posted
Hi folks, I didn't want to derail the other thread from the great discussion that's been going on over there, so I'll post these over here as promised.
I went to find some of the passages in my book and I saw that I had actually underlined the parts that were important for me. How convenient! I realized that most of these sections are affirmations of what I already believe, but said in a way that makes beautiful sense (which is why I love to read Lewis).
quote:Ransom: I think he made one law of that kind [not to go to the islands] in order that there might be obedience. In all these other matters what you call obeying Him is but doing what seems good in your own eyes also. Is love content with that? You do them, indeed, because they are His will, but not only because they are His will. Where can you taste the joy of obeying unless He bids you do something for which His bidding is the only reason? ...
Lady: Oh, brave Piebald, this is the best you have said yet...We cannot walk out of Maleldil's will: but He has given us a way to walk out of our will. And there could be no such way except a command like this. Out of our own will...
I love that. It's very clear to me and it's what I think of when friends or not so friendly people mention that my obedience is 'blind.'
More on that later I hope.
here's the next one that has a lot to do with our discussion of the Fall. Over here some folks said that they didn't get much out of this book because it was in opposition to LDS beliefs. I remember getting SO much out of this book, and my LDS beliefs are firmly intact and even strengthened. I don't know why, I guess I just saw it from a different perspective.
quote:Satan: He has hidden the half of what happened. Hardness came out of it but also splendour. They made with their own hands mountains higher than your Fixed Island. They made for themselves Floating Islands greater....(and he goes on). There is more. He has not told you that it was this breaking of the commandment which brought Maleldil to our world and because of which He was made man. He dare not deny it.
Lady: Do you say this, Piebald?
Ransom after some thought: I will tell you what I say. Of course good came of it. Is Maleldil a beast that we can stop His path, or a leaf that we can twist His shape? Whatever you do, He will make good of it. But not the good He had prepared for you if you had obeyed Him. That is lost for ever.
emphasis added.
This made so much sense to me, mostly in my own life. But it also made sense to me in relation to the Fall. While I believe that it was necessary for us to become mortal (in the LDS sense of the Fall) and therefore necessary for Adam and Eve to fall, I have to admit that there was a commandment there. A commandment that was broken. The Savior was prepared to come and God knew that this was the choice that Adam and Eve would make...but I really love to think about what God's plan A was. ? What was it?
When I think of it harder, the question is irrelevant because of what I believe about the Fall. But these words in this book were profound to me, they were very personal. I know there have been times in my life where I have made choices that weren't the best for me, that weren't God's will. When Ransom says "He brought good of it in the end. But what [ I ] did was not good; and what [ I ] lost we have not seen." I think there are cases in my life where I won't see what I lost.
But, it is THIS that illustrates to me how loving and wonderful God is. He will make "good of it," whatever I do. Now, for me it means He will make good of it as long as I am doing what I can and seeking help.
quote:He was in God's hands. As long as he did his best--and he had done his best--God would see to the final issue. He had not succeeded. But he had done his best. No one could do more. "Tis not in mortals to command success." He must not be worried about the final result.
I can think of the Fall as Adam and Even doing their best (which I believe they did) and God making the best of what their best was. I do think that it was always God's plan to have us progress and have this life here on earth, and He made that happen. This was another really important lesson for me to learn in my own life, especially on my mission. When I would freak out about 'ruining God's plan' because I did something wrong, or missed an appointment, I was assuming that it was I that had the power. That last quote, along with the earlier "Is Maleldil a beast that we can stop His path, or a leaf that we can twist His shape?" were important truths for me to learn so that I could be content with my best and 'walk out of my will.'
Anyway, that's a little of what I got out of this beautiful book. It probably doesn't make any sense at all (I'm not very articulate), but those are a few of my favorite quotes.
posted
I like this. I don't think there _is_ really a plan beyond simply setting the stage; I think practically everything is up to us (which is a good thing). A set plan implies divine foreknowledge, which I think is incompatible with free will.
Instead of setting up a specified number of pins (ie, appointments) to knock down, I think, like you said, God always offers us simply hope and encouragement, and constant possibility. For me, it's less a tally sheet of good things/bad things than it is a process of growth.
Posts: 794 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
The second one especially... I am arguing with a friend right now who wants a reason to believe...wants to know how it will make his life different because, as he and I both agree, you cannot simply command God (if He exists), who clearly allows suffering in the lives of those who follow Him as well as those who don't... and in apparently equal amounts. But I seized on the problem of suffering and said that we have two choices-- to believe that suffering is pointless, or to believe that there is a Being that can and does bring purpose and goodness out of suffering in the end. I have experienced the latter, so I believe and have genuine hope that it is the case for the world at large, rather than just my little corner of it.
Matt, as an example of how it is possible to have foreknowledge and still keep freewill, picture this:
The perfect platoon leader, who knows his troops perfectly, is tasked to defend a position. He knows how his men will perform... which will carry out their assigned duties and which will shirk them... even that some will outright betray their posts and who that will be... and deploys them, in time and space, such that his battle plan will work... taking advantage of even the ones who will fail to do as they are assigned to bring about the end result he is seeking. He may assign some of them impossible tasks, knowing that it is beyond their strength to do what they are asked, but knowing that their efforts and sacrifice will be enough to allow other important parts of his plan to be effected.
This planning and foreknowledge does not in any way take from the freedom or responsibility of the individual men.
quote: But I seized on the problem of suffering and said that we have two choices-- to believe that suffering is pointless, or to believe that there is a Being that can and does bring purpose and goodness out of suffering in the end.
This is, I suspect, the primary reason people still believe in God.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Matt, as an example of how it is possible to have foreknowledge and still keep freewill, picture this:
The perfect platoon leader, who knows his troops perfectly, is tasked to defend a position. He knows how his men will perform... which will carry out their assigned duties and which will shirk them...
Ah, that's the way James Talmadge, an LDS theologian, gets around the problem. But it's not _really_ foreknowledge, is it? It's simply prediction - very good prediction, perhaps, but prediction nonetheless, that by definition cannot be certain. I think God is within time, and therefore is not omniscient in the classical sense. But I'm okay with that. Posts: 794 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
I think time is the window through which we see the truth of freewill.
If you could travel at the speed of light, or stand on the event horizon of a black hole, the entire history of the universe would appear to be simultaneous to you (time dilation becomes infinite).
I think, personally, that is how things really are, and time is just how things appear to our consciousness.
But that's just my pet theory.
How would you define the difference between "perfect" prediciton and "foreknowledge"?
Posts: 3846 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote: I think God is within time, and therefore is not omniscient in the classical sense.
Neal A. Maxwell referenced Joseph Smith in this talk when he said:
quote:Actually, God has the past, present, and future ever before Him, constituting an “eternal ‘now’
I don't pretend to know what that means pertaining to the foreknowledge thing, but I definitely believe that God is omniscient in every sense of the word. Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Wow Jim-me. Your 'pet theory' is what one of the LDS apostles has stated to be fact! That makes me smile. Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
well... it's not quite so proprietary as I make it sound...
steven, it's not that time doesn't exist, but that it's a dimension along which we move and change shape... just as we (can) move and change shape along the axis of our height.
But unlike the axis of our height, we can only "see" the point at which our consciousness exists and, also unlike it, our consciousness seems to proceed through this axis continuously and in a particular direction, so we can only remember the part of it which we have moved through... which we call "the past".
Faith comes in mighty handy at times like this. [edit to add: 'this statement applies to me personally' so that people don't think I'm squashing inquiry into truth.]
Elders Maxwell and McConkie were supporters of absolute omniscience; Talmadge and Brigham Young supported predictive foreknowledge. Joseph Smith was actually here and there on the topic. So we can find support for a variety of positions here.
Personally, it seems to me that if God knew for a surity before my birth that on March 22, 2008, I would shoplift a candy bar, my own moral agency is compromised. This means that my future is fixed before I was born; there's nothing I can do to _avoid_ stealing the candy bar. Thus, am I really responsible for doing so? This conception of absolute foreknowledge, I think, stems from Greek conceptions of God as absolutely immutable.
But we know from, for example, the Old Testament that God hopes Israel will turn to him after certain calamities; when they don't, he feels grief and disappointment. So God is not immutable; he reacts to our free choices.
Blake Ostler, currently probably the leading LDS theologian, explains predictive foreknowledge in this way. I think he's probably right.
quote:God has certain knowledge that his plan will be fulfilled in the future. That probabalistic knowledge is not certain, but it is knowledge of probabilities, and in addition some physical processes undoubtedly limit and determine some outcomes (e.g, God can know that the sun will come appear over the horizon from our perspective tomorrow -- and he could change that if he wanted to but he also knows that he won't change it). So even though God doesn't know what free persons will do, there is a very large range of phenomena that can be predicted with great accuracy. What God predicts are usually elements of his plan that he will insure comes about.
God didn't intervene to "cause" the Romans to crucify Christ; they freely chose to crucify him. Yet given human nature it was highly probable that Christ's light would provoke a violent response. The Romans freely chose to be provoked by Christ and it was foreseeable with high probability that they would freely react as they did.
God knows _his_ future actions, without a doubt. And he also knows that his work will succeed. And he's smart enough to shape those things around our reactions.
Posts: 794 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
quote from narnia: "Faith comes in mighty handy at times like this."
there's a quote by Jascha Heifetz that goes someting like, "whatever side you choose in an argument, there will always be someone on your side who you wish was on the other side."
I wonder what Osama bin Laden would say about the time question I raised? Would it sound something like Narnia's answer? Hmm...
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I wonder what Osama bin Laden would say about the time question I raised? Would it sound something like Narnia's answer? Hmm...
I'm pretty close to calling a foul here. But I'll give you a chance to explain what this is supposed to mean first.
quote:there's a quote by Jascha Heifetz that goes someting like, "whatever side you choose in an argument, there will always be someone on your side who you wish was on the other side."
So, therefore, all sides in all arguments are wrong?
Posts: 794 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
As sacrilegious as it is, the illustration that has best helped me understand how God can see time as "one eternal now" is that of the aliens in Slaughterhouse Five. I'll probably find out how silly it is of me to think of it that way someday, but for now it really works for me.
Posts: 67 | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:As sacrilegious as it is, the illustration that has best helped me understand how God can see time as "one eternal now" is that of the aliens in Slaughterhouse Five.
Woah. I'm the exact same way.
Well, almost. When I started thinking about God that way, I went back to those ideas that I first got from Slaughterhouse Five.
Some similar ideas were discussed in another book I had to read for English class -- Grendel.
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Wow... two posts into the thread before you compare Narnia to, arguably, the most wanted Criminal on earth.
That tact thing is still escaping you, isn't it, Steven? and of course, God forbid we should express a little humility when discussing the unknowable and say "this is just our best guess..."
Posts: 3846 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Sister Annie--in fact, I often think of that very book when I think of time, etc. I in fact believe that the universe looks like this, from the no-time perspective:
roll your mouse and left-click and drag to rotate it. Look at it from both the side and the top/bottom.
There are only 5 such vortexes, each corresponding to one of the 5 Platonic Solids. Looking at it from the top, connect the intersections of the lines with straight lines to all other points, and you get a Platonic solid.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Jim, I actually sort of agree with your perspective. I just like to slap down those who would squash inquiry into truth. There's not that big a jump from "faith" to "sword of God" to "regular old sword".
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
One analysis of the use of the lack of free will and the sight of all time at once in Slaughterhouse 5 was that it was Vonnegut's attempt to present what he considered the only possible justification for Dresden. I.e., the only way one can accept what happened is if one decides that all events are beyond everyone's control.
Not that this changes its suitability for comparison here. I just think it's an interesting way to show outrage.
By the way, steven, villification of others and their views squashes inquiry into truth like few other things.
Except maybe a lack of organ meats in ones diet, of course.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
quote:I wonder what Osama bin Laden would say about the time question I raised? Would it sound something like Narnia's answer?
Well, since none of my answers in this thread were to your question, I guess it impossible to know. My posts were directed to Jim-me or Matt.
quote:I just like to slap down those who would squash inquiry into truth.
Nice slap. Who was 'squashing inquiry' might I ask? Was it me and Jim when we ventured to say "I don't know?"
Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote:To aid understanding we need to consider two models, two images of God, which lead to serious distortions of the divine character. First is the image of God as a puppeteer. Here God manipulates the strings of marionettes. The feet and the arms of the puppets jerk and dance as God pulls the strings. Puppets have no will. They have no heart or soul. Their bodies are filled with sawdust. If God were like this, not even the Wizard of Oz could make us truly free.
The second image of God is of the spectator. Here God sits on the sidelines of world history. He observes the game closely. He makes careful notes about the action and will turn in a scouting report. He is the ultimate armchair quarterback. He second-guesses the plays that are called. He roots for His favorite team. However, He is powerless to affect the outcome of the game in any way. The action is on the field, and He's not playing. This model of God destroys His sovereignty. The spectator God is a God who reigns but never rules. He is a God without authority. He observes history but is not Lord over history.
Obviously, I don't think either of these is correct. So, there can't be absolute freedom for man - he still has to be subject to God's will. But how does that affect our own freedom to make choices?
The answer, I think, is that God foreordains, but does not coerce events.
Sproul explains it this way:
quote:Foreordain does not mean coerce. It simply means that God wills that something take place. He may will future events through the free choices of creatures. This is the great mystery of providence - that God can will the means as well as the ends of future events. God can even will good through the wicked choices of men.
For example, Sproul brings up the Crucifixion. God foreordained that Christ would be crucified. Was Pilate his puppet then, when he freed Barrabbas and crucified Christ? Was it Pilate's own choice?
quote:Pilate succumbed to the howling crowd, not because God coerced him, but because Pilate was too weak to withstand the demands of the mob.
The outcome of God's eternal plan of redemption did not hinge finally on the decision of Pontius Pilate. What if Pilate had released Jesus and crucified Barabbas instead? Such a thought is almost unthinkable. It would suggest that God was only a spectator in the plan of redemption, that He hoped for the best but had no control over the events.
God did more than hope for the Cross. He willed the Cross. Jesus was delivered by the determinate forecounsel of God.
So what is the relationship between man's will and God's will? Both exist, but man's will is always subordinate to God's will.
quote:God is sovereign. Man is free. Man's freedom is limited, however, by God's sovereignty. God's sovereignty is not limited by man's freedom. This is simply to say that man is not God. God is free and man is free. But God is more free than a man. Man's freedom is always and everywhere subordinate to God's freedom.
Now, I'll turn to Charles Spurgeon for a very important point on the matter of salvation itself. It's been said in criticism that reformed Christians think that God arbitrarily just chooses people, forces them to convert in defiance of their own free wills, and then damns the rest to hell. That's a distortion of Reformed teaching, because it goes back to the puppeteer analogy and assumes that reformed Christians think man has no free will at all. Not so. I can't put it more beautifully than Spurgeon, so I'll quote him:
quote:MAN'S WILL HAS ITS PROPER PLACE IN THE MATTER OF SALVATION. "Whosoever will let him come and take the water of life freely." According to this and many other texts the Scripture where man is addressed as a being having a will, it appears clear enough that men are not saved by compulsion. When a man receives the grace of Christ, he does not receive it against his will. No man shall be pardoned while he abhors the though forgiveness. No man shall have joy in the Lord if he says, "I do not wish to rejoice in the Lord." Do not think that anybody shall have the angels pushing them behind into the gates of heaven. They must go there freely or else they will never go there at all.
I bolded that sentence because I just love it. It's one of my favorites.
What we believe is that no one turns to Christ on his own unless that person has been regenerated through the grace of the Holy Spirit. We believe man has a will, yet while that man is in bondage to sin that will rejects God and will not turn to him on his own. Man must be regenerated from within before he can accept the gift of grace. It does not mean, however, that we think man turns to that gift of grace against his will.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Hm. I'm late again. Well said Dag. (And Belle. I'm really late!)
quote:Foreordain does not mean coerce. It simply means that God wills that something take place. He may will future events through the free choices of creatures. This is the great mystery of providence - that God can will the means as well as the ends of future events. God can even will good through the wicked choices of men.
I believe that. Like you, I'm not willing to accept either of those first two explanations. I simply don't believe that God lacks power in any sense of the word. I don't believe that He's not all-knowing. I think He can orchestrate things like a brilliant chess player times infinity. He can see the consequences of all the future moves and makes His plan accordingly. It doesn't mean that He takes away the ability to choose, but He knows us perfectly.
quote:This is the great mystery of providence
When I say that faith comes in handy, it's a personal statement (note the edit above.) I choose to believe that there are some mysteries that I just cannot explain with my limited comprehension and knowledge.
Thanks for those quotes Belle. Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Spanish Inquisition. Catholics should bring their thick skin into religious discussions with me.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Dag, I don't really eat organ meats. If you'll notice, Dr. Price said that all tribes said shellfish were better, and the Masai, who ate organ meats, were too tall and thin. If you want to argue Dr. Price's stuff, check the thread on Price. Everybody else has backed down.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Steven, everyone needs to bring their thick skin into discussions with you, from what I've seen.
And what does the inquisition have to do with anything? Unless you're suggesting that the actions of a small segment of a population are valid reason for painting the entirety of that population that way?
That's hella-inductive reasoning, my man, as well as a little thing I was taught to call "prejudice".
Posts: 3846 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I was referring to you, Dag, when I said Catholic. and Jim-Me. And anybody who felt any sting when I said "spanish inquisition." Most of us on these forums have a Protestant background.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
*bump* to point out my edits above so that steven doesn't think I'm 'squashing' inquiry into truth. (Sorry I keep using that phrase, I just like it.)
quote:The answer, I think, is that God foreordains, but does not coerce events.
I wonder if you could elaborate on the difference between these. By foreordination, do you mean something similar to how Ostler describes the Crucifixion in the quotation I posted? IE, that God was able to predict what would happen in Israel at that point, and timed his own actions to fit with the currents of history and ensure that his plan was carried out, rather than directly influencing human action?
Posts: 794 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Jim-Me--you're just about dead on. Most everyone gets nailed when I'm on the warpath. But I can be pretty decent. If you had a sick kid, I'd be the first to try and help, just like I did with Pete at Home on Ornery. His son had some kind of mercury poisoning, and I suggested a product that I thought might help the little guy.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:I was referring to you, Dag, when I said Catholic. and Jim-Me. And anybody who felt any sting when I said "spanish inquisition." Most of us on these forums have a Protestant background.
A. I don't feel stings from gnats. There are people on this board capable of rhetorically stinging me. You, to date, have not demonstrated such a capability.
B. Was your post simply a non-sequitur, then? You insult Narnia with a reference to OBL and then, what, decided to have a go at the Catholics, too?
quote:Dag cheated when he brought up the organ meats.
Yeah, that's way worse than comparing someone to one of the most villified men in America (the villification, not the man, is in America).
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Narnia, edit all you want. I responded to the intent and tone of the original post. Anything that even vaguely smacks of favoring Catholicism over Mormonism is going to get a reaction from me here, for 2 reasons.
1. this site is named after books about Alvin Maker, who is clearly modelled after Joseph Smith.
2. Mormons are no worse than Catholics, in their response to dissent, that I can see.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
[to steven] THE ORIGINAL POST WAS NOT EVEN RESPONDING TO YOU. And how dare you imply that you know the 'intent and tone' of my post? You don't even know me! I wasn't even talking to you!
And as for the Mormon/Catholic crap, what are you TALKING about?
Posts: 6415 | Registered: Jul 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
Dag, you're just dogpiling. Can't beat me on the Price thread, so you've decided to come after me elsewhere.
Seriously, I'm having a crappy day. I've been looking forward to going out tonight for a week, but the young lady in question is sick with food poisoning. I took the evening off from work just to go out with her. Big fun.
Posts: 3354 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Steven, is what Narnia posted really all it takes to make you go "on the warpath?"
I am reminded of that site about ninjas flipping out and killing a town because someone dropped a spoon...
Posts: 3846 | Registered: Apr 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Dag, you're just dogpiling. Can't beat me on the Price thread, so you've decided to come after me elsewhere.
I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to put it to a vote as to whether you were "beaten" or not in the Price thread, although I will gladly acknowledge the work of others before my own in that regard.
quote:Seriously, I'm having a crappy day. I've been looking forward to going out tonight for a week, but the young lady in question is sick with food poisoning. I took the evening off from work just to go out with her. Big fun.
And this gives you the right to be mean to my friends here how?
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
Dude, people stopped posting to it because you were pretty completely beaten. They stopped out of pity.Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
[edit to add: 'this statement applies to me personally' so that people don't think I'm squashing inquiry into truth.]
