No. It means what it says. If God foreknows that you will choose vanilla, then that thing will necessarily happen. (you're liking vanilla and hating chocolate is immaterial). Because this thing will necessarily happen, there is no such thing as free choice.

Luther's argument is precisely the same one I've been making.

Of course there are. From his perspective, it would be theoretically possible to do wrong, but in reality it wasn’t, because he wouldn’t exist to do wrong.


Tom, are you joking? The whole point of our discussion is that you say God shouldn’t have created beings who would sin. How can you affirm it’s not a part of the scenario? If God knew that Gabriel, like Lucifer, would sin, He wouldn’t have created him. This is obvious.


To this I responded, “You are focusing on one aspect while I’m focusing on another. God is a sovereign, which means we serve, or obey Him. It’s not He who obeys us, but we who obey Him.”


Maybe.


As I said before, I consider it wasn't inevitable in the sense that there were two possibilities (if no creature had decided to sin, sin wouldn’t exist). But since God foresaw that one creature would decide to sin, sin became inevitable because God respects choices. So in a sense it’s true that sin was inevitable.


Yes, I see the same problem in your view.


Then you are admitting there also isn’t free will in the aspects of the future that are settled according to your view?

Of course there's not. Reality doesn't have sides. Reality is the state of things as they actually are. Reality is, by definition, not dependent upon one's perception of it.



How could he have a perspective if he didn't exist? Why wouldn't he exist? What are you trying to say here?



No, I'm not joking, and it's not obvious, and this isn't my argument here. What I was showing is that it was possible for God to create beings with free will without sin necessarily existing. He could have done this by creating just one being, say Gabriel. Unless it was inevitable that Gabriel would sin, it is possible to have FMAs without there being sin.



God did not create us so that we could serve Him. God lives to serve, not to be served, as Jesus demonstrated in His life and character, which is a revelation of God.

A sovereign is one who has supreme authority. Having supreme authority, He can do what He pleases. It please Him to serve, rather than to be served.

That doesn't mean we can't serve Him, of course, but His motivation in our service is not that He be served, but that we serve Him. In other words, God knows that it is more blessed to give than to receive, so He allows us the pleasure to serve so that we can obtain the blessing which is to be gained by serving.

God doesn't think of Himself, but of others.



Why maybe? If you're right, that without the cross the universe could not be safeguarded, and without sin there would be no cross, then it follows that without sin the universe could not be safeguarded.



That's what I was arguing. From your perspective, God had to create beings that would make wrong choices, once He foresaw that possibility, in order to respect free will. This is what you've been saying. Given this is the case, then sin was inevitable, once God decided to create beings with free will, and foresaw that some of them, if created, would sin.

Ok, now that you've agreed that I'm correctly representing your position, I can start the other topic. I think the question of the implications of what it means if sin was inevitable in the creation of beings with free will is worth considering carefully.



Ok, now that you've answered my question, as I requested, I will consider your argument. Let me repeat it to make sure I have it straight. Your argument is that under my view sin was inevitable because God could have prevented it by stepping in between Satan and Eve in between the time Satan was trying to get Eve to sin, and she was considering it, and the time Eve actually sinned.

That is, there was a moment in time where it was 100% certain that Eve would sin, but she hadn't yet sinned, and God could have stepped in at that moment to prevent sin from occurring. So God could have prevented sin from occurring after it had become inevitable. This is your argument, correct?



This is an interesting question. I'll think about it.

This is regarding this question:



The answer is no. It takes a bit of explanation to explain why, but hopefully will be useful in understanding the difference between the two models.

Here is the best example I could think of. Imagine a game of chess is being played, and the chess player, Joe, is about to make a move. It's a tournament game, so clocks are being used. God sees every possible future, and knows that Joe's next move will be some move, say Be2. Joe doesn't know this yet, because he hasn't figured out what he's going to do, but God sees every possible future, and in every possible future Joe plays Be2.

However, in some of the possible futures Joe plays Be2 sooner than in others, so the time on the chess clock will be different. Say he varies from taking 1 minute to 3 minutes, and there are 100 different time possibilities. So if you consider the question from what move Joe will make, it's the same move. But if you consider it from the standpoint of time on the chess clock and move, it's different.

The key point is that there are many different futures involved. These different futures have some things in common. In this case, a chess move chosen is in common to each possible future. However, there are also differences to the many different futures.

Free will is being exercised as not exactly the same thing is happening in each possible future. Just the same move is being played. But not the same move after the same process of thought to reach that decision, or the same amount of time to arrive at that decision.

In the other model, there is only one future, so there is only one option. Everything is identical about the possible futures, because there is only one possible future. The *one thing* God has foreseen must of necessity happen. There is no determination whatsoever taking place by the FMA in terms of the future as the unique, one, certain possible future is already determined.

Luther's reasoning is correct.

Well, that was a great question. I thought for a long time to come up with this illustration. Hopefully the explanation makes sense.

Supposing he had been created, he could have the illusion that it was possible for him to choose wrong, but in fact it wouldn’t, for if in the future he would choose wrong he wouldn’t have been created in the first place.


I know that, but what I’m pointing out is that Gabriel would have been created exactly because he would choose only good. If a future choice of evil would have precluded his creation, how can it be said he is free to choose evil?


Tom, to serve God is to obey Him and yes, God created us to obey Him, and perfect happiness is found only in obeying Him.


Tom, please reexamine my posts. I said I don’t know if the universe could be eternally secure without the cross, although it seems to me that it wouldn’t. That’s why I said “maybe.”


Correct.


This is the argument that both open theists and atheists use. They say that foreknowledge and free will are incompatible because if the future is set then there is no free will. When we point out that if we know what will happen tomorrow, and therefore the future is set, this doesn’t preclude our free will, then they say that our knowledge is not perfect, and that God knows perfectly not only what will happen but the moment it will happen (hour, minute, second, nanosecond, etc.). This explanation obviously doesn’t convince me.
However, according to your explanation, open theists shouldn’t say, then, that the future is partially settled, because if you consider that every second and nanosecond represents a different future, then no part of the future can be settled, and you have to explain prophecies in some other way.

Why not?

By the way, the illusion you are talking about here is exactly the illusion I'm talking about in respect to Judas. However, this doesn't have to do with whether or not one is created, but whether or not the future is determined.



Just suppose Gabriel is created. There doesn't need to be any presupposition that he wouldn't have been created if he didn't sin.



He is free to choose evil. No future choice of evil precludes anything.



Do you in any way disagree with what I wrote here?



If so, what do you disagree with? (Please read the first sentence in the light of the last paragraph.)



This doesn't make any sense. I said, "If you're right, then God was dependent upon sin's existing in order to safeguard the universe." The "if you're right" already takes into account the maybe.

Let's try again. If you are correct, in what seems to be the case to you (that the universe could not be safeguarded without the cross, and the cross could not exist without sin), then God would be dependent upon sin in order to safeguard the universe.



I don't think there was such a moment in time. Until Eve actually sinned, it was possible for Eve not to sin. There was no moment of inevitability before she actually sinned. She could have decided not to believe the serpent.



Actually the argument originated with the Reformers, such as Luther, whom I quoted, Calvin, etc. It wasn't until Arminius came around that a different idea arose. The main difference was that Luther (and Calvin and others) argued that logically it follows from the idea that God foreknows the future that there is no free will (libertarian free will), and that God foreknows what will happen because He has foreordained it.

Arminius' idea regarding how God saw the future was the same as Luther and Calvin's, but he took the position that God foreknew what was going to happen, but did not foreordain it. This position is not logically consistent, however, which can be seen in Luther's "the bondage of the will" and Jonathan Edwards "the freedom of the will" to name two well known works.



It looks like you're misunderstanding the issue here. This is not at all how open theists argue. Open theists point out that the issue is ontological, not epistemological, which your statement is.

How much God knows, or anyone else, is not the issue (not directly). The issue concerns the nature of the future.

The reason I say "not directly" is because the nature of the future can be inferred by the position one takes regarding one's foreknowledge (whether God's, or anyone else's). If the future can be known as fully settled, then it must be the case that the future is fully settled.

Or, perhaps an easier way to see the logical problem, if the future is such that there is only one thing that can happen, then libertarian free will is impossible. From the idea that God has EDF, we can infer the existence of just such a future.

The problem that most seem to have in these discussion is in not understanding that the issue is ontological and not epistemological. Thus one hears the statement "The fact that God knows you will do something does not force you to do it," which is not the issue. No one is asserting the knowledge of the future implies you can only do one thing; it's the reality of the future that implies this!



It doesn't appear to me that you have understood the explanation, as you have framed things epistemologically instead of ontologically. Before not being convinced, I think it would be good to understand the issue. Maybe then you'll become convinced! (we can hope, can't we? )



It's difficult to know the best way of communicating the concepts. The "settled" has to do with knowing the outcome of some choice or event. For example, the future is settled insofar as the son's coming up tomorrow is concerned. If you have a way of expressing things that you think is better, I'd be happy to hear it. Perhaps "some things which happen in the future can be known with certainty, because they happen in every possible future." That's a bit cumbersome to keep repeating though.

There's no need to explain prophecies in another way. If a certain prophetic event happens in every possible future (or every possible conditional future, where the condition takes place, assuming the prophesy is conditional), then the prophecy can be given, no problem.

This simply is not true, as I pointed out in my post # 93112. From the creature’s side, it was possible for Judas to repent, and from the Creator’s side, God didn’t do anything to prevent his repentance. So his free choice was no illusion.


Your problem with my view is that “God chose a scenario where sin came into the universe, as opposed to one of the scenarios where there wouldn't have been any sin. He is responsible for His choice.” Therefore, since God knows beforehand who will sin and who won’t, there is a need to presuppose that Gabriel wouldn’t have been created if his future choice would bring sin to the universe.


No, Tom, I don’t disagree. I disagree with your perspective that my view is selfish while yours isn’t. Under my view, God saw sin would happen, but permitted it to happen to respect His creatures’ free will. Under your view, God risked sin to happen to respect His creature’s free will. What’s the significant difference here? You obviously can’t say one view is selfish and the other isn’t. The best you can say is that one is more selfish and the other less selfish.


If you arrive in heaven, and God tells you that without the cross as a visible, palpable event, He couldn’t have safeguarded the universe, will you find the idea absurd?


You seem to be the only one who thinks that Eve had the fruit in her hands, was raising it to her lips, but wouldn’t sin. Now, if sin wasn’t inevitable, it was at least highly probable. Yet God didn’t do anything to prevent it. Why? God sends an angel to stay Abraham's hand, but doesn't send an angel to stay Eve's hand. Why?


I understand perfectly what you say, but don’t agree.


Both in the fully settled view and in the partially settled view of the future, “settled” has to do with knowing the outcome of some choice or event. This doesn’t have anything to do with the hour, minute and second of the event. If the outcome of some choice or event (as in the case of prophecies) is known in both your view and mine, the nature of free will is the same (either illusory or real) in both your view and mine. By the way, was Peter’s future determined, since the nature of his future (the triple denial) could be known by Christ? Was Peter’s free will an illusion?

There aren't sides to reality. There's just reality. Either Judas could repent or he couldn't. Logically, if the future is determined, as God's knowing that Judas would not repent would imply, Judas could not repent. He would feel like he could repent (from his side, as you put it), but he really couldn't, as this wouuld lead to the logical impossibility of something hapenning which is different from that which God knew would happen.




In the case of Gabriel, I was just showing how God could have created a being with free will without sin existing. There's only one being involved. There's no need to consider whether or not God knew he would sin or not.

If God created just one being, either that being would sin or he wouldn't. Supposed he wouldn't. That's a possible scenario, isn't it? If it is, then it was possible to create FMAs without there being sin.



This is a little confusing. What I asked if you disagreed about was something different than what you're commening on.



I don't think this is an accurate way of characterizing your view, for two reasons. First of all, there are only two classes of creatures involved here; those who would sin and those who wouldn't. Those who would not sin would not have had their free wills disrespected if they weren't created, because they wouldn't have existed. A creature has to exist in order to have its free will disrespected. Those who did exist would not have had their free will disrespected either, since their free will is just as free without the existence of sin as with it. So the free will of His creatures is not being respected any more by creating beings who sin than be not doing so.

I've pointed this out several times, and asked you whose free will would not be respected if God did not create creatures that would sin, and I don't believe you've answer this question. Sorry if you have, but I don't remember your doing so.

The second reason is that God actually made a choice to create creatures that would sin, under your perspective. You can't really say that God permitted sin to happen, because sin would not have happened had God not taken the steps to create beings that were certain to sin. Given your view, it is more accurate to say that God chose to create beings that were certain to sin, than to say that He permitted sin to happen. God actually *did* something. "Permit" gives the impression that God refrained from doing something, as opposed to doing something. You could say that God refrained from not creating the beings that were certain to sin, but that's rather unwieldy, and as God was not constrained to create them, it is less unwieldy and more accurate simply to say that God chose to create beings that were certain to sin.



The comment I made in regards to selfishness had to do with the reason that God created beings He knew would sin, under your perspective. The reason turned out to be because of His integrity. I said it seemed selfish to me that God would bring about such a horrific world because of His integrity.

In the view I'm proposing, God did nothing to bring out sin. He simply created beings with free will, who chose to sin, a possibility God knew was possible, but unlikely.

There's two big differences in our views worth mentioning here. One is that under your view, the possibility of sin was 100%, as opposed to a small probability. God's doing something that will have a certain bad result has to be seen as less desirable than God's doing something unlikely to have that bad result.

A second thing is that under my view, God had no alternative to sin's not coming about, other than not creating FMAs. Under your view, God could have created FMAs that wouldn't sin. As pointed out above, your explanation that it was to respect the free will of His creatures doesn't work, because if He didn't create beings that would sin, their free will wouldn't be disrespected, nor would the beings whom He did create have their free wills disrespected.



I take it you mean if sin had not occurred, Christ would still have had to die on the cross in order to safeguard the universe. I would find that very odd. Christ's dying on the cross involves Him becoming a human being. But if human beings did not sin, why should Christ become a human being? Why not some other being? Do those beings have crosses? Without sin, even our world wouldn't have had crosses, right? So just right off there seem to be a number of questions that come up.

Back to my point, I take it you agree with my statement that if what seems to be the case to you (that the universe could not be safeguarded without the cross, and the cross could not exist without sin), then God would be dependent upon sin in order to safeguard the universe, correct?



How do you get this idea? Before you were talking about God's intervening during the time Lucifer was talking to Eve. I said Eve could have chosen to disbelieve Satan. Once she decided to believe Satan, and decided to eat of the fruit, she was committing sin, wasn't she? Or do you think that had God inserted a force field to prevent the apple from reaching her mouth that Eve would not have been sinning?



I don't agree that sin was highly probable. I think it was very unlikely. Look at the response of heaven described in Early Writings. This certainly does not appear to have been an anticipated event, neither by God or Jesus or the angels. If it were highly probable, as you were suggestingmvn dep, it seems to me that they would all have been expecting it to happen.



It's only possible for the future to be known as fully settled without being fully settled if it is possible for God to know something to be different than it really is. It would be like God's knowing you have blonde hair even thought it's really brown.



Both in the fully settled view and in the partially settled view of the future, “settled” has to do with knowing the outcome of some choice or event. This doesn’t have anything to do with the hour, minute and second of the event. If the outcome of some choice or event (as in the case of prophecies) is known in both your view and mine, the nature of free will is the same (either illusory or real) in both your view and mine.[/quote]

I tried to explain why there's a difference in our views in the chess move illustration. In that illustration, *something* was known about the future, that the move Be2 was going to be played. However, there were still many different possible futures involved. They just had something in common, which is that a certain move would be played. But how that move would come about, whether played right away, or after more thought, varied. There were still different futures involved, even though they had a common characteristic.

What makes libertarian free will illusory in your view is that there is only one future involved. In my view, the person is still determining the future. There are still many possible futures. Again, there is just a common characteristic to those futures. It would be similar to knowing that the guy would not choose to commit suicide on that day. In none of the possible futures does he commit suicide. But he is still determining the future, which is to say, determining which of many different futures would come to pass. In your view, that doesn't happen. He doesn't determine anything. There is only one future involved, which is what makes free will illusory.



Peter determined which of the many possible futures would come to pass. God saw that in all of the possible futures, Peter would betray him, just as He saw in all of the possible futures Peter would not get on a boat to China. There were still multiple futures involved. The nature of Peter's futures wan't known (if by that you mean, Peter's future was completely known); just one thing about it was known. Peter's denying Christ 3 times was analogous to the chess player's choosing Be2 in that illustration.

Haven’t you realized that this is impossible in my view? Whatever the case, God knows, before the creature is created, whether he will sin or not. There is no way you can eliminate this piece of information from the scenario.


Forgive me for this illustration, but let’s suppose there are only two animals in the universe: cats and dogs. And let’s suppose the Lord says He respects both those who like cats and those who like dogs. However, He doesn’t create anyone who likes dogs. How can it be said He respects those who like dogs? Isn’t this very thought absurd? As to those who were created, they only like cats. Does it make sense to say they have free will to choose dogs – if they were created exactly because they will never choose dogs? What kind of free will is that? What kind of universe is that? What kind of respect is that?


I obviously disagree. God made a choice to not prevent creatures that would sin from existing, and thus He permitted sin to happen.


His integrity in respecting the free will of His creatures. God honors the choices of His creatures.


To me it’s not less desirable. I prefer to believe in a God who has absolute control of all things and chooses to allow some things to happen, than in a God who doesn’t know for sure how things will turn out in a given situation.


I obviously disagree.


I don’t think God is dependent on anything, but that He makes everything serve His purposes. I don’t know how things would have played out, but obviously the universe without the cross would be as it was before the cross.


I think she was vacillating, wasn’t she? She could be vacillating until the apple reached her mouth. She just made up her mind some seconds before she bit the apple. So yes, God could have sent an angel to warn her.



“With what intense interest the whole universe watched the conflict that was to decide the position of Adam and Eve. How attentively the angels listened to the words of Satan, the originator of sin, as he ... sought to make of none effect the law of God through his deceptive reasoning! How anxiously they waited to see if the holy pair would be deluded by the tempter, and yield to his arts! They asked themselves, Will the holy pair transfer their faith and love from the Father and Son to Satan? Will they accept his falsehoods as truth?” {TMK 14.5}

“All the angels of heaven were prepared to come to the aid of Adam and Eve in this contest with the enemy, if they would call upon God for help. An intense interest prevailed in the heavenly courts in this trial of man's obedience, and sadness reigned when Eve, yielding to the persuasion of the serpent, partook of the forbidden fruit.” {ST, February 17, 1909 par. 2}

God could have sent an angel to help Eve, but this would have violated her free will. So, God didn’t interpose to prevent sin from happening.


Either God knows the outcome of a certain choice or event, or He doesn’t. If He knows, then it’s not possible that that outcome won’t happen, and so the future is fixed. A fixed future is a future whose outcome is known, and if there are many futures whose outcome is known, all of them are fixed. Either the future is completely settled or it is completely open in relation to events involving free will. That thing of “partially open” does not make sense. The problem of open theists is that some prophecies are related to the free will of people (as is the case of Judas, Peter, etc.), and this kind of prophecy is completely incompatible with an open future. That’s why the “partially open” explanation was resorted to.

My point was simply that God could create an FMA without sin occurring. He could have created just one creature. That creature could have chosen not to sin.

Do you disagree with this? Do you think that God, if He had created just one being, would have had to create a being that would sin? (Because of what He foreknew, if for any other reason).



Assuming that dogs = sin in your analogy, aren't you arguing that sin has to exist? If God is saying He respects people who like sin, then there has to be sin for them to like, right?

It seems to me that the whole analogy falls apart, because it assumes the existence of dogs. Suppose dogs didn't exist. Then it wouldn't make any sense for God to say He respects those who like dogs, would it? No one would even know what dogs were.

I don't see how your analogy has to do with my argument. My argument is that your statement that God had to create creatures that would sin in order to respect the free will of His creatures is false. It's false because there are only two classes of creatures to exist, and if it can be shown that the free will of neither class of creature is disrespected assuming God did not create creatures who did not sin, then it is proven that your statement is false.

The first class of creatures are those who would sin. They don't exist. Therefore there free will is not disrespected, since they have no free, since they don't exist.

The second class of creatures are those who would not sin. You would have to somehow argue that their free will is being disrespected if God did not create creatures who would sin. This assertion seems to me to be absurd on the face of it, but you are free (in fact, required to, if you wish to try to defend your statement) to try to make such an argument.



They did not exist! He did not prevent them from existing, as if their existence is something they could themselves somehow generate. He had to create them! His choice was either to create them, or not. He chose to create them. Putting this in terms of God's not preventing them from existing is thinking of this in a weird way.

Suppose you are thinking of building a house, but change your mind. Would you say that you prevented the house from existing? Wouldn't you simply say that you decided not the build the house?

Let's go back to your way of putting it. You say "God made a choice to not prevent creatures that would sin from existing, and thus He permitted sin to happen." Now how did God "not prevent creatures that would sin from existing"? By creating them, right? So His choice to "not prevent" these creatures from existing is tantamount to His choice to create them, right?



The sinning creatures did not exist. They had no free will to respect. God had to create them first. You would have to say "His integrity in respecting the free will of His sinning creatures, provided He created them." If He didn't create them, He wouldn't be disrespecting their choice.

In order to support your point of view, you need to make some sort of argument that God's creating beings that would sin was in some way better for the creatures who did not sin than the alternative of not creating them.



If God has absolute control of all things, then it stands to reason He is responsible for all things.

Actually, I think this is the crux of our disagreement. It really has more to do with how we perceive God to be in character than anything else.



If you disagree that God could have created FMAs that wouldn't sin, then that means that God had to create FMAs that would sin (assuming He created FMAs). Right?



The universe without the cross doesn't need to be the same as it was before the cross. It needs to be better. It needs to be safeguarded. Before the cross it wasn't safeguarded.

But getting back to my point. What you stated before was that it seemed to you that without the cross the universe could not be safeguarded, and without sin the cross would not exist. My question is if you are correct in this, which is to say that things are as they seem to you, that the cross would not have existed without sin, and without the cross the universe could not be safeguarded, then without the existence of sin, the universe could not have been safeguarded.

This is simply, straight-forward reasoning. You agree with this, don't you?



Once she made up her mind, she was sinning. The sin is in the decision to do the act. It doesn't go away because of a lack of opportunity to do the act.



This supports what I said, that the actions of Adam and Eve were not anticipated by heaven.



This has nothing to do with my point. (about Adam and Eve's actions being anticipated by heaven).



No, and this is was the point of the chess move analogy. The outcome of the move is known, Be2, but there are many different possible futures involved. The future is not determined, until the chess player determines it. In the future he determines, he decides to make the move Be2. But he goes about this decision in different ways.



If there are many futures whose outcome is known, then none of them are determined, because there are many of them, and not one. That their outcome is known has absolutely nothing to do with anything! The problem is not epistemological but ontological.

Say you roll a die. There are 6 possible outcomes, all of them known. However, the future has not been determined until "iacta alea est" (the die is cast).



There's no reason for this assertion. There are some decisions that people with free will will always make. Some people, for example, will never make the decision to kill themselves by jumping off a building. This is settled. Other decisions could be open ended.



What is it specifically that you think does not make sense?



It's not incompatible. God sees every possible future. If a person will make the same decision in every possible future, where is there any incompatibility? The self-determining agent determines which of the future possibilities will exist, and God knows something about that possible future, because that one aspect is the same in each of the possible futures. It's like with the chess player choosing Be2. God sees that this is the move that will be chosen, but the chess player determines which of the possible futures will occur.

There's no incompatibility here.

It seems draconian to jump to the conclusion that because God knows some things with specificity that the future must be settled for all eternity and for all decisions of all creatures, and all the statements in Scripture (there are dozens upon dozens of these, if not hundreds upon hundreds) where it says God regrets, or changes His mind, or relents, do not mean what they say.

Also things like the EGW account of what happened in heaven when man sinned would not make sense according the one future idea. Why three meetings? How could God have decided to give permission to Jesus to come?

Also things like there being risk in Christ's coming, or heaven being imperiled, or Christ's being able to have come already, or our being able to hasten His coming.

There are all sorts of things in both the Spirit of Prophecy and Scripture that argue against the Augustinian idea.