How can we have free will if "God" knows everything that we are going to do? If God made us and gave us free will, then he would have to be making something over which he had no control, our decisions. Therefore, God can not be all powerful as Christians say he is. Either we have free will and God is not all powerful, or we don't have free will and God makes some of us "sinners" and burns us in hell for fun.
2006-10-01 16:31:23 · 26 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
no God has given us the BRAIN -- to think and be rational and also He has given us guidance and knowledge of right and wrong. He has given us Freewill but to make the best of ourselves is in our hands.
my actions today will determine my future tomorrow.
(this just doesnt apply to Divine law but also to laws u see in school, college/univs, work places and why even Govt.)
man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains -- 14th century French Revolutionist, Voltaire Rosseau
2006-10-01 16:37:01 · answer #1 · answered by marissa 5 · 2⤊ 2⤋
so, all in all, what christians mean by this is that God gave us the gift of free will, that we make (or as in feel) like we can make our own decisions. He also gave us the gift of knowing between good and evil. God KNEW what we were going to decide even before men inhabited the earth. This does'nt mean He made the choices for us. His plan is basically to create his works through the choices that we make.
-TTFN, hillardaoh
2006-10-01 16:59:26 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Free will means exactly that God has no control over our decisions or our actions. God relinquished control to mankind when He gave us free will. That doesn't mean that God's authority is diminished in any way. If the general tells the lieutenant to take over while he goes to a meeting, that doesn't mean the general's authority is reduced, for it is only by the general's supreme authority that the lieutenant is in charge. The general has delegated authority to an underling, while maintaining full authority over the underling. So it is with God. We have the ability to make moral decisions freely only because God, the ultimate and absolute authority, has allowed us to do so. Therefore our decisions are completely free of outside control yet God maintains full authority.
2006-10-01 16:40:38 · answer #3 · answered by PaulCyp 7 · 2⤊ 2⤋
Exactly.
If we really DO have 'free will', then an omniscient god is logically excluded. The logical fallacy lies in the premise that if god is omniscient, all outcomes are already known to god... everything that you think, decide and do... and everything that you WILL think, decide, and do.
For an omniscient being, all of existence over all of time is laid out as a tapestry before him... past, present and future, down to the smallest detail of material, of thought and of deed, and all is constantly in his awareness. There is no past, present and future from that perspective... there is only an eternal 'now'.
If that is the case, since god already knows everything that will happen, then everything is already decided... and as we go along through life, we are merely doing what has already been seen by god. Since god knows and sees everything that will happen, NOTHING that we think or do can be contrary to what god already sees and knows. We might THINK we have free will... but since we are merely acting out what god already sees and knows, this can be no more than an ILLUSION of free will.
So, imagine that since before time began, since before the universe was created, god has 'known' that you would come to a point of decision at some spatial and temporal coordinate, and that faced with the possible paths A and B, you would take path A.
Now, during the course of your life, you arrive at that spatial and temporal coordinate where this choice exists. You evaluate the potential outcomes, and you have it in your head that you have 'free will', and thus, you are free to choose between path A and path B. However, since god is 'omniscient', and god 'knows' that you will take path 'A', then path B IS NOT an option... it IS NOT a matter of choice... it is a 'NECESSITY'. OF NECESSITY, you WILL take path A. Not 'must'... not 'can'... WILL take path A. You DO NOT have a choice. Path B is NOT an option... it is not even a POSSIBILITY. The best that you can achieve is the ILLUSION that you are free to choose.
So, either god is omniscient OR we have free will. It is QUITE IMPOSSIBLE for BOTH of these conditions to coexist.
2006-10-01 16:33:14 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 3⤋
God isn't arbitrary, neither is He contradictory. for this reason He can’t convey any of His attributes on the fee of the different. with the help of the former testomony circumstances, He change into constrained in expressing His love for His advent because His desires for justice and righteousness had no longer been met. for the period of those circumstances He change into basic as an indignant and jealous God who periodically presented judgment upon the disobedient international. on the pass God made peace with us through starting to be the guy all of us understand as Jesus of Nazareth and demise for our sins. His desires for justice and righteousness were finally met and He change into loose to convey His love (Colossians a million:19-20). Now He asks us to stay at peace with others out of gratitude for what He’s performed (Romans 12:17-18). even if in worry-free words those interior the believing Church common the sacrifice that made peace with God plausible, the whole international has been blessed through His love for the Church, in that His anger has been held in verify. by using presence of the Church interior the international, love has change into His maximum glaring characteristic. yet quicker or later quickly, He’ll take the Church out of the international (a million Thes. 4:16-17). after we’re lengthy gone God will vent the whole fury of His wrath on those who’ve rejected the most spectacular present of love the international has ever basic, and through the time it’s over guy will be scarcer than organic gold (Matt. 24:21-22, Isaiah thirteen:12). Then God's desire for justice and righteousness can were satisfied, and He’ll be loose to convey His love back and peace will move like a river round the international (Isaiah sixty six:12).
2016-10-16 03:07:22 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
What if Adam's original sin propagated to everyone on the planet? Then EVERYONE would deserve hell, wouldn't they? Everyone's "freedom to choose" would be limited to one choice -- against God, never for him. So now we have both our "freedom to choose" and the omnipotence of God, who, by the way, doesn't make some people sinners -- we ALL are, and God is glorified when sin is punished, and we have nothing to say about it. Read through the book of Job and see how God jumped all over him for claiming to be righteous.
Now with this as our condition, for some odd reason that I can't explain, God saw fit to save the ones that he predestined from before the beginning of time as His own. BTW if Adam "knew" Eve then doesn't that make "foreknowing" foreLOVING, i.e. an intimacy that God has with his own? Again, we have nothing to say about who is written in the Book of Life, and again, God is glorified. He sent his own Son as a sacrifice to wipe clean the slate of His own, and His Holy Spirit acted upon those who would believe in Him.
So God keeps His sovereignty, and what would have been a "free choice" that would doom me is now turned around into a loving relationship, and I get to be counted as one of His sheep, even though I still sin but in that sin try to emulate my savior.
But yours was a good question, I've asked a similar one myself a while back and got nothing but doublespeak from people who couldn't face up to the contradiction that you presented. I thought I'd give you an answer that you might not have considered before.
2006-10-01 17:12:37 · answer #6 · answered by ccrider 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋
You're correct. If there is an all knowing god, we have no free will. In the following argument, the author doesn't assign a gender to god, therefor god is referred to as "it" instead of "he" or "she".
"The problem here is that God knows everything that has happened and everything that will happen. Its knowledge cannot be wrong. There is not a single event that it has not foresaw. Given that it created the Universe the way it did, do we have free will? Consider that when God made the Universe it could see every possible result of what it was doing. Which means: it could not create something without knowing what the results would be, and without knowing how it would be affected (and effect) the things around it.
Let's say that Fred has a choice that will save his life, to accept God or not to accept God and the final choice is to be made tomorrow. God knows already what choice he will make - God cannot be wrong therefore Fred cannot choose otherwise to what God has predicted. When God created the chain of events that made Fred it also knew that it was making Fred's choice for him, and knew how the various circumstances and character would make him choose either right or wrong. Fred would go forth and make that very decision that God knew he would make, and by virtue that God knowingly set up all the factors that affected his decision, it was not up to Fred but to God to decide how Fred would fare.
This argument does not imply that God does not exist. It leaves us with three results, two of which have to be wrong.
1. God created everything with full knowledge and we have no free will to change it
2. God does not have full knowledge
3. God did not make the Universe or there is no God"
2006-10-01 16:32:56 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 5⤋
The Bible teaches that God created man in 'his image and likeness'(Gen.1:26)Such "likeness" refers to qualities,not physical appearance.For instance,just as the Creator is free to do as he chooses,he has created man with a free will.Out of regard for this,the Creator does not fix or foreordain the path each individual will take.Does this conflict with God's ability to see into the future?No!To illustrate:A radio enables one to hear world news in the home,but it must first be switched on and the right station selected at the correct time.Likewise with the Creator's power of foreknowledge;he makes discretionery and selective use of it,showing regard for the free will he gave to man.
The Bible does not teach a place of eternal torment called "hell"Jehovah is a God of love.He gets no pleasure from the suffering of his human creation.
2006-10-01 17:11:24 · answer #8 · answered by lillie 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
God knows what we will do and not do, how we will do it and when we will do it, but we are free to do it or not do it. Just because He knows all this does not mean we are not free to choose what we do.
2006-10-01 18:04:58 · answer #9 · answered by TYRONE S 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Ah, yes, well... Have you never heard that it takes greater strength to exercise none when one could so easily exercise all??? That God knows the end from the beginning means that we have choice, He doesn't interfere, but sees the end before it begins. Because He has the power does not mean He must necessarily exercise it. You see? He chose to love us enough to let us love Him by choice. How much easier it would have been for Him to create us loving and perfect, serving His Glory because we are robots without thought or will... and how meaningless is that sort of love???
2006-10-01 16:37:18 · answer #10 · answered by reformed 3 · 2⤊ 2⤋
As a Christian I would like to appologize for the foolishly propogated idea that God is all powerfull.
You are correct, because of our freewill he isn't all powerful. There are many instances of this displayed in the Bible.
I would like to point out that the one thing God can't do is go against his nature. I guess a lot of things fall under that.
Taking away our freewill would be going against his nature therefore he can't do that.
2006-10-01 16:53:41 · answer #11 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 3⤋