To those who believe in a kind and merciful god....why is the world so hostile to life?

[Bodhi]

CHRISTIAN theology does say god decides what is ultimately right or wrong BUT IT also says that man has freewill and his judgements are also part of creation, they are the creation of man.

The attributes of God, which you've already listed,

Negate this idea. I've explained how.

That includes the attributes of god, being omnipotent and also being omni-benevolent which means god would not just change reality in any matter he likes because being all good he's not going to violate the will of other freewill creatures.

god being omiscient just means he know everything or every possibility not that he prevents all possibilities from coming into reality. All gods attributes work together in a certain order starting with his all goodness

Being omniscient means he knew all

Before creating it. He knows the outcome(s)

Of his actions before acting. If he did create the universe,

That means everything that happened and will happen

Is according to his will. Look up the definition of the word "Deliberate".

I'm not saying he prevented or changed anything.

I'm saying our reality is his will, if he created our reality.

Ephesians 1:11

In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will

In other words WHAT I AM trying to say is that god can only do things according to his nature. God, for example cannot lie because it's literally impossible for him to do so it's not in his nature, the same way he cannot create freewill creatures without giving them power to disobey him

Then he doesn't have free will.

If he cannot lie or commit acts of evil,

It is not possible for him to have free will,

According to your logic.

Non-human animals are not sentient in the way humans are in my previous post i put Human freewill in bold for that very reason. You operate under a different concept of consists of sentience. You also say that colors and numbers are concepts we disagree colors and especially numbers have real physical substance while true concepts like love and art depend on sentient judgement.

I'm not going to reply to this

Because doing so would create a whole new series

Of arguments.

Let me make thing clearer for you because you seem to have misunderstood me about heaven. when god restores the earth and jesus rules for 1000 years, this will be "heaven on earth" but satan would not be dead just locked away so evil in the "universe" will still exists at this time in some form but jesus will rule with and iron first.

After the great white THRONE judgement i have always understood that reality will change in some unknown way because it says both heaven and earth will pass away at this point all beats are off as far as i understand it so no one can tell you what this heaven will be like in any detail.

 

[zzombie]

CHRISTIAN theology does say god decides what is ultimately right or wrong BUT IT also says that man has freewill and his judgements are also part of creation, they are the creation of man.

The attributes of God, which you've already listed,

Negate this idea. I've explained how.

That includes the attributes of god, being omnipotent and also being omni-benevolent which means god would not just change reality in any matter he likes because being all good he's not going to violate the will of other freewill creatures.

god being omiscient just means he know everything or every possibility not that he prevents all possibilities from coming into reality. All gods attributes work together in a certain order starting with his all goodness

Being omniscient means he knew all

Before creating it. He knows the outcome(s)

Of his actions before acting. If he did create the universe,

That means everything that happened and will happen

Is according to his will. Look up the definition of the word "Deliberate".

I'm not saying he prevented or changed anything.

I'm saying our reality is his will, if he created our reality.

Ephesians 1:11

In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will

In other words WHAT I AM trying to say is that god can only do things according to his nature. God, for example cannot lie because it's literally impossible for him to do so it's not in his nature, the same way he cannot create freewill creatures without giving them power to disobey him

Then he doesn't have free will.

If he cannot lie or commit acts of evil,

It is not possible for him to have free will,

According to your logic.

Non-human animals are not sentient in the way humans are in my previous post i put Human freewill in bold for that very reason. You operate under a different concept of consists of sentience. You also say that colors and numbers are concepts we disagree colors and especially numbers have real physical substance while true concepts like love and art depend on sentient judgement.

I'm not going to reply to this

Because doing so would create a whole new series

Of arguments.

Let me make thing clearer for you because you seem to have misunderstood me about heaven. when god restores the earth and jesus rules for 1000 years, this will be "heaven on earth" but satan would not be dead just locked away so evil in the "universe" will still exists at this time in some form but jesus will rule with and iron first.

After the great white THRONE judgement i have always understood that reality will change in some unknown way because it says both heaven and earth will pass away at this point all beats are off as far as i understand it so no one can tell you what this heaven will be like in any detail.

 

[Bodhi]

the attributes of god and his purpose towards humanity do not negate the freewill of man they actually support it, you are leaving out the central attribute of god ,his all goodness. i am not convince by your explanation of against this.

His omnibenevolence is irrelevant to the argument.

GOD KNOW ALL outcomes but he knows them as possibility not as reality. GOD LETS us chose which future we bring into reality but he knows all possible futures, in other words the future is open and we have a strong influence on which one will be.

Then time is greater than God,

which doesn't make sense because God created time..

Or is that wrong?

ACCORDING TO MY LOGIC, God has freewill but because of his Omni-benevolence his will has to be in line with his nature. Just like our freewill cannot go beyond our design, meaning we cannot fly just because we will it, god in turn cannot do anything that would violate his very nature. which is why god cannot lie. ALL his attributes are informed by his Omni-benevolence.

Then God is confined by his nature

Just as we are confined by ours.

My question, then, is how does he retain his free will

In such a situation? If we weren't able to commit evil

Because of our nature,

We would be in the same boat.

You are using the bible to justify everything in reality being gods will but the bible says that god changes his mind. BUT if god knows the future IN THE WAY YOU DESCRIBED it then THAT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE. THEREFORE YOU ARE WRONG. God changes his mind so the future and all of reality cannot be 100% set and not 100% a creation of his will. Now god can because of one of his other attributes inflict his will onto man but this is done within the scope of his benevolence. Which is part of the reason why we pray, i can give you several instances from the bible where god changes his mind as a result of human prayer. You sound like a Calvinist now.

The Bible God is an amalgamation

Of various ideas from various people.

So those ideas are bound to conflict at some point.

Nevertheless, I'm going by the traditional interpretation

Of what and who God is.

Romans 8:28-29

28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

Acts 2:23

23 Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

So obviously God has foreknowledge of all things,

Which makes sense because he is

The creator of all things. Free will, however,

Doesn't make sense given God's omniscience.

As for my previous statement on heaven i was trying to clear up what i said up for you to understand there will be "heaven on earth" aka when jesus rules for 1000 years and then there will be "heaven" after the great white throne judgement in the former evil will still exist in some form and will be actualized when satan is released from his cage. In the latter, i don't believe anyone can say what will be because the bible says heaven and earth will pass away. DO YOU UNDERSTAND NOW??? AND IN any case something not being actualized does not negate the possibility of it so the possibilty of evil can still exist even if no one does it.

All I'm saying is that your original response, here >>>

The possibility will exist but it will not come into being in heaven.

Doesn't line up with what you're saying now.

Your "explanation" seems like backpedaling.

What I'm saying to you is if there is certainty that evil will never arise,

Then there's no possibility.

If there is possibility, then the correct way to express that

Would be, "evil may arise" and "someone may commit evil".

The word "may" expresses possibility. If you don't agree that evil may arise,

Then you don't really believe there's possibility of it.

 

[zzombie]

the attributes of god and his purpose towards humanity do not negate the freewill of man they actually support it, you are leaving out the central attribute of god ,his all goodness. i am not convince by your explanation of against this.

His omnibenevolence is irrelevant to the argument.

GOD KNOW ALL outcomes but he knows them as possibility not as reality. GOD LETS us chose which future we bring into reality but he knows all possible futures, in other words the future is open and we have a strong influence on which one will be.

Then time is greater than God,

which doesn't make sense because God created time..

Or is that wrong?

ACCORDING TO MY LOGIC, God has freewill but because of his Omni-benevolence his will has to be in line with his nature. Just like our freewill cannot go beyond our design, meaning we cannot fly just because we will it, god in turn cannot do anything that would violate his very nature. which is why god cannot lie. ALL his attributes are informed by his Omni-benevolence.

Then God is confined by his nature

Just as we are confined by ours.

My question, then, is how does he retain his free will

In such a situation? If we weren't able to commit evil

Because of our nature,

We would be in the same boat.

You are using the bible to justify everything in reality being gods will but the bible says that god changes his mind. BUT if god knows the future IN THE WAY YOU DESCRIBED it then THAT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE. THEREFORE YOU ARE WRONG. God changes his mind so the future and all of reality cannot be 100% set and not 100% a creation of his will. Now god can because of one of his other attributes inflict his will onto man but this is done within the scope of his benevolence. Which is part of the reason why we pray, i can give you several instances from the bible where god changes his mind as a result of human prayer. You sound like a Calvinist now.

The Bible God is an amalgamation

Of various ideas from various people.

So those ideas are bound to conflict at some point.

Nevertheless, I'm going by the traditional interpretation

Of what and who God is.

Romans 8:28-29

28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

Acts 2:23

23 Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

So obviously God has foreknowledge of all things,

Which makes sense because he is

The creator of all things. Free will, however,

Doesn't make sense given God's omniscience.

As for my previous statement on heaven i was trying to clear up what i said up for you to understand there will be "heaven on earth" aka when jesus rules for 1000 years and then there will be "heaven" after the great white throne judgement in the former evil will still exist in some form and will be actualized when satan is released from his cage. In the latter, i don't believe anyone can say what will be because the bible says heaven and earth will pass away. DO YOU UNDERSTAND NOW??? AND IN any case something not being actualized does not negate the possibility of it so the possibilty of evil can still exist even if no one does it.

All I'm saying is that your original response, here >>>

The possibility will exist but it will not come into being in heaven.

Doesn't line up with what you're saying now.

Your "explanation" seems like backpedaling.

What I'm saying to you is if there is certainty that evil will never arise,

Then there's no possibility.

If there is possibility, then the correct way to express that

Would be, "evil may arise" and "someone may commit evil".

The word "may" expresses possibility. If you don't agree that evil may arise,

Then you don't really believe there's possibility of it.

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

free will as a morally defining concept that doesn't apply to God. Free will as applied to moral CHOICES COMES down to the choice for good or evil. So to say that God has the opportunity to choose against Himself would be a contradiction in the terms of his nature. It is logically impossible

In His act of creation God gave His creations the ability to choose either for or against Him and that's when the concept of free will was introduced to the universe. God is omnipotent, because He has power over all things. However, does that mean that He can go against another part of His nature??? NO. GOD cannot go against his Perfect Goodness? because then God would be contradicting Himself, and that is not possible in an all-perfect being. It's a meaningless contradiction, much like a square circle.

God being un-created does not have any authority that can judge over him. However being that we are created BEINGS, naturally what created us has the power to judge our actions BECAUSE god has extensive knowledge about his creation he can judge our actions and in that judgement good or evil is defined. No, we cannot judge god because we lack totally extensive knowledge about god. see the book of job.

I feel that what you are really asking me is can god judge all our actions as being good??? the answer is yes but only if we are free to choose and if our nature was such that we could only please god then we would have no freewill and that would defeat the purpose we were created for. SO we literally cannot be in the same boat as god because we were created therefore there will always be the will of god and our will.

Time is the movement of matter through space ( a sequence of events) god created space and matter thus he created time and is greater than time and all possible events in time because he exists in all possible realities. TIME is an allowance from god therefore time cannot be greater than god.

The god of the bible is a spirit. john 4:24

God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth." There are many different christian traditions which one are you going by?? because Catholics have a different understanding about god's foreknowledge than Calvinist do. I think that you will find that most Christians don't believe that the foreknowledge of events creates those events which is the logical conclusion of your statement

READ romans 8:28 and acts carefully and put it in context with the rest of the bible

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

obviously god knows everyone before they are born but is everyone predestined to conform to the image of christ?? no because we know some people will be going to hell. so who do you think the apostle is taking about?? think about that and keep in mind Matt 7:22-23, 1 Corinthians 8:3,

just because something won't happen that does not negate the possibility of if happening and as long as there is a possibility to do evil for created creatures then it can be said that that creature has a freewill. "may arise" vs "will not arise" both terms are irrelevant to that point.

 

[Bodhi]

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

This argument >>>

And if God is omniscient,

He knew every detail of every event and every thing in the universe

Before he created it. If God is omnipotent,

He had the ability to change anything to his liking before

He created the universe.

That means, if God created the universe, he created

A universe that he wanted to create. That means that everything that

Ever happened is God's will and no one else's.

 

[Bodhi]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

 

[zzombie]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

nah i boils down to what the bible says in it's entirety

 

[zzombie]

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

This argument >>>

And if God is omniscient,

He knew every detail of every event and every thing in the universe

Before he created it. If God is omnipotent,

He had the ability to change anything to his liking before

He created the universe.

That means, if God created the universe, he created

A universe that he wanted to create. That means that everything that

Ever happened is God's will and no one else's.

god wanted to create a universe with multiple freewill creatures therefore he allows his universe to change and allows us to reject him

 

[Bodhi]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

nah i boils down to what the bible says in it's entirety

opinion

a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

Open theism is relatively new and based on

personal interpretation of scripture, like most

denominations, sects, and Biblical philosophies.

As I said, I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

 

[Bodhi]

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

This argument >>>

And if God is omniscient,

He knew every detail of every event and every thing in the universe

Before he created it. If God is omnipotent,

He had the ability to change anything to his liking before

He created the universe.

That means, if God created the universe, he created

A universe that he wanted to create. That means that everything that

Ever happened is God's will and no one else's.

god wanted to create a universe with multiple freewill creatures therefore he allows his universe to change and allows us to reject him

if you say so

 

[zzombie]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

nah i boils down to what the bible says in it's entirety

opinion

a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

Open theism is relatively new and based on

personal interpretation of scripture, like most

denominations, sects, and Biblical philosophies.

As I said, I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

If that's what you want to believe then that's on you HOWEVER the ideas behind open theism are not really new

 

[zzombie]

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

This argument >>>

And if God is omniscient,

He knew every detail of every event and every thing in the universe

Before he created it. If God is omnipotent,

He had the ability to change anything to his liking before

He created the universe.

That means, if God created the universe, he created

A universe that he wanted to create. That means that everything that

Ever happened is God's will and no one else's.

god wanted to create a universe with multiple freewill creatures therefore he allows his universe to change and allows us to reject him

if you say so

the bible says so

 

[Bodhi]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

nah i boils down to what the bible says in it's entirety

opinion

a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

Open theism is relatively new and based on

personal interpretation of scripture, like most

denominations, sects, and Biblical philosophies.

As I said, I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

If that's what you want to believe then that's on you HOWEVER the ideas behind open theism are not really new

Open theism is relatively new

 

[Bodhi]

his omnibenevolence is not irrelevant to the argument it is central to everything in creation and to this thread, have you looked at the thread title???

This argument >>>

And if God is omniscient,

He knew every detail of every event and every thing in the universe

Before he created it. If God is omnipotent,

He had the ability to change anything to his liking before

He created the universe.

That means, if God created the universe, he created

A universe that he wanted to create. That means that everything that

Ever happened is God's will and no one else's.

god wanted to create a universe with multiple freewill creatures therefore he allows his universe to change and allows us to reject him

if you say so

the bible says so

I'm sure

 

[zzombie]

I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

nah i boils down to what the bible says in it's entirety

opinion

a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

Open theism is relatively new and based on

personal interpretation of scripture, like most

denominations, sects, and Biblical philosophies.

As I said, I guess it all boils down to personal opinion for you.

If that's what you want to believe then that's on you HOWEVER the ideas behind open theism are not really new

Open theism is relatively new

A rose by any other name is still a rose people in the past not calling sections of there theology open theism does not mean the ideas of open theism are new

 

[Bodhi]

It really doesn't matter. It's your opinion

And I disagree with it. I've explained my view

As best I can but I'm failing to see

The logic in what you're saying. Perhaps it's my fault;

Maybe it's yours. Who knows.

 

[zzombie]

It really doesn't matter. It's your opinion

And I disagree with it. I've explained my view

As best I can but I'm failing to see

The logic in what you're saying. Perhaps it's my fault;

Maybe it's yours. Who knows.

i don't see the logic is your objection i really don't see why what i have said is so hard for you to understand and if what i have said is fact less opinion then everything you have said about the topics we have talked about is also fact less opinion.

 

[Bodhi]

We're arguing about things that we have no factual evidence for,

Yes. But I'm basing my arguments on what's logical, even though

The evidence is non-existent. For instance,

We have no evidence of God's existence. Yet I'm assuming he does exist

For argument's sake. And if he does exist, it's logical that we have no free will.

The fact that evil exists would be illogical assuming God also exists.

 

[zzombie]

We're arguing about things that we have no factual evidence for,

Yes. But I'm basing my arguments on what's logical, even though

The evidence is non-existent. For instance,

We have no evidence of God's existence. Yet I'm assuming he does exist

For argument's sake. And if he does exist, it's logical that we have no free will.

The fact that evil exists would be illogical assuming God also exists.

You cannot base your argument on what's logical without first defining the characteristics of what we are talking about. If you assume the god of the bible exists then you have to account for all his attributes as explained by the bible and not just cherry pick the ones you want. You cannot focus on omni-potenence and omni-science and leave out omni-benevolence, which is what you have tried to do.

you would also have to define freewill in relation to the god of the bible you have failed to do this

 

[Bodhi]

This debate is getting boring.