Reply to Drew Sparks

I did an informal book review of Jeffrey Johnson’s (of Free Grace, Grace Bible Theological Seminary) book “The Revealed God” posted on YouTube. 

https://youtu.be/YrajHBFhLIg?si=MNsKZ8dH67fpy1SH

I just skimmed Drew Sparks (of Ivy Tech Community College and IRBS) review of the same book. 

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5fbbe68e004e8f7a2365ec17/t/67a6374633b61b095673455d/1738946374950/2024.JIRBS.review.article.In+Defense+of+Classical+Theism.final.pdf

Sparks raises some issues worth exploring more. He believes necessitarianism in the form of a modal collapse does not logically follow from a robust doctrine of divine simplicity (construed as numerical identity) with the proper metaphysical distinction of hypothetical necessity. He thinks nothing about creation is essential to God to be God. This is a great opportunity for further analysis. Sparks assumes all change is necessarily extrinsic to God such that it could never be intrinsic to God. This is under the assumption of absolute immutability. So if God goes from a state of eternally existing solitarily as triune without creation to a state of creating existing with creation. But this is in question—what is the nature of change in creating. Generally, extrinsic change is explained by intrinsic change. A specific effect is explained by the properties and powers of its cause. If the properties or powers were different of a cause then the effect could be different. But to posit a cause that could never change that can produce different effects is explanatorily vacuous. Moreover, if divine cognition affirms both necessary and contingent knowledge. The contingent knowledge God possesses of the actual world would be different if God created a different world. If such a state of affairs is logically possible then there must be a tight relation between intrinsic and extrinsic change. Demonstrating change must be intrinsic to ground extrinsic change. But if God is necessarily and absolutely the immutable eternal creator then God modally cannot do other than God does as God. There is no possible world in which God eternally refrains from creation nor is there a possible world in which God creates a different world than the actual world least God cease to be necessarily and absolutely the immutable eternal creator. Ah but God can produce different effects while remaining necessarily and absolutely the immutable eternal creator. Well this seems to beg the question on the nature of change. It assumes change is extrinsic. But even if change is extrinsic there is no possible world in which God does not create in order for God to be the immutable and eternal creator. God must create to be the eternal creator. Creation as contingent does not logically preclude eternal co-existence with God which is problematic. Sparks says it’s an asymmetrical dependence relation between God the creator and creation. Creation depends on God for its existence while God does not depend upon creation for God’s existence. This is true if God is not necessarily and essentially the immutable creator. But if God is necessarily (logically/metaphysically) and essentially the immutable eternal creator then there is a mutual dependence of some sort (with intrinsic/extrinsic change?) that explains precisely how God is necessarily and essentially the immutable eternal creator. Perhaps the diffusion principle in Plato and Jonathan Edwards would apply here. 

Sparks says the Trinity is consistent with divine simplicity. He does not provide a coherent and consistent model of the Trinity.  I could not help but think what he says would make the Trinity logically impossible. How would Sparks deal with the logical problem of the Trinity with divine simplicity? Often this is simply sidestepped by appeals to mysterianism with the analogia entis—God being beyond being. But this welcomes paradox without any solution to the logical problem. At least Johnson, following Scotus, gives us tools such as the formal distinction to overcome the logical problem. Sparks explains the divine persons are conceptually distinct of the divine substance. Anselm says this is impossible for divine simplicity because conceptual distinctions must be grounded in extramental distinctions. Are the divine persons extramentally distinct of the divine substance? If not, then the processional relations (generation and spiration) are not ontologically distinct. In which case, there are no ontic grounds for individuation.  I see relations/modes can individuate very thinly, if any, given simplicity as numerical identity. In fact, Trinitarian divine cognition and knowledge seems to contradict divine simplicity as numerical identity. The divine persons of the Trinity seem to have distinct self-knowledge, de re beliefs or mental tokens, perhaps better characterized as a first-person perspective, that is unaccounted for by Thomistic simplicity. Scott Williams single mental token shared by the persons doesn’t seem enough. 

Is God the divine persons or the divine substance? Is God properly numerically identical to the divine substance of the three divine persons or is God numerically identical to the three divine persons of the divine substance? Often the latter is specified as God is the Father eternally begetting the Son and through the Son, spirating the Spirit. All three divine persons are essential to the definition of God as a concrete divine substance. If this is the case, then the logical problem of the Trinity must be solved with divine simplicity. But divine simplicity compounds the logical problem of the Trinity not solve it. If the divine substance is both concrete and numerically identical to the three divine subsistences/persons and the three divine subsistences/persons are numerically identical to the divine substance. But a divine subsistence/person is not numerically identical to the three divine subsistences/persons. If a divine subsistence/person is not numerically identical to the three divine subsistences/persons then a divine subsistence/person is not numerically identical to the divine substance. Perhaps this can be illustrated further. Is the Father all of who and what God is exhaustively? If you say yes then you deny the Trinity. If you say no, then you deny simplicity. The point is a concrete divine person/subsistence/mode is not the whole divine Trinity/three subsistences/persons.

Sparks thinks a denial of Thomas’s doctrine of divine simplicity undermines aseity. I show this is not necessarily the case in my YouTube video. 

https://www.youtube.com/live/2JG_Pm6nH9Q?si=lCeuYJp1BQ7jmN6m

Sparks thinks a denial of Thomas’s divine simplicity makes God’s attributes finite not infinite. How so? This reminds me of Spinoza’s  argument for pantheism. ‘Infinite’ must be clearly defined. If it is qualitative in intensity and extensively, e.g., maximal power, I see no problem. But perhaps Scotus’s concept of unitative containment can be adopted to remove this worry. Substantial priority (e.g. Fowler, Inman, Gould) would take the whole substance as the fundamental ground of its parts, properties or powers. As for what makes a property divine, it is the relation it has to the property bearer that gives the property its existence and identity. John Duns Scotus would identify the mode of infinity as the defining feature of divinity for the numerically distinct divine properties (e.g. Smith, Williams). 

Just some thoughts