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Attributes of God - Coggle Diagram
Attributes of God
comparing Boethius, Anselm and Swinburne
- anselm develops boethius's views and tries to overcome the possibility that boethius does not seem to have space for a god who intervenes
- he does thi sby focusing on the idea of time for god being different to time for ourselves
- eternity is not a time word but a dimension
- however anselm is still left with god sitting very separately to the universe and this raises questions about how god can interact with it
- swinburne takes a different approach and argues that his view of god and time is more in line with the biblical view
- however this assumes the accuracy of the biblical view
- if the bible is simply a human account of gods relationship with the world then it is a human perspective on god which is already limiting god because human understanding is limited
- this might explain why swinburne seems to limit god to being everlasting rather than eternal
- swinburnes approach does seem to help with the issues such as prayer
- if it is logical to say that an eternal god is separate to the world does god know what the date today is?
- however it could be argued that god might not know what the date is to him but he does know what the date is to the person
- equally however god might not be able to act if he is eternal because doing a miracle for me now will change the past for someone in the future
- as science fiction shows this would create real issues in logic
- Boethius's starting point is important - we need to understand that god sees things differently to us
- this can even help with understanding how swinburne would approach the issue of free will and omniscience
- although for swinburne god is everlasting he is able to know all that it is logically possible for god to know
- god might know everything about us as individuals and because god cannot be wrong god will successfully predict how we will respond in any situation
- it could be argued that saying god is everlasting does not necessarily limit him that much
- our free will might also be affected by our genes upbringing and psychological factors, etc - we may not even be free ourselves
benevolence
gods benevolence suggests that gods entire attitude is one of compassion, love and fairness - like a constant and active force
it is not just about the human word love
gods omnibenevolence is relational, total, linked to justice and judgement - it is fair, holy and expected to be found in his followers
agape = unconditional love - new testament - understand it in the context of loving even enemies as well as the central idea of forgiveness
examples - creation, interventions, miracles, incarnation, answered prayers, guidance, commandments, covenant
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issues arising
Boethius - 'god sees us from above and knows all things in his eternal present and judges our future free actions justly distributing reward and punishment'
do evil and suffering contradict a benevolent god?
- some would argue that it does because god would not allow his people to suffer
- some poeple would argue that justice fairness and free will mean that god might have to allow suffering perhaps using some of the theodicies or techniques found in response to problem of evil
can our language explain fully gods benevolence? is it presumptuous to claim that we can understand gods nature?
is hell the ultimate sign that god does give up on some people or is hell a place that people send themselves to (RC)?
what does it meam to call god good?
- the euthyphro dilemma suggests that either god defines goodness or god is subject to an independant standard of goodness - either way god is not worthy of worship
- the dilemma is often felt to be solved by aquinas' approach that god can only command out of his goodness so by definition no commands could be arbitrary
for christians faith has the final word - god journeys alongside his people and even if we do not fully understand how the world works, gods revelation assures christians that somehow gods attributes do work together
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Eternity
God as timeless - Boethius, anselm and aquinas
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god can perfectly see the past present and future - this means gods knowledge and power are not limited - god created the universe and is apart from the universe in terms of both space and time
boethius's views take into account the problem that if god is eternal and knows the future how can we be morally responsible for our actions?
he begins with his understanding of eternity - to understand knowledge boethius says that we have to understand the nature of the knower
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eternity is the 'simultaneous possession of boundless life' - god possess all at the same time all of existence
this is made clearer by comparison with temporal things - it is better understood when we compare gods nature with our nature
we do not have boundless life and so we live from moment to moment - we do not 'embrace the infinity of life all at once'
however god does and so god cannot have lost the past and doesnt have the future to look forward to - god is always infinitely present to himself
eternity for boethius therefore is something that god holds all in one go - time has no meaning for god - everythng is the present for god
this means that for god 'now' is the creation of the world, the coming of jesus, the birth of your childrens children, etc - all of this is the present at the same time
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from gods perspective he rejects the idea that the only aspect of time that exists is the present - this is how humans live we are within space and within time
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the past present and future all exist as terms that are relative to each other just like we relate to each other in terms of space
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in the same way that god is present everywhere, god is present everywhen
anselm develops boethius's idea of the simultaneous present and eternity becomes a non temporal word - it becomes a word to do with the fourth dimensions alongside the dimensions of space
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analysing the approaches
timeless
- how can a god who is seperate to the world have a relationship with those in it or intervene in it? is there any point in prayer?
- if god is eternal and knows the future are we free to choose what our future looks like?
- if god knows the future surely he is responsible for the problem of evil?
- if god is both eternal and knows the future can we be held morally responsibble for our actions? our we truly free?
- is it a play on world to say that things work differently for god?
- if god is eternal can god choose between one course of action and another? does god need to?
everlasting
- has god been limited too much? can god be omniscient or omnipotent if he is within time?
- if god does not know what choices we will make is he still worthy of our worship?
- should be trust the bibles account of god when the bible might simply be a human text?
- did god exist before time? if not has time always existed and it is logical that time existed before the universe?
- if god is everlasting god changes with time - can a perfect god change?
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