|
like asaris said, i would have thought the "argument from evil" problem resolved via the story of the fall---free will presupposes a choice between following the rules and not following them---the only problem that raises, really, is about the initial violation of the rules---the status of the choice in a phase of being that supposedly preceded that shaped by free will.
it's like the problem that attends judas in the new testament--his betrayal was a structural necessity, so to what extent did he have free will?
anyway, outside the particular frame of reference of christianity, these are non-problems.
there is no problem of "free will" in general except in the context of an opposition between an omnscient god and humans who run around doing things on this mortal coil.
even the notion of the "will" is problematic outside this frame of reference: the only reason that human beings are understood at all to be discrete (separated from a world with which it interacts across volitional acts) follows from the separation of soul from body....which is also the origin of the mind/body split that has done so much for so long making human praxis incomprehensible.
as for penn gillette's remark about being "beyond atheism"--i think its meaning pretty straight forward: atheism really is the inversion of christianity. beyond it is indifference to christianity, to the problems it creates for itself by the nature of its structuring assumptions.
__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
|