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Order of Contents
Articles 12+
Book 1
Quotes 3
Historical 3
Latin 8
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Articles
1200’s
Aquinas, Thomas – Question 9, ‘Of the Immutability of God’ in Summa, pt. 1
art. 1, ‘Whether God is altogether immutable? [Yes]’
art. 2, ‘Whether to be immutable belongs to God alone? [Yes]’
Scotus, John Duns – bk. 1, God & Trinity, dist. 4-10, 8th Distinction, pt. 2, On the Immutability of God, pp. 116-132 in The Ordinatio, tr. Peter L.P. Simpson Latin
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1500’s
Musculus, Wolfgang – ‘That the goodness of God is immutable and everlasting’ in Common Places of the Christian Religion (1560; London, 1563), ‘God’, ‘Goodness of God’, fol. 400.b See also this AI translation.
Beza, Theodore – 4. God is Immutable in A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1562), ch. 3
Viret, Pierre – A Christian Instruction… (d. 1571; London: Veale, 1573), A Familiar Exposition of the Principal Points of the Catechism, The Exposition of the Preface of the Law
Zanchi, Jerome – On the Incarnation of the Son of God tr. by AI by Matt Hedges (Heidelberg, 1593) Latin
About the power obtained through the union in the human nature of Christ, Thesis 3, From the union of the divine and human natures in one person, there has been this further development: namely, that as the Logos, the Son of God, remaining God, became man without undergoing any change in Himself, He became the perfect mediator between God and humans, the true high priest, and the unique head of the whole Church. And for this reason, as the natures are united and distinct at the same time in one person, so also the distinct actions of each nature, for accomplishing the same results of redemption and our salvation, have had and continue to have a communion, coming together in unity without any confusion. 382-466
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1600’s
Rutherford, Samuel – 16. ‘Whether God is immutable? We affirm against the Arminians.’ in Examination of Arminianism tr. by AI by Monergism (1639-1642; Monergism, 2024), ch. 2, ‘On God’, 5. On God’s Will & its Execution, pp. 185-90
Leigh, Edward – ch. 5, ‘That God is Immutable’ in A System or Body of Divinity… (London, A.M., 1654), bk. 2, pp. 150-52
Le Blanc de Beaulieu, Louis – Eternity & Immutability of God in Theological Theses Published at Various Times in the Academy of Sedan 3rd ed. tr. by AI by Colloquia Scholastica at Discord (1675; London, 1683), pp. 205-9 Latin
Le Blanc (1614-1675) was a French reformed professor of theology at Sedan.
Charnock, Stephen – Discourse 6, ‘On the Immutability of God’ on Ps. 102:26-27 in Discourses upon the Existence & Attributes of God (Robert Carter, 1853), vol. 1, pp. 310-63
Turretin, Francis – 11. ‘Is God immutable both in essence and will? We affirm.’ in Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1992), vol. 1, 3rd Topic, pp. 204-6
van Mastricht, Peter – ch. 7, ‘The Immutability of God’ in Theoretical-Practical Theology ed. Joel Beeke, tr: Todd Rester (RHB, 2018), vol. 2, Faith in the Triune God, pt. 1, bk. 2, pp. 153-65
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1700’s
Venema, Herman – ‘Is God, viewed as a substance, mutable or immutable?’ in ch. 6, ‘Attributes of God’ in Translation of Hermann Venema’s inedited Institutes of Theology tr. Alexander W. Brown (d. 1787; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1850), pp. 141-44
De Moor, Bernard – Continuous Commentary, ch. 4, ‘On God’
26. Immutability of God
26. Immutability Applied to God’s Existence & Essence
26. Impassibility of God
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1900’s
Wolter, Allan B. – ‘9-15. [Something is] Transient to Something [is] Eternal & Unchangeable’ in ‘Conclusions Respecting Reality’ in ‘Allan Wolter’s Conclusions respecting Reality, Proving God’ (RBO)
Wolter (1913-2006) was an American, Franciscan, John Duns Scotus (d. 1308) scholar and professor of philosophy.
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2000’s
Feser, Edward – ‘Immutability’ in Five Proofs of the Existence of God (Ignatius Press, 2017), ch. 6, ‘The Nature of God & of his Relationship to the World’, ‘The Divine Attributes’, pp. 197-99
Feser is Roman Catholic professor of philosophy and is an Analytical Thomist.
“A fallacy of accident is also committed by those who claim that if God were immutable, then He could not be said to have life. For while the living things of our experience do indeed change in various ways (by growing, taking in nutrients, moving about, learning, and so forth), it doesn’t follow that any possible living thing must undergo change.
What is essential to a thing’s being alive, at least on the traditional Aristotelian account of life, is that the thing operate in the basis of an internal principle, as opposed to being entirely dependent on external forces. Hence, an animal can be said to be alive insofar as at least much of what it does flows from its own nature, whereas a stone is not alive because it is entirely passive, and can do things (such as breaking a window) only insofar as other things act upon it…
Now, as the uncaused cause of all things, God certainly acts in a way which does not require his being acted upon by anything else. Hence, He can certainly be said to have life. Indeed, unlike other living things (all of which to some extent, even if not entirely, require being acted upon by other things, insofar as they need to eat, breathe, and so forth), God acts in a way which is completely independent of anything else. Hence, He can be said to have life in the fullest way possible.” – pp. 198-99
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Book
2000’s
Richards, J. Wesley – The Untamed God: a Philosophical Exploration of Divine Perfection, Immutability & Simplicity Pre (IVP Academic, 2003)
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Quotes
Order of
Norton
Wolter
Drake
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1600’s
John Norton
The Orthodox Evangelist… (London: Macock, 1654), ch. 1, ‘Of the Divine Essence’
pp. 8-9
“Immutability is God without any alteration in respect of being, will or any accidents, Ps. 102:27-28; Mal. 3:6; Jam. 1:17, ‘With whom is no variableness, nor shadow of turning.’
Objection: God might have willed or not willed the being of the creature, else He were not free. He that may both will and not will is mutable. The sum is: The liberty and immutability of God seem not to consist together.
Answer: That immutability and liberty consist together is evident from the nature of God, who wills his own being freely. (see Smising, [Tract on the One God] tract 2, disp. 3, quest. 1, num. 23) If He were subject to co-action and mutability, He were not God. If by reason of our weakness we are less able so distinctly to discern the liberty of God as concerning the creature in the act of God willing, yet it is clearly to be seen in the object willed, viz. the creature: because nothing is more manifest than that there is no necessary connection between the being of God and the being thereof. God had been the same, perfect and blessed forever, though the creature had never been.
Objection 2: God’s will in his decree and his will in the command are often contrary one unto another; therefore He is not immutable.
Answer: No such thing. The decree determines what shall be; the command shows what ought to be. God’s willing the futurition of the betraying of Christ by Judas, and yet willing it to be Judas’s duty not to betray Christ, have not the least appearance of two wills in God.
Objection 3: God sometime[s] promises and performs not: threatens and executes not; therefore He may seem not to be immutable.
Answer: Such promises and threatnings are to be understood conditionally, not absolutely. See Jer. 18:7, 10.
Objection 4: God in Scripture is often said to repent; He that repents is not immutable.
Answer: Such speeches, though spoken after the manner of men for the help of our understanding, yet are to be understood as becomes the nature of God. God is therefore said to repent because He does as men do when they repent, that is, He changes his deeds: yet without any change of his will. Nay, those changes of his deeds are the executions of his unchangeable will.”
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pp. 10-11
“The more principal relative attributes are in number seven: 1. Creation. 2. Providence. 3. Lordship. 4. Benignity. 5. Mercy. 6. Redemption. 7. Justice. To which, or some of which, the rest of like nature may conveniently be referred.
Though the terms Creator, Governor, Redeemer and Lord do more clearly hold forth the relation between God and the creature: yet (after others) the fore-named terms are here made use of both as sufficiently containing the relation and better conducing to teach the doctrine intended.
A new relative attribute or praedication does not always presuppose a change in that thing unto which that new relation is given, though it always presupposes a change in that whereunto such relation does really belong: for example sake:
Peter may sit at the right hand of John without any change in Peter, the change being only in John, who places himself at Peter’s left hand. The princes are said to stand on the right hand of the wall, Neh. 12:31, without any change in the wall; the change was only in them so placing themselves.
So God who was not a Creator from eternity, is a Creator in time: yet this new appellation puts no change in God, but only in the creature. The Second Person who was not incarnate from eternity, becomes incarnate in the fulness of time, yet without any change: the change was, and is only in the humane nature assumed, not in the divine nature assuming.
In these Relative Attributes (the Creator being above the order of the creature), the extremes not being alike, the relation is not alike. The relation on God’s part is only a relation of reason: that is, such a respect of the Creator to the creature, as is without any change in Him: but on the creatures’ part, it is a real relation: that is, such a relation as infers a change in it.
Relative Attributes add a new predication or title to, but cause no real mutation or change in God. As concerning the creature, they both add a new predication to it and cause a real mutation in it.
In all Relative Attributes there are considerable (but especially in Creation, Providence and Redemption) an eternal immanent act whereby God wills such a thing to be; and a transient temporal act, whereby He works the thing according to his will.”
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pp. 18-19
“Liberty is God willing Himself freely and necessarily, but whatever is besides Himself not necessarily, but freely: that is, not of any necessity of nature, but of his mere good pleasure,† Ps. 115:3; Isa. 49:3; Dan. 4:5.
† Scotus, bk. 1, dist. 39: Libera terminatio divinae voluntatis in creaturum potuit adesse vel abesse sine ulla mutabilitate subjectiva in Deo [The free determination of the divine will toward creatures could be present or absent without any subjective change in God.]. [Francis] Smising [Tract on the One God], tract 2, disp. 3, quest. 1, num. 23.”
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1900’s
Allan B. Wolter
Little Summary of Metaphysics (Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Co., 1958), pt. 3, p. 101 Wolter was a Scotus scholar.
“A dispute arises whether freedom is compatible with necessity (that is, unchangeableness and sempiternity) of this act in which God loves himself. According to Scotus, the act is spontaneous and proceeds not by way of nature but freely, that is, [logically] after intellection-cognition. But if anyone can grasp this, let him do so.”
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2000’s
K.J. Drake
‘Beyond the Flesh: Why Aquinas is both a beacon and a bridge for orthodox Christology’ in Credo Magazine, vol. 12, issue 2 (June, 2022)
“[On Aquinas’s view:] Because of God’s aseity and immutability, He relates to creation without taking on any new properties, which reside only on the creaturely side of the relation. While all relations between the triune God and creation have this ‘mixed’ or asymmetric quality…”
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Historical
On the Post-Reformation
Reformed
Book
Van Ruler, Han – The Crisis of Causality. Voetius & Descartes on God, Nature & Change (Leiden: Brill, 1995) 340 pp. ToC
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Roman Catholic
Article
Sangiacomo, Andrea – ‘Divine Action & God’s Immutability: a Historical Case Study on how to Resist Occasionalism’ European Journal of Philosophy of Religion, 7/4 (Summer 2015), pp. 115-135
Sangiacomo is an associate professor at the faculty of philosophy at the University of Groningen (NL).
Abstract: “Today’s debates present ‘occasionalism’ as the position that any satisfying account of divine action must avoid. In this paper I discuss how a leading [French] Cartesian author of the end of the seventeenth century, Pierre-Sylvain Régis [1632–1707], attempted to avoid occasionalism. Régis’s case is illuminating because it stresses both the difficulties connected with the traditional alternatives to occasionalism (so-called ‘concurrentism’ and ‘mere-conservationism’) and also those aspects embedded in the occasionalist position that should be taken into due account. The paper focuses on Régis’s own account of secondary causation in order to show how the challenge of avoiding occasionalism can lead to the development of new accounts of divine action.”
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Latin Articles
1200’s
Aquinas, Thomas – Question 9, ‘Of the Immutability of God’ in Summa, pt. 1
art. 1, ‘Whether God is altogether immutable? [Yes]’
art. 2, ‘Whether to be immutable belongs to God alone? [Yes]’
Scotus, John Duns – 5. ‘Whether God alone may be immutable [Yes]’ in Opera Omnia, ed. 9 (Paris: Vives, 1891), Ordinatio, bk. 1, 8th Distinction, pp. 735-73
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1500’s
Zanchi, Jerome – Of the Nature of God, or of the Divine Attributes, in 5 Books (Heidelberg, 1577)
bk. 2, ch. 4, ‘Of the Immutability of God’ 93-100
bk. 3, ch. 4, IX. Whether the will of God may be impeditively changed, or whether it may be wholly immutable, and hence whether it may always come about? 338-45
Zanchi (1516-1590) was an Italian, protestant Reformation clergyman and educator who influenced the development of Reformed theology during the years following John Calvin’s death.
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1600’s
Rutherford, Samuel – 16. Whether God is immutable? We affirm against the Arminians in Examination of Arminianism (1639-1642; Utrecht: Smytegelt, 1668), ch. 2, On God, 5. On God’s Will & its Execution, pp. 175-81
Voet, Gisbert – (9) Immutability in Syllabus of Theological Problems (Utrecht, 1643), pt. 1, section 1, tract 2, I. ‘Of God’, 4. Attributes of God in Specific, 1st Kind Abbr.
de Vries, Gerard – 12. ‘God-Immutable’ in Rational Exercitations on God & the Divine Perfections, even Miscellaneous Philosophical Things new ed. (Utrecht, 1695), vol. 1, Rational Exercitations, pp. 91-95 Detailed ToC 1
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1700’s
Roy, Albert – Of the Eternity, Existence from Himself & Immutability of God (Bern, 1717)
Roy (1663-1733) was a reformed, professor of Hebrew, catechesis and theology at Lausanne, Switzerland.
Holtzfus, Barthold – 5. ‘Of the Truth, Goodness, Primacy & Independency, Infinity, Incomprehensibleness, Eternity, Immensity, & Immutability of God’ in A Theological Tract on God, Attributes & the Divine Decrees, Three Academic Dissertations (1707), pp. 40-55
Holtzfus (1659-1717) was a professor of philosophy and theology at Frankfurt in the reformed tradition.
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