Divine justice?

[Wesrock]

The ability to distinguish right from wrong and to sentence from God point of view.

I don’t believe it’s within man’s ability to know the appropriate eternal sentence without revelation from God. However, God has given man the ability of reason to distinguish right from wrong, and has likewise given him a drive to seek the good and truth, which is ultimately God Himself. Man, at least by design, has the capacity to do such reasoning, which is why he may be held responsible for his choices. That man may incorrectly prioritize the good options before him, perhaps through intentionally sloppy reasoning, is how moral evil may occur.

It goes without saying that young children will not have developed the ability to reason appropriately, and certainly, due to physical defect in the brain or elsewhere, a man may never manifest such intellectual ability even should he reach the age of maturity. God is certainly aware of our capabilities and our deficiencies, and will certainly account for such things in any judgment made.

 

[Wesrock]

Nah, my dilemma lies on the fact that we are not able to intellectually understand right from wrong therefore there is a potential in us to do wrong, what God prohibited. This means that we are not responsible for our wrong act since we naturally avoid wrong act (if we understand it) since we are rational.

We are rational beings, but that doesn’t mean we always employ our full rationality. We’re not just algorithms.

 

[STT]

We are rational beings, but that doesn’t mean we always employ our full rationality. We’re not just algorithms.

Yes, we could do wrong because we have free will. That is another flaw in our creation.

 

[Wesrock]

Yes, we could do wrong because we have free will. That is another flaw in our creation.

The closer a creation is to being an image of God the more perfect it is. To be in the image of God requires a voluntary will. Certainly more wonderful than a machine that runs perfectly but has no intellect or will. Creation adds nothing to God’s being, but to share it with others who are free is wonderful. It becomes something more than just pretty to look at. A reality of beings of free will in whoch evil is permitted is fsr more wonderful and beautiful than a soulless machine.

 

[1Lord1Faith]

Yes, we could do wrong because we have free will. That is another flaw in our creation.

Here on these forums, I’ve seen your search for answers consistently move from an initial question in your original post to you making statements such as the one above, and in-between have managed to avoid reasonable arguments from other posters, which leads me to believe that your assertions such as, “We are intellectual beings therefore we avoid wrong things naturally. There is a potential in us to disobey God if we are not able to understand right from wrong. That is not our fault.” are either made in arrogance or in defiance, but you cannot claim ignorance unless you are simply not reading many of the posts from other posters who are doing a good job of answering your questions. Your own posts are refuting your own statements.

Maybe you already have your mind made up and are looking for a debate, if so you should change the religion status from, “seeking the truth”, to “I’ve got my mind made up”.

The fact that you cannot see the truth, is evidence of your shortcomings, not God’s. You are given the opportunity to gain knowledge, yet you reject it, and then blame God for the reasons you choose not accept it.

 

[ericc]

Sin is what prohibited by divine law. Divine justice is different from divine law. Divine justice can be defined as the ability to distinguish right from wrong and to sentence from God point of view. Divine laws is a set of allowed and prohibited acts.

Divine laws are derived from Divine justice. Divine justice does not arise from anywhere. It is one intrinsic attribute of God. Like free will.

God has to communicate his sense of Divine Justice to us to let us know his POV in any case. If I do not know your POV, I would not know why you think that way and may not accept your POV. So from the communication of Divine Justice comes Divine Laws. In any case, we don’t read God’s mind and try not to second guess. Second guessing God’s mind/intention may lead us not to respect his Divine Laws or find an escape clause.

 

[SalamKhan]

Nah, my dilemma lies on the fact that we are not able to intellectually understand right from wrong therefore there is a potential in us to do wrong, what God prohibited. This means that we are not responsible for our wrong act since we naturally avoid wrong act (if we understand it) since we are rational.

Actions are created by Allah, but actions are acquired by His creatures. We have the free will to acquire actions created for us by Allah, no more than that. It is only from Allah (and His revelation to us) that we can reach certainty of good and evil. It is possible, although with some difficulty, to discern between most goods and evils without revelation due to our fitra, but we are not responsible if divine revelation had not reached us.

 

[STT]

The closer a creation is to being an image of God the more perfect it is. To be in the image of God requires a voluntary will. Certainly more wonderful than a machine that runs perfectly but has no intellect or will. Creation adds nothing to God’s being, but to share it with others who are free is wonderful. It becomes something more than just pretty to look at. A reality of beings of free will in whoch evil is permitted is fsr more wonderful and beautiful than a soulless machine.

Well, I really don’t know what is the point of having free will. We could do just good without it and could do wrong with it. Really what is the point of having free will?

 

[STT]

Here on these forums, I’ve seen your search for answers consistently move from an initial question in your original post to you making statements such as the one above, and in-between have managed to avoid reasonable arguments from other posters, which leads me to believe that your assertions such as, “We are intellectual beings therefore we avoid wrong things naturally. There is a potential in us to disobey God if we are not able to understand right from wrong. That is not our fault.” are either made in arrogance or in defiance, but you cannot claim ignorance unless you are simply not reading many of the posts from other posters who are doing a good job of answering your questions. Your own posts are refuting your own statements.

I carefully read the responses to my post to see if the poster make any point. Could you please show me a post which answers the objection in the above argument(bold part)?

Maybe you already have your mind made up and are looking for a debate, if so you should change the religion status from, “seeking the truth”, to “I’ve got my mind made up”.

Well, I made my mind in some cases and I am confused with other cases such as “Yes, we could do wrong because we have free will. That is another flaw in our creation.”

The fact that you cannot see the truth, is evidence of your shortcomings, not God’s. You are given the opportunity to gain knowledge, yet you reject it, and then blame God for the reasons you choose not accept it.

I am trying hard therefore the failure in seeing the truth is not my fault. In fact that could be God’s fault since God is omniscient and omnipotent therefore He could easily show the truth to me which He wouldn’t.

 

[STT]

God has to communicate his sense of Divine Justice to us to let us know his POV in any case.

Yes, but how He could do that? He only deliver Divine laws to us.

If I do not know your POV, I would not know why you think that way and may not accept your POV.

Yes, I agree.

 

[STT]

Actions are created by Allah, but actions are acquired by His creatures. We have the free will to acquire actions created for us by Allah, no more than that. It is only from Allah (and His revelation to us) that we can reach certainty of good and evil. It is possible, although with some difficulty, to discern between most goods and evils without revelation due to our fitra, but we are not responsible if divine revelation had not reached us.

I don’t understand how your comment is related to my post.

 

[ericc]

Yes, but how He could do that? He only deliver Divine laws to us.

Yes, I agree.

He sent his Prophets, His Son and Holy Spirit to teach us. His Son instituted the Church and together with the Holy Spirit and the Apostles and officially delegated appointees to guide us into all truths, all times.

 

[SalamKhan]

I don’t understand how your comment is related to my post.

You believe we are not responsible for our sins, whereas I clarified that we are not responsible if divine revelation had not reached us. You believe that the potential for us to disobey Allah is not our fault, whereas I clarified that actions are created by Allah but acquired by us; we are not forced to do anything. That there is a possibility for us to sin is in our nature as contingent beings, we are not immutable. If my post does not have anything to do with your point, then you are failing to articulate your point.

 

[tonyrey]

You believe we are not responsible for our sins, whereas I clarified that we are not responsible if divine revelation had not reached us. You believe that the potential for us to disobey Allah is not our fault, whereas I clarified that actions are created by Allah but acquired by us; we are not forced to do anything. That there is a possibility for us to sin is in our nature as contingent beings, we are not immutable. If my post does not have anything to do with your point, then you are failing to articulate your point.

 

[tonyrey]

Well, I really don’t know what is the point of having free will. We could do just good without it and could do wrong with it. Really what is the point of having free will?

Without free will we would be animals unable to choose what to believe or how to behave.

 

[tonyrey]

He sent his Prophets, His Son and Holy Spirit to teach us. His Son instituted the Church and together with the Holy Spirit and the Apostles and officially delegated appointees to guide us into all truths, all times.

Indeed although the Church teaches that our ultimate authority is our informed conscience which allows for individual interpretation of texts like Genesis.

 

[STT]

He sent his Prophets, His Son and Holy Spirit to teach us. His Son instituted the Church and together with the Holy Spirit and the Apostles and officially delegated appointees to guide us into all truths, all times.

Your example is just about delivering divine laws rather than communicating His sense of Divine Justice.

 

[STT]

You believe we are not responsible for our sins,

I think that we don’t do wrong (wrong is different from sin) given circumstances in a situation.

whereas I clarified that we are not responsible if divine revelation had not reached us.

That I understand but that is not a proper counter-argument against mine because I am talking about another thing: We as rational agent can avoid performing wrong act since we as intellectual agents can understand right from wrong. The question related to this thread is whether we can understand Divine Justice so we can understand right and wrong from Divine perspective.

You believe that the potential for us to disobey Allah is not our fault, whereas I clarified that actions are created by Allah but acquired by us; we are not forced to do anything.

I believe that we have potential to disobey God since we don’t understand Divine Laws which is based on Divine Justice. God just say don’t do this and that which this is not enough for an intellectual being. We need to understand why some act is wrong or right.

That there is a possibility for us to sin is in our nature as contingent beings, we are not immutable. If my post does not have anything to do with your point, then you are failing to articulate your point.

I think I was clear enough. That was you who didn’t get my point. I hope that things are clear enough now.

 

[STT]

Without free will we would be animals unable to choose what to believe or how to behave.

You didn’t get my point so I repeat it again: We as rational agents can do just good without free will and could do wrong with it. Really what is the point of having free will?

 

[SalamKhan]

In that case, you are asking the wrong question. You would be better off asking, “can we understand divine wisdom?” and the answer would be no. Our ability to assess divine wisdom is impaired.

Asking about divine justice is incorrect, because the very meaning of tyranny or opression is infringing on the rights and ownership of others, but this cannot be attributed to Allah as He has dominion and ownership over all things, thus He has the right to take what He owns.
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He is not questioned about what He does, but they will be questioned.* -Surah 21, Ayat 23