The_Dark_Lord
New Lister
Free Will vs Pre-determination
It is a common phrase, even during disasters that you hear someone say, "It was all in God's will". This is true in Christianity and to my best of knowledge, in Islam also. So, is there free will? What does the bible say about free will?
What The Bible says
Apostle Paul of Tarsus, is credited with writing most of the New Testament by way of his many letters to different churches he had helped established. Even while in prison or travel, he used to receive letters informing him of the churches activities and him trying to help them solve them. It is in the book of Romans that he gives most of his philosophical ideas:
1. paganism and homosexuality: romans 1: 18-32
2. how will non-Christians then be judged: romans 2:1-24 specifically (12-16)
3. should circumcision be a requirement: romans 2: 25- 29
4. are Jews better off than Christians: romans 3:9
5. is God the God of Gentiles or God of Jews only: romans 3:29
6. are people saved by good deeds or by just believing: romans 3: 27-31 with the argument continued through to chapter 4 and initial 5. - (This is one of the major issues that caused the split between protestants and catholic, with Martin Luther insisting on salvation through faith just like Paul whereas the catholic church going with the arguments of James 2:18-26 summarised as "faith without accompanying good deeds is dead".
7. Is Jesus the only way out of sin: romans: 5:12-21
8. What is the purpose of the law is people are saved just by believing: romans: 6: 1- 20 and 7: 1-6
9. If we are sinners because there exist laws, is it to say that with no laws we would not be sinners (does knowledge of Law lead you to sinning?): romans 7: 7-25
Most of the book covers matters of salvation through faith and aspects of law and the rules in the Old Testament. but it is finally in chapter 9, that Paul tries to answer question of free will.
Beginning in verse 6, continuing the defense of salvation by faith, he says that it is not necessarily that the children of Abraham be direct descendants of Isaac but it means children of the promise meaning all those who believe in the promise of salvation. It is from here then he jumps to Isaac’s wife Rebecca.
Esau and Jacob
Rebecca had 2 sons: Esau and Jacob yet, so that God's will of choosing, it is written "Jacob I loved and Esau I hated" even before any of them had done anything good or bad (romans 9: 10-13). Then the question Paul had been asked was this, "is there injustice in God's part?" (Romans 9:14).
According to Paul, the answer is by no means, no, since God has mercy on whomever he chooses and compassion on whomever he chooses. (Romans 9:14-18).
Then for the question, if there is no free will, then why does God judge us when we make mistakes yet we cannot go against his wishes? (Romans 9:19)
Paul does a classic "Una maswali mingi kwani wewe ni polisi" question evasion tactic by answering with a question, "does the moulded ask the moulder why have you made me thus?". In short, stop asking questions since the moulder moulds some beautiful jars and others are made for menial use and they have no right to ask why they were made that way.
There is a reason that makes that question very hard for religion to answer and perhaps never will. It is an underlying dilemma for all religions with God who is good and merciful. It is called the problem of evil. (problem of evil wikipedia)
The problem of Evil
The problem is summarised as thus: if God is good, he would want to destroy bad things, evil things, hunger murders, and since he is all knowing, even though these evils are hard to tackle, he would have enough wisdom to eliminate them, and since he is all powerful, he would have the necessary power to eliminate them. However, bad, evil things exist therefore that would mean one, some or all of the characteristic of God are untrue. Either God is not good, or not all knowing or not all powerful or a combination of any or all of them or there does not exist.
To justify existence of bad, evil things, arguments by theologians have been proposed including the existence of free will which Paul already argued does not exist.
However, all of the arguments trying to support the premises are easily defeated by a counter argument of reversing the assertions by saying that there exists an all-powerful demon, who is omniscient and who is wholly evil and then using defense given as the argument to support it.
i.e., if evil things exist because God allows people to have free will, then that is usually defeated by a counter argument that Good exists because there is an all-powerful demon that allows people the free will to do good things etc. etc.
Scientists to the rescue of free will
It was theorized that if you knew everything about all the particles in the universe, their mass speed, and all vectors, you should be able to know their entire future to the very end. It even gave rise to a false paradox called the Maxwell daemon where knowledge of particle speed would enable one to heat a room without expending energy. However, according to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, nothing is certain. All factors cannot be known exactly hence it would be very hard to calculate all future possibilities beforehand.
In conclusion, you may choose to believe that graph imechorwa, “… but the truth is, most likely, the path you take, though the choices may be few and even sometimes predictable, you have the ability to choose them for yourself.”
sincerely,
THE_DARK_LORD.
It is a common phrase, even during disasters that you hear someone say, "It was all in God's will". This is true in Christianity and to my best of knowledge, in Islam also. So, is there free will? What does the bible say about free will?
What The Bible says
Apostle Paul of Tarsus, is credited with writing most of the New Testament by way of his many letters to different churches he had helped established. Even while in prison or travel, he used to receive letters informing him of the churches activities and him trying to help them solve them. It is in the book of Romans that he gives most of his philosophical ideas:
1. paganism and homosexuality: romans 1: 18-32
2. how will non-Christians then be judged: romans 2:1-24 specifically (12-16)
3. should circumcision be a requirement: romans 2: 25- 29
4. are Jews better off than Christians: romans 3:9
5. is God the God of Gentiles or God of Jews only: romans 3:29
6. are people saved by good deeds or by just believing: romans 3: 27-31 with the argument continued through to chapter 4 and initial 5. - (This is one of the major issues that caused the split between protestants and catholic, with Martin Luther insisting on salvation through faith just like Paul whereas the catholic church going with the arguments of James 2:18-26 summarised as "faith without accompanying good deeds is dead".
7. Is Jesus the only way out of sin: romans: 5:12-21
8. What is the purpose of the law is people are saved just by believing: romans: 6: 1- 20 and 7: 1-6
9. If we are sinners because there exist laws, is it to say that with no laws we would not be sinners (does knowledge of Law lead you to sinning?): romans 7: 7-25
Most of the book covers matters of salvation through faith and aspects of law and the rules in the Old Testament. but it is finally in chapter 9, that Paul tries to answer question of free will.
Beginning in verse 6, continuing the defense of salvation by faith, he says that it is not necessarily that the children of Abraham be direct descendants of Isaac but it means children of the promise meaning all those who believe in the promise of salvation. It is from here then he jumps to Isaac’s wife Rebecca.
Esau and Jacob
Rebecca had 2 sons: Esau and Jacob yet, so that God's will of choosing, it is written "Jacob I loved and Esau I hated" even before any of them had done anything good or bad (romans 9: 10-13). Then the question Paul had been asked was this, "is there injustice in God's part?" (Romans 9:14).
According to Paul, the answer is by no means, no, since God has mercy on whomever he chooses and compassion on whomever he chooses. (Romans 9:14-18).
Then for the question, if there is no free will, then why does God judge us when we make mistakes yet we cannot go against his wishes? (Romans 9:19)
Paul does a classic "Una maswali mingi kwani wewe ni polisi" question evasion tactic by answering with a question, "does the moulded ask the moulder why have you made me thus?". In short, stop asking questions since the moulder moulds some beautiful jars and others are made for menial use and they have no right to ask why they were made that way.
There is a reason that makes that question very hard for religion to answer and perhaps never will. It is an underlying dilemma for all religions with God who is good and merciful. It is called the problem of evil. (problem of evil wikipedia)
The problem of Evil
The problem is summarised as thus: if God is good, he would want to destroy bad things, evil things, hunger murders, and since he is all knowing, even though these evils are hard to tackle, he would have enough wisdom to eliminate them, and since he is all powerful, he would have the necessary power to eliminate them. However, bad, evil things exist therefore that would mean one, some or all of the characteristic of God are untrue. Either God is not good, or not all knowing or not all powerful or a combination of any or all of them or there does not exist.
To justify existence of bad, evil things, arguments by theologians have been proposed including the existence of free will which Paul already argued does not exist.
However, all of the arguments trying to support the premises are easily defeated by a counter argument of reversing the assertions by saying that there exists an all-powerful demon, who is omniscient and who is wholly evil and then using defense given as the argument to support it.
i.e., if evil things exist because God allows people to have free will, then that is usually defeated by a counter argument that Good exists because there is an all-powerful demon that allows people the free will to do good things etc. etc.
Scientists to the rescue of free will
It was theorized that if you knew everything about all the particles in the universe, their mass speed, and all vectors, you should be able to know their entire future to the very end. It even gave rise to a false paradox called the Maxwell daemon where knowledge of particle speed would enable one to heat a room without expending energy. However, according to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, nothing is certain. All factors cannot be known exactly hence it would be very hard to calculate all future possibilities beforehand.
In conclusion, you may choose to believe that graph imechorwa, “… but the truth is, most likely, the path you take, though the choices may be few and even sometimes predictable, you have the ability to choose them for yourself.”
sincerely,
THE_DARK_LORD.
