The Impossibility Of Perfect God

[Kemotx]

The Impossibility Of Perfect God

I'm an Atheist, but I was a Christian (Protestant) for 3 years. I did a lot of research, and of course, I though a lot. This thread is not meant to offend anybody, but information in it may be shocking to some people. I can over analyze many things, and I like to think outside the box.

Existence Of God, Can I (Dis)Prove It?


For a long time Christians and Atheists were saying that existence of God can't be proved or disproved. I disagree with this, though not completely. If we are talking about Imperfect Gods, then yes, they are a Russel's Teapot, however Perfect Gods are, at least for me, easy to disprove. People say, A finite mind cannot grasp the concept of infinite beings, but I say, My mind is big enough to understand that infinite beings are impossible.

1. Omniproblems


God is said to be infinite. Well, I could ask, who created him, but let's assume for a moment that he always existed. I can see problems right here. So we have our God, before he created the universe. If he is perfect in every way, we run into several problems.

Name: If your God has a name(Yahweh, Jehovah) he himself made, we have a very serious problem right there. Humans didn't give him a nickname, he chose it for himself. But since God knows everything, that means he invented everything, including language an alphabets. God loves everything equally, since for him, everything he created was good. Then, he couldn't choose a name for himself because he loves all symbols and letters equally. Remember, if he is perfect in every way, he has no favorite things. This means that his name would have to be every letter and symbol possible...but in which order? He loves everything equally so he doesn't have a favorite order.

Laws Of Physics: Similar problem occurs here. God can make any laws he wants, any setting would work, but which one will he choose? Remember, he can make all settings work perfectly. Since he loves all settings, he must create a universe with all possible laws of physics at once.

Universe: Our universe is irregular. How could a perfect God create an imperfect universe? How he chose where to put that and this star, if he loves all things equally? The only thing he could do is make everything at once since he has no preferences.

Biology And Humans: Why did God created Humans that look the way we look like and not in the other way? He can't choose because he loves everything equally. Yet there are infinite combinations of DNA, not to mention, we could've been based on anything.

So as we can see, God can't even choose since he loves all things equally. The same goes for names of Angels and pretty much everything he created. If he exists, he had to be imperfect in order to have opinions. This includes our morality. To make it simple: Imagine a painter who loves all paints and lanscapes so much that he must paint everything at the same time, on one picture, because he has no preferences.

2. Perfection Can't Create Imperfection


Satan was created perfect. He has free will. Yet we have a serious problem here. Let's assume that Satan was a painter. He has free will, but being ''Good'' meant that he could only use shades of Yellow. All other colors are evil, therefore, they have been not created by God. Satan has free will, and he can paint pale and yellow and orange and red things, but he can't use green color because God didn't create it. If being proud is using purple color, he can't do this, because such color wasn't created by God. Since Satan is perfect, he is perfectly happy with his shades of yellow, just like his friends. Satan was created perfect and he had no way of losing perfection. Unless God created things he considers evil and told angels about them, Satan couldn't lose perfection. We, Humans, have all colors because we have free will and we aren't perfect. Think about those who will recieve glorified bodies at rapture: What will happen to those people who will sin in heaven? But if we will be unable because of our nature, why didn't the God gave such nature to angels? He loves everything equally, right?

3. Other Arguments

-An infinite creator would have no need to create, being unlimited in knowledge and creativity before even creating us.
-A creator cannot be infinite- if that were the case, it would spend an infinite amount of time waiting to create, never getting around to doing it.

So these are my arguments. What do you think of them? I will answer all question, and if you want, feel free to challenge my arguments. Remember to think outside the box, and try to question everything, even your own logic.

[FlawedIntellect]

The biggest problem with your claims is that you fail to account for the Will of God. You act as though he has no will of his own. You also make certain assumptions about his nature that no one has any reason to hold to.

For God to be completely and totally indecisive, he must have no will of his own. And yet, the very definition of God requires that "will" is his very nature. What you're asserting is a contradiction to the nature of God. It's nonsensical.

Next, on what basis do you say that God must love everything equally? He clearly hates sin, which is a will that seeks to work against God and against His nature (oft. by trying to pit his nature against itself). Thus, it doesn't follow that he loves everything equally. So much of your claims that assume that he must love everything are simply making a false assumption of God's nature.

As most of your assertions fall from the assumption of God being indecisive, they fall flat by virtue of making assumptions that contradict the very nature of what constitutes as God.

As for assuming that perfection cannot create imperfection, again this assumes that God does not have his own will. God's definition of love requires that love be given freely by choice. He desires to be loved by other beings. So, he creates other beings with free will. They /have/ the ability to love God, but in order to have the ability to love God, they must also have the ability to reject God. Without the option of choice to freely give love, it is by definition not love.

As for your other arguments, other argument 1 (which is that he has no need to create) is simply irrelevant as it doesn't matter whether he needs to create. With his own will, he can create if he wants to. Other argument two doesn't stack up because firstly, time didn't exist until the universe started to come into being. Secondly, by virtue of his will, he can create whenever he feels like it. On the matter of it taking an eternity for him to create, there's no reason to believe this if he is omnipotent (which, by virtue of the definition of God, he must be.)

You're simply making faulty assumptions about God, which is what is leading to your faulty conclusions.

[RickD]

Kemotz,

Let's start from the beginning of your post. You wrote:

I'm an Atheist, but I was a Christian (Protestant) for 3 years.

Can you tell us what it means to be a Christian?

[Kemotx]

Kemotz,

Let's start from the beginning of your post. You wrote:

I'm an Atheist, but I was a Christian (Protestant) for 3 years.

Can you tell us what it means to be a Christian?

There are of course many opinions on who a Christian is, but I believed a strict fundamentalism, like the one presented by Kevin Mirasi. I decided to rebel (while believing that there is a God) back in 2012, after I had enough of believing in him because of fear of hell. Then, I became an atheist after seeing some sites debunking creationism. I've never heard a voice of God in my head and I've waited every night for a suprnatural dream. There is a theory that God may be in fact a tulpa, that is, a separate consciousness in our brain. I have Asperger Syndrome, so I think that this is why such tulpa can't be created by my mind, I also happen to be immune to hypnosis. My moral system and logic is somewhat different from that of a neurotypical person. (Though in no way I claim that they are better.)

So a Christian I used to be usually believes that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven, and that you ave to be very strict with all sins.

[RickD]

There are of course many opinions on who a Christian is, but I believed a strict fundamentalism, like the one presented by Kevin Mirasi.

After doing a quick search on Mr. Mirasi, I can understand being turned off by his kind of Christianity.

I decided to rebel (while believing that there is a God) back in 2012, after I had enough of believing in him because of fear of hell.

I couldn't believe in a god who I felt was keeping me believing by fear of hell.

I've never heard a voice of God in my head and I've waited every night for a suprnatural dream.

I can see why you would expect supernatural dreams if you were a follower of Mr. Mirasi. He's a self-proclaimed prophet, and believes he has prophetic dreams.

So a Christian I used to be usually believes that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven, and that you ave to be very strict with all sins.

And it seems you've be taught to follow a works type of Christianity too.

Kemotx,

I'm sorry the only version of Christianity you know is from a false prophet, judaizing, heretic.

I pray that you stick around this forum so you can see Christians who know the love of God through Christ.

I hope you decide to stay. I believe there are people here that can help you through your crisis.

[Jac3510]

Kemotx,

I think FI and Rick have given you some important things for you to ponder. You said it yourself that there are different versions of Christianity, so I would encourage you not to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Just focus on what C. S. Lewis called Mere Christianity and figure out the denominational stuff later.

As far as your specific arguments, the reason you can't see that God has a will (as per FI's comments) is that you a working from a false premise: namely, that God is somehow obligated to choose that which He loves more, that He must choose the "better." Thomas Aquinas, a theologian who lived about 800 years ago, addressed the problem you are raising. I name him to remind you that your objection is hardly new, that to the contrary, it is one among countless others that have already been thought through and answered by the greatest minds the world has ever known. Perhaps you believe you are better educated than men like Thomas Aquinas. I tend to try to pay them a bit more deference myself . . .

Now, rather than quoting him directly, as he is rather hard to read, I would point you to this article:

http://www.aquinasonline.com/Topics/boapw.html

That article points out that it is absurd to insist that God is somehow obligated to create "the best" world, the one He would "love the most" (whatever that would mean). After reading the article, what you will find is that, ironically perhaps, you have not rejected a perfect God, but rather another imperfect God. Your God is too small, too imperfect, in that your God is dependent on something other than Himself for His existence and for His actions. Your God, the one you present here, anyway, is forced to choose A rather than B. He is not free and is in need of something other than Himself. A small, imperfect God, indeed . . .

So, no offense, I don't think too much of your arguments, because they simply disprove a God that neither I nor the church historically has affirmed.

edit:

I do want to offer the first paragraph of the article quoted above, as I think it does a good job setting out honestly and in a straightforward fashion the premises to be challenged:

• It is understandable that many people with theistic convictions maintain that the present world and all its contents is the best or only possible world. Since we believe as a general principle that a person who does not choose the best choice available to himself when he is able is not as good as he could be. Applying this principle to God, it would be reasonable to suppose that God, being perfectly good, will choose the best option open to him. And since he is omnipotent, he has all options open to him. Therefore it seems reasonable to conclude that if God has created the world, and for those with theistic convictions it is readily granted that he has, then he must have chosen the best of all the options available to him. God, because he is both all good and all powerful, must have chosen to create the best of all possible worlds. This seemingly reasonable conclusion likewise gives rise to another seemingly reasonable conclusion, that whatever evils are present in this world of our experience must be necessary, since it previously believed that this world is the best possible. God could not have created this world without its present evils, given that he willed to create at all.

edit 2:

I also wanted to offer another source, this one quoted more fully beause it is from a book I have here on my shelf. Really worth reading, I think:

• God did not will this present order of things necessarily, and the reason is that the end of creation is the divine goodness which so exceeds any created order that there is not and cannot be any link of necessity between a given order and the end of creation. The divine goodness and the created order are incommensurable, and there cannot be any one created order, any one universe, which is necessary to a divine goodness that is infinite and incapable of any addition. If any created order were proportionate to the divine goodness, to the end, then the divine wisdom would be determined to choose that particular order; but since the divine goodness is infinite and creation necessary finite, no created order can be proportionate in the full sense to the divine goodness.
  
  From the above is made apparent the answer to the question whether God could make better things than He has made or could make the things which He has made better than they are. In one sense God must always act in the best possible manner, since God's act is identical with His essence and with infinite goodness; but we cannot conclude from this that the extrinsic object of God's act, creatures, must be the best possible and taht God is bound, on account of His goodness, to produce the best possible universe if He produces one at all. As God's power is infinite, there can always be a better universe than the one God actually produces, and why He has chosen to produce a particular order of creation is His secret. St. Thomas says, therefore, that absolutely speaking God could make something better than any given thing. But if the question is raise din regard to the existent universe, a distinction must be drawn. God could not make a given thing better than it actually is in regard to its substance or essence, since that would be to make another thing. For example, rational life is in itself a higher perfection than merely sensitive life; but if God were to make a horse rational it would no longer be a horse and in that case God could not be said to make the horse better. Similarly, if God changed the order of the universe, it would not be the same universe. On the other hand, God could make a thing accidentally better; He could, for example, increase a man's bodily health, or, in the supernatural order, his grace.
  
  It is plain, then, that St. Thomas would not agree with the Leibnizian 'optimism' or maintain that this is the best of all possible worlds. In view of the divine omnipotence the phrase 'the best of all possible worlds' does not seem to have much meaning: it has meaning only if one supposes from the start that God creates from a necessity of His nature, from which it would follow, since God is goodness itself, that the world which proceeds from Him necessarily must be the best possible. But if God creates not from necessity of nature, but according to His nature, according to intelligence and will, that is, freely, and if God is omnipotent, it must always be possible for God to create a better world. Why, then, did He create this particular world? That is a question to which we cannot give any adequate answer, though we can certainly attempt to answer the question why God created a world in which suffering and evil are present": that is to say, we can attempt to answer the problem of evil, provided that we remember to that we cannot expect to attain any comprehensive solution of the problem in this life, owing to the finitude and imperfection of our intelligences and the fact that we cannot fathom the divine counsel and plans.

From Frederick Copleston, S.J., A History of Philosophy: Volume 2, Part 2 -- Albert the Great to Duns Scotus (Garden City, NY: Image Books,1962), 89-90. Imprimatur: Joseph, Archiepiscopus Birmingamiensis Die 24 Aprilis 1948

[PaulSacramento]

To echo what has been said already:
None of your arguments are new and all of them have been shown to be, well...not very good.
IF you had done as much research as you said you did, you would have found this out.
I can understanding how turned off you would be from Christianity based on your arguments and your very brief interaction with the TYPE of Christianity you have been exposed to.

I would suggest that if you really want to learn about Christ and KNOW Him, to be open to learning and to listen.

Christianity is all about what Christ has done for us.
Christianity is a Gospel ( Good News) far more than it is a "religion".

[PeteSinCA]

To speak of God as perfect is a word-game trap. If God were perfect, then any act - e.g. creating anything - would make God other than perfect by virtue of changing from what was perfect. In Genesis God does not describe the things He created as perfect. God called each thing "good". Similarly, When addressed as "Good", Jesus challenged the person who so addressed Him to think about what he had said: "Why do you call me good? Only God is good."

[Jac3510]

To speak of God as perfect is a word-game trap. If God were perfect, then any act - e.g. creating anything - would make God other than perfect by virtue of changing from what was perfect.

""The Rock! His work is perfect, For all His ways are just; A God of faithfulness and without injustice, Righteous and upright is He." Deut. 32:4
"As for God, His way is perfect." ~ Ps 18:30
"O LORD, You are my God; I will exalt You, I will give thanks to Your name; For You have worked wonders, Plans formed long ago, with perfect faithfulness." ~ Isa. 25:1
"Be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect." ~ Matt. 5:48
"And having been made perfect, He became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation." Heb. 5:9
"For the Law appoints men as high priests who are weak, but the word of the oath, which came after the Law, appoints a Son, made perfect forever." ~ Heb 7:28

I don't think God's perfect is a word-game, much less a trap. God is perfect, and to suggest otherwise not only violates Scripture, it is make God dependent on something else that is perfect.