31 May 2022

If the Bible is the Word of God, then God is not omnipotent

Note:  I am of course aware that the Bible is a collection of myths and that God, Satan, and so forth are just mythological figures (fictional characters).  However, if we assume for the sake of argument that God exists and that the Bible is a direct revelation from him, there are some obvious oddities about it.  This is a brief discussion of one of them which I haven't seen raised elsewhere.

God is supposed to be omnipotent -- all-powerful.  Yet it is generally accepted among believing Christians that Satan launched a rebellion of angels against God, trying to overthrow him and causing a "war in Heaven" (Revelation 12:7-9).  By widely-accepted interpretation, one-third of the angels participated and were cast out of Heaven along with Satan.

Satan is clearly an intelligent being -- his role as a master deceiver of humanity would require high intelligence and insight.  If God were omnipotent, Satan would certainly know this, being in close proximity to God and having far more direct knowledge of his powers than we humans could ever have.  So why would he revolt, knowing that a war against an omnipotent entity would be doomed to sure failure?

It is not plausible that Satan was unaware of the extent of God's power.  Since he rebelled anyway, the only reasonable conclusion is that God is not omnipotent, and that Satan knew it.  If God told humans that he is omnipotent, he was lying to us.

The Bible itself confirms that God is capable of deceptive behavior; for example, he allowed Abraham to believe he was sincere in demanding the sacrifice of Isaac, right up to the last moment.  There are various interpretations of why he did this, but the fact remains that God here is depicted as willing to deceive a human when it suits his aims.

There is no logical reason why God would feel any obligation to be truthful with his inferior creations if it suited him to deceive them about something.  God routinely kills humans wantonly, even flooding the whole world according to one tale.  Why would he draw the line at lying to us if he chose?

If the Bible is the word of God, that's no reason to assume it is truthful.  It would merely reflect whatever he wanted us to believe, which might or might not be true.  God might well be an entity of great but limited power, as the story of Satan's rebellion implies, who simply preferred us to believe he is omnipotent.  You don't have direct knowledge of God the way Satan did.  You just have a book of statements that God wants you to accept.

Even the central dogma of Christianity -- the mission of Jesus -- is utterly incompatible with an omnipotent deity.  Supposedly God had to send a sub-entity of himself to Earth, who was then tormented and killed in some kind of disgusting vicarious atonement for the sins of humanity, and the only way for a human to be forgiven for sinning and be accepted into Heaven is to accept the story of this sacrifice as being true.  Any human who does not do this cannot be forgiven.  Why not?  An ordinary human is perfectly capable of forgiving the transgressions of another without going through any such weird and convoluted rigmarole.  An omnipotent being who wanted to forgive humans for their sins could simply do so, just as you or I could, without requiring any such bizarre ritual or belief therein.

Even if you believe in God and believe the Bible is his revelation, you have no basis for believing that that revelation is wholly truthful.  Logically, it might contain any number of lies, meaning it cannot be trusted as being factual about the nature of God or anything else.

7 Comments:

Blogger Jack said...

I'm sure the bizarre Jesus-sacrifice ritual must have been so we lowly humans would have known how to decorate our churches. But yes, it does seem like anything that deserved to be called a god would have many other options. On the other hand, the main god depicted in the bible resembles the sort of god humans of limited imagination would come up with if they were trying to write one.

31 May, 2022 03:16  
Blogger SickoRicko said...

The really flabbergasting thing to me is that anyone today would still regard gawd (all the versions) as something real.

31 May, 2022 07:43  
Blogger Mary said...

Good post..of course I agree 1000% with SickoRicko.
I’ve always felt believers in this nonsense have some sort of, while not mental illness per se, but some different neurological makeup that makes this type of belief possible. Much like conspiracy theory believers. Something leftover in the DNA that while lessening, hopefully, is rabid and dangerous.

31 May, 2022 10:15  
Blogger Mary Kirkland said...

Like someone else said, it's hard for me to believe that people still believe god is a real thing.

31 May, 2022 13:08  
Blogger NickM said...

"What does God need with a starship?"

-Book of Gene. 5:Whatever.

01 June, 2022 06:17  
Blogger yellowdoggranny said...

another reason why I'm a pagan..we don't rely on a book to tell us what to do...the Goddess hopes that you'll either be smart enough or have a good heart to do the right thing.

01 June, 2022 09:20  
Blogger jenny_o said...

I just cannot believe in gods or their books, so I'm not debating with you, rather I am just commenting on the mentality of a great many people when I say that Satan wouldn't have had to be very smart to deceive humanity ...

01 June, 2022 14:12  

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