Introduction
In this paper I am going to argue that it is extremely hazardous to separately discuss God’s essential attributes without considering them as a whole, which God as Eimi. I will also argue that the attempt to solve logical conundrums caused by eternal God’s temporal creation without standing on solid reformed teaching on doctrine of God will inevitably lead to the confusion of the Eimi/eikon distinction. Specifically, the case I use in this paper is William Craig’s view on God’s eternity. Firstly, I am going to start to articulate the reformed tradition[1] on developing God’s essential attributes and how eternity became an inseparable part of the aseity of God as a whole. Secondly, I will address two of his oppositions on God’s eternity. They are derived from God’s action in the world and God’s knowledge of tensed facts, respectively. The way to turn them down is both from their internal abstractness and from the external reformed doctrines. Finally, a conclusion will recapitulate the main point of this paper, which is God as Eimi, with a fuller and richer sense of covenantal faithfulness.
In Appendix 1, I am going to argue the intimate connection between time and motion. In Appendix 2, I will bring up some potential theological problems of B-theory of time from the perspective of creation and incarnation for further discussion.
1. The Reformed Tradition on God’s Eternity
a. God as Eimi[2]
“An understanding of eternity is inextricably linked to God’s name as ‘I AM,’”[3] because “[a]ll God’s other perfections are derived from this name.”[4] Derived from God’s name “I AM” is what we now called the “aseity of God,” which means God is “what He is through or by His own self.”[5] Another way to put it is that God is self-sufficient and independent. Before God created the world, He was the fully glorious God; after the creation of the world, His glory was not added even a little bit by the act of creation (WCF 2.2). Being independent is God’s essential characteristic, being Creator is not.[6] God, as the absolute Necessity, does not dependent on the absolute contingencies in anyway. “God, and God alone, is Eimi.”[7]
God’s immutability is a natural implication of Eimi. As the perfect One who is self-sufficient and independent of anything that is outside of Himself, God is immune to any sort of change. His Being is immutable because He is Being but not becoming;[8] His essence is immutable because He cannot become better or worse;[9] His will and knowledge are immutable because He wills and knows by His own Being and through His own essence.[10] Or to put it in another way as Dr. Oliphint quoted and summarized Thomas Aquinas and Turretin, respectively, “if God were mutable….he would be one who is less than perfect and who would seek to attain to perfection….[and thus] the very possibility of essential change is denied.”[11]
Traditionally, God’s immutability is called eternity when applied to time; and immensity/omnipresence when applied to space. Eternity and immensity together are called God’s infinity. It is God’s eternity that I am going to focus in this paper.
b. God’s Eternity: The Fullness of God’s Being
As Bavinck wrote in his Reformed Dogmatics, “God’s eternity should not….be conceived as an eternally static, immobile moment of time. On the contrary: it is identical with God’s being and hence with his fullness of being. Not only is God eternal; he is his own eternity.”[12] Thus, eternity is not “a flat or static mode of existence….[rather] it is non-successive duration” that founds distinction and unity and richness in Trinity.[13]
The non-successive duration is a crucial point for us to understand God’s eternity. God can and did make decisions that are distinguishable in the non-successive duration. We cannot simply flat these distinctions out by saying that there cannot be difference in eternity. Because these distinctions are based on the fact that God is a Triune God, who is the source of diversity and various abundances.[14]
Without considering God’s creation, God’s eternity is not in the center of debate because theologically speaking, it is simply a perspective of God’s aseity; and philosophically speaking, it cannot be challenged. However, the fact that God has created this world complicated the problem. William Craig plainly said that God does not seem to be able to remain untouched by the world’s temporality.[15] His two main reasons are divine action in the world and divine knowledge of tensed facts.
2. Opposition One: Divine Action in the World and Extrinsic Change of God
As Craig said, the moment of creation is the first moment of time, at which “God stands in a new relation, one in which he did not stand before (indeed, there was no ‘before’).”[16] This statement sounds no problem. But he continued and said that “even if in creating the world God undergoes no intrinsic change, he at least undergoes an extrinsic change.”[17] I am going to argue against this abstract statement in section 2.a. But before that, let’s see his summary of the argument from divine action in the world:[18]
(1) God is creatively active in the temporal world.
(2) If God is creatively active in the temporal world, God is really related to the temporal world.
(3) If God is really related to the temporal world, God is temporal.
(4) Therefore, God is temporal.[19]
a. Answer One: Divine Action without Divine Knowledge?
Craig distinguished his argument between divine action in the world and divine knowledge of tensed facts. There is no problem by generally categorizing in this way. But there is problem to argue against God’s eternity by categorizing in this way, as though divine action in this world and divine knowledge of tensed facts are intrinsic and extrinsic to God, respectively.
To argue in this way clearly indicates that Craig did not consider reformed teaching on doctrine of God when he wrote. Divine action in the world is nothing but God’s free will being executed by His power. Dr. Oliphint put it this way, “that which God determines is surely something that he knows….that which God knows and determines, he carries out [as divine action].”[20]
Maybe Craig wanted to emphasize the new external ontological relationship for God and thus, it is an extrinsic change for God. But again, the existence of this new external ontological relationship presupposes God’s free knowledge, free will, and His power from the outset.[21] By saying that God must undergo an extrinsic change but not necessarily an intrinsic change since creation,[22] Craig totally denied, or ignored, at best, God’s providence, which is an ongoing combination of divine action in the world and divine knowledge of tensed facts.
However, the main problem is not his neglect of the relationship between divine action and divine knowledge. The main problem is that he has not given concrete meaning of intrinsic and extrinsic change for God from biblical perspective. Now, rather than following Craig’s philosophical and abstract thought, we need to go back to theological and concrete biblical thinking.
b. Answer Two: The Covenantal Divine Condescension
Though Craig used the word intrinsic and extrinsic abstractly,[23] his argument did indicate that there is something in God essentially that is intrinsic and there is something outside of God that is extrinsic. But just what does the intrinsic and extrinsic mean for God, especially for His eternity? I will unfold the discussion following the structure of chapter two of Dr. Oliphint’s God With Us.
1) The Eimi/eikon distinction
God alone is Eimi. To input Christian content into Craig’s language,[24] the only intrinsic thing for God is His own Being. Before creation, there was God alone. Everything else is eikon, which images God in some sense, but cannot become Eimi Himself. Thus, everything else is extrinsic for God. Nothing that came into existence upon or after creation can become intrinsic for God.
2) God’s free will to create
Among those extrinsic things, God’s free will to create is one of them. Here, I am not saying that God’s free will per se is extrinsic for God. God’s free will is necessary and essential for God to be God.[25] Rather, I am saying that the fact that God freely willed to create is not intrinsic but extrinsic for Him. Otherwise, God would have no choice but to create and thus, became dependent on His creation.[26]
3) God’s free will to covenantally condescend
The very act of God’s creation, because of His Eimi nature, is an act of condescension.[27] Not only so, the condescension entails a contract, which God has taken the initiative in relating Himself to us and requires our response at the same time.[28] Thus, the condescension is covenantal in its nature.
However, what does God’s condescension mean exactly? I am going quote a crucial sentence from Dr. Oliphint and this is extremely helpful for our discussion in this paper. He said that “[By God’s condescension], we mean that God freely determined to take on attributes, characteristics, and properties that he did not have, and would not have, without creation.”[29]
Now the picture became clearer. While Craig said that God’s act of creation is God’s voluntary loss of His aseity, Dr. Olihpint said that it is a voluntary plus[30] to His aseity; while Craig said that God really changed, Dr. Oliphint said that God covenantally changed.
After the above analysis in 2.b., now I would like to rearticulate Craig’s summary of his argument from divine action in the world in the following way:
(1’) God is providentially[31] active in the temporal world.
(2’) If God is providentially active in the temporal world, God is covenantally related to the temporal world.
(3’) If God is covenantally related to the temporal world, God is covenantally temporal.
(4’) Therefore, God is covenantally temporal.
3. Opposition Two: Divine Knowledge of Tensed Facts and Intrinsic Change of God
For Craig, this argument that based on divine knowledge of tensed facts is the strongest one among various arguments that against divine eternity.[32] The reason is that this argument argues for intrinsic change in God regarding His knowledge of tensed facts in the world.[33] And because tensed facts in the world are in constant flux, God’s knowledge of them must also be in constant flux.[34] Again, Craig formulated the argument in the following way:
(1) A temporal world exists.
(2) God is omniscient.
(3) If a temporal world exists, then if God is omniscient, God knows tensed facts.
(4) If God is timeless, he does not know tensed facts.
(5) Therefore, God is not timeless.[35]
a. Answer One: The Futileness of Abstract Thinking
Seemingly persuasive, this argument has several fatal weaknesses. One of them is its abstractness. My question for Craig is that what exactly means for God to be temporal. We ought not to simply say that God became temporal upon creation without concretely explaining what that means for Him.
In one sense, temporality is equal to motion.[36] In Craig’s argument against Leftow, it is obvious that he totally separated time reference from spatial reference and thus, cut the connection between time and motion.[37] Thus, Craig can only abstractly say that God became temporal upon creation without being able to concretely indicate that the existence of God was somehow connected with motion that happens in space-time continuum. Has God really related Himself with space-time continuum? The answer is affirmative. But not in the sense as Craig has argued that God Eimi has become temporal and ceased to be Eimi. Rather, it is through condescension that God related Himself with this world. And of course, motion is the explicit expression of God’s condescension.
In chapter two, section C of God With Us, Dr. Oliphint listed several cases of God’s condescension action. He hovers, He speaks, and He walks.[38] All these are various reflections of God’s motion in this world. Again, God not just became temporal in an abstract way as Craig argues; He covenantally condescended to move in various ways that we, as eikons can understand. And this understanding is the foundation, based on which we may response to God covenantally.
By using Dr. Oliphint’s point about condescension, I would say that God’s condescension in temporal space-time continuum is not an abstract loss of His eternity (aseity!), but a concrete plus of covenantal motion.
b. Answer Two: The Danger of Trimming God’s Attributes
Trimming God’s attributes arbitrarily is another fatal weakness of this argument. As I have discussed in section 1, God’s essential attributes are inseparable. They are various perspectives of God as Eimi. By trimming off God’s eternity, Craig also plainly rejected His aseity because God would become dependent on the temporal world to know, to move, and to exist.
For example, because of the connection between time and motion, God not only has to come into time reference, but the spatial reference as well. Thus, God would lose His immensity. His immensity used to be entailed by His transcendence, but if Craig were correct, God’s immensity would be essentially no different from the “omnipresent” space-time continuum itself. And this is a “good” step to move from God’s immensity to panentheism.
c. Answer Three: The Mode of God’s knowledge
The reformed teaching on the mode of God’s knowledge is that “he knows all things by himself or by his essence….intuitively and noetically, not discursively and dianoetically.”[39] Craig, on the contrary, seems to argue that the mode of God’s knowledge is same as that of human beings. This is again, a denial of the Eimi/eikon distinction. God’s analytical knowing was downgraded to man’s synthetic knowing.[40]
Also, the free knowledge of God and the free will of God are often thought be to “coterminous.”[41] It is not the case that things are the ways they are automatically, and God comes to know them; rather, things are the ways they are because God willed so. God ordains whatsoever comes to pass (WCF 3.1). Also, because God alone is Eimi, His knowledge of tensed facts belongs to His free knowledge, which has nothing to do with His essential knowledge (which is His own Being because of His simplicity). Now, I am going to rearticulate Craig’s second argument in the following way:
(1’) A temporal world exists.
(2’) God is omniscient.[42]
(3’) If a temporal world exists, then if God is omniscient, God knows tensed facts.
(4’) God as Eimi knows tensed facts sovereignly; by covenantal condescension, God also knows tensed facts covenantally.
(5’) Therefore, God as Eimi is timeless; God in condescension is covenantally temporal.
Some curious philosophers may still want to know what exactly happened in God’s condescension. They want to study God’s relationship with creation in the way of logical deduction. However, this is not the correct approach in dealing with God’s mystery (as Craig did). To quote John Calvin, “when the Lord closes his holy lips, he also shall at once close the way to inquiry.”[43] But we do need, as Dr. Oliphint said, to keep in mind that there is no antinomy or contradiction in God.[44]
Conclusion
As we have seen, by separately considering God’s essential attributes and philosophysizing doctrine of God into abstract form without Christian content, Craig’s argument against divine eternity not only blurred the Eimi/eikon distinction but also minimized the trustworthiness of Christian Gospel. We either have a God, who alone is Eimi and thus immutable; or have a god, who is also in the flux of this world and thus mutable. God as Eimi entails the faithfulness of His promise in the Gosple, while a god in flux entails nothing. Even the word “entail” itself would lose its meaning.[45]
I cannot think of a better way to end this paper with WCF 7.1: The distance between God and the creature is so great, that although reasonable creatures do owe obedience unto Him as their Creator, yet they could not have any fruition of Him as their blessedness and reward, but by some voluntary condescension on God’s part, which He hath been pleased to express by way of covenant.
Appendix 1: The Inseparability of Time and Motion
Bavinck said that “though time is not synonymous with motion, it is most intimately connected with it.”[46] This is not just a coincidence. When God said “let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years,” (ESV) the internal connection between time and motion became obvious.
Augustine did say that “if the heavenly bodies were to cease and a potter’s wheel were revolving, would there be no time by which we could measure its gyrations?”[47] He is right in saying that the movement of heavenly bodies does not constitute time, but he neglected that it is motion in general that has an inseparable relationship with time but not necessarily the movement of heavenly bodies. Thus, when Craig said that “even if the entire universe were frozen into immobility, there would still be change relative to God, namely, change of temporal properties,”[48] he obviously missed the point. And there is definitely no such thing as change in temporal properties without some sort of motion. I am going to argue the inseparatability of time and motion in the following two short sections.
1.
time time
We can use this two-dimensional graph to describe the relationship among space, time, and motion (not accurate for sure, but it is still understandable). The left graph indicates a normal condition in which an object moves in the space-time continuum. In the right graph, when there is no time, our four-dimensional space-time continuum becomes three-dimensional space (which is indicated by one-dimension in our two-dimensional graph). What would happen then? At first glance, it seems that we could become omnipresent because we could be everywhere at the same “time”! Motion happens in space alone and does not consume “time.” But wait! What this actually tells us is that there can be no motion at all! Without the time-dimension, three-dimensional space is a rigid, dead structure without any real meaning.
2. The meaninglessness of time without space and motion (matter/energy)
Again, the left graph shows the normal condition. In the graph on the right side, space lost its existence. Our four-dimensional space-time continuum becomes one-dimensional time in which nothing movable that can give time meaning exists. Thus, time alone does not have meaning. Somebody may say that even all motions stopped, we can still sense the pass of time. My answer for this question is that it is the motion of neuro-transmitter that constitutes our senses. Without its motion, we can sense nothing (including the pass of time).
Appendix 2: Some Potential Theological Problems of B-theory of Time
In the end of his article of “Divine Eternity,” Craig said that “in order to adjudicate the question of the nature of divine eternity and God’s relationship to time, philosophical theologians have no choice but to grapple with a further question, one of the most profound and controverted issues of metaphysics: is time tensed or tenseless?”[49] If he means to think about this question philosophically without biblical content, I totally disagree. But I would like to try to bring up some potential theological problems mainly based on incarnation because “all explanations of God’s relationship to creation can be understood properly only within the context of God’s relationship to creation as expressed in the incarnation.”[50] The doctrine of creation will inevitably be touched.
The B-theory of time proposes that the universe is like a frozen river, [51] or an imprinted DVD (my preference). “The reality embraces past, present, and future equally and that the flow….[of time]…. is illusory.”[52] This is the theory that supports tenseless time as Craig mentioned. Its main argument is that “the event is always real, though its existence is dependent on the particular time in which it occurs. The time in which it occurs is an instance of the event, which itself is always real.”[53] If we use the imprinted DVD analogy and think of incarnation in that context, it is not hard for us to see the illegitimacy of the B-theory of time theologically.
The frozen space-time is like an imprinted DVD. The whole space-time and everything in it (from the beginning to the end) are already imprinted. We are in somewhere of the whole story in the DVD. But the fact that we are here at this time does not mean our future has not been recorded in the DVD or our past has been erased from the DVD.
Several theological problems can be derived if we take the position of B-theory of time:
1. God’s creation of the “world” has to be instantaneously to entail the equal realness of past, now, and future. When I say “world,” I do not mean a blank DVD upon which God can imprint “stories” later on; I mean an imprinted DVD that records everything from creation to the Judgment Day.
2. Entailed by the first problem, Christ’s incarnation has to be simultaneous with God’s creation. That is to say that while God’s Spirit was hovering over the waters in episode one of the DVD, Christ incarnated in episode n of the DVD at the same time. This might not be a serious problem because of God’s transcendence. He definitely can figure out a way to appear in different episodes simultaneously. But the next problem is a serious one.
3. God covenantally condescended to interact with this world. To have the episodes tell true stories, God cannot just condescend and then ascend. As long as the episodes are sort of “frozen” in the DVD tenselessly, God’s Spirit (in creation) and Christ (in incarnation) have to be frozen in the DVD also. Because only God’s Spirit’s “self-frozen condescension” and Christ’s “self-frozen incarnation” can entail the genuineness of the stories that are told in the DVD. For instance, because the genuineness of the past does not depend time reference, the incarnation of Christ has to be frozen in the specific episode. Thus, Christ’s incarnation became sort of “omni-temporal” incarnation. The “temporal” here does not refer to tensed time because we are talking about B-theory of time. Rather, the “temporal” here refers to creation as a whole from existential perspective. Christ’s omni-temporal incarnation indicates the coexistence of his incarnation with the world from the beginning (creation) to the end (renew).
4. So what is significance of this self-frozen omni-temporal incarnation? As far as I can tell, it seems incompatible with the nature of Eimi, who is the source of abundance, dynamics, and diversity of eikons. It seems that A-theory of time indicates the incompatibility of God and His covenantal condescension, but in fact there is no such incompatibility because of the durative nature of the “non-successive duration” of God.[54] B-theory of time, in contrast with A-theory of time, would change the biblical sense of Eimi into pure philosophical static.
However, is the self-frozen omni-temporal incarnation, which is derived from B-theory of time, necessarily theologically inacceptable or can be understood as sort of God’s covenantal character, which is a plus for God? I think it is open for further discussion.
[1] For the purpose of this paper, the reformed doctrines will be taken for granted without doing exegetical work to reaffirm them.
[2] The structure of this section is from Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 4 vols., ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2004), 2:151-164.
[3] K. Scott Oliphint, God With Us: Divine Condescension And The Attributes Of God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 73. Also see Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (London: James Clarke, 1960), 1:385-386.
[4] Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 2:151.
[5] Ibid., 2:151.
[6] For a thorough discussion with respect to God’s non-essential property as being Creator, see K. Scott Oliphint, Reasons for Faith: Philosophy in the Service of Theology (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2006), 204.
[7] Oliphint, God With Us, 90. It is the transliteration of Greek word “I AM.”
[8] Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 2:152.
[9] Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3 vols., ed. James T. Dennison, trans. George Musgrave Giger (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1992), 1:205.
[10] Turretin, Institutes, 1:207.
[11] Oliphint, God With Us, 83.
[12] Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 2: 163.
[13] Oliphint, God With Us, 248-249.
[14] For a thorough discussion on this topic, see Oliphint God With Us, 248-250.
[15] William Lane Craig, “Divine Eternity,” in The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, ed. Thomas P. Flint and Michael C. Rea (New York: Oxford University Press Inc., 2009), 155.
[16] Ibid., 155.
[17] Ibid., 155.
[18] I directly go to his summary without quoting more of his words because this argument is straightforward.
[19] Ibid., 155-156. My numbering, not Craig’s.
[20] Oliphint, God With Us, 98.
[21] For a thorough discussion of the relationship among God’s free knowledge, free will, and power, see K. Scott Oliphint, God With Us, 93-99.
[22] Here I just follow Craig’s logic by using “intrinsic” and “extrinsic” for argument’s sake. More on this will be discussed on section 2.b.
[23] And of course, because it is illegitimate to separate God’s action and knowledge, it is also illegitimate to unfold the discussion based on the wrong premise. But I would like to follow Craig’s approach for argument’s sake and see what we can get from his philosophical argument in a biblical way.
[24] Cornelius Van Til, Jerusalem and Athens, ed. E. R. Geehan (Phillipsburg, NJ: 1980), 126.
[25] Oliphint, God With Us, 250.
[26] Ibid., 97.
[27] Ibid., 110.
[28] Ibid., 111.
[29] Ibid., 110. My emphasis.
[30] The “plus” here does not mean that it made God more perfect. Rather, it is wholly an extrinsic covenantal “plus” that has nothing to do with God’s Being.
[31] Since the work of creation is done, God’s providence is a more common word that is used to express God’s action in the world.
[32] Other arguments such as argument from divine action, which we have mentioned, and argument from the impossibility of atemporal personhood are weaker according to Craig. For specific reasons, see William Lane Craig, “Divine Eternity,” in The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, 153-159.
[33] Ironically, in another written work of Craig, he said that “I am not in any way implying a change in God’s nature….I am spoke of his undergoing extrinsic change….This wouldn’t be a change in his nature. I do think God also changes in intrinsic ways-for example, knowing what time it is….But I think that these kinds of trivial changes are not at all threatening to an orthodox concept of God.” See William Lane Craig, “God, Time, and Eternity,” in What God Knows: Time, Eternity, and Divine Knowledge, ed. Harry Lee Poe and J. Stanley Mattson (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2005), 91. It seems that Craig was talking about God’s free knowledge, which is not God’s essential knowledge and thus, does not affect God’s nature. But in the article that we are interacting with, Craig did not make this distinction anymore.
[34] Ibid., 159.
[35] Ibid., 160. My numbering, not Craig’s.
[36] For a thorough discussion of the relationship between time and motion, see Appendix 1.
[37] Without quoting paragraphs from Leftow and Craig, I would like to bring up the point directly. Craig said that “spatial things can change even if there is no spatial motion by changing in their temporal properties.” Ibid., 159. His example is that some spatial objects can change by being one year old even if no change of place has occurred.
[38] Oliphint, God With Us, 111.
[39] Turretin, Institutes, 1:207.
[40] Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of The Faith, 2nd ed., ed. K. Scott Oliphint, (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2008), 32n15.
[41] Oliphint, God With Us, 96.
[42] Craig’s definition of omniscient is different from reformed tradition. He input middle knowledge to assure human libertarian freedom in contrast with God’s divine sovereignty.
[43] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 2 vols., ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles (Louisville, KY: 2006), 2:924.
[44] Oliphint, God With Us, 226.
[45] Cornelius Van Til, The Defense of the Faith, 191.
[46] Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, 2:162.
[47] Augustine, Confessions, trans. Henry Chadwick (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 237.
[48] William Lane Craig, “Divine Eternity,” in The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, 159.
[49] William Lane Craig, “Divine Eternity,” in The Oxford Handbook of Philosophical Theology, 163.
[50] Oliphint, God With Us, 226.
[51] Brian Greene, The Fabric of The Cosmos: Space, Time, and The Texture of Reality (New York: Random House, 2004), 127-142.
[52] Ibid., 132.
[53] Oliphint, God With Us, 75.
[54] Oliphint, God With Us, 249.
