(07-09-2023, 03:28 PM)Lucidus Wrote: You don't find this to be a rather sadistic and capricious game; in any way?
God knew they would sin.
He created them anyway. They did what they were created to do.
God found them guilty of what he knew they would do.
He punishes them even though they only did what they were created to do.
Why is it that God is exempt from blame, given that he purposely created the entire situation?
I know we were having a debate about this some time ago and it was a good dicussion but I think I just lost time in getting back to what we were talking about, but I'd like to jump back in on this.
I think the problem with the framework you've created here is in the bold.
Notice you said "They did what they were created to do". It sounds like you're saying we were created to sin, which I disagree with. We were created to choose. Our choices are between God and sin. I don't find that to be evil when we have been offered an everlasting alternative to suffering. Had God not given us an alternative then I'd be honest in saying that would be really concerning to me.
Quote:Why is it that human beings must accept the blame and responsibility for that which God chose to create? Could God have chosen to create a world in which the garden scenario plays out differently?
I believe God is responsible for giving us the ability to choose. However, I don't believe he is responsible for the choices that we make. To me, that is the difference. If you had the foreknowledge that someone was going to use a gun to commmit a mass shooting, and you put that gun near the shooter, I wouldn't say you were responsible for the shooting. However, I would say you were responsible for the gun being there for that person to use, but that doesn't make you responsible for the shooting actually happening because the shooting doesn't happen until the perpatrator makes the individualistic choice to use the gun.
Quote:God creates a world with sin.
Then comes in human form to offer a path of forgiveness for the sin he created.
However, he'll only provide salvation to those willing to plead guilty to the crimes hecreated them to commit.
Again, there's a problem with the framework here.
I wouldn't say God "created" sin, but rather sin is the by proiduct of God's law. In the same way in which human beings don't "create" crime, but rather it's the laws we put in place that "create" crime. Without human laws there is no such thing as crime, just as without God's law there would be no such thing as sin. It's kind of like how shadows aren't really "created". They are simply the by product of light acting on a physical object {like God 's laws or human laws}. You take away the light and suddenly shadows no longer "exist".
Notice you said God offers salvation to "the crimes he created them to commit". Well, that's not a true statement. God did not create us to commt crimes. He created us with the intention that we won't act in sinful ways, but we then choose to be sinful or "commit crimes."
I often find it very curious -- for all those that believe this particular version of the story -- as to what metric they used to determine that God was the good character and Satan was the bad. When their actions are compared, they're in no way comparable, in terms of pure evil; at least in terms of the stories as they're told in the Bible.
(07-09-2023, 06:01 PM)BigPapaKain Wrote: The Bible basically describes Satan as promoting free thought and happiness while God promotes unwavering and unquestioning fealty while spreading misery. Dude even sent his human son to die a HORRIBLE death because...love?
I'd say God is good because he is the only one that wants good things for us, offered us salvation and a life free of misery/suffering. Satan is in direct opposition of that, yet seemigly cannot offer us the same thing.
(07-09-2023, 06:29 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: I believe God is responsible for giving us the ability to choose. However, I don't believe he is responsible for the choices that we make. To me, that is the difference. If you had the foreknowledge that someone was going to use a gun to commmit a mass shooting, and you put that gun near the shooter, I wouldn't say you were responsible for the shooting. However, I would say you were responsible for the gun being there for that person to use, but that doesn't make you responsible for the shooting actually happening because the shooting doesn't happen until the perpatrator makes the individualistic choice to use the gun.
I wanted to touch on this and clarify what you are saying in your analogy. I don't think that responsibility is a binary flag but rather a spectrum. If you knew that a person was going to commit a mass shooting and you supplied them with the gun to do so, then I would argue that you absolutely have culpability for what occurred. Are you directly responsible for the shooting? No, but you played are a responsible party and you should face repercussions. Are you saying that in this scenario, you don't believe the weapon supplier should be found responsible in any way for the shooting?
This is the struggle that I face. If the argument is that god is omniscient, then he has foreknowledge of everything. He knew that by giving his creations free will, it would lead to the vast majority of them suffering for eternity and that there would be rape, murder, pillaging, betrayal, all committed by his creations. What follows is more questions about his creations, such as disease. Why did he create them with the foreknowledge that people would suffer from them and die early, miserable, painful deaths? This is why that, even if god existed, I am skeptical that he has an endless amount of love for us. He has created an impressive number of ways for us to suffer - potentially for eternity - with the foreknowledge that we would indeed do so.
I have to throw my catholic school info in here again:
We have two different approaches going head-to-head. One side says god made man, gave him free will, man sinned immediately, god kills a lot of people, blah blah blah and then Jesus dies for our sins. BUT we still have follow all the rules, ask for forgiveness if we break one and a few other steps or we suffer for all eternity.
The other view is all of that PLUS god already knows what choices we're going to make and lets it happen to teach us a lesson.
As a recovering Catholic for several years now I have had a hard time accepting that a god who created us and loves us unconditionally is also so vain and demanding that he would rather see his creations suffer during their lifetime than interfere because we "sinned".
Then it comes down to what is the sin? Are they all god given or are we take the word of the authors of multiple books, many of which contradict each other, many of which were just left out of the bible because the editors didn't like the narrative they contained vs centuries of people with power making and changing rules to suit their own needs?
Many "sins" of the past are not any more. The bible has been interpreted and reinterpreted. It has been twisted to defend many things that we look back on now as deplorable such as slavery, segregation, spousal abuse, etc.
And WE were taught that everyone who worked on all of that was being led by god himself.
But when I asked a friend if he would accept my new gospel that god told me to write he said he would have to study it and see if it "fit" in with what he was taught.
All religion is man-made.
Does that mean there is no higher power? I don't think so. I just think we'd all be better of dealing with each other in the here and now without trying to say our views are backed by an invisible man in the sky who is better that the other guy's invisible man in the sky.
Your anger and ego will always reveal your true self.
(07-09-2023, 07:27 PM)KillerGoose Wrote: I wanted to touch on this and clarify what you are saying in your analogy. I don't think that responsibility is a binary flag but rather a spectrum. If you knew that a person was going to commit a mass shooting and you supplied them with the gun to do so, then I would argue that you absolutely have culpability for what occurred. Are you directly responsible for the shooting? No, but you played are a responsible party and you should face repercussions. Are you saying that in this scenario, you don't believe the weapon supplier should be found responsible in any way for the shooting?
This is the struggle that I face. If the argument is that god is omniscient, then he has foreknowledge of everything. He knew that by giving his creations free will, it would lead to the vast majority of them suffering for eternity and that there would be rape, murder, pillaging, betrayal, all committed by his creations. What follows is more questions about his creations, such as disease. Why did he create them with the foreknowledge that people would suffer from them and die early, miserable, painful deaths? This is why that, even if god existed, I am skeptical that he has an endless amount of love for us. He has created an impressive number of ways for us to suffer - potentially for eternity - with the foreknowledge that we would indeed do so.
See what's interesting here is I think you have to separate God's "culpability" from the culpability of man. Something God can do that man 100% cannot do is offer salvation from suffering. Mathematically, any suffering we endure is negated by the fact that God offers us salvation which is infinitely more positive than any negatives you will suffer here on earth. Man cannot do this, therefore man would be much more responsible in these types of scenarios than God will ever be, because man cannot offer eternal peace to anyone.
If you believe God exists and his promise of salvation, then any suffering we endure here is actually quite minimal in the grand scheme of things. I understand that people experience terrible things in their life such as rape, murder, disease, war, disaters etc.... but these things are all finite with God. Why should God face repurcussions when he's already offered to take the suffering away, and infiitely so?
(07-09-2023, 06:29 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: I know we were having a debate about this some time ago and it was a good dicussion but I think I just lost time in getting back to what we were talking about, but I'd like to jump back in on this.
I think the problem with the framework you've created here is in the bold.
Notice you said "They did what they were created to do". It sounds like you're saying we were created to sin, which I disagree with. We were created to choose. Our choices are between God and sin. I don't find that to be evil when we have been offered an everlasting alternative to suffering. Had God not given us an alternative then I'd be honest in saying that would be really concerning to me.
Yes, that was a very good discussion indeed.
You stated that God created us to choose God or sin. If you believe God is completely omniscient, then this position suffers logical shortcomings.
If God knew all sins that would ever be committed if he created this particular version of us, and still purposely chose to create this version instead of another, then by default, we have no choice in whether we sin or not. It's already been determined by God's choice to create us. Can we choose to do differently that which God already knows we will do?
The everlasting alternative -- under the omniscient view -- seems nonsensical, as he already knows all outcomes; given that he created the world in which those outcomes would necessarily be the case.
Now, if one were to argue from a position where God is not omniscient, there are different conversations to be had.
Quote:I believe God is responsible for giving us the ability to choose. However, I don't believe he is responsible for the choices that we make. To me, that is the difference. If you had the foreknowledge that someone was going to use a gun to commmit a mass shooting, and you put that gun near the shooter, I wouldn't say you were responsible for the shooting. However, I would say you were responsible for the gun being there for that person to use, but that doesn't make you responsible for the shooting actually happening because the shooting doesn't happen until the perpatrator makes the individualistic choice to use the gun.
Let's place your analogy in the context of being omniscient:
I know in advance that a mass shooting will happen if I create a specific scenario.
I create the very scenario I already know will result in a mass shooting.
I created the mass shooting by already knowing the shooters choice and creating the scenario anyway.
Quote:Again, there's a problem with the framework here.
I wouldn't say God "created" sin, but rather sin is the by proiduct of God's law. In the same way in which human beings don't "create" crime, but rather it's the laws we put in place that "create" crime. Without human laws there is no such thing as crime, just as without God's law there would be no such thing as sin. It's kind of like how shadows aren't really "created". They are simply the by product of light acting on a physical object {like God 's laws or human laws}. You take away the light and suddenly shadows no longer "exist".
Notice you said God offers salvation to "the crimes he created them to commit". Well, that's not a true statement. God did not create us to commt crimes.He created us with the intention that we won't act in sinful ways, but we then choose to be sinful or "commit crimes."
Again, this seems rather contradictory on the omniscient version of God.
God created us with complete foreknowledge of all our sins; but also desired we not commit the sins he already knows about?
(07-09-2023, 08:15 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: See what's interesting here is I think you have to separate God's "culpability" from the culpability of man. Something God can do that man 100% cannot do is offer salvation from suffering. Mathematically, any suffering we endure is negated by the fact that God offers us salvation which is infinitely more positive than any negatives you will suffer here on earth. Man cannot do this, therefore man would be much more responsible in these types of scenarios than God will ever be, because man cannot offer eternal peace to anyone.
If you believe God exists and his promise of salvation, then any suffering we endure here is actually quite minimal in the grand scheme of things. I understand that people experience terrible things in their life such as rape, murder, disease, war, disaters etc.... but these things are all finite with God. Why should God face repurcussions when he's already offered to take the suffering away, and infiitely so?
Because he knows that, arguably, the majority of humans will not take it. He already knows everything, he is omniscient. For instance, let's say that I design an aircraft with a known flaw. This flaw will cause catastrophic failure resulting in loss of life at some point unless a series of very particular, complicated maintenance items are completed after every flight. Now, me being this engineering genius, knows that there is no way these maintenance items will be completed correctly every time as there aren't enough aircraft mechanics in the industry that are certified to do them. However, I put them into production and they go into service.
When the aircraft inevitably catastrophically fails, is the argument of "I offered the solution to prevent this from happening, look at the mechanic, it's his fault" an acceptable argument to remove any culpability from my side? I knew this would fail, just like god knew that his creations would not take up his offering of salvation. The plan is inherently flawed, but he went on with it anyway. This is why I am skeptical that he is an all-loving god, should he exist. That would strike me as more of an apathetic creator.
(07-09-2023, 08:23 PM)Lucidus Wrote: Yes, that was a very good discussion indeed.
You stated that God created us to choose God or sin. If you believe God is completely omniscient, then this position suffers logical shortcomings.
If God knew all sins that would ever be committed if he created this particular version of us, and still purposely chose to create this version instead of another, then by default, we have no choice in whether we sin or not. It's already been determined by God's choice to create us. Can we choose to do differently that which God already knows we will do?
I would say no, we cannot freely choose to do differently than what God knows we will do. But I would also argue that the inability to choose is not determined by what God knows, but by that which we have already chosen.
I think you are mistakenly treating the existence of humanity like a movie where God is the screenwriter and we are just the actors and we cannot deviate from the script which God has written. Really, we are the ones writing the movie (making the choices) and acting them out. God is more so the producer that puts money behind making the movie happen, but he is not necessarily directly involved with writing the script in relation to the choices the actors will make throughout the movie. That's not to say he isn't inviolved in the script at all, because producers are involved, it's just they're not writing every single thing that happens, just like God doesn't write everything that is happening, just parts of it.
Quote:The everlasting alternative -- under the omniscient view -- seems nonsensical, as he already knows all outcomes; given that he created the world in which those outcomes would necessarily be the case.
But without an everlasting offering from God, then there is never an outcome in which anyone will ever have everlasting life. The point being that knowledge itself does not beget the outcome. Without God's self choice of offering us everlasting life that outcome never exists.
Quote:Let's place your analogy in the context of being omniscient:
I know in advance that a mass shooting will happen if I create a specific scenario.
I create the very scenario I already know will result in a mass shooting. I created the mass shooting by already knowing the shooters choice and creating the scenario anyway.
Again, this seems rather contradictory on the omniscient version of God.
God created us with complete foreknowledge of all our sins; but also desired we not commit the sins he already knows about?
But you didn't create the mass shooting, because the shooting doesn't happen until the shooter acts it out on their own free will, much like how I just mentioned that there cannot be salvation until God chooses to give it to us. Before the shooting happens you just have the set up for the movie. Again, God sets the stage, but he doesn't write the whole script. He doesn't make us act out the shooting. Him knowing that it will happen is beside the point of the shooting actually happenning.
(07-09-2023, 06:38 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: I'd say God is good because he is the only one that wants good things for us, offered us salvation and a life free of misery/suffering. Satan is in direct opposition of that, yet seemigly cannot offer us the same thing.
God is literally the reason for misery and suffering. If he didn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, why not move the Tree of Knowledge? Or make it's fruit poisonous? Or put a fence around it?
God wanted mindless drones that looked like him. The Serpent (not Satan) convinced the dummies to break the one rule. Satan convinced God to torture Jod for...reasons. Lucifier refused to hold humanity before God and got sent to the pit for it. Every terrible thing in the Bible is direct result of God getting involved. The exception being the crucifixion of Christ, which was done because love?
Wouldn't a simpler solution be to just appear before all of humanity and say 'knock it off'?
Our father, who art in Hell
Unhallowed, be thy name
Cursed be thy sons and daughters
Of our nemesis who are to blame
Thy kingdom come, Nema
(07-09-2023, 08:31 PM)KillerGoose Wrote: Because he knows that, arguably, the majority of humans will not take it. He already knows everything, he is omniscient. For instance, let's say that I design an aircraft with a known flaw. This flaw will cause catastrophic failure resulting in loss of life at some point unless a series of very particular, complicated maintenance items are completed after every flight. Now, me being this engineering genius, knows that there is no way these maintenance items will be completed correctly every time as there aren't enough aircraft mechanics in the industry that are certified to do them. However, I put them into production and they go into service.
When the aircraft inevitably catastrophically fails, is the argument of "I offered the solution to prevent this from happening, look at the mechanic, it's his fault" an acceptable argument to remove any culpability from my side? I knew this would fail, just like god knew that his creations would not take up his offering of salvation. The plan is inherently flawed, but he went on with it anyway. This is why I am skeptical that he is an all-loving god, should he exist. That would strike me as more of an apathetic creator.
Well, I think there needs to be context for why you created the aircraft with a flaw in the first place.
God created us with free will, which is itself a flaw because free will suggests that we can do whatever we want. If we can do whatever we want then we can act in ways that are evil. But God did not create us to commit evil acts, he simply gave us the choice to. He gave us free will to be able to choose what we want, but in a limited sense of course.
I would still say God is responsible for creating us with free will, but I wouldn't say he's responsible for all the indivudal choices we make out of that free will. That's all on us because we chose to do it. Now, if God created us with free will and then literally controlled us like puppets at points in our lives and made us act out evil things that we didn't freely choose to do, I would say God is responsible for all of our evil acts. But that's not what's happening.
In regards to salvation...
God didn't have to offer us that. At all. He could have created a world where there's just a bunch of suffering and then you die. But I believe he offered us an alternative out of love. I know people will have gripes in the way that God is deciding to offer it to us, but at the end of the day I would argue that the reasons for not taking that offer seems a bit quesitonable.
For those who have a disdain for God, they want to have the free will to do what they want right? They want to be able to do all the "sinful" things they want to do, but why? Obviously because that's what's "fun" that's what's "interesting" that's what's "enjoyable", but that's all quite relative and I'd even argue a bit trivial in comparison to everlasting life in which you wouldn't get to act out those sinful desires but still have free will in a limited sense. This is because at the root of it all, we all really want peace. Eternal happiness. It's what we strive for as human beings. It's why we go to work everyday to make ends meet. It's why we have trelationships with other human beings. It's why we follow the law. It's why we eat and drink and sleep. It's why we do the majority of the things we do in life, because we want these things to lead to a happy/satisfying/peaceful outcome. Yet none of it lasts eternally.
Here comes God, offering us eternal salvation but we don't want that because we have less choice than we had before?
(07-09-2023, 09:28 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: Well, I think there needs to be context for why you created the aircraft with a flaw in the first place.
God created us with free will, which is itself a flaw because free will suggests that we can do whatever we want. If we can do whatever we want then we can act in ways that are evil. But God did not create us to commit evil acts, he simply gave us the choice to. He gave us free will to be able to choose what we want, but in a limited sense of course.
I would still say God is responsible for creating us with free will, but I wouldn't say he's responsible for all the indivudal choices we make out of that free will. That's all on us because we chose to do it. Now, if God created us with free will and then literally controlled us like puppets at points in our lives and made us act out evil things that we didn't freely choose to do, I would say God is responsible for all of our evil acts. But that's not what's happening.
In regards to salvation...
God didn't have to offer us that. At all. He could have created a world where there's just a bunch of suffering and then you die. But I believe he offered us an alternative out of love. I know people will have gripes in the way that God is deciding to offer it to us, but at the end of the day I would argue that the reasons for not taking that offer seems a bit quesitonable.
For those who have a disdain for God, they want to have the free will to do what they want right? They want to be able to do all the "sinful" things they want to do, but why? Obviously because that's what's "fun" that's what's "interesting" that's what's "enjoyable", but that's all quite relative and I'd even argue a bit trivial in comparison to everlasting life in which you wouldn't get to act out those sinful desires but still have free will in a limited sense. This is because at the root of it all, we all really want peace. Eternal happiness. It's what we strive for as human beings. It's why we go to work everyday to make ends meet. It's why we have trelationships with other human beings. It's why we follow the law. It's why we eat and drink and sleep. It's why we do the majority of the things we do in life, because we want these things to lead to a happy/satisfying/peaceful outcome. Yet none of it lasts eternally.
Here comes God, offering us eternal salvation but we don't want that because we have less choice than we had before?
Idk if I have a disdain for god or not. I can't even fully say that I believe one exists. If I did have anything close to disdain for such an entity, it's a lot less about free will to do what I want and a lot more about never having asked to be born into the morality play in the first place.
If I had a choice to be erased from time and never have been born, I would seriously consider it. The only thing that gives me pause is the impact on those close to me, but I'm not sure how much that would matter in the end.
let's be real, outside of what modern advertising has led us to believe, life is a pile of endless dogshit. We all spend 60-80 years doing things we hate and then we lose our faculties, get alienated by society, start shitting our pants, then, if we are lucky, we die somewhere with some dignity.
You can talk about endless suffering of the cosmic variety that god will inflict upon us, but the stuff we see here in real time is pretty nasty. We see it and we know it's real, and we know it happens to people for basically no reason at all every single day.
I'm just not sure what kind of. benevolent being gets gratification from watching the sorts of lives we live, as we fail endlessly to meet a perfect standard that we by definition will never achieve. That doesn't sound benevolent. That sounds like a parent or husband that beats his kids or spouse and tells them that the suffering can end if they just make the choice to do what he told them in the first place.
I read some crackpot online once who was trying to explain some other horseshit about this. His idea was that god is indeed the devil. He has laid the deception upon us that we must obey him while suffering in the world he created for us. Before that the universe existed in a state of oneness with the true "light" or god of all. It's a dangerous theory and anyone can say whatever, but it makes a solid point.
Why does an omnipotent being need to create something to worship it? What does it derive from that?
As for people having disdain out of a desire for pure sense pleasure, I find this false. This is a young person's illusion. I've gotten material things and experiences that I never thought I would acquire. Not a single one of them was worth the work I put into getting them. Not a damn one. Not one material thing I own that is anything but essential for life is something I'd say I'd miss significantly if I lost it. All I ever want is to achieve a state of contentment.
Rich people should be happy as hell by the logic that we just want to screw off and do what we want in spite of god. They're not. Most of them are still miserable assholes with screwed up lives and desires they can never satiate. it's the human condition. All money and "freedom" do is amplify the desires to the point of silliness.
(07-09-2023, 09:01 PM)BigPapaKain Wrote: God is literally the reason for misery and suffering. If he didn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, why not move the Tree of Knowledge? Or make it's fruit poisonous? Or put a fence around it?
Why does one have to conclude that God wanted them to eat from the Tree of Knowledge simply because it was there?
Quote:God wanted mindless drones that looked like him. The Serpent (not Satan) convinced the dummies to break the one rule. Satan convinced God to torture Jod for...reasons. Lucifier refused to hold humanity before God and got sent to the pit for it. Every terrible thing in the Bible is direct result of God getting involved. The exception being the crucifixion of Christ, which was done because love?
Yes, there are things that God gets directly involved in, however, that doesn't mean God is directly involved in everything.
Quote:Wouldn't a simpler solution be to just appear before all of humanity and say 'knock it off'?
No, I don't think it would. This assumes that if God revealed himself to the world then everyone would just listen and follow him.
(07-09-2023, 09:49 PM)samhain Wrote: Idk if I have a disdain for god or not. I can't even fully say that I believe one exists. If I did have anything close to disdain for such an entity, it's a lot less about free will to do what I want and a lot more about never having asked to be born into the morality play in the first place.
If I had a choice to be erased from time and never have been born, I would seriously consider it.
But in my opinion, people only say this because they've never experienced what it's like to be truly "alive". We are all dying right now. The moment we are born we literally start the process of dying. I can't say for certain what it's like to truly be alive, and by "alive" I mean living within the eternal glory of God. But what I can say is I do want to find out. God is the greatest mystery of life, and to miss out on that experience is far scarier to me than anything else in this life. To be completely honest, I don't see the downside to experiencing eternity with God, until we actually do, we can only assume what it will be like. But it can be the greatest thing we've ever experienced. I know a lot of people would argue it won't be great, but that's not what I believe.
Quote:I'm just not sure what kind of. benevolent being gets gratification from watching the sorts of lives we live, as we fail endlessly to meet a perfect standard that we by definition will never achieve. That doesn't sound benevolent. That sounds like a parent or husband that beats his kids or spouse and tells them that the suffering can end if they just make the choice to do what he told them in the first place.
I read some crackpot online once who was trying to explain some other horseshit about this. His idea was that god is indeed the devil. He has laid the deception upon us that we must obey him while suffering in the world he created for us. Before that the universe existed in a state of oneness with the true "light" or god of all. It's a dangerous theory and anyone can say whatever, but it makes a solid point.
I think that's one of the great deceptions. That in order for God to be good we must not suffer, so he must in a sense serve our interests and not his own. If God were to do that, it would in effect make him not God. And what good is a god that simply bends to the will of man? I don't believe the allowance of suffering makes God evil because we are able to escape it through the salvation he has offered us.
Quote:As for people having disdain out of a desire for pure sense pleasure, I find this false. This is a young person's illusion. I've gotten material things and experiences that I never thought I would acquire. Not a single one of them was worth the work I put into getting them. Not a damn one. Not one material thing I own that is anything but essential for life is something I'd say I'd miss significantly if I lost it. All I ever want is to achieve a state of contentment.
Rich people should be happy as hell by the logic that we just want to screw off and do what we want in spite of god. They're not. Most of them are still miserable assholes with screwed up lives and desires they can never satiate. it's the human condition. All money and "freedom" do is amplify the desires to the point of silliness.
Exactly.
My point being that our efforts to make ourselves happy/content are futile, even if temporary. It would serve us much better to turn to God and take him up on his offer of salvation and experience what it's like to truly be "alive".
(07-09-2023, 10:39 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: But in my opinion, people only say this because they've never experienced what it's like to be truly "alive". We are all dying right now. The moment we are born we literally start the process of dying. I can't say for certain what it's like to truly be alive, and by "alive" I mean living within the eternal glory of God. But what I can say is I do want to find out. God is the greatest mystery of life, and to miss out on that experience is far scarier to me than anything else in this life. To be completely honest, I don't see the downside to experiencing eternity with God, until we actually do, we can only assume what it will be like. But it can be the greatest thing we've ever experienced. I know a lot of people would argue it won't be great, but that's not what I believe.
I think that's one of the great deceptions. That in order for God to be good we must not suffer, so he must in a sense serve our interests and not his own. If God were to do that, it would in effect make him not God. And what good is a god that simply bends to the will of man? I don't believe the allowance of suffering makes God evil because we are able to escape it through the salvation he has offered us.
Exactly.
My point being that our efforts to make ourselves happy/content are futile, even if temporary. It would serve us much better to turn to God and take him up on his offer of salvation and experience what it's like to truly be "alive".
I don't think the idea is that we must not suffer. it's that we were put into a state that was highly likely to become suffering, and not by our own volition. If we were once a part of nothingness, or as this clown suggests, oneness with all of existence, then we became a part of our current existence through the hand of god. He had to know that suffering was likely if not a foregone conclusion.
It's like me offering my pet snake a live mouse. Now, I normally only feed him pre-killed, and he eats them readily. But I also know that if I offer live food, his instincts will compel him to strike and wrap. I suppose he could leave the mouse alone, as in like "anything is possible" kinds of terms. Like me finding a suitcase with 5 million cash on the way to work possible. It could happen, but it won't, and nobody would prepare as if it will. So, here's me in the role of his benevolent overseer, plopping a hapless rodent in there at the mercy of chance, all while telling my kid that if the snake eats the live mouse, imma kill his scaly ass for it. Live prey is forbidden in my house, and that's a hard rule. The only rule. Does the damn snake know that? Does he understand the human thought process about eating an animal alive and the barbarism is requires? Hell no. He's a biological eating machine. Sees heat and strikes if he's healthy. This is similar to us allegedly not being able to understand god's thought process, as it is unknowable to us. If god put that tree there, and he truly knew Adam and Eve, which he most certainly did, he knew well and good what they would do.
It all just seems very trivial for an all-knowing being. Put a thing in place that poses a test that they will most certainly fail.
(07-09-2023, 08:54 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: I would say no, we cannot freely choose to do differently than what God knows we will do. But I would also argue that the inability to choose is not determined by what God knows, but by that which we have already chosen; bound by the creators preferred reality.
The issue is that God knows the decision before it was made. When God chose to make this world instead of another, he also chose the decisions of this world as opposed to another. Our choices in any omniscient creation scenario would necessarily be contingent and unchangeable; bound by the creator's preferred reality.
Quote:I think you are mistakenly treating the existence of humanity like a movie where God is the screenwriter and we are just the actors and we cannot deviate from the script which God has written. Really, we are the ones writing the movie (making the choices) and acting them out. God is more so the producer that puts money behind making the movie happen, but he is not necessarily directly involved with writing the script in relation to the choices the actors will make throughout the movie. That's not to say he isn't inviolved in the script at all, because producers are involved, it's just they're not writing every single thing that happens, just like God doesn't write everything that is happening, just parts of it.
Keeping with your analogy --
God made a movie in which he purposely hired actors that he knew were terrible.
Once the movie comes out, he publicly condemns the actors for being terrible.
Then, he assigns himself to make a sequel using the same terrible actors he condemned.
However, this time, he tells the actors he will forgive them for doing what he hired them to do - be the terrible actors he knows they are - as long as they accept and worship his greatness as a movie maker; which will grant them eternal access to his entire filmography.
I'm being a bit playful with my version of your analogy, but only because I find the entire concept of original sin and sacrificial atonement to be completely devoid of any logical consistency and purposely absent any ontological responsibility.
Quote:But without an everlasting offering from God, then there is never an outcome in which anyone will ever have everlasting life. The point being that knowledge itself does not beget the outcome. Without God's self choice of offering us everlasting life that outcome never exists.
Knowledge, in and of itself, doesn't beget an outcome; but omniscience does beget complete knowledge of the outcome.
Do you believe God could have created any world he wanted, or do you think there are limits to what worlds he can create? -- in terms of all logically possible and noncontradictory worlds, of course.
Quote:But you didn't create the mass shooting, because the shooting doesn't happen until the shooter acts it out on their own free will, much like how I just mentioned that there cannot be salvation until God chooses to give it to us. Before the shooting happens you just have the set up for the movie. Again, God sets the stage, but he doesn't write the whole script. He doesn't make us act out the shooting. Him knowing that it will happen is beside the point of the shooting actually happenning.
If I created the exact scenario needed for the shooting to happen, having omniscient knowledge of what the shooter's decision would be, I am absolutely responsible if I did anything other than scrap that scenario so that it wouldn't occur.
The shooter, in that scenario, could not do anything other than what I knew he would do. The shooter's free will only exists to the extent he imagines it to be the case, because he can't escape omniscient knowledge and violate already known outcomes.
(07-09-2023, 10:08 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: Why does one have to conclude that God wanted them to eat from the Tree of Knowledge simply because it was there?
He chose to create the world in which he knew they would eat from the tree, instead of the world where they didn't.
The more I read this thread the more obvious things become. People have to twist themselves into pretzels trying to explain religion and the Bible to others.
I know, I know it’s all supposed to be faith but seriously guys listening to all these convoluted explanations makes one wonder about Gods sanity let alone his very existence
God allows evil to be done in his name. He allows innocent children to be grievously harmed in his name. He allows this world to go from war to war, often in His name, killing noncombatant. And we are then told He does this in love. People are just supposed to accept all of this on some vague promise of a better eternity yet the next generation comes along and it’s wash, rinse, and repeat.
Seems to me that God and his followers do more harm than good in this world
(07-09-2023, 11:57 PM)Lucidus Wrote: He chose to create the world in which he knew they would eat from the tree, instead of the world where they didn't.
As he knew Satan will betray him ...
And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.
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