Who made God?

Who made God? No one did. He was not made. He has always existed. Only things that had a beginning - like the world - need a maker. God had no beginning , so God did not need to be made. For those who are a little older, a little more can be said. Traditionally, most atheist who deny the existence of God believe that the universe was not made; it was just "there" forever. They appeal to the first law of thermodynamics for suport: "Energy can neither be created nor destroyed," they insist. Several things must be observed in response.

First, this way of stating the first law is not scientific; rather, it is a philosophical assertion. Science is based on observation, and there is no observational evidence that can support the dogmatic "can" and "cannot" implicit in this statement. It should read, "[As far as we have observed,] the amount of actual energy in the universe remains constant." That is, no one had observed any actual new energy either coming into existence or going out of existence. Once the first law is understood properly, it says nothing about the universe being eternal or having no beginning. As far as the first law is concerned, energy may or may not have been created. It simply asserts that if energy was created, then as far as we can tell, the actual amount of energy that was created has remained constant since then.

Futher, let us suppose for the sake of argument that energy - the whole universe of energy we call the cosmos - was not created, as many atheists have traditionally believed. If this is so, it is meaningless to ask who made the universe. If energy is eternal and uncreated, of course no one created it. It has always existed. However, if it is meaningless to ask, "Who made the universe?" since it has always existed, then it is equally meaningless to ask "Who made God?" since he has always existed.

If the universe is not eternal, it needs a cause. On the other hand, if it has no beginning, it does not need a cause of its beginning. Likewise, if a God exists who has no beginning, it is absurd to ask, "Who made God?" It is a category mistake to ask, "Who made the Unmade?" or "Who created the Uncreated?" One may as well ask, "Where is the bachelor's wife?"

- Dr. Norman L. Geisler

Originally posted by dj2becker
Who made God? No one did. He was not made. He has always existed. Only things that had a beginning - like the world - need a maker. God had no beginning , so God did not need to be made. For those who are a little older, a little more can be said. Traditionally, most atheist who deny the existence of God believe that the universe was not made; it was just ...[text shortened]... as well ask, "Where is the bachelor's wife?"

- Dr. Norman L. Geisler

Uhh....I'm sure it was man who made god dude.

Originally posted by shavixmir
Uhh....I'm sure it was man who made god dude.

Uhh... Oookay... So who then made man?

Originally posted by dj2becker
Uhh... Oookay... So who then made man?

No one. Not everything that exists was designed.

Can we move on now?

Originally posted by dj2becker
Who made God? No one did. He was not made. He has always existed. Only things that had a beginning - like the world - need a maker. God had no beginning , so God did not need to be made. For those who are a little older, a little more can be said. Traditionally, most atheist who deny the existence of God believe that the universe was not made; it was just ...[text shortened]... as well ask, "Where is the bachelor's wife?"

- Dr. Norman L. Geisler

Wow, that's dense, man! The way I see it, you have two choices. One is to believe in the existence of a creator. The other is to believe that we all came into existence suddenly out of thin air or randomly by accident.

I choose to believe the first, although I have no evidence to suggest that that is indeed the case. BUT! the real question is, I think, where's the starting point? Religious people limit their starting point to God. And therefore God created everything, how simple! And who then created God? No, there is no creator of God, he has always been around. But I ask, WHY? Why shouldn't there be a creator of God? If we can believe that the world has a creator, humans etc. have a creator, then God must have been created by something too. Now I don't claim to know who, or what, created God. And I don't think anyone can ever convince me of the correct answer. Of course the bible and the Quran are both written by humans, so those are no good evidence.

It would have been a little bit easier to believe, for example, that Mary was a virgin when she had Jesus, had a doctor carried out tests on her and actually recorded it in a medical journal etc. It would also have been a little bit easier to believe that Jesus actually fed 5,000 hungry people with only few loaves of bread and fish, if proper counting, eg weighing machines etc have been used (although this too is not conclusive).

I'd like to imagine how would it be if say 2,000 years ago a David Copperfield existed amongst the human race. He'd fly over Jerusalem (the modern one flew over London); he could make an entire building disappear (the modern one made the statue of Liberty disappear). Could it be possible that it wasn't so difficult to believe that that man was a messenger of God? And in that case, is it not possible that he could influence people around him?

Originally posted by dj2becker
Who made God? No one did. He was not made. He has always existed. Only things that had a beginning - like the world - need a maker. God had no beginning , so God did not need to be made. For those who are a little older, a little more can be said. Traditionally, most atheist who deny the existence of God believe that the universe was not made; it was just ...[text shortened]... as well ask, "Where is the bachelor's wife?"

- Dr. Norman L. Geisler

No one made god only the notion of god, god exists merely in our imaginations and forms of social control

Originally posted by dottewell
No one. Not everything that exists was designed.

Can we move on now?

"Before the mountains were brought forth, And before You gave birth to the earth and the world, Indeed from eternity to eternity, You are God." (Psalm 90:2)

God is the eternal I AM. Only He is eternally self existing. Only He is. This means that only He is everexisting and self existing - dependent upon nothing. We are. But we are dependent. The "I AM" of God is alone dependent upon nothing for His existence.

God says "I AM THAT I AM." No one created God. No one transcends God. Not only no one, but no thing transcends God or is above God or behind God. He just is and always was and always will be.

All lives have thier source in the Creator. The life of the Creator is uncreated life. Behind the universe and transcendent to the universe is a divine life which was not created but is from eternity to eternity.

The limitation of our creaturely minds cannot fully grasp a Being who always was. As creatures of time with a beginning we simply cannot fully comprehend an eternal Person.

But we can enjoy and have fellowship with such an Eternal Father. When He says "I AM" that also implies that He is everything we need. What we lack He is. And we can draw our life and strength from His unlimited being.

No one made God. God always was.
If your mentality short circuits at the thought of God Who always was, worship and praise and thanksgiving to this eternal God help.

Originally posted by dottewell
No one. Not everything that exists was designed.

Can we move on now?

So you believe in atheistic evolution?

Originally posted by Serendipity
No one made god only the notion of god, god exists merely in our imaginations and forms of social control

I think it is great over exageration to say this.

The abuse of religion to control people is not a statement on the unreality of God. It is a statement on the depravity of man.

Man, would justify some of his evil motives by laying hold of that which has some truth in it. How can he mislead with a total lie? The more apparent truth man mixes in with his evil the more likely he can deceive.

The use of a God concept to control people is not a indication of the unreality of God. Furthermore the accountibility of all men and women of all classes to an ultimate Governer assures that no one is getting away with anything. The portions of the Bible dealing with the last judgment leave no king, no prince, no politician, no employer, no slave master, no pope, no one period, off the hook. The high, the low, the ruler, and the ruled all are said to have to stand before God in the last judgment.

Conspiracy theories of the invention of God to control people are at best exagerated.

The Bible from early Genesis is quite candid about the tendency of sinful people to use God's word to further their own selfish aims not necessarily of God. The problem is by no means ignored or naively unaccounted for through the record of both Old and New Testaments.

I would challenge anyone to propose a reason why people wanting to control other people would put certain words into the mouth of God.

Try it:

God being created by slave masters to control slaves?
God being created by men to control women?
God being created by the rich to control the poor?
God being created by the poor to control the rich?

God being created by the West to control the East?
God being created by the East to control the West?

God being created by the White to control the Black?
God being created by America to control third world countries?
God being created by capitalists to control the working man?
God being created by the religious to control the scientific?

Given the full spectrum of teaching in the Bible I find that none of these conspiracy theories work.

Originally posted by dottewell
No one. Not everything that exists was designed.

Can we move on now?

Guess not, people seem to need their invisible non-reproducable randomly assisting randomly abusing friends.

Originally posted by jaywill
[b]"Before the mountains were brought forth, And before You gave birth to the earth and the world, Indeed from eternity to eternity, You are God." (Psalm 90:2)

God is the eternal I AM. Only He is eternally self existing. Only He is. This means that only He is everexisting and self existing - dependent upon nothing. We are. But we are dependent ...[text shortened]... ht of God Who always was, worship and praise and thanksgiving to this eternal God help.[/b]

jaywill, you are blessed with such a strong faith. You have faith in the holy bible. But some of us require more to convince ourselves, you see. You evidence, if one can consider it as evidence to start with, is based on the bible. Yes, you can quote so many things from the bible, but at the end of the day, all those words were written by humans. And yes, I am aware that they claim the contents came from God. And the contents of the Quran also were supposed to have come from God. Yet, in some cases, those contents were substantially different. Why? If all the contents in both books were from God, then why were they different? The only logical conclusion that one can draw from such inconsistencies, is that there must have been some mistakes done during the 'recording' of God's messages. And that is if one can really bring himself to believe that the contents were indeed from God!

So now we are faced with the dilemma of choosing to trust which book. I am absolutely certain that the Christians will say that the bible is the accurate one; and the Muslims will say that the Quran is the accurate one. How does one decide?

Looking at the bible, you find inter alia a person who claimed to be the son of God, and his mom was a virgin when she had him. He was the olden days' Gandhi who didn't believe in violence. He hardly ever gave straight answers, instead he spoke in parables.

The there is the Quran. A prophet named Mohammad claimed that he too was a messenger of God. But he said Jesus wasn't the son of God. He admitted that he's human like anyone of us. He had good taste in women, and so he said God allows a man to marry up to 4 wives. He preached not to harm others, and yet the next minute he led his people to war. When asked why, he said if you're protecting your religion it's OK to kill. He named it jihad.

Now people like myself are not trying to be difficult. We are not simply rejecting these religions without even pausing to think it out first. We are not simply stubborn. We are trying to accept, but it's so very difficult. After all, the brains that God gave us can, unfortunately, analyse logically.

Originally posted by jaywill
I think it is great over exageration to say this.

The abuse of religion to control people is not a statement on the unreality of God. It is a statement on the depravity of man.

Man, would justify some of his evil motives by laying hold of that which has some truth in it. How can he mislead with a total lie? The more apparent truth man mixes in wi ...[text shortened]... the full spectrum of teaching in the Bible I find that none of these conspiracy theories work.

One conspiracy theory that works: Mankind created religion(s) to control everyone they could subvert in anyway they can and found out they could control women and keep them subjugated which works really well to this day. Religion is perverted and while the evil that is the sum total of present day religion does not in of itself disprove the presence of a god or two, it possesses a large argument against such a god interacting with humans on any level. It says to me if there is a god, it is keeping well away from earth, probably can't stand the smell.
I say there is nothing to prevent us from blowing our planet into smithereens and no god would stop this. That in itself is an argument against the interaction of a god. Surely a god who invested its energy in making the universe and earth would not allow bottom feeding humans to ruin its creation. That also is an argument against the interaction of a god.

Originally posted by jaywill
[b]"Before the mountains were brought forth, And before You gave birth to the earth and the world, Indeed from eternity to eternity, You are God." (Psalm 90:2)

God is the eternal I AM. Only He is eternally self existing. Only He is. This means that only He is everexisting and self existing - dependent upon nothing. We are. But we are dependent ...[text shortened]... ht of God Who always was, worship and praise and thanksgiving to this eternal God help.[/b]

It is just as easy (and more parsimonious) to imagine an uncaused universe as it is to imagine an uncaused creator. Inserting a creator into the scenario solves nothing and raises many questions. How can he be uncaused? If he could be said to be uncaused, then why couldn't the universe itself be said to be uncaused, which would eliminate all the extraneous variables? As "creatures of time" we seemingly cannot comprehend an eternal universe, so we invent a supposedly eternal creator, which we somehow imagine as having solved the problem. But it does nothing of the sort.

Originally posted by dj2becker
So you believe in atheistic evolution?

There are many christians who believe in evolution. 'Atheistic' and 'evolution' are not synonymous.

Originally posted by rwingett
There are many christians who believe in evolution. 'Atheistic' and 'evolution' are not synonymous.

As you are an atheist, I recon you believe in atheistic evolution?