Goodness of God
- Created by: LMeadows
- Created on: 04-04-14 09:25
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- Goodness of God
- Statement about His nature or His actions
- Evidence in the Bible
- Creation stories - God's goodness is visible
- Genesis 1:31 "God saw all that he has made, and indeed, it was very good"
- Decalogue/10 Commandments (Exodus 20) - shows God's moral goodness
- God intervenes in the world, commandments are a gift to people in Israel - a good life can be lead
- Euthypgro Dilemna and Divine Command Theory
- Difficult to understand that God can act as a divine commander - what if he commands immoral actions ?
- The Incarnation
- Redemption through Christ
- God's righteous anger - the making of Idols, Amos the Prophet
- Birth of Samuel (Old Testament) - Miracles
- God answers prayer and is prepared to act in the world because of his goodness and his love
- Psalm 23 - God is like a good shepherd
- Hosea - jealous God - concerned when we are distracted by other things in life rather than knowing God
- Creation stories - God's goodness is visible
- God is perfection / not lacking anything and cannot be understood in human terms
- Augustine - something that is evil is a privation (lacking in something i.e. goodness)
- Problems
- Goodness is relative e.g. some of the incidents e.g. Joshua 8 (destructed city) may have been seen as right at one point but actually are not
- Incarnation
- Evil exists in the world (natural and moral) - how can we believe in a good, omniscient God - innocent people suffering. Why didn't God created world in a different way?
- But we've been given freewill and want to be free beings - we only have ourselves to blame for moral evil
- God's actions in world - how can transcendent God be involved in a physical world in time, answering prayer etc.
- Christians may say that God is omnipotent so can be transcedendent and eternal
- Sometimes appear to be bad e.g. Job - his faith remains
- "The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction..." (Dawkins)
- God is perfect, so cannot change (must be immutable)
- God is changing however if he acts in the world
- Genesis 1:31 "God saw all that he has made, and indeed, it was very good"
- God is perfection / not lacking anything and cannot be understood in human terms
- Augustine - something that is evil is a privation (lacking in something i.e. goodness)
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