If God is all powerful, then why can’t he stop evil from happening? That would mean he’s not all powerful. If God refuses to prevent evil, then he can not be all good. So can a Christian explain how God is all powerful and good in this case?

Certainly that logical fallacy, a superficial ignorant parroted polemic (such as invokes everything from the Flood to AIDS as a moral argument against God), can be answered.

For unless you want a world in which mankind is like a cloud or a robot, then allowing evil is a necessary good if:

And which consequences can affect others as well as self, directly or indirectly.

But which God can make to ultimately work out for what is Good, in the light of all that can be known.

Which includes just punishment for eternal beings which manifest they wanted the opposite of God, (John 3:19–21) though only being punished according to what they could and did choose to do, (Deuteronomy 24:16; Luke 10:1- 15; Revelation 20:12; cf. 2 Corinthians 8:12) while making all to work out to the benefit of those who honestly choose Him over sin, seeking and finding the mercy of God in the Lord Christ. (Roman 8:28)

1. made us (and angels) with no moral standard or sense or deprived us from the moral ability to respond to or choose good [morally insensible, even as with clouds].

2. granted us free moral agency, but never have given us anything to choose between [negation of moral choices, and no devil or God].

3. left man only with recourse to finite competing sources as his ultimate object of spiritual affection and allegiance and source of security, and supreme judge of what is good [atheism and atheistic governments].

4. called man to make the Creator their ultimate object of spiritual affection and allegiance and source of security as being what is right and what is best for man, versus finite created beings or things being one's "god," and provided moral revelation and influences. Yet always have moved us to do good, and never have allowed us to choose evil (even if as by making believing in God and choosing good so utterly compelling — like God appearing daily and always doing miracles on demand, and preventing any seeming evidence to the contrary - so that no man could attempt to make excuses for not believing in Him [effective negation of any freedom to choose]).

5. allowed created beings a negative alternative to faithfulness to the creator, and the ability to choose evil, but immediately reversed any effects and not penalized such [negation of consequences to choices].

6. allowed us to do bad, but restricted us to a place where it would harm no one but ourselves [isolated consequences to choices].

7. allowed us to choose between good and evil, and to affect others by it, but not ultimately reward or punish us accordingly [negation of judicial and eternal consequences, positive or negative].

8. given us the ability to choose, and alternatives to chose between, and to face and overcome evil or be overcome by it, with the ability to effect others and things by our choices, and to exercise some reward or punishment in this life for morality, and ultimately reward or punishment all accordingly [pure justice].

9. restrained evil to some degree, while making the evil that man does to work out for what is Good, with justice yet with mercy, and grace, towards those who want good, and who thus the One who is supremely Good.

10. in accordance with 8, the Creator could have chose to manifest Himself in the flesh, and by Him to provide man a means of escaping the ultimate retribution of Divine justice, and instead receive unmerited eternal favor, at God's own expense and credit, appropriated by a repentant obedient faith, in addition to the loss or gaining of certain rewards based on one's quality of work as a child of God. And eternally punish, to varying degrees relative to iniquity and accountability, those whose response to God's revelation manifested they want evil, [justice maintained while mercy and grace given].

and who is very ignorant of what all the effects of his choices have been and will be, in time and eternity,

and quite impotent to make them all work out as he/she wants, not only in one’s own life but in others,

is in no position to sit in judgment upon an omniscient and omnipotent being and giver of life,

who alone knows what all the effects will be of even our most seemingly insignificant actions or inactions,

And can make all work out for what is Good, for what is just, as well as showing mercy and grace.

And which the God of the Bible has often manifestly done already, and promises to do for those who choose the ultimate Good, the living and true God, (Romans 8:28) by His grace, thanks be to God.

This the choices of an omniscient omnipotent Being cannot be judged as being evil or good by extremely finite and relatively ignorant man. Not that - in my ignorance myself - I have/do not too often protested His dealing with me as I subjectively imagined Him, though objectively blessed, and I am being blessed right now listening to,

Christ's statement clearly indicates that there is at least one instance where oblivion would be preferable to being born. This prompts the question: Why didn't a merciful Deity - aware of this situation - perform a mitzvah and grant Judas non-existence ab initio? Your only intellectual honest answer can be: "God works in mysterious ways, and Man lacks the capacity to fathom them and/or Judas was a pawn in the Divine Plan and had to be sacrificed 'for the greater good.'"

You're wrong. The only intellectually honest answer is Deus Vult":

Matthew 26:39 "39 And he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt. "

followed by (after the arrest)

53Are you not aware that I can call on My Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of angels? 54But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen this way?”

Now compare that to the Last Supper, earlier that evening.

(Matthew 25)

23Jesus answered, “The one who has dipped his hand into the bowl with Me will betray Me. 24The Son of Man will go just as it is written about Him, but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed. It would be better for him if he had not been born.”

But compare to the words of Jesus during the Last Supper in the Gospel of John.

12While I was with them, I protected and preserved them by Your name, the name You gave Me. Not one of them has been lost, except the son of destruction, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled.

So the suffering and death of Jesus -- wholly innocent -- came about because the Scriptures had to be fulfilled. And apparently Judas betrayed him for the same reason.

What can we conclude from this?

1) Sometimes it is God's will that the innocent suffer. Christ is more innocent than anyone, and yet He suffered.(*)

2) God has the right to dispose as He wills. Regardless of how you want to whine about it.

(Jesus did not upbraid the Father for condemning Judas, nor for His own suffering. And He was a principal in the matter, not someone commenting from a keyboard 2000 years later.)

(*) You might also want to consider Job -- who is explicitly recommended to believers *as an example of patience in suffering* ("...and in all these things Job did not sin with his mouth" : even when his wife urged him, "Curse God and die."). And note that God's answer to Job also is one which does not allow for "free inquiry" : "Because I'm God, that's why."

It is easy to hold forth about the "nobility" of suffering when one is not oneself starving to death in a prison camp - or watching one's own loved ones die like animals.

As C.S. Lewis pointed out, "the doctrine that the world's miseries are compatible with its creation and guidance by a wholly good Being come from Boethius waiting in prison to be beaten to death and from St Augustine meditating on the sack of Rome. "

And as I pointed out earlier, the worldwide symbol of the Faith is of an innocent man, betrayed and convicted by a kangaroo court, being tortured to death.

Incidentally, speaking of that.

What do you think it did to the heart of the Father to hear his only Son begging from the Cross, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"

Have you ever lost a child?

It is beyond stupid to suggest that a faith whose worldwide symbol is that of an innocent man, betrayed and convicted by a kangaroo court, in the midst of being tortured to death, is living in a fairy-tale world that ignores suffering.

Seriously, as admirable as those acts of self-abnegation may have been - on the order of what many Holocaust victims suffered, some of them voluntarily, to spare another prisoner - a one-time act (over the course of a mere three days; I'm not giving credit for being born in a sh*thole country under occupation, etc. - since millions of others had to suffer the same thing) does not absolve the supernatural "Friend" of ever helping again. Or, more correctly: Of ALWAYS helping again. In every instance throughout all Human history, without exception.

Don't blaspheme.

The death of Christ was sufficient to pay for all sins, ever. And with it, the promise of a restored relationship and life with God forever.

The volunteering of a Holocaust victim was a temporary reprieve against being executed by Nazis. Didn't do jack squat beyond that.

And again, you are wrong because you are ignoring the words of Jesus:

29Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. 30And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. 31So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

So He knows all about evil, and somehow it doesn't bother Him, in terms of affecting His trust in God.

The death of Christ was sufficient to pay for all sins, ever. And with it, the promise of a restored relationship and life with God forever.

The volunteering of a Holocaust victim was a temporary reprieve against being executed by Nazis. Didn't do jack squat beyond that.

You make an interesting distinction between the two acts - a distinction that deserves further examination and inquiry.

I'm going to jump ahead here and, instead of asking you to explain WHY one pure act of Love and Compassion should be considered superior / more efficacious than another and make a bold assumption (though only to save time; I certainly don't want to put words in your mouth, but getting the relevant details from you people is like sometimes like pulling teeth: you folks never volunteer explanations, just brash assertions):

Christ's sacrifice - though not necessarily more self-less or more painful than, e.g., Maximilian Kolbe's (one could even argue that an Imperfect Man making a sacrifice of that magnitude, merely to stay the execution of another prisoner, deserves more credit than a Perfect Man doing it to Save the Whole World) - was more efficacious (in effecting the Forgiveness of Sins, Redeeming Mankind, etc.) merely because it had been so ordained.

Right?

Because God the Father had ordained: Christ dying on the Cross shall be considered sufficient!

God the Father could, instead, just as easily have ordained: Christ pricking his thumb and shedding a drop of blood shall be considered sufficient!

And before you mention Christ having risen from the dead (in case you think that that was somehow integral to the Forgiveness of Sins): There are Biblical accounts of people rising from the dead both prior to and after the Crucifixion, so I don't see what is so special about that.

Regards,

And as I pointed out earlier, the worldwide symbol of the Faith is of an innocent man, betrayed and convicted by a kangaroo court, being tortured to death.

And:

It is beyond stupid to suggest that a faith whose worldwide symbol is that of an innocent man, betrayed and convicted by a kangaroo court, in the midst of being tortured to death, is living in a fairy-tale world that ignores suffering.

That's a shining example of the ad populum Fallacy.

You are, in effect, advancing the argument that Christianity's success / widespread popularity is somehow proof of its truth.

Need I remind you that that there are also other faiths, with billions of adherents?

If the "worldwide" part of your statement is not necessary to your argument, I suggest that you omit it, otherwise you are leaving yourself open to attack through comparison with other religious belief systems likewise embraced by billions of people.

What do you think it did to the heart of the Father to hear his only Son begging from the Cross, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" Have you ever lost a child?

What do you think that it did to the hearts of innumerable, e.g., Jewish fathers, to witness the starvation, torture, rape, and execution of their children?

I sincerely don't understand how you people (i.e., apologists of Evil and Suffering in the world) can make utterances like that without instantly thinking also of the innumerable cases of a similar or even worse nature.

I ask you:

What is more painful for a father: Watching His only-begotten Son dying according to His pre-ordained Plan, i.e., to Forgive Mankind's Sins and Redeem the Human Race - or watching his children being starved, tortured, raped, and executed for NOTHING?

The emotional pain suffered by those Holocaust fathers (and mothers) was undoubtedly greater.

Regards,

Christ's sacrifice - though not necessarily more self-less or more painful than, e.g., Maximilian Kolbe's (one could even argue that an Imperfect Man making a sacrifice of that magnitude, merely to stay the execution of another prisoner, deserves more credit than a Perfect Man doing it to Save the Whole World) - was more efficacious (in effecting the Forgiveness of Sins, Redeeming Mankind, etc.) merely because it had been so ordained.p

As Wolfgang Pauli once said of another physicist's theory, "[You're] not even *wrong*."

For one thing, you are only looking at the immediate physical suffering. You are forgetting both the spiritual aspect -- Jesus had to endure more than the physical -- cf. Psalm 22 ("strong bulls of Bashan surround me" interpreted as demons assailing Him on the cross) -- as well as the Eternal Son, for the first and only time in all eternity, having the Father turn His back on Him.

Secondly, you are forgetting the *delta*.

Kolbe = ordinary human prisoner, volunteering to be executed. He could not save himself from death, and could only temporarily achieve a stay of execution by Nazis, not anything else. His death == "well, he died a little sooner than either the conditions in the camp, or sickness, or a bullet, would've killed him anyway"

Jesus = the Son eternally begotten of the Father, laying aside equality with God and making himself nothing, and accepting a shameful death, to destroy the power of death forever and restore all of mankind to God.

Christ's death was not more efficacious because it had been ordained; it had been ordained because it was uniquely efficacious ("...for it was impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin.")

God the Father could, instead, just as easily have ordained: Christ pricking his thumb and shedding a drop of blood shall be considered sufficient!

This is why you're wrong. You're acting (again) as though either this is a fairy tale, in which elements can be arbitrarily added or subtracted, either according to the fancy of the teller in that moment, or for various emotional/literary effects; or, as though one were merely evaluating various algorithmic functions, or values for key parameters in a model, and judging "goodness of fit."

"The wages of sin is death"; and "without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin." Poking your thumb with a needle isn't gonna do it.

BZZZZT.

You should've noticed, when Moses presses God so that he can tell the Israelites who is sending him, God answers "I AM".

God is unchanging and his attributes are intrinsic and essential; it cannot be that He ever could have been other than who He is. There is NO SUCH THING, not even as a thought experiment.

The reason atheists think this, is (again, back to the "Great, but I wanted a BUD Light!" commercial) is that their minds have been trained in the efficacy of such in performing mathematical model of physical, non-sentient (and non-Divine!) entities; their success in such leads them to jump to the conclusion that such mental gymnastics are not only efficacious, but in fact are also a guarantor of certain metaphysical assumptions. (When in fact the assumptions are pretty much a precursor to hoping for / trusting in the usefulness of the empirical / experimental method.)

There are Biblical accounts of people rising from the dead both prior to and after the Crucifixion, so I don't see what is so special about that.

None of the others rose by their own will or power. Whereas Jesus openly predicted His death *and* Resurrection, and pointed out "17The reason the Father loves Me is that I lay down My life in order to take it up again. 18No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from My Father.” John 18.

That's a shining example of the ad populum Fallacy.

No it isn't. I'm not claiming the crucifix being worldwide makes Christianity true. I'm pointing out that the crucifix being the worldwide symbol of Christianity proves that Christianity has suffering at its very center -- and therefore does not ignore it.

You are a cretin.

The emotional pain suffered by those Holocaust fathers (and mothers) was undoubtedly greater.

Now you are merely posturing. You have literally no way even to describe you a human could quantify Divine pain; let alone compare it to human pain.

Incidentally, the Holocaust is very small potatoes. The Boxer Rebellion in China led to 20 million dead or so; The Holodomor killed anywhere from 5-10 million; Mao's purges, 50 million?...you have the Tutsis and the Hutus hacking each other up with farm tools and such, 500,000 dead in six months to a year, during Clinton's Presidency (a rate per year comparable to the Third Reich); and then there is the 1970 Bangladesh cyclone (or was it 1971) with 500,000 - 1 million dead from drowning in one storm.

Why are you emphasizing the Holocaust? Things are rough all over.

I sincerely don't understand how you people (i.e., apologists of Evil and Suffering in the world) can make utterances like that without instantly thinking also of the innumerable cases of a similar or even worse nature.

Because I've seen through that little game.

Probably the scenes he is now witnessing will not provide material for an intellectual attack on his faith—your previous failures have put that out of your power. But there is a sort of attack on the emotions which can still be tried. It turns on making him feel, when first he sees human remains plastered on a wall, that this is “what the world is really like” and that all his religion has been a fantasy. You will notice that we have got them completely fogged about the meaning of the word “real”. They tell each other, of some great spiritual experience, “All that really happened was that you heard some music in a lighted building”; here “Real” means the bare physical facts, separated from the other elements in the experience they actually had. On the other hand, they will also say “It’s all very well discussing that high dive as you sit here in an armchair, but wait till you get up there and see what it’s really like”: here “real” is being used in the opposite sense to mean, not the physical facts (which they know already while discussing the matter in armchairs) but the emotional effect those facts will have on a human consciousness. Either application of the word could be defended; but our business is to keep the two going at once so that the emotional value of the word “real” can be placed now on one side of the account, now on the other, as it happens to suit us. The general rule which we have now pretty well established among them is that in all experiences which can make them happier or better only the physical facts are “Real” while the spiritual elements are “subjective”; in all experiences which can discourage or corrupt them the spiritual elements are the main reality and to ignore them is to be an escapist. Thus in birth the blood and pain are “real”, the rejoicing a mere subjective point of view; in death, the terror and ugliness reveal what death “really means”. The hatefulness of a hated person is “real”—in hatred you see men as they are, you are disillusioned; but the loveliness of a loved person is merely a subjective haze concealing a “real” core of sexual appetite or economic association. Wars and poverty are “really” horrible; peace and plenty are mere physical facts about which men happen to have certain sentiments. The creatures are always accusing one another of wanting “to eat the cake and have it”; but thanks to our labours they are more often in the predicament of paying for the cake and not eating it. Your patient, properly handled, will have no difficulty in regarding his emotion at the sight of human entrails as a revelation of Reality and his emotion at the sight of happy children or fair weather as mere sentiment,

-- The Screwtape Letters

So the Bible should be rejected wholly because it is not up to forensic standards.

Never said "wholly." Said instead that we should not abandon our rational faculties and accept as the unvarnished truth whatever appears in those documents which happened to be "deemed worthy," e.g., by the Council of Nicaea. Said that we are entitled to be skeptical - whether it be of the "first-hand account" of an alien abduction - replete with "anal probing" - in the 1960s or the Kiplingesque story of a fig tree withering on command in A.D. 29. Said that we are justified in using the same standard of evidence.

And instead you rely on "prehistory" -- something for which there are (by definition) NO written records.

"Written records" are not per se more believable than anything else; everything must be viewed in context, and then subjected to the closest scrutiny. No exceptions!

And why are you willfully ignoring the mountains of hard geological, archeological, and genetic data that we have?

Data that we are free to examine and debate and sort out in a free forum?

We have no written records (unless you want to count the ambiguous depiction on the Egyptian Tempest Stele, and the strange remarks mentioned in the Chinese Bamboo Annals) on the eruption of Thera ca. 1600 B.C., which obliterated the Minoan Civilization - yet the stratigraphic evidence is overwhelming!

I find the geological and paleontological and genetic evidence we have on the evolution of life during, say, the Cambrian Period (525 million years ago) more compelling than the written records (more accurately described as "Just So Stories") we find on fragmentary ancient parchments and relating incredible happenings of a much more recent provenance.

Fossils (for instance) when backed with mountains of corroborating radio-isotope dating, stratigraphic dating, consideration of geomagnetic field reversals, sea floor spreading, etc. - trump skimpy narratives found on incomplete, redacted, conflicting, poorly translated ancient tablets and tattered parchments. In many cases, these "stories" don't even purport to reflect hard historical fact, but rather are quite patently literary works intended to provide semi-literate nomadic tribesmen with some semblance of reassurance in a harsh and - for them - largely incomprehensible world.

Regards,

Ah, yes!

You just committed, what is it again, a category error?

The difference is that one overtly claimed all along to be supernatural -- remember when Jesus said, "If you don't believe My Words, at *least* believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves" -- notice He allows for evidence, and yet tells Thomas the following:

24Now Thomas called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. 25So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he replied, “Unless I see the nail marks in His hands, and put my finger where the nails have been, and put my hand into His side, I will never believe.” 26Eight days later, His disciples were once again inside with the doors locked, and Thomas was with them. Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” 27Then Jesus said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and look at My hands. Reach out your hand and put it into My side. Stop doubting and believe.” 28Thomas replied, “My Lord and my God!” 29Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

So yes, evidence, go ahead and look. But we are told explicitly "Blesssed is he who has not seen and yet has believed."

You are distinctly settling for second best.

It's 2:30 and I have to get up and go to work.

And yet you said earlier:

Cannot even a True Believer decry the sorry state of the Bible?! Why can't even a True Believer lament the fact that the Bible has been distorted, heavily redacted, badly translated, etc.?... Don't you agree that the Bible is in a sorry state? (You have hitherto assiduously avoided responding to this point except to interpret it as evidence of "Disbelief.")...["as if the mss evidence for it, and its volume and scope surpasses anything of of like antiquity, it supports what I presented"] Sorry-not-sorry, but the assertion that the Bible is better to any other documents of comparable antiquity just doesn't cut it with me. I don't care that it's "better" than the Bhagavad-Gita, etc. Nor have you ever bothered to explain why other such "Holy Scriptures" as the Book of Mormon should be excluded.

What you are doing is attempting to argue by catching on the horns of a dilemma while abrogating to yourself, the privilege of rejecting or accepting one of the horns, as it suits you.

"The assertion that the Bible is better to any other documents just doesn't cut it with me" -- you don't know what you're talking about.

Apply the same skeptical standards which you like to pretend to use on the Bible, to secular sources; from the literary criticism / "higher criticism" perspective.

You'll find they can all be dismissed pretty easily if you set your mind to it.

(See for example the satirical essay "The Dates in the Red-Headed League" by Dorothy L. Sayers.)

Or, for a more contemporary example, try going to the microfilms and reading up on the news stories the day of Osama bin Laden's execution. Even with "modern instantaneous electronic communication" you find significant discrepancies all through the accounts: and these are newsmen Dedicated To The Truth™ and Keeping YOU Informed™. I wrote an article about it on FR when it happened, I don't know if I've saved it. But if you applied the critical techniques and standards, used to "disprove" the Bible, you'd actually come to the conclusion that bin Laden was never killed.

Clown nose on, clown nose off.

I have never met a humble salvation-seeking soul who was bewildered even as to what Bible to find the Truth in.

You've never had a "religious discussion" with a pair of Jehovah's Witnesses? You've never been approached by clean-cut and articulate young men from the Church of Latter-Day Saints? You must have led a very sheltered life!

I have met many humble, salvation-seeking souls who were members of Christian denominations espousing irreconcilable differences in doctrine. Apparently, you haven't.

Indeed, I have been called "irredeemably reprobate, "evil," and a "demon" by such "humble, salvation-seeking souls" - even in this thread! On account of my asking questions!

I apologize for that, but while, by the grace of God, I have only needed medical care once (piece of rust from exhaust system stuck in my eye) in over 40 years (and having left all to serve God in 1986, without solicitation, or welfare, but seeing God act according to His word in response to obedience), and can still run with kids and handle wrenches, etc. yet my stiff typo-prone arthritic fingers are a test of my patience, taking hours to post replies, and my slowing mind gets fatigued, and thus even proof reading is neglected.

I sympathize with you - I really do! And I fully appreciate your efforts to get your message across! My mention of confusing syntax was not to denigrate you, but rather only to explain that I sometimes had genuine difficulty in understanding some individual points you were trying to make (cut-and-paste errors can sometimes be more grievous than mere misspellings - esp. when you are making a fine theological point).

Regarding your cogent and, umm, lengthy defense of the Council of Nicaea etc.: I will study the links you provided. I still can't countenance the omission of entire books of the Bible - your "explanation" that they weren't "essential" sounds very facile and weak in my ears. But I will investigate the sources you provided.

Regards,

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