Comment by lukan
20 days ago
"Why do you think it needs to be an explicit action from the creator as opposed to being just the result of your own actions? "
There is no such thing as "my own actions" if I was created by an allmighty god. And the environment likewise. Then every action would be determined by the allmighty.
It all would be just gods playground to test and reward and punish his creations for being how he (or she or it) created them.
Christianity also assumes free will and non-determinism, yeah otherwise it would be quite pointless. It also includes the possibility of willfully turning away from God, which is not intended by him. If you think of a place where (most) things behave exactly as God created them, that's the story before that apple[0], but guess what, it ended.
[0] ... I know that that is an translation error.
"Christianity also assumes free will and non-determinism"
I know, but those concepts are at odds to me with the core concept of allmighty all knowing creator - but sure, anything almighty can also solve any paradoxon - it still does not make sense to me, nor do I see reason to follow that logic.
For me it is rather determinism which invokes a paradoxon and is at odds with the Christian God. This is because of the following:
When the universe is deterministic, anything you think, is not because you recognized something to be truthful, or even reflects the truth at all, it all happens simply because that is what the deterministic rules make you think. So what you think does not imply anything about the universe at all.
That means that you can't think the universe to be deterministic and be actually right about it. Because if it would be, you couldn't be right about anything. Also along the way you throw away the post-enlightenment concept of science, because it assumes the existence of Laplace's Demon and the scientist having a share in it. Thus, when you believe in determinism, you actually place science at the same level as wizardry.
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Some seem to intuit that divine freedom is in competition with creaturely freedom. The assumption is that when God is acting, that necessarily drives out the action and initiative of creatures, and vice versa. The ancient Christian conception is that human freedom cooperates (synergizes) with God. Jesus illustrates this concept most clearly, being both divine and human and fully free in both respects. This union is an essential part of the whole plan in this view, that God would be present in His own creation and not infinitely apart from it. In this model the free action and cooperation of created things is essential to accomplishing the divine purpose.
On the other hand, if God really does just determine everything, you basically get pantheism where everything is an immediate and direct expression of “God.” That sounds like atheism with steps.
"On the other hand, if God really does just determine everything, you basically get pantheism where everything is an immediate and direct expression of “God.” "
Yes, or mysticism. We all exist within the mind of god. I do like those concepts more to be honest, but is indeed a quite different concept from the creator up in the clouds ruling the universe.
As the other reply said neither the classical Jewish or Christian view is that God is some guy literally up in the heavens sitting around all day.
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I do not think I share your view of what mysticism is, but this:
> the creator up in the clouds ruling the universe
is what e.g. the olympic gods were, i.e. something that Christianity decries as idols, doesn't accept to be the truth and intends to overcome.
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