PHIL 3910: Short Essay

Is God’s inability to create a stone too heavy for him to lift a restriction on his power?

Introduction

Understanding the Paradox of the Stone requires assumptions and concessions to be made.

Firstly, the existence of God is a necessary assumption, and secondly, that He is omnipotent

- whatever form that may take. Omnipotence is the idea of maximal power, meaning that ‘no

being could exceed the overall power of an omnipotent being’ (Hoffman and Rosenkrantz

2017). It should also be understood that power and ability are distinct features - a maximally

powerful being circumstantially prevented from acting on their power is not omnipotent

(Hoffman and Rosenkrantz 2017).

The Paradox of the Stone

The Paradox of the Stone explores the limits of God’s omnipotence - namely, whether He can

create a stone sufficiently heavy so that He cannot move it, and if so, is this a restriction of

His power? The paradox, paraphrased from Savage (1967, pp.74) is as follows:

A1. Either God is able to create a stone He cannot lift, or He is not able to create a

stone He cannot lift.

A2. If God is able to create a stone He cannot lift, He is not omnipotent as He is

unable to lift the stone.

A3. If God is not able to create a stone He cannot lift, He is not omnipotent as He is

unable to create the stone.

A4. God is not omnipotent.

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All answers to the Paradox of the Stone rely on the presupposed definition of God’s

omnipotence. Mavrodes suggests that, assuming God is omnipotent, it would be self-

contradictory for God to create a stone He cannot lift and therefore it does not constitute a

limitation of His power as it renders a main premise (A3) of the argument false (Savage 1967,

pp.74). Everitt adds that if it were logically possible for God to create a stone He could not lift,

it would be reasonable to believe that he could also render Himself non-omnipotent. As

omnipotence is one of His essential attributes, doing so would be unmaking Himself as God.

Then assuming that God exists necessarily it would not be logically possible for Him to create

the stone in question (Everitt 2010, pp.79). So then the question becomes, is the inability to

perform a self-contradictory task a restriction of God’s omnipotence? Descartes made it clear

that to him, part of God’s omnipotence included that ability to perform tasks that were self-

contradictory, namely ‘making a mountain without a valley and arranging that the sum of one

and two is not three’ (Wertz 1984, pp.18).

Savage’s solution

The paradox is parodied by Plantinga through McEar, whose personal essence is defined by

the single action he can perform - scratching his ear. As he is unfailingly able to fulfil what is

logically possible for him to do, he therefore possesses the power to ‘bring about every state

of affairs compatible with his own nature’ and is omnipotent (Baillie & Hagen 2008, pp.24).

This is of course absurd and it would be difficult to find someone who agrees with the notion

that McEar qualifies for omnipotence. What is needed then is a reconstitution of the paradox

which takes into account the issues raised by McEar and the concessions necessary to

facilitate God’s omnipotence. Savage (1967, pp.76) restated the paradox replacing God with

x, paraphrased as follows:

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 PHIL 3910: Short Essay

B1. Either x is able to create a stone x cannot lift, or x is not able to create a stone x

cannot lift.

B2. If x is able to create a stone which x cannot lift, there is at least one task x lacks

the ability to perform.

B3. If x is not able to create a stone which x cannot lift, there is at least one task x

lacks the ability to perform.

B4. There is therefore at least one task x lacks the ability to perform.

B5. If x is omnipotent, x has the ability to perform any task.

B6. x is not omnipotent.

The solution to this problem as presented by Savage lies in the assumptions made about B3

- ‘If x is not able to create a stone which x cannot lift, there is at least one task x lacks the

ability to perform’. Unlike the solutions of Mavrodes and Everitt, Savage does not believe the

solution is that the creation of the stone is a self-contradictory task - rather that our

assumptions are wrong. Replacing God with x makes God’s omnipotence irrelevant and

therefore immune to criticism of that nature. While B2 does in fact denote a lack of

omnipotence in the form of a task that cannot be performed, B3 does not. In order to

understand this, the statement can be reworded - ‘x is not able to create a stone which x

cannot lift’ becomes ‘x can create a stone which x can lift’, and therefore, any stone created

by x can be lifted by x. This clearly does not describe a limit of x’s omnipotence, and therefore

B3 ‘does not logically imply “There is a task which x cannot perform”’ (Savage 1967, pp.77).

Caution must be taken when replacing x with God however, as He holds the essential

attribute of maximal power and is presumably therefore capable of performing any task. God

presumably enjoys the power to create a stone of any size, and to lift a stone of any size. For

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God to be unable create a stone He cannot lift and for that to be a limitation of His power, He

must only be unable to create stones of any size, or unable to lift a stone of any size. Until

proven otherwise we can assume that God can in fact create a stone of any size and lift a

stone of any size, and that therefore His inability to create a stone he cannot lift is a direct

consequence of the war between two necessary components of His omnipotence (Savage

1967, pp. 78-79). The ability to create a stone of any size, and the ability to lift a stone of any

size necessitates that God is not able to create a stone He cannot lift, and therefore, any

stone created by God can be lifted by God (Wertz 1984, pp.17, Savage 1967, pp.79).

Wertz’s solution

Another solution posed by Wertz argued in the logic of Descartes that ‘God can create a

stone of any size but that stone, if it is to qualify as a body or as a stone, must be movable’, -

in other words, if if it is not movable, it is not a stone or any other body (1984, pp.19).

Descartes believes that God is maximally powerful and ‘can do anything, no matter how

problematic. The only condition is that the “stone” or entity in question must be a

stone’ (Wertz 1984, pp.19). It is impossible for God to create a stone he cannot lift as to

Descartes, a stone must, by definition, be liftable (Wertz 1984, pp.20). Whilst this solution

does resolve the issue of unliftable stones, it does nothing to attack the problem of the limits

of God’s omnipotence. By asserting that any stone must be liftable in order to be a stone,

you have merely redirected the question to a more comfortable territory. The question was

not so much ‘what is the heaviest physical object God can lift’, but ‘does God’s maximal

power break down when put in direct opposition of other aspects of his omnipotence?’

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Everitt’s solution

Everitt argued that God only need be powerful, not omnipotent; knowledgable but not

omniscient; and good, but not perfectly so - ‘it is not as if there is any overwhelming Biblical

warrant for the traditional attributions’ (Everitt 2010, pp.86). A non-omnipotent God however

raises uncomfortable questions about His limits, and requires a redefinition of the nature of

God as written and understood by most theists. Savage’s solution permits an omnipotent

God, and does not require a large departure from the traditional understanding of God in

order to be true. Savage’s answer is compatible with the established divine attributes and the

concessions necessary in order to facilitate God’s omnipotence.

Conclusion

God’s inability to create a stone He cannot lift does not imply a restriction of His power. The

illusion of the Paradox of the Stone lies in assumptions about what constitutes a lack of

omnipotence and misleading phrasing. Assuming that God is omnipotent and that He

possesses the ability to make a stone of any size, and to lift a stone of any size, he must

therefore be maximally powerful. Once that is understood, it becomes clear that God cannot

create a stone He cannot lift, and therefore, God can lift all stones He creates.

References

Baillie, J & Hagen, J 2008, ‘There cannot be two omnipotent beings’, International Journal for
Philosophy of Religion, vol. 64, no. 1, pp. 21-33 <https://doi-
org.proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/10.1007/s11153-007-9152-7>.

Everitt, N 2010, ‘The Divine Attributes’, Philosophy Compass, vol. 5, no. 1, pp. 78-90, <doi:
10.1111/j.1747-9991.2009.00264.x>.

Hoffman, J & Rosenkrantz, G 2017, 'Omnipotence', Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford

Encyclopedia of Philosophy, <plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2017/entries/omnipotence/>.

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Savage, C. W 1967, ‘The Paradox of the Stone’, The Philosophical Review, vol. 76, no. 1,
pp. 74-79, <www.jstor.org/stable/2182966>.

Wertz, S. K 1984, ‘Descartes and the paradox of the stone’, Sophia, vol. 23, no. 1, pp.
16-24, <https://doi-org.proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/10.1007/BF02780821>.

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