Let's pressupose first that we're trying to prove a God that is all-good. Meaning, he is only good, and not evil.
1. God is all-good.
2. Good is determined by being contrasted with evil.
3. Therefore, for good to be defined, evil must exist.
4. If God is all-good, then evil exists.
5. A being who is all-good would want to exterminate evil.
6. Yet evil exists.
7. Therefore, either God is not all-good or he is helpless to stop evil.
At this point let us resume with the assumption that God is still all-good. If this is the case, he must be unable to prevent the evil. Now, before the religious doctrine starts sprouting out of the woodwork, let me add an analogy to help this argument (To better put it into context):
Suppose that God is a lifeguard or capable adult laying on the beach. A child comes along. God warns the child of the dangers of the water. But the child goes in anyways. The tide begins to pull the child out (Or a shark appears, jellyfish, current, etc.). Now, could anyone believe that God would be all-good if he did NOT run out and save that child?
Yes. As Neo would say, "Choice. The problem is choice."
The child made a choice, God is constrained to leave free agency/will be.
However, this would not hinder the mercy of God in the resurrection as ignorance is not something that makes you unworthy of your reward.
Life here is not the point. The life after is. God is constrained here out of justice, but can exercise mercy in the after. However, he cannot be merciful if you 'sin away' your reward.
I think everyone's missing one key point though- the idea of an all-powerful, all-good God is incompatable with freedom of choice and the existance of evil.
Re: Re: A thought on the idea of an all-good God...
"Innocent bystander" is an oxymoron. One who stands by and does nothing while someone is hurt can hardly be called innocent.
The child, i.e. human beings may not have understood the warning of the lifeguard, i.e. God or the consequences of his actions.
Any lifeguard who says, "I warned the child to stay away from the water. By disobeying me, he made a choice. And I am constrained to not interfere with his free will," is not a very good lifeguard.
Moreover, no one has free will according to the Bible:
One understanding of the concept of omnibenevolence focuses upon a more literal reading of the word: a perfect and complete desire for goodness. Under this explanation, God always desires what is good, but that doesn’ t necessarily mean that God ever actually tries to actualize the good. However, it is unclear how and why a God who desires the good would not also work to actualize the good. It is also difficult to understand how we can label God as morally good when God desires the good and is capable of achieving good but doesn’ t bother to actually try.
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I am not driven by people’ s praise and I am not slowed down by people’ s criticism.
You only live once. But if you live it right, once is enough. Wrong. We only die once, we live every day!
Make poverty history.
the basic idea here is why doesn't god intervene.. This is a common attack at Christians...
Why doesn't god answer prayers?
Why doesn't god stop all the killings?
Why does god let people get sick or starve??
What you have to understand is that god is not trying to force you to accept him.. By intervening at any time he would prove his existence (Now god did send his only son to us, You could say why did he do this if he doesn't want to force us to accept him? The answer being before jesus came we knew nothing of god, with his departure people still refused to believe, as not all had seen him or heard of him).. Now if he proved his existence it would force none believers to accept him not out of choice but out of fear...
God doesn't want you to accept him cause you have no choice in the matter....
Your view of god is limited if you go by scripture. You cannot have the negative without the positives or good without evil. It's part of what we are. A god doesn't intervene because we create what we experience as a human race. God is in both the negatives along with the positives.
God only really showed himself to a few people, 1 at a time... and never did anything that would radicaly cause views to change...
Yes back then is different then today... back then it was to get his message across, It was needed to convince the people that Jesus wasn't crazy... if he did it today people would capture it, and everyone would be forced to believe... or suffer in hell...
Its not a perfect view, I'll admit that the bible is very rusty... I wouldn't take but the most basic message from it, otherwise a combination of time and old age views distort the message...
Excellent feedback on this. I really appreciate it, guys. The first argument I just kinda thought of while driving to school one day. It's a very interesting and definate argument, I might say. One that's always bothered me.
KMC Community Forums
Mar 11th, 2006 08:50 PM
By Barker
