Common use of Analysis part 1: Why God takes providential Clause in Contracts

Analysis part 1: Why God takes providential. care of his creation In the following pages I will present an analysis of Opif. 6b–12, focused on discovering Xxxxx’x view on the relationship between God and creation, because divine forgiveness implies interaction between God and creation. The analysis is divided into three parts. The first is dedicated to Xxxxx’x main concern regarding the opinion that the world was not created. He maintained that such a view implies that God does not care for the world.175 Philo structured Opif. 6b–12 in such a way that his strong support for God’s providential care is placed at the centre of his argument, in Opif. 10–11. Therefore, this central argument will be analysed first. In the second and third parts of the analysis, Xxxxx’x two arguments in support of the created nature of the material world will be explored. What will become apparent is that for Philo it was essential to maintain that even though God and creation are of completely different natures, God still cares for his creation. Why was it so important for Philo to maintain that God takes care of his creation? Several observations come to the fore. Xxxxx saw God’s providential care as a law of nature connected to God’s goodness, he argued that God created the world out of goodness and goodness automatically leads to care.176 Some 175 The world under discussion in Opif. 6b–12 is the world experienced through the senses – the material world – as becomes clear in Opif. 12. 176 In Opif. 10, Xxxxx writes that it is reasonable and logical that the father and maker of the material world also takes care of this world. In Praem. 42, he calls care for one’s creation a natural law. — Xxxxx’x doctrine of God — scholars maintain that Xxxxx did so because he found these ideas in the Bible.177 In the Bible, however, God’s reasons for creating the world are not explored, nor is his providential care considered a law of nature. Philosophical arguments, particularly those of Xxxxx, provide a better background for a notion that Xxxxx apparently took for granted. A paraphrase of Xxxxx’x deliberations will shed light on what Xxxxx believed was at stake when the created nature of the world and God’s providential care for that world were denied. In Laws, X 893B–903D, Xxxxx carefully deliberates on whether there is a spirit that guides the created world and whether it is good or evil. Here, Xxxxx contemplates whether there is proof for the belief that the gods exist and that they are good. He observes that the movement of the stars and other heavenly objects is orderly and harmonic. He deduces from this harmony that the souls steering them, commonly called the gods, must be rational and good.178 Xxxxx further reasons that if the gods were not to care for the world, they would be either unknowing or cruel. Given that he shows that the gods are rational and good, it follows that they take providential care of the world.179 According to Xxxxx, the care of the gods does not simply stop at a general level of providing order for the created world, but extends even to the minute details of human affairs as well. Xxxxx compares the divine providential care for the world to the care of a good physician. The latter does not stop at curing the most visible symptoms of a disease either; rather, he carefully considers all the details, knowing that to miss one single detail could leave a patient ill.180 In Opif. 21, Xxxxx presents goodness as God’s motive for creating the world. 177 Xxxxxxx identified Xxxxxxx-Xxxxxx as Xxxxx’x source for the view that God, because of his goodness, takes providential care of the world (Xxxxxxx, Les idées, pp. 76–77) (cf. above note 46). Xxxxx presents a similar view when he maintains that Xxxxx combines in his theological views Xxxxx’x understanding of goodness as a metaphysic category of ‘excellence of being’ with a biblical understanding of goodness as a more relational category of compassion and care. Xxxxx further maintains that in Xxxxx’x concept of God as Father, a Greek philosophical notion of God as the creative cause of creation and a biblical notion of God as a loving, caring father are combined (Xxxxx, Xxxxxxx, p. 442) (compare also Xxxxx, Xxxxxxxxxx, x. 63). Xxxxxxxxxx quotes multiple passages from Xxxxx stating that goodness was God’s motive for creating the world (Xxxxxxxxxx, Xxxxx, p. 35), without mentioning a specific source for this thought. In the Bible, however, no motive for God creating the world is articulated, whereas Xxxxx explicitly described goodness as the motive for God to create and care for the world (Xxx. 29E). Therefore, it seems more plausible that philosophy rather than the Bible was a source for this thought. 178 The first element in Xxxxx’x evidence is his observation that there is movement. Xxxxx distinguishes ten types of movement, of which he finds the self-moving motion (that which moves itself and sets other things in motion) to be the first and the best. Xxxxx identifies the self-moving motion with the soul, which leads him to conclude that everything that moves, is moved by a soul. According to Xxxxx, the stars and the universe itself must be moved by a soul as well. 179 As Plato reasons in Tim. 29E, the goodness of the creator is the reason why there was creation to begin with, an argumentation that Xxxxx adopted (see, for example, Opif. 21 and LA III, 73; see also note 177). 180 Xxxxxxx states that ‘there is no individual providence in the philosophy of Xxxxx’ (Xxxxxxx, Xxxxx vol. 1, — Xxxxx’x doctrine of God — To sum up. For Xxxxx the goodness of the Creator and his care for creation were undisputed facts, a law of nature. I considered Xxxxx’x rationale for something Xxxxx saw as necessarily logical to reveal what was at stake for Xxxxx if the created nature of the world were to be denied, namely the harmonious order of creation. Xxxxx argued that without a creator, there can be no providence, and without providence there can be no order in creation. In line with Xxxxx, Xxxxx held that God’s providential care enveloped the good and harmonious order governing the whole of creation from the vast scale of the planetary movements to the minute scale of human affairs. Without it, as Xxxxx saw it, there could only be chaos and anarchy, and human affairs would be left without a judge or arbitrator, ultimately leading to an evil world. That the elimination of divine providence was his main concern is affirmed in the analysis of the two arguments he presented in support of the created nature of the world.