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Author Topic:   Faith and belief - The Almighty God revealed through his grandness
Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 76 of 224 (497836)
02-06-2009 8:42 AM
Reply to: Message 65 by Cedre
02-06-2009 7:53 AM


Evolution fails to explain morallity in this instances and there are more examples but I'll stop here.
The exact details of each one are not simple, but evolution can easily explain why people do the things you listed just now: Nature is red in tooth and claw.
Evolution is about survival of genes, not the survival of the species. The survival of the species is a byproduct of the survival of the genes.
This is a thread in its own right. Perhaps we can take the discussion to one? Maybe Evolutionary Explanation for Morality?
To shift us back onto topic, the monotheist, when discussing religion must answer the following, "Is what is moral commanded by God because it is moral, or is it moral because it is commanded by God?". Perhaps your answer will reveal the Almighty God through its grandness?
Oh and by the way, this thread is 25% complete since they close at about 300 posts. I hope you planned for that.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 65 by Cedre, posted 02-06-2009 7:53 AM Cedre has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 80 by Cedre, posted 02-06-2009 8:57 AM Modulous has replied

Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 83 of 224 (497848)
02-06-2009 9:23 AM
Reply to: Message 80 by Cedre
02-06-2009 8:57 AM


What does your gut tell you, do you think its right to kill.
It depends on who is doing the killing and who is being killed and why.
Would you mind if I killed your mother and father, would you retain any sorrow in your heart after the deed, or anger toward me.
Yes I would mind. Interestingly, I would mind much less if you killed someone else's mother and father (say some African parents or some Indonesian ones).
The answer is simple what is moral is commanded by God because it is moral.
So morality is independent of God and God is bound by that morality just as we are? God is just a messenger of morality, not its creator?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 80 by Cedre, posted 02-06-2009 8:57 AM Cedre has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 85 by Cedre, posted 02-06-2009 9:34 AM Modulous has replied

Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 87 of 224 (497856)
02-06-2009 9:44 AM
Reply to: Message 85 by Cedre
02-06-2009 9:34 AM


Euthyphro
God has no choice but to be moral...he doesn't fish it out from another authority, it has always been with him just as his power has.
That doesn't make a whole lot of sense. You accept that God and morality are separate things? That God does not decide what is right or what is wrong, that Moral Law is that which God must prostrate before? Yet at the same time, God doesn't fish it from another authority?
Are you trying to have cake and eat it? Where did this moral law come from, and if it is separate from God why bring God up in a discussion about morality? Why not appeal to the ultimate morality that all beings, including God, must be beholden to?
There are some solutions to the dilemma that I won't bother arguing with you on, but your current solution seems a little incoherent. Perhaps you could expand on it a little?

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Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 152 of 224 (498131)
02-08-2009 11:07 AM
Reply to: Message 150 by DevilsAdvocate
02-08-2009 9:18 AM


Re: Modulous
I didn't cite Matthew 12:1-21 because I don't think this was a clear cut case in which Jesus disobeyed the Sabbath. But I will entertain your comments.
Agreed - I read that section as Jesus clarifying what does and does not constitute 'working on the Sabbath' which is at odds with the experts of Jewish Law: The Pharisees rather than necessarily being against the law itself.
In my opinion, all this "God can change his mind or amend or end the OT law" crap is an attempt by early Church fathers i.e. Jerome, Augustine and the like to try to rectify the obvious moral inconsistencies between the OT and the NT resulting from merging two worldviews together, the Semitic worldview of the OT and the Hellenized worldview of the NT. You explaining that God has the right to do this does not make it less of an inconsistent.
One of the things that always strikes me as odd about all this is that when God spoke to Moses in Leviticus he had the opportunity to say whatever he wanted. He could have said: Love all others as you love yourself. Instead he used the rather specific:
quote:
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I [am] the LORD.
(Lev 19)
So you should be nice to your own, but not to others? Hurray for Biblical support of Sectarian conflict.
"What do we do to the others O Lord?"
"Smite them, with a big stick. And do unspeakable things to their women folk."
"That's jolly convenient because that's what we have been doing and we have rather been enjoying it too!"
"I am thy Lord your God."
"Amen!"
It took a long time before God clarified that by "children of thy people" and "neighbour" what he really meant to say was "everybody, enemies and loved ones alike". And when God said that two witnesses were enough to condemn an adulterer to death (Deu 17), he neglected to mention that those witnesses must be without sin and that since nobody is without sin nobody would do (John 8).
It isn't that God forgot of course, it is that us sinful humans chose to misunderstand him. God is kind of like a bad debater - it isn't that his first post showed what a terrible, pedantic maniac he was, it was just that you need to interpret the first post in light of subsequent posts and you must spend hours of your own time trying to make them coherent and this is not because the poster is a bad communicator or that their position is poor/incoherent but instead it is because the reader doesn't 'get it'.
Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

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 Message 150 by DevilsAdvocate, posted 02-08-2009 9:18 AM DevilsAdvocate has not replied

Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 196 of 224 (498236)
02-09-2009 4:33 AM
Reply to: Message 178 by Cedre
02-09-2009 2:46 AM


Re: Clarification
We (Christians) look at the universe and say, wow look at what God did! And the Evolutionist looks at the same evidence and say, wow look at what Mother Nature did! But who is right.
Would it be too much to ask that you don't conflate 'Evolutionist' with 'materialist', 'physicalist' or 'atheist'?
Evolutionism is not a world view, any more than Germism or Gravitism. Evolutionists are people that accept what the science says about evolution, more or less.
So the bottomline is, no one in the EvC debate has better evidence than the other
OK, let's assume that's the case. The 'E' side has the same evidence, but their reasoning leads to their conclusions with far fewer assumptions and logical inconsistencies.
By the time this thread has lived up to its goal all will be in awe of his grandeur and nobility but most importantly his LOVE for humanity
This is the topic - you are halfway through. Is it going as you planned?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 178 by Cedre, posted 02-09-2009 2:46 AM Cedre has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 200 by Cedre, posted 02-09-2009 5:32 AM Modulous has replied

Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 208 of 224 (498256)
02-09-2009 6:12 AM
Reply to: Message 200 by Cedre
02-09-2009 5:32 AM


Re: Clarification
Wrangle as you will until you go red in the face that evoltuion is grounded fact and is in the same boat with the law of gravity, but the current state of evolution shouldn't even qualify it as a theory, much less a law.
Feel free to check out Confidence in evolutionary science to find out why I have the confidence I do have in the science behind evolution.
For the sake of the topic: Are you trying to tell me that the Grandeur of Almighty God is revealed in the fact that you think the evidence for evolution is unsatisfactory? After all, you said yourself that this is "chiefly a theological debate". So what theological conclusions can be found in the perceived failings of a scientific idea, exactly? How does it tell me anything about "grandeur and nobility but most importantly his LOVE for humanity."?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 200 by Cedre, posted 02-09-2009 5:32 AM Cedre has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 209 by Cedre, posted 02-09-2009 6:54 AM Modulous has replied

Modulous
Member
Posts: 7801
From: Manchester, UK
Joined: 05-01-2005


Message 211 of 224 (498270)
02-09-2009 7:35 AM
Reply to: Message 209 by Cedre
02-09-2009 6:54 AM


Re: Clarification
I have shown God's terrible splendor, Job 13:11 "and his glorious splendor would make you terrified." I have shown his power, Psa 97:5 "Mountains melt away like wax in the presence of the LORD of all the earth." and his lofty ways, Isa 55:8-9 "The LORD says: "My thoughts and my ways are not like yours. Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, my thoughts and my ways are higher than yours." but more importantly I have shown his love for mankind Joh 3:16 "God loved the people of this world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who has faith in him will have eternal life and never really die."
OK, so you have quoted some scripture at me.
One just has to look at the monstrous size of the universe, notice all its mysteries and wonders, and the beauty in its artistry to realize God's grandeur
And you've pointed at the universe. Somehow you have to tie the two together. I look at it, my breath is taken away, but I don't see how it necessarily must mean that God is grand.
When you do this you begin to comprehend just how big a sacrifice God perfomed for mankind when he died at their hands
Is the magnitude of badness of three days of death after torture and humuliation somehow proportional to the volume of the universe? How does that work?
Don't get me wrong - we all feal these numinous feelings from time to time, especially when we look at certain things (some get it from mathematics, others from cosmology, others from biology etc etc). However, different people associate that feeling with different things based largely upon their culture. Those raised as Muslims associate it with the glory of Allah. Those raised as Buddhists associate it with elusive flashes of enlightenment, those who have shed their culturaly religions tend to associate them with an extreme, unusual brain-based event.
Pointing at the universe and saying 'but...look at it! Read this bit of scripture! Look at the universe! Can't you see!?', doesn't really qualify as revealing the grandeur of God. It expresses that you feel the universe has grandeur I suppose.

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