Divine Ideas and Apologetics

By Paul M. Gould

New Format, Same Excellent Content

Before I turn the floor over to Paul Gould to talk about the importance of divine ideas, I wanted to let you know about a change in our format here at The Worldview Bulletin. For the past few years, we’ve produced a monthly newsletter for paid subscribers in addition to our free, weekly emails. However, we’ve concluded that it’s more manageable to read articles when they’re spread throughout the month, rather than receiving them all at once. So, going forward, we’ll publish these articles at regular intervals, giving subscribers more time to read and digest them, beginning with Dr. Gould’s below.

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The doctrine of divine ideas has fallen on hard times. Once heralded as “the real spiritual and scientific home of theology” because of the way the doctrine illuminated the tight connection between God and creatures, today the doctrine has largely been abandoned as either theologically problematic or scientifically implausible, given the general move away from essentialist talk in contemporary science.[1] In this month’s Worldview Bulletin, I want to defend the indefensible and provide reasons for a return to a more ancient way of conceiving God and the world. In short, I want to provide reasons for thinking the doctrine of divine ideas is worthy of our consideration and helpful in our apologetic efforts.

Let’s start with some basics. First, we might ask, does God think? Does God possess a rich and joy-filled mental life? Does God have beliefs, desires, hopes, and the like? I think that a straightforward reading of Scripture guides us. God has beliefs (about the moral status of creatures, the number of Abraham’s sons, and the identity of the Messiah). God has desires too: that all be saved, that Israel obey him, and so on. Thus, it is reasonable to think that God has a mental life. God thinks. Next question: prior to creating, does God think about possible creatures? More personally, does God think about me?