Keywords

We intend to make our case on the basis of a philosophically informed interpretation of the Christian Scriptures. So, first, we need to think about the conditions that need to be met for it to be rational to believe on the basis of the propositions asserted or implied in the Scriptures that God intends that (at least some) sin should occur. We talk first in terms of general procedure. The Scriptural texts we later present and discuss are a narrow and carefully selected group, and much that might apply generally does not apply in those particular cases.

2.1 Types of Scriptural Representation

There are two ways in which the Scriptures might represent God as intending that sin occur. They might just state outright that God chose to bring about sin:Footnote 1

  • (P) God chooses to bring it about that [a sin] occur in order that [a state of affairs] should obtain.Footnote 2

Alternatively, they might represent God as choosing to bring about some state of affairs in order that there might be a sin (itself a means to a further end):

  • (Q) God brings it about that [a state of affairs] obtain in order that [a sin] should occur.

In the schemata (P) and (Q) the brackets indicate the presence of variables, and the descriptions contained in the brackets indicate the things over which the variables range.

2.2 The ‘Bringing It About’ Relation

Some words of explanation: we don’t need the act of bringing about referred to in (P) and (Q) to be as strong as causation. It isn’t necessary to believe that God causes sin to occur in order to think that God intends that sin occur. Here is how this could work: suppose that freedom is incompatible with determinism. Now suppose that God knows exactly what Adam would freely do in any given circumstance, what is called ‘middle knowledge’ in the literature (e.g. Dekker 2000). So, in particular, God knows whether Adam would freely sin if placed in the Garden of Eden. Suppose that it is indeed the case that if Adam were placed in the Garden of Eden, he would sin. In this situation, if God places Adam in the Garden of Eden, he brings it about that Adam freely sins, even though he does not, on the indeterministic hypothesis, cause Adam to sin. This way of bringing about is sometimes called ‘weak actualization’ in the literature.Footnote 3 Now, if God intended that Adam sin, one way of fulfilling that intention would be weakly to actualization his sin, that is, to create him in the Garden of Eden in order that he might freely sin.

Nor is middle knowledge required of God. God might think it likely, or even just possible, that Adam would sin if placed in the Garden of Eden, and might create him in the Garden in order that this likelihood or possibility become actual. We think this is how the open theist must read the passages we discuss later.

2.3 The Insufficiency of Bringing It About

Why isn’t it enough to derive an assertion of the following form from the Scriptures?

  • (R) God brings it about that [sin] occurs.

This isn’t enough because such an assertion by itself is not sufficient to show that God intended that the sin in question occur. God might bring about, or even cause, a sin to occur without intending that it occur. The occurrence of the sin in question might merely be a foreseen, and unintended, consequence of God’s activity. We are all familiar with such a distinction at an intuitive level. Classic examples include that in driving a car one foresees, but does not usually intend, to use up fuel, and in walking one foresees, but does not usually intend, the wearing down of one’s shoe leather. More controversial examples include a bomber pilot’s foreseeing, but not intending, the death of civilians, and the doctor’s foreseeing, but not intending, the shortening of the patient’s life as a result of the pain-relieving injection. So, from the mere fact that God causes or brings about the occurrence of a sin or sins, we cannot infer that he intends that the sins in question occur, because they may all be foreseen but unintended consequences of his pursuing independent plans.

It might be responded that God never does anything unintentionally. This, however, is not the point. Even if each of God’s actions is intentional, it does not follow that every consequence of each of his actions is intended (unless for every consequence there is a distinct action of bringing about that consequence). For example, when the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the desert (Matthew 4:1), there were many trivial consequences of that action, such as the movement of grains of sand as Jesus’ feet went up and down. It does not follow from God’s intending that Jesus go into the desert that he also intended all these movements of grains of sand. Although God of course foreknew where the grains of sand would go, it doesn’t follow that he had a preference on their location, that their movements were parts of his plans. Of course, we don’t rule out such a position either.

One therefore needs to find more than merely (R) in the Scriptures. It is propositions satisfying (P) or (Q) that, if derived from the Scriptures, put rational pressure on one to believe that God intends the occurrence of sin.

2.4 Further Scriptural Representation: (P*)

In fact, as we explain later, what we’d really like to derive from the Scriptures is a proposition of the form (P*):

  • (P*) God chooses to bring it about that a [sin] occur in order that a [state of affairs that can obtain only in virtue of the sin’s occurring] should obtain.

A proposition of this form would be more helpful for our purposes because an objection could be raised to our use of a proposition of the form (P), the objection that God might choose to bring it about that a sin occur (satisfying (P)) without intending that the sinfulness of the sin obtain. While we could respond that this objection in fact cedes the debate to us, we wish to argue in what follows for the stronger conclusion that we may derive from the Scriptures propositions that satisfy (P*), that is, propositions according to which the very sinfulness of the sinful action is necessary for the achievement of God’s goals. We wish to argue that if propositions satisfying (P*) can be derived from the Scriptures, then not only do the Scriptures teach that God intends that sinful actions occur, but he also intends that their very sinfulness obtain (for just and holy reasons). All this should become clearer when we return to this in greater detail.

2.5 Does God have Discrete Intentions?

At this point, we should probably deal with the objection that God has only one undivided will, and the division of his will into intending this and not intending that has no underlying basis in reality. Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) writes:

the divine will is one and simple, as willing the many only through the one, that is, through its own goodness. (Aquinas 1920: Ia.Q19.a2.ad4)

This view is also shared by many writers in the Protestant tradition. For example, in the Lutheran tradition, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716) holds that God does not will that we sin, but also holds that God does not will that we do good. Instead, Leibniz thinks, God has only one will, that the best of all possible worlds be actualised:

As God can do nothing without reasons, even when he acts miraculously, it follows that he has no will about individual events but what results from some general truth or will. Thus I would say that God never has […] a particular primitive will. (Leibniz 1951: §206 [256])

In the Reformed tradition, Francis Turretin (1623–1687) writes:

The decrees of God are not many intrinsically and differently […] in God (although relating to different things […] extrinsically). Hence the things which in finite beings are formally diverse are eminently identified in the infinite being. (Turretin 1992: I.314)

Although in the decrees (considered formally on the part of God), order cannot properly be attended to (because they are not many and divided acts, but one only and a most simple act by which he from eternity decreed all things), yet there is no objection to ascribing a certain order to them. As they are considered objectively and on our part (with regard to our mode of conception, since the things decreed are manifold and most diverse and have a mutual dependency and subordination, mutually), some order must necessarily be conceived in them (according to which, some may be said, and may be distinctly perceived by us, to be prior or posterior to others). (Turretin 1992: I.417)

We do not wish to enter into discussion here about divine simplicity. The key point is that in the view of Aquinas and Turretin, the one divine intention has many objects. Our question is, then, whether the occurrence of sin is one of the objects of the divine intention. In what follows, we speak more idiomatically, following the Scriptures, as if God had multiple intentions each with a single object. This talk can be rephrased, we believe, into talk of a single intention with multiple objects.

Leibniz’s view is more difficult, since Leibniz holds that God’s single intention has only one object, the actualization of the world. It seems to us that the cost of this view outweighs its benefits: the cost is the fact that God does not intend the occurrence of the good things in the world too. It seems to us that this does not comport with the witness of the Scriptures. One might try to respond on Leibniz’s behalf that God intends the actualisation of this world because of the good things in it. This would not be faithful to Leibniz’s thought, however. God intends the actualisation of this world because it is the best, and it is the best not merely in virtue of containing all the good things that it does, but in virtue of containing the best balance of good over evil. So, it is not true to Leibniz’s thought to say, with reference to some particular good in the world, that God is partially motivated by the existence of that good. God is motivated solely by the overall value of the world, in Leibniz’s view. While we present here no philosophical argument against this view, we think it goes against the deeply particularistic tenor of the Scriptures, which hold out God as being motivated by, and, we believe, intending many particular things in the world.Footnote 4