Many Christians see belief in free will as the foundation in our Theology of 1. the necessity to keep GOD at arm's length from creating evil and 2. for the created person to be able to fulfill GOD's plan for them to love and to worship. So let's take a look at this idea...
Free will:
1. The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.
2. The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.
Religious free will demands that in a situation so serious that the decision self creates both our eternal characters and our eternal relationship with GOD, this decision must to be free of every and any coercion in the least possible way.
Necessary Elements of Free Will:
1. Free will can't be coerced:
1a. Nothing in their created nature could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This implies that they were not created with any moral, intellectual or emotional impulse to seek good or evil. This must include free from all constraints of biology, genetics and family and other social sources.
1b. Nothing in their experience could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This means that nothing that happened to them during their time deciding, (such as experiencing GOD's power and glory or experiencing the proof of the truth of reality), coerced them to choose one way or another.
1c. Nothing in their understanding or knowledge of reality could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This implies that the promises, ideas and arguments of their peers and supposed peers could NOT have any coercive or constraining effect upon their choice but only offer possibilities for their consideration.
In other words, they had to be completely and truly ingenuously innocent.
[Ref: definition of ingenuous: http://www.thefreedi...m/ingenuousness as: 1. Lacking in cunning, guile, worldliness; artless. 2. Openly straightforward or frank; candid.
2. Consequences of the choice must be known but not proved:
2a. The person must understand the full consequences of their choice or it is a guess, not a choice. “What will happen if I choose left or right, the red pill or the blue pill?” must be answered in full detail.
2b. But "PROOF" of the nature of the consequence would compel or coerce the person to choose what was proven to be the best for them. If the answer “death here,” “life there,” was proven, which would you choose? The weight of knowledge would destroy the effect of a true ‘free will’ choice.
Therefore they must know, but without proof, the nature of the consequences of their choice. Such a choice, is described as making a choice based on faith.
Question for discussion:
1. Do these areas of no coercion fully cover all situations so there would be no constraint upon the decisions of a created individual IF they were created and treated in this manner, or is some type of coercion left out?
Peace, Ted
Free will:
1. The power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.
2. The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.
Religious free will demands that in a situation so serious that the decision self creates both our eternal characters and our eternal relationship with GOD, this decision must to be free of every and any coercion in the least possible way.
Necessary Elements of Free Will:
1. Free will can't be coerced:
1a. Nothing in their created nature could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This implies that they were not created with any moral, intellectual or emotional impulse to seek good or evil. This must include free from all constraints of biology, genetics and family and other social sources.
1b. Nothing in their experience could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This means that nothing that happened to them during their time deciding, (such as experiencing GOD's power and glory or experiencing the proof of the truth of reality), coerced them to choose one way or another.
1c. Nothing in their understanding or knowledge of reality could force, coerce or constrain them to choose this or that. This implies that the promises, ideas and arguments of their peers and supposed peers could NOT have any coercive or constraining effect upon their choice but only offer possibilities for their consideration.
In other words, they had to be completely and truly ingenuously innocent.
[Ref: definition of ingenuous: http://www.thefreedi...m/ingenuousness as: 1. Lacking in cunning, guile, worldliness; artless. 2. Openly straightforward or frank; candid.
2. Consequences of the choice must be known but not proved:
2a. The person must understand the full consequences of their choice or it is a guess, not a choice. “What will happen if I choose left or right, the red pill or the blue pill?” must be answered in full detail.
2b. But "PROOF" of the nature of the consequence would compel or coerce the person to choose what was proven to be the best for them. If the answer “death here,” “life there,” was proven, which would you choose? The weight of knowledge would destroy the effect of a true ‘free will’ choice.
Therefore they must know, but without proof, the nature of the consequences of their choice. Such a choice, is described as making a choice based on faith.
Question for discussion:
1. Do these areas of no coercion fully cover all situations so there would be no constraint upon the decisions of a created individual IF they were created and treated in this manner, or is some type of coercion left out?
Peace, Ted
