God's Omniscience

[Ivellious]

So, by all accounts God is said to be both totally omnipotent and omniscient, meaning capable of doing anything and knowing everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen. These statements confuse me a bit in respect to certain things about what God says and does in the Bible.

Mostly, it confuses me how, if God knows everything that will happen, and generally speaking set certain things in motion so that certain events would undoubtedly happen, how is God so angry or disappointed with what transpires?

For instance, take the Fall. God must have known that in creating Adam and Eve as they were, placing the Tree of Knowledge in their vicinity, and allowing the serpent to roam Eden, that Adam and Eve would be deceived and eat from the tree. God is angry for this, when to me it seems kind of hypocritical...If God knew when his creation was complete that these events would undoubtedly occur, how can He really blame anyone but himself? Or even if you say that it wasn't "His fault", how does he explain getting ticked off at something happening that was both within his design and that he was fully aware of from the start?

There are lots of similar examples, and the farther you go down the line, I guess you can say that human free will clouds that aspect of God's omniscience or something, but if you take the Book of Genesis, all of that seems to be set up like dominoes. Like in Noah's flood...supposedly God felt the urge to kill off everything but Noah and his family, but it still seems strange that he could justify a punishment for a problem that he clearly created himself.

I guess, as a sort of related question, based on God's omnipotence and omniscience, is it at all possible that our universe is kind of like a video game for God that he programmed Himself? Or a movie that he has directed and watched an endless number of times? Obviously omniscience implies that even with free will, God has uncanny knowledge of exactly what we will do with that free will (otherwise He wouldn't be omniscient). He would have even "broken the 4th wall" in a way by giving the characters (us) knowledge of the ending, again implying that regardless of free will God already has the whole thing mapped out.

[Byblos]

So, by all accounts God is said to be both totally omnipotent and omniscient, meaning capable of doing anything and knowing everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen. These statements confuse me a bit in respect to certain things about what God says and does in the Bible.

Mostly, it confuses me how, if God knows everything that will happen, and generally speaking set certain things in motion so that certain events would undoubtedly happen, how is God so angry or disappointed with what transpires?

It's called anthropomorphism. We ascribe human qualities to God in order for us to relate to and make sense of Him. It does not mean God is actually angry, disappointed, or surprised in any way.

For instance, take the Fall. God must have known that in creating Adam and Eve as they were, placing the Tree of Knowledge in their vicinity, and allowing the serpent to roam Eden, that Adam and Eve would be deceived and eat from the tree. God is angry for this, when to me it seems kind of hypocritical...If God knew when his creation was complete that these events would undoubtedly occur, how can He really blame anyone but himself? Or even if you say that it wasn't "His fault", how does he explain getting ticked off at something happening that was both within his design and that he was fully aware of from the start?

Like I said, anthropomorphism. Not only did God know that the fall will happen, His plan of salvation (Christ) was put in motion (so-to-speak) from before the creation itself. As to who is at fault, that's a discussion involving God's sovereignty and free will. To summarize, the 2 are not mutually exclusive. If you've followed the Divine Simplicity thread and read the thesis whose link is posted there, it covers this topic in detail.

There are lots of similar examples, and the farther you go down the line, I guess you can say that human free will clouds that aspect of God's omniscience or something, but if you take the Book of Genesis, all of that seems to be set up like dominoes. Like in Noah's flood...supposedly God felt the urge to kill off everything but Noah and his family, but it still seems strange that he could justify a punishment for a problem that he clearly created himself.

Same as above.

I guess, as a sort of related question, based on God's omnipotence and omniscience, is it at all possible that our universe is kind of like a video game for God that he programmed Himself? Or a movie that he has directed and watched an endless number of times? Obviously omniscience implies that even with free will, God has uncanny knowledge of exactly what we will do with that free will (otherwise He wouldn't be omniscient). He would have even "broken the 4th wall" in a way by giving the characters (us) knowledge of the ending, again implying that regardless of free will God already has the whole thing mapped out.

No.

[Canuckster1127]

I'm a bit of an odd duck. I tend to believe that many of the theological terms that are foundational to western theology find their roots, not necessarily directly in Scripture but in a mix of Scripture and Greek Philosophy. Omnipotence and Omniscience for example tie into things like Plato's cave. Of course, when anyone notes that the response is that not believing them to be true is indicative of a position known as Open Theism which in a nutshell, means that God can be surprised and whether by nature or design choosing to be so, can limit his knowledge and expression of power in dealing with men and indeed, to some extent must do so as we are not equipped to deal with him in his totality. I'm not an Open Theist by any means, but I'm not so quick to discount that there are elements where God can choose to limit Himself (we see evidence of this in Christ in Phil 2:5-11) and it's not just anthropomorphizing ourselved onto the screen of God.

I'm not saying that this mix of Philosophy and Scripture is by necessity always wrong. There are strong arguments I know for appealing to logic and rationality as expressions of God as well and as such are legitimate.

I tend to believe that the value of the mix is diminished however when we get buried in the philosophy and wrapped around the axle of delving into the mechanics and lose sight of a transcendent God who has elements of mystery (and by mystery I don't just mean the things that we can't explain as opposed to those things we think we do understand because they fit into our epistemological framework.)

It's a good thing I think to be challenged and take a look at some of the things that are present in the Eastern Traditions of Christianity and be reminded that historically Judaism is more eastern in it's worldview and mindset and that much of our Western Christianity can root strongly in the Epistles of the New Testament and particularly Paul who in addition to his Jewish Training (he was a pharisee) was also well versed in Roman education and applied that in his writings as well. I don't think it's a coincidence that for us in the West it is a tempting thing to camp there more than other places. It's a good thing at times to step off of the analytics and return to the Gospels and grasp the elements there that are outside of the Greek Philosophical elements we're tempted to at times limit it to.