Kevin's Watch

How could Judas have avoided his fate if Christ had already foreseen it? If Christ and God knew Judas was going to betray Jesus (as the canonical Gospels indicate), then it will follow that Judas could not avoid his fate. That is certainly a kind of predestination.

I don't know.... it's miraculous, and defies mortal explanation.

As I tried to say above, I think it's erroneous to presume that it must have worked one way or another way. We're in the realm of the not-humanly-explicable. So I will take it for granted that pre-knowledge and free will can be reconciled; any other choice leads me to renounce one major aspect of my religion or another. Call it believing in both sides of the paradox at the same time.

But what is the difference between your explanation and predestination, "divine" or not?

Wayfriend wrote:Judas chose to betray Jesus. Jesus saw what Judas would choose. It's as simple as that.

Pretty much, yeah. When God sent Christ, He had a plan for Him. He knew he had a pretty good shot at everything going a certain way (omniscience has that affect, dont'cha know).

Lord Mhoram wrote:But what is the difference between your explanation and predestination, "divine" or not?

I don't have an explanation -- I'm saying it's inexplicable.

(Also, I editted my response within 20 seconds of posting it, and your response got in that window.)

None of us can know what God knows. We can only speculate. I will never state any one thing that is of the Divine as fact because I can not know what God knows. I sure don't mind thinking about things though. This is why I teach my kids that they do not have to agree with, understand or accept someone else's beliefs/religion/philosophies, etc., but they MUST respect them.

All discussions of theology come down to that one simple sentence: "I don't know." Very frustrating.

Hey! That gives me a good idea for a religion: The Church of the I Don't Know Lemmings: "Meep, Meep, A
h
h
h
h
h
w
!
!
"

Or "God knows". Heh!

(or a huge basement completely packed with human blobs screaming, "Help us, feed us, help us, feed us!" **shudder**)

I don't think that using the word 'miracle' shuts down all theological discussion!

If we were having a philosophical discussion instead of a theological one, I would be the first one to point out the contradictions between free will and prescience. We could take sides, and debate the merits of either side, and the several famous attempts at reconcilliation. But Christian belief doesn't partake of any of those things, and it would be wrong to pull them into such a discussion.

God has given us free will, and he judges us as good or bad. That's doctrine.

God has from time to time predicted the future choices of people. That's doctrine too.

Which leaves you here: if you say Judas was destined to betrayal and therefore had no free will, you go against doctrine. If you say Judas was free and so could not have been predicted, you go against doctrine. And if you even start to discuss how the two doctrines are mutually exclusive, you are certainly going against doctrine.

If you're a Christian, and choose to believe, the only choice you have is to believe that God's predictions and free will are not mutually exclusive.

That's not so bad for me. That's the kind of universe I want to live in, the kind of belief I choose to have. I don't want to believe that I'm an automaton, and I don't want to believe that God's not infinite.

Wayfriend wrote:I don't think that using the word 'miracle' shuts down all theological discussion!

If we were having a philosophical discussion instead of a theological one, I would be the first one to point out the contradictions between free will and prescience. We could take sides, and debate the merits of either side, and the several famous attempts at reconcilliation. But Christian belief doesn't partake of any of those things, and it would be wrong to pull them into such a discussion.

God has given us free will, and he judges us as good or bad. That's doctrine.

God has from time to time predicted the future choices of people. That's doctrine too.

Which leaves you here: if you say Judas was destined to betrayal and therefore had no free will, you go against doctrine. If you say Judas was free and so could not have been predicted, you go against doctrine. And if you even start to discuss how the two doctrines are mutually exclusive, you are certainly going against doctrine.

If you're a Christian, and choose to believe, the only choice you have is to believe that God's predictions and free will are not mutually exclusive.

That's not so bad for me. That's the kind of universe I want to live in, the kind of belief I choose to have. I don't want to believe that I'm an automaton, and I don't want to believe that God's not infinite.

Absolutely! Also, how do we know those were God's predictions? A person said they were predictions from God. People are fallable. Now, if God appeared in front of us and said, "Why, yes, these are my predictions," then that would be different. No. These were prophecies by people touched by God's insight. This does not make every message exact since it is subject to human interpretation.

Wayfriend wrote:I don't think that using the word 'miracle' shuts down all theological discussion!

If we were having a philosophical discussion instead of a theological one, I would be the first one to point out the contradictions between free will and prescience. We could take sides, and debate the merits of either side, and the several famous attempts at reconcilliation. But Christian belief doesn't partake of any of those things, and it would be wrong to pull them into such a discussion.

God has given us free will, and he judges us as good or bad. That's doctrine.

God has from time to time predicted the future choices of people. That's doctrine too.

Which leaves you here: if you say Judas was destined to betrayal and therefore had no free will, you go against doctrine. If you say Judas was free and so could not have been predicted, you go against doctrine. And if you even start to discuss how the two doctrines are mutually exclusive, you are certainly going against doctrine.

If you're a Christian, and choose to believe, the only choice you have is to believe that God's predictions and free will are not mutually exclusive.

That's not so bad for me. That's the kind of universe I want to live in, the kind of belief I choose to have. I don't want to believe that I'm an automaton, and I don't want to believe that God's not infinite.

Excellent post Wayfriend.

Soulquest wrote:

One thing a friend of mine recently brought up (we met at a college Catholic retreat) is why [does] God require a blood sacrifice?

As best that I recall (digging through the cobwebs of my memory) this is because from the first sin in the Garden of Eden, the punishment for sin has always been death. Thus from Abel's accepted sacrifice, through the Jewish Yom Kippur and ending with Christ's death, shedding of blood is the only acceptable atonement.

Wayfriend,

Aside from the fact that there is no homogenous "Christian doctrine," I can't help but see the contradiction: We have free will, yet God has foreseen what our decisions will be. Firstly, if God has given us this free will and we had no choice in accepting it, I see a contradiction there. Secondly, if this God has already planned out our actions, how can we say we are making those decisions freely? And does God foresee all of our actions, or just those who are part of his cosmic plan, like Judas for example? To be honest, I don't see how you or anyone else can answer any of these questions - you can consult the dubious texts of the Bible, or the ex post facto documents created by the Church to cover up the theological holes present in Chrisitan doctrine that any rational person can easily see. Or you can consult a fallible yet divinely-mandated priest or minister. The enormous questions posed by any religion make it impossible for me to subscribe to them. Christianity seems to me be the most intellectually stagnant of the world religions.

Lord Mhoram wrote:Wayfriend,

Aside from the fact that there is no homogenous "Christian doctrine," I can't help but see the contradiction: We have free will, yet God has foreseen what our decisions will be. Firstly, if God has given us this free will and we had no choice in accepting it, I see a contradiction there. Secondly, if this God has already planned out our actions, how can we say we are making those decisions freely? And does God foresee all of our actions, or just those who are part of his cosmic plan, like Judas for example? To be honest, I don't see how you or anyone else can answer any of these questions - you can consult the dubious texts of the Bible, or the ex post facto documents created by the Church to cover up the theological holes present in Chrisitan doctrine that any rational person can easily see. Or you can consult a fallible yet divinely-mandated priest or minister. The enormous questions posed by any religion make it impossible for me to subscribe to them. Christianity seems to me be the most intellectually stagnant of the world religions.

This is why I enjoyed my Catholic high school so much. They were very open minded and taught us that the Bible was made up of stories passed down before written language. Ever played grapevine? Things change passed down through oral tradition. Then there were all these revisions to the Bible. It has been translated so many times that much of what was original is no longer phrased the same way. I teach my kids about all different religions. They've learned about Judism, Paganism, Buddism, etc. I had to learn these religions in my high school. My parents were all outraged because they "can't be teaching the Baltimore Catachism (or however it is spelled)." I'm glad they didn't. It expanded my Religious/Spiritual thinking.

SoulQuest,

I go to a Catholic prep school and I've had the same experience. My freshman year I had two one-semester classes on the Biblical texts. Maybe for some it strengthens their faith, but for me, it severely weakened mine to learn that the preconceived notions that I had from church, etc., about the Bible was a total sham. I had kind of like an intellectual crisis - if the texts that this faith resides on are so questionable, how can I accept any of it?

Reading Foucault, Derrida, Nietzsche, and other thinkers, I've come to explore new ways of examining a text. The preconceived notions of narrative and oeuvre do not hold up, and this is especially true of the Bible.

But I am getting way off topic.

I told a friend of mine recently - a fundamentalist Baptist - that Paul actually did not write 1 Cor 14:34:

Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.

but that this was actually added much later by someone who wanted to control the women in their community.

I thought she was going to lose her mind.

I bet that was not a pleasant experience, dlb.

Lord Mhoram, I agree with you 100%. I'm just not wearing my "practicing Christian" hat when I do. Do you see?

You can't ask of your faith to prove such stuff.

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Regarding blood sacrifices:

Ancient Hebrewism is a sacrificial religion. That is, its about offering up harvest and livestock "to god" on an altar, to appease G-d's wrath and solicit his blessing and so on.

The people of the dominant religion in that area in those times thought in terms of abjuring G-d through sacrifice. Therefore Christ's ultimate act was perceived those terms - because of the people who were the ones being converted. And so he is "the Lamb of God" - he was a sacrifice made on our behalf, to move G-d to saving us.

This is how I understand it, anyway.