Explain this logically christians....

[strikeviperMKII]

Sure, but since you don't know the consequences of that action and since consequences (according to strikeviperMKII) determine whether something is good or evil...

Does the fact that you do not know them make them disappear? It does make the knowledge of the good or evil of our actions impossible to know until we know the consequences. Makes it a bit difficult to decide sometimes, doesn't it?

 

[Koldo]

Does the fact that you do not know them make them disappear? It does make the knowledge of the good or evil of our actions impossible to know until we know the consequences. Makes it a bit difficult to decide sometimes, doesn't it?

There is no evil in our actions if it was not intended.
You can never do something evil unless you wanted to.

You are considering bad things as evil.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

There is no evil in our actions if it was not intended.
You can never do something evil unless you wanted to.

Good point ^above^ Koldo because as Deut 32v5 says the people corrupted themselves.

Sin is either intentional or unintentional.
Intentional would be on purpose, premeditated, willful, not by accident.
By accident would not be evil in the sense it was not planned.

 

[Copernicus]

My understanding of evil is that it always involves a malicious act, i.e. an intentional act whose goal is to inflict extreme, unnecessary suffering. Unintentional acts may cause great suffering, but they are not evil. They are tragic.

 

[URAVIP2ME]

My understanding of evil is that it always involves a malicious act, i.e. an intentional act whose goal is to inflict extreme, unnecessary suffering. Unintentional acts may cause great suffering, but they are not evil. They are tragic.

Please keep in mind that in Scripture 'evil' is not always synonymous with wrong doing. When necessary God uses 'calamity as an evil' against evil doers.
Revelation 11v18 B

 

[Copernicus]

Please keep in mind that in Scripture 'evil' is not always synonymous with wrong doing. When necessary God uses 'calamity as an evil' against evil doers.
Revelation 11v18 B

That is because primitive cultures interpreted all misfortune as being caused by gods. When they went to war, they won or lost depending on how powerful the gods were on each side and whether the gods were pleased or displeased with a side. It wasn't a very sophisticated view of reality. Time we grew up.

 

[Frank Merton]

My understanding of evil is that it always involves a malicious act, i.e. an intentional act whose goal is to inflict extreme, unnecessary suffering. Unintentional acts may cause great suffering, but they are not evil. They are tragic.

You have a different sense of the word than I usually have, although I think both of our senses can be found in dictionaries. I think of suffering as evil, not that which causes it.

So, two meanings: My sense the death caused by the tsunami is an evil. Your sense, such death is not an evil but a murderer is evil. In common use both senses are ubiquitous, and I suspect most of the time this does not cause problems.

 

[Frank Merton]

That is because primitive cultures interpreted all misfortune as being caused by gods. When they went to war, they won or lost depending on how powerful the gods were on each side and whether the gods were pleased or displeased with a side. It wasn't a very sophisticated view of reality. Time we grew up.

I think that is a caricature.

So-called "primitive" peoples have far more sophisticated notions than that. "Animism" (the word usually used to define the "religious" ideas in such cultures) is widely misunderstood as being much like classical polytheism, with the world populated with all sorts of gods. Classical polytheism (of the Homeric sort where gods and goddesses actively interfere in human battles) was mainly a cultural trait of Indo-European language speaking cultures, and by no means universal.

 

[waitasec]

You have a different sense of the word than I usually have, although I think both of our senses can be found in dictionaries. I think of suffering as evil, not that which causes it.

meaning, the capability of experiencing suffering is evil?

 

[1AOA1]

That is because primitive cultures interpreted all misfortune as being caused by gods. When they went to war, they won or lost depending on how powerful the gods were on each side and whether the gods were pleased or displeased with a side. It wasn't a very sophisticated view of reality. Time we grew up.

Don't they say that it began in the early times when gods dwelt with them?

 

[Copernicus]

You have a different sense of the word than I usually have, although I think both of our senses can be found in dictionaries. I think of suffering as evil, not that which causes it.

I'm not finding your sense of the word in dictionaries so far.

So, two meanings: My sense the death caused by the tsunami is an evil. Your sense, such death is not an evil but a murderer is evil. In common use both senses are ubiquitous, and I suspect most of the time this does not cause problems.

But death is not suffering. That is what the survivors experience. How do you use the adjective? Do you apply it to emotions? Inanimate objects? Animals? Normally, we apply it to intelligent beings that we empathize with. People can be "evil", not rocks or trees or suffering. Suffering may be undesirable and unnecessary, but it is never "evil".

So-called "primitive" peoples have far more sophisticated notions than that. "Animism" (the word usually used to define the "religious" ideas in such cultures) is widely misunderstood as being much like classical polytheism, with the world populated with all sorts of gods. Classical polytheism (of the Homeric sort where gods and goddesses actively interfere in human battles) was mainly a cultural trait of Indo-European language speaking cultures, and by no means universal.

I wonder if animism is more widely misunderstood by ordinary folks or by those who tend to over-intellectualize it. There is a very strong tendency in us to personify everything, especially including forces of nature. We see ourselves in everything, because the world is only meaningful insofar as it relates to experience. The Indo-Europeans were not so different from other cultural groups that existed in their time. Their cosmology, including their views of gods, was roughly the same. Inanimate forces were controlled by intelligent beings such as themselves, and they could manipulate those beings through pleading, cajoling, and contractual offers (e.g. offering exclusive rights to being worshiped in exchange for favors).

You live in Asia, and it is full of people who believe in gods that are little different from the Indo-European ones. Older, more sophisticated people tend to take a less anthropomorphic view of gods, but they still view them as external forces, even if they all ultimately manifest the same being. Monistic philosophy was never exclusive to Eastern religions.

Don't they say that it began in the early times when gods dwelt with them?

Who are "they", and how would "they" know anything more than you or I about it?

 

[1AOA1]

Who are "they", and how would "they" know anything more than you or I about it?

Aren't they the ancients who experienced ancient times?

 

[Copernicus]

Aren't they the ancients who experienced ancient times?

Why are you asking me? You were the one who brought "them" up. I see no reason to assume that the "ancients" all held to one opinion about gods or that they were in any better position than us to know about the nature of reality. In fact, I think that we moderns are in a position to know a great deal more. I treat a modern scientist as far more credible than some primitive bronze age self-appointed sage.

 

[1AOA1]

Why are you asking me? You were the one who brought "them" up. I see no reason to assume that the "ancients" all held to one opinion about gods or that they were in any better position than us to know about the nature of reality. In fact, I think that we moderns are in a position to know a great deal more. I treat a modern scientist as far more credible than some primitive bronze age self-appointed sage.

Opinions? Are you saying that they did not see that gods dwelt among them?

 

[PolyHedral]

Opinions? Are you saying that they did not see that gods dwelt among them?

It could just as easily have been sky people.

 

[Copernicus]

Opinions? Are you saying that they did not see that gods dwelt among them?

That seems like the most plausible idea. Why should I believe that gods dwelt among them? It's not as if history isn't full of people making false claims about gods. You can't believe everything you read.

 

[1AOA1]

It could just as easily have been sky people.

Well I guess you could assign any name you want to these beings

 

[1AOA1]

That seems like the most plausible idea. Why should I believe that gods dwelt among them? It's not as if history isn't full of people making false claims about gods. You can't believe everything you read.

It is most plausible for someone who doesnt believe in god that there were no gods there?

 

[PolyHedral]

Well I guess you could assign any name you want to these beings

Point is, it'd be amazingly easy to convince an ancient person of you're being a god, when you aren't really. Consider the effect stage magic has, even when you know it's not real. And that's assuming that the ancient peoples' accounts have survived, unaltered and exaggerated until the present, which is a silly assumption to make.

It is most plausible for someone who doesnt believe in god that there were no gods there?

It is most plausible, full stop. You're essentially playing a 2000+ year game of Telephone, so why are you giving any credit to the answer you get out the other end?

 

[1AOA1]

It is most plausible, full stop. You're essentially playing a 2000+ year game of Telephone, so why are you giving any credit to the answer you get out the other end?

But I'm not an atheist. Am I?