How can God be infinitely simple and perfect if He is a person?

[Pope_Noah_I]

I should elaborate. How can God be infinitely simple and perfect if his actions and attitude and ways change? For example, God said He was going to destroy Ninevah. He was mad at the people of Ninevah. He should have destroyed Ninevah, according to His justice, but didn’t according to His love. This amounts to a divide within God, doesn’t it? God’s justice and God’s love are two seperate aspects of His person, more than once coming into conflict with eachother. If he is infinitely perfect, and simple, then why not just do the perfect thing in the first place, without having to change His mind?

 

[Nickkname]

I should elaborate. How can God be infinitely simple and perfect if his actions and attitude and ways change? For example, God said He was going to destroy Ninevah. He was mad at the people of Ninevah. He should have destroyed Ninevah, according to His justice, but didn’t according to His love. This amounts to a divide within God, doesn’t it? God’s justice and God’s love are two seperate aspects of His person, more than once coming into conflict with eachother. If he is infinitely perfect, and simple, then why not just do the perfect thing in the first place, without having to change His mind?

Because WE are imperfect. You gotta remember, for every problem which man raises against God - why is there evil and suffering? why dosen’t God just do this or that? why do people go to hell? - it is actually man who is at fault, not God. All the problems which we raise against God only reflect back at us our own imperfections, because by making these problems against God, we presume we are perfect, when the reality is, we are far from it. Only God is perfect. A lot of people hate this answer, though, because they believe God must be at fault somehow, or, they believe that God being perfect is just a cop-out; what they fail to realize is that God is a god, and if they studied philosophy and got to know God by His attributes, they’d know better than raise questions against God, they’d learn to trust in God.

 

[Pope_Noah_I]

Thanks, but, I’m not trying to blame anything on God. I’m just asking how an infinitely perfect and simple being change it’s mind.

 

[Sarpedon]

God can’t change His mind. This is part of the classical theological notion of Divine Immutability (check out “The attributes of God” at newadvent.org). In scripture, when God “changes His mind”, I would guess it is simply a literary metaphor, because immutability, perfection, and timelessness are such difficult things to grasp, expecially for those without much education.

 

[Sarpedon]

newadvent.org/cathen/06612a.htm#IID

 

[Pro_Domina]

You are starting your thought all wrong. Precisely because of the error itself.

You are starting the thought from you. You, a miserable human being. If you start from God, then the word person does not mean the vulnerable human person, which is an image of the Persons of the Holy Trinity.

Second, God is pure love, He is Love. So when He does an act of Justice, it is because of love of Himself, because He wants to do and can only do what gives Him more glory.
Mercy usually demonstrates God’s glory more than Justice, but not always. Tell me fire burning down the cursed Sodom is not awesome!

 

[JimG]

God does not change his mind. God does not change.

The stories in the bible are written by humans with a human perspective, but inspired by God to teach what he wanted to teach.

If he had wanted to teach about his unchanging nature, he might have inspired the writers to write in the manner of Aquinas. But that would have made no sense to the ancient Israelites, to whom a more basic message was being imparted.

 

[Michael_David]

Is there NO dialog with God? Between Him and us? Is it all “yes sir”, “no sir”?
If God wanted to forgive my sin, yet I do not confess it… is it forgiven? And if I do confess it, is this not dialog with Christ?
What is the ‘Ask…Seek…Knock’ all about? If not dialog with God?
Who says God is not fluid? And who says there is no ‘interaction’ between God and us?
And to know that God’s (personality) does not change, that it is Love, does not discount a change of Heart after some dialog with us. Didn’t Christ not only come for our salvation, but also to better relate to us Humans? And didn’t He converse with us (dialog) and from our point of understanding, lead us further?
And how does the Holy Spirt “Lead us to all understanding” if not by dialog? Among other ways, like experiences.
No, God does not change. But He can be ‘anything’ and ‘everything’ He wants to be… at any given time. And even listen to our reasoning to see how His action may affect us and our relationship with Him. Why not? He can!

 

[JimG]

Yes, he can. Because he is God. And you are right: that is why he became man!

 

[tm30]

I should elaborate. How can God be infinitely simple and perfect if his actions and attitude and ways change? For example, God said He was going to destroy Ninevah. He was mad at the people of Ninevah. He should have destroyed Ninevah, according to His justice, but didn’t according to His love. This amounts to a divide within God, doesn’t it? God’s justice and God’s love are two seperate aspects of His person, more than once coming into conflict with eachother. If he is infinitely perfect, and simple, then why not just do the perfect thing in the first place, without having to change His mind?

God’s mind did not change. He intended to do something according to His justice at that moment. But when the people of Nineveh repented, justice demanded mercy, instead. God did not change. The people of Nineveh changed. If the people of Nineveh repented, and God destroyed them anyway, THAT would be an example of “change” in God, because it would be an imperfect decision on His part - a violation of Himself.

The perfect thing in the first place, according to God’s immeasurable mercy, was to give the people of Nineveh an oppportunity to repent. That is God’s justice - to give each of us the free will to choose our own fate. And for those who choose wisely, it’s a greater act of mercy.