theophilus

I understand that this site is supposed to deal with the existence of god in some general, theoretical sense, but the fact is, most of the posts are in support of or in opposition to the Christian god, i.e., the God of the Bible.

Many of the questions and objections to "this" god are not pertinent exactly because they try to deal with him in a non-specific, generalized fashion. When Christians speak of GOD, we do not have in mind some general concept of deity, nor merely a set of attributes. We have in mind the "infinite, personal God" of scripture.

God, as he is revealed in scripture, is incomprehensible to us; he is "unknowable" in his essence. We know him only as we relate to him as creator, sustainer and redeemer.

Questions as to "how good" he is or how "potent" he is can only be answered in terms of our relationship to him. He is absolutely "good," since he is the standard of good. He is "all" powerful in relationship to his purposes for his creation.

Issues of good and evil can only be understood in the context of his redemptive purpose which was established before the creation began.

I do not post this for discussion, but as a point of clarification which relates to all the threads.

Respectfully,

Philosoft

Are you really satisifed with "[God] is absolutely 'good,' since he is the standard of good"? This leads to moral relativism of perhaps the worst kind - God's idea of "good" is necessarily arbitrary because there is no standard absent God.

Zadok001

Ok, sure. God is unknowable. I'll repeat that. The first sentance of this quote says: "God is unknowable." Keep that in mind.

Now you're assigning God properties. He's unknowable - How do YOU know him? "He is ~foo~" is not compatible with "He is unknowable." You are claiming here to know the unknowable - Where do you get this information? The Bible? See "Square One."

Here's the problem, theophilus. You claim first that God is unknowable. I'll grant you this. But then you claim to know certain things about him. You make assertions as to his nature. By your own admission, that doesn't work so well, neh? Clearly you have gotten this information from somewhere. It wasn't from introspection or examination of empirical reality - If information about God could be gleaned from either source, he wouldn't be "unknowable," now would he?

So you got that information from somewhere else. From where? From God? Ok, perhaps - But why should we then believe YOUR story about what God says, but not the story of the Hindus, Greeks, Romans, pantheists, etc.? Did you get your information from the Bible, then? Well, why should be believe the Bible over the Quran?

Defining God as unknowable is not a great way to dodge arguments against God, but it's ok. However, it's a HORRIBLE way to try to spread your religious beliefs, as it requires the people around you to make the irrational jump from "God is unknowable" to "And here's what he's like!"

theophilus

If God (or a being exactly like him) is not the standard of good, then there is no standard becuase there is no such thing as good. There might be pain and pleasure, pleasant and unpleasant experiences, but to assert that one or the other is inherently superior to the other is unsupportable.

We are left with mere preference. The question is, are you really satisfied with that?

theophilus

I'm sure I have deficiencies as a communicator, but I don't think I'm that bad.

If you'd read carefully, you'd have noticed that I said he is "incomprehensible in his essence." We only know him as he has chosen to reveal himself and that revelation gives sufficient knowledge for his purpose.

Silent Dave

If the alternative is to risk being immoral by not following God's command to commit genocide, absolutely. But in fact, there are many different accounts of secular objective morality, none of which you have shown to be problematic.


Dave

Fiach

But as your introduction suggested we need to define God, and since God is hypothetical, different definitions can be proposed. What is God? Is God the creator of the Universe? Perhaps that should be the starting point before considering the human god who snoops into and intervenes in trivial human behaviour.

I will post a followup in this theme. I have posted it before.

Fiach

Fiach

What exactly is God? How can we argue about the existence of God if none of us can define that of which we are debating?

There are several different quasi-definitions of God used on the various forums. The classic type is the anthropomorphic god. This God usually has a human personality with human emotions, human virtues, and human vices. These are manifested by jealousy, anger, rage, love, mercy, capriciousness, justice and injustice, insecurity (need for adoration as assurance of his supremacy), and forgiveness. He is omnipotent, omniscient, and the creator of all reality. This anthropomorphic god can range from the minimal anthropomorphism of Monotheistic Allah, to the marked human raging Monotheistic JHWH, to the every human Jesus Christ who is a God-human hybrid in a trinity that believers pretend to be Monotheism.

There are relatively undefined or poorly defined gods such as the one recognised by Deists, Unitarians, and Bahai’s. This god is conscious but clearly not human. He or She may or may not have emotions. That is not defined. He/She has but one function. That is to create the universe and the rules by which it runs.

Then there is the totally undefined God, not of a particular religious school of thought. People say they believe in a god-creator but say that nothing can be known about this god.

Another kind of god, believed by many American scientists, possibly to avert the charge of Atheism is the Inanimate God. This god is defined, as perhaps Steven Hawking would say, as the elementary forces of nature and the unified field theory of reality. This god is not a conscious being. It has no personality. It is incapable of thinking (cognition). It knows nothing. But its action results in the formation of universes, beginning with a big bang from a tiny singularity, and accounts for all of the properties of energy and matter. Those innate properties account for the evolution of matter from energy and nanoparticles, and the evolution of life from atoms combining into a series of increasingly complex molecules. Life evolves through stages of mobility, which requires some self-awareness and reactivity to cognition and intelligence. Intelligence is merely an animal behaviour evolved in stages for adaptation. This adaptation includes finding food, finding reproductive mates, and avoiding predators. As such thinking and intelligence is not necessary for a creator god who needs no food, needs no reproductive mates, and need fear no predators. Such a creator-god needs intelligence no more than a sponge needs a computer keyboard.

This then gets us to the question facing Atheists. In countries like the USA where Atheists are widely hated, would they be better off claiming to be theists. When asked to elaborate on God, they could reply with a Hawking style definition. God is the creator of the universe, inanimate, totally natural, non-conscious, and non-cognitive. They would be eligible to join the Boy Scouts of America, and Atheistic war veterans (10%) could join the Veterans of Foreign Wars now denied to them, by renaming themselves as Hawkings Theists.

Fiach

Philosoft

No kidding. But you don't think anything is "inherently superior" either. You have to wait for God to tell you.
Well, I don't have much choice. I can trust that I usually act in my own best interest and go from there, or I can trust that God, who, by your own admission often does things for reasons we can't comprehend and must somehow act in the best interests of every other individual, is telling me (via a translated 2000-year-old text, no less!) the right things.

Lobstrosity

Morality is merely a code that facilitates social interactions. It's actually a fairly simple concept. Humans are highly social creatures and as such morality is an essential aspect of human nature. It has nothing to do with religion save for the fact that in the days before we had police who would enforce laws designed to protect the people we needed some incentive to ensure that people acted in the best interests of society. Religions adopted the obvious rules, threw in a few faulty ones for good measure (hell, they were created by humans and humans are fallible--something made especially evident when they believe one antiquated notion is an absolute truth rather than collaborating to constantly learn, adapt, and improve), and used the fear of an omnipresent, all-powerful being to coerce members of society into behaving.

There are plently of codes of morality that are entirely secular. Every athiest I've ever met behaves morally, or at least as morally as the average citizen. You hardly see us living in anarchy and chaos, murdering and raping at will, lying to everyone we meet while taking candy from babies and spitting on old ladies. I think it's fairly obvious that morality can easily be divorced from any notion of God. The people who require God in order to be moral are just...well, weak. They can't get themselves to care for society itself without either being threatened with punishment or promised some sort of fantastic reward. In my mind, Christians aren't even great models of morally because their actions are wholly selfish.