Would it be more palatable for you for me to say, "Morality is objective, as far as it applies to creatures."?
But here and below, you are denying the very essence of what it means to be God. God doesn't process thoughts the way we do; he doesn't weigh the value of one action or decision against another. That is already a given, to the omniscient and perfect. Consider the notion that, for God, to think is to decide is to do. Some say that God's attributes are indistinguishable from himself, and others even say he IS his attributes. There is a certain validity to that idea; he cannot behave differently from his attributes.
Whether you think his morality comes from outside himself or not, you still think that way, if you think his decisions are filtered before acted on, or that he must consider whether a thing is good, before doing what is simply his nature to do. It is a moot question whether morality is subjective or objective as God considers it. He needn't consider at all. It doesn't filter through him, because it is what he does. It proceeds from him to us --it is not OURS. Objective.
The fact your morality (some of it, any way) seems more or less universal should tell you something about whether it is subjective or objective.
Where do you get the idea it is needless? Who --or what-- do you think God is? This life is not for this life. That should be self-evident, if God exists.
"These things must come, but woe to the one through whom they come."
Alright, I'll concede that objective vs subjective doesn't enter into the equation where God, Himself, is concerned
As for His creatures, I still maintain that our morality is subjective because, unlike God, we DO weigh the value of our actions and decisions via a process of filtration through our personal thoughts and feelings
Unless, of course, we simply do automatically, and without question, what we are told to do - in which case I would argue that we are not functioning as moral agents at all
Where do I get the idea that harm, consciously and purposefully inflicted by God, is needless?
Well, any and all harm as consciously and purposefully inflicted upon us by God is, by definition, needless because God, being God, needn't ever do anything!
He is not required to do anything
He is not forced to do anything
He is God
Everything He does is by His choice and of His own free will
Let's take, for example, drowning babies during the Great Flood
I'll give God the benefit of my doubt and assume that His motivation for drowning innocent babies alongside the wicked was to save them from a fallen world and resurrect them to a better one {Heaven}
God consciously and purposefully inflicted the harm of drowning upon babies
Why was this needless harm?
Because God COULD HAVE saved and resurrected those babies WITHOUT drowning/harming them
Very often, us human beings have no other choice except to inflict harm in order to achieve a greater good
EX: We cut people open to remove cancer
God, however, is capable of removing cancer without invasive surgery
God is capable of achieving any end He desires by any means that He desires!
God COULD HAVE saved and resurrected babies without drowning them
God COULD HAVE saved and resurrected babies without causing them harm
Instead, God consciously and purposefully chose to inflict the NEEDLESS harm of drowning upon them
