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Who decides what is ultimately evil, spiteful, or cruel? The most powerful God? Isn't that just supernatural might-makes-right? For God to be beyond good and e

Who decides what is ultimately evil, spiteful, or cruel? The most powerful God? Isn't that just supernatural might-makes-right? For God to be beyond good and evil, someone (probably God) has to have the authority to decide that. This is analogous to the concept of standing in the legal code. So even to say that God is beyond evil, you'd have to admit that there's some ultimate judge out there somewhere. And therefore something that defines what doesn't count as evil.

krapp 11y ago
>Who decides what is ultimately evil, spiteful, or cruel? The most powerful God? Isn't that just supernatural might-makes-right? Basically, yes. In the Book of Job, God's justification for visiting such cruelty onto an admittedly righteous man who didn't deserve it (to win a bet with Satan, no less) was, in essence, "Because I'm God, and you're not." God doesn't have to play by human rules, humans have to play by God's rules. In many old religions, divine beings had no problem killing any mortal they pleased - and the strongest gods tended to be the most petty and violent of the lot. They were manifestations of the wanton and arbitrary power of the natural world. The Old Testament God seems to be cast from the same mold - murder is a sin, but if He commands you to kill your firstborn, you'd better not hesitate. It's not a satisfactory philosophical answer for modern times but it is an answer. The modern version of this seems to be "God works in mysterious ways," but it's a reformulation of the same argument - God is essentially alien, and not a moral being as humans understand morality.
- humanrebar 11y ago
  It's different in monotheistic theology. In pantheism, not all gods create everything equally. And the gods don't (typically) agree on what is fair and unfair. So the conundrum there is that the most powerful gods ends up winning 'moral' arguments, at least while they can. As for the God of the Bible, I don't understand your point. It seems fair to say that people might not understand the whole picture and that it's not fair to judge God with limited wisdom and perspective. This attitude was Job's sin, not merely being weaker than God. Are you claiming specific charges against the God of the Bible? Based on whose measure of morality?
  - krapp 11y ago
    I'm not making any claims, just presenting alternative approaches to the problem. The apparent paradox of the "problem of evil" in Christianity depends upon a specific interpretation of the nature of God which the Bible itself doesn't always support. A being that is beyond understanding cannot be merely good or evil, because those are human concepts, which humans understand.

krapp 11y ago

>Who decides what is ultimately evil, spiteful, or cruel? The most powerful God? Isn't that just supernatural might-makes-right? Basically, yes. In the Book of Job, God's justification for visiting such cruelty onto an admittedly righteous man who didn't deserve it (to win a bet with Satan, no less) was, in essence, "Because I'm God, and you're not." God doesn't have to play by human rules, humans have to play by God's rules. In many old religions, divine beings had no problem killing any mortal they pleased - and the strongest gods tended to be the most petty and violent of the lot. They were manifestations of the wanton and arbitrary power of the natural world. The Old Testament God seems to be cast from the same mold - murder is a sin, but if He commands you to kill your firstborn, you'd better not hesitate. It's not a satisfactory philosophical answer for modern times but it is an answer. The modern version of this seems to be "God works in mysterious ways," but it's a reformulation of the same argument - God is essentially alien, and not a moral being as humans understand morality.

humanrebar 11y ago
It's different in monotheistic theology. In pantheism, not all gods create everything equally. And the gods don't (typically) agree on what is fair and unfair. So the conundrum there is that the most powerful gods ends up winning 'moral' arguments, at least while they can. As for the God of the Bible, I don't understand your point. It seems fair to say that people might not understand the whole picture and that it's not fair to judge God with limited wisdom and perspective. This attitude was Job's sin, not merely being weaker than God. Are you claiming specific charges against the God of the Bible? Based on whose measure of morality?
- krapp 11y ago
  I'm not making any claims, just presenting alternative approaches to the problem. The apparent paradox of the "problem of evil" in Christianity depends upon a specific interpretation of the nature of God which the Bible itself doesn't always support. A being that is beyond understanding cannot be merely good or evil, because those are human concepts, which humans understand.