God is evil if He has miracles and does not use them.

According to you, evil is just a cultural defined thing that is not applicable to God because God is not part of our culture. Whether or not evil is by omission or commission would not seem to matter much under that standard.Apparently though, that line of reasoning can be discarded when necessary.

Yes, this is what I've decided, because morals are subjective.
You're free to disagree, if you'd like. God can decide to do whatever God likes.
I'm free to judge God by my own criterion.This is the reasoning I'm using:

quote:

---

IF God exists.
IF God is all powerful.
IF "evil" includes not helping others when you're quite capable of helping them at no risk or loss of resources to yourself.
IF God does not prevent rapes.

​

THEN God is evil.

---

I'm not removing God's free will at all. I'm just calling Him evil. Perhaps He'll smite me for it. Maybe He'll change His ways. Maybe He doesn't care. Who knows?

No, ringo. The topic (truncated) is "Is God Evil".Everyone has an opinion based on their upbringing and acculturation tempered with the morality of their society in time. You do the same thing with your posts in this thread.As for the ice cream, if the kind of ice cream this god of yours likes is Haagen-Dazs Chocolate then maybe he's not totally evil. I wouldn't be surprised, though, if he was the one responsible for Turkey Hill and Edy's. That's evil.

You know how when you're watching nat geo and the predator is going after the prey, how if you were there watching it in RL and filming it then you'd feel like you'd want to interfere and stop the violence, but you really wouldn't if you were just there to just observe it, plus if you save the prey then you're hurting the predator so then you kinda realize that you don't really want to "play God".Maybe God avoids being evil by not playing God. You might still call that evil, but I think you understand not interfering with the predator/prey thing if you really want to do no harm. You can't fuck it up if you don't touch it.Now, omnipotence would mean that God would know exactly how good and evil he's made it. And in that case its really not worth you judging it because it just is what it is: as God wills it. Even your judging of it is just how he wants you to make it Within these premises, the only way to stop God from being evil is to limit His power.It might help you to think of how God could be good maybe if you limit the power in a way where he doesn't really know exactly how good and evil His actions are going to make it. (P.S. There might be a good argument for that based on there being a lack of knowledge of the future as an allowable limit even to omnipotence) And in that case I think you may begin to understand how being hands-off doesn't have to actually be evil. The more hands-on you are the more chances you have of fucking it up and making it evil.And in that case, if He did put his hands on it and try to stop the violence in effort to going away from evil, then I think that would become more admirable as the risk gets higher for Him. Again it depends on just how much of a limit on the all powerfulness you're willing to considering.It also depends on the reason for the violence. The predator/prey relationship is easy to understand not stopping the violence.Rape, not so much. I don't actually have a solution within the premises of your Problem of Evil.But, can you entertain any limits to the all powerfulness?I don't think a good God could really be all powerful, like really truly ALL powerful, as you say that just doesn't work.Maybe a slight limit on knowing the exact ramifications of His actions can help you construct a God that could be good in the absence of action against what you think it evil. Well, if that why you're trying to do.If you're happy with what you've accomplished, well then I don't think this is the first time I've agreed with you about this.I supposed you were looking for an argument, and I thought of this while watching nat geo and figured I'd offer it to you.So... Cheers, Stile.P.P.S. Are you still playing FF14? I'm waiting for GTAV on PC, you gonna get in on that?

It is definitely not a position I envy. Too much responsibility, not enough free time Yes, the answer to the problem of evil (if God exists) may very well be "God works in mysterious ways" or any other "God's ways are not our ways" sort of answer.It is a possibility that must be accepted, if we're going to consider the existence of God in the first place.It still leaves the ability to say what we think about the problem... but it does sort of take the wind out of the sails. Yes, that's why I picked that example, hoping for something "obviously wrong." Maybe I should have gone with slapping a baby for fun?
And, of course, there's always the cultural-era subjective-ness of "evil" hanging around. That plays a big role too. I think it would be a very good solution to the problem of evil to learn that God simply isn't ALL powerful. With restrictions comes doubt... with doubt comes the ability to "try your best." *IF* God is simply "trying His best" and this is the way it is, I have no more blame on Him then I do on myself. Meh, I think it's pretty much pettered out, now. I just find the topic of good/bad and moral pondering to be interesting. Which is why I tend to focus on those subjects.Things like that The Cabin in the Woods idea I linked to earlier. There are some very interesting (to me) moral conundrums.
Is survival of our species something that should take precedence at all costs?
If yes... why? How can that be considered "good?"
If no... what costs are "too much?" ...what costs are "acceptable?"Very interesting questions to my brain
I don't think I have answers, just lots of ideas.
My plan here is two-fold... one side is provoking discussion simply to make myself think about such things more and possibly in different ways.
The other side of my plan is to poke holes in other people's arguments where I see them... this may make them think a bit more about their position, or it might just get me to realize why it's not actually a hole in the first place. Like a boss: Message 184

In what society is the wanton death of children considered moral?

Inca, 13th to 16th century.Uganda, 21st century.Edited by AZPaul3, : No reason given.

Last I checked, society considered the Ugandan genocides to be immoral.In what way did the Incans wantonly kill children. Did they just sit next to cliffs and let their babies crawl around?

The only "society" that matters in such a discussion is Ugandan society. Other societies do not control Ugandan society. And as I recall you were not talking about the Ugandan genocides but child sacrifice. In Uganda ritual child sacrifice is quite acceptable. Yes, I know that officially the Ugandan government opposes the child killings but, as I understand, a lot of the upper politicos engage in the practice themselves. They sacrificed their kids to the mountain gods. IIRC, it was considered an honor to have the priests select your child as the sacrifice. From Wiki:

quote:

---

The Inca culture sacrificed children in a ritual called capacocha. Their frozen corpses have been discovered in the South American mountaintops. The first of these corpses, a female child who had died from a blow to the skull, was discovered in 1995 by Johan Reinhard.[2] Other methods of sacrifice included strangulation and simply leaving the children, who had been given an intoxicating drink, to lose consciousness in the extreme cold and low-oxygen conditions of the mountaintop, and to die of exposure.

---

Something like that. 'Cept they left the kid on the cliff and went home to supper.Edited by AZPaul3, : No reason given.

Wow. From 2008.Surprise.Regards
DL

Hey all Shall I take a stab at it?

quote:

---

IF God exists.
IF God is all powerful.
IF "evil" includes not helping others when you're quite capable of helping them at no risk or loss of resources to yourself.
IF God does not prevent rapes.

​

THEN God is evil.

---

IF a God exists.
& IF that same God is omnipotent and is the creator of everything that exists.
& IF that same creator, by extension and as a consequence of being G.O.D. , is responsible for (not guilty of) everything that exists, including the existence of evil
& that same creator becomes a created being and allows the created to murder Him
& by being killed bears (emotionally/mentally/spiritually) the weight of guilt of all evil in existence,THEN Has not justice been done and God is justified?&, I would argue, is not God absurd for doing such a thing when, as Faith wrote earlier on this thread, evil came about as a consequence of choices made by the created?
& Is God not absurd for loving so immeasurably the ones who brought about his death? (keeping in mind He did bear responsibility regardless, as we might imagine any good God would).So, why all the hostility? God is not evil because he does not always lift his hand to prevent the choices of humans. He is simply God. And He already proved that He was good 2000 years ago.Regards! ,- RaphEdited by Raphael, : No reason given.

Actually, the God of Calvin is most certainly a product of a particular culture, society and era.Not sure I see how you arrive at your conclusion.A GOD should GOD exist though would not qualify.The point, yet again, is that we can assign the term evil to things we decide are evil but that has no relation to whether or not the actual reality is evil.

In many cultures the death and sacrifice of children was considered not just moral but honorable. There are also cultures where there is no value placed upon children, often girl children, and so killing one is not evil at all.

I can see your point regarding God as being defined and depicted through the lens of the culture,experience, and context of the individual.Raphael and other Christians, such as myself, regard God as alive and, though separate from the culture we live in in an absolute sense (Being eternal and supernatural) we believe that through Jesus Christ God becomes alive in communion with the worshiper. You will, of course, ask us how we know that it is God rather than a "bad burrito" and I can understand how your enquiring mind would very much like to know.Though I cannot speak for Raphael, I will say that personally, GOD (yes, the capital One) experiences the culture that I live in through being in Holy Communion with me.Again, I realize that you dislike the belief that some of us are special (peculiar?) yet not everybody experiences this Communion---but I find no evidence that the warlord(GOD) communes equally with everyone---unless they accept the terms of the communion.(Does that make any sense or is it word salad? )

Why not? Can you accept the idea that GOD chose to commune with humanity (the ants) by spiritually embodying one of them?Is it not possible that GOD (yes, again the Capital One) wants to be in communion with humanity and has provided a way for us to understand---despite the infinite difference between GOD and man?