This wouldn't work because, firstly, it is not what Paul seems to me to be saying in Romans 1
I never said that this was the content of Romans 1. I was providing an option which would make your statement above -- the one regarding God's triune nature, that either 1. non-Christian monotheists would have an excuse, or 2. trinitarianism can be definitively proven from nature -- a false dichotomy.
secondly, because it has nothing to say to the countless men and women who died, without excuse, prior to any Scriptures being written. They were without excuse before God, yet they did not have the revealed Word of God written on paper to convict them, so that cannot be what is the damning factor in natural revelation.
I never said that the revealed Word is what damns people. In fact, I provided an explicit example given the case of people who never receive the Word: "Therefore if someone doesn't believe in a triune God, they are damned for their own sin and not necessarily for their lack of belief in the triune God (this would apply to those tribes that never hear the Gospel)."
Also, I'm not sure what you mean when you say, "they did not have the revealed Word of God written on paper to convict them, so that cannot be what is the damning factor in natural revelation" -- you seem to be saying, If people did not have special revelation to convict them, then special revelation can't be the part of natural revelation that convicts them. But this does not make sense, for special revelation is not a subset of natural revelation. (I'm guessing this is not really an error at all in content, and that it is merely due to your fatigue as you noted at the end of your note, so you can leave this alone if you want.)
To smooth out the rough edges, I'll just state my position right here: people are without excuse and have some type of knowledge of God from mere natural revelation. The Bible is obviously God's Word and will be immediately accepted as His Word to any whose eyes God has opened; all who reject it are
prima facie wrong in their rejection of it. Therefore, all are damned who never hear the Gospel (because convicted through natural revelation), and those who have somewhat of a knowledge of the Bible (
viz. enough to know that God is triune) are punished for their denial of the Trinity, because they should have accepted the Bible as authoritative and therefore the Trinity as solid doctrine. But those who do not hear the Word are still damned; however they are not punished for their non-trinitarianism -- since they never were aware it was in the Bible anyway.
How does a person go about taking the belief in God produced in them and distorting it willfully? When, at what point in life, does this occur?
That's a good question. I'm not sure of the mechanics of it, but I can tell you that all natural men "suppress the truth by their wickedness...what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them" (Romans 1:18-19).
And Bahnsen spends a long time in
Van Til's Apologetic outlining the awkwardness of this case. Chapter 6 is entitled "The Psychological Complexities of Unbelief," pp. 405-460. It's obviously not a very simple thing to discuss -- such as, When in life does this occur? Steven, I obviously do not know that, but neither is such a topic very crucial to the present discussion.
And the objection that the sensus divinitatis producing false beliefs in them because of sin would be unfair, because they are not believing those things willfully, sounds like the objection that men can't be held responsible for sin because their physical state is such that they can't do otherwise. They are not given the "opportunity" to obey the law so they can't be held responsible.
It absolutely
can be a viable objection. There has to be
some sense of ability-to-do-otherwise that accompanies moral responsibility (not in the Pelagian/free will sense, of course -- I'm still an extremely staunch theological determinist); otherwise the analogies which are supposed to be arguments -- such as "God wouldn't punish a rock for falling; so also He wouldn't punish sinners for doing what they must do" -- would absolutely hold water.
By the way, I contend that this ability to do otherwise consists of the ability given a contrary desire, a counterfactual ability to do otherwise. I wrote a paper on this for my philosophy of religion class if you (or anyone reading) is interested.
Even if you would never grant any of the preceding two paragraphs, though, it is still clear that people cannot be held morally responsible for wrong beliefs if they did nothing to get them, or if they did not distort other beliefs that were actually good. Such people would be doing the best they can given their situation; they would be doing nothing wrong. People cannot be held morally responsible for things that they do not mistreat. That'd be like giving a child a broken toy and spanking him for breaking it.
You might counter that totally depraved sinners are doing the best they can and therefore cannot be punished for their necessary sin (to imply a
reductio ad absurdum of my argument), but I reply that it still within sinners' ability
in a sense to be sinless -- namely, if they had godly desires and a new heart -- the same distinction I outlined above, one of counterfactual desire. (Of course, this never occurs this side of heaven, and there is no free will for sinners to choose this, but that's beside the point. The ability exists in a sense, which is crucial to the argument.)
And please, please, anyone reading this -- don't mistake what I wrote for Pelagianism or Wesleyan holiness.
I hope you recover on your sleep, Steven.
