This is raised by just about everyone: Priests and ministers, college students and housewives, butchers, bakers and candlestick makers.
It’s one of the hardest questions anybody ever asks.
Just a few days ago, a close friend of mine, Laurin, passed away after a fierce 18 month battle with cancer. What a horrible experience this was for him and his wife Diana.
I’ve visited the slums of Sao Paulo Brazil, where 500,000 homeless street kids sniff glue and steal for a living. Sometimes the police hunt them down and kill them, just to reduce the crime rate.
Last year my wife spent a week in Mozambique where she saw an infant in her mother’s arms, dying of pneumonia in a hospital waiting room. She met hundreds of other kids with malaria and malnutrition. We’ve given some money for a medical clinic, and every bit helps. But the problems are so huge, what little you try to do still seems like a teardrop in the ocean.
If you took all the parties, the humor, the success and happiness in the world, and put it side by side with the suffering and pain, the comparison would be almost absurd.
There’s a lot of sickness and sadness in this world.
How can God let it go on?
Well, I can’t give you an answer. I can only tell you a true story.
~~~
A certain man threatened the Religious Gestapo, who in turn convinced the Roman government that He was a threat to them, too.
His followers were disappointed that He didn’t overthrow the Romans and declare himself King, like the Messiah was supposed to do. So they abandoned Him.
The ancient Romans pioneered what was possibly the most cruel form of torture ever devised by man: Crucifixion. They would drive spikes into their victim’s ankles and wrists, smashing his nerves. He would hang there in blinding sheets of pain, slowly suffocating and dehydrating for days, until he finally expired.
Jesus was whipped and beaten, literally beyond recognition, then nailed to a cross between two common criminals.
One of these criminals was cursing and shouting at Him in a fit of rage: ‘HEY! If you’re the KING, why don’t you get yourself down from there! And US, TOO!!!’
The other guy went along with this… for a little while.
But he saw that Jesus wasn’t hurling insults at his torturers. Instead He was asking God to forgive them (?!).
He sobered up. He said to the other criminal, ‘Hey dude, you and I are here because we deserve it. But this man Jesus has done nothing wrong.’
Then he said to Jesus, ‘Remember me when you take charge of your Kingdom.’
Jesus simply replied, ‘Today you’ll be with me in Paradise.’
~~~
Stop the camera.
What you have here, in this brief conversation, is a snapshot of the entire world.
You have two criminals who have gotten themselves into a horrendous, awful mess. And you have the Son of God, who has not only chosen to live with us in our world of pain and suffering, but has personally taken all of it upon his own shoulders.
Even though he is completely innocent.
One thief refuses to accept any responsibility for his actions. He’s unwilling to admit that he created the very mess that he’s in.
He lives in denial until the bitter end. He grits his teeth and dies in his sin.
The other thief comes clean. He recognizes that Jesus possesses divine authority. He admits his guilt. He is required to do nothing, other than to let go of his pride.
He asks for forgiveness.
Forgiveness granted.
Jesus’ pardon doesn’t make the cross or the agony go away. But finally the struggle ceases and this man crosses the Great Divide. The intense pain dissolves and he steps into a New World, designed by God Himself — with renewed body and soul.
That’s a picture of the entire world, right there. You and I are in this mess together, and we’ve all contributed to it.
We’ve all rejected God in some way or another, we’ve all committed some kind of crime, and we all experience suffering.
The situation is what it is.
So we have a simple choice: Accept that fact that God has suffered with us — or mock him and be furious because the suffering exists in the first place.
Which way do you want it???
The decision is yours. You and I will never get a true ‘answer’ about the pain and suffering we experience in this life. But in the midst of our pain, we have a companion. You and I can have the same conversation with Jesus that this criminal had, and we can experience the same forgiveness. All we have to do is ask, just like the thief on the cross did on that sad day.
~~~
This is the last of the Seven Great Lies of Organized Religion. I pray that I’ve helped to strip away all the baggage that the Religious Gestapo adds to the story and reduce it to the bare essentials. I hope this has stirred your mind and your heart.
Are you trying to strip away the baggage and get to a deeper truth? We’d like to hear from you. Simply submit a comment below.
We often run behind, but will do our best to respond.
Respectfully Submitted,
Perry Marshall
www.CoffeehouseTheology.com
- Read the whole conversation between the two thieves and Jesus
- Hear my extended presentation of the 7 Great Lies
- The prophet Ezra asks God why his people suffer so much. God sends an angel with an answer. Story continues here.
The question about the ‘why’ of evil finds a reasonable explanation in Karma and Reincarnation – we get what we deserve or what we need to progress in our spiritual evolution(which may be painful). The whole point is that our life on earth is a school and a preparation for a higher state of being and one lifetime is insufficient to achieve this. The Gospels have been cleared of any reference to reincarnation by the church, with one exception: read Matthew 11:11-15 and 17:10-13
Hi Liliana,
I still cannot find the answer to the why – in the Karma – re-incarnation cycles. Why go repeatedly through these cycles? What is the final product?. Will these cycles ever end? Why is it not ended yet? What will happen after they end? When did these cycles start? Who started them, and why? Why did he make it into an instantaneous act like a Bigger bang?
Actually, Serge, the scriptures were not compiled for a “few” lost souls. That is just a conjecture. The reason for a systematic compilation containing rules and regulations was to direct the faiths of the misguided communities to the correct and desirable pattern. All of humanity needed those scriptures. The prophets thought it would be best to preserve the divine revelations for future generations.
You may also know, God is not susceptible to the progression of time. He is exempted from time. His time, and our time are entirely different. He does not experience the “loss” of time. For him, he doesn’t lose time for completing tasks.
Why would God actually supply this form of species with versatile tools and elements? We live in a planet containing the vital elements needed to harness and sustain life. What makes you think we are a race which has no importance to God? He created us, therefore he would quite clearly care for this particular species of life. Hence, every creature is provided with intrinsic neccessities of life. Therefore, God certainly cares, which is the reason he provided his creations with basic neccessities for progression.
What makes you say this Galaxy is unknown to God? God is ubiquitous. This statement was quite extraneous.
I’m not sure if God is doing any “bad”.
Yes, i believe faith can only be discovered by the individual. The only requisite is to believe in a common God, since there is only one God. But also, try to follow the commandments of God, as their only purpose is to guide without potential harm sustained in the journey to acquire perfect spirituality.
Pink Floyd sang «we’re just a few lost souls swimming in a fish bowl». As far as I’m concerned, all of humanity past, present and future, compared to the size of the universe remains a small number of people.
I believe in God, but not in a god that would make a difference between those of one faith over those of another faith or those with no faith at all.
I believe in God, but not in a god that would favor what was written by one person over what was written by another person. We are all part of God. And the words I write and you write and anybody writes come exactly in the same way as the words written in the Bible, or any other holy book.
Also, I have had to learn about the ten commandments and have no problems with that. I have a problem with the fact that religious authorities all over the world use the commandments as a front while behind the scenes, they keep on torturing and killing people shamelessly.
The religious people in the United States support the army and an unfair economic system. Their journey to perfect spirituality is going to be very long since they are headed in the wrong direction.
All you need is love, love is all you need.
I’m not sure that my voice here much matters, but having been a committed follower of Jesus for thirty years now, I find that my thinking has shifted over time from wondering “why is there evil in the world? Why do bad things happen?” to living daily in amazement and joy simply noting that good exists, that good things happen.
I guess as I’ve gotten older I’ve recognized the innate and unavoidable inclination to do ugly things in my personality, and seen the brutality of both man and nature when left unchecked.
So it seems to me the “way of the world” – the natural order of things, from the laws of thermodynamics (tending toward disorder) to the inclinations of human behavior left unchecked – is, as Hobbes eloquently put it, “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
Which leads me to ask “why is there good in the world?”
And when I see the hand of my Master in every aspect of life, wooing all creation to Him, I can’t see evil as evidence of His absence, but of His grace and mercy and longsuffering.
So if the existence of evil troubles you, maybe you could take a day or so to look at life around you and ask a more fundamental question:
“With all this evil around – the world, the flesh and the devil – where could any good possibly be coming from?”
Cheers,
Calix
“Why is there good in the world?”
Good question!
The media tell me about all the evil in the world, but when I look around me, friends, family, neighbours, I see mostly good people doing their best.
So I wonder, could it be that the world is a better place that we think ? Could it be that we are led to believe it is mostly bad when in fact it is mostly good?
Being good is a personal choice that we each have to make over and over all the time. And many people have been making that choice since the beginning, regardless of where or when they were born.
Put this in context and see how it fits..
The world is created by God.
He creates mosquitoes that carry viruses to kill babies, he creates parasites that literally eat the hearts of man, he made wasps that inject their unborn into catepillars so they may eat the living catapiller until it dies. He made the world with continents arranged so their will be volcanoes, quakes, floods, storms, great winds and great droughts. He made the black plague. He made some plants poisonous and some plants edible, then for his amusement he decreed that we shall not eat one of the few safe plants.
He decreed we must spend our time worshipping him and telling others how great he is. He tells us not to kill, while in his book it is recounted how many hundreds of thousands he personally has killed. He decrees SADNESS one of the deadly sins (removed from later kersions of His Book) and never includes KINDNESS as a virtue. (the great adversary, Lucifer it may be noted from the great book, is noted as killing only a single person, but he is we are told, evil)
Of all the books in His Book, only a few are permitted to be retained in the later years and The Church is (apparently ordered so by Him) made to edit out: The Book of Enoch, The Book of Mary and some dozen others..
This is a god to be sure of, a great god, a terrible god, a vengeful god. A mad god, a cruel god – and in my mind, a very, very evil god.
Yes, our world was created by an evil god and men so worship him out of fear.
And so..
I will kill no wife for not being virginal
I will kill no man for eating shellfish
I shall not condemn any man who is ‘cut’ or ‘crushed’
I shall not cut the hand from a woman for any ‘crime’.
Nor shall I follow any of His commandments which are cruel or condemn my fellow man who may be confused or uncertain of his place in this world..
Instead ..
I will go to this god’s Hell spitting and roaring in fury at his evil ways and denying him any dominion over me, having not spent one moment of my short life wasted in worshiping him, his evil ways or showing him anything but fury at the pain and misery he has chosen to subject us all to for no purpose but his amusement.
Sounds like you’re a man who holds bitterness and cynicism in fairly high regard. How’s that workin’ out for you so far?
Labeling Kay Jay as being bitter and cynical in no way refutes the point she/he makes, Perry, which is essentially that if there were a cosmic Child Protection Agency, the deity y’all worship as “God,” who is usually said to stand in the same relation to us mortals as that of a loving father to his children, would be up on charges. In any event, I commend for your consideration Ambrose Bierce’s definition of a cynic: “A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.”
Conway,
I considered whether to respond to Kay Jay’s questions, or not.
I decided not to, since he asserts God “never includes KINDNESS as a virtue.”
If he believes that then his ignorance of Christianity is so total as to be irredeemable.
I’m not going to debate the Bible with Kay Jay if he won’t read it for himself.
Does he raise valid questions? Sure he does.
But to hold God responsible for Man’s evils is total abdication of personal responsibility. Regardless of what one does or does not believe about God, man has ostensibly been allowed the freedom to do what man wants to do in the world.
You can’t curse God for that, and in the same breath get angry at people who want to impose conservative forms of morality on others. I have no doubt that Kay Jay would be the first to defend the party line of liberal “rights” – abortion, euthanasia, etc.
He has every right to want those things, and every right to have those things, and only the Church Lady will attempt to stop him.
But in claiming those rights he forfeits the right to blame God for the bloodshed we see on planet earth.
Planet Earth is no a cosmic Child Protection Agency. Planet earth is a realm of free thought, free inquiry and human beings empowered to behave in the world as they see fit. If you don’t like it, blame man. But don’t blame God.
Perry, the Coffeehouse Theology site doesn’t permit me to lay out my response as I would like, with your comments in one font color and mine in another, so I have simply enclosed those of your comments to which I am responding in quotes, and have left mine unenclosed.
“But to hold God responsible for Man’s evils is total abdication of personal responsibility. Regardless of what one does or does not believe about God, man has ostensibly been allowed the freedom to do what man wants to do in the world.”
Perry, I couldn’t disagree more. If one believes, as most religionists seem to, that there is some sentient being called God, Yahweh, Allah, Jehovah, whatever, who created this frame of existence and all that’s in it, and who is also omnipotent, omniscient, all-wise, all-good, and so on, then one has to concede that 1) God created Man, and that, since Man is so obviously flawed, that, 2) God created Man flawed. One further has to concede that God knew that his creation was flawed, and proceeded with it anyway. Or do you suppose that, to take the myth of the Fall of Man as an example, that when Eve, under the blandishments of the Serpent, ate the Forbidden Fruit (usually said to have been an apple) and then encouraged Adam to do likewise, God slapped himself on the forehead and said, “Wow! I didn’t see that coming!” Well, by the same reasoning that now has Toyota in trouble, in that Toyota is being held liable for having knowingly made a flawed product, the conclusion is inescapable that, whatever bad things happen on this planet, whether man or inanimate nature is the agent whereby they occur, God is ultimately responsible for them.
Now, let me make it clear that I, for one, don’t believe that God is responsible for them, because I don’t believe that God exists in any other sense than that in which Ebenezer Scrooge, Mickey Mouse, and Wile E. Coyote are said to exist. But those who do believe in the real existence of the entity called God have, as Ricky Ricardo used to say, “some ’splainin’ to do.”
“Planet Earth is no a cosmic Child Protection Agency.”
I think you may have misunderstood my point, Perry, which was not that Planet Earth is a cosmic Child Protection Agency, but that if there were such an agency, God would be subject to prosecution for abusing us, his children, whom he is said to love so inordinately. I don’t find much love to be inferable from the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, or from any of a string of natural disasters going back thousands of years (remember Pompeii?), or from the existence of such boons as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, supranuclear palsy, scleroderma, glioblastoma multiforme, retinoblastoma, disseminated cancer of the breast or prostate, Parkinson’s Disease, multiple sclerosis, etc., or from the fact that the pedophile, John Couey, kidnapped and raped little Jessica Lunsford and then left her to die of suffocation when he buried her alive. Now, granted, Couey was acting of his own free will, but what did Jessica’s free will have to do with what happened to her? Or for that matter, what does the free will of any of the victims of the human predators that prowl our planet have to do with what the predators do to them?
So no, Perry, if God created this frame of existence, then God is responsible for whatever unpleasantnesses it contains, and people who recognize this inescapable conclusion are entitled to curse his very name. I don’t waste my time doing so, simply because, as I see it, there is no God, and the bad things that nature inflicts upon humankind are, for the most part, random events.
But I agree that we humans, and we alone, bear responsibility for the evil that we inflict upon ourselves and each other.
Conway,
I believe that human beings have a “free will” that is granted by God; that free will is a real, actual ontological entity, and that your decision to stop at a red light or blow right through it is a decision that you and you alone make. And that you and you alone are responsible for. And will be judged for, ultimately.
Yes, our free will operates within severe constraints of whatever is around us but we are nevertheless free to choose what we do and say. I think Viktor Frankl’s book “Man’s Search for Meaning” is a beautiful explanation that even in a concentration camp, nobody can take away your will to be a living, thinking, self-aware human spirit.
Thus I believe that God has truly granted us a gift of being allowed to make such choices and as such He is NOT responsible for the choices we make. 6 billion people make 6 billion choices and 6 billion people enjoy the rewards and suffer the consequences.
You may agree or disagree, but I submit to you that what I have said here is rational and coherent.
And yes, in some sense it’s inevitable that the world is this way because God decreed that it would be created with these degrees of freedom. I understand that this is aesthetically repulsive to many people. But I can only respond that Christian theology does not flinch from this reality for a single nanosecond. Read the book of Job – it is ALL about this question. And consider that Jesus Himself said, “Father remove this cup from me – but not my will but thine be done.” Jesus – God in the Flesh – came and suffocated to death just like Jessica Lunsford.
And THIS is the key to understanding Christianity: Whatever you think about the world as it is, God joined us in our sufferings. God UNDERSTANDS. God takes His own medicine. Is this a mystery? Yes. But when you are able to accept this, you enter into a fascinating journey of redemption and discovery.
I think the following story adds flavor to this question:
http://www.perrymarshall.com/articles/religion/esdras-and-evil/
By the way even though we’ve disagreed I appreciate your participating in this discussion with us.
Sincerely,
Perry
Interesting discussion. Just a thought for Kay Jay and Conway: if you wrote a computer program, and somebody else wrote a virus to infect and cause it to damage somebody’s computer… does that mean that *you* wrote a flawed, evil program?
Translate that to God, creation, the devil, and sin: God created a perfect world, but because He chose to allow free will (call it “open sourcing” or perhaps “allowing user modification” if you will… or would you rather have no free will?), the devil (a rebellious angel, remember) brought his rebellion and offered it to Adam and Eve. They CHOSE to accept it. God gave them the “anti-virus” to protect themselves; they had hundreds of other “websites” (fruit), but they had to choose the one that had a red warning flashing all over it; they chose to “download anyway”. Did God create the mosquito? Why not? It used to drink sap, or nectar, or some other plant juice (read Genesis 1 again). Now, it drinks blood, and carries disease, because WE chose to allow it to. (Or would you blame Adam and Eve, now, and say “but it’s not MY fault”? Because the first sin was rebellion… exactly the spirit in which you both are “condemning” God.)
I totally agree with u!!!!! these days every body is carried away with the sins of the world and all they wana do is put blame on things that dont deserve it… God bless u my friend because u have spoken the plain truth….
Hello everyone,
I somehow think that people are all a little confused about this question of good and evil. God ‘created’ neither: the concept is man’s alone. Good and evil do not exist in nature: animals do as they do and none ‘blames’ the other for being what they inherently are. Shifting the blame for evil onto God or some other agency (the devil) is simply looking for a scapegoat and not accepting responsibility for your own actions.
Our societies have a great many flaws: there is not one left that is ‘perfect’. The question now arises as to whether any ‘perfect’ society ever existed. The answer is yes, at least one did. Unfortunately, this society was destroyed by modern culture (if one can call it that), who viewed this perfect society as flawed. The Bushmen are now caught up in our mad, modern striving for riches, eating rubbish and the wearing of the most ‘desirable’ labels.
Permit me to tell you a little about the Bushmen. They lived in a vast area called the Kalahari. This region is designated a ‘desert’, even though it teems with wildlife and has a multitude of indigenous plants. The greatest feature of this area is that it rains for only three months of the year. The water soon disappears, leaving the landscape covered with dry grass, which the animals find most nutritious. The Bushmen lived here, trekking from place to place when the mood and the need to do so took them. The Bushmen had no concept of ownership: everything was shared unconditionally and unreservedly. They knew where to look for tubers and roots and these they would consume in a variety of ways. Some were simply shaved down and squeezed to release their moisture, which the Bushmen drank. Whenever he killed an animal to eat, the hunter would kneel down and apologise to the beast for taking its life, explaining that, in order for him and his people to live, it was necessary to kill and eat the animal. Every part of that animal was used: nothing was ever wasted. They knew which plants cured which ailment and disease, which were good to eat and which should, at all costs, be avoided.
In contrast to our quest for a high ‘standard of living’, the Bushmen had the most enviable ‘quality of life’, because they spent all their time in the company of friends and family, every single member of which they could trust implicitly. They knew no jealousy, had no concept of covetousness or anger. The children learned in the most natural way possible: by mimicking their elders and peers. Their ‘neighbours’ were wild animals, spiders, scorpions and snakes. They learned, from a very early age, which were potentially dangerous and which would do no harm. The dangerous ones were avoided and the harmless ones left unmolested.
The Bushmen were pacifists, doing no harm to others, each band keeping to itself, perhaps meeting one or two other bands in a year, because no other people could survive in that unique environment. Some people go so far as to call it ‘hostile’, but nothing in nature is hostile: nature is unforgiving and inhospitable toward those who do not know and obey the rules, but nature is not hostile. Look at it this way: we all know where the ‘tornado alleys’ are; where there are active volcanoes and where earthquakes occur. Anyone who lives in these areas must make provision for these threats to their lives and property. It’s no use praying to God to protect you from them, because God does not take sides against nature. He created nature to be in charge of the processes that operate on the planet and if you are too damned stupid to see that certain places are too dangerous to occupy, then you must suffer the consequences. That is all.
Neither God nor nature are ‘out to get you’, but they have no sympathy for ignoramuses. Your sole defence against any environment is knowledge, but man, in his headlong race toward …what? … does not study the processes of earth, or those that govern his existence on the planet.
Man has become a parasite: perhaps the deadliest parasite ever to have existed. This is as a result of his own skewed perspective of his importance on the planet. Many people, especially those who are slaves to organised religions, think that they have certain ‘God-given’ rights. These so-called ‘rights’ are not given to you by God, but are condescendingly granted to you by such authorities as your religious leaders and magnanimous governments. The fact is that you have no more ‘rights’ than the fleas you crush or the bacteria you try to eliminate with your antiseptic compounds. God created them all and I think that He is quite proud of His creativity and abilities. I know of no man on this earth who can build a mosquito, or even a single, living cell from its base elements, so what ‘right’ do men have to kill any of them? You become ill because your body has not been given the opportunity to develop an immune system that is powerful enough to ward off the causes: you keep disinfecting yourself and your environs so that your body does not have time to learn to fight the germs and bacteria that threaten you. My wife and I have a small shop, so we are exposed to people with all manner of ailments every day of our lives. Since we only wipe our bodies down daily (using no more than about two litres of water and mild, liquid soap for this purpose) and shower once a week, we not only have constitutions of stainless steel, but we use less water in a month than most of our peers waste in a day! Although I am over sixty and she is in her middle fifties, neither of us has had a cold or ‘flu in over ten years and we are free of headaches and other ailments and pains. Over the years we have discovered that her blood group requires different food to mine, so she eats a lot more fruit and vegetables than I do, while I consume a vast amount of animal fat, which she cannot stomach. We live far away from the nearest town, surrounded by our animals and as much of nature as circumstances will allow.
Frogs, lizards and spiders are our ‘insecticides’ and I catch and release into safe areas any venomous snakes that come visiting. The egg-eating snakes are welcome to any eggs they find in our aviaries and the odd genet that kills and eats a chicken is left unmolested. They were here before we arrived: we ‘stole’ their habitat, now we do not deny them their ‘right’ to eat the things that we used to replace the prey that once roamed freely on our piece of land. We love nature and understand natural processes and are thus able to thrive in areas in which even indigenous human inhabitants struggle to survive.
There is no ‘good’ and no ‘evil’: God is immune to such delusions. God did not make you so that He could have someone upon whom to vent His spleen. God made you in the same frame of mind that He created the earthworm and the elephant. The only difference between us and them is that we have the unfortunate flaw of having a brain that we cannot hope to learn to use to its full capacity. This is because we permit others to delude us and beguile us with their selfish agendas. We also manage to delude ourselves.
Ask anyone you know, who has read the Bible, what is meant by “God made man in His own image”. I am willing to wager a sizeable sum of money that they don’t have the foggiest notion. Well, I will tell you: it means that we humans have incredible powers, so powerful that we can, for example, influence the processes of nature. However, no thanks to the canard spouted by parents, priests, professors and politicians, we never realise this and therefore never learn to wield them. It is only lately that such people as Gary Craig have discovered a simple and profoundly effective healing method and quantum physicists are beginning to understand that everything is most definitely NOT as is seems.
Until every person realises that they have such powers and are ultimately responsible for their own actions, they will never discover the meaning of life, the universe and everything. Break out of the mould that your tutors, parents and ‘authorities’ have cast: find yourself, BE yourself, take responsibility for yourself. Oh, and stop taking yourself so seriously!
Would you encourage your own children to break free of your “mould”? Not every authority is evil–while I have little use for most politicians, there are those who do seek what is best for their people, and I would suggest that the majority of teachers, more than half the priests, and even some parents are on the right track in spouting certain moral values.
If we can’t take the future of our eternal souls seriously, then what?
Otherwise, you have some neat ideas. ;p
This is an excellent and simple answer. Way to go, Perry
Conway,
Thanks for tracking with this discussion. 2 issues:
1) Collateral damage: In Genesis 3 God pronounces the curse and says Adam will labor by the sweat of his brow and to the dust he will return. Thorns and thistles are introduced and he is no longer protected from the evils outside the garden, including disease. If Adam was immortal before he is now mortal.
Adam doesn’t get to choose how he dies – he could die of any number of things. He has chosen death (which was promised) and he doesn’t get to choose how it will manifest itself.
2) You can accuse God of being cruel by allowing Adam to choose this (and Adam DID choose it; I think he knew what death was) but God also became flesh and suffered just as Adam does. The alleged cruelty of God is absolved by the cross. There is no suffering that God was not willing to enter into. God feels ALL the suffering you describe. God’s child was murdered, too.
If the spirit controlling the earthy matter out of of which Kay Jay is made could be stirred up into such fury by the God’s Word, that he / she is prepared to go to Hell spitting and roaring against evil, this world has served God’s purpose in His creating it.
Like how man, using a computer program brings a sense of order, and sequence to how some silicon atoms behave, and control electron flow through them; and educate them to perform result oriented tasks for him, God has succeeded using His Word, to make Kay Jay recognise evil from virtue, and has educated him/ her to abhor evil. Is God’s Word not a wonderful program?
This earthy world is God’s mould for moulding his creations. Once the perfect creatures of His imagination are moulded, the moulds can be broken and thrown away.
After a child has passed from one grade to his next, his books (which were causing him a lot of pain, anger, and sometimes joy, and which he kept carefully)are given away, because their use is over.
My mother used to scare me (when I was a child) with stories of a pandaran (ogre, or monster) to make me eat my food, or prevent me from getting out of her sight. The pandaran was a lie, which like all lies died when I became older, and knew better. But it served its purpose when I was being moulded.
This earthy world (with viruses that kill babies, parasites that eat men, and wasps that inject their unborn into catepillars so they may eat the living catapiller until it dies) along with all its gold, and paper currencies, and mortal cruel rulers, are all but a BIG LIE to mould Kay Jay into a perfect soul fit for entering the perfect Heaven God has prepared for him/ her. Kay will then realise that he was all the time in this world experiencing a life long educational documentary cinema.
Tony, can you point to one bit of evidence that the scenario you outline is anything other than pure fantasy? And from a logical point of view, don’t you find it bothersome that God, usually viewed as being perfect in every way, would resort to a BIG LIE to teach us mortals anything? I understand your mother lying to you, because, as a mere human, she simply didn’t have the resources to get you to behave as she wanted to without lying. God, on the other hand, presumably has at his disposal the resources of infinite wisdom and infinite knowledge, not to mention infinite power. I would expect his pedagogical methodology not to include lying or deception of any kind. Lying/deception are techniques that would be more appropriate in the Devil’s repertory of ploys,don’t you think?
Conway, What you see as evil is only evil to you. To God, everything is good. To God, a rose flower will be as evil or good as cow shit.
A jail sentence will seem to the victim as very evil. But to the whole world, it is something good. It may be also good to the victim, because it can correct him and bring him back to a good life, and put a fear in others to keep them in the right tracks.
Actually there is no evil, or pandaran, or ogre or monster. Evil is like darkness, which is absence of Light , which is nothing, which means it is non-existent. Light is like the truth, which exists, and will exist for ever, and cannot be killed. A lie will always be exposed.
Time is a litmus test for finding out what is truth and what is not. Lies and untruths (earth is flat) always get exposed, and die, But a truth (eg 1+2=3) will always endure – through centuries, storms, empires, disease, or the atom bomb.
So everything that is temporary is a lie. The Sun will have to die after some time. So are the other created things in this Universe – due to rise in entropy, or contraction, or expansion of Universe or some other reason. Therefore this Universe has to be a lie – A temporary home or a correction centre or possibly a jail, to mould something more valuable and of a more permanent nature – like a clay mould to mould a gold ornament. The clay mould will be broken and discarded once the ornament is moulded. The clay mould has to be the negative or inverse shape of the ornament, like the good will seem to be the opposite of evil. But the mould is a necessary evil, if we have to make an ornament.
If I have to make a table, there has to be boundary for it, outside of which is not a table. So I have to take a piece of wood, and saw off or chisel off things that are not the table. So during creation, there will always be some waste (which you call evil) for which disposal will become a problem; (which is one man is facing in this world today).
God is smarter. Instead of using real books and paint, and colour pencils (which will bring disposal problems)-to educate men, he uses a virtual world (temporary, like my mother’s pandaran) which he can and will switch off after its use is over.
Even our body can be considered a temporary home for our soul, to get disciplined, which will be destroyed after our soul is moulded.
Mankind is like the embryo in an egg, which is getting developed into a chicken. His body, the earth, and other material things are the shell, within which a perfect living soul is getting moulded. But if the soul gets too much materialistic and gets attached with this world, he will become part of the shell – which will get discarded or destroyed. While those who believe in life after hatching, will stick to the chicken, and will become part of the living chicken.
Those of us who do not believe in life after death, will become part of the shell (earth) – and will never resurrect, and will be dead permanently. Those who are guided by the Living spirit, will rise (hatch)into eternal Life.
So what do you call the rest then? Cynics.
Oh, would like to add to the above too. God is so much about love, any person who holds true unconditional love to thier children or wife must be subject to losing that love. Once you lose the ultimate love, then there is nothing left. So much for a loving God.
So has does that work out for you. Great comeback you had. Typical defender of a fake lying God that has wreaked so much torture and torment the world over. Oh yes i can see that a new born baby deserves the punishment handed to it when it dies or starves or has parents that don’t love it.
OMG… dude u ga some terriable thing goin on with u!!!! my friend i sit here n wonder to myself if u hav family??? Or futher anyone cus im sure a person of ur stature doesnt need anyone or anyting… u my friend i will pray for u futher i will fast and repent for u because u kno not wat ur saying… I urge all those who will read tis plz plz pray for our fried he needs it now more than ever… God bless!!!!
Suffering, evil, hatred, injustice. It’s everywhere in the world and the same Christ faced when He was with us. When sin entered the world everything went downhill because creation decided to take its own course. We face evil, the Pharisees in our lives, we face Pilot and the crowd just like Jesus did. Our Father could have erased everything facing His Son and made it easy for Him – but He did not. Our Father saw His Son suffer, be tortured and put to death. Why stop the same for us?
Is that too extreme to believe? Any contradictions?
Thank You for considering this.
My views on evil and suffering in the world: We must remember how all this got started. If we consider all of Creation we’ll see that nothing, absolutely nothing compares with MAN in God’s creation. We are God’s masterpiece! We are the apple of His eye! And we were created perfectly. However we have become damaged goods. How did that happen? It all started when Satan got kicked out of heaven for his rebellion. It has been his purpose to ruin God’s masterpiece in revenge ever since. (like one painting a moustache on Michael Angelo’s Madonna).
God, however, purposes to fix His masterpiece rather than scrap it(lucky for us) In this endeavor, God has His own timetable and has fixed a time for judgment. However, we must remember that God is JUST and having set a date for judgment, will not pronounce sentence before the trial. He is bound by His own word. In the meantime, all who are to be saved are being saved (Rom 8:29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son). Satan, on the other hand is taking advantage of this pre-trial period to inflict as much damage as he possibly can. (For the devil… knoweth that he has but a short time. Revelations 12:12b) All this evil and suffering doesn’t come from God, it is Satan’s doing.
But why did God allow the creation of a Satan? Or why is he not in the dock yet?
Typical, it is always Satan that causes the damage, what a load of rubbish. It goes if you believe and be positive you shall be rewarded but that never happens does it? Then when you love wiith all your heart, it is taken from you. Isn’t love meant to be the most pure of anything according to dimwit christians who believe in a fake. Love, Relationships are a total waste of time. This planet is finished. If Satan is the cause as you say then this planet is finished. If god nurture and protects his children then i would love to see it because it isn’t happening. Seems Satan is winning. Then the bible tells how all will be finished so if God is that powerful why would he let Satan do this in the first place? The bible is a whole lot of contradiction and christians will defend it in any means with not one shred of evidence to prove any of it.
God has great things for you
Things happen for a reason
God has chosen a great path for you, no matter how messed up it is.
God God God. What a load of crap
Golly gee, Following Jesus, what is your understanding of why “Our Father” arranged for “His Son” to suffer, be tortured and put to death? I also take exception to your implication that if suffering, being tortured and put to death was good enough for Jesus, it is good enough for us. The standard dogma that Christ died for our sins has never made any sense at all to me, in light of the fact that the deity who, in Christian mythology, arranged for him to do so, is said to be, among other things, omnipotent, and presumably could have forgiven all our sins with a mere word or two, such as, “Te absolvo.”
In passing, I mention that the Procurator of Judea from 26 AD-36 AD, the man who, legend has it, presided over Jesus’ trial and subsequent execution, was named “Pilate,” not “Pilot.”
Conway, I notice that you do not reply to Carl Dick’s comment. It’s quite a good explanation, I think. For such an expert on Biblical history and Christian “mythology” and “legend”, you pretend not to understand basic principles like justice and goodness. Your argument that if He can do anything, He can just forgive everyone, “no questions asked”, is purely stubborn rebellion against something you already know in your heart. It’s like using the “unstopable force/immovable wall” argument: can God create something so big He can’t lift it? It’s a “fun” discussion, but if you use it as an excuse to reject salvation, then you knowingly accept the consequences.
Stef, my comment was not directed at Carl Dick, about whose posting I shall have more to say later, but at someone who signed him/herself “Following Jesus.”
But I must ask you, from which of my statements, in any of my postings, do you infer that I “pretend not to understand basic principles like justice and goodness?”
I also fail to follow your point when you say that “Your argument that if He can do anything, He can just forgive everyone, ‘no questions asked’, is purely stubborn rebellion against something you already know in your heart.”
How so? What is it that you, telepath that you seem to be pretending to be, have ascertained that I already know in my heart? Leaving aside the technical objection that I never, ever said, “no questions asked,” all I am doing is pointing out the logical inconsistency between you true believers claiming on the one hand, that God is all powerful, but, on the other, that he could not have absolved Mankind of all its sins with, as I said, a mere word or two.
This has nothing to do with the question of whether God could create a rock so heavy that he couldn’t lift it. The concepts “immovable object” and “unresistable force” simply cannot exist in the same universe of discourse, any more than can the concept of a square that is simultaneously a circle. To talk in the same breath about immovable object and an irresistible force is to talk nonsense, as is talking, except metaphorically, as when sports writers refer to a boxing ring as “the squared circle,” about a circle that is at the same time a square.
But with respect to the sins of Mankind, a major point of Christianity, if not its whole point, is that those sins are in fact redeemable/forgivable, so there is no question of, say, some sin of such enormity that it cannot be redeemed/forgiven. So once again I find myself asking, as I asked the writer whose moniker is “Following Jesus,” what’s up with God’s chosing such an unpleasant means of redemption as having his only begotten son tortured and killed in a manner almost unspeakably cruel, when, presumably, God, omnipotent as he is, and also, as you yourself say in another post, “absolute good,” could have accomplished the same end by saying simply, “Te absolvo?”
If you have a logically coherent answer to this question, I would be most interested in hearing it, but free of any Betazoid fantasies of yours about what I know in my heart.
Fine; I don’t know what’s in your heart. You know what’s in your heart, though, and you’re responsible for it.
As to the basics of justice:
Irrestible force = perfect justice.
An absolutely just God has no choice but to destroy us for our sin. That is the essence of Law: action, re-action; rebellion against God, death. There is no “slap on the wrist” when the crime is treason against the Almighty Creator.
It is similar to a light of infinite brightness shining through a pane of glass: only glass of infinite purity will allow the light to pass harmlessly; even a single, tiny imperfection will cause resistance, turn the light into heat, and destroy the glass. God has no wish to destroy us: His perfect nature requires it.
So, how can He give us His absolute purity, so that we can co-exist with Him and not be destroyed?
According to His Law, sacrifice is allowed to pass the impurity on to another creature; other creatures already being impure, though, this is only a partial and temporary solution.
Christ, by living a perfect, sinless life, and by not inheriting the in-born sin of His human father, is the perfect sacrifice: our blemishes, stains, sins went onto Him at the cross, but because He is integrally sinless and perfect, God’s holy justice could destroy the sin off the surface of Christ’s “glass” without destroying the glass itself.
Now, I admit, light and glass are not perfect images for the process; they don’t have to be, do they?
Regarding the choice of crucifixion itself: why second-guess God? If there had been another way, a better way, He would have chosen it. You’ll say that this is circuitous logic, perhaps, but I see it as simply definitive: apples come from apple trees, because they are apple trees. Well, the crucifixion was the best/only way, because it’s the way God chose.
I actually just wrote a short article for my school about the cross; I’ll quote part of it here.
“Some non-Christians accuse us of sadism, claiming our joy in the cross is related to the suffering it brought. While the original purpose of the cross was indeed to execute the vilest of criminals in the most horrific way, I do not believe that God is glorified in gruesomely detailed explanations of how much agony Christ was in before He died. It should suffice to know that He suffered; certainly some people have experienced greater physical pain in their lives, but His greatest suffering was of course separation from God, and thanks to His sacrifice, none of us ever needs to know that pain.
The cross was also one of many forms of “deterrent” punishment: He was lifted up so that everyone could see Him. Public punishment, both corporal and capital, has been used in almost every culture and time as a warning that crime does not pay; for some people, the fear of being humiliated in public is more powerful than the fear of pain or death itself! Interestingly, Man lifted Him up onto the cross to shame Him, but God turned that lifting up into His greatest glory: salvation for mankind.
Horrible, shameful death on a cross is by no means beautiful, but what about life on a cross? Let us not forget that the cross is but a tree–tortured and twisted, but still a tree. Adam’s sin barred Man forever from the Tree of Life in Eden; the cross, offered to us as a new Tree of Life, can never be taken away.”
Why did He have to suffer? Again, second-guessing. Which way would you have it? “Te absolvo” wouldn’t work; it defies and destroys any concept of justice. Would you prefer a quick, painless execution? That way, we have our perfect sacrifice, but none of the gory agony. Yeah, ok, but then you’d call it a cop-out. “Sure, He died for our sins; didn’t hurt, did it? He knew He was going to live again; so He went to sleep and woke up again. Great, meaningful salvation!”
You can’t please everybody, and to be honest, some people you can’t please at all. Who chose the cross for Christ to die on? Well, that would have been the Romans; their culture and punitive practices were the results of their experiences with other, older cultures. God knew what would happen, so He gave prophecies so that people would know the Messiah when He came. So, now we blame God for sending Christ at that time, that place, instead of here, today, for example, where He’d get life imprisonment instead. Oh, wait, if Christ came 2000 years later instead, we’d blame Him for waiting so long… You know, this could go on forever.
You want your “te absolvo”; ask God, and He’ll give it to you. (Oh, right, you don’t want to ask, because then you’d have to believe… ok, so, God is supposed to not even let you make a choice, and just forgive you automatically… oh stink, now we’ve gone and upset the people who believe in God, but actually hate Him, and don’t want to be forgiven…).
Good night, Mr. Redding, and God bless; I’ve already commented on your discussion with Carl Dick (before I looked up here and saw your reply). Search your heart.
That was beautiful. Don’t know who you are but that was beautiful.
So we pay for Adams sin, makes sense to me and then Jesus saves us from our sins, makes sense to me. All rubbish the whole lot. I stopped believing when my heart was ripped out for what for loving. Of course it would be. Love is a sin isn’t it, i must pay for loving.
What a joke. My life is finished because of your hypocrit nonsense
actually, I think there might be something like a consistent reply to this question. God – in christian belief – is not simply god, but the trinity of father, son and spirit. This is vague of course, but it is supposed to be a “mystery”, so it’s fair enough I think.
Keeping that in mind, the death of Jesus – an aspect of god as father, son, and spirit – can be seen as the physical manifestation of god’s forgiveness, and his suffering and sadness at the sight of our sins. Our sins pain him – and his “son” aspect they also pain physically – but he forgives them nevertheless.
What do you think of that explanation?
I have a personal question for you Sir Conway? If somebody would rape and murder your daughter and ask for forgiveness will you let him go free or scream for justice. I probably guess because you are a human being its normal that you want the guilty one to be in death row right away. That’s justice, sin needs to be punished. Sin’s punishment is hell. And the death of a perfect, blameless substitute is the only way for man to escape the punishment.(That is why Jews in the old testament do sacrifice spotless animals to picture the death of Jesus in the cross in the future- you prolly know this stuff already.) My point is God indeed let us go free after His Son Jesus received the punishment on the cross(Justice). My last point, although Jesus paid for all sin of all men it does not mean all will be saved.(FOR WHOSOEVER shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13) I don’t like using the word absolvo or absolved its kinda have something to do with penance which contradict grace.(Ephesians 2:8-9 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the GIFT of God: NOT OF WORKS, lest any man should boast.)
So salvation is a GIFT all you need to do to be saved is RECEIVE it. If Christ died for all Why not all men will get saved? The answer is simple, not all will receive Him,still others is trying to earn salvation by their good works. On your birthday you have a choice to reject gifts or accept gifts. You cannot call the gift you rejected your own even though its intended for you. But the gifts you received is yours forever.
God is fair, just, perfect, righteous at the same time loving, merciful, compassionate. God is wiser that all human intelligence combined.God is unsearchable. If anyone would like to believe a god he can figure out that’s gonna be a cheap god, much like the ones people carve out of wood or a molded metal of an image of man of which some man bow down to.
RoyJover, I will stick to my usual format for responding to posts on this site. Your comments will be enclosed in quotation marks; mine will not be thus enclosed.
Author: RoyJover
Comment:
“I have a personal question for you Sir Conway? If somebody would rape and murder your daughter and ask for forgiveness will you let him go free or scream for justice. I probably guess because you are a human being its normal that you want the guilty one to be in death row right away.”
You’re right. I’d probably dispatch the miscreant myself, given the opportunity. But I wouldn’t kill someone who had nothing to do with the crime. And in any event I’ve never claimed to be all-merciful and all-compassionate, which are two of the traits usually attributed to this God of whom you prate.
“That’s justice, sin needs to be punished.”
If sin demands punishment, why are you True Believers even talking about forgiveness at all?
“Sin’s punishment is hell. And the death of a perfect, blameless substitute is the only way for man to escape the punishment.”
Sez who? Your statement simply makes no sense, RoyJover. If God is all-powerful, then surely he could come up with a better way for “man to escape the punishment” than the one you True Believers think he arranged. As I’ve commented in other posts to this site, it seems to me that God, one of whose soubriquets is “The Almighty,” could with the merest raising of one eyebrow have obliterated all of mankind’s sins.
In any event, even if one supposes that the death of Jesus was the bail that got mankind out from under the threat of eternal hellfire, let me ask you, was the bail good for all time? Does it still count? Can every person since the death of Jesus rest assured that he/she has been forgiven, since Jesus has already died for his/her sins?
“(That is why Jews in the old testament do sacrifice spotless animals to picture the death of Jesus in the cross in the future- you prolly know this stuff already.)”
The Jews of the Old Testament sacrificed spotless animals because the Jews of the Old Testament were a bunch of primitive, Late Stone Age to Bronze Age barbarians, and it is only in such primitive cultures that you find this business of blood sacrifice/atonement. I understand, from a psychological point of view, how this foolishness may have gotten started, but foolishness it is, the whole idea of let’s toss a virgin (spotless, you know) into the volcano to appease the gods, or let’s rip a virgin’s still beating heart out of her breast, or let’s nail a presumably spotless creature (Jesus, born of a virgin, or so the myth goes) to a cross. In some such benighted cultures, the blood sacrifice/atonement also involves cannibalizing the body of the sacrificial offering, an idea which is perpetuated, in much less gory form, in the Eucharist, or Holy Communion (”This is my body, broken for thee; take and eat…”). It’s all pure, ignorant superstition, and seems rooted in the unarticulated sense that if one commits an enormity, one can somehow expect an enormous payback, in the form, rather incredibly, of some sort of boon, from the unseen sentient forces that many mistakenly believe have something to do with the course of our lives here on Planet Earth.
“My point is God indeed let us go free after His Son Jesus received the punishment on the cross(Justice). My last point, although Jesus paid for all sin of all men it does not mean all will be saved.”
Why not, pray tell?
“(FOR WHOSOEVER shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13) I don’t like using the word absolvo or absolved its kinda have something to do with penance”
Absolution has nothing whatsoever to do with penance, RoyJover. It is simply the granting of remission of sin(s). There is nothing about the concept of absolution that strictly entails that the one whose sin(s) has(have) been remitted must do or have done penance.
“which contradict grace.(Ephesians 2:8-9 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the GIFT of God: NOT OF WORKS, lest any man should boast.)
So salvation is a GIFT”
First, quoting the Bible is not cogent reasoning, RoyJover, if only because, like the song from “Porgy and Bess” puts it, “The things that you’re liable to read in the Bible, it ain’t necessarily so…”.
Second, my idea of a gift is something that is freely given, with no conditions attached. When the giver begins to expect something as a result of what he/she, or God, has given, it stops being a gift and becomes a kind of bribe.
“all you need to do to be saved is RECEIVE it. If Christ died for all Why not all men will get saved? The answer is simple, not all will receive Him,still others is trying to earn salvation by their good works.”
So, if what you’re saying is true, then worshipping and adoring God, which are usually accounted to be “good works,” avail nothing, and there is no point in doing them. Or am I missing something here?
“On your birthday you have a choice to reject gifts or accept gifts. You cannot call the gift you rejected your own even though its intended for you. But the gifts you received is yours forever.”
See my comment above, anent whether or not the forgiveness purchased with Christ’s blood is indeed “forever,” and if so, why any of us should need to be concerned about, or try to make up for in any way, any of the sins mankind has committed since Christ’s crucifixion.
“God is fair, just, perfect, righteous at the same time loving, merciful, compassionate. God is wiser that all human intelligence combined.”
All the more reason for this fair, just, perfect, righteous, loving, merciful, compassionate God to have devised a better way of remitting the sins of humankind than sending his only begotten son to experience torture and degradation and then to die a messy, cruel death. Once again, “Te absolvo,” or that aforementioned merest raising of one eyebrow, is sounding pretty good to me.
“God is unsearchable.”
What does that even mean, exactly, RoyJover? You almost seem to be implying that, since God is unsearchable, those who seek God will never find him. Is that what you intended to convey?
See, as far as I am concerned, if you haven’t picked up on this by now, the God of whom you speak is purely imaginary, like Daffy Duck, Dick Tracy, Scarlett O’Hara, and multitudinous other creations of the human mind. Now, I grant that anyone has the right to believe whatever. There are those who believe, for example, that Barack Obama is a Muslim and was born in Kenya; there are those who believe that the 1969 moon landing never happened but was filmed on a movie set in the Nevada desert; there are those who believe that the events of 9/11/2001 were perpetrated by the U. S. government and not by Islamic fundamentalists; there are those who believe in the possibility of a perpetual motion machine, and that the FBI and/or CIA have somehow implanted microchips in their heads that allow those agencies to control their thoughts, and that the TV medium John Edward actually talks to the dead.
And then there are those who believe in the real existence of God, and associated tommyrot.
Unfortunately, in most cases these beliefs, like the delusions of the certifiably insane, are absolutely impervious to reason, but every once in a while I run across someone who still has a shred of critical thinking capacity left, who understands what I and other nontheists are saying, and who begins to find his/her way back to the real world. I don’t imagine, however, that you will be one of those, Roy Jover.
Conway Redding
As I said before your reasoning is way out there. You answer with insult and sarcasm. There is really no point in wasting time to convince somebody who is already convinced of something. If you still have one drop of science left in your head, search the video of the lecture on Religion of Ian Morison in fora(dot)tv. He is a professor of Astronomy in Gresham College. This time it is a man of science who will teach you about our existence and about God. It’s a 5 hours video BTW and it is not a bible study. Take note also about his conclusion. Science does not have to say God has to exist but certainly science cannot say a God/creator does not exist. If all of a sudden you came up to a conclusion that God is fairy tale, your science is as good as voodoo.
I can tell you right now that you believe things you cannot see / or did not see / or you have no proof. Or you believed things as facts only because someone else said so. Your “Duffy the Duck” insults will fall back in your head. Please disagree with these statements so I can start enumerating. You believe in imaginary things (THINGS WE CANNOT SEE). You have tons of it in your head. Think about it for a while.
likewise to you no point convincing someone who is already convinced. Jesus died for our sins so not all will be saved. That is just another contradiction. The bible is full of this rubbish. God is a loving god so you must pay.
Of course if my child was raped i would kill the sick perverted animal. Of course, christians apparently believe in non-adultery but sex is rampant throughout this world. Hearts just keep getting broken. How many christians have cheated. I would say plenty.
You too have sinned so will you be saved or do you just hope that you will be? Jesus died for our sins so i guess it wouldn’t matter if i went and killed a million people, i will be saved? Non believing is an apparent sin, so i guess i will be saved.
So Roy, if your daughter was raped would you forgive the culprit? I really don’t think many people would but remember it is christians who created the marriage, only one partner rubbish drummed into our heads over the centuries, when really we a animals that mate just like animals, which means relationships love rape are all just rubbish. I found out the hard way, having my heart completely smashed so that now i will be alone forever because i refuse to be in any nasty relationship again. Oh by the way she was a very beautiful woman her personality was one of the best i have ever seen. My point is because of loving her and being treated the way i was all my life, i lost her. Love has ended me. All i see now are sex shops, porn sites, Kids having sex and getting pregnant. Governments and christians taking our children away and then making us pay the villians who take our kids. Tearing our hearts out. So is loving a sin? since it seems everytime you love someone, you have to pay for it.
You christians will never get out of your fantasy land. Why is it that someone who is negative can gain so much more then someone being positive. Law of attraction and God are just marketting schemes. That is all it is.
“…man will cease to commit atrocities when he ceases to believe absurdities.”
-Voltaire
Out of context, that seems to suggest Voltaire is blaming belief in God for the evils in the world. I can’t say I knew the guy personally (not that old, hee hee) but I do know he believed that there is a God. Quotations like that are more helpful when placed in context. ;p
P.S. To some good men, Voltaire was a hero; to other good men, he was a traitor. Just because everybody knows his name doesn’t make his words universally relevant.
I guess that would go for all the rubbish in the bible. It is irrelevant. Everything that anyone says to each other is irrelevant because you have no more power over me then i do you. What i choose to do is my choice as is yours. Too many governments and religious freaks think they own us all and it is these governments and religious freaks that create the wars. Hence are Christians going to be saved for these attrocities that they have brainwashed people into doing.
If religious people were true to there words, they wouldn’t care about other peoples business or religious beliefs. Why do they try to keep drumming such rubbish into peoples heads.
There is so much crap out there now, who knows what to believe. As far as i am concerned i can only believe in me.
I have written on so many of these blogs and rubbish but one day it occurred to me how many other people think they know it all. How they think what they say is right. Like when someone is devastated over someone else, they say it passes in time. Then somoene tells them they have been in heartache over somone for ten years. But this is that person and how they feel not you or me or anyone else. I personally know a lady who has not been in a relationship for 20 years because she was sick of her heart being broken. No sex, nothing.
This is her and yes it is a choice but the point is, it isn’t a choice because she wants to. Its because of everyone else not feeling like she does. Just like me now. 2 and half years it has been and i still refuse. I am still majorally heart broken, angry and upset but i can’t just put it behind me because i am not you or someone who can. It is over for me and this time i know it, i know it in my heart. It just isn’t the same anymore. It is all i lived for so i am finished on this earth. I have done what it is i was sent here for. Staying here is just putting myself in further agony, each and everyday, I look at all my beautiful furniture and it now does not mean anything to me. Nothing means anything to me now. I am dead. All because of love. Now how can a God be so selfish to make me lose my dream like this and yes, i caused it myself, you will say but if that is so then why did i suffer all the torture, no love and torment as a child, to have made me this way where i destroy my own relationships out of fear of abandonment. What did i do as a baby that desrved punishment in this way. When i became a good person and was travelling such a great path, why wasn’t God fair to me. By one post it said God is just. So i guess all that i have endured like many other, it is justification.
All i see is Bad people being rewarde and good people paying the price for it. Is that one of those gifts, that should not be reewarded. Should people slave and starve to keep a criminal in a jail. Should people slave and go without food so gluttenous governments live like kings for all there lives, taking it easy, controlling us all? Aren’t we all meant to be equal. Well if that is so, i feel i was born into a place i never had the choice to be born in. I have to pay to live here just like most others, while the select few, live on easy street at the expense of others as if they were gods themselves, making up there own laws to control us all. Wasn’t that one of the ten commandments not to treat someone else like a god. 99% of people have sex before marriage, i guess we are all doomed.
All a load of rubbish the whole lot.
Sandon,
It is obvious that you are a very smart man. You bring up many valid arguments about many injustices in the world. It also seems obvious to me that no end of arguing facts and theories will be enough to satiate. You’ve also mentioned that you’ve been hurt. Coming from a man whose first love ran off with another man, its better to forgive and go on, and thats true for all of the hurt. Forgiving doesn’t mean that what they did to you was right. It doesn’t mean that they “get off free”. It doesn’t mean that you have to give up all your rights. And it doesn’t mean that its easy. A friend of mine who had to walk through lots of forgiveness issues had to start with trying to want to forgive. But unforgiveness only hurts you, not the person it’s directed at. And God doesn’t want you to be in pain. Ask him to help and he will. He loves you.
Stef, I think that you have taken this in the wrong spirit. I was not talking about the man, but about his observation. The quote could have come from anyone and would still be relevant. Whether he believed in God or not is also neither here nor there. The fact is that men do believe the most absurd things and even argue and go to war about them. On concentrating on Voltaire and not on his statement and then telling me that my quoting him is out of context makes YOUR observation absurd.
Let us stop picking nits and get on with the original question: that being whether God created evil and why He permits it to exist.
Some of the comments seem to make sense and others may just be fill-ins for what we’ve yet to discover. I sometimes wonder if we make God out to have some varying personality factors than he really has. Our Father is beyond all comprehension, so what seems to be an answer for us is only an answer by us. Take care of and serve your fellow brother and sisters and Our Father will take care of the rest. Doesn’t that sound even clearer, easier and totally realistic?
The statement, “Our Father is beyond all comprehension” is self-contradictory, since some degree of comprehension of this entity’s traits is required in order for anyone to claim that the entity is in fact incomprehensible. In other words, when you aay that God is incomprehensible, you are simultaneously claiming to comprehend something about him. If God is incomprehensible, then, in this context, Ludwig Wittgenstein’s aphorism, “Worauf man nicht sprechen kann, darauf muss man schweigen,” becomes singularly apt. The aphorism translates, roughly, as “If you can’t talk about something, then shut the hell up about it.” I see that you and your fellow religionists continue to prae about God, so I presume y’all believe you know something about him, which would not be the case were God truly incomprehensible.
hello everybody,
I think no body yet answered Kay Jay questions, why god created viruses, diseases, starvation,…
and i like to answer him with a question, what do you feel when you see a disabled person? if that doesn’t remind you that one day you may be in his place i think you are making a mistake.
death, illness, disaster they all alarms and reminders that u made of dust and u will return to dust, and one day u will standup again and you still have a chance to be by god side, don’t miss that chance because at the moment u go to hell, u will not be that brave to spit.*think again*
Some thoughts on the whole “if God is good, why does evil exist?” issue:
I’ve never found this to be complicated. God didn’t/doesn’t create evil, for evil is not an independent thing, just as darkness and cold can’t exist outside of the concepts of light and heat. Darkness is the absence of light, evil is the absence of good. God is good; God is also omnipresent (He is everywhere); so, there should be good everywhere. However, light banishes the dark, heat chases away the cold, and good destroys evil. God is absolute good; if He were to get rid of all the evil… He’d have to get rid of us, too. (Nobody can honestly convince him/herself that he/she is purely, 100% good–you can lie to yourself about it, though.) So… why doesn’t God just get rid of the worst of the evil, and leave us “some good, some bad” people alone?
Silly question, when you really think about it: God could have stopped Hitler. But… then Himmler or Heydrich would have taken over, and many agree that they could have been even worse. Ok, so God could have killed all the Nazi leaders. Well, then we’d blame Him for allowing the Spanish Inquisition, and the Crusades. So, He should have not allowed any of those evil people to have been born in the first place. … Hey, where did everybody go?
That, dear people, is why we really have no right to “second-guess” God. He tried killing off all the evil-doers (the flood, having His chosen people take over Canaan, strict punishments for breaking the commandments, …) and instead of appreciating His motives, we call Him “cruel” or “vengeful”; He’s also tried letting people go their own way, and appealing to them through kindness and compassion, and gotten blamed for “allowing” evil to exist. The truth is, no matter what God does, we’re going to say that He should do it differently. When will we grow up?
Of Psychos, Psychics and Soap Boxes:
On “God could have killed Hitler”. Interesting point Stef, but apparently Hitler had a psychic medium working for him, so perhaps the odds were stacked against it. A good reason Hitler eventually lost WWII is that Winston Churchhill also used a psychic, (who even had a room paid for in the Park Lane Hotel). This brings up a fascinating point about the Church of England establishment and how it actually supported Christian Spiritualism (those of us who believe there is a God and that we all reincarnate many times over until we go back home to the Godhead through good karma and spiritual enlightenment. Psychic mediums, past life hypnosis, gift dreams from dead loved ones and near death experiences are our evidence of the souls eternity). In 1939 Arch Bishop Lang in the Church of England had a committee study spiritualism. It took two years to complete (and was during world warII), but their “Majority Report” came out concluding that spiritualism is valid, ie that some psychics are real (as we all know: some are, some aren’t). It was also 1939 when apparently Hitler tried to infiltrate the Vatican with some soldiers dressed as monks, buying up land right next door. The monks aroused suspicion unfortunately as they were womanising far too much for a typical monk and knew far too little about Catholocism (so that evil plan was foiled as they were sprung bad)! Interestingly the Majority Report of the Church of England was put in a pigeonhole for 9 years after that and no conclusive mainstream media comment was given about it (just bits dribbled quietly to alternate press magazines). So that certainly explains 1. Why Hitler took a while to die
2. Why The Orthodox Church establishment has an aversion to psychics and mediums and
3.Why many Christian fundamentalist evangelists propose that if you dabble with psychics, you dabble with the devil.
4.It makes me understand and forgive those poor dudes in frocks who have held from us the real teachings of Jesus about the eternal soul and reincarnation of each of us. They have come out appearing to be a bunch of old guys who haven’t told the whole truth about God and our place in the universe just so they could have more respect, authority and control over us all. Of course another reason why the Majority report was kept quiet is that coming out in suppport of fortune telling gypsies would have given the Bishops the label of fruit and nut cakes at the time within the scientific community. That respect, authority and control of Christian religions leaders has diminished considerably recently anyway by other ways: The controversy of Paedophilia -and its cover-up-within the whole church establishment over the last decade (which has crept into the Vatican of late). I now feel sorry for Arch Bishop Lang in 1939. He had formally revealed an eternal truth that the world were really on the brink of needing, but the evilness of Hitler caused the report to be kept secret. The fear that this spiritual knowledge could be used for evil again all over the world obviously kept them from acknowledging and teaching us about it. It set back the spiritual evolution of our world too. The fear. Nothing to fear but that eh? Imagine if we were actually taught in our Sunday schools that our mission on earth is to be as much like an Angel as possible (and not the kiddyporn variety). Imagine if we were taught that if we do it well, we WILL become one (an Ascended Master, or spirit guide they are called), and be able to help others reincarnate and transform into one sooner too.
I’ll get off my soap box now! Peace, Truth and Love 4 all!
Kez
“…but apparently Hitler had a psychic medium working for him, so perhaps the odds were stacked against it. A good reason Hitler eventually lost WWII is that Winston Churchhill also used a psychic…”
So, psychics are more powerful than God? Sorry, but that’s a strange sort of God to believe in. It’s really simple: God is all-powerful, or He isn’t. If He isn’t, then He isn’t worth believing in, because He can’t save you and *keep you saved* for all eternity. If He is all-powerful, then we’d better do things His way, because He knows what He’s doing (at very least, a whole lot more than we do). Now, the only all-powerful God I’m aware of is the one in the Bible; He says that psychics and mediums are of the devil. He also says that astrology and any other sorts of divination or fortune-telling are evil. So… I’m going to go with what He says. Whether *people* in the church have at some point or other disobeyed God–be it with psychics or paedophilia–is irrelevant.
Just because a group of people decides to disobey God and “recognize” spiritualism does NOT make it acceptable to God. “Karma” and reincarnation are NOT what Jesus taught, nor in the Bible anywhere, outside of the proverbial “getting what you deserve” and resurrection into either a new, eternal life or judgement (and death).
It’s a good thing our Sunday school teachers DON’T teach us to be like angels–the Bible is very clear that it is better to die than to mislead children! What they DO teach, because it is what the Bible teaches, is to be like Jesus Christ–hence the name, “Little Christ” (”Christian”).
If you assembled a computer, and if it didn’t work well, who should be blamed?
What is the point in punishing the computer by dipping it in water, or boiling water, or kicking it with army boots?
Will it start working perfectly if you “punish” it with floods, and torture it with burning flames?
Computers are deterministic. They do not have free will. Humans truly have the ability to choose for ourselves what to do. So I fully understand your reasoning but it’s flawed because God is not responsible for what you do. You are. The acceptance of this fact is the first step towards freedom.
Don’t many people chose the wrong path because the whole truth is not visible to them? God has for some reason, chosen to hide a lot of truth in mysteries.
Even with access to computers, books, internet, and bible resources, we can see that all participants of this forum do not agree on what is truth and what is not. Surely one group is misled. Who can we say is responsible for those who are misled. I am sure all of us here, are sincerely seeking Truth.
I am sure all of us here are NOT sincerely seeking Truth. People do not want to believe that they are ultimately responsible for their choices. It’s much more fun when you can be “a product of your environment” and place the blame on somebody else, because then YOU don’t have to change yourself.
Where is God hiding? Look up at the sky. Are you willing to see God’s truth in the wonder of His creation, or do you insist on belittling Him with a firm belief in evolution and random chance? Look at your hand–are you not “fearfully and wonderfully made,” as the Bible so eloquently says? When God says that your sole purpose in existence is to praise and glorify Him… are you thankful for His truth, or resentful that it’s not all about *you*?
Don’t say that everybody seeks the Truth, and don’t try to blame God for “hiding”. There are many “versions” of what we call “truth” simply because we are too arrogant to believe that things are not the way *we* think they should be. If you choose not to listen, you can’t blame God for “keeping silent”.
Now… certainly there is someone trying to mislead. The Bible speaks of the “deceiver”, the “father of lies”, Satan. Certainly, he is trying to keep you from God. Certainly, he can only succeed if you *let* him, because God is greater than he is. Certainly, the devil is very successful–many people want to believe him–because his message is easy on the ears: “Don’t worry, you don’t have to choose *right now*, you can wait until tomorrow, until next year, until your deathbed…” The lie, of course, is in that by “not choosing”, you are choosing “no”. Of course, if you don’t believe that the devil exists, then you make his job a whole lot easier.
People choose the “wrong” path because they CHOOSE it. If they do not “see” another choice, then that choice is not available to them–ie., there is no other choice. We are condemned for *rejecting* Christ; those who never have a choice (aborted fetuses, for example) can’t be blamed for a choice they never have the opportunity to make, now can they?
Excellent writing, Stef. I haven’t seen a -2 apple either. As long as you write like this, you take the load off of me and I can take a rest. It is a most wonderful thing to be led by the Holy Spirit and receive His revelation as is obvious in your case. Congratulations and God Bless,
Carl Dick
To God be the glory… and thank you. (I’ve felt the same about your comments… so keep on sharing, be it here or elsewhere, eh!)
I don’t think it likely we’ll meet here on Earth, but I’m sure that in the place Jesus has prepared for us, you and I will have much to discuss.
God bless.
Stef
P.S. To *everybody* else who reads this comment: I truly hope we’ll see you there!
“1. When people are backed into a corner and do not want to change their beliefs. They go into denial. No amount of logic, evidence, scientific findings or proof can change their minds. I guess somehow I had thought that if you put enough peer-reviewed, non-controversial textbooks, definitions and examples in front of them they would admit that I could be right.
Nope… not the case. If someone doesn’t want to believe something, there is nothing you can do to change their minds.
NOTHING.”
Dear Perry, It probably took me longer than it should to arrive at your conclusion, stated above in “THE MOST FAMOUS, PASSIONATELY ARGUED, LONGEST-RUNNING DEBATE” for which reason I have decided to drop out of my discussion with Conway Redding on Lie #7. It’s an absolute waste of valuable time. However, my comments along with Stef Coulombe’s may have been helpful to others who were not so obstinate in their thinking.
If we were to let the atheists have their way on the site, the damage they could do could be incalculable. I personally believe the influence of Satan is driving these guys even though they may never know it. I will henceforth carefully choose which comments are worthy of debating.
Usual format, Carl — your comments enclosed in quotation marks, mine not.
“‘1. When people are backed into a corner and do not want to change their beliefs. They go into denial. No amount of logic, evidence, scientific findings or proof can change their minds. I guess somehow I had thought that if you put enough peer-reviewed, non-controversial textbooks, definitions and examples in front of them they would admit that I could be right.
Nope… not the case. If someone doesn’t want to believe something, there is nothing you can do to change their minds.
NOTHING.’”
Gee, whoever wrote this (I’m guessing it was Perry Marshall) seems to be describing him/herself and his/her fellow True Believers to a T. To some extent, y’all remind me of the story about the psychotic man who believed that he was dead. A psychiatrist asked him, “Do dead men bleed?,” and the psychotic replied, “Of course not, doctor. Don’t be silly. Everyone knows that dead men don’t bleed.” Whereupon the doctor pricked one of the man’s fingers with a lancet and squeezed out a drop of blood. “Hmm,” said the psychotic, “What do you know? Dead men DO bleed.”
Perry Marshall is right — nontheists will probably not change their minds, and theists will probably not change their minds. But I aver that, at this point, logic and reason are on the side of the nontheists, and of the aforementioned psychiatrist.
“Dear Perry, It probably took me longer than it should to arrive at your conclusion, stated above in “THE MOST FAMOUS, PASSIONATELY ARGUED, LONGEST-RUNNING DEBATE” for which reason I have decided to drop out of my discussion with Conway Redding on Lie #7.”
It seems to me, Carl, that you’ve decided to drop out of the discussion because you’ve recognized that my counterarguments are logically unassailable.
BTW, I notice that you never did say anything attempting to rebut my reasons for believing that Matthew 16:27-28 was not, as you averred, referring to Pentecost, but in fact to the Second Coming of Christ.
“It’s an absolute waste of valuable time. However, my comments along with Stef Coulombe’s may have been helpful to others who were not so obstinate in their thinking.”
Helpful to others only if their thinking is as muddled as yours and that of your fellow True Believers, Carl.
And since you’ve mentioned Stef Coulombe, let me say that it has been amusing to watch his convoluted reasoning about the existence of evil. He seems to be arguing that since evil is simply the absence of good, it doesn’t exist in its own right. He is wrong on two counts, the first one being that evil is not a material substance but a quality that we humans assign to various events and circumstances, depending, it appears, on how harmful, either physically or psychologically, those events/circumstances are perceived to be to humankind. According to you True Believers, our sense of what is evil and what is not derives from God, but if that is so, one has to explain how it is that at different times and in different places, different events/circumstances have been labeled “evil.”
The second count of Stef’s errancy is this: if evil is the absence of good, and if God is absolutely good and also omnipresent, as is usually claimed, then there is really no place from which good can be absent. Stef Coulombe, far from solving the problem of the presence of evil in a frame of existence created and overseen by an all-good, all-powerful, ever-present deity, has made his position even more difficult to defend. And y’all can just forget all that crap about free will as an explanation for the evil that we inflict on each other, until y’all can account for the role that the free will of someone like 11-year-old Jessica Lunsford or 7-year-old Adam Walsh played in the evil that befell them because of the exercise of free will by, respectively, John Couey and, it is believed, Ottis Toole. I asked Stef Coulombe a while ago to attempt such an explanation, and at this point I am prepared to believe that that his failure to do so is evidence of his inability to do so, just as I am now prepared to believe that your dropping out of the discussion about the occurrence of evil is evidence of your inability to reconcile that occurrence with what you believe about the real existence of an omniscient, omnipotent, all-good, all-compassionate, all-merciful deity. That’s okay, though. As Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry Callahan character said in the movie “Magnum Force,” “A good man always knows his limitations…”
Another poster to this site recently said that I want “proof of God.” Nope. I don’t want proof of God. What I want, evidently in vain, is for those who insist on believing in the real existence of a deity, with the traits usually attributed to that deity, to account for the multiple illogicalities and inconsistancies that such a belief entails. So far no one, least of all you, or Stef Coulombe, or RoyJover, or Perry Marshall, has risen to the challenge in any rational way.
“If we were to let the atheists have their way on the site, the damage they could do could be incalculable.”
Only if you think that it is damaging to attempt to rob religious twaddle of its power to lead people to do stupid and cruel things, such as the recent enactment in Uganda under the prompting of fundamentalist Christian religious missionaries, of statutes calling for capital punishment for homosexuality (I guess Ted Haggard, one of your own, needs to stay the hell away from Uganda, eh?), or, as I have mentioned in another posting, the suicidal destruction of the World Trade Towers and 3000+ human beings on 9/11/2001, by men who believed that doing so would assure them a place in paradise where, among other things, they would enjoy for all eternity the sexual favors of comely virgins.
“I personally believe the influence of Satan is driving these guys even though they may never know it.”
Of course you believe that, Carl, along with a bunch of other hooey. That’s the problem. What can I say.
“I will henceforth carefully choose which comments are worthy of debating.”
You might try debating only those comments for which illogic and irrationality can carry the day, Carl. It won’t be much of a debate, though, since those comments will be the very ones with which you agree.
I was going to say that this will be my last posting to this site, but I am sure that as in moments of idleness I monitor the site I will come across something so abysmally irrational that I will feel compelled to respond, despite my awareness that the blind faith of the True Believers is an absolute shield against logic and rationality. But the main point about blind faith is that it is blind.
Conway Redding
“…until y’all can account for the role that the free will of someone like 11-year-old Jessica Lunsford or 7-year-old Adam Walsh played in the evil that befell them because of the exercise of free will by, respectively, John Couey and, it is believed, Ottis Toole. I asked Stef Coulombe a while ago to attempt such an explanation, and at this point I am prepared to believe that that his failure to do so is evidence of his inability to do so…”
To the real people out there: has anybody, anywhere, claimed that everything that happens to *me* is *strictly* and *absolutely* the result of my own free will? That would be the belief in karma, not belief in the Bible.
Many/most of the bad things that happen to me are because I make bad choices and stupid decisions. I’m an individual human.
Many are also because I’m part of a human society that chooses not to serve God, that chooses to do evil instead. Our society loves Hollywood, with all the sex and violence on TV; that has consequences. Did Jessica or Adam “bring it on themselves” by watching TV? Of course not, don’t be stupid. Could God have saved them? Certainly. Why didn’t He? Well, do I look like God to you? Why don’t you ask God? Oh, right, you don’t believe in God. MAYBE there is some good to come from it. (”Blasphemy! To think that the tragedy that befell those poor children could ever result in anything good…!”)
My daughter is two. Some time ago, when she was less than a year old, we heard a horrible report in the news: a father of a six(?)-month-old baby threw the baby into a pot of boiling water because she was crying.
If you want to focus on two poor children because they made the headlines in your country, and ignore the hundreds of millions throughout history who have suffered worse–yes, WORSE–fates, then you are truly as arrogant as you sound. Why does this stuff happen?
It’s in the Bible, but you don’t want to hear it. I’ll write it again anyway.
God created the world; He created man. God gave the world to man. Man sinned, and gave the world to Satan. God does not yet take the world back by force, so that man can (and must) choose which side he wants to be on. There are, sadly, casualties in any war; God could have ended it all to save one child’s life, but He’d be condemning all those who had not *yet* chosen the right side. God could have stepped in and rescued the child from that terrible situation, and often He does (though skeptics like you would never recognize His Hand–you’d say “the neighbour” or “some kid walking down the street” or “pure coincidence” saved her); when He does not, either we believe that God is good and He has a good reason, or that He is a liar and a fraud.
Now, at the risk of sounding “Betazoid”, I’m going to guess that Conway Redding’s puppeteers are going to argue that God could just perform His “te absolvo” and abolish the need for free will. That argument is getting old. Answers have been posted; whether you accept them is your CHOICE.
If some horrible thing should befall my daughter… you have no idea the love I have for her. It would destroy me, I’m sure. I can not speak with experience, as by the grace of God both my children are healthy and safe; however, I can only hope and pray that should something happen, that God will take and keep her soul, and that some good would come of it… and that my faith in Him should grow as a result. More than that… what would you expect?
And now, a somewhat unrelated comment: I am generally careful in my typing and spelling. Should there be a typo in my recent comments, before “using it against me”, understand that I injured my hand last week and it still twinges a bit. (This comment is added because I know some of us–even, on occasion, I–like to nit-pick, mock, and otherwise belittle those with whom we disagree.)
I seem to have a few moments to spare earlier than expected, so I’d like to make one further reply to the comments ascribed to the (fictional) Conway Redding:
“And since you’ve mentioned Stef Coulombe, let me say that it has been amusing to watch his convoluted reasoning about the existence of evil.”
I’m always happy to entertain.
“…He is wrong on two counts, the first one being that evil is not a material substance…”
Hold evil in your hand, anyone? Where can I buy a bucket of the stuff?
“…at different times and in different places, different events/circumstances have been labeled “evil.””
That IS hard to understand. Killing in self-defence is absolutely the same as pre-meditated murder, then? (Not by my Bible, but then if you’re going to make sweeping generalizations about a book, it’s best not to read it too carefully, I guess.)
“The second count of Stef’s errancy is this: if evil is the absence of good, and if God is absolutely good and also omnipresent, as is usually claimed, then there is really no place from which good can be absent. …”
Math lesson: infinity plus one equals… anybody know the answer? Anyone? It’s infinity, right? Infinity plus a million? Hmmm… anybody? Oh, hey, it’s infinity again. Pretty cool, huh? Now for something more difficult: infinity *minus* one. Gee, that’s tough. No, wait, it can’t be… but it is! Ding ding ding! The answer is… infinity!
So, let’s apply our limited, finite comprehensions to something quite simple:
dimensions being limitless (space defined as “space being occupied by matter” may be finite, according to some theories, but the x/y/z axes themselves are certainly infinite), omnipresence must also be an infinte quality; therefore, God being “omnipresent” is not altered or reduced if He is *not* as present in a particular locale. As suggested before (and thoroughly mocked and derided, oh well), God’s perfect Presence must destroy sin and imperfection. So, should He choose to be fully present in every heart where He is not wanted, those hearts would simply cease; those souls would be destroyed. “Oh, but an omnipotent God can forgive sin anyway He wants to!” Hark the voice of those who think they know better than God! Much though some stubborn ears refuse to listen, God does give us a choice–He does not force Himself into our hearts. *That* is freedom of choice.
(By the way, this works equally well with God’s omniscience: His “forgetting” our sin in no way reduces the infinite quality of His knowledge and wisdom. Oh, and on the omnipotence issue: “Superman” is not omnipotent, not just in the limits on his strength, but in the limits on his *control* over his strength. For example, he can not voluntarily allow a needle to penetrate his skin. Let’s not forget that “infinite ability” includes the ability to control and even limit that ability–such that in order to allow freedom of choice, God can and must limit His infinite justice from destroying us all as we deserve… He didn’t kill Hitler, because He doesn’t want to kill you, either.)
“Stef Coulombe… has made his position even more difficult to defend.”
Depends on what war you’re fighting, now don’t it?
“…And y’all can just forget all that crap about free will… until y’all can account for the role that the free will of someone like 11-year-old Jessica Lunsford or 7-year-old Adam Walsh played in the evil that befell them because of the exercise of free will by [their murderers].”
Dude, seriously, anybody saying stuff like this is missing a few. ‘Tis explained elsewhere, but for the insistent blind, here we go again: why should *my* free will stop you from hurting me? In what convoluted, twisted yarn of logic would that even make sense? My free will allows *me* to help or harm, as I choose. If *my* free will stopped *you* from acting, then *you* wouldn’t have free will, now would you? (I mean, like, duh!)
“I asked Stef Coulombe a while ago to attempt such an explanation, and at this point I am prepared to believe that that his failure to do so is evidence of his inability to do so…”
It’s so much fun to be a hypocrite. Shall I tally all the arguments I’ve put forward that have not been answered?
“…As Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry Callahan character said in the movie “Magnum Force,” “A good man always knows his limitations…””
Wow. Rejecting the wisdom of the Bible for Hollywood quotations. Forgive me for a little bit of ridicule, here. Ah, good times…
(Should “Conway Redding” actually be a real person–which I don’t believe, of course–and should he actually be touched by any thing on this page, he need only open his heart to God. His “te absolvo” is there for the asking. If Conway is real, then God loves him too…)
I agree. Please let me add. A lot of people say show me a proof of God and I will believe Him.These days a lot of people ride this band wagon of reasoning. In my opinion its both st*p*d and dangerous. In the New Testament Jesus was healing sick,lame, mute, blind, raise the dead, walks on water and did all other mind blowing stuff. Did they believe Jesus? No They hanged Him on the cross. Even the disciples who lived with Him for 3 years or more fled when he was arrested. Peter who walked on the water with Jesus, the most loyal one even denied Him 3 times. Faith has nothing to do with proofs.
Still others would insist for proof and say I only believe what is logical and can be proven by science today. Well, even Ian Morrison (Scientist & Astronomer)once said in his lecture that after much research and technology which science has to offer, Scientists were NOT able to find any Goldilock planet like ours. He concluded since science has not proven it yet (Goldilock Planet), we cannot deny it exist. Then he continue to say something like this, since we don’t have the technology to prove God WE CANNOT SAY HE DOES NOT EXIST.
Right now we already have tons of archeological and geological proofs about the Biblical events. Bible is not like a hindu book of Hindu gods(Vishnu,and the rest of the million gods they have, Bible can be verified through history.
After much logical/scientific discussion still others will continue to argue about their disbelief and say I will believe God if you can prove it. Well, here are some practical contradiction to that kind of Philosophy:
1. Point to an airplane up in the sky and ask, Do you believe that there is a pilot flying that plane? If the answer is “yes” say, do you have proofs. If the answer is no ask the same question.
2. Ask them something about the future, Anything in the future. Then continue by asking, Do you have proofs on what you just said? We are only sure of what is present, future is a dimension we cannot cross even science cannot prove what is going to happen tomorrow. We can calculate and predict but its not guaranteed to happen.
3. If the person had a divorce, it meant that when the person got married the person was thinking/believing their marriage will work (with no proof) and he was wrong.
4. If you have sat on a chair and you broke a leg of that chair it simply meant that when you sit you believe the chair can carry your weight (You have no proof about it but you believe it).
If you are observant there are tons of things that will refute the idea that says I only believe God if there is a proof.
One of the main reason people turn away from faith is not the credibility of the God or the Bible but the failures of Christians to live what they believe. “My family goes to church and call themselves Christians BUT they don’t even read their Bible, only in church the Bible get opened,” is what they always say. It is a sad fact. If you have been living in a Christian family most likely you know a lot of the waeknesses of your loveones. If thats the case it does not mean God is not real or God is a fake. I been in church my whole life and i’ve seen leaders in the church do disturbing and terrible things. I have a choice to walk away and say God’s not real, It’s all fake and stuff like that OR I reason to myself that these Christians are but people that is prone make mistakes just like I’m prone to make mistakes. They will give an account of the things they did in the meantime I’m not gonna judge them, God is not done fixing them yet.
Hope I was of help. God bless you all.
Amen. Ghandi said, “If Christians would really live according to the teachings of Christ, as found in the Bible, all of India would be Christian today.” He also said, “If it weren’t for Christians, I’d be a Christian.” This sentiment is repeated ad nauseam by philosophers and religious men alike. Sad, but true.
Even sadder: despite the failings of Christians to show Christ, it is still ultimately the choice of the individual to accept or reject Him. Sorry, Ghandi (and everybody else), but even if we (Christians) are not perfect–however extremely so–it is still your soul, your choice, your responsibility.
You are absolutely correct. All of us here are not sincerely seeking TRUTH.
Many here already are brainwashed into believing what their parents / mullahs, pastors have told them. Each one holds fast to their own belief, and want to impose it on others.
Some of them have difficulty in believing that this universe was not created, and existed from the beginning, but they have no difficulty at all, in believing in another entity (called God) who they say created this universe, and existed from the beginning. If somebody questions their logic, they call them names, and accuses them of being foolish, or like “Pharisees of the Bible who seek to entrap”.
When I buy a car, I would like to know who made it, and where it was manufactured. All responsible car manufacturers usually have their names boldly displayed on their products, and some also displays the country of manufacture. So when I see a Benz car made in Germany, I can from previous experience, know how much reliability, value for money, etc. I can expect from the car.
If all the things in this universe had a plastic tag “Made by GOD” or Made by Krishna, or Allah, or “Made in Heaven” stuck on them, it would have saved us consumers a lot of trouble, fights, and bloodshed. If there is a God, who created everything, there must be a reason why he is not showing his face, or refuses to put a plastic tag on his products. He expects us to worship Him, obey Him, and die for Him, but does not want to show us His face. This is like asking a girl to consent to marriage with a person she had never met, seen, or talked to.
I do not claim to know all the answers. But I have contempt for people who claim to know everything, has no answers for simple questions, and brand real Truth Seekers as “foolish ” and “Pharisees”.
So… there are other Creators? Car manufacturers label their products for competitive reasons only. If there is only ONE car manufacturer, then he doesn’t need to label his product because everybody who buys one should know who made it.
You want your “made by God” tag? It’s in your heart.
You want to know why “made by God” is not universally recognizable? Well, haven’t you ever heard of counterfeit products? People make cheap rip-offs and sell them as the real thing ALL THE TIME. People also steal the original, re-label and re-package it, and sell it as their own. Name tags don’t prove anything.
I don’t believe I know everything. *My* problem is with those who present a part of the truth and then contaminate it with a lie. My parents once told me that a *little bit* of knowledge is the most dangerous thing in the world.
If you believe in the God of the Bible, please stop openly blaming Him for all the wrong in the world. I love my God, and it hurts to see people lying about Him.
If you think God “created evil”, then sorry, but you don’t believe in the God of the Bible.
*That* is simple.
I am not convinced. You first say that God does not need tags because He has no competitor, then you go on to say that He has competitors selling counterfeit products.
The way you explain God, He must be working under many constraints, and may not be omni-potent after all. Otherwise, an omnipotent God could
1) destroy Satan and all his counterfeit products. Recently the Rado watch company, with the help of local authorities confiscated fake Rado watches in many places, and destroyed them, and got the trading licences of the offending shops cancelled. God with His omnipotence should be able to do better.
2) At present, people get punished for their crimes after a delay. God can give some very visible warning signs with a quicker response: eg. the nose of a liar can be made to go red even when he thinks about lying; or the ears can be made to glow green when he is jealous. This will discourage him from lying, as well as warn others around him when he is about to lie.
Why did God send His only begotten Son only to save the lost sheep among men, and not the lost sheep among angels?
I could think of a hundred ways of how I would straighten corrupt politicians, adulterous people, liars, etc. if I were omnipotent.
But God, I feel deliberately makes some poisonous fruits taste good, and obnoxious tasting fruits healthy and nutritious. God could have made chocolate fudge taste like spinach and vice versa. Stef would argue that all this was done by Satan to tempt man to do the wrong things.
If God has forgiven man his sins, why should He still insist that man live by the sweat of his brow, and women deliver children with pain?
There are definitely more things than what Stef can get from the Bible. I would like Stef to give me Bible based answers for the following questions.
1) The Bible explains how Man was tempted to sin by Satan, but who tempted Satan to sin and how.
2) The Bible also says about Sons of God having sexual intercourse with Daughters of Men which resulted in monsters and giants who taught men how to commit different types of sins. Was God not omni present and omnipotent when all these things were happening, or was He taking rest in Heaven, and were all these things being done behind his back?
3) Are Angels incorruptible? Or can they also sin? Are Angels holier than men? Why were they put in charge of watching men in the world?
4) Jesus said that in heaven, everybody are like angels , and do not marry. How can spiritual angels have sexual intercourse with women? Are Angels male or female?
5) Can sons of men have sexual intercourse with angels and produce offspring?
6) Why is satan trying to corrupt only men, and not angels? Are the present angels vaccinated against sin? Why are men not given the same vaccination?
7) Are angels or Men more dear to God? Why is God forgiving only the sin of Man, and not of the angels?
I could go on with a hundred more questions, and if I had the answers to all of them in the Bible, I probably would not have read any other book. But Stef, as seekers of Truth, should we not explore what is available outside the Bible also? Can such a great Being as God be explained completely in one book of a thousand pages?
I believe that God has given us many books and many paths, to reach Him. And in all the paths, the traffic rules are almost the same; except for some minor differences like left hand drive, and right hand drive. But if you decide to be in a right hand drive path, you have to stick to all the rules in that path; otherwise you can have fatal accidents. You cannot have right hand driving and left hand driving motorists in the same path.The other rules like do not steal from others, do not murder others, do not pinch or kick others, etc., are almost similar in all the paths.
There are many ways to skin a banana, and many ways to reach Mount Everest, and a million paths you can take to travel from the South Pole to the North Pole. I think that any path that takes you to your destination can be called a true path, and any path that leads you astray from your destination is a false path.
“You first say that God does not need tags because He has no competitor, then you go on to say that He has competitors selling counterfeit products.” No, I was simply showing the holes in your argument that God *should* have used tags on His creation. YOU claimed that God is just like a car manufacturer; I’m saying that this is a mis-representation. Further, tags wouldn’t prove anything, because there will always be liars.
As to why God doesn’t just kill all the liars (”destroy Satan and his counterfeit products”)–come on, buddy, do you even read what you yourself write? Have you already forgotten all those “free will” issues?
Now, in the search for truth, there are indeed many “good” books, but the Bible states that it alone is the inspired Word of God. If that is a lie, then we can’t trust anything in it–similar to the “Jesus was a great man, but not God’s Son” argument: if He was not God’s Son, then He was a monumental liar, and therefore, hardly a “great man”. If the Bible is not God’s Word, then it has NO value except as rather dry and sometimes moralistic entertainment; if it IS God’s Word, then we’d better believe everything in it, including the parts that say it is the ONLY Word, that say Jesus is the ONLY way, that say that there IS NO OTHER PATH to God.
The argument for “any path that gets you there” is easily abused, as Macchiavelli showed with the “ends” justifying the “means”. Even popular advertisements share this truth: the destination is important, but so is the journey.
Can God be explained in a thousand pages? No less than He can in a billion pages. Infinity, remember? All the writing by every person in a million years would still not be able to define an infinite Being. Isn’t it considerate of Him to not require us to study billions of books, but rather have all the answers we *need* in one convenient package?
And to that list of questions: if it’s not in the Bible, we don’t need to know the answer. (Come on, smart-alec comments welcomed from everybody: “What about science? What about medicine? Are you saying burn all the other books?”) Science, medicine, entertainment even, it’s all good and valuable, but not necessary for eternal salvation. Why do we need to know what angels are like? Really? What business is it of ours? If God doesn’t tell us, it is pure arrogance on our part to think that we “deserve” to know. If we believe that God is good, then certainly if such knowledge were helpful, He would share it with us. The Bible does NOT tell us those things about angels; it would be pure foolishness, however, to start randomly believing what everybody else writes about angels. I *could* make up answers for you, as many do, but God doesn’t really like it when we lie.
IF WE BELIEVE, then we have assurance that our eternal life in Him will be (humanly) unimaginably awesome–and we do NOT need the details right now.
“But God, I feel deliberately makes some poisonous fruits taste good, and obnoxious tasting fruits healthy and nutritious.”
Not the God of the Bible. Luke 11:11-13. (Of course, the gods of all these other books may very well be like that.)
As to the consistency of non-Biblical laws: yeah, I would take that as evidence of God trying to limit the damage of our sin. You that whole accusation against God, that “He is responsible for all the wrong in the world”? Well, He does not *have* to do anything about it–it’s our choice to sin, and our choice to rape, murder and steal; however, because of His great love, He shared some kind of conscience, some desire for justice, with various civilizations throughout time. It’s not enough to save you, but it does make life on this Earth a bit less miserable for people who refuse to know Him–imagine the suffering, if no God-fearing people had any concept of law! Can’t you see the tears in His eyes, as people then take His gift, and use it at evidence against Him? The real kicker: He knew it would happen. Despite His knowing what people would do, He still loves us so much, that He would rather take all of our anger and hatred if it means some measure of “peace on Earth”.
“If God has forgiven man his sins, why should He still insist that man live by the sweat of his brow, and women deliver children with pain?”
You’ve already answered this yourself. Forgiveness must be accepted. And, though our (Christians’) sins be forgiven, there is still the consequence of past choices. What would we learn, if we could just say, “Oh, sorry!” and have all the negative results of our actions taken away? Jesus offers forgiveness and salvation to eternal life; it’s not a magical 100% on every test we’ve ever failed. Why should it be?
And finally, “The way you explain God, He must be working under many constraints, and may not be omni-potent after all.”
Let’s see: He is perfectly good, so He “can not” lie. Is that what you mean? He is omniscient, so He “can not” make a mistake. Or, perhaps you mean those examples about “forcing” people to tell the truth–which goes back to the question of free will (a question which, again, you YOURSELF have answered already).
Omnipotence is a human word for something we can’t understand, obviously. We use it to describe God’s infinite power. It comes back to the question, “Can God create an object so big that He can’t lift it?” And once again, I’m going to turn to Mr. Redding’s answer that “unmovable object” and “irresistible force” are mutually exclusive.
Searching for truth you may be, but you don’t really seem to be thinking this through. I start to wonder if my time would be better spent somewhere else.
” No, I was simply showing the holes in your argument that God *should* have used tags on His creation. YOU claimed that God is just like a car manufacturer; I’m saying that this is a mis-representation.
Why is there this hide and seek game? When Apostle Thomas insisted in putting his finger through Jesus’ wound to confirm that Jesus had risen, why are Christians asked to believe it without any proof, after 2000 years? What would happen if there were more transparency?
Further, tags wouldn’t prove anything, because there will always be liars.
Of course, and God will easily be able to expose the liars, like he is doing even today. But the problem is that the warning light comes on after the engine is burnt. Can’t we have the warning light flashing when the temperature starts to rise,or stop the engine before it destroys itself, surely because of some faulty design or manufacturing technique?
As to why God doesn’t just kill all the liars (”destroy Satan and his counterfeit products”)–come on, buddy, do you even read what you yourself write? Have you already forgotten all those “free will” issues?
For an engine, it may be O.Kay. But will we leave your child on top of a cliff, and tell him to keep away from the edges, and humanely give him the “freedom” to choose whether to obey you or not?
Now, in the search for truth, there are indeed many “good” books, but the Bible states that it alone is the inspired Word of God. If that is a lie, then we can’t trust anything in it–similar to the “Jesus was a great man, but not God’s Son” argument: if He was not God’s Son, then He was a monumental liar, and therefore, hardly a “great man”. If the Bible is not God’s Word, then it has NO value except as rather dry and sometimes moralistic entertainment; if it IS God’s Word, then we’d better believe everything in it, including the parts that say it is the ONLY Word, that say Jesus is the ONLY way, that say that there IS NO OTHER PATH to God.
Just as the Bible is “THE” holy book to you, Muslims have Koran, and Hindus have their texts. How can anyone say their text is holier and more truthful than others, especially, when all of them are saying more or less the same things?
Do you honestly think that a honest and devout Hindu who loved his neighbours, and worshipped his God daily but did not read a page of the Bible, and never even heard of Jesus would land up in hell after he died?
The argument for “any path that gets you there” is easily abused, as Macchiavelli showed with the “ends” justifying the “means”. Even popular advertisements share this truth: the destination is important, but so is the journey.
I do not see any reason why anybody has to “justify” his path, if he is not breaking any rules, or stepping on anybody’s toes.
I can travel from New York to Chicago by car, or by air. If I can afford both, and have enough time for both, and don’t steal money for paying the fare, why should anybody care, and to whom should I justify using one path over another?
If a Hindu decides to find his God sitting under a tree in the Himalayas, instead of sitting in a church listening to a pastor, to whom should he justify his choice?
Can God be explained in a thousand pages? No less than He can in a billion pages. Infinity, remember? All the writing by every person in a million years would still not be able to define an infinite Being. Isn’t it considerate of Him to not require us to study billions of books, but rather have all the answers we *need* in one convenient package?
Is man satisfied with knowing only things that he needs?
Why should man know whether something can travel faster than light?
Why does man “need” a car, or fly an aeroplane?
Why should man know how far the Sun is from earth, or whether the sun goes around the earth, or vice versa?
…and about the things that are available in the Bible, Why does he need to know if there is One God or 5 gods, as long as he has enough food clothes and shelter?
How will it matter if God has a daughter instead of a son?
And to that list of questions: if it’s not in the Bible, we don’t need to know the answer. (Come on, smart-alec comments welcomed from everybody: “What about science? What about medicine? Are you saying burn all the other books?”)
No I mean to say, we need to read books other than Bible also. We should not look for all answers inside the bible.
God has also pre-programmed man’s brain with a copy of the Bible. He will feel guilty when he steals or commits a murder, even if he has never seen a bible or other holy book.
Science, medicine, entertainment even, it’s all good and valuable, but not necessary for eternal salvation.
So are theology, religious books, and clergymen and sermons, and religious ceremonies, and holy places. I won’t be surprised if I find more people in heaven who have never read a holy book, than popes, and bishops, and mullahs, and theological scholars, and people who have dipped in holy rivers, or gone on pilgrimage to holy places.
Why do we need to know what angels are like? Really? What business is it of ours? If God doesn’t tell us, it is pure arrogance on our part to think that we “deserve” to know. If we believe that God is good, then certainly if such knowledge were helpful, He would share it with us.
How does it help you to know that the Son sits on the right hand of the Father, and not on the left?
Why does the Bible not tell us how to recognise liars, how to control tsunamis, how to stop global warming?
The Bible does NOT tell us those things about angels; it would be pure foolishness, however, to start randomly believing what everybody else writes about angels. I *could* make up answers for you, as many do, but God doesn’t really like it when we lie.
I am not particularly interested in knowing much about angels, but the little information given to us in the Bible leaves us guessing.- how they procreated with daughters of men when they are sexless, and how their children taught civil engineering and metallurgy to men to corrupt them.
IF WE BELIEVE, then we have assurance that our eternal life in Him will be (humanly) unimaginably awesome–and we do NOT need the details right now.
This is something I have always failed to understand. Is it enough that we believe something, or is it not necessary to act on your belief, if you are to obtain a certain result? Suppose I get a bottle of wine by post from a certain Stef. If I believe all Stefs are good, I will drink it. But if it was sent to me by a bad Stef who had mixed some potent poison with the wine before sending, my belief would be wrong, and I would die. (like how Eve was tricked into eating the apple.
Now, the result of dying will happen,
if Stef is bad but I believe him to be good, and drink.
I will not die
if Stef is good and I believe him to be good,and therefore drink
if Stef is bad but I don’t believe him,and therefore didn’t drink
if Stef is good, but I believe that he is bad , and I don’t drink.
Is “believing” or “drinking” more important, in deciding the outcome?
So is it not safest not to believe anybody?
Serpent, God, holy books, charlatans, scamsters, pastors, popes, et al?
Is not in-action safer than enthusiastic action under a belief ?
“But God, I feel deliberately makes some poisonous fruits taste good, and obnoxious tasting fruits healthy and nutritious.”
Not the God of the Bible. Luke 11:11-13. (Of course, the gods of all these other books may very well be like that.)
Why is creamy chocolate fudge cake tastier than boiled broccolli?
As to the consistency of non-Biblical laws: yeah, I would take that as evidence of God trying to limit the damage of our sin. You that whole accusation against God, that “He is responsible for all the wrong in the world”?
Well, is He not, if He is the author of everything seen and unseen in this Universe?
Well, He does not *have* to do anything about it–it’s our choice to sin, and our choice to rape, murder and steal; however, because of His great love, He shared some kind of conscience, some desire for justice, with various civilizations throughout time.
He could have shared the whole of it. Is it necessary to make babies, and grow them up? Was Adam created as a baby, and made to grow up, or was he created as an adult?
When we make a truck, do we make a small truck and then let it grow, or do we make a 1950 model truck, and then replace the parts with parts of better design, to finally get a 2010 model truck? We directly build the most modern truck with all the latest electronic gadgets.
Why does man have to be born as a baby, and grow up gradually, repeating all the mistakes his father and grandfather did, and learning from them? Why can’t his brain be straight away loaded with the latest software ?
It’s not enough to save you, but it does make life on this Earth a bit less miserable for people who refuse to know Him–imagine the suffering, if no God-fearing people had any concept of law!
Why do you think people refuse to know him? half the people of this world are at war with the other half, because they are not sure who their God is. Why is the Son still sitting on the Father’s right hand. He could come here and become the ruler, and put satan in jail. Why should he come stealthily like a thief? Why can’t he come in a 3 piece suit and land in JFK airport, in full sight of all press photographers, and start ruling the world, and end all misery in this world?
Can’t you see the tears in His eyes, as people then take His gift, and use it at evidence against Him?
This is all happening because He is not
The real kicker: He knew it would happen. Despite His knowing what people would do, He still loves us so much, that He would rather take all of our anger and hatred if it means some measure of “peace on Earth”.
This is like a father giving a Ferrari to his 5 year old son to drive, to stop him from crying, because he loves his son dearly.
“If God has forgiven man his sins, why should He still insist that man live by the sweat of his brow, and women deliver children with pain?”
You’ve already answered this yourself. Forgiveness must be accepted. And, though our (Christians’) sins be forgiven, there is still the consequence of past choices. What would we learn, if we could just say, “Oh, sorry!” and have all the negative results of our actions taken away? Jesus offers forgiveness and salvation to eternal life; it’s not a magical 100% on every test we’ve ever failed. Why should it be?
If I break your beer glass, and if you forgive me, will you still insist on my paying for a new glass? Then what is the meaning of “forgiving”?
And finally, “The way you explain God, He must be working under many constraints, and may not be omni-potent after all.”
Let’s see: He is perfectly good, so He “can not” lie. Is that what you mean? He is omniscient, so He “can not” make a mistake. Or, perhaps you mean those examples about “forcing” people to tell the truth–which goes back to the question of free will (a question which, again, you YOURSELF have answered already).
No I don’t think I have the answer yet. I am still seeking answers.
God need not reduce the freedom of MAN. But He can restrain SATAN.
Omnipotence is a human word for something we can’t understand, obviously. We use it to describe God’s infinite power. It comes back to the question, “Can God create an object so big that He can’t lift it?” And once again, I’m going to turn to Mr. Redding’s answer that “unmovable object” and “irresistible force” are mutually exclusive.
Do you imply that satan is so powerful, that getting rid of him off is impossible for God, like lifting an unliftable weight?
Searching for truth you may be, but you don’t really seem to be thinking this through.
I may be not very clever, but I am enjoying this journey towards Truth.
I start to wonder if my time would be better spent somewhere else.
Don’t give up too soon. The fruit we get after a lot of effort will be sweeter than what we will get easily.
Tony, there doesn’t seem to be a “reply” link under your comment, so I’ll put it under my own.
In your own words:
“Why is there this hide and seek game?” And “Can’t we have the warning light flashing when the temperature starts to rise,or stop the engine before it destroys itself, surely because of some faulty design or manufacturing technique?”
And then:
“God has also pre-programmed man’s brain with a copy of the Bible. He will feel guilty when he steals or commits a murder, even if he has never seen a bible or other holy book.”
I’m sorry that I simply don’t have the time to respond to each of your comments… but I don’t really need to, because you’ve answered most of them yourself.
Really, second-guessing God is an exercise in futility. Why can’t we walk on water? Why do we have to breathe oxygen? Why is the sky blue?
Do we really think that God never considered those questions? Dare we accuse God of not thinking it through?
If God is as described in the Bible, then the way He did it was the only and best way. END OF STORY. We may still respectfully ask Him why, but to start saying the He should have done it differently is like the ignorant bystander telling the professional how to do his job–except that in this case, the professional knows everything and can do anything.
As to doubting Thomas, Jesus specifically said that it was better to believe without seeing; besides, the “evidence” is in our hands, it’s the Bible.
On the Qu’ran and other “holy” scriptures: the Bible says that Jesus is the only way, so if the Bible is true, then the other scriptures are WRONG because they teach a different “salvation”. If the other scriptures are true, then the Bible is WRONG, and therefore not worth the comparison. It’s NOT like choosing between driving and flying–it’s choosing between the “easy” path that leads to death, and the “difficult” path that leads to life. Why is the good path so difficult? Well, that brings us to your broccoli/cake question: for someone with healthy eating habits, broccoli DOES taste good; in fact, “creamy chocolate fudge cake” is so sickeningly sweet that only in the West, where the diet uses so much sugar that we can’t taste it anymore, is such a thing actually “delicious”. (Far Eastern pastries tend to have much less sugar, because they’re not used to the sweetness.) At first, the healthy diet seems restrictive and “bland”, but once you get all the poisons out of your system, you find a world of flavour that doesn’t leave you sick to your stomach afterwards. SAME THING.
Now, briefly (for I must also sleep at some point): it is not wrong to be curious and inventive; these are God-given qualities. However, you ask why the Bible doesn’t tell us “useful” things: “Why does the Bible not tell us how to recognise liars, how to control tsunamis, how to stop global warming?”
It does tell us: liars tell you things that don’t agree with the Bible. (This seems almost like one of those “well, duh!” statements, but I’m actually trying not to offend here: the Bible is Truth. ANYTHING that disagrees with the Bible is therefore a lie; anyBODY that disagrees with the Bible is a liar. Easy, no?)
Tsunamis? Prayer. Jesus calmed a storm by speaking to it. He can do the same again–if we would only *ask*. Global warming? Don’t steal, don’t be selfish, don’t be greedy, don’t be lazy… hey, that would solve the problem.
“I won’t be surprised if I find more people in heaven who have never read a holy book, than popes, and bishops, …”
Well, I can’t disagree with you there. Most of the human leadership of the Church is in it for the power, not for God’s glory. It’s sad, but true. On the other hand, you keep going on about finding truth in “other” books, and that is where the majority of those “religious leaders” go wrong! A pastor who has read the Bible and ONLY the Bible may never have a huge church, but he will be a good and faithful shepherd, as long as he reads the Bible truly.
Now, on the matter of the Stef and the Wine: if God had said, “You may drink any wine but the Vignet ‘89,” and the Stef sends you a wine bottle clearly labelled “Vignet ‘89″, then OBVIOUSLY your faith in the Stef is irrelevant– what matters is whether you obey God! If you believe nobody, then you see a wine bottle and drink because you are thirsty. “Faith” and “actions” can not be separated; you can’t start deliberating which is “more important”. (Lots on that in the Bible, but there’s no point in reading it until you’re willing to accept that the Bible might be true, and all “competing” scripture false.)
“If I break your beer glass, and if you forgive me, will you still insist on my paying for a new glass? Then what is the meaning of “forgiving”?”
If in your rebellion against me, you broke my glass, and then asked for forgiveness, I would forgive you for your rebellion, but perhaps still ask you to pay for the glass–especially if it wasn’t the first time. My forgiveness means that we can still “be friends”.
“Do you imply that satan is so powerful, that getting rid of him off is impossible for God, like lifting an unliftable weight?”
Again, NO, you’ve got to read more carefully. “Infinite strength” and “unliftable weight” are mutually exclusive by definition. The Bible says that God is infinite in power, so therefore, there is no such thing as an unliftable weight. Please stop mis-representing my words! Every time I start to think that maybe you are being sincere, you go and pull something like that.
“This is like a father giving a Ferrari to his 5 year old son to drive, to stop him from crying, because he loves his son dearly.”
Holy crap, but you are frustrating. There are none so blind as those who WILL not see!
You ask why God doesn’t limit Satan more. Again with the second-guessing! Either God loves us and does what is best for us–like the Bible says–or He doesn’t. IF THE BIBLE IS TRUE, THEN YOU HAVE TO TRUST GOD. IF THE BIBLE ISN’T TRUE, THEN SATAN DOESN’T EXIST ANYWAY.
好不好? Ok?
“I may be not very clever, but I am enjoying this journey towards Truth.
…
Don’t give up too soon. The fruit we get after a lot of effort will be sweeter than what we will get easily.”
Don’t take this wrong, I mean, I’m glad you’re enjoying this, but really: if the Bible is true, then every moment you delay in making a decision, you are risking your soul. Death comes so easily– my mother-in-law went into the hospital last weekend with pneumonia. She’s recovering, but she’s still in the ICU. One of my former students died last fall from stomach cancer. Airplanes crash, bacteria on sandwich meat makes deadly toxins, people DIE– don’t be one of those to whom Jesus says, “I never knew you”!
There are moments in your comments where you seem truly earnest in your search… but mostly, you seem to be playing devil’s advocate. It may be time for you to stop doubting. I will pray that God keep you safe until you come to know and accept Him, but don’t take too long– the devil wants nothing more than for you to die thinking you can still decide “tomorrow”.
I fear I may be too busy to keep in contact for the next little while… take care and God bless, and please stop running from God. He loves you so much…
Some animal rights’ activists call them “inhumane”, but the truth is that for most pets, invisible fences work. You know, those beacons you set up in a perimeter which send a signal to a dog’s collar, giving him a shock when he tries to pass beyond the perimeter–and if well designed, the shock gets stronger the further the dog ventures out of his allowed territory. Now, assuming the owners are not complete morons, and they actually take time to try to teach the dog where the limits are–”don’t leave the yard, stay off the neighbour’s lawn”–then the dog usually learns quickly, and relatively painlessly, not to leave the yard.
Do the owners do it to be sadistic? No, they don’t want their beloved pet getting run over on the road.
Can the dog still choose to ignore the pain, and run away anyhow? Sure he can–that makes it his choice, though, doesn’t it?
If he does run away, and gets hit by a car, is that his owners punishing him?
Sure, the owners *could* tie him up, so he can’t leave the yard. I’ve never met a tied dog who was truly happy, though. I’ve seen a lot of miserable dogs in cages, who have good enough reason to think their masters are petty and powerless, and whose only thought is escape because *anywhere* else has got to be better than where they are.
I’ve also seen a lot of happy, content dogs, who have learned to stay in their yards because–however they were trained–they got to know their masters well enough to believe that there’s nowhere better to be than with their masters.
Does God put us in cages? Or does He actually try to teach us what the boundaries are, to keep us safe, and sometimes resort to discipline to help us learn, so that we will eventually come to know Him well enough to not *want* to leave?
I’ve left the yard a few times, and on occasion gotten zapped for it, but by HIS grace, I’ve not yet gotten run over by a car.
As to your computer analogy… Perry gives a pretty good answer. ;p
One simple question can put to rest both the arguments. Will you give your son the same freedom that you give your dog, even though your son is more intelligent and logical than the dog?
In what way is that “simple”? Mr. Francis, you’re not thinking carefully, here. Your question suggests that because my son is more intelligent, I should give him *less* freedom. (Perhaps you should reconsider the meaning of “even though”). Really, your question solves nothing–but rather, like the Pharisees of the Bible, you seek to entrap: whether I answer “yes” or “no”, you will have some seemingly clever comment to distract readers from the truth.
I still strongly suspect you are only trying to start arguments. The Bible has much to say about such foolishness.
Now, you’ve had plenty of opportunity to learn and understand; you have the “freedom”, however, to choose not to. If you are as young as your comments seem to suggest, then a word of warning: your smart tongue will get you into trouble, one day. (Mine did for me, when I was your age.)
God bless–and grow up.
You can call me by any name, but my intention is not to distract people from truth, but to make them think and arrive at their own conclusions instead of being satisfied with what they are fed by pastors and mullahs and priests.
When we are children, we usually have hundreds of different rules we have to obey. eg. Do not touch knives, do not touch electric plugs /appliances. Stay away from the stove/ oven, stop playing and get back home by 6 Oclock, Take bath by 6-30, etc., etc. etc.
As you grow up, the same father who told you not to touch a stove, may ask you to boil some water and make a tea for him. When you grow still more mature, the number of rules will decrease further.
But when you were small, you could get away with passing urine in bed, or soiling your clothes. But when you become more mature, your responsibility increases though the number of rules have reduced. What was not a crime when you were ignorant, becomes a crime when you become more mature, though you have more freedom like staying away from home even after 6 Oclock, or have access to all electric plugs / utensils.
What happened in the Garden of Eden is that Man chose to trade restrictions for responsibility.
He chose to venture out of the restrictions (do not eat that apple) and face the consequences. In other words, he “matured” from a boy to an adult. He knew what is right from what is wrong, unlike the child he was before.
Will any Father want to lock up his son in a cellar and feed him three times with nutritious food with the correct amount of calories, so that he will never go out and get hit by a car , or have an accident, or get obese eating junk food?
Why should we think that God “punished” Adam for “growing up” and venturing out?
Every tree tries to send its seed as far away as possible from itself, so that it can grow into another full fledged tree, instead of it falling down, and having a stunted growth under its shade.
So if you exercise your freedom to venture out, you will grow up, otherwise, you will have stunted growth, and remain a boy within the boundary of your home.
So Stef can decide whether to grow up, or remain stunted believing that there is truth only in the bible, and none elsewhere.
Also in my home, my 2 years old dog has more freedom than my 10 years old son. The dog can come and go any time, eat or sleep any time, and pass urine on every tree or boulder it comes across, but my son is not allowed these freedoms. I hope that you will now understand why I used the expression “even though”
“He chose to venture out of the restrictions (do not eat that apple) and face the consequences.”
That’s not maturity! Maturity is growing up and understanding the need for the restrictions; being mentally able to have the rules explained, not just dictated. Adam didn’t show maturity, he disobeyed. Before, he knew what was wrong: eating the fruit from that tree. My son will show his maturity when he chooses to FOLLOW the rules, not when he chooses to disobey them. Really, man, think! When he follows the rules willingly, he shows that he is ready to understand–or already understands–the reason for the rules. As long as he rebels, he clearly does not understand the purpose of the rules! (Or is the ten-year old son supposed to be smarter than the father, and show this by challenging his authority?)
“When you grow still more mature, the number of rules will decrease further.” Wrong again. As a two-year-old, your rules encompass your environment–one room of a house, perhaps–and as an adult, the same is true–but now, your environment is the whole world. Fewer rules? Think again.
God WANTED Adam to “venture” out–remember, “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the Earth…”– but Adam refused to do things God’s way.
“What happened in the Garden of Eden is that Man chose to trade restrictions for responsibility.” No, what happened is Man sinned. He traded ONE restriction (the fruit) for a whole world of restrictions. Responsibility? He was already responsible for his decision regarding the fruit, and showed himself incapable of handling even that responsibility.
This is what happens when you look outside of God’s Word for His Truth. Again: if it disagrees with the Bible, then either “it” is wrong, or the Bible is NOT the inspired Word of God; if the Bible is not the inspired Word of God, then why use it at all?
“Also in my home, my 2 years old dog has more freedom than my 10 years old son.”
Your dog has the freedom to use the phone, eat with a knife and fork, take a bath on his own, buy comic books, do chores, get an allowance, get dressed, choose his own clothes to put on, tell you what he wants for breakfast, ask for birthday presents, brush his own hair, read books, participate in school activities, go shopping with you, ……………………
You’re right. Poor kid, eh? The dog has “more” freedom than he does.
Thanks, but I’ll stick to the Bible. Perhaps it will “stunt” my worldly growth, but that doesn’t seem to important to God, so I really don’t understand why it should be important to me.
P.S. I will apologize for one thing: if your son is ten, then you are probably older than I am; the Bible says to respect one’s elders, so I must say sorry for some of my less polite comments. On the other hand, the Bible does say an aweful lot about pointless arguments, as well. So: if you insist on disregarding the Bible, there’s not much more for us to discuss; if, however, you wish to examine the truth of its claim to be the inspired Word of God, there may be some profit in the discussion.
“When you grow still more mature, the number of rules will decrease further.” Wrong again. As a two-year-old, your rules encompass your environment–one room of a house, perhaps–and as an adult, the same is true–but now, your environment is the whole world. Fewer rules? Think again.
Why was Moses given 10 commandments, while Jesus taught only “LOVE”- Love of GOD and Love of your Neighbours.?
Did Jesus reduce the number of rules because men during Moses’time were more holy, and responsible?
God WANTED Adam to “venture” out–remember, “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the Earth…”– but Adam refused to do things God’s way.
“What happened in the Garden of Eden is that Man chose to trade restrictions for responsibility.” No, what happened is Man sinned. He traded ONE restriction (the fruit) for a whole world of restrictions. Responsibility? He was already responsible for his decision regarding the fruit, and showed himself incapable of handling even that responsibility.
Its O.K for us to say now, that Adam sinned. But considering the circumstances God had put him in, anybody would have acted like him.
In the first place, why was the forbidden tree put in reach of Adam or Eve.
Why do parents lock away medicines, razor blades, guns, etc. out of reach of their immature children?
Did God make a mistake while assessing the maturity of Adam and Eve/ or was the stage set for Adam to sin?
How would Adam know that the serpent was lying, when he was ignorant and innocent of all sins ? How would he have known that there are some beings that are not to be trusted?
Even today, how would a man know whether, Krishna, or Allah or Jesus is God, and whom he should trust?
If a man (Mr. M)is brought up in a certain faith where he is taught that it is “holy” and a virtue to kill people of other faiths, and if he sincerely believes it and obeys the teachings, is he committing a sin?
1) according to you
2) according to Christianity?
3) according to his faith?
4) according to him?
This is what happens when you look outside of God’s Word for His Truth.
Should Mr M look outside of what he was taught, searching for the real truth?
If yes, why should not Adam or a Christian do the same?
Again: if it disagrees with the Bible, then either “it” is wrong, or the Bible is NOT the inspired Word of God; if the Bible is not the inspired Word of God, then why use it at all?
But to Mr. M, the Christian Bible would be “another book” that does not agree with his faith.
“Also in my home, my 2 years old dog has more freedom than my 10 years old son.”
Your dog has the freedom to use the phone, eat with a knife and fork, take a bath on his own, buy comic books, do chores, get an allowance, get dressed, choose his own clothes to put on, tell you what he wants for breakfast, ask for birthday presents, brush his own hair, read books, participate in school activities, go shopping with you, ……………………
You’re right. Poor kid, eh? The dog has “more” freedom than he does.
The dog does not have to come home by 6 PM,
He does not have to do home work.
He does not have to brush his hair.
He does not have to brush his teeth.
He does not have to flush the toilet.
He can roll in dust, mud, and go for a swim anytime.
He can chase birds, cats and mice any time he feels like.
He can continue sleeping even when the telephone rings
I can go on and list 2 freedoms of the dog for every freedom you mention for the boy.
Thanks, but I’ll stick to the Bible. Perhaps it will “stunt” my worldly growth, but that doesn’t seem to important to God, so I really don’t understand why it should be important to me.
Then you will not be following God’s plan. There must be a reason why God put the forbidden tree and the “other ” books within man’s reach. If all boys did only what their parents taught them, we would not have had any inventions, or computers or advancements in science.
P.S. I will apologize for one thing: if your son is ten, then you are probably older than I am; the Bible says to respect one’s elders, so I must say sorry for some of my less polite comments.
On the other hand, I will appreciate if you respect my logic rather than my age. What an aged person says need not necessarily be more “truthful” than what a younger man says. Einstein was only in his 20s when he postulated his Theory of relativity.
I did not notice any un-politeness in your comments so far. But if that was your intention, then, I accept the apology.
On the other hand, the Bible does say an aweful lot about pointless arguments, as well. So: if you insist on disregarding the Bible, there’s not much more for us to discuss; if, however, you wish to examine the truth of its claim to be the inspired Word of God, there may be some profit in the discussion.
Now that I know that you are younger than me, may I ask you a few questions that may liberate you from some constraints which are restricting your thoughts.
Do you think that our world is progressing or deteriorating?
Is it following God’s plan, or has God made a mistake?
Why did God want to “test” Adam?
Did he not know what the result of the test would be?
Did God give freedom of choice to man in the hope that he would never exercise it?
Is man progressing or deteriorating?
Will God achieve his purpose of Creation in the end?
Has God started on plan B (for saving man from eternal destruction) after His plan A was foiled by Satan?
Was Satan a part of God’s plan, or another earlier mistake?
If God had made a mistake while creating Satan, why did He not use the lesson learnt from that mistake, while creating Adam?
and finally, can you find fault with – terrorists carrying out suicide bombing etc. who do so blindly following some instructions from a book they fanatically claim to be “WORD of GOD” without going through them logically, and verifying if it would achieve the desired results, if you are doing the same with Bible?
Personally, I do believe that the Bible is the true “WORD OF GOD”, – not because a pastor or my parents told me but because it has passed all the “tests” that I have subjected it to.
There are hundreds more of tests and questions I have in mind, and I don’t think I will have time in this lifetime to explore all the possibilities, and understand it all. But that should not kill my curiosity which is what makes life so interesting. If that forbidden tree was not planted in the Garden of eden, Adam would have had a very boring life- living a today which is like yesterday, and will be like tomorrow having nothing new to know, or invent.
I finally have a moment to read through your comment again, and I’m not going to answer it all, because quite simply, we don’t believe in the same God. My God doesn’t make mistakes. That’s what the Bible says. You don’t believe it.
Claim to believe in the Bible if you wish, but don’t forget Jesus’ words that there will be those who say to Him, “Lord”, but He will reply to them, “I never knew you.”
Infinity requires perfection. It’s simple physics. No imperfect system–or being–can last forever. If your god can make mistakes, then he’s not perfect, and he sure as snot can’t save your soul for eternity.
“Personally, I do believe that the Bible is the true “WORD OF GOD”, – not because a pastor or my parents told me but because it has passed all the “tests” that I have subjected it to.”
You think that no muslims “test” the Ko’ran? No mormons “test” their Book of Mormon? No devil worshippers “test” their unholy scriptures?
I believe that the Bible is the Word of God because I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. My life experiences have “proven” the Bible to me, but just because it is logically consistent does NOT mean that it saves me! The dictionary is logically consistent, too.
You believe that sin was necessary for life to be “interesting”; you believe that God made mistakes; you believe that God *wanted* Adam to sin by eating from the tree. None of that is consistent with the God of the Bible; therefore, you don’t believe in the God of the Bible.
Have you read the Chronicles of Narnia? I’m thinking of the seventh book, The Last Battle, towards the end, where the black dwarves refuse to see Aslan. Why do you refuse to see the glory of God? You write extensively about it, but when it is spread out in front of you like a banquet, you grumble about rotten turnips! The one concept alone, that without sin God’s creation would be dull and boring, that you so stubbornly cling to–that one idealogy of yours proves your insistent blindness. IF God is great, then He does NOT need suffering, conflict, SIN to make our lives interesting! OPEN your eyes and read the words that you yourself have written!
(This is at the root of everything you write–please, ask God to open your eyes!)
God does create evil, he did from the beginning, he created lucifer. He created eve who picked the apple from the tree and then he condenmed us all for that one sin. Condemning is a relative to evil or bad or negative. God does create evil. He created us all apparently your bible says. He can’t have created some things and not the others. His only son died on the cross, He created it all. We are Gods creation and so are the heavens and earth. God created everything. He created evil for sure. Stop denying it. He can’t create some things and not others. If god forgives us for our sins. Why did we sin in the first place. He created us to be sinners. Just another contradiction
Why does everyone think that God is “good” and how do you define “good” in the first place, when measured against the creator of the universe? When bacteria go to work against dead organic matter and turns it into compost that enriches the soil, it is “good”, but when other bacteria go to work against YOU and try to do the same while you are living, you regard it as “bad” or “evil”. There is no good or evil in the universe, just as you point out: there is reverse and obverse, different sides of the coin, that is all.
I doubt that you actually live your life as though there is no good or evil in the universe, nor do you want anyone else to behave as though that’s true.
Actually, Conway, the statement regarding our inability to completely comprehend the characteristics and abilities of God, is an assertion (in this case). The original statement, is an assertion. Meaning, most people would understand its exact implication. We don’t quite know the complete set of abilities God possesses. Well, apart from a few stated by the deity, Himself.
In response to Kay Jay’s implications; If all microbial life wield the possiblitiy of severe disease(s), then God has also provided the more capable members of the society with minerals/materials/objects needed for curing/healing purposes. God has provided us with everything. He has provided us with intellect and pertinence, to comprehend and process a multiplex of occurences, or events. “Understanding” voids us of any doubts of the impossiblity of certain tasks. Everything within our realm of possibility can be achieved.
If we attain “all knowledge” there is to acquire, we would be able to perform certain tasks seemingly impossible, considering the current frame of thought of people regarding the extrapolations of impracticality.
Then he created greddy governments to stop us from using these help aides, when really it is our own right to do what we want. If i wanted to hang myself, it would be my choice and noone elses. If i want to have children, it would be 50% my choice and 50% my partner or the girl etc. Not government or any other. They know how to run cars on water also but why isn’t it being done. Oh the scare stories, unsafe etc, how can it be not safe, it is water. Fuel,/ gas explodes also. All it is is greed, control over others, this is why wars also get started. They can cure any disease with pure oxgen machines but government slam that. I can tell you, if bill made a machine that could cure me and i was on deaths door. It would be my choice to use his machine and his choice to make the machine not government or doctors. All those people are greed, They let ther own people starve and slave., while they drive around in luxury on the backs of others. They created a business out of something that was meant to be a rep for each country to liase, not to control us all but still people do not see it. I couldn’t care less if it was the queen of england, she has no more power over me then i do her so she would not be telling me i could not see my own children or if dying wanting to use bill machine. If it killed me, that would be my choice. If it cured me that would be my choice.
Listen up! Kay Jay and Conway, ye ‘would-be’ judges of God! Your problem is quite like that of Job, who could not understand his own suffering. The main difference between you and Job is that while Job did not curse God, even though his wife suggested it to him, you two needed no prodding to do the same.
Did God explain it to him? Not one bit. He only showed Job how meager his understanding was. Where were you when I was laying out all the cosmos? (Job 38:4-41). And so, neither will I attempt any further explanation. If you really want to understand, ask God!
I don’t think you have read my posts carefully, Carl. At no point do I curse God, if only because I won’t waste my time cursing an imaginary being. It would be kind of like cursing Wile E. Coyote or Daffy Duck.
But I do find it hard to understand how anyone who does believe in the real existence of the entity called “God,” or “Jehovah,” or “Allah,” or “Yahweh,” whatever, could forbear cursing him, when they consider the many unpleasantnesses that that entity, whom they claim is the author of all, has arranged to make them subject to on this plane of existence. Yes, yes, I know that the standard counter-argument is that it’s not God but Satan who has arranged the bad stuff, but taking that tack immediately raises the question, within the religionists’ cognitive framework, of who arranged for Satan to exist.
Let me add that, in my universe, Satan, too, is entirely a figment of the imagination of men, and that when religionists invoke Satan, they are simply compounding their error, referring to one imaginary being to get another imaginary being off the hook, so to speak.
As for Job, well, that little story is the one that, when I was in Sunday School longer ago than I care to say, first spurred me to begin thinking critically about what I was being taught, rather than just sitting there nodding my head and thinking, “True, true.” I mean, here’s Job, God’s good and faithful servant, going along minding his own business, and here’s God, who, to prove a point to Satan, his arch-enemy, allows Satan to mess Job over big time. My thought then was that God was being a bit of a dick; his failure to explain to Job what was going on just made his being a dick more egregious. In my almost 75 years I have read little in the Bible, and heard nothing from people who claim to know about such things, that has changed my opinion.
But I do not curse the nonexistent, Carl. I’m much more likely to curse those who attempt to foist superstition, legend, and mythology off on the gullible as “Holy Truth.”
I suspect, but cannot prove, that the only reason you will attempt no further explanation of the logical contradictions to which a belief in the real existence of a deity inevitably leads, is that, ultimately, there is no viable explanation. So here is the choice: either shit-can your ability to reason and embrace the multitudinous contradictions and inconsistencies inherent in being a True Believer, or begin to think and reason and as a result move from Bronze Age darkness into the light.
Sorry to interrupt your private feud (though I guess you didn’t notice the last time, either), but what more horrible thing can you say about someone/thing than that he/it does not exist? Sounds like a curse to me.
By the way, “in my universe”… doesn’t that sound a little bit hollow to you? Are you alone in your universe? Do you assume that we each live in our own universe, and that whichever beliefs we choose to endorse are real to us and therefore real in our own universes? If that’s the case, these web comments are actually your own sub-conscious speaking to you–SO much to say on that–or you share the universe with the rest of us, and that means there is one universe (a bit redundant to point out, what with “uni-” in the word), one reality, one truth… and it comes down to this: A) you’re right, there is no God; you gain nothing, I lose nothing; or B) you’re wrong, there IS a God; I gain everything… you lose everything.
Please, think again. As with most Christians, I don’t believe I’m always 100% right in everything, but this I know for sure: when I die, my soul is safe; Jesus loves you, despite your doubt; and, whether you believe in them or not, both God and the devil believe in *you*. God wants to save your soul, the devil wants to destroy it, and only you get to choose which of them will succeed. If you’re almost 75, then you may not have much time left. Don’t be like the captain of the Titannic, stubbornly certain that his ship won’t sink… and find out too late that you were wrong.
One more thing: if you’re concerned with people saying “I told you so” then you don’t need to tell us if you change your mind. What does it hurt, really, to just ask God, with an open heart, if He exists? If you like, I will ask Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote if they are real. I’ll ask them sincerely and honestly; I’m fairly sure I won’t get an answer, but I’m willing to try. Would you be willing to do the same? Honestly, sincerely, ask God if He’s real, and listen for an answer. What can it hurt?
God bless.
I’m using my usual format for answering postings on this site, Stef: Your comments I’ve enclosed in quotation marks, and mine I have not thus enclosed.
“Sorry to interrupt your private feud (though I guess you didn’t notice the last time, either), but what more horrible thing can you say about someone/thing than that he/it does not exist?”
Oh, I dont know, Stef. But how about, “He/it exists but is unspeakably evil.” Seems to me that, for horribleness, that trumps saying “He/it doesn’t exist.”
“Sounds like a curse to me.”
Sorry, Stef, but you can’t curse someone/thing that doesn’t exist, except in a metaphorical sense. So when I say God has no real existence, that is less a curse than a statement of what I take to be fact.
“By the way, “in my universe”… doesn’t that sound a little bit hollow to you? Are you alone in your universe? Do you assume that we each live in our own universe, and that whichever beliefs we choose to endorse are real to us and therefore real in our own universes?”
You’re really grasping at straws here, Stef, in an attempt, I presume, to convince a reader that my position on the real existence of a deity is untenable. The line of reasoning would be, I suppose, that a thoroughgoing solipsism is untenable, and that a thoroughgoing solipsist is likely to hold other untenable beliefs. But anyone with a dram of understanding of the use of figurative language would have recognized that the turn of phrase, “in my universe,” is equivalent to “as I see it,” or “in my opinion,” and does not permit the reasonable inference that I hold a solipsistic point of view.
“If that’s the case, these web comments are actually your own sub-conscious speaking to you–SO much to say on that–”
Oh, and are you now an authority on my subconscious, Stef? Hmmm… Seems to me you have a penchant, at once presumptuous and arrogant, for pretending to be a some kind of telepath or empath, a Betazoid, if you will. In one of your prior posts you seemed to be claiming to know what I know to be true deep down in my heart. I asked you to spare me this presumption, but you appear determined to ignore my request.
“or you share the universe with the rest of us, and that means there is one universe”
Evidently you’re unfamiliar with the modern cosmological concept of “multiverses.” But no matter.
“(a bit redundant to point out, what with “uni-” in the word), one reality, one truth”
Oh come on Stef, think, if think indeed you can, which I’m beginning to doubt. There may indeed be only one objective reality, but there are as many subjective realities as there are perceivers of that one objective reality, as is easily demonstrated any time two people look at the same thing/event and report perceiving something differentfrom what the other has reported perceiving. This plays out in courtrooms every day that court is in session, and is one of the reasons eyewitness reports have proven to be so unreliable and are so assiduously deconstructed by prosecutors and defense attorneys alike.
“… and it comes down to this: A) you’re right, there is no God; you gain nothing, I lose nothing; or B) you’re wrong, there IS a God; I gain everything… you lose everything.”
Thank you, Blaise Pascal, from whom you cribbed this specious argument, without, I note, giving him credit. But if God has no real existence, and I do think the available evidence points in that direction, then I have been spared wasting my time on meaningless rituals, prayers, worshippings, and adorations, time that I could have put to better use, and you have not been thus spared. On the other hand, if God has a real existence, what’s to assure you that when I stand before this God, he won’t say, “Hey, with what I gave you to work with in the way of evidence, I can understand why you didn’t believe I existed.”? And what’s to assure you that when you stand before him, he won’t say, “You know, I gave you a brain with which to reason, and I gave you the tools of logic and observation to use in support of your ability to reason, yet you chose not to use any of these gifts. I don’t want your kind in my Heaven.”? Just asking, Stef.
“Please, think again. As with most Christians, I don’t believe I’m always 100% right in everything, but this I know for sure: when I die, my soul is safe; Jesus loves you, despite your doubt; and, whether you believe in them or not, both God and the devil believe in *you*.”
My mind boggles trying to grasp what you can possibly mean when you say that imaginary beings believe in me. What would you make of it if I told you that whether or not you believe in their real existence, Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote believe in *you*? Such a statement would be arrant nonsense, and so is yours, Stef.
“God wants to save your soul, the devil wants to destroy it, and only you get to choose which of them will succeed. If you’re almost 75, then you may not have much time left. Don’t be like the captain of the Titannic,”
That’s “Titanic,” Stef. The “Titannic” was another ship, made entirely of the yellowish or brownish bitter-tasting complex phenolic substance present in tea, some barks, grapes, etc.
“stubbornly certain that his ship won’t sink… and find out too late that you were wrong.
One more thing: if you’re concerned with people saying “I told you so” then you don’t need to tell us if you change your mind. What does it hurt, really, to just ask God, with an open heart, if He exists?”
All it would hurt would be my belief that, to date, I have been relatively free of psychosis. I gave up talking to, or asking questions of, imaginary playmates, a long, long time ago, and see no reason to revive that practice now.
“If you like, I will ask Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote if they are real. I’ll ask them sincerely and honestly; I’m fairly sure I won’t get an answer, but I’m willing to try. Would you be willing to do the same? Honestly, sincerely, ask God if He’s real, and listen for an answer. What can it hurt?”
As I said, it would do damage only to my perception of myself as a person more sane, I like to think, than not.
Let me know how it goes for you when, despite knowing what the outcome is going to be, you query Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote about their real existence, because whatever answer you get is precisely the answer I would get if I chose to squander my time and effort asking God if he really exists, to wit, utter silence. Your suggestion strikes me as being ludicrous to the point of making you sound mentally unbalanced. While we’re at it, Stef, I’m not going to be organizing any safaris to hunt unicorns, basilisks, gryphons, dragons, centaurs, rocs, or leprechauns any time soon, either. I’ll leave that to all you True Believers who seem determined to ascribe palpable reality to the irrefutably imaginary.
So here’s a task for you, Stef — go sky-diving from 5,000 feet without a parachute, and pray to God to preserve you from all harm when you smash into the earth. Are you willing to do that? Or does your faith in goofy stuff go only so far?
Sorry to butt in….You believe in Multiverse?????? String theory???? Colliding membranes and these sorts of stuff? These are theorized by scientist that even science has not proven or accepted it. It will remain a CONCEPT ( a faulty concept BTW). They will never ever prove the origin of everything. Is it easier to believe these than to accept the creation’s point of view? There billions of galaxies out there our technology could not even find one planet that is like ours. Now you want a proof of God.
“So here’s a task for you, Stef — go sky-diving from 5,000 feet without a parachute, and pray to God to preserve you from all harm when you smash into the earth. Are you willing to do that? Or does your faith in goofy stuff go only so far?”
— My answer to this that your sense of right or wrong is imbalanced. Your logic is way out there. This kind of flow of thought is too familiar. Did Satan tell Jesus to jump from the top of the temple? I thought so.
As usual, your comments are enclosed in quotes; mine are not.
“Sorry to butt in….You believe in Multiverse?????? String theory???? Colliding membranes and these sorts of stuff? These are theorized by scientist that even science has not proven or accepted it. It will remain a CONCEPT ( a faulty concept BTW).”
First, I never said that I accepted the idea of a multiverse, or string theory; I only suggested that those who speculate about such matters think these things are possibilities, and, barring evidence to the contrary, that I, too, accept that they are possibilities.
Second, how do you know these concepts are faulty, RoyJover? I rather doubt that you have the mathematical smarts to follow the reasoning that supports these speculations. The scientists who have put these ideas forward will be the first to abandon them when evidence that they are faulty comes to light. You’re sounding a bit like the learned Catholics of Galileo’s day who balked at accepting his observation that the earth orbits the sun rather than the other way around. But if the mark of the rational person is to change his/her views as new evidence becomes available, it is the mark of the religious ideologue to hold opinions that are impervious to facts and logic alike. Tell you what, if one day the heavens open and a golden staircase unfurls, down which descends Jesus Christ attended by choirs of cherubim, seraphim, thrones, powers, and the other mythological denizens of a mythological heaven, I will be the first to admit I was wrong. After, of course, having assured myself that what I was seeing didn’t come out of the Pixar or Dreamworks studios.
“They will never ever prove the origin of everything. Is it easier to believe these than to accept the creation’s point of view? There billions of galaxies out there our technology could not even find one planet that is like ours.”
Yet. Of course, planets have been detected circling distant stars, but our technology, at present, is not sufficient to detect any planets roughly the size and mass of the earth. Stay tuned, though.
“Now you want a proof of God.”
Nope. I don’t want proof of God, RoyJover. What I want is for those who insist on believing in the real existence of God to account for the multiple illogicalities and inconsistancies that such a belief entails. So far no one, least of all you, or Stef Coulombe, or Carl Dick, or Perry Marshall, has risen to the challenge.
It has been amusing to watch Stef Coulombe’s convoluted reasoning about the existence of evil. He seems to be arguing that since evil is simply the absence of good, it doesn’t exist in its own right. He is wrong on two counts, the first one being that evil is not a material substance but a quality that we humans assign to various events and circumstances, depending, it seems, on how harmful, either physically or psychologically, those events/circumstances are perceived to be to humankind. According to you True Believers, our sense of what is evil and what is not derives from God, but if that is so, one has to explain how it is that at different times and in different places, different events/circumstances have been labeled “evil.” The second count of Stef’s errancy is this: if evil is the absence of good, and if God is absolutely good and also omnipresent, as is usually claimed, then there is really no place from which good can be absent. Stef Coulombe, far from solving the problem of the presence of evil in a frame of existence created and ruled over by an all-good, all-powerful, ever-present deity, has made his position even more difficult to defend.
“‘So here’s a task for you, Stef — go sky-diving from 5,000 feet without a parachute, and pray to God to preserve you from all harm when you smash into the earth. Are you willing to do that? Or does your faith in goofy stuff go only so far?’
— My answer to this that your sense of right or wrong is imbalanced. Your logic is way out there.”
How so, RoyJover? How, exactly, is my sense of right or wrong “imbalanced?” How is my logic “way out there?” It’s not enough to make a bald assertion; you should also be able to adduce evidence, or develop a line of reasoning, that supports your assertion. This comment of yours reminds me of your equally bald assertion about the multiverse and string theory, to wit, “It will remain a CONCEPT ( a faulty concept BTW).” Well, I ask, “As evidenced by what?”
“This kind of flow of thought is too familiar. Did Satan tell Jesus to jump from the top of the temple? I thought so.”
How are these three statements of yours, one of them a question, even relevant to the suggestion I made to Stef Coulombe? After all, if I have faith in something, I have no problem behaving in ways that demonstrate that faith. For example, each morning when I awaken I have faith that when I swing my legs out of the bed, the floor will be waiting there to support my feet, and consequently I do not hesitate to swing my legs out of the bed. So I fail to see how my logic is “way out there” when I suggest that if Stef has faith that God can do all things, then Stef should be as willing to behave in ways that demonstrate that faith, as I am to demonstrate my faith that I won’t fall into an endless void when I get out of bed. To make my request less outrageous, I might have suggested that, should Stef contract a life-threatening illness or injury, he should refrain from seeking medical attention and rely on God, The Almighty, to handle the situation. Of course, that is what hard-core Christian Scientists, and members of certain other quasi-psychotic sects, do, and the result is almost invariably worsening of the illness/injury, followed by death. And when the decedent has been a child below the age of reason, whose parents have denied him/her medical care on the grounds that they had faith that God would fix things, some kind of court action also ensues, and the parents are punished. I don’t know Stef Coulombe personally, but I would be willing to bet you that when he gets sick, or when he injures himself, depending on the severity of the sickness or injury, he goes to a physician. If so, where’s his faith in God?
Conway Redding
Conway Redding does not exist.
I have decided to exercise the blind faith of which I’ve been accused, and put it towards something constructive: a object lesson in blind faith itself.
All the postings that are labelled as having been written by Conway Redding are clearly a prank by some college kids; no real person could be so arrogant and insolent. (Many other postings here are, indeed, insolent–including some of my own!– but the beauty of *blind* faith is that I don’t have to examine the evidence that carefully.)
Show me a picture of this fictional “Conway Redding” and I will examine it in photoshop and find some error or irregularity that “proves” the photo is a fake; of course, I could just as easily claim that the photo is simply of somebody else, a paid actor, perhaps.
Let me meet him in person, and I can still pretend he’s not real–I can use the “paid actor” argument again, or simply refuse to see him. If he hits me, I can still pretend that it was somebody else. Or, I can claim that his whole life, his whole being, is a fraud–after all, a psychologist who “suggests” that I jump out of an airplane without a parachute is obviously fake, or he would have encouraged most of his clients to commit suicide, right? (By the way, it doesn’t matter whether this fictional character ever actually claimed to *be* a psychologist; in my blind faith, I’m allowed to make assumptions based on the texts ascribed to him, without reading them that carefully. Anything goes, as long as it supports my blind faith.)
Driver’s license? ID? Government records? All falsified, to be sure. Blind faith is remarkably like paranoid conspiracy theory, when you think about it.
So, I believe that Conway Redding doesn’t exist. You know, I feel much better now. I don’t need to worry about his eternal soul, just as I don’t worry about Bugs Bunny going to hell–he seemed to enjoy it in the last cartoon I watched.
I don’t need to reply to his comments, anymore, either, because he doesn’t exist–it’s like disagreeing with Lord Voldemort about his morality and personal lifestyle choices.
Blind faith is loads of fun, and carries no consequences that I can see. (Obviously, I can’t see the consequences, because I don’t believe they exist!)
Let’s recap: I have reasons for believing in God; personal experiences, testimony from people I trust, my ability to reason (question it if you like)–it all points to the God of the Bible being real, and being Who He says He is. My faith in God is not blind. I will examine other arguments, and consider them; at the end of the day, I still believe in God. It is FAITH.
My faith in the non-existence of Conway Redding, however, is blind. I have decided that he doesn’t exist, and view all possible “evidence” in a prejudiced, predisposed light. You could be the best lawyer in the world, and convince every member of every jury, and I will still, stubbornly, cling to my blind faith.
In fact, every effort you make to convince me, I will simply twist and mis-interpret to support my blind faith. Teehee. This is actually quite fun.
Of course, I’m not cursing or insulting Bugs Bunny by saying that he doesn’t exist, so my comments about Conway Redding not existing aren’t insulting either, are they?
Wow. Blind faith is so much easier than real faith. ;p
(Now, the people pretending to be Conway Redding have actually brought up an interesting point, in God’s omni-presence being supposed to cancel out all evil everywhere. I’d be happy to continue this discussion with a real person, perhaps in a couple weeks, after our school drama is finished.)
Hi Mr. Redding,
You said in your post
“You’re sounding a bit like the learned Catholics of Galileo’s day who balked at accepting his observation that the earth orbits the sun rather than the other way around.”
Please read below the real story of what happened, which has come to light after so many centuries of misinformation by vested Protestant interests.
During Galileo’s time, the Jesuits had a highly respected group of astronomers and scientists in Rome. In addition, many notable scientists received encouragement and funding from the Church and from individual Church officials. Many of the scientific advances during this period were made either by clerics or as a result of Church funding.
Nicolaus Copernicus dedicated his most famous work, On the Revolution of the Celestial Orbs, in which he gave an excellent account of heliocentricity, to Pope Paul III. Copernicus entrusted this work to Andreas Osiander, a Lutheran clergyman who knew that Protestant reaction to it would be negative, since Martin Luther seemed to have condemned the new theory, and, as a result, the book would be condemned. Osiander wrote a preface to the book, in which heliocentrism was presented only as a theory that would account for the movements of the planets more simply than geocentrism did—something Copernicus did not intend.
Ten years prior to Galileo, Johannes Kepler
published a heliocentric work that expanded on Copernicus’ work. As a result, Kepler also found opposition among his fellow Protestants for his heliocentric views and found a welcome reception among some Jesuits who were known for their scientific achievements.
Anti-Catholics often cite the Galileo case as an example of the Church refusing to abandon outdated or incorrect teaching, and clinging to a “tradition.” They fail to realize that the judges who presided over Galileo’s case were not the only people who held to a geocentric view of the universe. It was the received view among scientists at the time.
Centuries earlier, Aristotle had refuted heliocentricity, and by Galileo’s time, nearly every major thinker subscribed to a geocentric view. Copernicus refrained from publishing his heliocentric theory for some time, not out of fear of censure from the Church, but out of fear of ridicule from his colleagues.
Many people wrongly believe Galileo proved heliocentricity. He could not answer the strongest argument against it, which had been made nearly two thousand years earlier by Aristotle: If heliocentrism were true, then there would be observable parallax shifts in the stars’ positions as the earth moved in its orbit around the sun. However, given the technology of Galileo’s time, no such shifts in their positions could be observed. It would require more sensitive measuring equipment than was available in Galileo’s day to document the existence of these shifts, given the stars’ great distance. Until then, the available evidence suggested that the stars were fixed in their positions relative to the earth, and, thus, that the earth and the stars were not moving in space—only the sun, moon, and planets were.
Thus Galileo did not prove the theory by the Aristotelian standards of science in his day. In his Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina and other documents, Galileo claimed that the Copernican theory had the “sensible demonstrations” needed according to Aristotelian science, but most knew that such demonstrations were not yet forthcoming. Most astronomers in that day were not convinced of the great distance of the stars that the Copernican theory required to account for the absence of observable parallax shifts. This is one of the main reasons why the respected astronomer Tycho Brahe refused to adopt Copernicus fully.
Galileo could have safely proposed heliocentricity as a theory or a method to more simply account for the planets’ motions. His problem arose when he stopped proposing it as a scientific theory and began proclaiming it as truth, though there was no conclusive proof of it at the time. Even so, Galileo would not have been in so much trouble if he had chosen to stay within the realm of science and out of the realm of theology. But, despite his friends’ warnings, he insisted on moving the debate onto theological grounds.
In 1614, Galileo felt compelled to answer the charge that this “new science” was contrary to certain Scripture passages. His opponents pointed to Bible passages with statements like, “And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed . . .” (Josh. 10:13). This is not an isolated occurrence. Psalms 93 and 104 and Ecclesiastes 1:5 also speak of celestial motion and terrestrial stability. A literalistic reading of these passages would have to be abandoned if the heliocentric theory were adopted. Yet this should not have posed a problem. As Augustine put it, “One does not read in the Gospel that the Lord said: ‘I will send you the Paraclete who will teach you about the course of the sun and moon.’ For he willed to make them Christians, not mathematicians.” Following Augustine’s example, Galileo urged caution in not interpreting these biblical statements too literally.
Unfortunately, throughout Church history there have been those who insist on reading the Bible in a more literal sense than it was intended. They fail to appreciate, for example, instances in which Scripture uses what is called “phenomenological” language—that is, the language of appearances. Just as we today speak of the sun rising and setting to cause day and night, rather than the earth turning, so did the ancients. From an earthbound perspective, the sun does appear to rise and appear to set, and the earth appears to be immobile. When we describe these things according to their appearances, we are using phenomenological language.
The phenomenological language concerning the motion of the heavens and the non-motion of the earth is obvious to us today, but was less so in previous centuries. Scripture scholars of the past were willing to consider whether particular statements were to be taken literally or phenomenologically, but they did not like being told by a non-Scripture scholar, such as Galileo, that the words of the sacred page must be taken in a particular sense.
During this period, personal interpretation of Scripture was a sensitive subject. In the early 1600s, the Church had just been through the Reformation experience, and one of the chief quarrels with Protestants was over individual interpretation of the Bible.
Theologians were not prepared to entertain the heliocentric theory based on a layman’s interpretation. Yet Galileo insisted on moving the debate into a theological realm. There is little question that if Galileo had kept the discussion within the accepted boundaries of astronomy (i.e., predicting planetary motions) and had not claimed physical truth for the heliocentric theory, the issue would not have escalated to the point it did. After all, he had not proved the new theory beyond reasonable doubt.
Galileo “Confronts” Rome
Galileo came to Rome to see Pope Paul V (1605-1621). The pope, weary of controversy, turned the matter over to the Holy Office, which issued a condemnation of Galileo’s theory in 1616. Things returned to relative quiet for a time, until Galileo forced another showdown.
At Galileo’s request, Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, a Jesuit—one of the most important Catholic theologians of the day—issued a certificate that, although it forbade Galileo to hold or defend the heliocentric theory, did not prevent him from conjecturing it. When Galileo met with the new pope, Urban VIII, in 1623, he received permission from his longtime friend to write a work on heliocentrism, but the new pontiff cautioned him not to advocate the new position, only to present arguments for and against it. When Galileo wrote the Dialogue on the Two World Systems, he used an argument the pope had offered, and placed it in the mouth of his character Simplicio. Galileo, perhaps inadvertently, made fun of the pope, a result that could only have disastrous consequences. Urban felt mocked and could not believe how his friend could disgrace him publicly. Galileo had mocked the very person he needed as a benefactor. He also alienated his long-time supporters, the Jesuits, with attacks on one of their astronomers. The result was the infamous trial, which is still heralded as the final separation of science and religion.
Tortured for His Beliefs?
In the end, Galileo recanted his heliocentric teachings, but it was not—as is commonly supposed—under torture nor after a harsh imprison- ment. Galileo was, in fact, treated surprisingly well.
As historian Giorgio de Santillana, who is not overly fond of the Catholic Church, noted, “We must, if anything, admire the cautiousness and legal scruples of the Roman authorities.” Galileo was offered every convenience possible to make his imprisonment in his home bearable.
Galileo’s friend Nicolini, Tuscan ambassador to the Vatican, sent regular reports to the court regarding affairs in Rome. Many of his letters dealt with the ongoing controversy surrounding Galileo.
Nicolini revealed the circumstances surrounding Galileo’s “imprisonment” when he reported to the Tuscan king: “The pope told me that he had shown Galileo a favor never accorded to another” (letter dated Feb. 13, 1633); ” . . . he has a servant and every convenience” (letter, April 16); and “[i]n regard to the person of Galileo, he ought to be imprisoned for some time because he disobeyed the orders of 1616, but the pope says that after the publication of the sentence he will consider with me as to what can be done to afflict him as little as possible” (letter, June 18).
Had Galileo been tortured, Nicolini would have reported it to his king. While instruments of torture may have been present during Galileo’s recantation (this was the custom of the legal system in Europe at that time), they definitely were not used.
The records demonstrate that Galileo could not be tortured because of regulations laid down in The Directory for Inquisitors (Nicholas Eymeric, 1595). This was the official guide of the Holy Office, the Church office charged with dealing with such matters, and was followed to the letter.
As noted scientist and philosopher Alfred North Whitehead remarked, in an age that saw a large number of “witches” subjected to torture and execution by Protestants in New England, “the worst that happened to the men of science was that Galileo suffered an honorable detention and a mild reproof.” Even so, the Catholic Church today acknowledges that Galileo’s condemnation was wrong. The Vatican has even issued two stamps of Galileo as an expression of regret for his mistreatment.
Infallibility
Although three of the ten cardinals who judged Galileo refused to sign the verdict, his works were eventually condemned. Anti-Catholics often assert that his conviction and later rehabilitation somehow disproves the doctrine of papal infallibility, but this is not the case, for the pope never tried to make an infallible ruling concerning Galileo’s views.
The Church has never claimed ordinary tribunals, such as the one that judged Galileo, to be infallible. Church tribunals have disciplinary and juridical authority only; neither they nor their decisions are infallible.
No ecumenical council met concerning Galileo, and the pope was not at the center of the discussions, which were handled by the Holy Office. When the Holy Office finished its work, Urban VIII ratified its verdict, but did not attempt to engage infallibility.
Three conditions must be met for a pope to exercise the charism of infallibility: (1) he must speak in his official capacity as the successor of Peter; (2) he must speak on a matter of faith or morals; and (3) he must solemnly define the doctrine as one that must be held by all the faithful.
In Galileo’s case, the second and third conditions were not present, and possibly not even the first. Catholic theology has never claimed that a mere papal ratification of a tribunal decree is an exercise of infallibility. It is a straw man argument to represent the Catholic Church as having infallibly defined a scientific theory that turned out to be false. The strongest claim that can be made is that the Church of Galileo’s day issued a non-infallible disciplinary ruling concerning a scientist who was advocating a new and still-unproved theory and demanding that the Church change its understanding of Scripture to fit his.
It is a good thing that the Church did not rush to embrace Galileo’s views, because it turned out that his ideas were not entirely correct, either. Galileo believed that the sun was not just the fixed center of the solar system but the fixed center of the universe. We now know that the sun is not the center of the universe and that it does move—it simply orbits the center of the galaxy rather than the earth.
As more recent science has shown, both Galileo and his opponents were partly right and partly wrong. Galileo was right in asserting the mobility of the earth and wrong in asserting the immobility of the sun. His opponents were right in asserting the mobility of the sun and wrong in asserting the immobility of the earth.
Had the Catholic Church rushed to endorse Galileo’s views—and there were many in the Church who were quite favorable to them—the Church would have embraced what modern science has disproved.
I’m using my usual format for answering postings on this site, Stef: Your comments I’ve enclosed in quotation marks, and mine I have not enclosed in quotation marks.
“Sorry to interrupt your private feud (though I guess you didn’t notice the last time, either), but what more horrible thing can you say about someone/thing than that he/it does not exist?”
Oh, I don’t know, Steff. But how about, “He/it exists but is unspeakably evil.” Seems to me that that, for horribleness, trumps saying “He/it doesn’t exist.”
“Sounds like a curse to me.”
Sorry, Stef, but you can’t curse someone/thing that doesn’t exist, except in a metaphorical sense. So when I say God has no real existence, that is less a curse than a statement of what I take to be fact.
“By the way, “in my universe”… doesn’t that sound a little bit hollow to you? Are you alone in your universe? Do you assume that we each live in our own universe, and that whichever beliefs we choose to endorse are real to us and therefore real in our own universes?”
You’re really grasping at straws here, Stef, in an attempt, I presume, to convince a reader that my position on the real existence of a deity is untenable. The line of reasoning would be, I suppose, that a thoroughgoing solipsism is untenable, and that a thoroughgoing solipsist is likely to hold other untenable beliefs. But anyone with a dram of understanding of the use of figurative language would have recognized that the turn of phrase, “in my universe,” is equivalent to “as I see it,” or “in my opinion,” and does not permit the reasonable inference that I hold a solipsistic point of view.
“If that’s the case, these web comments are actually your own sub-conscious speaking to you–SO much to say on that–”
Oh, and are you now an authority on my subconscious, Stef? Hmmm… Haven’t you pulled this telepath/empath stuff before, as when you pretended to know what I must know deep down in my heart? This pretense is both arrogant and presumptuous.
“or you share the universe with the rest of us, and that means there is one universe”
Evidently you’re unfamiliar with the modern cosmological concept of “multiverses.” But no matter.
“(a bit redundant to point out, what with “uni-” in the word), one reality, one truth”
Oh come on Stef, think, if think indeed you can, which I’m beginning to doubt. There may indeed be only one objective reality, but there are as many subjective realities as there are perceivers of that one objective reality, as is easily demonstrated any time two people look at the same thing/event and report perceiving something different. This plays out in courtrooms every day that court is in session, and is one of the reasons eyewitness reports have proven to be so unreliable and are so assiduously deconstructed by prosecutors and defense attorneys alike.
“… and it comes down to this: A) you’re right, there is no God; you gain nothing, I lose nothing; or B) you’re wrong, there IS a God; I gain everything… you lose everything.”
Thank you, Blaise Pascal, from whom you cribbed this specious argument, without, I note, giving him credit. But if God has no real existence, and I do think the available evidence points in that direction, then I have been spared wasting my time on meaningless rituals, prayers, worshippings, and adorations, time that I could have put to better use, and you have not been thus spared. On the other hand, if God has a real existence, what’s to assure you that when I stand before this God, he won’t say, “Hey, with what I gave you to work with in the way of evidence, I can understand why you didn’t believe I existed.”? And what’s to assure you that when you stand before him, he won’t say, “You know, I gave you a brain with which to reason, and I gave you the tools of logic and observation to use in support of your ability to reason, yet you chose not to use any of these gifts. I don’t want your kind in my Heaven.”? Just asking, Stef.
“Please, think again. As with most Christians, I don’t believe I’m always 100% right in everything, but this I know for sure: when I die, my soul is safe; Jesus loves you, despite your doubt; and, whether you believe in them or not, both God and the devil believe in *you*.”
My mind boggles trying to grasp what you can possibly mean when you say that imaginary beings believe in me. What would you make of it if I told you that whether or not you believe in their real existence, Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote believe in *you*? Such a statement would be arrant nonsense, and so is yours, Stef.
“God wants to save your soul, the devil wants to destroy it, and only you get to choose which of them will succeed. If you’re almost 75, then you may not have much time left. Don’t be like the captain of the Titannic,”
That’s “Titanic,” Stef. The “Titannic” was another ship, made entirely of the yellowish or brownish bitter-tasting complex phenolic substance present in tea, some barks, grapes, etc.
“stubbornly certain that his ship won’t sink… and find out too late that you were wrong.
One more thing: if you’re concerned with people saying “I told you so” then you don’t need to tell us if you change your mind. What does it hurt, really, to just ask God, with an open heart, if He exists?”
All it would hurt would be my belief that, to date, I have been relatively free of psychosis. I gave up talking to, or asking questions of, imaginary playmates, a long, long time ago, and see no reason to revive that practice now.
“If you like, I will ask Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote if they are real. I’ll ask them sincerely and honestly; I’m fairly sure I won’t get an answer, but I’m willing to try. Would you be willing to do the same? Honestly, sincerely, ask God if He’s real, and listen for an answer. What can it hurt?”
As I said, it would do damage only to my perception of myself as a person more sane, I like to think, than not.
Let me know how it goes for you when, despite knowing what the outcome is going to be, you query Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote about their real existence, because whatever answer you get is precisely the answer I would get if I chose to squander my time asking God if he really exists, to wit, utter silence. Your suggestion strikes me as being ludicrous to the point of making you sound mentally unbalanced. While we’re at it, Stef, I’m not going to be organizing any safaris to hunt unicorns, basilisks, gryphons, dragons, centaurs, rocs, or leprechauns any time soon, either. I’ll leave that to all you True Believers who seem determined to ascribe palpable reality to the irrefutably imaginary.
So here’s a task for you, Stef — go sky-diving from 5,000 feet without a parachute, and pray to God to preserve you from all harm when you smash into the ground. Are you willing to do that? Or does your faith go only so far?
Dear brother, I’m really sorry for the depth of ignorance you’re in. If you are really a knowledge seeker, please read Dr.Michael Delton’s Nature’s Destiny, and Evolution, A Theory in Crisis. There you will get the Creator’s Wisdom. I believe that the author of this article (Lie #7: ‘If God was really powerful and good, he wouldn’t allow so much evil and suffering to go on) will not tempt God the Almighty because he is wise and knows his Heavenly Father very well. I advise you to try to be wise too, by seeking your Heavenly Father if you are one of the lost sheep. If not, I’m really sorry for your end will be eternal condemnation. If you doubt that there is Hell, please read Dr.Rawlings To Hell and Back documentary stories at his site. So please try to be a knowledge seeker, be multi-visionary not a cart-horse. I pray that God help you, my brother.
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and
his beard trimmed.As the barber began to work, they began to have a good conversation. They talked about so many things and various subjects. When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said: “I don’t believe that God exists.”
“Why do you say that?” asked the customer.
“Well, you just have to go out in the street to
realize that God doesn’t exist. Tell me, if God exists, would there be so many sick people?
Would there be abandoned children? If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can’t imagine a loving God who would allow all of these things.”
The customer thought for a moment, but didn’t respond because he didn’t want to start an argument.
The barber finished his job and the customer left
the shop. Just after he left the barbershop, he saw a man in the street withlong, stringy,dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and unkempt.
The customer turned back and entered the barber shop
again and he said to the barber: “You know what? Barbers do not exist.”
“How can you say that?” asked the surprised barber.
“I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!”
“No!” the customer exclaimed. “Barbers don’t exist
because if they did,there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards,like that man outside.”
“Ah, but barbers DO exist! ” answered the barber.
“What happens, is, people do not come to me.”
“Exactly!”- affirmed the customer. “That’s the
point! God, too, DOES exist! What happens, is, people don’t go to Him and do not look for Him.
That’s why there’s so much pain and suffering in the world.”
DID YOU KNOW THESE FACTS?
Death is certain but the Bible speaks about untimely death!
Make a personal reflection about this…..
Very interesting, read until the end…..
It is written in the Bible (Galatians 6:7):
“Be not deceived; God is not mocked:for whatsoever a man sow, that shall he also reap.
Here are some men and women who mocked God :
Here we go…..
John Lennon (Singer):Some years before, during his interview with an American Magazine, he said:
“Christianity will end, it will disappear. I do not have to argue about that. I am certain.
Jesus was ok, but his subjects were too simple, today we are more famous than Him” (1966).
Lennon, after saying that the Beatles were more famous than Jesus Christ, was shot six times.
Tancredo Neves (President of Brazil ):During the Presidential campaign, he said if he got 500,000 votes from his party, not even God would remove him from Presidency.Sure he got the votes, but he got sick a day before being made President, then he died.
Cazuza (Bi-sexual Brazilian composer, singer and poet):During A show in Canecio ( Rio de Janeiro ),
while smoking his cigarette, he puffed out some smoke into the air and said:”God, that’s for you.”
He died at the age of 32 of LUNG CANCER in a horrible manner.
The man who built the Titanic
After the construction of Titanic, a reporter asked him how safe the Titanic would be. With an ironic tone he said: “Not even God can sink it”
The result: I think you all know what happened to the Titanic
Marilyn Monroe (Actress):She was visited by Billy Graham during a presentation of a show.
He said the Spirit of God had sent him to preach to her.After hearing what the Preacher had to say, she said: “I don’t need your Jesus”.
A week later, she was found dead in her apartment
Bon Scott (Singer):The ex-vocalist of the AC/DC. On one of his 1979 songs he sang:”Don’t stop me; I’m going down all the way, down the highway to hell”.
On the 19th of February 1980 , Bon Scott was found dead, he had been choked by his own vomit.
Campinas (IN 2005):In Campinas , Brazil a group of friends, drunk, went to pick up a friend…..
The mother accompanied her to the car and was so worried about the drunkenness of her friends and she said to the daughter holding her hand, who was already seated in the car:My Daughter, Go With God And May He Protect You.” She responded: “Only If He (God) Travels In The Trunk, Cause Inside Here…..It’s Already Full ” Hours later, news came by that they had been involved in a fatal accident, everyone had died, the car could not be recognized what type of car it had been, but surprisingly, the trunk was intact.The police said there was no way the trunk could have remained intact. To their surprise, inside the trunk was a crate of eggs, none was broken
Christine Hewitt (Jamaican Journalist and entertainer)said the Bible (Word of God) was the worst book ever written.In June 2006 she was found burnt beyond recognition in her motor vehicle. Many more important people have forgotten that there is no other name that was given so much authority as the name of Jesus. Many have died, but only Jesus died and rose again, and he is still alive..
Leoul, that story about the barber is a really good one. I think I’ll use that one myself, in the future.
Just to give credit where due: Perry Marshall is the author of the site/article; I only make comments as I feel led; and, God Himself is, of course, the source of any/all Truth in our words. ;p
God bless, eh!
Dear Leoul,
I believe in God, and His good works. But I am not convinced of the arguments you have made to prove the existence of God.
In your barbershop parable, the barber is not responsible for making people’s hair long and dirty and giving them untrimmed beards; but God is responsible for everything- including the Devil,and evil and dirty hair, and hair filled with lice, and all the other sufferings in the world. So you cannot compare God’s position with the Barber’s in this context.
Afterwards, you give a long list of people who died – mostly untimely deaths. Everybody – good as well as evil people die of some reason- cancer, heart attacks, accident, explosion, drowning, etc. Also irrespective of whether they are good or evil some people have untimely deaths. But can you say that all people who have untimely and cruel and gory deaths are evil? If that is true where will you place Jesus Christ who had an untimely gory cruel death at the age of 33?
Tony, since when is “God responsible for everything”? Obviously, you choose not to believe what God says about the devil, so you are making a choice; freedom of choice means that God can NOT be held responsible for everything. Are you responsible for the choices your children make? You can be a good, loving parent, and still see your children make bad choices. The devil himself CHOSE to rebel against God. How is that God’s fault?
Incidentally, the list of people who died is clearly in reference to Conway Redding’s suggestion (for me) to jump out of an airplane. The Bible says “God is not mocked”. The people who challenged God–who mocked Him– are examples. Yes, everybody dies; however, it is particularly foolish to mock God, and there are consequences. Leoul did NOT say that “all people who have untimely deaths are evil”.
“Tony, since when is “God responsible for everything”?
From the time He started creating.
“Obviously, you choose not to believe what God says about the devil, so you are making a choice; freedom of choice means that God can NOT be held responsible for everything. Are you responsible for the choices your children make? You can be a good, loving parent, and still see your children make bad choices. The devil himself CHOSE to rebel against God. How is that God’s fault?”
Will a good loving parent leave his child on the ledge of a window of a high rise building, and give him freedom of choice to jump into the building or jump out of the window?
“Incidentally, the list of people who died is clearly in reference to Conway Redding’s suggestion (for me) to jump out of an airplane. The Bible says “God is not mocked”.
How can my own creation mock me, if I do not teach it how I can be mocked?
“The people who challenged God–who mocked Him– are examples. Yes, everybody dies; however, it is particularly foolish to mock God, and there are consequences. Leoul did NOT say that “all people who have untimely deaths are evil”.
If not, what was he trying to infer from the examples?
Stef: ““Tony, since when is “God responsible for everything”?”
Tony: “From the time He started creating.”
Stef: Ah ha ha, good one, you really crack me up… oh, wait, you were serious.
Forgive the commoness, but: from the time you first slept with your wife, you are responsible for everything your children do and say, and by extension, everything their children will ever do and say.
I hope your great-grandkids never break the law, ’cause you’ll end up in jail.
I start to suspect that “Tony Francis”, like the late Conway Redding (”late” because he no longer exists, if I apply his own logic to his own self), is really just a group of University kids blogging for laughs. In Conway’s case, I suspect that because his answers don’t match his supposed profession; in Tony’s case, because of the wide-ranging inconsistency in his answers. First, “God is too amazing to comprehend”, then “God would be bored without sin”; first, “God is good and loving and forgiving”, then “God is petty and not only did He create evil, but He also *wanted* Adam to sin and fall; first, “Really, I’m searching for truth, please help me” and then this nonsense.
Now, I’m trying to be offensive, because you, sir, are being offensive to my God. I hope you’re getting a good laugh out of all this, but one day you’ll have to pay for it.
- – - – - -
Stef: ““The people who challenged God–who mocked Him– are examples. Yes, everybody dies; however, it is particularly foolish to mock God, and there are consequences. Leoul did NOT say that “all people who have untimely deaths are evil”.”
Tony: “If not, what was he trying to infer from the examples?”
Stef: …?! Maybe that “…it is particularly foolish to mock God, and there are consequences.” Holy stink, man, you remind me of my students:
“Teacher, I don’t understand.”
“Read the instructions.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Read the instructions.”
“But I don’t know how to answer the question…”
“Read the *£$*%*ing instructions!”
“Oh, ok. Now I understand. Thank you, teacher!”
The only difference is that you are still stuck somewhere in the middle; even my “least cooperative” students eventually get to the part where they quit whining and try following the directions!
I’m using my usual format for answering postings on this site, Stef: Your comments I’ve enclosed in quotation marks, and mine I have not enclosed in quotation marks.
“Sorry to interrupt your private feud (though I guess you didn’t notice the last time, either), but what more horrible thing can you say about someone/thing than that he/it does not exist?”
Oh, I dont know, Steff. But how about, “He/it exists but is unspeakably evil.” Seems to me that that, for horribleness, trumps saying “He/it doesn’t exist.”
“Sounds like a curse to me.”
Sorry, Stef, but you can’t curse someone/thing that doesn’t exist, except in a metaphorical sense. So when I say God has no real existence, that is less a curse than a statement of what I take to be fact.
“By the way, “in my universe”… doesn’t that sound a little bit hollow to you? Are you alone in your universe? Do you assume that we each live in our own universe, and that whichever beliefs we choose to endorse are real to us and therefore real in our own universes?”
You’re really grasping at straws here, Stef, in an attempt, I presume, to convince a reader that my position on the real existence of a deity is untenable. The line of reasoning would be, I suppose, that a thoroughgoing solipsism is untenable, and that a thoroughgoing solipsist is likely to hold other untenable beliefs. But anyone with a dram of understanding of the use of figurative language would have recognized that the turn of phrase, “in my universe,” is equivalent to “as I see it,” or “in my opinion,” and does not permit the reasonable inference that I hold a solipsistic point of view.
“If that’s the case, these web comments are actually your own sub-conscious speaking to you–SO much to say on that–”
Oh, and are you now an authority on my subconscious, Stef? Hmmm… Haven’t you pulled this telepath/empath stuff before, as when you pretended to know what I must know deep down in my heart? This pretense is both arrogant and presumptuous.
“or you share the universe with the rest of us, and that means there is one universe”
Evidently you’re unfamiliar with the modern cosmological concept of “multiverses.” But no matter.
“(a bit redundant to point out, what with “uni-” in the word), one reality, one truth”
Oh come on Stef, think, if think indeed you can, which I’m beginning to doubt. There may indeed be only one objective reality, but there are as many subjective realities as there are perceivers of that one objective reality, as is easily demonstrated any time two people look at the same thing/event and report perceiving something different. This plays out in courtrooms every day that court is in session, and is one of the reasons eyewitness reports have proven to be so unreliable and are so assiduously deconstructed by prosecutors and defense attorneys alike.
“… and it comes down to this: A) you’re right, there is no God; you gain nothing, I lose nothing; or B) you’re wrong, there IS a God; I gain everything… you lose everything.”
Thank you, Blaise Pascal, from whom you cribbed this specious argument, without, I note, giving him credit. But if God has no real existence, and I do think the available evidence points in that direction, then I have been spared wasting my time on meaningless rituals, prayers, worshippings, and adorations, time that I could have put to better use, and you have not been thus spared. On the other hand, if God has a real existence, what’s to assure you that when I stand before this God, he won’t say, “Hey, with what I gave you to work with in the way of evidence, I can understand why you didn’t believe I existed.”? And what’s to assure you that when you stand before him, he won’t say, “You know, I gave you a brain with which to reason, and I gave you the tools of logic and observation to use in support of your ability to reason, yet you chose not to use any of these gifts. I don’t want your kind in my Heaven.”? Just asking, Stef.
“Please, think again. As with most Christians, I don’t believe I’m always 100% right in everything, but this I know for sure: when I die, my soul is safe; Jesus loves you, despite your doubt; and, whether you believe in them or not, both God and the devil believe in *you*.”
My mind boggles trying to grasp what you can possibly mean when you say that imaginary beings believe in me. What would you make of it if I told you that whether or not you believe in their real existence, Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote believe in *you*? Such a statement would be arrant nonsense, and so is yours, Stef.
“God wants to save your soul, the devil wants to destroy it, and only you get to choose which of them will succeed. If you’re almost 75, then you may not have much time left. Don’t be like the captain of the Titannic,”
That’s “Titanic,” Stef. The “Titannic” was another ship, made entirely of the yellowish or brownish bitter-tasting complex phenolic substance present in tea, some barks, grapes, etc.
“stubbornly certain that his ship won’t sink… and find out too late that you were wrong.
One more thing: if you’re concerned with people saying “I told you so” then you don’t need to tell us if you change your mind. What does it hurt, really, to just ask God, with an open heart, if He exists?”
All it would hurt would be my belief that, to date, I have been relatively free of psychosis. I gave up talking to, or asking questions of, imaginary playmates, a long, long time ago, and see no reason to revive that practice now.
“If you like, I will ask Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote if they are real. I’ll ask them sincerely and honestly; I’m fairly sure I won’t get an answer, but I’m willing to try. Would you be willing to do the same? Honestly, sincerely, ask God if He’s real, and listen for an answer. What can it hurt?”
As I said, it would do damage only to my perception of myself as a person more sane, I like to think, than not.
Let me know how it goes for you when, despite knowing what the outcome is going to be, you query Daffy Duck and Wile E. Coyote about their real existence, because whatever answer you get is precisely the answer I would get if I chose to squander my time asking God if he really exists, to wit, utter silence. Your suggestion strikes me as being ludicrous to the point of making you sound mentally unbalanced. While we’re at it, Stef, I’m not going to be organizing any safaris to hunt unicorns, basilisks, gryphons, dragons, centaurs, rocs, or leprechauns any time soon, either. I’ll leave that to all you True Believers who seem determined to ascribe palpable reality to the irrefutably imaginary.
So here’s a task for you, Stef — go sky-diving from 5,000 feet without a parachute, and pray to God to preserve you from all harm when you smash into the ground. Are you willing to do that? Or does your faith go only so far?
Ha, you caught my one typo. Good job! (The wry smile with which this is written is being described only for the purpose of conveying my answer to most of your previous response: it seems my sense of humour did not communicate itself clearly to you, and so I apologize for the misunderstanding.)
I still think “you don’t exist” is the worst insult, and thus curse, but we don’t need to agree on everything. As to the “multi-verse”… yeah, it’s a fun concept, but not a very reliable one. Too much relativism and there is no basis for morality at all, and therefore no reason not to start killing everybody just because you feel like it–and also no basis at all for the concept of “sanity”.
If this life is all there is, then time is rather meaningless; you can’t “waste” something that has no lasting value. The only way you can “waste” time is by not putting it to “eternal” use; otherwise, in 200, 2000, or 20,000 years, who is really going to care what you spent your time on? An effort at understanding an eternal Creator is about the only intelligent way to spend what time we have, and if He doesn’t exist, then your life couldn’t have meant anything anyway.
By the way, my mind “boggles” that you assume that, just because *you* think God is imaginary, He really is. I could pretend that you were imaginary, but it wouldn’t make you stop existing (even with all that subjective reality talk, it wouldn’t stand up in court–other people can see that you exist, even if I refuse to).
Sorry to Pascal; I had no intention to steal his words, I simply didn’t realize where they were from. Oh, and on the Betazoid complex–I make assumptions on your thoughts and sub-conscious based on what I know of my own. Sorry, I thought that was fairly normal; at least, to date, you’re the only one that has ever take such insolent exception to it. I’ll try not to offend again. ;p
As to the host of imaginary friends we seem to be accumulating… on one hand, you talk of subjective reality, and on the other, you mock any reality different from your own. Many things were believed to be imaginary by many people (like, um, atoms, and, er, germs, and even black holes and other universes…); some people still don’t believe that living near high-intensity power lines can cause cancer. Heck, some people still refuse to believe that smoking causes cancer. Just because *you* don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it’s not real. (Oh, sorry, I already said that.)
As to sky-diving without a parachute… well, it would be kind of stupid to “test” God, when He specifically says not to. (I know what you’re going to say–oh, stink, I did it again, sorry… anyway, *somebody* is going to say, “That’s mighty convenient, ‘God’ telling us not to test him…” Well, do you have kids? Grandkids? Did you let them jump off the couch to see if you would catch them?) However, if for some unforeseen reason I should find myself at 5,000 feet, without a parachute, you can be certain I’ll be praying, and either God will “catch” me, or He won’t–instead, He’ll take me home. Either way, I win. ;p
Now, I still notice in other comments that you’re hung up on the crucifixion as needlessly cruel. I’ve said it in other places… but here it is again: if the crucifixion were painless, it would be a “cop out”; if it were some kind of mental torture, instead of bloodily physical, then people would say “but He didn’t have to suffer physically, so He doesn’t understand my pain”. Do you second-guess *everyone* with such animosity? I don’t know if you like Da Vinci, but do you accuse him of not finding a prettier model for the Mona Lisa? What about Whistler’s mother–couldn’t he have made her more attractive? And hey, while we’re at it, let’s redesign the automobile, because all those “experts” out there don’t know what they’re doing. If God exists, then He probably knows what He’s doing better than you do; if He doesn’t exist, then why keep obsessing over what He “did”? If you’re trying to prove that our belief in Him is irrational because you don’t understand why He did what He did, then you’re kind of like the English-speaking janitor complaining about the Latin professor writing “gibberish” on the blackboard.
You don’t understand our God; you don’t want to. I get you. Will you say that “understanding” is irrelevant, because He doesn’t exist? Yeah, try that one with a virus some time. It’s a good thing for all the “ignorant masses” that there have been doctors to find “non-existent” problems and cures.
(I notice that my comment to your other reply, up above, is finally “approved”. It was a bit kinder than this response; perhaps I have less patience today.)
Didn’t you say before that you are responsible when you have a wife? How can God say not to? It is you telling yourself not to. How can god do some things but not others and all of those things seem to be what you choose but not whoever else chooses?
God created Satan, hence he created evil. God created eve as the story goes he told her not to pick the apple. Hence he created a woman that picked an apple. He created the temptation in her mind. He created the brain to produce the temptation. He created all the planets. Come on. You can’t have God create some things and not others. It seems your God only creates what you believe he creates but not what other believe he creates. Does this make you a God?
Yes Steph Coulombe I asked God if He/She was real by putting out a challenge, only about a month ago. When my ex took my 15 yr old daughter on a Harley ride, him wearing no leather jacket,I insisted he cover all skin for safety. he laughed at me, when I said he should try to be a good role model, then rode off. so I said to God (out loud), “please God give him a little lesson to teach him to wear protective leathers, and to prove to me you exist. Please, -not today but soon, when he is wearing a jacket -give him a very small accident that will not injure him but will remind him of the danger he faces riding a motorbike without protection and show his daughter that she should not copy his irresponsible behaviour”. Within a week he had just such a small accident! (I felt so guilty I’d prayed for it to happen, I did not tell him). But get this it was whilst he was wearing a leather jacket and it hardly injured him at all=-just some scratches- that would’ve been much worse if he were wearing no leather pants. He had been sitting stopped at the traffic lights and a young driver was slowing down behind him, whose foot “suddenly slipped off the brake”, making his car bump lightly into my ex’s motorbike. Sure, you could say this just coincidence, but the fact is my ex has never had a road accident before, in 30 years of riding and car driving. This story actually also may answer why bad things happen to good people. Some bad things may be preventing something worse that is due to occur (eg. worse accident with no leathers). Maybe some bad things are the answers to bad prayers,(or inappropriate ones with good intention as I saw mine then, but not in hindsight- I know it was a bad prayer).
Somtimes I wonder whether my mother died suddenly when I was a young kid because she may have prayed to God to take her away from her impossible family. Under many atheists is a broken angry heart not ready forgive a God they know in their soul must exist. I was a staunch atheist for many years, but have done so much soul searching lately and have found proof of survival of our soul’s eternity through actual psychic mediums (eg they really do find dead people and their murderers), books on near death experiences and past life hypnosis. You sceptics should try that path too. Oh and if you try challenging God to prove he/she exists, try something less risky than I (and do be specific-God finds it difficult to have to interpret what you want).
Perry Marshall, I love what you do and how you do it. You are bringing R-E-S-P-E-C-T back to our debates about the bigger stuff. Oh and by the way, I am very appreciative we have the freedom of speech to do this debating- its invigorating and stimulating and makes us learn more- its what democracy is all about. I also like the term “Intelligent Design” as opposed to “Creationism” as the latter has a negative connotation with atheists, related to literal interpretations of the Adam and Eve metaphore. Much love to you in your journeys. May Peace, Truth and Love be spread in at least one small way by you today (and see God bring it back to you in abundance-test that challenge!)
Kewi
Kewi,
What a GREAT story. And I’ve gotta say… there are LOTS and LOTS of people with stories just like this. “God if you’re there I want to know it” is a dangerous and thrilling prayer to pray.
Yes, you are right underneath the ferocious front of atheism is a desperate sadness and disappointment. They hate the idea of God because they secretly wanted God and came to believe they could not have such a thing. That it was just a big hoax. They feel ripped off, exposed, shamed. One of the most popular atheist videos is called “The God Who Wasn’t There.” Encapsulates that disappointment perfectly.
I hurt for atheists but I cannot help them if they won’t be forthright with the story of what their real struggle is or was. And I will not permit them to desecrate science with theories of randomness and purposelessness (that’s not science, it’s anti-science) or rewrite history…. or propagate a belief system that has murdered 100 million people in the last 100 years. Atheism in the 20th century has a genocide rate of 1 million people per year. Inexcusable.
As for psychics, again you are absolutely right. There is a reason police departments hire them. One of my very best friends had a mother-in-law who was psychic and was hired by a local police department in California to solve a disappearance. She had a vision of a man at a campsite. I forget the exact details but he was waking up in the night to go to the bathroom, falling over the edge of a hill and stumbling to an outhouse; snagging his shirt on a nail and then passing out somewhere. I forget exactly how he died.
They found the footprints, threads from his shirt on the nail in the outhouse, and his body was exactly where she said it would be found. Just as there are pockets of people who are democrats or NASCAR fans or tattoo enthusiasts, there are pockets of people with seer gifts. If you know some of them you hear stories like this all the time and there is no way to ‘explain them away’ unless you somehow feel you have to.
At the same time I GREATLY caution you that many psychics draw from the dark side and there is a lot of danger there. Rather I would encourage you to explore the prophetic ministry within the church – which does not come from the dark side. Most evangelicals deny this but charismatic churches embrace it. I know dozens of prophetic people and they’re absolutely uncanny. Prophetic ministry properly done in the church is one of the most beautiful things you will ever see.
Glad you’re enjoying the debate. Yes, let’s bring RESPECT to these discussions.
Some people call it «malavista», others «voodoo». It has nothing to do with God. It is related to the psychic powers we all have to some extent. We can wish bad things to happen to other people. We can feel things happening in the future, in the past or far away. We don’t need to involve God in any of that.
Look there are coincidences all the time. I prayed to god to meet a girl and low and behold, next door to me she arrived. I also didn’t pray that she would leave and never come back because i truly thought the world of her more then anyone i have ever met but that is exactly what has happened and my life is over becausee of that. 2 years or so it has been this way for me. Did i pray for that? No i don’t think so. I prayed to marry her and have children with her and be together with her forever because she was the girl from my dreams and trust me, that is who i envisione. It took me more then 20 years to meet her and guess what, my life is over because i aint wasting another 20 to find her again or even 2 or 1 or any. I didn’t pray for her to be taken from me but it happened. I prayed for things to work for me and i have prayed to win the lotto but the opposite has happened instead and i have never won the lotto. That argument or senario is irrelevant really.
Conway,
I am in no way a theologian and nor am I schooled in the bible or scriptures; however, my view on Jesus’ life, death and resurrection is that he came here to teach and illustrate as well as to absolve.. by appearing on earth and teaching and illustrating how God wished us to live, as he did, his lesson may have lasted a generation or two.
God knows what it takes for us to truly listen and learn lessons. The horror of what he allowed his son to suffer for us was something quite extraordinary that has continued to impact until today. The very fact that he allowed this horror on our behalf resonates within the human psyche and soul in a way that teachings alone would not have.
A quick question for you Conway – you believe God to be non-existent, if this is your firmly held conviction, do I understand that your posting here is to persuade Christians to atheism? Or looking to see if someone can refute your convictions? general exchange of views?
Nothing wrong with any of those, just curious as to what you are looking to achieve in this forum – if you are of a mind to share.
Regards,
«… just curious as to what you are looking to achieve in this forum… »
I have also contributed to this forum, and if you permit I will try to answer that question.
I have been attracted to this place first because I found Perry Marshall’s scientific arguments for the existence of God convincing as I also believe in God and I am also looking for scientific arguments to prove the point.
But when I read the rest of the story I realized that we were actually not at all talking about the same God.
What I see here is people setting up the scene for another round of Inquisition. I feel no love, no compassion, only the urge to prove the others wrong.
So I post here not to persuade christians to atheism, but to prevent people who pass here out of curiosity not to fall for your particular brand of christianism.
Luke West, I have enclosed your comments in quotation marks, and have left my responses to your comments not thus enclosed.
“Conway,
I am in no way a theologian and nor am I schooled in the bible or scriptures; however, my view on Jesus’ life, death and resurrection is that he came here to teach and illustrate as well as to absolve.. by appearing on earth and teaching and illustrating how God wished us to live, as he did, his lesson may have lasted a generation or two.
God knows what it takes for us to truly listen and learn lessons. The horror of what he allowed his son to suffer for us was something quite extraordinary that has continued to impact until today. The very fact that he allowed this horror on our behalf resonates within the human psyche and soul in a way that teachings alone would not have.”
Luke, are you proposing that God, omnipotent as he is conceived to be, could not have come up with a less gruesome way to teach whatever lesson he wanted to teach? If so, you are asserting, in essence, that God acts under a set of constraints, which is the same as saying that God is not omnipotent. Certainly many merely human teachers have managed to impart lasting lessons without horrifying their students, and without harming them in any way. Could not a Supreme Being, with all the resources at his disposal, such as infinite knowledge and power, do better? This same objection holds — that God, being omnipotent, could accomplish his aims without causing any human misery –against those who claim that the misery occurs to teach us something, or is part of some divine plan that is incomprehensible to us. Once again, if God has a real existence, and is truly all-powerful, then, whatever his divine goals, he could bring them to fruition, as I have said, without distressing us poor mortals, to whom he is said to stand in the same relationship as that of a loving father to his children.
“A quick question for you Conway – you believe God to be non-existent, if this is your firmly held conviction, do I understand that your posting here is to persuade Christians to atheism? Or looking to see if someone can refute your convictions? general exchange of views?”
My postings on the Coffeehouse Theology site are in the service of speaking out against irrationality, as that irrationality is embodied in certain religious beliefs. If someone chances to be spurred by my postings to begin to think logically about what has been foisted off on him/her as Holy Truth, and ultimately gives up those beliefs, that is frosting on the cake, so to speak. At the same time, yes, I am looking to see if someone can sensibly rebut my objections to the core religious belief, the real existence of a deity, something that so far has not happened. If/when it does, I will modify my thinking on the subject of religion and the real existence of God.
Now, as to the existence/non-existence of God, I do think, as you have no doubt gathered, that the available evidence suggests strongly that God, as that entity is usually conceived to be, to wit, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, all-loving/compassionate, and deeply concerned about and involved in the affairs of mankind, can be demonstrated to have no real existence, but only the sort of existence enjoyed by any one of a number of figments of the human imagination, such as Sherlock Holmes, Daffy Duck, Mickey Mouse, Uriah Heep, Dick Tracy, James Bond, Wee Willie Winkle, etc. So when I am asked if I believe in God, I usually respond, “Yes, absolutely, but only in the same sense as I believe in Sherlock Holmes, Daffy Duck, Mickey Mouse, Uriah Heep, Dick Tracy, James Bond, Wee Willie Winkle, and the like.”
The general tenor of your posting suggests to me that you are less interested in knowing what my aims are in posting, than in letting me know that you don’t agree with me, which is okay. You are surely not alone in that. But what I would hope for from someone who stands in opposition to my views on matters religious, is a reasoned exposition of that opposition. You don’t have to be a theologian to think rationally about these things. Indeed, it seems to me that schools of theology have as one of their unacknowledged purposes the crushing of the rational impulse. It does help, though, to be somewhat familiar with various religious documents, such as the Bible and the Qur’an.
Regards,
Conway Redding
My apologies to you, Conway, for tying you up with Kay Jay. It was K.J. who actually cursed God, but you didn’t because you don’t believe He exists. Now I will try to answer you in as civil a manner as I possibly can.
Seeking truth is commendable but you have gone a step further in concluding that God does not exist because it makes no sense to you. There was a time when I, like you, had similar thoughts. But let’s get on with it.
Consider Solomon, the wisest man that ever lived. He was a seeker of wisdom and the Bible says God granted him the desire of his heart. Through him, we have the book of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. But how much did that help him? Against his own advice, he ended up with 700 wives and 300 concubines besides being an idolater. This tells me that having knowledge is simply not enough. It is all about FAITH!! “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things NOT SEEN”. The evidence you are seeking is only going to be revealed to you through faith.
Also consider the advice of Jesus to His disciples when He sent them out on a mission to declare the Gospel. If they didn’t believe, they were to wipe the dust off their feet and move on. It was not about logical arguments, it was about FAITH!
Now a little about me. I was witness to a miraculous deed along with five other friends at about the age of 30 and could never understand it as I was an electrical engineering student and taking physics classes at the time. It didn’t make sense to me and no one I knew could offer an explanation. However, at age 75,(now 79) I once again observed the phenomenon, but this time, mentioning it to a pastor and offering to show him evidence, he simply said “I don’t need to see it, I know it exists, but I have to tell you, this is not of God, for He has not given that kind of power to us.” Immediately, like a flash of lightening, it all came to me and I shouted “What have I done with my life?” Since then, everything in nature provides evidence of God to me.
I realize I have not revealed the nature of the phenomenon, not wanting to spark a new series of debates, but only to show that revelation does not necessarily come by education, knowledge, sight or wisdom. But the Lord knew what I needed to believe. He knew what Saul of Tarsus, (now Paul), needed and I certainly hope He will do the same for you.
Carl,
As usual, I have laid out my answer as follows: I have enclosed what you wrote in quotation marks, and have left my responses unenclosed by quotation marks.
“My apologies to you, Conway, for tying you up with Kay Jay. It was K.J. who actually cursed God, but you didn’t because you don’t believe He exists. Now I will try to answer you in as civil a manner as I possibly can.
Seeking truth is commendable but you have gone a step further in concluding that God does not exist because it makes no sense to you. There was a time when I, like you, had similar thoughts. But let’s get on with it.
Consider Solomon, the wisest man that ever lived. He was a seeker of wisdom and the Bible says God granted him the desire of his heart. Through him, we have the book of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. But how much did that help him? Against his own advice, he ended up with 700 wives and 300 concubines besides being an idolater. This tells me that having knowledge is simply not enough. It is all about FAITH!! ‘Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things NOT SEEN’.”
Sorry, Carl, but on the topic of faith I’m with Mark Twain, who, putting his comment in the mouth of a fictional schoolboy, wrote, “Faith is believing what you know ain’t so.”
“The evidence you are seeking is only going to be revealed to you through faith.”
Carl, I’m looking less for “evidence” than for logical consistency.
“Also consider the advice of Jesus to His disciples when He sent them out on a mission to declare the Gospel. If they didn’t believe, they were to wipe the dust off their feet and move on. It was not about logical arguments, it was about FAITH!
Now a little about me. I was witness to a miraculous deed along with five other friends at about the age of 30 and could never understand it as I was an electrical engineering student and taking physics classes at the time. It didn’t make sense to me and no one I knew could offer an explanation. However, at age 75,(now 79) I once again observed the phenomenon, but this time, mentioning it to a pastor and offering to show him evidence, he simply said “I don’t need to see it, I know it exists, but I have to tell you, this is not of God, for He has not given that kind of power to us.” Immediately, like a flash of lightening, it all came to me and I shouted “What have I done with my life?” Since then, everything in nature provides evidence of God to me.
I realize I have not revealed the nature of the phenomenon, not wanting to spark a new series of debates, but only to show that revelation does not necessarily come by education, knowledge, sight or wisdom.”
I agree, but I do think that the verification of the truth of what may have come by revelation does depend on the use of observation, logic, and reason. The German chemist, Friedrich Kekule had a revelation, in a dream, of the circular shape of the benzene molecule, but confirmed the truth of that relevation with observation, logic, and reason. And I think that the essence of the long conflict between science, which leans heavily on observation, logic and reason, and religion, which leans heavily on faith, is that the revelations stemming from faith have tended not to be borne out in those cases in which it has been possible to bring observation, logic and reason to bear on them. For example, faith, based on Holy Writ, told the fathers of the Catholic Church that the earth was stationary, but Galileo demonstrated otherwise, and was punished for it as being in error, because it conflicted with what faith said was the case. Martin Luther made quite explicit the enmity between faith and reason when he wrote, “Vernunft … ist die höchste Hur, die der Teufel hat;” or, “Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore.”
“But the Lord knew what I needed to believe. He knew what Saul of Tarsus, (now Paul), needed and I certainly hope He will do the same for you.”
See, Carl, as far as I am concerned (and this is a thought, one of many the expression of which got me kicked out of Sunday School more than once, lo these many long years ago), Saul of Tarsus had some kind of epileptic seizure, probably located in the temporal lobe. In my long career as a psychologist I have encountered many people who have had unusual experiences which they believed to be real, but which, by objective standards, were not. Now, I can by no means deny the subjective reality of any experience a person reports, but I do tend to have questions about the objective reality of some of those experiences. One case in point of many possible such: when I was still riding with law enforcement out here in the San Diego area as part of something called the Psychiatric Emergency Response Team, my deputy partner and I responded to a complaint from a man that his neighbor was burning him from a distance with some kind of particle-beam energy device. The man showed us the spot on his arm where the burning was occurring, but neither I, nor my deputy partner could see any evidence of a burn or any kind of dermal irritation at all. More to the point, the neighbor who was said to be responsible for this assault proved not to exist. Now, I have no doubt that the man was feeling a burning sensation on his arm. But I did, and do, have reasonable doubt about the source of that sensation. And I have no doubt that Saul of Tarsus experienced something unusual on the road to Damascus, but I sure have doubts about its source, much as the pastor to whom you spoke about whatever event it was you observed when you were around 30, and again at age 75, that you deemed “miraculous,” had doubts about that event’s source.
It’s curious to me that though the pastor to whom you recounted the event, whatever it was, told you it was “not of God,” it nevertheless generated an epiphany for you of the truth of various religious assertions, such as that an entity who created all things visible and invisible, and who is omnipotent, omnipresent, all-loving/compassionate, all-good, and is directly involved in and concerned about the doings of we mortals, to whom this being is said to stand in the same relationship as that of a loving father to his childreen, has a real existence.
Having said all that, let me add that insofar as what you believe sustains you and makes it easier for you to deal with the vicissitudes of life here on Planet Earth, it makes no difference whether what you believe can be objectively verified. As I have made it clear, I do not think that beliefs embodied in the mythologies of any religion, and particularly in the mythologies of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), can be objectively verified, and further, I think, and am convinced I can demonstrate, that they entail self-nullifying logical contradictions. Speaking for myself, I am very uncomfortable with such things, partly because so many evil deeds have been done on the basis of beliefs that, by me, just ain’t verifiably so. Remember, it was faith that Allah would reward them with a place in Paradise and access to 72 comely maidens who had never known the touch of a man, that encouraged Mohammed Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, and 17 other fools to hijack those airliners on 9/11/2001 and fly them into the twin towers in New York City.
Meanwhile, congratulations on having survived for 79 years in a frame of existence in which such survival is by no means a foregone conclusion — according to the Bible (Psalm 90, Verse 10), you’re now 9 years past the divinely allotted life-span of “threescore and ten.”
You know Conway, believe it or not, I feel a great empathy towards your position, having been there myself. In case you may be thinking I was hallucinating or having a vision of some kind like you think Saul of Tarsus had, remember that I said there were six of us in my group (and many others who were not of my group and it was in broad daylight). The question ultimately boils down to this. Is the universe logical, or is it magical? In this analysis, let us agree that if even a single event ever occurs that is contrary to logic, then we must conclude that the universe is magical.
Thus, the Big Bang theory renders the universe magical, as there is nothing logical that could be assigned to its cause. Something being made out of nothing certainly qualifies for magical! The only thing that offers an answer is the Bible. If we don’t accept that, we are left with nothing. It seems the Author of the Book knew that it would be difficult for some when He wrote: (Isa 55:8) For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
If only a logical universe will satisfy your curiosity, then I see no way out of your dilemma. I was hoping I could secure a promise out of you to let us know if and when you have a change of heart; not trying to win a debate, but to celebrate a new convert. And thanks for the kind words regarding my age. You, too are into overtime, my friend.
Mathematician Kurt Gödel showed that all logic ultimately rests on things that are unprovable, thus defining an integral relationship between faith and reason: http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/blog/incompleteness
Any good logic will have a boundary within which that logic will surely be true. The Pacific ocean to man is a comparatively calm and peaceful ocean like most big entities are. But inside these huge entities, there can be a lot of strife, competitions, sacrifices, births and dyings and killings. One component may become the food for another. Altogether, these strifes and dying s and killings complement each other, giving the Pacific ocean an external appearance of stability, calmness, and age-less-ness.
We can see the same thing if we observe a sleeping man. Under his external appearance of calmness, there will be a lot of activity in his blood and brain and muscles. There would be white corpuscles killing alien viruses, spent cells dying, and getting excreted, etc.
God who is the biggest all encompassing entity will have internally different shades of colours of everything. Altogether,they complement each other, and God as one Being will be age-less, change-less, and at peace, though internally, there may be hunger, and thirst, and quenching, and killing.
Sitting inside a boundary,without any mode of passing information, one would never know what happens outside, and will not be able to make any logical statements about it.
Who said there was no logic in magic and no magic in logic ? Certainly someone with a very closed mind.
«Something being made out of nothing» is what quantum physics is all about. This is both logical and magical. And the Bible is certainly not the ONLY answer on that matter. Besides, if there is a God, then that God must be involved in each and every book that was ever written, not only in the Bible. A God that takes sides doesn’t make sense.
Serge, you equate the Bible with every other book, but to us, who believe, the Bible is God’s Word, inspired by Him and delivered to us by His prophets. All other books are the products of man’s intelligence. God is not taking sides. He is not in competition with anyone. HE IS SOVEREIGN. And because He is sovereign, it is His prerogative to intervene in His creation any way He sees fit, whether by logic or magic (miracles). He answers to no man. All this talk about what God would do if He were really all-powerful is simply ignoring this fact. That is, a fact TO US who believe.
Quantum physics brings us a step closer to understanding God’s creation, all of which the Bible predicted long ago. (In the End Times knowledge will increase and …there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.) No other book could have said those words.
Questioning God in this manner, as many do on this site, is seen by Him, according to His Word, as arrogance. Please do not be offended; far be it from me to offend. As you are a non-believer, I can understand your saying that, as it reflects your understanding of reality which I have to respect.
There are many reasons to believe the Bible to be the inerrant work of God. Some of the most compelling reasons are the fulfilled prophecies as only God can know the end from the beginning. I would like to recommend to all who visit this site with doubt in their minds to the following site: http://www.ellisskolfield.com where you may download THE FALSE PROPHET for free. You will see the fulfillment of no less than 13 prophecies with mathematical precision that are easily verifiable in history; in particular, the return of the Jews to Israel in 1948, and their control of the land after the six day war in 1967, all foretold 2536 years ago. This is a serious work done with the rigors of mathematics that cannot be found elsewhere. You will also see the reason why these prophecies could not be deciphered prior to 1967!
This is a must for all serious seekers of truth.
Best regards, Carl Dick
He talks to no man but christians pray to him and some even say god talked to them. So does he or doesn’t he.
So if he is takes no sides or is a loving god then why answer your call for help but then destroy you for no reasoning?
God created us all, remember this. If he created us all he created the books that man writes. Afterall man wrote the bible too. Since the bible is so old, do you think it could have been distorted just like news crews do with every single story they tell. It reminds me of john caught a 10 pound fish. By the time it gets to the last person, John caught a 50 pound fish.
Everything you are saying, i am saying and everyone else here is saying is the creation of god. You can not have it both ways. It is either one way or the other. The only way is if there are 2 Gods, one is Satan, Satan created all bad people etc. But seriously do you think God would allow Satans bad people to inhabit his earth alongside his good people. This really gets more and more ridiculous.
As usual, Carl, your comments in quotation marks, mine not.
“You know Conway, believe it or not, I feel a great empathy towards your position, having been there myself. In case you may be thinking I was hallucinating or having a vision of some kind like you think Saul of Tarsus had, remember that I said there were six of us in my group (and many others who were not of my group and it was in broad daylight). The question ultimately boils down to this. Is the universe logical, or is it magical? In this analysis, let us agree that if even a single event ever occurs that is contrary to logic, then we must conclude that the universe is magical.”
Carl, unexplained phenomena are not necessarily magical, but simply unexplained. Now, I don’t know what you and your friends observed, or thought you observed, but, without having been there myself I would hazard a guess that an experienced magician (not a “true” magician, but an illusionist; those who deem themselves “true” magicians call what they do “magick,” to distinguish themselves from the David Copperfields, David Blaines and Criss Angels of the world) like James Randi, might have a different take on what you observed. Indeed, I believe Randi has a standing challenge that if anyone brings him an event that seems to them to have been caused by “magical” or supernatural means, he will reproduce it using means he can easily explain. Of course, this would not prove that the original event didn’t involve magic or the supernatural, but it would destroy the certainty that it did involve magic or the supernatural.
Now, for a little fun, if you have the time. Go to the site indexed by the following URL, and play the game you find there. There are people who have pretty much decided that this little curiosity involves some kind of “magick,” or real “mind-reading.” I send you to it as a demonstration that not everything that seems really strange is in fact “magickal.”
http://www.regiftable.com/regiftingrobinpopup.html
But Carl, I’m still curious to know how an event that a pastor assured you was “not of God” led you to a belief in the real existence of a deity.
“Thus, the Big Bang theory renders the universe magical, as there is nothing logical that could be assigned to its cause. Something being made out of nothing certainly qualifies for magical!”
I attended a lecture a couple of weeks ago by a physicist/philosopher named Victor Stenger, who said that, in the higher mathematics entailed in an understanding of so-called string theory, there is a derivation from which it can be inferred that something can indeed come from nothing. Granted, I am not nearly enough of a mathematician to follow the derivation, which the physicist certainly didn’t attempt to explicate to his lay audience, and I didn’t take him entirely at his word, but I found the idea provocative.
In any event, before I’d call the Big Bang “magickal,” I would simply call it “unexplained,” and leave it at that. And even it it was truly magickal, the universe (or possibly multiverse) that ensued, does seem susceptible to logical analysis and understanding, as demonstrated by the way science has over the centuries begun to dope out many of its phenomena and how and why they occur.
“The only thing that offers an answer is the Bible.”
Actually, every culture known to man has a creation myth, as you probably know. As you probably also know, the myths do not all agree. The Bible’s creation myth is simply one of many.
“If we don’t accept that, we are left with nothing.”
And I’m comfortable with that, Carl, more comfortable than I am with answers that, as I’ve said, seem to me to lead to incontrovertible contradictions.
“It seems the Author of the Book knew that it would be difficult for some when He wrote: (Isa 55:8) For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
If only a logical universe will satisfy your curiosity, then I see no way out of your dilemma. I was hoping I could secure a promise out of you to let us know if and when you have a change of heart; not trying to win a debate, but to celebrate a new convert.”
If I change my mind, the people on Coffeehouse Theology will be the first to know. But I suspect that, like my late Mother, unless my mind becomes enfeebled by some kind of senile dementia, I will go to my death still doubting and still unwilling to accept what seems to me to be patently absurd. My Mother never said much about what she believed or didn’t believe about religion, and, along with my father, insisted that I receive religious instruction as a child, but the little she did say was telling, as when she once remarked to a minister, “You, sir, need to get yourself an honest job.” When, at age 94, she was close enough to death to have been placed in a hospice (her mind was still clear; it was her body that was going south in ways she found it hard to tolerate), and the hospice caretakers asked her if she would like to talk to a “spiritual counselor,” she answered, “No. I had no need of their kind while I was alive, and if I’m about to die I have no need of their kind now.”
“And thanks for the kind words regarding my age. You, too are into overtime, my friend.”
Don’t I just know it, Carl, and with increasing frequency I’m getting reminders that my own exit ramp impends — last week one of my oldest friends from my college years died, at the age I will be on my next birthday.
Onward, and with wishes that whatever time remains to each of us on Planet Earth is more pleasant than not.
Conway Redding
My dear Conway, I’ve got to hand it to you. You have got to be one of the most honest and sincere persons I’ve ever met. Yet, I can’t but question the openness of your mind. It seems to me that you have a kind of loyalty to your beliefs that won’t let you question your own beliefs. I know that you are a psychologist and will probably give me a thorough going over for saying that.
As for your little game, it took me about 10 minutes to figure it out. Have you? If not, here goes: subtracting the two digits that make up any two digit number will always render a multiple of nine, 9,18,27,36,etc. The designer of the game needed only to place the same object in every multiple of nine to amaze his audience.
So you see, my dear Dr. Watson, aka Conway, I’m not so easily deceived. Please excuse the humor, just couldn’t resist it. Besides, it makes the reading enjoyable. Now here is a more serious part. There is magic and then there is REAL MAGICK. That’s what makes it so confusing and, I suspect, is one of Satan’s most brilliant tricks. I now see on TV a program that discloses magic’s greatest tricks. It takes a lot of discernment to tell the difference. The devil is not about to blow his cover! I know you don’t believe in Satan either, but please bear with me. I will delve into that matter at a later time if the debate warrants it and if it becomes necessary.
I owe you an answer to your query:
“But Carl, I’m still curious to know how an event that a pastor assured you was “not of God” led you to a belief in the real existence of a deity.”
The answer is not expected to impress you one bit, but here it is: It was none of my doing; when I heard the words, that belief in God was impressed upon my mind. Suddenly, everything became clear to me, and I understood! Now it is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but I say an experience is worth a thousand pictures which equate to a million words.
I don’t believe a man can simply decide to believe; it doesn’t work that way. The most a man can do is to leave himself open to belief. God does the rest. Man has no active part in salvation, “lest any man should boast”. In my case I was prepared (pre-disposed) or what the Bible calls “Behold I stand at the door and knock, if any man opens, I will come in…) Get the picture?
It seems to me you run a tight court. One that will admit no circumstantial evidence; you need to see the man pulling the trigger in order to convict. There is much I could bring in the way of evidence, but you already stated that evidence is not what you’re looking for, it has to be rigorous, logical, mathematically sustained, which is one of the reasons I stated that I don’t foresee a way out of your dilemma. If you would agree to consider some evidence, I would be glad to present them.
Just suppose for a moment, Conway that I may be right, and the promises made to believers were true. Would you not want me to present all possible evidence (and there are some really good ones) in support of my position? If I am right, the stakes are really high.
While there’s life there’s hope. But life is running out! We are in the End Times!
Best wishes, Carl
Usual layout, Carl — your stuff in quotes, mine not. And may I say these exchanges with you have been a pleasure, despite the fact that if it were possible to be more diametrically opposed than 180°, that is the relationship in which we would stand to one another.
“My dear Conway, I’ve got to hand it to you. You have got to be one of the most honest and sincere persons I’ve ever met. Yet, I can’t but question the openness of your mind. It seems to me that you have a kind of loyalty to your beliefs that won’t let you question your own beliefs.”
You’re right about that, Carl, but only in the sense that I don’t question such beliefs as that, in a base 10 number system, 2 + 2 = 4, or that such logical canons as “modus ponens” and “modus tollens” are valid.
“I know that you are a psychologist and will probably give me a thorough going over for saying that.
As for your little game, it took me about 10 minutes to figure it out. Have you?”
Of course, and I’ve sent the solution, starting with the algebraic demonstration that subtracting from any two digit number the two digits that comprise it will always produce a multiple of nine, to those friends of mine who seemed prepared to believe that something truly uncanny was going on here.
I thought that you, with a background in electrical engineering, would suss out this little bit of “magic” pretty quickly, Carl, but my point is that there are those who have not done so and who have allowed goofiness to rush in to fill the vacuum created by their problem-solving deficit. Now, I don’t mean to sound harsh, but from where I stand, you are one of the ones who hasn’t figured out yet the true state of affairs in the area of theology, to wit, that God has no real existence and is an imaginary construct. Nor do I expect you to figure it out, because, just as I don’t question the validity of the arithmetic statement 2 + 2 = 4 or the logical proposition ((p.(p→q))→q), you are loath to question the validity of the statement, “God has a real existence.” Instead you, and other True Believers, will use all kinds of convoluted, often metaphorical arguments in support of what you already assume to be true, which is that God has a real existence.
As you are no doubt aware, there are other reasons for believing something than, that it is true.
“So you see, my dear Dr. Watson, aka Conway, I’m not so easily deceived. Please excuse the humor, just couldn’t resist it. Besides, it makes the reading enjoyable. Now here is a more serious part. There is magic and then there is REAL MAGICK.”
As evidenced by what, exactly, Carl?
“That’s what makes it so confusing and, I suspect, is one of Satan’s most brilliant tricks. I now see on TV a program that discloses magic’s greatest tricks. It takes a lot of discernment to tell the difference. The devil is not about to blow his cover! I know you don’t believe in Satan either, but please bear with me. I will delve into that matter at a later time if the debate warrants it and if it becomes necessary.
I owe you an answer to your query:
‘But Carl, I’m still curious to know how an event that a pastor assured you was “not of God” led you to a belief in the real existence of a deity.’
The answer is not expected to impress you one bit, but here it is: It was none of my doing; when I heard the words, that belief in God was impressed upon my mind. Suddenly, everything became clear to me, and I understood! Now it is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but I say an experience is worth a thousand pictures which equate to a million words.
I don’t believe a man can simply decide to believe; it doesn’t work that way. The most a man can do is to leave himself open to belief. God does the rest. Man has no active part in salvation, ‘lest any man should boast’. In my case I was prepared (pre-disposed) or what the Bible calls “Behold I stand at the door and knock, if any man opens, I will come in…) Get the picture?
It seems to me you run a tight court. One that will admit no circumstantial evidence; you need to see the man pulling the trigger in order to convict. There is much I could bring in the way of evidence, but you already stated that evidence is not what you’re looking for, it has to be rigorous, logical, mathematically sustained, which is one of the reasons I stated that I don’t foresee a way out of your dilemma.”
Carl, it is not a dilemma to me.
“If you would agree to consider some evidence, I would be glad to present them.”
Present away. But understand that I would expect said evidence to stand up to critical evaluation. Case in point: several months ago a couple of hunters down in Georgia claimed to have in their possession the carcass of a Sasquatch or Bigfoot, and had pictures of the carcass as it lay preserved in a huge ice-chest. Turned out to be a bear-skin rug, or something like that, wrapped around some scraps of offal.
“Just suppose for a moment, Conway that I may be right, and the promises made to believers were true. Would you not want me to present all possible evidence (and there are some really good ones) in support of my position? If I am right, the stakes are really high.”
You seem to be referring here, somewhat obliquely, to Pascal’s Wager, which basically sets up a 2 X 2, zaro-sum game matrix, in which the cells are C1: “God exists and you believe,” C2: “God exists and you don’t believe,” C3: “God doesn’t exist and you believe,” C4: “God doesn’t exist and you don’t believe.” Pascal suggests that the winning strategy for this game is to believe, because if God has a real existence, you have gained everything but lost nothing, and if God has no real existence, you have neither gained anything nor lost anything. There are a couple of objections to Pascal’s proposal. First, as you yourself point out above, belief is not a matter of decision, and if God has a real existence and you have been pretending to believe, which is all you can do if you don’t really believe, do you suppose that God, constituted as that entity is usually deemed to be constituted, would not know that you are a pretender and deal with you accordingly? So you would have spent your life living a lie, and would be doomed anyway. Second, if God doesn’t exist, and you have lived your life in the belief that he doesn’t, you have been spared wasting a lot of time on prayers, adorations, and various worshippings, time you might well have put to more productive use.
While we’re fantasizing, let me offer another scenario: God exists, and when I stand before him, he says to me, “You know, with the scant and logically inconsistent evidence that I gave you on which to base a belief in my real existence, I can understand why you didn’t believe. You’re wrong, as you can see, but you reasoned well, and that’s really what I was looking for.” And when you stand before him, he says to you, “I gave you a brain, and the tools of reasoning and logic to employ in operating that brain, and yet, though reason and logic pointed in the direction of my having no real existence, you disdained my gifts, and did not use them to reach the conclusion, false though it has turned out to be, that I did not exist. Well, I have reserved heaven for those who used the gifts I gave them, so you’ll have to go elsewhere.”
A further fantasy: religion has been created by Satan, to lead mankind away from the Path of Reason that God had hoped they’d follow. To put a new twist on an old religious aphorism, “The most brilliant trick of Satan is to convince mankind that God exists.” Yeah, I know, that aphorism leads immediately to paradox, but in the land of the imaginary, paradox is not penalized.
“While there’s life there’s hope. But life is running out! We are in the End Times!”
Well, you and I are certainly in our personal End Times. But I hope you’re not talking about an impending Biblical Apocalypse and the Second Coming of Christ, because it seems pretty clear to me that that’s not going to happen. True Believers will say, of course, that it simply hasn’t happened YET, but to me the Bible itself is unambiguously clear on that subject when you read, in Matthew 16:27-28 (New International Verson), “For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done. I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” My understanding of this passage is the same as my understanding of a statement made by an anti-aging researcher up in San Francisco, which was to the effect that “There are people now living who need never die.” And no, he wasn’t a Christian idealogue referring to the promise of Life Eternal to those who embrace Christ; he was referring to his expectation that within the next 120 years or so, biological science will discover how to stop aging completely, or maybe even reverse it, and delay the occurrence of death indefinitely. Time will tell whether or not he is right. But, back to the Biblical passage, time has already rendered a judgment on the truth of the passage, because the Book of Matthew is believed to have been written between 50 and 70 A.D., and it is plain to see that in the 1,940-1,960 years that have elapsed since then, within which time period certainly everyone living when the Book of Matthew was written has died, the re-arrival of the Son of Man and his angels has been conspicuous by its nonoccurrence.
Ever onward, Carl, if not always ever upward.
Conway
Dear Mr.Redding here are my latest comments:
“Instead you, and other True Believers, will use all kinds of convoluted, often metaphorical arguments in support of what you already assume to be true, which is that God has a real existence.”
Can’t argue with that. I do assume it to be true. I do accept it by faith, which is the only way I can know it. If people waited till they had logical sustainable reasons, there would be no Christians, no religion, no hope.
“As you are no doubt aware, there are other reasons for believing something than, that it is true.”
Fortunately so, and I think that’s the way God would have it.
“As evidenced by what, exactly, Carl?”
By the Big Bang for starters. All nature declares the glory of God.
“ and if God has a real existence and you have been pretending to believe, which is all you can do if you don’t really believe,”
I don’t see any cells in the matrix corresponding to “pretending to believe”.
“but you reasoned well, and that’s really what I was looking for.”
I have tried to follow you into your fantasy. But my fantasy is that what God is looking for is FAITH; not reason. I would venture to say that faith is the premise of the whole Bible. (Heb 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is…’)
“…I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”
Seems you almost had me there. Actually, you had me scurrying to the original Greek text, which is what I do whenever there appears to be some inconsistency. You see, the Bible is only inerrant in the original text. All translations cannot be said to be inspired, which is the reason there are so many different versions. The problem here is the word ‘coming’, which is defined by Strong’s number G2064 as follows:
G2064
ἔρχομαι
erchomai
er’-khom-ahee
Middle voice of a primary verb (used only in the present and imperfect tenses, the others being supplied by a kindred [middle voice] word, ἐλεύθομαι eleuthomai or ἔλθω elthō; which do not otherwise occur); to come or go (in a great variety of applications, literally and figuratively): – accompany, appear, BRING, come enter, fall out, go, grow, X light, X next, pass, resort, be set.
Capitals mine for emphasis
The translators had to decide on which term to use and chose ‘come’ rather than ‘bring’, which is more consistent with what was being said, for a man cannot be said to be ‘coming in his kingdom’. If, on the other hand, they had chosen the word ‘bring’, the passage would then read:
“…I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man bringing in his kingdom.”
The kingdom here spoken of is the spiritual kingdom (the church), which hadn’t come into being until Pentecost, which most, who were then alive, could have seen. Remember the words of Jesus to Pilate: My kingdom is not of this world. If not of this world, which is material, then what world? The spiritual, of course, where the body of the True Believer is His temple, and He is King, reigning in our hearts. This kingdom is eternal, and will continue in its present state until He returns, at which time our bodies will be miraculously transformed into incorruptible bodies (entropy proof). And that is what we True Believers believe. Have a laugh at my expense.
I kinda like upwards more that onward, thanks, Carl
Sorry to interrupt again… but thanks for that answer. It is a valid question, and although I know *I* have no problem with it, for me to explain that to somebody else would require a bit more study than I currently have time for. So, thanks, Carl, and God bless.
Usual format, Carl — your comments in quotes, mine not.
“Dear Mr.Redding here are my latest comments:”
Instead you, and other True Believers, will use all kinds of convoluted, often metaphorical arguments in support of what you already assume to be true, which is that God has a real existence.
“Can’t argue with that. I do assume it to be true. I do accept it by faith, which is the only way I can know it. If people waited till they had logical sustainable reasons, there would be no Christians, no religion, no hope.”
I dispute that a world without Christians and without religion would be a world without hope. I would consider it to be a world without one of the major repositories of ignorance, superstition, and irrationality. As for hope, such a world would have to rely on mankind to seek out solutions to the many problems facing it, rather than praying to an imaginary being for succor.
As you are no doubt aware, there are other reasons for believing something than that it is true.
“Fortunately so, and I think that’s the way God would have it.”
Your response, immediately above, to my comment about there being other reasons for believing something, other than that it is true, suggests that you think God wants us to believe things that are untrue. What I was getting at is the fact that people believe many untrue things, and that there are reasons for their doing so, such as wishful thinking and unconscious needs of various sorts. I was by no means suggesting thatthe wishful thinking and unconscious needs that might account for someone’s believing something that is untrue — such, as, for instance, that the TV medium John Edward is actually in touch with the dead — renders those beliefs valid. But it does make them understandable.
” All nature declares the glory of God.”
Does amyotrophic lateral sclerosis declare the glory of God, Carl? How about glioblastoma multiforme? Anencephalic terata? Multiple sclerosis? Supranuclear palsy? Hansen’s Disease? The 1931 China floods, for which the death count was 1-4 million? All of these phenomena are part of “nature” or “the natural order.”
… and if God has a real existence and you have been pretending to believe, which is all you can do if you don’t really believe…
“I don’t see any cells in the matrix corresponding to ‘pretending to believe’.”
No, you don’t, but you yourself acknowledge that belief is not a matter of choice or an act of will. As you worded it, “I don’t believe a man can simply decide to believe; it doesn’t work that way.” It follows, then, that if one does not believe, and if one is going to try to take Pascal’s Wager, the only option one has is to pretend to believe.
…but you reasoned well, and that’s really what I was looking for…
“I have tried to follow you into your fantasy. But my fantasy is that what God is looking for is FAITH; not reason. I would venture to say that faith is the premise of the whole Bible. (Heb 11:6 ‘But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is…’)”
I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. (My citation of Matthew 16:28.)
“Seems you almost had me there. Actually, you had me scurrying to the original Greek text, which is what I do whenever there appears to be some inconsistency. You see, the Bible is only inerrant in the original text.
You realize that such a statement, “…the Bible is only inerrant in the original text”… immediately makes it impossible to know what in the Bible is inerrant, since the only people able to read the Old Testament in the original text, Old Hebrew, with full access to all that language’s multifarious and nuanced cultural associations, have been long dead; the same is true of the only people able to read the New Testament in the original text, Koine Greek. Everybody else must perforce rely on translations. In this sense, the original text is lost, and our only recourse is translations. One might suppose that native speakers of modern Hebrew and modern Greek might have an advantage, since their languages evolved directly from those languages’ Biblical predecessors, but the rest of us, including you, of course, must translate. Hence resources like Strong’s Biblical Concordance.
“All translations cannot be said to be inspired, which is the reason there are so many different versions.”
So how do you determine which translations are inspired, and which not, Carl?
“The problem here is the word ‘coming’, which is defined by Strong’s number G2064 as follows:
G2064
ἔρχομαι
erchomai
er’-khom-ahee
Middle voice of a primary verb (used only in the present and imperfect tenses, the others being supplied by a kindred [middle voice] word, ἐλεύθομαι eleuthomai or ἔλθω elthō; which do not otherwise occur); to come or go (in a great variety of applications, literally and figuratively): – accompany, appear, BRING, come enter, fall out, go, grow, X light, X next, pass, resort, be set.
Capitals mine for emphasis
The translators had to decide on which term to use and chose ‘come’ rather than ‘bring’, which is more consistent with what was being said, for a man cannot be said to be ‘coming in his kingdom’. If, on the other hand, they had chosen the word ‘bring’, the passage would then read:
‘…I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man bringing in his kingdom.’
The kingdom here spoken of is the spiritual kingdom (the church), which hadn’t come into being until Pentecost, which most, who were then alive, could have seen.”
Carl, despite your scholarly references to Strong’s #G2064, which you cite in the service of supporting your speculation that the Koine Greek verb ερχoμαι in Matthew 16:28 has been mistranslated, I must disagree that the passage from Matthew that I cited refers to the events of the Pentecost, which, if one believes that the Bible is historically accurate in this matter, certainly did occur during the lifetimes of some of those living when the Book of Matthew was written. Aside from the fact that my Liddell’s Greek Dictionary gives the primary meaning of ερχoμαι as being “to come back” or “return,” (the form used in Matthew 16:27 is actually ερχεσθαι, the future tense, or “will return”; the equivalent form in Matthew 16:20 is ερχομενον, a noun, meaning “a coming back,” or “a returning”), the preceding verse, Matthew 16:27, from which Matthew 16:28 flows seamlessly, clearly makes reference to the Final Judgment, when it says, “For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.” This is not, however, what happened on Pentecost. The Holy Spirit descended, but there was no Final Judgment. Furthermore, Matthew 16:27 makes reference to Christ coming with his angels in all his father’s glory, and that is something else that did not happen at Pentecost — there’s no mention, in Biblical accounts of the Pentecost (Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 2), either of Christ appearing, or of any angels, only “a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind,” and “cloven tongues like as of fire,” and the bestowal upon the Apostles of the gift of tongues. I conclude, then, that Matthew 16:27-28 is indeed referring to eschatological even of the Second Coming of Christ, which is generally conceived of as a bit more than a merely spiritual event, what with the resurrection of the dead, the Last Judgment, the meting out of just rewards and punishments, and the inauguration of a Holy Millennium on Earth. I also conclude that the Bible was wrong, whether read in Koine Greek or in any translation therefrom, when it averred that this event would occur before some of the people who were alive when the Book of Matthew was written, had died.
Your apologia for what I take to be Biblical error demonstrates the kind of convoluted thinking that you True Believers begin to employ when attempting to refute those who question the basis of your beliefs, or who point out that those beliefs entail illogicality.
“Remember the words of Jesus to Pilate: My kingdom is not of this world. If not of this world, which is material, then what world?”
So, Carl, is the Second Coming of Christ to be a spiritual event alone, or is it to involve a material Christ walking a material terrestrial sphere, raising the material dead, judging every material human being, both the materially quick and the formerly materially dead, giving those deemed worthy an incorruptible material body, assigning those deemed sinful to a material Fiery Pit, and so on?
“The spiritual, of course, where the body of the True Believer is His temple, and He is King, reigning in our hearts. This kingdom is eternal, and will continue in its present state until He returns, at which time our bodies will be miraculously transformed into incorruptible bodies (entropy proof). And that is what we True Believers believe. Have a laugh at my expense.”
When I was interacting with the intractably deluded in closed, locked psychiatric facilities, laughter at their expense did not seem appropriate. Nor does it seem appropriate in interacting with True Believers.
“I kinda like upwards more than onward…”
And so do I, Carl, but have noticed over the years what I like and what I get do not always coincide.
Conway
I hope the passage quoted below from Davies will give a clearer picture of how matter can be created from nothing.
There is a remarkable possibility, for creation of matter from a state of zero energy. This possibility arises because energy can be both positive and negative. The energy of motion or the energy of mass is always positive, but the energy of attraction, such as that due to certain types of gravitational or electromagnetic field, is negative. Circumstances can arise in which the positive energy that goes to make up the mass of newly-created particles of matter is exactly offset by the negative energy of gravity of electromagnetism. For example, in the vicinity of an atomic nucleus the electric field is intense. If a nucleus containing 200 protons could be made (possible but difficult), then the system becomes unstable against the spontaneous production of electron-positron pairs, without any energy input at all. The reason is that the negative electric energy can exactly offset the energy of their masses.
In the gravitational case the situation is still more bizarre, for the gravitational field is only a spacewarp – curved space. The energy locked up in a spacewarp can be converted into particles of matter and antimatter. This occurs, for example, near a black hole, and was probably also the most important source of particles in the big bang. Thus, matter appears spontaneously out of empty space. The question then arises, did the primeval bang possess energy, or is the entire universe a state of zero energy, with the energy of all the material offset by negative energy of gravitational attraction?
It is possible to settle the issue by a simple calculation. Astronomers can measure the masses of galaxies, their average separation, and their speeds of recession. Putting these numbers into a formula yields a quantity which some physicists have interpreted as the total energy of the universe. The answer does indeed come out to be zero wihin the observational accuracy. The reason for this distinctive result has long been a source of puzzlement to cosmologists. Some have suggested that there is a deep cosmic principle at work which requires the universe to have exactly zero energy. If that is so the cosmos can follow the path of least resistance, coming into existence without requiring any input of matter or energy at all. (Davies, 1983, 31-32)
One problem: you still need a catalyst. Absolute nothingness will remain absolute nothingness unless impelled to change; remember inertia? Just because zero *can* be split into +1 and -1 does not mean that it will spontaneously do so of its own accord. So what if the “sum total” of the universe is zero? If there is zero mass and zero energy… there is zero force/pressure/cause for change. The whole “big bang” joke is exactly that–to even call it a theory requires either a twisted sense of humour or a lack of perception of the obvious.
Think about it–if nothing can spontaneously become positive and negative something, then it would be happening all the time. My empty bank account does not arbitrarily split into “cash in hand” and “credit due”; *I* must use my credit card in order for that to happen. Empty classrooms do not magically sprout “good” and “bad” students. (Ok, now I’m mocking the whole idea… but I hope the point is clear.)
Even *if* God used the “big bang” for Creation, we still have a much more important issue: God is real. Why do we feel the need to discuss hypothetical physics and dictate to God how He did it, when He tells us Himself, plainly and simply?
The issue we are discussing is not whether God initiated the Big Bang, or was a catalyst. The question is whether “Good can be created without a equal amount of “Evil” also.
Back the old “cold is the opposite of heat” argument, eh? Still no “cold-emitting” ray gun as evidence? (No cheating: something that just “steals heat” isn’t good enough.)
SOME SCALES HAVE AN ABSOLUTE ZERO. Sheesh, why is that so hard?
Just like all the unaccounted for insect to be named as yet. Or new species that are being found of different fish or plants or viruses or whatever. That is the key. What hasn’t been found is unexplainable as thus far.
I’m afraid I think that the replies here miss the point of the question; I mean replies like “god is the source of good, we are the source of evil”, “this suffering is part of god’s ultimate plan, trust him”.
The real problem is that if god is all powerful, why does he not eradicate evil and suffering? If he can do anything, why does he not come up with a new “ultimate plan” that does not include suffering, and keeps all the good elements of this one that does?
A reply like “god wants us to have free will, so he lets us choose between good and evil ourselves” does not work, because if god is all powerful, he should be able to give us free will without needing evil.
Simply put, if god is all powerful, he created evil and suffering ALTHOUGH HE DIDN’T NEED TO – since being all powerful he could have achieved anything he wanted without including evil and suffering.
That’s the heart of the problem: that god incorporated evil and suffering in his creation without there being any intrinsic need for them. It was simply his will that little children should die of cancer, though he could have done it otherwise.
The alternative, of course, is that he is not all-powerful.
Amazing, Stjepan, someone who is posting to this site who actually recognizes the core problem with belief in the real existence of a deity, as that deity is usually conceived to be constituted! Rabbi Harold Kushner, the man who wrote “When Bad Things Happen to Good People,” resolved the dilemma by deciding that God is not all-powerful, a conclusion that pretty much eviscerates God, and immediately raises the question of why anyone should have any truck with this deity, who is now only “sort of powerful.” I myself resolve the dilemma by concluding that God has exactly the degree of reality as that ascribed to Daffy Duck, Frankenstein’s monster, Count Dracula, and other creations of the human imagination.
Thanks. Just to be clear, I am not exactly an atheist – tough I certainly don’t go to church.
But I do recognize the immensity of this problem.
I agree – a non-all-powerful god is just a big bully.
Suffering and pain are not necessarily evil. If we did not experience pain, we would be like leprosy patients, destroying ourselves. Leprosy patients don’t feel any pain when they hit or twist or tear their limbs accidentally. This results in them losing their limbs.
Our ability to experience pain is a grace given to us by God, who has designed the complex nervous system, so that we will not lose our limbs and destroy ourselves.
Suffering is a warning signal to us individually, and to our society, that something is amiss. If we correct ourselves, suffering will end.
Love also can end suffering. When a mother carries a heavy load of food items from the market to feed her children, she enjoys what she is doing; but she would groan with pain carrying half the load while doing something she didn’t like.So also most mothers “enjoy” the pain they suffer during the birth of their children,- in anticipation of the bundle of joy that they are delivering.
Sacrificing your joys for someone you love is the the sweetest experience possible in this world. People who have really loved would have experienced it. Others will never understand what I am saying, even if they are Phds in Logic or Science or Technology. They will also never understand why a patriotic soldier will lay down his life – protecting his country.
Everybody will suffer pain, and die. Some people do them against their wishes. While some others are prepared to sacrifice their everything for protecting what they love, and believe in.
Though Jesus cried out “Why did you forsake me ?”He surely must have felt a deeper satisfaction and fulfilment while going through his crucifixion. That is why, even though he could easily have escaped from the Romans, He went ahead and became the scapegoat for Man’s sins, instead of running away from pain.
To take an extreme example, a chicken would rather be killed to be eaten by a man, than die of old age in a forest. It must be enjoying getting sacrificed to become food for man, because then, it will become part of a living man, while if it dies a natural death, it will go back to lifeless dust.
you mean to say that god has little children die of cancer as a “warning signal” that something is amiss in our society?
Well, that very helpful of him. What a nice guy.
What other “humane” disease would you like children exposed to toxic waste, nuclear radiation etc. die of?
but why have it in the first place. God created us, without it we would know no different. This pain is a traesure bull is really no argument. I still insist that why give pain in ther first place. For instants, my pain started in early childhood. It then grew to be out of control but i tell you, what chance did i have as a child and why cause the pain in the first place. Now i have learnt my lesson so my time is up, i feel void, useless, no zest, couldn’t be bothered all because of the pain created by this god, if real, my parents really, to now have caused me major life problems as an adult, that in turn has completely ruined my life. Now what is it exactly i was meant to learn. Afterall i didn’t create this pain in the beginning and if i never had this pain in the beginning, i would then not know any different but i am sure my life now would be much greater. I guess i am just Gods puppet or his slave, i don’t deserve love. Or it doesn’t matter that i can love my little girls and my future wife so much but now its over. Has been for years. Yep i really needed that lesson. It has made me a much better personm, NOT. Always the same argument that never has any real value. Take it from me your lesson theories and God theories, which is all it is, a theory or a marketting scheme. A fiction novel written by man. It not as if God wrote the book himself and left it on Mary’s table have nevre made me any better off. Instead have caused more and more misery over the years to where i am now, where i have turned bitter and angry and hate everything. I don’t associate or have any friends. I can’t connect to any women when once i was a don juan. I am just gods puppet. Anyone who believes in God is his puppet.
so what lesson is a child born in ethiopia learning. Mustn’t choose parents who live in poverty area next time around. Even though i am 1 years old, can’t walk yet, i will become a better person and i will create food just by thinking about it. Yep great lesson god is teaching this child of his, i am sure. Or is that poor little child going to be labelled the devils child because only the devil causes bad things, god wouldn’t do any such thing.
Another theory on God is this. As with probably all of us we have had our share of good and bad things happen to us. Since God is teaching us all a lesson for what i have no clue. what lesson exactly? Conway doesn’t believe in a God, as he said resembles Daffy duck. He has made it to the ripe old age of 75. For all any of us know he could have lived his dreams without believing in god and had the greatest life, he seems very litterate and well educated to me. He could be a hardened criminal that found education boring because it was easy to him. He could be poor living on the street venturing to a warm library getting on the internet to waste his time talking to us so he has somewher to stay warm. Point is, what lesson is God teaching him? since god has some great path for us all. All i see is my path was great for 3 months out of my piece of shit existence. It just gets worse no matter how hard i try or even not try as some say is best as if they know all the answers to everyones problems. It seems to me that Conway has a great life, which is exactly what i said before. Why do bad people (figuratively since not believing in a god is supposed to be a sin)get great things happen to them and then some innocent loving person be treated like a piece of trash ad never get anywhere. Gives without any reimbursement loves unconditionally and all the rest of gods so called ten coomandments. But never gets anywhere? I mean, these days you can be a prisoner and have all your meals for free, a TV, warm bed, Gym equiptment al at the expense of others and because of humane society live a much easier life then what a criminal should live while we on the outside starve, try to find shelter, etc etc. Who really are the criminals in this world? Another point, who says you are right over a drug pusher or anyone else? What says your way is better then my way? It seems Conway is 75, doesn’t believe in God but he is 75, has an internet connection, must eat to still be alive at that age. Seems to be in good health to be able to write the poetry he writes and have a good mind since he can debate with the best.
God theories just don’t stand up anymore.
God created us to have freewill which means that we often suffer for the bad choices of others, not because of what God did, but because of what other people did.
Some dictionaries list “dark” as the “opposite” of “light”– but any high school student should know better. “Dark” is the *absence* of “light”. It’s not that hard.
“A reply like “god wants us to have free will, so he lets us choose between good and evil ourselves” does not work, because if god is all powerful, he should be able to give us free will without needing evil.”
Um… who defines what an all-powerful being should be able to do? Before somebody makes some smart-alec comment about the definition of “all-powerful”, let’s consider another “definition”: what is “evil”? As mentioned before, darkness does not “exist”; it is the absence of light. Cold does not exist; in fact, the “cold, dark vacuum of space” is quite simply where there is no heat, light or matter. (Yeah, ok, even in a vacuum there’s some matter, because we can’t make and haven’t yet found a perfect vacuum. The point is still clear and valid.)
God doesn’t “need” evil; He didn’t “create” evil. It’s a simple answer, really. Evil is the absence of good. It’s not a question of “limiting” or “re-defining” God’s power. This argument is but an excuse for ignoring God.
You can’t redefine evil as an entity unto itself and then claim that God created it. Currently, there is no “schloznar” in the universe; does that mean that, if somebody “creates” schloznar, he automatically must also create “anti-schloznar”?
Choose not to believe in God if you will; choose to believe in some false, limited god if you will; but at least admit that it’s because you don’t *want* to believe in a real, all-powerful God. If He is real, then we are responsible for our choices and actions–and nobody really wants that, right?
So is it OK if we understand the following from your statements?
EVIL = NOTHING
COLD EMPTY SPACE = NOTHING
Therefore
EVIL = COLD EMPTY SPACE
Did I say COLD = DARK, or that EVIL = NOTHING? No, I’m quite sure I didn’t. I said that cold, dark and evil are all the *absence* of something, not the *opposite* (and therefore, “somethings” on their own). Just as the value of “zero” can exist in different directions–something can have a value or position of (x,y)=(2,0), for example–you can’t equate the absence of “good” with the absence of “light” or the absence of “cold”. In the real world, there are number sets where only positive values and zero are valid. Have you ever seen -2 apples? Me neither. Either there are one or more apples, or fractions thereof, or none at all. Is zero apples the same as zero oranges?
(Yeah, I didn’t think so.)
“Currently, there is no “schloznar” in the universe; does that mean that, if somebody “creates” schloznar, he automatically must also create “anti-schloznar”?”
In modern physics, there is no such thing as “nothing.” Even in a perfect vacuum, pairs of virtual particles are constantly being created and destroyed. The existence of these particles is no mathematical fiction. Though they cannot be directly observed, the effects they create are quite real. The assumption that they exist leads to predictions that have been confirmed by experiment to a high degree of accuracy. (Morris, 1990, 25)
I am quoting below from Hawking, for the benefit of people who have difficulty understanding why every matter and action and force or anything and everything in this Universe has to have an opposite.
Every good therefore must have a corresponding evil.
So one way of creating something positive is to make something negative, and lock it up, far away out of reach of anything positive. A corresponding positive will be formed automatically.
This is probably why God first made a Kingdom for a bad Son of God (Satan), so that a Kingdom for a Good Son of God who sits at His right hand is made possible.
“There are something like ten million million million million million million million million million million million million million million (1 with eighty [five] zeroes after it) particles in the region of the universe that we can observe. Where did they all come from? The answer is that, in quantum theory, particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle pairs. But that just raises the question of where the energy came from. The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus, in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.”
(Hawking, 1988, 129)
This means, that at the end of creation, when God wakes up after resting on the seventh day we will have a Jerusalem which will have no COLD EMPTY SPACE. It will be ONE unit comprising of components and creatures and spirits that complement each other, loving each other and working for each other like one body. Empty space or EVIL or chaos will be out of bounds within this City of Peace.
You’re equating good and evil with positive and negative again. Um, I don’t see you trying that silliness with heat and cold. Go on, try it. How about negative light? Please, show me a “dark projector”. Sure, light is little packets of energy, which sometimes behave like particles instead of waves, and therefore they must have opposite “anti-particles”…
Some scales have an absolute zero. “Good” is one of those scales. Deal with it, and move on. In the mean time, tell me this: if everything has an opposite, then what is the “opposite” of God?
–”When God wakes up…”? Dude, seriously, which Bible are you reading?
…And finally, all due respect to Mr. Hawking, he is NOT the final authority on the physics of the universe. God is. I’ll believe God over Hawking any day; God says that Satan is NOT His son–he was an angel who rebelled–and I believe Him. If you choose not to believe God, well, that’s your choice.
If Hawking cannot be trusted, I hope you will trust
Hendrik B. G. Casimir, a Dutch physicist, who in 1948 showed that two uncharged parallel
metal plates alter the vacuum fluctuations in such a way as to attract each other. The energy density between the plates was later calculated to be negative. In effect, the plates reduce the
fluctuations in the gap between them; this creates negative energy and pressure, which pulls the plates together. The narrower the gap, the more negative the energy and pressure,
and the stronger is the attractive force. The Casimir effect has recently been measured by Steve K. Lamoreaux of Los Alamos National Laboratory and by Umar Mohideen of the University of California at Riverside and his colleague Anushree
Roy. Similarly, in the 1970s Paul C. W. Davies and Stephen A. Fulling, then at King’s College at the University of London, predicted that a moving boundary, such as a moving mirror, could produce a flux of negative energy.
And when or where has God told that there is no negative energy?
“And when or where has God told that there is no negative energy?”
And when or where did I claim that there is no negative energy? You seem intent on misunderstanding me.
Now, to be clear: there is no negative LIGHT. You can argue mathematically that removal of light is a “negative” process, in the same way that you can describe an endothermic reaction as having “negative heat” (because as a PROCESS it REMOVES heat), but the truth is the heat itself can not be negative, nor can the light.
Light may very well, as a particle, have an “anti-light” particle; however, darkness is an absolute: having an abundance of “anti-light” particles may cancel out existing light, but can not make it darker than the absolute absence of light. This is by the very definition of darkness–it can’t get darker than “I can’t see squat”. Cold can not get any colder than zero atomic movement (at which point, theoretically, the atom would collapse and self-destruct…hmm, sounds like a God-less society…). “Negative movement” of particles would in fact result in positive heat! This is very different from positive/negative electric or magnetic values– there is no “absolute lowest” value, because you can keep adding electrons to the mix, indefinitely, until the universe is empty of them… and then God is still creating more.
To quote myself yet again, “SOME SCALES HAVE AN ABSOLUTE ZERO.” Can anybody prove this wrong?
P.S. Back to the source of this discussion: You can’t redefine evil as an entity unto itself and then claim that God created it… which deflates all of those silly “God can’t be good because He created evil” arguments.
Hi Stef,
I am offering this explanation because I am repeatedly seeing in your posts, an argument suggesting impossibility of having anti light or heat, because of the impossibility to go below absolute zero temperature or darkness.
An antiparticle is something which in contact with a particle results in annihilation of both.
To have an anti-particle for photon (particle of light or heat), we do not need to go below absolute zero of temperature or darkness. Since light and heat are waves of forces or fields, they already have the positive and negative in themselves. So a photon can be the antiparticle of another similar photon. One photon can annihilate another photon of light of the same frequency if it is out of step by 1/2 phase or 180 degrees angle. So in the case of photons, 1+1 can be any none or one or more photons of a total value between 0 (zero) and 2.
I know it is not written in the bible, but I hope that it will give you a good reason to look for truth in other books also.
So, you’re basically saying now that one particle of “good” can cancel out another particle of “good”. Or, that “good” by nature is paired with equal and opposite “evil”, so that in the end, we have no hope of salvation whatsoever, because all good will ultimately be cancelled out by evil.
I never said that there are no good books beside the Bible; the Bible itself, however, claims that it is the inspired Word of God, and that Jesus is the ONLY way to God. SIMPLY: a book that disagrees with the Bible is NOT a good book. A book that disagrees with the Bible is NOT truth.
Now, at this point I’m going to “give up” on you, at least for a while. It is one thing to examine the different sides in an argument, but to keep attacking the foundation for one side of the debate (ie., the Truth of the Bible), you clearly place yourself on the other side of the table. You do not acknowledge it when you have no further argument against my “answers”, but rather keep trying to find weak spots in the basic belief of Christianity; this is not a search for truth so much as a search for an excuse to discount the Bible.
So: it’s your choice. If you don’t want to believe in the Bible, then look in your “other books”; the answers may “satisfy” you for now, but you’ll find out one day that they can’t save you. Sorry.
how can god be told anything when he is apparently the creator. He created negative. he had to have created it.
God created us in his likeness, with freewill. We can tell him anything. And sometimes he listens.
“The assumption that they exist leads to predictions that have been confirmed by experiment to a high degree of accuracy.”
For non-scientists, let us give a gentle reminder: a scientific model is considered successful, perhaps valid, if it works; it is NEVER considered to be the only possible explanation, or the final answer, because that is unscientific. So, in other words… so what?
Sorry to be so dismissive, but that doesn’t *prove* anything. It is an assumption that so far has not been proven wrong. Whoopee. Let’s examine this argument in another fifty years, and see whether the theoreticians haven’t abandoned these assumptions.
(By the way, anybody who has taken a class in statistics knows that “a high degree of accuracy” can mean just about anything at all.)
As to particles and anti-particles… sorry, but does that mean that every time I eat an apple, the anti-me does not eat an anti-apple, or something? As previously stated, there are values with no negative equivalent in the real world. Talking about negative apples–yes, that is mathematical “fiction”.
Does your perfect vacuum have energy? Because if there’s no energy and no matter… it can’t be observed, and its “effects” can’t be observed either without introducing energy and matter into the experiment… and making assumptions based on that kind of theory is rather like me claiming that there are invisible, mass-less fairies, with impenetrable energy-masking fields, who are responsible for making gravity work. You can’t prove me wrong, can you? Because anything you say, I’ll be able to explain away with my fairies’ magic. Experiments? Sure–I don’t need to be a “wizard” to manipulate numbers and prove that my fairies do what I say they do… especially if it means more funding for my “fairy research” department.
Oh, and I don’t believe I ever used the word “nothing”. ;p
From the accounts of the Bible, we were made to understand that before the creation of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, God had created the heavens & all the beings in it. Lucifer the great angel of Light was a cut above other heavenly beings, in the hierachy of heaven.
A perfect God creating perfect spirit beings. To be sure perfection connotes a lack of defect, balance, or in our case a lack of evil. But Lucifer, the perfect being created perfect by God, was soon to acquire a new reputation. He who later became known as the Devil had a choice in obeying God or not. If he did, then it is proof conclusive that Lucifer did not create evil, he only discovered it. Choice implies options, options will have to exist for anyone to exercise free will. So if Lucifer did not create evil, who did?
The beings in heaven that presumably did not rebel against God also knew about the existence of evil. Did they also have to eat of the fruit to aqcuire this information, or did they know just by virtue of the fact that they are heavenly beings? Why do we have evil in the world? Why do we have day and night, black and white, big and small, hot and cold? why cant everything be just good, why do we not live forever,eat cake, merry and party for ever and ever?
The seasons, weather, and climate provides certian clues that may be important to note. Winter, spring, summer, autumn, exists for certian purposes, beyond the obvious need the ecosystem has for activity and rest, we as individuals have different responses to these seasons.
All life moves according to certian cycles, and there is no thing living or non living that does not obey this law, there is a time of birth, growth, maturity,and then death. Nothing escapes this pattern. So if it exists in nature, then there must be a reason. The arguement that mosquitoes drank nectar, and ate pollen is laughable. Death and what we call evil had existed long before Adam and Eve. The Dinasours existed and ruled long before we did.
So why evil, or the negative power? Evil exists to remind us of the good that also exists, and of the need to learn and grow. The nation of Isreal exists today because Hitler killed millions of Jews. When we lose our loved ones, it reminds us of the need to draw even closer to those that are still with us. When we see hunger and pain, it reminds us to be grateful for the little we have, and the need others might have of them. Great acts of compassion and love always follow great calamities, the heart begins to open in ways hither to unappreciated, and understood.
Perfection in our physical universe is not the absence of evil, but the balancing of both good and evil. Balance, both within and without. That is why the mosquitoe and other diseases exists, to teach us the leasons of clealiness, personal responsibilty, and service to ourselves and each other.
Evil starts with dis-obedience of laws.
There could not have been evil when there were no laws.
In the Bible, the first instance of dis-obedience is seen in the Garden of Eden.
Satan probably was created to do what he is doing.
I once saw how rats were trained to get out of a mace, using electrified wires lined along the walls of the mace. The rats soon learned to get out of the mace without touching the walls.
Satan and his bunch of devils might have been created to punish men who stray from the correct path (following Jesus, who is the Way).
It is difficult for me to believe is an omniscient God made a mistake creating Angels who would do things contrary to His plans.
Satan and his team must be God’s labourers, who are loaded with a program to find loopholes in God’s systems and eliminate them. Once the program has completed its job, he may destroy it or keep it safely locked for later use.
It is difficult for a seed to take roots in un-tilled soil. So before God sent his seed to this world, he sent his labourers (devils) first to till it well, and prepare the earth for receiving God’s seed (Jesus- The WORD- God’s DNA).
The word (the order) can be written only in a contrasting background. If man is to read the word, the Word has to be written (in say white – because the Word is pure)on a black background. So the purity and goodness of God’s WORD will be seen by men only if there is evil all around(in a Black background). So we can say that this world is a blackboard painted black by the evil of Satan, on which God wants to write HIS WORD (in White), so that Man can know GOD, and learn the path to reach HIM.
“The arguement that mosquitoes drank nectar, and ate pollen is laughable.” Then laugh at God, and laugh at His record of creation. Why even pretend to believe in Adam and Eve, if you won’t believe in the other verses in the chapter? Read Genesis 1:30 again. Choose to laugh, if you will, but then at least make up your own names for Adam and Eve to go along with your own version of creation.
It was never about “balance”; that’s a human concept. If there is something/someone to “balance” God, then there is no hope whatsoever for the future, because the balance against God’s creation out of nothing is absolute destruction back into nothing.
Laugh as much as you like; the Bible says it, so I believe it. (It’s called “faith”.)
I don’t have too much time to go into specific details or comments, so I’ll make a quick statement:
The immovable object/irresistable force argument disproves that God (or anything else for that matter) can be omnipotent. Therefore, no matter how much power God has, He must have some limit.
The fact that the world is such a mess proves that God is either a masochist who enjoys torturing others and himself with unspeakable horrors (because he saw it coming and went through with it anyway), or he is cannot know everything for all time (Omniscient). I don’t like to think of God as a sadistic masochist, as it’s woefully depressing, so let’s go with knoledgable and wise, but short of Omniscient.
As for the “Why God lets bad things happen/Why God does not help people in need” question, I present this answer:
Why should God interfere to stop evil, when Humans are perfectly capable of stopping it themselves, together with peace, love and a handful of common sense and logic?
This brings me to an interesting conclusion that will hopefully make people think:
God made Humans in his own image-we look like Him.
God can predict the future to an extent-Humans can forsee events that will happen in the limited future.
God has great power, but is still limited-Humans can do incredible things together, but are not unlimited in their power.
God is kind, compassionate, gentle, loving, wise, intelligent and caring-All aspects of Humanity.
God is jealous, angry, vengeful and cruel-All aspects of Humanity.
God is everywhere-Everywhere Humans go, there Humans are.
When you really think about it, the only real difference between Humans and God, is that God is simply greater and more advanced than us.
Therefore you could argue that God is Human, Humans are God.
As for Miracles: “Any technology sufficiently advanced is indestinguishable from Magic and Miracles.”
You could buy a lighter for $10 at the corner shop down the road. Show it to a caveman and he will revere you as a God. Tell him he must sacrifice the first kill of the day to you as a burnt offerring, and he must follow your word or his family with die, and you’ve just performed a miracle, and created a faith. Wouldn’t that make you God?
I leave you with this to ponder as I’m 20 minutes late and need to go home in my magical, indestructible, four-legged, terrifyingly loud, red-scaled beast.
One major problem, Marko: eternity.
An eternal God must be infinite, or even He eventually must die. He must be all-powerful, or He must eventually be overcome by His creation. He must be omniscient, or eventually, He must be faced with an unforeseen and insurmountable problem in His plans. A limited God can not be eternal; therefore, “Someone” must have created “Him”. (The Greeks, and others, solved that problem by having a “father” for their gods, and then a father for him, and someone before that… and then getting their civilization destroyed before they really had to worry about what had started it all.)
The “perpetual motion machine” made by human hands can never be truly perpetual, because no matter how refined our equipment, no matter how many generations of computer technology go into it, it is still ultimately flawed–and after thousands or millions of years, a microscopic speck of dust, or a molecule of contamination, will eventually cause enough friction or loss of energy to bring the machine to a halt. You can not “refine your way to perfection” (at least, with uncountable concepts) any more than you can “add your way to infinity”. A billion to the power of a billion, billions of times, is still finite.
Interestingly, infinity plus one is the same as infinity plus a billion; our pitiful number values mean nothing when compared to God’s infinity, but His grace in offering us His infinity means that our actual “value” is not what can save us–we just need to accept His gift. (Mathematical salvation… sorry for the digression.)
So, if God exists, He must be infinite. Honestly, a finite, limited god wouldn’t be worth following–if, as you put it, “… the only real difference between Humans and God, is that God is simply greater and more advanced than us.” Sorry, I don’t worship no finite god.
As to the “immovable object/irresistable force argument”, well, I disagree with Conway Redding on almost everything else, but when it comes to logic, he knows what he is talking about, and his answer to that one is quite sound. (Basically, he says that they are mutually exclusive–by definition, they can not both exist.)
It’s nice(?) to be able to “put God into a box” because then we have the comfort of “having” Him, but not the inconvenience of “having Him everywhere”. Sorry, but no respect for believing in a limited god. My God can save my soul and give me eternal life, and what’s even better, He can out-think me, so an eternity with Him won’t be boring (harp-playing stereotype, anyone?). I’m looking forward to an infinity of surprise and wonder, without any fear, because after my God’s “goodness” is everywhere, there will be no “evil” (absence of good) anywhere. I have no idea what He is going to do, but I can trust that it will be beyond limited, human imagining *because* my God is infinite, all-powerful, all-knowing.
Why would I want to exchange that for a non-omnipotent, boxable god? Why would anyone?
Here’s something that came up in a conversation that I’d like to share. “Eternity” we usually look at as a moving forward concept. How about moving backwards? Ready for this? What if we are the 1526th universe of creation? Our universe could be the 1,000,000,000,000,423rd too because eternity with no beginning goes back a long time. Anybody ever had that conversation come up? And here is something perhaps even more off-center: “Did Jesus have to redeem before?”
Comments, no matter the flavor are expected and welcome!
Eternity? – What will happen after the final judgement, when all the good people are in heaven, and all the bad guys and the devils are locked up for ever in Hell. Life from then on will start becoming really boring with no evil men, and no damsels in distress, and no villains to save them from. Or will God replay the same soap again with a few variations here and there?
Ok, so God can create an infinite universe, but He can’t keep us occupied? The more I read your comments, Tony, the more I worry about your view of God. Certainly, you don’t believe in the God of the Bible; HE is an infinitely creative God, Who will continue creating an ever-increasingly interesting universe for us to explore and play in. The fact that we can NOT guess what God will do is an indication that we will constantly be being surprised and amazed anew. Bored? Sorry, but no. Have you lost your wonder at God’s awesomeness? In the earlier comment you made, below this one, you seem to appreciate His greatness… do you not believe your claim that “All the scientists, and all the mathematicians and all the atheists and all the religious leaders and all the king’s men would never be able to figure out even an iota of the mysteries and magic that exists even in a grain of sand”?
We don’t need an adversary, villains and damsels in distress, to spend an eternity in wonder and joyous exploration of His creation.
Why can’t God get “bored”? If He can be angry, sad, or greived, why can’t he get bored? If God has made man in His likeness, and if Man can get bored, so can God. What God can he be if he is not allowed to get “bored”?
Moreover, in an earlier posting, I had asked why God made this Universe at all. I am sure it must be out of boredom. If everything today, is like yesterday is like tomorrow, how can God say He is a God of the “Living” ?
If something is alive, it should be change. There should be some purpose in its life, and some satisfaction at least to its maker when achieving it. God also must be looking forward to the day when “Man” is saved from the clutches of “satan”. God could of course switch off the whole thing and go to sleep, but he must be playing this game to kill “time” which must be God’s real enemy. God just want’s to kill “TIME”.
Satan and demons and Angel Michael and men must be chess pieces in a big chess board which is our universe. God needs both white and black pieces to play. Just imagine God playing chess with only white pieces, just because He is God, and omnipotent, and all powerful, and can burn and destroy all the black pieces!
For something to live, it must breathe, and eat.
there should be a constant cycle of want and fulfilment, of positiveness and negativeness. There should be a lack of oxygen followed by a inhalation followed by exhalation of carbon dioxide. There should be a hunger followed by eating followed by an urge to excrete waste. There should be an urge (thirst ) to drink fresh water followed by an urge to excrete waste water. If everything is at peace, and rest and there is no want and no hunger, and no thirsting for water, and no breathing, how will a living Stef be different than a piece of dead stone? All matter and space and energy are waves which are nothing but cycles of positive and negative forces, charges, rarefaction, and compression, of wants and excessiveness.
Though I cannot prove it, I believe the Universe also breathes. It must be having an expansion phase, in which it is now, when entropy may be increasing, and a contracting phase, when entropy will decrease with time. If Stef can have his pet theory of God and Universe, why should I be deprived of one?
Cute. A quotation from Robert Heinlein, if you will: “Men rarely (if ever) invent gods superior to themselves. Most gods have the morals and manners of a spoiled child.” Perhaps he’s not an authority on God, but he does bring up a valid point.
A limited, bored god is an invented one, and not one I’d serve because he’d have neither interest in saving me, nor even ability to do so. You warn me not to under-estimate God; you suggest the ability to get bored is a pre-requisite for His omnipotence. You miss the defining element of His nature: love. God’s love existed before *we* or even the angels existed, so who did he love?
Perfect love *includes* love for oneself. How could God be bored? He is, and always has been, and always will be, with the One He loves. How could He not be in love with Himself? He’s (literally) perfect. (Don’t go off on some homosexual auto-erotic tangent, here–His love is perfect, and as such, is perfectly right; if I “love” myself in some limited capacity, of course it will be a different situation!)
Why did He create? Why not? He wanted to share His greatness with somebody. Why else is the purpose of all creation to praise Him?
If God were limited, such self-involvement would be petty, selfish and probably cruel. Because He’s perfect… the single most wonderful thing He can give anybody is Himself.
You have yourself described the wonder and glory of God. Do you not believe it? Or, is the god you believe in limited and defined by what he created?
P.S. Genesis 2:2 “…; so on the seventh day He rested from all His work.” ON. Not SINCE. He’s said and done an aweful lot since then. Psalm 121:4 “indeed, He Who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.” If you’re going to read (mis-read, actually) one verse out of the whole Bible, and ignore the rest, then you can’t possibly hope to understand the Book, now can you?
*”How could He not be in love with Himself? He’s (literally) perfect. (Don’t go off on some homosexual auto-erotic tangent, here–His love is perfect, and as such, is perfectly right; if I “love” myself in some limited capacity, of course it will be a different situation!)
Why did He create? Why not? He wanted to share His greatness with somebody. Why else is the purpose of all creation to praise Him?”*.
In the above sentences quoted from your posting, You say in the same breath, First, that God was perfect and contented and at peace with himself, and then that He is craving for attention, and praise, and created some creatures for doung it -for boosting his ego?
The picture I have of God is different.
I said nothing about boosting His ego. Imagine you had the most wonderful, most awesome thing in the universe; being full of love, you want to share that thing with somebody. Incidentally, the “most wonderful, most awesome thing” happens to be you. Where’s the problem?
“The picture I have of God is different.” Yes, well, obviously. The picture you have of God is someone who created out of boredom–I really hope He doesn’t get bored again!–and created evil for, well, I’m still not clear on why *your* “God” created evil.
I’ll stick with “my” God, thanks. In my search for truth, I’m not seeing any better choices. ;p
In the postings so far, we can see that people are believing or not believing in God or his Powers- on the basis of what happened to them in their personal life. Since all people had different experiences in their lives, their views about God differ considerably from each other. So we are seeing in the postings, a pre-occupation with petty feuds, in which even their ability to spell “Titanic” correctly is used to justify their views, and put down others’. This is not very different from what happens in the real world, where people go to war with each other, kill, and shed each others blood, simply because they have different views about God. And afterwards, we have some people blaming GOD for all the violence and carnage and chaos.
To really analyse logically the various stands, we have to establish a standard set of postulates acceptable by all, before we can start arguing about the logic of statements derived out of them.
For that, whether we are Christian, Buddhists, Muslim or atheists, we should be able to answer at least the following questions, if we are to arrive at a reasonable logical conclusion.
I invite your answers and your explanations.
1. Was God a happy contented person, when He was alone, before he created angels, and the earth, and man? If He was, and if He had everything he wanted, why did He create something new?
Atheists can explain why the world is always changing, what it was in the beginning (before the Big Bang or what ever) , and what it is going to be in the future, and why it is not already in its final stable state if the beginning was so far ago?
2. If there was nothing else other than GOD himself in the beginning, did He give birth to His first creature out of Himself (like a mother gives birth to her child, or Did He create something new external to Himself? In other words, does God encompass His creatures, Is He omnipresent, or does he visit his creations only when He incarnates Himself into a being there?
Atheists can explain why we don’t see what we see in our world – cows and grass and butterflies etc.- in the other heavenly bodies. In a billion trillion years and in a billion trillion stars, if dust could evolve itself into monkeys and human beings, why did it happen only in this world? Why do we see only dust and gas in the millions of stars around us? How are they so very different from our sun? I would have agreed with your view even if I saw one pointed eared one eyed three-legged alien breathing ammonia drinking liquid sulphur, and crunching on plutonium crisps- just passing by.
3. If God was something and everything before He created, where was nothing and emptiness- was it within Him or outside Him?
Atheists can tell us what they believe exists outside the all encompassing universe we are in now.
I can go on asking a lot more questions, but we can start with these three for the time being.
If we cannot answer them using evidence, or logic available to us, there is no point in writing postings after postings on more complex truths.
This is where faith comes in. If we know something, or can deduce it, then we don’t have to believe in it, because we already know it. We have to believe only things that we cannot verify using available means, and for which we have no explanation for.
Actually everything is a miracle, because we do not have an explanation for anything. Just because we see the sun rising everyday in the morning, we consider it as a common thing, and not a miracle. For a person seeing sunrise for the first time, it must be such a glorious miracle. Just because we can predict what time the sun will rise tomorrow, we think we know everything about the sun. We know even less about the fishes in our seas, and the animals in our forests. Everything we see around us – the birth of a baby, a blooming flower, is magic, or magik, depending on what you believe.
All the scientists, and all the mathematicians and all the atheists and all the religious leaders and all the king’s men would never be able to figure out even an iota of the mysteries and magic that exists even in a grain of sand. Because the One who has designed all this is a Super artist- who wants to entertain you and wants you to open your mouth in awe of the Splendour of His creation which is something more spell- binding, and more magical and more mystery filled than any performance by a David Copperfield or Chris Angel. But instead of enjoying the show, we chose to fight over it, and kill each other because of it, and again blame GOD who has provided everything for your happiness and enjoyment.
This is like the caveman who when given a lift in a Cadillac, instead of enjoying the free ride, wanted to kill the driver, and become the owner of the car, even though he didn’t know how to drive, or maintain the car.
Tony, while I disagree with your earlier suggestion that Satan is “God’s workman”, this comment above is one fine answer. Thank you, and God bless.
Tony, while I disagree with your earlier suggestion that Satan is “God’s workman”
Dear Stef,
I do not for sure know whether Satan is God’s workman.
But I have seen that in this world, most of the evil persons would any day sacrifice principles and truth to gain more money, gold, buildings, hotels, theatres, factories, and other earthly assets, to which they are more attached -(more or less like Judas). In spite of their earthly riches, I have found that they are the ones who rarely sleep peacefully, or enjoy a vacation.They usually are worried all the time about their assets, and work day and night to safeguard t