Essay by EssaySwap ContributorCollege, Undergraduate February 2008

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Timeless or Not? To consider a view that God is timeless or not timeless, we must first understand the concepts and attributes of God. What are the concepts of divine immutability, omniscient, and timelessness? How do these concepts relate to the view of God? How do the views of God relate to the views of time? One concept of God is God is omniscient and omnipotent. This is to say that God is the maximally perfect being, all knowing and all powerful. There are no limits to God's wisdom and power. Another concept of God is God is immutable. Simply means that God cannot undergo any change. All of God's properties are unchanging. God's wisdom and power are immutable. These concepts relate to the last concept, timelessness. This concept says that God, like an abstract object such as numbers, does not have a temporal location. Meaning God is not in time itself.

God exists outside of time. So to be timeless is not being affected by time therefore not changing, being immutable and omniscient. However, these concepts of God bring up controversies that are "philosophically problematic." One such argument is that if God is timeless and immutable then God cannot possess human traits or characteristics such as experiencing emotions. God can't feel pain. Yet many religions depict God with emotion such as love and sorrow. God experiencing emotion would be incompatible with God as timeless and immutable. Then again shouldn't God know what pain or love feels like since God is omniscience.

The two major views of God are being timeless or not being timeless. Still the view of God as either is still not consistent. One major problem is that if God is timeless, exists out of time, then God cannot know temporal events because they exist only in...