God and Free Will

IceAgeCivilizations said:
You say it doesn't mean what it says, and that it really has some hidden meaning which has been somehow lost through the years, but you can't say when it was written, when it was supposedly changed, nor what it was like before it was changed, so what are you left with?
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I didn't say what was written was changed - where did you get that?
I am saying that I have an alternate view of how it is interpreted by many people and religions.

Believe it or not, I have spoken with a few Rabbis and Rabinnical students about my interpretation, and they agree with me.
I have also been told that interpretations in the Talmud support what I have said (though I haven't read them myself, so I can't say for certain).

What am I left with?
An interpretation that makes much more sense to me than the typical Christian interpretation and is supported by those who practice the religion which the book actually belongs to and outdates the Christian religion.
I am also left with an open mind, and many more questions.

What do you have?
 
IAC,

You are not clever enough to play Plato, and I'll not play along with your games.
Please refrain from trying to back me into a corner and simply be honest and open.
If you are, we could have some good discussions, I'll wager.
If you aren't, I'll take it as a sign that you have no desire to have any real discussions (because you already have your forgone conclusions, and are not interested in challenging them) and I will simply ignore you.
Thank you.
 
one_raven said:
IAC,

You are not clever enough to play Plato, and I'll not play along with your games.
Please refrain from trying to back me into a corner and simply be honest and open.
If you are, we could have some good discussions, I'll wager.
If you aren't, I'll take it as a sign that you have no desire to have any real discussions (because you already have your forgone conclusions, and are not interested in challenging them) and I will simply ignore you.
Thank you.
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IAC's intellectually laden one-liners do about as good a job of putting someone in a corner as trying to put out a skyscraper fire with a Super soaker.

Raven,

I finally read all of that post you linked on the first page of this thread. Kudos to you. That makes more sense to me than any explanation in the bible or by any apologist.
That begs a question for me then, once the child is away from the parents and out on his own, what happens way down the road when the child is staring their own mortality in the face? Does the 'accept jesus or burn for eternity in hell' rule still apply? Wouldn't a parent love their child(ren) as they were, regardless of the choices they make, and not forsake them to an eternal life of torture?
 
mikenostic said:
IAC's intellectually laden one-liners do about as good a job of putting someone in a corner as trying to put out a skyscraper fire with a Super soaker.
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I know, but I am a stubborn son of a bitch, and I never give up when I should.
I keep thinking I'll get through to him, and he will finally play with an open deck and we can have some interesting discussions.
I'm stupid.

mikenostic said:
I finally read all of that post you linked on the first page of this thread. Kudos to you. That makes more sense to me than any explanation in the bible or by any apologist.
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I'm glad you read it and I'm glad you like it.

mikenostic said:
That begs a question for me then, once the child is away from the parents and out on his own, what happens way down the road when the child is staring their own mortality in the face? Does the 'accept jesus or burn for eternity in hell' rule still apply?Wouldn't a parent love their child(ren) as they were, regardless of the choices they make, and not forsake them to an eternal life of torture?
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Let me just say that if the God Jesus was referring to, Heaven and Hell actually DO exist, then I think (according to the words attributed to Jesus) a "good" Atheist will have a better chance of getting to Heaven than a Christian who behaves only out of fear of Hell.

I'm not saying that all Christians only behave out of a fear of Hell, I am just saying that those who do, will have a harder time getting into Heaven than someone who had no fear of Hell, yet still was a good person.
 
IceAgeCivilizations said:
If Atheists can get to Heaven, then Jesus died and resurrected for no reason.
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Jesus said that you can get to Heaven through him.
As I understand it he was saying that if you follow his teachings, you will get to Heaven.
Do you agree?

His teachings, as you are well aware, are covered in the Synoptic gospels (I reject the book of John, but that's a topic for another discussion) and (though debated) the extra biblical books (The Apocrypha and Gnostic books).
Do you agree?

I think his teachings are best summed up by the Beatitudes.
Do you agree?

If an Atheist lives his live by those same principles as the words he taught, and Jesus' goal was to get people to be "good" why would that Atheist be denied Heaven?

As for his resurrection...
Let me ask you this...
1.) If God told you that if you were to give away all your money, every last dime, and he will pay you back tomorrow by giving you an endless supply of money and anything else you ever need, what sacrifice have you made?
2.) If Jesus was God, as opposed to just a wise and great teacher, why did he ask why God had forsaken him when he was on the cross?
 
No, He said "you must be born again," and that He is THE way, THE truth, and THE life, and that "no man comes to the Father but by me," says Jesus.

You can't be good enough to please God on your own, you must have Jesus as your advocate to the Father, who paid your sin debt on the Cross, and that only by being "born of the Spirit."
 
IceAgeCivilizations said:
If Atheists can get to Heaven, then Jesus died and resurrected for no reason.
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Yeah - that would be a pisser for you, wouldn't it! :)

"How can you lot get into Heaven?! I prayed my arse off for this reward - and what did you lot do other than lead a genuinely good life for no alterior motive?"

:D
 
IceAgeCivilizations said:
Better re-read that Med Woman.
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*************
M*W: I read it. Jesus neither lived nor died nor rose again. However, the sun performs these 'miracles' everyday. Atheists don't have a need to go to a mythological place in the sky. Atheists look up at the night sky to observe the stars, constellations and planets. We're quite content to be here on earth and see "heaven" for what it really is sans ancient myths.
 
Isnt this thread supposed to be about free will?

well to get it back on track, take a crack at this theists..

Free Will and an Omniscient God is a logical impossibility!

If God knows everything that is happening and will ever happen, everything is predetermined and thus you have no free will, you can never surprise God.

For Example, you have the choice of picking up a red ball or a blue ball..

God already knows that you will pick the red ball. You have no free will. God knows you will pick the red ball and you are helpless to do otherwise. And if you start for the red one but then pick up the blue one, God knew your plan all along and you had no choice but to pick up the blue one. If God knows the future, everyone is a puppet playing helplessly into God's predetermined plan for everyone.

God already knows who will believe in him and who wont. Thus I, as a nonbeliever, do not have the free will to believe in him.

Basically, free will is incompatible with an omniscient god.

*Not related to free will, but many of god's other attributes are incompatible. For example, God can't be omnipotent and omniscient, for if he knew the future that means he would be incapable of changing it. If he knows that an earthquake will kill hundreds of innocent people, he could intervene and change it so that nobody dies, but he would have known all along that he would intervene, so he is now powerless to not intervene. It all boils down to God(as omnipotent, omniscient, and granting free will) is IMPOSSIBLE!!
 
Jeff 152 said:
Free Will and an Omniscient God is a logical impossibility!

If God knows everything that is happening and will ever happen, everything is predetermined and thus you have no free will, you can never surprise God.
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This is simply a semantic argument, therefore pretty meaningless.

Omniscient does not necessarily mean that he knows everything that WILL happen.
It means that he knew everything there is to know.
The future could be unknown and unknowable.
 
If God know Everthinkg then Free will is an Illusion

one_raven said:
This is simply a semantic argument, therefore pretty meaningless.

Omniscient does not necessarily mean that he knows everything that WILL happen.
It means that he knew everything there is to know.
The future could be unknown and unknowable.
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Jeff 152 makes a classic point about the incompatibilites of the most common ideal of God (allknowing, all-powerful, ever present etc.) How can God know everything, yet not know the future?

Perhaps the point your trying to make Raven, is that the illusion of free will is still free will to us humans...if not God. Although God might be able to see a predetermined future, the fact that we humans can't allows us to THINK we are making free will choices.

But the illusion of free is not free will. If God know everything, the he not only has perdetermined our lives before we were born, he also has no free will himself because his actions are bound by his knowledge of the future as Jeff 152 pointed out.
 
No. The point I was trying to make is that God can be omniscient, and still not know the future, simply because it is unknowable.

I can certainly conceive of a God that knows all there is to know, and not know the future, becaue that is not something that is to be known.

Omniscient is simply a word, and it's not even a word that appears in the Bible.
 
Roman said:
Did god grant men free will?
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yes


Does god ever prevent men from exercising free will?
Should god prevent men from exercising free will for his divine plan, or preventing murder, or stuff like that? Does he?
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you are mixing things here


Basically the divine plan of god is that all living entities utilize their free will to develop a loving relationship with him - refusing that (by our free will of course) lands us in the material world - kind of like a person in jail also has free will, but the nature of their environment greatly inhibits their ability to fulfill their desire
 
What about when god hardened the hearts of the Canaanites to prevent them from seeking peace with Isaiah and his barbarian tribes of Israelites, so that the Israelites could slaughter every man, woman, child and animal?

Is that not a gross transgression of the free will that god gave to man? And if god's willing to do that sort of thing, why can't he soften people's hearts so they don't, I dunno, shoot and kill 31 people?
 
If there's a god, there's no free will, if god exist He has no free will.

Hence the theist themselves made god an impossible phenomenon, when they tried to make him omnimax of all it's attributes.

If god be omniscient, then he has perfect knowledge of an outcome of a human decision, if an entity has foreknowledge of such a decision, then humans hold no free will.

If god is omniscient, he then can't change that which he knows that is going to happen, therefore if god can't change an outcome of an event, because he knows that event shall happens a certain way, and a certain way only, then god has no free will.

God contradicts free will:
http://www.vexen.co.uk/religion/rm.html#FreeWill

Limitations of being Omnipotent - No Free Will
http://www.churchofreality.org/wisd...tions_of_being_omnipotent_-_no_free_will.html
 
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Godless said:
If there's a god, there's no free will, if god exist He has no free will.

Hence the theist themselves made god an impossible phenomenon, when they tried to make him omnimax of all it's attributes.

If god be omniscient, then he has perfect knowledge of an outcome of a human decision, if an entity has foreknowledge of such a decision, then humans hold no free will.

If god is omniscient, he then can't change that which he knows that is going to happen, therefore if god can't change an outcome of an event, because he knows that event shall happens a certain way, and a certain way only, then god has no free will.

God contradicts free will:
http://www.vexen.co.uk/religion/rm.html#FreeWill

Limitations of being Omnipotent - No Free Will
http://www.churchofreality.org/wisd...tions_of_being_omnipotent_-_no_free_will.html
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Blah de blah blah.

I have evidence in the scripture of god taking away free will so his chosen people could continue with their genocide. I'd like someone to explain to me how this fits in with the qualities that lightgigantic and his ilk typically assign god.
 
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