Why doesn't God just not create the bad people to keep them from going to hell

[Amandil]

It’s not hard to understand when we realise that those who go to hell punish themselves by putting themselves before everyone else. Moral laws are not luxuries but essential conditions of our spiritual well-being. Egoism inevitably leads to isolation.

And ironically the loss of our own individuality.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

“Immediate implication”.
Another non-sequitur.
Again you don’t understand what it means for human beings to not have free will. Free will is essential to human nature, not merely a product of it.

By creating something without free will, even if it possessed a humanoid form, it would not, by definition be human but something else.

You’re avoiding thinking about the consequences of the claims you make. According to your rules, God would have to create every logically possible human lest he “destroy the free will of that human.” He would also have to create everything else that was logically possible and had free will.

You can appeal to wishful thinking all you like. The fact is obvious that it is not merely a “belief” that fee will “always and inevitably” puts some people in hell, Jesus confirmed it as a fact.

This necessarily rules out the possibility that everyone will accept the Salvation when offered.

So obviously, since God is infinitely more wise than either if us, then it is rather self-evident that such a world as you wish could be(simply because you imagine it) in reality can not.

If it is possible then He surely would have done it. Since He did not, then it cannot be possible.

So again we’re back to my original comment regarding your resentment of being a human with free will. To you sin is apparently unconquerable so you’d rather not be made at all.

God says that we can all master sin through His grace, that it is not unconquerable, but that He in fact conquered it.

So who do you trust in? God? Or your own power and ability?

Suppose God made exactly one person with free will. According to you, that person would have to go to hell because free will always and inevitably sends at least some people to hell.

I am curious how anyone can know of God’s existence and nature if not through their own powers and abilities. I suppose such a person would have to be living an unexamined life.

 

[Amandil]

You’re avoiding thinking about the consequences of the claims you make. According to your rules, God would have to create every logically possible human lest he “destroy the free will of that human.” He would also have to create everything else that was logically possible and had free will.

You clearly haven’t been paying attention, God is not bound by time, thus He is neither bound by cause and effect.

Every person He intends on creating in time, including all of their free-will choices- already exist in His mind as actuality.

So no, God does not “need” to create in time “every logically possible human” for what I said to be true.

JapaneseKappa:

Suppose God made exactly one person with free will. According to you, that person would have to go to hell because free will always and inevitably sends at least some people to hell.

Even if I granted this strawman, (which I don’t) it’s not free will that might send him to hell but his abuse of it through sin. All men share solidarity in the original sin (emancipation from God, egocentrism, self will).

In any case, you’re utterly avoiding the fact that God offers salvation, even to those who refuse it, again, by the abuse of their free will.

JapaneseKappa:

I am curious how anyone can know of God’s existence and nature if not through their own powers and abilities.

You apparently have not heard of divine grace or the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

And Simon said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

And Jesus said, “Blessed are you, Simon bar Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my Father who is in heaven…”

JapaneseKappa:

I suppose such a person would have to be living an unexamined life.

Given the incoherent nature of your hypothetical anecdotes up to this point, I’ll take that as a compliment.

 

[Oreoracle]

You clearly haven’t been paying attention, God is not bound by time, thus He is neither bound by cause and effect.

The problem with this objection is that, for all we know, the universe may not be bound by time. Things within the universe certainly are, but I’m not sure what “time” would even mean when applied to the universe itself. If time is indeed inapplicable to the universe, then the notion of cause and effect is also inapplicable to the universe, thus the universe doesn’t need a cause in the way that things within the universe do.

 

[Amandil]

The problem with this objection is that, for all we know, the universe may not be bound by time. Things within the universe certainly are, but I’m not sure what “time” would even mean when applied to the universe itself. If time is indeed inapplicable to the universe, then the notion of cause and effect is also inapplicable to the universe, thus the universe doesn’t need a cause in the way that things within the universe do.

So are you saying that the universe is distinct from the things within it?

What is the universe? You say that the universe doesn’t need a cause, how do you know?

If the universe is in some way changing, then that change can be recorded as time.

If you’re going to say that the universe doesn’t change(and I don’t mean change as in that it moves around but that the universe moves from potentiality to actuality) then how do you know?

 

[oldcelt]

You clearly haven’t been paying attention, God is not bound by time, thus He is neither bound by cause and effect.

Every person He intends on creating in time, including all of their free-will choices- already exist in His mind as actuality.

So no, God does not “need” to create in time “every logically possible human” for what I said to be true.

Even if I granted this strawman, (which I don’t) it’s not free will that might send him to hell but his abuse of it through sin. All men share solidarity in the original sin (emancipation from God, egocentrism, self will).

In any case, you’re utterly avoiding the fact that God offers salvation, even to those who refuse it, again, by the abuse of their free will.

You apparently have not heard of divine grace or the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

And Simon said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

And Jesus said, “Blessed are you, Simon bar Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my Father who is in heaven…”

Given the incoherent nature of your hypothetical anecdotes up to this point, I’ll take that as a compliment.

There are no facts in the unobservable…only beliefs or faith.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Every person He *intends *on creating in time, including all of their free-will choices- already exist in His mind as actuality.
So no, God does not “need” to create in time “every logically possible human” for what I said to be true.

So you are saying: “God must create everyone he *intends *to create.” So why can’t he just intend to not create anyone who will end up in hell in the first place?

Even if I granted this strawman, (which I don’t) it’s not free will that might send him to hell but his abuse of it through sin. All men share solidarity in the original sin (emancipation from God, egocentrism, self will).

It’s not a strawman. If your statement is not true in some particular case, then it is not true in general. I supplied a particular case. If there were exactly one free-will-having person, he would not be subject to any original sin, only his own sins.

You clearly haven’t been paying attention, God is not bound by time, thus He is neither bound by cause and effect…

In any case, you’re utterly avoiding the fact that God offers salvation, even to those who refuse it, again, by the abuse of their free will.

Look, lets call a spade a spade. This is a dodge; it only works when the person you’re using it on is also looking for a way out of this sort of question.

It fails because God knows things infallibly. If God created us knowing we would go to hell, you can not argue that we had the opportunity to go to heaven. That would be tantamount to arguing that we had the opportunity to prove God wrong.

Lets also talk about the weirdness that timelessness brings to this picture. According to you, my whole life (including free will decisions) already exists in the mind of God. Therefore, I have already made all my decisions; in fact, I must already be in either heaven or hell. At what point did I actually make my free-will decisions? Did I make them all in the same instant God created everything? But, if God’s creation is a timeless event and cause-and-effect don’t apply in timeless events, then we could not say that my free will decisions caused any effects. So we can not say that my free-will-decisions caused me to be in heaven or hell. What then would be the cause of my attainment of heaven or hell? The simple fact that when God created me, he created me already in one or the other.

You apparently have not heard of divine grace or the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Who does the believing, you or the Holy Spirit?

 

[Amandil]

There are no facts in the unobservable. …only beliefs or faith.

Then that belief invalidates itself; it cannot be a fact, only a belief.

Besides we don’t need to observe that 13 X 13= 169 to know that it is true.

Nor do we need to “observe” the idea that “the whole is greater than its parts” to know that it is true.

There are many unobservable things which are considered fact. So your comment simply doesn’t follow.

 

[tonyrey]

There are no facts in the unobservable…only beliefs or faith.

Is your mind observable?

 

[Aloysium]

God creates us with our particular gifts and blessings. We decide what to do with them. We participate in our own creation through our decisions for or against love.

God creates us from eternity. There is no knowing what we will do until we are created and do it. Once the totality of our lives exists in eternity, because we exist, it cannot be taken away. It exists in God’s “mind” and hence, in reality.

We are not robots created to behave in a specific way - that would make us incapable of loving.

I’m in awe of our existence.

 

[bojosh]

God wants us to WANT to be with him so he gives us choices whether we choose good to be with Him or bad, not wanting to be with Him. It’s meaningless if he made us to be robots to obey and worship him. He wants us to want to obey and worship him. He does so because he deserves to be obeyed and worshipped and loved through his beautiful works and giving us another chance to be with Him through Jesus, His Son He sent.

 

[Amandil]

So you are saying: “God must create everyone he *intends *to create.” So why can’t he just intend to not create anyone who will end up in hell in the first place?

Because, as the author of the OP explicitly mentioned, then there are others who He may intend to create cannot be created because their parents choose hell over God.

God’s creation included the human free-will to cooperate in that creation.

It’s not a strawman. If your statement is not true in some particular case, then it is not true in general. I supplied a particular case. If there were exactly one free-will-having person, he would not be subject to any original sin, only his own sins.

One, it is a strawman because you misrepresented what I said.

Secondly, now you’re committing the fallacy of division.

If original sin is not an actuality, then please explain how absolutely no one has ever not fallen susceptible to the “forbidden fruit”? Why doesn’t anyone ever choose innocence? If out of ten billion people, ten billion choose A and no one chooses B, we can hardly believe that we have unfettered freedom to choose between A and B.

Every culture, tribe, and nation throughout history have a similar story. One of the most widespread sacred stories in the world is the one of a paradise lost, a time without evil, suffering, or death. The mere fact that everyone innately believes the same thing does not prove that it is true on its own of course; but it is at least significant evidence.

And if we assume what Chesterton calls “the democracy of the dead” and extend the vote to everyone, not just to “the small and arrogant oligarchy of the living,” the few lucky ones who happen to be walking about in the strangest, most secularized society in history,** it puts the onus of proof on the small modern minority who scorn the universal myth.**

The second piece of experiential evidence for original sin are the four most salient facts about human existence:

1. All desire perfect happiness.
2. No one is perfectly happy.
   3)All desire complete certainty and perfect wisdom.
   4)No one is completely certain or perfectly wise.

The two things we all want are the two things no one has. We all behave as if we remember Eden and can’t recapture it, like kings and queens dressed in rags wandering the world in search of their thrones. If we had never reigned, why do we seek a throne? If we had always been beggars, why would we be discontent?

The fact that we gloriously and irrationally disobey the first and greatest commandment of our modern prophets(the pop-psychologists)-that we do not accept ourselves as we are-strongly points to the conclusion that we must at least unconsciously desire, and somehow remember, a better state.

Look, lets call a spade a spade. This is a dodge; it only works when the person you’re using it on is also looking for a way out of this sort of question.

It fails because God knows things infallibly. If God created us knowing we would go to hell, you can not argue that we had the opportunity to go to heaven. That would be tantamount to arguing that we had the opportunity to prove God wrong.

I absolutely can. The only reason why you can’t see it is because you can only see it as a dilemma(either-or). Your view is a false dichotomy.

Lets also talk about the weirdness that timelessness brings to this picture. According to you, my whole life (including free will decisions) already exists in the mind of God. Therefore, I have already made all my decisions; in fact, I must already be in either heaven or hell. At what point did I actually make my free-will decisions?

In time.

Did I make them all in the same instant God created everything?

In God’s eternity He saw you make them.

But, if God’s creation is a timeless event and cause-and-effect don’t apply in timeless events, then we could not say that my free will decisions caused any effects.

And there’s part of your confusion. I never said that “God’s creation is a timeless event.”

I said that God’s act of creation is in eternity, the event of human creation takes place in time.

So we can not say that my free-will-decisions caused me to be in heaven or hell. What then would be the cause of my attainment of heaven or hell? The simple fact that when God created me, he created me already in one or the other.

Yes, we can. The cause of your attainment of heaven or hell is your decision to either cooperate with God’s grace or to ignore it and have it your way.

 

[oldcelt]

Then that belief invalidates itself; it cannot be a fact, only a belief.

Besides we don’t need to observe that 13 X 13= 169 to know that it is true.

Nor do we need to “observe” the idea that “the whole is greater than its parts” to know that it is true.

There are many unobservable things which are considered fact. So your comment simply doesn’t follow.

Both that you cite are easily observable. I truly cannot understand how you could even think that, much less write it down,

 

[oldcelt]

Because, as the author of the OP explicitly mentioned, then there are others who He may intend to create cannot be created because their parents choose hell over God.

God’s creation included the human free-will to cooperate in that creation.
One, it is a strawman because you misrepresented what I said.

Secondly, now you’re committing the fallacy of division.

If original sin is not an actuality, then please explain how absolutely no one has ever not fallen susceptible to the “forbidden fruit”? Why doesn’t anyone ever choose innocence? If out of ten billion people, ten billion choose A and no one chooses B, we can hardly believe that we have unfettered freedom to choose between A and B.

Every culture, tribe, and nation throughout history have a similar story. One of the most widespread sacred stories in the world is the one of a paradise lost, a time without evil, suffering, or death. The mere fact that everyone innately believes the same thing does not prove that it is true on its own of course; but it is at least significant evidence.

And if we assume what Chesterton calls “the democracy of the dead” and extend the vote to everyone, not just to “the small and arrogant oligarchy of the living,” the few lucky ones who happen to be walking about in the strangest, most secularized society in history,** it puts the onus of proof on the small modern minority who scorn the universal myth.**

The second piece of experiential evidence for original sin are the four most salient facts about human existence:

1. All desire perfect happiness.
2. No one is perfectly happy.
   3)All desire complete certainty and perfect wisdom.
   4)No one is completely certain or perfectly wise.

The two things we all want are the two things no one has. We all behave as if we remember Eden and can’t recapture it, like kings and queens dressed in rags wandering the world in search of their thrones. If we had never reigned, why do we seek a throne? If we had always been beggars, why would we be discontent?

The fact that we gloriously and irrationally disobey the first and greatest commandment of our modern prophets(the pop-psychologists)-that we do not accept ourselves as we are-strongly points to the conclusion that we must at least unconsciously desire, and somehow remember, a better state.

I absolutely can. The only reason why you can’t see it is because you can only see it as a dilemma(either-or). Your view is a false dichotomy.

In time.

In God’s eternity He saw you make them.

And there’s part of your confusion. I never said that “God’s creation is a timeless event.”

I said that God’s act of creation is in eternity, the event of human creation takes place in time.

Yes, we can. The cause of your attainment of heaven or hell is your decision to either cooperate with God’s grace or to ignore it and have it your way.

Still trying to find a way around omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence (which invalidates the notion of out of time).

 

[Amandil]

Both that you cite are easily observable. I truly cannot understand how you could even think that, much less write it down,

Not all empiricists are subjectivists or relativists, but they should be; for if what is empirical is determined by subjective experience (or observation), then truth is subjective and relative(an orange tastes sweet to you, but bitter to me).

You said:

oldcelt:

There are no facts in the unobservable. …only beliefs or faith.

I gave two examples of things that need not be observed in order to be true. I could easily have multiplied examples of things which are in fact known to be true without direct observation.

Regardless of even that, if you are claiming that it is a “fact” that “(t)here are no facts in the unobservable,” that “fact” which you posit is itself not observable, it is only your belief.

Thus, as I already said, it invalidates itself as a “fact”. Facts are not reducible to only that which is observed or sensed.

It’s hardly if at all any different than Empiricism as a theory of truth.

Its a statement that is designed a priori rather than from what is “observed” or sensed or from experience. It’s based upon ideology, not from the evidence.

 

[oldcelt]

That’s not what you said. You said:

I gave two examples of things that need not be observed in order to be true. I could easily have multiplied examples of things which are in fact known to be true without direct observation.

Regardless of even that, if you are claiming that it is a “fact” that “(t)here are no facts in the unobservable,” that “fact” which you posit is itself not observable, it is only your belief.

Thus, as I already said, it invalidates itself as a “fact”.

It’s no different than the Empirical Theory of truth, i.e. “truth is only that which can be sensed.”

Its a statement that is designed a priori rather than from what is “observed” or sensed or from experience. It’s based upon ideology, not from the evidence.

But you do have to observe them, test them, and then recognize that they are fact. For the rest, show me a fact in the unobservable.

 

[Amandil]

But you do have to observe them, test them, and then recognize that they are fact. For the rest, show me a fact in the unobservable.

Why, to satisfy your ideological bent and grant your fallacy of raising the bar on the definition of the word “fact”?

No thank you.

 

[Amandil]

For the rest, show me a fact in the unobservable.

Is your “Deistic” god a fact or a belief?

 

[oldcelt]

Is your “Deistic” god a fact or a belief?

A belief…just like every other deity. Unobservable and therefore existing only through faith.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Because, as the author of the OP explicitly mentioned, then there are others who He may intend to create cannot be created because their parents choose hell over God.

God’s creation included the human free-will to cooperate in that creation.

If all God needed was a placeholder to pass along genetic information, he could have created a husk of a person without an eternal soul. No one would be the wiser, the person’s soul wouldn’t be damned, and all later people could still exist. In fact, it seems possible that this could be what God actually does. Perhaps no one goes to hell, we only think people do because we observe these “husks” doing damnable things.

Human free will did not cooperate in the creation of Adam and Eve, so it is certainly possible for God to create people without the cooperation of other people.

Also, remember that we are talking about God, the subject of the scripture which reads “nothing is impossible with God.”

One, it is a strawman because you misrepresented what I said.

Secondly, now you’re committing the fallacy of division.

If original sin is not an actuality, then please explain how absolutely no one has ever not fallen susceptible to the “forbidden fruit”? Why doesn’t anyone ever choose innocence? If out of ten billion people, ten billion choose A and no one chooses B, we can hardly believe that we have unfettered freedom to choose between A and B.

Were Adam and Eve subject to original sin prior to committing original sin? I contend that they were not. Therefore, if there only existed one single person with free will, he could not be subject to the sins of any other free will having person. In order for that one single person to be subject to the sins of another, there would have to be a second person to commit a sin. However, there is exactly one person.

According to Catholics, Mary was sinless. All it took was for God to create her without original sin; so it certainly seems like it would be possible for God to create someone like Mary who would have free will and not go to hell. We would therefore have to conclude that free will does not necessarily result in some people going to hell.

I absolutely can. The only reason why you can’t see it is because you can only see it as a dilemma(either-or). Your view is a false dichotomy.

And there’s part of your confusion. I never said that “God’s creation is a timeless event.”

I said that God’s act of creation is in eternity, the event of human creation takes place in time.

Yes, we can. The cause of your attainment of heaven or hell is your decision to either cooperate with God’s grace or to ignore it and have it your way.

Now this is quite a jumbled theology you’ve proposed. God is:

God is not bound by time, thus He is neither bound by cause and effect.

and his creation:

Every person He intends on creating in time, including all of their free-will choices- already exist in His mind as actuality.

However, I actually make my decisions

In time.

But God knows what decisions I make because:

In God’s eternity He saw you make them.

But on top of that, God’s act of creation is not timeless

the event of human creation takes place in time.

Now, you first claimed that everyone God intends to create already actually exist. That is to say, from God’s timeless/eternal perspective, everything is already settled; he can see each and every decision because all the decisions exist simultaneously and he can see everything that exists.

Now, lets ask the question: was there a state where God was part way through creation?

If God’s creation was in time, then there certainly would be such a state. God could have created history right up until the present time, but not the rest, for example. However this contradicts what was said earlier about all of creation existing simultaneously. If God had only created history up until now, it would not be true that all our free will decisions already exist. Perhaps you will object that “exist in God’s mind” is different from “actually exist.” God is like a playwright, you might say, with an infallible script, and he creates us players in time according to the script. Just because a character hasn’t had their turn on the stage yet doesn’t mean they don’t exist in the script. However, this just kicks the can down the road one step. All we have to do is update the question to be: was there a state where God was part way through writing the script? If the script writing was timeless, when and how did we exercise our free will?

If God’s creation was not in time, then my original objection holds: we cannot identify when or how we would have made our free will decisions. We perceive time as integral to our decision making process, but an instantaneous creation event means that we were somehow able to make all the decisions in our life in a single instant, the same instant God created us.