As I was trying to say to rysmiel below (probably not very eloquently), I don't think I see suffering as entirely bad. Doesn't having to go through bad stuff as well as good stuff a) enrich our existence, b) allow us to enjoy the good stuff more, and c) give us lots of plot bunnies?
To me, the concept of God is weird enough anyway without applying rules to him that *we*'ve created - the whole point of the theory that God exists is that we don't understand him, right? He's there to explain what we don't understand through science and so on. Or at least that seems to be the way in which religion grew up originally, AFAWCT.
Applying rules to God seems a bit like applying rules to time travel. I mean, whatever God might be, if he even exists, we just don't know - we posit his existence it the same way we do perishable materials used to write ancient texts, or aspects of quantum physics. So by all means let's have lots of LJ posts about it, I just don't think we're going to get anywhere very fruitful :)
But you were asking what *I* would do, and *I* think I can cope with the concept of being good *and* allowing people to suffer.
But most people say that if God were good, he wouldn't let the large number of people starving, etc, in the world do so.
Isn't that an argument from an atheist point-of-view? I don't think even now that atheists (even atheists + agnostics) outnumber people who believe in a god or some gods, do they?
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Date: 2008-05-11 01:26 pm (UTC)To me, the concept of God is weird enough anyway without applying rules to him that *we*'ve created - the whole point of the theory that God exists is that we don't understand him, right? He's there to explain what we don't understand through science and so on. Or at least that seems to be the way in which religion grew up originally, AFAWCT.
Applying rules to God seems a bit like applying rules to time travel. I mean, whatever God might be, if he even exists, we just don't know - we posit his existence it the same way we do perishable materials used to write ancient texts, or aspects of quantum physics. So by all means let's have lots of LJ posts about it, I just don't think we're going to get anywhere very fruitful :)
But you were asking what *I* would do, and *I* think I can cope with the concept of being good *and* allowing people to suffer.
But most people say that if God were good, he wouldn't let the large number of people starving, etc, in the world do so.
Isn't that an argument from an atheist point-of-view? I don't think even now that atheists (even atheists + agnostics) outnumber people who believe in a god or some gods, do they?