On Behalf of a Molinist Perspective | Gracepoint Church - San Francisco

In December of 2019, Dr. Craig gave two lectures at a conference at Gracepoint Church in San Francisco, CA. Here he gives a lecture with Q&A "On Behalf of a Molinist Perspective."

I was delighted when Sung Lee invited me to address the subject of a Molinist doctrine of divine providence. This is a fascinating and important subject, but one that I rarely have the opportunity to address. So I'm very, very glad to be able to share with you about this subject today.

In Charles Dickens’ wonderful story, A Christmas Carol, the climax of the story comes when Scrooge, shaken by the scenes shown to him by the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come, pleads, “Answer me one question. Are these the shadows of things that will be, or are they shadows of things that may be only?” And the Spirit does not answer Scrooge a word, with good reason. For had the Spirit responded “These shadows are merely scenes of things that could be,” Scrooge might then well have breathed a sigh of relief and gone on with his life as before. After all, he might quietly reflect, “Virtually anything could happen. No need to lose sleep about that.” On the other hand, if the Spirit had told him candidly, “No, these shadows are not scenes of things that will be” (as we know to be the case from the story’s end) then Scrooge might have held no cause for alarm whatsoever since none of what he had witnessed would, in fact, come to pass. In that case, he might not have been led to repent and change his life. Hence the Spirit’s terrifying silence.

Scrooge's problem was that he was asking the wrong question. He had failed to exhaust the alternatives, for in between what “could” be and what “will” be lies what “would” be. What the Spirit was revealing to Scrooge was what would happen if Scrooge were not to repent and change. The Spirit was not exhibiting mere possibilities. It's possible that Scrooge would sell his business and open a flower stand in Covent Garden, but who cares about that. Nor was he showing Scrooge what was, in fact, going to take place. Dickens assures us that Tiny Tim did not die. Rather, the Spirit was warning Scrooge that if he did not repent, all of these terrible things would come to pass.

In philosophical terminology, what the Spirit was revealing to Scrooge was a bit of counterfactual knowledge. Counterfactuals are conditional statements in the subjunctive mood. For example, “If I were rich, I would buy a Mercedes.” “If Goldwater had been elected president, he would have won the Vietnam War.” “If you were to ask her, she would say yes.” Counterfactuals are so called because the antecedent and/or consequent clauses are typically contrary to fact. I am not rich. Goldwater was not elected president. The U.S. did not win the Vietnam War. Nevertheless, sometimes the antecedent and/or consequent are true. For example, your friend, emboldened by your reassurance that if you were to ask her, she would say yes, does ask the girl of his dreams for a date, and she does say yes. Counterfactual statements comprise an enormous and significant part of our ordinary language and are an indispensable part of our decision-making. “If I pulled out into traffic now, I wouldn't make it.” “If I were to ask J.B. for a raise, with his mood he'd tear my head off.” “If we sent the Third Army around the enemy's right flank, we would prevail.” Clearly, life-and-death decisions are daily made on the basis of the presumed truth of counterfactual statements.

Christian theologians have typically affirmed that in virtue of his omniscience God possesses counterfactual knowledge. He knows, for example, what would have happened if he had spared the Canaanites from destruction, what Napoleon would have done had he won the Battle of Waterloo, how Jones would respond if I were to share the Gospel with him. Not until the advent of modern theology did theologians think to deny to God knowledge of true counterfactuals. Everyone who considered the issue agreed that God has such knowledge.

What theologians did dispute, however, was so to speak when God has such counterfactual knowledge. The question here does not have to do with the moment of time at which God acquired his counterfactual knowledge, for whether God is timeless or everlasting throughout all time, in neither case are there truths that are unknown to God until some moment of time at which he discovers them. As an omniscient being, God must know every truth there is and so can never exist in a state of ignorance. Rather, the “when” I mentioned refers to the point in the logical order of things that God has counterfactual knowledge.

Post-Reformation theologians disputed where in the logical order of God's decrees his counterfactual knowledge belongs. Everybody agreed that logically prior to God's decree to create a world, God has knowledge of all necessary truths including all the possible worlds he might create. This was called God's natural knowledge. It gives him knowledge of what could be. Moreover, everyone agreed that logically subsequent to his decree to create a particular world, God knows all the contingent truths about the actual world including its past, present, and future. This was called God's free knowledge. It involves knowledge of what will be. The disputed question was where one should place God's counterfactual knowledge of what would be. Is it logically prior to or posterior to the divine decree?

Catholic theologians of the Dominican Order held that God's counterfactual knowledge is logically subsequent to his decree to create a certain world. They maintained that in decreeing that a particular world would exist, God also decreed which counterfactual statements are true. Logically prior to the divine decree, there are no counterfactual truths to be known. All God knows at that logical moment are the necessary truths, including all of the various possibilities. At that logically prior moment, for example, God knows that there is a possible world in which Peter denies Christ three times, and another possible world in which Peter affirms Christ, and yet another possible world in which it is Matthew who denies Christ three times, and so on. God picks one of these possible worlds to be actual, and thus subsequent to his decree it is true that Peter will deny Christ three times. Moreover, God knows this truth because he knows which world he has decreed. Not only so, but also in decreeing a particular world to be real, God decrees which counterfactuals are true. Thus he decrees, for example, that if Peter had instead been in such-and-such circumstances, he would have denied Christ two times. God's counterfactual knowledge, like his foreknowledge, is logically posterior to the divine creative decree.

By contrast, Catholic theologians of the Jesuit Order, inspired by the theologian Luis Molina, maintained that God's counterfactual knowledge is logically prior to his creative decree. This difference between the Molinists and the Dominicans was no mere matter of theological hair-splitting. The Molinists charge that the Dominicans had in effect obliterated human freedom by making counterfactual truths a consequence of God's decree. For it is God who determines what a person will do in whatever circumstances he finds himself. By contrast, the Molinists, by placing God's counterfactual knowledge prior to the divine decree, made room for human freedom by exempting counterfactual truths from God's decree. In the same way that necessary truths (like two plus two equals four) are prior to and therefore independent of God's decree, so counterfactual truths about how people would freely choose under various circumstances are prior to and therefore independent of God's decree.

Not only does this view make room for human freedom, but affords God a means of choosing which world of free creatures to create, for by knowing how persons would freely choose in whatever circumstances they might be in, God can, by decreeing to create just those persons in just those circumstances, bring about his ultimate purposes through free creaturely decisions. Thus, by employing his counterfactual knowledge, God can plan a world down to the last detail, and yet do so without annihilating creaturely freedom since what people would freely do under various circumstances is already factored into the equation by God. Since God's counterfactual knowledge is logically in-between his natural knowledge and his free knowledge, Molinists called it God's middle knowledge. On the Dominican view, there is one logical moment prior to the divine decree at which God knows the range of possible worlds he might create, and then he chooses one of these to be actual. On the Molinist view, there are two logical moments prior to the divine decree. First, the moment at which he has natural knowledge of the range of possible worlds, and second the moment at which he has knowledge of the proper subset of possible worlds which, given the counterfactuals true at that moment, are feasible for him to create. The counterfactuals which are true at that moment thus served to delimit the range of possible worlds to worlds feasible for God.

For example, there is a possible world in which Peter affirms Christ in precisely the same circumstances in which, in fact, he denied him. But given the counterfactual truth that if Peter were in precisely those circumstances, he would freely deny Christ, then that possible world in which Peter freely affirms Christ in those circumstances is not feasible for God. Now, of course God could make Peter affirm Christ in those circumstances, but then his confession would not be free. So, on the Molinist scheme, we have the following logical order:

MOMENT 1: ... o o o o o o ...

MOMENT 2: ... o   o o     ...

----DIVINE CREATIVE DECREE----

MOMENT 3: ...       o     ...

In moment 1 we have God's natural knowledge by which God knows the entire range of possible worlds, which are symbolized by the circles. In moment 2, we have God's middle knowledge in which he knows the range of worlds feasible for him given the counterfactuals true at that time. And you notice that the feasible worlds are a proper subset of the possible worlds. Some of the possible worlds drop out at this moment and are not feasible for God because in order to be actualizable different counterfactuals would have to be true. Next comes God's creative decree whereby he chooses one of these feasible worlds to be the actual world. And finally in moment number 3, we have God's free knowledge where God knows the actual world past, present, and future, and you see the single circle symbolizing the actual world that God has chosen from the range of feasible worlds known to him by his middle knowledge.

So on the Molinist scheme we have three different logical moments with respect to God's knowledge. His natural knowledge of all necessary truths, secondly his middle knowledge of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, then his divine decree on the basis of his natural knowledge and middle knowledge, and then finally his free knowledge of the actual world.

Now, why think that the Molinist scheme is correct? Basically, three lines of argument present themselves: biblical, theological, and philosophical. Biblically speaking, it's not difficult to show that God possesses counterfactual knowledge. One of the favorite proof texts of the Jesuit theologians was 1 Samuel 23:6-10 which tells of David's inquiry of the LORD by means of a divining device called an ephod whether Saul would attack Keilah where David was ensconced, and whether the men of Keilah would deliver David over to Saul. In both cases, the ephod registered an affirmative answer whereupon David fled the city so that the predictions did not, in fact, come true. What the device had mediated to David was not therefore simple foreknowledge of the future, but counterfactual knowledge. God was letting David know that if he were to remain at Keilah then Saul would come after him, and that if Saul were to come after him then the men of Keilah would deliver him over to Saul. The answers given by the ephod were thus correct answers even though the events did not come to pass since the answers were indicative of what would happen under certain circumstances.

Although most scriptural prophecy is given in an unconditional way, sometimes prophecies are provided explicitly in the conditional form that David received at Keilah. Consider, for example, Jeremiah's prophecy to King Zedekiah in Jeremiah 38:17-18:

Thus says the Lord, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: “If you will surrender to the princes of the King of Babylon, then your life shall be spared, and this city shall not be burned with fire, and you and your house shall live. But if you do not surrender . . ., then this city shall be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they shall burn it with fire, and you shall not escape from their hand.”

In his omniscience, God knew what would happen whichever course of action Zedekiah chose. Indeed, construing certain prophecies as counterfactual warnings rather than as categorical declarations of simple foreknowledge enables us to explain how it is that in Israel the test of a true prophet is the fulfillment of his predictions according to Deuteronomy 18:22, and yet some predictions given by true prophets do not actually come to pass due to a change on the part of the people forewarned. Think, for example, of Jonah 3 and the people of Nineveh – “Yet 40 days and Nineveh will be destroyed.” Or in Isaiah 38:1-5, God's prophecy to Hezekiah that in two weeks time he would die. In such cases, what God was giving was counterfactual knowledge of what would happen under the prevailing circumstances, but were intercessory prayer or repentance to occur then God would not carry out what had been threatened.

We also find counterfactual knowledge exhibited by Christ. For example, he tells Peter,

Go to the sea and cast a hook, and take the first fish that comes up, and when you open its mouth, you will find a shekel; take that and give it to them for me and for yourself (Matthew 17:27).

The passage is most naturally understood as an expression of Jesus’ knowledge that if Peter were to carry out Jesus’ instructions, he would find things just as the Lord had stated. Or, again, Jesus commands the disciples after a futile night of fishing, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find some” (John 21:6). The miraculous catch that ensued shows that Jesus knew exactly what would happen if the disciples obeyed his command.

Sometimes Jesus makes counterfactual statements himself. For example,

If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin . . . If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin” (John 15:22,24).

Or, again, “If my Kingship were of this world, my servants would fight, that I might not be handed over to the Jews” (John 18:36). Or, again, “Woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would be better for that man if he had not been born” (Matthew 26:24). Examples of this sort could be multiplied.

I think it's plain then that the God of the Bible exhibits counterfactual knowledge. Given God's infallibility, it will not do to construe these examples as mere hunches on God's part. If God believes that Saul would besiege Keilah if David were to stay there, then that counterfactual is known by God to be true since it is logically impossible for God to subscribe to false beliefs.

Unfortunately, this does not settle the matter of whether God has middle knowledge, for the scriptural passages show only that God possesses counterfactual knowledge, and, as I've said, until modern times all theologians agreed that God possesses counterfactual knowledge. The dispute concerned when in the logical order of things that knowledge comes. Is it before or after the divine decree? Since Scripture does not reflect on this question, no amount of prooftexting concerning God's counterfactual knowledge can go to prove that such knowledge is possessed logically prior to God's creative decree. This is a matter for theologico-philosophical reflection, not biblical exegesis. Thus, while it is clearly unbiblical to deny that God has simple foreknowledge and even counterfactual knowledge, those who deny middle knowledge cannot be accused of being unbiblical. Rather, the strongest arguments for the Molinist perspective are theological. Once one grasps the concept of middle knowledge, one will find it astonishing in its subtlety and power. Indeed, I would say that it is the single most fruitful theological concept that I have ever encountered. With respect to our concerns this morning, middle knowledge provides an illuminating account of divine providence and human freedom. The Molinist account of divine providence is stunning. Consider the following biblical passages:

Acts 2:23: “this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.”

Acts 4:27-28: “For truly in this city they were gathered together against thy holy servant Jesus, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever thy hand and thy plan had predestined to take place.”

Here we have a staggering assertion of divine sovereignty over the affairs of men. The conspiracy to crucify Jesus involving not only the Romans and the Jews in Jerusalem at that time, but more particularly Pilate and Herod by name who tried Jesus, is said to have happened by God's plan based on his foreknowledge and foreordination. How are we to understand so sweeping a providence as this? If we take the word “foreknowledge” to encompass middle knowledge then we can make perfect sense of God's providential control over a world of free agents. For via his middle knowledge, God knew exactly which persons, if members of the Sanhedrin, would freely vote for Jesus’ condemnation. Which persons, if living in Jerusalem, would freely demand Christ's death favoring the release of Barabbas. What Herod, if king, would freely do in reaction to Jesus and to Pilate’s plea to judge him on his own. And what Pilate himself, if holding the prefecture of Palestine in AD 27, would freely do under the pressure of the Jewish leaders and the crowds. Knowing all the possible circumstances, persons and permutations of these, God decreed to create just those circumstances and just those people who would freely do what God willed to happen. Thus, the whole scenario, Luke insists, unfolded according to God's plan.

This is truly mind-boggling. When one reflects that the existence of the various circumstances and persons involved was itself the result of myriads of prior free choices on the part of these and other agents, and these in turn of yet other prior contingencies and so on and so forth, then we see that only an omniscient mind could providentially direct a world of free creatures toward his sovereignly established ends. In fact, Paul reflects that, “none of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory (1 Corinthians 2:8). Once one grasps it, the doctrine of middle knowledge thus issues in adoration and praise of God for so breathtaking a sovereignty.

What account of divine providence might be given in the absence of middle knowledge? There are three alternatives: divine openness, simple foreknowledge, and divine determinism.

Advocates of divine openness freely admit that without foreknowledge or middle knowledge, a strong doctrine of divine providence becomes impossible. But such a viewpoint can make no sense whatsoever of scriptural passages such as those I cited a moment ago. It is bewildering to me that partisans of this camp can deny divine foreknowledge while claiming to be biblical when foreknowledge (in the Greek, prognosis) is part of the very vocabulary of the New Testament. Nor can it be said that God's plan was hit upon by him late in the game once he could reasonably guess what the relevant agents would do. For as Paul who is want to emphasize, this was an eternal plan made from the foundations of the world but hidden for ages in God and now realized in the fullness of time as God sent forth his Son manifesting the wisdom of God to the principalities and powers who opposed him (Ephesians 3:9-11 and Galatians 4:4).

Proponents of simple foreknowledge of the future without middle knowledge can make no good sense of God's providential planning of a world of free creatures, for logically prior to the divine decree God has only natural knowledge of all the possible scenarios and no knowledge whatsoever of what would happen under any circumstances. Thus, logically posterior to the divine decree, God must consider himself extraordinarily lucky to find that this world happened to exist. “What a break!” we could imagine God saying to himself. “Herod and Pilate and all those people all reacted just perfectly!” Actually, the situation is much worse than that for God had no idea whether Herod or Pilate or the Israelite nation or the Roman Empire would even exist posterior to the divine decree. Indeed, God must be astonished to find himself existing in a world out of all the possible worlds that he could have created in which mankind falls into sin and God himself enters human history as a substitutionary sacrificial offering to rescue them.

Now, of course I'm speaking anthropomorphically here, but the point remains that without middle knowledge, God cannot know prior to the creative decree what the world would be like. If the defender of simple foreknowledge goes on to say that God's foreordination of future events is based upon his simple foreknowledge then this trivializes the doctrine of foreordination making it a fifth wheel which carries no weight since the future by definition cannot be changed. Once God knows that an event really is future, there's nothing more left for foreordination to do. Foreordination becomes a redundancy, and surely there's more substance to the biblical doctrine of foreordination than the triviality that God decrees that what will happen will happen.

The divine determinist interprets the above passages to mean that foreknowledge is based upon foreordination. God knows what will happen because he makes it happen. Knowing the intentions of his will and his almighty power, God knows that all his purpose shall be accomplished. But this interpretation inevitably makes God the author of sin since it is he who moved Judas, for example, to betray Christ, a sin which merits everlasting perdition for the hapless Judas. But how can a holy God move people to commit moral evil? Moreover, how can these people then be held morally responsible for acts over which they had no control?

Thus, of the options available, the Molinist approach provides by far the most elucidating account of divine providence. It enables us to embrace divine sovereignty and human freedom without mysticism or mental reservation thereby preserving faithfully the biblical text’s affirmation of both of these doctrines.

We therefore have powerful theological motivation for adopting the Molinist perspective.

Finally, I think that we also have good philosophical grounds for thinking that a doctrine of divine middle knowledge is correct. What we may call the middle knowledge argument runs as follows:

1. If there are true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, then God knows these truths.
2. There are true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom.
3. If God knows true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, God knows them either logically prior to the divine creative decree or only logically posterior to the divine creative decree.
4. Counterfactuals of creaturely freedom cannot be known only logically posterior to the divine creative decree.

From premises (1) and (2) it follows logically that:

5. Therefore, God knows true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom.

From (3) and (5) it follows that:

6. Therefore, God knows true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom either logically prior to the divine creative decree or only logically posterior to the divine creative decree.

And from (4) and (6) it follows that:

7. Therefore, God knows true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom logically prior to the divine creative decree (which just is the essence of the doctrine of middle knowledge).

Let me say a word in defense of each of the middle knowledge argument’s premises.

The truth of premise (1) is required by the definition of omniscience which I have listed here as O:

O: For any agent x, x is omniscient if and only if for every proposition p, if p, then x knows that p and does not believe not-p.

What O requires is that a person is omniscient if and only if he knows all truths and believes no falsehoods. This is the standard definition of omniscience. It entails that if there are counterfactual truths then an omniscient being must know them.

Premise (2) asserts that there are true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. We have every reason to think that there are true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. In the first place, we ourselves often know the truth of such counterfactuals. For example, if I were to offer my wife Jan a plate of chocolate chip cookies and a plate of liver and onions, I know which one she would freely choose as certainly as I know almost anything. A little reflection reveals how pervasive and indispensable such counterfactual truths are to rational conduct and planning. We base our very lives on their truth or falsity. Second, as I pointed out earlier, Scripture itself gives examples of such true counterfactuals. Think again about Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians 2:8: “none of the rulers of this world understood this, for if they had they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory.”

Premise (3) of the middle knowledge argument states logically exhaustive alternatives for an omniscient deity, and so must be true. Counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are known by God either prior to his decree or only after his decree.

Finally, premise (4) must be true because if counterfactuals of creaturely freedom were known only posterior to the divine creative decree then it is God who determined what every creature would do in every circumstance. Augustinian-Calvinist thinkers bear witness to the truth of this premise in their affirmation of compatibilist theories of creaturely freedom. They thereby testify that God's all determining decree precludes libertarian freedom which is the sort of freedom that we are here concerned with. Thus, if God knows counterfactual truths about us only posterior to his decree then there really are no counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. If there are such counterfactuals, they must be true logically prior to the divine decree. Given the truth of the premises, the conclusion follows that prior to his creative decree God knows all true counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, which is to say that he has middle knowledge. QED.

In conclusion then, while not explicitly taught by the biblical text, the doctrine of divine middle knowledge is certainly compatible with it which cannot be said of at least some of its competitors. Middle knowledge redounds to the glory of God and illuminates biblical truth in a dazzling way. Moreover, we have good theological and philosophical grounds for affirming middle knowledge. Theologically, middle knowledge enables us to provide an intelligible account of God's providence over a world of free creatures. Philosophically, omniscience by definition entails knowledge of all truth, and since counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are true logically prior to God's creative decree, they must therefore be known by God at that logical moment. Therefore, I believe we should affirm that God has middle knowledge.

QUESTION There's a philosopher, Saul Kripke, and he distinguished epistemology and metaphysics in that epistemology and metaphysics may be related but they are independently distinct. So when you say that a counterfactual knowledge is true, do you mean it to be true metaphysically or epistemically? If used to mean epistemically, to me that would make sense because that preserves human freedom, but how can something really be epistemically true without it being metaphysically true. And if it's metaphysically true then I would argue you lose actual human freedom.

DR. CRAIG: . . . between epistemic truth and metaphysical truth, I don't understand that distinction. I would just speak in terms of truth. These statements are true, and by that I mean that the world is as these statements describe. So, for example, if I were rich, I would buy a Mercedes. Actually, that's a false statement, but in the case of some persons that's just a true statement. If you want to call it metaphysical, I guess that's fine. I just mean that's the way reality is.

QUESTION: I just had a clarification or maybe you could help me out with the philosophical argument for Molinism. Premise (3) – it talks about God knowing counterfactuals prior or posterior (so before or after his creative decree). Is there any way you could help me understand? Because God is timeless so it's kind of hard to think about God knowing something before or after.

DR. CRAIG: As I emphasized, the order here is not chronological; it’s logical. If you don't like the idea of logical priority, you could think of it in terms of explanatory priority. Some things are explanatorily prior to other things. For example, say in mathematics. The axioms of a mathematical theory are explanatorily or logically prior to the theorems that are derived from them. It's not a matter of chronological priority. If they're true, they're true eternally. But nevertheless there can be a relation of explanatory or logical priority between the axioms and the theorems that are derived from them. And similarly, here natural knowledge and middle knowledge are logically or explanatorily prior to and independent of God's decree.

QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Craig. My question is: If God chooses which world to create based on his knowledge of what we would do in each of those worlds with his counterfactual knowledge, and then he chooses a world to decree, isn't he in effect choosing what we choose?

DR. CRAIG: Yes.

FOLLOWUP: So does that take away from our human freedom?

DR. CRAIG: No, because he chooses what you choose. You stated it correctly. Your choice is explanatorily prior to his choice of which world is actual.

FOLLOWUP: I see. It's still me that's choosing. So I’m still accountable for my choices.

DR. CRAIG: Yes. Exactly. One French Molinist put it in this way that sounds very paradoxical but when you think about it, I think it's quite profound. He said: It is up to God whether I find myself in a world in which I am predestined, but it is up to me whether I am predestined in the world in which I find myself. It is up to God whether I find myself in a world in which I am predestined. God chooses which feasible world is actualized. Right? It's up to God whether I find myself in a world in which I am predestined, but it is up to me whether I am predestined in whichever world I find myself. That is to say, in every feasible world God gives sufficient grace to every person for salvation, so it's up to you whether you want to be predestined in whichever feasible world God creates that you are in.

QUESTION: I think mine's a good follow-up to that because you described how Molinism allows God to use free agents to accomplish his will. Could you elaborate a little on the tension that I feel that creates? Because if God is relying on free agents to accomplish his will, I sense some kind of loss of sovereignty or a sense of is God surrendering some sovereignty or is he maintaining that because he's the ultimate chooser of the actual world?

DR. CRAIG: Molinists have often pointed out to determinists that a Molinist account of sovereignty actually exalts and magnifies God's sovereignty because he can control a world of free creatures whereas for the determinist he can't. He has to determine them. He can only control a world of puppets – creatures which he himself determines. But that sort of God lacks the sovereignty to manage a world of free creatures, where Molinism says God doesn't need to causally determine creatures in order to sovereignly direct history toward his provisioned ends. So is actually exalts his sovereignty and power by showing how he can sovereignly and providentially direct the world without having to resort to causal determinism.

QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Craig. Thank you for being here. My question is: If God has access to counterfactual knowledge and he creates people who freely choose what he wills then why is there sin in the world? Are we saying that there's no feasible world where people don't sin? If so, could you speak on that a little bit?

DR. CRAIG: Sure. Alvin Plantinga is the contemporary philosopher who, in utter ignorance of Molina, reinvented the doctrine of middle knowledge in the 1970s. One of the reasons Plantinga did this was to deal with the problem of evil. He said: Why didn't God create a world in which everybody freely always does the right thing? That's got to be a possible world. There's got to be logically possible worlds in which people freely always make the right choice. So why didn't God create that world? And what Plantinga says is that it's possible that such a world is not feasible for God. That given the counterfactuals that are true, it may well be the case that a world of free creatures that always does the right thing and is without sin is not feasible for God. In fact, Plantinga goes so far as to say that it's possible that there is no world feasible for God of free creatures that involves as much moral good as this world but with less moral evil. And so Plantinga cut the ground from under the problem of evil by appeal to this Molinist perspective and distinction between possible worlds and feasible worlds. I've since tried to apply this to many other theological questions. I think it sheds light on New Testament inspiration, on the question of the unevangelized, why didn't God create a world in which everyone freely receives Christ and is saved, things of that sort. It may be that there are a lot of these worlds that simply aren't feasible for God given the counterfactuals that are true. Always keep in mind that these counterfactuals are independent of God's will because they are prior to his decree.

QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Craig. My question is about salvation in terms of the world that God chooses. If I'm understanding this correctly, let's say he has world 1, world 2, and world 3. And in world 1, person A and B are saved, but person C is not. In world 2, it’s A and C. In world 3, it’s B and C. So if he chooses world 2 or whatever world he chooses, is it that he chooses based on a utilitarian argument of the most people that are saved? If it's not like that, is it favoritism on God's part that he chooses for me to be saved versus some other person in the world?

DR. CRAIG: This is a question, I think, on which proponents of middle knowledge can disagree or have different views. Molina's view was that God does not pick worlds based upon what A, B, and C would do. I think the idea there would be that God looks at the feasible worlds and he sees which ones are of the best value, and he picks one of those blindly in a sense without seeing whether A, B, or C is the one who comes to salvation. He leaves that up to A, B, and C to decide, but he picks a feasible world that has a certain level of goodness that is sufficient for its being created, but not with a view toward the salvation or damnation of particular persons. I find Molina's perspective on this to be, I think, very persuasive. I think he was right in saying this.

FOLLOWUP: Is there evidence about how that is logically reached?

DR. CRAIG: Well, the argument would be, I think, similar to what you just said. That God doesn't play favorites in that sense, but he leaves it up to whomsoever will may come and therefore allows creatures to decide whether or not they are predestined in whichever world they find themselves. It would be motivated by not wanting to make God be the one who determines that a world is actual in which Peter is saved and Shirley is damned. Rather, God simply chooses a feasible world that has a certain value, and then it's up to Shirley and Peter whether they're both saved or both damned or one is saved and one is damned. And this isn't part of God's decree.

QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Craig. My question is somewhat similar to the one asked previously about the existence of sin. But my question is really regarding the implications of middle knowledge toward human pain and suffering. Based on my understanding of what you've told us, the idea of God's being able to orchestrate, based on prior knowledge, all these different circumstances to fulfill his will means that in some cases, let's say, a person God wants these . . . like apostle Paul to be his prophet to the Gentiles. But in that process, a lot of Christians who were persecuted, and a lot of Christians were actually even dragged to prison or whatever . . . is it that in these sorts of circumstances where it seems that God is allowing his people to be persecuted or to suffer even though it is kind of part of his plan, is that because God is using that suffering to put maybe Paul in a position or a circumstance in which he then has the ability to choose to repent and turn to God?

DR. CRAIG: I think that's very plausible. One of the reasons that I think that the problem of evil is so difficult for the atheist to put through successfully, it could be that your daughter's dying of leukemia sends a ripple effect through history such that some person living in Nepal 300 years from now will come to know Christ and find eternal life, and so that was permitted, say, with a view toward the salvation of this person which is an incommensurable good that would outweigh any suffering that you or your daughter had to endure. I think that middle knowledge does shed a lot of light upon human suffering and how this could be permitted by God with a view toward greater goods and ends. Does that answer your question?

FOLLOWUP: Yeah, I think it does. Just one quick question related to that. Does that also apply then to, let's say, missionaries who go to Africa, and they . . . there are some stories of people who get killed as soon as they get there or they never even make it or something like that. Or even for us – we try to minister to a student and they totally blow us off or don't pay attention. All of that is either putting us in a circumstance or putting them or some other people in a circumstance where then they have the opportunity to choose Christ at a later time.

DR. CRAIG: Yes. That may well be, and maybe not them but maybe others who are affected by the ripple effect that that failed evangelistic appointment ascends through history. So this puts a totally different perspective on failure. It may mean that God's will for your life might include failure, and that there are things that God has to accomplish through failure that could never be achieved through a success. We just don't know how in God's providence these sorts of frustrated efforts may bear fruit into the future and into eternity.

QUESTION: Dr. Craig, I'm a physics major. I am thinking about something related. The current understanding of quantum physics – fundamentally, it's deterministic probability. So I’m just wondering if middle knowledge is a form of conditional probability?

DR. CRAIG: It's not a form of conditional probability, but middle knowledge would give God sovereign control, not only of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, but what we might call counterfactuals of quantum indeterminacy. If you think that quantum physical events are really causally indeterminate then they, too, would have these counterfactuals of quantum indeterminacy that would be known by God and would be factored into his decree to create a world. So this again gives God sovereign control even over quantum events that are causally indeterminate.

FOLLOWUP: Does that mean that the possibility of the world is just one where God leaves all the possibilities just for certain events he predetermined?

DR. CRAIG: No, no. If that's what you think, you've completely misunderstood the theory. The theory is that in addition to all of the possibilities that it could be – the isotope will decay at this point, rather than at some other point; all these indeterminate things – God knows which result would happen if that isotope were to be measured, say. So he knows true counterfactuals of quantum indeterminacy, and then on that basis can decree which world to make. There will be possible worlds that are not feasible for God because, just as the wrong counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are true, so the wrong counterfactuals of quantum indeterminacy might be true. So this is a theory of divine providence that doesn't appeal to causal determinism, and doesn't require God to intervene in the quantum realm in order to push these atoms and things about.

QUESTION: Hello, Dr. Craig. Thank you for coming and giving these talks. I actually have a question related to the first plenary. I'm not sure if that's okay. Your fifth point about the possibility of God's existence and him being a perfect being implies existence. This is the first time I've actually really heard it that way, and it kind of sounded circular to me. I'm not sure how to word it exactly. It just seems like the definition of perfection that you're presenting is: because God is perfect therefore him existing in any possibility means that he exists in all [possible worlds including ours] because of his perfection. But that's like the definition of perfect.

DR. CRAIG: I don't think that the argument is at all circular. An argument is circular, or a person begs the question or reasons in a circle, if his only reason for affirming a premise is that he already believes the conclusion. So if one believed that it is possible that God exists because you believe that God exists you would be begging the question. You would be reasoning in a circle. But that's not the way the argument was presented. Rather, the idea is that the concept of a being which is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect in every possible world is a perfectly coherent concept and is therefore logically possible. And there's no circularity there at all, I think you can see.

FOLLOWUP: I suppose I feel like the circularity comes from . . . the proof comes from the definition, if that makes sense.

DR. CRAIG: Yes. But it's not just from the definition. There are versions of the ontological argument (I think failed versions) that try to deduce God's existence from the definition of God: “By definition, God is a metaphysically necessary perfect being, therefore he exists.” But see, that's not the version that I gave which is stolen from Alvin Plantinga. Plantinga’s version says it's possible that a maximally great being exists, and so it's not based on the definition of God. It's based upon the possibility that God exists. Do you think it's possible that a maximally great being exists? And so Plantinga’s version of the argument avoids precisely the problem you mentioned of trying to define God into existence. The argument is clearly not an argument that God exists because this is how God is defined. It's based upon the idea that this is a possible concept.

QUESTION: Just following up on the same argument: ontological. I'm on premise number three: If a maximally great being exists in some possible world then it exists in the actual world.

DR. CRAIG: I think it was “in every possible world.” It just doesn’t exist in some; it exists in every.

FOLLOWUP: Is it because the definition of a maximally great being is that it must exist in every world?

DR. CRAIG: Yes. And that probably is where the other questioner thought it was just defining God into existence.

QUESTION: Hi. I wanted to go back to the plenary you just had, and I wanted to clarify two points quickly. I'm having trouble understanding the difference between a feasible world and a possible world. I understand that feasible worlds are a subset, but what distinguishes the natural knowledge and the middle knowledge? Is it just the premise of free choices at that point?

DR. CRAIG: What distinguishes them is that natural knowledge is God's knowledge of all necessary truths (two plus two equals four, if it is raining then it is raining, everything that has a shape has a size). All of these necessary truths are known by God by his natural knowledge. Middle knowledge is not knowledge of necessary truths. This is something that sometimes is misunderstood. These counterfactuals of creaturely freedom are contingent truths. If Jones were in circumstances C, he would freely phone his wife. That's a contingent truth that confronts God in moment 2. So a world in which God creates Jones in precisely those circumstances C, and Jones refrains from phoning his wife, isn't feasible for God. Why? Because it's true that if Jones were in C he would really phone his wife. So what middle knowledge is is knowledge of these contingent counterfactuals of freedom that are true independent of God's decree. Is that clear? I don't know how to say it any more clearly.

FOLLOWUP: I guess my second point I wanted to clarify is related to this which is what goes into a free decision? Is the component of a free decision always determined by the circumstances around you? Because that is what this seems like.

DR. CRAIG: Yes, I think that's right. We're talking here about freedom-permitting circumstances – circumstances in which I have the ability to make a choice without being causally determined to do this or that. So this is a very different concept of freedom than those who think that freedom is compatible with being causally determined to do something. Those folks are called compatibilists. I alluded to them in the talk at one point. Whereas Molinism endorses a view of freedom called libertarianism which says that freedom is incompatible with causal determinism. It's got to be up to you what you do in those circumstances rather than there being causally determining factors that are brought to bear upon you through those circumstances that make you do what you do. So we are talking about this libertarian concept of freedom.

QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Craig. I'm having trouble reconciling the whole “God knows all the possible and feasible worlds.” But then he also intervenes based off of prayer. Right? . . . How do I think of it in terms of taking time into consideration for us? Is it: God knows all the feasible worlds moment to moment within our world as it is now? I guess I'm having a hard time reconciling the whole . . . how do I think of things in perspective of time, since we are bound by time but God is not.

DR. CRAIG: OK. That’s a fair question. Those worlds that I represented on the diagram by little circles are a whole history, past, present, and future. You could think of them, if you wanted to, not as worlds, but as histories. They are alternate histories. So once God chooses one of those – boom! – he then has free knowledge which will involve his knowledge of past, present, and future of the actual world.

FOLLOWUP: OK. So then, now God – from this point on for us – God knows all the possible/feasible worlds that could happen. And he knows what will become, but then how . . . getting from now to there, he just knows what possibilities and it is . . . I don’t know.

DR. CRAIG: It is subtle, isn’t it? Well, let me try to address your question. I didn't talk about this, but middle knowledge gives a very illuminating account of God's simple foreknowledge of the future. If God has middle knowledge, it becomes trivially easy to explain his knowledge of the future. If God knows that if a person were in a certain set of circumstances he would freely do something, then by decreeing to create that person in precisely those circumstances he knows exactly what he will do. So foreknowledge is just a byproduct of middle knowledge plus the divine decree. On the basis of middle knowledge and the divine decree to create these people in these circumstances, God knows exactly what they will do. So by middle knowledge he knows what they would do if they were in those circumstances, and in his free knowledge he knows what they will do if in fact that's in the world he has chosen to actualize.

FOLLOWUP: OK, so then it's just based off of “in the now,” like what we end up deciding?

DR. CRAIG: I'm not sure what you meant. [laughter] The idea is that you have the freedom in these freedom-permitting circumstances to choose whatever you want. It's up to you. You just can't escape being known by God. You can't escape being seen by God. But you're perfectly free to do whatever you want.

FOLLOWUP: So going back to prayer. Does God know when . . . He foresees that we will pray intercessory prayers for . . .

DR. CRAIG: Yes.

FOLLOWUP: He does.

DR. CRAIG: Go ahead! Go ahead!

FOLLOWUP: Or does he? OK . . . [laughter]

DR. CRAIG: Let me try to complete your question for you.

FOLLOWUP: OK! Go ahead! [laughter]

DR. CRAIG: Am I saying that God has to wait until he hears your prayer to answer it? No, not if he has middle knowledge because he knew that you would pray if he created you in those circumstances. And so knowing that you would pray, he can also decree that a certain answer or something like that will also transpire. He doesn't have to wait around for you to pray or to send the answer. This can all be factored in from the start in terms of his middle knowledge. Now, this doesn't exclude miraculous interventions. One factor that I didn't mention in this scheme is – when you have in that diagram “divine decree,” it not only is God's decree of which feasible world to create, but he also decrees what he would do in any circumstances. So he knows that if Adam and Eve were to fall in the Garden, he would freely expel them from the Garden. So in the divine decree there are also counterfactuals of divine freedom that he decides at that point, not simply counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. But that's an extra subtle wrinkle that we don't need to get into, I think.

FOLLOWUP: OK, thank you. All I can say is, “Wow!”

DR. CRAIG: That’s exactly my reaction when I first read about the doctrine of middle knowledge! It was “Wow!” If any of you are interested in following up on this fascinating area, I have a little book called The Only Wise God which is a defense of divine foreknowledge of the future and its compatibility with human freedom.

QUESTION: Hello. My question is if Molinism is so persuasive, why would so many theologians today be Reformed? Where would their disagreements with it be, and how would they respond to this perspective?

DR. CRAIG: I think that many theologians in the Reformed camp would share the attitude of someone earlier who came to the microphone and said “I feel like it gives up something of God's sovereignty” because it means that God doesn't determine what you would freely do in these various circumstances. He doesn't declare the truth of these counterfactuals of creaturely freedom; rather, he finds himself confronted with them, and then working with them he can arrange to create a feasible world. So I think that for the Reformed theologian, many of them want God to decree even the truth of these counterfactuals of creaturely freedom and not to say that these are independent of God's decree.

FOLLOWUP: Then, as a follow-up . . .

DR. CRAIG: Can I just say one more thing though? When you read the Westminster Confession of Faith, it reads like a Molinist document. It is a marvelous affirmation of both human freedom and divine sovereignty! But then the fly in the ointment is that there's one article where it says God does not do this by knowing what people would freely do in the various circumstances. It's clearly an anti-Molinist statement, but apart from that single sentence I could affirm everything in the Westminster Confession.

FOLLOWUP: Following up then, how would they respond to your previous answer [. . .] which was that this, in fact, glorifies God even more because he's able to control.

DR. CRAIG: I don't know. I haven't heard a Reformed theologian respond to this. But I think this is really a good point – this view exalts God's sovereignty because it doesn't require him to resort to causal determinism to sovereignly direct a world of free creatures. It's actually a greater concept of sovereignty. I spoke several years ago at Westminster Theological Seminary in the San Diego area, and I spoke on the subject of middle knowledge. Afterwards, it was almost a stunned silence. Finally, one of the theologians said, “Dr. Craig, I've got to apologize for our community. We don't even know what you're talking about. We don't have any familiarity with this literature or this doctrine.” And he was very embarrassed. So sometimes there's . . . I think that's probably less frequent today because Molinism has really taken many people . . . well, it has greatly, greatly expanded its influence. In fact, one thinker, Dean Zimmerman at Rutgers University (a Christian philosopher) has said that Molinism is now the most popular theory of divine providence and human freedom that's out there. That doesn't mean it has the majority, but it would be, say, like if it has 35% everybody else has, say, 20%, 19%, something like that. He says it's the most popular account today of divine sovereignty and human freedom. In fact, as long as I'm telling stories, I spoke at Calvin College and Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan several years ago. They invited me to do the Stob Lectures. As I was speaking to the theology department of systematic theologians at Calvin Seminary, we got to talking about this. And one of the theologians said to me, “Oh, we're all Molinists here.” And I said, “What? At Calvin Seminary?” And he looked at his colleagues on either side of him and said, “Yeah.”