Author Topic: Does God have human needs and wants ?  (Read 48437 times)

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Offline brian464

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Does God have human needs and wants ?
« on: February 25, 2016, 01:05:18 PM »
We worship God because we respect Him but what happens when somebody does not worship God ?

We know that God is not human and humans have a need to be "worshipped" by their spouse, friends etc,

 so does God have the same need as humans do ? or does He give us free will to worship Him or not to worship Him ? and

 if somebody does not worship God, does God punish him for not worshipping Him ?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #1 on: February 28, 2016, 10:51:36 AM »
Another indication that God does not have human needs and wants and in the case below, God does not mind apostasy.

We know that God is present everywhere including the place in which the apostate devil is at and

 since the devil is in a state of apostasy and God is in the very place where the devil is at, it would seem that God does not mind interacting peacefully with the apostate devil

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #2 on: February 28, 2016, 01:25:18 PM »
The following is from my own understanding and knowledge which could be faulty.

God does not have a "need" for anything, He can like one thing and dislike another, but that does not indicate a "need".

Muslims believe that this life is a test, so that people who deserve Heavenand Hell can be differentiated from each other. Muslims believe that before the start of this test, they were asked by God whether they want to go through with it or not. They agreed to be tested, therefore according to this covenant, they have to follow God's commands.

If someone does not worship God, God can be merciful and choose to forgive the person, or God (because of the agreed upon test) can choose not to forgive and punish the person. This is not because God has a need for worship, it is because of breaking the promise.

On the matter of God being everywhere, this is not something that Muslim scholars have had a consensus over. We are not given a clear description of God's attributes, so we can't really say for sure. The following are two articles which go in some detail about this question:

http://www.understanding-islam.com/q-and-a/islamic-beliefs/is-god-everywhere-6570
http://www.islamreligion.com/articles/2562/where-is-god/

On interacting with the apostate devil, as far as I know about the Islamic doctrine, we have absolutely no idea whether such an interaction takes place or not. It is possible, but we have been given no information for it.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #3 on: February 28, 2016, 01:53:01 PM »

God does not have a "need" for anything,

In other words, God does not have a "need" for people to worship Him then ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #4 on: February 28, 2016, 02:00:15 PM »
If "need" is defined as something the absence of which decreases a person in some way, then God does not have a "need" for anything.

God likes people who worship Him and dislikes those who don't, possibly because such persons are going to face harsh penalties for such actions, but there is no reason or evidence to attribute this as a "need" by God.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #5 on: February 28, 2016, 02:04:52 PM »
If "need" is defined as something the absence of which decreases a person in some way, then God does not have a "need" for anything.

God likes people who worship Him and dislikes those who don't, possibly because such persons are going to face harsh penalties for such actions, but there is no reason or evidence to attribute this as a "need" by God.

Thanks for your interest in this subject because its a subject that all believers need to address.

 Please do check back daily or every few days for updates to this discussion, thanks once again

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #6 on: February 28, 2016, 02:56:29 PM »

 He can like one thing and dislike another

If God truly had the human emotion of "like" or "dislike", do you think He would have created hurricanes, earthquakes, natural disasters etc

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #7 on: February 28, 2016, 05:22:49 PM »
The following is from my own understanding and knowledge which could be faulty.

I don't think I understand the question, what has God's like/dislike to do with natural disasters?

Muslims believe that natural disasters are either expiation for a people's sins or a test for them.

Also, it would be somewhat erroneous to relate some aspect of God with any feature of humans. Just like when God says something like, He sees everything, it shouldn't be taken to mean that He has eyes because such particular explicit knowledge is not provided in Islamic scripture. Similarly, God's likes/dislikes should not be related with the way we understand it for humans. It might be very similar, or it could be very different, we cannot say with certainty.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #8 on: February 29, 2016, 04:46:33 PM »


I don't think I understand the question, what has God's like/dislike to do with natural disasters?


You believe that natural disasters is due to human sin ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #9 on: February 29, 2016, 05:28:07 PM »
The following is from my own understanding and knowledge which could be faulty.

Natural disasters are because of God's will, or to put it in different words, they are included in the natural system of the world that God has created.

According to Islamic doctrine, from a spiritual point of view, they serve as either expiation of a people's sins (so that they don't have to pay for these sins in the afterlife) OR a test for them (passing which will increase their rewards in the afterlife).

As far as I know, the Prophet never taught that all the natural disasters are because of human sins (some can be, but definitely not necessarily); this particular interpretation can be regarded as an innovation in Islam.

A particular event from the life of the Prophet is somewhat relevant here: After the death of one of Prophet Muhammad's sons, their was an eclipse; people started saying that the eclipse is because of the son's death, but the Prophet corrected them and told them that such things are natural phenomena and they don't occur on the death of any person.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #10 on: February 29, 2016, 09:13:33 PM »
pay for these sins in the afterlife


Why is man required to pay for sins ?  when its obvious that God does not mind the Devil constantly sinning from the day that the devil committed apostasy right in front of God

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #11 on: March 01, 2016, 04:33:48 AM »
God does mind devil's sins, because of which he will also get punished in the afterlife. His punishment is just postponed.

The devil asked for some time from God to try and lead the humans astray and thus, in such a way was formed the basis of the test for humans (i.e. to not follow the devil) which they have to pass to get into heaven.

Regards,

Offline submit

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #12 on: March 01, 2016, 07:01:51 AM »
In other words, God does not have a "need" for people to worship Him then ?

God does not need people to worship Him because God is worthy to be worshiped.
God is pleased with those who worshiped Him with great rewards  in the Hereafter.

The attributes of forgiving and merciful God. http://www.answering-christianity.com/99_names.htm

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #13 on: March 01, 2016, 03:31:40 PM »
God does mind devil's sins,

Its obvious that God is not human and does not have human needs or wants since

 He created the devil, knowing that the devil will one day refuse to worship God ( apostasy ) and yet God still created the devil.

God could have easily created (only) the beings He knew will never commit apostasy but

 since He created beings who He knew would commit apostasy, tells me that He is does not need or want humans or beings to worship Him

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #14 on: March 01, 2016, 03:35:36 PM »

God is pleased with those who worshiped Him


God is pleased

In addition to my comment to Brother Farooq above,

God being pleased is a human emotion which means He can also be angry if people do not worship Him.

 I doubt God ever gets angry or cries or is happy according to how people respond to Him

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #15 on: March 01, 2016, 04:13:32 PM »
The following is from my own understanding and knowledge which could be faulty.

As I mentioned before, this was the test that the humans (and I suppose Jinns are also included here) accepted. God of course knew that some will follow Him and others will disobey Him, but (according to the Islamic doctrine) humans chose this test out of their own free will, they were not forced into it.

He does not "need" our worship, but He would be pleased if we succeed in our tests.

Everything we know about God, comes from the Qur'an and authentic Hadiths. They along with some other attributes of God do talk about the pleasure and displeasure of God. Therefore, these cannot be denied (although there are some groups of Muslims who try to give metaphorical meaning to clear statements from scripture about such attributes, but from what I know that is not the majority opinion).

Regarding whether such attributes can be related to any human like emotion, from what I understand, we just don't know. Like the eyes example I gave before, we just have not been given enough information to say much for certain.

All we can say with certainty is what Islam tells us, which is, that God is pleased by those who follow Him, and displeased by those who disobey Him; exactly what is the nature of that pleasure and displeasure or what accompanies them, if there is anything, is not certain (although "crying" is, I suppose, definitely something beneath God).

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #16 on: March 01, 2016, 11:42:12 PM »
, this was the test that the humans (and I suppose Jinns are also included here) accepted.majority opinion).

God could have easily told the humans that He knew many ( possibly billions )  will fail the test and so

 I do not believe that God would have withheld that vital piece of  information before  the humans accepted the test because

 I do not believe that God is in the business of either deception or trickery

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #17 on: March 02, 2016, 07:37:02 AM »
Who said God withheld the information?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #18 on: March 02, 2016, 10:20:16 AM »
Who said God withheld the information?

So God revealed to the humans that they will fail the test ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #19 on: March 02, 2016, 11:55:03 AM »
As far as I know, no information is provided in this respect.
However, some can argue that the very idea of a Heaven and Hell implied that some were going to succeed and some, fail.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #20 on: March 02, 2016, 01:15:26 PM »
As far as I know, no information is provided in this respect.
However, some can argue that the very idea of a Heaven and Hell implied that some were going to succeed and some, fail.

Regards,

If God truly revealed to humans that they will fail in the test, I highly doubt humans would have agreed to the test ( humans are not that stupid to agree to something in which they know that failure is a good possibility ) when hell fire is the result of failure

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #21 on: March 02, 2016, 01:47:55 PM »
Exactly what are you basing that answer on?
If there was the fear of Hell on one hand, then there was also the Hope of Heaven on the other. Who knows which was more.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #22 on: March 02, 2016, 02:59:26 PM »
Exactly what are you basing that answer on?
If there was the fear of Hell on one hand, then there was also the Hope of Heaven on the other. Who knows which was more.

Are you saying the majority of humans accepted the test because the majority felt they will pass the test ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #23 on: March 02, 2016, 05:36:10 PM »
What I am saying is that, although that is a possibility, we don't know for certain. We have not been provided with the information to make such a claim, at-least as far as I know.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #24 on: March 03, 2016, 12:31:19 AM »
What I am saying is that, although that is a possibility, we don't know for certain. We have not been provided with the information to make such a claim, at-least as far as I know.

These humans existed before Adam ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #25 on: March 03, 2016, 04:36:32 AM »
Muslims believe that at this point, God was addressing just the souls of the people; the physical bodies came later.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #26 on: March 03, 2016, 03:06:59 PM »
Muslims believe that at this point, God was addressing just the souls of the people; the physical bodies came later.

Regards,

The souls of the people who have already committed sin ?

Offline submit

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #27 on: March 04, 2016, 05:19:01 AM »

God is pleased

In addition to my comment to Brother Farooq above,

God being pleased is a human emotion which means He can also be angry if people do not worship Him.

 I doubt God ever gets angry or cries or is happy according to how people respond to Him

God will be displeased if one disbelieved, however the matters will be judged and punishment will be given in hereafter.
God is Merciful and Oft-forgiving. To those that follow His covenant, God will be pleased to multiply the rewards onto them that will be counted in hereafter. 
All of these are the ordains of His covenants and His rulings to the universe. Which all matter will be judged in the Day of Judgement.

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #28 on: March 04, 2016, 06:13:34 AM »
The souls did not commit any sin (at-least as far as we know).
First the souls accepted the test, after which the memory of this was wiped from them, then they were given physical human bodies and after that they started committing good deeds and bad deeds.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #29 on: March 04, 2016, 05:51:14 PM »
they started committing good deeds and bad deeds.

Regards,

God knew that "bad deeds" would be done, right ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #30 on: March 04, 2016, 06:21:16 PM »
It should have been in God's knowledge, yes.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #31 on: March 05, 2016, 12:15:32 AM »
It should have been in God's knowledge, yes.

Since God is not deceptive, He must have told the souls that they ( billions in fact), will fail  the test

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #32 on: March 05, 2016, 05:06:33 AM »
We don't know how many will fail the test, it is for God to decide who passes and who fails.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #33 on: March 05, 2016, 06:00:26 PM »
We don't know how many will fail the test, it is for God to decide who passes and who fails.

So the souls knew that at least one human would fail the test, since God told them that at least one will fail

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #34 on: March 05, 2016, 06:28:41 PM »
Probably, but the scarcity of information that Islamic doctrine provides on the matter makes such conclusions, at the end of the day, nothing more that just speculation.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #35 on: March 06, 2016, 10:21:50 AM »
Probably, but the scarcity of information that Islamic doctrine provides on the matter makes such conclusions, at the end of the day, nothing more that just speculation.

Regards,

What was the author's purpose in reporting such a story ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #36 on: March 06, 2016, 11:33:53 AM »
Don't know for sure. Probably to show the purpose of this life, of why we were created, of why there is a heaven and hell or the logic behind religion etc.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #37 on: March 06, 2016, 11:50:58 AM »
Don't know for sure. Probably to show the purpose of this life, of why we were created, of why there is a heaven and hell or the logic behind religion etc.

The author did not reveal the most important question : why give the test when God knew people would fail ? and apparently, the souls also knew at least one of them would fail

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #38 on: March 06, 2016, 08:45:14 PM »
I meant, I don't know for sure, others of more knowledge might.
Additionally, the argument can also be made to why not give the test, when God knew people would pass.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #39 on: March 07, 2016, 10:08:43 AM »
why not give the test,

The test included, worshipping God, right ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #40 on: March 07, 2016, 04:52:53 PM »
The test included following God's commands on Earth, which I suppose includes worshiping too.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #41 on: March 08, 2016, 07:01:03 PM »
The test included following God's commands on Earth, which I suppose includes worshiping too.

Regards,

What would you think of the person who made the following offer ?:

If somebody told you that if you worship him or her, you will get rewards

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #42 on: March 08, 2016, 07:40:05 PM »
Depends on the kind of rewards.

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #43 on: March 08, 2016, 07:40:44 PM »
... among other things.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #44 on: March 09, 2016, 09:48:44 AM »
Depends on the kind of rewards.

aren't rewards, bribery?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #45 on: March 09, 2016, 12:10:44 PM »
Is a person's salary, Bribery?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #46 on: March 10, 2016, 01:33:20 AM »
Is a person's salary, Bribery?

what is your definition of a bribery then ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #47 on: March 10, 2016, 06:55:25 AM »
Why do you need my definition of bribery?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #48 on: March 10, 2016, 08:45:09 PM »
Why do you need my definition of bribery?

I am pretty sure your definition of bribery is the same as mine.

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #49 on: March 10, 2016, 09:37:07 PM »
I don't know about that. In any case, I will just quote the definition that Google gave, which although containing a few subjective terms, seems pretty appropriate:

Quote
... persuade (someone) to act in one's favor, typically illegally or dishonestly, by a gift of money or other inducement.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #50 on: March 11, 2016, 10:13:47 AM »
persuade (someone) to act in one's favor, typically illegally or dishonestly, by a gift of money or other inducement

Can you give the details of the rewards?


Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #51 on: March 11, 2016, 11:44:56 AM »
The rewards for what?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #52 on: March 13, 2016, 01:09:34 AM »
The rewards for what?

what are the rewards for worshipping Allah five times a day ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #53 on: March 13, 2016, 01:51:24 AM »
Fulfilling God's commands on Earth will have the reward of heaven in the next life.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #54 on: March 13, 2016, 01:56:21 PM »
Fulfilling God's commands on Earth will have the reward of heaven in the next life.

what exactly is heaven ? a place where you have to watch what you say, like in North Korea ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #55 on: March 13, 2016, 01:59:58 PM »
What we have been told about heaven, is that the desires of humans will be fulfilled there, some of those  features have been mentioned in the Islamic sources, but not everything has been explicitly defined.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #56 on: March 14, 2016, 06:58:47 AM »
What we have been told about heaven, is that the desires of humans will be fulfilled there, some of those  features have been mentioned in the Islamic sources, but not everything has been explicitly defined.

can you give details about the "features"?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #57 on: March 14, 2016, 07:36:41 AM »
If I remember correctly: rivers of milk, having the opportunity to listen to the voice  of Allah, palaces, if I'm not mistaken, the people getting served drinks by Allah Himself, people probably getting the opportunity to meet with their loved ones, or even the prophets.

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #58 on: March 15, 2016, 12:37:39 AM »
people getting served drinks by Allah Himself,

So in return for worshipping Allah five times a day, Allah rewards people by serving them drinks in heaven.

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #59 on: March 15, 2016, 08:16:56 AM »
First of all, it is much more than just 5 times a day prayers, and secondly what exactly is wrong with that? It is but one of many rewards.

Stop mincing words and speak plainly. Also, why didn't you include the fact about the opportunity to listen to Allah in heaven? Is it because you couldn't come up with any arguments against it?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #60 on: March 16, 2016, 02:23:38 AM »
If I remember correctly: rivers of milk, having the opportunity to listen to the voice  of Allah, palaces, if I'm not mistaken, the people getting served drinks by Allah Himself, people probably getting the opportunity to meet with their loved ones, or even the prophets.

There is no sex in heaven ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #61 on: March 16, 2016, 08:10:49 AM »
If that is what the residents of heaven desire, than it will be there.

As I said before, "stop mincing words and speak plainly." It appears you were trying to push the discussion towards this point from the time you started asking about rewards of heaven about 5 days ago. And by the way, nice job on continuously moving from one topic to another, probably with the objective of finally finding a good argument against Islam.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #62 on: March 17, 2016, 01:38:49 AM »
If that is what the residents of heaven desire, than it will be there.

Was there a reason you left the sex part out when you listed the rewards in heaven (in your previous post )  ?

Offline AhmadFarooq

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #63 on: March 17, 2016, 02:05:19 AM »
Because it has been becoming increasingly clear to me that you are just trying to bait the other person in saying certain specific things. If you already knew the rewards, why were you asking me?

If you wanted to talk about this subject, you should have just said so, about a week ago when you tried to push the discussion towards this point. This is the third time, I'm saying this: "Stop mincing words and speak plainly."
It is apparent to me that you are not a Muslim, you have changed the subject multiple times in this discussion, apparently trying hard to finally catch the other person without an answer. Topics that were explained to you in one post, even though you did not continue to argue on that topic (presumably because you couldn't), you continued to debate on that same issue with another person in a way that showed complete ignorance of the arguments that I had already given.

Give me one good reason that I'm wrong, otherwise this is probably going to be my last post on this thread.

Regards,

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #64 on: March 18, 2016, 02:12:09 AM »
If you wanted to talk about this subject, you should have just said so,

The subject of the post is " Does God have human needs and wants ? " and the answer is pretty clear: according to muslims/christians/jews,  God wants people to worship Him ( a very human want ) and in return,

 heaven is the reward ( a very human response ).

and in the case of certain religions ( muslims being a part ) , sex is also part of the list of rewards.

 My question is , how far does sex go in heaven ?  Is it only with a person's wife or does the person have a  choice of multiple partners, in addition to the wife on earth ?

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #65 on: March 20, 2016, 07:01:27 AM »
Muslims believe that before the start of this test, they were asked by God whether they want to go through with it or not.

Allah must have revealed to the "test takers" that failing to worship Allah would result in being burned alive in hell forever

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #66 on: March 22, 2016, 07:36:57 AM »
They agreed to be tested, therefore according to this covenant, they have to follow God's commands.

Could any reasonable person agree to a test when failure ( to worship Allah )  means being burned alive forever ?

 Allah must have revealed to the "test takers" that the devil failed to worship and, at least, one of the "test takers" would fail to worship and the result is being burned alive without end

Offline brian464

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #67 on: March 25, 2016, 08:56:21 AM »
they have to follow God's commands.

The command of worshipping only Allah seems a little too human to me since humans have the tendency of demanding or commanding worship of themselves (  abusive husbands tend to command worship )

Offline fadi

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Re: Does God have human needs and wants ?
« Reply #68 on: October 31, 2016, 04:59:53 PM »
Dear Brian464,

I read the first few questions you have asked in this post, and I think that I may be able to help you (if God willing). Dr. Laurence Brown who converted to Islam few years ago wrote many articles concerning some of your questions. I would like to invite you to read this article and I think that you MAY find answers to your questions.

The Big Questions, Part III—The Need for Revelation

In the previous two parts of this series, we answered the two “big questions.” Who made us? God. Why are we here? To serve and worship Him. A third question naturally arose: “If our Creator made us to serve and worship Him, how do we do that?” In the previous article I suggested that the only way we can serve our Creator is through obeying His mandates, as conveyed through revelation.
But many people would question my assertion: Why does mankind need revelation? Isn’t it enough just to be good? Isn’t it enough for each of us to worship God in our own way?

Regarding the need for revelation, I would make the following points: In the first article of this series I pointed out that life is full of injustices, but our Creator is fair and just and He establishes justice not in this life, but in the afterlife. However, justice cannot be established without four things—a court (i.e., the Day of Judgment); a judge (i.e., the Creator); witnesses (i.e., men and women, angels, elements of creation); and a book of laws upon which to judge (i.e., revelation). Now, how can our Creator establish justice if He did not hold humankind to certain laws during their livetimes? It’s not possible. In that scenario, instead of justice, God would be dealing out injustice, for He would be punishing people for transgressions they had no way of knowing were crimes.
Why else do we need revelation? To begin with, without guidance mankind cannot even agree on social and economic issues, politics, laws, etc. So how can we ever agree on God? Secondly, nobody writes the user manual better than the one who made the product. God is the Creator, we are creation, and nobody knows the overall scheme of creation better than the Creator. Are employees allowed to design their own job descriptions, duties and compensation packages as they see fit? Are we citizens allowed to write our own laws? No? Well then, why should we be allowed to write our own religions? If history has taught us anything, it is the tragedies that result when mankind follows its caprice. How many who have claimed to banner of free thought have designed religions that committed themselves and their followers to nightmares on Earth and damnation in the hereafter?

So why isn’t it enough just to be good? And why isn’t it enough for each of us to worship God in our own way? To begin with, peoples’ definitions of “good” differ. For some it is high morals and clean living, for others it is madness and mayhem. Similarly, concepts of how to serve and worship our Creator differ as well. More importantly and to the point, nobody can walk into a store or a restaurant and pay with a different currency than the merchant accepts. So it is with religion. If people want God to accept their servitude and worship, they have to pay in the currency God demands. And that currency is obedience to His revelation.
Imagine raising children in a home in which you have established “house rules.” Then, one day, one of your children tells you he or she has changed the rules, and is going to do things differently. How would you respond? More than likely, with the words, “You can take your new rules and go to Hell!” Well, think about it. We are
God’s creation, living in His universe under His rules, and “go to Hell” is very likely what God will say to any who presume to override His laws with their own.
Sincerity becomes an issue at this point. We should recognize that all pleasure is a gift from our Creator, and deserving of thanks. If given a gift, who uses the gift before giving thanks? And yet, many of us enjoy God’s gifts for a lifetime and never give thanks. Or give it late. The English poet, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, spoke of the irony of the distressed human appeal in The Cry of the Human:
And lips say “God be pitiful,” Who ne’er said, “God be praised.”
Should we not show good manners and thank our Creator for His gifts now, and subsequently for the rest of our lives? Don’t we owe Him that?
You answered “Yes.” You must have. Nobody will have read this far without being in agreement, but here’s the problem: Many of you answered “Yes,” knowing full well that your heart and mind does not wholly agree with the religions of your exposure. You agree we were created by a Creator. You struggle to understand Him. And you yearn to serve and worship Him in the manner He prescribes. But you don’t know how, and you don’t know where to look for the answers. And that, unfortunately, is not a subject that can be answered in an article. Unfortunately, that has to be addressed in a book, or maybe even in a series of books.
The good news is that I have written these books. I invite you to start with The Eighth Scroll. If you’ve liked what I’ve written here, you’ll love what I’ve written there.

The article is from: http://leveltruth.com/?p=72

 

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