About Adam and Eve...

[Azure Kite]

This is a question put in to play in many scenarios in the Bible. "If God knew, why did he do that?" Sometimes you have to except that you just don't know. I have wondered about this topic sometimes. I could probably find an abundance of explanations, but I just choose to except that I will one day understand it. That is called faith.

There ARE an abundance of explanations for this questions. I tend to think its probably the one being said here the most, which is, God chose to test Adam and Eve, and allow the Devil to tempt them, and they failed. But then, WHY would God do something like that??? Well, something else to remember.

God has NEVER told us everything. And he doesn't have to. God is loving enough to provide a way to escape ****. We are lucky He did that. Not just because we sinned and deserve that, but because as creations, we could be easily destroyed. In laboratories, there are experiements being made every day. Experiements performed to find cures for sicknesses, solutions to energy problems, etc. Most are thrown away, because they failed.

If God was looking to creat a perfect world, and Adam and Eve sinned, hence not being perfect, why did God not just destroy the world and start over with a clean slate? Because He is a loving God, as stated. You just need to look around and see all the things you have, and know what you deserve, to see that you have no right to complain.

But then, back to the question of why would God do something like that? Isn't He all knowing, and all seeing, knowing was has and will happen? Then you come back to faith. Excepting that you don't know, but one day you will know. But it is not blind faith. Faith still requires believing and trusting.

There won't be an explanation for everything here on Earth. God lets us choose to believe what we want. You can believe God "set us up". And so what if He did? Its HIS creation. As stated earlier, you should be lucky He didn't destory our world. When you come back to this question, thats all you have to think about to know how blessed you are to still be here.

 

[Umbykirb]

Here's my Jewish stand on things, and it's not much different from the regular Christian thought.

For basics, the original sin was not condemning all mankind. It is taken as a defiance. Jesus did not have to die for our sins, we were not into that. Also, Satan was not the snake which tempted Eve. It was a snake. However, my thoughts compiled from commentaries on the Torah tell me that God may of had "set them up". It may had of been a test as well. All Eve knew is that she was told not to, but curiosity got the better of her. She knew that life had been boring, that they hadn't been doing anything, and wanted to get a taste of knowledge. She took a bite, and you know the rest of the story.

God wouldn't of put the tree there if he didn't expect somebody to want to eat it, right?

 

[master of puppets]

I'll tell ya, its hard to have faith when you're overall a really good person, yet your prayers are not answered and people who are "less faithful" than yourself get so much further ahead than you.
Why is that?

 

[V_For_Vendetta]

Exactly. God had set them up because it was all part of his Plan, The Plan, to have them exiled from the Garden of Eden, He wanted them to truly experience Life (Pain, Hardship, and test us to see if we could make the right choices to return to him someday), so he had them exiled from the Garden.

There you go, there is your dosage of Mormon Proselyting for the day

I knew someone was going to come in with this "God has a plan" nonsense. Just because someone has a plan, doesn't mean you go along with it (Hitler had a LOVELY plan for the entire world, Genocide on a Old Testament God-like scale, yet we didn't exactly go along with that plan now did we?)

And return to the Garden by making the right choices? Thats a Paradox, the ones who you want to return to you, the intelegent thinkers, will be the ones who question you because they aren't the ones to take the word of a few guys in robes and an archaic old book (There is no such thing as second-hand revelation. The Bible is simply hearsay), whereas the people who WILL end up returning to you are little more than sheep, following the will of something they do not know, cannot comprehend, and will not question. If you are telling me that the only way to return to God is to throw my intelegence and curiosity out the window (for the Bible CLEARLY condemns those who question it), then I would rather suffer for eternity as the man I was born with than live forever as a Pretender.

The whole "return to him" thing just fails in the grand scheme of things.

This is a question put in to play in many scenarios in the Bible. "If God knew, why did he do that?" Sometimes you have to except that you just don't know. I have wondered about this topic sometimes. I could probably find an abundance of explanations, but I just choose to except that I will one day understand it. That is called faith.

I don't know why lightning falls from the sky. There must be a guy throwing thunderbolts.
I don't know why we suffer and die. Some woman must have opened a box.
Have faith maybe, but why in YOUR religion? Why can't God simply accept that humans will make their own minds up, and not punish us for eternity for it, is it not the job of a "Father" to love and cherish his children regardless of their choices in life?

There ARE an abundance of explanations for this questions. I tend to think its probably the one being said here the most, which is, God chose to test Adam and Eve, and allow the Devil to tempt them, and they failed. But then, WHY would God do something like that??? Well, something else to remember.

So as I said, before, God set us up to live guilt ridden lives, going into eternity knowing that we will never again return to Paradise (according to Genesis).
He allowed an OBVIOUSLY charismatic demon (lets be honest, Lucifer convinced half the angels of Heaven to rebel, he is obviously a good speaker) to talk to your creations and tempt them? Thats quite the equivilant of Rosevelt allowing Hitler to come over here and make a speach to America during WWII, its utter stupidity.
So why would you want to worship this guy again?

God has NEVER told us everything. And he doesn't have to. God is loving enough to provide a way to escape ****. We are lucky He did that. Not just because we sinned and deserve that, but because as creations, we could be easily destroyed. In laboratories, there are experiements being made every day. Experiements performed to find cures for sicknesses, solutions to energy problems, etc. Most are thrown away, because they failed.

We are lucky he doesn't throw us all into the fire because he made us imperfect and wishes to save some of us from a fate of eternal pain and suffering in a place he made?
The more I hear about God, the more I think of him as a cosmic Hitler, judging and killing those he finds unworthy to be with him, and casting them aside.

If God was looking to creat a perfect world, and Adam and Eve sinned, hence not being perfect, why did God not just destroy the world and start over with a clean slate? Because He is a loving God, as stated. You just need to look around and see all the things you have, and know what you deserve, to see that you have no right to complain.

A loving God who flooded the Earth, made a human sacrifice out of his own son, and set plagues upon innocent people just to prove his existence and his power?
Once again, Nazi much?

But then, back to the question of why would God do something like that? Isn't He all knowing, and all seeing, knowing was has and will happen? Then you come back to faith. Excepting that you don't know, but one day you will know. But it is not blind faith. Faith still requires believing and trusting.

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?

Answer that.

There won't be an explanation for everything here on Earth. God lets us choose to believe what we want. You can believe God "set us up". And so what if He did? Its HIS creation. As stated earlier, you should be lucky He didn't destory our world. When you come back to this question, thats all you have to think about to know how blessed you are to still be here.

Your father made you, so he decides he wants to beat you to death. By your logic, he is allowed to.
A creator has no right to punish a creation for acting out upon the flaws that HE designed into him, thats utter stupidity. If God screwed up making us, guess whos fault it is?
And lucky to be here? Excuse me? I am here thanks to my Mom and Dad, thank you. God did nothing to make me come here. And don't even get started on the immortal soul part, God making an imperfect and violent creature immortal is the most sickening of all his crimes.

 

[SD PokeMom]

i'm a bit confused here: are you attempting to disprove christianity/'god', or just trying to find an alternative world view/religion that doesn't impose the paradoxes you're having issues with?

in matters of faith, often it boils down to an 'agree to disagree' situation. if your point is the former, you're not going to change anyone's mind who has decided that the creator god of the bible is what they believe in.

if you are in fact searching for something that doesn't have all the 'disconnects' you've cited rather than just looking to debate, then you might want to look at other religions with different world views than the judeo-christian creator god; one is this: http://buddhistfaith.tripod.com/beliefs/index.html

for example: one difference in worldview is that people are not seen as sinful, but human...and humans do foolish things. another is that this world/life is not some kind of minefield of 'sin' one must navigate in order to 'earn' their way to an 'afterlife'.

'mom

 

[Xenoz Blaid]

So as I said, before, God set us up to live guilt ridden lives, going into eternity knowing that we will never again return to Paradise (according to Genesis).

You have not read Genesis in it's entirety then. He promised them a Savior. If we keep God's law and trust and believe His word ( unlike Adam and Eve that chose the serpents word and ignored God's word about what would happen if they ate of the fruit) we would be saved from this and once again live in paradise.
We all know that we have not, and cannot keep those things perfectly therefore we need a savior. God knew this and he sent one to us. His own son Jesus Christ who died and took our sins upon Himself. If we believe that we have sinned and are in need of a savior, Jesus will save us.

 

[V_For_Vendetta]

i'm a bit confused here: are you attempting to disprove christianity/'god', or just trying to find an alternative world view that doesn't impose the paradoxes you're having issues with?

I am attempting to get some of these questions answered, I am not here to disprove God or make people into non-believers, I simply want to know how God can be an all loving murderer, and all knowing despite the compounding evidence otherwise.
My arguement is against the Bible, which was written by man. I believe it to be a complete work of fiction, and that there is some all powerful diety out there who is VERY angry about it.

in matters of faith, often it boils down to an 'agree to disagree' situation. if your point is the former, you're not going to change anyone's mind who has decided that the creator god of the bible is what they believe in.

And nor do I want to, I am simply looking for a good few answers to my questions that are in the book that many find to be so holy. People will believe what they believe, I am quite simply curious about their beliefs and have had these questions plaguing me for some time now.

Who better to answer them than the book's followers?

if you are in fact searching for something that doesn't have all the 'disconnects' you've cited rather than just looking to debate, then you might want to look at other religions with different world views than the judeo-christian creator god; one is this: http://buddhistfaith.tripod.com/beliefs/index.html

'mom

Because this is not about other religions, this is about the bible. This is about some extremely confusing facts that have been handed to us by this book, many of which do not make sense. I seek answers to these questions.

And I do not accept "I have faith in this, why don't you" as an answer, and I never will. So if anyone is going to post silliness like that on my thread, I will deal with you accordingly

Back to back posts merged. The following information has been added:

You have not read Genesis then. He promised them a Savior. That Savior is named Jesus Christ.

He promised them nothing, the prophesy of the messiah was made by Isaiah in Isaiah 7:14.

Wasn´t Isaiah actually claiming that the baby would be a sign that a planned siege on Jerusalem during a civil war would fail? In fact, doesn´t the prophet then go on and try to fulfil his own prophesy at Isaiah 8?!

I don't have time right now to say more but I will be back later.

I look forward to it

 

[SD PokeMom]

i don't think you'll find the answers you seek here then; no one will be able to explain these disconnects to your satisfaction. your choice then is to believe or not believe (have faith), walk away and believe in nothing, or find an alternative (different religion you CAN believe in).

please tone down the inflammatory language in future posts though. comparing the god of the bible to hitler isn't going to advance your discussion, but sidetrack what so far has been a well-behaved thread. thanks...

'mom

 

[Xenoz Blaid]

Genesis 3:15 says this " And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."

PS: I did not mean to post that. What i meant to post is now posted. Please read the post again

 

[Kabutops141]

It's just that God gave Adam and Eve one rule. Adam and Eve, though, were human and made a mistake. Their curiosity got the best of them. I don't really understand where you are coming from. God sent a savior, and if we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior and ask for forgiveness, we will be taken to heaven. God is an all-knowing being and IMO, you shouldn't question him. He had a very good reason for telling Adam and Eve not to eat out of the tree, but we, as humans, may not be able to comprehend why he did this. Hopefully this makes sense. Didn't sleep too much last night. x_x

 

[drmario]

Because this is not about other religions, this is about the bible. This is about some extremely confusing facts that have been handed to us by this book, many of which do not make sense. I seek answers to these questions.

And if you read the bible literally then these problems tend to crop up. You can interpret the bible however you like. Some people take it as word for word truth, which in my opinion doesn't work. Interpret how you will. It's entirely up to you.

i don't think you'll find the answers you seek here then; no one will be able to explain these disconnects to your satisfaction. your choice then is to believe or not believe (have faith), walk away and believe in nothing, or find an alternative (different religion you CAN believe in).

I agree.

 

[Xenoz Blaid]

When you boil everything down it all comes to faith that includes evolution.

 

[pkmnvet]

lol Wow, I never thought such a debate would end up on a pokemon site. V for Vendetta, whats the point exactly of this thread? I mean all this will end up doing is boilig down into a really heated argument eventually. Even if you seek answers, you need to understand many of the books followers are at different levels of understanding, so one may know the answer while another does not. Someone of that level of understanding may not be on this forum, however I do know someone who is at a very high level of understanding if you REALLY want these answers.

 

[Umbykirb]

Well, personally for me, I think the Torah (and in many cases, Bible) are just stories used to make the world a better place. One example: Kosher. Kosher is used to keep people healthy by prohibiting most animals that have a chance to give you a disease, also to help keep animal's suffering down. The Ten Commandments are just laws which to live by. It's ethically correct.

Eve ate the Fruit of Knowledge out of curiosity according to the bible. I do not think that we will return to the garden, unlike Mormon beliefs. Dr. Mario said, "And if you read the bible literally then these problems tend to crop up. You can interpret the bible however you like. Some people take it as word for word truth, which in my opinion doesn't work. Interpret how you will. It's entirely up to you." This is very true. If you read some Torah and Bible commentary, you would see that the Rabbis and Priests tried to get lessons out of the stories, to make sense of all that was there. There are so many different ways to interpret the Bible, that if you look too literally it won't make too much sense. This is the problem you encounter, Vendetta.

 

[Prime]

I like to chat about the logistics of things. I find the Bible is a topic that pops up a lot.

Adam/Eve must have had more than one rule. They couldn't have killed one another, or lie to god, or do any of that bad stuff that is mentioned in the 10 commandments (I know that came out way after them, but it makes sense since it was given by God). I doubt God told Adam/Eve, "Okay, you can do whatever you want, kill each other, mutilate animals, etc, but don't eat from that one tree."

People have said that Adam/Eve were bored. Bored? Come on, they only had one rule (supposedly)! Some guy drops you off in the middle of a paradise and gives you one rule, that is easy not to break, and you get bored?

God didn't tell Adam/Eve to multiply until after they had sinned, so I'm guessing that Adam/Eve probably didn't have permission to do much at all. I'm guessing that there were other rules that God gave them, but maybe one "special" rule.

And I think it all goes back to God. God put that tree there. He made everything, so he made Satan talk to Eve, which led to the humans sinning, which lead to humans being impure and sin-filled for the entire history of them. What kind of God does this?

I'm not trying to slander God, but think about some of the stuff he's done (or controlled since he controls everything and made everything), and explain to me how he is perfect and never errs. Don't get it.

 

[Water Pokemon Master]

Like I said, God gave His creations a choice to sin or not. The Devil was an angel who got the idea in his mind that he could rise up and be equal to God. If He had not given us a choice, we would be mindless beings who only love Him because we were programmed to. What kind of existence is that? We are all tested every day - He only wants, I think, people who pledge allegiance to Him in spite of sin and goodness existing (faith). You are a better human being if you live under His Word with sin around you.

 

[ryanvergel]

It is a prerequisite that God is omniscient, so doing something or having a destiny that He would not know of is impossible. That means that the only possible actions we can make are actions that coincide with what will yield the destiny He knew we were going to have.

Our actions are predetermined, they follow a set path that God already knows about. We are unable to change our actions into anything unknown or against God. Therefore, we do NOT truly have free will in the sense that our Destiny is in our own hands. We follow a set path, the path God is said to have set for us. If all actions are done through, by, and for God, we have no means of changing our path to conflict with His will, and our acts and end is known, then there can be no such thing as free will in context to Christianity.


This proves that there is no such thing as free will. If there is no such thing as free will, that means all sin was forced to occur. This follows the Bible exactly:

For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

I always thought that God doesn't care about us at all. The companionship we must offer Him might be compared to the companionship a quark offers me or you. Think of our overall insignificance compared to Him. We must be lower than nothingness in comparison. It's like dividing by zero- we are meaningless. I truly feel He could care less what I do. At best we might be described as an experiment on some random planet in the Universe. I think the fact of my worshiping or not worshiping Him doesn't really matter to Him in the slightest.

The older I get the more I begin to feel the essence of God. The feeling isn't one of companionship or anything like that, but it's sort of like feeling the interconnectedness of all matter and energy. God would be energy, and matter is merely slowed energy- in essence I feel as though I am merely a less perfect of "God"- or energy. The beauty in the Universe and the randomness and the connection I feel with everything is what I attribute God to be. I think God is more of a state of mind or perspective than anything else.

 

[Rambo1000]

why would you take the bible literally in the first place?

 

[drmario]

why would you take the bible literally in the first place?

Good question. Argh 17 characters.

 

[ryanvergel]

why would you take the bible literally in the first place?

cuz god told us 2?? duhh :nonono:sychic: