quote:
Chiroptera: "If God is not a good and just god, then I have no assurance that he will keep his end of the bargain even if I do believe in him."
zipzip: This supposes a definition of good and just that supercedes God -- that is, some "higher law" that exists outside of all creation and above God. In which case God is actually not God in the Christian sense, apart from whom there is nothing. This line of reasoning is therefore meaningless.
I'm not sure why an informed believer would consider this meaningless. Maybe I'm giving you too much credit.
It depends on how you define 'good.' Is anything God commands good, regardless of whether we could consider it good independent of God's command? Or would God not command anything that were not good in an objective sense?
I'd say the latter is the only meaningful definition. A just God would only command something that were objectively good. An informed believer would agree, since otherwise anything could be considered 'the Will of God' no matter how reprehensible. That makes it easier to explain why I'm not a believer: there is 'good' even if there is no God.
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America is like watching a symphony conducted by the tuba player. -Dow Mossman,
The Stones of Summer
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