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Why did He allow a whole eternity to elapse before His plan was put into execution? Moreover,
why did He select that particular moment for His creative work?
c. Suggested solutions of the problem.
(1) The theory of eternal creation. According to some,
such as Origen, Scotus Erigina, Rothe, Dorner, and Pfleiderer, God has been creating from all
eternity, so that the world, though a creature and dependent, is yet just as eternal as God
Himself. This has been argued from the omnipotence, the timelessness, the immutability, and
the love of God; but neither one of these necessarily imply or involve it. This theory is not only
contradicted by Scripture, but is also contrary to reason, for (a) creation from eternity is a
contradiction in terms; and (b) the idea of eternal creation, as applied to the present world,
which is subject to the law of time, is based on an identification of time and eternity, while
these two are essentially different. (2) The theory of the subjectivity of time and eternity. Some
speculative philosophers, such as Spinoza, Hegel, and Green, claim that the distinction of time
and eternity is purely subjective and due to our finite position. Hence they would have us rise
to a higher point of vantage and consider things sub specie aeternitatis (from the point of view
of eternity). What exists for our consciousness as a time development, exists for the divine
consciousness only as an eternally complete whole. But this theory is contradicted by Scripture
just as much as the preceding one, Gen. 1:1; Ps. 90:2; 102:25; John 1:3. Moreover, it changes
objective realities into subjective forms of consciousness, and reduces all history to an illusion.
After all, time-development is a reality; there is a succession in our conscious life and in the life
of nature round about us. The things that happened yesterday are not the things that are
happening today.[Cf. Orr, Christian View of God and the World, p. 130.]
d. Direction in which the solution should be sought.
In connection with the problem under
consideration, Dr. Orr correctly says, “The solution must lie in getting a proper idea of the
relation of eternity to time.” He adds that, as far as he can see, this has not yet been
satisfactorily accomplished. A great deal of the difficulty encountered here is undoubtedly due
to the fact that we think of eternity too much as an indefinite extension of time, as, for
instance, when we speak of the ages of comparative inaction in God before the creation of the
world. God’s eternity is no indefinitely extended time, but something essentially different, of
which we can form no conception. His is a timeless existence, an eternal presence. The hoary
past and the most distant future are both present to Him. He acts in all His works, and
therefore also in creation, as the Eternal One, and we have no right to draw creation as an act
of God into the temporal sphere. In a certain sense this can be called an eternal act, but only in
the sense in which all the acts of God are eternal. They are all as acts of God, works that are
done in eternity. However, it is not eternal in the same sense as the generation of the Son, for
this is an immanent act of God in the absolute sense of the word, while creation results in a
temporal existence and thus terminates in time.[Bavinck, Geref. Dogm. II, p. 452.] Theologians