Another "God" question

Hi Guys,
If you were to set up a snake sanctuary, breed poisonous breeds, in a safe and secure environment - Then because they misbehaved, set them free into the outside world. WHO do you think would be accountable for every subsequent deadly (evil) or irresponsible act henceforth? YOU. of course! The snakes are blameless, end of.
Therefore God (as stated for the tenth time) (Isaiah 45.7.) is the creator of ALL evil, as well as good. "All acts are BY Him, FOR Him and THROUGH Him" Does that not make sense to any of you? What has been created - that God did not create?
I don't even believe in the biblical God, yet I can read His book clearly. Good and Evil don't exist - They are points of view...Only. In the minds of men, as are all points of view.

Anyway, have a fantastic day, all of you.
Mark...

1 Reply

@mark noble,

Quote:

Good and Evil don't exist - They are points of view...Only. In the minds of men, as are all points of view.

I think this statement is pretty meaningless though. Why do I say that? It is all very well to spout platitudes on an online forum where nobody really has anything at stake. If you are trying to deal with real suffering in the real world, which has real consequences for yourself and your loved ones, I don't think it will cut the mustard.

I think the purpose of a mature spirituality is to enable you to cope with evil and suffering while maintaining your integrity. I won't try and pre-empt how you're going to do that. But saying it is a only point of view is not what I would call a robust solution to the problem.

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

I think it will "cut the mustard" perfectly well to say that good and evil are entirely human concepts that don't exist outside of our own subjective realities. And I know suffering. To look at suffering as something that I have the subjective power to use as fuel for thought is entirely my choice over blaming something I can't consciously observe (God) for letting tradgedy befall this human race. Saying something is meaningless, on the other hand, just won't cut the mustard, dear sir. In my philosophy, meaning doesn't exist either outside of the human concept, but by saying things are meaningless inside of the human concept, we miss the point of the whole exerience.
As far as solutions to problems go- why leave it up to someone other than the self? If you see suffering and you genuinely care, do something about it. If you believe in God, that's what He would want from you anyways.

1 Reply

@A Lyn Fei,

Quote:

I think it will "cut the mustard" perfectly well to say that good and evil are entirely human concepts that don't exist outside of our own subjective realities.

So - here in Australia, we are having a big dispute with the Japanese over whaling. They think it is OK to hunt whales - they say it is for 'scientific research' but it is common knowledge that most of the meat ends up on the market. Australia opposes the hunting of whales. So how to judge whether the Japanese or the Australian is the correct view? Is there a correct view? Or are there just two opposing views, which are both correct, depending on your viewpoint? Is there any non-subjective basis for arbitrating this vexed issue?

2 Replies

@jeeprs,

Hi Jeeprs,
Don't get me wrong, I am capable of association to the rights and wrongs of issues. All I am saying is that my interpretation of an event isn't necessarily another's. "One man's good is another man's evil" - Japan v Australia, on the whaling issue, for example. Good and Evil though, place a theistic essence in the cooking pot, and that doesn't appeal to a non-theist, or have any significance either.
When I hear of an act of (let's say) cruelty to children, animals (except domesticated cats), etc. I am as appalled as the next man, disgusted even. As for what they do to the whales and why, the whole globe knows this too, is despicable - Deforestation, Shark-fin soup, tiger skins, ivory trade, etc etc etc. All of it appalls me Jeeprs, but I see it as "Wrong", not "Evil". And my wrong is another's right, at that. If I were to bear the burdens of man's negativity, jeeprs, I'd soon have a Christ-complex and a warm padded room. If you want to cast the first stone, by all means do so, but remember "In order to discover the root of the problem, we need only look in the mirror".

To make this world a better place
All you need to do
Is hunt your soul, confront control
And forge
A better YOU!

Glad you're still with us Jeeprs, have a great day, sir.
Mark...

0 Replies

@jeeprs,

I believe right and wrong are entirely subjective and do not exist outside of humanity. However, is there a way to determine if something has a better outcome for all? Absolutely. One can logically determine that it is not healthy for the whale species to continue whaling. One can determine that those who gather income from such sport might find it elsewhere. One might determine that there is a "right" way, but not based on emotional or spiritual viewpoints, based on science. Still, this is not to say that health is a finite definition of "good". More Darwinistic types- to be entirely honest, like myself- would say may the best species win. I wouldn't agree with them, as one human evolutionary attribute is intellect, which means that we can understand the consequences of whaling and poaching.

1 Reply

@A Lyn Fei,

Quote:

I believe right and wrong are entirely subjective and do not exist outside of humanity.

Well we will have to agree to differ on this point. I regard things which are entirely subjective as matters of opinion, by definition. And I don't think science provides any basis for value judgment, and in fact it attempts to exclude everything which it regards as subjective.

My viewpoint: I personally believe there is a moral law. It is not imposed on us by a God but is just the way things work. It follows from this that the quality of your intention determines the result. From altruistic actions which are done for the benefit of all, good results follow. From self-interest and craving, bad results will definitely accrue. It may sound simplistic, but if everyone acted in accordance with this understanding, the world would be a different place.

But I do thank you for your reply. Wink

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@jeeprs,

I like your viewpoint. It is very nice to think that this could be so, and I will not argue it further as I fear it would do no good. I would like to ask, however, why you believe that more people do not "act in accordance with this understanding" if such moral law does, in fact, exist?

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

jeeprs wrote:

My viewpoint: I personally believe there is a moral law. It is not imposed on us by a God but is just the way things work. It follows from this that the quality of your intention determines the result. From altruistic actions which are done for the benefit of all, good results follow. From self-interest and craving, bad results will definitely accrue. It may sound simplistic, but if everyone acted in accordance with this understanding, the world would be a different place.

Hi Jeeprs.
I pursue, to the best of my ability, the logic of (Proverbs). I just remove the God attribute, read it as a textbook of moral guidance, and stick to it as best I can. Within those passages are the gathered obsevational results from centuries of analysis of human P's + Q's. It works for me.
Have a great day jeeprs.
Mark...

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@jeeprs,

jeeprs wrote:

My viewpoint: I personally believe there is a moral law. It is not imposed on us by a God but is just the way things work. It follows from this that the quality of your intention determines the result. From altruistic actions which are done for the benefit of all, good results follow. From self-interest and craving, bad results will definitely accrue. It may sound simplistic, but if everyone acted in accordance with this understanding, the world would be a different place.

I'm sure that thought is within us all. But, you see, there were those parents who taught us this, churches who taught us that, then schools got in the way, those neighbors, all those friends thinking the way they do, arguing and fighting. All those blasted wars, that nasty history.

How will we all blast this from our memory? I think, by knowing the truth about it all - ALL of it, is the only way. Maybe all people are in that process, somewhere, just in different places along the way.

I agree with you. It's not "keep it simple," but "get it down to simple."

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@jeeprs,

jeeprs wrote:

My viewpoint: I personally believe there is a moral law. It is not imposed on us by a God but is just the way things work. It follows from this that the quality of your intention determines the result. From altruistic actions which are done for the benefit of all, good results follow. From self-interest and craving, bad results will definitely accrue. It may sound simplistic, but if everyone acted in accordance with this understanding, the world would be a different place.

i use to think this way, but the more i analyzed it the less true it actually seems. it really started when i first got into the medical industry. one of my professors was a doctor and the things he would say as business advice was contrary to what i thought was productive for a consumer or patient. the bad part about it was almost every other professor agreed with is assessment and many of the students seemed to fall in line with his line of reasoning. the further i looked into it, it dawned on me just how wide spread the problem was.

he said that a medical practitioner can place their consumer ahead of their practice which sounds idealistic but it will make your business fail. it is better to place your business before a consumer so that you always maintain leverage.

this shows that in the corporate world success depends on a certain level of deception and lack of empathy. in other words his motivation was not to work for the benefit of your consumer or patient but instead for your business success. it was not about trying to improve the world because he said all those who try to approach their business with that in mind will struggle or fail altogether.

So why is it that the most successful businesses are often the most deceptive? Where is the universal karma kicking in? There isn't anything and if it comes after this life ends then it does nothing to help the people now.

The conclusion i came to is that, the only time a deceptive person meets any sort of justice is if someone brings it to the attention of others, but even this does not always work. There have been very deceptive politicians that have gotten away with murder and are still not held accountable for their actions. So where is this so called karma? If it is waiting then it is far from justice.

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@A Lyn Fei,

Quote:

however, why you believe that more people do not "act in accordance with this understanding" if such moral law does, in fact, exist?

Many reasons, but principally out of selfishness and ignorance. And consumer society has a considerable vested interest in encouraging greed and delusion. It is worth big money to many large companies if people want a lot of stuff.

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

But that is my point: big companies are made up of a lot of individual people. You speak of consumer society as though it were an entity not human made, but it is. Humans love their consumer society. It allows for thoughtlessness and moreover excuses to act in ways that a thoughtful person might consider amoral. Morality is a funny thing. It is a kind of sub-genre of logic, if you will. Logic does not exist without the human brian, yet logic is what derives God or science from the patterns and connections between all things that we perceive. Morality, in my opinion, does not exist beyond conception, yet- like logic- there seems to be a way of deriving it from patterns and connections within what we perceive. Whether it is in my chemistry to defend a child or whether my brain is fast enough to understand that this child has its own cognitive abilities and it is my duty or categorical imperative to protect it, I would most likely run in front of a car to save a child. Is that gesture a moral choice, or simply a decision which one person made based on circumstance? If it were the former, would we even have a conversation about it?

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@A Lyn Fei,

god does not matter , never has

the only attitude that does matter is the attitude we have to ourselves and to this planet

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@A Lyn Fei,

As it happens, I work in a big company. Totals around 42,00o people, I believe, but my section comprises only a few hundred. Be that as it may, consumer society as we now know it has very little future. Soon we are going to have multiple crises - energy, food, climate, and financial, all happening at once. This is a gloomy and unfortunate fact, and quite off topic for this thread, so I won't pursue it here. But it is kind of built in to the way Western society consumes energy and runs their economies. It is already obvious to many people. There have been theories of sustainable economies around since the 60's but precious few are aware of them.

As regards my view of ethical law, it is Buddhist. Dharma, the ethical law, is 'that which holds everything together'. It is quite dissimilar to Western religious authoritarianism in some ways, being observed rather than enforced on others. That is what the Buddhist does - observes the Dharma. Anyway this thread has wandered off an awful long way from where it started, so I will probably look for another opportunity to converse, elsewhere. Thanks :-)

1 Reply

@jeeprs,

jeeprs wrote:

As it happens, I work in a big company. Totals around 42,00o people, I believe, but my section comprises only a few hundred. Be that as it may, consumer society as we now know it has very little future. Soon we are going to have multiple crises - energy, food, climate, and financial, all happening at once. This is a gloomy and unfortunate fact, and quite off topic for this thread, so I won't pursue it here. But it is kind of built in to the way Western society consumes energy and runs their economies. It is already obvious to many people. There have been theories of sustainable economies around since the 60's but precious few are aware of them.

As regards my view of ethical law, it is Buddhist. Dharma, the ethical law, is 'that which holds everything together'. It is quite dissimilar to Western religious authoritarianism in some ways, being observed rather than enforced on others. That is what the Buddhist does - observes the Dharma. Anyway this thread has wandered off an awful long way from where it started, so I will probably look for another opportunity to converse, elsewhere. Thanks :-)

start a new thread perhaps ?

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@Wozz,

If you want to give your Logic teacher some Logic on the matter, check out Alvin Plantinga. He uses logical proofs to show that the 3-O God can exist with evil.

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It seems the true or honest question might be; Is one’s perceptions of good and evil, in agreement with God?

I don’t see how perceptions of good and evil can ever become logical, only to those who agree what is good and evil (right or wrong) and almost always for their own reasons.

But morally or ethically speaking. It’s the way of man to betray agreement, and that lack of ethic or moral all men understand. All men understand loyalty and betrayal. And it is the Way of God to fulfill agreement, His agreement with mankind.

It is also understood that in a agreement there is the ability to keep, or fulfill the agreement, the inability to keep or fulfill the agreement, the refusal to keep the agreement when having or offered the means to keep the agreement, and flat out betrayal of agreement.

But who can question what God allows or lets be, without ones own ability to keep agreement with God? Not even a Peace agreement. Consider how one can question what a power does, if one is not in agreement with that power in the insistence of choosing what is good and evil, in betrayal of the agreement of the same power that has given life to be in the earth. Even gangsters understand this. Loyalty to the agreement first, then ask why.

Only God is able to keep and fulfill His Word. Man’s constant insistence to his own perceptions of good and evil proves that. It is Man’s constant insistence to his own perceptions of good and evil that betrays God’s agreement with mankind, which is the fulfillment of His Word, that is Good.

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Perhaps you should revise your concept of "God." You may be thinking of Yaweh or Elohim, when in actuality God may be just as neutral as the universe itself. Even if he's not neutral, and does have an affect on after-creation events, it seems a little conceded that the creator and controller of the entire universe, and perhaps even more, would notice something as trivial as an oil spill on a single planet.

Personally, if God exists, I believe he is completely neutral, amoral, and transcended.

1 Reply

Long thread, so I didn't read every post and therefore apologize if I missed a reply similar to mine:

The original poster said he is a Lutheran, so I ass-u-me he is looking for answers relevant to Lutheran concepts of omnipotence, free will, original sin and so forth. If Lutherans embrace Calvin's doctrine of predestination, I also ass-u-me they accept his five precepts: total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace and perseverance of the saints.

This sounds alot like the Apostle Paul's letter to the Romans, in which he sets forth the concept of vessels of wrath and vessels of glory. This seems to apply to individuals, not to the world, so I think it would be more relevant to the OP's question to also say that the bible is often interpreted to mean that god created a perfect world, but that we, through Adam and Eve's original sin, defiled everything. And that we are therefore responsible for all the bad things that happen, not god.

When Jesus came along and overcame sin with his perfect sacrifice, both people and the world were saved. But not then and not everybody. Not until he returns to create a new heaven and earth and collect the select, the vessels of glory. Meanwhile, it's oil spills, riots, typhoons, crowded freeways, crying babies, lousy films and stupid commercials. Despite all its sham, drudgery and oil spills, however, it's still a beautiful world.

--Bill

PS I do not believe god wrote the bible or that hesheit even exists but can recommend Job as a good source of questions about suffering. Follow his questions, not the answers his friends offer. Answers are a dime a dozen. And they weren't friends.

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