Questions About Molinism

DR. CRAIG: Hello! This is William Lane Craig. I'm really excited about our spring campaign for strategic partners of Reasonable Faith. We are offering as a free premium two books, Assessing the New Testament Evidence for the Historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus and The Historical Argument for the Resurrection of Jesus, both of which were previously available only in editions that cost literally several hundred dollars apiece. And now, because these books are being reprinted, we're able to offer them free to you for anyone offering a sustaining campaign gift of $75 monthly on an ongoing basis. If you're unable to give that much, we have many other fine premiums at lower levels like $50 a month, $30 a month, but this top award is so extraordinary, so unprecedented given the previously unaffordable and exorbitant price of these books that I really do hope you'll take advantage of it. This is my scholarly work done at the University of Munich on the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection, and I think it will be a real benefit to you if you can get a hold of it. So I hope you'll participate in this year’s spring campaign.

KEVIN HARRIS:

Hello, Dr. Craig. I have a question regarding the application of middle knowledge. Middle knowledge is God’s knowledge of what free creatures would do in various circumstances. But what about the amount of people that God could create? Could this number be infinite? If it is infinite then doesn't that mean that it is very likely, if not certain, that God could create a world in which everyone is saved? The works of Josh Rasmussen provoked me to this question, and my trying to find an answer to this question has been very fruitful which is why I've been led here. I find the Molinist framework very helpful and so deeply desire to defend this concept. Any help here would also be appreciated. God bless, Cayden. United States

DR. CRAIG: What Cayden needs to understand is that it is not part of middle knowledge or Molinism that God could not have created a world in which everybody freely did the right thing or in which everybody is freely saved. That is one of the applications of Molinism that I have personally made to the question of why God did not create a world in which everyone is freely saved. What I suggest is that maybe such a world is not feasible for God. Even though it's possible given the counterfactuals about how people would freely act and the various circumstances they could be in, maybe it's not feasible for God to create a world of universal salvation. If I'm wrong about that, fine. That doesn't affect the theory of middle knowledge in any way. It just means that that application that I've suggested is unsuccessful. But does Cayden give us a good reason here for thinking that my proposal is implausible? I don't think so. I think he is confusing two things. He says that if the amount of people (or the number of people) that God could create is infinite then doesn't that make it very likely that God could have created a world in which everyone would freely be saved? That doesn't follow at all. In having a possible world in which there's an infinite number of people, that doesn't do anything to increase the probability that all of them would freely find salvation. On the contrary, you might think it actually diminishes that. Surely someone would go wrong. But I don't think that's what Cayden is really talking about. I think he's misexpressed it. I think what he's asking is, “Are there an infinite number of feasible worlds each containing a finite number of people which God could have actualized? And if there is an infinite number of such feasible worlds then surely [he's saying] in some of them everyone would have been freely saved.” I'd simply respond that while that's possible logically, there's just no reason to think that that's true. Cayden needs to remember that these counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are contingently true, and it may just happen to be that in the actual world in none of these feasible worlds would there be universal salvation. Or, if there is (say there are worlds with only one or two people in them) that there are other overriding deficiencies of such worlds that make them less preferable to God. So given that it's contingent, I just don't see that there's any way you can say that if there were an infinite number of feasible worlds available to God that in some of them universal salvation would take place. One last point. Cayden needs to keep in mind we're not dealing here simply with random odds. Don't think of this as like throwing dice, and if you throw the dice enough times then any combination is going to come up. We're talking here about free choices of personal agents, and therefore you should not think of these choices as randomly distributed across feasible worlds in the way that, say, the spins of a roulette wheel would be random. Therefore I simply don't think there's any grounds for saying that if there are an infinite number of feasible worlds available to God that there probably are feasible worlds in which universal salvation takes place without any overriding deficiencies.

KEVIN HARRIS: Next question is from Singapore. Victor says,

Hi, Dr. Craig. Your ministry has been such a blessing to me. Thank you for being such a servant of God and serving him with your brilliant mind and gifts. I have a question regarding Molinism. I watched some of your lectures, and you seem to always put emphasis on knowledge of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom must be logically posterior to the divine decree, for if it is logically prior to the divine decree it would make God the author of sin.

DR. CRAIG: Can I interrupt right there? Victor has got it exactly reversed, and I think it's important to get this on the table right away. The Molinist’s claim is that these counterfactuals of freedom (like, “If I were rich, I would buy a Mercedes Benz”) are true logically prior to God's decree to create a world. The Reformed theologian like James White says that, no, these counterfactuals are true only posterior to the divine decree. It is God who decrees the truth value of those propositions. So the question is: Are these counterfactuals about how people would freely choose in various circumstances true prior to God's creative decree and choice of a world, or are they true only subsequent to God's decree and choice of a world? So that's the setup.

KEVIN HARRIS: OK. He says,

My question is: Does it even matter if it's logically prior or posterior? Why can't God carry out the divine decree and then by accessing the knowledge of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom intervene in human affairs thereby putting them in certain circumstances where God's ultimate plan will come to pass? I have trouble seeing why this knowledge of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom must be logically prior to the divine decree. It seems to me whether logically prior or posterior, it doesn't matter. Could you explain this part a little bit more? Thank you, and God bless you.

DR. CRAIG: Sure. I think this is easy to understand. If, prior to his decree to create a world, God has no knowledge at all of how people would freely act in various circumstances then that makes the divine decree blind. It means that God has no idea what's going to result from the divine decree if people have genuine human freedom. God would be utterly shocked, so to speak, posterior to the divine decree to discover all of the things that people would do in various circumstances. So it means that things aren't under his control. They're really quite out of control because God had no idea of what he was decreeing. The decree would be blind unless you say with the Reformed theologian that God determines the truth value of these counterfactuals – that when he decrees to create a world, he decrees this is how the people would decide and act in these various circumstances. My argument is that that then makes God the author of all of the evil and sinful acts that people do in the world because it is God who determines how they would choose in those circumstances. So that means it is God who determined that if Judas were one of the twelve disciples he would betray Christ for thirty pieces of silver, or that if Peter were confronted in the courtyard of the high priest by the servant maid that he would deny Christ three times. It's God who determines that, and that makes God the author of evil and the author of sin.

KEVIN HARRIS:

Hello, Dr. Craig. I've watched with much interest your recent debate with Dr. James White on the problem of evil. I was disappointed to not get a clear position from Dr. White on the core question that was put to him several times. How, on Calvinism, can God not be held accountable for the creaturely moral evil he unilaterally determines? At times Dr. White seemed to at least implicitly bite the bullet and accept this particular outworking of Calvinism. At others he would appeal to creaturely freedom rightly stating that God occasionally restrains or encourages through hardening creaturely moral evil, conveniently omitting that God is the one supposedly having determined it in the first place. That's making the whole biblical view of the human condition some sort of cosmic pantomime. I was however wondering what your own thoughts would be on this specific point particularly given that Molinism also seems to have to answer the same charge albeit with regards to natural rather than moral evil. Which biblical arguments would make this distinction tenable? Considering that God works all things according to the council of his will (Ephesians 1) which verses would you appeal to in order to qualify the “all things” and exclude it from certain kinds of evil but perhaps not others?

Big question!

DR. CRAIG: As I pointed out in the dialogue that we had, I think that Molinism and Calvinism do an equally good job of explaining the natural evil in the world, things like suffering from earthquakes or disease or infirmity. It's with respect to the moral evil – the sinful choices of man – that I think the difference emerges most clearly. Here I would simply appeal to the many verses in the Scripture that indicate that it is not God's will that people should sin and do evil. One verse that I did not quote that I wish I had in the interview is from James chapter 1 when James says, “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted with evil and he himself tempts no one; but each person is tempted when he is led astray by his own desires” (James 1:13-14). So God doesn't tempt people to do evil, much less determine people to do evil. Specifically, the Scriptures also say that God is not willing that any should perish but that all should reach repentance. He desires all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. So if God were unilaterally determining everything, there should be universal salvation. Hell should be empty. But sadly that's not the case. The difference is that human beings have the capacity to resist God's perfect will and therefore to bring evil into the world.

KEVIN HARRIS:

Dear Dr. Craig, I'm curious if we sometimes press this concept too hard – that is, God actively creates every human being. So many of the intellectual struggles with God 's sovereignty and human free will or lack of free will seem to be based on the concept that God is choosing to create every human being one by one knowing many will ultimately be condemned. Am I missing something obvious in Scripture that would prevent the concept that God simply instructed Adam and Eve and then Noah to multiply and fill the Earth but he has now fully turned that process over to humanity? In other words, what if God is allowing the human reproductive process that he initiated but stepped away from to continue producing humans based solely on free will procreation and then he works their subsequent actions toward his goals. If this is feasible, would it alleviate the problem of God choosing to create someone he knows will reject him? Thank you for your consideration, and thank you for all you do. Kyle, United States

DR. CRAIG: I think Kyle's question is interesting, but the motivation behind the question is misconceived. Adopting this hypothesis would do nothing to alleviate the problem of God choosing to create people who he knew would ultimately reject him because even if people are just procreating by their own free will and God isn't specially creating every individual, given his foreknowledge of the future he knows who will reject him and who will freely accept him. So I think we need a theory of providence that I tried to articulate based upon God’s middle knowledge of each person that he creates and how that person would freely respond to God’s grace in the circumstances in which God created him.^[1]