How could a moral God allow suffering?

[tonyrey]

It is a purposeful universe because it is a basis for life and rational existence. And purpose does not emerge by chance…

That is enough to undermine the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity which are based on the belief that we are all children of the same Father in heaven. Without interaction we are lost in the eternal darkness of eternity with no source of help, guidance or inspiration.

Look at all the other basic ideas and you have very little variance.

Which ideas?

Deists just don’t believe, through observation and history, that God does not intervene with His creation. I can live with that…even find it comforting. You can’t…and find the idea disturbing. I think we are at a loggerhead.

It is impossible to observe divine activity unless you have supernatural insight.

I don’t find the idea disturbing at all because it is so absurd. We condemn parents who abandon their children and leave them to fend entirely for themselves yet you regard it as comforting and praiseworthy on the part of God!

 

[tonyrey]

So, the Abrahamic/Christian God hold sins against all of us that were committed 5,000 years ago by people we never knew. That’s a good start…you are down one before you take your first breath. Then you attribute suffering to that same sin.

405 Although it is proper to each individual, ** original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam’s descendants. **It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice, but human nature has not been totally corrupted: it is wounded in the natural powers proper to it, subject to ignorance, suffering and the dominion of death, and inclined to sin - an inclination to evil that is called concupiscence".

We are not isolated individuals but members of an international community who are deeply affected by our cultural and historical environment.

Though I agree that mankind causes a lot of its own suffering…natural aging and illness probably cause much more.

How can atrocities like the Holocaust possibly be considered less evil than natural processes?

Now, on to the devil. Your God created him, let him escape, etc., etc., so He shoulders a good deal of the responsibility for any satanic suffering in this world.

Even without the devil there is no limit to the evil of which men are capable. That is the price of free will because it is a form of supernatural power without which we would be incapable of unselfish love. Corruption optima pessima…

 

[Charlemagne_III]

We reject all revelation because the sources are generally unknown, often conflicting and cannot be tested.

The source of all revelation is God; God does not contradict himself; and it is God who must test you, not you who must test God.

This is the presumption of all those religions that de-personify God, including Buddhism. Their religions are man-made, and they make no claim of revelation so much as the claim of one’s best guess. Buddha just felt himself inspired to get up one morning and start a whole new religion. The Deist knows God had nothing to do with it. Even Buddha does not say God had anything to do with it.

Whereas revealed religion takes God at his word when it is given and his goodness is revealed through his prophets.

Here’s the rub. Either God exists as a conscious being who cares about his creation (and why wouldn’t he?) or God is an unconscious being who blindly creates for no apparent reason and abandons his work. Which is the more likely God?

Which is the more likely logic to follow based on our own experience, which is all we can base any of our conclusions on? Who is the better creator: the artisan who starts his work and then leaves it unfinished to fend for itself; or the artisan who does not abandon his work and carefully nurtures it until it is finished?

That is all we have to go on. Give God power but no intelligence or heart and you have a god unworthy of the name, not even a god you want to talk to or think much about except maybe to hate him because he is apparently just an unthinking machine who lets children die in a fire or a flood.
.

 

[tonyrey]

The source of all revelation is God; God does not contradict himself; and it is God who must test you, not you who must test God.

This is the presumption of all those religions that de-personify God, including Buddhism. Their religions are man-made, and they make no claim of revelation so much as the claim of one’s best guess. Buddha just felt himself inspired to get up one morning and start a whole new religion. The Deist knows God had nothing to do with it. Even Buddha does not say God had anything to do with it.

Whereas revealed religion takes God at his word when it is given and his goodness is revealed through his prophets.

Here’s the rub. Either God exists as a conscious being who cares about his creation (and why wouldn’t he?) or God is an unconscious being who blindly creates for no apparent reason and abandons his work. Which is the more likely God?

Which is the more likely logic to follow based on our own experience, which is all we can base any of our conclusions on? Who is the better creator: the artisan who starts his work and then leaves it unfinished to fend for itself; or the artisan who does not abandon his work and carefully nurtures it until it is finished?

That is all we have to go on. Give God power but no intelligence or heart and you have a god unworthy of the name, not even a god you want to talk to or think much about except maybe to hate him because he is apparently just an unthinking machine.

Or the Devil! A view reminiscent of Gloucester’s words in King Lear:

As flies to wanton boys are we to th’ gods. They kill us for their sport.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Or the Devil! A view reminiscent of Gloucester’s words in King Lear:

Yes, that becomes another problem. But since the Deist sees no personality in God, he would not see the devil there either. Just a great and powerful Zero, it seems.

Aquinas and Aristotle toy with this idea that God must have intelligence and will because, based on our observations in nature (which is all we have to go on) only self-moved beings have intelligence and will. Consequently, if the Deist admits that God is the supremely self-moved being (which he would have to be to get creation started), he must have supreme intelligence and supreme will. That makes of him a personal God. But it also makes of him a God who is supremely far above our ability to understand unless he reveals himself to us

 

[oldcelt]

The source of all revelation is God; God does not contradict himself; and it is God who must test you, not you who must test God.

This is the presumption of all those religions that de-personify God, including Buddhism. Their religions are man-made, and they make no claim of revelation so much as the claim of one’s best guess. Buddha just felt himself inspired to get up one morning and start a whole new religion. The Deist knows God had nothing to do with it. Even Buddha does not say God had anything to do with it.

Whereas revealed religion takes God at his word when it is given and his goodness is revealed through his prophets.

Here’s the rub. Either God exists as a conscious being who cares about his creation (and why wouldn’t he?) or God is an unconscious being who blindly creates for no apparent reason and abandons his work. Which is the more likely God?

Which is the more likely logic to follow based on our own experience, which is all we can base any of our conclusions on? Who is the better creator: the artisan who starts his work and then leaves it unfinished to fend for itself; or the artisan who does not abandon his work and carefully nurtures it until it is finished?

That is all we have to go on. Give God power but no intelligence or heart and you have a god unworthy of the name, not even a god you want to talk to or think much about except maybe to hate him because he is apparently just an unthinking machine who lets children die in a fire or a flood.
.

Revealed religions accept the revelations that they choose. The Deist God is intelligent beyond measure based on nothing but observation. May He seem a bit machine-like? I’ll concede that possibility…but He is not malevolent.

 

[oldcelt]

Yes, that becomes another problem. But since the Deist sees no personality in God, he would not see the devil there either. Just a great and powerful Zero, it seems.

Aquinas and Aristotle toy with this idea that God must have intelligence and will because, based on our observations in nature (which is all we have to go on) only self-moved beings have intelligence and will. Consequently, if the Deist admits that God is the supremely self-moved being (which he would have to be to get creation started), he must have supreme intelligence and supreme will. That makes of him a personal God. But it also makes of him a God who is supremely far above our ability to understand unless he reveals himself to us

I think you are getting close to the matter at hand. The only issue is the “personal” God. Why would intelligence and being a self-mover necessarily make Him personal…whatever that is.

 

[Tomdstone]

The source of all revelation is God; God does not contradict himself;.

According to the book of Psalms:
PSA 145:9 The LORD is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.
Would this be contradicted by the tenth plague?

 

[Doug_Kraeger]

You can hope that your beliefs are true, but the evidence isn’t there. And if your God is using children to make a point then He is evil and I have chosen not to accept that God can be that evil and heartless.
Deists have a much more positive view of the Creator, because He does not bring death and suffering like some classroom lesson. He does not want or expect our worship, which is the ultimate in narcissism. Whether or not He has prepared an afterlife is unknown and irrelevant because He has given us true free will to make this planet what we wish it to be. No plan…no predestination…true freedom.

Questions: Did your God create all time and space? Does your God know everything that has happened and will happen because It (your god) is outside of and was before time and space came into existence? If your god did not create time and space, where did they come from

If your God created man, who decided that loving and caring are good and we should love and care about ourselves and others? If your god is god, are there sinful acts a person can do and be held culpable for by your god?
Is your God capable of giving everyone (even those going to hell forever and ever and ever and ever… capable of giving everyone the love, peace, joy, thankfulness,and sorrow for sin that Jesus Christ had on the Cross as He suffered for all sinners?

 

[Tomdstone]

The source of all revelation is God; God does not contradict himself;
.

Matthew 5:3-12 : Blessed are the peacemakers, and ROM 15:33 Now the God of peace be with you all.
But: EXO 15:3 The LORD is a man of war
Isn’t this another contradiction?

 

[tonyrey]

Matthew 5:3-12 : Blessed are the peacemakers, and ROM 15:33 Now the God of peace be with you all.
But: EXO 15:3 The LORD is a man of war
Isn’t this another contradiction?

Not if it is seen in its context of the development and refinement of the Jewish concept of God. Even then, at least five hundred years before the birth of Christ, they anticipated the Redemption:

In your unfailing love you will lead
the people you have redeemed.
In your strength you will guide them
to your holy dwelling.

EXO 15:13

 

[tonyrey]

Questions: Did your God create all time and space? Does your God know everything that has happened and will happen because It (your god) is outside of and was before time and space came into existence? If your god did not create time and space, where did they come from

If your God created man, who decided that loving and caring are good and we should love and care about ourselves and others? If your god is god, are there sinful acts a person can do and be held culpable for by your god?
Is your God capable of giving everyone (even those going to hell forever and ever and ever and ever… capable of giving everyone the love, peace, joy, thankfulness,and sorrow for sin that Jesus Christ had on the Cross as He suffered for all sinners?

Deism is a descent from the sublime to the absurd…

 

[tonyrey]

According to the book of Psalms:
PSA 145:9 The LORD is good to all: and his tender mercies are over all his works.
Would this be contradicted by the tenth plague?

Not if it is seen in its context of the development and refinement of the Jewish concept of God. Even two thousand years later Calvin made the mistake of attributing **all **physical events to the Will of God.

…it is certain that not a drop of rain falls without the express command of God. /QUOTE]spurgeon.org/~phil/calvin/bk1ch16.html

 

[Charlemagne_III]

I think you are getting close to the matter at hand. The only issue is the “personal” God. Why would intelligence and being a self-mover necessarily make Him personal…whatever that is.

Inanimate beings do not move themselves. They only move when they are moved.

A person moves himself by his intellect and his will. If your God is not a person, how does he move himself to create a universe of moving beings?

Why would being impersonal (whatever that is) be an attribute of God?

Did God reveal that to you, or did you think it up?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Reviewing some of your posts I came across this.

Revealed religions accept the revelations that they choose. The Deist God is intelligent beyond measure based on nothing but observation. May He seem a bit machine-like? I’ll concede that possibility…but He is not malevolent.

But you have been saying right along that God is not a personal God. Yet you give him the attribute of intelligence. It seems you would also have to give him the attribute of will, since he created the universe.

What other attributes would you be willing to concede that move us in the direction of a personal God rather than a blind, unthinking Force?

 

[oldcelt]

Reviewing some of your posts I came across this.

But you have been saying right along that God is not a personal God. Yet you give him the attribute of intelligence. It seems you would also have to give him the attribute of will, since he created the universe.

What other attributes would you be willing to concede that move us in the direction of a personal God rather than a blind, unthinking Force?

I have never said that He was a blind…that has been the Christians here. But, to answer your question, and I’m not quite sure what you mean by a personal God, sounds protestant to me, My God is an intelligent force whose intentions I can’t even guess at. I take it as loving that He leaves us to learn at our pace. So there’s another attribute.

I don’t see Him as communicating with us

 

[Charlemagne_III]

I have never said that He was a blind…that has been the Christians here. But, to answer your question, and I’m not quite sure what you mean by a personal God, sounds protestant to me, My God is an intelligent force whose intentions I can’t even guess at. I take it as loving that He leaves us to learn at our pace. So there’s another attribute.

I don’t see Him as communicating with us

O.K. Now you’ve said that God is intelligent. You must also believe he has a will or he would not have willed the world into existence. And you just said he loves us. So what attribute of God makes him an impersonal God? That you don’t hear him communicating with you personally?

 

[Achilles6129]

Revealed religions accept the revelations that they choose. The Deist God is intelligent beyond measure based on nothing but observation. May He seem a bit machine-like? I’ll concede that possibility…but He is not malevolent.

I have never said that He was a blind…that has been the Christians here. But, to answer your question, and I’m not quite sure what you mean by a personal God, sounds protestant to me, My God is an intelligent force whose intentions I can’t even guess at. I take it as loving that He leaves us to learn at our pace. So there’s another attribute.

I don’t see Him as communicating with us

If your God is impersonal, then how is he good? Wouldn’t any good God be a personal God? Scripture makes it clear that God wants to rescue the human race from this present evil age (Gal. 1:4); the only reason why they aren’t rescued is disobedience to his commands.

 

[oldcelt]

If your God is impersonal, then how is he good? Wouldn’t any good God be a personal God? Scripture makes it clear that God wants to rescue the human race from this present evil age (Gal. 1:4); the only reason why they aren’t rescued is disobedience to his commands.

I have a different view of mankind, that being that I do not think that we need a savior. We have the capability to take care of ourselves. The question is, will we do it?
God, the Creator, provided the place where we and other species could evolve and thrive. He has chosen to stay out of our day to day affairs for reasons that only He knows. This notion of God is arrived at through observation of our history and our current state of affairs.
Galatians was written 2,00 years ago and is revelation, which Deists hold as unreliable and even dangerous.

 

[Tomdstone]

Inanimate beings do not move themselves. They only move when they are moved.

There was an earthquatke in Northern California. I don;t see where anyone caused the inanimate plates of the earth to move.