Is Middle Knowledge Theologically Useful?

Dr. Craig explains how Molinism helps to reconcile God's sovereignty and human freedom!

We welcome your comments in the Reasonable Faith forums:

[AnthonyMarcus]

This doctrine of complete Providence by middle knowledge is one of the most devotionally enriching truths of scripture I’ve ever come across.

[TONyjustRoCks]

I'm commenting because although I am staunchly against Craig's creation views, I absolutely applaud his representation of middle knowledge. I lean heavily towards middle knowledge in part because of his explication and popularization via Molinism.

[eltonron]

Without free will, it's impossible for God to desire we seek him.

[GuitarTunings]

Without Freewill it's impossible to interact with chaos in the universe.

[osks]

Under the rigour of a proper Biblical exegesis, we quickly discover that the idea of God’s ‘natural knowledge’ and God’s ‘free knowledge’ is a theological canard constructed to accommodate the (utterly unBiblical) idea of God’s ‘middle knowledge’ - an artificial abstraction contrived by men like William Lane Craig to somehow salvage the ‘sovereignty of man’ while paying little more than lip service to the absolute sovereignty of God…
I really don’t understand why the disciples of Dr Craig aren’t also troubled by the fact that he insists on appealing to two extra-Biblical sources to support his Autonomian commitments, rather than allowing the sufficiency of the very Word of God (2Tim 3:16, 17) to speak for itself on the things of God…
On the one hand, Craig employs an argument formulated by a Muslim apologist (amongst others), Al-Ghazali, as ‘proof’ for the existence of God (as though it were possible to reduce the infinitude of God to the level of finite human comprehension)!
And then, Craig employs an argument formulated by Luis de Molina, a Spanish Jesuit priest commissioned by Pope Paul III as a Romanist ‘soldier of the Catholic Church’ to counter the Scriptural principle of Sola Scriptura upheld by the Protestant Reformation
It is little wonder that God has (yet again) given His church over to the Fool into apostasy…

[Stowerslemalu]

Wrong question, the better question is; is it Biblical, of who which it isn't.

[osks]

‘Middle knowledge’ is nothing but a specious (and utterly unBiblical) attempt to somehow preserve man’s ‘freedom’ while desperately trying to avoid compromising God’s sovereignty!
If man were truly ‘free’ (in the Libertarian sense) as Craig suggests, then, why does Jesus bother to promise (true) freedom (Jhn 8:32) to those who are held captive by the Devil to do his will (2Tim 2:26) - where’s the ‘freedom’ in that?
Craig is very adept at using ‘fine sounding arguments’ (Col 2:4) that seem plausible on the surface but that have ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANT WHATSOEVER IN SCRIPTURE (unless of course, one is willing to contort/distort Scripture to eisegetically fit an intended interpretation)! Under the rigour of critical scrutiny, Craig’s argument can also easily be exposed as a desperate and intellectually impoverished one…
Rather than appealing to God and His revelation as his authority, Craig (once again) insists on appealing to Romanist dogma (Molinism) instead!
Also… please don’t be impressed by the rhetoric - using terms like ‘subjunctive conditionals’ and ‘counterfactuals of creaturely freedom’ is nothing but a cheap trick to try and give his argument some intellectual respectability (even at the cost of Biblical substance) - it is really a poor attempt to muddy the waters to make it seem deep…

[michelangelope]

The question humanity have to ask oneself is "why the most emblematic remark of atheism is "who created god?" with "god" in lower case?. God is the creator of the universe and the question "does God exist?" means "was the universe created by an intelligence that gave purpose to the creation?" and doesn't mean what they made you believe from childhood it means. Atheism is a logical fallacy that assumes God is the religious idea of the creator of the creation to conclude wrongly no creator exists because a particular idea of God doesn’t exist. I am tired and I need to rest. To end the war in Ukraine the discovery that atheism is a logical fallacy has to be news.

[godschild]

These theological differential terms just cloud the issue, which is that God is all knowing.

[TheMirabillis]

“ God freely created the World but could not freely refrain from creating the World “

Did God have free will ?

“ Bob freely drove his car but could not freely refrain from driving his car “

Did Bob have free will ?

Now consider Molinism: “ God knew Bob would freely reject Him and end up in Hell “.

The problem is, that once the World has been created, Bob must reject God and end up in Hell. He can’t refrain from rejecting God because if he did refrain, then God would have a different World than the World which He chose to create. Furthermore, God would have been wrong in His knowledge of what Bob would do ( and God being wrong is impossible ).

It is impossible that in the actual and created World that there is free will. The actual and created world is completely deterministic. Free will requires that a Person can do X and refrain from doing X but in Molinism you can't do X and refrain from X.

There is no free will in Molinism.

[kravitzn]

It's just theological compatibilism. If God knows what someone would "freely" do, there is a fact about what someone would "freely" do, then an act can be "free" and yet there is a fact about what it would be before it happens. It's just determinism (there is a fact about what will happen) plus freedom, which is just compatibilism.

[eltonron]

Without free will, it's impossible for God to desire we seek him.

[eltonron]

Without free will, it's impossible for God to desire we seek him.