The holy scriptures of the Jews, the Christians, the Muslims and of other creeds portray God as good. I have a problem with that although I wish I could agree with that.
My reasoning in this case starts with considering a new born baby - 5 seconds old. If the God of the universe were good, that baby would have been born with an innate understanding of this God. If this baby is truly the creation of this good God it would have, let's say, an instinct for the laws of God and all the other things God would want a creature to have; an instinct that for instance new-born sea-going turtles have to make it into the sea as soon as possible.
All brand new turtle babies know to scratch and claw their way up to the surface of the sand and immediate, and in great haste begin to crawl toward the sea. They have an innate understanding of how to do all this and why. Such baby turtles know they are easy prey to birds and mammals, so they rush as fast as possible into the safety of the waters. New-born human babies should have such instinct from birth about God's will and purpose for it.
Yet, a new-born baby's mind is blank about spiritual matters. It is like a new auxiliary hard drive for a computer. Such a hard drive has some programs loaded in it to format it for the computer it will be used with; but there is absolutely nothing in a baby's mind about the knowledge of God. If there was, I could very well understand the need and purpose for a bible, the Torah, the Quran, etc.
I can understand that through circumstances of its birth and environment and means of growing up the child may completely forget or consider the knowledge of God to be superfluous or even wrong. Later on in life, reading a Holy Scripture could remind the person of the goodness of God and bring again into mind what the person was born with concerning the knowledge and goodness of God. The person would then again exist in harmony with God and align its life with this harmony according to its own will.
Yet, nothing like that exists or occurs. A baby's mind is blank about the knowledge of God - just like the minds of any new-born creature. This, to me, is the sign we are dealing with a God that is not innately good.
Babies are born to people who are utterly ignorant of how to deal with a new-born baby. They never try to understand what is on a new-born baby's mind, other than responding to its cries for sustenance and discomfort. Parents are not equipped to deal with spiritual matters in a new born baby's mind - neither are any of the clergy.
Babies are immediately indoctrinated to the physical environment and to the several (maybe even "loving") social, religious and legal standards/propaganda of its parents. From long experience this seems the very best way to commune with a dumb baby. It seems to be parents' way of expressing the common-sense manner of dealing with a baby.
A sense of God and the corresponding understanding of the goodness of God are indoctrinated by several means into the baby's and child's mind.
From early on a child is impressed with the goodness of God and the badness/evil of the devil. The devil is said to seduce children and adults to go contrary to God's will. Yet, no one knows about God's will but through a thorough indoctrination of a set of writings that are considered holy and good. The indoctrinations of one religion can go in entirely opposite directions than another set of Holy Scriptures held as sacred by a different set of people.
Now, I ask, which of all these writings is truly the word of God? A good God cannot contradict himself even in the least little matter because one of these uttering would be a lie to one set or another set of people. See, I claim that, at best, Holy Scriptures are the interpretations of the uttering of a supposedly good God to certain 'supposedly' holy people in the several regions on earth.
These interpretations written down and learned by other religious people are now the religions of the several groups of people on earth. Yet, we must inculcate into these writings the wiliness of the devil. Is the devil not supposed to seduce people (any people whether holy or not, but more so the holy ones because these are the ones who will write down the many uttering of God) to misinterpret God's true word? If I were wily and a devil, I would do my best to seduce these holy ones to misunderstand God's word.
Everybody knows that spiritually this world is not good. There are too many things wrong with it as far as it concerns humans and human relations. I would say that the worst wars and the very worst crimes are committed exactly by authorities and obedient lay people of religious groups - or by a regional cast of society against certain religious people and even entire groups.
Now we are getting back to the tiny little babies born into all these differing religious groups. Without indoctrination of any kind these children will grow up to be like wild animals and roaming groups of wild animals. Some children will naturally shun such groups and because of their inclination to be apart may become targets of maliciousness of one or more groups. So the individualist is forced to join one group or other for reasons of survival.
If God were good and the maligned sentiments of adults are stripped from the upbringing of babies these babies should grow up right in the sight of God; yet, all we can expect from them is wildness and malicious cunning. Where in all this comes the goodness of God into the situation? Nowhere; there is absolutely no innate connection between man and God that tells us that God is good! Holy writings are nothing more than the considered moral and ethical expressions of people. I do not dismiss that there is a deep yearning in people to find and have a good and just God reigning over the world and mankind.
I do not say that the God of the universe is not not-good. I sincerely believe he is good but in an entirely different role than mankind has given to him. To give God this good role, people had to invent a devil - an entity that is through and through evil. There is not even one iota good in this devil. I know this to be untrue. The entire spectrum and realms of the spiritual world is very carefully ordered according to the knowledge of good. The universe is only a very tiny, but very important part of the whole spiritual realm and it appears as a realm where evil can reign in its full bloom.
The true God's purpose for all creation is good and it is ordered to produce the understanding of the idea of good in creatures. God's problem is that most people simply are not interested or incapable of understanding the purpose of the God of this universe and the purpose for which the universe was created. People are utterly unfamiliar with the God of this universe's boss - the true God.
Physical creation's purpose is to introduce new spirits to the ideas of evil because good cannot be fully appreciated without the knowledge of evil. He does so in order for the masses to be unable to grasp the purpose and meaning of God and spiritual reality. What the true God's purpose is for the God of the universe is for only a few to be able to grasp and learn true spiritual ideas of evil and experience evil to the fullest to understand that in true spirit only the principles of good can reign!
God does not want a set of automatically controlled yes-nodding humans like we see in the oil fields. Holy Scriptures, the ones I am familiar with make people yes-nodders and make people do religious duties and other extraneous rituals by rote. People pray by rote, they go to church by rote and are obedient to the best they can be by rote. I call that a routine of phoniness.
No! God is interested in communion with us as friends. All he wants from us is to have trust in him in spite of what the environment brings against us. God wants us to be immersed in any and all situation we consider evil, bad, impossible to bear, suffer through, etc. He wants us to almost drown in all the evil; but he wants even more from us - to continue to have trust that all will be well without kowtowing, never-ending strings of the identical ceremonies and rituals and pleas. He wants you to be a friend, to confide in and trust him just as you would your best friend - to continue to have trust and consideration under any circumstances. Talk to him, curse him, explain yourself to him but never lose faith in him!
The devil is there, but he is God for another range of races and species and he wants you to join those races and species. In order to do that he needs you to trample on "God's laws. If the God of the universe does not want you anymore this devil has claims on you as you reincarnate.
The God of the universe is a devil in a higher realm of beings. He is a devil in true reality. Those who offend the true God, so to speak, are rejected in reality and the God of the universe then has claims on those entities. That is how humans came into the world. They literally fell from spirit into the physical world.
The souls that fell from reality believed a lie about true reality and its God. Lie believers are dead to the truth. So when souls incarnate in the physical universe after these souls has been stripped of the true spiritual truth, they are born (materialize) absolutely lacking in the knowledge of true reality, its God and his precept. Babies thus come into the world utterly devoid of spiritual truth or even about the truth colored by the lie the God of the universe would want them to know.
This flip-flop in hierarchy goes all the way down through many species and races and many devils - each opposing the "God" above it. So there are Gods/devils for humans, dolphins, dogs, ants and microbes.
Remember, those who are not in reality must be in unreality or some sort of virtual reality. The universe is a system of virtual reality and we are caught in it. The God of the universe is supreme commander there, but not without the consent and orders of the true God. The trap is divinely designed and its purpose is for lost souls to find back reality. For that purpose the true son of God, posing as the son of the God of the universe, came down into this virtual realm to give us a helping hand; so at least some souls trapped in human bodies may find back their home, true reality. The rest of humans and all other critters are caught in this universe forever (or so it seems).
Truly, the universe is a place to be lost and remain lost spiritually. Something very extraordinary must happen to a soul to again be placed in reality and to be found, so to speak.
My reasoning in this case starts with considering a new born baby - 5 seconds old. If the God of the universe were good, that baby would have been born with an innate understanding of this God. If this baby is truly the creation of this good God it would have, let's say, an instinct for the laws of God and all the other things God would want a creature to have; an instinct that for instance new-born sea-going turtles have to make it into the sea as soon as possible.
All brand new turtle babies know to scratch and claw their way up to the surface of the sand and immediate, and in great haste begin to crawl toward the sea. They have an innate understanding of how to do all this and why. Such baby turtles know they are easy prey to birds and mammals, so they rush as fast as possible into the safety of the waters. New-born human babies should have such instinct from birth about God's will and purpose for it.
Yet, a new-born baby's mind is blank about spiritual matters. It is like a new auxiliary hard drive for a computer. Such a hard drive has some programs loaded in it to format it for the computer it will be used with; but there is absolutely nothing in a baby's mind about the knowledge of God. If there was, I could very well understand the need and purpose for a bible, the Torah, the Quran, etc.
I can understand that through circumstances of its birth and environment and means of growing up the child may completely forget or consider the knowledge of God to be superfluous or even wrong. Later on in life, reading a Holy Scripture could remind the person of the goodness of God and bring again into mind what the person was born with concerning the knowledge and goodness of God. The person would then again exist in harmony with God and align its life with this harmony according to its own will.
Yet, nothing like that exists or occurs. A baby's mind is blank about the knowledge of God - just like the minds of any new-born creature. This, to me, is the sign we are dealing with a God that is not innately good.
Babies are born to people who are utterly ignorant of how to deal with a new-born baby. They never try to understand what is on a new-born baby's mind, other than responding to its cries for sustenance and discomfort. Parents are not equipped to deal with spiritual matters in a new born baby's mind - neither are any of the clergy.
Babies are immediately indoctrinated to the physical environment and to the several (maybe even "loving") social, religious and legal standards/propaganda of its parents. From long experience this seems the very best way to commune with a dumb baby. It seems to be parents' way of expressing the common-sense manner of dealing with a baby.
A sense of God and the corresponding understanding of the goodness of God are indoctrinated by several means into the baby's and child's mind.
From early on a child is impressed with the goodness of God and the badness/evil of the devil. The devil is said to seduce children and adults to go contrary to God's will. Yet, no one knows about God's will but through a thorough indoctrination of a set of writings that are considered holy and good. The indoctrinations of one religion can go in entirely opposite directions than another set of Holy Scriptures held as sacred by a different set of people.
Now, I ask, which of all these writings is truly the word of God? A good God cannot contradict himself even in the least little matter because one of these uttering would be a lie to one set or another set of people. See, I claim that, at best, Holy Scriptures are the interpretations of the uttering of a supposedly good God to certain 'supposedly' holy people in the several regions on earth.
These interpretations written down and learned by other religious people are now the religions of the several groups of people on earth. Yet, we must inculcate into these writings the wiliness of the devil. Is the devil not supposed to seduce people (any people whether holy or not, but more so the holy ones because these are the ones who will write down the many uttering of God) to misinterpret God's true word? If I were wily and a devil, I would do my best to seduce these holy ones to misunderstand God's word.
Everybody knows that spiritually this world is not good. There are too many things wrong with it as far as it concerns humans and human relations. I would say that the worst wars and the very worst crimes are committed exactly by authorities and obedient lay people of religious groups - or by a regional cast of society against certain religious people and even entire groups.
Now we are getting back to the tiny little babies born into all these differing religious groups. Without indoctrination of any kind these children will grow up to be like wild animals and roaming groups of wild animals. Some children will naturally shun such groups and because of their inclination to be apart may become targets of maliciousness of one or more groups. So the individualist is forced to join one group or other for reasons of survival.
If God were good and the maligned sentiments of adults are stripped from the upbringing of babies these babies should grow up right in the sight of God; yet, all we can expect from them is wildness and malicious cunning. Where in all this comes the goodness of God into the situation? Nowhere; there is absolutely no innate connection between man and God that tells us that God is good! Holy writings are nothing more than the considered moral and ethical expressions of people. I do not dismiss that there is a deep yearning in people to find and have a good and just God reigning over the world and mankind.
I do not say that the God of the universe is not not-good. I sincerely believe he is good but in an entirely different role than mankind has given to him. To give God this good role, people had to invent a devil - an entity that is through and through evil. There is not even one iota good in this devil. I know this to be untrue. The entire spectrum and realms of the spiritual world is very carefully ordered according to the knowledge of good. The universe is only a very tiny, but very important part of the whole spiritual realm and it appears as a realm where evil can reign in its full bloom.
The true God's purpose for all creation is good and it is ordered to produce the understanding of the idea of good in creatures. God's problem is that most people simply are not interested or incapable of understanding the purpose of the God of this universe and the purpose for which the universe was created. People are utterly unfamiliar with the God of this universe's boss - the true God.
Physical creation's purpose is to introduce new spirits to the ideas of evil because good cannot be fully appreciated without the knowledge of evil. He does so in order for the masses to be unable to grasp the purpose and meaning of God and spiritual reality. What the true God's purpose is for the God of the universe is for only a few to be able to grasp and learn true spiritual ideas of evil and experience evil to the fullest to understand that in true spirit only the principles of good can reign!
God does not want a set of automatically controlled yes-nodding humans like we see in the oil fields. Holy Scriptures, the ones I am familiar with make people yes-nodders and make people do religious duties and other extraneous rituals by rote. People pray by rote, they go to church by rote and are obedient to the best they can be by rote. I call that a routine of phoniness.
No! God is interested in communion with us as friends. All he wants from us is to have trust in him in spite of what the environment brings against us. God wants us to be immersed in any and all situation we consider evil, bad, impossible to bear, suffer through, etc. He wants us to almost drown in all the evil; but he wants even more from us - to continue to have trust that all will be well without kowtowing, never-ending strings of the identical ceremonies and rituals and pleas. He wants you to be a friend, to confide in and trust him just as you would your best friend - to continue to have trust and consideration under any circumstances. Talk to him, curse him, explain yourself to him but never lose faith in him!
The devil is there, but he is God for another range of races and species and he wants you to join those races and species. In order to do that he needs you to trample on "God's laws. If the God of the universe does not want you anymore this devil has claims on you as you reincarnate.
The God of the universe is a devil in a higher realm of beings. He is a devil in true reality. Those who offend the true God, so to speak, are rejected in reality and the God of the universe then has claims on those entities. That is how humans came into the world. They literally fell from spirit into the physical world.
The souls that fell from reality believed a lie about true reality and its God. Lie believers are dead to the truth. So when souls incarnate in the physical universe after these souls has been stripped of the true spiritual truth, they are born (materialize) absolutely lacking in the knowledge of true reality, its God and his precept. Babies thus come into the world utterly devoid of spiritual truth or even about the truth colored by the lie the God of the universe would want them to know.
This flip-flop in hierarchy goes all the way down through many species and races and many devils - each opposing the "God" above it. So there are Gods/devils for humans, dolphins, dogs, ants and microbes.
Remember, those who are not in reality must be in unreality or some sort of virtual reality. The universe is a system of virtual reality and we are caught in it. The God of the universe is supreme commander there, but not without the consent and orders of the true God. The trap is divinely designed and its purpose is for lost souls to find back reality. For that purpose the true son of God, posing as the son of the God of the universe, came down into this virtual realm to give us a helping hand; so at least some souls trapped in human bodies may find back their home, true reality. The rest of humans and all other critters are caught in this universe forever (or so it seems).
Truly, the universe is a place to be lost and remain lost spiritually. Something very extraordinary must happen to a soul to again be placed in reality and to be found, so to speak.