Why would a perfect God have its creation suffer on Earth?

Ray wrote:

Quote:
Hmmm,
You seem to be missing the point.
He does make us appreciate happiness.
That is one result of suffering.
There are people who are perfectly happy. As far as I can tell, they are mentally incompetent or deranged. In other words, they are happy because parts of their intellectual/emotional system is not working as it should.

There are a lot of other people who are not happy and who were or are suffering.

Can one appreciate happiness without suffering? I don't know, but if He is perfect, He can create us as such a being that can appreciate happiness without having to suffer.

My point is this: Why would He want us to be "tested". If he is perfect in the sense that He is able to do anything (which means within and beyond the scope of human imagination), He doesn't need to test us.

I agree, G-d does not need to test us.
However, my point comes from what I consider the answer to your question in a corollary - A perfectly happy and content existence is pointless.
Now, if one believes that life is random and there is no G-d, then existence is indeed pointless.
Okay.
However, if there is a purpose to Life and existence, then perfect happiness and contentment does not help one to endeavor to succeed in whatever one's purpose may be.
That is how life works.

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Good argument.

However, existence itself after you have achieved the happiness would be considered pointless according to your argument.

Is life pointless if we have happiness from the beginning? Maybe, but that does not render it unimportant or not good.

One of the only point of living might be to live itself, couldn't it?

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"Mr. Hollister says there isn't a bird or fish or reptile or any other animal that hasn't got an enemy"

And what of Satan/The Devil,Lucifer, etc?

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Ray wrote:

Good argument.

However, existence itself after you have achieved the happiness would be considered pointless according to your argument.

Is life pointless if we have happiness from the beginning? Maybe, but that does not render it unimportant or not good.

One of the only point of living might be to live itself, couldn't it?

If there is no purpose to the universe; if all is random accident, then yes, of course the only point to living is simply to live.
However, if there is a purpose to your life; if we live in a Created universe; if there is a G-d, then perfect happiness is pointless.
If Man is created, then he is obviously created to strive; to create; to do things and explore his universe. This is what Man does. This is what religious scriptures endorse. These are drives that secular science has observed.
This striving will cause suffering and it will bring satisfaction; happiness.

It is the growth between the suffering and the achievement that brings Man closer to his purpose, whatever that might be.

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Moishe3rd

".....If Man is created, then he is obviously created to strive; to create; to do things and explore his universe. This is what Man does. This is what religious scriptures endorse......"

In the light of the problems which allegedly ensued from eating from "the tree of knowledge" I'm curious to know precisely what "religious scriptures" you have in mind here.

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fresco wrote:

Moishe3rd

".....If Man is created, then he is obviously created to strive; to create; to do things and explore his universe. This is what Man does. This is what religious scriptures endorse......"

In the light of the problems which allegedly ensued from eating from "the tree of knowledge" I'm curious to know precisely what "religious scriptures" you have in mind here.

Only the ones I have read Laughing

I was thinking of the Torah; the Christian bible; the Bhagavad Gita; other Hindu texts, such as the Upanishads; the I Ching; the Tao te Ching; the Koran; American Indian stories of the spiritual aspects of life; Plato; the Egyptian book of the Dead; Tibetan Buddhist philosophy; Homer; and so on up through more modern spiritual texts such as Shakespeare and Maurice Nicoll...

Oops. And to add on vis a vis the tree of knowledge:
G-d put Adom HaRishon in the Garden. Everything from minute one was a struggle for Adam, including whether or not to disobey G-d.
That is how Adam was created. Free will. Struggle. Win or lose.
That is how we are all created.

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Moishe, this is off topic and my apologies to anyone in the thread I'm interrupting. I tried to PM you and a message told me I'm not in good standing, I think because I ahven't been posting much.

I was just wondering, if you didn't think it was too personal, specifically what Jewish group you affiliate with. I believe you said that you're haredi before, but at that point there's still quite a bit of variation, particularly between hasidim and other haredim. That's actually the specific variation I was curious about.

Apologies again for my intrusion to all.

Thanks.

Dauer

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dauer wrote:

Moishe, this is off topic and my apologies to anyone in the thread I'm interrupting. I tried to PM you and a message told me I'm not in good standing, I think because I ahven't been posting much.

I was just wondering, if you didn't think it was too personal, specifically what Jewish group you affiliate with. I believe you said that you're haredi before, but at that point there's still quite a bit of variation, particularly between hasidim and other haredim. That's actually the specific variation I was curious about.

Apologies again for my intrusion to all.

Thanks.

Dauer

Well, off topic me too. I got the same PM message.
Idea here. Travel over to On Judaism and I will post an answer there.
Smile

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A lot of people stated that life is meaningless if we were perfect...
Then, why are we all striving towards perfection? It's the same kind of argument that says if we were all rich, then we wouldn't know how to
appreciate it.... Personally, I prefer to be rich from the start and let
anyone else be poor if they so choose. :-)

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A friend of mine says that it would be illogical for a God to just create a bunch of people and say, "Alright y'all - start worshipping." I can see how such a God would rather see its subjects choose to love it, not be told to love it. However, that's just speculation. One could say that we cannot possibly know whether the former or the latter would appeal more to an omnipotent being, since we could not even perceive of being in such a position.

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Here's a question that monks used to debat for days on end.
" If God is all powerfull, could he create a rock he couldn't lift?" Answer that one will you.

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Here's a question that monks used to debat for days on end.
" If God is all powerfull, could he create a rock he couldn't lift?" Answer that one will you.

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Well I think that God allowed suffering because of what Sanctuary's sister said, upon some of my research I came accross a nice saying that described it quite well too.

"what makes the stars shine so bright at night?"

Darkness.

that being said I get asked the question alot by my nn Christian friends how come God lets all these poor hungry kids suffer etc. doesnt it mean He is evil etc and not perfect. well my reply is usually that firstly God is just not defined as our understanding as in "perfect" dont you think those who will and do evil upon others should pay the price? God works in the same way, if you do bad and die without His grace and all you goto hell.

My understanding of perfect is not so much about what "Feels good" and what "Feels bad" its about pleasurable good and intelligible goods. I mean you can do certain things and it feels good but it can destroy you or end up causing u more probs. intelligle goods are often hard things to do like going to school to get an education or in my spiritual belief not having an abortion and being self sacrificing in the times to come and making way for a life.

God does not will evil but allows it to exist for the greater good!

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Maybe god is a sadistic entity, getting off on our eternal suffering.

>God: get on your knees and lick my boots!

>People: Yes sir, God, sir!

^^'

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You may be on to something there Eryemil. There certainly is no shortage of domination themes in the Bible.

Quote:

15 And if ye shall despise my statutes, or if your soul abhor my judgments, so that ye will not do all my commandments, but that ye break my covenant:
.16 I also will do this unto you; I will even appoint over you terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
.17 And I will set my face against you, and ye shall be slain before your enemies: they that hate you shall reign over you; and ye shall flee when none pursueth you...

.27 And if ye will not for all this hearken unto me, but walk contrary unto me;
28 Then I will walk contrary unto you also in fury; and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.
.29 And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.
30 And I will destroy your high places, and cut down your images, and cast your carcases upon the carcases of your idols, and my soul shall abhor you.
.31 And I will make your cities waste, and bring your sanctuaries unto desolation, and I will not smell the savour of your sweet odours.
32 And I will bring the land into desolation: and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it.

Levitcus 26:15-17... 27-32

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Hahaha!

http://www.techhelpers.net/e4u/comp/comp11.gif

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There's only one logical solution to the problem of evil.

The spirit world which God inhabits and rules over, and the physical realm which we live in, are orthoganal to eachother.

For the most part, God does not exercise any power or dominion in our physical realm and he may in fact not have any. In fact it might actually be that man was created to PROVIDE the spirit world with some level of instrumentality in this physical realm.

Moreover in antique times, the strong separation of the two realms which we experience, i.e. the lack of communication between the two realms, did not pertain. All antique religious practices, including oracles and prophets, were intended to communicate with the spirit world directly and determine God's intentions for mortals and their governments.

The good news is that we spend 60 - 80 years here, and eternity there. Having it be the other way around would be a serious problem.

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gungasnake wrote:

For the most part, God does not exercise any power or dominion in our physical realm and he may in fact not have any. In fact it might actually be that man was created to PROVIDE the spirit world with some level of instrumentality in this physical realm.

Sounds like you believe the bible to be bunk then, because it is very much about power and dominion of our physical realm.

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Gunga's starting to look more like a Deist than a Christian.

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The only reason we are living this way is because of adam and eve.

Anyone who reads and follows the bible would know this.

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Why would a perfect God have its creation suffer on Earth?

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