is god all powerful or just the most powerful possible being?

if god is all powerful then we get contradictions like this:

can god make a rock so big that god can't move it?

yes - then he isn't powerful enough to move it
no - then he isn't powerful enough to make it

if god is the greatest possible being then we wouldn't expect him to be able to do the impossible (like make a rock so big he can't move it) or defy the laws of logic etc...

but thats okay.

the benefits to the 'greatest possible being' interpretation is that it would actually be possible for god to exist!

[moodyblu]

Since we cannot possibly understand the omnipotent in our "70 odd"...it is WE that are on the limited side.
Since God is eternal...we are viewing his "ego"... if you will...on strictly mortal terms. If God is ALL...God doesn't have to prove anything...especially limits.
p.s. This philisophical stuff kinda gives me a headache...
m.b.

[SeptemberMorn]

LOL Your arguments amaze me!

To me, it's a simple matter of faith. If God created the universe, and He keeps it in order, then how could he possibly create a rock that is too big for Him to move??? He can simply speak it into being and as easily, He can speak it into oblivion!

Yes! We limit Him everyday when we choose to NOT believe that He can do anything!

[JustAPixie]

We will never be able to understand God with our own minds, how can the created understand the creator??? God transcends all thought and we can never put Him in a box saying this is "God" or that is "God". What we know about God is only that which He choose to reveal through us... You can ask a million questions and reach a illion dead ends and you still won't be any closer... that is why we call it "Faith"

I don't understand how or why it is a 'limit' as opposed to 'an insight into his nature'.

Can god make a square circle?
Can he make 2+2=5 (not by changing the meaning of the conventional signs)
Can he make something both red all over and blue all over at the same time?

Why on earth would we expect him to be able to do any of that?

I understand the notion that we can't grasp everything with these tiny finite minds like ours...
But then I think that we also see parts clearly sometimes and god (if you like) gave us this wonderful tool of reason for a reason...

I don't see it as a limit on god.

I don't feel CONSTRAINED by not being able to do the impossible...

I think we can use reason to hit up upon the limits of what we are able to conceptualise
All that is left to be done then is to gesture at what lies beyond and to have faith

But I have trouble with the notion of God on the one hand and reason on the other

[JustAPixie]

Yes, God can make 2+2+5 and all those other things... But we are limited to the dimension we live in and our minds cannot understand what lies beneath that. Maths is part of OUR dimension, so is circles and squares and all other shapes, you cannot see the shape of another dimension, but it does exist. Colour is aonther constriant on OUR dimension, so is physics and all the stuff you can think of. God can make a rock big enough that He can't move it and in the same instant also move it... that is just connected to weight and area displacement (forgive the bad scientific translations). All these things are part of the world God created for us to live in, a world full of limits, and therefor we cannot understand the concepts of no limits... just as we can't understand eternity... And Jesus being at creation, but also only being born 2000 years ago...

can god make

p = not p?

can he make

good become evil

evil become good

are things evil because god hates them
or does he hate them because they are evil

could god have made it the case that
the morally obligatory thing to do
is to torture innocent babies for fun?

________________

i don't understand why someone would choose to say 'yeah' to all of that... i don't understand how saying 'no' is limiting god (in fact) rather than limiting superflous language about him.

the greatest possible being... what more could you ask for?

contradictions cannot be the case, however.

if you want god to exist then you better not endorse contradictions in the way you define him

if you believe god does exist then his nature will be such where he doesn't contain any contradictions

what good would the greatest impossible being be?

PS... One can use the 'greatest possible being but can't do things that are impossible' line as a response to the problem of evil too so it can multi task.

Also... I'm fairly sure that some church doctrine (catholic I think) and maybe others... Some church theologians decided that this conception of God was the least objectionable solution to the problem of evil and they officially state something to the effect of god being the greatest POSSIBLE being...

[AlteredState01]

What a great post, ak! And your question at the end - wow!
I just want to write and write and write about this, but the problem is, I have/had/still have the same problem!

But you know what? I see more and more how mankind, through their own methods (scientifically, politically, medically, historically, socially and in all senses, really) are building up proof of God's existence, yet are unaware of it because "we" are so sceptical and somewhat intent on proving the opposite, it seems. "Blinded," God said He would make them (worldly mankind) to this.

All the awe-inspiring discoveries just about the human body in such a short period of time is just more proof of "intelligent design," political-spinningly speaking! (try saying that out loud...) The thing is, they are just discovering anew again and are, yet again back at step one, in many, many ways. I honestly believe the more mankind seeks proof of the opposite, the more it will prove Him. Oops, probably rambling.

I shouldn't write any more on this, 'cause I really want to think about this - this has soooo peaked my interest (that, and I don't even know if it has anything to do with the original topic...sorry!)

Altered State

I think that (this is my personal take) in order for god to exist it must be POSSIBLE for him to exist. There are thus constraints on his nature (his nature can't be IMPOSSIBLE aka CONTRADICTORY). Thus... Reflection on Gods nature can help us get clearer on gods nature.

I'm agnostic as to whether God exists, truth be told.

When I see people say 'God is x' and x contains a contradiction then I'm an athiest about that particular God...

The arguments for and against the existence of God...
I personally find them to stack about equally either way. That leads me to conclude (just my personal opinion) that whether one believes in God or not is not a matter of reason, it is a matter of faith.

But, once again, if people define God in a way that is contradictory then I'm an atheist about that particular God...

Considering the arguments for and against can help one get clearer on the possible Gods that could exist that are potential candidates for one to have faith in, however.

I think you do get extremists on both sides...
People who have faith who define God in a way that is contradictory...
People who don't have faith who are unreasonably hostile / resistent...
And I think that both kinds of people feed off each other and keep the other camp in their implausible extremist position (I do not at all mean to say that anyone here is in either of those two camps, but I think it is something that does tend to happen).

'Intelligent Design' is an interesting notion... Upon examination there are a lot of related notions / claims that are in the vicinity...

One notion would be to deny evolution by natural selection.
(aka to maintain that god made all the species individually they didn't evolve from a common anscestor)
One notion would be to be make a claim about how old the earth is.

Another notion (the one I have some sympathy with) is the idea that there is a supernatural being who caused the first event in the natural world. Thats about as far as I'm willing to take the intelligent design hypothesis.

[moodyblu]

Another notion....that God keeps you guessin and walkin into dead ends like some endless "twilight zone" episode
cause you want to know if God exists...
Just hope you don't let us know about it the whole time your lookin...
Here's hope for your "blinding flash of truth at the end of the tunnel"....
m.b.

> Just hope you don't let us know about it the whole time your lookin...

read what helps, avoid the rest.
reply to what helps, avoid the rest.
if you don't appreciate my posts then please feel free to not read them and not respond to them.

thanking you for your tolerance in advance.

[moodyblu]

Hmmm...Your right. I'm sorry I "stomped" on your thread and made you upset.
It must be that dang "creationist" side to me...gets in the way all the time.
Have a nice life. God bless!
m.b.

[Rhapsody]

<font color="purple"> God is limited when ones mind is limited.... closed. </font>

I'm not upset. Thanks.

[SeptemberMorn]

I think you've answered your own question. We can't expect God to do those things because they are imaterial. He wants us to accept Him on FAITH.

Read the verses that have been posted RE: faith.

Yeah.

I guess I was wondering what other people thought...

Sometimes people think that God can do ANYTHING (even the impossible) because they think that some things just SEEM impossible to finite minds like ours but for god NOTHING is impossible.

But then there are problems...

I guess I don't really see it as limiting his power...

But some people don't like it.

I guess I was wondering what other people thought...

And what people thought after some reflection.

[(JD)]

I believe that God operates by His own laws of quantum physics/quantum mechanics. It isn't that he CAN'T, imo, it's that He WON'T.

The mind of God comes into play when you brooch such subjects...just because we can't think it, doesn't mean God can't anything... who can know the mind of God?

[Perna]

I don't think we can limit God, no matter what we think, feel or do; we can only limit ourselves and our own beliefs?

[AlteredState01]

</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
alexandra_k said:
I think that (this is my personal take) in order for god to exist it must be POSSIBLE for him to exist. There are thus constraints on his nature (his nature can't be IMPOSSIBLE aka CONTRADICTORY). Thus... Reflection on Gods nature can help us get clearer on gods nature.

-------

Another notion (the one I have some sympathy with) is the idea that there is a supernatural being who caused the first event in the natural world. Thats about as far as I'm willing to take the intelligent design hypothesis.

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

There are absolutely restraints that God has put on Himself, such as the fact that He will not go against His own will, meaning exactly what you have pointed out above.

He cannot lie. (Titus 1:2) He cannot (will not) be unjust, unloving, showing no mercy, etc. This is the foundation of God and His nature - unchanging - the ultimate standard - perfection in every sense.

And as respects your second comment re "as far as you're willing to go," well, I just find that interesting...

You have certainly considered "both sides" of the arguments that, probably the brightest of minds, have put forth, but have you actually considered what God says about himself rather than just considering what "mankind" supposes him to be?

Indeed, if you do find contradictory statements from a particular religion or teachers about who God is, then I would too, not trust any of their teachings.

I am highly skeptical when it comes to such things. If I find hypocrisy about God and who He is within a particular religion/teaching, then forget it.

If there is contradiction, then we've got it wrong! After all, we are just learning (about everything - us, our planet and what's on it, in it, around it, how to put it in a pure language (mathematics), how to interpret it, etc.) He already knows this stuff.

What would be so fun about life if God answered every question when we asked it? Even when we are brought back to perfection, we still won't have all the answers - the greatest gift He gave us was the capacity to learn and learn and learn...

Wow, probably way off the topic by now. Oh, yeah, this is coming from a Christian perspective (which I am sure you were aware of already).

Altered State

[JustAPixie]

"could god have made it the case that
the morally obligatory thing to do
is to torture innocent babies for fun?"

Rather ask the question if God WOULD do such a thing... God doesn't do evil evil by choice, not because He is limited...

[SeptemberMorn]

We don't know the mind of God in everything. But we do know Him in part though His words in the Bible. We know what He expects of us and how He feels about sin. We know that "God is Love." We can know His will for us and our lives if we are open to the signs he gives us, the doors He closes to us and other doors He opens. We have the Ten Commandments in the Old Testament and the Great Commmision that Jesus gave along with everything else He taught the apostles.

If God is limited, He's limited in each of our lives depending on the faith we have in Him and how open we are to His leading. If it looks like He's limited as far as the way the world is going, even though there are many righteous men are praying, it's not in God's plan to do anything to change things JUST YET.

When we think of "impossible" things, we are thinking with our finite minds. We think of things that are impossible to us, therefore when we say "Can he do the impossible?" to US it may be impossible but NOTHING impossible for Him. He just doesn't deal in "silliness" like making the sum of 2+2 become 5. He figured out the sum of those numbers long before He brought us into being... Just like He has everything else worked out. You see, He can dream a dream and it comes into being.

Lastly, God is unfathomable; His mind, His will and His love. Like the hymn says:

Could we with ink the ocean fill
And were the skies of parchment made
Were every stalk on earth a quill
And every man a scribe by trade

To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry
Nor could the scroll contain the whole
Though stretched from sky to sky

AMEN!

And this I prefer to accept on FAITH rather than try to reason it out. None of us can do that due of our humaness.

> He just doesn't deal in "silliness" like making the sum of 2+2 become 5. He figured out the sum of those numbers long before He brought us into being...

It isn't supposed to be about what God does and does not choose to do (ie whether he chooses to deal in "silliness" or not) it is about coming to a clearer conception of God's nature so we are better able to contemplate him...

When you say he 'figured out the sum of those numbers' it makes it sound as though there are facts about the sum of those numbers that God (in his state of knowing everything) figured out rather than a fact that God chose to make so.

Thats okay...

But that is precisely what is at issue... Whether God made the laws of logic (or mathematics) so, or whether they are the way they are and while God can come to know those facts he is only free to work within their bounds...

But put that way it seems to be an irritation to people. We are limiting God's nature??? Is obeying the laws of mathematics and logic best conceptualised as a constraint?

I don't think so...

But others can disagree, of course...

The trouble is that you might well end up with a conception of God that is incoherant... That doesn't worry some people but it worries me... One reason it worries me is that surely God (if he exists) gave us this tool of reason for a reason...

I'm trying to use it to better contemplate his nature.

The question at issue is whether there are limits (or bounds) on God's power...

>> could god have made it the case that
the morally obligatory thing to do
is to torture innocent babies for fun?

> Rather ask the question if God WOULD do such a thing...

One could ask your question instead, but that would be a different question and it would be a question that isn't as interesting with respect to contemplating the issue of whether God's power is limited.

The relevant question for determining whether God's power is limited is the question:

COULD God make it the case that torturing an innocent child solely for fun is a morally obligitory (or even permissable) thing to do?

This issue arises in some of the dialogues of Plato where Socrates asks:

'Is what is good loved by the Gods because it is good...
Or is what is loved by the Gods good because it is loved by the Gods'.

We can replace 'Gods' with 'God' if you prefer, but the issue still arises:

Are the Gods (is God) able to make something evil (ie torturing an innocent child solely for fun) good or is something evil (ie torturing an innocent child solely for fun) evil despite what God (or anyone else for that matter) thinks about it?

This bears on the relationship between God and morality / ethics (divine command ethics in particular where something is thought to be good because God says and evil because God says).

> God doesn't do evil evil by choice, not because He is limited...

But could he choose to do evil?

If he could choose to do evil (ie torture an innocent child solely for fun) then would evil be good?

Or would it be impossible for God to make an evil act (ie torturing an innocent child solely for fun) good?

If the latter, then should this be construed as a limit on Gods power?

Hey. I think I agree with you. There are limits on Gods power imposed from without (ie the laws of logic and mathematics) and from within (that he has promised to not lie etc). One could see them as limits... But the notion of limitless power is contradictory (and hence cannot be the case). The same issue arises in the problem of evil. I'll note that I'm including the problem of evil so as to better contemplate God's nature and NOT to prove that God doesn't exist. It seems that we might be forced into some conceptual revisions as to his nature, however. The problem of evil is as follows (and I'm sure it is an issue that every believer and non-believer has grappled with on some level)

P1) God is all knowing (follows from conception of God in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam)
P2) God is all powerful (follows from conception of God in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam)
P3) God is all good / kind / loving (follows from conception of God in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam)
P4) Evil exists (follows from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam). I'll also provide a couple examples to support this premise. Evil can be split into two different kinds:
NATURAL EVIL: Hurricanes, volcanoes, natural disaster etc that lead to suffering / loss of life.
MORAL EVIL: Rape, torture, genocide etc.

Now...

Either God CHOOSES not to prevent evil (in which case he is not all loving)

Or God CANNOT prevent evil (in which case he is not all powerful)

Or God DOESN'T KNOW about the evil (in which case he is not all knowing)

So... Something has to give...

This has been debated by theologians for centuries in order to... Come to a clearer conception of God's nature...

Theologians who attempt to hold onto the first three premises in the face of the problem of evil offer what is known as THEODICIES. (There is such a tradition of this that the defences have come to be known as theodicies).

I think it is fair to say that the most common line of defence is to say that God's power isn't limitless after all... And to offer a defence along the lines of:

This world is the greatest of all the possible worlds (with the good to evil ratio). Hence... God could not prevent the evils of this world without a reduction in overall goods.

This is really controversial, however. You just need one instance of an evil that does not seem to offer any good and the problem re-emerges...

There are lots of other theodicies that have been offered...

> have you actually considered what God says about himself rather than just considering what "mankind" supposes him to be?

I don't know what 'God says about himself'. I suppose one might find it in the Christian bible or the Mormon bible or the Catholic bible or in the buddist texts or the hindu texts or the old testament or the new testament or through prayer etc... How do we decide what 'God says about himself' compared to what people have said about God????

I have no idea...

I think the arguments are stacked either way:

It is just as rational to believe 'God exists' as it is to believe 'God does not exist'.

But the million dollar question: What do I mean by God?

I think that contradictory states of affairs cannot exist. Hence, if Gods nature is contradictory then God cannot exist. If we 'discover' Gods nature is contradictory then we have a choice, however:
1) We can conclude that God does not exist
2) We can revise our conception of God

I choose to revise my conception of God in the face of contradiction and hence I can get clearer on the nature of the possible Gods that could exist...

That gives us a range of possibilities as to what Gods nature is like...

Then...

Whether we believe in one of those Gods or not...

Is a matter of faith.

A matter of faith.

Where reason leaves off faith soars

It requires just as much faith to say 'God exists' as it does to say 'God does not exist'. Either way is a matter of faith...

A conception of the relationship between reason and faith that I really struggle with is the conception that where reason delivers a contradiction faith can persist IN SPITE OF reason. I struggle with that. I really think that God (if he exists) gave us reason for a reason... Such a reason may be (for example)... To better contemplate his nature.