God's Test of Human Souls: Is it fair?

[Wolf_Shade]

Assumption 3 is false. Life is not a test. As such assumptions 4 and 5 are invalid.

As for tree of good and evil:
Adam and Eve were only perfect upon creation in that they had never disobeyed God.

They were ANIMALS because only animals don't know the difference between good and evil !!!

Substantiate that animals don't know the difference between good and evil. I have no doubt an animal has a sense of right and wrong.

The " inspired " Bible writer made a cardinal mistake by claiming that God created the " perfect garden" where there was NO knowledge of good and evil .

God created a garden where it can only be gleaned that two inhabitants had no knowledge of good and evil. Anything else is speculation that cannot be backed up.

While God might CREATE something akin to evil , good CAN NOT be CREATED

Whether good was created or not, has little to do with the knowledge of it. I fear your argument is inaccurate.

A state of " no good and no evil" could NEVER exist and neither could such a tree exist !!!

God being good, a state of no Good cannot exist. You are correct. This does not mean the tree cannot exist. It does not say that good and evil did not exist. It said man did not have the knowledge of them.

 

[copernicus]

Hi, folks. For reasons that are unclear and unexplained, this thread--a debate over a commonly-recognized antinomy in the definition of God--has been moved out of Apologetics to "Non-Christian Religion". I have appealed the move, because it makes no sense to me. Also, I had thought that this thread had played itself out, but Wolf_Shade seems to want to continue it.

Assumption 3 is false. Life is not a test. As such assumptions 4 and 5 are invalid.

We've had a lot of discussion over that issue already, but I would like to hear your reasons for refusing to acknowledge premise 3 as valid. After all, life does end, and one's decision on whether to choose Jesus or not decides one's fate in the afterlife. By any reasonable definition of "test", life is a test. Grades are handed out on Judgment Day.

As for tree of good and evil:
Adam and Eve were only perfect upon creation in that they had never disobeyed God.

You are taking this a bit off-topic. I have already stipulated to the argument that Christian Doctrine is based on original sin. In theory, Adam and Eve committed an act of disobediance that God felt applied to their progeny as well as them. But this is a back-story to the question of whether God is unfair in the test of choosing good over evil and/or accepting Jesus. The argument is that life presents us with unequal chances to arrive at a state of grace. Hence, God is unfair (which undermines the definition of God) or God does not exist.

 

[SavedByGrace3]

Cope...
The fact is, what you have presented here is simply not Christianity.
It is some sort of religion based on works and judgment.

 

[copernicus]

Didaskalos, I respect your opinion on what constitutes Christianity (which you have not explained or elaborated upon in this thread), but that argument could be made of every single challenger to Christianity in the Apologetics forum. Although my view of Christianity may be mistaken--and that is a fair challenge to it--it is wrong to say that the thread should be moved because my depiction of Christianity does not agree with yours. This thread has been limited to a discussion of the fairness of the Christian God, and I have generally refrained from talking about other religions or types of gods.

 

[Wolf_Shade]

We've had a lot of discussion over that issue already,

You're right, we have. These forums have gone over the discussion of God's omniscience versus man's choice many times on this forum. It's been gone over many times in many places. All you're doing is putting a different spin on it by calling it a test. The base issue stills remains the same. You want to know how it's fair for God to create a person who He knows is going reject Him.



Life is a test: You pass or fail based on your decision.

Life is a contest: Those who get the right answer get the prize, those who don’t, don’t.

Life is a joke: Those who get the punch line get the joy of understanding the joke, those who don’t, don’t.

Life is a race: Those who run it well will receive the reward, those who drop out won’t.

Life is a gift: The gift has guidelines and you live by those guidelines or you don’t. If you don’t the gift is taken back, as that was part of the guidelines when it was given to you.


Any one of these could be viewed as what Christianity says. It's a matter of your perspective. As such, I disagree with your assumption 3.

 

[copernicus]

...The base issue stills remains the same. You want to know how it's fair for God to create a person who He knows is going reject Him.

That's not quite it, although I have posed this question as well. The basic argument is that a fair test would be one in which all souls are tested under the same conditions. Since all of us live life under different conditions, there is no way to compare the results fairly. How can one who has never been tempted to commit a sin be judged against one who has been placed in conditions where it is extremely difficult to resist sin?

Mark Twain once touched on the problem in his famous short story The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg. The point of the story was that Hadleyburg represented a town that had a reputation for moral and correct behavior. The plot introduces a character--a stranger to the town--who has a grudge against the town and puts out a specious claim for a citizen to come forward and claim a large reward for having done the the stranger a good deed. The offer, of course, attracts all sorts of people from the town. Twain's satire made the subtle point that virtuous behavior in the absence of temptation is no guarantee of moral character. Just because one has never lied, stolen, or cheated, that does not mean that one never would, given the right circumstances.

So my argument is that the test conditions are unfair. Whether the test is morally correct behavior or simple belief in religious doctrine, the judgment of souls based on behavior in a lifetime is simply not fair.

Now omnipotence injects another dimension to my argument, because one can certainly argue that the only point in testing souls at all is to find something out. If one already knows the answer, then what is the point of the test? It is unnecessary. Put another way, God already knows whether or not a soul will "reject" him without the need of having that soul pass through life in order to arrive at Judgment Day.

Any one of these could be viewed as what Christianity says. It's a matter of your perspective. As such, I disagree with your assumption 3.

Why? You admit that any of the metaphors could be used legitimately. Why do you reject the "life is a test" metaphor?

 

[markie]

Yup, I hold the same view.
He does not exist or if he does(since I do not claim to know everything), he is not just.

Another thing that I would like to add is that salvation is more like a lottery.

1. Out of billion of different species, you have to be lucky enough to be born into the human species. (hardest part to pass since the odds of being born a human are very slim i would suppose)
2. If you are lucky enough to be born into the human species(you would be almost there), you would have to be lucky enough to be born into the right religion.
3. If you are born into the right religion, you would then have to be lucky (or unlucky ) enough to hold that religion's point of view towards God.

Well, 2 or 3 doesn't necessary have to happen, as long as sometime in that person's life he starts assuming what his religion says as true without any logical explanation.

You can't win if you don't play the game.

 

[Izzy23]

God can do what He wants.
We are here for His purpose alone.
I don't remember reading anything about "fair".

 

[copernicus]

God can do what He wants.
We are here for His purpose alone.
I don't remember reading anything about "fair".

Izzy, would you then be willing to admit that God is not fair? That would seem to contradict the idea that God is perfectly benevolent. Unfairness--arbitrarily conferring favors on some and depriving them from others--strikes me as a reasonable trait for a pagan god, not the Christian one.

 

[Izzy23]

Hi Copernicus~ There is a scripture in Isaiah which says God's ways are not our ways nor His thoughts our thoughts. I DO believe in a GOOD God. He does things for the greater good. Something we don't understand, yet. I believe He gives us all the same opportunities however they present themselves. I can't explain it. It just is, if this makes any sense.

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord" (Isaiah 55:8)

 

[copernicus]

Hi, Izzy. I understand your feelings and your point. In this thread, I have not been particularly concerned about God's goodness as much as how we reconcile God's behavior with fairness, which is a virtue. How does the Christian religion make sense of God's behavior? One can always claim that everything that happens on earth is God's will and must therefore be good. What appears to be evil may, in fact, be necessary in order for the greater good to prevail. Under this way of thinking, God may appear to be unfair in posing greater moral hardships on some than on others, but it is all for the greater good.

Such thinking has, in fact, been very popular among religious philosophers as a way of circumventing the Argument from Evil, which goes like this:

1. If God were perfectly powerful, God would be able to prevent any evil.
2. If God were perfectly knowledgable, God would know how to prevent any evil.
3. If God were perfectly benevolent, God would want to stop any evil.
4. Evil exists in the world.
5. Therefore, God does not exist.

My Argument from Unfairness approach, which has been the purpose of this thread, is very similar, although it looks at the fairness of the choice God presents us with in order to attain salvation through Jesus. So my argument could be countered by the claim that God's fairness is the best it could be, but that none of us can quite see the overall picture of how it all balances out so that God is actually treating us fairly.

The theologian's defense of evil (or unfairness) strikes me as exceedingly dangerous, because it can ultimately be used to justify our own evil behavior. Maybe Torquemada was right, and heathens needed to be tortured in order to save their souls. Maybe it is a good thing to kill abortion doctors, because one is carrying out God's will. And that sometimes requires a micro-evil on behalf of the overall macro-good. In other words, the defense of micro-evil in this way actually undermines the justification for moral (or fair) behavior.

 

[Izzy23]

Hi Copernicus~ Ya know, in reading your post, it sounds to me as if you pretty well have a grasp of what we believe.

There is never a justification for doing wrong. Man has been given the gift of free will and we again have to make our choices and are then faced with the circumstances. I know you're looking for the deeper meaning of it all.

I don't know that we can equate fairness with evil. What we consider unfair in our human eyes God sees the bigger plan. I think we base unfairness on our own experiences. Man IS unfair, but we are motivated by evil. God is not.

I can't help but feel Atheists are always looking for a reason to believe.
I'm sure you have read the bible but may I suggest you read it again (from the beginning) with an open heart.

Every element plays a part in the world we exist in.
God does have a plan and we are all a part of it.

God places us in different circumstances (birth, childhood, and so on) and watches each person to see what decisions they are going to make. Some choose evil and some are the victims but at anytime we are allowed to choose Jesus to change the direction of our lives. Children don't consciously make this decision but when you choose to make a just choice you choose God or good.

When you give complete control to that higher power (God) you admit that you don't have all the answers and realize that as humans we are limited. As I have walked with my Lord things are perfectly clear. I have also come to realize that things I considered important are not and the greater good is in our own grasp. To make a difference in our neighbors life. To love one another. Continue asking questions. God welcomes that. He will show you. I'm far from being a scholar. I'm just a humble nobody saved by His grace.

much peace and love.