Couldn't God Create a Better World?

[JP2Admirer]

You say we are dependent in our very existence. Right. But that is not at all the same as our very being. Aquinas and the whole tradition are suffering from failure to distinguish being from existence. Esse means to be; but we should realize that existere means to “stand outside”…existence is a mode of being…for fallen creatures who are persons and who are outside themselves within themselves and, as the existentialists are fond of thinking, must be conscious of their consciousness of themselves in order to be free and make choices, etc. And the word existence is a pitiful equivalent for being when you also consider that sub-personal beings all ex-sist: stand outside themselves via extension, having “parts outside of parts,” as the scholastics termed it. This failure to distinguish existence from being is another effect of the cosmolock that classical philosophers and theologians have been weighted down with for centuries and do not seem to know it YET.

I have to admit, I am utterly confused by what you are saying here. When I imagine standing “outside” of being, I think of nothingness. To stand outside of existence is not to be.

If you are talking of existence as being the first effect of God, then I think I can agree with you to some extent.

Honestly, I have learned to trust the Angelic Doctor to notice any subtleties and nuances of language. You’re talking about a man who, having no knowledge of Greek properly interpreted the “pathetikos nous” of Aristotle’s De Anima as the “particular reason” and not the passive intellect, after having only read the Latin! You are also talking about a man who once distinguished (following Aristotle) between 8 different ways to interpret the word “nature.” Thus, I think it is presumptuous to think he overlooked some nuance of language. Obviously, this is an appeal to authority and the genius of the man (which I doubt you would dispute), but I think it’s better to trust that he wouldn’t have missed this nuance.

When you say that the “very nature of created dependent being is that it tends to non-being” you are saying something quite true. But that dependency in being–that existence mode of being–comes from us, not God originatively. In the rehabilitative creation of which the Book of Genesis is speaking, we are totally dependent on God, “thanks” to our originative sin at the moment of originative, ex nihilo creation.

Are we self-creators then? This sounds a bit too existentialist for me. We create our own being? But only get our existence from sin? What does this mean? How did you create yourself? I think this flies purely in the face of empirical experience as well.

By the way, let’s all wake up and realize that God does not EXIST. God IS! And so each of us IS, thanks to God’s gift of our being [our own be-ing, not some “part” of God’s being]. But we also exist, because of botching our immediately free response to the gift of being in our creation ex nihilo!

I guess I can see what your are saying here. But I would follow Aquinas in understanding our “own being” as a sui generis accident gifted to us by God. Our essence is not existence, but God gives us our “own being” in virtue of the essence He endows us with. We are still participators in the being of God, because we only have being save having it from him.

Let’s take up the commission given by JP2 in Fides et Ratio: to develop a philosophy of being that is not tied to lame formulae, but rings with the dynamism of the act of being itself. [Jesus both IS and exists as incarnate God, identifying with us in all things except sin and the ability to sin.] Praise God from whom all goodness flows!

All we need do to achieve this is to bring forth the mind of fire of Aquinas in more poetic and less formalized language. His philosophy really is quite poetically riveting if it’s removed from the dusty scholastic language. Behind the precision is a mind on fire, it just requires the right people to call it forth poetically. A living Thomism is what is needed, because God is not some abstract philosophy, He is a living being. That is there in Aquinas, just not romantically and poetically.

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

To this question, sometimes posed by atheists and theists alike, I believe Aquinas would answer that this world could be better, because an infinitely powerful God could always make something better. But by the same logic, it seems that if God could always make something better, then He could still never make anything perfect-which is the equivalent of saying that evil will always be present in creation to some degree by virtue of the fact that creation, itself, is not God, or, perhaps to put it another way: even God can’t create another God.

But this unavoidable “flaw” becomes an even greater dilemma if God deems it wise to grant freewill to creation-in, say, the form of man or angels. Because then this imperfect creation can conceivably express its imperfection, by an act of its imperfect will, with moral evil or sin a possible result. If all this is so, then the only way a created being with freewill could consistently act perfectly would be if He was somehow led by Gods’ perfect will instead of his own.

And if this is so, then perhaps it would make sense that the only way for these beings, this creation-with-freewill, to always behave perfectly would be for them to choose, not to act perfectly, which they could not consistently do, but, if possible, to always be directly united with God, who is perfection itself, and as such the only Being who always wills rightly. And I believe this is consistent in a general way with Catholic thought and teachings on the New Law/Covenant, except maybe for my first paragraph. Any thoughts of your own on this?

*God is Perfection itself. Since God is Perfection then the only thing Perfection can do is beget perfection. If the world could be “better” than God would not be Perfect since imperfection cannot exist inside of Perfection.

This therefore means that everything is perfect. Now you’re probably asking yourself how this can be. Well I will try to explain.

God creates a World so that creatures (humans) could exist and love Him freely (Free Will). The only way Free Will could exist perfectly is if the World God created which is perfect will allow for the perfection to be corrupted. Gods permitting of this corruption of perfection is also perfection because it allows the perfect purpose to be fulfilled for why the perfect world was created.

What this then means is that imperfection does not exist but rather is a word we use to describe what we perceive (due to our perfect corruption) to be the absence of perfection.
*

 

[fhansen]

What this then means is that imperfection does not exist but rather is a word we use to describe what we perceive (due to our perfect corruption) to be the absence of perfection.
*

So sin is just a perception, and not the absence of perfection?

 

[Ontologian]

Honestly, I have learned to trust the Angelic Doctor to notice any subtleties and nuances of language. .

JP2Admirer, I appreciate your attempts to understand and to defend Thomas Aquinas. I think he is the finest overall theologian-philosopher in Church history. But it is important to realize that Thomas was never a Thomist, and ever a truthist. He looked for truth everywhere and gave mighty benign interpretations at times to his potential and actual adversaries, so as not to shortchange what they were meaning.

Let’s be really like St. Thomas and be TRUTHISTS. St. Thomas was a saint. But he was also a “heretic”…e.g. he died without believing in the Immaculate Conception and his stance on that issue was a big part of the reason the Dominicans tended to hold out against the proclamation vs. the Franciscans who went with Duns Scotus et al.
Although Aquinas is most worthy of our trust, he was not infallible and can readily have missed important dimensions of the truth…maybe not as likely, but just as definitely as the rest of us.

No, I am not talking about existence as the effect of God. You might do well to read what I’ve said earlier in the thread. Existentialists tend to mean by existence the mode of being (of being human) wherein we are capable of, as it were, “standing outside ourselves” by our power of reflective consciousness so that we can make decisions about ourselves and our lives. Dogs and cats et al. have ‘direct consciousness of things’ but cannot be conscious of their consciousness of those things and hence cannot be free to know WHAT they are doing such that they can make a rational choice. Hope that helps. So much more could be said.

As for our being self-creators, I think there is a way to see that as true: we freely create a response to the being gifted to us by God at the moment of creation ex nihilo (out of nothing). With the infinite power of God and ALSO by our own gifted finite power we create–not our being out of nothing; God does that–but our being out of the powers gifted to us in that being, powers for knowing the good and willing it. All our best actions are creative in an interior way, as intellective and volitional creatures. I do not mean the same thing as existentialists, especially the egregious version of Sartre about “creating our own essence.” Ours is a finitely free (creative) response to being who and what we are as gifted by God.

As for "our ‘own being’ as a sui generis accident gifted to us by God, oh no!
Our being is not an accident either of us or of God. Our being is not necessary but oh so essential, once gifted to us by God out of nothing. When God says BE, you ARE…forever. For better or for worse, richer or poorer…thanks to YOU, not to God. Thank God you are and are who you are originatively; but God will not interfere with the perfect finite freedom that he gave unqualifiedly to YOU and to YOU ALONE. Your freedom is yours; not God’s–in any way. [God as God cannot be finitely free, only infinitely free.] It is better to say that we “have our being” from nothing, rather than ‘from God.’ The latter way smacks of pantheism. And that is my issue with Aquinas. There is a latent pantheism in the Thomistic notion that we finite beings are “habens esse” and not esse: that we only have being and are not being. What he should have said is that God is God’s infinite Esse and we ARE (not merely have) our finite esse, thanks to the infinitely free act of God in gifting beings to finite persons, without any “strings attached.” You go to hell on your own. But also you go to heaven on your own…with MORE THAN God’s HELP: with God’s infinite presence and power, infinitely loving you, but never interfering with your most intimate decisions of being. So that we can say you go to heaven both with the grace of God AND ALSO REALLY with the grace of your own being…the gift of love you give to God. Not so much a “return” of God’s love for you, but of a free initiative on your part. [Not a “quid pro quo”!] Failing that, you can be said to go to hell on your own: by the power of your own willing and ‘freedom.’

I like what you say about bringing fire into the field of Thomist studies and that St. Thomas himself was afire with love. Think of the beautiful Eucharistic hymns he composed and the beauty of the forms in the Summa Theological et al. We need the spirit and character of the man himself and not the dry, dessicated scholarship of the parasites.

Won’t go into your confusion about the “independent” being we received originatively from God. But notice that I said it is not a being independent OF or FROM God, but something different: a being INDEPENDENT WITH God…you know, like the Triune Persons themselves are INDEPENDENT WITH (not dependent on) One Another. They being, of course, infinitely independent with One Another; we being finitely independent with God and one another. Our total dependence on God comes from our sinfulness, specifically our originative sinfulness, not from our relation with God in creation ex nihilo. So, paradoxically we are BOTH independent with God in be-ing AND dependent on God in ex-istence, in need of redemption and salvation.

By the way, creation ex aliquo is my term for the creation accounts in Genesis: God creating out of something (dust, a rib, chaos, darkness, et al.) Not at all the same as God creating out of nothing, which is a perfect Creation, as our partner in discussion Credo in Deum seems to have put it.

May we all be blessed in receiving God’s gifts ever more deeply.

 

[JP2Admirer]

JP2Admirer, I appreciate your attempts to understand and to defend Thomas Aquinas. I think he is the finest overall theologian-philosopher in Church history. But it is important to realize that Thomas was never a Thomist, and ever a truthist. He looked for truth everywhere and gave mighty benign interpretations at times to his potential and actual adversaries, so as not to shortchange what they were meaning.

Let’s be really like St. Thomas and be TRUTHISTS. St. Thomas was a saint. But he was also a “heretic”…e.g. he died without believing in the Immaculate Conception and his stance on that issue was a big part of the reason the Dominicans tended to hold out against the proclamation vs. the Franciscans who went with Duns Scotus et al.
Although Aquinas is most worthy of our trust, he was not infallible and can readily have missed important dimensions of the truth…maybe not as likely, but just as definitely as the rest of us.

I’m sorry if I came off as a “truthist”, by which I think someone who thinks the debate ended when Aquinas stopped writing. In some sense a truthist would be a “fideist”, taking the debate to be settled. Sed contra, the beauty of Thomas Aquinas is that his inquiry is open ended (I follow MacIntyre’s interpretation here.)

I am unaware of any declared saint as being a “heritic”. Aquinas’ teachings were condemned, yes, by Bishop Tempier (I believe a Franciscan), but that was based on partisanship and not on any heresy in his writing. The Franciscan’s did not like his writings because of the eternity of the world controversy as well as the unity of the intellect.

The Nihil Obstat found at the beginning of his writings generally means he was not a heretic. A declared saint a heretic? I’ve never heard such a thing.

The Immaculate Conception was not official Church dogma until the 19th Century. This is not to say that it was not a traditionally upheld belief, but not one that Aquinas could be held accountable for.

No, I am not talking about existence as the effect of God. You might do well to read what I’ve said earlier in the thread. Existentialists tend to mean by existence the mode of being (of being human) wherein we are capable of, as it were, “standing outside ourselves” by our power of reflective consciousness so that we can make decisions about ourselves and our lives. Dogs and cats et al. have ‘direct consciousness of things’ but cannot be conscious of their consciousness of those things and hence cannot be free to know WHAT they are doing such that they can make a rational choice. Hope that helps. So much more could be said.

Sounds to me like you are talking about an intelligent being – an intellector of being. This, however, does not represent for me “standing outside of existence” it merely means we have intelligence, but we are still a mode of being that possesses its being from Being itself.

As for our being self-creators, I think there is a way to see that as true: we freely create a response to the being gifted to us by God at the moment of creation ex nihilo (out of nothing). With the infinite power of God and ALSO by our own gifted finite power we create–not our being out of nothing; God does that–but our being out of the powers gifted to us in that being, powers for knowing the good and willing it. All our best actions are creative in an interior way, as intellective and volitional creatures. I do not mean the same thing as existentialists, especially the egregious version of Sartre about “creating our own essence.” Ours is a finitely free (creative) response to being who and what we are as gifted by God.

I’m just going to have to agree to disagree with you here. I fail to see how we are responsible for our being in any way, shape, or form. It is pure gift. By “we” do you mean the first parents, human nature, or you and me? Because I certainly do not see how I am responsible for my existence – my parents are, and their parents were for them, but they are only havers of being, or else we fall into an infinite regress and we can forget my existence. I can state I am responsible for my existence in the sense of what I do with the being that was gifted to me…but I cannot, nor do I see how I can possibly be a self creator. I have a nature given to me. What I do with that is up to me, but I am not responsible for having my being.

As for "our ‘own being’ as a sui generis accident gifted to us by God, oh no!
Our being is not an accident either of us or of God. Our being is not necessary but oh so essential, once gifted to us by God out of nothing. When God says BE, you ARE…forever. For better or for worse, richer or poorer…thanks to YOU, not to God…

How would you distinguish being and essence within us, then? I absolutely cannot agree that my existence is thanks to me in any way. Am I a self-generator? I did not create myself. Quite honestly this smacks of the worst kind of humanism – the idolatry of man.

The latter way smacks of pantheism. And that is my issue with Aquinas. There is a latent pantheism in the Thomistic notion that we finite beings are “habens esse” and not esse: that we only have being and are not being.

Pantheism would suggest that God is all things. Aquinas refutes this a number of ways. God is magis intimum to all things, but the things are themselves…they are not God. Thus, the charge of pantheism is a misinterpretation of Aquinas. (For evidence see SCG Bk 1 Ch.26)

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

So sin is just a perception, and not the absence of perfection?

*Imperfection cannot exist because God in whom all things exist is Perfection itself so to say imperfection could exist within perfection would be a contradiction. The only way this could be is if there was no perfection at all, however, if there was no perfection then there could also be no imperfection .

Yet someone will ask how can Perfection exist without imperfection? The answer is because levels of perfection can exist within Perfection without taking away from Perfection itself.

This brings us to sin and what it is.

Sin is when we use our free will to choose a lower perfection rather than a higher perfection. The choosing of a lower perfection is evil since it would result in the absence of the higher perfection; however this ability (free will) to choose the lower perfection is not evil in of itself.

Sin is therefore not the abence of perfection but the absence of a higher perfection.*

 

[Curious_Seed]

To this question, sometimes posed by atheists and theists alike, I believe Aquinas would answer that this world could be better, because an infinitely powerful God could always make something better. But by the same logic, it seems that if God could always make something better, then He could still never make anything perfect-which is the equivalent of saying that evil will always be present in creation to some degree by virtue of the fact that creation, itself, is not God, or, perhaps to put it another way: even God can’t create another God.

But this unavoidable “flaw” becomes an even greater dilemma if God deems it wise to grant freewill to creation-in, say, the form of man or angels. Because then this imperfect creation can conceivably express its imperfection, by an act of its imperfect will, with moral evil or sin a possible result. If all this is so, then the only way a created being with freewill could consistently act perfectly would be if He was somehow led by Gods’ perfect will instead of his own.

And if this is so, then perhaps it would make sense that the only way for these beings, this creation-with-freewill, to always behave perfectly would be for them to choose, not to act perfectly, which they could not consistently do, but, if possible, to always be directly united with God, who is perfection itself, and as such the only Being who always wills rightly. And I believe this is consistent in a general way with Catholic thought and teachings on the New Law/Covenant, except maybe for my first paragraph. Any thoughts of your own on this?

God could create a better world.

God could create a better world, yet again.

Could God create a perfect world?

We, always less than perfect, could never know.

What we do know is that God created the world He wanted.

 

[Ontologian]

I’m sorry if I came off as a “truthist”, by which I think someone who thinks the debate ended when Aquinas stopped writing. In some sense a truthist would be a “fideist”, taking the debate to be settled. Sed contra, the beauty of Thomas Aquinas is that his inquiry is open ended (I follow MacIntyre’s interpretation here.)

I am unaware of any declared saint as being a “heritic”. Aquinas’ teachings were condemned, yes, by Bishop Tempier (I believe a Franciscan), but that was based on partisanship and not on any heresy in his writing. The Franciscan’s did not like his writings because of the eternity of the world controversy as well as the unity of the intellect.

The Nihil Obstat found at the beginning of his writings generally means he was not a heretic. A declared saint a heretic? I’ve never heard such a thing.

You did not seem to come off as a Truthist, but a hard and fast Thomist. But my point is that Thomas himself was not the latter, but a truthist, one committed to the truth wherever he found it, and presumably willing to change even major features of his thought if he encountered the truth about its insufficiencies.

And he would have done so if he had come to see, e.g., the Immaculate Conception. But he did not…so wrapped up in a cosmogenic mode that he could not see the being of the Virgin independently of her zygotic-embryonic body!

I put quotes around the word heretic to indicate that Thomas was materially a heretic, not formally one in any sense. The Dogma was not proclaimed until 1854. But he died believing something that turned out to be false. It showed the limits of his thinking on a mega-important matter.

I’m just going to have to agree to disagree with you here. I fail to see how we are responsible for our being in any way, shape, or form. It is pure gift. By “we” do you mean the first parents, human nature, or you and me? Because I certainly do not see how I am responsible for my existence – my parents are, and their parents were for them, but they are only havers of being, or else we fall into an infinite regress and we can forget my existence. I can state I am responsible for my existence in the sense of what I do with the being that was gifted to me…but I cannot, nor do I see how I can possibly be a self creator. I have a nature given to me. What I do with that is up to me, but I am not responsible for having my being.

You do not seem to be able to distinguish receiving as active from receiving as passive.
The ability to receive (whether said of God or of a creature) is first of all an active potency, not a passive one. Aquinas along with Aristotle never quite made it to see that every being is a gift (a pure gift, as you so rightly say) that out of nothing receives itself from God. The created person does not have the gift imposed upon him or her, but is able to receive fully, partly, or not at all the gift that he or she is and do so BY THAT VERY GIFTED BEING ITSELF. Quite a paradox. God gifts us with our being out of nothing and so we are perfect in being and freedom; and we immediately and freely are able to receive perfectly or imperfectly as WE WILL, this perfect gift: perfect forever as gifted by God; perfect or imperfect as received by us.

God too receives. God receives us in the very act of gifting us. God does not just do so perfectly, but with infinite perfection. We are able to do similarly, but with finite perfection.

WE are not responsible for our being-at-all or for our being this unique person! But we ARE RESPONSIBLE for receiving it fully as God gifted it or for receiving it less than fully and even for being unwilling to receive it at all. IF the latter, we still are the perfect being that God gifted us to be AS GIFTED, but exist as the quite imperfect being we alone MADE OURSELVES TO BE, by refusing to exercise positively the perfect finite freedom with which we were gifted at the non-durational instant of a moment in which God said BE. By the way, that moment ex nihilo is prior in being to the reclamation creation accounts given in the Bk of Genesis!! Aquinas et al. failed to distinguish creation ex nihilo from creation ex aliquo (out of the mess we made of our original gift of being. SO in hell we would be perfect finite being as gifted, but totally imperfect being AS RECEIVED…and act that only we could do, the receiving of our being, for better or for worse. Now that’s real created freedom!

Pantheism would suggest that God is all things. Aquinas refutes this a number of ways. God is magis intimum to all things, but the things are themselves…they are not God. Thus, the charge of pantheism is a misinterpretation of Aquinas. (For evidence see SCG Bk 1 Ch.26)

Aquinas cannot bring himself to say: I AM my esse, my be-ing. He can only say I HAVE my esse. While he is not the cause of his being and being-at-all, he is the cause of how he receives it, initially and forever. And it is HIS being doing the receiving. God cannot receive our being for us and still be GOD! If only God can be esse, then our esse is a part of God’s and that is pantheism of a sort. Aquinas confused being in general with unique being. God is God’s infinite being. You ARE your finite being. Beg off of that and you are reneging on you God-like responsibility to be.

 

[razredge]

I think there are things even God cannot do.

It would definitely seem that he isn’t able to create a world with free will for it’s inhabitants without any suffering (or even with less suffering that is experienced currently).

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

I think there are things even God cannot do.

It would definitely seem that he isn’t able to create a world with free will for it’s inhabitants without any suffering (or even with less suffering that is experienced currently).

If I’m not mistaken He did create a World with Free Will and without suffering. Didnt you read Genesis?

 

[razredge]

If I’m not mistaken He did create a World with Free Will and without suffering. Didnt you read Genesis?

I don’t know, unless you are a strict Creationist there was suffering and death long before Adam & Eve ate an apple and caused a fallen world.

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

I don’t know

Exactly

 

[razredge]

Exactly

Well, actually I meant ‘I don’t know’ to express doubt in your previous statement about a world created without suffering and with free will. As if you take this world as example, it would seem not to be the case, unless of course you ignore the evidence.

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

Well, actually I meant ‘I don’t know’ to express doubt in your previous statement about a world created without suffering and with free will.

I know my friend I know.

As if you take this world as example, it would seem not to be the case, unless of course you ignore the evidence.

Oh never my friend. I would never ignore the evidence and I would never use the evidence to claim something the evidence could not give proof of. I am curious to know however if you find suffering to be “bad” or “evil” and if so then why?

 

[Eric_Hyom]

God created us in his perfect image, which I believe is the greatest commandments, these commandments are perfect and without flaw.

There is nothing greater that God could give us as a code to live by.

If you believe we could be created in a better way, then it would be necessary to find commandments greater than the ones we have.

Blessings

Eric

 

[razredge]

I know my friend I know.

Oh never my friend. I would never ignore the evidence and I would never use the evidence to claim something the evidence could not give proof of. I am curious to know however if you find suffering to be “bad” or “evil” and if so then why?

Well, I definitely am not one of those people who believe in God as their own personal genie and think that because they pray to him means they’ll never have to suffer or want for anything, (Lots of Protestants seem to be like this -with dangerous rubbish like prosperity theology)

One thing I admire about Catholicism is the value it places on stoicism and sacrifice, you don’t get too many Mother Theresas or Maximilian Kolbe in Protestantism.

I definitely think that as a Catholic you should be prepared to suffer and not expect an easy life because you have some special relationship with God - the lives of the apostles and saints have shown as much.

So I will not deny that the world has a lot of suffering and much of it doesn’t seem to bring about spiritual growth (eg. young children dying of starvation & disease).

But since I accept that God is omnipotent, omniscient & omnibenevolent the logical conclusion must be that even God could not create a universe with less suffering that currently exists (it would be a logical impossibility, like creating a square circle or similar).

Hope that clarifies my point of view.

 

[tonyrey]

So I will not deny that the world has a lot of suffering and much of it doesn’t seem to bring about spiritual growth (eg. young children dying of starvation & disease).

That is inevitable when there is an element of chance within the framework of Design.

But since I accept that God is omnipotent, omniscient & omnibenevolent the logical conclusion must be that even God could not create a universe with less suffering that currently exists (it would be a logical impossibility, like creating a square circle or similar).

Precisely. The onus is on the sceptic to explain how a universe with less suffering could be created…

 

[Credo_in_Deum]

Well, I definitely am not one of those people who believe in God as their own personal genie and think that because they pray to him means they’ll never have to suffer or want for anything, (Lots of Protestants seem to be like this -with dangerous rubbish like prosperity theology)

One thing I admire about Catholicism is the value it places on stoicism and sacrifice, you don’t get too many Mother Theresas or Maximilian Kolbe in Protestantism.

I definitely think that as a Catholic you should be prepared to suffer and not expect an easy life because you have some special relationship with God - the lives of the apostles and saints have shown as much.

So I will not deny that the world has a lot of suffering and much of it doesn’t seem to bring about spiritual growth (eg. young children dying of starvation & disease).

But since I accept that God is omnipotent, omniscient & omnibenevolent the logical conclusion must be that even God could not create a universe with less suffering that currently exists (it would be a logical impossibility, like creating a square circle or similar).

Hope that clarifies my point of view.

*Yes it does and I thank you very much.

I always believed that Eden existed outside of time and space (much like Heaven) and that “days” in the Bible are used to describe something that we (as creatures now held down by time and space) cannot fully comprehend. After the fall when mankind introduced its own perfection (corruption/sin) into existence God exiles them from Eden to enter a World (the one we have today) that now has (by man’s use of free will) the perfections of God’s Hands and the perfections of Mans hands (corruption/sins). In this world designed by God and man we will have to go through a purgation of our perfections in order to allow Gods perfections to live in us and therefore become united with our Creator. A unity we once shared in Eden.

In other words it’s not that God couldn’t create a world without suffering and free will but rather that God cannot create a world that denies the choices His creation made with their free will. And by mankind’s sin we chose to have “suffering” and God complied with our choice. *

 

[belorg]

That is inevitable when there is an element of chance within the framework of Design.
Precisely. The onus is on the sceptic to explain how a universe with less suffering could be created…

No, the onus is on the theists to explain how it is possible that someone who, by their own definition can do everything, nevertheless cannot cretae a universe with less suffering.

IOW the theist must prove that creating a universe with less suffering is logically impossible.

BTW, that there is an element of chance within the framework of design is not something most classical theists will agree with.

 

[presidentjlh]

My apologies if someone already gave a similar opinion as the one I am about to, but I just wish to make my opinion known.

I feel that what we must first consider is the definition of “perfection”. What is “perfection”? Do we truly know what “perfection” really is? Of course, we understand God to be perfect, but we still do not fully know Him, and will not until we obtain the Beatific Vision after our time here on Earth comes to a close.

Second, let us say we have an idea about what “perfection” is. Is it not entirely possible that God, being an infinitely superior Being to us in all ways, has different definition of “perfection”, and since He is incapable of fault, is it not true then that whatever His definition is that it is the correct one? Therefore, it is also entirely possible that our idea of “perfection” is inaccurate, for we are flawed.

Third, I would like to go on a bit of a tangent here, and propose that the concept of “perfection” in itself is a proof of God. I cannot recall which philosopher originally proposed this, but let us consider this. We as humans have only experienced imperfection beyond that of our relationship with God, and even then, that relationship is flawed (only on our part, mind you). Since all we know is imperfection, how do we have the sense that there is such thing as perfection, then? I posit as follows: That the concept of “perfection” in regards to being held by imperfect beings could only have originated from a perfect being. In short, we have a concept of perfection in an imperfect world because God is perfect, and has imbued us with the idea that there is such thing as “perfection”. Now, this definition can come to be altered (and thus made inaccurate, being that God’s definition of “perfection” is perfect) by our actions and words, so as to arrive at our current understanding of perfection, which is a flawed one.

In regards to creating a universe that has less suffering, let us consider what “suffering” is. Is “suffering” what we know to be suffering, or is there a different sort of suffering?

I posit that true suffering is on the part of humanity, who, by free will, can choose to harm each other. Natural disasters do cause suffering, yes, but is there not a feeling that something is worse when it is caused by a person rather than a natural process? Thus, greater suffering is caused by humans. Consider a fire, for example. If a fire is caused by, say, a lightning strike that hits a flammable object just right, doesn’t that make one feel less suffering than if someone commits arson to cause it?

I posit that our choices, our misguided actions, are what increases the level of suffering in this world, and that any less suffering on the part of nature would be returned with greater man-made suffering. Less disasters means more people, which naturally will lead to higher levels of crime, as well as worse behavior due to greater levels of stress caused by general conditions.

However, before one says, “Then do away with free will,” let me posit that we can only truly do good if we can do evil. Good goes hand in hand with evil, both must exist or else neither exist. We cannot truly love, care for, or aid anyone if we cannot hate, harm, or ignore others. Love requires the possibility of hate, for then the fact that we choose not to hate means the love is genuine.