Dan Chapa

This one is Isaiah 45:7: “I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.” This is a verse that many people do not know is in the Bible. Its sentiment shocks them. They think that God could not have created evil. But this is precisely what the Bible says, and it has a direct bearing on the doctrine of predestination. Some people who do not wish to extend God’s power over evil things, and particularly over moral evils, try to say that the word evil here means such natural evils as earthquakes and storms. The Scofield Bible notes that the Hebrew word here, ra, is never translated sin. This is true. The editors of the Bible must have looked at every instance of ra in the Old Testament and must have seen that it is never translated sin in the King James Version. But what the note does not say is that it is often translated wickedness, as in Genesis 6:5, “And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the Earth.” In fact, ra is tran...

Ever wonder why Baal worship had such a strong comeback after Elijah's great victory? I don't. ( link )

Here's William Hasker's version of the foreknowledge argument. (B1) It is now true that Clarence will have a cheese omelet for breakfast tomorrow. (Premise) (B2) It is impossible that God should at any time believe what is false, or fail to believe anything that is true. (Premise: divine omniscience) (B3) Therefore, God has always believed that Clarence will have a cheese omelet for breakfast tomorrow. (From 1, 2) (B4) If God has always believed a certain thing, it is not in anyone's power to bring it about that God has not always believed that thing. (Premise: the unalterability of the past) (B5) Therefore, it is not in Clarence's power to bring it about that God has not always believed that he would have a cheese omelet for breakfast. (From 3, 4) (B6) It is not possible for it to be true both that God has always believed that Clarence would have a cheese omelet for breakfast, and that he does not in fact have one. (From 2) (B7) Therefore, it is not in Clarence...

Traditionally, Libertarians have guarded the definition of free will very closely. Libertarians don't allow compatiblists to remove essential aspects from the concept of free will, like say, reducing ability to hypothetical ability. But while we maintain constant vigilance against compatibilist reductions to free will, it seems to me we are less aware of needless and harmful additions to the concept of free will; additions that may be just as damaging as compatibilist reductions. Both Arminians and Open Theists frequently use the term free will, but do we mean the same thing by it? Compatibilist reductions to free will are subtle; saying we are able to do otherwise, meaning we are able to do otherwise if we want to . Likewise, Open Theists may have subtle and dangerous additions to free will.

Certainty properly is not an affection of an existing thing or of one about to happen, but of the mind certainly knowing or foreknowing that the thing exists or is about to exist: whence a transference is made to the event, -for it is the same that a thing will happen, and that it will certainly happen, -but that it may be signified to another that there is no reason to doubt of the event coming to pass. But necessity is an affection of the being, and adds a mode to the event, by which it is said that a thing will happen necessarily, and is opposed to the mode which is called "contingency". Therefore the same idea is not expressed, when it is said that a thing will happen certainly and necessarily; for the one word is only about futurition, the other about the mode also of futurition. This necessity is that of the consequent, by which a thing exists from its antecedent beginning and cause, so that it cannot not-exist from it: to which is opposed the contingency of the consequ...

However, the action itself must not be counted among the things that are necessary for acting. This is evident per se, since otherwise one would not be asserting anything special about the causes under discussion; instead, one wold be making a claim that to all things - not only to all agents but to all entities as well- namely, that if they have a form whereby they are constituted with such and such an esse or under such an such a notion, then the consequent that they are of that sort follows necessarily. For just as if someone has whiteness, then he is necessarily white, so too if someone exercises an action, then he necessarily effects something-where this is merely the necessity of the consequence (as they say): that is, a conditioned necessity, and not the necessity of the consequent-that is, an absolute necessity. The former kind of necessity is irrelevant in the present context, since causes cannot be distinguished with respect to it. 1 Therefore, in order for the discussion to...

“When addressing the question of whether it is within one’s power to prevent some future event, it is important to keep clear that the distinction between the sensus divisus and the sensus composites. In sensu composito I cannot prevent a future event, for this is self-contradictory. But in sensu diviso I can prevent some future event, for I have contra-causal power to bring about future events. Similarly it is not within one’s power to postvent a past event in sensu composito because this is self-contaditory. Since backward causation is metaphysically impossible, we do not generally have it within our power to affect the past even is sensu division, thus generating our intuitions of the unalterability of the past as over against the future. But where what is past is conditioned by what is future (for example, future contingent propositions’ being antecedently true), I have the power to act in such a way that the past would have been different than it in fact was. (Craig. Divine Forekn...