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Not open theism.
- Thread starter 37818
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CJP69
Active Member
This simply does not work.
Do you understand what the term "eisegesis" means? (That is a real question. No implied insult is intended.)
It happens when you bring your doctrine to the text and interpret away the meaning of a text that one would get by simply reading it in order to preserve a doctrine that you hold a-priori.
In short, whether Open Theism is true or not, your explanation of "now I know" is completely ad-hoc in nature. It is the theological equivalent to what modern astrophysicists do when they come across an observation that contradicts their theory of planet formation. Instead of letting the evidence falsify the theory, they find an ad-hoc rescue device (usually a massive collision of some kind). A practice, that I have little doubt that you're aware of and disapprove of.
As for the doctrine of exhaustive divine omniscience, it is a doctrine that no Jew or Christian believed at all until Augustine of Hippo imported it from the Classics (i.e. Aristotle and Plato). It simple isn't taught in the bible at all. God knows, or is able to find out, what He wants to know of that which is knowable. The biblical material cannot establish anything beyond that.
Lastly, you call Jesus (God the Son) God's "temporal" agent. The idea that God exists outside of time, in addition to being self-contradictory on it's face, is yet another idea imported by Augustine from Aristotle and Plato and which cannot be established biblically. On the contrary, the bible is full to running over with positive proof that God experiences duration and sequence (i.e. time).
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37818
Well-Known Member
What are you
claiming makes no sense?
Yes, John 1:18 uses the term.
No. An actual conclusiom is never a-prori.
How? How do you hear the LORD God say "now I know" and not, lie? Genesis 22:12, ". . . And He said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from Me. . . .
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He only understands his view. Refuses to listen to anything anyone says and accuses everyone of not answering his posts and saying "XXXX. Full Stop" as though his words were scripture. I gave up on even interacting with his Open Theism.
CJP69
Active Member
You resonded too fast!
I changed it to, "It doesn't work." and I'm referring to the entire line of thinking. It is irrational, beginning with the conclusion and working backward doesn't work. It's a way of doing theology that allows you to believe anything at all.
What does that have to do with anything?
Well, it is if you start with the conclusion and read that into whatever it is you're using for a premise. That's why its irrational.
I explained how. You're making it up out of whole clothe in order to rescue your doctrine from the plain reading of the text.
Easy! He said what He meant!
Why would there be any thought in anyone's head that God was lying? God tested Abraham and Abraham passed the test. Seems pretty straight forward to me. Why not just believe what the text plainly states?
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37818
Well-Known Member
And your own argument does not make sense. Why? You really did not show what you claimed from my argument. You need to show what and why my argument doesn't work.You resonded too fast!
I changed it to, "It doesn't work." and I'm referring to the entire line of thinking. It is irrational, beginning with the conclusion and working backward doesn't work. It's a way of doing theology that allows you to believe anything at all.
What was made up?
That wasn't at issue. God didn't know Abraham feared God until he offerred his son.
But what was my argument as to why? And why do you think my answer is not true?
God is fully omniscient. How or why would He say differently and not be lying?
I do. Do you deny it was the Son of God who appeared to Abraham per John 1:18?
CJP69
Active Member
I absolutely did show it.
You don't get to start with a doctrine and go reading that doctrine into the text and then pretend that you've provided biblical evidence for the doctrine you started with. That isn't how sound reason works. Any third grade child knows that.
The idea that it was only God the Son who said "know I know" is what you've made up. The text doesn't say that, nor is there any reason to think that even might be the case EXCEPT for your doctrine which the idea is intended to rescue from what the passage not only plainly states but quotes God Himself as having said.
It is your contention and thus it is your burden of proof, not mine. My point is simply that you have nothing to support your claim. The ONLY reason you have for even positing the idea is in order to rescue your doctrine from this passage and others like it.
Yes, yes. This is the doctrine that you are trying to rescue from the plain reading of the words that scripture puts in God's own mouth.
This is called begging the question. The argument only holds IF your position is correct, which is what is being debated.
I reject your premise and so have no need to resolve such a dilemma. He wasn't lying because He didn't know.
I see that you think that's what you're doing but I'm trying to get you to see that what you're really doing is reading your doctrine into the text.
It was God. Whether it only God the Son is, at best, a matter of speculation. The text doesn't indicate that it was only one third of the Trinity. It does no harm to my doctrine either way.
37818
Well-Known Member
No, there is nothing for me to rescue. God is omniscient. And God is cited to say "now I know."
I have three questions.
What does Mark 13:32 explain about God the Father?
What does Acts of the Apostles 1:7 Explain about God the Father?
What does John 1:18 explain about God the Father?
37818
Well-Known Member
The Trinity are Persons. They are not the same Persons. They are the same LORD God.
Note that God is never unaware. He appoints at the proper time.
Seeking nothing but each other’s harm, these kings will plot against each other at the conference table, attempting to deceive each other. But it will make no difference, for the end will come at the appointed time. “Then at the appointed time he will once again invade the south, but this time the result will be different.
(Daniel 11:27,29)
This is my only comment.
Open theism is a slippery slope to liberalism and hell.
Seeking nothing but each other’s harm, these kings will plot against each other at the conference table, attempting to deceive each other. But it will make no difference, for the end will come at the appointed time. “Then at the appointed time he will once again invade the south, but this time the result will be different.
(Daniel 11:27,29)
This is my only comment.
Open theism is a slippery slope to liberalism and hell.
CJP69
Active Member
Which is contradicted on its face by "know I know" which is why you feel the need to come to omniscient's rescue by positing the idea the it was only God the Son who didn't already know, which you have no evidence for nor any reason at all to believe other than to rescue your beloved doctrine of exhaustive divine omniscience, which the bible not only doesn't teach but openly contradicts and which no Jew or Christian believed before Augustine imported the doctrine from Aristotle and Plato.
Oh boy.
Mark 13:32 “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
It means that God the Father has a time line in mind for the setting up of Israel's Kingdom, which Jesus was not informed of at the time He said these words.
Acts 1: 24 And they prayed and said, “You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these two You have chosen.
The word translated "Lord" here is "kyrios" which a title that applies to both God the Father and Jesus Himself so, by itself, this verse tells us nothing about God the Father in particular. However, God (i.e. the Triune God) knows the hearts of men. Incidentally, there is no necessity to believe that God had any preference for Matthias over Barsabas. Which is not to say that God didn't cause the lot to fall on Matthias but only that He didn't have to. The use of lots was common in New Testament times. Whether God actually caused the lot to fall one way or the other isn't the point. The point of casting lots is to keep people in authority with a healthy dose of humility.
John 1:18 No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
If I didn't know better, I'd say you were being condescending with these questions. This verse, just as the others, means what it says. Any third grade child can understand the sentence.
I could just as easily ask you a similar question. What does John 10:30 say about God the Son?
And, more importantly what does any of this have to do with what we're talking about? If you have an argument to make then make the argument and stop with the condescending questions about what simple sentences mean. I can read just as well as you can. What I can also do is support my doctrine with sound reason and the plain reading of scripture all without resorting to ad hoc rescue devises to explain away the words that scripture puts in God's own mouth.
CJP69
Active Member
Saying it doesn't make it so.
In fact, God Himself tells us otherwise....
Genesis 18:20 And the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, 21 I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”
Abraham then proceeded to negotiate with God about how many righteous people found in Sodom with would take to save the city from destruction. Seems like Abraham was neither a Calvinist nor an Arminian.
There is no doubt that God has ordained certain times for certain events, especially when those events have to do with the Nation of Israel, but it is an error to project this truth out to every event that has or will ever occur.
Well, thanks for your two cents. It's not worth much more than that because, as I said a moment ago....
Saying it doesn't make it so!
More than that, its boring. Make an argument! Even a weak argument is more interesting than just a wholly unsupported declaration of what you believe. Any pimple faced teenager can get on the internet a state what he believes.
Of course, the reason you don't make an argument is that there is almost certainly no such argument to make. The most conservative people I have ever known in my life are Open Theists. Conservative to the point that they refused to take the COVID shot, one of which subsequently died of COVID, because they believed it was "abortion tainted" science that produced it.
In fact, I don't know of even one single liberal Christian who does not reject Open Theism. Liberal Christians who believe that God exists outside of time, knows everything in advance and/or predestined everything that happens are literally all over the place!
So, no! I'm very decidedly not convinced that you're even close to being correct but merely couldn't resist the temptation to get on the internet and throw out an insult. That sounds to me very much like what a liberal would do!
CJP69
Active Member
Unresponsive.
37818
Well-Known Member
Acts 1:24 is not Acts 1:7.
The three references, had somethings held by the Father, distinct from the Son.
The Trinity are distinct Persons. As God they are the same God.
It is fine by me you do not agree with my view on Genesis 22:12, it being the Son of God per John 1:18. Your disagreement doesn't change my understanding.
CJP69
Active Member
So what?
No one has suggested that there aren't distinctions between the members of the godhead. That doesn't mean that you get to believe in whatever distinction you care to make up in order to rescue some pet doctrine from the plain reading of scripture!
So, is this you admitting that you're just going to go even try to respond to my argument with something other than a simple reaffirmation of your position?
Do you simply not care that your doctrine is done in an irrational manner?
What if it was some different doctrine? What if David Koresh wasn't dead and he showed up here spouting some one of his hundreds of wacky doctrines and I came along and demonstrated, not that his doctrine was necessarily false, but that the reasoning he was using to justify the doctrine was irrational and that it could be used to defend ANY DOCTRINE anyone cared to make up out of whole clothe - would you click the "agree" button then?
If you're just hell bent of believing something, I can't stop you, of course. But be honest enough with yourself to understand that someone has now come along and demonstrated that you cannot rationally defend your doctrine.
Why cling to a doctrine that the bible openly contradicts? I don't get it.
37818
Well-Known Member
The plain reading of Scripture is not at issue. Your mere disagreement doesn't disprove my understanding of John 1:18 either. No one can make anyone hear what is not explained or for that matter, to hear to understand what has been explained what one does not want to hear.
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37818
Well-Known Member
CJP69
Active Member
I've demonstrated that it is. You ARE reading your doctrine into the text, whether you admit it or not. Facts are facts.
I never suggested otherwise. It is your method of doing theology and formulating your doctrine that I'm arguing against. Whether you're right or wrong about it being only God the Son who said "now I know" is irrelevant to the fact that the method you've used to come to that conclusion is irrational in the extreme. If your method were valid, there isn't a doctrine that anyone could conceive that couldn't be defended in a similar manner. It would render the entire faith or any wacky flavor of it as utterly unfalsifiable. David Koresh could use the tactic to defend his having sex with the twelve year olds in his congregation and there's not a word you could utter against him that doesn't do just as much harm to your doctrine as it does his.
You got that right! That's the caption along the bottom of the poster with your picture on it.
CJP69
Active Member
Said the kettle to the pot!
The whole thread is still here for the whole world to read!
Remember the verse in Genesis that you and I have been talking about this whole time where God Himself states that "now I know..."?
The plain reading of that text directly contradicts your doctrine which is the ONLY reason you have for positing the notion that it wasn't God the Father who didn't know but only God the Son. Your own position is predicated on the FACT that the plain reading of that passage contradicts your doctrine!