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Does God intentionally mislead?
- Thread starter Francine
- Start date
Ratiocinative
Member
Again it seems that you aren't able to read, so I'll help you out. At the beginning of Ezekiel 20 God gives Ezekiel a message to give to Israel. In this message God explains how the people of Israel repeatedly disobey him. Several times he tries to make them understand that what they are doing is wrong by punishing them, but they still refused to listen. So finally, in verse 25, God decides to give them up to their sinful desires. He lets them go ahead and do whatever evil things they want to so that they will experience the consequences of the very actions God told them not to, so that they will come back to him once they realize how miserable their actions have made them.
Francine
Well-Known Member
They can answer they were only going by the bum commandments and misleading ordinances sent by God, as described in the OP.
Francine
Well-Known Member
I don't know. He told Abraham to sacrifice Isaac to see if he would really do it.
Francine
Well-Known Member
That is a very good question! There's no answer that preserves God's omniscience and omnipotence simultaneously.
It is hard to analyze any verse taken out of context. Sometimes we need to hear the whole story and not just one line of it.
Ratiocinative
Member
Really? To me it sounds like a rather dumb question. Since when does knowing what will happen take away freewill? God already knows everything, so therefore he can't learn anything new, and if he can't learn anything new, then there's no new information that he would need to reevaluate his decisions against. You're basically saying that if someone asks you a question that you know the answer to, that you were bound by fate to answer it correctly. Obviously you could answer it wrong if you wanted to, but there's no reason to not answer correctly and so you did so. Since God already knows everything he's already made the correct decision and doesn't need to change what he's decided to do.
Yes, he knew they would disobey but if he left them before they disobeyed then how would it be fair to punish them? God could have just skipped creating Earth and just sent all the people that would have accepted him to Heaven and all those that would reject him to hell, but then that wouldn't be fair because those in hell hadn't actually done anything wrong yet. God gives everyone many opportunities to repent from their sins for the purpose of giving no one an excuse come judgment time, even the ones he knows will never repent.
Wandered Off
Sporadic Driveby Member
To me, it sounds as if you haven't thought through the implications of those words.
That is a fun topic to ponder...
http://www.religiousforums.com/foru...would-foreknowledge-contradict-free-will.html
Yet he is said to have changed his mind about Nineveh and regretted creating humanity.
Why does everyone think that God doesn't want people to turn away from evil? Wandered Off brought up Nineveh and how He changed His mind about destroying them when they turned away from evil.
Francine
Well-Known Member
The Medes and Babylonians were less forgiving, they razed Ninevah to the ground in 612 BC.
McBell
Unbound
Seems to me that this was the punishment for their disobedience.
Francine
Well-Known Member
If they didn't obey the good statutes, why would they obey the ones meant to trip them up?
crystalonyx
Well-Known Member
It can easily be proven that an omnipotent,(and by inference omniscient) benevolent god cannot exist. An omnipotent benevolent god would not allow needless suffering, yet we see much needless suffering around us. Thus god either cannot prevent it (not omnipotent), or will not prevent it (not benevolent). Other gods are not worthy of worship.
BucephalusBB
ABACABB
Or shall not, as our suffering is not related to his benevolent, but that would be another religion probably..:run:
Francine
Well-Known Member
A world without suffering in it might be like a triangle with four sides. You can't criticize God for not doing what is logically impossible. A good God can only create the best of all possible worlds.
Ratiocinative
Member
It's called freewill. God's not interested in creating robots that have no choice except to do exactly what they were programmed to, he's interested people making their own choice to accept him into their lives. You pointing out that there is so much needless suffering only proves that people choose to do wrong rather than choosing to do right. The only way to get rid of suffering would eliminate free will, which would defeat the whole purpose of creating the universe in the first place, otherwise people will continue to choose evil rather than good.
Wandered Off
Sporadic Driveby Member
But since the future already exists to God (you said earlier God already knows), then they can't change their foreknown ending. In that sense, they're still doing what they were programmed to do. If you can't change the course, you only think you have free will.