megasamurai Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 I notice that free will is made a huge deal by Christians even though the Bible never uses the phrase "free will." Supposedly, free will is why god refuses to help the helpless. Teleporting people out of the World Trade Center during 9/11 would have violated free will? I was just pondering, if I were a superhero with mind-control powers and somebody was about to use a doomsday weapon, according to the Christian, it would be more moral to let him fire the weapon than to violate his free will. Supposedly, only full free will is possible. God can't make it where we can't choose to harm people but can choose what color shirt to wear. We either have full free will or none at all. An omnipotent god can't or won't create anything in between. Also, because of free will, god is obligated to send people to hell if they want to go there, and hell is total agony. My mom thought that it was monstrous of me that I would send people to heaven against their will if I were god. I would prefer free will be violated than people weep or mash their teeth. Of course, I doubt that people would really choose hell forever if it were weeping and gnashing of teeth because people are separated from love for all eternity and unable to feel love (because god is love is a literal rather than figurative statement) and would at worst, prefer erasure from existence. Free will is supposed to be paramount, but god can't honor people's free will to be annihilated because? The Christian god as a fictional character has a code of morality I don't understand. Supposedly, every Christian would send sinners to hell if they were in his position, but I couldn't do it no matter how much someone begged to be sent to hell. I have very good reason to believe that god isn't love because loving people often violate free will. Is giving a child vaccinations against their will violating free will and thus against Christian morality. In this case, we put well being above free will because we love, not in spite of love. Humans respect free will to a degree, but when someone you love's well being is at stake, that is usually where we draw the line at free will. There's a gray area between turning people into robots and not stopping people from harming themselves. Most friends would intervene if a friend commits self harm, but wouldn't turn that person into a slave. WIth god, there is no gray area when it comes to free will. Am I the only person who'd feel uncomfortable with sending people to hell? I know that god, hell, and the like are hooey concepts, but I just find the concept of a loving god who sends people to weeping and gnashing of teeth because they choose to go there revolting. Of course, I don't believe that any non-believer really thinks "gee, I want to go to hell," but Christians say that's what we all think. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1989 Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 I have some thoughts on free will and the Bible. At least twice in the Old Testament God actively negated a person's free will. The first was Pharaoh, the second I can't remember exactly, but it was a king whose territory the Jews passed through. God made the king not trade with the Jews and so the Jews attacked and sacked the kingdom. Furthermore, in the New Testament it says that God will send delusions to the unbelievers so they cannot believe during the Tribulation or whatever you call it, since the term "Tribulation" isn't in the Bible at all. As an aside, we supposedly have free will to choose to believe and serve or not. Our reward is that we get to go to Heaven, where there is no sin. Without the possibility of sin, God negates free will by denying us the ability to choose it. Finally, if God is omnipresent, he already knows everything, including all our future decisions and their outcomes. Do we have free will if the outcome is already determined? Of course not. Because we don't know what's going on we have the illusion of free will, but since God supposedly knows everything, then our past, present, and future are already decided we do not have free will, no matter what any Christian says or believes. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Storm Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 If we don't have free will, then Jesus died for nothing. Its our ability to choose to serve God that makes his love for us so valuable. That is what I was taught to believe. If we didn't have free will and God ordered everything and we have no control, whats the point of becoming a believer? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator Joshpantera Posted October 25, 2017 Moderator Share Posted October 25, 2017 And it turns out, we don’t really have much in the way of free will. Look up Sam Harris on free will. That pretty much steam rolls the ancient religious writers having no idea how illusory free will turns out to be in reality. They couldn’t have known, short of divine intervention. Which then opens another can of worms as far as eliminating the possibility of an all knowing god inspiring the Bible, who, apparently knew nothing about the reality of free will verses determinism and therefore can’t be all knowing... These idiots don’t just turn out wrong time and again, they’re layers and layers deep in wrong time and time again.... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted October 25, 2017 Author Share Posted October 25, 2017 Don't forget that miracles would violate free will if done in modern day, but not in Biblical times. That's the excuse for no miracles in modern day. Biblical characters who say weird shit disobeyed anyway so that disproves that notion. Free will is just an excuse for anything. I ponder, Spider-Man felt guilt for not stopping Uncle Ben's killer, but god continuously lets robbers go and kill Uncle Bens. Should Spider-Man have let the robber go and yell, "free will!"? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geezer Posted October 25, 2017 Share Posted October 25, 2017 The early church fathers (Catholics) edited, redacted, & even rewrote scripture so it would say what they wanted it to say. Today's Bibles are forgeries. Barth Ehrman is a good scholar to read about how the bible was changed, edited, & rewritten many times. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted October 25, 2017 Author Share Posted October 25, 2017 How did the early church handle the "free will" situation? Was it a big deal back then. It seems that predestination as stated by Paul (god hardens or softens your heart. You are made to be good or evil) was the original church idea, but "you choose to go to hell" seems like a very recent, 20th century phenomenon. If the people who go to hell want to go there, why does Jesus mention people begging to be sent to heaven banging on the door and being denied. Aren't their free wills being violated? How does this correspond with "you choose to go to hell." How does Paul's speech about "god hardens who he hardens" correspond with free will? There seems to be evidence that C. S. Lewis and J. P. Moreland invented the doctrine of voluntary damnation out of whole cloth, or was this belief older than I expected? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator florduh Posted October 25, 2017 Super Moderator Share Posted October 25, 2017 Free will is sacred for the same reason God is sacred. It doesn't exist and we want it to. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 5 hours ago, florduh said: Free will is sacred for the same reason God is sacred. It doesn't exist and we want it to. If we have free will then what? If we only think we have free will but dont really then what? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geezer Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 If you think Paul's teaching reflected the literal words of God, then you might consider reading the book The Fabricated Paul, by Hermann Detering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted October 26, 2017 Author Share Posted October 26, 2017 Some people's will seems freer than others. There are some people who claim that god does all these crazy miracles in Africa and Asia yet not in the first world and that doing these in the first world would violate free will. Why do miracles violate first world countries' free will but not the third world? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator florduh Posted October 26, 2017 Super Moderator Share Posted October 26, 2017 9 hours ago, midniterider said: If we have free will then what? If we only think we have free will but dont really then what? Your perception would be the same unless you think it through and recognize your constraints and programming that determines what you will freely choose to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzyspinalfusion Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 I would imagine that the devout Christian believes that they have experienced God in some form. Whether it was a religious experience, being born again, having a prayer granted, they genuinely believe they have experienced the presence of God, and found it to be good. Continuing off of this, they believe that we were created in God's image. Since they believed to have experienced God, they believe this experience was good, and they believe that they are made in God's image, then it isn't a huge leap that they believe that God's image is good. Believers also tend to believe that they are not perfect, and that God is perfect. Since there is always that difference, believers tend to think that there will always be a misunderstanding of God because they are not perfect. This results in the belief that freewill is a reflection of God, that freewill is a reflection of goodness and perfection, and that any misunderstandings of why we are granted freewill are accepted as lack of understanding due to our imperfect nature. While it is an understandable conclusion to the ideas presented, there are a lot of assumptions being made. How do we know that we can't understand perfection? How do we know that God is perfect? How do we know that freewill is the reflection of perfection and not imperfection? How does a person know if they truly experienced God versus just having a powerful psychological experience? Etc. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 On 10/24/2017 at 9:00 PM, megasamurai said: I notice that free will is made a huge deal by Christians even though the Bible never uses the phrase "free will." Supposedly, free will is why god refuses to help the helpless. Teleporting people out of the World Trade Center during 9/11 would have violated free will? I was just pondering, if I were a superhero with mind-control powers and somebody was about to use a doomsday weapon, according to the Christian, it would be more moral to let him fire the weapon than to violate his free will. Supposedly, only full free will is possible. God can't make it where we can't choose to harm people but can choose what color shirt to wear. We either have full free will or none at all. An omnipotent god can't or won't create anything in between. Also, because of free will, god is obligated to send people to hell if they want to go there, and hell is total agony. My mom thought that it was monstrous of me that I would send people to heaven against their will if I were god. I would prefer free will be violated than people weep or mash their teeth. Of course, I doubt that people would really choose hell forever if it were weeping and gnashing of teeth because people are separated from love for all eternity and unable to feel love (because god is love is a literal rather than figurative statement) and would at worst, prefer erasure from existence. Free will is supposed to be paramount, but god can't honor people's free will to be annihilated because? The Christian god as a fictional character has a code of morality I don't understand. Supposedly, every Christian would send sinners to hell if they were in his position, but I couldn't do it no matter how much someone begged to be sent to hell. I have very good reason to believe that god isn't love because loving people often violate free will. Is giving a child vaccinations against their will violating free will and thus against Christian morality. In this case, we put well being above free will because we love, not in spite of love. Humans respect free will to a degree, but when someone you love's well being is at stake, that is usually where we draw the line at free will. There's a gray area between turning people into robots and not stopping people from harming themselves. Most friends would intervene if a friend commits self harm, but wouldn't turn that person into a slave. WIth god, there is no gray area when it comes to free will. Am I the only person who'd feel uncomfortable with sending people to hell? I know that god, hell, and the like are hooey concepts, but I just find the concept of a loving god who sends people to weeping and gnashing of teeth because they choose to go there revolting. Of course, I don't believe that any non-believer really thinks "gee, I want to go to hell," but Christians say that's what we all think. The idea of free will ensures that people will be able to be controlled by the church. It puts all the responsibility of the 'relationship' with God on the Christian, relieving God of any responsibility. This kind of idiocy is fine if you are having a relationship with a non-existent being, but is absurd when people have a relationship with each other. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 Free will is sacred because we're predetermined to think that way. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted October 26, 2017 Share Posted October 26, 2017 6 hours ago, florduh said: Your perception would be the same unless you think it through and recognize your constraints and programming that determines what you will freely choose to do. Yes, and though we might be told that we have free will, we could thoroughly test that and find ourselves in a straight jacket, solitary confinement or a casket. If, during a sermon on free will, someone walked up to the pulpit and starting beating the shit out of the pastor, I wonder how many church members would allow the aggressor to express his free will? I suppose there's a couple different kinds of free will. The hypothetical type involving someone and God. And the other one that operates (or not) in real life. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted October 26, 2017 Author Share Posted October 26, 2017 Isn't the general idea that we are responsible for stopping bad things from happening but not god? I'm curious as to why god saving Daniel from the lion's den wasn't violating King Darius's free will to kill Daniel? Saving people from danger back then didn't violate free will, but saving people now does. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
★ Citsonga ★ Posted October 27, 2017 Share Posted October 27, 2017 One minor correction to the OP: The word "freewill" actually is in the Bible. It's used a handful of times in the Old Testament. However, all but one of those are referring to freewill offerings, and none give a spelled out doctrine. You can see the uses here: https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=Freewill&qs_version=KJV As far as the modern doctrine of freewill, I'd say the main reason it's so sacred among a lot of Christians is because it supposedly gets God off the hook. Most people can easily see that torturing someone for eternity as a punishment for something the person had no control over is completely unjust. They can't accept that their God is unjust, so "freewill" shifts the blame to the individual by claiming that he/she chose to reject God. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midniterider Posted October 27, 2017 Share Posted October 27, 2017 18 hours ago, megasamurai said: Isn't the general idea that we are responsible for stopping bad things from happening but not god? I'm curious as to why god saving Daniel from the lion's den wasn't violating King Darius's free will to kill Daniel? Saving people from danger back then didn't violate free will, but saving people now does. Possible Christian answers are: 1. You took that out of context 2. If you were a Christian, you'd understand 3. Don't question God 4. He works in mysterious ways 5. You think too much 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted October 27, 2017 Share Posted October 27, 2017 God did the will of Darius. No free will violation. If you read the story Darius is essentially tricked into putting Daniel in the lion's den. A bunch of guys want Daniel gone so they come up with a scheme to do away with anyone who petitions a man or god other than Darius, for 30 days, and they get Darius to sign off on it. Knowing Daniel prays three times a day they catch him in the act and tell the king reminding him of the law he signed and he cannot reverse it. Daniel is sent to the den but Darius tells Daniel at this point that it is up to his god to deliver him from his fate. It's right here that Darius does not want Daniel dead (well, before here actually but the story points out that its up to Daniel's god around this point). So Daniel is delivered from his fate via a miracle. Then Darius is happy and has the bad guys and all their families put in the den to be eaten. It then goes on to say Darius was all about Daniel's god and a bunch of nonsense that is untrue from every other record that has uncovered from that time. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted October 27, 2017 Share Posted October 27, 2017 God did the will of Darius. No free will violation. If you read the story Darius is essentially tricked into putting Daniel in the lion's den. A bunch of guys want Daniel gone so they come up with a scheme to do away with anyone who petitions a man or god other than Darius, for 30 days, and they get Darius to sign off on it. Knowing Daniel prays three times a day they catch him in the act and tell the king reminding him of the law he signed and he cannot reverse it. Daniel is sent to the den but Darius tells Daniel at this point that it is up to his god to deliver him from his fate. It's right here that Darius does not want Daniel dead (well, before here actually but the story points out that its up to Daniel's god around this point). So Daniel is delivered from his fate via a miracle. Then Darius is happy and has the bad guys and all their families put in the den to be eaten. It then goes on to say Darius was all about Daniel's god and a bunch of nonsense that is untrue from every other record that has uncovered from that time. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted October 30, 2017 Author Share Posted October 30, 2017 But what about the guys who wanted Daniel dead's free will? Didn't saving Daniel violate their free will? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted November 2, 2017 Share Posted November 2, 2017 On 10/29/2017 at 8:49 PM, megasamurai said: But what about the guys who wanted Daniel dead's free will? Didn't saving Daniel violate their free will? I guess I'm confused as to what free will is then. I mean it seems we're using the term "free will" here to mean that whatever we want we actually get? Every single time? To its ultimate end. So if someone, anyone, wanted Daniel dead he simply had to die? That's free will? Because I read it a bit differently. They wanted him dead, plotted it, and pretty much made it so. Daniel did wind up in the den after all. Now, that's all very one-sided of course. It ignores the other person. Daniel certainly wouldn't want to die. Does his free will count? Does it work in the same fashion? Getting what you want to the ultimate end? So living at all cost? At what point does the "free will" influence stop? I see free will as choices people make. It extends no further. So those who plotted against Daniel, as I stated above, used their free will to place him in the den. At that point they could make no further choices to influence him (unless they went inside the den and simply killed him). Now it was Daniel who could make choices. His choices happened to include prayer, which meant invoking the supernatural to get the lions to not eat him. Afterward Darius made his choices to kill off the plotters. So as I see it everyone exercised their free will. Not everyone's plan came to fruition but not because their free will was overridden. Had, at some point, something had occurred like with the Pharaoh of the Exodus I would say otherwise. For example, if Daniel had prayed and the story had claimed that god had changed the minds of one or more of the plotters to get the king to let Daniel go free, or something along those lines of altering what someone thought to help Daniel, then that would be going against their will. At best the will of some lions may have been violated but we don't actually know if they were going to eat him or not (we'll just assume they were since I don't care). mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deva Posted November 2, 2017 Share Posted November 2, 2017 Free Will is used by Christians as a rather modern defense of God in the face of all the suffering in the world and as a defense of God creating hell (believe it or not). The idea is that God gave humans "free will" because he did not want robots (a modern word, "robot"), but rather people who would freely give their devotion, worship, etc. In this way of course, humans who suffer bring it on themselves by not making a right choice, using their "free will." I guess that means that people in heaven can never change their minds, or do they? Are they then even human? They made a choice once, during their limited lifespans, for all eternity. So, if they don't have "free will" to change their minds in heaven, why couldn't omnipotent god have made it that way to start with? What is so terrible about not having free will? Isn't it preferable to being eternally punished for making a wrong decision? How is this creation "good"? The absurdity goes on and on... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
megasamurai Posted November 2, 2017 Author Share Posted November 2, 2017 The idea I'm trying to get at is that "free will" supposedly justifies all non-intervention and the idea not intervening is to avoid violating free will. Wouldn't telaporting the Columbine victims before the shooter appeared by a free will violation according to the Christian excuse that saving people violates the free will of the shooter? It's a flawed argument, but that's how Christians justify non-intervention when people do bad things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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