1. Philosophy of Religion – Boethius Continued
Year 13 Lesson 7 & 8
Tuesday, December 3rd, 2013.

2. Where Are We Now? Review Judeo-Christian View of God
Look at passages, scripture from Old and New Testament
An Eternal God and Omniscient God
Issues arising from these concepts
Timeline, Free Will
Boethius
*Views on Eternity & Foreknowledge*
Responses made to this point
An Omnipotent God
Issues arising from this concept
An Omnibenevolent, Good God
Should God reward and punish?

3. Consider this
‘If God knows that I will eat cornflakes for breakfast tomorrow, am I free to have toast instead?’ Take 2 minutes and write a response. Take another minute or 2 to challenge your response given what we know about this problem.

4. Recap Boethius
If we are to draw a representation of Boethius’ interpretation of God’s eternalness and timeline, how could we potentially draw it?
God has perfect knowledge of what we will freely choose to do, but he does not know what moral choices we will make in advance of our making them.
Because God does not know things in advance of them happening, it makes no sense to talk of what God should have known in the past or what God will know in the future

5. Wider Reading
As a class, we are going to collectively understand Boethius. As a group, you will be given the task to summarize and gather key information from your reading. This task may take some time – really focus on understanding the content from the text, we will go over it as a group in today’s lesson and tomorrow’s.

6. Boethius Key Points Book V Summary:
Any chance event that occurs has its own set of hidden causes that is governed by Providence
There must be free will and no rational nature exists without it.
Judgment is an intrinsic quality
The more rational of a person that you are free (and have free will) . The more evil a human being becomes, the less free they become.
Accountability is necessary with humans, given the concept of free will.
God knows what is going to happen, but doesn’t interfere with the free will of humanity
Prayer is the only communication between humans and God.

7. Key Points continued
The idea of foreknowledge – “if God sees everything in advance and cannot be deceived in any way, whatever his Providence forsees will happen and must happen”
Rewards & Punishments  Are these even possible if we do not have Free Will?
There is no virtue of vices or concepts of morality if we are predetermined. Boethius would say that we do have moral values.
Problem of Evil: If God knows everything then he is essentially the author of what we consider evil
The Nature of the Knower  Ability to use reason.
Criticism of Boethius from Kenny: A and C should be happening at the same time, but it doesn’t
Boethius would respond that the events happen simultaneously to God, not to us.

8. Note:
Providence is the plan in the divine mind that embraces everything at once.
This differs from Fate: Fate is the way in which that plan unfolds in the sensible word, subject to time and space.
Providence is to fate as being is to becoming.
Boethius is saying that while all things are subject to Fate, they are also subject to Providence. Fate is characteristic only of the temporal world, so that the possibility remains open to mankind, by rising up to the level of Intellect – to free himself.

9. Key Points Continued
Freedom means that there is no antecedent necessity.
The problem of predeterminism
Necessary acts are the opposite of free acts
Necessary acts are predetermined and can be foreknown (for example, he knows the speed and direction of an object struck by another object – this will allow some minimal facts about a situation)
God is an eternal being and must always be present, compared to humanity which has a past present and future.

10. Discussion of Free Will
John Calvin:
Process Theologians:
Augustine:
Swinburne:
Consider discussion of Free Will and Determinism that you’ve talked about in Mrs. Fieldgate’s class.

11. Free Will vs. Omniscience
What is the problem that we face with an Omniscient God and Free Will?
How Can this be addressed?