Determinism is bugging me big time :-(

[Tynan]

God gave us our ability to reason and He wants us to use this gift. We work out our own salvation according to the scriptures. God invites us to reason with Him.

Tynan wrote: Your belief is faith based, it is a belief in god or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, therefore is not based on reason.

You are simply wrong.

Not all people beleive a religion/belief based on reason. In fact, very few do. Deists, Atheists, Agnostics, Humanists... maybe Universalists and Buddhists. The rest is based on faith rather than reason. They're not wrong, they just think differently than you do.

If they say they base their 'faith' on reason, they are by definition wrong.

Elman is saying his religion (one of the thousands of versions of Christianity) is based on reason, this much is clear.

I am saying this is wrong, as faith is based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, you do not reason your way to believing in Allah or Ganesh.

Therefore I maintain my position that he is wrong.

 

[phsyxx]

Tynan wrote: Your belief is faith based, it is a belief in god or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, therefore is not based on reason.

You are simply wrong.



If they say they base their 'faith' on reason, they are by definition wrong.

Elman is saying his religion (one of the thousands of versions of Christianity) is based on reason, this much is clear.

I am saying this is wrong, as faith is based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, you do not reason your way to believing in Allah or Ganesh.

Therefore I maintain my position that he is wrong.

I second Tynan on that motion.

 

[elman]

=

Tynan;26427149]Tynan wrote: Your belief is faith based, it is a belief in god or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, therefore is not based on reason.

You are simply wrong.

Why do you assume I have no reasons to believe as I do? Do you have reasons to believe as you do? You simply pronounce me wrong when you have no knowledge of my reasons. You also pronounce God as not existing I assume when you have no reasons for doing so.

If they say they base their 'faith' on reason, they are by definition wrong.

What is your definition of faith or reason. I guess it must differ from mine.

Elman is saying his religion (one of the thousands of versions of Christianity) is based on reason, this much is clear.

I am saying this is wrong, as faith is based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof, you do not reason your way to believing in Allah or Ganesh.

I do reason myself to believe in God being good and not evil. Faith is based on spiritual apprehension and on reason or proof.

 

[elman]

OK
I am going to take a different slant at your problem (the initial post)- in order to hopefully answer it more fully and more satisfactorily than others who have attempted to do so.

In order for me to answer your problem- we first need to understand what you mean by
LOVE.

I am not sure who your are talking to but Jesus defined love in the story of the good Samaritan and in Matt 25:31 and following.

Matt 25:31-26:1

31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

34 "Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'

37 "Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'

40 "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

41 "Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'

44 "They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'

45 "He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

46 "Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."


(from New International Version)

 

[phsyxx]

I am not sure who your are talking to but Jesus defined love in the story of the good Samaritan and in Matt 25:31 and following.

Matt 25:31-26:1

31 "When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

34 "Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.'

37 "Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?'

40 "The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'

41 "Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.'

44 "They also will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?'

45 "He will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.'

46 "Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."


(from New International Version)

Sorry, I don't mind you using a parable of Jesus to define love, but I think the acts of the samaritan are more towards selflessness than love.

 

[elman]

Sorry, I don't mind you using a parable of Jesus to define love, but I think the acts of the samaritan are more towards selflessness than love.

I disagree. The parable follows Jesus saying the only law of God that matters is love your neighbor and then Jesus was asked: "Who is my neighbor?" The parable was the answer to that question and the question was an effort understand the law to love.

 

[Emmy]

Dear BushwigBill, you had some strange replies, and when you said that you are a Christian, and had always been free-thinking, am I right? you use the the free will God gave us? That is true, we are free to choose, what we think is best for us, we are not robots, or puppets. God wants our love freely given, not automatically, like an automaton. As long as we remember that all we, ourselves, do, or say, has consequences, rewards and punishment. We decide ourselves. God told us what us good for us, and He told us what Not to do. I say this humbly and kindly, BushwigBill, and send greetings. Emmy, your sister in Christ.

 

[phsyxx]

So...to love is to be kind to your enemy.

In that case, a loving God would allow the Devil back in to Heaven, an Atheist into Heaven, a sinner into Heaven...

infact, I don't think God discriminates at all who goes to Heaven.

 

[elman]

So...to love is to be kind to your enemy.

In that case, a loving God would allow the Devil back in to Heaven, an Atheist into Heaven, a sinner into Heaven...

infact, I don't think God discriminates at all who goes to Heaven.

There are many scriptures that indicate a failure to be loving results in a failure to receive eternal life-Heaven. I think God gives us all the gift of physical life. He does not give us all the gift of spiritual or eternal life. That come from His grace and it is connected to our responding to His love with love.

 

[phsyxx]

There are many scriptures that indicate a failure to be loving results in a failure to receive eternal life-Heaven. I think God gives us all the gift of physical life. He does not give us all the gift of spiritual or eternal life. That come from His grace and it is connected to our responding to His love with love.

So,,,,this leads me onto another problem entirely...

If God discriminates about who does and does not enter Heaven....
doesn't that make him anything but "all-loving".
QUE?

 

[elman]

So,,,,this leads me onto another problem entirely...

If God discriminates about who does and does not enter Heaven....
doesn't that make him anything but "all-loving".
QUE?

No because God does not discriminate. He gives everyone the opportunity to be loving and the grace to cover their imperfections. It is not all loving to force your presence on someone who does not want it.

 

[phsyxx]

No because God does not discriminate. He gives everyone the opportunity to be loving and the grace to cover their imperfections. It is not all loving to force your presence on someone who does not want it.

So God cannot prevent those who WANT to come into Heaven, but will allow those who choose not to to go somewhere else.

So I understand from that then, that Hell is not: and there will be starred words, : fire and brimstone and bloody damnation.

?

 

[quatona]

No because God does not discriminate. He gives everyone the opportunity to be loving and the grace to cover their imperfections. It is not all loving to force your presence on someone who does not want it.

Do you think it is all loving to set a dead-line, after which this someone´s ability to want or not want this expires?

 

[quatona]

So God cannot prevent those who WANT to come into Heaven,

Very good point.

So I understand from that then, that Hell is not:

elman doesn´t believe in hell.

 

[0rion]

I'm a Christian. Always have been. But I've always liked to think of myself as pretty free-thinking.

Good to hear that, and by the nature of this question I would agree.

Lately I've been wondering, if God knows everything, He must have known when he created Lucifer that he would rebel against Him. And when He created mankind and gave us free will, He knew that the fall of man would follow.

Correct, that is the problem.
It is claimed that (omniscience + benevolence) is what created this universe, yet in this universe misery reigns.

So my question to everyone is: Why does a loving God create a person, knowing that they will reject Him and go to Hell?

In my opinion, this is a question that could only be answered with conjectures, since neither of us is God himself and we do not know if determinism is true or not. (But, if there is a God and that God is omniscient, then this universe must be deterministic.)

Because in technicallity, if determinism is true, all crimes and bad things which happened in this earth would be God's fault because of his omniscience.

And do we really have a choice in whether we accept or reject God, or does it all just come down to the way He chose to create us?

Although we do not know which is actually true between determinism and indeterminism, freewill however, is a logical absurdity.

We do not have a choice in our beliefs. And all choices have a reason, cause, etc... therefore triggered, a sign of causation.

Also, indeterminism does not equate to freewill, because indeterminism equates to randomness, unpredictability, unwilled. The reason I said freewill was a logical absurdity is because freewill actually tries to pass out as willing something randomly, which is a contradiction in itself.

So, to answer your question if we really have a choice to choose or reject God... the answer would be no. If you were to finish your life and we were to turn back time, you would be the same person you were in the past, and not a single thing would change.

If anyone could shed some light on this for me I would greatly appreciate it.

I hope I was able to shed some if not a little light, I know my responce was not the best... but I tried to focus on the topic of the question.

 

[0rion]

One of them, called the Qadariyyah, asserted man’s free will and responsibility to the extent of denying Allah’s foreknowledge, and claiming that Allah knows our free made actions only after we have performed them.

This is logical, but it denies God of his omniscience.

The other, called the Jabriyyah, held the opposite view and claimed that there was no difference between the motions of inanimate things and our movements in performing so-called free actions, and that when we use intentional language we speak only metaphorically.

the idea of determinism is somewhat there, but this view would make God responsible for a criminal's actions.

But there is no need to go to such extremes, since it is not difficult to reconcile Divine qadar (predestination) and human responsibility.

Yes, it is not difficult if you want to add logical absurdities into your answer.

Allah decided to create man as a free agent,

What is a free agent? Free from what?

The problem with this answer is that it brings illogical terms and tries to give them meaning and soundness.

but He knows (and how can He not know!) before creating every man how he is going to use his free will;

What is being created here is a contradiction.

A = !A

God can predict the unpredictable. Such statement is an absurdity.

 

[phsyxx]

This is logical, but it denies God of his omniscience.



the idea of determinism is somewhat there, but this view would make God responsible for a criminal's actions.



Yes, it is not difficult if you want to add logical absurdities into your answer.



What is a free agent? Free from what?

The problem with this answer is that it brings illogical terms and tries to give them meaning and soundness.



What is being created here is a contradiction.

A = !A

God can predict the unpredictable. Such statement is an absurdity.

It is not unpredictable.
It is predictable in terms of God- but unpredictable in terms of everyone else.

What if God does play dice, Einstein? But what if he knows the outcome?

 

[elman]

=phsyxx;26975727]So God cannot prevent those who WANT to come into Heaven,

I did not say there was anything God could not do.

but will allow those who choose not to to go somewhere else.

I don't see God forcing Himself on anyone.

So I understand from that then, that Hell is not: and there will be starred words, : fire and brimstone and bloody damnation.

Hell is death, not llife in pain.

 

[0rion]

It is not unpredictable.
It is predictable in terms of God- but unpredictable in terms of everyone else.

phsyxx, predictable or unpredictable in terms of anyone is irrelevant. what we are talking about is the possibility of something being able to be predicted -- not who is able to predict something (you are confusing the two thus your flawed reasoning).

What if God does play dice, Einstein? But what if he knows the outcome?

I don't think that you understand what you are trying to prove. Are you trying to prove that our actions are unpredictable? I hope that you do realize that indeterminism does not equate to freewill. Indeterminism equates to randomness, where randomness and will are in themselves contradictory.

And if God knows the outcode, then the outcome was not unpredictable to begin with. (and FYI, dice rolls are predictable)

 

[elman]

Do you think it is all loving to set a dead-line, after which this someone´s ability to want or not want this expires?

It seems loving to me to give someone a gift and if they use their gift in a loving way, give them another gift. I don't see love meaning I have to give the ones who are unloving with what they have been given the same second gift I would give to the loving. The first gift of physical life has its own dead line. That is simply part of the gift.