Hitler: Part of God's Plan?

Originally posted by knightmeister
Despite everything you have said the fact still remains that Jesus believed in an omniscient Father God and taught that we were to do his will. It was an integral part of his teachings that we were to have a relationship with his Father and know him as Father.

Now even you would have a hard time arguing that away. Jesus would have stern words for ...[text shortened]... don't even believe that Jesus's Father is actually there. Jesus would be unimpressed.

I know that you like to think your beliefs are coherent. They just aren't. Sorry.

It seems your beliefs are more important to you than truth. They just aren't. Sorry.

If God is truth, shouldn't you align yourself with truth?

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
I know that you like to think your beliefs are coherent. They just aren't. Sorry.

It seems your beliefs are more important to you than truth. They just aren't. Sorry.

If God is truth, shouldn't you align yourself with truth?

Abstract nonsense. These are just vague terms and concepts thrown out willy nilly. You talk in generalisations and mantras as a substitute for proper debate.

How about we return to the question of what Jesus meant by the words "the son shall set you free" . By God man we could be well into it by now rather than engaing in your pathetic tittle tattle.

You say it's pointless debating but you are quite happy to waste hours chanting your repetitive truth mantras. Care to look deeper into the issues or are you still taking your ball home to mama?

Originally posted by knightmeister
Abstract nonsense. These are just vague terms and concepts thrown out willy nilly. You talk in generalisations and mantras as a substitute for proper debate.

How about we return to the question of what Jesus meant by the words "the son shall set you free" . By God man we could be well into it by now rather than engaing in your pathetic tittle tattl ...[text shortened]... mantras. Care to look deeper into the issues or are you still taking your ball home to mama?

Sometimes I have to wonder what you do for a living.

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
Sometimes I have to wonder what you do for a living.

Any chance you want to discuss the actual issue at hand for a change? You ran away from Ephin. , probably from Josephw too , you have run off with your ball twice before from me.

So , do you have any logical reason to put forward why "the son shall set you free" should not be extrapolated in the way I suggest?

If you need more time to think just say so instaed of playing games.

Originally posted by knightmeister
Any chance you want to discuss the actual issue at hand for a change? You ran away from Ephin. , probably from Josephw too , you have run off with your ball twice before from me.

So , do you have any logical reason to put forward why "the son shall set you free" should not be extrapolated in the way I suggest?

If you need more time to think just say so instaed of playing games.

No games. Just no point in trying to have a rational discussion with an irrational person.

I'm sure you'll find those who are willing to "debate" things with you just for the grins. Personally, I find it too sad.

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
No games. Just no point in trying to have a rational discussion with an irrational person.

I'm sure you'll find those who are willing to "debate" things with you just for the grins. Personally, I find it too sad.

Ok . I know I'm perfectly rational and my flying pink elephant friend agrees with me. So how do I convince you that I have a rational point to make here ? What would it take for you to at least consider the possibility that there is more to Jesus' teachings than you put forward.

You see my logic is telling me that the essence of our discussions is basically that you think that any hint of salvation via faith and grace takes away from and detracts from our obligation to do away with sin. You see grace and personal effort not as team mates on the same side but as enemies for some reason. This makes it very difficult to discuss things with you because you can't actually hear what I am saying. It's always translated into ToO -speak.

Any time I put forward an argument for grace it's immediately interpreted as a threat to personal righteousness. And you are right to worry about this. It's a trap to think grace on it's own is sufficient and St Paul talks about this himself.......

However , you have taken this to about as extreme a postion as is possible and show an immense resistance to the idea of any grace at all. You end up almost completely polarised at this extreme , unable to see the role of faith or grace because grace for you is always a threat to personal righteousness. I have noticed how when others put forward the idea of grace you seem to automatically assume that they are proposing that sin should not be taken as seriously as Jesus suggested.

It's an absolute classic case of throwing the baby out with the bath water and my guess is you do it for emotional / personal reasons rather than any educated study of the whole Bible and Jewish culture. What happened to you ? What Christians have you been exposed to ? Who got to you? There's something much deeper behind this I'm sure of it.

Originally posted by knightmeister
"God guesses? God gets it wrong? Then He's not omniscient." ---nemesio

Yes , when he introduced free will into the universe then he created a situation where it's possible he would be surprised by his creations. However , the difficulty here is understanding the duality of God's omniscience. He a) knows what you will do tomorrow because tomorrow is ...[text shortened]... or b) it's both . This may sound wierd but did you expect it to be straightforward?

How is that not just blatantly contradictory? Aren't you saying, for instance, that God both knows and doesn't know our future willings?

In some sense, it's rather obvious why you do this. The truth of your libertarianism would imply that God cannot infallibly know our future willings. You recognize this, but you still try to have it both ways by saying in effect that He both does and does not have such knowledge. That doesn't work.

On top of which, you have never provided any reason in the slightest for me to think that your concept of god as the "eternal" agent is coherent. You and I both agree that talk of time collapses to talk of events/changes. So, I think it's a pretty obvious contradiction that you continually try to advance: on one hand, that god's existence is constitutively independent of temporal relations; and on the other hand, that god somehow achieves agency through some mysterious sequence of events "in eternity". It boils down to your claiming that god is changeless...but not really!!! This you use in conjunction with your other major claim that god knows our future willings...but not really!!!

What's interesting is that you often quasi-acknowledge the contradictions you put forth but then respond with empty statements like "This may sound wierd [sic] but did you expect it to be straightforward?" You act like your "weird" outcomes are profound consciousness-raisers. But they really are just what they seem to be: they are contradictions that signal boundaries for coherent thought.

I consider your god concept meaningless. You may as well simply come onto these boards and state "God is flippety blurble globbinga blurp!" I hold a similar attitude toward your concept of free will, as well.

Originally posted by knightmeister
Ok . I know I'm perfectly rational and my flying pink elephant friend agrees with me. So how do I convince you that I have a rational point to make here ? What would it take for you to at least consider the possibility that there is more to Jesus' teachings than you put forward.

You see my logic is telling me that the essence of our discussions is exposed to ? Who got to you? There's something much deeper behind this I'm sure of it.

Why is it that your "logic" is always so seriously flawed? No doubt in your mind you think you have all these "deep insights", but you're really not very good at it.

Originally posted by LemonJello
How is that not just blatantly contradictory? Aren't you saying, for instance, that God both knows and doesn't know our future willings?

In some sense, it's rather obvious why you do this. The truth of your libertarianism would imply that God cannot infallibly know our future willings. You recognize this, but you still try to have it both ways by ...[text shortened]... a blurp!" I hold a similar attitude toward your concept of free will, as well.

"In some sense, it's rather obvious why you do this. The truth of your libertarianism would imply that God cannot infallibly know our future willings. You recognize this, but you still try to have it both ways by saying in effect that He both does and does not have such knowledge. That doesn't work." -- lemon


Response----------
Of course God cannot know for sure what we will do until that point that we do it , if he could predict our actions perfectly we would be automatons. So God doesn't know what we will do unless we do it - (logical enough for you?). However , the other aspect is that God is not restricted by space/time (to argue he would be is nonsensical).

The problem with yourself and whitey and others is that you point out these contradictions without reference to God's eternity. You treat God as if he was on our timeline with us. I have tried to point out that the idea that God foresees or predicts is a time bound concept but apparently yourself and others seem unwilingly to think about this and instead love to talk about the contradictions in God's ominiscience whilst pretending he's not eternal. You take one aspect of God's charactor (omniscience) and pick it apart without reference to the other aspect (his eternal nature). I'm just saying you should be in for a penny in for a pound.

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
Why is it that your "logic" is always so seriously flawed? No doubt in your mind you think you have all these "deep insights", but you're really not very good at it.

Ok mate , stick with your own righteousness. One day when we stand before the Lord you will cry out.......

"Lord , grant me salvation , look what I have achieved , take into account my righteousness. I have overcome sin , grant me the place in heaven I deserve ahead of those others who still struggle"

I will cry out " Lord , thank you for bridging the gap between my nature and your perfect holiness in Jesus. Thank you for granting me your righteousness to be clothed in as my own. Thank you for helping me become the person I am and overcoming sin within me."

On that day you won't care about logic or insights , you will be trusting your own efforts and your own righteousness to stand before the holy furnace of God. God will have provided for you in grace and the gift will have gone begging. Whatever personal righteoussness you think you will have achieved it will still be as rags and not be enough. It will be based on what you think you have achieved rather than on what God might have achieved in you via grace.

One day we will both know the truth and I hope the Son sets you free from your bondage to works.

Originally posted by knightmeister
Ok mate , stick with your own righteousness. One day when we stand before the Lord you will cry out.......

"Lord , grant me salvation , look what I have achieved , take into account my righteousness. I have overcome sin , grant me the place in heaven I deserve ahead of those others who still struggle"

I will cry out " Lord , thank you for brid ay we will both know the truth and I hope the Son sets you free from your bondage to works.

How unfortunate that you remain so self-centered. Is there any wonder that you remain blind to the teachings of Jesus?

"And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him DENY HIMSELF, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it."

"Jesus answered and said unto him, 'If a man love me, he will keep my word: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my words.'"

Originally posted by knightmeister
"In some sense, it's rather obvious why you do this. The truth of your libertarianism would imply that God cannot infallibly know our future willings. You recognize this, but you still try to have it both ways by saying in effect that He both does and does not have such knowledge. That doesn't work." -- lemon


Response----------
Of course God ca ect (his eternal nature). I'm just saying you should be in for a penny in for a pound.

Of course God cannot know for sure what we will do until that point that we do it , if he could predict our actions perfectly we would be automatons. So God doesn't know what we will do unless we do it - (logical enough for you?).

Well, no, I'm certainly not going to agree with that nonsense (your conception of freedom is absurd and you unjustifiably reject the prospects of fallibilist knowledge). But our disagreement here stems mainly from our different conceptions of freedom. It's sufficient for me to say (once again) that here I agree with you on the following point: the truth of your libertarianism would preclude God's having infallible knowledge of our future actions. Again, I agree with you on that. But, you cannot on the other hand then claim that God mysteriously does have such knowledge. Come on, KM, this is fairly straightforward: it cannot both be the case that God does and doesn't have such knowledge.

The problem with yourself and whitey and others is that you point out these contradictions without reference to God's eternity.

No. I am tired of repeating my objections to your eternity argument. Reread my previous post if you want. I think your concept of god as the "eternal" agent is flat-out self contradictory. It's rather appalling that you think you can appeal to a contradictory line of thought in order to clear up your other contradictory line of thought (which you claim is merely ostensibly contradictory).

Originally posted by LemonJello
[b]Of course God cannot know for sure what we will do until that point that we do it , if he could predict our actions perfectly we would be automatons. So God doesn't know what we will do unless we do it - (logical enough for you?).

Well, no, I'm certainly not going to agree with that nonsense (your conception of freedom is absurd and you unjustif ...[text shortened]... her contradictory line of thought (which you claim is merely ostensibly contradictory).[/b]

If you do not even accept (if only hypothetically) that for the purposes of the argument God is eternal then it's hopeless.

It would be like someone claiming that the whole idea of a plane flying is stupid because planes don't have wings. If God is not eternal he's not omniscient , or omni anything . Infact he 's not much at all , so what's the point in claiming the Christian view is self contradictory if you don't hypothetically agree to it's concepts.

If you want to say that God as eternal is bunkum then say so , if you want to say the whole idea of eternity is bunkum then say so. But don't say it contradicts free will if you don't actually get it anyway.

Originally posted by ThinkOfOne
How unfortunate that you remain so self-centered. Is there any wonder that you remain blind to the teachings of Jesus?

"And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him DENY HIMSELF, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall sav ...[text shortened]... come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth me not keepeth not my words.'"

It's a pity that you think you understand Jesus when you only have half the puzzle. Boy , you are in for a shock one day. His grace and love will hijack you just when you least expect it and only on that day will you know just how off the radar you were.

Originally posted by knightmeister
If you do not even accept (if only hypothetically) that for the purposes of the argument God is eternal then it's hopeless.

It would be like someone claiming that the whole idea of a plane flying is stupid because planes don't have wings. If God is not eternal he's not omniscient , or omni anything . Infact he 's not much at all , so what's the poi hen say so. But don't say it contradicts free will if you don't actually get it anyway.

If you do not even accept (if only hypothetically) that for the purposes of the argument God is eternal then it's hopeless.

What is hopeless here is your conception of god -- it's hopelessly incoherent. Let me be clear since I am not at all convinced you get it: I see nothing incoherent in the concept of eternality per se (either in the interpretation as temporally without beginning or end or in the interpretation as being constitutively independent of temporal relations). What is incoherent, however, is the combination of eternality and causal agency that you ascribe to god. I'm sorry you cannot seem to appreciate the incoherency, but your view boils down to claiming both that it is the case that god is active in time and that it is not the case that god is active in time.

Infact he 's not much at all , so what's the point in claiming the Christian view is self contradictory if you don't hypothetically agree to it's concepts.

Is your view the "Christian view"? If so, then the Christian view is incoherent. Sorry. Other than that, I'm not understanding what your beef is here.

If you want to say that God as eternal is bunkum then say so , if you want to say the whole idea of eternity is bunkum then say so. But don't say it contradicts free will if you don't actually get it anyway.

I have no idea what you're talking about. I didn't say anything about God's putative eternality contradicting libertarian free will (whatever that would mean). Go reread my posts if you're interested in what I actually did say.