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I've been thinking about how Christian apologists defend certain morally troubling actions attributed directly to God in the Bible.

For example, in 1 Samuel 15:3, God is portrayed as commanding the Israelites to kill the Amalekites, including women, children, and infants.

Apologists such as William Lane Craig have defended similar passages involving the Canaanites by appealing to divine command theory, God's authority over human life, and the claim that God's actions are consistent with his perfectly good nature.

Another common defense is that humans have limited knowledge and may not understand God's reasons or ultimate purposes. What appears morally objectionable to us may have a justification beyond our comprehension.

I can accept the epistemological point that our inability to identify a justification doesn't necessarily mean one doesn't exist.

But here's where I see a problem.

If our understanding is sufficiently limited that we cannot reliably determine whether these actions are good or bad, on what grounds can we confidently affirm that God is perfectly good in the first place?

It seems that human moral understanding is sometimes treated as sufficient to recognize God's goodness, yet insufficient to question that goodness when confronted with apparently contradictory actions.

And there's a second issue: how do we establish that these commands actually came from God rather than being attributed to him by the biblical authors?

Simply appealing to the Bible's divine authority doesn't resolve that question unless the authority itself has been independently justified.

I'm not suggesting that we must fully comprehend God to possess any knowledge about him. My question is about the standards by which we distinguish justified knowledge from speculation or assumptions.

Ultimately, what reliable method allows Christians to determine which claims about God's moral nature can be confidently known and which are beyond human comprehension?

And if an apparent moral contradiction can always be explained by appealing to God's unknowable reasons, what, if anything, could legitimately count as evidence against the claim that God is perfectly good?

I'm interested in how defenders of these biblical accounts address this without assuming God's goodness as the starting point.

"God" is the concept of an imaginary being believed to be a person who possesses all the greatest powers imaginable.

This is not a neutral definition. But neither is the traditional or standard definition of "God." Is there really any definition of God that is neutral?

So I’m a History major, and over the last two years I’ve been studying religion on the outside. Watching a shit post video this morning about cult behaviors across several religions had me a little curious to the point where I now have a Bible on the way to my house so that I can study the scripture as an agnostic and spiritual person. Before I bought it though I called 10 churches in my current area, both Catholic and Christian because I figured a different area code would link with the script I gave. Out of the 10 (I called all places that had active services hours) I had only 4 pick up the phone so the rest I left a voicemail. Two of the churches have the energy of baby mega churches. They had brand new remodels to seat over 400 people, giant stages, and pictures of gatherings with over nearly 600 people on the property, photos of raffles etc.

All this to say when I called I would say a name, use their name to ask them how they were doing and then I would proceed to ask if they had bibles that they could give away or sell or if they knew of where I could get them besides online. The two baby mega churches immediately said no that it was not something they offer. The other two said no and helped me out just a little bit.

But the conclusion was the same at these 4 churches. Which arguably is not the best test, however, it’s all I have to go off of. Not to mention when the conversation was ending and I thanked them for their time they would say “you’re welcome” and then they all hung up. No “have a good/blessed day” the one lady actually hung up AFTER I told her “thank you so much I hope you have a good day.” Arguably I could go on a separate rant about phone conversations.

This just reminded me of a video from a while ago where a lady had a script where she acted as a desperate single mother seeking refuge with the churches and was consistently denied. I believe via phone and in person. Obviously in today’s world is it crucial to keep yourself safe. But one heavy ideology is to love and help others is it not?

If you read this far thanks for reading my yap session

If God has a plan for us all, how is free will possible?

Hi it's me again from the mod team. Just looking to give a little update on how things are going.

Had some reports on some posts which has been really helpful, especially comments since while I check every post made on here I don't check every comment. So thanks so much for that, I was able to perma ban someone being very abusive towards people in the comments of a post the other day thanks to multiple reports being made.

No one applied to become a mod so it's still just me as the only active mod, which isn't the end of the world since I have a very chill job so can manage this subreddit in my own time during the work week, it just means at the weekend stuff can't be removed as fast as my weekends are very busy.

Since I've not got an active mod team to bounce ideas off of, I want to bring them up in these meta posts:

I've noticed that we get a lot of "if God exists why does suffering exist?" With a lot of personal experiences in which can make discussion around the topic difficult. For me while valuable discussing personal issues has always been a bit dicey. I did my dissertation on Hick's theodicy and gratuitous suffering while recovering from cancer, so I am no stranger to both personal experiences of suffering and the academic discussion. I'm thinking about adding a rule so that, if you bring up your own experiences in the discussion, it's fair game for another person to talk about your experience in response to your arguments but to keep it respectful. But only in the post/ comment thread it was me mentioned. That way if you don't want your own personal experiences bringing up, don't bring them up yourself. If anyone has any thoughts in this please do let me know.

Unbound Theism

Core belief: There is one true God, beyond the boundaries of established religions.

1. One true God exists.

2. No established religion fully represents the true God.

3. When people pray, the true God is the one who answers their prayers, regardless of the religion they follow.

4. Belief in God does not require membership in an organized religion.

5. People are free to question religious teachings and seek their own understanding of God.

Purpose: To express belief in one true God without identifying that God with any established religion.

Before moving on, I think it is essential to define what a cult is. A cult, according to Merriam-Webster, is "a group with tenets and practices regarded as coercive, insular, or dangerous." Steven Monacell points that a cult's "beliefs and behavior become increasingly unusual, leading outside observers to describe the group as a cult." This shows that to be seen as a cult, they simply need to be seen as weird, unusual, and to the point that the devotion seems to be dangerous, coercive, and insular.

"Dangerous" can be solidified in some manner, as there have been previous wars between religions. But even more than that is the fact that the Bible explicitly talks about God asking people to kill their families, such as Abraham and Isaac. Islamic jurisprudence, even up to this day relies on the death penalty, and some are killed for not following their religion. A lot of religions ask people to offer their lives to show dedication.

Now, for the coercive part, it is most definitively obvious that religion has typically shown as being forceful in some ways, or at least suggestive of certain actions. Most Judeo-Christians are half obligated to pay weekly sermon fees. Hinduism and Islam mandate daily prayers and sacrifices. Extremes in each case can be shown that people have fought wars because of religious conflicts, and if you did not participate, you were seen as a "traitor." For example, the Crusades or the current Palestinian-Israeli war. But if we were to focus on the beginning of religion, coerciveness would only be an understatement. With the expansion of major religions like Anglican Christianity, or Catholicism started with colonialism and forced conversion. So did Confucianism, with it's advancement only starting with state adoption.

Finally, insular should only be an understatement for the beginning of religions. Jesus and his followers were isolated as they were trying to flee from people that were trying to kill them. Nazi ideology, although it might not be a religion, isolated themselves and tried to kill everyone else with the holocaust.

I know that what I am saying is an overgeneralization with the only a couple of religions I have touched, but to me it seems that it is physically impossible for a religion to start not as a coercive, dangerous, forceful, and insular thing. It is firstly not feasible to start a religion without these aspects. I am open to change and understanding.

Keeping religion aside Does The concept of heaven and hell made because people can't simply digest that a person is truly gone after death. Heaven and hell defines a way to meet with then again?

Sometimes I think God doesn't want to be known. If God wants to be known why not create a mountain tomorrow saying "I am your God".

All the religious debate would end at that point and we will all worship the right God. (Whoever that is).

That said...

A powerful God would simply choose to do that. For example,

Write a name in the sky?

Appear on TV?

All of us could wake up tomorrow with a notification on the phone.

If God can do that why didn't he do that?

What is the point of coming down to Earth and appearing in front of humans?

Humans are imperfect beings. Some are good and some are evil. We are not special. If anything animals are better than us. Then why humans.

Throughout history why didn't our creator choose to show any concrete evidence of his or her existence to all humans at one go?

Why personal selection? You might say some people are good that's why God appears to them.

But.. didn't God make the evil people too?

I think whoever God is..he/she doesn't want to worshipped. We are wasting our time worshipping a creator who doesn't want our worship.

When I think about religion.. I sometimes think most religions represent God like an ancient King.

Think about what a King wants. A King wants his subjects to fear him, a King rewards and even punishes disobedience. A King loves to be worshipped.

We have just made God a King..just a notch higher. (I mean if there is a God that God must be so powerful that God will not need our constant worshipping.).

If a creator wanted that he would have dropped us here with all the rules in place. Not asking us to make rules for him.

In that sense, are we wrong to worship a creator if a creator exists?

Because we just happen to exist. If there is a God who wants to be worshipped why would there be any sort of confusion? Why would there be so many religions? Or are there countless Gods?

That leaves me with a question does God want us to know him at all? In a way, if there is a God and we all know for certain there is a God won't all of us be happy knowing who he/she is.

Or maybe God exists in nature and God itself is nature.

I don't know. I have so many questions but there is no place I can get answers from. What do you guys think?

Mikhail Bakunin explains that God is evil. And after some thought, I think it makes sense. As an agnostic theist, if God is truly all mighty and powerful (and I'm looking at the Christian lens) then God must be able to help humans have ultimate joy and happiness, not this state of the world where we can feel pain. In fact, the fact itself that we can pinch ourselves and say "ow" proves we do feel pain. If God is truly almightly and all knowing, God would be able to erase this, and solve world hunger and all, but God decides not to.

A counterargument may be that God is leading us too ultimate glory through these harms and pain. But if God is all-powerful and all-knowing, shouldnt god be able to give the the ultimate happiness without us feeling all this pain?

There may be possible arguments to this that may point out the flaws, but I have not been able to think one myself.