I just don’t get Calvinists
Is Al Mohler a deterministic Calvinist? It does not seem so: So . . . Why Did I Write This? The Delusion of Determinism where he is responding to Free Will vs. the Programmed Brain.
As a matter of fact, this capacity and accountability is rooted in the biblical concept of the imago Dei — the image of God. Our Creator made us as moral creatures and planted within us the capacity of conscience. All this refutes the concept of moral determinism.
I’ve heard that rhetoric before, yet doesn’t Calvinism subscribe to moral determinism?1
Update: Tom corrected me on Calvinists describing themselves as (hard) determinists. They subscribe to compatibilist soft determinism. For more on this, see parableman’s posts on this topic:
I myself subscribe to incompatibilist libertarianism, which Jeremy (and I assume Calvinists in general) rejects in favor of compatibilist soft determinism.
- This is where I get the Calvinists to do my homework for me. [↩]
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Comments
Yeah, I think you’re right Tom. I just don’t see how Compatibilism works either. I do remember hearing that now. Question - the people that are described as hyper-Calvinists, are they full fledged determinists? If God is really sov, then he is sov over absolutely everything.
I think classical Calvinism affirms God’s absolute sovereignty as well. I don’t know if hyper-Calvinists are Compatibilists or not. I would assume they are - but I can’t confirm that.
Compatibilists are no less dedicated to determinism than Determinists are. They just think Determinism is compatible with Free Will - though, of course, they have to define Free Will differently than Libertarians do to maintain their position…and that’s where the crux of the debate occurs.
I am not in “deep thinking” mode, but the compatibilist position just does not make sense to me at all and I got my mind on other things to get to heady into it.
The compatibilist argues that God is primary cause of everything. But the secondary (and thus responsible) cause is human action. God has not violated human freedom so long as the human acts in accordance with their own desires AND could have acted differently had they desired to.
Now, God determines the desire and humans act upon that desire. Therefore, human freedom is not violated. Furthermore, had God determined a different desire, the human could have chosen that as well.
I disagree entirely with this view, but this is (in short)Â Compatibilistic freedom.
Honzo,
Have you read Johnathan Edwards Freedom of the Will? It is the book that we Calvinists point to for a definition of compatibilistic freedom. Edwards really gets into free will there. I haven’t been able to finish it because of all that I am required to read elsewhere (Greek and Hebrew grammar, seminary textbooks, Captain America [that last one is a joke] etc.). Read Edwards’ arguments and see what you think of compatibilism then. May be it at least might help understand the thinking.
[...] the issue of Free Will. Over at Theology for the Masses, Honzo wrote the following post entitled I just don’t get Calvinists. There he wrestles with the compatablist view of free will that Calvinism holds to. This that [...]
I’m not sure what you mean by “moral determinism,” but Calvinists aren’t Philosophical determinist - they’re Compatibilists. Thus, Mohler (and all Calvinists) can speak of free will, while at the same time believe that God determined all things. I don’t think it really works, in the end, but that’s at least what they say.