I don't see it.

If we make assumption that God is involved (somehow) in the world, and has knowledge of what transpires and is capable of altering what transpires (else, how would we describe "involved?"), then it doesn't make sense.

Imagine, for a moment, a king, sovereign by law, sans constitution, so that all except the king must obey the laws made by the king. What then, shall we think of this king, who's law forbid murder, but who commits murder himself, being above the law?

I will grant you that he is "within his rights." I suspect, however, that I would be a somewhat disgruntled subject. I daresay I might even be receptive to revolutionary ideas of overthrowing such a monarch.

Now, it seems that at very minimum the God described most often to me is aware ("sees the little sparrow fall"), but does nothing to intervene, although it would be possible for Him to do so. Now, that He does not intervene means that sparrow is going down! This is perfectly within (a putative) God's rights, but once again, I would find myself a most disgruntled subject.

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evangelicalhumanist: Greek "eu"=good and "angelos"=messenger. Spreading the good news of Humanism.

I saw this today:


Quote:
If God is Good and evil exists, then God cannot exist.

My comment:

Evil is a relative concept... If a three year old snatches away a toy from another child.. We can accept this as part of a three year old's developement. Saying he doesn't yet know aboutboundaries and possessions and is developing his self concept. If a CEO of a major corporation seizes peoples' pensions and exploits them for himself we consider it "evil". So the concept is that God allows human beings to progress and develope in freedom.



Quote:
If God was all powerful, God would wipe out evil.

Comment:

Evil again is something that people have through their freedom of choice and is part of their developement... It is our job to reduce our evil and God does not I believe wave the magic wand to eliminate it...


What are your thoughts on good and evil?

Comment:

In a way good and evil are relative concepts and have to do with our choices... and what is instilled in us or what we accept.

- Art

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"it benefits us to be thoughtful, not of the glory of our minds, but rather, above all else, of the glory of God."
- Johannes Kepler

I think this is still assuming that what transpires is fixed from the beginning. What if it is not?


You are introducing some new aspects, including moral (rather than causative) law. Clearly, one of the characeristics of moral law is that it can be disobeyed. Whereas the law of gravity cannot be disobeyed. In fact, although the king forbids murder, no one is prevented from committing murder. Murder happens in spite of the prohibition. And it doesn't make any difference that the sovereign is a god.

The question remains, does this mean God is not omnipotent or omniscient? Do we, as human beings, have to be pre-programmed robots incapable of murder for God to be omnipotent/omniscient?

What logic requires that an omnipotent/omniscient God must not create free agents other than Godself? What logic requires that an omnipotent/omniscient God not incorporate elements of chance into the physical nature of the cosmos? What logic requires that an omnipotent/omniscient God use divine power/knowledge to interfere with God's own creation? Why would God have to do this in the first place? Why does God have to break God's own rules to prove to humanity his existence/omnipotence/omniscience?

Or to put it all succinctly---why is an open future inconsistent with omnipotence/omniscience?


For a very different conversation we can ask another question. Is an open future inconsistent with science?

It seems to me that a thorough-going determinism, such as some derive from scientific investigation of human behaviour, is actually an argument against omnipotence, not for it.

I'm going to have to be very brief, but I'll give a quick response to these and once you respond, I'll attempt to deal in more detail later.

To deal with the first point you raised, I think the reality of the situation is to deal with God in as much of a logical way we can, while at the same time realizing that our logic is very limited as well as our knowledge of the subject. In which other way can we operate? Spinoza and Einstein present a very logical approach to these questions, which does not necessarily mean they were correct.





But those may well be just anthropomorphic qualities that we've attached to God that may not exist in reality-- at least maybe the way we envision them.






Because it doesn't seem logical in any other way. Either He knew or He didn't know. Either He created all or He didn't. So here I have to agree with their logic, or we have to think that God was quite possibly neither omniscient and/or omnipotent.





Yes it would. But again, it is us that is assigning "omniscience" and "omnipotence" to God, which may miss the mark.

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"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."-- Einstein

You concluded with exactly the point I was going to make. There is no more reason to attribute omniscience to God than to attribute goodness to God. The latter may be no more real than the former.

In fact, in terms of the problem of evil one has no problem unless God is both omnipotent/omniscient and benevolent. So you cannot brush away the latter as only anthropomorphism. Without that attribute there is no need to account for evil. It simply is.



Why does it not seem logical? I wish someone would spell out the logic for me.

How does the premise of omnipotence/omniscience preclude a universe created to include chance elements? Why must omnipotence/omniscience create a deterministic universe? Why does the knowledge of possibilities and probabilites not count as relevant to omniscience?



Knew what? What would happen? What could happen? What would most probably happen? Human scientists seem to be able to figure out a lot of things with a high degree of confidence on the basis of probabilities. Why would that be a problem for an omniscient God?


Of course God created all, but how does that rule out random events as created or as an element in creation?

So, are we to summarize it which of the following ways?

1. No evil, no god.
   
2. No! Evil!! No god!!
   
3. No evil? Know god?
   
4. Know evil? Know god!

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Grassaf, Eolas

I think we may have a bit of a disconnect here. What I meant by the anthropomorphism comment is that the attributes that are so often attributed to God may well be anthropomorphisms. This not only may include "good" and "evil", but also "omniscience" and "omnipotence". Einstein felt, correctly or incorrectly, that the concept of a God who demanded moral behavior was simply "childish", to use his terminology. Personally, I am not willing to go that far by any means, but neither am I willing to attach attributes to God.






How could God produce that which He was not aware of? If I'm assembling a jig-saw puzzle that I actually made, how can I not be aware of all the pieces if I'm supposedly omniscient? We're not talking just about knowledge here-- we're also talking about the creation process. So I have to return back to how could an omniscient God not know exactly what He created to the point of not being able to determine what it will do and actually have that certainty programmed in? Who else or what else would program it in any other way?

The bottom line here: if God made all, and if He is fully aware of all He created, there's simply no opportunity for "chance".





I don't see that as being an "of course". Which accounts give positive indication of this "of course"? I honestly don't think the scriptures do us any good at this point. Do we believe the Bible describes God accurately? To a fundamentalist, "yes" would be their probably answer, but you and I aren't fundamentalists. Are the Biblical depictions of God more reliable than the Hindu or pantheistic concept?

Again, I gotta go for now, so hopefully we can get back to this tomorrow-- very busy day today.

__________________
"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."-- Einstein

I'm enjoying this conversation, and hope you don't mind if I insert a comment or two.

I agree that God would be totally aware of everything in His creation. That doesn't necessarily mean He created the physical world or that He would be aware of it. For example, He could be aware of the perfect life/spirit in us, the part which does not change and connects us with the whole. But the physical world, the body, space, etc., seem to suggest what is whole is actually split into pieces which are separate from each other. The world we live in is like a dream - it is a witness to our state of mind, our decision to be separate from the whole. It is our creation, or miscreation, as the case may be. We will "have it our way" until we decide differently.

As far as predestination goes, the concept only makes sense when we think in terms of time/space (which is a great witness to the separation ). If there is no time/space except in our mind, then in Reality there is no past, present or future, only the illusion of past, present and future. Ultimately, outside time (and in the eternal now) there would be no "pre" in predestination, because there is no before or after.

Ok. It just seemed when you first raised the point that you were speaking of only some attributes, not all. But you actually corrected that later in the post.


To me, it would be the other way around. The unethical gods of ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt, of the Homeric and Roman traditions are the ones that seem petty and childish. The Israelite insight that God does make moral demands seems a great deal more mature.



Why assume that a world which includes the dynamics of chance is a world God must be unaware of?



But is a jigsaw puzzle an appropriate image of the world? A jigsaw puzzle suggests a fixed, static world assembled, like a machine from pre-existing components according to a pre-planned blueprint.

But the world as we know it is not a fixed, static, robotic mechanism. It is much more like a dynamic, changing, developing organism.

Why assume that omniscience can only comprehend or know what is fixed? Is omniscience not able to trace a dynamic flow with its many possibilities?


But is the programming that of a computer or more like that of DNA? Why does creation have to be machine-like to be known by God? Why can chance accidents (mutations) not be part of the process because God chooses that kind of a process in preference to that of computer language?

How does it lessen God's omnipotence or omniscience to work with something alive and agential in its own right? Is the knowledge and skill of a gardener somehow less than that of a mechanic or engineer?

Indeed, it seems to me that we are struggling here with images of God and nature, and how they relate to one another. Since the Enlightenment, it has been customary to think of nature as a grand machine and God as the engineer who designed it.

And the notion of omnipotence/omniscience which is being proposed is one that fits that worldview. It is also one that almost necessarily leads to the Deistic view of God as totally transcendant and indifferent to creation once the jigsaw puzzle is completed. Indeed why should God take any interest in what is essentially a finished work?

But what if we change worldviews and see nature as more organic, a la the Gaia view of earth? And God is immanent in, as well as transcendant to, creation? What understanding of omnipotence and omniscience becomes appropriate to this worldview?

You compared God to a person making and putting together a jigsaw puzzle. But maybe God is more like the professional poker player who knows intimately all the possible card combinations and the probabilities of every hand--and who has a game plan already in mind, no matter which card is drawn. Why would this not also be omniscience and omnipotence?



I disagree. I see no logic that requires this conclusion. I think it is dependent on a particular worldview that limits the possibilities of the creator/created relationship.


First, we would have to ask, "which biblical description"? It is not as if there is only one.


No, I am not a fundamentalist, but I am a Christian, and with all due respect, yes, I do believe the Biblical depictions are more accurate.

To me, the idea that God did not create the physical world or is unaware (and unconcerned) about it makes no sense at all.

I suppose if one believes in the fundamental unreality of the physical, it is logical. But I find that concept very unsatisfying.



I know many people treat "predestination" and "predetermination" as interchangeable terms, but I think that distorts the meaning of "predestination". As you many know it is a concept associated with Calvinist theology. And critical to it is the idea that God acts as a free and sovereign agent in predestining his elect to salvation.

Specifically, predestination is NOT based on God's foreknowledge of what a person will do or become. That would turn predestination into a reward for foreseen good behaviour, and in Christian theology, salvation is always a gift, never a reward for merit, never something earned.

As I see it, any sort of predetermination of human choices also robs God of his sovereign freedom and so of the freedom to bestow salvation on his predestined elect as a free and unmerited gift.