The following comes from “Disputation between a Christian and a Saracen” by John of Damascus:
Section 1a: The
omnipotence of God and the cause of evil
When the Christian
was asked by the Saracen, “Who do you say is the cause of good as well
as of evil?”
The Christian:
We say that God alone is the author of all that is good, but not of evil.
The Saracen
asked in response: “Who do you say is the cause of evil?”
The Christian:
Obviously the devil who has perverted the truth by choice, and we humans.
Saracen: Because of what?
Christian: Because of our own
free will.
Section 1b: Man’s
Power
Saracen: What then? Do you
have free will to do anything you wish?
Christian: God has created me
free in regard to only two things.
Saracen: What are they?
Christian: Doing what is evil
and doing what is good. Accordingly, if I do wrong, the law of God punishes me,
but if I do what is good. I do not fear the law. Instead, I am rewarded by God
and by his mercy. In the same way, before the first man, the devil has been
created with his own free will by God, but he sinned, and God expelled him from
his proper state.
Section 1c: Justice
of God
Christian: If, as you say,
good and evil come from God, then God is unfair; but he is not. Indeed, if God had
commanded the adulterer to fornicate, the thief to steal and the murderer to
kill, as you say, then these men deserve honor for their obedience to his will.
Section 1d: “Creation”
and/or “generation
And the Saracen:
“Who,” he says, “forms the infants in the wombs of the women?” (The Saracens
present this difficult objection because they want to prove that God is the
cause of evil. For if I reply by saying, “God forms the infants in the wombs of
women,” the Saracen will say, “Behold, God is cooperating with the fornicator
and the adulterer.”)
The Christian responds
to this: “We find nowhere in Scripture where it says that God formed or crated
anything after the first week of the creation of the world. . . . For God
created the heavens and the earth and the universe in six days, and the seventh
day he rested from all the work he had started doing, as the Scriptures witness
to me.”
. . . .
Section 1g: God’s
providential and permissive will
The Saracen: “In
your opinion, is the one who does the will of his God good or evil?”
The Christian,
however, sending a trip said: “I know what you are getting at.”
The Saracen: “Explain
it to me.”
The Christian:
You want to ask me: “Did Christ suffer willingly or unwillingly?”
So that if I say to
you, “He suffered willingly,” then you will say to me, “go and bow down before
the Jews, for they have done the will of your God.”
The Saracen
admits: “That is what I wanted to tell you. If you can answer me, do it.”
The Christian:
What you call “will,” I call “tolerance” and “patience.” (Daniel J. Janoski, John
of Damascus First Apologist to the Muslims: The Trinity and Christian
Apologetics in the Early Islamic Period [Eugene, Oreg.: Pickwick Publications,
2016], 269-71, 272)
Further Reading
An Examination and Critique of the Theological Presuppositions Underlying Reformed Theology
