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It very well could be exactly the same action. One human killing another. It's the motive that makes one wrong and not the other, right? No, it's the entire point. It's the most important point. Motive is everything. Mind you, I'm referring to culpability for sin, not just a "wrong...

As I suspected, this is mostly just a difference of semantics. I think we're on the same page. There's a difference between a rational being and being rational. Correct? I've been advocating from the latter perspective and you, the former.

It's very much like the faith vs works argument. James says that works are the proof of faith. If you have true faith, works will follow. But works without faith is dead. Actions come from the heart.

Oops, I didn't mean to post that yet! Continuing on.... Thought experiment: If, after eating the fruit, Eve had disguised the fruit and tricked Adam into eating it (maybe she mixed it in with some other frutits or berries), would Adam be culpable? I don't thnk so. Even though technically, he...

I don't disagree with anything here. However, I do believe all sin comes from the heart. The actions that spring forth form the heart are the evidence. That's the difference between cold-blooded murder and self-defense manslaughter. It's the same action but with different motives. Same is...

I agree that we're very close. And I see that we keep unintentionally misrepresenting each other's positions and/or statements. So it's just a matter of finding the harmony. Let's try this.... Would you agree that there are not different types of reason, but rather we are able to access and...

Well, if everything was perfect, there would have never been sin, or rebellion, or disobedience of any kind. A finite being with freewill can't be perfect, IMO. God made the creation "perfect" for its intended purpose, but not perfect in the absolute sense. "Very good" simply means it was...

I think you and I are in total agreement on this part. Adam and Eve had every bit of ability they required to make the right choice. And they chose wrong. Eve, because she was deceived. Adam, for other undisclosed reasons (See 1 Tim 2:14). It wasn't because they lacked reasoning skills or...

Are you saying that it's impossible to mix poor reasoning with good reasoning? It has to be all or nothing? If you could break our thinking down into tiny incremental tidbits, maybe you could say each tidbit is either 100% reason or 0% reason, but I'm not even sure that is accurate. Even so...

"Very good" is not the same thing as perfect. Would you disagree? That raises even bigger issues if Adam and Eve were perfect, not to mention all of creation.

This is true. And also, if we apply substandard reasoning to a perfect premise, we get a faulty result. It works both ways. Imperfect reasoning isn't the only way we get into trouble, but it's not uncommon. That's what happens when we're duped or tricked into doing dumb things, like signing...

It seems that you and I don't define reason the same way. It appears that you believe someone either has reason or he doesn't have reason. Black or white. On or off. Binary. Only two possibilities. Please correct me if that is not your view. Rather, I believe that reasoning ability is on...

I'm not sure which statements of mine you're arguing against here. I haven't ever claimed that "reason doesn't work" or that "logic doesn't apply to God". God's reason/logic is supreme. I've always maintained that. It's mankind who has a limitation on his own reasoning abilites. God has no...

Right. My point was simply that we don't apply faulty reasoning intentionally. It's often because we are limited in knowledge and understanding that makes our reasoning faulty. But poor reasoning certainly doesn't justify disobedience. We must base our reasoning on our perceptions, IMO...

But isn't that the exact danger we live with every day? We all have the freedom to apply faulty reasoning. And it's never on purpose. God told Eve not to eat the fruit, whether she understood why or not. Her sin was not her lack of reason. It was disobedience. Our lesser reasoning does not...

Your essay is well-written. I have several thoughts and questions regarding your starting point and conclusions that would probably be better suited for another thread. But I'll try to address the points directly relevant to this discussion here. This is a tough one to sort out because there...

This was simply a list I compiled of scattered claims quoted by folks in this thread, albeit paraphrased. And my point is really no more than that these are ideas which are not explicitly stated in the Bible. Therefore, they require extra formulation of thought and reason in order to get from...

I agree that we need a more concise term. Even "Calvinist" or Augustinian" is problematic as they both inherently imply more than is likely accurate about a lot of believers in God's total omniscience. I myself believed it for many years but I was never a Calvinist nor an Augustinian. In...

My bad. That's me being sloppy. I probably should have used the term "presumption" rather than "assumption". I didn't mean to imply these claims had no merit whatsoever -- just that they aren't stated per se in the Bible.

Right. Good points. And another question that arises is whether or not this is a special circumstance. After all, it was God who initiated the entire series of events. So was He paying particular attention to Satan's actions regarding Job only because of the "deal" He made with Satan? Or is...