GOD, TIME, AND ETERNITY Ratio Christi Spring 2015 Presented by Andrew Robbins

DOCTRINE OF GOD: FOUNDATION Old Testament New Testament Key components: Transcendence Immanence How can we know God?

THE GOD OF THE PHILOSOPHERS The One (The Ultimate): Utterly simple No parts, no properties Ineffable incommunicable Unknowable Beyond being Impersonal

THE GOD OF AUGUSTINE Creatio ex Nihilo Beyond good Perfectly just Omnipotent Unchangeable An unsayable other All present being Incorporeal Timeless Purely abstract apprehension of another ontological possibility not thinking, not willing, not existing in the way we do “the qualities he imputed to God were so lofty, so far removed from human capacity, that it was foolish to claim that any human community possessed them fully”

DOCTRINE OF GOD: CONTENT Ineffability (unknowable) Impassibility (emotionless) Immutability (changeless) Trinity (three persons in one essence) Omnipotence (all powerful) Omniscience (all knowing) Timelessness/Eternity (unending in time) Simplicity (indivisible) Necessity (the only necessary being)

GOD AND TIME God has no beginning or end, is uncreated, eternal: Isaiah 57:15, 41:4 Hebrews 1:10-12 Psalms 90:2 Revelation 4:8b Genesis 1:1 Proverbs 8:22-23 John 1:1-3 Jude 1:25

WHY FORMULATE A DOCTRINE OF GOD AND TIME? Biblical Christianity has been attacked on the basis of divine eternity: “God the Creator, by His very nature, must transcend space and time… the coming into being of the physical unioverse involved the coming to being of space and time as well as matter. I can’t emphasize this too strongly and so if we wish to have a God who is in some sense responsible for the origin of the universe or for the universe, then this God must lie outside of the space and time which is being created.” -Paul Davies Many Christian have already said careless/silly things about it Hugh Ross views God in a multi dimensional “hyper-time” There are many flawed and contradictory analogies people use to discuss this issue

GOD AND TIME: TWO THEORIES Divine Timelessness  God is “outside” of time Divine Temporality  God is unending throughout all of time

WHAT IS TIME? ‘A’ theory of time  Temporal becoming is real  The past and the future do not exist ‘B’ theory of time  Time is a dimension of reality  All points in time are equally real

DIVINE TIMELESSNESS: ARGUMENT 1

DIVINE TIMELESSNESS: ARGUMENT 2

DIVINE TIMELESSNESS: ARGUMENT 3

CLOCK SYNCHRONIZATION: RELATIVELY STATIONARY Frame 1 Frame 2

CLOCK SYNCHRONIZATION: RELATIVELY MOVING Frame 1 Frame 2

DIVINE TEMPORALITY: ARGUMENT 1

DIVINE TEMPORALITY: ARGUMENT 2

DIVINE TEMPORALITY: ARGUMENT 3

TIMELESSNESS Only makes sense on the ‘B’ theory of time Implies utter immutability Implies that all points in time are equally real, so no progress is ever actually made.  i.e. sin is never really vanquished It is difficult to understand how temporal beings (us) can have a relationship with an utterly static atemporal being (God).

DIVINE ETERNITY God is unending throughout time Permits God to have legitimate changing relationships with people Fits with a view of divine immutability that allows for God’s accidental properties to change Implies that God has thought processes, and can have knowledge of tensed facts

FOREKNOWLEDGE Understanding foreknowledge depends on:  ‘A’ or ‘B’ theory of time  Divine eternity, or divine timelessness?  Human freedom (or lack thereof)

HOW DOES GOD KNOW THE FUTURE? Calvinism (no freedom, Timelessness)  God knows because he causes Open Theism (freedom, Eternity)  Freedom means that God cannot know the future Arminianism (freedom, ‘B’ theory, timelessness)  God ‘sees’ the future (i.e. the future must exist) Molinism (freedom)  God knows the future by virtue of middle knowledge  God knows what free creatures would do in any circumstances they would be placed in