AUGUSTINE THEODICY Flashcards
(15 cards)
What is Natural Theology ?
a person uses their own capacities to attempt to know and understand God
What does Hick say about God ?
John Hick’s soul-making theodicy is an example of universalism. Hick argues that our purpose in life is spiritual development – the end goal of which is to freely choose to follow in God’s ways and reconcile with Him. Hick argues that it would be a logical contradiction of God’s omnibenevolence for God to allow anyone to suffer forever. As such, Hick sees hell as a temporary place where we continue to exercise our free will until we change. This might take some people a very long time, but ultimately everyone will necessarily learn to choose good, escape hell, and reach heaven.
What is Revealed Theology ?
When people look to scriptures and biblical texts to turn and acknowledge God
What did Calvin argue ?
Calvin rejected free will and argued that God has control over everything, including our actions and spiritual destiny. This led Calvin to the conclusion of double predestination: God created some people to go to heaven and created some people to be sent to hell.
What is limited election ?
Is the view that God has chosen only some people to go to heaven but not others – that there’s a limited number of places.
What is unlimited election ?
Unlimited election is the view that everyone can go to heaven but that it’s possible (in theory) that some people may not due to their choices in life.
What did Karl Barth argue ?
arguing that the fall corrupted human nature so badly that we can only know of God through revealed theology. Barth argued that conscience is a result of God’s grace. In other words, we know right from wrong not because we work it out ourselves through natural methods, but because God reveals it to us.
What did Pelagius argue about the fall ?
Pelagius argued that human nature is not inherently damaged by the fall and that it is possible – at least theoretically, though not really in practice – for a human to be sinless
- impossible to be seminally present in adam
What did Pelagius argue about gods grace ?
Pelagius argued that God’s grace helps people know good from bad, but that humans ultimately have free will to choose their actions.
What did Pelagius say about free will ?
Pelagius believed in free will and argued that we are not born sinners but instead become sinners when we choose to sin
What did Augustine argue about the fall ?
Cupiditas and caritas
-We are all seminally present in Adam
-Undivided will ( need to do good but never the action)
-All doomed to evil no matter what
- Pay for Adams sins
What is Concupiscence ?
Rebellion towards God
What did Augustine argue in response to Pelagius ?
Saying it downplays God’s grace and leads to arrogance. Scriptural support for Augustinianism can be found in Ephesians 2:8-9, which says: “For by grace are you saved through faith- revealed theology
What are some strengths of Augustines theory ?
- Supporting evidence from church and emperical evidence in the world
- Privation makes sense and emphasises the ultimate goodness of god. Philosopher Herbert Mccabe used the analogy of a bad deckchair and bad grape showing how the deckchair falling isnt as bad as the grape
-Supports idea that privation means something is bad because it has fallen ill of our expectations, Augustines theory is internally coherent- evil means we have fallen short of expectation, not god.
What are some weaknesses of Augustines theory ?
- Requires a reading of genesis which is not always accepted by christians and evolution challenges Augustine theory- emperical evidence and can highlight that we are moving towards perfection, not the other way around.
- Augustines arguement suffers from a logical fallacy since it does not satisfy the problem of evil. Why would an omnibenevolent God doom us to evil and and excuse ourselves from sin ?
-If we were all made in the image of god, why cant we reach perfection ?
