Hate the Sin, Love the Sinner?

The following is an email I had received:

There's something I don't quite understand in the Bible. It says to "hate the sin" but to "love the sinner," and then in Psalm 5:5 it says about God, "You hate all who do wrong." I don't quite understand what that really means. How can God love us but hate us? And how can we do the same? Am I missing something here? Although I do realize that so many people have turned hate-the-sin-love-the-sinner into a cliché, so that it has lost all meaning, what's the true meaning?

You're right, it is a cliché. But as general principles go it is a fairly good one.

The deal with hatred comes down to the issue of intentions, or what lies at back of a specific act or emotional state (as does everything we are held morally culpable for). And not only for us but for God too, because in one sense he hates but in another sense it is impossible for him to hate, e.g., God is capable of hatred in the sense of "aversion" but not in the sense of "malice."

At back of God's hatred lies his supreme commitment to his own glory and righteousness. In other words, the reason why he hates all who do wrong is because they defy the supremacy and glory of God, and God simply cannot deny himself (2 Tim 2:13); as John Piper said, for God to deny the infinite worth of his own glory "would imply that there is something more valuable outside himself. He would commit idolatry." This is the reason for God's "intense aversion" (hatred) toward sin and sinners—and also the necessity of Christ and his atoning sacrifice. Without Christ our end is inescapable: utter destruction. It is because of Christ—and only because of Christ—that this world has not been destroyed and that anyone is saved at all. In ourselves we can offer God no worthy thing; the ground of the saints' justification is Christ, and only Christ.

The same thing may be said of the saints as well. Our hatred is justified when it takes the form of "aversion" but it is a sin when it takes the form of "malice." The saints never hate for hatred's sake; we hate for God's sake because, like David, we have a Spirit-fueled commitment to the supremacy and glory of our Lord God. As John Calvin said, "A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent." The reason for our "intense aversion" (hatred) toward sin and sinners is because we have a commitment to the supremacy and glory of God that exceeds all else, completely. "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—he cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26). For the saints, God comes first in all things and their commitment to him is intense.

We do not hate others because of their race or sexual orientation or because of what they have done to us; all these things are human-centred motives. Our motives are God-centred: "Do I not hate those who hate you, O LORD, and do I not loathe those who rise up against you" (Psa. 139:21). We are to live peaceably and to love others and forgive them, but never at the expense of God's glory; although we are to live peaceably here on earth, we are to avoid friendship with the world wherever it threatens the priority of God in our lives. "You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God" (James 4:4).

But it is very important to note that there is no Scriptural warrant for hating individual people. David said that he hates those who hate God and loathes those who rise against God, but notice: here he hates a certain class of people, not select persons, that class of people who hate God. But no individual is being specified. We can never be certain of who falls into that class, but we can certainly hate that class itself, like David, because of our passionate devotion to God.

When it comes to individual people, we have no idea who belongs to the elect of God and who does not. Smith might live in rebellion against God today but we should love him nonetheless, forgive him, and preach the Word to him, because next week he could turn his life over to God and become one of his most passionate followers. All along he was one of God's elect, but not until later did his life of faith begin. Walk down the street and notice the people around you: any one of them could be one of God's elect. We must not hate them as individuals because we do not know who belongs to God. But we must, like David, hate that class of people who defy God and rise against him because we cannot serve two masters. Where our loyalty is concerned, it must fall on the side of God, his supremacy and glory.

Is Compatibilism Self-Contradictory?

Quite a few months ago (prior to this blog's existence) I had received an email from someone who argues that compatibilism must be false because, according to his reasoning, it contradicts itself. The following is a copy of my response to his email.

Determinism and free will cannot both be true because, if determinism is true, then that choice is already determined for me. God knows at this moment if I will burn in hell or convert at some point and, if he knows, then there is nothing I can do to change it. There is a contradiction here.

Here the disputant claims that a contradiction was committed, but is this the case? It seems he is saying that if your choice is determined then it is not free. While this is quite a standard libertarian argument (and open to criticism), does it succeed in proving a contradiction?

As it stands? No. There is no immediate contradiction between determinism and free will. So then whether or not a contradiction occurs will depend on how one has defined 'free' because a contradiction occurs only when a proposition and its denial are both claimed to be true at the same time and in the same respect. In other words, if one defines 'free' in this context as "that which is not determined" then a contradiction would be present (but the question-begging fallacy is also committed). You see, for there to be a contradiction, it would have to be argued, "My will is both determined and, at the same time and in the same respect, not determined." But that is not the compatibilist argument at all.

That emphasized part is the clincher. I am claiming that in one respect my choices are determined, by internal forces, and in another respect my choices are not determined, by external forces. Because of this distinction the charge of contradiction vanishes.

My choices are causally necessitated from within—my desires, character, and beliefs determine the choices I make. But they are not causally necessitated from without—God knows my choices but he does not make them for me. Omniscience is an attribute of God, not an act of God. The omniscience of God is not the proximate cause of my choices. My desires, character, and beliefs are. My volitional activity is not passive (i.e., merely responding to the controls of external forces). The desires are mine. The beliefs are mine. The character is mine. The choices which they lead to are mine. From start to finish, the causal chain ran through my conative faculties. God does not make my choices for me; I make my own choices, which are causally necessitated by my own desires, beliefs, and character.

It is for this reason that in one respect free will is indeed an illusion. Let me explain. Properly speaking, our will is not free; it is determined by our desires, beliefs, and character. This is why I tend to indicate, in agreement with Locke and others, that "freedom is properly predicated of persons, not faculties." In other words, the agent is free, not his will. We ought to speak of free agency, not free will. The causal chain runs through the agent's conative faculties, not irrespective of them but concordantly with them; the volitional activity of our will actively shapes this causal chain. Nothing makes our choices for us; we make our own choices. We are not mindless puppets. Although our will is determined or causally necessitated, it is so only by our own internal forces.

In one respect my choices are determined (by internal forces). And in another respect my choices are not determined (by external forces). The charge of contradiction is refuted.

You said that "Smith chose C over V because at circumstance B his desires were constituted as X. He could have chosen V instead but this is a hypothetical condition only because his actual desires were X in that circumstance." But this cannot be; if determinism is true, as compatiblism claims, then B will always be the same for the instant and Smith will always choose C. He cannot choose V unless B were to change and since B is determined, B is determined as well.

Here I am convinced that the disputant misunderstood the argument, becoming confused about what the letters stood in the place of. So I reiterated the glossary:

• V = vanilla pudding
• C = chocolate pudding
• B = two bowls of pudding, V and C
• X = desire for chocolate instead of vanilla
• Y = desire for vanilla instead of chocolate

Using these definitions, I'll restate the argument and here directly address this rebuttal.

Smith chose C over V because at circumstance B his desires were constituted as X. Hypothetically his desires could have been Y, and therefore his choice of V, but this is hypothetical only because every time we encounter the real world we find that his desires at B were constituted as X, not Y, and therefore his absolute choice is C, not V.

So he is correct, that B is always the same, i.e., it is absolutely the case that there are two bowls of pudding which Smith must choose between. The point needing to be stressed is the difference between the real world and the hypothetical world.

In the real world his actual desire was for chocolate instead of vanilla so he chose the bowl of chocolate pudding. Yes, he could have chosen the vanilla, but this is hypothetical only; it is possible that he could have had a desire for vanilla instead of chocolate (Y) but it is not actual; his actual desire was for chocolate (X). Ergo, Y is hypothetical while X is real.

Now let's address the rest of the rebuttal, that if X is determined from without then his choice of C is determined from without as well. We know that his choice of chocolate (C) is determined by his own desire for chocolate (X), so it is determined—not from without but rather from within. And what is X determined by? We may reasonably assume that Smith has eaten both types of pudding at different times in the past and decided that he enjoyed the chocolate over the vanilla. This is what X, his desire for chocolate, was determined by. So in our scenario, at circumstance B (two bowls of pudding, V and C) Smith's eyes are drawn to the chocolate; his mouth begins to salivate as his mind recalls the past pleasurable experience of chocolate. Presto: desire leading to choice. This is causality running through Smith's conative faculties. Past experience forged the desire; the desire determined the choice. Here we observe determinism and free agency in action.

As you can see, there certainly is "more than one option that can occur." It is possible that Smith could have either a desire for chocolate (X) or a desire for vanilla (Y). It is hypothetically possible for either one to occur, but what is the real state of affairs? His desire for chocolate (X). And it is possible that Smith could have chosen either vanilla (V) or chosen chocolate (C). It is hypothetically possible for either choice to be made, but what is the real state of affairs? His choice of chocolate which was according to his desire for chocolate—X determining C.

"Remember," I said to him, "I do not need to convince you of the truth of compatibilism. You are free to reject it. All I need to do is inform you of this theory's existence, show its validity and coherence, and affirm that this theory is Scriptural. That alone firmly undercuts your already invalid argument against the existence of God (re: omniscience). To persist in your argument beyond this point without engaging the counter-arguments I made here, then, is to commit the 'straw man' fallacy."

The 'Greening' of Christianity Is Not New

In a segment on All Points West (a regular series on CBC Radio One hosted by Jo-Ann Roberts) earlier this afternoon, Roberts and a select guest discussed the appropriation of environmental concerns by many of today's religions which, if memory serves me, she referred to as "the greening of religion" or the growing spiritual dimensions of socio-ecological issues. She set the tone by opening with the example of the "new sins" described last March by Bishop Gianfranco Girotti [PDF] which include such offences as social and economic inequality; these feed off an "unsustainable form of social injustice and is related to environmental issues," Girotti said, "which currently have much relevant interest."

The following is a letter I wrote to All Points West which describes my mild disagreement because, as I indicate, socio-political concerns is actually not a new arena for the Christian faith.

Dear Jo-Ann Roberts,

This afternoon (21/Apr/2008) on All Points West there was a brief discussion on "the greening of religion." I would include more relevant information, like the name of the guest and the points he raised, but I cannot find a podcast for your show, which restricts me to personal memory.

I wanted to provide a brief response on the relationship between the socio-ecological concerns of our day and at least one particular 'institutional religion'—Christianity. There is always room for continuing education and growth on the individual and community scale, but socio-ecological concerns are not unfamiliar to this religion. As covenant children of God, Christians have a willing and sober obligation to be responsible stewards of God's creation wherever it touches our lives; from the beginning we have been given the ethical mandate of superintending God's creation and are therefore responsible in this capacity before God. Although the Christian community is chiefly concerned with spreading the message of Christ and redemption, it also recognizes manifold social responsibilities and that evangelization is ecologically active, "bringing the message and realities of the kingdom of God into the social affairs of human beings and into responsible stewardship of all creation" (Dr. Grant McClung, "Is Jesus' Proclamation Our Proclamation?" Christian Churches Together in the USA, 7/Feb/2007).

This is addressed implicitly in the Lausanne Covenant (1976), one of the most influential documents in modern evangelical Christianity, written and adopted by 2,430 evangelicals at the International Congress on World Evangelization (ICWE) in Lausanne, Switzerland. This conference was called by a committee headed by Billy Graham of the United States and brought together 150 Christian religious leaders from around the world. In one of the sections it reaffirms the "responsible service to the world" faced by Christian ministry, expressing the belief that "evangelism and socio-political involvement are both part of our Christian duty" because both are logical "expressions of our doctrines of God and man, our love for our neighbour and our obedience to Jesus Christ . . . [The gospel and its mission] should be transforming us in the totality of our personal and social responsibilities" (Section V, emphasis mine).

In the Manila Manifesto (1989), the Second ICWE in Manila, Philippines (sometimes called "Lausanne II") elaborated on the Lausanne Covenant, calling explicitly for an integration of words and deeds, including a "continuing commitment to social action" because it is recognized "that the biblical gospel has inescapable social implications." It affirms the belief that authentic evangelization demands "the prophetic denunciation of all that is incompatible with [God's kingdom]. Among the evils we deplore are destructive violence, including institutionalized violence, political corruption, all forms of exploitation of people and of the earth" and so forth (Section IV, emphasis mine).

There is also the Evangelical Environmental Network (EEN), which is a non-profit organization "that seeks to educate, inspire, and mobilize Christians in their effort to care for God's creation, to be faithful stewards of God's provision, and to advocate for actions and policies that honor God and protect the environment" (emphasis mine). The EEN "provides theological and spiritual guidance on Christian responsibility in the light of biblical teaching on the care of creation and the reality of modern environmental degradation." This group expresses the conviction that if "the Bible teaches us that Christ has created the universe, gives it life and sustains it, and has reconciled everything to God, then our actions should participate in Christ's creating, sustaining, and reconciling work."

The examples could be multiplied, especially if consideration is given to Christian social and relief initiatives concerned with food security, emergency management initiatives, economic development, health care, basic education and so forth (e.g. Salvation Army, Samaritan's Purse, World Vision, Adventist Development and Relief Agency, etc).

Although further "greening" of Christian evangelical convictions and efforts are desired and commendable, the existence of such international conferences and initiatives underscores the reality that such "greening" is not a 21st century bandwagon being appropriated by the Christian faith among other religions, but has actually been a growing concern for many decades.

Answering the Circularity Charge and Looking at What 'Atheist' Means

From an online discussion I had elsewhere, a young man by the name of Adam responded to me by asserting,

"The transcendental argument for the existence of God does in fact attempt to prove God's existence and, therefore, commits the fallacy of circularity."

No, it does not. It does not 'prove' his existence; it 'assumes' his existence and shows the inescapable necessity of doing so. It does not argue "Objective Morality, therefore God" but rather "God, therefore Objective Morality"; that is, the TAG argues at the level of our presuppositions, speaking on the stuff that comes prior to our 'proof' arguments, in order for us to even have them at all. As an illustrative example, there is a principle operating in all scientific investigations called 'inductive inference'. This principle comes prior to and is necessary for scientific enterprise to take place at all; it cannot be established scientifically, but it is absolutely impossible for science to operate without it. That's the presuppositional level. The TAG establishes the preconditions necessary for the intelligibility of human reasoning, experience, and dignity by taking some feature of each (e.g. logic, or objective morality, or the value of human life) and investigating what has to be true in order for that feature to be possible and intelligible. That's the key feature which rebuttals seem to persistently miss, that his existence is NOT the conclusion.

To help illustrate this point, consider as a loose analogy some argument for the Law of Non-Contradiction (LNC). Now, no such argument for the LNC could ever 'prove' the law; it's impossible to prove in that sense, and there is a reason for that. What such an argument does is show that the LNC is true necessarily, not contingently, by assuming its truth and showing the inescapable necessity of doing so. In other words, it works to show that the truth of the LNC is intrinsic, self-evident, and necessary by virtue of "the impossibility of the contrary" (i.e. one uses the LNC in their denial of the LNC); its truth is not established contingently by its relation to some truth more basic than itself (extrinsic). The truth of the LNC is not proven; it's assumed and must be so. The TAG takes a similar form; it does not prove God's existence but, rather, assumes his existence and shows the necessity of doing so. Some feature of human reasoning, experience, or dignity is the conclusion; the existence of God is not the conclusion but, rather, that which is necessary for reaching the conclusion.

Adam also asserted,

"Atheism literally means not believing in god(s)."

False. The term 'atheism' is derived from the Greek root 'theos' prefixed by a negating article. Ergo, atheism/atheist/atheistic literally means "godless" or "ungodly," a sound etymology recognized by Anders Bjørn Drachman in his book Atheism In Pagan Antiquity: "

In Greek they said 'atheos' and 'atheotes'; to these the English words 'ungodly' and 'ungodliness' correspond rather closely.

That is the literal meaning, so a definition of 'atheism' consonant with Greek usage will not deliver up the popular meaning "absence of God-belief." Consider, for example, the curious fact that early Christians were called atheists, despite their God-belief, because they refused to acknowledge the pagan gods of Rome.

Consonant with contemporary thinking, if we accept that the prefix 'a-' is to be understood as "without" or "no" and that 'theos' is supposed to mean "God"—and this is surely the case—then an atheist is someone who is "ungodly" or "without God" or "godless." That is, he will view the world in the context of "no God" and live his life "without God." If something is amoral then it is 'without morality'. If something is asymmetric then it is 'without symmetry'. If something is atypical then it is 'without typicality'. Any appeal to the Greek will only prove that atheist ('a-' + 'theos') means "without God."

Michael Martin, who made an appeal to the original Greek in Atheism: A Philosophical Justification, tried to conclude that "from this standpoint an atheist would simply be someone without a belief in God." It is impossible, however, to miss how Martin fraudulently snuck in the word "belief" when his etymological presentation made zero reference to the Greek root 'pistos'. Too many definitions of atheism, when appealing to the original Greek, try to import the 'belief' feature into the presentation when it is simply not present in the Greek 'atheos'. Every attempt to import this term into an argument from Greek etymology is at once both fraudulent and irresponsible. Atheism as a philosophical creed does address the belief feature, but its etymology does not.

Like many atheists, Antony Flew preferred the 'weak' definition of atheism and expended a good deal of effort making his case, but he had the propriety and intellectual honesty to admit that it was a new interpretation. Atheism defined in this way essentially began with George H. Smith (Atheism: The Case Against God, 1979) and was further popularized by Antony Flew (The Presumption of Atheism, 1984) and others such as Gordon Stein (An Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism, 1980), Michael Martin (Atheism: A Philosophical Justification, 1990), and Douglas Krueger (What is Atheism? A Short Introduction, 1998) and so forth. The historically rich and more common definition of atheism, as explained in the Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Etymological Dictionary of English Language, Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Oxford Companion to Philosophy, etc. as being the conscious rejection of theism, is a view which considers "absence of theistic belief" to be an illegitimate form of atheism, as noted by such prominent atheists as Ernest Nagel, Paul Edwards and Kai Nielsen. Frederick E. Edwords, Executive Director of the American Humanist Association, also concurs that this is the correct definition and, indeed, the term 'atheist' is used this way by most people. Similarly, in Ernest Nagel's A Defence of Atheism he asserts that

atheism is not to be identified with sheer unbelief . . . Thus, a child who has received no religious instruction and has never heard about God, is not an atheist—for he is not denying any theistic claims.

Such a child would at best be a 'nontheist', a term popularized by atheist and skeptic Michael Shermer, who may likewise be placed within this camp, for he writes (How We Believe, 1999) concerning the term 'nontheist' (emphasis supplied):

If by fiat I had to bet on whether there is a God or not, I would bet that there is not. Indeed, I live my life as if there was not a God. And if the common usage of the term "atheism" was nothing more than "no belief in a God" I might be willing to adopt it. But this is not the common usage, as we saw in the OED . . . Atheism is typically used to mean "disbelief in, or denial of, the existence of a God." But "denial of a God" is an untenable position. It is no more possible to prove God's nonexistence than it is to prove His existence. "There is no god" is no more defensible than "There is a God." The problem with the term agnostic, however, is that most people take it to mean that you are unsure or have yet to make up your mind, so the term nontheist might be more descriptive.

NOTE: Something should be said about the differentiation between 'atheism' and 'agnosticism'. It seems popular to believe that there are three positions with regard to the question of God's existence: that one is either (1) a theist, (2) an atheist, or (3) an agnostic. However, this is not the case; such a view results from either an inability or refusal to appreciate the distinction. Robert T. Carroll, in his The Skeptic's Dictionary, available online, affirms this distinction when he states that "an agnostic could also be a theist or an atheist." Often times 'agnosticism' is used as a synonym for 'weak atheism', but this is ultimately erroneous—'weak atheism', the Wikipedia article on Agnosticism explains, "is not equivalent to but is compatible with agnosticism" (emphasis mine).

Properly understood, agnosticism is a subset of both theism and atheism: one can be an agnostic theist or an agnostic atheist because 'agnosticism' describes the condition of one's knowledge (Gk. 'gnosis'), whereas 'theism' and 'atheism' describe the condition of one's relationship with respect to God. For example, an agnostic atheist is someone who admits he doesn't know whether or not God exists but lives his life as though God doesn't (e.g. naturalism), while an agnostic theist is someone who also admits that he doesn't know whether or not God exists but lives his life as though God does (e.g. fideism). There is a significant difference between 'belief' propositions (doxastic) and 'knowledge' propositions (epistemic), illustrated by the fact that 'belief' is a necessary condition for 'knowledge', e.g. you can believe something you don't know (e.g. intelligent life exists on other planets) but you can't know something you don't believe (e.g. it is sheer nonsense to say "I know the milk is in the fridge but I don't believe it is"). Both atheism and theism speak to the beliefs we confess while agnosticism speaks to the knowledge we confess.