Bill Snedden

I think that's a reasonably good challenge to P2. I had thought of it as well, but unfortunately it doesn't fit with orthodox Christian theology which holds that evil is personified in the form of Satan, who does exist.

In other words, in order to deny P2 in the way you've suggested would seem tantamount to denying the existence of Satan. That would be heterodox at best and therefore outside the paramaters in which the argument was created.

Besides this, you also seem to be suggesting that evil exists independently of God. According to orthodox Christian theology, nothing exists independently of God. God is the only non-contingent entity in existence.

I suppose it's possible to hold that "evil" is inherent only in actions, rather than beings. I guess that would allow one to hold the position you advocate relative to the metaphysical status of evil without lapsing into heterodoxy. Perhaps.

At any rate, even evil understood as merely the absence of good doesn't allow God to escape His responsibility for it. God is the creator of all that does exist, and hence the antecdent conditions that allow evil actions to take place. In addition, he knew with absolute certainty how these antecedent conditions would affect future actions. Therefore, he is ultimately responsible for those future actions.

Regards,

Bill Snedden

HelenM

Originally posted by Van Agon:

I do believe that hell is a real "place" of some sort that people "go to" in some way, and that it is undesirable in some ultimate sense. Second, I don't believe that hell is an eternal torture chamber where God inflicts pain and agony on a person because the person has failed to "measure up".

Ok, let's go with this. Hell is an undesirable place which people will spend eternity in and never can escape from.

Perhaps you would agree that that could be agony emotionally even if there are no literal flames or darkness, etc.

hell is the absence of God.

Theologically speaking, God is generally believed to be everywhere so you must mean this somewhat relationally, I suppose, that Hell is not being in fellowship with the God who is everywhere.

God does not use coercion to force one to accept Him. Ergo, He provides a "place" for people to go where He is absent. For to require one to be in His presence would be to force His Love on one, and forced Love is a contradiction in terms. That is, forced Love is intrinsically impossible.

Ummm...well, is there even such a thing?

Are you saying that people really do reject real love?

Why would one reject God even when faced with the alternative (remaining eternally absent God's presence)?

Excellent question!

I don't fully comprehend this, but some of my thoughts include: (1) For one to choose God in the afterlife would likely result in coercion, which we discussed earlier.

What if it weren't coercion so much as, there are some things that are rejected only if one doesn't recognize them. So when they are seen as they are they are no longer rejected.

One cannot be coerced into Loving, for this is intrinsically impossible. (2) I observe some who choose prison over freedom even in this lifetime.

They don't really choose prison. They choose something that sets of a chain of consequences leading to prison. Conceivably when they make the first choice they hope they can yet avoid prison, or they don't realize it is going to be the consequence, or they are in some kind of 'denial'.

But I don't think it's exactly true that they 'chose prison', per se.

Personally, I've discovered that overcoming destructive tendencies were realized by placing my faith in Jesus Christ. This of course is no empirical test, and is only a personal experience.

I respect that as your experience and that as far as you are concerned it really is through the power of the Lord Jesus Christ that you have overcome certain things.

No doubt others testify to encountering victory over bad habits through crystals, meditation, or other means. I am not here attempting to cast aspersions on their experiences, but only testify to my own.

It's laudable, imo, that you can respect the experiences of others as being as real to them as your experience of Jesus is to you.

(And no-one has asked you to comment theologically on their experiences )

Thank you for listening.

You're welcome! I do try to

Maybe I over-snipped your comments...I was going to respond to something I didn't end up with .

Anyway I was going to say - part of the problem for non-theists is that it seems deceptive of God to say "You have a free choice! Believe in me or not!" and then at the end say - "Oh well, hell is the result of your choice" - if God didn't - as far as they can tell, give them any good reason to believe in Him.

I realize this is a very 'man-centered' way of thinking about God, man, sin, salvation and hell.

But - people are man-centered and God of course must know that. Has He really done all He could do to make the options clear and to make His own reality clear to humankind?

love in Christ
Helen

Van Agon

Hi HelenSL,

In response to your post dated July 05, 2002 09:23 AM, thank you for your response.

[You said:] Yes, I think that captures it. And since I believe being in fellowship with God is His purpose for creating us, anything less in an ultimate sense results in a sense of being unfulfilled - a kind of spiritual emptiness. Now I've read from some here recently that the prospect of simply existing to Worship God seems to be quite a boring purpose, indeed. I, of course, disagree, for in my experience, worshiping God - that is, having fellowship with God - has proved to be the very most fulfilling aspect of living. Comparatively, all else has paled.

[You said:] It seems we are both in agreement that there is not. Forced Love is a contradiction in terms. Somewhat like asking, "Can God create a rock too heavy for Him to lift?" Because a created thing is finite, and God is infinite, then it is a contradiction in terms to conceive of a finite thing greater than it's infinite Creator. Similarly, since Love is a gift freely given and freely received, then it is a contradiction in terms to conceive of a giver of a gift forcing the receiver to accept it. For once one is coerced into receiving a gift, then that gift is no longer a gift at all.

[You said:] Yes, I believe this is feasible, as I believe it is oberservable in the world around us. More below.

[You said:] Perhaps. But it seems everytime one purchases a pack of cigarettes, they have before them a warning label that this habit may result in many undesirable conditions. So, I'm not convinced that lack of information is always the cause of poor choices.

[You said:] Is it possible that that is what "hell" is - an eternal state of "denial"? Perhaps the keys to hell lock from the inside. I've read of criminals released, who committed crimes for the sole purpose of returning to jail. I've read of lottery winners who squandered their wealth. Rock Stars and Hollywood Actors who had everything and traded it in for drug addiction. I'm not convinced that when someone has all of the options placed before them, with full disclosure of every possible contingency, that they would necessarily make the "right" choice. Is it possible to reject God without giving lip service to the deed? Maybe our decisions are attributed in our mind as logical conclusions. But in some deeper sense we have simply succumbed to an urge to rebel against our Creator.

[You said:] Well, of course I believe He has.

Blessings, -Van

A3

TooBad
You seemed to complain about bad design, natural disasters and such. That this universe should be more user-friendly. For one thing that it should lack all evil or discomfort. Sorry if I got your message wrong.
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As you say there is “Much suffering” small- and large scale, caused by nature and by humans... As soon as you say “all this ends at death” I would fully agree that if there is a God, He would be a cruel God. This natural life, however, is only the preamble of something spiritual.
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Exactly, some people love being cruel in this life and through God’s infinate mercy are allowed to go on being cruel in hell (their “heaven”). Some people love causing other people pain, same story. No one is forced to cut someone else of in traffic, no one is forced to rob a bank or fly into a building, or even build their house on a vulcano. These are all choices based on a warped love. We are not only what we choose to eat we are much more what we chose to love. A very strong statement from Swedenborg says it all: We have not been creatred for the sake of ourselves but for the sake of others. We will live to eternity in the happy state we chose here. We will be very happy in a heavenly state but could also be kind of happy in a hellish state. From a heavenly perspective everything else looks like hell but so do things seen from hell. It all depends on what our basic love is. People in a heavenly sate are very happy because they live with people just like them. People in a hellish state are kind of happy because they live with people just like them too. And they can hate (burn) to their hearts desire. Determining our future state is the single connection between this life and the next.
You are right, no amount of “extra time” will change that. At death our ‘design’ is frozen, where the tree falls there it lies. We will be perfected as to our state to ‘eternity,’ but it cannot change direction from good to bad because we don’t want to.
BTW it is not an eternity of time but of state. Time and space only belong to this natural world.

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[qoute]A3: Another thing, human suffering is primarily based on ignorance. Ignorance about this life and the next.
TB:No it isn't. If a doctor tried to remove my left leg without first administering an anaesthetic, I wouldn't be screaming "Please give me a religious education!" And neither would you.[/quote]
You are right, because one has absolutely nothing to do with the other. Now if this ‘doctor’ did this out of ignorance of normal medical procedures, that would cause you a lot of needless suffering indeed. Another scenario would be if this was in the jungle, after a snakebite. Would you rather keep your leg and die or lose it with a lot of suffering and live? Some of our personal decisions in life are as tough as that.

Thank you, that is much appreciated.

Bill Snedden
[quote]A3: Bill, would you see a baby as good or as evil? Neither, maybe?
Bill: Neither. Human beings have the potential for either good or evil.

For the purpose of debating this question, it is granted that God exists and is the creator of all that exists (except himself, of course). This is not my personal belief, but rather the assumption granted for the purpose of the argument.[\quote]
So your postion in this argument is from a borrowed platform, not your own. You assume someone else’s idea of God (whatever that may be). Would you mind elaborating on the idea of God that you have borrowed? If it is ‘Traditional Christian’ a term you sometimes use, it is a very different understanding of God than ours. Traditional Christianity has taken revelation literally and as a result have many mysteries because of wrong assumptions and conclusions.
A creation ‘motivated’ or based on love makes all the sense in the world. But love cannot exist in an environment without freedom. As is shown in any home setting, the less freedom (especially between partners) the less love. We love to play golf, untill we have to. You say that “Human beings have the potential for either good or evil,” and that potentiality is the essence of our ‘designed’ freedom. Anything less and we wouldn’t be human. Humans were created ‘good’ but were in no way forced to be good. Without the ability to choose evil we would be forced to be good by lack of choice. That is the typical animal state, we are supposed to elevate ourselves above that level. We express that human sentiment in art, poetry and music and our preference of each.
This freedom is such an essential ingredient of life that God protects this as we would the apple of our eye.
That is the basis of eternal life. Whatever determines our eternal life takes precedence over any temporal (dis)comfort or even suffering. We are free to believe there is no God, no next life no spiritual life if that makes us happy. To be forced in any way (miracles?) would destroy our freedom and thus our happiness. BTW there are reasons why miracles were used by God but not anymore. Often we encounter hardship, suffering, misfortune etc. without having the least amount of choice in the matter. However, we have complete freedom in how we will react to it. This is how we can become stronger or weaker, depending how we choose to react, it separates the good from the bad. As from ‘the beginning’ this is our proofing ground. We can go along with the intention of creation and in freedom choose to do good (with happiness as a side effect) or we can choose to go our own way and create evil by doing our own ‘good.’ Don’t get me wrong though, and this is our big difference with Trad. Christ. I am not saying that a person who honestly does the best he can while he doesn’t know about Christ or God (same thing) or Bible or church goes to hell. Only someone consciously making that choice does. God doesn’t care if a baby had some water sprinkled over it before it dies. But I’m digressing, sorry.

Sid
You seem to throw everything together, beliefs, superstitions, assumptions. Plus you ignore any progress on the human side of the equation. There were times when people didn’t know the first thing about our body and how it works, now we know more. When, as a parent, you tell your kid you ‘go to work’ does that mean they understand what you are doing? Do you tell them about all the bills, the tax man, of why you love what you do? Or do you accommodate all that to their state? God did exactly the same. He didn’t change, we did. How do you tell someone about a soul if they have absolutely no idea they have one. How do you teach a child sex-education if they don’t know they have one?
Whatever you tell someone, and they believe it, is real to them. That works at home, in the office and at church too. Now (2000 years later) we know that we should believe something only if we think it is true, not because so and so says so no matter what uniform they are wearing. Progress is only possible when we have a healthy skepticism and not a closed mind.

Regards
Adriaan

TooBad

*L* Just a tad.

My point was, and remains, the absurdity of believing that a world which contains widespread arbitrary suffering, much of which is not instigated by human actions, is the free creation of a loving God. I'd still be interested to know how you address that point.

[ July 05, 2002: Message edited by: TooBad ]</p>

ManM

Bill,
I basically plagiarized St. Augustine in my objection to P2, so I am not abandoning historical Christianity. Might your conception of Satan be a bit drastic? Also I am not suggesting that evil exists independently of God. Using the famous hair analogy, bald is not a hair color, but is simply the absence of hair. However 'bald' is meaningless unless paired with the concept of hair. Likewise, evil is not independent of God. This avoids the metaphysical duality you are worried about.

Regarding your main argument, do you believe that God could create a state of affairs that had the potential to oppose His will?

HelenM

Hi Van

My main response to you is - I find it very hard to envisage 'love' as watching someone suffer, having the power to prevent it and - not preventing it.

I find it how to see how not intervening is loving, when you could end the suffering.

I find it hard to understand how giving someone the choice to suffer and to damn themselves eternally - is loving.

I can see that you accept the ways of God. I want to be honest about what is hard for me to understand. It doesn't mean I'm 'denying doctrine' but I also don't want to turn my mind and emotions off with "God's ways are higher than mine" if I have any other options...

love in Christ
Helen

Brahma's atheist

A good illustration of what I'm saying came in The Simpsons. The hurricane episode. The sign outside the church said 'God welcomes his victims'.
People rationalise things to fit what they need to believe in. You need your god and other people need their gods( there is more than one supreme being you know). So you come up with things like being given free will. This takes responsibility away from godx. Many parents do this with their kids. You can't watch them all the time. A parent is not quite the same as a supreme being though it, the parent, does actually exist.
I have to go along with Toobad and say you(religios) seem to have disregarded the point of the natural disasters that the gods throw at their followers.Sometimes while they are prosrtating themselves.
It seems to be a carrot and stick affair. The carrot of some gods compassion and the sick of life. Sometimes you get the stick with the carrot.
The gods, if they existed and the world was as it is would be no less than cruel, evil and not a little bit rubbish.

Brahma's atheist

I meant stick of life, not sick.

Bill Snedden

No, the position I'm arguing is my own. I'm granting some initial assumptions for the sake of the argument. Those assumptions are not part of my worldview, but if those assumptions were to be true, then I believe that the premises and conclusion of my argument would be true as well.

Certainly. It's really a rather generic sort of "god" idea. God, in this assumption, is simply the creator of all that exists (except Himself). He also carries the traits of omniscience and omnipotence.

Although such a being does not possess all of the characteristics ascribed to God by orthodox Christian theology, such a being is neverthless amenable to or at least consonant with the Christian God.

True. I snipped the remainder of your post because it simply doesn't address the argument. Again, I'm not arguing that God could have, should have, or would have done any better. I'm not arguing that the existence of evil "proves" anything one way or another. The original question was, "prove that God is responsible for the existence of evil." I formulated a simple deductive proof and nothing that you've posted (although interesting in its own right) really even addresses that proof.

Regards,

Bill Snedden