Does God change his mind?

[OnceConvinced]

A Christian member of our forum recently pointed out a bible contradiction for all to see:

This verse was presented first:
Numbers 23:19 "God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind."

The Christian then attempted to trump it with a contradictory scripture where God DOES change his mind, thus exposing a blatant bible contradiction:

Jeremiah 18:8 "But if that nation about which I spoke turns from its evil way, I'll change my mind about the disaster that I had planned for it."

Here are further verses that show God changing his mind:

Exodus 32:14
So the LORD changed His mind about the harm which He said He would do to His people.

Amos 7:3
The LORD changed His mind about this. "It shall not be," said the LORD.

Jeremiah 18:10
if it does evil in My sight by not obeying My voice, then I will think better of the good with which I had promised to bless it. (wow this is a verse where God says he will break his promise!!)


So questions for debate:

Does Got change his mind?
If he does change his mind, how do we know he hasn't changed his mind about much of what he expected from us in the New Testament?
If he does change his mind, how can we really know what he wants of us today?

[marco]

[Replying to post 509 by marco]

Yes, we, or at least you, are getting way off the OP here, which is why I suggest that your concerns would be best addressed in sub-forums I have found here on educational requirements, etc. I came here to discuss changeability as it relates with God. That's the focus of the OP and that's the topic I'm sticking with.

Which is good. But lest it be thought I am committing the sin of irrelevance let me say again that in discussing changes in God's mind we must ascribe qualities to God and the question then arises: from where do we get knowledge of those qualities so as to make comments on change?

I said that if we stick to the Biblical God, we can readily discuss whether God changes his mind. He does. If we have a modern version of some deity, then that brings in all sorts of problems. So perhaps we should stick to the version of God we all know - the Abrahamic one. Dealing with another god necessitates what might SEEM to be irrelevance.

[hoghead1]

[Replying to post 511 by marco]

Yes, but speak for yourself. It might bring all sorts of problems for you, but it definitely dos not for many of the rest of us. Many assume that they are just gong on Scripture and nothing else, getting it all right straight from the bible. However, no one comes to Scripture with a totally blank mind. Everyone reads Scripture through a lens. And so a large part of our task here, at least for me, is outlining what this lens might me. Now, maybe you think it is a simple matter of pointing passages in Scripture that say God changes and leaving it go at that. Sorry, that isn't so easy, isn't such an open-and-shut case. Therefore, you will find many Christians who take issue with you that the Bible is actually claiming God changes. The reason is that many look at Scripture through the lens provided by traditional theology, the church dogmas. And traditionally it was assumed, via the influx of Hellenic metaphysics and standards of perfection, that God does not change in any respect whatsoever. So when they come to Scripture and see passages seemingly saying God changes, they write these off a mere figures of speech that have nothing to do with the actual reality of God in any way whatsoever. Calvin said that God had to use "baby talk" to accommodate himself to our feeble intellects. So yes, in his sermons he preached on the "wrath" of God, but, and this is very important, wrote off all passage in Scripture that attribute emotion to God as mere figures of speech, God's "baby talk." Earlier, Anselm argued that yes, God does appear very compassionate, but that is in mere appearance only, just on our end of it, due to our feeble intellects. In his own nature, God is totally passionless, unmoved by the world, utterly immutable. So it's never enough here to say Scripture says so and just walk away. There is the matter of how you interpret Scripture, and much of that depends on your extra-biblical presuppositions about God's nature.

[marco]

There is the matter of how you interpret Scripture, and much of that depends on your extra-biblical presuppositions about God's nature.

Which is what I've been saying. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose, as Alphonse Karr might have said about our dialogue here.

I am suspicious when people tell me they "have no problems" interpreting the Bible and the portrait of God given there.

[hoghead1]

[Replying to post 513 by marco]

Well then, it seems we are in agreement that extra-biblical sources must be brought into the picture. And so when it comes to God changing, being responsive to the world and receiving it all up, I think we must ask, "Ou sont les neiges d'antan?"

[marco]

[Replying to post 513 by marco]

Well then, it seems we are in agreement that extra-biblical sources must be brought into the picture. And so when it comes to God changing, being responsive to the world and receiving it all up, I think we must ask, "Ou sont les neiges d'antan?"

Very funny. I suppose we can now expect a villanelle on God's changes. I shall leave it there in our partial agreement, though I fear we will disagree in other matters.
C'est la vie.

[hoghead1]

[Replying to post 515 by marco]

I wasn't trying to be funny. Just playing into your use of French. Thought you might enjoy that, as you like to cite French. Also, I have published translations of French works by Calvin, Descartes, Benz, Farel, etc. However, that is off the OP here. Villanelle, huh? You flatter me. I'm not that good of a poet or song writer. In my novel "Hot Rail!" I did have one of the characters sign songs that I wrote in the spirit of Irish railway workers. Very dirty. If you want, I'll PM you my "Paddy and Mike" song. However, that's way off the OP.

[marco]

[Replying to post 515 by marco]

I wasn't trying to be funny. Just playing into your use of French. Thought you might enjoy that, as you like to cite French. Also, I have published translations of French works by Calvin, Descartes, Benz, Farel, etc. However, that is off the OP here. Villanelle, huh? You flatter me. I'm not that good of a poet or song writer. In my novel "Hot Rail!" I did have one of the characters sign songs that I wrote in the spirit of Irish railway workers. Very dirty. If you want, I'll PM you my "Paddy and Mike" song. However, that's way off the OP.

I did enjoy it, which is why I said it was funny. Villanelles, as it happens, have earned me a fair amount of cash and kudos, so I wasn't flattering too much. They're not all that difficult if Marco can do them. A theologian might find the form useful for expressing God's repetitive changes.

Anyway, on the topic we keep returning to what drives our own views of God and it is our own little artwork we are examining when we ask about God's changed mind. We move in great circles. Mary Queen of Scots suggested that: "En ma fin gît mon commencement..." (in my end is my beginning) and TS Eliot saw it as: "In my beginning is my end." I am sure both observations have great relevance to our topic for no matter how far we travel we return to our starting point.

I'd love to meet your Paddy and Mike by the way.





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[hoghead1]

[Replying to post 517 by marco]

Speak for yourself. They look plenty difficult for me to do, not my style. I think art is important to consider here, because I believe aesthetics represents deeper truths than can be achieved by a purely cognitive approach. However, I will leave that for further discussion.

Since you are interested in "Paddy and Mike," I'll PM it to you ASAP.