Is Christ cruel? (For member Schrafinator)

You misunderstand. People here have said God's intention is to create an unbeliever to go to hell. That's means his will and intentions must be that specific people go to hell.If those people are named right now for me, let's say "Joe bloggs" was the victim of God intending him to go to hell, then Joe Bloggs, as of tomorrow, could become a believer. Therefore, God would not intend people for hell, even if he foresaw them going there, as his intention and will would be wrong, and Jo Bloggs would go to heaven.You see, if it is God's will that Joe Bloggs go to hell, then Joe can change that, thus the choice is really Joe's. It doesn't matter what anyone says Mike. To prove God intends people to go to hell you MUST show that that is his will NOW and in order to show that a will precedes and outcome, and is truly his will. Otherwise, it isn't his will.Think about it. God might create someone, but if he created them to go to hell, then he would have decided that that person would go there long ago. SO in order to prove to me it is his will they perish you MUST tell me the specific name he decided long ago.As for dead people, you can say now that it was God's intention and will that they go to hell, but can you tell me that when they are alive? If Mary died an unbeliever, you'd have to prove it was his will before she died, as he would have decided her fait before He created her. It's no good saying it's was his will when she is dead, as that proves nothing.You must prove A)it was God's will before she died in order to then prove it by her dying an unbeliever B)If she dies, then anyone can say it was God's will, which proves nothing. We can still say he foresaw her death, but his will would have to be proven by way of him giving us her name and showing us it was his will beforehand. Him foreseeing something and willing it are two different things.Showing me her name on a list before her death would prove it was God's will. But if you name Shraff NOW, then she can change her mind tomorrow.Conclusion: Even though God foresees people going to hell, he doesn't create them to go there, nor is it his will, because people choosing to believe would negate that willThe missing term is choice. It's only possible that we create our own fait, as the choice we have is not negated. You can choose right now, to believe. The choice is real, you must show the choice isn't real. But we all know it is.Red - doesn't need proving.
Yellow - does need proving.If a man said to you, "that man just died and he left me some money", if there was no will beforehand, you couldn't prove it.PROVE IT.This message has been edited by J. Davis, 06-02-2005 12:26 PM

The flaw lies right there. If Schraf does believe then God would have known that to begin with. So the correct path to take would be God knows that Schraf will believe. Schraf believes. God was right.If you are talking about a God who can foresee, then God will know that one day Schraf will believe (he can foresee it).If God cannot foresee, he would not speculate in the first place on whether at some point in the future Schraf will believe or not.

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The flaw lies right there. If Schraf does believe then God would have known that to begin with

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No, it's not a flaw - it's a premise of the argument under discussion. And unless you wish to claim that EVERYONE will convert to Christianity and be saved it is not a premise that can reasonably rejected.

I understand you. Thank you.lfen

If you wish to post here again, you can email either me or the Queen and explain why you should be allowed to continue to post at EvC.

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The premise is, correct me if I am wrong, that "God knows that Schraf will not believe". Right? If God knows that then God must be the forseeing God and he knows then Schraf will not believe. Schraf will not go on to believe later, if God has forseen that she will not, since if she did, then God would not have foreseen it.Therefore, either God can foresee and knows that Schraf will never believe (and Schraf never will)
or
God cannot foresee and does know what Schraf will do only that which is in her heart right now.Now, there is Biblical support for the latter. Check out Job 1. God clearly did not know for sure that Job would remain faithful after all the testing. The satan clearly knew that God did not know. Therefore, God does not know how the heart's of mankind will change and what state they will be in in the future. As such, God does not know how Schraf will end her existence, only what her heart says now.

bold mineWhat you don't seem to see is that by creating someone in the first place, knowing that they will be atheists at death IS saying its his will. Please answer the questions I asked before:
1. Is god omniscient?
2. Is god the sole creator of life?No one is arguing that mere knowledge makes it his will. It is the knowledge coupled with creating WHILE having the knowledge.

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Asgara
"Embrace the pain, spank your inner moppet, whatever....but get over it"select * from USERS where CLUE > 0http://asgarasworld.bravepages.com
http://perditionsgate.bravepages.com

J. Davis has left the building. If he wishes to return he can email either you or me and explain. See Message 129.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Give it up mike, we know who you are and your argument hasn't changed since you've been around here.

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Asgara
"Embrace the pain, spank your inner moppet, whatever....but get over it"select * from USERS where CLUE > 0http://asgarasworld.bravepages.com
http://perditionsgate.bravepages.com

I agree the concept of something being outside of time is confusing, to say the least. One might argue that a time-bound being can have no concept of eternity (i.e,--absence of time). But the idea is meant to explain how God could know everything we are "going to do" (from our point of view) and yet we also have free will.As far as your point that God "has no idea of the effects of his actions," I think I would phrase it a little differently:God knows everything but the only thing there is to know is the eternal present. There are no "effects," for to have an effect is to be in time.As the poet said, "Human kind cannot bear very much reality."So we have "space-time"--an illusion.

I think, Ifen, you have taken my words out of context. People do not have free will because God is watching them; people have free will, according to this doctrine, because their choices are not fore-ordained in the everlasting Now.

Yes, the premise under discussion is that God knows that Schraf will not believe. If you reject the idea that God has that sort of foreknowledge then your view is rather at odds with the idea being defended here.As to Biblical support I suggest you consider the well-known prediction that Peter would deny Jesus 3 times before the cock crowed. If true that reveals fairly detailed prior knowledge of human decisions (not only Peter, but the people he encounters).But y you probably ought to be discussing your ideas on the thread about how propecy works.

By clipping the quote where you did you made me appear to be saying something I didn't say. I'm all in favor of brevity, and a reduced quote would have been fine if you had responded to what I actually intended to communicate, and what I did communicate in the full quote, but you instead responded to what you made me appear to say instead of what I actually said. I very clearly wasn't raising the issue of sin, I explicitly said worship.It turns out you're only playing devil's advocate, explaining why your posts gave the appearance of inadvertently making my points for me. Your characterization of a God who places people in harm's way to intimidate them into worshipping him is probaby drifting pretty far from what true conservative Christians would likely say.--Percy

That is the complete message I was responding to. I think there is a big gap between "not making them do it; He's just watching them." and "Hence, they have free will."Free will though apparently obvious is very obscure. The advaitist argument of Wayne Liquorman and his guru Ramesh Balsekar is that there isn't free will. That just as science suspects it's all conditioning and response, and consciousness does indeed just watch it.Someone told me about going to see the latest Star War movie and how their friends left in tears. Nobody really died and no one in the movie had free will either, it was a script the ending was already on the film along with the opening, but those in the audience were identified. In a similiar way consciousness identifies with the unfolding process of the organism and it's conflicts and is under the illusion that it is the organism and is making decisions. Awakening is when that "divine hypnosis" is removed and one realizes that one was never the organism, one was free all along along, but that is not within phenomenality. It is transcendent freedom.lfen

I am not suggesting that God has no foresight.The issue was raised right at the beginning of the debate (by the seeming conservative Christian, robinrohan) when he mentioned Boethius Message 38, and Calvin. The argument (and its critisism). I don't think Boethius was making the argument robinrohan thought he was, maybe he was I don't know. Boethius' argument is essentially that God knows all future events, but he does not cause them by knowing them. The free will is still intact, even if God knows what is coming. In some ways this solution plays out like a tragedy play. Maybe that's why Jesus wept :-p