Here’s the question from Come Reason Ministries.
Excerpt:
Hello,
Christian doctrine holds that God is all knowing (1 John 3:20), and humans have free will (Deuteronomy 30:19 is my favorite example). however, at my favorite apologetics debate board, I have seen skeptics raise an objection to these points several times. the basic logic behind their arguments is this:
- A being with free will, given two options A and B, can freely choose between A and B.
- God is omniscient (all-knowing).
- God knows I will choose A.
- God cannot be wrong, since an omniscient being cannot have false knowledge.
- From 3 and 4, I will choose A and cannot choose B.
- From 1 and 5, omniscience and free will cannot co-exist.
I have read many counter-arguments from apologetics sites, but they were either too technical (I couldn’t understand them), or not satisfying. so, I was wondering what would your input be on this issue?
Thank you,
Justin
Ever heard that one? Here’s Lenny Eposito’s answer:
Hi Justin,
Thanks for writing. This is a great question as it shows how even those who appeal to logic can have biases that blind them. Let’s examine this argument and see if it follows logically.
Premises 1 and 2 in your outline above are the main premises to the argument and are not disputed. The Christian worldview argues that every human being is a free moral agent and is capable of making choices simply by exercising their will, not under compulsion or because of instinct. Also, it is a long held doctrine of Christianity that God is all-knowing. The Bible says that God knows “the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:10).” For omniscience to be truly knowledgeable it must be correct knowledge, so premise number 4 is also granted.
However, point number 5 is where the logic falters. Those who argue in this manner make the mistake of thinking that because God possesses knowledge about a specific matter, then he has influenced it. That does not follow at all. Just because God can foresee which choice you will make, it does not mean you couldn’t still freely choose the other option.
Let me give you an example. I have a five year old son. If I were to leave a chocolate chip cookie on the table about a hour before dinner time and my son was to walk by and see it, I know that he would pick up the cookie and eat it. I did not force him to make that decision. In fact, I don’t even have to be in the room at all. I think I know my son well enough, though, to tell you that if I come back into the kitchen the cookie will be gone. His act was made completely free of my influence, but I knew what his actions would be.
In examining the argument, the assumption is made in premise 3 that because God knows I will choose A somehow denies me the choice of B. That is the premise that Christianity rejects. Omniscience and free will are not incompatible and it is a non-sequitor to claim otherwise.
Thank you Justin for this interesting question. I pray that you will continue to defend the gospel of our Lord and may He continue to bless you as you seek to grow in Him.
That’s a great answer and should work in ordinary conversations.
More technical
J.W. Wartick maps out the arguments more fully with symbolic logic here on his Always Have A Reason blog. But I’ll just excerpt the gist of it.
Excerpt:
It is necessarily true that if God knows x will happen, then x will happen. But then if one takes these terms, God knowing x will happen only means that x will happen, not that x will happen necessarily. Certainly, God’s foreknowledge of an event means that that event will happen, but it does not mean that the event could not have happened otherwise. If an event happens necessarily, that means the event could not have happened otherwise, but God’s foreknowledge of an event doesn’t somehow transfer necessity to the event, it only means that the event will happen. It could have been otherwise, in which case, God’s knowledge would have been different.
[…]Perhaps I could take an example. Let’s say that I’m going to go to classes tomorrow (and I do hope I will, I don’t like missing classes!). God knows in advance that I’m going to go to classes tomorrow. His knowledge of this event means that it will happen, but it doesn’t mean that I couldn’t choose to stay in and sleep for a while, or play my new copy of Final Fantasy XIII, or do something more useless with my time. If I chose to, say, play Final Fantasy XIII (a strong temptation!), then God simply would have known that I would play FFXIII. His knowledge does not determine the outcome, His knowledge is simply of the outcome.
If we choose A, God would foreknow A. If we choose B, God would foreknow B. His foreknowledge of our choices is contingent on our making free choices.
I had to learn symbolic logic and Bayes’ theorem in college for my computers science degrees, and it’s pretty useful for understanding these philosophers. Philosophy is a lot like computer science, at least for analytical philosophy.
WINTERY KNIGHT 
Actually, it is the logic of the respondents which is lacking. The father who “knows” his son will take the cookie is not omniscient. The analogy is flawed. It is bait and switch.
Determinism, the opposite of free will, states that an outcome is guaranteed by some pre-existent conditions. Because God is all-knowing, God has complete knowledge of the conditions in place prior to a human being making a decision. If God knows the relationship of those preconditions to the decision, and if God’s predictions are infallible, then humans are denied free will.
Therefore, either John is wrong or Deuteronomy is wrong (or both are wrong). They simply cannot both be right.
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“If God knows the relationship of those preconditions to the decision, and if God’s predictions are infallible, then humans are denied free will.”
That is question-begging. Under determinism, conditions determine an outcome. That is to say that given a certain set of conditions, the outcome must happen and cannot happen in any other way. Foreknowledge is to say that God knows what will happen, and that it will not happen in any other way.
Those two statements are completely different. To say that something must happen is to say that it will happen, but the reverse is not true. We make claims all the time about what will happen in the future (e.g. Presidential election) but nobody is saying that their predicted outcome must happen.
Will is a different concept from must, and does not entail it.
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NeuroProf
you have a point that the cookie analogy falls apart since a dad does not know with the certainty that God does regarding what is going to happen. He only has a really good idea (ie the event is highly probable).
However, knowing – even with certainty – is still not causing. A good example is you know that some event happened in the past (ie. your son ate the cookie you left on the table, Washington was the first POTUS). You did not cause it these events to happen, but you still know with certainty that they happened.
God – being outside of time – knows the future the way we know the past. He knows with certainty what will happen w/o determining (ie causing) it.
Mike
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I would argue that simply by knowing a future event beyond a shadow of a doubt would cause the event to happen since God cannot be wrong. If God knows that knowing the outcome of a future event would make it set in stone and cannot happen any other way then isn’t God in essence causing that event to happen? Also your analogy of us knowing the past cannot be compared to God knowing the future. Those are two entirely different things.
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Oh my gosh why is this so hard to understand? God’s knowing something doesn’t cause it. Humans cause things and whatever we cause, God knows about.
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I remember my pastor saying that just because God predetermines doesn’t mean he predestines. Predetermination and Predestination are two different things. Predetermination is contingent upon already knowing the decision that we will make out of our own free will, since God is not bound by time.
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Actually, the Bible does not ascribe free will to all people. It states that there is no one who seeks God or to do his will under his or her own power. Only when God has quickened the person with his Spirit can there be any possibility of choosing to follow God. Some may argue that one doesn’t need the Spirit in order to do good works, to make a right choice instead of a wrong one. But that fails to see God’s understanding of what constitutes a good work. Motivation is essential in God’s eyes. Without the Spirit, no one can come to God. They may honor God with their lips, but their hearts will be far from him. And out of the heart proceeds all kinds of wickedness.
Another thing that is standing in our way is that we cannot understand what it’s like to live beyond the third dimension. The reason God can see the end of all things is because he is outside of time and not bound by it. Our “finite” beings cannot fathom how this can be, but only in this way could we understand how God knows all things without resorting to determinism. For a really good discussion on the topic of dimensions, check out
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions is an 1884 satirical novella by the English schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott.
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