Freedom of the will - Edwards - V - Part III commenced

Required reading
Freedom of the Will by Jonathan Edwards (available from Amazon or free here) - Commence Part III by reading Sections I to III.
My summary
Now in Part III Edwards looks at whether free will is necessary if humans are to be moral creatures with virtues and vices, praise and dispraise.  This is because the Arminians argue that: 'If all human actions are necessary, virtue and vice must be empty names; we being capable of nothing that is blameworthy, or deserveth praise; for who can blame a person for doing only what he could not help, or judge that he deserveth praise only for what he could not avoid?'

So in Section I Edwards argues that if man has no free will and therefore no morality, then God who is necessarily holy must also have no morality.

In Section II Edwards repeats the argument of Section I but in application to Jesus - it was impossible for Jesus to sin but he nonetheless Jesus is praised for his morality.

Then Section III answers the Arminian charge that man is 'unblamable' for sin if he has no freewill.  Edwards answers this by pointing out that the Arminians do accept that it is 'difficult' for man not to sin and this is essentially the same thing: 'From all which it follows, that a strong bent and bias one way, and difficulty of going the contrary, never causes a person to be at all more exposed to sin, or any thing blamable: because, as the difficulty is increased, so much the less is required and expected. Though in one respect, exposedness to sin is increased, viz. by an increase of exposedness to the evil action or omission; yet it is diminished in another respect, to balance it; namely, as the sinfulness or blamableness of the action or omission is diminished in the same proportion. So that, on the whole, the affair, as to exposedness to guilt or blame, is left just as it was.'

What grabbed me
The first two sections today were major body blows to Arminianism. 

If the Arminians are right in claiming that anyone who performs tasks out of necessity is not worthy of praise, then when God and Jesus act in accordance to the necessity of their holiness, God and Jesus are not worthy of praise: 'So that, putting these things together, the infinitely holy God — who always used to be esteemed by God’s people not only virtuous, but a Being in whom is all possible virtue, in the most absolute purity and perfection, brightness and amiableness; the most perfect pattern of virtue, and from whom all the virtue of others is but as beams from the sun; and who has been supposed to be, (being thus every where represented in Scripture,) on the account of his virtue and holiness, infinitely more worthy to be esteemed, loved, honoured, admired, commended, extolled, and praised, than any creature — this Being, according to this notion of Dr. Whitby, and other Arminians, has no virtue at all; virtue, when ascribed to him, is but an empty name; and he is deserving of no commendation or praise; because he is under necessity, he cannot avoid being holy and good as he is; therefore no thanks to him for it. It seems, the holiness, justice, faithfulness, &c. of the Most High, must not be accounted to be of the nature of that which is virtuous and praiseworthy. They will not deny, that these things in God are good; but then we must understand them, that they are no more virtuous, or of the nature of any thing commendable, than the good that is in any other being that is not a moral agent as the brightness of the sun, and the fertility of the earth, are good, but not virtuous, because these properties are necessary to these bodies, and not the fruit of self-determining power.'

This is a powerful, powerful argument!

Next week's reading
Conclude Part III by reading Sections IV to VII.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.