this post was submitted on 18 Apr 2026
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No Stupid Questions

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[–] RoddyStiggs@lemmy.blahaj.zone 50 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Because god is a delusion used as a means of social control and as an excuse for violence.

[–] OldChicoAle@lemmy.world 30 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I was raised Hindu and omg this is so evident. Dharma and karma are essential in the faith. Dharma outlines your roles and responsibilities in life. Basically, you're born poor because of your past karma. You deserve to be poor. So don't overstep your boundaries and stay in your lane. And let the rich and powerful walk all over you because they are more deserving.

Man, amazing how a lot of religions align with letting the rich be douchebags.

[–] Atomic@sh.itjust.works 13 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

I'm not religious. But I'm pretty sure they would say that we are created in his image.

So, if we have emotions. I don't think it's beyond reason that god might have them as well.

And holy shit these comments are insufferable. This isnt about your personal vendetta against religion, just answer the god damn question.

[–] LapGoat@pawb.social 5 points 4 days ago (1 children)

tbf in most cases with personal vendettas against religion, the religion started it...

[–] Atomic@sh.itjust.works 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Maybe, I don't know. But that doesn't excuse people taking it out on this guy for just asking a simple question.

It's called "no stupid questions". I always thought that also means "no stupid answers"

[–] LapGoat@pawb.social 2 points 4 days ago

idk if we can expect people to not be stupid sometimes, thats just how we are.

thats why we get our lil votes and such, yes?

[–] Pat_Riot@lemmy.today 48 points 6 days ago (2 children)

God has emotions because it is created in man's image. It's pure projection sold through propaganda to keep the weak, scared, and stupid under the thumb of the kind of men who wish to rule.

[–] Dran_Arcana@lemmy.world 13 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Less cynically, I believe the argument in scripture is the inverse. Man was created in god's image therefore we probably inherited a lot of properties of the devine.

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If a deity like the Judeo Christian god is real, the reason they have emotion is we have emotion so early people would tie their emotions to them and think they have it as well. Something bad happens and it has to be god being angry and punishing them, because that was the only explanation they had.

[–] Multiplexer@discuss.tchncs.de 26 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Starts with:
"Not to get into a debate."

Continues with:
" If God is so omnipotent"...

🤪

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[–] mech@feddit.org 11 points 5 days ago

Any omnipotent being must be capable of feeling emotions, otherwise that would be a thing they can't do, making them not omnipotent.

[–] Yawweee877h444@lemmy.world 22 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Because it's nonsense created by humans. Humans came up with these stories, of course they anthropomorphized their deity.

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[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 20 points 6 days ago (10 children)

So first, asking religious questions on the Fediverse is a fool's errand, but that aside: Why not? Hell, if anything it'd be the other way around: An all-powerful being without emotion wouldn't create anything, because they wouldn't gain anything from doing so. Any creation by an omnipotent being would have to be an emotional affair.

[–] StoneyPicton@lemmy.ca 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Maybe it was boredom. I mean, when effortlessly power everything sometimes you just need a break.

[–] riskable@programming.dev 7 points 6 days ago

Boredom is an emotion. As is hunger.

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[–] nutbutter@discuss.tchncs.de 20 points 6 days ago (3 children)
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[–] Jankatarch@lemmy.world 6 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

The main idea is that books like Bible and Quran were sent to humanity so they are made for humans of the time.

The "anger" isn't supposed to be a literal anger, just how humans identify what happened.

For example most verses about wrath follow with curse or punishment etc, so maybe "wrath" is just what humans call it when God curses or punishes people; and it's not a literal feeling of anger.

There was a similar debate with how some verses say God heard/saw "humans were doing [insert thing]..." etc in the books.

Less relevant info.Also in the case of Islam for example, different branches and even sects have different popular interpretations.

I know one Sufi theologist saying "All creatures were made to reflect God's light" so they might call it "What our own emotions were modeled after, and are distorted versions of?"

Then there is Ahl al-Ra'y (Mainly followers of Maturidism today) who see Hadith as "uncredible" so they usually have slightly different views on most stuff. But I am not religious enough to learn theology that far.

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 1 points 4 days ago

I know one Sufi theologist saying "All creatures were made to reflect God's light" so they might call it "What our own emotions were modeled after, and are distorted versions of?"

This is (unsurprisingly, since Islam is an Abramic faith, also further descended from ancient Sumerian religion) very similar to "the shattering of the vessels" in certain sects of Judaism. And incidentally, I agree with it.

[–] AngryRedHerring@lemmy.world 5 points 5 days ago

Or vanity. "I'm gonna need y'all to show up once a week to tell me how awesome I am"

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 16 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

All written accounts of God are produced by humans for an audience of other humans.

In the same way that we might describe a storm cloud as "angry" or a sunny day as "cheerful", one might apply emotional descriptors to an omnipotent divine force in order to personify an impersonal and abstract entity.

Past that, assuming you believe that a divine being is above humanity, why wouldn't they have emotions? Emotions are a feature of sentience and God is supposed to be a super-sentient creature. If anything, it would experience these emotions more intensely and intricately than its creations. The human rage of a shout or the despair of a cry becomes the earth-splitting eruption of a volcano or the suffocating deluge of a flood.

At the same time, it is the overwhelming longing for companionship that drives a God to form life from the void of space. The intense joy in the creative act leads this fundamental superhuman force to tirelessly build an entire universe. The deep and profound pride and love which brings them among their creations clothed in their own form, willing to endure the humiliation of this avatar form in order to enlighten and elevate their divine progeny to their own level.

Absent these primal emotional urges, why would a God choose to be a God at all, and not simply languish within the darkness for eternity, content to the echoing silence of dead space?

[–] bufalo1973@piefed.social 7 points 5 days ago

Which of the 3000 gods are you referring to?

[–] Cornpop@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago

Because we created god in our image

[–] itisileclerk@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

To be omnipotent first need to exist. If don't exist then anything after is nonsense, therefore can be portrayed as wild as author's imagination is.

[–] Rivermoonwolf@lemmy.world 11 points 6 days ago (3 children)

As St George the Carlin asked, if God is all powerful, why does he need money?

[–] AngryRedHerring@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago

"If God is all-powerful, can he make a rock so heavy even he can't lift it?"

The Class Clown album was the beginning of the end of my Catholicism

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 1 points 4 days ago

G-d doesn't. G-d's creatures do. This is a means of distribution.

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[–] BuboScandiacus@mander.xyz 4 points 5 days ago

Because it’s God’s nature? Sorry, but this seems like a pretty weak gotcha. The “Can God create a stone that he himself cannot lift?” is much better. This one is like asking “Why, if electrons present particle characteristics, do we don’t know (precisely) where an electron is at any given time?”. It’s just their nature, there is no reason behind it.

[–] Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (9 children)

Or maybe it's the other way round: We have emotions because God has emotions (not to get into a debate)

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[–] BladeFederation@piefed.social 7 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Having power over somebody does not exclude you from having emotions. Superman is nearly invincible and a great guy who always does the right thing; but his feelings can still get hurt if people are mean to him, and he still gets angry when people are cruel to each other, such as a human murdering another human. God would be above a superhero, but the same principle applies.

If you are God, the point of creating humanity is because you're alone, and want to love and be loved. If you spent a lot of time and effort to raise your kids and they grew up to hate you for no discernible reason and did terrible things just to act the opposite of how you raised them to be, you'd be pissed too. Do I have "power" over my kids? I guess. I'm bigger than them and even if they're adults, you can always pull out a .22 and shoot them if they don't obey. But that doesn't solve anything and it's not very loving is it? I want to raise my kids to do the right thing simply because it is the right thing to do, but also because it benefits us all to act that way reliably, and makes us all happier.

If everyone obeys God just because they have to fall in line or die/be directly punished every time, that defeats the point of making humanity because they won't love you. Yet maybe it would be necessary to step in if they're harmful enough to the rest of humanity, hence the smiting. But most religions have an idea that God is trying to move us past the point where he has to step in, or has already stepped back permanently. Maybe God punishes evil after death to facilitate us getting our act together. Or perhaps he simply rewards the good and doesn't reward the evil. Maybe he experimented a little in the past as to what actually works. Maybe he knew he was justified to punish evil, but didn't realize the toll it would take on him by hurting your own children until it happened, and that's why he doesn't do it anymore.

Don't @ me in the comments criticizing some specific version of God you have in your head. There's a million different religions that say a million different things. This is theoretical, answering OP's question.

God does not exist - and even if they do exist, they have about as much consideration for the human race as we as a species have for paramecium

[–] Stamau123@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago

Sounds like you want God how they're portrayed in Druze: The Druze conception of the deity is declared by them to be one of strict and uncompromising unity. The main Druze doctrine states that God is both transcendent and immanent, in which he is above all attributes, but at the same time, he is present.[188]

In their desire to maintain a rigid confession of unity, they stripped from God all attributes (tanzīh). In God, there are no attributes distinct from his essence. He is wise, mighty, and just, not by wisdom, might, and justice, but by his own essence. God is "the whole of existence", rather than merely "above existence" or on his throne, which would make him "limited". There is neither "how", "when", nor "where" about him; in this way, he is incomprehensible.

[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 5 days ago

Don't forget jealousy!

[–] Apytele@sh.itjust.works 3 points 5 days ago

Humans anthropomorphize pretty much everything around us with varying levels of accuracy. I'm fairly certain that my dog and cat feel anger and love in a very similar way to the way I do. I'm pretty sure plants really don't, but they might a little bit more than a storm cloud. However you apply that to your spirituality or your perception of that of others is going to be a highly personal experience for you.

[–] Triumph@fedia.io 6 points 6 days ago

Humans really want to have a reason for things. Any reason, even one that's wrong, is better than no reason. Some things have reasons that are only discoverable after centuries of investigation, but we demands reasons now.

[–] Strider@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago

Religion does not and never made any logical sense.

(this does not mean it does not have any / also positive use for societies)

[–] adespoton@lemmy.ca 5 points 6 days ago

Well, the obvious answer is: if God is so much greater than humans, how would we know? If you’re talking about the Hebrew god from the Christian Bible / Jewish Scriptures, you’re seeing the depiction of God as told through the lens of humans, who often try to be telling other humans about god using the limited vocabulary and imagery available.

God is depicted as being powerful enough that a human not being fully aligned with God but being in God’s presence would lead to annihilation, just like a human approaching the sun would be destroyed — not because the sun was angry, just because of its nature compared to ours.

On the flip side of that, for the biblical God, humans are made in God’s image, which means the species as a whole would reflect God’s character (including the bit about wanting to be the ones fully in control).

[–] scarabic@lemmy.world 4 points 6 days ago

Aren’t we as humans proving every year that goes by, that no matter how much power and knowledge you amass, you can still be an evil, childish, asshole? God is just a little further along that dotted line. He’s got all the power and knowledge. This doesn’t make him mature or good.

[–] IchNichtenLichten@lemmy.wtf 4 points 6 days ago

It's a little like when a mediocre screenwriter tries to write a character who is supposedly a genius.

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