The fact that God can override free will since God is All-Powerful is a moot point. That does not mean that God does override free will and nobody could ever know if or when He does.
Exactly and since we can only assume that if prophecies are to be fulfilled, either the path laid out for them have been determined by God or God interfere with whatever could prevent a prophecy from fulfillment then free will is irrelevant and not possible.
If we look at the definition of free will:
the power of acting without the constraint of necessity or fate; the ability to act at one's own discretion.
One can not be said to act without constrain or at one's own discretion, if God interfere.
If there is no such thing as free will then nobody can be held accountable for their actions. That would mean that all of the court system is a sham.
That I think is a discussion of its own, whereas what we just talked about is whether free will and prophecies are compatible.
But it is true that, one could argue that our court system is a sham, and in many cases it is. Its not an equal system, those with lots of money to buy good lawyers are more likely to get reduced punishment or even to go free, than those who can't. People of different races also occasionally suffers from injustice. Those which are considered of "higher" importance than others, also seems to be able to get away with more, than the average person. so there are lots of problems to be found here.
In regards to free will, you will undoubtedly run into issues as well. If a person is born with a mental issue, which makes them unable to feel remorse or sympathy for other peoples suffering, and therefore unable to understand that they are doing something wrong when committing a crime. Is it then justice to punish them on equal terms as one who is capable of this? And is it fair to point at such person in judgement, when it was something they were born with and was not of their own choosing. All of this raises a lot of moral issues, that we as society have to deal with.
Which to me is also why we as humans ought to spend a lot more energy in making sure that we are better suited to spot people with such conditions and to help them before they end up committing a crime. The justice system is not all that effective at preventing crimes from happening, as its one that deal with the aftermath of a crime. Obviously the fear of getting punished will help reduce crimes, but people suffering from mental issues, might not really react to this as that is not, what is needed in order to help them. This is a very difficult topic I think, and not one where the answer is black and white as I see it.
From my point of view it does not matter why they do these things, unless they are mentally ill, mentally challenged or have some kind of brain damage, they are accountable in a court of law and so they are responsible for their actions.
I was talking about the idea of evil and not whether someone ought to be punished or not. But I would agree with you that people ought to be punished for such things.
But again, as mentioned above, I would like to see more effort being put into preventing these things from happening in the first place, rather than having to wait for things to go wrong first.
That might be true for people in the western world but what about Buddhists and Hindus and Muslims? They have their own scriptures.
That is obviously because they do not accept the full teachings of the bible. In regards to the Muslims, they do acknowledge the bible and a lot of the stories, so if it went away, the foundation for Islam would go as well. In regards to Buddhists, a lot of them are actually atheists. Hindus follow their own religion, and don't know that much about it. But I don't think they acknowledge the bible, but since their religion is not based on it, they obviously wouldn't be atheists for not doing so either.
I have been overreacting lately because the Bible is being shoved down my throat, not by you but by others on forums. I am tired of hearing about it; I do not shove the Baha’i scriptures at people and expect people to accept them as the Word of God just because I believe they are. Sure, the Bible is old and it has a track record and Baha’i doesn’t, but that does not mean the Bible is any truer than the Baha’i Writings, and what about the Qur’an? 22% of people in the world are Muslims, 33% are Christians and Jews and by 2060 Muslims will take a larger share of the world population than Christians and Jews. Yet the Qur’an gets no attention even though it is MUCH more authentic than the Bible.
As I mentioned to you before, the reason I focus on the bible is because that is the foundation for the Islam as well, in fact some of the passages in the Quran are so similar to the bible that you would not know which of them it came from. Had I read the Quran, I would have no issue using that for the discussion rather than the bible.
If you read this chapter in its entirety you will get a broad overview of the Baha’i viewpoint on religion in general, within the context of history and its relationship to present day society.
I read it and I think it would require a detailed walked through as I have to say I disagree with most of it. But to give some examples:
How shall we determine whether religion has been the cause of human advancement or retrogression?
Among the great prophets was His Holiness Abraham who....
It is evident that throughout the history of Abraham and His posterity this was the source of their honor, advancement and civilization. Even today the descendants of His household and lineage are found throughout the world.
There is no evidence for Abraham ever having existed, so making it sound like
"Even today the descendants.." is something evidently, is just not right.
While they were in the condition of abject poverty, in the lowest degree of abasement, ignorance and servility His Holiness Moses suddenly appeared among them.
He led them to the Holy Land and founded there a great civilization which has become permanent and renowned and under which these people attained the highest degree of honor and glory.
The deeds of Moses are conclusive evidences of His prophethood. If a man be fair, unbiased and willing to investigate reality he will undoubtedly testify to the fact that Moses was verily a man of God and a great personage.
There are no evidence of Moses ever having existed either and also no evidence of a huge amount of people travelling from Egypt to Israel at the time. It seems very wrong to call it "conclusive evidence" when his existence can't even be confirmed.
But what about religious beliefs that help people lead good lives?
I would not deny that religion can't have a positive effect on some people, that is not the issue I have, its when these religious views starts to be proclaimed as being the truth and therefore others have to follow them as well. As I think, I have mentioned to you before, is that I don't care what others choose to believe in or not. But when such beliefs starts causing harm, then I don't think they are fine.
It is true that suffering is explainable through human behavior and natural causes, but how you can believe there can be any justice I do not know since we rarely get justice in this world.
But who say that there has to be justice besides humans? Nature is clearly not following the rules of justice, a new born zebra getting eating by a group of lions or a cat playing with a mouse, before eating it or a tsunami killing thousands of people. You never see anyone calling to the sky or yelling at nature for justice. Justice is something we have invented because we are emotional beings, that gets offended or hurt when we experience something we think is bad or unfair.
Personally I think this is due to several things, first of all because we are very altruistic beings, much more than the average animal. Secondly, because we can project others emotions unto ourselves, much like when we are watching a movie and even though we know that its not real, we can relate and feel with the actors and what they are experiencing. So seeing someone in dire needs we can relate to it and therefore feel a need to intervene. Last I think there are some egoistic meaning to it as well, we don't like seeing bad things, like people killing each other in the streets or mistreating each other, because it makes us feel unsafe, so such behavior need to be punished so we don't have to deal or see it anymore. So its both a way to protect us and those we love from physical harm, but also from the emotional experiences that comes from it.
Putting it all together, we feel that justice is needed, because it makes us feel better in the end.
