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And greetings, welcome to The Dividing Line. My name is James White. We're gonna try this again. We already did this once. And according to Rich, we are struggling. And I don't know why. I don't understand these things, but Rich is blaming YouTube.
So what can I say? I don't know anything about YouTube. I mean, I know how to use YouTube. I have YouTube TV. But evidently, you know, it could just be that YouTube doesn't like us anymore. And so they're hitting us with stuff.
I don't know. I have no earthly idea, but at least, at least the chances are minimal that what happened yesterday happens today. Because yesterday we got hit with a power spike that took out the computer because the backup UPS, the allegedly UPS was IPS.
So the uninterruptible power source was interruptible power source. And it died. And so the computer went down and we couldn't recover the file. And that was it. There was an hour's worth of programming gone and couldn't recover it.
And that's all it was that. So the chances of another power spike taking out the new UPS. Yeah, then you start putting those little cameras in the office, you know, watching at three o 'clock in the morning to see who's coming in to mess with stuff.
So, yeah. So worst comes to worst, if this is herky-jerky bad live, I'll minimize my Twitter window so I don't see it. And we'll get it recorded and we'll get it up. And because it's almost like there's stuff piling up to get to, because I'm still doing my studies.
I'm sure Ken Wilson is very happy about that. I'm still doing my studies and stuff is still happening. And so we've got to work on stuff here. So we've got to get to it. So the first thing that we need to get to, and we did not test this, unfortunately, is we need to, like I said, we are redoing everything we did yesterday.
And so I'm going to respond to a Muslim video and then I'm going to add in something that I need to add in. And that is a comment from yesterday morning, probably about three o 'clock our time, but yesterday morning, maybe even earlier, from Pope Francis's morning mass devotional type thing that was pointed out to me and need to keep track of this particular situation.
I think it's very, very important. Then I've got some reading from the institutes to do with you. And then we get back into, I have had the opportunity to spend a number of hours over the past couple of days looking at Ken Wilson's dissertation and then following notes, following references.
I can't always do that on secondary sources because he wrote this at Oxford University and had a very large library. I've got a pretty good library, but it ain't Oxford's. But especially when we're quoting from Augustine or Athanasius, I've got all that.
So we're going to be doing some Ken Wilson says, and then Augustine actual, this is what he really said. And all of that's going to help us to really get focused in on the fundamental error, the fundamental flaw, this doesn't work.
It will never work. It will lose in debate. It will lose in debate badly, dupied. The attempt on Ken Wilson's part to create a concept that will allow him to let you listen to Calvin speaking and then go, that's manichaeism.
No, it's not. And the fundamental foundational differences are far too large to substantiate the assertions that he himself makes. And so we will be getting to that. It's going to be a trucker length dividing line.
Let's put it that way. The truckers who were upset that yesterday we didn't provide them with anything to listen to should be happy with this one. So maybe, obviously God works everything according to the counsel of his will.
I had looked at this video just briefly right before the program yesterday. So since the program didn't go off, I had opportunity to get the fuller video, which is five minutes long instead of two and a half minutes long, and also figure out who the author was and what their context was.
Ibn al-Khaim was the successor to a very, very, very, very, very well-known name that we've talked about more than once in the program, Ibn Taymiyyah. If you know anything about, well, the developing terminology as to which Muslim groups are which and the overriding views and purposes and so on and so forth, you know the name Ibn Taymiyyah, especially because of his emphasis upon Tawhid.
And if you have any strong emphasis upon Tawhid, you will end up with a strong emphasis as well upon the various forms of shirk. Tawhid is the oneness of Allah. Shirk is the association of anyone or anything with Allah.
This can be in regards to his names, his attributes, his worship, so on and so forth. There are different categories of shirk, different levels of shirk, but shirk is the unforgivable sin. So the Quran is very clear about that.
So you have Ibn Taymiyyah's successor in essence, he was a student of Ibn Taymiyyah anyway, as many people saw him as his successor. This is a poem that this man wrote to Christians. So this gives you an idea.
This is not a hundred years after Muhammad utilizing Western terminology, Western numbers. This would be what, 700 years approximately? Because he's contemporaneous with Ibn Kathir. So centuries down the road.
You would think by this point in time that there would be an accurate understanding on the part of Islamic leadership of what Christianity teaches and believes. But that's not been my experience. That's not the case.
And of course, the same thing is true in reverse. Even to this day, even though I would say you can find many, many Christian writers and scholars that are fully aware of the fundamental and foundational assertions of Islam.
But when it comes to the man on the street, your average Christian is just as ignorant as your average Muslim of the other person. But this isn't your average street guy. This is a scholar. And the fact that he is so disconnected from the reality of what Christians believe says a lot about where the conversation between Muslims and Christians has been for a long, long time.
So here is the poem. I just turned the sound off on that. My understanding is the poem is being recited in Arabic behind this, but that's not gonna make it very easy for us to really be able to hear anything or really understand it.
So I'm just getting rid of the sound. What I'll do is I'll play it. It is translated at the bottom of the screen in English. I'll stop it, respond to each statement. A couple of the statements are similar, are just sort of poetically repeating what has been said before.
And we'll work through it that way. Oh, worshipers of Christ, we'd like your most wise to answer our questions. Okay. Anyway, all right. If our God was murdered by some people's actions, and you'll notice it, okay, then what sort of God is this?
Well, this would be a God who is totally sovereign over what's taking place in his world. And hence, from eternity past, had chosen this mechanism as his means of self-glorification. The Father, the Son, the Spirit in eternity past chose to reveal the attributes of the triune God, his power, his wrath, his justice, his might, as well as his love, his grace, his mercy, in the drama of redemption.
And the center point of that drama of redemption is the cross of Christ. And so it was the intention of the second person in the Trinity, the divine Son, in perfect harmony with the Father and with the Spirit to enter into flesh as Jesus of Nazareth, to live a perfect life.
He did not cease being God. He took on a perfect human nature. Since God can create a perfect human nature, he can take on a perfect human nature. Without ceasing to be God, he takes on that perfect human nature, lives a perfect life, and then gives his life voluntarily in the place of his people so that God's wrath justly falls upon him in our place, substitutionary atonement, so that his righteousness can be given to us so that we can have forgiveness and eternal life.
His wisdom is thereby demonstrated, and we are provided with eternal life. The triune God is glorified by this entire drama as it takes place. So that is what sort of God this is. Now, the Muslim struggles with this because of the emphasis upon Allah's transcendence, and Christians believe that God is transcendent in the sense that he is not of necessity connected to human things or to created things in that sense, but that he voluntarily, in grace, enters into relationship with us.
It's not something that he is forced to do by any necessity in and of himself or external necessity or anything else, but he does so because he loves and he desires to accomplish his purpose. So what sort of God is this?
The triune God of Scripture. That is the triune God of Scripture. And we wonder, was he pleased by what they did to him? I'm thinking that last, the reason is this worked better last time is I wasn't playing it off of the thing because it keeps covering the words.
I think we were playing it off of YouTube or something last time, and that's why it didn't show up, I don't know. So then, were they pleased, was he pleased with them? If so, then blessed are they, for they must have achieved his pleasure.
So this is not a valid objection from a Muslim perspective because you believe that Allah accomplishes his purposes without going to the conclusion that that means that Allah is pleased in sinners or in sin.
So the, I think, much clearer revelation in the Hebrew scriptures and the Christian scriptures is seen in passages such as Genesis chapter 50, Isaiah chapter 10, Acts chapter four, where God ordains what takes place, but his intention in it is good.
And the intention of mankind is evil. They are judged on the basis of the intention of their heart. He is glorified on the intention of his part. And I would think that for most Muslims, especially someone in the line of Ibn Taymiyyah, that that would be a sort of a given that you'd accept that, understand that.
That would seem to make sense to me, but maybe not, I don't know. But if he wasn't pleased with them, then this must mean they overpowered him. Well, if in the sense that you're saying that what happened overpowered God, well, no, of course not.
Acts chapter four, just mentioned it just a moment ago, verses 27, 28, the early church praise what Herod Pontius Pilate, the Jews and Romans did, God's hand and God's will had predestined to occur. So they did not overpower him.
He could have called 10 ,000 angels is a phrase that we frequently utilize to respond to something like this. So was the present entity left without a God and all hearing being who can hear prayers? And the answer of course is no.
So when I reviewed this yesterday, I was a little confused as to exactly how this connected with what came before, because I thought maybe because of the picture that they were talking about in the garden, but the scene before was more about the crucifixion.
So there doesn't seem to be as much knowledge on the part of the Muslim poem writer as you might've expected. But the idea is in death, did God cease to exist? Well, even Muslims do not believe that death is cessation of existence.
So I don't know why Islam continuously asserts to us that if Jesus died, he ceased to exist. We do not believe that death causes someone to cease to exist. And Jesus voluntarily gave his life. He said, father into your hands, I commit my spirit.
And so if you understand, and it's clear that Ibn al-Khayyam did not understand the doctrine of the Trinity, even if you somehow have some idea of cessation of existence, the father didn't cease to exist.
The spirit did not cease to exist. And it's quite possible that as many Muslims do, it's quite possible that the idea here is you're responding to what's called modalism, the idea of the father, son, and the spirit of one person, which is a ancient heresy, but it's not one that we actually believe.
Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And were the heavens vacated when he was placed under the earth and the dirt above him? Again, this is a poem, so you get some of that. No, the heavens were not vacated.
He did not cease to be God. The father did not cease to exist. The son did not cease to exist. The spirit did not cease to exist. This was the giving of the human life that had been taken on by the son himself.
Perfect human life, the God-man. But again, it's not cessation, no vacation, vacating. Vacation, not quite the same thing. But no, that would not be the case at all. And then the next assertion, and was the universe left without a God to manage it while his hands were being nailed down?
Same answer as before. No, that would not be the case. That's assuming that there is only one divine person. And why didn't the angels help him when they heard him cry out in pain? Because it was not his intention that they should do so.
It is amazing that they, I mean, I'm sure that they were utterly amazed at the condescension of their maker in allowing himself to be treated in the way he was. But this was the intention from eternity past.
And again, it would just strike me that most Muslims should be able to understand this. Most Muslims I've spoken with do believe in the Qadr. And if they've not given much thought to it, because I don't think the Quran really does address it very much.
But if they've not given much thought to it, still the idea that God has perfect knowledge of all future events should be rather natural to most Muslims. And that therefore he has a will that he is accomplishing.
We just believe that will is much more exhaustive, evidently, than many Muslims do and included the crucifixion itself. And how could any wooden beam hold up a true God while he is being fastened to it?
Well, it has been said more than once that one of the amazing things, one of the amazing truths, is that Jesus made the very wood, the very tree from which the wood was taken upon, the cross was made that he was nailed to.
And I did yesterday, and I suppose I should still do so again. I did read, I was reminded when I saw this, of a section from an early Christian writing around one, in the 60s, 170s. So very, very early, about 120 years after the time of the Apostle Paul or so, somewhere around in there, 110 years or so after Paul and about 140 years after the crucifixion.
This is Melito Sardis in his Passover sermon. He said, and so, I think I remember doing this too. And so he was lifted up upon a tree and an inscription was attached indicating who was being killed. Who was it?
It is a grievous thing to tell, but a most fearful thing to refrain from telling. But listen, as you tremble before him on whose account the earth trembled. He who hung the earth in place is hanged. He who fixed the heavens in place is fixed in place.
He who made all things fast is made fast on a tree. The sovereign is insulted. God is murdered. The King of Israel is destroyed by an Israelite hand. This is the one who made the heavens and the earth and formed mankind in the beginning.
The one proclaimed by the law and the prophets, the one in flesh in a virgin, the one hanged on a tree, the one buried in the earth, the one raised from the dead and who went up into the heights of heaven, the one sitting at the right hand of the father and the one having all authority to judge and save, through whom the father made the things which exist from the beginning of time.
This one is the Alpha and the Omega. This one is the beginning of the end, the beginning indescribable and the end incomprehensible. This one is the Christ. This one is the King. This one is Jesus. This one is the leader.
This one is the Lord. This one is the one who rose from the dead. This one is the one sitting on the right hand of the father. He bears the father and is born by the father. To him be glory and power forever.
Amen. So again, from Melito of Sardis in the mid to late second century from a sermon on the Passover, affirming that yes, Jesus made the tree upon which he was crucified. That is exactly part of the great condescension and love that was shown in his self-giving.
And how could any iron be brought to him so that it could be driven inside him and cause him pain? He made it. He made it. It was his purpose. It was his intention to do so. The Muslim is thinking, this is not something God wanted to do.
And how could his enemy's hands ever reach him so that they could whip him from behind? It was his intention that he do so. This was the prophecy that was given in scripture long beforehand. And did this Christ revive himself or was there another God that brought him to life?
So again, it does seem that Ibn al-Khayyam is assuming a heresy known as modalism as the idea of one, it's a Unitarian idea, which is understandable. So it's understandable if you are a Unitarian as he would have been to push your ideas into the Christian experience.
But that is not the case. We are not, we are monotheists, but you're not Unitarians. And so the Bible actually describes the father as raising the son, the spirit is raising his son, and the son as raising himself.
He said he has the authority to take his life back again. And so the resurrection is a triune action in the New Testament scriptures. Again, all the earliest Christian writings confirm this. I could give you a fantastic quotation from Ignatius, for example, where he associates the three together in the one work of the gospel.
And that's 106, 107 AD. So very, very, very early. And there is nothing from that time period that says otherwise, as you would expect, if in fact the standard understanding of Muslims is the case and that is Paul sort of messed everything up and the original apostles wouldn't have believed all this.
Well, that's just, this is not the case. And so father, son, and spirit were involved in the resurrection. There aren't any other gods. There's only one God, Yahweh, creator of all things. So no. Okay, that one's staying on the screen for, there we go.
And how strange is it that a grave could be enclosed on a God and even stranger is the womb that enclosed it. So again, this is the assumption on the part of Muslims to this very day that the incarnation cannot happen.
This is really, this is why the debate we had in 2011 and wish we could have more debates like it remains central to this subject. And that's where we debated, can God become man? Because this is the real issue, the real issue between Islam and Christianity.
This is where Muslims just simply can't go to this point because of the assumption that God cannot take on that which he himself created. He has the ability to create the perfect human nature. He does not have the ability to take on a perfect human nature without ceasing to be God or without turning a human nature into a God or all these other things.
And of course, Christians had thought through all of this stuff long before Muhammad came along. He just was not aware of those answers. He was not aware of that. He may not have ever met a Christian who understood those things though.
Yeah, I know he met with the delegation of Najran but he was already well into his established beliefs by that point in time. And we don't know who those people were or what level of knowledge they had or things like that.
And it does seem that he had real confusion as to the sources from which Christians derive their beliefs. That's reflected in the Quran and the fact that the Quran quotes from Gnostic sources or at least sources that have been influenced by Gnosticism.
Non-canonical works, the making of the clay birds causing them to come alive and fly away. That's from the infancy gospel of Thomas. That's not canonical scripture but the author of the Quran didn't know that.
And it is interesting, if any of you are falling asleep right now, I think Rich is. He's actually says that he's not falling asleep. He is looking very carefully at the monitors and watching every little thing that's going on.
Just the horizontal and the vertical. He is tuned in. He's gonna keep it going. See, I was on a roll there. I was on a roll there. But in case you were, in case you were tuning out with all the Muslim stuff all of a sudden, it is interesting that a number of writers have theorized because how do you prove it?
But have theorized that Muhammad had interaction with, you ready? Manichaeans. That's not possible. Well, yes, it is possible. At least, let's put it this way. That he had interaction with people who at least could speak of what Manichaeans believed.
Maybe not, I mean, he could have met them. And would he have been able to differentiate between them and Christians? Because many middle of the third century, he dies in the middle of the third century.
So he's only a couple of hundred years beforehand. Manichaeism does spread into those areas. So it's possible. We can't prove it one way or the other. I mean, there's so much about Muhammad's life. We can't answer questions about it.
We can only speculate about it. But it is interesting. Why? This will plug into the Ken Wilson stuff later on. Mani had two visions of Al-Tawm. Now, Al-Tawm is the twin. The first one, I think it was like 12 and then about 10 years later.
And that was based upon this idea of there being a divine twin. Each person has a divine twin in the divine realm. That's not really relevant. But he is informed that he is the Paracletos. Mani claimed to be the Paraclete.
What do Muslims say about Muhammad? That he's the one prophesied in John 14 and 16. And, and Mani claimed to be the seal of prophecy or the seal of all the prophets, which is exactly the language that is used of Muhammad as well.
So it is interesting. You do wonder at that point, but the whole point being, I honestly see no evidence in the Quran or the Hadith that Muhammad possessed the ability to be able to differentiate between Christians, Christian heretics, Gnostics and Manichaeans.
So given that Manichaeism, Mani was told that he was going to bring all of the religious, all the great religions together into one in his message. So when Manichaeism went West into Rome, then it emphasized Jesus.
When it went East, it emphasized Buddha. And it was almost like interchangeable, you know, like, oh, these people are more into the Jesus stuff. So we'll use Jesus here rather than Buddha, so on and so forth.
So how would Muhammad have been able to know since he did not understand Orthodox Christianity? How would he have been able to tell the difference? He did not differentiate about sources. So how could he differentiate about specific theologies?
That is a question. So this takes us back to the question here. And how strange is it that a grave could be enclosed on a God and even stranger is the womb that enclosed him? The whole idea from the Islamic perspective is how strange that the creator would condescend to enter into his creation.
And that is the issue that separates Christians and Muslims, especially as regards to Jesus. No two ways about it. So the next statement is, which he remained inside for nine whole months and under darkness being fed by blood.
Yes, he did. He was truly a man. And so he was not, as some people theorize, beamed out of Mary. The prophecy, and I believe Muslims believe that Isaiah was a prophet. The prophecy in Isaiah chapter nine says, a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us.
And the root for child and born in Isaiah nine six, Yalad, Yalad and Yalad goes straight into Arabic. That's the same tri-literal root in Arabic as it is in Hebrew, they're both Semitic languages. And so, yes, a child was born to us.
There was blood on the straw. He was truly human. So the life that he gave could truly take the place of that which we owed and provide for our salvation in the process. Then he emerged from the womb as a small child completely helpless, reaching out to be breastfed.
Yes, indeed. That does not mean for a moment that the universe was without direction or that the son himself had ceased to be God. None of these things are true, but the assumption, if you buy into a Unitarian idea, that would be necessary, but we're Trinitarians, not Unitarians, so that's not a objection to us.
Thus he ate, drank, and after he answered the call, which comes naturally, so is this really your God? And so the objection there, of course, is that, well, if Jesus ate and drank, then he had to do everything else that mankind does, and therefore he can't possibly be God.
Again, the underlying assumption being Allah could create all this, and here's one of the interesting things. Was Adam created good? Well, Adam ate, so how can that be bad? And so the assumption is, looking from the fallen state, and of course the fall is not seen the same way within Islam.
There is a fall, it's just not seen as having the same impact as it is in Christianity. There's much less clarity as to the result of that. There are differing things that are said in the Hadith and other sources.
Anyway, but the idea is this would be beneath Allah, and at least that does have a chronic foundation in Surah 5, you have the same argument being made there. Highly exalted is Allah, flash, flash, flash.
And that's where he ended. I think that's where he ended before, but we see what the rest of it says here. Highly exalted is Allah above the lies of the Christians. I wonder if the shorter version was so that you did not include the Quranic-style condemnations, each of whom will be asked about their fabrications.
And so if you believe what the original followers of Jesus wrote, and you have nothing earlier than them, then these are called fabrications and the lies of the Christians. Asserting things that are not true of Allah is the concept of the writer.
Oh, cross-worshippers. Now, this is important for you to see. We didn't get into this last time. This is new stuff now. But cross-worshippers, oh, cross-worshippers, for what reason is someone exalted for accepting this and blameworthy for rejecting it, the cross?
Now, again, you would think, there is that one example of a meaningful Muslim-Christian dialogue in the early years that we've gone over in the past. I'm not going to go into it right now, but it doesn't seem like that continued for very long.
And so it's understandable that people would view us as cross-worshippers because they don't understand what the cross means. There is a, when I would wear a cross, and I'm wearing a cross more often these days because to be perfectly honest with you, I see a day coming when we're not going to be able to wear it at all, where it would be dangerous to do so.
And I happen to know of many brothers and sisters in the world who can't wear one for sake of possibly losing their life or being arrested. So as long as I've got the freedom to do it, I'm going to remember what the Apostle Paul said to the Galatians.
He said, but God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ by whom the world is crucified in me and I into the world. Now, I understand that Muslims do not understand the centrality of the cross.
They do not understand the centrality of the person who died upon the cross. And they do not understand that the cross itself is not the point. It is the act that took place upon the cross. We rejoice and we glory in the cross, not because the cross as a wooden, you know, God did not preserve that.
Christians in the medieval period thought that he did and there were fragments of the true cross all over Europe. In fact, as Desirius Erasmus said, if you gathered up all the fragments of the true cross, you could build a ship with fragments of the true cross.
And so there was a time there has been an inordinate materialization of the cross, but the biblical glorying in the cross is glorying in the fact that it was God's intention, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, from the beginning for that to happen.
That his will predestined it, his hand brought it about. That the Son, not my will, but yours be done. Father, into your hand and commitment of spirit. It is finished. It is the center point of history.
From the Christian perspective, everything before it, look forward to it. Everything afterwards looks back to it. We live now in the light of the cross that shines from the empty tomb. And so it is the center point of history.
So we don't worship the cross. We are not cross worshipers, but we do glory in it because of what it says about the condescension, the mercy, the grace, and the love of our God that has been demonstrated in what took place upon it.
It was not an accident. He voluntarily gave his life. That is always something I emphasize to our Muslim friends because a lot of you need to hear that. So, and is it not logical that we should break and burn what humiliated Christ and the one that made it?
Because part of the discussion that takes place is a portion of, I'm not sure we'll call it prophecy, but in regards to the end times, it is said that when Christ returns, he will kill the pig and break the cross.
And this idea of breaking the cross, that's what's here. Is it not logical that we should break and burn what humiliated Christ and the one that made it? See, Ibn al-Kaim did not know what Philippians chapter two says.
The cross did not humiliate Christ. The cross was a means that Christ used to bring about his own humiliation, which then led to his exaltation. He humbled himself, becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross.
Christ was in charge. The father, the son, the spirit, but Christ voluntarily gave himself. He humbled himself. And because he did so, God the father highly exalted him, gave him the name, which is above every name, including the name of Muhammad.
At the name of Jesus, every knee will bow. Every tongue will confess. That was written long before Muhammad came along. And I have no reason to believe Muhammad ever heard those words, ever understood those words.
And so, no, it is not logical because there is no understanding here as to what the cross was all about. I'll probably do one or two more. I think we've covered most of the things here. Since you claim that God was forcibly crucified upon it with his hands nailed to it, for truly what a cursed cross to carry, which one should discard instead of kissing when glanced upon?
And so, again, this primarily developed, I'm sure, out of the response of, once the borders of the Islamic empire firmed up after that century of expansion, then eventually there has to be, the Muslims have to deal with the fact they have Christians in their lands, and so they're observing what people are doing.
And just like the Romans misunderstood what Christians were doing, and by this point in time, Christians were doing things they shouldn't have been doing as far as excesses of veneration and things like that.
Mariolatry and hagiolatry had developed by that point in time, things that were not soundly biblical. That's where this is coming from in the mind of the Muslim. So we've covered the main part there. I'm gonna, since we've not only got that, but also have the Pope saying, I'm gonna go ahead and call that at that particular point and hope that that is useful to you in responding to what has been said about that.
I was sent, shifting gears now, and thank you for having sent that to me. I apologize if my initial response was too brusque. It just seemed, I'm just thankful that I know of Muslims who have taken the time to find out what we believe.
But the reality is they are the minority. They are the minority. And I'm talking about who actually then address Christianity. I would expect that any Christian who's gonna address Islam should, is under obligation to accurately represent the other side.
I realize that does not always take place. But in my experience, there is significantly more desire on the Christian side to understand Islam and to read Islamic sources than vice versa. I just don't find many Muslims doing that the other way around.
Okay, so with that said, yesterday morning, which would have been early, maybe even the night before our time here in the United States Pope Francis had a, what would they call this? Not now, there was a specific name.
Private Daily Mass at his residence, Casa Santa Marta, on May 4th, so yesterday morning, Italy time. And he said something during this. This is reported by Zenit .org, which is there in Rome. It's a Roman Catholic source that wants to get the Pope's words out to everybody.
So this is not one of these, somebody heard somebody say that they had talked with the Pope and he had said such and so. No, that's not what this is. Here's the section from the brief papal homily. In the gospel, the Lord says to us, I have other sheep that are not of this fold.
I must bring them also and they will heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd, John 10, 16. The Lord says, I have sheep everywhere and I am shepherd of all. This all in Jesus is very important.
We think of the parable of the marriage feast when the guests would not come, one because he had bought a field, another because he got married. Each one gave his reason for not attending and the king got angry and said, go now to the thoroughfares and invite to the marriage feast as many as you find.
All great and little, rich and poor, good and evil, all. This all is the vision of the Lord who came for all and died for all. But did he die also for that wretch who has made my life impossible? He died also for him.
And for that brigand, he died for him, for all. And also for the people that don't believe in him or are of other religions. He died for all. This doesn't mean that one must engage in proselytism. No, but he died for all.
He has justified all. The rest of the paragraph isn't overly relevant, but I want you to catch the terminology. Obviously, for example, the universal catechism of the Catholic Church emphasizes universal atonement.
Because of the theology of Rome and the doctrine of the sacraments, well, what you have is provisionalism. What you have is the death of Christ provides grace that is then channeled through the sacraments.
So Rome has the sacramental system, provisionalism has autonomous faith. But in both cases, the death of Christ does not actually save anyone. And so it is absolutely universal. But once you get into South American, Roman Catholic theology, the impact of liberation theology really started flourishing there, what, in the 50s?
And just really blew up in the 60s and hence is extremely important in the education of Pope Francis before he became Pope. When you look, especially at the South American context, where there is a tremendous amount of Marxism, you're seeing here what happens when politics grabs hold of a bad imbalance in a theological system and creates this situation.
Now, the historic Roman Catholic position is not universalism. That's obvious. It should be obvious from anyone who reads almost anything from the history of the Roman Catholic Church, from Unum Sanctum being just one of many examples of the fact that Rome has not been universalistic.
I have said for quite some time that I believe that the Pope minimally, minimally it's unquestionable that the Pope is an inclusivist. But he has said many things that seem to indicate he is a universalist.
Remember the young boy who came up to the Pope and asked the Pope if his father had gone to hell because his father had died and his father was an atheist. And the Pope's response, once he was told the story, was that his atheist father had gone to heaven because he had had his kids baptized.
So you can be an atheist and go to heaven. The idea of believing the right things, of having a true confession of faith can be transformed into almost anything else. And it is in liberal Catholicism, liberal Protestantism.
We all saw the video. I thought I'd seen this video before, but we all saw the video of the people walking into some Protestant cathedral. It came out over the weekend, but I thought for sure it was the same one that I had seen two years ago of this procession where you have people dressed as trees.
They're literally on stilts. They look like guardians of the galaxy without getting trimmed properly. And so we have the Protestants have their wacko leftist liberals too, just like the Catholics do. And so you get that kind of weirdness taking place, but he's emphasizing the all, the word all.
This all is the vision of the Lord who came for all and died for all. But did he also die for that wretch that has made my life impossible? He died also for him. And for that brigand, he died for him, for all.
And also for the people that don't believe in him or are of other religions, he died for all. And then sort of to make it rather plain, why else insert this here? If this is just, yeah, we're talking universal atonement, but you still have to do these things.
Then why does he say this? This doesn't mean that one must engage in proselytism. No, because see, that's how it's always been understood before is that if Jesus died for all, then we need to evangelize them, announce to them from the Catholic perspective, this provision that has taken place.
He says, no, this doesn't mean that one must engage in proselytism. No, this Pope does not like proselytism. Could it get any plainer in light of the statement that he signed just last year with one of the Muslim leaders that he is perfectly fine with you remaining a Muslim.
You do not have to bow to the knee to Christ. It's obvious. I know that theologically that can't be the case because he's the infallible Vicar of Christ, right? But this doesn't mean that one must engage in proselytism.
No, but he died for all. And then here's the, he has justified all. Now that's not what Trent taught. That's not what Vatican II taught. That sure ain't what the other living Pope taught. That is not the dogmatic formulation of the church.
I know, I know, I know. The response is he was not, this is not an infallible teaching of the Pope and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I just keep coming back. Look, how many years has this got to go on before we realize that this man only knows one chord on the guitar?
He can only play one chord. And so it's useless to try to deny that that's the one chord he's playing. Well, I don't know, it sounds like a B flat to me. No, it's a C, that's all he knows. And how many times does he have to make it plain and clear?
I don't know. I don't know, but there you go. He has justified all. That seems to get, if this was all alone, okay, maybe. But it's not, it's not all alone. It is a body of statements that lead to the inevitable conclusion that this man is a universalist and that is not historic Roman Catholic teaching.
Whatever you do with that, whatever you do with that. And of course he is the one that then makes people cardinals and assigns them to biblical, pontifical biblical commission places and seats and authority and everything else.
And yeah, there you go. It's challenged, notorious about it. It's challenged. Okay, we did a little reading earlier on from Milito Sardis. And now I'm going to do a little reading from book three of the Institutes of the Christian Religion.
And I, yesterday when I did this, I didn't say who it was from, but some of that might've gone out. So, you know, somebody may have run into it. I don't know. But, so I sort of kept it in a suspense, even though it really wasn't all suspenseful.
Kept it in suspense yesterday, won't do that today. I have said numerous times, I will repeat now, the fact that one of the things that struck me in seminary as I read the Institutes for the first time, not as an assignment, but because I just wanted to read them once I had found out about Reformed theology and things like that, is the fact that the ink, and this was the, you can still see the marking.
This was the set that I read. The ink still smudges. And what I mean by that is John Calvin had the ability to address truths of the Christian faith in a timeless fashion, in a fashion that was not parochial.
It was not limited in its appeal or expression to just his time period. He makes reference to contemporary things, but it's amazing that even when he does that, it's like he's talking about people today.
I've written many books, but I've never written a book that comes anywhere close to what Calvin was capable of writing. Just a tremendous intellect and a tremendous ability to communicate. And much more of a pastoral figure than he has given credit for, by the way, by many people, including by many people who are his friends, I might add.
We are dealing with individuals who I believe are fundamentally opposed to the Christian faith. To the Reformation and to the theology of the Reformation, even though they are not Roman Catholics. We are dealing with the assertion made by Ken Wilson that if you believe what Calvin believed, you are a Manichean Christian.
In fact, once Rich gets back, see, I had to let everybody know that you're leaving your post again. But let me just remind you, I saved this as a file just so I can play it at any point in time I want, okay?
So remember, this is Leighton Flowers and Ken Wilson. This is the conclusion of that first interview. This is their thesis.
Say that Augustine was the first to clearly articulate these views. That coupled with what you found, it seems to be an insurmountable argument against a more deterministic understanding of the text.
Yes, if you want to remain a traditional Christian. If you want to go be a Manichean Christian with Augustine, then it's fine to take a deterministic view. But for a traditional Christian, you should hold a free will view.
So, Manichean Christian.
So what you're going to be hearing here is a Manichean Christian. Now, for most people, they don't know what a Manichean Christian would be. And of course, the very idea of Manichean Christian does not make the slightest bit of sense.
That is a less meaningful phrase than Mormon Christian. Really is. Once you understand just how wildly different the foundational story, concepts, worldview, of Manicheanism is, then you'll understand that.
But we're being told this is Manicheism. So I want to read some from Calvin, remind us of these things. And then we're going to be looking at some assertions made by Ken Wilson in his dissertation and continuing the process of providing a response to those assertions.
But this is more enjoyable, much more enjoyable. I'm reading from chapter 21 of book three. Now, I've pointed out before, should be pointed out in the 1559 Latin edition, book chapter 21 follows chapter 20, obviously, but chapter 20 is the longest chapter in the Institutes and it's a chapter on prayer.
So for those who think that Calvin's view of providence, providence, sovereignty, divine decree, destroys the idea of the importance of prayer, you probably haven't read Calvin and probably don't know much about his life either.
In actual fact, the covenant of life is not preached equally among all men. And among those to whom it is preached, it does not gain the same acceptance either constantly or an equal degree. In this diversity, the wonderful depth of God's judgment is made known.
For there is no doubt that this variety also serves the decision of God's eternal election. If it is plain that it comes to pass by God's bidding that salvation is freely offered to some while others are barred from access to it, at once great and difficult questions spring up explicable only when reverent minds regard as settled what they may suitably hold concerning election and predestination.
A baffling question, this seems to many, for they think nothing more inconsistent than that out of the common multitude of men, some should be predestined to salvation, others to destruction. But how mistakenly they entangle themselves will become clear in the following discussion.
Besides, in the very darkness that frightens them, not only is the usefulness of this doctrine made known, but also it's very sweet fruit. We shall never be clearly persuaded as we ought to be that our salvation flows from the wellspring of God's free mercy until we come to know his eternal election, which illumines God's grace by this contrast, that he does not indiscriminately adopt all into the hope of salvation, but gives to some what he denies to others.
How much the ignorance of this principle detracts from God's glory, how much it takes away from true humility is well known. Yet Paul denies that this, which needs so much to be known, can be known unless God, utterly disregarding works, chooses those whom he has decreed within himself.
At the present time, he says, a remnant has been saved according to the election of grace. But if it's by grace, there's no more works, otherwise grace would no more be grace. If to make it clear that our salvation comes about solely from God's mere generosity, we must be called back to the course of election.
Those who wish to get rid of all this are obscuring as maliciously as they can, what ought to have been gloriously and vociferously proclaimed. And they tear humility up by the very roots. Paul clearly testifies that when the salvation of a remnant of the people is ascribed to the election of grace, then only is it acknowledged that God of his mere good pleasure preserves whom he will, and moreover, that he pays no reward since he can owe none.
They who shut the gates, that no one may dare seek a taste of this doctrine, wrong men, no less than God. For neither will anything else suffice to make us humble as we ought to be, nor shall we otherwise sincerely feel how much we are obliged to God.
And as Christ teaches, here is our only ground for firmness and confidence in order to free us of all fears and render us victorious amid so many dangers, snares and mortal struggles, he promises that whatever the father has entrusted into his keeping will be safe.
From this, we infer that all those who do not know that they are God's own will be miserable through constant fear. Hence, those who by being blind to the three benefits we have noted would wish the foundation of our salvation to be removed from our midst, very badly serve the interests of themselves and of all other believers.
How is it that the church becomes manifest to us from this when as Bernard rightly teaches, quote, it could not otherwise be found or recognized among creatures since it lies marvelously hidden, both within the bosom of a blessed predestination and within the mass of a miserable condemnation, end quote.
But before I enter into the matter itself, I need to mention by way of preface, two kinds of men. Human curiosity renders the discussion of predestination already somewhat difficult of itself, very confusing and even dangerous.
No restraints can hold it back from wandering and forbidden bypass and thrusting upward to the heights. If allowed, it will leave no secret to God that it will not search out and unravel. Since we see so many on all sides rushing into this audacity and impudence, among them certain men not otherwise bad, they should in due season be reminded of the measure of their duty in this regard.
First then, let them remember that when they inquire into predestination, they are penetrating the sacred precincts of divine wisdom. If anyone with carefree assurance breaks into this place, he will not succeed in satisfying his curiosity and he will enter a labyrinth from which he can find no exit for it is not right for man unrestrainedly to search out things that the Lord has willed to be hidden himself and to unfold from eternity itself the sublimest wisdom, which he would have us revere but not understand that through this also he should fill us with wonder.
He has set forth by his word the secrets of his will that he has decided to reveal to us. These he decided to reveal in so far as he foresaw that they would concern us and benefit us. We have entered the pathway of life, says Augustine, let us hold steadfastly to it.
It leads us to the King's chamber in which are hid all treasures of knowledge and wisdom for the Lord Christ himself did not bear a grudge against his great and most select disciples when he said, I have many things to say to you but you cannot bear them now.
We must walk, we must advance, we must grow that our hearts may be capable of those things which we cannot yet grasp. But if the last day finds us advancing there we shall learn what we could not learn here.
That's the end of the quote from Augustine. If this thought prevails with us that the word of the Lord is the sole way that can lead us in our search for all that is lawful to hold concerning him, it is the sole light to illumine our vision of all that we should see of him.
It will readily keep and restrain us from all rashness. For we shall know that the moment we exceed the bounds of the word, our course is outside the pathway and in darkness and that there we may repeatedly wander, slip and stumble.
Let this therefore, first of all, be before our eyes to seek any other knowledge of predestination than what the word of God discloses is not less insane than if one should purpose to walk in a pathless waste or to see in darkness.
And let us not be ashamed to be ignorant of something in this matter wherein there is certain learned ignorance. Rather, let us willingly refrain from inquiring into a kind of knowledge, the ardent desire for which is both foolish and dangerous, nay, even deadly.
But if a wanton curiosity agitates us, we shall always do well to oppose it with this restraining thought, just as too much honey is not good, so for the curious, the investigation of glory is not turned into glory.
For there is good reason for us to be deterred from this insolence, which can only plunge us into ruin. One last paragraph, and it's an important one. There are others, so he's talking about two different kinds, here's the second.
There are others who wishing to cure this evil all but require that every mention of predestination be buried. Indeed, they teach us to avoid any question of it as we would a reef. Even though their moderation in this matter is rightly to be praised because they feel these mysteries ought to be discussed with great soberness.
Yet because they descend to too low a level, they make little progress with the human understanding, which does not allow itself to be easily restrained. Therefore, to hold to a proper limit in this regard also, we shall have to turn back to the word of the Lord in which we have a sure rule for the understanding.
For scripture is the school of the Holy Spirit in which as nothing is omitted that is both necessary and useful to know, so nothing is taught but what is expedient to know. Therefore, we must guard against depriving believers of anything disclosed about predestination in scripture, lest we seem either wickedly to defraud them of the blessing of their God, or to accuse and scoff at the Holy Spirit for having published what it is in any way profitable to suppress.
Now, obviously, it's a lengthy section and it then goes into excellent biblical exegesis. I would suggest to you that the exact same form of exegesis, the exact same form of interpretation that Calvin presented for justification by faith alone, grace alone, faith alone, inspiration of scripture, sufficiency of scripture, the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, he uses the same hermeneutics and exegesis in dealing with predestination and election.
He does not have to refer us to external sources and he does not have to ever once adopt a Manichean understanding of the text of scripture. I would invite you to read it for yourself and see if that is not the case.
It most plainly and assuredly is. Now, over the weekend, I published another article on our website working on Wilson's dissertation number four, Abusing Language, and I focused upon a single sentence.
I actually have found another to go along with it. I actually would like, I may go back and add it. On page 35 of the dissertation, we have this sentence. Manichaeism taught free will was totally lost after humanity's fall.
Let me repeat it again. Manichaeism taught free will was totally lost after humanity's fall. Now, one of the challenges that I face in seeking to fulfill my desire to respond to this dissertation, to refute its errors regarding the assertion that to believe in predestination election is to be a Manichaean Christian.
I think that is an absurdity. It cannot possibly survive cross-examination in any meaningful debate, and we will see that when we debate. But in light of that, I recognize I have a real task. And the task is that as Christians read a sentence like this, we interpret it in our language.
So free will, totally lost, humanity fall. These will all be naturally, and I believe were intended by Ken Wilson. I believe this is Ken Wilson's understanding. He is utilizing language that is common in our context and has common meanings in our context.
Those meanings would not be present in Manichaeism or Gnosticism or in Stoicism. They'd be present in the Qumran community because of the biblical foundations there. I mentioned all of them because those are the groups along with the Neoplatonists that Wilson seeks to, in some way, connect together with his dupied idea, which I'll be looking at the actual initial definition of dupied in the dissertation today.
Here's the problem. That's a natural way of reading a sentence. That's a natural way that people think it is not a scholarly way of doing things. It cannot be a scholarly way of doing things. Scholars must recognize the meaning of words in the context in which they're originally used.
This is a part of meaningful exegesis of anything, whether it be scripture or anything else. And the fact is that Manichaeism did not teach free will, never taught free will, has no basis for even understanding free will.
And this sentence implies that humanity had free will but that free will was totally lost after something called the fall. The problem is that there is no fall. There is no way to cross-connect the Christian understanding of creation by one God who creates all things good, including the physical universe.
And the wild mythology of Manichaeism, you can't do it. And let me prove that to you. Let me explain a little bit more about Manichaeism. How's that? I have some images here too, because I mean, it's wild stuff.
It really, really is. And trying to keep track of all of it can be very, very, very challenging. Let's talk a little bit about the origination of all things within Manichaeism, okay? Now, Manichaeism is fully dualistic.
Now, you've heard me talk about dualism many times before. Normally when we define dualism, we define it somewhere along the lines of that which is spirit is good, that which is physical is evil. But that's a element of dualism, but Manichaeism is truly dualistic because Mani posited the idea that there are two equal eternal principles.
One did not give rise to the other. There is no God who is self-sufficient in giving rise to all things within Manichaeism. There isn't. That would be enough right there, but that's just the start, believe me.
That's just the start. You have the kingdom of light, you have the realm of light. See, kingdom sounds so medieval, like knights running around, it's like that. That's not what it's like. But you have the realm of light and you have the realm of darkness, good and evil, but it's light and darkness.
And there's almost a physical property, not technically physical, but there's a sense in which light exists as something. And you have the father of greatness. Almost all of these systems have sort of this nebulous, undefined great being who did not originate anything else.
He's complete in and of himself. He's just light, undisturbed, beautiful. But then you have this, and it has been so eternally, but over here you have the realm of darkness and it's eternal too. And one didn't create the other.
There is no divine decree in Manichaeism. No divine decree in Manichaeism. None. Sorry about that. None. Yes, I am saying that Ken Wilson tried to draw a direct line between a system that has no divine decree to the divine decree and failed completely in the process, as we'll see.
I mean, all I gotta do is explain this stuff and the rest of you sit there and going, really? Wow. Okay. All right. Okay. So you have in the kingdom of light, you have the father of greatness. And at some point, the kingdom of darkness sees the kingdom of light and sees that it's beautiful and wants to possess it.
And so the first battle begins, the first war begins, and there is an invasion. I'm not sure how invasions take place like this. How does darkness invade light? Everything that the father of greatness does is in response to what the kingdom of darkness does.
There is no, there is literally no divine initiative. There is no desire for the revelation of any attributes. There is no desire for the communication of attributes. Nothing that we would associate with Judaism, Christianity, and the understanding.
Of the father of greatness. Okay. But in response to the invasion of the kingdom of darkness, and this is where a lot of the Gnostic ideas come in. Because in Gnosticism, it is the thinking of that great initial pure virgin spirit that gives rise to the Barbalo and all the rest of this, these other eons that are emanated out.
So we might say give birth to, but, and there may be an element of that, but it's more of an emanation of. So there is a reaction from the father of goodness, the father of light, father of greatness, and two emanations come out from him.
And the one is called the mother of life. And the other is called the primeval man or primal man. That's not Adam. That is not Adam. That's where a lot of this can get so stinking confusing. Cause we automatically try to translate this stuff into categories that we can fit in.
And especially here, you don't want to even bother trying to do that. So you have the primal human being, primeval man. Those are two different terms we use, same guy. Guy. Not a guy. It's a emanation from the father of greatness.
And the mother of life. And so the primal man to defeat the forces of darkness, he allows himself to be captured by the forces of darkness. And they steal from him part of his essence of light. Now, remember, Manichaeism is going to undergo development over time.
The best we can do is sort of approximate what Augustine would have been hearing. For 10 years, Augustine was a Manichaean hearer. He was not one of the elect. The elect did not marry. They did not have sex.
That's why they eventually passed from the scene. Happens with every group where you do that. But the hearers would prepare food, very, very limited diet of food for the elect. And so he was a hearer for about 10 years.
And so the best we can do is try to go, what would Augustine have heard? Where was Manichaeism at that particular point in time in the fourth century? So basically a hundred years down the road from where Manny was, what developments had there been?
And again, the original Manichaeism is more in the East. As it went West, it sort of adopted Western terminology. You can really see this when you look at some of the interactions that are recorded for us with Manichaeans, primarily by Augustine.
So it may have been different in the East, but I'm just giving you the best summary we can. So the primal man is captured and he prays to the mother of life to deliver him. And he is raised back to the realm of light, but part of him, like his armor or whatever you would, he's an emanation.
But light remains trapped in the kingdom of darkness. And most of the entire Manichaean mythology is the redemption of the light that is in the kingdom of darkness. That's what it's all about. That's what it's all about.
So the primal man goes back to the realm of light. And then you have the second phase of the war. And in the second phase of the war, well, okay, parents, sorry. Up to now, been easy. But the Manichaean myth is sexual and perverse.
I can't avoid that reality. So I'll just let you know, you may want to listen to this first and then decide or skip over it. I don't know. Just letting you know ahead of time. We have to talk a little bit about the seduction of the Archons.
Now, I know that there was a Star Trek episode that had the Archons in it, but I never knew this. First one, first one, first one, yeah. Ha, yeah. Okay, so what happens is there is a, messenger, yeah, the living spirit and the messenger are emanated by the Father of Greatness.
At least there aren't nearly as many eons as in Gnosticism, but it actually ends up getting more complicated later on. And to, in an act of odd, strange, I don't even know how to put it. There is, the messenger, sometimes in the stories told in a boat or something like that, which comes from the Realm of Light, passes by some of the demonic dark powers.
Now, we use the term demon in a very, very, very specific way. Demon in Greek simply means, powerful being, a being with supernatural power. So when we talk about, so since these are dark demonic beings, then there would be a lot of cross connection to what we would consider a demonic power.
But these are some of the leading powers of the Kingdom of Darkness, evidently been emanated by whatever is the head of that. So the messenger sails past them and the demons are male and female. They're male and female.
There's no transgenderism and manichaeism, thankfully. One point for the manichaeans. Yeah, yeah, no kidding. So this messenger is like hermaphroditic. It's like a hermaphrodite. It's like, it's androgynous in a way, but not really.
It's not like 1990s rock stars. But to the male demons, the messenger appears as a beautiful naked female. And to the female demons, it appears as a beautiful naked young man. This is where you, this is where you stop, start, whatever.
So beautiful is this messenger that the male demons ejaculate sperm onto the earth. And this, and the female demons, who for some reason are pregnant, have abortions that fall onto the earth. And these contain light, which they've stolen from the primal man.
And this then becomes the beginning of plants and animals on earth. And this explains why plants and animals have light within them. This is where they came from. Okay? So you've already heard me mention that Manichean worship is focused on the digestive system.
Because the idea is that by properly preparing only certain kinds of food, pure food, the hearers bring this to the elect. The elect are so pure that their bodies are able to release the light from the food in the digestive system so that the light can then begin its journey back to the realm of light.
So through digestion and excrement, the light is released. And as the Manicheans would look up at the nighttime sky, they saw that there were two great collections of light, the sun, the moon. And then there was a pathway of light, which we know as the rest of our galaxy, the Milky Way.
They didn't know what it was. And so the idea is that that light is leaving the elect. That's the Milky Way. And it goes to the moon, which is why the moon gets fuller and fuller and fuller. And then once it's full, it goes from there to the sun, which is why it goes down and down and down, and then it fills back up again.
That's why you have the phases of the moon, okay? But it goes from the moon to the sun, from the sun to the realm of light. And so it's a redemption process where you're recovering light, okay? So what then happens after the seduction, so when the messenger sails by in this sexually erotic form, this is called the seduction of the archons.
They then begin the process of trapping light in the created order, which is of the realm of darkness. So the created order is never good. There's no God to create it good. So then I quoted directly from this work here.
It is the history of Mani and Manichaeism by G .O. Wittingren, translated by, it was translated by Charles Kessler, revised by the author. It's back in the 1960s, 1965 English translation. Excellent work on Manichaeism.
And so I'm going to quote from it. So you get, so it's not just me giving this. Here's the quotation. To retain that portion of light, which still remained in it, matter in the person of concupiscence evolved a plot.
A major part of light was to be concentrated in the creation of an individual as a counterweight to the heavenly creation. A male demon, Asqualon, Asqualun, sorry, and a female one, Namrael, were chosen to put the plan into effect.
To assimilate those particles of light, which had fallen upon the earth and were present in the archons abortions, Asqualon engulfed all those monsters which were male whilst Namrael was correspondingly served with the female ones.
Then Asqualon had intercourse with her and begot Adam, then Eve, the first two human beings. Thus mankind, as has been properly stressed, originated from a revolting mixture of cannibalistic and sexual performances.
His body as the purely animal manifestation of the archons and his lust, the libido driving him in accordance with matter's plot to procreation and parturition, these are man's heritage from his demonic provenance.
But the world of light neither could nor was willing to leave man at the mercy of the world of evil. In Adam was gathered the greatest portion of the remaining imprisoned light, and that was why he became the first subject of effort at redemption on the part of the world of light.
Page 59, if you wanna look it up. So mankind is the offspring of two demons who eat other demons and get light in them and then mate and produce Adam and then Eve. But since the light is particularly focused in them, then the realm of light focuses upon them to try to get the light out of them, which becomes what Manichean worship is all about.
You choose to become one of the elect, the elect are pure, they purify their bodies, they have rigorous dietary requirements, no sexual activity, because that would procreate, that would just trap more light in more bodies.
And then your body becomes the means of redemption by eating food and releasing the light particles, Milky Way, moon, sun, realm of light. That's the redemptive plan in the world. So with that portion of Manichaeism explained, you can turn the sound back on if you want, parents.
Let's go back to this statement. Manichaeism taught free will was totally lost after humanity's fall. How does any of that fit into what we just learned? Fall from what? We are the offspring of demons.
Fall from what? We were never made upright. The physical being has always been evil. It's not of the realm of light, it traps light. There was no pre-existence. Is part of this trying to say that light had will or something?
That doesn't make any sense. So to say Manichaeism taught free will was totally lost after humanity's fall, the Manichaean idea is that mankind is created evil, so there is no fall. And redemption is getting the light out of ourselves.
So like, for example, when one of the elect dies, their light goes back to the realm of light. That's part of the redemptive process. When a hearer dies, their light does not go back to the realm of light.
It is reincarnated in another human being who hopefully will become one of the elect and then continue the process. But to say that there is a gulf fixed between the meaning of each one of these words and the meaning within Christianity is hopefully to say something that is very, very obvious.
Right? Now, like I said, there was another quote that I wanted to add in here real quick. Page 36, it's this next page, this quotation. Manny's totally incapacitating fall, which destroyed free will, like Qumran, Gnosticism, and Neoplatonism demanded a strict unilateral predetermination of eternal destinies by the spiritual God, then dupied, divine unilateral predetermination of individuals' eternal destinies.
Can you see, hopefully you can see that the nature of man, the nature of God, the nature of the will, the nature of the fall, everything is fundamentally different. Fundamentally different. To try to draw a connection would require a Herculean effort that I can assure you was not made in this dissertation at all.
And I hope you see that the continuous joining together of Manichaeism, the Qumran community, Gnosticism, Neoplatonism, for some reason the Stoics didn't show up in this line, but is to connect things that are fundamentally different.
Fundamentally different. Is to make connections that are invalid connections. Should this, again, I don't know how this got through the process. I don't get it. I don't get it. And we've only started.
We've only started. So with that, let's look at this concept of dupied, okay? Because you might be sitting here going, I've never heard of this before, and I had not either. First place I ever saw this, right here.
And of course it is all through. When I said earlier, I made a mistake earlier. I'll make a lot of those. I said there were like 89 times that occurred. I was using the search function for the whole phrase.
And one of the problems is the dissertation uses hyphenation as it should. So the search function doesn't take that into account. If you just search on like unilateral, and maybe one other term and try, but it's over 200 times.
Over 200 times this phraseology is used in dissertations. This is not just some side issue. It is central, absolutely central to the argumentation. So you would expect an extensive explanation as to, well, why have I come up with my own phraseology here that no one else has ever come up with?
What's the reasoning here? Well, we're gonna read the one place that appears. And the one place that appears is on page three of the dissertation. Did Augustine's predestination evolve as an elaboration upon previous theologians interpretations and scripture or rise de novo?
The terms predestination, fate and determinism can entice either affirmative or hostile connotations. Not sure entice is the proper word to use there, but anyways. Tassel defines and Wetzel defends Augustine's interpretation as biblical predestination, while Weaver writes of Cassian's anti-predestinarian sentiments.
Now I'm just gonna stop for a second and you're gonna say you're just being picky. I'm not. Most of these sentences just don't make sense on a basic English level, just a basic English level. Let me read it again.
Tassel defines and Wetzel defends Augustine's interpretation as biblical predestination, while Weaver writes of Cassian's anti-predestinarian sentiments. What's the relationship between those two parts of that sentence?
None that I know of, none that's expressed. There might've been in his mind writing notes one night, but it didn't make it into the dissertation. There is no connection between the two. Anyway, Augustine's opponents, while still embracing biblical predestination, those in scare quotes, pejoratively refer to Augustine's predestinarian doctrine as determinism or fate.
Therefore, here we go. Therefore the neutral term, divine unilateral predetermination of individuals' eternal destinies, dupied, D-U-P-I-E-D, will be preferred. Now, may I point something out? That's not a neutral statement.
That's not a neutral descriptive, by any stretch of the imagination. I think what is trying to be communicated is that God has a sovereign decree that he accomplishes. And that that sovereign decree includes mankind and the entirety of salvation itself.
But as I said from the beginning, one of the things that really bothers me is this focuses upon mankind. Notice, predetermination of individuals' eternal destinies. That's only one portion of God's decree.
There's so much more to it. We just privilege ourselves in thinking we're the most important part of that. But there's so much more to it. But divine unilateral predetermination, unilateral. Well, if it's divine, why even say unilateral?
Unless your idea is that God is limited in his actions in time to what creatures allow him to do, which I think is exactly what's gonna come out. This dupede is God's unilateral decision, unconditional election.
And notice that's a, unconditional election is a subset, a lower portion of the divine decree, which includes working all things after the council of his will. This is all focused upon free will, no election, et cetera, et cetera.
And does not even begin to take into consideration the depth of the reformed understanding of the decree. So dupede is God's unilateral decision, unconditional election. It is not based upon foreknowledge of human faith or responses in relational interaction, responses in relational interaction.
Now, God interacts with his creation in time, but it sounds like what this is saying is, and what he ends up doing is changed. By what he experiences in time. Now I understand that Dr. Wilson's working on a book on the sovereignty of God through history.
I'll have something to say about that in just a moment. God's election is of specific individuals instead of nations or for the nation of specific world events. There seems to be confusion even here. Election has specific meanings.
God does elect nations, but he also elects individuals, but that's not the same thing as the decree. The election is a subset. There's very inaccurate utilization of theological terminology throughout this.
Finally, God's predetermination unilaterally decides person's eternal destinies, not merely earthly circumstances. Well, does God know eternally what anyone's destiny is going to be, is whether they're going to heaven or hell?
That's a form of determinism. Philosophically, it is. This term will preclude privileging Augustine's doctrines as biblical predestination. Well, we wouldn't want to do that. While avoiding the pejorative term fate, allowing comparisons with other philosophies and religions, adhering to divine unilateral predetermination of individual's eternal destinies.
So the assertion is being made that whatever this dupede means, a lot of people believed it. So it must be extremely nonspecific in light of the groups that he says did and how vastly different their beliefs actually were, which makes it utterly worthless.
Although authors have detailed the individual influences of Stoicism, Neoplatonism, and Manichaeism upon Augustine with differing conclusions, to what degree did their combination contribute to his liberum arbitrium captivatum, the captive free will, the captive free will, which is mocked throughout the work, but that's frequently done when people don't understand that there's a difference between acting in one realm freely and in another realm under the decree of God and how the two relate to one another.
So there's where it first appears. And there are lots of problems in the definition that's even given of it. But then it's just assumed after that. And it will be asserted that the Stoics believed it and the people at Qumran believed it and the Gnostics believed it and Neoplatonists believed it and the Manichaeans believed it.
Even though obviously what that means is because all of those had massively different worldviews that it can't really contain anything of specific meaning because they're all coming from completely different perspectives.
It's just the idea that, well, and it can't even be because it says divine unilateral. So it's assuming that there is a divine will involved. There isn't in Manichaeism. There isn't. What's the divine will?
The father of greatness, did he have a divine will to create the physical universe? Of course not. Did he have the divine will to create human beings? No, they were the result of a war of emanations of two equal powers.
There is no decree involved. There is no divine. There is no unilateral. It's not there. It's just not there. I don't know how you can't see it, but it's just not there. So to talk about Manichaean dupied is stupid because it's not there.
There is no divine unilateral. The first part's missing. So, okay. Now, moving to page 36. Where are we at? Hour and 45 minutes, huh? Wow. Are we still broadcasting? We're good. Because see, you've gotten good at hiding yourself.
Hide when it's dying over there. Good. All right. I've been doing a lot of work for you folks. This stuff isn't necessarily fun. You know, me and the wife are sitting out, social distancing on the front porch, you know, in the cool of the evening.
There ain't no cool of the evening left now. This was before it got hot out here. 107 tomorrow. And this is what I'm reading. What are you reading, hon? You really don't want to know. It's just not, don't want to go there.
Let me just mention something before I go to this. Dr. Wilson, if you're writing a book, as you say you're writing a book on this subject, may I suggest some reading material to you? Because in looking at your dissertation, I have come to the conclusion that your familiarity with Reformed theology is minimal.
Very minimal. Or you have such an amazingly strong bias and prejudice that you cannot hear what we're saying. So may I suggest a two-volume set by Stephen Sharnock, The Existence and Attributes of God.
His section is materials on immutability, decree, things like that might be very useful. Or shorter one would be Absolute Predestination by Jerome Zankeus, interaction with which would help you, I think, to see why those of us who are listening to what you're saying, we read your conclusions, we hear you saying that what we believe is actually manichaeism, just look at you and go, wow, brother, you missed it.
You missed it big time. I think it would help, help a lot. Really, really would. Okay, page 36 of, I'm going to go right to the hour, then I've got some place to run. So two hours, just have to do it for the day.
I'm sure all the rest of you are going, no, we want more. Yeah, right, okay. Hey, we covered a wide variety of stuff today. You got it, you know, we covered a few things. All right, page 36. From ancient Sumer to Stoicism, from Qumran and Gnosticism to Neoplatonism and Manichaeism, fate and divine unilateral predetermination of individuals' eternal destinies have been championed.
Notice, just putting fate together with this. In contrast, Judaism's scriptures are interpreted by Jews as implying God's limited providence, allowing human freedom of choice, requiring caution and attempts to locate deterministic passages.
Stop right there, not an end note given. It's hard to respect this. I'm sorry, it is so hard to respect this. Because to make a meaningful statement, you would have to recognize, you would have to at least identify, which Jews are you talking about?
There are so many different streams of tradition. Who, which rabbi, which school, what time period? Are we talking pre-Taniatic, Taniatic, second temple, post-destruction of Jerusalem? What are we talking about here?
Making the blanket statement, Judaism's scriptures are interpreted by Jews as implying, oh, what I believe, God's limited providence, allowing human freedom of choice. Who, which texts, requiring caution in attempts to locate deterministic passages.
You don't have to have any caution. There's a lot of them. We've walked through Genesis 50 and Isaiah 10 recently. They're very clear, very clear. And be happy to defend them in debate without any difficulty at all.
I mean, it's just, there are so many. Psalm 33, let's do it, straight up. But the dissertation is filled with this kind of statement. Because I would go, excuse me, what Jews? And give me an example. The apocrypha and rabbinical literature solidly support an individual free choice while simultaneously maintaining God's sovereignty over physical events without direct control by interposing foreknowledge of human responses.
Where? Such as? Unfounded assertions just thrown out. The imposing Yetzir can be overcome when we avail ourselves of God's strength. Rosenzweig's demonstration of the evil Yetzirah in external force, and I copied this into some, I think it was in a different font or something in the other one.
An external force attaching itself to humans instead of a Hellenistic intrinsic evil aspect of the psyche controlling the will has corroborated the Judaic emphasis upon free choice confirmed by brand.
I told you, this is hard to read. And it's not because it's so complex. It's just poorly written. Judaism rejected the pagan divine unilateral predetermination of individual's eternal destinies doctrines, except for the extremist sect at Qumran and the writings of Philo of Alexandria, which a common Stoic Indo-Mesopotamian influence could explain.
Broad, broad, broad statements. Judaism, not told what Judaism, rejected the pagan divine unilateral duped. Where? Would they have even understood what that meant? I don't think so. But there's this insertion of this concept with the assertion, these people rejected, these people, all the other church rejected it.
But I never have to really define it. And I never have to really find it anywhere. And what we're going to be doing, and I've run out of time for today, but I already have at least eight right here. And the only reason we have that many is because how much of Augustine I have to read to take you through this.
Examples of where he'll say things like, then Augustine used this Manichaean duped interpretation. And then you go to Augustine, like John 665. Go to Augustine, he just quoted John 665. He didn't even interpret it, he just quoted it.
Oh, so that's a Manichaean duped interpretation? He'll frequently say the Manichaeans interpreted it this way. The Gnostics interpreted it that way. Won't tell us which ones, when, where. And then when you look up the source, there's nothing there to support it.
There's nothing there to support it. I have a feeling I'm probably the first person, other than the guys who are more focused on the baptismal issues, but I don't think they had the dissertation when we first started talking.
I'm probably the first person to be looking these notes up. Unfortunately, it's not the first dissertation I've had to do this on, but here we go. So what I'm gonna be doing is I'm gonna be looking at these and going, so, is there a foundation for this assertion?
Is there a foundation? Because if there isn't, if the foundation isn't there, then the conclusions can be completely dismissed. And it's those conclusions that we need to get to. Because it's those conclusions that are being used in various forms around the internet to basically say that Reformed Theology is this, that, and the other thing.
Okay, so back to the dissertation real quickly here. Well, wait a minute. That was, I thought that was page 30. I thought it was page 36. Hmm. I may have put the wrong reference there. Let me look here really, really quickly.
Continue through 39, page three. That says page 36. I hope there isn't a different there. There can't be a difference between. Yeah, okay, there it is. All right. Efforts to rescue the Qumranites from divine unilateral predetermination of individuals' eternal destinies prove insuperable due to their belief in God's direct control over every thought, emotion, action within irreparably damaged human worms.
Now remember, we read from the Thanksgiving hymns. And what is obvious to almost anybody is the primary influence in those Thanksgiving, which are found in the same cave with the Isaiah scroll are biblical terms, biblical backgrounds, biblical language.
When we read the reference section, remember this is sometime last week, every simile and allegory that was used in it, every example paralleled in scripture, paralleled in scripture. So what we see here is at Qumran and in the Old Testament, you have compatibilism.
You have God's absolute sovereignty and you have man's responsibility. It is a given in Wilson's thinking that you cannot have the two. You have to have one or the other. So whatever the answer to what the Bible teaches or what this group teaches, whatever the answer is, it can't be that.
That's a given. That's not the conclusion of his studies. That's how it's being presented. It's not the conclusion of his studies. It is what drove the studies to begin with. That is very, very evident.
Very, very, very evident. So if you believe that God works all things after the counsel of his will, if you believe that the very fabric of time comes from his decree, then you believe in duped. And that connects you to Manichaeans who don't believe any of that.
And if that connects the two of you, then it's meaningless. It is a meaningless concept with meaningless results. So I'll pick up with that point on page 36 of the dissertation the next time we are together, which we've sort of been doing the Wednesday off thing.
So that's true. We did miss yesterday. No, we didn't miss yesterday. We did it. We just didn't get it posted. That's all.
We did the work. It just went floop, gone. Nah, we'll do it again Thursday. We'll do it again Thursday. We'll pick up page 36 on Thursday. I hope you are learning even as we get into some of the weeds here.
And again, sorry to have to discuss all that Manichaean stuff, but you just have to understand what's really going on there. We'll see you on Thursday, Lord willing. God bless.
