Posted: 5/22/2006 2:08:35 PM EDT
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i have a question that has been bugging me for quite some time. to be honest its a little like the chiken or the egg question but here it goes. if god created heavens and earth who/what created god? im really not trying to start shit but someone has to be able to give me a real answer for this please. |
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thats a question that leads many to doubt God's existence, but a simply answer is God is the First Cause and existing outside normal concepts of time and space. If you believe, don't let shit like that bug you. If you decide you don't believe, don't let the people harass you for your lack of faith. Always respect their right to believe and don't use arguments like the above to bludgeon them. |
It seems to me that both believers and non-believers have to address this same question. Even if you don't believe in God but rather think creation is all just some cosmic coincidence you still have the same question. If the big bang is true, for example (and it could be even with God as the creator) then where did that first super dense matter exist? It had to be somewhere and where did that place/space/etc. come from? Believers understand God to be the only self-existant one. He existed from the beginning and all we see is created by a THOUGHT (the scriptures say "he spoke") from him. If that doesn't satisfy then I'm afraid I don't have a better answer — but neither does anybody trying to explain creation outside of God. I'm one who tends to say there are no mysteries and that God's plan can be understood given spirit from him. But I admit, this question is one I have not been able to wrap my head around completely. |
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thanks guys i was afarid a was going to get flamed. at this point im not sure what to belive and kind of digging around. i belive what all the main religions are trying to teach as far as morals but all of the stories (including creation) all seem a bit exagerated. (for lack of a better term) |
If you listen to the nightly news you might get the impression that all Bible believers take the Genesis creation story literally and that we all think the world was created in six of man's 24 hour days. Nothing could be further from the truth. Personally, I do not believe the Bible is a history book (though it has some history in it). Nor do I believe it is a science book (though it contains a few scientific truths that science is yet to grasp). I view the Genesis creation story largely as: 1.) The best understanding man had and could pass down at the time of Moses to explain creation, 2.) An allegory inspired by God to explain things far more important than mere questions of science Frankly, there are so many truths contained in the Genesis story that it matters to me not one bit if it is historically/scientifically accurate. Just a few of these truths: • every seed brings after it's own kind (besides precluding species-transforming evolution, this means that if you sow kindness you reap kindness; if you sow discourse, you get discourse) • Creation is a process. Nothing happens overnight but that it takes "days" (which could have been translated "process of time"). It's the same when applied to creating a new creature in us. Nothing happens in an instant. • Man is created in God's image (meaning among other things that we are SOULS: spiritual beings free to make choices) • God is made up of male and female (which I understand to represent his word and spirit) • Sin comes from an outside source (in the Genesis story it comes from a "tree" of knowledge and a serpent -- clearly identified as the evil angel "devil" in Revelation) • We are tricked into sin when our "woman" (the spirit in us) is drawn away from the instructions (male/seeds) that we have from God. There are many, many more. These kinds of lessons are far more meaningful to me than any argument about six natural days or even 6,000 years. Besides, on the most basic level, a literal understanding of the creation story doesn't make a lick of sense from a logical point of view. The star we call the sun wasn't created until the fourth day so the plants created on the third day would have had a tough time growing. Not to mention the fact that God, being creator of the whole universe, would not be governed by our insignificant time keeping mechanism, based on the rotation of one planet in a solar system containing billions of stars . . . |
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it's a good question, but it's equally a good question to question where matter or space or whatever came from if there weren't a God. What about the big bang that suppossedly formed everything, so what blew up and what caused that, and where did the cause of that originate from, ect. Believe in God or not you still have a seemingly impossible start that's hard to reason. I side with intelligence and a purpose at the start. |
what he said. I should read more responses before responding. |
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Once I learned that God is not controlled by anything, mainly time, It was easier for me to understand. It's pretty big stuff. don't expect just to 'get it' over night or with a pole. I had to study up on many sides of the Ontological Arguments and debates to help..When it hit me was when I read something that Socrates had debated about the existance of God. He said: "It is better to exist than not to exist..." |
We don't all have to answer the same questions. I am ok with saying "I don't know, but here are some theories" or even just "I don't know". The same question pops up when you mention God. Just because you say God is pre-existent doesn't make it so. It could as easily be that the matter which makes up our universe has always existed, but we can only go trace it as far back as the big bang. I don't know what there was before the big bang, and neither does anyone else. I'm ok with that. |
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I've always thought that during the creation God also created the concept of time, so what's going on with us is like a blink of an eye to Him. What that always leads me pondering is what did God and Jesus do before that? I know the angels were already there, but I have no concept at all of what went on before the physical creation. It also brings up the question of everyone who is transformed at the end of the age will do for eternity. I've heard various guesses, but never anything that sounds plausible. It must be true that what awaits is beyond our comprehension. (It's definately beyond mine). 
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