Bertrand Russell

[Charlemagne_II]

Shike

*Faith doesn’t require evidence, just a honest heartfelt desire to **believe whatever you want to believe…*faith is what makes it true! Ergo: god can be whatever we say he is because we have faith.

Sounds like atheism to me … faith, not evidence, that there is no God because we don’t want to believe.

 

[severntofall]

severntofall

*But only because if we don’t we’ll burn in hell forever…right? *

No, because if we reject Him, he will reject us. But he gives us umpteen thousand chances to accept Him before we make it final.

Any idea why an all-loving god would create a reality in which infinite torture was even a possibility? What would have been so horrible about a reality in which suffering eternally did not even exist as an option? It’s like poisoning a cake with cyanide and then blaming your son for being stupid enough to actually eat it…after all you did warn him not to. Why not just make the cake without cyanide in the first place? If the bible is correct, then by far the majority of humans go to hell…why was this option so important to god that he insisted upon including it? What would have been so horrible about a reality in which nobody was tortured forever? Just wondering.

 

[Earnest_Bunbury]

In other words: God exists because we know he exists, and we know he exists because we have faith. The fact that there is no evidence to support any of my asserions is irrelevant as faith will provide all the proof you need. Faith doesn’t require evidence, just a honest heartfelt desire to believe whatever you want to believe…faith is what makes it true! Ergo: god can be whatever we say he is because we have faith.

It is a Catholic answer forum by the way. And the Rule of Faith for Catholics is the Church, the pillar and ground of the truth. If you don’t want faith, don’t ask for it. The proof is in the faith which is not blind belief, it is the cooperation with He who made us and in Whom we move and have our being.

**Any idea why an all-loving god would create a reality in which infinite torture was even a possibility?**j What would have been so horrible about a reality in which suffering eternally did not even exist as an option? It’s like poisoning a cake with cyanide and then blaming your son for being stupid enough to actually eat it…after all you did warn him not to. Why not just make the cake without cyanide in the first place? If the bible is correct, then by far the majority of humans go to hell…why was this option so important to god that he insisted upon including it? What would have been so horrible about a reality in which nobody was tortured forever? Just wondering.

One possibility is in the free will, to choose to do good or to choose to do that which is the opposite, the absence of good which is the basis for evil. As God is Creator and sustains all things as well as out of love created us to share in His Love, but only if we choose it. Eternal punishment is the separation of yourself through your free will in rejecting God’s Love. Love is clearly better than hate and doing evil selfishly and doing good is sharing in the Love that is God. The basis for this is the free choise in this, otherwise it isn’t a sharing, like the difference between loving a stuffed animal and loving a spouse. You choose to love both but only one satisfies as it is a sharing and is free. As has been said, to judge God on your standard is setting you as the standard, as god.

 

[Leela]

As has been said, to judge God on your standard is setting you as the standard, as god.

I don’t think we have to judge God by out own standard to wonder about infinite torture in hell. All we are doing is wondering what sort of standard of justice could God possibly be using if infinite torture for finite transgressions is God’s idea of justice. If you say we have no place to even ask the question, you are basically accepting the first horn of the dilemma and saying that something is good because God commands it. Whatever he says goes, because he is God. There is no other reasoning to do on the issue.

You don’t like severntofall attempting to understand God’s idea of morality. What Russell is then asking is, what possible standard could YOU be using when you say that God is good? Based on your comments, you must only mean God is God since you would never judge God based on your standard.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Leela

*Based on your comments, you must only mean God is God since you would never judge God based on your standard. *

Why do you want to make the rules instead of God? You make yourself wiser than God. Ah, wasn’t that Eve’s problem, so aptly diagnosed in Genesis? The fruit of the tree will make me smarter, and if I eat it, I’ll be as smart as God, maybe even smarter because I overcame his commandment not to eat.

How can one dare to be in the presence of God? We are not worthy. But we strive to make ourselves worthy by loving God. That is all God asks. But the deal has two outcomes. If we do not love God, we do not earn the reward of being in his eternal favor. How can one have eternal heaven without eternal hell? If there is justice in eternal reward, why isn’t there justice in eternal rejection? Does it seem unfair? But that is God’s rule. We live with it. If you prefer to think that a better God would have said, “Well, you get hell for a while, but eventually I will embrace you. Don’t worry about not loving me. Go ahead, deny even My existence. Sooner or later I’ll take you in. So go your merry way; sin all you want; in the end we’ll cuddle.”

That, I suppose, would be every atheist’s dream … in case there is a God.

 

[matahari]

I don’t think we have to judge God by out own standard to wonder about infinite torture in hell. All we are doing is wondering what sort of standard of justice could God possibly be using if infinite torture for finite transgressions is God’s idea of justice. If you say we have no place to even ask the question, you are basically accepting the first horn of the dilemma and saying that something is good because God commands it. Whatever he says goes, because he is God. There is no other reasoning to do on the issue.

.

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Hi Leela,
You could turn the question around and ask what standard of justice and mercy could God be using to open the Gates of Heaven to us and urge us to come and live with Him in perfect joy for all eternity?
Firstly, we Catholics tend to trust God, partly because we believe in Him and all He has said and done.

I believe God is all Love and all goodness.

We don’t have an automatic right to Heaven.

We were created for Heaven , but not as robots. We have to choose God , and His Heaven and all that that implies during our earthly lives.

Transgressions may be finite. But those transgressions are committed against an Infinite God. which gives them eternal consequences.

Enter Jesus Christ and His Saving death on the Cross. Now we can be reconciled through Him taking the punishment and dying in our place.

So, we must choose the salvation He has provided for us. By accepting what Christ has done we have taken the all_important first step of faith.

By rejecting what Christ has done for us we would be damning ourselves.

God has incredible respect for our free will .

 

[Leela]

matahari, Charlemagne,

Neither one of you answered the question. What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

Best,
Leela

 

[Leela]

Leela

*Based on your comments, you must only mean God is God since you would never judge God based on your standard. *

Why do you want to make the rules instead of God? You make yourself wiser than God.

I don’t believe in God, so this is not a question for me. It is a question I asked of you.

By your “God makes the rules” statement you seem to be accepting the first horn of the Euthyphro dilemma. God can make anything right or wrong by fiat. Is that your view?

Could God have decided to make rape good and helping old ladies cross the street bad?

 

[Charlemagne_II]

What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

I don’t judge God at all. We know God … and God’s goodness is manifest to us both by the light of reason and revelation. By reason through the light of conscience … knowing instinctively that love is good and hate is wrong, for example. By revelation in that the commandments urge us to be good, not evil. These are from God, not the devil.

 

[Shike]

By your “God makes the rules” statement you seem to be accepting the first horn of the Euthyphro dilemma. God can make anything right or wrong by fiat. Is that your view?

Only half-heartedly following the convo… but I thought we were all past the divine command theory and moved on; apparently not (I guess that is the OP, however so I shouldn’t complain).

And I’m not convinced that the essence existence solution begs the question. There’s something fishy going on and a simple answer somewhere. But not tonight

And if tautology were the case, which I don’t think it need be, I don’t think its your everyday kind. I think it tells us a lot that is useful.

splitting headache Goodnight!

 

[Earnest_Bunbury]

matahari, Charlemagne,

Neither one of you answered the question. What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

By our very existence do we judge God as good, He made us. And made us for Him. This is the proof in faith, relationship with God. Try it, you’ll like it.

 

[tonyrey]

What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

How do you think creativity, goodness and love originated? The most adequate and economical explanation is they emanate from One Creator Who is freedom,goodness and love. We obviously cannot fully explain the nature of the Creator but we have personal experience of freedom, goodness and love. How else would you explain them?

 

[Thales]

By your “God makes the rules” statement you seem to be accepting the first horn of the Euthyphro dilemma. God can make anything right or wrong by fiat. Is that your view?

Could God have decided to make rape good and helping old ladies cross the street bad?

God reveals the rules, but they are not necessarily created or arbitrary. The world was created first then man was created to live within this world. God wants what is best for us and tells us what we need to do to succeed in a difficult and treacherous place. The reason the world is so treacherous and difficult however, is not because God thought it would be fun to see us struggle, but that we decided we wanted our “eyes opened” to ourselves, to experience good and evil. Before the Fall and without free will there was no need for the moral laws we have now. Moral goodness is dependant on human self-awareness, free will, and human interactions with creation. If God had created the universe differently then good and bad would also change. You see, God is not a creature bound to His created world and the laws governing it. The angels are creatures but are not bound to the physical world. For angels there are sins of pride and other such things free will brings, but an immortal bodiless being cannot very well murder another bodiless being, so murder, as we know it means nothing to an angel if man does not exist.

God transcends all of it, even good and evil, because those things arose from the workings of two aspects He created. Overall this discussion is difficult because “good” can have many subtle meanings and none of them fully describe God. I think we say “God is good” because we don’t have any better words to describe His will for us.

“Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.”
Catechism of the Catholic Church. Part 1, Section 1, Chapter 1, IV:40

 

[Earnest_Bunbury]

I don’t believe in God, so this is not a question for me. It is a question I asked of you.

By your “God makes the rules” statement you seem to be accepting the first horn of the Euthyphro dilemma. God can make anything right or wrong by fiat. Is that your view?

Could God have decided to make rape good and helping old ladies cross the street bad?

Philosophically the concept of God can be defined as “a being than which no greater can be conceived” and thus if there is no God, a being than which no greater can be conceived, then you (and by extension anyone) are the greatest being that can be conceived. The universe doesn’t know of you but you know of the universe. This makes you the god you refuse to ascent to in the creator of what surrounds you. You could say that what appears to be around you is illusion, but I bet you stop a red lights like the rest of us. It is easy to reject reality if one doesn’t live and work there.

Faith in God is the ascent of the intellect and the will to that which is. One can deny this but that again sets up oneself as the being than which no greater can be conceived (BTWNGCBC) in denying your ascent to a BTWNGCBC. Genesis chapter 3 shows man wanting a share in that being. Taking it from God and controlling it instead of humbly accepting it.

If you say “I can conceive a god that is good on my terms of what I denote as good”, then you are back to being greater than the BTWNGCBC as being its creator. In the end, God is that being and can be known only through the ascent of faith via the admonition that God, in His very Being and Nature, is the absolute that makes rape bad and can be known as bad when that bad happens to you. That is when it ceases to be a concept and becomes a reality. God ceases to be a concept when you seek Him, as it says:

9And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.

10For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.

13If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

 

[JDaniel]

What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

I don’t judge God at all. We know God … and God’s goodness is manifest to us both by the light of reason and revelation. By reason through the light of conscience … knowing instinctively that love is good and hate is wrong, for example. By revelation in that the commandments urge us to be good, not evil. These are from God, not the devil.

Charles:

Wouldn’t you say that the standard would be to the extent that God is omnipotent? As Robert Spaemann says, rarely are those two concepts combined, or, predicated of anything earthly. But, only towards God. If God were not at least as good as He is powerful, we could be in for an eternally brutish time in the afterlife. Some will be; but, that’s their choice.

jd

 

[Charlemagne_II]

JDaniel

*Wouldn’t you say that the standard would be to the extent that God is omnipotent? *

Omnipotence and goodness go hand in hand? One would certainly hope so. If not, what’s to stop us from believing that God created the universe for the ultimate purpose of conning us into believing something that isn’t true? Such a god would be evil. But he would also not likely be all powerful, for surely an all powerful God could devise more horrible ways to torture us than that.

 

[Leela]

Philosophically the concept of God can be defined as “a being than which no greater can be conceived” and thus if there is no God, a being than which no greater can be conceived, then you (and by extension anyone) are the greatest being that can be conceived. The universe doesn’t know of you but you know of the universe. This makes you the god you refuse to ascent to in the creator of what surrounds you. You could say that what appears to be around you is illusion, but I bet you stop a red lights like the rest of us. It is easy to reject reality if one doesn’t live and work there.

There is a big confusion here between what we can imagine and what actually exists.

 

[Leela]

How do you think creativity, goodness and love originated? The most adequate and economical explanation is they emanate from One Creator Who is freedom,goodness and love. We obviously cannot fully explain the nature of the Creator but we have personal experience of freedom, goodness and love. How else would you explain them?

How is it an explanation of goodess and love to say that goodness came from goodness and love came from love?

 

[matahari]

matahari, Charlemagne,

Neither one of you answered the question. What do you mean when you say that God is good? Does that mean anything more to you than God is God? If so, by what standard are you judging God to be good?

Best,
Leela

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Hi Leele, Remember Cilla Black , Well, like her I used to ask a lorra lorra questions when I was younger. Then a very dear uncle said to me

" Life is not a problem to be solved
But a mystery to be lived "

That was food for thought for me. But I still ask a lot of questions when I don’t understand something !

Tonette

"Seek and you shall find " Matt.7:7

 

[Leela]

---

Hi Leele, Remember Cilla Black , Well, like her I used to ask a lorra lorra questions when I was younger. Then a very dear uncle said to me

" Life is not a problem to be solved
But a mystery to be lived "

That was food for thought for me. But I still ask a lot of questions when I don’t understand something !

Interesting point. Believers tend to think of life as a problem to be solved (how can I be saved?) whereas atheists don’t see that problem.

My concern is not so much with people viewing life as a problem. I don’t see it that way, but if believers want to, fine with me. My concern is with those who think they possess the one right solution and that their answer must be imposed on others.

Best,
Leela