Can God Change The Past?

Since God is all-powerful, He isn’t limited by space and time. So, can He change the past? Could He go back and undo WWII or stop Lincoln’s assassination? Thomas has this to say:

There does not fall under the scope of God’s omnipotence anything that implies a contradiction.

Since God is omnipotent, there are things He cannot do. God’s inability to do these things actually proves His power and in no way diminishes it. For example, an immortal man cannot die, an invincible army cannot lose, and an omnipotent God cannot contradict Himself. Each of these has a perfection that precludes the possibility of incurring the opposite defect. If a man were not immortal, he could die; if an army were not invincible, it could lose; and if God were not omnipotent, He could contradict Himself.

Thomas continues: 

That the past should not have been implies a contradiction. For as it implies a contradiction to say that Socrates is sitting, and is not sitting, so does it to say that he sat, and did not sit. But to say that he did sit is to say that it happened in the past. To say that he did not sit, is to say that it did not happen. Whence, that the past should not have been, does not come under the scope of divine power. This is what Augustine means when he says: “Whosoever says, If God is almighty, let Him make what is done as if it were not done, does not see that this is to say: If God is almighty let Him effect that what is true, by the very fact that it is true, be false:” and the Philosopher says: “Of this one thing alone is God deprived—namely, to make undone the things that have been done.”

The Principle of Non-Contradiction states that a thing cannot be and not be at the same time in the same way. No surprise there. If Socrates is sitting, he is not standing; if he was sitting, he was not standing. But, if God changed the past and made Socrates sit while he was standing, it would be true that Socrates was sitting and standing simultaneously; this is a contradiction and, therefore, impossible. 

If God caused something to happen and undid it later, He would contradict Himself. 

Analogously, when a college student changes his major from Biology to Theology, he changes his mind, and his older self contradicts his younger self. This is not a problem for him because his will is mutable and his mind is ignorant. Perhaps he changed majors because he discovered how much he enjoyed reading Thomas Aquinas, so he abandoned his plan to become a physician. (That’s what happened to me). 

God is omniscient and immutable, so He cannot change His mind the way I changed my field of study. 

To make another analogy, God writes history the way men write books. The difference is that God is a perfect author who comprehends and composes His entire work instantly and not page by page. Since the Author of Life makes no mistakes, He writes in pen and makes no edits. If God were not an omnipotent author, He would write in pencil to fix His errors. Since God can do no wrong, He does not need to edit His creation and undo what he has done. 

To summarize, God cannot self-contradict; therefore, He cannot undo the past. 

Thanks for reading,

Reference: 

https://aquinas.cc/la/en/~ST.I.Q25.A4.C

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