Why would God's ultimate power come with ultimate responsibility?

[9-10ths_Penguin]

responsibility
something that it is your job or duty to deal with:
responsibility

Seeing how you keep copy-pasting this from a dictionary somewhere, I'm sure you can see the other definitions of "responsibility." Why do you keep omitting them?

 

[Truthseeker]

According to the Baha'i Faith teachings, if they get the death penalty God will not impose a second penalty upon them, and I think that means that if they get life in prison God will punish them after they die and are judged by God.

Not necessarily. I don't think one logically follows the other. Getting life in prison may mean that the offense was not as bad, so God will not punish them.

 

[Trailblazer]

@Trailblazer

Are we supposed to only consider the definition of responsibility you present in the opening post - which is probably not what they person you were talking to was intending - or are we permitted to use the most common definition of the term (e.g., "the quality or state of being responsible; esp. being the cause or explanation of")? I mean, as someone who accepts all reality is interconnected, everything is more or less responsible for everything else in a sense, so... I don't see how your god would be exempt from that. Especially if your god is said to have very direct causatory control over all of reality - it would be connected at the first degree.

God is definitely responsible for the suffering in this world, connected at the first degree, since God created a world designed so suffering would exist.
However, God is not responsible to prevent the suffering people endure. To claim that would be illogical. Since God set it up so that people would suffer why would God want to prevent them from suffering?

The argument that atheists present, that God is all-powerful so God should prevent suffering if God is all-good is totally illogical.
Just because an all-powerful God could prevent suffering that does not mean that God should prevent suffering, or that God owes it to us to prevent suffering, just because some cry babies don't like suffering. I will be the first to admit that I do not like suffering, but I am not a cry baby about it. Admittedly, I used to be a cry baby, but not anymore. I think the suffering has taught me a lesson, that being that I can endure the suffering and still survive.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The argument that atheists present, that God is all-powerful so God should prevent suffering if God is all-good is totally illogical.

That isn't the argument.

The argument is that God's actions would be a reflection of his character, so God's failure to mitigate the suffering that he ultimately caused would imply that God is not all-good.

 

[Trailblazer]

Well, that is correct, if God is defined as perfectly moral.

God is not moral or immoral since morality does not apply to God.
Only humans are are subject to being moral or immoral.

Moral: concerned with the principles of right and wrong behavior and the goodness or badness of human character.
moral means - Google Search

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

God is not moral or immoral since morality does not apply to God.
Only humans are are subject to being moral or immoral.

Morality applies to all thinking agents.

Is your God not a thinking agent?

 

[Trailblazer]

Therefore, if God is perfectly moral, then the fact that He allows evil can only be logically explained by concluding that what looks like evil, is not evil. God let apparently bad things to happen, because it is for the common good, and they are therefore functional towards optimizing the final Good.

What looks like evil is evil. That is why the justice system puts evil criminals in prison for life or gives them the death penalty.

The fact that God allows evil is logically explained by the fact that humans have free will, so humans can choose between good and evil.

So, if I take my gun and shoot the first kid I see, and God did not stop me, then we can conclude that God sees the demise of that little child as contributing to the best of possible worlds, and it was therefore not evil at all. Same with Him letting about 30,000 kids die today.

So, if I take my gun and shoot the first kid I see, and God did not stop me, then we can conclude that God sees the demise of that little child as
an evil act that I chose to commit.

God did not cause 30,000 kids to die today so God is not responsible for those deaths.

 

[Trailblazer]

To me that hits a little different when the parent also sets up the kind of pain and tribulation the child will have to face. The God isn't just the parent, but also the architect for the world that the child gets to experience

Good point. You can bet your bottom dollar it is different! Human parents do not deliberately set things up so their children will suffer. They protect their children as much as possible, knowing that there will still be suffering given that is the way life is, thanks to God's design.

I guess this is one reason the idea of the monotheistic god just doesn't gel well with me. Life is complicated. At least with polytheism, there's an explanation for why life is so diverse and colorful, and why there are so many aspects of life that play out in so many different ways. I struggle to see how life in all of it's chaotic complexity could come from only one Divine source

I also struggle to understand why things are this way, but I nevertheless understand how this can come from one God.
You see, I am not obligated to believe that God is always loving just because other believers, namely Christians and Baha'is, believe that.
A child thinks this way, but I am a grown up with a mind to think things thrusgh.

I do not see how that is possible that so much suffering can exist alongside a loving God so I cannot believe it just because scriptures say it.

 

[Trailblazer]

On one hand, God is the all-powerful, all-knowing creator being, existing outside the time and space of the universe and beyond the understanding of human beings. On the other hand, we have the anthropomorphic God, being happy, sad, angry and surprised, having desires, wishes, opinions and, of specific relevance here, morals (or not).

As I see it, these two images are entirely inconsistent. A being that was truly all-powerful, all-knowing, and particularly, not subject to linear time those "human-like" characteristics simply don't make sense. It is the fact we don't know everything, can be helpless or vulnerable and are subject to liner time that gives us all of these characteristics in the first place.

I agree that it makes no sense for a being that is truly all-powerful, all-knowing, not subject to linear time, as well as not being subject to the world conditions that He created, to have human-like characteristics such as the Bible and other scriptures assign to Him.

As long as you try to have it both ways, you'll never be able to address this kind of question. Of course, if you don't try to have it both ways, you break some fundamental aspects of your religion.

I do break some rules of my religion but I have never been much for rules, and I detest religious dogma that tells me what I am supposed to believe.

 

[Trailblazer]

We are each responsible for the foreseeable consequences of our actions.

Yes, and God's created this world, so God bears some responsibility for the outcome of that creation, just as a painter is responsible for the painting that he painted.

 

[Trailblazer]

Having no possible means of grasping the reality of omniscience, omnipresence, or omnipotence, we nevertheless choose to pass judgement on an entity that we imaginatively endow with all these traits.

Seems like a game for fools, to me.

I am not passing judgment. That is a game that some atheists play.

 

[Trailblazer]

If you see the world as some kind of training ground, then it makes sense up to a point. The problem is that a loving parent would not subject a child to experiences that it was totally unequipped to deal with. By all means allow a child to fall over as it learns to walk, but make sure it is on a soft carpet or whatever. Later, a skinned knee is acceptable as he learns to ride a bike, but not getting killed in traffic. This applies not only to kindness, but also efficacy. If an experience totally destroys a person's ability to learn, how does that work? I'll list a few examples.

A baby is born with a medical condition that causes intense pain and death in a few days.
Someone falls off a high cliff. He learns that it is a good idea to avoid the edge of cliffs, but that the end of it (literally).
A person is born a sociopath and is totally unable to change that.

As I told you some time ago, I'll meet you at the atheist kiosk.

 

[Trailblazer]

One is, imo, responsibility for their actions as well as inaction.
For example if you have the power to save a child life and choose not, you are still responsible for the results of your inaction.

That is true. If you are a bystander and have the power to save a child being raped or murdered and you just stand by and watch, you could even be considered an accessory.

This only applies to humans, not to God, which is why God is never the defendant in any court of law.

 

[Trailblazer]

Yes, I agree with that. It is not quite so simple.

Why isn't it that simple? Because of the Baha'i apologetic you are afraid to present?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Yes, and God's created this world, so God bears some responsibility for the outcome of that creation, just as a painter is responsible for the painting that he painted.

If God were to have created the world, he would bear full responsibility for everything in it, except for what he couldn't foresee.

 

[Trailblazer]

Seeing how you keep copy-pasting this from a dictionary somewhere, I'm sure you can see the other definitions of "responsibility." Why do you keep omitting them?

I looked at all the definitions but I picked the one that is the simplest and most relevant to what the atheist in the OP meant.
I know that from the long conversation we were having.

This atheist said that an all powerful, all knowing, and perfectly good God would have as His job and duty to deal with everything, yet he had no logical argument to support that claim.

responsibility
something that it is your job or duty to deal with:
responsibility

You can post other definitions if you want to.

 

[Trailblazer]

If God were to have created the world, he would bear full responsibility for everything in it, except for what he couldn't foresee.

Why?
Why would God be responsible for freely chosen human actions?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Why?
Why would God be responsible for human actions?

The same reasons anyone can be responsible for others' actions.

An illustrative example: say you somehow knew that your neighbour would commit murder if he ever got hold of a gun.

You leave a gun on your front lawn, knowing that your neighbour will find it. He finds it and kills someone with it.

Would you bear responsibility for the murder?

 

[Trailblazer]

Not necessarily. I don't think one logically follows the other. Getting life in prison may mean that the offense was not as bad, so God will not punish them.

This applies to cases where a person could either get life in prison or the death penalty for the same crime. Remember, Baha'u'llah sais that the UHJ could choose to impose either one.

I think it was Abdu'l-Baha who said that if a person gets the death sentence a second penalty won't be imposed by God.
I looked for the quote but I cannot find it right now, sorry.

 

[Trailblazer]

That isn't the argument.

The argument is that God's actions would be a reflection of his character, so God's failure to mitigate the suffering that he ultimately caused would imply that God is not all-good.

You are saying that God is not all-good unless God mitigates the suffering that He caused.

What suffering did God actually cause? Indirectly God allows for suffering since God created a world in which suffering is unavoidable, but that is not the same as causing suffering.