Problems with Belief when it comes to a Christian and Islamic God...

[leibowde84]

It is effected by relativity, yes. Perhaps my understanding of time was on a more basic level. But if it is not to allow and show change, I do not know what it is for.

I am not assuming. It is known because it is given by God as all things are. I am aware that it will look like that to you because you don't posses such things.

Everything that we can explain to one degree or another, yes.

This applies to God, yes.

If it applies to god, where did God come from?

 

[Robert.Evans]

Yes you did, and I posted the actual defintion of the word eternal, which is "lasting or existing forever; without end or beginning."



I never said it could.



No it doesn't, not if it's eternal.



There isn't? I thought God was eternal, no? When was God born?



Damned if I know.

Eternal comes from Latin and means age:
e·ter·nal

e·ter·nal [i túrn'l]
adj
1. existing through all time: lasting for all time without beginning or end
eternal life

2. unchanging: unaffected by the passage of time
eternal truths

3. seemingly everlasting: seeming to go on forever or recur incessantly
an eternal student



n
something everlasting: something that lasts for all time without beginning or end


[14th century. Via French < late Latin aeternal- < Latin aeternus < aevum "age"]


-e·ter·nal·i·ty [tər nállətee], , n
-e·ter·nal·ly, , adv
Encarta ® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1998-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.


So, what do you mean when you say "eternal"? You quoted "lasting or existing forever; without end or beginning." which means what exactly? Eternal is about time. It means an age. Even ignoring that, what does eternal mean? Do you mean it just 'is'?

 

[Robert.Evans]

If it applies to god, where did God come from?

Simple Existence

 

[leibowde84]

Eternal comes from Latin and means age:
e·ter·nal

e·ter·nal [i túrn'l]
adj
1. existing through all time: lasting for all time without beginning or end
eternal life

2. unchanging: unaffected by the passage of time
eternal truths

3. seemingly everlasting: seeming to go on forever or recur incessantly
an eternal student



n
something everlasting: something that lasts for all time without beginning or end


[14th century. Via French < late Latin aeternal- < Latin aeternus < aevum "age"]


-e·ter·nal·i·ty [tər nállətee], , n
-e·ter·nal·ly, , adv
Encarta ® World English Dictionary © & (P) 1998-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.


So, what do you mean when you say "eternal"? You quoted "lasting or existing forever; without end or beginning." which means what exactly? Eternal is about time. It means an age. Even ignoring that, what does eternal mean? Do you mean it just 'is'?

Your definitions all disagree with you. The latin rout of a word doesn't determine it's current meaning in english. "Eternal" means "existing forever without beginning or end" in english. Like you said, something that just "is" without having a starting or ending point.

 

[Demonslayer]

So, what do you mean when you say "eternal"?

I mean the defintion of eternal. Look at your own post, you posted the definition. That's what I mean.

You quoted "lasting or existing forever; without end or beginning." which means what exactly?

It means it's eternal. That it has always been.

Eternal is about time. It means an age.

Yes, LOTS of time. ALL the time you might say.

Even ignoring that, what does eternal mean?

Please refer to the definition of eternal that we now have both posted. Eternal means:

e·ter·nal [i túrn'l]
adj
1. existing through all time: lasting for all time without beginning or end

Do you mean it just 'is'?

Yes, it just is.

Simple Existence

Yes this is a good way to state it. The universe just simply exists.

If something called God just simply exists, something called the Universe can simply exist.

 

[leibowde84]

Simple Existence

What does that mean? Please explain.

 

[leibowde84]

Simple Existence

You said that everything comes from somewhere, and you did not exclude God from this rule. Thus, there must be "somewhere" that existed befor God where God actually came from, right?

 

[Robert.Evans]

You said that everything comes from somewhere, and you did not exclude God from this rule. Thus, there must be "somewhere" that existed befor God where God actually came from, right?

It is not really a "somewhere" as nowhere actually exists accept for the Existence or Source which is everything. That is the simple-existence that just 'is' and that evolved into what we think of as God. So much like evolution, you have simple and then complex.

 

[leibowde84]

It is not really a "somewhere" as nowhere actually exists accept for the Existence or Source which is everything. That is the simple-existence that just 'is' and that evolved into what we think of as God. So much like evolution, you have simple and then complex.

Where did you get this idea from?

 

[First Baseman]

If it applies to god, where did God come from?

Wrong question. God didn't "come from" anywhere but rather everywhere came from Him. There was no place for God to have come from until after He created places. God existed before anything physical did. God is Spirit. He didn't need a place to "come from."

 

[Robert.Evans]

Where did you get this idea from?

Gnosis is given intuitively. That is why it works so well. Scripture of various sources, science, listening to others etc. Complex things must be explained- even Dawkins says that.
If you are interested I can find something perhaps, though it has been a while. Most aren't interested in learning, just arguing.

 

[ArtieE]

Wrong question. God didn't "come from" anywhere but rather everywhere came from Him. There was no place for God to have come from until after He created places. God existed before anything physical did.

Why? What was the reason for his existence?

 

[leibowde84]

Wrong question. God didn't "come from" anywhere but rather everywhere came from Him. There was no place for God to have come from until after He created places. God existed before anything physical did. God is Spirit. He didn't need a place to "come from."

Please look back at the context of the question. I was asking someone else this question based on claims they had made previously. I am not curious about the answer, but, instead, the reasoning behind it.

 

[leibowde84]

Gnosis is given intuitively. That is why it works so well. Scripture of various sources, science, listening to others etc. Complex things must be explained- even Dawkins says that.
If you are interested I can find something perhaps, though it has been a while. Most aren't interested in learning, just arguing.

I've just never heard this theory before. I am interested in learning where it originated (apart from being "from God" of course).

 

[Robert.Evans]

I've just never heard this theory before. I am interested in learning where it originated (apart from being "from God" of course).

This confirms in part what I say:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoplatonism

You would also have to read the Gnostic text. I can find the most important if you wish. They all confirm what I thought. Truth is found in many places, but does not flourish well, so you may only find odd flowers that bloom.
If you want further, I might be able to find it, but the gnosis comes in many and varied forms. I can give you more of what I believe. It is up to you then to understand it.

But the simple existence is important. God cannot have been always as he is now or else we may ask, what was he doing before the "beginning".

also:
http://gnosis.org/naghamm/sjc.html

 

[leibowde84]

This confirms in part what I say:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoplatonism

You would also have to read the Gnostic text. I can find the most important if you wish. They all confirm what I thought. Truth is found in many places, but does not flourish well, so you may only find odd flowers that bloom.
If you want further, I might be able to find it, but the gnosis comes in many and varied forms. I can give you more of what I believe. It is up to you then to understand it.

But the simple existence is important. God cannot have been always as he is now or else we may ask, what was he doing before the "beginning".

also:
http://gnosis.org/naghamm/sjc.html

So, you consider the gnostic texts to be scripture?

 

[Shad]

It is effected by relativity, yes. Perhaps my understanding of time was on a more basic level. But if it is not to allow and show change, I do not know what it is for.

I was merely stating time can be influenced by movement.

I am not assuming. It is known because it is given by God as all things are. I am aware that it will look like that to you because you don't posses such things.

Since you reject science as an objective meter to your claims then you claims are subjective and assertion until you can show it to be otherwise by an objective standard. I can toss back your argument to counter your view

You inability to accept your religion is a fiction is due to your lack of education in the history of Judaism, Greek philosophy about Gods and the counters to religious ideologies based on faith. You do not posses this knowledge thus can not accept this fact /golfclap

Everything that we can explain to one degree or another, yes.

This applies to God, yes.

If it applies to God then you must admit God is contingent upon something else for God's existence which is a restriction thus your God is not a God but a powerful and limited entity. I guess your supposed source of "knowledge" failed to educate you in the argument from contingency. Which undermines your views to the point that your source of knowledge is not a God but from your own mind.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

This creates an issue with some scholars since they believe in the religion they study.

Not really. Everybody is biased, historical Jesus studies postdate those on Socrates (making Socrates probably the most studied person in history prior to the early 20th century), and most importantly the historical Jesus quest began and continued to be biased against Christianity. To the extent religious biases exist in historical Jesus studies (and they do), they do in multiple ways. It is widely known, actually, that seminary tends to create atheists, agnostics, and liberal Christians out of fundamentalists as the entire framework of historical inquiry and other methodological tools of the NT scholar, theologian, etc., render problematic fundamentalist/conservative Christian apology.

Irrelevant figures are moot. I was not talking about other gods but historical figures.

So having presupposed the answer, you evaluate the question. It is hardly intellectually defensible to regard evidence counted for the historical Caesar as "moot" when it comes to the historical Herakles or Dionysus yet meaningful when it comes to other deified individuals. You assume certain results from historical inquiry whilst trying to critique vast swathes of said scholarship.

We have coins minted by Caesar and coin made from a month to years after his death.

And we have more evidence for Herakles and other mythic figures. You can't use two standards of evidence by presuming the historicity without rendering the entire enterprise pointless.

People have begun questioning Homer as the author of the work attributed to him due to the lack of material evidence.

What do you mean "have begun!!!??" Even the ancient Greeks questioned whether he existed, and it is practically universally agreed that Homer never existed (although there are those who argue that both the Iliad and the Odyssey were written by a single author). And it has NOTHING to do with the material evidence. Nobody questions whether Euripides existed, whether Socrates did, whether Antiphon did, or whether most of those whom we know of did despite the fact that the vast majority are known through a handful of medieval manuscripts (and most in manuscripts in which they are quoted or referenced, not copies of texts written by them). The reason it is widely believed Pythagoras existed despite the fact that the earliest known biography of his life was written many centuries after his supposed lifetime while 60,000 books on the nature and existence of the historical Jesus were written in the 1800s alone has much to do with the fact that there are no Pythagoreans but many Christians. There is no Reimarus for the Mithraic mystery cult, no Strauß for Herakles, no Wells or Doherty or Carrier or Price for Socrates, etc.

You missed my point. We have material evidence, not just textual, covering part of Alexande'rs life, namely his conquests, which covers a large part of his "world".

You missed mine. Such evidence is all contingent. Historical inquiry isn't about what evidence exists but about how best to explain the evidence that exists, which includes everything from Greek drama to the spatiotemporal distribution of extant 2nd & 3rd century NT manuscripts. Using conquest as evidence, Romulus and Remus were the historical founders of Rome, Agamemnon existed, etc. We don't have material evidence that Alexander, Romulus & Remus, or Agamemnon conquered anything. We have sources indicating this, and after careful consideration any rational person should agree that Alexander clearly DID conquer and therefore existed, while the conquest of the other three occurred but is attributed to mythic figures.

Unless you want to suggest that the collapse of the Persian Empire, hellenization of the area and the emergence of successor states following Greek culture spontaneously appeared with zero cause at all.

Rome existed, and Roman historians not only told us that this was do to the conquests of Romulus and Remus (whom, as Livy explains in a classic instantiation of the historicizing myth, were thought to be raised by wolves because of a misunderstanding of their adopted parents' names), but also that they and therefore the founding of Rome could be directly traced to the survivors of Troy. By your reasoning, they clearly existed. Or we could realize that the historical method is not to assume who is and isn't historical and then singularly apply in a haphazard method particular (and rather ad hoc) weights to particular types of evidence.

 

[Desert Snake]

If it applies to god, where did God come from?

God is self created. Even in various differing concepts of God, the self creation is an obvious attribute. There is no reason to suppose otherwise.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

God is self created.

If God can be self-created then so can the universe.