Socrates Meets Jesus: Part 2
— alsop
Socrates:
Of course. By definition he is without sin because he could not be disobedient to himself. The only real difference between the two is the degree of power. Therefore, Satan was not wrong or sinful to rebel against God, he was only wrong to lose the rebellion. For if he had won, God would be the sinner because God would have been disobedient to Satan who would be better than God or the other angels because he could not sin against himself, that is, be disobedient to himself, and he would have proven himself all powerful. If Satan had won, he would have become God, by your definition because he would have been all powerful and without sin. Who knows but that this didn’t happen? From your description of God, I begin to suspect at this point that it did.
Jesus:
God is more than mere power and righteous lack of sin. He is infinite justice, mercy, peace and compassion, and all forgiving. Satan is vicious, selfish, destructive, and evil.
Socrates:
What happened to Satan after he was thrown out of heaven?
Jesus:
He was thrown into Hell by God where he was tormented and tortured for all eternity.
Socrates:
What is Hell and why did Satan stay there if it is so painful and unpleasant?
Jesus:
God locked him in Hell and he was not permitted to leave. God created Hell as a place to punish Satan and all men who do not have faith in God. It is an eternal burning inferno or torture, agony, and torment: all sinful men who do not ask God for forgiveness and have no faith in him go there for all eternity to be tortured by the devil.
Socrates:
If God is just or merciful, how can he do this to an enemy who fought him in battle. Why did God not simply pardon Satan after defeat as men often do to a captured nation after they defeat it? Mankind would seem in victory to be more merciful than God; for they do not treat the vanquished to such terrible torments for even a lifetime, let alone for all eternity. Why did God not show the qualities that you described as his justice, mercy, compassion, and forgiveness to Satan? Certainly God’s warlike nature is in marked contrast with your definition of the term God as being peaceful, merciful and all forgiving.
Jesus:
God works in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform.
Socrates:
If Satan is locked in Hell, how can he bring plagues and torments on mankind and why does God allow it if he is all powerful and all good? If God is all powerful, how is it that he permits this evil Satan to survive? Why does he not destroy him? Although I begin to wonder, at this point, if the opposite course would not be better.
Jesus:
God allows Satan to be free to bring plagues and torments on mankind in order to punish man for his sin in the Garden of Eden.
Socrates:
What is the Garden of Eden?
Jesus:
When God created the first man and woman, Adam and Eve, he put them in the Garden of Eden. When they were created, they were pure and without sin. That is how God created them. The Garden of Eden was a beautiful paradise, and it provided Adam and Eve with everything they needed. They did no have to work but merely pluck the fruit from the branches from lush trees. They were as innocent and untroubled as children and knew nothing about carnal fleshly love. They had each other for companions and adored and worshiped God who visited them once in a while.
Socrates:
Why did God create mankind?
Jesus:
He was lonely.
Socrates:
Why did he not simply create additional angels who were more his equal rather than this much lower form of life, Man? Could it be that he wanted obsequious slaves that he could look down on who would fear, reverence, and worship him?
Jesus:
Since he is our creator, we owe him our worship, reverence, and obedience.
Socrates:
Is the child of a criminal duty-bound to be obedient to his father, or does he have a right and obligation to judge for himself between right and wrong? What sin, what act of disobedience, did man commit in the Garden of Eden?
Jesus:
In the center of the Garden of Eden, God put the tree of knowledge. God told Adam and Eve that they were not to eat of the fruit of that tree. Satan went to the Garden disguised as a snake and told Eve that she would gain great knowledge if she ate the fruit. Satan said that God had told them not to eat the fruit because he was afraid that if they did they would become as great as he was. Eve convinced Adam to eat the fruit. After they ate, the learned of sexual love. That was the original sin.
Socrates:
Is knowledge evil that God would want to keep it from us? Why did God want to keep us from gaining knowledge? Did he want to keep us subservient slaves groveling under his feet? It seems to me that we owe Satan thanks and worship for his help. Satan seems rather like the Titan Prometheus, who in defiance of the orders of the gods brought man the knowledge of fire. For this service to man, Prometheus like Satan was subjected to torment and torture for all eternity. Certainly human life would be worth a great deal less that it is without love, fire and knowledge.
Jesus:
But Satan was lying to Eve, because we did not become as great as God by eating the fruit. He was lying to us merely because he wanted to destroy the work of God.
Socrates:
If God is all powerful, why did he allow Satan to come to the Garden and tempt Eve? If God did not want man to eat the fruit, why did he put the tree in the Garden in the first place? If God did not want man to make sexual love, why did he equip man with the organs necessary for it? If God did not want man to commit the original sin, why did he give man a desire for knowledge, experience, adventure and carnal love?
Jesus:
God put the tree in the Garden and allowed Satan to come there because he wanted to test mankind.
Socrates:
You have said that God was all knowing; that he knows everything that happens before it happens. Certainly God already knew how man would behave in any situation.
Jesus:
God gave man free will. It was just as possible for man to be virtuous and obey God as it was for man to be sinful and disobey the word of God.
Socrates:
Did God know that man would sin?
Jesus:
He knew that man would sin but he allowed man the free will to make his own choice.
Socrates:
Could God have created man so he could not sin? Could God have created man so that he would not have sinned in this particular situation?
Jesus:
Yes, since God is all powerful he could have done that, but he did not want men to be mere puppets. He wanted men to have free will.
Socrates:
Could God have created man with two heads and three legs or any other way if he wanted to?
Jesus:
God could have created man any way he wanted to.
Socrates:
Did God create man the way he intended to? Did God intend for man to have one head, two legs and to appear exactly as he does today?
Jesus:
Of course. God is perfect and all powerful. He could not make a mistake.
Socrates:
Then God did not make a mistake, but created man exactly as he intended to in every way?
Jesus:
Yes.
Socrates:
Then you and I were created exactly as God intended us to be? And Adam and Eve were created exactly as God intended them to be?
Jesus:
Yes. It is as I have said.
Socrates:
Did everything that is part of man come from God?
Jesus:
Yes: God is the master and controller and creator of all.
Socrates:
Did the devil or any other force create any part of man?
Jesus:
No. God is sole creator of all.
Socrates:
Then, if God created man’s eyes, legs and mind, he also created man’s desires; all his desires, even his desire for knowledge and sex. Why did man sin?
Jesus:
He sinned because of his weaknesses and his evil nature.
Socrates:
Is man’s nature a part of man, just as hands and feet are a part of man?
Jesus:
Yes. Man’s nature is a part of man.
Socrates:
Who created man?
Jesus:
God.
Socrates:
Who created man’s hands and feet?
Jesus:
God.
Socrates:
Who gave man two hands and two feet and created them exactly as they are today, and exactly as they were in the time of Adam and Eve?
Jesus:
God.
Socrates:
Who created man’s nature?
Jesus:
God.
Socrates:
Who gave man his evil nature and weaknesses? God did, because everything that is a part of man came from God and God alone.
Jesus:
God gave man free will.
Socrates:
Who intended for men to have two hands, the devil?
Jesus:
No. God intended for man to have two hands.
Socrates:
Who intended for man to have weaknesses and an evil nature, the devil? No. God intended for man to have weaknesses and evil nature. If mankind is flawed or evil or weak, it is because God put the flaw or weakness there and intended it to be there. Let me tell you another parable. Have you ever seen the birds killing fish in the sea? Who put it into that bird to fang and kill that flying fish? Who’s to doom man when the judge himself is dragged before the bar?
Jesus:
Man has free will. God did not force him to sin. He merely gave him the opportunity to be virtuous or sinful. Man would have been of no value to God if he had made him a mere puppet who could do nothing but good. He wanted to give man the opportunity to be good or evil according to his own merit and choice.
Socrates:
It is absurd for God to punish man after creating him. It is as though a Homer wrote an ode about a pig and then whipped and lashed the pages or cast them on an eternal unconsuming fire, because he disliked the qualities of the animal. Or that a master sculptor made a perfect statue of a pig and then lashed it for all eternity because he disliked the traits of the animal.
Jesus:
God did not create man with an evil nature that predetermined that he must sin.
Socrates:
Then who did?
Jesus:
God created man to be innocent and naturally good. God put man in a paradise, the Garden of Eden. He gave man free will and allowed Satan to come into the Garden of Eden to test mankind. God did not predetermine that man would sin.
Socrates:
But God created everything that went into this combination, situation or environment. When he created each of the elements or ingredients in the situation, he knew exactly how each would react with the others in any circumstance; because he was all knowing. He intended for each element to be exactly as it was because he was all-powerful and could not make a mistake. It is as though a scientist or a physician combined several ingredients into a medicine, which although harmless in themselves, when combined become a deadly poison; and then after administering it to a patient, disavowed any responsibility for his death. In just this way, God combined many things; an innocent man, a tree of knowledge, a beautiful garden and an angel.
