So what is the answer to God and the rock that He can't push question anyway?

Question

Okay, so it's on here all the time and I just dismiss it.

So here's why I'm asking instead of reading the 1,000 other times it has been asked. First is to get through all the *drink* type answers, and ask what is the best answer you've ever heard to the question.

I mean really it's a valid question, God can do anything, well then God can either make a rock so big He can't push it, or He can't.

Either way there's something He can't do, it's unavoidable.

"Nothing is impossible with God" is something I hear all the time on here, well how is this possible?

"They are the Fallacy of Contradictory Premises. They negate each other, and thus are illogical."

So what you're saying is, is it's impossible? Uh-oh!

Answer 1

God doesn't have a physical body and does not deal with anything within the physical plane. (He has cronies that deal with the lower worlds.) God is power. God is spirit. If God wanted to move a rock, he would think it and it would be there. However, God resides beyond the worlds where time, space and matter exist. All of these questions being posed refer to matter.

Answer 2

No He can't.

It may not seem it, but this question is actually a question about God's character (it seems almost a question of physics).

A human analogy might be useful - this question is similar to asking, "Can an honest person lie all the time?" The answer to that question is clearly, "No." The only way an honest person can lie repeatedly is by changing his character and by no longer being an honest person.

The original question is actually asking, "Can God, who's character is the very source of logic, do something that is logically invalid?" The answer is no, not because God isn't powerful enough, but because the only way God could do it is by changing who He is and by changing His character.

So He could no more create a rock too big for Him to move than He could be unjust - doing things like that is just not part of who He is.

Answer 3

The question is a logical fallicy because something cannot be one thing and its opposite at the same time. It is like saying, "Here's a piece of white paper. Make it black, without changing it from being white." It can't be done.

God has set up certain laws for the Universe, and this one of them: Something cannot be itself and its opposite at the same time.

Now it may be that there is an alternate system somewhere out in the Universe, but that's the way He made the one we live in.

Answer 4

I'll play along; the more sensible position seems to be that an all-powerful being would be unable to create the rock he couldn't lift. That is: God can do anything except that which limits his own power. I'm actually kind of surprised that this isn't doctrine. (Although my other thought for most likely answer, "Mumble mumble mysterious ways" does seem to be doctrine.)

Answer 5

God creates a rock that weighs more than he can push at the time he created it. Then God increases his power to move it. So the answer is yes, and God still has accomplished anything that he wanted too.

Answer 6

They are the Fallacy of Contradictory Premises. They negate each other, and thus are illogical.

Answer 7

Yeah. I'm going with the law of contradictory premises. I don't see semantic logic working through it -- possibly a form of modal logic.

Answer 8

That's just the old question of "what happens when an unstoppable force hits an unmovable object?" rephrased. Excellent point. And I like your username.

Answer 9

If God can do anything, I don't see why he couldn't limit his strenght so that he wouldn't be able to lift the rock.

Answer 10

Garbage!