The Temporal Presence of God in a Relativistic Universe

The traditional concept of a temporarily present God in Open Theism more closely aligns with religious and biblical understandings of God than does the classical timeless concept. Divine temporal knowledge and causality require, however, a dynamic theory of time and absolute time, concepts that most theorists of relativity challenge. The standard version of presentism, as proposed by W. L. Craig, has not been well received in the scientific community. A more effective solution to conceptualizing God’s temporal presence in a relativistic universe involves reinterpreting the Theory of Relativity as pertaining to measurements of local times, which do not interfere with the unique cosmic “now”. In this view, Minkowski’s space-time does not need to be interpreted solely as a geometric representation of the effects of natural forces, as Craig suggests, but it can be argued that even if realistic, it does not exclude a unique present.

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Publication Details

Journal
Studia theologica
Published
2024-10-10
DOI
https://doi.org/10.5507/sth.2024.009
Primary Topic
Philosophy and Theoretical Science
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00
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article

The Temporal Presence of God in a Relativistic Universe

Ľuboš Rojka
Studia theologica
Philosophy and Theoretical Science
article

The Temporal Presence of God in a Relativistic Universe

Ľuboš Rojka
article en

Abstract

The traditional concept of a temporarily present God in Open Theism more closely aligns with religious and biblical understandings of God than does the classical timeless concept. Divine temporal knowledge and causality require, however, a dynamic theory of time and absolute time, concepts that most theorists of relativity challenge. The standard version of presentism, as proposed by W. L. Craig, has not been well received in the scientific community. A more effective solution to conceptualizing God’s temporal presence in a relativistic universe involves reinterpreting the Theory of Relativity as pertaining to measurements of local times, which do not interfere with the unique cosmic “now”. In this view, Minkowski’s space-time does not need to be interpreted solely as a geometric representation of the effects of natural forces, as Craig suggests, but it can be argued that even if realistic, it does not exclude a unique present.

Studia theologicaVol. 26(2)
Openalex Percentile: Top 78%
Philosophy and Theoretical Science
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