The Terror of God
or Why He is not Here
In the beginning… there was no beginning. There was just God. He was alone and he was perfect. He knew everything. He knew everything that could ever be, would ever happen. And he was alone.
Because he knew everything he knew what he would do and what would happen. He wanted to create, he wanted company, he wanted there to be worlds and worlds of people. He wanted life.
But he knew that he already knew what would happen, what he would create and what every thought of every person would be. Because he already knew it was as if it had happened and was deep in the past. There was no future, no past, there was no point or purpose in creating what he already fully understood because it had already happened. The Past, Present, and Future were One.
This awareness was his terror and his reason for doing nothing. He knew he was to live an eternity alone, that there was no purpose, there was no reason to create that which already fully existed in his memory. He was alone and could create nothing to surprise himself, nothing he did not already know as fully as he new himself. He was alone with nothingness and no reason to create.
He could not even enjoy a joke because he knew the punchline before the joke began.
Proposition for Debate:
There is no God, because if there were, he would not have bothered to create the universe or us. Therefore, does not our very existence prove there is no God?
The Terror of God
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The Terror of God
Post #1___________________________________
“Before You Embark On A Journey Of Revenge, Dig Two Graves”
— Confucius
“Before You Embark On A Journey Of Revenge, Dig Two Graves”
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #11I thought you'd go down the path of:
Since God was alone and knew everything to come, that he is the only possible source.
He is the source of the war, rape and helpless pedophilia.
Since God was alone and knew everything to come, that he is the only possible source.
He is the source of the war, rape and helpless pedophilia.
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #12[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #5]
Then when challenged, you say "that's not what I said," because of course there are an infinite number of ways to say something.
Is this the defense of your god?
Let's face it, if you (any Christian) can make up the properties of your god so it remains a viable concept, you are just making up your god in your mind, and have demonstrated you don't believe in it enough to keep it sacred.
You it must be nice, in one argument you make one claim, in another you state the opposite...I do not agree.
Then when challenged, you say "that's not what I said," because of course there are an infinite number of ways to say something.
Is this the defense of your god?
Let's face it, if you (any Christian) can make up the properties of your god so it remains a viable concept, you are just making up your god in your mind, and have demonstrated you don't believe in it enough to keep it sacred.
Last edited by Willum on Tue May 24, 2022 3:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I will never understand how someone who claims to know the ultimate truth, of God, believes they deserve respect, when they cannot distinguish it from a fairy-tale.
You know, science and logic are hard: Religion and fairy tales might be more your speed.
To continue to argue for the Hebrew invention of God is actually an insult to the very concept of a God. - Divine Insight
You know, science and logic are hard: Religion and fairy tales might be more your speed.
To continue to argue for the Hebrew invention of God is actually an insult to the very concept of a God. - Divine Insight
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #13WHY WOULD GOD BE SELECTIVE IN HIS USE OF FOREKNOWLEDGE?TRANSPONDER wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 5:29 pm Why would a God who had foreknowledge of everything so as to construct the best possible plan with the right outcome, select what he wants to know and what not?
ANSWER: Because only by being selective in his exercise of foreknowledge can free will be respected. As has been pointed out, use of absolute knowledge for everything renders all relationships superficial and all interchange, merely cosmetic. To have a real relationship with his intelligent creation a God with access to all knowledge must limit it use and progress through life with them "real time" for that relationship to be real.
JW
To learn more please go to other posts related to...
FREE WILL, OMNISCIENCE and ...SELECTIVE FOREKNOWLEDGE
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #14Well one of those angels is depicted as becoming Eve's tempter in the garden of Eden. We know him as Satan the Devil.
JW
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #15[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #14]
The concept (and character) of 'Satan' is interesting and one that puzzles theologians. The OP assumes a strict monotheism, a lone creative God in the void of the universe. How would an anti-god, a force of evil intrude in a universe with an omnipotent God?
When I wrote the 1st post I pictured how I would react, how I would think if I was alone in the universe, alone for all eternity. That's where the 'Terror' of the title comes in. I think a lone God would almost welcome an adversary... anything but the terror of total and absolute solitude forever.
So the concept of an evil character, a rival god or force of evil is almost welcome. But this is problematic for monotheism.
Was God ever alone in the universe? Was Satan coexistent from the beginning? Were the angels?
Or did God create Satan? Did God create evil? If 'he' did, why? Does man have free will without Satan? Why would God knowingly introduce evil to the world, knowing the misery and agony of disease and cruelty? Or is God not God at all, but just one powerful force among many?
The concept (and character) of 'Satan' is interesting and one that puzzles theologians. The OP assumes a strict monotheism, a lone creative God in the void of the universe. How would an anti-god, a force of evil intrude in a universe with an omnipotent God?
When I wrote the 1st post I pictured how I would react, how I would think if I was alone in the universe, alone for all eternity. That's where the 'Terror' of the title comes in. I think a lone God would almost welcome an adversary... anything but the terror of total and absolute solitude forever.
So the concept of an evil character, a rival god or force of evil is almost welcome. But this is problematic for monotheism.
http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?scr ... 3000200017ABSTRACT
The concept of 'monotheism' has become a matter of debate in Hebrew Bible scholarship. This article investigates whether the concept should still be used, starting with Second Isaiah, who in the early Persian period elaborated a discourse that presented Yhwh as the only god. Therefore he had to integrate into this deity functions traditionally attributed to goddesses and to demons or evil gods. However, this attempt did not succeed. The goddess, whose elimination is probably reflected in Zechariah 5, returned in a certain way through the personification of Wisdom in Proverbs 8, and the 'dark sides' of the gods were materialised in the figure of Satan, who experienced an impressive career in the following centuries. The question of evil is not resolved in the Hebrew Bible. Some texts admit the autonomy of evil, whereas Isaiah 45 claims that Yhwh himself is at the origin of evil. This diversity makes it difficult to characterise the Hebrew Bible as the result of a straightforward evolution from polytheism to monotheism.
Was God ever alone in the universe? Was Satan coexistent from the beginning? Were the angels?
Or did God create Satan? Did God create evil? If 'he' did, why? Does man have free will without Satan? Why would God knowingly introduce evil to the world, knowing the misery and agony of disease and cruelty? Or is God not God at all, but just one powerful force among many?
Last edited by Diogenes on Mon May 23, 2022 10:23 pm, edited 1 time in total.
___________________________________
“Before You Embark On A Journey Of Revenge, Dig Two Graves”
— Confucius
“Before You Embark On A Journey Of Revenge, Dig Two Graves”
— Confucius
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #16Peace to you,
I have not read through the thread yet, so I apologize if this has already been covered:
Certainly God loves Himself (so His own existence would not be horrifying), but also He loves His Son, and other life that HE brought forth through that Son. Love GIVES LIFE. God is love, and from His love and his energy (energy that love produces; as opposed to fear and depression which can paralyze <- as the OP seems to be suggesting), God brought forth LIFE (beginning with His Son).
Love would give life to others (if you are a being who is capable of bringing forth life, of course.) Love would not deny others the chance to live, and not just the chance, but to actually live, to have love, joy, to learn wisdom, to become merciful and forgiving and loving as well.
I learned the following some time back from my Father in heaven, through His Son (Jaheshua), and I shared it with some of my brothers and sisters in Christ:
Our Father IS love, and His love is SO great... His energy SO great... that when He SPOKE (shouted from the rooftops)... He brought forth Life.
(That LIFE being His Son, and all other life through His Son.)
This seems so obvious to me now, so I apologize if I am not explaining it well. But of course if you love someone, even before they are born, and you have the ability to give them life, then you give them life. Out of love, including out of love for them.
Peace again to you all,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy
I have not read through the thread yet, so I apologize if this has already been covered:
You have not taken love into consideration.Diogenes wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 1:42 pm The Terror of God
or Why He is not Here
In the beginning… there was no beginning. There was just God. He was alone and he was perfect. He knew everything. He knew everything that could ever be, would ever happen. And he was alone.
Because he knew everything he knew what he would do and what would happen. He wanted to create, he wanted company, he wanted there to be worlds and worlds of people. He wanted life.
But he knew that he already knew what would happen, what he would create and what every thought of every person would be. Because he already knew it was as if it had happened and was deep in the past. There was no future, no past, there was no point or purpose in creating what he already fully understood because it had already happened. The Past, Present, and Future were One.
This awareness was his terror and his reason for doing nothing. He knew he was to live an eternity alone, that there was no purpose, there was no reason to create that which already fully existed in his memory. He was alone and could create nothing to surprise himself, nothing he did not already know as fully as he new himself. He was alone with nothingness and no reason to create.
He could not even enjoy a joke because he knew the punchline before the joke began.
Proposition for Debate:
There is no God, because if there were, he would not have bothered to create the universe or us. Therefore, does not our very existence prove there is no God?
Certainly God loves Himself (so His own existence would not be horrifying), but also He loves His Son, and other life that HE brought forth through that Son. Love GIVES LIFE. God is love, and from His love and his energy (energy that love produces; as opposed to fear and depression which can paralyze <- as the OP seems to be suggesting), God brought forth LIFE (beginning with His Son).
Love would give life to others (if you are a being who is capable of bringing forth life, of course.) Love would not deny others the chance to live, and not just the chance, but to actually live, to have love, joy, to learn wisdom, to become merciful and forgiving and loving as well.
I learned the following some time back from my Father in heaven, through His Son (Jaheshua), and I shared it with some of my brothers and sisters in Christ:
Our Father IS love, and His love is SO great... His energy SO great... that when He SPOKE (shouted from the rooftops)... He brought forth Life.
(That LIFE being His Son, and all other life through His Son.)
This seems so obvious to me now, so I apologize if I am not explaining it well. But of course if you love someone, even before they are born, and you have the ability to give them life, then you give them life. Out of love, including out of love for them.
Peace again to you all,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #17[Replying to tam in post #16]
You are just repeating Christian platitudes without answering any key questions.
You are just repeating Christian platitudes without answering any key questions.
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— Confucius
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— Confucius
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #18By the exercise of free will.Diogenes wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 9:59 pm [Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #14]. How would an anti-god, a force of evil intrude in a universe with an omnipotent God?
Was God ever alone in the universe? Biblically yes, before he started creating.
Was Satan coexistent from the beginning? No
Were the angels? No, angels were according to scripture the beginning of God's creative works
... did God create Satan? No, God created a perfect angel that made the free will decision to become "satan"
Did God create evil? As in create that which is negative and malicious....No.
If 'he' did, why? See above
Does man have free will without Satan? Of course. Free will is not dependent on another individual
Why would God knowingly introduce evil to the world, knowing the misery and agony of disease and cruelty? He did not (see above)
Or is God ... just one powerful force among many? Yes the God of the bible (YHWH) is one powerful force among many but being omnipotent, none are his equal.
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681
"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" - Romans 14:8
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #19Peace to you,
Perhaps a 'human' example would help? I am a mother. I had children because I wanted to love them. If I knew everything about them before having had them - could experience it even - "boring" is not a reason I would ever refuse to have them. That wouldn't even factor into what I chose to do, because that would not be from love for them. And God's love is far greater than mine.
So I don't see what question has not been answered. Unless you wanted me to come right out and say, "no, our very existence does not prove there is no God." For the reasons stated in my previous post.
Peace again to you all,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy
What platitude? That God is love? If so, then you might want to consider that a thing labeled as a platitude can also be true. Calling it a platitude takes nothing away from what I shared.Diogenes wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 10:24 pm [Replying to tam in post #16]
You are just repeating Christian platitudes without answering any key questions.
Perhaps a 'human' example would help? I am a mother. I had children because I wanted to love them. If I knew everything about them before having had them - could experience it even - "boring" is not a reason I would ever refuse to have them. That wouldn't even factor into what I chose to do, because that would not be from love for them. And God's love is far greater than mine.
So I don't see what question has not been answered. Unless you wanted me to come right out and say, "no, our very existence does not prove there is no God." For the reasons stated in my previous post.
Peace again to you all,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy
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Re: The Terror of God
Post #20From another thread;Diogenes p[quote wrote:ost_id=1078649 time=1653327771 user_id=14646]
Proposition for Debate:
There is no God, because if there were, he would not have bothered to create the universe or us. Therefore, does not our very existence prove there is no God?
Unfortunately I got no more interaction from Compassionist re this...and now this thread.Compassionist: I think being omniscient and omnipotent would give one free will. Since I am not omniscient and omnipotent, I can't know that for sure.
William: What process did you use in order to come to the declaration that being omniscient and omnipotent would give one free will/amount to one having free will?
Compassionist: I realize that if I were all-knowing and all-powerful, I would be free from all constraints and my will won't be determined by my genes, environments, nutrients and experiences.
William: Let us examine this idea together then.
I see immediately that if I were all-knowing. I would be constrained by my omniscience.
Thus I would have no free will in relation to being all knowing.
Yet - being also all-powerful, I would be able to break free from the constraints of being all-knowing.
Would you agree with this assessment, so far?
Your Proposition for Debate is something of straw because it failed to add in the aspect of the idea of GOD to do with being all powerful.
An all powerful GOD [omnipotent] who knew everything could indeed have created this universe, and the existence of this universe goes some way toward evidence which gives us - in our existing - an understanding of why we exist in such an environment as we do.
Also, your assumption that the GOD would be lonely and terrified and without purpose is what I refer to as "Mirror-Mirror" as one places what one believes of of oneself, into the GOD-role and "Hey Presto!'
What you see is what you get.
This same thing carries over into the next faze, given the many NDEs people have shared to the world. Whether they know it or not, each individual who meets GOD through NDE meets a being to which they place their own images onto, which in turn effects the way the GOD goes about showing them things.
Which is to say, if one thinks of GOD as being lonely and terrified and without purpose, there are places which accommodate such individuals and such individuals get to experience such places...according to the stories circulating...
But anyway, it is my purpose to warn folk about how they think about GOD - specifically to try and assist them in way which might help them use their freeish will to avoid such fate.
The grounds for your Proposition for Debate "There is no God" are faulty Diogenes. They are a false image of the self, superimposed upon the structure of GOD.
viewtopic.php?p=1079590#p1079590