Comments on: A Reformed Account of the Beatific Vision

By: Kyle Strobel

Kyle Strobel — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 14:09:58 +0000

Ray,

Sure, drop me a line if you get stuck.

Blessings, kyle

By: Ray

Ray — Thu, 23 Aug 2012 07:19:10 +0000

Kyle,

Thanks for the response. That does help. I just wanted to know if I was headed in the right direction with connecting the beatific vision with the miracle that could give a disembodied soul *spiritual* perception and consciousness (i.e. that once disembodied the soul isn’t necessarily inert or unconscious given hylomorphism).

I do like the idea that “the physical sight purifies the body while the spiritual sight purifies the soul.”

I’m just doing some preliminary studies for a philosophy of mind course that I just started at the undergraduate level and am trying to wrap my head around this view (considering I only have a layman’s knowledge of theology right now).

After being impressed by checking out some of your other posts, I added this site to a list of blogs I check regularly. I look forward to following you and the other contributors. Also, if it is alright with you, you might hear back from me from time to time if I need some help with certain theological heavy lifting.

Thanks once again!

Blessings,

Ray

By: Kyle Strobel

Kyle Strobel — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 23:03:19 +0000

Ray,

The reformed tend to assume that the way we “see” God, since he is invisible, is with “the eyes of the soul.” Even Owen, who orients the beatific vision around seeing Christ, claims that in glorification we receive a “new visive faculty” (on top of the new visive faculty received in regeneration) to see God. So there is still a physical as well as spiritual seeing taking place. The problem with this, I think, is that they seem to leave these two kinds of seeing as separate and important, but not equally so. In other words, the real sight is the sight of the soul, and the physical sight is just an added bonus. So, one way to think about it, put by (if I recall correctly) Turretin, is that the physical sight purifies the body while the spiritual sight purifies the soul.

I hope that helps.

By: Ray

Ray — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 06:53:24 +0000

Kyle,
I know I’m arriving here a little late (well, over a year late to be exact) so I don’t really expect a reply but if you happen to read this: I’m a reformed philosophy student and I’ve recently been looking into Thomistic hylomorphism. Not sure exactly where I stand on it yet, but I was intrigued by Brian Leftow’s closing comments in his essay “Soul, Mind, and Brain” which can be found in “The Waning of Materialism” (ed. by Koons and Bealer):

“A thing with a complete nature can *under natural circumstances* do the actions natural to its kind. In *nature,* says Thomas, the soul cannot do its peculiar action without a body. For its act is to understand, but the soul cannot do this *naturally* without a body to supply ‘phantasms,’ the data and media of its understanding. If the soul cannot understand on its own, it cannot be fully a soul on its own. If the soul can understand only in a body *(naturally),* the soul can fully be itself only when in a body *(naturally).* So if the soul is a soul by itself, it is incompletely a soul. *So too, a severed but still live eye, unable to see, would be incompletely an eye.*” (414)

Leftow goes on to say that the real difference between Descartes and Thomas is that the former believes that the soul can act on its own, “apart from input or aid by [the] body or brain, without a *miracle*” while the latter disagrees. I was wondering: could this ‘unnatural miracle’ (lets call it) partly be explained by the doctrine of the beatific vision? That is, is there something about the beatific vision that–despite our awaiting glorified bodies and thus being incomplete–we may still be conscious and perceive God without bodies? Any help on this issue would be appreciated; especially, any material from the Reformed tradition.

Thanks for your time.

Ray

By: Kyle Strobel

Kyle Strobel — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 21:06:24 +0000

Jim, for the Reformed, there is no experience of the beatific vision, as such, prior to glory. We always will see “through a glass darkly” until that time. In terms of some spiritual advice, let me suggest that regaining whatever experience you had would not be the right approach. An appropriate model for the vision we do have now is not to try and perfect what cannot be perfected here, but to proclaim, “Without you I can do nothing” – it is to focus on Christ regardless of the experience (or even if there is no experience). I hope that helps. Blessings, kyle

By: Jim LaCroix

Jim LaCroix — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 01:50:37 +0000

Hi guys, I hesitate to say anything here because I can tell you are out of my league in a lot of ways. But I was very interested to read your comments about the possible experiencing of the beatific vision by well known protestant reformers. i was starting to think only catholics had this kind of experience and I’m not catholic but I had an experience several years ago that I haven’t been able to find another suitable description for other than what I’ve read about the beatific vision. I lived in the glory of that experience for 4-5 years with very little fading of what I “saw” but lately it’s getting dim and I hope to find someone who can help me regain the vision…I know it’s in His Word but sometimes I think a flame can be rekindled by hearing someone recount their experience. At least I hope so. Anything you have read that might help me?
jiml

By: Bobby Grow

Bobby Grow — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 19:58:00 +0000

Kyle, I don’t remember either; I’m going to have to pull my files and see if I have this one in there. Thanks for the run down on the book. It looks interesting. Glad to see Batzig in there too. I’ll have to see if I can get a review copy for the blog at some point. Hope all is well, Kyle.

By: Kyle Strobel

Kyle Strobel — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 19:14:08 +0000

Bobby, I can’t remember. I might have sent on the original paper I gave at the Edwards and Scotland conference that this chapter is based on. The book is a bit random. I am dissappointed that Bebbington didn’t include his paper in it (he must have had it slotted for another publication). Wilson Kimnach focuses on the transatlantic brotherhood of preachers, Adriaan Neele focuses on Scotland, Netherlands and America with specific focus on van Mastricht and A History of the Work of Redemption. David Ceri Jones looks at the Welsh Methodists and their reading of Edwards, and Chris Chun focuses on Edwards and revivals among Presbyterians and Baptists in Scotland. Nicholas Batzig discussed Edwards, McLuarin and the transatlantic concert of prayer, and Kelly van Andel discussed subjectivity and the mission frontier. Richard Hall wrote on Edwards and Hume on causation, and H. G. Callaway wrote on Witherspoon, Edwards, and ‘Christian Magnanimity.” Natalia Marandiuc wrote on human will, divine grace and virtue in Edwards and Kant (which looks particularly interesting) and Susan Miller wrote on Edwards and Keats.

By: Bobby Grow

Bobby Grow — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 18:08:03 +0000

Very cool, Kyle! I think your chapter is one I read from you in the past, isn’t it? What is your assessment of the rest of the book? Which Scots do the authors of the other chapters place Edwards in conversation with?

By: Kyle Strobel

Kyle Strobel — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 16:07:17 +0000

For Edwards, what is made visible is the spiritual. So, for instance, believers this side of glory have a spiritual sight that allows them to see Jesus as having “grace and truth.” Grace and truth are pushed into an aesthetic register such that they partake in the concept of beauty. Beauty, for Edwards, is primarily a spiritual term that denotes personal relations. The beatific, in this sense, is a grasping God’s fundamental beauty – which, again, is ushered into the realm of persons rather than essence.

Furthermore, Edwards ends up following Gregory of Palamas quite closely (without ever reading him). Edwards develops something incredibly similar to the essence / energies distinction except that he follows Calvin’s distinction between the essence and nature of God. The nature of God is communicable, whereas the essence is not, in a similar way as Easter Orthodox theologians like Lossky would parse Palamas’ distinction. One benefit for making the essence / nature distinction in this manner is that you can talk about 2 Peter 1:4 in a more robust manner – that creatures truly to partake in the divine nature, and that isn’t somehow a partaking in God’s essence (which would, it would be argued, be divinizing the creature in such a way as to make a fourth person of the Trinity.