A Critical Review of Gordon H. Clark's "God And Evil: The Problem Solved": Part X

I just read through a section of Clark's work entitled "Responsibility and Determinism". I am going to split up my review of it into two blog posts.

The first post will examine a claim that Clark makes in the first paragraph of this section: that responsibility is not contingent on Free Will, but on knowledge. He advances this by no thorough exegesis or logical syllogism, only an aside about the first chapter of Romans.

I was surprised that Clark brought up Romans 1, because this passage has always appeared to me as one that would be challenging for a Calvinist to take seriously. Here is what Paul writes, starting at verse 18:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

It seems to me that Paul is not trying to say that these men were determined to do what they did but were also given some knowledge concerning God and are therefore morally responsible. He doesn't say that these men couldn't have done otherwise.

Rather Paul says just the opposite: that these men knew better; they could have worshipped Him. His existence and invisible attributes are evidenced by what He has made, and yet these men chose to reject the Truth.

Clark's casual lack of exegetical treatment makes it seem as though this passage so clearly denies that responsibility is contingent on Free Will that it requires no more than a quick allusion.

But if Paul had written the passage in such a Calvinist way, it would have come out more like:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of [He causes in] men, who by their unrighteousness [the absolute predetermination of God's secret will] suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So [even though it was by God's causal decree that they sinned] they are without excuse [due to the fact that they were also given some knowledge concerning God].

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

If God is jealous for His own glory, why would He cause men to exchange His glory for images of men, birds, and animals? If God wants above all to be worshipped and enjoyed forever, why would He cause the men of Romans 1 to worship idols instead of Him?

Seems counter-intuitive, doesn't it?

Paul says that it is because these men, who should have known better, chose to exchange God's glory for idols, God gave them over to their lusts as a result:

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

Notice that God gave them over to their lusts after they chose to suppress the truth, and not the other way around.

Clark's reading of this passage would have us believing that God is enraged at these men for behaving exactly as He decreed (and not as they freely willed). Clark would have us believe that though God pretends He wants to be worshipped (His "revealed will"), He actually caused these men not to worship Him (His "secret will"), and that God became upset that they did exactly as He secretly caused but not as He outwardly commanded, and consequently gave them over to what He implanted in their hearts to begin with. Now these men will suffer eternal hellfire under His wrath.

At any rate, one paragraph later, Clark says that it actually isn't really just knowledge that grounds responsibility after-all. What he says it is that does in fact ground responsibility, and why I find such view also to be wanting, will be discussed in the next post.