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Mon, 26-Nov-07 13:35:35
Mon, 26-Nov-07 13:54:12
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Mon, 26-Nov-07 17:41:24
Quote:Medini:You are still missing the point. If the act (whether eternal or temporal, whether creative or not) is completely free, then it is ex-nihilo, as I have explained, and cannot be G-d, unless your "G-d" is ex-nihilo, i.e., existentially dependent in the most fundamental way. If the act is not completely free, then it is inherent to G-d, and your "G-d" is essentially dependent, requiring that act in His very essence. In either case, you are left with either an act that is not and can not be G-d or with a "G-d" that is finite, not Infinite in the proper sense of that term.
Mon, 26-Nov-07 18:02:24
Mon, 26-Nov-07 18:09:41
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Mon, 26-Nov-07 19:54:57
Mon, 26-Nov-07 20:04:31
Quote:Medini:The issue isn't a "beginning" but freedom or inherency - does G-d eternally totally freely do these acts or does He eternally do them because He must do them?
Quote:Medini:If the former, then the acts eternally exist from non-existence and cannot be G-d unless the same can be said of G-d, which would mean the basic existential limitation on G-d.
Quote:Medini:If the latter, then G-d is bound by necessity to do these acts, an essential limitation.
Quote:Medini:So, it remains a problem - either these acts cannot be G-d in any sense or your "G-d" is limited.
Mon, 26-Nov-07 20:34:38
Quote:My point was the angels from heaven sometimes appear as men - but were not men, as you and I. Do you agree or disagree that they were not men - ever?
Tue, 27-Nov-07 06:28:41
Quote:Medini:If the act is not completely free, then it is inherent to G-d, and your "G-d" is essentially dependent, requiring that act in His very essence. In either case, you are left with either an act that is not and can not be G-d or with a "G-d" that is finite,...
Posts: 507
Tue, 27-Nov-07 07:13:21
Tue, 27-Nov-07 10:08:53
Tue, 27-Nov-07 12:07:09
Tue, 27-Nov-07 19:04:46
Quote:Medini:Existence from non-existence is not a temporal state, an after and a before, but an ontological condition that is the precisely the existential state of any truly free activity, any activity to which the actor is not bound in any way and in which the actor remains exactly the same as if he were not acting, as if the action did not exist. Hence, it is applicable to eternal activity just as to temporal activity, and means that even eternal activity cannot be G-d in any sense unless your G-d is existentially limited to the state of existence from non-existence.
Quote:Medini:No there is no must here, there is only absolute freedom from any nature or obligation or boundary at all. I have no concept of G-d, but allow certain concepts to open me to G-d (see more below).
Quote:Medini:There is no idea of G-d here at all; simply allowing certain special names (like Ekyeh or YKVK) or terms (like Absolute Infinity or Absolute Freedom) to open our minds to G-d through their own self-negation. Let me explain:These terms or names are intrinsically definition-transcending, definition-negating. All words are just sounds or letters, having no meaning without referents. Ordinary terms are meaningless unless they are defined by reference to the defined. By contrast, intrinsically definition-transcending terms are meaningless the moment they are defined or conceptualized, meaningless unless they remain truly undefined and referentially open. Such referential openness obviously requires them (as far as the sounds or visual letters that mark [denote], but dont conceptually or ontologically define, them) to entirely get out of the way. Unless they always push us beyond any conceptualization or definition, even their own defining sounds, letters or referential stance, they become completely meaningless self-contradictory gibberish. Their self-negation is intrinsic and complete. Thus, such a term always pushes us beyond itself, always eludes definition thereby opening the mind rather than closing it around any defined, hence finite, concept.
Quote:Medini:And what you miss here is that if G-d is truly Free, truly Infinite, then He is free from any nature or self to become bound or dependent even as He freely acts in bound or dependent (finite) ways. In this way, He can freely be all finites without ceasing to be free from every finite, meaning that all the finites He freely can be will not be Him, and that He will freely be them as not Him.
Quote:Medini:All of your examples are subject to this same truth, a truth that means that while G-d freely can be any finite, no finite will be or can be Him....
Quote:Medini: thereby refuting the Trinity or any other attempt to view any defined, distinguishable, finite as G-d.
Tue, 27-Nov-07 22:36:08
Wed, 28-Nov-07 08:47:33
Quote:Malachi's response: This all sounds like a nice explanation but the problem is there is no scriptures to support it at all. The fact remains Jesus was considered a created being by the early Church Fathers who quoted Proverbs 8:22 to provide evidence that he was the first one created and then used by Jehovah (YHWH) to created everything else.Colossians 1:15 and Revelations 3:14 backs this up beyond doubt. You have done nothing to overturn these scriptures.
Quote:MalachiJohn 1:18 In what sense was Jesus an only-begotten son? Does anything Johns says lead us to believe the term "only-begotten son" does not mean what we would normally think it would mean? We know that the term means when it is used in reference to other people so whey should the reader ascribe a totally different meaning when it is used in reference to Jesus?
Quote:MalachiThe fact that Jeus is said to have created all other things does not prevent himself from being created. Just read Revelations 3:14 because that is exactly what it says.
Quote:MalachiYou are holding onto a doctrine that must rely on it own definition in order to refute the scriptures that appear to refute it rather thn simply relying on the scriptures.The evidence is overwhelming ezAad that Jesus is not G-d or part of a Trinity. Try reading the Hebrew Bible and GT without presuppoing the doctrine of the Trinity and you will see that the evidence for the Trinity is very weak.
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