God transcends time

[lexy]

I'm confused by the saying "God transcends time" . To me it seems time is change ( thoughts, actions , and any other form of change ) So transcending time doesn't make any sense as you would need to change in some way to create the universe ,because To be timeless ( due to transcending time not making sense )would mean to be forever timeless if there is no form of change to cause you to change yourself. With this in mind wouldn't god creating the universe mean god exists within time? This would restrict god with the question of "where did it come from" due to it also being a timed being with a required beginning to initiate change. So what i'm trying to ask is, am i missing something? is it just that i'm not taking something into account that lead me to deduce this as impossible? I always hear this from many adults who have faith in god and i just ponder in my head how they could think this to be true. I'm not stating no god exists, nor that one does, i simply think this idea of transcending time should be either explained in detail or not spoken of at all .

[Kurieuo]

Firstly, philosophically, you have A-Theory and B-Theory on time. Are you familiar with these?

If not, don't worry... but I mention them in case you wish to look into these competing positions further.

That said, I agree with the ideas and logic that you've presented. Great thinking and questions.

Based upon this, I believe it therefore follows that God was timeless and in virtue of God's true relationship with creation God entered into time (and therefore God should now be considered temporal).

An interesting side issue to note here is that something must have always existed. If you agree with that point, then either this "something" is intelligent (e.g., God) or unintelligent (e.g., physical matter). Only intelligence would possess the ability to "change" since, for example, a timeless state of ice would forever be ice and unable to change.

Yet, "intelligence" alone is not enough. Such a being would also need a "will" (to will a change) and "power" to implement the change within itself such that the "created order" now exists. This intelligent being is who I call "God".

[Byblos]

Based upon this, I believe it therefore follows that God was timeless and in virtue of God's true relationship with creation God entered into time (and therefore God should now be considered temporal).

Ooooh K, them fightin' words my brother. Hope Jac sees them.

[PaulSacramento]

I'm confused by the saying "God transcends time" . To me it seems time is change ( thoughts, actions , and any other form of change ) So transcending time doesn't make any sense as you would need to change in some way to create the universe ,because To be timeless ( due to transcending time not making sense )would mean to be forever timeless if there is no form of change to cause you to change yourself. With this in mind wouldn't god creating the universe mean god exists within time? This would restrict god with the question of "where did it come from" due to it also being a timed being with a required beginning to initiate change. So what i'm trying to ask is, am i missing something? is it just that i'm not taking something into account that lead me to deduce this as impossible? I always hear this from many adults who have faith in god and i just ponder in my head how they could think this to be true. I'm not stating no god exists, nor that one does, i simply think this idea of transcending time should be either explained in detail or not spoken of at all .

Tine as we know it is based on THIS universe and THIS reality as we know it NOW.
God is NOT part of this universe and reality, though He may enter it when He wants to.
Because God is not part of this reality/universe then the Laws of this universe do not apply to Him.
Time as we know it is NOT applicable to God.

[Jac3510]

I'm confused by the saying "God transcends time" . To me it seems time is change ( thoughts, actions , and any other form of change ) So transcending time doesn't make any sense as you would need to change in some way to create the universe ,because To be timeless ( due to transcending time not making sense )would mean to be forever timeless if there is no form of change to cause you to change yourself. With this in mind wouldn't god creating the universe mean god exists within time? This would restrict god with the question of "where did it come from" due to it also being a timed being with a required beginning to initiate change. So what i'm trying to ask is, am i missing something? is it just that i'm not taking something into account that lead me to deduce this as impossible? I always hear this from many adults who have faith in god and i just ponder in my head how they could think this to be true. I'm not stating no god exists, nor that one does, i simply think this idea of transcending time should be either explained in detail or not spoken of at all .

So K has given you the modern evangelical answer to your question. Allow me to present the other view.

First, while A and B Theories are both conceptions of time, they are not the only ones. The classical view is actually precisely what you have suggested, namely, that time is change. A-Theory (which K's answer necessarily presupposes) requires that we think of time as a real thing in and of itself. It is a Platonic conception that views time as a collection of "containers" of various lengths in which things happen. B-theory, on the other hand, just argues that there is really no such thing as time at all, that everything is static, and that all change is a matter of perception. I think both views are wrong. I agree with you that time is change and nothing else. Were there is no change there is no time.

So the question is how a "timeless" being can do something "in time." Understanding "time" the way I've suggested, what we really mean is we need to know how a changeless being can produce a change in something else. First, let me just say that so stated, that isn't nearly as hard to imagine. Imagine a car accident in which a car smashes headlong into a brick wall (or if you prefer something less violent, a wave crashing into a cliff). The car/wave certainly changes a lot at impact, doesn't it? It changes in response to the brick wall/cliff. And yet the brick wall/cliff experience no change at all (let's let slide for the sake of an imperfect illustration underlying physics here. Again, this is only an illustration). So we can say that the wall/cliff produced a change in the car/wave without itself being changed. (FYI, the classical illustration is actually a potters hand molding clay; the hand doesn't move--it holds its shape. The clay changes in response to the unchanging hand.)

Now if that makes any sense, let me go just a bit further. Descartes realy screwed us up here, because he gave us Hume, and the whole modern idea of God's temporality is based on the Cartesian/Humean notion of causality. See, for Hume, change happens when e₁ brings about e₂. So in our example above, the first event is the impact (of the car/wave against the wall/cliff), and the second event is the crumpling of the car/dispersion of the wave. Now on this view, where is the causality? It turns out to be an unanswerable question, because there is nothing actually common between the events. What, after all, is between e₁ and e₂? This is why Hume argued that all causality is merely psychological, and that if it really exists, we can't know it. It is also why Kant, following Hume, rejected all causal arguments for God's existence, since psychological reality cannot be applied to the external reality (the way Descartes got around that was by appealing to God's existence; but, of course, that makes arguments for His existence based on causality circular). The second problem is, when did the change happen? It turns out that we are forced on this view to assume either a Platonic view of time (as K does with his A-theory above) or else deny that time and change exist all the way around (which B-theory and Hume did).

I raise that because there are only two ways to conceive causality. The first is the way we just mentioned--the Cartesian/Humean notion in which events bring about other events within this Platonic container called "time"--or the classical position you implicitly assumed. The classical view is that things change, that things cause change (not events). On this view, change is not e₁->e₂, but rather S_a1->S_a2 (where S="substance," and a="accident"). That is, the car had the property being well shaped before the collision. Because of the car's interaction with the way the wall actually is, the car lost the property being well shaped (S_a1) and acquired the property being crumpled (S_a2).

Now, on this view, I ask the same questions. First, where is the causality? It is in the car/wave, not the wall. That is clear in that it is the car that changed, not the wall. So we see the classical axiom, "Change is always in the effect, never the cause." Second, when did this change occur? The answer is that the change precisely is the loss of one property and the gaining of the other. We do not need to presume a "container" called "time" in which the change happend. The change itself is what time is.

As it happens, by the way, this classical view of time is precisely what we see in modern science, but that's another matter entirely.

So with all that said, the answer to your question should be easy enough to answer.

God is changeless (absolutely immutable). He simply is what He is. When He brought into existence the creation, there was no change in Him, because remember, change is always in the effect, not the cause. What changed? The creation. It "changed" insofar as it came into existence (I'm leaving aside here more technical discussions on the difference in generation vs. substantial change). God does not aquire a new property, having now created the universe. The universe has the property, "having been created by God." You cannot say that the universe aquired some new property at creation (it exists where before it had the property it does not exist) because prior to creation there was no creation to have any properties at all. So we say that creation is "really related to God"--it has the relationship to Him that the effect (that which is changed) has to a cause (that which causes the change). We say further, however, that "God is not really related to the universe." Put differently, God's relation to the universe is not real but one of reason, which is a distinction well understood by philosophers. The "changes" in God as result of His relation of reason to creation are called by philosophers "cambridge changes" are are widely recognized, even by evangelicals who hold the views K espouses, as not really being changes at all. For instance, I suspect that prior to reading this, you did not know that Aquinas taught everything I am saying here. Having gained this knowledge, would you say that Aquinas changed? After all, he gained the property lexy is aware of my teaching, a property he did not have before! But it's obvious that Aquinas hasn't changed at all. On that level, your relation to him in one of reason, and the change is one of reason, not of reality. (As another aside, this is a good reason why we need to get away from the Platonic notion of "properties" all the way around and get back to proper language of accidents and substances).

So bottom line:

In creation, it changed, not God. Since God did not change, He is not temporal. God transcends time.

[Byblos]

And that ^ (and so much more) why classical theism is a reasonable (from reason), comprehensive, and unparalleled system of thought.

[Kurieuo]

Would you guys mind repeating what Jac said in your own terms? I'm suspicious, because I found it extremely hard to follow. Maybe it's my current lack of sleep.

But Jac, as mentioned in that thread re: your paper of God's immutability; if you don't assume that "timeless" or "temporal" is some part of God's nature, then where is the issue? Like you have an unchanged "Potter's hand" that changes world, I too subscribe that "God's nature" is not changed by the world. That is, what changes is not something within God's nature, but rather a change in the "relational aspect".

For example, the relational state of the "Potter's hand" is first "a-molding clay" and then "molding clay". It could be said that there is a change in the hand, but obviously it would be exactly the same hand. It's just that the "relational aspect" of the hand changed. Therefore if you are saying God is like the "Potter's hand" and simply does not change, then I have no issue with that. This is easily accommodated by my position. "Time" for me is much like the "clay" such that an "atemporal" state is akin to an "a-clay" state, and "temporal" is akin to a "clay".

So... the only disagreement I can see really between us, besides some trip into Plato and whatever people have believed in the past re: the reality of things and causality (which I must actually plead my historical ignorance on)... is that it doesn't make sense logically to me how you avoid B-Theory (tenseless theory of time). To say things are not caused, one must subscribe to this tenseless position. This position being that everything that exists or comes into existence has in fact always existed eternally so. "Time" on this view is that it is simply "perspective" such that God literally sees the whole reel of movie film all at one. Each frame already exists, but being somehow attached to this instance of our life playing out, it doesn't get played out until we get to that "frame" in our life.

As you might recall, something I find especially troubling to a tenseless B-Theory (as Craig mentions in his book Time & Eternity: Exploring God's Relationship To Time), is the theological repercussions that are swept under the carpet. For Christ is literally defeated for all eternity being nailed to the cross, as He is also eternally resurrected. To say, "Oh, but the resurrection happens after the crucifixion" is to fall back into a tensed theory of time (A-Theory).

On a tenseless view of time, each "frame" in the "movie film" of creation is always there, eternally so... thus, the events that transpired at the Fall is as actually real today as Christ's resurrection is as actually real today as today is as actually real as yesterday is as actually real today as tomorrow. Furthermore, God can never truly bring an end to everything like Scripture proclaims -- there will always be sin, always be death, always be Jesus conquering evil in the Resurrection, always be evil triumphing over Christ and God in the crucifixion.

This is by no means a "Classical" Christian view, nor is it a "Scriptural" view, of God's relationship to time and creation. There are simply real logical questions that were unanswered in the past, that an attempt is being made to answer. And that is all Craig and I are doing.

[Jac3510]

As per my previous quote of Craig, a temporal God necessitates a change in His intrinsic nature. We aren't talking mere Cambridge changes here. These are real changes in God. Yet we simply cannot allow for intrinsic change in God. Ware, for all his faults, recognizes that the biblical statements on immutability claim that it is God Himself that does not change (not merely behavior). That is to say, according to the Bible, there are no intrinsic changes in God. So if a temporal God necessitates intrinsic change (and it does), then God cannot be temporal.

So it seems to me that all the problems I raise in my paper necessarily follow, including myriads I don't get around to addressing, some of which Craig actually admits elsewhere are very serious. For instance, if we accept that God is temporal, then we must admit that God does not exist perfectly in Himself. He has lost the past exactly like you and I have and it is thereby irretrievable even to Him. He, like us, has at best a nostalgia. But that seems incompatible with the perfect joy of the Godhead. In short, it just makes God imperfect, and if we are to take the ontological argument seriously at all (and I think we should, just not as an argument for God's existence), then we must affirm that whatever else God is, He is the greatest conceivable being. But a being that has perfect, complete existence within Himself is surely greater than one who has irretrievably lost something. There are further problems now with aseity (what amounts to a flat denial of the doctrine) and a complete inability to ground the type of immutability that really matters (God's ethical immutability) in a philosophically coherent way.

As far as comments on B-theory goes, I don't have any problem with them. I am not a B theorist. I am not an A theorist. Both are wrong.

[Kurieuo]

As far as comments on B-theory goes, I don't have any problem with them. I am not a B theorist. I am not an A theorist. Both are wrong.

But these theories are simply this.

A-Theory = belief in tensed facts
B-Theory = belief in there being no tensed facts.

Unless you remain agnostic, then I don't see how there can be a middle ground.

[lexy]

To Jac 3510

“ God is changeless (absolutely immutable). He simply is what He is. When He brought into existence the creation, there was no change in Him, because remember, change is always in the effect, not the cause. What changed? The creation. It "changed" insofar as it came into existence (I'm leaving aside here more technical discussions on the difference in generation vs. substantial change). God does not aquire a new property, having now created the universe. The universe has the property, "having been created by God." You cannot say that the universe aquired some new property at creation (it exists where before it had the property it does not exist) because prior to creation there was no creation to have any properties at all “

I have problem with this claim or assertion ( that God is immutable ). As a law grad and a student of logic I found very little traction in the reasoning here. Here’s what I meant. “ God is immutable and He created the universe.” Here’s the catch, An act of creation requires a state –a change in the creator (from not having exercised His will, to having exercised His will, from making a choice of one to the other, bear with me on this for a while. It will be clear as you read along) despite your claim that “there was no change in Him, because remember, change is always in the effect, not the cause. What changed? The creation. It "changed" insofar as it came into existence (I'm leaving aside here more technical discussions on the difference in generation vs. substantial change). God does not aquire a new property, having now created the universe.”. God did change by virtue of exercising His free will to create the Universe. Simply put in a layman’s term He could have created something else besides the Universe, could He not? But He choose to create the Universe for reason best known to Him. Simply making a choice and exercising that free will on His choice necessitate “ change/s “ in Him. Correct? Therefore God is NOT an immutable being cause an immutable being cannot undergo a state-- a change. If He created the universe God cannot be an immutable ( simply cause He changed due to exercising his free will and making that choice)
My conclusion lead to :
1. An immutable being cannot create the universe
2.God does not exist
3. Or if God exists “ Immutability ‘ is not one of His qualities.

[Jac3510]

As far as comments on B-theory goes, I don't have any problem with them. I am not a B theorist. I am not an A theorist. Both are wrong.

But these theories are simply this.

A-Theory = belief in tensed facts
B-Theory = belief in there being no tensed facts.

Unless you remain agnostic, then I don't see how there can be a middle ground.

You're looking in the wrong place, good sir. You are assuming that the relationship to object X to Y in the creation is identical to the relationship of God to X or God to Y. That is, you assuming that if X and Y are in a tensed relationship to one another, then God is in a tensed relationship to X and Y; or, if X and Y are in a tenseless relationship to one another, then God is in a tenseless relationship to X and Y.

I argue that only the present really exists and that real objects stand in a tensed relationship to one another. Feel free to call that an A-theory of time (so long as you reject the underlying Platonic realism that usually accompanies such a view).

Craig says that God must be temporal on this view because God's relationship with X changes with each passing moment. This would only be true, however, if we accept the proposition that God is really related to the world. And that is what I said before. He is not. It is a fundamental tenant of Thomism that God is not really related to the world. Craig says that he just doesn't know what Aquinas means here, but it doesn't seem to be to be terribly complicated. I have my suspicions as to the reasons he can't make heads or tails of Aquinas here, but I won't get into them now unless it comes up. The point is that on Aquinas' own metaphysics, God's non-relatedness to the world is both perfectly coherent and entailed by his Five Ways. In short, Aquinas would affirm the following two propositions:

1. Objects in the real world stand in a tensed relationship to one another;
2. God stands in no relationship, tensed or otherwise, with things in the real world.

Since God stands in no real relationship, He is not drawn into temporality. He brings about effects the same way everything else brings out effects: by being in act. Things interact with God and thereby change. Remember, as I said before, all change is in the effect, never the cause.

[Jac3510]

I have problem with this claim or assertion ( that God is immutable ). As a law grad and a student of logic I found very little traction in the reasoning here. Here’s what I meant. “ God is immutable and He created the universe.” Here’s the catch, An act of creation requires a state –a change in the creator (from not having exercised His will, to having exercised His will, from making a choice of one to the other, bear with me on this for a while. It will be clear as you read along) despite your claim that “there was no change in Him, because remember, change is always in the effect, not the cause. What changed? The creation. It "changed" insofar as it came into existence (I'm leaving aside here more technical discussions on the difference in generation vs. substantial change). God does not aquire a new property, having now created the universe.”. God did change by virtue of exercising His free will to create the Universe. Simply put in a layman’s term He could have created something else besides the Universe, could He not? But He choose to create the Universe for reason best known to Him. Simply making a choice and exercising that free will on His choice necessitate “ change/s “ in Him. Correct? Therefore God is NOT an immutable being cause an immutable being cannot undergo a state-- a change. If He created the universe God cannot be an immutable ( simply cause He changed due to exercising his free will and making that choice)
My conclusion lead to :
1. An immutable being cannot create the universe
2.God does not exist
3. Or if God exists “ Immutability ‘ is not one of His qualities.

You just haven't understood what I said. All your response amounts to is "na-uh."

First, you are wrong that "an act of creation requires a state -a change in the creator." Contrary to what you said, it is not true that God went from "not having exercised His will, to having exercised His will." All you are doing is begging the question here, because the change itself necessitates time, which is the very thing under consideration. God's being was never such that He had not "exercised His will." In fact, God is His will. In the strictest terms, we do not say that God has a will. God is His will. In scholastic terminology, He is His act.

Now, due to what God is (by His own freedom to be what He is), He creates. Again, to doubly emphasize, that is just what God is. As Creator, the world comes into existence. Again, all change is in the world, not in God, because all change is always in the effect, not in the cause.

You are, of course, free to disagree with the view of God I'm suggesting. You'll be in good company. Most Christians do today. And you can take it up with people who hold your view you decide to thereby take up and debate is coherent. I do not think it is. In the process, though, you should recognize that the position you are dismissing out of hand is the classical position--the one that the church has held since about 200 AD. There are very strong reasons for thinking it is right, too. Sadly, proponents of the modern (and heretical) idea of God's temporality never bother to actually engage those reasons.

Anyway, the only thing you really need to recognize is that your view assumes that God and His will are distinct things. If they are, then you have a point. If they are not, but if God merely is His will, then your point falls apart. The classical view is that God is identical to His will (and to His knowledge and to His power and to His love and to everything else--the doctrine is called divine simplicity).

[Jac3510]

I want to add that the common assumption that people like Craig and K and lexy seem to be making with regard to creation is that in order for creation ex nihilo to be meaningful, there must have been a time--that is, a state of affairs--in which nothing really existed (apart from God). But I think that is unwarranted and frankly incoherent.

It is unwarranted because creation does not require nothingness "to exist" (whatever that would mean). It only requires that there be no material cause for the universe's existence. It certainly has an efficient and final cause, but so long as there is no material cause, then creation ex nihilo is satisfied.

It is incoherent because it makes no sense to speak of a time in which nothing existed, and that for a couple of reasons. First, if nothing existed, then there can be no state of affairs that we can call "nothingness." For a state of affairs is by definition something after all. True nothingness is actually non-being, and non-being is simply inconceivable. It is thus incoherent to say, "nothing existed." Possibly worse, it is incoherent so speak of there being a "time" in which nothing existed, because if there is nothing, then by definition there is no time.

Anyway, I just thought I would point that out. The assumption that there must have been a time or state of existence in which there was nothing is a false, self-contradictory assumption.

[Kurieuo]

I want to add that the common assumption that people like Craig and K and lexy seem to be making with regard to creation is that in order for creation ex nihilo to be meaningful, there must have been a time--that is, a state of affairs--in which nothing really existed (apart from God). But I think that is unwarranted and frankly incoherent.

It is unwarranted because creation does not require nothingness "to exist" (whatever that would mean). It only requires that there be no material cause for the universe's existence. It certainly has an efficient and final cause, but so long as there is no material cause, then creation ex nihilo is satisfied.

Actually, there are varying degrees to "creation ex nihilo" that I see.

You have at least "God" and therefore creation is not really from nothing.

The question then is, what is creation "made from". Some pre-existing and separate substance that changes when it comes into contact with God (thus perhaps maintaining an strong immutability ), or something literally "breathed" into existence from the Divine?

I'm sure we're not in the same boat here. But I'd be interested in just a quick response from you to these questions for my own clarification. I'm fairly certain I'm also not in the same boat with Craig's view, which seems rather absurd to me. As absurd as Atheists believing the universe popped into existence from nothing, so too Craig believes due to God that the universe popped into existence from nothing. At least, this is based on an article I read from Craig somewhere online. Just because "God" or "God's Word" is added doesn't mean coming into existence from nothing (in the strictest sense of "nothingness") now makes sense.

I feel this might be straying from the topic at hand, but there is no real point lumping me in with Craig here, or presuming that there is some ulterior motive to my beliefs. My response takes seriously God's relationship with us throughout time, such that God is here with me in the present rather than being far removed so as to not taint some strange "immutability'" where a change in position somehow means a change in one's ontological nature. To use your potter's hands molding clay versus a motionless hand -- if God is not immutable in my view with God's relationship to time, then neither is the potter's hand "immutable" (i.e., changeless).

It is incoherent because it makes no sense to speak of a time in which nothing existed, and that for a couple of reasons. First, if nothing existed, then there can be no state of affairs that we can call "nothingness." For a state of affairs is by definition something after all. True nothingness is actually non-being, and non-being is simply inconceivable. It is thus incoherent to say, "nothing existed." Possibly worse, it is incoherent so speak of there being a "time" in which nothing existed, because if there is nothing, then by definition there is no time.

There is nothing I necessarily disagree with here given I believe it is illusory that the spawning of a temporal world can create time to exist before itself. This based on the impossibility of retro-causation (an effect causing itself to exist prior to its existence). Just because now time exists, we may in fact coherently speak of a time before time, it is not in actual reality true that time did exist prior to itself.

So in this manner, I agree with you that it is incoherent to speak of there being a time when nothing existed. Perhaps your further reasoning here is built upon your prior assumption of me having some ulterior motivation to make "creation ex nihilo" more meaningful. But really, I just don't see what I'm meant to be disagreeing with you on in this post of yours.

I'd like to ask you another question though. Is it not equally incoherent to speak of there being a state in which only God existed without creation? What is your take on this question? Also, just want to add that the way I've constructed the question has no bearing upon what I believe. Just interested in your thinking.

[jlay]

I have problem with this claim or assertion ( that God is immutable ). As a law grad and a student of logic I found very little traction in the reasoning here. Here’s what I meant. “ God is immutable and He created the universe.” Here’s the catch, An act of creation requires a state –a change in the creator (from not having exercised His will, to having exercised His will, from making a choice of one to the other, bear with me on this for a while. It will be clear as you read along) despite your claim that “there was no change in Him, because remember, change is always in the effect, not the cause. What changed? The creation. It "changed" insofar as it came into existence (I'm leaving aside here more technical discussions on the difference in generation vs. substantial change). God does not aquire a new property, having now created the universe.”. God did change by virtue of exercising His free will to create the Universe. Simply put in a layman’s term He could have created something else besides the Universe, could He not? But He choose to create the Universe for reason best known to Him. Simply making a choice and exercising that free will on His choice necessitate “ change/s “ in Him. Correct? Therefore God is NOT an immutable being cause an immutable being cannot undergo a state-- a change. If He created the universe God cannot be an immutable ( simply cause He changed due to exercising his free will and making that choice)
My conclusion lead to :
1. An immutable being cannot create the universe
2.God does not exist
3. Or if God exists “ Immutability ‘ is not one of His qualities.

This is simply a laymen's perspective. The problem I see here, Lexy, is that this doesn't treat time as part of the universe. What I mean is that your position presumes that the timeline pre-exists and retreats right past 'in the beginning.' However, the beginning really is the beginning of space, time and matter. And I think Jac would agree that God is transcendent, timeless, and immaterial, and the creation is not. However, Lexy, you are presenting creation (as best as I can tell) as an act IN time. There was no creation, and then (at some point in time) God created. It is question begging. It presumes a timeline prior to the creation, and then the creation just fits on that timeline at some point. (For example: eternity<-------------bang/creation-------------->) I would argue, and I think Jac might agree, that to say "before" creation, is question begging and making an incorrect presumption. If the beginning (of time, space and matter) is truly the beginning, then there isn't a before in the sense that we are employing the word. Of course Jac may totally disagree and I may be completely off base.