What if god actually exist...

...and simply underestimated the powerful combination of the human intellect and free will?

If I'm a god, and I wish to imprint in my believers a sense of my greatness, would I cheat? For instance, if I wanted to stop the sun in the sky, would I actually do that (with all the physical consequences it would have that I would have to keep track on), or would I simply create the illusion that the sun stopped, knowing that my followers will not be able to tell the difference?

If I'm the kind of god that wish to save my thought powers I might just create illusions instead of the real thing, and maybe that's why we can't point to definitive evidence that any of the major biblical events actually happened?

Maybe god thought: "Nae, I don't really have to do it. They can't tell the difference anyway", and then, to god's surprise (having given us free will and the powers of deduction), there was men like Galileo, Newton, Darwin and Einstein, continuously pushing our understanding forward, and it all just went downhill from there (from god's perspective, of course)?

😲

In hindsight, he probably shouldn't have been so lazy.

😕

Originally posted by C Hess
...and simply underestimated the powerful combination of the human intellect and free will?

If I'm a god, and I wish to imprint in my believers a sense of my greatness, would I cheat? For instance, if I wanted to stop the sun in the sky, would I actually do that (with all the physical consequences it would have that I would have to keep track on), or would ...[text shortened]... s perspective, of course)?

😲

In hindsight, he probably shouldn't have been so lazy.

😕

What if God knows when we have been well informed yet still wishes to maintain our
ability to deny Him? What if He understands completely and all the errors are on us?

What if we are on a planet ruled by powers of darkness whose hate towards God and us
makes them want to keep us in denial about God least we turn towards Him so they are
always pumping us with disinformation so we always have an excuse to avoid Him?

Originally posted by KellyJay
What if God knows when we have been well informed yet still wishes to maintain our
ability to deny Him? What if He understands completely and all the errors are on us?

What if we are on a planet ruled by powers of darkness whose hate towards God and us
makes them want to keep us in denial about God least we turn towards Him so they are
always pumping us with disinformation so we always have an excuse to avoid Him?

What if

Originally posted by wolfgang59
What if

Come on, get it out. I know you can do it.

Originally posted by RJHinds
Come on, get it out. I know you can do it.

It's funny, most of the good things in life has been accomplished by mankind, cures for many diseases, medical developments, even simple stuff like splints, your so-called god didn't give us ANY of those things, we figured it all out on our own, no god needed but of course when it came to saving those hundred million who died in WW2, not a peep out of your god, the ones that survived survived because of human intervention,

Not much of a god you have there. For instance, putting it in the religion not to eat pork when the real problem wasn't the pork at all but a parasite inside the pork. Where was the word from your god about THAT? Even with that parasite, pork is safe to eat if you cook the hell out of it. Didn't see any of THAT in your pathetic bible.

Which would be because it was not inspired by a god, it was just humans not knowing what else to do about diseased pork or not knowing ANYTHING about parasites. Your god was totally silent about that little tidbit.

If God is all knowing ie. knows the future then he does not have free will.
For him to know the future it is already mapped out.
If he does not have free will he would not permit us to have free will.
Therefore to punish us for our sins when we have no choice means God is a monstrous psychopath.

Originally posted by Captain Strange
If God is all knowing ie. knows the future then he does not have free will.
For him to know the future it is already mapped out.
If he does not have free will he would not permit us to have free will.
Therefore to punish us for our sins when we have no choice means God is a monstrous psychopath.

No, that doesn't follow. There were several long threads about this a little while ago. Essentially, omniscience does not contradict free will.

Suppose I have some choice to make, to P or not to P. Suppose I do P, God knew I would do P in advance, but he only knew I would do P because I chose to. If I had chosen not P then god would have known that I would not P. God's foreknowledge is contingent on what I do and not the other way around.

Originally posted by DeepThought
No, that doesn't follow. There were several long threads about this a little while ago. Essentially, omniscience does not contradict free will.

Suppose I have some choice to make, to P or not to P. Suppose I do P, God knew I would do P in advance, but he only knew I would do P because I chose to. If I had chosen not P then god would have known that I would not P. God's foreknowledge is contingent on what I do and not the other way around.

Yeah. I lost that one with LemonJello. The question is whether or not most Christians will accept that version of (contingent) omniscience.

Originally posted by vistesd
Yeah. I lost that one with LemonJello. The question is whether or not most Christians will accept that version of (contingent) omniscience.

It made sense to me, but I suppose you could make the case that I'm not most Christians... although I have been surprised by Christains who seem determined to add and/or delete from basic (fundamental) doctrine.

Are there any Christians here who do not believe God is omniscient?

Originally posted by RJHinds
Come on, get it out. I know you can do it.

It's cold out.

Originally posted by lemon lime
It made sense to me, but I suppose you could make the case that I'm not most Christians... although I have been surprised by Christains who seem determined to add and/or delete from basic (fundamental) doctrine.

Are there any Christians here who do not believe God is omniscient?

I believe God is becoming omniscient. I believe God can still learn, just as all of us can still learn. Obviously, God knows more than any other being.

Originally posted by RJHinds
I believe God is becoming omniscient. I believe God can still learn, just as all of us can still learn. Obviously, God knows more than any other being.

Oooooo.... tread carefully when evaluating the One who read Job the riot act before He restored his life and fortune.

But now that I think about it, getting chewed out before being blessed beats being ignored and/or rejected any ol' day.

Originally posted by DeepThought
No, that doesn't follow. There were several long threads about this a little while ago. Essentially, omniscience does not contradict free will.

Suppose I have some choice to make, to P or not to P. Suppose I do P, God knew I would do P in advance, but he only knew I would do P because I chose to. If I had chosen not P then god would have known that I would not P. God's foreknowledge is contingent on what I do and not the other way around.

That is only possible in universes where time travel is allowed as you are essentially saying that causation may flow backwards in time.

It also leaves the problem of Gods own free will unsolved, and to some degree limits Gods ability to do anything about our decisions.

Originally posted by Captain Strange
If God is all knowing ie. knows the future then he does not have free will.
For him to know the future it is already mapped out.
If he does not have free will he would not permit us to have free will.
Therefore to punish us for our sins when we have no choice means God is a monstrous psychopath.

God is eternal, we are the ones that have our place within a universe with a beginning
and an end. In it we are free to do as we will, and you can see the results of our freedom
by watching the news. We don't have a stinking clue what an eternal being has with
respect to limitations and knowledge, we live in this very small sliver of time called now
that is so small its beginning is in the same place as its end. You assume to much.

Originally posted by sonhouse
It's funny, most of the good things in life has been accomplished by mankind, cures for many diseases, medical developments, even simple stuff like splints, your so-called god didn't give us ANY of those things, we figured it all out on our own, no god needed but of course when it came to saving those hundred million who died in WW2, not a peep out of your ...[text shortened]... k or not knowing ANYTHING about parasites. Your god was totally silent about that little tidbit.

Go back in time about 3500 years and try to explain to people about "a tiny animal you can't see living inside another bigger animal". You'd be run out of town ( "We don't allow crazy people living here filling our heads full of lies!!" ) before sundown.