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

[G.T.]

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.

This is a discussion on the god that commanded genocide. Not about your OCds about morals.

And the passage you quoted believed god commanded genocide.

That means he also commanded rape, baby torture, stoning and everything else...and it means that that god from that scripture is a relativist by definition.

 

[G.T.]

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?

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

 

[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, 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.

I am arguing on their behalf.

Actually it doesn't prove that that particular god moral codes as relativist. It proves that all things work for the good of those who love him. Just because you don't understand that isn't his fault.

You do realize that no one gets out of here alive, right?

It seems that you believe that unless everything is perfect there can be no God. That's naive.

 

[ding]

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?

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

Who are you to say how things should be? You want to view God in a vacuum. If you are going to blame him for all the bad things, don't you think you should credit him for all the good things too?

 

[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.

I am arguing on their behalf.

Actually it doesn't prove that that particular god moral codes as relativist. It proves that all things work for the good of those who love him. Just because you don't understand that isn't his fault.

You do realize that no one gets out of here alive, right?

It seems that you believe that unless everything is perfect there can be no God. That's naive.

It indeed proves he is a relativist, unless youre asserting some rape and baby killing is okay. Are you asserting that

 

[G.T.]

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?

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

Who are you to say how things should be? You want to view God in a vacuum. If you are going to blame him for all the bad things, don't you think you should credit him for all the good things too?

i dont believe in him, so this is a strawman

but the one in the bible, im blaming for biblical script that says he commanded disgusting things that I find wrong as in...always wrong...not relatively. pretty simply

 

[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, 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.

I am arguing on their behalf.

Actually it doesn't prove that that particular god moral codes as relativist. It proves that all things work for the good of those who love him. Just because you don't understand that isn't his fault.

You do realize that no one gets out of here alive, right?

It seems that you believe that unless everything is perfect there can be no God. That's naive.

It indeed proves he is a relativist, unless youre asserting some rape and baby killing is okay. Are you asserting that

No. It proves you have incomplete knowledge in this matter. He doesn't. It would be exceedingly strange if an omniscient being did not immeasurably exceed our grasp of such matters.

 

[ding]

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?

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

Who are you to say how things should be? You want to view God in a vacuum. If you are going to blame him for all the bad things, don't you think you should credit him for all the good things too?

i dont believe in him, so this is a strawman

but the one in the bible, im blaming for biblical script that says he commanded disgusting things that I find wrong as in...always wrong...not relatively. pretty simply

Which is why you have created a Fallacious Equivocation: The Knowledge of God vs. the knowledge of man.

 

[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.

I am arguing on their behalf.

Actually it doesn't prove that that particular god moral codes as relativist. It proves that all things work for the good of those who love him. Just because you don't understand that isn't his fault.

You do realize that no one gets out of here alive, right?

It seems that you believe that unless everything is perfect there can be no God. That's naive.

It indeed proves he is a relativist, unless youre asserting some rape and baby killing is okay. Are you asserting that

No. It proves you have incomplete knowledge in this matter. He doesn't. It would be exceedingly strange if an omniscient being did not immeasurably exceed our grasp of such matters.

It doesnt matter if he has justification, what matters is that if hes justified in rape and genocide then rape and genocide arent ALAWAyS bad, but instead its relative to said justification..youre walking right into making my case in seeking to justify his rape and genocide. ~ this isnt that difficult...i suppose unless you dont know the term "relative."

youre literally making the case that its relative by implying he mad have good reasons.

 

[G.T.]

^ 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?

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

Who are you to say how things should be? You want to view God in a vacuum. If you are going to blame him for all the bad things, don't you think you should credit him for all the good things too?

i dont believe in him, so this is a strawman

but the one in the bible, im blaming for biblical script that says he commanded disgusting things that I find wrong as in...always wrong...not relatively. pretty simply

Which is why you have created a Fallacious Equivocation: The Knowledge of God vs. the knowledge of man.

Incorrect, the knowledge is irrelevant it is the acts.

If the knowledge is relevant, then youre proving relativity.

 

[ding]

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.

I am arguing on their behalf.

Actually it doesn't prove that that particular god moral codes as relativist. It proves that all things work for the good of those who love him. Just because you don't understand that isn't his fault.

You do realize that no one gets out of here alive, right?

It seems that you believe that unless everything is perfect there can be no God. That's naive.

It indeed proves he is a relativist, unless youre asserting some rape and baby killing is okay. Are you asserting that

No. It proves you have incomplete knowledge in this matter. He doesn't. It would be exceedingly strange if an omniscient being did not immeasurably exceed our grasp of such matters.

It doesnt matter if he has justification, what matters is that if hes justified in rape and genocide then rape and genocide arent ALAWAyS bad, but instead its relative to said justification..youre walking right into making my case in seeking to justify his rape and genocide. ~ this isnt that difficult...i suppose unless you dont know the term "relative."

youre literally making the case that its relative by implying he mad have good reasons.

Again, you don't have perfect knowledge. You have incomplete data. Your knowledge of your fellow human beings is severely limited, especially the ones that existed thousands of years ago. You are in a poor position to assess the degree of their sinfulness.

 

[ding]

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

No. Those are things I find always wrong, And some of which OT God commanded be done himself.

Who are you to say how things should be? You want to view God in a vacuum. If you are going to blame him for all the bad things, don't you think you should credit him for all the good things too?

i dont believe in him, so this is a strawman

but the one in the bible, im blaming for biblical script that says he commanded disgusting things that I find wrong as in...always wrong...not relatively. pretty simply

Which is why you have created a Fallacious Equivocation: The Knowledge of God vs. the knowledge of man.

Incorrect, the knowledge is irrelevant it is the acts.

If the knowledge is relevant, then youre proving relativity.

No. It isn't irrelevant. You yourself treat others poorly on your justification that they deserve it. You do it all the time. You are arguing against your own behaviors.

 

[G.T.]

Here is why its ill advised to discuss things with ding.

Hes not bright enough to realize that by arguing god may have justification for rape, genocide, etc...

hes literally arguing that those morals are relative (sometime justified), and not absolutes.

You are the grandest waste of fucking time on the entire internet.

 

[G.T.]

so since ding agrees that genocide, eape and such are sometimes maybe OK, by Gods all knowledge...

he agrees theyre relativistic morally.

And doesnt even know hes literally doing that.

derpderpderp

 

[ding]

Here is why its ill advised to discuss things with ding.

Hes not bright enough to realize that by arguing god may have justification for rape, genocide, etc...

hes literally arguing that those morals are relative (sometime justified), and not absolutes.

You are the grandest waste of fucking time on the entire internet.

Because I disagree with you? Elevate your game from name calling, GT. Because all you are proving by calling me names is that you can't refute my argument.

 

[ding]

so since ding agrees that genocide, eape and such are sometimes maybe OK, by Gods all knowledge...

he agrees theyre relativistic morally.

And doesnt even know hes literally doing that.

derpderpderp

No. You have incomplete knowledge to make that assessment. You don't know that they did not deserve to be punished. You yourself treat others poorly on your justification that they deserve it. You do it all the time. You are arguing against your own behaviors.

 

[ding]

Here is why its ill advised to discuss things with ding.

Hes not bright enough...

^ dunning effect

 

[G.T.]

so rape and genocide are ok if the victims deserve it...therefore only relatively bad to do to somebody

i dont think you understand what happened there ding, in fact im confident you dont...but you made my case

 

[G.T.]

ding argued morals are relative based on the situation

on the internet

 

[ding]

so rape and genocide are ok if the victims deserve it...therefore only relatively bad to do to somebody

i dont think you understand what happened there ding, in fact im confident you dont...but you made my case

So treating Sonny like shit is OK because he deserved it?

It's Ok because you limited your bad behavior to verbal insults?

Do you comprehend the concept of punishment, GT?

Because it seems to me that you believe punishment is immoral, right?