Derek Kidner’s Adam and Eve Model

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But the same classical systematic theology textbooks which explain how/why/what is meant by “in an analogous way” go on to provide an outline which includes the points and “standard proof texts” which I mentioned in the very brief summary above. My academic career was more exegesis than systematics but I can attest that this is pretty standard stuff. And because William Lane Craig was mentioned I should also add that he has a seven year systematic theology video series (with transcripts) available for free on his ReasonableFaith.org website. It is in his Defenders Podcast series (there’s three of them because when he finishes one series he starts a whole 'nother one.) I know it is somewhere in his Doctrine of God portion of the outline. One can probably find it easily with a keywords search of “Divine Aseity.” I can recall some of the lectures where he talked about what it means for God to want/desire/will various things.

And yes, at age 70 I have a neuromuscular disease (similar in symptoms to multiple sclerosis) which introduces spelling errors including repeated characters—most of which get fixed by my auto-spell check tool, but I have discovered just now that aseity is not in its vocabulary. I see that it did manage to flag the misspelled word as unknown but my vision limitations cause me to miss things. (Yes, such as my not seeing the notorious “red dot” in the middle of some of my cartoon images until @misterme987 pointed them out. That one appears to be a sometimes artifact of the screen capture software I use. Sometimes it will clear with a Windows reboot and sometimes not.) I read with just one eye and the field of vision is small.

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But if they were in fact created without that need if God could create them without that need, where’s the fun in creation? Where’s the fun and playing a video game If you have all the cheat codes already? Perhaps one of the points of this life.Or game or experiment or simulation.
Or unfolding of natural events is for us to discover our true purpose.

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From this perspective offered by the Sufi mystic Ibn Arabi, where “God” is described as a “hidden treasure” who created the universe as a way to be known and experienced by creation, essentially desiring to be discovered by his creation through their interaction with the world around them.

It is mainly through science and all the different fields of science that we are able to discover so much about the world around us. In that discovery lies the adventure. Life is both a destination and a journey, or rather a journey towards a specific destination; the discovery of truth.

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No worries. I probably shouldn’t have but I chuckled when I read the misspelling.

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Yes, it IS pretty funny. (The term “asseity” could probably be adopted as a quantitative measurement of trolling characteristics, for example, as in "The asseity of that last sealioning post was 9.8. It would have been a perfect 10 if not for two Russian judges ruining the scoring.)

Somewhere I have a collection of spellcheck twistings in professional and academic papers. Wish I could remember the best ones.

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Given your condition, I apologize for my spelling troll.

Apropos misterme987’s observation, my presentation of God’s attributes is standard Christian theology, something I learned as a result of four years study at Jesuit university (where I also first heard the term “aseity” over 50 years ago). I’m not sure why my question would “baffle” anyone interested in Christian theology. What is baffling is a lack of serious attempt to actually deal with the point that creation is gratuitous in light of the Christian definition of God. Christianity has only itself to blame for this conundrum, by continuing to insist on a God of perfection. Ironically, however, the God you describe, through your extensive use of scripture, seems to be nothing but a bundle of wishes and wants and desires and only reinforces my point.

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t’s been my experience that Christianity (along with the other Abrahamic religions) takes pretty much all the fun out of creation…

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I assume you are referring to the “fun” we creatures might be having. If so, it doesn’t really address my point. An omnipotent god could have created life forms whose highest level of bliss would be achieved by sitting in a pool of their own excrement, contemplating their navels. That would be much simpler, and just as much fun.

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Please. Let’s not take easy pot shots at our current crop of politicians.

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This somewhat reminds me of the Ameglian Major Cow from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

The Ameglian Major Cow (also referred to as the Dish of the Day) was one example of a race of artificially created, sentient creatures which were bred to want to be eaten.

Freed from the evolutionary constraints of having an organism that wants to survive, eat, procreate, etc, etc, an omnipotent god could create life forms that want/enjoy anything that god could conceive of.

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Who are you replying to? If you want to make that clear, use the “Reply” button right under the post instead of the one at the bottom of the page.

To anyone here: As mentioned by others a couple of times already, I think the most interesting question is why God would desire to be worshipped.

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I’m very sorry you’ve had that experience during your life time. In my experience I have found that every soul needs spiritual sustenance.

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Well, that is your opinion on the matter albeit quite a vivid and graphic one at that. I think it’s safe to say that you are not a theist.

But my analogy of the video game is quite relevant.Because we are endowed by the Creator with free will. Otherwise we would literally be A NPC or a non playable character in the video game.That’s is no fun.You wanna be the main character. The one that has an active role to play in making decisions that affect the outcome of the game.

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Thank you for clearing that up. As far as the Abrahamic god is concerned there is no desire whatsoever to be worshipped, as the Abrahamic God is free of need. We, as contingent imperfect mortal beings, are the ones in need.

However the point I raised about the video game and the non playable character versus the free will human beings are endowed with is relevant.

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Accepting, only for the sake of argument, the assumption that we, “contingent imperfect mortal beings”, have a “need” to worship God, why would a God with “no desire whatsoever to be worshipped” create contingent imperfect mortal beings with that (purported) need?

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God, being omnipotent, can have his cake and eat it too.

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I still don’t see how that would create or necessitate any need to worship any entity who has zero desire to be worshipped.

Are you intending to make a political statement here, or a religious one?

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Socrates stated that the best of rulers would be a a sage king, that is the one who does not even want to rule over other people. That’s one of the ways you know that they would be an effective political leader and a righteous king because they don’t want to rule. But the burden is placed upon them, and the truly righteous rise to the occasion to serve humankind, their fellow man, and never themselves.

Similarly, you can use that analogy to the righteous kingship of God being the greatest of all kings and the most righteous of all kings, the original sage king, for example.

In that sense he doesn’t have any need to be worshipped. However, we as created beings in the created world have a duty to ourselves at the very least to worship the uncreated creator.

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Yes, but would God want a cake, and/or want to eat it?

This is not about what God could do (which would appear to be anything that is not logically impossible), but what he would want to do.

“God, being omnipotent, can” create a vast universe consisting solely of green cheese. But I I see no reason he would want to do this.

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One possibility is that it was out of love so that we through the excercise of our free will may come to know and love him, and hopefully one another as well.

This would be the meaning of Mark 12:29. That is the Bible verse where Jesus states that the Shema Israel which states that the God of Israel is One God only is the most important biblical verse.

Jesus goes on to state in the next couple of verses that the commandment means that you should worship God with all of your heart, mind, body, and soul. Additionally you must love your neighbor as your brother, the rest of the Bible is commentary.

One possibility offered from Judaism is that God is omnipotent omniscient and omnipresent. .We as limited beings cannot see the divine plan from afar. Only in action up close and near. So we’re not really in a position to question what the divine plan may or may not be. In the words of the USMC, “We are not here to question why, we are here but to do and die, devil dog.”

Further, for all we know, perhaps all we were meant to be is the caterpillar that gave birth to the AI butterfly, for example.

Another possibility from a non-Abrahamic theism is the concept of Lila in Hinduism, wherein Brahman or the creator God goes to sleep and dreams up all of existence.

Every particle, atom, rock, tree, animal, human, planetary system, galaxy, and universe. During that dreaming process, he forgets that he is every single being in existence both animate and inanimate during the “dream”.

Periodically, he wakes up from the dream pats himself on the back for dreaming then he goes back to sleep to restart the cyclical process once again