It's not that God is waiting to throw people into Hell. It's that his character as described in the Bible, by most interpretations of the Bible, created humans with "original sin" so that hell would be the default destination. Why would a good god create a fallen world?
Even at the Universalist church I've attended a few times with Melinda, they talked about the idea that everyone receives salvation. That bothered me. Why did a good god create damnation to save us from?
"Its just a doctrine that some denominations promote but in reality has no scriptural support at all, very easy to disprove." The kind of thing that every denomination and every interpretation of the Bible claims about every other competing denomination and interpretation.
It's good to hear that you don't believe all your fellow humans deserve eternal suffering. It's hard to understand why people would go to such efforts to defend a Lord of Damnation though.
It doesn't say in the Bible, "Hi, I'm the Lord of Damnation." That's an appropriate label to put on the Christian god after reading the stories of the Bible.
If God existed according to the stories in the Bible, if people experience eternal suffering (a.k.a. damnation), even if it's not burning but being somewhere apart from God, then damnation is a condition designed by God as part of his plan.
If damnation and suffering and sin exist, the Creator of everything must have created them.
Let's try this again....google the following with the quotes and see the real history behind it:
"hell was created for the devil and his angels"
Everyone chooses their paths, if you follow satan, intentionally or unintentionally...you'll end up where he is....if you follow God and His ways, then you'll end up where He is.
If there is a place in the universe where light does not exist, and if an omniscient, omnipotent god created everything in the universe, then it was his intent and part of his omniscient plan to create a place where light does not exist, also known as "darkness."
If there is a place where goodness is absent, where the experience of being apart from God is eternal suffering as if you were forever in a lake of fire (i.e. damnation), then this condition was intended, planned, created by God.
You keep repeating this yet have offered no proof to back up your claim at all.
Darkness is merely the absence of light just as evil is the absence of good....and once again this exists because God in His mercy and fairness did not want robots or puppets but rather people who were able to make free will choices and decisions.
No proof is necessary when point B follows obviously from point A. How could you possibly say that an omniscient, omnipotent being creates a universe without it turning out in the way he intends? If God intended things to turn out differently, he obviously could have caused them to turn out differently. Maybe he doesn't *hope* for lots of people to sin and end up damned, but it's obviously within his plan, or else he would have done things differently, since he'd know how it turns out.
"God did not want robots or puppets". I think he did. From what Christians say, our lives on Earth are like a way for sinners (people who choose to sin with their free will) to be weeded out from good people who will avoid sinning, or who will jump through the right hoops to enter Heaven. Then when the good people are in Heaven, none of them will ever choose to sin again. Like I said in the video, that state of being sounds like robots or puppets.
... So if it's okay for humans to live in Heaven as if they're robots, never choosing to sin again, then it's like they have free will and choose never to use it the wrong way. In that case, why couldn't God have created all humans like that in the first place, given them free will yet create them so they never make the wrong choice?
It sounds like a myth designed by people who didn't really think it through all the way. The same people who didn't think what it would mean to be omniscient.
One more thing, God created the world perfect, not fallen, but then gave dominion over it to Adam and Eve who blew it.
....and about the 'everyone receives salvation' thing....no, that is not found anywhere in the Bible, just another false doctrine of men....we are repeatedly told to choose between life or death....its not automatic. ;)
"One more thing, God created the world perfect, not fallen, but then gave dominion over it to Adam and Eve who blew it."
So he created the world "perfect" and then took steps to ensure that it would fall, or at least it would be "blown", when he gave dominion to fallible humans. (If God were omniscient, then he must have known how it would turn out.) And still you assign blame to Adam and Eve, as if God did not intend for them to blow it, as if it was somehow not part of an omniscient plan.
Show me biblically where God 'intended' Adam and Eve to fail. You can't, its not there.
Yes, He's omniscient, He knew what would happen when He gave them free will, yet, in His mercy he created a plan of salvation to redeem fallen man, His beloved kids.
Does the Bible say that God is omniscient and omnipotent? Does it say that Adam and Eve fell or failed or in the terms you used "blew it"? How could you say the results are not ones that God intended if he set Adam & Eve in motion, knowing what they would do? Either it is part of his plan and his intent, or else he didn't know it would happen, which would mean he wasn't omniscient.
Do a study on free will and what it means exactly. If someone subscribes to your theory, that God 'intended' them to fail, then its all a big cosmic game with God being the puppet master and pulling all the strings.
You won't find that in the bible either. His plan was to give His kids free will and to be willing to help if they 'failed' in some of their choices. Of course some folk don't want His help but that's not His fault either.
I have read plenty about the topic of free will. Please don't assume that my disagreeing with you indicates I haven't "studied" enough.
If someone subscribes to my theory, then the Christian myths are about a jealous, petty deity that intends people to fail as part of his plan. But they wouldn't worry about their lives actually being a cosmic game or joke, because they'd understand the Bible is myth.
I don't know who you studied with then, only calvinists and those like-minded adhere to the 'God makes everything happen' theory.....which a study of the bible quickly dismisses. God gave MAN dominion over the earth and took His hands off of it. He only intervenes now if asked to.
BTW, I thought this discussion was based on: 'if the bible is true, why did (fill in the blank). Why are you suddenly switching to 'the bible is just a myth so I'm dismissing it' now?
You don't know who I studied with, but you assume that I must have studied *with* someone? Sounds like some humans have convinced you to trust their judgment and interpretation of the Bible, not to think about it for yourself.
"God gave man dominion over the earth and took his hands off of it."
Interesting, except we're talking about an omniscient, omnipotent creator. God created all men knowing what they would do, what the results would be. Creation was an "intervention" that unfolds forever.
I don't quite understand how an omniscient, omnipotent being could create everything that has ever existed, and not be a "puppet master pulling all the strings." Omniscience would mean he knows everything that ever will happen. If he didn't want it to happen, he could have and would have created things differently.
"some folk don't want His help but that's not His fault either." Since God created humans knowing how they would behave, yes, he is responsible for the way everything turns out.
""God created humans knowing how they would behave""
He created Adam and Eve and gave them the power to procreate....each person can choose to have children or not, God will not stop a Hitler from being born. God is not responsible for every individual's personal choices.
If everyone was the same, if they all 'behaved the same way' as your post implies, then EVERYONE would either choose good or EVERYONE would choose evil....but that ain't happening, everyone is different.
"God will not stop a Hitler from being born. God is not responsible for every individual's personal choices."
Given that an omniscient, omnipotent creator could have designed humanity in a way that avoided people making bad personal choices, then he is ultimately responsible for every individual's personal choices.
I didn't say everyone behaves the same way. I said an omniscient god would have known before the different ways that each individual would behave, before he created the first one.
Universal salvation is a wide interpretation of the Bible, where you leave out or take as metaphor all the parts where the good god commits genocide, and you assume that he really is a good god somehow. I agree, it requires ignoring large sections of the Bible, or taking them as poetic metaphor.
Realistically, the Bible ought to be interpreted literally so there's no room for misunderstanding it, or it ought to be understood as fiction....
Alrighty, you have lots of questions and I have lots of answers if you really want to know! :D
About the 'genocide' thing....I assume that you're talking about the Amalekites? God was just protecting His children that He had a covenant with...the Amalekites had for many years been slaughtering them and it came to the point where enough was enough.
For the whole story google this with the quotes in place:
"shouldn't the butchering of the Amalekite children be considered war crimes?"
Amalekites in Samuel is the clearest genocide, but we could also count The Flood wiping out all humans but Noah's family. There are other examples.
"God was just protecting His children that He had a covenant with...the Amalekites had for many years been slaughtering them and it came to the point where enough was enough." = same kind of thing that apologists say for every genocidal ruler and war criminal.
Clearest genocide? Seriously, please google that link, you don't know the history behind that at all....the Amalekites were the aggressors and were constantly trying to destroy the Jewish race.....they were continually warned but continued on with 'their genocide' program until God stepped in.
As to Noah and the flood, the people were warned for 100 years that this was coming yet 'choose' to continue to ignore it, they could have come onto the ark too.
Yeah, I bet those Amalekite camels and sheep, donkeys and oxen, old and young, suckling and infants and all the women and men of Amalek were "aggressors."
See, with a realistic view of fellow humans, we can appreciate that there are some people in every nation who are peaceful and friendly and innocent, even between two nations at war. But in an ancient fairy tale such as the Bible, people are all stereotypes, where every last person in a tribe or nation can be "evil."
Let's put this on more of a personal level, what would you do if someone was continually and mercilessly attacking your loved ones? They've been warned and warned yet the attacks only escalate.
Keep in mind also that there no prisons or welfare systems in place at the time....where do you put them all? Who will care for them? Who will feed the thousands of them?
Given that hypothetical situation, if I were a good god, assuming I wasn't guilty of creating this aggressor, then I would stop him from attacking. I would turn him into a good person. I wouldn't need to make him suffer eternally or even kill him or remove him. But if I were a benevolent creator, my creatures wouldn't behave that way in the first place.
I wouldn't be a good god if I killed him, banished him, damned him, or ordered genocide on his whole nation.
I don't see why free will is so important or necessary, if we're talking about a creator who is good. To allow free will is to allow some evil, which is at best indirectly *creating* evil, especially if we're talking about an omnipotent, omniscient creator.
If I were capable of creating a good universe, or changing it to good, why should I be more worried about "violating" someone's free will than allowing evil to happen (allowing him to choose and carry out evil)?
I suppose if you accept that every man and woman and tiny child on Earth for 100 years before the Flood had been directly or adequately warned by God that they were going to be punished for their sins, then it can seem like their fault for misbehaving, instead of the Creator who made them, knowing exactly how they would behave. This character punishes people for behaving how he made them to behave. It's not bad enough that you believe the god character exists, but you also think he's good?
Show me exactly where that can be found in the Bible. He made us with free will, He repeatedly tells us to choose.
Even the angels have free will, and even satan KNEW there was a God....no ignorance of God there....yet he 'chose' to rebel and do evil, as did a third of the rest of the angels.
Actually I'm not sure if the Bible says that God is omniscient or omnipotent. But if you believe he is, then it follows that he'd know the results of anything he created, including humans with free will. Our ability to choose for ourselves wouldn't make it somehow a mystery. That's what omniscient means, all-knowing, all-powerful.
Is it an all-knowing god, or is it a god who created us without knowing exactly what we would do and how creation turns out? It can't be both.
Let me try to make an analogy for this problem of our free will versus an omniscient creator.
Let's say I build a dozen toy robots that walk in random directions when I wind them up and turn them loose. One of them walks into the street and punctures a car tire. The car owner demands I pay for his tire, but I say it's not my fault, I made the walking pattern random so I wouldn't know for sure where it would go. Blame the toy.
See, as the creator, I still knew the potential for each of them...
... But even that randomized toy analogy doesn't work very well, because free will is not a randomizer. It doesn't block an omniscient being from knowing what each creature is going to do. It might give humans their own choice. But if God creates a human with free will, knowing that it will do something bad, then that bad action was known and caused by God. (At best, you could say indirectly caused, but still.) The little sinner was just an "agent" who carried out God's plan.
""God creates a human with free will, knowing that it will do something bad, then that bad action was known and caused by God""
Several of your new posts keep revolving around this point so I won't address them all but rather consolidate them in my reply here.
If you really think this through you will realize that omniscience and pre-ordination are two totally different animals. Knowing something will happen and causing something to happen are two totally different actions....
The point is that allowing something bad to happen when you could stop it makes a limited human being responsible for it. In the case of an unlimited being who creates the whole universe, he would be responsible for everything that ever happens in it. Anything bad that ever happened would be within his knowledge and within his ability to control it. Therefore he caused it by creating all the situations leading up to it.
You place such little value on free will and you seem to have a problem grasping the fact that God gave certain authorities and certain dominion to mankind.
You want Him to pull all the strings and make all the decisions.....would you do that with your own children? That's more how someone would treat a pet, not a child.
Once again, disagreeing with you should not be seen as "failing to grasp" or needing to study more.
I place such a high value on morality that I don't understand why "free will" would be a higher priority. Your insults don't serve to explain why it's more important for God to give us free will than to eliminate the possibility of evil.
I don't *want* humans to lack free will. I like having it (although it could be an illusion, and how could I tell?). That doesn't mean it was right or good.
....an example.....say someone knows what will happen in the future, whether it be a prophet of God or a secular fortune teller.
By your yardstick, the fortune teller (because they KNEW what will happen) is totally responsible for orchestrating the events that they predicted.
Does that make sense to you? Of course not....yet you're trying to use the same illogic in reference to God knowing things and that because He knows He must surely have orchestrated it too.
A fortune teller who knew something bad was going to happen and was capable of stopping it would bear moral responsibility for allowing the events to happen, like an accomplice to the act. The Christian God not only has the knowledge and ability to prevent bad things from happening, but he created everything. Therefore anything that ever happens is something he's responsible for. The holocaust would not have happened if God had not created humans who would carry it out.
God cannot lie nor violate His own Word. He gave man dominion and authority over certain things on the earth, we, not God are now responsible for many things going on in our own lives, He's not the big Nanny in the sky.
Why do bad things happen to good people? Because of free will choices that others make and good people not knowing or not caring to live in victory by doing things God's way.
If God could not lie nor violate His own word, it would be wrong to describe him as "omnipotent." Perhaps you mean that God is unwilling to lie or violate his word.
Why did the tsunami wipe out Nx100,000 people a few yrs back? "Because of free will choices that others make..." That's a silly, non-falsifiable superstitious claim.
Even if we do have free will, that doesn't get an omniscient, omnipotent creator off the hook for knowingly setting loose humans with free will to do evil.
It's interesting that you bring up "a third of the angels" following Satan. In "Reason-Driven Life", Robert Price points out how a lot of the Christian traditions about Satan are based on apocrypha or wild interpretations.
Where does it say in the Bible that Satan convinced a third of the angels to rebel? Rev 12:4 where a dragon "swept a third of the stars from the sky"? That's a really stretched interpretation of that line. I suppose there are some experts who assure you that's what it means.
Yes, that is one of the proof references but a 'third' is irrelevant to this discussion, all you need is one fallen angel to prove that they had free will.
2 Pet. 2:4 however back up that there was more than just one.
Lol, a tale about a dragon's tail knocking stars from the sky is a "proof reference" that Satan convinced one third of angels to rebel!
2 Peter 2:4 says there were multiple angels who sinned, not one-third. If that bit from Revelation is the kind of thing you take as "proof" of your prefered interpretation of the Bible, we don't have much common ground for agreeing on what the truth is, morally or physically or any other truth.
You're right, I didn't really address your point about "Even the angels have free will, and even satan KNEW there was a God....no ignorance of God there....yet he 'chose' to rebel and do evil, as did a third of the rest of the angels."
Given that the traditions in or out of the Bible have Satan and the angels created by God, it still makes me wonder why a good god would create any beings *capable* of choosing to do evil, knowing that some of them would choose evil.
...Interpreting it literally requires believing the earth is flat and only about 6000 years old, the sun revolves around the earth, and other biblical claims that are demonstrably false.
Interpreting it symbolically or metaphorically leaves so much room for error that it's practically useless. It allows anyone to pick parts they like and ignore or downplay parts they don't like. Unless some humans have more authority than others, whose poetic interpretation do we believe?
I don't where you're getting a lot of your 'literal interpretations' from....I do take the Word literal and I see from it that the earth is round....again, google the following with the quotes and see what it really says about that:
"Did Bible writers believe the earth was flat?"
Same with age of the earth, its VERY old, probably billions of years old:
God is saying, come, I'll show you the way out of the eternal suffering that I created for you by default. That doesn't sound much better than "waiting to throw everyone into Hell." (Default means he doesn't have to wait. He can *set it and forget it* like a Ronco rotisserie oven.)
Here's a map of your street to avoid the landmines I planted there. Am I an evil person for burying landmines on your street, or a benevolent guy for sharing the safe-route map with you?
Another false premise, God did not create suffering or evil. Evil is merely the absence of good in the same way that darkness is just the absence of light.
It's not a "false premise" just because you can describe the same condition in different words. If God created a place and condition for humans to exist in that has an "absence of goodness" in it, and we experience that as eternal suffering, what's the difference? How is he not responsible for designing the experience?
quick question have you read arepagitica by john milton? (he wrote gulliver's travels)
im not sure if they will answer your questions, but there are actually a lot of what i believe to be rational explanations to your arguements, from a philisophical and theological perspective. sadly, i dont want to be a hypocrite, but i dont want to debate them over the internet, because
1. it would be looongggg
2. im not a very good person at explaining things, so i probably wont do my beliefs justice.
I went to a catholic school all my life and was raised RC. Although i was told, some times felt bulled into believe in God , the things tart to me, ie, be good unto others and so on. I still today wonder who or what God is. Now an adult I feel the higher power, be it just a fully cloud in the sky , it warms my heart because I need to believe I will see my family again so I do my best to be a good person in order to do so.
If there is a god who ordered and carried out genocide and infanticide multiple times as described in the Bible, and you believe he exists anddo everything he commands, then you are "okay" in the sense that good Germans were okay when they didn't object to Nazi rule.
If there isn't a god and you believe, then your fear of his damnation and guilt over "original sin" that you had nothing to do with, is not "okay" either. Then it's unnecessary harm to yourself and others, based on superstition.
Truth isn't a popularity contest. Are we talking about whether or not it's true, or whether it's fun or useful to believe in a god? Because if our priority is beliefs that are fun or useful, then we could believe all kinds of wacky untrue things. Maybe it would make me feel really good if all my relatives who have died are really alive, hiding somewhere, and there's some good reason why they can't tell me.
I don't Read the Bible alot, I don't go to Church.
But I have seen Evil and I have felt the presence of God, Holy spirt, Jesus, Allah whatever People call it. There is something more intelligent then you me and everyone else. We are like children walking into a library unable to read all the books but we know that someone wrote the books but we can't explain whats in them. That is how our existence is i feel.
"the presence of God, Holy spirt, Jesus, Allah whatever People call it" doesn't sound like something that most Christians would say. You sound like a fairly liberal Christian (or a theist but not necessarily Christian), so you might not have all of the nasty brimstone and damnation baggage that most Christians mix in with their understanding of life and God and afterlife. Good on ya!
Also, if you notice, I wasn't putting forward a lot of arguments in this video that the Christian god is unlikely to be real. What I was mainly talking about is, even if the Bible were true, is the Christian god a good god? And is it moral for people to tell me I deserve eternal suffering just because we disagree on how the world works? Not because I harmed anybody.
My arguments are still valid even if some intelligent designer did create trees & stars & leukemia & oceans.
You're right that it is a matter of faith. I just wish more people could be convinced that faith is not a virtue, and it is not helpful as a tool to lead people to truth. If it were a reliable tool, then why would so many people "of faith" disagree with each other about right and wrong and God and Allah and Jesus? If it reliably led people to truth, wouldn't all or most people of faith agree and reach the same truth?
Sorry, I know this will go on and on like politics. It's important.
When I see Nature, The woods the ocean the night sky I don't think WOW what neat random event! I think this has all been created if not then why don't dolphins grow mustaches and murder the sharks? (That's a joke about the Original sin thing.)
One of the problems with Pascal's wager is that it's another way of emphasizing the threats of Christianity, as if morality doesn't enter into it at all.
If an evil creator had made all of us and threatened punishment for everyone who didn't believe in him, then the same Pascal's wager would apply. It wouldn't matter whether the god was good or evil, just that we fear his threats in case he's real.
Does a good god need affirmation by humans so desperately that he has to threaten us?
I am an "athiest", but that's because I find the notion of a "God" plain ridiculous -I don't live and breathe "atheism" like a kind of reverse religion, I just exist -and the main thing that shits me about Christians etc is that they demand that I live according to the society that they've created as "Christians" -so all their morality, their views on Gays/euthanasia/nudity etc etc -restrict me -when I think the religion that produced it all is bogus..
I think that certain behaviors lead to a miserable existence in the eternity that we experience in this life. One version might be Dante's Inferno with levels of suffering for various indulgences or behaviours. Encouraging people to avoid misery could be noble but threats are not a decent conversion tactic. I also don't think that togetherforpeace uses it in order to convert people or threaten them.
some good points
ModernDeism 1 year ago
Acts 8:22 Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray God if perhaps the thought of your heart may be forgiven you.
Act 8:23 For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity."
Psalms118 1 year ago
Proverb 16:4 The LORD has made all for Himself, Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.
16:5 Everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD; Though they join forces, none will go unpunished.
16:6 In mercy and truth Atonement is provided for iniquity; And by the fear of the LORD one departs from evil.
Psalms118 1 year ago
This has provoked alot of thoughts, I'll write em down and post them to you sometime.
Emm0r 2 years ago
Its all acording to which religion you are listening to. Man is only as smart as his understanding allows him to be.
We live in our little world, where everything has an end. But, when we leave this system, things are totally different.
most " so called " Christians, Need to have a change of heart, dump their religions, and follow the true Jesus.
There is a hell, and its there for haters, Of God, or man! Like your talent by the way. peace
voiceof1cryin 2 years ago
Just get your accordion out, and jam...
lunnyyy 2 years ago
You're going off of the wrong premise, read The Book again ;)
God isn't waiting to throw someone into hell, hell is the default destination of this fallen world.
But rather He is the one saying.....come, I'll show you, this is the way out.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
It's not that God is waiting to throw people into Hell. It's that his character as described in the Bible, by most interpretations of the Bible, created humans with "original sin" so that hell would be the default destination. Why would a good god create a fallen world?
Even at the Universalist church I've attended a few times with Melinda, they talked about the idea that everyone receives salvation. That bothered me. Why did a good god create damnation to save us from?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
No, we were not created with 'original sin'....if that were true it would mean that all babies who died would go to hell.
Its just a doctrine that some denominations promote but in reality has no scriptural support at all, very easy to disprove.
Paul even states that there's an age of accountability in effect with this verse:
Romans 7:9
For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.
He was alive until HE willfully sinned.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
"Its just a doctrine that some denominations promote but in reality has no scriptural support at all, very easy to disprove." The kind of thing that every denomination and every interpretation of the Bible claims about every other competing denomination and interpretation.
It's good to hear that you don't believe all your fellow humans deserve eternal suffering. It's hard to understand why people would go to such efforts to defend a Lord of Damnation though.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Lord of damnation??? I have no idea where you're getting that from, He's a God of mercy and grace.
Again, show me scripturally where your views can be biblically supported.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
It doesn't say in the Bible, "Hi, I'm the Lord of Damnation." That's an appropriate label to put on the Christian god after reading the stories of the Bible.
If God existed according to the stories in the Bible, if people experience eternal suffering (a.k.a. damnation), even if it's not burning but being somewhere apart from God, then damnation is a condition designed by God as part of his plan.
If damnation and suffering and sin exist, the Creator of everything must have created them.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Why was hell created? Do you know?
Let's try this again....google the following with the quotes and see the real history behind it:
"hell was created for the devil and his angels"
Everyone chooses their paths, if you follow satan, intentionally or unintentionally...you'll end up where he is....if you follow God and His ways, then you'll end up where He is.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
""If damnation and suffering and sin exist, the Creator of everything must have created them""
No, evil is the absence of good....its not a 'created' thing.
I don't have enough room for a proper breakdown for you.....soooooo......google time:
"The Professor Teaches About Evil and Christianity"
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
If there is a place in the universe where light does not exist, and if an omniscient, omnipotent god created everything in the universe, then it was his intent and part of his omniscient plan to create a place where light does not exist, also known as "darkness."
If there is a place where goodness is absent, where the experience of being apart from God is eternal suffering as if you were forever in a lake of fire (i.e. damnation), then this condition was intended, planned, created by God.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""then it was his intent""
You keep repeating this yet have offered no proof to back up your claim at all.
Darkness is merely the absence of light just as evil is the absence of good....and once again this exists because God in His mercy and fairness did not want robots or puppets but rather people who were able to make free will choices and decisions.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
No proof is necessary when point B follows obviously from point A. How could you possibly say that an omniscient, omnipotent being creates a universe without it turning out in the way he intends? If God intended things to turn out differently, he obviously could have caused them to turn out differently. Maybe he doesn't *hope* for lots of people to sin and end up damned, but it's obviously within his plan, or else he would have done things differently, since he'd know how it turns out.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
"God did not want robots or puppets". I think he did. From what Christians say, our lives on Earth are like a way for sinners (people who choose to sin with their free will) to be weeded out from good people who will avoid sinning, or who will jump through the right hoops to enter Heaven. Then when the good people are in Heaven, none of them will ever choose to sin again. Like I said in the video, that state of being sounds like robots or puppets.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
... So if it's okay for humans to live in Heaven as if they're robots, never choosing to sin again, then it's like they have free will and choose never to use it the wrong way. In that case, why couldn't God have created all humans like that in the first place, given them free will yet create them so they never make the wrong choice?
It sounds like a myth designed by people who didn't really think it through all the way. The same people who didn't think what it would mean to be omniscient.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
One more thing, God created the world perfect, not fallen, but then gave dominion over it to Adam and Eve who blew it.
....and about the 'everyone receives salvation' thing....no, that is not found anywhere in the Bible, just another false doctrine of men....we are repeatedly told to choose between life or death....its not automatic. ;)
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
"One more thing, God created the world perfect, not fallen, but then gave dominion over it to Adam and Eve who blew it."
So he created the world "perfect" and then took steps to ensure that it would fall, or at least it would be "blown", when he gave dominion to fallible humans. (If God were omniscient, then he must have known how it would turn out.) And still you assign blame to Adam and Eve, as if God did not intend for them to blow it, as if it was somehow not part of an omniscient plan.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Show me biblically where God 'intended' Adam and Eve to fail. You can't, its not there.
Yes, He's omniscient, He knew what would happen when He gave them free will, yet, in His mercy he created a plan of salvation to redeem fallen man, His beloved kids.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Does the Bible say that God is omniscient and omnipotent? Does it say that Adam and Eve fell or failed or in the terms you used "blew it"? How could you say the results are not ones that God intended if he set Adam & Eve in motion, knowing what they would do? Either it is part of his plan and his intent, or else he didn't know it would happen, which would mean he wasn't omniscient.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Do a study on free will and what it means exactly. If someone subscribes to your theory, that God 'intended' them to fail, then its all a big cosmic game with God being the puppet master and pulling all the strings.
You won't find that in the bible either. His plan was to give His kids free will and to be willing to help if they 'failed' in some of their choices. Of course some folk don't want His help but that's not His fault either.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
I have read plenty about the topic of free will. Please don't assume that my disagreeing with you indicates I haven't "studied" enough.
If someone subscribes to my theory, then the Christian myths are about a jealous, petty deity that intends people to fail as part of his plan. But they wouldn't worry about their lives actually being a cosmic game or joke, because they'd understand the Bible is myth.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I don't know who you studied with then, only calvinists and those like-minded adhere to the 'God makes everything happen' theory.....which a study of the bible quickly dismisses. God gave MAN dominion over the earth and took His hands off of it. He only intervenes now if asked to.
BTW, I thought this discussion was based on: 'if the bible is true, why did (fill in the blank). Why are you suddenly switching to 'the bible is just a myth so I'm dismissing it' now?
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
You don't know who I studied with, but you assume that I must have studied *with* someone? Sounds like some humans have convinced you to trust their judgment and interpretation of the Bible, not to think about it for yourself.
"God gave man dominion over the earth and took his hands off of it."
Interesting, except we're talking about an omniscient, omnipotent creator. God created all men knowing what they would do, what the results would be. Creation was an "intervention" that unfolds forever.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I don't quite understand how an omniscient, omnipotent being could create everything that has ever existed, and not be a "puppet master pulling all the strings." Omniscience would mean he knows everything that ever will happen. If he didn't want it to happen, he could have and would have created things differently.
"some folk don't want His help but that's not His fault either." Since God created humans knowing how they would behave, yes, he is responsible for the way everything turns out.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""God created humans knowing how they would behave""
He created Adam and Eve and gave them the power to procreate....each person can choose to have children or not, God will not stop a Hitler from being born. God is not responsible for every individual's personal choices.
If everyone was the same, if they all 'behaved the same way' as your post implies, then EVERYONE would either choose good or EVERYONE would choose evil....but that ain't happening, everyone is different.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
"God will not stop a Hitler from being born. God is not responsible for every individual's personal choices."
Given that an omniscient, omnipotent creator could have designed humanity in a way that avoided people making bad personal choices, then he is ultimately responsible for every individual's personal choices.
I didn't say everyone behaves the same way. I said an omniscient god would have known before the different ways that each individual would behave, before he created the first one.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Universal salvation is a wide interpretation of the Bible, where you leave out or take as metaphor all the parts where the good god commits genocide, and you assume that he really is a good god somehow. I agree, it requires ignoring large sections of the Bible, or taking them as poetic metaphor.
Realistically, the Bible ought to be interpreted literally so there's no room for misunderstanding it, or it ought to be understood as fiction....
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Alrighty, you have lots of questions and I have lots of answers if you really want to know! :D
About the 'genocide' thing....I assume that you're talking about the Amalekites? God was just protecting His children that He had a covenant with...the Amalekites had for many years been slaughtering them and it came to the point where enough was enough.
For the whole story google this with the quotes in place:
"shouldn't the butchering of the Amalekite children be considered war crimes?"
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Amalekites in Samuel is the clearest genocide, but we could also count The Flood wiping out all humans but Noah's family. There are other examples.
"God was just protecting His children that He had a covenant with...the Amalekites had for many years been slaughtering them and it came to the point where enough was enough." = same kind of thing that apologists say for every genocidal ruler and war criminal.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Clearest genocide? Seriously, please google that link, you don't know the history behind that at all....the Amalekites were the aggressors and were constantly trying to destroy the Jewish race.....they were continually warned but continued on with 'their genocide' program until God stepped in.
As to Noah and the flood, the people were warned for 100 years that this was coming yet 'choose' to continue to ignore it, they could have come onto the ark too.
Moral? Don't miss the boat ;)
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Yeah, I bet those Amalekite camels and sheep, donkeys and oxen, old and young, suckling and infants and all the women and men of Amalek were "aggressors."
See, with a realistic view of fellow humans, we can appreciate that there are some people in every nation who are peaceful and friendly and innocent, even between two nations at war. But in an ancient fairy tale such as the Bible, people are all stereotypes, where every last person in a tribe or nation can be "evil."
deidzoeb 2 years ago
You never read the link, did ya? ;)
Let's put this on more of a personal level, what would you do if someone was continually and mercilessly attacking your loved ones? They've been warned and warned yet the attacks only escalate.
Keep in mind also that there no prisons or welfare systems in place at the time....where do you put them all? Who will care for them? Who will feed the thousands of them?
I'd really like to hear your answer on this.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
No, I haven't read the links.
Given that hypothetical situation, if I were a good god, assuming I wasn't guilty of creating this aggressor, then I would stop him from attacking. I would turn him into a good person. I wouldn't need to make him suffer eternally or even kill him or remove him. But if I were a benevolent creator, my creatures wouldn't behave that way in the first place.
I wouldn't be a good god if I killed him, banished him, damned him, or ordered genocide on his whole nation.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""I would turn him into a good person""
Then you would be violating his free will by turning him into something that he doesn't want to be.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
I don't see why free will is so important or necessary, if we're talking about a creator who is good. To allow free will is to allow some evil, which is at best indirectly *creating* evil, especially if we're talking about an omnipotent, omniscient creator.
If I were capable of creating a good universe, or changing it to good, why should I be more worried about "violating" someone's free will than allowing evil to happen (allowing him to choose and carry out evil)?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""I don't see why free will is so important or necessary""
Then its a good thing that you're not God ;)
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
I suppose if you accept that every man and woman and tiny child on Earth for 100 years before the Flood had been directly or adequately warned by God that they were going to be punished for their sins, then it can seem like their fault for misbehaving, instead of the Creator who made them, knowing exactly how they would behave. This character punishes people for behaving how he made them to behave. It's not bad enough that you believe the god character exists, but you also think he's good?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""for behaving how he made them to behave""
Show me exactly where that can be found in the Bible. He made us with free will, He repeatedly tells us to choose.
Even the angels have free will, and even satan KNEW there was a God....no ignorance of God there....yet he 'chose' to rebel and do evil, as did a third of the rest of the angels.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Actually I'm not sure if the Bible says that God is omniscient or omnipotent. But if you believe he is, then it follows that he'd know the results of anything he created, including humans with free will. Our ability to choose for ourselves wouldn't make it somehow a mystery. That's what omniscient means, all-knowing, all-powerful.
Is it an all-knowing god, or is it a god who created us without knowing exactly what we would do and how creation turns out? It can't be both.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Let me try to make an analogy for this problem of our free will versus an omniscient creator.
Let's say I build a dozen toy robots that walk in random directions when I wind them up and turn them loose. One of them walks into the street and punctures a car tire. The car owner demands I pay for his tire, but I say it's not my fault, I made the walking pattern random so I wouldn't know for sure where it would go. Blame the toy.
See, as the creator, I still knew the potential for each of them...
deidzoeb 2 years ago
... But even that randomized toy analogy doesn't work very well, because free will is not a randomizer. It doesn't block an omniscient being from knowing what each creature is going to do. It might give humans their own choice. But if God creates a human with free will, knowing that it will do something bad, then that bad action was known and caused by God. (At best, you could say indirectly caused, but still.) The little sinner was just an "agent" who carried out God's plan.
God created sin.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
""God creates a human with free will, knowing that it will do something bad, then that bad action was known and caused by God""
Several of your new posts keep revolving around this point so I won't address them all but rather consolidate them in my reply here.
If you really think this through you will realize that omniscience and pre-ordination are two totally different animals. Knowing something will happen and causing something to happen are two totally different actions....
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
The point is that allowing something bad to happen when you could stop it makes a limited human being responsible for it. In the case of an unlimited being who creates the whole universe, he would be responsible for everything that ever happens in it. Anything bad that ever happened would be within his knowledge and within his ability to control it. Therefore he caused it by creating all the situations leading up to it.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
You place such little value on free will and you seem to have a problem grasping the fact that God gave certain authorities and certain dominion to mankind.
You want Him to pull all the strings and make all the decisions.....would you do that with your own children? That's more how someone would treat a pet, not a child.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Once again, disagreeing with you should not be seen as "failing to grasp" or needing to study more.
I place such a high value on morality that I don't understand why "free will" would be a higher priority. Your insults don't serve to explain why it's more important for God to give us free will than to eliminate the possibility of evil.
I don't *want* humans to lack free will. I like having it (although it could be an illusion, and how could I tell?). That doesn't mean it was right or good.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
....an example.....say someone knows what will happen in the future, whether it be a prophet of God or a secular fortune teller.
By your yardstick, the fortune teller (because they KNEW what will happen) is totally responsible for orchestrating the events that they predicted.
Does that make sense to you? Of course not....yet you're trying to use the same illogic in reference to God knowing things and that because He knows He must surely have orchestrated it too.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
A fortune teller who knew something bad was going to happen and was capable of stopping it would bear moral responsibility for allowing the events to happen, like an accomplice to the act. The Christian God not only has the knowledge and ability to prevent bad things from happening, but he created everything. Therefore anything that ever happens is something he's responsible for. The holocaust would not have happened if God had not created humans who would carry it out.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
God cannot lie nor violate His own Word. He gave man dominion and authority over certain things on the earth, we, not God are now responsible for many things going on in our own lives, He's not the big Nanny in the sky.
Why do bad things happen to good people? Because of free will choices that others make and good people not knowing or not caring to live in victory by doing things God's way.
Hosea 4:6
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
If God could not lie nor violate His own word, it would be wrong to describe him as "omnipotent." Perhaps you mean that God is unwilling to lie or violate his word.
Why did the tsunami wipe out Nx100,000 people a few yrs back? "Because of free will choices that others make..." That's a silly, non-falsifiable superstitious claim.
Even if we do have free will, that doesn't get an omniscient, omnipotent creator off the hook for knowingly setting loose humans with free will to do evil.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
It's interesting that you bring up "a third of the angels" following Satan. In "Reason-Driven Life", Robert Price points out how a lot of the Christian traditions about Satan are based on apocrypha or wild interpretations.
Where does it say in the Bible that Satan convinced a third of the angels to rebel? Rev 12:4 where a dragon "swept a third of the stars from the sky"? That's a really stretched interpretation of that line. I suppose there are some experts who assure you that's what it means.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Yes, that is one of the proof references but a 'third' is irrelevant to this discussion, all you need is one fallen angel to prove that they had free will.
2 Pet. 2:4 however back up that there was more than just one.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
Lol, a tale about a dragon's tail knocking stars from the sky is a "proof reference" that Satan convinced one third of angels to rebel!
2 Peter 2:4 says there were multiple angels who sinned, not one-third. If that bit from Revelation is the kind of thing you take as "proof" of your prefered interpretation of the Bible, we don't have much common ground for agreeing on what the truth is, morally or physically or any other truth.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
You're completely overlooking what I said...you want to dismiss that reference in Revelation....fine.
It still doesn't change the fact that throughout the bible its clearly demonstrated that satan had free will too.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
You're right, I didn't really address your point about "Even the angels have free will, and even satan KNEW there was a God....no ignorance of God there....yet he 'chose' to rebel and do evil, as did a third of the rest of the angels."
Given that the traditions in or out of the Bible have Satan and the angels created by God, it still makes me wonder why a good god would create any beings *capable* of choosing to do evil, knowing that some of them would choose evil.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
...Interpreting it literally requires believing the earth is flat and only about 6000 years old, the sun revolves around the earth, and other biblical claims that are demonstrably false.
Interpreting it symbolically or metaphorically leaves so much room for error that it's practically useless. It allows anyone to pick parts they like and ignore or downplay parts they don't like. Unless some humans have more authority than others, whose poetic interpretation do we believe?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I don't where you're getting a lot of your 'literal interpretations' from....I do take the Word literal and I see from it that the earth is round....again, google the following with the quotes and see what it really says about that:
"Did Bible writers believe the earth was flat?"
Same with age of the earth, its VERY old, probably billions of years old:
"Beyond Gap Theory Interpretation of Genesis"
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
God is saying, come, I'll show you the way out of the eternal suffering that I created for you by default. That doesn't sound much better than "waiting to throw everyone into Hell." (Default means he doesn't have to wait. He can *set it and forget it* like a Ronco rotisserie oven.)
Here's a map of your street to avoid the landmines I planted there. Am I an evil person for burying landmines on your street, or a benevolent guy for sharing the safe-route map with you?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Another false premise, God did not create suffering or evil. Evil is merely the absence of good in the same way that darkness is just the absence of light.
karyzzmatic 2 years ago
It's not a "false premise" just because you can describe the same condition in different words. If God created a place and condition for humans to exist in that has an "absence of goodness" in it, and we experience that as eternal suffering, what's the difference? How is he not responsible for designing the experience?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
quick question have you read arepagitica by john milton? (he wrote gulliver's travels)
im not sure if they will answer your questions, but there are actually a lot of what i believe to be rational explanations to your arguements, from a philisophical and theological perspective. sadly, i dont want to be a hypocrite, but i dont want to debate them over the internet, because
1. it would be looongggg
2. im not a very good person at explaining things, so i probably wont do my beliefs justice.
poopyhead25 2 years ago
I haven't read that. I'll look it up.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I have to say Bravo on this topic Rob!
It's making my faith even stronger!
Cheers!
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
I went to a catholic school all my life and was raised RC. Although i was told, some times felt bulled into believe in God , the things tart to me, ie, be good unto others and so on. I still today wonder who or what God is. Now an adult I feel the higher power, be it just a fully cloud in the sky , it warms my heart because I need to believe I will see my family again so I do my best to be a good person in order to do so.
NunaFeedTheDucks 2 years ago
If there is a god and you believe then your're ok
If there isn't a god and you believe then your're ok
If there isn't a god and you don't beleive you're ok
If there is a god and you don't believe
Your screwed.
It's kinda easy!
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
If there is a god who ordered and carried out genocide and infanticide multiple times as described in the Bible, and you believe he exists anddo everything he commands, then you are "okay" in the sense that good Germans were okay when they didn't object to Nazi rule.
If there isn't a god and you believe, then your fear of his damnation and guilt over "original sin" that you had nothing to do with, is not "okay" either. Then it's unnecessary harm to yourself and others, based on superstition.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Well If you say so.
I just think that it's cool to believe in god.
People messed up the whole god thing not god.
This could go on and on just like politics and nascar.
Either you have faith or you don't
Faith is faith
Einstein believed in God and he was pretty smart. Right?
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
"cool to believe in god."
Truth isn't a popularity contest. Are we talking about whether or not it's true, or whether it's fun or useful to believe in a god? Because if our priority is beliefs that are fun or useful, then we could believe all kinds of wacky untrue things. Maybe it would make me feel really good if all my relatives who have died are really alive, hiding somewhere, and there's some good reason why they can't tell me.
...But I don't thinks so.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
I don't Read the Bible alot, I don't go to Church.
But I have seen Evil and I have felt the presence of God, Holy spirt, Jesus, Allah whatever People call it. There is something more intelligent then you me and everyone else. We are like children walking into a library unable to read all the books but we know that someone wrote the books but we can't explain whats in them. That is how our existence is i feel.
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
"the presence of God, Holy spirt, Jesus, Allah whatever People call it" doesn't sound like something that most Christians would say. You sound like a fairly liberal Christian (or a theist but not necessarily Christian), so you might not have all of the nasty brimstone and damnation baggage that most Christians mix in with their understanding of life and God and afterlife. Good on ya!
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Also, if you notice, I wasn't putting forward a lot of arguments in this video that the Christian god is unlikely to be real. What I was mainly talking about is, even if the Bible were true, is the Christian god a good god? And is it moral for people to tell me I deserve eternal suffering just because we disagree on how the world works? Not because I harmed anybody.
My arguments are still valid even if some intelligent designer did create trees & stars & leukemia & oceans.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
HAHAHAH! Leukemia.
That was just funny.
I dig the dry humor!
Much love brother!
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
You're right that it is a matter of faith. I just wish more people could be convinced that faith is not a virtue, and it is not helpful as a tool to lead people to truth. If it were a reliable tool, then why would so many people "of faith" disagree with each other about right and wrong and God and Allah and Jesus? If it reliably led people to truth, wouldn't all or most people of faith agree and reach the same truth?
Sorry, I know this will go on and on like politics. It's important.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
When I see Nature, The woods the ocean the night sky I don't think WOW what neat random event! I think this has all been created if not then why don't dolphins grow mustaches and murder the sharks? (That's a joke about the Original sin thing.)
kalburiumstormbreath 2 years ago
One of the problems with Pascal's wager is that it's another way of emphasizing the threats of Christianity, as if morality doesn't enter into it at all.
If an evil creator had made all of us and threatened punishment for everyone who didn't believe in him, then the same Pascal's wager would apply. It wouldn't matter whether the god was good or evil, just that we fear his threats in case he's real.
Does a good god need affirmation by humans so desperately that he has to threaten us?
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Meanwhile, whether a question is true or false does not depend on how high the stakes are one way or the other.
deidzoeb 2 years ago
Well, it was interesting so far..
I am an "athiest", but that's because I find the notion of a "God" plain ridiculous -I don't live and breathe "atheism" like a kind of reverse religion, I just exist -and the main thing that shits me about Christians etc is that they demand that I live according to the society that they've created as "Christians" -so all their morality, their views on Gays/euthanasia/nudity etc etc -restrict me -when I think the religion that produced it all is bogus..
DrHoldowicz 2 years ago
IMO, that version of Christianity is flawed.
I think that certain behaviors lead to a miserable existence in the eternity that we experience in this life. One version might be Dante's Inferno with levels of suffering for various indulgences or behaviours. Encouraging people to avoid misery could be noble but threats are not a decent conversion tactic. I also don't think that togetherforpeace uses it in order to convert people or threaten them.
Barklord 2 years ago
video response incoming!
TheDramaChambers 2 years ago