April 26th, 2013
by Max Andrews
In Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov (1821-1881), a story of four brothers in Russia is a grim description of the reality of what the world would look like if God were not to exist. One brother, Ivan, an atheist, tells another brother that there are no objective truths, specifically that there are no moral absolutes. Ivan’s brother then kills his father, an act that obtains no condemnation if God does not exist.
This can be understood as ☐(~Eg ⊃ ∀ϕ~Wϕ), (Let Eg represent the existence of God, ϕ for any action, and W for wrong), also known as Karamazov’s Theorem. It is necessarily true that if God does not exist then any action cannot be wrong. It may also be true if a conjunct of rightness is inserted into the theorem. This ultimately leads to moral nihilism—a nonexistence of value. Without God, everything is permitted. Nothing can be praised and nothing can be condemned. This world, as Dostoevsky understands it, is a world of nothingness.
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April 18th, 2013
by Max Andrews
Man is alienated from himself, from other persons, and from God, and as a result man has been burdened with absurdity. Absurdity ought to be understood in a dichotomous manner. Absurdity is experienced subjectively, such that the individual experiences it in an autonomous manner. The objective absurdity is the metanarratives of life. This would include a lack of ultimate meaning, incentive, value, and purpose.
Overcoming this alienation and the notion of absurdity, primarily objective absurdity, can only be done so by a divine telos.[1] It does seem that man lives his life as if he does have an ultimate meaning, incentive, value, and purpose. However, if God does not exist, then the absurdity is not only subjective but itreally is objectively absurd. The existence of a divine telos enables man to live a consistent life of meaning, incentive, value, and purpose. There is a reconciliation of man to himself, others, and God by overcoming this absurdity.
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April 17th, 2013
by Max Andrews
You have put me in the lowest pit, in the dark places, in the depths. Your wrath has rested upon me, and you have afflicted me with all your waves. Speak up, my ears are growing weary. I’ll sing this song to the end and watch the waves crash over me.
I am shut up and cannot go out. But I, O Lord, have cried out to you for help. And in the morning my prayer comes before you. O Lord, why do you reject my soul? Why do you hide your face from me? I was afflicted and about to die from my youth on; I suffer your terrors; I am overcome. There’s not much to overcome with enough time to turn it all around.
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April 17th, 2013
by Max Andrews
There are many facets to death and death is a character of many hats. Death wears a natural hat and a spiritual hat, both of which I will address. My proposition I want to make a case for is that death is designed by God.
First point of discussion, natural death. Natural death will, of course, entails theological implications. This is also an issue of fine-tuning. Does death happen today? Yes. Does decay happen today? Yes. Via astronomical inquiry can we see if the physics of the universe have ever changed? Yes. Have they? No. I think there can be a strong case for a geological inquiry, but because I believe an astronomical inquiry ultimately encompasses a geological study, we shall include that.
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April 17th, 2013
by Max Andrews
Now, I know this isn’t a term heard often but the imprecatory psalms are the psalms that make requests or desires known to God that are… well… evil. Here’s a few.
Let death come deceitfully upon them; let them go down alive to Sheol, for evil is in their dwelling, in their midst. Ps. 55.15
O God, shatter their teeth in their mouth… Ps. 58.6
May they be blotted out of the book of life and may they not be recorded with the righteous. Ps. 69.28
Let his children be fatherless and his wife a widow. Ps. 109.9
How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones against the rock. Ps. 137.9
I would encourage you to go to these passages and read them yourself. Understand the contexts in which these words and thoughts were expressed. Let’s not be too quick to say, “There’s no wrong in this!”, ”This is the Word of God, these Psalms cannot be evil!” I’m not saying the psalms are evil, I’m saying that aspects of what are being expressed are evil. The psalmist, David for the most part, is desiring justice and vengeance. He wants them to have death be surprised upon them, for them to be buried alive, for their teeth to be knocked out, for them not to receive salvation, and for their children to die in the manner in which his people’s children have been murdered. I’m just guessing but if I had not set up these imprecatory psalms in a biblical context already you would think that they were pretty evil–no?
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April 16th, 2013
by Max Andrews
Forgetting Your Forgiveness—2 Pt. 1.3-11
God’s Power in Our Lives
V3—God has made available everything we need spiritually through Him
If 2 Peter was written to fight Gnosticism, then spiritual necessity is not esoteric
Believers are called to live in harmony with God’s moral character
“Excellence” (arête- virtue) used to sum up all desirable character qualities
V4—“Partakers” (koinonos- sharer) we never become part of God but this can found mostly in Peter’s sermon at Pentecost (Acts 2.14-41) through the Holy Spirit)
“Divine nature” a term Peter could use to relate to Hellenists about understanding the idea of conforming to the image of Christ
“Having escaped…” at conversion we are delivered from the corruption of the world
Where does the world’s corruption come from?
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December 15th, 2012
by Max Andrews
If everything God does is GOOD, and if God controls EVERYTHING, then it would be BAD had one less child been murdered in Newtown, CT.
This is the argument we find particularly among open theists but I would consider it an important existential question. It primarily focuses on the problem of evil and the hiddenness of God. Here’s the argument in a formal depiction:
- If everything God does is Good [and]
- If God controls everything [by weak and strong actualization]
- Then, it would be bad had one less child been murdered in Newtown.
- It would have been good had one less child been murdered in Newtown.
- Therefore, either not everything God does is good or God does not control everything.
- God is good and everything he does is good.
- Therefore, God does not control everything.
It seems like we are posed with interesting dilemma (at least for the Christian who affirms that God’s means of providence is not exclusively causal, but that he controls all things).
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September 27th, 2012
by Max Andrews
Friedrich Nietzsche’s Twilight of the Idols commences with his maxims and missiles, the wisest of proverbs Nietzsche embodies his thought in. Initially, the maxims are not so clear and one may only speculate as to what Nietzsche really intends for them to mean. His succeeding work is an exegesis of these maxims, an illumination of the text, and an expository revelation of Nietzsche’s assailment of the Christian church.
“The Problem of Socrates” was Nietzsche’s understanding of the life of the philosopher, or better yet, the death of life. Socrates was the philosopher, one who embodied the reason, virtue, and happiness, one who understood the vanity of life. Life was a sickness, as an individual philosophizing and as an aggregate society. Socrates and Plato were the “symptoms of decline” for life. Life’s sickness progressed as more reason revealed the sickness many covered. This revelation was only known through the philosophers. What then is the value of life? Nietzsche’s response, a paradox:
A living man cannot [estimate the value of life], because he is a contending party, or rather the very object in the dispute, and not a judge; nor can a dead man estimate it—for other reasons. For a philosopher to see a problem in the value of life, is almost an objection against himself, a note of interrogation set against his wisdom—a lack of wisdom.
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September 4th, 2012
by Max Andrews
Once the philosopher finds himself participating in and engaged with the world, he will also find himself in a state of alienation. Alienation is primarily two-fold: an alienation from the self and alienation from the world. It is the philosopher’s goal and, as Hegel may agree, the purpose of the philosopher. The separation of the Geist is really an underlying notion that plagues philosophical inquiry. Philosophy… does not merely discuss alienation; it is a peculiarly significant manifestation of it. With this very simple and subtle premise, the very notion and presence of philosophical inquiry entails a separation from absolute mind, Geist. It is certainly consistent that the philosopher lives in a state of alienation and philosophizing is contingent upon being in a state of alienation, for if Geist were an actuality all reality would be understood. Hence, the philosopher’s attempt to provide a reconstruction of reality and thus providing a purpose and need to overcome alienation.
Alienation from others and from the world is ultimately an alienation from the self as well. Human anthropology, according to Hegel, is a man-to-man function. Participation in the world is participation in all of mankind and humanity. Any action is for the contribution of man. For Hegel, this was religion at its highest, a religion of Nature.
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August 28th, 2012
by Max Andrews
To attribute nihilism to Friedrich Nietzsche’s works would be a complete misunderstanding of his teleology. Nietzsche’s Thus Spake Zarathustra is a calling and desire for the übermensch to create a transvaluation of values. To categorize Nietzsche as a nihilist would be a misunderstanding and misinterpretation of his work.
When referring to nihilism there must be an understanding of all that the word entails. Nihilism refers to nothingness and is a denial of all worldviews. There are apparent problems with being consistent in rendering a nihilist understanding. Referring to everything having no meaning renders a meaning of nothingness. There is no objectivity, knowledge, truth, or virtue. There is a claim of paradigm-independent referents. For the advancement of understanding Nietzsche’s teleology, this self-referential incoherence must be set to the periphery. To discard Nietzsche so quickly in such a manner would be to misunderstand his teleological claims.
Nietzsche’s paradigm for truth was based on biological development. This, by all admission, was a relativistic understanding and rendition of truth; it was a social construct. This was in response to the proclamation that “God is dead.” In the fifth chapter of Twilight of the Idols Nietzsche deduces the implications of stripping God from Christianity [in reference to morality]. Under the Christian paradigm, morality is a command originating from a transcendent source. Because it is a transcendent command it cannot be criticized, and it is only contingently true given the existence of God and that God is the source of all truth. This worries Nietzsche because he believes that there is no reason for God to exist any more being that God is only a social construct that was once useful. As a result, Nietzsche calls for the übermensch.
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