The Ultimate "What Would Jesus Do?" Question?

[Questing Beast]

Time to God is measured differently from our time, I believe for two reaons:

1. He is immortal and time perception to an immortal is very different for that of on whose time is limited.
   
2. The temporal dimension His time is measured by is a different temporal dimension than ours. He can be outside of our TD and thus he might be able to see beginning to end of our TD in some way. He might have the ability to move forwards and backwards in our TD. I feel that He is an extra-dimensional being which means He is subject to physical laws which we can't even begin to comprehend.
   

Doesn't this strengthen my assertion that to be bound by some immutable "system" of salvation, makes God less than omnipotent? The atonement as presented to us cannot be literally true for an Infinite Being. We don't comprehend what is actually going on, because it Is God doing it....

[Ahab]

As already pointed out, time is present, beginning and end, with God.

Time is what is past, present and future. God doesn't relive past events as if what is past remains in the present and future.

That means that if literally true as presented by Judeo-Christianity, the atonement is constantly present....

Problem solved. You've been operating on a false notion, and I hope it won't continue much longer.

[Questing Beast]

"realistic imagination" is a novel concept I have never heard about. Who gets to determine between what is realistic imagination and what is not? You are taking a selection of comments given for vast array of contexts and then creating your own conclusion to meet your predetermined objective. There was a single price to pay for all sin; that price has been paid. Each sin that you commit does not increase the price of the atonement and does not cause the Savior new pain. The effects of the atonement are constant, but the price paid was a singular event.

"God Is Infinite", the scriptures say so in several/many places and so many words. His ways are beyond our comprehension. So fixating on an atonement and making it into a finite less than 24 hour event must be simplistic and not realistic. We are given this picture of "God's" love in ways that we can accept and comprehend. To further take the pictured event and turn it into a finite, "single" act, denies the Infinite Existence that "God Is". Of course, it fits in with Mormon theology and cosmology, which is what I have difficulties with....

[Questing Beast]

I happen to agree with you that an Exalted Being lives beyond the bounds of time & exists at every point in space time simultaneously, and so as such it is possible that our Saviour does at all times remember his suffering in Gethsemane but how vast is eternity? Think of all the joyous experiences the Saviour has experienced through His existence. The council in Heaven, the creation of Earth, his resurrection & conquest over sin & death, the joy He takes in every small act of kindness that is performed, His joy in seeing us, His younger brothers & sisters, fulfilling their destiny and becoming exalted themselves, the fruition of all the marvellous works & wonders that have been, are now and will be performed in His name. His joy as he himself becomes a Heavenly Father and starts his own plan of salvation, as we who prove ourselves do the same. All the joyous moments that have no beginning or end would surely swamp the pain & suffering he suffered in the garden through to his death on the cross. In His exaltation that moment would be but a blink of the eye & swamped by all the other glorious moments he has experienced.

Nice picture. And why wouldn't the same apply to us? Instead we are faced with dire "never ending torment", etc. It is inconsistent. Of course we remember our pains, our disappointments, and we do our best to focus on our joys instead. That is natural. But we actually live only in the "now". "God" does also, the difference being that NOW to "God" includes all of existence. I don't see how the atonement is necessary in the first place....

[LordUther]

Nice picture. And why wouldn't the same apply to us? Instead we are faced with dire "never ending torment", etc. It is inconsistent. Of course we remember our pains, our disappointments, and we do our best to focus on our joys instead. That is natural. But we actually live only in the "now". "God" does also, the difference being that NOW to "God" includes all of existence. I don't see how the atonement is necessary in the first place....

The same does apply to us, Joseph Smith himself was comforted in Liberty Jail with the Lord telling him his suffering would be for such a small moment, and those suffering "never ending torment" would not be glorified exalted beings and their torments will be of their own devising as they beat themselves up over their own failings.

Tbh I don't know why the atonement is necessary in the first place, nor do I know why baptism is essential, but then I am just a man with finite understanding and I trust the Creator of this world knows a darn sight more about what is needed or not needed than I do.

[Questing Beast]

Hello QB.

I am not sure you read Ostler’s article on his theory of atonement. I think he addresses the idea that God need not extract a pound of flesh to bring about some state of affairs if God was omnipotent.

No, I have not read Ostler. And what you share of his view later does not encourage me to read him, since he is trying to understand the atonement, believing it to be a literal fact already. I have asked why it was necessary in the first place. It seems to me to be without necessity, and fits right in with all religious dogma that has been borrowed from already existing religions.

Within the LDS tradition there is a vein of thought that explains suffering primarily through the limits of God’s omnipotence. I am not a fan of this thought, but I gladly worship with folks who think this incorrect IMO thing.

All but the most committed Calvinists believe that God is not so powerful that He can bring to pass your free actions. There are limits upon God’s omnipotence IF we have power to bring about our free actions.

You don't accept the notion that the atonement is best explained as showing a limit to God's "omnipotence", yet you accept that our free will puts limits on it? I don't get that at all. Why is free will necessarily putting a limit on omnipotence? If the scripture is literally true, then "God gave man his agency in the day he created them." What Is given proves the power to give, it does not show a limitation on power. To create beings that go forth and do as they choose is not putting limits on God's power! It increases creation to "send" unlimited sapient beings possessing free will, it shows the omnipotence, not the opposite. And creation makes sense out of the assertion "God Is Love", only if "God" created that which will discover Joy. I don't see how an atonement is necessary in any of this.

...

Now, one of the aspects of the atonement theory Ostler advocates that I find very compelling is that the pain experienced and described in atonement scriptures is associated with being in relationship with sinful people. Sin creates pain. ...

I can understand the need to delve into the atonement as Ostler, yourself, et al. others do in order to try and fathom what is going on. But if you get completely away from the notion that we are "fallen" and require restoring through some massive sacrifice in order to not be "lost forever", etc., then the whole paradigm of atonement suffering seems superfluous. "God Is All Powerful". That means exactly what it says. There isn't any eternal system in place that transcends "God's Power", since nothing that Exists can transcend "God".

So I cannot accept the notion that sin creates/causes pain for "God". "God" is the originator of pain and every other sensory and emotional state of being.

Again, I think the second great commandment invites us to absorb sin energy just as Christ ultimately absorbs ours. A wonderful Methodist man has absorbed some of my sin energy. As I struggled to navigate life’s challenges he became a mentor for me. To the extent I could, Christ absorbed much of the sin energy my actions created, but this man was there for me too. I remember wondering how he could love so much, but the answer is that some of the sin energy I off-loaded on him he shuttled to Christ. He was following the second great commandment to love me, but it was Christ’s love for Him that gave Him strength I hope I am beginning to realize in my life (allowing me to shuttle sin energy from those I love too, rather than becoming overwhelmed by the pain they cause me).

"Absorbing sin energy" for us would be temporary, since we exist only in the moment, within spacetime, which "God" created/Caused, therefore our sufferings are indeed temporary, although the memory of them is not.

When "God" says, "I remember their sins no more", what is being said is that "God", seeing the end from the beginning, does not choose, when relating to us as human, to recall or dredge up all the imperfections of our past, but takes us as we ARE. Nothing impertinent to what we are is necessary to bring to the relationship of human relating to human. I imagine "God In Total", outside of spacetime, enjoying being "God" as a man or woman, and experiencing the finite qualities as each one of us, intimately, one on one. The contrast must be eternally fascinating, to observe existence unfolding from the perspective of a singular sapient being (in our case, human), immortal and continually discovering more about "God".

Why is an atonement necessary in any of that either?

I personally think Mormonism is one of the most DEMANDING religious paradigms ever created, precisely because we are called to sacrifice our ALL. But, I consider Mormonism to be among the lease dogmatic religions.

Then I guess we have different understandings of what we mean by "dogmatic". I see the main result of dogmatism being "exclusivity" religion: that is to say, "us and them", where any of "them" are of a lower order of enlightenment and therefore obedience, doomed, if they don't convert at some point, to a lower order of existence. All such "us and them" paradigms, those "in and out" of the favor of God, result from manmade dogma, insisting that others must change, not "us".

... I think Ostler responds to many of the atonement concerns you express (in a faithful LDS way), but he presents no evidence that the atonement is a teaching Christians borrowed from Ugaritic texts so perhaps there are other places you would like to study.

Charity, TOm

Yes, I will be on the lookout for studies on "atonement theory" outside the LDS sphere....

Edited July 30, 2013 by Questing Beast

[pogi]

"God Is Infinite", the scriptures say so in several/many places and so many words. His ways are beyond our comprehension. So fixating on an atonement and making it into a finite less than 24 hour event must be simplistic and not realistic. We are given this picture of "God's" love in ways that we can accept and comprehend. To further take the pictured event and turn it into a finite, "single" act, denies the Infinite Existence that "God Is". Of course, it fits in with Mormon theology and cosmology, which is what I have difficulties with....

There are more than one explanation as to what an "infinite" atonement means. Because God is infinite, does note suggest that the atonement could not be a finite event of less than 24 hours with infinite consequences. Only an omnipotent being could understand how this is possible and do it. As you say, his ways are beyond our comprehension, so I would not limit God's experiences to your finite understanding of infinity and of God. I would try to understand the atonement in a way that is cohesive with all scripture, not just the ones that you like to fixate on that use the word "infinite."

[Questing Beast]

I don't pretend to know how God experiences reality.

Well, we can be certain that "God" experiences what we experience, how experience it, so one way that "God experiences reality" is as human beings.

While he may have all of history, present, and future continually before his face, this is not to say that he is viscerally experiencing them all at once, all of the time.

Of course "God In Total" must experience all of Existence at the same "time", or as NOW. But experiencing Existence finitely, i.e. as one of us, would be a completely different perspective, and I agree that not all of Infinite Existence is experienced by finite beings, and never will be, for to experience that would require that we comprehend the total mind of "God", which would erase our identity. There might be an experience, such as Moses, the brother of Jared and others asserted to have had, wherein all of creation was revealed to them. But once "back in the flesh", only the memory of the experience would remain, not the details, since the details are only within the purview of "God In Total".

God himself has said that there may be a limit to what is before his face. He said, when we repent, he will remember our sins no more. This, to me, assures me that he is not continually and constantly suffering for my sins. Christ may "remember" our unrepentant sins, but that is not the same as suffering for them constantly.

And I believe, as I said above in a response, that "God" relates to the world of humans as a human, and therefore Is not interested in bringing into the relationship anything impertinent to how we ARE at that moment. So, all imperfections/sins that have been discarded through our choice, and "God's" help, are of no account....

[Questing Beast]

The same does apply to us, Joseph Smith himself was comforted in Liberty Jail with the Lord telling him his suffering would be for such a small moment, and those suffering "never ending torment" would not be glorified exalted beings and their torments will be of their own devising as they beat themselves up over their own failings.

Tbh I don't know why the atonement is necessary in the first place, nor do I know why baptism is essential, but then I am just a man with finite understanding and I trust the Creator of this world knows a darn sight more about what is needed or not needed than I do.

That's sound reasoning. I trust the Creator too. Too much about Mormonism and all the rest of the world's religions smack of manmade assertions, resulting in dogmatic demands/controls. I can learn quite fine on my own.

I agree that "their torments" (hell) are "of their own devising". When someone gets over it, they have learned not to "beat themselves up", and they admit their mistakes, recognize what Joy is not, and turn and pursue Joy more focused on truth about themselves. It doesn't matter how "long" this process takes. I am convinced it is the purpose, the work, of immortals....

[Questing Beast]

Time is what is past, present and future. God doesn't relive past events as if what is past remains in the present and future.

Problem solved. You've been operating on a false notion, and I hope it won't continue much longer.

Ahab, you are an interesting fellow. "Problem solved" only if "God" does not comply with a system that he did not "invent", which demands that he do the "atonement thing" the way it is presented in scripture/dogma. If "God" had no choice in how to "save" us, then "God" is not omnipotent, i.e. the asserted god is anything but omnipotent. I don't accept such a concept as the atonement in scripture. I'm willing to be disabused of my ignorance at any point. I just don't see the world of humans that way....

[mfbukowski]

No, I have not read Ostler. And what you share of his view later does not encourage me to read him, since he is trying to understand the atonement, believing it to be a literal fact already. I have asked why it was necessary in the first place. It seems to me to be without necessity, and fits right in with all religious dogma that has been borrowed from already existing religions.

One can also take a naturalistic view of the atonement however, should one have a need to do so, Frankly I think Ostlers points fall short and do not even consider the fact that when we do something wrong, we seek forgiveness naturally, so that in a way what we call the "atonement" can be seen as a natural process of social behavior.

Perhaps of course some do not seek forgiveness and they are often condemned as "sociopaths"- and I think this seeking forgiveness actually has survival value socially, in that those who do "wrong" with impunity end up being punished for their actions, and anciently of course that meant an "eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth". Ending up toothless and blind does not make one a good catch for the opposite sex

So those who behave anti-socially are condemned and such behaviors become marginalized and it is not easy to reproduce in prison, to cut to the chase.

On the other hand, those who feel sorry for doing "wrong" things and want to make them "right" get along well in society. It is acknowledged that everyone makes mistakes and that "repentance" (not doing wrong again) is the socially acceptable way to redeem oneself from sin, as it were.

We see clear examples of that all the time, where people are caught doing something wrong, and apologize for it, and say that they will never do it again, and then society will consider them "redeemed". This whole nonsense about the prospective mayor of New York is a perfect illustration of what happens to one who pretends to repent, but does not, and ends up a pariah (we hope....)

People who successfully repent however, have "paid their debt to society" and are allowed to live on peacefully and, again, to cut to the chase, be part of society and reproduce with teeth and eyes intact.

So guilt, repentance and redemption actually have survival value, and the memes that one should behave in this way are perpetuated.

So one can see the "debt" to be paid for sin to be a debt to society from which one may be "redeemed" by "repentance", which is performed by never doing the anti-social act again. Through repentance in this natural sense, one earns a longer life- perhaps not "eternal life" but certainly more life nevertheless.

I think all societies which value living peaceably together (and which do NOT? ) MUST have some idea of at least this version of what we call the "atonement".

Should one choose to do so, one may elevate this naturalistic tendency to a great Cosmic Principle.

I am not saying that this is the "true explanation" for the "myth of the atonement" because as a good Pragmatist, I see that there are many ways of seeing "truth" and that any way of representing "truth" has value if it works for a given purpose.

So the way I see it, atheists might value the principle of the atonement just as much as we do, it's just that their story of what those behaviors mean and why they work, may differ from ours.

I think we need to look at the big picture and find commonality wherever we can. People of good will are hard enough to find nowadays and there is no reason for us to squabble over doctrine.

Edited July 31, 2013 by mfbukowski

[BCSpace]

but an all powerful being would not have to suffer eternally just to keep "his" creation rolling.

That's why God is all powerful relative to us. God has found/devised a way for us to become Gods like Him. That is powerful enough.

[TOmNossor]

No, I have not read Ostler. And what you share of his view later does not encourage me to read him, since he is trying to understand the atonement, believing it to be a literal fact already. I have asked why it was necessary in the first place. It seems to me to be without necessity, and fits right in with all religious dogma that has been borrowed from already existing religions.

For me there are two reasons that I seek remotely adequate descriptions of the atonement rather than rejected it based upon a simple line of reasoning (very similar to the Problem of Evil lines of reasoning – this from Epicurus)

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Is God willing to heal us without causing great pain to His son, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent and enjoys tormenting His son. Is he both able and willing? Then whence the torment of His son? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

First:

I once thought the idea that I believed because God is a “crutch for the weak” was obviously untrue because I was better and stronger and smarter and ... than ..., but it was humbling to recognize that God was clearly greater than I am. As I experience God’s call to love others in a way inconsistent with my pride and arrogance I modified my view. God was not a “crutch for the weak” because I am better and stronger and smarter and ... than ..., and it is only God’s call to love others that stretches me beyond what personal greatness (and arrogance and pride) can accomplish. Thus without God I am great, but with God I am humbled by His greatness AND called to be something different than I am something I cannot be on my own. Still not a “crutch for the weak.” In my most honest moments I could tell someone that I “feigned humility,” and I always knew expressing the above was not socially acceptable so I got along pretty well by not expressing the above.

As God has patiently changed me I can see that I lacked in so much and needed Him every step (and the arrogance was probably my crutch after all). This rescue and transformation does not fit with the “God is a crutch for the weak” model, but the need of rescue and transformation does not fit with the “TOm is great alone” model. The model that fits is that Christ died for my sins and somehow atones and transforms me, “The Continuous Atonement.”

Lest I sound like I think I have concurred pride and arrogance, I still struggle with pride and arrogance and I still “feign humility.” (was that feigning?)

Second:

The easiest way to explain “horses in the BOM” or “coins in the BOM” or ... is that Joseph Smith made it all up. But what of “nahom” or “cement” or ..., these are difficult to explain via Joseph made it all up. I think there is reason to believe that Christ existed, was crucified, and a volume of his followers from the earliest times believed that his sacrifice was for our sins somehow.

The idea of atonement does come from Jewish thought. The day of atonement and the need for a sacrifice are Jewish ideas. So if you are looking for Old Testament roots you will find them. But the Jewish folks who become the Christian folks certainly saw in Christ the one who atones. Again I am not aware of pre-Judaism roots, but I would guess you could find them. Certainly the authors of the New Testament didn’t believe they were imbibing of such things.

So yes, chucking the atonement can remove the problems with seeing God the Father as a tormentor of His Son, but there is a lot that must be explained in its stead.

You don't accept the notion that the atonement is best explained as showing a limit to God's "omnipotence", yet you accept that our free will puts limits on it? I don't get that at all. Why is free will necessarily putting a limit on omnipotence? If the scripture is literally true, then "God gave man his agency in the day he created them." What Is given proves the power to give, it does not show a limitation on power. To create beings that go forth and do as they choose is not putting limits on God's power! It increases creation to "send" unlimited sapient beings possessing free will, it shows the omnipotence, not the opposite. And creation makes sense out of the assertion "God Is Love", only if "God" created that which will discover Joy. I don't see how an atonement is necessary in any of this.

I probably didn’t communicate very well.

I do not believe that God has the power to transform us from sinful humans to saintly divine persons by merely saying the words, “be thou healed.” Our humanness which derives from that which is eternal within us does not allow for such a transformation (like a body rejects a foreign organ or ...). We could be destroyed or chained or ... and remade, but to be transformed we must CHOOSE to walk a path. A path of at-one-ment and reconciliation with God. A path that we walk because He first loved us while we were still unlovable (by all human measures).

One of the MOST important aspects of the restoration IMO is the idea that there is something eternal within every person. This eternal intelligence is a “past necessity” that God is limited by. God cannot make it so that the lesser intelligences that existed forever never existed. He must either leave these lesser intelligences behind or work with them.

“All that God has He could freely give us, but all that He is we must become.” – adapted from “The Challenge to Become” – Elder Oaks.

I see in some of your post a rejection of the LDS teaching that God did not create us “ex nihilo.” Do you believe God created ex nihilo? LDS believe He created from “eternal intelligences.” I generally agree that the problem of evil (and the sub-problem of atonement) is unsolvable if God created everything from absolutely nothing completely untethered from some “past necessity.”

I can understand the need to delve into the atonement as Ostler, yourself, et al. others do in order to try and fathom what is going on. But if you get completely away from the notion that we are "fallen" and require restoring through some massive sacrifice in order to not be "lost forever", etc., then the whole paradigm of atonement suffering seems superfluous. "God Is All Powerful". That means exactly what it says. There isn't any eternal system in place that transcends "God's Power", since nothing that Exists can transcend "God".

So I cannot accept the notion that sin creates/causes pain for "God". "God" is the originator of pain and every other sensory and emotional state of being.

I think LDS thought rejects the absolute and total transcendence of God.

God chooses to love us, but He cannot separate the pain caused by loving the sinful. He sees the result of our sin and He weeps for us. It hurts. Now, God exists in a perfect loving relationship and is never overcome by the pain because of the magnitude of joy He has loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It doesn’t change the fact that He is affected by us though. He might be able to not love us, but if He loves us and we sin, He hurts for us. Again, not an incapacitating hurt, but a hurt that exists within the completely fulfilling relationship Father, Son, and Spirit have.

This is of course a limit upon omnipotence it would seem, but it is something that true love requires (eternally?).

"Absorbing sin energy" for us would be temporary, since we exist only in the moment, within spacetime, which "God" created/Caused, therefore our sufferings are indeed temporary, although the memory of them is not.

When "God" says, "I remember their sins no more", what is being said is that "God", seeing the end from the beginning, does not choose, when relating to us as human, to recall or dredge up all the imperfections of our past, but takes us as we ARE. Nothing impertinent to what we are is necessary to bring to the relationship of human relating to human. I imagine "God In Total", outside of spacetime, enjoying being "God" as a man or woman, and experiencing the finite qualities as each one of us, intimately, one on one. The contrast must be eternally fascinating, to observe existence unfolding from the perspective of a singular sapient being (in our case, human), immortal and continually discovering more about "God".

Ostler dragged me kicking and screaming from the idea that God is timeless. I do not believe God experiences time quite the way we do, but there is more than a static eternal now (though God’s experience of past and future, prolly potential future, is always with Him in a way we cannot experience).

Then I guess we have different understandings of what we mean by "dogmatic". I see the main result of dogmatism being "exclusivity" religion: that is to say, "us and them", where any of "them" are of a lower order of enlightenment and therefore obedience, doomed, if they don't convert at some point, to a lower order of existence. All such "us and them" paradigms, those "in and out" of the favor of God, result from manmade dogma, insisting that others must change, not "us".

I think you are misusing “dogma” and “dogmatic.”

One can dogmatically believe that all paths return to God and NONE are of superior value. It is the certainty and fixity that makes it dogmatic not the exclusivity.

Of course perhaps I am misusing dogma.

And, I do not believe that LDS must believe we have ALL truth, that there is only one way to walk closer to God on this earth, or even that there are not truths worth embracing understood by others but not presently understood by some group of LDS authorities. I personally believe that it is not “all relative” and LDS thought better captures reality than other groups of thought be they Catholic, Lutheran, Muslim, Buddhist, agnostic, or atheist. I also think we are best inclusivists, not exclusivists or pluralists.

Charity, TOm

Edited July 31, 2013 by TOmNossor

[Questing Beast]

...

Should one choose to do so, one may elevate this naturalistic tendency to a great Cosmic Principle.

I am not saying that this is the "true explanation" for the "myth of the atonement" because as a good Pragmatist, I see that there are many ways of seeing "truth" and that any way of representing "truth" has value if it works for a given purpose.

So the way I see it, atheists might value the principle of the atonement just as much as we do, it's just that their story of what those behaviors mean and why they work, may differ from ours.

I think we need to look at the big picture and find commonality wherever we can. People of good will are hard enough to find nowadays and there is no reason for us to squabble over doctrine.

I take the "natural tendencies" of our species to be God-given, or created. This is how we are in the world of humans. We don't require further "add-ons" to regulate or control people, what they believe or why. The atonement, a la Christian style, is not required in my religious world view, and if that is a mistaken omission then I expect "God" to disabuse me of my remissness....

[Ahab]

The atonement, a la Christian style, is not required in my religious world view, and if that is a mistaken omission then I expect "God" to disabuse me of my remissness....

He won't simply wipe that mistaken omission away, though, as if you had never ommited the idea you're not accepting right now.

He'll share the truth with you in an idea you can understand and it will still be up to you to either accept it or continue to ommit it.

Think of the "atonement" in it's most basic terms... the way God helps you to become as he is.

[Questing Beast]

... Epicurus ...

Interesting logical plays there. The obvious, to me, answer is that "God Is in the Joy business". That is the overarching concept that allows "evil" to have its way. It is only a teaching tool, to point to the fact that we are joyful beings, always have been and always will be. That we require serious schooling is only bound to increase the recognition of what true Joy Is, when that awakening comes.

...

So yes, chucking the atonement can remove the problems with seeing God the Father as a tormentor of His Son, but there is a lot that must be explained in its stead.

To me it becomes much simpler. "God" can do whatever Is required. "God" is not bound by something transcendent over which "God" has no control. There is no torment occurring, caused by "God" or because "God" can not prevent it. The whole purpose of creation is to give "God" Joy, which is preferable to sitting in the darkness with nothing, in the Void as it were. Both states exist simultaneously as NOW to "God", both being options. But creation obviously occurs because just the Void is literally nothing. Endless creation, endless beings, or God being endlessly diverse in going about creation, has to be motivated by the opposite of Void, which Is fecund Existence and the infinite ways that it Is joyful.

I do not believe that God has the power to transform us from sinful humans to saintly divine persons by merely saying the words, “be thou healed.”

Of course "God" has that power, and it would be pointless if applied. "Physician, heal thyself" is what it would turn existence into. If "God" made "himself" sick, the power of healing is equally there. But the process of knowing Joy requires contrast, opposition, what joy is not, in order to define Joy and make it exist. Not only exist, but grow forever. Each sapient soul is destined to that life, but it is the process of choices and consequences that proves the reality of Joy. "God" does not push any of us through a cookie cutter.

One of the MOST important aspects of the restoration IMO is the idea that there is something eternal within every person. This eternal intelligence is a “past necessity” that God is limited by. God cannot make it so that the lesser intelligences that existed forever never existed. He must either leave these lesser intelligences behind or work with them.

That is what I am talking about. It makes "God" into one of us, just "more intelligent than they (we) all". Existence in the first place has no Cause, it just IS. Okay, so existence just IS, and GtF is part of that like each one of us. To my mind, that Existence must be infinitely greater than GtF will ever be, and it is to that Existence that was never caused that I turn to worship. I believe that GtF must worship "it" too. I want to know all that GtF has already learned about that Existence of which he is a part.

I see in some of your post a rejection of the LDS teaching that God did not create us “ex nihilo.” Do you believe God created ex nihilo? LDS believe He created from “eternal intelligences.” I generally agree that the problem of evil (and the sub-problem of atonement) is unsolvable if God created everything from absolutely nothing completely untethered from some “past necessity.”

I don't see the problem of "God" creating out of "himself". That isn't ex nihilo. Evil cannot exist separately from "God". To assume that evil exists like intelligences without Cause is to make the Mormon GtF into a much lesser being than I am interested in!

No. "God" Is the Cause of all. As we exist, everything that exists comes from "God". The existence of apparent "evil" is no different than anything else we observe as "good and bad", we desire what feels "good", we flee from what feels "bad", it is our nature, and the surest evidence that Joy is the pursuit of our species. We are created to be joyful "at the end of all things". I like the scene in the book and movie of Lord of the Rings, where Gandalf is presenting to Pippin a view of the undying world ahead, and even though death is pounding on the doors and about to engulf them, Gandalf is JOYFUL. He knows. And Pippin "gets it", enough to feel that joy himself and not fear death so much anymore, etc. Our world is crammed full of illustrations, we swim in them constantly, of what our existence is all about. And it isn't about battling evil, it Is about Joy. The apparent "battles" are simply provided to point to the Joy. Without the battles we would, as Lehi says, be "thing(s) of naught", having no purpose, being insensible to happiness or misery or existing as if we "remain dead"; in the words of Poe, as quoted in Alan Parson's project "Fall of the House of Usher", life without contrast is where "color becomes pallor, man becomes carcass, home becomes a catacomb, and the dead are, but for a moment, motionless". Brrr! But what imagery depicting a pointless, insensible existence, where no battles occur, no oppositions to Joy, and we never ever learn what Joy is not because we never experience it. There doesn't need to be "fallen man", just ignorant man, to provide all the contrast we need.

I think LDS thought rejects the absolute and total transcendence of God.

I think you are correct, which is the problematic part for me remaining a "TBM".

God chooses to love us, but He cannot separate the pain caused by loving the sinful.

I don't have a problem with "God" feeling pain. I have a problem with "God" being compelled to make someONE suffer for others. "God" doesn't even do the suffering himself, he has to ask the Son to do it. Makes zero sense to me. That I would agree to it in some preexistence of ignorance offends me. I would rather be annihilated than remember the whipping Jesus took in my place because I was too cowardly to submit to it myself. That's not gratitude, it's cravenness. I can't see it.

He sees the result of our sin and He weeps for us. It hurts. Now, God exists in a perfect loving relationship and is never overcome by the pain because of the magnitude of joy He has loving Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It doesn’t change the fact that He is affected by us though. He might be able to not love us, but if He loves us and we sin, He hurts for us. Again, not an incapacitating hurt, but a hurt that exists within the completely fulfilling relationship Father, Son, and Spirit have.

I appreciate your efforts to make it make sense. And I agree that "God" feels pain for those feeling pain. How could he not feel everything that Creation feels? It all comes from him. It Exists. But to take it further and say that "God had to do it", had no choice in the matter, etc., is where I get off.

Ostler dragged me kicking and screaming from the idea that God is timeless.

Of course "God Is timeless." GtF is not, even though he says he effectively is: "all is as one day with God", etc. But "God" created spacetime as the ruling framework of Creation. We are creatures of spacetime and always will be, that's what I believe. I see no purpose or reason why we need to be otherwise.

I do not believe God experiences time quite the way we do, but there is more than a static eternal now (though God’s experience of past and future, prolly potential future, is always with Him in a way we cannot experience).

Understatement! Yes, "God" experiences all spacetime, of all Creation (the infinitely expanding multiverse), as NOW. We can apprehend the concept (I just typed it, after all), but never comprehend it, or BE it as "God Is".

I think you are misusing “dogma” and “dogmatic.”

One can dogmatically believe that all paths return to God and NONE are of superior value. It is the certainty and fixity that makes it dogmatic not the exclusivity.

Of course perhaps I am misusing dogma.

I am no doubt misusing both words in someone's opinion. To be clear: "dogma" to me is formalized, "official" teaching, and that makes such teachings "dogmatic". A dogmatic approach is "by the book", no variation allowed, end stop. Dogmatic religions do not suffer individual departures, such as mysticism, gladly. Dogmatic, organized religions require belief to fit within the "box" of the dogma/doctrine.

And, I do not believe that LDS must believe we have ALL truth, that there is only one way to walk closer to God on this earth, or even that there are not truths worth embracing understood by others but not presently understood by some group of LDS authorities. I personally believe that it is not “all relative” and LDS thought better captures reality than other groups of thought be they Catholic, Lutheran, Muslim, Buddhist, agnostic, or atheist. I also think we are best inclusivists, not exclusivists or pluralists.

Charity, TOm

True, LDS assertions to possess truth allow that others can learn truths before becoming LDS, and "bring them with you" when they join the Church. All good traditions and truths are kept when becoming LDS. But the caveat is that more truth revealed to the earth will only come through the prophet, since one exists on the earth again. The pope will not get a revelation that the prophet subsequently picks up and says, "yes we believe that too". All truths extant before the restoration were part of earlier dispensations of the gospel, wherein each dispensation revealed truth and yet more truth, which was inculcated by men outside of the priesthood. So "all truth from whatever source it be" is the "property" of the LDS people, because it was GtF who revealed it earlier, and we are simply reclaiming it by acknowledging that it is in fact truth, which was once revealed truth through the same priesthood authority that receives truth now through the priesthood of the LDS Church.

Of course when "we" talk this way we offend everyone who is not LDS who is part of some other religious persuasion. And they can make equally sweeping assertions about their own "in" with God. And we have an impasse, and it is not breakable. I see no superiority claims originating from the LDS faith, only assertions as valid or not as anyone else can make....

[Questing Beast]

He won't simply wipe that mistaken omission away, though, as if you had never ommited the idea you're not accepting right now.

He'll share the truth with you in an idea you can understand and it will still be up to you to either accept it or continue to ommit it.

Think of the "atonement" in it's most basic terms... the way God helps you to become as he is.

The atonement is not the "most basic" paradigm of making sense out of what "God" Is up to with Creation. The Judeo-Christian model is anything but the simplest explanation. I don't see why it should be more complex than it has to be. But I do see how men can muck it up with dogma that asserts control over others and their behavior. I see no need for the "atonement" as presented. To argue for it requires volumes of exegesis, trying to make the concept/doctrine more convincing that it is in the scriptures. If the scriptures don't make it clear enough to be necessary, then I say that is evidence for the teachings of men. "God" teaches me a simpler concept and it makes sense of all the warring "sectarians", sweeping away any need to choose any of them....

[Ahab]

The atonement is not the "most basic" paradigm of making sense out of what "God" Is up to with Creation. The Judeo-Christian model is anything but the simplest explanation. I don't see why it should be more complex than it has to be. But I do see how men can muck it up with dogma that asserts control over others and their behavior. I see no need for the "atonement" as presented. To argue for it requires volumes of exegesis, trying to make the concept/doctrine more convincing that it is in the scriptures. If the scriptures don't make it clear enough to be necessary, then I say that is evidence for the teachings of men. "God" teaches me a simpler concept and it makes sense of all the warring "sectarians", sweeping away any need to choose any of them....

Still in denial, I see.

The scriptures couldn't be more crystal clear than they already are about what the atonement is and why it is necessary.

It's the whole focus and purpose of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

[mfbukowski]

I take the "natural tendencies" of our species to be God-given, or created. This is how we are in the world of humans. We don't require further "add-ons" to regulate or control people, what they believe or why. The atonement, a la Christian style, is not required in my religious world view, and if that is a mistaken omission then I expect "God" to disabuse me of my remissness....

I wasn't talking about our "natural tendencies" since I am not quite sure what that phrase would mean. I did a whole spiel somewhere up there about my opinion that the phrase "man's nature" doesn't mean a whole lot.

What I said was "Naturalistic tendency"- which means something quite different to me. By this term, I am referring to the tendency to explain everything away in "naturalistic " terms, as if there is no God- that correspondence with "nature" is the only source of truth. Such a view would hold that for something to be true it must be scientifically verifiable. A person using this term would typically be making a distinction between "natural" and "supernatural", using a question begging definition to show that the "supernatural" cannot be true because it is not natural.

Such is the position of some atheists who don't think things through quite all the way.

All I was trying to show is that even people who don't believe in God understand that guilt and repentance are indeed the solution for sin.

They don't use those terms- but in effect they are recognizing the phenomenon of what we call "the atonement" even without using those terms.

To put it in its simplest terms, if one makes a mistake, one should apologize and not make the same mistake again. THAT becomes the cure for guilt. That is one way of putting it.

Another way to say that is "Jesus through the atonement has healed us from the consequences of sin, as long as we repent and never repeat the sin."

Both ways of saying it have the same net affect in our lives- we stop doing wrong and feel better about ourselves.

[Questing Beast]

Still in denial, I see.

The scriptures couldn't be more crystal clear than they already are about what the atonement is and why it is necessary.

It's the whole focus and purpose of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Holding a bigger picture, that includes more beliefs about "God" than "mere Christianity", is where the problem comes in. Why discard a bigger, more charitable, less complicated picture, for what a narrow, "Jewish" set of books have to say? Just because the resulting religion happened to become the largest conglomerate religion does not prove it to be the exclusive "favorite" of Deity. Far from it, the squabbling over doctrine and creeds is abominable. How has Mormonism improved this condition exactly?...

[Questing Beast]

I wasn't talking about our "natural tendencies" since I am not quite sure what that phrase would mean. I did a whole spiel somewhere up there about my opinion that the phrase "man's nature" doesn't mean a whole lot.

What I said was "Naturalistic tendency"- which means something quite different to me. ...

Ah yes, sorry about that conflation. I am not a believer in correspondence theory, remember. I only questioned why it was de facto fallacious, and observed that for many things it seems to work.

To put it in its simplest terms, if one makes a mistake, one should apologize and not make the same mistake again. THAT becomes the cure for guilt. That is one way of putting it.

Another way to say that is "Jesus through the atonement has healed us from the consequences of sin, as long as we repent and never repeat the sin."

Both ways of saying it have the same net affect in our lives- we stop doing wrong and feel better about ourselves.

The net effect, as you put it, is real enough. That's the "natural tendencies" I was speaking to: human beings understand, naturally, intrinsically, the "law of comeupance". "What goes around comes around." Consequences. There is no requirement for anything more in all of eternity. "God" created us to become joyful, or rather, to recognize that we were created as joyful to begin with. If it takes a billion eons for a stubborn soul to "get it", to "God" it is as a single day and amounts to no more than the fascination of variability between souls, where the path to awe is by learning, not a freebie opening of the head and pouring in the Joy....

[Ahab]

Holding a bigger picture, that includes more beliefs about "God" than "mere Christianity", is where the problem comes in. Why discard a bigger, more charitable, less complicated picture, for what a narrow, "Jewish" set of books have to say? Just because the resulting religion happened to become the largest conglomerate religion does not prove it to be the exclusive "favorite" of Deity. Far from it, the squabbling over doctrine and creeds is abominable. How has Mormonism improved this condition exactly?...

Mormonism includes the gospel truth and the blessings (good things) that come from accepting it and sharing it with other people.. It's not our fault some people want to disregard it or pretend it's not true and miss out or delay their receipt of those blessings.

[mfbukowski]

Ah yes, sorry about that conflation. I am not a believer in correspondence theory, remember. I only questioned why it was de facto fallacious, and observed that for many things it seems to work.

If you think it through we will see that it doesn't work at all.

Every thought that has ever been thought, every object ever seen, every observation made whether in science, poetry, music art, or business, every mathematical equation, every interpretation, every word out of someone's has been come out of a human mind.

There is no way to escape the human mind to see if what is thought "corresponds" to something outside the human mind. It can't be done.

So to use your term correspondence IS "de facto" fallacious.

All we can know is in one way or another the product of a human mind- mine or someone else's, written or spoken or none of the above.

I mean think about it. What does the word "know" even mean??

How can you know something that has never been in anyone's mind? We use that word to describe what IS "in your mind" - nothing is known without a knower!

[Questing Beast]

...

I mean think about it. What does the word "know" even mean??

How can you know something that has never been in anyone's mind? We use that word to describe what IS "in your mind" - nothing is known without a knower!

"I know [insert object of certitude here] is true". That has always been a core botheration to me in the Church. As a child I determined the difference between "believe" and "know". The progression of this distinction has led to my fav mantra: "I know practically nothing, about almost everything". I don't believe that anyone knows anything. They believe some things and doubt other things. But to KNOW is impossible: there is always your 'satiable imagination at work, far ahead of what you assert to "know", bringing in all manner of variation to the possibility of scenarios involving "God". Any one of those imagined possibilities, intruded upon the world of humans, could undo your certitude, even render it void and therefore impossible.

Nevertheless, faith comes in where the world of humans is considered. We have observed correspondence between repeated causes and effects. We "know" enough about these to land on the moon and return home, and will go to Mars based on the same correspondence theories, our confidence in them having been shown enough times to "prove" them true. We know enough to continue to build our understanding of the human body including the brain. We build in fact because our knowledge has surpassed mere hope.

Of course, imagination says that this afternoon the entire ball of wax baby could suddenly vanish in the presence of a more dominant paradigm, to which we have previously been ignorant: "God" could suddenly spring anything on us and cosmically shout, "I was just yanking your chain, humanity! HAHAHAHAH!" That's where faith comes in.

Correspondence theory does seem to work for many things. It is where the metaphysical enters in that it does not work, except to the satisfaction of individual faith; it can't be shown to anyone else.

In my religious world view, doubting something as fundamental as the atonement being necessary is not a problem, even though to others the declaration of such is heresy blown into total apostasy. I see "God" differently, and there is no correspondence of my views, or yours or anyone else's which can show a superiority to any other view. That's where correspondence theory has no power or even reality: there is no correspondence "bridge" between "the natural and spiritual realm".

But the physical world of humans has plenty of correspondence to show enough correlation to come up with the "sciences". Without correspondence between the brain and the empirical world of humans there would be no science. There would be no reality in place to define existence as human.

It is pointless to assume that, in the world of humans, some other reality exists which transcends or even contradicts human senses, including the "sixth sense" which is our metaphysical contact with "God". We are made to relate to "God" as humans, and "God" relates to us as human. The rest is all imagination, "God's" province alone as Infinite Cause, although we can imagine some of it, probably as "proof" that "God Exists", otherwise, why are we able to imagine things outside the ken of correspondence?...

[mfbukowski]

Well I am actually glad you brought this up, because Dr. Peterson actually brought up almost an identical objection elsewhere, in passing. It is kind of amazing that both you and he would have the same objection- I suppose I don't have to go into why it is surprising, but it is the case. I am going to spend some time on this because it comes up again and again and again and for me is based on a total misunderstanding of all of this which people just CANNOT get past. It seems that some see it and others do not. I think Kevin C actually has it pegged on this, but that is another story. http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/~rapaport/perry.positions.html

"I know [insert object of certitude here] is true". That has always been a core botheration to me in the Church. As a child I determined the difference between "believe" and "know". The progression of this distinction has led to my fav mantra: "I know practically nothing, about almost everything". I don't believe that anyone knows anything. They believe some things and doubt other things. But to KNOW is impossible: there is always your 'satiable imagination at work, far ahead of what you assert to "know", bringing in all manner of variation to the possibility of scenarios involving "God". Any one of those imagined possibilities, intruded upon the world of humans, could undo your certitude, even render it void and therefore impossible.

I agree, and the philosophy I am trying to explain here does away with that problem by doing away with the whole idea of "certitude" in the first place. For someone who seriously wants to understand this very point I would recommend John Dewey's book The Quest for Certainty summarized here.

The bottom line is that once one realizes that certitude is an illusion, one uses the word "know" in it's common form which typically means "I'm sure for all practical purposes". That's about all it really means to anyone anyway. So get over the quest for certainty, and go with what you know works. That's the best you are going to get anyway.

Nevertheless, faith comes in where the world of humans is considered. We have observed correspondence between repeated causes and effects. We "know" enough about these to land on the moon and return home, and will go to Mars based on the same correspondence theories, our confidence in them having been shown enough times to "prove" them true. We know enough to continue to build our understanding of the human body including the brain. We build in fact because our knowledge has surpassed mere hope.

I don't mean to yell but I am going to.

NO!

THIS DOES NOT IMPLY CORRESPONDENCE AT ALL- IN FACT IT IMPLIES THE OPPOSITE OF CORRESPONDENCE AND NO ONE SEEMS TO GET THIS. Ah, ok I feel better now, thanks for letting me spout off.

What we see repeated that works ARE THE OBSERVATIONS MADE BY HUMAN MINDS which allow us to fly to the moon and do all scientific endeavors. WE DO NOT SEE "THE WORLD" WE SEE OUR OBSERVATIONS OF THE WORLD, OUR EXPERIENCES OF OUR SENSES. We cannot know we are seeing anything "beyond" what we see feel taste touch- ADD AS MANY SENSES AS YOU LIKE- they are all HUMAN COGNITION- HUMAN EXPERIENCES.

AND SO ARE SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES. SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCES ARE AS MUCH HUMAN EXPERIENCES AS ANY OTHER. Yes, spiritual experiences are subjective and scientific ones are objective BUT ALL ARE HUMAN EXPERIENCES.

Correspondence theory does seem to work for many things. It is where the metaphysical enters in that it does not work, except to the satisfaction of individual faith; it can't be shown to anyone else.

If you think it through you will see that correspondence doesn't actually "work" for anything. Correspondence implies a world which exists BEYOND HUMAN EXPERIENCE WE KNOW NOTHING ABOUT.

What "works" is WHAT HUMANS HAVE EXPERIENCED WORKS. That is what "truth" is. It is what works!

In my religious world view, doubting something as fundamental as the atonement being necessary is not a problem, even though to others the declaration of such is heresy blown into total apostasy. I see "God" differently, and there is no correspondence of my views, or yours or anyone else's which can show a superiority to any other view. That's where correspondence theory has no power or even reality: there is no correspondence "bridge" between "the natural and spiritual realm".

Yes, but there is no correspondence bridge anywhere else either.

But the physical world of humans has plenty of correspondence to show enough correlation to come up with the "sciences". Without correspondence between the brain and the empirical world of humans there would be no science. There would be no reality in place to define existence as human.

Totally backwards. How do you know anything about the brain and the empirical world when that "knowledge" is in YOUR and everyone else's HEAD?

How does the brain communicate with the world except through sense data? And what is sense data? A product of what your senses tell you!!!

It is pointless to assume that, in the world of humans, some other reality exists which transcends or even contradicts human senses, including the "sixth sense" which is our metaphysical contact with "God". We are made to relate to "God" as humans, and "God" relates to us as human.

Exactly right! Exactly!

The rest is all imagination, "God's" province alone as Infinite Cause, although we can imagine some of it, probably as "proof" that "God Exists", otherwise, why are we able to imagine things outside the ken of correspondence?...

Using your terms, "cause" is as much in the "imagination" as anything else. You can define anything as a cause of anything else. World War 2 was caused by the first amphibian who came ashore and evolved into mankind who start wars. How much sense does that make? What causes what effects is subject to definition and is totally arbitrary.