by cameo-d 21 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Total freedom of choice is living in a fantasy.. who get gets to choose their parents, eye color, land of birthIQ etc ?
Well.
Freedom is relative.
I can't choose to violate the laws of physics either, but within a certain domain where I have power, I have a degree of freedom to exert my will.
BTS
If Adam accepted the gift, it would be subject to conditions which God informed Adam of immediately.
Is it really a gift if it is conditional?
If I gave you 100 dollars for your birthday "gift" and I told you that you could only use it to buy shoe polish...and considering you only owned one pair of shoes and they are canvas....would this really be a gift? Or would it be a display of control as well as mockery?
Gift should have neither condition nor obligation. Otherwise, it's not a gift, in my book.
For me, that means I owe Him my life - but that, is the free choice we all will make. Johnny
Again, a genuine gift does not leave the recipient with a sense of obligation or "oweing back."
Exactly Cameo, if there were no strings attached and someone truly chose to serve God becuase they love him rather than because there is a threat this has more a ring of genuine love.
If God made us knowing our desires and fears, then what satisfaction would there be in getting someone to love you through coercsion?
If you gave the gift of a bike to kid, knowing they want it, because they love to explore and told them they could only drive it in the parking lot, you are actually creating a temptation and form of torment.
If he loves me, he won't drive the bike on the road. This is sick thinking. If he loves you he will drive the bike on the road so he can fully appreciate the gift you gave him.
Then you can really show your deep love by grounding him, and it becomes a worse gift because your not letting him use his natural inclination to explore and learn the rules of the road and in the end you've taken more away than you've given. This is not love.
If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you, it was truly yours to begin with, if it doesn't it never was.
In prison if you give something to someone, and they put it in their cell, they can own you. You can become their bitch. True love. This is very sick thinking! Jail mentality from the holy of holies.
While I believe god's little test was petty and weird the words "free will" and "ultimatum" are not mutually exclusive.
Your example of the gift of $100 could use some refinement in this way: If the person giving the gift was capable of reading your heart and mind - and knew the possibility that you may go spend it on drugs or something very bad, it would not be unreasonable for the giver to make a stipulation of you not use the gift for that purpose - otherwise, the gifter would not give you the gift...? Right?
cameo-d
I believe Adam was a slave in many ways. He was created for a purpose, for God's Good pleasure. Isn't God a good Master. What's the problem?
God told him everything he had to know, except......
From a line in Dr. Zhivago....."Wives are a very sticky commodity."
I am sure many here have learned that lesson.
r.
It cant be free if theres strings attached.
Oh thats right God is Jewish.
Here is another point the God I hear advertised in the bible is all knowing.
So he knew before Adam and Eve ate the fruit that they would eat the fruit.
So he's kind of Sadistic also.
What a god.
Of course he probably never saw a good shrink.
Or maybe he did see a Shrink then he changed his name to Bud
dAh.
Reading this question and trying to answer it has convinced me that there could not have been an Adam.
No free will. No ultimatum.
It would not have made sense for an all powerfull and all wise being to create either scenario and then react the way he did.
Case closed.
The Oracle
