If God exist, why does he reward those that bullied us?

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If you assume that God doesn't exist, then nothing. If you assume God does exist, then it's not His purpose with regard to us that ought to concern us but rather our purpose with regard to Him. This may be an oversimplification, however so is the question "For what?".

I find this whole debate goes to one of "free will" and faith.

For faith to exist, there can not be absolute proof of God's existence. For "free will" to appear real, we must believe we have a choice with no dire consequence for choosing wrongly. If God intervened to stop every evil act man chooses to do to each other, there would soon be no basis to dispute God's existence, faith would be irrelevant and "free will" would cease to be.

For creating the universe, for creating in general actually, for being the creator. An predominantly evil god is evidently not, because such a God being it's nature to destroy and ruin, would begin by destroying itself. Evil= destruction and degeneration, Good= creation and evolution. Since the latter has happened over the time not the former, God is Good.

The problem comes when we attempt to ascribe human social morality to God, in other words the form of morality (one based upon love and rules like though shalt not kill) that we hopefully at least try to practice and which allows human society to flourish.

The problem is that God is above such human moral rules and would reasonably enough ascribe to the pure or fundamental Good. As such human morality is merely one contender to divine support, not the ultimate Good.

A competitor is the 'strength ethic', as in to ensure the flourishing of the strongest and the elimination of those who are weak, this serves the ultimate end of ensuring the development (Good) and avoiding degeneration (Evil).



You do not have the free will to jump 20 feet into the air do you? Given we already exist under restrictions, nothing prevents God from stopping us doing anything evil at all.

And Faith is the currency of charlatans. While necessary for those without understanding so they may gain greater understanding through instruction in things they do not yet understand, Faith is a liability.

I have the will to jump 20 feet up in the air. I just don't have the strength.

Exactly, there is no reason why free will necessitates that people have the ability to actually do what they freely will to do. That is the basic problem with the free will defense of evil, it explains why they should be allowed to wish evil on others; but it does not explain why they are able to do this let alone while they are allowed to 'get away with it' so often.

The way out of this dilemma is to presume that God places a 'moral value' upon ability, power and strength. This is reasonable if you try to look at things, even on a human level, positive morality is to cultivate development and increase 'strength'.

While avoiding suffering might be a workable ethic for human beings, it clearly is not the divine objective.

He/she doesn't reward them at all, they are often ugly and get sick.

He doesnt reward us either for falling short of our potential

Just becuase they are living a nice earthly life dosen't mean their after life is going to be so peachy keen unless they repent. Give it time, they won't be living the charmed life for long. My bullies usually ended up worse than I did.

As an agnostic UU, I say: Matthew 20:1-15. One of my favorite passages in the Bible.


Cheers,

TH

For purposes of topics like this I start with the premise that a god does exist. While I dont personally believe that to be a fact, I place that aside.

So you first sentence: Correct. But I know that and dont have to question it.

Your second sentence is reasonable in the context as well. Cliffracerslayer however, is applying human level definitions to something that really cannot be contained thusly. You can see that he repeatedly does it in his posts following your adroit statement. God, if it exists, must be outside the paradigm of good and evil.

Saying god is good is like saying a psychopath is composed of evil atoms.

I believe that is the generally the justification, that even if life is good for them, then in the after life they will pay without having repented, the problem with this, is that if they repent, then what? I mean, there is the idea that even if you repent of your sins, you have to suffer the consequences on earth even if you are saved. So I tend to find some inconsistency on this approach, given that, apparently, "karma" does indeed discriminate.

No God would cease to be: thus - "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED."
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't though of that" and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

An appropriate quote considering your user name.

Q:Why does God not punish bullies?
A:He does.

Look at any bully in later life and they will have not achieved much to say the least. A bully can be intelligent but nobody likes them and therefore they are rejected. In a indirect way I suppose God does punish bullies. Because it is our human nature to reject those who abuse us. I still get the feeling I am not answering the question properly... I have just rearlized I preach a moral code and not a Christian one. So I must go and think about this. I have come to the concllusion that I cannot sufficiently answer the question.

James

Actually, powerful people who push other people around seem to do rather well. You can console yourself that they will be punished in the next life but that's just bully propaganda so you won't bother them in this life. It.s what suckers like to believe when they have no way to get even.

If there is a god (and that's a massive "if"), he/she/it must think just like a human, since he/she/it is clearly sadistic.

Not necessarily so.

I dealt with a guy who was a bully. He had status, authority, a nice job, but everyone thought he was an A-hole. He only stayed in his job because he knew how to work the system and people were afraid to stand up to him in large numbers on a consistent basis. Since I know how bullies work, I refused to cower before him...hence the conflict. In any case, everyone thought he was an A-hole and only gave him lip service as far as respect was concerned. If he died or retired, I'm sure the office would throw a party over the event. His peers thought he was a laughing stock. So self-important but honestly served no real purpose. All the important work was done by the guy beneath his position.

If a bully is a psychopath (or which ever term best applies) and cares nothing about what people think of him or honestly is delusional about how loved he is by others, yeah, he loses nothing and can do very well by being a bully with no real ill effect.

However, it's easy to be the most popular guy in town when everything is going your way. It's when times are tough you find out how many friends you really have in life. Bullies are very prone to be alone, unloved, rejected once they are no longer at the top of their game. They burned all their bridges trying to climb to the top of the mountain.