Summary of text [comment] pages 47, 48 and 49

Does sin affect God?

The Scriptures say yes. God emotionally reacts to provocation and disdain. God may be rash, slow to anger, and regret prior stances. Yahweh exhibits anger, pity, jealousy and commitment.

But does that mean that sin affects God?

From the Greek point of view [a linear development of ideas honing the possibility of recognition], God’s majesty and transcendence implies that He endures no injury and no harm.

Summary of text [comment] page 47

Schoonenberg’s essential definition gives rise to another set of questions about the relations between God and humans:

1. Does sin really effect God?
2. Does God affect sin? Does He cause it, since He is the universal cause?
3. What do we mean when we say that “God punishes sin”?

Summary of text [comment] page 47

After all these blogs, let me again state the two points in Schoonenberg’s list:

Sin is an opposition to God’s salvific activity and to His creation, hence a crime against the world and against humans.

The opposition (to God) derives from our freedom. The opposition materializes on a variety of levels. It both resembles and differs from evil in the prepersonal level.

Summary of text [comment] page 47

[Natural evil is scandalous.

The “the scandal of natural evil” inspired individuals to turn away from Christianity.

Where did they go?

People were called to other religions, ones that had the audacity to call God “evil” and to propose cures to the “evils of His creation”.

These modern religions called themselves “not religious”.

Each variation of the postreligionist Enlightenment Godhead proposed cures for the evils of His creation.

Each produced evils that dwarfed the evils they were designed to cure.

Despite the disasters of the past two centuries, these think^groups continue flourish, longing for the infusion of sovereign power, longing to become a Public Cult, longing to materialize think^pro-objects.

Is this what the Peace of Westphalia wrought?]

Summary of text [comment] page 47

The scandal of natural, or “prepersonal”, evil is a case in point.

How could a God who called his creation “good” have included physical evil?

New theories in science were popularized as scandalous. But the scandal is obviated by the notion that God creates spontaneous orders; something that we humans also do, but can never take credit for, because we are embedded within them.

There is an analogy between moral and natural evil. They both share the same nested categorical structure.

There is also a collision between moral and natural evil. They intersect. They intersect precisely at “the scandal of natural evil”.

In nature, bad events happen.

In morals, we are limited and selfish. We cause bad things to happen.]

Summary of text [comment] page 47

[This leads to a question:

What about scientific discovery?

Scientific discoveries alter the way we express law^essential, especially those features that exist independently of us. In Latin, the term is ens reale.

Notably, there is a difference in speed of response for each type of think.

For example, accounts of a new discovery may give political or some other advantage to a particular think^group. They interpret law^essential in their own favor, thus producing an affirmative form of law^denial. They will claim the discovery works to their benefit. Once these claims are debunked, these interpretations end up as fodder for think^divine. The claim itself remains in law^essential.

This fits the definition of “scandal”: “a fascination of the surface that blocks access to seeing deeper”.]

Summary of text [comment] page 47

Next on the list: The opposition (to God) derives from our freedom. The opposition materializes a variety of levels. It both resembles and differs from evil in the prepersonal level.

[In regards to the prior intersection, free will associates to conscience^lacking and conscience^free.

The comment on “levels of freedom” associates to two points.

One concerns the diversity of think^groups that speech alone talk makes possible. Even if a person is not in opposition to God, there are many groups to join, each with its own independence. Both the individual and the group may find ways to oppose God.

Two concerns the horizontal level of the intersection. This nested form interscopes with other nested forms. The nested form of law^essential interscopes with other expressions of the natural law. Each interscoping nested form constitutes a level of law^essential that must be accounted for by think^{group_or_divine}.]

Summary of text [comment] page 47

Schoonenberg opens chapter 1, section 7, with a list. These are the topics that he has covered so far. These topics constitute an essential definition of “sin”.

Let me go through the points one by one.

Sin is an opposition to God’s salvific activity and to His creation, hence a crime against the world and against humans.

[This can be portrayed by the formalism of the intersecting nested forms for “the message underlying the word ‘religion'”.

Sin is at the core of any mob or conspiracy:

think^group_3V( sin₂( conscience^lacking_1V)).

Sin is in opposition to God’s salvific activity:

think^divine_3V( virtue₂( conscience^free_1V))

Opposition to His creation is a crime against the world and fellow humans. That crime is captured by:

law^essential_3H( sin or virtue₂( dispositions_1H))]

This blog continues the review of Piet Schoonenberg’s book, De Macht der Zonde (1962), translated into English in 1965.

Man and Sin: A Theological View (University of Notre Dame Press: Notre Dame, Indiana) is divided into 4 chapters plus an epilogue.

This blog continues on chapter 1, section 7, titled “God and sin”.