Determinism versus Free Will
Today is "A day in the life of Luther Seminary" in school. I met with about ten perspective students for an entire evening and tomorrow to assist discerning their calls. The lecture by Lois Malcolm was really something. It was almost like an intense and invigorated hour long homily. She mentioned that our will is bonded to our sins but Jesus liberated us and bestow us with complete freedom to serve our neighbors. Basically she mentioned that our will is still bound, but in regard to service for the kingdom of God, it is completely free. It is not her idea but Luther's. I have no qualms with that. One issue I struggled over the years is that I don't think predestination and condemnation are compatible concepts.
It has been said that the universe is a representation of wills. The interesting question is do mortals, sentient beings, have any contribution to this representation. I think the sovereignty talks from the Calvinists are quite silly. The God which they put inside a box is incapable of choosing against having total and exhaustive control of everything in the universe. That idea actually renders God completely unsovereign. If God is truly all powerful, He can still use, combine, or work around our wills dispite the fact that our wills don't necessarily align with His. Another problem with the whole idea of sovereignty and predestination is that how can any of us be blamed for anything we do wrong if they have been planned out and determined from the beginning, and all we do is to act it out?
On the flipside, I don't think we have free will. We have a will, but is neither free from external circumstances nor from our internal personalities and preferences. The will is bound, not free. The reason I wrote this blog is because I was influenced by Lois Malcolm speech today and Karen Gutzman's comment a few Monday's ago. My decision to write this entry is based on external factors and internal factors. I am an introvert and a nerd, and that's the internal factor. It is affected by my genetic predisposition which I did not choose. People with more money and powerful might have better control over their circumstances or contigencies of their environment, but nobody is truly free from it.
The concept of free will is a modern invention and is popular in today's modern world and often goes unchallenged. It matches with our ideas of "the American dream" or "those who tries hard will succeed." Or the current idea of justice: "if you committ the crime, you do the time." We put a bank robber in jail and not members of the person's dysfunctional family in jail or creators of violent movies or music or whoever else contributed to this person's circumstance or whoever put the idea in this person's head in the first place. If a person truly has free will, is the person guilty of his or her crime? I would argue the opposite. If a person's will is so free that it completely transcends this person's external and internal contingencies, then whatever this person did is created ex nihilo. It has absolutely nothing to do with this person. Well, then, how can such person be credited or blamed or anything good or bad?
Determinism vs Free Will is really difficult to understand. I want to pull my hair out just by thinking about it. Hopefully I'll have better ideas in the future as I receive more education.
It has been said that the universe is a representation of wills. The interesting question is do mortals, sentient beings, have any contribution to this representation. I think the sovereignty talks from the Calvinists are quite silly. The God which they put inside a box is incapable of choosing against having total and exhaustive control of everything in the universe. That idea actually renders God completely unsovereign. If God is truly all powerful, He can still use, combine, or work around our wills dispite the fact that our wills don't necessarily align with His. Another problem with the whole idea of sovereignty and predestination is that how can any of us be blamed for anything we do wrong if they have been planned out and determined from the beginning, and all we do is to act it out?
On the flipside, I don't think we have free will. We have a will, but is neither free from external circumstances nor from our internal personalities and preferences. The will is bound, not free. The reason I wrote this blog is because I was influenced by Lois Malcolm speech today and Karen Gutzman's comment a few Monday's ago. My decision to write this entry is based on external factors and internal factors. I am an introvert and a nerd, and that's the internal factor. It is affected by my genetic predisposition which I did not choose. People with more money and powerful might have better control over their circumstances or contigencies of their environment, but nobody is truly free from it.
The concept of free will is a modern invention and is popular in today's modern world and often goes unchallenged. It matches with our ideas of "the American dream" or "those who tries hard will succeed." Or the current idea of justice: "if you committ the crime, you do the time." We put a bank robber in jail and not members of the person's dysfunctional family in jail or creators of violent movies or music or whoever else contributed to this person's circumstance or whoever put the idea in this person's head in the first place. If a person truly has free will, is the person guilty of his or her crime? I would argue the opposite. If a person's will is so free that it completely transcends this person's external and internal contingencies, then whatever this person did is created ex nihilo. It has absolutely nothing to do with this person. Well, then, how can such person be credited or blamed or anything good or bad?
Determinism vs Free Will is really difficult to understand. I want to pull my hair out just by thinking about it. Hopefully I'll have better ideas in the future as I receive more education.
posted by doulos theou | 9:32 PM
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