omnicient, omnipresent, creator AND judge?

Hi, I've never posted here before. I was having a discussion with a Calvinist who believes that his religion is rationally/fact based and not faith-based. In the context of this discussion, the topic of god as judge came up. I argued that an omnicient and omnipotent creator cannot rationally hold accountable his creation for actions because, as an omnicient creator, every design decision consequence is known, therefore all actions taken by his creation are necessarily direct manifestations of god's will (regardless of any perception of free will on the part of the creation). This is a paradox, yes? An omnicient, omnipotent creator and judge, by definition, is irrational (judging a pre-determined [by the creator] "choice" is pointless). The Calvinist argued that god rightly judges the creation's intent, that the perception of free will is enough. The creation has earnestly made a choice (regardless of pre-determination). To me, this seems irrelevant. What say you?

An omnicient, omnipotent creator and judge, by definition, is irrational (judging a pre-determined [by the creator] "choice" is pointless).

Hi Inthenever, I know nothing about Calvinists and disagree with what you quoted the man you talked with said. But the above you asked I can give my opinion on, for me if there is an omnipotent creator or creators they only judge our soul not our choices here in this life. Every religion since Egyptian times, says about the afterlife of our soul and how it is [judged} and weighed (by the God Anubis who weighs the heart of the deceased (left tray) against the feather of Ma'at, goddess of truth and justice (right tray) not at anytime does a deity intercede or intervene in human choices until they die and in the afterlife. Choice isn`t pointless in this world its crucial to the freedom and learning by our choices. Hope that that clears it up for you.

regards

♫♪х₣∑эЖ♪₧Á♫

Hmm, interesting.

I think the piece of that I'd struggle with is still the same as the calvinist I debated with. If god creates you and is omniscient/omnipotent, from its perspective you can have no free will. I've not much contemplated the soul. I think I tend to think more in physicalist terms. But, wouldn't that still be part of god's creation? There is nothing independent to judge given an omnipotent/omnicient creator?

hum...Maybe I wasn`t clear enough.

Example: a parent knows their child is an adult by 16yrs old and they have to let them make their own choices, even though the parent knows by insight and wisdom and experience and listening and seeing that the child is on a collision course to disaster, they still can`t intervene as the child has shut them out and is ignoring their advice through their wanting their independance and so the parent lets their child learn. If they did intervene the child would resent them, until that child learned by EXPERIENCE. Do you now understand what I am saying? If God is the parent of humanity he would allow us freewill to choose our mistakes even if he knew better because we shut him/her/them out of our co-creating with knowledge and wisdom, we became our own god over gods and we ignored our parent. What is the parent? the parent is our heart and soul and conscience the child is our not learning and inexperience our inhumanity and our ego..the moment we say to ourselves humans don`t have a soul is the moment we become inhumane toward our fellow humans. In fact all living life inclusive of nature and animals have a soul until man or woman see`s this its their misfortune. Man is his own undoing we don`t need any gods for that

I guess this topic is better to be forwarded to some Christian forum, let the buggers deal with their own waste. Philosophy has little to do with this at all.

Marabod wrote
guess this topic is better to be forwarded to some Christian forum, let the buggers deal with their own waste. Philosophy has little to do with this at all.

That coming from the person who quotes the Talmud haha I guess its okay to be bias against one faith but accepting of another more irrational one.

Duh! I quote Talmud, Bible, Friedrich Engels, Nietzsche, Lenin, Bush or whoever I find necessary to quote. Ever tried to overcome the hard heritage from the neanderthal ancestors?

Pia, parents have a responsibility NOT to let their children hit destruction. If the child has those needs, perhaps the parents should rethink their parenting skills and what they have done so far (and not done). A happy child has no needs to rebel. Also, if the child is not stopped, and gains experience, it may come do despise his parents, BECAUSE they didn't stop (=they didn't care).

As for the soul, you seem to follow the path of "life after death, but not rebirth"? And that's fine, the problem is when a person destroys another person, the victim may not gain a "reward" but punishment after death (if the soul of the victim reaches darkness). So basicly, punished on earth, punished in hell? Are some souls born to suffer?

Mark wrote
Pia, parents have a responsibility NOT to let their children hit destruction

This is a misunderstanding. The part I wrote in my example that you are disagreeing with isn`t saying parents are not to act responsible or stop caring . Parents with grown up adult children can`t make them listen to them or do anything if their children ignore them refusing to listen. It becomes the adults (the parents child) decision if they listen to their parents or ignore them.

Marabod you are unduly fixated with abasing Christianity so when you quote the Talmud this all makes sense that you would oppose and abuse the name of Jesus Christ. I have read the book The Truth about the Talmud by Michael A Hoffman. If you want to compare religious nonsensical neanderthal quotes.

Mark wroteAs for the soul, you seem to follow the path of "life after death, but not rebirth"?

Hum.. I have said no such thing. This was a religious question from the OP and I gave my opinion on the question asked.

Mark wrote
the problem is when a person destroys another person, the victim may not gain a "reward" but punishment after death (if the soul of the victim reaches darkness). So basicly, punished on earth, punished in hell? Are some souls born to suffer?

I think my post addressed this question by saying all religions since Egyptian times have weighed the soul and sought the truth and eeked out justice. So anyone who gets away with destroying another person in this lifetime would not get off the hook in the next world or afterlife. How could they if their soul is weighed and the truth and justice is decided? if the truth is the person who was the victim wants reward and justice that would be covered in the afterlife judgements upon the soul of their punisher. This is all hypothetical. But it makes sense to me, we don`t have to be reborn to balance things out, it would make sense to me if we are reborn if we choose to be reborn, not that we have to be reborn. Nature works in a cyclic fashion so rebirth and reincarnation isn`t at all unreasonable to believe, but what would be unreasonable to believe is that we are reborn to get even with someone who hurt us from a previous lifetime. That is someone trying to find an excuse for their bad behaviour this time around

These are all interesting ideas, but let me first explain that which I believe you might have misunderstood.

When I said that you do not follow the path of rebirth, was based on that which you wrote. The parallell to the Egyptians (and Christianity) implied that. There is no reincarnation in those teachings (that I know of [except for one/some of the Gnostic teachings where one can find this]). Another reason I wrote that, is that the idea of rebirth can explain human suffering with karma.

I didn't mean that reincarnation can be used to get even. No no no. My point with the victim was this: That the victim itself becomes the perpetrator (because of the victimization). Example: a sexually abused child grows up and does the same to another child. The point is, the child is actually a victim, and has not healed but reached darkness. For this, we'd assume he is punished after death, he has not a pure heart, on the contrary, the heart is very very dark. So, he was a victim on earth and punished here, after death there is no salvation, but more suffering. Is this a soul born for suffering?

Parents with grown up adult children have less to say, but it doesn't mean they abandon them. If an adult child suffers, surely the parent helps? The child may not listen, but a real parent will make sure they have done everything they could, and even more. Furthermore, a good upbringing creates good relationships. If the relationship between the child and the parent is bad, then the child cannot be at fault.

"Example: a parent knows their child is an adult by 16yrs old and they have to let them make their own choices, even though the parent knows by insight and wisdom and experience and listening and seeing that the child is on a collision course to disaster, they still can`t intervene as the child has shut them out and is ignoring their advice through their wanting their independance and so the parent lets their child learn. If they did intervene the child would resent them, until that child learned by EXPERIENCE. Do you now understand what I am saying? If God is the parent of humanity he would allow us freewill to choose our mistakes even if he knew better because we shut him/her/them out of our co-creating with knowledge and wisdom, we became our own god over gods and we ignored our parent. What is the parent? the parent is our heart and soul and conscience the child is our not learning and inexperience our inhumanity and our ego..the moment we say to ourselves humans don`t have a soul is the moment we become inhumane toward our fellow humans. In fact all living life inclusive of nature and animals have a soul until man or woman see`s this its their misfortune. Man is his own undoing we don`t need any gods for that"

I think I understand your point, namely that God allows free choice so that humanity can learn experience. But, I think this does not address my points. What I'm pointing out is the incoherence of an omnimax god creator. From god's perspective, there can be no free will. We may have an illusion of free will, but an omnicient creator necessarily makes all "choices" for its creation because it knows the outcome of each design decision. You mentioned judging the "soul," but in this context, the soul is no more independent than any other piece of the puzzle. In order for this to work, there would have to be two "gods," an effectively omniscient judge and an effectively omnipotent creator (disclaimer: I am aware that neither omniscence or omnipotence are logically possible).

As far as the consequences of not acknowledging a soul, I'm not sure I understand that point. Since the soul is not measurable/demonstrable, how is it relevant?

What I'm pointing out is the incoherence of an omnimax god creator. From god's perspective, there can be no free will. We may have an illusion of free will, but an omnicient creator necessarily makes all "choices" for its creation because it knows the outcome of each design decision. You mentioned judging the "soul," but in this context, the soul is no more independent than any other piece of the puzzle. In order for this to work, there would have to be two "gods," an effectively omniscient judge and an effectively omnipotent creator (disclaimer: I am aware that neither omniscence or omnipotence are logically possible).

Let me try!

Why can there not be a free will? Do humans not make different decisions in the same situations? If the "free will" was fixed, we'd be alike, making the same decisions, the same predicatable decisions, wouldn't we? God may know the possibilities, or even how we will act, but the possibilities are still in the plural, hence there must be choice involved? What you could blame God for, is that he didn't stop you, or that he didn't stop someone else from harming you. But that, would also be a choice, not everyone lives in the past, some do move on and fogive.

Yes, we have the perception of free will. But, god does not allow, he does. This seems to me a necessary consequence of omniscience at the time of creation. He knows the consequence of every design decision. Therefore, he is effectively the only actor in the universe. As, he already knows the choices you will make, knew them as he created you, decided how you would be created, there is no free will for you in relation to God. Differences in human behavior are the consequence of god's whim/design, not the decisions of humans. . . i.e., these behavioral variations are a manifestations of god's will, not human's.


Disclaimer: I am a weak atheist.

Marabod you are unduly fixated with abasing Christianity so when you quote the Talmud this all makes sense that you would oppose and abuse the name of Jesus Christ. I have read the book The Truth about the Talmud by Michael A Hoffman. If you want to compare religious nonsensical neanderthal quotes.

Christianity is the main religion in all countries where I was ever living - I would be gladly "bashing" the remote religions too but I have little personal experience with them and do not know what exactly do they do to the people, while about Christianity I know enough to be able to say something.

It is very nice to hear that you read a book about Talmud, but I always prefer the primary sources to the secondary. Similar way I would avoid reading a book called "the Truth about the Bible" or "The Truth about Quran" or "The Truth about Quantum Mechanics", I would rather read Bible, Quran or a QM textbook themselves. Say, my knowledge about Relativity is based on 5 lectures, which Einstein gave in Princeton university in 1921, thus I have my own opinion of it and do not require anyone else's explanations.

In the forums I seek to exchange these personal opinions, not the opinions taken from some books by the self-appointed experts.

Christianity is the main religion in all countries where I was ever living - I would be gladly "bashing" the remote religions too but I have little personal experience with them and do not know what exactly do they do to the people, while about Christianity I know enough to be able to say something.

Marabod, would you say that seeing Christianity is a primary source, or is it possible that it is actually a second-handed source, since what you see is other people's interpretations of Christianity?

INTHENEVER:

Are your thoughts that free will cannot exist because the choices are pre-made by God? Maybe one could see it like that. Yet there are choices, and we can pick either-or. You say God cannot punish because there is no free will. But this (limited) free will does include good and bad choices, making judgement even logical. God may know the outcome, but the design still included and does still include the possibility of choice.