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Single Idea 23334

[filed under theme 16. Persons / F. Free Will / 2. Sources of Free Will ]

Full Idea

The Christian view, following Genesis, is that man is created in the image of God, and this is understood as crucially involving the idea that man has a free will in the image of God's will.

Gist of Idea

For Christians man has free will by creation in God's image (as in Genesis)

Source

Michael Frede (A Free Will [1997], 08)

Book Ref

Frede,Michael: 'A Free Will' [Univ of California 2011], p.126


A Reaction

The idea of free will evidently originated with Epictetus, but was taken up by Christians because it fitted doctrinal needs. Even Epictetus saw free will as originating in Zeus.

Related Ideas

Idea 23329 We make progress when we improve and naturalise our choices, asserting their freedom [Epictetus]

Idea 23333 The idea of free will achieved universal acceptance because of Christianity [Frede,M]

Idea 23332 Zeus gave me a nature which is free (like himself) from all compulsion [Epictetus]


The 20 ideas with the same theme [what makes free will in humans possible]:

Epicurus showed that the swerve can give free motion in the atoms [Epicurus, by Diogenes of Oen.]
Voluntary motion is intrinsically within our power, and this power is its cause [Carneades, by Cicero]
The actions of the mind are not determinate and passive, because atoms can swerve [Lucretius]
Zeus gave me a nature which is free (like himself) from all compulsion [Epictetus]
Rational natures require free will, in order to have power of judgement [Boethius]
The will retains its power for opposites, even when it is acting [Duns Scotus, by Dumont]
People are only free if they are guided entirely by reason [Spinoza]
The first motion or effect cannot be produced necessarily, so the First Cause must be a free agent [Reid]
We shall never be able to comprehend how freedom is possible [Kant]
The manifest will in the world of phenomena has to conform to the laws of nature [Kant]
I want independent control of the fundamental cause of my decisions [Fichte]
Freedom is produced by the activity of the mind, and is not intrinsically given [Hegel]
Only idealism has given us the genuine concept of freedom [Schelling]
If we say that freedom depends on rationality, the irrational actions are not free [Sidgwick]
Freedom needs knowledge, the possibility of arbitrariness, and law [Jaspers]
The idea of free will achieved universal acceptance because of Christianity [Frede,M]
For Christians man has free will by creation in God's image (as in Genesis) [Frede,M]
The Stoics needed free will, to allow human choices in a divinely providential cosmos [Frede,M]
Awareness of thought is a step beyond awareness of the world [Dennett]
Foreknowledge permits control [Dennett]