” and “philosophers” in the texts of that time. This article aims to analyse how different researchers interpreted the meanings of these words in Kyivan Rus’ written sources of the 11th – 14th centuries. Use of the word “philosophy” was interpreted by the researchers in six different ways: (1) as an approximate synonym for the word “education” (which was for a long time a prevailing opinion), but also (2) as a pagan or (3) Christian wisdom, (4) as theology, (5) as an allegorical method of interpreting Scripture, and (6) as the knowledge of the nature of things. Some researchers emphasized one of the meanings, but others opted for a “pluralistic approach”, considering that Kyivan writers used the word in different meanings at the same time. The same is true about the word “philosopher”. It referred to an educated man, an ancient philosopher, a Christian thinker, a theologian etc. Another approach in the interpretation of these terms suggested Vilen Horskyi (1931-2007), distinguishing formal and essential properties of words “philosophy” and “philosopher”. He finds that the essential feature of philosophy was deification (theosis), a process whose aim is likeness to God, and cognition of God’s wisdom. Furthermore, according to Horskyi, in the philosopher the link between his knowledge and his action was inextricable.

The Phantom of the Omniscient Leader

The Phantom of the Omniscient Leader

Divine Foreknowledge and Providence

In this paper, we aim to examine the relationships between four solutions to the dilemma of divine foreknowledge and human freedom—theological determinism, Molinism, simple foreknowledge and open theism—and divine providence and theodicy. Some of these solutions—theological determinism and Molinism, in particular—highlight God’s government of the world. Some others—simple foreknowledge and open theism—highlight human autonomy and freedom. In general, the more libertarian human freedom is highlighted, the less God’s government of the history of the world seems possible. However, the task of theodicy becomes easier because humans are fully responsible for the evil they do. Conversely, the more God’s government is highlighted, the more human freedom seems to be restricted. Moreover, God seems to be directly or indirectly responsible for evil in the world. Because of the trade–off between control and freedom, each solution finds itself at ease with some problems, while on other fronts, it must adopt a defensive position. As we will see, no solution can solve all problems; thus, the pros and cons of each solution should be weighed carefully.

Abul-Barakāt al-Baghdādī on Divine Foreknowledge and Human Free Will

The present paper aims to explore the medieval philosopher Abū al-Barakāt al-Baghdādī’s (d. pre- 560 AH/1164-5) position concerning the problem of divine foreknowledge and human free will and argues Abū al-Barakāt to have considered the argument for compatibility between divine foreknowledge and human free will to be invalid. One can defend either divine foreknowledge or human free will; no other solution is available. By examining his accounts on this issue through the logic and metaphysics of his book al-Muʿtabar fi-l-ḥikma, Abū al-Barakāt defense of human free will shall become evident.

On the incompatibility of God's knowledge of particulars and the doctrine of divine immutability: towards a reform in Islamic theology

AbstractAffirming that divine knowledge of occurrent changes among particulars is incompatible with the doctrine of divine immutability, this article seeks to resolve this tension by denying the latter. Reviewing this long-running debate, I first formalize the exchange between al-Ghazālī and Avicenna on this topic, and then set out the ways in which contemporary Sadrāean philosophers have tried to resolve the incompatibility. I argue that none of the cited Sadrāean attempts to resolve the incompatibility between divine omniscience and immutability is successful. Then, by reference to certain principles drawn from Shia theology, I indicate how one might seek to reject the dogma of divine immutability. I conclude that by emancipating ourselves from that dogma, new horizons could be opened for Islamic philosophy, free from traditional Hellenistic constraints.

THE TACIT CURRICULUM: UNEXPLORED OPPORTUNITY OR APPARENT CHALLENGE IN NURTURING RESILIENCE AND TRUST IN GOD’S SUPERNATURAL POWER AMONG YOUTH?

This article investigated on the role played by the unseen curriculum in developing resilience and real honor for God among youth to help them holistically define their way of life and aspirations amid numerous life challenges. Since time immemorial significant attention has been directed towards the official curricular, but the role played by the veiled curriculum in nurturing young people to endure predicaments and genuinely trust in God’s supernatural power has barely featured in many schooling discourses. This means a good number of Christians are burdened by how best they can inspire young people to trust in the omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent Creator of the universe but very few, if any, ever think about how the veiled curriculum, can hinder or facilitate young people’s development of resilience and trust in God. In this article the meaning of the concept unstated curriculum and its influences on nurturing resilience and teaching about God’s supernatural power—which when invoked in faith causes the kingdom of darkness to tremble, are discussed. The research employed a phenomenological design, guided by an interview guide with 12 open-ended items followed by extensive probing questions. Two experts examined the interview guide items to determine their clarity, but the researcher also conducted a pilot study among 3 participants (one lecturer and two students) to determine participants’ level of understanding of the interview guide items. The results from the research indicated a remarkable connection between hidden curriculum aspects and young people’s resilience and their grasp of how deep, wide, and high God’s power is in overcoming life challenges. Article visualizations: