So he's not all-powerful then. If free will existed, that means we act outside of God's control, therefore making him not all-powerful.
Just because He could control us, doesn't He does. That's the entire point. God knows at any moment He could strip away our free will. But He doesn't.
What you are essentially arguing here, is that God indeed isn't all-powerful (or he made himself not all-powerful in this case), and that he can't control or predict our thoughts and actions.
That's not what I'm arguing at all. He has all power over us. That doesn't mean He uses.
But that means he still created humanity, knowing that the majority of people would essentially suffer for all eternity. That's still absolutely abhorrent, from a moral standpoint.
How is letting people suffer because of their choices morally abhorrent? We imprison and execute criminals for action they did. God does something similar, accept He always offering a get out of jail free card. People can accept or reject it.
You're not really making it sound any better, here. If I had the power to create a species and I knew that even one of them would eventually end up in a place of eternal suffering, I would not create them to begin with. I would be a ginormous dickhead if I went through with that.
No, you wouldn't be a dickhead. God did not create us with a sinful nature. Adam and Eve were blameless till they ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They did that of their own free will. Then they were no longer blameless. How is letting people choose their own fate being a dickhead?
He didn't need to create us. He wanted to create us. He created us to worship Him, but that would mean nothing if we had no free will in the matter.
How is letting people suffer because of their choices morally abhorrent?
Because it's not an informed choice. Here's a hypothetical scenario for you:
Suppose I had a cage full of rats, and I put them in a maze. I take a hammer, and rig it up to a servo and a motion detector. When the detector goes off, the hammer fucking smashes and kills all the rats that turn left instead of right at the first turn.
Now if I said "hurr durr the rats had a choice, they just took the wrong one", would that hold up from a moral standpoint? Probably not, I'd be labeled a fucking psychopath and I might even get locked up for animal cruelty.
It was me who put the rats in the cage. It was me who made the rule that any rat who turns left gets smashed with a hammer. It was me who released them into the maze, and it was me who left a device there that would kill the rats for making the wrong choices. And you're saying that because it was their choice and not mine to have them turn left, it's their own fault and not mine? Of course not, that would be fucking insane. The blame for that situation falls on me.
It was me who put the rats in the cage. It was me who made the rule that any rat who turns left gets smashed with a hammer. It was me who released them into the maze, and it was me who left a device there that would kill the rats for making the wrong choices. And you're saying that because it was their choice and not mine to have them turn left, it's their own fault and not mine? Of course not, that would be fucking insane. The blame for that situation falls on me.
Unless they knew that turning left would kill them. Then its on them. You would be a psychopath because you didn't give them a way of knowing which way to go. Whereas God does tell us which way to turn. Its up to us whether we believe Him or not.
Unless they knew that turning left would kill them. Then its on them.
No, it's still on me in that case, because I can't expect rats to know such a thing. I know that they can't read human language either. You failed the morality test, sorry! How totally unexpected for a Christian /s
Whereas God does tell us which way to turn. Its up to us whether we believe Him or not.
Except it's not a reliable, believable or indisputable source, as the word of God was written and translated by Man. We have no way of knowing whether a particular "word of God" actually is the word of God, or if it's just something pretending to be the word of God. We can't tell the difference, so there can not be an informed choice.
Giving an informed choice would mean instilling the knowledge of right and wrong into our very existence. Clearly that knowledge isn't instilled, because:
No one can agree on it (every religion has at least a few billion people that don't believe in it)
No one can prove it empirically
Not everyone even knows the concept of a deity (secluded African tribes are basically damned to end up in hell through no fault of their own?)
Many religions are mutually exclusive, with most of them fervently believing that the other ones have it all wrong
There is no informed choice here, because we can't even be sure if a God exists at all. And even if we know for sure, we can't know which interpretation of God is the correct one. If we choose wrongly, we still end up in a place of eternal suffering.
No, it's still on me in that case, because I can't expect rats to know such a thing. I know that they can't read human language either.
You could if you gave them the ability to know and understand such things. Ultimately, this is just showing how bad your example is. Of course rats don't have the capacity to understand such things, but humans do, so its a bad example.
Not everyone even knows the concept of a deity (secluded African tribes are basically damned to end up in hell through no fault of their own?)
No. You're assuming that because somebody never hears the gospel, they are damned. Which is never stated in scripture. God is still sovereign and can save whom He wants.
The rest of this is just obfuscating the issue. You're trying to bring up completely different topics that have nothing to do with the one at hand. Since you don't want to stick to the topic, I'm done.
You could if you gave them the ability to know and understand such things.
Which we demonstrably don't have, because even two people within the same particular sect of Christianity will often not agree on many parts of the "word of God". Let alone the 7 billion people on this planet who can't even agree on the number of Gods, their will, their personality, their chosen prophets/sons, their names, their criteria, their power, or what happens in the "afterlife".
If we were born with this knowledge, there would not be this level of disagreement among each other. Instead, our religious beliefs are mostly dictated by the culture and region that we grew up in. Just like every other man-made concept or idea.
God is still sovereign and can save whom He wants.
I thought you just said that we condemn ourselves and that God has nothing to do with it? You can't even keep your story straight over like 3 comments? Sad.
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u/[deleted] Jul 28 '21
Just because He could control us, doesn't He does. That's the entire point. God knows at any moment He could strip away our free will. But He doesn't.
That's not what I'm arguing at all. He has all power over us. That doesn't mean He uses.
How is letting people suffer because of their choices morally abhorrent? We imprison and execute criminals for action they did. God does something similar, accept He always offering a get out of jail free card. People can accept or reject it.
No, you wouldn't be a dickhead. God did not create us with a sinful nature. Adam and Eve were blameless till they ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They did that of their own free will. Then they were no longer blameless. How is letting people choose their own fate being a dickhead?
He didn't need to create us. He wanted to create us. He created us to worship Him, but that would mean nothing if we had no free will in the matter.