God created evil

[PRmerger]

You are introducing another conundrum.

If God knows everything and the boy does indeed end up in hell, then God would always know that was going to be the outcome. It’s not likely it would come as a surprise to Him.

Indeed. Def. not a surprise.

But you are now suggesting that God would have tried everything He could do to save him. In other words, God would have tried to change what He already knew was going to happen.

How does that work?

It’s not exactly that God “tries” to do something. It’s more like God offers abundant graces, but it’s up to us to accept them.

 

[Bradski]

Which leaves us in the same position when evaluating the atheist explanation for evil.

Sometimes it’s quite liberating to say: I have no idea. Which, as you said we’re in the same boat, I assume is your position on why God creates people who are hell bound.

But evil is such a slippery word. It conjures up biblical metaphors and religious rules and regs. If you simply mean ‘doing bad things’, then there is always an answer. Unless you want us to dance the Infinite Regress Tango. I can hear the band starting up right now.

And a one and a two…

 

[tdgesq]

Actually that may be the most important criterion for definitions since definitions are meant to reflect common uses. Language is conventional. Consider how, over the years, words like “incredible” and “literally” have been abused to the extent that even dictionaries mention the new meanings, which are roughly the opposite of the old ones.

No, your personal experience of how people use certain words is not how we arrive at definitions. This is exactly what you accused Amandil of doing earlier. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, you’ve changed your mind.

I think that connotations matter. If you use a word that is technically correct but is suggestive of something entirely different, you’re using language irresponsibly. It is irresponsible to liken “faith” in its common use to “trust” in its common use.

No one here is suggesting it has any such connotation, except you. No one is defining the term as “blind faith,” except you. Instead, we are insisting that you use the standard definition, which is exactly what you required earlier. Now you’ve changed your mind. So rather than the primary dictionary definition, the philosophical definition from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the definition of the Roman Catholic Church; we should instead rely upon your personal experience of how you’ve seen people use the word. And you chide us for using language irresponsibly.

 

[Bradski]

It’s not exactly that God “tries” to do something. It’s more like God offers abundant graces, but it’s up to us to accept them.

But God…

…knows everything. From the beginning of Time He knew what would happen. It’s all occurring in His Mind at the same Eternal Now.

So He offers us not just graces, but abundant graces, that He knows we will not accept. The concept of God wasting His time is a new one to me.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . In other words, God would have tried to change what He already knew was going to happen.

How does that work?

Consider:

Genesis 4:6-10
Then the Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast?
If you do what is right, will you not be accepted?
But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”
Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?”
“I don’t know,” he replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
The Lord said, “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.

God gave Cain a warning about where his hate was taking him.
Cain could have otherwise acted out of shear emotion, but once warned, it became a rational decision, to allow sin to grow.
God knows our choices, but He does try to help us.
He entered into time to help Cain before that choice was made. Cain refused.
It is like our conscience, which we try to sometimes ignore.
God does not just create us and sit back to watch the fireworks.

I’m not sure if this analogy works, (I am sure you will let me know.) but consider that you are writing a living book in which all the characters choose what they do.
You would have to make all sorts of changes to every chapter depending on what they do, in order to get it to end right.
Imagine you had all eternity to do this.
Naturally, all the characters would experience would be the final product.

 

[PRmerger]

Sometimes it’s quite liberating to say: I have no idea.

Indeed.

Which, as you said we’re in the same boat, I assume is your position on why God creates people who are hell bound.

Oh, no, no, no, no.

I was simply offering a rhetorical.

If we accept your position which is, “We Christians can’t know what God why God permits evil”, that is no better than the atheistic one which is, “We can’t know why there is evil in the world. We atheists, too, have no better answer.”

However, let me be perfectly clear: the Christian worldview has an answer. A very good answer.

It’s called free will.

But evil is such a slippery word. It conjures up biblical metaphors and religious rules and regs. If you simply mean ‘doing bad things’, then there is always an answer.

So what is the atheistic answer for why we do bad things?

 

[PRmerger]

So He offers us not just graces, but abundant graces, that He knows we will not accept. The concept of God wasting His time is a new one to me.

Again, there is no “He knows we* will not *accept”, emphasis on the will, future tense.

It’s all in the Eternal Now in his mind’s eye.

He offers. And it’s up to us to accept.

 

[Bradski]

If we accept your position which is, “We Christians can’t know what God why God permits evil”, that is no better than the atheistic one which is, “We can’t know why there is evil in the world. We atheists, too, have no better answer.”

But we weren’t talking about evil. We were talking about if God creates people who He know will end up in hell. And I think that, at very long last, we had agreement on that. Unless, if you check some of the previous posts, we end up with contradictory statements.

So what is the atheistic answer for why we do bad things?

I was going to be careful here and ask what you thought was ‘a bad thing’. But I don’t think that’s really necessary.

I stole something when I was a kid. It was a bad thing to do. I did it because I cared more about having it then I did about the the feelings of the person who was going to lose it.

Hello, is that the band I hear?

Again, there is no “He knows we* will not *accept”, emphasis on the will, future tense. It’s all in the Eternal Now in his mind’s eye. He offers. And it’s up to us to accept.

I don’t know how to write a sentence in the Eternal Now tense so you’ll have to accept the tenses that we clumsy, temporal mortals have to use.

But whatever tense you prefer, God knows/will know/did know/was knowing/knew etc etc (as you just yourself posted, using the present tense) everything. So He knows/will know/did know/was knowing/knew etc etc that some of us will not accept a single grace, let alone an abundance of them.

He knows (can we stick with the present?) that some of us are created for hell. Yes, we got there by free will choices, but that second statement doesn’t negate the first.

 

[Aloysium]

. . . He knows (can we stick with the present?) that some of us are created for hell. Yes, we got there by free will choices, but that second statement doesn’t negate the first.

No one is “created for hell”. Some of us are hell-bound (or hellhound as spell checks prefer) in spite of all God’s efforts to have this turn out otherwise, and God knows all this. Who do you think your conscience is?

 

[Oreoracle]

I still think the main disagreement in this thread is that we’re using different conceptions of what “free” means. For most atheists I know, and certainly myself, to say that a choice is free is a modal claim. It means the choice could have been made differently.

The Catholics here seem to be using a very unusual notion of freedom. The main purpose of their version of freedom seems to be to attach responsibility to actions rather than make modal claims about them. Thus they say we are responsible for our “free” choices even when they couldn’t have been made differently.

Bradski seems to be getting some concessions at last, but I doubt the Catholics here see the moral dilemma behind what these concessions suggest because of their version of “freedom”.

 

[Aloysium]

I still think the main disagreement in this thread is that we’re using different conceptions of what “free” means. For most atheists I know, and certainly myself, to say that a choice is free is a modal claim. It means the choice could have been made differently.

The Catholics here seem to be using a very unusual notion of freedom. The main purpose of their version of freedom seems to be to attach responsibility to actions rather than make modal claims about them. Thus they say we are responsible for our “free” choices even when they couldn’t have been made differently.

Bradski seems to be getting some concessions at last, but I doubt the Catholics here see the moral dilemma behind what these concessions suggest because of their version of “freedom”.

I have no idea what you are talking about, but I imagine it feels good that you think you have figured it out. It seems you have not converted, so I guess you haven’t. -sigh-

 

[Bradski]

No one is “created for hell”. Some of us are hell-bound (or hellhound as spell checks prefer) in spite of all God’s efforts to have this turn out otherwise, and God knows all this. Who do you think your conscience is?

But Aloysium, I think that it’s been established that God knows everything about us. And when I say us I mean everyone who has been born, is currently living and is yet to be born.

The phrase ‘knows everything about us’ will include whether we end up in hell or not. It is not the case that God ‘thinks we may end up in hell’ or ‘believes we might possibly end up in hell’. It will not come as a surprise to Him. he is not likely to say something along the lines of: ‘Well, I didn’t see* that *coming!’ In other words, there is no doubt in God’s mind.

So if He knows someone will end up in hell we can say two things about the situation:

Firstly, God created Him knowing that he would end up there.

Secondly, it is illogical to say that God could make an effort to change something that He already knows will take place (swap the tenses around as you see best fit).

In fact, I’m not even sure that it’s possible for a Christian to say something like ‘in spite of all God’s efforts’. That is saying that He tried to do something and failed.

 

[Oreoracle]

I have no idea what you are talking about, but I imagine it feels good that you think you have figured it out. It seems you have not converted, so I guess you haven’t. -sigh-

Intentional irony?

 

[Amandil]

I still think the main disagreement in this thread is that we’re using different conceptions of what “free” means. For most atheists I know, and certainly myself, to say that a choice is free is a modal claim. It means the choice could have been made differently.

The Catholics here seem to be using a very unusual notion of freedom. The main purpose of their version of freedom seems to be to attach responsibility to actions rather than make modal claims about them. Thus they say we are responsible for our “free” choices even when they couldn’t have been made differently.

Here’s a summary on Aquinas’ view on the human will:
"First off, let us treat the will. Generically, the will is an appetite, that is, a power of the soul by which we are inclined toward something. By means of appetitive powers, we seek and desire things; we strive to unite ourselves (in various ways) with them. They are consequent upon knowledge. “Some inclination follows every form.”( ST, Ia, 80, 1 ) Because knowledge the attainment of a new form in a non-material way, an inclination of the appetite follows upon this knowledge. So, since there are two kinds of knowledge, sense and intellectual, there are consequently two kinds of appetites.

From sense knowledge, ie. the apprehension of the forms of things in their particularity, sensual appetition follows. In a like manner, from intellectual knowledge, the apprehension of universal forms, intellectual appetition follows. In humans, the intellect is discursive, going from premises to conclusions logically, and so is called rational. Likewise the consequent appetite is rational; it is called the will. The will then is that power by which we desire the universal, not bound in itself to any manifestation of that universal in particular, real, material things.

The object of both appetites is proportionate to the kind of knowledge appropriate to that appetite. Now all appetites tend toward goodness in some manner, and the manner of tending is determined by the kind of form it has, that is the kind of knowledge. So, sense appetite tends toward sensible, particular goods, and the will toward universal goodness."

Here’s a more precise definition of freedom:
"Freedom does not apply to the necessities of nature or the general end, for these are not the objects of the will (except perhaps the latter in the next life) but the principles of willing. Freedom does apply to the exercise or non-exercise of the will and to the acts of the will with regard to particular ends as means to the general end. Citing Aristotle in chapter 48 of the second book of the Summa Contra Gentiles, St. Thomas says that the will is the principle of the self motion in humans. That is, humans are free to exercise their will and to choose particular things.(DV 24.1.)

The will of necessity wills universal goodness as it end and elicits its act by means of reason. It cannot do otherwise while still being a rational appetite. Since this tendency is according to the will, it is voluntary. Any choice of the will for universal goodness, because it is in accord with the principles of volition, is voluntary. Aquinas does not consider this general tendency toward the good as free since it is determined necessarily.(ST Ia, 83, 1 ad 5.)

The will however is an intellectual power, its activity presupposes knowledge. In considering the voluntary movement toward universal goodness as being necessary and not free, Aquinas is considering a very special case: knowledge of universal goodness. For Aquinas, the Good itself is God, and knowledge of the Good is attainable only in the beatific vision after death. In this situation, we will will voluntarily the Good, but not do it freely.

This point on knowledge is the fundamental foundation for the wills freedom. In the present life, no one object can be considered by our reason as totally good and so does not move the will necessarily to will it in particular. The will must necessarily be moved by the good or apprehended good thing, no one thing so exhausts goodness that the will is moved to it necessarily.( ST Ia, 105, 4) Many things possess goodness to varying degrees and with various aspects, such that several particular goods may be contrary or, in their various aspects, even contradictory. Therefore no one thing is sufficient to move the will necessarily. Not even the consideration of the goodness of things is completely good, so that people are free to judge or not judge particular objects. Hence, the will is free both in its exercise and in its specification, ie. choosing one good over the other.

On the other side, in the way the will acts, freedom is also preserved, since every act of the will is particular. The specific act of the will cannot encompass the entirety of universal goodness be cause of its specificity. So even choosing to act over not acting does not fulfill the will’s necessity toward goodness.( ST Ia-IIae, 13, 6) Also, because no particular means is necessary for the attainment of goodness or happiness, there is freedom. The will might not choose any particular means to its end because it is not bound by the necessity of utility.(DV 24.2.) The will is free to specify its acts after it chooses to act at all."

Aquinas and the Freedom of the Will

So in short, the will is the appetite which is directed towards Goodness, both the universal and the particular.

And no particular thing(or things) is sufficient to move the will by necessity. Therefore when the will chooses a particular thing based upon its goodness(or in the case of sin its perceived goodness), it chooses freely.

 

[Gary_Sheldrake]

But Aloysium, I think that it’s been established that God knows everything about us. And when I say us I mean everyone who has been born, is currently living and is yet to be born.

The phrase ‘knows everything about us’ will include whether we end up in hell or not. It is not the case that God ‘thinks we may end up in hell’ or ‘believes we might possibly end up in hell’. It will not come as a surprise to Him. he is not likely to say something along the lines of: ‘Well, I didn’t see* that *coming!’ In other words, there is no doubt in God’s mind.

So if He knows someone will end up in hell we can say two things about the situation:

Firstly, God created Him knowing that he would end up there.

Secondly, it is illogical to say that God could make an effort to change something that He already knows will take place (swap the tenses around as you see best fit).

In fact, I’m not even sure that it’s possible for a Christian to say something like ‘in spite of all God’s efforts’. That is saying that He tried to do something and failed.

Good Evening Bradski: You are correct in that we have established that the God who is a mental artifact of Abrahamic lore knows everything, however, I don’t think that we have in fact established that God in fact knows everything, or has the same value systems that we have ascribed to Him, which are simply projections of our own thinking on matters such as sin, good and evil. My opinion on this matter is that the problem we are having in his discussion is the idea of God that is trafficked in popular thought, which is not a tenable image when we start to delve into the matter.

The same problem applied to heaven and hell as being places we are sent to or end up in. Because in truth, they are sates of being, not places. They are levels of attainment, not rewards or punishments that are conferred on us because of our goodness and our badness. This too is an untenable position, because goodness and badness are not absolutes, and occur in degrees. They are relative, like most everything. No evil person is evil every minute of their lives, and no saint is good every minute of theirs. The level of inner goodness, kindness and peace we attain within us is the level of heaven we achieve. the level of badness, anger and malcontent we develop within ourselves is the level of hell we attain. Accordingly ,Christ said that the Kingdom is heaven is inside of us. And our expectations about rewards in a place called heaven or our sufferings in a place called hell are a simple matter of obfuscation born of wishing for something more than the simple truths spoken by a man with a profound grasp of simple truths.

Thank you,
Gary

 

[Richca]

Only from a human point of view.

God knows everything about people who exist - regardless of time.

Entertaining but unenlightened - as a result of obstinate obsession with the time factor. An anthropic view of the Creator is bound to be myopic!

The issue is why God creates us if He knows we are going to make evil decisions. The answer is that the choices of uncreated persons are unknowable. Once we are created He knows exactly what we shall choose but He cannot be blamed for our decisions. The time factor is totally irrelevant.

We are all in the same boat regardless of when or where we are born. Like truth, goodness, justice, beauty and love, freedom is independent of temporal or spatial considerations. Either we’re capable of self-control or not. We can’t have it both ways…

Tony, your statement in bold is not accurate. God knows all our choices before He created us just as He knew what He was going to create before He actually created it. In God’s intellect and knowledge, we have existed from all eternity but, of course, we have not existed from all eternity in our own being. God’s knowledge is eternal like His being, it does not change. Created things. on the other hand, are not eternal.

 

[Bradski]

And our expectations about rewards in a place called heaven or our sufferings in a place called hell are a simple matter of obfuscation born of wishing for something more than the simple truths spoken by a man with a profound grasp of simple truths.

Christianity seems like it should be blazingly simple. Here’s a man who said some things to which we should all listen. The rest? Go figure…

 

[PRmerger]

Christianity seems like it should be blazingly simple. Here’s a man who said some things to which we should all listen. The rest? Go figure…

It is indeed blazingly simple. Simple enough for the most uneducated peasant to get it, and allow it to transform her into a wondrously holy woman…

And it is sublimely and profoundly deep. Deep enough for all of us to be able to pontificate and explicate and dissect, and never even scratch the surface.

Amazing, no?

Christianity is like a river: shallow enough for the lamb to go wading, but deep enough for the elephant to swim.

 

[rinnie]

But God knew before he created them that they would sin. He deliberately created something that he knew would sin. To argue that God isn’t responsible for sin would require you to pass the buck onto people that were already pre-determined to behave that way.

This is where Amandil and I disagree: Amandil uses a perverted definition of “freedom” that allows for such arguments to be made. But as Amandil noted in another post (quite ironically), you can argue anything if you insist that white is black. Likewise, you can avoid the problems associated with free will if you use a nebulous definition of “freedom” as Amandil does.

The bottom line is that if you’re okay with calling pre-determined choices “free” then we simply can’t agree. As I’ve said multiple times now, to say that a choice is free is a modal claim; it means the choice could have been made differently. But if God knew what would be chosen, then it can’t have happened differently without contradicting God’s knowledge. If God knows what brand of cereal I’ll eat tomorrow, you can’t argue that my choice of cereal is free.

You problem is you don’t understand that there is no time with God. God knew years ago that I would be speaking to you at this moment. I didn’t, and God knows what I am going to say, although at this time I am trying to put my thoughts into words.

I could say something kind right now, or something mean. That has nothing to do with God. But he knows what I will do because he knows everything.

My choice is…:flowers: There you go.

I feel maybe someone giving you flowers might brighten up your day today, and I want you to have a wonderful bright happy day. So for today have a great day full of lots of Love and sunshine. And for today enjoy the flowers.

 

[PRmerger]

It is indeed blazingly simple. Simple enough for the most uneducated peasant to get it, and allow it to transform her into a wondrously holy woman…

And it is sublimely and profoundly deep. Deep enough for all of us to be able to pontificate and explicate and dissect, and never even scratch the surface.

Amazing, no?

Christianity is like a river: shallow enough for the lamb to go wading, but deep enough for the elephant to swim.

Also brings to mind a quote from St. Gregory the Great:

“It has out in the open food for children but keeps hidden away the things that fill the minds of the eminent with awe.”