Convince me that God is loving

[Alien826]

The word "but" usually is used when the person thinks there is a problem, in this case with "there are many Paths to God"

I rather would phrase it like:
"There are many paths to God, butand if the person is sincerely seeking God, he will get there"

I would not use "but" here, as I realize that all Paths as brought to us by Saints, Prophets, Avatars, Messengers are Granted to humanity by God...I rather not critique ("but") God for this

In this case I would not reply to God starting with "but", instead I would thank God for Granting us so many Paths,

and they all lead to God...isn't that great?

As this thread is already all over the place, what do you think of these ideas?

There is one path to God, but many vehicles to travel in. (The vehicles are among other things religious practices).

Paths (or the path) are not brought to us by Saints etc, they are already there. Saints just point to them for us.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

resurrection as it is referred to in the Bible does not mean revivication of a dead body.

My point is that if one is allowed to assign whatever meaning to the words in scripture that he prefers, the words mean no more or less than whatever he says they mean. I choose to assign the meaning that I did. Your mileage may vary.

And I disagree with you about what the Bible reported happened. They make a big deal about rolling the stone away and the grave being empty.

But it doesn't matter what they were thinking, because all we have are their words, and words mean whatever we want them to mean in biblical apologetics. A day isn't a literal day if you need it not to be. Meek doesn't mean meek. Slaves weren't really slaves. Bad isn't really bad if you're a god. Contradictions aren't really contradictions if you read all of the words just right.

 

[Alien826]

Of course God KNEW that suffering would result from His creation, but God's knowledge of that is not what CAUSES the suffering.

Do me a favor, or not as you wish. Go back and read my argument, which I put some time and effort into, as a connected series of points then respond to that? I don't have the time to set it all out again.

Nevertheless, if God had not create a world in which suffering could take place, then suffering could not take place, but happiness could not take place either. I say that because the nature of this world offers opportunities for both suffering and happiness.

Happiness is optional. That's why the American Declaration of Independence gives "the pursuit of happiness" as a right rather than just "happiness". Some people can be happy in horrible circumstances and others refuse to be happy not matter what. There is no doubt in my mind that worlds more conducive to that pursuit can be envisioned. Suffering and happiness are not interdependent, though. I can imagine a world where no reasonable person would be unhappy, can't you?

I'll tell you a story, I just remembered it. On another forum, there was an atheist who was formerly a Christian who I used to post to for about eight years, practically daily. Once he told me that God could have created a world where there was only happiness, and no suffering. He told me that is what he thinks God should have done. Maybe he was thinking of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

You have to note the different meanings of "suffering" and "happiness". One is what happens, the other is how we react to it. I do think there could be a world with no externally caused suffering.

He also said that God could have created humans so they will never die. I told him he should rejoin the Christians who believe that is the way it was 'in the beginning' and the way it was intended to be forever.

I can't think of anything worse than living forever.

No, God did not design humans to be less than perfect. God created us all good, not perfect, but after that the ball was in our court to become more or less good, or even evil, since we all have free will.

But God created free will also ...

Yes, we are free to make bad choices, but how is that God's fault? If we were not free to make bad choices we could not make good choices either.

How about using our free will to decide between different good things?

Why is my analogy a bad analogy?

Why is a manufacturer that makes cars where the brakes fail on a regular basis a good analogy?
I don't understand how that is an analogy at all. Nobody chooses to have their brakes fail.

God made us faulty. It's not the car's fault when the brakes fail, it's the fault of the manufacturer.

Are you saying that God makes humans such that they have no choice except to fail?
That makes no sense since not all humans fail.

It's not me saying it.

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)

But I agree, nobody is perfect.

 

[Trailblazer]

And I disagree with you about what the Bible reported happened. They make a big deal about rolling the stone away and the grave being empty.

You do not 'disagree with me' since I do not believe what the Bible reported happened.
Rolling the stone away and the grave being empty is no big deal to me since it does not prove that Jesus rose from the dead 'even if it actually happened.'

 

[Truthseeker]

You do not 'disagree with me' since I do not believe what the Bible reported happened.
Rolling the stone away and the grave being empty is no big deal to me since it does not prove that Jesus rose from the dead 'even if it actually happened.'

Hello, Susan. I've started the Zoom meeting. Just reminding you.

 

[Trailblazer]

Hello, Susan. I've started the Zoom meeting. Just reminding you.

I got it.

 

[Watchmen]

Is God ALL powerful? Yes.
Is God ALL knowing? Yes.
Is God Omnipresent? Yes.
Does God ALLOW suffering? Yes.
Sounds like god is a d 1 c k.

 

[Trailblazer]

Do me a favor, or not as you wish. Go back and read my argument, which I put some time and effort into, as a connected series of points then respond to that? I don't have the time to set it all out again.

I don't have time to go back and respond to all the points you made, but I know what your position is, so let's just move forward.

Happiness is optional. That's why the American Declaration of Independence gives "the pursuit of happiness" as a right rather than just "happiness". Some people can be happy in horrible circumstances and others refuse to be happy not matter what. There is no doubt in my mind that worlds more conducive to that pursuit can be envisioned. Suffering and happiness are not interdependent, though. I can imagine a world where no reasonable person would be unhappy, can't you?

I would not say that happiness is optional, as if some people do not choose it as an option, and I would not say that people refuse to be happy no matter what. People are either happy or they are not and it is not because they try to be happy or because they refuse to be happy.

Happiness is a mental-emotional state. There are many factors that lad to happiness and they are different for each individual. It is not simply the circumstances of a person's life that lead to happiness, it is how they process those circumstances in their minds, and that is primarily related to their childhood upbringing and their genetic predisposition, neither of which were within their control.

Worlds more conducive to happiness can be envisioned, but they are not material worlds, because the material world is what causes sorrow as well as happiness. It's a mixed bag.

I can imagine a world where no reasonable person would be unhappy, and that is the spiritual world, aka heaven. This material world was never intended to be a paradise, despite what some Christians believe.

You have to note the different meanings of "suffering" and "happiness". One is what happens, the other is how we react to it. I do think there could be a world with no externally caused suffering.

I am not sure what you mean by 'externally caused suffering.' Are you saying that there could be a world where nobody would react to anything external and suffer from it, so they would always be happy?

There are some Baha'is who believe we are already living in such a world, but I disagree with them because I think they are very naive, to believe that or to think that just because some of their scriptures say that. Every mental health professional knows that is not true.

I can't think of anything worse than living forever.

I tend to agree with you the way I feel now, but since I have not died and seen what is on the other side, I cannot know how I will feel after I die. I could change my mind.

But God created free will also ...

So are you saying that it's God's fault if we choose not to be good?

How about using our free will to decide between different good things?

We could do that, but are you saying that God could have made bad choices impossible?
How do you think God could do that?

God made us faulty. It's not the car's fault when the brakes fail, it's the fault of the manufacturer.

God did not make us faulty, God made us all good. Some people then became faulty by choice.

It's not me saying it.

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)

But I agree, nobody is perfect.

Yes, all humans fail in some ways, but I don't see the problem with that.
Only God is perfect. Humans can never be God so they can never be perfect.

 

[Brian2]

Did God know that before he created them? If so, God is responsible for creating that evil. It doesn't speak well of this creator that he finds his failures intolerable and punishes them. It's also not very omnipotent to not be able to do something that I can do and do do every day - coexist with the shortcomings of others.

Yes God is responsible for creating us and knowing we would all sin and doing it anyway and reaching out to us to repent and come back to Him and for judging us and for not wanting the continuation of evil in His creation.
If it was your choice, would you allow people to live in your little town who are murderers and rapists and thieves etc when they want to continue with those things and cause suffering in your town?
Are our evil deeds the result of God's failure or are we to blame for our own actions? You seem to think that humans are not responsible for their actions.

It's this fluidity of interpretation that allows the religion to evolve under the influence of humanistic values despite the words being fixed. We see this in the discussions of biblical slavery. A few millennia back, slavery was acceptable to the bible writers. The rules for it were elucidated. Have you seen the American news about five cops who beat a man to death recently? He died three days after the beating, which would be acceptable if he were a slave of the Hebrews in antiquity. Obviously, the modern Christian needs to sanitize all of that, and he has by changing meanings. Was it this thread where we saw owned people called servants rather than slaves? We are told how this was helpful to these people. That's revisionism. No idea that offends modern sensibilities is to be taken literally.

We try to understand slavery for what it was in those times and yes there is some sanitizing that is used probably but there is no doubt misrepresenting of Biblical teaching about such things as slavery by those who don't like Bible teaching.

It means whatever you want it to mean. It also means whatever I or anybody else wants it to mean. There is no literal secular meaning for evil. That's a religious term referring to a disembodied universal principle in conflict with its opposite. I'm a humanist. We don't consider either physical injury or distress evil. Also, words like divine and sin have no meaning to a humanist except in metaphorical terms.

Since we are talking about Biblical terms those terms need to be understood in the Biblical sense of what they meant.

And why doesn't that deserve to be called evil to the Abrahamic theist? That's a perfect description of Satan in the garden. Calamity of biblical proportion befell man following that. And yes, the omniscient, omnipotent creator of Satan is responsible for Satan and for unleashing it on the earth, and for building it an eternal torture pit. I understand that much or all of that is unacceptable to the modern Christian, and so he just redefines everything. Nothing means what it says because the meanings of those words have changed.

We try to understand the meaning in the original meaning.

Then she was not responsible for the harm that's inherent in human nature. Whoever was the author of that nature is responsible for it, assuming that that harm could be foreseen and prevented.

If creatures are moral beings it means they can choose to do what is wrong or what is right. Being moral being is what is inherent in our nature.
Most people who judge God in the Garden of Eden seem to think that God did not want Adam and Eve to know good and evil, to grow and mature etc. This seems to be something that you think would be a better state for humans to be in,,,,,,,,,,,,, ignorance, beings who are not moral beings and so who cannot do right or wrong. Is that right or am I misunderstanding you.
Do you think that God did not want Adam and Eve to learn eventually about right and wrong?

If God exists, he is either not omniscient, not omnipotent, or not omnibenevolent.

Does that mean that you think that He has dealt with human evil the wrong way? How would you have dealt with it?

 

[Brian2]

You are making two suggestions.

1. It was not possible to make humans that are "better" than we are. My response is that humans vary in their "morality level". We see that it is possible for a human with a very high moral "score" to exist. If it is possible for some such humans to exist, then all humans could have been made at this higher standard. So though I'll grant the possibility that a perfectly moral human could not exist, it's clear that, as a group, we could be a lot better than we are.

I would say that humans could have been a lot better than we are if Satan had not lied to them and tempted them through that lie to sin.
God may have gone on to teach Adam and Eve about good and evil in a better way so that they could learn without actually doing what is evil.

2. Creation is a better choice than non creation. Given #1 (though if I'm right, a third option, a "better" creation exists), then we're looking for some reason why what we have with all it's suffering is better than nothing. I think, as we're assuming God's benevolence, there has to be some reason, and that reason can't be because he was bored or for his own benefit. Personally, I would not be comfortable being in heaven if the price for that was the suffering of others. (Let's make sure this is understood, as I sense a misunderstanding coming. According to your last sentence, the only way to get people in heaven is to create this world where many suffer and a few are rewarded. If I were to be among the rewarded, I would not be able to enjoy that reward knowing how many suffered to bring it about.)

God in the Bible knows what will happen and did not allow it because He was bored.
But really I don't think it was inevitable that there is all this suffering caused by human evil. It was a result of humans' initial evil that we are all in the s**t now and God is probably dealing with it in the best possible way and the end result, the happiness at the end, will probably make all the suffering seem not that bad when looked back on from that perspective and hopefully we will understand why it had to be this way.

 

[It Aint Necessarily So]

Yes God is responsible for creating us and knowing we would all sin and doing it anyway and reaching out to us to repent and come back to Him and for judging us

That doesn't sound like a god. I could do better than that, and so could you. If I couldn't create creatures incapable of avoiding behaviors of which I disapproved, behaviors they would need to repent despite my shortcomings as a creator, shortcomings that I cannot tolerate and for which I would feel the need to dispose of them in a lake of fire, I wouldn't create any at all. Of course, I can tolerate that. I have all my life, and have difficulty understanding why a transcendent being can't do at least as well.

If it was your choice, would you allow people to live in your little town who are murderers and rapists and thieves etc when they want to continue with those things and cause suffering in your town?

No. Why do you ask? Is this the justification for throwing people like me, "the unbelieving," in hell? The scriptures equate unbelievers with the worst scum: "But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone." - Revelation 21:8

Are our evil deeds the result of God's failure or are we to blame for our own actions?

A tri-omni god would be responsible if one existed. And our misdeeds are not done against the god, so it has no legitimate complaint.

You seem to think that humans are not responsible for their actions.

That is incorrect, but they are not responsible for the urges programmed into them from birth. I attribute those to our evolutionary heritage. We have inherited the ways of multiple types of prior beasts. We still have our reptilian brain and its urges. We still have our mammalian brain and its urges superimposed on those. And we have our human brain superimposed on those. The Abrahamic creationist believes that all of those contradictory urges arise with the creation of man from dust and a rib by a tri-omni god. So why are they there?

We try to understand slavery for what it was in those times

It was then what it is now - stealing a persons freedom, humanity, labor and children. I think you mean that you look for ways to forgive the behavior and condone it like the Bible writers do.

there is no doubt misrepresenting of Biblical teaching about such things as slavery by those who don't like Bible teaching.

Then it should be easy to produce an example. I'll I've ever seen from skeptics on the topic is quoted Bible scripture. The misrepresenting I've seen is by the apologists trying to make this practice consistent with the will of a benevolent god.

Since we are talking about Biblical terms those terms need to be understood in the Biblical sense of what they meant.

There is no biblical sense for what words mean.

Most people who judge God in the Garden of Eden seem to think that God did not want Adam and Eve to know good and evil, to grow and mature etc. Do you think that God did not want Adam and Eve to learn eventually about right and wrong?

So it would seem. The story is about people punished for seeking the knowledge of good and evil, which they were ordered to not do. But that is not the thing that deity is most harshly judged for in that story. Every bit of it is worthy of condemnation. Why was the serpent allowed unfettered access to those kids, especially knowing how it would turn out? Why does such a very human act the equivalent of a kid taking a cookie from a jar after being told not to - absolutely normal, harmless, tolerable human behavior - lead to such extreme punishment?

I believe I know the answer, but it is based in there being no such god. People needed an answer for why this god did not put them in paradise, since it is said to have loved them and had that power. The answer is always the same - sin, and blaming the victim. Man lives a much harder life than seems necessary and then dies. That's what that story is for.

Does that mean that you think that He has dealt with human evil the wrong way?

I wrote, "If God exists, he is either not omniscient, not omnipotent, or not omnibenevolent." I believe such a god would have done better. As I said, I think that you or I could have done better. I realize that you do not allow yourself to see through the eyes of a god, but I do. If I had those powers and were running the show, things would be very different and much better. This is not to vaunt myself. I think that's true in the case of millions of others as well. Virtually any kind and decent person would be more moral than godless nature. It's part of the argument that no such deity touches our lives.

 

[101G]

Convince me that God is loving without referring to scriptures that say that.

you are alive and breathing right now. proof enough

101G.

 

[Alien826]

I don't have time to go back and respond to all the points you made, but I know what your position is, so let's just move forward.

Then don't just quote one part of a connected argument and think you have refuted it.

I would not say that happiness is optional, as if some people do not choose it as an option, and I would not say that people refuse to be happy no matter what. People are either happy or they are not and it is not because they try to be happy or because they refuse to be happy.

You've never met people that only see the down side of everything, and others that somehow manage to see a silver lining in every cloud? I think you are saying that they can't help being that way and can't change. I beg to differ.

Worlds more conducive to happiness can be envisioned, but they are not material worlds, because the material world is what causes sorrow as well as happiness. It's a mixed bag.

It's a matter of proportion. Are you really saying this world cannot be improved (I'm not saying made perfect)? How about simply removing one bad thing, like cancer. We're on the way to that already, with a long way to go. Wouldn't the world be better if that was so? Now remove a few more bad things, then some more. You would probably hit a limit as the way the material world works includes many things that harm us. For example, to remove hurricanes you might have to change the way air and water reacts physically, which would disturb all kinds of other things. Nevertheless, when you reached that limit, there would be a world more conducive to happiness and still material. No immaterial world required. A world completely free of the possibility of harm would probably not be material, I agree.

I can imagine a world where no reasonable person would be unhappy, and that is the spiritual world, aka heaven. This material world was never intended to be a paradise, despite what some Christians believe.

I know some people that would find something to complain about in heaven!

I am not sure what you mean by 'externally caused suffering.' Are you saying that there could be a world where nobody would react to anything external and suffer from it, so they would always be happy?

React with unhappiness. I doubt that's universally possible, given human nature. I'll relate a story though, from my days as a Buddhist. We were fortunate to have a Tibetan lama to guide us . We were having this very discussion. He told us about someone (another lama) who had fallen in front of a train and lost both legs, but was still happy. Why would he not be, he asked with genuine surprise. To him it was a given that we have control over our emotions if we want to exercise it.

I tend to agree with you the way I feel now, but since I have not died and seen what is on the other side, I cannot know how I will feel after I die. I could change my mind.

That comes from my feeling that endless perfection would eventually be boring. There would be nothing to strive for. No way to improve the world. No need to help others. For an eternity!!! Of course that might not be an accurate representation.

So are you saying that it's God's fault if we choose not to be good?

God made us capable of choosing evil, so bears responsibility for it.

We could do that, but are you saying that God could have made bad choices impossible?
How do you think God could do that?

He could have made us so we were less inclined to make bad choices.

God did not make us faulty, God made us all good. Some people then became faulty by choice.

If we were "all good" we wouldn't have chosen to be faulty.

Yes, all humans fail in some ways, but I don't see the problem with that.
Only God is perfect. Humans can never be God so they can never be perfect.

You said "That makes no sense since not all humans fail".

Make up your mind.

 

[Alien826]

I would say that humans could have been a lot better than we are if Satan had not lied to them and tempted them through that lie to sin.
God may have gone on to teach Adam and Eve about good and evil in a better way so that they could learn without actually doing what is evil.


God in the Bible knows what will happen and did not allow it because He was bored.
But really I don't think it was inevitable that there is all this suffering caused by human evil. It was a result of humans' initial evil that we are all in the s**t now and God is probably dealing with it in the best possible way and the end result, the happiness at the end, will probably make all the suffering seem not that bad when looked back on from that perspective and hopefully we will understand why it had to be this way.

I just realized that you are responding to @It Aint Necessarily So on this same subject, so I don't want to have you repeat everything.

Instead, I'll try a slightly different tack. I'm sure you are aware of the old saying "A stitch in time saves nine"? Or, if you discovered a wet patch in your basement and found a small hole in a water pipe, wouldn't you fix it right away rather than wait until the whole basement was flooded with everything in it ruined?

What I'm suggesting is that God had a number of opportunities to stop all this before it escalated to the point where he had to, first destroy nearly everyone in a flood, then later torture part of himself to death to be able to offer "salvation".

I'll just suggest one very easy solution. Simply forgive Adam and Eve, kick the snake out of the garden, and give them another chance. Maybe this time he could explain to them why they shouldn't eat the "apple". Then teach them about good and evil as you suggest.

Incidentally, I know I'm arguing with mythology. The problem that I saw during my brief excursion into Christianity, and still do to some extent, is that all this stuff tends to put people off Christianity as a whole. And if you feel, as I did then, that there is a lot of good in Christianity, you don't want that.

 

[Trailblazer]

you are alive and breathing right now. proof enough

101G.

How is that proof that God is loving?
Not everyone is alive and breathing....
What about people who are dead and not breathing?

 

[101G]

How is that proof that God is loving?
Not everyone is alive and breathing....
What about people who are dead and not breathing?

Romans 14:9 "For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living." (smile).

101G.

 

[Trailblazer]

Romans 14:9 "For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living." (smile).

101G.

That still does not prove that God is loving. That can never be proven, it has to be believed.
I now believe that God is loving because some Baha'is on another forum used reason to convince me that God is loving.

 

[101G]

That still does not prove that God is loving.

see, you're his, dead or alive...... (smile).or he could not love you by never bringing U into this world, or destroying you after U died.

101G.

 

[Trailblazer]

see, you're his, dead or alive...... (smile).or he could not love you by never bringing U into this world, or destroying you after U died.

101G.

Yes, that is one angle...

3: O SON OF MAN! Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image and revealed to thee My beauty.

4: O SON OF MAN! I loved thy creation, hence I created thee. Wherefore, do thou love Me, that I may name thy name and fill thy soul with the spirit of life.

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 4

 

[101G]

Yes, that is one angle...

3: O SON OF MAN! Veiled in My immemorial being and in the ancient eternity of My essence, I knew My love for thee; therefore I created thee, have engraved on thee Mine image and revealed to thee My beauty.

4: O SON OF MAN! I loved thy creation, hence I created thee. Wherefore, do thou love Me, that I may name thy name and fill thy soul with the spirit of life.

The Hidden Words of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 4

it's hidden alright, because it's not true, the Lord JESUS, the Son of Man is not CREATED, the Son of Man is GOD in the ECHAD of his own-self..

101G.