On May 13, 3:39 pm, SM <[email protected]> wrote: > > Even what you and Brock are suggesting can be described as a process. > > > Step A. Some individual human lacks the truth. > > Step B. God gives revelation to that person. > > > That's the process or method by which the individual gets the truth. > > You wanna call that a process? Uh, ok...if that works for you, I can dig > it.
My point is not whether you can call it a process or a method or algorithm or decision tree or just a set of steps. The point is, can we control whether or not we get to the truth? Can we be held responsible for trying to reach the truth or neglecting to reach the truth? Can we be held for being confused or unsure whether there is a God? If God gave everyone this truth, that would be great, because no one could claim they were confused or unsure or that they did not believe. If that were true, your conclusion must be that all atheists and agnostics and non-Christians and ambivalent people are lying or deluded or mentally damaged in some way that prevents them from understanding the truth they have been given. Do we have to get into the "obstacle of sin" again? People are magically given the truth about God but some people can't recognize it because sins blocks it somehow? Then God has not given the truth to those people. And it starts to sound like a method again, something that puts responsibility and agency back on the individual instead of God. People must take steps to remove their sins or get rid of the obstacles in order to see the truth. Great, now if they don't have access to this truth that certain behaviors are sins, or that sins are an obstacle to understanding the truth, then how would they know or decide to stop sinning or somehow clear away this obstacle to the truth? It just goes around and around. The same way that Adam and Eve were held responsible for their transgression, eating from the tree of knowledge and good and evil, before they had knowledge of good and evil. Of course, they were warned, God told them not to do it, so they should have known that it was an evil thing to do. Except they were supposedly innocent and had no knowledge of good and evil. Warnings would be pointless, ineffective, and would not confer responsibility on the person getting a warning that it could not understand. Anyway, the point of asking about the process or methods we use for accessing truth is to help take agency. If you want to hold me responsible for some transgression, then it has to be something I am informed about. You can't hold a person responsible for consequences that they couldn't have known would result from their actions. So how do I get informed? How do I ensure that the truth about how to live and how to avoid eternal suffering is the one prescribed by the Bible or the Quran or the Book of Mormon or the Talmud, or if I should go to Buddhist or Confucian texts or others? So I hear that you and Brock are trying to know there is no external way to double-check whether I have received the truth about the Bible. The truth is just there given by God, and there's nothing I can do to avoid it or to actively try to gain it. I think the Bible is partly fiction, so if that's the truth, we're all set. If I don't have the truth about it, and my actions can't change whether I receive or recognize the truth, then wtf am I supposed to do? How am I responsible for God not really giving me the truth, or allowing some obstacles to come between his message and my understanding of it? > > Now take one of those groups that you don't believe really had > > received the truth from God, even though they claimed it. Followers of > > Jim Jones or David Koresh or maybe Mormons. They may claim that God > > revealed himself to them (doesn't really matter what platform or > > medium through which God is supposed to have sent his message, does > > it?). In fact, they may say all the things that you or Brock say about > > why they are sure they have the truth. Their only difference might be > > the "content" of that truth, not the method by which they received it > > (revelation from God). > > God's revelation to us from any source *never* contradicts Scripture. The > message from *any* purveyor of truth must be validated against the full > counsel of Scripture. Mormons and Muslims and David Koresh would say that their interpretations are consistent with and validated against the full counsel of Scripture. If there were any contradictions, they would probably brush them off in the ways that Christians already do. They'd say the laws laid out in the New Testament were "nailed to the Qabba" or something. > > Setting aside the people who are just lying about it, if we focus on > > people who sincerely believe they've received some wild idea revealed > > from God, would you say those people have been contacted by Satan or > > demons that caused them to feel they experienced a revelation from > > God? Or would you just say that they are confusing a strong feeling > > about the topic (or about some charismatic figure who convinced them > > it's true), and nothing supernatural was involved? > > This kinda relates to what I was talking about with Bridge. If we live by > our feelings or emotions, rather than sound beliefs (informed by the Bible), > we risk being led astray. Beliefs informed by the Bible seem to be informed by our feelings and emotions about the Bible, so they are no more "sound" than any other beliefs based on feelings or emotions. > > Either a person repeats that cycle until they convince themselves it's > > true, or else they reach a point where they decide to stop, at which > > point they can be dismissed by believers because they didn't "complete > > the process" (for the rest of their lives). > > "...at which point they can be dismissed by believers..." > I'm not sure what you mean by this, but this cynical thought is your own and > is not something that Brock or I said. Sorry, I've heard this kind of simple non-falsifiable litmus test from other Christians, but not necessarily from you or Brock. What would you conclude about a person who tried those steps and eventually decided that soliciting prayers from others and studying the Bible and offering their own prayers did not help convince them that the Bible is true or that God exists? > It's God who leads people to repentance. Other believers may be agents in > that process, but we can claim neither credit nor responsibility for the > outcome. Is the individual in question responsible for it, or only God? If it's only God, why would anyone be damned for God's failure or decision not to lead them to repentance? -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "A Civil Religious Debate" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/a-civil-religious-debate?hl=en.
