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Searching
for an Adequate God:
A
Dialogue between Process
and
Free Will Theists
Edited by John
B. Cobb Jr.
and Clark H. Pinnock
William
B. Eerdmans Publishing:
July,
2000. 269 pages.
Reviewed by
David Pendleton
For
another review by Sally Bruynell, please click here.
The issues of the
compatibility, and indeed the reality, of humankind’s free will and God’s
foreknowledge have recently received significant attention. Once seen as a
topic of interest only to theologians of the Ivory Tower, such questions
are now the topic of home Bible fellowships and today appear on the cover of
popular Christian magazines, such as Christianity Today.
Why? And why now? Process
philosophers have been around for quite some time. The writings of Alfred
North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne have been assigned texts in many
graduate seminars in divinity schools for decades. Their intellectual
heirs – most notably Schubert Ogden – have been publishing for many
years and in turn training many other process-educated theologians and
process philosophers.
So why now all the talk
about the relation between human free will and divine foreknowledge?
Perhaps the cause of the
recent prominence of the discussion lies not so much in the message, per
se, but in the identity of the recent messengers. Evangelical theologians
have long been familiar with the problem of evil, the necessity for a
relevant (contemporary) theodicy, and of such notions as panentheism and
dipolar theism. But never before have they had to contend with such ideas
on their own playing field. Only recently have they found prominent
evangelicals questioning whether the Bible requires one to take the view
that the future in all its respects and minute details has been fixed and
unalterable from the beginning of time.
Evangelicals used to be
able to "write off" process thought as yet another mistaken
philosophical system of the theological left which they could dismiss as a
mere fad. But with the publications of theologians such as Clark Pinnock
and Richard Rice, for example, both evangelical in orientation and
thoroughly committed to Scripture, theological conservatives have had to
take seriously those who see process thought as providing insights
consistent with the biblical witness.
Especially with the
publication of The Openness of God: A Biblical Challenge to the
Traditional Understanding of God (Intervarsity Press, 1994), theological conservatives
and evangelicals have had to grapple with the contention that the open
view is not only consistent with the biblical witness but compelled by it.
Before going any further,
it would be helpful to define our terms. In simple terms, I see the
theological spectrum essentially dividable into two camps. One of these is
a group that rejects all insights from process thought, claiming that such
notions have nothing to contribute to theology or an understanding of God.
The other camp can be placed on a continuum. At one end are the process
philosophers, then follow the process theists. Then you will find at the
edge of the continuum closest to where most evangelical Christians would
be located a group that might be described as open theists. They are
evangelicals who find some of the perspectives of process thought inherent
in and grounded in the Biblical witness.
Those who are
self-described process philosophers need not be Christian at all. Those
committed to process theism – whether identified as philosophers or
theologians – have always been philosophers first and theologians
secondarily. "Process theology can be formally defined as the type of
theology that derives its conceptuality for speaking of God, human
existence, and the world primarily from the philosophy of Alfred North
Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne." (p. 2) They rely first and
foremost on these "major philosophical resources for interpreting
Christian faith." (p. 163)
While process theists are
not as a group monolithic and homogenous, and are in ways a diverse group
which can, of course, be divided into camps, as it were, they are
necessarily committed to the terminology and framework of process thought,
even where such is clearly opposed to the biblical materials. Conflicts
between biblical materials and process thought are resolved in favor of
the latter. They would argue that reason rather than revelation
necessarily prevails, as reason has in fact determined what qualifies as
revelation.
Fundamentalist theologians,
by contrast, could be described with an equally broad brush as those who
would stand with revelation regardless of the conclusions of reason. They
see the essential claims of process thought as utterly incompatible with
the biblical materials and reject out of hand the suggestion that such
insights might prove complementary to the biblical witness. Human reason
is fallible, and hence any conflicts between the Word of God and the words
of men are resolved in favor of the former.
Those committed to the open
view of God, it seems to me, avoid both of these extremes. They have found
a middle course, as it were, not so much because it is expedient but
because it is consistent with Scripture and experience. Rather than seeing
revelation and reason in irreconcilable conflict, or as forcing an
either/or choice, they find helpful many insights of process thought and
incorporate such into their systems to the extent that they are consistent
with the Biblical materials. This selective and prudent use of human
insight is compelled by an appreciation of natural theology. If God
reveals himself in nature and in human reasoning, then insights from logic
and systematic philosophy and theology and from metaphysics can prove
supportive of faith.
"The open view of God
is a perspective on God’s relation to the world" wherein it is
asserted that "the biblical evidence indicates that God enjoys an
interactive, dynamic experience of the world." (p. 163) Hence it is
the biblical materials which lead certain evangelical
theologians to avail themselves of certain insights of process thought.
While this is a rather
broad brush treatment of the differences, it is not inaccurate. Richard
Rice says that "evangelical and process theologians stand at
different ends of the theological spectrum." (p. 164) They are
different in key and fundamental ways. And the fact that they are able to
amicably and profitably dialogue through the course of this book should
not be held against such evangelicals.
For example, against
fundamentalist critiques, Rice doubts that "we can flatly assert that
every notion of God that originates in philosophical reflection is
irrelevant, let alone inimical, to religion." (p. 180) An idea needs
to be assessed on its merits and cannot be rejected or embraced based on
its lineage.
Against process
philosophers, Rice says that while open theists "appreciate some of
the insights of process thought, we have major reservations."
(p.183) Hence process insights add depth to but do not dictate one’s
theology.
Another example of the
balanced approach of open theists is their guarded use of philosophy.
"Philosophy may no longer be the handmaid of theology, but it still
has a contribution to make. At the same time, open theists believe that we
must avoid making theology subservient to any philosophical system."
(p. 183)
Searching for an Adequate
God is a dialogue between process theists, on the one hand, and free will
or open theists, on the other. Some might from this exchange conclude a guilt by
association, as it were. Free will or open theists cannot be as
orthodox as they claim since they associate with such unorthodox thinkers,
some might snicker.
But such is the risk open
theists, such as Rice and Pinnock, are willing to take in order to harvest
the fruit of respectful and open dialogue.
At 269 pages in length,
this is perhaps not the last word on the topic. But it is an excellent
beginning. It may not be the definitive book on open theism versus process
theology, but this is the best book for now until that definitive work is
eventually published.
I wholeheartedly recommend
this book to all who would wish to understand and profit from contemporary
developments in theology. It makes accessible the
basic tenets of free will or open theism and it allows the easy comparison
and contrast between the middle position – as I see it – of, on the one
hand, a Rice and or a Pinnock, evangelicals in both theology and
temperament, and, on the other, the process position.
Ultimately, the debate is
not so much about whether God is limited in his foreknowledge but whether
an omnipotent God can create a world wherein the future is not knowable in
every minute respect but which in fact is open in certain important ways.
At stake is the nature of the world God created, not the nature of God.
If fundamentalists argue
that an omnipotent God cannot create such a world with an open future,
then they are the ones who place unwarranted limits on God, not free will
theists.
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