Why do people think God is perfect and doesn't make mistakes?

That's part of why the Eden narrative is allegorical IMO.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

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You really do misunderstand God's ways. You are far from alone....
God made possibly the simplest rule ever. Don't eat from that knowledge tree. God also told Adam the consequences. Adam and Eve were created neutral. You can think of it as God creating a potential family. He is the Father, after all. God's intent was to create beings like Himself. However, God does not want robots. He gave Adam and Eve the ability and right to choose. The question was (and is still), would Adam choose to obey or disobey God? Adam made a really bad choice. God did not force Adam to do anything. God did not set a time by which Adam had to choose. It was up to Adam.

No, Adam did not have to eat from the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil. He could eat from any other tree. Your questioning is like that of Job. 38:1 & 2 "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said: “Who is this who obscures My counsel by words without knowledge?""

The forbidden fruit is representative of the implicit risks of free will. There was no way to avoid that risk if man was going to be made in the image of God and have moral autonomy.

God wasn't learning and improving over the span of the OT. Man was maturing philosophically and politically and approaching "the fulness of time" when Christ could become manifest and His message could be carried out to the world. God was working with man, despite man's faults, to bring him to that point.

When things are less that perfect in the Bible, as they frequently are, it is best to assume God is perfect and it is we who have the problem. Even our own lives provide abundant evidence to at least the last part of that statement.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

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God set forth the guidelines. He's not the one who made the mistake. He gave us free will to take the path we want. He wants those that are willing to follow not ones who are forced.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

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This is his perfect plan. Unless you see that, you are missing the entire message about his glory.

SoManyQuestions! said:

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

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Then I would squash those ants like bugs. Just kidding. Thankful God didn't do that though

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

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Actually Study His entire Word and you will find out much MUCH differently .... you are making assumptions and flippant statements based on your limited knowledge/understanding.

Ones approach to learning about God should be taken seriously and takes time ... just as one doesn't know or understand calculus before first learning about addition, subtraction and on into algebra and trigonometry. So it is with His Word.

Hi Word teaches that God can’t make mistakes because He is perfect, all-knowing, and all-powerful, and that He can’t change His mind because He is unchanging and eternal.

Isaiah 40:28
Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

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Is it like that? Really like that? Or is your analogy kind of a rough, approximated illustration that doesn't quite fit since it doesn't take into account a host of various biblical details?

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

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I'd say it's an example that's a bit too small. Got anything bigger?

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

Click to expand...

Ants aren't moral creatures. Adam and Eve were moral creatures. They were fully functioning adults who listened to God and understood what he told them to do and not do, and disobeyed anyway. This wasn't God's mistake, but their disobedience.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

Click to expand...

Alternative thesis: God doesn't make mistakes, but the Scriptures provide us with stories to help teach us important lessons.

The point of the story of Eden isn't about literal trees and fruits, but about humanity's responsibility (and our demonstrable lack thereof) and the tragic and fundamental problem of sin.

Also, I'm not sure there's any need to use any slurs here.

-CryptoLutheran

Firstly, ancient humans lack the ability to convey a history. That's why whatever happened, say, some 6000 years ago become myths in different cultures. Take the flood for an example, that is, even when a flood did occurred, today's humans can only possibly read a myth (or story) but not any formal history records as it is out of ancient humans to convey such a piece of history.

That's why even chooses to convey a long history in the form of stories such that humans lived long ago can convey it effectively.

That said. The Eden story is more than a simple story, it is rather a multi-fold prophecy about humans. Basically today's humans choose to rely on their knowledge/science to deny God (who is conveyed in the Bible which is known as the Word of God). That's how Adam chooses to ignore God's words to eat from the Tree of Knowledge. The day humans choose to eat from it, the same day they shall surely die (a second death).

The Tree of Knowledge is for humans to deal with the reality (that's why it is in Eden). However, it is not meant to be used to judge God and a future situation. It is because humans don't have the ability to tell a future. They don't have the ability to tell if God exists or not with their knowledge (science). After eating from the Tree they however think that their eyes are opened, that they can judge to say that "God doesn't exist".

The Tree of Life is about a future, that is, how life will go on after our physical death. It is thus in Eden as it concerns every single human. "Not allowed to eat from" means it's not by design to allow humans to tell a future or how life will go on after our physical death. Only God can tell a future. That's why it is said that they already have the Tree of Knowledge, if they eat from the Tree of Life as well, they thus become gods.

The above complication can somehow be told by a story which is the only mean ancient humans can convey without much loss of information. It's amazing. It's more like a complicated computer program being compressed and encrypted, conveyed without distortion, and now can be decrypted as long as you can get to a correct decoder and decompressor.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

Click to expand...

Man's objective was not to: "Never ever sin", but it has always been to become like God Himself in that we have the greatest gift possible being Godly type Love.
Adam and Eve plus all of us can be thankful for the Garden experience as a unfortunate yet wonderful lesson in why the Garden situation is an impossible place for humans to fulfill their earthly objective.

ViaCrucis said:

Alternative thesis: God doesn't make mistakes, but the Scriptures provide us with stories to help teach us important lessons.

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God in Genesis 6 says he regretted making man. Usually when I regret something I wish I had not done it.

SoManyQuestions! said:

He makes a lot of them in the bible. It takes him the whole of the old testament to finally fix them in the new testament with Jesus. An easy example is the first one. Okay so God doesn't want Adam and Eve to eat from the tree of knowledge, so he places them right next to it and tells them not to eat from it. -__-

That's like us putting sugar on an ant hill, telling the ants not to eat the sugar, then getting mad because they eat some of the sugar. Of course they are going to eat it, you retard!

That is just one small example. There are many more along with just plan questionable choices that come off as anything but good and loving.

Click to expand...

Each human being seems to be naturally in touch with the ineffable, with God, from the start in life, and it's so natural that they don't even think about it -- like breathing air. We aren't even aware there is any other way to be. Like a fish in water.

But we learn and learn and learn from the adults/culture around us, as we grow up....

In time, one day, the young child becomes more and more aware (from older people, adults, around them) that there is 'good' and 'bad'.... -- the 'knowledge of good and evil'.

(That's the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" -- assuming for ourselves the authority/power/ability to decide what is good and what is bad, to become our own 'God' instead of relying on God...)

And eventually, they begin to feel -- I could decide for myself, without that special Truth/Good within, even in spite of Him...what I think is good and bad, instead of trusting in Him...

That's what Eve and Adam did really -- trusting themselves above God, instead of Him.

In this way the Garden story is about the inevitable: the birth of consciousness which has to happen (there really is no other way) for any intelligent being given true freedom (ability to choose).

Autonomy/intelligence -- that which creates the potential (the possibility) that we can eventually rebel, and thus lose the bliss of perfect innocence. To break trust with God.

At first, our judgement we've assumed for ourselves, it isn't so great...

It's like we need to hear the true Law, the rules of actual good that are true, so that we can learn we have gone wrong, and be convicted of our wrongs, instead of believing ourselves perfect.

So....all sin, and all fall short. Then we need a way to reconcile to God, to return to Him.

Especially those who have wandered off, who so much need a way back to Him.

Christ came to call us to repentance: Luke 5:32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance."

Christ even went to the 'spirits in prison' (as revealed to Peter in 1rst Peter chapter 3, v 18-20) -- those from past times, all of humanity practically before the Flood, representative of rebelling against God, or all people in all of time who hadn't yet heard the gospel.

It's actually all....perfect...necessary...inevitable.

There cannot be Love without freedom. And there cannot be an absence of evil if there is freedom, because freedom includes the ability to choose wrong.

We have to learn that God is good......

Halbhh said:

Each human being seems to be naturally in touch with the ineffable, with God, from the start in life, and it's so natural that they don't even think about it -- like breathing air. We aren't even aware there is any other way to be. Like a fish in water.

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When you say this people that do not believe in God will disagree. It seems like you are saying that you know better about what they believe than the non believer does.

Clizby WampusCat said:

When you say this people that do not believe in God will disagree. It seems like you are saying that you know better about what they believe than the non believer does.

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Early childhood, such as age 2-4. Perhaps the wording wasn't clear enough in that first paragraph. But the 2nd-3rd paragraphs would have helped clarify when read.

Clizby WampusCat said:

God in Genesis 6 says he regretted making man. Usually when I regret something I wish I had not done it.

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Which is the framing of the narrative. I do think that the more interesting thing about the story of the flood isn't the idea that God regretted anything, or the flood itself; but rather how the story fits into the larger narrative structure of Genesis, and what it's saying within the larger story going on in the Bible.

Perhaps I should be somewhat clear here: I don't believe there was a literal Noah, flood, or ark.

-CryptoLutheran

Halbhh said:

Early childhood, such as age 2-4. Perhaps the wording wasn't clear enough in that first paragraph. But the 2nd-3rd paragraphs would have helped clarify when read.

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I did read the paragraphs. So you know what 2-4 year old's believe?

ViaCrucis said:

Which is the framing of the narrative. I do think that the more interesting thing about the story of the flood isn't the idea that God regretted anything, or the flood itself; but rather how the story fits into the larger narrative structure of Genesis, and what it's saying within the larger story going on in the Bible.

Perhaps I should be somewhat clear here: I don't believe there was a literal Noah, flood, or ark.

-CryptoLutheran

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Why? How do you determine what is literal in the bible and what is not literal?