Attributes of God

• The idea of divine power

  • God's creation is perfect, humanity itself has failed
  • the idea of God as paradoxical is due to human limitations
• Can God sin?

  • 'It is impossible for God to lie' - Hebrews 6:18
  • 'for no word from God will ever fail' - Luke 1:36-37
• Can God do everything?

  God can do everything possible, not because he is limited but because he is logical
• Descartes

  • Go can do all, regardless of logic
  • God is the supreme perfection
  • God can do evil but his omnibenevolence stops him
  • the human mind is limited
  • suffering is the price we pay for autonomy
• Logical and philosophical problems

  • God is limitless - Descartes
  • God is limited by logic, not a lack of power - Aquinas
• Aquinas

  • God is omnipotent, depending on logic
  • God cannot do anything that is inconsistent with his nature because that would imply a contradiction, eg. God can't be evil and omnibenevolent
  • 'God takes in all history as a whole', he has a 3rd eye
• Vardy

  God's omnipotence is limited, although self-imposed
• Swinburne

  • humans understanding of the world is limited
  • God's omniscience relies on logic, God knows everything that can be known
  • it is illogical for God to be transcendent/timeless
• Alvin Plantinga

  • God can do everything that God can do
  • God limits his power to preserve human free will
• Peter Geach

  God has power over everything, not the power to do everything
• The Paradox of the Stone

  Can God create a stone that is too heavy to lift?

  • Mavrodes - opposes the paradox as is illogical and self-contradictory
  • no objection to God's omnipotence
• Macquarrie

  • God can do all, regardless of logic
  • limitations are self-imposed
  • the human mind is limited
  • God is self-emptying, he deliberately left behind divine qualities for Jesus so that Jesus could still be human
• Whitehead and Hartshorne

  • absolute omnipotence, God's power cannot be surpassed by another being
  • God controls all
  • God's omnipotence relies on logic
• William of Ockham

  2 types of God's power -

  1. ordained power, God cannot 'uncreate' his choices
  2. absolute power, God can do anything
• Flew and Mackie

  • free will gives us the opportunity to do good
  • God could've made us with the ability to only do good, he chose to give us free will by allowing the potential for evil
• God's relationship with time

  • God as timeless (atemporal) - Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas
  • God as everlasting (sempiternal)
• God as omniscient

  • free will should not be swayed by the knowledge that God knows all
  • not that God can't know all but he won't know all, he chooses not to so he can be more like us
• Knowledge and the sense

  • no 'before God' - Augustine
  • God is not like us, he is limitless - Aquinas
• Middle knowledge

  knowledge of what would happen if the past happened differently
• Does eternal mean 'timeless'?

  • 'God's years neither come or go, whereas ours both come and go' - Augustine
  • God is the constant
  • God is not limited so his omnipotence is not threatened
• Can God be personal and timeless?

  if God is in time, he would be subject to change
• Does eternal mean everlasting?

  • God moves in time with us but never begins or ends
  • God has always existed and will always exist
  • God is sempiternal, everlasting
• Criticisms of God as everlasting and timeless

  • limits our free will
  • the problem of evil, God as omnibenevolent but allows evil
• Oscar Cullman

  eternal means everlasting, not timeless
• Boethius

  • the problem of God's omniscience, if God knows the future he is wrong to reward or punish us for our behaviour
  • prayer is pointless as the outcome will not change, predestination
  • God has no influence on what we will do although having knowledge of it
  • God sees our whole life from a 'lofty peak above them'
  • we are responsible for our own faults, not God
• Anselm

  • ontological
  • Presentism - only the present moment exists
  • Humans can only be in one place at one time, we are limited
  • God is limitless, he controls all
  • we have free will
  • God sees our past, present, and future - from 'a lofty peak above them'
  • we are responsible for our own faults, not God
• Old Testament

  people should have love for God and each other as a result of loving God
• New Testament

  God loves everyone and includes all in his plan for salvation
• Platinga

  omnipotence is not a necessary quality for God, it limits free will