Putting An End3 To The Free Will Versus Predestination Debate

[TheRedneckProfessor]

In several of our recent threads here in The Den, we have touched on the centuries-old debate over free will versus predestination.  Given that the question of free will is essential to god's supposed omniscience, just as predestination is to his supposed omnipotence, this subject comes close to the very heart of any argument either for or against the possible existence of a god, and certainly the god of the bible.  As such, I thought it might be a good time to have (yet another) general bowdy-how on the subject.  Lamentably, our own @Edgarcito is the only christian currently in our midst; but perhaps, if god both wills and predestines it, more will happen along and chime in.  With that said, this is Ed's opportunity to put forth the best arguments he has to support his position on the subject (if he so chooses to take up the mantle, of course).  I will say that, as a christian, I was a firm believer in free will; but have found enough scripture suggesting predestination that I could also mount an effective argument supporting it as well.  What say you, Ed?  Free will, or predestination?  And, more importantly, why do you believe in whichever one you believe in?  Can it be supported with scripture?  Without speculation?  Or, would you rather just tell me to go engage in various forms of self-fornication?

[Edgarcito]

On 11/8/2022 at 11:23 AM, TheRedneckProfessor said:

In several of our recent threads here in The Den, we have touched on the centuries-old debate over free will versus predestination.  Given that the question of free will is essential to god's supposed omniscience, just as predestination is to his supposed omnipotence, this subject comes close to the very heart of any argument either for or against the possible existence of a god, and certainly the god of the bible.  As such, I thought it might be a good time to have (yet another) general bowdy-how on the subject.  Lamentably, our own @Edgarcito is the only christian currently in our midst; but perhaps, if god both wills and predestines it, more will happen along and chime in.  With that said, this is Ed's opportunity to put forth the best arguments he has to support his position on the subject (if he so chooses to take up the mantle, of course).  I will say that, as a christian, I was a firm believer in free will; but have found enough scripture suggesting predestination that I could also mount an effective argument supporting it as well.  What say you, Ed?  Free will, or predestination?  And, more importantly, why do you believe in whichever one you believe in?  Can it be supported with scripture?  Without speculation?  Or, would you rather just tell me to go engage in various forms of self-fornication?

There are many predestination related verses in the Bible Prof.  If creation is God breathed, I'm uncertain how God might separate himself from himself other than "pruning" himself of his own manifestation.  Or making part of his creation autonomous.  Not sure how either would work.  Liable to be a fruitless discussion that just leads to more angst.

 

Maybe free will and fate are just an illusion of circumstance.

[Edgarcito]

Maybe the mechanism is love, faith based....the organization of matter is love/faith dependent.  Seems reasonable at the moment.

[Edgarcito]

Maybe when love fails in our perception, in our circumstance, it doesn't fail in the overall projection of God's intent, so long as the projection is working towards love or through the avenue of repentance.   Active hate however....not sure where that goes other than disorganization.

[walterpthefirst]

3 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

There are many predestination related verses in the Bible Prof.  If creation is God breathed, I'm uncertain how God might separate himself from himself other than "pruning" himself of his own manifestation.  Or making part of his creation autonomous.  Not sure how either would work.  Liable to be a fruitless discussion that just leads to more angst.

 

Maybe free will and fate are just an illusion of circumstance.

 

If free will and fate are just illusions of circumstance, then why would you trust what the bible says about them?

 

And if those passages are not to be trusted, what about the rest of the bible?

 

Would any of it be trustworthy?

 

 

[Edgarcito]

1 hour ago, walterpthefirst said:

 

If free will and fate are just illusions of circumstance, then why would you trust what the bible says about them?

 

And if those passages are not to be trusted, what about the rest of the bible?

 

Would any of it be trustworthy?

 

 

What verses are you referring to please sir

[walterpthefirst]

4 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

What verses are you referring to please sir

 

My comments don't rely on any specific passages, Ed.

 

Instead they rely on what you've said in the past (that scripture says we have free will) and what you've said today about predestination (fate) in the bible.

 

Why believe by faith that free will or fate is true, if they're both just illusions of circumstance?

 

Illusory things cannot be true.

 

Do you see that?

[TheRedneckProfessor]

5 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

There are many predestination related verses in the Bible Prof.  If creation is God breathed, I'm uncertain how God might separate himself from himself other than "pruning" himself of his own manifestation.  Or making part of his creation autonomous.  Not sure how either would work.  Liable to be a fruitless discussion that just leads to more angst.

 

Maybe free will and fate are just an illusion of circumstance.

I'm not really asking you to speculate on god separating himself from himself and still being omnipresent while simultaneously not being present in the presence of his autonomous creation in which he is also present, but not really.  That was certainly a good effort, however; and worthy of a separate thread. 

 

No, what I am interested in is whether we have free will or we are predestined, based on scripture. 

[TheRedneckProfessor]

5 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

Maybe free will and fate are just an illusion of circumstance.

What do the scriptures say?

[TheRedneckProfessor]

4 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

Maybe when love fails in our perception, in our circumstance, it doesn't fail in the overall projection of God's intent, so long as the projection is working towards love or through the avenue of repentance.   Active hate however....not sure where that goes other than disorganization.

6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.  1 Corinthians 13

 

If it fails, even in our perception or circumstance, it must be something other than love.  But this is another irrelevant diversion from the topic at hand.

 

 

[☆ DarkBishop ☆]

9 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

What do the scriptures say?

Good luck! 

[Edgarcito]

12 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

If it fails, even in our perception or circumstance, it must be something other than love.  But this is another irrelevant diversion from the topic at hand.

 

No sir, not really.  Our perceptions and selections may be so small relative to something larger, they may appear to us as one way or another but not actually in the trend of the whole.  Which, imo, makes faith apropos.  "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose."

 

I was just thinking out loud, speculating.  There's a very small chance that I'm going to stumble on some answer to this age-old question.  My perception is that we have free will but speculating my perception might not make a hill of beans in the cosmic perspective.  There are numerous predestination verses in the Bible that suggest our fate was known before we were organized or this world.

 

I'll look for free will verses today.  Thx.

[Edgarcito]

13 hours ago, walterpthefirst said:

 

My comments don't rely on any specific passages, Ed.

 

Instead they rely on what you've said in the past (that scripture says we have free will) and what you've said today about predestination (fate) in the bible.

 

Why believe by faith that free will or fate is true, if they're both just illusions of circumstance?

 

Illusory things cannot be true.

 

Do you see that?

Certainly I see that, but I don't know that we have an option in this case.  Thx.

[walterpthefirst]

Posted 17 minutes ago

  14 hours ago, walterpthefirst said:

 

My comments don't rely on any specific passages, Ed.

 

Instead they rely on what you've said in the past (that scripture says we have free will) and what you've said today about predestination (fate) in the bible.

 

Why believe by faith that free will or fate is true, if they're both just illusions of circumstance?

 

Illusory things cannot be true.

 

Do you see that?

Certainly I see that, but I don't know that we have an option in this case.  Thx.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Well, actually there is another option, Edgarcito.

 

It's the one that you use at work and at home, the one that you rely on a hundreds times a day and the one that makes it possible for us to communicate here.

 

It's not an option that you will like or will want to accept.

 

But it is real and it is true.

 

 

Surely you know what it is?

[Edgarcito]

1 minute ago, walterpthefirst said:

Surely you know what it is?

No sir I don't, thanks.

[walterpthefirst]

Just now, Edgarcito said:

No sir I don't, thanks.

 

Ok then.

 

What are you using to understand these words as they appear on your computer screen?

 

Faith?

 

Or something else?

 

 

Now do you know the answer?

[TheRedneckProfessor]

52 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

Which, imo, makes faith apropos.

Now these three things remain: faith, hope, and love.  And the greatest of these is love.  And love never fails.  Do you, then, disagree with the scripture?

[Edgarcito]

12 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

Now these three things remain: faith, hope, and love.  And the greatest of these is love.  And love never fails.  Do you, then, disagree with the scripture?

No sir.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

19 hours ago, Edgarcito said:

Maybe when love fails in our perception, in our circumstance, it doesn't fail in the overall projection of God's intent, so long as the projection is working towards love or through the avenue of repentance.   Active hate however....not sure where that goes other than disorganization.

 

14 hours ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.  1 Corinthians 13

 

If it fails, even in our perception or circumstance, it must be something other than love.  But this is another irrelevant diversion from the topic at hand.

 

 

 

23 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

Now these three things remain: faith, hope, and love.  And the greatest of these is love.  And love never fails.  Do you, then, disagree with the scripture?

 

8 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

No sir.

Here is an example of you disagreeing with the scripture.  The scripture says that love never fails; but you indicate that it does.  Are you disagreeing of your own free will and volition?  Or were you predestined to disagree?

[walterpthefirst]

43 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

No sir I don't, thanks.

 

Ok Edgarcito, lets see if you still don't know the answer after answering all of these questions.

 

 

Do you know what the instruments in your lab tell you by faith?

 

Do you know what your friends and family say to you by faith?

 

Do you know if you are hungry, thirsty or tired by faith?

 

Do you know how much is in your bank account by faith?

 

Do you know who FDR and JFK were by faith?

 

Do you know what the capital of the U.S. is by faith?

 

Do you know what colour your car is by faith?

 

Do you know who wrote Born In The USA by faith?

 

Do you know where the Alamo is by faith?

 

Do you know what a tornado is by faith?

 

 

The answer is that you know all of these things by _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

 

Now you even know the number of letters in the answer.

 

 

So, what is the answer, Edgarcito?

[Edgarcito]

5 minutes ago, TheRedneckProfessor said:

Here is an example of you disagreeing with the scripture.  The scripture says that love never fails; but you indicate that it does.  Are you disagreeing of your own free will and volition?  Or were you predestined to disagree?

Could be both yet makes faith the appropriate choice, doesn't it?

[TheRedneckProfessor]

19 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

Could be both yet makes faith the appropriate choice, doesn't it?

No.  It could not be both.  You cannot act of your own free will and volition if all of your actions have been predetermined.  Go back to the law of non-contradiction (A and not-A cannot both be true).  It's interesting to note that "faith" is your go-to response when attempting to reconcile two contradictory statements in an effort to continue believing in both.  But, as Walt has already demonstrated in a previous thread, your faith fails you at times, also.  What happens when faith and love both fail?  Do you continue in hope?  Those who live in hope often despair for having done so.

[TheRedneckProfessor]

23 minutes ago, Edgarcito said:

Could be both yet makes faith the appropriate choice, doesn't it?

Moreover, your own answer here is self-contradictory.  If free will and predestination are both equally valid, how can "faith" make a choice?  How could "faith" make a choice on its own, in the first place, without a human vehicle carrying said faith?  In which case, it would not be "faith" making the choice, but the human, albeit guided or informed by the faith.  And how do you come to have "faith"?  By free will?  Or by predestination?

[walterpthefirst]

Posted 1 hour ago

  1 hour ago, walterpthefirst said:

Surely you know what it is?

No sir I don't, thanks.

 

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

 

This is a truthful and honest statement from you, Edgarcito?

 

That you don't know of any other option but to use faith to believe that free will or fate are true?

 

Or would it be more truthful and more honest of you to say that you refuse to use anything else but faith to believe these things?

 

That you do know that there is another option?

 

But you don't like it, can't accept it and won't use it?

 

 

Hmmm... ?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Edgarcito]

Just from drawing it out on paper, it seems that if God were predestining a manifestation of himself through man, he created man in his image with free will and the ability to manifest.  If through Jesus, even if we are wrong in our choices, faith moves us to the predestined manifestation God was aiming for.  If we select no faith, right or wrong, it puts us in the God's predestined group that he didn't desire.  Two things.  Does God have free will?  And two, the Bible suggests that the predestination was before the world was created.  Kind of fits because Jesus says that he's given those that are manifested through him.

 

So if I have faith and true then I am manifesting God's desired goal /predestined through the Law.

If I have faith and am unable, then I am manifesting God's desired goal/ predestination through Christ.

 

If I am without faith and believe and manifest then I'm outside the desired goal/ predestination.

If I am without faith and don't believe and manifest, then I'm outside the desired goal/predestination.

 

Just thinking out loud again.  See what you think please.  All just reasoning/speculation.

 

Thanks.