God botherers - are you insane?

Originally posted by knightmeister
There's a difference between seeing from the outside and knowing from experience (from the inside). You can only get so far by observing and having intellectual understanding. Experiential understanding gives you something completely different.

Do you seriously think that even if I spent a trillion years studying every facet of your life and obser ...[text shortened]... of sex? Both? neither? Why are these two different? 3,000 words minimum , hand in Monday)

Do you seriously think that even if I spent a trillion years studying every facet of your life and observing your life from the outside that I would be able to understand nearly as much about what it feels like to be you as you understand.

Minor problem: You're not omnipresent, nor able to read my thoughts, nor able to design a living being as complex as a human. Oddly, to reconcile your personal claims with those of your faith, you are forced to downplay the power of God!

Originally posted by BigDoggProblem
[b]Do you seriously think that even if I spent a trillion years studying every facet of your life and observing your life from the outside that I would be able to understand nearly as much about what it feels like to be you as you understand.

Minor problem: You're not omnipresent, nor able to read my thoughts, nor able to design a living being ...[text shortened]... ile your personal claims with those of your faith, you are forced to downplay the power of God![/b]

I don't deny for one minute that God would have a distinct advantage on me in this endeavour. However , I don't think he can go all the way without knowing what it's like to be human and suffer. He might get quite a way in one particular way but in terms of experiencing it he is not much better off than me , infact he's worse off because I've experienced pain and being human , he hasn't! (in your concept)

The questions at hand here are

1. Is it important for God to know what it is to suffer and be human? (on which we roughly agree , although you seem to think intellectual knowledge might be enough)

2. How can God achieve this?

You think God can know exactly what it's like to be a human being (with all the feelings , physical sensations and suffering that go with it) without actually being a human being. I think that this is not possible because it would be incomplete and missing the vital experiential element
I do not think God can experience what being a human being is really like unless he becomes a human being. I believe this in the same way as I don't think you can know what sex is really like unless you actually have sex.

You don't seem to think God actually experiencing these things to be that important . I can see how they are very important. You are obviously not an experiential kind of guy or a kinesthetic learner.

Interestingly though, even if you were right and God could know what it was like to be human without actually becoming one it would be useful only to God and not to us. A big, big part of this is not just that HE knows what it is to be human but that WE know that he knows and can relate to how he knows. Your kind of 'knowing' is too remote and abstract and doesn't cut the mustard for us (even if it theoretically did for him).

In short , it's important that God shows us that he is prepared to walk the walk , not just talk the talk and it's vital for us to be able to RELATE to his knowing what it is to be human AS WELL AS for him to actually have that experience. Your god wouldn't work for real people who don't live in books of abstract theology. The real God of Christianity is passionate , intimate and vulnerable and gets his hands dirty . I'm glad you stopped believing in whatever god it was you were in to. What on earth was it that you thought you had to believe?

I'd bet my mortgage that if God had not done what he has done you would be arguing my very points for me in reverse and using them as an argument for how God lacked courage , or was too remote or was hypocritical. But then if that was what God was about then I would be an Atheist anyway.

Originally posted by knightmeister
Since you have joined the fray , can you tell me why my posts keep going bold and then light. Am I pressing the wrong key? My experiential knowledge is letting me down.

If you want to make text bold, you put it between [*b*] [*/b*]***

If you have any [*b*]s without the closing one, be it in the text you are quoting or the main post, the rest is bold. Hope this helps.


*** remove the *'s

Originally posted by Halitose
If you want to make text bold, you put it between [*b*] [*/b*]***

If you have any [*b*]s without the closing one, be it in the text you are quoting or the main post, the rest is bold. Hope this helps.


*** remove the *'s

** the two of you

Originally posted by frogstomp
** the two of you

Same to you my good man. 😛