u/HegemoneXT

Given the title, I know many will claim that consciousness is an illusion or other approaches like determinism and compatibilism take on free-will. But for the sake of this question's relevancy, we ignore all that and premise that free agency is truly metaphysically real even if our behavior is influenced by environmental factors. Is it ontologically possible to create conscious beings that does not possess free-agency? For example, it is ontologically impossible for a square to only have 3 sides because it goes against the nature of being. so in a similar manner, i am asking if it is ontologically sound to produce a type of reality where consciousness exist without free-agency.

so often, i come across people who ask "Why do theist believe in a sky dad?" or questions of the like. However this rudimentary notion of God ignores what the scripture states who God is and how God describe Himself. Most are familiar with the phrase - "I AM THAT I AM" in the OT(exodus) which defines the name of God - yaweh. But what does this "I AM" mean?

For the past thousands years, theologians understood the "I AM" of God as a declaration of Being, Him claiming to be the source of foundation reality - that which is. To say that God is the foundation of Being to say that God declares Himself as the "that is which it is" of existence itself. The nature of existence is an ontological structure and God sits as the centerpiece and source of ontology. God subsisting, meaning He does not possess being but is Being in itself. God does not possess existence but is the very raw inductive definition of what "existence" at the most fundamental level. So in a more philosophical language, God in the OT is claiming to the foundation of ontology - "That I AM and therefore reality is".

now the being of God is separated into three personhood - the Father, Son and Spirit. These are hypostatic distinction of ontology and in logical relations with each other. We have the Father - the hypostatic Principle of Being, and the Son - the Hypostatic Logos of Being, and lastly we have the Presence and embodies essence of the Principle - the Spirit of God.

The Hypostatic relation of the Son is begotten of the Father, meaning the Son is truly generated. Yet the geenration of the Son is not one of causality, temporal sequence, or ontological contingecy, but one of pure logical procession of ontology itself. The Son is described to be the Word of God. Most people when they ecounter this definiton thinks of the word as verbal speech or written text. However the Word in this context is actually referrring to the concept of intelligibility itself, the logical structure that give rise to and order the instantions of all created finite beings - the fabric of intelligiblity.

Clearly God isn't saying that the Son is verbal speech in the way human speak. when human speak, we are constrained within the context of time, space and matter - sound is just vibrations traveling through the air and reaching our physical brain. However for God, speech is different. The Word of God is the ontological procession from the Principle of "That which is" into the dynamic manifestation of "what that is".

If the Logos of God is the Divine Reason by which all reality is given form and structure, then the Logos is the form of forms, in whom contain all the archetypes of to existence and the operational intermediate to the Being of God. This is why the Father, who represent the Principle of Divine Being, is incapable of entering into creation even though he is omnipresent, but the Son is capable taking on flesh form and entering into creation. The Son is the image of the invisible God, the Logos of Being. They are hypostatically distinct, in the sense that the Reason of Being is not Being itself and yet the Reason of what Being is shares the exact same ontology as Being itself.

For example, the Being of a sqaure - that it exists - can not be anything unless it possess the reason to be. If a sqaure does not posses the nature of a square, having four corners and four sidse, then the square can not be in any meaningful reasonable sense - it simply ceases to be a sqaure. So in a similar manner as in the relation between the Being and the Logos of Being, they are synonymous in ontology and in separable.

I recently came across a person couple days ago asking "If a parent is obligated to hold a child from jumping off a cliff, when can't an all-powerful God do the same by granting salvation to all and prevent us from sinning?"

3 reasons

1. the analogy compares the problem of sin to "falling off a cliff" which is a category error. Salvation involves being righted and reconciled to God in the spirit, which involves a person freely choosing to align their will to His identity rather than wickedness. Whereas "accidently falling off a cliff" only denotes a meaningless consequence of death and not the cause of "true spiritual death" - sin. A person who commits evil becomes separated from God. I person who accidently falls physically does not commit evil.

2. It is the wrong doing that is being punished and the analogy commits a modal error with the relation between God and humanity vs parent-child dynamics. Even in our modern society, we have those who legislates laws, enforces laws, and judges those who transgress against the law. As you can guess, God is the very law of reality, not merely within the confines of society but the very moral structure creation hinges upon and governed according to their due perfection in Him. When a child commits a wrong doing, it is the parents jobs to correct him or her. But when the child continues to transgress the law knowingly, in such cases of criminals, they are put in prison as a punishment. God is the same, when we transgress against our parents as to act wrongly, we are not only sinning against our parents but sinning against God himself, who is the law behind all things.

3. Analogy presupposes that goodness can occur in the instance of God forcibly restraining us. It is true that God provides discipline in our daily lives and consequences to keep us from doing evil. But when we continually transgress against Him as to harden our heart, our mind becomes darkened and our heart impenitent. In such instance, it is impossible for us to be reconciled back to God and to receive salvation because salvation requires true repentance in which we willingly choose good over evil.