Molinism


Molinism, named after 16th-century Spanish Jesuit theologian Luis de Molina, is the thesis that God has middle knowledge : the knowledge of counterfactuals, particularly counterfactuals regarding human action. It seeks to reconcile the apparent tension of divine providence and human free will. Prominent contemporary Molinists include William Lane Craig, Alfred Freddoso, Alvin Plantinga, Michael Bergmann, Thomas P. Flint, Kenneth Keathley, Dave Armstrong, John D. Laing, Timothy A. Stratton, Kirk R. MacGregor, and J.P. Moreland.

God's types of knowledge

According to Kenneth Keathley, author of Salvation and Sovereignty: A Molinist Approach, Molinists argue that God perfectly accomplishes His will in the lives of genuinely free creatures through the use of His omniscience. Molinists, following Luis de Molina himself, present God's knowledge in a sequence of three logical moments.
The first is God's knowledge of necessary truths or natural knowledge. These truths are independent of God's will and are non-contingent. This knowledge includes the full range of logical possibilities. Examples include such statements as "All bachelors are unmarried" or "X cannot be A and non-A at the same time, in the same way, at the same place" or "It is possible that X obtain."
The second is God's free knowledge. This type of knowledge consists of contingent truths that are dependent upon God's will, or truths that God brings about. Examples include statements such as "God created the earth" or something particular about this world which God has actualized. Free knowledge encompasses the future of what will happen.
In between God's natural and free knowledge is His "middle knowledge" which contains the range of possible things that would happen given certain circumstances, by which God knows what His free creatures would do in any situation. These are "truths" that do not have to be true, but are true without God being the primary cause of them. In The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, John D. Laing has provided an example of middle knowledge: "If John Laing were given the opportunity to write an article on middle knowledge for the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, he would freely do so."
Molinists have supported their case scripturally with Christ's statement in :
The Molinist claims that in this example, God knows what His free creatures would choose under hypothetical circumstances, namely that the Sodomites would have responded to Jesus' miracles and ministry in a way that Sodom would still have been in existence in Jesus' day, given that hypothetical situation.
Matthew 11:23 contains what is commonly called a counterfactual of creaturely freedom. But counterfactuals are to be distinguished from foreknowledge, and middle knowledge is to be distinguished from God's knowledge of counterfactuals. The Bible contains many examples of foreknowledge such as, where God tells Moses that the Israelites will forsake God after they are delivered from Egypt.
Some opponents of Molinism claim that God's foreknowledge and knowledge of counterfactuals are examples of what God is going to actively bring about. That is, when Christ describes the response of the Sodomites in the aforementioned example, God was going to actively bring it about that they would remain until today. Molinists have responded to this objection by noting that scripture contains examples of God's foreknowledge of evil acts. For example, the Israelites forsaking God, or Peter's denial of Christ, are both examples of what one would call overt acts of sin. This is fallacious according to the Molinist. In order for this account of prophecy to be valid all prophecies must be wholly good, and never contain evil acts; but this is not what opponents believe to be the case. It may simply be the fact that Christ's human nature made a rational prediction of the said actions, as he once experienced beforehand from Peter, to which he replied, "Get thee behind me Satan".

Knowledge of counterfactuals

Molinists believe that God has knowledge not only of necessary truths and contingent truths, but also of counterfactuals. A counterfactual is a statement of the form "If it were the case that P, it would be the case that Q." An example would be, "If Bob were in Tahiti he would freely choose to go swimming instead of sunbathing." The Molinist claims that even if Bob is never in Tahiti, God can still know whether Bob would go swimming or sunbathing. The Molinist believes that God, using his middle knowledge and foreknowledge, surveyed all possible worlds and then actualized a particular one. God's middle knowledge of counterfactuals would play an integral part in this "choosing" of a particular world.
Molinists say the logical ordering of events for creation would be as follows:
  1. God's natural knowledge of necessary truths.
  2. God's middle knowledge.
  3. :—Creation of the World—
  4. God's free knowledge.
Hence, God's middle knowledge plays an important role in the actualization of the world. In fact, it seems as if God's middle knowledge of counterfactuals plays a more immediate role in perception than God's foreknowledge. William Lane Craig points out that "without middle knowledge, God would find himself, so to speak, with knowledge of the future but without any logical prior planning of the future." The placing of God's middle knowledge between God's knowledge of necessary truths and God's creative decree is crucial. For if God's middle knowledge was after his decree of creation, then God would be actively causing what various creatures would do in various circumstances and thereby destroying libertarian freedom. But by placing middle knowledge before the creation decree God allows for freedom in the libertarian sense. The placing of middle knowledge logically after necessary truths, but before the creation decree also gives God the possibility to survey possible worlds and decide which world to actualize.
Craig gives three reasons for holding that counterfactual statements are true: "First, we ourselves often appear to know such true counterfactuals. Second, it is plausible that the Law of Conditional Excluded Middle holds for counterfactuals of a certain special form, usually called 'counterfactuals of creaturely freedom'. Third, the Scriptures are replete with counterfactual statements, so that the Christian theist, at least, should be committed to the truth of certain counterfactuals about free, creaturely actions."

Theological implications

William Lane Craig calls Molinism "one of the most fruitful theological ideas ever conceived. For it would serve to explain not only God's knowledge of the future, but divine providence and predestination as well". Under it, God retains a measure of divine providence without hindering humanity's freedom. Since God has middle knowledge, He knows what an agent would freely do in a particular situation. So, agent A, if placed in circumstance C, would freely choose option X over option Y. Thus, if God wanted to accomplish X, all God would do is, using his middle knowledge, actualize the world in which A was placed in C, and A would freely choose X. God retains an element of providence without nullifying A's choice and God's purpose is fulfilled.
Molinists also believe it can aid one's understanding of salvation. Ever since Augustine and Pelagius there has been debate over the issue of salvation; more specifically, can God elect believers and believers still come to God freely? Protestants who lean more towards God's election to salvation and sovereignty are usually Calvinists while those who lean more towards humanity's free choice follow Arminianism. However, the Molinist can embrace both God's sovereignty and human free choice.
Take the salvation of Agent A. God knows that if He were to place A in circumstances C, then A would freely choose to believe in Christ. So God actualizes the world where C occurs, and then A freely believes. God still retains a measure of His divine providence because He actualizes the world in which A freely chooses. But, A still retains freedom in the sense of being able to choose either option. Molinism does not affirm two contradictory propositions when it affirms both God's providence and humanity's freedom. God's providence extends to the actualization of the world in which an agent may believe upon Christ.

Difference from Calvinism and from Arminianism

In contrast to the Calvinist acrostic TULIP and the Arminian Five Articles of Remonstrance, Timothy George has devised an acrostic summary for Molinism called ROSES:
  • Radical Depravity
  • * Man's nature is radically depraved from the fall.
  • Overcoming Grace
  • * God's grace overcomes man's radical depravity. As opposed to irresistible grace, man can respond.
  • Sovereign Election
  • * God's sovereign election of individuals, predetermined by His exercise of middle knowledge to know who would respond to Him in faith. This is instead of unconditional election, where God elects individuals independent of their libertarian free will.
  • Eternal life
  • * Regenerate believers will not fall away from a state of justification.
  • Singular redemption
  • * A modified view of limited atonement. Christ's redemption is sufficient for all, but applicable only to the elect.
Molinism differs from Calvinism by affirming that God grants salvation, but a person has the choice to freely accept it or reject it. This differs from Calvinistic double predestination, which states that a person's salvation is already determined by God such that he or she cannot choose otherwise or resist God's grace.
Both Arminianism and Molinism agree that God definitively knows how a person would react to the Gospel message, but Molinism relies on the concept of middle knowledge while Arminianism does not.
Molinists have internal disagreements about the extent to which they agree with Calvinism, some holding to unconditional election, others holding to conditional election and others still holding to an election that is partly both. Alfred Freddoso explains: “Some Molinists, including Bellarmine and Suárez, agree with the Bañezians that God antecedently elects certain people to eternal glory and only then consults His middle knowledge to discover which graces will guarantee their salvation. Thus, in Peter's case, God would have chosen different graces if those He actually chose had been foreknown to be merely sufficient and not efficacious for Peter's salvation. Other Molinists, including Molina himself, vigorously reject any such antecedent absolute election of Peter to salvation. They insist instead that God simply chooses to create a world in which He infallibly foresees Peter's good use of the supernatural graces afforded him, and only then does he accept Peter among the elect in light of his free consent to those graces.” Other Molinists avoid the issue altogether by holding to the view of trans-world damnation, the idea that the unsaved in this world would have rejected Christ in any world.