The Psychology Behind the Belief in Heaven and Hell

But if God defines righteousness then whatever God does is "righteaous" and whatever opposes this is "unrighteaous". By definition alone. This is circular. It also leads to some quite bizzarre depictions of 'righteaous' and 'unrighteaous'.When God is being vengeful and retributional he is being 'righteaous' whilst those who might oppose this vengefulness on grounds of compassion for example would, by this definition, be 'unrighteaous'.I just do not see how this is compatible with the more sensible aspects of the Christian message (peace, love, forgiveness etc. etc.) or with any sort of morality that could meaningfully be called "absolute"??Frankly it all seems like an overly intricate web of justification by definition.

Well at least we agree that simply defining gods actions as righteaous is a flawed and circular argument. None of which addresses the circularity of the situation here.If gods actions are not righteaous by definition then by what measure are they being declared righteaous?

OK. God is zog. By definition. Thus whatever god does is presumably zoggy by definition? In fact God is incapable of being un-zoggy by definition.So how can we ever know what is zog and what is not without knowing the mind of God at any given time?I want to live my life in a way that is consistent and zog. But how do I ever know what is zoggy and what isn't?In any choice, any course of action, how do I know how to be zog so that I can avoid hell and achieve heaven?

It's actually spelt existence. Even in American I believe.I am prone to this sort of thing and would rather it was pointed out to me so I assumed the same from you. Feel free to ignore me either way.Good post by the way.

Because this assumes that I somehow know what God deems to be right or wrong. Whether I actually believe in him or not.But how do I know that God doesn't consider my actions wholly justified? How do I know what God thinks?

Well yes. How exactly do you propose that I know what God deems to be right or wrong?The answer to this rather obvious question seems to be a glaring omission in your replies. Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

So God is also evil..........?

As the ultimate creator of evil is it not then the case that God is capable of evil? How can the creation for the potential of evil be "good"?

Well you tell me. In what way are gods actions not evil?

Surely those with free-will can only do evil if the potential for evil already exists? So how can the creation for the potential of evil be "good"? I don't think free-will is any sort of answer to the question I asked.And I still don't know how I am supposed to know what God thinks is good or evil at any gven time. As per Message 124.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Untrue. Evil can only be commited by those with free-will if the potential for evil has already been created by God. Why not simply operate free-will in an environemnt where only goodness and indifference exists? There is plenty of scope for choice and free-will right there without actual evil ever coming into it. I mean how many of us really choose between good and evil rather than good and shades of indifference on a daily basis? So why even create the opportunity for evil? How can that possibly be deemed a "good" or even necessary thing?I am afraid that free-will is not an adequate answer as to why god created the potential for evil. But we don't know what God thinks is good or evil at any given time. That is the point. And given that (apparently) our salvation rests upon knowing this it seems like something of an oversight on His part.Why can't he make his absolute morality known to us? Then we can exercise genuine free-will. As things stand we have people like you taking a well intentioned best guess approach and people like me concluding that even if there is an absolute morality in existence I will never know what it is so I might as well assume that it doesn't exist and make up my own mind. With a bit of clear communication from him upstairs all this opportunity for poorly informed but well intentioned choices could be avoided. Poor management. If you are claiming that people can just feel what God determines to be right or wrong in any given situation then you are on seriously dodgy ground. Different people's consciences will result in radically different and often wholly contradictory outcomes. Leaving us more lost than ever in our quest to know what God deems to be right or wrong, good or eveil. So lost that we might as well give up on ever working it out and simply sort out how best to live together ourselves in fact. Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

Really? So eyes and ears interpret information? From where I am sitting you are just talking ill informed nonsense. And what the hell has any of this got to do with belief in heaven or hell anyway?

And yet there are so many who would claim that they do know gods will and who are utterly convinced of this. And yet they do things I think my own conscience would never allow. So the question remains.How do we know what God considers to be right and wrong in any given situation? Because personal conscience leads to conflicting and, what I would deem to be, desperately immoral acts.

Good grief Iano you seem to be advocating that whatever people convince themselves is right is fine by God as long as they genuinely believe it? This is more morally relativist than most ardent moral relatavists would go! Well if he wanted the free-est of wills surely an omnipotent god could have made an even worse form of evil posible? The scale of man's ability to do wickedness could have been even greater? I mean presumably no man can be as evil as Satan himself (whether Satan is real or just a concept of ultimate evil is irrelevant to this). So it would seem we already don't have the "free-est" of wills in terms of our ability to commit possible evilness.So again - If there is going to be a limit imposed, which there must be, why not stop at indifference rather than evil? Once again free-will doesn't seem to answer all the questions. Even the "free-est" of will.

Ok. I have read it again and it still seems like that is what you are saying to me. Whilst I appreciate the poetically eloquent nature of your posts regarding god, in this instance I think it would help if you clarified in more direct language. Can you clarify? How do we know what god thinks is good or evil in any given situation? I am obviously being dum today as I don't get this either. You said god wanted man to have the free-est of wills and so had to create evil. But you agree that there are limits on this evil thus meaning that man doesn't actually have the free-est of wills at all. This seems inherently contradictory.If we are going to have holes in the bucket of goodness then why can we not have holes of indifference rather than evil? Like I said before most of us do not choose between good and evil on a daily basis. Most choose between good and shades of indifference. Why cannot judgement be made on the basis of those choices without invoking any evil at all?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.