posted
Assume you died and went to Heaven. Do you still have free will? If so, what prevents all the usual problem-of-evil things happening? Even good people can do highly cruel things. And if not, in what sense are you still yourself?
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posted
Satan has no power in heaven, so you can't be tempted. There will be no desire for sin. That's kind of how I view it at least...never really thought about it.
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Having the power to do a thing. Having the desire to do it. Having no external obstacle to doing it.
It is NOT contingent on:
Having knowledge of the costs and consequences of doing it. Liking the consequences. Having no consequences.
So if, in heaven, God gives you the power to do a thing, and you still have the desire to do it, and there is no obstacle blocking you from doing it (like angels with shotguns), then you would be free to do it.
But what if the only people who get to heaven are those who do not have the desire to do anything that isn't righteous?
If the desire for perfect righteousness is coupled with perfect knowledge of all possible consequences, or even MORE perfect knowledge of the exact list of consequences that certainly WILL happen, then presumably you could STILL have free will and yet never do anything bad, because you would know what WAS bad, and you would never desire to do it.
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posted
I think evil exists independent of Satan. To deny that gives him a power equal to that of God.
My slightly-skewed-Mormon take is that free will is fundamental; it comes from that part of us which is coeternal with God, and is in fact essential to what makes us sentient beings. It can't be taken from us. I'd approach the evil-in-heaven question from a perspective similar to Dag's article; by that point in our progression we will have attained a maturity and wisdom which will preclude action based on the selfishness that is at the root of evil.
KoM didn't use the word sin, but I think that's an important distinction to make, too. I think that a lot of stuff that's considered sin is in fact limited to Earth and mortality, and has little divine relevance.
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posted
My problem with that comes from the nature of eternity. If Heaven is limited to those who are so good and wise that they will never commit an evil act - not just "not once in a million years", but "not once in a million, million, million, and go on like that forever" then I think Heaven is going to be quite empty.
EDIT : To clarify, I wasn't thinking of evil on the scale of the Inquisition or the Holocaust, but small daily cruelties, impatience, snapping at a loved one - that sort of thing.
[ April 03, 2005, 11:31 PM: Message edited by: King of Men ]
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posted
I think that that isn't the same as giving him a power equal to God...God created both, while the Devil can't create, only destroy. Even if he could create, he could not create God, so once again he would not be equal.
I think that a lot of things that are done wrong..sins, or evil actions, are rooted in ignorance, hence the raod to hell being paved with all thos good intentions. In heaven I think a lot of that ignorance would be removed, and therfore a lot of evil actions would be avoided without removing free will.
posted
Question for you. If someone can do highly cruel things, are they really a good person? I am thinking of the conversation we were having in the other thread.
Christians in particular seem to find themselves at odds with the people who say humans are fundamentally "good". Christians believe that mankind is "fallen". But how much are these ideas really at odds with each other? Those that say humans are fundamentally good freely admit that humans have desires within them that tend towards "bad" behavior. It is up to each person to choose good over evil. I think they would admit that otherwise good people do bad things from time to time.
I think the idea in Christianity in general (I may be wrong) is to get humans to the point where they aren't just "mostly good" but they cease to do evil. How this is accomplished differs slightly from sect to sect. I am not an authority, but I will tell you how it *appears* to me. (Feel free to correct me, anyone.)
Some take the perspective that once we accept Christ, though we might continue to sin or make mistakes, those sins have pretty much already been absolved because we have accepted Christ as our Savior. I think the idea here is that ideally, if you *really* accept him, you won't be doing bad things anymore. Some, I'm pretty sure, believe that as long as you accept Christ, it doesn't matter if you sin. Even if you sin terribly, you still have a "get out of jail free" card, as someone so recently put it. I'm not quite sure I am representing this take correctly, because it doesn't completely make sense to me.
Another take is that you have to work at not doing bad things anymore, that Christ is available to help you in this effort, but the responsibility lies on you to do the work. We still couldn't be saved without Christ's atonement, but his atonement doesn't remove our personal responsibility for our actions.
I'm sure there are many other slightly different takes on it, but those seem to be two that stand out.
As a Mormon, I believe that we lived with God before this life. I don't know if we sinned then. I believe that Satan started out good and that we were all siblings, all God's children. He and a large number of those children chose evil. The rest chose to come to earth and follow God's plan. In this model, there doesn't seem to be a lot of room for middle ground (though admittedly there may have been some.) It may be that with the amount of knowledge we had at that time, sinning was a very different matter than sinning here on earth. When you are in the light, you have to be pretty dark inside to turn against it. Since on earth we live by faith, not having a sure knowledge of God, our sins don't have as severe a natural consequence now as then. But it is far easier to sin also--so easy that everyone does.
Anyway, so I believe we are here to be tested. The test is if God can trust us to be good in spite of temptation to do otherwise. He knows we will make mistakes. But the ones who will be part of God's kingdom in the end will be those who overcame all these things in a combination of their effort and Christ's grace.
So basically, I believe that the only people in this portion of "heaven" (Mormons believe in three kingdoms of heaven, and even three levels within the highest of them) will be those who have proven themselves in the furnace of trial and temptation. They have become something different than they were before, in so many ways. They can be trusted to not sin ever again.
I believe this state is not reached at the end of this life, but that the effort continues after this life--that even then we must walk by faith to some extent. We believe there is a waiting period between death and our ressurrection, which is when we stand before God and account for our lives. I also believe that at that time our memory of our life with God before mortality will return to us in full. Then we have faith no longer, for we have full and complete knowledge. In such a state, we don't need God to condemn us. If we are guilty, we will condemn ourselves. Up till then, it isn't "too late". But it is easier to "prove ourselves" in this life with its mortal difficulties than after it when we are but disembodied spirits.
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posted
When I die, if I am right about heaven, I will be in a tiny minority, probably of 1. If I am wrong, I will be in a vast growing majority, probably of everybody but maybe 1.
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posted
Yeah, I can see how that might appear hopelessly optimistic, but that's the appealing thing about religion (at least to me, who is often quasi-agnostic) - an absolutely stunning conception of human potential and nobility, even when it's buried under thick layers of Sunday school lessons about dressing modestly.
Yikes. That's to KoM's post about eternity being a long time.
posted
Not so much as limited to those without sin or sinful thought/actions, because we all have those, but filled with those who are able and willing to be transformed into something other that human...more than human.
This has a lot in common with the argument that if there is free will how can God know all, and if he does does that remove all possibility of free will?
The answer is no, it doesn't remove free will, any more than a mother saying "You'll burn your fingers on the stove" to a child is....how many times have you seen a friend or loved one ruin their lives by making a mistake that you KNEW was a mistake? You could see it coming, even if they could not..but that didn't mean that the choice was removed from them, did it? They had to learn on their own, and make the mistake, or they would have never believed you.
If God allows specific people into Heaven then I imagine they would be a) Not human any more
posted
Yikes! Kwea, I don't think I've ever seen you make so many spelling mistakes. It is actually difficult to read. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
I am one of those who expect heaven to be completely theoretical, unless people from heaven come and visit me in hell and tell me about it. Presumably they would only tell the truth.
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posted
Yes, but is the truth what you would hear when they spoke? Perhaps that would be part of the punishment in hell, not being able to tell if they were telling the truth....
-------------------------------------------------- Bev...I have been trying to type without looking at the keys, as the mavis beacon typing tutor told me to do, but that mean I reverse a lot of letters in words....sorry about that. I can hit the right keys, but I have only been typing for real for a few months now so they don't always get hit in the right order.......
posted
Beverly: I'm not LDS (should I say "yet"?), but I've been looking into the religion a fair bit recently. Your long post above resonately VERY strongly with me, if for no other reason than I think I want to believe in something like that, even though at the moment I'm not really sure why I want to. Thanks for the point of view.
posted
The curse will be lifted in eternity so we will no longer have a sin nature. I think our understanding on how different this will be is almost beyond our comprehension.
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Well...my religion (Kardecist Spiritism) believes in reincarnation. Let me try to be simple, here...hmmm...well, as you live countless lives, you progress, both intelectually and morally. There is no turning back. You never get worse, only better, or you stagnage for some lives. It's as if you are cleansed from impurities over time. Everytime you die, your spirit, aided by more evolved ones, help you understand your mistakes and what you still have to learn. We believe everyone carries such information in a subconcious level.
So, given enough time, everyone ends up in heaven. Here is a link you can follow to know something more about it.
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posted
Zotto, thanks for letting me know that it meant a lot to you. It is very exciting to me that you are looking into it. I've always had a lot of respect for you, and that you are thinking about something that is so near to my own heart is just really cool. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Thanks for your replies. I have a follow-up : There are many things that are considered sins without any obvious cause - dietary laws in Jewish tradition, sex outside marriage, homosexual sex. I'm aware that some people believe these have bad secular effects, but I disagree - certainly I disagree that this is deserving of eternal punishment. Moreover, particularly in the last case, most explanations I've seen are of the form "this is God's will and we just have to accept that". Now, taking this at face value for a moment, will this particular will of God be rescinded in Heaven? Or will we be told what the reason for it is, so that we'll be better able to avoid it on our own hook? Or perhaps they just won't be relevant anymore - no sex in Heaven?
A further question : I assume we'll still be able to love people in Heaven, or there wouldn't be much point. What of unrequited love? Plainly this leads to quite a lot of unhappiness, yet it isn't really anyone's fault - if you don't feel that way about someone, you just don't. Will we always fall in love with people who will love us back? That doesn't quite seem to square with free will.
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quote: I'm aware that some people believe these have bad secular effects, but I disagree - certainly I disagree that this is deserving of eternal punishment
Maybe not all religions think that punishment for sin is eternal.
quote:I assume we'll still be able to love people in Heaven, or there wouldn't be much point. What of unrequited love? Plainly this leads to quite a lot of unhappiness, yet it isn't really anyone's fault - if you don't feel that way about someone, you just don't. Will we always fall in love with people who will love us back? That doesn't quite seem to square with free will.
My personal take on this is that love is something a lot bigger than we imagine. Everyone says there are many kinds of love... "I love you like a sister" means, pretty much, "we're never going out. Nope - no chance." I'd venture to say that there is only one type of love - love is love - but only appropriate manifestations of love. I think it's entirely possible to love thy neighbor with the same kind of love with which you love your spouse. There are only appropriate manifestations of love. I think, from what I've gathered so far in life, that the point is to love everyone more. This pretty much precludes not requiting someone else's love.
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posted
I have been told by a bishop whose opinion and knowledge I respect very much that we all have problems and temptations within ourselves.
At the end of our life, if we have not dealt with them here, we will just have to deal with them there. Sooner or later, we will have to deal with them and try to overcome them.
The thing is, it's a lot easier to do it now than to put it off until later. The time to improve ourselves is now, the place is here, and just saying we won't do it, or that we want to give up on life, doesn't mean we won't have to eventually. It just puts it off and makes it harder.
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posted
So you're saying, then, that (for example) a homosexual attraction is a 'problem within yourself' that you're going to have to overcome at some point? Do you believe, then, that attraction to the same sex can be overcome in Heaven - certainly there's been very little success on Earth - or that it just won't be that relevant anymore? If there's no sex, then presumably homosexual attraction wouldn't be a problem, just love without sin.
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posted
Attraction isn't a sin. It's a difficulty. What you do about it determines whether you sin or not.
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quote:KoM: My problem with that comes from the nature of eternity. If Heaven is limited to those who are so good and wise that they will never commit an evil act - not just "not once in a million years", but "not once in a million, million, million, and go on like that forever" then I think Heaven is going to be quite empty.
But what if going to heaven gives you more of an insight on things and takes away the 'desire' to sin (similar to what OSC said in an early post). So even those who would sin somewhat when they are on earth, would no longer sin once joined with god. The only problem with this is the fact that Adam and Eve walked with God...and they still managed to sin...but of course they were tempted by Satan (who would not be in heaven)
quote:Matt: I think evil exists independent of Satan. To deny that gives him a power equal to that of God.
I don't see why it would? Say God wishes to allow free will...so he leaves people open to go either way (good or evil). In a place without temptation, evil would never come up...so even with free will you would not choose evil. However in a place with temptation (ie: earth) Satan can use our ability to go either way to tempt us to go the evil route. I don't see that as giving him equal power to God. He/it is simply using the nature of humans that God created.
quote:OSC: I am one of those who expect heaven to be completely theoretical, unless people from heaven come and visit me in hell and tell me about it.
Not sure what you mean by this. Are you saying that you think that heaven is theoretical...and does not exist? Or that this conversation can never be more than theoretical (well, until we kick it of course)
quote:KoM There are many things that are considered sins without any obvious cause - dietary laws in Jewish tradition, sex outside marriage, homosexual sex
Actually, if you think about it many of these things DO have reasons (or did at the time when they were given). It seems that following the Jewish dietary rules would have helped avoid disease back when they were first given. Restricting sex to marriage can also help avoid disease (and children out of wedlock who don't have both a mother and father to care for them)
posted
I didn't, I was inquiring whether that was what you believed. But if attraction is a difficulty, will that difficulty then be removed in Heaven? Or will it at least be possible to remove it?
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posted
Yes, Lupus, but if that were the reason for the dietary restrictions, then they should be removed when the secular reason is no longer there. But as I understand it, Jews still keep kosher because it is God's will. As for disease, I very much doubt that would be a problem for a small, nomadic tribe.
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posted
I don't think the prohibitions on extramarital sex are there for reasons of disease. I think they're there so we don't break people's hearts.
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posted
KoM, I am someone who firmly believes that marriages may remain binding in heaven an that after we are ressurrected and have bodies once more there very well may be sex again.
If people are born with homosexual orientation rather than influenced by their environment in some way, I imagine (according to my belief system) it will be removed in the ressurrection as will any other mortal infirmity. My reasoning for this has to do with my Mormon belief in eternal marriage being a part of the plan. The idea is that married couples gifted with eternal life go on to create their own earths inhabited by their offspring as we are God's offspring. Eternal homosexual relationships don't make sense in this pattern. So I assume it is a tendancy that will be experienced in mortality only. In fact, I am of the belief that those ressurrected not in eternal marriages won't be capable or desirous of sex (pure speculation.)
As a result of this belief, I tend to look at sex as a sacred gift from God and that part of our test here is to see how we deal with it. Are we kind? Are we in control of ourselves? Are we patient? Are we faithful? How can we be trusted to deal with this "power"?
I don't think disembodied spirits experience sexual attraction and if they do are not capable of carrying out those desires. I think sex is unique to having a physical body.
posted
<-- Is on his best behaviour since OSC started posting
Bev, there seems to be a disconnect somewhere in that. Now, if there's no sex, then the offspring you refer to must be created by some other means, right? So why, then, is there no room for eternal homosexual marriages? I don't know what sort of reproductive activity you're envisioning; the lack of sex for spirits makes good sense, but seems to indicate that there is no longer any need for male and female. Wouldn't just two loving people be enough?
Getting back to the subject of unrequited love, I think "Let's just be friends" would be just as devastating in Heaven as on Earth. By definition you can only love one person in a monogamous way! So would our souls be changed to be contented with other kinds of love if that was what we could get? Or would we perhaps be so perfectly wise that we would be able to control our emotions, and not fall in love with someone we knew was inappropriate? Again, though, what if we chose to do so? Free will, after all.
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posted
Bev's comment makes more sense when you realize that from her religion's perspective, we are spirit beings for a while after death and then resurrected, having bodies again.
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posted
I implied *strongly* that I think there will be sex between eternally married couples and it will serve a procreative purpose every bit as much as sex does now.
Thanks, Susie, I didn't realize that wasn't clear.
posted
The general tendency of my faith has been to believe that there will be no sex in heaven, nor any marriage. Many--though not all--of our theologians have suggested that this will be because there will be no physical sexes there (a few have actually argued that we will all be male).
Although we do tend to believe in a literal resurrection, our bodies will not be as they are now--how different they will be is in dispute. I believe I've heard one or two people argue that Jesus' appearances "in a different form" after his resurrection are not miracles so much as a property of his new body, and that ours will be the same.
As for the original question....heck, I don't know. I think I've even seen the opinion expressed at least once that it will be possible to sin in heaven--after all, it's already happened once.
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posted
I think the point of heaven is that if we get there, we experience direct contact with God. I assume that direct contact with God means a complete and total re-formatting of our understanding of everything. It may well be that there are souls who experience soul re-formatting and decide to turn away from God. I don't know. The proper use of free will is, I think, critical to getting to heaven, so I don't think it would be discarded upon arrival.
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posted
Actually, I find the "total reformatting" idea creepy. The most common use of that idea in my church is to explain why we won't be miserable that some of our loved ones are in hell.
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posted
If I'm understanding what bunbun means correctly, I think "reformatting" might have a stronger meaning to computer-oriented people (who think of it as a total wiping of information) than was meant.
It's not like we'll forget, but we'll reinterpret what we know based on a wealth of new information.
posted
Probably it would suggest that, Dagonee, but I wasn't so much referring to the use of the term "reformatting" as to my encounters with a similar idea. I can't think of anyone ever calling it "reformatting" at all, actually, although that term seems appropriate enough.
To put it in the terms I have seen, the belief is that once we are in heaven we will no longer be afflicted with sinful tendencies, and will therefore be able to view the behavior of other people with greater clarity. Therefore we will recognize that those people who have gone to hell--regardless of our feelings for them in our life on earth--deserve to be there, and we will not be concerned about their well-being.
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posted
Excessively creepy. I believe that hell is not a state of, for lack of a better word, physical torment, but rather of realization of sin and guilt and anticipation of suffering (whether that actually comes or not). I also believe that those in, for lack of a better word, Heaven, may in some circumstances be able to visit those in, for lack of a better word, Hell, and help lift them out of it eventually (not that they won't suffer as long as they deserve to).
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posted
I should clarify that that is not an official doctrine, although it appears to be quite common, but simply one of many attempts to explain how the afterlife functions.
Likewise, the exact nature of hell is in dispute, and I am not certain what percentage consider it to be physical. That it is real, and very unpleasant, is very nearly beyond dispute among us, though. (A few people do believe in annihilation.)
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posted
In LDS scripture there is a passage that I find very moving. It is a passage where Enoch and God are having a conversation. Enoch sees God weeping, and he can't understand why. God is so powerful, He made everything. How can He grieve?
God then opens to Enoch a vision in which Enoch understands that many of God's children are using their free will to do things that will bring themselves and others misery. He shows Enoch the suffering people endure from the sins of others. He sees the very earth as a living being suffering because of the wickedness of mankind. He is so moved by this vision that he himself is inconsolable and begins weeping, pleading with God to know when the earth shall rest.
He then sees Christ's sacrifice and how it sets things right. He is at last content. But he also understands that just because someone is in heaven and perfect does not mean that they do not grieve for the suffering of others.
I take that to mean that in heaven we will still know sorrow--of only one kind. Sorrow for the suffering of others. It is as though true joy would not be complete without that bitter twist.
But we also believe that the only ones that are truly lost forever are the ones that fully embrace the darkness, utterly refusing God's light. All others will receive a degree of salvation and glory. The highest like the light of the sun, the second like the light of the moon, the last like the light of the stars.
So I imagine the sorrow for the suffering of others is softened by knowing it can have an end and that they will be given every chance to accept God's mercy. The only ones that will be truly lost will, I imagine, have become too monstrous--by their own choice--to consider human anymore. That doesn't mean we won't still sorrow for them, but it might effect how we view the situation--inevitable, written into the fabric of reality, preserving and protecting balance, rather than arbitrary or unfair.
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posted
LDS pretty much believe that annihilation isn't even possible. But we also believe that there is something deep down within each of us that has always existed. We don't know the nature of this "eternal essence", only that it cannot be created or destroyed--only change. I imagine it is the essence of our free will.
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posted
Beverly> I had come to the conclusion on my own that annihilation is impossible. That's not as friendly a conclusion for me as it is for you, though.
Something like a dozen major attempts have been made to soften my church's doctrine on hell, but none of them has ever succeeded in the long run. Most people have been convinced that scripture requires a literal and eternal hell, no matter how unpalatable it is. People who really can't live with that eventually tend to leave rather than continue trying to change things.
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