The need for a coherent Christian theism has never been more
obvious than it is today. In a Church where post-modernism has seen its share
of successful advances, and Christian doctrine has, to a large degree been
ignored or worse, swept aside in preference for a more pragmatic approach, it
is clear that the time for a more cohesive understanding of Christian theism is
upon us. Not since the very early and transitional phase of Christianity has
the Church had more members who knew less about the system to which they claim
to subscribe than it does today! One area where that glaring inconsistency
emerges is in how Christians understand divine foreknowledge and its
relationship to human responsibility. In order to understand the nature of how
these two areas relate to one another, it is imperative to understand both. Three
things will be examined: The Bible’s teaching on divine foreknowledge, the
nature of human freedom, and how the two cohere with one another within the
larger unifying context of Christian doctrine. Christian theism is one unified
system of truth. If that system is to prove itself rational, it cannot include
logical contradictions.
The Bible and Divine Foreknowledge
God’s knowledge is comprehensive, all encompassing,
excluding nothing from its scope. Unlike human knowledge, God’s is not based on
observation; it is undivided, simple, unchangeable, eternal. All things are
eternally present to him.[1]
God’s knowledge is simple, eternal, absolute, complete. This means that the
state of God’s knowledge has never changed even though the state of temporality
has changed. What God knows, God has always known and what God knows he has
never not known. God’s knowledge cannot increase nor can it decrease. God does
not gain information through observation. God’s knowledge exists in a state of perfect
infinity. God’s knowledge is complete, perfect, and eternal. It is without
limitations in both its scope and its perfection. Ps. 147:5 states “Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his
understanding is beyond measure.” The Hebrew expression is that God’s
understanding “cannot be measured.” Psalm 147 strongly emphasizes God’s
sovereign control over all the earth to include every set of circumstances that
arise. Psalm 147:5 points up to Isa. 40:28, Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his
understanding is unsearchable. God’s knowledge, his comprehension and understanding
are without limitations. God’s knowledge has no boundaries. Paul echoes this
idea in the New Testament; Oh, the depth of the riches both of the
wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable
are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! (Rom.
11:33) Job affirmed the same thing about God’s limitations when he asked the
questions, “Can you find out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limit
of the Almighty?” (Job. 11:7)
God possesses perfect knowledge
of the future: “Behold, the former things have come to pass, and new things I
now declare; before they spring forth
I tell you of them.” (Isa. 42:9) God knows the beginning, the end, and
everything in between; “declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient
times things not yet done.” (Isa. 46:10) And no creature is hidden from his
sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give
account. (Heb. 4:13) God knew all temporal events before time began: But we
impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for
our glory. (1 Cor. 2:7) God decreed the wisdom that is found in and produced by
the gospel before time began. The issue that will have to be grappled with is
how can a timeless being act in a way that is before time. Does God’s existing
eternally, outside of the bounds of time mean that there is no order in God’s
eternal activities? It would seem to me that God decreed to create and then God
actually created. Nevertheless, the main issue here concerns God’s knowledge.
Since God’s knowledge is essential to God himself, it necessarily follows that
his knowledge is infinite in scope and perfection. God does not take in
information resulting in an increase in his knowledge. God’s knowledge both of
himself and of the universe is so decisively and clearly taught in Scripture
that it has at all times been recognized within the Christian church.[2]
Psalm 139:16 says, “Your
eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.” John
Frame points out that even if the psalmist only intends to say that God knows
our days on the earth before we are even born, this is still a profound
statement of God’s knowledge because such knowledge entails knowledge regarding
free decisions made by every human being from the day they are born until the
day they die.[3] There
are a great many free decisions that go into how long a human being lives on
this earth. And those decisions do not only belong to the person in question,
but to numerous other individuals as well. The web of connections that this
requires is vast and since it applies to every individual who has ever existed,
the statement is beyond anything we can actually comprehend.
The question arises then,
if God knows all things exhaustively, to include every future decision of every
human being, how can human decisions be free? This question has caused a great
many men to fall into heresy. Cicero could not harmonize omniscience with human
free will and therefore he denied the former. Marcion the heretic denied
omniscience. The Socinians believed that God could not know future contingent events
with absolute certainty. The Socinians were a group of antitrinitarian
heretics. The fact that this issue can lead to heretical views of the divine
character should be enough to ensure due care in any investigation or study of
this subject.
If one surveys theological
literature on the subject of God’s knowledge, historically they will find that
theologians distinguish between God’s natural knowledge and his free
knowledge. God’s natural knowledge is knowledge of things merely possible
and is therefore called indefinite because nothing on either hand is determined
concerning them by God.[4]
God’s natural knowledge is knowledge of all possible events. It is called
natural because it is natural to God’s existence. The second type of knowledge
is God’s free knowledge. God’s free knowledge deals with future things and
follows God’s free action to create. God’s free knowledge is his knowledge that
is associated with his will or decree to create, or actualize this world and
all that is in it. Basically, God’s knowledge being both natural and concerning
all possible worlds which includes every possible event in every possible
world, and God’s knowledge being free entails that God’s knowledge is
all-encompassing. There is nothing that God does not know always.
One popular view of God’s
free knowledge was brought forward by the philosopher Boethius and it remains
popular to this day. God sees the beginning from the end the way that a man in
a blimp or tall building would see the beginning of a parade and the end of it
all at once. The problem with this view is that it does not comport with God’s
free knowledge which is determinative. The Bible depicts God’s knowing as
synonymous with God’s willing. Not only does God know the end from the
beginning, he knows it precisely because he declares it. (Isa. 46:10) The
counsel of the Lord will stand forever. (Ps. 33:11) Many are the plans of the
mind of man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. (Prov. 19:21)
The idea that God is a passive observe of the parade from the top of the
tallest building is quite wide of the mark where descriptions of divine
knowledge are concerned.
Reason also proves the
doctrine of omniscience. First, it does this by way of negation: ignorance is a
defect and imperfection, but God is most perfect; therefore, all ignorance is
to be removed from him.[5]
This can also be seen by way of causality. There can be no sure attainment of
the ultimate goal unless the one who brings about the end knows it fully – or,
stated in a more logical form, the final goal, although temporally subsequent
to the means used to attain it, is necessarily logically prior. What this means
is that if God decreed to create, and surely he did, then God had an ultimate
purpose for that act. This is clearly taught throughout Scripture. And since
God created with an ultimate end in mind, it logically follows that God had
this purpose and all that it entails prior to his creative act. Furthermore,
since creation was to serve this purpose and since nothing could thwart this
purpose, and since all things are connected to this purpose, it must be the
case that God determinatively knew all the particulars necessary to accomplish
this purpose. Moreover, all things in creation are being worked by God
according to God’s precise plan and there is nothing in creation that is not
working in perfect accord with God’s plan. (Eph. 1:11) God’s purpose for
creation is eternal. (Eph. 3:11) There was no state in which God did not
purpose to reveal and redeem men to himself through Christ.
Since all things exist in
the mind of God, then subsequently in themselves, it necessarily follows that
God has perfect knowledge of all things. God knows himself perfectly. God’s
self-knowledge determines the nature and character of God’s knowledge of all
things outside himself perfectly.[6]
What are the implications of this understanding of God’s knowledge? This
implies that God’s eternal knowledge of all persons and things makes it
impossible for God to not know what each person will do in each and every
possible scenario (God’s natural knowledge) and in each and every actual
scenario (God’s free knowledge) over the course of that person’s life.
Given that God is
infinite and knows himself, his knowledge must also be infinite; so too, given
that all things exist because of his will, by simply knowing what he wills, God
must know all things.[7]
In other words, all things exist and take place because of God’s will. God
possesses perfect knowledge of all that he wills. Therefore, God knows all
things because God knows his own will. It can be stated in the form of a
logical syllogism:
God possesses perfect
knowledge of all that he wills. God’s will is the cause of all that exists and
occurs. Therefore, God has perfect knowledge of all things that exist and
occur. If this argument is to be rejected, it is usually the second premise
that comes under criticism. No rational believer would ever be so absurd as to
argue against the proposition that God knows his own will perfectly. But there
are those who do not believe that all things that happen, happen by divine
fiat. The reason for this is usually due to a misunderstanding regarding the
freedom of the will and it’s harmony with divine justice. Paul tells us that
God is working all things according to the counsel of his will. (Eph.
1:11) God’s will in such a context is an expression of God’s eternal plan, what
some call God’s eternal decree. The same idea is conveyed in Romans 9:11 which
tells us that God chose Jacob over Esau before they were born so that his
purpose according to his election might stand. God’s will involves accepting
Jacob and rejecting Esau before either man was even born. The reason for God’s
choice is known only to God. God’s glory is the ultimate singular purpose for God’s
acting. All things are for God’s glory, including God’s election of Jacob based
purely on God’s will and his rejection of Esau prior to his birth based purely
on God’s will. This is the clear teaching of Paul in Romans 9.
The free knowledge of
God, as Scientia pratica, is causal in nature. God’s free
knowledge, being grounded in God’s will, raises the problem of human freedom.
This so-called problem has its roots in Aristotelian philosophy and its denial
that God (the unmoved mover) possesses knowledge of particulars. From this
philosophy, the Palagians and Socinians argued for the independence of the
human will, claiming that God does not know individuals who will believe, but
merely decrees to save in a general way any who will believe and repent. However,
Scripture clearly indicates that God knows all universals as well as
particulars. For God to know only universals and not particulars is an
unacceptable imperfection in God that is incongruent with basic Christian
belief.
If God wills to reject Esau, for example, and
he further wills that Isaac would bless Jacob instead of Esau, is Isaac free to
bless Esau instead? Can Isaac freely choose to do that which is contrary to the
eternal plan of God? Paul and Daniel answer this question quite clearly. Paul
says that God has mercy on whom he wills and whom he wills he hardens. Pharaoh
is the example Paul uses to prove his point. Paul anticipated the objection:
why does God find fault with men like Pharaoh if they only do what God had
willed them to do? For no one can resist God’s will! (Rom 9:16-20) Dan. 4:32-35
tells us that not even a king can resist the will of God and that God does
according to his will among the hosts of heaven and the inhabitants of the
earth. No one can stay his hand! Clearly then, no one can resist God’s will!
And since God wills everything that happens either directly or through
secondary causes, nothing happens outside of, or contrary to God’s will. And
since God knows himself perfectly, he knows his will perfectly. And since God
knows his own will perfectly, God knows every detail of every past, present,
and future event in the history of human existence. God knows these things
because God wills them.
[2] Ibid., 192.
[3]John M. Frame, Systematic Theology: An
Introduction to Christian Belief (Phillipsburg, New Jersey: P & R
Publishing, 2013), 316.
[4] François Turrettini, Institutes of Elenctic
Theology, trans. George Musgrave Giger (Phillipsburg, N.J.: P & R Pub.,
©1992-©19), 213.
[5] Richard A. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed
Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, Ca. 1520 to Ca. 1725,
2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academics, ©2003), 395.
[6]Ibid., 400
[7]Ibid., 398
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