Why do people say the god of the bible is Omnisciencent? (page 6)

snowbird

It just riles me to have people say, "In order for God to be ___________, He has to be __________."

WHO SAYS???

Sylvia

superpunk

I think I would have been more than just a little dissappointed if Adam had simply robotically obeyed the orders about the fruit, and was still wandering around that garden stark naked after how-ever many thousand years now. When is that guy going to show some initiative? A truly ROBOTIC ADAM could have done just that...

Well said. Moreover, since the story's Adam did not have any "formative years", he must have been morally nothing more than a computer program (since there were no other humans his morality was what God programmed it to be). If I had personally written a computer program that malfunctioned, I would be more upset with myself (or possibly someone else who interfered with my program) than the program itself.

PSacramento

Hence - not omniscient.

In regards to OUR choices, God knows what they are and God knows the results, but he doesn't "know" which choice we will make so, no, God is not omnisicent in your view because there is at least one thing God doesn't know and that is which of the choices he KNOWS we have, we will choose.

snowbird

Harmonizing free will with God's omnisicence is an issue that has dogged the best of theologians.

No one, save God Himself, has the answer.

Sylvia

superpunk

He is aware of ALL posibilites and outcome, big difference.
Example:
God decides to speak to you and you ask him, God will I win the lottery?
God: Yes, IF you decide play the lottery on this day at this time at this palce and play these numbers.
God knows but the decision is ours, God NOT telling us is keeping the "law" of free will in place.

Adding the word "all" makes no difference to whether God can see into the future or not. Bible-God can and is recorded as doing a good deal more than simply write "If/Then" excel formulas.

Elsewhere

Wow... this is even more fun than asking if god can create a rock so big that not even he could move it.

PSacramento

Adding the word "all" makes no difference to whether God can see into the future or not. Bible-God can and is recorded as doing a good deal more than simply write "If/Then" excel formulas.

You believe in the bible?

notverylikely

God knows but the decision is ours, God NOT telling us is keeping the "law" of free will in place.

So, Adam didn't have knowledge of good and evil, God didn't know what he would do, just the options he had, Adam makes a choice God didn't know he would make, then God punishes Adam (who didn't know good from bad until he ate from the tree) for making a bad choice with death?

That's not really free will, then, if the choice is "Do what I tell you or I will kill you and curse untold millions of your descendants with death and suffering. And I'm not going to tell you that until after you make the bad choice. And you don't know what good and bad means until after you make the choice."

WHO SAYS???

The bible says god knows everything. Is the bible wrong?

God knows the results, but he doesn't "know" which choice we will make

Then how could he know the results? How could he know that at 3:50 PM EST I will write this? What if instead I had chosen to get coffee and not written this until 3:55? How can he know the results without knowing the choices we make?

notverylikely

Harmonizing free will with God's omnisicence is an issue that has dogged the best of theologians.

No one, save God Himself, has the answer.

So then it's useless to me?

God: "I have the winning lottery numbers."

Me: "Can I have them?"

God: "No."

Leolaia

The Yahweh of J is the most anthropomorphic, and human, of the whole OT. He takes a walk in the afternoon to enjoy the cool air, he comes down from heaven to witness the building of the tower, he regrets his decisions, he smells the delicious aroma of Noah's sacrifice, etc. This is exactly how most deities in the ANE were conceptualized. Omniscience is a byproduct of monotheism and that didn't arise in its complete form until the exilic period in Deutero-Isaiah (the older parts of the OT are henotheistic). And then only later do we have more transcendent views of God, such as what we find in parts of the NT.

Why do people say the god of the bible is Omnisciencent?

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