Religious Question: Why did God create bad people?

[Vic]

Originally posted by: ffmcobalt
You can do anything you want. But I'm just coming from the standpoint of the Christian religion that says that if you're going to believe Christianity, then you have to believe that all other religions are wrong.

*shrug*

it's all good, beau

Which is how Christianity became corrupted. Christ never said that the Jews were wrong, He was one. He simply came to bring a new message and to atone for the sins of the world. And in the meantime, He broke bread with sinners and gentiles to spread His message as far and wide as possible. Oddly enough, it may have been His associations with these lower classes that upset the Pharisees the most. Now do you see my point? Christ's message was for the whole world, yet you and some other Christians say that the "standpoint of the Christian religion that says that if you're going to believe Christianity, then you have to believe that all other religions are wrong."

:disgust:

And the answer is BOTH free will and the necessity for opposites.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: Moonbeam
God is omnipotent..... So could he make himself move if he tried to resist it. I think the problem is that when you catch a big fish like God and he gets away, you tend to exaggerate how big he was. Omnipotent contains within it, the notion of absurdity, and as soon as you attribute that quality to God you make Him absurd too. If God is perfect, you get into the same mess. How can perfection admit evil. How can you have free will to choose evil if there is only God, only perfection. Everything is perfection. There is no evil to choose. If there is no evil then people can't be evil. If people can't be evil then what's the problem. Who are you to judge anybody. Where did this evil trip come form. It is a delusion, a bum rap. There is no sin and you were never guilty of anything. There is only perfection. That's why you're forgiven. You screwed up and believed a lie.

No... the question is "How can perfection exist without evil?"

 

[joohang]

Originally posted by: Placer14

Originally posted by: odz

Originally posted by: ed21x
Are you seriously interested in an explanation, or is the purpose of this question to bash on/ antagonize christians? If it's the latter, please don't waste our time.

No I am definately not bashing Christians, since I am one.

Like i said before, you're proabbly better off talking to your pastor/priest/bishop/elder or wahtever to asnwer that instead of getting people upset here. You will NOT get a good answer from most of the people who would take the time to answer, thusly I honestly doubt the sincereity in your quest to know the truth and are really just out to upset people. (Like myself) :| If you truely wanted to know, you would've known who to go to in the first place assuming you are christian as you say you are. A christian would not question this on a platform such as an online forum. :|:|:|:|

How come?

Are such people the only ones qualifies to think and discuss such issues?

 

[Beau]

Here's a dinger: If Jesus was a man, and man is inherently flawed, was Jesus flawed?

 

[Netopia]

Everything has to exist in a balance, God - Satan, heaven - hell, good - evil.

Sounds good, but it's wrong. God has no equal opposite. The opposite of Satan would be, perhaps, the Arch-Angel Michael. Also, just as dark isn't the OPPOSITE of light, but only the absence of it, cold isn't the opposite of heat, but only the absence of heat.... so bad isn't the opposite of good... only the absence of it.... there is no grey area between.

Christ's message was for the whole world, yet you and some other Christians say that the "standpoint of the Christian religion that says that if you're going to believe Christianity, then you have to believe that all other religions are wrong."

John 14:6 Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Please note the DEFINITE ARTICLE "THE" as in THE way, THE truth, THE life. Jesus Himself called himself THE, not "A" way, "A" truth or "A" life. He goes on to say that NO ONE can get to the Father except through Jesus. That's a pretty clear indication that ONLY belief in Jesus as the Messiah (Christianity) is true and that all other religions lead somewhere else. Care to venture a guess as to where that somewhere else might be?

Here's a dinger: If Jesus was a man, and man is inherently flawed, was Jesus flawed?

Good question. And the answer is..... No. Adam sinned and even though Eve ate the apple (actually "forbidden fruit") first, the blame goes on Adam because God had given him authority and did not hold to his responsibility. That descendancy from Adam did not pass to Jesus because He had no Earthly, physical father. He did not inherit a sin nature, but was pure like Adam was before the fall of man.

And as to the original question.... God never created any bad people. He created exactly two.... Adam and Eve. All others (except for Jesus) were brought into being by the physical act of two already fallen (spiritually and physically corrupted) persons copulating. We create additional people, both body and soul. Perhaps ?create? isn?t the right word, but it is through our actions that other life is created. God gave us the ability to reproduce, but He doesn?t make the babies, he lets us do it.

Joe

 

[Placer14]

Originally posted by: joohang

Originally posted by: Placer14

Originally posted by: odz

Originally posted by: ed21x
Are you seriously interested in an explanation, or is the purpose of this question to bash on/ antagonize christians? If it's the latter, please don't waste our time.

No I am definately not bashing Christians, since I am one.

Like i said before, you're proabbly better off talking to your pastor/priest/bishop/elder or wahtever to asnwer that instead of getting people upset here. You will NOT get a good answer from most of the people who would take the time to answer, thusly I honestly doubt the sincereity in your quest to know the truth and are really just out to upset people. (Like myself) :| If you truely wanted to know, you would've known who to go to in the first place assuming you are christian as you say you are. A christian would not question this on a platform such as an online forum. :|:|:|:|

How come?

Are such people the only ones qualifies to think and discuss such issues?

I'm not saying you can't discuss it. If he was looking for serious answers to his question, (well if I were him at least, which i'm not) i'd go to an authority on this. And the reason why I think it best not be discussed here is because this is the type of question you'd ask a Judao(sp?)/Christian to directly oppose their beliefs. This type of question is easily taken as a direct attack on their belief and a) could be worded as to not attack other religions b) could be discussed in a forum more suitable to the subject. And as we have seen in the past, this sort of subject does not carry over well.

If you'd like to disucss, please do, but this question is not the means to open that discussion.

Also, do not say that this could not be taken as an attack. My father was brought up as an Orthodox Jew. He strongly opposed people approaching him with their Christian beliefs. He was content and that was that. It infuriated him so that he learned (very thoroughly) the Christian New Testament (as he already knew the Old from the Jewish Torah) and found these "loopholes" in the Bible to get the evangilists to shutup. I'm not saying he was right in what he did, but hearing storied from my father, I've become familiar with these common "catches".

And if anyone is curious, my dad is now a Messianic Jew who brought up his kids with Christian values. *sigh* Take what you want from that rant.

 

[Orsorum]

Originally posted by: Placer14

Originally posted by: joohang

Originally posted by: Placer14

Originally posted by: odz

Originally posted by: ed21x
Are you seriously interested in an explanation, or is the purpose of this question to bash on/ antagonize christians? If it's the latter, please don't waste our time.

No I am definately not bashing Christians, since I am one.

Like i said before, you're proabbly better off talking to your pastor/priest/bishop/elder or wahtever to asnwer that instead of getting people upset here. You will NOT get a good answer from most of the people who would take the time to answer, thusly I honestly doubt the sincereity in your quest to know the truth and are really just out to upset people. (Like myself) :| If you truely wanted to know, you would've known who to go to in the first place assuming you are christian as you say you are. A christian would not question this on a platform such as an online forum. :|:|:|:|

How come?

Are such people the only ones qualifies to think and discuss such issues?

I'm not saying you can't discuss it. If he was looking for serious answers to his question, (well if I were him at least, which i'm not) i'd go to an authority on this. And the reason why I think it best not be discussed here is because this is the type of question you'd ask a Judao(sp?)/Christian to directly oppose their beliefs. This type of question is easily taken as a direct attack on their belief and a) could be worded as to not attack other religions b) could be discussed in a forum more suitable to the subject. And as we have seen in the past, this sort of subject does not carry over well.

If you'd like to disucss, please do, but this question is not the means to open that discussion.

There are some incredibly educated people on this board, and there have been some amazing threads on this before. It's possible, if the idiots stay out of it.

 

[Beau]

Originally posted by: Netopia

Everything has to exist in a balance, God - Satan, heaven - hell, good - evil.

Sounds good, but it's wrong. God has no equal opposite. The opposite of Satan would be, perhaps, the Arch-Angel Michael. Also, just as dark isn't the OPPOSITE of light, but only the absence of it, cold isn't the opposite of heat, but only the absence of heat.... so bad isn't the opposite of good... only the absence of it.... there is no grey area between.

Your analogies of showing that the absence of is the opposite for physical things is neat, but has no relevancy, as God, good, evil, etc., are all ideas, not physical objects.

Here's a dinger: If Jesus was a man, and man is inherently flawed, was Jesus flawed?

Good question. And the answer is..... No. Adam sinned and even though Eve ate the apple (actually "forbidden fruit") first, the blame goes on Adam because God had given him authority and did not hold to his responsibility. That descendancy from Adam did not pass to Jesus because He had no Earthly, physical father. He did not inherit a sin nature, but was pure like Adam was before the fall of man.

That's good and all if you believe in Adam and Eve, but an evolutionist would argue otherwise.

And, you contridicted yourself in the next paragraph:

And as to the original question.... God never created any bad people. He created exactly two.... Adam and Eve. All others (except for Jesus) were brought into being by the physical act of two already fallen (spiritually and physically corrupted) persons copulating. We create additional people, both body and soul. Perhaps ?create? isn?t the right word, but it is through our actions that other life is created. God gave us the ability to reproduce, but He doesn?t make the babies, he lets us do it.

Even though he may not have had an earthly father, he still had an earthly mother, which still makes him man, and flawed. Further proof that Jesus was flawed is that while on the cross, he questioned God's judgement: "my God, my God, why hath thou forsaken me?" If he was truely perfect, he would have never questioned or feared.

 

[Beau]

Christ's message was for the whole world, yet you and some other Christians say that the "standpoint of the Christian religion that says that if you're going to believe Christianity, then you have to believe that all other religions are wrong."

John 14:6 Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Please note the DEFINITE ARTICLE "THE" as in THE way, THE truth, THE life. Jesus Himself called himself THE, not "A" way, "A" truth or "A" life. He goes on to say that NO ONE can get to the Father except through Jesus. That's a pretty clear indication that ONLY belief in Jesus as the Messiah (Christianity) is true and that all other religions lead somewhere else. Care to venture a guess as to where that somewhere else might be?

The bible was written by man, albeit through god's inspiration, but still by man. It is flawed. It is also very open to interpretation.

 

[classy]

He didn't. He gave to man his own free will.

 

[Scarpozzi]

I'm glad he made me......even though I'm probably going to hell.

 

[Woodchuck2000]

Non-Religious Question: When will athiests/agonostics stop making these threads trying to attack religious people?

I mean, the major complaint that the non-religious have is that religious people keep bothering them and trying to preach to them. Yet it seems the other way around, where atheists/agnostics are the ones constantly promoting there is no God and attacking the beliefs of others.

I'm strictly with Gr1ml0ck on that one. I'm an agnostic but I find these constant "Christians are Hypocrites" "Mormons belong to a cult" "God created bad people" type thead really annoying. They exist simply to attack the beliefs of others.

 

[Placer14]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000

Non-Religious Question: When will athiests/agonostics stop making these threads trying to attack religious people?

I mean, the major complaint that the non-religious have is that religious people keep bothering them and trying to preach to them. Yet it seems the other way around, where atheists/agnostics are the ones constantly promoting there is no God and attacking the beliefs of others.

I'm strictly with Gr1ml0ck on that one. I'm an agnostic but I find these constant "Christians are Hypocrites" "Mormons belong to a cult" "God created bad people" type thead really annoying. They exist simply to attack the beliefs of others.

'nuff said.

 

[gopunk]

Originally posted by: Placer14

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000

Non-Religious Question: When will athiests/agonostics stop making these threads trying to attack religious people?

I mean, the major complaint that the non-religious have is that religious people keep bothering them and trying to preach to them. Yet it seems the other way around, where atheists/agnostics are the ones constantly promoting there is no God and attacking the beliefs of others.

I'm strictly with Gr1ml0ck on that one. I'm an agnostic but I find these constant "Christians are Hypocrites" "Mormons belong to a cult" "God created bad people" type thead really annoying. They exist simply to attack the beliefs of others.

'nuff said.

look the guy said he was christian, who are you to challenge his beliefs? you can tell him to keep his mouth shut lest he hurt somebody's feelings (boo hoo) but i'm interested in hearing the christian response to this question. and i would much rather read about it here than have to go seek out some priest and ask him what could possibly be a dumb question.

 

[Howard]

Actually, I read something about how violent people were more sensitive to a certain protein. This obviously comes from the genes, and seeing that Adam was our forefather...

 

[odz]

Originally posted by: Woodchuck2000

Non-Religious Question: When will athiests/agonostics stop making these threads trying to attack religious people?

I mean, the major complaint that the non-religious have is that religious people keep bothering them and trying to preach to them. Yet it seems the other way around, where atheists/agnostics are the ones constantly promoting there is no God and attacking the beliefs of others.

I'm strictly with Gr1ml0ck on that one. I'm an agnostic but I find these constant "Christians are Hypocrites" "Mormons belong to a cult" "God created bad people" type thead really annoying. They exist simply to attack the beliefs of others.

I have a few questions like this that have been bouncing around in my head for awhile, and thought it would make for good discussion. I am happy that I did ask because I already received an answer that makes sense for me.
Even if no one had an anwser, my faith wouldn't be affected. If your faith is so fragile that it is damaged by discussion of ideas, then perhaps you shouldn't read these forums.

 

[Moonbeam]

Netopia, how can there be a absence of God. Is not the good and God and perfection all tied together. How can the bad find a place in perfection. Is evil a part of God. God is everywhere so where can evil find a place to be except as part of God. I think you're telling me a fish story. Same thing with The Way. There are a million ways and they all lead nowhere. Nowhere is The Way.

 

[odz]

I have a few questions like this that have been bouncing around in my head for awhile, and thought it would make for good discussion. I am happy that I did ask because I already received an answer that makes sense for me.
Even if no one had an anwser, my faith wouldn't be affected. If your faith is so fragile that it is damaged by discussion of ideas, then perhaps you shouldn't read these forums.

This was meant to be posed to Gr1mlock, not you Woodchuck.

 

[Netopia]

I'm not saying he was right in what he did, but hearing storied from my father, I've become familiar with these common "catches".

I would be interested in what these are if you are so inclined to post some... thanks!

Your analogies of showing that the absence of is the opposite for physical things is neat, but has no relevancy, as God, good, evil, etc., are all ideas, not physical objects.

No, not physical objects... God at least is spiritual. The others are merely measurements.

That's good and all if you believe in Adam and Eve, but an evolutionist would argue otherwise.

As would be his privilege.

Even though he may not have had an earthly father, he still had an earthly mother, which still makes him man, and flawed.

Which is YOUR privilege to believe.... the Bible indicates otherwise and I'll trust it first.

Further proof that Jesus was flawed is that while on the cross, he questioned God's judgement: "my God, my God, why hath thou forsaken me?" If he was truely perfect, he would have never questioned or feared.

My guess is that you don't understand the loss of fellowship between God and man after the fall. This break in fellowship was put on Jesus for our sake and what you quoted was His emotive response to a condition he took for our sakes which He Himself never deserved.

The bible was written by man, albeit through god's inspiration, but still by man.

Who wrote the page you are reading now... me or a server belonging to Anand? Surely the server created the letters and the formatting, but who is actually doing the "speaking"? Me, of course. So it is with God and Scripture, with certain specific exceptions..... like where in Paul's writings he say (I say this...not God) to make clear who is speaking.

The other thing that gets in the way of this is the improper interpretation we have of the Koine Greek word where we get "inspired" We tend to think of inspired as "got a thought" or "had a good idea" or "was motivated by"... but the Greek word didn't have that connotation... it meant simply "to breath into". Literally, it would mean that God "breath the words into the writers"... or something close to that. Not a whole lot different than me sitting here typing.

Moonbeam, always good to see you!

I would say that the absence of God in people would be the absence of influence and acknowledgement, not the physical absence, for the reasons you stated. It's sort of like the Bible says the in Hell people will be eternally separated from God but also forever in the presence of the Lamb. He may be there, but they have no fellowship with Him or knowledge of Him.

From this stance, I believe that "Bad" is the absence of the influence of the only thing that "truly" exists... Good. To some extent, even our courts use this model, in that in order for someone to be found "insane" they have to be unable to discern between right and wrong. If they know what is right and yet they ignore it, they are said (by our courts) to be sane for the purpose of responsibility for their actions.

Joe

 

[Moonbeam]

Hi Netopia, nice to see you too. I think about you often, as it happens. I agree with your notion of absence, but for me it carries, I assume, some unChristian implications. I see the absence you speak of as ignorance and of a funny sort. Are we ignorant of God because we choose to be, as having made a fully volitional choice, or are we ignorant of God because we had to be to survive? And was the choice a conscious one done in the full light of reason------> I see You, God, in all Your splendor, but I've decided I want to be an atheist, or was it that we were beaten out of heaven before we had even a single defense or words to put into memory of our surrender? I cannot share the Christian view that we choose or do not choose to believe in God. There is only God and nobody would choose other than Him if they had a real choice. Guilt, as I see it, has to be remorse and guilt over making a choice to die to God that couldn't possible be helped if we expected to live. It is making the choice for which we couldn't possibly do otherwise that we are forgiven. Forgiveness is the Way, how you get to the point of forgiving is legion. Clearly, I think, the kingdom of heaven is within us. Always was, always will be. It's just a difference as to whether you know it or not. The man without guilt is Christ. If God is everywhere and I am ignorant of him, He will be when I am not. If there is only God, what else can a man be who dies to himself?

There are, I think, two ways to God. One is to transcend the self and the other is to root it out.

 

[her209]

He created humans to prove something to himself.