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The Beginning of God

Steve01
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Posted 05/21/05 - 11:47 PM:	#11
Us humans imagine every thing to have a beginning and an end, we cannot imagine how something can come to existence without a beginning…it only makes sense. It has therefore been asked who the creator of God was? And who was His creator, and so forth….But we have to come to the conclusion that: AT SOME POINT SOMETHING MUST HAVE COME FROM NOTHING. I don't understand why that conclusion should be so readily accepted, especially when it's obvious that something cannot come from nothing. Since something cannot come from nothing, the conclusion that is reached, in your second paragraph, is a conclusion that is unreachable. I agree that it doesn't make sense for something to come to existence without a beginning. That appears to be a contradiction. However, if one believes in the Christian God, I don't see why that person should believe that God ever came into existence. It doesn't appear contradictory when someone states that God never came into existence without a beginning.

nerfed
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Posted 05/22/05 - 04:51 PM:	#12
Steve01 wrote: I agree that it doesn't make sense for something to come to existence without a beginning. That appears to be a contradiction. However, if one believes in the Christian God, I don't see why that person should believe that God ever came into existence. It doesn't appear contradictory when someone states that God never came into existence without a beginning. It appears contradictory because people try to apply cause and effect to God, when cause and effect can only be applied to finite and temporal objects. Concepts like "beginning" and "end" only apply to temporal bodies. They relate to time. So if God existed prior to time, He also existed prior to the advent of "beginnings" and "endings". That is why God is eternal, if something is not affected by time, then it logically cannot have a beginning or an ending. Something cannot come from nothing. It is that simple. If a rabbit cannot pop into existence, what makes people think something like the universe or God could pop into existence? Nothing begets nothing. It's that simple.
"Only Jedi deal in absolutes." - Senator Palpatine, The Emperor

BicPen
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Posted 06/06/05 - 01:19 PM:	#13
Jagger wrote: BicPen, I reached the same conclusion as you. The natural follow-on question is how does change occur in an eternity without time? The beauty of this theory to me is how the Christian Bible, and my reason, supports each other so nicely. The bible states that God is eternal, God will always love you, and God will never change. And it’s a popular question for Christians to ask, how it is possible for God, to never change, and always love you. I think the answer is that God exists outside of time, where there's no time for change to occur in. So in reply to your question: "how does change occur in an eternity without time?" I would say that there occurs no change outside of time.
It’s not our world that’s imperfect, but rather your definition of perfect. -Johan van Vuren-

philosophy
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Posted 06/06/05 - 03:30 PM:	#14
To further that thought, if you never saw change, would you perceive time?
There is no more pleasant food for the soul than the knowledge of truth. - Lactantius

Jagger
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Posted 06/06/05 - 08:44 PM:	#15
So in reply to your question: "how does change occur in an eternity without time?" I would say that there occurs no change outside of time. Without change, then how was our universe created by God? Unless all of our physcial universe has always existed past, present and future simultaneously, then our physical universe would never have been created. I lean towards change even without physical time. But the change would be a non-physical change and thus a non-physical time. The lack of time is theoretical. But it is a very powerful theoretical with time predicted to disappear at the speed of light by Einsteins Special Relativity. Special Relativity supports a region of timelessness or "eternity".

abba
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Posted 06/07/05 - 06:46 PM:	#16
Without change, then how was our universe created by God? This is a superb question.... that obviously nobody can answer. We cannot even imagine God in "no-time" having a Godly thought because that itself would be a Change where there should be no change. I think it just illustrates that we really can't imagine that to which we are giving labels. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. One could almost interpret this as God not "making" the universe, but shaping "himself" to "be" the universe... like a type of pantheism. Weird thoughts.

Jagger
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Posted 06/08/05 - 08:48 PM:	#17
This is a superb question.... that obviously nobody can answer. We cannot even imagine God in "no-time" having a Godly thought because that itself would be a Change where there should be no change. I think it just illustrates that we really can't imagine that to which we are giving labels. Ahhhh...but there has to be answer. Look at our definitions of eternity and time. Eternity means time without end. Or even better since we are considering a realm without time, existence without end. Note the emphasis on "end". There is no reference to beginning. While time is just measurement of physical change. If you assume thought or intention is not physical change, then time is not required for non-physical change to occur. Why can't something exist for eternity outside of time and have non-physical change? The problem is anytime you have sequencing of events regardless of whether time exists or not, you must have first cause. The only way I can think of to avoid first cause is to assume all events occur simultaneously-both cause and event. There would only be one moment of existence...the present. Edited by Jagger on 06/08/05 - 09:01 PM

Jagger
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Posted 06/08/05 - 08:56 PM:	#18
PS...I am discussing a realm outside of time. I do believe time exists within our universe. However I believe there are regions separate from our universe which would lack time. Think multiple universes with different laws of existence such as speculated in brane theory. Any region/universe/realm of existence lacking physical matter would lack our physical time-such as at the speed of light.

aguy2
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Posted 06/13/05 - 01:56 PM:	#19
I hope I am not too late to join this interesting and productive thread. abba wrote: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. One could almost interpret this as God not "making" the universe, but shaping "himself" to "be" the universe... like a type of pantheism. Weird thoughts. Your thoughts may not be so weird as they might appear. Rev.1:8 says, "I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, WHICH IS, and WHICH WAS, and WHICH IS TO COME, the Almighty." I think that there is a high probability that the 'Creator of the Universe' has done so in an attempt to create itself, and is doing this not out of any absolute necessity, but to answer the thorny questions of cause and effect that so plague anyone or anything that contemplates these questions. Nerfed and others have logicaly concluded that, "Something cannot come from nothing", Y cannot create Y. In other words if that which is going to become the creator of the universe is the only thing that exists, it would be logically impossible for it to directly create itself out of whole cloth. It would still be skating on the outer edge of logical possibility but might it not be possible for Y to create X, and for X to then in turn create Y? aguy2
"We and the Universe around us could very well be involved in an ongoing, staged process of self-creation; wherein and whereby the 'Creator' of us and the Universe around us is attempting to create itself."

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