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@3RU7AL
If they have to be justified they probably aren't axioms!Justifying your axioms is a whole other kettle of fish.
A classic: From creator god ==> Specific God
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@keithprosser
If they have to be justified they probably aren't axioms!
Some people treat what should be premises as unquestionable axioms.
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@3RU7AL
That I do agree!
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@ludofl3x
Five pages and not a single attempt at answering the question, theists? For real??
Translation "I am willfully ignorant, that makes me right!"
The Ultimate Reality is God, there is no other.
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@Mopac
"The Ultimate Reality is God" = Deism.
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@3RU7AL
Deism isn't a God.
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@Mopac
Deism isn't a God.
This isn't a logical argument.
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@3RU7AL
Cabbage is a vegetable isn't a logical argument either.
But if you want to call God by the name of Deism, I would say that is the first time I ever heard of anyone using that as a name for God.
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@ludofl3x
What would you expect from a living, thinking, rational, logical Being? You would expect to find reasons for the creation. You find laws of nature that are expressed by mathematical formula and principles that are DISCOVERED, not put there by us thinking it. You would expect to find life coming from life, not from the non-living, as living beings producing other living beings is all you ever witness. You would expect morality to originate from a moral Being. That is just the drop in the bucket.If this were a rational, living, thinking, logical being that created the universe, you mean? I guess I'd expect to find evidence of any of the adjectives you've used. What's the "rationale" in the idea that eventually, and without question, the Andromeda galaxy will collide with ours is tens of millions of years and literally rip everything in BOTH galaxies to shreds?
The biblical God is demonstrated to be such a being.
If you say so, but what does that have to do with the present or even millions of years in the future? Are you questioning why God would do this?
What's the "thinking" behind extinctions happening at a 99% rate for all species?
I would think that humanity has contributed greatly. Per the Bible, since sin entered the world through one man death followed, provided that life on earth is not as old as the current evolutionary paradigm suggests.
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The question that is worth asking is if the present (that we live in) is the key to the past? Can we be sure that we understand the conditions then and how different are they from now? All we have to go by is an interpretation of the data using scientific models. Those models change as we become aware of other factors we did not include in our original equations of how things were. When we look at the distant past, I believe it is more scientist than science.
If it is the case that the earth is as old as supposed then a Hugh Ross or an old age creationist scenario would supply the answers.
What's the "thinking" behind extinctions happening at a 99% rate for all species? What's the "living" bing you're describing doing creating giagnitc and insurmountable distances between us and our nearest neighbors? Or the logic is perhaps not having neighbors at all? The fact that all of these natural phenomena are present directly contradicts the description you provide. Wait, let me guess, we know not his holy purpose. EXCEPT YOU ARE SAYING YOU DO, and it's Earth. Why I'm even engaging you on science is questionable, maybe I'll quit it, because if you believe in a literal Adam and Eve, you clearly do not care about evidence or science or really anything that isn't what you already think.
Do you mean insurmountable distances between, say, humans and dinosaurs? Or do you mean the 99% of animals we, as humans, have killed through extermination for all sorts of reasons, our encroachment of their environments, our pollution, our overhunting, and our lack of understanding of what we are doing?
You are thinking within your scientific box that has been constructed by "Enlightened" thinkers who have built on the evolutionary framework made popular by Darwin.
Many have identified a paradigm shift from God as the reason during the "age of reason" where humans became the measure of all things.
No, we don't put NATURAL LAWS in nature, yes, we derive them, but I'm pretty sure what I said we put there is meaning.
I contend the meaning was already there. We are able to express and see that meaning using mathematical formulas.
Psalm 19:1-3 (NASB)
The Works and the Word of God.
For the choir director. A Psalm of David.
For the choir director. A Psalm of David.
19 The heavens are telling of the glory of God;
And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.
2 Day to day pours forth speech,
And night to night reveals knowledge.
3 There is no speech, nor are there words;
Their voice is not heard.
And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands.
2 Day to day pours forth speech,
And night to night reveals knowledge.
3 There is no speech, nor are there words;
Their voice is not heard.
Why, exactly, would I expect morality to originate from a moral being?
Because morality is a mindful process and it needs an absolute, unchanging, fixed measure for it to be logical and made sense of. Without such a standard that is not derived by preference or subject to change, the question becomes whos opposing moral view is the true or right standard or measure since opposites cannot both be right when they refer to the same standard - what is good or right. Relativism is just not logically defensible. A = A loses its identity because A can mean whatever you want it to mean. Thus A = dog, and A = tree, or A = abortion, and A = do not abort, or A = Same-sex marriage is right, and A = same-sex marriage is wrong. It begs the question of who gets to decide and why are they right?
And more to the point and the topic, why is that moral being the character in a book that's less than 2000 years old?
The Bible is older than 2000 years. I would contend that all religious views stem from a corrupt view of the one God and after generations when humanity worshiped idols instead of God He gave a true account and set the record straight. Hence, many world religions have a creation and flood account that has been corrupted by the generations after the Flood.
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@ludofl3x
You understand that your biblical prophesy argument also presumes the god of the bible is true, so before you get there (essentially a "this BOOK is true because") you should get to how you identified that before the book, the god in it existed as and behaved as described (I know God created the universe and it wasn't Cronos because...).
Moses was instructed by God in collecting the accounts or genealogies that were written down from Adam onwards. Thus there were written records. Also, with the worship of man-made gods, God wanted humanity to understand the truth through His revelation which He used Moses to compile and collect.
This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made earth and heaven.
These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time; Noah walked with God.
[ Descendants of Noah ] Now these are the records ofthe generations of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah; and sons were born to them after the flood.
[ Descendants of Shem ] These are the records of the generations of Shem. Shem was one hundred years old, and became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood;
Now
these are the records of the generations of Terah. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor
and
Haran; and Haran became the father of Lot.
Etcetera.
With all but One.Bald faced special pleading.
As opposed to...pleading chance happenstance or gods that are contradictory in nature and the beliefs about them do not give an adequate reason for their existence?
I laid down my reasoning before. We are here because of two possible reasons that can be argued to some degree of reason - God/gods or chance happenstance.
I claim different gods, other than the biblical God, are not reasonable. That is a claim I could get into discussing to justify my belief system as opposed to yours or any other.
If you want to mention your worldview we can begin our discussion on its reasonableness as opposed to the Christian worldview.
And here you are, placing yourself as "god" declaring what is and is not without any reasonable or logical demonstration that what you say can be trusted.Said the guy trying to say the reason god can exist without being created is because he's eternal or exists outside of space and time.
I'm willing to discuss the evidence that supports God. What do you know of the reasonableness of prophecy? What is your understanding as to how it backs up the biblical revelation by what we know about
history.
If god can be eternal, can you demonstrate that the stuff that makes up the universe is NOT eternal?
I can give a reasoned and logical argument.
Given the Bible is true the universe would have a beginning by God. So you would have to consider what proofs such a God offers through what He has made and through His revelation. I contend prophecy is hard to refute with the historical evidence available. The OT proceeds the NT. It contains warnings of the Old Covenant with the destruction (once again) of Jerusalem and the Jewish economy that is constructed around temple worship. These prophecies exist way before the destruction of the temple in AD 70.
Science, at present, is confirmation that the present model shows the universe had a beginning. If it had a beginning what started the process and what does it mean - "this singularity?"
"The initial singularity was a singularity of seemingly infinite density thought to have contained all of the mass and space-time of the Universe[1] before quantum fluctuations caused it to rapidly expand in the Big Bang and subsequent inflation, creating the present-day Universe.[2] The initial singularity is part of the Planck epoch, the earliest period of time in the history of the universe."
Where did this singularity come from?
What's the logical demonstration you would use to show "this character in a book is real, and he somehow exists without the two things that are absolutely required for ANYTHING to exist: space (for something to occupy) and time (for the span of existence). It's all special pleading, special knowledge garbage. I wonder what you might have been like if you hadn't dedicated so much brainpower to undergirding some fairy tale for I don't know whose benefit. Yours, of course.
I could use a variety of evidential or logical arguments depending on whether I wanted to approach this topic from an evidential or presuppositional approach.
Logically, to know morality we would have to have something objective, absolute, and unchanging to fix "good" or "right" to or else it is relative and meaningless.
Prophecy/history speaks to the truthfulness of the Bible.
Making sense of worldviews is another way to approach the reasonableness for God.
I could make an argument over your ultimate authority as opposed to my ultimate authority.
There are also many classical arguments for God such as the ontological and teleological arguments.
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@Mopac
Have we met?I would say that is the first time I ever heard of anyone using that as a name for God.
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@Mopac
Translation: I repeat the same nonsensical mantra over and over because I haven't got a brain in my head.The Ultimate Reality is God, there is no other.
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@ludofl3x
If you were eternal, how could you have a beginning? Answer that question.Can you demonstrate that this being is eternal?
I can give a good, logical rationale for why it is reasonable to believe.
If the time, space, matter continuum had a beginning then what is the reason for it since somehow it came to be. God provides sufficient and necessary reason. The Bible that claims thousands of times to be either His word or God speaking to humans is reasonable to believe. Prophecy provides a reasonable and logical example that is not easily refuted. I am waiting for someone to give it a good rebuttal on these threads.
What it boils down to what you are willing to accept since worldview bias gets in the way.
Failing that, can you demonstrate that the universe in one form or another itself isn't eternal? No one says a word about god until about 5000 years ago. Up until then, he wasn't there, other gods were.
I can give many understandings from science that give a reasonable example that it had a beginning. The currently accepted view is the Big Bang model or some derivative from it. The universe is expanding. It is running out of usable energy. There is cosmic background radiation, what is thought to be the afterglow of the Big Bang. Einsteins theory of General Relativity is also said to dispute an eternal universe.
We only have written records that extend back so far. The Bible explains other gods as man-made inventions that do not have the power that God has.
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@PGA2.0
If the time, space, matter continuum had a beginning then what is the reason for it since somehow it came to be. God provides sufficient and necessary reason
Possible reason, but not a 'sufficient and neccessary' one!
"[The entity that gave moses 10 commandments] provides a sufficient and neccessary reason for the universe" is just not true! YHWH creating the universe might be sufficient for the world to exist, but its not neccessary it was Him. It could have been zeus, or brahma - either would be sufficient, but it ain't necessarily any of them!
Prophecy provides a reasonable and logical example that is not easily refuted.
I am at a loss to know how to prove a piece of writing is not genuine prophecy. It's not hard to show a 'prophecy' isn't neccessarily miraculous, but completely proving it?- Not possible.
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@PGA2.0
So you still stone non virgin brides to death, do you?Because morality is a mindful process and it needs an absolute, unchanging, fixed measure for it to be logical and made sense of.
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@PGA2.0
What language did Adam write in?Moses was instructed by God in collecting the accounts or genealogies that were written down from Adam onwards. Thus there were written records. Also, with the worship of man-made gods, God wanted humanity to understand the truth through His revelation which He used Moses to compile and collect.
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@disgusted
Lying pig
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@PGA2.0
What language did you say Adam wrote in?
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@PGA2.0
I don't believe the temple prophecy is all that impressive, I know that's your big one. First of all, it's not accurate, until you add some weird multipliers that make a month or a week or a day into a year or a decade or an hour, and there's no reason to do it. 70 days = 70 days. 490 years =/= 70 days without gymnastics, first of all, and second of all, is it even that impressive to imagine that the ruling Romans would tear down the Jewish temple if they continued to misbehave? it seems the sort of thing that a lot of people could predict, and that's granting it was a prediction at all. Again, those books are of questionable authorship. Try it again, as I said, without bothering with the bible, because god would have had to be there before the book (the bible isn't older than 2000 years. Maybe books in it are, but the ones you care about, the NT, aren't close to that). Why is your god the one who must have created the universe? That's the whole question.
Are we not even going to get to hear your interpretation of the "meaning in" the Bootes void? Or the "rationale" of colliding two galaxies together when humanity will be long gone? The 99% extinction rate predates the existence of mankind by literally hundreds of millions of years. Your answer seems to somehow say "well, only if all the evidence is true! If It isn't, then Jesus!" Please tell me you don't think dinosaurs went extinct because someone ate a magic apple.
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@3RU7AL
Deism, LOL
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@ludofl3x
I don't believe the temple prophecy is all that impressive, I know that's your big one.
I don't think you understand what the OT Jewish life was focused on then, or you are just trying to downplay the importance of what the destruction meant. Their whole ritual system of atonement and animal sacrifice, their whole economy and right standing with God revolved around maintaining a right relationship with Him. That system came to an end in AD 70. Not only that, Deuteronomy 28 lists blessing of obedience and curses of disobedience. If you go down the list of curses (verses 15-68) you will find that what God warned against He judged them on. Throughout the OT Mosaic Covenant relationship, you constantly see these people being disobedience to the covenant they agreed to follow (Exodus 24:3, 7). God continually sent prophets to them warning them to repent and turn back to Him. They continually ignored Him. Finally, He sends His Son, and they engineer His death through the Romans (Hebrews 1:1-2), which fulfilled all righteousness and initiated the New Covenant promised in the OT.
First of all, it's not accurate, until you add some weird multipliers that make a month or a week or a day into a year or a decade or an hour, and there's no reason to do it. 70 days = 70 days. 490 years =/= 70 days without gymnastics, first of all, and second of all, is it even that impressive to imagine that the ruling Romans would tear down the Jewish temple if they continued to misbehave?
First, there are two ways of looking at it, one is a literal 490 years that I believe has been reconciled through Philip Mauro's work. He points out the many problems of using the Ptolemaic calendar in determining dating the time frame. Then there is the other view that the years are not precise but rounded off as can be demonstrated numerous times in the Bible that culminate in the six conditions mentioned in Daniel 9:24. So, I believe it can be logically justified both ways.
As for your claim that the Roman's would want to tear down the temple, that claim is shot down by Josephus who describes Titus as wanting to preserve, not tear down, such a magnificent structure.
it seems the sort of thing that a lot of people could predict, and that's granting it was a prediction at all. Again, those books are of questionable authorship. Try it again, as I said, without bothering with the bible, because god would have had to be there before the book (the bible isn't older than 2000 years.
The Dead Sea Scrolls confirm the OT was written before the new millennium and change in dating from B.C.E. to A.D. So you have to account for the many scriptural verses that predict the Messiah and judgment culminating in the destruction of the city and temple. Some of the biblical OT manuscripts date back many centuries. This claim can collaborate scientifically.
With the NT manuscripts, you have not one mention of an already destroyed city or temple yet you have several warnings of a soon, quick, near coming catastrophe and impending judgment. That is highly significant.
The NT continually addresses an OT worship system that is still in effect at the time of writing, thus no NT writing has any mention of what for these OT people were something their whole life revolved around, the temple and its already destruction.
The NT is a fulfillment of everything Israel was waiting for.
And, after AD 70 the priesthood is gone, the animal sacrifices abolished, the temple is destroyed the people are scattered. The genealogy for the Messiah was kept in the temple so they cannot trace His lineage officially, nor can their Mosaic prophecies be fulfilled because they are not relevant, they address an OT people that do not exist in covenant relationship after this point in time.
And, after AD 70 the priesthood is gone, the animal sacrifices abolished, the temple is destroyed the people are scattered. The genealogy for the Messiah was kept in the temple so they cannot trace His lineage officially, nor can their Mosaic prophecies be fulfilled because they are not relevant, they address an OT people that do not exist in covenant relationship after this point in time.
Maybe books in it are, but the ones you care about, the NT, aren't close to that). Why is your god the one who must have created the universe? That's the whole question.
The Christian God is the same God revealed in the OT. The Bible is a progressive revelation of God. As I mentioned in a previous post, Moses was given the task of compiling the accounts from creation forward as lead by God.
Are we not even going to get to hear your interpretation of the "meaning in" the Bootes void? Or the "rationale" of colliding two galaxies together when humanity will be long gone? The 99% extinction rate predates the existence of mankind by literally hundreds of millions of years. Your answer seems to somehow say "well, only if all the evidence is true! If It isn't, then Jesus!" Please tell me you don't think dinosaurs went extinct because someone ate a magic apple.
Who said anything of an apple? What happened in the Garden was disobedience of God's command, which meant that Adam decided to make his own choice on what was "good," the beginning of relativism. When he ate the fruit he then understood what evil was, it was doing what is contrary to God and rejecting His goodness. Evil has been witnessed throughout humanity from that time.
There is evidence that dinosaurs existed with humanity.
The Bootes void in relation to what?
Show me what evidence you are referring to in regard to the colliding (that you believe is concrete).
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@PGA2.0
The Christian God is the same God revealed in the OT. The Bible is a progressive revelation of God. As I mentioned in a previous post, Moses was given the task of compiling the accounts from creation forward as lead by God.
This does not answer the question: why is this god the one that created the universe? Your answering "Is this god consistent with this other character also called god?"
There is evidence that dinosaurs existed with humanity.
Is that evidence in stories in the bible? Because scientists almost uniformly agree (like above 99%) that dinosaurs died out 65 million years before people of any kind ever show up. And more than dinosaurs go extinct. 99% of all species that have ever existed on this planet have gone extinct. What's the 'meaning' in that?
The Bootes void in relation to what?
YOu're the one who says there's "meaning in" the universe. I'm asking, then, what's the "meaning" intended in something like the Bootes void? You seem quite certain that you've identified meaning in everything (as in some sort of intention by some unseen agent creating it), please help my understand what the holy meaning of the Bootes void is.
Evidence of the collision of the two galaxies to follow: PROPHESY!
It's math.
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@PGA2.0
@ludofl3x
The scale of destruction can be overstated. Josephus relates:And, after AD 70 the priesthood is gone, the animal sacrifices abolished, the temple is destroyed the people are scattered
Pompey, and those thatwere about him, went into the temple itself 1 whither it was not lawful for any to enter but the high priest, and sawwhat was reposited therein, the candlestick with its lamps, and the table,and the pouring vessels, and the censers, all made entirely of gold, asalso a great quantity of spices heaped together, with two thousand talentsof sacred money. Yet did not he touch that money, nor any thing else thatwas there reposited; but he commanded the ministers about the temple, thevery next day after he had taken it, to cleanse it, and to perform theiraccustomed sacrifices.
That is the temple was not desroyed and sacrifing was barely interrupted. The reason or overstating things is Cristian theology; God has to transform from the god of the hebrews to the god of the gentiles. The 'destruction' of the temple is symbolic of a break between god and israel; in ad 70 God abandons the jews and the 'new covenant' begins.
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@keithprosser
That event you are referencing happened nearly 150 years prior to the destruction of Jerusalem.
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@keithprosser
And also your theological assessment is wrong.
The Christian Church is made of both Jews and Gentiles, and it is the real church.
Things got weird after the Bar Kochba revolt, which created a greater division between The Church and the Jews who decided to reject Jesus.
But hey, nobody cares about Bar Kochba anymore, but we are stilll talking about Jesus.
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@Mopac
You are correct about the destruction of the temple- my dating is all wrong and I withdraw it. Good fun doing research tho! So much to read...
I don't know about the orthodox view on covenant theology. My comments on that were more relevant to pga's 'Preterist' views.
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@keithprosser
I can't say, but post-reformation evangelical/protestant theology tends to be way off from Orthodoxy.
This, as you can imagine presents a huge obstacle when it comes to presenting Orthodoxy to a protestantized culture.
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@PGA2.0
or gods that are contradictory in nature
Do you mean like your god who IS love?
2 The LORD is a jealous and avenging God; the LORD takes vengeance and is filled with wrath. The LORD takes vengeance on his foes and vents his wrath against his enemies.3 The LORD is slow to anger but great in power; the LORD will not leave the guilty unpunished. His way is in the whirlwind and the storm, and clouds are the dust of his feet.4 He rebukes the sea and dries it up; he makes all the rivers run dry. Bashan and Carmel wither and the blossoms of Lebanon fade.5 The mountains quake before him and the hills melt away. The earth trembles at his presence, the world and all who live in it.6 Who can withstand his indignation? Who can endure his fierce anger? His wrath is poured out like fire; the rocks are shattered before him.