I need to come back to this for [[The Mechanics of Will]]. ## A Corrected Middle Knowledge Preface, I am a 5 point calvinist. I think Heiser is closer to right about middle knowledge than WLC. God does know the answer to every if. The classical understanding of middle knowledge is that there is an actual world where something that went against God’s predetermined plan could happen. I think this doesn’t account for every sparrow falling in the Lord’s time. What I’ve been thinking about lately is a funny relation to quantum physics. This is not me saying that quantum physics is how God governs the universe. There are two schools of thought in quantum physics: 1. The many-worlds interpretation - That for every possibility, there is an actual-factual universe to house that possibility. 2. The superposition interpretation - That reality has infinite possible states, but we live in the actualized state based on the necessary mechanics. I would say that the classical understanding of middle knowledge is equivalent to the many-worlds interpretation, and God had to write His plan and rewrite His plan based on the choices of every human ever born. The truth is that God understands how the world’s systems(including man’s heart) works so deeply, that He doesn’t need to base His plan around our choices, our will is pulled to follow His choices. Genesis 50:20 (NASB20) “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to keep many people alive. So, of course God understands “what would happen if”, in the same way we can forecast the weather so poorly. He is a far better weatherman for every circumstance and system. ### Comment Threads #### Stephen Gothard: > Micah Alexander Longmire Preface, I’m not presently committed to a particular view within general orthodoxy and reformational consensus. > When you say that classical middle knowledge holds that “other worlds” are “actual” and not hypothetical - is there something you read that talks about either Luis de Molina or WLC holding to this? I’ve heard WLC refer to God’s knowledge of possible worlds as a “heuristic device” rather than the worlds being actual. I don’t recall ever reading something that led me to think Molina held to other worlds being actual rather than hypothetical. I largely agree with what I’m seeing in your post, just not sure about that one point. > Additionally, in response to JD’s thoughts above, I’ve found the distinction in “metaphysical possibility” and “logical possibility” to be helpful. I can’t see how conceiving of God having knowledge of *logically possible* worlds, and this knowledge being present in decreeing/creating, infringes on Divine simplicity at all. In fact, to deny it would likely cause problems for omniscience. If the argument were about true metaphysically possible worlds, then sure, I think this would maybe cause problems for divine simplicity. But acknowledging the relevance of God’s knowledge of all logical possibilities in His providence should be accounted for. > I think Terrence Tiessen’s paper on “Why Calvinists should embrace middle knowledge but reject Molinism” addresses this point. > Also Bruce Ware addresses this some in God’s Greater Glory. ##### My Response: > Stephen Gothard Thank you for the comprehensive response! > This started as a response to Heiser’s chapter on predestination and free will in The Sacred Realm which is summarized here: https://drmsh.com/predestination-and-free-will-a-summary-of-the-naked-bibles-position/ > It is very clearly borrowing from middle knowledge in its use of “possibilities” in point one, and it made me think for a while on how to understand a world that has possibilities and a God that knows the best possible for the purposes of His glory. > When I say other worlds, I am speaking of them in the same metaphor as the many-worlds interpretation. That the possibilities represented are “real potential possibilities” as opposed to “logical possibilities”. > My metaphor is saying that it is untrue to think of any possibility that has not occurred as ever having been real and possible. It is also untrue to think of future possibilities that have not occurred to be real if they are not in agreement with the predestined plan of God. > > I need to do some more research into WLC’s view(you’ll find little online). I’ll admit that all that I’ve heard of WLC is that he agrees with Molina. I disagree thoroughly with WLC(if he holds to Molina’s proofs) and Molina in this: > > The Fourth Proof of Middle Knowledge: God Predestines According to His Middle Knowledge. > > “God knows all the things that are possible with respect to the free acts of his creatures, and he knows this before he decides to create any of them. This knowledge is called middle, because it is in between the knowledge of simple intelligence and the knowledge of vision." > - Molina > In this definition of middle knowledge, I am inclined to agree. The problem comes when molinists use this middle knowledge as a logical decider for how God carries out or orchestrated His plan. By chaining God’s decision making to possibilities, they become more potential than logical. I think that goes against the eternality of God’s decision making and therefore puts Him in time. I have the same problem with infralapsarianism and supralapsarianism. > > His awareness of our actions within the plan did not halt Him one bit in deciding how the plan would be carried out. He made decisions as the Potter, the clay molded into place. > > I would like to read those sources soon, and I will try! Putting them on the list near the top. #### Scott Bailey: > If I may blunt, Micah Alexander Longmire, so what is the point of your rumination here? What is the impact on your faith? How does it affect how you live out God's power and righteousness? It can be fun to speculate on the infinite God and try to understand him as much as our finite understanding allows. At the same time, we can get too caught up in trying to describe that which is beyond our comprehension. > > I do agree that God does know the what-ifs..I would even go do far as to say God plays them out more than we know. As you seem to suggest, God can do so without changing his overarching plan. Not being a Calvinist, I don't believe God micromanager every detail of our lives in his plan. He can (and does) step in when he wants to. And he allows us great freedom to choose. That freedom does not interfere with his overarching plan nor limit his sovereignty. ##### My Response: > Scott Bailey It has no impact on my faith aside from meditating on the mind of Lord. > > I just thought it might be a good metaphor in understanding middle knowledge in a way that doesn’t attempt to bind the uncontainable God to the wills of men. > > Romans 11:33-36 (NASB20) 33 Oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! 34 For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, OR WHO BECAME HIS COUNSELOR? 35 Or WHO HAS FIRST GIVEN TO HIM, THAT IT WOULD BE PAID BACK TO HIM? 36 For from Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. #### JD Longmire: > God does not deal in “what if” - He is sovereign and decrees the beginning and the end without consideration for possibilities. He only uses “if” to illustrate our insufficiencies, never to propose His will is alterable. ##### My Response: > JD Longmire Exactly, but He is aware of all possibilities. Only one reality exists. We can predict terribly, He can predict perfectly. #### JD Longmire's Response: > Micah Alexander Longmire ugh - “possibilities” is anthropomorphic. God does not consider “possibilities” as a component of His will. When He says “if”, it is only a concession to our weakness and temporality. Paul nails it when he says “if it were possible” ##### My Response: > JD Longmire I am saying that God is eternal and omniscient. That’s hardly anthropomorphic. I am saying that in order to understand God’s view on reality, it is not heretical to say that He has an awareness of possibility, because while He is timeless, He also has created a plan that occurs in time. So He is fully aware of all occurrences within time. Not only is He aware of all occurrences in time, He has predestined events to take place. So He is aware of how the agency of men’s will occurs in His plan. With 2 men in a room, the number of choices is pretty calculable. With 10, it becomes very hard to follow. He is aware of the infinite potential choices men make, and He has not only accounted for them, He has actualized a reality where He is most glorified with men’s will as His means. > > What we are wrestling with is not God making infinite choices, because He did not, but the way He accounts for ours. #### JD Longmire's Response: > Micah Alexander Longmire by forcing the accounting of “possible” actions on a meticulously sovereign God, you are squeezing God into a human perspective. He actualized the only reality, the singular plan that He decided in advance. IOW - He didn’t consider many patterns for His tapestry - He designed it and made it without consideration for anything other than maximizing the glory of the Godhead. It is a singularity. > Micah Alexander Longmire by forcing the accounting of “possible” actions on a meticulously sovereign God, you are squeezing God into a human perspective. He actualized the only reality, the singular plan that He decided in advance. IOW - He didn’t consider many patterns for His tapestry - He designed it and made it without consideration for anything other than maximizing the glory of the Godhead. It is a singularity. > Man’s choices are not infinite - they are fixed based on our nature. We choose to glorify God or not in our decisions - 1 or 0 - God accounted for the binary decisions. Baseline, it’s all 0. Simple. > Micah Alexander Longmire read up on antinomy as it relates to God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility - here is a good place to start: https://www.ligonier.org/learn/qas/how-is-gods-sovereignty-compatible-with-mans-responsibility-in-salvation ##### My Response: > JD Longmire I actually hadn’t heard of an antinomy, adding that one to the lexicon. However, I know that this is an apparent paradox, so that doesn’t change what I understand about this. I don’t think you’re seeing what I’m seeing. > > I use this passage from the article almost everyday it seems when trying to rationalize predestination to my guys: > > “Paul says in Philippians, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12–13. Clearly, there is something called “divine sovereignty” and there is something called “human free agency.” We’re not robots. We’re not automatons. We are responsible creatures who make moral choices. We don’t have free will in the sense that you can choose all the good that’s out there. We are, by nature, totally depraved, but we do have free agency for which we are morally responsible. > > You say that I am forcing God to account for possibilities. I am not. I am saying that He is aware of them. Classical molinism says that God has to account for them in predestination, and I thoroughly disagree with them. What I am saying is that God has a reasoning for every action He has taken or will take, and if we questioned Him on why, He would be able to give us a million reasons why and why not, but the primary is that “I said so.” > > All I am saying is that God can answer any what-if with infinite comprehension. I am not saying He went through an infinite list of what-if’s when calculating and writing His predetermined plan. #### July Lyons: > What arguments are there against this view?: God is outside of time. He doesn't need to what-if because He has equal awareness of all moments, unlike us who experience them in sequential progression as if our story started at a beginning. It's just as true to see our individual story and the story of the world as winding out backwards from an end-without-end that has already occurred in God's awareness. ##### My Response: > Judy Lyons Most reformed people are in disagreement with this view, due to a disagreement in presupposition with the concept of middle knowledge. > > I am saying that middle knowledge as it is currently known is false, but there is a way to understand it that is not in contradiction with the predetermined plan of God. > > I am in agreement, however, we also must acknowledge the fact that God has awareness of potentialities that have not occurred. David wearing the ephod. > > 1 Corinthians 2:8 (NASB20) the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age has understood; for if they had understood it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory; > > Middle knowledge is the answer to the ifs. There are no if’s, because God accounted for all of them in His original plan. #### John Pritchett: > I don't know what the wlc is but I do know that I serve a God who is Omniscient Omnipotent and omnipresent. I believe we have free will to do whatever we want but God is capable of seeing every possible decision and the outcome of said decision so while I believe God chooses not to know what decision we will make he does already know every possible outcome of any decision. So he doesn't rewrite anything because all creation speaks to his Glory and all things work out according to his will in the end. ##### My Response: > John Pritchett William Lane Craig, he’s a molinist. > > We do not have free will, but I agree with your last sentence because we do not have free will. Soli Deo Gloria. #### Jack Vaught's Response: > Micah Alexander Longmire actually, I think John nailed free will when he writes, “we have free will to do whatever we want.” This is the Calvinistic interpretation of free will called compatiblism. It states that we are free to act in accord with our greatest desire (want), & this is what we always do. Granted our desires are based on our nature, whether the sin nature we are born with or the new nature we are born again with. > > For an excellent treatment on the subject, check out Scott Christensen’s book, “What About Free Will?” ##### My Response: > Jack Faught True. The only problem is that our will is in bondage to our greatest desire, therefore, not free. > > A la, Romans 6:5-14 #### Jack Vaught's Response: > Micah Alexander Longmire I see what you’re saying. But it could also be said that it is a willing bondage in either case. We willfully submit to sin as slaves or we willfully submit to Christ as slaves (Jn 8:34; 2 Pt 2:19; Rom. 6:16-18). And if the Bible calls Christians free, we can comfortably use the language as well (Jn 8:36; Rom 6:22). ##### My Response: > Jack Faught Once we are in Christ, we are free indeed, but we are spurred along by the Spirit. I mainly talk about free will in the sense of the Augustinian 4 states of man. > > We as Christians now have the ability not to sin or to sin, but pre-salvation, we would be dead in sin, and therefore in bondage to it. > > I think of Philippians 2:12-13 when I say this. #### Jack Vaught's Response: > Micah Alexander Longmire that’s good. I appreciate your distinctions. The four states of man are also helpful for thinking on this subject. And Philippians 2 provides a great balance of our responsibility within the framework of God’s sovereign grace. # A Summary of My View From My Original Post and the Responses: - God is omniscient and knows every possible outcome of our choices. - He doesn't need to rewrite His plan based on our choices, as our will follows His. - God's understanding of the world's systems is so deep that He can perfectly predict outcomes. - While humans have free will, it is in bondage to their greatest desire; we are either slaves to sin or slaves to Christ. - Classical understanding of middle knowledge incorrectly suggests that there are alternate realities where things could go against God's plan. I propose that there are only possibilities within the actualized reality determined by God. - By creating a predetermined plan, God has accounted for all possibilities. There are no 'what ifs', because God accounted for them in His original plan. - This view does not limit man's free agency or responsibility, but rather highlights the perfect knowledge and sovereignty of God. - Middle knowledge should not be seen as a decision-making tool for God but as a testament to His infinite comprehension and predestined plan.