The Fall

[Ormly]

God is a liar if He calls someone “guilty” for an evil disposition which HE instituted within their hearts. Suppose you had a drug that efficaciously causes people to murder. You implant this drug in people – and then blame them for it? Blame yourself.

Now I would agree with you that is logically possible that if God is a non-selfsufficient being (i.e. He has emotional needs), that He could be warranted, if His needs so drove Him irrevocably, to institute a world full of unjust suffering, even to put people in hell to satisfy His own need for glorification, assuming He kept that suffering to the minimum to which His needs so drove Him (it would be morally wrong for Him to exacerbate it).

But the Calvinist views God as self-sufficient. In this view He has no emotional need that would justifiably drive Him to take advantage of human beings – and then dishonestly call them “guilty”!


And as for your claim that authorship requires intent, I think it is unclear or even unintelligible. If a person writes a book, he is the author of that book, regardless of his intent. I would agree with you that we have to look at His intent and His needs to determine whether the authorship was an evil act or a warranted one (one driven by His needs).




As for God implanting an evil intent, looks to me like you need to read your Bible. James says that God is neither temptible nor tempts anyone.


I really don’t know what you are saying here. By the way, Calvinists have done nothing convincing to show that free will can be completely purged from theology. If there is no free will, there is no real guilt. Period.


Now you are trying to come up with an obscure definition of sin to cover up the whole contradiction. (A favorite technique of theologians is to use obscure, highly technical language to avoid charges of contradiction). Sin is now “human limitations”. Absurd. If God creates me finite or weak, He is the one responsible. He is then a liar to judge me immoral or deserving of hell for my God-given limitations.


You continue to obscure the matter with this statement:

Sin is freely willed evil. Any other definition of sin is unintelligible. Now I will accept, in a loose sense, that an act resulting from an addiction (and thus uncontrollable) may be also called sin, even though not freely willed – as long as the addiction originated in freely willed sin which CAUSED the addiction.

We do agree. A hearty "Amen" to all f it!
Welcome to the leper colony.

 

[Ormly]

Yes, I remember this silly argument of yours a while back. You said that even though a parent is responsible for his adolescents (society holds him accountable for their acts in some cases) the parent is not necessarily guilty of those acts, depending on the situation. My reply is the same as it was before. Let’s lay the blame where it is due. If the parent was faithful as a parent, he is not to blame (society’s imperfect justice system might indeed blame him, but this is really an error).

But if the parent somehow instigated the children to do the deed – and thus the deed is by his “sovereign ordination” - he is guilty, and he is a liar if he blames the children. Anyway you slice it, if you make God’s sovereignty so absolute that men have no free will, you make Him a liar for blaming us.


I realize there are passages which seem to construe God as the instigator. I don’t have time to deal with them one by one – I can only say that we MUST resolve them to avoid contradicting God’s holiness.

I will deal with one of them here. “God hardened Pharoah’s heart.” We could perhaps speculate that the term “hardened” is hyperbolic here. Or that the language is techiclly imprecise due to the brevity of Scripture. A good example of technical imprecision is when Scripture says that Christ died for our sin. The death is not “really” what atoned for us, if you think about it. Christ was suffering until the moment of death. Thus the moment of death was the CESSATION of suffering. What “really” atoned for us was the suffering PRECEDING the moment of death. Scripture sometimes sacrifices technical precision for the sake of brevity - this is a very practical usage of language.

With the reality of technical imprecision in mind, consider the following solution. One way to harden Pharoah’s heart is to allow a demon to do it. In this case, it’s certainly not God’s fault, and in fact “hardening” is probably imprecise because, arguably, it’s really not even Pharoah’s fault. Chances are the only one to blame here is the demon. True God allowed the opportunity, but such is the nature of allowing free will.

Consider that God hardened a heart He "foreknew" would never yield to His word. God wasn't losing a soul in this. To prove to everyone His correction in His dealings with Pharaoh, God gave him ten chances.
Ergo, no need for a demon, Pharaoh's own "freewill" and wrong choices did the deed.

 

[beloved57]

Right on, Mikey.
And understanding this fundamental fact puts everything re: good & evil in understandable perspective.

If author of sin we mean :

author =

1. 1. <LI type=a>The writer of a book, article, or other text.
   2. One who practices writing as a profession.
2. One who writes or constructs an electronic document or system, such as a website.
3. An originator or creator, as of a theory or plan.
4. [FONT=arial,sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Author[/SIZE][/FONT] God.

if you mean by author #3,4 yes God is the author of sin..

Sin originated from The eternal plan and purpose of God..which means His plan or purpose is causative in bringing about sin into the world by the fall of adam..

But clearly all things are of God from His Throne,

The true saints understand this as in rev 4:

11Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

 

[beloved57]

jal says

Originally Posted by JAL
God is a liar if He calls someone &#8220;guilty&#8221; for an evil disposition which HE instituted within their hearts.

Well be advised you just blasphemed God..

ps 105 25

25He[God] turned their heart to hate his people, to deal subtilly with his servants.

josh 11


20For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses.

Do you want to repent of your ill advised statement ?

 

[JAL]

jal says

[/i]

Well be advised you just blasphemed God..

ps 105 25

25He[God] turned their heart to hate his people, to deal subtilly with his servants.

josh 11


20For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses.

Do you want to repent of your ill advised statement ?

As stated, one solution is to speculate that God allowed a demon to do it.

But even if God did it with His own hand, I doubt this would change the matter. Suppose God wants to execute you because let's assume you really deserve it.
So He reaches into my heart and gives me a disposition to kill you. We could call this "hardening my heart towards you." Nothing wrong with this - as long as God doesn't then blame me for the act. He would be a liar to say it is a sin on my part. It's a righteous act if you do indeed deserve the execution.

No, I'm not going to repent of my statements because they exonerate Him of evil. It's you who needs to repent of a theology insinuating that He is unjust and a liar.

 

[Van]

If exhaustive determinism was true, then God would be punishing others for the sins He caused them to commit. This is unjust. Saying it is just is a dog that will not hunt. Calvinism is defended by asserting irrational arguments as if they were rational.

God arranged the fall, but Adam chose to sin. And as a consequence of Adam's sin, the many (all mankind) were made sinners, spiritually separated from God and unable to obtain an unseparated state by works of merit. Hence, dead in our tresspasses.

 

[beloved57]

jal says

As stated, one solution is to speculate that God allowed a demon to do it.

Thats the problem with the wicked , speculation is above revealation..

 

[JAL]

If exhaustive determinism was true, then God would be punishing others for the sins He caused them to commit. This is unjust. Saying it is just is a dog that will not hunt. Calvinism is defended by asserting irrational arguments as if they were rational.

God arranged the fall, but Adam chose to sin. And as a consequence of Adam's sin, the many (all mankind) were made sinners, spiritually separated from God and unable to obtain an unseparated state by works of merit. Hence, dead in our tresspasses.

What you say about determinism, Van, I have to totally agree with. It just doesn't work.

 

[Rick Otto]

This is unjust.

Can you explain how that is true in 2 or 3 sentences?

 

[beloved57]

van says

If exhaustive determinism was true, then God would be punishing others for the sins He caused them to commit. This is unjust

This wining sounds familiar..lol


rom 9:


11(For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth
12It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.
13As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.
14What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
15For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
16So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
17For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
18Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
19Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? 20Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?

 

[Ormly]

God arranged the fall, but Adam chose to sin. And as a consequence of Adam's sin, the many (all mankind) were made sinners, spiritually separated from God and unable to obtain an unseparated state by works of merit. Hence, dead in our tresspasses.

God didn't arrange the fall. He foreknew it and He pre-arranged the remedy for the consequence and its causation.

 

[heymikey80]

God is a liar if He calls someone &#8220;guilty&#8221; for an evil disposition which HE instituted within their hearts. Suppose you had a drug that efficaciously causes people to murder. You implant this drug in people &#8211; and then blame them for it? Blame yourself.

You're using imagery to make a point that you can't make with imagery. Add one point to the imagery and the argument collapses.

Everybody dies. The question is whether anyone can be fitted out to live through death. If the physical is all there is, then you've got a bigger problem of worldviews to deal with. You're talking with the God Who made the physical out of nothing -- not a problem there.

In your imagery -- that drug you speak of prepared some people to be more alive than they could ever be, without it. Their murderous tendencies could be constrained, too. So everyone who might be made more alive, would be. And those who remained on a murderous path were ultimately beyond hope, and would die two deaths.

Now I would agree with you that is logically possible that if God is a non-selfsufficient being (i.e. He has emotional needs), that He could be warranted, if His needs so drove Him irrevocably, to institute a world full of unjust suffering, even to put people in hell to satisfy His own need for glorification, assuming He kept that suffering to the minimum to which His needs so drove Him (it would be morally wrong for Him to exacerbate it).

You're proposing one reason when myriad appear. God doesn't have to have a need. He can simply have a want, and that want's satisfaction is morally warranted. Your God is too small. You wish to place human inconvenience and suffering above God's desires -- not to mention the needs of evil humanity above the eternal purposes of God. Those are inconsistent places to demote God to. As long as your god doesn't exist, feel free to do so. But don't expect an extant God to find this acceptable. It doesn't pass the test of logic.

But the Calvinist views God as self-sufficient. In this view He has no emotional need ...

Don't try to strawman a Calvinist view. It's done here so pervasively and constantly that you lose credibility the moment you say, "the Calvinist views ..."

...that would justifiably drive Him to take advantage of human beings &#8211; and then dishonestly call them &#8220;guilty&#8221;!

Dishonest? To grow wood for the fireplace, it's dishonest to throw it in the fire? The inconsistency isn't worth answering.

And as for your claim that authorship requires intent, I think it is unclear or even unintelligible. If a person writes a book, he is the author of that book, regardless of his intent.

Ah, so if write a book I'm responsible for every meaning anyone gets out of the book.

I assure you, I'm not.

I would agree with you that we have to look at His intent and His needs to determine whether the authorship was an evil act or a warranted one (one driven by His needs).

If evil can only be committed freely, then you've already assumed evil is a free act, and thus required freedom for evil to exist.

By definition -- you've begged the question.

As for God implanting an evil intent, looks to me like you need to read your Bible. James says that God is neither temptible nor tempts anyone.

It looks to me like you need to read more broadly into the Bible.

"lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Lk 11:4

What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction Rom 9:22

the LORD God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Gen 2:9

As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good Gen 50:20

So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills. Rom 9:18
​

I really don&#8217;t know what you are saying here. By the way, Calvinists have done nothing convincing to show that free will can be completely purged from theology. If there is no free will, there is no real guilt. Period.

Trimming up a strawman doesn't make it a real man. Calvin never excluded all meanings of the term "free will". He just found most were theologically untenable. They take one meaning of "free will" and expect to project it onto another meaning. As you've done by implying Calvinists are even attempting to purge free will from theology.

I'm intrigued why, if you want others to read more broadly, you haven't read Calvin's and indeed Luther's extensive writings on the subject?

Now you are trying to come up with an obscure definition of sin to cover up the whole contradiction. (A favorite technique of theologians is to use obscure, highly technical language to avoid charges of contradiction). Sin is now &#8220;human limitations&#8221;. Absurd.

I think that's funny how you've tried to say this is "absurd." Sin is "any lack of conformity to God's law." Hm, sin is a lack in this historic definition! What's "hamartia"? Go ahead, look it up. It was used for insufficiency; for inaccuracy; for lack.

If God creates me finite or weak, He is the one responsible. He is then a liar to judge me immoral or deserving of hell for my God-given limitations.

Ah, so if you declare your freedom to will whatever you want without His judgment, that's your business, and God's a liar to hold you accountable and thus destroy your freedom.

That's precisely the kind of freedom Calvin attacked as immoral and deserving of judgment. You're not free here.

You continue to obscure the matter with this statement:

Sin is freely willed evil. Any other definition of sin is unintelligible.

Thus begging the question.

Morality is all evil, intentionally desired, whether freely or unfreely desired. If I were a natural born killer and I entered the Marines to satisfy that blood lust, I would not be any less sinful. I would only be more serviceable to the government.

If I were medically depressed and I took dangerous jobs that would get me killed, I would not be any less sinful to desire my own death by legal means.

Now I will accept, in a loose sense, that an act resulting from an addiction (and thus uncontrollable) may be also called sin, even though not freely willed &#8211; as long as the addiction originated in freely willed sin which CAUSED the addiction.

Ah, so natural born killers shouldn't be imprisoned, they should be allowed to kill freely consistent with their natures. Because freedom's their natural right, and their nature is to kill indiscriminantly.

Carriers of disease don't deserve to be physically constrained, they should have free will to move around killing people. It's not like they meant it or anything!

What do you do with medically-induced killers? What do you do with drugs that naturally occur in people, inducing them to kill, or neglect the lives of others they're responsible for?

You do nothing.

This view of morality is fantasy. Morality is more than "freely willed evil."

 

[holdon]

This view of morality is fantasy. Morality is more than "freely willed evil."

Do you prefer this kind of "morality" then:

if you mean by author #3,4 yes God is the author of sin..

Sin originated from The eternal plan and purpose of God..which means His plan or purpose is causative in bringing about sin into the world by the fall of adam..

 

[Rick Otto]

Plans, purposes, & intents are not "causitive", they are motive. God's motive is consistantly good, even when He employs evil to bring it about.
An elegant expression of sovereignity.

If I loved myself more than my Creator, I would consider Him unfair, & unjust as well.

 

[Ormly]

Plans, purposes, & intents are not "causitive", they are motive. God's motive is consistantly good, even when He employs evil to bring it about.
An elegant expression of sovereignity.

If I loved myself more than my Creator, I would consider Him unfair, & unjust as well.

Adam took that position. . . . and it was passed on to us simply because he didn't deal with the issue of self -love when he had the chance.

 

[Van]

God arranged the fall. Does Satan enter the Garden without God allowing it? Nope. Did God plant the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden, where it would be accessible to Adam and Eve? Yes. Did God make a conditional covenant with Adam, if you eat the fruit, there will be consequences? Yes. God arranged the fall. And of course He knew that man would fall, for no plan of God's can be thwarted. God chose Christ to be His lamb before creation, and you do not choose a Redeemer, unless you plan on folks needing redemption.

 

[Van]

If you define evil as something bad or wicked in the eyes of God, then you have a valid definition of evil, but if you define evil as something bad or wicked in our eyes, then you have a bogus definition of evil. God created our harsh environment, where calamity occurs. But this feature of God's creation is not evil, for we all die, and none can say we should live as much as the next, for that is the sin of covetness. Thus what many are referring to as evil is not evil, however the use of the bogus definition is evil.

Is the death of a new born child evil? God gives life and takes it away? But the expectation that someone deserves the same blessings as the next is covetness, and prideful, because it does not accept the sovereignty of God.

 

[Ormly]

God arranged the fall. Does Satan enter the Garden without God allowing it? Nope. Did God plant the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden, where it would be accessible to Adam and Eve? Yes. Did God make a conditional covenant with Adam, if you eat the fruit, there will be consequences? Yes. God arranged the fall. And of course He knew that man would fall, for no plan of God's can be thwarted. God chose Christ to be His lamb before creation, and you do not choose a Redeemer, unless you plan on folks needing redemption.

He still didn't arrange the fall as you are twisting His reasoning for placing what and where the things planted for your supposings.

 

[heymikey80]

Do you prefer this kind of "morality" then:

I prefer a kind of morality that can be plausibly accepted as real. I do not prefer a kind of morality that plays on populist ideas of free will that put people independent of their own universe, and self-actualization that makes humans into gods.

Plenty of Christians have hit on versions of morality that don't make humans into beings independent or ascendant over their own creation. While I don't find all those views to be accurate, I don't find them offensive.

 

[Van]

Ormly, God arranged the Fall as demonstrated yet again in post #196. Saying the verses do not add up to an arrangement without offering an alternative view is not compelling.