Harbal wrote: ↑Wed Sep 18, 2024 7:28 pm
Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Sep 18, 2024 6:48 pm
Harbal wrote: ↑Wed Sep 18, 2024 6:35 pm
So God must put himself before all other things. He's a supremely self centred being.
God IS before all things, by definition. It's called being the "First Cause." So is God legitimately "before all things," and do all things "consist in Him"? Indeed so: and it's a claim that Scripture is glad to make (see Col. 1:17).
But none of that prevents God from having priorities. So why is it not legitimate to ask what God puts before all other things?
Because whatever is the most valuable thing in the universe IS the thing most deserving of our affection. By definition, there's nothing higher.
But there's nothing "self-centered," in the negative sense, about God: a God who is willing to die for His people
But God is said to be eternal, therefore he can't die. But I suppose you are talking about the earthly death of Christ. Whether presented as truth, or allegory, I have never understood the "logic" of Christ's death being a benefit to anybody. It makes absolutely no sense to me, and believe me, I have genuinely tried to understand the underlying concept.
It's called "substitutionary atonement." And it's actually not a hard concept to understand. There are at least rough parallels in ordinary human practice. Think of when somebody else pays your fine for you, and you don't end up going to jail. It's when somebody else gives you a kidney, so you don't end up on dialysis. It's not hard to understand what's going on, in either case. But as with either case, your agreement to the arragement defines whether or not it's even going to happen.
What makes such a claim hubristic in a human being, and what turns being self-centered into such a bad thing for us is two things: first, that it's totally unwarranted, and secondly, that no man is legitimately or plausibly the center of even his own universe, let alone anybody else's.
Well we are all inevitably the centre of our own universe,...
Actually, the obvious fact is the opposite. You and I come into a world that was already formed and running when we were born. During our lives, much of what happens to us, from cradle to grave, is beyond our ability even to influence, let alone control; and what actually we can control or change often turns out to be very small, local, and only related to our own immediate situation. And we're totally out of control of when and how we die...short of suicide. And then, when we're gone, the universe will go on as if we never existed. So of what were we the center?
Maybe the real marvel is that so many people think they're some kind of "center of the universe" when nothing could be farther from the obvious truth.
But if we have any duty at all, as human beings, I think it is towards other human beings, and not to "supreme" beings, whether they be real or fictional.
To fictional ones, you're right; we can have no duty. But if God is God, then not only is it obvious we have duty to Him, but it's been an instant recognition by all cultures and by practically every person who has ever lived that we do. If it's not obvious to you, that might be a function of being raised in an atypically unspiritual culture. It's certainly not the world or historical average. And given that all attempts to construct a metaethical basis for morality on secular lines have been dismal failures so far, then if we believe in morality at all, it's only because of that legacy of recognition that mankind has that God should be the focus of our duty.
