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Predestination and Jehovah’s ForeknowledgeThe Watchtower—1953 | June 1
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that obedience would mean life and disobedience would mean death, and he so informed Adam, and through him Eve.—Gen. 2:16, 17.
14. Why would Jehovah not need to foreknow their rebellion to cope with it?
14 In the face of absolutely no Scriptural evidence that Jehovah foreknew this trio’s transgressions, on what basis can it be argued that he did? No sound basis. He would not have to foreknow the rebellion of these three in order to cope with it. Nor need he foreknow the works of demons and men at this time in order to accomplish his purposes. No more so than would a man, intending to cut the weeds from a plot of ground to make a garden, have to foreknow the acts of insects dwelling in the jungle of weeds and which constitutes their home. Regardless of what the insects might do, they could no more prevent the man from cutting the weeds than man could prevent God from accomplishing the divine works. God needs to foreknow man’s opposing efforts no more so than the man needs to foreknow the insect’s. (Isa. 40:22) In either case the intended purpose can be carried out regardless of the opposition, since it is so insignificantly feeble in comparison with the power of the purposer.—Isa. 46:11; 55:11.
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Foreknowledge Compatible with Free WillThe Watchtower—1953 | June 1
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Foreknowledge Compatible with Free Will
“I know what their temperament will lead to, even now, before I bring them into the land, which I promised them on oath.”—Deut. 31:21, AT.
1. How do Presbyterian teachings deny man’s free will?
IT IS not denied by predestinarians that men are free moral agents, yet their own teachings certainly deny it. Do not the following statements from their publication rob of real meaning their contention that men are free to will good? “Man, by his fall into a state of sin, hath lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation.” But when God intervenes to convert an otherwise helpless sinner he “enables him freely to will and to do that which is spiritually good”.a God promises to “give unto all those that are ordained unto life, his Holy Spirit, to make them willing and able to believe”.b So those not ordained have no free will or ability to believe. Similarly, God is “renewing and powerfully determining their wills” in order to make men “willing and able” to answer his call.c Even after starting in the right way the “perseverance of the saints depends, not upon their own free will, but upon the immutability of the decree of election”.d And where is the free will of individuals to be found in their statement that God is “governing all his creatures; ordering them, and all their actions”?e If God did “unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass”, and to show his sovereign power over some did “ordain them to dishonor and wrath”, and to show his grace toward others did predestinate them to life “without any foresight of faith or good works”, then how
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