Omnipotence and the problem of evil

Related posts: Opposition in all things ; Creation ex nihilo ; The Fall of Man Part I

Classical theism affirms that God is omnipotent. But the meaning of omnipotence varies from person to person. Can God do only what is logically possible? Are there only non-logical limits to God’s power? Is God’s power limited by human free will? If God has all the power, are we powerless? If we have some power to what extent is God limited? Most people don’t believe that God can make 1 + 1 + 1 = 1, but do believe God can cure the sick and prevent accidents. But understanding omnipotence to mean God can do only what is logically possible isn’t enough: It’s logically possible God doesn’t exist. Consequently, some Christians define omnipotence as having all possible power, or maximal power.

The various definitions of omnipotence stem from philosophical and theological questions. Can God make a rock so massive he cannot move it? Did God create evil? If not, did he create all things? Is there any way to reconcile foreknowledge with free will? And so forth. Obviously philosophers tinker with conceptions of God. Some of the most prominent theological questions arise from the problem of evil.

Australian philosopher J.L. Mackie argued that given the awful reality of evil, believing in God’s omnipotence and benevolence is logically inconsistent. Because evil exists, if God is benevolent he cannot be omnipotent; because evil exists, if God is omnipotent he cannot be benevolent; if God is benevolent and omnipotent then evil would not exist. An omnipotent God could eradicate evil. A benevolent God would want to eradicate evil. An omnipotent and benevolent God would eradicate evil. Yet evil exists. Omnipotence, benevolence, and evil he writes, “are essential parts of most theological positions: the theologian…at once must adhere and cannot consistently adhere to all three” (italics original).[1]

Alvin Plantinga
Alvin Plantinga formulated a solution to the logical problem of evil as posed by Mackie, sometimes referred to as the Free Will Defense. Mackie contends the following propositions are logically inconsistent: (1) God is omnipotent and wholly good, and (2) evil exists. However, Plantinga points out if an idea can be found which intersects with (1) and entails (2) they are not exclusive; the idea need only include the existence of God and entail the existence of evil; if such an idea is possibly true then Mackie’s contention that the theologian cannot rationally adhere to (1) and (2) is false.

In The Nature of Necessity Plantinga argues that among all the possible worlds God could have created which contain free persons, that (quite possibly) if any one of them were actualized it could not contain moral good but no moral evil. What follows is a very simplified explanation of Plantinga’s arguments — which I sincerely hope I haven’t butchered. Consider the following question. What if it’s true that from among all the possible worlds containing free persons, if God actualized any one of them that everyone would commit at least one wrong act? Suppose for now that it is true, call it transworld depravity. If everyone suffers from transworld depravity it’s not possible to actualize a world containing free persons and which contains moral good but no moral evil. As an illustration consider a city official Curley. In the actual world W Curley is offered a $20,000 bribe and accepts. Now consider an alternate world W′ where Curley is offered $20,000 and refuses. If it’s true that “Curleyhood” (the essence of Curley) has the property he accepts all bribes greater than 19,000 dollars, then God cannot actualized a world where Curley doesn’t have this property; properties aren’t created. Consequently God cannot actualize any world that includes a Curley who freely rejects all bribes greater than $19,000, and consequently God cannot actualize W′. Now suppose every person has the property I will go wrong at least once if given the chance. The idea behind transworld depravity is that if God (strongly) actualizes any state of affairs where people are genuinely free to act, it would give them the opportunity to go wrong. So if everyone suffers from transworld depravity then God can not actualize only those persons who never go wrong. Moreover, a world having genuine moral agency is, in effect, like offering Curley a $20,000 bribe. Conclusion: If transworld depravity is true it’s not possible for God to create a world containing moral good but no moral evil. In Plantinga’s words,

What is important about the idea of transworld depravity is that if a person suffers from it, then it was not within God’s power to actualize any world in which that person is significantly free but does no wrong…it is possible that everybody suffers from transworld depravity. …the price for creating a world in which such persons produce moral good is creating one in which they also produce moral evil. (pp. 186-187)[2]

If transworld depravity is possibly true then Mackie’s contention that belief in (1) and (2) is positively irrational is positively wrong.

Now, saying everyone possibly suffers from transworld depravity is kind of like throwing a million dice at once and saying it’s logically possible to get all sixes. The probability of getting all sixes is mind bogglingly small — (1/6)^(1,000,000). However, the probability is not zero so the outcome is certainly possible; and it’s the possibility that resolves the logical problem. It bars the claim that it is positively irrational to believe in getting all sixes. Getting all sixes is roughly analogous to the idea of everyone suffering from transworld depravity: “It is possible that everybody suffers from [it].” The possibility bars critics of theism from claiming that believing in (1) and (2) is positively irrational. The strictly logical problem has been solved.

**I mention Plantinga’s free will defense because I believe it is a good defense of theism against the logical problem of evil. Mackie has admitted that Plantinga’s Free Will Defense works.[3] For theists, because transworld depravity need only be possibly true, those who are skeptical about it may still use it to defend theism. If Plantinga’s idea is possibly true then the door is open. Also, most people are probably not willing to go with the Mormon conception of God which altogether avoids the logical problem of evil.**

God’s omnipotence
But do Plantinga’s arguments subtract from God’s omnipotence? Could a being exist that is free from the restriction of transworld depravity? “It does appear to be logically possible that there be a being which is freer from restrictions than God in fact is,” writes William J. Wainwright (“Freedom and Omnipotence,” Noûs, vol. 2, no. 3, 1968, pp. 293-301). But Wainwright asks, “Does omnipotence involve a freedom from this kind of restriction?” He concludes that it does not.

The concept of omnipotence is not an entirely clear one. Omnipotence is sometimes understood in a more restricted sense and sometimes in a less restricted sense. There is no agreed on definition which could be used to settle the question in a quick and universally acceptable way…The notion that God is somehow limited by human freedom, that He must respect free decisions, is as old as the notion that he is omnipotent…one might suppose that a restriction like those we are considering has always been (vaguely) built into the notion of omnipotence. (pp. 300-301)

Mormons and the logical problem of evil
Among all the possible definitions of omnipotence most include things like freedom from causal laws and antecedent conditions (God is pure act); absence of non-logical restrictions to power; omniscience; essential goodness; essential existence (God cannot not exist); creating the universe ex nihilo; and “than which none greater can be imagined.” The traditional Mormon concept of omnipotence diverges from several of these, many of which I have already mentioned in previous posts (Omniscience ; Immutable, Omnipresence ; Omniscience and divine Learning). Here is another one. The Book of Mormon prophet Alma teaches, “Do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay…If so, God would cease to be God” (Alma 42:25). That’s a very radical idea which is open to interpretation. It could be saying arguendo if God were to be other than what he is he wouldn’t be God; which is not so radical. But some have taken it to mean that if God were to attempt to ignore the laws of justice he would genuinely loose his power and cease to be God. Alma qualifies his statement with, “God ceaseth not to be God” (Alma 42:23). But it seems to imply that in some theoretical way God could be otherwise than God. God is theoretically contingent, which fits well with the idea that God has progressed from lower stages of existence to where he is now. But this doesn’t necessarily entail it is actually possible for God to be other than God. Even if God progresses he can possess unchangeable qualities such as mercy, love, and justice.

We also believe that good and evil must coexist for God to bring about his purposes (see Fall of Man: Part I; Opposition in All Things), and that matter and intelligence exist independent of God. Intelligences “have no beginning; they existed before, they shall have no end, they shall exist after, for they are…eternal” (Abr. 3:18; D&C 93:33). We also deny creation ex nihilo. (See Creation ex nihilo.) We believe God organized the heavens and the earth (Abr. 3:22; 4:1; D&C 20:17). Consequently, for us there is no logical problem of evil. And Mackie concedes this: “If you are prepared to say that…there are limits to what an omnipotent thing can do, then the problem of evil will not arise for you.”

The amount of evil and natural evil
But even though our theology provides an easy response to the logical problem of evil the problem of the amount of evil in the world remains. So, in that spirit, consider the following question. Is it possible God could have created the world a little better than it actually is? Imagine a world similar to ours in nearly every respect, but with one small difference. There are one fewer murders. That’s a possible world and it’s better than what we got. It also seems easily within God’s power. So speaking generally, if God were good he would make the world a little better than it is. One could always say, “Perhaps God does and we just don’t know it.” But that’s hard to believe and I’m inclined to think it’s begging the question. I’m not going to pursue the debate here because it is not the purpose of this series. I simply point out that being able to avoid the logical problem of evil is not a huge advantage in itself. The non-logical problem of evil remains.

There are also natural evils, bad things that happen because of tornados, earthquakes, famine, disease; acts of nature that end up harming people. In Mormon beliefs God didn’t create natural laws, so it’s easy to say natural disasters aren’t his fault. But surely God can prevent them, or at least make them less frequent. Along this line P. J. McGrath argues,

Consider first what happens to the problem when God is conceived as infinitely good but not omnipotent…while God does not want evil to be present in the universe, he does not have sufficient power to prevent it. But the trouble with this is that some evils which formerly existed have been eliminated by human ingenuity. For example, smallpox has been wiped out through the use of vaccination. If man can get rid of an evil like smallpox, why could God have not done likewise? (“Evil and the existence of a finite God,” Analysis, vol. 46, no. 1, 1986, pp. 63-64).

One solution proposed by an LDS philosopher uses the idea of an over-burdened doctor: “There are evils, which God could have averted but which occur at a time in which it is more important for God to attend to other matters” (“Finitism and the Problem of Evil,” Dialogue, vol. 33, no. 4, pp. 83-95). I strongly disagree, and I think most Mormons would too. Our beliefs hold that God is spiritually “in all things, and is through all things, and is round about all things” (D&C 88:41; Immutable, Omnipresence).

There are several approaches a Mormon can take when dealing with the problem of the amount of evil, whether natural or manmade. We believe that without opposition, “righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad” (2 Nephi 2:11). This passage seems to imply that the existence of evil is necessary for the very possibility a greater good to exist. How can a given act be morally good if the doer has no choice? How is not committing adultery good if adultery is impossible? It is even possible to love your neighbor without the possibility of hating him? If the presence of moral evil is necessary for our progression one can see how God might permit it. Because man’s intelligence is not created God cannot simply program us with genuine knowledge of good and evil. Consequently knowing the difference between good and evil, righteousness and wickedness, pleasure and pain, happiness and misery must be learned experientially.

How we view suffering
As to the suffering of the believers, perhaps we have a tendency to view their suffering selfishly. In their agony, like Job, they never loose faith. However, friends and family may question the existence of God because of their suffering. If the sufferer doesn’t loose faith, why should others? Sometimes the burden of comfort falls on the sufferer. In a scene from the movie The Bucket List, the two principle characters Carter Chambers (Morgan Freeman) and Edward Cole (Jack Nicholson) are given six months to live. Edward proposes they travel the world doing all the things they wanted to do before they die—the things on their bucket list. Edward says to Carter,

What do ya think happens now? I go back and sit around listening to people talking about mezzanine financing and subordinated debt, predending that I care about dead money. You go home to some ceremonial procession into death with everyone standing around watching you die while you try to comfort them. It that what you want, to be smothered by pity and grief?

My own response to the problem of natural evil draws heavily on my own experience with pain. When I was fifteen I was attending a Boy Scout jamboree in Mexico. It was about midnight and I was in my tent trying to sleep. Nearby, two other scouts decided they wanted a late night snack and started up a gas stove. It exploded, burning them and myself—the accident was caused by a faulty seal. I received 2nd and 3rd degree burns over about eleven percent of my body—my right arm is still heavily scarred. Ask anyone who has been badly burned and they will tell you that the healing process is infinitely more painful than getting burned: Much of the skin is destroyed, along with nerve endings; it’s most painful when they begin to grow back as the raw nerve ends are exposed. Two or three times a day the nurses would change my bandages and clean my burns. And even though they used the softest cloth and pressed as gently as they could, and even though they doped me up with morphine, I swear, it felt like they were scrubbing me with steel wool as hard as they could. It’s difficult to describe the intensity of the pain. It went on like that for almost two weeks. But that was over twenty years ago and I don’t sense any emotional trauma from it. The pain ended.

All wounds can be healed
From an eternal perspective all wounds can be healed. Consequently natural evils are evil only in times of distress. Once the pain has been eliminated the question of its evil fades to the sufferer. So the answer to the question, “If God were good wouldn’t he eliminate natural evils?” is affirmative. I suppose this isn’t very satisfactory for people who have suffered a great deal more than I, and who are presently suffering. But it is my perspective on the problem of pain.




End Notes___________________________
[1] Anthony Flew contends, “We cannot say that [God] would like to help but cannot: God is omnipotent. We cannot say that he would help if he only knew: God is omniscient. We cannot say that he is not responsible for the wickedness of others: God created those others. Indeed an omnipotent, omniscient God must be an accessory before (and during) the fact to every human misdeed; as well as being responsible for every non-moral defect in the universe” (“Theology and Falsification,” from New Essays in Philosophical Theology, 1955, p. 107).

Elder Neil A. Maxwell addressed Flew’s comments in “The Richness of the Restoration” ( Ensign, Mar 1998).

[2] “It is of course up to God whether or not to create Curley…But if he creates him, and creates him free with respect to this action, then whether or not he takes [the bribe] is up to Curley—not God…The atheologian is right in holding that there are many possible worlds containing moral good but no moral evil…[but] one of his central assumptions—that God, if omnipotent, could have actualized just any world he pleased—is false” (The Nature of Necessity, p. 184).

[3] Mackie concedes that Plantinga’s solution works. Mackie writes,

Since this defense is formally possible, and its principle involves no real abandonment of our ordinary view of the opposition between good and evil, we can concede that the problem of evil does not, after all, show that the central doctrines of theism are logically inconsistent with one another. But whether this offers a real solution of the problem is another question. (The Miracle of Theism, p. 154)

The Attributes of God: Whence God? Talking about God.

The Attributes of God
Part iv: Whence God? Talking about God

Related posts: Immutable, Omnipresence ; Omniscience ; Omniscience and divine Learning ; Godhead: God or Gods?

In 1844 Joseph Smith taught,

God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!…I say, if you were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form—like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image and likeness of God. (King Follett Discourse, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith)

This was emphasized by president Lorenzo Snow (5th president of the church; d. 1901), “the Spirit of God fell upon me to a marked extent, and the Lord revealed to me, just as plainly as the sun at noon-day, this principle, which I put in a couplet: ‘As man now is, God once was; As God now is, man may be’” (The Teachings of Lorenzo Snow, edited by Clyde J. Williams, p. 2). That couplet is widely recognized by Mormons. Elder N. Eldon Tanner (Apostle; d. 1982 ) said, “We believe also that ‘as man now is, God once was: As God now is, man may be’…Therefore, man should strive all his days to increase his intelligence and learn all the truths he can” (“Ye Shall Know the Truth,” Ensign, May 1978). Consequently, even Mormons who hold a more traditional view of omniscience tend to believe that God gained his knowledge of past, present, and future; as opposed to orthodox omniscience where God knows all things timelessly and independent of causation.

The following articles from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism quote President Snow’s couplet: Theogony ; Christology ; God the Father ; Godhood ; Snow, Lorenzo ; Doctrine: LDS Doctrine Compared With Other Christian Doctrines.

How Mormons talk about God
As I mentioned in my previous post, most Mormons believe that God knows all things; they believe in traditional omniscience. Joseph Fielding Smith (b. 1876; became 10th president of the church in 1970; d. 1972) said, “I believe that God knows all things and that his understanding is perfect…why should we say that his knowledge is limited and that hidden law and truths abound which he has not discovered. Who made those laws and where do they come from?” (Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1, p. 8). The Lectures on Faith (included in the Doctrine and Covenants until 1921) reads, “Without the knowledge of all things God would not be able to save any portion of his creatures…if it were not for the idea existing in the minds of men that God had all knowledge it would be impossible for them to exercise faith in him” (4:11).[1] Yet Brigham Young said, “[it has been said that] God can progress no further in knowledge and power; but the God that I serve is progressing eternally” (JD, 11: 286 – 287). And Wilford Woodruff (as an Apostle) said, “God Himself is increasing and progressing in knowledge, power, and dominion, and will do so, worlds without end” (JD, 6:120). George Q. Cannon (Apostle; d. 1901) said, “There is progress for our Father and for our Lord Jesus…It is endless progress, progressing from one degree of knowledge to another degree” (Gospel Truth: Discourses and Writings of President George Q. Cannon, p. 92). John A. Widstoe (Apostle; d. 1952) said, “If the great law of progression is accepted, God must have been engaged, and must now be engaged in progressive development” (A Rational Theology, p. 30-31).

The interpretation of these passages hinges upon the meaning of progression.

Within Mormonism there are principally two views of progression. Both hold that God has progressed to where he is now. The minority view holds that God is now progressing in knowledge and increasing in dominion. The other view, the neo-orthodox view, holds that God has progressed to ultimate perfection and knows all things past, present, and future. His increase in dominion is purely quantitative: he creates new worlds and his children become exalted, and this for all eternity. Elder Bruce R. McConkie (Apostle; d. 1981) taught this view: “There are those who say that God is progressing knowledge and is learning new truths. This is false—utterly, totally, and completely. There is not one sliver of truth in it…God progresses in the sense that his kingdoms increase and his dominions multiply—not in the sense that he learns new truths and discovers new laws. God is not a student” (“The Seven Deadly Heresies,” June 1, 1980, BYU Speeches).

Can there be harmony between these apparently divergent views? Sterling McMurrin suggested that we simply sermonize classically and theologize non-classically: “The word ‘finite’ stirs nothing in the soul of the worshipper,” he wrote in the Theological Foundations of the Mormon Religion, “But ‘infinite,’ ‘omnipotent,’ and ‘omniscient’ are words made to order for the preacher…So Mormon theological writing and sermonizing are more often than not replete with vocabulary of absolutism” (p. 35). It’s true in any religion that preachers sometimes preach one way and theologize another. But there is another view that rests on the idea of spheres of existence that synthesizes the ideas of perfection and progression. Brigham Young taught, “[We may become] as perfect in our sphere as God and Angels are in theirs, but the greatest intelligence in existence can continually ascend to greater heights of perfection” (JD 1:93). That statement implies that perfection can be relative to a given sphere. So perfect knowledge means knowing all there is to know and perfection means as perfect as one can be in a given sphere of existence. LDS scholar and essayist Eugene England has made use of this concept in an attempt find harmony between these two views of God. He writes,

My simple thesis here is that, in fact, these statements are not contradictory. These Church leaders were using two different, but complementary, ways of talking about God based on two different aspects of the Mormon understanding of God, both of which, I believe, are essential to our theology and must be maintained. With the help of a basic concept—that of different, progressive spheres of development and of possible perfection within each sphere—it is possible to believe both in God’s perfection of knowledge and power in relation to our sphere and in his progression in these attributes in his own and higher spheres. (“Perfection and Progression: Two Complementary Ways to Talk about God,” BYU Studies, vol. 29, no. 3.)

James R. Harris, Professor of Ancient Scripture at BYU, has adopted a view that God does know all things past present and future.

Statement about the foreknowledge of God are characteristically associated with reference to the “beginning and the end,” i.e., that the scope of God’s knowledge spans all of man’s experience (premortal, mortal, post-mortal, and immortal) and that man’s end (i.e., his final condition as an individual) was known by God, “from the beginning”…

The scope of God's foreknowledge would, at the least, encompass that period of man's existence cradled between the “beginning and the end”…

Eternal progression, like eternal punishment and eternal life, may represent a quality of experience and not exclusively a duration of experience…

For God there is no floundering, no experimentation, no misapplication of truth, for all things, past, present, and future are present with him… (“Eternal Progression and the Foreknowledge of God,” BYU Studies, vol. 8, no. 1)

Harris’s thesis is that God knows at least everything about this sphere of existence, past, present, and future, from its beginning to its end, as well as all things generally. I believe England is saying that God is omnipotent and omniscient in this sphere of existence; God can do everything that is possible to do in this sphere and knows everything about it. Only after its “end” does God progress to a higher sphere.

I haven’t thought through these arguments completely; the idea of spheres of existence seems to work. On the other hand I’m not bothered that within Mormonism there are divergent schools of thought about the attributes of God. So I don’t feel like harmonizing these different views is highly important. We have no equivalent to the Athanasian Creed which says that unless one firmly believes in the Trinity “he cannot be saved.” Mormonism has never required adherents to believe in a prescribed conception of God.[2] (See Four Important Creeds, Mormonism and the Creeds of Christendom.)




End Notes______________________
[1] Recent scholarship suggests the Lectures on Faith were written by Sidney Rigdon. They were removed from the Doctrine and Covenants because “they were never presented to nor accepted by the Church as being otherwise than theological lectures or lessons” (“Lectures on Faith,” Encyclopedia of Mormonism).

[2] The beliefs necessary to becoming a Mormon can be found in the baptismal interview. These questions are adapted to the individual’s circumstances and age. These interview questions outline the basic beliefs necessary to being baptized and confirmed a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

1. Do you believe that God is our Eternal Father? Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Savior and Redeemer of the world?

2. Do you believe the Church and gospel of Jesus Christ have been restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith? Do you believe that [current Church President] is a prophet of God? What does this mean to you?

3. What does it mean to you to repent? Do you feel that you have repented of your past transgressions?

4. Have you ever committed a serious crime? If so, are you now on probation or parole? Have you ever participated in an abortion? a homosexual relationship?

5. You have been taught that membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints includes living gospel standards. What do you understand of the following standards? Are you willing to obey them?
a. The law of chastity, which prohibits any sexual relationship outside the bond of a legal marriage between a man and a woman.
b. The law of tithing.
c. The Word of Wisdom
d. The Sabbath day, including partaking of the sacrament weekly and rendering service to fellow members.

6. When you are baptized, you covenant with God that you are willing to take upon yourself the name of Christ and keep His commandments throughout your life. Are you ready to make this covenant and strive to be faithful to it?
(From Preach My Gospel, p. 206)

Part III: Omniscience and divine Learning

The Attributes of God
Part III: Omniscience and divine Learning

Related posts: Omniscience ; Immutable, Omnipresence ; Whence God? Talking about God ; Creation ex nihilo

Is the future open or closed? If the future is open to God then naturally God learns. Some might find it surprising but this belief was once common among Mormons. In 1857 Apostle Wilford Woodruff (who became 4th president of the church in 1889) said, “God himself is increasing and progressing in knowledge, power, and dominion, and will do so, worlds without end” (JD 6:120). Brigham Young said, “The greatest intelligence in existence can continually ascend to greater heights of perfection” (JD 1:93).[1] George Q. Cannon (Apostle; d. 1901) said, “There is progress for our Father and for our Lord Jesus…It is endless progress, progressing from one degree of knowledge to another degree” (Gospel Truth: Discourses and Writings of President George Q. Cannon, p. 92). General Authority B.H. Roberts (Seventy; d. 1933) wrote, “God is [not] Omniscient up to the point that further progress in knowledge is impossible to him; but that all knowledge that is, all that exists, God knows” (Seventy’s Course in Theology, vol. 4, p. 70-71).

Because the Mormon conception of the universe denies its creation ex nihilo (see Creation Ex Nihilo) there is a sense of obligation to grapple with scientific explanations of physical phenomena. We believe there is an underlying consistency between the universe and God. For example, James E. Talmage wrote in Jesus the Christ,

Miracles cannot be in contravention of natural law, but are wrought through the operation of laws not universally or commonly recognized…The human sense of the miraculous wanes as comprehension of the operative process increases. (p. 139)

Though God’s knowledge is greater than ours, even he operates within the bounds of law—this is uncontroversial for most Mormons. Miracles might contradict known laws but ultimately they do not suspend the natural laws of the universe. But does God learn?

Can God’s knowledge change?
If God learns then what he knows is subject to change.

This brings me to an illustration of one way God might learn. Firstly, suppose truly random processes exist. Most scientists would concede this is predicted by quantum mechanics, but I will use the illustration of “random” dice. Consider the outcome of a role of a six-sided dice, and suppose I get six. If the dice is truly random I cannot say there was a reason I got six. It could easily have been one, two, three, four or five. The outcome is unrelated to all antecedent conditions. There was no cause. It is, after all, random. If true randomness exists in the larger universe it’s impossible for science to predict absolutely the future. If randomness is outside God’s foreknowledge then he can learn at such-and-such a time, at such-and-such a place, Troy rolled a six. Taking this idea further, what if I base some of my decisions on a random quantum device (RQD) — such a device could be designed utilizing electron spin. When I push a button my RQD randomly lights up a yellow or red light. So when I make the decision to either walk to school or to ride the bus I push the button. If I get yellow I take the bus; if I get red I walk. Because my choice is based on a random outcome it’s impossible to foreknow what it will be.[2] If this is impossible for God to foreknow then he would learn on that particular morning the RQD gave me a red light and that I shall walk to school.

There is another way God’s knowledge could change. If I am sitting, then surely at that moment God knows I am now sitting. God knows I am now sitting only while I am sitting, and not at any other time. God cannot know I am now sitting while I am standing, neither can he know I was sitting before I sit, neither can he know I will be sitting after I stand up. If God’s knowledge is subject to change then it is at least partially temporal.[3] But further, doesn’t God know that he knows what he knows?—I, for example, know that 1 + 0 = 1; I also know that I know 1 + 0 = 1. [4] If God’s knowledge has any temporality to it then what God knows about himself changes. God cannot know that he knows I am now sitting before I sit. If any of God’s knowledge is temporal then God also discovers himself.

But what if God sees all temporal events as an eternal “now”? At that “now,” then, I am both sitting and not sitting, which seems to be a denial of the law of non-contradiction—a proposition cannot be concurrently true and false.

Mechanization
If God knows me absolutely then I am a mechanism. If I am a mechanism then free will is an illusion. If free will is completely knowable it too is mechanistic. But if I am not a mechanism it follows that God cannot know me absolutely. If I adopt this belief I should also reject infallible foreknowledge because it seems inconsistent to believe God knows all my future actions and yet does not know me completely. If God can’t know me completely then obviously I don’t know myself completely—true. But can God know himself completely? Is God a mechanism? Should we worship a mechanism? It seems if any being is to be non-mechanistic then total and comprehensive knowledge of it must be impossible, both to itself and to others. This requires rejecting traditional omniscience and embracing the belief that God learns. It also means there is no positive description of free will—random “choices” are also un-foreknowable. So it provides merely grounds for believing free will exists.

But could there be any way for God to know exactly what I will do even if my intentions are hidden? Consider this example. Every morning I choose either to walk to school or to ride the bus. And on one particular morning the bus breaks down several blocks from my house, but I had already chosen to walk to school without knowing this. God knew the bus would break down—He is, after all, an ace mechanic. So he knew with certainty I would walk to school, and I freely chose to walk to school, and participated in bringing that about. Though only one choice was available, Fate didn’t find me. I encountered it. Also, my choice need not be mechanistic—it could have been based on the outcome of my RQD; the issue of mechanization needn’t arise. All God needs to know is that I intend to go to school (one way or another) and that nothing shall prevent me from going to school, and that the bus will break down. Simply put, God can foreknow I walk to school and I can choose freely to walk to school. But instead of basing my choice on the outcome of my RQD, it could be based on my un-foreknowable free will.

But what if I had waited for the bus? Eventually I would have been forced to walk to school. So this illustrates only that some choices can be made freely and also be compatible with foreknowledge.

Having said that, I find it hard to believe something like the above example applies to all my free choices. What if there are two pieces of a cake to choose from, and my choice is based on the outcome of my RQD? or my unknowable will? That choice would be truly un-foreknowable.

Why reject omniscience?
Are there more solid grounds for rejecting traditional omniscience? Patrick Grim has come up with an intriguing argument against omniscience. If omniscience is knowledge that constitutes the set of all truths then there can be no omniscient being. I will simplify his arguments. Suppose there exist only three truths in the universe and they constitute the set S = {T1, T2, T3}. One could argue an omniscient being will know all truths in the universe, all truths contained in S—S, after all, is the set of all truths. However, a power set can be formed from these truths. The power set of S consists of every possible combination of the three truths of S: {}, {T1}, {T2}, {T3}, {T1, T2}, {T1, T3}, {T2, T3}, {T1, T2, T3}. I can then ask, “Is T1 in the first element? No. Is T1 in the second element? Yes. Is T1 in the third? No,” etc. What I end up with is more truths than those contained in the so-named set of all truths. (This is an application of the diagonal argument.) Because there is no set of all truths there can be no omniscient being. If an omniscient being did know all truths, it is always possible to generate more truths from the power set; the power set is always larger than the original set. Moreover, the argument works equally well with an infinite set of truths and analogues to this argument can be made for other ways of explicating omniscience. Because there can be no set of all truths, there can be no omniscient being.

Maybe that is true. At the very least it proves there is no cogent description of omniscience. But does this necessitate abandoning the very idea of omniscience? Perhaps not. In an exchange with Patrick Grim, Alvin Plantinga responded:

Suppose you are right: what we have, then, is a difficulty, not for omniscience as such, but for one way of explicating omniscience…A person who agrees with you will then be obliged to explain this maximal perfection in some other way; but she won't be obliged, at any rate just by these considerations, to give up the notion of omniscience itself. (“Truth, Omniscience, and Cantorian Arguments: An Exchange,” Philosophical Studies, vol. 71, 1993)

Conclusions
Personally, I have no strong objections to omniscience or to soft fatalism; nor do I have any special attachment to them. Scripture can support either view.[5] A typical argument for traditional omniscience is, “Without the knowledge of all things, God would not be able to save any portion of his creatures” (Lectures on Faith, 4:11). But I don’t see how that holds up. Suppose God knows everything except, say, how many dust particles existed in some uninhabitable, unobservable part of the universe six billion years ago? Would it matter to my salvation? I can’t see how. It’s always possible to come up with some factoid that doesn’t matter. Though traditional omniscience is very important to the God of the philosophers—If you want to say God is a being “than which nothing greater can be imagined” you must have omniscience—I don’t like the theological baggage that comes with it: pessimism, the fated future, that being known completely means I am a mechanism. Moreover, I don’t believe omniscience has any serious soteriology. If omniscience were essential to salvation then every fact, no matter how seemingly trivial, has salvific value or is necessary to another fact that has salvific value. And I can’t see how that’s true. Though omniscience has tremendous comfort value it seems unnecessary to religion.




End Notes_____________________________
[1] The Apostle Orson Pratt taught that God could not progress in knowledge. This was denounced by Brigham Young who said on 13 January, 1867, “Some men seem as if they could learn so much and no more. They appear to be bounded in their capacity for acquiring knowledge, as Brother Orson Pratt, has in theory, bounded the capacity of God. According to his theory, God can progress no further in knowledge and power; but the God that I serve is progressing eternally, and so are his children: they will increase to all eternity, if they are faithful” (JD 11:286). Wilford Woodruff wrote in his journal, “Prest Yound said I corrected O. Pratt to day I did not way that God knows all things comprehends all things had has a fullness of all that He will ever obtain that moment eternity seases you put bound to Eternity & space & matter and you make an end and stopping ploease to it.” (4 March, 1860; qtd. in “The Mormon Concept of God” by Blake Ostler. See footnote 38 on page 77).

[2] LDS scientist Henry Eyring made a similar observation:

More recently, we have been obliged to give up the old determinism of classical mechanics as well as the idea of indestructibility of matter. Mechanical determinism meant that if one were given the state of the universe at any instant of time, a sufficiently expert mathematician could calculate the state of things at all times to come. This left no place for the great religious principle of free will. Then quantum mechanics brought with it the uncertainty principle. This principle eliminates the possibility of predicting the future exactly and tends to confirm that fundamental Christian tenet that man enjoys free agency as a divine gift. (Improvement Era, vol. 51, no. 2, February 1948)

[3] See Wolterstorff, Nicholas, 1975, ‘God Everlasting’ in God and the Good: Essays in Honor of Henry Stob.'

[4] “And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments” (1 John 2:3).

[5] One from the Book of Mormon reads, “But the Lord knoweth all things from the beginning; wherefore, he prepareth a way to accomplish all his works among the children of men; for behold, he hath all power unto the fulfilling of all his words” (1 Nephi 9:6). Preparations imply acting in time, and possibly accounting for contingences. Knowing all things “from the beginning” doesn’t necessarily imply knowing all things to their end. And Nephi didn’t say God has infinite power, but power to bring about his will. Also, “the Lord God doth work by means to bring about his great and eternal purposes” (Alma 37:7). And when the scriptures say “the Lord knoweth all things” (1 Nephi 9:6) and “the Lord knoweth all things which are to come” (WoM 1:7) it means that God knows the past, present, and all possible futures. Also, when God says, “my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil” (D&C 10:43; 3 Nephi 21:10), it sounds like God outsmarts the devil, which could imply temporality to God.

Scriptures supporting the traditional view of omniscience are: “all things are present with me, for I know them all” (Moses 1:6); “[I am Alpha and Omega,] The same which knoweth all things, for all things are present before mine eyes” (D&C 38:2); “But the Lord knoweth all things from the beginning” (1 Nephi 9:6; I quoted this one in the above paragraph).

The Attributes of God: part II

The Attributes of God
Part II: Omniscience and Fate

Related Posts: Immutable, Omnipresence ; The Fall of Man Part II ; Election ; Creation ex nihilo ; Omniscience and divine Learning ; Whence God? Talking about God

Immutability leads to timelessness, and timelessness to ubiquity. God is omnipotent and free from all spatial and temporal limitations. God is also omniscient. In contrast, the LDS belief in spiritual omnipresence does not entail timelessness or immutability, and it still allows us to believe God knows all things.[1]

A typical definition of omniscience is that God knows all truths and holds no false beliefs. Traditional omniscience includes God’s certain knowledge of past, present, and future. Of knowing past, present, and future, absolute knowledge of the future is most controversial.

In this post I explore how omniscience affects beliefs about freedom, moral responsibility, and the nature of man. If one billion years ago God knows that today I have a veggie sandwich for lunch, and because God cannot be wrong, I have no choice but to realize my fate. If God knows me completely, does that mean I am a mechanism? If I am a mechanism and/or my future was determined without me, can I be held morally responsible for my actions?

Explicating Omniscience
The Encyclopedia of Mormonism mentions three ways of believing about the foreknowledge of God (“Foreknowledge of God,” Encyclopedia of Mormonism). (1) God knows all things past, present, and future, and yet humans are free. According to this belief God knows what will happen but doesn’t make it happen. God simply knows how each of us will freely choose; foreknowledge is simply knowledge and is distinct from causal and logical necessity. I should point out that in traditional Christianity “foreknowledge” is an anthropomorphism, a human concept used to refer to God’s knowledge of events we perceive as happening in time. However, in the Mormon conception God exists in time, so foreknowledge is truly fore-knowledge. (2) God has perfect knowledge of the past and present. He also knows every possible future along with the probability of each being actualized but does not know which will be actualized. The future is open. According to this way of believing God is omniscient because the unknowable does not qualify as knowledge: “Because the future is yet undecided—propositions about the future are neither true nor false” (Blake T. Ostler, “The Mormon Concept of God,” Dialogue, vol. 17, no. 2, 1984).[2] In this view God has absolute knowledge he will bring about his purposes because he is the so-called unbeatable chess player. And finally (3), God has perfect knowledge of past, present, and future, and free will is an illusion.

Mormons overwhelmingly reject (3). Most believe in (1), which puts them closer to traditional Christian philosophers such as Augustine and Anselm. Many believe in (2). In addition, there is another view which uses the language of (1) and the theology of (2); it’s a kind of synthesis between omniscience, perfection, and an open future, but I'll save that for a later post in this series.

For myself, I do reject (3), but am undecided between the others. While many Mormons believe God knows the future, they are uncomfortable with the idea it is fixed. Traditional omniscience implies a fixed future, and at the very least, that we are under God’s providential control—Few theists would accept that God knows all things and yet that history is beyond his control.

Non-traditional omniscience (2) involves an open future, and that we are under God’s providential guidance. In this view God knows the past, present, and all things that could yet happen, but not which will happen. Because the future has not yet happened, propositions about future events have no truth value. For example, in September 2008 it was not true that Barack Obama was to be inaugurated as 44th president of the United States. Back then it was possible John McCain will have won the race. The proposition, “The 2008 election results select Barack Obama to be President of the United States,” did not become true until election results made it true. The statement, “Today I will go to the public library,” is made true by my going to the public library today; before that it had no truth value. But, as with all philosophical propositions an open future has its difficulties. In particular, when exactly do propositions regarding the future acquire truth value? For example, which of the two following propositions is true: (i) admiral A wins tomorrow’s sea battle and admiral B looses; or, (ii) admiral B wins and admiral A looses. (Ignoring for now the possibility of a stalemate.) Do they acquire truth value when the battle is over? when one fleet is mortally wounded? or has retreated? Do they acquire truth value near the beginning, middle, or end of the battle? If a proposition acquires truth value at a given moment in time, it is not at all obvious how a nano-second before that moment the proposition was neither true or false, and a nano-second after it is true.

However, if God knows A wins then (i) is always true and (ii) is always false. But again, the future is fixed. On the other hand, if before the battle (i) and (ii) have no truth value then the future is genuinely open. Eventually, however, either (i) or (ii) happens. And if admiral A wins it could be argued that (i) is always true and (ii) is always false. If propositions about the future have no present truth value the future is open. If propositions about the future have fixed truth value the future is closed.

Fate
With a locked-in future one must deal with the issue of fatalism. This is the belief that no matter what you do, the future is foreordained. It cannot be other than what it is. Fatalism has a strong and weak sense. (I’m going to use these senses very loosely.) For example, if three witches tell me that tomorrow I shall fall into a pit and die, then no matter how I try to avoid it, I will stumble into a pit and die. In trying to avoid my fate I unavoidably, and accidently, encounter it. That is weak fatalism. Strong fatalism is somewhat different. Suppose the Angel of Death decides that tomorrow I shall die. Despite my efforts to evade him, he hunts me down and frees me from my mortal coil. But suppose I am unaware of Fate’s decision? Suppose the witches don’t tell me of their prophecy? With weak fatalism I encounter my fate, whether or not I am conscientiously trying to avoid it. With strong fatalism, Fate encounters me, regardless. Maybe both, one, or none of these is true. But the kind of fatalism I am most bothered by is strong fatalism—weak fatalism involves accidents and it’s easy to believe in accidents. With weak fatalism exactly how I shall encounter my fate is unknown. With hard fatalism Fate finds me and forces his choice on me. With weak fatalism there is a sense of “What’s going to happen is going to happen. I will encounter my fate. Que sera sera.” But with hard fatalism I am not an active participant in bringing about my fate, hence there is a sense of, “Life happens to you, so why try. Fate will find me.” With weak fatalism I am participatory in bringing about my fate. With strong fatalism I am its hapless victim.

So how could the hard Mr. Fate force me to encounter his chosen plan? Suppose during Tuesday’s lecture I inform my students that Thursday’s lecture is canceled and that they needn’t come to class on Thursday. Telling my students not to come to class is normally sufficient to bring it about that they don’t come to class. But if Fate says it is true that my students do come to class on Thursday then it’s impossible for me to bring it about that they don’t come. Without the effect of my students not coming to class I can’t cause that they don’t come. I cannot cause a future event if the event doesn’t exist. If Fate decided to deny the effect then it cannot be caused. This argument can be applied broadly. Suppose every event in the universe is based on cause and effect; without effects there are no causes. Because effects are yet future and causes live in the past the necessity is in the future. Consequently, it is a form of strong fatalism. Fate determines effects; fate chooses what I can cause; there are no accidents and my actions are constrained. If God knows the history of the universe before the universe existed then our actions are determined by God’s vision of the future. Before the universe came into being its entire history was an effect, and that is the only history than can be caused.

Fate and Mechanization
As I mentioned, Mormons (like most people I suspect) tend to dislike fatalism; but they are especially allergic to strong fatalism. They also tend to believe God knows with certainty all future events. One popular workaround to strong fatalism is the idea that God knows our future choices because he knows us so well. Divine foreknowledge is then analogous to predicting the weather or a parent knowing what their child will do. If the patterns of the past are the patterns of the future then foreknowledge of a person’s choices is drawn from knowing that person. James E. Talmage (Apostle; d. 1933) wrote in his very influential book Articles of Faith (still required reading for missionaries),

God’s foreknowledge concerning the natures and capacities of His children enables Him to see the end of their earthly career even from the first…God’s knowledge of spiritual and of human nature enables Him to conclude with certainty as to the actions of any of His children under given conditions; yet that knowledge is not of compelling force upon the creature. (p. 173)

He also said,

Can we be consistent in saying that because he [a father] has thus studied his son, learned his nature, and thus knows what is approaching, that his knowledge determines that that son shall sin?… If I examine the barometer, the hygrometer…[and] I am able to say, “there will be a rain within a few hours…can you say that I cause the rain…If this be true, ignorance is not only bliss, but much to be preferred, for practical reasons. God’s foreknowledge showed Him exactly what our first parents would do under given conditions, but He did not cause them to fall; He did not cause them to disobey; He gave them their freedom and their agency to do as they chose to do. (Conference Report, October 1914, Third Day Morning Session, p.104)

Elder Talmage has a good point: If foreknowledge determines our choices then ignorance is better; at least then we would be free (from that). And if foreknowledge is derived from knowing our natures then foreknowledge does not force our choices any more than knowing that a clock ticks makes it tick. With this kind of fatalism I am an active participant in bringing about my fate. If God knows that I put on blue socks today then putting on blue socks today is not forced on me because I participate in bringing it about. His foreknowledge is an extrapolation based on what he knows about me.

However, this soft approach seems to imply a different kind of fixed future just as disturbing as hard fatalism. If predicting human behavior is like predicting the weather we are dealing with causal necessity. The implication of which is that free will is illusory. If all events can be traced back through a chain of causality—A caused B, B caused C, C caused D, etc.—then all events are determined by causal laws and antecedent conditions. If God’s knowledge of our future actions is extrapolated with certainty from physical, spiritual, and behavioral laws then our actions are merely the latest event in a chain of causal necessity. “If God can know me absolutely—as I know my children partially,” argued Marden J. Clark, “then this must mean that I am a knowable creature: absolutely knowable…To be absolutely knowable, predictable, I must be an absolute mechanism” (“Some Implications of Human Freedom,” Dialogue, vol. 5, no. 2, 1970). Mechanisms do only what they can mechanistically do, consequently they are perfectly predictable. If Dr. Talmage is correct, I mechanistically participate in bringing about my foreknown choices.

Stronger fate
But doesn’t logic dictate some kind of stronger necessity to the foreknown future? If God foreknows my future intentions, how can they be free? If before the foundation of the world God knows that on a given day I shall intend to put on blue socks, how was I an active participant in making that true? And if God created me in toto the issue of mechanization can’t be avoided. Consider the following argument. Let E stand for putting on blue socks.

(i) I have no free will before I exist because what doesn’t exist can’t make choices or have intentions.
(ii) It is timelessly true that I intend to do E at time t.
(iii) Before I exist I do not participate in making it true that I intend to do E at time t.
(v) It was determined without my participation that I shall intend to do E at time t.

Therefore,
(vi) We are back to strong fatalism and/or mechanization.

I have no formal training in philosophy so I suspect the argument is simplistic. But it does have intuitive value. If my intentions are known timelessly then I am non-participant in those intentions. At least it seems that way. A typical out for the traditional theologian is that God foreknows my actions because he knows how I will freely act. God cannot know that I freely act without my acting freely. Suppose he knows, “While living I freely choose to do E at time t,” and consequently he foreknows, “I will do E at time t.” If knowing what I freely choose is somehow epistemically prior to foreknowing that choice then foreknowledge might not necessitate strong fatalism.

Intelligence
But this is unnecessary for Mormons. We believe that intelligence is not created. “Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be. All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence” (D&C 93:29-30); “[intelligences] have no beginning; they existed before, they shall have no end, they shall exist after, for they are…eternal” (Abr. 3:18). If part of me is uncreated then, if God knows me completely, he foreknows my intentions, and I alone am the source of my intentions (Luke 16:15; Alma 18:32). God's foreknowing I intend to put on blue socks today can be compatible with my freely choosing to put on blue socks today. There is quite a lot more that could be written about this. Is intelligence mechanistic and/or completely knowable? If intelligence is at least partly unknowable to both God and man then whether or not it is mechanistic cannot be settled, nor could the question of fate. But I’ll leave it for now.

Moral Responsibility
What about moral responsibility? Suppose Mr. Dodds intends to murder his compassionate friend. If God knows Mr. Dodds intends to murder his friend, and will not be prevented from carrying out the diabolical crime, then Mr. Dodds shall murder his friend and that is that. The distressing thing is this. The day following the murder we are shocked and outraged that Mr. Dodds did such a terrible thing to a friend who was only trying to console him; his friend did not deserve this. But if the murder is foredoomed are our feelings of outrage superfluous? Can Mr. Dodds be justly punished? Perhaps. But only if he is the source of his intentions and he is not a mechanism. If he can be known completely then he is a mechanism: He killed because he is what he is. So why punish a mechanism?[3] Can he accidentally encounter his fate as in soft fatalism? No. How could he accidentally encounter a premeditated crime? or accidentally premeditate the crime? But if the murder is determined by hard fate then something besides Mr. Dodds foredoomed the crime. So Mr Dodds is merely the unfortunate puppet. Moral responsibility is easier if some part of Mr. Dodds is unknowable, even by God. And for some Mormon thinkers this fits easily within their belief about the nature of man.

Apathy
What about foreknowledge and apathy? If God knows the future we must grapple with either soft or strong fate. Both can engender pessimism. What will be cannot be otherwise. LDS Apostle Neal A. Maxwell warned, “The combined doctrine of God’s foreknowledge and of foreordination is one of the doctrinal roads least traveled by…Isolated from other doctrines or mishandled, though, these truths can stoke the fires of fatalism, impact adversely upon our agency, cause us to focus on status rather than service, and carry us over into predestination” (Meeting the Challenges of Today, p. 151.) In the Calvinist view foreknowledge and predestination are intimately connected. Hence the Westminster Confession contains this caution, “The doctrine of this high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care” (Westminster Confession 3:8).




End Notes_______________________
[1] Mormonism teaches that God has perfect knowledge (2 Ne. 2:24; 2 Nephi 19:20; Alma 7:13; D&C 38:2).

[2] Mormon General Authority B.H. Roberts (Seventy) wrote,

God is [not] Omniscient up to the point that further progress in knowledge is impossible to him; but that all knowledge that is, all that exists, God knows. He is Universal Consciousness, and Mind-he is the All-knowing One, because he knows all that is known. (Seventy’s Course in Theology, vol. 4, p. 70-71)

[3] One might say, “Why not punish a mechanism.” But if Mr. Dodds is pure mechanism then we are too. If people are like pocket watches then why should we fret over smashing a few pocket watches? Our sense of moral responsibility recoils at the thought.

Attributes of God: part I

The Attributes of God
Part I: Immutable; Omnipresent; Impassible

Related posts: Omniscience and Fate ; Omniscience and divine learning ; The Fall of Man Part II ; Whence God? Talking about God

In this six part series I explore Mormon conceptions of the attributes of God and compare them to traditional Christian beliefs. By conceptions I mean that Mormonism has no prescribed conception of the attributes of God. There are guidelines but few specifics. We don’t adhere to the traditional belief that God has one essence and three personal distinctions; we don’t accept God’s plurality and unicity. Not in any traditional sense at least. We believe the Godhead consists of three separate persons, each a God. (See Godhead: God or Gods?) Though we believe they share an intimate unity such that they may be spoken of as God, our language is along the lines of social trinitarianism; generally, that is the sense of our unqualified monotheistic language. In the posts comprising this series, when I use the word God in an LDS context it is in this generic sense.

Conventional Christian theology asserts that God is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, and omnibenevolent. Omnipotent: God has all power, or infinite power. Omniscient: perfect knowledge of all things past, present, and future. Omnipresent: is free from all spatio-temporal limitations. Omnibenevolent: possesses perfect love for all his creatures. While these omnis evoke a sense of awe and wonderment they also provoke very difficult theological questions. If God is benevolent how could he allow wars to happen? or the Jewish holocaust to have occurred? If God cannot be wrong and foreknows history, where does that leave free will? Does God play with his human toys? If the future is as God knows it to be, is he powerless to change it?[1] If God created all things, did he create evil? And why doesn’t he, according to Philip Appleman’s so-called humble advice, “make the bad people good—and the good people nice”?[2] Or is it as Nickles complained in the play J.B., “I heard upon this dry dung heap that man cry out who cannot sleep: ‘If God is God, he is not good. If God is good, he is not God. Take the even, take the odd, I would not sleep here if I could.’”[3] In a more formal statement, “The problem is this: God is omnipotent; God is wholly good; and yet evil exists” (J. L. Mackie, “Evil and Omnipotence,” Mind, vol. 64, no. 254, April, 1955).

Philosophers and theologians have been wrestling with those questions for centuries. If the answers were easy the debate would have ended long ago. Though the Mormon belief about God doesn’t resolve all difficult theological questions, it accords to the LDS philosopher a straightforward way in approaching many of them. In reading this post it will quickly become obvious that in many ways the Mormon conception of God differs from the traditional Christian one. Yet there are similarities. I hope the reader will realize our understandings of God are reasonable, not irrational, and even satisfying on many levels.

These posts will focus on the omnis already mentioned as well as the problem of evil as illustrated above. These topics are highly interrelated so discussing one tends to involve the others. Each of the topics covered is quite a large subject, so my treatment of them is very pedestrian—which is all I’m presently qualified to do. The point of this blog is to give people a sense of how Mormons think and believe, not to provide polished presentations of theology—not that there are many of those in Mormonism anyway. I have written this series as much for myself as for others.

Immutable; Omnipresent; Impassible
The doctrine of immutability entails that God cannot change. According to the New Unger’s Bible Dictionary, “To think of God otherwise than as unchangeable is to think of Him otherwise than as perfect.” Any change would deviate from perfection. God cannot be improved or diminished. Moreover, because change exists in time, God must be timeless and eternal. “The notion of eternity follows immutability, as the notion of time follows movement,” wrote Thomas Aquinas. Now suppose God has a physical body. If so, he could move from region A to region B, which happens in time; boundaries can also change in time. Consequently, if God is timeless he must be free from spatial and temporal boundaries. God is therefore omnipresent and incorporeal.[4]

An immutable being cannot change. An immutable God cannot change or be changed. So God is impassable, free from external influences that affect or change him, such as human suffering or petitionary prayer. God is perfectly happy to eternally contemplate himself. The Westminster Confession says “[God is] without body, parts, or passions... immense”—by passions it means susceptible to external influences. The 1905 Catholic Encyclopedia says, “[it is] God’s immutability that prevents Him from suffering” (“Sin”). On this subject Thomas G. Weinandy (author of Does God Suffer?) writes,

God is perfectly compassionate not because he suffers with those who suffer, but because his love fully and freely embraces those who suffer. The absence of suffering in God actually liberates God from any self-love that would move him to act to relieve his own suffering. The absence of suffering allows God’s love to be completely altruistic and beneficent. What human beings cry out for in their suffering is not a God who suffers, but a God who loves wholly and completely, something a suffering God could not do. [5]

What Mr. Weinandy has not answered to my satisfaction is how God’s suffering would diminish his love or make him selfish? He continues,

Michael Dodds has perceptively written that “if it were my friend’s compassionate suffering itself that brought me consolation, then I would be in the peculiar situation of reacting in quite the opposite way to my friend’s suffering from the way that he reacts to mine. For I would be taking some sort of joy in his suffering while he reacts rather with sadness at my own.”

Sadly, Mr. Dodds believes if he were to suffer emotional or physical pain, and his loving friend was pained by his suffering, he would be “taking some sort of joy” in his friend’s condolences. This is rather sarcastic, but Mr. Dodds’ friend would be better off with a new friend. Such empathy does not diminish love nor does being comforted by a good friend qualify as abuse. According to Weinandy, “Suffering is caused by the loss of some good.”

Needless to say, his belief is by no means universal. Dennis Ngien, Research Professor of Theology at Tyndale Seminary, wrote,

If love implies vulnerability, the traditional understanding of God as impassible makes it impossible to say that “God is love.” An almighty God who cannot suffer is poverty stricken because he cannot love or be involved… If friendship means allowing oneself to be affected by another, then this unmoved, unfeeling deity can have no friends or be our friend. (“The God who Suffers,” Christianity Today, vol. 41, no. 2)

And philosopher Alvin Plantinga wrote in his spiritual autobiography,

As the Christian sees things, God does not stand idly by, coolly observing the suffering of his creatures. He enters into and shares our suffering. He endures the anguish of seeing his son, the second person of the Trinity, consigned to the bitterly cruel and shameful death of the cross. Some theologians claim that God cannot suffer. I believe they are wrong…we don't know why God permits evil; we do know, however, that he was prepared to suffer on our behalf, to accept suffering of which we can form no conception.

Along those lines, the strongest argument for the passibility of God is the suffering of Jesus. Paul tells us that “Jesus Christ [is] the same yesterday, and to day, and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Yet Jesus wept (John 11:35; Luke 19:41-42), was moved with compassion (Matt. 19:36), and pleaded for relief (Matt. 26:39). Jesus was angry (Mark 3:5), distressed and troubled (Mark 14:33). And yet he is one with the Father (John 10:30). Jesus made it clear that he takes the suffering of others upon himself: “For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink” (Matt. 25:35).

If God is omniscient he knows my suffering. And it stands to reason that he knows how my suffering feels to me. If so, then God is affected by my suffering.

One way around the difficulty of how Jesus can suffer and yet God not suffer is the dual nature of Christ. Christ has two natures, one human (Jesus) and the other divine (God). Christ’s human nature suffers, but the divine nature does not suffer. God does not suffer as God. But as I pointed out above, the idea that God does not suffer is not universal in Christendom. The two natures of Christ is not a doctrine found in Mormon belief. (See The Nature of Christ.)

What do Mormons believe?
Divine immutability is intimately connected to ideas about divine perfection. God is perfect. If God changed he would be imperfect. But God cannot change. He is immutable, timeless, ubiquitous, and impassable.[6] The Mormon conception of deity is that of a God with body, parts, and passions. Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said,

The consequences persist in the various creeds of Christianity, which declare a Godhead of only one being and which describe that single being or God as “incomprehensible” and “without body, parts, or passions.” One of the distinguishing features of the doctrine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is its rejection of all of these postbiblical creeds. (Dallin H. Oaks, “Apostasy and Restoration,” Ensign, May 1995)

Now suppose God has boundaries; suppose he is corporeal.[7] If so, it follows that he can be in region A at time t, then in region B at time t+ .[8] God therefore exists in time. If God exists in time then perhaps he can change in other ways besides location. Firstly, Mormons do not believe that God’s person is ubiquitous. We believe the Father and Son are corporeal: “The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also” (D&C 130:22).[9] But what about scriptures that say God fills heaven and earth? (Jer. 23:24.) We believe that God has an organic connection to all things, a kind of spiritual immanence. The Doctrine of Covenants teaches, “[God] comprehendeth all things, and all things are before him, and all things are round about him; and he is above all things, and in all things, and is through all things, and is round about all things; and all things are by him, and of him, even God, forever and ever” (D&C 88:41; see also Moses 1:6; D&C 93:35; 88:5-13; Jer 23:24). At first glance this appears the same as conventional omnipresence,[10] but conventional omnipresence arises from God’s freedom from all limitations of space and time. The Mormon conception of spiritual “omnipresence” is not related to the everywhereness and everywhenness of God. It simply means an “organic connection with the creation” (see footnote 10). I believe most Mormons would not accept that an organic connection extends to the past and future. God’s connection with creation does not extend to temporal immanence.

Mormons also believe that God’s feelings (and possibly his decisions) are affected by external influences such as human suffering and wickedness, and petitionary prayer. A good example of this is found in the book of Moses:

[Enoch] beheld Satan; and he [Satan] had a great chain in his hand, and it veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness…And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept…And Enoch said unto the Lord: How is it that thou canst weep, seeing thou art holy. (Moses 7:25-31; compare to D&C 19:16-19)[11]

Evidence of divine passability is plentiful in the Old Testament: “God’s anger was kindled” (Num. 22:22); “the LORD was angry with me for your sakes (Deut. 4:21); “The LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart” (NASB, Gen. 6:6); “O LORD God of hosts, how long wilt thou be angry against the prayer of thy people?” (Ps. 80:4); “You are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abundant in loving kindness, and one who relents concerning calamity” (NASB, Jonah 4:2); “the LORD, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God” (Ex. 34:14); “I [God] have had a change of heart; My compassion is stirred!” (HCSB, Hos. 11:8). (These passages also imply temporality to God.)

To me this means that God can change in some ways, but also that he possesses essential qualities such as holiness, loving kindness, and mercy. God is ethically immutable. His compassionate qualities, such as love, mean he is passable. We believe, along with our more traditional Christian cousins, that “God is love.” And yet loving a person involves suffering because of the wrong actions or suffering of the one who is loved. I imagine that God’s suffering is analogous to that of a grieving parent who suffers with their suffering child.[12] They would not suffer if they did not love. And yet, because God’s goodness is immutable, because his eternal purposes cannot be frustrated, because he cannot do evil, because he has power to save those who believe in him, we can have total faith in him.



End Notes____________________________

[1] According to David Hume, Epicurus (supposedly) framed it thus: “Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? then is he impotent. Is he able, but not willing? then is he malevolent. Is he both able and willing? whence then is evil?” (This quote is from Hume’s “Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion” part 10.)

[2] “O Karma, Dharma, Pudding and Pie,” from Five Easy Prayers for Pagans.

[3] J.B. was written by Archibald MacLeish. It is a modern adaptation of the story of Job.

[4] If God is omnipresent, he must needs be omniscient; but he is omnipresent; this supposes the infinite and immensity of his being, from which follows the ubiquity of his presence; heaven and earth include the whole creation, and the Creator fills both (Jer. 23:24). (Matthew Henery’s commentary on Psalm 139:7-16)

[5] His argument could be problematic to a belief in the Trinity. If God is free from self-love and God consists of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and the Father loves the Son, then God is not free from self-love.

[6] Actually immutability does not require impassibility. If God knows all that will happen, and can feel all emotions simultaneously, then he can at once suffer for all sins past, present, and future. So long as the suffering never began and never ends then God can both passable and immutable.

[7] If from the local element entering into the description God's subjection to the limitations of space were inferred, then one might with equal warrant, on the basis of the physical, sensual elements entering into the representation, impute to the writers the view that the divine nature is corporeal (“Omnipresence,” International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 1915).

[8] If God is visualized as a nebulous mass then one can believe God’s boundaries can be subject to change.

[9] I have said that God is corporeal, but what I specifically mean is that God has a physical body. Most Mormons would accept that the Holy Ghost is corporeal, but does not have a physical body.

[10] This is something LDS philosopher and General Authority B. H. Roberts (d. 1933) points out.

It may be thought that “immanence” is but the restatement in another form, of the attribute of omnipresence in Deity--simply an affirmation of his every-whereness; and it must be admitted that there is at least a close resemblance if not identity between the two things for which the two terms stand. And yet there is a difference between immanence and omnipresence. The latter means merely the every-whereness of God, “present in all places and at the same time.”

Immanence means that, too; but it means more than that. It means presence accompanied by power; or presence plus power; presence accompanied by doing, or act, leading to manifestations of God’s power. In modern philosophy the word is applied to the operations of a Creator conceived of as in organic connection with the creation…These declarations go at least as far as to establish the omnipresence of God, not of his bodily, but of his spiritual presence. (B. H. Roberts, Seventy's Course in Theology, vol. 5, p. 2-3)

[11] In the Book of Mormon, God gave his prophet Nephi tremendous power (Hel. 10:6, compare Gen. 18:23-33 and Matt. 16:19). When his people become embroiled in devastating wars he pleaded with God to bring a famine on his people to stop the bloodshead and hopefully save his people from destruction (Hel. 11:1-4). After the people relented and the war ceased Nephi prayed that the famine be abated:

O Lord, thou didst hearken unto my words when I said, Let there be a famine, that the pestilence of the sword might cease; and I know that thou wilt, even at this time, hearken unto my words, for thou saidst that: If this people repent I will spare them…O Lord, wilt thou turn away thine anger, and try again if they will serve thee? And if so, O Lord, thou canst bless them according to thy words which thou hast said. (Hel. 11:14-16)

[12] Some might say that God cannot have human-like emotions, or that it’s more appropriate to say human emotions are a bit like God’s emotions. Blake Ostler has argued that our way of understanding involves what we experience. If we try to speak of God as wholly unlike man then we strip ourselves of the possibility of any understanding of God.