'Boethius’ ideas were successfully updated by St Anselm' Discuss(40)
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The Nature of God/Attributes of God
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Oxford A Level Religious Studies for OCR
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How far is it true to claim that it is not necessary to resolve the conflicts between divine attributes.(40)
Have Boethius, Anselm or Swinburne successfully resolved problems connected with God’s attributes and human free will?
‘God can do the logically possible’ Discuss (40)
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‘Boethius’ ideas were successfully updated by St Anselm.’ Do you agree?
(40)
The conflict between divine attributes such as omniscience, omnibenevolence and human
freedom has important consequences. This impacts how and whether we keep faith in a God
who is apparently so full of contradictions. Boethius, a 6th century philosopher, was particularly
concerned about how God’s omniscience may have an impact on our moral freedom. In order
for God to judge us fairly and in order for humans to have free will, Boethius came to the
conclusion that God must have everlasting nature. In the 11th century, St Anselm updated
Boethius' idea of God and proposed the four dimensionalist approach to the timelessness of
God. Through critical analysis, it will become clear that Anselm had not successfully updated
Boethius’s ideas because they both have the same flaws.
Both Boethius and Anselm have failed to resolve the apparent conflict between gods
attributes because they instead encourage the conceptualisation of a God with whom
we cannot form a relationship with. Boethius' timeless understanding of time has been
developed into a four-dimensionalist understanding of time by Anselm. Anselm argued
that the past and future exist in the same way that the present does. Time should be
understood as the fourth dimension alongside height, width and depth. God is in control
of time and space. Understanding the eternity of God as fourth-dimensional means
according to Anselm we do have free will as God can see the free choices that we make
and have made in the past and will make in the future. Thus for both Boethius and
Anselm, we can be held morally responsible for our actions which we choose freely and
which God can see at all times. Nonetheless, understanding God in such a way makes
it very difficult for humans to have a relationship with God. If God was outside time and
was able to be in the future as well as in the past and present it might not be possible to
please or anger God. Additionally, If God can see every decision we can make as the
past and future exist in the same way as the present do, we are not truly autonomous
beings as whatever we will do God will always be aware thus removing any sense of
free will. Boethius and Anselm do not solve the conflict between divine attributes and
human free will; rather, they just complicate matters by creating an impersonal God.
Therefore, Boethius’ ideas have not been successfully updated by St Anselm.
Boethius’ Ideas have not been successfully updated by Anselm as they both envision an
impersonal God who is incapable of reacting to mankind. Boethius presents an incoherent
idea by interpreting God's eternal nature as timeless. Boethius argues that God does
not see past, present and the future in temporal terms as humans do but rather
simultaneously ‘’as though from a lofty peak’’. The fact that God can see us making
those choices, and knows what our future choices and their consequences will be, does
not restrict our freedom to act freely. Ideas of past, present and future work differently
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