You bring up a lot of interesting points to ponder. If one were to accept the stories in the Bible, then the angels had free will. Otherwise, there couldn't have been rebellion in heaven. Now, if humans are to go to heaven and have free will, then you know for certain it's bound to happen again. Just look at how many times the Bible says humans have disobeyed and rebelled against God.
I wonder -- if God created everything, would that mean he created the angels as well, with free will? And if their free will led to rebellion in heaven, does that suggest free will isn't truly compatible with a perfect heavenly existence, especially if it leads to disobedience and harm? Then perhaps causing some angels to be banished. Some might then consider God is out of his depth due to the situation his actions created in heaven.
When we consider the billions of people who have lived with their own sense of right and wrong, shaped by the political and cultural contexts of their time, what’s the likelihood of a rebellion in heaven being even more significant? Then through into the mix of different religions and religious beliefs here on earth. What kind of heavenly war would all this cause? How might this be avoided? Perhaps in heaven, humans -- or even angels, would need to abandon their earthly personalities, or at least most aspects of their own personalities, and adopt a collective personality given to them by God. Would that kind of transformation allow for harmony in heaven?
The only way for it to work would be for humans to have free will taken away, which would mean they are slaves or prisoners. However, if you are going to have humans without free will, then why not create that in the first place, and save all the drama with the angels and humans. Just create creatures who have no choice.
It almost seems like the act of creationism might be an experiment that went awry. I agree with you that if humans were created without free will, it could have saved a lot of the pain, suffering, and rebellion. Free will gives us the ability to choose our actions, but unfortunately, the human race has made a mess of it.
Some people believe that everything about the individual is preordained, which would imply that we have no true sense of free will -- and therefore no genuine sense of right or wrong either.
I've mentioned in other threads (the reincarnation thread?) that as a 5-year-old, I had a sense that I had been here before, perhaps many times. I imagined a cycle of birth, earthly life, death, heaven (or some similar place), and then birth again. It felt as though I was continually being tested and developed until I became the person that God, or some higher force, would deem worthy to remain in heaven. Perhaps it’s only after many cycles on Earth -- developing both my personality and free will in a way that might be compatible with heaven, that I might be ready for that next step and stay there.
To your point, if you had your own personality, then you would be able to make choices wherever you are. I don't see how that could work in any concept of heaven described in the Bible.
Me neither, or at least in the way it's described in the bible.
At this point in time, I believe, if God exists, it is some form of creative energy without any plan or perhaps even consciousness (In the way we think of it). When we die, our energy continues because that's precisely how nature works. We just become other living organisms who get consumed by other animals, and we become part of them. If God is that energy, then we are always one with God (If you want to give that energy a name). It's the same energy that gave birth to the universe and existed prior to it.
Then that would suggest that god is formless, which may be the case. In turn, it throws into question that we were created in the form of God, which I personally struggle with anyway. Could God as a formless universal energy, explain the continuation of life and death and life again in a natural cycle?
If we are indeed one with this creative energy, does that mean our personality, consciousness, and or soul is somehow preserved within it, even if it transforms into something else after death? Or does it simply dissolve, as part of the ongoing process of nature? In that case, what about the unique aspects of who we are, our memories, thoughts, emotions? Are they just temporary or something more eternal? Part of the energy you mention?
I read Genesis and I think,
"W
ho on earth has written this?! It doesn't seem like something that has been sent down to us." It seems to be mostly written in the wrong order. Written in the imagination of humans, as their first attempt to get to grips with science.
