and here in this country, we like to back things up with logical arguments, as opposed to randomly stating things
bxr, you just BLEW MY MiND. i looked at the universe as being God, then thought about how its like each planet and sun is like a single atom. Man, that really gives scale to the lives of men.
What if God didnt know the future? He may just be watching us real-time 
If we are all a part of God, as a drop of water is a part of the ocean, then essentially, being that drop of water, we would have free will: BUT!
But; we would be largely influenced by our surroundings, our environment. The other billions of drops of water would have a large impact on us.
We would live with free will, as would all the other drops - The thing is; even if we have free will, it doesnt mean our will is limitless and it doesnt mean we can choose what we want done to us. Other drops of water may do something to you that dont expect, want or like and such is life.
God may have put us here with our ‘free will’, given us his commandments and simply sat back and watched how we all interpreted him and his commandments, how we live or lived, what we decide and decided, why we decided what we did and why we decide what we do. How much we learnt and why we learnt it.
…and I suppose most importantly: How good or bad we were in the world and life he gave us.
Ghandi has really opened my mind to religion and while I definatly may be wrong, this is what I have been lead to conclude and believe.
W.C.
Well put, W.C. Well put…
The fact of the matter is that the all powerful all knowing god of mainstream religions today have no idea if God is all knowing and all powerful. Now if God did know everything and was all powerful, I’m sure with his all powerfulness he would be able to keep himself busy with perhaps other wordly creations outside of our space or time perspective… Perhaps even control all mirror dimensions that may exist… Like it is said, “All things that can happen, do happen” so perhaps in all instances of other dimensions he is also controlling them as well. Being an all knowing being means he must have the capacity to be all knowing. I’m just confusing myself at this point but if you understand then yeah.
I would say that being all-knowing and all-powerful are infinities of the highest degree, ie. no matter how many dimensions God are keeping track of and controlling, he would still be able to track and control infinitely more.
Which in turn would mean that boredom is not an option for God… Being all powerful he has the ability to be outside the box, and outside of boredoms power because his power is more than anything else. Maybe he plays solitaire?
Hi Lasko,
I normally avoid such discussions about the Ineffable, but why do you make human experience the basis of your assumtions about God in eternity?
I think the images that people are conjuring up are a result of taking things literally that are meant figuratively. The language of spiritual experience is limited, but that is because it is an interpretation for something ineffable.
The most spiritual always stress the otherliness of their experience, the failure of language or eloquence, as well as the existentiality of the message. It seems unbecoming to me to ridicule what I don’t understand - even though I know you didn’t mean to.
Shalom
Good post Bob, and I agree with you there in some aspects but making human experience the basis of my assumption about God in eternity is a bit more logical in the sense that Christianity bases its God off of a Human/God named Jesus who was another rise-form-the-dead God, regardless of his divinity he appears human and we can assume if God is able to give birth to a begotten son he is also capable of knowing any human experience we feel because of his all knowingness and all powerful abilities. Now maybe I took your post a bit further than you expected but could you ellaborate a bit more on what you mean. To me your post seemed a bit hazy and hidden behind a wall that could be shown easier.
On a sidenote, could god be infinitely finite?
Interesting speculation. If God has infinite abilities, that doesn’t exactly quantify them, because there are several different flavors of infinity. There are the completely singular uncountable varieties, or the countable infinities that arise from limits. We can’t do anything or say anything about the former.
But about the latter. Suppose God’s abilities, energy, resources, ect were an infinity of a certain order. Would He then create a universe that was finite? Or an infinity of a lesser order? Or an equal order?
A finite universe just seems rather unlike the product of an infinite God. I think, and certainly hope, that it is infinite in extent. I would expect that out of something made by God.
If the order of the universe is less than the order of His power, then He can reserve an infinite amount of control over every aspect of the universe.
But if the order of the universe is an infinity of the same order as His power, He can only exert a finite amount of control over each part of it.
(If it were of a greater order, he could only exert zero power over each part of it, and therefore couldn’t create such a universe over a finite span of time.)
The idea that God’s infinite power spread over an infinite universe (of an equal order in size, complexity, and degree of scale) would allow only a finite amount of control over each part of the universe yeilds some rather interesting, and seldom considered theological possibilities. Would it be in God’s nature to make a universe of a lesser order than what He could accomplish, for the sake of maintaining exact control over it? Or would His nature require him to create a universe that was of an equal order to His ability?
MRM1101, god is not infinitely powerful he is ALL-powerful. There is no possible situation where all the power is not his as this would contradict his nature.
Who said that we’re the only channel that g-d’s watching?
no offense evryone but why are we talking about god…again?
i’d say that one good reason is because this is a PHILOSOPHY FORUM. Remember that.
well then
what you believe debates the facts of average life
for no real reason, you people go on and on about
some crazy idiot who can’t wait to kill the very thing
he made it’s pointless to make something if your going
to destroy it and can only support it spirtually wich has
a good risk of suicide just to meet the idiot.
First off- Agnostic. They’re not my beliefs.
Second- I was just pointing out that (and get this) you’re in the RELIGION SECTION of a PHILOSOPY FORUM. I wonder what people are going to talk about in there. Hmm… Could it be… YES! RELIGION! You think people are going to talk about cooking or nice resorts here? No. They’re going to talk about God, Satan, Buddah, Zeus, and/or any other supreme being out there being worshipped.
The way I look at it is this- People believe in things like a ‘god’ or a divine force because people need something to believe in. If everybody thought that there was nothing waiting for them after death, many people would have no hope. Faith and religion are there to help get people through the day. That’s what I find it to boil down to.
[size=75]Also, if you could, do us all a favor and spice up your writing with a bit more punctuation and perhaps even some good grammar.[/size]
The word of Allah (God) in the Qur’an says
6:59 With Him(GOD) are the keys of the unseen, the treasures that none knoweth but He. He knoweth whatever there is on the earth and in the sea. Not a leaf doth fall but with His knowledge: there is not a grain in the darkness (or depths) of the earth, nor anything fresh or dry (green or withered), but is (inscribed) in a record clear (to those who can read).
you mean the treasures called lifes that which he (god) seals in heaven
treasure box 1=angels
treasure box 2=unborn humans
treasure box 3=unborn demon rulers (like satan)
no secret lasts forever god is a keeper of souls and i don’t respect his rule
we are the holy spirit we (me) shall know what he(god) knows because i am
of him (god) you believe the bible because you are a believer i am not so i know what you rely on (lies).