As simple as possible to summarize the best way you can, first, please. Feel free to expand after, or just say whatever you want lol. Honest question.
As simple as possible to summarize the best way you can, first, please. Feel free to expand after, or just say whatever you want lol. Honest question.
Like what
I see a fair amount of Christian-related posts in your post history so Iām gonna go ahead and suggest that this is probably a conversation you donāt want to have. Iām trying not to be an asshole here, but I am very well read on the subject of Christianity, so suffice to say that contradictions exist, they are widely known, and I find Christian apologia on the subject wholly unconvincing.
That said, if Iām really the person you would like to go on this journey of discovery about your religion with then I will take you, but I canāt say that you are very likely to enjoy the results.
As a Christian I would like you to try to rock my world.
You are welcome to read the thread below, Iāve laid out my issues here, but it looks like we might get a proper conversation going if you want to keep reading.
Iām an Orthodox Christian our theology (which is that of the first thousand years) is likely different from anything you take issue with from Catholic or Protestant traditions in regard to soteriology, ecclesiology, sanctification etc
Itās great that you have interest in Christianity but Orthodoxy leans on 2000 years of scholarship and tradition. With all due respect youāre not going to ask any new questions or bring up any novel points. I donāt claim to be an expert but have Orthodox resources I can draw from.
Fair point. I am not very familiar with Orthodox Christianity at all, save a little of the very early history. You also sound fairly well-educated on the subject, which makes you twice over not the usual kind of person who responds to my comments about religion.
So, first, let me apologize for making assumptions; the usual kind of person I get is an American evangelical protestant who hasnāt read most of his or her own bible and is of the opinion that anything important for them to know would be whispered on the wind directly into their ear by god himself, so they have a pretty dim view of learning in general, but also of learning about their religion in specific. Thatās clearly not you. My bad.
Second, itās my understanding that Orthodoxy (probably not the right word, my bad) uses fundamentally the same scriptures as Catholicism and Protestantism, with some additions to the Old Testament. My issues come from the bibleās descriptions of god, events, and people, so Iām going to assume thereās enough common ground that my these translate to Orthodoxy as well as the others. Please correct me if Iām wrong.
I have 3 core issues with Christianity:
These, to me, seem like unsolvable, unavoidable paradoxes. I see two paths when faced with them:
I donāt begrudge people who believe or find comfort in it, mind you, but itās not for me. Iām searching for Truth, not a search for āitās probably not true but I guess itās a nice idea?ā
First of all āOrthodoxyā is accepted as a shorthand referent to Orthodox Christianity so no issues there.
Secondly no worries on the assumptions I also anticipate Protestant hand waving when it comes to certain topics such as canonicity.
Now for your core issuesā¦
Orthodoxy doesnāt conceive of Godās knowledge as something that competes with human will. Because God is not bound by time, His knowledge isnāt predictiveāitās participatory. We remain free precisely because God allows our freedom to unfold within His omniscient love. This is the mystery of synergy with the Holy Spirit.
What we perceive as logical already presupposes the existence of God, because logic itself depends on the existence of objective truth. If God is bound by created laws, He ceases to be God; He is the source of all order, not subject to it.
Two paths forwardā¦
The revelation of God is one that compounds on the past. Creation, Expulsion, Punishment, Enrichment, Liberation, Exile etc until you reach God incarnate in the form of Jesus Christ who uses the history of human failures to illustrate the grace of God and the establishment of a new covenant that saves all people. This is a logical progression.
I havenāt seen a compelling case that divine truth has been fundamentally corrupted. It seems more a result of your sentiment than a critical analysis.
I recognize you may disagree with the points I adequately communicated or have questions about ones I failed to describe well. I am a fallible human after all š. You may find that many of the contradictions youāre grappling with donāt exist in Orthodox thought in the same way they might in some Western traditions. Iād encourage looking into Orthodox apologia for a perspective not burdened by the theological inheritances of later Western heresies like penal substitution or strict determinismā¦
An aside about āwar crimesā ā I will not expound on this too much because itās a whole separate topic but be wary of using a modern lens when assessing the ancient. Youāre smuggling in a moral framework to critique a metaphysical one. Itās easy to forget that secular ethical ideas such as āwar crimesā typically find their origin in Christian morality to begin with (at least in the West). What is the epistemic justification for Good and Bad in a world where everything is relative? Philosophically it is an arbitrary critique without grounding.
Re:Orthodoxy - fair enough.
Original Sin
Ok, thatās an interesting take. If man is not guilty of the sin of Adam then why does he bear the consequences of the act? Why punish someone for something you donāt believe they did?
Yeah but then he followed them around? Adam praises god on the birth of his sons, they give offerings to god and even talk to him, etc. And if Adamās sin is transmitted to all mankind then Cain and Abel were sinful too, so it kinda seems like god didnāt have a problem being in the presence of sin?
This doesnāt fly with me, because god created Adam and Eve as they were and they (assuming omniscience) couldnāt choose to do otherwise. So not only is god punishing them for a sin of his own making, heās punishing everyone else despite, in the Orthodox version, them not being guilty of that sin. And then to call pain and suffering a mercy because it gives us the āopportunityā to āearnā back what you took? Nah, Iāll take a hard pass on that one. Sin but not guilt is kind of worse actually. Itās like telling your kid, āI know your brother was the one who took the cookie, but Iām going to spank you for it too.ā See also: pettiness and tyranny.
If it was static, how did it change from āangelicā to ādamnedā or whatever after his act of rebellion? Was it the act itself that somehow changed the unchangeable, or did god decide to rewrite reality just this once? If thatās the case, rewriting someoneās soul just so you can eternally punish them for one mistake is kind of a dick move.
Free Will
I donāt think so, though I concede that there might be definitions of free will that render it thus, Iām using the pretty common definition of having the ability to make choices.
I whole-heartedly disagree, foreknowledge precisely equals predestination. He doesnāt have to orchestrate things; merely knowing ahead of time that I will turn left instead of right at the next intersection means that it is definitionally impossible for me to turn right. If I was able to turn right anyway that would definitionally preclude foreknowledge: you canāt know that I turned left if I turned right.
Even if I grant this for the sake of argument, humans do not operate outside of time so foreknowledge of human futures, again definitionally, must necessarily be knowledge about the future of the time that humans operate in. But even if that wasnāt true, if god exists outside of time then he also definitionally exists outside of causality and cannot influence or be influenced by human choices within time, which precludes foreknowledge of human futures.
Ok, Iāll take your word for it, but according to the most widely-accepted definitions if man is free to choose then god cannot have forenkowledge of those choices.
If heās not outside of causality (as implied by the participatory element here) then heās not outside of time, because those two things mean effectively the same thing. You say he allows it out of love, I say he allows it out of lack of foreknowledge, because thatās the only thing that is logically consistent.
Logic doesnāt presuppose god, it merely presupposes consistency. Objective truth can arise from the structure of reality itself without requiring a divine source. We have mountains of evidence that logic is internally self-consistent; thatās not the case for pretty much any holy book Iāve read.
Vengeful/loving God
That doesnāt render it invalid. Also: primarily, but not uniquely as you point out; I was personally puzzling over this stuff back in the 80s before anyone but the editors of a few science journals had ever heard of Richard Dawkins.
I donāt dispute that he is also loving, I dispute that he is exclusively loving as of the New Testament. He just goes on and on about how vengeful and angry he is in the OT, and thereās some of that in the NT too, though I think itās all said by others since (IIRC, itās been a while) god doesnāt really have a speaking part in much of the NT. Also I donāt think you get to send your PR team out to call you a āloving godā after slaughtering innocents and children (and advocating the same) over and over again.
I wouldnāt count that as wrath, and I also wouldnāt attribute it to god. We know heās capable of turning those tables over himself if he wanted to, but he didnāt. :P
Thatās fair, itās definitely more of a vibe-check thing, Iām not sure thereās much space to discuss there.
(cont, TIL lemmy doesnāt have that high of a maximum post length.)
Two Paths
Which is kind of my point. A logical progression of revelation implies change over time in godās plan, actions, or relationship with humanity. But a truly perfect, eternal, unchanging truth wouldnāt require progression or revision. If the Divine Truth was perfect and eternal and true, why did it need changing? Evangelicals talk about the ānew covenantā all the time, but humanity isnāt any different now than it was then, why did we need a new one? Seems like either god changed or the truth wasnāt eternal.
Corrupted might not be the right word, but we have examples of, say, King James commissioning his own bible to support the divine right of kings. But aside from that, human fallibility plays a part in the transmission of this truth, and anyone who has played a game of telephone in grade school can tell you how that tends to go: you line up the whole class, whisper something into the first kidās ear, they whisper into the next, and what started out as āBilly canāt come to school today because heās sickā comes out the other end as ālittle Billy diedā or whatever. Even if you assume each person in the chain intends to transmit it faithfully people make mistakes, there are disputes over word choice and changes to meaning over time in translation, there are newly-discovered ancient texts that cast new light on the ones we had, etc. I donāt know about fundamentally corrupted, but if the perfect eternal truth is all of those things then something else has to account for the paradoxes, and if weāre assuming the literal existence of god then that leaves only human fallibility.
Me too man, Iām just here to have an engaging conversation and learn a little something. All we can do is do our best to own mistakes and not be shy about admitting fault.
That doesnāt surprise me. What little I know of the early history of Orthodoxy is that there was an early, pretty severe schism over some fundamental stuff that sent the two churches in very different directions. I am curious to know more, though, so I hope you stay and keep the discussion going. I admit that (probably because the way I fell out of Christianity and then into a long but fortunately-ended period of atheism) that Orthodoxy was never really on my radar in my religious studies. But I am a more curious person than I once was with considerably more free time, so Iāll do some poking about and see what I can find. ;)
Thatās entirely fair. I donāt think I was intentionally doing it but there may have been some subconscious stuff going on there. My intent, and perhaps I shouldāve chosen a better tool, was to use the terminology of modern ethics to convey the weight of my distaste for the idea of punishing one person for anotherās crime in any context.
I donāt think everything is relative, nor do I think god is the only source of morality. Even without modern utilitarian concepts like least-harm, itās pretty clear that ancient human cultures had a concept of justice that depended on the simple and self-evident truth that causing intentional harm to others is bad. It may have been applied unevenly and inconsistently, but. And hell, even a toddler with barely a grasp on language, much less culture or philosophy, can tell the difference between getting bitten by the kid you bit and getting bitten by some kid because she thought you bit her. Theyāre unhappy at being bitten in either case, but - and Iāve seen this in my nieces and nephews - they get downright angry when they feel that sting of injustice, even if they canāt describe it.
If youāre serious, there are so many. Hereās one of the first results I found in a search, but you can find so much writing on it if you want to, which if you actually believe youāre following the ātruthā you should look into.
One of the most common fundamental contradiction arguments is the Judeo-Christian god is defined as omniscient and omnipotent, all knowing and all powerful, as well as benevolent. If this is true, why is there evil in the world? Heās omnipotent so must have the power to make a world in which it doesnāt exist, and he must be aware of whatever will happen in the world he creates, since heās omniscient, and must not want evil to exist since heās benevolent.
These cannot all be true. If they were then heād create a world that satisfies his goals that does not have evil, which he must be capable of doing if heās omnipotent. If evil must exist to accomplish his goals then he isnāt omnipotent. If he canāt detect evil will exist then he isnāt omniscient. If he wants evil to exist then he isnāt benevolent.
I viewed your link and randomly selected 4-5 of the ācontradictionsā and basic knowledge of the bible and historicity dispelled them. Iām not going to go through all 50. Sorry you get out what you put in lol. But Iāve heard many of them before and highly recommend the āWhole Counsel of Godā podcast which walks through scripture verse by verse and addresses the most common Catholic, Protestant and Post-Modern critiques of scriptural ācontradictionsā which are typically due to bad theology, poor historicity, translation errors, cultural ignorance etc etc Itās also a great way to learn scripture in a deeper way.
This is a meme in Christian apologetic circles because non-Christians always think itās a big own when it is really just a demonstration of a lack of understanding of what Christianity is actually about ā Redemption. The story of how the world enters a fallen state is explained in Genesis. The fact that the world is fallen is critical to Christian theology and the process of sanctification.
God does not play by your rules. The struggles we face on Earth (often of our own creation) are for our salvation. This is what the bible and church tradition teaches.
I have a more expanded response in this thread here for some other points ā https://lemmy.ml/post/30390799/18750134
It being a meme doesnāt mean there isnāt a reason for the argument. Redemption from what? Whatever it is, God had control over it happening. Why did it happen? He is trivially capable of creating a universe where there is no need to be redeemed. Why is one where redemption required the one he chose to create? Dismissing something as just being a meme does not actually answer the question.
The point is, God knew we would create the struggles. Is he omniscient? He knew it would happen. Is he omnipotent? He could have created a situation where it doesnāt happen. Is he benevolent? He wouldnāt want it to happen.
Yes, this is what the church teaches. Iām well aware. Does it make sense?
I understand. Iām more commenting on how itās usually framed as a gotcha as if Christians have never thought of this before.
The real answer to what is essentially the Epicurean āProblem of Evilā lies in Freedom and Love. God created human beings with genuine freedom, because only freely chosen love is real love. This means that the possibility of rejecting the good (e.g. evil) is not a flaw in creation but a necessary precondition for freedom.
Yes. He is omniscient, omnipotent, and all-good. But benevolence doesnāt mean preventing every possibility of suffering. In the Orthodox view, Godās goodness is shown not in preventing freedom, but in enduring suffering with us, and transforming it into life and healing. God knew the risk of creation, yet chose to create and then chose to redeem through suffering love. Thatās not negligenceāthatās the Cross.
Not in a tidy, rationalistic wayāand Orthodoxy is okay with that. Thereās a deep apophatic element to the theology: the idea that not everything about God can be explained in human terms. But what does make sense in experience is the way the Church helps us encounter God through prayer, sacraments, and love. Evil isnāt ignoredāitās faced head-on, and transformed in Christ.
I think the questioning of it originally comes from Christians, so obviously that isnāt the case, nor is it what Iām saying.
The flaw here is heās all powerful. If you believe the Adam and Eve story (and even if not it makes a good small case argument) he created the garden, created the tree and fruit, created the serpent, knew theyād eat the fruit, knew heād damn them for it and theyād suffer for it, and chose to do this anyway. He trivially could also have created a world where they chose not to. Even when given the freedom of choice, he knows what choice will be made (since time is not relevant to him) and can set things up to create any outcome.
Itās not a risk. He knew what would happen. He created something where this specific thing is what would come to be with fill awareness and decided thatās what he wanted, if itās true. Itās not negligence, itās indifference to suffering. There is no other option for it than that, since he could choose to have made something where it didnāt exist. Maybe we canāt imagine what that would be, but thatās what it means to be omnipotent.
Yeah, thatās fine if it helps you. However, every religion has this claim, so it isnāt evidence that itās correct. Thatās fine. Faith is by definition belief without evidence.
Youāre right to point out that God knew what would happen. In Orthodox theology, this is acknowledgedābut itās essential to distinguish foreknowledge from predetermination. Godās knows the outcome of free choices but doesnāt coerce them. His foreknowledge does not violate our freedom.
More importantly, God is not only omnipotent but all-good. And since God is the source of all goodness, the possibility of choosing anything other than God is the possibility of choosing evilāwhich is, by definition, a lack or distortion of the good. If we are to love God freely, we must be free to reject Him.
Therefore yes, God could have created a world where Adam and Eve never fellābut that would not be a world of genuinely free persons. It would be a world of perfectly programmed beings, and Orthodoxy insists that freedom is essential to personhood. Without it, love isnāt possible.
Also, itās important to clarify: Orthodoxy does not teach that God ādamnedā humanity for the Fall. The consequence of sin is death and corruption, not divine vengeance. Godās response was not punishment but a rescue missionāthe Incarnation. The āTree of Lifeā returns in the Cross.
From our human perspective, it may seem this way. But God did not create evil or sufferingāHe permitted it as the cost of freedom, because only through freedom can there be love, growth, and communion. What matters is not just that suffering exists, but how God responds to it.
And His response is not indifference, but sacrificial love. In Christ, God enters our suffering, takes it upon Himself, and opens a path to life. The Cross is not God watching suffering from a distanceāitās God partaking and being the example for all of man for our sake.
While it may not mean much to you I would be remiss not to defend Orthodoxy here. Faith isnāt blind belief or wishful thinking; itās trust grounded in revelation, history, and experience. The resurrection of Christ, the lives of the saints, the enduring wisdom of the Churchāthese are not āproofsā in a modern empirical sense, but they are reasons for belief.
Furthermore I donāt know what your standards for evidence are but I encourage you to look at arguments like the Transcendental Argument for God. It argues that universals like logic, reason, and math are only justified if God exists. (e.g. X (God) is necessary for Y (logic, math etc). Y therefore X.)
If you deny Godās existence, you must account for the reliability of reason, logic, and abstract universals like mathematics. If these are simply āself-evident,ā then youāre assuming the very thing your worldview has no means to justify. Furthermore without a transcendent source of rationality, why assume logic is binding or that it applies universally?
Believing in God is foundation to a worldview that relies on universals the alternative is arbitrarily granting yourself self-evident axioms.
I think you misunderstand. He could create a world where they freely choose to not fall. Itās not predetermination, like you say. Itās premeditation. He must have wanted them to fall, because thatās what he knew would happen and he set it up so they would choose that. If I set up a tripline that activated a trap then tell someone to go where itāll be tripped, thatās something I did, even if they chose to follow it.
Heās all powerful, so he must necessarily be able to create a world with free will and free choices, but also one such that we always genuinely choose the right thing. It doesnāt require us to be programmed beings. Rather it requires foreknowledge, planning, and capability of the designer, and a desire for this to be the case. It doesnāt matter if we canāt imagine that world. Heās omnipotent. He can create it, but chose not to.
Again, he designed it knowing the results, with the ability to create absolutely anything, even things we canāt imagine. The problem with the human perspective is we assume this is the way things must be, but with omnipotence it allows literally anything to be possible, including total freedom, but also where every choice made is good. That is necessarily true, if he is omnipotent.
He can create a world where every person gets into heaven, by choice, even if they have the ability to make choices where they wouldnāt, since heās omniscient. Itās like setting up dominoās. You donāt program how they fall. You just set things up so they fall as planned, but youāre omniscient and omnipotent, so you never make a mistake. All dominos fall perfectly into place exactly as you want, because you know the outcome of everything you place.
Theyāre proofs that every religions claims equally, yet (for most) only one can be correct. Thatās the big issue.
First, I donāt deny any gods existence. We both lack the brief on most gods. I just donāt believe in one more than you. I donāt claim to have knowledge on any of their existences, except insofar as them not being internally consistent. Iām an agnostic (not knowing) atheist (lack of belief). I donāt actively believe anything about any gods.
The reliability of logic and mathematics are as reliable as the axioms they are founded on. No further and no less. There isnāt a thing universal about them. They are not a part of reality that we wandered across. Theyāre made up by humans to be useful tools. This seems obvious because both have come into existence in different forms in different places and times. If they were universal they would always appear in the same form.