Is sin allowed into heaven?

Do christians believe that sin is allowed into heaven? By this I mean that do people in heaven have the possibility to sin?If we don't have the possibility to sin, what of free will? That is always touted as the most important quality we have, stopping us being robots etc. It is also used as the reason that we can sin. If we can't sin in heaven have we lost free will? And if so, why was it so important we have it in the first place. If we haven't lost free will, then why aren't we stopped sinning on earth?If sin is allowed into heaven, in what way is heaven any different to earth? Why is earth necessary at all, why not just go straight to heaven and miss out the uneccessary step?

Well I understand if you don't want to promote it. I just saw it as being at the core of christianity, so wondered what christians think of it. I see it as being a major inconsistency with christian doctrine since either a yes or no answer to the question seems to bring up problems.

Yes, that was where I expected it to go. I asked the question because I assumed there would be something scriptural about it, so the original question (about sin being allowed into heaven) at least would have a definate answer, and then we could discuss the ramifications.

Why? What happens if we don't choose not to? Why not just send us all straight there and miss out the irrelevence of earth? Whatever choice we have to make, we can make it there.

Thats possible. I don't see determinism as an inevitability. Even in science and the laws of nature determinism doesn't exist, because it is physically impossible to know everything about a system. That is a property of the universe. Without knowing everything, you can't determine everything. Coupled with the entirely statistical nature of quantum mechanics there's certainly room in there for free will if indeed it does exist.

And it doesn't mean it is, it's pointless to say it is unless we know it is. Bells inequality rules out the possibility for hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics. That is why non-local phenomenon such as entanglement are possible. Without this there would be no such thing as teleportation. Unsupported assertion...you can't start with a conclusion and then explain away things that don't fit it with handwaving and claims of incomplete knowledge. If we can't understand something, we can't have knowledge of it.Anyway, this is all irrelevant to the thread. Free will is a fundamental part of christian doctrine, without it christianity is meaningless. For the purpose of this thread, assume that free will exists. If you want to start a thread on the existance of free will we can talk about this more there.

Where did I say that? What I said was that Bells inequality shows that hidden variables are incompaitble with what we observe. If hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics accurately depicted the real world, we would observe completely different things. What we don't know about quantum mechanics is irrelevent, since we don't know what we don't know. You can't use lack of knowledge as evidence of something. No Heisenbergs Uncertainty Principle shows that absolute determination of the state of a system is impossible. Bells inequality simply shows that hidden variable theories are incompatible (or at least it sets up the conditions that would be true if they were compatible, and experiment shows that those conditions are violated). Anyway, you just admitted that you can't prove your assertion, so there is no way to know that your assertion is true. It's not a simple logical step at all. We have little idea about how the inner workings of the brain work, so we certainly can't say if it's possible to determine the future state of it or not. Also, just because we are subject to physical forces, that does not mean the end result is entirely deterministic for precisely the reasons we've discussed above.As an example, take an electron diffraction experiment. Basically you have a double slit, and you fire an electron at it, then measure where it lands on the board. If you fire a single electron at the slits, in full knowledge of the physical forces being applied to it, where will it end up? Who knows, it's not determinable. You can determine the probabilities of where it will end up on the board, and if you fire enough electrons those probabilities will form a definite pattern, but you can never know where one single electron will end up. Can you be certain no quantum effects like that occur in the brain? Without free will there is no choice. Without choice there is no accountability for our actions, and forgivness becomes stupid. Without the need for forgiveness, christianity becomes irrelevent. The whole reason for our existence on earth becomes irrelevent. Without free will there is no reason not to simply create everyone in heaven, only creating those that would meet the requirements. Do you demand repentance from your computer when it breaks? Thats not surprising with names like NosyIsAnUglyMan and JarLikeBoys! I have a feeling that the thread for discussing free will already exists anyway, so we should probably just find that..

Hi Xenocrates, welcome to the forum. I take it your post was more in reply to me than anything NosyIsAnUglyMan said. Anyway, i'm pretty certain that NosyIsAnUglyMan has been well and truly banned. He has issues with the admins for something or other, and he probably won't be back any time soon.You're right, the science doesn't really belong in this thread. I shouldn't really have indulged NosyIsAnUglyMan in it, but as there were no other takers I felt there was no harm in discussing with him. We should keep the thread on philosophical issues from now on. (I have a scientific background too btw. No biology, all physics). And then... From what you wrote there I take it that you think our rebellious nature comes from being tempted by demons etc. (You're right that they're existence or lack thereof is not part of this topic. I don't believe they exist, but for the purpose of this debate i'll suspend disbelief. I'm sure there will be threads out there that discuss it, or if not maybe you could propose one in the Propose New Topics forum). And you believe that if we are not tempted by demons then we will not choose to sin. But you also said somewhere that sin is physically (if thats the right word) not possible in heaven as it's not allowed. So what would happen if of your own choosing you did choose to sin in heaven. If you have free will then that is a possibility. If it's not a possiblity then it would be possible to create a situation on earth where free will existed but we would never be able to choose to sin, and sin would be uneseccary.

Ok, I get you now. You think that demons just exacerbate the problem, but removing their influence doesn't stop humans sinning as they will still desire to due to their sinful nature?But when you go into heaven this sinful nature will somehow be removed and you'll have no desire to sin and you will choose not to sin?Well I can see two alternatives as to what could happen here. Either your sinful nature has been completely removed (or maybe simply repressed by god so completely that the sinful part of you is no longer evident, which amounts to the same thing) so you are no longer "you", you are different somehow to what you are here on earth. If this is the case, I see no reason for you to ever have had that part of you in the first place. You could have been created with free will and no desire to sin in the first place. (This also removes the free will defense for evil that some people use, but that is a different topic).The second option is that the sinful nature part of you is not removed, and there is every possibility that you may choose to sin while in heaven. I know you said that you will always choose not to, but if you have a sinful nature then there is nothing stopping you choosing to sin. If that is the case this brings up the question of what will happen if someone sins in heaven? It also makes heaven no different to earth, meaning that anything that could be learned on earth could also be learned in heaven.I'm simply running the concept through my head and seeing where it leaves me. I simply find the christian concept of heaven to not fit with the existence of the universe, and specifically the existence of people on earth. Obviously this is all purely hypotheitical so I don't expect any hard and fast answers.

Don't worry, i'm just intending a sharing of thoughts This is where I will differ with you. I'm of the opinion that if a part of me was removed then I wouldn't be the same person, I would cease to be "me". I happen to like being "me", and all of what I am goes towards that. Sorry, I should have explained it better. This was from the second option, where your sinful nature wasn't removed and you could still choose to sin in heaven. If this were the case, I fail to see how heaven would be different to earth, so there was no actual need for the step on earth. Everything could have been taught in heaven. I get the feeling that you aren't of the opinion that you can choose to sin in heaven though, so this part may not be relevant. And I will. One thing to note though is that none of this has any particular connection to me being an atheist. That comes purely from my lacking any experience of evidence that a god exists, rather than anything that I consider inconsistent about the concepts

I don't see people in terms of perfect or imperfect, or anything else in nature come to think of it. I could tell you if a circle was perfect or imperfect, or if a number was a perfect square or not, but these things have strict definitions. We define what the "perfect" state of them is.With humans I don't think there is a perfect state, an ideal. People try to make us think there is. If you look at advertising you see this constantly. The models you see wearing the clothes and wearing the makeup are meant to be perfect specimens with perfect bodies, and more than that perfect lives and perfect personalities. The advertisers try to make us define ourselves based on certain things, and then make us use that definition to realise we're not perfect. There's a great scene in fight club at the start. The guy is upset when his apartment burns down because he thinks that he was only a few items away from having the perfect life but it all burnt down in the fire. I don't think defining a perfect state for myself is a good thing, I prefer to accept myself as me and work with what I have As for the example of having an eating disorder, that would certainly be a problem physically. I don't think that deleting a part of my self would be the best way to solve it though. If you go along that route, where would you stop? You could go on deleting parts of what is you forever until there's nothing left based on the unreachable state of perfection you have in mind.I think the best way to deal with it is accept yourself for who you are, and work on any problems you have without trying to delete them as if they never existed. Mistakes are more valuable than sucesses in many ways, as long as you don't forget about them I would certainly never want a part of me removed based on some arbitrary image of perfection

Not exactly, for example I do think that the perfect circle is an absolute definition. I just don't think that "human" has a strict definition in the way a circle does. For example, someone with a deformity is no less perfectly human than someone with no deformity. I think that with humans, "perfect" is completely contextual. One person's "perfect" human is not another persons "perfect" human.And you're right, I don't believe in an objective reality that exists in the same way say as gravity. I think it is derived from human needs. We need society because we're pretty weak and useless on our own. There are certain things which help society to exist, and there are certain things which hinder it.Oh, and i'm more than willing to continue this by PM or email, whichever you want