RTS Papers / Turretin's Institutes / Spring 2018
***Citations are by volume and then page number of the P&R edition.
THEOLOGY PROPER: WHAT MUST BE IN GOD
It would come as no surprise to those who identify as Reformed today that a theologian such as Turretin would hold to the holiness, omnipotence, omniscience, and sovereignty of God, or that his God does all things for his own glory. What might come as more of a surprise is how Turretin takes for granted the categories of classical theism. These are all inherited from the Patristic and Medieval eras. Where they are defended, it is clear that the heretical movements of the seventeenth century are the ones challenging these ideas. It ought to give us pause to read about Socinians and their cohorts denying the same divine attributes and actions as many conservative Evangelicals do in our day, or as the most celebrated theistic philosophers have for over a generation.
What I want to show here is that natural theology is operative when we speak about God even from the data of Scripture. Of course natural theology is technically a function of the generally revealed data — perhaps this should be called “contemplative theology” [Dolezal, xv] in this context — however that data is functioning throughout our inferences that we often assume are taken “from Scripture alone.” Consider Turretin’s statement about God, in almost Anselmian language: “it is evident that nothing can be or be conceived better and more perfect. Thus he must necessarily be infinite because an infinite good is better than a finite … he embraces every degree of perfection without any limitation” [I.195].
No such propositions exist verbatim in the Bible. Yet every time we say something like “God must x” or “It is unthinkable that in God x,” we are drawing inferences from known divine attributes to other truths.
What is crucial to the classical view of revelation is that we already know many such things a priori to our reading of Scripture. One commentator on Turretin remarks about his view that, “if the Christian revelation was to be intelligible, the essential nature of the divine revealer had to be known (at least rudimentarily) prior to special revelation if that revelation should be possible to relate or identify with God” [Rehnman, quoted in Reforming or Conforming? 63].
Now we proceed to those three attributes.
Divine Simplicity
Turretin gives one of the great definitions of this neglected attribute: “The simplicity of God … is his incommunicable attribute by which the divine nature is conceived by us not only as free from all composition and division, but also as incapable of composition and divisibility” [I.191]. In other words, this is not the “simplicity” or “oneness” of exclusivity, as when the First Commandment or Deuteronomy 6:4 excludes other gods. Nor does “simple” mean a thing that is easy to understand. Simple may be used in two senses: either absolutely and simply (excluding all composition), or else relatively and comparatively (excluding some composition). The most basic material elements and even spiritual beings, like angels, are only simple in the relative sense. God alone is simple in the first.
Before he shows what follows from this simplicity, he concludes to simplicity from other attributes: (1) from independence, since composition requires dependence on that which composes it; (2) from unity, since oneness of the whole variety (not the exclusive variety) negates parts; (3) from perfection, since composition requires mutability and thus dependence on that which actuated each part’s potentiality; and (4) from activity, since the First Cause must be in pure act, having no potentiality awaiting activation from without. Interestingly, this fourth inference is identical to Thomas’ rationale for the simplicity of God which he makes follow directly his five ways to show God’s existence [Summa Theologica. I.Q.3, Art.1]. That shows us that Turretin thinks like Aquinas about the relationship between natural theology and theology proper.
Moving the other direction, with simplicity as a premise, he says: “The infinity of God follows from his simplicity and is equally diffused through the other attributes of God, and by it the divine nature is conceived as free from all limit in imperfection” [I.194]. Here again we have one divine attribute as the conclusion of another, and then as a premise to still others.
If God is simple, then he is infinite; and if he is infinite, then no other attribute can be limited. Said another way: every divine attribute is infinite because every divine attribute is simple.
For Turretin, natural theology was not “Chapter One” that is left behind when the “Chapter Two” of biblically revealed theology proper begins. Inferences concerning necessary relation come to mind precisely because we are being faithful to what is revealed.
What follows from this doctrine is that God’s essence cannot be conceived apart from his existence, because God simply is. He is the one being for whom existence is essential. This is part of a larger section in which “all species of composition” are ruled out. He distinguishes between modes and essences on the one hand, and essential versus accidental on the other. These two distinctions will help navigate through the mysteries of Trinity and Incarnation, as well as the controversies surrounding God’s relationships to the creation.
Two mysteries are immediately protected by retaining divine simplicity: first the Incarnation, as it was not a composition of the divine and human, but only, “by hypostatical union” [I.192], a communication of the attributes to the Person of the Son; second, the Trinity, as “Simplicity and triplicity are so mutually opposed that they cannot subsist at the same time … [rather] simplicity with respect to essence, but Trinity with respect to persons” [I.193]. And again, “The personal property of the Son does not make his essence different than that of the Father … Distinction is not composition” [I.194]. So this attribute of simplicity would seem necessary in order not to fall into either Christological or Trinitarian heresy.
Likewise the decree of God is often related to simplicity in the question of whether there are many decrees or one. There is a supposed dilemma. If there is only one decree, then it would seem that either a diversity of things do not happen, or else, if they do, all but one thing has happened outside of God’s decree. If on the other hand, there is more than one decree, then the decree of God has reference to his effects, it being many as they are many. But if the latter, then it seems to follow that the act of God is composed of parts. Consequently, since God is actus purus, then it would follow that the divine essence is composed of parts.
How does Turretin resolve this? Although he does not directly address it in this section, he conceives of the decree in the same way as his earlier division between the divine attributes into subjective (in God) and objective (receiving God’s action). The Latin used for this objective or outward sense is ad extra and is a very important distinction in the contemporary examination of theistic mutualism. Many things that the Bible portrays as diverse in God’s thoughts or decisions or other apparent actions are only so ad extra, rather than pointing “to the inside” (ad intra) as if there were phenomena in God. Such would imply that “there is more than one real entity” [I.192], which is another of Turretin’s descriptions of composition. Consequently the decree of God is singular and simple in the former sense and yet diverse in the latter, in reference to its many effects.
Divine Eternality (or Atemporality)
Here I am only concerned with the attribute of eternity in its negative sense, and not Boethius’ definition of God’s supreme possession of life, with all that this might entail. The dimension of eternity that concerns Turretin here is that which transcends time. Again we have to understand his doctrine in light of the errors of his day. Eternality is poised against the Socinians in this work, but because of his argument with “the Jesuits” over Middle Knowledge, this attribute is very relevant for contemporary renovations to omniscience as well.
Turretin lists three Jesuit antagonists who challenged absolute omniscience, though we would recognize Luis de Molina as the ring leader. Hence the label Molinism. As tempting as it would have been to treat his argument against Middle Knowledge, in light of William Lane Craig’s position, I have seen fit to resist that temptation.
He begins with this definition: “The infinity of God in reference to duration is called eternity to which these three things are ascribed: (1) that it is without beginning; (2) without end; (3) without succession … We maintain that God is free from every difference of time, and no less from succession than from beginning and end” [I.202]. Scripture supports that an absolute eternity belongs to God (Gen. 21:33, Is. 41:4, 57:15, 1 Tim. 1:17, Ps. 90:1-2, 102:25-28, Rev. 1:8).
The challenge will be whether the theologian can show that this “eternity” is something more than simply an aspect of time to the nth degree. If it is, it is part of the same set. Does it not rather transcend temporal succession altogether? Turretin’s argument from the Psalms and James 1:17 both reduce succession to mutability, and so excludes it from God by relating God’s eternity to immutability. If one is lost, so is the other.
It is important to note that the classical doctrine that God transcends time is not a denial that he is also present to time: omnipresence. Transcendence and immanence go together in the Christian view without reducing either. What matters is that God is not limited by the elements of time. He further argues that “succession depends upon a beginning,” and that succession involves “change of former into latter” [I.203], so that it would compromise God’s immutability.
To the more recent theistic mutualists, “creation is the linchpin that requires temporality in God” [Dolezal, 81]. That is because the attribute of Creator denotes, to their view, something that is not essential to God and yet an aspect of God. To torture the words of Arius, “There was when he (the Creator) was not.” But notice that this presupposes a “before and after,” which is only to beg the question. If every unit of space or time is present to God, then the particular effect of creation is no different. Thus it is not new to him, even as it is a free effect of God. We will come back to this below concerning immutability.
What about God’s knowledge? If omniscience is a knowledge of “all things,” then each thing in that set is a particular. So God must know that “It is 7:40 AM” as I type this. The contemporary theistic philosopher resolves this by assuming God is in time up front and then treats the “all things” of time as a succession in which one is experiencing the succession, rather than God knowing perfectly of the succession (and each of its moments) within his omnipresence.
But the question of whether succession is presented in God’s eternal mind or whether God is “in” the succession (or the succession is “in” him) is not resolved by presupposing the latter as the only acceptable definition. That is to beg the question. Later on he says, “The indivisible eternity of God embraces all divisible times, not coextensively or formally, but eminently and indivisibly” [I.204]. I used the word omnipresence above, but Turretin uses the old world immensity to denote that which “embraces …all the extended and divisible parts of the world (although indivisible in his nature) because wherever he is, he is wholly” [I.204]. At any rate, we can see the close association between atemporality and omniscience. It seems that Turretin would agree that to lose one is to lose the other.
The Socinians divided the decrees between those made before time and the majority made after the creation began.
But the reasons for holding to all the decrees as eternal are: (1) Scripture expressly ascribes eternity to them (Mat. 25:34, Eph. 1:4, 2 Tim. 1:9, 1 Pet. 1:20); (2) Scripture implies it from foreknowledge (Acts 15:18), since if the decrees are foreknown, and foreknowledge is eternal, then so are the decrees; and (3) temporal decisions imply deliberation.
Now deliberation implies ignorance and succession; but ignorance is opposed to omniscience, and succession is opposed to immutability and eternality. That there is an order to the decrees does not mean that some are eternal and others not. The order is logical and not chronological.
One last point about the essence of God in relation to all that is not God. The essence of eternality cannot be fundamentally defined by time. Time is created, as Augustine showed [Confessions. XI.14.17], and so the divine essence cannot be determined by his effects. “True eternity has been defined by the Scholastics to be ‘the interminable possession of life —complete, perfect, and at once’” [I.203]. Thus eternality is, most basically, qualitative of life and only secondarily quantitative in relation to succession, and that by negation. So in the end, Turretin does have an understanding that accords with the definition given by Boethius. If the primary definition was not his main focus, it was only for polemical reasons.
Divine Immutability
Is God immutable both with respect to his essence and with respect to his decrees? That is Question 11. Turretin was especially arguing against those who divorced the divine will from the rest of the divine essence. First the attribute must be defined with respect to God. It means not only that God does not change, but that he cannot change. Scripture teaches absolute immutability (Mal. 3:6, Ps. 33:11, 110:4, 102:26, Jam. 1:17, Num. 23:19, Is. 46:10, Heb. 6:17); and reason confirms it since a necessary and independent being cannot change. He argues, “All causes of change are removed from him” [I.205], which must include error, ignorance, or inconstancy of will.
We have already introduced the objection that when God creates anything, a new relation seems to be arising in God, or, at least, an act of the divine will has moved in a way that it had not moved before. Turretin flatly rejects this: “Creation did not produce a change in God, but in creatures” [I.205]. The events of history are changing. Biblical theology, if not balanced by theology proper, presses us to conceive of God as changing with the narrative of Scripture.
Turretin draws a distinction common among other medieval and Reformed theologians between the names of God and the attributes of God. The names “Creator” and “Lord” and “Redeemer” and “Savior” are all relative terms. Properly speaking they are denoting a relation between God and his effects and not an attribute of God which, in his essence, he did not previously possess. On the other hand, if all of God is eternal and all of his acts are an act of that eternity, then creation would also seem to be an eternal act. Note that this is not the same as to say that therefore the universe is eternal. The act proper is a divine act and thus transcends any effect. This is also no embarrassment to the classical position where the divine will and act are not separated.
Correct understanding of immutability helps to answer the objection that the Incarnation effects change in God’s essence. It is “not by a conversion of the Word … into flesh, but by an assumption of the flesh to the hypostasis of the Word.” So the doctrine of the Incarnation is supported by the antecedent truth that, “It is one thing to change the will; another to will the change of anything” [I.205].
God as immutable Creator is foundational to God the Son assuming human nature. Neither the essence nor the decree were altered by the Word becoming flesh. The Incarnation especially points to the irony of modern theology’s attempt to make God more personal by pitting immanence against transcendence (in this case, temporal change in the name of divine action). The irony is that it would no longer be God acting in time and space if he must become in order to do so.
The challenge of Open Theism is likewise anticipated by this reasoning: “Unfulfilled promises and threatenings do not argue a change of will because they were conditional, not absolute” [I.206]. When man disobeys a condition set forth by God, what would natural follow the condition goes undone, but the decree is not overthrown. Of things that require a condition, and yet will not be fulfilled: “since God (who has all things in his own power) knows that such a condition will never take place (since he himself has not decreed it), he cannot be said to have decreed anything under that condition” [I.318].
We see a clear example here of that distinction between absolute and consequent necessity. Many things were possible, if God had so chose, yet impossible given the decree. The former belongs to the absolute necessity of God and the latter to the consequent necessity of the decree.
Turretin cites the example of Christ being crucified: God was perfectly free to do otherwise, yet Christ’s not being crucified is impossible consequent to the decree. In other words, God was free to withhold redemption from sinners, but given his decision to save, the cross accomplished some essential ways to carry it out.
Absolute necessities, in true theology, wholly determine consequent necessities. And the practical importance of this to what follows in this thesis is that those consequent necessities (e. g. Righteousness is imputed through our faith in Christ’s action) are necessary precisely because of the nature of their antecedents (e. g. God cannot accept any righteousness but a perfect righteousness).
It should also be pointed out that this distinction between antecedent and consequent necessity is not the same as the “antecedent and consequent wills” of God posited by the Socinians and Remonstrants. By this they held out the prospects that God set out both his imperatives and invitations antecedently, but then followed man’s “free” response with either rewards or punishments [I.226]. So the their idea of God’s consequent will is the divine response to man’s response subsequent to the antecedent divine will.
All of the Reformed would reject this, and yet in order to do so, our fellow Calvinists will have to reply upon classical categories applied to the decree: namely, that is it simple, eternal, and immutable. Naturally all of this raises more questions: How then is there freedom either in God or in the creature? Since answering these exceeds the scope of this essay, my only aim is to show how these divine attributes, central to classical Christian theology, provide the logical ground for God’s gracious covenant to sinners, his means of salvation in the cross of Christ, and therefore justification by faith alone.
(#Turretin #Reformed #classical #theology #simplicity #divine #immutability)
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