>When people argue that because God knows the outcome of
>future events they must necessarily happen, they usually
>fail to realize that in their explanation they are assuming
>the fallacy of trying to personify god. Its hard for us to
>understand how Divine Foreknowledge and free will are really
>compatible because for us things happen in a temporal
>context, meaning we experience past, future, and present.
>
>To God, and as is inherent to the nature of God, He
>experiences things in eternity, which is to say that he
>doesn't experience things in time. To God everything is
>happening at once. Imagine what you would consider the
>ever-fleeting moment of the present. What you did 1/100 of a
>second ago is the past and will never happen again, and what
>has not happened is the future and thus it has not happened.
>For God all events are experienced simultaneously. They are
>all in the present. He experiences your birth and your death
>at exactly the same time. He experiences the rise and fall
>of the roman empire all at the same time and at the same
>time as your birth ( you get the idea).

getting into a discussion about what god does or doesn't do and forgetting this makes things virtually pointless....even though it's an easy trap to slip into

the over-personification of god is one of the things i don't like about the "big 3" religions. god isn't SUPPOSED to be "jealous" or condemning...god is (or should be) above all that. especially when that jealousy & judgement is over the obedience to a set of rules--many of which are very arbitrary and pertain to very particular cultural/social/philosphical situations.

that's not to say there isn't some truth within those belief systems....i believe there is.

but

...yeah.

_____________________________

"This is , the Americans have no right to do this," declared veiled Egyptian businesswoman Rawya Shaker. "This is colonialism, this is an aggression against innocent people. This is something even an infidel wouldn't do."

"The best way to 'our boys' is to create enough dissent that will pressure the leadership of this country to end this illegal and immoral war." ~okp HoChiGrimm

www.poetsagainstthewar.org