[quote]nephorm wrote:
As I said, it is a bit unfair to put things out there that I won’t be able to defend in the upcoming days, and I will be away from a computer. But I will explain what I mean by reducing the problem to theodicy. The issue that pookie brought up is that if God mauls young boys, we would like an account of God’s actions. That is, God tells us not to murder, and yet God murders. It is not particularly difficult to imagine a God that punishes, but in this case, the punishment seems out of proportion to the crime. But this sort of talk isn’t very pious anyway, because we would have to question the motivations of the Deity. In the first place, those motivations would necessarily be hidden from us, and in the second place, we are not in a position to pass judgment on God. We may simply resolve the issue by saying that God rules by fiat; that is, there is nothing inherently good nor bad but judgment of the Lord makes it so. And this accords with the account in Genesis that the ability to distinguish fine from base makes us like Elohim.
But this verse raises another problem that is within our reasonable scope of inquiry, and which we cannot resolve in such a way. That is, pookie suggests that the hand of God is the proximate cause of the bears mauling the boys. But this suggests change in the nature of God, and I would suggest that God is necessarily unchanging - this is an argument that Maimonides treats in detail that I simply don’t have the time to reproduce here - but the unity of God, and the idea that the necessary existent must exist in actuality, and not potentiality, means that God cannot have such direct volitions. We cannot attribute motion or other accidents (in the Aristotelian sense) to God, and since time is dependent upon motion, God is necessarily outside of time. So we come up against the problem of miracles occurring in time, which is outside of the character we can infer from the necessary property of the deity.
But the verse does not say that God acted directly. Rather, Elisha utters the curse, and the mission is accomplished. In the interests of time, the reason that Dr. Skeptix’s analysis reduces the problem to theodicy is that the prophet is responsible for his own exercise of power. While the power comes from God, it only comes remotely, in the same sense that our power to create a weapon and kill someone comes from God, remotely. By placing agency on the prophet rather than God Himself, we no longer have to answer the questions “why would God do such a thing,” or “how was God acting in time?” Rather, we have to answer the question “why does God allow injustice or evil in the world?” So that is the question of theodicy, and it is a more reasonable way, I think, of approaching the problem.
My other thoughts are still incubating. I hope some of these made sense.[/quote]
Very interesting stuff, neph. You should jump in more often.
I’d ask if it is the best approach to interpret the story using concepts and ideas about God that wouldn’t be developed until a few thousand years later, if our desire is to understand the author’s intended meaning as clearly as possible.
If we wish to understand the original author’s intent, the meaning he wanted to communicate when he put the words to paper (or parchment or whatever it is he used), aren’t we better off doing the interpretation by using the idea of God as it was (as best as we can tell) at the time in which the author lived?
It is my understanding that modern thoughts about omniscience, omnipotence, God being simple, unchanging, etc. are all theological concepts that were explored and developed long after the texts of the Bible had been written.