Where does God come from?

[Sahaqiel 1232]

All this being said, I am actually trying to be considerate.

Sure I'm trying to refute certain things, or maybe I'm just one of those things that test your faith. Who knows? I might just be the messenger. I'm really pretty impartial to this whole topic, and I don't think any different of you for having these beliefs.

I acknowledge that God is totally a possibility, and like I said, I think it would be cool if there were gods/goddesses. It would make things less boring.

Sahaqiel

[Ivo-goji 0]

@Sahaquiel:

I am aware that the majority of mass murders aren't suffering from a mental problem that was been with them since birth. I was speeking of those that did. We are commanded to look out for one another and help each other to prevent people from having brake downs. It doesn't always work, because we can't control everything. God can control everything but us. There isn't much that can be done.

I have already explained the Garden of Eden. Several times. Either you are ignoring what has been written, or you can't tell when a question has been answered.

God can't do anything. He can't control our thoughts and actions, because that would destroy our agency. God can't make us perfect from the beginning, because we were never created. We were born. God is our Father.

God is God, God is God. Your the only one I've heard repeat this so many times. I have not once said "God can do anything because He is God", or "It doesn't matter because He is God." All my responses have been as clear as I can make them. God put the Tree in the Garden so Adam would fall, because humanity NEEDED to fall. We aren't perfect because children can't be born whole, they have to grow up.

I don't know every little thing about Christianity, no. But I do know just about everything about Mormonism. I've been taught enough to defend my views. I've read enough to tell you your instistance that my religion is contradictory is wrong. I've felt enough to know when somthing I've been taught or I've read is true. The Bible has been tainted, this we know. That is why the Lord gave us more than one Tastament of His reality. People can be tainted, this we know. That is why the Prophet tells us to pray if we do not believe him.

Say what ever you like about how the Holy Ghost is only in my mind. I have felt it strongly enough. In the end, you are still sitting in another place, on another computer, reading what I type, not here, not in my head, and not able to tell what I feel.

I don't need to prove that God exists. I believe it, and if you don't, that is not my concern.

[Sahaqiel 1232]

Stop quoting whole posts omgggggggggggg.

I edited that post, anyway.

Break it up or something, or just put a simple "@Sahaqiel".

God is supposed to be all-powerful. God DID apparently create the earth in seven earth days, after all. Which is funny, because earth days wouldn't have existed prior to the creation of earth.

Saying God is almighty, then placing restrictions on God is contradictory.

I mean for serious. So God placed a God-proof seal on something? That's paradoxical, because the almighty can do anything. It's the unmovable object getting hit by the unstoppable object.

Paradoxes are contradictions. You are saying your God is contradictory.

I keep bringing up the Garden because you haven't answered it yet. Saying we needed to fall isn't an answer. Tell me why God didn't just birth into his children what imperfection was? It saves a lot of steps. This is another case of God being a grand excuse.

Also, people with a leg and arm chopped off with nothing but a sugar pill feel pain relief pretty strongly.

The human mind is a powerful thing.

Sahaqiel

[Skippy 82]

No, and no. People with faith are quite capable of logic, although they apply it selectively, excluding the fallibility of their own beliefs. Faith itself is illogical. People, too, need to train themselves into thinking with a logical process. This doesn't matter consistently, but for the major questions of life, it's important to be right, rather than assuming the dogma of previous generations.

Abundantly false. Are you aware, that some people are born incapable of compassion? These people are known as born psychopaths, and there is no hope of rehabilitation. I suppose it is part of God's great plan?

Many people with faith apply logic, look into deism, God is in the details. Dogma is illogical, faith is not.

The question of God has no right answer, as it is beyond the scope of our understanding, and being wrong is not as important as believing you are right, at the end of the road, it doesn't matter if you are wrong, unless that is, there is a God, and you didn't believe. (this is entirely hypothetical, by the way)

One cannot say with finality that God does not exist, as such, one cannot say that faith is illogical.

Also, those born without compassion are Sociopaths, not psychopaths. Not a big deal, but there is a difference.

EDIT: TO Ivo and Saha, most mass murderers have serious mental issues that may not have been born into them, but have been with them a majority of their lives.

[Sahaqiel 1232]

I know, Skippy. Why are you telling me?

I'm just saying. It's not entirely anyone's fault for someone being a mass murderer, and this includes mass murderers themselves. They are not at fault. But religion claims to punish people, and it is never anyone's fault, so it's unfair.

Also, I don't spell Sahaqiel with a U, Ivo.

Sahaqiel

[Skippy 82]

I'm telling you because you were both arguing about it, and it's kinda my area.

Sometimes it is entirely their fault, sometimes it's not. It all depends on the case. Saying that people's actions and choices are not their fault is fallacy, and rationale for being allowed to do anything, regardless of what happened in life, you still chose to commit the crime. The only exceptions are those who are unable to control themselves, and this is much rarer than one might think.

[Sahaqiel 1232]

I'm not saying people don't deserve to be punished, I'm saying that their entire life is based on the Butterfly Effect. All our lives are. If you take one person out of the equation from a long time ago, then things change dramatically. Criminals might switch places with people. It's all a domino effect in a field of randomly placed dominoes. A person may beat their child, but it's because they were beaten. A person may contract a mental disease, but it might be in part due to their genetics. I am saying that a person is never entirely to blame, ever. It's not that far fetched.

Sahaqiel

[Skippy 82]

I have to disagree, there may be compulsions and illness and environmental factors, these make a person more likely to have the compulsion to commit a crime or act, but it does not make them do it.

People who were beaten may or may not beat their children, and not all people who beat their children were beaten. Someone may be a sociopath, but that didn't make them kill someone.

Now, keep in mind, I am talking only of deviant and criminal behaviour, not things like contracting a disease, or things inside ones body which they cannot control.

[Max 10]

I think this is pointless. God can neither be proven nor disproven.

[Skippy 82]

^ This is true

[Ivo-goji 0]

@Sahaqiel:

Odd, I don't remember reading that in the rules. I thought it just bugged people really bad. Oh well, I can live with warn status.

The Bible doesn't say seven Earth days. It says seven days according to the passing of day into night. Earth was not the first thing ever created. There were other bodies to keep time by.

Again, I'm wondering what you have read. I'll re-phrase my previous statement. God won't do anything. He won't control our thoughts and actions, because that would destroy our agency. God would't make us perfect from the beginning, because we were never created. We were born. God is our Father. But there are things he can't do aswell.

The universe has rules, Sahaquiel. God is still bound by them. God is allmighty in that he can do anything that is possible. If something isn't possible, it can't be done. Your assuming our entire religious stand-point hangs on God being beyond all laws and limits. It doesn't. A person can still worship something that doesn't brake the Laws of Physics. God has never claimed to defy the Laws of Physics to anybody.

"As Man is, God once was."

God used to be like us. We are His children. A bear's cubs are not born as full grown bears. If God could decide how we would come into existance, then there is no better way than this. If not, then their is still no better way than this, for none is possible. Either way, there was no alternative to how the creation, the fall, or the Atonement can play out.

Your last statement seems slightly random.

[randomfan 0]

Goodness. I may be the only person on this forum that's both pessimistic and religious. Speaking from a purely scientific point of view, there is no reason to not believe in God. Everything in this universe happens by cause and effect, from the orbits of planets down to the movement of molecules. This of course encompasses our own decisions, but I won't go in to that. Point is, for the singularity that contained the universe to explode and cause Big Bang, something had to happen. Not only that, but something had to make the matter in the first place. And theoretically, some type of divine being could exist, provided that they are not physically in spacetime. They'd have to be where the universe has yet to expand. Which, by the way, is entirely possible. Also interesting is the fact that our universe seems to fit together perfectly. For instance, if the rate of expansion one second after the big bang had been even one hundred thousand million millionth smaller, the universe would have quickly recollapsed.

This is where science can go no further, and philosophy must take the wheel. By the logic described above, something had to create God. But something had to create that creator, and another to produce that one, on and on ad infinitum. Thus, the laws of logic break down when we go beyond the beginning. Fortunately the human mind is able to comprehend something further. Unfortunately, we also use logic to do so, which is what causes problems. The human mind, in fact, cannot seem to tear away from it. Sadly, logic isn't applicable to every situation. There are some times when it must be suspended, and we must rely on feelings or beliefs instead.

Which leads me to the paradox of God. That's an example of where logic doesn't work. You either choose to believe in a divine being, or you don't. There isn't solid proof on either side, so one must make their own decisions. As I understand, the question of human suffering seems to be the single biggest reason for disbelief. So far, I have found a few reasons to justify pain:

1) It leads to greater happiness. That is, it makes the good things stand out more.

2) It's something to contrast heaven with.

3) It's so we don't become sedentary lumps.

4) It's to make sure nothing of that type happens again. For instance, the Holocaust happened. Now we try as hard as we can to stop anything like that from happening again.

There are probably more reasons, but I don't claim to know the mind of God. So as to wether he exists or not...that's up to you. Anyways, we'll all find out eventually.

One final note: the Bible was not made to be interpreted literally. Most of the stories are parables. Are there actual historical facts in there? Of course. But not necessarily many.

...Say, can anyone find a clear direction in that? If you do, please tell me.

[Ivo-goji 0]

Also, I don't spell Sahaqiel with a U, Ivo.

Sahaqiel

It is complusive when I'm typing. Imagine the confusion when it winds up like that in the alphabet.

[Sahaqiel 1232]

I have to disagree,

I am saying that personal histories spark butterfly effects. John Wilkes Booth assassinated Lincoln because he was racist and felt Lincoln was an oppressor. If JWB didn't grow up in an environment like that, he might have not killed Lincoln. Things like that. It wasn't his choice to be born and grow up in that area, it was his father and mothers', who brought him to that area, and his other ancestors who did various things that lead THEM to that area. I am calling the butterfly effect a fault. It may be the person's choice, but it wasn't their choice to gain that personality or decision making process, because history stretches way back, and it heavily influences everything, so, people are never entirely at fault. It's wrong to think this can help you escape from punishment, but I am saying, that in a broader, (Or maybe more specific) sense, that no one is ever at fault for anything they might have done wrong. This is what I'm getting at. No one person is ever at fault.

I came to this conclusion after debating with myself about whether or not I should have compassion for criminals. I concluded that I should, because there were an infinite amount of possibilities as to how the criminal in question might have been grown up, and he or she was just pushed in the wrong direction by things out of their control.

Also Min, we know this.

I'm not trying to disprove God or anything. I'm just saying the concept of a god is illogical, and can easily be attributed to the human factor of trying to explain things with assumption.

Sahaqiel

The universe has rules, Sahaquiel. God is still bound by them. God is allmighty in that he can do anything that is possible. If something isn't possible, it can't be done. Your assuming our entire religious stand-point hangs on God being beyond all laws and limits. It doesn't. A person can still worship something that doesn't brake the Laws of Physics. God has never claimed to defy the Laws of Physics to anybody.

The concept of a God itself breaks the laws of physics. Like the conservation of mass-energy.

You just seriously contradict yourself here, I don't even.

If I were to worship anything I legitimately believed to be God, it would just be the universe itself.

That's one crafty universe, spontaneously creating everything like that.

The concept of the universe itself has a lot of things in common with your god concept, and with my concept of a god that is uncaring.

Go figure.

Sahaqiel

[Skippy 82]

Never said one shouldn't have compassion for criminals, just remember, at the end of the day, 95% of them allowed their environmental influences and everything else influence that choice.

Sure, Booth was raised a racist, and hated Lincoln, but he still pulled the trigger, he still made the plan and still did the deed. How many others also hatedLincoln and grew up in the same socio economic environment?

When it comes down to it, murder is control, you have deemed that your life and wants are more important than that persons life. Murder in cold blood is a product of a selfish mind that cannot see another way to get what they need or want. Is it his fault that he grew up in that way? no. Is it his fault he decided to do what he did? Yes. What I am saying, is I have compassion for the criminal , but not the crime, much like God and sin.