God before time? Assessing three stories of God, time, and the world

Ryan T. Mullins

doi:10.56487/kpnhje15

Autores/as

Ryan T. Mullins University of Lucerne, Lucerna, Suiza

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.56487/kpnhje15

Palabras clave:

Dios — Tiempo — Eternidad — Creación — Providencia

Resumen

Parte de la tarea de la teología filosófica consiste en proporcionar una explicación última, coherente y plausible de la realidad. El teólogo filosófico debe ofrecer una explicación plausible del mundo que satisfaga la curiosidad intelectual de la humanidad, pero también una explicación que cautive la imaginación y ayude a los individuos a encontrar su propio lugar en la historia de Dios. William Lane Craig tiene un relato particular que contar sobre Dios, el tiempo y la creación. Me propongo explorar la coherencia y la plausibilidad del relato de Craig en comparación con otros rivales prominentes en la historia, como Plotino y una perspectiva que denominaré temporalidad divina pura. Argumentaré que la perspectiva de Plotino presenta ciertas dificultades y que Craig solo las supera de forma aparente. Un examen más detenido de la perspectiva de Craig revela que, en realidad, no le va mucho mejor que a Plotino, y que una perspectiva de temporalidad divina pura puede explicar mejor el mundo que la perspectiva de Craig.

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Referencias

Thank you to Tyson James, and audiences at the University of Lucerne and the Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore for helpful feedback on earlier drafts of this paper.

Marcello Oreste Fiocco, “What is time?,” Manuscrito 40 (2017): 43-65.

W. H. Newton-Smith, The structure of time (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980), 7; John Earman, World enough and space-time: Absolute versus relational theories of space and time (Lon don: The MIT Press, 1989), 13.

For a history of this, see Emily Thomas, Absolute time: Rifts in early modern British metaphysics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018); Ryan T. Mullins, From divine timemaker to divine watchmaker: An exploration of God’s temporality (New York: Routledge, 2025).

For a history, see Mullins, From divine timemaker, chapter 2.

Cf. Ryan T. Mullins, “The precreation moment is easy to find: A reply to ben page and reflections on rival theories of creation,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 99, no. 9 (2026).

David Brown, God in a single vision: Integrating philosophy and theology, ed. by Christopher R. Brewer and Robert MacSwain (New York: Routledge, 2016), 18-19.

Levi Ben Gershom Gersonides, The wars of the Lord, vol. 3, trans. by Seymour Feldman (Phila delphia, PA: The Jewish Publication Society, 1999), 330, 338, 342.

Samuel Lebens, The principles of Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), 31.

Ibid.

Cf. George F. R. Ellis, “Does the multiverse really exist?,” Scientific American 305 (2011): 38-43.

Plotinus, The Enneads, trans. by Stephen MacKenna and John Dillon (London: Penguin Books, 1991), 137.

Ibid., 149.

Ibid., 136.

Cf. Christopher Isaac Noble and Nathan M. Powers, “Creation and divine providence in Ploti nus,” in Causation and creation in late antiquity, ed. by Anna Marmodoro and Brian D. Prince (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015); 51-70; Riccardo Chiaradonna, “Plotinus’ ac count of demiurgic causation and its philosophical background,” in Causation and creation in late antiquity, 41-50.

E.g., M. S. Zarepour, Necessary existence and monotheism: An Avicennian account of the Islamic conception of divine unity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022).

For more on grounding, see Kerry McKenzie, Fundamentality and grounding (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022).

Plotinus, The Enneads, 227.

Ibid.

Ibid., 232.

Ibid., 227-228.

Ibid., 226.

Ibid., 227.

William Lane Craig, Systematic philosophical theology, vol. 2a, On God: Attributes of God (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Blackwell, 2025), 328.

William Lane Craig, God, time, and eternity: The coherence of theism II; eternity (London: Klu wer Academic Publishers, 2001), 255.

Craig, On God: Attributes of God, 255.

For a deeper exploration of this issue, see Ryan T. Mullins, “Does providence entail divine tem porality? Maybe,” Religions 15 (2024): 1-13.

Craig, On God: Attributes of God, 260.

Ibid., 331.

William Lane Craig, Time and eternity: Exploring God’s relationship to time (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2001), 235.

Craig, On God: Attributes of God, 333-334. Emphasis in original.

Craig, Time and eternity, 236.

Paul Helm, Eternal God: A study of God without Time, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 222.

Craig, Time and eternity, 233.

Richard Swinburne, The Christian God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 81-90; Sam Baron and Kristie Miller, An introduction to the philosophy of time (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2019), 128; Graham Oppy, “Are there any Gods?,” in Is there a God? A debate, by Graham Oppy and Kenneth L. Pearce (New York: Routledge, 2022), 11; Alison Fernandes, The temporal asym metry of causation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023). This principle is also com mon place within Indian philosophy. Michael T. Williams, “Analytic philosophy of time in early Modern India,” in Temporality and eternity: Nine perspectives on God and time, ed. by Marcus Schmucker, Michael T. Williams, and Florian Fischer (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022), 167.

Craig in personal correspondence.

Fabrice Correia, “Ontological dependence,” Philosophy Compass 3 (2008): 1013-1032.

Alan R. Rhoda, “Foreknowledge and fatalism: Why divine timelessness doesn’t help,” in Debates in the metaphysics of time, ed. by L. Nathan Oaklander (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), 265-266.

Richard C. Dales, Medieval discussions of the eternity of the world (New York: E. J. Brill, 1990), 160-161.

In the 12th century, Peter Lombard follows Aristotle on this point (The sentences — Book 2: On creation, trans. by Giulio Silano [Ontario: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 2008]).

Craig, On God: Attributes of God, 331.

Ibid.

Ibid., 259.

Ibid., 253.

For more details on this argument, see Mullins, “Does providence entail divine temporality?”

William Lane Craig, “No trouble: A reply to Wielenberg,” TheoLogica 5 (2021): 90.

Plotinus, The Enneads, 223.

D. H. Mellor, Mind, meaning, and reality: Essays in philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012): 169.

Ulrich Meyer, The nature of time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 15.

J. P. Moreland and William Lane Craig, Philosophical foundations for a Christian worldview (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2017), 194.

Some might try to complain that the absolute theory of time also faces a circularity objection, but this is to misunderstand the circularity. The relational theory denies that time is an entity, but each attempt at reduction involves sneaking time back into the world as an entity in its own right. So, the reduction is a failure. The absolute theory says time is an entity, and each analysis of time will unsurprisingly involve time being temporal. There is no vicious circularity here.

Plotinus, The Enneads, 226.

Dales, Medieval discussions of the eternity of the world, 199.

Geoffry Gorham, “Descartes on God’s relation to time,” Religious Studies 44 (2008): 413-432.

Jon Hoover, “The Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyyah on God, creation, and time,” in Tempo rality and eternity: Nine perspectives on God and time, ed. by Marcus Schmucker, Michael T. Williams, and Florian Fischer (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022), 94-95.

Anindita Niyogi Balslev, “Time and the Hindu experience,” in Time and religion, ed. by Anin dita Niyogi Balslev and J. N. Mohanty (Leiden: Brill, 1992), 166.

Debika Saba, “Hinduism, Nyaya-Vaisesika,” in Encyclopedia of time: Science, philosophy, theology, and culture, ed. by H. James Birx (London: SAGE Publications, 2009), 663.

Nicole Oresme, Le Livre du ciel et du monde (London: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1968), 177.

Ibid., 163-165.

For more, see Mullins, From divine Timemaker to divine Watchmaker, chapter 5. Cf. Thomas, Absolute time.

Timothy O’Connor, “The unity of the divine nature: Four theories,” in Classical theism: New essays on the metaphysics of God, ed. by Jonathan Fuqua and Robert C. Koons (London: Rout ledge, 2023), 143-144.

Hoover, “The Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyyah on God, creation, and time,” 90; Bonaventure, The Breviloquium 2.1.3, in The works of Bonaventure, vol. 2, trans. by Jose de Vinck (New York: St Anthony Guild Press, 1963), 71.

Shaykh Abu Mansoor al-Maturidi, The book of monotheism: Kitaab at-Tawheed; God and the universe, a manual of Sunni theology, trans. by Sulaiman Ahmed (London: Maturidi Publica tions, 2019), 65. Bracketed in original.

Ibid. Bracketed in original.

Dean W. Zimmerman, “God inside time and before creation,” in God and time: Essays on the di vine nature, ed. by Gregory E. Ganssle and David M. Woodruff (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 88-89.

Craig, God, time, and eternity, 268.

Craig, Time and eternity, 234.

Ibid., 214.

Ibid., 213.

This is why so-called ersatz presentism has been developed as a possible solution to the ground ing objection. This view tries to ground tensed facts on tenseless facts. E.g., Craig Bourne, A fu ture for presentism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006); Thomas M. Crisp, “Presentism,” in The Oxford handbook of metaphysics, ed. by Michael J. Loux and Dean W. Zimmerman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).

Craig, Time and eternity, 234.

Personal dialogue with Craig.