Is God Self-Evident

I agree.I'm not arguing that God is self-evident because I don't think he is, in the sense demanded for self-evidence in this thread. I'm dealing with an objection from Teapot&unicorn which finds flaw in the mechanism of salvation posed which doesn't rely on God making himself evident. That mechanism supposes an absolute, unchangeable morality to which we have access. T&u says such a thing can't be because Gods own moral viewpoint (T&u claims) changes.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

Do people have different consciences? If so, how would we tell*? Remember, the mechanism of salvation posed suggests that people can suppress conscience in order to:a) carry out evil (suppression of conscience telling us what we "ought to do")b) justify the evil done (suppression of conscience telling us that we didn't do as we ought to have done = suppression of guilt)By this means will you arrive at a situation where different people have different moralities. It doesn't mean they weren't/aren't equipped with the same conscience at the outset.-* Richard Dawkins cites an interesting piece of scientific research in his recent book "The God Delusion". The scientists generated a series of moral conundrum type questions which aimed to strip out influences that might exert themselves on those questioned. Influences such as class, religion, education, country of birth, age, etc. What they found was that people the world over share the same morality thus cleansed. Even primitive tribes with minimal exposure to western mores were found to share world-morality.Quite what Richard thought could be gained for his case by such a revelation isn't known to me

We are told by this God what moral behaviour we are to engage in in order to be holy. Then we are told "be holy for I am holy" he says. Which does give us links into his morality. We are also told that he is good and are given indications as to what goodness entails.You, as so many others, appear to be conflating God (eg killing with us killing when you suggest a "do as I say not as I do" style. A snack is a snack - a righteous killing is not an unrighteous killing.Apples and pears.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

Aah! Well the same research indicates to us that there is such a thing as an underlying common morality. And that life influences change it. So far so fine for the posited mechanismI might have to leave your question for now as I'm on the way out the door.

There is no need for you to be consciously aware of the salvation mechanism working in your case in order for it to work in your case. You are being asked a question and your choices w.r.t. to good/evil and guilt/suppression of guilt when you have done evil form your answer to the question.What better way for gauging a heart response from someone than let their thoughts, words and deeds dictate their answer?

.The point is that you're comparing apples (eg: God's righteous killing) with pears (our unrighteous killing) so as to erroneously arrive at a "do as I say" comparison."Do as I say.." involves 2 same order / same circumstance beings. God/us doesn't.

God says "thou shalt not kill". Thou means you and me. God takes something belonging to him (a life) we, if we kill unrighteously, take something not belonging to us. The only righteous killing we can do is killing sanctioned by God. Some suppose war to involve righteous killing. They may be right, they may not be. We'll all find out in the end.Later..

What if the parent said "stay away from the computer" and spent the evening on the computer themself? Would that not be a 'do as I say, not as I do? And a perfectly rightful one at that? The parent is exempt because they are the parent and the child is the child.I'll repeat the point that

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you're comparing apples (eg: God's righteous killing) with pears (our unrighteous killing) so as to erroneously arrive at a "do as I say" comparison.

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Edited by iano, : No reason given.

Your not making a whole lot of sense. Nor are you pointing out any contradiction. More rigor and less vitriol please, if further response is desirable to you.

For sure ... if you're an unbeliever. My argument is;a) assuming God exists and the Bible is his wordb) posing a mechanism of salvation that doesn't require God to be self-evident in the light of those assumptions. It's a given that God instructed the Israelites to slaughter - what we're looking at is whether that is justified in order to decide whether unwavering morality exists (unwavering morality being a piller of the mechanism I'm posing). Where does this occur?Edited by iano, : No reason given.

It is clearly being assumed, for the sake of presenting a mechanism of salvation not requiring Gods self-evidency, that the Bible reveals his will. If God is completely other than (it is assumed) he is revealing himself in the Bible, then of course all of this is moot.The mechanism explains why our standards might vary from his. That doesn't alter him being good. (good being defined as that which conforms to Gods will and evil defined as that which doesn't) I'm saying we do know his morality and his masterplan - when he condemns as evil/unholy certain actions they are so because they run counter to who he is and what he's about. It looks unfair to the unbeliever because ... well because the unbelievers is geared towards running counter to who God is and what he's about. Granted. The argument assumes the Bible isn't a front for some other sort of God. Again, the assumptions on which the mechanism posed is based aren't being taken into account.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

If you bio-engineer another human being you'll have created like order and will have opened up a can of worms regarding rights. If you bio-engineer a very much lower-order creature - let's say an amoeba, then the problem diminishes. How much lower order are we than God? Edited by iano, : No reason given.

I'm not saying that. Honestly.I start out with certain basic assumptions (God exists and the Bible is his word) and lay other basic assumptions upon that (my own take on the Bible (which is already assumed to be the word of God) is as God meant it to be taken...) and, after all those basic assumptions are applied, I lay out a mechanism of salvation that doesn't require God's self evidency. That is the topic of the thread and that is my concern Sorry. It meant a moral viewpoint that never changes. Stealing will always be wrong (although you might have a long discussion as to ownership rights before actual theft is established) Could you elaborate - regarding the bit about God's declaring of his rejoicing in the manner you suggested.

Contentless. As you well know. Some definition of good has to be applied to the discussion. It happens to be this one. What one would YOU apply? Given the above..so? I can't prove the existance of it. What I can do is suppose the existance of it (and all that it is supposed to have inspired by way of writing) and present the logic/reasonableness of it's supposed (I suppose)way of salvation Too vague PD. You need to follow the mechanism suggested in order to pick holes in it. Er.. that's the definition of a non-believer (leaving aside the saved persons ability to sin for the moment)

Yes You're welcome to quote me saying same. Given that you won't find me saying anything of the sort (except by convolution) we might as well wind back to some agreed point in discussion and re-progress. Indeed. More correctly: I say that suppressing conscience is the act of our will whereby God's restraining hand is shook off in order that the attractions that sin offer can be obtained. You were always God-antagonistic. You appear to have become rabidly so since I last visited EvC. Irrationally so, given the poor state of your argumentation.