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The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 18th, 2009, 11:46 pm
by AllanS
Suppose there exists a god who is Omnieverything minus 1. Almost absolute, but not quite. Perhaps every trillion years he tells a white lie. Or if it came to a contest of power with the Lord Most High, he would be weaker by one microgram.

Would we be able to tell the difference between the Lord Less High and the Lord Most High? And would it matter?

Putting it another way, if Jesus did sin, just the tiniest tiniest bit, what would have happened? Would the universe have blinked out? Would God have imploded? Or is the question meaningless?

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 19th, 2009, 2:10 pm
by Stanley Anderson
Certainly for mathematical systems, if you can demonstrate the (seemingly) tiniest contradiction anywhere in the system, you can demonstrate that that contradiction "ripples" through the entire system making anything and everything inconsistent and contradictory. For example if you were somehow able to demonstrate that something we might never "actually" run across in a million years, say, that "pi to the hundred millionth power equals pi to the hundred millionth power plus 1", such a demonstration would immediately allow you to prove any other mathematical condition, say, 1+1=5 or 7 = 5,000,007 or anything at all. It would be cataclysmic for that system.

Can one extrapolate from there to a theological idea about God? I certainly would myself, but that's about as far as I could go in terms of a "convincing argument" to give to someone else. Something like this is probably what Lewis had in mind when he had Aslan respond in LWW to the suggestion that he simply take the traitor Edmund back from the White Witch about the consequences of such a seemingly simple action.

And of course one could wander into all sorts of interesting (but probably ultimately unanswerable) speculations about how something like this is apparently exactly what happened to the otherwise impenetrable gates of death when the innocent lamb of God was slain -- the whole world was turned upside down and reborn (and then given a slap on the butt to start it breathing in the new atmosphere it was born into?:-)

--Stanley

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 19th, 2009, 6:14 pm
by Bluegoat

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 19th, 2009, 8:39 pm
by Tuke

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 19th, 2009, 10:59 pm
by AllanS

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 20th, 2009, 5:00 pm
by cyranorox

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 20th, 2009, 9:03 pm
by Tuke

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 20th, 2009, 9:52 pm
by AllanS

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 21st, 2009, 12:59 am
by cyranorox

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 21st, 2009, 6:42 am
by AllanS

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 21st, 2009, 10:39 am
by Bluegoat

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 22nd, 2009, 3:55 pm
by cyranorox

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 23rd, 2009, 11:05 pm
by sehoy
I know you want to hash it out. so have at it, but...

You have to read, if you haven't already, "Jesus of Nazareth" by Joseph Ratzinger. On page 33 he starts talking about the first temptation of Jesus, and in two pages front and back he knocks it out of the ballpark.

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 23rd, 2009, 11:54 pm
by AllanS
Hi Chris,

Thanks for that recommendation.

As for hashing the question out, I don't think so. Whenever I try to get a handle on God, I end up drowning. I get confused and increasingly depressed. I can't lift that mountain. I love Ps 131. The writer says he's given up trying to understand. Instead, he rests his soul in God's loving arms. Let God be God, and Man be Man.

Here are some things I do understand (enough, at least, to enjoy them). That's Levi, grandchild #3. And my magnificent Kubota.

Image

Re: The Lord Less High

PostPosted: May 24th, 2009, 11:03 pm
by sehoy