Lets say for a moment god exists!!(Ha Ha…yes I know that sounds a bit far fetched)…anyway, lets say someone dies in a car crash. He was taken away by God to be with him in heaven!!(The easiest explanation to his kids) Does that make him a cruel and unjust God for taking him away from his family, causing them pain and anguish?. Sure sounds like it to me.
Any religious fanatics out there, please dont give me that “Gods’ will” crap. If you cant come up with a better answer dont answer at all.
Not a fanatic here nor even religous not even close. I agree about God’s will crap. To attribute cruelty to an omnipotent being is a tad far fetched. Cruelty is in the ego category and I sincerely doubt such a creature would need an ego boost. If a God does take a soul to be with it, then there must be either a pleasent reason or a bad reason. I think that if the reason were bad such as, the god needed a servant or slave, then it would really cause alot of pain and panic. So people prefer that God takes a soul to their version of a happy place. That is if you wish to attribute Gods reaching down and killing people just to either alleve their suffering or to use them for some unpleasant reason. I can’t picture an omnipotent being doing that.
Death of your body is just a neccessary part of biological existence. Otherwise this planet and others would be really crammed full of all manner of creatures. It is the energy of your soul that moves on and becomes or goes somewhere else, you do not stop existing you just change your physical body for something else. There maybe an omnipotent being guiding your energy but, I think it is more akin to a traffic cop or director, then any godliness.
Some godforms are incredibly “cruel”, whilst other godforms are incredibly “kind”. It all depends on which one you are talking about, and “what” that particular godform “is”.
Ohh noooooooooooo! Poor God! How can you slander Him like that???
“Him”?
Get out while you still can, oldphil. This forum is full of what Zappa called “Po-jama People.”
Listen to the song and report back to me.
Of course God is cruel, He/She/It was invented by Human Beings after all… Heh heh.
I don’t believe in God, but I think the idea could go lsomething like this.
God is going to place you with your friends and family forever when you die, so even a lifetime apart from any one of them is pretty much nothing, so shut up and quit whining.
Why do you suppose God had anything to do with the accident? You completly ignor free will. It is your choice to drive, not Gods. Why blame Him? 
I guess if I’m not willing to start any threads, I can’t complain, so here goes.
Oldphil, I have a hard time believing that this will actually turn into a conversation between you and I, because that’s not your style, but if you do any any response or rebuttal to what I’m about to write, it would like to see it just the same.
Anyways: When bad things happen to people like car accidents, it causes very complex reactions in the social world around that person. Both up and down- yes, dying sucks, and the family is upset. Maybe somebody destined to be really important in some way learns from this to buckle their seatbelt. Maybe a grieving family member starts some charity and helps a lot of people. Maybe none of that happens. Point is, you can look at all the good things and bad things that spark from any particular event, and the event you’re considering doesn’t even have to be a tragedy itself- someone being spared in a car accident could have consequences every bit as tragic as someone dying in one.
No matter how you slice it then, horrible things do happen. Does this mean that God is cruel? To my way of thinking, part of the definition of cruelty is excessiveness. Since we don’t know what God is up to, we can’t say if the amount of suffering in the world is more than it had to be, or not. So I don’t think we can say yes or no on ‘cruel’. God is mean, though. But He’s also right, and that’s always been more important than being nice.
OldPhil, I’m curious about the implication of your argument- if God is mean, or heck, even if God is cruel, does that affect how people should behave towards God, or the likelihood of God’s existing?
God is not cruel. He has given us freewill to do as we please down here. On occasion God does enact His will down here accordingly, but the primary point is that we have free will and all the cruelty that is enacted upon us is not by God, but by mankind. When God strikes a man down it is because there is a specific reason for it. Being punished for a very specific issue is not cruelty, even when it may appear to be by our standards! We are limited in comparison to God, so we will never be able to fully comprehend Gods nature!
God is not cruel, everything that is done against us will be avenged by God. Taking vengeance against someone for harming another is not a typical trait of a cruel being! God is all about Faith, Justice, and Mercy.
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let’s say you exist. I know a bit far fetched. After all, I’ve only read your words via the computer terminal sitting in front of me. How can I know that you aren’t a reploid?
says who? Was God behind the wheel of the car? Did God tell the driver to get behind the wheel even though he was drunk?
sure, let’s blame all of OUR problems on something/someone else.
That’s the Freudian answer. We’re screwed up. It’s gods… er our parent’s fault.
This is just, yet another way to deny self responsibility for what happens in your life. It has nothing to do with whether or not god is cruel, or even whether or not the sodding bastard exists.
what would you expect from such a common heresy post?
besides you aren’t going to find any religious fanatics here.
I see that you’ve already got several good answers. The point is, personal responsibility/free will.