Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Mon Oct 16, 2023 1:02 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2023 4:00 pm
Will Bouwman wrote: ↑Wed Oct 11, 2023 6:57 amI don't understand how you can claim that we are a supreme being's most cherished creation, a sort of mini me made in his own image,...
Wait.
You'd maybe better do some investigation of what "made in the image of God" potentially means.
In the UK, religious education remains a compulsory subject and was taken seriously in the schools I attended. I voluntarily took philosophy of religion as a module for my first degree, because I fully appreciated the influence religion has, and has had on how people think and, as I have said, I made a point of reading the Bible. I am well aware of what "made in the image of God" potentially means.
Then that manifestly puts you ahead of most theologians. For the term remains highly debated, even among theologians.
So I'm interested: what have you concluded that "made in the image of God" entails?
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2023 4:00 pmNow, which is worse: that we
have sinned, or that we are
instinctively the kinds of creatures that long to sin? Is it our doing or our being that is the problem?
Doing. People who think about committing crimes are not a problem in the same way as people who act on those thoughts.
We should say that people who ONLY THINK about committing crimes are not a problem in the same way. Those who THINK AND THEN DO, are manifestly even worse than those who might only DO impulsively.
But when it is found that somebody has done something wicked, we do not merely say, "Well, that's over now." What we do -- and rightly so -- is concern ourselves with the disposition of that person, his character and the likelihood of his future misdeeds, based on his manifested nature. So we don't just worry that he "has murdered," but also that he "is a murderer," and plausibly "a murderer likely to repeat the deed."
I'm intimately familiar (for academic reasons) with the penal system, what some call the "reform" system. And I can tell you that it contains two types of tenants: one is the
criminally-minded, and the other is the
not-criminally-minded.
Just for your interest, let me expound the difference, if I may. (If you know this already, please ignore it.) The non-criminally-minded are those who ended up in jail by incident or accident. A man might even have killed his wife; but he did not premeditate it. She attacked him, and he pushed her; she fell, hit her head and died. He's a murderer. But he neither wanted to kill her, nor planned to do so. His character was quite otherwise, but he was caught up in an unfortunate situation, and he did indeed end up killing her. (This is a real case; I assure you, it happened.) The criminally-minded, by contrast, would be exemplified by the gang leader. He went to jail for plotting and executing drug deals. He has contempt for the system, indifference to his many victims, and a determination to repeat his offense as soon as he is no longer incarcerated. His character is bad. He cannot be rehabilitated except by miraculous means. And every penal officer knows the distinction between those two types of inmates.
So which is the real issue of sin: the man who did the more violent act, or the character of the man who cannot wait to repeat his offence?
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Oct 14, 2023 4:00 pmAnd whose fault is it that our rebellion against God has made us that kind of creature?
Plugging all that in, what's your question?
How is an in utero human being, say at two minutes after conception, at fault for his or her nature?
It depends on what you mean by "fault." If you mean only, "What has she done?" then the answer has to be "Nothing yet." But if you're asking if she has the faulty character already that will guarantee her future criminality, then the answer is "This is a serious problem."
And one more thing needs to be taken into account. If we take the definition of God seriously, then we would have to concede that God is not an entity subject to time. God knows all things, from the beginning to the end, and is not linear-time-bound, as we are. That being so, God knows not only what that child
has done but what that child
will do -- and not only what that child
will do, but even what that child
would do, were circumstances provided for it to happen.
And that's the real concern. God's primary aim, we must recall, is
relationship. His goal is not the mere approving and condemning of deeds, but the establishing of a dynamic and free love relationship with his human creatures. Given that that is His goal, the question of the character of the human person becomes even more pressing: what
kind of a person can enter into a love relationship freely, and one with a holy and righteous God?
And the answer is, a person who is disposed favourably toward sin cannot do so. So God's primary interest is in rescuing that person from
who they are, not just
what they might do.
To sum up: what is the fault of the child? The fault is one of
character, and not yet of
action. But the actions are inevitable, given the character. Hence, a solution must be provided, even for the child.