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Why do we believe our creator must be benevolent? Why couldn't our creator be sadistic? It seems to me that there are more signs pointing to evidence of a sadistic creator, if there is a creator at all.
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A benevolent deity? or no?
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#2
Posted 20 January 2010 - 02:02 PM
Doesn't this really depend on which faith your talking about? The Bible and the Torah, both refer to god as being benevolent, I believe, other faiths have deities that aren't so. I don't think that Cyote is portrayed as particularly benevolent yet depending on the story he's credited with our creation. The biblical portrayal very well may be hopefull thinking, or simply focusing on one aspect of the deity.
#3
Posted 21 January 2010 - 05:54 AM
There is no deity, not in the sense that you're talking about. Nothing created us. If there was a "higher power" I would think of it more like the Hindus do, as a sort of universal consciousness that doesn't create or destroy, it just exists in everything, and we're all a part of it, and we're going to return to its sort of consciousness when we die.
Or maybe we're all just randomly here, on this planet that randomly developed because of its random position in the universe, and randomly evolved to be these breathing, thinking, suffering, dying creatures that we are.
If there is a Creator Deity, and we all have souls that have conscious memory when we die and go to chill with the Deity, then I've got a hell of a lot of questions for It, and I seriously doubt It has a good explanation for the suffering in this wordly experience.
Or maybe we're all just randomly here, on this planet that randomly developed because of its random position in the universe, and randomly evolved to be these breathing, thinking, suffering, dying creatures that we are.
If there is a Creator Deity, and we all have souls that have conscious memory when we die and go to chill with the Deity, then I've got a hell of a lot of questions for It, and I seriously doubt It has a good explanation for the suffering in this wordly experience.
This post has been edited by Holiday: 21 January 2010 - 05:55 AM
#5
Posted 21 January 2010 - 08:52 AM
I understand that there will be exceptions but for a majority of the world's religions they believe in a benevolent creator. Obviously, this question is for those that already believe or those who can set aside their atheism in order to consider the psychology perhaps. I've been thinking about it because of good vs evil, and the origins of morality. Do we follow a benevolent creator, because we have evolved morals? Do we obey and follow a sadistic creator, out of fear?
#6
Posted 21 January 2010 - 02:07 PM
I've wondered these things as well. If you compare the god of the Old Testament to the god of the New Testament, the personalities are extremely different from one another. In the Old Testament, God slays many of the Israelites in the desert because they were gorging on fowl. They'd complained about the manna that fell daily from heaven, they'd grown tired of it. So, he sent them birds and they choked and died as they were eating. There are stories of the ground opening up and swallowing groups of people for not doing right. There is poor Job who lost everything.
It doesn't make sense to me, the two personalities. A verse in the New Testament states that God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. I believe it is out of fear or brainwashing that many Christians turn a blind eye to the horrific acts in the Old Testament. It's difficult to love someone who perpetrated those acts, so one rationalizes instead of facing reality. They say you cannot understand the mind of God.
Many people convert to Christianity out of fear.
It doesn't make sense to me, the two personalities. A verse in the New Testament states that God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. I believe it is out of fear or brainwashing that many Christians turn a blind eye to the horrific acts in the Old Testament. It's difficult to love someone who perpetrated those acts, so one rationalizes instead of facing reality. They say you cannot understand the mind of God.
Many people convert to Christianity out of fear.
#7
Posted 21 January 2010 - 03:52 PM
Darkness, on 21 January 2010 - 05:52 AM, said:
I understand that there will be exceptions but for a majority of the world's religions they believe in a benevolent creator. Obviously, this question is for those that already believe or those who can set aside their atheism in order to consider the psychology perhaps. I've been thinking about it because of good vs evil, and the origins of morality. Do we follow a benevolent creator, because we have evolved morals? Do we obey and follow a sadistic creator, out of fear?
I think for me it's easier to accept some one telling me how to live if I know those instructions are being given because they're in my best interests. Also I think because the realization of what life would mean to me is rather bleak if there is no god or if that god is malevolant. But to some extent I think it is wishful thinking, human beings tend to personify people they care about with their own ideals, morals and expectations. So who I think god is very well be different then the reality because I have personified him how I see him. And as I just said life would have no hope for me if that isn't the case.
#8
Posted 23 January 2010 - 03:25 AM
It is written in the Christian Bible that we were created in God's image. If this is true then I think your on the right track. In fact according to the Bible God describes himself as being "A jealous God" and also "Vengeful". Both of these being incredibly human traits. So if you ask me I'd say he is neither. If he's feeling happy then he casts a few miracles and saves a few lives. If hes got out of the wrong side of the bed then you better watch out or he might smite your ass. Ever heard of the dark ages?
#11
Posted 23 January 2010 - 10:23 PM
Hello Darkness. To me personally, the creator would be totally transcendent. I don't think it's possible to know it, religions may have their good qualities but that is all just manmade stuff imo. I don't think we can ascribe human emotions or characteristics to the creator, whatever it be.
This post has been edited by Wyntyr Zyphyr: 23 January 2010 - 10:24 PM
#12
Posted 01 February 2010 - 07:56 PM
Maybe they just hope to appeal to its more benevolent side more in hopes of scouring some favour or place next to it? All praise it for yada yada reason!! ....so we can be selfish pricks and think it stands next to our ideals more and push aside anyone else who doesnt share our view of it.
Eventhough it may be horribly unbiased, much like its earth, to our being and again as someone put it on the movie constantine "god is a kid with an antfarm".
It doesnt matter what angle of faith you fall under or what view of a greater deity you believe in, your body will wither. You will still be very human before it does with the same capacity to love and hate, destroy or create and endure all compromises that orchestrate some sense of individuality and purpose.
Creation/creators can just as easily destroy, especially in the wake of a new build.. you can see this in anything created, and how updates shed old pieces and parts like some second skin. How would windows 98 react if it was sentient enough to see it being replaced by vista?
Eventhough it may be horribly unbiased, much like its earth, to our being and again as someone put it on the movie constantine "god is a kid with an antfarm".
It doesnt matter what angle of faith you fall under or what view of a greater deity you believe in, your body will wither. You will still be very human before it does with the same capacity to love and hate, destroy or create and endure all compromises that orchestrate some sense of individuality and purpose.
Creation/creators can just as easily destroy, especially in the wake of a new build.. you can see this in anything created, and how updates shed old pieces and parts like some second skin. How would windows 98 react if it was sentient enough to see it being replaced by vista?
This post has been edited by shadowsbane: 01 February 2010 - 07:59 PM
#14
Posted 07 February 2010 - 12:26 AM
i was writing in my note book a few weeks ago, and this reminds me of some of my thoughts. to me, thinking of the christian ideal of god, goes hand in hand with the satan. bu what i wrote was "is the devil really that bad a person? the devil, satan, shaitan, ..so many names. did god cast him out because of his deeds, or because he was afraid? did he cast him out because he thought he would lose power over others? where the intentions of Lucifer that bad? or did he want something different? were they merely having an argument, and one got a foothold over the other and did away with him best he could? god, elohim, yahweh, there are as many names for him as for the devil. but how do we know you? as a god? as a creator? or just a figment of our imagination?..." dont know, i think if there is a god the way christianity has it, he still has some work to do on his part.
#15
Posted 18 February 2010 - 05:50 PM
The only answer I can come up with in regard to a benevolent deity allowing such suffering in the world is the same one I was given when I asked that question in sunday school; because it gives humans an opportunity to grow as spiritual beings when faced with the suffering of the world. That answer didn't satisfy me then and it sure doesn't now. Good and evil not being absolutes adds a degree of difficulty to that belief as well.
A warlord raiding an African village and butchering every man, woman, and child doesn't allow the victims to grow as spiritual beings other than to say 'God called them to its side.' Well, great. That was easy enough for them. All the had to do was suffer and die horribly to attain their enlightenment. What about the rest of us seeing this and having to come to terms with the atrocity and make sense of it? How do we grow as spirital beings from that? We don't. We are heartsick and lost over the incident. To say it is 'Gods will' only adds more weight to the arguement of a malevolent god. 'God wills suffering? Of the just and unjust alike? Then what purpose is there in worship except out of fear (I know, we covered this already. I'm just trying to think this through completely.)
Now if you 'blame' the suffering of the world on free will then you might have a workable arguement. If God created humankind in it's image i.e. gave us free will which would give us the ability to choose our own destiny as an individual, and as a race, then it could be said that God is indeed benevolent insofar as it wishes us to live freely. At the same time, if this were the case, then humans would have no one to blame for the terrible things going on around but ourselves based on the decisions we've made as a species. Meaning we could end much of the horror around us if we simply choose to. Or perhaps it's too far gone for that....
I don't even know if any of that made a bit of sense but it's the best I can do right now.
A warlord raiding an African village and butchering every man, woman, and child doesn't allow the victims to grow as spiritual beings other than to say 'God called them to its side.' Well, great. That was easy enough for them. All the had to do was suffer and die horribly to attain their enlightenment. What about the rest of us seeing this and having to come to terms with the atrocity and make sense of it? How do we grow as spirital beings from that? We don't. We are heartsick and lost over the incident. To say it is 'Gods will' only adds more weight to the arguement of a malevolent god. 'God wills suffering? Of the just and unjust alike? Then what purpose is there in worship except out of fear (I know, we covered this already. I'm just trying to think this through completely.)
Now if you 'blame' the suffering of the world on free will then you might have a workable arguement. If God created humankind in it's image i.e. gave us free will which would give us the ability to choose our own destiny as an individual, and as a race, then it could be said that God is indeed benevolent insofar as it wishes us to live freely. At the same time, if this were the case, then humans would have no one to blame for the terrible things going on around but ourselves based on the decisions we've made as a species. Meaning we could end much of the horror around us if we simply choose to. Or perhaps it's too far gone for that....
I don't even know if any of that made a bit of sense but it's the best I can do right now.
#17
Posted 19 February 2010 - 12:17 AM
http://forum.darkness.com/public/style_images/darkness/snapback.png' alt='View Post' />ThreeGNinja, on 06 February 2010 - 06:49 PM, said:
I will let Epicurus answer for me
Oh!! I didn't realize you had posted this, I just found this quote recently, it's perfect.
Maybe the Deity is just playing a universal chess game, and we're the pawns, rooks, etc. It's just having fun amusing itself. Or maybe it created us as an experiment one day and then went off to do other things, and now has no clue and doesn't care what has happened to us.
Maybe it is a benevolent Deity.
It is better to exist than not to exist, isn't it? So maybe the Deity knew it could create us or not, but it knows how it all turns out in the end, if we're created or not. And in order to exist, we've got to go through some tough things. Maybe the Deity does too, we don't know. I'm sure it's tough being all-powerful sometimes.
Maybe the Deity knows all possible endings and outcomes for everything, and it knows just what needs to happen so that our Souls/Selves end up in the best possible of situations, and all this suffering we go through is all part of it somehow, but we can't know that or it would mess things up. And it only intervenes when it has to in order to make things come out right.
This post has been edited by Holiday: 19 February 2010 - 12:18 AM
#18
Posted 19 February 2010 - 07:00 AM
(ignore the gender)
True, maybe he is benevolent but not omnipotent. Maybe he didn't create the universe, or the stars and maybe he can only create very simple plants and life forms, that eventually became us. Maybe he was not even immortal himself, or free from suffering.
True, maybe he is benevolent but not omnipotent. Maybe he didn't create the universe, or the stars and maybe he can only create very simple plants and life forms, that eventually became us. Maybe he was not even immortal himself, or free from suffering.
#19
Posted 19 February 2010 - 08:34 AM
"Jehova, who of all good gods adored by men was certainly the most jealous, the most vain, the most ferocious, the most unjust, the most bloodthirsty, the most despotic, and the most hostile to human dignity and liberty."
Michail Bakunin
Michail Bakunin
This post has been edited by Gautr: 19 February 2010 - 08:37 AM
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