Thomas Aquinas John Webster on Why God is Not Self-Caused

“Tell me how I got here again . . .”

When pressed, the concept of [God as causa sui] soon shows itself incoherent and dogmatically precarious. At a purely formal level, it seems to suggest that God in some way precedes himself as his own cause . . . The dogmatic difficulties are equally serious. Talk of God as his own cause cannot easily cohere with teaching about divine eternity or immutability, since it appears to introduce an actualist concept of God’s ‘coming-to-be’ as the result of some causal process. Further, it imperils divine simplicity, introducing distinctions between cause and that which is caused, or between potentiality and act, which, by attributing potentiality to God, undermine the all-important identity of essence and existence in God . . . By suggesting that God produces himself, it seems to require the possibility of God’s non-existence as a kind of background to his being. In effect, a God who is his own cause lacks an integral element of perfection. If the concept of causa sui is to be used, therefore, the notion of cause must first be stripped of any associations with ‘becoming’ or ‘coming-into-existence’ – of anything that might corrode the eternal fullness of God’s being.

John Webster, ‘Life in and of Himself’, in God without Measure: Working Papers in Christian Theology. Volume i: God and the Works of God (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2016), pp. 22–23

Inclusion within the Divine Identity: Observations on the Conversion of Saul

You’ll forgive me for not being the most studious of Bible scholars, but I thought I’d post a couple of observations I made today when reading Acts 9:1-22 – today’s reading for the festival that is the Conversion of Paul. And here’s Acts 9:1-9, from which my observations have come:

Meanwhile, Saul was still spewing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest, seeking letters to the synagogues in Damascus. If he found persons who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, these letters would authorize him to take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. During the journey, as he approached Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven encircled him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice asking him, “Saul, Saul, why are you harassing me?”

Saul asked, “Who are you, Lord?”

“I am Jesus, whom you are harassing,” came the reply. “Now get up and enter the city. You will be told what you must do.”

Those traveling with him stood there speechless; they heard the voice but saw no one. After they picked Saul up from the ground, he opened his eyes but he couldn’t see. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. For three days he was blind and neither ate nor drank anything.

First, there’s the commonplace observation that by persecuting the believers, Saul is persecuting Jesus himself. But a parallel passage flashed through my mind: Matthew 25:31-46, the so-called parable of the sheep and goats. I subscribe to the view that ‘the least of these’ in Matthew here is a reference to the Church, so that the sheep and the goats within the parable are those who adopt different stances to the suffering people of Jesus. My first observation, then, about the Acts 9 passage is nothing too profound – it’s a simple recognition that the Church is included within the divine identity in some way, and that there is a consistency of thought between Matthew 25 and Acts 9.

My second observation might be obvious to some and strained for others, but I couldn’t help but think of Jesus’s own death and resurrection when the text states that Saul was blind for three days and consumed nothing. If this reading isn’t too absurd or forced, then surely it’s possible to say that Saul’s own experience mirrored Jesus’s Easter Saturday emptiness in some way until he is ‘resurrected’ to new life as Paul the Apostle. Here, Saul himself is included within the divine identity, within Jesus’s own sufferings – and so the Church’s, too.

IJST: Special Issue on Creation

The latest issue of the International Journal of Systematic Theology is now available, and it’s a special issue on the theology of creation. There are some interesting-looking articles on Aquinas and divine simplicity, and Calvin and providence. The full table of contents is here.

Is Theology Nit-picking?

Basil the Great thinks not:

Those who are idle in the pursuit of righteousness count theological terminology as secondary, together with attempts to search out the hidden meaning in this phrase or that syllable, but those conscious of the goal of our calling realize that we are to become like God, as far as this is possible for human nature. But we cannot become like God unless we have knowledge of Him, and without lessons there will be no knowledge. Instruction begins with the proper use of speech, and syllables and words are the elements of speech. Therefore to scrutinize syllables is not a superfluous task. Just because certain questions seem insignificant is no reason to ignore them. Hunting truth is no easy task; we must look everywhere for its tracks.

St Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit, translated and with an introduction by David Anderson. Poplar Patristics Series 5 (Crestwood, NT: St Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1980), 1.2, p. 16

Basil was referring specifically to the use of prepositions in the doxology, but I think what he says about the need to press our theology in service of the truth can be further extrapolated.

The Creed According to Hillsong

I’ve recently come across Hillsong’s ‘This I Believe (The Creed)’, written by Ben Fielding and Matt Crocker. We’ve sung it in the church where I worship for the past two weeks in place of saying the Nicene Creed or one of Common Worship’s so-called ‘Authorized Affirmations of Faith’. Needless to say, I have some reservations about the Hillsong version, and not just because musically I find it trite (a friend also says it reminds him of Peter Cetera’s ‘The Glory of Love’). I’m finding it hard to articulate my reservations, so what follows is a little disorganized; but it’s fair to say that I think that ‘This I Believe’ dehistoricizes and so depoliticizes the Apostles’ Creed on which it’s (presumably) based. Here are the lyrics:

Our Father everlasting

The all-creating One

God Almighty

Through your Holy Spirit

Conceiving Christ the Son

Jesus our Saviour.

I believe in God our Father

I believe in Christ the Son

I believe in the Holy Spirit

Our God is three in one

I believe in the resurrection

That we will rise again

For I believe in the Name of Jesus.

Our Judge and our Defender

Suffered and crucified

Forgiveness is in you

Descended into darkness

You rose in glorious life

Forever seated high.

I believe in you

I believe you rose again

I believe that Jesus Christ is Lord.

I believe in life eternal

I believe in the virgin birth

I believe in the saints’ communion

And in your holy Church.

I believe in the resurrection

When Jesus comes again

For I believe in the Name of Jesus.

At first glance, there aren’t too many problems with the words to ‘This I Believe’. All three persons of the Trinity are mentioned, and there are references to the Son’s conception by the Holy Spirit, the virgin birth, the Son’s crucifixion and suffering, the communion of saints, the Church, and so on. But there are, I think, some significant omissions that present a dehistoricized version of the Christian faith. So while there’s a reference in ‘This I Believe’ to the virgin birth, there’s no reference to Mary. And while there’s mention of the Son’s suffering and crucifixion, there’s no mention of Pontius Pilate. But why? The omission of Mary and Pilate from the Apostles’ Creed could encourage a more mythical interpretation of the Son’s life rather than one that situates him at a particular time and in a particular place. Moreover, there is no explicit statement that Christ died and was buried. Of course, ‘crucified’ presumes death, but the lack of reference to Christ’s death and burial avoids making a necessary connection with the reality of life and death in first-century Palestine under Roman rule.

‘This I Believe’ also alters and embroiders the Apostles’ Creed. The Son (presumably) is described as ‘our Judge and our Defender’, but this is ambiguous. Of whom is Jesus the Judge? Does the ‘our’ in ‘our Judge’ refer to every person in the world or to Christians alone? If the latter, then arguably the geopolitical sovereignty of the risen and ascended Son is almost a fiction. And why is Jesus described as ‘our Defender’? Again, is this a reference to the whole world or just to Christians? If the latter, then how far is this idea of Jesus as ‘our Defender’ no more than a belief in Jesus as a Big Brother or a bodyguard, someone eager to protect Christians from the nasty bullies or elements of the world?

Elsewhere in ‘This I Believe’, Jesus descended into darkness – but not to the dead. ‘Darkness’ lacks the finality of ‘the dead’, perhaps, and needn’t even mean ‘the dead’ (unless, of course, the songwriters are channelling Old Testament conceptions of Sheol). There is a statement about resurrection, but not necessarily resurrection of the body; a belief in the holy Church, but not the holy catholic Church; a recognition that ‘forgiveness is in you’, but no clear recognition that this forgiveness is specifically the forgiveness of humanity’s sins; and an acknowledgement that the Son is ‘forever seated high’, but not that he is seated at the right hand of the Father, with all the geopolitical connotations this conviction entails. And finally, is the phrase ‘You rose in glorious life forever seated high’ a conflation of Christ’s resurrection and ascension, two events in the life of Christ that the Apostles’ Creed itself takes care to distinguish? This, alongside the line ‘I believe in the resurrection when Jesus comes again’, could express a theology that sees salvation primarily as isolation and extraction from the world.

All these things suggest to me that ‘This I Believe’ is a dehistoricized version of the Apostles’ Creed. The tenets of belief have been stripped of any clothes that might root them in a reality that doesn’t prioritize the internal life of the individual believer. This means that ‘This I Believe’ is not only a dehistoricized version of the Apostles’ Creed, but a depoliticized version, too. The affirmation that Christ is forever seated high as ‘our Judge and our Defender’ is surely an impoverished view of the sovereignty exercised by the risen Son as received by his Father, the sovereignty to judge the living and the dead.

Now I’ll admit that many of these points may seem to be stretching things a little. After all, if ‘This I Believe’ is simply based on the Apostles’ Creed, then it probably doesn’t need to include every single detail contained within its source. But here’s the thing: Any act of editing, including this song, is a process of deciding what elements to leave in and what elements to leave out. Thus it’s legitimate to ask why certain things have been ‘removed’ from the Apostles’ Creed – for example, Mary and Pilate, or Christ’s death and burial. I can’t say for certain why Fielding and Crocker chose to write what they did; but my concern is that, as it stands, ‘This I Believe’ is a dehistoricized and so depoliticized version of the Apostles’ Creed. Why is this a problem? In my view, a dehistoricized and depoliticized Apostles’ Creed is more amenable to those whose faith is predominantly an individualized, internalized spirituality, one focussed on salvation as extraction from the world rather than on salvation as transformation of the world, and all expressed using terms sympathetic to a theological therapeuticism.

New Books on Providence: The Mechanics of Divine Foreknowledge and Providence and Abraham’s Dice

Here are details of a couple of forthcoming books on providence. First of all, here’s the blurb for T. Ryan Byerly’s The Mechanics of Divine Foreknowledge and Providence:

How exactly could God achieve infallible foreknowledge of every future event, including the free actions of human persons? How could God exercise careful providence over these same events? Byerly offers a novel response to these important questions by contending that God exercises providence and achieves foreknowledge by ordering the times.

The first part of the book defends the importance of the above questions. After characterizing the contemporary freedom–foreknowledge debate, Byerly argues that it has focused too narrowly on a certain argument for theological fatalism, which attempts to show that the existence of infallible divine foreknowledge poses a unique threat to the existence of creaturely libertarian freedom. Byerly contends, however, that bare existence of infallible divine foreknowledge cannot threaten freedom in this way; at most, the mechanics whereby this foreknowledge is achieved might so threaten human freedom.

In the second part of the book, Byerly develops a model for understanding the mechanics whereby infallible foreknowledge is achieved that would not threaten creaturely libertarian freedom. According to the model, God infallibly foreknows every future event because God has placed the times that constitute the history of the world in primitive earlier-than relations to one another. After defending the consistency of this model of the mechanics of divine foreknowledge with creaturely libertarian freedom, the author applies it to divine providence more generally. A novel defence of concurrentism is the result.

I’ve not read Byerly’s book yet, of course, but already I’m wondering about how novel is his approach. It’s fine to contend that ‘God exercises providence and achieves foreknowledge by ordering the times’, but I’m not sure how this differs from many within mainstream Augustinian–Calvinist traditions. I suppose much depends on what Byerly means by ‘primitive earlier-than relations’.

The second book – Abraham’s Dice – is a volume edited by Karl W. Giberson:

Most of us believe everything happens for a reason. Whether it is “God's will,” “karma,” or “fate,” we want to believe that an overarching purpose undergirds everything, and that nothing in the world, especially a disaster or tragedy, is a random, meaningless event.

Abraham’s Dice explores the interplay between chance and randomness, as well as between providence and divine action in the monotheistic religious traditions, looking at how their interaction has been conceptualized as our understanding of the workings of nature has changed. This lively historical conversation has generated intense and engaging theological debates, and provocative responses from science: what of the history of our universe, where chance and law have played out in complex ways? Or the evolution of life, where random mutations have challenged attempts to find purpose within evolution and convinced many that human beings are a “glorious accident.” The enduring belief that everything happens for a reason is examined through a conversation with major scholars, among them holders of prestigious chairs at Oxford and Cambridge universities and the University of Basel, as well as several Gifford lecturers, and two Templeton prize winners.

Now, as never before, confident scientific assertions that the world embodies a profound contingency are challenging theological claims that God acts providentially in the world. The random and meandering path of evolution is widely used as an argument that God did not create life. Organized historically, Abraham’s Dice provides a wide-ranging scientific, theological, and biblical foundation to address the question of divine action in a world shot through with contingency.

The contents of this one – found here – reveal quite a few interesting-looking titles and some big-name contributors (e.g., Oliver Crisp, John Hedley Brooke, and Alister McGrath). And I’ll be interested to see if any fresh or alternative angles will be on view.

A New Song for (and about) Church Services: ‘I am a grumpy old man’

Here’s a cynical little ditty I’ve penned. It took about five minutes to write (so don’t take it too seriously; it’s not exactly a masterly critique of modern worship patterns) and is to be sung to the tune of Dave Bilbrough’s 1983 classic, ‘I am a new creation’.

I am a grumpy old man,

I moan far more than you can

about church services and more.

My heart is overflowing

with the despair of knowing

there’s little lasting at their core.

Yet I will praise you, Lord,

yes, I will praise you, Lord,

and I will stay despite all that is done.

My Lord, may I inherit

a true thirst for your Spirit

to show what’s lasting at my core?

Can I get an amen?

Ron Highfield on the Rhetorical Argument from Evil

Towards the end of The Faithful Creator, Ron Highfield outlines what he labels the ‘rhetorical argument from evil’ against God’s existence:

The rhetorical argument from evil begins by rehearsing in exquisite detail excruciating and nauseating accounts of horrendous cruelty and suffering. It does not move to a conclusion by way of inference but ends with a challenge, explicit or implicit: how dare you diminish the horror of human suffering by making it a means to greater good or a higher harmony! Such exclamations are more agonized protest than rational argument. It forces believers to choose between shame-faced silence and playing the role of the cold-hearted theodicist.

Ron Highfield, The Faithful Creator: Affirming Creation and Providence in an Age of Anxiety (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 2015), p. 332

images belong to The Estate of Alice Neel

To elucidate the matter, Highfield looks at Voltaire’s Candide and Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. Highfield’s account of the latter is interesting because he notes how subsequent critics focus on Ivan Karamazov’s rhetoric in ‘The Rebellion’ and ‘The Grand Inquisitor’ and avoid the response that is the life of Elder Zosima. The point is that the so-called rhetorical argument from evil cannot be refuted intellectually; it can only be assuaged by recognising on an epistemic level that cruelty and suffering cannot be explained away. We simply do not know why God allows rape or murder or terrorism or exploitation to happen. But we can be sure, says Highfield, that these things will not be for nothing: ‘To hope that God will “dry every tear” does not imply that the tears were cried for nothing; rather it asserts that life is stronger than death and joy more lasting than sadness.’ (p. 357)

I admit I’m not sure how far to go along with what Highfield contends here. I have trouble accepting his distinction between metaphysical and epistemic absurdity (p. 356), because this implies that while we (currently) may not know why something evil happens, we can be sure that that something does have a proper place in God’s providence. How far does this stance simply justify the presence of evil in a world created good? There is surely a distinction to be made between saying that God works all things for good (Rom. 8:28) and that all things are justified or made acceptable by the good that arises from them.

In this context of protest atheism, Highfield also offers a critique of Jürgen Moltmann’s theology:

Moltmann explicitly denies that God is vulnerable to sin, suffering and death by nature. Instead, God voluntarily suffers so that the world might exist and God voluntarily abandons the Son so that sinners might be accepted. But this theory of divine self-limitation is a fiction; it is an all-too-convenient, ad hoc hypothesis designed to secure the benefits of a finite and suffering God without being burdened with its liabilities. If God can suffer willingly, it follows that God’s nature is such that God can suffer, which is to say that God is by nature vulnerable to suffering. Otherwise it would not even be possible for God voluntarily to suffer. I can suffer and die. Hence I can suffer and die willingly or unwillingly. If God can willingly suffer and die, does it not follow that God can suffer and die unwillingly? (p. 359, emphasis original)

No; it doesn’t follow. Highfield is right to point out that Moltmann’s theology means that God’s suffering entails an ability to suffer by nature, but this doesn’t mean that God can suffer unwillingly. In the end, then, while Highfield’s chapter on the rhetorical argument from evil is fascinating and contains a number of insightful perspectives, I cannot help but think the most appropriate response to such an argument is far simpler than he makes out: genuine lament before God.

inScripturations #6: Exodus 12:2