John Loftus is going to tell us what’s wrong with Calvinism.
http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2006/02/calvinistic-problems.html#links
“I've separated the following paragraphs from the previous post below in order to highlight specific problems for Calvinistic Christians.”
Brace yourselves for this spine-tingling exposé!
“There is a huge divide among evangelicals themselves over this whole issue (this is the case in point for my previous post). If God is sovereign as Calvinists claim, then he can do pretty much anything he wants to with a complete and total disregard for decency and morality.”
Calvinism has never said that God can do anything he pleases with complete and total disregard for decency and morality. This is a straw-man argument.
Here’s a question I have for Loftus: give us some verbatim quotes, along with page references, to some leading Reformed theologians who have made this claim.
“I charge this kind of God as showing partiality by revealing himself to some people but not to others (even though he forbids us to show partiality--James 2).”
This is incompetent. James has reference to the rich discriminating against the poor. It is not a general prohibition against all forms of partiality.
Indeed, the Bible prescribes certain forms of partiality. For example, a married man is supposed to be partial to his wife to the exclusion of other women.
“I think this kind of God is barbaric, since he lies to us (telling us he wants us to do one thing but secretly “causing” us to do something else).”
a) If God is lying to us, then how would Loftus be in a position to know that God is lying to us?
He’s not alluding the Bible, is he? For if God is a liar, then God is lying to us in the Bible, in which case Loftus can’t cite anything from Scripture to prove his point since the Bible isn’t true, right?
b) A playwright may script a villain to highly the true character of villainy.
“He doesn't abide by his own ethical obligations laid out in the Bible (whereby he can virtually violate all ten commandments and still demand worship as a holy God.”
i) Really? Which of the Ten Commandments has God broken?
Does God worship false gods? No
Does God take his name in vain? No.
Does God dishonor his father and mother? No, since he has no father and mother.
Does God commit murder? No.
Does God commit adultery? No.
Does God steal? No. He owns everything.
Does God commit perjury in the courtroom? No.
Does God covet his neighbor’s house or wife or livestock or domestic servants? No.
More to the point, none of the Ten Commandments is applicable to God since they are adapted to human frailties and temptations.
You know, a halfway intelligent critic would first read through the Decalogue for himself and ask these questions before he posted such a statement on the World Wide Web.
Perhaps, though, Loftus is really a double agent who pretends to be an apostate in order to damage the cause of atheism by so badly representing the cause of infidelity.
If so, I’d advise my fellow believers in the Christian blogosphere not to blow his cover in this delicate operation. Let us commend him for going under cover in order to infiltrate the dark side from within.
ii) God is not more bound to follow all the precepts he imposes on his creatures any more than a human father is bound to follow all the rules he has made for his little kids.
If I tell my two-year old not to play with matches, does that mean that I can’t use matches? If I tell my two-year old not to cross the street all by himself, does that mean that I can’t cross the street all by myself?
“And he condemns people to hell simply because it brings him more glory (if, however, he can control our free willed choices, then why didn't he make us all obey in the first place)?”
No, he condemns people to hell for two reasons:
i) They are sinners, deserving of hell;
ii) Knowing God is the highest good because God is the highest good. By foreordaining the fall, God reveals his attributes of mercy and justice to the elect by extending mercy to the elect and exacting justice on the reprobate.
“Suffice it to say that if Calvinism is true, then God cannot be a good God because he decrees all of the evil we experience in human history. All of it.”
A non-sequitur. God decrees evil as a means to a higher end—a second-order good.
“No belief in “God’s inscrutable ways” can absolve God of this guilt.”
Nothing can absolve God of responsibility, but responsibility and culpability are two very different things.
“Evangelical and Open Theist Clark Pinnock responded to such a theology with these words: ‘One need not wonder why people become atheists when faced with such a theology. A God like that has a great deal for which to answer.’”
Pinnock is another apostate, and there is some truth in what he says. A man may well be a nominal believer, like Hick or Pinnock, until he comes face-to-face with a full-strength version of Christian theology.
And that confrontation may, in turn, force him to either become a real Christian, or drop the pose.
The more he talks, the easier it is to see why Loftus lost his faith, since he has so little faith to lose.
He invariably raises the most shallow, impressionistic objections to the faith, exactly matching his paper-thin grasp of the faith.
in case you readers want to read another critique: http://presstheantithesis.blogspot.com/2006/02/debunking-john-w-loftus.html
ReplyDeleteJL: No one should ever impose a morality on another person who does not have to live that same moral life, except when the morals imposed are done so for the protection of the ones who must live under those morals.
ReplyDeletePM: Who says John. Where did you get this standard? Did you just make it up?
Why then, is it that forbidding us to lie, to steal, to cheat and to murder are merely for our own protection, whereas God may freely do these things and decree that people do these things?
ReplyDeleteThis is another incompetent argument. Surely, you can't be that obtuse, man. Who says that God may freely do these things?
How is God free to commit idolatry? He is the only true God and He always acts for His own glory already.
How can God take His name in vain? It is His name to use as He wishes.
How can God dishonor father and mother? He has neither.
How can God commit murder? Life is His to give and take, and when He takes a life, He takes the life of a guilty sinner that deserves to die.
How can God commit adultery? He transcends gender and is spirit.
How can God steal or covet that which is not his? He owns everything already.
How can God commit perjury in a courtroom? He is the judge and the ground of truth itself.
See, John, basic thinking.
God foreordains people do these things, and when they do, they do not do so because they love God and know Him. They do so hating God or for selfish motives. You're conflating first and second order goods, a basic level confusion.
"Thou Shalt not lie" is merely compared by me to the sovereign decrees that people should lie. This is a consistency problem.
Not at all, the law is not given to tell man what He can do but what He should do and to show him that He can't do it. When men withhold the truth from whom it is due and perjure themselves in court, do they do so because they love God and desire to serve Him? No. Herein is where the sovereign will of God, the moral will of God, and the nature of men intersect. Men do not know what God knows, and, when they lie, they do so according to their natures as second causes. They want to do what they do, and they do not lie out of a love for God. Ergo, they act for their own glory and not their own, and fail to comply with the first order good. This is what renders their act morally blameworthy.
I'd add that you are conflating responsibiltiy and blame. Responsibility is a necessary but insufficient condition for moral blame. Moral blame requires a moral intent. What is in men's hearts when they break the Decalogue?
This command you name is given for what reason? To show that men have the ability to comply? One can adduce a sum total of zero about ability from a command. God gave the Law to expose sin and increase the consciousness of our inability to keep the Law so we would know we are condemned sinners and without excuse for our sins. The Law’s purpose is to show us that we do not have the ability to keep it, not to show us our ability to keep it. “The Law came in so that transgression might increase.” (Rom.6:20a).
The Law is good, but it is our love of evil that keeps us from keeping it. “By the works of the Law, shall no flesh be justified.” (Rom.3:20, Gal.2:16). If men have the ability to keep the Law, then there are two ways of salvation: works and grace. Such an idea ultimately negates the need for the gospel itself. Paul specifically calls such a thing an anathema in Galatians.
The Law cannot justify because of the weakness of the flesh (Romans 8:3). Paul tells us more about exactly what makes the flesh weak. Romans 8:5-8; For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
Your objection is irrational. Nothing can be deduced about abilities from a command. One can command someone to do something to show them their inability and increase their guilt. Remember, the reason that men cannot obey is moral. They cannot obey, because, by nature, they do not want to obey.