Is it consistent to maintain that human free will is incompatible with determinism in the natural world while also maintaining that it is compatible with divine universal causation? On the face of it, divine universal causation looks like a form of determinism. And the intuitions that lead to incompatibilism about free will and natural determinism also lead to incompatibilism about free will and divine determinism. W. Matthews Grant resists this conclusion. Grant contends that we can understand all of God’s activity as an exercise of divine “libertarian” free will and can construe God’s actions as nothing over and above the (created) effects brought about. I argue that Grant’s attempted reconciliation of human free will and universal divine causation fails, and on two counts. First, Grant’s account of the interaction of divine and created agency is occasionalist; second, even if we assume Grant’s account successfully avoids the charge of occasionalism, it fails to reconcile divine agency with created free agency. The latter is illustrated by exploring the nature of the determination relation required by incompatibilist, agent-causal accounts of free will.

I raise two challenges for theological determinism. First, a prominent criticism of theological determinism holds that human moral responsibility is incompatible with theological determinism. Many theological determinists resist this criticism by maintaining that determinism is compatible with moral responsibility. I attempt to break new ground in this debate by arguing that the theological determinist cannot adequately avoid moral luck. I argue that opponents of theological determinism can embrace a truly luck-free notion of responsibility, on which nothing beyond the agent’s control impacts their praiseworthiness or blameworthiness. But theological determinists, insofar as they are not skeptics about human responsibility, are stuck accepting that luck impacts responsibility. Thus theological determinists are committed to intuitive unfairness, which their opponents can avoid. Second, although I grant that some free will theodicies are available to theological determinists, I argue that they cannot make use of the most attractive type of free will theodicy. Finally, I draw an interesting connection between my approach to moral luck and my preferred sort of free will theodicy.

In this chapter, I argue that hard theological determinism is strictly incompatible with divine forgiveness. After laying out my argument for this conclusion and defending its central premises, I discuss some implications of the argument. I focus in particular on the apparent conflict between hard theological determinism and traditional theological perspectives. My discussion of these issues also highlights a reason why religious believers might attach importance to the idea that we sometimes have free will and are morally responsible for at least some of our behavior.

The problem of evil is often thought to be the single most important objection to theism. The most popular reply to (the logical version of) this objection is the Free Will Defense (FWD), but this seems to presuppose incompatibilism, and thus be unavailable to divine determinists. In this chapter I explore this worry at length. First I consider the claim, made by Steven Cowan, that FWD may be utilized even by those who deny some of the propositions it includes. I then turn to two authors who claim that compatibilists – at least compatibilists of certain types – can accept each proposition utilized in FWD. I conclude that the first defense of this claim, offered by A. A, Howsepian, is implausible, but that the second, offered by Jason Turner, does show that a certain sort of compatibilist can accept FWD. Unfortunately, I will argue, there is reason to think that many divine determinists will be wary of accepting this sort of incompatibilism. I conclude with a quick look at other options and a brief investigation of the evidential problem of evil.

In this chapter I continue the task, begun in the last chapter, of considering whether divine determinism undermines human free will. In this chapter I take up manipulation arguments. I begin by focusing on Derk Pereboom’s Four Case Argument. This argument moves from intuitions about cases in which humans are manipulated by other humans to cases in which they are determined by laws of nature, maintaining that the original intuition that the human agent was not morally responsible is preserved even when the case is modified in various ways. I propose a variant of this argument in which the final case involves divine determinism. I also consider an argument that makes a direct appeal to intuition, maintaining that it is obvious that the sort of manipulation involved in divine determinism undermines human moral responsibility. I consider replies to both arguments, noting especially replies that depend upon pointing to the radical differences between God and human manipulators. I close with an investigation of bullet biting in the context of rejecting the truth of common intuitions.

In this chapter I begin consideration of the claim that divine determinism undermines human free will. I begin with Peter van Inwagen’s Consequence Argument. This argument claims that since humans have no choice about the distant past and the laws of nature—which together determine human actions—humans likewise have no choice about any of their own actions. I argue that although some divine determinists are not threatened by this argument, a revised version of this argument does pose a threat to all divine determinists. This revised argument maintains that since humans have no choice about divine determining activity, they likewise have no choice about their own actions, which are determined but it. After laying out this revised argument, I consider several possible responses to it. In particular, I consider the reply that God’s unique causal activity allows actions to be determined while remaining contingent and the reply that divinely determined agents possess the highest sort of ability to do otherwise that is coherent. I argue that both replies fail, and briefly consider other options for the divine determinist, including semi-compatibilism and hard divine determinism.

In this chapter I explore a number of different proposals for how to define ‘divine determinism.’ I settle on one to guide the rest of the book, which was first offered by Heath White. On this account, divine determinism is the conjunction of two claims: (i) The facts about God’s will wholly determine every other contingent fact and (ii) the facts about God’s will explain every other contingent fact. I then turn to a brief overview of some motivations for divine determinism. I begin with philosophical motivations, including motivations arising from consideration of the principle of sufficient reason, divine sovereignty, divine power, divine knowledge, divine aseity, and divine providence. I then turn to motivations that are more closely tied to particular religious traditions, including ones related to prophecy, scriptural authorship, and specific scriptural passages. Finally, I investigate two different varieties of divine determinism: primary divine determinism and Edwardian divine determinism.