Answering Difficult Questions From Atheists

reel

While I do understand the concept of testing, I cannot agree with that sort of an explanation. Yes, it is not entirely impossible that such a God would test us with hardship. I get that. However, the 5 year old girl that will be brutally raped today, go tell her that your loving and merciful God is allowing that to happen so that he can test her with "hardship". Do you realize how egregiously asinine that sounds? It is almost as if we are talking about the test of the devil, not of a God!

I have been wondering about that for a while. I even asked the forum question about it. I do not truly reject incarnation, but saying that the 5 year old girl got raped because she probably was a rapist in her previous life is pretty outrageous because in this life, her soul doesn't remember what she was before. God tells in Quran that he would tell people where they were wrong.....this applies to even sectarians. The whole punishment coming from previous life is detrimental to society as demonstrated by India and China. Some hindus and buddhists say you should not help the poor or a person in danger because it means you are objecting God's intervention. That's pretty harsh way to look at things.

Now as for the 5 year old, I have come to realize that the problem is not God, but us humans. He has given us a brain. He has given us the power to understand what is good and wrong. He has given us hands and legs. He has taught us the meaning of unity. With all these resources available, we should be able to create a system where such thing should not happen. But we just don't do it, allowing innocent people to suffer.

Having no evidence for Gods or disproves of Gods, I turned into an atheist. There could be no Gods at all, or one God or many. I just have no evidence for any of those possibilities. Until the day I do, I refuse to believe in any of those possibilities.

I don't believe all atheists would go to hell and all. However, I am interested to know what kind of evidence of God are you looking for? What are the requirements you have established which would prove that he exists?

Thanks.

Jafar

I have been wondering about that for a while. I even asked the forum question about it. I do not truly reject incarnation, but saying that the 5 year old girl got raped because she probably was a rapist in her previous life is pretty outrageous because in this life, her soul doesn't remember what she was before.

Her body might not remember.. but her soul might..
There are things called "Past Life Regression" which I'm intrigued to try it myself..
And there are few quite convincing cases where one remember clearly about his/her past life..

Plus.. where is our 'memory' being stored is still a mystery up until now..
Apparently it might not be inside our 'brain'..

God tells in Quran that he would tell people where they were wrong.....this applies to even sectarians. The whole punishment coming from previous life is detrimental to society as demonstrated by India and China. Some hindus and buddhists say you should not help the poor or a person in danger because it means you are objecting God's intervention. That's pretty harsh way to look at things.

I never encountered any Hindus or Buddhist who said such things..
And the Buddhist DO NOT BELIEVE in any deity or God.. at least as understood by the western culture.

Within the framework of "Karma" if you don't help anyone during their time of needs.. then you will also not be getting any help during your time of needs. It doesn't matter whether it's widely believed or not.. as they believed the law of "Karma" is automatically enforced to those who believe or not believe in it. That's why they never enforced their belief to be believed by others. (Unlike those in the West)

The beauty of the "Eastern culture" is that they NEVER ENFORCED their belief upon others..
They never said "Those who do not believe in the law of Karma shall be tormented in hell for all eternity" or "their blood is eligible to be shed because they're the enemy of our deity or god".

Plus..
They also don't have any conception of "A Deity Writing A Book as such we need to consider it as Holy".
The conception of "Holy Book" ONLY EXIST IN THE WEST.. specifically SEMITIC CULTURE.

Started by the Ancient Egyptian with their Holy Book Of The Dead.
Continued by the Israelites with their holy Torah and Tanakh
Continued by the (Messianic) Jews with their holy Gospel.
Continued by the (Messianic) Jews + Arabs with their holy Quran.

reel

Her body might not remember.. but her soul might..
There are things called "Past Life Regression" which I'm intrigued to try it myself..
And there are few quite convincing cases where one remember clearly about his/her past life..

Count me in along with my sibling and fiance. In the last thread about atheism I was just pretending to be a shallow atheist, but truth is that the research I spoke about matches what I myself felt and the things I have heard and seen. I have good memory about my "baby" days. But there is one thing that struck me was me attempting to take the stairs and then suddenly falling down causing severe pain in my head. My servants screamed. That's all I remembered. According to the scene, I was some kind of an intolerant business person but with sense of responsibility. Back to baby days, when I was brought home I kept feeling suffocated because I knew it was not my address. It felt like demotion. Hurt ache got severe when I saw myself in the mirror. I thought I was an adult, but mirror said I was a baby. I felt trapped. For a while, I hated the people around me apparently because I thought they were too inferior for my taste except my dad. Like Stewi from family guy, I was disappointed to meet my new mom. I was suspicious of using things cheaper than what I umm normally used before falling down from the stairs. I considered them all dirty and things of the poor people. I toned down after some years and forgot all about it, but one thing that still remains with me is the fear of stairs. I always feel that I would have temporary blindness and that would cause me to fall down. I shiver sometimes when taking the stairs. Similarly, my fiance has unusual fear towards this bridge https//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/San_Mateo-Hayward_Bridge-2edit.jpg He said he felt as if he once fell from it and also there is a community college which he believed he had been student of when he passed by it in the car at age 4 or 5.

The reason why I believed the research was correct was because it showed babies could remember their past life till age 5 and also that the cause of the death in their previous lives turned into phobia in their present ones.

I never encountered any Hindus or Buddhist who said such things..
And the Buddhist DO NOT BELIEVE in any deity or God.. at least as understood by the western culture.

You can go to India and interview people. One of my friends did. There are two kinds of buddhism. In one, multiple gods exist. I did provide the link to an interview from china where the residents were asked why they feared saving people from road accidents and that was one of their excuses. It is several pages away in this forum under my posts. So at this moment it is difficult for me to retrieve it.

Within the framework of "Karma" if you don't help anyone during their time of needs.. then you will also not be getting any help during your time of needs.

I don't know how exactly Buddhists view karma, but in hinduism, they have caste system which complicates the matter.

That's why they never enforced their belief to be believed by others. (Unlike those in the West)

They dont enforce belief, but they do kill those who are of other belief systems or do not agree with them similar to those hardcord blind people of Abrahamic religions http//www.newrepublic.com/article/116335/burma-massacre-muslims-ethnic-cleansing-has-just-escalated
As far as I know, next will be the christian community.

1970 Thai Monks It is not violation of buddhism to kill communists
2004 Thai monks were trained to become militant buddhists
Sinhala Buddhist Nationalists are known to persecute minorities
During WW2, Buddhist monks promoted the idea that it is okay for Japan to be violent to have a huge empire

The beauty of the "Eastern culture" is that they NEVER ENFORCED their belief upon others..

Except when it comes to dating maybe hmm

They also don't have any conception of "A Deity Writing A Book as such we need to consider it as Holy".

Why need a holybook when there are thousands of crazy superstitions to choose from?

Started by the Ancient Egyptian with their Holy Book Of The Dead.
Continued by the Israelites with their holy Torah and Tanakh
Continued by the (Messianic) Jews with their holy Gospel.
Continued by the (Messianic) Jews + Arabs with their holy Quran.

I don't know everything written in Torah and Gospel, but I do know Quran has helped me and took me by surprise several times for which to me it will always remain holy. I'll actually depend on one single book rather than
going to people with occult power to tell them to show me my path
believing that there is some kind of occult power in coin tossing for which I need to have blind faith in it
believing that my daughter's meat can heal my illness
thinking and waiting for some plant to bring me money and luck

peace

Jafar

Count me in along with my sibling and fiance. In the last thread about atheism I was just pretending to be a shallow atheist, but truth is that the research I spoke about matches what I myself felt and the things I have heard and seen. I have good memory about my "baby" days. But there is one thing that struck me was me attempting to take the stairs and then suddenly falling down causing severe pain in my head. My servants screamed. That's all I remembered. According to the scene, I was some kind of an intolerant business person but with sense of responsibility. Back to baby days, when I was brought home I kept feeling suffocated because I knew it was not my address. It felt like demotion. Hurt ache got severe when I saw myself in the mirror. I thought I was an adult, but mirror said I was a baby. I felt trapped. For a while, I hated the people around me apparently because I thought they were too inferior for my taste except my dad. Like Stewi from family guy, I was disappointed to meet my new mom. I was suspicious of using things cheaper than what I umm normally used before falling down from the stairs. I considered them all dirty and things of the poor people. I toned down after some years and forgot all about it, but one thing that still remains with me is the fear of stairs. I always feel that I would have temporary blindness and that would cause me to fall down. I shiver sometimes when taking the stairs. Similarly, my fiance has unusual fear towards this bridge https//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/San_Mateo-Hayward_Bridge-2edit.jpg He said he felt as if he once fell from it and also there is a community college which he believed he had been student of when he passed by it in the car at age 4 or 5.

The reason why I believed the research was correct was because it showed babies could remember their past life till age 5 and also that the cause of the death in their previous lives turned into phobia in their present ones.

Intriguing.. but well one need to experience by him/her self in order to believe.
I'm still intrigued to do the "Past Life Regression" session myself..

You can go to India and interview people. One of my friends did. There are two kinds of buddhism. In one, multiple gods exist. I did provide the link to an interview from china where the residents were asked why they feared saving people from road accidents and that was one of their excuses. It is several pages away in this forum under my posts. So at this moment it is difficult for me to retrieve it.
I don't know how exactly Buddhists view karma, but in hinduism, they have caste system which complicates the matter.

There are millions kind of Buddhism.. as many as there are those who claimed to be buddhist.

And Caste system has nothing to do with Karma.. it's just yet another way for the noble and king to stay in power.
Sidharta during his life (or should I say his time on this earth?) opposed the Caste system.

They dont enforce belief, but they do kill those who are of other belief systems or do not agree with them similar to those hardcord blind people of Abrahamic religions http//www.newrepublic.com/article/116335/burma-massacre-muslims-ethnic-cleansing-has-just-escalated
As far as I know, next will be the christian community.

Driven by pure Myanmarese Nationalism and Ethno-Facism.
It has nothing to do with religion or 'belief'.
Rohingya has a long history to be once acted as the "imported agent of British Colonialist".. which started the resentment with the Myanmarese or should I say Baganese.. back in the 19th century.
But well I don't want to discuss Myanmar politics here..

It's similar to Myanmarese vs Thai conflict..
Or Turkish vs Arab conflict or Turkish vs Kurds conflict or Tibetans vs Han Chinese conflict..
In short it's an ethnicity conflict..

Rohingya is not the only ethnical conflict which are happening in Myanmar.. there are others.. although others didn't have the luxury of "international coverage" due to some reasons.. (where religion is again play part)

Here's the list
https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_conflict_in_Myanmar

The western world doesn't care too much if it's Buddhist vs Buddhist..
Yet once it's Buddhist vs Christian or Buddhist vs Muslim.. (The westerner religion) they start to pay attention due to "shared identity" sentiment.

Except when it comes to dating maybe hmm
Why need a holybook when there are thousands of crazy superstitions to choose from?

Exactly... and writing down those thousands of crazy superstitions to a book and declare it as holy / coming from God is indeed an act of insanity.

I don't know everything written in Torah and Gospel, but I do know Quran has helped me and took me by surprise several times for which to me it will always remain holy. I'll actually depend on one single book rather than
going to people with occult power to tell them to show me my path

If the believe in Holy Book suits you then fine.. because it really doesn't matter anyway... it's your actual deed that matter..

Just to let you know that Billions of people on this earth still see the act of "Believing in a book as holy and God wrote a book" as "bizarre and strange".

As bizarre as when you see a cult who think that "God has written a software and such software is a holy software".
But well.... if such "holy software" really helped the life of such cult member then fine right?
As long as they don't enforce such belief to others or they start murdering or torturing people with their "holy software" as justification.

reel

Intriguing.. but well one need to experience by him/her self in order to believe.
I'm still intrigued to do the "Past Life Regression" session myself..

I am not aware of how past life regression goes. Let us know about the experience.

And Caste system has nothing to do with Karma.. it's just yet another way for the noble and king to stay in power.

In Hinduism, it is believed all evil people take their rebirth in lower caste.

Sidharta during his life (or should I say his time on this earth?) opposed the Caste system.

That is why, Buddhism was threat to hinduism.

Driven by pure Myanmarese Nationalism and Ethno-Facism.
It has nothing to do with religion or 'belief'.
Rohingya has a long history to be once acted as the "imported agent of British Colonialist".. which started the resentment with the Myanmarese or should I say Baganese.. back in the 19th century.

Migration is normal. Rohingya people weren't invaders. They were minorities anyways.

It's similar to Myanmarese vs Thai conflict..
Or Turkish vs Arab conflict or Turkish vs Kurds conflict or Tibetans vs Han Chinese conflict..
In short it's an ethnicity conflict..

But its monks who have been causing the problems.

Exactly... and writing down those thousands of crazy superstitions to a book and declare it as holy / coming from God is indeed an act of insanity.

Would love to see proof

If the believe in Holy Book suits you then fine.. because it really doesn't matter anyway... it's your actual deed that matter..

I can judge by deeds using the book though.

Just to let you know that Billions of people on this earth still see the act of "Believing in a book as holy and God wrote a book" as "bizarre and strange".

All those billions of people do not live inside me. So I do not care.

As bizarre as when you see a cult who think that "God has written a software and such software is a holy software".

If I don't read the book I would think that way. But I did.

But well.... if such "holy software" really helped the life of such cult member then fine right?

I don't see any problem with that.

As long as they don't enforce such belief to others or they start murdering or torturing people with their "holy software" as justification.

I don't see people of this forum forcing their belief on anyone. They are more about evidence and logic. I haven't heard of Quranists killing anyone for holy software.
Apparently, I was wrong about Buddhism not forcing their belief on anyone

Forced Conversion to Buddhism in Eastern Nagaland
http//www.burmalink.org/forced-conversion-buddhism-eastern-nagaland/

Christians forced to convert to Buddhism in rural Nepalese village
https//www.barnabasfund.org/news/Christians-forced-to-convert-to-Buddhism-in-rural-Nepalese-village

The worst countries for religious freedom

Burma 2. China 3. Eritrea 4. Iran 5. North Korea 6. Saudi 7. Sudan 8.Uzbekistan
https//www.indexoncensorship.org/2014/01/worst-countries-religious-freedom/

peace

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem Invalid,

A baby getting raped sounds tragic. A person murdered for no reason also sounds tragic. If GOD was to interfere, the rapist would not have raped and the murderer would not have murdered hence there would be no free will.

So, are you suggesting that your God would rather grant the rapist and murderer free will to rape and murder over suspending their free will so that innocents don't suffer? Here is the situation explained better

Situation A
-God does not intervene
-Woman is being raped against her will
-Her child is being murdered against his will
-Rapist gets to keep his free will to do evil
-Murder gets to keep his free will to do evil
-God then punishes the rapist and murder
-The woman remains raped and the child murdered

Situation B
-God DOES intervene
-Woman gets her will and therefore isn't raped
-Her child gets his will so doesn't get murdered
-Rapist doesn't get to rape
-Murder doesn't get to murder
-Nobody gets punished

In situation A, you have a woman raped, her child witnessing that rape and then the woman witnessing her child being murdered as she was being raped. That is then followed by the murderer and rapist being punished by God. No amount of punishment of the criminals will un-rape or un-murder the victims.

In contrast, Situation B is the best one and we already practice that. The good people do not have to suffer just so that we can let evil run rampant and exercise free will to cause harm to innocents.

If you had the means to stop it and came across a woman being raped while her son was being murdered, would you wait for that crime to happen then complain to the police to send the rapist and murderers to prison? Or would you be like me and stop it first even if it means that you will have to suspend the free will of the rapist and murderers? Whichever you decide, know that at least 2 people will lose their free will. If you choose not to intervene, the mom and son won't be victimized of their free will. They will be raped and murdered AGAINST their will.

The Quran speaks of the baby girls who were buried alive for no reason. On the day of resurrection, her killers will be asked for what reason was she murdered. Her killers will suffer for what their hands brought forth and go to hell for it. Did the baby girl deserve it? No. Did she do anything wrong? No. So why did it happen? Because God gave us free will and if you follow your instinct(Satan), you don't just destroy yourself, you also hurt other fellow humans.

See, this is exactly what I was talking about. Your God would rather first allow the crime to happen so that the victim suffers and then he can then go on to punish the criminals which doesn't make the crime not happen. I find that extremely disturbing and immoral.

I do not believe that there is anything devilish about our instincts. As far as I know, we have both good and evil instincts. Mindlessly going on instinct is highly irrational and can be really dangerous.

What I find the most baffling thing is that only in religion do we totally invert things. For example, we all understand that with great power comes great responsibility. The more power one has over things, the more responsible they are in general. However, when it comes to the most powerful being, he acts like the most irresponsible one. I mean, if I was standing there with a gun while my mother was being raped and brother being murdered and did nothing and only took the criminals to court afterward, people would not think highly of me. However, when you God, the all mighty one just stands there witnessing millions of murders and rapes so that the criminals can "exercise their free will", we praise that God and blame it all on the criminals.

I don't think that we really do have free will anyway. I can actually prove that. But that would have to be a separate topic, my friend.

You don't deserve anything from GOD and neither do I. Did you ask GOD to give you life, a pair of eyes, legs, arms, unlimited oxygen etc? You didn't and neither do you deserve them. Everything you have is out of GOD's mercy. GOD does not owe you anything, let alone your life. All bad stuff happens because of ourselves and the people around us. They chose to follow their instinct(Satan), misguide their offspring, cause corruption and bloodshed.
Do you blame GOD for all those misguided and lost Muslims? Their parents spread corruption and that is where it came from, Not GOD.

I disagree that God has no responsibility towards us. If I created beings that could feel things and are conscious, I wouldn't be a d*ck to them. I'd be respectful and try to help them out as much as I could and not just stand there watching the evil ones rape the innocents just so that I could punish them later.
God didn't owe us anything. However, once he ended up making us, the thing changes from that point onward. A nice entity would try to maximize well-being and a d*ck would toy around with these entities.
I do not blame God for what random Muslims do. I just blame him for allowing them to do evil in the first place.

And yes, if there was a tablet I could take to make sure I become incapable of doing evil ever, I'd take that tablet without ANY HESITATION. That is because I actually care about my actions and their consequences.

Peace
------------- Student of Allah

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem reel,

I have been wondering about that for a while. I even asked the forum question about it. I do not truly reject incarnation, but saying that the 5 year old girl got raped because she probably was a rapist in her previous life is pretty outrageous because in this life, her soul doesn't remember what she was before. God tells in Quran that he would tell people where they were wrong.....this applies to even sectarians. The whole punishment coming from previous life is detrimental to society as demonstrated by India and China. Some hindus and buddhists say you should not help the poor or a person in danger because it means you are objecting God's intervention. That's pretty harsh way to look at things.

Yeah. That is seriously messed up. The problem I have with reincarnation justifying suffering is two folds

There is no evidence for it.
This one is actually a bigger problem If someone rapes me, should I just let them? I mean, I do deserve it then, don't I? Wouldn't a righteous person just let justice run it's course?

If we followed that kind of a philosophy, we'd all watch babies being raped and be like "SubhanAllah! Finally some justice!". That just is too sick and a hard one for me to swallow!

Now as for the 5 year old, I have come to realize that the problem is not God, but us humans. He has given us a brain. He has given us the power to understand what is good and wrong. He has given us hands and legs. He has taught us the meaning of unity. With all these resources available, we should be able to create a system where such thing should not happen. But we just don't do it, allowing innocent people to suffer.

God can do much more than I can with my hands. How come you don't expect him to intervene and stop the baby from being raped but would expect me to intervene and stop the baby from being raped? double standards much? Your God has infinite power, therefore infinite responsibility. Yet he clearly stays out of helping the weakest of the weak ones.

Sad! Very sad!

I don't believe all atheists would go to hell and all. However, I am interested to know what kind of evidence of God are you looking for? What are the requirements you have established which would prove that he exists?

I never believed that we could ever tell who'd go to heaven and who wouldn't. Even when I was a muslim, I never actually believed that on average a Muslim girl has more chances of entering heaven than an atheist or a Jew.
It's actually a tough thing you asked of me. No matter what God does, he must do something that is objectively verifiable. It cannot be a "feeling" or something I won't be able to double check using independent sources. I mean, it's tough because if he starts talking to me, I'll assume that I am either hallucinating or going crazy. That's not an unfair assumption to make as we do have people who hears all kinds of voices and are in mental institutions. So, he has to give me something more and solid.

Perhaps the best way to put would be to say that a God worth the title would know exactly what it would take to convince me

Peace
---------------- Student of Allah

good_logic

Peace Student Of Allah.

Nice to hear from you every now and then.

I read your posts . I see your logic, however for me there is "situation C"

Situation C
-GOD promised not to intervene until the predetermined day.
-GOD keeps His promise and will not intervene.

Let me just add,if GOD intervened, it will be a different world, a different creation,a different scenario...etc. A world with no hatred, no wars, no oppression,no murder,no...etc.

For me there is the looking forward to the day promised by GOD. The day when GOD will eventually intervene .
For the Atheist things will carry on as they are. A world with rape, murder,...i.e as follows
-Woman is being raped against her will
-Her child is being murdered against his will
-Rapist gets to keep his free will to do evil
-Murder gets to keep his free will to do evil...Unless man s justice prevails or not.

GOD bless you.
Peace.

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem good logic,

Peace Student Of Allah.

Nice to hear from you every now and then.

It's good to hear from you too. Hope you are in good health and enjoying life.

I read your posts . I see your logic, however for me there is "situation C"

Situation C
-GOD promised not to intervene until the predetermined day.
-GOD keeps His promise and will not intervene.

Let me just add,if GOD intervened, it will be a different world, a different creation,a different scenario...etc. A world with no hatred, no wars, no oppression,no murder,no...etc.

It is not an entirely separate situation. You just gave one possible explanation for my situation A. Your reasoning is that God decided to not intervene because he promised us or to himself. Therefore he decided to stay out of it. The evil and irresponsible nature of that is not negated by the fact that he promised whoever. He knew what was going to happen and decided to stay out of it while having the power to not let evil happen like this. So my point still holds. Situation A still is a valid dilemma.

For me there is the looking forward to the day promised by GOD. The day when GOD will eventually intervene .
For the Atheist things will carry on as they are. A world with rape, murder,...i.e as follows
-Woman is being raped against her will
-Her child is being murdered against his will
-Rapist gets to keep his free will to do evil
-Murder gets to keep his free will to do evil...Unless man s justice prevails or not.

I get that you have some hope. However, your hope doesn't make it true. On top of that, you are making it sound like if I had the choice, I wouldn't bring evil to justice. It's not like I can press a button here and make evil people pay and I have decided for them to not pay and you have decided to make them pay. It's like you believing that Bill Gates will leave his wealth with you when he dies and being all smug about it while you tell me about you have that hope and I will be so much poor in comparison. P

On matters of principle, what bothers me more is that you are totally fine with God allowing evil to run rampant under his watch and punishing wrongdoers later when the victims have already been victimized. While I won't settle for anything less than him finally growing up and being responsible. By that, I am talking about stopping the rape of the mother and murder of the child before it happens. That is FAR MORE MORAL and rational to do then waiting until they have been raped and murdered for you to show off your super powers. Ever wondered what kind of an unreasonable and diabolical person SuperMan had to be if he did the same? Can you even imagine SuperMan waiting for a mother to be raped and her son to be murdered so that he can just sit back and watch and then later go after the criminals and torture them?

That my friend is what bothers me the most. It is really disturbing to me that any being would actually do that. Even more disturbing when I see others praising and worshiping such a being after knowing this.

And before anybody starts talking about "free will" again, please consider this God is supposed to already know exactly what will happen. Therefore he doesn't need to test anything. Especially when innocents will suffer as a result. For example, if you had 100% confidence that locking up criminal X with your mom in a prison cell will mean that he will rape your mother, will you knowingly lock her up with that criminal? Your God would! He would knowingly arrange that rape and sit back and watch and then go after the rapist. That is beyond disturbing to me.

Peace
------------- Student of Allah

good_logic

Peace Student of Allah.

Humans make their own decisions.

No,no no!!! You cannot have it both ways. Humans making their own decisions and GOD intervening to stop them?

Whether the woman is raped or the child is murdered or whatever bad happens... If GOD intervened with one bad thing HE( No gender) will intervene with all the bad things in this life.

Hence GOD will force people to stop making bad decisions!!!! i.e stopping humans to live this life?

Whatever happens will happen due to humans making good or bad decisions until GOD intervenes .like promised, Until GOD stops this life altogether. Another new way/life/dimension will have another set of rules/criteria...etc.

We find ourselves "humans" and we have no choice but to live this life making our own decisions. Good or bad. If women get raped or children get murdered or...because of the decisions humans are making ,GOD will not intervene yet.

GOD the Creator chooses and decides when to intervene or not according to HIS knowledge which is beyond our capacity to comprehend.GOD said intervention happens on the day of judgement.That is when it will happen. GOD has the ultimate knowledge and we have to trust and have confidence in HIM.

Whatever happened,is happening and will happen through this life is the outcome of the "human" decision making .

GOD bless you.
Peace.

imrankhawaja

Peace Student Of Allah.

Nice to hear from you every now and then.

I read your posts . I see your logic, however for me there is "situation C"

Situation C
-GOD promised not to intervene until the predetermined day.
-GOD keeps His promise and will not intervene.

Let me just add,if GOD intervened, it will be a different world, a different creation,a different scenario...etc. A world with no hatred, no wars, no oppression,no murder,no...etc.

For me there is the looking forward to the day promised by GOD. The day when GOD will eventually intervene .
For the Atheist things will carry on as they are. A world with rape, murder,...i.e as follows
-Woman is being raped against her will
-Her child is being murdered against his will
-Rapist gets to keep his free will to do evil
-Murder gets to keep his free will to do evil...Unless man s justice prevails or not.

GOD bless you.
Peace.

exactly situation c ,,there is only one way out from earth to heaven/hell till judgement day... and that's y everybody will be judged in proper way what they deserve,, this time non believers and believers didn't remember they made a choice ,,, but on judgement day their memory will come back and they will ,, cry like beggars ,,,but that time ,,nobody can save them from law from police from court,,,from jail... here in this world we are spending low life ,, so this worldly justice is not sure everywhere,,, that's how nature is testing us,,

anybody imagine person like hitler kill millions of jews will be forgiven,,, dnt you think somebodyz watching you day and night...l

huruf

Shalom Aleikhem good logic,

It's good to hear from you too. Hope you are in good health and enjoying life.

It is not an entirely separate situation. You just gave one possible explanation for my situation A. Your reasoning is that God decided to not intervene because he promised us or to himself. Therefore he decided to stay out of it. The evil and irresponsible nature of that is not negated by the fact that he promised whoever. He knew what was going to happen and decided to stay out of it while having the power to not let evil happen like this. So my point still holds. Situation A still is a valid dilemma.

I get that you have some hope. However, your hope doesn't make it true. On top of that, you are making it sound like if I had the choice, I wouldn't bring evil to justice. It's not like I can press a button here and make evil people pay and I have decided for them to not pay and you have decided to make them pay. It's like you believing that Bill Gates will leave his wealth with you when he dies and being all smug about it while you tell me about you have that hope and I will be so much poor in comparison.

On matters of principle, what bothers me more is that you are totally fine with God allowing evil to run rampant under his watch and punishing wrongdoers later when the victims have already been victimized. While I won't settle for anything less than him finally growing up and being responsible. By that, I am talking about stopping the rape of the mother and murder of the child before it happens. That is FAR MORE MORAL and rational to do then waiting until they have been raped and murdered for you to show off your super powers. Ever wondered what kind of an unreasonable and diabolical person SuperMan had to be if he did the same? Can you even imagine SuperMan waiting for a mother to be raped and her son to be murdered so that he can just sit back and watch and then later go after the criminals and torture them?

That my friend is what bothers me the most. It is really disturbing to me that any being would actually do that. Even more disturbing when I see others praising and worshiping such a being after knowing this.

And before anybody starts talking about "free will" again, please consider this God is supposed to already know exactly what will happen. Therefore he doesn't need to test anything. Especially when innocents will suffer as a result. For example, if you had 100% confidence that locking up criminal X with your mom in a prison cell will mean that he will rape your mother, will you knowingly lock her up with that criminal? Your God would! He would knowingly arrange that rape and sit back and watch and then go after the rapist. That is beyond disturbing to me.

Peace
------------- Student of Allah

I find your message childish. So you want a God, a world where this and that does not happen. I am moved. You are so good. Whereas other people, like disgusting "good logic" (excuse me "good logic&quot are quite happy with those things happening or at least letting them happen without giving a good rebuke to her god.

What you are doing in fact is demanding, exacting from ?whom? that what exists be not what exists but what your "moral" superiority has decreed that somebody (whom?) should make for you so that you cana give your approval to the God of such thing. You are demanding that someone, something should be all powerful and while being allpowerfull submit to your own idea, or the whole world's idea forthat mtter, of how things should be.

And since that does not happen you blame good logic or other people for submitting to such a world as it does exists and blame that because she accepts that world she wants all the bad things that happen.

Your exposition is rather absurd.

May be God, or let us say, somebody who is really allpowerful has already created and exists a world which is just as you demnd. May be. Good. But we, we who are here are not in it. We are here, in this world, in this universe, where millions,trillions, zillions of atoms joint for the absurd sport of making a big, big, big star. That is plain waste and absurd, but it is.

And so, while there are marvellous people there are other peopple tha rape and murder. You play fowl when you blame good logic for admitting such a thing as if she had any choice or more power than you to rpevent it, or least that she whould reprieve er God for allowing that and further say that that people are later indemnized is not enough, God is under the duty to make it not happen at all.

But what good logic or I or many other people would tell is that God himself has told you and I and anybody to prevent those things from hapenning. You can't prevent them, and therefore you are very angry because Gd orders you something you are unable to do. And since you have superior morals to God (who by the way does not need morals at all because it is He who made moral for us, but not for Him because He is above that) so you do not approve of Him or you do not acknowledge Him. And so what. Since you do that no more women will be raped, no more children will be killed? No, it is not so... rapewill go on and children will be killed, you are powerless. So you continue from there. You hve your tantrums and say that no no way anybody will be compensated because in the first place that should not have happened. Very logical, yes, it should not. But that doees not solve anything and that does not satisfy anybody, least of all the raped or the murdered.

So, yes, really, good logic is ridiculous expecting God to make up to anything and even more than that to make up far more than what was the first suffering of the human kind. She is really reprovable.

Humans are lost, may be, but they are not wholy stupid either and between your superior morals and the hope of later hapiness peddled by good logic many people cling to the latter... and may be also to high morals.

God is evil but He makes good promises and idiots believe them.

That is, I suppose, why Marx said religion is the opium of the masses. Your only offer is to withdraw the opium, but not stop their suffering at all.

But of course, neither you nor anybody else is allknowing so you do not know that good logic is wrong. You don't. And on the other hand, we do have witnesses that indeed many things are possible that you are not able to conceive or accept or acknowledge or that many people could not imagine.

Yes we are helpless and allumpowerful, but we do have choice, at least apparently, and we choose the best, the best for us as far as we can judge of what we feel and know. We do know that there is repentance, that there is reward in suffering, that there is real hapiness in so many things, in so many reddresses... so what is there making us fooler than you if we do believe that hapiness can exist forever for everybody?

A matter of choice, may be. Because I do not know whether you can really choose between believing and not believing.

I have never made an effort to believe, I am like that without no effort, and I tell you, I do not regret it in the least and I wouldn't change myself for anything and least of all for not believing.

So I think are you, you are quite happy with your choice, I imagine, but as to the demand that the world be as you want it because you are more moral than others, you may have to wait or become God, which finally is what we are all destined to be, that return to God who is the source of all existence.

Salaam

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem good logic,

Peace Student of Allah.

Humans make their own decisions.

No,no no!!! You cannot have it both ways. Humans making their own decisions and GOD intervening to stop them?

Whether the woman is raped or the child is murdered or whatever bad happens... If GOD intervened with one bad thing HE( No gender) will intervene with all the bad things in this life.

Hence GOD will force people to stop making bad decisions!!!! i.e stopping humans to live this life?

Stopping people from doing evil is not equal to stopping people from living their lives. That conclusion of yours is absolutely ludicrous! I know that you already understand that. For example, if your mom was being raped and the police just stood there watching it happen so they could let the rapist finish and then arrest him afterwards, you'd say exactly what I am saying! You'd call the police EVIL for allowing that to happen so that that the criminal "can live his life". That just makes no sense.

Whatever happens will happen due to humans making good or bad decisions until GOD intervenes .like promised, Until GOD stops this life altogether. Another new way/life/dimension will have another set of rules/criteria...etc.

I understand that that's the idea that you believe in. Trust me, I totally understand that. What I am critiquing is it's morality. I am saying that even if it's true that there is a God and that God is doing what you are suggesting, he is as immoral and a scumbag like the police that would just stand there watching your mom being raped so that the rapist could "live his life" while your mom and others are victimized.

We find ourselves "humans" and we have no choice but to live this life making our own decisions. Good or bad. If women get raped or children get murdered or...because of the decisions humans are making ,GOD will not intervene yet.

Yes, your model of God is such that it is immoral to the point that it won't intervene. I find the average human being way more moral than that model of God. Any decent human being who had it in their power to stop that would first stop that. That is the difference between a decent person and your model of God.

GOD the Creator chooses and decides when to intervene or not according to HIS knowledge which is beyond our capacity to comprehend.GOD said intervention happens on the day of judgement.That is when it will happen. GOD has the ultimate knowledge and we have to trust and have confidence in HIM.

I already know that the God you are proposing does say that he will intervene once the damage has already been done. That is the reason I tried to explain why that way of dealing with evil is evil itself! Nobody would approve of it. NOT EVEN YOU! I am more than confident that you'd never ever appreciate a cop that just stood there watching your mom being raped so that he may intervene in the court case against the rapist and let the judge cast his judgement! I find it bizarre that you'd despise such a cop while simultaneously praise/worship such a God!

Peace
-------------------- Student of Allah

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem Huruf,

I find your message childish. So you want a God, a world where this and that does not happen. I am moved. You are so good. Whereas other people, like disgusting "good logic" (excuse me "good logic&quot are quite happy with those things happening or at least letting them happen without giving a good rebuke to her god.

There is nothing childish about asking an all powerful entity to be more responsible. There is no childishness involved in asking the most powerful being in existence to stop evil so that innocents aren't victimized only so that He could go on to punish the criminals later. That method doesn't undo-evil, it just increases the total number of suffering in the world. Just do the math

My method
Nobody gets raped, nobody gets murdered, therefore nobody gets punished.

Your god's method
The mother will suffer rape, the child will suffer murder, the murderer and rapist will suffer serious punishment. 4 total victims!

There is nothing childish about what I am saying.

I don't think that good logic is a disgusting person. Certain beliefs held by us can actually have disgusting implications when we think about them in depth. That doesn't automatically make us disgusting human beings. I hope good logic won't misunderstand what I was trying to say based on your misrepresentation of it.

And the fact that you can find people who are willing to grant immunity to beings from the evil that they support doesn't make those evil works good. In other words, you being fine with a criminal's crime doesn't make it not a crime.

What you are doing in fact is demanding, exacting from ?whom? that what exists be not what exists but what your "moral" superiority has decreed that somebody (whom?) should make for you so that you cana give your approval to the God of such thing. You are demanding that someone, something should be all powerful and while being allpowerfull submit to your own idea, or the whole world's idea forthat mtter, of how things should be.

I agree with you there. I am demanding for a more responsible God than the one you worship. Luckily there is no evidence for the existence of such a horrendously evil monster. Just to preserve your beliefs, you won't agree with me. However, I am confident that if the legal/police authority in your town just watched crimes taking place while not saying a word but later on went after the criminals to punish them, you'd do exactly what I am doing here. You'd despise them for being immoral and irresponsible just like I'm doing here.

And since that does not happen you blame good logic or other people for submitting to such a world as it does exists and blame that because she accepts that world she wants all the bad things that happen.

Your exposition is rather absurd.

That's not correct. I am not blaming people like good logic for the crimes of that God. I am merely pointing out how immoral it is to revere such a being who wouldn't even stop a little baby from being raped despite having all the power in the universe. There is nothing absurd about that.

May be God, or let us say, somebody who is really allpowerful has already created and exists a world which is just as you demnd. May be. Good. But we, we who are here are not in it. We are here, in this world, in this universe, where millions,trillions, zillions of atoms joint for the absurd sport of making a big, big, big star. That is plain waste and absurd, but it is.

I don't know if there exists a god or if that god actually acts more responsibly towards another world which he created.

The number of atoms that it took to make this universe is not absurd to me. It only becomes absurd when you have that arrogantly self-centered view of the universe having been created for, ironically, an all knowing God to test one species of apes! Then it sounds like a waste. However, I do not buy into that myth anyway. So it never sounds absurd to me.

And so, while there are marvellous people there are other peopple tha rape and murder. You play fowl when you blame good logic for admitting such a thing as if she had any choice or more power than you to rpevent it, or least that she whould reprieve er God for allowing that and further say that that people are later indemnized is not enough, God is under the duty to make it not happen at all.

ONCE AGAIN! I am not blaming good logic for the evil in our world. If whatever I said came across that way, then let me type out an explicit statement confirming to good logic that I DO NOT BLAME GOOD LOGIC for the evil in this world. I am just pointing out to good logic that it'd be absolutely immoral and evil to revere the all powerful entity who could stop it but decided not to. Much like both you and good logic would despise the cop that would stand there watching your moms being raped only to punish the rapist later on. I'm asking for no more demand of better justice than that situation which you already understand.

But what good logic or I or many other people would tell is that God himself has told you and I and anybody to prevent those things from hapenning. You can't prevent them, and therefore you are very angry because Gd orders you something you are unable to do. And since you have superior morals to God (who by the way does not need morals at all because it is He who made moral for us, but not for Him because He is above that) so you do not approve of Him or you do not acknowledge Him. And so what. Since you do that no more women will be raped, no more children will be killed? No, it is not so... rapewill go on and children will be killed, you are powerless. So you continue from there. You hve your tantrums and say that no no way anybody will be compensated because in the first place that should not have happened. Very logical, yes, it should not. But that doees not solve anything and that does not satisfy anybody, least of all the raped or the murdered.

I do not accept that God doesn't need to be moral because he created morality. That is an absurd idea. the implication of that statement is that if God told a guy to go rape his mother, that becomes moral! Which I think nobody with an atom worth of morality in them would say is moral. So morality clearly transcends God and is independent of what God might say.
I am not against us working to stop evil. I AM NOT. Please do not misunderstand the point I am making here. It is absurd to expect fallible weak mortals to fight against evils while the most powerful immortal being just stands there doing nothing about it while simultaneously judging the weak ones!

So, yes, really, good logic is ridiculous expecting God to make up to anything and even more than that to make up far more than what was the first suffering of the human kind. She is really reprovable.

That's sick. There is no amount of payment you can do to me in any form including punishing the criminal for eternity where I'd be fine with you allowing the rape of my mother in the first place. IF how ever your God just is incapable of stopping the rape and then later punished the rapist and tried to make it upto my mom, then it'd have been a different story.

That is, I suppose, why Marx said religion is the opium of the masses. Your only offer is to withdraw the opium, but not stop their suffering at all.

Not correct. The context of this discussion wasn't to talk about what we can or should do to fight evil. Therefore I didn't try to write essays on crime fighting.

But of course, neither you nor anybody else is allknowing so you do not know that good logic is wrong. You don't. And on the other hand, we do have witnesses that indeed many things are possible that you are not able to conceive or accept or acknowledge or that many people could not imagine.

I don't have to know if good logic is right or wrong. That is irrelevant. I mean, I am having this discussion assuming that there is a god who acts the way you guys are saying he acts. So I am already accepting the existence of that god for the sake of this discussion. The fact that such a monster could exist doesn't make him any less of a monster.

Yes we are helpless and allumpowerful, but we do have choice, at least apparently, and we choose the best, the best for us as far as we can judge of what we feel and know. We do know that there is repentance, that there is reward in suffering, that there is real hapiness in so many things, in so many reddresses... so what is there making us fooler than you if we do believe that hapiness can exist forever for everybody?

I never ever said a word about you guys choosing to do evil. So it's strange that you are writing things implying that I have a problem with that. My entire argument is there to show how the model of God you guys are proposing is immoral. That has nothing to do with your individual actions against evil when you confront evil.

If you decide to believe that there will be some happy ending, I can't do anything about that. I can ask you for some strong evidence to hold that belief at best. But that's about it. It has nothing to do with the point I was making about the morally bankrupt model of God that I was proposed with.

A matter of choice, may be. Because I do not know whether you can really choose between believing and not believing.

That's actually a super interesting topic. From everything I've learnt so far, it seems to me that beliefs are not a matter of choice. We have different life experiences, different ability to comprehend ideas, different sensitivities, different biases. Therefore we incline more or less towards any proposed belief based on our uniqueness. Then it isn't actually a matter of free will either.

I have never made an effort to believe, I am like that without no effort, and I tell you, I do not regret it in the least and I wouldn't change myself for anything and least of all for not believing.

I don't think people in general usually sits down and makes a conscious effort to believe things. I believe it works differently.

So I think are you, you are quite happy with your choice, I imagine, but as to the demand that the world be as you want it because you are more moral than others, you may have to wait or become God, which finally is what we are all destined to be, that return to God who is the source of all existence.

I do demand a better world. However, I didn't ever say that I am more moral than others. What I said is that I am more moral than the model of God that we were discussing. In fact, I don't know anybody who isn't more moral than that kind of a God.

Peace
--------------- Student of Allah

imrankhawaja

@ student of Allah.
My method
Nobody gets raped, nobody gets murdered, therefore nobody gets punished.

Your god's method
The mother will suffer rape, the child will suffer murder, the murderer and rapist will suffer serious punishment. 4 total victims!

,,,, come on this topic,, now ,, do u think that rape is wrong,,, if you think its wrong tell me one logical reason ,,, how it wrong or bad for the rapist,,,, he will never get punish if he is powerful person,,, for a powerful person its not harming him ,,, so he will continue it until ,, he died.. as he know there is no body who can punish him..
same like robbery ,,, if u rob a person ,, prove me logically its wrong... as far thief concern its harming other public but from him its good to do robeery... police cant touch him he is powerful,,, mafia cant touch him he is running mafia,,, so let him do whatever he want..for him its good to do robbery..

but for a believer he know ,,, somebody is watching and recording,,,

chances for an atheist to do rape and robbery 100 percent
chances for a believer(one who believe in what Allah instruct him) to rape and robbery 0 percent...

so you trap on your own question...

I can give all of you answers but what I feel is ,,, there is no point of explaining you a thing ,, which you have no knowledge of,,,human is always argumentive. and instead of focusing on signs he want to see with his eyes the truth(Allah)... how can you see such a thing which your eyes cannot see,,,

mosa did the same thing ,,, when he try to see Allah ,,, he was even a messenger ... but did he successful,,, do you think that when moses cant grasp an image of allah ,,, how can you....

believing in creator is better than disbelieving.
two eyed person is better than blind
believer of Allah is better than rapist and robber ....

unknownuser

chances for an atheist to do rape and robbery 100 percent
chances for a believer(one who believe in what Allah instruct him) to rape and robbery 0 percent...

Look buddy i'm not an atheist, stepping up for them or anything but just because they don't believe in a god that doesn't mean they don't have morality, even though a person believes in a God they too could rape and do robbery also if they don't have a senses of morality.

Please stop with the stereotype that all atheist are pure evil, eat their babies 24/7, or does a killing spree on a daily basis, these stereotypes are the reason that gave religious people a bad impression.

As a long one single human has a tiny wee of ideology in his head he will fight or kill for it, no matter how righteous or not he is.

O you who acknowledge, you shall avoid much suspicion, for some suspicion is sinful. Do not spy on one another, nor shall you gossip one another. Would one of you enjoy eating the flesh of his dead brother? You certainly would hate this. You shall observe God. God is Redeemer, Compassionate.

Student_of_Allah

@ student of Allah.

My method
Nobody gets raped, nobody gets murdered, therefore nobody gets punished.

Your god's method
The mother will suffer rape, the child will suffer murder, the murderer and rapist will suffer serious punishment. 4 total victims!

,,,, come on this topic,, now ,, do u think that rape is wrong,,, if you think its wrong tell me one logical reason ,,, how it wrong or bad for the rapist,,,,

It's a violation of the raped person's human rights. That makes it wrong.

Unless a human being is a psychopath and has serious brain malfunction, he/she will agree with the following

Life is in general preferable to death
Health is in general preferable to sickness
Human well being should be maximized
Human suffering should be minimized

Even from these rudimentary principles alone you should be able to deduce that a society where one person would get to force another person sexually would lead to a society full of suffering with well-being minimized.

If the only reason you are not a rapist is because you think God would mind, then you are one extremely filthy person who should be always under surveillance.

he will never get punish if he is powerful person,,, for a powerful person its not harming him ,,, so he will continue it until ,, he died.. as he know there is no body who can punish him..

Sadly, that's true. People can get away with crimes.

same like robbery ,,, if u rob a person ,, prove me logically its wrong... as far thief concern its harming other public but from him its good to do robeery... police cant touch him he is powerful,,, mafia cant touch him he is running mafia,,, so let him do whatever he want..for him its good to do robbery..

It is wrong for the reasons I stated above. Such behaviors aren't conducive to building/sustaining a society where people are trying to maximize human well-being and minimize human suffering. Such behaviors go against the basic concepts of fair play. The concepts of fairness have been observed among other animals too. Please don't insult us any further by suggesting that what these animals can do based on their sense of fairness, I need an old book to do that same thing.

but for a believer he know ,,, somebody is watching and recording,,,

This statement is sickening. Vile and disgusting. Obscene to a very high order. I hope that most people on this forum aren't like that. I hope that the reason you guys don't rob/steal/murder/rape is not because "somebody is watching and recording". I hope that reason you guys are nice/fair/good/kind/compassionate is not because "somebody is watching and recording". You are making it sound like the reason you haven't raped and murdered and robbed is because you are afraid that "someone is watching".

If you really wake up every day with the intense urge to rape women, rob people, murder people, cheat people, then all I can suggest is that you keep believing whatever you believe in that's stopping you from revealing your true face.

chances for an atheist to do rape and robbery 100 percent
chances for a believer(one who believe in what Allah instruct him) to rape and robbery 0 percent...

Oh really? I will wait for the evidence for such a big claim. According to your understanding of human behavior, all rapists should be atheists and no one who believes in the existence of God can rape. So, submit your evidence if you are truthful. Show us the crime statistics of the world where all the rapes have been done by atheists and not a single one by someone who believes in the existence of a God.

You live in a fantasy world in your head where that is true. In the real world, the prison population is not mostly non-believers of God.

so you trap on your own question...

No sir! I did not get trapped by my own question. You fell for the trap and exposed yourself as a potential rapist who didn't rape anyone because "somebody is watching and recording".

I can give all of you answers but what I feel is ,,, there is no point of explaining you a thing ,, which you have no knowledge of,,,human is always argumentive. and instead of focusing on signs he want to see with his eyes the truth(Allah)... how can you see such a thing which your eyes cannot see,,,

So far you have failed to resolve any issue I have brought up. The only thing you successfully managed to do is make me fear you and want to report you to the authorities as a potential criminal because the only reason you don't do horrendous evil is because "somebody is watching and recording".

As for "how can you ssee such a thing which your eyes cannot see" I have never seen an electron but I accept the existence of that. Not because I have seen one with my eyes. But because it is testable. We can conduct tests to validate it's existence. For your God however, we cannot do that.

mosa did the same thing ,,, when he try to see Allah ,,, he was even a messenger ... but did he successful,,, do you think that when moses cant grasp an image of allah ,,, how can you....

Did I ever say anywhere that I want to see your God with my own eyes otherwise I won't believe? NO! So please don't make it sound like I ever demanded that. Your God was supposedly with communication with Moses, therefore Moses had no doubt. How about doing at least that for me? How about communicating with me so that I don't doubt?

believing in creator is better than disbelieving.

According to your ill-informed opinion.

two eyed person is better than blind

Funny you should say that. I mean, for a person who just criticized people who wants to see God with their eyes, your statement up there is a bit ironic.

believer of Allah is better than rapist and robber ....

No evidence for that. Just your ill-informed opinion.

I hope that someday you will mature in your thoughts and outlook and will finally be able to not want to rape/loot/murder even if nobody is looking.

P.S. Your statements would still have disturbed me back when I was a believer in God. I would have still felt insulted and dehumanized by someone trying to imply that I feed a hungry poor lad and don't murder/rape not because I see the value in good works, not because I can empathize unlike a psychopath, not because I genuine despise evil, but because "somebody is watching and recording". brickwall

Peace
--------------- Student of Allah

huruf

Student of Allah,

God is inmoral, a stone is inmoral, a rat is inmoral...

Tht is about I told you, morality, morals are for humans. If God is allpowerful and allwilling and you think he is inmoral, of course you can think whatever you choose o do not choose but feel you should coose, but it is nonsense. If Godwere human and choose todo what you say He does, he would be inmoral, but, God os about the farthest thing from human so you may expec from Him morality, what you call morality tillfrogsgrow hair because in fact it is like that as if you expected frogs to grow hair.

Humn need morality for the kind of beings they are. God does not need anything, does not want anything, and does not have to answer to anybody, you included. So good you are so moral and you want God to be asmoral as you. Why would you want that and not exact morality from rats, or fromstones? Please don't come now to tell me the thiing about how animals do everything for a reason... or tellme it is the same God also does things for a reason, formany reason, and that is what He does in revelations, tell us the reasons.

And what revelations? A revelation is to see, actually see and understand what you see, be it a math theory or roblem, be it the character of a person you know, be the picture of a situation which was beyond your understanding and at a point apears to you clear, understandable and perfectly explained. Those are all revelations of a different orders but revelations.

I do not want to convince you of anything. As it is, I am sure that I amallumpowerfull to convince anyody of anything. With the people I love the most I do is that they admit me my own convictions and don't pester me how wrong I am, how nobody thinks like I do, etc. etc.

But summing up what I am pinting out to you is that we exact from God, something He is never going to do, is who He is and therefore cannot be what you would like that He be, nd if you say He is inmoral, finr you can say till that time I said, when frongs grow hair, but that that is as useless and purposeless as anyhting thinkable. I do not know if that frustrates you or makes you happy ecause so you have your pet complaint to be always a child that has tantrums. I donotobviously, but the gist of your sttement, as such, amounts more or less to the sid, expecting morality from stones. It is a whim and nothing that can be loggically exected nor is going to happen.

On the other hand, you dismiss as if it was shit, that humans an be heroic, that a raped woman, that any humiliated and persecuted person, is in fact in itself a positive thing, not fromthe point of view of what has happened to himor her, but from the point of view of what she or he can become from there. Something that would not have become if there had not been that disgrace.

You may dismiss that, but there you are acting ignoring FACTS. May be not facts of yours but facts of real people, nd you also may dismiss other things that in fact do make that inmoral God of yours as indeed the most merciful, which makes us discover sweetnesses and compensations beyond what we would have ever expected or imagined. My eole an attest to that morally. And without saying, that I am an inspired person or anything of the kind, as you may know formmy writings in the forum, I amfar frombeing a necessarily pleasant person, but, I do can attest that suffering is very, very fruitful. It is unleasant, well it is suffering, but like having a child, which that you cannot deny, is ainful, unleasant a lot of sufferingmany times, I attest to that, it is about the most gruelling thing that can be thrown on a person, after nine months of unrelenting physical suffering but, then who hs ever regreted. Somepeople have regretted undoubtedly, but most women, certainly me, woul say that it is a fruitful suffering, and I, myself I dare say that suffering is always fruitful, it is always meant to be fruitfful.

Imagine snakes, do they feel constrained inside their skins when they outgrow them and till they crow the new skin. I can imagine that some stretch of the cycle must be ainful or strianing to them, being compressed, but then they change skin AND GROW.

All that "inmorality" springs from you stopping things at a point. And you count your belssing or unblessings up to that point and sto there. But nothing stops, things continue aand the writing of the book of existence continues and it is a fraud to make people believe that they should stop writing their existence atthe point of utmost unhpiness and stop there because that is real. Tht may be rel but what comes after and continues coming forever is also real. You end your story where you feel most unsatisfied, good luck. But stories can continue forever, and do continue. I could have stopped my story and the point of utmost suffering where all I wanted was forit to end momatter whether I died or not, which became absolutely secondary, but I didnot die and I do not regret, nor do I regret any other suffering. It made me, and I am quite happy with that and I trust tht every suffering in the world is potentially the source of blessings, of happiness, of love, of beauty. Bcaue tht is the law of the unvierse of that inmoral God you complain about. Bcause us humans create, God gaveus that faculty, we create love and create hate, we do have a life to live a life to fight, life is that, with truces, but in fct it is fight, as noble and and elevating and entlightening as we want to make it. If you choose to turn the lights out, we can, but we are not forced to not be happy to, no matter how realistic we may be, not expect good things, not to expect the best, the very best.

Salaam

reel

Yeah. That is seriously messed up. The problem I have with reincarnation justifying suffering is two folds

There is no evidence for it.
This one is actually a bigger problem If someone rapes me, should I just let them? I mean, I do deserve it then, don't I? Wouldn't a righteous person just let justice run it's course?

If we followed that kind of a philosophy, we'd all watch babies being raped and be like "SubhanAllah! Finally some justice!". That just is too sick and a hard one for me to swallow!

God forbid, if the thought is applied to Islam that?s how it would look like. Study is done on reincarnation. The researcher went global to do his research and was surprised that kids were able to recall their previous lives. However, he had hiccup about translations going wrong for which people have been instructed to take the study with grain of salt.

God can do much more than I can with my hands. How come you don't expect him to intervene and stop the baby from being raped but would expect me to intervene and stop the baby from being raped? double standards much? Your God has infinite power, therefore infinite responsibility. Yet he clearly stays out of helping the weakest of the weak ones.

Actually he did, but we don?t listen. Instead we have created situations to allow these things to happen. Last year I was researching a lot on rape and came realize that whether people believe in God or not, whether they are in the west or east, they simply DO NOT WANT harsh punishment for rapists.
Here is one from Sweden
http//www.thelocal.se/20090428/19124
I do know that there is one country somewhere in Middle East where rapist is shot in public. I remember Indians bringing it up after they were fed up of seeing their politicians showing numerous excuses against harsh punishments for rapists. One community did this
Lynch mob use butcher's meat cleaver to castrate rapist they caught attacking teenage girl in alleyway in Indian city
http//www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2787752/Lynch-mob-use-butcher-s-meat-cleaver-castrate-rapist-caught-attacking-teenage-girl-alleyway-Indian-city.html
Now don?t you think keeping a society free of rape is in our hands? I am actually someone who looks for ways to solve social problems. I see immense possibilities and ideas. But lack of fund, politics, self interest, twisted laws, stubbornness, fear, threat, laziness, pride and plenty of other things created completely by humans forming the main obstacle to every solution.

But from atheistic point of view, why should we care about a 5 year old getting raped? What is exactly immoral about it? One reasoning I get is that some future owner losing a good factory or office slave and a government losing another future tax payer. But again, just like God, it isn?t possible to see the future. Hence, it needs to be canceled out. Another one I can think of is us feeling bad. But it?s such a temporary feeling which actually can be conditioned to turn into a positive one through continues exposure to such incidents. Cultures are always going through change anyways. We do know that some sectarians believe they do nothing wrong when they marry little children. The royals of Europe also have attraction to these little ones, but what makes them diff from sectarians is that they do not marry the children.

It's actually a tough thing you asked of me. No matter what God does, he must do something that is objectively verifiable.

I am guessing that you are talking about scientific method. But hasn?t it made it clear that it will take into account only things it can see?

It cannot be a "feeling" or something I won't be able to double check using independent sources.

We have qualitative research based on feelings though. It cannot be always verified, but has recently been accepted by the science community.

I mean, it's tough because if he starts talking to me, I'll assume that I am either hallucinating or going crazy. That's not an unfair assumption to make as we do have people who hears all kinds of voices and are in mental institutions. So, he has to give me something more and solid.

But isn?t it kind of crazy that we talk to something called mind whom we cannot see, but do what it tells us to do? Of course, this has nothing to do with god. But I do find the thing called mind a little creepy.

Student_of_Allah

Shalom Aleikhem reel,

God forbid, if the thought is applied to Islam that?s how it would look like. Study is done on reincarnation. The researcher went global to do his research and was surprised that kids were able to recall their previous lives. However, he had hiccup about translations going wrong for which people have been instructed to take the study with grain of salt.

Can you please link me to the study? I want to have a look.

Actually he did, but we don?t listen. Instead we have created situations to allow these things to happen. Last year I was researching a lot on rape and came realize that whether people believe in God or not, whether they are in the west or east, they simply DO NOT WANT harsh punishment for rapists.
Here is one from Sweden
http//www.thelocal.se/20090428/19124
I do know that there is one country somewhere in Middle East where rapist is shot in public. I remember Indians bringing it up after they were fed up of seeing their politicians showing numerous excuses against harsh punishments for rapists. One community did this
Lynch mob use butcher's meat cleaver to castrate rapist they caught attacking teenage girl in alleyway in Indian city
http//www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2787752/Lynch-mob-use-butcher-s-meat-cleaver-castrate-rapist-caught-attacking-teenage-girl-alleyway-Indian-city.html
Now don?t you think keeping a society free of rape is in our hands? I am actually someone who looks for ways to solve social problems. I see immense possibilities and ideas. But lack of fund, politics, self interest, twisted laws, stubbornness, fear, threat, laziness, pride and plenty of other things created completely by humans forming the main obstacle to every solution.

Since I do not believe in the existence of an all powerful deity, the only thing I can believe in is that IT IS OUR RESPONSIBILITY to do everything we can to make sure nobody gets raped.

Having said that, I must bring your focus back to my point of contention. If you think that we as mere mortals with such limited powers become responsible to stop such evil, how come you let your God go off the hook when it comes to being responsible? Clearly, your God could stop every damn rape with no effort at all. That was my point.

But from atheistic point of view, why should we care about a 5 year old getting raped? What is exactly immoral about it? One reasoning I get is that some future owner losing a good factory or office slave and a government losing another future tax payer. But again, just like God, it isn?t possible to see the future. Hence, it needs to be canceled out. Another one I can think of is us feeling bad. But it?s such a temporary feeling which actually can be conditioned to turn into a positive one through continues exposure to such incidents. Cultures are always going through change anyways. We do know that some sectarians believe they do nothing wrong when they marry little children. The royals of Europe also have attraction to these little ones, but what makes them diff from sectarians is that they do not marry the children.
I am guessing that you are talking about scientific method. But hasn?t it made it clear that it will take into account only things it can see?
We have qualitative research based on feelings though. It cannot be always verified, but has recently been accepted by the science community.
But isn?t it kind of crazy that we talk to something called mind whom we cannot see, but do what it tells us to do? Of course, this has nothing to do with god. But I do find the thing called mind a little creepy.

I have responded to this question on another thread of yours

http//free-minds.org/forum/index.php?topic=9607830.msg378277#msg378277

Shalom Aleikhem,

Even though the qualities I will talk about are also present in other creatures to a degree, I'll limit my post to discussions about human beings only.

Unless there is something wrong with your brain, you should have the ability to empathize. You should prefer life over death, health over sickness, pleasure over suffering. The mirror neurons in your brain helps you put yourself in someone else's shoes and understand the consequences of your actions to their lives. We are social creatures after all. Not only us, almost all creatures that evolved under the selection pressure of being in groups possesses the ability to get along by reciprocating.

Do this thought experiment

WARNING, DO NOT READ IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO BRUTAL AND GORE THINGS

Imagine taking a knife and shoving it into the eye socket of a baby while using a drilling machine to brutalize the anus of the baby.

Did that thought disturb you? Was there a discomfort involved in your head when you were visualizing doing that? Or did it feel just like being asked to read a newspaper? If it felt horrible, then you, like 99.99% of human beings have a built in sense for this. That built in sense is what guides you. It is not perfect but works. If it felt just as normal as reading a newspaper, please see a psychiatrist and a neurosurgeon ASAP!

The biggest defeater to your line of reasoning I believe is this

Conduct a little study. Find out the religious demographic of various countries. Do this for as many countries as possible. Now, do a religious demographic study for the prison population of those same countries. If your line of reasoning is correct, then you should expect to find that the prison populations of all these countries are overwhelmingly disbelievers in God.

Guess what? Your research will surprise you. Atheists do not make up the majority of the inmates in any country's prisons (unless of course that country already has atheists as the majority of their population). This alone should conclusively prove to you that the mere lack of belief in Gods and Goddesses does not tell you ANYTHING about how moral or immoral a person IS.

It's sad that one would even think that. Please do not take offence to what I will say now. It's not personal but merely a remark based on my observation. You make it sound like the only reason you have the will to do good and avoid evil is because someone is looking (in your case Allah). When an atheist buys a poor guy some food, she does it not because someone is looking, but because she genuinely feels for that poor guy. I don't know about you but when an atheist wakes up in the morning and doesn't go around killing and raping everyone, it's not because of what would God think. It is because they aren't a psychopath. If you genuinely felt for others, you wouldn't require the permission of a cosmic deity to do the right thing. I think we all should have enough dignity and self respect to not wait for someone's permission to be good and to avoid bad. I mean, really? I have seen animals share food with other species of animals. I have seen a dog trying to save a freaking fish! And now I have to explain why I, one of the most highly intelligent species on this planet capable of decoding human genome and sending man to moon, should naturally be better at those things than those animals?

Peace
------------ Student of Allah

Peace
---------------- Student of Allah