Thursday, April 11, 2013

Possible Worlds, Possible Calvinisms and The Solidarity of God

 
  photo christ-on-cross.jpg
 
 

 Some time ago I did a post called "Is Jesus suffering the Mechanism for Atonement?" In that post I argued that it is the participation of Jesus in humanity and in death that expresses God solidarity for humanity. It's the acceptance of that solidarity through repentance and commitment to righteousness through Christ that creates the grounds of forgiveness. So that would mean that the reciprocal nature of solidarity is actually the mechanism. Not to leave the resurrection out in the cold, it's the Hegelian sublation of hope through resurrection that actually puts the energy into the process of atonement, but that comes after the act of atonement. Sublation means moving up word through a stair step process of dialectic. The Resurrection has a dialectical structure. One source through which we can understand this is Jurgen Moltmann's The Crucified God. Although I can't pin it to a page number, 187-274 spell it out. (see the book on Amazon).
....In contrast tot this view a reader called 'Renegade Gospel makes a comment to that post that gives me the basis for some thinking on this issue:
 
Renegade Gospel said...

You can find the complete answers to atonement in a kindle book called Renegade Gospel The Jesus Manifold by Jamey Massengale.
1. God is the creator completely soveriegn
2 My separation from God is due to my knowledge of good and evil because i use it to judge god i.e. why do the innocent suffer etc. is an accusation in interrogative format.
3 If God is omniscient I cant do other than what God KNEW i would do before He created me and He created me as He did; therefore God is responsible for my sin
4 If God is responsible for my sin then God should die for my sin
5 In Jesus God did die for my sin or Jesus as god died for all sin ( which is by the way the ultimate statement of soveriegnty, where God says in essence “I do it all” cause effect and resolution.)
6 However Jesus the man did not sin nor was He under original sin so He didn’t deserve to die, but being God as man, now by the rule of equity, all men are equal to God, syllogism: Jesus is a man and all men are human therefore Jesus is human and Jesus is God therefore all men are in Jesus equal to God in their HUMAN/GOD rights.
7 Therefore since only God as the “potter” had the rights of life, liberty, and property; and since Jesus transfers to all humans like Himself those rights, we don’t need a law saying by fiat “thou shalt not kill”, because all men now have the right to life; I know I violate that right if I kill a man. Thereby the law is fulfilled in right-eousness, or “the having of the rights of God”.
That’s it in a nutshell and it explains a lot of ambiguous statements Paul makes. I haven’t quoted much scripture for brevity’s sake but I find the Jesus manifold completely supported from genesis to revelation. It affirms the homoousion, it satisfies the complete taxonomy of sin(ontologic, deontic, and relational), and it satisfies all of Abelard’s criteria: 1. it’s logical 2. It’s not arbitrary if God is omniscient, therefore actions are predestined, and love demand’s it to satisfy the human cry of injustice. 3 It’s intelligible being stated capable of syllogistic treatment in plain unambiguous language. The implications to a multiverse for an omniscient God require He know everything in all possible universes, this single incarnation would then only be required in this one to satisfy it’s precise constraints, as it exists within the multiplicity of universes in God’s consciousness.

I apologize if the first part is ambiguous as to the idea of multiverse. Only in science fiction and thought experiment is a multiverse with divergent timelines considered. This universe has the timline it does because of physical constraints that cannot be changed if human life is to exist as it does(see Anthropic principle). There are approximately 20 such constraints that are so precise the universe would cease to exist as it does if they varied even one plank measure. Those multiverses actually possible would be defined by changes in those constants. Therefore there can be no other universe which would value the atonement as this one does(anthropically); however these constants do not forbid interactions at the quantum level, and may derive their stability from these interactions. In that case the incarnation in this universe has it’s meaning only in this universe but would have implications to all other possible universes.
7:35 PM
I'm not trying to put RG on the spot or to attack his views or make him feel put upon. His comments have made me thing about certain things. 
....First of all I reject the premise that would make God the author of my sin. If that there true it would be completely unjust that anyone is punished for sin. Then it comes from a Calvinist presupposition  which means it's totally unjust anyway, since predestination is unjust. Secondly, I reject the deterministic conclusion based upon God's omniscience.  This does not make God responsible for my decisions. It also doesn't determine my actions in such a way as to eliminate the possibility that I would change my mind. Even if it did that wouldn't mean the original decision is not mine alone. If God observes all from a timeless perspective he would know about any mind changes, but that wouldn't prevent my mind changes. Just knowing the final deicsion doesn't prevent free will in choosing it. Our choices are finite and they are made so by the finite number of years that we live. Being finite that means we have only so many mind changes we can make. God can know about them all that doesn't make them impossible. For example I know that William Barrett Travis drew the line in the sand at the Alamo. That doesn't mean I am the author of his decision to do that. If I knew nothing of the Alamo Travis would still have drawn the line.
.....Secondly, consider the statement: "In Jesus God did die for my sin or Jesus as god died for all sin ( which is by the way the ultimate statement of sovereignty, where God says in essence “I do it all” cause effect and resolution." I fail to see why we need a demonstration of God's sovereignty if we make the Calvinist deicsion to base all theology on that concept in the first place. I also fail to see how Jesus dying for all sin is both cause and effect, unless of course it means that Jesus committed my sins, which would eliminate the talk of him not sinning. That would have to be the logical conclusion to "I do it all." If Jesus committed my sins why do I need salvation? The problem is Calvinism, it does not make sense. It seeks to set up God as the badest bully on the block and just arbitrarily feiot in his goodness despite total absolute injustice. It makes a lot more sense to think of God in Weslyan terms. 
....Mind you, Jurgen Moltmann, the guy I refer you too above, in fact the role model from where I took my view of God's Solidarity--is a Calvinist! He's not the kind of Calvinist we see on Message boards. He's not a TULIP guy. He's more of a Barthian style Calvinist. So I am not against all forms of Calvinism. It makes more since to think of us as responsible for our own sins and God as expressing solidarity through the taking the consequences for them even though he's not guilty of them, and when he doesn't have to.
....When  he says: "The implications to a multiverse for an omniscient God require He know everything in all possible universes, this single incarnation would then only be required in this one to satisfy it’s precise constraints, as it exists within the multiplicity of universes in God’s consciousness." Are you confusing possible worlds with multiverwse? The explanation about multiverse is one reason I think he/she may be confusing possible with multivariate. Possible worlds are infinite and the are not actual.Yes to be God God must be in all possible worlds and he must therefore be the creator over the entire multiverse. But possible worlds are not actual worlds and the criteria for their possibly is that they conform to divine necessity not vice verse. They do not constrain the nature of God, God constrains their nature. If God is just in one possible world he must be just in all possible words. If God is in solidarity with humanity in possible world he must be so in all possible worlds, not because the worlds make it so, because God is just and God is in solidarity with us. Christ's atonement is a perfect example of solidarity, it is participatory in that he had to participate in life with us as one of us to make it work. Humans die unjustly. Dying as a human and being in solidarity does not necessity God's authorship of my sin.
 







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9 comments:

Renegade Gospel said...

This argument rests upon what actually separates us from God. Is it the sinful act? Without law there is no sin because nothing is prohibited. However what separates is our accusation of God, what is usually called Theodicy. As a necessary being all God does is for his own Good. But the predestination argument not only comes up it doesn't remove responsibility from God even free control over outs could be proven. If a man creates a bomb which uses a random number generator to detonate it, and doesn't know who it may or may not kill, is he any less responsible if someone dies. That is evil from our point of view and God so loved us that he satisfied our point of view. I don't know anyone who has never asked "why do bad thins happen to good people?" or "why do bad things happen at all?" This is simply an interrogative form of accusation against God if all he does is good. If the wages of sin is death God can legimately take responsibility for causing our acts and die for them.

5:19 PM
Joseph Hinman (Metacrock) said...

The problem is that making Calvinist assumptions sets us up to force conclusions that indict God for injustice becuase Calvinist God is unjust. If God set's people aside, creates in the first place, to burn in hell just to prove he's sovereign that is the ultimate injustice.

The only right thinking way to have a just and merciful God is to over the childish indulgent egotistical Calvinist BS and accept the responsibility of free will.

RG says:
"This argument rests upon what actually separates us from God. Is it the sinful act? Without law there is no sin because nothing is prohibited."

not exactly true. Yes sin is disobeying law so law has to exist, but law is not merely the arbitrary list of rules. the basis of good i love. So the basis is law is love. Absence of love is the basis of sin.


"However what separates is our accusation of God, what is usually called Theodicy."

the so called "accusation of God" is only a technical default because we make Calvinist assumptions.

"As a necessary being all God does is for his own Good."

Since God is the basis of all that is what is for his good is for our good too.


"But the predestination argument not only comes up it doesn't remove responsibility from God"

remove it? It mandates it.

"even free control over outs could be proven. If a man creates a bomb which uses a random number generator to detonate it, and doesn't know who it may or may not kill, is he any less responsible if someone dies."

your intent is getting foggy here


"That is evil from our point of view and God so loved us that he satisfied our point of view. I don't know anyone who has never asked "why do bad thins happen to good people?" or "why do bad things happen at all?" This is simply an interrogative form of accusation against God if all he does is good. If the wages of sin is death God can legimately take responsibility for causing our acts and die for them."

asking why bad things happen is not an accusation. It's a legitimate question. there is a legitimate answer.

6:23 AM
Renegade Gospel said...

The original sin is saying that the question why do bad things happen is a legitimate question. It is only legitimate from a contingents view; from the necessary view (God's view) there are no bad things. When you ask that question you suppose some things are bad apriori. God does not need to satisfy His view of events to reconcile us, he needs to satisfy our view. Why would God do that? He loves us, but that is why it is a stumbling block to the Jews (for they will not admit God would take responsibility for sin) and foolishness to the Greeks ( who define the Divine "apathy" that it is impossible for God to have such "feelings" that would so love the world to do that). The bomb metaphor is simply to illustrate that you are responsible for what you create. To create a being which by "free will" (analogus to random number generation) affects other other beings you are responsible for what that being does, otherwise there is no justice or injustice. I don't get my understanding of predestination from Calvin but from the laws of physics, which are now augmented by evidence in neuro science (such as the brain activity preparing the body to act a minimum 7 seconds before the person is even aware that he will "will" the act)

10:42 AM
Renegade Gospel said...

The atonement model proposed is not penal substitution nor solidarity, it has the name "Jesus Manifold" because it is very precise and renders the whole subject of atonement to precise statement with the language of mathematics and symbolic logic:
In mathematics, a manifold of dimension n is a topological space that near each point resembles n-dimensional Euclidean space. More precisely, each point of an n-dimensional manifold has a neighborhood that is homeomorphic to the Euclidean space of dimension n. If the probability shows that Jesus is homeomorphic to God, the logical consequence is that God died on the cross. The implications in atonement are two fold, 1. That our primary separation from God is that we make the argument of evil, (that there was no just cause for God to create evil which humans suffer from in this life, and may suffer for in the afterlife), and it is evident that evil exists, therefore God is responsible for it, and is unjust; 2. That God had given a revealed law to the nation of Israel called the Torah by Moses validated by evidence at the Exodus, that defines the sin and evil God was responsible for creating and then punishing men for, and is thereby unjust: God bearing the twofold guilt of both satisfies the cry for justice in Gods being crucified and dying for the guilt of all sin. All who then claim that Jesus has satisfied their need for justice by believing that He as God died for their sin, now have nothing to separate them from God, such as the cry that God is unjust.
While non euclidean geometries are necessary in physics A Posteriori, they are not possible without A Priori Euclidean geometry for a foundation as Kant demonstarates in his "critique of pure reason". Calvin and Moltmann both use John Lockes understanding of reason which Kant proves is difficient (and Kant thereby lays the ground work for physics to even logically discuss possible worlds or a multiverse, and quantum physics in general where an "observer effect" is observed).

10:59 AM
Renegade Gospel said...

I have enjoyed the comments you can now read Renegade Gospel The Jesus Manifold online at truthconcentrate.com

2:08 PM
Joseph Hinman (Metacrock) said...

"His view of events to reconcile us, he needs to satisfy our view. Why would God do that? He loves us, but that is why it is a stumbling block to the Jews (for they will not admit God would take responsibility for sin) and foolishness to the Greeks ( who define the Divine "apathy" that it is impossible for God to have such "feelings" that would so love the world to do that)."

thanks for explaining God's view point to me. I'm glad he's not beyond your comprehension. Just the rest of us.

say if you know math as well as you imply, have I got a mission of you. Ever hear of the CARM board?

seriously, I've been waiting for a mathematician for years to take on HRG on Carm.

5:39 AM
Renegade Gospel said...

Hi looked at some of your debate with HRG, He is saying God is a tautology, an apriori truth. That is true, God is real just like triangles are real. Now the question is how do prove circles aren't square, which is to say how do you prove God is "this" and not "that". That is the whole point of the Jesus Manifold, it allows you prove God is good, then evil, then good, because he is just. The second thing HRG is doing is saying an apriori truth does not exist because it cannot be proven a posteriori. It just so happens I can find an aposteriori triangular object which allows superimposition of my apriori triangle definition. HRG is saying you have the apriori definition of God but you have nothing to superimpose it on, no a posteriori example of God, and your taking the bait because then you admitt you can't prove God by example.

11:55 AM
Joseph Hinman (Metacrock) said...

He's made a classic mistake in thinking that a priori = tautology. Plantinga deals with that. The kind of necessity we are talking about is not the kind of necessity we get when we say all husbands are married men.

6:53 AM
Renegade Gospel said...

Quite right, the necessity we are talking about is one like Kant discusses in "time" and "space". HRG must admit those to even discuss physics and they only exist apriori. God has the defintion of the necessary mind; where apriori truth, like time and space exist. The anthropic principle points precisely to this, since the universe appears a posteriori, to exist so that a priori truth as an object for it's superimposition.

7:28 PM

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