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Schleiermacher on the Divine Causality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Bruce L. Boyer
Bruce L. Boyer
Affiliation:
Philosophy Department, University of California at Irvine
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Extract

In chapter 6 of God and Timelessness, Nelson Pike cites Schleiermacher as saying that ‘eternity (timelessness) is an “inactive attribute”’.1 An inactive attribute is an attribute that God has by virtue of being what he is, as opposed to an attribute which he has by virtue of what he does. Omnipotence is an active attribute, as Pike says, because, ‘To think of God as omnipotent is to think of Him as vital and effective’ (p. 97). Roughly, then, an inactive attribute is one which God has by virtue of what he is in himself, while an active attribute is one which God has by virtue of his relation to something else, e.g. his creation.

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Type
Articles
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Religious Studies , Volume 22 , Issue 1 , March 1986, pp. 113 - 123
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986

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References

page 113 note 1 Pike, Nelson, God and Timelessness (London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1970), p. 97.Google Scholar

page 113 note 2 Schleiermacher, Friedrich, The Christian Faith, trans. Mackintosh, H. R. and Stewart, J. S. (New York, Harper and Row, 1963), section 52.1.Google Scholar (Referred to parenthetically as CF.)

page 123 note 1 I would like to thank Professors Nelson Pike and Peter Woodruff for suggestions that greatly improved this paper.