Is God perfect?

[Meesheltx]

hmm...thats an interesting point. I think perfection should be defined as fullfillg one's purpose without flaw, in the best possible way. So now the question to ask is, what is the purpose of God, and is that purpose fulfilled? I don't know of very many people who would agree on the purpose of God, even amongst those who believe in much the same God. I believe the purpose of God is to give people hope...some people just don't have enough will power/self confidence/or whatever it is they need to want to live. The idea of God helps so many people in their lives. So, I would think its objective to each person whether or not God is fulfilling its purpose. So, its subjective whether or not he is perfect.

 

[michel]

I already gave you an example of where I can think of something "greater," with both meanings of "greater." Are you saying that you can't think of anything "greater" than a perfect circle? Perfection by itself is not an attribute; it is only the measure of an attribute. Without a specified attribute, "perfect" makes no sense. "Wholly perfect" and "Perfectly perfect" sound nice but are meaningless.

I am repeating myself to no avail so with that I wash my hands of this argument.

You made your point well Lilithu, and I agree with the point you have made (which was something I hate to admit I had never thought of) in the concept of 'wholly perfect'. Thanks for the lesson!

 

[cardero]

Meesheltx writes: So now the question to ask is, what is the purpose of God, and is that purpose fulfilled?

This is a good question and one that can only be answered by knowing GOD personally, for purposes can be achieved but they also must be maintained and I have a feeling that GOD is a grand achiever and could have many purposes going on at one time.

Meesheltx writes: The idea of God helps so many people in their lives. So, I would think its objective to each person whether or not God is fulfilling its purpose.

I would agree that one of the purposes of GOD is to help each and everyone of us but GOD must do so carefully and considerately. What is helpful for one individual may not be important for another.

 

[Æsahættr]

The idea of a non-perfect God makes no sense, and this is one of the main reasons that many people are atheists. If God was not perfect then He must be just another life form like us, all be it much more evolved. This means that He is not a God, but only appears as one to us. Many people who look around at the world do not see the hand of a perfect designer, and as such do not believe in God.

 

[michel]

The idea of a non-perfect God makes no sense, and this is one of the main reasons that many people are atheists. If God was not perfect then He must be just another life form like us, all be it much more evolved. This means that He is not a God, but only appears as one to us. Many people who look around at the world do not see the hand of a perfect designer, and as such do not believe in God.

Hi Æsahættr,

You almost sound as if you are describing yourself; is that the case, may I ask ?

 

[lilithu]

The idea of a non-perfect God makes no sense, and this is one of the main reasons that many people are atheists. If God was not perfect then He must be just another life form like us, all be it much more evolved. This means that He is not a God, but only appears as one to us. Many people who look around at the world do not see the hand of a perfect designer, and as such do not believe in God.

I am having trouble following your logic here. Yes, it's true that many people who look around at the world do not see the hand of a perfect designer, and as such do not believe in God. How does postulating a perfect God, whatever that means, change that fact? They would still look around at the world and not see the hand of a perfect designer.

 

[Æsahættr]

Hi Æsahættr,

You almost sound as if you are describing yourself; is that the case, may I ask ?

I am describing myself, but speaking from personal experiences it seems to me that it applies to a large number of atheists as well.

I am having trouble following your logic here. Yes, it's true that many people who look around at the world do not see the hand of a perfect designer, and as such do not believe in God. How does postulating a perfect God, whatever that means, change that fact? They would still look around at the world and not see the hand of a perfect designer.

Sorry. I wasn't very clear; it's because I started off one one point and changed half way through into another lol. I meant that if you allow for an imperfect God then even if the world is imperfect it allows room for God to have created it, and simply made a few mistakes. If however you assume that any God must be perfect, then His creation must also be perfect and if it isn't He can't have created it.

 

[michel]

I am describing myself, but speaking from personal experiences it seems to me that it applies to a large number of atheists as well.

That is what I assumed.
Sorry. I wasn't very clear; it's because I started off one one point and changed half way through into another lol. I meant that if you allow for an imperfect God then even if the world is imperfect it allows room for God to have created it, and simply made a few mistakes. If however you assume that any God must be perfect, then His creation must also be perfect and if it isn't He can't have created it.

Can you give an example, or examples of imperfections in creation ?

 

[Saw11_2000]

Yes. God is perfect.


I don't think God would say that.

God has never told anyone to kill someone else?

http://www.geocities.com/mayeredgar/killson.htm

What's that then?

 

[Saw11_2000]

BTW, the word "kill" appears 42 times in the New Testament.

 

[lilithu]

Sorry. I wasn't very clear; it's because I started off one one point and changed half way through into another lol. I meant that if you allow for an imperfect God then even if the world is imperfect it allows room for God to have created it, and simply made a few mistakes. If however you assume that any God must be perfect, then His creation must also be perfect and if it isn't He can't have created it.

Thanks for the clarification. Speaking for myself, I wouldn't say that God made "mistakes." That implies that "God" could theoretically have created a better world but screwed up. (Gnostics hold this view, and I respect that but I don't agree with it.) Personally, I would say that the world is imperfect because God's power is limited. It was never possible for God to make a better world than the one we have right now without violating natural law and/or free will. However, it is possible for us, thru our choices, to help create a better world than the one we have.

This is why I've been so adamant about defining perfection. Is God perfect in that God never makes mistakes? In which case why do so many things seem wrong? Or is God perfect in that God always moves towards what is right/good but is constrained by natural law and our free will? To me, the "Is God perfect?" question is part and parcel with the "Is God omnipotent?" question in another thread. Perfect what? Pefect power, meaning omnipotence? Pefect wisdom, meaning God never makes mistakes? Perfect compassion, meaning that God cares about all of us? Perfect what?

 

[Æsahættr]

Can you give an example, or examples of imperfections in creation ?

Erm, well natural disasters to start off with. I know what some people's responses to that would be. I know several people who believe that natural disasters are the fault of humans, and come about because of sin. However I do not buy into that whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, a system where the mistakes of people leads to the deaths of others is not perfect. Far from it.

What else? Oh, the fact that the Universe is not going to survive forever. Surely if God can create a Universe He can create one which is stable. While we do not know how the Universe will die, it will (unless it never stops expanding in which case eventually all particles end up seperated from one another, which doesn't seem much better than a Universe that dies)

The extinction of species, that's another one. What's the point in designing species that are doomed to become extinct.

That's most of the major ones I can think of right now, excluding trivil Sod's Law style points.

 

[michel]

Thanks for the clarification. Speaking for myself, I wouldn't say that God made "mistakes." That implies that "God" could theoretically have created a better world but screwed up. (Gnostics hold this view, and I respect that but I don't agree with it.) Personally, I would say that the world is imperfect because God's power is limited. It was never possible for God to make a better world than the one we have right now without violating natural law and/or free will. However, it is possible for us, thru our choices, to help create a better world than the one we have.

This is why I've been so adamant about defining perfection. Is God perfect in that God never makes mistakes? In which case why do so many things seem wrong? Or is God perfect in that God always moves towards what is right/good but is constrained by natural law and our free will? To me, the "Is God perfect?" question is part and parcel with the "Is God omnipotent?" question in another thread. Perfect what? Pefect power, meaning omnipotence? Pefect wisdom, meaning God never makes mistakes? Perfect compassion, meaning that God cares about all of us? Perfect what?

Sorry, lilithu,

can you give examples of imperfections in the world ?

 

[Æsahættr]

Personally, I would say that the world is imperfect because God's power is limited. It was never possible for God to make a better world than the one we have right now without violating natural law and/or free will.

What do you mean by natural law? If you mean the laws of physics, then bear in mind that they come as part and package of our Universe. If God created the Universe He made the laws of physics.

Actually, on a side note, this is linked to an interesting thing I read the other day. Traditional Einsteinian physics leaves room for a God in that our laws cannot explain the Universe in the very earliest stages of the Big Bang, and as such allows for the explanation 'God did it.' However, apparently in Quantam Physics this gap is no longer a problem because it is possible for the 4 dimensions of the Universe to be closed, like the surface of a sphere, with no beginning point. As such, there is no moment of creation. The Universe can be self contained without any moment at which it began, although as I understand it the Big Bang still took place, it's just that it occupies one particular place in spacetime. As such there is nothing for a God to do! He would just be an observer if He existed at all.
(btw, do not treat any of that above as fact, it's simply my attempt to understand Steven Hawking. If anyone is an expert in Quantam physics, or just knows more than me, I would be very interested to have my understanding corrected as it needs to be)
(oh, and sorry if this was hijacking the topic a bit. I suddenly thought of it when typing my above point and though it was vaguely linked)

 

[JesusIsTheWay]

God has never told anyone to kill someone else?

http://www.geocities.com/mayeredgar/killson.htm

What's that then?

What is it? It is a horribly misinterpreted.
Genesis 22:1 God tested Abraham
It was a test to see if Abraham really loved Him (God) as much as Abraham claimed.

Genesis 22:2 Then God said, "Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burn offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about."
Doesn't that sound familiar? "Take your won, your only son, whom you love." God sent his only Son, Jesus into the world as a sacrifice for our sins. Could this be that not only is God testing Abraham on his love for Him, but also a foreshadowing of the Cross? What the text here is saying is that we sometimes must give up the things we love most for God, because He must be first in our lives. Jesus says later that we must forsake all for Him and that we can love nothing more than God. Could Abraham have began to love Isaac more than he loved God?

Genesis 22:9-10 When they reched the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound up his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.
Abraham was going to obey God no matter what it cost him.

Genesis 22:11-12 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"
"Here I am," he replied.
"Do not lay a hand on the boy," he [the angel of the Lord] said. "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son."
God stopped Abraham from killing his son. This was also a testing of Abraham's trust in God. Abraham trusted God and "passed the test."

I encourage you to read the rest of this story in Genesis 22. That is all I will post for now.
Have a good day/night,
- David

 

[Saw11_2000]

Last time I checked, sacrificing in that context means killing.

If memory serves me correctly, at the last minute, God lets the child live.

But, still, he does tell him to kill his child at first.

 

[michel]

Erm, well natural disasters to start off with. I know what some people's responses to that would be. I know several people who believe that natural disasters are the fault of humans, and come about because of sin. However I do not buy into that whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, a system where the mistakes of people leads to the deaths of others is not perfect. Far from it.

What else? Oh, the fact that the Universe is not going to survive forever. Surely if God can create a Universe He can create one which is stable. While we do not know how the Universe will die, it will (unless it never stops expanding in which case eventually all particles end up seperated from one another, which doesn't seem much better than a Universe that dies)

The extinction of species, that's another one. What's the point in designing species that are doomed to become extinct.

That's most of the major ones I can think of right now, excluding trivil Sod's Law style points.

Thanks for the reply;

a) natural disasters - I do not see these (In a global context) as disasters**; merely changes caused by the effect of nature (AND yes, man's intervention) - **I am not bellitling natural disasters; however, without sounding callous, what is the death of a few thousand, occasionally, over the lifespan of Earth ? - I hope I would have the strength of character to say that if I had lost relatives in one of the recent disasters; believe me, I am not taking the deaths lightly - there is no doubt that they are and have been, and will continue to be traumatic for those affected..............

b) As far as I'm concerned, a system where the mistakes of people leads to the deaths of others is not perfect......... Why ? the purpose of life is to grow, to learn, and to (in my case, as a Christian) to sin as little as possible, and try to emulate the life of Christ; to make the task more realistic, the human being needs to be imperfect........mistakes therefore occur, and thus, it follows that, yes, mistakes by some humans will result in the deaths of others..........

c) Surely if God can create a Universe He can create one which is stable ? - how do you know that it is not ? How do you know that what we are aware of is not a minute portion of a universe so immense that the mere little ripples of instability here are not as the ripple on the surface of a pond ?, insignificant..........

d) The extinction of species, that's another one; is it ? why ? have you not sat outside, for a couple of days, camping ? - during the time that you have done that, a generation of worker ants will have lived their entire lives........who is to say that the entire period of the life of man, from the beginning, until his demise is not a mere 'blip' in the life of the universe ? - Each creature that becomes extinct, has done so, because that creature would hamper the evolution of another, that needs to have a chance to has 'his' day ?

 

[lilithu]

Sorry, lilithu,

can you give examples of imperfections in the world ?

Well, "imperfect", just like "perfect" requires that one define the quality that one is measuring.

When I say that the world is imperfect, what I'm saying is that I think that the world should be better than it is. It should be more just. Life should be more fair. No one should starve. No one should be lonely and unloved. If one doesn't care about these things, they would not be evidence at all that the world is imperfect. But I do, so to me these are signs that the world is not perfect.

But again, I do not blame God for it. I do not say that God made the world imperfectly (that God could have made a better one). I believe that God made and continues to make the best world that can be given the constraints of natural law and free will. (In that limited respect, the world is perfect - ie - without flaw - as it is.) I believe that, because of free will, it is within our power to make things better than they are (not perfect but better - by my standards, a perfect world is impossible) and if we don't choose to do so, then I blame us.

 

[Æsahættr]

a) natural disasters - I do not see these (In a global context) as disasters**; merely changes caused by the effect of nature (AND yes, man's intervention)

Changes caused by the effect of nature? But surely nature is under God's control? If humans are the only species with free will isn't anything that we don't control controlled by God? When you say man's intervention do you mean directly in terms of pollution or indirectly in terms of sin?

b) As far as I'm concerned, a system where the mistakes of people leads to the deaths of others is not perfect......... Why ? the purpose of life is to grow, to learn, and to (in my case, as a Christian) to sin as little as possible, and try to emulate the life of Christ; to make the task more realistic, the human being needs to be imperfect........mistakes therefore occur, and thus, it follows that, yes, mistakes by some humans will result in the deaths of others..........

I don't see how it follows that mistakes need to result in the deaths of others. While you may learn from your mistakes if they harm you or people close to you, how do you learn if your mistakes cause harm to people you don't know, and in a way that is not apparent to you?

c) Surely if God can create a Universe He can create one which is stable ? - how do you know that it is not ? How do you know that what we are aware of is not a minute portion of a universe so immense that the mere little ripples of instability here are not as the ripple on the surface of a pond ?, insignificant..........

I assume you don't mean to use the word Universe there? We know perfectly well that the Universe consists of more than we can see. This is why we don't know how it will end. However, we do know that this Universe is not entirely stable. It is expanding, therefore cannot be stable. If you mean that this Universe is part of something greater, then consider this. Using your analogy of a pond, if God were to create a pond, why would it make sense to have any ripples at all if those ripples damaged even the smallest part of it? Surely a perfect pond would be one in which there was no damage done to any part?

d) The extinction of species, that's another one; is it ? why ? have you not sat outside, for a couple of days, camping ? - during the time that you have done that, a generation of worker ants will have lived their entire lives........who is to say that the entire period of the life of man, from the beginning, until his demise is not a mere 'blip' in the life of the universe ? - Each creature that becomes extinct, has done so, because that creature would hamper the evolution of another, that needs to have a chance to has 'his' day ?

Same answer as above. Perfection means perfect down to the smallest detail. It doesn't matter if when you step back the problems fade away and it appear perfect, if it was perfect it would not be necessary for any animals to die at all.

 

[Ernesto]

Can you give an example, or examples of imperfections in creation ?

Your aforementioned querolousness desires a new thread, I feel.