ONLINE FIRST
published on October 11, 2018
Dawn Eschenauer Chow
https://doi.org/10.5840/faithphil20181010109
The Passibility of God: A Plea for Analogy
The traditional doctrine that God is impassible (here, invulnerable to suffering) is subject to the objection that it is incompatible with belief that God is loving and compassionate. However, the doctrine that God is passible has grave difficulties as well. I argue that Christian believers should take an analogical approach, by believing that God does something relevantly similar to loving us in a way that involves vulnerability to suffering, and thus conceiving of God as loving us in that way, while simultaneously believing that God is in fact impassible. I conclude with answers to several likely objections.