MARK MAKIN
THE DOCTRINE OF ETERNAL GENERATION has fallen on hard times of late. Critics of eternal generation dwell overwhelmingly on whether the doctrine finds support in Scripture, and this is as it should be. If no biblical warrant exists for eternal generation, then Christians should simply reject the doctrine. In the end, the doctrine of eternal generation, like all other doctrines, stands or falls with Scripture. Yet several critics have gone beyond disputing the doctrine’s biblical warrant, raising philosophical-theological objections to eternal generation. Eternal generation, critics charge, is unintelligible and entails subordinationism by robbing the Son of necessary existence and self-existence (aseity). Heavy charges, indeed, that would undoubtedly undermine the doctrine of eternal generation if true.
While some progress has been made against these philosophical-theological objections, proponents of eternal generation have been hampered by their inability to produce philosophical models of eternal generation that withstand the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections.1 In this chapter I defend eternal generation by developing three viable philosophical models of the doctrine that withstand these objections: a causal model, a grounding model, and an essential dependence model. Although these models cannot provide a positive case for the doctrine of eternal generation, they demonstrate that eternal generation is philosophically coherent and theologically sound. Eternal generation cannot be dismissed on philosophical-theological grounds.
I begin by presenting a minimal statement of the doctrine of eternal generation, rehearsing the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections, and laying out desiderata for philosophical models of eternal generation. I then develop a causal model, a grounding model, and an essential dependence model in turn. With each model, I show how it meets the minimal statement of the doctrine, satisfies the desiderata, and withstands the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. Potential drawbacks of each model are noted along the way.2
THE DOCTRINE, OBJECTIONS, AND DESIDERATA
According to the doctrine of eternal generation, the Father eternally begets the Son. But what does this mean? What exactly does affirming that the Father eternally begets the Son commit proponents of eternal generation to, minimally? Begetting suggests dependence. The Father’s begetting of the Son implies that the Son depends on the Father for his existence or, equivalently, the Son exists in virtue of the Father. Much like my son depends on me for his existence, the Son somehow depends on the Father for his existence. The begetting of the Son is eternal at least in the sense that the Son exists eternally. Whether God exists in time or not, there was never a time at which the Son was not. At minimum, then, proponents of eternal generation seem committed to the following statement:
Eternal Generation: Necessarily, the Son depends on the Father for his existence, yet the Son exists eternally.
In other words, eternal generation requires necessary eternal existential dependence. Whatever it means for the Father to eternally beget the Son, it means at least this.3
This minimal statement of the doctrine of eternal generation must be interpreted with two crucial constraints in mind. As the ancient church stressed, the Father begets the Son “of necessity” and the Son is “begotten, not made.” The Father begetting the Son “of necessity” prohibits eternal generation from being contingent. The necessity of eternal generation entails that the Father and the Son are mutually inseparable. Just as the Son cannot exist without the Father, the Father cannot exist without the Son; necessarily, the Father exists if and only if the Son exists. The necessity of eternal generation, however, does not entail that the Father begets the Son against his will. Nothing forces the Father to beget the Son; rather, the Father willingly affirms the betting of the Son. Moreover, the Son is “not made” or created. Eternal generation cannot amount to eternal creation. The relation between the Father and the Son must differ importantly from the relation between the Father and creation.
Despite these constraints, critics of eternal generation have sought to undermine the doctrine on philosophical-theological grounds. According to the unintelligibility objection, eternal generation is simply unintelligible. Erickson, for example, maintains that the doctrine “does not make sense philosophically,” deriding it as “meaningless.”4 He elaborates:
Philosophically, [eternal generation] has been deemed by many to draw a distinction that does not make sense: to insist on some sort of eternal derivation of being from the Father, or the Father being eternally the source of the subsistence of the other two persons, yet in such a way that they are not at all created by him.5
Driscoll and Breshears similarly complain that “the term ‘begotten’ could never be defined with any clarity, so it was of little use.”6 Eternal generation falls on an unhappy spectrum somewhere between philosophically incoherent, at worst, and unclear, at best. Wherever it may fall, eternal generation is unintelligible, and so untenable.
Another, more sophisticated objection to eternal generation is the subordinationism objection. Critics who level this objection allege that the doctrine of eternal generation entails subordinationism, the view that the Son is less than fully divine. Eternal generation, they contend, robs the Son of two divine attributes: necessary existence and self-existence (aseity). The doctrine robs the Son of necessary existence because eternal generation cannot but render the Son’s existence contingent. Although proponents of eternal generation insist that the Father begets the Son “of necessity,” some argue the doctrine entails that it is possible for the Father to exist without the Son. If the Father causes the Son to exist, and causation is contingent, then the Son could have not existed.7 Thus, the Son lacks necessary existence. Eternal generation robs the Son of self-existence or aseity because the Son exists in virtue of the Father. According to Yandell, aseity is “the property existing without being caused by anything else.”8 On the doctrine of eternal generation, Yandell claims the Father acts and the Son results, implying that the Father causes the Son to exist. Since the Father causes the Son’s existence, the Son lacks aseity. At best, the Son possesses a kind of knockoff aseity or what he dubs “ ‘next door to aseity’—aseity regarding every being but one.”9 Craig raises the same worry but conceives of aseity more broadly. Aseity, for Craig, is the property of existing without depending on anything else: “God is not dependent upon any other being for His existence. . . . God does not exist through another or from another. He just exists in and of Himself, independent of everything else.”10 On this broader conception of aseity, if the Son’s existence depends in any way (causal or otherwise) on the Father, then the Son lacks aseity. “Even if [eternal generation] takes place necessarily and apart from the Father’s will,” reasons Craig, “the Son is less than the Father because the Father alone exists a se, whereas the Son exists through another (ab alio).”11 Eternal generation thus robs the Son of the divine attributes of aseity and necessary existence, rendering the Son less than fully divine. In this way, the doctrine of eternal generation entails subordinationism.
Any viable philosophical model of eternal generation must meet the minimal statement of eternal generation and withstand the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. Every model will involve some sort of dependence relation between the Father and the Son. But what more should we look for in a philosophical model of eternal generation? More specifically, what features must the dependence relation between the Father and the Son have? I submit four desiderata.
The first and most obvious desiderata is that the dependence relation must be able to relate persons. After all, eternal generation is a relation holding between two persons, the Father and the Son. So, for instance, if a proposed model involves a dependence relation that can only hold between events, then the model is not viable.
Second, the dependence relation between the Father and the Son must be nondiachronic. A diachronic relation holds across time; one of the relata is temporally prior to the other. If the relation between the Father and the Son were diachronic, then the Father’s existence would be temporally prior to the Son’s existence. There would be a time at which the Son does not exist. But there was never a time at which the Son was not. His existence is eternal. So the dependence relation cannot be diachronic. The relation between the Father and the Son can be nondiachronic by being simultaneous or timeless. Either way ensures that there was never a time at which the Son was not.
Third, a viable model of eternal generation must involve an asymmetric dependence relation between the Father and the Son. On the classical Christian doctrine of the Trinity, the Father eternally begets the Son—but not vice versa. Eternal generation is a one-way street. Demanding that the dependence relation be asymmetric rules out the possibility that the Son eternally begets the Father.
Fourth and finally, the dependence relation must preclude spurious eternal generation. The Father eternally begets the Son, but nothing else besides the Father should be said to do so. A viable model of eternal generation needs a dependence relation fine-grained enough to eliminate unwanted eternal generation. For example, a model entailing that any necessary existent, such as the number two, eternally begets the Son should be rejected out of hand.12
To sum up, a viable model must involve a dependence relation between the Father and the Son that can relate persons, is nondiachronic, is asymmetric, and precludes spurious eternal generation. Though perhaps not exhaustive, these four desiderata establish a sensible standard by which we can assess the viability of proposed models of eternal generation.13 In what follows I argue that a causal model, a grounding model, and an essential dependence model each satisfy all four desiderata, meet the minimal statement of eternal generation, and withstand the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections.
CAUSAL MODEL
On a causal model of eternal generation, eternal generation is a form of causation. In its most basic form, it states:
Causal Model: The Son is eternally begotten of the Father =df. Necessarily, the Father causes the Son to exist eternally.
To say that the Father eternally begets the Son is just to say that necessarily, the Father causes the Son to exist eternally. Not just any old conception of causation will do, however. A causal model of eternal generation will require a more permissive conception of causation. Causation is widely assumed to relate events. A causal model needs causation to relate persons as well, not just events involving persons. Causation is likewise typically thought to be diachronic; the cause always precedes the effect in time. A causal model needs simultaneous or timeless causation to be possible. So for a causal model to be viable, one needs a conception of causation that allows for simultaneous or timeless causation between persons. This is not a popular conception of causation, but it’s not crazy either.
Given this more permissive conception of causation, a causal model of eternal generation meets the minimal statement of the doctrine and satisfies all four desiderata. Necessarily, the Father causes the Son to exist (perhaps because causing the Son’s existence is part of the Father’s essence), and simultaneous or timeless causation allows for the Son to exist eternally. The more permissive conception of causation can relate persons and is nondiachronic, and causation is generally regarded to be asymmetric. Spurious eternal generation poses no threat since causation is sufficiently fine-grained; for instance, the model does not entail that the number two eternally begets the Son because the number two, while a necessary existent, does not cause the Son to exist.14
A causal model can also withstand the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. The more permissive conception of causation is meaningful and arguably philosophically coherent.15 Causation remains compatible with necessary existence. God causes necessary existents like the number two to exist, yet the number two nonetheless exists necessarily. Similarly, the fact that the Father causes the Son to exist in no way undermines the Son’s necessary existence. The Son’s existence is caused, but it needn’t be contingent.
That a causal model of eternal generation can preserve the Son’s aseity is less obvious. Recall that Yandell defines aseity as the property of existing without being caused by anything else. The Father clearly causes the Son’s existence on a causal model of eternal generation, so how can the Son still possess aseity? One way to mitigate the aseity worry emphasizes the familiar distinction between the divine essence (ousia) and the person (hypostasis) of the Son. Following John Calvin, we can maintain that the Son possesses aseity with respect to the divine essence, but not with respect to his person:
Therefore we say that the deity in an absolute sense exists of itself; whence likewise we confess that the Son since he is God, exists of himself, but not in respect of his Person; indeed, since he is the Son, we say that he exists from the Father. Thus his essence is without beginning; while the beginning of his person is God himself.16
Unlike the Father, who possesses aseity with respect to the divine essence and his person, the Son only possesses aseity with respect to the divine essence. The Son differs from the Father in that he does not possess aseity with respect to his person, but it is not at all obvious that this difference entails that the Son is less than fully divine. That the Son must also possess aseity with respect to his person in order to be fully divine demands further argumentation, argumentation that critics of eternal generation have not provided.
Another way to mitigate the aseity worry invokes a distinction between things existing “inside” God and things existing “outside” God. Divine aseity, one might think, only precludes God from depending (causally or otherwise) on things existing “outside” God. Depending on things existing “inside” God does not violate divine aseity. Even Craig concedes that this qualification on divine aseity is plausible. In another context, while discussing whether God depends on his thoughts, Craig observes, “Still, I think that we have to admit that there remains intuitively a sense, difficult to articulate, in which divine thoughts existing ‘inside’ God do not seem to violate divine aseity as do uncreated, Platonic, abstract objects existing ‘outside’ God.”17 The distinction between things existing “inside” and “outside” God is a murky one, to be sure. That said, if anything counts as existing “inside” God, it is the divine persons! On a causal model of eternal generation, the Father causes the Son’s existence, and the Father exists “inside” God. Because the Son’s existence is not caused by anything existing “outside” God, the Son possesses aseity tout court. Therefore, a causal model of eternal generation does not violate divine aseity. (The same reasoning holds for any model of eternal generation. If divine aseity only precludes the Son from depending on things existing “outside” God, then eternal generation cannot rob the Son of aseity.)
The drawbacks of a causal model of eternal generation are twofold. First, it requires a controversial, some might say incoherent, conception of causation. Someone who has independent philosophical reasons for rejecting simultaneous and timeless causation between persons will consider a causal model a nonstarter. Second, withstanding the subordinationism objection requires qualifying divine aseity. If divine aseity requires unqualified causal independence, then saying that the Son possesses aseity with respect to the divine essence or that the Son’s existence is not caused by anything existing “outside” God will not be enough. The Son still lacks aseity with respect to his person, and the Father still causes the Son’s existence. For those who think aseity requires unqualified causal independence, the Son simply cannot possess aseity on a causal model. The Son must settle for a kind of knockoff aseity. Even so, other plausible conceptions of aseity remain on which the Son fully possesses aseity.
GROUNDING MODEL
Although likely unfamiliar to anyone not immersed in contemporary analytic metaphysics, the past decade has witnessed burgeoning philosophical interest in a dependence relation called grounding.18 Complete consensus on grounding has proven elusive, but grounding is generally taken to be an asymmetric relation of noncausal dependence. Grounding is widely regarded to be a necessary relation—that is, necessarily, if the grounds are present, then the grounded is present. Considerable disagreement surrounds the relata of grounding; for present purposes, however, I assume that grounding relates things from any ontological category, including persons such as the Father and the Son. Putative examples of grounding abound in philosophy: sets are grounded in their members, truths are grounded in their truthmakers, wholes are grounded in their parts, determinable properties are grounded in determinate properties, and so on. Consider a specific case of a determinate property grounding a determinable property: my navy blue sweater. The navyness of my sweater grounds its blueness. Notice that the blueness of my sweater asymmetrically depends on its navyness. My sweater is blue because it is navy; it is not navy because it is blue. The dependence relation here is taken to be noncausal largely because it is nondiachronic. The navyness of my sweater is not temporally prior to its blueness; these properties are instantiated simultaneously. This grounding relation is also necessary in that necessarily, if my sweater is navy, then it is blue. In this way, the blueness of my sweater necessarily, asymmetrically, and noncausally depends on its navyness. Every case of grounding will have these features.
These features of grounding bode well for a grounding model of eternal generation. According to a grounding model of eternal generation:
Grounding Model: The Son is eternally begotten of the Father =df. The Father grounds the Son.
A grounding model of eternal generation easily meets the minimal statement of the doctrine and satisfies all four desiderata. Because grounding is a necessary relation, it is necessary that if the Father exists, then the Son exists. And since the Father exists necessarily and eternally, it follows that necessarily, the Son depends on the Father for his existence and exists eternally. Every possible world is one in which the Father grounds the Son and the Son exists eternally. Grounding can relate persons because it relates things from any ontological category. It is asymmetric, nondiachronic, and fine-grained enough to preclude spurious eternal generation.
A grounding model also withstands the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. To defend grounding’s intelligibility, grounding enthusiasts point to putative examples of grounding and describe its formal features (e.g., irreflexivity, asymmetry, and transitivity). Grounding remains compatible with the Son’s necessary existence and aseity. For example, the set that contains the number two as its sole member, {2}, is grounded in the number two, yet {2} still exists necessarily. Because grounding is noncausal, the Son possesses aseity because his existence is not caused by anything else. Even if one conceives of aseity more broadly as the property of existing without depending on anything else, the Son’s existence still does not depend on anything existing “outside” God.
Suppose critics of eternal generation press further, insisting that aseity requires unqualified independence. Aseity demands that the Son cannot depend in any way on anything whatsoever, regardless of whether it exists “inside” or “outside” God. On a grounding model (or, for that matter, any model of eternal generation!), the Son still depends on the Father, so the Son does not possess unqualified independence. At this point, proponents of eternal generation ought to question such a sweeping conception of aseity. Why think that aseity requires unqualified independence? Why should divine aseity preclude the Son from depending on anything existing “inside” God (namely, the Father)? Eternal generation is a dependence relation located entirely “inside” God. As long as the dependence relation stays “inside” God, God is self-existent. God’s existence does not depend on anything existing “outside” his triune self.19 Furthermore, why should aseity preclude all forms of dependence? Aseity may rightly preclude causal dependence, but why should it preclude every form of dependence? After all, some dependence relations seem perfectly innocuous, posing no threat to divine aseity. Take modal existential dependence, for instance. One thing modally existentially depends on another just in case necessarily, the former exists only if the latter exists. God modally existentially depends on the number two, since necessarily, God exists only if the number two exists. Perhaps God modally existentially depends on the number two because numbers necessarily exist in virtue of God’s nature. One could object to this picture for many reasons (for example, because it subverts God’s freedom with respect to creation)—but not for the reason that modal existential dependence violates divine aseity.20 If divine aseity is compatible with modal existential dependence, why can’t it be compatible with grounding or essential dependence? Without additional argumentation, we have no good reason to think that aseity requires unqualified independence. Such a sweeping conception of aseity is unmotivated.
A few drawbacks accompany a grounding model of eternal generation. The first drawback is that, unlike causation, the very notion of grounding is controversial. A number of philosophers reject the grounding relation, deriding it as useless and unintelligible.21 As far as critics of eternal generation are concerned, a grounding model may simply swap one unintelligible relation for another unintelligible relation. A second drawback is that grounding, at least according to some, is a type of causation. Grounding and what we ordinarily call causation are two sides of the same coin. Grounding just is metaphysical causation.22 If this is right, then the drawbacks of a causal model carry over to a grounding model of eternal generation. The third drawback is that a grounding model, when extended to the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit, has difficulty accounting for the difference between eternal generation and eternal procession. Generation and procession hold between different persons on a grounding model, yet there is no qualitative difference between the relations of generation and procession. Especially on the single procession view of eternal procession, the grounding relation between the Father and the Son and the grounding relation between the Father and the Spirit will be qualitatively identical. Generation and procession will differ in name only.23
ESSENTIAL DEPENDENCE MODEL
Before developing an essential dependence model of eternal generation, the notions of essence and essential definition need some introduction.24 As I understand it, essence is a primitive; essence cannot be analyzed.25 The essence of a thing is simply what the thing is, or what it is to be the thing. Or as John Locke, emulating Aristotle, puts it, the essence of a thing is “the very being of any thing, whereby it is, what it is.”26 The essence of a thing is not a further thing (e.g., a collection of properties) mysteriously related to the thing in question. Things have essences. Essences are not themselves things.27 Although primitive, essences are expressed by essential definitions. An essential definition is a proposition representing the essence of a thing. In an essential definition, the definiens will characterize the essence of the definiendum; the definiens will characterize what the definiendum is, or what it is to be the definiendum. Essential definitions are typically of the form “To be X is to be Y,” where “X” is the definiendum and “Y” is the definiens. For example, consider the Aristotelian essential definition of a human being: To be a human being is to be a rational animal.28 Notice that the definiens specifies both a genus and a differentia or differentiating feature. In this case the definiens specifies the genus, animal, and the differentia, rationality. Taken together, the genus and differentia characterize the essence of the definiendum. What it is to be a human being is just to be a rational animal; that’s the essence of humanity, for Aristotle.
Essential dependence, like essence, is best understood in terms of essential definition. Essential dependence holds when the essence of one thing involves another thing; one thing is part of what it is to be another thing.29 In terms of essential definition, essential dependence holds when one thing is a constituent of an essential definition of another thing.30 Where “Y” and “X” represent things from any ontological category, essential dependence may be formulated as follows:
Essential Dependence: Y essentially depends on X =df. X is a constituent of an essential definition of Y.
For example, smiles essentially depend on mouths. Take Mona Lisa’s smile. Mona Lisa’s smile essentially depends on her mouth. The essence of Mona Lisa’s smile involves her mouth; her mouth is part of what it is to be her smile. In other words, her mouth is a constituent of an essential definition of Mona Lisa’s smile. To be Mona Lisa’s smile is to be her mouth with the corners turned upward. Mona Lisa’s smile, in this way, essentially depends on her mouth.
On an essential dependence model of eternal generation, eternal generation is a form of essential dependence. To say that the Son is begotten of the Father is just to say that the Son essentially depends on the Father. To put it more formally:
Essential Dependence Model: The Son is eternally begotten of the Father =df. The Father is a constituent of an essential definition of the Son, and the Son exists eternally.
According to the essential dependence model, the essence of the Son involves the Father. The Father is part of what the Son is, or what it is to be the Son. An essential definition of the Son will be of the form “To be the Son is to be the divine person who _______ the Father,” where the blank is filled in by some description characterizing the Son’s essence. Note that the Son, like the Father and the Spirit, falls under the genus divine person; once filled in, the blank will help specify the differentia, what differentiates the Son from the other persons.
The best way to fill out the Son’s essential definition is by consulting what God has revealed in Scripture. Of all the descriptions of the Son in the Old and New Testaments, the following verses seem to me to characterize the Son’s essence, or what it is to be the Son:31 “The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation” (Col 1:15); “the Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being” (Heb 1:3); and “Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor 4:4). Without getting into exegetical tangles about whether these verses refer to the eternal Son, these excerpts suggest that to be the Son is to be the divine person who is the image of the Father. The essence of the Son involves being the image of the Father; being the image of the Father is part of what it is to be the Son. In this way, the Father is a constituent of an essential definition of the Son, and so the Son essentially depends on the Father.
For the essential dependence model to succeed, the Father cannot essentially depend on the Son. There must be an essential definition of the Father in which the Son is not a constituent to show that the Father’s essence does not involve the Son. The form of such an essential definition will be “To be the Father is to be the divine person _______,” where the blank is to be filled in by some description characterizing the Father’s essence. Once again we consult Scripture to fill out the essential definition of the Father: “God, for whom and through whom everything exists” (Heb 2:10); “for from him and through him and for him are all things” Rom 11:36); and “yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one LORD, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live” (1 Cor 8:6). Together these verses suggest that to be the Father is to be the divine person on whom all things ultimately depend.32 Alternatively, the Father may be defined as the divine person who is the ultimate source (principium) of all things. However, the term “source” is misleading, suggesting that the Father is the causal source of all things. All things, created or not, ultimately depend on the Father. Creation causally depends on the Father, but not all things depend on the Father causally. Most notably, the Son does not causally depend on the Father, yet the Son still depends on the Father. That is, the Son essentially depends on the Father. To be the Father is to be the divine person on whom all things ultimately depend, causally or otherwise.33
The essential dependence model of eternal generation just outlined easily meets the minimal statement of the doctrine and all four desiderata. Because the Son’s essence involves the Father, it is necessary that the Son depends on the Father for his existence, and essential dependence is compatible with eternal existence (imagine an eternal smile, for instance). Essential dependence can relate things from any ontological category (including persons) and is nondiachronic. The essential dependence relation between the Son and the Father is also asymmetric. On the proposed essential definitions above, the Son’s essence involves the Father, but the Father’s essence does not involve the Son; thus, the Son essentially depends on the Father but not vice versa. An essential dependence model also precludes spurious eternal generation, since necessary existents like the number two are not constituents in any plausible essential definition of the Son.
The essential dependence model likewise withstands the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. Essential dependence has been widely regarded as intelligible for millennia, dating as far back as Aristotle. Examples like Mona Lisa’s smile demonstrate essential dependence’s intelligibility, and nothing prevents essential dependence between the Son and the Father from being similarly intelligible. Moreover, essential dependence is perfectly compatible with necessary existence. Consider again the number two and {2}. Both the number two and {2} exist necessarily, yet {2} essentially depends on the number two. The number two is a constituent in an essential definition of {2}: To be {2} is to be the set that contains the number two as its sole member. Essential dependence is thus entirely consistent with the Son’s necessary existence. Essential dependence also poses no threat to the Son’s aseity. On an essential dependence model, the Son’s existence is not caused by anything else because essential dependence is a noncausal form of dependence. Nor does the Son depend on anything existing “outside” God. The Son admittedly does not possess unqualified independence, but this sweeping conception of aseity lacks motivation. Therefore, an essential dependence model preserves the Son’s aseity.
One likely objection to the essential dependence model is what I call the different essences objection. Some might argue that the essential dependence model entails that the Father and the Son are not homoousious—that is, they do not share the same divine essence. The Father and the Son have different essential definitions, after all, so they must have different divine essences. But on the classical doctrine of the Trinity, there is only one divine essence (ousia). Hence, an essential dependence model contradicts the classical doctrine of the Trinity.34
The problem with the different essences objection is that it conflates two different senses of the term “essence.” Although I have been speaking as if “essence” is univocal, the term can be used to refer to a thing’s individual essence or its general essence. Every individual object is an instance of some kind K. “If X is something of kind K,” Lowe explains, “then we may say that X’s general essence is what it is to be a K, while X’s individual essence is what it is to be the individual of kind K that X is, as opposed to any other individual of that kind.”35 For example, Eli Manning is an instance of the kind human. Eli’s general essence is what it is to be a human, while Eli’s individual essence is what it is to be Eli, as opposed to some other human. The individual-general essence distinction similarly applies to the Son. The Son is an instance of the kind divine. The Son’s general essence is what it is to be a deity or what it is to be a divine person, while the Son’s individual essence is what it is to be the Son, as opposed to some other divine person.
In general, every person has an individual essence, and if two persons are numerically distinct, then they must have different individual essences (what it is to be this person and what it is to be that person). Because the Father and the Son are numerically distinct persons on the classical doctrine of the Trinity, they must have different individual essences. There can be no distinction between the Father and the Son without a difference in their individual essences. The Father’s individual essence is what it is to be the Father, as opposed to the Son or the Spirit, and the Son’s individual essence is what it is to be the Son, as opposed to the Father or the Spirit. Now, on an essential dependence model, the Father and the Son have different essential definitions. But these essential definitions characterize the Father’s and the Son’s individual essences—not their general essence. In fact, the Father and the Son have the same general essence on an essential dependence model. Essential definitions of the Father’s and the Son’s general essence will be identical, both specifying what it is to be a divine person. Thus, the Father and the Son share the same general essence—that is to say, they share the same divine essence. On an essential dependence model, therefore, there are two individual essences (setting aside the Spirit) but only one general or divine essence.
The sole drawback of an essential dependence model of eternal generation is that it may require reconceiving Fatherhood. One might hope that the Father’s essence involves the Son in some way, that the Son is somehow a constituent in an essential definition of the Father. How could the Father be the Father without the Son? Though the Father cannot exist without the Son on an essential dependence model, the Son is still not part of the Father’s essence. The Son cannot be a constituent in an essential definition of the Father if the essential dependence relation between the Son and the Father is to be asymmetric. Instead, an essential dependence model returns to a conception of Fatherhood common in the ancient church: Fatherhood as being the ultimate source (principium) of all things. This alternative conception of Fatherhood has historical precedent and, more importantly, finds support in Scripture, as evidenced by the verses cited earlier.36
CONCLUSION
A viable philosophical model of eternal generation, I have argued, must meet the minimal statement of the doctrine, satisfy all four desiderata, and withstand the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections. My aim here has been to present three such models: a causal model, a grounding model, and an essential dependence model. While each model of eternal generation has its drawbacks, the viability of these models shows that philosophical-theological qualms about the doctrine of eternal generation have been overblown. The doctrine of eternal generation has proven philosophically coherent and perfectly compatible with the Son’s necessary existence and aseity. Critics of eternal generation, I hope, will heed this philosophical “alter call” and embrace the eternally begotten Son.
1. William Hasker admirably defends eternal generation against philosophical-theological objections, but he does not propose a philosophical model of the doctrine. See William Hasker, Metaphysics and the Tri-Personal God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), ch. 26.
2. I defend my own essential dependence model of eternal generation over against causal and grounding models in “God from God: The Essential Dependence Model of Eternal Generation,” in Religious Studies (forthcoming). There, I take a “half-empty” view of causal and grounding models of eternal generation; here, I take a “half-full” view.
3. To prevent the Father from “deifying” the Son, less minimal statements of the doctrine add that the Father “communicates” the divine essence (ousia) to the Son. In contrast, the Father “generates” the personal subsistence (hypostasis) of the Son. See, for example, Hasker, Tri-Personal God, 220; and Keith Johnson, “What Would Augustine Say to Evangelicals Who Reject the Eternal Generation of the Son?,” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 16 (2012), 26.
4. Millard Erickson, Who’s Tampering with the Trinity? An Assessment of the Subordination Debate (Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2009), 251.
5. Ibid., 184.
6. Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears, Doctrine: What Christians Should Believe (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2010), 28.
7. Paul Helm pushes this line of reasoning against Richard Swinburne’s view of eternal generation in Eternal God: A Study of God without Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 280–81. On a related note, William Lane Craig claims that the Son “becomes an effect contingent upon the Father” (Craig, “A Formulation and Defense of the Doctrine of the Trinity,” http://www.reasonablefaith.org/a-formulation-and-defense-of-the-doctrine-of-the-trinity.) He could mean by this that the Son exists only contingently and lacks necessary existence, but more likely he means that the Son’s existence depends on the Father.
8. Keith Yandell, “Review of Metaphysics and the Tri-Personal God,” in Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/48755-metaphysics-and-the-tri-personal-god/, 2014. Emphasis in original.
9. Ibid.
10. William Lane Craig, God Over All: Divine Aseity and the Challenge of Platonism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 1.
11. Craig, “A Formulation and Defense.”
12. This precise problem dooms a modal dependence model of eternal generation. On a modal dependence model, eternal generation is a form of modal existential dependence. To say that the Father eternally begets the Son is just to say that necessarily, the Son exists only if the Father exists, and the Son exists eternally. Modal existential dependence, however, is not asymmetric and cannot preclude spurious eternal generation. I expand on these criticisms in my “God from God” (forthcoming).
13. A potential fifth desiderata, which I discuss later when considering a grounding model of eternal generation, is that a model should account for the difference between generation and procession.
14. One might wonder how eternal generation differs from eternal creation on a casual model. Though the Son and creation are both caused by the Father, the Father causes creation out of nothing (ex nihilo), whereas the Father causes the Son out of himself (ex Patre).
15. Immanuel Kant famously cites a ball resting on a pillow as an example of simultaneous causation in The Critique of Pure Reason. For a defense of simultaneous causation, see Myles Brand, “Simultaneous Causation,” in Time and Cause: Essays Presented to Richard Taylor, ed. Peter van Inwagen (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1980), 137–53.
16. Inst. 1.13.25 and 1.13.19.
17. Craig, God Over All, 81.
18. For helpful introductions to the notion of grounding, see F. Correia and B. Schnieder, “Grounding: An Opinionated Introduction,” in Metaphysical Grounding: Understanding the Structure of Reality, ed. Fabrice Correia and Benjamin Schnieder (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 1–36; and Ricky Bliss and Kelly Trogdon, “Metaphysical Grounding,” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. E. Zalta (Winter 2014 Edition), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2014/entries/grounding/.
19. Craig in his more recent work regrettably refrains from discussing whether he still believes eternal generation robs the Son of aseity. At one point Craig remarks that the divine Persons “exist acceptably a se,” but the context does not explicitly mention eternal generation. The suggestion seems to be that the Son possesses aseity in an acceptable sense because the Son’s existence does not depend on anything existing “outside” God. Hedging with the adverb “acceptably” ostensibly indicates that the Son does not possess aseity in its fullest sense. See Craig, God Over All, 81–82, for the remark in context.
20. Tellingly, Craig (God Over All, 57–58) objects to this picture because it restricts God’s freedom, not because it violates divine aseity.
21. Grounding skeptics include Christopher Daly (“Scepticism about Grounding,” in Correia and Schnieder, Metaphysical Grounding, 81–100), Jessica Wilson (“No Work for a Theory of Ground,” Inquiry 57 [2014], 535–79), and Kathrin Koslicki (“The Coarse-Grainedness of Grounding,” in Oxford Studies in Metaphysics, vol. 9, ed. Karen Bennett and Dean Zimmerman [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015], 9:306–44). For a reply to Daly’s accusation that grounding is unintelligible, see Paul Audi’s “A Clarification and Defense of the Notion of Grounding” in Correia and Schnieder, Metaphysical Grounding, 101–21.
22. Alastair Wilson argues that grounding just is metaphysical causation. See “Metaphysical Causation” in Noûs (2017), doi:10.1111/nous.12190.
23. To be fair, grounding comes in varieties; for an inventory, see Kit Fine, “Guide to Ground,” in Correia and Schneider, Metaphysical Grounding, 37–80. Nevertheless, generation and procession will be instances of the same variety of grounding on the single procession view of eternal procession.
24. For present purposes, I omit many technicalities surrounding an essential dependence model of eternal generation. Those who desire a more philosophically rigorous development of the model should see my “God from God” (forthcoming).
25. I presuppose a definitional account of essence, which elucidates essence using the notion of essential definition. Accounts of essence generally divide into definitional accounts and modal accounts. Following Kit Fine (“Essence and Modality,” in Philosophical Perspectives 8 [1994], 1–16), David Oderberg (Real Essentialism [New York: Routledge. 2007]), and E. J. Lowe (“Two Notions of Being: Entity and Essence,” in Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement 62 [2008]: 23–48; and “The Rationality of Metaphysics,” Synthese, 178 [2011]: 99–109), I reject modal accounts of essence, which analyze essence in terms of de re modality, as deeply flawed.
26. John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, ed. Peter H. Niddich (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979), 3.3.15.
27. Here I follow Lowe, “Two Notions” and “Rationality of Metaphysics.”
28. Example adapted from Kathrin Koslicki (“Varieties of Ontological Dependence” in Correia and Schneider, Metaphysical Grounding, 197–98). For similar characterizations of essential definition, see Kit Fine, “Essence and Modality,” Philosophical Perspectives 8 (1994): 1–16, and “Ontological Dependence,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 95 (1995): 269–90; and David Oderberg, “Essence and Properties,” Erkenntnis 75 (2011): 85–111.
29. For an opinionated introduction to essential dependence, see Kathrin Koslicki’s “Ontological Dependence: An Opinionated Survey,” in Varieties of Dependence: Ontological Dependence, Grounding, Supervenience, Response-Dependence, ed. Miguel Hoeltje, Benjamin Schnieder, and Alex Steinberg (Munich: Philosophia, 2013), 31–64.
30. I use the indefinite article “an” so as to leave open the possibility that a thing may have multiple equally accurate essential definitions.
31. All translations are taken from the NIV. Emphasis added.
32. The quantifier “all” is restricted only to exclude the Father so that the Father doesn’t essentially depend on himself.
33. One might think that the Father should be defined as the divine person who eternally generates the Son. This essential definition of the Father implies that the Father essentially depends on the Son, making the relation between the Father and the Son symmetrical. But this essential definition of the Father is not at all satisfactory. It presupposes the very relation (namely, eternal generation) that an essential dependence model seeks to illuminate and does nothing to answer the unintelligibility and subordinationism objections.
34. The different essences objection is raised against eternal functional/role subordinationism by Erickson, Tampering, 172; Keith Yandell, “How Many Times Does Three Go Into One?” in Philosophical and Theological Essays on the Trinity, ed. Tom McCall and Murray Rae (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 159–60; and Tom McCall, Which Trinity? Whose Monotheism? Philosophical and Systematic Theologians on the Metaphysics of Trinitarian Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 179–80.
35. Lowe, “Two Notions,” 35. Emphasis in original.
36. It’s worth noting that an essential dependence model has the virtue of illuminating Calvin’s claim that the Son possesses aseity with respect to the divine essence, but not with respect to his person. Additional virtues include the model’s natural extension to the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit and its account of the difference between generation and procession. I laud these virtues of an essential dependence model and more in my “God from God.”