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The view that
God's exercise of his foreknowledge is infinite and that he
does foreordain the course and destiny of all individuals is
known as predestinarianism. Its advocates reason that God's
divinity and perfection require that he be omniscient
(all-knowing), not only respecting the past and present, but
also regarding the future. For him not to foreknow all
matters in their every detail would evidence imperfection,
according to this concept.
But consider the
implications of such a predestinarian view. This concept
would mean that, prior to creating angels or earthling man,
God exercised his powers of foreknowledge and foresaw and
foreknew all that would result from such creation, including
the rebellion of one of his spirit sons, the subsequent
rebellion of the first human pair in Eden (Gen. 3:1-6; John
8:44), and all the bad consequences of such rebellion down
to and beyond this present day. This would necessarily mean
that all the wickedness that history has recorded (the crime
and immorality, oppression and resultant suffering, lying
and, hypocrisy, false worship and idolatry) once existed,
before creation's beginning, only in the mind of God, in the
form of his foreknowledge of the future.
If the Creator of
mankind had indeed exercised his power to foreknow all that
history has seen since man's creation, then the full force
of all the wickedness thereafter resulting was deliberately
set in motion by God when he spoke the words: "Let us make
man." (Gen. 1:26) These facts bring into question the
reasonableness and consistency of the predestinarian
concept; particularly so since the disciple James shows that
disorder and other vile things do not originate from God's
heavenly presence but are "earthly, animal, demonic" in
source.-Jas. 3:14-18.
The argument that
God's not foreknowing all future events and circumstances in
full detail would evidence imperfection on his part is, in
reality, an arbitrary view of perfection. Ultimately, God's
own will and good pleasure are the deciding factors as to
whether anything is perfect, not human opinions or
concepts.-2 Sam. 22:31; Isa. 46:10.
To illustrate
this, God's almightiness is undeniably perfect and is
infinite in capacity. (1 Chron. 29:11, 12; Job 36:22; 37:23)
Yet his perfection in strength does not require him to use
his power to the full extent of his omnipotence in any or in
all cases. Clearly he has not done so, or, not merely would
certain ancient cities and some nations have been destroyed,
but the earth and all in it would have been obliterated long
ago by God's executions of judgment, as at the Flood and on
other occasions. (Gen. 6:5-8; 19:23-25, 29) God's exercise
of his might is therefore not simply an unleashing of
limitless power but is constantly governed by his purpose
and tempered by his mercy, where merited.-Neh. 9:31; Ps.
78:38, 39.
Similarly, if, in
certain respects, God chooses to exercise his infinite
ability of foreknowledge in a selective way and to the
degree that pleases him, then assuredly no human or angel
can rightly say: "What are you doing?" (Job 9:12; Isa. 45:9;
Dan. 4:35) It is therefore not a question of ability, what
God can foresee, foreknow and foreordain, for "with God all
things are possible." (Matt. 19:26) The question is what God
sees fit to foresee, foreknow and foreordain, for
"everything that he delighted to do he has done."-Ps. 115:3.
(Watchtower 8/1/1970 pp. 469-70; see also Insight on the
Scriptures, Volume 1, pp. 851-860 [specifically 853-854])
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