RogerLeeCooke

This is a fallacious inference. God could give *finite* punishments for bad behavior forever. The crux of the question, I think, is how a finite being can deserve infinite punishment. Not that I'm asking the question. It's *way* too far into beliefs that I don't have even to consider the question.

madmax2976

What has any of this got to do with your unwillingness to continue speculate further than you already did?

You engage in speculation regarding:

- The existence of a deity
- The actuality of an afterlife
- Supernatural realms where people go in that afterlife
- What you think this deity will do to us in that afterlife
- That the God in question actually distributes "grace" (whatever that means)

Since this all appears to be mere speculation, why don't you just keep going?

Koyaanisqatsi

Hello David.

Certainly. God is ineffable and incomprehensible to man and grants you salvation in spite of what you do, say, practice or believe, not because of, or else his salvation would not be as a result of his merciful grace.

That would include belief in Jesus, as well, of course, because if any human could ever point to one single thing or belief or thought or deed and say, "This is the one thing that I know God will grant me salvation for," that would mean the individual knows God's thoughts.

Which is not possible, right?

That's fascinating, but does not address my question. Do you need me to clarify this one, too?

Since it's not possible to know God's thoughts and not possible to know what belief, action or thought will result in God granting you salvation and salvation by God's grace means that you are actually saved in spite of your beliefs, actions or thoughts and not because of, doesn't that mean that your beliefs serve no purpose for you on earth (and, arguably, go against your hopes of salvation, considering God's merciful grace would mean you are saved in spite of and not because of)?

Right, so you agree that absolutely nothing you believe, say, practice or preach makes any difference and even that thought or acknowledgement or revelation serves no purpose for you in regard to God's salvation, so, since you're apparently not going to just throw everything you've been talking about in the trash as superstitious gibberish, wouldn't that mean you have to follow every single decree you possibly can (including the contradictory ones and the ones you think are not in the Bible) at all times, every second of your existence to cover all your bases?

[quote]ME: So what the f*ck are you doing here?

David: Obviously, I am talking to you.[/b]

In direct violation of your own god's decree.

So are you going for the in spite of by directly disobeying your god's decree?

If so, bravo!

Love,

Koyaanisqatsi

Synaesthesia

David,
If God truly wanted us to be in heaven, we would go there because he is all powerful. However, it's a good thing that we don't all go to heaven, being tortured is all a part of his lovey-dovey plan.

Right now I'm slowly pulling the intestines out of my writhing, wimpering little brother. I intend to keep him alive and conscious so that he suffers as long as absolutely possible. Don't worry, I'm stopping the bleeding and periodically let his intestines heal a bit as I burn his eye with cigarettes.

But it's a good thing. After all, how is it possible that I be merciful to my siblings if I don't inflict as much merciless misery and suffering on some of them?

It's either torturing them for as long as I can or helping and loving and being understanding with them all.

Heck, even God can't do that. Why should *I*?

Bible Humper

Hello David,

I'll answer this, but I'm disappointed that you decided that this would be your "answer" to my post.

Beginning with the proposition that God does not exist, there aren't any reasonable, rational and defensible worldviews that proceed automatically from this point.

If we change the proposition to Thor does not exist, you will see what I mean. Both of us are atheists towards Thor, but we have different worldviews because there aren't any pre-packaged beliefs bundled up with lack of belief in Thor. Do you see how atheism towards Yahweh is the same? Someone searching for philisophical enlightenment who looks at the deity myths and says "Nope, none of those are true" is by no means finished his quest.

If you are interested in knowing what my "worldview" is, I am a metaphysical naturalist and a moral nihilist.

99Percent

David Mathews: If there was no potential for humans to suffer eternal punishment God could not act in a merciful manner towards sinful humans. Eternal salvation would then be a given and therefore all human decisions -- good and evil, righteous and blasphemous -- would have no consequence.

I hope for your sake, David Mathews, you see the obvious contradiction here: omnibenevolence against omnipotence. If God could not act then he is definitely not omnipotent.

Pomp

Why don't we have a graemlin that I can use to indicate a nausea-inducing post???

Jobar

David: The concept of God has a direct impact upon the human intellect which is beneficial to all people who contemplate the subject. I suppose that even atheists receive benefits from thinking about God and that is why this subject is not pointless nonsense.

Yes, I agree that contemplating the very large questions is beneficial to us. And as a moderator on a forum called 'Existence of God(s)' I'd look pretty silly denying that I spend a lot of my time thinking and talking about the subject, not so? But I still maintain that the Christian concept of God- the theistic explanation for the universe, Jesus, souls, Heaven, Hell, et cetera- is non-sense. You yourself have said that God is beyond all our perception and comprehension. Why not just admit that you are trying to climb several steps beyond where the ladder of abstraction ends, and build on the things we can perceive and comprehend?

David: Atheists enjoy talking about God as much as any theist. God is such a powerful and attractive subject that humans have devoted their whole lives to exploring the subject, and humankind as a whole has invested several billion years to thought about God. I would not call such a huge investment a "con game."

I said "con game" referring to the fact that organized religion is a dishonest method for the priests and the powerful to bilk money and obedience from all those who fall for their ruses. Blind and unquestioning faith is the earmark of a sucker. I do agree that 'exploring the subject' and 'thought about God' can be enlightening and profitable- in that it leads one to question that which I have called "The evil which wears the mask of good", i.e. organized religion.


David: It seems possible to me that the choice of fates in the afterlife may not be available to those who consciously choose to reject heaven in this life. In such a case, no amount of pleading on the Day of Judgment will preserve the soul from punishment.

Ah-ah-ah, David! This seems to contradict your belief in the salvation of atheists- and besides, few of us absolutely reject all this, remember. We simply say that there is no least whiff of evidence that any of it is true! We try to live our lives as if it were meaningless- which to us it really is.


Me: What reason is there for you to preach to us?


David: The reason is because many of your concerns are also my own concern.

Good answer, despite the fact that we seem to be reaching different conclusions from similar evidence. I still am of the opinion that you are putting absolute faith in the words and ideas of men, which are always relative and approximate- but that is a common fault indeed!

I hope that you can continue to answer as honestly and directly as you have done in this thread. Remember, 'concern' is a synonym for 'care'!

MrDarwin

You mean like this?

Personally, I prefer the analogy of the father who warns his little daughter that as long as she loves him, everything will be wonderful, but she had better love him... or else. He never quite specifies what "or else" means, except that it's pretty horrible and painful, and will happen when she's least expecting it.

Well, this frightens her so much that instead of loving him, she fears him. So one night he comes to her bedroom, hauls her out of bed, throws her naked into the basement, and locks the door. She is trapped in the cold and dark, with no food and no water. She cries, screams, begs and pleads, but the father never, ever lets her out of the basement, and never speaks to her again, even as her cries fade to whimpers, because she didn't love him.

Of course she didn't love him! Her father was a sociopath, and anybody in their right mind would label him as such.

[ July 25, 2002: Message edited by: MrDarwin ]</p>

Wyrdsmyth

Hello David,

What I have always been curious about is that if a particular God exists, why does he not make his existence explicitly known to each and every one of us? If he wants us to be able to freely choose to obey or disobey him, love or not love him, that is fine. But how can he expect such a choice to be made when it is not evident to many of us that he even exists? Could he not, at the very least, put the knowledge within each of us that he indeed does exist, and is in fact the Judeo-Christian God and not some other? The exhortation not to worship "false Gods" seems somewhat incredulous. Clearly it is in the power of an all-powerful and all-benevolent and all-present God to make his presence and existence manifestly evident to each and every one of us, unequivocally. Yet, he does not do so. In fact, it does even seem quite likely to many of us that the Judeo-Christian God, like all other gods, is quite probably a societal construct, a mythological development. So, it seems to me quite evident that if God does exist, he likes being elusive and leaving us in the dark, and allowing the possibility in our minds that he doesn't exist, may not exist, or other religions might be correct. What is the purpose of this? Why only appear to a select few? Why manifest as a burning bush, or a voice to a select group of prophets in the Near East, or have a "chosen people" (the Israelites) among all the peoples of the earth? What is the point of that nationalism, that tribal deism? Is it not obviously more likely that the god of the Israelites, like the gods of other peoples, was created by the Israelites to justify and shore up their own interests and nationalism and desire to be united and to ward off oppressors? Is it not obvious that the Judeo-Christian religion has adopted other elements of other religions and philosophies, such as the flood myth, Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism, and incorporated them into an ongoing and developing conception of God?

[ July 25, 2002: Message edited by: Wyrdsmyth ]</p>