Is forgiveness without a price a virtue?

[Justin108]

Is it a good thing to be able to forgive without any price?

If so, is God imperfect for being unable to forgive sin without Jesus' sacrifice?

[Justin108]

The part of the cumulative argument that I feel narrows the discussion upon the Christian God is the historical argument for the Resurrection. The facts such a case are built upon are the resurrection appearances, the empty tomb and the origin of the Christian faith. Let's take it one at a time. Do you agree that Jesus' earliest disciples claimed to have seen a resurrected Jesus or should we look further into this one first?

I don't know. It is possible that all the Gospels were written by people other than the disciples themselves. Many hold this belief. But let's skip ahead and assume the four Gospels were indeed written by Jesus' disciples... so we have four testimonies of Jesus' resurrection. In post 162, you criticized belief in fairies and stated that...

It's fideism or, at best, relying solely on someone's testimony with no corraborating reasons to do that.

How is relying on the Gospel accounts of the resurrection anything more than relying solely on someone's testimony?

[Justin108]

3. The Effect of Sin

No!

determined by the exercise of our free will (for whatever reason(s))

We are trying to figure out what the "for whatever reasons" are!
1. Natural attraction
2. Chance

If literally everyone chose self-reliance over surrender, then this is either because self-reliance is more attractive, or it is by chance. If you can think of a third option, then name it. And if you dare say "free will" then I will end this discussion immediately because then it indicates that you are not listening to a damn thing I'm saying.

Or that we are talking past each other. Please define chance.

noun
1.
the absence of any cause of events that can be predicted, understood, or controlled: often personified or treated as a positive agency:
Chance governs all.
2.
luck or fortune:
a game of chance.
3.
a possibility or probability of anything happening:
a fifty-percent chance of success.
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/chance

In the context of this discussion, I am asking of this particular outcome (all people choosing self-reliance over surrender) is due either to
- attraction
- or chance (as defined by the number 1 definition above)
the absence of any cause of events that can be predicted, understood, or controlled

If nothing caused these people to all favor self-reliance over surrender, then they are absent of cause and therefore, the outcome was due to chance.

I am then extending this to the number 3 definition...
a possibility or probability of anything happening:
a fifty-percent chance of success.
...and arguing that the odds of everyone in the history of humanity just choosing self-reliance over surrender for no particular reason (such as attraction) is staggeringly low, just as the odds of everyone on earth choosing the exact same lottery numbers for no particular reason.

Is this clear enough?

[Justin108]

So by "creed' what you really mean is "interpretation"?

Well, not all interpretations are creeds but, yes, Christian creeds are Biblical interpretations. A creed is an interpretation agreed upon by a group to be authoritative for that group. How are you using creed?

I have never heard of anyone who agrees that Jesus has two natures and so, I am forced to conclude that this is not a "creed" but rather a personal interpretation of yours. I recognize "Jesus is the son of God" as a creed as virtually every Christian agrees on this. I do not recognize "Jesus has two natures" as a creed as I have never heard of this before you told me.

An omnipotent God would have no problem performing that action

Unless (and you have agreed with this in the past) the action was illogical.

If you insist this action is illogical, then demonstrate why and how it is illogical.

It is clearly illogical for a being to perform an ability it does not have.

To clarify, the ability God is expected to perform here is helping us surrender. In order for you to claim that it is logically impossible for God to do this, you must first demonstrate that God does in fact not have this ability (i.e to help us surrender). All you have done thus far is demonstrate that God cannot surrender himself, but that does not mean that he cannot help others surrender.

To summarize your argument (as I understand it)
- P1: God cannot do that which he does not have the ability to do
- P2: God does not have the ability to help us surrender
- C: God cannot help us surrender

Now I am asking you to please support P2. How do you know that God does not have the ability to help us surrender?

The claim that "God cannot surrender" falls apart when we actually take a look at the specifics of what "surrender" requires. Vaguely saying "God cannot surrender" is open to interpretation, but then you specified an example of "surrender" as us helping a homeless man. If you substitute "surrender" with "helping a homeless man" then there is no logical contradiction in God helping a homeless man.

So
- Surrender (in this instance) = helping a homeless man
- God can help a homeless man
- Ergo, God can help us surrender

There is no logical contradiction.

No, surrender in this instance is surrendering our will (not wanting to help the homeless man)

I am trying to figure out what you mean by "surrender", and now you're telling me that "to surrender is to surrender our will". This is the umpteenth time you've used tautology in your explanation of concepts. Telling me that "surrender means surrendering our will" is not telling me anything! That's like me asking "what does driving mean" and you answer "driving is when you drive on the road". Your definition is getting me nowhere closer to understanding what "surrender" is!

So please... without more tautology... give me a non-vague, precise example of surrender. Give me a non-vague example of Jesus helping us surrender, then explain to me why God would not be able to do the exact same thing.

[The Tanager]

1. Does the Christian God reject people for beliefs they don't have control over?

I have previously clarified that I cannot choose my belief and that this process is automatic to me. I have also clarified in post 125 that the only thing I have control over is
- method of investigation
- consideration
- contemplation

You disagreed with me on this and insisted that I can still choose what to believe. And now you're saying "to change that belief you will need new information or to look at old information in a new light". Which is exactly what I said in post 125

No, it's not the same. I agree you go through the investigation, consideration, contemplation and then choose your belief from among the alternatives you have investigated, considered and contemplated. You decide to follow what you think reason is telling you, or you decide to give in to emotions or you decide to go with A over B because of the pull towards A from various influences (reason, emotion, etc.) instead of the pull towards B from other influences (wishful thinking, authority, etc.). At a different time you may make the opposite choice.

...but choosing belief is not a choice. Not to me. If you insist that I have this ability, then you will have to tell me how because you have yet to do so.

You claim it is not a choice, thinking reason determines your belief after the consideration and all of that, which is why I said:

The real issue here (it seems to me) is that you are arguing that reason compels you to believe one thing in every situation (of belief formation) and I don't think that is the case.

To which you responded:

Why don't you think that is the case?

It does not matter. You have the burden to prove your view because you use that view [/i]as the basis of your argument that the Christian God is cruel or incoherent for rejecting people who have no control over their beliefs.[/i] That is the argument you made and I critiqued. You have the burden to support that argument. You haven't upheld it because you keep asking me to prove the opposite. That is not how rational defenses of an argument work. This section is closed unless you can come up with something new.

This is not new:

Choose to believe in fairies. If you cannot, you proved my point. It's that simple.

No, it's not that simple. For this to be true you'd have to prove that all kinds of beliefs work exactly the same. Where is your support for that? I don't think they all work the same.

Reason compels you to not believe in fairies just as reason compels me to not believe in the Christian God. Your excuses for why that is the case is nothing but double standards. If you cannot choose to believe in fairies, then belief is not a choice.

Hopefully you will see the difference with section 2 here. You are not offering a supposedly rational argument for belief in fairies. I am offering a supposedly rational argument for belief in the Christian God. That is the difference. That is why it is not a double standard.

In post 198, you said "thus you are making a choice between two reasonable alternatives". For your claim to be accurate, belief in YHWH must be a reasonable choice. If it is not a reasonable choice, you cannot claim that I made a choice between two reasonable alternatives. If YHWH is not a reasonable choice, then by default, lack of belief in YHWH is more rational.

I agree. So, onto section 2.

[The Tanager]

2. Radical claims require radical evidence

I don't know. It is possible that all the Gospels were written by people other than the disciples themselves. Many hold this belief. But let's skip ahead and assume the four Gospels were indeed written by Jesus' disciples...

I'm not arguing that the Gospels were necessarily written by the disciples. I'm also not arguing here for the historicity of everything in the Gospels. Whoever wrote these down and whenever they were written, the scholarship (and not just from conservative Christian scholars) seems to be in large agreement that the earliest disciples proclaimed that they had seen a resurrected Jesus from the very beginning. I'm not saying we should take the majority scholarly view at face value, though. We can look further into it if you want to.

How is relying on the Gospel accounts of the resurrection anything more than relying solely on someone's testimony?

It's not just relying on someone's testimony. If you still think it is after the whole case is laid out, then we can revisit this critique.

[The Tanager]

3. The Effect of Sin

Let's try a different example and lay out the whole picture to make sure we aren't talking past each other. Let's say 10,000 people are both attracted to creme-filled donuts and oatmeal.

Person A is attracted to the taste of creme-filled donuts but doesn't like the taste of oatmeal. But is also attracted to health. Person A chooses to go with the healthier option and picks oatmeal.

Person B loves the taste of both equally, doesn't care about health, but chooses oatmeal.

Person C loves the taste of donuts, is indifferent to oatmeal, doesn't care about health, but is attracted to doing what her older brother does. He chose to eat oatmeal and so does she.

Person D loves the taste of both, had donuts yesterday and so chooses oatmeal today because variation is attractive to him.

Person E loves the taste of both, had oatmeal yesterday, but having things the same is attractive to her while on a vacation and so she chooses oatmeal.

And let's say the rest of the 10,000 all choose oatmeal for 1 of these 5 reasons (or even reasons I haven't mentioned). The cause of these free choices are all due to attraction as opposed to chance, right?

But you are asking what accounts for everyone choosing oatmeal. Well, the cause doesn't change when looking at the whole of indidvidual choices being made. So, it is still attraction. But they were attracted to both donuts and oatmeal, so we can't say oatmeal is just inherently more attractive.

But, as I said before, the fact that they all happened to choose oatmeal was coincidental/chance because...

In the context of this discussion, I am asking of this particular outcome (all people choosing self-reliance over surrender) is due either to
- attraction
- or chance (as defined by the number 1 definition above)
the absence of any cause of events that can be predicted, understood, or controlled

...there was not one cause of the whole collection of events, it was various exercises of individual free will amidst various attractions. They were not controlled. They could not be predicted. But they can be understood.

If nothing caused these people to all favor self-reliance over surrender, then they are absent of cause and therefore, the outcome was due to chance.

No one thing caused the collection of favorings to be the same thing, if that is what you mean.

I am then extending this to the number 3 definition...
a possibility or probability of anything happening:
a fifty-percent chance of success.

Yes, with free will anything (within natural limits for humans) can happen.

...and arguing that the odds of everyone in the history of humanity just choosing self-reliance over surrender for no particular reason (such as attraction) is staggeringly low, just as the odds of everyone on earth choosing the exact same lottery numbers for no particular reason.

The odds of everyone choosing oatmeal are staggeringly low. But everyone choosing oatmeal does not mean that oatmeal is attractive to humans AND the donuts were naturally less attractive.

[The Tanager]

4. An analysis of one analogy of the Christian solution

I have never heard of anyone who agrees that Jesus has two natures and so, I am forced to conclude that this is not a "creed" but rather a personal interpretation of yours. I recognize "Jesus is the son of God" as a creed as virtually every Christian agrees on this. I do not recognize "Jesus has two natures" as a creed as I have never heard of this before you told me.

It was front and center of the Council of Chalcedon in 451 which is recognized by Catholics, Eastern Orthodox and most Protestants. Because of this council the Oriental Orthodox church split from the Eastern Orthodox.

To clarify, the ability God is expected to perform here is helping us surrender. In order for you to claim that it is logically impossible for God to do this, you must first demonstrate that God does in fact not have this ability (i.e to help us surrender). All you have done thus far is demonstrate that God cannot surrender himself, but that does not mean that he cannot help others surrender.

To summarize your argument (as I understand it)
- P1: God cannot do that which he does not have the ability to do
- P2: God does not have the ability to help us surrender
- C: God cannot help us surrender

Now I am asking you to please support P2. How do you know that God does not have the ability to help us surrender?

No, that is not what I'm claiming. I've said God can help us surrender by telling us how to do it. But we don't follow God's help there. So there is a next step. God can now help us (those of us who don't follow God's instructions) by:

(1) continuing to offer the same level of help (which yields the same results)
(2) making us follow God's instructions (which negates free will)
(3) help us in a new way that doesn't negate our free will

I'm saying God chooses (3). This new way of helping us goes beyond (1). God doesn't just tell us what it means for us to surrender and then let us choose to follow it or not. God actually helps us perform the surrender (without forcing this choice upon us). In the same way I hold my daughter's hand to form the letter A (but not if she doesn't want me to help in that way). I'm not just telling her how to do it. She doesn't do it from that kind of teaching. I'm actually forming the letter with her. God moves our will to surrender because we couldn't move our own will to surrender. And it is this kind of helping that I'm saying is illogical for God to do without being able to surrender.

So please... without more tautology... give me a non-vague, precise example of surrender. Give me a non-vague example of Jesus helping us surrender, then explain to me why God would not be able to do the exact same thing.

You didn't ask for a definition there in what I was responding to. I was correcting your misunderstanding of my use of the example. The example of surrender was not equivalent to "helping a homeless man". We have a will that doesn't want to help the homeless man. God wants us to help the homeless man. We surrender our will/desire to pass on by...we lay it down and take others into account. We then do God's will (because it is good for the homeless man and good for us).

From the very beginning I explained surrender as making a decision in concert with God as opposed to doing our own thing. That's not a tautology and it was there from the beginning. We can either make our decisions without taking God's influence into account or we can take God into account, seeking and trusting God's advice.

[Justin108]

1. Does the Christian God reject people for beliefs they don't have control over?

I have previously clarified that I cannot choose my belief and that this process is automatic to me. I have also clarified in post 125 that the only thing I have control over is
- method of investigation
- consideration
- contemplation

You disagreed with me on this and insisted that I can still choose what to believe. And now you're saying "to change that belief you will need new information or to look at old information in a new light". Which is exactly what I said in post 125

No, it's not the same. I agree you go through the investigation, consideration, contemplation and then choose your belief from among the alternatives you have investigated, considered and contemplated.

Again, how do you do that? How do you choose? I do not know how. You insist that I have this ability but you cannot tell me how to use it. For me, this process is automatic. You insist it is not yet you cannot explain to me how to choose.

You decide to follow what you think reason is telling you, or you decide to give in to emotions or you decide to go with A over B because of the pull towards A from various influences (reason, emotion, etc.) instead of the pull towards B from other influences (wishful thinking, authority, etc.).

And what if reason pulls me away from Christianity? Should I ignore reason and go with wishful thinking instead?

Why don't you think that is the case?

It does not matter.

It does

You have the burden to prove your view because you use that view

I already have. By requesting that you choose to believe in fairies. You have failed to do so, thereby proving my point that belief is not a choice.

Choose to believe in fairies. If you cannot, you proved my point. It's that simple.

No, it's not that simple. For this to be true you'd have to prove that all kinds of beliefs work exactly the same. Where is your support for that? I don't think they all work the same.

I have to do no such thing. My hypothesis is that if belief is a choice, you would be able to choose to believe in fairies. You fail to do so and your explanation for this failure is that belief in fairies is somehow different from belief in YHWH. Your counter-argument opens up a new hypothesis (namely that belief in fairies is somehow different from belief in YHWH) and so you will now need to support your new hypothesis. As I see it, your excuse for why you cannot choose to believe in fairies yet I must be able to choose to believe in YHWH is nothing but special pleading and double standards.

Reason compels you to not believe in fairies just as reason compels me to not believe in the Christian God. Your excuses for why that is the case is nothing but double standards. If you cannot choose to believe in fairies, then belief is not a choice.

Hopefully you will see the difference with section 2 here. You are not offering a supposedly rational argument for belief in fairies. I am offering a supposedly rational argument for belief in the Christian God. That is the difference.

I'll ask again as you seem to have missed my earlier question: Define rational argument, then give me an example of a rational argument for the Christian God

[Justin108]

How is relying on the Gospel accounts of the resurrection anything more than relying solely on someone's testimony?

It's not just relying on someone's testimony. If you still think it is after the whole case is laid out, then we can revisit this critique.

Then let's revisit it. How are the resurrection claims anything other than someone's testimony?

[Justin108]

The odds of everyone choosing oatmeal are staggeringly low. But everyone choosing oatmeal does not mean that oatmeal is attractive to humans AND the donuts were naturally less attractive.

And we both agree that oatmeal in this scenario represents self-reliance?