skier

In many monotheistic religions today, Gods are portrayed as Omniscient, Omnipotent beings, seeing all, creating all, (and presumably) contain the power to destroy all. These two attributes seem to go hand in hand, but can one believe in a single god that is mearly Omniscient? Or Omnipotent? Or would this weakness prove to be a downfall?

In christianity (pardon singling you out, you're the religion i know best) I have been unable to pinpoint any instance where God is either just Omniscient or just Omnipotent, other than the limits I tend to see in his actions- like they are limited to a human's imagination.

In the Koran, (from what i understand) Allah IS everything, and has basically caused whatever to be, to be. That everything fits into some plan of the world that he has made using is Omniscience.

Now, can one believe in a monotheistic God that merely watches, with no power of his own? A sort of voyeur, with no method of communication or presence. Can one really believe in a God that has no history, no influence, and no presence? Just believe that since, it's possible for a God such as this to exist, It Must? Wht type of person would found their religion upon such a creature/being/etheral character?

Now take the other hand. Can we believe in a God that we seem to think has moved mountains, shaped streams, and created volcanos because they felt like digging? A sort of imbecile Omnipotent individual, with a poor judgement of right and wrong, and good and bad? Blundering about, sometimes a monster, sometimes a saint. Could anyone put faith in such an force? Keep in mind, this is not an "elemental" force, but a Single, all powerful, ruler of the cosmos. A being that could suffocate a star if it twinkled wrong. A being that has no knowledge of past and future. Living the present, and fogetting as soon as it is past. Also note that as in all current religions today, there is no scientific foundation, or any empiracal (sp?) evidence supporting these gods in any way whatsoever. We are merely told they exist, as I am telling you now.

Do either of these Gods have the support they need to maintain a monothestic religion? Or are they both missing that essential bit of each other that makes a polytheistic religion necessary?


This is just something that has been brewing in my head for a little bit, and i haven't really worked it out yet. Any insight you can apply to this would be greatly appreciated.

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filtherton

I used to wonder the same things.
If god were truly omniscient, why would god's behavior suddenly change after the flood, thereby implying a lesson learned? Wouldn't a truly omniscient god already understand what it means to be human-why was christ necessary?

But then i realized that if one is going to go out of one's way to believe in an all powerful deity, all inconsistencies can and will be written off as just part of the grand scheme of things. Perhaps our logic is different from the logic of a deity. After all, the logic of our human existence very likely has little or no overlap with the logic involved with creating and ruling the universe(if the role of god can be summed up as such).

To put it simply-nobody can know for certain so find something that makes sense to you to explain it.

CSflim

People can, and will, believe whatever the hell they like!

It is no more absurd to believe in an non-omniscient, non-omnipotent god than a 'normal' one.

Further more, why do you remove ALL power from your potential god in order to stop him being omnipotent? And why do you remove ALL knowledge n order to stop him being omniscient?

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sexymama

I think that God is as complicated as us humans. There can be many sides to the one being, so why does she/he have to be one or the other? Why not both?

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asaris

Omnipotence seems to entail omniscience, at least in the following way: If omnipotence is the ability to do anything (w/ the usual caveats), then it includes the power to learn anything. But omniscience doesn't entail omnipotence in the same way, so it's logically possible, I guess, that a being could be omniscient but not omnipotent. But could it be totally impotent? I doubt it, in the strict sense, since the ability to continue existing is a potence. But only exist, just to watch with no ability to affect anything? I don't see any logical inconsistency here.

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"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Mantus

As a few discussions on this forum have shown Omniscience and Omnipotence are not logically conceivable.

To get around the contradictions surrounding these concepts many theists simply refer to God as Supreme. Which means that God is the greatest possible being.

macro

With the notion of the Christian god, he is omnipotent and omniscient. Other religions don't necessitate both of these in their god(s), and in the case of god(s)people selectively choose to worship who they feel is most appropriate (for whatever reason).

tecoyah

Why not think of "God " as energy...from a physics standpoint. This would give the god all attributes, it is all things and responsible for all that will ever be. It commumicates with all other pieces of itself at all times and can be any, and all things. It is within and without us all, in every rock and tree,every creature and thought.
As energy and Mass are interchangable, there are literally no limitations on this entity and all prerequisites from every holy text are met.

e=god

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stevie667

sounds about right to me.

CSflim

I've got an even better idea!
Why don't we get rid of a redundant word "god", and just stick to the already defined word "energy"? That way it will be less confusing for people.

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tecoyah

Sounds like a plan, energy damn it!

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Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

stevie667

ah yes, but then someone will get confused about energy and energy, i vote we call energy 'the being formerly known as god, but now known as energy'.

CSflim

why the need to distinguish between the same thing?

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Lebell

I'm sure God, the great "I AM", the Alpha and Omega, the Lamb who was Slain, the Son of Man, Adonai, Abba, the King of Kings, the Good Shepard will be pleased to go along with you plan and be renamed "energy".


Edit to say,

Believe or don't believe, but quit pussy-footing around it.

God creates and uses the energy we know of in this reality, but God in all of our understanding of Him/Her is most assurdly not energy.

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"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis

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CSflim

thank you.

A similar "pussy-footing around" argument that comes up often is the pantheism argument:

God is everything in the universe
The universe exists
Therefore god exists

or

God is the feeling of love
We all can feel love
Therefore god exists.

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Thagrastay

I think the thing that we really need to remember in this equation of an omnipotent, omniscient Being, and it's ability to shape, create, sustain and control all things, is that we, as the creations have no real idea what it is like to be that "God" at all, and any attempts to try and understand it are absurd and result in petty religions.
This "God" has reasons for doing what it does that we could not possibly begin to imagine and all our greatest wisdom and accomplishments would seem as Foolishness to this "God" if it even noticed us at all. Whereas this God's reasonings and wisdom would no doubt be so foriegn to us that it would seem like foolishness to us.
Unless this "God" itself condescended to make contact with us, there would be no way we would ever be able to understand anything about it at all. And how whould It do that?
Flashes of thunder? Lightning? Burning Bushes> Booming Voices?
Would it select one of us and let us see it and give us a message to take back to the rest of humanity about what IT wanted us to know about IT?
How many times would IT put up with us ignoring IT's messengers until IT finally came down ITSELF as one of us?
Or just wiped us all out?
If it noticed us at all?
Why would it even bother with us?
I love the Hebrew Prophet Jeremiah's statement:
"What am I Lord that of all the heavens you would even consider me?"
What a great question.

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Lebell

I would agree with you.

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"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis

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Mantus

Yet another contradiction. Claiming that the Divine Being is beyond human comprehension while stating various characteristics of the being in the same sentence.

Lebell

It's very Tao

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"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis

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Thagrastay

Not characteristics, capabilities.
Big differnce, that.

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Mantus

Capabilities are characteristics. Though it doesn’t matter, my statement retains its meaning with either word.

skier

Ah, right. I feel the thread has derailed a little. My question was proposing whether a being with Omnipotence or Omniscience alone could support a monotheistic religion. Now I have to agree with Asaris that you could not have a totally impotent God, or a completely ... looking for the word here, I want to say unseeing, but that is a limited way to state un-omniscience. Thanks for your great statement there Asaris, it's solid. But say either of these Gods were at the minimum limit for either of these two qualities- Would just Omniscience or Omnipotence be able to support monotheism on it's own? Or would it needs the other for "balance", to act as an equalizer?

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"Asking a bomb squad if an old bomb is still "real" is not the best thing to do if you want to save it." - denim

asaris

In my opinion? No. I don't see why a 'God' who just happened to know everything, but had no power, would be worth worshipping. We worship God, not just because he's who he is, but because he has done great things.

__________________
"Die Deutschen meinen, daß die Kraft sich in Härte und Grausamkeit offenbaren müsse, sie unterwerfen sich dann gerne und mit Bewunderung:[...]. Daß es Kraft giebt in der Milde und Stille, das glauben sie nicht leicht."

"The Germans believe that power must reveal itself in hardness and cruelty and then submit themselves gladly and with admiration[...]. They do not believe readily that there is power in meekness and calm."

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Thagrastay

What asaris said.

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Mantus

The major problem with both of these being is that they can never be known. The omnipotent one will be indistinguishable from nature. While the omniscient one will never be seen at all.

Can they be worshiped? Absolutely. Though there will be no chance for a personal relationship between the worshiper and the God. Praying to either one would be useless for example. Though one may always get around this by adding other entities (while not gods) to the pantheon such as saints, angels or spirits who can be both personable and have the ability to act.

gondath

The solely omniscient God sounds more like a theoretical construct than a divine being. It seems like something we all want to aspire to. Having all knowledge and seeing all things just isn't possible for us, so perhaps a culture could worship the theory of an invisible creature knowing and viewing all things. With all information at our disposal, we could achieve greater things, but it might cheapen our accomplishments.

rollin_ronnie

The whole argument stems, as someone pointed out, on projecting human values and features on a being that, by definition, is not within the limits of our understanding. It is entirely possible that a god would have no comprehension of, or make no distinction between, good and evil. Therefore omnescience and omnipotence are possible, but irrelevant, as the form of the power and knowledge are incomprehensibly different to the definitions we give them.

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Slavakion

I don't see why a religion couldn't be built around such a god. If he/she/it created everything or wacthes us or whatever, I think there's enough for a faith of some sorts.

Here's an imperfect analogies:

1) Let's take a standard, desktop ant farm. Now give the ants human intelligence. They can't see you all of the time, they (may) know that you can't see them all of the time. But to them, you are omnipotent, providing food like manna from heaven, and capable of unleashing chemical hell upon them.

I couldn't come up with an omniscient analogy right now...

Oh well, tear my post apart

irateplatypus

uhh... no.

if you could prove to me that God could accurately be described as energy, then myself and millions of other Christians would have a radically different picture of God.

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tiberry

God is everything and everywhere. God is all powerful.

In other words - Omnipresent and Omnipotent.

Can someone provide some examples (from any main-stream religion) that portray or indicate that God is Omniscient?

I don't think that omnipotence should imply omniscience or vice versa. Nor do I think that the Christian God ever implied Omniscience, that is, in terms of "knowing the future" or what would imply "I know the outcome of every event". Instead, I think this trait has been given to God because of our lust for knowledge. It's only natural that we'd ascribe this trait to our "god", yet he (or she) never claimed it.

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archpaladin

I'll take Christianity, being that I'm a Christian...

You acknowledged God's omnipresence already, which means that He knows everything that happens in the present. Since we assume His continued omnipresence, He also knows everything in the past. As to seeing the future, I reference Deuteronomy 18:21-22:

In five minutes of searching, I could not find a passage where God specifically states that He can see the future, but from the prophecies in Scripture I get the idea that He knows. Also, the above passage was part of the law given by God to Moses, and it implies that God is omniscient. Notice that this implication stands regardless of the alleged prophet's accuracy.

There's also a theological argument:

God created everything, which includes our concept of time. Since God created time, He is above and outside of time, and thus can see all that would happen regardless of 'when' it might occur.

archpaladin

As to skier's original proposal about a supposed monotheistic religion.....

The Greek gods were anthropomorphised deities....they had powers far greater than humans but - as I recall - didn't have the abilities of the gods of current mainstream religions.

Now, could you picture a religion that only worshipped Zeus and didn't have any other gods in the picture? All that comes to my mind is some type of super-human character that would probably be more suited for comic books. Someone like Superman or Professor X, for example.

I think a monotheistic religion must have a god that is all encompassing. Without all encompassing powers, the 'god' in question seems lacking to me.

Besides, gods in mainstream religions are worshipped for what they do and who they are, not simply because they can flex a lot more muscles than your average human. I think that point was already clearly mentioned.

gondath

One important reason people worship God is because he is all powerful and can do bad things to them if they don't listen. The expression God fearing comes to mind. Plus, he sends you off to the home of his greatest enemy to burn if you die after living a life not devoted to his teachings. Of course, hell differs between even the Christian sects, but the point remains the same. The biggest dog leads the pack because he can tear your throat out any time he wants. Few true believers in God stress only a benevolent and caring aspect.

archpaladin

Personally, I think that a religion founded out of fear isn't going to last too long. Eventually people stop being afraid, and then those who had power suddenly find themselves without it. I'm not trying to discount the idea that some people worship God simply out of fear of the giant "Smite" button, but I feel that someone whose religion consists solely of this has missed a couple of points somewhere down the line.

That's why I said earlier that people worship God more for who He is and what He has done for us, rather than simply because He wields all the power.

idiono

Archpaladin, I see what you're saying in that a fear-based religious belief does not seem logical, or at least not on a large scale. But the truth of the matter is that it does work and has worked for a long time on many people in many religions. I say this because generally people have a fear of the unknown, especially when it's intangible, as God is. And if you are under the belief that that unknown God has all the power in the universe to create and destroy, and that God sees all and knows all, and that God has the power to judge you, possibly for eternity at the end of your life... well, suddenly being afraid kind of makes sense.

And just for the record, I personally do not buy into any of this because I'm agnostic, but I just wanted to point out what I've observed.

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tiberry

Don't want to beat a dead horse - but this does not imply omniscience. A prophet is an emmisary of God...the quote itself implys that God told the 'prophet' what He intended to do or make happen. Don't confuse prophecy - Imparting a message of an impending action CAUSED by God with "fortune telling" - Knowing the future.

In other words - Your example accounts for God giving fair warning (through prophets) of an action he intends to take, it doesn't account for an action that He did not cause - i.e. something that a human or other being caused.

A more relevant example might be Jesus telling Peter (Paul?) that he would "deny him" before the cock crowed...that seems that Jesus predicted the future or knew all...I still doubt it though - just proves to me that Jesus was a great judge of human character...

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My life's work is to bridge the gap between that which is perceived by the mind and that which is quantifiable by words and numbers.

archpaladin

My bad. I'll buy that one.


My second theoretical argument is still in place though:

Yakk

People worship god for many reasons. A broad-spectrum Religion, that pushes many buttons, will be able to gather more followers than a narrow-spectrum Religion.

Which means that if you had an Omniscient god or an Omnipotent god, in a Religion there would be some incentive to add the other capability to the god of the Religion.

It could probably be kept out as a means of contrasting it with another Religion, or possibly kept alive by the Religions anti-mutation defence.

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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.

tiberry

Close...but no cigar just yet!

If God is omnipotent then sure, time has very little meaning to him - you could say, as a friend of mine said "God operates outside the dimension of time". Given that view, to an observer thats INSIDE the time dimension, it would APPEAR that God was omniscient because he could, at will, CAUSE things to happen in the "future", but tell us about it "BEFORE" it happened. Again - because God is omnipotent he can cause ANYTHING to be, at will. To someone other than God, then, there could be no distinction between this and omniscience...but its still an illusion.

So is time. What is time if not just a subjective measuring tool used to describe our perception of movement? God didn't create time, we imagined it. It doesn't exist, its not something that can be created.

This could get really deep if I'm not careful...let me know if you want to go on...for now let me just say:

With Omnipotence, there is NO NEED for omniscience.

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My life's work is to bridge the gap between that which is perceived by the mind and that which is quantifiable by words and numbers.

archpaladin

Hmmm......I don't quite think you're in a position to say that. Correct me if I'm wrong, but without someone outside of 'time' to verify for you that time is merely a subjective perception, you have no knowledge one way or another whether or not time actually was created or simply imagined.

Also, the idea of time being a subjective measuring tool means that someone, somewhere, has a different viewpoint. If that's the case for God, which we can assume to be true, then yes, to us God appears to be omniscient. But after all, isn't the definition of omniscience knowing all things in all times? Thus, God would be omniscient to us regardless of whether time was created or simply imagined. If humans imagined time, then God fits the criteria for omniscience that we have imagined. If God created time, then He fits the criteria for omniscience that He set forth himself. Either way you look at it, God is omniscient.

But to say that subjectivity of time = imagined concept? Neither a verifiable or falsifiable statement...