Now that we have considered the ramifications of divine middle knowledge, let us turn to some theological objections that are raised against it.

The theological problem may be stated as follows: if God has middle knowledge, and desires that all people are saved, why did he create a world in which so many people are lost? God's middle knowledge shows him under which circumstances any person would accept him, and so why didn't he plan his creation in such a manner so that all are saved? This is not a problem for simple foreknowledge (as it holds that God did not have such knowledge in the logical moment prior to creation), but needs to be explained by the defender of middle knowledge.

Craig notes that the claim is that it is impossible to hold the following four statements as true simultaneously:

1. God has middle knowledge.
2. God is omnipotent.
3. God is all-loving.
4. Some people freely reject Christ and are lost.

The fourth statement is self-evident, and as Christians, we are unable to reject premises two or three, leaving only divine middle knowledge that can be rejected. However, as Craig states, there is no explicit contradiction between any of these statements - the claim is that there is some implicit contradiction between them instead.

So instead the claim may be that the proponent of middle knowledge must believe the following:

(1') God knows under what circumstances any person would accept Christ.
(2') God is able to create a world in which all people accept Christ.
(3') God holds that a world in which noone rejects Christ is better than a world where somebody does reject him.

The problem is really that God should have been able to create a world in which everyone was saved. If he knew under what circumstances that they would be freely saved, then he should have been able to bring about those situations.

The problem with this argument, as Craig points out, at least two of those statements are probably false. This is more obvious by flipping them around:

(1'') There are some possible people who would not accept Christ under any circumstances.

This is in effect stating that no matter what the circumstances, no matter how much the Holy Spirit worked on their hearts, there are some people who will never accept Christ. I think that (1'') is definitely true. Consequently, God could not possibly create a world in which those people are saved. The question is then, could God instead simply refrain from creating such people. Then we run into (2'').

(2'') There is no possible world in which all people would reject Christ.

It is possible that no matter what world God created, some people would reject Christ. In fact, the more people God created, the more likely that he would create someone who would reject him. So, while it may be possible that God can create a world with only people who accept Christ, it is possible that such a world may only contain a few people, or even only one person! So now we have premise (3'').

(3'') God holds that a world in which some people freely reject Christ but the number who accept him is maximised, is better than a world in which few people accept him and none are lost.

In other words, God may allow the existence of some who will be lost in order to maximise the number of people who will accept him. God's aim is not to minimise the number of people who go to hell, but to maximise the number of people who go to heaven.

Consequently I think that statements (1') and (3') are very likely to be false, and (2') is suspect unless you limit the number of created people to only a few. So I think that that the original statements are in fact compatible. They are compatible because it is very likely that the world God created maximises the number of people saved, and that those who are not saved would have rejected Christ under any circumstances.

By definition, God could not have done any better. He could not make those who would reject him, accept him instead, or else they would either not be free, or would be different people entirely.

Middle knowledge is up to this theological challenge, and is able to explain why God created a world in which people still freely reject him.

Posted by Dave Bryant at 8:36 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)