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

[Thana]

I truly find that belief in the God of Christianity and Islam to be odd.

Both systems of belief believe that God wanted to save everyone...or at least save who want to be saved, and punish those who sin or don't believe in him. Those that are saved go to paradise and those who don't, end up in hell - the whole "afterlife" shebang.

He is supposedly all-powerful and all-knowing and eternal.

With tens or even hundreds of millions praying everyday, at different times of the days (remember, there's time zones), and with hundreds of thousands if not millions of people dying each year, then God would have to listen to all these prayers and to judge each soul after have died.

God being eternal and being outside of time and all, where do God have anything else to do, other than listening to prayers, and judging and sentencing each soul to destined afterlife?

This has to be time-consuming, not to mention a very boring job to do.

In the real world, each court, especially in big cities, have bus-loads of bus-load of cases to be heard, and they all required for each case to be reviewed and processed before any hearing, and if necessarily trials.

Don't God have better things to do with his time than judging souls or listening to prayers?

Perhaps, 1400 or 2000 years back, the world population was probably much smaller than today. But now with population heading towards 6 billion people, I don't see how God could really spend so much of his time with humans.

Both the Qur'an and bible make God out as someone who play at being personal confessor, judge and creator, and that's what make both Christianity and Islam such ridiculous religions.

What's your 2-cent about this?

You're anthropomorphising God, everyone does it of course but if you want to make sense of the concept of God then try not too.
Also you said that He's outside of time but then you bring up how time-consuming judging people must be for Him, Which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

 

[gnostic]

Bible =/=Koran

Never said they did.

Couldn't you just focus on one religion at a time?

This is the 21st century, learn how to multi-task.

 

[Willamena]

God being eternal and being outside of time and all, where do God have anything else to do, other than listening to prayers, and judging and sentencing each soul to destined afterlife?

I can't answer the rest, but this one seems obvious. "Outside of time" would preclude having any problem with timing in judging and sentencing each soul.

 

[gnostic]

That you are trying to give an infinite being, only finite abilities. Not logical.

Even if you were to live for eternity, doing anything will take time, whether they be thousands of years or as little a nanosecond.

But if you put a billion tasks, even that nanosecond per task will build up, and will take a longer time when you have completed a billion tasks.

Similarly, if a billion people were to die today, then God will have to judge those billion souls, one by one. Let's say God could shorten his time on judgment seat by multitasking in judging, like judging 100 souls at the same time.

Of course, he could make life lot easier for himself, by dividing the billion people in half, and send one half to heaven and condemn the other half to hell. Won't that be fun when have several hundreds of thousands of criminals having party in heaven, while millions of innocent children are rotting in hell?

 

[gnostic]

Also you said that He's outside of time but then you bring up how time-consuming judging people must be for Him, Which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

No, thana, I don't believe that at all.

First of all, I don't think God is real at all.

Second, I don't think there is anything or anyone "outside of time". The whole "outside of time" is usually argument that theists make about God. I am just using one of the common statement that theists make about eternity.

Third, time will occur regardless of whether God only 6000 years or for all eternity. Time will pass if he change from stillness to movement, regardless of how old he is, and regardless of eternity. Time will pass even when God is just sitting like a lump on his throne.

 

[Desert Snake]

No, thana, I don't believe that at all.

First of all, I don't think God is real at all.

Second, I don't think there is anything or anyone "outside of time". The whole "outside of time" is usually argument that theists make about God. I am just using one of the common statement that theists make about eternity.

Third, time will occur regardless of whether God only 6000 years or for all eternity. Time will pass if he change from stillness to movement, regardless of how old he is, and regardless of eternity. Time will pass even when God is just sitting like a lump on his throne.

Fascinating. Perhaps tell what IF ANYTHING, non-materialistic or non-explicitly atheistic you do adhere to, etc.



anything?

 

[George-ananda]

Even if you were to live for eternity, doing anything will take time, whether they be thousands of years or as little a nanosecond.

But if you put a billion tasks, even that nanosecond per task will build up, and will take a longer time when you have completed a billion tasks.

Similarly, if a billion people were to die today, then God will have to judge those billion souls, one by one. Let's say God could shorten his time on judgment seat by multitasking in judging, like judging 100 souls at the same time.

Of course, he could make life lot easier for himself, by dividing the billion people in half, and send one half to heaven and condemn the other half to hell. Won't that be fun when have several hundreds of thousands of criminals having party in heaven, while millions of innocent children are rotting in hell?

I think you are not quite grasping the word 'infinite'.

 

[gnostic]

You're anthropomorphising God, everyone does it of course but if you want to make sense of the concept of God then try not too.

Ha.

Yeah, sure, I'm anthropomorphising. Unless I come across that doesn't anthropomorphising God, then I would do so.

Having read both Bible and Qur'an I see nothing but God undergoing anthropomorphising. Nothing in either scriptures show God to be nothing more than superstitious guys been portray as person of that time, whether it be the time of Adam, time of Abraham, time of Moses, of David, Isaiah, Jesus or Muhammad.

He act like a human, can feel love and compassion, or he could feel jealousy or wrathful. In some texts, he is seen as sitting on a throne, like a king; if he was a spirit, then why would he even need a throne to sit on. Even in Jesus' parables, God is depicted like human with human characteristics.

Show me some texts, when God is not acting human-like.

 

[gnostic]

I think you are not quite grasping the word 'infinite'.

Infinite time does mean there are "no time".

God can watch a person born into the world and die 50 years later. Those 50 years would still have passed, regardless God outliving that time. Time is still relevant.

 

[George-ananda]

Infinite time does mean there are "no time".

God can watch a person born into the world and die 50 years later. Those 50 years would still have passed, regardless God outliving that time. Time is still relevant.

I was getting at the point that a infinite being can judge the biggest number of things you can possibly think of essentially instantaneously. (I was referring to your example of soul judgments.)

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

What's your 2-cent about this?

I'm agnostic, yet I find the Christian god (or at least a Christian god) more believable than many religious belief (though, of course, by no means all).

 

[Thana]

Ha.

Yeah, sure, I'm anthropomorphising. Unless I come across that doesn't anthropomorphising God, then I would do so.

Having read both Bible and Qur'an I see nothing but God undergoing anthropomorphising. Nothing in either scriptures show God to be nothing more than superstitious guys been portray as person of that time, whether it be the time of Adam, time of Abraham, time of Moses, of David, Isaiah, Jesus or Muhammad.

He act like a human, can feel love and compassion, or he could feel jealousy or wrathful. In some texts, he is seen as sitting on a throne, like a king; if he was a spirit, then why would he even need a throne to sit on. Even in Jesus' parables, God is depicted like human with human characteristics.

Show me some texts, when God is not acting human-like.

He's described by people to the best of their abilities. That doesn't mean anything more than that.
And I did say we all anthropomorphise, But in your case to better your understanding I think you should try not too.

No, thana, I don't believe that at all.

First of all, I don't think God is real at all.

Second, I don't think there is anything or anyone "outside of time". The whole "outside of time" is usually argument that theists make about God. I am just using one of the common statement that theists make about eternity.

Third, time will occur regardless of whether God only 6000 years or for all eternity. Time will pass if he change from stillness to movement, regardless of how old he is, and regardless of eternity. Time will pass even when God is just sitting like a lump on his throne.

I know you don't believe, It never even crossed my mind that you did.

Also I don't think you understand the principles of time or the concept of eternity and how that would affect ones concept of time.

 

[psychoslice]

This is why I gave up organised religion, it was too ridiculers.

 

[Deathbydefault]

Christopher Hitchens, is all I need say.

 

[gnostic]

I can't answer the rest, but this one seems obvious. "Outside of time" would preclude having any problem with timing in judging and sentencing each soul.

The "outside of time" is a concept that no one can verify that it can happened, except that could happen in paranormal fiction or science fiction, in mythology, in movies or tv, in pseudoscience books. This is philosophical concept, not a scientific one.

Eternity, on the other hand, is a different concept to "outside of time". Eternity just mean a long period of time, or it could mean having no beginning and no ending, but time still exist. It doesn't mean it is "outside of time". But like "outside of time", eternity is still hypothetical, even mythological.

And of course, some groups of religious people would like to meld eternity and outside of time together, but I personally think they are reaching. It is in the realm of wishful thinking.

 

[gnostic]

I was getting at the point that a infinite being can judge the biggest number of things you can possibly think of essentially instantaneously. (I was referring to your example of soul judgments.)

Yeah, sure, George. That's possible...but, in what fantasy world that this infinite being could infinitely multitask judging a really large population of souls?

You are just speculating, just as everyone else is speculating, when they talk of infinity, eternity, "outside of time". Most of you, are jumping off the reality-train into the la-la-whirlpool of philosophy mixed with messy religions.

Heck, even I am speculating on this, and I am willing to admit that I speculating about this whole topic. Are you willing to admit the same?

 

[gnostic]

He's described by people to the best of their abilities. That doesn't mean anything more than that.
And I did say we all anthropomorphise, But in your case to better your understanding I think you should try not too.

Hey, I am working on the concepts of your own religious literature. If I had a literature that I could read, that doesn't anthropomorphise your deity, I would use that.

Even your Jesus did the same, in his description of God in the parables. And Revelation...now that book is chock-a-block of anthropomorphism, but here the beings (God, Satan, angels, demons) are nightmarish mixed human characteristics with that of animals and mythological creatures, morphed together as some sort of chimera.

In Genesis, God made man to look like him. Is that really the case, or did the author really wanted god to look like us?

But that's not my point about bringing Revelation into the picture. Where as Genesis made God to look like us, and even walk among us, the Revelation has gone back to the more primal myths of where god look part human, and part animal, like in Egyptian myths. Angels, having no wings, to angels with wings...and more interesting the seraph had a head, but four faces (or was that four heads).

Of course, we are not meant to take the parables or the Revelation literally. But the sort of sources that I have to work with.

 

[George-ananda]

Yeah, sure, George. That's possible...but, in what fantasy world that this infinite being could infinitely multitask judging a really large population of souls?

You are just speculating, just as everyone else is speculating, when they talk of infinity, eternity, "outside of time". Most of you, are jumping off the reality-train into the la-la-whirlpool of philosophy mixed with messy religions.

Heck, even I am speculating on this, and I am willing to admit that I speculating about this whole topic. Are you willing to admit the same?

I am not saying I personally believe in the Christian and Muslim conception of God. I was just arguing that the points you raised in the OP did not bring down that concept.

 

[Lyndon]

Another atheist that's made up there own unbelievable God, so they can say they don't believe in him!!

 

[Rick O'Shez]

The whole "outside of time" is usually argument that theists make about God.

Yes, it looks like a very dodgy concept to me, another bit of theological trickery. It's like a parent trying to explain to a child how Santa Claus can deliver all those presents in one night.