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You chide me for finding something in an Old Testament text that neither the canonical nor the patristic writers advocate. This is a dubious principle of interpretation if left unqualified. If we can only repeat what the New Testament writers said about Old Testament passages, then we shall not have much to say. Though the interpretations of the canonical writers are correct, they do not say everything that needs to be said regarding the Old Testament. Just because Paul highlights certain parts of the narrative that suit his purpose does not mean there are no other points to the narrative. Following your principle, the patristic writers you cite were wrong to see Isaac as a type of Christ since none of the canonical writers do so. How can you let them get something out of the text that is not in the apostolic witness?

You ask why the Fathers do not interpret the "now I know" (Gen. 22:12) the same way I do. Elsewhere I have documented that though the Fathers were correct to engage and make use of Greek philosophy, they accepted certain philosophical notions that prevented them from reading some (not all) biblical texts in the correct way. We all have our presuppositions, and theirs led many of them to conclude that God cannot actually grieve or change his mind or be affected by our prayers. I find this quite unscriptural. Let me give some examples. God does grieve over our sinful rebellion (Gen. 6:6; Eph. 4:30). Though God originally planned to have Saul and his lineage be kings over Israel, because of Saul's sin, God changed his mind and selected David instead (1 Sam. 13:13, 15:11).

The prophet Isaiah says to King Hezekiah, "Thus says the Lord," you will die and not recover from this illness. Hezekiah prays to God, asking him to change his mind. God does and sends Isaiah back to announce, "Thus says the Lord," you will recover from this illness (2 Kings 20:1-6).

Our prayers can have an effect on God's plans. It makes no sense to say God grieves, changes his mind, and is influenced by our prayers, and also claim that God tightly controls everything so that everything that occurs is what God desired to happen! Furthermore, on several occasions God expected Israel to repent but they did not do what God expected (Isa. 5:2; Jer. 3:6-7, 19-20). Also, God uses words such as might, if, and perhaps (Exod. 4:8-9; Jer. 26:3; Ezek. 12:3), indicating that some of the future is open, but such words make no sense in your view—in fact, God seems less than genuine to offer forgiveness when he already knows they will not repent.

There are two types of texts concerning divine omniscience in Scripture: those that portray God as knowing precisely what will happen (Jer. 5) and those that portray God as not knowing precisely what will happen (the texts I've just cited). We believe the best way of holding on to both sorts of texts is to see the future as partly definite and partly indefinite, even for God. The typical strategy is to claim that the texts portraying God as knowing exactly what will happen are true while those that depict God as not knowing or grieving do not tell us the truth about God. You accuse us of "subjecting Scripture to human logic" but that is exactly what you are doing here! We uphold both types of texts rather than subsume one under the other, so we believe openness is a superior perspective.

Your fellow servant,
John

Chris Hall replies, next page.

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June 11 2001, Vol. 45, No. 8