The question before us is whether the doctrine of divine simplicity (DDS) can be upheld without the collapse of modal distinctions.

In "Simply Impossible: A Case Against Divine Simplicity" (Journal of Reformed Theology 7, 2013, 181-203), R. T. Mullins asks (footnote omitted):

Could God have refrained from creating the universe? If God is free then it seems that the answer is obviously ‘yes.’ He could have existed alone. Yet, God did create the universe. If there is a possible world in which God exists alone, God is not simple. He eternally has unactualized potential for He cannot undo His act of creation. He could cease to sustain the universe in existence, but that would not undo His act of creating. One could avoid this problem by allowing for a modal collapse. One could say that everything is absolutely necessary. Necessarily, there is only one possible world—this world. Necessarily, God must exist with creation. There is no other possibility. God must create the universe that we inhabit, and everything must occur exactly as it in fact does. There is no such thing as contingency when one allows a modal collapse. (195-196)

The foregoing suggests to me one version of the problem. There is a tension between divine simplicity and divine freedom.

1) If God is simple, then he is purely actual (actus purus) and thus devoid of unexercised powers and unrealized potentialities. He is, from all eternity, all that he can be. This is true in every possible world because God exists in every possible world, and is pure act in every possible world. As a necessary being, God exists in every possible world, and as a simple being, he is devoid of act-potency composition in every world in which he exists. 2) As it is, God freely created our universe from nothing; but he might have created a different universe, or no universe at all. This implies that any universe God creates contingently exists.

The dyad seems logically inconsistent. If (1) is true, then there is no possible world in which God has unexercised powers. But if (2) is true, there is at least one possible world in which God has unexercised powers. Had God created no universe, then his power to create would have gone unexercised. Had God created a different universe than the one he did create, then his power to create our universe would have gone unexercised. So if God is both simple and (libertarianly) free, then we get a logical contradiction.

In nuce, the problem is to explain how it can be true both that God is simple and that the universe which God created ex nihilo is contingent. Clearly, the classical theist wants to uphold both. What is unclear, however, is whether he can uphold both.

There are two main ways to solve an aporetic polyad. One is to show that the inconsistency alleged is at best apparent, but not real. The other way is by rejection of one of the limbs.

Many if not most theists, and almost all Protestants, will simply (pun intended) deny the divine simplicity. I myself think there are good reasons for embracing the latter. But how then avoid modal collapse?

Modal Collapse

We have modal collapse just when the following proposition is true: For any x, x is possible iff x is actual iff x is necessary. This implies that nothing is merely possible; nothing is contingent; nothing is impossible. If nothing is merely possible, then there are no merely possible worlds, which implies that there is exactly one possible world, the actual world, which cannot fail to be actual, and is therefore necessary. Modal collapse ushers in what I cill call modal Spinozism.

(The collapse is on the extensional, not the intensional or notional plane: the modal words retain their distinctive senses.)

Suppose divine simplicity entails modal collapse (modal Spinozism). So what? What is so bad about the latter? Well, it comports none too well with God's sovereignty. If God is absolutely sovereign, then he cannot be under a metaphysical necessity to create. Connected with this is the fact that if God must create, then his aseity would be compromised. He cannot be wholly from himself, a se, if his existence necessarily requires a realm of creatures. Finally, creaturely (libertarian) freedom would go by the boards if reality is one big block of Spinozistic necessity.

Steven Nemes' Solution

If God created our universe U, and U is contingent, then it is quite natural to suppose that God's creative act is as contingent as what it brings into existence, namely, U. But this is impossible on DDS. For on DDS, God is identical to his creative causing. This being so, U -- the creatively caused -- exists with the same metaphysical necessity as does God. The reasoning that leads to this unacceptable conclusion, however, rests on an assumption:

DP. A difference in effect presupposes a difference in the cause. (Nemes, 109)

For example, the difference between U existing and no universe existing entails a difference in God between his actualized power to create U and his unactualized, but actualizable, power to refrain from creating anything.

Nemes proposes that we reject (DP), at least with respect to divine causality. (110) Accordingly, the contingency of U's existence does not reflect any contingency in God, even though U is wholly dependent on God for its existence at every moment at which it exists. So if we reject the Difference Principle, then we can maintain both that the created universe is contingent and that there are no unrealized potentialities in God. But if we don't reject (DP), then "the argument from modal collapse [against the divine simpicity] is successful." (111)

Is the Nemes Solution Satisfactory?

I say it isn't. It strikes me as problematic as the problem it is proposed to solve.

Consider an analogy. In a dark room I turn on a flashlight that causes a circular white spot to appear on a wall. When I turn off the light the spot disappears. Clearly, the beam of light from the flashlight is the cause and the spot on the wall is the effect. We also note that the beam is not only the originating cause of the spot, but a continuing cause of the spot: the spot depends on the beam at every moment at which the spot exists. In this respect beam-spot is analogous to divine creating- universe existing. Finally, we note that, just as the spot depends for its existence on the existence of the beam, and not vice versa, the contingency of the spot depends on the contingency of the beam. If the spot is contingent, then so must be its cause. Suppose that at time t, the light is on and the spot appears. To say that the spot is contingent is to say that, at t, t might not have existed. But had the spot not existed at t, then the light would not have been on at t. Surely it would be absurd to say both that the light is on at t and the spot does not exist at t

Similarly, it seems absurd to say both that the creative causing of U is occurring in every possible world and that U does not exist in every possible world. Bear in mind that divine causing is necessarily efficacious: it cannot fail to bring about its effect. The divine Fiat lux! cannot be followed by darkness (or no light).

But of course arguments from analogy prove nothing (assuming the rigorous standards of proof that I favor), and so Nemes would be within his rights were he simply to reject my analogy. He might insist that just as God is sui generis, the creative relation between God and creatures is sui generis and cannot be modeled in any way. He might insist that divine causality is unique. In this one case, a causal 'process' that occurs in every possible world -- because said process is identical to God who exists in every world -- has an effect that exists in only some possible worlds.

We are now in the following dialectical situation. Nemes would have us accept DDS and reject DP. But I see no reason to think that this is any better than accepting DP and rejecting DDS. Either way, the exigencies of the discursive intellect are flouted.

An Aporia?

It seems that the proponent of divine simplicity faces a nasty problem. At the moment, I see no satisfactory solution.

The aporetician in me is open to the thought that what we have here is a genuine aporia, a conceptual impasse, a puzzle that we cannot solve. God must be simple to be God; the created universe is really contingent. We cannot, however, see how both limbs of the dyad can be true and so we must see them as contradictory, even though they are presumably not contradictory in reality.

It could be like this: the limbs are both true, but our cognitive limitations make it impossible for us to understand how they could both be true. Mysterianism may be the way to go. This shouldn't trouble a theologian too much. After all, Trinity, Incarnation, etc. are mysteries in the end, are they not? Of course, I am not suggesting the doctrine of divine simplicity can be found in the Bible.

An Exchange with Lukas Novak

In an earlier thread, I wrote:

At best, a cosmological argument takes us from the contingent universe U to a divine creative act that explains the existence of U. Now this creative act is itself contingent: God might not have created anything. If God is simple, then he is identical to the creative act. Since the act is contingent, God is contingent, and therefore not God by the Anselmian criterion. On the other hand, if God is necessary, then the creative act and U are necessary, which is unacceptable. The following cannot all be true: 1) God is simple.

2) God is noncontingent.

3) God's creative act is contingent.

Dr. Novak responded:

God's creative act need not be contingent. It only needs to contingently bring about its effect. God's efficiency is distinct from created efficiency. A created cause is itself changed by causing (by eliciting de novo the productive act as its accidental form), God is not changed by causing (being for eternity identical to any of its timeless creative acts). God would be the same in all respects had He not caused the world into existence. This is the requirement of His perfection.

Novak's first two sentences makes no sense. If the effect is contingent, then the creative act which is its cause must also be contingent. There is a three-fold distinction on the notional plane among God (the agent of the creative act or action), the creative act itself, and the effect of the creative act. God is a necessary being. Now if God is identical in reality to the creative act whereby he creates U, as per DDS, then the creative act must also be necessary, in which case the created universe cannot be contingent.

One source of confusion here is that 'act' can be used in two ways. To say that God is pure act (actus purus) is not to say that God is pure action; it is merely to say that he is devoid of all potency. Note also that God is not the cause of the existence of U; the cause is God's creative action.

I can agree with the rest of what Novak says, except for the penultimate sentence, but only if he draws the conclusion that follows from it, namely, that the created universe exists of metaphysical necessity.

REFERENCE: Steven Nemes, "Divine Simplicity Does Not Entail Modal Collapse" in Carlos Frederico, et al. eds., Rose and Reasons: Philosophical Essays, Bucharest: Eikon, 2020, 101-119.