07-09-2023, 08:54 PM
(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.
