Redefining Good and a Not-So Omniscient God
July 17, 2005 by The Prize
If you have read my previous post, you will know of my Christian lady acquaintance who I met on a certain chat room. Just a while ago, she introduced me to a friend of hers. She then created a conference for the three of us to hangout. The conversation started with casual fun and lighthearted conversation. Then soon after, her friend’s curiosity led him to inquire about my atheism. To make things simpler, his question can be boiled down to, “What made me leave Christianity?”
Since the question requires a book to sufficiently answer, I just pulled out one of the simplest problem that I have seen in the Bible - the atrocities and violence committed by God and his followers.
My intent for using that is to make him see for himself if the God of the Bible is really as “good” as we initially thought him to be. I then quoted some verses from the Old Testament. And these were their answers:
- Those acts are not evil. We are simply looking things at our human point of view. But on God’s point of view, they aren’t evil.
This is actually a subset of the “God is beyond human understanding” argument. This argument assumes that there are two “versions” of good. The first good is what we humans commonly understand as good. The second is a version of “good” that only “God knows”.
Actually, to say that God has a different kind of morality than we, humans, is to concede that we should not call God good. If God doesn’t fit our definition of what is good, then God is not good. Case Closed.
Let me illustrate further. If I go outside, look above, and see a plane, I will describe the plane as a flying vehicle that has two wings, a metal body, a small set of wheels, a motor and so on. My description fits the definition of what a plane is. Did I see a plane? Yes I did because that is how a plane is described and my description fits the definition of what a plane is.
But what if someone then says that “on some other definition”, what I saw could be considered as a television. Is it no longer an airplane then?
No. To say so is absurd. The “plane” that I saw fits the definition of a plane. That is what we mean by saying that it is a plane. It does not fit the definition of a television, so we should not call it that.
If something fits the definition, then that is what it is. If God fits the definition of good, then he is good. If he does not, then he is not. If one will admit that he does not fit our definition of good, then he is not good. It is nonsensical to say that he could be “good” in some other definition. By the very definition of good, the God of the Bible fails utterly.
But then, one can argue that despite what we think, God could still have his own version of morality that dictates that he is good. Even if we could not call him good, that does not mean that he is not good on some definition. He could have his own “unknown” definition anyway.
But this argument poses many problems. If God has definitions of things that are radically different from our own, he might have a different definition about lots of other things. He might have his own definitions of such things as eternal reward, or eternal life. The Christian’s supposed eternal life in heaven might just be a year, or it could be a thousand years of torture on another definition. God could also say he has a definition of reward that includes excruciating torture as part of the definition.
If God can redefine any word, then anything goes. God could send all believers to what we call hell and say that it is heaven. He could give us ten days in heaven and say that that is his definition of eternity. God could promise us eternal life and then not give it to us and say that is his definition of keeping a promise!
So on and so forth.
Now you see the absurdity of claiming that God ordering people to dash infants against rocks and floors (Psalms 137:8-9), or God ordering pregnant women to be ripped open (Hosea 13:16), or God causing parents to eat the flesh of their children (Leviticus 26:13,29), or God discriminating against the handicapped (Leviticus 21:16-21), are all “good” by some other “unknown” definition (By the way how could we know that there is even a “different” version if it is “unknown” in the first place?). If a human dictator will do any of these, we would call him a psychopath. When God does the same we call him “loving” and build churches in his honor.
Emery Lee once wrote, “It is a sad day when we condone the abuse of one human being by another. It is also a sad day when we condone such abuse by God.”
- He gave us freewill!
At this point, I asked him if he believes that God is omniscient. I defined omniscience to him as having complete and perfect knowledge of the past, present, and future. After much side stepping on his part, he finally acknowledged that God is indeed omniscient. I then laid out this simple question, “If God knew ahead of time that I will be heading to hell even before I was created, why did God still created me anyway?” The point of this question is two fold. One is to demonstrate that “freewill” cannot exist in a world created by an omniscient God who has foreknowledge of the future. Let me illustrate:
- God is omniscient.
- God’s omniscience is infallible.
- Freewill is the ability to choose freely among the options presented.
- On Saturday, God knows that I will do “X”.
- It’s Saturday and I have a “choice” between “X” and “Y”.
- By necessity, I choose “X”.
- By choosing “Y”, I would contradict #2.
Conclusion: Therefore freewill does not exist.
He said on one point that he believes that “God gave us free will in order to change our destiny.” And on another point he said, “He knows the future, but he doesn’t know what we will do next.” What a blatant self-contradiction! How can you know the “future” and not know what humans will do next, which is an event that occurs in the “future”!
The second reason, is to make him realize that a being who punishes a person whom he had already foreseen to be heading to hell even before creating him but he still created anyway is not worthy of being called “good”. This also shows that being omniscient, God is perfectly responsible for everything that will happen in the reality that he created since he knows already the final outcome of everything - past, present, and future. To better understand this, let me repost an example that I posted on the Debating Christianity and Religion Forum:
Suppose you have been granted a one time ability to see what will happen to your unconceived future son and daughter. You saw in the future that at the age of 10, your daughter would be gang raped by 4 pedophiles. And you saw how exactly this animosity was done. You saw various sex torturing devices being used against her and you saw her being subjected to different sexual activities. Fortunately, she survived. But she became severely traumatized and refuses to be comforted. Consequently, at the age of 11, committed suicide and in her suicide letter, she wrote “I hate GOD”. In short, she chose to go to hell.
As a result, her 18 year old elder brother (your son) accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. A week later this son of yours died.
Then back to the present. You just recently married. Now the question is, will you still pursue conceiving this daughter of yours so that your first born son will be saved through her? Or will you rather not let the two of them be born at all?
I am asking you this as a parent who loves his children.
The answer that he gave me, after much side-tracking, is “I believe that God knows where we are going based on our free will. If we continue to do the things we are doing then he will continue to know where we are going”.
As obvious from the above, his answer necessitates the denial of God’s omniscience!
An example of the ramifications of a reality created by an omniscient God:
- Omniscience is a complete and perfect knowledge of the past, present, and future.
- God is omniscient
- If God is omniscient, he knows perfectly and completely all details of the past, present, and future.
- By virtue of his omniscience, God knows with complete and perfect knowledge what my future is even before I was created.
- God had seen, by virtue of his omniscience, that in the future, I am going be tortured to hell.
- Since God’s omniscience is perfect, then God cannot make a mistake on his foreknowledge of what my future is.
Conclusion: Since God’s omniscience is perfect and complete, I shall inevitably go to hell in the future if he so decides to bring me into existence.
But his answer denies omniscience altogether:
- Omniscience is a complete and perfect knowledge of the past, present, and future.
- God knows where we are going BASED on our free will.
- From # 2, God’s knowledge of the future of each person depends and contingent only on each person’s actions.
- To make future knowledge contingent on a cause entails a period of uncertainty until the cause actualize itself. God cannot know (uncertainty) our eternal destiny (future outcome) until we make a choice (cause).
- If God can experiences uncertainty, then God cannot and does not possess complete knowledge of the future.
- To be unable to have complete knowledge of the future is to be not omniscient.
Conclusion: Therefore, God is not omniscient.
He adheres to the Open View Theism’s concept of a God without him knowing it. This is understandable as most Christians put faith on their belief without first thinking what their belief really means and entails.
Pretty detailed argument.
Simply put:
If God was omniscient, why did he create Man, if he knew Man was going to sin and burn in Hell?
Exactly. And the apologist’s only way out here is to deny one or more of God’s omni characteristic (omniscience, omnipotent, omnibenevolent etc.). No theist ever deals with all of these God-characteristics at the same time, for they cannot - to do so leads to contradictions.
*whew* That was long. *lol*
God causing parents to eat the flesh of their children (Leviticus 26:13,29)
O.O OMF-!! *reads Bible*
There is a joke that goes along this lines:
Question: “What is the surefire way to make a person an atheist?”
Answer: “Let her read the Bible.”
I am studying along these lines presently.
I do not believe that God knows what each person will choose to do at any given time…until just prior to them doing it and even at that exact moment free will dictates they could change their mind.
The mind is made up certain nano moments before an action takes place so he simply needs to be able to read your mind and spirit and heart. Which i do believe He does? well actually don’t hold me to that one for the moment.
So God doesn’t know what you will do.
He knows everything else that is happening because they run on systems other than free will. Systems he also created.
Man was made different than all other species.
We are in His likeness and image. That means something particular. It is that creative, will-ful, nature.
We are in a vacuum. Reality moves in real time. God is not limited to our time and space but he is bound to honor the system he placed.
When God booted Adam and Eve it was so that they did not take of the tree of life and live forever as gods with their sin nature…it would have brought about a collapse of the “motherboard” of God.
Why? Because the seed of God remained in them.
We are children of God from creation…fallen now but the watermark is still there.
So if God does not know what we will do…He did not know that they would partake of the “apple”…He did not know what effect the snakes tactics would take on Eve. Also if he wanted to keep them from the choice…which is a whole other subject…he could have shielded them…but freewill means being given the choice.
If God wanted true fellowship with created beings like himself yet without risk of imploding his throne with little kings he would have to give them every chance to fail and every chance to be redeemed without manipulation.
Now some misconstrue scripture to say he did manipulate.
The first few generations after Adam were familiar with God in a way the world now doesn’t get…and yet they lived completely contrary to his will, law, nature, etc..
There was plenty of warning…plenty of grace to go around…if something wasn’t done; the results would have been apocalyptic.
So the flood. A sign to the future. Judgment on carnal man.
A distinction for Noahs spirit. Not perfect but he “found grace in the eyes of the Lord”
Well we can all do that…right? Anyone anywhere…even the deep forest indian who has never heard the gospel can seek and find the true God and be set free from the bondage of darkness and fear.
the just shall live by faith.
I gotta step back…i am still working out the kinks on this notion that God knows not where each person will end up.
I believe that right now and a couple passages with the word foreknowledge arent’ enough to undo all the other passages that say “if” and “consider” and “well done” and “repent”
So lets assume for a moment he doesn’t know everything people will choose…or how the seed of his word is taking root in their lives to the point of breaking the surface of the self will until it is manifest.
Does that make him less God or Almighty?
What if he purposely keeps from making this happen?
Everything else is self fulfilled prophesy.
Its not that cruised ahead in time…our time that hasn’t even happened yet…and saw who would be there…its more like He spoke what the end game would look like and pulls the levers that will make nature, evil, judgement, grace, church, sin, death and hell have their say and play in due time…he will conduct it at his will.
I disagree with some definitions thrown around on this arguement.
Ominiscience is not perfect knowledge of the future of people.
Also Foreknowledge doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing. Foreknowledge of Christ being saved forever and all those in Him get the same treatment…yes that is easy to say for Christ would return to Him.
More On Foreknowledge
I have been reading and thinking and praying and reading and studying.
There are great thinkers who are stuck or have taken positions that not every Christian believes in. This has nothing really to do with their salvation or what they think the hope of salvation is …probably.
I will try to just put down soundbytes if you will as they come up so they can be recorded. I tend to move and and stop thinking on things like this when the moment passes.
A Calvinist believe the Election is Unconditional and that man was foreordained by God to either be saved or to be damned.
A Arminianist i believe thinks that Election is Conditional in that God looked ahead to see who would have faith and then elected them for salvation. And some think that they could still lose it…after being the Elect.
Currently i am taking a stand that is contrary to both. Because i see the Arminianist point of view as flawed to the point of being worse than the Calvinist. Calvinist conclude that the candidate for salvation is essentially saving themselves by their works of FAITH. This is proposterous for faith is given by God ….so God had to draw them…what they are saying is God drew them and they came. Still the C will see this as a work unto salvation. The A will argue there are many, many verses that say to the sinner, come, choose, turn, do this and do that. Essentially giving them a choice to answer the call.
The salvation part is separate from the candidates response. Jesus gives free grace to whoever will take it. Because i took it doesn’t mean i earn it or worked for it. It simply means i took it. It was still free.And if i give it up it doesn’t mean it was based off my works to be kept…but it means i was not will to keep the end that God said would be involved in receiving the free gift. It would be like a man having a free feast…all the food was free…but the trip there and the clothes to wear at the feast must be picked up along the way. You cannot lose the free gift but you must come take it. A free meal is great sitting there but it is much better for the giver if you actually come eat it.
If God foreknew who would be saved: He would be complicit in their salvation or damnation thus foreordaining them. Thus predetermining.
If you say God knew who would be saved but did not affect their freewill to choose or deny. Well you have to ask when God created the universe knwing far ahead of time those who would deny and those would accept and then he spoke the words nevertheless to “let there be light” was he not authoring their lives…did he not write the history we look back at…did he not authorize their salvation and their damnation and can he possibly be upset with anyone for only playing out what was foreknown that they would do.
Isn’t it much more likely and also woudln’t it fit with scripture, with warnings, with risk, with Christ sacrifice…that God has no idea who will be saved. He hopes and wills for all to be saved…but sits waiting to see. Even Jesus said that God left some real time events out of the foreknowledge of Christs mind…why because it was indetermidable.
This lines up with most all scriptures…yet there are a few that make you go…what does paul or peter mean here about foreknowledge…what foreknowledge did god have.
Well there is much foreknowledge God has…before your life began he could foresee certain things…all outside the force or your will…all easy to compute truths. The variables are what are left to human will, the work of satan to hinder God church…the prayers of the saints…etc… He can see ahead to my tomorrow…knowing me barring any far out tribulation i will no doubt continue in His will to be where he wants speaking relatively close to what he wants doing relatively just what he wants…there may be some misses but as i seek to live in the spirit and pray and believe and surrender i can walk very close to his perfect will…this is not the case with all folks and at any time i could rebel and seek to disrupt Gods will and authority with my own. This would present a quandry to God. He would certainly have foreseen it at some point…working to stop it no doubt…but could he stop it without killing me??? Does God make people do his will or give them the freedom too. It was for freedom we were made free. There is something about us being free that gives him glory.
What was it about Job. Was he sinless? Bible says he was perfect, upright, without blame…pretty good guy i guess…but nobody is perfect and everybody siins everyday …right? wrong. Not everybody sins everyday. There are some who can go days without a sin. Can live in holy surrender without blame. His will is their will. These are the elect. What is elect about them…they choose to surrender. Yes they were all chosen first by God…everyone that is saved is first drawn. But they choose him again…returning his investment with interest…a profitable servant. Job was tested to see if he would sin and curse God if enough bad happened to him. The devil was proved a punk but God also found man has limits to his wisdom. We cannot conceive of God as soverign and able to do what he wants with us. We much prefer the word…”FAIR” we want a fair God. So when we stand before him and say…didn’t i do this and that that you asked of people…we want God to say…oh my apologies i didnt recognize you come on in and continue in your own will…no God deserves and will have much more. Jesus opens that door…he is that door. Through that door is a mystery of fellowship unlike anything we can know…it is present tense and it is fragile. It is based on His final work on the cross and it is based on your taking the Word of life offered…opening to him and surrendering your life. One side precludes the other but the other must be paid forward.
You are bought with a price. What if you choose not to pay it…did God know that? I dont’ think so…i think it remains to be seen. It is a fight. It is the struggle Paul talked about. It is the need for diligence and stedfastness that Peter talked about. It is the obedience and love that John talked about. It is the change of spirit; becoming a spirit being not a natural man that Christ talked about. This is eternal life…
We enter the kingdom now. We come in as children knowing nothing believing everything…we stay as students and disciples…we are kept by the power of God and it is all to his credit and glory.
the elders in heaven have crowns for a reason…they did something that drew God attention…he said Well done thou good and faith servant…they did not simply carry out they predestine foreordained roles otherwise there is nothing praiseworthy about it. Is there? can you praise them for doing what they were compelled to do? A wage is not a reward. We receive wages..or what we are due…that is spoke of in scripture…but there is also rewards…what we won by going over and above the least we needed to do. Did God foreknow we would or just give us opportunities and hope we would…? another good point…does God hope? I guess he would not hope or need faith or need to pray….why would Christ sit in intercessory prayer if everything is already mapped out. Why would God be angry with someone for simply doing what they were created to do in the order he foreknew (thus foreordained ) them to do????
Some may say again…to foreknow is not to forordain. I say rubbish. mincing words to please your fancy is not proper bible study. Foreknowledge for God is scripting the history of the world. Even if i say…that a God could powerfully enough make the universe foreknowing what would happen because of it and then leave the responsibility of who was saved and who wasnt on their own heads…though i could conceive of a god who could do this…i dont believe mine did. No i believe he operates in real time. The future of my soul hasn’t happened yet. It is not predetermined. It is not fixed or set. The variable that could upset the whole thing remains inside me. It is what makes us special and dangerous. My broken submission to God is a reaction and a choice. God cannot know if i will continue…but His promises are only for those who “continue in well doing” alas God says He doesn’t know…but groups them into categories…the called, the elect, the bride, the body, the multitude, the few, overcomers, believers, saints, etc…
This doesn’t change anything in my doctrine of salvation or holiness…it only makes it all the more emphatic that you must be born again and you must continue in Christ or you will be lost and it is not over yet. The die is not cast. You are working out your salvation…whether it is in fear and with cautious obedience or if you are using Gods grace as a license to sin will be seen.