The "immoral" People there are extremely loveable. They are so to say not guilty not rather unguilty guilty. — Beebert

:s - no I don't think so at all. Smerdyakov is guilty of murdering Fyodor Pavlovich, Ivan is guilty for teaching Smerdyakov that God is dead (for then everything is permitted), and so forth. They're all guilty and sinful - whether they know what they're doing or not.

The whole Court of law / juridical language of the bible, at least as understood by western Christianity is in itself against life and love IMO. I cant understand how one can view life as a process of trial. God as some sort of Police. Isnt he Most of all a creator? So then being creative should be one of man's primary concerns.

Yes. All are guilty. But compare Dostoevsky 's understanding of that to the understanding of Augustine and Aquinas. It is vastly different. Dostoevsky goes so much deeper.

Yes. All are guilty. But compare Dostoevsky 's understanding of that to the understanding of Augustine and Aquinas. It is vastly different. Dostoevsky goes so much deeper. — Beebert

I don't see how what D says disagrees with A&A.

Yes. All are guilty. — Beebert

So then they are immoral.

They are so to say not guilty — Beebert

So this must be false.

No they are guilty and unguilty at the same time. That is what Dostoevsky really means; there is Only one true sin: The failure to love. There is no doubt that Dostoevsky is closer to Nietzsche than to Aquinas

No they are guilty and unguilty at the same time. That is what Dostoevsky really means; there is Only one true sin: The failure to love. — Beebert

No they're not unguilty in any way. I don't know where you take that from, D never suggests otherwise. Failure to love is exactly what they're doing.

So define guilty then.

So define guilty then. — Beebert

Guilty = having committed a sin.

Hmm

Vill du veta den stora skillnaden mellan Dostojevskij och de flesta kristna (Augustine och Aquinas ingår)? Dostojevskij found älskvärda trots deras "omoral", trots sina brister och sätt att vara. Eller tydligare: Människor är ontologiskt värd kärlek. Aquinas och Augustinus trodde mycket annorlunda. Människan är av sin natur förkastligt och ovärdigt kärlek. Dostojevskij sade man skall älskad genom Gud. Augustinus och Aquinas trodde man skulle bli älskad för "Guds skull" (särskilt Aquino). Det är en grotesk skillnad.

Guilty as in juridically guilty?

Guilty as in juridically guilty? — Beebert

Of course.

You want to know the great difference between Dostoevsky and Most Christians (Augustine and Aquinas included)? Dostoevsky found People loveable despite their "immorality", despite their shortcomings and way of being. Or more clearly: People are ontologically worthy of love. Aquinas and Augustine thought very differently. Man is by his nature reprehensible and unworthy of love. Dostoevsky said man shall be loved THROUGH God. Augustine and Aquinas thought man should be loved for "The sake of God" (especially Aquinas). That is a grotesque difference. — Beebert

No, sorry, I don't think a psychopathic murderer is worthy of love in any common sense of the term.

Vill du veta den stora skillnaden mellan Dostojevskij och de flesta kristna (Augustine och Aquinas ingår)? Dostojevskij found älskvärda trots deras "omoral", trots sina brister och sätt att vara. Eller tydligare: Människor är ontologiskt värd kärlek. Aquinas och Augustinus trodde mycket annorlunda. Människan är av sin natur förkastligt och ovärdigt kärlek. Dostojevskij sade man skall älskad genom Gud. Augustinus och Aquinas trodde man skulle bli älskad för "Guds skull" (särskilt Aquino). Det är en grotesk skillnad. — Beebert

Please translate this.

sorry my phone translated automatically. It says the same thing as the one you quoted in the post above.

why did God create a psycopathic murderer? In fact, why did he create at all? Just in order to play police and judge?

why did God create a psycopathic murderer? — Beebert

He didn't, that person became so, partly out of their own choice.

But did God not know he would become like that before the foundation of the world? Wasn't it God who made the first free choice when he created a bunch of creatures inclined to sin?

All results in the world, all actions and unfortunate destinies, must have been foreseen by him who made mankind, and who, in the first place, made them not better than they are, and secondly, set a trap for them into which he must have known they would fall; for he made the whole world, and nothing is hidden from him. According to these doctrines then, God created out of nothing a weak race prone to sin, in order to give them over to endless torment. Except a few who are saved for reasons one does not know. That is the christianity I find in Aquinas and Augustine.

But did God not know he would become like that before the foundation of the world? — Beebert

So what if He knew? It was still the man's free choice that made him so. God's foreknowledge does not mean lack of free will. The "morality" you're putting forth here is an abomination. Can you imagine, letting the unrepentant criminal who deserves the utmost punishment go? That is not justice, that is stupidity, cowardice, and injustice masquerading itself as benevolence. Benevolence towards everyone, except the criminal's victims.

It seems like God's free choice. His knowledge about it and approval of creating the world that way means he wills it. So be wants People in hell then?

Try to be honest instead. You are incredibly biased. But I guess you understand something that I dont. I would Love to understand therefore. If I say: "If God knew all this about the world would happen and yet approved it in the sense of creating the world in spite of it, but yet doesnt approve with the fact that people do something he knew they would do because he created them 'free', then it seems to me that not creating the world at all would be far better", then many Christians accuse me of blasphemy and Think of me as hellbound. I think better of you Though, and therefore I would really appreciate of you read this article/essay by Schopenhauer and then comment on it, what is wrong with it etc:

https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/religion/chapter6.html

Besides, you accuse me of teaching horrendous things because I claim that benevolence is recquired towards all except victims. This is utterly false. I dont claim that. But to me it seems like you demand revenge. As if benevolence towards the victim in this short little intermezzo in relation to eternity recquires that the wrongdoer is eternally tortured for something done in time, while the "victim" is rewarded with eternal bliss. Why does the victim need his enemy to be punished eternally as well? Why isnt his own eternal bliss enough? Is it because he so hates the enemy that there can be no bliss unless the enemy is forever suffering? Seriously, let me understand this. How is this compatible with "turn the other cheek"? Or is this just something Christians are supposed to do untill the whole Army of God with Jesus in the forefront goes berserk on all their enemies?

Well, we can then ask why there is the privation of the good, as opposed to just the good. Evil cannot be absolutely nothing, since it has meaning with respect to what it is a privation of. In other words, it presupposes the good. But, again, must the good presuppose evil? Why could there not simply be the good, without any privation of it? I quite like the idea as far as it goes, but it still fails as a theodicy.

Also, so called natural evil is not to be ignored. As David Bentley Hart says,

[O]ur modern narrative of nature is of an order shaped by immense ages of monstrous violence: mass extinctions, the cruel profligacy of an algorithmic logic that squanders ten thousand lives to fashion a single durable type, an evolutionary process that advances not despite, but because of, disease, warfare, predation, famine, and so on. And the majestic order thus forged? One of elemental caprice, natural calamity, the mercilessness of chance—injustice thrives, disaster befalls the innocent, and children suffer.

This perhaps more than anything else forms the greatest barrier to my possible conversion.

It seems like God's free choice. His knowledge about it and approval of creating the world that way means he wills it. — Beebert

He wills you to have free will, exactly. Therefore He cannot control what you do with your free will, if He did, you wouldn't have free will to begin with. It's really quite a simple thing, I don't know why you don't get it. It's not God's fault that someone is a rapist, etc. etc. - it's their fault for making that choice.

And to preempt an objection - if He knows you will misuse your free will and chooses not to create you, then His creatures effectively don't have free will. So either way, if God wants His creatures to have free will, evil must exist and be possible.

then it seems to me that not creating the world at all would be far better" — Beebert

Yes, from a limited human understanding. Apparently, God doesn't think so. He thinks free will is worth hell.


:s That's a red herring, since the situation with God isn't the same. Vice is punishment for itself, and virtue is reward in itself. If someone rapes, etc. then he will get punished, by other people, and by the damage his crime does on his own soul. People punish themselves, and its righteous that we are so constituted such that evil leads to destruction.

Why does the victim need his enemy to be punished eternally as well? — Beebert

It's uncertain what "eternal" means. It certainly doesn't mean infinite temporal duration, but more like timelessness.

Is it because he so hates the enemy that there can be no bliss unless the enemy is forever suffering? — Beebert

Nope, it's just that evil has to be rewarded with evil, unless there is repentance.

But, again, must the good presuppose evil? — Thorongil

It's an interesting question... Is God beyond good and evil?

Is God beyond good and evil? — Agustino

I can see this being answered both affirmatively and negatively. I don't know.

This perhaps more than anything else forms the greatest barrier to my possible conversion. — Thorongil

I did notice this before. But you seem to have a very rationalistic/Kantian position with regards to morality. What if true morality is - dare I say - contradictory? For example, I remember you sent me Kant's commentary on the story of Abraham and Isaac - that's also a very rationalistic way of thinking and seeing morality. Kierkegaard's version though - as expounded in Fear and Trembling - is less trapped by the boundaries of human rationality, and opens up into an authentic relationship with the Divine.

I might as well add that this ultra-rationalism with regards to morality is quite a "modern" invention. So while you're not - say - a secular progressive - you do share with them the same emphasis on reason with regards to morality, although obviously you come to different conclusions than they do.

I would really appreciate if you read and commented on the article in the link I posted. So God thinks that it is better to live a short life with free will and then be eternally punished for it (something he apparently foreknew) than to live without Free will or to not live at all? I disagree with God if so. I use my "Free will" to say that I would have prefered one of the other two alternatives. You say my actions are my fault. Sure. But God knew Everything before creating me, and therefore he created me that certain way. In a way, it seems to be his fault of what you say is true.
Eternity is timelessness, I understand that. So then eternity belongs to the one living in the presence without expecting something of the future? So then Perhaps there is an end to the punishment? Or is eternity fixed and without movement? Static, that is?
Didnt Christ say "Do not resort evil "? And yet evil must be repayed with evil?

So God thinks that it is better to live a short life with free will and then be eternally punished for it (something he apparently foreknew) than to live without Free will or to not live at all? — Beebert

No, God doesn't think from the perspective of one single human, but rather from the perspective of the whole of Creation. But even from the perspective of one human being, yes that may be better.

I disagree with God if so. — Beebert

That wouldn't change that He is God, and you are just a human being.

You say my actions are my fault. — Beebert

Yes, because in that case you're showing that you're not very wise.

But God knew Everything before creating me, and therefore he created me that certain way — Beebert

No He didn't create you that way. He created you with free will. You're using your freedom in that manner right now. Why? You could stop doing that for example.

In a way, it seems to be his fault of what you say is true. — Beebert

It can't be - you have free will.

Didnt Christ say "Do not resort evil "? And yet evil must be repayed with evil? — Beebert

You would be a fool if you repaid, say, a criminal who has raped, tortured and killed hundreds of people with anything but justice. Justice can entail harming another. Evil is not to be trifled with, it must be squished and eradicated. If you let evil grow, it will overtake you and your society and destroy you.