Kvalhion

To learn that such a being does exist, and has existed, wouldn't really make much of an impact on my perspective of life. Going by what we see and experience every single day, there is no notable difference between the happiness and suffering of believers and nonbelievers. In other words, whether or not such a god exists and has existed, things would be the same.

What possible explanation could a 'greatest possible being' have for stories such as this one that would make me "happy"? At best, such a being is irrelavent.

xian

1. loaded question. i cannot answer this.

2. yes, and i still do

xian

Q: What would it honestly take for you not to believe?

A: The dead body of Jesus. But even then I'd still be a theist.


Q: Are you a biblical literalist? If so, how do you reconcile the Creation story?

A: I'm not sure what you mean by "literalist"...if you mean that I believe the earth was created in 144 hours, where each hour is composed of 60 minutes, comprised of 60 seconds which is the duration of 9,192,631,770 cycles of microwave light absorbed or emitted by the hyperfine transition of cesium-133 atoms in their ground state undisturbed by external fields....then no, I do not believe that, though I haven't "ruled it out" so to speak.

Q: If your so called GPB revealed himself to you, and like in the OT, he point blank asked you to murder, honestly, what would be your reaction?

A: Attempted obedience.

Q: Would you think it an illusion?
A: If he revealed himself to me according to my criteria necessary for carrying out the act of killing someone, then it would obviously not be an illusion. If the infinite creator of the universe, which owns all bipedal anthropodic bags of mostly water on this planet, says "I require the life of this particular person" and does so in an objective relvelation which would satisfy my criteria for identifying illusion from a demonic spirit from God himself, then you are darned straight i'm going to obey. At least try anyway.

Baloo

Well, I kind of answered this in the previous discussion, but I'll toss it in here as well (rather than ask people to read 250 or so posts to find it). I find the idea of a Loving Creator to be completely contradictory to the God described by a literal reading of the Old Testament. I could no more asses how I'd feel about that deity than you could asses what color a sqare-circle ought to be. However, I'd truthfully be overjoyed about the LC God existing. I think Bill Snedden put it much better than I did, so I'll leave it at that.

BadBadBad

Well I think you may be unique xian. You didn't deny the possibility of my hypothetical. Your initial response was not to flat out reject God. I congratulate you for at least sticking to christianity as defined by the revelation of God through the Bible. I mean, I'm surprised that my hypothetical seems to be so offensive to so many christians that I've proposed it to. A large portion of the Bible is the supposed history of exactly that kind of revelation from God. It's really all we know of what God might reveal to us about his will and divine purpose.

It is a little disturbing to me though that you did have some rather critical exclusion clauses in your answer that I think we should discuss. Why the exclusion clauses? Why not just flat out uncategorically yes?

And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son.

What is the difference between your faith and Abraham's?

What are your necessary criteria? What do you mean "does so in an objective relvelation which would satisfy my criteria for identifying illusion from a demonic spirit from God himself?" That's the crux of the question isn't it? You don't really have such quantitative or even qualitative criteria do you? Why does God need to satisfy your criteria for revelation. What happened to your faith? How would you really delineate, illusion, IPU, GPB, devil, Allah, or Yahweh?

Why do you qualify your obedience with "attempted" and "at least try?"

Before you answer, think about your own statement again:

"he will reveal himself to you in a way in which you are not expecting, yet will not negate the need for faith"

Dianna

xian: If the infinite creator of the universe, which owns all bipedal anthropodic bags of mostly water on this planet, says "I require the life of this particular person" and does so in an objective relvelation which would satisfy my criteria for identifying illusion from a demonic spirit from God himself, then you are darned straight i'm going to obey. At least try anyway.

What is an objective revelation? What are workable criteria for distinguishing between an illusion from a demonic spirit, or perhaps Satan himself, and a command from God?

Thanks,
Dianna

xian

please see my response under Baloos latest variant of this question for answers to your questions. if they aren't answered enough, please ask them over there!

HaysooChreesto!

I didn't forget anything. It was a simple answer to a simple question with a little pondering thrown in.
I don't feel the need to run the OP around in circles when I know damn well what she's asking. I don't find it necessary to attempt to confound a person of faith with a million inane questions when a simple answer is all that's required.
The OP was neither rude, argumentative, or insufferable so I felt no need to respond in such a way myself...

Asha'man

Actually, you are not talking at all about the Greatest Possible Being. You are talking about the Greatest Imaginable Being. We don’t know what is possible, so any talk about the GPB is pure speculation. It is entirely plausible that being disembodied and intelligent is simply not possible, intelligence may require a physical brain, so your Imagined being isn’t possible. Perhaps being eternal makes you self-centered and vindictive, no entity can survive a Trillion years of boredom without giving up on all us mayfly mortals. Again, that would render your definition of God impossible, and therefore pointless.

Actually, it is pretty clear that the Judeo Christian God, as described in the OT, is nothing like the Greatest Possible Being, or even the Greatest Imaginable Being. It is trivial to imagine a being that is less jealous and vengeful. The God of the OT has clearly bumbled his relationship with humanity horribly. A more competent God would have managed to create humans in such a way that they never left the Garden of Eden, and would not have needed mass extermination via drowning. There should be a way for everybody to be happy without anyone getting nailed to a tree.

If I became convinced that the OT Judeo Christian God was real, I would be morally obligated to join Satan and oppose him. (I may, however, not have the personal strength to follow my moral obligation.) I would be horrified and terrified, knowing that life on earth was under the watcful eye of a murderous tyrant, and that there was little hope for me in the afterlife either.

However, as Jobar points out, there are several escape clauses here. The God of the NT is clearly something different than the God of the OT. Perhaps there is some massive misunderstanding going on, perhaps there really is a omnibenevolent entity out there, but the Bible is not an accurate description of him. If it turned out that the Bible was actually an inaccurate description of God, and that God was really more like the pleasant fantasy described by most Sunday school teachers, then my attitude would be entirely different. How could I not be glad to find a truly loving God?

So, which god were you asking about again? The Greatest Imaginable Being is not Possible, so answering that is pointless. The Greatest Possible Being is undefined, so answering that is impossible. I would not be at all glad if the God described by the OT was real, I would be terrified and horrified. The God described by the NT, assuming massive misunderstandings, might make me happy.

Silent Dave

Why is it a loaded question?


Dave