Angels and Free Choice

[Evoman]

So I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine tonight. I thought some of you religious people could help me understand something. Here is a memory transcript of what was said.

Evoman: So dude, I was watching Dogma and at one point one of the angels says he hates humans because god gave them free choice, but he didn't give the angels free will.

Buddy: Yeah, that was a funny movie.

Evoman: So your christian. Is that true?

Buddy: What, did god give angels free will?

Evoman: Yeah, did he?

Buddy: No, I don't think so. I think you need a soul to have free will. Angels don't have a soul, so I don't think they have free will.

Evoman: Will, wasn't Satan or Lucifer or whatever an Angel?

Buddy: Yeah, a fallen angel who wanted to fight god.

Evoman: But did god make him do that? I mean, if he had no free will, doesnt that mean that god made Lucifer choose evil so that he would go and make hell to torment us heathens.

Buddy: Uh...shit. I don't know. Why do you care. You dont believe in angels, your just being difficult.

Evoman: Yeah, pretty much.


Anyways, thats basically how the conversation went. So I really did start getting curious. I've read the bible once (took forever!), but I can't remember if angels do have free will. So DU christians, can ya give me an answer. If angels have no free will, how could satan choose evil. If they do have free will and were always in the light of god, why would they choose evil? I thought that once you basked in his light in heaven, you basically didn't want to do evil...i.e theres no stabbings in the heavenly afterlife.

I'll also just come out and say, I am not religous and I don't even believe in angels. I just want to know how christians/jews/muslims resolve this issue.

[Oversea Visitor]

1. Aaaah go ask an Angels

They got the answer

[ThoughtCriminal]

2. I think the general belief is yes, they have free will

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallen_angel

"It is generally accepted by most Christians that the fallen angels were cast out of Heaven due to free will. Pride, being the most grave of sins, is usually taught as the reason the angels were expelled from Heaven"

---

I don't know the "Correct" answer either, to me it's like arguing over the powers of comic book heros, but one argument is that angels have free will, but no salvation if they sin.

[rawtribe]

3. Logic and religion

don't mix....

:eyes:

[Goblinmonger]

6. Absolutely awesome avatar

I just bought the anthology. What a blast to my high school days.

[Hekate]

4. Dude

Just giving this a little kick until someone more theologically knowledgeable comes along. My background is Mythology.

Seriously, you've hit on one of Christianity's longest-running internal arguments.

Humans are supposed to have free will -- it's what makes us humans, not animals. Animals have no free will, just instincts that drive them -- they are what they are, and their actions cannot be considered good or evil, just a matter of survival. (I think that's a bit reductive; some of the animal kingdom are more sentient than others. But then I'm not exactly a Christian any more.) The innocence of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden was the innocence of animals until they ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, woke up and became human.

Humans can choose our behavior and beliefs, and can rationalize what we do. Humans can choose good or evil actions. We are less than the angels, but greater than animals. We have immortal souls in mortal bodies -- when we die, the soul goes on. (This figures into fairy-tales -- the fairy-folk are immortal, but have no souls. They are said to envy us for that.)

I am not clear about the nature of angels (whose name means "messenger"), but Lucifer was not the only one who disobeyed God; he seems to have had a small army of followers who joined him in the attempt to overthrow God. They lost the battle and were thrown out of Heaven -- they are "fallen angels" because they fell from Heaven. I think this must imply that angels, who are immortal beings, have free will as we do. Lucifer's name, btw, means "Light Bearer" and he was supposed to have been kind of a favorite before he rebelled. Hell was the absence of God's presence.

As to the argument over our free will-- one problem as I understand it comes from those sects (like the Calvinists) who believe that only a few people are destined for Heaven. God has decided who they are before they are even born (i.e. they are predestined), but no one else knows. Everyone else is predestined for Hell. Everyone is supposed to believe the Creed/Credo, pray, try to do everything right, and yet believe it may not affect the outcome.

Calvinism is actually a pretty cruel world-view. Infants are born into a state of sin ("In Adam's fall, we sinnéd all") and if they have the bad luck to die before they can be baptized their little souls go to Hell too. This belief has to have been very hard on the Puritan mothers. Throughout Christian history there have been various doctrinal contortions attempting to mitigate this awful fate; it's one of the reasons "limbo" was invented, a place neither Heaven nor Hell.

Christian theology is vaster than Calvinism and far more complex than I can do credit here. On the whole salvation seems to come down on the side of (1) belief, and then (2) somewhere between grace and good works. Popular American Christian beliefs today are fairly scrambled, possibly even heretical, but that’s another story. But it is always focused on the world-to-come.

Christians are supposed to subscribe to a particular set of beliefs and state them publicly (the aforementioned Credo, which starts: I believe in God, the Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth; and in Jesus Christ his only son, our Lord, who . . ." etc, etc). That’s the reason fundies in the US keep going on about their personal relationship with Jesus.

Jews, on the other hand, don’t go around talking about their relationship with God. They are supposed to ACT a certain way. There are around 600 separate commandments (mitzvot) if one is Orthodox; fewer that are considered necessary if one is Conservative or Reform. But it all comes down to how one behaves in this world. Quite obviously, free will is an essential component.

I like that, frankly, because between "grace" and "good works" I always come down on the side of good works, because that is something a person actually has control over. To me, "grace" is like a butterfly that comes unbidden, but doing good is always within our grasp.

That’s all I have to contribute.

Hekate

[trotsky]

5. Not just angels, but heaven in general.

Does ANYONE have free will in heaven? We are told time and time again that the reason there is suffering (or "evil") on earth is because it's the price we pay for god's precious gift of free will. You can't have free will without giving people the ability to harm each other, we're told.

So, do we have free will in heaven? Because there's no suffering in heaven (otherwise it wouldn't be much of a paradise, now would it?), if there is free will, then the axiom has just been broken. It is possible to have free will and yet not suffer. In that case, why didn't god just create heaven, and be done with it? His precious creations would have their free will and never suffer!

The only other way out is to say that no, there is no free will in heaven, that we all just praise god 24/7 for all eternity. But again, that doesn't sound like much of a paradise.

[Evoman]

9. Good point

That's a really good point. If a good christian man is capable of sinning on Earth (for example, maybe he has sexual thoughts about his wife's sister or he cheats on her), why, all of a sudden, does he no longer sin when he goes to heaven. What is stopping a murderer who has redemption and entered heaven from stabbing another person in heaven out of anger? What is stopping anybody in heaven from getting angry or jealous? Free wiil gone? Or is it that being so close to god makes you give up those things and we do still have free will (which begs the question...why didn't that help the angels). If we have free will in heaven but don't feel the need to be angry or jealous or hateful.....well, why didn't god just do that on Earth. Why not give us free will but still not the capacity for evil. If god hadn't created evil, then we could use our free will to choose between having hugging our friends or kissing them.

Evoman

[Dorian Gray]

7. I believe that they are believed

to have Free Will. Of course. I don't think Dogma is the arbiter of Christian Theology. (Though it's a fun movie!) :)

[sutz12]

8. There is one story I heard.....

I think it came from one of the Joe Campbell tapes, and I believe it came from Islam.

Anyway, in the story Satan (Lucifer) was one of the principle angels. When God created man, he instructed the angels to serve man. Satan refused, saying that he could only serve God, not man. That was why he was cast down.

So, does this exhibit free will by Satan, thus leading to his demise?

Did God entrap Satan, intending him to be cast down so that he would have an evil counterpart to provide mankind with a moral choice between the two? Presumably, without Satan, the world would be completely good; there would be no evil. By extension, from the 10 Commandments, Satan had a similar commandment to "Have no God before me," which would preclude him serving someone other than God. Did God change the rules in mid stream?

Is this merely a corrolary to the Garden of Eden story (which doesn't really mention Satan by name)? One could say that God, through the serpent, entrapped Eve and Adam by providing a temptation greater than they were prepared to resist.

Religion is always about paradox. Believers are asked to 'look beyond' (ignore, to a rationalist) their senses and have faith in something that is not of this physical world, and which is inherently non-provable, and by definition, non-rational (one could say irrational, but that would be an insult, I suppose ).

And, of course, as in all good religious debate, one is always left with more questions than answers. :)