Does God have free will?

Question

Can he choose to do anything other than what is perfect and righteous?

Answer 1

Nope. Consider this:

1) God knows the future infallibly.
2) Nothing can be done to contradict the perfect knowledge of God.
3) Therefore, God is powerless to do that which contradicts his perfect knowledge.

Answer 2

Really, if he is omnicient, then I can't see how he could have true free will. If he has perfect knowlegde of the future, then he knows everything that he will ever do for eternity. Therefore, he couldn't do anything different. It really makes my head spin, but at the same time is amusing because you can tell that the people that came up with the christian god didn't think these things through when they were coming up woth this stuff.

Answer 3

Of course He can. He is God. He can do anything He wants. He would not give us free will if He Himself is incapable of it. God is perfect however, and He is capable of choosing to only do what is perfect and righteous, whereas we humans are imperfect and because of our imperfection, are easily swayed to make stupid, imperfect choices. That said, we are still responsible to avoid being swayed and to think things through and make the correct choice. God however, will never make a wrong choice - not because He is incapable, but because He is perfect, and He uses His free will to choose righteously.

Answer 4

Anything he does is perfect and righteous. Even when he wiped the earth clean of life with the flood, it was still perfect and righteous.

Answer 5

Hard question. But God can do anything he wants. His judgment is perfect and as the creator of the what is good and righteous only he can decided, Who are we to decide?

Answer 6

I don't normally do this, but I am going to answer this with a question:

How can God give us something he doesn't have already?

We wouldn't have freewill if he didn't have it to give in the first place. D'uh.


**You're question is a 2-part and has nothing to do with each other. We all have or had freewill (God, Jesus, all humans who've ever existed - even Satan). That much is for certain.

You're point about him doing wrong is a separate issue because evil is not a part of his character - just as good is not a part of Satan's character.

Answer 7

He is the completion of both. Read the Book of Samuel you will find here what he did to Saul. 1Samuel 18:10 The next day an EVIL SPIRIT from God came forcefully upon Saul.......Does not that show of a FREE WILL on His part to be what He wants? Here's another before that incident. 1Samuel 16:14 Now the spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him....

Answer 8

Yes, God has free will, in that He knows what's good and what it evil. However, He doesn't do evil, unlike us:

Genesis 3:22 Then the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”— 23 therefore the LORD God sent him out of the garden of Eden to till the ground from which he was taken.

Answer 9

Excellent question. I would hope so. Especially when you consider some of the blunders of the Old Testament. He's not happy with His creations so he kills every living thing on earth except for what Noah manages to cram into his pleasure boat. Then He gives us a rainbow as a sign that He will never, never do such a terrible thing again. lol

Answer 10

If god did exist how could he be the pure embodiment of perfection and right as you say? All beings make mistakes whether it be conscious or a simple oops.

But seeing as how god is an ideal of man, something we aspire to, then he is restrained to all the good we would come to expect from him, he is what we all wish we could be but can never attain.