“The virgin birth story is about an all-knowing, all-powerful deity impregnating a human teen. There is no definition of consent that would include that scenario. Happy Holidays"The Bible makes a surprisingly large amount of God's desire for human consent, when you consider the power differential. God doesn't need human consent for anything. Like Eru Ilúvatar in the opening act of the Silmarillion, an all-powerful God could readily rework even the most rebellious dissent into a new harmony. So he could respect your free will without cost to himself or his designs. In point of fact, on this model, it's only because of his choice that any of us have free will at all. A god like Ilúvatar could have built mindless machines to execute his designs.
Another Twitter user called the professor’s claim into question, noting that the Bible states that the Virgin Mary did, indeed, agree to God’s plan for her.
“The biblical god regularly punished disobedience,” Sprankle rebutted. “The power difference (deity vs mortal) and the potential for violence for saying ‘no’ negates her ‘yes.’ To put someone in this position is an unethical abuse of power at best and grossly predatory at worst.”...
Sprankle also decorated his Christmas tree with Satanic decor, as shown in another tweet he sent this past weekend.
One of the interesting things about the Bible, then, is just how interested God seems to be in humanity's willful compliance. It's true that God punishes bad behavior sometimes. It's also true that God forgoes punishment where there is reform, sometimes. But the central fact of Jesus' mission in the Bible is the search for individual choice -- consent -- on behalf of each and every soul. Jesus does not compel, he argues in favor and leaves it to his listeners to decide what to do with what he says; ultimately, what to do with him.
It's an unreflective pose, this professor's. One ought to think more deeply when one is supposedly wed to the life of the mind.
7 comments:
Satan's a master of the philosophical bait-and-switch, as this prof may well discover.
The Bible at least hints at the possibility that God is not all powerful on Earth due to the Fall, which disrupted the Divine Order of His creation. There are at least a few places where Earth is a sort of nuetral zone between God and Satan. Satan obviously has some power here or he wouldn't have posed a crediblle temptation to Jesus. So it makes some sense that human consent is needed for His plans to be fulfilled. Even Jesus had to pray 'not my will but Thine be done' when he was physically present on Earth.
"Let it be with me according to Thy will." The Bible treats Mary with the respect due a human soul, not as a political or infantilized pawn. It also treats God as God and not as the schmoe who lives next door, which I suspect is the real gripe here: who does He think He is? Making demands on people all the time, expecting huge sacrifices, laying down the law.
Satan would have to be an idiot to have wagered with God over Job if God wasn't fully committed to the whole "free will" thing. Given his success rate, I don't think Satan is an idiot. (Except for that one big lousy decision way back when, of course.)
Agreement - and the enforcement of contract (agreement!) -- this is a cornerstone of successful Christian Capitalist civilization.
God wants humans, with Free Will, to choose to be in close communion with Him.
I find this discussion interesting in that it doesn't address *Joseph's* position. The husband is the one who's supposed to have exclusive connubial rights to his wife (which gives him confidence that he's the father of any and all children she bears), yet AFAIK, God didn't ask Joseph's permission (I don't pretend to be particularly knowledgeable regarding the relevant Scriptures though).
Look what happened to Zechariah when he didn't get enthusiastically on board with the pregnancy that would produce John the Baptist. Privileges aren't absolute.
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