'God v Aliens' - what a great B movie title!

CS Lewis has a great essay on this subject (God vs. aliens), though he doesn't address the 'greatness' issue specifically and he takes the opposite position from what you're looking for. Might be worth looking at to see what points might be involved in the discussion.

Steve W said:

Hi,

Okay, it's not the sequel to that 50s classic 'Earth against the Flying Saucers', but, please stick with it.
This is regarding an argument in my WIP:

As the Bible says Man is God's greatest creation, would the existence of aliens prove damaging to Christianity? Obviously I'm not talking about alien mircobes or bugs, but aliens that are mentally and physically superiour to humans. Could such existence cast doubt on there being a God, or a God as we know it, by showing His 'greatest creation' is inferior to the aliens, therefore, He can't be all powerful/knowing, etc? I know this might be difficult, but I'm not looking for proof of God, or how aliens could exist without any detriment to His word, etc, but the opposite -- how to argue that such alien life would impact adversely on Christianity. (I don't know enough about the subject to know if the argument I've used is sound enough.)

Hope that makes sense.

Thanks for your time.
Cheers,
Steve

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LOL!!! Nope, not me. I don't care how many aliens are out there, Jesus is still my God and I'll believe in Him no matter what's out there. And I think you need to understand why Christians believe in Christ. We believe b/c He confirms Himself to us everyday. It's like He says, Yes, I'm here for you. We believe in Him b/c He loved us first. So, no alien life would not have an impact on Christians. I think you need to have a better understanding of what Christianity is and why we believe in what we believe. But please, feel free to ask questions. You can PM if that makes you more comfortable.

kim

There was some thread where this subject was tossed around.....sorry, can't think of the thread at the moment.

Some christians believe that "aliens" are, in fact, fallen angels that rebelled with Lucifer. They were cast out of heaven and became the devil and demons.

Humans greatness is not in our physical/mental abilities but rather the fact that we are made in God's image. Also, we are His beloved, where He has placed his affections. The scriptures say, "In our (human) weakness, He (Jesus) is made strong. God reveals Jesus and Himself through humans to the heavenly beings (Ephesians, I think). God reveals Himself to humans through Jesus and nature.

According to scriptures, there is, in fact, a spiritual war that is going on since the day of the rebellion of Lucifer and the rebelling angels.

If "aliens" are fallen angels/demons, it is clear that God/Jesus/christians are in a constant state of warfare. Until Jesus comes back, that is the status quo.

what is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?

You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.

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So where in there does it say that man is God's greatest creation? Or anywhere else in the Bible? Maybe I'm just forgetful...

Caveat: I am NO Bible scholar. However, I think that "man is God's greatest creation" was extrapolation fro the Genesis story. God made Man last, in God's image, and said Man would rule over the beasts etc.

IMO, why wouldn't aliens exist? I think it's more farfetched to see all the galaxies and assume we're the only sentient beings God created.

And that doesn't mess with my faith. I believe God shows Himself to people in a context we can understand. So Jesus is my context, the Morrighan is another context, Zeus is yet another.

I heard a great comedian say that taking the Genesis story at face value, god created Man at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon, and nobody does their best work that late on a Friday.

I'm rambling...

callalily61 said:

Caveat: I am NO Bible scholar. However, I think that "man is God's greatest creation" was extrapolation fro the Genesis story. God made Man last, in God's image, and said Man would rule over the beasts etc.

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Which is more or less my point. The passage I cited makes it pretty clear that man is NOT the greatest of God's creation, even without resorting to aliens. Extrapolations and theological cogitations are not what the Bible says, but what people have decided they think it means. Many curious doctrines have been concocted this way, some very popular in some very large denominations.

The existence of aliens would not, in and of itself, shake my faith. I suggest that Steve W read C.S. Lewis' science fiction trilogy, chock full of both faith and aliens.

Dancre said:

LOL!!! Nope, not me. I don't care how many aliens are out there, Jesus is still my God and I'll believe in Him no matter what's out there.

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i dont understand.

jesus is your god but he wouldnt/couldnt be god for the aliens?

that sounds like polytheism.

I probably shouldn't this early in the morning, but I'll chime in with my personal opinion.

God is God, in my belief the only God. If aliens do exist, He created them and He's their God as well (though he most likely gave them free will as he did us, so their belief of Him is also up to them as it is up to us.)

I have no problem as a Christian believing aliens might be out there. I also have no problem believing they very well may not be out there. I think if it were important to our faith, He would have mentioned them. The fact that He didn't doesn't mean they might not be out there.

Do I think for even one second that aliens could exist without God having created them? No. But that's just my belief. Your mileage may vary.

MidnightMuse said:

I probably shouldn't this early in the morning, but I'll chime in with my personal opinion.

God is God, in my belief the only God. If aliens do exist, He created them and He's their God as well (though he most likely gave them free will as he did us, so their belief of Him is also up to them as it is up to us.)

I have no problem as a Christian believing aliens might be out there. I also have no problem believing they very well may not be out there. I think if it were important to our faith, He would have mentioned them. The fact that He didn't doesn't mean they might not be out there.

Do I think for even one second that aliens could exist without God having created them? No. But that's just my belief. Your mileage may vary.

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Agreed. I just hope that in Heaven we get the answers to all these mysteries.

Here's a fun thought. What if we meet aliens and they are all astonished because we are NOT unanimous in believing in God? What if we're the oddballs in the universe, with our atheists, polytheists, agnostics?

I'm pretty sure we ARE the oddballs !

Quote:
what is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?

You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor.

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So where in there does it say that man is God's greatest creation? Or anywhere else in the Bible? Maybe I'm just forgetful...

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The Bible actually says multiple things about man--that we're created in the image of God, and so the highest order of creation, but also that we're an unbelievably fallen, sorry bunch of creatures (who God happens to love, passionately). So it depends what passage you quote, but both can be supported, as both are true.

C.S.Lewis, Tolkien, and others often speculated about the possibility of life on other planets. I don't see the possibility as necessarily challenging to my faith in any way. I enjoyed Lewis' space trilogy almost as much as the Narnia tales. God is certainly bigger than our sense of space and time, so anything's possible. I do think, though I may be wrong, that if He'd created any other being in His image we'd know about it...and therefore, my instincts tell me that we're His highest order of creation. If aliens are discovered and they turn out to be smarter than us, it wouldn't change that opinion. After all, dolphins are said to be smarter as well.

God created the Universe and everything in it, so I'm told. That would include aliens, nematoads and brussel sprouts.

I believe, according to the Book of Phobias, Chapter 2 vs 4: Ye and verily I say unto you, Satan invented brussel sprouts.

Ok, on the original question -- what exactly are you asking, Steve? It sounds like you want a character to make the argument that the existence of aliens throws doubt on Christian teaching about God -- yes, no?

Remember what "aliens" were for most of human history? Just other humans from other lands. Not that everyone agreed on that point -- even today people categorize some aliens as less human than themselves.

As our Judaism and Christianity arose, so did the multiple religious experiences of peoples all over the globe who had never heard of our faith. As Christianity was designed to spread, it has always been assumed that Christ gave himself for all people of all origins. If another race of beings equally gifted with souls comes along (e.g. from another planet) one can assume a common definition of humanity and salvation between us, without any more than the usual conflicts of tradition between our pre-existing religions and bigotries.

I'm very skeptical of the belief in intelligent beings on other planets evolving by chance -- not out of arrogance or anything like that, it's just that I can't review all the qualifications for life surviving on this planet, added together with the survival of humans, and believe it's terribly common according to everything else I read about the known cosmos. There's too much working against that chance, even with billions of star systems to give it a try. However, even if it's unlikely, it's ridiculous to say it's scientifically impossible -- it's already happened once, so it could happen elsewhere. For the purposes of exploring Christianity through science fiction, it's well worth wondering how our society would approach those questions if proof of other intelligences stared them in the face.

MidnightMuse said:

I believe, according to the Book of Phobias, Chapter 2 vs 4: Ye and verily I say unto you, Satan invented brussel sprouts.

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Yes, and HMO's.

Judg said:

So where in there does it say that man is God's greatest creation? Or anywhere else in the Bible? Maybe I'm just forgetful...

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Beat me to it.

AnnieColleen said:

Ok, on the original question -- what exactly are you asking, Steve? It sounds like you want a character to make the argument that the existence of aliens throws doubt on Christian teaching about God -- yes, no?

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i think the existence of aliens would be entirely contradictory to christianity because of what i brought up earlier.

jesus couldnt be their god because he died for man's sins, and was supposed to be the perfect example of a human.

so if he's not their god, then how can he be on the same level as god the father who would be their god?

Genesis tells of the world's beginning.

Revelations tells of the world's end.

Thus do we mistakenly believe that all aspects of physical existence are explained in the Bible: if it ain't in there, it ain't real. Aliens aren't mentioned in the Bible, so they must not exist. Right???

The fact that Bible frequently speaks in both superlatives and absolutes doesn't help any.

One of those pesky absolutes in the Bible is Romans 8:22 which says "All the creation groans." This implies that the ENTIRE UNIVERSE (all the galaxies, etc) have fallen under the curse of Adam's sin.

Did it?

I don't know.

Lewis' Planet Trilogy overtly puts forth the possibility that the sin of Adam only impacted the planet Earth, and that the other planets (Mars and Venus, etc) each stand on their own before God, to either succeed where we failed, or to likewise fall just as we fell.

Tolkien's Elves were supposed to be a non-fallen race, and were his ideal model of what humanity could have/should have been had we never fallen.

Are there other races out there in the cosmos? Are they impacted by Adam's sin?

I think the very fact that the angels (part of God's creation) have not been impacted by Adam's sin suggests such a possibility is valid. Evidently, only that which was put under the headship of Adam (the Earth and everything in it, which he was commanded to subdue) was impacted. This suggests that anything lying beyond the Earth never fell under Adamic subjugation, and therefore suffers no Adamic sin-imapct.




My own feeling is, aliens probably do exist. If they're out there, who cares? To say that a first contact tomorrow would be proof positive that God doesn't exist is about as ludicrous and non-logical as saying a jug of sour milk in my refrigerator is proof positive that cows are useless creatures.

kdnxdr said:

Some christians believe that "aliens" are, in fact, fallen angels that rebelled with Lucifer. They were cast out of heaven and became the devil and demons.

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There are dozens of variations on this possibility. I did a lot of web research last year about it. It's amazing and disturbing to read some of the many and varied concepts out there on the lunatic fringes of Chritianity concerning this infamous alien/angel connection.

Bravo said:

i think the existence of aliens would be entirely contradictory to christianity because of what i brought up earlier.

jesus couldnt be their god because he died for man's sins, and was supposed to be the perfect example of a human.

so if he's not their god, then how can he be on the same level as god the father who would be their god?

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Are you saying only humans here on this planet can know Jesus? He was the "second Adam" and the therefore exclusive gift to this planet (the fallen world of Adam)?

I think that washes only up to a point. The smiling guy with the brown hair and beard, and walking around in Galillee with sandals telling clever stories and healing people was exclusively sent to this planet to redeem this planet's people. But the Word who was with God in the beginning is still God. He's the Third Person, he's very much God, and if he created the Heavens and the Earth, then he is indisputablly the God of all non-Terrans also.

Plot Device said:

Are you saying only humans here on this planet can know Jesus? He was the "second Adam" and the therefore exclusive gift to this planet (the fallen world of Adam)?

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based on christian theology, yes.

I think that washes only up to a point. The smiling guy with the brown hair and beard, and walking around in Galillee with sandals telling clever stories and healing people was exclusively sent to this planet to redeem this planet's people.

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it would be hard for alien beings to relate to such a guy...

But the Word who was with God in the beginning is still God. He's the Third Person, he's very much God, and if he created the Heavens and the Earth, then he is indisputablly the God of all non-Terrans also.

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.....

so the word is jesus which means that jesus also sacrificed his life for alien beings?

is that correct?

Plot Device said:

I think the very fact that the angels (part of God's creation) have not been impacted by Adam's sin suggests such a possibility is valid. Evidently, only that which was put under the headship of Adam (the Earth and everything in it, which he was commanded to subdue) was impacted. This suggests that anything lying beyond the Earth never fell under Adamic subjugation, and therefore suffers no Adamic sin-imapct.

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Angels may not have been 'impacted by Adam's sin' but they are free-will creatures who are capable of choosing to rebel (sin), as evidenced by the story of Lucifer. So theoretically aliens existing elsewhere could be in that freewill pre-Adamic state, still capable of choosing sin (if they haven't yet). But on the other hand, they could be just like lower creature forms, incapable of moral choices, and therefore the whole 'sin' issue is moot.