Dogmatiek

The intense nature of the problem of evil has led theologians to conceive God differently. One of such recent ways of conceiving God is that of the open and relational theology and this book represents that view. Holtzen is a professor of philosophy and theology at Hope International University, Fullerton.

The purpose of his book is, first of all, to show that if God is relational and humans are free, then God is a God of faith. According to Holtzen, God desires a loving relationship with humans therefore faith is necessary for this partnership. Other theologians have begun to conceive God from the open and relational point of view as vulnerable and a risk-taker. Holtzen seeks to complete and balance that view through a redefinition of some moral attributes of God.

These include faith, love, belief, trust, and hope. He argues that just as it is in the Imitatio Dei, God must possess such properties required of humans in this loving relationship which God desires to have because it is not necessary to have what God does not have. God is not just faithful in keeping His promises to us, but He has faith that we, in turn, will be faithful in our covenantal relationship with Him and being committed to the project of creation.

Since faith has both the elements of belief and hope, it is also not possible to have faith without trust which is confidence. God also trusts. Holtzen argues that humans can be trusted even though they are depraved, because they are not totally depraved. Since the Bible calls for obedience from humans, they can obey hence God can have faith, trust, and hope in them. Holtzen further maintains that when the Scriptures speak of God as repenting, relenting, surprising, testing to know, changing His mind, hoping, and even ‘holding a false belief’ as in Jeremiah 3:7, 19-20, it is an authentication of the fact that the future is not known to God. God believed that Abraham feared Him when Abraham proved it by willing to sacrifice Isaac. Before that, God didn’t know that Abraham feared him.

The account of creation depicts God as a God of trust who trusted Adam and handed over the project of creation to him. The hypothetical statements of God in the Bible in dealing with Israelites point to the fact that God trusts. God is faithful, hopeful, and trusting before requesting us to do same, just as He first loved us so that we love Him in return.

Holtzen cites numerous passages to support his arguments and I must confess that thinking about God in this direction is unique. However, I have a few issues with this concept of God.

In the first place, according to Holtzen, the purpose of creation is not known: ‘Scripture does not reveal God’s purposes for creating this world’ (4). But to say that the Bible does not state the purpose of creation raises lots of questions. The Bible is clear enough from Genesis that the earth was created for the benefit of humans, that humans may have fellowship among themselves and with God and that through it God may be glorified. Christ requested the Father to glorify Him with His glory which He shared with Him before the creation in John 17. Numerous passages can be cited to support this and even Holtzen himself believes that God authored creation for sake of relationship (6).

Secondly, Holtzen contends against those who argue that divine faith, trust, and hope is not taught in the Bible that the Bible does not have to teach this explicitly, because the doctrine of the Trinity, omniscience and omnipotence are also not taught explicitly in the Bible (21-23). I think this is another slippery argument.

In the third place, Holtzen says that God regrets, is surprised ‘and even, quite shockingly, believes falsely’ (95). I think it is inappropriate to think of God in this manner. If God truly has faith in humans, trusts, and hopes in them for the entire course of history and if his plan for the universe was hanging solely on Adam, I believe God would have been dead by now as a result of much heartbreak seeing how humans have been toying with His emotions. Logically, the argument of this book is wonderful. But, biblically the God presented in this book is a God created in the image of man.

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