Reconcilable God And The Dialectic

Ok, so to present us with a dialectic; Lets start with a story:

Two men insult a man of God, if we assume God will not permit this evil and will show himself just, we can argue that without showing himself harsh to these men, their sins are shown to each other. Finding that they had each slept with each others wives and had been laughing quite seperately at each others misfortune for years, they fell into a brawl and killed each other.

This being unknown to the man of God, who had already forgiven them, God stays judgement on the pair of them and gives them back their lives. Thoroughly glad of the forgiveness they had been given they forgive each other and again become friends.

It happens again that they insult the man of God again, and the man of God forgives them, but this time God shows the man of God His forgiveness before the man is completely sure of the wisdom of forgiving the pair; he is shown by God what such revenge would entail.

Once again the pair again had their sins revealed to each other. (With all they had done since to each other piled upon the former sins.) This time then they killed each other in rage as if they had slept with each others wives all over again. Being brought before God for judgement, an accusation is brought that they might not be forgiven. The pair promptly forgive each other, fearing judgement. A further accusation is brought that if their first forgiveness had been true, they would not have fallen upon each other the second time.

The man of God considers all this and understands the wisdom of this: for it was not necessary for God to reveal their sins to each other by means of avenging the insult, since he forgave them. If they had forgiven each other their fault truly, he could not judge them as God.

So where is the evil here? In the mind of the man of God, there is a very nasty deception being played out. Would God avenge an insult to the death of two men who would otherwise be friends? is it just? What is unjust is to expect that God would necessarily avenge an insult by laying the two men's sins bare so that they brawl if the man of God forgives them.

If then the fault is to expect the man of God to not necessarily forgive the two men, in the mind of the man of God if this appears not necessary, then the entailing possibility is of the two men having been avenged upon for the insult and the man of God remaining blameless: it seems inadequate! For the men had forgiven each other because he forgave them, and God had stayed the judgement of the men.

If the fault is in necessarily requiring that God avenge insult so that grace can be increased, then is much evil done by the two men, sin here is multiplied upon itself, and since the man of God forgave them a second time, so should God, but if they truly can not be trusted with forgiveness, though the sin be exactly as the first, then the forgiveness of God appears to be slighted.

So it appears, either forgiveness is not necessary if God avenges evil, or God's forgiveness appears to be imperfect and accusation has a cause for reproach.

The man of God, seeing God's wisdom knows that his own forgiveness and God's is sure, because there is no logical requirement that God necessarily avenge mens sins before any fixed period of time, after which all mens lives are laid bare to each other, and the just are saved, and the unjust are condemned. There is therefore a judgement when God will judge all men, living and dead. The forgiveness of the man of God is then justified by this faith.

The situation above is a dialectic complete with collapse. To assume necessarily that forgiveness must be given for sins is to assume that all sins are forgiven. Logical necessity in this sense is absolute, and therefore the law "do as thou wilt" reigns and all men may sin as they please. Coming before God at a judgement like His own, They will not be able to do anything other than demand forgiveness unjustly or slight God by attesting His forgiveness is imperfect and He is unjust.

The dialectic comes from reasoning from the empty set: here the set is not the fact that the man of God forgave the men, but that God would avenge the insult if the man of God forgave them. The two men, as bad as each other are the "punch and judy" synthesis in the centre of the dialectic, they are the sideshow that take the attention of the believer away from the lie. If the man of God had not forgiven the men, as a man of God he eventually would have, or have done so at the judgement as the two men also were shown to him to do. The dialectic was there for demanding, what is in essence is a requirement of the liberty of God in his perfection motivated towards satisfying the feelings of the individual believer.

If all mens sins were laid bare in this fashion, and there were no forgiveness, then we would all be killing each other, every one of us by this argument. God has not sinned in any thing He did here, and would not. The only one being toyed with is the man of God by his feelings. Assuming the second time that the man of God's forgiveness was in error the first time round is the deception here. That God's judgement is unjust, that permitting evil is unjust rather than revealing it to stop it, or that God's forgiveness is easily made imperfect. Forgiveness the first time removes the common sense for avenging, but if there was forgiveness, there is no offence before God. Likewise, would we exxpect God not to forgive or even offer temperance because a victim does not?

If the two had not forgiven each other, could they expect forgiveness? Irrelevant, their sins are not laid bare except by the will of God - but if they be so unforgiving, but God would not cause evil to be multiplied upon itself, so the vengeance, (the laying bare) can wait until the judgement and God is satisfied. The man of God sees this wisdom.

So, there could not be a "first time" unless the mens sins were their own dire fault, so the man of God asks himself, Does my forgiveness matter? but he knows he requires no avenging, and accepts the wisdom of it. Perhaps they should forgive each other - being the real ones insulted of each other.

God has not done anything unjust in all this, the men would kill when he would not, is God insulted? Very likely - but the man of God is not insulted by the wisdom of God, not one bit.

So these lies that affect this situation, are really;

i) A presence of evil causes a reaction in the believer to assume that God is more perfect for having to avenge evil. This statement is inconsistent with God's perfection, requiring of Him his liberty. A similar thing happens with sin, when we assume that God is more perfect for letting us have our own way.

ii) That forgiveness must be a logical necessity - all men in the example can forgive each other, but God's forgiveness is imperfect?

iii) If "do as thou wilt" is the consequence of this logical necessity then no amount of evil is inexcusable to man, and (falsely reached) God has to remain silent on His judgements.

iv) that if God is silent on His judgments, then scoffers say that He is an inconsistent concept.

So how can we collapse the dialectic? Surely if all three men forgive, then God should forgive, for the sake of the believer if nothing else. If all three men genuinely forgave, they would have known better; done it more often and have had the character of God to stop this heinous character play from occurring, thus justifying the perfection of the forgiveness of God. This keeps the whole situation resolved: If they truly see the good in that, God will forgive them also. By this reasoning, the man of God knows forgiving the men is a wise move.

But this merely keeps the heinous play open : what collapses it? Not demanding the liberty from God? or simply assuming that the two men are men of God themselves? If the man of God reasons he has God's authority to forgive sins, then so do those two men if they be saved as well!

So, we can collapse all these deceptions by requiring a Klein four group like structure on the believers... for not considering to forgive a brother or sister in Christ is an insult, especially in the ears of God, is it not? The truth in Christ is; If two men insult you and they forgive each other, then if they ARE of God and do so forgiv truly, their forgiveness to each other can be equal to your forgiveness of them.

So where are the symmetries of unbelievers? To all in Christ, who are insulted, the devil plays the part of the first and second insult thrower. It is too easy to get drawn into a punch and judy play. Forgive them, you don't have to trust them again.

This whole play can be avoided if the man of God simply repented of evil, and forgave them wisely first time round. By repenting of evil, the man of God attests that God is just, who forgives the sins of men that are forgiven. So the sons of God have the authority to forgive sins in all regards. God's forgiveness is perfect, and He is most certainly not inconsistent.

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