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I'm terrible at English.
"god knows everything BEFORE you even exist"
yeah, that's true. to put it more accurate, God knows whatever you're going to choose to do before you even exist. that is different from saying he forced you to do anything
he knows what you're going to do NOT makes you do whatever he knows.
you can not do anything other than what he knows not because he forced you to, but because you freely chose not to do other than whatever you gonna do.
Of course he knows all possibilities, but he also knows which possibility you're going to choose.
Peripatetic
Your saying that god knows everything you will do before you are born? Do you believe we have free will? So god knew I would become an Atheist?
yeah he knew that you would become an atheist, but he didn't force you to.
You've been telling us for days that god is the cause of everything; but now your telling us god didn't cause him to be an atheist. This is what happens when you start invoking supernatural absolutes: contradictions pop up everywhere.
what i have been telling you for days that there must be a necessary being that caused the universe to exist. how on earth could that be interpreted to Humans have no free-will?
Is the necessary being your god? Humans created religion to worship the gods that imagined were real. Can you prove your god is the necessary being?
what do you mean by "my god"? it's not " take the whole package or nothing"
One can prove that a necessary being that is wise, knowing, powerful created the universe but did not send prophets, Or he might have sent prophets but Muhammad for example isn't one of them.
so what do you mean by telling me prove that "your" god exist? do you wanna know why Muslims think Muhammad is a Prophet? cause that's what it means ... but who told you i'm a Muslim? Even if I am then who told you that unless i proved muhammad is a prophet from god i cannot say god does exist?
So your not a muslim? Is the necessary being a god?
@Peripatetic:
You told us that contingent things require necessary things. And you have laid out god as the initial (and presumably only) necessary thing. If we take what you told us at face value then the user xenoview is clearly a contingent thing. His atheism is a contingent thing. Clearly his atheism (contingent) must be caused by something necessary (your argument, not mine!) and that means god caused xenoview's atheism. This is the web you have woven.
So you say god didn't make me an Atheist. You say god didn't force me to become an Atheist. What made me an Atheist was trying to be a better believer in a god.
i don't think i understood what you've written, But i think it's not something about the subject
According to the fairy tale a person can't believe in Yahweh or Yeshua unless they want him to believe in them. So the Bible says that it's out of your hands.
Caitlin, do you believe that everything that happens is part of you god's plan?
@ caitlin post quite a few back, (when the nested replies get long the nesting diagram gets screwy and reply placements become anyone's guess.)
You changed it from god is omnipotent to god is all powerful. Sure a god idea can be all powerful, and people can still have free will in that idea. (As long as you do not include god knows everything(omnipotent) within that definition of god is all powerful, which of course makes him not ALL powerful, just very powerful if he does not have the power to be omnipotent.)
You can not say god knows everything, and people to still have free will. If you say god knows every possible choice we can make and we get to make choices, (free will,) he apparently does not know what choice we will make, then, god does not know everything. If god does know what choices we make, long before we ever make the "choices" they are not choices at all, everything was already predetermined. It is like watching your favorite movie for the 100th time, you already know how it ends, all the characters in that movie have no free will within the story there actions are "predetermined" as the story plays out, and you have ultimate knowledge of those actions and what those actions lead to within that story.
The biblical stories clearly illustrate that people don't have free will. Noah had no choice but to build the ark. Isaac had no say about the crazy old coot Abraham wanting to gut and roast him as a sacrifice so that Abraham could gain personal fame and fortune. The Israelites had no say in being Yahweh's chosen people. Every time they wanted out he yanked them back in. You might want to get into the golden cube but how can you as a Gentile when there's no gate for you to enter through?
Catholics believe is free will.
Catholics believe in free will? So what? My grandson believes in Santa.
Belief does not equal truth. Belief is not a reliable path to truth. It is woefully inadequate.
Free will is more than a belief. Comparing it to Santa Claus is a stretch.
Caitlin
Who wrote those doctrines? Did humans write them?
Divinely inspired and meditated on. But yes people wrote it.
People are not perfect right? Even the supposed divinely inspired ones?
Means the bible is not perfect right?
Lol as you can see no it is not completely perfect. It can be interpreted 100 different ways and is hard to relate to modern time but that is a reason why Catholics don't just follow the Bible. I get what you're saying though.
Do you have proof those doctrines were divinely inspired? Do you believe the people that wrote them without evidence?
Caitlin
What do you do when you get to heaven, don't you worship god for all of eternity? So that means you have no free will in heaven.
I previously wrote a lengthy response to this question but to sum it up what you're saying is not how I see it. I purely believe that when you die, if you lived by God than you can be with God. Of course some can see this as worshipping but if I dedicated my whole life to God why would I struggle with being with him in the afterlife. I love God and I want to be with God.
Caitlin,
Do you follow the biblical teachings? If you don't follow them here on Earth while you are alive how will you be able to cope when you are stuck with Yahweh and/or Yeshua for eternity? How many times did you go to worship service this year? That's all you will be doing for eternity. Nothing else. Even some of the angels got tired of that routine.
People that created "all powerful" omnipotent god idea.
"Hey all let's create an idea, where all rules,reason, logic, and agreed upon language we and the universe live by do not apply? We can then use this idea to answer questions we do not know the answer to, or do not like the current most likely answer!"
Then someone else stumbled upon: "hey people give money and power for this idea we made even if there is zero actual proof our idea has any merit at all and is not insane!"
.
.
It actually likely did not happen this way, instead people were scared and were seeking answers, and then found answers by coming up with an idea that answers them all by breaking all the rules of reality.
Caitlin - thank you for trying to answer my question regarding the omnipotence paradox!
I've always felt frustrated by theism because they claim to be absolute and correct yet provide zero credible evidence.
Even with this paradox, a theist such as yourself will make the claim "god is omnipotent. What the question is asking is can an omnipotent being create a rock so heavy that he himself could not lift it. This is speaking in terms of a being, not God. God is 'to be' (past, present, and future)."
As you eloquently put it....
However, according to Collosians 2:9 - "For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form" so he can be considered an omnipotent being or has the abilities to be so... and therefore you çome around full circle to the original paradox.
So if I'm understanding this right, you're asking is Jesus omnipotent? This definitely gets deep into theology and I'm not sure if there is a clear cut answer but what I do know is that all I said about God being omnipotent still stands and Jesus is God. He is not a part of God but is God in human existence while also outside of time. I'm not sure if it's fair to say but God could create a rock that Jesus could not lift but does lift. This is a difficult question and I'm aware of the flaws in my response but I also think God cannot create something greater than himself. I think this would be a false idea because it is following a law that exists in this realm of existence. Thanks for the question! Sorry if it wasn't answered! I would suggest reading some catholic theologians and philosophers if you're still seeking an answer.
I'd also like to address the free will argument...
If you get to heaven, you're not allowed to sin before god... In fact, you have the promise that, in the eternal state, you will never experience death, sorrow, crying, or pain (Revelation 21:4).
The mere fact that one person cannot inflict a negative feeling on another in heaven negates the possibility of free will.
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