Sorry to take so long to reply, but we’ve been out of town for a family reunion. We’ll be gone again tomorrow and part of the next day. But I went looking for any posts from you, knowing you would ping me to anything particularly fascinating. And, sure enough…
It is evidently very common for theologians to presume that God is limited to a timeline, i.e. He knows the future because He foreordained it. All I can figure is that, since they can only conceive of existence on a timeline, that they have presumed God must be limited in the same way. Doesn’t make much sense when it is stated that way, eh?
Truly, xzins, I wish I knew why theologians aren’t meditating on the obvious – that our vision and our minds have been designed to limit our perceptions. (I Cor 13:12) We are functionally blind to other dimensions, hence we are blind to the nature of time – because time is geometric.
What this means is (whether in special relativity, general relativity and most particularly extra temporal dimensions) – time is relative to the observer. From extra temporal dimensions, what we sense as time is actually a plane or planes - and not a "line". In relativity, essentially no time passes at one space/time coordinate while it races along at another – all depending on the geometry (gravity is a space/time indentation).
Even with that limited mathematical understanding, if God were simply an observer (and He is obviously much, much, much more than that) … He would already know the entire scenario, beginning to end. Moreover, when He moves it is over all of space/time – past, present and future. Therefore, He cannot lie – because when He speaks, it is – even though we may not “perceive” it coming into fruition until some distant point in the future because we sense that our lives pass along a timeline.
IOW, what we see as a movie, frame by frame, He sees all at once, as a whole. He is also able to change it, in any direction – and we’d never know He did unless He told us!
Thus, from our frame-by-frame perspective the future is not determined. For instance, we make a free will choice to hear His voice and follow Him, and He (not us) changes the script. Ditto for other free will spiritual choices. Or we make no such choice and we continue on a ruinous path under the dictates of the laws of physics. Likewise we pray – not because we can change the future, but because He can – and not on a timeline either, but all at once.
I agree with you absolutely – God is omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent and none of these are mutually exclusive.
Thanks for your wonderful reply. I always enjoy reading what you have to say.
IOW, what we see as a movie, frame by frame, He sees all at once, as a whole. He is also able to change it, in any direction - and we'd never know He did unless He told us!
This seems to be similar to a concept which occurred to me while I was thinking about how God manages to answer many different prayers, from many millions of people.
Consider one person: each individual has many choices to make, every hour--some important, and some (seemingly) irrelevant. An important choice might be moving to another city, taking a new job, or deciding to marry. The apparently irrelevant might be what shirt to wear, or whether to brush one's teeth, or whether to retie a loose shoestring.
Every time one of these choices is about to be made, there are at least two possible timelines -- one if choice A is made, and another, if choice B is made. Everything which occurs AFTER this choice is switched into one or the other of these timelines. So, then, thousands of possible timelines, every day, are chosen; in being chosen, they become part of that which solidifies into "history." And, that is for only one person. The same thing happens for each of the billions of people alive today.
God, of course, is perfectly able to see all of the possible future timelines, not only for one person, but for all of those billions. Thus, God is able to answer prayers, by many means--everything from blatant miracles to nudging people to make certain choices. Furthermore, having said in advance that he will certainly do certain things (gather Israel back to the promised land, for instance) He is perfectly able to cause those things to happen, while still allowing people to make their own choices.
[Of course, it should be noted that this is only a concept, not directly derived from scripture.]
It is evidently very common for theologians to presume that God is limited to a timeline, i.e. He knows the future because He foreordained it. All I can figure is that, since they can only conceive of existence on a timeline, that they have presumed God must be limited in the same way.
I think we should never limit God (in our minds) to only those things which our minds can conceive.
DG
I had this argument just within the past year. It was put to me that God knows the future precisely because He is in control of everything. The implication clearly being, that God could not know the future if He were not controlling everything.
I countered by arguing that God knows the future because He occupies not only every point in space, but also every point in time. In other words, He is not only everywhere, but everywhen. He 'sees' the future because He is in the future. Therefore, His control is not a relevant factor.
I supported this further by arguing that time is inextricably linked to space and, therefore, must be part of the created order, just as space is. God, being the Creator, is not subject to the creation. That He permeates the entire time-space continuum in no way implies that He is bound within it's confines. Rather, He transcends it.
In short, it is as easy for Him to describe events in the future as it is for me to describe the objects on my desk.
Likewise we pray – not because we can change the future, but because He can – and not on a timeline either, but all at once.
I was once engaged in a conversation about the effectiveness of prayers for the dead. In the Orthodox Church, prayers for the dead are considered effective, without speculation as to how. So, there we were, sipping coffee and speculating as to how. Unofficially, of course.
Basically, once a person dies, that's it for them. They can no longer do anything, good or bad. So whatever state they were in (in regards to sanctification) when they died, that's how they will remain. However, the prayers of others may be a caveat. In brief, a person could go into the grave in bad shape and pop out of it in good shape, due to the afformentioned prayers (presuming, of course, that this is within God's will). From a strictly temporal perspective, it would seem as if these prayers were retroactive; a prayer said on thursday affecting a person who died on tuesday. This is one possibility. God, having perfect knowledge of the future as well as unrestricted 'mobility' outside the timeline, could easily manage this. However, if we consider that the afterlife is not inside this particular time-space continuum, but in another realm outside of it, then the precise order of events in this timeline becomes moot, since a one-to-one ratio between realms is not a given. Prayers offered up at any point in this realm could be applied, by God, to someone in the other realm without regard to any sequencing processes inherent to either realm, respectively.
We are familiar only with being in one place at any given time. Put differently, we occupy a specific point in the time-space continuum. But we can imagine exceptions. Consider the concept of folded space. Gravity bends space. Theoretically, space could be bent back over itself, producing a fold. Folded tight enough, the observable distictions between 'here' and 'there' would cease to exist. Any object residing withing that fold may very well appear to be both 'here' and 'there' simultaneously. Fold space again and an object may appear to be here, there and also somewhere else. Since space and time are linked, a fold in space would seem to necessitate a fold in time as well. The future might appear to coincide with the past! Just for kicks, imagine this: what if, instead of neatly folded, time-space were crumpled.
Now, imagine a realm where the dimentions are not smooth, but crumply. Imagine that the crumpling is such, that any perceivable 'point' is accessable from any other perceivable 'point'. One could participate in a logical sequence of events without actually being bound by the process of sequencing. The sequencing would be by choice, rather than necessity. One could step out of a particular logical sequence, participate in another, and return to the original sequence without missing a single moment in either sequence.
I've enjoyed reading your posts and look forward to any thought you may have on this.