<\/p>
Stephen Barr has a fine review of John Polkinghorne\u2019s recent Science and the Trinity <\/i> (Yale) in the May issue of First Things <\/i> . Along the way, he offers some sharp and devastating criticisms of Polkinghorne\u2019s unfortunate acceptance of open theism, which Polkinghorne accepts because, in Barr\u2019s words, it \u201cmakes room for free will, simplifies theodicy, accords with the developmental nature of the world, and makes God\u2019s knowledgte truer to that which is known.\u201d Barr responds: \u201cThe first [argument] was demolished by St. Augustine, who pointed out that God\u2019s knowledge of future acts no more renders them unfree than our own knowledge of past acts renders them unfree. The third and fourth argumentys are based on the fallacy that acts of knowing must partake of the qualities of the things known. (It is not true, for example, that one\u2019s knowledge of smells is smelly, or that one\u2019s knowledge of evil must be evil. No more, it would seem, must knowledge of change be changeable.)\u201d <\/p>\n
Perhaps most devastatingly, Barr (a particle physicist) argues that Polkinghorne adopts this revisionist theology without any pressure at all from science. On the contrary, \u201chis position is open to the objection that it does not square with what physics has learned about the nature of time.\u201d Consciousness, Barr notes, is divisible into past, present, and future, and \u201cNewtonian physics projected this tripartite division onto the whole physical universe.\u201d Einstein, however, showed that \u201cthere is no absolute meaning to the question of what is happening (or coming into being) \u2018now\u2019 throughout the whole universe. And if it is a mistake to project the timeline of our mental states onto the entire universe, it is even less justified to project it onto God, who infinitely transcends the universe.\u201d To speak of \u201cfuture\u201d and \u201cpast\u201d in a global sense is inconsistent with Einstein\u2019s theory, so that Polkinghorne\u2019s construal of God\u2019s relationship to time \u201cimposes upon the world exactly the one-dimensional temporal structure that physics tells us it does not have.\u201d <\/p>\n
Polkinghorne pushes the logic of his open theism to odd directions in Christology and Trinitarian theology. He suggests that there is a \u201ctemporal pole\u201d and an \u201ceternal pole\u201d within the divine nature. When the Son was incarnate, he speculates, \u201cit was the temporal pole of the Second Person that became incarnate,\u201d while \u201cthe eternal pole continued its timeless participation in the divine essence and governance.\u201d This is bizarre, if not simply heretical. He also suggests that the Trinity undermines the doctrine of God\u2019s simplicity, suggesting that the Trinity \u201cindicates a degree of complexity existing eternally within the divine nature.\u201d But, as Barr points out, \u201cthe Trinity does not involve a split within <\/i> the divine nature\u201d but rather each Person \u201cis understood to possess the whole <\/i> divine nature.\u201d <\/p>\n
Barr ends with a compliment to Polkinghorne\u2019s public witness as a Christian and scientist. Given the oddities of Polkinghorne\u2019s theology, I am less than convinced that his witness is entirely to the good. <\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Stephen Barr has a fine review of John Polkinghorne\u2019s recent Science and the Trinity (Yale) in the May issue of First Things . Along the way, he offers some sharp and devastating criticisms of Polkinghorne\u2019s unfortunate acceptance of open theism, which Polkinghorne accepts because, in Barr\u2019s words, it \u201cmakes room for free will, simplifies theodicy, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3021,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science"],"yoast_head":"\n