emur

Sorry to disappoint you, but it is not about pain being avoided first and foremost. It's about God being partial. And no, Christianity is not about being free from suffering and pain. That has never been my point. You seem to want to make it my point.

No, I don't want God to be partial to Christians, nor do I believe that being a Christian deserves the reward of healing. So I gather only those who think like you understand the message of the gospels?

And what does this have to do with Christians harming other Christians? Are you saying that the Christians that harm other Christians are wolves?

Just because the bible says God is a loving father doesn't make it so. The biblical qualities assigned to God range from a genocidal savage to love. These qualities are contradictory.

The God of the bible is a human construct. This is the reason Christians look at the bible and come to many different descriptions of God. Why is only yours correct? Are you somehow better or more "spiritual" than other Christians?

Mel

long winded fool

It's about God being partial about what and in what way?

No, I don't want God to be partial to Christians, nor do I believe that being a Christian deserves the reward of healing. So I gather only those who think like you understand the message of the gospels?

What do you think, emur? What is the problem with the "arbitrariness" of healing? If it is unloving, what is unloving about it? Keep in mind that you can't compare the physical suffering of a human father's children to the physical suffering of God's children, because the Bible specifically addresses this. It's all about the soul, not the body. The body is good, but the soul is the all-important self. It is truly who you are. The body can be easily and lovingly sacrificed if the soul requires it. (Abraham and Isaac?) God loves our eternal souls far more than our temporal bodies.

I don't know that anyone fully understands the Gospels, but yes: Those who think rationally and objectively about what they read comprehend more than those who read from any motive of emotion, (fear, contempt, desperate desire for grandeur.) Instead of finding two things that seem contradictory and throwing the whole Bible out in an emotional explosion of self-righteousness and vindication, (or throwing the contradictions out in the same way,) it is far more sensible to reread the part one doesn't understand and see if you've taken it out of context with the rest. Since the authors of the Bible were obviously quite brilliant to any who critically analyze the epic collection of inspired stories that are woven through the allegorical contexts of almost 70 books, it is logical to presume that such blatant and easily identifiable contradictions might have been thought of and might have explanations contained elsewhere in the context of the story, (like almost every other apparent contradiction that skeptics and fundies often use in order to stop thinking and start declaring.)

And what does this have to do with Christians harming other Christians? Are you saying that the Christians that harm other Christians are wolves?

Perhaps. Now we're getting into exactly who constitutes a Christian. Certainly not all who call themselves christian are Christian in the Biblical sense. Some who do not call themselves christian may be Christians. Even those who've never heard of the man "Jesus" can be Christian according to the Bible, since following Jesus is really just following total honesty and love. "I Am Truth," he said. Following the Truth is following Jesus. The Law is written on the hearts of everyone. God speaks no language, but is bound by none either. Like love.

I think I see where your problem is. Hurting someone in God's name is a sin. If you inflict harm on another person for your benefit, are you following the teachings of Jesus? If you are not, can you still be a Christian? Christians can't harm other Christians, but those who are trying to be Christian but failing can. Christianity is not a "club" which you join by declaring yourself to be a believer. It is merely a state of being. Think of it as synonymous with the word "good." Can Buddhists be good? Can Satanists? If one honestly desires to be free from moral mistakes and uses their gift of reason and love to be the best person they can be, aren't they "good" no matter what their religion? Aren't they "Christian" even if they have never read the Bible if being Christian is just being "good?" I know this is not the contemporary connotation of the word "Christian," but Christian means a follower of the teaching of Jesus, not a follower of the teaching of someone who claims to be a Christian. The teaching of Jesus is to love your brother and love God above all. If God is truth, goodness, and love, you should never do anything apart from these. If you follow these, you will love your brother as you love yourself. So you could say that a "christian" who harms another Christian is a wolf in sheep's clothing. (And maybe an "infidel" who loves goodness and truth above all and therefore loves his brother as he loves himself is a sheep in wolf's clothing? A little strange, possibly even confusing, but no less a part of the flock.)

Just because the bible says God is a loving father doesn't make it so. The biblical qualities assigned to God range from a genocidal savage to love. These qualities are contradictory.

The God of the bible is a human construct. This is the reason Christians look at the bible and come to many different descriptions of God. Why is only yours correct? Are you somehow better or more "spiritual" than other Christians?

Mel

I'm as good (or as bad) as the worst sinner in the world, because I sin. Even the smallest sin is a direct affront to God, and even the biggest sin is forgivable. I agree that because the Bible says God is a loving father doesn't make it so. If God were a loving father, only that fact would make it so. I'm not assuming my description is the correct one. I'm showing that yours is not Biblical. The interpretation I've presented is present in the Bible. I don't claim that it's complete or even irrefutable, but any interpretation that contradicts the one presented in the Bible for any to objectively read and understand represents a false Biblical interpretation, wouldn't you agree? If someone said God is really Satan in disguise, isn't this a false interpretation? It may be a fascinating idea, but if it is not present in the Bible, it cannot be a logical premise in an argument against the God of the Bible. It can only be a conclusion. Since the Bible makes clear that the soul is more important than the body, it is illogical to assume that God must be unloving if he allows the bodies of all of his children to be damaged and destroyed.

Incidentally, God does not allow his children to actually harm his other children in regards to the soul. No one can hurt your soul except for you (by way of your animal instincts) and then only if you allow your soul be hurt. Since the soul is the only truly important part, the physical body and even the physical life are there only to service the soul. The physical only carries value as long as it's doing its job of serving the soul. If the soul is better served by having the physical destroyed, then the loving thing for God to do is to destroy the physical body of the soul. No, it is not okay for a Christian to kill another Christian (or anyone else) to save their soul, even if it is with the best of intentions, because no Christian is free from sin, (or mistake.) Only God can judge, and he judges fairly and lovingly who should be killed and who should stay living based on the well being of the soul. This is the only loving thing to do. Whatever it takes to turn the hearts of those lost without force. Better to sacrifice every Christian life than sacrifice one soul.

Therefore, according to the nature of God, He can allow his children to physically harm each other without creating a conflict with his all-loving nature. The only thing this undercuts is the human instincts of pain avoidance and self-preservation. Since these instincts are not the proper objects of love, they cannot be given more value than the soul and remain in a philosophical discussion about the Biblical God.

scombrid

This is all well and good when the suffering is a direct result of our action. You know, if I cussed and got my mouth washed out with soap I knew that cussing caused the soap treatment. The cause/effect relationship is clear. Likewise, if I fought my brother and got whipped for it, once again we have a neat cause/effect.

Most human suffering is not linked so neatly in a cause/effect relationship. If I get terminal cancer from some genetic defect, what the hell am I being punished for? How do we figure it out? What about the "player" that has loads of sex without contracting an STD but then some poor kid gets HIV from a friggin transfusion or a dentist's drill that wasn't adequately autoclaved? What did that kid do to deserve god's tough love? Oh, I know Justice will be served in the end. But wait, suffering is supposed to be some sort of justice system that guides our behavior now. Why is the fornicator getting off scot-free and the innocent kid getting screwed?

I don't see god following people around slapping hands out of the cookie jar. I'm actually surprised that anyone argues that suffering is god's tough love. It has been sufficiently obvious to theologians of years gone by that earthly suffering is to arbitrary to be clear punishment for any one action. Some get around the arbitrary nature of god's wrath by blaming suffering on original sin. Others invented hell since earthly suffering is clearly not associated with an divine penal system.

emur

It would appear that you take the view that whatever God does is loving (assuming for a moment that God is interventionist). I believe that showing partiality is wrong, and as such it is not an action of a loving being. So it's wrong for God to heal Grandma Millie of her back problem but let Deacon Elmer die a slow death from cancer.

As for the body/soul dichotomy, I believe that much of the harm done to people by Christians isn't physical, but emotional. The discouragement and crushed spirits do affect the soul (if there is such a thing) in the here and now. I realize that you may put this under the catagory of the physical, however.

I don't share the same high regard for the bible that you do.

I never said that my understanding of God is biblical. My questions simply show why I am not a believer in the biblical God. They show why I believe God is neither interventionist nor a loving father.

We obviously are at an impass over the importance of the physical vs the soul. I don't share your conclusions. I cannot say for certain that a soul exists, but I do know that I as a person exist. And a belief system that downplays the person in this life for the soul in the next is untenable for me. But thanks for trying.

Mel

long winded fool

How can you say you are not a believer in the biblical God if your understanding of this God is not biblical? You are essentially saying you are not a believer in a non-biblical God. You may also not be a believer in the biblical God, but you haven't shown why. The logical attack you've constructed cannot apply to the God of the Bible, since the God of the Bible is not subject to the conflict you have presented, according to the Bible. Saying that you personally believe He is, regardless of what the Bible says and that's why you don't believe in Him begs the question.

I respect your conclusion and know that many share it. However, do you see that you are now disregarding your premise? You have attempted to show why you don't believe in the God of the Bible with a valid argument. One of the premises you used was false however, making the argument unsound. You have not shown how one could logically come to your conclusion based on your premises. You then proceed to say that you don't really accept the premise, and that therefore your conclusion ought to stand. This is begging the question.

It was not my intention to portray suffering solely as individual punishment. The point was that it is irrelevant to the question of God's love, whether we want to admit it or not. The importance humans project onto suffering is clearly not shared by the Biblical God. It is often punishment for wrong acts, and it is also a fact of life. Sometimes it is caused by right acts, and sometimes it doesn't follow wrong acts. The oft-repeated message of the Bible is to not fear poor physical condition, but to fear the poor condition of your soul. It's more important not to sin than it is to not suffer. (For true Christians anyway.) No matter how blessed a person is, we ALL always must undergo physical discomfort in our life. It is not arbitrary, it is universal. The amount of suffering undergone has nothing to do with anything other than personal comfort. The only sinless man who ever lived underwent massive amounts of suffering. More than most expert sinners will ever know. This is not arbitrary love because, while God cares how we feel at the moment of our suffering, he cares much more about where we'll be in eternity. If he doesn’t end our suffering, it can be rationally assumed to be for good reason. Pain is not the ‘arch-evil.’ Arbitrary love would be choosing who gets to be in the Kingdom of God and who doesn't based on nothing more than a whim, since not being in the Kingdom of God IS the ‘arch-evil.’ Since this is a common misconception of the Biblical God, it is necessary to elaborate: All are welcome in heaven. The only ones who don't go are the ones who don't want to go. They have every opportunity they can possibly have to decide while allowing for their free will. If they choose Hell over Heaven, then they are free to go there. The existence of suffering is not Biblically relevant to divine love. Relief of suffering is merely a strong desire of physical love.

emur

I've read the bible a number of times, have a masters degree from an evangelical seminary, read many works from an evangelical point of view, and have spent over ten years in ministry. I know what the bible says about God. Because you interpret the bible differently doesn't mean that you have the correct view and I don't.

You even said in a previous post that an infidel can be part of the flock. Now I don't have a problem with that, but it sure as hell is not in the bible, except via your interpretation.

No.

Which one?

You interpret the bible in such a way that God's arbitrary interventions (assuming God is interventionist) are OK, and that the bible's view of God as loving father is OK. Now I realize that the bible shows that God is interventionist and that those interventions are arbitrary. It also says that God is a loving father. I am saying that these things are not OK. Arbitrary intervention is wrong, and the picture of God as loving father is wrong. Thus I reject the biblical notion of God as true. And no theist to date has been able to answer my concerns to my satisfaction. I reject your physical/soul dichotomy, and as a result, you have not answered my concerns to my satisfaction.

Mel

scombrid

If suffering and healing are both apparently arbitrary to us (even if it's all within god's plan that we cannot know), what purpose do they serve? If not acting as an error correcting mechanism, as would be supposed if suffering were truly analogous to a mother taking away a child's priviledges for some offense, then what are the suffering and healing doled out by god meant to accomplish? The fate of our supposed soul depends on our actions in life. If god's reward/punishment system is purely arbitrary then it doesn't serve to correct our behavior/thoughts/beliefs and thus has no benefit for the soul and does harm to the physical body. What's god's point?

long winded fool

Emur, I think I understand your point. You reject the Biblical notion of God, like many do. According to your argument, you reject it solely because you intensely dislike it, (a fair reason) but not because it is inherently contradictory. It contradicts your own personal (non-biblical) beliefs, but it doesn't contradict itself. You understand how a God could be all-loving and allow arbitrary suffering if one accepts the physical/soul dichotomy clearly expressed in the Bible, however you reject this Biblical notion and therefore God. Fair enough. I can't explain how a God could be all loving and arbitrarily allow his children to suffer if the physical life is the only life. Luckily, this is not descriptive of the Biblical notion of God. To claim that it is represents a clear and provably false interpretation.

Perhaps we should look at the evolutionary purpose of suffering for a moment. Why do we have nerves that cause us to experience discomfort? While suffering is an error correcting mechanism, it is not the only error correcting mechanism. Our reasoning brains can correct our errors before we experience the suffering. This argument continually comes back to the idea that suffering is some kind of divine punishment for sin. It is "punishment" for acting wrongly in the same sense as not being able to eat steak is a punishment for not working. Pain is a consequence of either wrong human action, or other natural phenomena, it is not a divinely inflicted spanking. It is 'arbitrary' that those who don't have a job don't get enough steak to eat, because some do. Does this mean that having a job is not something to value, since those who don't often get the same benefits? What's the point of having a job if you can possibly get steak without one? These sound like the questions of someone who is unaware of the true value of having a job and a purpose in life. Getting steak is not the only reason to work, though it is a reason to work. In fact, with the exception of the extremely unfortunate, having a job is not required for eating. There are plenty of places to get food without having a job. It is even concievable that people who have jobs might get less steak to eat than someone who doesn't. Is this fair? No. Is it arbitrary? No. Circumstances are different for every individual. If surviving is all you care about, then that will be the purpose in your going to work everyday. If you care about things other than merely "getting steak," you will work for personal enjoyment, for education, for excercise, for human contact and relationships... etc.

Compare to life. If all you care about is avoiding pain, then that will be the center of your life. You will probably experience less pain than those who don't have this as a goal, but then you might not. Since there is actually more to life than avoiding pain, even though some people make this their whole life, experiencing suffering does not indicate failure, just as not getting as much steak to eat as the next guy doesn't indicate failure in a job... unless of course the only goal is to get the most steak to eat.

So then, the guy on the left who doesn't get to eat steak every night and is jealous of his neighbor in the middle who has no job and eats steak every night will cry "Not fair! Arbitrary!" But the guy on the right who doesn't need anymore food than will sustain him but loves his job as much as his neighbor in the middle loves his steak will happily join his neighbor in the middle for steak every once in a while and they'll get along great. The guy on the right who is poor has everything he wants, therefore there's really nothing to be jealous about. Assuming his rich neighbor in the middle also has everything he wants, these two men are equal. Only the jealous neighbor on the left who wants steak and can't afford it can see any unfairness or arbitrariness to complain about. And the unfairness exists only in his mind. Only in his goals. Instead of being happy with what he's been given like the neighbor on the right, he chooses to be upset and insecure. Decrying it unfair is only projecting the cause of his problems away from their true cause. Himself.

emur

Actually I reject the biblical notion of God both because I dislike it and because it is contradictory.

I dislike any genocidal savage, whether it is a human dictator or a human contruct of a supreme being. The same is true for a being that shows partiality.

As for loving father, the biblical picture of God is contradictory with some of the other characteristics given. Love and genocide do not go hand in hand, and neither does love and partiality.

Mel

Stephen T-B

I thought this to be an interesting remark from LWF: “In fact, with the exception of the extremely unfortunate, having a job is not required for eating.”

Doesn’t sound very Biblical to me. Didn’t God curse Adam with this: “By the sweat of thy brow shalt thou live...”?

LWF makes much of the Biblical message about the nature of God only making sense in terms of our souls.
Allowing physical suffering is therefore not a measure of wether or not he loves us.
OK. If only our souls matter, why were so many of the miracles described in the Bible (the learned lpetrich provided us with a representative sample) orientated towards meeting physical needs or relieving physical pain or discomfort?
If physical needs,/pain/discomfort are irrelevancies, why this emphasis on them?

Some of the miracles were intended to demonstrate God’s power – an extremely crude means, if I may say so, of accessing our souls.

Emu’s questions are entirely valid; LWF’s defence is spurious, demonstrating how a need to believe in the supernatural can evoke any interpretations - however ludicrous - which serve it.

If LWF needed to argue that black was white, we would see it being done.

The Bible is propaganda: in the pre-Christ eras it served to promote the national identity of an embattled people and in the post-Christ era it served to promote a religious doctrine. If it contains any truths about human nature and the human condition, it does so only to the extent that it combines great literary power with its propaganda role.
But I think Shakespeare does the job just as well.