[Erinites]

Theology, science and politics as we well know, don't mix well...
these topics combined.. have been the result of wars....

I have but one question for Biblical Christian...

which came first...

Humans Or God?

P.S. Fellow mods...
Mario... you know what to do...

: I wanna fly with this one... just for the sake of entertainment...
soooooo I am calling him out...XOXOC

[therookieca]

God! and this is chicken or egg cause we didn't need humans to make God!

[therookieca]

Just read the first 10 pages of the bible old testement!

[Gunnair]

therookieca therookieca:

God! and this is chicken or egg cause we didn't need humans to make God!

And yet God needed humans in order to make his existance known.

Hmmmmm....

[therookieca]

Could you explain a little more I don't exactly get what you mean.

[Pseudonym]

The answer is pretty obvious for Biblical Christians. You might want to redirect it to nonBiblical ones.

[Gunnair]

therookieca therookieca:

Could you explain a little more I don't exactly get what you mean.

Without humans, God would not exist.

No other creature is aware of God's existance, so without humans, God does not exist except in the mind of God.

[Pseudonym]

Are you saying that you cannot objectively exist unless another is aware of you?

[Brenda]

Pseudonym Pseudonym:

Are you saying that you cannot objectively exist unless another is aware of you?

Are you saying with this a god is human?

[Gunnair]

Pseudonym Pseudonym:

Are you saying that you cannot objectively exist unless another is aware of you?

Yep.

What would you base the objectivity on without some form of outside concurrence?

[CaliShark]

A pointless question, realistically. If God exists, man's perception of God is immaterial. If God does not exist, then man could not create God. Objective existence is regardless of perception. Schrodinger's cat aside, the endangered species of the Amazon that remain undiscovered exist regardless of our knowledge of them. And, furthermore, the answer depends on what you mean by a god, and what context you place this question in.

Christians declare that "God is Love" but Aristotle said "Love cannot be a god for it must have an object, and a god must be self-sufficient." By Aristotle's reckoning, any god must pre-exist man, otherwise the god is dependent and therefore not a good. Yet Christians declare that God is self-sufficient ("I am God alone") and yet dependent ("I am the God of Israel," "God is Love," "God is Just"). If God is Love, God must have an object. Christians solve this, usually, by pointing to Genesis ("Let US make man in OUR [idol] in OUR likeness" Caps for emphasis) and the beginning of the Ten Commandments ("The Lord our God is One": The declaration of unity/wholeness is seen as an inference that there may be a question of the multiplicity of God). However, these are multiplicity VIA FIAT, and doesn't follow necessarily from natural experience, and so the question still remains confused.

Ancient Greek philosophers, of whom Plato we know best, declared that God must be unitary. The "allegory of the cave" we know best indicates that god(s) are like the sun: Providing illumination to reality. Plotinus believed that the heavenly unitary provided existence with its definition. Christianity agrees to an extent ("In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth"). However, Christianity agrees with Plato more than with Plotinus, saying that the "Holy Spirit dwells within us." Plato indicated that souls were a result of the initial creator's investment of persons with a bit of his own essence. This is reflected in the Jewish account of God "breathing his spirit" into man's nostrils (Genesis 2). This indicates that God may become multiple through God's own actions, which we can see in nature: The more you treat an animal like a person, the more it will behave like a person. The fact that owners/animals become like each other is more than mere anecdote.

This is more confused by God's self-identity presented in the Old Testament. "I am what I am" or "I am who I am" is what God gives when questioned by Moses. The more literal translation "I shall be what I shall be" is no more illuminating. Unless, of course, we take the concept of God at its figurative word. That "God" as we know it, is, in fact, existence. Not "existence" in the Hindu sense, where Brahmin is the collection of the million contradictory senses that make up every man, woman, child, and animal. God would be saying here, that the Being of existence itself, the context of reality, (Heidegger's veritable "Being of Beings") is God. This dispenses with Heidegger's critique of humanity ("The Being of Beings itself cannot be a Being") by dispensing with the "Beingness" of the divine.

However, as Existence's sole reference point to us is the manifestation of nature, that is the sole defining point by which we may reference God. Consequently, God, in it's only real, rational, reference point to us, must be the definer of reality.

Anything less than this definition is not "God" or "a god" in any real sense. Even Zeus, Odin, and Kali were definitional axioms. Even as Saturn ate his children, he could not help but to have them: The gods demanded their existence as part of reality.

Consequently, if there is a God, God must exist before man, and man must be contingent upon God.

Purely anthropologically, the belief of man in "world spirits" and "divine secrets" is as old as man himself. We did not grow from atheistic society into religious, but vice versa. Man may "outgrow" God, but if the worship of Darwin and Dawkins as a prophet, the worship of Communism, or the worship of post-Modernism, complete with Holy Wars, inquisition, and dogma, are any indication, man will never outgrow Religion.

[mixedfarmer]

god was around before humans

[Brenda]

That is why it was for Biblical Christian. He knows exactly what was meant

[Pseudonym]

Excellent work Cali Shark. I think I can leave satisfied now.

[CaliShark]

Gunnair Gunnair:

Pseudonym Pseudonym:

Are you saying that you cannot objectively exist unless another is aware of you?

Yep.

What would you base the objectivity on without some form of outside concurrence?

Um, you're conflating existence with perception. Solipcism aside, things *exist* in a way that belief and perception cannot affect. This is what science is entirely based upon.

A Primer:

Subjectivity is the statement that a certain thing is interpreted or perceived by something else, the Subject. Subjectivity only states that something cannot be understood by the Subject except if it is actually understood by the Subject. Something that *is* subjective is something that *only* exists in the mind of the perceiver: Desires, wants, and preferences for example, for they cannot be understood except by communication from the person to another.

Objectivity says that the thing exists entirely an Object, and not because of its perception by another. Thus an "Objective" thought would be connect to no subject, and exist by itself. Everyone can perceive the object as it is independent of the subject. There is no communication necessary in order to make another aware of the "Objective" thing. Thus: Everything, once brought into actuality, is objective. The perception of such things is Subjective.

Consequently: All Opinions are Subjective, but some may be true. Just because something happens in our brains doesn't mean it doesn't reflect nature as it is.

Brenda Brenda:

Are you saying with this a god is human?

The Christians say so.

Pseudonym Pseudonym:

Excellent work Cali Shark. I think I can leave satisfied now.

It's hard to tell sarcasm over the internet, but if that was sincere I thank you for the praise.

If it was sarcastic, well, we *are* on the internet and it's impossible for people arguing on the internet to ever settle things.