Can God learn?
If God knows everything, then there is nothing for God to learn. Right?
Learning
is one of the most important things that human beings, as well as other
living things, do. We eagerly teach our children, our students, even
our pets, and we take pleasure when we see them mastering a new task or
gaining a new insight. The person who cannot--or worse, will not--learn
is someone we feel sorry for or avoid. We see growth and development as
positive and the capacity to learn as being open to newness.
And
yet, from a traditional perspective, the answer to the question of
whether God can learn like humans is a definitive "No!" God is
omniscient--all-knowing--and so there is nothing for God to learn. God
already knows everything. Case closed. But why should learning separate
us, who are made in the image and likeness of God, from God?
First,
the idea that God knows everything and so does not need to hear our
concerns conveys the dangerous idea that God does not care about us. But
the Bible tells us the opposite: God is love. God's love for humankind
was such that God came into the world as a human being in the person of
Jesus. In the incarnation, God took on flesh. We are told that Jesus
"grew in wisdom, age, and grace." He was taught by Mary and Joseph and
learned many things from them. Jesus is one with the Father and the
Spirit and, in this sense, the whole Trinity "learns." The idea that
Jesus did not need to learn--or eat, or suffer--is heretical: It denies
Jesus' full humanity.
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