Grace2u wrote:
Christianity actually agrees with you in a sense. Reformed theology would argue that you are in rebellion against God and that any definition of good you produce, God will not adhere to - and thereofre to you, God is not good.
I'm not actually rebelling against any deity so much as rejecting your personal theology. All religions have an explaination as to why some individuals chose to reject their particular God. It is an essential part of the religious formula.
This is ultimately what drives the world against God. In its feeble attempts to be God - it denies the reality that He is all things and that everything : sensible morality, rationality, logic and science all depend upon His existance. So in an attempt to make ourselves God, we deny that which is obvious. To the world, Christ - the Wisdom of God, is foolish. What the world fails to see is that it is dependet upon His existance in order to make sense of itself and of the entire human experience
The world
is not against the concept of a God . The vast majority of people believe in a God and submit themsleves to their God concept.
In what way are any of us attempting to be God? Are we attempting to be God by bettering ourselves and gaining knowledge? By gaining a better understanding of the universe and the world around us? Because a tiny minority of us reject the intellectuals shackles of faith and dogma? Your just spouting non-sensical Christian mantra, aren't you? This is such a worrisome and daft accusation, and it is often the basis for Christians to rally against the areas we have made most significant progress throughout modern history.
The religious definition of morality is far from sensible, in the emotive realm of religion there is little room for rationality, your theology repeatedly defies logic, and none of your material claims stand up to scientific investigation.
Existence is not reliant on the created thelogy of man. Besides insight into the human condition, religion has provided us with no insights into the natural world. Indeed it held us back until the advent of what you call "our attempts to be God", and it will drag us back down if given a second chance.
"Do I find God personally pleasing or Does the Christian God meet the subjective definition of good that I have produced - even though it might change as my opinions change"
Or perhaps better put,
"Do I like the Christian version of God"
The question is, and remains is God good? That he is not, is settled. That anyone should not desire anything ungood, goes without saying
Just because you don't like God, doesn't mean that He doesn't exist or that He isn't good if He does.
True. Let's just ignore my opinion of your God concept and deal with the fact that you have absolutely no way of knowing of your God is good, have only contrary evidence and this theological dilemma is yet more evidence that your God concept is merely a flawed product of the human mind.
It just means that He doesn't meet up to your humanistic definition of good
We can restate that as the
human definition of good.
Thanks for again stating that your God isn't good.
It just means that He doesn't meet up to your humanistic definition of good - something that He clearly states He will never meet up with
Well he could try, just a little. Not a very good role model, is he?
Then, once again, we have absolutely no way of knowing whether he is worthy of trust, worship or respect. You have no basis for your claim that God is good, other than what believe is his say so. If he can't even live up the the moralistics qualities, that ironically you argue he imbued us with, then he is not a concept worthy of our consideration.
You have several options:
1) Try to rewrite the nature history of your religion. Deny God's cupability for the ungood acts of Bible history, the creation of evil, and the ongoing ungood of the world. You'll very much have to limit his powers.
2) Admit the largely ungood character of your God and claim that he should be worshipped on other basis: fear, awe, loud voice, biggest sandals etc.
3) Make up a new, totally non-sensical definition for the word good, so that it encompasses all of the shitty things that the Christian God embodies.
You chose number 3.
His goodness is far greater than any changing and relative defition the greatest humanisitc philosophers could come up with. HE IS THE STANDARD.
And you know this how? How do you evidence your God's goodness?
For example - surely you know that the Christian God is unchanging - as defined by Christianity. Your question would otherwise be this - "does some humanisitic, changing and relative definition of good apply to a God that is unchanging?" How could it be??? God might be good by todays standard but not good by tomorrows standard. Just because He might not be good now, doesn't mean that He isn't good in the universal sense. BUT, your question is not this, it is "Is God good". Clearly you are aknowledging a univerasal/unchanging standard and you are attempting to determine if an unchanging God has met this standard.
The fact that our appraisals of morality and aesthetics evolves in no way undermines the integrity or significance of those concepts. There really is no difference in the concept of religious morality anyway, as history has shown us that it evolves significantly also. Jar articulated how the Christian concept of God has changed throughout the history of the Bible itself. It's integrity is actually undermined by it's inability to evolve quickly enough.
It is a dangerous basis of morality because adherents believer, as you do, that anything God instructs is by definition "good".
For your God to be good, in the universal sense, he must be good by the evolving majority consensus of the the concept of good. I am not acknowledging any other universal basis for the concept of good above that of the evolving majority consensus.
This is far from an alien concept: when our courts come to applying public morality to, for example, pornography, indecent acts, offensive language etc they don't have to apply to your friggin' God for a current definition. They merely appeal to the reasonable standards of the community of that era. These concepts do evolve, but as stated above that doesn't undermine the integrity or significance of those concepts.
Stop playing daft of the defining good question.
This is why your question makes no sense. This is why in order to make sense of your question, you must affirm that which you are clearly trying to disaffirm. - namely if God is good.
Nope. We merely have to refer to the evolving majority consensus of the definition of good.
Just like you, the believer, have to refer to evolving majority when determining your own religious morality.
To ask if God meets some relative standard of good has no meaning. What is the point. Who really cares, especially since God has said that you will not agree with Him.
I don't agree with you, not your fictional deity. I have no issue with him or space monkeys.
There is a point. In an internet forum, over not much more than a week, we have established that your God concept needs not be worshipped for any reason other than fear and awe, loud voice and really big sandals. And this theological absurdity documents another arguement for the non-existence of your God.
For exmaple, you would then have the problem of good "How could an all evil god allow good in the world". Clearly, the good in this world outweighs the bad. GOd has an answer for the bad. He says that the bad is a byproduct of disobedience towards His will and rebellions against His nature. While we might not fully understand all the evil- at least we know that there are some potential answers out there - free will, differences between Gods directed and permissive will, etc.
Clearly the simplest answer is that the God that you describe does not exist and interact with the world. The nature of the world can be well rationalised without attempting to define everything in terms of the actions of an ever present deity.
I dispute the claim that good outweighs the bad in the world. What good offset the death by starvation of thousand of third world children this year? Try not to make something up or state that we do not know the bigger picture.
Free will is contradicted by the Christian concept of pre-determinism. Theological deficiency number 737.
We cannot say that we cannot understand the bigger picture in relation to evil without also admitting we cannot know the bigger picture in relation to good. Go back to post number 1 and 4. Thanks for finally asserting that
Your question ultimately has no meaning because of the fact that your definition of good is not binding on God and because God Himself has stated that you will not agree with Him. He is God and He defines goodness. Of course there are questions at times (such as when the kids were massacred in russia). This however drives me to a deeper understanding of Gods goodness however (we know evil exists, the absence of God) - not further away from Him. Because I know that GOd hates these acts far more than I could ever hope to dispise them. Because of this, I know God is good. To the qeustions, I rely upon His goodness and His understanding. This is not irrational - I do not know everything - nor do you. Many things we are not capable of understanding. This does not mean God is not good however. It only means that He is at times unsearchable and that His ways are not our ways.
This last paragraph is a nasty repeat of the same content. Once again:
- I do not care about the opinion of your fictional deity. Your fictional deity is defined as ungood. That we have established and you have admitted.
- It is you that is stating why I reject your God. Your are repeating your particular religions mantra for this anticpated dilemma.
- Your deity cannot convincingly claim to be good and then act in a very non-good way. Actions speak louder than words.
- When Christians use the word good, they mean something competely different to the standard dictionary meaning. It is extremely deceptive to use the word good in this context. In this context good includes unjustifiable murder of innocent children for the actions of their ancestors. In this context the definition is absurd.
- There are questions at all times. You cannot rationalise evil in the world and the Bible, and in turn you have no basis for rationalising God's goodness. Indeed, you cannot claim any qualities for your God, who may simply be taking the piss.
- Your only basis for claiming that God is good, in the traditional sense is on the basis of a blind appeal to faith. You cannot evidence any goodness.
- Your God is not understandable because he is made up. It is an ineffective and progressively obsolete attempt to explain the events of the natural world and human nature.
™ Version 4.2