"[I]f God is sovereign and exists a se, then (a) he has created everything distinct from himself, (b) there is nothing upon which he depends for his existence and character, (c) everything distinct from him depends upon him, and (d) everything is within his control" (78). Plantinga thinks the most important part of this intuition is (d), and that (a)-(c) are in some way emergent from the truth of (d). God is a necessarily existent being; He also has necessary properties (e.g goodness, love, justice, mercy, etc.). If the "sovereignty-aseity intuition" is conjoined with these features, problems appear to arise rather quickly.
First, how do these divine properties exist? If they exist apart from God such that they are also necessarily existing entities that have always existed--similar to how a Platonist might say the forms or numbers exist--then it appears that every part of the intuition (Except (b)) is violated. If divine properties exist in this way, then (a) he has not created everything distinct from himself, (c) not everything distinct from him depends upon him, and (d) not everything is within his control, since the divine properties could not have failed to exist if they are necessary entities.
So, if the sovereignty-aseity intuition is going to be maintained, we don't want to endorse this kind of platonism about abstract objects. What about nominalism, then? This is roughly the view that denies the existence of abstract objects that exist as properties. God might be omniscient because he knows all knowable facts, but this does not entail that there is an abstract property of omniscience that he can participate in. Well, Plantinga ends up rejecting this too: while abstract properties can be dismissed, characterizations cannot. If God is omniscient not in a way that requires participating in an abstract object, it still seems that the characterization 'God knows all things' still necessarily exists in some way.
Classical theism goes a different direction. They say that God is identical to his essence so that he is one substance and is therefore identical with his properties--though these properties do not individuate the substance of God. But Plantinga claims this is an insufficient solution for two reasons:
"In the first place if God is identical with each of his properties, then each of his properties is identical with each of his properties, so that God has but one property. This seems flatly incompatible with the obvious fact that God has several properties...In the second place, if God is identical with each of his properties, then, since each of his properties is a property, he is a property--a self-exemplifying property. Accordingly...If God is a property, then he isn't a person but a mere abstract object..." (47).
I'll add a third complaint here that has to do with the sovereignty-aseity intuition: If God necessarily exists and necessarily exemplifies certain properties, even if the classical theist is able to make it such that God is merely one substance while exemplifying a variegated set of properties, it seems that (d) is violated because he had no say in his constitution--he just is simple.
Another time this week, I want to take a look at responses to this argument from classical theists, because from what I understand, this argument of Plantinga's is known to be problematic by most metaphysicians (even non-classical theists) concerned with models of God.
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