After taking several months to ponder the last post, I feel I’ve come to somewhat of a conclusion: If a human’s possible moral freedom is limited even in the slightest way, humanity in general is wronged deeply, not unlike how human life in general is cheapened by a single murder. Possible moral freedom should be thought of as that freedom which exists inside the necessary limits of the physical world (as humans are physical) and of social/cultural behavior firewalls (as humans are social creatures).
Moral freedom is connected deeply to who we foundationally are, for much of our humanity comes from our ability to make moral choices. Accordingly, there is no such thing as unnecessary evil. For humans to exist as we know them, evil must exist, from minor to horrific levels.
After surveying the various views, this one seems to be the most resonant with reality. Nonetheless, thinking through it all has really made me fall in love with God’s subtlety, respectfulness, and grandeur all the more.
January 7, 2008 at 1:42 am
There is a theory that, if true, means that God is not able to exert direct power upon men individually or collectively to intervene about anything whatsoever that they may propose to do. If He is to take action against an evildoer, it must be in the form of arousing other men against that one to bring him under judgment. This is done as much for that one as for all others, for it may be that so doing will bring the man not only under the conviction of his fellows but also under God’s as well. (Karla Faye Tucker is a great example of this.)
God, who is a Sovereign, has assigned to individual men a piece of that sovereignty as it applies to themselves. He delegates to them that portion of His own sovereignty that pertains to their persons as individuals. Moreover, God has assigned to mankind that portion of His sovereignty that pertains to their collective society. By these delegations, which are irrevocable, God has substantially diminished his power over individual men and mankind in general. As a result, he must now resort to men to deal with men. This is why Jesus had to become a man to redeem men.
If this be so, then God now lacks the sovereignty to usurp that of men insofar as their sovereignty is His own as delegated to them. (As contradictory as it may sound, a man who rapes and kills a child cannot be directly prevented by God because the man is acting with God’s own sovereignty delegated to him, and God is powerless to stop him.) If this be so, some may ask why need it to have been so. Given the nature of God, there may have been no other way to create freemen than to give to them the very freedom which He possessed. It may be that there truly is no other kind.
Warm regards,
Opus
January 7, 2008 at 2:25 am
I think there’s some strong evidence for that theory, but it’s hard to show in scripture where this universal and irrevocable delegation might have happened.
January 7, 2008 at 2:42 am
Gen. 1:26-28 seems to be a solid foundation, and as one progresses, one sees the effects of the delegation in action. Consider, for example, Abraham’s “negotiations” with God in Gen. 18:17-33. (Even the judgment of Sodom may have been due to what Darwin called secondary causes.) I have long desired to search this out in scripture but have not yet done so. In the end, I do believe it is supportable and explains a great deal more than other theories, which all new theories should. This theory arose in my own efforts to find a weak spot in the doctrines of Calvinism, and if true, it destroys their whole edifice because it strikes at its very foundation—their doctrine on the Sovereignty of God.
Warm regards,
Opus
January 7, 2008 at 4:34 pm
I find it hard to believe that Genesis marks the point of delegation, since God works apart from humans many times thereafter. In any case, I find Free Will Defense to have more scriptural evidence and explanatory power.
January 7, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Yep. It is not an easy one, and I am not yet convinced. There are certain problems. There must be, however, a mechanism (or an anchor) for human free will that is consistent with the best extant theory(ies) while adding a great deal more explanatory power—solidifying it, as it were, and firming up its foundations.
Warm regards,
Opus