God, Agency, And The "prime Directive"

[DarkScythe]

the future is never set even if it known.

[Rob Osborn]

Here is something to think about- The Holy Ghost can teach us all truth and keep us away from danger. We can either listen to the counsel or not but it shows to us that God can influence us to "change" the course of our future. When God created the earth he said that he would prove us herewith to see if we would be obedient. It doesn't say that he would send us here to fulfill all destiny in exactly who would be obedient or disobedient of which was already known.

[CV75]

Knowing the future does not take away agency

If the future is known and set in stone that would be predestination, a doctrine not accepted by LDS doctrine

I agree that knowing the future (or our thoughts and intents of the heart) does not take away agency. I do not think knowing the future means or requires the future to be set in stone. I think this is because “knowing” (or knowledge) has various orders of operation, and is a “compound in one” with faith as well as many other godly attributes.

When it comes to God’s knowledge and faith, they are infinite, and even absolute, in comparison to our own, just as He can count innumerable worlds and inhabitants in comparison to what we can do (Moses 1:28-37). But His eternal knowledge and faith still follow the eternal principles outlined in Alma 32.

At least three ways in which I see God’s knowledge of the future, as expressed to us, include: (a) His perfect plan, which is given to and carried out by the faithful—taught in the form of prophecy about the future; (b) His perfect faith in eternal principles (His course of one eternal round)—taught in the form of revelation; © His perfect intelligence in comprehending the past, present and future by virtue of His faith and knowledge—taught in the form of His example.

 

The way I see it, since intelligence is independent in that sphere in which God has set it to act for itself (D&C 93:30), there has to be a mutual interdependency between God's faith and knowledge of that intelligence's acts (having His level of faith and knowledge) and how that free intelligence exercises agency with the faith in and knowledge of truth that it posseses.

[Monster]

No doubt I love Star Trek but the concept of the Prime Directive never seems realistic to me. In more than one episode they are willing to let an entire civilization be wiped out so they can b e smug in the superiority. Who is to say not interfering is any less damaging than interfering?

 

1) What is its purpose? In other words, why is it so essential for us to have moral agency?

 

Mormons are the worst at agency. They want everyone to be able to choose, but when they choose differently than they are suppose to they throw a fit and try what ever they can to get them to change their mind. I do not believe agency is the key but knowledge. It is not so important what we do in this life but what we learn not to do. Agency or free will are concepts created to explain tragedy in the world. They may exist but are not as integral to Gods plan as we would like to think. 

 

2) Where does God draw the line between inspiring us and compelling us? Another form of this question is, How closely does God direct the church? Is he a micro-manager or does he take more of a laissez-faire approach?

 

It is rather obvious God is not a Micro Manager of his children or the church if you want to say that. He is so hands of as to be almost completely absent.

[Tacenda]

Well, I also think this may be one of the problems that emerge with Mormon theology.

 

I was reading on a mormon site (not anti-mormon by any means, really straight down the line) a couple of years ago where someone mentioned that (and this is a paraphrase) in view of the "God used to be a man" theory, Mormons have a little tendency to make God into the "very wise old man who lives just down the road", rather than that omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent being, who's Spirit fills the immensity of space and communicates with all that he has created therein, whether it be animated or not, for whom time does not exist but all things are present before Him, past, present and future.........Well, you get the idea.

 

To me, this is the only Being that has the capacity to offer Eternal salvation, and I am just amazed that He takes an interest in us.   

I'm definitely slow in my LDS walk and never really knew we thought He was a man before becoming God.  I didn't have parents that discussed the doctrine much.  So this hasn't been taught to me and I guess maybe it's why it bothers me.  And since reading other faiths beliefs, this sounds more like what I've always thought of God, much bigger, much much bigger.... 

[changed]

If the future is known and set in stone that would be predestination, a doctrine not accepted by LDS doctrine

Free will concerns WHO sets it in stone, not IF it is set in stone.  We set our own future in stone, it is not predestination, it is our own free will. 

[Rob Osborn]

We choose our own future of which is not set in stone. We pave the road towards the future by actions we choose in the present. God has the power to control the future of prophecy because he is the master road paver and can pave the road in the direction to the destiny he said we would arrive at.

Edited January 5, 2014 by Rob Osborn

[changed]

These are deep philosophical paradoxes that are not easily dealt with.

Knowing if Lucifer would rebel is paramount in the timing of it. If God truly knows all things before they happen and God creates Lucifer and raises him in heaven, then you have a paradox of God who isn't evil knowingly creating and establishing evil. This creates a paramount problem because God has to not only knowingly create him to fall but he also has to raise him in light and truth giving him a position of high authority and then causing circumstances that lead to his fall and banishment. This is not the God I know.

I picture God as raising Lucifer in truth and light and then at some point God forsees his fall because of the choices Lucifer has made and the pattern of disobedience and lies emerging. If Satan is the destroyer, why would God knowingly create a being that would destroy his other creations? The only way Lucifers fall makes sense is that God didn''t initially create him to fall but rather to become like himself just as the rest of us. Because God gives us choice and laws within those choices it puts God in the position of having influence on his creation but not actual providence concerning our destiny which is ultimately up to us.

Again, knowing something, and causing it, are two very different things.  "Allowing" is NOT "causing".  God allows many evil things to happen, knows many evil things will happen, but He is certainly not the cause, or creator, of anything evil. 

For those who aren't familiar with Mormonism, we do not believe in ex-Nihlo creationism, we belive God is cleaning up a mess He did not make - that everything is eternal, there was never a time of "nothingness"...

 the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.(New Testament | Romans 8:15)

adoption - taking care of someone you did not create...

create is better translated as transform/organize -

So scriptures like this:

(Old Testament | Isaiah 45:7)

7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

are better translated/understood as this:

(Old Testament | Isaiah 45:7)

7 I form the light, and transform darkness: I make peace, and transform evil: I the LORD do all these things.

see:

http://www.ancient-hebrew.org/5_creator.html

Child Root (Branches of the Tree)

Pronunciation: "Qa-NeH"

Meaning: To build a nest.

Comments: This child root is a nest builder, one who builds a nest such as a bird. Also God as in Bereshiyt (Genesis) 14.19; "God most high creator (qaneh) of sky and earth". The English word "create" is an abstract word and a foriegn concept to the Hebrews. While we see God as one who makes something from nothing (create), the Hebrews saw God like a bird who goes about acquiring and gathering materials to build a nest (qen), the sky and earth. The Hebrews saw man as the children (eggs) that God built the nest for.

 

Here is something to think about- The Holy Ghost can teach us all truth and keep us away from danger. We can either listen to the counsel or not but it shows to us that God can influence us to "change" the course of our future. When God created the earth he said that he would prove us herewith to see if we would be obedient. It doesn't say that he would send us here to fulfill all destiny in exactly who would be obedient or disobedient of which was already known.

Proving obediance means allowing the action to happen - rather than just a good idea, or a thought experience, it has to be real.... not just the nice idea "I love you enough to die for you", but the actual deed. 

Alma 14:11 - one way or another, we are "allowed" (not caused, not created to, but allowed) to do what is in our heart to do..  Justice demands action - physical reality, not just thoughts.  It is not just to condemn or reward someone for actions that have not actually happened.  I can't give my star student an A before they take the test even though I know they are smart, and I know they will do well on the test. 

 

 

I agree that knowing the future (or our thoughts and intents of the heart) does not take away agency. I do not think knowing the future means or requires the future to be set in stone. I think this is because “knowing” (or knowledge) has various orders of operation, and is a “compound in one” with faith as well as many other godly attributes.

When it comes to God’s knowledge and faith, they are infinite, and even absolute, in comparison to our own, just as He can count innumerable worlds and inhabitants in comparison to what we can do (Moses 1:28-37). But His eternal knowledge and faith still follow the eternal principles outlined in Alma 32.

At least three ways in which I see God’s knowledge of the future, as expressed to us, include: (a) His perfect plan, which is given to and carried out by the faithful—taught in the form of prophecy about the future; (b) His perfect faith in eternal principles (His course of one eternal round)—taught in the form of revelation; © His perfect intelligence in comprehending the past, present and future by virtue of His faith and knowledge—taught in the form of His example.

 

The way I see it, since intelligence is independent in that sphere in which God has set it to act for itself (D&C 93:30), there has to be a mutual interdependency between God's faith and knowledge of that intelligence's acts (having His level of faith and knowledge) and how that free intelligence exercises agency with the faith in and knowledge of truth that it posseses.

Inifnite is infinite, no matter what you compare it to. 

If He did not know everything, then perhaps there is a better plan of salvation and Jesus did not have to die, and we don't have to experience pain and sufferring - the is the road walked down is God does not know everything.

Time -

(Book of Mormon | Alma 40:

all is as one day with God, and time only is measured unto men.

D&C 93

29 Man was also in the beginning with God.  bIntelligence, or the light of dtruth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be.

30 All truth is independent in that asphere in which God has placed it, to bact for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence.

31 Behold, here is the agency of man,

We are independant of God - we are dependant on Him if we want to progress... I don't think interdependant applies here though, I don't think God depends on us for anything, He is who He is with or without us.

 

[changed]

We choose our own future of which is not set in stone. We pave the road towards the future by actions we choose in the present. God has the power to control the future of prophecy because he is the master road paver and can pave the road in the direction to the destiny he said we would arrive at.

We choose our future as we chose our past.  We are eternal beings, with an eternal uncreated core - one that is eternally teachable and able to eteranlly progress, or one that does not progress and instead decomposes and dies....   Who we are - (living beings, or dead beings - entities able to act, or inanimate robots merely acted upon...) who we are is set in stone, but this is not a bad thing, because we are alive - it means life is eternal, and cannot be destroyed.  

[Calm]

And since reading other faiths beliefs, this sounds more like what I've always thought of God, much bigger, much much bigger.... 

But that is only because you apparently see man as much, much less than he possibly really is.  The veil may just be hiding a significant section of ourselves and considering what is to come....eternities for eternal progression...to see man as if his existence and value and meaning doesn't amount to much more than what we see in the here and now where we aren't even aware of anything beyond our selves save the outside of others' skins...we cannot truly know their thoughts and feelings, just at best get some of it through our own interpretation of their interpretation as expressed through the limitations of speech and writing.

 

What do you think the Spirit is if not a man?  What were our own spirits before we were born?  And why do you think God's spirit would be fundamentally different from ours?

Edited January 5, 2014 by calmoriah

[mfbukowski]

 

It is rather obvious God is not a Micro Manager of his children or the church if you want to say that. He is so hands of as to be almost completely absent.

Not in my life.

[CV75]

Inifnite is infinite, no matter what you compare it to.

Of course it is. But "infinite" (like "endless" and "eternal" -- D&C 19:7-12) means so many things, all valid, including its comparative sense. Any faithful, covenant-keeping saint's understanding is sufficiently effective in generating the faith necessary for salvation. This is how God numbers the numberless.

 

Of course we depend on God for the independence He gave us--we would never advance from estate to estate without Him. But because at some point in the "infinte" past He truly did give us our agency, that is the only thing we truly own and can return to Him (He will never just take it from us), and which He must rely (depend) upon us to freely give Him. Elder Maxwell said, "The submission of one’s will is really the only uniquely personal thing we have to place on God’s altar. The many other things we ‘give,’ … are actually the things He has already given or loaned to us. However, when you and I finally submit ourselves, by letting our individual wills be swallowed up in God’s will, then we are really giving something to Him! It is the only possession which is truly ours to give!" (see https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2005/10/knowing-the-lords-will-for-you?lang=eng). So yes, He does depend on our choice to be one with Him if He is to actually enjoy our being one with Him, and we must depend on Him in order to do so (hence the interdependence).

 

I take the scriptures you provided in the context I described. I imagine either reading is just as effective as the other for inspiring us to submit to His will and voluntarily give our will back to Him.

[The Nehor]

No doubt I love Star Trek but the concept of the Prime Directive never seems realistic to me. In more than one episode they are willing to let an entire civilization be wiped out so they can b e smug in the superiority. Who is to say not interfering is any less damaging than interfering?

 

1) What is its purpose? In other words, why is it so essential for us to have moral agency?

 

Mormons are the worst at agency. They want everyone to be able to choose, but when they choose differently than they are suppose to they throw a fit and try what ever they can to get them to change their mind. I do not believe agency is the key but knowledge. It is not so important what we do in this life but what we learn not to do. Agency or free will are concepts created to explain tragedy in the world. They may exist but are not as integral to Gods plan as we would like to think. 

 

2) Where does God draw the line between inspiring us and compelling us? Another form of this question is, How closely does God direct the church? Is he a micro-manager or does he take more of a laissez-faire approach?

 

It is rather obvious God is not a Micro Manager of his children or the church if you want to say that. He is so hands of as to be almost completely absent.

 

No, the Prime Directive was there to protect the Federation. They would not know how much is too much interference or what the results would be so it is considered best to just let it go. Benevolence without knowledge is dangerous. They never really acted smug. But yes, the whole thing did not make that much sense.

 

1. I have to disagree. Celebrating agency is not celebrating the diversity of choices. It is celebrating the right to choose. Getting annoyed that people choose wrongly is not disapproval of agency.

 

2. I disagree here too. I think he is pretty "in the details".

Edited January 6, 2014 by The Nehor

[changed]

Of course it is. But "infinite" (like "endless" and "eternal" -- D&C 19:7-12) means so many things, all valid, including its comparative sense. Any faithful, covenant-keeping saint's understanding is sufficiently effective in generating the faith necessary for salvation. This is how God numbers the numberless.

 

Of course we depend on God for the independence He gave us--we would never advance from estate to estate without Him. But because at some point in the "infinte" past He truly did give us our agency, that is the only thing we truly own and can return to Him (He will never just take it from us), and which He must rely (depend) upon us to freely give Him. Elder Maxwell said, "The submission of one’s will is really the only uniquely personal thing we have to place on God’s altar. The many other things we ‘give,’ … are actually the things He has already given or loaned to us. However, when you and I finally submit ourselves, by letting our individual wills be swallowed up in God’s will, then we are really giving something to Him! It is the only possession which is truly ours to give!" (see https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2005/10/knowing-the-lords-will-for-you?lang=eng). So yes, He does depend on our choice to be one with Him if He is to actually enjoy our being one with Him, and we must depend on Him in order to do so (hence the interdependence).

 

I take the scriptures you provided in the context I described. I imagine either reading is just as effective as the other for inspiring us to submit to His will and voluntarily give our will back to Him.

I'll have to think about that... seems like God is perfect (which means complete) with or without us, that for His actions to be selfless, He would not be getting anything back in return... In Moses 7:28, we bring Him sorrow...do we also bring Him joy? 

[JarMan]

1) What is its purpose? In other words, why is it so essential for us to have moral agency?

 

Mormons are the worst at agency. They want everyone to be able to choose, but when they choose differently than they are suppose to they throw a fit and try what ever they can to get them to change their mind. I do not believe agency is the key but knowledge. It is not so important what we do in this life but what we learn not to do. Agency or free will are concepts created to explain tragedy in the world. They may exist but are not as integral to Gods plan as we would like to think.  

 

I agree that knowledge is the ultimate goal. But the conclusion I'm reaching is that gaining that knowledge isn't possible without agency. Otherwise, wouldn't God just sit us down and teach us everything we need to know, all the while avoiding all of the tragedy and pain?

 

2) Where does God draw the line between inspiring us and compelling us? Another form of this question is, How closely does God direct the church? Is he a micro-manager or does he take more of a laissez-faire approach?

 

It is rather obvious God is not a Micro Manager of his children or the church if you want to say that. He is so hands of as to be almost completely absent.

 

He often seems pretty absent to me, too. I used to think I wasn't looking hard enough. But now I think he's simply respecting my agency.

[CV75]

I'll have to think about that... seems like God is perfect (which means complete) with or without us, that for His actions to be selfless, He would not be getting anything back in return... In Moses 7:28, we bring Him sorrow...do we also bring Him joy?

Yes, He is Perfect and Complete. But His work and glory does not end there with Himself; He does not intend to keep to Himself; He wants to share all that He has; etc. – if it were otherwise, He would not be Perfect and Complete! I also believe we bring Him joy when we align with Him just as we bring Him sorrow when we reject Him. This is the purpose of our exaltation (we rely on Him to accomplish that, and He relies on us to submit our will unto Him--He won't force it).

Someone in the telestial kingdom is also perfect and complete in that his body is perfect (Alma 11:43), but he is not perfect and complete in the same way God is; he alone and not engaged in the Father’s work and glory, and the Father lacks his participation.

[Kind Debater]

In Moses 7:28, we bring Him sorrow...do we also bring Him joy?

I think so. See the following: Isaiah 62:3-5, Psalm 44:3, 149:4, Proverbs 8:29-31, Zeph 3:17.