Do humans naturally hate God?

[Venite_Adoremus_1]

I have an evengelical friend who recently told me that humans naturally hate God.

Is this true? What scripture passages support or refute this?

 

[Strydersroom]

No human naturally hates, ALL are taught to hate based on fear, ignorance and yes many times misguided religious beliefs.

 

[Hatikvah]

Well, hatred of God and sin are clearly intertwined, both being disobedience… one can make a case for original sin having such an effect, I guess.

 

[Ad_Orientem]

What exactly does he mean by “naturally” and “hate”?

It is true that human nature *alone *does not love God with the supernatural charity he deserves (although it can acquire natural virtues including justice, which includes the virtue of religion, albeit in an imperfect form).

If that’s what he means by “naturally,” I suppose we could call it “hatred of God” insofar as the will is oriented towards itself and created things and is not oriented to God in the way the regenerate soul is; but I don’t think original sin alone gives us *malice *towards God. Malice is something we choose.

Still, one could question this use of “naturally,” since God created us to be infused with divine grace, and since we retain our human nature in the state of grace.

 

[thistle]

I have an evengelical friend who recently told me that humans naturally hate God.

Is this true? What scripture passages support or refute this?

When anyone makes a claim get them to show you documentary support for their claim which we can then discuss. If they can’t its all hot air.

Its not up to us to refute baseless assertions.

 

[pianistclare]

When anyone makes a claim get them to show you documentary support for their claim which we can then discuss. If they can’t its all hot air.

Its not up to us to refute baseless assertions.

Agreed.

 

[The_Reginator]

When anyone makes a claim get them to show you documentary support for their claim which we can then discuss. If they can’t its all hot air.

Its not up to us to refute baseless assertions.

On the contrary, humans naturally love God, but in our fallen state we love ourselves and our world more. That’s why we need to remain The Church Militant – fighting (a spiritual battle against) the world and our own worldly desires.
We are made in God’s image. We have this drive, shown in different cultures and throughout history, to find a meaning to our lives. I believe that this is part of our desire to find and love God.

 

[RPRPsych]

I have an evengelical friend who recently told me that humans naturally hate God.

Is this true? What scripture passages support or refute this?

Tsk, tsk, I thought Evangelicals knew their Bibles better than this.

Ask him (or her) to read Romans 7.

In our fallen state, we can wish or will to do what is good, including loving God, but because we lack His grace, we fail to follow through on it. (This isn’t just Catholic teaching; Protestant commentators like A. T. Robertson say almost the same thing.) That’s where the whole Sola gratia concept comes in.

 

[jcrichton]

I have an evengelical friend who recently told me that humans naturally hate God.

Is this true? What scripture passages support or refute this?

Hi, Adoremus!
…I think it stems from that interpretation that man is fully vile and cannot do/be but abominable.

It is the belief that man cannot cooperate with God’s Mercy and Grace; that he is doomed to damnation (if God has predestined damnation).

Interestingly enough, Jesus claims the opposite:

25 Jesus answered them: I speak to you, and you believe not: the works that I do in the name of my Father, they give testimony of me. 26 But you do not believe, because you are not of my sheep. 27 My sheep hear my voice: and I know them, and they follow me. 28 And I give them life everlasting; and they shall not perish for ever, and no man shall pluck them out of my hand. (St. John 10:25-28)

44 No man can come to me, except the Father, who hath sent me, draw him; and I will raise him up in the last day. 45 It is written in the prophets: And they shall all be taught of God. Every one that hath heard of the Father, and hath learned, cometh to me. (St. John 6:44-45)

This theme is part of Salvation:

17 For God sent not his Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by him. 18 He that believeth in him is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged: because he believeth not in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the judgment: because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light: for their works were evil. 20 For every one that doth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, that his works may not be reproved. 21 But he that doth truth, cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, because they are done in God. (St. John 3:17-21)

God does not understand man as His nemesis; man does not inherently hate God… since we are creatures born with Original Sin we are vulnerable to concupiscence; yet, hatred of God is an act of the will not of inheritance.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[adamhovey1988]

The Burden of proof is on the person making the assertion. Ask your friend where in the Bible it says humans “naturally hate God”

 

[Entwhistler]

I’d be curious to know why he believes that. Quite an interesting proposition but one that needs more elaboration than just “humans naturally hate God”.

 

[Robert_Sock]

When anyone makes a claim get them to show you documentary support for their claim which we can then discuss. If they can’t its all hot air.

Its not up to us to refute baseless assertions.

Many of the saints had visions which nobody could possibly document. Many of my most treasured beliefs lacks documentation, but are firmly based on divine revelation. My point is simply that we often have no solid proof to justify our beliefs other than personal experience, and we know that there is nothing like “experience.”

 

[LethalMouse]

Children generally love God, they are confused and learn bad things from adults. Adults hate God. We are loving first, confused second, hateful third.

 

[Vico]

I have an evengelical friend who recently told me that humans naturally hate God.

Is this true? What scripture passages support or refute this?

The first sin of the angel and mankind is pride. The sources of sin for humans are ignorance, passion, and malice. Pride may be malice. Passion and malice may be mortal sin which is uncharitable (hateful).

Isaiah 14:12–15:

How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How are you cut down to the ground, which did weaken the nations! For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. Yet you shall be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

Proverbs 16:18

Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

 

[jcrichton]

Many of the saints had visions which nobody could possibly document. Many of my most treasured beliefs lacks documentation, but are firmly based on divine revelation. My point is simply that we often have no solid proof to justify our beliefs other than personal experience, and we know that there is nothing like “experience.”

Hi, Robert!
…but this assertion is not a claim that there has been some personal revelation; rather, the statement makes an unequivocal claim that man (all of humanity) hates God, inherently.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[jcrichton]

The first sin of the angel and mankind is pride. The sources of sin for humans are ignorance, passion, and malice. Pride may be malice. Passion and malice may be mortal sin which is uncharitable (hateful).

Isaiah 14:12–15:

How are you fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! How are you cut down to the ground, which did weaken the nations! For you have said in your heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. Yet you shall be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

Proverbs 16:18

Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

Hi!
…have you noticed that this particular passage (Isaiah 14:12-15) speaks of Lucifer, aka Satan, aka the Ancient Serpent?

So while we are born of Original Sin, we do not, inherently, see God as our nemesis.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[Vico]

Hi!
…have you noticed that this particular passage (Isaiah 14:12-15) speaks of Lucifer, aka Satan, aka the Ancient Serpent?

So while we are born of Original Sin, we do not, inherently, see God as our nemesis.

Maran atha!

Angel

Adam and Eve were granted the gifts to which human beings have title by nature – namely the preternatural gifts of infused knowledge, absence of concupiscence, and bodily immortality, and the supernatural gift of grace.

So these gifts are not inherent.

 

[SirEwenii]

Probably gets it from Romans 1:

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

Context is the pagan gentile world, however chapter 2 makes a similar claim on the Jewish people and Romans 3 sums it all up making the point that all human beings are sinners, whether Jew or Gentile.

"None is righteous, no, not one;
no one understands;
no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
no one does good,
not even one.” Romans 3:10-12

The apostle Paul is trying to make the point that everyone in the world is a sinner and in need of the forgiveness through Jesus Christ

 

[Reuben_J]

What about Psalm 42:1 As the deer yearn for the running stream and so my soul yearn for you, O Lord, ?

Or St Augustine, Our hearts are restless, until they find rest in you (God).

 

[OneSmallFlower]

Nope.

In our truest perfect nature, we love God above all things. Humans are naturally inclined towards the good. That’s why we like things like good food, pretty music, the sight of a sunrise, etc. etc. etc… Since God is the pinnacle of all good, if we “naturally hated God,” we wouldn’t be able to stand any of those things.

Now, in our fallen state, we sometimes are inclined to love good things MORE than we love God, or we love the perversions of good things instead of the goods themselves. That’s called “concupiscence.” But we only love those things, even when we do so wrongly, because we see some good in them that reflects, in greater or lesser degrees, the goodness of God.

So in answer to your question, no, humans naturally love God; it’s the unnatural distortion of our nature by evil that makes us want the creations more than we want the Creator, and then we get angry when the Creator demands greater love for Him than we give to His creations.

Sources: Augustine’s Confessions, basic philosophy