The Myth of Free Will

[Shivani Devi]

Greetings people. I posted this in an 'out of the way' part of the forum, but I would like to understand all of this from a Christian perspective, so any thoughts and comments on this matter will be highly appreciated and thank you.

I still can't understand all of this 'free will' stuff.

For example, what did Jesus mean when he said "Thy will be done?" isn't everything in the end, the way God wills it to be regardless?

Aren't we all just pre-programmed via the 'Akashic Records' to achieve a certain outcome in this life?

If God is so perfect, why create imperfect beings? (or, if you are a Christian, let Adam and Eve eat the apple in the first place?)

If this is the case, then God cannot stop Satan from doing what Satan does and isn't God 'sposed to be 'all powerful' and 'almighty?' yet he cannot even get rid of a single snake from His garden.

Isn't the very notion that we all have a 'free will' the only thing that keeps us separate from God? isn't 'free will' just an illusion we like to believe we have so that the relationship between what is 'human' and what is 'divine' gets accepted and perpetuated throughout history?

These questions are all rhetorical of course, but you can answer them if you feel like it.

[sky]

We think we have free will but we are conditioned by our upbringing, our parents or teachers etc: we are influenced by our ego mind.

' Thy will be done ' to me means to surrender to a higher power than my ego mind.

[ianalexanderr]

We have the free will to choose to live selfishly - or surrender to a higher power.

[Shivani Devi]

Thank you, but wouldn't God already know what that outcome will be and what ever happened to 'by the grace of God go I?'

[Serenity69]

There are 3 distinct states for a human being on Earth

Divine Will
You are working under God's law, the goal to eventually bring Heaven On Earth

Freedom Of Choice
You have a number of positive choices

Free Will
You have a number of positive/negative choices

[Shivani Devi]

Doesn't that first state totally negate the other two in the process?

[Jeremy Bong]

Necromancer,

I answer your post under originally person's point of view.

Somethings are not encouraged to do which not always means lacking of "free will". Say something people knew that is evil.

We appreciate the value of our commitment and condemned also evil.

The degree of like and hate certain things can be judged by wisdom. So I hope you know what I mean.

[secretscribe]

Re: the OP.

Well, as for Adam and Eve, I think that the 'problem of evil' is really what the Book of Job struggles with at length; what is eventually revealed is the strength of this problem itself, although it also shows that some answers to the question are more appropriate than others.

Adam and Eve is really a very brief story that basically just says that humanity's parents were very carnal and unspiritual, and brought trouble on themselves by not looking past the physical. Evolution from lower animals ironically doesn't really jar with this story that badly, since it does look at humanity as being akin to the lower animals, only worried about sex, frankly.

As for free will versus destiny, I can almost picture a difficulty in my mind, but I've never really felt much difficulty in it myself. You have choices, because it's your life, and you are on your way somewhere, because that's just the way you are. I just don't feel the difficulty in that.

[WabiSabi]

Reality is vast, and our tiny minds cannot comprehend it in any sort of finality. There are always dualities and contradictions in the human mind regarding reality, and yet such things are actually not contradictory at all in reality itself, only when we think of them. And so I will say that we both do and do not have free will.

In one sense, everything that happens is the will of God, the fate of existence itself, and so free will is an illusion and everything that happens is predetermined. On the flip side, each moment brings choices to be made, and which choice you make affects what you will experience. It is easy for us to look back and say we would be living a different life if we had made different choices.

I believe that when most people think of free will, they have a view of creating a new path that has never existed before. The issue with this notion is that time itself is an illusion of sorts, and all paths already exist. So instead of creating a new path, think of it as tracing a path that already exists. All of the paths that can exist do exist, so you cannot create a new one, but you CAN choose what path you are going to trace, and so choose what reality you will experience.

And that is how I would explain it in the here and now. Ask me the same question a few days from now and I may explain it in a completely different way.

[Serrao]

Human beings can do whatever they want.

But if one wants to be saved one should act the way God dictates.

So if one wants to be saved, one doesn't have complete free will.