Quitting the Quintilemma: Eternal Security and Warnings of Falling Away: A Response to William Lane Craig

In a previous post (HERE), I presented an argument against the doctrine of eternal security in which I argued that, in order to avoid antinomianism while maintaining eternal security, a proponent of the doctrine of eternal security has four possible moves, none of which is ultimately acceptable: (i) Antinomianism; (ii) No true Christian (i.e., no person in the state of justification) has ever committed the sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8; (iii) Antinomianism minus apostacy; (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings. This set up a quintilemma in which it was concluded that the doctrine of eternal security is false. Focusing on (iv), if the doctrine of eternal security is true, then it would seem that Scripture contains pointless warnings. For if a Christian cannot lose his salvation, then warnings about Christians losing their salvation are pointless.

In this post, I want to consider a possible reply to this that would allow a proponent of eternal security to escape the conclusion of the quintilemma. This reply has been defended by the Protestant philosopher and theologian William Lane Craig in his article "'Lest Anyone Should Fall': A Middle Knowledge Perspective on Perseverance and Apostolic Warnings," which can be accessed for free HERE. Craig's aim is to develop an account of eternal security that uses Molinist principles (especially the doctrine of middle knowledge) and that affirms the possibility of losing salvation (hence rendering the warnings of Scripture not pointless) while still maintaining that no true Christian will in fact lose his salvation (thus maintaining a version of eternal security).

In developing this account of eternal security, Craig recognizes the difficulty posed to eternal security by the various scriptural warnings about falling away: "Apostolic warnings against apostasy pose a difficulty for the classic doctrine of perseverance of the saints because either the warnings seem superfluous or else it seems possible for the believer to fall away after all." Craig's chief contention in the article is that "the warnings themselves are the means by which God preserves the elect." As Craig continues, quoting the theologian Louis Berkhof:

There are warnings against apostasy which would seem to be quite uncalled for, if the believer could not fall away away [sic] .... But these warnings regard the whole matter from the side of man and are seriously meant. They prompt self-examination, and are instrumental in keeping believers in the way of perseverance. They do not prove that any of the addressed will apostasize, but simply that the use of means is necessary to prevent them from committing this sin.

Something noteworthy so far that the reader may have noticed is that there seems to be an implicit assumption that the only thing that could cost a Christian his salvation even in principle is the sin of apostacy, i.e., the complete renouncement of the Faith. Indeed, Craig seems to insinuate this in the following characterization of his thesis: "By warning believers against apostasy, God ensures that they do not commit apostasy" (emphasis added). The focus, therefore, is exclusively on apostacy. As discussed in my aforementioned previous post on this issue, this is one of the four moves that I identified that the proponent of eternal security can make in order to avoid antinomianism while maintaining eternal security. In said post, I argued that this is an untenable position. It is also a position that is explicitly condemned by the Council of Trent:

If anyone shall say, that there is no deadly sin but that of infidelity [i.e., apostacy]; or, that grace once received is not lost by any other sin, however grievous and enormous, save only by that of infidelity; let him be anathema (On Justification, Canon XXVII).

It is interesting, in this regard, that in the list of verses that Craig cites as indicating that a Christian can forfeit his salvation (Rom. 11.17-24; I Cor. 9.27; Gal. 5.4; Col. 1.23; I Thess. 3.5; I Tim. 1.19-20; II Tim. 2.17-18; Jas. 5.19-20; II Pet. 2.20-22; I Jn. 5.16), he conspicuously leaves out those which explicitly speak of mortal sins other than apostacy such as, e.g., 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8, the second of which is an explicit warning from St. Paul that is directed towards Christians: "I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God" (v. 21). As we will see, these verses will prove to be Craig's undoing. I should say that, in what follows, my objection to Craig's position is not philosophical but theological. Philosophically, Craig's position is internally coherent and plausible, at least if the doctrine of middle knowledge is internally coherent and plausible. My objection is that Craig's position with its underlying assumptions is not compatible with the teaching of Sacred Scripture in conjunction with common experience. As will be shown, Craig's construal of eternal security ultimately finds itself trapped in the same set of four moves that the Calvinist construal of eternal security is trapped in.

A quick, high level summary of Craig's model of perseverance is as follows: God, by His middle knowledge, prior to the act of creation, knew whether a given person who was given grace would in fact persevere in grace in any given set of circumstances that said person might be placed in. On Craig's construal of eternal security, in the actual world, all who have received grace will persevere in grace, and this is brought about at least in part by the scriptural warnings of falling away. God, by His middle knowledge, knew that if He were to actualize this world, then all who would receive grace and the warnings of falling away from it would (freely) persevere in grace. Hence, in actualizing this world, God thereby secured the perseverance of the saints while also respecting human free will. On this model of eternal security, those who have received grace could fall away, but they in fact won't, and the scriptural warnings serve as a means to making this happen.

The problem with this model is that, while philosophically it reconciles libertarian free will with eternal security (an advantage over the Calvinist model), it is plagued by the same theological problems that the Calvinist model of eternal security is. For we've seen that Craig seems to think that only the sin of apostacy could cause a Christian to forfeit his salvation. So, for Craig, as long as apostacy doesn't happen, a Christian will not lose his salvation. This is essentially to adopt position (iii) Antinomianism minus apostacy. This would mean that a Christian could commit mass murder, never repent, and still be guaranteed to go to Heaven, an extremely implausible position to hold. It is furthermore incompatible with the teaching of Scripture that grave sins such as murder exclude (even Christians) from the Kingdom of God (cf. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, Revelation 21:8). The consequence of this is that Craig's position renders these warnings pointless, even if it can account for the warnings specifically about apostacy. Thus, Craig seems to be backed into (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings.

In order to avoid this, Craig could try to extend his model to cover these warnings as well: Using His middle knowledge, God uses these warnings as a means of preventing Christians from committing these sins, thereby always preserving them in a state of grace. The trouble with this is that this would imply that no true Christian ever has committed or ever will commit the various sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8. Thus, if Craig makes this move, he is then committed to (ii) No true Christian (i.e., no person in the state of justification) has ever committed the sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8, which, as we've seen in my previous post on this issue, is very implausible. Surely some true Christians have committed or will commit at least some of these sins.

From here, Craig's options seem to be to either move to (i) Antinomianism or (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings. Craig, of course, rejects (iv). His entire project, after all, is to maintain eternal security while avoiding rendering the warnings of Scripture pointless. And antinomianism, as was shown in the previous post, is plainly false. Ultimately, the only tenable move to make is to reject eternal security, whether its Calvinist construal or Craig's Molinist construal. Craig's articulation of the doctrine of eternal security, therefore, cannot escape the quintilemma:

1. Either (i) Antinomianism, (ii) No true Christian (i.e., no person in the state of justification) has ever committed the sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8, (iii) Antinomianism minus apostacy, (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings, or the doctrine of eternal security is false.
2. (i), (ii), (iii), and (iv) are false.
3. Therefore, the doctrine of eternal security is false.