Is Open Theism Heresy?

[PaulThomson]

however what Scripture declares is quite a different narrative:

Proverbs 16:33​

The lot is cast into the lap; ​

but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.​

​

'the lot' is an unpredictable ((from human perspective)) random event: completely unknowable future when it is cast.

but the Scripture says God controls and knows it. it is in fact because of the omniscience of God extending over the unknowable, unpredictable, random future, that the people of God used the lot to determine God's will - only He and He alone can do this.

The literal trqnstation of the words in this proverb are:
Ha-GaDoRaL (The lot) YUTaL (Hiphil Imperfect: is being cast) Ba-HeYKh (into the lap) U-MeYHoVaH (and/but Yehovah) MiShPaT-oV (His judgement) KoL (whole) MiShPaT-oV (His judgment).

Is it really obvious that this means that God knows which stone will be drawn from the ephod before it is drawn, or which numbers will show on the dice before they are thrown? It certainly is not the obvious meaning I see from just reading the words. I may quite easily see that, if I came to the proverb with a presupposition that God foreknows all things.

But what do I see the words saying? The words make me picture a lot being cast into someone's lap to determine an immediate outcome. The soldiers casting lots to see which of Jesus' garments they will get to take home as souvenirs. But beyond the immediate outcome of the lot-casting there will be consequences for the winner regarding how they use their just-now acquired-winnings. So, don't think that winning a lottery implies God is judging you positively. Your winnings are a test, and God will judge you on how you behave once you have won them.

Likewise, David used the Ephod to determine whether Saul would come down to Keilah, and whether the Keilahites would hand David over to Saul. God knew by His knowledge of the present what both Saul and the Keilahites were planning to do. There was no foreknowledge of the future needed. But God would hold David accountable for what he did with the outcome of the lot-casting. This to me is the more obvious meaning of the proverbs words, if I approach it with an open mind.

 

[John146]

Arguably, someone who thinks God is able to achieve His ends only if He knows every detail of history, even before he starts the world, thinks God is not smart enough to problem-solve unexpected challenges to His plans and overcome those glitches to nevertheless achieve His planned outcomes. I think the second description of God ascribes more intelligence to God, and fits the Bible narrative better. Others disagree. If your perspective works for you to get you loving God and loving all people and loving the creation, and produces good relationships with the same, all power to you.

What is amazing is the thought of an almighty God working in and through and around every human event and decision to bring about his expectant end as declared in his word. Wow! Praise the Lord!

 

[PaulThomson]

Jeremiah 1:5

"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
before you were born I set you apart;
I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

Bi-TeReM (in - before) 'eTsaRK (Qal imperfect: I was fashioning you) Ba-BeTeN (in - the belly) YiDaTsThiYK (Qal perfect:I knew - you) U-Be-TeReM (and-in-before) TheTseH (Qal imperfect: you were leaving) Be-ReKheM (inside the womb) HiQDaShTh-iYK (Qal perfect: I set you apart). NiThaTh-iYk (Qal perfect: I ordained-you) NaThiy": a prophet) La-GoYiM (to the-nations).So, a random sperm and ovum merge in the fallopian tube and the zygote descends and implants in the uterine wall. God knows at the time the particular sperm and egg combine what information the DNA contains, and chooses this as a good gene content for a prophet He wants to speak to the nations. Then He supplies the life and the oversight needed for the process of building/forming the child.

So, yes, God knew Isaiah intimately and genetically in detail as a zygote before he was fashioning the zygote into a baby delivered nine month later. There is nothing here that screams that God knew from eternity past that Isaiah specifically would be born a prophet to the nations.

Psalm 139:13-18

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
17 How precious to me are your thoughts,[a] God!
How vast is the sum of them!
18 Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand—
when I awake, I am still with you.

16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
and in (V-'aL) your-book (SiFR-Ka) all-for me (KeL-aM 3rd person masculine plural) they-were being written (YiKaTheB-U: Niphal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural) daily / the days (YaMiYM: common masculine plural)
they-were fashioned (YeTSaR-U: Piel perfect 3rd person common plural) and-not (V-LoV ) one ("eKhaD) from-them (Ba-HeM" : 3rd person masculine plural)

There is some dispute as to the referent for all in "all-for me" and they in "they-were fashioned" and "they-were being fashioned", and the them in "from-them". They all match in gender and number with YaMiYM, so could all refer to days. Some think it refers to the members being formed daily from the unformed substance.

Either way, the imperfect verb they-were being written (YiKaTheB-U: Niphal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural) means that whatever was being written had not already been written, since then the Niphal perfect would be used. The meaning is that as the body was being formed, the days were being written or the members were being recorded.

So neither of these, in any way, imply some exhaustive knowledge of isaiah, or the future from eternity past. 'Hope this helps.

 

[Believer08]

@PaulThomson, are you not afraid what you believe is heretical? I appreciate your confidence in what you believe and wish I had that, but what leads you to believe open theism isn’t damnable? Not looking for an argument, just a question, thanks.

 

[PaulThomson]

@PaulThomson, are you not afraid what you believe is heretical? I appreciate your confidence in what you believe and wish I had that, but what leads you to believe open theism isn’t damnable? Not looking for an argument, just a question, thanks.

God wants a relationship with us where we are free to learn from Him. learning requires making mistakes and discovering that these were mistakes. Learning leads to the realisation that we do not know very much at all, and even what we think we know may be "off" a little or a lot, and may need to be corrected further down the trail.

I have spent a lot of time discussing theology with people who are sure they are right and cannot tolerate challenges to their positions on things, who are happy when they think they have won a point, and are miserable and resentful when they are confronted with ideas that may entail them giving up a confidently held opinion. Some people are so egoically wedded to their opinions, that hey cannot even bring themselves to concede that an alternative view may have any merit whatsoever.

Our conception of what God is like, whether a kind gracious loving patient forgiving Father, or a perfectionist intolerant harsh taskmaster, will determine whether we fear God will strike us down for some theological misstep or let us find out in time that we were mistaken and should adjust our thinking. The God I worship wants reconciliation with rebels so much that They subjected one of their members to humiliation and death at the hands of those rebels, just to show us how much They love us and how terrible we can be when we rely on our instincts and dismiss Their guidance.

 

[PaulThomson]

.


you sure sound agnostic.

Arguing logically sound agnostic to some sects within Christendom, because to believe in their God one must jettison logic.

 

[posthuman]

Arguably, someone who thinks God is able to achieve His ends only if He knows every detail of history, even before he starts the world, thinks God is not smart enough to problem-solve unexpected challenges to His plans and overcome those glitches to nevertheless achieve His planned outcomes.

you are the one saying something is impossible with God, not me, and not scripture.

you are the one saying things are hidden from God, not me, and not scripture.

you are the one saying God's arm is shortened, not me, and not scripture.

 

[GWH]

as for me,
i believe God can create a rock so big that He can't move it.
and also that He can move it.

That's absurd per Logos in this creation!

 

[posthuman]

Yes He did. He knew before I said it. He could read the neurons pathways that were preparing me to say it. But I don't think He knew from all eternity past that I would say it.

amazing! God knows the future a few nanoseconds before it happens?

wow, He is almost as prescient as a computer.

 

[posthuman]

Yes He did. He knew before I said it. He could read the neurons pathways that were preparing me to say it. But I don't think He knew from all eternity past that I would say it.

so you believe thought is a physical process, arising from chemical processes in your fleshly brain, not a spiritual process which effects a physical response?

you do not believe that you as a person are a spiritual being?

 

[posthuman]

on the other hand, as distasteful as it may be to earthly, mere deist, human intellect, the Biblical narrative is not only that God knows all things from all time, but that He also destined people and things and events from eternity past, and actively brings them about.

​

Mark 10:40​

but to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared.​

 

[Melach]

Bi-TeReM (in - before) 'eTsaRK (Qal imperfect: I was fashioning you) Ba-BeTeN (in - the belly) YiDaTsThiYK (Qal perfect:I knew - you) U-Be-TeReM (and-in-before) TheTseH (Qal imperfect: you were leaving) Be-ReKheM (inside the womb) HiQDaShTh-iYK (Qal perfect: I set you apart). NiThaTh-iYk (Qal perfect: I ordained-you) NaThiy": a prophet) La-GoYiM (to the-nations).So, a random sperm and ovum merge in the fallopian tube and the zygote descends and implants in the uterine wall. God knows at the time the particular sperm and egg combine what information the DNA contains, and chooses this as a good gene content for a prophet He wants to speak to the nations. Then He supplies the life and the oversight needed for the process of building/forming the child.

So, yes, God knew Isaiah intimately and genetically in detail as a zygote before he was fashioning the zygote into a baby delivered nine month later. There is nothing here that screams that God knew from eternity past that Isaiah specifically would be born a prophet to the nations.



16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
and in (V-'aL) your-book (SiFR-Ka) all-for me (KeL-aM 3rd person masculine plural) they-were being written (YiKaTheB-U: Niphal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural) daily / the days (YaMiYM: common masculine plural)
they-were fashioned (YeTSaR-U: Piel perfect 3rd person common plural) and-not (V-LoV ) one ("eKhaD) from-them (Ba-HeM" : 3rd person masculine plural)

There is some dispute as to the referent for all in "all-for me" and they in "they-were fashioned" and "they-were being fashioned", and the them in "from-them". They all match in gender and number with YaMiYM, so could all refer to days. Some think it refers to the members being formed daily from the unformed substance.

Either way, the imperfect verb they-were being written (YiKaTheB-U: Niphal imperfect 3rd person masculine plural) means that whatever was being written had not already been written, since then the Niphal perfect would be used. The meaning is that as the body was being formed, the days were being written or the members were being recorded.

So neither of these, in any way, imply some exhaustive knowledge of isaiah, or the future from eternity past. 'Hope this helps.

if you have to go thru this much effort to explain away the meaning of the text you should reconsider your views

 

[posthuman]

That's absurd per Logos in this creation!

2 Samuel 6:22​

And I will be even more undignified than this, and will be humble in my own sight. ​

 

[posthuman]

Arguing logically sound agnostic to some sects within Christendom, because to believe in their God one must jettison logic.

this is simply false.

logic is in fact the purview of Christianity, which supplanted such things as the worship of rocks and stars, human will and merely physical processes, the later two of which don't seem to have yet been supplanted in your own thinking.

 

[PaulThomson]

so you believe thought is a physical process, arising from chemical processes in your fleshly brain, not a spiritual process which effects a physical response?

you do not believe that you as a person are a spiritual being?

No. I believe the body, mind and spirit operate in a two way fashion. What happens in our mind, the physical body harmonises with.

 

[PaulThomson]

amazing! God knows the future a few nanoseconds before it happens?

wow, He is almost as prescient as a computer.

That's a kind of prescience that satisfies Biblical references to God predicting our speech. If someone wants to extend the reach of God's prescience further into the future, they need to show scriptures which require that more extensive kind of prescience. You can't persuade by just imagining it and then claiming it must be so.

 

[PaulThomson]

you are the one saying something is impossible with God, not me, and not scripture.

you are the one saying things are hidden from God, not me, and not scripture.

you are the one saying God's arm is shortened, not me, and not scripture.

I have said that A = not A is impossible with God, on logical grounds.

I have said that certain abilities postulated by some as God's are not stated to be so by scripture. They may be so, but if they are, that has not been revealed to men through scripture. And what God has not revealed to us, no one has to believe to be saved. Anyone who claims they do, is adding to God's word... which one does despite a serious warning of consequent plagues and destruction.

I have not said there is anything hidden from God. Nonexistent things cannot be hidden. They just are not.

I have never written "God's arm is shortened." My, your argument is in tatters if you have to invent objectionable strawmen and put them in your interlocutors mouth to you poison the well.

 

[PaulThomson]

this is simply false.

logic is in fact the purview of Christianity, which supplanted such things as the worship of rocks and stars, human will and merely physical processes, the later two of which don't seem to have yet been supplanted in your own thinking.

Claiming that God has decreed whatsoever comes to pass, but not in such a way as to be responsible for the evil in creation is not logically coherent.

 

[PaulThomson]

this is simply false.

logic is in fact the purview of Christianity, which supplanted such things as the worship of rocks and stars, human will and merely physical processes, the later two of which don't seem to have yet been supplanted in your own thinking.

Claiming that God has decreed whatsoever comes to pass, but not in such a way as to be responsible for the evil in creation is not logically coherent.

 

[PaulThomson]

if you have to go thru this much effort to explain away the meaning of the text you should reconsider your views

I go to this effort because thr Old Testament was written primarily in Hebrew, so what the Old testament texts mean should be understood according to the grammar and syntax of the Hebrew, and we should not just accept the translation offered to us that best agrees with our presuppositions and biases.

Perfect and Imperfect verb forms are a thing in OT Hebrew, and do affect the meaning of texts.