by Norm 103 Replies latest jw friends
Norm,
You said, "your attempt at an 'explanation' here is in the best tradition of Paul."
Thank you. I take that as high praise.
Mike
"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God."
(1 Cor. 1:18)
aChristian,
I consider it interesting that you posted such short and unsubstantual replies to both Norm and myself.
Your response to Norm was particularly disinginious. Paul's "argument" was an ad hominem of the worst sort; he simply said "those who disagree with me are evil" or something to that effect. There is no argument herein; merely an assertion. Your adoration of Paul is based on your supernaturalism, that is, the argument is circular.
Your answer to my arguments was totally self-defeating:
As you may recall, the Bible tells us that when Christ returns all Christians, the living and the dead, will be made both immortal and incorruptible. (1 Cor. 15) That being the case, they will then be able, of their own free will, to eternally live perfectly righteous lives, something Christians have always had the desire to do but not the ability to do.
Then, why don't humans living now exercise this option?
It must of course be because God decided to create humans unable to follow his own laws, and unable to live happily with a free will. Thus, God wanted humans to suffer. When he denoucnes humans for breaing his laws, it is pure hypocrisy, because that was his intention from the start.
Otherwise, explain why it is not possible now but will be in the future.
Finally, to engage the "free will" argument, please explain what exactly this is. So far you've only used the expression as a magic wand to avoid dealing with the issues. Does it mean that nothing constrains our will, only our execution of the will? What, if anything, is its limitations? Be concrete.
- Jan
--
"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen"
-- Albert Einstein
Julie,
You wrote, "You said something that I son't understand. :God cannot act unrighteously."
God cannot act unrighteously because God decides what is right and wrong. What is wrong for us is not necessarily wrong for God. We can tell our children that they are not allowed to cross the street. That does not make it wrong for us to cross the street. Though it is wrong for people to take the lives of other people, it is not wrong for God to take people's lives. God gave all of us our lives and has reserved the right to take our lives at any time He chooses. Christians trust God. Though, we do not always fully understand all of God's ways, we believe that any time God has ever taken a life He has done so for a righteous purpose.
We should also keep in mind that Jesus Christ told us that everyone who has ever lived and died will be brought back to life by God. (John 5:28,29) That being the case, God has never really taken the life of anyone. He has only interrupted their lives.
You asked, "Or how about the guy who was told by his father to go and impregnate his dead brother's wife? The brother didn't think this was too kosher so he pulled out of the deal at the last minute. Maybe he was just following the law in Leviticus about not laying with your brother's wife."
The law in Lecviticus you refer to was speaking of a living brother's wife, not a dead brother's wife. (Lev.18:16) The fact is, the Jewish law required an unmarried brother to marry his deceased brother's wife if she was childless, and if she demanded that he do so. This can be seen by reading the law itself, recorded in Deut. 25:5-9, or by reading part of a question which the Sadducees asked Jesus, recorded in Matthew 22:24. There we read, "Teacher," they said, "Moses told us that if a man dies without having children, his brother must marry the widow and have children for him."
There are certainly many passages of scripture which critics claim prove the Bible is contradictory and that the God of the Bible is evil. However, with a little bit of study, nearly all such passages can be shown to prove no such thing. I do not have the time to straighten out all such misunderstandings for you. I wish I did. I hope you will take the time to do such study when it is needed.
Jan,
:I consider it interesting that you posted such short and unsubstantual replies to both Norm and myself.
For one thing, I'm a bit short of time today. For another I tend to believe that even if I am able to explain and defend the Gospel in a way that might make some sense to you, you would still reject it because of your certainty that the Bible is deficient in many other ways. Finally, Norm referred to the message of Christ which Paul preached as, "bullshit." As a matter of policy, I don't engage in conversations with people who show such total disrespect for the beliefs of others.
: Your response to Norm was particularly disinginious.
Of course it was. I greatly admire Paul. Norm obviously does not. Thus my reply to Norm was meant to be understood as jest.
: Aha, so it was possible for God to create beings who both had "free will" and live perfectly rightous lives without suffering and pain.
Even if we now all had the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, few people would choose to do so. Those who would then choose to do so are probably living quite Godly lives now. Those who would not then choose to do so would then cause just as much harm to others as they presently do. Thus If God had created us all with the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, if we chose to do so, this world would now be little different than it is.
Giving someone the ability to live a perfectly righteous life after that person has chosen to do so is a much different thing than creating all people to be incorruptible to begin with. God has chosen to give incorruptibility and immortality only to those, who as corruptible people, freely decide that they want to live perfectly righteous lives. If God had created us incorruptible to begin with we would now have no such choice. We could not choose to do wrong. For if one has the ability to do wrong he is corruptible.
Your questions concerning man's free will I will leave to the theologians to argue. However, I do believe it is possible for each of us to have totally free will and at the same time have our destinies entirely foreknown and even foreordained by God. Though you may call such a statement a contradiction, I call it a paradox. One which we as limited people cannot understand because of our inability to fully understand a limitless God
Hi Mike,
Thanks for the response, I appreciate that you had many to answer and probably have other things to do too.
:The law in Lecviticus you refer to was speaking of a living brother's wife, not a dead brother's wife. (Lev.18:16) The fact is, the Jewish law required an unmarried brother to marry his deceased brother's wife if she was childless, and if she demanded that he do so.
:-)
I have to smile at this. Henry VIII used this scripture to base his suit of divorce from Katherine of Aragon on. Katherine had been married to Henry's older brother Arthur, who died. After being unable to produce a son Henry was certain this marriage was incestuous and was the reason God would not send him the longed for male heir. This scripture proves it, he insisted. He sent this argument to every theologin in Europe, even those wretched Lutherans ;-) (he was desperate). Many agreed, except of course the pope who was being held hostage by Katherine's nephew at the time, leaving him in a delicate position indeed. Hence the schism.
If it weren't for that rule in Leviticus England might be Catholic today. Just an interesting and useless detail for you.
Regards,
Julie
aChristian,
Speaking of Paul, here is my favorite example of his shining logic:
It was one of them, their very own prophet, who said, "Cretans are always liars, vicious brutes, lazy gluttons." That testimony is true. (Titus 1:12,13)
Paul is quoting an embroidered version of Epimenides' Paradox. Epimenides was a Cretan who said: "All Cretans are liars." Do you think Paul just didn't get it, or did the guy have a weird sense of humor?
Ginny
Women are not always liars. I am a woman. That testimony is false. {Epilady's paragams}
two dox=dilemma
Paul left Titus in Crete for the purpose of having him appoint "blameless," "upright" and "holy" Cretans to shepherd Christian congregations in Crete. (Titus 1:5-9) So, obviously Paul did not really believe that "Cretans are ALWAYS liars, evil brutes and lazy gluttons." (vs 12) If he really believed such a thing he could not have referred to some Cretans as "blameless," "upright" and "holy."
Paul asked Titus to appoint Cretan Christians having such good character to positions of oversight in their congregations for a very good reason. He told Titus he was doing so because there were then in Crete "many rebellious people, mere talkers and deceivers," who were there "ruining whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach." (vs 10,11) When Paul quoted and then apparently agreed with the then familiar words of Epimenides describing Cretans as "always" being "liars, evil beasts and lazy gluttons," he was simply using a bit of hyperbole to convey to Titus the magnitude of the problem which Christian congregations in Crete were then experiencing.
Hello Mike,
You wrote:
Even if we now all had the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, few people would choose to do so. Those who would then choose to do so are probably living quite Godly lives now. Those who would not then choose to do so would then cause just as much harm to others as they presently do. Thus If God had created us all with the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, if we chose to do so, this world would now be little different than it is.Giving someone the ability to live a perfectly righteous life after that person has chosen to do so is a much different thing than creating all people to be incorruptible to begin with. God has chosen to give incorruptibility and immortality only to those, who as corruptible people, freely decide that they want to live perfectly righteous lives. If God had created us incorruptible to begin with we would now have no such choice. We could not choose to do wrong. For if one has the ability to do wrong he is corruptible.
I'm afraid I have to agree with Jan and Norm about your engaging in excusogetics. While I will admit that your explanations on this topic are about the cleverest I've seen, and are harder to refute than those the Watchtower Society puts out, they're still eminently refutable.
In your view God created humans in the state that JWs call "imperfect", i.e., they are unable by their very nature always to obey God. Even if they ardently want to obey God, their created nature prevents them from doing it. Thus God deliberately created humans so that they could never fully obey him.
Doesn't that strike you as wierd? Your exposition has not touched on why this is something that a reasonable creative entity would do, so far as I can see.
Now, we know from how genetics and reproduction work that the probability that any combination of genes will occur is extremely small, so that the a priori likelihood that any given human will come to exist is almost nil. In other words, it's a random process how any particular combination of genes comes to be, and how any particular human comes to be born. According to your exposition it's not very likely that a given human will want to perfectly obey God. Therefore God deliberately created humans so that it is unlikely that any given human would even want to obey him perfectly, and so that it is impossible even for those few to do so. In other words, God deliberately created humans so that only a small, random fraction of them would end up gaining the prize of eternal life.
Again isn't that a wierd thing for God to do? Why would he want to do such a crazy thing? Why would he want most of his intelligent creatures to die? Why not just create ALL of them with the desire to choose to live a perfectly righteous life? If God can do it for that small fraction that randomly comes to possess the desire, why not for all? Why build in the defect in the first place?
Several of your statements are self-contradictory. For example, you said:
Even if we now all had the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, few people would choose to do so.
First, how do you know that? How can anyone say that someone with a perfect ability to live an incorruptible life would choose to act contrary to his nature? Second, you're saying that God could create some incorruptible humans with the desire to choose to obey him perfectly, and some who did not have that desire. But that's going right back to standard Watchtower fare, which you've already said is wrong. So just what are you trying to say?
Your above-quoted statement is contradicted by this one:
If God had created us incorruptible to begin with we would now have no such choice. We could not choose to do wrong. For if one has the ability to do wrong he is corruptible.
If it is true that if one has the ability to do wrong, he is corruptible, then it is equally true that if one is incorruptible, he does not have the ability to do wrong. Do you see why your statements are contradictory?
Are you saying that there are actually four potential categories of humans?
(1) Those who do not have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives.
(2) Those who have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives and choose to do so.
(3) Those who have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives but choose not to.
(4) Those who are incorruptible and therefore not only have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, but do not have the ability not to do so.
The bottom line of your argument amounts to this: God created humans such that only a small, random fraction would CHOOSE to obey him perfectly if they could. Only those who happen to possess this unlikely tendency will eventually gain the prize of being UNABLE TO CHOOSE to disobey God.
Again, does this sound like what a reasonable creator would do? If you still think so, in just what way is it reasonable?
As I wrote to the Watchtower Society years ago on this issue, the old saw seems to apply: "As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport."
AlanF
Hi Alan,
You wrote: [So, according to you] God deliberately created humans so that they could never fully obey him. Doesn't that strike you as weird? Your exposition has not touched on why this is something that a reasonable creative entity would do, so far as I can see.
No, it does not strike me as weird. For I believe God wanted everyone who would at some point choose to live their lives righteously, and who He would later give the ability to do so perfectly, to have a first hand knowledge and understanding of why God's ways are best. God did not want even those who would freely choose to do things "His way" to not personally understand why "His way" is the best way. Only by creating the human race in such a way that all of us would be sure to gain a personal "knowledge of good and evil," (i.e., creating a human race that could never fully obey him) could God be certain that all of us would acquire such "knowledge." For only by making sure that every human being would personally experience the negative results of unrighteous living could God be sure that all who would sooner or later choose to live righteous lives would fully appreciate why doing things "God's way" is the best thing for us.
I believe "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" in Eden, which God told Adam and Eve not to eat from but from which he knew they would eat (being "forbidden fruit" and all), was meant to illustrate the situation we are now discussing.
You wrote: [So according to you] God deliberately created humans so that only a small, random fraction of them would end up gaining the prize of eternal life. Again isn't that a weird thing for God to do? Why would he want to do such a crazy thing? Why would he want most of his intelligent creatures to die? Why not just create ALL of them with the desire to choose to live a perfectly righteous life? If God can do it for that small fraction that randomly comes to possess the desire, why not for all? Why build in the defect in the first place?
You seem to feel that those who at some point in their lives choose to serve God make that choice solely due to their genetic programming. I doubt that is the case. But your basic question remains. Namely, "Why not just create ALL of us with the desire to choose to live a perfectly righteous life?" I do not believe God creates any of us with preprogrammed "desires." I believe God creates all us free to decide how we want to live our lives.
You wrote: Several of your statements are self-contradictory. For example, you said: quote:
Even if we now all had the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, few people would choose to do so.
I don't see how that is self-contradictory.
You asked: First, how do you know that?
Because we all now have the ability to live fairly righteous lives but few people choose to do so.
You asked: How can anyone say that someone with a perfect ability to live an incorruptible life would choose to act contrary to his nature?
Having an ability to do something is not the same thing as having a nature to do something. I have the ability to rape and to murder. However, I do not do these things. For they are not in my nature.
You wrote: Your above-quoted statement is contradicted by this one: quote: If God had created us incorruptible to begin with we would now have no such choice. We could not choose to do wrong. For if one has the ability to do wrong he is corruptible.
I don't see how that contradicts anything else I said.
You wrote: If it is true that if one has the ability to do wrong, he is corruptible, then it is equally true that if one is incorruptible, he does not have the ability to do wrong.
I agree. Once we are given incorruptibility we will no longer have the ability to do wrong. I would gladly give up that ability now. But I am glad I had it for a while. For having it has allowed me to gain a first hand appreciation for why God's ways are best that I could have never gained without it.
You asked: Are you saying that there are actually four potential categories of humans?
(1) Those who do not have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives.
(2) Those who have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives and choose to do so.
(3) Those who have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives but choose not to.
(4) Those who are incorruptible and therefore not only have the ability to live perfectly righteous lives, but do not have the ability not to do so.
I guess so.
You wrote: The bottom line of your argument amounts to this: God created humans such that only a small, random fraction would CHOOSE to obey him perfectly if they could. Only those who happen to possess this unlikely tendency will eventually gain the prize of being UNABLE TO CHOOSE to disobey God.
Again, I don't know about your "tendency" argument. Christ did say that more of us would end up on the road to destruction than on the road to life. But that does not mean God desired this to be the case. I have two children. I love them both. I have done everything I can to encourage each of them to make good choices in life. If one of them ends up choosing to live a life of crime, am I to blame? I believe that when Christ said most of us would end up on the road to destruction he was only predicting the future. Knowing the future and purposefully creating the future may be very different things, even for God. But now we get into questions of man's "free will" and "predestination," subjects which I told Jan I prefer to let professional theologians argue about.
You asked: Again, does this sound like what a reasonable creator would do?
I believe it does.
You wrote: "As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport."
I believe that old saw is mistaken. I believe God loves each one of us very much.
