Doubting Thomists | Doug Wilson and Dr. James White 

Fun fact: James White got all the way to Moscow before realizing he’d forgotten his sweater vest, because of gas prices he biked to Phoenix and back and still made it in time to sit down with Doug.

Sweater vest days are the best days. Praise the Lord for you both, James and Doug.

James White "How far can we go past the headlights of scripture"? Exactly!

I would have lost my mind if not for these two. Thank you for your courage and God bless.

It's fun to see Doug listening and looking like he's actually learning from someone else.

As a Catholic, and obviously a Thomas Aquinas reader, its interesting seeing the protestants perspective of him. Good convo

I tried so hard to follow this conversation, and now my head hurts.

Really enjoy listening to these guys discuss topics that I am ill-equipped to follow along with. I guess I can sigh while being edified.

We can venture out pretty far in trying to understand these things but overall, God has given us a Word which has to be relatable to humanity.

I studied under Dr. James Dolezal at University and would be quite interested to hear a dialogue between him and Dr. White. I couldn’t help but think of Dr. Dolezal the entire time I listened to this.

Time-stamp 15:05 - 15:25, 15:40 - ad intra 15:50 - acting in harmony 16:23 - no giving of love? 16:58 - letting the scripture speak 19:30 - feminism and submission 20:00 - authority and submission within the Godhead 20:25 - ad intra 21:02 - Wilson’s summary: “And so for us, submission does not equal inequality.” 25:03 - Wilson’s view on labels and “subordination”: subordination is a heresy, so don’t go by that. 22:10 - James White: Does Jesus receive His deity from the Father, second-hand? 23:20 - John 10:30 28:10 - James White on Nicaea, Chalcedon, and creeds 32:00 - White on his book 33:22 - Paul expanding on the Shema of Deuteronomy 6:4 in 1 Corinthians 8:6 34:06 - Wilson’s take on skepticism

Two brilliant theologians talking shop, who can’t get enough of this. This is gold Jerry

I am 8 minutes in and there is still not a definition of what Thomism even means. While I am familiar with many theological terms and therefore don't want to be treated like I'm completely ignorant, is it not fair to say that this is not a commonly used term? A quick, basic definition would set the foundation so people could then follow the discussion better.

This conversation is heady and I like it quite a bit. However, Doug's reaction @16:49 perfectly exemplifies me trying to follow along the first time through this lol

This is why you guys should Join us in the Orthodox Church. We don’t have to deal with this blatant contradiction. You have to jump through hoops justifying why you reject Rome, but USE the theology of the Saint that massively shaped the very reason the reformers left Rome, for your own theology.

Great discussion I just wish that you had provided specific talking points from thomists because now I’m curious if I’ve been hearing this

In reference to the attributes of God, I once had a Pentecostal minister make the statement that in the beginning God was not sovereign as there was nothing to be sovereign over. To which I reasoned, you can't make an attribute of God dependant on the external Creation; Sovereignty is a part of who He is. It was as though we can't have God sovereign within himself apart from Creation. He might start deciding things for Man before He creates him & that would endanger Free Will. Needless to say I was never again invited to tag along with my Pastor to a "School of Ministry" conference.

Too complicated for me.... but what made sense was "talk like the Bible talks" ... and "don't go beyond the headlights of Scripture".

In the first 4 minutes I’ve detected at least 5 misrepresentations.

"They're now being presented as absolutely necessary for theological orthodoxy" said the guys who believe wholeheartedly that their particular (pun intended) systematic theology is absolutely necessary for theological orthodoxy.

This was helpful, now sit down with some Evangelical Thomists and have a similar type of discussion!

Aquinas was not himself working "beyond himself." He was working within a very rich Western (and Eastern) tradition. He authentically quoted far more Scripture and theologians than Dr. White. ever does. By the way, instead of just telling us what Thomists think, bring in Edward Feser and let him respond to White.

Sweater Vest Dialogues 4Life! We need more of this. And in person.....Love you guys!

Would love to see a conversation between Paster Doug and Bishop Baron, just a little dialoge between protastants and catholics

This shows that there has been a Van.Tilian captivity of the Reformed churches

I like this version of Dr white ! Asking important questions ov the other side and also allowing for explanation. Maybe Dolezal and Barcellos would be willing to dialogue with him ? This would be very educational for us .

I feel like God is allowing us to learn, love, and Glorify HIM but like they said 12:53 - 13:45 sums it up well. Great discussion. In agreeance like to stick to scripture. Only a one TRUE GOD can be so incomprehensible.

Two men befuddled by the fact that many Christians are favoring Thomas interpretation of scripture over theirs

Need to start out defining terms, to help those who are not 4th year doctor of divinity candidates...

we need a debate/discussion between James white and James Dolezal

Humbling conversation. Brings light on the limits of our feeble attempt to know everything there is to know about God.

We only know of God what He has revealed of Himself to us. To look for more than what He has revealed is to not be satisfied with what He has seen fit to reveal of Himself as if He doesn’t know what we need to know. That is pride and we know where that leads. Enjoyed this discussion!!

The question is pretty simple : What is the background of the NT writers, the Law and the Prophets or the greek philosophers?

I have watched a metric ton of both of these men's material, but I have never noticed that scar on Dr. White's lip. Does anyone know when that happened, and what caused it? Thanks

None of the divine attributes are in conflict with each other or contradictory. This is a very different kind of categorical distinction than saying all of those attributes are the same thing.

"The Two Powers of Heaven" by Alan F Segal (Dan 7, Ancient of Days and Son of Man, being the two powers) is an indirect investigation into the prototypical trinity (binity) that emerged in the Intertestamental period. But the doctrine was declared heretical in the second century AD because the Son of Man looked too much like Jesus. The Christians rounded out the Trinity by including the Holy Spirit to the already existing Two Powers doctrine following Pentecost and the highly visible activity of the Holy Spirit. The Trinity was not a radical new invention, as some assert, but a natural development of increased understanding of the Godhead.

Great discussion guys! What are you guys say carries a lot of weight with me because you’re both Churchman and scholars! I don’t understand why evangelicalism has to go crazy either with Wokeness or with this hyper-Thomism

Maybe this misunderstands the distinction between nature and attributes? God is not comprised of parts in the manner in which a person is comprised of parts but rather exists as pure Being. When we speak of nature, or essence, we speak of the metaphysics of God's being. To say we can recognize attributes of that multi-faceted yet indivisible Being, does not negate that He is in fact pure being and has no parts. The 1689 seems to articulate this as well in their section on God and the doctrine of the Trinity. These are not mutually exclusive concepts. Much love and respect for pastor doug and doctor white.

Where can I locate the ligioner article James mentioned he wrote on the divine simplicity?

I don't have no problem with Aquinas as long as not go against the basic tenets of faith revealed in the Scriptures. He is part of what I call the " great three A's of apology": Athanasius, Agustine and Aquinas.

Francis Schaffer would have responded with the Capadocian fathers on this as towards the end of his life was very much studying the eastern fathers. The answer for these distinctions in God is the monarchia of the father and the Essence Vs. Energies distinction. Good convo!

Enjoyed the talk. The fundamental error here is the, well, presupposition that one's interpretation of or derivation from Scripture is "what Scripture teaches." For example, White says that his claims about God's simplicity are the express teachings of Scripture, but that just isn't the case. The claims he made about God's simplicity are found nowhere in the Bible. They are man's attempts to make sense of reconcile the various claim in Scripture (and that we observe and experience). There really isn't any escaping this, but White reads these back into Scripture and says they are "there," when he is just engaging in a rather sophisticated eisegesis. He then pretends that his own eisegesis isn't eisegesis, but everyone else's is, and so everyone else (and in this case, Aquinas) is wrong and only White and those of his persuasion have "it" right. It is a bit delusional. He then performed some kind of bizarre conflation of Anselm's Ontological argument with Aquinas' position. The whole discussion became increasingly surreal as the talk unfolded. This confusing of one's ideas with Word of God, and of thinking I understand things when I do not, are among the great dangers of apologetics.

Excellent discussion. Doug, you addressed the main issue in the current debate when you said, "Thomas is not my interpreter." Amen.

One thing is needed , Marry🎉 closed the good Part and will not be taken away from her . JUST LOOK AT JESUS , SPEND TIME Daily IN THE SECRET PLACE OF HIS PRESENCE . ONE THING IS NEEDED ❤

been watching Dr. White for years... has he always had that scar on his lip or is this just the highest quality footage ever, catching all the details?

Helpful conversation, but in all of my reading of Aquinas I never got the impression that he was attempting to baptize Aristotle. IOW, It seems to me that Aquinas, following Anselm, who was following Augustine, believed that his doctrine was the product of the Bible not Aristotle.

It’s unclear to me why you would quote Augustine favorably in terms of the Father loving the Son and then in the next breath criticize inseparable operations, a doctrine Augustine defines and defends in De Trinitate, as though it were a Thomistic invention.

40:20 Doug Wilson was so quick to it and gave me a very good laugh.

I was the 666th person to like this video. Good thing I’m postmil, otherwise I’d be freaking out 🤣

I am a Protestant and I thank you for this dialogue. However, it seems to me that you teach Subordintionism? The only distinction in the Trinity is the role in which the Persons relate to each other. That is why you need the filioque (otherwise there would be two sons of god which cannot be).

Seems to me that this conversation suffers from the same failure to understand (or take seriously) Thomas’s biblical theological scholastic method, which people like Van Til and Schaeffer also didn’t understand. Aquinas did build on Aristotle‘s natural theology, but in the light of divine revelation. These types claim for scripture an alternative metaphysics of its own, but when pressed can never really show us clearly in the text where it lies. The reason for that is none of the sacred writers, though inspired, wrote metaphysics. There are obvious metaphysical implications of their writing, but there is no formed metaphysical doctrine in sacred scripture that can be lined up against Aristotelian-Thomism and used to critique it. It’s analogous to when some evangelicals claim a scientific picture of nature in the Bible and then use that to critique contemporary experimental science. The methodological problem at root is that the biblical writers wrote essentially historically, and experientially, leaving to the church the task of doing the science of metaphysics (or natural science) in light of it - as opposed to seeing them as competitors. The protestant principle of sola scriptura leads to a constantly competitive approach, as opposed to the faith-seeking-understanding approach in St. Thomas and other non-reformed scholastics.

Would it be appropriate to view Aquinas and his influence in the same way that we would see bishop Athanasius in his day ? It took a good while for the church to formulate its doctrine on the trinity even though it was taken for granted buy the church from its inception. I’m not on either side at the moment and I found Dr whites book on the trinity to be my number one resource when answering others for a more clear presentation of the trinity . This topic has come up in my 1689 circles and men that I love to learn from are leaning in the direction of Aquinas , but not for all that he would go on to teach .

The only way to make sense of Gods attributes is with the energy essence distinction.

Great advice about not being Pardison when it comes to being Thomist. I love these guys, but do we make the same mistake with Calvin?

Sweater vests for life!

This is a giant exercise in determining that Canon Press has a way better camera than Alpha and Omega Ministries. Yes, the video is better. Yes James White got into a fight with a group of lions. It was only because he was limited to 2 fingers to poke out their eyes and no weapons that one of them happened to catch his lip.

Richard Swinburne provides a very clarifying perspective on the Godhead in his book “Was Jesus God”, I really appreciated his understanding and explanation of this topic.

Why in the world did James White think that THAT particular shape of beard looks good on him?

Two great men of God

Once you talk about revelation when the Word of God is silent, it's just speculation.

I guess I don't understand what this video is even about. I do hear embrace of the EFS, which as taught by Owens Strachans father in law and embraced by him is heresy. I've heard Jeff iirc dismiss Stephen Wolfe for being a "Thomist", I still don't get what the issue is. Even in Joel Beeke systematic theology Thomas is referenced a bunch in the first chapter in systematic theology alone.

Oh that was the best ending to any of these dialogs!

James refers to Calvin, does anyone know where that is found, I read the chapter in the institutes about the Trinity, but doesn't sound like what James is talking about.

I love Doug Wilson. I like James White. I listen to them both frequently. Brilliant men. But listening to them discuss simplicity, ad intra distinctions in God, subsistent relations, and inseparable operations… is like listening to Chesterton talking about Calvinism. Almost insufferable. Simplicity isn’t really that difficult. There are no ad intra distinctions WITHIN GOD… i.e. things we can separate from just God’s undivided essence (i.e. parts). Whenever we see something IN THE WORLD like God’s wrath, love, justice, mercy, goodness, jealously… all of those simply predicate 1 THING (i.e. God). They do not predicate things (i.e. parts) IN GOD… they simply predicate God. The trinity does not refer to three THINGS (i.e. parts) that can be distinguished from one another as separate “things”. It refers to 3 subsistent relations within God that are predicated on ONE THING (i.e. God). God the Father, who is knowledge and love, knows himself perfectly from all eternity and this self knowledge is the begotten Son… the WORD… and eternally acts in love towards Himself as the Spirit. The trinity describes how God relates to Himself, in perfect knowledge and love. Each of these relations, knowledge and love, are founded on the one BEING of God and each are distinctly and fully God. Which leads us to inseparable operations. The act of any of the three persons of the trinity is simply the act of the ONE GOD making his BEING… KNOWN in the world (by Christ) through the act of love toward the world (by the Spirit). We can distinguish various acts of Father, Son, and Spirit… but each are in fact the ONE GOD acting (i.e. Father making himself known through the Son by the Spirit). All of this can be derived from Scripture. None of it is “extra-Biblical”, except to the extent that the Bible must itself be understood by reason, according to truth, in the Spirit.

I greatly enjoy theological discussions, but you Gentlemen are next level. I mean, you're so up there; whereas, I... let's just say I get lost a lot, but when I don't, it means I get it 😆 Always looking forward to the Sweater Vest Dialogues, my good Gentlemen!!

Lots I want to say, but I'll leave it at this: I sometimes wonder if guys holding views like the Thomists truly Or at least consistentl regard Scripture as divinely inspired LETTERS (they aren't all letters but you get my point) to people. If you start with that understanding, you will not feel so comfortable to turn every little verse into a proposition that needs to be carried to its ultimate logical conclusion. We don't do that with regular letters we send or receive. The Spirit does at some richness to the Bible that can only be discovered through tough studying, but that's not the same as forcing everything to fit an unscriptural(?) paradigm.

I really wish y’all would define Thomism before you spend an hour talking about it

Scary with the quote that the persons do not love one another. That is what they do. If they were to stop (which is impossible) they would no longer have anything. It is a mutual giving of everything, in eternity. Love is giving, freely, everything, all one is, a constant emptying. We humans are incapable of that on our own. Only by faith do we participate that divine love. I personally think that creation is the eternal overflowing of that love between the persons. They all let go constantly and give, and the process itself amplifies (in temporal existence) the love itself into more of it. Of course in eternity, it's hard to talk of any amplifying, it all just is, eternally. The end product is both the beginning, and the journey. I think temporality itself is our experience of the unfolding of that love, though in eternity, it not temporal of course, it just is what it is. God, it's hard to know how to talk of this. In one sense, the whole point of it all, from God's side, is to make us aware of the eternal, on the other hand it seems impossible to do it through regular language. Seems like poetry is better suited to the task.

Always love seeing you two together!!

@12:54 Not only is attempting the answer this question in vain because of the limitations of man and the lack of this answer in scripture, but God wasn’t thinking anything 10 minutes before the world was created because the concept of time was not brought into fruition, And God is not subject to time, let alone anything that he hadn’t already created yet or if he had created anything that you would be subject to it at all.

God having many individual parts [attributes or powers] could come from or lead to myths about heroes gaining powers and becoming gods.

I think one question here is, within a biblical standpoint (assuming presuppositionalism), what sort of philosophical tools are most consistent with Romans 1, and to what extent do we allow proofs from natural revelation to shape our theology. For example, if one could use change/contingency in creation to show that God is the uncaused cause of the world, should we use such a proof? Is that good philosophy according to the Bible? Put another way, is it helpful to have a philosophical proof from a contingent world that proves strict monotheism? If the cost of such a proof was commitment to an unchanging monad in whom there was no potency, would that simply be a speculation or would it materially conflict with the Bible’s teaching about God? Follow up thought: Van Til seems to have objected to Thomism’s view of the proofs of God’s existence because they result in a world that is correlative with God (i.e. co-eternal). But Van Til also affirms that there is no change in God (even in his will?) at creation. It’s difficult to see how he could reconcile his criticism of Thomism with an affirmation of God as pure act. Any ideas? John Frame, in his book the doctrine of God, seems to agree with Van Til’s criticism of Thomas, and wants to allow for contingent acts in God’s will to preserve the doctrine of a free act of creation. But he seems to give up absolute immutability in the Thomist sense to do it. Is that a nod toward the Bible or the sacrifice of the traditional view of God as absolutely immutable?

Scholastic Answers deboonked you guys on this

Listening to this video can only lead one to conclude that the foundation of The Faith is the Bible and Tradition. To be rich in history is to be Catholic brothers.

Why don't james white have a dialogue with Dolezal?

Thank you!

What happened to James White's lip?

Now, would you also take information from other writers like, C.S. Lewis, who leaned upon Aristotle and Aquinas? And whose best friend was Roman Catholic, that person being Tolkien...?

How exactly are they harmonious without being “parts”. How are these attributes separate without being divided? They are separate ad extra, just like you almost said before you corrected yourself.

Love this!!

Question: "Does Thomism or Classical theism have an exclusive claim on Christian orthodoxy?" Answer: No, Thomas Aquinas never made an exclusive claim on Christian orthodoxy by insisting that God was the author of the Summa Theologica and that should it should be memorized before reading the Bible. However, John Calvin twice did make such an exclusive claim on Christian orthodoxy by stating (A) that the Institutes of the Christian Religion were actually authored by God, and then (B) exhorted its readers to memorize it before reading the Bible so that (C) the reading of the latter might then become "profitable": 1. When presenting the Institutes of the Christian Religion to the French monarch, John Calvin wrote: "But our doctrine must stand sublime above all the glory of the world, and invincible by all its power, because IT [the Institutes] IS NOT OURS, BUT THAT OF THE LIVING GOD and his Anointed, whom the Father has appointed King ..." from the PREFATORY ADDRESS TO HIS MOST CHRISTIAN MAJESTY, THE MOST MIGHTY AND ILLUSTRIOUS MONARCH, FRANCIS, KING OF THE FRENCH (Henry Beveridge, Esq. English translation, Page 10, Paragraph 2) 2. In the Preface To The Reader, SUBJECT OF THE PRESENT WORK, [prefixed to the french edition, published at Geneva in 1545.], John Calvin wrote: "And since we are bound to acknowledge that all truth and sound doctrine proceed from God, I will venture BOLDLY TO DECLARE what I think of this work [the Institutes], ACKNOWLEDGING IT TO BE GOD'S WORK RATHER THAN MINE ... (Ibid, Page 22, Paragraph 6) 3. Regarding the order by which the Institutes and the Bible should be read, John Calvin wrote: "My opinion of the work then is this: I exhort all, who reverence the word of the Lord, TO READ IT [the Institutes], AND DILIGENTLY IMPRINT IT ON THEIR MEMORY, if they would, IN THE FIRST PLACE, have a summary of Christian doctrine, and, IN THE SECOND PLACE, an introduction to the PROFITABLE reading both of the Old and New Testament." (Ibid, Page 22, Paragraph 6)

Will there be a part 2?

Can you do a video on the world society church of God? Asking for a friend.....

I love all that Apologia Church has done for me as an agnostic calling me back to the Christian faith. Ive been to theyre church many times in Mesa, Arizona. Their service is great & they have a lot of little ones in attendance thats always made me smile so cute. Ive recently converted over to Catholicism, ive done this miraculous thing that just sounds so simplistic but when implementing it into practice is difficult. Listening to someone genuinely like I may perhaps be wrong & if not better for me to rationalize my position. Regardless if they align with me, or whether they have a neutral or opposing alignment, ive learned a lot about protestant-catholic lies & propaganda & to be fair vise versa with catholic-protestant lies & propaganda.

What an educational discussion! Thank you.

Thanks Brothers Doug and James.

“Claim Jumping” Theological Orthodoxy, Great Historic Creeds, Orthodox Trinitarian theology, received Orthodox understanding, camp of the Orthodox all in the first 3 minutes. If you are referring to classical Calvinist thinking say that but it sounds more like what I’ve heard an awful lot lately that Reformed thinkers are reaching back to ancient Church History and the wisdom of the Church Fathers to assign credibility to Protestantism. Doing so is a step in right direction but is precisely “claim jumping”. It’s also always correct and valid when confronting Catholicism, but, that is a double edge sword in the predicament of Protestantism. Believing the Church Fathers were infallibly inspired by the Holy Spirit when they created the Bible but completely absent similar or any such inspiration in any other aspect of their respective ministries is nonsense. Orthodoxy is Orthodox because of the fundamental organizational principle of Christ Church established by James and the Apostles in first century Jerusalem, enduring consensus. The Only Church that has maintained fidelity to that principle is the One, Holy, Catholic (not Roman) and Apostolic Church, the Orthodox Churches. Orthodoxy wasn’t rediscovered by 16th revelation because it never went away. claiming authority by harkening back to this element or that while completely disregarding the totality of it to argue the correctness or incorrectness of any subsequent revelation or tradition is missing the point because your all swimming in the same stagnant pool just as you do when invoking a singular passage from scripture to say see my belief is correct while ignoring the sum total of Scripture in its completeness in history and in full context from not just a literary perspective but also a cultural one. This allows your opponents to likewise cherry pick verses to prove their point and that has led to 30,000+ Christian denominations and still counting, the greatest tragedy to Christendom ever, thank you Pope Leo the IX. True understanding of Scripture only comes from the men who created it and those men are now referred to as Orthodox and their Church, Christs Church is inarguably the Orthodox Church. Is the Orthodox Church perfect? Of course not. Is it the only Churxh in which one finds salvation? Salvation is Gods gift through his incarnate son to everyone who choose to seek. Is it’s road map on the search for salvation more correct than any other fashioned from 16th century revelation or from the notions of any one Pope or emperor? Yes obviously, because it has as has always been the case that Truth is distinguished from heresy through the enduring voices of the many and is evidence of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit throughout the ages.

36:12 - But Calvin? :) Good talk, this is very typical of people and Paul addresses this in scripture, does he not? 1 Corinthians 3

Scared to see where their theological offspring go

Help me out here because I want to know better. The Father- 100 percent God Jesus- 100 percent God Holy Spirit- 100 percent God But if you remove any of the persons of the Godhead He is no longer the same God correct?

Didn't Thomas say all he had written was chaff?

Fueling the alligator rhythm

Doug's laugh 😂😂

How much of this is a difference in ontology being the fundamental starting point vs epistemology being the fundamental starting point?

I don’t know what to think about this. Thomas did much more to define and break down the attribute of God but this go back to Anselm and Augustine and neoplasticism. Augustine had a philosophical construct of “who” God is before he ever read a word of scripture. You don’t get Augustine, Luther, Calvin ect.. Outside of a classic theist framework. The idea that God’s Foreknowledge = Decree and the impossibility of creatures with free wills comes from the idea of Divine simplicity and Divine immutability. Dr. White saying “we are going outside the light of scripture” is essentially saying “we are fine with classical theism until it proves itself inconsistent with scripture”. That way of thinking calls your entire hermeneutic into question. At least it should.

Great conversation, a follow up would be: whats the earliest Christian theologian/father/figure whose position on all the big topics (salvation, etc) you agree with more or less fully? Doug and James would be forced to point to someone in the 1800s and not a millisecond earlier. I guess everyone before then, Aquinas included, got it wrong Makes you really think.

Maimonides used Aristotle to prove Judaism, Averroës used Aristotle to prove Islam, and Aquinas used Aristotle to prove Christianity. The problem is Aristotle's law of non-contradiction.

We need a dialogue between James White and James Lindsay. Maybe add John MacArthurand Michael Horton

this conversation demonstrates how ridiculous are the predicates that flow from the application of platonic categories to the bible. you're trying to describe the monad and then despairing at how futile it is. when it fails you revert to biblical language, round and round

We are created in the image of God. What does that mean if God is a spirit one day, a person with flesh and bone walking on Earth the next, and after He ascended (what did he do with his body anyway?) He sent the comforter. Also, who was He talking to upon the cross? The idea of the Trinity makes no sense to me. It makes more sense that They are three separate and distinct beings, with a unique and single purpose, like a husband and wife with their single purpose.