Thursday, February 19, 2009

On The Wrath Of God

This post will largely be a response to another blog post written by Father Stephen Freeman at his blog Glory To God For All Things. Father Freeman attempts to address the question of God's wrath from an Orthodox perspective, arguing that God is not actually "wrathful" toward anyone in the way Protestants (and Catholics) have tradtionally thought. In this post I will respond to Father Freeman's arguments and attempt to defend the traditional Protestant view of the Wrath of God.

Father Freeman sets the tone of his post by beginning with this Scripture passage:

When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him, who went and entered a village of the Samaritans, to make preparations for him. But the people did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. And when his disciples James and John saw it, they said, "Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?" But he turned and rebuked them.
-Luke 9:51-55


(Father Freeman's quotation of this verse includes the phrase "and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of", which is included in the ESV only as a textual variant in a footnote. For the purpose of this post, I will grant Father Freeman that his citation is correct)

He goes on to juxtapose this passage with another one:

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming
-Colossians 3:5-6


Now Father Freeman says, "A legitimate question has to be: has the Spirit “of which we are” changed between Luke 9 and Colossians 3? Or is there a deeper understanding at work?" He then argues that the revelation of Christ in the Gospels must be the definitive revelation of God, not the Old Testament or even the Epistles.

Let me just stop here and make one comment. Even if this were so (and I'm not saying it is or it isn't), this seems a bit simplistic to me. Surely the Old Testament must be interpreted in light of the New, but why shouldn't we allow there to be some interplay between the Gospels and Epistles? Part of the reason the Orthodox interpret the Resurrection of Christ in the way that they do is because of Paul's teaching on it. The only thing the Gospels tell us explicitly is that Jesus was dead and then he was alive again. The interpretation of those events is in large measure left up to Paul and others.

Moving on, Father Freeman responds to a potential objection, saying, "Of course my citation of Luke 9 is often countered with, “What about the moneychangers in the Temple?” To which I can only say that He “drove them out with a whip” which is not the same thing as saying that Christ beat them, nor did He call down fire from heaven to consume them."

This seems to miss the point. The discussion is not about specific instances of judgement or types of punishment, it's about (speaking anthropomorphically) an emotive stance or attitude of God toward sin. Was Jesus angered by what the moneychangers were doing? Did he drive them out by force? Was he whistling and smiling as he did it? This is an important matter that the Father dismisses too quickly.

Father Freeman continues:

For various reasons, some people are determined to make the economy of salvation to be linked with the Wrath of God. If you do not repent, then God will do thus and such… I have always considered this representation of the gospel to be coercive and contrary to the love of God. I have heard convoluted ways in which this wrath is interpreted to be “the loving thing to do” but I do not buy it.


At this point, and for the remaining few paragraphs of the article, Father Freeman, in my opinion, totally side-steps the issue in favor of a discussion of God's love and how we present the gospel to others. Whether or not we can make the gospel sound "coersive" is not the issue. What the Bible actually says about the wrath of God is the issue. Of course, dispensing wrath upon sin is not so much the "loving" thing to do as it is the just thing to do, but Father Freeman neither engages with nor argues against either of these positions, so I can't respond to him on that point.

Of the use of "wrath" in the Bible, Father Freeman says, "The common witness within Orthodox Tradition is that the wrath of God is a theological term which describes not God Himself, but a state of being in which are opposed to God." I have never understood the argument that the phrase "wrath of God" is not referring to God's wrath, nor have I seen convincing arguments that clear instances of judgement in Scripture are not really judgement. But again, Father Freeman provides no Scripture passages or arguments here.

So let's engage Father Freeman's original question. Has the Spirit “of which we are” changed between Luke 9 and Colossians 3? What is this Spirit?

Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord."
-Romans 12:19


Here I think we see a clear example of what Father Freeman might have in mind. We are not to be, as the Apostles in Luke 9 were, seeking after vengence. We could say that we ought not have a vengeful spirit. But why? In this passage, Paul tells us why. Because vengence belongs to God. This is extremely important. Paul here not only tells us not to be vengeful or wrathful, but he grounds that command in the fact that God is the one who is wrathful and vengeful. God alone can execute judgement perfectly against the wicked, so we should not attempt to do so. Far from being some kind of horrid doctrine that is "not worthy of the God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ" (in Father Freeman's words), the doctrine of the retributive wrath of God is used by Paul to ground a very "Christ-like" attitude of charity and forgiveness toward others (the very attitude that Father Freeman assumes will be threatened by such a doctrine).

It is also important to note that the phrase "wrath of God" here is explicitly connected with vengence and the Lord's active "repayment" for wickedness. There can be no doubt here of what "wrath" Paul is speaking of.

Father Freeman concludes:

It is very difficult in our culture, where the wrathful God has been such an important part of the gospel story, to turn away from such portrayals - and yet it is necessary - both for faithfulness to the Scripture, the Fathers, and the revelation of God in Christ.


On the contrary, it is becoming increasingly more rare to hear any Christian preacher in America (at least among Evangelicals) even mention the wrath of God, let alone consider it an important part of the gospel story. Not only does the Emergent movement show us this, but the flight among evangelical youth to Eastern Orthodoxy does as well. "Postmodern" America is not the sort of culture that looks kindly upon a perfectly Holy and Just God who follows through on His promises to punish sin by His wrath. That is why it is so important to stand firm on the teachings of the Bible, and not be swayed by the opinions of men.

48 comments:

  1. David
    Could Father Freeman be trying to point out that often we get God's wrath confused with His mercy? For example, in Romans 1, St. Paul points out that God gives sinners over to their lusts. Is it God's wrath or His mercy that gives one over to their lusts? I would argue that it is God's wrath. The irony is in the fact that he who pursues his lusts gets exactly what he 'wants.' However, if one's lusts go unchecked, he is choosing the creation over the creator which turns him away from God. When an alcoholic loses his job and his family, that isn't God's wrath. It is in these consequences that we often turn away from our lusts and turn towards God thereby saving our souls.

    I have heard that the 1st consequence of sin is that we enjoy it...quite a paradox, but true.

    Another point that Father may be trying to make is that often times we try to portray God as if He is human and changes depending on His mood. He's merciful one moment and wrathful the other. We know that God doesn't change...He Is. So God's wrath and/or mercy could in fact be a reference to our position in relation to God. God doesn't punish us, we punish ourselves. It is kind of like the law of gravity. I can't break the law but I can break myself against it.

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  2. David C,

    I agree that some consequences of sin are "natural." But all of them are not (the flood, the destruction of Soddom, etc). Moreover, ALL cases of giving sinful people over to their lusts cannot be to turn them back to God, because that would be universalism.

    As to your last comment, God is not simply a law of nature. He is a person. He may not be a person like us, but He is still personal. We may speak of His "hating sin" in an analogical way, but it remains true.

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  4. am not saying that turning them over to their lusts turns them back to God. In fact, I was saying just the opposite. We tend to see things like this: I get what I want (God's mercy), I get something undesireable (God's Wrath). I am suggesting that the flood, destruction of Soddom, etc. can be seen as mercy while allowing someone to "get what they want" to the point of depravity as wrath.

    You are right, God isn't a law of nature. However, don't you believe that the laws of nature do reflect God's nature? He just is. He doesn't become merciful one moment then wrathful the other because that would imply change. We both know God can't change.

    What do you think it means that God hates sin? Does He hate sin because he makes a decision to hate it or does He hate sin because His very nature doesn't allow otherwise? For example, God can't lie. One can see this to mean God has limitations. But the opposite is true. God declares something and it becomes what he declares. Just like the phrase "you're fired" accomplishes what it states. So, by that definition, God cannot lie.

    BTW, I am not trying to argue with you here. I will save that for the other conversation :). I was just trying to throw my two cents in and hopefully shed some light on what Father Freeman was getting at.

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  5. Yes, I agree that God doesn't change and that he hates sin because it is His very nature to do so (it is required by His holiness and justice). But what the Father is saying is that God just loves everyone, and that wicked people who turn away from God will experience his love as if it were wrath. This is what I am denying in my post. Hell is not a place filled with God's love.

    Sinclair Ferguson (a Presbyterian theologian) has said that "wrath" is really just what sinners experience when they come into contact with God's holiness. This is similar to what the Orthodox would say (and it avoids the problem of making God sound like he's emotional and changes His mind) but the emphasis is different. It makes clear that God's disposition towards sin and Hell is not love, because God is incapable of loving sin.

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  6. David,

    If you read the cited article "The River of Fire" by Dr. Alexander Kalomiros which is on my blog roll, you might see that what I am saying is rooted in the Fathers and Orthodox teaching. And that the "wrath" in some literal sense, imagery, is indeed condemned as heresy even blasphemy from an Orthodox understanding. We certainly believe that sin has consequences, but that the consequences are in what we have done to ourselves, in refusing reconciliation with God and thus the healing and salvation of our souls, but not in a punishment (legal metaphor). The subtle distinctions have to do with the Goodness of God versus having to use man's reason to explain how a vengeful and wrathful God is actually good. I think the Fathers read on Scripture is to be preferred.

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  7. Is it possible that you are both trying to say the same thing, but language is getting in the way?

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  8. Father Freeman, thank you for commenting!

    I understand the Orthodox position, which is what I was attempting to respond to. But I will definitely take a look at that article, thank you for letting me know that it was available on your site.

    I'm curious, do you have any thoughts/responses to the specific arguments I made in this post, specifically having to do with Romans 12:19?

    Thank you again.

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  9. MG from The Well Of Questions sent me the following comment:

    David–

    (Right now, my computer won’t post this on “Reason from Scripture” so I thought I’d post it here instead. If I don’t remember to use a different computer and post it on RfS, could you insert it using quotations into a comment please?)

    Why think that Romans 12:19 is assuming a retributive theory of justice? Why think that vengeance and wrath here could not be pedagogical, restorative, demonstrative, deterring, or preventative? There seem to be several possible ways of reading the text that take into account both the command to not take vengeance and the fact that Paul locates vengeance in God; yet not all of them attribute retributive motivations to God’s vengeance. So long as the theory of justice assumed by Paul here doesn’t have to be retributive, it doesn’t seem like this is a counterexample to the claim that the wrath/vengeance/judgment of God is non-retributive. I can substantiate that claim if need be.

    David Cox–

    I don’t think there is a misunderstanding here. Admittedly words like “vengeance”, “retribution”, and “punishment” are ambiguous terms, and they need to be given some kind of specific content. Different theories of justice would ascribe different motivations to a person exercising punishment. Most Protestants would say they are committed to the idea that God sometimes (perhaps often, or even always) has retribution as one of his motives for permitting or inflicting harm. Retributive punishment (as I understand it) is any infliction of harm (whether by permission or commission) in response to wrongdoing, that is proportional to wrongdoing, and which is motivated by the intrinsic goodness of inflicting suffering on those who do evil. The Orthodox have generally held (though rarely, if ever, formally articulated) pedagogical, restorative, deterring, and preventative understandings of justice, and denied a retributive theory. Pedagogical justice views punishment as a means to the reforming of a person’s character. Restorative justice views punishment as a means to restoring the damage for wrongs done. Deterring justice views punishment as a means to making potential criminals wary of the harm that will ensue if they do wrong, and consequently preventing them from doing evil. Preventative justice views punishment as a means to protecting goodness (innocence, purity, safety, etc.). Obviously these non-penal theories of justice are compatible with saying that there can be multiple motives for punishment–one or more that view it as a means to an end, and also a penal motivation that views punishment as an end in itself. But the Orthodox-patristic tendency has been to deny a retributive motivation for justice wholesale, identifying punishment entirely according to one or more of the other theories.

    Though we believe there is judgment and divine wrath as a response to sin, it is a different kind of response than the West would generally say. And the nature of hell (the reason for why people go there, the reason why it has eternal duration, etc.) is also very different from the Western view. Father Stephen’s post, as well as The River of Fire, and some posts (written by amateurs/laity, though) in the “Natural Consequences” series on our blog The Well of Questions provide information about this.

    -MG

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  10. MG,

    I simply see no other way to understand "repay" (or "vengeance" for that matter). "Repayment" is practically synonymous with "retribution." Perhaps you could explain how there could be absolutely no retributive element to this verse, because I simply can't see it.

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  11. David--

    First, "repay" clearly does not always mean to bring retribution. This is obvious because sometimes "repay" has a positive connotation in Scripture in such verses as Romans 11:35, Luke 14:14, and 1 Thessalonians 3:9. Any argument that this means retribution must, therefore, be based on context and background. Furthermore, it seems to me like you are assuming (I might be wrong--you might not be assuming this) that there is no sense in which non-penal theories of justice can speak of "repayment" or "penalty". On the contrary, they include penalty, but understand it differently. So what contextual argument could be given that this must mean retribution? Or what reasons are there to think Paul believes in retributive justice?

    A good definition of payment that takes the positive and the negative sides seriously is "causing a person to experience a state that is appropriate to their actions, character, obligations, etc.". Now, if we take some given payment to be an instance of preventative justice, we can interpret the payment in this passage as follows. The appropriate thing to do to a person who is harming the innocent is to deprive them of the ability to harm the innocent. Presumably this would involve inflicting some kind of harm on them that would incapacitate them (this harm could be a number of things, ranging from physical obstruction to imprisonment). So for God to exhort us not to repay evil for evil, and to heap hot coals on enemies' heads can mean "Don't take active preventative justice into your own hands and try and decide exactly what the proper way is to prevent another person from harming you and other Christians by force. Use the method for deterring an adversary that is always appropriate: loving them. This will create an occasion for their repentance, perhaps warming their heart with shame and love." And for God to repay those that are against Christians means for him to perform actions that decisively deter enemies from obstructing the well-being of Christians. So God is saying "let me handle deterrence by force, if that is even necessary". God's reasons for restricting payment to his own prerogative could include our ignorance of the ideal way of bringing this about, as well as the fact that a harmful cutting-off of a threatening person should only be done if they are beyond the possibility of reform.

    Although I also want to say that there's something about this where it seems like only God can execute this kind of justice for some more ultimate reason (perhaps that God has the divine energy of justice? I'll have to think about it).

    Also, I assume that Paul is talking about interpersonal affairs in this part, not civil justice. Part of God's plan for preventative justice may be civil government, which shows a natural connection between Romans 12 and Romans 13.

    Is there anything obviously wrong with this explanation?

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  12. MG,

    Sorry, I wasn't be clear. Of course "repay" can be positive, and the context would have to determine that. But obviously the context does not suggest to us that "repay" is positive here.

    But my point still stands. Whether positive or negative, to repay someone is to do something to them because of something they have done. If a man works, he earns his wages. This is payment. If a man breaks the law, he earns punishment. I would say the same about the word "vengeance." Both of these words imply a sort of "action-reaction" model. Now, repaying someone for a crime he has done MAY also serve some other purpose for the good of society, such as deterrence, but the initial repayment is RE-paying someone for something he has done.

    As with wrath, I'm getting the feeling that we need to come up with contrived definitions for things and make complicated arguments in order to get out of what seems to me to be the plainest and most obvious reading of the text.

    There may be some connection between 12 and 13, but Paul definitely does not say "don't avenge yourselves, because God will use the civil authority to handle those things." The next topic simply flows rather smoothly from what he's been saying.

    Considering the fact that the context of this verse is a call to showing love to your enemies (and generally trying to live in peace), I doubt prevention of future evil is the chief subject in mind. It is much more likely that Paul is giving pastoral counsel to the Romans not to seek after vengeance when they are persecuted (to repay evil with evil). Surely if they were mainly concerned with preventative action to save other Christians from future harm Paul would have something about that, since an obvious objection to what Paul has said (which he's usually very good at anticipating) is that they would not be repaying evil with evil, but rather doing good by saving other Christians' lives. I simply don't see the "do no take preventative action" read arising naturally out of this text.

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  13. David—

    You wrote:

    “Sorry, I wasn't be clear. Of course "repay" can be positive, and the context would have to determine that. But obviously the context does not suggest to us that "repay" is positive here.”

    Yes, that is true. But does context determine that the word must have a retributive meaning?

    You wrote:

    “But my point still stands. Whether positive or negative, to repay someone is to do something to them because of something they have done. If a man works, he earns his wages. This is payment. If a man breaks the law, he earns punishment. I would say the same about the word "vengeance." Both of these words imply a sort of "action-reaction" model. Now, repaying someone for a crime he has done MAY also serve some other purpose for the good of society, such as deterrence, but the initial repayment is RE-paying someone for something he has done.”

    I agree that repayment is to do something in response. The question is “what kind of response?”

    It seems like if the New Testament teach that virtue is its own reward, then we wouldn't be able to understand “repay” in a strict sense of merit. Do you think that the New Testament teaches that virtue is its own reward?

    Do all instances of wage-payment in the New Testament involve crediting of merit by God?

    Why think that repaying someone for a crime means retribution?

    You wrote:

    “As with wrath, I'm getting the feeling that we need to come up with contrived definitions for things and make complicated arguments in order to get out of what seems to me to be the plainest and most obvious reading of the text.”

    Given the way that Paul has already talked about penalty, punishment, and wrath in Romans, I don't see anything particularly implausible about our take on the Pauline understanding. Why not have earlier discussions of divine wrath and the punishment of sin inform Paul's understanding as we go throughout Romans?

    You wrote:

    “There may be some connection between 12 and 13, but Paul definitely does not say "don't avenge yourselves, because God will use the civil authority to handle those things." The next topic simply flows rather smoothly from what he's been saying.”

    But isn't it at least possible that the connection that I've drawn is correct?

    You wrote:

    “Considering the fact that the context of this verse is a call to showing love to your enemies (and generally trying to live in peace), I doubt prevention of future evil is the chief subject in mind. It is much more likely that Paul is giving pastoral counsel to the Romans not to seek after vengeance when they are persecuted (to repay evil with evil). Surely if they were mainly concerned with preventative action to save other Christians from future harm Paul would have something about that, since an obvious objection to what Paul has said (which he's usually very good at anticipating) is that they would not be repaying evil with evil, but rather doing good by saving other Christians' lives. I simply don't see the "do no take preventative action" read arising naturally out of this text.”

    Isn't the prevention of future evil a consequence of showing love to your enemies?

    Right—Paul is telling Christians not to exercise retributive justice. The question is “why not?” We both agree that Paul's quotation “vengeance is mine, I will repay” means “because God will take care of justice.” You just assume that the kind of justice God would be exercising is retributive. I think its preventative, so that what Paul means is “don't exercise retribution, because God will decide how justice is to be done, and this will not consist in retribution”.

    The wrath of God is God's response to sin. So “give place to wrath” means “give place to the divine response to sin in God's exercising justice”. The following is speculative, and I'm interested in what you think of it, so I will give it a shot. One way to prevent evil and harm on the community is to help threatening people overcome their desire to harm Christians. I propose that it is possible to understand this “give place to the divine response to sin in God's exercising justice” as being fulfilled in “if your enemy is thirsty, give him drink; you will heap coals of fire on his head”. We are being commanded to become the instruments of divine vengeance upon sin—the means by which he responds to sin and condemns it, preventing its perpetuation and its harmful effects on sinners and the community of the Church. God repays his enemies by giving them abundant blessings, and in doing so, prepares them to accept him. Though God's ultimate plans for how to deal with sinners remain in his counsel, He reveals one way of responding to sin and repaying sin and the sinner—loving those that hate us. This is how we overcome evil with good—by giving place to wrath in being the means by which God responds to sin and prevents the increase of evil.

    This connects the immediately preceding verses, the verses that immediately follow, and the next chapter, with the phrase “give place to wrath; for it is written 'vengeance is mine, I will repay' says the Lord,” and gives them a natural, organic flow. Its speculative, of course, and I will have to think about possible objections myself. But what do you think—are there any big problems with this proposed exegesis?

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  14. MG,

    The bottom line for me is that I don't see how "repay" cannot include some concept of retribution. It's possible that retribution can also have the effect of deterrence, but deterrence need not always include retribution. So I don't see how it can be argued that repayment can have a sense of deterrence but NOT of punishment. Repaying or "paying back" is exactly what punishment is.

    As for your possible interpretation, I'm not against it wholesale, because I agree that loving your enemy can be like heaping coals on him and therefore your showing love is a kind of punishment for him. But I don't see how that interpretation can be drawn from this specific passage. Your description, "We are being commanded to become the instruments of divine vengeance upon sin" is the exact opposite of what Paul explicitly states in this verse, and so I certainly see no presumption in its favor. Moreover, I would disagree with the original presumption that the way God repays his enemies is by blessing them.

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  15. Orthodox theologian Vladimir Moss wrote an article titled "The River of Fire Revisited," which debunks Kalomiros thesis through Scripture and Fathers. It is available online.

    If it is mentioned that Moss was a bit of a seperatist, well so was Kalomiros. Also, on a less sophisticated note, in one of the notes of "The Orthodox Study Bible," there is an article on God's Judgement (p.1523). Therin are such statements as; "An unrepentant or hard heart despises God's goodness, treasuring up the wrath of God at the judgement," "God's just judgement of us is based on our exercise of free will," "Christ will judge on the basis of the light He himself has given to each of us."

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  16. Anonymous (care to give a name or a website?),

    Thanks! I haven't read "The River of Fire" yet, but when I get around to it I'll make sure to read the refutation as well.

    Also, thanks for the references in the OSB. I own one myself, so I'll make sure to check out that article on divine Judgment.

    Thanks for stopping by, I appreciate your comments.

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  17. Type in "The River of Fire Revisited" on google. It's the first hit. Not everyone in the Orthodox Church is teaching this. Although it is alot more widespread than I thought. I'm in the Antiochian Archdiocese and I have consistently been taught that God does in fact exhibit wrath towards sin. It is in our prayer books and litanies!

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  18. Anonymous, when I asked for a name or website it was in reference to you personally (since speaking to someone named "anonymous" makes this cold and detached medium of blogging even colder!).

    Thanks again. It's good to know that there may be some agreement on this point with at least some spheres of the Orthodox world! :)

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  19. Yeah, I'm only a stupid catachumen (in the Orthodox Church), but I also know that this thread of logic is a modern innovation, perhaps with its roots in liberal Protestantism or perhaps in Origen.

    In every single gosh-durn service we pray "for a good defense before the dread judgment seat of Christ." Now I'm sorry, but this (and many, many other prayers found in the Liturgy) makes it very clear that God is volitional in judgment.

    I would also highly recommend the reading of Kalimiros' "River of Fire," but read it more as a well-worded expression of heresy in the Orthodox Church. (And don't let anyone fool you, we have heresies. If we did not, I should sincerely doubt that we were in fact the New Testament Church.) Moss' response is also valuable, though less eloquent, and I would recommend it as well.

    Particularly as a catachumen, I regret having to speak publicly against the teachings of Orthodox Elders such as Father Stephen. Nevertheless, I could not stand by and let his view come to the table as "the Orthodox consensus," because (in spite of this view's popularity on the internet) it simply is not.

    It is true of Orthodox history that on a great many occasions the clergy have saved the Church from heresies, and on other occasions, the laity have powerfully saved the Church from the clergy and whatever heresy happened to be "in vogue" in that era.

    Unlike my brother above, I leave an avenue for redress, a paper trail as it were. We do not live in fear of our clerics, rather we live in loving reverence and submission. It is always a grave thing to contradict one's parent in public, and I regret having to do it. Fr. Stephen, if you read this, please forgive me my offense to your dignity and my public opposition of your position. Nevertheless, it is quite clear that you are wrong and I hope that you will come to your senses and publicly recant your position in the near future.

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  20. Ed—

    you wrote:

    “...this thread of logic is a modern innovation, perhaps with its roots in liberal Protestantism or perhaps in Origen.”

    Though I understand the worry about avoiding modern innovations, and introducing dichotomies like “legal vs ontological” (a false dichotomy, for sure) I doubt that this is a modern innovation.

    Liberal Protestants don't believe in an eternal hell of any kind—even a hell that is the natural consequence of our sins.

    Origen's view of hell is not where this idea is coming from. Origen taught an eternal cycle of falls and restorations. He thought that in the eschaton, everyone eventually became saved—an apokotastasis of the entire universe, including the personal salvation of all individuals. However, the blessed had to maintain their free will. But this meant that they had two objects of opposing moral value to choose from: God and creation. That's what free will is for Origen—choosing between two things of opposing kinds. Eventually, with enough time, someone would goof and choose creation. This would begin a fall from pure contemplation of God back down into sharing in matter. And the cycle would repeat itself over and over again.

    The view of hell that Kalimoros is explaning would probably be more naturally traced to Maximus the Confessor. Maximus' view was a corrective to Origen's. Maximus agreed that the blessed must have free will in heaven; for God himself is perfectly free and to partake of God is to share in his freedom. Maximus disentangled the idea of having multiple options from the idea of those options being opposing kinds of things. He thought that human free will could consist in choosing between good and evil, but it could also be a choice between multiple equal goods. If a Christian strives for participation in God's life, then they will eventually be habituated into divine virtue. Their will can become fixed in goodness, so that it can't choose evil. But that doesn't mean its not free—it just means its freedom leaves behind freedom to choose evil, and widens to include an infinite number of distinct goods.

    Now Maximus also seemed to think of the fate of the damned as parallel to that of Christians. The way people got stuck in hell was by personally habituating themselves into vice—fixing their will in evil objects. Heaven was a reward for good deeds in the sense that virtue is an inherently valuable state that is partially achieved through actively seeking to share in God's grace (the goods). Hell was a punishment for evil deeds in a parallel sense: it is an inherently negative state that is achieved by resisting God's grace, and habituating oneself into a state where you can only choose to oppose God's will. Joseph Farrell's “Free Choice in Maximus the Confessor” gives an exposition of this view.

    Ironically, it is Origen who thought that God's justice necessitated that he would punish sin. God having justice meant that he was constrained from eternity to inflict retributive judgment on sinners. God had to create to display his attributes, including his justice, which necessitated that he punish.

    You wrote:

    “In every single gosh-durn service we pray "for a good defense before the dread judgment seat of Christ." Now I'm sorry, but this (and many, many other prayers found in the Liturgy) makes it very clear that God is volitional in judgment.”

    When we take into account Maximus' view, it seems incorrect to call Kalimoros a modern innovator *in all that he says*. However, I will grant that he overstates the patristic view in several highly problemmatic ways, including especially denying that God's judgment on sinners is ever active.

    Of course God is volitional in his judgment sometimes. The Fathers and Scripture clearly teach that at least some of the divine punishments are active. But why think that this implies retribution? God could be volitional in other kinds of punishment.

    Consider, for instance, the resurrection of the universe and mankind. The resurrection is God actively liberating humanity and the cosmos from the power of death and corruption. The uncreated righteousness of God is flowing from Christ's glorified human nature, permeating the creation. God destroys sin and corruption, freeing the cosmos, and thus vindicating his will that his creation would persist in immortality and incorruption. Think Romans 8—the cosmos and man are liberated from (in other words, justified from) sin and death. This reconstitutes the cosmos, putting it to rights. The justice is restorative, putting things back in order. God is active (energetic) in perfecting the world into a state of harmony. The divine light/fire (the two are basically the same thing for the ancients) of the book of Revelation—which is God's uncreated glory and justice—is actively filling all things in heaven and on earth.

    Now, if people have habituated themseles into vice, they're obviously not gonna like the fact that God is resurrecting the world. The devil's will to destroy creation will be thwarted. The damned will experience the fact that God's righteous presence is unbearable in all of its active, restorative power. The judgment seat of Christ—where He declares “let all things be put to rights”—is dreadful for those whose works are evil. Because are works are evil, we pray for a good defense—namely that God would grant us personal union with his justice. For those who have been habituated into vice, the active decree of Christ to reconstitute the world in righteousness will harm them. They will experience the fire of God's active, holy presence as swift vengeance.

    Notice that thus far I have not invoked the idea of retribution. Retributive punishment (as I understand it) is any infliction of harm (whether by permission or commission) in response to wrongdoing, that is proportional to wrongdoing, and which is motivated by the intrinsic goodness of inflicting suffering on those who do evil. And this didn't enter into my explanation of God's active judgment. But yet it seems like the account given here is consistent with the consensus of the Fathers and biblical teaching that God's judgment is active.

    What do you think? Obviously I'm not defending Kalimoros per se, because I think he underemphasized the activeness of God's justice. But yet I'm agreeing with him that God's justice is not retributive in motivation. Does this seem incompatible with praying for a good defense before the fearful judgment seat of Christ? It seems quite consistent to me, but I'd like to hear your opinion.

    You wrote:

    “I would also highly recommend the reading of Kalimiros' "River of Fire," but read it more as a well-worded expression of heresy in the Orthodox Church. (And don't let anyone fool you, we have heresies. If we did not, I should sincerely doubt that we were in fact the New Testament Church.) Moss' response is also valuable, though less eloquent, and I would recommend it as well.”

    Moss' response definitely is right to point out the fact that Kalimoros is wrong to say that God's judgment is inactive. But that doesn't prove that God's justice is retributive. And it seems like Fr. Stephen and Kalimoros are far from heretics. Even if some major Church Fathers thought that God retributively punished sin (which is not clear to me at all) this wouldn't imply that there's no major Fathers who denied divine retributive punishment. It seems like at least some Fathers thought that God does not retributively punish sin, and I think many of the references that Kalimoros brings up are not dealt with addequately by Moss. We can examine them on a case-by-case basis if you want.

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  21. Please refer to greater and more respected Orthodox theologians on this issue. I recommend Fr. Thomas Hopko, The Fathers, The Bible, and not Fr. Timothy Ware.
    Orthodox Christians believe in Heaven and Hell and that God is coming and He is pissed.

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  22. Dear MG,

    Well, for starters I'll agree with you that there is much of value in Kalimoros' teaching, and I believe his fundamental insight that it is ultimately each person's choice what their ultimate destiny is, is valid (in the vernacular sense of course, o logicians).

    And I would like to thank you for helping me with my poor historical knowledge regarding Origen and particularly Maximus.

    But I still cannot rid myself of the conviction that God's justice is in fact partially retributive: that he does repay sinners for sin and that it is good to do so. I'm not sure exactly how to respond to your definition of retributive justice itself, so I'll stay silent on that. I'm not a professional philosopher, just a silly catachumen.

    I mean, I will not claim to have a great knowledge of the precise nature of the eschatological world, but it seems to me that Kalimoros' "everybody standing in a field of daisies while the Sun warms some and burns others badly" is not in line with Biblical imagery. God chooses because God is not like the Sun, he is (tri-)personal! And if we believe the resurrection world will be physical, then it seems impossible to me that God should in fact merely plop everyone in the same field of daisies with no distinction made between the righteous and the unrighteous. In any event, it seems to do serious violence to the imagery of the Bible (cf. Rev. 20:11-15; Matt. 25:29-46).

    And what do you make of the OT line (and NT refrain) "Vengeance is mine, I will repay." Paul says in Romans 12:19, "Do not take revenge, but leave room for God's wrath." If retribution has no place in God's character, why does so much of the Bible seem to suggest so blatantly that it does?

    I realize that I'm not providing indisputable evidences or logic here, but it's midnight and my brain hurts. Look, the bottom of the matter is this: I see Kalimoros and Freeman massively overreacting to the West. Whereas the West mostly forgot the Early Church focus on the renewal of Creation and the destruction of the dominion of death and the devil and instead chose to focus on our need to be delivered from God's wrath, Freeman and Kalimoros would like to tell us that God really has no wrath. Read your Bible again and see if their God without wrath doesn't seem to blatantly contradict the plain sense of the text (and not just one text, hundreds of them).

    Look, I speak as an (almost) Orthodox brother. It is very tempting to heighten our disagreements with Western Christians unnaturally, but we absolutely must resist this tendency, because it will lead us into heresy.

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  23. Anonymous--

    You wrote:

    "Please refer to greater and more respected Orthodox theologians on this issue. I recommend Fr. Thomas Hopko, The Fathers, The Bible, and not Fr. Timothy Ware.
    Orthodox Christians believe in Heaven and Hell and that God is coming and He is pissed."

    The only book I ever read by Ware is his "How are we Saved?" about three years ago. All of my stuff that is from moderns is drawn from sources such as David Bradshaw, Demetrios Batrellos, Joseph Farrell. My patristic sources... well, Kalimoros talks about some of them, and Moss says others. And there's more quotes too, of course.

    Of course heaven and hell are real. And of course God is coming. And--though I'm not sure I'd put it your way--God is the great judge, the avenger who repays each man according to his works. All I'm wondering is what this means.

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  24. Dear MG,

    Well, for starters I'll agree with you that there is much of value in Kalimoros' teaching, and I believe his fundamental insight that it is ultimately each person's choice what their ultimate destiny is, is valid (in the vernacular sense of course, o logicians).

    And I would like to thank you for helping me with my poor historical knowledge regarding Origen and particularly Maximus.

    Glad you agree with the particular things that are obviously right in Kalimoros. And glad I could be of help in explaining St. Maximus (although really I’m just repeating what I’ve seen argued elsewhere by Orthodox scholars).

    You wrote:

    “But I still cannot rid myself of the conviction that God's justice is in fact partially retributive: that he does repay sinners for sin and that it is good to do so. I'm not sure exactly how to respond to your definition of retributive justice itself, so I'll stay silent on that. I'm not a professional philosopher, just a silly catachumen.”

    I agree that God repays sinners for their sins. I just understand repayment differently from some people, because I have a different understanding of justice. Of course it seems to me that the view of justice I side with is the Christian-patristic view; but I grant that its not 100% clear, and I’m definitely willing to be corrected. But there are good reasons, it seems to me, to think that the justice is not retributive.

    You wrote:

    “I mean, I will not claim to have a great knowledge of the precise nature of the eschatological world, but it seems to me that Kalimoros' "everybody standing in a field of daisies while the Sun warms some and burns others badly" is not in line with Biblical imagery. God chooses because God is not like the Sun, he is (tri-)personal! And if we believe the resurrection world will be physical, then it seems impossible to me that God should in fact merely plop everyone in the same field of daisies with no distinction made between the righteous and the unrighteous. In any event, it seems to do serious violence to the imagery of the Bible (cf. Rev. 20:11-15; Matt. 25:29-46).”

    Hell will be horrible (though to varying degrees). And it will be a result of God’s free choice to punish sinners. The question then becomes “what will the suffering of the damned consist in?” Will the torments be retributively-inflicted by God? Or will the torment consist in the painful experience of God’s great power and uncreated righteousness? The opposition of two different fates will not come from an opposition of two different divine energies; it will be the moral opposition of those that reject the grace that has entered their humanity in Christ, and that shines out and permeates all things in the eschaton.

    We must keep in mind that the imagery is meant to communicate spiritual truths, and is not literal. But you are right—the truth communicated is that the righteous and unrighteous have opposite personal fates, and these fates have vastly different quality to them. But there is also a common fate. Think of the fact that “heaven and earth” is a phrase denoting the totality of reality. So to say heaven and earth will be full of the lamb’s glory means that God’s immortality, righteousness, and incorruption, etc. fill all things in reality. The damned are part of reality, and so they, too, will experience God’s energies. The glory of God is fire, because it is light, and in the ancient world, light and fire went together. To deny that there is to some degree a commonality of fate (human nature and the universe are full of God’s glory/light/fire) seems to do complete violence to biblical and patristic language and imagery as well.

    You wrote:

    “And what do you make of the OT line (and NT refrain) "Vengeance is mine, I will repay." Paul says in Romans 12:19, "Do not take revenge, but leave room for God's wrath." If retribution has no place in God's character, why does so much of the Bible seem to suggest so blatantly that it does?”

    I will post a proposed exegesis of those phrases on my blog later tonight. Check thewellofquestions.wordpress.com . I don’t think the Bible blatantly suggests that God has retributive motives for punishment—unless the Bible is read without any attempt to synthesize the various things it says, and we take one set of images and variety of language at face value only. And this could lead to the exact opposite conclusion as well, if we looked at different passages.

    You wrote:

    “I realize that I'm not providing indisputable evidences or logic here, but it's midnight and my brain hurts. Look, the bottom of the matter is this: I see Kalimoros and Freeman massively overreacting to the West. Whereas the West mostly forgot the Early Church focus on the renewal of Creation and the destruction of the dominion of death and the devil and instead chose to focus on our need to be delivered from God's wrath, Freeman and Kalimoros would like to tell us that God really has no wrath. Read your Bible again and see if their God without wrath doesn't seem to blatantly contradict the plain sense of the text (and not just one text, hundreds of them).”

    First of all, they do not deny divine wrath, they just have a nuanced understanding of it. Granted Kalimoros’ understanding needs even more nuancing (which I have tried to do) in order to be plausible.

    Second, we need to try to synthesize punishment texts with forgiveness texts and especially the parables and words of Christ. And when we do that, things get more complicated. The question we really need to ask is which view best synthesizes all the biblical data, giving interpretive priority to the Gospels and the words of Christ.

    You wrote:

    “Look, I speak as an (almost) Orthodox brother. It is very tempting to heighten our disagreements with Western Christians unnaturally, but we absolutely must resist this tendency, because it will lead us into heresy.”

    Agreed. I think Kalimoros is overreacting; but its not obvious to me that my view is an overreaction against the West. All I’m trying to do is take Jesus and the Fathers seriously.

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  25. Ooops, I goofed in my last comment.

    First, I didnt put quote marks at the beginning.

    Second, I meant "We must keep in mind that the imagery is meant to communicate spiritual truths, and is not 100% literal all the time." Obviously some imagery is literal, and our decisions about what's literal needs to be carefully derived.

    Third, I wrote "To deny that there is to some degree a commonality of fate (human nature and the universe are full of God’s glory/light/fire) seems to do complete violence to biblical and patristic language and imagery as well." but I didn't mean it does COMPLETE violence. It does violence, but its not completely absurd.

    Fourth, my blog address is wellofquestions.wordpress.com

    Sorry 'bout that.

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  26. LOL, "God is coming and he's pissed." If "Anonymous" is who I think he is, he knows Dr. Bradshaw. I've met him personally once or twice, but have never really heard any of his teachings.

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  27. This is Anonymous #1, that was Anonymous #2. #2 was almost made Ed, by #2 and #1. Both #1 and #2 know Dr. Bradshaw, who told #2 that "he became Orthodox in order to escape the wrath of God." If this is the case, he certainly has no problem with the conventional language. I will ask him to parse that out a bit if I see him next Wednesday.

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  28. What an insult to God, to say He is pissed, wow! Talk about anthropomorphism. We must accept human words as a feeble but necessary representation of divine things. God does not have bad days! He does not wake up on the wrong side of the bed!

    We do not need to change God's mind about us; we need to change our minds about Him...

    His love is like a fire, it warm your house or it can burn it down, it all depends on whether you have a place for it.

    Hell is His Love...

    Just as the same beautiful day can be miserable for one person and glorious for another so can God's Love. St John Chrysostom says take a person enslaved to passions and put him in paradise and He still won't be happy.

    Forgive me brothers, that's all that came to me.

    I'm with Met. Kallistos Ware and Fr Stephen on this one.

    God punishes, that's for sure, but is it anything remotely like our understanding of punishment, God forbid, his thoughts are not like our thoughts and His ways are not like our ways!

    Christ is Risen!

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  29. Ian,

    No one said anything about God being "pissed" or having bad days. Please do not caricature anyone's views, as it tends to stifle the dialog.

    That said, I agree fully that God's ways are far beyond our ways, which is why I am not going to pass judgement over what the Scriptures reveal about His character. They reveal that He is a God who hates evil. Obviously His hatred is not like our hatred, since human hatred is often tainted by sin and selfishness. God, rather, has only a just and righteous indignation.

    I also agree that human words are feeble and unable to fully articulate the truth of divine things. But unlike the Orthodox, I allow the words used in Scripture (inspired by the Spirit Himself) to carry actual meaning. When The Bible says that God has wrath, I do not completely reinterpret the words of Scripture so that wrath actually means love. The Bible does not merely speak of God have only one attitude or disposition toward mankind and us receiving it differently based upon our own attitude or disposition. Quite the opposite. God is said to objectively have a different disposition toward some things (evil) than others (good).

    Also, your analogies seem to indicate that God is absolutely simple, which is a position that the Orthodox reject (maybe you're not Orthodox, though?). God's energies are truly distinct, and according to Scripture one of His energies is His wrath.

    Thank you for the comment.

    He is Risen indeed!

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  30. Just a few thoughts for consideration from the perspective of an Orthodox Christian:

    With regard to "Vengeance is mine; I will repay", God never commands us to do anything that is not a reflection of Himself. Having said that, God does indeed bring about 'vengeance', but not in the way we normally understand the word, for God is love, and He is love to all at all times.

    Only after gaining the understanding of the love of God through the Orthodox Church did I begin to see the numerous passages in the Scriptures that clearly describe what I had previously been blinded to. For example, Paul does not say that Christ will actively destroy sinners at His coming. Rather, he says that they will be destroyed “by the brightness of His coming.” Nearly every reference to His judgment and His coming to judge the earth is framed in these terms. Even the Scriptures that do not directly frame His judgment in these terms have reference either to our refusal to share in His love (“For I was hungry, and you gave me no food. I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink…”) or to putting an end to evil that has become irredeemably entrenched (something only God knows) as in the Great Flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and consciously unrepentant mankind in the last days. God is judge BECAUSE OF WHO HE IS. His very existence constitutes His judgment of us in the present, and His unmediated presence ("the brightness of His coming") is what constitutes the future judgment. It is not at all incorrect to describe this as the wrath OF GOD, for it is God Himself who brings it about by His unmediated presence. But His presence is experienced as wrath to the ungodly (those who refuse to share His likeness), while this very same unmediated presence of God is bliss for the godly (those who share His likeness).

    I am fully aware that there are those who cannot accept this. As a former Protestant, I understand this way of thinking.

    With regard to David N.'s comment that God "has only a just and righteous indignation," the Orthodox would agree with the following caveat:

    The concept of justice in Orthodox Christianity (and in the Bible in general) relates to righteousness, love, goodness, compassion, and fairness. God’s justice is understood in the same way the Scripture describes the Betrothed when he discovered that Mary was with child, “...and her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.” The Biblical concept of justice is entirely different than the justice that exacts retribution.

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  31. Brian, thanks for the comment.

    I would agree 100% that wrath is really just the presence of God manifested toward unbelievers. Sinclair Ferguson, a noted Reformed preacher/theologian, has argued this explicitly. But unlike the Orthodox, Ferguson noted that it is the Holiness of God, not the Love of God, which unbelievers experience as wrath. To suggest that wrath is love is to completely turn the Biblical texts about wrath and judgment on their heads and requires the most incredible feats of eisegesis. The only way that one can take such a construct seriously is if you do not need to take the grammatical-historical approach to exegesis seriously, and can instead substitute a supposedly infallible tradition.

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  32. David,

    You are somewhat (although not entirely) correct in your assessment of the Orthodox accepting Tradition over what many see as "the plain text" of Scripture. We do not, however, substitute Tradition for Holy Scripture (although, again, as a former Protestant I can certainly understand why many think we do). Rather, we understand the Scriptures as an integral and true expression of that Tradition. This simply means that there existed a people of God in both Old and New Testaments who knew Him, knew the truth about Him, and worshiped Him in truth prior to the existence of any Scripture. These are they who, in fact, wrote the Scriptures in their union with God, and it is that life in union with the Holy Trinity that they lived in which we share.

    Having said that, it is important to realize that when we use the word 'Tradition' we are not speaking of mere customs or set of required dogmatic beliefs; we are speaking of a shared life lived together in communion with the Holy Trinity and all the saints of all time. It is a fullness of life that cannot be fully expressed or contained in any words - even the words of Scripture. Like any relationship of love, it cannot be defined or adequately expressed in words of any kind. I realize this is scandalous to many, but if one considers it prayerfully, one realizes that this is the nature of personal (and I do not mean 'private') communion. Please do not misunderstand. We take Scripture very seriously and in fact very literally - perhaps more so than many.

    Finally, I wasn't going to comment on it, but since you mentioned it previously and alluded to it again in your noting of Ferguson's comments I need to make a correction of fact for anyone who may be reading this. The Orthodox do, indeed, believe that God is 'simple.' It is true that we 'distinguish' (not the best word, but the only one I can think of to use) between His 'essence' and His 'energies', but this distinction is only a means to explain the difference between the ability (and calling) of human beings to become like God by grace, which is to say by participation in His energies (which are God Himself - and thus the weakness of the word 'distinguish')) and the impossibility of participation in His 'essence', which is to say the impossibility of knowing God as He is in Himself; for to do so would mean that we would literally BECOME God (which is impossible). We shall in every way be LIKE God by His grace, but we shall never BE GOD. This contrasts sharply with the way you described the Orthodox Christian understanding of God's energies. Your description was more akin to what Protestants would call 'attributes'- a word that the Orthodox would be loathe to employ in attempting to describe God.

    Please understand that I'm not being critical, nor am I demanding that you believe as we do. I'm only clarifying what Orthodox Christians believe.

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  33. I hope I'll be excused for coming into this discussion so late. Over the last year or so, I have had these ideas about God and wrath presented to me quite often. I "became" Orthodox two years ago after 15 years of investigation. I came from an Evangelical background and consider Orthodoxy to be a kind of fulfillment of that background. The issue that so often troubles me is the lack of Biblical reference for what I see as non dogmatic theological opinion that is presented as Orthodox teaching. This issue really is a matter of opinion driven by over reaction to a bogey (or straw!) man. A long time ago I came to see that in the New Testament the fear of hell is not used as a means of evangelism. The Gospel is, for the most part, a plea to turn to a loving Father God who did astounding things to reconcile us to Himself. Hellfire preaching is confined to a sliver of evangelicals and always has been. BUT, Scripture plainly talks about God's judgment and wrath and to try to say those ideas are just reflections of the limitations of language is at best disingenuous and at worst stupid (sorry to be blunt). Were I to be convinced that the Orthodox Church does in fact teach (as in dogmatically teach) the ideas discussed in this blog, I would finally find the reason I looked for, and did not find, for 15 years NOT to become Orthodox. With respect to all, Dave

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  34. Dave,

    Thanks for the comment. I am very happy to hear that someone who considers himself Orthodox also sees what I see in Scripture. I also agree with you that the use of "hellfire preaching" to "scare" people into becoming Christians is a totally unbiblical method of evangelism.

    Just to clarify, is it your belief that the Eastern Orthodox churches do NOT dogmatically teach that Christ redeemed ALL of humanity and that those who are in "hell" are merely experiencing God's Love (just differently than believers experience it, because of their unrepentance)? I have had a lot of discussions with a friend of mine who recently converted to Orthodoxy from Evangelicalism, and he seems to think that this is a dogmatic (and Patristic) teaching of the Orthodox church. Are you saying that this is just a belief that SOME, but not ALL, Orthodox theologians hold? Do you know of any Orthodox theologians who believe in Retributive justice?

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  35. Dave Michie--

    Though I don't just think the language of "wrath" and "judgment" is a limitation of language, I personally don't believe in divine retribution. There is a middle road between saying that punishment language is just metaphor or that it is a limitation of language. This middle position views the punishment of hell Christologically as an experience of the glory of Christ's resurrection by the damned, sees some punishments as willfully-imposed by God for our benefit, and others as natural consequences of our sins. Some of my analysis of the Fathers on this issue can be found here:

    http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/01/21/natural-consequences-5-athanasius-on-the-law-of-death/

    http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/11/22/natural-consequences-7-cyril-of-alexandria-on-divine-speech-and-punishment/

    http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/natural-consequences-8-the-fathers-on-merciful-justice/

    http://wellofquestions.wordpress.com/2009/12/15/natural-consequences-9-the-definition-of-natural-consequences-and-st-john-of-damascus/

    I would say that the non-retributive explanation of God's justice that I believe is at least consistent with a significant amount of what the Fathers say. Though some of them do seem to believe in retribution, I don't think there is a dogmatic teaching of the Church on which there is a consensus in favor of retributive punishment. Whether or not there is a consensus against retribution and in favor of my view, I'm not sure, but am inclined at this time to say "yes".

    What do you think of the moderate position that gets argued for in my posts (assuming you have time to read it, etc.)?

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  36. David Nilsen--

    You wrote:

    "Sinclair Ferguson, a noted Reformed preacher/theologian, has argued this explicitly."

    Is this really the Reformed position, or just the position of a single Reformed person?

    You wrote:

    "But unlike the Orthodox, Ferguson noted that it is the Holiness of God, not the Love of God, which unbelievers experience as wrath."

    The humanity of Christ is made holy in his recapitulation, so that means we agree that unbelievers experience God's holiness as wrath in the resurrection. The difference is that we think unbelievers experience this as a necessary consequence of the redemption of human nature from corruption, not as an extrinsically-related punishment that is imposed by an act of God's will distinct from the act of resurrecting humanity.

    You wrote:

    "To suggest that wrath is love is to completely turn the Biblical texts about wrath and judgment on their heads and requires the most incredible feats of eisegesis."

    Do you deny that God's punishment is ever motivated by love?

    Notice that we're not denying God's justice and holiness are enacted in punishment. We just understand justice very differently, because we don't think it is the opposite of mercy or love. Do you think there is any opposition in God?

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  37. MG,

    I don't believe that Ferguson was merely voicing a personal or unique opinion. He was answering a question (something like, "If God is changeless, how did He have wrath before there was sin?") and he was doing so from a standpoint of "this is what the Reformed believe..."

    "Do you deny that God's punishment is ever motivated by love?"

    Of course not, but not all of his punishments are corrective in nature (Hell, obviously, is not for the benefit or future correction of the damned). Those of God's punishments that are motivated by love are all temporal, not eternal, and they all have as their objects the elect.

    "Do you think there is any opposition in God?"

    You'll have to flesh this out a bit. What exactly do you mean? Are you asking if I think there is contradiction in God, or something else?

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  38. David--

    You wrote:

    "I don't believe that Ferguson was merely voicing a personal or unique opinion. He was answering a question (something like, "If God is changeless, how did He have wrath before there was sin?") and he was doing so from a standpoint of "this is what the Reformed believe..."

    So would he deny that hell is eternal separation from God?

    You wrote:

    "Of course not, but not all of his punishments are corrective in nature (Hell, obviously, is not for the benefit or future correction of the damned). Those of God's punishments that are motivated by love are all temporal, not eternal, and they all have as their objects the elect."

    Well all the Orthodox are claiming is that some of God's punishments can be a corrective expression of his love (along with his holiness, justice, etc.). If you concede that this is possible, then you've already granted that it is not eisegesis to think that in Scripture punishment can be intrinsically related to divine love. You may not agree on the scope of the application of this concept, but you at least grant it is there when you agree that not all divine punishments are unloving.

    You wrote:

    "You'll have to flesh this out a bit. What exactly do you mean? Are you asking if I think there is contradiction in God, or something else?"

    Is it true that with respect to some cases where God manifests himself or actualizes his powers, the fact that he is manifesting justice in this particular case precludes the possibility of this particular case being a manifestation of love? In other words, with respect to retributive justice, is it true that the more God is inflicting retribution the less he is being loving/merciful, etc.?

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  39. MG,

    "So would he deny that hell is eternal separation from God?"

    Since the Reformed tradition denies this, yes, I assume he would deny it as well.

    "If you concede that this is possible, then you've already granted that it is not eisegesis to think that in Scripture punishment can be intrinsically related to divine love."

    Eisegesis has to do with the interpretation of a given text. So, when it comes to any text that I would argue speaks clearly of retribution and not correction, it would be eisegesis.

    "Is it true that with respect to some cases where God manifests himself or actualizes his powers, the fact that he is manifesting justice in this particular case precludes the possibility of this particular case being a manifestation of love?"

    Yes.

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  40. David--

    What you are saying means that some divine energies are intrinsically incompatible with each other. Do you agree that opposition in a thing is a sign of imperfection?

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  41. MG,

    Well, first, I'm not sure how they would be *intrinsically* opposed to each other, since I did not say that it was impossible in *every* situation for justice and mercy to manifested toward the same object. Second, I'm not sure that I would say that "opposition in a thing is a sign of imperfection." To take a different example, it's not possible for God to be in a special covenant relationship with someone and also not be in a special covenant relationship with them. This is hardly a sign of imperfection, since God is simply not capable of a contradiction. If showing mercy toward a sinner involves, at least in part, forgiving their sin rather than punishing it, God certainly cannot forgive and not forgive at the same time. This, too, is hardly a sign of imperfection.

    Third, I would add that it seems possible to me at the moment (though I don't yet commit myself to this view) to construe Hell as being compatible with some form of love, if only in the sense that it is better or more loving to allow something to continue to exist than to cause it to stop existing. Thus it would be better to exist in Hell than to not exist at all.

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  42. "God certainly cannot forgive and not forgive at the same time." - David N.

    "I say that those who are suffering in hell, are suffering in being scourged by love.... It is totally false to think that the sinners in hell are deprived of God's love. Love is a child of the knowledge of truth, and is unquestionably given commonly to all. But love's power acts in two ways: it torments sinners, while at the same time it delights those who have lived in accord with it"
    -St. Isaac the Syrian

    I would ask that we consider these words of St. Isaac in the context of the following Scriptures:

    "...Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him. “So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses."

    "For if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive you"

    Shall we REALLY understand these words to mean that God changes His disposition toward us? Or is it not rather true that it is OUR disposition that renders us incapable of receiving the forgiveness of God?

    "For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign LORD. Repent and live!"

    "They pour out drink offerings to other gods to provoke me to anger. But am I the one they are provoking? declares the LORD. Are they not rather harming THEMSELVES, to their own shame?"

    Allow me to state clearly, however, that there is little or no PRACTICAL difference (from our human point of view) between the consensus of the Orthodox understanding and that of the host(s). Whether hell is God's love or retribution, unrepentant sinners will EXPERIENCE it as though it is retribution. The problem we Orthodox have with with the idea of retributive justice has little or nothing to do with effects (I think is is basically safe to say that we agree on the effects). It has everything to do with the fact that it ascribes to God passions that are characteristic of fallen man, making Him out to be someOne other than who He is. It is precisely this (forgive me if I offend) calumny of God's character that concerns us; and moreover, it turns many people off to the Gospel.

    "For God so LOVED the world that He gave..."

    "For while we were yet sinners Christ died for the ungodly."

    "For Thou art a GOOD God who LOVEST mankind and unto Thee we ascribe glory, to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit now and ever and unto ages of ages." -From the Orthodox Divine Liturgy

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  43. David, you wrote:

    “Well, first, I'm not sure how they would be *intrinsically* opposed to each other, since I did not say that it was impossible in *every* situation for justice and mercy to manifested toward the same object.”

    If you think that at some time, the manifestation of justice is incompatible with the manifestation of mercy, then this is an affirmation of intrinsic incompatibility. To say two things are intrinsically incompatible is not to say that they are strictly necessarily incompatible; “necessarily” is not precisely the same as “intrinsically”. If something is necessary it couldn’t be otherwise (if it is strictly necessary, it couldn’t be otherwise at all in any sense). If some quality x is intrinsic to some thing y, then x is an aspect of what the thing y actually is; it is a quality that gives structure and reality to the kind of thing y is. For instance, saying that if two objects exist they are necessarily three feet from each other (perhaps because of an act of divine will that ensures this happen, or because of some force that binds them together) is not the same as saying that if two objects exist they are intrinsically three feet from each other (which wouldn’t make sense). Distances between objects are not intrinsic to those objects, because they are never intrinsic, but it seems possible for them to be necessary to those objects. Another example: to say that the human nature of Christ is necessarily related to the Eternal Word by the operation of the divine will is not the same as saying the human nature of Christ is intrinsically related to the Eternal Word. To say two things are intrinsically incompatible means that a metaphysical relationship holds between them where in at least some circumstances, the partial actuality of one makes it necessary that the other is not fully actual. Even if their complete co-actuality is possible in some situations, if it is impossible in any situation, then the two things are intrinsically incompatible.

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  44. You wrote:

    “Second, I'm not sure that I would say that "opposition in a thing is a sign of imperfection." To take a different example, it's not possible for God to be in a special covenant relationship with someone and also not be in a special covenant relationship with them. This is hardly a sign of imperfection, since God is simply not capable of a contradiction. If showing mercy toward a sinner involves, at least in part, forgiving their sin rather than punishing it, God certainly cannot forgive and not forgive at the same time. This, too, is hardly a sign of imperfection.”

    To say that God cannot do two things that are logically contradictory is not the same as saying that God can do things that are intrinsically incompatible. Intrinsic incompatibility does not concern strict logical consistency, because intrinsic relationships are not relationships of identity. As such, relationships of intrinsic incompatibility are not relationships of logical contradiction or negation. They are relationships of metaphysical incompatibility (that’s what we mean by “opposition” when its used in the metaphysical sense).

    The real question to ask, then, is not “can God do x and ~x at the same time in the same way?” which would be dealing with logical questions about contradictions. Instead, the question is whether there is a divine energy that is not a logical contradiction of “being in a special covenant relationship with someone” that would preclude the actuality of the divine energy “being in a special covenant relationship with someone”. For instance, is being just towards such a person ever intrinsically incompatible with “being in a special covenant relationship with someone”? Notice that “being just” is not the logical contrary of “being in a special covenant relationship with someone” but is distinct nonetheless. (I don’t think “being in a special covenant relationship” is an energy of God, personally, but it may be a way in which the divine energies of justice and love are manifested) If we answer “yes, the two are incompatible,” then we would have a case of two things that are metaphysically opposed without being logical contraries

    Now there are two ways to deal with your argument that forgiveness and punishment are incompatible. The first is that I agree with what Brian said about forgiveness or punishment happening based on the state of the person who is receiving God’s energy, instead of based on an opposition in God between an “energy of forgiveness” and an “energy of punishment”.

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  45. The second is just a hypothesis, because I haven’t really thought this through. Lets define (in a way that probably fits with your tradition) “forgiving” and “punishing” in terms of “not enacting harm in proportion to guilt” and “enacting harm in proportion to guilt” respectively. “Forgiving” is the absence of God particularizing the energies of mercy and justice with respect to an agent that would be harmed by being exposed to such a particularization. And “punishing”, then, is a particularization of the divine energies of mercy and justice with respect to an agent that will be harmed by exposure to them. Forgiving and punishing are not themselves divine energies. To discern an intrinsic incompatibility, what we need to ask is if it is ever unjust to rightly forgive, or if it is ever unmerciful to rightly punish. If it is, then we have intrinsically incompatible energies and you’ve made your case.

    The question “are two logically consistent things y and z metaphysically compatible?” (which sometimes, depending on the y and z, is a “yes” and sometimes a “no”) is not the same as “are two logically incompatible things metaphysically compatible?” (which is always a “no they are incompatible”) The question of whether forgiveness and punishment (given the above definitions) are opposed is the second kind of questions. This doesn’t imply the coexistence of punishment and forgiveness towards a person is possible in the same sense at the same time (because you can’t be harming and not harming at the same time in the same way). But in order for this to be a problem, there would need to be an argument that the two are not logical contraries. By what definition could this be argued?

    You wrote:

    “Third, I would add that it seems possible to me at the moment (though I don't yet commit myself to this view) to construe Hell as being compatible with some form of love, if only in the sense that it is better or more loving to allow something to continue to exist than to cause it to stop existing. Thus it would be better to exist in Hell than to not exist at all.”

    But God couldn’t love such people with the same degree of love whereby he loves the elect, right? The degree to which God loves such people is inversely proportional to the degree to which he punishes them, and hence there is still an opposition between those two things, I think. Is that correct?

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  46. MG,

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but the two examples you gave are of things that are not intrinsically opposed, but still *necessarily* opposed in some other way. The question, though, is can two things be intrinsically opposed *without* also being necessarily opposed? I don't think so. To say that two things are, by their very natures and "what-ness", opposed to each other would mean that they cannot cease to be opposed to each other without ceasing to *be* what they are. If justice is intrinsically opposed to love, then it cannot *not* be opposed to love without ceasing to be justice.

    Now I suppose you could argue that there are different types of justice, and only some types are intrinsically opposed to love, but I don't think that that's what your saying, and if it is, my position is probably compatible with that.

    Moreover, if you define justice, or at least one type or form of justice (the kind being expressed toward those in Hell) as being intrinsically or necessarily opposed to love, then it would be a matter of logical contradiction to say that God can show *that* type of justice *and* love to the same object. So even in that case the opposition is not an imperfection, because it is just like my covenant relationship example.

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  47. David--

    On your view, are divinity and humanity intrinsically opposed?

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  48. he grounds that command in the fact that God is the one who is wrathful and vengeful.


    Not according to the words of His own Son, in Matthew 5:43-48.

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