The Body Argument, the Problem of Evil, and Panentheism

"The Body Argument, the Problem of Evil, and Panentheism"

Retreating into pious nonsense

I'll comment on this post:

https://philosophyandtheism.wordpress.com/2014/07/08/god-in-time-yes-temporal-god-no/

God is in time because there is no time unless God is in it.

Unfortunately, Shannon gives the reader no reason to agree with that claim, on its own terms. It's just a tendentious slogan. 

At best, he shifts gears to a different argument:

That’s a little Vos-Van Til talk, but we could infer the same from omnipresence and eternity. Eternity does not mean that God as God cannot touch temporality (again, unless you are entangled in Thomistic simplicism; but then you have created your own problems). It means that he fills all time, just as omnipresence doesn’t mean that God cannot be in places (spatially located); it means that he fills all places. This is an unbiblical non sequitur: He fills all time, therefore he cannot be in time. So is this: He fills all space, therefore he cannot be in a place.

It doesn't even occur to Shannon that his comparison might backfire: just as omnipresence doesn't mean God literally fills space, eternity doesn't mean God literally fills time. Shannon doesn't anticipate that move, or give the reader reason to deny it. 

So if we affirm, say, omnipresence, what then is condescension (which the divines worked into the confession—WCF 7.1)? If God fills all space, what does it mean that he ‘comes down’? To where does he come down? Well, to the top of Mt. Sinai (Ex 19), for example—even though being omnipresent, he was already there. He ‘comes down’ to covenant with Israel. Mt. Sinai is a particular place; and Ex 19 records the Lord’s presence there at a particular time. And so: if God fills all time, we may say that he condescends in order to covenant with his people at Mt. Sinai, at that time. The Lord speaks to Moses, then and there. 

That's a theophany or angelophany. A manifestation of God's presence. A manifestation is the effect of something else, and not the thing itself. 

Take a hologram. I could see and hear your holographic presence in my living room, but that doesn't mean you are physically present in my living room. It's a concrete representation. 

In principle, I might be dead by the time you receive the hologram. In that event, not only am I not actually in your living room, I'm not even offsite. 

And this presence of God with his people is no innovation; it is the telos of covenant history:

“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.” Rev 21:3 

That presumably alludes to Christ dwelling with his people. That involves the communication of attributes. The usual Reformed construction is that what's said of each nature can be said of the person, but what's said of one nature can't be said of the other.

"Panentheism and Ontological Containment"

Prof. James Anderson continues his helpfully incisive thoughts on panentheism.

The donum superadditum and the doctrine of man: a foundational difference between Protestants and Roman Catholics

This is a slightly edited re-post of a topic I put up at Beggars All some time ago. The topic is relevant to some of the discussions of panentheism, which have been showing up in some of the comments.

At the heart of the differences between Roman Catholics and Protestants, there are key differences understandings, both in terms of their understanding of the doctrine of God, but also of the doctrine of Man.

Peter Escalante has, in the context of a discussion about civil authority, given a fairly succinct overview of one of the key differences. I’m not fully prepared to engage in a discussion of all of this -- it involves different concepts of man, and different consequences in terms of the doctrine of justification. But I’ve been following this excellent discussion, and I wanted to pass it along while it was still fresh in my mind.

It involves Rome’s understanding of the donum superadditum with regard to the state that Adam was in before he fell. Briefly, Protestants say that man, created in the image of God, was “very good,” and when he fell, it resulted in a spiritual death. God’s legal declaration, imputation of righteousness and union with Christ are what’s required to restore man back to his pristine, pre-fall state. Rome, on the other hand, holds that, not only was Adam “very good,” but that he had some “super-added gift of grace”, which made him what he was. (Why God would not have created him “complete”, but “needing some super-added grace, is beyond me). But according to the Roman Catholic paradigm, man lost only this “super-added grace” in the fall, all other things being equal, and it is that “superadded grace” that needs to be restored. Hence the need for an “infusion of grace” in Roman doctrine. [This accounts for the difference in which Calvin described man as “spiritually dead,” and hence “totally inable” or “totally depraved,” whereas Roman Catholics merely believe that man was “impaired” but with an otherwise full capacity to please God with his own grace-assisted works.]

Peter describes it this way:

For us, man originally had connatural beatitude, and when he fell, the reduced and superficial participation in that beatitude still possible to him, in an extrinsic way, was what we call temporal felicity or civic righteousness. But for RC, original felicity was a donum superadditum, and the status of original creation was thus left unclear, with at the very least a strong suggestion that much of what we think of as creation is in fact the effect of the Fall- an anti-Hebraic gnosticism which marred the thought of the ancient Greek church (and modern EO), and Rome too, though a more Biblical countertendency was present in the West and finally came into full victory with the Reformation. Given that the RC think of the New Covenant as the restoration of the donum superadditum, its relation to the temporal is ambivalent at best and hostile at worst. But for us, the New Covenant a) disables the heteronomous and unattainable Law which measured our alienation, and b) grants full citizenship in the Kingdom of God, simply by trust in Christ and union with Him. This means that the reality of original beatitude is poured into the forms of the creational order, and slowly transforms it spiritually, until all things shall be made new (emphasis added).

There are many, many concepts tied up in this one little paragraph, and it would take a long time to extract the meaning from them. But the one I want to focus on is that, right from the outset of their understanding of man, Protestants and Catholics differ.

John Fesko, in his Justification: Understanding the Classic Reformed Doctrine, describes this situation with respect to the “donum superadditum”:

It seems as though much of the debate over infused versus imputed righteousness hinges upon the presuppositions of each party. The typical Reformed understanding is that Adam was created upright, or righteous, and that God justified, or declared righteous, the initial creation as well as man in his declaration that everything was “very good” (Gen 1:31). We see the Westminster Larger Catechism echo this point when it states that God created man in “righteousness, and holiness, having the law of God written in their hearts, and the power to fulfill it” (q. 17). By way of contrast, the typical Roman Catholic understanding of Adam’s original state holds to the necessity of infused righteousness. Roman Catholic theologians typically hold to the idea of the donum superadditum (“superadded gift”). Medieval Roman Catholic theologians, for example, argue that the donum superadditum was a part of the original constitution of man, that it represented his original capacity for righteousness. We see then, from the outset, that man in his fallen state required infused righteousness in the form of the donum superadditum. If man requires infused righteousness in the prefall state, then he would most assuredly require it in his sin-fallen but redeemed state. The original state of man, then, is an issue that must feature in any dialogues over the question of imputation (John Fesko “Justification: Understanding the Classic Reformed Doctrine” Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing Company, pg 372.)

Michael Horton, in his Covenant and Salvation: Union with Christ, expands on this concept greatly. “According to the federal theologians, Adam and Eve were never in a state of grace before the fall. Endowed in their creation with all of the requisite gifts for fulfilling God’s eschatological purposes, there was nothing lacking requiring a gracious supplement” (194). If anyone is interested, Horton develops this topic quite extensively, relying on Bavinck’s account.

This is one of the key differences between Protestants and Roman Catholics, and it is one of the distinctions that the Reformers made -- a (very likely unwitting) Roman misunderstanding and accretion that somehow became the law of the land at Trent.

Can a leopard change his spots?

According to Tony Flood:

It seems that a certain non-philosopher has a difficult time fairly exegeting my plain words.

It seems that a certain apologist for Hare Krishna has a difficult time explaining himself.

That he also lacks charity in his expression of disagreement is also much in evidence. I have indeed returned to Christian orthodoxy -- the Nicene Creed was the standard implied by James Anderson in the discussion in question, and that will suffice for my purposes.

Yes, well, you know the old saying about the leopard changing his spots (Jer 13:23). The fact that Tony strenuously defends panentheism as “orthodox,” in the added context of Sudduth’s conversion of Hare Krishna, no less, suggests the spot remover was temporary.

In my initial post I had said they warrant a prima facie presumption -- a defeasible, "at first glance" presumption -- in favor of panentheism…I don't assume the locative sense for the Greek en, but the neither should the instrumental sense be assumed.

Tony fails to grasp what conditions must be met for Acts 17:28 to even constitute a prima facie prooftext for panentheism. Since he can’t see that for himself, let’s walk him through the process:

i) He’d have to show that the locative sense is the prima facie preferred meaning of the Greek preposition. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

ii) Assuming he did (i), he’d have to show that the locative sense was prima facie meant literally rather than figuratively. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

iii) Assuming he did (ii), he’d have to show that the quote prima facie teaches panentheism rather than pantheism. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

iv) Assuming he did (iii), he’d have to show that even if the quote originally taught panentheism in Classical usage, that this was still the prima facie understanding in Hellenistic times. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

v) Assuming he did (iv), he’d have to show that even if the quote was understood panentheistically by Paul’s pagan audience, that this is also how Paul prima facie intended to exploit the quote. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

vi) Assuming he did (v) he’d have to show that even if Paul intended the passage panentheistically, that Paul’s model of panentheism is prima facie isometric with Flood’s panexperientialist model of panentheism. Otherwise, Flood’s appeal is equivocal.

vii) Assuming he did (vi), Flood would also have to show that his panexperiential model of pantheism is prima facie isometric with the panentheism of the Hare Krishna cult.

So Flood must establish each of seven individual propositions to even justify his prima facie appeal.

"Paul clearly has a different worldview than the pagan source he quotes," but even a broken clock tells time correctly twice a day, and this was one of those times.

That’s a non sequitur. The fact that Paul is exploiting a pagan source doesn’t necessarily or even probably mean that they coincidentally agree at this particular juncture.

Rather, Paul could just as well, or better, be mounting an ad hominem argument, by addressing his pagan audience on its own grounds. For Paul’s purposes, what matters is not what he thought the original writer meant, but what his audience would take the quote to mean, especially as a Paul recontextualizes the source material. Paul’s intent is determinative.

A pagan writer had said that we are the offspring of the Gods, but instead of denying that genealogy, Paul drew a lesson from it: "we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone" (Acts 17:29a). I suggested a panexperientialist model of how one thing can be “in” another, one person can be “in” another, and how creation can be “in” the creator. Again, why beg the question against that model? The most important question is: which model makes the most sense of all the scriptures?

i) To begin with, notice the bait-n-switch. Flood initially told Anderson that “it would be good to have Anderson’s interpretation of Acts 17:28...which at least prima facie supports a panentheistic understanding of the creator-creature relationship.”

Now Flood suddenly swapped out Acts 17:28 and swapped in Acts 17:29a.

ii) Even so, Flood must now explain how his new prooftext furnishes prima facie support for panentheism.

iii) He also needs to show that Paul’s alleged model of panentheism maps onto Flood’s preferred model.

iv) Finally, let’s briefly consider Flood’s own model. He said:

On a panexperientialist metaphysics, God experiences – not merely contemplates at a safe distance – His creatures, which are, at the basic level, also subjects of (at least rudimentary) experience, and they all experience God. Experience provides a non-spatial model for understanding how one entity can be “in” another – even how one Divine Person can be in Another – which is most assuredly not like Bob’s being in the kitchen. Neither is it a mereological (whole and its parts) affair (or set and subsets), on which your putative refutation trades. According to this panexperientialist model, God has judged and redeemed the fallen creation that He experiences, but its fallenness does not demote Him metaphysically in any way. It does not “pollute” Him, to use your descriptor, or derange Him. He knows His creation from the inside as well as from the outside. We enjoy the good and suffer evil, and so does God, He does so but eminently.

i) To suggest that in Classical Christian theism (e.g. divine impassibility), God contemplates his creation at a “safe distance” is a rather tendentious way of framing the issue.

For instance, a virologist might study a deadly virus at a safe distance to avoid infecting himself. But he’s not doing that merely to protect himself. Rather, if he were to risk infection, and thereby die, he’d be in no position to discover a cure. Putting himself at risk puts his patients at risk. He can’t treat his patients effectively if he himself is a dying patient.

Likewise, if a psychiatrist is treating a mental patient, it’s preferable than the psychiatrist is not himself mentally ill. The sane should treat the insane; not the insane treating each other. A psychiatrist shouldn’t experience the insanity of the patient. If he shared the insider perspective of his mental patient, he’d be incompetent to treat the patient.

“Distance” can be a good thing.

ii) Likewise, if God feels whatever Ted Bundy feels, then that does indeed, pollute or derange God. Bundy didn’t enjoy the good and suffer the evil. Rather, Bundy enjoyed the evil. If God truly identifies with the viewpoint of his creatures, from the inside out, then he takes pleasure in what pleases Ted Bundy.

While we’re on the subject of Flood’s spooftexting, he also cited 2 Pet 1:4 as prima facie evidence for his position. But as a standard commentary explains:

Peter's affirmation enters into the ancient discussion about the nature of the gods, humans, and the animal world. The question raised was not about humans becoming divine but rather which characteristics and attributes these different classes of beings shared or did not share (see 1:3 and comments).

 

Peter’s thought has to do with moral transformation and not divinization or becoming divine men...about the acquisition of moral character...Peter underscores the moral aspect of participation in the divine nature...

G. Green, Jude & 2 Peter, 186-87.

As such, that text supplies no prima facie support for Flood’s appeal.

Finally, the irenic tone James Anderson took in his last reply to me should be noted. It would be nice if it were also emulated.

It would also be nice if Flood led by example. When is Flood going to emulate the virtues which he urges on others?

Does the NT teach panentheism?

Tony Flood says he used to be a process theist, but has since returned to Christian orthodoxy. Yet over at James Anderson's blog he's been prooftexting panentheism from the NT and citing "orthodox" process theologians–a lovely oxymoron. So the leopard hasn't changed his spots.

Tony cites the locus classicus for panentheism: Acts 17:28. But this is ill-conceived:

i) Paul is quoting a pagan source. So one must make allowance for audience adaptation. It's not like Paul is quoting the OT. Paul clearly has a different worldview than the pagan source he quotes. Therefore, there's a certain equivocation in the way he appropriates and applies this foreign text to the issue at hand. Filtered through his Judaism, it would refer to God's all-encompassing creative and providential activity.

ii) Tony's inference is overly dependent on connotations of the English preposition we use to translate the Greek preposition. Why assume the locative sense ("in") rather than the instrumental sense ("by")?

iii) Even if it were locative, Scripture typically uses spatial metaphors.

I'll finish by quoting two commentators:

In any case, this is not a pantheistic formula, or one that expresses the immanence of human beings in God; it merely formulates the dependence of all human life on God and its proximity  to him. J. Fitzmyer, Acts of the Apostles, 610.

 

The Stoics connected life with movement (the Prime Mover being God) and movement with being.

 

The en is an obvious example of the meaning "in the power of"; cf. Sophocles, Oedipus Coloneus 1443, tauta d'en to daimoni, and other examples given by Liddell and Scott. Begs. translates, "By him we live and move and are."

 

God is not remote but accessible, so near as to constitute the environment in which we live, but in a personal sense. In Greek philosophical background the words will have had a pantheistic meaning, God being hardly anything other than our environment. The change is likely to have been made already in Jewish-Hellenistic use. G. K. Barrett, Commentary on Acts, 2:847-48.

Why I Am Not a Panentheist

Answered by James Anderson, in response to Michael Sudduth's statement, "Consequently, I now accept a panentheistic metaphysics in which the universe and human souls are, to put it roughly, in the being of God."