by Tim Black
The following is an email exchange between fellow WTS student Nathan Sasser and myself, begun because Nathan wanted to discuss a lecture given by Dr. Bruce McCormack of Princeton Seminary during a special WTS chapel meeting, Fall 2002. Dr. McCormack is acclaimed as the foremost Barth scholar in the world today. He presented the following argument, in brief:
Nathan asked me what I thought.
In addition to what I said below, I want to add that if McCormack's presentation of Barth is correct, then in fact Barth is not starting from the orthodox doctrine of Christ, as he claims he is. Barth is correct to emphasize that the two natures are not identical at any point in the Person of Christ. But he neglects the biblical teaching that man is created in the image of God, and the implication of scripture that even before He created man, God was of such a metaphysical/epistemological/ethical nature that man's metaphysical/epistemological/ethial nature could be made in accord with God's nature. This accord is partly accomplished by God communicating His communicable attributes to man. Man was originally created in God's image (which includes many immutable communicable attributes, summarized by Van Til as man's being a "covenant personality"); in redemption man is re-created in accord with God's nature (by virtue of the mutable communicable attributes of "knowledge, righteousness, and holiness," cf. Westminster Confession 2.2, 4.2, 6.2, 8.2-3, 8.7-8, 9.2, Larger Catechism 17, 25, 38-40, 57-59, 67, 69, 75, 77, 87, Shorter Catechism 10, 18, 32). (Rom. 8:3-4, 29; 1 Cor. 15:49; 2 Cor. 3:18; Eph. 4:24; Col. 1:15; Col. 3:10; Philippians 2:6-8; James 3:9) This implies that God's nature was eternally capable of being accorded-to by man; Barth appears to deny this.
I'm building on Krabbendam, Sovereignty and Responsibility, which is in Westminster's library.
The emails in the order in which they were written:
First email
Second email
Third email
But the most substantive email is the third one, which for your convenience is found immediately below.
Subject: Re: Being in becoming From: Tim Black To: Nathan Sasser Date: 12-18-2002
Hi Nathan,
I don't mean to sidetrack our discussion here on a minor point...in the end I don't think I am. You've focused on the major ones, and that is utterly cool. : )
My question below is, what is the central thrust of Van Til's critique, focused by his associating a position's error with "metaphysical relativism?" What is wrong with metaphysical relativism? Bahnsen, 702-704, does not give any explanation. The context Van Til is assuming for the discussion is that of Idealism (not primarily Pragmatism; Pragmatism is the immediate opponent, evaluated within VT's broader debate with Idealism in that context), a context with which regrettably I remain too unfamiliar at present. However bold it is to say this, I think this is the only thing I don't understand very well in your and his discussion below.
What metaphysics is VT presenting over against the Pragmatists, and how does that metaphysics also differ from Barth's "being in becoming?" Can you explain? That's a way to focus my question here. I think it is something along the lines of what VT says in the third paragraph of his dissertation's introduction:
"To do this it will be sufficient to take the pivotal conception of God which lies at the basis of all Christian theism and contend that it is the only conception that can offer a possible unity to human experience. The only alternative to belief in this God is scepticism. The course of our argument will be that Idealism beginning with the sanguine expectation of finding complete rationality in experience must slowly give up its high ideal and come around to the Pragmatic camp of thought which regards all attempts at metaphysics as futile. To establish the above argument would be sufficient for our contention were it not that some of the more recent idealists seem to have relinquished the hope of complete rationality and have to that extent already yielded to the Pragmatic position. Hence we shall have to preface our controversy with Idealism with a brief discussion of the Pragmatic conception of thought in order to justify the search for complete unity in experience."
Early in VT's career, his discussion was colored by his apologetic against and within Idealism. Later he worked more within and against the context of neo-orthodoxy, carrying on his earlier anti-Idealism emphases. Your quotes are from the early period. They are found in Christianity and Idealism, and "God and the Absolute," (1955), which appears to be taken from "God and the Absolute," (1930), in which some of the quotes appear as well, and which is derived from his 1927 doctoral dissertation. Though, I can't find the quotes you quoted in his dissertation. Not to be cruel. ; ) But these are the contexts in which to trace this one aspect of VT's discussion within his own life and writings.
I can see that in his dissertation, Idealism represents supposed universality in the field of epistemology, Pragmatism represents supposed particularity. Van Til's critique of each is that neither can hold to its position without assuming the reality of its opposite; Idealism needs particularity in order to survive (its a-priori does not accord with the facts), Pragmatism needs universality (an a-priori from which to begin its reasoning). Pragmatism is the position associated prima facie with metaphysical relativism; Van Til drives Idealism to the same relativism in order to show its internal inconsistency. Metaphysical relativism then is the ground of utter particularity in knowledge? Of irrationality, and equivocism. I think.
I think you're right that VT is unwilling to make God's aseity ("being") interdependent with His interrelation with and action within creation ("becoming"). God is a-se prior to and independent from all interdependence with creation. Note the meta-level/recursive use of aseity there; God's aseity is a-se from creation; returning to the non-meta-level, that is to say, God is UTTERLY independent from creation.
However, I'm not sure whether either Barth or Van Til have in mind here a discussion of the relation between God's eternality/immutability (static being?) and His eternal "activity" (eternal, ad-intra "becoming?") (Cf. Hodge, who says God is eternally active, independent from His interaction with creation.) Barth might.
Ok, here's more of what I would write if I had time....irresponsibility looms
"Being and becoming, being in becoming"
-Simple reference? Philosophical baggage
I'm uncomfortable with the whole discussion using these terms "being and becoming," because too much of the philosophical baggage is assumed, and differing, contradictory, even dialectical definitions are assumed, in the background while using these terms.
The chief divide is between ancient and modern conceptions of being and becoming. In both eras being is associated with the transcendent realm, becoming with the immanent realm. But in the ancient form-matter scheme, being is universal, becoming particular. In the modern Freedom/noumenal-Nature/phenomenal scheme, being is particular, becoming is universal. But the ancient view is also used within the modern view! Grr. And both are dialectical. Oh, my brain.
For Plato and Aristotle, the pure structurality and actuality of the forms is pure being. It organizes and actualizes the pure non-structurality and potentiality of matter, which is pure non-being. Being--actuality--"moves" any subsistent entity from non-being into being. This movement is the process of becoming.
(For the ancients, universality was "good," particularity was "evil." We need the Form.)
For Kant and the moderns, the pure non-structurality (Freedom) of the noumena is given rational structure by the pure structurality (Nature) of the categories of the understanding, as the phenomena manifest the noumena to man's mind, and as man's mind perceives the phenomena and conceives both them and the noumena behind them. The noumena, "things-in-themselves," are entities, essences, beings; they are the entities which have the attributes perceived in the phenomenal realm. The noumena's participation in the world of phenomena, manifesting themselves, and being conceived of by man's mind, is the process of becoming.
(For the moderns, particularity is "good," universality is "evil." We need Freedom.)
In the ancient world, becoming was metaphysical in emphasis. In the modern world, becoming is epistemological in emphasis. But moderns discussing the ancient issue blend the ancient and modern discussions into one.
Idealism mixes the ancient and modern perspectives some. Like the ancients, the Absolute (ideal) is universal, relative to the realm of flux (the real). But like the moderns, the Absolute is also characterized by noumenal freedom--particularity--relative to the scientific laws of the phenomenal realm--universality. In the end I think Van Til following Dooyeweerd is right, that this second, modern emphasis is the more dominant in Idealism. The Absolute is first off transcendent, but becomes increasingly immanent through the process of history. Or better, the two realms become increasingly synthesized from an initial dialectical opposition into a (still dialectical? presumably no, but inescapably, yes) final harmony.
The essential issue in the ancient and modern discussions is the relation between universality and particularity. The secondary issue is the relation between the transcendent realm and the immanent realm, perhaps better reconceived by us Christians as the relation between God and creation. These two issues need to be distinguished, else we too easily fall into either the ancient or modern unbiblical ways of conceiving of the issues. Other issues here are the relations between existence and nonexistence, and the static identity and flux/change/process of being. I am UNWILLING to group and arrange these issues in the ancient arrangement, or in the modern arrangement. Only the biblical arrangement will suffice.
I. Being in Relation ad intra
diagram 1
God: U + P |
Internal to Himself, God is not the "pure being" (universality) of the ancients. He is not the "pure freedom" (particularity) of the moderns. He is universality and particularity, within Himself. We see this in two primary relations, then in many other less immediately obvious relations:
Note that the ontological trinity is primary relative to the economic; thus the ontological is universal relative to the economic. These relations are represented below in diagram 1a. I would argue this is the pattern of orthodoxy.
diagram 1a
U + P : U Ontological | | | | | U + P : P Economic |
Further implications must be drawn out from this, but only outlined here: universality and particularity in the Godhead 1) are (ontologically) equally ultimate, 2) sustain an (economically) ordered relation of priority with universality primary, particularity secondary, and 3) are mutually coextensive, mutually exhaustive, and in all other ways are in perfect harmony with one another. This pattern of 1) equal ultimacy, 2) primacy of universality, and 3) perfect harmony, is the pattern of orthodoxy. There is no biblical doctrine without this pattern at its core.
II. Being in Relation ad extra / in creation
diagram 2
U + P : God | | | | U + P : Creation |
In relation to creation, His transcendent, even a-se existence may not be identified with either pure universality nor with pure particularity! Else we likewise incorrectly define creation as the dialectical opposite. He DOES rationalize all the facts of creation, true; Idealism has an insight there. But He also is the ground, the fountain, of all particularity in creation. Idealism attempts to provide this as well, in the particularity of the noumena, but fails due to the consistently DIALECTICAL nature of its definition of universality and particularity. As such it fails to give the correct ground of universality in creation as well, because God's internal universality is not dialectically defined relative to His internal particularity.
In other words, the relation(s) of universality and particularity in the Godhead is independent from creation, and provides the ground, pattern, source, etc., of the analogous relation(s) of universality and particularity in creation. Creation's universality-particularity relation is derived from God's. This complex of relations is represented by diagram 2 above. I would even argue this in particulars. It is the unity of God's being in His plan and its execution which provides the unity of creation. Likewise it is the diversity and particularity of God's persons in their activity in creation which necessitates and fleshes out the particularity of creation. The second point is harder to argue, but without it the interrelation of the Father's promise, Christ's production, and the Spirit's personalization of salvation, as well as its revelation in scripture (cf. Luke 24), becomes impossible.
III. Being in Relation intra-extra
diagram 3
U + P : U God I. | | | | | > III. U + P : P Creation II. |
The relation between God and creation is also one of universality and particularity. Creation is relatively particular in relation to God, because creation is derived, God is original. But THIS particularity of creation is not to be aligned directly with any and every aspect of universality within God! This particularity of creation contains the universality which God has created within creation. Likewise, creation's internal particularity is particular even in relation to the particularity within God. Diagram 3 above attempts to represent this. E.g., God's (universal) unity of being is not to be placed DIRECTLY relative to the (particular) dependence of creation upon God. It may be related INDIRECTLY, however, by saying that the universality (e.g., unity) within God, as part of the universality of God relative to creation's relative particularity, provides the ground of the particularity which is internal to creation's own internal universality-particularity relations. Notice that diagram 3 manifests the same pattern as found within the trinity, in diagram 1a.
When we construe God as universal relative to creation as particular, however, we need to be careful to maintain the biblical doctrines which distinguish some aspects of the relations found within God (I.) and creation (II.) from the relation between God and creation (III.)--notably, the biblical doctrine that God remains a-se, God existed logically, causally, and temporally prior to creation. E.g., God's unity of being is primary relative to the secondary status of the diversity of His persons, but both are co-eternal. Likewise unity and diversity in creation are co-original within the created context, with unity retaining the primacy. But God's co-eternality between universality and particularity, and creation's derivative co-originality, cannot be found in the relation between God as universal and creation as particular. This is inherent in the meaning of creation's DERIVATIVE status.
The question then arises, are the "being-in-relation" structures described in I., II., and III. fundamentally identical, or fundamentally distinct? I would argue that they are both, without contradiction.
I. Universality and particularity in God are fundamentally identical and fundamentally distinct. Without contradiction. To demonstrate: The persons are the being, the being is the persons; exhaustively. But the being and the persons remain distinct. Each person thus IS the other person, exhaustively. But the persons remain distinct.
II. By virtue of their derivation, universality and particularity in creation are fundamentally identical and fundamentally distinct. They are such because they are the expression, the manifestation, of God's universality-particularity structures. This is GOD'S creation, showing His being, persons, authority and submission, being and attributes, etc.--all of His glory--throughout.
III. Because God's glory is both identified with and distinguished from the glory of this creation--it is His but it is not Him--we must maintain that the relation between God and creation is one of BOTH real identity and real distinction. I do NOT mean that God is His creation. But I DO mean that there exists a real, positive relation of DERIVATION-FROM God, such that there is a real similarity, identity of some sort, between God and creation. Perhaps a word other than "identity" is more appropriate. Man is made in God's image, in His likeness. We think God's thoughts, after Him. We act in accord with His holy actions. Our "new man is created according to God in true righteousness and holiness." (Eph. 4:24) Which is to say that our metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics (being, thinking, and activity) in creation and redemption is made to fundamentally ACCORD with God's metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. Metaphysicians distinguish different kinds of "identity." Here I mean to speak not of numeric (identity of entity), nor of specific identity (identity of kind), but of an identity which exists by virtue of creation's being derived from God with the result that it is sustained in a fundamental accord with Him. I term it "identity" here to show the way in which the relation (III) between God and creation follows the general pattern of the relation between universality and particularity seen in relations I, II (above), and IV (below).
As such, the Creator-creature distinction is correct, but does not deny a real, fundamental, relation of DERIVATION or ACCORD between God and creation. I believe I am not attempting to emphasize here anything that goes beyond Van Til's doctrine of analogy.
IV. As such, then, the "being-in-relation" structures of I., II., and III. must be seen to be fundamentally the same, with some real, and fundamental distinction as well. The nature of all their interrelations? Oh my, that's too wonderful for me at the present. I think I'll remain silent. I will not attempt to explain the depths of ANY universality-particularity relation, because I do not believe God has enabled man to do so. But I will trace the structure of that relation wherever it appears, and it appears to appear everywhere. Even, as this number "IV." indicates, as we attempt to ascend to meta-levels of abstraction. In other words, I am both admitting and denying an infinite regress here. On the one hand, yes, you can abstract this discussion to infinitely higher levels, always positing a universality-particularity relation at that level, and between levels. This is an infinite regress. But I maintain that for the mind of man, the relation, at whatever level accessible to man, remains the same. It is not a vicious regress (as in Aristotle's "third-man" problem with Plato). Rather, it confirms the pervasiveness of the structure. Anyway.
What the sinful mind of man seeks to do is to go beyond merely recognizing and tracing this structure; it attempts to explain HOW equal ultimacy, the primacy of universality, and perfect harmony are possible. But as such, while truly dealing with this structure, it has already denied this structure.
On the basis of the universality within the relation between God and man (in His image!), man sinfully seeks to deny the particularity of the real distinction between God and man (man is created!). But God is not a man, and not like a man; His thoughts and ways are higher than ours; ours are derivative from His. Man cannot understand this structure in the way God can. Something always remains mysteriously unexplained in the relation between universality and particularity. Man sinfully desires to be like God, knowing good and evil. In being, knowing, and acting. But God is exalted above all creation.
Likewise, on the basis of the particularity within the relation between God and man (man is particular and distinct from God), man presumes by denying the universality of his fundamental connection to, his derivation and dependence upon, God. God is not here, He does not know, He will not do. Man is here, man knows, man can do. But then man hears God walking in the Garden, he fears God's knowledge, he hides from God's punishment. But then God comes with salvation, revealing it in Christ, applying it by His Holy Spirit.
Man's conquest of universality and flight to particularity in his relation to God are both a rebellion against God. Both are denials of the equal ultimacy of universality and particularity. Both are denials of the relation of primacy between universality and particularity. Both are denials of the perfect harmony between universality and particularity. I suppose this could be explained at a later point.
The specific nature of this denial is that it is replaced with a dialectical structure. Universality and particularity are defined to simultaneously mutually presuppose and mutually exclude each other, such that perfect harmony is replaced by perpetual war. Equal ultimacy holds that both universality and particularity are equally real, present, original. Dialecticism attempts to maintain equal ultimacy in regard to the mutual presupposition between universality and particularity, but cannot maintain equal ultimacy due to the simultaneous mutual exclusion. Likewise, dialecticism attempts to maintain the relation of primacy between universality and particularity by emphasizing mutual exclusion between them, but fails because the mutual exclusion seeks to destroy the one pole or the other (u or p), and because the mutual presupposition seeks to destroy all distinction between the two poles.
I am not sure this parallel is precise, represented in the parallel between a) and b) in diagram 4. In other words, mutual presupposition may not be precisely parallel to equal ultimacy (as its denial), and mutual exclusion may not be precisely parallel to an order of primacy. Harmony and disharmony here are precisely parallel. However, mutual presupposition does seem to absolutize the universality, and mutual exclusion does seem to absolutize the particularity, of the relation between universality and particularity; on those points a) and b) are parallel as well.
diagram 4
a) Orthodoxy U + P : U Equal Ultimacy (Ontological) | | | | | U + P : P Order of primacy (Economic) \ / Harmony b) Dialecticism U + P : U Mutual Presupposition (Ontological?) | | | | | U + P : P Mutual Exclusion (Economic?) \ / Disharmony |
Barth, Bultmann, Heidegger, et. al. have helped us clarify more precisely what the nature of the unbeliever's opposition to orthodoxy is. However, they sadly claim that unbelief is orthodoxy. Van Til happily turns their world upside down, or rather back to right-side-up from a Christian perspective.
For Barth, yes, God is transcendent, but that transcendence is defined only in relation to His immanence; they are eternal correlates of one another. God is His revelation. God's transcendent being is in His immanent becoming. Transcendence and immanence are identical. Mutual presupposition.
But God is also wholly other. His transcendence transcends immanence. It is other than immanence. It is opposed to His immanence. The noumenal and phenomenal, being and becoming, God and scripture, are fundamentally distinct, but further, in absolute opposition to one another. Else could they still be distinct? Mutual exclusion.
(Note first that Barth is thoroughly Kantian in the coloring of his distinctions, however much McCormack claims Barth's content is intentionally biblical. I haven't demonstrated this here.)
God's transcendence both is and is not His immanence, utterly.
To this point I have described Barth so that the line between him and orthodoxy is difficult to discern. I am doing this to show how we in orthodoxy also need to be able to say that universality and particularity (at least in God and creation, I. and II.) are fully identical and fully distinct. But is their relation characterized by HARMONY or DISHARMONY? Orthodoxy claims harmony, Barth, with dialecticism, claims disharmony. Tension, contradiction, paradox, angst, between universality and particularity are the hallmarks of dialecticism. Harmony, non-contradiction, mystery, worship, in the relation between universality and particularity are the hallmarks of orthodoxy.
For Barth, then, God's transcendence and immanence are opposed to one another. For God, they are not. For Barth, God's universality and particularity both do and do not cancel each other out. For God, they do not.
Fundamentally, dialecticism identifies the fundamental battle between God and evil with the fundamental relation between universality and particularity. Scripture does not. It distinguishes them, affirming the goodness of universality and particularity in God and the original creation, and condemning the evil perversions of them BOTH in man's sin and its outworkings.
> So the difference maybe between the dialectic and between the equal ultimacy of the one and the many is that the dialectic is willing to say that they actually cancel each other out and do not cancel each other out. We affirm that they do not, and deny that they do. So God does transcend history, and does act in history. God is a unity and a plurality; Barth would say probably that his unity both does and does not cancel out his plurality.
Yeah, with a few qualifications above. ; )
--Tim
... yeah, so much for a simple, brief, and clear response. Sorry. Help me out here with the identity between God and creation. I think I'm in agreement with VT. But.....I'm worried. shiver
Nathan, you are so cool.
I am not utterly alone. The truth is out there.
I agree VERY much with what you wrote here. I'll give you what I hope will be a simple, brief, and clear reply, point by point, in a day or two. But for now, could you explain one thing to me...I'm not sure what Van Til means by "relativism" in the quotes below. Could you give me a hint? Here are some options:
1. There are no absolute truths. A contemporary definition of the term, but not quite Van Til's in this context, it seems. "The abyss of the unrelated?" Hm...but now that I read Bahnsen, 702-4, some of this dfn. is involved.
2. Correlativity. (Interrelatedness?) Between the one and many, universals and particulars, being and becoming (ancient: form and matter; modern: noumenal and phenomenal), transcendent and immanent, absolute and relative, etc. But a dialectical or equally-ultimate correlativity?
3. Identity of being between God and man/creation. Denial of the Creator-creature distinction. The opposite of (epistemological) equivocism's metaphysical ground; the ground of univocism. But this hardly sounds like "relativism." Except in the context of a dialectic, then everything goes.
4. Idealism's "real" realm of facts? The immanent, this-worldly world of human thought, phenomena, process, relativity rather than absoluteness. Over against the transcendent "ideal" realm of God and/or the Absolute? This is closer to dfn. 1.
If I can get what VT is saying is evil, I can get what he is saying is good.
Well, talk with you later.
In Christ,
Tim
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Original Message <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
On 12/16/2002, 7:30:47 AM, "maddog " maddog@mischiefdesigns.com wrote regarding being in becoming:
> so i was just settin here thinkin about this phrase from that the barth lecture and how you wanted to talk about it and i was thinkin... well maybe i'm gettin the details confused. this is how it was runnin in my mind.
> Revelation has its being in becoming.
> Revelation is not distinct from God but God is essentially his revelation.
> So God has his being in becoming. ???
> Since Becoming is temporal, it seems like God's aseity and eternality is compromised. If he cannot define himself and say who he is without regard to temporality.
> Barth would reply that the relationship between being and becoming is dialectically related, that is, both require one another and both cancel one another out.
> Orthodoxy disagrees that they both require one another. God's being precedes all becoming. Although being and becoming are correlative terms for man, they are not for God. We cannot define being and becoming without referring to the other, but that does not mean that God cannot. So we may state unequivocally, analogically, that God's being is absolute, while he acts in the sphere of becoming without compromising his eternality and aseity.
> Barth states everything equivocally, confusing this with analogy, because he goes so far as to say that God's being is and is not compromised by his becoming. But to say that God's being is cancelled out by his becoming assumes that terms that are correlative for man must be correlative for God. So this fellow who is supposedly trying to maintain God's entire otherness ends up by eliminating the Creator-creature distinction. He makes temporality/plurality ultimate and lands in metaphysical relativism.
> Van Til says of the Pragmatists in his doctoral thesis that they do the same thing: "They constantly tell me what can and cannot be. They tell me, for example, that the very terms 'relative' and absolute' are correlatives so that it is impossible for us to think of God otherwise than a correlative to man. THis is but one example of the commonest form in which the assumption that all categories of thinking are the same for God and man is stated. The assumption underlying this is once more that of metaphysical relativism. Only upon the basis of this assumption can you maintain that all categories of thinking are the same for God and man and therefore conclude that the correlativity for us of such terms as 'absolute' and 'relative,' necessarily implies the correlativity of these terms for God..."
> "I do not close my eyes to difficulties as they center about God's relation to his temporally created world, but I have yet to find a solution of these difficulties that does not begin by dissolving one of the terms to be related, that does not begin by assuming metaphysical relativism. Is it hard to believe in God? It is far harder not to believe in him."
> So the difference maybe between the dialectic and between the equal ultimacy of the one and the many is that the dialectic is willing to say that they actually cancel each other out and do not cancel each other out. We affirm that they do not, and deny that they do. So God does transcend history, and does act in history. God is a unity and a plurality; Barth would say probably that his unity both does and does not cancel out his plurality.
> what do you think.
> nnnnnnnnnn
> --
> "The easy possibility of letter-writing must--seen merely theoretically--have brought into the world a terrible disintegration of souls. It is, in fact, an intercourse with ghosts, and not only with the ghost of the recipient but also with one's own ghost which develops between the lines of the letter one is writing..."
> -kafka
> --