[Crimson Dynamo]

back in the day when Adam ate the apple and it all went pear shaped. Why did not God just start again and remove the snake thus preventing millions of years of bad humans?

In the end he had to become human and be killed so he could forgive them, but would it not have been easier just to start again?

[InOne]

Why didn't an all knowing God predict they'd do it anyway? Also why didn't he see it as it was happening? Was he reading the paper?

[oddballmisfitsFTW]

God told Adam and Eve not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge

then he made a quick exit, found a nearby phone box, changed into the Serpent and reappeared just in time

[rick-roll]

Because it wouldn't be an interesting story otherwise.

[GypsyGoth]

Boys are dumb, it's too easy to get them to eat apples.

[BB_Eye]

For God to have started again would be as if to admit to making a mistake and God, in essence, doesn't make mistakes. God gave Adam and Eve free will and the choice of either resisting or succumbing to temptation. How could we say they were human if they were incapable of choosing?

[Danielle1232]

It's noo true. (:

[Crimson Dynamo]

Originally Posted by BB_Eye

For God to have started again would be as if to admit to making a mistake and God, in essence, doesn't make mistakes. God gave Adam and Eve free will and the choice of either resisting or succumbing to temptation. How could we say they were human if they were incapable of choosing?

who says humans are humans only if they can choose?

[Shardlake]

I heard a Christian on the radio the other day (may have been the TV cant remember, may have even been the internet) anyway...

He was asked if there is a god why does he let all bad things happen to his people on earth.

He said that god let man take charge of their own destiny so that they could be shown how foolish they can be (or words to that effect).

Think it's all rubbish myself

[Jords]

I thought Eve ate the apple first?

[ElProximo]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

back in the day when Adam ate the apple and it all went pear shaped. Why did not God just start again and remove the snake thus preventing millions of years of bad humans?

In the end he had to become human and be killed so he could forgive them, but would it not have been easier just to start again?

The Problem of Evil.

I don't know if this is a fully satisfying answer but here is one thing to be taken into serious consideration when attempting an answer:

IF you will have genuine Free Will then you must have a 'choice'. I think most of us can grasp that.
At least the ability or possibility of making a wrong choice or right choice.
If you only know you can pull 'good levers' and there only ever exists 'good levers' to pull?
Free Will is never 'realized'.

But your question gives that but then wants to ask why can't the Free Will exist but simply 'erase' the bad consequences.
This amounts to the exact same problem again.
In a real sense you no longer have a 'bad lever' to pull anymore. You can just pull either lever and the same results occur - good ones.
Free Will becomes a mockery.

I'd mention one other thing here and it has to do with that inherent sin idea of 'millions of bad people'.
Yes, we do say that Adam and Eve 'introduced sin' into the world but here is the thing:
Really, nobody has to follow the lead. Cain is just as personally responsible whether or not his parents sinned.
Same for his kids.
Really it could be the same for us because we are actually choosing to do some crap thing on someone.

But back to the whole 'real consequences' necessity and the Incarnation and death and resurrection.
Yes.
Here again is what I like about Christianity and what some say gives it that validity - it has real consequences and real payments must be kept and filled.
Negative actions really (realized) really mean something. Positive choices also bring real consequences.

Of course that is not answering everything. It's more something to just think about and consider in all this.

[Shasown]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

back in the day when Adam ate the apple and it all went pear shaped. Why did not God just start again and remove the snake thus preventing millions of years of bad humans?

In order to have free will there has to be choices, if there wasn't choices you have predetermination which invalidates free will.

Anyways how do you know he hadnt already had a few goes and Adam and Eve were the best of a few bad batches? According to Genesis he made Man on the 5th day(Chapter 1:26) then made man sometime after the seventh(chap 2:7)

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

In the end he had to become human and be killed so he could forgive them, but would it not have been easier just to start again?

He HAD to become human, why? Saying that presupposes an outside set of conditions that god/jesus had to comply with, surely god would have determined those conditions and could have quite simply changed them.

[Omen]

I thought Protestant heathens didn't believe in all that freewill business, believing instead in predestintion ~ your fate is decided, whether you're going to heaven or hell, from the day you are born, (if not even before).

[Mac Hiavellian]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W-zN...eature=related

[Omen]

Originally Posted by Mac Hiavellian

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8W-zN...eature=related

That's wrong. The Earth is only about 6,000 years old. It says so in the Bible.

[BB_Eye]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

who says humans are humans only if they can choose?

Thinking is an essential property of existence. In all other things, that is to say sensory things -hearing, seeing, touching, etc- there is room for doubt, because our senses can deceive us. Cartesian rationalism 101.

If we can think, then we can reason, if we can reason, then we can make choices.

[Mac Hiavellian]

Originally Posted by Omen

That's wrong. The Earth is only about 6,000 years old. It says so in the Bible.

I'm more inclined to believe Kenneth Branagh's narration of Walking with Dinosaurs over The Bible tbh

[Omen]

Is it fair that some people have more free-will than others? Like if you are rich you don't have to make a moral choice to steal. Those born with a silver spoon are confronted with fewer moral challenges.

[Shasown]

Originally Posted by Omen

Is it fair that some people have more free-will than others? Like if you are rich you don't have to make a moral choice to steal. Those born with a silver spoon are confronted with fewer moral challenges.

Or possibly more, they have to make decisions about what to spend their money on, or use their influence on, as well as the day to day choices poorer people have. There is probably more temptation for poor people to to steal thats true.

[BB_Eye]

Originally Posted by Omen

Is it fair that some people have more free-will than others? Like if you are rich you don't have to make a moral choice to steal. Those born with a silver spoon are confronted with fewer moral challenges.

I think it's more complex than that. You could well say the people who face the most difficult moral challenges are those naturally inclined to be evil, ie those who were brought up with no role models. There can be no doubt that they are responsible for their actions, but they have to feed their bad inclinations like an addiction. The biggest challenge faced by people with good inclinations is to intervene when others are doing wrong or else they run the risk of being morally complicit.

Is the temptation for poor people to steal much greater? Without a doubt. But it's worth bearing in mind poverty, working to make ends meet and being faced with greater ostacles in life alone confers dignity on a person.

In the end, I find it's best to look at it this way. Everybody is as 'good' as they would be hypothetically, were they faced with the same challenges.

[Omen]

Originally Posted by Shasown

Or possibly more, they have to make decisions about what to spend their money on, or use their influence on, as well as the day to day choices poorer people have. There is probably more temptation for poor people to to steal thats true.

But shouldn't everyone have an equal test? Some get virtually a free ride all the way to the pearly gates. Unless everyone's lives contain the same measure of difficulty there can be no fair assessment of who goes where in the afterlife.

[Omen]

Originally Posted by BB_Eye

I think it's more complex than that. You could well say the people who face the most difficult moral challenges are those naturally inclined to be evil, ie those who were brought up with no role models. There can be no doubt that they are responsible for their actions, but they have to feed their bad inclinations like an addiction. The biggest challenge faced by people with good inclinations is to intervene when others are doing wrong or else they run the risk of being morally complicit.

Is the temptation for poor people to steal much greater? Without a doubt. But it's worth bearing in mind poverty, working to make ends meet and being faced with greater ostacles in life alone confers dignity on a person.

In the end, I find it's best to look at it this way. Everybody is as 'good' as they would be hypothetically, were they faced with the same challenges.

That's like saying, "you'd get an A in that test if you sat that test". Sure God might as well have bypassed temporal existence altogether and just created heaven and hell.

[BB_Eye]

Originally Posted by Omen

That's like saying, "you'd get an A in that test if you sat that test".

Perhaps that was improperly worded, but I am only hypothesising. But still, the measure of a good deed lies as much in how hard that person had to work to accomplish it. I think this is consistent with Kant's categorical imperative which seeks to deal with putting our moral code into practice.

Originally Posted by Omen

Sure God might as well have bypassed temporal existence altogether and just created heaven and hell.

Our modal understanding of life cannot teach us any a priori truths. There is nothing to say with complete logical certainty that a) that what we see, hear and touch truly exists; and by extension b) that it is creation of God.

[Crimson Dynamo]

I think the most logical explanation of the free will stuff is that there is no sin, no god and there are just humans who have over millions of years evolved into what we currently are.

Why we are expected to live our lives governed by the laws of physics and reality only to throw all this out of the window when we look at religions is beyond me.

The god we cannot see, cannot hear, cannot understand and yet we must obey seems a touch convenient?

[bananarama]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

back in the day when Adam ate the apple and it all went pear shaped. Why did not God just start again and remove the snake thus preventing millions of years of bad humans?

In the end he had to become human and be killed so he could forgive them, but would it not have been easier just to start again?

An apple that turned into a pear.......Crikey!!!! No wonder mankind is confused....