Divine Simplicity Q&A w/ William Lane Craig + Ryan Mullins
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 22 ส.ค. 2024
- In this livestream, you'll get the opportunity to ask Dr. William Lane Craig and/or Dr. Ryan Mullins ANYTHING about the doctrine of Divine Simplicity! Got an objection? Ask them live!
Btw, here's a good popular-level resource on Divine Simplicity: • An Introduction to Div...
------------------------------- GIVING -------------------------------
Patreon (monthly giving): / capturingchristianity
Become a CC Member on TH-cam: / @capturingchristianity
One-time Donations: donorbox.org/c...
Special thanks to all of my supporters for your continued support as I transition into full-time ministry with Capturing Christianity! You guys and gals have no idea how much you mean to me.
--------------------------------- LINKS ---------------------------------
Website: capturingchrist...
Free Christian Apologetics Resources: capturingchris...
The Ultimate List of Apologetics Terms for Beginners (with explanations): capturingchris...
--------------------------------- SOCIAL ---------------------------------
Facebook: / capturingchristianity
Twitter: / capturingchrist
Instagram: / capturingchristianity
SoundCloud: / capturingchristianity
-------------------------------- MY GEAR ---------------------------------
I get a lot of questions about what gear I use, so here's a list of everything I have for streaming and recording. The links below are affiliate (thank you for clicking on them!).
Camera (Nikon Z6): amzn.to/364M1QE
Lens (Nikon 35mm f/1.4G): amzn.to/35WdyDQ
HDMI Adapter (Cam Link 4K): amzn.to/340mUwu
Microphone (Shure SM7B): amzn.to/2VC4rpg
Audio Interface (midiplus Studio 2): amzn.to/33U5u4G
Lights (Neewer 660's with softboxes): amzn.to/2W87tjk
Color Back Lighting (Hue Smart Lights): amzn.to/2MH2L8W
-------------------------------- CONTACT --------------------------------
Email: capturingchrist...
#DivineSimplicity #CapturingChristianity
![ทางเดินชีวิต - ธีเดช ทองอภิชาติ x อ.ไข่ มาลีฮวนน่า [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/1f3wcG16dd4/mqdefault.jpg)
![[TH] 2024 PMSL SEA W2D1 | Fall | ต่อเนื่อง ในสัปดาห์สอง](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/ElcO9uC_Dbk/mqdefault.jpg)
Love this topic and these two guests. Thanks CC and thanks Bill and Ryan
Agreed!
Interesting conversation. I’m with the general consensus that we need to see a Feser/ Craig conversation on the topic.
For CONVERSATION it's better for it to be Feser/Mullins. For DEBATE it's better for it to be Feser/Craig.
Mullins didn’t even mention Feser’s name despite having had written and printed exchanges with him on this very issue…
For real. I can't see how this topic was discussed without Feser.
It must be David Bentley Hart vs. Craig!
@@Imadkaram I would LOVE that. No chance In hell that it would ever happen.
So we have two philosophers who are critical of the doctrine of divine simplicity; wouldn't it be more interesting to have either of them discuss with a capable defender of the doctrine, like Ed Feser for example?
PS: That's me grabbing the chance to ask for a Craig vs Feser debate.
Gotta get either Feser or Richard Howe in the discussion. It’s like getting Dennett and Dawkins together to explain Christianity
@@JohnSmith-bq6nf I doubt he'd turn down a formal debate with Craig, despite Craig's considerable prowess. I think if anything it'd go the other way. But then Craig has also said that he feels it obligatory to defend his academic work in public, so it would be hard for him to go back on that.
@@JohnSmith-bq6nf not Trent Horn. There are far better Classical Theists who defend simplicity far better than Trent.
Or Rob Koons. Mullins doubts Koons’ acceptance of DDS, but Koons gave a long presentation on CC arguing that within God there’s no essence/existence distinction, that God is identical to his existence and his attributes, that God is pure act, etc.
You took the words right out of my mouth. I like listening to both Mullins and Craig, but it would surely have been more profitable to have both a critic and an advocate of DS on the program.
Another good quote from St. Maximus the Confessor: “Theology without practice is the theology of demons”
Just want to say that the aesthetic quality of CC interviews are excellent and I really appreciate that
I am philosophy graduate and keen enthusiast in theology.
I'm on the fence with DDS - I want and WE need a Craig vs Feser debate.
Come on....
read books. dont watch youtube
@Man For Today I'd prefer Gaven Kerr personally
@@lalumierehuguenote Debates can really test the credibility of a view because if you don't have the knowledge or skill to defend it against direct criticism, then one view emerges stronger usually.
These would be two forceful intellects, not just 'youtube'.
@@ManForToday but debates only give a glimpse of the logic behind the arguments. they are too fast to cover the whole reasoning.
@@TheBrunarr Rob Koons
How am I just now finding this channel? Great work!
Please try to set up a discussion between Mullins and Matthews Grant who is one of the the best defenders of divine simplicity in the academic literature and has not been on the channel.
@@JohnSmith-bq6nf yes, but a more moderate divine simplicity. I dont think God is equivalent to His actions. I think God is unlimited being and so is simple, but God *has* actions but I dont think it makes sense to say God is = to His actions.
Where can we find a good matthews grant video? He seems sparse on TH-cam
@@DryApologist yes if there is room for any distinction I'd agree it would be between his pure actuality and his action. As both words are often abbreviated to act, sometimes confusion arises. I'm not sure there really is any distinction in his actuality and action. It depends on God's relationship with time and the nature time itself. But if there is distinction it would lie there, if anywhere.
@@billj6109 He has an interview on Furthering Christendom and Pat Flynn's channel, but I recommend his paper Divine Simplicity, Contingent Truth, and Extrinsic Models.
@@DryApologist thank you
Ryan may be living in an IKEA showroom, Cameron, but at least he doesn't have a smoke machine in the background to highlight the laser show. 😜
Well I don't know that two neoclassical theists are the best to call on as experts in this area (although Ryan at least has done some decent research here).
Of course both are respectable.
I think it was Maimonides who said “God cannot change over time, moreover, as he would then be dependent upon
the relation between some unrealized potentiality within himself and some fuller
actuality somehow “beyond” himself into which he may yet evolve; again, he
would then be a conditional being.”
DBH (;
Maimonides has a much stronger doctrine of simplicity than even Aquinas. According to Maimonides, we can not know anything about God except for what God is not, and God's creations. Maimonides even says that God doesn't have any attributes.
@@ob4161 DBH quoting Maimonides, my guy knows whats up😉
@@danzo1711 That sounds about right, the logic is we can never know the infinite because its always infinitely more, we can only know about him cataphatically and apophatically, any 'attributes' of God are refractions viewed through our finite selves that can only attempt to explain God.
@@danzo1711 Actually Maimonides' doctrine of Divine simplicity is the same as orthodox judaism in general. Judaism has the strongest version of Divine simplicity
Even though I affirm DDS, Ryan's joke at 12:11 was hilarious!
i don’t get it
@Jared. The joke is, he just made it up that isn’t what Hezekiah 3:16 says lol… he just made up the perfect quote for divine simplicity to be funny :)
"people just arent reading Mullins, or they just dont understand Mullins." That is hilarious.
God can't have any potentiality because that implies that God can change, which is incompatible with God's imutability. Furthermore, if God can change, say, go from a state of " not knowing" to a state of "knowing", this change will need an explanation outside of God, which would be incompatible with God being a necessary Being.
Right! Creation is impossible.
There's no way that divine simplicity per se was the motive for denying the trinity. People denied the trinity because they simply rejected the revealed doctrine. Blaming simplicity for unitarian doctrines is just historically silly.
No, they are correct that it was a weapon wielded by Muslims and heretics alike to deny the Trinity.
Agreed
@@shannonbyrd2877
That may be true but it only means they misunderstood it
@@shannonbyrd2877 perhaps but pretty much all Orthodox Christians held to it before recent times. Perhaps you mean certain heretical groups like Arianism or neoplatonists.
@@billj6109 Arians said that Fatherhood was part of gods simple nature, this Jesus couldn’t be God
When Cam was showing the hat to Dr. Craig and he replied with "What does it say on it? Oh Kalam!" in a happy high pitch, it made my heart happy lol.
We absolutely need more of this quality content!
I believe that denying divine simplicity involves overstepping a boundary, a very subtle one because I don't think it's possible to say exactly where it starts, that tells us how far our finite reason, even illuminated by theologal faith, can reach in the knowledge of what is Infinite, and therefore, ultimately incomprehensible.
One clear sign that this boundary has in fact been overstepped is what the young man says towards the end, something down the line of God lacking a Creator-creature relationship. To think the remote possibility that this relationship adds to God's perfection in any way sounds to me downright contradictory to so many other things, that the whole intellectual framework of Christianity would collapse.
my body is gods body my soul is gods soul, of which what i consider myself as one voice amongst the choir worshipping from the heart.
In the beginning, when Dr. Mullins says that DDS defenders argue that God does not have any properties, they are not talking about so called "Cambridge properties". Which are properties that you get or lose without you undergoing change. For example when I become an uncle, I don't change anything about myself. Likewise, when God creates the world, he doesn't change himself.
DDS defenders call God "Creator" and appropriately so.
You're just wrong. When you become an uncle, something has changed in you, and that is that you have gained a real intrinsic property of being an uncle, which you didn't possess beforehand.
@@danzo1711 how is being an uncle an intrinsic property?
@@jordandthornburg Are you serious? In a person who is an uncle, is the property of being an uncle.
@@danzo1711 Property of personal identity doesn't change as the indexical when making a referential predicate relation to an extrinsic property from yourself. Your position may change wrt that specific subject, however, your essential dispositional states are immutable.
@@kayvoncrenshaw1799 Irrelevant. To be timeless doesn't just mean to not change in any essential features, it also means to not gain or lose any accidental features.
This was great, but let's be honest. The dialog we're all truly waiting for is Craig vs Feser on DDS. Formal, prepared beforehand, and nice and long.
It wouldn't violate Dr. Craig's personal policy against debating Catholics or other Christians, because top reformers hold to DDS and plenty of Scotists and other Catholics do not.
It's philosophy, not intra Christian debate.
Isn't DDS Catholic dogma?
@@sathviksidd a very basic statement of it. What matters I guess is what exactly they had in mind in Trent.
@@sathviksidd fourth lateran and Vatican 1, not trent. My mistake
@@billj6109 okay. I've seen some (respectable) people state that they don't adhere to DDS and hence Catholicism, as it is their dogma
Gotta read more lol
Does craig has a personal policy about it
Great, mature, discussion. Excellent!
Fun podcast and topic here! It was interesting listening to Craig's comments on how the Thomistic account of divine simplicity is similar to Arianism or could easily fall into Arianism. I was just thinking along those lines a few weeks ago and then there Craig mentions an Arian theologian that held that God had absolutely no distinctions and features except being a bit similar to Aquinas. I agree with both Craig and Mullins that a strong view of divine simplicity is untenable and that it leads to modal collapse to necessitarianism. To say the least, if God has free will and if creatures are to have free will then there has to be at least this distinction between contingent and necessary facts and truths in God. Otherwise, if there are no distinctions in God including the distinction between contingent and necessary truths in God, then we would have this modal collapse like in Sponiza where only necessary truths exist in God and God lacks freedom of will. At any rate, these more extreme views on simplicity of God seem to be rooted in Plotinus as both thinkers point out here. Nonetheless, the only thing I would disagree with on Craig and Mullins is their view that God is temporal. I would think God is rather timeless. Anyway good show here!
It seems to me that the panel's rejection of "the" Divine Simplicity is to make a room for a personal god. But then by rejection the principle you create a host of problems, among them: a) problem of evil; b) god's response to prayers and creating miracles involves the "tampering" with the laws of natures thus making science ad hoc at best; c) it follows, god seeming to be involved in a game: he created people, he knows they will pray for him and ask him and he ill respond to their prayers.
it seems to me the personal God is imperfect, for he is constantly involved in fixing things (he should have fixed in the first place!)
Craig at the 46 minute mark on the Trinity is a flat out tritheist.
Orthodox judaism embraces the most extreme form of Divine Simplicity. It's conceptually hard but ultimatelly unavoidable
Chad's PSR pertaining to God: 1]I find it problematic as it assume the PSG pre-date God or at least God is abiding by some rules, thus making Him limited. 2] going from concrete being into non-concrete being as God is not something in the province of PSR, for one thing: there is no way to uphold the essential law of identity.
59:53
*angry Calvinist noises*
I really enjoyed that dialogue, nice job.
Super interesting convo!!
That quotation that God says he is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is a really good point! God is identifying himself as the God of them. That is an identification of a contingent property of God that God identifies himself as, Very interesting point!
Or it could mean I am the God who these three worshipped. This is more of a Cambridge property. God didn't change.
St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine, Boethius, and St. Bonaventure agree with St. Thomas. It seems to me that if St. Thomas is right about divine simplicity, possibility, and actuality, then Dr. Craig's "God" concept implies a vicious infinite regress. Let me explain.
Cold water is possibly hot and actually cold. My hair was possibly brown years ago when it was actually auburn instead. Now it's actually brown. But, by the way, no one dyed it. An actual cigarette is possibly a pile of cigarette ashes. An actually full swimming pool is a possibly empty one.
The cold water didn't heat itself. The stove heated it. My hair didn't dye itself. Some biochemical event changed my hair color. The cigarette didn't destroy itself. A flame turned it into ashes. In each example, something went from having a property potentially to having it actually because something else actualized a potential. Something already actual caused the change,
A thing's nature or essence determines what that thing can do. Water can't dissolve sugar, hydrate your plants, clean your windows, cool your car, and be an ingredient in a cheesecake. But it can't turn itself into a cheesecake. A cigarette can give you pleasure when you smoke it, shrink when it burns, and make me cough. It can't be a nail you'll hammer into the wall you're paneling. Cream cheese can nourish you, top your bagel, melt, and stick to your tongue, But your car can't burn it as fuel. In St. Thomas's senses of the words "possibly" and "actually," nothing can have a property possibly and actually in the same respect at the same time. So Thomas would disagree with a 21st-century analytic philosopher who would say that the fire in your fireplace is possibly hot and actually hot because it's already burning.
With all that in mind, please remember that there are two kinds of causal series. There's a linear kind and a hierarchical one. Here's an example of a linear one. My wife and I have a natural daughter named Tammy. Tammy grows up, marries her boyfriend Brian, and they give us a grandson who has children, too. So we gave our daughter life. But she and the others could keep giving us grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so for many years after my wife and I die. But our daughter and the others can make babies on their own. They don't depend on us for their baby-making ability.
Now imagine a train with an engine, dining care, a passenger car, and a caboose. When the engine moves, the pulling power flows from it to each car. The cars need it to do that because they can't propel themselves. They could roll down a mountainside if something shoved them. But then the shover would be engine-like. It would move the cars. So you know why the train needs the engine. Without it, the cars would stay put. When you topple a domino, every other domino falls because a previous one pushed it after you tapped the first one.
Now think about a book on a desk. The desk holds up the book, the floor supports the desk, the foundation supports, the course, and they all sit on the earth. Remove something from the pile, and something else will fall if the moved thing supports it. But the earth won't fall.
Now we need to know why the pile and anything in it exists now from moment to moment, even if it has always existed. Something needs to make the pile, and each part of it exists. But the existence needs to come from something that doesn't get its existence from another source. Otherwise, you'd get a vicious infinite regress of supporters and no pile. There would be no self-existing cause to make the other things exist. There would be no purely actual cause sustaining the other stuff.
Dr. Craig would agree that God is the first cause that gives every other cause its causal power and sustains the other causes. But he also argues that God was timeless sans creation and inside time after creation. So to do that, God would need to be able to change. For that to happen, something already actual needs to make it happen. Then God wouldn't be the first cause since he would need a cause. And so on forever. With no purely actual being, nothing can undergo change. If Dr. Craig's "God" concept were the biblical one, there would be no God of the Bible.
Regarding our intuition to be idolaters, I would say God didn’t create a world of people who are natural idolaters. Rather, I would say that tendency is a result of our fallen state. We have chosen to be something different from what God created us to be. If there had been no fall, perhaps it would be natural for us to understand and believe in divine simplicity.
Barry Anderbg's had a great question.
Just recently saw a video of a TH-camr, whipe the floor with Matt from the atheist experience, using an argument from Divine simplicity. That made this video a little more interesting.
what video is this?
I agree with WLC that we shouldn’t let folks get away with the notion that the Strong DDS is the Classical Theism of early Christianity.
It largely is though. Can anyone cite down one clear statement against it? Even Mullins said that thr cappodocians were pretty much full DDS.
You should create videos that are snippets of these debates or interviews- you’d get much more engagement!
Simplicity as a whole I do not accept. But I *do* believe God is essential existence and that from that springs His other attributes. (E.g., we call “good” anything that tends to *cause* or *enhance* the reality of existence. Anything that wipes that out-or works against it-we call evil. Try the thought experiment for a while and see if it’s right.).
But I do not view Him as a *slave* to every facet of His existence. Indeed He cannot be a slave, for while we are slaves of our nature if not empowered by God, that is because there are spiritual and physical realities *above* the ability of our wills to think or control. Not so with the Almighty God. He serves no one *but* Himself. But if One truly serves only himself, then He also owns Himself and is therefore free to obey His every wish that lies in the realm of possibility. (Even those possibilities, that are so *only* for God.)
I wasn't able to attend live, but I'm curious what Dr. Craig takes 'classical theism' to be. From the way Mullins defines classical theism, Craig is definitely not a classical theist. But Craig sees himself as a classical theist. I'm curious where he'd draw the line and why.
To my understanding, Craig takes classical theism simply to involve omniscience, omnipotence, moral perfection, necessity, incorporeality, aseity, and perhaps a few other things. He thinks that is acceptable because he was able to point out several early Christian thinkers who did not adopt the stronger classical doctrines such as strong simplicity. I think he would draw the line at something like open theism.
49:40 I agree with Dr. Craig's statement when talking about an imperfect person such as a human. But I believe it is erroneous for us to say well God has just done something because he is free to do so. I believe it makes more sense for him to appeal to his claim of Molenism here. Because that means God did everything with purpose and reasoning.
Great talk. Love both these guys. I'm somewhat new to the subject, but really just baffled that any Christians can hold to the strong version of this doctrine. Mullins is so bright and I'm looking forward to seeing how his career progresses, and what other sorts of topics he takes an interest in.
@Psicólogo Miguel Cisneros where did he concede this?
My two favorite analytic theologians!
How is Ed Feser not in this conversation? This seems to me there are more objections to divine simplicity from both sides. They seem to agree with each other than disagree.
Was interesting to see Mullins immediately refute Craig on the view of the Cappadocians.
Are you referring to Ryan's opening remarks around 12:15? I didn't take that as a refutation as much as a contrary opinion on what seems to be a complicated treatise against Eunomius.
@@JohnSmith-bq6nf maybe because he's a specialist on analytic theology? 👀....he's doing great where he is
These guys are closer to the side of the Eastern Orthodox view of Devine Simplicity with the essence/energy distinction
It's very frustrating that neither of them addressed analogical prediction (particularly concerning the idea that we have no understanding of God given DS). When we describe God as having parts, we describe God analogically many different ways, because the apply in an Infinity different way to God
Yeah analogical predication is dicey. One atheist told me all analogy collapses into some univocity. Yet we want the creature creator distinction to be hard and fast. Seems to be some real tension here which apophatic theology is supposed to resolve. But does it really resolve it. Maybe Scotus was right. It's above my intellectual pay grade
@Psicólogo Miguel Cisneros that's not the point, the point is they didn't engage with material that answers the issues that they have with DS
47:23 “the Word 👉became👈 flesh and dwelt among us” John 1:14
This sounds like a permanent separation/change in the Godhead from the incarnation forward. Therefore, DS is false? 🧐
Great question. From a classical theist perspective, the *becoming* is all on the side of creation and does not entail intrinsic modification in the Word's divine nature. Dr. James Dolezal has a very good article coming out on this. He defends a model for the Incarnation called 'terminative assumption.'
Look up Hypostatic Union and Chalcedon Creed. Rejecting ecumenical councils to own the Catholics bruh…
In a blog post, I've read that Dr. Mullins conflates simplicity and necessity.
Hello cam! Can you do the long-awaited crossover of Jordan Peterson and John lennox
I would agree that there are extremes when applying the doctrine of simplicity, and what's helpful about this video is thinking through the implications of an absolute application of the doctrine, or even thinking out the implications of how theologians have over-applied exaggerations of this doctrine. However, it is even easier for modern theologians to miss the better application of this doctrine because anthropomorphisms about God are so popular, especially in how metaphysical possibility is conceived here. I don't think these guys are giving applied theology enough credit by expecting it defined so exclusively in our limited human perspective. The neo-platonic habit to misfind an attributment of the fact of God's pure being, for the use of an advantage of a claim to the nature of our knowledge is a deeply felt instinct to many modern people often who reject God outwardly. There are ways that the genuine faith of theologians has pursued conceptions of God's pure being guided by the Holy Spirit and Scripture, however important we are doing the second and not the first. The best iteration of divine simplicity is not anti-biblical, each of these implications are about God's personhood in ways that are hidden to our knowledge in not a way relative to our abstractions of thought or speech, but mysterious and requiring God to have spoken. God has acted this way in history on purpose, not as a random consequence for our reason to attribute, but for a context of mystery that makes the content of his revelation all the more exiciting. I've always taken divine simplicity most helpful as a description of God's spirituality, against our insistence to define God in relation to ourselves - I'm not sure these guys value how important that is. There is an important first point they are making, then some intentional mishearing. Divine simplicity has too often been used as an excuse to undermines the Trinity when taken as absolute, but it doesn't outright deny the Trinity so necessarily when understood and applied rightly, especially for Evangelicals who esteem the bible as God's definitive word as the sole final authority to all human ideas since. I also think it's important we take divine simplicity as a description and not to be taken as the basis for the definition of who God is. I understand these guys are not identifying open-theism, but I'm not sure they avoid it completely in what they are implying - especially in a second order theory of contingency in their biblical hermeneutics implied by being so matter of fact in their expectations about the nature of God's revelation being so fully explicable to us as limited creatures made for purposes beyond ourselves and no less intriguing (it does seem like the escape open-theism with respect to almost every other doctrine I've heard them discuss, though I've studied them only a little). The habit of modern theology to define God based upon the processes of our knowledge what these guys are accusing Thomas of, I don't think their avoiding in their expectations of an overly direct explanation for our definition of the rational reasons for God's works. Mullins seems to be working from an inverted process theology, which is interesting academically with respect to abstract topics, but I think mostly unnecessary to practical theology, except for with respect to determinism. Determinism does result in taking divine simplicity absolutely and this is an important topic, so I am grateful they have spoken openly about asking. We also must not belittle God's works by expecting them so fully explicable in human categories, for that is the error we are trying to avoid at the start. Again, a very important topic with tremendous implications, with important work to be done. We can know so much of what God is like, only because he has spoken, but he has spoken, and we can know much, though little in beginning any comparison with respect to who God is!
One hour isn't enough. I wish it was 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
I wish these two would debate timelessness
In regards to the nature of O.T prophecy, Sean McDowell interviewed J Warner Wallace who's just written a new book that looks at what he called messianic 'cloaked prophecy'. This was described as a prophecy that at the time doesn't point to a Messiah, but looking back it fits within the big picture.
In regards to the problem of parts of Trinity I like to think of it as the father son in the holy spirit being different forms of the one God. Instead of parts of a whole, a whole with three different forms, for example, fried egg , boiled eggs, and scrambled eggs are different forms of an egg not parts. It's part of the same concept just in a different structure.
Be careful not to fall into the Heresy of Modalism. What you are describing sounds awfully similar to Modalism where the three persons are different modes that God manifests in.
I’m skeptical of Mcintosh’s argument. A Thomist doesn’t have to point to an explanation “in” God so to speak, it seems to me all they’d have to say is that God is concrete and that his explanation of his existence is self explanatory.
Excellent dialog!
Even on Craig and Mullins' own view of divine perfection, specifically omniscience and perfect goodness, his action is always going to be one infinite timeless act. Sure it's free and unconditioned, but there's no basis for it to change or improve or have contingency or potentiality. It's all one act of uncomposed, uncompelled freedom, and will never be other than what it is.
They both disagree with that, since they both believe that God is omnitemporal.
@@ChrisBandyJazz
What does omnitemporal mean? I've never heard of that before.
@@ob4161 It means existing at every moment of time.
@@ChrisBandyJazz but they also believe, or at least craig does, that God existed without time in a perfect state. Some nuance is needed here, because I think in Craig's view Gods timelessness sans creation was sort of an accidental property of God, due simply to not having opted to change yet, (no change, no time) whereas strong or traditional timelessness is an essential property, owing to God's fullness and inability to change due to his total perfection. I lean toward the latter view and see God as timelessly yet freely willing creation, so that he never changes his will.
It's hard for me to understand God as spontaneously changing his will for no reason given his absolute goodness, omniscience and power. Why not just say God freely yet eternally or timelessly wills creation, and that time is simply a temporal coordinate within creation.
@@billj6109
1. I think you have accurately captured Craig’s view. I also do not hold that view, because once I came to a satisfactory definition of _time_ that view was ruled out.
2. I think the timeless view might work if you think all of time is a block, which it looks like you lean towards. I personally am a presentist and hold to the A-theory.
3. I don't think that all change has to be for the better or worse, so I do not think that God’s perfection requires timelessness.
4. I agree that it seems counterintuitive for God to change God’s mind for no reason.
The cappodocians also held to energy essence distinctions see Basils letter 234.
Can you quote the relevant text
Absolute Divine Simplicity [ADS] in Christian theology might be an aspect of theology that was influenced by the monism of the Parmenides and Zeno, as well as by Medieval Islamic theologians who wanted to affirm God's oneness to the exclusion of the Trinity. As a Van Tillian I think it over-emphasizes God's oneness to the detriment of God's pluralness. God is both one and many. That's why Van Til thought the Trinity in some way solves the oldest of all philosophical problems. The problem of the one and the many. That's why as a Calvinistic continuationist Baptist I affirm divine simplicity [DS], but not *ABSOLUTE* divine simplicity [ADS]. I recommend watching Anthony Rogers YT videos on Islam's problem of the oneness of God. He provides some good criticism of Islamic affirmation of God's oneness [and by extension simplicity], but unfortunately I think Rogers hasn't fully seen how his affirmation of the Christian's God's simplicity could come under the same criticisms if he pushes simplicity to its extreme.
ia ffirm absolute simplicity and find the trinity as a natural fruit of the understanding
25:45 worship the nature or persons of God?
45:00 persons of the trinitarian God parts?
51:45 1 not 3 persons would make God simpler?
Something here sure is simple...
Now if God wills the divine goodness and being necessarily, someone might think that he wills other things necessarily also, since he wills all else by willing his own goodness, as we have already proved (ch. 75). Yet to those who look at it rightly, it is clear that he does not will other things of necessity.
For he wills other things as ordered to the end, which is his goodness (ch. 75). Now the will is not necessarily directed to the means, if the end is possible without them: for the physician, supposing him to have the will to heal, has no need to prescribe to the patient those remedies without which he can heal the patient. Since, then, God’s goodness can be without other things, (nay more, since nothing accrues to it from other things), he is under no necessity to will other things through willing his own goodness.
Again. Since the good understood is the proper object of the will, any concept of the intellect, provided it retains an aspect of goodness, can be an object of the will. Therefore, although the being of a thing as such is good, and its non-being an evil, the non-being of a thing can be an object of the will by reason of some connected good which is retained, alhough not of necessity, because it is good for a thing to be, even though another be nonexistent. Hence the will, according to its nature, is unable to will not to be only that good without the existence of which the aspect of good is wholly done away. Now such a good is God alone. Therefore, the will, according to its nature, is able to will the non-being of anything whatever except God. Now will is in God according to its full capacity, since all things in him are in every way perfect (ch. 28). Hence God can will the non-being of anything whatever except himself. Therefore, he does not necessarily will things other than himself.
Moreover. God, by willing his own goodness, wills other things to be, inasmuch as they partake of his goodness (ch. 75). Now, since God’s goodness is infinite, it can be participated in an infinite number of ways, and in other ways besides those in which it is participated by those creatures which now are. If, then, through willing his own goodness, he willed of necessity the things which participate it, it would follow that he wills an infinite number of creatures partaking of his goodness in an infinite number of ways. But this is clearly false: for if he willed it, they would exist, since his will is the source of being to things, as we shall prove further on (bk. II, ch. 23). Therefore, he does not necessarily also will those things that are not.
Again. A wise man, through willing the cause, wills the effect which follows necessarily from the cause: for it would be foolish to will that the sun exist above the earth, and that there be no brightness of day. On the contrary, it is not necessary for one through willing the cause to will an effect which does not follow of necessity from the cause. Now other things proceed from God not necessarily, as we shall show further on (bk. II, ch. 23). Therefore, it is not necessary that God will other things through willing himself.
Moreover. Things proceed from God as products of art from a craftsman, as we shall show further on (bk. II, ch. 24). Now the craftsman, though he will himself to have his art, does not necessarily will to produce his work. Therefore, neither does God necessarily will things other than himself.
We must accordingly consider why it is that God knows of necessity other things than himself, whereas he wills them not of necessity; and yet through understanding and willing himself, he understands and wills other things (ch. 49, 75). The reason a person understands something is that he is conditioned in a certain way, insofar as a thing is actually understood through its likeness being in the person who understands it. But that the willer wills something is due to the thing willed being conditioned in some way, since we will a thing either because it is an end, or because it is directed to an end. Now the divine perfection necessarily requires that all things should be in God in order that they may be understood in him (ch. 50), while the divine goodness does not necessarily demand that the other things which are directed to it as their end should exist. For this reason it is necessary that God should know, but not will, other things. Therefore, neither does he will all things that can possibly be directed to his goodness, although he knows all that can in any way be directed to his essence, by which he understands.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles Book 1, Chapter 81.
Any chance you can get Jerry Walls and Keith Parsons on to debate the doctrine of hell? I know they both contributed and responded to each other in the book “Debating Christian Theism”. and maybe Jeffrey Jay Lowder :)
Hey, how can others of us get one of those Kalam hats? I definitely would wear one!
1. It'd be good to get a debate or at least dialogue on divine simplicity between Craig or Mullins and Feser or another proponent of divine simplicity like James Dolezal. Although didn't Mullins have a dialogue with Koons?
2. Craig and Mullins' criticisms of divine simplicity may be correct even if their alternative position (e.g. theistic personalism) is not. I only bring this up because some comments seem to assume that their criticisms of divine simplicity aren't correct because they argue for theistic personalism. But the two are separable. An atheist can criticize Islam and argue for atheism, but that doesn't mean atheism is correct. Or that his criticisms of Islam necessarily depend on his arguments for atheism.
Or Gregory Pine as he might be more available.
Great Interview. I love how easily they dealt with the question regarding the necessity of God’s nature and his freedom of choice.
I was interested in this video until I realized both guests disagreed with the idea. Having a "Q&A" about a doctrine with two people who don't hold the doctrine and are critical of it is kind of silly. If you want to discuss why the doctrine is wrong, fine, just be up front with that and call this video something like "Why the doctrine of Divine Simplicity is wrong". Instead you titled the video what feels like a kind of bait and switch.
I get that's probably not what you intended, but its definitely how it came across.
Hahahaha. Craig calling Cameron out of existence!
St Gregory Palamas would disagree with Ryan about the cappodocians playing Tom Foolery. This is typical western revisionist history from Ryan.
Can you elaborate?
Why have 2 opponents on to talk about Simplicity. These 2 are in the extreme minority in their position. Get Richard Howe back on here to give us the other side
Extreme minority in rejecting divine simplicity?
@@gianniryansmith614 - yes, it’s a pretty rare position historically. Also Craig’s nominalism is probably even more rare than that and in my opinion that’s what leads him to reject Simplicity.
@C Not sure what you mean by DDS as dogmatized by the RC? Do you have a problem with the trinity, as "dogmatized" by Catholics? as historically accepted and expanded upon by Thomas Aquinas, simplicity has been a core doctrine. Even with the reformers - read what Calvin has to say about Simplicity. Spurgeon, ect. Find someone who spoke out against it prior to 1900 and see how they were responded to.
Divine simplicity is incompatible with the trinity.
Premise 1: God is pure act.
Premise 2: If God is pure act, then there are no unactualized potentials in God.
Premise 3: There are unactualized potentials in the Trinity.
Therefore the trinity is not pure act.
Therefore the trinity is not God.
The son, but not the father and holy spirit, incarnated; the father or the holy spirit could incarnate so Thomism is false if Christianity is true.
Why would your p3 be true? How does the Trinity necessitate any kind of potentiality in God?
@@foundyif The father did not incarnate and neither did the holy spirit, but the son incarnated. So, there is unactualized potential in the trinity.
@@metatron4890 You misunderstand the Incarnation. The Incarnation didn’t affect any change or motion (from potency to act) in God, but in creation. Holding the view that God is somehow changing in the Incarnation not only is making God temporal and mutable, but is confusing the natures and collapsing the Hypostatic Union. The divine essence is not changed or moved whatsoever in the creation of a second human nature; that created human nature moves from potentiality to actualization, but God does not in any of His persons.
We need Jay Dyer vs Feser. Dyer made a devastating critique of Feser's book. Btw, WLC is Apollinarist
It would be fun watch as long as dyer was muzzled outside his time (pun slightly intended).
@Actus Purus Ok, you seem like a smart dude. Can you help me with Ross's argument regarding the immaterial aspect of thoughts? I have questions regarding one premise
Can we say that God under DDS is absolutely simple in logical terms, but infinitely complex in mystical terms?
That is, one would have two categories to describe: the logical and the mystical.
If God did not possess mystical complexity, that is, complexity beyond the grasp of the human intellect, then He could not create a complex world.
Language can get so confusing. In my vocabulary God would be mystically absolutely simple in that beyond human intellect his simplicity is absolute. But logically, that is, in the human intellect, God is infinitely complex. Funny how words can mean different things even if expressing the same point.
Side note. Classic difference between generations represented here. Dr. Craig speaks with a clear and even cadence of the older generation that I find easy to listen to while Dr. Mullins speaks with the extremely fast and uneven cadence that resembles today’s generation of what I call mumbling. Difficult for me to understand his points simply because of his speaking style. Old man rant off.
If God has distinct properties, they're metaphysical parts of him. So if he has them, what put them together?
Not all parts need put together.
What??? In a circle, the radius and circumference are distinct. Does something put them together?
@@danzo1711 pi does! Well, it doesn't really put them "together" but it relates them!
@@charles4208 That may depend on what you mean by "together." It seems to me that if God has parts, he can change. If he can change, he can't be what Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas call "the first." Suppose that change is the actualization of potential. St. Thomas techies that for someone or something to go from possibly having a property to actually having it, something already actual needs to actualize that potential. If there's no purely actual actualizer, you get a vicious infinite regress of causes.
@@Tommy01_XO That's just a misunderstanding of what it means to put something together. In order to put something together, it must be composed of separable parts, but the radius and circumference of a circle, are not separable from each other.
I’m not particularly interested in direct debate/ dialogue on such a complex topic. People need time to digest arguments. So I’m one of the few who really doesn’t want a conversation between Feser & Craig
Then don’t watch that dialogue if it ever happens. Strange comment.
Overall I'm a fan of Dr. Craig but I think he needs to define his terms of what a "libertarian free agent" actually means. God isn't free to do anything outside of who He is / His character. He cannot lie, He cannot sin. Also, the Lamb was slain before the foundations of the earth; wasn't therefore the creation of our world necessary? God is sovereign over everything and scripture clearly teaches us that God chooses certain people.
I assume then Dr. Craig also believes people have libertarian free agency as well and can choose Christ by themselves. However, this denies John 6:44 in that no one can come to Jesus unless the Father draws them. Sounds to me that if we say people have free will then ultimately God isn't sovereign because He then doesn't have full control over the outcome. I understand many have a problem with this though, people like to think they’re Neo from the Matrix in that they don’t like believing they’re not the ones in control of their life. Sounds like hubris. What I find funny about that is, is that even many atheists and agnostics believe in determinism because of cause and effect and physical laws within the universe.
This is not a debate... bunch of people agreeing with each other. Wasted 1hr....bring in serious people and debate
Minute 22:14 is central
I think it would be fun to take a quick poll amongst the theists in the comments. Comment "yes" if you like DDS, comment "no" if you think it sucks.
I somehow hate it,. yet Im just a lay man,. It diminishes God, limits Him. Thats the first impression for me.. Man can never fully understand God or he would be God,. But I have not even took deeper look in to subject,. So I dont know if I understand it.
It's interesting how for some dds diminishes God from his Biblical fullness as a living acting person, whereas others like myself see denial of dds as diminishing God into a very contingent changeable creature with a lots of power, but still just one member of a broader or higher reality. Monotheism itself I think is hard to defend without dds except by it being a cosmic accident.
No
no
@@billj6109 I tried to please mr Tommy by saying accurately what he asked: "no" with small letter, trying to get answer from him :)
Should be a good one
whatever is true we should work from that base: God's knowledge is not contingent in any way or form.
idk if someone has said this before but Dr. Mullins talks and looks like Elon Musk here
Actually Paul uses the modal collapse in Hebrews 6:13, God swore by Himself, and there are the two immutable things about which God cannot lie in swearing such an oath, those being 1. God cannot lie to Himself and 2. God cannot lie to Himself about Himself. That which He swore to perform is a necessity, such as the oath to the son sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your foot stool, and due to that oath God is not free to do otherwise. So God simply creates a modal collapse in honor of the son, the Messiah. A Singularity schwartzchild field is a modal collapse. Christ is the BEGINNING, big bang, of all things.
God doesn't "create a modal collapse." Do you think God necessarily created this particular order of providence with all of its contingencies? Couldn't God have created a different world? Those are the sorts of questions at play in the modal collapse objection.
Your speculating about some theoretic God, a philosophical creation.
YHVH necessarily created this universe to precisely express YHVHJESUS, the son. THAT'S THE FULLEST EXPRESSION OF THE INVISIBLE GOD. HE DIRECTED HIS COMPLETE LOGOS INTO THAT YHVHJESUS REVELATION. THEREFORE NO, YHVHJESUS COULD NOT DO THAT DIFFERENTLY, IF THAT IS MODAL COLLAPSE FINE.
All possible world's will declare YHVHJESUS LORD, the MODAL COLLAPSE of any other idea of God.
Even though I am a cultural Christian when it comes about believing the Bible and the concept of God in Christianity I find it very hard to believe. To me, it seems like the Christian God is a very partial God.
He is so great it is hard to comprehend for me and my finite mind. But, i know about love, mercy, and justice, and their reconziliation on the cross, a universal sacrifice on our behalf, we just need to believe, confess and declare that Jesus is lord and rose from the dead!! Have a great weekend the fleeing thinker, hope this made some sense, great chatting with you!😊
@@peterlindal3352 Can you tell me if the God of the Bible is not partial then why you and I are in a position where we can watch videos on TH-cam and comment and some people who are starving to death? Why you and I gets to eat and others don't?
@C Are you telling me that people chose to born in a situation where they will starve to death?
@C But why you are not starving but others are why you got lucky or God was partial to you?
It Would be interesting a debate between William Lane Craig and James Fodor The autor of The book : Unreasonable Faith: How William Lane Craig Overstates the Case for Christianity
There's another problem for Dr. Craig's theism because he's a Monothelite. A Monothelite believes that Christ, God the Son, has only one will, the divine will. But God the Son took a human nature when he incarnated. Since a human nature includes a human body and a human soul, and since the human will is a faculty of the soul, Dr. Craig's theism suggests that Our Lord had only part of a human nature. So Christ can't be fully divine and fully human if he has only a partial human nature. By Catholic standards, Dr. Craig's theism is nonclassical and heretical because Monothelitism is a Christological heresy.
What about modal collapse? Dr. Craig and Dr. Mullins think Thomisitic theism implies it. So I want them to convince me that they're distinguishing between necessity and divine simplicity.
@Psicólogo Miguel Cisneros That's a fallacious inference. When Mullins concedes something, he merely agrees with it. So he could concede, i.e., agree with, a falsehood. Would you say that since Ryan Mullins believes that Catholicism is false, it is false? I hope not because from what I can tell, he doesn't understand it.
@Psicólogo Miguel Cisneros I use the word "feel" to talk about sensations and emotions. "Believe," "think," and "know" are the words I use to talk about truths and falsehoods.
When a belief is true, it matches reality. Suppose you believe that my computer is on my dining room table. Then you know your belief is true when you find the machine there. I know I exist. I see my body, hear myself talk, feel sensations, and pay attention to what I'm thinking. If I deny that I exist, I contradict myself because my ability to deny that I exist presupposes that I do exist.
Some propositions are true about you, Others are true about me. But I reject the postmodern relativist distinction between your truth and my truth. For me, the truth and we need to discover it. Our beliefs need to conform to reality.
@Psicólogo Miguel Cisneros I've read Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy. But I don't know what he thought truth consisted of. I'm Aristotelian and Thomistic. So I believe the correspondence theory about truth.
So, God created humans, gave them free will, but expected them to obey His will, not act of their own. When they didn't obey, He had no option, -though He is omnipotent and free-, but to become a human -granted, a divine human- to die crucified and atone for the sins -disobedience- of His own creation. That makes sense, doesn't it?
In a way. Think of it this way:
What is perfect world? One where is free will.
fact: evil exist
fact 2 man is curious,
where does this lead?
Also: love aquires free will
Its impossible to freely force someone to do good ( think about it )
So what if people go bad
Jesus is like great positive reset es way out way to God way to Heaven Way to Life.
But as there is 2 enteties people being able to reflect both of these good and evil witch way you go
@@Hbmd3E I see you are given to poetry, but what about truth?
@@estuchedepeluche2212 .. actually this just is much technical what I wrote
@@estuchedepeluche2212 e.g even without God you can explain things that seem religious. You are finite being in the face of infinet. There is always more outside that you can understand/ take. And you are going to die. This makes you resentful if you dont aim for Truth, if you think you can twist the fabric of the reality to get what you want..
you can come to philosphical truth, there is many things you can come to some conclution without it being scientifically measured.
You are the one started to speak about God so we can argue about that. I said What is perfect world, so can you agree that one part in it is freedom? Free will?
You didnt answer.
Then following that is there evil in the world? Have you felt thatyou fell in to sin? that is you did something that make you embarrased after and feeling of guilt and shame. Or even made hate yourself. that you wished you did not do. And it may involve things like sexual desire, lust for money, fear of men and so on. this is reality. you can say no but then we both no you are lier. Just technical , no emotions..
So then you need to be made good if you go bad. This is reason that God become man and died for your sins. But you need to make Him to your Lord. He can then purify you and give you eternal life. There is no sinners in Heaven,. makes sense?
@@Hbmd3E Sounds fancy. However, your writing is very difficult to follow, there are missing articles, conjugations, I really don't understand what you are trying to say, much less what specific criticism you have of my comment. If you wish to have a conversation, you could start by pointing what parts of my comment are wrong and why. Thanks.
1st.
Suomi mainittu
Suomi on kaunis 😍
Great, I came to see two great thinkers giving Cameron validation for not becoming Catholic in a echo-chamber for an solid hour. Will be back when the discussion will get more interesting.
Inknow, it seems kind of odd to have a Divine Simplicity Q&A and then feature only critics of Divine Simplicity
So God has no properties? It is like he doesn’t exist at all. Go figure.
i believe in God Simply Complexity as Himself A TriunGod. BIBLE IS THE ONLY ONE SOURCE & TRUTH! why it's only theology philosophy talk without prove/evidence from bible?
we don't need comparison/devinision from other religions & kalam! i'm disappointed with dr.Craig argument, especially his support to muslim thinker/theology & kalam! 😰😞
Feser v Craig or Mullins
12:12 😂😂😂
Energy essence distinction for the win. ADS is problematic and garbage
The dyerdox have arrived lol
@@AD-en5dq no. Dbh for example or Aidan Kimmel both defend strong divine simplicity
Even if Craig and Mullins are correct, it’s still disappointing that neither made any serious efforts to steel-man the best of their opposition. Also, Rob Koons absolutely endorses DDS (eg he says God’s existence and essence are the same, that God is identical to his act of existence, that God’s Omni attributes are identical to each other and to God, etc). Mullins and Feser have interacted in print on the subject, so it’s off that didn’t even mention Feser’s name.
Etc
Essence/energies distinction.
Dr Craig doesn't understand the Trinity. Well then I guess it can't be true. A shame, was hoping this Christianity thing was true.
Unfortunately, Yahweh has little in common with the god of classical theism.
trinity is easy to see. subject verb object, even in divine simplicity
@Lolopopolo with divine simplicity, we have things like love and beauty as one single thing in essence. this could be said as well with views of reference. we can build entire languages with only nouns or only verbs as well. it is intuitive for us to think that subject verb and object are separate things, like if i act upon something, that me, the act i do, and the object the act acts upon, we would think those to be separate things. however in an universe with only god, he is only one thing. so thereby he is the object of his own act as well as the subject. and he is also act as well due to divine simplicity. so god can completely be a subject, completely be an act, and completely be an object and all 3 are the same thing in esssence.
@Lolopopolo they are distinguished in how we explain reality. we cannot logically explain reality in any other way than subject verb and object, and in the total experience of consciousness, all 3 are same in essence and existence. so with the trinity in being logically equal to love and infinite power and knowledge what not... the infinite being is equivalent to his infinite act, of which he acts upon himself. his act cannot be completely defined in human categorization since the infinite is indivisible, thus a placing of any label upon it must necessarily convey its entire being. Love will be its infinite act, and the fact that its love is infinite and unceasing means infinite power, and the fact that it experiences all existence is its infinite knowledge, as it has all knowledge as one experiential thought being manifested through time
hope this helps!
@Lolopopolo because subject verb and object are identifiers for the same BEING. and we call them persons based on how we interact with them. like the way i interact with you if i see you on the street. i consider myself a subject, you an object, and we shake hands, an act. and as you said if love makes everything as good as possible, it is still freely done since in reality theres just one true actor
so determinism is like relative to our free will
@Lolopopolo i consider myself as within the son due to my tendency to sin. also to your latter position, yes.
Summary: No one agrees on what Divine Simplicity is… 🤦🏼♂️
Fuc
What's wrong with IKEA kitchens?
John Smith
So? I mean, what are we too "high brow" to entertain someone with an IKEA kitchen? Seems like a snobbish thing to point out. "Is that IKEA? Pffff, poor pleb. Get a better kitchen poor boy" - I don't think that type of thing is funny or helpful in any way.