Occasionally a theist makes an argument so amusingly stupid that it would be a shame not to share it with a larger audience. This is one of those occasions.
On another thread, we’ve been discussing the unloving way in which God — supposing that he exists at all — is treating the victims of Hurricane Harvey (and the soon-to-be victims of Hurricane Irma, unfortunately). In the course of that discussion, fifthmonarchyman — a Christian — made the following, er, memorable argument:
I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the LORD, do all these things.
– Isaiah 45:7
keiths:
Yes, and creating disaster for his children is exactly what every loving father sets out to do. Right, Mung?
Nothing says “I love you” like drowning someone or wiping out their possessions.
At that point fifthmonarchyman got the bright idea that he could defend God by arguing that God is not our father. He wrote:
quote:
the Originator of the heavens and the earth! How could it be that He should have a child without there ever having been a mate for Him – since it is He who has created everything, and He alone knows everything? – Sura 6:101
and
and say: “All praise is due to God, who begets no offspring, and has no partner in His dominion, and has no weakness, and therefore no need of any aid” -and [thus] extol His limitless greatness. – Sura 17:111
end quote:
That’s right, folks. Fifthmonarchyman quoted the Quran to argue against the idea that God is our father — forgetting that the latter idea comes straight from Jesus. What are the first two words of the Lord’s Prayer? Our Father.
Seeing fifth — a Christian — use the Quran to argue (unwittingly) against Jesus is one of the stupidest moves I’ve seen in a long while. I therefore renominate fifth for the title of World’s Worst Apologist.
After posting his comment, fifth belatedly realized that he had just thrown Jesus under the bus. He tried to undo the damage:
Get it keiths ?
A loving father is not the default understanding of God. Not by a long shot.
To know him as Father you need to have met his Son. Once you have met his Son you are simply not dissuaded when bad things happen.
peace
It’s a bit too late to backpedal, fifth.
This is a good time to quote Augustine again, on the topic of Christians who make fools of themselves:
…we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn.
The inanity goes even deeper. I’ll elaborate in the comments.
Now watch keiths try to change the subject.
Or streets, because streets can flood.
And he fails at basic logic.
Even streets made of whipcream aren’t good enough for keiths, because the sidewalks aren’t!
But hurricanes might be good, because keiths won’t ever tell what is good.
phoodoo:
Mung:
Ha ha. Exactly the opposite happened. I wanted to talk about it, and phoodoo was the one who tried to change the subject.
Good work, Mung. You’ve re-exposed phoodoo’s cowardice.
keiths,
No keiths, Mung is pointing out that you refuse to show how suffering is avoidable. THIS is what you hide from.
Mung,
You just shot phoodoo in the foot. I wonder if he’ll shoot back.
I think he’ll let you off the hook. He needs friends, plus it’s pretty obvious that the shooting was due to incompetence, not malice.
Here’s the question again, phoodoo:
You’re actually claiming that God can’t create “a world with choices” without drowning people and destroying their homes?
keiths,
I am still here, now when are you going to say how suffering is avoidable?
Infinite whipcream?
How do you know so much about how God communicates with people?
He also ignores contrary evidence. And then pretends it about the evidence. But then argues as if it’s about the logic.
keiths:
CharlieM:
This is not difficult, Charlie, but you have to be willing to think.
Read this again:
That didn’t happen. So again, why doesn’t he warn people? Does he hate them and want them to suffer or die? How do you explain this unloving behavior?
phoodoo,
You’ve already failed the test. Just like every other believer here, you can’t say why your supposedly loving God drowns people and destroys their homes
“Because otherwise there would be no choice in the world” is an idiotic answer, as you yourself realize. That’s why you are afraid to answer my question:
If you say “yes”, then you’re admitting that God is puny and weak. If you say “no”, then you’re admitting that you were wrong, and that your “choice” rationale is bogus.
Pick your poison. Or do what you always do, which is to stall, squirm and skedaddle like Mung.
The Grand Inquisitor
Poor Mung. Those mean skeptics and their questions!
If you are a fan of the University of Miami
Why didn’t God warn the people that the sidewalks were not made of whipped cream?
#BadGod
Why didn’t God keep me from shooting phoodoo in the foot? Why didn’t God warn phoodoo that he should to move his foot? Therefore God does not exist.
ETA: Or, if God does exist, he is not the phoodoo-loving kind of god.
People choose to suffer?
Why didn’t someone warn the child not to have a rare genetic disorder?
keiths,
What’s idiotic is saying you want the world to be made of whipcream for your pleasure.
But so far that is all we know about your position.
phoodoo,
I see you’ve chosen the stall, squirm, and skedaddle option. When will you get to the skedaddling part?
keith and his dream…
I guess they all “needed” that, huh, Charlie? How loving of God to provide them that experience.
ok, Allan should definitely incorporate that into his religion.
Of course you are, for the same reason that Uday Hussisn was skeptical that General Schwarzkopf was loving and compassionate. There is nothing odd in that. What is odd is that you think that we should care what you think about this topic.
No it’s not, any more than Uday’s accusations of supposed war crimes committed by General Schwarzkopf would be a problem for his wife Brenda.
She knew he was loving and trusted that any supposed evidence to the contrary was false.
Again Im not engaging in an apologetic exercise.
From time to time I might explain why I think your impression is mistaken just as Brenda might do if she was constantly badgered with claims that her husband was a war criminal.
Of course her husbands moral character in no way would depend on her desire or ability to explain why her husband acted in a certain way.
She could if she liked simply point out that Uday does not know him the way she does.
That is all that it would take to defeat his charge. It might not stop him from complaining though
Are you claiming that there is some sort of objective moral standard out there that God is required to meet in order to to be considered loving.
Good luck proving that one.
Perhaps you are just saying that lots of folks agree with you that God is unloving.
Uday could say the same thing about Schwarzkopf.
It would not of course matter in the slightest to Brenda she knew he was loving she had experienced his love.
Those that claim otherwise are hopelessly uniformed and under-informed on the topic.
peace
quote:
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good
end quote:
Genesis 50:20
The cool thing for Christians is that even when evil folks conspire to do them harm in this way it eventually works out for their good. (Romans 8:28)
peace
The grand omniscient decider has rendered his verdict.
“god is mean”
Nothing left but to execute sentence.
LOL
http://deoxy.org/wc/wc-toc.htm
peace
keiths. Master Goad Kicker
Jesus, after being thrown under a bus by an overzealous admirer, emerged miraculously undamaged.
Mung,
Just as I predicted:
PS It’s amusing to see you characterize FMM as “an overzealous admirer” of Jesus. That’s the second time you’ve shot him in the foot recently.
fifth, to OMagain:
Fixed that for you.
You don’t have to be omniscient to decide that God, if he exists at all, is not powerful and loving. You simply need to open your eyes, fifth.
The evidence is right in front of you, but your eyes are squeezed shut.
keiths:
fifth:
No, I’m skeptical of it because I actually look at the evidence, while you sweep it under the rug.
Remember, you actually wrote this:
Ignore that inconvenient evidence, follks. Fight the truth.
As I commented at the time:
If God is omnipotent, why does he allow keiths to decide that, if he exists at all, he is not powerful and loving? Therefore, God does not exist.
keiths:
fifth:
You’re trying to defend your faith. That’s apologetics.
Why deny the obvious? Your credibility is already in tatters. This just makes it worse.
Why does God allow people to deny the obvious? Therefore, God does not exist.
Mung,
Beat that strawman! Feels good, doesn’t it?
Problem is, you look like an idiot.
Instead of whaling away at that strawman, why not be brave and and explain to us why your “loving” God drowns people and wrecks their homes?
Why does God allow people to beat up on straw-men and then feel good about it?
Therefore, God does not exist.
Since the local believers are struggling so helplessly, let’s look at how some more prominent folks have approached the problem we’re discussing.
From an older thread of Vincent’s:
keiths:
But why would a loving God allow the local believers to struggling so helplessly?
Therefore, God does not exist.
Why oh why didn’t God WARN US about keiths? Sob!
Mung,
Maybe what ketihs is saying is he wants us to be able to make some choices, but then he wants God to make other choices for us. Maybe he can give us a short list of which choices he should make and which choices God should make for him.
Do you think keiths would chose to be him? Let’s see if he wants that to be his choice or God’s choice. Who will get the blame?
Of course. But why couldn’t an almighty God have foreseen that keiths would become his greatest nemesis and prevent it? Therefore, God does not exist.
Mung and phoodoo,
Have you made any progress on this OP?
I admire you patience… 🙂
phoodoo,
Here is the paradox, should God choose what should be on his short list of choices to make, or should Keiths choose what should be on his short list of choices to make?
If he chooses to choose his shortlist of choices himself, but then later he chooses poorly, can keiths blame God for allowing him to choose to choose himself?
Without God there would be no love and no standard of love which keiths could accuse God of failing to measuring up to. But keiths will deny that there’s any objective standard of love. So we’re left with keiths subjective luv.
And keiths wonders why we don’t “defend” God against his subjective idea of what he thinks luv ought to be like. He doesn’t seem to get it that his standard of a father’s luv fails, because fathers don’t even meet up to the standard of luv that keiths has set. So he has an “argument” without a premise.
Which is why he can only ask why. Well, we can ask why too. Apparently that’s all that’s needed for an argument.
Many Christians believe that God caused a flood that wiped out all mankind except just a few. But keiths never even stops to think that flooding in Texas doesn’t even come close to that. Doesn’t even begin to compare to it at all. Why does keiths think that flooding is inconsistent with God’s love, given that it very clearly is not?
Think keiths!
Mung and Phoodoo,
The main question is:
What would have happened if God had decided to shield Adam and Eve from the consequences (aging, sickness, death, danger outside of the paradise) of their rebellion against his 1 prohibition?
As written in Gen 2:16-17
“God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; 17 but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
God could have said: I’m going to forget it this time…” right?
But he didn’t, because he couldn’t.
WHY?
This is a tough one… I now…
Yes he could.
Because he is omnipotent.
OMNIPOTENT
What you mean to say is ‘He did not desire it’.
If you’re going to philosophise intelligibly about a being who can do anything that is logically possible then you don’t get to ignore your premises. Because then you’re just doing fan-fiction.
J-Mac:
Woodbine:
That’s right. God had the power to forgive Adam and Eve. A loving God would have forgiven them. The Christian God refused to forgive them, banished them from the Garden, made their lives miserable, and then blamed their descendants as if they had anything to do with it.
The Christian God is an unloving asshole. Thank God (so to speak) he doesn’t exist.