picks out a situation. But how can Smith freely choose to sin if, as (B) maintains, that
very situation depends on God for its being the case? And if it does depend on God, does
that not make God an accomplice in Smith's sin?
Related questions beset the aseity assumptions, although perhaps not (C) so much as (D)
and (E). How, for example, can God be essentially omniscient without depending on the
possession of some sort of faculty for acquiring and retaining knowledge? At the core of
theistic belief lies the tenet that God is a creator. How does this tenet comport with theses
(D) and (E)? Many theists, from Plato
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on, have insisted that it is God's nature to be a creator. But if God must be a creator then
there must be creatures, and so it would seem to follow, contrary to (D), that God
depends on the existence of creatures for his being what he is. Moreover, if it is God's
nature to create, it would seem to follow that God cannot refrain from creating
something, and thus that God is not, as (E) maintains, perfectly free.
I shall discuss the issues raised in the previous two paragraphs. I do not, however, intend
to remain above the fray. I shall argue for the tenability of a set of positions that many
contemporary philosophical theologians regard as undercutting God's personal nature. As
might be expected, I shall argue that that regard is unwarranted.
Divine Sovereignty
Parsimonious philosophers will suspect that (A) and (B) are one thesis too many. Some
might contend that every situation is, after all, some kind of thing; thus, that thesis (B)
collapses into a generously interpreted thesis (A). Others, on the contrary, might argue
that a proper ontology would dispense with things as basic, construing them as complexes
constructed out of situations, thereby relegating (A) to the status of corollary of (B). I do
not propose to take a stand on the issue of thing- versus fact-ontologies. I shall treat (A)
and (B) as relatively independent theses, commenting, however, on their interconnections
as we proceed.
Creation
If asked to articulate the sense in which things depend on God for their existence, theists
are apt to respond that God created things. Construed in this way, dependence as being
created is a causal notion. Opinions begin to diverge as we press for details.
For all their impressive complexity, artistic creation and biological procreation simply
involve, in different ways, the reworking of matter already on hand. If one thinks of
God's creative role along these lines, one may arrive at a picture of creation like the one
put forward by Timaeus (Plato 1997, 1234–36): the universe is the ultimate artifact, the
handiwork of an enormously powerful and benevolent craftsman. If we find reason to
complain about the imperfections we find in the
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