The Problem of Predestination
 | The Problem of Predestination – as a prelude to A. N. Prior's tense logic BY Per F. V. Hasle© Centre for Cultural Research University of Aarhus DRAFT Introduction In his memorial paper on the founder of temporal logic A. N. Prior (1914-69), A. J. P. Kenny summed up his life and work with these words:
It is by now recognized that, with the construction of tense logic, Prior made a highly original and lasting contribution to philosophy and logic. In honesty, nothing similar can be said for his early theological work. Nevertheless, the above lines clearly grasp a continuity within Prior's work as regards some its themes. Considerable changes in approach notwithstanding, one can indeed trace motivations and considerations of a theological nature underlying later formal and philosophical achievements. So far, however, little has been done in order to investigate the relation between his theological work and his later work on tense logic. One reason for this is the simple fact that much of the early work is all but inaccessible, a significant part of it indeed unpublished. Moreover, there is the plain observation – already suggested above – that his later work is much more far-reaching than his early writings. But apart from sheer historical interest it seems to me that philosophical logic – as well as theology – will be well served by spelling out this relation in somewhat greater detail. The aim of my paper is to disclose some major points of this relation. For that purpose I shall make use of some still unpublished work by Prior. Almost immediately after the death of Arthur Norman Prior, 6 October 1969, his widow Dr. Mary Prior, aided by Peter Geach, went through his papers, notes, correspondence etc. They were suitably grouped and deposited in the Bodleian Library, now holding the material in 21 boxes. This material bears significantly on the subject, as I hope to make clear. As for Prior's published papers, I shall refer to them by their entries in the Øhrstrøm/Flo-bibliography - e.g.: [1942a]; for futher notes on the use of references, please see Introductory Remarks to the References. 1. The Problem of Predestination Prior was brought up as a Methodist, but during his first year as a Philosophy student at Otago University, 18 of age, he became a Presbyterian. The reason for this shift was dissatisfaction with the lack of systematicity in Methodist theology and, especially, with its emphasis on the importance of having a personal conversion experience. Prior had not had, and never was to have, any such experience himself. During his B.A. studies in Philosophy, he attended courses at the Presbyterian Knox Hall with a view to entering the Presbyterian ministry. This intention was never realised, but he was for many years to come a practising member of the Presbyterian denomination. The Presbyterian denomination is Calvinist. Now the central insight of the Reformation was that man could not save himself through his deeds, but rather salvation was pure grace, a gift from God, demanding only faith. However, this immediately raises the question whether faith is something man is free to accept or reject, or whether some are 'elected' to be believers – receiving passively the gift of faith – while others are not accorded that gift. The reformers differed on this point, but Calvin, at any rate, took a firm and consequent stand: indeed that there is no such thing as a free choice with respect to faith; every person is predestined either to belief or disbelief, and thus to salvation or damnation. The most marked feature of Presbyterianism, then, is its teaching concerning predestination. The Westminster Confession, a fundamental statement of Presbyterian Christian creed formulated by the Westminster Assembly, London 1643, states on predestination these articles: III. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of his glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life, and others foreordained to everlasting death. - IV. These angels and men, thus predestinated and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed; and their number is so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished. The understanding of these articles in turn depend upon the relationship between some other major decrees by God, especially the decrees: 1) to create the world and man - 2) to permit the Fall - 3) to redeem the world - 4) to elect Christ to redeem the world - 5) to elect some to believe in Christ, i.e. to salvation, and to pass others by, i.e. leave them to damnation. The order among the above decrees can in no way be taken for granted, but on the contrary it determines how predestination should be understood. One crucial concomitant question is whether Christ died for all men, or for 'the Elect' only. We shall come back to these issues below. It is rather a striking fact that even though Prior had become a Presbyterian by his own choice, he was from a very early point concerned about the doctrine of predestination. He quickly took up the "revisionist" Calvinist theology of Karl Barth, who was a leading theologian at that time (in fact Barth remains one of the most important theologians of this century). After completing his M.A. thesis, Prior spent the years 1937–40 in Europe, where he hoped to make a living out of religious journalism. In 1938 he attended the 4th International Congress of Calvinists in Edinburgh, writing up its proceedings for various journals. In 1939 he took part in the World Conference of Christian Youth, Amsterdam, recording his impressions for various journals (and praising the Barthian Calvinist resistance to nazism). Back in London, he wrote on a proposed revision of the Westminster Confession. His concern about predestination is evident [NWC p.1]:
These remarks are followed up in another unpublished paper, [LC]: The Logic of Calvinism Here he criticises 'The Orthodox Calvinist doctrine' of predestination for maintaining that men are created saved men or damned men; what then becomes the necessity of a "new creation"? We seem to have moved a long way from the original premise of the doctrine of predestination, which is that men have nothing to hope for in themselves, and everything to hope for in Christ, in whom God has seen them from all eternity. [LC, p. 17] These remarks are indicative not only of his concern, but they also anticipate his (Barthian) answer to such worries. This answer is elaborated in Robert Barclay: Quaker or Calvinist? [RB]. The paper takes its starting point in a discussion of the different attitudes towards mission exhibited by Quakers as compared to Calvinists. The Quakers eagerly endorsed mission, whereas Calvinists were reluctant – a difference, which stems from a difference in opinion as regards whether Christ died for all men or for the Elect only. That, in turn, leads back to the interpretation of predestination. In RB (p.8), the distinction between the Elect and the Reprobate (those predestined to damnation) made by the leading 17th century Scottish Presbyterian John Knox is determined as essentially a distinction between what men are in Christ and what they are in themselves or "in Adam". This is refined by reference to Karl Barth's discussion of Election in his Gifford lectures (in Edinburgh 1939), where Barth ...unites the doctrine of Predestination with that of Christ's Person and Work so intimately that neither has any meaning without the other. Predestination – the doctrine that God "chooses" men for himself no matter what they themselves may be or do – means that from all eternity God sees us, not as we are in ourselves, lost men and reprobates, but as we are in His Son Who came to take our place... [RB, p. 12] One might say – somewhat crudely – that on such an interpretation the division introduced by the doctrine of predestination is not so much a division between different individuals as a division within each individual. Prior concludes that Calvinists have increasingly succumbed to the temptation to replace the distinction between what men are in Christ and what they are in themselves, by one between different groups of men. [RB, p. 13] In The Reformers Reformed: Knox on Predestination, (1946b), these considerations are dealt with in greater depth. The paper opens with a quote from George Every , stating inter alia: Where the logic of Calvin is pressed to a conclusion, the struggle between the self and God is gone, for either the self has been by decree united to God, or left to build a life of its own... And the difficulty must lie not with predestination, but with the individualistic, atomic way of thinking about predestination which, according to Every, was a heritage from Hellenistic thinking. Clearly these passages condense the task which Prior takes up in this paper. He does so through a discussion of John Knox's Treatise on Predestination, which he immediately declares to be a useful starting point for those of us who would like to see a further "reformation" of the Church's teaching about it. [1946b., p. 19] The main distinction drawn in the paper is that between an electionof individual men, a notion which stands in danger of imparting upon the elected ones a quality of having received special grace – almost as if deserving this –, and election 'in Christ', where men are united solely on grounds of what Christ has done for them, which is also directed towards unbelievers. Prior points out that while Knox insists on predestination to damnation, he usually takes this as a prelude to praising the mercy and grace of God – in fact, that the doctrine of predestination is important exactly because it stresses that while we are in ourselves lost men, our hope in Christ is boundless. A main point in the same paper is that insight into predestination to damnation should not lead the Elect to feel any superiority towards the "reprobate", but on the contrary to realise that they, and all men, are lost in themselves, but have everything given to them in Christ: In Knox the doctrine of reprobation, emphatically as he always affirms it to begin with, continually dissolves into an assertion of the free and undeserved character of election [1946b., p. 20] – which is exactly seen to be free and undeserved in Christ. Nevertheless, Prior admits that in spite of such attempts to draw positive conclusions from the idea of predestination, Knox accepted its harshest conclusions, and Prior explicitly wants to "reform" Knox (and Calvinism) on this point, by reinterpreting predestination along the lines already sketched. But interestingly, he praises Knox for his consequent thinking: But it is not enough to deplore his willing acceptance of horrifying beliefs, which in part shows an admirable and even scientific determination to bow to the truth as he sees it and hide nothing and tone nothing down. [1946b., p. 21] The paper proceeds to deliver a "criticism in the light of the Bible", very much along the lines suggested above – stressing that the essence of predestination is really an idea of election in Christ. The latter notion in some sense comprises all mankind, for Salvation is not salvation if we are saved alone and election into Christ means election into a living body, whose Head is the Head of the Elect because he is the Head of Mankind. [1946b., p. 23] These observations are related to the discussion on whether Christ died for all Mankind or for the Elect only. We have already seen this theme touched on in RB. In the paper Supralapsarianism (1947d), this issue is discussed with greater systematicity. As said at the beginning, God's 'decrees' - and the internal order among them bear upon the understanding of predestination. In Supralapsarianism, some major lines of interpretation concerning the doctrine of predestination (as determined by the order of decrees) are analysed with a special view to the theology of Karl Barth. In the 17th century, there were three major 'schools' within Calvinism as regards the interpretation of these questions. It should be noted that the order among the decrees was not a time-order but a logical one [1947d., p. 20], as was realised by all parties. Now the supralapsarians, in brief, held that, "first", God decreed to manifest his own Glory by his attributes of mercy and justice, this being the purpose of creation, "second", God decreed to elect some for mercy and others for justice for the purpose just stated, "third", God permitted man to fall in order to have objects for this election, "fourth", God decreed the salvation of the Elect through the death of Christ. The obvious consequence is that Christ did not die for all men, but for the Elect only. The infralapsarians, by contrast, saw it as morally troubling that men should be created with the purpose of visiting mercy on some and justice on others. They held that God "first", for reasons unknown, permitted the Fall – leaving all men as deserving justice (punishment) – and then decided to visit mercy on some and pass others by. However, they agreed with their counterpart that the decree to elect Christ to redeem the world was a means to implement the salvation of the Elect, and hence, that Christ died for those only. Even so, the latter position seems more morally understandable than the former (at least as seen from our day and age). But one school, the post-redemptionists, went one step further. The post-redemptionists held that the decree of permitting the Fall preceded the election – such that God, seeing man as fallen, decreed to redeem the world through Christ; but contemplating that man was unable even to lay hold on this redemption, He decreed to elect some to receive the gift of faith, and hence, to be saved. The consequence is that Christ did indeed die for all mankind, viz. mankind as fallen, election "taking place" logically speaking after the sacrifice of Christ. Having described these differences, or as Prior himself calls them, "somewhat ethereal disputes", the paper examines the position of Karl Barth. In brief, Barth emphasised that Christ died for all men, but (at least on Prior's reading) also appeared to hold that the world was created in order to be redeemed. In this manner Barth combined Post-redemptionism with Supralapsarianism; but it becomes clear that Prior would like a still more radical re-interpretation of predestination, for he then concludes the paper by saying: Although his Post-redemptionism removes some of the more objectionable features of 17th century Calvinism, his Supralapsarianism seems to be still open to what was even then the principal objection to the doctrine, namely that the redemption of a world created for the very purpose of being redeemed has a certain moral artificiality about it, as it seems to involve the artificial engineering of the need for redemption. It still seems a too incautious application to the ways of God of the category of means and end. We have seen how Prior struggled, intellectually as well as morally, with the doctrine of predestination. This struggle began no later than at the end of the thirties, and at least lasted towards the end of the fourties. For most of this period, Prior was nonetheless a committed Presbyterian. 2. A crisis of belief The most quoted and referred theological paper by Prior is without doubt Can Religion be Discussed? [1942a]. Written in 1942, it does express, one can safely say, deep worries about the tenability of Christian belief. Kenny [1970 p. 326] describes how, at this time, Prior passed through a crisis of belief, which gave rise to his first philosophical article which is still remembered. Prior became strongly influenced by Freud, and clearly the most serious doubt is induced by a psychoanalytic explanation of religious belief. The paper is built as a discussion between five invented characters, namely Barthian Protestant, Modernist Protestant, Catholic, Logician and Psychoanalyst. The Barthian Protestant represents the Calvinist-Barthian conviction that religion cannot be discussed since the faith itself is a miracle. An atheist account of religion is an intellectual possibility, but no rational decision can be made between belief and unbelief, only a religious leap. Catholic, on the other hand, stands on Scholastic ground, arguing that God is a 'necessary being', and hence, that the creed is intelligible – implying, of course, that it must also be able to answer intellectual criticism. Both of these positions seem to be fairly demolished by Logician and Psychoanalyst. The fideism of the Barthian is rejected by Logician by observing that there is indeed no choice or rational decision between belief and unbelief, based on an argument that religious belief consists of meaningless statements – hence there is in fact not "anything" of this sort to believe at all: "Unbelief is inevitable". As for the Catholic, Logician destroys his notion of "necessary being" by a linguistic argument in the positivist vein (existence is not a predicate; moreover, Catholic vacillates between using 'God' as an abstract and as a concrete noun). Psychoanalyst agrees with the criticisms made by Logician – clearly, the two share a modern scientific spirit – but he goes one step deeper by explaining the roots of religious belief in terms of repressions due to the Oedipal Complex, concluding that:
This concludes the discussion, save for the Barthian's final cry of 'Lord, I believe; help Thou my unbelief'. As for the Modernist Theologian, he isn't given much of a hearing – he is allowed just one (slightly ridiculous) remark, and Psychoanalyst can be said to dispatch of this kind of position by stating that it tries to satisfy the urge to believe by inventing milk-and-water religions like that of Modernist here, using religious language to describe anything they find impressive or moving or mysterious. [1942a., p. 11] But, as Kenny observes: The atheism of 'Can Religion be Discussed?' does not seem to have lasted very long... After a very brief pause he resumed the writing of Presbyterian articles. [Kenny 1970, pp. 326-327] However, the influence of Freud is in fact spelled out even more distinctively in two other (unpublished) papers, (ca. 1942): In The Case of Edward Irving [EI], Prior discusses this 19th century minister of the Scottish Established Church. Irving preached that idolatry encompassed not only outward homage to a material image, but also worship of ideas or values cherished by us, e.g. Mammon-worship. In doing so he was not unusual, but he went further and also contended that parents are the objects of idolatry by their infants in early childhood. He thereby anticipated a Freudian insight – accepted by Prior – which could not be tolerated by the church, especially since it is a model of our wider motives for being religious. The paper seems to embrace Freudian theory to a degree where it must lead to atheism. The same can be said of Children of the damned [CD], which examines the cases of four persons directly or indirectly influenced by a perception that they themselves, or one of their parents, were irretrievably damned. The persons in question are Frederick Denison Maurice, a Victorian theologian, Søren Kierkegaard, 19th century Danish Christian philosopher, "Rabbi" John Duncan, 19th century Scottish Presbyterian minister and missionary to the Jews, and James Joyce. In each case a Freudian analysis is offered as an explanation of their preoccupation with damnation, especially with reference to the Oedipus-complex. The analyses offered appear sharp and inventive. Also this paper is Freudian to the point of a psychoanalytically motivated atheism. It is obvious that in Children of the damned, Prior's worries about predestination merge with his doubts induced by Freudian psychoanalysis. However, around 1944 the influence of Freud was diminishing. Kenny records that, in October 1944, Prior wrote: God "dwelleth not in temples made with hands"... not even in the strange structures erected by psychoanalysts in the mental depths they have discovered' His Christianity had always had a strong political content, and Freudian analyses of religion were inadequate to account for this. [Kenny 1970, p. 328] An interesting unpublished paper, Faith, Unbelief and Evil [FUE], forms a striking counterpart to Can Religion be Discussed?. Like the latter, it is built as a dialogue, this time between Historian, (Barthian) Theologian, and (atheist) Humanist. The paper opens with a quote from Karl Barth, the fourth of his "main theses" on God's Election of Grace in his Dogmatic:
This being a significant prelude, given Prior's constant preoccupation with the problems of predestination and determinism, the paper proceeds as a discussion among the three on the subjects of (i) Our Knowledge and Our Ignorance of God, (ii) The Paradox of Evil, (iii) Atheism and Evil, (iv) The Two Edged Sword, (v) God's Strategic Retreat. In good Priorean style, central themes are quickly identified and lucidly debated, but I content myself with a significant quote about predestination, put forth by 'Theologian' [FUE p.17]: We are not called upon to do the really crucial acting here – we are not called upon to "take damnation lovingly" [as Christ did on the Cross], and we couldn't do it if we were; but we are called upon to live as those for whom God himself has done this. And that is the whole of the negative side of predestination – the whole meaning of "predestination to damnation". And the positive side, too. It is the Gospel. - This, especially when taken together with the Barth-quote above, may well be Prior's reply to his own worries about the Calvinist doctrine of predestination. It is interesting to compare FUE with Can Religion Be Discussed?. Both are cameos built as dialogues between invented persons typifying certain positions. But here, in FUE, the implicit answer to the question: Can Religion Be Discussed? is a (qualified) affirmation. In the course of the discussion, Humanist at times seem to be on the point of saying that further discussion is not possible – venting reservations that have no doubt been troubling Prior himself:
These remarks are obviously very much like Logician's objections in 1942a. Actually, Theologian and Historian - who is also a Christian, as his statements in the long run make it clear - are on the point of concurring that further discussion is meaningless; but the discussion does carry on, obviously in a meaningful way. If this paper is later than 1942a, it may well be seen as reflecting Prior's overcoming his personal religious crisis vented in 1942a. In Faith, Unbelief and Evil, Theologian is given the last word:
3. From predestination to indeterminism – the 'invention' of tense logic One remarkable defence of predestination, respectively determinism, is given in the paper Determinism in Philosophy and Theology. This paper is difficult to date, but it was probably written in the mid-fourties. In contrast to Prior's other "theological papers" from the fourties (and earlier), this paper thematically compares the doctrine of predestination with philosophical determinism, respectively, indeterminism. The paper opens by observing that in "modern discussions", determinism is often associated with a "scientific creed" as opposed to the idea of free will, which is considered to be religious. But this perception is immediately countered [DPT p.1]:
The paper then proceeds in four major steps: First, it is emphasised that philosophical or scientific determinism is in part different from the idea of predestination: the Calvinism expounded by Barth and Brunner is not pure determinism, but a paradoxical mixture of determinism and free will [DPT, p. 1]. They wish to replace the "secular mystery of determinism", respectively, indeterminism, by the "holy and real mystery of Jesus Christ." Man is seen as unable to perform by himself an act of faith, but when, by the grace of God, he does perform it, that is an act of real freedom,"freewill for the first time". Second, it is argued (with reference to arguments put forward by the contemporary philosopher C. D. Broad) that the ordinary ideas of free will, when understood as moral accountability and general indeterminism, are at least as absurd as the idea of predestination:
Thirdly, Prior goes on to describe how certain human experiences actually are compatible with the notion of predestination, observing that
Various – quite convincing – arguments are offered to underpin the plausibility of Augustinianism in the face of human experience. Up to this point, the paper – even if brief in its analysis – is a vivid and convincing defence of predestination, or determinism in an Augustinian sense. But this perception is modified in the final step of the analysis. In the fourth and concluding part, Freudian psychoanalysis is thus brought into the picture. It is argued that religious determinism is concerned with "particular inward compulsions and dependences", from which we can be released through (psycho)analysis [DPT, p. 4]. Following Freud, the doctrine of sin and salvation in St. Paul and Augustine is seen as a partial psychoanalysis, leading to the conclusion that The theological doctrine of predestination is a "Theory of Obsessions", prefaced to the analysis of a particular case. [DPT, p. 4] Nevertheless, it is not quite clear whether this means that Christianity, and especially the doctrine of predestination, are "subjected" to a psychoanalytical viewpoint, or whether it rather implies that evidence from psychoanalysis corroborates the idea of predestination within (Prebyterian) Christianity. The final remarks point in the former direction, the overall context rather points in the latter direction. This has nothing to do with inconsistency, of course, but there is a tension here which may well reflect Prior's own state of mind at the time of writing. As is probably known to most students of tense logic, Prior's stance on determinism was to change from the early fifties and onwards. Throughout the fourties, he was interested in logic – mainly classical and non-symbolic logic – but apparently even more interested in philosophical and historical issues within theology. In 1949, he was in the process of writing a history of Scottish Calvinist theology. However, the Priors' house was burnt in March 1949, the loss including parts of the manuscript for this history. That was a turning-point, he gave up the project, and increasingly turned his attention to logic. His first interest in modal logic was aroused in 1951, leading to the publication of The Ethical Copula (1951a). At this time he also developed into an adherent of indeterminism, and indeed, of free will. Jack Copeland describes how
But in one respect this perhaps says a little too much, for Prior was still an active Presbyterian, becoming an elder of the Presbyterian Church in 1951. Clearly, he must have been revising his former attempts to defend the doctrine of predestination, but apparently this did not at the time shake his fundamental Christian belief. In 1956, when the Priors went to Oxford, they also joined the local Presbyterian community there. At any rate, Prior's first hint at the possibility of a logic of time-distinctions is found in the unpublished manuscript The Craft of Logic 1951 (cf. Copeland 1996, p. 15). In 1953, when he was reading a paper of Findlay Time: A Treatment of Some Puzzles, he decided to take up Findlay's challenge of working out a calculus of tenses (cf. Øhrstrøm and Hasle 1993, p. 25). Major sources for him were also Lukasiewicz' discussion of future contingents, which was inspired by Aristotle's De Interpretatione, and the Diodorean "Master Argument", which he came to study via a paper by Benson Mates on Diodorean Implication. In both of these problem sets – future contingents, and the Master Argument – the logic of time is strongly interwoven with the discussion of determinism versus indeterminism. Thus from the very outset of Prior's development of tense logic, the problem of determinism was dealt with in parallel with the logic of time. (Here, I shall leave aside an richness of details, but see [Øhrstrøm and Hasle 1995] for a discussion of these and related subjects.) Moreover, it is clear that the determinism-issue has roots in the problem of predestination, and that Prior's dealing with it was a natural continuation of his earlier preoccupation with predestination. At the same time, however, there also is a breach in the very approach to these problems. The emphasis on time and change is itself a marked departure from the peculiarly atemporal spirit of the Calvinist teaching on predestination, as witnessed by the Westminster Confession in general and in particular by the articles III and IV quoted earlier. Prior's early work on the logic of time led to the papers Three-valued Logic and Future Contingents (1953d) and Diodorean Modalities (1955d). In the second half of the fifties, he increasingly took up the notion of (Divine) 'foreknowledge', which is obviously related to the issues of determinism and predestination. His studies led him to consider the classical Christian belief in Divine Foreknowledge as untenable (except perhaps in a very restricted form). In Some Free Thinking About Time, he stated his belief in indeterminism as well as the limitations to Divine Foreknowledge very clearly [SFTT pp.1-3]:
In December 1958, the Priors left New Zealand for good, Arthur Prior taking up a professorship at the University of Manchester. This time he refrained from joining the local Presbyterian community. His logical studies had increasingly led him away from what he regarded as indispensable parts of the Christian faith. He had become an agnostic, although not an atheist. He remained respectful in his treatment of Christian belief as an intellectual possibility, but at least one unusually sharp remark in Creation in science and theology on Karl Barth reveals how Barth's theology, acknowledged as a pinnacle of theological thought in our century, had ceased to be of any aid for him:
In The Formalities of Omniscience (1962e.) he further investigated the problems of determinism and foreknowledge. The paper examines the idea of omniscience, especially in the form of statements such as – God is omniscient, and some putative consequences of it, such as:
Various interpretations of such statements are discussed, especially with reference to St. Thomas Aquinas, Ockham, and Peirce. It is argued that, for logical reasons, future contingents cannot be 'known' at all, leading to the observation: I don't think we get my proposition '8'... except in the weak sense that He [God] knows whatever is knowable, this being no longer co-extensive with what is true (1962e, p. 122). Prior concludes with the following statement (which may be indicating not an atheist, but rather an agnostic position):
For completeness' sake, it should be mentioned that, in a number of papers, Prior also dealt with the ideas of Creation out of Nothing and personal identity (both issues bearing, directly and indirectly, on beliefs in individual immortality). Noteworthy in this connection is also his unpublished The fable of the four preachers [FFP], which in an allegorical form discusses ideas of immortality. It is clear from the discussion that problems concerning temporal and 'trans-world' identity are on his mind here. At the same time, the Calvinist background is also traceable in the paper. 4. The freedom of inquiry Already in the late thirties, Prior combined his Christian faith with a strong commitment to the cause of the poor and oppressed. The Barthian resistance to Nazism was for him a welcome confirmation of the values of his chosen denomination. Indeed, socialism was for him an integral part of Christianity; in 1940 he remarked that Christian socialism is neither a sugaring of the socialist pill with Christianity, nor a sugaring of the Christian pill with socialism. It is just sound Bible Prebyterianism properly understood. Prior was to remain left wing, even though he gave up Christian faith. Although "conservative" in his theological outlook as a Christian, he was never a "fundamentalist". This is made quite clear already in the unpublished A Modernist Stocktaking [AMS] (ca. 1940), which warns against taking for granted the gains of "Modernism", especially the right to free and critical inquiry. The paper deals with the position of Christianity in the face of Modernism. It rejects fundamentalism, but otherwise embraces Christianity – warning, however, against a "bringing-up-to-date" of Christianity such as the one taking place in Nazi Germany at the time. The example from Germany may well have contributed to that obvious suspicion against any manipulative modernisations of Christianity, which is also evident in Can Religion be Discussed. On the other hand it is observed that scientists, being men, need to be defended from making a religion out of science, a defence which is a duty of Cristian thinkers. Finally, the modernist spirit is endorsed:
At that time, and for many years to come, Prior saw no conflict between his faith and his insistence on the freedom of inquiry and criticism. But as we have seen, he gradually came to doubt the dogmas of Christianity. One is tempted to formulate a "trilemma":
The last paper, wherein Prior seems to be endorsing Christian faith, if only vaguely, is The good life and religious faith (1958c.) This is a discussion between Prior and a few other philosophers on religion – among them John Mackie. Prior seems at this point to be still "defending" religion (Christianity) in replies to Das and Mackie. However, one statement by Mackie seems to anticipate an essential reason why Prior became an agnostic. The statement Mackie makes is this:
5. Conclusion On the face of things, Prior became agnostic because he came to see Christianity as an obstacle to the freedom of inquiry. According to Mary Prior, he felt that as a logician it was his job to (freely) investigate the consequences of any assumptions, which we may make, and:
At the same time, it should be remembered that even as a young and devout Christian he insisted on this very same freedom of inquiry - cf. A Modernist Stocktaking. His problem, then, seems to have been a discovery that Christian doctrine, as he saw it, led to unacceptable conclusions. What worried him were first and foremost the doctrine of predestination, and the related doctrine of foreknowledge. Of course, to become an agnostic on these grounds presupposes that an honest and consistent believer must actually accept these doctrines as inherent in Christianity. We have seen Prior praising Knox for his honesty and "almost scientific mind" in the matter of predestination. At that time (1946) Prior attempted a Barthian solution to avoid the "horrifying beliefs" imparted by the doctrine of predestination to damnation, but obviously this approach became unsatisfactory to him in the course of the fifties. In parallel with his development of tense logic he became a firm believer in indeterminism and free will, tenets incompatible with Calvinism (even in its Barthian version). Moreover, on strictly logical grounds he came to consider the ideas of omniscience and foreknowledge as untenable. It is worth noting, though, that agnosticism was for Prior a position different from atheism:
Even so, a modernist-liberal "milk-and-water" Christianity was not an option which lay open to Prior; he obviously saw such an approach as an almost dishonest and at any rate inconsequential way of thinking. It is perhaps not too difficult to follow Prior in this on a general level, but maybe there is also a paradox here. Prior gave up Methodism in favour of Presbyterianism, finding the former "unruly", but the latter consistent and well worked out. An even more important reason for this shift was lack of any 'conversion experience', an ingredient of Christian faith which is strongly emphasized in Methodist theology. But at least as regards that troublesome point of predestination, Methodism is more congenial with the spirit of Prior's later indeterministic conviction. Methodism traces its roots to Calvinist Jacob Arminius (1560-1609), a Calvinist who sought to modify the reformed faith exactly on the points appertaining to predestination: in particular, he taught that men were free to choose to believe. At any rate, the founder of Methodism, John Wesley (1703-91), was strongly influenced by Arminius, not least on this point. Thus, in a sense, Prior of his own accord left one interpretation of Christianity in favour of another one, whose most distinctive feature was that doctrine of predestination, which appears to have been a main motive for his later becoming an agnostic. Such observations can, of course, in no way detract from A.N. Prior's arguments. He has, perhaps more clearly than any other thinker, pointed out the logical limitations of foreknowledge. Likewise, he has shown and developed the logical possibilities for indeterminism. Theology is challenged - as well as enriched - as much as logic and philosophy by those insights. In the wider perspective of our cultural history this is not the least significant among Prior's achievements. Acknowledgements The work on Prior's papers is supported by a grant from the Aarhus University Research Foundation. I also wish to thank the staff at the Bodleian Library in the Department for Western Manuscripts, especially in the Modern Papers Reading Room, for being always helpful when I have been working with Prior's papers there. Thanks must also go to Balliol College for a gracious offer of accomodation while working in Oxford on Prior's papers. I am indebted to Jack Copeland for answering various questions, and to Peter Øhrstrøm for carefully reading and commenting this paper. Finally, and above all, I wish to thank Mary Prior for her forthcoming and helpful answers to questions on Arthur N. Prior's work and life, and her kind support in every respect. References Introductory Remarks The references are divided into three sections: i) General references, ii) Published papers by A. N. Prior, iii) Unpublished papers by A. N. Prior. The papers by Prior are mainly or at least significantly concerned with theological problems. As for the published papers, I follow the numbering used in the Prior-bibliography by Øhrstrøm and Flo (in: Copeland 1996). The unpublished papers are kept in 21 boxes at the Bodleian Library, Oxford. I indicate for each paper its length, whether it is typed or hand-written, and the box in which it is kept. Moreover, I add a dating whereever possible. The Øhrstrøm/Flo bibliography as well as further information on Prior's unpublished papers in the Bodleian Library can be found at the following WWW-site: http://www.hum.auc.dk/~poe/. i) General references
ii) Published papers by A. N. Prior Published papers by A. N. Prior with mainly (or otherwise significant) theological content: 1942a. 'Can Religion be Discussed?', Australasian Journal of Psychology and Philosophy, vol. 15 (1937), pp. 141-151. (Reprinted in Flew, Antony; MacIntyre, Alasdair (eds.): 1955, New Essays in Philosophical Theology, S. C. M. Press, London, pp. 1-11.) 1946b. 'The Reformers Reformed: Knox on Predestination', The Presbyter, vol. 4 (1946), pp. 19-23 1947d. 'Supralapsarianism', The Presbyter, vol.5 (1947), pp. 19-22. 1955g. 'Is necessary existence possible?', Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol.15, pp. 545-547. 1958c. 'The good life and religious faith' (East-West meeting at Canberra Dec. 1957), Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 36 (1958), pp. 1-13. 1959d. 'Creation in science and theology', Southern Stars, vol. 18 (1959), pp. 82-89. 1962e. 'The Formalities of Omniscience', Philosophy, vol. 37 (1962), pp. 114-129. 1996a. 'Some Free Thinking About Time'. First published in Copeland 1996; for its original dating, see footnote 14. I quote from the original 'SFTT', kept in the Bodleian Library, box 7. iii) Unpublished papers by A. N. Prior Unpublished papers by A. N. Prior with mainly (or otherwise significant) theological content: [EI]. Ca. 1942. 'The Case of Edward Irving', typed, 5 p. Box 6. [CD]. Ca. 1942. 'Children of the damned', typed, 10 p., + 2 hand-written p. Box 6. [DPT]. Ca. 1943? (See footnote 6). 'Determinism in philosophy and theology', typed, 4 p. Box 6. [FFP]. Ca. 1960?. 'The fable of the four preachers', typed, 5p. Box 6. [RB]. Ca. 1942. 'Robert Barclay: Quaker or Calvinist?', typed, 15 p. Box 7. [NWC]. 1940. 'Notes on the Westminster Confession (and the proposed revision)', typed 2p. + hand-written 3 p. Box 7. [LC]. Ca. 1940. 'The Logic of Calvinism', hand-written, 26 p. Box 7. [FUE]. Ca. 1942/43. 'Faith, Unbelief and Evil', typed, 19 p. Box 7. [AMS]. Ca. 1940. 'A Modernist Stocktaking', typed, 6 p. Box 7. Appendix Further papers by Prior with mainly (or otherwise significant) theological content: 1938a. Review of Etienne Gilson, The Philosophy of St. Bonaventure. The Criterion, vol. 18 (1938), pp. 141-143. 1940a. 'Makers of Modern Thought (1): Kierkegaard', The Student Movement, March 1940, pp. 131-132. 1940b. 'A Scot Seeks God', The Churchman, 1940, pp. 34-42. 1940c. 'A Calvinist Romantic', Purpose, vol. 12 no. 1 (1940), pp. 15-21. 1948a. 'Adam Gib and the Philosophers', Australasian Journal of Psychology and Philosophy, vol. 26 (1948), pp. 73-93. 1948c. 'Disruption', Landfall, vol. 2 (1948), pp. 8-18. 1957b. 'Is it possible that one and the same individual object should cease to exist and later on start to exist again', Analysis, vol. 17, pp. 121-123. 1957d. 'Opposite number', The Review of Metaphysics, vol.11 (1957), pp. 196-201. 1960c. 'Identifiable individuals', The Review of Metaphysics, vol.13 (1960), pp. 684-696. 1962f. 'Limited indeterminism', The Review of Metaphysics, vol. 16 (1962), pp. 55-61. 1965f. 'Time, existence and identity', Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, vol. 66 (1965-1966), pp. 183-192. 1976b. 'On Some Proofs of the Existence of God', in Geach, P. T.; Kenny, A. J. P. (eds.): 1976, Papers in Logic and Ethics. University of Massachusett Press, Amherst, 1976. pp. 56-63. | |