Evolution? How?

Quote: "God makes it abundantly clear in many parts of the bible that we have choices, thus implying free will. The idea of free will is incompatible with the generally accepted definition of omniscient: that God must, of necessity, know all things in advance. To accept that categorically would be to place blame on God for all the human misery that has plagued mankind for the 6000 years or so of recorded history."

There is an obvious contradiction here. If god doesn't know all things in advance, why did he kill everybody by the flood?

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wandeljw wrote:

neologist,
C.I. was referring to this statement:

Quote:
God has forsight and made the judgement. All the little bitty babies were gonna grow and become horrible people apparently.

Can you explain it for us? Is the bible consistent about this?

It's pretty simple, the bible says that God judged the world and couldn't find a righteous person....

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Even the babies and the unborn?

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thunder and c.i.,
Check this thread from neologist. Your current discussion may be more appropriate there. (Have I ever recommended neologist before?)
Define God

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wand, Thanks for the link. Wink

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thunder_runner32 wrote:

It's pretty simple, the bible says that God judged the world and couldn't find a righteous person....

Does this then not introduce a paradox? God's will, according to the Bible, was that man be in God's image. Why would an entire category of thing or being fashioned in the image of an all-perfect model be imperfect? An individual here or there, OK, sorta, by the stretch of "Free Will" ... but wiping out not only man, for want of a single acceptable example apart from Noah and crew, but also all other flora and fauna, plants and animals etc, entities not endowed with free will - a purely human attribute, if the Bible is to be believed - inescapably entails that the perfection of the Creation wrought by a Perfect Creator self-cancels.

The Biblical God would not screw up and start over, if the Biblical God were as The Bible purports that God of necessity and clear example to be, yet that same Biblical God, as recounted at length, depth, and detail, accompanied by recurrent cross-reference, looked things over, decided things involving the living components of creation were screwed up beyond repair, cleared the table, and started over. Pretty tough to reconcile in any logical, forensically valid, intellectually honest manner.

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Great stuff for fairy tales to scare the liddlies and make them go to bed quietly, though . . .

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Yeah, and a great setup for the priesthood industry, for just those reasons ... pretty much meets the definition of self-establishing, don't it?

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cicerone imposter wrote:

"God had farsight..." is one of the stupidest statements on a2k.

Ac 2:23 - Show Context
Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

1Pe 1:2 - Show Context
Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

Quote: "God makes it abundantly clear in many parts of the bible that we have choices, thus implying free will. The idea of free will is incompatible with the generally accepted definition of omniscient: that God must, of necessity, know all things in advance. To accept that categorically would be to place blame on God for all the human misery that has plagued mankind for the 6000 years or so of recorded history."

There is an obvious contradiction here. If god doesn't know all things in advance, why did he kill everybody by the flood?

Could it be that God's foreknowledge is selective?

BTW, no need to be embarrassed about misspelling foresight. Rex screwed it up too. At least the word you did spell, farsight, was spelled correctly.

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timberlandko wrote:

Does this then not introduce a paradox? God's will, according to the Bible, was that man be in God's image. Why would an entire category of thing or being fashioned in the image of an all-perfect model be imperfect?

I thought you understood this. When Adam and Eve sinned, they lost their moral as well as their physical perfection. They could not pass what they no longer possessed to their descendants.

timberlandko wrote:

An individual here or there, OK, sorta, by the stretch of "Free Will" ... but wiping out not only man, for want of a single acceptable example apart from Noah and crew, but also all other flora and fauna, plants and animals etc, entities not endowed with free will - a purely human attribute, if the Bible is to be believed - inescapably entails that the perfection of the Creation wrought by a Perfect Creator self-cancels.

The Biblical God would not screw up and start over, if the Biblical God were as The Bible purports that God of necessity and clear example to be, yet that same Biblical God, as recounted at length, depth, and detail, accompanied by recurrent cross-reference, looked things over, decided things involving the living components of creation were screwed up beyond repair, cleared the table, and started over. Pretty tough to reconcile in any logical, forensically valid, intellectually honest manner.

Suppose you had the resources of Bill Gates and built a beautiful village for a group of pre selected people. Free rent and utilities. Room for family gardens. They might be grateful at first and even erect a statue of an eagle in the town square. But imagine that, after a generation or two, they lost their respect, began to trash the village, and became utterly lawless. Would you not feel regret over your creation?

The only thing you did 'wrong' was to allow your beneficiaries free will. You didn't screw up in this scenario and God didn't screw up when he made man in his image (including free will).

You don't have to believe the bible, of course.

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Neo, I see an irresolvable dichotomy; perfection may not be possessed of the attribute of imperfection - self cancelling proposiitions. The only light in which the Serpent and Eve myth makes sense is to assume God has a wicked, cruel sense of humor and a mean streak, setting up one of his creations to fall, and putting into place the conditions to effect that fall (his garden, his serpent, his fruit tree, his Adam and Eve, his rule, free will, and all that) - hardly attributes of perfection. "Adam and Eve Chose to Disobey" is a preposterous bit of sophistry if else of the Creation Myth and its star player are to be taken seriously.

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timberlandko wrote:

Neo, I see an irresolvable dichotomy; perfection may not be possessed of the attribute of imperfection; self cancelling proposiitions. The only light in which the Serpent and Eve myth makes sense is to assume God has a wicked, cruel sense of humor and a mean streak, setting up one of his creations to fall, and putting into place the conditions to effect that fall (his garden, his serpent, his fruit tree, his Adam and Eve, his rule, free will, and all that) - hardly attributes of perfection. "Adam and Eve Chose to Disobey" is a preposterous bit of sophistry if else of the Creation Myth and its star player are to be taken seriously.

in what way is free will incompatible with perfection?

I don't believe and never said that God did not anticipate the possibility of rebellion. But his name, 'he who causes to become' and his attribute which he spoke to Moses in Exodus 3:14 "I shall prove to be what I shall prove to be," indicates he has the power to bring into being whatever he sets forth.

I envision God's view of time somewhat as we might view a stream. We are in the stream and more or less are carried along with it.

You would have great power if you could stop the stream. To the observer, your actions would be at the speed of lightning. Of course, if you restarted the stream, you could not go back.

Now imagine the power you might have over the former persons if you could not only stop the stream, but reenter it at whatever point you wished.

Free will in the hands of a God such as this would be insurmountable indeed.

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timberlandko wrote:

thunder_runner32 wrote:
It's pretty simple, the bible says that God judged the world and couldn't find a righteous person....

Does this then not introduce a paradox? God's will, according to the Bible, was that man be in God's image. Why would an entire category of thing or being fashioned in the image of an all-perfect model be imperfect? An individual here or there, OK, sorta, by the stretch of "Free Will" ... but wiping out not only man, for want of a single acceptable example apart from Noah and crew, but also all other flora and fauna, plants and animals etc, entities not endowed with free will - a purely human attribute, if the Bible is to be believed - inescapably entails that the perfection of the Creation wrought by a Perfect Creator self-cancels.

The Biblical God would not screw up and start over, if the Biblical God were as The Bible purports that God of necessity and clear example to be, yet that same Biblical God, as recounted at length, depth, and detail, accompanied by recurrent cross-reference, looked things over, decided things involving the living components of creation were screwed up beyond repair, cleared the table, and started over. Pretty tough to reconcile in any logical, forensically valid, intellectually honest manner.

God has allowed free will... This has in turn been used by humans and devils alike to malign and confuse the image of God.

One should not look back in the Bible for answers but look ahead.

When you look back you see men and women of God who only could see God in a dismal and rigid legalistic way. They lived by a set of "laws" that were kept in the holy of holies not the heart and it was an "external" guide that was crude and inefficient in many cases of human need and understanding.

Even when we get to the Gospels and with the lord even present here on the earth this was not enough to convince (in the face of free will) the greatest believer of the day (Peter) to not deny Jesus 3 time twice...

The greatest believers of the day (other than Christ) during the Gospel times had spiritual deficiency... i.e. sleeping while he prayed, and of course, the worlds inability to recognize "the Christ", also Judas...

Were these the best spiritual people the world had to offer Christ Jesus?

It was not until the spirit was taken from the external places of the OT/gospels and became internal (Christ within) and a living "guide" (Epistles of Paul) that the understanding of God's true nature became known.

So if we look "back" we see a God(s) mixed and appearing to be causing floods and bringing pestilence to the uninspired. If this was all the doing of the true God then what purpose was the devil? Certainly not blame...

When we look ahead (from the Gospels) we see a pure God of truth and love...

But when we look ahead with "farsight" we see destruction and doom in the Bible.

As if our time today is some sort of lull in the ebb and flow of time.
That our in day and time there is knowledge of the spirit and knowledge of God.

Yet, as the spirit became more visible to humans it also in time will make it's journey away from the earth and the earth will be plunged back into darkness as it was in the OT...

That our dispensation is a unique period in the history of the earth..

In God's acceptable time the light (church) will make it's journey back to God. Then the earth will return to this OT law and this external guide that is crude and blind.

Then with no holy spirit left upon the earth then evil can rise and exist without fetters.

This is why we see such darkenss ahead. This is why we see such darkness behind. This is why that in the midst of all of this darkness we shine with the light of God through Christ. This is the purpose of the earth and the universe. That life mingles with the spirit and the spirit receives new souls into the kingdom of God.

So we see this small chunk of the Bible that is actually addresses "to" us today. The OT was addressed to the faithful Hebrews as the Gospels were addressed to the faithful Hebrews also yet from Acts to 2Thessalonians we see a change. We see this being addressed to "the church". Thus this marks this period of grace that we live in today.

This period of grace will end with the gathering "day" when Christ gathers "the church" in the air.

Then, the earth will be abandoned by the church and Christ. This will signify the end of Grace and a return to law... Because the inner guide no longer exists on the earth..

People will have de-evolved into scientists! Smile

Peace with God.

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"The, the earth will be abandoned by the church and Christ. This will signify the end of Grace and return to law... Because the inner guide no longer exists on the earth.."

What a bunch of clap-trap! There are cultures that existed before christ and still exists that was never considered a christian nation.

Your myopic world is a sad one that refuses to understand world history or the cultures that existed long before 2,000 years ago.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

"The, the earth will be abandoned by the church and Christ. This will signify the end of Grace and return to law... Because the inner guide no longer exists on the earth.."

What a bunch of clap-trap! There are cultures that existed before christ and still exists that was never considered a christian nation.

Your myopic world is a sad one that refuses to understand world history or the cultures that existed long before 2,000 years ago.

We are talking 6000 years ago... remember, the first cities?? Where are all these cultures? Archaeology puts them before that in the jungles living in the "wild"... Very little tool making and innovation over millions of years.

We have had computers for what, 50 years? You are talking cultures? You are the one with the clap-trap there...

Even being generous... written languages have only existed on the earth 6-20 thousand years... If you call a few paintings with mud in a cave a language well you are worse off than I thought...

I dare not to even imagine the fantasy world you live in...

There were cultures that "existed" before? There are monkeys too... Do they know the true God? Do you???

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But the christian religion was created after the time of "jesus." Only the bible's stories can be dated back 6,000 years.

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Neo wrote:

in what way is free will incompatible with perfection?

Quite simply in that as conceptualized in The Bible "Free Will" not only permits but is proximately causitive to an imperfection; the very possibility of the "Fall of man" negates Perfect Creation. That a Perfect Creation might embody the potential for failure or other imperfection in and/or of any component of that Perfect Creation is an absurd proposition on its very face, that it might contain the seeds of its own negation is a ludicrous notion - as said, self-cancelling; can't have it both ways. The Biblical "Free Will" dodge is just that, a dodge, and forensically indefensible. All that apart from the purported eradication-and-start-over of such components of that purported Perfect Creation by its outraged Perfect Creator as were not endowed with "Free Will", and therefore by definition could not merit any penalty or sanction arising from the exersize thereof. Honestly, Neo, I simply cannot reconcile the contradictions; denying the paradox, explainaining it away through sophistry and circular reasoning, does not obviate the paradox.

"Faith" is no answer, it is an abstract, a mind-set, a belief system, a dodge in and of itself; those with faith have no need of proof, while those those who seek proof have no faith - without faith, one cannot have faith - one must accept faith to have faith - one who has no faith rejects faith - unless one believes, one cannot believe - etc etc etc ad infinitum ... c'mon, now, can't you see the substanceless circularity there?

Rex, I submit your postings are not arguing, analyzing, critiquing, nor even discussing; they are but preaching, proselytizing, parroting, hypothecating, and conjecturing. Where you stasnd is not at question, your position is abundantly clear, if even saying it is "clear" does not construct an oxymoron. That your position stands on anything of substance apart from your assertion it does remains undemonstrated.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

But the christian religion was created after the time of "jesus." Only the bible's stories can be dated back 6,000 years.

Biblically, the God of Jesus Christ dates back roughly 4000 years before the first century.

Yet, the Bible also speaks quite a bit about times perhaps billions of years before Eden... likewise billions of years (eternity) into the future...

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RR, Please show chapter and verse in the bible where the bible speaks about billions of years before Eden? YOu must remember that by your answer to confirm such, you are negating all the theologians and biblical scholars that have studied this issue.

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