Note from Guru Kurt: This was a delightful romp through what appeared at first glance to be formidable arguments, but which in the end were as foolish as the prattlings of a senile old man or woman. People think if they number their statements that this is sufficient for logical argument. "Didn't you see my numbers? You cannot argue against the numbers!" This is really their position, although I would not have believed it before I sent this to some Atheists, and realized to my great shock that they could not understand my reasoning! I have the impression that they are all holding some kind of tube in front of their faces, and if you tap them on the shoulder and say, "Buddy, the world is wider than what you can see through that tube," they say, "Oh, no it isn't! Stop being irrational! We're the rational ones! No one who believes in God can be rational; this is indisputable!" Their ears are stopped up with wax. Their minds are gummed up with cleverness, which is not real cleverness but total intellectual bankruptcy and vacancy. In truth, they are Atheists of faith, and think that science is behind them. I claim to know God, and to know that science is behind me, for science only discovers what has already been done by God. We have a standoff, but as yet they have not even seen me for those tubes in front of their eyes, giving them tunnel vision in the wide and wonderful world that divine Power has given us all!
Neo-Christian Refutation of Incompatible Properties Arguments
To the Atheists:
I don’t know where you get
your strange ideas about God. I maintain that God may only be known directly and
personally, or through the study of scripture. All other thinking about Him is
mere idle conjecture and supposition. The God that I know is alive and well, but
you may also consider my arguments here as proof that there is at least a
conception of God that is more evolved than primitive, childish fancy and that
some ideas about God, whether true or not, are at least consistent and coherent.
I state that the existence of God cannot be proved or disproved by intellectual
argument, so I do not take issue with your disproofs of Theistic intellectual
arguments for the existence of God, except wheref they are equally in error, but
mostly with your arguments disproving God. These are typically of the
"straw man" variety, for you disprove the existence of something that
never could exist. This is a real world, not an imaginary one, and God is an
actual being, not a fictional character. You will see that I do not ascribe to
Him every conceivable perfection, while still maintaining His dignity, grandeur,
and magnificence when compared to the lowly species homo sapiens.
Here I take issue with the
Atheistic incompatible properties arguments, as surveyed at http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_drange/incompatible.html.
I will first give my definitions for the twelve properties of God that are
listed, which as you will see are not childish but realistic, and still leave
room for a mighty God who should be feared and loved by mankind. You define
these terms in such constricted, impractical and unrealistic ways that no real
being could possibly fall under them, and thus are liable to the "straw
man" accusations I raise.
(a) perfect
To state that God is perfect
means that a person who knows Him will never under any circumstances detect any
imperfection of character, action, or intent. God is incomprehensible to the
human mind, but He bends down to our level so that we may understand something
about Him. This is one reason why He is so wonderful to know, but we will never
detect an imperfection in Him. If we think we see an imperfection, it is most
likely an action more profound than we can comprehend. For instance, He allowed
His own Son to suffer an ignominious death on a cross, but this answered to
deeper, profound divine purposes.
(b) immutable
To state that God is
immutable means that He is extremely constant (unchanging) in His attributes,
such as compassion, mercy, and love. These attributes will never change to our
observation, but appear to us to be permanent fixtures in His character. The
revelations in the Bible of a wrathful God are in keeping with this idea, for
although He is merciful, we are but ants in His path. If we do not act as He
would wish us to act, He exercises His right as Creator to call our bluff and
force us to cash in our chips. He is also immutable or unchanging with respect
to His intents and purposes, for instance His intent to maintain and not destroy
the universe, which He certainly could do.
(c) transcendent
God is transcendent, meaning
He is not limited like humans to a definite physical location but is
omnipresent. He is aware, simultaneously, of the thoughts of billions of people,
and keeps independent logs on each of them. He knows each creature personally
and individually but is able to take in information through a multitude of
channels simultaneously, as we are able to see and hear at the same time. He is
aware of each individual, but He is also aware of the whole, i.e. He transcends
or exists in a state transcendental to the realm of separate individuals. He is
also able to act through a multitude of channels at the same time. This is
another reason why He is so wonderful to know.
(d) nonphysical
God exists in the spiritual
realm. He is invisible, and as spirit witnesses as well as acts upon spirit. In
Christianity this is known as the action of the Holy Spirit, who acts in the
minds and lives of men. Although He is spiritual, He is also able to view and
work with matter. He does have an interface with the material world through
which He creates matter, and through which He guides evolution. Again, the truth
of my statements are not essential to my argument, only the possibility of truth
must be admitted.
(e) omniscient
God is omniscient, meaning
He knows everything that has happened in the past, is occurring now, and which
will happen in the future. I do not state, however, that this knowledge is
limitless, but as we travel forward into infinity even God will begin to forget
trivial details, such as the number of hairs on each person’s head, about
which He doesn’t care that much anyway. He also probably does not see into the
infinite future, but only so far as His divine intelligence can reach, which is
certainly trillions of years if not longer. He also possesses deep practical
knowledge about the creation of souls and the creation of matter which are
essential for His action. Further, He is a supreme human psychologist, who knows
well the effect of words upon the human mind.
(f) omnipresent
He is present everywhere,
both within and without the human being. He sees all our actions, and He knows
what is in our hearts. He knows our secret desires, and He also knows all our
motivations. A person who does evil with good intentions is therefore
exonerated, just as a person who does good with selfish intent is condemned. As
I shall touch upon later, He is also present both within and without the
universe, for He possesses a cognitive region that is external to and separate
from His creation.
(g) personal
God is personal. Although as
Creator of the universe His personal attributes are far beyond our ability to
conceive, He embodies Himself from time to time in a human body. These are the
incarnations that have appeared on earth, including Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha,
Krishna, Chaitanya and Ramakrishna. If one wishes to worship the personal God,
one should choose one of the major religions in which to do so. The impersonal
God may also be worshipped, although as I stated His attributes are so immutable
and unchanging that it is difficult to feel much attraction for Him in this
aspect. For instance, although the impersonal God may be said to be full of
love, yet He upholds physical laws that cause the death of many creatures, such
as the unchanging law of gravity or chemical reactions that are explosive in
nature. The personal God or incarnation is not involved in these things
directly, and so He is much more loveable.
(h) free
God is ever-free, meaning He
can do whatever He wants at any time. Fortunately for us, He has guaranteed our
eternal souls although the fate of these souls is in question. For Christians
and Mohammedans, the choice is paradise or hell. For Hindus and Buddhists, the
choice is liberation or continued conditioned existence. In reality, hell is
when God casts a soul back down into an animal body, perhaps forever. Such a
soul experiences real torment, for it loses its rational thinking capacity in an
instant. It takes a long time for this capacity to be completely reabsorbed into
the mass of the soul or spirit, at which time it will again know peace. As I
say, God is free and the universe exists according to His pleasure only. He is
free to demolish it or nourish it, as He chooses. He is good, and thus it will
not be demolished, but you only have my word on this, nothing more.
(i) all-loving
God is love, but as I say it
is a real world and not all the beings He has created meet His minimal standards
for continued existence on planet earth. This is why the divine purifying action
promised by Jesus will come to pass, for the heaven Jesus predicted will be His
kingdom right here on earth. All who are present in the world today will not be
allowed to remain. Suppose you love a Rottweiler, but every time you go near it,
it bites you viciously. This is God’s problem with sinners. Although you love
the Rottweiler, you will still put it down for it causes continuous trouble for
you and everyone it sees. Similarly, God will allow good people to remain but
will cast out the evil ones, as a shoe factory sometimes throws out shoes that
have been improperly manufactured.
(j) all-just
God is just, but His justice
is delayed and not immediate. Most of it occurs after a person has died. Very
evil men are put into animal bodies in their next life, where they suffer
tremendous agony because of the sudden loss of their reasoning ability. Others
are cast into difficult circumstances. A very rich and evil man may be put into
dire poverty in his next life, for his own education and the good of the world.
As I say, God keeps a log book or accounting on each person’s every thought
and action. Although He is merciful, He is also just and rewards or punishes in
order to help the whole world grow spiritually, which is His main concern.
(k) all-merciful
God is merciful, but
credulity is not a trait of His. He sees into the heart of each man, and He sees
truly. He calls a spade a spade. Even a terrible sinner, though, may ask for His
mercy and be assured of receiving it. He is forgiving, and does not hold a man
to strict accounting who asks for forgiveness.
(l) the creator of the
universe
God created the universe by
bringing it out of a non-thinking part of Himself. The entire universe is
spiritual, including matter and all the souls that exist, and God preceded it.
His main thinking region exists outside the known universe, although He does
also act within the universe. Although created from God’s spiritual body, yet
for all intents and purposes we are free, separate beings. The creation of
matter and the creation of souls are both intricate, complex processes about
which we know nothing, although modern science is beginning to show the
intricacies of matter. The end result of these processes is a universe where
everything appears separate although it truly has its origin in the divine.
It should be obvious that I
do not present the standard conception of God here, but while I maintain that
these statements of mine are indeed true, they do not need to be taken as such.
One can merely entertain the possibility that things may be as I say. As I will
show, the very possibility of such a God as I describe invalidates all attempts
to disprove the existence of God in general, supporting my claims to some
extent. I say supporting, for I do admit it is not possible either to prove or
disprove God’s existence by intellectual argument. He must be known, and then
everything becomes plain.
I shall deal with each of
the arguments presented in turn. I will preface the web page contents with the
author’s initials, TMD, and my comments with my initials, JKJ. In each case
there is an obvious tautology based on unintelligent definition of terms, and I
begin each of my comments by explicitly stating this.
TMD:
The
Perfection vs. Creation Argument.
Version
#1
1. If God exists, then he is perfect.
2. If God exists, then he is the creator of the universe.
3. A perfect being can have no needs or wants.
4. If any being created the universe, then he must have had some need or want.
5. Therefore, it is impossible for a perfect being to be the creator of the
universe (from 3 and 4).
6. Hence, it is impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A
perfect being (one with no needs or wants), could not have needed or wanted
anything."
The fallacy is in point 3,
that a perfect being can have no needs or wants. I have defined perfection as
excellence in personal attributes, a flawless character. Your argument attempts
to define perfection in an unrealistic and foolish way. Certainly God wanted to
create the universe, or else He would not have acted. One may indeed argue that
statement 3 is self-contradictory, for the definition of "being" must
necessarily include the capacity to desire, which as I have said God does
possess. Mr. Drange points out that in his argument, the idea of perfection is
of something that is in itself complete. This is where imagination has taken
over, for only someone with no experience of God would define perfection in such
an absurd manner. I have defined perfection in a way that is incompatible with
this idea. God has desires, for instance He wanted earth to be overall a happy
place. If He lacked desire and were "complete" in the absurd sense it
is used here, He would be a kind of metal being, a big chunk of ice, never
acting, perfectly happy just as He is. This is why I say that the concepts of
"living being" and "lack of desire" when put together form a
self-contradictory statement. God is alive, and He created the earth with a
specific intent.
TMD:
Version 2
1. If God exists, then he is perfect.
2. If God exists, then he is the creator of the universe.
3. If a being is perfect, then whatever he creates must be perfect.
4. But the universe is not perfect.
5. Therefore, it is impossible for a perfect being to be the creator of the
universe (from 3 and 4).
6. Hence, it is impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A
perfect being (one that could only create perfect things), could only create
perfect things."
The fallacy here is in line
3, which is based upon again a shallow and imperceptive definition of
perfection. You know nothing of the difficulties of creation! These naïve
notions are like the story of Pinocchio. Geppetto created a puppet, and this
puppet came to life. If Pinocchio looked at himself and said, "Look, I am
made of wood, and I am not perfectly sanded everywhere! Some of my joints are
loose. There is no way I could have had a creator, for that creator would have
had to be perfect, and he has made something imperfect!" The argument is
ridiculous. He did have a creator, but is applying an absurd standard of
perfection. Even if Geppetto had been perfect, there is only so much anyone can
do with wood!
Why do you say God must be
perfect in the way you assume here? This is the real question. The answer is,
You do not know and are using imagination only. You create an image of God using
your imagination that never could exist, then burn it to the ground, the classic
"straw man" approach. A being perfect in character can certainly
create a universe that appears imperfect to us. You appear to assume that the
universe is not real, that it is some sort of imaginary phenomenon in the mind
of God somewhere. It is real, and it was created with real processes. The being
who created it possesses perfection in virtuous character, but He made what He
could with the material that He had, which as I stated earlier was a
non-thinking portion of His own immense spirit. You must admit, while everything
is not perfect He certainly has done a very good job, for we are all here and
most of us lead relatively happy lives. Note that He did not want a world of
automatons, but wanted free beings. He was graceful in granting this to us, so I
say His grace is perfect. That some of the beings end up evil is not His fault,
for they are free to choose.
TMD:
2. The Immutability-vs.-Creation
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
immutable.
2. If God exists, then he is the creator of the universe.
3. An immutable being cannot at one time have an intention and then at a later
time not have that intention.
4. For any being to create anything, prior to the creation he must have had the
intention to create it, but at a later time, after the creation, no longer have
the intention to create it.
5. Thus, it is impossible for an immutable being to have created anything (from
3 and 4).
6. Therefore, it is impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5)
JKJ:
The tautology: "An
immutable being (one that cannot at one time have an intention and then at a
later time not have that intention), cannot at one time have an intention and
then at a later time not have that intention."
By immutability, as I stated
earlier, I understand unchangeability or constancy in personal attributes. I
also understand it to be constancy in purpose. For instance, God when He creates
matter also maintains it. It is His divine power that is called by scientists
gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and the weak nuclear forces. Although
entropy exists, this is merely the weakening of His hold on matter, the way a
strong man can hold up a heavy weight for only so long. The universe will
certainly die a heat death as scientists predict, but at this time God draws the
whole thing into Himself for a long period of rest. He then begins again with a
new universe, and all the created beings from the first universe are restored,
for they are eternal. His immutability is therefore analogous to that of a very
strong man. He upholds all the physical laws of the universe and these do not
change. For a human to attempt such a thing would be ludicrous, which is why
God’s strength is rightly said to be very much greater than man’s. It truly
is correct to call Him immutable by comparison with ourselves. This resolves the
objections raised in 3 and 4 above, for God intended to create the universe and
maintain it after creation, and He intends to create and maintain a new universe
when this one is burnt out. You are merely using a play on words here and
calling it an argument, for it would be a shallow intention indeed to just keep
on creating and creating as though one could never stop! God is a real being,
not a machine. You must not forget this.
TMD:
3. The Immutability-vs.-Omniscience
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
immutable.
2. If God exists, then he is
omniscient.
3. An immutable being cannot
know different things at different times.
4. To be omniscient, a being
would need to know propositions about the past and future.
5. But what is past and what
is future keep changing.
6. Thus, in order to know
propositions about the past and future, a being would need to know different
things at different times (from 5).
7. It follows that, to be
omniscient, a being would need to know different things at different times (from
4 and 6).
8. Hence, it is impossible
for an immutable being to be omniscient (from 3 and 7).
9. Therefore, it is
impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 8).
JKJ:
The tautology: "An
immutable being (one that cannot know different things at different times),
cannot know different things at different times."
The problem here is in
statement 3, for a being immutable as I have defined it, possessing grand
designs and purposes that do not change for billions upon billions of years, can
and does know different things at different times. You have not defined an
immutable being here, but an unthinking one, an unintelligent one. You define
"immutable" in such a way that thought is not allowed! This is indeed
foolish, for you are in essence saying, "If God is not an actual living
being, then God is not an actual living being." In defining immutability as
the inability to know different things at different times, you are not allowing
God existence, so this is again a straw man you have created. It is like saying,
"A stone could never have the capacity to think, therefore a stone could
never read an essay." Of course not! I maintain that God does think, but
His immutability consists of the constancy of His purpose and personal
attributes, which is a sane, rational and realistic definition. He is not a
stone but a real, mighty, living being.
TMD:
4. The Immutable-vs.-All-Loving
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
immutable.
2. If God exists, then he is
all-loving.
3. An immutable being cannot
be affected by events.
4. To be all-loving, it must
be possible for a being to be affected by events.
5. Hence, it is impossible
for an immutable being to be all-loving (from 3 and 4).
6. Therefore, it is
impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5).
JKJ:
The tautology: "An
immutable being (one that cannot be affected by events), cannot be affected by
events."
Here again the shortcoming
is in defining the term immutable in an irrational, instead of in a rational
way. The fallacy shows itself in proposition 3, for a being that is immutable to
our way of thinking in attributes and purpose will be affected by events and is
capable of love. The flaw is in your restrictive definition of the term
immutable as an inability to be affected by events. As such this argument is
again a play on words and a "straw man" argument. You are not allowing
for the possibility of a real being, but instead make the definition of
immutable so tight that no being could ever fit into it, that can rightly be
called a being. I say God is a mighty spiritual being, and He has personal
attributes. Imagine a man who is a serial killer, for instance Jack the Ripper.
For Jack, society’s will against him, society’s will to punish him, appears
immutable. Society is immutably or unchangeably against all serial killers.
Similarly, God is immutably for the universe. He supports it constantly, or it
would all unravel in a day. Such a purpose, which is maintained for billions of
years, is holy to us and worthy of our respect and adoration. This is why it is
meaningful to call God immutable, although we cannot use your narrow, cold, and
unrealistic definition of absolutely no change of any kind, and state instead
that certain aspects of God are unchanging, at least in any way that we could
possibly detect, but that certain aspects do change, in particular His thoughts
and sensibilities.
TMD:
5. The Transcendence-vs.-Omnipresence
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
transcendent (i.e., outside space and time).
2. If God exists, then he is
omnipresent.
3. To be transcendent, a
being cannot exist anywhere in space.
4. To be omnipresent, a
being must exist everywhere in space.
5. Hence, it is impossible
for a transcendent being to be omnipresent (from 3 and 4).
6. Therefore, it is
impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A
transcendent being (one that cannot exist anywhere in space), cannot exist
anywhere in space."
With a wave of your hand you
try to demolish God by defining "transcendent" in a manner that would
not allow any being existence. This is not right. There is something special in
God’s existence that is denoted by the word transcendent, but what that is, is
not so simple as a hand-waving (i.e. outside space and time). It is not so
facile. I have described a scenario in which God is both outside the universe,
i.e. His main thinking part is outside the universe, and within the universe,
for verily God has become everything. This is true transcendence, for everywhere
you look nothing but God exists. His being transcends every created thing, for
He has become everything. This view of mine is not unique, but is supported in
the Hindu Upanishads. I merely reaffirm it.
TMD:
6. The Transcendence-vs.-Personhood
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
transcendent (i.e., outside space and time).
2. If God exists, then he is
a person (or a personal being).
3. If something is
transcendent, then it cannot exist and perform actions within time.
4. But a person (or personal
being) must exist and perform actions within time.
5. Therefore, something that
is transcendent cannot be a person (or personal being) (from 3 and 4).
6. Hence, it is impossible
for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 5).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A
transcendent being (one that cannot exist and perform actions within time),
cannot exist and perform actions within time."
The mystery of time is a
deep one, and cannot easily be resolved. God existed before the universe was
created, but whether He had a beginning or is outside of time, beginningless and
endless, only He knows. I submit that it is possible that God exists outside of
time, yet supports the universe in time. Why could this not be true? The problem
with your argument is in statement 3, for how does any human know what is
possible for a being outside of time to do? Who says God cannot be outside of
time and yet create time and all the matter and creatures here too? The truth
is, no one knows. Statement 3 is a totally unsupported assertion. I do not think
my position is incoherent, but then I am not trying to prove God’s existence,
merely to show that your disproofs are not valid. It doesn’t take much
imagination to think of a being who is Himself outside of time yet created a
universe inside time. Indeed, modern physics calls time a fourth dimension, and
no one really understands this! Simply because our minds cannot understand
precisely how it works does not make it incoherent, simply incomprehensible, not
obviously false, but perhaps a mystery that we do not understand.
There is actually a way to
conceive of what I describe, for a person with imagination. Presume that God is
an immense spirit for whom time is not a reality. He had no beginning, but
simply exists. As I said, He formed the universe from a non-thinking part of
Himself, and the changes in this universe are evidence of what we call time. He
made the universe very energetic, yet entropy is real and the folds and creases,
if you will, that He made in His spirit to create matter, gradually unravel
until finally the universe dies of heat death. He is thus responsible not only
for the entire universe, but also for the phenomenon of time, as entropy
proceeds in the material realm He has created from Himself. While Himself
outside of time, He is responsible for the time we experience that has no other
reality aside from the process of unraveling, also known as entropy. I state
that this is not an incoherent picture, but a real possibility, one that I feel
is likely but you may say is unlikely. Nevertheless, the possibility exists.
TMD:
7. The Nonphysical-vs.-Personal
Argument
(1) If God exists, then he
is nonphysical.
(2) If God exists, then he
is a person (or a personal being).
(3) A person (or personal
being) needs to be physical.
(4) Hence, it is impossible
for God to exist (from 1-3).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A
personal being (one that needs to be physical), needs to be physical."
Statement 3 is completely
unsupported. All major religions that speak of God say that He is spirit and
does not have a physical body. You are here merely asserting the opposite!
"God is spirit," they say. "A person cannot be spirit," you
say. Man knows nothing about spirit, and as I say only a person who can actually
talk to God has any inkling about it. The best you can say here is, "I have
never met a person who was not physical." You cannot state anything more.
The world’s scriptures are full of accounts written by people who state that
they have met this divine being, who is spirit only. It is your word against
theirs. This argument is merely a "he said, she said" type of
argument. Thus I state that your argument here only proves you have never met a
spiritual being, nothing more than this.
TMD:
8. The Omnipresence-vs.-Personhood
Argument
(1) If God exists, then he
is omnipresent.
(2) If God exists, then he
is a person (or a personal being).
(3) Whatever is omnipresent
cannot be a person (or a personal being).
(4) Hence, it is impossible
for God to exist (from 1-3).
JKJ:
The tautology: "An
omnipresent being (one that cannot be a person), cannot be a person."
Statement 3 could well be
false. God is a multifaceted spiritual being, as I said earlier, obtaining
information though multiple channels and acting through multiple channels, all
simultaneously, and all controlled, witnessed and appreciated by His central
intelligence. An organist supplies a good analogy from the human context. She
reads music and plays separate parts with each foot and with each hand, all
coordinated and with a result that is most beautiful to hear. Similarly, God
does many things at once. He is just much, much larger than we can conceive,
spanning the entire universe and acting on all the planets that have living
beings on them, which are more widespread than anyone today suspects. Obviously
I cannot prove my statement to you, who cannot see God, but neither can you
prove to me that God is not omnipresent. It is my word against yours, and
couching your opinion within a logical argument does not strengthen it in truth,
for you have no experience of spiritual reality and are not an authority! If you
will think carefully about your evidence why you think that whatever is
omnipresent cannot be a person, you will discover that all you can say is,
"I have never seen one, or the actions of such a one. I really do not
know."
TMD:
9. The Omniscient-vs.-Free
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
omniscient.
2. If God exists, then he is
free.
3. An omniscient being must
know exactly what actions he will and will not do in the future.
4. If one knows that he will
do an action, then it is impossible for him not to do it, and if one knows that
he will not do an action, then it is impossible for him to do it.
5. Thus, whatever an
omniscient being does, he must do, and whatever he does not do, he cannot do
(from 3 and 4).
6. To be free requires
having options open, which means having the ability to act contrary to the way
one actually acts.
7. So, if one is free, then
he does not have to do what he actually does, and he is able to do things that
he does not actually do (from 6).
8. Hence, it is impossible
for an omniscient being to be free (from 5 and 7).
9. Therefore, it is
impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 8).
JKJ:
The tautology: "An
omniscient being (one that must do what he does do, and cannot do what he does
not do), must do what he does do, and cannot do what he does not do."
The problem with this
argument is in statement 5, and it arises from a gross underestimate of the
capacity of God to plan and to carry out His plans. Think of a "soccer
mom" who is taking a group of kids to a soccer game. She plans to drive to
each of the kids’ homes, picking up each in turn along a route that she has
carefully planned. She knows the approximate amount of time it will take so she
will start early. Then she plans to sit and watch the soccer game, chatting with
the other "soccer moms" as they cheer their childrens’ performance.
After the game, she plans to take them all out for ice cream, then drive them
all home, along another well-planned route.
On the day of the game, she
carries out this plan. Now, it may happen that her minivan gets a flat tire, in
which case she will need to change her plans on short notice, perhaps even to
the extent of missing the game entirely. This soccer mom, although not
omniscient as in 1, yet can plan things to the best of her capacity, so she has
some amount of intelligence. She is free, as in 2, since she can change her
plans. Now is where it gets interesting, because she also fits 3, in that she
knows exactly what actions she will and will not do (within the limits of her
intelligence, naturally). Now I say imagine this soccer mom multiplied, as the
saying goes, to the nth degree, and you will have some idea about
God’s manner of planning things, then carrying them out.
God has made long term plans
for the universe. Since He is God, He has a great deal of control over exactly
what will transpire here. Unlike the soccer mom, He will not be interrupted or
delayed in performing His actions, so that all the actions He has planned He
will indeed carry out. Imagine, for instance, how much more likely it would be
that the soccer mom would arrive safely at her destination if (suppose she were
the mayor’s wife) she could ask all other drivers in the city to stay off the
roads while she was driving! God has this kind of control over the world,
although we do not see His actions. He does what He planned to do, in the way
that He planned to do it. It is His omniscience that enables Him to make these
intense and deeply-laid plans, and to carry them out as well. He is free to
change His plans should He need to change them, but He doesn’t need to because
His intelligence is immense and He foresees all difficulties. I say the problem
with your argument is statement 5, because He never acts without deep
deliberation, without knowing the full consequences of His actions, and without
planning His actions to great detail. He could refrain from doing what He has
decided to do, but He does not because He decided He should do those actions.
Due to His immutable character which I’ve already discussed, He does not sway
from His decisions. Any constraint arising from His omniscience is self-imposed
only. Is the soccer mom free just because no difficulties occur and she carries
out her plan as she intended to do? Of course she still is.
TMD:
10. The Justice-vs.-Mercy
Argument
1. If God exists, then he is
an all-just judge.
2. If God exists, then he is
an all-merciful judge.
3. An all-just judge treats
every offender with exactly the severity that he/she deserves.
4. An all-merciful judge
treats every offender with less severity than he/she deserves.
5. It is impossible to treat
an offender both with exactly the severity that he/she deserves and also with
less severity than he/she deserves.
6. Hence, it is impossible
for an all-just judge to be an all-merciful judge (from 3-5).
7. Therefore, it is
impossible for God to exist (from 1, 2, and 6).
JKJ:
The tautology: "A just
and merciful being (one that cannot treat individuals with distinction), cannot
treat individuals with distinction."
God is merciful to the
repentant man, but harsh to the unrepentant. Jesus spread this message among
mankind. To receive God’s mercy, one must ask for it in prayer. This is
exactly the type of justice that is dispensed on earth! When a jury and a judge
see a criminal who is truly repentant and sorry for his actions, who may even
cry openly in the courtroom, they are always disposed to be lenient except when
the crime is especially evil. If, on the other hand, the defendant taunts the
victim’s family, insults the judge and spits at the jury, he is likely to
receive the harshest sentence possible. God is swayed by repentance, for He sees
hope for the individual to reform himself and become a better person. A lack of
repentance is a very bad sign in a person, and more evil will certainly issue
forth from such a one. In these cases, He is harsh. The problem with the
argument then is statement 5, since it makes the artificial and ridiculous
attempt to apply mercy and full justice to the same person, whereas in truth
these two are applied to different people based on their attitudes.
I have presented a picture
of God which is wild and controversial by comparison with most modern thinking,
and I have not presented my reasons for the views that I have beyond stating
that they are supported by the Upanishads of ancient India. The idea that God
has made the universe from a non-thinking part of His own spirit sounds like
nonsense to the Western ear, although to the Eastern ear it is a central
doctrine. Both cultures are influenced deeply by tradition, and the only leap an
intelligent Western person needs to make is to admit that Indians are people
like we are, and that there may indeed be something valuable in their thinking.
If you dismiss my position as nonsense, it is a sign of a judgmental and
prejudiced mind. Dismiss it you may, but I then rightly may call you irrational,
immature, thoughtless and lacking in imagination.
In any case, I have
presented a rational and consistent picture of God as being a real being, a
picture that demolishes your arguments. If I have not succeeded in proving that
this God is real, as I know cannot be done by intellectual discussion, I have at
least succeeded in showing that incompatibility arguments rely on definitions of
words that are tight and unyielding, that really preclude a priori the existence
of the God they denounce. They are essentially "straw man" arguments,
and though arranged in precise logical order they are not logical, but
fallacious in obvious and fundamental ways. The real problem with these
arguments is that you do not know God. You have no clue as to what He is, what
He does, or what His thinking is like. This is why all your definitions fall
flat, because you are trying to define something that exists only in your
imagination. Your attempts to disprove God are no more successful than the
Theists’ attempts to prove Him. Belief in God is essentially a matter of the
heart, not of the intellect.
-Guru Kurt