The Divine Nature - Ryan Mullins & Gaven Kerr (Christian Theology Series)

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The purpose of Intellectual Conservatism is to defend the true, good and beautiful things of life that are jeopardized in mainstream academia and society. On this page, you will find artwork, music, satire, academic papers, lectures and my own projects defending the duty of conserving these true, good and beautiful things.

[@pumpkinpummeler4310]

Didn't know my brain could melt and I still remain conscious. Great discussion

[@m.l.pianist2370]

That was strangely intense and chill at the same time. Great conversation!

[@TheProdigalMeowMeowMeowReturns]

Mullins occasionally comes across as rude and dismissive. And *sometimes* his attempts to summarize an opponent’s position are very poor (eg his summary of Thomas Talbott in another video as “God beats you up until you repent, but what about free will?”).

[@DryApologist]

Good discussion. On impassibility, I think making the distinction that God is not moved by His creatures and then reinterpreting stories in the Bible that speak in a way that sounds like God is being moved by His creatures is quite different than arguing that the resurrection is political statement etc.

[@andrewvillalobos5686]

This is a really great dialogue! My dood, Suan, I have really enjoyed the content on this channel thus far. It is great to see fellow zoomers (i.e. Gen Z) diving into Thomisim.

[@CedanyTheAlaskan]

Indeed it is. So good to see Zoomers having/hosting conversations like this

[@CrystallineWyvern]

Thanks for putting this together Suan and to Gaven and Ryan for participating! Some thoughts, highlights summary: Ryan mentions Keith Ward on his side saying theologians debate metaphysics without allowing scripture to inform them properly Gaven as a Thomist argues we have real relations with God but vice versa. For example, looking at an object we are affected by it by thus developing an image of it in our mind while the object is not affected, would not be different had we not observed it (wonder what Whitehead and Milbank would say about that?). God as the primary cause and as love wills Himself (?) and then wills the contingency of creation and creatures as willing their good as an accidental property of God willing Himself which is love. ^ curious what alterations DC Schindler would suggest, esp on shifting the object of the will to beauty rather than goodness Language of emotions about God is expressing something true from the perspective of the creature which is experiencing God's love (which is identical with His will) in various ways that may be experienced as mercy, wrath, ect. We are not present to God but God is present to us Also it seems like Milbank via Whitehead and Bergson and Augustine could agree with the true in what Ryan is saying re: time. God as simple and ontologically transcendent is not in opposition to temporality. Gaven on you inevitably bring metaphysical presuppositions to textual interpretation, so need to make sure your metaphysics is coherent • Gaven also on how the prophetic figures also didn't think God was the sort of being that would become incarnate and die on a cross for all people out of love, so we shouldn't think that their perspective is the correct one even if we do think we know what they thought (which may well have been a more poetic understanding of God's emotions rather than literal), and also recall Miriam on the earlier Hebrew understanding of God was henotheistic / monolatrous and not omnipotent • God can use previous people's cultural inderstanding to convey truths that are understood differently at different times, and have a pedagogical purpose as well. Obviously the full revelation of God is in Jesus, and the OT only or at least primarily got into the canon for its spiritual typological sense, as per Jeroslav Pelikan (sp) as Jordan daniel Wood mentions in Aiden Kimel's blogpost on DBH and Marcionism The Protestant Catholic divide here I think is key. Scripture is not self-interpreting and does not dominate over holy tradition and Catholic tradition and the magisterium; these are all sources of truth, not scripture alone. As a Protestant Ryan seems to have no notion of living tradition in a strong sense (which is not to say certain corrections can't be made as it develops, as per DBH and Milbank) I do still have sympathy for Ryan re: Hartshorne on arguing for real relations in God as more biblical in some ways and intelligible and beautiful I think I might be fine with entertaining an analogical understanding of God's emotions, and / or that this is not far off from the position that we experience his Simple love in multiple emotional aspects

[@MajestyofReason]

Can confirm that Gav's tattoos are FIRE

[@irememberyou12]

Both Joe and Suan's channel is FIRE

[@irememberyou12]

Suan, how do I get in contact with you? Are you able to share your email by any chance?

[@chrismabe2661]

Did anyone notice that Dr. Mullins kept bringing God down to our level in terms of causality?

[@catholickirby]

Well done to Dr. Kerr for endeavouring to help the Thomistic position be better understood, despite the wide gap in metaphysical and apologetic strategies featured in this discussion.

[@RobertDryer]

Poor Ryan, he’s like, I really don’t believe anything Gaven believes and he’s a better arguer than me let’s just keep moving on. So awkward at times lol. Gaven slayed, Ryan is very unorthodox, it all fascinating and interesting AF. Good job to both, stimulating and informative stuff. Crazy deep discussion despite the obvious disagreements.

[@diggingshovelle9669]

Excellent discussion.Informative and educational,

[@williammcenaney1331]

St. Paul wrote a letter to the Corinthians in which he compared his body to a tent, which sounds like Platonic dualism. This means that St. Paul saw himself as a non-physical person with a human body. I wondered how Dr. Mullins would reconcile this dualism with the doctrine of the incarnation. Thomists believe each human person comprises a human body and a human immortal soul. This means that a person's body and soul are both parts. If an immaterial soul is a person instead of part of one, it suggests that two persons share Christ's body. But Catholics believe Christ is one divine person who took on a human nature. Substance dualism suggests that two distinct persons share Christ's body. But Catholics believe Christ is a divine person who adopted human nature. This causes a significant problem: if Dr. Mullins's substance dualism is accurate, it would imply that two persons share Christ's body.

[@markbirmingham6011]

Comment for traction. This is a great convo

[@DekemaStokes]

Oh My Goodness GAVIN absolutely nail a precise and picture perfect refutation to Ryan I like Ryan and all but man Gavin got him really good look at this part and tell me he doesn’t get Ryan here @ 1:58:36 - 1:59:35

[@TheBookgeek7]

Just to throw in my two cents worth... On biblical exegesis: (I am A protestant,and A Classical Theist, so I take this objection very seriously!)... first off: it's very hard to entirely avoid temporal language,in any way, so...that's a far as that goes. (I could elaborate, but this is a large comment already- and that goes for a lot of these points!) My view of the emotional language, is that - so far as I can tell, when it's at its most extreme, it frequently ends with a sort of very unemotional conclusion- like: "I am insane with anger!" suddenly turning into,"I am prepared to punish your wrongdoing." So reading this as poetic analogies (especially within the ancient near eastern context of the Old Testament) doesn't seem at all strained. Finally, I think there are suggestions of Divine Simplicity throughout the Bible. There's Exodus 3:14 (again, temporal language hard to avoid, and it sounds like the tense is very ambiguous in this passage anyway, while the Classical Theist interpretation is fairly straightforward), and John 1:1. There's also Romans 8 and 9- since,so far as I can tell, (Aquinas works it out in the Summa) simplicity is the best way that you can work out how God could both FORESEE our choice of salvation, and PREDESTINE them. Hope this helps!

[@alfred9916]

The Divine Catfish argument is the ultimate refutation of classical theism

[@trenbologna2207]

Your avi is Scotus

[@alfred9916]

@@trenbologna2207 yes, so?

[@terilien6124]

@@alfred9916 Scotus was a Classical Theist and would have repudiated everything Mullins is saying.

[@alfred9916]

@@terilien6124 yes. What I wrote was a joke

[@terilien6124]

OHHHHHH. LOOOOL. No wonder Suan loved your comment lmao.

[@LynchMobster47]

I’d really love to hear Dr. Edward Feser discuss time with Dr. Mullins. I feel like Dr. Feser took Newton to task in Aristotle’s Revenge. I definitely agree with Dr. Feser that Newton (and seemingly Dr. Mullins) commit the reification fallacy with respect to time by treating it as a substance when in reality “time” is a mere abstraction of changes of real substances with respect to succession. But the substances themselves cause the time, not the other way around.

[@callums6570]

Mullins is a presentist

[@LynchMobster47]

@@callums6570 The issue is not his presentism, but his treating time like a substance.

[@callums6570]

@@LynchMobster47 I hadn't watched the video before commenting I just knew Mullins was a presentist lol 😅

[@nathanketsdever3150]

Feser and Mullins discussing would be interesting.

[@justinlovern1902]

Feser and Mullins have swapped words before. Search Ryan Mullins on Feser's blog. It does not go well for Mullins.

[@alfred9916]

Great video! Keep it up.

[@TheBrunarr]

HYPE

[@jacobkats3670]

He really don't miss

[@carsonianthegreat4672]

When the guy on the bottom claimed that God existed at a point in time before creation… hoo-boy, that was a doozie

[@hudsontd7778]

Mullins believes the Bible, many academic philosophers are cult like and can't undo there platonic idea of God. This is very simple but hard for those who have been influenced by greek philosophy, the Bible says Absolutely NOTHING about God being outside of Time/Space before creation.

[@carsonianthegreat4672]

Eternity is atemporal. Aevum is unending time, right?

[@evolutionfalse]

Read Mullins papers on Time and his Book

[@williammcenaney1331]

Time measures change.

[@TheProdigalMeowMeowMeowReturns]

Catholic philosopher Thomas Flint would also be a great participant in these discussions.

[@gethimrock]

Fun fact about Thomas Flint, at Notre Dame there is also a Flint Thomas who is a prof. I was an Engineering major so I had Flint Thomas and they opened every semester in their class with a picture of them together lol

[@TheProdigalMeowMeowMeowReturns]

@@gethimrock that’s so cool! I’m envious

[@MountAthosandAquinas]

Being raised in a Bible foundational denomination for 26 years (Pentecostal) I think that Ryan misses the distinction between the New and the Old. To clarify, Ryan calls into question the (or quotes someone who does) “child like” speech of the Law and the Prophets vs Divine Simplicity of the scholastics. If he is going to take the Bible to be foundational, then he must admit that the Bible itself demands one understand being as a “child” when spoken to by the Law and the Prophets. Paul speaks of the Old being a “pedagogue” until Christ comes. Moses not only wrote a “copy” of what he saw, but the very words themselves that Moses wrote the Apostle calls a “veil.” Am I really going to look at the “veil” and say “that’s who God is!” Or, as the Apostle urges us, “let us enter the holiest.” Now, if anyone knows Jewish literature, they would know that the Holiest is absolutely devoid of any light whatsoever. It was pitch black. If the High Priest didn’t enter with the incense he would be in absolute utter darkness. Why? Because, as the scholastics teach and John of the Cross emphasizes, to strip oneself of every material imagination and image and form is to begin to enter into who God really IS. Christ, the incense, gives us eyes to see what is too high to see. To anthropomorphize God is to return back to the Old Testament and prophets and not enter the “Holiest” where one is stripped of every imagination, every image, and every “veil” Moses placed in the sacred scripture. “Beholding God face to face” by the light of Christ who gives the beatific Vision.

[@gaseredtune5284]

How can you look to God face to face if He has no relation to you? I DEFINITELY think you are wrong to imply the Old testament is "child like" considering the entire (post gospel) new testament is commentary on the Old Testament

[@williammcenaney1331]

God, Who is Life, is not a Being built up of various and lifeless portions; He is Power, and not compact of feeble elements, Light, intermingled with no shades of darkness, Spirit, that can harmonise with no incongruities. All that is within Him is One; what is Spirit is Light and Power and Life, and what is Life is Light and Power and Spirit. He Who says, I am, and I change not (Malachi 3:6), can suffer neither change in detail nor transformation in kind. For these attributes, which I have named, are not attached to different portions of Him, but meet and unite, entirely and perfectly, in the whole being of the living God. Fuqua, Jonathan; Koons, Robert C.. Classical Theism: New Essays on the Metaphysics of God (Routledge Studies in the Philosophy of Religion) (p. 234). Taylor & Francis. Kindle Edition.

[@fndrr42]

Mullins is like some kind of contrarian robot. This stuff has been explained to him so many times.

[@fndrr42]

Gavin is a freaking beast man

[@DekemaStokes]

Yes bro he went in

[@martyfromnebraska1045]

Good ole Ryan Mullens, the monopolytheist.

[@jonathacirilo5745]

joke or is that somehow a thing?

[@martyfromnebraska1045]

@@jonathacirilo5745 It’s a joke. Neotheists, imo, reduce the ontological status of God to something more similar to one of the polytheistic gods of old than the radically different God of classical theism.

[@jonathacirilo5745]

@@martyfromnebraska1045 oh. it's a bit funny. I see.

[@gaseredtune5284]

Ryan was completely right here

[@cygnusustus]

Intelligent reasoning: We observe a being with these attributes, therefore that being is God. Christian reasoning: We presuppose the existence of God, therefore he must have these attributes.

[@cygnusustus]

@@carsonwall2400 I'm not. But you obviously are.

[@cygnusustus]

@@carsonwall2400 That's what you've got? I accept your concession that you cannot refute my point, or defend your own beliefs.

[@cygnusustus]

@@carsonwall2400 I simply commented on that fact that you were never able to muster up an actual point or argument. Thus, you cannot defend your beliefs.

[@cygnusustus]

@@carsonwall2400 My comment illustrates a fundamental flaw in theistic reasoning. "nuh-uh" is not a rebuttal, child. So my point stands unchallenged. Dismissed.

[@cygnusustus]

@@carsonwall2400 How dense do you have to be not to realize that you are not pointing out any error, but merely asserting that I made one. Yep. Unless you are able to provide an actual counter-argument, you are wasting your time. Stop acting like a petulant child and start applying actual reasoning. That's what we at the grown-ups table do. You made a claim. You failed to justify it. You lost. Dismissed.