What It Is

A well-known question with a catch. If you respond “no, he cannot,” then God is not omnipotent. If you respond “yes, he can”, then the rock would by definition exceed God’s power – which again means God has limits.

Then, if either way God is not almighty, there is little use of him, and perhaps he does not exist at all. Checkmate, theists.

This is the so-called Paradox of a Stone, a particular instance of the broader family of omnipotence paradoxes. The same idea in other forms: “can the almighty God, within Euclidian geometry, create a square triangle? Can he draw two parallel lines that intersect?”

All of them reduce to: “if God is omnipotent, can he perform something logically self-contradictory?”

Possible Answers

One answer is both poetic and pastorally useful:

“Yes, God has already created such a stone. It is the human heart.”

Then you explain that this refers to free will. God has granted it to humans and never takes it back, even if we use it for evil.

This answer may work well in a casual discussion. But, strictly speaking, it is inaccurate. Free will per se does not impose any limitations on divine omnipotence. God preserves it inviolate because he has freely decided to do so, but he could revoke it easily if he wished.

What Do Theologians Say?

The classic answer, given by St. Thomas Aquinas:

the word “omnipotent” means “able to do anything that is possible”, not “anything including what is impossible”.

This resolves the problem at its root.

C. S. Lewis puts it memorably:

“…not because His power meets an obstacle, but because nonsense remains nonsense even when we talk it about God.”

Later thinkers refined the distinction with terms such as “accidental omnipotence”, “essential omnipotence”, and others.

And what about carefree omnipotence? Sounds like something I’d have on a lazy Sunday.

We will not explore them in depth, because ultimately they remain within the same framework: God is omnipotent in the way that is always logically coherent.

This fits perfectly into the broader Thomistic picture, where God is the living Truth – and therefore, the living Order, Law, and Logic itself as well.

Then the question “can God do something intrinsically self-contradictory?” becomes equivalent to asking “can God stop being God”, or even “Can God cease to exist.”

Not Bad, But…

This approach, though solid, harbors a certain weakness. It forces God into bounds of formal logic. God appears as if compelled to obey something, even if that “something” was his own nature. This creates an unsettling impression that logic, in some way, is “stronger” than God himself.

I find this slightly arrogant. The human mind is finite; yes, we can indeed grasp something about God, but we should never grow overconfident. God transcends us, and our understanding, infinitely.

Thus, I want to discuss a second approach, a much less known one.

Absolute Omnipotence

This line of defense originates with Descartes and unfolds as follows:

Q. Can God create a rock he will not be able to lift?

A. Yes, he can.

Q. But then, by definition, God cannot lift this stone, therefore he is not omnipotent.

A. No. God can do anything whatever, so he can lift this stone.

Q. But then God can and cannot lift this stone simultaneously! That is a flat contradiction.

A. Exactly. However, this appears contradictory only to us, humans, who can operate solely within the bounds of formal logic. But God is not obliged to restrict himself to the law of non-contradiction. We cannot imagine how such a thing is possible, because it lies outside the capacities of our finite nature. Yet for God, nothing is impossible.

So, God is omnipotent in a way that transcends even the laws of logic. What seems to us an unresolvable paradox is not so for him.

Advantages of This Approach

This answer has several decisive strengths.

It protects the sublimity of God while evidently showing our own limitations. The trap springs shut on the trapper: instead of us proudly “catching God in a web of logic”, we end up catching ourselves.

It also challenges the hegemony of positivism, which often lurks beneath the surface of atheism or scientism.

Such a perspective is healthily humbling. For centuries, people believed they more or less “figured out how God works.” This led to complacency and, arguably, to crises of Christian faith. This approach slaps us awake, restoring God and us to our proper places.

This answer is unexpected. It has a striking, disorienting effect. I have personally witnessed opponents rendered literally speechless when this argument was brought into a discussion.

Instead of getting bogged down in endless semantic hair-splitting – and thereby playing into the opponent’s hand – you pull the rug out from under them in a single motion.

The very fact this approach is so little-known shows how poorly we understand God. Even more, how poorly we understand the fact that we understand him poorly.

God stands above even the most fundamental mechanisms of our thinking. Before him, even logic, our infallible lodestar, is merely an instrument: immensely useful, yes, but limited.

Such an insight can clear the fog from the mind and rekindle proper awe before the divine. It refreshes the faith that has grown stale. It is the very remedial pill of apophatic theology that every theologian and every thinking Christian would do well to swallow.

Discussion

However, there are serious objections to this approach.

The main one is:

If God can break the law of non-contradiction and contain mutually exclusive properties, then we can say nothing about him at all. For example, it would become possible to claim that he both exists and does not exist; that he is both good and evil. Any discussion would become meaningless, since rational inquiry can be built only on formal logic.

I respond:

Saying that “God is above logic” does not mean he defies it entirely, but rather that he creates, encompasses and transcends it.

God is neither a-logical nor anti-logical, he is hyper-logical: meaning fully logical and beyond that.

This clarification does not break logic or undermine God’s nature, but emphasizes His transcendence.

This does not deprive us of the ability to speak of God. Some, not all, aspects or acts of God may appear paradoxical to us, but they are not paradoxical to him.

Moreover: God can act above our logic if he wills – but that does not mean he wills to do so. In fact, God remains consistently logical and good: not because formal logic forces Him into this particular track, but because he himself chooses to act as He does.

Further

One may still object:

But if God can, in principle, break or transcend logic at his will – even if he usually refrains – then his revelation might contain fallacious or inscrutable parts, without our ever noticing it. God’s modus operandi becomes too arbitrary, which would turn out all our knowledge of him unreliable.

I respond:

In a certain way, yes, all human knowledge of God is unreliable. Everything we say about him we say by analogy. “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways.”

When we say “God is good”, we state something true, but far less direct than when we say “the leaf is green.”

Even the most rigorous Thomist will agree with this.

Nevertheless, as we have already noted, God freely chooses to be logical and knowable to the extent that we are capable of perceiving. This is precisely why he unfolds within earthly history a gradual process of revealing truth about himself, that reaches its climax when He becomes flesh in Jesus Christ.

We can reliably trust that knowledge of God that the God himself formulated and handed over to us.

Conclusion

God indeed can, if he so wishes, create a rock he cannot lift, and still lift it.

But he generally does not will to create such rocks.

God stands above formal logic and has no obligation to obey it, yet he chooses to appear and act coherently. He does that freely, out of love to us.

This is both frightening and reassuring. It allows for mystery, liberty, majesty, awe, love and faith all at once.

May God Almighty lift our hearts of stone to Heaven, where our true home awaits. Amen.

P.S. Clash with Thomism?