1. Did God actively and purposely plant the Garden and take Adam and put him in the Garden with the Tree and the Serpent, knowing the outcome beforehand with all certainty? Yes. And this would fall under the category of "decree".
2. Did God willingly permit Adam to freely choose disobedience, to take of the fruit and sin; and did this sin culminate in a situation where God's preordained plan of redemption (the Lamb slain before the foundations of the world; God's Provision) would be worked out? Yes. And this would God ordaining via his permissive will Adam to sin (not that Adam should sin, but that in sinning Adam's fall served God's redemptive and eternal purpose).
Are we ready to look at your logic yet?
As a reminder to you (and anyone else who stumbles by), what I charged you with was holding a faulty logic. You confirm that God knew before Creation that placing Adam in the Garden would result in Adam sinning. And you confirmed that God created Adam, planted the Garden, placed Adam in the Garden all the while knowing that this would result in Adam's sin. Your conclusion is that God was unwilling for Adam to sin.
Since I believe God knew before Creation what would happen when Adam was placed in the Garden, and I believe that God willingly created Adam, planted the Garden, and put Adam in the Garden, then my only logical recourse is to believe that the Fall was decreed.
Since I believe that God created Adam with the freedom to choose,that God does not force men to sin, and that Adam of his own accord chose to sin (otherwise Adam's action could not be defined as "sin"), I believe that God permitted Adam's sin.
Logical Fallacy - Begging the Question. You are assuming that God's ordaining (allowing to occur by his permissive will) of the fall would cause God to be a participant in Adam's sin. I suppose you would believe the same if we were speaking of God "decreeing" the fall as well.
You carry several presuppositions into your short declaration here. First, that it is even possible for God to sin. Second, that sin can be established solely trough objective action. Your conclusion is along the line of accusing God of sin because he had ordained that Joseph's brothers sell him. Or that God sinned if the Crucifixion was a part of his plan of redemption.
He would be a participant if he renders whatever he permits certain..Or as you said, he permits with certainty. See even permission is a loaded term far removed from the normal and natural meaning.
Essentially, permission and decrees are virtually indistinguishable...just fancy and deceptive word play
The Fall is that transition of man from a state of holiness (in that man was yet without sin) to one of unrighteousness. Adam sinned, his eyes were opened, and God removed him from the Garden (from his direct presence). This is why the term is called "the Fall".
This is why I'm not a Calvinist. They believe that God has a part in our committing sin.
If this were true and it isn't. Then man has no responsibility for his own actions. Man would be made to sin and forced to be saved. Man has no purpose he's just a lump of clay. This makes no sense at all. It means God doesn't know what He is doing. We all may as well ignore the scriptures and go ahead and sin anyway because God ordained it. If He hadn't ordained it then we would not sin. Whether we are saved or not, sin or not isn't even up to us. If I believed this I would have to ask myself why bother to live. We are all just puppets on a string. Why have any hope or faith for that matter. We wouldn't even have the ability to Love.
MB
Thank you and I'd agree. Fall was change for worse occasioned by sin/rebellion.
In my finite and negligible wisdom, I view decrees as commands akin to creative commands; 'let there be...'
If there was no 'let there be...' say light, there would have been no light. So I can confidently assert that light for instance was necessitated by the 'let there be light...' command. The command caused light.
Question was, had there been no Fall decree, would man have transitioned? Or in other words did this decree necessitate the transition?
Permissive will lives in the imagination of Calvinist. It's simply not found in scripture neither is God decreeing Adam's fall. God doesn't permit sin. He gave men a choice to make in life either follow Him or sin If I'm wrong then correct me with scripture. God did not create sin. Sin exist because of the Laws against doing certain things. The Law is God's directive and it's sin not to keep His laws. If God was willing that man sin then He would not have given us directions to follow. If He were willing that we sin why give us the Law, or directions?.
MB
Exactly!!!
God would be a participant in those things he renders certain. Now, look at my statements. You determined permissive will and active will indistinguishable (we disagree here, that they can be the same does not make since to me). But I absolutely agree that God is a participant in Creation insofar as Creation itself exists in and through him. God participated in the Fall. Definitely. God created Adam, put him in the Garden, gave the command (created the "law"), expelled man....God, by virtue of his Creatorship, was a participant in the Fall.
BUT God was not a participant in the sin. This is what you are missing. Sin, the Bible teaches, comes from within man. God did not participate in Adam's sin.
But before you can look at this you have an inconsistency to deal with in your own reasoning.
NO Calvinist that I have ever read, other than certain Hyper ones, would ever associate the Lord with being th One to cause
the Fall by making Adam sin!