# Christians, how do you justify that God is not a total prick? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 25, 2011, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976 "2011-03-25T15:33:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2011, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/141 "2011-04-08T11:18:02Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > I remember an old quote from the movie, Oh God. When God was asked why he allowed all the suffering that went on, he asked “Why do YOU allow it?” indicating that we have been given the resources to create a paradise and what we see around us is the result of our choices. > From a speculative spiritual sense, > What makes more sense to me, is that we are co creators, and volunteers in the temporary world of duality, good and evil. I would answer: Because you created me to not see the consequences of evil and The flaw was put there by you, You knew I would do wrong because you created my first parents with flaws and like DNA it is passed on. Perhaps had you made your self known to me, as you did Adam and Eve, then I wouldn’t wonder if you existed at all, because you liked to hide the fact that you were my parent and depended on some other human to teach me when they didn’t know either!! I was given a human brain that is limited, with out the compasity that you are said to have, and until this moment when you finally showed up to speak to me, so i could understand, you ask me Why I allowed it? I am sorry but I do not allow all the evils in the world, and cannot stop them , but you could but don’t!!! ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2011, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/142 "2011-04-08T14:49:24Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > I remember an old quote from the movie, Oh God. When God was asked why he allowed all the suffering that went on, he asked “Why do YOU allow it?” indicating that we have been given the resources to create a paradise and what we see around us is the result of our choices. > From a speculative spiritual sense, > What makes more sense to me, is that we are co creators, and volunteers in the temporary world of duality, good and evil. I can accept that we create many problems for ourselves and others, but, as others have pointed out, we are not all responsible for all the causes of suffering in the world. I did not cause a baby to be born with defects, and you did not cause people in the Congo to be attacked and raped–for just two examples. ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/143 "2011-04-08T16:33:03Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > So what? It’s the ones that do who matter, it’s the ones who do who control the course of the religion and represent its core values. There’s enough to pass bigoted laws like bans on same sex marriage. There’s more who do want to shove their beliefs down the throats of others than there are those that don’t. And most of those who don’t hand money to the ones that do so it doesn’t really matter. Trolls will always overwhelm an unmoderated forum, and the easiest way to attract lazy people is to build up their ego at the expense of others. That doesn’t mean that the majority of Christians are like that, nor does it mean that this is the way things are going. Anymore than it means that the majority of Republicans are like Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck. BTW, laws to ban same sex marriage? Has it occurred to you that the reason why they have to pass laws is because the tide is turning against these particular conservatives? We’ve come a long way from the days (not so long ago) that having a homosexual relationship at all was against the law. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2011, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/144 "2011-04-08T18:42:44Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > I would answer: Because you created me to not see the consequences of evil and The flaw was put there by you, You knew I would do wrong because you created my first parents with flaws and like DNA it is passed on. Perhaps had you made your self known to me, as you did Adam and Eve, then I wouldn’t wonder if you existed at all, because you liked to hide the fact that you were my parent and depended on some other human to teach me when they didn’t know either!! > > I was given a human brain that is limited, with out the compasity that you are said to have, and until this moment when you finally showed up to speak to me, so i could understand, you ask me Why I allowed it? I am sorry but I do not allow all the evils in the world, and cannot stop them , but you could but don’t!!! If you can’t see the consequences of evil, how can you ask a question about suffering? And, although you do indeed have flaws, how do you know what might happen if you truly gave it your all? Yes, there’s a lot you don’t see and understand, but you have yet to truly deal with what you can see and can understand. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2011, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/145 "2011-04-08T18:48:51Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > I can accept that we create many problems for ourselves and others, but, as others have pointed out, we are not all responsible for all the causes of suffering in the world. I did not cause a baby to be born with defects, and you did not cause people in the Congo to be attacked and raped–for just two examples. That’s part of why I reject a concept of God as a separate ruler of all, being. As I said, I see it more as part of the whole, like the eastern concept of drops that are part of the ocean. We are co creators who are here voluntarily, experiencing the wide range of good and evil that a world of reality has to offer. There are the things we impact directly and cause, and there are the things we have to deal with, both as an individuals and as a group, a society. That is, if there’s anything at all. ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2011, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/146 "2011-04-09T12:36:59Z")
> [@cosmosdan](#): > > If you can’t see the consequences of evil, how can you ask a question about suffering? And, although you do indeed have flaws, how do you know what might happen if you truly gave it your all? Yes, there’s a lot you don’t see and understand, but you have yet to truly deal with what you can see and can understand. I can see the consequence of evil, that is why I cannot see why a loving supreme being would allow an evil monster to live and influence humans.. And since I would be talking to God…Not you; He should alrready know before I was born that I needed the brain compasity to understand. It is hard to believe a Supreme Being would create beings, then punish them because the knew the difference between Good and Evil, he must have wanted humans to be as a robot with out the ability to think for them selves, so he didn’t want them to eat of the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil!. Many religions do this today, they state God said, or did something, and have no proof that is was said or done by God, just that they were taught by other humans through the centuries to believe it was God who spoke to the people who wrote things or taught things they said was god, when it was just in their own minds that it was God…hence all the conflict of teachings etc. There is just as much Proof that God was supposed to have dictated a Book to Muhammad as there was a God who gave Moses 600+ Commandments, now narrowed down to 10. I can just imagine the weight of the tablets that Moses carried down the first time, then after he smashed them because the people were worshiping a golden calf,then must have gone up again to get God to Narrow them down to 10! ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2011, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/147 "2011-04-09T14:47:51Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > I can see the consequence of evil, that is why I cannot see why a loving supreme being would allow an evil monster to live and influence humans.. And since I would be talking to God…Not you; He should alrready know before I was born that I needed the brain compasity to understand. It is hard to believe a Supreme Being would create beings, then punish them because the knew the difference between Good and Evil, he must have wanted humans to be as a robot with out the ability to think for them selves, so he didn’t want them to eat of the tree of knowledge of Good and Evil!. > > Many religions do this today, they state God said, or did something, and have no proof that is was said or done by God, just that they were taught by other humans through the centuries to believe it was God who spoke to the people who wrote things or taught things they said was god, when it was just in their own minds that it was God…hence all the conflict of teachings etc. There is just as much Proof that God was supposed to have dictated a Book to Muhammad as there was a God who gave Moses 600+ Commandments, now narrowed down to 10. I can just imagine the weight of the tablets that Moses carried down the first time, then after he smashed them because the people were worshiping a golden calf,then must have gone up again to get God to Narrow them down to 10! I hope you realize I was just proposing an argument rather than expressing my personal beliefs. As I said above, I reject the concept of God as a separate all powerful creator, ruler of the universe. If anything, we are co creators and voluntarily part of a greater whole that we are trying to understand. IMO, spiritual growth, personal, or as a society, has to do with our inner selves. Anything called a “Holy” book only matters because of how it resonates within you as a person. Inspiration, an epiphany, can come from anyplace. It’s truly unfortunate that so many people give these books some kind of divine authority they cannot have. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/148 "2011-04-10T10:00:43Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > There is just as much Proof that God was supposed to have dictated a Book to Muhammad as there was a God who gave Moses 600+ Commandments, now narrowed down to 10. I can just imagine the weight of the tablets that Moses carried down the first time, then after he smashed them because the people were worshiping a golden calf,then must have gone up again to get God to Narrow them down to 10! Hellllooooo ignorance. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/149 "2011-04-10T10:11:38Z")
> [@denbenenki](#): > > HOW CRUEL IS HE? > > this god is soooo cruel, only he could have come up with this curse or penalty/punishment: > > that pregnant women would eat their babies after giving birth!:smack: > > though that is paraphrased, it is exactly what the bible says. > > it chills me to type it. i cannot remember WHY he exacts that punishment, but it is somewhere within the first four books. > > if christians could isolate this to ALLAH, they would have an easier time in bedeviling that religion. Have you been reading the \*Protocols \*lately? God warned the Hebrews that the famine would be so great that they would want to eat their children. They turned away from God. People eating children in times of famine is not a rarity. _See also: China._ ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/150 "2011-04-10T11:28:23Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > Hellllooooo ignorance. It has been told many times there were originally over 600 commandments! Also that Moses smashed the first set. Now there are just ten recorded. What is ignorant about that? ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/151 "2011-04-10T11:45:19Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > It has been told many times there were originally over 600 commandments! Also that Moses smashed the first set. Now there are just ten recorded. What is ignorant about that? There are still 613. The 10 you speak of are the Noahide laws. ---
**Author:** ![raindog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@raindog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raindog)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/152 "2011-04-10T11:47:08Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > It has been told many times there were originally over 600 commandments! Also that Moses smashed the first set. Now there are just ten recorded. What is ignorant about that? The whole 600 are/were recorded. The texts do not say anything different, nor do they say that the original set of tablets had 600 laws and the new set only 10. What are you talking about? ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/153 "2011-04-10T11:47:39Z")
add: Here’s the list: > **[A List of the 613 Mitzvot (Commandments) - Judaism 101 (JewFAQ)](https://www.jewfaq.org/613.htm)** > > A list of the 613 mitzvot (commandments) that are binding on Jews. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2011, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/154 "2011-04-10T16:28:05Z")
> [@raindog](#): > > The whole 600 are/were recorded. The texts do not say anything different, nor do they say that the original set of tablets had 600 laws and the new set only 10. > > What are you talking about? Are you calling Charlton Heston a liar?? BLASPHEMY!!! You’ll have to pry the false knowledge from my cold dead brain. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/155 "2011-04-11T11:23:47Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > There are still 613. The 10 you speak of are the Noahide laws. THen people just decided 10 was enough? It was a human that said God wrote the Commandments and people put their faith in that human who is doubtful that he even existed! The first one implys that there are indeed other Gods! ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/156 "2011-04-11T11:29:33Z")
> [@raindog](#): > > The whole 600 are/were recorded. The texts do not say anything different, nor do they say that the original set of tablets had 600 laws and the new set only 10. > > What are you talking about? I am talking about the fact that many religions that believe in the commandments recognize only 10. Also that God didn’t really write anything, people just believe a non-historical man said God wrote them with his finger,and last I heard a spirit doesn’t have a finger. Nor to add: if God is an unseen spirit , why would his back side be any different than his face it too would be invisible! ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/157 "2011-04-11T11:52:48Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > There are still 613. The 10 you speak of are the Noahide laws. No, the [Noachide laws](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah) number seven. The “10 commandments” are 10 of the 613 laws which are given a certain kind of priority, or at least, pride of place, in the OT. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/158 "2011-04-11T11:54:34Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > I am talking about the fact that many religions that believe in the commandments recognize only 10. Also that God didn’t really write anything, people just believe a non-historical man said God wrote them with his finger,and last I heard a spirit doesn’t have a finger. Nor to add: if God is an unseen spirit , why would his back side be any different than his face it too would be invisible! You’re just throwing out anything you can think of right now. Just admit you had it wrong about the 613 and 10. None of your other points depend on it. There’s no need to be stubborn about this. The scriptural account doesn’t say that there were “originally” 613 laws and that there were only 10 in a “second” set of laws given after Moses smashed the first one. You’re vaguely recollecting something you were confused about when you originally heard it in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/159 "2011-04-11T12:46:49Z")
> [@monavis](#): > > THen people just decided 10 was enough? It was a human that said God wrote the Commandments and people put their faith in that human who is doubtful that he even existed! > > The first one implys that there are indeed other Gods! The Christians picked which ones they liked the best and went with that. ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2011, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976/160 "2011-04-11T12:48:41Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > No, the [Noachide laws](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Laws_of_Noah) number seven. > > The “10 commandments” are 10 of the 613 laws which are given a certain kind of priority, or at least, pride of place, in the OT. Ah, gracias. Total slip. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/christians-how-do-you-justify-that-god-is-not-a-total-prick/575976.md?page=9)