The "Problem" of Evil

[wgreen]

juliod wrote:
The bible certainly does not describe a god that is all-god or all-powerful, but a large number of christians seem to conceive of god that way.

Is it true that the Bible does not present a God who is All Powerful and All Good?

It would seem that this is not true. Two examples follow.

"And [Jesus] said to him, "Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments (Matt 19:17; NASB)."

"Now when Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; Walk before Me, and be blameless (Gen 17:1; NASB)."

[nanikore]

Things weren't harsh in the Garden.

Bill, nanikore, of course we will be able to maintain our own distinctive interpretations when our back-stories are so different. The idea of a perfect garden is, without a spiritual frame of reference, difficult to realise. The carnal mind which is busily at enmity with God is all the while thinking that human physiology is such that even a little thing like our teeth would be a dead give-away that there never was such a "real event" as the Garden. If things were rationalized to make this event into a reality then I would argue that no recognizable vestige of human form would remain. Perhaps somehow the events depicted in Genesis are a meta-state of the reality of creation that we see today, but how can we convince ourselves that this was a ever a reality for anything remotely human?

If then, everything depicted in the Garden of Eden is so far removed from the form and function that we see today, what greater connection does it have with us over the self-extracting appearance man from the physics of the cosmos that is the back-story to an alternative interpretation? In this interpretation the only analogy to the Garden lies in the future rather than the past. "Sin" might be the difference between the ideal and the actual in this case. The "ideal" could be a natural extrapolation of ideas that can exist in the mind of a conscious individual who has evolved imagination and self-awareness as an expedient.

I will have to ask you to explain your points regarding the teeth as well as form and function.

[nanikore]

He has stopped crime plenty of times before by having people repent (repent means stop) out of choice.

So you are agreeing that god stops some crime, but not others. In other words, his crime-stopping desire or ability is finite. That means he is either finitely good or finitely powerful, or both.

Do you know how some are unhappy (yes, suffering) while surrounded by riches and luxury, while others manage to find lasting happiness even in squalor?

You always characterize things in our finite human terms. I think you have not once even attempted to formulate something in infinite terms. I don't think you grasp "infinite".

DanZ

Oh He has the desire alright; It's just that people don't.

Funny; it is "characterizing things in finite human terms" that leads to the philosophical non-problem of evil in the first place. How about answering my previous question. The answer would be quite illuminating.

[QED]

I have thought about this and it is an interesting question. I think there are at least a a few possibilities. First, it seems that sin pre-dates the fall of mankind (Satan's fall), and it is possible that creation was designed accordingly. Second, it is possible that God designed creation according to what he knew would happen (that man would fall). Thirdly, it is possible that the form of creation changed after the fall of man. There do seem to be difficulties with this third option, as you have pointed out. It is hard to imagine a lion without adaptations for carnivory. It seems that when you remove the carnivorous features of a lion, you get a cow. I don't think it is so hard to imaging a man without such adaptations, though it is still difficult.

I really don't think that "difficult" provides an adequate description of this question. The idea that current flora and fauna could be transformed into a form compatible with eternal life and zero suffering has more than merely cosmetic implications.

If option three is true, then you are right that the garden would have been a VERY different place from present day earth. Such a place (and such men) is hard to imagine, but perhaps not inconceivable.

[QED]

I will have to ask you to explain your points regarding the teeth as well as form and function.

In which case I suspect our notions about natural history differ considerably. I am persuaded of our common descent from animals with spines (chordates) spanning some hundreds of millions of years. The natural economy throughout this period is one in which different animals have different capacities to extract energy and nutrients from their surroundings leading to some animals being wholly reliant on eating others to gain access to 'preprocessed' foods. The form of each individual is closely coupled to its function so, for example, by studying the teeth of an individual we can determine which sort of animals ate which.

The different types of teeth found within the fossil record dating back to the Pre-Cambrian era indicates that the eating of flesh has been a feature of life all the way back to a time when the largest animal on the planet was no more than a few tens of centimeters in extent.

[Galphanore]

I'm suggesting (and I know this is hard to grasp for a theist) is that by ording his followers to kill and rape, YHWH has done evil. (I.e. He is not good, much less infinitely good.)

I'm suggesting (and I know this is hard to grasp for an atheist) is that all of the evils were self-wrought. Did you read the links I sent on the wars regarding the minimalization of killings? (they are the same links I sent on your accusation of genocide) If you want, I can regurgitate by summary but that would take a while. Also, please substantiate your rape accusation. This is a group where sexual immorality is prohibited, and not a random group of gentiles.

Killing all of the first born of the Egyptians after hardening their kings heart so he would not let 'his' people go isn't evil? So god wiping out all life on earth isn't evil? Burning Sodom and Gomorrah to the ground isn't evil? Oh, right, he decided those places were sinning so it's a-ok to level them. God personally killed over two million people for various reasons. Care to explain how those are the actions of an all-loving, all-powerful, all-knowing being?

[Viridis]

God can take away volition and make everything perfect. He certainly has the power to do so. Then again, he'd just be watching a puppet show. Would you like your child to be remote-controlled by you?

Perhaps I need to study theological tracts opposing Calvinism, but it seems to me that the concept of an omniscient God necessarily precludes the possibility of human volition. If God is all-knowing, then He would have to know everything that has happened, everything that is happening, and everything that will happen. Therefore an omniscient God already knows every "choice" that we will make in our lives, which is the basis for the doctrine of predestination. The Puritans believed in this, and felt that one's ultimate destiny (to be saved or damned) was already set before birth, and there wasn't a thing a person could do about it. You could make the claim that people still have the ability to make choices even if God knows the outcome beforehand, but that doesn't really seem like free will to me. That seems much more like the puppet show you mentioned.

Since this thread is supposed to be about the problem of evil, we should perhaps consider the character of Satan, as he is central to Christian theology as the nemesis of God. I'm not sure if this is stated directly anywhere in the Bible, but according to standard Christian theology, Satan started out as the highest, most beautiful, most powerful angel - Lucifer, the light-bearer. As the story goes, he rebelled against God and convinced a host of other angels to follow him. God cast him out of heaven, but did not immediately destroy him, with the result that Satan was able to tempt humans and basically cause havoc on Earth. Now, presumably an omniscient God would have known that Lucifer would rebel even before creating him, and would further know that Lucifer would try to corrupt His creation. Why create Lucifer then? Why allow him to rebel? Why allow his continued existence? (An omnipotent God could surely destroy him at any time.) Did God need Satan to "test" the faith of humans? What would be the point of any test to an omniscient being who is fully aware of what the outcome would be? For that matter, why even test the faith of Abraham by telling him to sacrifice his son? If God already knew what the outcome would be, then He was just being sadistic there. If He didn't know what the outcome would be, then He wouldn't be omniscient.

It truly seems to me that the concept of a completely omniscient and omnipotent God poses many logical quandaries.

[Greatest I Am]

The bible depics an imperfect God, who seems to fail at every turn. He can't make a perfect world,, can't make a perfect heaven, can't make a perfect human being.etc.
The bible was writen by those who did not recognize that God did indead accomplish positively all of the above.
From perfection only perfection may flow.
We canot blame them too much because perfection by it's very nature is hard to see.
Even with God' direct intervention it took my 20 years to start to see the form and color of His perfect system.

Regards

DL

[Greatest I Am]

I'ts a shame that our all powerfull god is portrayed as such a looser. Not able to create a perfect world, human, heaven, ets
What were the writers of the bible thinkink.

[ABEL21]

I will read from time to time for that.