Rudolf,
God is kinda touchy on things that get him mad, and lashes out and kill people unless someone innocent is willing to step in and take the brunt of his anger after which he calms himself and nolonger can remember what the sin was
Is Jehovah (GOD ) an intelligent being ? Or an incompetent
by smiddy 25 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Cold Steel
How do you know God hasn’t revealed himself? And why do you suppose the people of the Earth would accept it? Also, why do you think that if he could reveal himself in the heavens, that he doesn’t?
According to the scriptures, the Lord will eventually reveal himself, but he’ll do it following an extended tribulation. The reason God doesn’t reveal himself in the heavens is because we’re still in a state of probation. The Lord tends to provide man with evidence of his dealings with mankind, but not proof. The reason he doesn’t provide proof is because man would condemn himself if he were provided proof and did not act on it. In short, there are people who would not repent and turn their lives around even if they had proof of his existence, and they would be under utter condemnation if that happened. God leaves evidence for man but not proof to spare those who otherwise would be under condemnation. It also would rob man of his free agency to see God revealed in his glory. He was willing to do it with the children of Israel, when he showed himself to 70 elders of Israel plus Joshua and a few others; however, had they subsequently rejected him, their condemnation would have been severe. There have, in fact, been cases in our day when God has reportedly revealed to man absolute proof of his existence, and there were witnesses, but they were made to understand the consequences should they ever deny their testimonies.
God is the same yesterday, today and forever, and he does not change the way he deals with man. But it often requires that man search for him.
I believe God has revealed himself in our day just as he did anciently. (If you want to know more, PM me.) But as for the Jehovah’s Witnesses, General Board members believe they have inspiration...but not revelations. But what’s the difference? They either are led by the Holy Spirit or they aren’t. Anciently, the church received guidance to vacate Jerusalem just before the Romans got there; and they received revelation on where to send missionaries throughout Asia and Greece/Rome. Their doctrines are indicative that they don’t receive assistance in formulating either their eschatology or their exegesis. Members don’t seem to have a limit in how much they’ll tolerate and even after numerous predictions regarding the end of the world, they tend to remain in the church.
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fakesmile
considerinig circumsicion and inherent sin, id have to go with incompetent. also long hair on a man being a sin. a perfect creator could limit the length that a mans hair grows. and apparently free will is an inherent design flaw too.
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King Solomon
fakesmile said:
and apparently free will is an inherent design flaw too.
My reading of Gen 2-3 says that "free will" is not "given" to man, as that decision is controlled by YHWH by keeping his mouth shut.
Think of two domains that cover all actions of man:
1) God's Expressed Divine Will
2) Man's Free Will
So that's it: that's all there is.
Whenever God expressed his Divine Will and gave a law prohibiting some action ("thou shalt not"), that act instantly is removed from man's free will domain and placed into God's Divine Will domain. So God increasingly expressed his Divine Will, and man's realm got that much smaller.
What God didn't do was give man the "fuel" that is needed to use free will in a responsible fashion: wisdom. So when God gave ONE law for them to obey ("don't eat forbidden fruit that makes you wise"), they were unable to anticipate the outcome of their actions, since they were fools. YHWH was surprised when the fools he made actually acted as fools.
The interesting part is the Garden of Eden account parallels the story of Prometheus, where Zeus withholds fire (a symbol in Greece mythology for knowledge) from mankind but Prometheus steals it and delivers it to man, only to be punished by Zeus for the crime (Adam sentenced to death, and working the earth, a repetitive task; Prometheus was sentenced to have his liver eaten out by a vulture every day after it regrew).
Pandora is parallel to Eve, as the mother of mankind. We all remember the story of Pandora's box, where all the bad stuff entered into the World as a result of her curiosity; same happened with Eve sinning, leading to the death of all humanity. After Pandora opened the box, the only thing left after the ills flew out was "hope". Of course, Xians claim that Christ is the symbol of hope for mankind, which they claim is foreshadowed in the prophecy of "you shall bruise him in the head".
Point being, the theme is very common to ancient cultures, and not unique.
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yadda yadda 2
The only rational version of God to me, if one exists, is a Deist version, because if he exists there's no satisfactory reason for why he would permit so much horrific suffering experienced by the most innocent for millennia. Just saying that God's going to end all the suffering one day doesn't explain why he's allowed it and has failed to explain why he's allowed it.
I mean, why would a God that for whatever reason won't mitigate the worst kinds of suffering care a jot about my little prayers to relieve my comparatively insignificant suffering. If he did that, he would be immoral. Why would a God of any comprehensible morality at all answer my prayers as a fairly comfortable, healthy, well-off western peson, but ignore the prayers of a dying and suffering starving or diseased child, for example? Why would any smug typical westernised Christian even expect God to help them but ignore others who need his help much, much more? If God refuses to intervene to help the worst suffering he cannot intervene to help the least, and answering prayers is a form of intervention. It seems, therefore, logically impossible that there can be a God who personally cares about us and answers prayers.
There's not a single Christian theodicy to try and explain this that you can't poke big holes in. The traditional and Biblical concept of God squared against the reality of human existence is the greatest conundrum that no apologist has been able to satisfactorily answer since the time of ancient Greece.
Nevertheless, if he (or it) does exist, God must be very intelligent if he made us and everything else, but incompetent? Don't know if that's the right word, more like completely unfathomable and mysterious with an incomprehensible morality that seems entirely at odds with normal human morality (but aren't we created 'in his image'?). "No one knows" is ultimately all we can say.
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fakesmile
sol, i agree with you 100%. my opinion is that "god" is a perfect being invented by incompetent designers... humans.