We are continuing our analysis of Ganssle's statements. For your convenience, I will quote the full paragraph again:

If determinism is true, then no action is up to the one who does it. At least no action is up to the one who does it to a high enough degree to make it reasonable to hold the person responsible. Yet we do hold each other morally responsible. The best explanation is that some actions are up to us and we are responsible for them.

Today we will examine the following: "At least no action is up to the one who does it to a high enough degree to make it reasonable to hold the person responsible."

Now things really get strange.

He says that the "up to"-ness must be high enough before it is "reasonable" to hold someone "responsible." Of course, my first reaction is, WHY? Even if we could understand his statement, we have no reason to believe it. But as we will see, it is not that easy to understand the statement.

Before we even know what he means by "up to," he now suggests that there are degrees of "up to"-ness. So, according to him, an action can be "up to" a person to a greater or lesser degree, but how he knows that, he does not explain.

Then, he indicates that the "up to"-ness must reach a certain degree before it is "high enough" to make it "reasonable to hold the person responsible." But even if we swallow the suggestion that there are degrees of "up to"-ness, how high is "high enough," and how does he know?

Also, if the "up to"-ness must be high enough to be "reasonable," what does he mean by "reasonable"? By "reason-able," does he mean something that is validly deducible from true premises, or something like "morally acceptable"? If he means something like the latter, then what would he mean by "acceptable"? "Acceptable" to whom? How does he know?

Or would we be completely unjustified in suspecting that by "reasonable," he is once again appealing to some intuitive standard that he cannot objectively project and support outside of his own mind, and in which case his intuition would once again take the place of God?

So why must the "up to"-ness reach a certain degree before it is "high enough" to be considered "reasonable" to hold someone responsible? This point remains unanswered.

Also, what does he mean by "responsible"? I will not even try to guess.

Now, since he contrasts the "up to"-ness of one's action against "determinism," and since the "up to"-ness can be of a greater or lesser degree, it follows that the "determinism" must also be in degrees — that is, it is not absolute, but relative.

But this puts the God who is the subject of "determinism" in a similar position with the creatures who are the objects of the "determinism." That is, some things are "up to" (determined by) him, but some things are not. He might be more powerful than we, so that more things are "up to" him than "up to" us, but it remains that when it comes to "up to"-ness and determinism, he differs from us only in degree and not in kind.

So again, we have lost the God of the Bible.

In contrast, the biblical position is that we are "morally responsible" in the sense that we are morally accountable to God; that is, God will judge us. Our beliefs and actions will have consequences because God will cause these consequences.

Moreover, it is "reasonable" for God to hold us morally responsible in the sense that it is both logically valid and morally acceptable for him to do so. It is logically valid because this is a conclusion deducible from his own will and decree, and it is morally acceptable because God is the sole and ultimate moral standard, and he accepts his own decision to hold his creatures morally responsible.

In this explanation, the issue of human freedom does not even enter into the discussion. It is thoroughly consistent with absolute divine determinism, in which God controls all things, including every human thought and decision.

(To be continued.)

Recommended:

Vincent Cheung, Systematic Theology
Vincent Cheung, Ultimate Questions
Vincent Cheung, Presuppositional Confrontations
Vincent Cheung, Commentary on Ephesians
(See www.rmiweb.org)

Gorodn Clark, Christian Philosophy
Gordon Clark, Predestination
Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will
(See www.monergismbooks.com)

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