by THE RATT
The conception of God is understood & accepted by Christians, Muslims, Jews, and other like-minded monotheistic theologies as a loving & just deity. God is also personified as the omnipotent, all-knowing, creator of the universe. This is evidenced by the following verses:
"He knows about everyone, everywhere. Everything about us is bare and wide open to the all-seeing eyes of our living God; nothing can be hidden from him to whom we must explain all that we have done." Hebrews 4:13 NLT
"I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope". Jeremiah 29:11 NLT
"Come, let's talk this over! says the Lord; no matter how deep the stain of your sins, I can take it out and make you as clean as freshly fallen snow. Even if you are stained as red as crimson, I can make you white as wool! If you will only let me help you, if you will only obey, then I will make you rich!" Isaiah 1:18-19
Yet this all-knowing, all-powerful deity sounds mighty surprised in this passage...
"Listen, O heaven and earth, to what the Lord is saying: The children I raised and cared for so long and tenderly have turned against me. Even the animals.. know their owner and appreciate his care for them, but not my people.. No matter what I do for them, they still don't care. Oh, what a sinful nation they are! They walk bent-backed beneath their load of guilt. Their fathers before them were evil too. Born to be bad, they have turned their backs upon the Lord, and have despised the Holy One of Israel. They have cut themselves off from my help" Isaiah 1:2-4
... and doesn't sound very loving in this one:
"Master," his disciples asked him, "why was this man born blind? Was it a result of his own sins or those of his parents?" "Neither," Jesus answered. "But to demonstrate the power of God." John 9:2-3
The question is this:
Why, as an all-knowing & all powerful God, would you need to rely on the opinions of your creation to dictate your self worth, allow them to turn against you in the first place, act surprised & angry when they turn against you, and then take your childish anger out on one of your innocent "children"?
One argument came across from the stance that God gives us Free Will. Quoting, "When talking about say Adam and Eve, the apple tree in the Garden of Eden. They were presented with temptation and he gave them the right or choice to obey or not. We're all presented with temptations and it's all of a personal choice. And how can you have any compassion without having any type of suffering? Some people live to a couple minutes old while others live to 115 yrs +. If it weren't this way don't you think it would be more of like a robotic way of life?"
My first rebuttal is to make note that the story of Adam & Eve comes from the Old Testament... which, as Christians themselves point out, the Old Testament just doesn't count. :-)
Let's say you gave me a very expensive present, knowing in advance that I wouldn't like what it was, and I refused to accept it... because that's my Free Will. Are you going to be surprised & shocked because I didn't take it? God did. Let's go a little further & say I threw that same present on the ground & stomped on it. Are you going to get pissy & go poke out the eyes of a random stranger's baby? God did. So where's your logic?
As for free will? According to the Danish theologian Soren Kierkegaard, divine omnipotence cannot be separated from divine goodness. As a truly omnipotent and good being, God could create beings with true freedom over God. Furthermore, God would voluntarily do so because "the greatest good ... which can be done for a being, greater than anything else that one can do for it, is to be truly free." So, let me get this straight: Big omnipresent God knows all about your life, knows what you're thinking, and knows what you will do in your life, because he's God & he's got a plan for you. Yet I, as a mere mortal & "God's creation", have the "freedom" to make my own decisions? What if that messes up God's great plan? That would render God falliable, which can't happen because he's big bad omnipresent God, right? Were you, as a devout theist, to suggest that God had human qualities & made mistakes, us "heathens" might actually be right... and only those who fight for God's army can be right, right???
Sorry about that, I get on my sarcastic soapbox & lose it sometimes. After all, I AM human. I'm susceptible to emotional influences in my behavior, and I can take responsibility for my own actions (i don't have a god or devil to blame). Actually... let's touch on that subject of emotion:
One could compare God's behavior to the way a parent handles a young child. Perhaps the child's actions are unsatisfactory, but that doesn't mean the parent stops loving the child. To imply that the emotion of love would cause eradic behavior in a human is completely natural... we see evidence of this every day. Now by stating that the human is susceptible to irrational and harmful behavior influenced by emotion would be considered a weakness within the human. Correct? For example, if a sound-minded man commits murder after proving his wife guilty of infidelity, we would associate that behavior as being fueled by the emotions of anger and jealousy. His actions were influenced by his emotions, though his rational sound-mind would not think to commit such an act. This is indicative of a weakness, an imperfection if you will. Rational to speak of for humans, yes. However, this is God we're talking about...
He is "perfectly immutable; there is no variableness in him, nor shadow of turning".. as read in James 1:17 (KJV)
"Dost thou know the balancings of the clouds, the wondrous works of him which is perfect in knowledge?" Job 37:16 (KJV)
"O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable [are] his judgments, and his ways past finding out!" - Romans 11:33
"Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My way is hid from the LORD, and my judgment is passed over from my God? Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding." - Isaiah 40:26-28 (KJV)
"Because I will publish the name of the LORD: ascribe ye greatness unto our God. He is the Rock, his work is perfect: for all his ways are judgment: a God of truth." - Deuteronomy - 32:3-4
"As for God, his way is perfect: the word of the LORD is tried: he is a buckler to all those that trust in him." - Psalms 18:30
Revelations. 15:4, Psalms. 25:10, 19:7, 2 Timothy. 1:16, 17.... the list goes on & on & on about the perfection of God.
"Be ye perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect", (Matthew 5:48 KJV) Be ye perfect as the Lord: go have some children, order them to fulfill your low self-esteem issues (but give them the Free Will to chose otherwise), get angry & turn your back on your children because they chose to act upon their Free Will, and then go poke out some little baby's eyes in order to prove how manly you are. Oh yes, my dear brothers & sisters... be ye perfect as the Lord. [offering plate passes]
THE RATT HAS SPOKEN
References: KJV Online (biblical quotes) – http://www.hti.umich.edu/k/kjv/browse.html
Ratt Blog (theistic arguments) – http://blog.myspace.com/ravnosjo
Wiki: Soren Kierkegaard – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%B8ren_Kierkegaard
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