The Hezekiah Problem

[seer]

First let me quote:

2 Kings:

20:1 In those days Hezekiah became sick and was at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz came to him, and said to him, "Thus says the Lord: Set your house in order, for you shall die; you shall not recover."
20:2 Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord:
20:3 "Remember now, O Lord, I implore you, how I have walked before you in faithfulness with a whole heart, and have done what is good in your sight." Hezekiah wept bitterly.
20:4 Before Isaiah had gone out of the middle court, the word of the Lord came to him:
20:5 "Turn back, and say to Hezekiah prince of my people, Thus says the Lord, the God of your ancestor David: I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; indeed, I will heal you; on the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord.
20:6 I will add fifteen years to your life. I will deliver you and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria; I will defend this city for my own sake and for my servant David's sake."

This came up in another thread and I thought it would make a good topic.

Here God makes a specific prediction; The near immediate death of Hezekiah. But Hezekiah prays and God relents and gives him 15 more years.

Now as I see it we have three choices:

1. God was untruthful in His prediction. He used a falsehood to compell Hezekiah to repent.

2. God did not know that Hezekiah would repent. Was touched by his prayers and sincere sorrow and changed His mind.

3. God had all intention of causing the immediate death of Hezekiah,but knew that Hezekiah would repent, and that He (God) would relent. In this model God's first intention was truthful because Hezekiah had the ability to repent or not repent.

Any thoughts?:huh:

[doogieduff]

I'm going to add a fourth idea, which I think happened here. It's a bit different from your other three.

God looked at Hezekiah's condition, and absolutely KNEW that Hezekiah would indeed perish from his fatal condition. God would know better than any other doctor. As to why God told Hezekiah he would die, I'm not sure. Maybe God wanted to grant him more life, but doing so would be stupid unless he truly wanted it. God could save anybody's life. Why did he choose to save Hezekiah's? I don't know. Contrary to your third option, God was not going to cause Hezekiah to die. Hezekaih was going to die because of his fatal illness. So what do we have...

1. God knew Hezekiah's illness was fatal, and his time alive was very short
2. God commands Hezekiah to put his house in order, for he will die and not live.
3. Hezekiah weeps.
4. For whatever reason God decides to grant him 15 more years of life.
5. In doing so, God also promises to defend him from the king of Assyria, and defend the city for His own sake.

So, God was indeed sincere and honest when He told Hezekiah he would die. He said this, not because He peeked into the future, but rather because He could see that his disease was fatal. (If HE indeed could peek into the future, He would know that He Himself was to heal him from his illness!) Hezekiah wept, but never asked for more life. God grants him more life, and in turn, healed him as well.

An interesting side note. In the third year of Hezekiah's 15-year extension, he gave birth to a son called Manassah. When Hezekiah's 15 years were up, his son reigned in his place at the age of 12. King Manassah turned out to be one of the most evil of all kings, if not the most evil. So, with the traditional view of divine foreknowledge, we now have to ask why God would heal Hezekiah, knowing he would begat the most evil king to have reign in his place. You see, I believe God granted Hezekiah life because of Hezekiah, not because of anyone else. When you look at the Bible as God working with us in the present, it's all clear to me. God grants Hezekiah life because Hezekiah himself is deserving of it. It just so happens that Hezekiah would begot a son who would turn out to be a very evil king. This wasn't part of God's original plan when giving Hezekiah life.

[seer]

Interesting doogie,so are you an open theist? But as far as God knowing that Hezekiah's son would be a evil ruler, God is known to set up evil rulers: Daniel 4:17.

[Blake Reas]

Today @ 12:49 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=75963#post75963)
doogieduff:

I'm going to add a fourth idea, which I think happened here. It's a bit different from your other three.

God looked at Hezekiah's condition, and absolutely KNEW that Hezekiah would indeed perish from his fatal condition. God would know better than any other doctor. As to why God told Hezekiah he would die, I'm not sure. Maybe God wanted to grant him more life, but doing so would be stupid unless he truly wanted it. God could save anybody's life. Why did he choose to save Hezekiah's? I don't know. Contrary to your third option, God was not going to cause Hezekiah to die. Hezekaih was going to die because of his fatal illness. So what do we have...

1. God knew Hezekiah's illness was fatal, and his time alive was very short
2. God commands Hezekiah to put his house in order, for he will die and not live.
3. Hezekiah weeps.
4. For whatever reason God decides to grant him 15 more years of life.
5. In doing so, God also promises to defend him from the king of Assyria, and defend the city for His own sake.

So, God was indeed sincere and honest when He told Hezekiah he would die. He said this, not because He peeked into the future, but rather because He could see that his disease was fatal. (If HE indeed could peek into the future, He would know that He Himself was to heal him from his illness!) Hezekiah wept, but never asked for more life. God grants him more life, and in turn, healed him as well.

An interesting side note. In the third year of Hezekiah's 15-year extension, he gave birth to a son called Manassah. When Hezekiah's 15 years were up, his son reigned in his place at the age of 12. King Manassah turned out to be one of the most evil of all kings, if not the most evil. So, with the traditional view of divine foreknowledge, we now have to ask why God would heal Hezekiah, knowing he would begat the most evil king to have reign in his place. You see, I believe God granted Hezekiah life because of Hezekiah, not because of anyone else. When you look at the Bible as God working with us in the present, it's all clear to me. God grants Hezekiah life because Hezekiah himself is deserving of it. It just so happens that Hezekiah would begot a son who would turn out to be a very evil king. This wasn't part of God's original plan when giving Hezekiah life.

Like I said in the other thread if Manessah did not rise to power then there would have been no heir to the thrown of Israel. Also God had his plans. If you read Romans 13 it talks of God bringing up rulers. It speaks thus:

For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed. (Romans 13:1-2)

This passage does not just say good kings or nice kings it means all authorities. So God at least ordains who will and will not be kings. If you want to know the implications of this verse it would mean that God put Hitler at the head of Germany also. God has reasons for putting rulers like Manessah at the heads of state. We may not know most of the time but sometimes God gives us a glimpse. For instance He moves David into the head office to make Israel a mighty nation. So I think your question of why God would allow an evil king like Manessah to be on the thrown is badly misguided.

What you said in number five is rather interesting actually. You say that God kept the Assyrians away while Hezekiah was king has it occured to you that it was God's purpose to keep Hezekiah alive for that very reason and also so that the line of David would not be broken? (See my thread in "God chose Saul to Fail?) You are left with some problems here. If Romans 13 should be used as a grid to interpret the rest of the Bible about kings then YHWH is soveriegn over the affairs of nations. I also think the last paragraph that you posted is nothing but an emotinal argument all you say is that God would not have done it that way so we must sacrifice the proper meaning of the text to give Hezekiah LBF! I think the Presuppositions are showing through doogie:wink:

By His Grace For His Glory
Blake

[seer]

So Blake, when God told Hezekiah to set your house in order, for you shall die; you shall not recover...

Was that a false prediction?

[sacre]

It was obviously not a false prediction, because Isaiah would have been stoned to death. It was clearly not seen as a prediction of the future, but instead an exhortation to repentance. Cf. John 8:23 "And He was saying to them, 'You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world. Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.'"

Regards,
R.

[Blake Reas]

Today @ 02:20 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=76046#post76046)
seer:

So Blake, when God told Hezekiah to set your house in order, for you shall die; you shall not recover...

Was that a false prediction?

First, I do not think that God lied He was invoking a response out of Hezekiah. Also if God has a decretive and revealed will then we are only experiencing his Revealed Will. In this aspect he is really interacting with us and no he is not lying. God is working out his plan. Second, I could be wrong here but I do not think this gets you off the hook either in your view God also took back what he had said. Here is an example God told Hezekiah he would die but then God changes his mind about this. Did not God tell Hezekiah to get his house ready? I will quote John Piper's take on Boyd's argument for this passage since it is close to yours:

#1 Hezekiah's Repentance and 15 Added Years
Isaiah 38:1-5
In those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, "Thus says the LORD, 'Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.'" 2 Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD, 3 and said, "Remember now, O LORD, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart, and have done what is good in Your sight." And Hezekiah wept bitterly. 4 Then the word of the LORD came to Isaiah, saying, 5 "Go and say to Hezekiah, 'Thus says the LORD, the God of your father David, I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; behold, I will add fifteen years to your life.'"
Observations:
1. All agree that God did not express an exception when he said, "You shall die and not live."

2 .All agree that there was an implicit exception, perhaps: "You shall die, unless you repent and pray."

3. Boyd denies that God knew whether Hezekiah would fulfill the implicit exception.

4. Historic Christian exegesis affirms that God knew that Hezekiah would fulfill the implicit exception.

Major sticking point in the debate.

5. Boyd says that it would have been disingenuous of God to say that Hezekiah was going to die if he knew that he would not die but live 15 more years.

6. But Boyd's own view also seems to make God disingenuous. Is God telling the truth when he says," You shall die, and not live," when he really means," You might die, but won't if you repent"? Boyd's criticism of historic Christian exegesis applies to himself at this point.

7. But it is not true that one must always express explicitly the exceptions to the threats one gives or the predictions one makes in order to be honest. One reason for this is that there can be a general understanding in a family or group of people that certain kinds of threats or warnings always imply that genuine repentance will be met with mercy.
For example, in 1 John 4:8 "The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love." And 1 John 3:14 says, "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love abides in death." These could be taken in isolation to mean there is no exception or escape for any failure to love. But we don't take the implicit threat that way because a general understanding exists in John's community that this refers to unconfessed and persistent refusal to love. 1 John 1:8-9 makes this clear: "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
Therefore, we do not need to jump to the conclusion that every exception to every warning needs to be expressed especially where there is an understanding that genuine repentance and confession will be met with mercy. Hezekiah's earnest prayer for mercy seems to indicate that he did not assume there was no escape clause even though none was expressed. He seemed to assume that mercy may well be given if he repented.


Is a Father not genuine when there child is about ready to do something wrong and the father says that he is going to spank the child when he does it even though he knows the child will quit? NO! The father has used the threat to get a response to get his hand out of the cookie jar or whatever else the child is doing!
You could say that the father does not know the future but if the son is disciplined then he will listen to his father.

By His Grace For His Glory
Blake :spam:

[Blake Reas]

Today @ 02:20 AM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=76046#post76046)
seer:

So Blake, when God told Hezekiah to set your house in order, for you shall die; you shall not recover...

Was that a false prediction?

Seer,
When an opponent makes an argument answer it. I have answered yours know answer my question about Romans 13 and also the fact that God promised David that his line would not be broken.

Blake

[Solly]

My own post from the "Saul" thread for completness.

Isn't it strange how everything which God says seems to have universal and unbinding significance to some, rather than just being relevant to the issue at hand. God said Hezekiah will die, so that's it: you're dead Hezekiah. Why this failure to understand that Reformed theology can handle real-time interactions between men and God, without turning into OVT?

Is Hezekiah going to die?

Yes, he has a fatal illness. Left to himself, he will die.

Was God lying?

No. Hezekiah was going to die in the normal course of his illness.

Did God have an ace up his sleeve, which he was not obliged to reveal, and which he did so after receiving an appropriate response from Hezzy?

YES!!

Why?

“Isa 38:10 I said in the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave: I am deprived of the residue of my years.
Isa 38:11 I said, I shall not see the LORD, [even] the LORD, in the land of the living: I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world.
Isa 38:12 Mine age is departed, and is removed from me as a shepherd's tent: I have cut off like a weaver my life: he will cut me off with pining sickness: from day [even] to night wilt thou make an end of me.
Isa 38:13 I reckoned till morning, [that], as a lion, so will he break all my bones: from day [even] to night wilt thou make an end of me.
Isa 38:14 Like a crane [or] a swallow, so did I chatter: I did mourn as a dove: mine eyes fail [with looking] upward: O LORD, I am oppressed; undertake for me.
Isa 38:15 What shall I say? he hath both spoken unto me, and himself hath done [it]: I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.
Isa 38:16 O Lord, by these [things men] live, and in all these [things is] the life of my spirit: so wilt thou recover me, and make me to live.
Isa 38:17 Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but thou hast in love to my soul [delivered it] from the pit of corruption: for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.
Isa 38:18 For the grave cannot praise thee, death can [not] celebrate thee: they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth.
Isa 38:19 The living, the living, he shall praise thee, as I [do] this day: the father to the children shall make known thy truth.
Isa 38:20 The LORD [was ready] to save me: therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments all the days of our life in the house of the LORD.”

God's glory, on the lips of a saved sinner; and instruction to the people of God on how to face difficult situations.

One of the points we have to remember in reading the scripture accounts is that they are not necessarily like our every day dealings, precisely becuase they are scripture accounts. These are the events God has chosen to appear in the bible.
They don't exist in a vacuum either; there is all that has gone before, and all that will come after. one of those things is the history of Israel, as Blake has outlined with reference to Manasseh. Another, and bigger one, is God himself.
This particular situation seems to boil down to the fact that God knew hezzy was going to die, and either

a) He was surprised by Hezzy's reaction, and took pity on him - for no reason, it appears, since he has never done it for anyone else in that way, or

b) God was not surprised, and the sickness, while fatal in prognosis, was not ultimately unto death because of God's intervention (without which it would have been truly fatal, so God spoke right), but part of Hezzy's spiritual growth - ie, what did he really care about? As well as reminding Israel that their God was able to undertake in the big issues: Sennecharib beseiging Jerusalem perhaps even at the same time as some commentators think, and the "small" issues - Hezzy's sickness. The idea of "testing" is part of the Christian way, and God reserves the right to "test to destruction" if he deems it appropriate.
Another similar thread topic would be Abraham and Isaac on Mt Moriah.

The whole point about what God does and doesn't say is undergirded by the fact that God is good, righteous and truth. It may seem like a "lie" or being "economical with the truth" to some, but it isn't.

[geebob]

Seer,
When an opponent makes an argument answer it. I have answered yours know answer my question about Romans 13 and also the fact that God promised David that his line would not be broken.

I will. For one thing, I'd like to mention that it seems like you specifically were aiming your comments at doogieduff, so I don't see why you'd insist seer has some fault for not answering it.

All authority comes from God. This is evident from romans 13. But that does not mean that the authority is not abused and misused against God.

[Blake Reas]

Today @ 04:21 PM post located here (http://www.theologyweb.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=76538#post76538)
geebob:



[quote]I will. For one thing, I'd like to mention that it seems like you specifically were aiming your comments at doogieduff, so I don't see why you'd insist seer has some fault for not answering it.

It does not really matter. Seer made a comment in which applied to what I had already answered so I did not feel the need to repeat myself. I am sorry, the question is open to any open theist who wants to answer.

All authority comes from God. This is evident from romans 13. But that does not mean that the authority is not abused and misused against God.

You act as if I cannot say authority is abused and misused against God. Like I have said before the Calvinist has no problems with affirming this. But it has all been decreed by God. Also Romans 13 does not seem to me to fit the eisigesis you have supplied. All that it says it be in subjection to the governing authorities. If we take the Historical context in which Paul was speaking the Roman Empire was in control hardly a nice place for Christians Paul seems to say that even Nero and the other emperors where at God's disposal!

By His Grace For His Glory
Blake

[seer]

It does not really matter. Seer made a comment in which applied to what I had already answered so I did not feel the need to repeat myself. I am sorry, the question is open to any open theist who wants to answer.

I'am not an open theist,as a matter of fact I don't know what kind of theist I am - except Christian Theist. But could you repeat the question....