God and freewill?

Free will does not stop becoming free because God knows what will happen. For example, I know that my child will choose to eat chocolate cake over a bowl full of stinking dead mice. If I were to set them both before my child, it is safe to say she will not eat the dead mice. Knowing this is not taking away the freedom of my child since she is freely choosing one over the other. Likewise, for God to know what a person will choose does not mean that the person has no freedom to make the choice. It simply means that God knows what the person will choose.

God knows his Children and how they will act. This is the best way that I know to put it into words.

[Edited on 3-3-2004 by BlackJackal]

Originally posted by BlackJackal
God knows his Children and how they will act.

If this is true then why does god create those that do not believe in him? Or those that commit crimes? Or Satan if god knows how they are going to act?

Actually Jackal it does. If God knows what will happen to you in your life, then it is already predetermined. Therefore, any SEEMING choice you make, only leads down the road which God ALREADY knew you were going to take. I'm actually arguing against mechanistic existence, but it not so simple as to you knowing whether your child will eat chocolate or a rat! The key word here is seeming. And a semblance or illusion of choice is far different from free will.

Originally posted by Joseph Knecht
Infinite Regress here. But for posterity's sake: How is there freewill if God already knows everything you are going to do? Remember the lamb's book of life? Your name is or is not already written.


And one more thing: You acknowledged that God created Good and Evil. HOW COULD A BENEVOLENT GOD CREATE ANYTHING OTHER THAN GOOD? HE IS NOT CAPABLE OF EVIL BUT CAN CREATE SENTIENT BEINGS WHO ARE?

Your name is written in the book of life only after you have been judged. If you have lived your life as God wanted your name will be added to the book.

Revelation 21:27

Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life.


The Catechism of the Catholic Church asserts, "Behind the disobedient voice, opposed to God, which makes them fall into death out of envy. Sacred Scripture and the Church�s Tradition see in this being a fallen angel, called �Satan� or the �devil�� . Throughout Sacred Scripture, we find mention of Satin, the devil. The word Satan comes from the Hebrew verb satan meaning to oppose, to harass someone; so Satan would be the tempter, the one to make us trip and fall, the one to turn us from God. The word devil is derived from the Greek diabolos meaning an accuser, a slanderer. Other synonyms for Satan in Sacred Scripture are the Evil One, Beelzebub, the Accuser, the Tempter, the Great Dragon and the Ancient Serpent.
We believe that in the beginning, God created Satan as a good angel: The Lateran Council IV stated, "The devil and the other demons were indeed created naturally good by God, but they became evil by their own doing." These angels irrevocably chose through their free will to rebel against God and not to serve Him. For this rebellion, they were cast into hell. Sacred Scripture attests to this belief: Our Lord, speaking of the final judgment, said, "Then [the Son of Man] will say to those on His left: �out of my sight, you condemned, into that everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels�"

In sum, God created the devil as good; but God punished him for his sin.


The 5 things Satan wanted:

1. Lucifer wanted God's place: "I will ascend into heaven." He wanted to move God off His throne.

2. Lucifer wanted God's position: "I will exalt my throne above the stars of God." "Stars" = angels of God. Lucifer was never the Commander-in-Chief of the angelic army, but he was a Five-Star General. He was not happy just being in charge of the cherubim; he wanted sole authority over all the angels without submitting himself to the authority of the Creator. He wanted to eliminate God from the scene.

3. He wants to control all the universe--absolute control: "I will also sit on the mount of the congregation on the farthest sides of the north."

4. He was no longer happy to be a reflector of his Creator, he wanted to be the originator: "I will ascend above the heights of the clouds." Of the 150 references to clouds in the Bible, over 100 of them are related to the presence and glory of God. Lucifer was saying he was going to take to himself a greater glory than the glory of God.

5. He wanted to be responsible to no one but himself. He wanted total independence: "I will be like the Most High."

God�s triumph over Satin is best explained in:

Revelation 20:1

And I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key to the Abyss and holding in his hand a great chain. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. He threw him into the Abyss, and locked and sealed it over him, to keep him from deceiving the nations anymore until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be set free for a short time.

Revelation 20:7

When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth--Gog and Magog--to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God's people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

Originally posted by Jonna
If this is true then why does god create those that do not believe in him? Or those that commit crimes? Or Satan if god knows how they are going to act?

For what reason or reasons should God have not created the devil even if he was going to fall? Just because God knows what will happen doesn't mean that the person or angel isn't free to make choices. Satan freely chose to rebel against God. God knew this would happen. Nevertheless, let me offer some possible reasons why God would create Satan even though He knew he would fall and rebel.

-It was necessary to have the fall so that God could then have a reason to die for our sins thereby demonstrating that God can and does provide the greatest act of love which is to lay ones life down for his friend.

-The fall of Satan provides yet another method for God to be glorified in that God can use sin to prove that sin is "bad" and that God's word about righteousness is true.

-If God is to have creatures with free will, then the risk of rebellion is part of that freedom. Satan had that freedom and used it to rebel.

-If God had not created Satan and instead another angel fell, then we'd be asking why God made that angel knowing he would fall.

-God has reasons that we simply do not know about.


I know my children will act badly at times, but knowing that does not mean mean that I shouldn�t have kids. Part of the risk of freedom is that rebellion will be a reality.

Originally posted by BlackJackal
-The fall of Satan provides yet another method for God to be glorified in that God can use sin to prove that sin is "bad" and that God's word about righteousness is true.

Isn't this a form of control?

See it all just seems like a big contradiction to me. God knows everything that is ever going to happen which means that he set it in stone the way that these things will happen. So basicly one's unborn child has already had his/her life laid out for them because god already knows everything that is going to happen. See why I am having a problem with god and freewill? You can't have it both ways.

-God has reasons that we simply do not know about.

Well now that is an statement baised on faith and has no logic to it. Not everyone believes in god or in a perticular version of god.

Originally posted by Joseph Knecht
Actually Jackal it does. If God knows what will happen to you in your life, then it is already predetermined. Therefore, any SEEMING choice you make, only leads down the road which God ALREADY knew you were going to take. I'm actually arguing against mechanistic existence, but it not so simple as to you knowing whether your child will eat chocolate or a rat! The key word here is seeming. And a semblance or illusion of choice is far different from free will.

Knowing what a person will do still does not force them or limit them to doing what is known. But it does present a paradox that the human mind will never be able to completely understand.

The idea is God's foreknowledge of an event somehow limits the event and the choice of the individual. The complaint implies that there is an action by God upon a person that negates His freedom to choose. To prove this you would need to establish some logical connection between what God knows what will happen and the mind of the one who makes a choice so that the mind of the person making the choice no longer is making a choice. It seems that you are saying that the choice-maker is affected by God's knowledge to such an extent that his freedom is lost. If that is the case, then can you prove this logically? I don't think that it can be proven.

Originally posted by Jonna
Well now that is an statement baised on faith and has no logic to it. Not everyone believes in god or in a perticular version of god.

No it is not based on Faith. It is based on the fact that if we were created by a "God" (Which if we were not then this thread is not needed) then there are tons of questions that cannot be answered similar to this one. One such question that is greater than the one you posed is why did God create life to begin with? Are we just his play toys? Is there some purpose for us?

Originally posted by BlackJackal
No it is not based on Faith. It is based on the fact that if we were created by a "God".

Fact? Where is your proof? Do you have a link?

OK you got me for bad grammer. It should have been like this.

It is based on the assumption, provided to be fact by this thread title, that we were created by a "God"

Originally posted by Jonna


Isn't this a form of control?

See it all just seems like a big contradiction to me. God knows everything that is ever going to happen which means that he set it in stone the way that these things will happen. So basicly one's unborn child has already had his/her life laid out for them because god already knows everything that is going to happen. See why I am having a problem with god and freewill? You can't have it both ways.

What about if there are an infinite number of ways that things can turn out? And what if God can comprehend the infinite in a way which you cannot?

Kinglizard: What I feel you are not comprehending is this:

If a GOD creates ANYTHING that is capable of evil, then PRIOR to such creation God MUST have had a grasp of what evil was. Whether you or Lucifer or anyone is given a choice or not to do bad things is irrelevant to this point. Anything that he has created must (by the nature of being the creator) come from HIS consciousness. Think about this.



BlackJackal:

Using an analogy of people falls short in trying to grasp the implication of an all knowing god. Everything does. But I keep going still: If there is an all knowing God, then he would know (by his definition) everything that has, will, and won't happen. Whether we know or not is irrelevant to this point. Again, an illusion of choice is not really choice. I'd go out on a limb to say you believe in prophecy. And what is prophecy? Foreknowledge. Is Armegedon going to happen because it was foretold? Can we avoid it in any way, being that biblically, it is our future?

Luke 12:25-26 � "And, which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit? If ye then be not able to do that thing which is least, why take ye thought for the rest?"

Originally posted by Sidhe

Originally posted by Truth

irrelevant.

you don't know this before hand so it doesnt matter.

But it does matter since it voilates our conception of God as "all good." If God is all good, then how could he create the murderers and rapists and other monsters who prey on the innocent? He knew they would do it and he made them anyway. We recognize that makers are implicated in evil when we make laws that hold them accountable for their creations. So cigarette companies, car manufacturers, and so on, are legally liable when they knowingly create things that hurt people.

If you believe law springs ultimately from God, then you must see the contradiction. We've indicted God as a criminal! This cannot be the case, therefor, God didn't create any monsters. Then how did the monsters come to be?

No amount of arguing from logic is going to solve this problem. It has been argued for thousands of years.

God is not good........

If he knew ahead of time that he would have to destroy innocent men, women, children in a flood his is not a good god.

If he was a good god he would never allow those type of people to be conceived. Don't try to say god can't control conception either. Virgin Mary, Sarah.........etc...
Alot of women who lose their children or miscarry think it was because god wanted it that way.

Originally posted by Joseph Knecht
Infinite Regress here. But for posterity's sake: How is there freewill if God already knows everything you are going to do? Remember the lamb's book of life? Your name is or is not already written.


And one more thing: You acknowledged that God created Good and Evil. HOW COULD A BENEVOLENT GOD CREATE ANYTHING OTHER THAN GOOD? HE IS NOT CAPABLE OF EVIL BUT CAN CREATE SENTIENT BEINGS WHO ARE?

Deuteronomy
32:39
See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.




ONLY GOD CREATES EVIL!

Isaiah
45:5
I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:

45:6
That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.

45:7
I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

I agree with you Jonna

If we had a god, who is all seeing and all knowing, and has total control over us, then why would we be here debating about our freedome?