The First Step Of Clarke's Argument Of God

(1.a.) Clarke’s first argument is God’s existence as a sufficient infinite reality in Person and Being. The first step of Clarke’s argument is “given any conditioned being, there must exist at least one absolutely unconditioned, or self-sufficient being (Clarke 215).” Every living thing is conditioned, in that it requires a cause. We are all radically conditioned to exist and we depend on other things to keep us that way. Humans for example exist do to their parents and they keeping existing because of the oxygen they breathe and the nutrients they eat. If we trace back the source of every living being, we must find a beginning, an initial source. We cannot trace back the sources forever. The second step of Clarke’s argument is “no being can
There is a general understanding of God as omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent but theologies have difficulties allowing these three to work together. Classical Theory emphasized God as all-powerful and removed the idea of human free choice. By claiming God as omnipotent, Classical Theory moves away from the idea that God is good. If God is the source of everything, that includes the bad actions and events as well. We lose the idea of God as omnibenevolent. Process Theology disregards the idea of God as omnipotent and views God as changing, in process. This undermines the divine perfection and removes God as the source of all. In Process Theology God is eros, meaning willing my good or fulfillment. This is in opposition to the more popular belief that God is agape, meaning self-giving love. If God is eros, God creates for God’s own fulfillment. God becomes God by creation, so he’s creating for himself and not for us. John Wright argues both of these are wrong because neither of them fit the God that is in the scriptures. There is a dialogical pattern, God has absolute initiative, creation and salvation. God doesn’t depend on the universe, God creates something out of nothing. There is human response, we are called to live more fully, to know and to love. God responds to this with without judgment, he gives our
God knowing, God choosing and then God’s power bringing everything into being. God’s choice does not exhaust everything God knows. During creation, God’s divine will choses amongst what the divine intellect knows. Creatures and the created universe will specify what the divine will choses because they have their own integrity. The universe is a vast network of infinite relationships and God is truly regarding an evolving universe. God knows all the possibilities and knows they will plays out based on our interactions. This types in with evolution because God give being and existence. God allows creatures to act according to their nature. The creatures enter into a structure of God’ causative knowledge. After God creates, he choses what do give being to, specified by the universe. God creates the universe and it starts to play out in an intelligent, reasonable way. This is just like Clarkes argument for an intelligent