Divine Sovereignty and Human Free Will

Liberty Theological Seminary

THE RELATIONSHIP OF DIVINE SOVEREIGNTY AND HUMAN FREEDOM: HOW THE

FINITE HUMAN MIND CANNOT FULLY UNDERSTAND ITS CONCEPTS

A Paper

Submitted to Dr. Mark Walton

In Partial Fulfillment

Of the Requirements for the Course

Systematic Theology II

THEO 530-B12

By

Ryan Sebastian

October 15, 2010

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Thesis Statement:

The purpose of this research is to dive into the conclusion that human minds are finite

and cannot fully comprehend the concept of God’s Sovereignty and how it coincides with human

free will.

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CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………………...1

THE PREDESTINATION VIEW 1

THE FREE WILL VIEW 2

Nature of the Will 5

The Outstanding of Deliberation 5

Absence of Exterior Thought of Determination above Choices and Decisions 5

Preference and Verdict 6

Responsibility and Attempt 7

Scripture Passages That Seem to Resist Free Choice 8

The Will and Foreknowledge 9

DETERMINISTS AND LIBERTARIANS 10

Libertarian’s Arguments for the Freedom of the Will 11

The Examining of Psychological Viewpoint 11

The Moral and Religious Viewpoint 12

Arguments for Determinism 13

Physiological Data 13

Psychological Data 13

Sociological Data 14

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CONCLUSION 14

BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………………… 16

INTRODUCTION

The concept of human free will and God’s sovereignty is something that theologians have

tried to solve for centuries. These two views seem to be conflicting but both appear in Scripture.

Differentiating concepts within the two views will be examined along with the Scripture

passages that support each view. The purpose is to examine the data of both points of views to

conclude that there is not adequate information that the finite human mind can fully understand

and that the debate between the two views must come to a standstill until man knows what nature

of freedom is essential for moral responsibility.1

THE PREDESTINATION VIEW

There is the viewpoint that if in order for God to be fully sovereign then He must have

predestined those who would receive salvation and likewise who would receive damnation in

hell. The predestination view states in quintessence that prior to the earth or people were

fashioned, God selected certain persons to transpire in heaven and the rest to transpire in hell.

Advocates for this view use Ephesians 1:4-5 and Romans 8:29-30 in support of predestination.

Romans 9:29-30 states: “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the

likeness of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brothers. And those He

predestined, He also called’ those He called, he also justified; those he justified, He also

gloried.”2

1 David M. Ciocchi, “Suspending The Debate About Divine Sovereignty and Human Freedom,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 51 (2008): 590.

2 John Boykin, “The Predestination Principle: A Bible Study,” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:3 (2009): 262.

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This subject came into the sharpest focal point during the Reformation. There were many

issues that faced the Reformation, but the one that was of great importance was the choosing of

reciprocally exclusive sides amid the concepts of predestination and free will. The two most

noted, outspoken followers for predestination were John Calvin and Martin Luther.3 Kenneth

Latourette condensed Luther’s view of predestination by stating, “Man, so Luther held, does not

have free will. Man’s will is like a beast of burden. It is ridden either by God or by the Devil

and does whatever the one who is in the saddle directs.”4 Calvin likewise defined predestination

as the eternal declaration of God, by which He has resolute in Himself, what He would have to

be suited of every person of humanity. Individuals are not at all created with a parallel destiny.

Some have been foreordained for eternal life and some for eternal damnation. Since every man

is created for one of these outcomes, Calvin would then state that man is predestined for life or to

death.5 The failure of many to accept the promise of Jesus Christ suggests the inclusive

antagonism of divine sovereignty and human freedom. Freedom includes resistance to God’s

will. Calvin, at a deeper intellectual level, refuses this opposition. He has noted that even

human freedom to rebuff God must be in at some degree part of God’s own will.6

THE FREE WILL VIEW

In contrast, the free will view states in quintessence that God created mankind with a free

will to construct their own choices, which results in obedience or disobedience. God does hold

3John Boykin, “The Predestination Principle: A Bible Study,” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:3 (2009): 263.

4 Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953), 724.

5 Paul Evans, The Moody Handbook of Theology (Chicago: Moody Press, 1989), 481.

6 William A. Wright, “Divine Sovereignty: Absolute or Limited by Human Freedom,” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009): 16-17.

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into account the choices of man, but he does not pressure humanity into choosing. Supporters of

the free will view point to passages such as John 3:16, which states: “For God so loved the

world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but

have everlasting life.” Another passage that is frequently used for support of this viewpoint is

Romans 10:13, which states: “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” In

John 3:36 the author concludes in stating “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but

whosever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.”7

An early theologian in church history named Erasmus was considered the most outspoken

advocate for the free will view during the Reformation. He later became Martin Luther’s

antagonist in the field. Erasmus held to the view that “God would be unjust and immoral if He

were so to order the universe that man could not of himself fulfill the conditions which He had

ordained for salvation and then were arbitrarily to choose some to be saved and by doing so

condemn others to hell.”8 Martin Luther confessed that at one time the evident contradiction of

free will and predestination that is presented in Scripture had so driven him to the chasm of

desolation that he wished that he never had been born. Luther, like many others, stood in

admiration of the splendor and impenetrable justice of God. He maintained the belief that God is

unattainable to human reason.9 No man can guarantee the amount of control they have.

Additionally, there are some things that man cannot accomplish. Free will does not mean that

humanity can append to the standing of any given bequest outside the restrictions positioned by

nature. In addition, it does mean that man can fashion some innovative ability. Humans can 7 John Boykin, “The Predestination Principle: A Bible Study,” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:3

(2009): 262-263.

8 Ibid., 264.

9John Boykin, “The Predestination Principle: A Bible Study,” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:3 (2009): 262-263.

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only function within the restrictions and potential of their given desires and abilities of their

environment. In reality, free will is freedom within the boundaries of a person’s unborn

capabilities and of the world in which he lives in.10 Humanity has the freedom to will under

unsure limitations. One’s will action is not subjective in the logic that it can function in devoid

of the regard for one’s tattered nature within their precedent development. The will action

represents the aptitude of humanity to construct their own world within the potential worlds

provided by man’s surroundings and capacities. In reality, humanity wills what is probable to

their own nature, and as a result man finds himself efficient to differentiating extents. Therefore,

man is further than a receptive being. Man is a responsible being. Humanity’s synthetic desires

and abilities supply the unrefined resources from which man can build their temperament and

individuality. Man cannot be liable for the raw material. In contrast, man can be blamed for the

type of configuration one can will to fashion out of them. There would be no reason in

considering man’s experience in moral responsibility if man could not will the good in which

man aspires.11 Dr. Henry C. Thiessen once stated that “God can foresee how men will act without

efficiently decreeing how they shall act. God is not limited in the carrying out of His plans,

except as He has limited Himself by the choices of man. God has set certain general bounds

within which His universe is to operate. Within these bounds He has given man freedom to

act.”12

Nature of Free Will

10 Willard F. Enteman, The Problem of Free Will (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1967), 23.

11 Ibid., 23.

12 Samuel Fisk, Divine Sovereignty and Human Freedom (New Jersey: Neptune, Loizeaux Brothers, 1973), 54.

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To understand the concept of “free will” one must first dive into its nature. The scheme

of free will is a thing of human intangible pretense. In order to investigate it beneficially, one

requires to commence by taking into consideration what the conception at issue involves and

what intelligence can be made of it.13

The Outstanding of Deliberation

There are a few requirements that free will must maintain. The first is the outstanding of

deliberation. This consists of the will being the aptitude of authority of manufacturing

premeditated choices concerning man’s actions, and in so doing guides man’s actions by way of

thought. As a result, such a will is free when it follows man’s own wishes rather than pertaining

to being controlled or manipulated. John Locke has instructively defined free will by stating:

“The idea of liberty, is the idea of power in any agent to do or forbear any particular action

according to the determination or thought of the mind, whereby either of them is preferred to the

other.”14

Absence of Exterior Thought of Determination Above Choices and Decisions

The second requirement is the absence of exterior thought of determination above choices

and decisions. In order to sustain that humans are outfitted with a free will is to declare that

mankind has a confident meticulous genus of an aptitude. This capacity consists of the ability to

formulate choices and decisions consisting of deliberative thought based on mankind’s own

impulse, without the outcome-determinative infringement of factors and processed whose

operations are entirely outside human individual power. The standard point of such an

13 Nicholas Rescher, Free Will: A Philosophical Reappraisal (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2009), 15.

14 Ibid., 16.

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arrangement is that man’s actions question human choices and decisions. Man’s choices and

decisions are industriously produced by man rather than being nonchalantly prepared for man by

a progression lying exterior of human control. Henri Bergson stated that choice is engulfed with

human sense of reality’s deputation futurity. He is also noted in stating that in making a choice,

man endeavors to convey to an awareness of one type of prospect relatively than to another.

Within the realm of genuine freedom, the subject of the incentive becomes essential. The Greek

term autexousia, which means “absolute power,” indicated the self-determination has an issue

with freedom of slavery. This was used by the early Church Fathers to situate for the type of

sovereignty characteristic of free will, which is the power of self-determination.15 Nicholas

Rescher goes on to point out that:

Just as in politics coercion and force are the prime impediments to freedom, so in personal agency external manipulation and undue influence are its prime impediments. With free will the only viable sort of constraint upon someone’s decisions and choices are those impressed by the agent’s thoughts and deliberations in the process of deciding; any sort of own constraint upon an agent’s autonomy is antithetical to free will.16

Rescher, like so many others, have strived to comprehend the complexity of the realm of free

will and the necessary components behind it.

Preference and Verdict

Another requirement for free will is preference and verdict. One may ask “how do

people resolve alternatives and make one’s choices and decisions?” This can be answered by

individual judgment or by allocation to others. Personal judgment cannot constantly be rational

since at some point snap judgment is called for because consideration computation cannot be


16 Ibid., 22.

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conceded through ad infintum, which means “to infinity.” Therefore, deliberation is to be

correlated in a relatively extensive and comprehensive manner.

Responsibility and Attempt

The fourth requirement is “responsibility and attempt.” Man’s freedom as cogent beings

is restricted by the apprehension of commonness of foreclosed portions. This is the innumerable

thing that the unyielding realities of nature deposited afar from the reach of probability for man

and experience. It is clearly given that many things are beyond humanity’s capacities. Man’s

power of mind over matter is futile. Humanity cannot choose to stay abstemious upon drinking.

In contrast, man’s control over what man can try to do is grander. Humanity’s control over what

they desire is even better. One cannot be free of will and a forestall being inundated with anger

when unreasonably offended. In reality, nothing can impede one from regretting that this is so,

desiring it were otherwise, and striving to construct it as so. The results by means of reverence

to authentic outcomes could be ahead of humanity, but results by means of reverence to endeavor

definitely are not.17 When a person is treating matters of choice and decision, one has to sustain

a peculiarity between the subjective and the objective viewpoint. There is a decisive distinction

in correlation in which an agent is free to choose and what the agent is free to do. The former

commonly affords to a great extent to a wider range.18

Scripture Passages That Seem to Resist Free Choice


18 Ibid., 29.

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Now that we have looked at free will and it has been clearly defined, Scripture on the

subject needs to be evaluated. There are several passages in Scripture that make it hard to hold

to the concept of free will. One passage is Exodus 9:12, which states: But the LORD hardened

Pharaoh's heart and he would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said to

Moses;” and yet again in Exodus 9:16, which states: “But I have raised you up for this very

purpose, that I might show you my power and that my name might be proclaimed in all the

earth.” Paul also illuminates it even more, bringing forth a parallel text. The text is Exodus

33:19, which states: “And I will be gracious to whom I am gracious, and will show mercy on

whom I show mercy.” Another difficult passage is Malachi chapter one and is also expounded in

Romans chapter nine. It states, “’Was he not Jacob’s brother?’ says the Lord. ‘Yet I have loved

Jacob but I have hated Esau.’” Paul then expounds in Romans 9:11-13 that “thus they were not

yet born and had done nothing either good or evil in order that God’s purpose of election might

continue, not because of works but because of his call, she was told, loved, but Esau have I

hated.” An early church father named Jerome expounds on this passage according to the

interpretation of another church father named Origen. He stated that “God hardens when he does

not at once punish the sinner, and has mercy as soon as he invites repentance by means of

afflictions.” Another passage of note is Hosea 4:14, which states: “I will not punish your

daughters when they play the harlot.” God speaks in fury according to Psalm 89:32, which

states: “Then I will punish their transgression with the rod and their iniquity with scourges.” In

the same light Jeremiah 20:7 states: “O Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived; thou

wert stronger than I, and thou hast prevailed.” Jerome has been noted to lead astray when he does

not immediately recollect from his fault, and this is also Origen’s belief as well. He conduces to

a supplementary faultless health, just as a qualified surgeon would desire an abrasion not to scar

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too rapidly in order that when the corrupting substance is brought out of the open injury it would

permanently heal. “And Origen notes that the Lord says: ‘But for this purpose have I raised you

up,’ not ‘For this purpose I made you.’ Otherwise, Pharaoh would not have been wicked if God

had made him like that: ‘Who saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good’

(Gen. 1:31).” In reality, Pharaoh was created with a will that can turn to evil or to righteousness,

but he wished to turn to evil and preferred not to obey God. Nonetheless, God turned the

malevolence of Pharaoh to His own glory and to the salvation of the Israelites that thus it might

be made plainer that men venture in futile endeavors when they defy the will of God.19

The Will and Foreknowledge

Many theologians have struggled with the thought of the will and foreknowledge. To

God, the will and foreknowledge is paralleled. Karl Barth is an example of a theologian that

sought to better understand this topic.20 In some way, it ought to be that He wills what He

foreknows as future, and that which He does not obstruct, though it is in His power to execute so.

This is what Paul means when he states “who can resist His will” in accordance to whom He

wills and hardens whom he wills (Romans 9:19). If there were a dictator who conceded into

consequence whatever he willed, and no man could oppose him, the dictator could be noted to do

whatever was pleasing to him. In parallel, the will of God seems to entail inevitability on man’s

will. In Romans 9:20 Paul does not personally unravel the question, but he rebukes the question.

19 E. Gordon Rupp and Philip S. Watson, Luther and Eramsmus: Free Will and Salvation (Louisville: Westminister John Knox Press, 1969), 64-65.

20 J. Scott Jackson, “Divine Sovereignty in Light of Christ’s Lordship:Karl Barth on the Heidelberg Catechism,” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009):21.

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The passage states: “But who are you, a man, to answer back to God?”21 God maintains his

sovereignty in every aspect of creation and time.22

DETERMINIST AND LIBERTARIANS

Also, in order to have a better understanding of free will, one must examine the views of

determinist and libertarians. The minority of philosophical controversies have been waged with

a superior debate between the determinists and the libertarians. The dynamism between both

parties of the question have been espoused do not only the metaphysical magnitude of the

subject, but rather more particularly to its moral and religious implications. There are no other

philosophical concerns that are of better moral and theological instant except of those consisting

to God and the depravity of the soul. The question has been so meticulously debated that

auxiliary contemplation of it may seem ineffective. The inquiry of the freedom of the will when

it is abridged to its barest necessities is: “Are man’s acts of will unceremoniously fashioned by a

precursor of circumstances or are at least several actions free from causal determination?” The

determinists maintain that the entire events, yet the most carefully planned and premeditated, can

be explained, and that if man knew an adequate amount regarding a man’s inherited

characteristics and the situational influences which encompass the man’s shaped character. Also,

one could calculate just how the man would conduct themselves underneath any particular

situate of conditions. The libertarian or free willist asserts that there is a minimum sort of human

21 E. Gordon Rupp and Philip S. Watson, Luther and Eramsmus: Free Will and Salvation (Louisville: Westminister John Knox Press, 1969), 64-65.

22 Winfried Corduan, “Divine Sovereignty and Creation,” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009): 12.

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actions of the volitional sort in which the individual by the expression of man’s will power acts

autonomously of habitual conditions.23

Libertarian’s Arguments for the Freedom of the Will

There a few arguments that need to be evaluated from the libertarian’s point of view.

Theologians on both sides have essential arguments for or against free will. The ones that will

be examined are the pensive of psychological argument and the moral and religious argument.

The Examining of Psychological Viewpoint

The majority of supporters of the free will doctrine hold true that the mind is

unswervingly conscious of its freedom in the very act of constructing a decision. Therefore,

freedom is an instantaneous reference to man’s examined consciousness. The most persuasive

and elementary of the arguments for freedom is the phrase, “I experience myself free, thus I am

free.”24 The occurrence of decision following deliberation is an unquestionable truth which

libertarians and determinists equally have to recognize. In actuality, the authentic issue is

whether this truth warrants the production which the libertarian puts upon it. The determinist

response to this argument is to urge the mind-set of freedom and that it is nothing but a sagacity

of liberation proceeding upon past indecisiveness and strain. Subsequent to indecisiveness and

divergence, the raved energies of the psyche are unconstrained and this progression is

accompanied by an interior sagacity of supremacy. Therefore, the emotion of freedom or of

intentional control over one’s actions is a sheer prejudiced misapprehension which cannot be

measured in verification for psychological indeterminacy.25 An additional introspective actuality


24 Ibid., 35.


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cited by the free willist or libertarian is the support of doctrine that the moral agent is in thought

and certain that the libertarian may have trailed an itinerary of actions in contrast from that which

the libertarian essentially sought after. The conviction that there are indisputable alternatives of

action and that the selection among them is indeterminate, is generally stronger in outlook and in

thought than at the instance of tangible choice.26

The Moral and Religious Viewpoint

The moral argument assumes a diversity of shapes. The diversity of forms all concur in

their effort to assume volitional freedom of the moral man from some characteristic of the moral

condition. The greatest characteristic attribute of moral action is that is perceives to be bound for

the comprehension of a superlative of the execution of a commitment. The libertarian would

argue that it’s of the very temperament of an idyllic or a commitment that it shall be

unreservedly embraced. The recognition or denunciation of a moral ideal and the acceptance of

a commitment as fastening can merely be accounted for on the conjecture of man’s free choice.

The moral argument for freedom has on occasion not been affirmed from the viewpoint of the

moral man, but of the moral opponent. This opponent lays verdict on the exploit of another or

yet among the opponent’s own actions. A verdict of tribute or charge extends freedom to the

man whose deed is judged.27

Arguments for Determinism

26 Ibid., 37.

27Ibid., 38.

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While the verification for the free will doctrine is greatly humanistic and moralistic, the

case for determinism is a petition to scientific data. The determinist finds that the discipline of

sociology, psychology, and physiology gives verification that human deeds are no exemption to

the underlying equivalence of nature.

Physiological Data

The greater a person knows about the physiological and impartial processes which go on

in the interior of the human being, the further apparent it transpires that there is not a sever in the

unremitting sequence of causation. This is even when it reacts to the greatest intricate of

incentive. Physiology has revealed a sensibly transparent depiction of the machinery of human

behavior. Behaviorists have been recruited for the cause of determinism. They have applied the

objective system of the physiologist to the human behavior. The behaviorists have described in

the slighted aspect the apparatus of reflexes and the method of their habituation. “Delayed

responses are mediated by very complex neutral processes which on their subjective side are

called conflict, indecision, and deliberation, but they are not exception to the behaviouristic

formula.”28

Psychological Data

Whereas the deterministic theory conjunctures its most apparent support from physiology

and behaviouristic psychology, introspective psychology constructs an endowment as well. An

impartial reflective assessment of preference supports the hypothesis of psychological

determinism. Now if a person’s supremacy of introspective were satisfactorily constructed, that

person could presumably follow any conclusion in discovering the precise psychological


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influences which provides that meticulous verdict predictable. Beyond question for an absolute

elucidation of definite resolutions, it is essential in calculation to the cognizant experience of the

volitional performance to improve the more obscure subliminal and cataleptic influences. The

subsistence of cognitively unfathomable conscious proceedings was one of the greater

convincing reasons for the unique positing of a cataleptic or subliminal psyche. It stays accurate

that a reasonably absolute proceeding of the psychological effect of volitional choice is probable

yet lacking an alternative to a cataleptic mind.

Sociological Data

The social field of sciences succumb a copious confirmation for the deterministic view of

human conduct. The actuality that the behavior of a great collective of individuals is expressible

in conditions of an arithmetical bylaw which positively leads in that bearing, even though it is

not an irrefutable fact of individual determinism. It is intricate to resolve the likelihood of the

laws of a collective or accumulation of actions with the individual free will.29

CONCLUSION

Theologians for centuries have tried to explain the concept of human free will against

God’s sovereignty. This debate will most likely continue until the return of Christ. It is essential

as a Christian to examine all aspects of doctrine including free will. After must examination into

the debate the only conclusion that must be of note is that the finite human mind cannot fully

comprehend the concept of God’s sovereignty and human free will. As noted, both are revealed

in Scripture. How can both concepts be true? This is a question that will consume theologians

until the end of time


BIBLIOGRAPHY

Boettner, Loraine. The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination. Phillipsburg: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1932.

Boykin, John. “The Predestination Principle: A Bible Study.” Evangelical Review of Theology 33:3 (2009): 262-269

Ciocchi, David M. “Suspending The Debate About Divine Sovereignty and Human Freedom.” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 51 (2008): 573-590

Corduan, Winfried. “Divine Sovereignty and Creation.” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009): 1-15.

Enteman, Willard. The Problem of Free Will. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1967.

Evans, Paul. The Moody Handbook of Theology. Chicago: Moody Press, 1989.

Fisk, Samuel. Divine Sovereignty and Human Freedom. Neptune: Loizeaux Brothers, 1973.

Jackson, J. Scott. “Divine Sovereignty in Light of Christ’s Lordship:Karl Barth on the Heidelberg Catechism.” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009): 1-22.

Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christianity. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953

Rescher, Nicholas. Free Will: A Philosophical Reappraisal. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2009.

Rupp, Gordon, and Philip S. Watson. Luther and Eramsmus: Free Will and Salvation. Louisville: Westminister John Knox Press, 1969.

Wright,William A. “Divine Sovereignty: Absolute or Limited by Human Freedom.” Testamentum Imperium: An International Theological Journal 2 (2009): 1-17

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Divine Sovereignty and Human Free Will