Originally posted by Yorzhik
Hope you don't mind Knight, but I want to try something...
1. Everyone has, as a consequence of being made in God's image, the trait of personal, individual will, and without fail it is accompanied by motive.
This isn't a definition of freewill. You can easily replace, if one didn't know the definition of "freewill", with anything the definition isn't known for, and it makes the same sense:
1. Everyone has, as a consequence of being made in God's image, the trait of personal, individual
squigy, and without fail it is accompanied by motive.
Do you know what
squigy is by your statement? Let's do the same thing with your next statement:
2. Everyone has the ability within themselves to squigy, BUT man's squigy is impotent. Therefore what man can, within himself, squigy does not necessarily translate into the freedom to perform what is squigied. Consider--
A. Our squigy is always subject to our own mutability. What we squigy one moment may not endure into the next moment.
B. Our squigy may be countermanded by someone else's squigy. Only those who have not been married would dispute that point, and those who would vehemently deny such a possibility are not likely to ever find a wife. If they DO find one, it is likely that they will soon deservedly lose her.
C. As a consequence of our fall in Adam, the power of our squigy was marred; that aspect of God's image in us being, as all our traits, defaced from its former brightness.
The definition of
squigy cannot be determined by what you say. It should be the same as
freewill if you had actually supplied a definition as you said you were doing.
Now, with
C, could you please let us know what you mean when you say (from your original statement)
C. As a consequence of our fall in Adam, the power of our squigy was marred; that aspect of God's image in us being, as all our traits, defaced from its former brightness.
How does one have their freewill marred? You have it or you don't.
Man's will cannot, of itself, 1. bring forth good fruit
So what, even if it is true, does that diminish the presence of freewill? We wouldn't know… Rolf still hasn't defined what freewill is.
In addition, Reymond notes that things like weather, disease, and earlier parental influences can influence our squigy without our being aware of their effect upon us. Additionally, Reymond says that for us to know in any particular instance that our squigy is truly independent of extraneous causes, we would have to be omniscient, for only then could we know all possible extraneous influences hindering us from absolute independence.
Still… no definition.
Finally, Both God and man have volition, and motivation is, without fail, involved in the volition of both.
vo•li•tion (v -l sh n) n. The power or faculty of choosing; the will.
You cannot use a word to define itself, and you essentially do this immediately above.
So… for those of you who though Knight was just blowing Rolf off, my answer *could* have been:
Sorry... Rolf... but you're far too vague and obscure.
Please tell us.... Rolf, how do YOU define freewill?
