From
@e v e on our old forum
there is an incredible text written on fatalism. Dodds,
The Greeks and the Irrational.
fatalism's essentially a greek thing at heart, as to its inception,
and relates to the greek fear of their gods (=satanic beings, fallen angels)
concerning their determinism of every detail of life...
the greeks feared those beings.. Christ had not come yet,
this was pre 0AD. and the greeks felt forced to obey them... it was bondage.
---fatalism is based on the capricious and cruel nature of
those gods (fallen angels).
it's interesting the term got adapted to situations outside its original intent.
that the gods were fatal to the soul, and compare, every greek tale tells of the gods 'fooling man.'
On one hand it all (the greek philosophy)
seems so rational.... (e.g., Aristotle's substance and causality, plato's view of God as unaffected, the unmoved mover etc.)
until it's utter empty sickening cruelty is understood.
the book is a download on scribd.
Scribd is the world's largest social reading and publishing site.
www.scribd.com
Or it is on amazon.
Bringing this up because Christianity and fatalism have zero in common.
God Directing All reality and His outcome happening
, is not fatalism whatsoever.
That said, determinism and free will are early modern concepts, after descartes and after the medieval was ending, and related to the "self" that esau was bringing in. It has different roots than does fatalism. Different concept but also, not Christian. The greeks had no idea of a 'self' or 'free will'.
Only a deity had 'will'.
Saying that God knows and directs all reality and that He decides what will happen
(which is TRUE!) is
NOT
the same as any of these essentially pagan terms and systems:
fatalism (greek) -- explained above in cliff note form
determinism (early modern) -- not explained due to space
occasionalism (leibniz) -- not explained due to space
free will-ism (early modern) -- not explained due to space
debating all this is a waste of time...
God never uses such terms...does He