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Answer to the Problem of Evil

psionl0 said:
There are a couple of examples in the bible where somebody's free will has apparently been overridden ...
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That, if you deal with the free will of all mankind but Noah's to remain alive as one single example.

Gee! I wonder which is the other example and how many books it encompasses.

Don't worry, you said it, it's all apparent.
 
psionl0 said:
I thought it said that God had a plan for you even before you were born or that God knows what is in your heart (neither of which negates free will).
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Hence, either the godthingy sends a child rapist or says "go ahead and rape that child away, I'll punish you afterwards". If a decent person took that stance the rest of us would consider them a monster.

That's the diferente between the biblical/quranic godthingy and a decent person, and no matter how many tired rehashes of medieval apologetics Emre posts and how many aspersions and smoke screens you cast it'll remain true.
 
psionl0 said:
I thought it said that God had a plan for you even before you were born or that God knows what is in your heart (neither of which negates free will).

But upon you producing the appropriate quotes from the bible, I will admit I was wrong.
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The thing with bible quotes is that they are as clear as muck.

You and I for instance have a totally different reading of the two Matthews verses you quoted earlier.
And the same holds true for every other religion.
 
Seems to me that the Hindoos don't have a problem of evil. Every god has a mate of the opposite sex which is also a second aspect of that god, and every god has a ferocious form, and they are all merely aspects of the Almighty, which encompasses absolutely everything, including me and you and the **** that we do, and life and death and genocide and herpes and ice cream, and you gotta love it somehow.

Trust me, I know what I'm talking about.
 
psionl0 said:
You had to insert the word "unable" to make the verses coincide with your "interpretation".
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Ok.
Unwilling then.

The point is, in the parable, the god of the bible does not in any way stop the devil from sowing the bad people/influences.
Whether that is unwilling or unable is moot, in both cases it does not show an omnipotent benevolent god.
 
psionl0 said:
That was the reply. Did you really think that the question of whether God knows what you are going to do before you are born means that God created rapists?
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If you assume that self same god is responsible for creating the entire universe according to it's will (which is what most major religions claim), then yes.
Such a god KNEW the being he'd create would be a rapist (all knowing) and he created it anyway even though he could have prevented that (all powerful).

I agree that the bible shows a god that is neither all powerful nor all knowing nor benevolent so that would make sense.
 
Lukraak_Sisser said:
If you assume that self same god is responsible for creating the entire universe according to it's will . . . . .
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You can stop right there. The assumption is that God created people with free will. He didn't program people to be thieves, rapists or murderers. Those are choices that people are free to make or not make entirely of their own volition.
 
psionl0 said:
You can stop right there. The assumption is that God created people with free will. He didn't program people to be thieves, rapists or murderers. Those are choices that people are free to make or not make entirely of their own volition.
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So, not all knowing then. After all an omnipotent being that is all knowing cannot create free will.

Tolkien had the same problem when writing his mythology, though he actually explained WHY his benevolent being did not just remove the evil from his world.

Anyway, a god that creates free will and then does not interfere when there are things clearly evil is also not benevolent. At most indifferent.
 
psionl0 said:
You can stop right there. The assumption is that God created people with free will. He didn't program people to be thieves, rapists or murderers. Those are choices that people are free to make or not make entirely of their own volition.
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That all works pretty well until you get to intervention. If a god were either unable to meddle (perhaps because if you know what will happen it really already has) or unwilling (perhaps because free will would lose its meaning), we've got something, but as soon as we start having God creating miracles and intervening in the events of mankind, we're back to the nasty question of "why this and not that?" A god that transubstatiates has some explaining to do.
 
Lukraak_Sisser said:
So, not all knowing then. After all an omnipotent being that is all knowing cannot create free will.
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This might be considered a technical argument against "all knowing".

Lukraak_Sisser said:
Tolkien had the same problem when writing his mythology, though he actually explained WHY his benevolent being did not just remove the evil from his world.
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Did Tolkien have a different explanation to Matthew?

Lukraak_Sisser said:
Anyway, a god that creates free will and then does not interfere when there are things clearly evil is also not benevolent. At most indifferent.
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If a god interferes with free will then we don't have free will.
 
bruto said:
That all works pretty well until you get to intervention. If a god were either unable to meddle (perhaps because if you know what will happen it really already has) or unwilling (perhaps because free will would lose its meaning), we've got something, but as soon as we start having God creating miracles and intervening in the events of mankind, we're back to the nasty question of "why this and not that?" A god that transubstatiates has some explaining to do.
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If this world is all there is then you might be right.
 
Has "free will" been defined in this thread? It seems like something different is being intended by the term in recent posts than in the OP.
 
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