If God is omniscient, he must already know how he is going to intervene to change the course of history using his omnipotence. But that means he can’t change his mind about his intervention, which means he is not omnipotent.
—Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion (2008), p. 101
If there is one thing I learned while studying theology, it is that everything ends in mystery and paradox. Every single theology issue, if you get deep enough, ends with a variation of the phrase “it’s a mystery.” This is seen as profound and wonderful.
How can Jesus be 100% God, and yet 100% man? Mystery. How can God be good and command the Israelites to commit genocide over and over again? Mystery. How can God be merciful and torture unbelievers in hell for all eternity? You got it: Mystery.
Sounds a lot like pseudoscience. How does homeopathic medicine work if it’s so diluted? Mystery. How does acupuncture stimulate the chi energy in your body? Mystery. How do aliens get people out of their beds in the middle of the night without anyone noticing? Mystery. And why do they enjoy making crop circles in the middle of nowhere? That’s right, mystery!
In other words, they don’t have clue what they’re talking about. By their own admission, it’s all mystery. They can’t figure it out. They just have to believe whatever their holy book says. And if it doesn’t make sense — and much of it doesn’t — then you can ask Jesus about it when you go to heaven.
I do indeed find Christianity mysterious. It’s mysterious I could have believed it so long when I was really so wrong.
John C: Anti-no, “I” dont have any credibility either but the difference is that “I”m not... 
Custador: “Matt and Mark record “My God, My God, Why hast Thou forsaken me?”; John, “It is finished”; and Luke,... 
Daniel Florien: When you have indigestion when you’re reading it, you know it’s true! 
Mary Lynne: Hmm – I wonder what a “true fairy tale” would be. Is that like jumbo... 
Antiutopia: John C — Christ himself doesn’t have any credibility with these ignorant morons — do you... 
Uzza: Cool story. It reminds me of Confucius, meeting the mad hermit of Chu, who told him it was... 
Sunny Day: Custador if you’re waiting for hope, you might want to pack a few extra lunches and update your will.... 
23 Comments
Why do people listen to Coldplay? Mystery.
It’s okay, I used to believe it too. The thing that got me out was my ability to just keep thinking about the very things that you mention. If you stop your emotions for a bit and really do some critical, rational thinking, you’ll realize that Christianity doesn’t make a goddamned bit of sense. Then it all falls apart, and you become better off. :)
luke O’dell: Because they are gay, they said so in “forty year old virgin movie”,….why would they lie?
“If God is omniscient, he must already know how he is going to intervene to change the course of history using his omnipotence. But that means he can’t change his mind about his intervention, which means he is not omnipotent.” – Dawkins
I hate to have to repeat this because it has been said so many times: the traditional Christian definition of omnipotence is not that God can do anything. The idea is that God has absolute power with respect to His creation; He can do what He wants with what He has created. One way of putting it is that God can do “all His holy will.”
There are many things God cannot do. He cannot lie. He cannot do the illogical (make square circles, etc.). He cannot limit Himself (make a rock so big He cannot move it, etc.). He cannot sin (because He does not want to). And He cannot change His reaction to what He finds in His creation (He will always react to what He finds in the way that is consistent with His nature.).
Dawkins does not even attempt to interact in a deep way with Christian theology or with the traditional arguments for God’s existence.
“By their own admission, it’s all mystery. They can’t figure it out. They just have to believe whatever their holy book says. And if it doesn’t make sense — and much of it doesn’t — then you can ask Jesus about it when you go to heaven.”
Many things in Christian theology have answers that are not mysterious. Even when the Christian faith does invoke mystery, there is nothing necessarily illogical about what it says.
Science has many mysteries (things it cannot yet explain), but we don’t abandon science because it doesn’t explain everything.
“Dawkins does not even attempt to interact in a deep way with Christian theology or with the traditional arguments for God’s existence.”
Part of the problem here is that Dawkins is looking at Christian Theology from the outside. And from the outside Christian Theology looks like a towering edifice founded and braced on mere assertion. It is all connected and perhaps logically consistent, but it rests on … nothing at all.
Take your statement that “[God] cannot lie.” What is this statement based on? What evidence can you present? You cannot even say that it’s biblical, since God is depicted as lying in the Hebrew Testament.
To Dawkins, this makes theology potentially interesting, but ultimately worthless. How can we verify any of your assertions? Why can’t God limit himself? Certain esoteric types of Jewish theology have God limiting himself, by actually removing himself from creation. He created a place where he was not, in order to create something new in that place. Having done so, he has limited his ability to interact with creation.
Which brings up another point. So how do we judge between these two types of theology? History tells us that the matter is usually resolved either by force or by popularity vote. But is this really a way to judge the veracity of a theological statement?
Science, at least, offers us a way to judge between competing theories. They make predictions, those predictions are tested against reality, and the one that produces the most consistently accurate results is more likely to be (small t) truth. When science faces a mystery, is usually offers some means of exploring the edges of the mystery, and some hopeful avenues of research that may lead us to the answer – avenues that don’t involved dying and finding out in heaven, I might add.
The assertions made by Christianity are backed by logical arguments with verifiable premises. Books on that sort of thing abound. If Christianity is based on sound arguments, your assertions fail.
“…since God is depicted as lying in the Hebrew Testament.”
Please provide a reference on that one.
“…He created a place where he was not, in order to create something new in that place.”
But He was not limited by His creation. He was still able to present. That’s all Christian theology requires.
@J.K. Jones:
“Books on that sort of thing abound. If Christianity is based on sound arguments, your assertions fail.”
Humor me. What are these premises?
“Please provide a reference on that one.”
Probably the most famous example is in 1 Kings, 22:20-23, where Micah explains that God has sent a lying spirit to the court prophets, so that Ahab would go and be killed at Ramothgilead.
Obviously, this is a bit confusing, since Micah is apparently going against God here to tell Ahab about the lie. It’s most likely a spat between the court prophets and the wandering prophet Micah. But the fact remains that Micah does suggest that God would lie, and the court prophets do not react to that but to the suggestion that Micah has some priority over them. The notion that God could lie did exist, and appears to be part of biblical theology.
There are some further references: [KJV]
Ezekiel 14:9 – “And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the LORD have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand upon him, and will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel.”
2 Thessalonians 2:11-12 “And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. ”
My favorite reference might derail the thread, but I’ll throw it out anyway: Gen.2:17 “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”
Yes, “For **in the day** that thou eatest thereof…” The most natural reading of this is that death will result from eating the apple within the day – or at least very swiftly. This is either a threat, “eat it and I’ll kill you,” or a warning, “it’s poison.” Neither turn out to be true, in fact it’s the serpent that’s telling the truth here. I maintain that without reading anything to the text and forcing it into some preconceived ideal, the only reasonable conclusion is that God lied. They did not die **in that day,** nor did they die swiftly.
This is important, because I think it’s an artifact of a pagan time, and the serpent is Nehushtan. (Quick quiz, what form of locomotion did the serpent have before he was cursed? My guess: he flew. The winged serpent, Nehushtan, which later got turned into Moses’s bronze serpent symbol [2 King 18:4] as myth became legend.) Here we have a very pagan version of YHWH, or perhaps some previous “God Most High,” lying to his servants so they don’t go mucking around with the magic fruit that he and the other gods eat. This type of story would fit very well in early Mesopotamian myth, but these types of myth got cleaned up and philosophized by the priestly authors of the Pentateuch. Except for the occasional hiccup, like this one …
“But He was not limited by His creation. He was still able to present.”
Actually, in this theology, God was absent. In forming a place for creation, he had exiled himself from the world. (This theology came about after the Jews were kicked out of Spain in the middle ages, so the theme of exile was a very powerful one.)
I’m not saying that this theology is right and that your stream of Christian theology is wrong. I’m saying that a great many types of theology can be created, each reasonable and logically consistent. But since evidence does not enter the picture, it is impossible to judge between them in an objective manner.
Wow! I’d never heard of Nehushtan before. Thanks for the background!
A clumsy bit of sophistry from Dawkins who, along with many others in this conversation places God in time and space when He transcends them both. That is a mystery all right, one we’re not, limited to space and time, likely to work out anytime soon.
In the case of Micaiah (not Micah) the lying spirit was sent because there was no love of the truth (same as in 2 Thessalonians 2) and truth would not be accepted. The KJV was all right for 1611, but try reading those references in more modern translations and, for goodness sake, read the context!
The death of Adam and Eve was a spiritual death (separation from God — Romans 5:12; Ephesians 2:1-7) initially that began the day they ate the fruit and resulted in physical death many years later.
@dwhitsett
“The KJV was all right for 1611 …”
Yup. Beats me why anyone pays any attention to it nowadays.
@dwhitsett:
“A clumsy bit of sophistry from Dawkins who, along with many others in this conversation places God in time and space when He transcends them both. That is a mystery all right, one we’re not, limited to space and time, likely to work out anytime soon.”
Seems like an easy cop-out to me. If you’re going to explain any paradox by essentially saying the normal rules of the universe don’t apply, then you can never be proven wrong. That’s not an explanation, it’s just a way for you to avoid providing an answer.
@dwhitsett:
Putting what trj said in another way–You are merely blabbing a tired set of assertions that have no validity in reality. Your assertions are an irrational attempt to avoid the reality of your eventual, unavoidable death (non existence). Your theology is motivated by your fear of death and by those who exploit that fear.
The idea of a god not limited by space and time is a modern idea that never would have occurred to ignorant men who thought the earth was flat and the center of the universe. Their god was nothing more than a magic, super human being who promised his followers an escape from death. That promise is the oldest con of them all.
@dwitsett -
“That is a mystery all right, one we’re not, limited to space and time, likely to work out anytime soon.”
Well, see, that’s the problem. This kind of statement cuts both ways. If the nature of God is beyond our understanding, then there is nothing that we can say about God. The statement, “God is a liar,” is meaningless. But so is, “God is love,” or “God is jealous,” and so forth. You can’t play the mystery card, then turn around and make a statement about the will of God.
They say that whenever Gautama Buddha was asked about the Gods, he simply became silent. That may be the only reasonable response to any question about God.
“In the case of Micaiah (not Micah)”
1. Yes, sorry about the name. The spellchecker got away from me.
2. The KJV was handy. Generally, we atheists don’t have very many study bibles laying around – though there are exceptions.
3. I know the contexts, but I don’t see them as meaningful to the argument. The statement that we were debating was whether or not God can lie. The justification for that lie is immaterial.
4. “Spiritual death” is not part of the text. I repeat, there is no natural reading of Gen. 2:17 that produces anything like “spiritual death.” If you start bringing things into the text, there is literally no limit to the things you can draw from the reading. You might as well take up Kabbalah and declare that God exiled himself from the garden of Eden.
“The assertions made by Christianity are backed by logical arguments with verifiable premises.”
So is “The apple I am holding is green. Green apples are delicious. Therefore the apple I am holding is delicious.”
The problem is that, though there are premises here, and they’re verifiable, and they’re organised into a logical argument, I’m not holding an apple.
Just because an argument is valid and the premises are verifiable doesn’t mean it’s true.
In the same way, “God is all-powerful within his creation. Beings that are all-powerful within their creations cannot limit themselves. Therefore God cannot limit himself” rests on the assumption that God exists. If God doesn’t exist, and there’s no proof he does, then the whole edifice crumbles.
Which was Dawkins’ point.
Oh, and don’t tell us to read things in context, it really doesn’t make it any better. Genocide, murder, incest, rape, (incestuous rape, to get into a little category mixing), are bad things no matter what the context is. God, according to His Holy Word, caused all these things to happen. Context for the story of Ammon and Tamar, for example (did I get those names right?), just lays more of the blame at God’s feet.
“3. I know the contexts, but I don’t see them as meaningful to the argument. The statement that we were debating was whether or not God can lie. The justification for that lie is immaterial.”
thats just like a scientist excluding certain results from a test, just because they didn’t like the results… that’s backwards science, and all you science believers would be waiting in line to rape that scientist.
it could be compared to a president ignoring certain constitutional rights endowed to everyone just because it would benefit his long term goals; if i recall right, everyone has been pretty upset at the last guy to do that…
why should you be able to do the same? are you an authority on this subject?
if i’m not mistaken, most of the world population is preaching unity, acceptance, and tolerance. why can christians not be tolerated just like the muslims, jews, catholics, buddhists, and the like? why should they be the only excluded group? or better yet, why don’t you start tearing the koran or the book of mormon apart? oh thats right, those religions are tolerated…
@kt -
“thats just like a scientist excluding certain results from a test, just because they didn’t like the results… that’s backwards science, and all you science believers would be waiting in line to rape that scientist.”
Wow. Poe’s law and all, I’ll try to answer you.
The statement that I was responding to was J.K. Jones’s comment that, “[God] cannot lie.” Do you see the construction there? CANNOT. Not that he wouldn’t lie without good reason, but that by His very nature he CANNOT lie. I was responding by, among other things, saying that statement was not born out by the Bible.
The references to the bible depict God as being able to lie. Whatever the justification for that lie, the depiction of God as being able to lie is the important part. Drawing only from these references, we can say that God CAN lie. Maybe he wouldn’t without overwhelming reason, maybe because someone can’t handle the truth, but these references all say that God CAN lie.
“why can christians not be tolerated just like the muslims, jews, catholics, buddhists, and the like?”
You’re getting a certain amount of ribbing in the comments section of a atheist blog. If this is your idea of “intolerance,” then you’ve been leading a very sheltered life.
kt’s also been living a very sheltered life if he thinks that a) Christians are somehow less tolerated in North American society that any other religious group and b) that we’d hesitate to roast any sacred cow a believer chose to drive onto this comment thread.
Of course the language in that comment is kind of revealing: “Why can Christians not be tolerated like the Muslims, Jews, Catholics, Buddhists, and the like?”
First off, kt, my Catholic mother would like me to tell you to read the definition of Christian.
Secondly, “tolerate” implies putting up with something, enduring its presence. To quote Lehrer:
“Step up and shake the hand,
of someone you can’t stand
You can … tolerate him, if you try”
I don’t tolerate people because they’re religious. I tolerate them when they’re @$$#013s but I can’t get away from them.
Thirdly, we’re perfectly happy to slap around any sacred text you give us, I’m sure. But the god we happen to be covering here happens to belong to a particular monotheism, which uses one particular sheaf of poorly-translated nomadic shepherds’ tales as its particular sacred book.
Oh my. I’d missed the “Catholic” slip there.
So tell us, kt, do you think that Catholics are really Babylonian sun worshipers?
VJ: technically, yes.
HAIL MITHRAS!
But seriously, as for the roasting of sacred cows, I prefer to pan-fry them, with some bacon in the pan for flavouring and maybe some consecrated-wine marinade.
Anything else this recipe needs?
Maybe a few jesus corpse crackers on the side, with ketchup.
dwhitsett said:
A clumsy bit of sophistry from Dawkins who, along with many others in this conversation places God in time and space when He transcends them both. That is a mystery all right, one we’re not, limited to space and time, likely to work out anytime soon.
Then why did god create people? And why ask (or rather, demand) them to believe in him?
In the case of Micaiah (not Micah) the lying spirit was sent because there was no love of the truth (same as in 2 Thessalonians 2) and truth would not be accepted.
A lot of people here (as well as de-conversion.com and exchristian.net) are former churchgoers who did a lot of searching, prayin’ and thinking about this stuff. I know you did not accuse us of not loving the truth, so let me pre-empt that here.
The KJV was all right for 1611, but try reading those references in more modern translations and, for goodness sake, read the context!
Ahh, yes, context. It’s interesting that when christians try to use the bible to condemn or control, they never care about the context of anybody’s life. Yet when people have you in a corner, all of a sudden, we have to put the bible in context. Why should you get it both ways?
@ Blue Nine
“Ahh, yes, context. It’s interesting that when christians try to use the bible to condemn or control, they never care about the context of anybody’s life.”
That’s a very bold statement. Christians never care about the context of anybody’s life? Could you explain what you mean? Not saying you’re wrong, it just strikes me as a huge and probably inaccurate generalization which requires some backing up.
um, moral absolutism?
ie stealing is always wrong, even when it’s stealing a loaf of bread to feed your family?
and suchlike