Fate and Free Will

Heath White

Description

In Fate and Free Will, Heath White explores and defends a traditional view of God's relationship to creation that has in recent years fallen out of favor. White argues that theological determinism—the idea that God is directly responsible for every detail of history and existence—is relevant to concepts such as human responsibility, freedom, and justice; the meaning of life; and theodicy. Defending theological determinism from the perspective of traditional orthodox Christianity, White clarifies this view, positions it within scripture, and argues positively for it through considerations about divine attributes and via the idea of an ex nihilo creation.

White addresses objections to theological determinism by presenting nuanced and insightful counterarguments. He asserts that theological determinism does not undermine practices of criminal punishment, destroy human responsibility, render life meaningless, or hinder freedom. While the book does not attempt to answer every dilemma concerning evil or hell, it effectively grapples with them. To make his case for theological determinism, White relies on theories of free will, moral responsibility, and a meaningful life. He uses clear commonsense language and vivid illustrations to bring to light the conditions of meaning and purpose in our lives and the metaphysics of God's relationship to the world. This original book will appeal to the philosophical community as well as students and scholars of theology.

Traditional theism posits a deity possessing all perfections—all possible power, all possible knowledge, perfect justice and love—one who is Creator and Lord of the universe. There are many puzzles about the coherence of this conception.

One of the more obvious puzzles centers on human freedom. Can human beings have free will if they live in a universe governed by a god like this? We might sharpen this question in two different ways. One has to do with divine foreknowledge, in particular God’s knowledge of our future actions. How can humans be free if God knows what we will do? This question has received quite a lot of attention in the past few decades. While it is not an easy question to answer, I believe there are a number of feasible routes the traditional theist might take in trying to answer it.

The second puzzle has to do with God’s providence—his wise and good ordering of the world. I view this puzzle as technically harder, philosophically more interesting, and theologically more pressing. Perhaps just because it is harder, it has received less attention in the literature than the first problem. On the one hand, the religious believer wishes to trust that God has arranged even the details of life in wise and good ways, and this requires that God have sovereignty, or control, over even the details. The more details the believer wishes to be able to trust God with, the more sovereignty over details she will need to believe that God possesses. On the other hand, she may wish to have some exercise of free will, and this requires that she have some control (sovereignty) over at least aspects of her own life. Yet, on the face of it, control is a zero-sum game: to say that I am free with respect to this or that means I have control over it, and insofar as I have control, God lacks it. And vice versa: whatever aspects of the universe God controls are, due to that fact alone, not under the control of my free will. So how can humans be free if God is sovereign over their actions? But if God is not sovereign over human actions,then how can we be confident that God has ordered the world wisely and well? And if we cannot be confident that God has ordered every aspect of the world wisely and well—because human beings have the power to mess up at least bits of it—doesn’t God lack a power that a maximally perfect being would have?

This problem of divine providence, or sovereignty, and human freedom connects quite closely with another longstanding question for theism, the problem of evil.It is not ridiculous to observe the many and seri- ous evils of this world and conclude that, in fact, it is not arranged wisely and well by a provident God.The horrors, tragedies, and disasters that regularly sweep through corners of this planet provide powerful evidence—so it has been argued—that no powerful, knowledgeable, just and loving God rules it. One longstanding move in this debate is the appeal to free will: God has not wrecked the joint; we have, through the misuse of our divinely granted free will. This appeal, however, raises further questions. If we humans have been given the power to wreak havoc around us (especially on other humans), doesn’t that mean that God is no longer in control of his creation? Whereas, if God is in control of the evils that we do, how has the appeal to free will done anything to solve the original problem of evil? Or, in other words, if we wish to preserve God’s moral uprightness, his love and justice, it seems we will have to curtail his sovereignty, perhaps by saying he has ceded some of it to human beings in the form of their free will. On the other hand, if we wish to preserve God’s sovereignty it seems we must temper our estimate of his goodness. Neither alternative is particularly attractive for theists of a traditional stripe.

I think it is fair to say that theistic analytic philosophers of the last generation have thought human freedom very important to defend. Moreover, they have generally defended it in a particular version: namely, libertarian free will, according to which, if one performs a free action, it is possible not to have done it, and possible in the strongest sense.The libertarian claims that nothing and no one, including God, can determine whether we do or don’t perform a particular action, if we perform it (or refrain from doing so) freely. Because of the absolutely untrammeled nature of libertarian free actions, libertarian free will lends itself most readily to the zero-sum conception of control: what control we have, God lacks, and what control God has, we lack. To the extent that I am exercising my free will, God does not decide what happens; to the extent that God is exercising his free will, I do not freely decide what happens. So the general tendency to emphasize libertarian free will in analytic philosophy of religion has a reciprocal effect, namely, a general tendency to conceive of God as exercising somewhat less providential control than the majestic sovereign of the universe that traditional theism posits.

This book will break the other way. In it I wish to make the best case I can for theological determinism.

(Excerpted from introduction)

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. Divine Action

2. Why Believe Theological Determinism?

3. Does Theological Determinism Undermine Human Justice?

4. Responsibility

5. Does Theological Determinism Undermine Responsibility?

6. Theological Determinism and the Meaning of Life

7. Theological Determinism and Freedom

8. The Problem of Evil I: Its Mere Existence

9. The Problem of Evil II: Beyond Mere Existence

10. The Problem of Hell

11. The Last Word

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Philosophie politique
• Éthique et morale
• Philosophie de la religion
• Free Will
• Religious
• PHILOSOPHY
• Philosophie et théologie
• Good & Evil
• Determinism
• Ethics

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 30 novembre 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268106317
• Langue: English

Extrait

Fate and Free Will
FATE AND FREE WILL

A DEFENSE OF THE OLOGICAL DETERMINISM
HEATH WHITE
UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME PRESS NOTRE DAME, INDIANA
University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 www.undpress.nd.edu
Copyright © 2020 by the University of Notre Dame
All Rights Reserved
Published in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: White, Heath, 1972–author.
Title: Fate and free will : a defense of theological determinism / Heath White.
Description: Notre Dame, Indiana : University of Notre Dame Press, [2019] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019037147 (print) | LCCN 2019037148 (ebook) | ISBN 9780268106294 (hardback) | ISBN 9780268106324 (pdf ) | ISBN 9780268106317 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Free will and determinism —Religious aspects — Christianity.
Classification: LCC BT810.3 . W45 2019 (print) | LCC BT810.3 (ebook) | DDC 234/.9 — dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019037147
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019037148
This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail]
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Introduction
ONE. Divine Action
TWO. Why Believe Theological Determinism?
THREE. Does Theological Determinism Undermine Human Justice?
FOUR. Responsibility
FIVE. Does Theological Determinism Undermine Responsibility?
SIX. Theological Determinism and the Meaning of Life
SEVEN. Theological Determinism and Freedom
EIGHT. The Problem of Evil I: Its Mere Existence
NINE. The Problem of Evil II: Beyond Mere Existence
TEN. The Problem of Hell
ELEVEN. The Last Word
Notes
Bibliography
Index of Names
Index of Topics
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book has gestated a long time and has the benefit of influence from many people. The indirect influences would be too numerous to mention and impossible for me to remember fairly, but several more direct contributors deserve my public thanks.
Sandra Visser and Kevin Timpe read portions of the manuscript and gave valuable feedback. James Gilmore and Mark Murphy each generously read the entire manuscript and sent me comments as well. Along with the thorough comments from two anonymous referees at the University of Notre Dame Press, these resulted in substantial improvements in the manuscript. Dan Johnson was a third reader for the press —I know because he identified himself to me after submitting his report — and I thank him, heartily, for his encouraging remarks and for not asking for any further revisions.
Stephen Little has been a worthy editor at Notre Dame University Press, and the University of North Carolina–Wilmington has supported my research endeavors.
In a very important sense, the greatest contributors to my philosophical work have been my parents, Ed and Susan White, who have never ceased to love, encourage, and believe in me. This book is dedicated to them.
Introduction
Traditional theism posits a deity possessing all perfections—all possible power, all possible knowledge, perfect justice and love—one who is Creator and Lord of the universe. There are many puzzles about the coherence of this conception.
One of the more obvious puzzles centers on human freedom. Can human beings have free will if they live in a universe governed by a god like this? We might sharpen this question in two different ways. One has to do with divine foreknowledge, in particular God’s knowledge of our future actions. How can humans be free if God knows what we will do? This question has received quite a lot of attention in the past few decades. While it is not an easy question to answer, I believe there are a number of feasible routes the traditional theist might take in trying to answer it. 1
The second puzzle has to do with God’s providence—his wise and good ordering of the world. I view this puzzle as technically harder, philosophically more interesting, and theologically more pressing. Perhaps just because it is harder, it has received less attention in the literature than the first problem. On the one hand, the religious believer wishes to trust that God has arranged even the details of life in wise and good ways, and this requires that God have sovereignty, or control, over even the details. The more details the believer wishes to be able to trust God with, the more sovereignty over details she will need to believe that God possesses. On the other hand, she may wish to have some exercise of free will, and this requires that she have some control (sovereignty) over at least aspects of her own life. Yet, on the face of it, control is a zero-sum game: to say that I am free with respect to this or that means I have control over it, and insofar as I have control, God lacks it. And vice versa: whatever aspects of the universe God controls are, due to that fact alone, not under the control of my free will. So how can humans be free if God is sovereign over their actions? But if God is not sovereign over human actions, then how can we be confident that God has ordered the world wisely and well? And if we cannot be confident that God has ordered every aspect of the world wisely and well—because human beings have the power to mess up at least bits of it—doesn’t God lack a power that a maximally perfect being would have?
This problem of divine providence, or sovereignty, and human freedom connects quite closely with another longstanding question for theism, the problem of evil. It is not ridiculous to observe the many and serious evils of this world and conclude that, in fact, it is not arranged wisely and well by a provident God. The horrors, tragedies, and disasters that regularly sweep through corners of this planet provide powerful evidence—so it has been argued—that no powerful, knowledgeable, just and loving God rules it. One longstanding move in this debate is the appeal to free will: God has not wrecked the joint; we have, through the misuse of our divinely granted free will. This appeal, however, raises further questions. If we humans have been given the power to wreak havoc around us (especially on other humans), doesn’t that mean that God is no longer in control of his creation? Whereas, if God is in control of the evils that we do, how has the appeal to free will done anything to solve the original problem of evil? Or, in other words, if we wish to preserve God’s moral uprightness, his love and justice, it seems we will have to curtail his sovereignty, perhaps by saying he has ceded some of it to human beings in the form of their free will. On the other hand, if we wish to preserve God’s sovereignty it seems we must temper our estimate of his goodness. Neither alternative is particularly attractive for theists of a traditional stripe.
I think it is fair to say that theistic analytic philosophers of the last generation have thought human freedom very important to defend. Moreover, they have generally defended it in a particular version: namely, libertarian free will, according to which, if one performs a free action, it is possible not to have done it, and possible in the strongest sense. The libertarian claims that nothing and no one, including God, can determine whether we do or don’t perform a particular action, if we perform it (or refrain from doing so) freely. Because of the absolutely untrammeled nature of libertarian free actions, libertarian free will lends itself most readily to the zero-sum conception of control: what control we have, God lacks, and what control God has, we lack. To the extent that I am exercising my free will, God does not decide what happens; to the extent that God is exercising his free will, I do not freely decide what happens. 2 So the general tendency to emphasize libertarian free will in analytic philosophy of religion has a reciprocal effect, namely, a general tendency to conceive of God as exercising somewhat less providential control than the majestic sovereign of the universe that traditional theism posits.
This book will break the other way. In it I wish to make the best case I can for theological determinism. Theological determinism (TD from here on) is, roughly—more precision will be forthcoming presently—the view that God’s power should not be viewed as at all limited by anything contingent, including exercises of human freedom. God’s sovereignty is maximal, and his will determines everything that happens down to the smallest detail. One consequence of TD is that, whatever kind of free will we have, it is not libertarian. More generally, whatever kind of freedom or responsibility we have, it must be compatible with complete and absolute determinism by the divine will.
Rejecting libertarian free will has a number of consequences that, to be brief, have been thought to be so devastating that the position cannot be sustained by an intellectually responsible and morally sensitive theist. Nevertheless, I have become convinced that the objections to TD are less powerful than they have been made out to be. Furthermore, TD of some species or other is a hardy perennial in the tradition of theistic reflection, and it has the weight behind it of some powerful arguments that have not been widely appreciated. It is these arguments and replies to objections that I aim to set forth in the following chapters.
In recent decades, TD has been discussed (when discussed at all) most often under the rubric of the problem of human freedom and divine fore-knowledge. However, divine foreknowledge is not the primary focus of TD. Philosophers who worry about the paradox of human freedom and divine foreknowledge often have little to say about the paradox of human freedom and divine providence or sovereignty. TD, however, yields clear answers to both puzzles. It also makes contributions to answers to questions about divine and human freedom and responsibilit