Yikes, sky dad...morals are absolute, though

[IsaacNewton]

He created mankind and then after a few thousands years saw that they were all wicked so he drown every man woman and child except one family who then had incestual sex to repopulate the Earth with righteous people who then became wicked as the people that were drown.

This whole story sounds like something you'd do in a bad video game if you were terrible at video games.

Or a story about an actual event that was passed down for 1000's of years.

You do realize it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses recorded it, right? The account of the tower of babel - which was an allegorical account of the great migration from the cradle of civilization - explains how it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses penned it.

Every civilization in history has a 'flood' story. Know why? Floods have happened for billions of years, are happening now, and will continue happening until the sun swallows the Earth. You have a need to believe in magic and a surrogate sky dad who will make it all better. Good for you if that is what gets you through life, just stop this nonsense of trying to push your delusions out onto the rest of us. Believe what you want and just leave it at that. You are an atheist when it comes to the 3,999 gods that people believe in that you don't believe in. Relax and just kneel like they do to their respective 'god's' and be happy with just that.

 

[ding]

He created mankind and then after a few thousands years saw that they were all wicked so he drown every man woman and child except one family who then had incestual sex to repopulate the Earth with righteous people who then became wicked as the people that were drown.

This whole story sounds like something you'd do in a bad video game if you were terrible at video games.

Or a story about an actual event that was passed down for 1000's of years.

You do realize it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses recorded it, right? The account of the tower of babel - which was an allegorical account of the great migration from the cradle of civilization - explains how it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses penned it.

Every civilization in history has a 'flood' story. Know why? Floods have happened for billions of years, are happening now, and will continue happening until the sun swallows the Earth. You have a need to believe in magic and a surrogate sky dad who will make it all better. Good for you if that is what gets you through life, just stop this nonsense of trying to push your delusions out onto the rest of us. Believe what you want and just leave it at that. You are an atheist when it comes to the 3,999 gods that people believe in that you don't believe in. Relax and just kneel like they do to their respective 'god's' and be happy with just that.

C.S. Lewis responds:

If you are a Christian you do not have to believe that all the other religions are
simply wrong all through. If you are an atheist you do have to believe that the
main point in all the religions of the whole world is simply one huge mistake.
If you are a Christian, you are free to think that all these religions, even the
queerest ones, contain at least some hint of the truth. When I was an atheist
I had to try to persuade myself that most of the human race have always
been wrong about the question that mattered to them most; when I became a
Christian I was able to take a more liberal view. But, of course, being a Christian
does mean thinking that where Christianity differs from other religions,
Christianity is right and they are wrong. As in arithmetic — there is only one
right answer to a sum, and all other answers are wrong: but some of the wrong
answers are much nearer being right than others.

 

[IsaacNewton]

He created mankind and then after a few thousands years saw that they were all wicked so he drown every man woman and child except one family who then had incestual sex to repopulate the Earth with righteous people who then became wicked as the people that were drown.

This whole story sounds like something you'd do in a bad video game if you were terrible at video games.

Or a story about an actual event that was passed down for 1000's of years.

You do realize it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses recorded it, right? The account of the tower of babel - which was an allegorical account of the great migration from the cradle of civilization - explains how it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses penned it.

Every civilization in history has a 'flood' story. Know why? Floods have happened for billions of years, are happening now, and will continue happening until the sun swallows the Earth. You have a need to believe in magic and a surrogate sky dad who will make it all better. Good for you if that is what gets you through life, just stop this nonsense of trying to push your delusions out onto the rest of us. Believe what you want and just leave it at that. You are an atheist when it comes to the 3,999 gods that people believe in that you don't believe in. Relax and just kneel like they do to their respective 'god's' and be happy with just that.

C.S. Lewis responds:

If you are a Christian you do not have to believe that all the other religions are
simply wrong all through. If you are an atheist you do have to believe that the
main point in all the religions of the whole world is simply one huge mistake.
If you are a Christian, you are free to think that all these religions, even the
queerest ones, contain at least some hint of the truth. When I was an atheist
I had to try to persuade myself that most of the human race have always
been wrong about the question that mattered to them most; when I became a
Christian I was able to take a more liberal view. But, of course, being a Christian
does mean thinking that where Christianity differs from other religions,
Christianity is right and they are wrong. As in arithmetic — there is only one
right answer to a sum, and all other answers are wrong: but some of the wrong
answers are much nearer being right than others.

You have no reason better than any other person why your 'god' is any more real than all the others. And all the faux rationalizations regarding your 'god' won't change that. The Flying Spaghetti Monster demands your obedience. You don't believe in him? But...........what if you're wrong.

 

[ding]

He created mankind and then after a few thousands years saw that they were all wicked so he drown every man woman and child except one family who then had incestual sex to repopulate the Earth with righteous people who then became wicked as the people that were drown.

This whole story sounds like something you'd do in a bad video game if you were terrible at video games.

Or a story about an actual event that was passed down for 1000's of years.

You do realize it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses recorded it, right? The account of the tower of babel - which was an allegorical account of the great migration from the cradle of civilization - explains how it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses penned it.

Every civilization in history has a 'flood' story. Know why? Floods have happened for billions of years, are happening now, and will continue happening until the sun swallows the Earth. You have a need to believe in magic and a surrogate sky dad who will make it all better. Good for you if that is what gets you through life, just stop this nonsense of trying to push your delusions out onto the rest of us. Believe what you want and just leave it at that. You are an atheist when it comes to the 3,999 gods that people believe in that you don't believe in. Relax and just kneel like they do to their respective 'god's' and be happy with just that.

You are proving my point. Every major civilization that existed in antiquity had an account of a major flood. It just so happens that the account of the Chinese matches perfectly with the account of Genesis and was captured 1500 years before Moses recorded it. Do you know why? Because they migrated from Mesopotamia to China and shared common beliefs with the Jews before they migrated which was explained in the Bible in the account of the great migration (aka Tower of Babel).

The Original ‘Unknown’ God of China

 

[ding]

He created mankind and then after a few thousands years saw that they were all wicked so he drown every man woman and child except one family who then had incestual sex to repopulate the Earth with righteous people who then became wicked as the people that were drown.

This whole story sounds like something you'd do in a bad video game if you were terrible at video games.

Or a story about an actual event that was passed down for 1000's of years.

You do realize it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses recorded it, right? The account of the tower of babel - which was an allegorical account of the great migration from the cradle of civilization - explains how it was captured as symbols in the Chinese language 1500 years before Moses penned it.

Every civilization in history has a 'flood' story. Know why? Floods have happened for billions of years, are happening now, and will continue happening until the sun swallows the Earth. You have a need to believe in magic and a surrogate sky dad who will make it all better. Good for you if that is what gets you through life, just stop this nonsense of trying to push your delusions out onto the rest of us. Believe what you want and just leave it at that. You are an atheist when it comes to the 3,999 gods that people believe in that you don't believe in. Relax and just kneel like they do to their respective 'god's' and be happy with just that.

C.S. Lewis responds:

If you are a Christian you do not have to believe that all the other religions are
simply wrong all through. If you are an atheist you do have to believe that the
main point in all the religions of the whole world is simply one huge mistake.
If you are a Christian, you are free to think that all these religions, even the
queerest ones, contain at least some hint of the truth. When I was an atheist
I had to try to persuade myself that most of the human race have always
been wrong about the question that mattered to them most; when I became a
Christian I was able to take a more liberal view. But, of course, being a Christian
does mean thinking that where Christianity differs from other religions,
Christianity is right and they are wrong. As in arithmetic — there is only one
right answer to a sum, and all other answers are wrong: but some of the wrong
answers are much nearer being right than others.

You have no reason better than any other person why your 'god' is any more real than all the others. And all the faux rationalizations regarding your 'god' won't change that. The Flying Spaghetti Monster demands your obedience. You don't believe in him? But...........what if you're wrong.

That is the argument a child would make. I don't care what you believe. Please believe whatever you want.

 

[norwegen]

 

[norwegen]

 

[norwegen]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

 

[G.T.]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

 

[ding]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.

So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

 

[ding]

JFC TL/DR

Dont worry, it was simple minded sophistry designed to impress the easily impressed minds of dogma dupes. It was glaring logical fallacy after logical fallacy, and cs lewis has been refuted only 6, 842 times but I could be wrong because I lost count.

He was better at fiction.

They actually USE c.s. lewis in philosophy classes to teach examples of irrational thought processes.

He's a historic go-to for fundy religious-types because their brains are already hard wired to jump from effect to cause.....from correlation to causation, and its easily and demonstrably incorrect reasoning.

Here's a decent ass-fucking of one of lewis' many bumbles of dogma:

Fundamentalist Deceit: An American Tradition: C.S. Lewis on thought...

Apparently you believe if you rebut one thing a person says you have rebutted everything a person says. That's not how it works, GT.

But putting that aside you haven't rebutted anything C.S. Lewis has written.

 

[G.T.]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.

So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

Look, dude. If you dont believe in the text, then the discussion is not for you. Not sure why thats so difficult to understand.

Youre arguing with me whether or not the OT is the word of God. That isnt the discussion. I believe none of it is.

This is a chat for folks who believe it.

Go frame your own thread weirdo.

 

[ding]

Dear Mr. GT,

Yes. On my view one must apply something of the same sort of explanation to, say, the atrocities (and treacheries) of Joshua. I see the grave danger we run by doing so; but the dangers of believing in a God whom we cannot but regard as evil, and then, in mere terrified flattery calling Him ‘good’ and worshiping Him, is still greater danger. The ultimate question is whether the doctrine of the goodness of God or that of the inerrancy of Scriptures is to prevail when they conflict. I think the doctrine of the goodness of God is the more certain of the two. Indeed, only that doctrine renders this worship of Him obligatory or even permissible.

To this some will reply ‘ah, but we are fallen and don’t recognize good when we see it.’ But God Himself does not say that we are as fallen as all that. He constantly, in Scripture, appeals to our conscience: ‘Why do ye not of yourselves judge what is right?’ — ‘What fault hath my people found in me?’ And so on. Socrates’ answer to Euthyphro is used in Christian form by Hooker. Things are not good because God commands them; God commands certain things because he sees them to be good. (In other words, the Divine Will is the obedient servant to the Divine Reason.) The opposite view (Ockham’s, Paley’s) leads to an absurdity. If ‘good’ means ‘what God wills’ then to say ‘God is good’ can mean only ‘God wills what he wills.’ Which is equally true of you or me or Judas or Satan.

But of course having said all this, we must apply it with fear and trembling. Some things which seem to us bad may be good. But we must not consult our consciences by trying to feel a thing good when it seems to us totally evil. We can only pray that if there is an invisible goodness hidden in such things, God, in His own good time will enable us to see it. If we need to. For perhaps sometimes God’s answer might be ‘What is that to thee?’ The passage may not be ‘addressed to our (your or my) condition’ at all.

I think we are v. much in agreement, aren’t we?

Yours sincerely, C. S. Lewis

 

[G.T.]

ok AyeCantSeeYou i retract my PM....Hes not stopping on his own I guess and hes deflecting from the OP

 

[ding]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.

So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

Look, dude. If you dont believe in the text, then the discussion is not for you. Not sure why thats so difficult to understand.

Youre arguing with me whether or not the OT is the word of God. That isnt the discussion. I believe none of it is.

This is a chat for folks who believe it.

Go frame your own thread weirdo.

Andrew Menkis responds:

A few nights ago, in the midst of a spirited discussion about faith and morality, my friend made a powerful statement. He said emphatically, “I can’t worship a God who would command his people to go kill all the men, women, and children of another nation.” This is one of the more common objections I hear to Christianity, and I can genuinely sympathize with those who feel this way.

However, the more I think about it, I believe the exact opposite. I don’t believe that I can worship a God who doesn’t command his people to commit genocide. That’s a provocative claim, so before you write me off as a someone who thinks there’s nothing wrong with ethnic cleansing (I don’t!), allow me to explain why I would make such a bold assertion.

God and Genocide in the Bible
God commands Israel’s first king, Saul: “Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” (1 Samuel 15:3).

My first response to this verse is utter repulsion. Not only are women and children to be killed, but the animals are to be brutally slaughtered as well. How can anyone praise and honor such a violent God? It seems to defy our reason and our sense of morality. It is no surprise that many people feel they can’t worship a God who commands these atrocities.

I resonate deeply with this sentiment, and yet I think it rests on a shaky foundation. The objection to worshiping God is based on what we think God should be like. God should be good, loving, kind, merciful, and forgiving. Beneath this objection is the premise that God only deserves our worship and obedience if he possesses the characteristics that we approve of. When we bring this mentality to the Bible, we discover passages that don’t fit into that narrow picture of God. For my friend and for many, that incongruity leads to a rejection of God and the Bible.

A Real God Defies Expectation
As I contemplate the disconnect between our idea of what God should be like and what the Bible tells us God is like, it seems to me that we should expect a difference between the two. If God is a real being, then he is what he is. If God always fit into our notions of what God should be like, that is a sure sign that we created a god of our own imagining.

This is true of all interpersonal relationships. Have you ever had the experience of your ideas or preconceived notions about someone challenged when you interact with them? Every person exists as a distinct and unique individual, and this means that they will at times defy our conception of them. This happens often the first time we meet someone, but it also happens with people we have known for many years. In A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis, noting this phenomenon in his relationship with his wife, aptly says, “All reality is iconoclastic.” Real people have a way of destroying our preconceptions precisely because they are real.

The fact that our notion of God is challenged by the Bible is a sure sign that the God revealed within the pages of Scripture is real. Lewis went on to say, “My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence?" Instead of rejecting God because we don’t like what the Bible reveals about him, we seek to understand more deeply who he is.

A Real God Is Just and Loving
What does a passage like 1 Samuel 15:3 tell us about God? The first thing we have to do to answer this question is to look at the context. Verse four gives us the reason for God’s command, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘I have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt.’” Therefore, God commands Israel to devote the Amalekites to destruction.

Israel is God’s tool used to administer divine justice. In this sense, as one of my seminary professors said, “Israel is not behind the times, they are ahead of the times.” Israel is not barbaric and backward in following God’s command, rather God’s command to destroy the Amalekites prefigures the second coming of Christ at which the final judgment will occur and every human being will be called to account for their lives. 1 Samuel 15:3 tells us that God is a just God who will give everyone what they deserved for their actions.

The God revealed in the Bible is not one dimensional. He is not reducible to the attributes of love or mercy. Any attempt to do so is shattered by reality. God is a righteous, holy, and just God. He does—and in fact, must—punish evil. If this was not the case, I do not believe God would be worthy of worship. We would never praise a judge who chooses to let convicted thieves, murders, and rapists return home without so much as a reprimand. Even if a judge did this in the name of love, we would never be satisfied with the practical realities of having these people living unpunished in our neighborhoods or teaching our children at school. A God who never metes out justice is a God who should be rejected. A God who is both loving and just is a God that is not only worthy of but also demands our worship and obedience.

How Can God be Just and Loving?
The God of the Bible is most fully revealed to us in the person of Christ. As Jesus hung upon the cross, the love, and justice of God came together. Paul expresses this truth in Romans 3:23-26:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Though he was sinless, Christ took on the punishment deserved by sinners. The justice of God is satisfied in his death. As a result, if we place our faith in Christ, God declares us righteous in his sight. On that final judgment day, when all are called to account for their actions, we are sheltered from God’s righteous anger. What an incredibly just, holy, righteous loving, gracious, and merciful God! Is there any other response to this God than worship?

Is God a Genocidal Maniac?

 

[G.T.]

Genocide is okay.


Genesis 7:21-23,
21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died.23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth.Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.

2 Chronicles 13:15-18
15 and the men of Judah raised the battle cry. At the sound of their battle cry, God routed Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah.16 The Israelites fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 Abijah and his troops inflicted heavy losses on them, so that there were five hundred thousand casualties among Israel’s able men.18 The Israelites were subdued on that occasion, and the people of Judah were victorious because they relied on the Lord, the God of their ancestors.



Baby killing? Heads in sand, please.

Exodus 12:29
29 At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstbornin Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well


2 Kings 2:23-24
Elisha Is Jeered
23 From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” 24 He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.

Judges 11:30-39
30 And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord: “If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the Lord’s, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.

32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the Lord gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.

34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of timbrels! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter.35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, “Oh no, my daughter! You have brought me down and I am devastated. I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break.

36 “My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me just as you promised, now that the Lord has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request,” she said. “Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry.”

38 “You may go,” he said. And he let her go for two months. She and her friends went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.



Judges actually has a large number of these abhorrent stories, like God gave someone the power to slaughter 30-men because he lost a bet.


What's to come oh...God will kill a 3rd of mankind(revelations).


The Bible is actually a pretty funny place to derive one's morals. Especially the morals from the Era of Moses but for God, morals are relative to the times and not absolutes




The stuff I've read about how God found fit for women to be treated is outright ridiculous, too. Holy moly!~


And baby torture, condoning rape, stoning, slavery.....dude's a wreck. Morally.

My views on morals more-so align with Sam Harris, not Biblical God. Some of his quotes are as follows:



“If our well-being depends upon the interaction between events in our brains and events in the world, and there are better and worse ways to secure it, then some cultures will tend to produce lives that are more worth living than others; some political persuasions will be more enlightened than others; and some world views will be mistaken in ways that cause needless human misery.”

“Just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim Algebra, we will see that there is no such thing as Christian or Muslim morality.”

“The fact that millions of people use the term "morality" as a synonym for religious dogmatism, racism, sexism, or other failures of insight and compassion should not oblige us to merely accept their terminology until the end of time.”


“Our sense of our own freedom results from our not paying attention to what it is actually like to be what we are. The moment we do pay attention, we begin to see that free will is nowhere to be found, and our subjectivity is perfectly compatible with this truth. Thoughts and actions simply arise in the mind. What else could they do? The truth about us is stranger than many suppose: The illusion of free will is itself an illusion.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“most of the research done on happiness suggests that people actually become less happy when they have children and do not begin to approach their prior level of happiness until their children leave home.”
― Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values
2 likes
Like
“We must continually remind ourselves that there is a difference between what is natural and what is actually good for us. Cancer is perfectly natural, and yet its eradication is a primary goal of modern medicine. Evolution may have selected for territorial violence, rape, and other patently unethical behaviors as strategies to propagate one’s genes—but our collective well-being clearly depends on our opposing such natural tendencies.”

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.

So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

Look, dude. If you dont believe in the text, then the discussion is not for you. Not sure why thats so difficult to understand.

Youre arguing with me whether or not the OT is the word of God. That isnt the discussion. I believe none of it is.

This is a chat for folks who believe it.

Go frame your own thread weirdo.

Andrew Menkis responds:

A few nights ago, in the midst of a spirited discussion about faith and morality, my friend made a powerful statement. He said emphatically, “I can’t worship a God who would command his people to go kill all the men, women, and children of another nation.” This is one of the more common objections I hear to Christianity, and I can genuinely sympathize with those who feel this way.

However, the more I think about it, I believe the exact opposite. I don’t believe that I can worship a God who doesn’t command his people to commit genocide. That’s a provocative claim, so before you write me off as a someone who thinks there’s nothing wrong with ethnic cleansing (I don’t!), allow me to explain why I would make such a bold assertion.

God and Genocide in the Bible
God commands Israel’s first king, Saul: “Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” (1 Samuel 15:3).

My first response to this verse is utter repulsion. Not only are women and children to be killed, but the animals are to be brutally slaughtered as well. How can anyone praise and honor such a violent God? It seems to defy our reason and our sense of morality. It is no surprise that many people feel they can’t worship a God who commands these atrocities.

I resonate deeply with this sentiment, and yet I think it rests on a shaky foundation. The objection to worshiping God is based on what we think God should be like. God should be good, loving, kind, merciful, and forgiving. Beneath this objection is the premise that God only deserves our worship and obedience if he possesses the characteristics that we approve of. When we bring this mentality to the Bible, we discover passages that don’t fit into that narrow picture of God. For my friend and for many, that incongruity leads to a rejection of God and the Bible.

A Real God Defies Expectation
As I contemplate the disconnect between our idea of what God should be like and what the Bible tells us God is like, it seems to me that we should expect a difference between the two. If God is a real being, then he is what he is. If God always fit into our notions of what God should be like, that is a sure sign that we created a god of our own imagining.

This is true of all interpersonal relationships. Have you ever had the experience of your ideas or preconceived notions about someone challenged when you interact with them? Every person exists as a distinct and unique individual, and this means that they will at times defy our conception of them. This happens often the first time we meet someone, but it also happens with people we have known for many years. In A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis, noting this phenomenon in his relationship with his wife, aptly says, “All reality is iconoclastic.” Real people have a way of destroying our preconceptions precisely because they are real.

The fact that our notion of God is challenged by the Bible is a sure sign that the God revealed within the pages of Scripture is real. Lewis went on to say, “My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence?" Instead of rejecting God because we don’t like what the Bible reveals about him, we seek to understand more deeply who he is.

A Real God Is Just and Loving
What does a passage like 1 Samuel 15:3 tell us about God? The first thing we have to do to answer this question is to look at the context. Verse four gives us the reason for God’s command, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘I have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt.’” Therefore, God commands Israel to devote the Amalekites to destruction.

Israel is God’s tool used to administer divine justice. In this sense, as one of my seminary professors said, “Israel is not behind the times, they are ahead of the times.” Israel is not barbaric and backward in following God’s command, rather God’s command to destroy the Amalekites prefigures the second coming of Christ at which the final judgment will occur and every human being will be called to account for their lives. 1 Samuel 15:3 tells us that God is a just God who will give everyone what they deserved for their actions.

The God revealed in the Bible is not one dimensional. He is not reducible to the attributes of love or mercy. Any attempt to do so is shattered by reality. God is a righteous, holy, and just God. He does—and in fact, must—punish evil. If this was not the case, I do not believe God would be worthy of worship. We would never praise a judge who chooses to let convicted thieves, murders, and rapists return home without so much as a reprimand. Even if a judge did this in the name of love, we would never be satisfied with the practical realities of having these people living unpunished in our neighborhoods or teaching our children at school. A God who never metes out justice is a God who should be rejected. A God who is both loving and just is a God that is not only worthy of but also demands our worship and obedience.

How Can God be Just and Loving?
The God of the Bible is most fully revealed to us in the person of Christ. As Jesus hung upon the cross, the love, and justice of God came together. Paul expresses this truth in Romans 3:23-26:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Though he was sinless, Christ took on the punishment deserved by sinners. The justice of God is satisfied in his death. As a result, if we place our faith in Christ, God declares us righteous in his sight. On that final judgment day, when all are called to account for their actions, we are sheltered from God’s righteous anger. What an incredibly just, holy, righteous loving, gracious, and merciful God! Is there any other response to this God than worship?

Is God a Genocidal Maniac?

^ This passage says that God is a moral relativist, it rationalizes whether its ok with its writer or not for God to have commanded genocide.....it does not say that he didnt do such things.

If genocide is not bad as a moral absolute, God is a relativist. good points.

 

[ding]

ok AyeCantSeeYou i retract my PM....Hes not stopping on his own I guess and hes deflecting from the OP

So you want me to debate the way you want me to debate, GT? Really?

I usually don't go fishing in a barrel. I like a little sport, a little challenge.

 

[ding]

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.



So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

Look, dude. If you dont believe in the text, then the discussion is not for you. Not sure why thats so difficult to understand.

Youre arguing with me whether or not the OT is the word of God. That isnt the discussion. I believe none of it is.

This is a chat for folks who believe it.

Go frame your own thread weirdo.

Andrew Menkis responds:

A few nights ago, in the midst of a spirited discussion about faith and morality, my friend made a powerful statement. He said emphatically, “I can’t worship a God who would command his people to go kill all the men, women, and children of another nation.” This is one of the more common objections I hear to Christianity, and I can genuinely sympathize with those who feel this way.

However, the more I think about it, I believe the exact opposite. I don’t believe that I can worship a God who doesn’t command his people to commit genocide. That’s a provocative claim, so before you write me off as a someone who thinks there’s nothing wrong with ethnic cleansing (I don’t!), allow me to explain why I would make such a bold assertion.

God and Genocide in the Bible
God commands Israel’s first king, Saul: “Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” (1 Samuel 15:3).

My first response to this verse is utter repulsion. Not only are women and children to be killed, but the animals are to be brutally slaughtered as well. How can anyone praise and honor such a violent God? It seems to defy our reason and our sense of morality. It is no surprise that many people feel they can’t worship a God who commands these atrocities.

I resonate deeply with this sentiment, and yet I think it rests on a shaky foundation. The objection to worshiping God is based on what we think God should be like. God should be good, loving, kind, merciful, and forgiving. Beneath this objection is the premise that God only deserves our worship and obedience if he possesses the characteristics that we approve of. When we bring this mentality to the Bible, we discover passages that don’t fit into that narrow picture of God. For my friend and for many, that incongruity leads to a rejection of God and the Bible.

A Real God Defies Expectation
As I contemplate the disconnect between our idea of what God should be like and what the Bible tells us God is like, it seems to me that we should expect a difference between the two. If God is a real being, then he is what he is. If God always fit into our notions of what God should be like, that is a sure sign that we created a god of our own imagining.

This is true of all interpersonal relationships. Have you ever had the experience of your ideas or preconceived notions about someone challenged when you interact with them? Every person exists as a distinct and unique individual, and this means that they will at times defy our conception of them. This happens often the first time we meet someone, but it also happens with people we have known for many years. In A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis, noting this phenomenon in his relationship with his wife, aptly says, “All reality is iconoclastic.” Real people have a way of destroying our preconceptions precisely because they are real.

The fact that our notion of God is challenged by the Bible is a sure sign that the God revealed within the pages of Scripture is real. Lewis went on to say, “My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence?" Instead of rejecting God because we don’t like what the Bible reveals about him, we seek to understand more deeply who he is.

A Real God Is Just and Loving
What does a passage like 1 Samuel 15:3 tell us about God? The first thing we have to do to answer this question is to look at the context. Verse four gives us the reason for God’s command, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘I have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt.’” Therefore, God commands Israel to devote the Amalekites to destruction.

Israel is God’s tool used to administer divine justice. In this sense, as one of my seminary professors said, “Israel is not behind the times, they are ahead of the times.” Israel is not barbaric and backward in following God’s command, rather God’s command to destroy the Amalekites prefigures the second coming of Christ at which the final judgment will occur and every human being will be called to account for their lives. 1 Samuel 15:3 tells us that God is a just God who will give everyone what they deserved for their actions.

The God revealed in the Bible is not one dimensional. He is not reducible to the attributes of love or mercy. Any attempt to do so is shattered by reality. God is a righteous, holy, and just God. He does—and in fact, must—punish evil. If this was not the case, I do not believe God would be worthy of worship. We would never praise a judge who chooses to let convicted thieves, murders, and rapists return home without so much as a reprimand. Even if a judge did this in the name of love, we would never be satisfied with the practical realities of having these people living unpunished in our neighborhoods or teaching our children at school. A God who never metes out justice is a God who should be rejected. A God who is both loving and just is a God that is not only worthy of but also demands our worship and obedience.

How Can God be Just and Loving?
The God of the Bible is most fully revealed to us in the person of Christ. As Jesus hung upon the cross, the love, and justice of God came together. Paul expresses this truth in Romans 3:23-26:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Though he was sinless, Christ took on the punishment deserved by sinners. The justice of God is satisfied in his death. As a result, if we place our faith in Christ, God declares us righteous in his sight. On that final judgment day, when all are called to account for their actions, we are sheltered from God’s righteous anger. What an incredibly just, holy, righteous loving, gracious, and merciful God! Is there any other response to this God than worship?

Is God a Genocidal Maniac?

^ This passage says that God is a moral relativist, it rationalizes whether its ok with its writer or not for God to have commanded genocide.....it does not say that he didnt do such things.

If genocide is not bad as a moral absolute, God is a relativist. good points.

Actually it doesn't. And doesn't that now bring in my point from my C.S. Lewis passages about how morals are a real thing which exist outside of man.

God is a righteous, holy, and just God. He does—and in fact, must—punish evil.

 

[G.T.]

ok AyeCantSeeYou i retract my PM....Hes not stopping on his own I guess and hes deflecting from the OP

So you want me to debate the way you want me to debate, GT? Really?

I usually don't go fishing in a barrel. I like a little sport, a little challenge.

Ding, I wanna talk to folks who are biblical literalists. Youre a cherry picker who doesnt believe that way, so youve no reason to be here and only addressed the actual OP once, in your last post, with a guy who rationalizes why the genocides dont seem all that bad in perspective but his agreeing they existed in the first place reaffirms my premise: they show that particular gods moral codes as relativist.

 

[ding]

Genocide was okay. The Old testament is former, and former things have passed away.

Jesus didn’t come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfill them (Mt 5:17). When the era of Mosaic Law ended, the world did not become lawless. On the contrary, when the old heaven and earth passed away with the Law (Mt 5:18), the Law took on a whole new meaning. That is, when the risen Christ became High Priest—or when the priesthood changed—then the law changed (Heb 7:12). It was now a law transcribed on the hearts of believers, who by the spirit of truth and power of forgiveness fashioned a civilization after the Master’s own heart, for Christ is the end of the law (Rm 10:4). No longer did God’s faithful surrender to ordinances and mandates; they began to live under His grace. The changing of the guards, so to speak—from the old to the new—was the end of all prophecy, the ultimate promise that God kept that Christ inherit the throne of David.

your 2st sentence was my point

if genocide WAS ok, and then it WASNT, as I said and you agreed....that makes that particular moral relative to the time we are discussing, versus an absolute.

And my point was that is attributed to the Jews who wrote the OT and not God.

So maybe you ought to explore what they were thinking when they wrote that.

Or if you would rather there are a whole lot of bad things that happen to good people and we could discuss why an all loving God would allow those things to happen.

Look, dude. If you dont believe in the text, then the discussion is not for you. Not sure why thats so difficult to understand.

Youre arguing with me whether or not the OT is the word of God. That isnt the discussion. I believe none of it is.

This is a chat for folks who believe it.

Go frame your own thread weirdo.

Andrew Menkis responds:

A few nights ago, in the midst of a spirited discussion about faith and morality, my friend made a powerful statement. He said emphatically, “I can’t worship a God who would command his people to go kill all the men, women, and children of another nation.” This is one of the more common objections I hear to Christianity, and I can genuinely sympathize with those who feel this way.

However, the more I think about it, I believe the exact opposite. I don’t believe that I can worship a God who doesn’t command his people to commit genocide. That’s a provocative claim, so before you write me off as a someone who thinks there’s nothing wrong with ethnic cleansing (I don’t!), allow me to explain why I would make such a bold assertion.

God and Genocide in the Bible
God commands Israel’s first king, Saul: “Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” (1 Samuel 15:3).

My first response to this verse is utter repulsion. Not only are women and children to be killed, but the animals are to be brutally slaughtered as well. How can anyone praise and honor such a violent God? It seems to defy our reason and our sense of morality. It is no surprise that many people feel they can’t worship a God who commands these atrocities.

I resonate deeply with this sentiment, and yet I think it rests on a shaky foundation. The objection to worshiping God is based on what we think God should be like. God should be good, loving, kind, merciful, and forgiving. Beneath this objection is the premise that God only deserves our worship and obedience if he possesses the characteristics that we approve of. When we bring this mentality to the Bible, we discover passages that don’t fit into that narrow picture of God. For my friend and for many, that incongruity leads to a rejection of God and the Bible.

A Real God Defies Expectation
As I contemplate the disconnect between our idea of what God should be like and what the Bible tells us God is like, it seems to me that we should expect a difference between the two. If God is a real being, then he is what he is. If God always fit into our notions of what God should be like, that is a sure sign that we created a god of our own imagining.

This is true of all interpersonal relationships. Have you ever had the experience of your ideas or preconceived notions about someone challenged when you interact with them? Every person exists as a distinct and unique individual, and this means that they will at times defy our conception of them. This happens often the first time we meet someone, but it also happens with people we have known for many years. In A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis, noting this phenomenon in his relationship with his wife, aptly says, “All reality is iconoclastic.” Real people have a way of destroying our preconceptions precisely because they are real.

The fact that our notion of God is challenged by the Bible is a sure sign that the God revealed within the pages of Scripture is real. Lewis went on to say, “My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence?" Instead of rejecting God because we don’t like what the Bible reveals about him, we seek to understand more deeply who he is.

A Real God Is Just and Loving
What does a passage like 1 Samuel 15:3 tell us about God? The first thing we have to do to answer this question is to look at the context. Verse four gives us the reason for God’s command, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘I have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when they came up out of Egypt.’” Therefore, God commands Israel to devote the Amalekites to destruction.

Israel is God’s tool used to administer divine justice. In this sense, as one of my seminary professors said, “Israel is not behind the times, they are ahead of the times.” Israel is not barbaric and backward in following God’s command, rather God’s command to destroy the Amalekites prefigures the second coming of Christ at which the final judgment will occur and every human being will be called to account for their lives. 1 Samuel 15:3 tells us that God is a just God who will give everyone what they deserved for their actions.

The God revealed in the Bible is not one dimensional. He is not reducible to the attributes of love or mercy. Any attempt to do so is shattered by reality. God is a righteous, holy, and just God. He does—and in fact, must—punish evil. If this was not the case, I do not believe God would be worthy of worship. We would never praise a judge who chooses to let convicted thieves, murders, and rapists return home without so much as a reprimand. Even if a judge did this in the name of love, we would never be satisfied with the practical realities of having these people living unpunished in our neighborhoods or teaching our children at school. A God who never metes out justice is a God who should be rejected. A God who is both loving and just is a God that is not only worthy of but also demands our worship and obedience.

How Can God be Just and Loving?
The God of the Bible is most fully revealed to us in the person of Christ. As Jesus hung upon the cross, the love, and justice of God came together. Paul expresses this truth in Romans 3:23-26:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Though he was sinless, Christ took on the punishment deserved by sinners. The justice of God is satisfied in his death. As a result, if we place our faith in Christ, God declares us righteous in his sight. On that final judgment day, when all are called to account for their actions, we are sheltered from God’s righteous anger. What an incredibly just, holy, righteous loving, gracious, and merciful God! Is there any other response to this God than worship?

Is God a Genocidal Maniac?

^ This passage says that God is a moral relativist, it rationalizes whether its ok with its writer or not for God to have commanded genocide.....it does not say that he didnt do such things.

If genocide is not bad as a moral absolute, God is a relativist. good points.

Would you praise a judge who chooses to let convicted thieves, murders, and rapists return home without so much as a reprimand?