by Bona Dea 37 Replies latest jw friends
Hoob
The suffering on this earth has not been temporary. It has been from the beginning. How many millions of yrs were there dinosaurs living, suffering and dying, before men even showed up? The fantasy to which you refer never happened. The 'problem' to which you refer never was.
SS
"Have not parents who truly love their children permitted them to undergo a painful operation to correct some problem? Yes, the permission of temporary suffering has often made it possible for children to enjoy better health later on in life. "
Who would allow their child to be cut open without having them put to sleep first? Ever heard of anesthesia? Pain pills? It's called numbing the pain...making it as tolerable as you possibly can, which is what any decent parent would do for their child. Has God done this? How can allowing your child to be raped or beaten to death benefit them and secure them a better life later on?
"I've always enjoyed the following illustration in "Live Forever" book:"Have not parents who truly love their children permitted them to undergo a painful operation to correct some problem? Yes, the permission of temporary suffering has often made it possible for children to enjoy better health later on in life. "
So as parents we do allow our children to suffer so that a problem can be repaired or permanently fixed."
Dear Sword, Your analogy does not work. For we as humans have little power to heal and so often times must depend on painful and evasive surgery. There will come a time when medicine will advance beyond this. Your god on the other hand supposedly has the power to heal without pain, yet chooses not too. Have you noticed Sword, that your god only makes sense when you lower him down to human level as you did in the above analogy? Could that be because he was a creation of mans to begin with? JamesT
There is also the little matter of god not just permiting wickedness, but in the case of this mother, instigating it. The woman heard god tell her to kill her children. Of course, I think she is insane, and wish she would have chosen sanity when she started hearing voices, but even so, why would god allow this to happen with his name attached to it?
I'd wager that far more people have commited evil acts because god told them to, than have done so because satan spoke to them. Wonder why that is?
There is also the little matter of god not just permiting wickedness, but in the case of this mother, instigating it. The woman heard god tell her to kill her children. Of course, I think she is insane, and wish she would have chosen sanity when she started hearing voices, but even so, why would god allow this to happen with his name attached to it?I'd wager that far more people have commited evil acts because god told them to, than have done so because satan spoke to them. Wonder why that is?
I agree Six. More atrocities have been committed throughout mankind's history in the name of God than for any other purpose.
The Holy Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the Palestinian intifadeh, the Muslim jihad, World Wars where chaplains on both sides preach to the armies informing them that the same Christian God is on their side...
The Jehovah's Witnesses manipulating doctrine to instruct people that God wants them to shun family members and avoid blood (even if it means children die), or lie using "theocratic warfare" to protect the image of the organization even if it means molesters of children are able to get away with such behavior...
The list goes on and on.
Also, Sword of Jah, we as imperfect humans only have the capacity to do so much. As JamesT said, if we had the power to prevent the ailments that make surgery a necessity, then no doubt we would exercise that power and illiminate the cause altogether. Does God have the power to do this? And if he does, then why doesn't he do it? As a parent, if I had the power to allow my child to be born free of pain, suffering, etc. or let them live a life full of strife and hardships, knowing I could let them die and bring them back, which do you suppose I would choose? What would choosing the latter prove? What a jerk of a parent I would be to let my kids hurt when I could do something to stop it. What a jerk of a parent I would be to give nothing to my kids, completely ignore them for thousands of years, give them a screwy book that can be interpreted a million different ways to guide them, and then blame them and deny them resurrection and/or punish them for all of eternity for being angry with me, losing faith in me, and refusing to do things my way (whatever way that is, because the book I gave them can be interpreted a million different ways).
Sadie
Here is an analogy even a Jehovah's Witness can understand.
SOJ, consider this.
As a parent, if you had a child (of young age) who was with you in the kitchen while you were preparing a meal, and the stove was hot, and they went to reach for the stove and were about to burn their hand. You sternly warn them not to touch the stove because they will burn their hand... yet they do so anyway and burn themselves.
Do you punish your grandchildren or great-grandchildren because of what your child did?
Allegedly according to Christian Bible doctrine, Adam ate from the Tree of Life after being warned not to by God. Did God punish just he and his wife.. the perpetrators of the crime? No. He instead declares a death sentence to all humanity, and punishes BILLIONS of people, generation after generation, because of the actions of two.
According to all Christian doctrine, everyone alive after that period never had the choice. All suffer because of Adam's mistake? Yet as an excuse you say that this is temporary so as to garner a better reward later? Who are you kidding? Some loving God you got there. Jesus allegedly claim to atone Adam's sins. So thousands of years of suffering and death are so that an Almighty God can prove a point?
Be realistic.
Wake up and stop following a fairy tale.
I'd wager that far more people have commited evil acts because god told them to, than have done so because satan spoke to them. Wonder why that is?
Yes...and I agree. And it kills me when I talk to christians about things like this and they try to make excuses like "well, they are obviously not real christians." I'm like, are you and I reading the same book here? Can't they see where these wackos get their ideas? I mean, you got a god here that all but throws a party when people die in HIS name. The good old Jehovah of Armies. How do you reckon he earned that title? You have a god who has zero tolerance for the likes of unbelievers, homosexuals, witches, lepers, slightly flawed people, and disobedient children. You have a people who follow a god, whom they believe is going to punish "the wicked" by completely obliterating them from existence or is going to burn them for all of eternity in hell. So, we're supposed to be all surprised when we come across sites like "godhatesfags" or hear of people who beat their kids with the excuse of the age-old adage "spare the rod, spoil the child"....
Why is God permitting all of this to continue? I've got a few possibilities:
1) He's too busy providing new light to his earthly organization (yeah right)
2) He's laughing his ass off at our stupidity
3) He created a better planet somewhere else and decided to abandon this one
4) He no longer exists
SOJ,
Your "God" would be really annoyed with your for your "bad association" so why don't you go away and let the thinking people deal with this?
Bona Dea,
I have accepted that my ability to understand a "creator" is hampered by my humanity. In other words, it makes no sense to me that the all loving creator would "allow" suffering for so many centuries just to prove people would blindly worship him. That being said, I don't believe that the universe could happen with so much order out of nothing. Of course, I realize that leads to the catch 22 of where did God come from. Basically, I could go in circles for the rest of my life, and not come to any definitive answers until I died, since that's the only time we will all know for sure what the "truth" is. Because I have lost loved ones, I simply believe that I will see them again in some other form of life, and take comfort from that. If I'm wrong, who does it hurt?
Happyout
