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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ela_eluwa120" data-source="post: 12318455" data-attributes="member: 193664">This is splited from Y2K's thread <a href="http://www.elakiri.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1354196" target="_blank">RE: Lord Buddha's arguments against GOD</a>An interesting treatise about free-will...I first decided to post this as a reply in Y2K's thread. But, then changed my mind because his topic is different...Extracted from "Is God a Taoist" from Raymond M. Smullyan***************************MORTAL: And therefore, O God, I pray thee, if thou hast one ounce of  mercy for this thy suffering creature, absolve me of having to have free  will!GOD:   You reject the greatest gift I have given thee?MORTAL:    How can you call that which was forced on me a gift? I have free  will, but not of my own choice. I have never freely chosen to have free  will. I have to have free will, whether I like it or not.GOD:   Why would you wish not to have free will?MORTAL:   Because free will means moral responsibility, and moral responsibility is more than I can bear.GOD:   Why do you find moral responsibility so unbearable?MORTAL:   Why? I honestly can’t analyze why; all I know is that I do.GOD:    All right, in that case suppose I absolve you from all moral  responsibility, but still leave you with free will. Will this be  satisfactory?MORTAL:  (after a pause): No, I am afraid not.GOD:    Ah, just as I thought! So moral responsibility is not the only aspect  of free will to which you object. What else about free will is  bothering you?MORTAL:   With free will I am capable of sinning and I don’t want to sin!GOD:   If you don’t want to sin, then why do you?MORTAL:   Good God! I don't know why I sin, I just do! Evil temptations come along, and try as I can, I cannot resist them.GOD:   If it is really true that you cannot resist them, then you are  not sinning of your own free will and hence (at least according to me)  not sinning at all.MORTAL:   No, no! I keep feeling that if only  I tried harder I could avoid sinning. I understand that the will is  infinite. If one wholeheartedly wills not to sin, then one won’t.GOD:    Well now, you should know. Do you try as hard as you can to avoid sinning or don’t you?MORTAL:    I honestly don’t know! At the time, I feel am trying as hard as I  can, but in retrospect, I am worried that maybe I didn’t.GOD:    So in other words, you really don’t know whether or not you have been  sinning. So the possibility is open that you haven’t been sinning at  all!MORTAL:   Of course this possibility is open, but maybe I have been sinning, and this thought is what so frightens me!GOD:   Why does the thought of sinning frighten you?MORTAL:   I don’t know why! For one thing, you do have a reputation for making out rather gruesome punishments in the afterlife!</blockquote>

Verification: Asuwa dahayen wadi kalama keeyada?

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