swivel
September 11th, 2007, 04:17 PM
I don't mean that fewer people would believe in God's existence, I mean that fewer people would "believe" in him and what he is doing if his existence was taken as axiomatic. Let's explore this bizarre hypothesis:
Assume that God was not something that required faith. He made his presence known by talking with each of us on and off. He would often appear in some form to large groups and proclaim this or that. Miracles happened often, and God would appear and take credit for them. Let's assume that we had contact with angels and other mystical creatures. We would all KNOW that God was real, but would we believe in him, the way we believed in our parents as small children?
Imagine hurricane Katrina happens in this hypothetical world. We can't GUESS that this was the punishment brought forth by some unseen, faith-needing creature of unknown motivations. This would be something done by that big dude that roars proclamations from the clouds. We could point to the thing responsible. Would we all say, "New Orleans had it coming"? Or would we wonder to ourselves, "Wasn't that a bit extreme?". Wouldn't we start seeing this guy as a maniacal, power-mad tyrant? Isn't this God the archetypal bad guy of any work of fiction? The overbearing ruler that the small hero of the story works to free himself from?
What's funny about God's existence is that if we ever take it as a given, it leads to these horrible results. It means that all of our loved ones are in heaven or hell, and we can't talk to any of them. It means that when we lose a husband or wife, and re-marry, we will have to resolve this three-some in the afterlife which is going to go on for a mind-numbing ennui-filled eternity.
It means that Siamese twins, midgets, kids with MS, these really are God's way of "testing" parents, and not the natural result of the imperfect nature of DNA to RNA sequencing. There would be a dude there that we can question for all of the injustices of the world. Would we still love him like we do now? Or do we only love what we don't know and can't understand? Would we instead fear and loathe the overseer. Would we feel like ants, dodging the focused sunlight cast down by the petulant, sadistic child above us?
There are two options when it comes to morality: 1) Good and evil exist outside of any God, and they must conform to these standards just as we must. 2) A God randomly determines what is good and what is evil, and we must abide by these arbitrary standards.
If 1) is true, then God must play by the same rules that we must. And any evil acts by him must be seen as a violation of these rules which are greater than all of us, and by being greater than us, are MEANINGFUL, because they are not random and arbitrary. Rather they are good or bad due to some objective truth inherent within each moral action.
If 2) is true, then God is insisting that we live by a set of rules that he plucked out of thin air, or just because they suited his random wishes one day (remember that they can only be INHERENTLY good and bad in the first example, which means that God is just obeying them as well). This means that we go to heaven or hell for not following the RANDOM rules of a tyrant-father.
If God showed his face daily, we could hate him if 1) is true, and fear him if 2) is true. Either way, he would be the evil fuck in all of our lives, and we would be the moral fighters for justice in the tale.
It is DOUBT, not faith that gives God any grace.
Assume that God was not something that required faith. He made his presence known by talking with each of us on and off. He would often appear in some form to large groups and proclaim this or that. Miracles happened often, and God would appear and take credit for them. Let's assume that we had contact with angels and other mystical creatures. We would all KNOW that God was real, but would we believe in him, the way we believed in our parents as small children?
Imagine hurricane Katrina happens in this hypothetical world. We can't GUESS that this was the punishment brought forth by some unseen, faith-needing creature of unknown motivations. This would be something done by that big dude that roars proclamations from the clouds. We could point to the thing responsible. Would we all say, "New Orleans had it coming"? Or would we wonder to ourselves, "Wasn't that a bit extreme?". Wouldn't we start seeing this guy as a maniacal, power-mad tyrant? Isn't this God the archetypal bad guy of any work of fiction? The overbearing ruler that the small hero of the story works to free himself from?
What's funny about God's existence is that if we ever take it as a given, it leads to these horrible results. It means that all of our loved ones are in heaven or hell, and we can't talk to any of them. It means that when we lose a husband or wife, and re-marry, we will have to resolve this three-some in the afterlife which is going to go on for a mind-numbing ennui-filled eternity.
It means that Siamese twins, midgets, kids with MS, these really are God's way of "testing" parents, and not the natural result of the imperfect nature of DNA to RNA sequencing. There would be a dude there that we can question for all of the injustices of the world. Would we still love him like we do now? Or do we only love what we don't know and can't understand? Would we instead fear and loathe the overseer. Would we feel like ants, dodging the focused sunlight cast down by the petulant, sadistic child above us?
There are two options when it comes to morality: 1) Good and evil exist outside of any God, and they must conform to these standards just as we must. 2) A God randomly determines what is good and what is evil, and we must abide by these arbitrary standards.
If 1) is true, then God must play by the same rules that we must. And any evil acts by him must be seen as a violation of these rules which are greater than all of us, and by being greater than us, are MEANINGFUL, because they are not random and arbitrary. Rather they are good or bad due to some objective truth inherent within each moral action.
If 2) is true, then God is insisting that we live by a set of rules that he plucked out of thin air, or just because they suited his random wishes one day (remember that they can only be INHERENTLY good and bad in the first example, which means that God is just obeying them as well). This means that we go to heaven or hell for not following the RANDOM rules of a tyrant-father.
If God showed his face daily, we could hate him if 1) is true, and fear him if 2) is true. Either way, he would be the evil fuck in all of our lives, and we would be the moral fighters for justice in the tale.
It is DOUBT, not faith that gives God any grace.