1 Corinthians 2:14

[makesends]

What I did say was "inability" means "not able to happen." If that is applied to choice, then an inability to choose means not able to choose.

There's the core. Inability does not mean, "not able to happen". That "inability" implies that the creature is not able to make it happen, has no bearing on whether it is possible that it happen. I don't believe in an inability to choose. I do not believe in any ability to choose other than what God has decreed. But perhaps someone (to avoid saying, "you"), can demonstrate something to the contrary.

 

[Josheb]

There's the core. Inability does not mean, "not able to happen". That "inability" implies that the creature is not able to make it happen, has no bearing on whether it is possible that it happen.

Hair-splitting sophistry. We are not discussing cosmology. We're discussing human ontology relevant to 1 Corinthians 2:14. If a sinfully dead and enslaved human is unable to do something then s/he is unable to make that thing happen. God can do whatever He likes but 1 Corinthians 2:14 is not a statement about God. It's a statement about the natural man. The natural man CANNOT understand and accept the things of the Spirit (and I have already explained how that informs his volitional and behavioral agency, or lack thereof).

I don't believe in an inability to choose.

Then a basic understanding of life exists.

I do not believe in any ability to choose other than what God has decreed.

You just contradicted yourself..... again! It's impossible to choose what God has not decreed if God's decree is the only thing that can happen. That would be an example of an inability to choose, which was denied in the previous sentence. Furthermore, a choice with only one thing to choose is not a choice. A "choice" is, by definition, the act of selecting from two or more options or possibilities. A choice is not merely the assertion of one's will; acting voluntarily is not the same thing as acting choicefully. For an actual choice to exist then two or more options must also exist, from which the individual me choose Strict determinism negates choice. That's why compatibilism was developed.

But perhaps someone (to avoid saying, "you"), can demonstrate something to the contrary.

In any give moment of choice there exists a huge and complicated history of influence and causation bearing on that moment of choice. The human, especially the sinfully dead and enslaved human, is largely ignorant of it. No human understands all the decisions of his/her own that brought him to this moment, nor how all those past decisions influence the current one. The same applies to all the other experiences he's had up to the given moment of choice. Sheer, unadulterated, abject ignorance exists. He the individual knowledge and understanding of any of it he might make a different decision in the given moment. One the other side of that moment of choice there also exists a pile of ignorance because no human can know or understand all the possible consequences or repercussions of this one choice in this one moment, partly because that one choice is really an amalgam of all past choices and experiences. Not only can he not know all the possible consequences in his own life, but he cannot know the effects this moment of choice will have on all the other people affected by that choice. A different choice might be made if any of the knowledge was known and understood. We cannot choose that which we do not know. God could be proactively forcing that ignorance upon us all but the more likely, the more rational, the more scriptural, the Occam's Razor explanation is to understand that ignorance a simple product of living in this particular spatio-temporal singularity, a product of divine design, not the nefarious workings of benevolent God who is actually acting with nefarious tyranny to keep everyone stupid.

Neither can anyone make a choice to defy the physics in which they live and have their being. You could choose to jump off the Chrysler building, but you cannot choose to survive the sudden stop at the end of the fall. You do not have the ability to do so. Jesus does. God does. You do not.



With the 1 Corinthians 2 text a division is made separating the "natural" man, the sinfully dead and enslaved person, from the man in possession of God's Spirit, the regenerate man, the spiritually alive and enslaved person. The former individual has been altered by sin and the chief alteration by sin is death and hostile ignorance. He CANNOT understand and accept anything of the Spirit, not even his own sin, death, and ignorance. He CANNOT change that disposition, either. We have agency only as far as our nature allows. The sinful state destroys volitional agency in all areas pertaining to the Spirit. The spiritual state avails volitional agency to all areas pertaining to the Spirit. Both the "natural" man and the "spiritual" man are slaves, but one is a slave to sin and the other is a slave of righteousness. Everyone has a master. Some have two. The natural man must serve both sin and God, the spiritual man must serve God. However, the slave of righteousness is also an adopted son and, thereby, privileged to all the inheritance that is available in Christ (which includes interest and knowledge, understanding, wisdom, power, and everything necessary to live a godly life).

At this point

1) the errors in your posts are increasing.... and not being addressed,
2) the posts are still off topic,
3) both our posts' contents are becoming repetitive.

Therefore, unless I read something new and topical, I'll be moving on.

 

[makesends]

makesends said:
There's the core. Inability does not mean, "not able to happen". That "inability" implies that the creature is not able to make it happen, has no bearing on whether it is possible that it happen.

Hair-splitting sophistry. We are not discussing cosmology. We're discussing human ontology relevant to 1 Corinthians 2:14. If a sinfully dead and enslaved human is unable to do something then s/he is unable to make that thing happen. God can do whatever He likes but 1 Corinthians 2:14 is not a statement about God. It's a statement about the natural man. The natural man CANNOT understand and accept the things of the Spirit (and I have already explained how that informs his volitional and behavioral agency, or lack thereof).

I'm at a loss to understand how one might think I disagree with the doctrine of Total Depravity.

I would not assume my worthy opponent is unaware of the fact that all scripture works together, and that one passage is not to be considered out of context with the rest of scripture. We're discussing meaning of words, implications and how they apply to the subject at hand. A view of human ontology apart from God's decree, is narrow indeed. While I admire the single-minded trajectory of the arrow toward a target, to ignore elevation and windage results in a claim that an adjusted target had been at its new position all along.
makesends said:
I don't believe in an inability to choose.

Then a basic understanding of life exists.

makesends said:
I do not believe in any ability to choose other than what God has decreed.

You just contradicted yourself..... again! It's impossible to choose what God has not decreed if God's decree is the only thing that can happen. That would be an example of an inability to choose, which was denied in the previous sentence. Furthermore, a choice with only one thing to choose is not a choice. A "choice" is, by definition, the act of selecting from two or more options or possibilities. A choice is not merely the assertion of one's will; acting voluntarily is not the same thing as acting choicefully. For an actual choice to exist then two or more options must also exist, from which the individual me choose Strict determinism negates choice. That's why compatibilism was developed.

Wait ....what? Am I hearing the "y—" word??

It's pretty simple, really. All that is and happens within this temporal creation is and does so by God's decree.

But perhaps my opponent can prove otherwise by claiming it is so, by OUR merely human say-so, apart from the larger scriptural context, and apart from the logic of causation,


makesends said:
But perhaps someone (to avoid saying, "you"), can demonstrate something to the contrary.

In any give moment of choice there exists a huge and complicated history of influence and causation bearing on that moment of choice. The human, especially the sinfully dead and enslaved human, is largely ignorant of it. No human understands all the decisions of his/her own that brought him to this moment, nor how all those past decisions influence the current one. The same applies to all the other experiences he's had up to the given moment of choice. Sheer, unadulterated, abject ignorance exists. He the individual knowledge and understanding of any of it he might make a different decision in the given moment. One the other side of that moment of choice there also exists a pile of ignorance because no human can know or understand all the possible consequences or repercussions of this one choice in this one moment, partly because that one choice is really an amalgam of all past choices and experiences. Not only can he not know all the possible consequences in his own life, but he cannot know the effects this moment of choice will have on all the other people affected by that choice. A different choice might be made if any of the knowledge was known and understood. We cannot choose that which we do not know. God could be proactively forcing that ignorance upon us all but the more likely, the more rational, the more scriptural, the Occam's Razor explanation is to understand that ignorance a simple product of living in this particular spatio-temporal singularity, a product of divine design, not the nefarious workings of benevolent God who is actually acting with nefarious tyranny to keep everyone stupid.

Neither can anyone make a choice to defy the physics in which they live and have their being. You could choose to jump off the Chrysler building, but you cannot choose to survive the sudden stop at the end of the fall. You do not have the ability to do so. Jesus does. God does. You do not.



With the 1 Corinthians 2 text a division is made separating the "natural" man, the sinfully dead and enslaved person, from the man in possession of God's Spirit, the regenerate man, the spiritually alive and enslaved person. The former individual has been altered by sin and the chief alteration by sin is death and hostile ignorance. He CANNOT understand and accept anything of the Spirit, not even his own sin, death, and ignorance. He CANNOT change that disposition, either. We have agency only as far as our nature allows. The sinful state destroys volitional agency in all areas pertaining to the Spirit. The spiritual state avails volitional agency to all areas pertaining to the Spirit. Both the "natural" man and the "spiritual" man are slaves, but one is a slave to sin and the other is a slave of righteousness. Everyone has a master. Some have two. The natural man must serve both sin and God, the spiritual man must serve God. However, the slave of righteousness is also an adopted son and, thereby, privileged to all the inheritance that is available in Christ (which includes interest and knowledge, understanding, wisdom, power, and everything necessary to live a godly life).

At this point

1) the errors in your posts are increasing.... and not being addressed,
2) the posts are still off topic,
3) both our posts' contents are becoming repetitive.

Therefore, unless I read something new and topical, I'll be moving on.

I never said that the natural man can do (nor choose) what Scripture clearly says he cannot. Why my opponent keeps harping on this is beyond me. But the notion that he is not choosing when he rejects Christ is rather silly, it seems to me. That he cannot do otherwise does not mean he has not chosen. The command does not imply the ability to obey.

But the circular argument that I am contradicting myself, which argument depends on the assertion that choice is of two or more necessarily possible options, (and that assertion in the face of all history contradicting it—i.e. since only one choice actually ever happens), quite neglecting that we consistently choose only between options, whether possible or not. God uses our choices to accomplish what he decreed. But if it helps, let's allow that all options are available from which to choose, but only the one(s) chosen will be chosen, and so we can know that God decreed it/them.

If something happens, it is because it could happen. When something we considered possible before happening does not happen, it is because it could not have happened, as retrospection affirms. The fact that we don't know which would happen ahead of time is irrelevant to the facts. How could it have happened, if it did not? It is not possible. Our speculation is no purveyor of truth.

The unbeliever cannot believe until God regenerates him —this much my opponent agrees with; The unbeliever consistently CHOOSES to reject Christ.



At this point, because of 1) The errors in —what? The Y-word again?— my opponent's reasoning are not being addressed by my opponent, and 2) The tangent upon which he has set us by not recognizing the errors in his assumptions, and, 3) Both our posts have been repetitive from the get-go, especially given how many times we have entered into this same issue on many threads, —

—My worthy opponent will be moving on.