Would a good god allow the Coronavirus?

[Brian2]

Ok do you think there is something beautiful in seeing the way the poor accepted their suffering like Christ accepted his suffering.

I was not the one saying it or the one who has experienced seeing so much suffering by people who were willing to accept it. If I could see through her eyes I might see that. As it is I hear what she said and consider it and try to see what she might have meant.

 

[People_Lack_Integrity]

The most common christian answer to the "problem of evil" I've found is that basically it's our fault...or rather the fault of two flawed idiots who were convinced by a talking serpent to eat an apple to gain knowledge (smh). Original sin in other words. I also find that they don't actually view anything god does as actually evil....because it's god and they aren't allowed to see god as anything other than good. So if god orders the slaughter of children...that's ok, because it's god. If god throws a tantrum and commits mass genocide...that's ok because it's god. If god gets angry because apparently his flawed creation of men have foreskin and he asks you to tear it off...ok, no problem god, you are good, so I'll just take this sharp stone and...we're good! I find this idea that "god is good"...just because...to be appalling. It's the sacrifice of your very humanity, moral sensibilities, empathy and integrity...for whatever this "god" says it right. Given any other scenario, these same people would be appalled by someone asking them to kill their children to prove their loyalty....but put god there...now it's ok. That's why the whole idea and concept of religion is so incredibly dangerous and why so many atrocities have happened in the name of religions...because when you have faith that you have the right god and the right answers by having "god" on your side, supporting whatever actions you think it wants...then anything can be justified as good, even if it is actually an affront to mankind.

 

[Brian2]

The most common christian answer to the "problem of evil" I've found is that basically it's our fault...or rather the fault of two flawed idiots who were convinced by a talking serpent to eat an apple to gain knowledge (smh). Original sin in other words.

A problem I have found with this subject is that the word "evil" is used in ambiguously and it sometimes is hard to tell whether it refers to moral evil or to suffering.
Moral evil in the world is what people do.
Physical suffering in the world is the result of our material nature and the environment.
Suffering in animals is because of the same thing and it comes from the way God designed things and eventually leads to the death of the animals. There is the good side of physical suffering in that it is given as a warning of injury and illness and potential harm. The uncomfortable side of physical suffering is the discomfort of it, it hurts. So let's blame God for it if we want to blame someone.
We do not know exactly what the full results would be if we ended up not doing our own thing and did as God directed. I would think that we would not die and maybe would not suffer in other ways also.
But as I said, the moral evil is what humans do and not God.

I also find that they don't actually view anything god does as actually evil....because it's god and they aren't allowed to see god as anything other than good. So if god orders the slaughter of children...that's ok, because it's god. If god throws a tantrum and commits mass genocide...that's ok because it's god. If god gets angry because apparently his flawed creation of men have foreskin and he asks you to tear it off...ok, no problem god, you are good, so I'll just take this sharp stone and...we're good! I find this idea that "god is good"...just because...to be appalling. It's the sacrifice of your very humanity, moral sensibilities, empathy and integrity...for whatever this "god" says it right.

Yes we trust that God is good and does what He does for good reasons.
We also see God as all knowing and so has good reason for doing what He does.
We also see God as all powerful and so has good reason for not stepping in and stopping either moral evil most of the time and physical or mental suffering most of the time.
He has stepped in and stopped these things and still does imo at times but of course when He does take the stand of judging people He is criticised and it is damned if you do and damned if you don't because we humans like to judge God even though we know nothing or choose to know nothing and to twist what the Bible says as you have done.

Given any other scenario, these same people would be appalled by someone asking them to kill their children to prove their loyalty....but put god there...now it's ok.

Abraham trusted God and believed Him when He said that he would be the father of nations through Isaac and so thought that Isaac would be resurrected or something even if Abraham killed Isaac. So the test of loyalty was complete even before the act was done. I see the same sort of test of loyalty on movies when someone is asked to kill a friend to prove loyalty. It's a good test, and in this case at the start of what would be the salvation of the world, an important test and showed Abraham's faith, the thing which would gain the salvation for the world.

That's why the whole idea and concept of religion is so incredibly dangerous and why so many atrocities have happened in the name of religions...because when you have faith that you have the right god and the right answers by having "god" on your side, supporting whatever actions you think it wants...then anything can be justified as good, even if it is actually an affront to mankind.

It's true that atrocities are committed in the name of different Gods but if I used the logic you are using I would do away with many more things than religion that people put their trust in and end up committing atrocities, even things that many of us probably see as good things.
So the real problem is in humans imo

 

[Alienistic]

No, unless it couldn’t do anything about it but then why call it god.

But to an evil god, it would be good for it to get satisfaction out of the torture, suffering, pain of others.

If Corona virus is used as some sort of punishment or lesson.... then this god is inept and demented for creating humans and their potential the way that it did and then holding the lowly, ignorant collective human race accountable for how it made it.

 

[Alienistic]

So the real problem is in humans imo

The ever larger problem, would be that which created or designed the human and all of its potential.

 

[rational experiences]

Science says there were two forms of God.

Science is notified.

God the holy one natural forms.

The God of Satan who separated what God had formed being human scientists.

 

[Brian2]

The ever larger problem, would be that which created or designed the human and all of its potential.

It's not the power of the motor cycle that is the problem but not knowing how to handle it.
Potential is a good thing in the right hands and with tuition in the right direction and with humans, a change of heart towards the creator and not away from Him.
To take away human potential is to make us into something less than human.

 

[Hermit Philosopher]

There are two (opposite) premisses for theists to choose from when responding to whether a “good” god would allow a virus:

1. Either Man is (a) God’s marionette and (a) God controls everything that occurs; in which case, the question is irrelevant because there can be no matter of actual “good” or “bad” in regards to what happens to marionettes, or…
   
2. Man has free will and personal agency; in which case (a) God is the observer and judge of Man’s own reality/worldliness and the virus is caused by how Man has chosen to live - not by (a) God.

With option 2, one could argue that yes, a good God would allow a virus because to not allow it would be to alter the consequences of Man’s choices, which could potentially threaten the purpose of his free will.


Humbly
Hermit

 

[Alienistic]

There are two (opposite) premisses for theists to choose from when responding to whether a “good” god would allow a virus:

1. Either Man is (a) God’s marionette and (a) God controls everything that occurs; in which case, the question is irrelevant because there can be no matter of actual “good” or “bad” in regards to what happens to marionettes, or…
   
2. Man has free will and personal agency; in which case (a) God is the observer and judge of Man’s own reality/worldliness and the virus is caused by how Man has chosen to live - not by (a) God.

With option 2, one could argue that yes, a good God would allow a virus because to not allow it would be to alter the consequences of Man’s choices, which could potentially threaten the purpose of his free will.


Humbly
Hermit

1) is most sensible. Mankind never chose to be created or given free will or the potentials within itself to be able to be bad or evil puppets and be punished for how it was designed. It is simply doing as it were programmed to be and do. Just as mankind never chose to be smitten with diseases, virus’s, suffering.

Perhaps a human marionette can become aware that it is a marionette, choose that this god must be evil, and seek and choose to become as free from it as it can be.

 

[People_Lack_Integrity]

A problem I have found with this subject is that the word "evil" is used in ambiguously and it sometimes is hard to tell whether it refers to moral evil or to suffering.
Moral evil in the world is what people do.
Physical suffering in the world is the result of our material nature and the environment. Except that they can be both, especially if someone is inflicting suffering on people purposefully, for example a dictator starving his people, or someone inflicting torture on someone else.
Suffering in animals is because of the same thing and it comes from the way God designed things and eventually leads to the death of the animals. There is the good side of physical suffering in that it is given as a warning of injury and illness and potential harm. The uncomfortable side of physical suffering is the discomfort of it, it hurts. So let's blame God for it if we want to blame someone. Well if you are a christian, most don't want to admit that, but it's not just for physical suffering, it's for moral evil as well, or you are saying that god isn't in control of its own creation, including with things like Covid that wiped out several hundred thousand at this point and more are dying everyday, or that god isn't responsible for cancer, AIDS, or any disease or virus. You also would be avoiding natural disasters like Hurricane Ida that just hit Louisiana and others that kill people, destroy their homes and lives, along with Tornado's, Earthquakes, Psunami's, etc.
We do not know exactly what the full results would be if we ended up not doing our own thing and did as God directed. I would think that we would not die and maybe would not suffer in other ways also. So you believe in a literal Adam and Even story?
But as I said, the moral evil is what humans do and not God. So for you everything god does is good, including kill innocents both directly and indirectly in the bible, sanction slavery, sending a bear to maul some kids for insulting his "servant", making a war deal with Jepthah knowing in advance that his daughter would be sacrificed to fulfill it, asking Abraham to kill his son, judging people not on their actions, but whether they believe in you or not. Funny you speak of Moral evil that humans do, but if you read the bible, this actually doesn't matter at all to god when it comes to judgement.

Yes we trust that God is good and does what He does for good reasons. All evidence to the contrary.
We also see God as all knowing and so has good reason for doing what He does. All evidence to the contrary, for example when he did the worldwide flood, it failed. So either he didn't know it would fail, or thought that mass genocide was necessary anyways, even though it wouldn't accomplish his goal.
We also see God as all powerful and so has good reason for not stepping in and stopping either moral evil most of the time and physical or mental suffering most of the time. Despite him stepping in so many times in the OT and trying to stop "moral evil", yet ended up inflicting it most of the time.
He has stepped in and stopped these things and still does imo at times but of course when He does take the stand of judging people He is criticised and it is damned if you do and damned if you don't because we humans like to judge God even though we know nothing or choose to know nothing and to twist what the Bible says as you have done. There isn't a single event in history ever confirmed that "god stepped in and stopped it" and I know this because every single event that's been referenced to me are things that either were the work of humans, or something that would have happened anyways. So your statement is really wishful thinking. People like to attribute normal events to their specific god. Like when a Hindu is healed from an injury, they'll thank Brahma, or Vishnu...instead of the doctors who healed them.

Abraham trusted God and believed Him when He said that he would be the father of nations through Isaac and so thought that Isaac would be resurrected or something even if Abraham killed Isaac. So the test of loyalty was complete even before the act was done. I see the same sort of test of loyalty on movies when someone is asked to kill a friend to prove loyalty. It's a good test, and in this case at the start of what would be the salvation of the world, an important test and showed Abraham's faith, the thing which would gain the salvation for the world. If god knew he was loyal and knew the future, then the test was futile. Abraham isn't a good or decent man if he was willing to kill his son. If someone came to you promising they were god and performed some magic tricks and asked you to sacrifice your child, I'd bet you wouldn't do it. Most wouldn't because they are decent people. Anytime though that someone does kill their child and claim "god told me to do it", they always are tried as criminals and sent off to the mental ward and rightly so. It's not a good test, unless you are a sick, demented individual who doesn't care about the sanctity of life. That's kind of christianity in a nutshell is "Who cares about this life, we've got a better one waiting when we die". But for the atheist, we know this is all there is and therefore it becomes paramount and more precious than anything, not just for ourselves but for everyone because we see the world for what it is and not what we wish it to be in fantasy land.

It's true that atrocities are committed in the name of different Gods but if I used the logic you are using I would do away with many more things than religion that people put their trust in and end up committing atrocities, even things that many of us probably see as good things. So the real problem is in humans imo

Oh humans are the problem for sure, but religions and ideologies given humans a clear path to commit atrocities. When you believe and "trust" that god is on your side and that your beliefs are right....you pretty much can come up with a reason to do anything and call it good. Take your example of defending Abraham. You are defending someone who was going to murder their child. In any other circumstance outside of religion, you would be horrified. But your religious conviction demands that you see this as good. That was my point before is that religion makes ordinarily moral people and compel them to say and do terrible things. So you proved my point.

 

[Wandering Monk]

God to all the sick and dead from Covid: Look what you made me do!

 

[Brian2]

Well if you are a christian, most don't want to admit that, but it's not just for physical suffering, it's for moral evil as well, or you are saying that god isn't in control of its own creation, including with things like Covid that wiped out several hundred thousand at this point and more are dying everyday, or that god isn't responsible for cancer, AIDS, or any disease or virus. You also would be avoiding natural disasters like Hurricane Ida that just hit Louisiana and others that kill people, destroy their homes and lives, along with Tornado's, Earthquakes, Psunami's, etc.

God is responsible for creating all these things and God is responsible for making us so we could suffer and die. That does not make God morally culpable however.

So for you everything god does is good, including kill innocents both directly and indirectly in the bible, sanction slavery, sending a bear to maul some kids for insulting his "servant", making a war deal with Jepthah knowing in advance that his daughter would be sacrificed to fulfill it, asking Abraham to kill his son, judging people not on their actions, but whether they believe in you or not. Funny you speak of Moral evil that humans do, but if you read the bible, this actually doesn't matter at all to god when it comes to judgement.

Everything that God does is good. I just don't agree with your interpretation of some of the Biblical stuff and no doubt your idea of who God is and the authority He has.

All evidence to the contrary, for example when he did the worldwide flood, it failed. So either he didn't know it would fail, or thought that mass genocide was necessary anyways, even though it wouldn't accomplish his goal.

It succeeded in doing what He wanted it to.

Despite him stepping in so many times in the OT and trying to stop "moral evil", yet ended up inflicting it most of the time.

God is the judge and has done and probably still does inflict suffering on the world for various evils and the worst of it is still to come. He does this even though most of us don't get it and don't turn from our ways.

There isn't a single event in history ever confirmed that "god stepped in and stopped it" and I know this because every single event that's been referenced to me are things that either were the work of humans, or something that would have happened anyways. So your statement is really wishful thinking. People like to attribute normal events to their specific god. Like when a Hindu is healed from an injury, they'll thank Brahma, or Vishnu...instead of the doctors who healed them.

Credit should go to God and to the doctors in the case of a healing but the thing is that we cannot be sure when God was acting or not. You seem sure and I find it difficult to know.

If god knew he was loyal and knew the future, then the test was futile. Abraham isn't a good or decent man if he was willing to kill his son. If someone came to you promising they were god and performed some magic tricks and asked you to sacrifice your child, I'd bet you wouldn't do it. Most wouldn't because they are decent people. Anytime though that someone does kill their child and claim "god told me to do it", they always are tried as criminals and sent off to the mental ward and rightly so. It's not a good test, unless you are a sick, demented individual who doesn't care about the sanctity of life. That's kind of christianity in a nutshell is "Who cares about this life, we've got a better one waiting when we die". But for the atheist, we know this is all there is and therefore it becomes paramount and more precious than anything, not just for ourselves but for everyone because we see the world for what it is and not what we wish it to be in fantasy land.

We are told what Abraham experienced with God and it is that which gave him so much faith in God and a willingness to do what God wanted. You are looking at the actions and dismissing what it says God did for Abraham and so you interpret it wrong.

 

[Bethel]

Calvinism decided that God created evil.
Just ignore it, unless you're a Calvinist, and in that case, your mind has been made up for you.
You can thank John Calvin for that situation.
Don't blame God, as that's on you.

 

[People_Lack_Integrity]

God is responsible for creating all these things and God is responsible for making us so we could suffer and die. That does not make God morally culpable however. So if a scientist created or modified a virus that wiped out several hundred thousand people, you are saying they wouldn't be morally culpable? Or if a mining company inadvertently caused an earthquake due to accidentally igniting an underground layer of gas? This god who is supposedly "responsible for creating all these things", created viruses, diseases and causes natural disasters...but you are saying isn't morally culpable? I don't know how you could possibly say or argue that.


Everything that God does is good. I just don't agree with your interpretation of some of the Biblical stuff and no doubt your idea of who God is and the authority He has. So you are one of those who has determined that everything that god does is good...just because it is god. So when god commanded the murder of all the Amalekites, including the "children and infants", then baby killing becomes good...because you know, god is good. But again, in any other circumstance, you would call baby killing horrific, revealing your hypocrisy. I don't care who it is and if it claims to be god, no being has the "authority" to kill innocents and nothing can justify that.

It succeeded in doing what He wanted it to. I assume you are talking the flood here and no it did not. It says very plainly that god did it to get rid of all the unrighteous people and the "evil in men's hearts", but after the flood it failed and god said in Genesis 8:21 “I will never again curse the ground because of man, even though man’s inclination is evil from his youth. And I will never again strike down every living thing as I have done." So again, if he already knew that evil was in man's heart from youth, then the flood was completely unnecessary as it did not solve the problem. So no it did not succeed and Genesis 8 says that.

God is the judge and has done and probably still does inflict suffering on the world for various evils and the worst of it is still to come. He does this even though most of us don't get it and don't turn from our ways. I'm glad you at least acknowledge this, but then how can you say that everything god does is good, if he's inflicting suffering? That is a very narrow view, especially if you've never visited the children's cancer ward. Yes, I fail to get how children, who no fault of their own, get cancer, suffer and live short lives. It causes suffering to the child, the parents and family and for what? For the evil's of another? That is not just, that is not good and quite plainly any god that would inflict suffering is not "all good".

Credit should go to God and to the doctors in the case of a healing but the thing is that we cannot be sure when God was acting or not. You seem sure and I find it difficult to know. That's because in 99.9% of the cases where someone decided to go with prayer over medical treatment, they died or got worse. I say 99.9% because there are a few rare cases of for example spontaneous remission in cancer patients where the doctors did no treatment and the cancer went into remission on its own. Even in those cases you couldn't possibly point to a god. But intercessory prayer studies have been done, the most famous being a 3 year long study on heart patients with 3 different control groups. One group where the patients didn't know they were being prayed for, one in which they did and the last group they actually participated in the prayers with the group. This funded by the Templeton Foundation a religious organization that wanted to prove that prayer works. Instead it showed that prayer had no effect at all. The bible says pretty plainly that if you have faith, that god will answer your prayers. This study showed that prayer works as well as random chance and in fact the last group fared worse at about 44% for the ones that participated in the prayer, with the hypothesis being that it added stress to the patients. Look up the study. If there's no way to tell if "god was acting or not", then there's no reason to ever credit any god to begin with.

We are told what Abraham experienced with God and it is that which gave him so much faith in God and a willingness to do what God wanted. You are looking at the actions and dismissing what it says God did for Abraham and so you interpret it wrong. No, I'm taking it for what it is and what it says and am not predisposed to say "god is good" no matter what. Again, the lemon test is if I described a similar scenario for another religion/god or circumstance for an individual, or a dictator requesting a guy kill his son to prove his loyalty. In any other circumstance you would say "That guy/god/person is EVIL!!!" Even if the dictator/god/person didn't allow the sacrifice to be completed and stopped it. In the case of this god, there's one case with Abraham in which he stopped it and another in which he accepted the sacrifice with Jepthah, which I noticed you ignored. The difference in between you and me is that if there was a god and I was for certain it was a god or THE god and it asked me to sacrifice my kid...no matter the reason....I would judge that god as evil and tell him off. You....I guess you would put your child on that altar, which to me is horrifying, because in doing so you are actually sacrificing your humanity. That is what is so staggering about religion is that it's like an off switch for empathy and for people to confuse evil actions with good ones.

 

[lukethethird]

Would a good god allow the Coronavirus?
Would a good god make a difference to anything that matters?

 

[Brian2]

You're really going to have to learn the quote system when answering posts.
If there is a part you want to reply to then put it in a quote box.
You do that by copying the first quote bracket at the start of what you want to quote, and the end quote bracket at the end of what you want to quote. [/QUOTE]
That way the part you want to quote ends up in a box in your post.

So if a scientist created or modified a virus that wiped out several hundred thousand people, you are saying they wouldn't be morally culpable? Or if a mining company inadvertently caused an earthquake due to accidentally igniting an underground layer of gas? This god who is supposedly "responsible for creating all these things", created viruses, diseases and causes natural disasters...but you are saying isn't morally culpable? I don't know how you could possibly say or argue that.

God is God and humans are humans. God knows what He is doing and that it is for a good reason and we humans do things through ignorance and an evil heart.

So you are one of those who has determined that everything that god does is good...just because it is god. So when god commanded the murder of all the Amalekites, including the "children and infants", then baby killing becomes good...because you know, god is good. But again, in any other circumstance, you would call baby killing horrific, revealing your hypocrisy. I don't care who it is and if it claims to be god, no being has the "authority" to kill innocents and nothing can justify that.

I always give God the benefit of the doubt about what He does and see Him differently than you do no doubt. God is the creator and the judge of us humans and God was also ordering killing of children for good reason in the OT, something I guess you will deny because you just see God as a character in a story, like another human and do not bother to look at the possible reasons God had for doing and ordering what He did.

I assume you are talking the flood here and no it did not. It says very plainly that god did it to get rid of all the unrighteous people and the "evil in men's hearts", but after the flood it failed and god said in Genesis 8:21 “I will never again curse the ground because of man, even though man’s inclination is evil from his youth. And I will never again strike down every living thing as I have done." So again, if he already knew that evil was in man's heart from youth, then the flood was completely unnecessary as it did not solve the problem. So no it did not succeed and Genesis 8 says that.

The idea seems to have been to judge the world for the evils that were happening and to get rid of the culture of the day and make a new start, knowing that things would get worse again of course. Even the righteous do unrighteous things and just because Noah was righteous that does not mean the next generation will be righteous.

I'm glad you at least acknowledge this, but then how can you say that everything god does is good, if he's inflicting suffering? That is a very narrow view, especially if you've never visited the children's cancer ward. Yes, I fail to get how children, who no fault of their own, get cancer, suffer and live short lives. It causes suffering to the child, the parents and family and for what? For the evil's of another? That is not just, that is not good and quite plainly any god that would inflict suffering is not "all good".

All the things that God does are for the best. I don't think that I could say that God caused all children with cancer to get that cancer. God did make the earth as it is however and put us in charge and then kicked us out of the garden paradise to make our own way in the world. God does not always step in to stop suffering but God has no responsibility to do that. God has promised a day when He will judge the earth and bring the suffering to an end and restore the paradise however and we await that and try to be worthy of being given access to the paradise and eternal life.
There is more at stake than us humans however, the angels need to be judged and there is a whole realm apart from this material realm that is part of what God is considering. In the meantime He shows that what He does is done righteously.

That's because in 99.9% of the cases where someone decided to go with prayer over medical treatment, they died or got worse. I say 99.9% because there are a few rare cases of for example spontaneous remission in cancer patients where the doctors did no treatment and the cancer went into remission on its own. Even in those cases you couldn't possibly point to a god. But intercessory prayer studies have been done, the most famous being a 3 year long study on heart patients with 3 different control groups. One group where the patients didn't know they were being prayed for, one in which they did and the last group they actually participated in the prayers with the group. This funded by the Templeton Foundation a religious organization that wanted to prove that prayer works. Instead it showed that prayer had no effect at all. The bible says pretty plainly that if you have faith, that god will answer your prayers. This study showed that prayer works as well as random chance and in fact the last group fared worse at about 44% for the ones that participated in the prayer, with the hypothesis being that it added stress to the patients. Look up the study. If there's no way to tell if "god was acting or not", then there's no reason to ever credit any god to begin with.

It is a tough one for Christians when God does not answer prayer and someone dies. The answer of faith is to keep believing, as Job did.
When it comes to healing miracles I can say that I have heard of those cases when miracles seem to have happened.

No, I'm taking it for what it is and what it says and am not predisposed to say "god is good" no matter what. Again, the lemon test is if I described a similar scenario for another religion/god or circumstance for an individual, or a dictator requesting a guy kill his son to prove his loyalty. In any other circumstance you would say "That guy/god/person is EVIL!!!" Even if the dictator/god/person didn't allow the sacrifice to be completed and stopped it. In the case of this god, there's one case with Abraham in which he stopped it and another in which he accepted the sacrifice with Jepthah, which I noticed you ignored. The difference in between you and me is that if there was a god and I was for certain it was a god or THE god and it asked me to sacrifice my kid...no matter the reason....I would judge that god as evil and tell him off. You....I guess you would put your child on that altar, which to me is horrifying, because in doing so you are actually sacrificing your humanity. That is what is so staggering about religion is that it's like an off switch for empathy and for people to confuse evil actions with good ones.

I doubt that I would sacrifice my son, but then again I have not had the same experiences with God that Abraham had.
It is faith that God wanted and got it with Abraham, who believed God. Then God said, when He stopped Abraham that He would supply the sacrifice and He did at the time when a ram was caught nearby in a bush and it ended up being a prophecy about faith and God sending His Son to be a sacrifice for our sins.
Jepthah's daughter was not something God did, it was something that Jepthah did. God was going to save Israel from the enemy attacks and killings without Jepthah doing what he did. I don't think he had the right to do it personally, but he did and God allowed him his freedom to do it.

 

[Muffled]

Alex. "In order to assert that there is a God who is supervising this, then it must follow that there is morally sufficient reason for it to occur"

The Bishop could not give a convincing answer IMHO.

I believe the reason would be the millions of children murdered in abortion throughout the world.

 

[Muffled]

Maybe that is the greater good that caused God to allow 100,000 people to die in my country?

What is your abortion rate. Is it over 100,000 dead children?

 

[Muffled]

Valid point. Though I suspect they’d be seen the same way as martyrs are. Dying for the greater good and all that

I believe for some people it is just time to die. I don't see any martyrdom in that.

 

[People_Lack_Integrity]

You're really going to have to learn the quote system when answering posts.
If there is a part you want to reply to then put it in a quote box.
You do that by copying the first quote bracket at the start of what you want to quote, and the end quote bracket at the end of what you want to quote.

That way the part you want to quote ends up in a box in your post.[/QUOTE]
Sorry, I'm new here, so I didn't know how to do this. Hopefully I did it right this time.

God is God and humans are humans. God knows what He is doing and that it is for a good reason and we humans do things through ignorance and an evil heart.

That's not an answer to the challenge and you don't actually know if "God knows what he is doing", or even if god is a "He" or even if it exists at all. So dismissing an evil action done by a god, just because you presume this god is good, is simply you ignoring evil in favor of a being more powerful that you.

I always give God the benefit of the doubt about what He does and see Him differently than you do no doubt. God is the creator and the judge of us humans and God was also ordering killing of children for good reason in the OT, something I guess you will deny because you just see God as a character in a story, like another human and do not bother to look at the possible reasons God had for doing and ordering what He did.

Which proves my point that because you start out with the presumption that god is good, you are willing to look past human suffering and atrocity, so long as it is committed by this same god. That's frightening to say the least, because it also means that if this same god ordered you to do something you know is evil, you'd do it, because as you put it, "God must have a good reason for killing children". It always amazes me that people can justify the killing of innocents and children, just to support their religion. You lost your humanity in all of this.

The idea seems to have been to judge the world for the evils that were happening and to get rid of the culture of the day and make a new start, knowing that things would get worse again of course. Even the righteous do unrighteous things and just because Noah was righteous that does not mean the next generation will be righteous.

Which it failed to do and immediately so. I mean, right after the flood your "god" acknowledges the failure of his plan. Genesis says what the plan was, to get rid of the evil in men's hearts, by saving the only righteous family on earth. Yet immediately after says that god learned that he couldn't get rid of the evil in men's hearts and would never again curse the ground of the earth by wiping out mankind. This is an acknowledgement of failure. Your god failed at wiping out the evil in men's hearts, which is why he promised to never commit mass genocide again.

All the things that God does are for the best. I don't think that I could say that God caused all children with cancer to get that cancer. God did make the earth as it is however and put us in charge and then kicked us out of the garden paradise to make our own way in the world. God does not always step in to stop suffering but God has no responsibility to do that. God has promised a day when He will judge the earth and bring the suffering to an end and restore the paradise however and we await that and try to be worthy of being given access to the paradise and eternal life.
There is more at stake than us humans however, the angels need to be judged and there is a whole realm apart from this material realm that is part of what God is considering. In the meantime He shows that what He does is done righteously.

According to whom? I think the people who were just killed or lost their homes in Louisiana just a few days ago due to Hurricane Ida would disagree. I think the parents of children with cancer, or other diseases would disagree. You say that god doesn't cause all children to get cancer? Well god could also cure all those kids, especially the ones of faithful parents who are praying ever day and the prayers will go unanswered. Besides which, did god invent cancer? Or is he completely not in control of the diseases, viruses, bacteria and natural disasters of this world? For a god...he doesn't seem to have much power, or willingness to act. There's an old quote by Epicurus that is still highly relevant today and is logically sound:
Is god willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him god?

I'm not sure how you can say that there's more at stake than "us humans". It's never been proven that angels, demons, other realms..etc...exist at all. So far as science can tell, there's only the material realm. Until you or somebody else can prove there is a "whole real apart from this material", then you have no business asserting you know there is one.

It is a tough one for Christians when God does not answer prayer and someone dies. The answer of faith is to keep believing, as Job did. When it comes to healing miracles I can say that I have heard of those cases when miracles seem to have happened.

Of course it is tough, because there's simply no explanation. The bible clearly states that if you have faith, your prayers will be answered. So when a prayer is not answered, you get all these excuses that are non-biblical such as "God sometimes says no" or "God must have had a good reason" or "Maybe you didn't pray hard enough" or "Maybe your faith wasn't strong enough". The bible says explicitly in Matthew 17:20 and Luke 17:6, that even if you have a small amount of faith or the "faith of a mustard seed", then nothing will be impossible for you, that you can pray to move a mountain and it will move, or if you pray for a Mulberry tree to be uprooted and planted in the sea, it will obey you. Clearly this isn't true and that's why you have all of these excuses christians give as to why prayer does not work. So, either the bible is wrong, or christians are wrong, or both. Keeping believing won't change anything with regards to the outcome of the prayer. In science, if an experiment fails, the scientist does not say "Oh well, even though this cure didn't work, I'm going to keep believing that it did and just try it again". No, they toss the experiment, declare it a failure and move on to another experiment. Prayer is a failed experiment that people keep trying anyways hoping for a different result, but always get the same outcome. As far as miracles....there isn't one proven miracle in the history of mankind. Every single "miracle" boils down to bold claims with insufficient evidence to back them and almost always a logical fallacy such as "this is unexplainable by science, it must be god". I've taken on every single "miracle" referenced to me by a believer and they are always found wanting. Not because I'm biased, but because I base my beliefs upon evidence and not emotion.

I doubt that I would sacrifice my son, but then again I have not had the same experiences with God that Abraham had.
It is faith that God wanted and got it with Abraham, who believed God. Then God said, when He stopped Abraham that He would supply the sacrifice and He did at the time when a ram was caught nearby in a bush and it ended up being a prophecy about faith and God sending His Son to be a sacrifice for our sins.
Jepthah's daughter was not something God did, it was something that Jepthah did. God was going to save Israel from the enemy attacks and killings without Jepthah doing what he did. I don't think he had the right to do it personally, but he did and God allowed him his freedom to do it.

You left some wiggle room that you "doubt" you would sacrifice your son. Right there is the horror of religion, that you could even consider it an option. I would not hesitate in telling that god to go F himself. My son is my world and I would never sacrifice him to some insecure being to prove my loyalty to them. Nothing Abraham did was good, because he was willing to kill his son for a god, just to prove loyalty. That's sick and sadistic and shows no regard for human life. Jepthah made a deal with god. The deal was, "God, help me win this battle and I'll sacrifice the first thing that comes through my door." God accepted the deal, Jepthah won his war and the first thing to go through his door was his daughter. God knew it would be his daughter, because it's god right? God knows everything. It makes no difference that Jepthah did it, because Abraham was also going to kill his son, but god stopped it. But god did not send an angel to stop Jepthah and there was time! It even says god gave him a few more days with his daughter and then allowed Jepthah to push a sword through his daughters heart, fulfilling the deal. In any other context, people would look at this and say "This must have been a deal with the devil since it involved war and sacrificing a child!!!" Yet it was not! It was your god, who is supposedly the good one, but killed millions upon millions in the OT, took sides in wars, killed children, women, babies, and released plagues upon people. You can literally do a body count of the people killed directly by god or directed to be killed by god through others and it totals over 2 million people and that's in actual numbers referenced in the bible. If you estimate with other events where specific numbers weren't listed, not to mention the global flood, that number goes up significantly! Know how many people Satan killed in the bible? About a dozen and the majority were in his bet over Job where god allowed Satan to kill his family. It amazes me that people could read the bible and say that god is the good one in this story.