The Impassibility of God

The gravity of the endeavor of systematic theology heightens considerably as the interpreter realizes that his or her digestion of the Scriptures “reveals not only who God is but also what we can expect from him and what he expects from us” (Feinberg). Tozer, then, is right to say that the most significant doctrine before the Church is always that of “God Himself” (I did learn something theologically significant from Intro. to Missions!). All that to say, we must ensure by careful study that our notions of God are as sharp, poignant, and direct as humanly possible. That brings me to the question of God’s impassibility.

Let me open with a passage which I stumbled upon while reading through Jeremiah the prophet. God says in response to Israel’s rebellion: “My anguish, my anguish! I writhe in pain! Oh the walls of my heart! My heart is beating wildly; I cannot keep silent…” (Jeremiah 4:19). There are three ways to interpret this passage: 1) all literal…that is, the picture is meant to describe God’s actual nature and actual ontology; 2) partially literal…that is, the picture hyperbolistically represents God’s nature but metaphorically depicts God’s ontology; 3) all metaphorical…nothing in the description is literally true of God. I think the latter conclusion is, I think, preferable and probable. God, particularly in the Prophets, used graphic, vivid, offensive language to rouse his people from lethargy and move them once again towards covenantal faithfulness. I grant that to begin with this passage in arguing against passibility might, at the outset, appear to be a bit of a cheap shot (it’s not…which I hope to prove later) since Passibilists themselves would probably align with my interpretive conclusion. Now that the stage is set, I’ll move to my twofold plea.

1) The language which Evangelicalism now seems to embrace is at best confusing and at worst damaging—particularly during the reign of Open Theism/Process Theology. Bruce Ware, in an article entitled “An Evangelical Reformulation of the Doctrine of the Immutability of God” (it’s on the ischool website, if you’d like to read it and be angered), went so far as to assert that God is “relationally mutable.” Even Grudem says: “God responds differently to different situations.” I object to propositions like this. In this purely pragmatic criticism, I’m not even calling for Passibilists to jettison the position itself. But surely we can be more linguistically precise than Ware and Grudem have been seen to be.

2) Second, proponents of passibility are inconsistent within their own system. For example, Grudem, Erickson, Carson, and Feinberg all argue against impassibility, yet flee quickly to the very doctrine to escape language of God’s repentance (see Ware’s article for the extensive list). You need a better excuse than saying, like Ware, simply that the Impassibilists are ‘right on this point’. In such a system, determination between metaphorical/literal language is left to theological arbitrarity (‘This doesn’t fit with my philosophy…so I choose option a’ or ‘I choose b’). This double-move smacks of duplicity

I love C. S. Lewis on this point. In making his case for impassibility, he uses the idea of ‘God’s love’ powerfully. “The passion of love is something that happens to us, as ‘getting wet’ happens to a body: and God is exempt from that ‘passion’ in the same way that water is exempt from ‘getting wet’. He cannot be affected with love, because He is love.”

Does God regret decisions which at the outset he deemed ‘good’? Or, is God capable suffering through the enactment of his holy, unstained purpose? Emotional movement is, at its core, ontological variation. Stephen Charnock is right, then, to say: “If God’s essence be changed, he either increaseth or diminisheth.” Knowledge of God is derived analogously; yet an analogy never perfectly correlates with the object for which it stands. If ever this statement was true, then surely it must be so with the One who exceeds or transcends or extends infinitely beyond all cerebral categories. Rather than chafing at the metaphorical language, such a recognition should result in worship to the God who ‘bends backwards’ on behalf of mankind—not only in reducing himself to symbols cast on a page but also in confining himself to common imagery through which readers might come to know him.