I had this discussion with ScottR regarding lessons you should train your children to know.
My question to Scott was whether it was more important to train your children to recognize sin or to know that they are not supposed to judge others.
He basically contends that proscription against judging others is such that it would be covered under the more general learning of what is and is not a sin.
I have the completely opposite viewpoint. That by concentrating on teaching your children to recognize sin (in themselves and others, I assume), you are actually training them to be judgemental people, and thus encouraging one of the most clearly proscribed behaviors in the New Testament.
Anyway, I figure I must just be missing the boat, having never been a parent. I don't really want to say that I'm right and therefore ScottR and most (I fear) of the parents on this board are wrong...
But, this all came about in the context of a comment about homosexuality. From Scott's statement, he would feel that it is more important to teach his children that homosexuality is a sin than to teach them that they should not judge those who are homosexual.
It is in going from the abstract (teach about sin versus teach about being non-judgemental) to the specific (teaching THAT homosexuality is a sin versus teaching your children not to judge those who ARE homosexual) that I have a problem with this doctrine.
I think it is clear that trying to convey to a child that homosexuality should be abhorred while teaching them not to abhor homosexuals is a tall order. And, in essence, would be leading them into the more common sin (and the one Jesus mentioned by name -- as opposed to homosexuality which he never did mention) of being judgemental.
I think Jesus singled this one out not becuase it is a sin, but because it is the big trap for us all.
Oh well... I guess I was wrong on this.
I respect people like ScottR a lot, so when I hear that our views are so different, it does lead me to question mine. But this is something so fundamental to what I thought I knew about being Christian, I'm just concerned I must not know anything...
Can someone help out on this. Maybe there's an easy reconciliation of the two views that I'm just not seeing in my panic...
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Bob, if you don't recognize sin, how can you fix it in yourself?
In overcoming something like alcoholism, isn't recognition the first step?
Your theory is like saying it is far more important to pretend your friend is not flushing their life down the tubes by abusing alcohol than to stage an intervention that might give them back their life.
I truly think that believing it isn't important to recognize sin could only come from believing there aren't any sins that are actually that bad.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
That's one way to look at it, I suppose.
The thought I had, however, was that Jesus didn't say judging people was a sin or was not a sin. He just said specifically don't do it.
I figure that means we shouldn't do it.
And we don't need to worry about what we call it.
Maybe he focussed on that specifically because it was more important than all the other messages he left unsaid (i.e., maybe he really believed homosexuality was a sin, but figured this was a more important message).
Or, he figured everyone he was talking to already knew what the major sins were, but this "new" one was important for them to learn about.
See, I view the call to be non-judgemental as straight from God's mouth, clear as a bell, but not necessarily talking about it as if it is "just another sin."
You and Scott agree, apparently, that it is just another sin and Jesus highlighted it because of that temporary novelty of it for the audience he was currently addressing. That it was nothing all that special for us to be wary of given all the other sins we might fall prey to.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
More like ALL sin, all those things, separate us from God.
It would be more clear if Jesus employed a good technical writer to triage the information and organize it into bullet points, but if Jesus picked a most important commandment, it was to love the Lord. And then later said, if you love me, keep my commandments.
How on EARTH can you keep his commandments if you do not recognize when you are not?
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"It would be more clear if Jesus employed a good technical writer to triage the information and organize it into bullet points...."
This has inspired me to do a PowerPoint version of the Bible -- unless, of course, one already exists.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I'm sure Lumicon has one.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
These guys?
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
I believe that children should be taught to recognize right from wrong, first and foremost. This is, in fact, teaching them to be judgemental. I think children should be taught to be judgemental. After all, if they cannot discriminate right from wrong, they (1) will likely do wrong themselves very often, and (2) will be unable to advise or teach others right from wrong. Both of these are high priorities.
However, I don't believe you can ever teach a child to discriminate right from wrong very effectively unless you teach them to understand others, and to recognize the difference between judging a person's acts to be wrong and judging that person to be bad. If they don't learn this lesson, they will inadvertantly start committing sins, thinking it is justice. They will do things like hate gay classmates, thinking those classmates are choosing to do wrong, when in reality they simply do not share the same belief system, and are under the impression that there is nothing wrong with homosexuality.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
I totally agree with Tres.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Nope. These guys.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
Why are you making us go so deep in thought so early on a Monday morning, Bob?
Okay, as a parent, here's my approach, which I do NOT claim to be right -- parents just have to learn as they go....
In talking about homosexuality with my kids, as in talking about ALL things that as a Christian are considered "sin", we have to first and foremost point out that ALL of us are sinners and fall short without the salvation offered through Jesus. So in other words, we all have sin.
But I do teach them what the bible mentions as sinful -- pointing out scriptures that refer to specific sins and a guiding point in helping them determine right and wrong. And right and wrong choices of behavior.
Now, I have two cousins (different sides of the family) who are homosexual. I am very good friends (?) with both. We e-mail and correspond often and get together. My kids see that I treat this person the same way I treat any other family member or friend.
Now, if they question that -- I point out that ALL my relatives are sinners -- because we all are. I myself was "with child" prior to wedlock some 19 years ago. So I was a sinner. My family didn't turn their back on me. Why should I treat this one person's sin differently than my own?
Hopefully they learn that it is for God to judge and give salvation, not me; not us. That doesn't mean that I don't think it is sin -- it just means that I'm no better.
I won't absolutely say this works perfectly -- my oldest son is very homophobic, to my dismay, and very judgemental of others. My other two kids are more "live and let live," recognizing that they don't believe it is right, but keeping their opinions to themselves.
Farmgirl
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I’m not a parent either, but I’m thinking that the scripture that might be most helpful here is the “log in your own eye” one. It is important to teach children to recognize sin, but it’s also important to teach them that the main reason for learning it is to recognize it in themselves, not to point it out in others.
It’s not enough to say “we’re all sinners” if the sins we talk the most about are the ones that we personally never commit.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Well Bob, maybe if you looked at it this way. The worst result of Scott's methos is to create children who are very judgmental and negative towards others. The worst result of your method is to create children who sin constantly because they do not know.
And to be honest, I think that while a worst case sceneroi as caused by any decent parents wouldn't be that bad either way, Scott's seems less likely to reach it's worst since hating is certainly something you can warn your children about so that even if they don't understand the reason for it at first, they can learn the purpose without having to deal with the consequences of sinning to begin with.
Or that's how I see it.
Hobbes Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
yeah -- what dkw said. That is what I was trying to say that I talk with my kids about.
Like the scripture "let he who is without sin cast the first stone..."
We need to be always mindful of our own sins, not focused on those of others.
Farmgirl
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I don’t have kids, so I can’t speak to the specifics of how best to impart knowledge on them. However, scripture does not require us not to be judgmental in the sense that we should not make judgments. It requires us not to judge people. At the end of the scene, doesn’t Jesus say “Now go and sin no more?” Obviously, He has a lot more standing to say something like that to someone else than I do, but I think the clear implication is that it is our responsibility to be able to judge behavior as sinful, at least as much as is needed to avoid that behavior ourselves.
Clearly, sometimes Christians are called on to point out the sinfulness of others’ actions. The clearest cases involve when the sin hurts other people. The prime example in our history would be the abolition/civil rights traditions founded in Christianity. I doubt that saying slaveholding and racist repression are sinful would run afoul of the “Judge not lest ye be judged” admonition.
When does calling attention to sin pass into the prohibited judging? I don’t know. I’m much more suspicious of judging when the behavior is “victimless” (in the sense that any sin is actually victimless – not hurting another person). However, my standards of victimless differ quite a bit from the classic libertarian standpoint.
I also think the motive of the person naming the sin are critical. If the person is motivated truly by a desire to help someone else, I have a hard time condemning them. In the scene under discussion, those attempting to stone the woman were obviously not trying to help her.
I’m well aware that base motives can be obscured in “trying to help” someone else – some slave owners justified their actions because it was better for slaves to be enslaved in America than living as “savages” in Africa. Even disregarding the inherent racism in the statement, this ignored the fact it would be better to live free in America than as slaves in America.
The obsession with homosexuality by some Christians has interesting underpinnings. It’s too simplistic to say either “They care about the homosexuals’ souls” or “It’s all based on homophobia.” The truth is probably a very complex mixture of these and other motives.
All that being said, the “Go forth and sin no more” statement is impossible to carry out without knowledge of what behavior is sinful and what isn’t. It does little good to limit a child’s religious education in one respect simply because another necessary portion is hard to teach.
Dagonee
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Maybe it's a matter of favorite commandment?
Human nature being what it is, maybe our favorite commandments are the ones we don't have a problem with, and so can congratulate ourselves on being good.
Like a bishop of mine said, it's no problem keeping the law of chastity if you haven't had a date in six months.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Most moral systems show this sort of conflict between legalism and idealism. On one side, there is the idea of an absolute set of laws that are followed for their own sake. On the other, there is the idea that there is some sort of ideal or principle that forms the foundation for these laws. So, sinning in the first case would be transgressing any of the list of laws, while in the second case, it would acting in violation of the underlying principle.
In the Christian tradition, idealists have siezed upon verses such as Matthew 22:36-40:
quote:Then a lawyer asked our Lord Jesus, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” Jesus' answer: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets.”
and Rom. 13:8-10:
quote: Be under obligation to no one - the only obligation you have is to love one another. Whoever does this has obeyed the Law. The commandments, "Do not commit adultery; do not commit murder; do not steal; do not desire what belongs to someone else" - all these, and any others besides are summned up in the one command, "Love your neighbor as you love yourself." If you love others, you will never do them wrong; to love, then, is to obey the whole Law.
In psychological studies of morality, people who express a legalistic orientation tend to be much more likely to depersonalize other people. In studies where we've been able to examine morals formation under stress, such as the Milgram and Robbers' Cove experiments, we've found that the desire to hate or do bad things to other people often leads to creation of moral rules that say that this is ok.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
I'm just curious why Bob chose to pose this question here, instead of over on his Voy Forum -- where there are many more highly religious people who can perhaps better answer his question...
Farmgirl
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
So, the letter of the law versus the spirit of the law.
What is your stand on this, Squicky?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Kat, My stand is that it's more complex than that. Sure it's a letter of the law thing versus a spirit, but it's also more an expression of what people believe about human nature.
If you believe that people are (without divine intervention) irredeemably evil, then there is no hope of anyone ever acting mainly out of love for any one else. However, if you believe that people are either at their base good, or immature and selfish but with the possiblity of developing into mature and unselfish, then you're probably going to push for love over all.
Philosophically, I'm a quasi-Taoist, which has it's basis in the statement, "Thou art that." This essentially is one step beyond Jesus' formulation of the Golden Rule. Instead of loving my neighbor as myself. I'm pretty much loving another aspect of myself as myself. So, it's pretty clear where I stand.
Taoism and its philosophical cousin, Buddhism, have another interesting basis that fits in here too. In Taosim, there is a rejection of rules because distorting virtue. In Taosim, the edenic paradise was destroyed when people started to impose rules on it, when people put names to what can't be captured in words. In Buddhism, the fundamental sources of evil are identified as fear and desire. Action can only be righteous if it's done for it's own sake, rather than because of desire for reward or fear of punishment.
These ideas were especially meaningful to me (although I'm not on board with the blind optimistic humanism of the Taoists) because psychology has, for the last 60 years or so, been proving that the naive behaviorism (i.e. reward people to make them do something more, punish them to make them do it less) that I see as on of the fundamental assumptions of western society in the last 2000 or so years doesn't actually work. To put it another way, scientific studies have been showing that the Buddhists were right. Fear and desire aren't the wellsprings of good behavior. The lead instead to distortions of the right and the good.
In regards to children, they, like all of us, have conflicting motivational systems. Yes, they are definitely selfish, but, they are also empathetic. Our job as adults is to provide them with an environment where their selfishness decreases and their empathy increases. Certainly they need rules, but, as studies of different parenting styles have shown, these rules have to be meaningful and guided by underlying principles, rather than autocratically imposed on them.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote:If you believe that people are (without divine intervention) irredeemably evil, then there is no hope of anyone ever acting mainly out of love for any one else. However, if you believe that people are either at their base good, or immature and selfish but with the possibility of developing into mature and unselfish, then you're probably going to push for love over all.
What if you believe that people are, without divine intervention, irredeemably broken (evil is too loaded a word for what I mean) but also believe that there is no one in whom the divine hasn’t intervened?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
dkw, It all comes down to whether you believe that people can love without God forcing them to. If people are all broken and then God fixes them all, I don't really see how that would be different from them not being broken in the first place.
Of course, theologically, as you know, I believe that God as decribed in the Christian Old Testament is an evil god, so, from my perspective, it does matter why and how God "fixed" them.
Posted by Dan_raven (Member # 3383) on :
My fifth of a dime.
The question comes down to, should you teach your children right from wrong, or love thy neighbor. While I really want to say, love thy neighbor should be all of the law, the ideas of right and wrong must come first.
I think the greatest commandment, divine suggestion, good thing, is to love others. (Not sex--Love) To teach this to children creates children who can do little harm, accept to themselves when they love too much, trust too easilly, and become prey to those who love no one.
Yet the concept of Love Thy Neighbor is difficult for children to grasp. They can much easier grasp good and evil/right and wrong. I don't mean they can decide what is good and what is evil, but they can decide that doing good is what you are supposed to do, and doing bad/evil is wrong.
Then we guide them on what is good and what is evil based on our own beliefs.
To some, homosexuality is bad. To others, condeming others is bad.
The question is how much emphasis do you place on the list of sins, the list of bad things and the biblical law that surrounds it. If you teach a strict "Law" filled version of religion you will loose the followers the first time they run across a thing they know is good--loving thy neighbor, but that goes against the law.
The child has an Uncle who lives with a woman he is not married to. The woman is nice, pleasant, caring, and friendly. Should the child condemn her and the child's Uncle as sinners? That will hurt these good people.
The Child learns that "Thou Shall Not Kill." The child see's on TV the US Bombing and shooting our enemies. The legalist tries to explain, "No, its Thou Shall Not Kill unless....."
The child discovers loop holes and technicalities and exceptions. The child is on its way to becoming a lawyer.
basically, you have to teach good and evil, right and wrong. You just also have to avoid being to dogmatic about it, or you will loose them.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
And no one can restrain the dogs of war.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Jesus had something say about that, too. Matthew 5:39-41
quote:"But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles."
Jesus was, by the standards of his time and of ours, a freaking nut-job. For example, the guy forcing you to walk a mile with him is a reference to a law giving the Roman forces occupying Israel the right to force any citizen to carry their pack for a mile. Jesus is telling people to willingly give aid to their most hated enemies.
I am constantly suprised (ok, I'm really not, but it sounds nice to say.) when people talk about the comfort they find in Jesus. He's not a comfortable guy. To follow Jesus is not to be just, but rather to be beyond justice. At the strictest level, there is never any justification for harming another person, no matter what. Following Jesus is not something you can achieve; it's not an accomplishment. It's a constant struggle.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Don't bother being nice. It isn't convincing.
Jesus promised the Comforter to those who believe on his name.
It isn't the doctrines that are comforting - they are supposed supposed to make you uncomfortable.
It's being wrapped up in the arms of the Spirit that's comforting.
[ January 05, 2004, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Squick, I don’t think God forces anyone to love. But I don’t think people are capable of love without God. Fortunately, God’s love is available to everyone, therefore everyone is capable of love. (Whether/how one chooses to exercise that capability is another question.)
And you already know I strongly disagree with you on the OT thing, so I won’t go into it again. Posted by Ryuko (Member # 5125) on :
I think the problem is with the word 'sin'. When I was a kid, It'd have been hard for me to have understood that people could be sinners and still be good people. Sin is a very loaded word, it brings up connotations of black poison in my mind.
Though I'm not a parent, I was raised by one who I think was very good at what she did. She taught me that some things were bad and not to be done, but that if you were weak and did these things, you could be forgiven and not do it again. At least, this is what I assume she taught me, because whenever I feel like condemning someone for what they do, I'm forced to remember what I've done in my life.
Of course, my upbringing wasn't the most conventionally Christian one. In fact, though I believe in God and call myself Christian, there are many points in which the scriptures and I disagree. But in my untested opinion, the best way to teach kids to be accepting and also the difference between right and wrong is to make sure that they understand the latter while knowing that they can eventually be forgiven.
Of course there's always a chance that someone would take the 'always forgiven' edict to its extreme and do bad things just because they knew they'd be forgiven... When I was a kid I thought about that. But I decided that if they meant to do it because they knew they'd be forgiven, they didn't feel bad about what they'd done and they wouldn't be forgiven anyway.
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
quote:The child has an Uncle who lives with a woman he is not married to. The woman is nice, pleasant, caring, and friendly. Should the child condemn her and the child's Uncle as sinners? That will hurt these good people.
What an interesting choice for an example. As it happens, my children have an uncle who lives with a woman he is not married to. She is nice, pleasant, caring, friendly, and I can hardly wait to call her "sister". No one in my family would condemn either one of them (though all of us are sinners, both them and us). However, because they aren't married, when they come to stay the night, they have to sleep in seperate beds. My house, my rules. They have honored that without complaint. My brother joked with me, telling me that they would not be sleeping in seperate beds when we came to stay the night. I love my brother -- he slays me.
Still, when the time comes, I will tell my children that this isn't the way God wants us to conduct our sexual relationship.
Just because we disagree with someone's choices doesn't mean we have to therefore condemn them. I really wanted my brother to get married in a church and get lots of premarital counselling. I told him so, since we are close enough that I can do that without hurting him or our relationship. He's going to marry his excellent girlfriend in Vegas in a few weeks. I think this is a poor choice, but you know what? I'm not the one getting married. I made my pitch, gave my reasons, and did so only because we have a relationship that could sustain that sort of conversation. He's choosing otherwise, and I'm going to go to his wedding and cheer them both on.
So ultimately, it comes down to love, not sin. Do you love the person you think is making a bad choice? Have you loved them well enough that your opinion matters to them? And do you love them enough that even when they make that choice you disagree with, you keep on loving them, not love-the-feeling, but love-the-action?
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
quote: The child has an Uncle who lives with a woman he is not married to. The woman is nice, pleasant, caring, and friendly. Should the child condemn her and the child's Uncle as sinners? That will hurt these good people.
This reminds me of an incident that caused a hoopla between my parents and some of their friends. My parents are fairly hard-core anti-alcohol, except for medicinial purposes, and taught us it was a drug. I guess from the brain chemistry standpoint they are right.
However, this got them into extreme hot water, when their 4 year old son (my brother) was offered some Kool-Aid by some friends of theirs at a large social gathering in honor of some other mutual friends. After seeing a couple of beers in the fridge, my brother went running into the area where the adults were going "Mommy Daddy, they have drugs in their refrigerator!" This led to some social upheaval for a while, when multiple friends were upset at my parents for teaching their kid they were "evil"!
AJ
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
I guess my point above is, it doesn't really matter whether you state it in the positive or the negative. "Don't hurt others" or "Love your neighbor as yourself" (and yes these are paraphrases and I know they aren't quite equivalent)
The hard part is trying to instill tact into a 4 year old. Some of us never learn.
AJ
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Ryuko brings up an excellent point about the word “sin.” It has so many different definitions and connotations that it’s difficult to use it in conversation except in defined communities where everyone shares the same context. I remember a conversation on Hatrack last year when someone referred to X as a sin and another poster demanded to know, “so you think I’m damned to hell just because I X?” The first poster said, “no, where did you get that idea?” The discussion derailed, with the responding poster seeming incapable of defining “sin” as other than “something Christians think I’ll go to hell if I do.” Since none of the Christians posting were defining it that way there was much confusion.
I know people who won’t sing “Amazing Grace” because they don’t want to call themselves “a wretch.” And then there’s John and Charles Wesley (founders of Methodism) who both frequently referred to themselves as “the chief of sinners.”
Do you (generic ‘you’) think of sin as the violation of a law or the violation of a relationship? Is it a crime or an illness? A deliberate act of malice or a failure to act in love? A mistake you can learn from and then forget about or a really big, horrible mark on your permanent record?
(Note: although those all ended up as pairs, they aren't intended to define two opposing options.)
Posted by HenryW (Member # 6053) on :
I'll give you this father's opinion. I am not a christian, but for the purposes of this discussion sin and wrong can be the same thing. This is a wonderful discussion and it is very interesting to see how far folks go to research their foundation in teaching children. I happen to think that our highest calling is to (at least attempt to) teach children.
I think the concepts have to be mutually exclusive at times. I agree with many others - teaching right and wrong is tantamount. More to the point, teaching them to embrace values and use those values in determining the type of person they will be is the objective. As a parent, you have no better tool in helping your child protect themselves and to encourage free will and right minded thinking.
This is somewhat separate from judging others. Those who don't conform to your definition of right in a particular area should not be discounted. The point here is that the whole of a person is valuable and single point discrimination is wrong. History is full of dastardly actions of baseless discrimination (Hitler's Aryan Nation, slavery of any sort, nationality, etc.). Humanity shares a common bond - much in the same way that you would bandage a stranger's wounds, you should be open and nondescrimating in your intial review of your fellow humans.
The big question - Does this mean we should like indiscriminately? I taught my child that the answer was 'absolutely no'. We have to be judgemental in determining the who, why and how that surrounds us and makes us more valuable folks. But it is important that we look at others as a whole. Sexual orientation, religion, profession, etc. are just bit players in our overall make up.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
I can't speak as a Christian, but I can speak as a father. I've tried to instill strong ethics in my sons, but I've never used the word "sin." That, to me, implies a moral definition. If I had to come up with a secular definition, I'd say that sin lies in deliberately and unnecessarily hurting others.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Isn't that A sin, rather than the definition of a sin?
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
quote: think it is clear that trying to convey to a child that homosexuality should be abhorred while teaching them not to abhor homosexuals is a tall order.
Yes it's a tall order, but it's a responsibility Christian parents have, and one they should take very seriously.
I want my kids to know what sin is. And what it isn't. Sin doesn't damn you, sin doesn't send you to hell. Sin separates you from God. In essence since we're all born sinners, no one is SENT to hell at all. We are only saved from our fates by the sacrifice Jesus made for us. I deserve hell because I AM a wretch. I sing the song very proudly.
My kids and I have talked about homosexuality. Well, I should qualify that my oldest (now 11) and I have talked about it. And I did stress that one should not hate anyone that is committing a sin because then you would have to hate the world. Instead, you should pray for that person that they will find forgiveness for the sins they practice just as you pray every night for God to forgive you.
By emphasizing to your children that they are just as much in need of grace as anyone else, I hope that they will never become judgmental. Instead I want them to be thankful for what God has done for them and I want them to treat others with compassion and love. By recognizing their own sins, they can lead a life that draws them closer to God and can instill in them a love for other people. That is my prayer for my kids. I also pray that I'm adequate to the job, because I feel so very inadequate so many times.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
It's good to see you, Belle.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Chris Bridges:
quote:I've never used the word "sin." That, to me, implies a moral definition. If I had to come up with a secular definition, I'd say that sin lies in deliberately and unnecessarily hurting others.
Javert Hugo:
quote: Isn't that A sin, rather than the definition of a sin?
See therein is exactly the conflict dkw is talking about about definitions for the word "sin"
To throw in a conservative Christian definition of sin for contrast
"Sin is any word thought or deed against God's Will"
It has died down as a trend, from what I am aware of but this definition is the reason why "Finding God's Will for Your Life" seminar type things became extremely popular for a while. The idea was that you could be sinning even if you didn't mean to be if you hadn't researched God's Perfect Will for your life thorougly (and of course these people had the inside track to God)
AJ
Posted by Bokonon (Member # 480) on :
I don't think so, kat. The classification of sins, in Christianity, has always seemed to me to be just separating different ways one can violate Chris' (Or altenatively, Christ's) rule. Whether the hurt is financially, physically, emotionally, the hurt almost always exhibits itself as pain in the subject of your sinning.
Whether you take a lamp, a limb, or a lover, fundamentally are these not all springing from the same thing? A decision that is destructive to God's Work, that is (knowingly or not) ultimately objectifying the other as inferior, as separate from God's Plan?
The conflict I see, is the realization of this idea, in some form, and the fact that there are people out there who would make those decisions, either in spite or in ingnorance.
Including one's self.
-Bok
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
back at dkw
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Okay, we have the following possible definitions for sin:
1. Intentionally and unnecessarily hurting others. 2. Violating one of God's commandments. 3. Anything that separates a person from the Lord.
I think the last two would encompass the first.
Where do you get your definition of sin from? The word sin itself implies a judgement (of God). Wouldn't God be the one to define it?
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:"Sin is any word thought or deed against God's Will"
This is the definition I'd use.
But I believe God is perfectly good, and that therefore God's Will would have to be for us to do good, and that all wrong acts would therefore be against His Will. Hence, I would say a sin is equivalent to any wrong act.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I want to come back to the letter versus the spirit of the law thing. I think I figured out what troubled me about that definition. For people in the legalistic tradition, the letter is the spirit of the law. There is no underlying principle, other than submission to the authority that laid down the list.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Squick, isn't that saying that those who follow the letter of the law believe the letter of the law IS the spirit of the law?
Posted by HenryW (Member # 6053) on :
quote: My kids and I have talked about homosexuality. Well, I should qualify that my oldest (now 11) and I have talked about it. And I did stress that one should not hate anyone that is committing a sin because then you would have to hate the world. Instead, you should pray for that person that they will find forgiveness for the sins they practice just as you pray every night for God to forgive you.
Belle - I enjoyed your overall comments (it was definitely that indefinite style that us 'not exactly sure what we are doing' parents use). While I think I know the answer, I have a question on the above part of your comments:
What do you teach your children with regard to deeper relationships with folks that have a strong attachment to sin (such as homosexuality)? This would be more along the lines of a deep friendship, not as lover.
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
This will require more thought. My initial response was that of course you need to teach your child what is sin. But the more I think about it, the more sin is covered by the "love your neighbor as yourself" commandment from Christ.
I was trying to think of other situations where a parent should teach a child what is sinful or wrong that most would agree on. One of those that I came up with involved my nephew. He is now 10 and has always been the biggest kid in his class. He is a very good natured kid now, but when he was very young (about 3 or 4), his parents had a few problems because he was using his size against other kids to get his way. His parents had to explained to him that his behaviour was wrong. We can all agree that this is a case where the parent does need to say what is right and what is wrong. I don't know, maybe not.
But of course, that example falls pretty easily under the "love your neighbor as yourself" commandment.
What about tithing? I know it's another area of contention amongst Christians, but is it a sin not to tithe and should you teach your child that? I think it also could fall under the "love your neighbor as yourself" commandment, as the money will be used to help others in many ways.
But where does that leave a parent when faced with an issue like homosexuality? I believe it is a sin, but it doesn't really have a victim. I don't think it follows loving your neighbor, but does that mean I shouldn't convey my beliefs to my son?
Yes, I will tell him what things my beliefs tell me are sinful. But one thing I also hope to instill in my son is that as he grows older, he will need to seek God himself and not simply rely on what I've told him.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
I'm afraid if I get deeper into this it'll quickly become a "Why I'm Not a Christian" post, and so I'll gracefully bow out.
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
Henry, I'm not sure exactly what you mean? What do I teach my kids about people that are homosexual and are just friends not acting on it? Or what do I teach them about us being friends with a person who is a homosexual?
It's late and I haven't eaten lunch, my brain is not working on all cylinders. Posted by Christy (Member # 4397) on :
I've been chewing on this one a lot. It deeply disturbs me, but I have been having a hard time coming up with an appropriate response. Bear with me.
quote: I respect people like ScottR a lot, so when I hear that our views are so different, it does lead me to question mine. But this is something so fundamental to what I thought I knew about being Christian, I'm just concerned I must not know anything...
I think it depends on what you respect about ScottR's views. I believe it is possible to still be a good Christian with the views you hold. You are just emphasizing a different part of God's word because it touches you more, but I think in the spirit of the word, that is okay. It does not mean that you don't know anything about being a Christian.
quote: I have the completely opposite viewpoint. That by concentrating on teaching your children to recognize sin (in themselves and others, I assume), you are actually training them to be judgemental people, and thus encouraging one of the most clearly proscribed behaviors in the New Testament.
For me, this comes with my percieved abuse of many Christians of judgement. Because I have seen this viewpoint abused, I would swing towards your end of the spectra that teaching children not to be judgemental is more important than teaching them about sin. However, here are where the other views that I hold (such that homosexuality in a committed relationship is not a sin) conflict with views of other good Christian souls. I also believe that there are too many ways to interpret the bible to make a strict moral code and that we on earth can never know the true will of God, we can only glimpse through our own limited minds and hearts.
The trouble is, though, how to teach morality to your children as well as temperence. If they should be willing to accept everyone and not be judgemental, why should they be any more critical of themselves? Can you still teach them to be passionate and accepting?
I think it can be done. You have to first teach them your morals as fact, but as they learn and grow, teach them how to open their minds and find for themselves where the inconsistencies are and why you hold the views you do.
Posted by HenryW (Member # 6053) on :
quote:Or what do I teach them about us being friends with a person who is a homosexual
That's it Belle.
I reread my stuff and it doesn't appear to be your fault. I was writing that comment between three conversations and just assumed some words got typed...
Oh well - at least I am the only one that has to be around me all the time.
Edited for poor typing skills.
[ January 05, 2004, 06:01 PM: Message edited by: HenryW ]
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
I'm just replying to the start of the original post, and my presently favored theory on children and morality is that one has to act autonomously for oneself, but be tolerant of others. I think the same child can have enough autonomy to neither embrace immorality, nor embrace persecution of the immorality of others.
Of course, I come from the view that both the importance of sex to an individual and sexual orientation are variable. I didn't say mutable (meaning deliberately shapeably). I think you can try to influence someone but it may have none, little, or the opposite effect of what was intended.
Finally, I think teaching and patterning what is right is more important that obsessing on what is wrong.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Christy, your post summed up my view of things perfectly.
I suppose part of my problem is that teaching a child that some specific action is a sin versus teaching that child that you BELIEVE that action to be a sin is a huge gulf for me. And while I would agree that it is important for parents to teach their beliefs (i.e., their morals) to their children, what comes with that is people teaching their own unfounded prejudices to their children -- a thing which I think is truly harmful and against Jesus' teachings in that it actually encourages them to pre-judge other people.
Oh well.
It is impossible to separate teaching a child "right from wrong" and teaching them about "sin" if you are a religious person. I know that. And I would argue that every parent does worse NOT to teach their children right from wrong from the earliest point at which the child will understand.
I wonder, though, when is it the right time to teach that it is not our job to judge others? And do you teach that as a general rule (i.e., Jesus said don't judge others) or do you teach it as specific to particular "sins" as they are encountered and learned about by the child.
I mean, teaching a child not to pass judgement on homosexuals requires that the child first understand what the deal is anyway. At least I assume parents aren't just pulling their six-year-olds aside and saying "homosexuality is a sin, Junior." You'd want them to actually understand what homosexuality is before you share your beliefs about it...right?
Belle, by the way, I have to say that your post was one of the better ones I've read regarding the thing we've argued about so often in the past (the old "hate the sin, love the sinner" thing). Thanks!
What else can I say but thank you ALL for the shared thoughts so far. It helped me be less bleak today, even though I couldn't chime in becuase of all the work I had to do.
I'm personally much more comfortable with something along the lines of Chris Bridges' approach, but I wasn't worried about my own comfort level so much as I was about what I feared was a fundamental lack of understanding of what a truly devout Christian upbringing would entail.
To be honest, I think the whole notion of being "fallen" and wretched sinners is a terrible doctrine and one that I can't even begin to believe in. I could say the words "I'm a sinner" but to actually believe that I'm not good and worthy...nope, I can't do it. That's not pride, really. It's simply that I can't believe the worst about myself or others and still love myself or others.
I don't think I could love myself and count myself as a wretch. It just rings false to me. Like it must be a mistake in translation, or the book of the Bible where that thought was somehow explained and softened was inadvertently left out.
I know I'm not God, or anything close. But that doesn't mean I'm not simply terrific overall.
And I think all of you are simply terrific too!
Yes, even you! You wretch!
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Going back to the previous page, my current working definition of sin is “failure to recognize oneself as created in the image of God.”
It’s got a really long, really boring, constructive theology paper to back it up, but that’s what it boils down to.
Posted by Christy (Member # 4397) on :
To me, the idea of sin is that we are all capable of falling in to temptation or to doing wrong. However, this should not consume us with doubt and worry, nor should we condemn ourselves as sinners because we are people made in the image of God who are given the tools to recognize these temptations and the will to overcome them and to better ourselves.
i.e. humility is good, despair is not
quote:I suppose part of my problem is that teaching a child that some specific action is a sin versus teaching that child that you BELIEVE that action to be a sin is a huge gulf for me. And while I would agree that it is important for parents to teach their beliefs (i.e., their morals) to their children, what comes with that is people teaching their own unfounded prejudices to their children -- a thing which I think is truly harmful and against Jesus' teachings in that it actually encourages them to pre-judge other people.
Bob, I fear this as well -- greatly. However, you have to start from somewhere. Children just don't understand enough at a young age that you can openly present your ideas to them in a non-biased fashion. How do you explain to your two year old that he/she must go to bed now? Because mom/dad said so. And once you do that, the rest of the "morals" must follow to a certain extent. However, I do feel that the important factor in not just passing on your prejudices is being open enough to discuss your beliefs with your children as they become interested and ready to explore their own viewpoints. What is the right time to do this? Hard to say. I think you teach acceptance as a general rule, and by example. And I think any of us will have a hard time in doing so. Even young children are mean and judgemental of each other. Bullying and teasing begins at an early age when kids don't even understand what they are doing, but following the crowd. Individuality is a hard thing to foster, but we can keep trying to be good examples and teach the best we can.
[ January 05, 2004, 09:27 PM: Message edited by: Christy ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
kat, I thought that was what I said. I guess it didn't come across. I was trying to make the distinction between people knowing that their is a spirit to a law and not following it and people believing that following the law is completely true to the spirit of the law. To me, this is more interesting when it comes to looking at the Bible. In the literal tradition, the Bible stories are history, plain and simple. It's what happened and is important because it happened. From a stricly idealistic standpoint, the Bible stories didn't need to happen for them to be true and valuable. The concepts, questions, and way of looking at the world (a.k.a. the ideals) that comes from these stories is the important part and historical accuracy doesn't necessarily enter into it.
----
quote:How do you explain to your two year old that he/she must go to bed now? Because mom/dad said so.
This gave me a brief flash to Japanese child-rearing practice. Instead of using an appeal to authority ("Because I'm your mother, that's why.") to get children to do the things that are good for them, it's customary in Japan to make an appeal to emotion (e.g. "It makes Mommy sad when you don't go to bed when you should.") I'm not advocating one style over the other; I just thought it was an interesting contrast.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:more important to train your children to recognize sin or to know that they are not supposed to judge others.
:sigh:
Let's go to the good book, shall we? To get a better understanding of this, the rallying cry of the 'tolerant.'
quote:
St. Matthew 7
1 JUDGE not, that ye be not judged.
2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
3 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.
6 Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.
Christ does not excuse either the mote or the beam; both must be RECOGNIZED and removed. Note the responsability is on the one who sees the sin to help the one who does not recognize and change.
With the same breath that he utters 'Judge not,' he goes on to require us to judge between men, swine, and dogs.
EDIT: By the way, I haven't read through the whole thread, being on dial up, and hoping that Slash gets a turn out here soon. . . I'm responding simply to Bob's initial post.
[ January 05, 2004, 10:17 PM: Message edited by: Scott R ]
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Guess I should have posted this here:
"Bob, as a parent, I MUST say -
Recognizing sin in others is not a priority lesson for children. (IMHO)
Recognizing sin (error) in self does top the list, though. It's part of the maturation/discipline process. Recognizing when I have screwed up and done something that harms another or myself. Making amends. Asking forgiveness. Changing the behavior.
I dunno - I always thought the greatest commandment was "Love one another as I have loved you." The capper, as it were. " --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on :
I appreciated something that my Mom said the other day to my five-year-old brother. He had just said "smoking is bad!" and my Mom, like most parents, took the opportunity to reinforce this point, but also added something important. She said, "Yes, smoking is bad, but that doesn't mean that people who smoke are bad people." I think this is the key to the argument, really.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Scott, I was always taught a different lesson in regards to the mote/beam thing. I was told that it was a call for vigorous self-examination as a necessary condition for just judgement of others. It's no accident that we're talking about obstructions in the eyes. The idea is that one cannot even recognize the faults of others when they have unacknowledged faults of their own. So, for me, that passage has always spoken to the unfitness of nearly everyone to judge anyone else. It speaks to the person judging much more than to the people he is judging.
Thinking about it now, I sort of think that the beam in people's eyes fits very well into viewing other peopel with prejudice and hatred, perhaps best exemplified by the "God hates Fags!" crowd.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
dkw...you never cease to inspire deeper thought. I haven't heard a new definition of sin in a long, long time. Thanks!
<part of Bob's mind wanders off to ponder...>
ScottR...I wonder if that verse you quoted is as misunderstood as you seem to think. Basically, it warns of the dangers of judging others. It doesn't say you should prepare yourself for the day when you are wise enough to judge. It doesn't say you shouldn't judge others unless you are really, really sure. I read it and think -- no human is or ever will be qualified to judge others. At least not on what seems to matter most to those who wish to judge -- who is going to heaven or not, what things are sins and what things are not.
Here's an interesting example not having to do with homosexuality. My pastor for a time in Orlando gave a fervent lecture on why drinking alcohol was sinful. At the end of it, he confessed to not being able to handle his liquor. In other words, when he drank, he became inconsiderate, abusive and ultimately was out of control. His inability to kick the habit sort of sealed the deal for me in that I took him to be a more or less standard alchol abuser. He had a serious problem with alcohol.
He was and is an alcoholic.
Now, he credits God with saving him from a wasted life indulging in his addiction. Instead, he is abstinent and views the drinking of alcohol as a sin.
And frankly, for him, it is.
For me and the vast majority of the population, it is not. I'm not a heavy drinker. I never drink to excess and I don't get stupid or abusive from ingesting too much alcohol. I am not an alcholic, in other words.
For me, taking a drink is not a sin. I don't believe it will ever become one either. I'm just not that big on alcohol. It doesn't rule my life.
And more to the point, the fact that my pastor decided that alcohol intake is a sin for everyone made me think he wasn't really in tune to what sin really is.
And he would certainly be one who would teach his children that drinking is a sin. And they would no doubt notice me drinking and believe I was sinning as a consequence.
The fact that he'd be wrong is beside the point.
Now, this same man had no problems with gluttony. I on the other hand enjoy food and probably would be classified as a food addict, a glutton, or what have you. I might be inclined to admit that my food obsession has caused problems and that for me it could even be classified as a sin.
And if I had children, I might work very hard to ensure that they learn healthier ways to relate to food than I have learned. I doubt I would teach them that liking food is sinful, but I might certainly tell them that over-eating is bad for them.
Where was this going?
I'm hungry.
Oh yeah, the point I was trying to make is that people of faith do tend to identify sins in themselves that in others are not sins. And they do tend to see things a bit more black-and-white than will comfortably fit in most people's reality.
One of the reasons I sort of liked the "that which separates one from God" definition of sin is that it had contained within it the possibility that there were idiosyncratic sins -- things that amounted to a "sin" for one person, but didn't meet the criterion for someone else. Not on the big things like murder, but maybe for other things.
And to bring this back to the important topic at hand...
If judging others is a sin, it is one for all of us.
Homosexuality might be a sin for you...being married to a woman who is the mother of your children and to whom you have a commitment.
Homosexuality to another might be normal, natural and harmless -- in fact, it could be their only way to a committed relationship...
So, in the grand scheme of things, being judgemental towards others seems the greater or more universal sin. The one worth actual mention by Jesus as a true pitfall to most of us. The one all of us are more likely to commit and harm each other as a consequence of.
And yet people persist in making sure that they and everyone else knows that they are BY GOD going to raise their children knowing that homosexuality is a sin.
Does this not strike you as a bit of misplaced emphasis? It sure does me. I take it to mean that the individual is deciding which sins are most repugnant in THEIR eyes and passing that prejudice on to the next generation.
Oh, and Sorry about the dial-up...that truly is a sin...
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
<rest of Bob's mind wanders back>
quote:failure to recognize oneself as created in the image of God
dkw, I was convinced for a long while that the greatest sin was not making good (in every sense of that word) use of the gifts God gave to each of us.
I ultimately saw some holes in that definition but I couldn't really figure out what to do to fix it. I like yours better and it seems to include my previous favorite.
Would you agree that this is subsumed in the definition you have proposed or am I off track here?
Posted by Ryuko (Member # 5125) on :
quote: So, in the grand scheme of things, being judgemental towards others seems the greater or more universal sin. The one worth actual mention by Jesus as a true pitfall to most of us. The one all of us are more likely to commit and harm each other as a consequence of.
I think that this is completely true. Moreover, a point I think you might be brushing up against is that not only is it a sin to judge, it's a sin to presume that the sins that you abhor the most are the ones that God abhors. This is why I disagree with many people who make a point of introducing themselves as Christians. A lot of the people who are Christians first and humans second feel like they have the right to condemn others for their actions, which to me seems presumptuous. Because they lift themselves up above the level of others, in God's eyes or so they believe, they're really putting themselves above God. Do this to the least of my children and you do it to me, as the Bible says... To me, it's a greater sin to be self-righteous.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Who am I to judge.
NO. Really! Who am I to judge? I'm sitting here, I got the robe, the gavel, and I'm ready to go!
Oh well...
Ryuko, the ones to really watch out for are those who advertise as operating a "Christian" business. I've never been ripped off more blatantly than by people who put a fish symbol on their ad in the phone book. Maybe they stuck that there to lure gullible Christian clients. But it sure is suspicious.
And the ones that advertise in the church bulletin!!!
quote:Today's Communion wafers brought to you by Alpha & Omega plumbing. Our motto: May the Lord's peace drain down on thee
[ January 05, 2004, 11:20 PM: Message edited by: Bob_Scopatz ]
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Hmmm - let's see if paraphrasing helps this out at all:
St. Matthew 7
1 JUDGE not, that ye be not judged.
*It's not for me to decide if you have sinned, otherwise I'll be judged a sinner. This is stated in such a way as to imply that judgement of others is not a desirable thing.*
2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.
*So, if I say you are bad, I shall be told off as the same - and if I discipline you, the same discipline will be given to me. I notice that this does NOT say that I have or will do the thing I have judged to be bad, yet I will receive the same judegement and discipline. . . *
3 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
*Wake up - why are you looking at the blindness of the person next to you when your blindness by comparison is several times worse?*
4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
*How can you offer to remove the blindness in the other guy's eye when you have your own incredibly large blind spot*
5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye.
*Imperfect judger: Learn to see clearly first, and then you can see clearly enough to remove the blindness from the other person . . . this begs the question that without the grace of God would we be able to ever see clearly enough to give sight to a blind person?*
6 Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.
*I can't give anyone else God's grace - that is for God to do. And I can't give the grace given to me by God to anyone else, either. I think the last verse is quite a statement on the frailty of the human condition - very aptly described by Bob with regards to his Pastor. All drinkers became sinners to him - the dogs, the swine - because they didn't receive the grace God gave him. What the Pastor seems to have missed out on is that God's grace is different for each of us - we don't each achieve our ultimate spiritual goals in the same fashion as each other.*
So, it's not my place to tell you how wrong or right you are (even though we all do it, all the time, to everyone). It is my place to love the people around me as best I may, modeling myself after Christ's example. This will not necessarily be comfortable. Christ asks us to move outside our comfort zone. He didn't spend his time with the "law" abiders, as you all may recall. As a matter of fact, he spent a lot of time showing just how pathetic the "law" was and focused on the frail humanity around him, loving them with honesty and dignity and grace.
Just my two cents.
P.S. I REALLY liked your definition, dkw, and I'd love to read the paper.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
Bob, I don't believe it is correct to say that something can be a sin "for me" but not "for you." If something is a sin, it is a sin for everyone, whether they think it is or not. This is especially true for the religious, who tend to strongly reject moral relativism.
I also think it would be particularly dangerous to teach kids to be moral relativists. I would think it would often lead them to think whatever moral system they've been taught is no better than any other, and thus can be discarded. After all, they are bound to ask at some point "Why is it a sin for me and not them?"
Posted by Wussy Actor (Member # 5937) on :
quote:I would think it would often lead them to think whatever moral system they've been taught is no better than any other, and thus can be discarded. After all, they are bound to ask at some point "Why is it a sin for me and not them?"
Don’t we want children to question and examine beliefs and decide on their own whether or not one set of beliefs is better than another?
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
Yes, but moral relativism tells them not to try and figure out which is better. Instead it says to not judge any person's morals as any more right than any other.
Posted by Wussy Actor (Member # 5937) on :
Isn’t that the jist of bob’s question? Whether or not its right to teach a child to judge other’s beliefs?
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
What I find curious is that in a number of other places Jesus tells us (or someone, in context) to judge--only to judge in a particular way. For instance, in John 7, Jesus tells some people to "stop judging by appearances, and make a righteous judgement".
To me this indicates that it isn't judging itself that is wrong--only some very common standard of human judgement--and that we can learn to judge properly.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
"Instead it says to not judge any person's morals as any more right than any other."
Forgive me, but no, it doesn't. Moral relavitism says that judgment is relative to the individuals and situations involved. Right and wrong can still be discerned, but more things must be taken into account.
Thou shalt not kill, but self-defense is justifiable and waging war is occasionally necessary. Thou shalt not steal, but stealing to feed a child should not receive the same penalty as stealing, say, a company's 401(k). Honor thy father and mother, but when your parent abuses you or tries to kill you I don't think you can be blamed if you don't visit them every day.
Every law has an exception, and that exception is determined by the existing conditions. Punishment for breaking that law must include those conditions in its judgment. Every action must be taken in context, otherwise there could never be mercy.
Nothing personal, Tresopax, but people who believe in absolute morals scare the crap out of me.
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Chris, I agree that mercy is necessary, but mercy by definition is something that can't be encoded in law--that's justice. Mercy is inherently something outside the law; you can't expect it to be defined by law.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
My favorite moral absolute is "there are no moral absolutes."
Tres, I really do believe you are wrong about this one sin fits all approach. Or is it all sins fit all.
If that's the case, then I demand that Christians of good conscience get together once a year and publish a list so I can decide whether I should consider myself Christian or not by their standards.
Um... it's just not a tenable solution, honestly. It probably leads to greater division between sects. I mean, my pastor was convinced that drinking alcohol is a sin. I could easily abstain from alcohol if I felt like him, but the fact that I can take it or leave means I don't have that monkey on my back. (I have others). But to say that I am sinning if I do have a drink is just patently absurd.
And if one "universal sin" can be so easily delisted, why not others? Why not all? Where is the line drawn?
Do we just boil it down to violations of the Ten Commandments and have done with it?
Or do we (I hope) drop all this worry about sin and concentrate on the positive aspects of this faith we have cobbled together?
After all, Jesus sort of did provide a clue when he said outright that all the commandments flow from the first two. If you do those two right you aren't going to violate the others.
Right?
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
Bob, do you think there are times when we must judge others? And I don't mean in criminal court.
I know you're not big on organized religion anymore, but if you were a member of a church and you found out a deacon was having an affair, would you want him to remain a deacon? Of course, every deacon is sinning in some way since we all do so, we just don't know what it is they're doing.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
See, I have no problem judging others based on their agreement to be judged by me (either expressed or implied). By living in a society of laws and partaking of the good things that society has to offer, all the members of that society are agreeing to be bound by its laws. There is freedom of choice in that you can choose to move elsewhere. There is also the chance to affect a change in the laws through appeals, legislative action, or running for office yourself.
So, no problem if people are judging others in criminal or civil matters.
Likewise, a deacon of the church, by virtue of taking on that position, has agreed to a certain code of conduct (again either expressed or implied). And in violating that code of conduct, he or she has forfeited their right to the position -- or at least has set themselves up for judgement of whether they should be removed or not.
God and religion are totally different situations: 1) God never asked a single person if he or she would accept the rules. 2) There's no viable alternatives -- it's living under God's rules or DIE! 3) Nobody but God has a say in how the rules get modified over time or with various circumstances. 4) I'll add that there appears to be a fair amount of disagreement as to what the rules are, in the fine print anyway.
Given the situation, I think it's pretty darn clear that God intends to do whatever God wants and we should keep our noses out of it. Judging the sins of others is not our province. That's Gods or no-ones.
Judging whether someone lived up to the rules they agreed to or even set for themselves in full knowledge and control, that's a different story altogether.
Judgement is mine sayeth the Bob...in those cases.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
(debating whether to amend my apatheism enough to join the Church of Bob..)
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
Well said. You are right that a deacon is in a more public position where he has agreed to a set of rules.
I still think there are times when "judging" is the correct think to do. Although, maybe the term "judging" is incorrect and that's where my problem lies. To me, judging brings up connotations of putting yourself above another, considering yourself better than they are.
If I have a friend who is cheating on his wife, should I talk to him about it? I can't wait til I've gotten the log out of my eye, because that's never going to be the case. In a case like that, am I judging my friend or am I loving him by trying to help him get back on the right track. I think that if I ever did something like that, I would want someone to confront me on it.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
I want to jump back and addressed something Bob said while I was gone
quote: I suppose part of my problem is that teaching a child that some specific action is a sin versus teaching that child that you BELIEVE that action to be a sin is a huge gulf for me. And while I would agree that it is important for parents to teach their beliefs (i.e., their morals) to their children, what comes with that is people teaching their own unfounded prejudices to their children
I don't teach my children what I believe to be sin -- I teach them what the scriptures say is sin.
However, there is NO way to be a parent without in some way, passing along your own prejudices and paradigms. I'm sorry -- it just isn't possible. They learn so much more from what we ARE than from what we say. So to say that parents teach unfounded prejudices -- sure we do -- even when we don't WANT to.
My kids don't like Ford automobiles simply because I've always been a Chevy person. I love the Dallas Cowboys, so they do too -- (except not recently because teens think it is great to go for the team that mom is NOT for -- just to irritate her). Little things like that -- you can probably name several things that YOUR parents believed that you now agree with simply because you are so used to thinking that way.
So even if I teach them that homosexuality is a sin (that the SCRIPTURES say that, not me), they are going to learn how to treat others of that nature by my example, not by my words.
Farmgirl
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:"Instead it says to not judge any person's morals as any more right than any other."
Forgive me, but no, it doesn't. Moral relavitism says that judgment is relative to the individuals and situations involved. Right and wrong can still be discerned, but more things must be taken into account.
Yes, moral relativism does say that. Moral relativism is the belief that two people can look at the same specific situation, come to two different conclusions about what the best action in such a situation would be, and both be equally right. If you don't support that idea, you believe in an objective morality (the right thing to do in a situation doesn't change depending on who is doing the judging) and thus not moral relativism. If you DO support that idea, you believe in no objective morality, and thus do not believe in any bar with which one person's moral beliefs can be objectively compared with another.
quote:Um... it's just not a tenable solution, honestly. It probably leads to greater division between sects. I mean, my pastor was convinced that drinking alcohol is a sin. I could easily abstain from alcohol if I felt like him, but the fact that I can take it or leave means I don't have that monkey on my back. (I have others). But to say that I am sinning if I do have a drink is just patently absurd.
Why not just believe that your pastor is mistaken? It seems to me that that is more tenable than trying to say you are BOTH right, even though you disagree. I mean, by saying you are both right you put God in the odd position of both having to condemn you (since you are doing something wrong according to the pastor, and he is right) and having to not condemn you (because you are not doing something wrong according to you, and you are right too.) How could this be the case?
quote:Do we just boil it down to violations of the Ten Commandments and have done with it?
Well, no. I think things are far more complicated than the Ten Commandments. In reality, you can't really ever rely on moral rules like "X is always wrong in all situations no matter what.' I believe in one true, objective morality, but it's a complicated thing that depends on you to consider the specific details of each situation that arises separately. I believe Christ's teachings get at this.
quote:Or do we (I hope) drop all this worry about sin and concentrate on the positive aspects of this faith we have cobbled together?
You mean you don't want anyone to worry about doing right or wrong? Does this mean we can stop worrying about refraining from murdering people (provided, of course, we can escape the law undetected)?
quote:By living in a society of laws and partaking of the good things that society has to offer, all the members of that society are agreeing to be bound by its laws. There is freedom of choice in that you can choose to move elsewhere.
There's no such free choice. You are BORN into society, and by the time you are old enough to go anywhere, there will likely be many things you have become very attached to that will prevent you from leaving without a good deal of suffering on your part. It'd be like saying "Here's this deal - you can take it or leave it freely. But if you leave it, we take away your home, friends, and family."
[ January 06, 2004, 09:10 AM: Message edited by: Tresopax ]
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:Judging the sins of others is not our province. That's Gods or no-ones.
The problem is, how do you expect to ever have good judgement if you don't have practice judging?
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Practice judging all you want - start with YOURSELF first . . . get all the kinks ironed out and then decide if you should be out there judging others.
I'd be willing to speculate that we all can get plenty of practice "judging" by closely monitoring our own behavior, attitudes, thoughts, words, actions . . . hmmm?
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
A sin is a sin no matter who does it. There is no way for something to be a sin for one person and not for another.
Not in the sense of "Killing is always wrong.", but in the sense that Bob killing an intruder who broke the window and was waving a gun at him is the same as Scott killing an intruder who broke the window and was waving a gun at him.
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Never mond Bob and Scott, Javert - what is it for you?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
"Moral relativism is the belief that two people can look at the same specific situation, come to two different conclusions about what the best action in such a situation would be, and both be equally right."
Not exactly, or at least not how I've always defined it. Two people from differing cultures or in different circumstances can come to two differnt conclusions about what the best action in such a situation would be, and both could be equally right in regards to their own context.
Say, for example, I've killed a man. This is forbidden by a Commandment, clearly a sin in the eyes of God. Does it make a difference if I hated him? Or if I was defending myself? Or if I wanted his money? Or if I was defending your family? Or if I was just bored? Or if he was about to harm a lot of people? Or if he was dying in unspeakable agony and begged me to? Or if he was on the enemy side of a battle?
I think these contexts make a great deal of difference. The act is the same. I've killed him. But judging me is impossible without knowing the situation, something you yourself alluded to: "I believe in one true, objective morality, but it's a complicated thing that depends on you to consider the specific details of each situation that arises separately." As soon as you consider separate conditions, your morality has become relative. Otherwise every single one of those examples should receive the exact same penalty.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
Shan, trying to do that is going to be problematic for a number of reasons. For one thing, many important moral problems are situations that may only occur once or twice, and you won't have experience with unless you look at others. You won't, for instance, be having too many abortions (hopefully.) For another thing, people tend to be very biased and selfish when judging themselves. Often (especially with little kids who are new at this) you can't see what's wrong with an act until you observe someone else doing it, and judge them as wrong. Thirdly, and probably most important of all, a large part of learning morality is interacting with the moral views of others. If left to your own devices, you'll probably come to very distorted conclusions.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Personally I think Bob's conflict with his preacher is due to the preacher getting too specific. His sin was selfishness, allowing his own desires to get in the way of what he knew was right. In his case it was alcohol. In Bob's case it might be chili cheese fries. It wasn't the alcohol that was the sin, it was the indulgence.
Posted by Olivet (Member # 1104) on :
Here's an interesting and sort of disturbing story, that I don't know if anyone has mentioned yet.
It's disturbing because it shows how clueless we are in the study of sexuality, I think. It's alot less black-and-white than we seem to assume. At least for some people.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Shan: You mean, if someone came through the window and was waving a gun at me and I shot him and he died, would it be a sin?
You know, I don't know. I'd have to pray for guidance, because I just don't know off the top of my head and would need help in judging that.
[ January 06, 2004, 09:58 AM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:As soon as you consider separate conditions, your morality has become relative.
I think you don't quite have the right definition for relativism then. I think that, of course, right or wrong will depend on the conditions or context of a situation. I don't know of many who'd deny this.
Moral relativism takes this a step further and says that given the SAME context and conditions, the rightness of wrongness of an act changes relative to the person judging that act. Here is a definition of relativism from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Here's two quotes:
quote:Although there are many different kinds of relativism, they all have two features in common. 1) They all assert that one thing (e.g. moral values, beauty, knowledge, taste, or meaning) is relative to some particular framework or standpoint (e.g. the individual subject, a culture, an era, a language, or a conceptual scheme). 2) They all deny that any standpoint is uniquely privileged over all others.
quote:In ethics, this amounts to saying that all moralities are equally good;
[ January 06, 2004, 10:01 AM: Message edited by: Tresopax ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Historically, attraction to whatever sex has always been a a gradient instead of a black and white issue.
It has only recently been turned into a black and white issue for political reasons, because a request to slide a little farther to one side in a gradient is greatly different from a complete switch from one side to the other.
In other words, the rhetoric of you are what you are and you know it from the beginning is most DEFINITELY not always true.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Tresopax, to me what you are saying is that you believe in a meta-morality, as it were, underlying everything and that the meta-morality will stay constant even when the specifics of the case change.
Am I twisting what you said too much?
AJ
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
If being judgemental is a greater sin than homosexuality, is it not a greater sin still to call someone judgemental? :church lady "Hmmmm?": And if you call someone who calls someone "judgemental", "judgmental", what does that make you?
In terms of relativism, I guess we all strive to have more information so we can have the most insight into every situation. But sometimes someone's moral milieau is that they have a narrow view. How open minded do you have to be to understand the motive of the narrow minded person.
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:Tresopax, to me what you are saying is that you believe in a meta-morality, as it were, underlying everything and that the meta-morality will stay constant even when the specifics of the case change.
Uh, yes, I think.
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
quote:Tresopax: Shan, trying to do that is going to be problematic for a number of reasons. For one thing, many important moral problems are situations that may only occur once or twice, and you won't have experience with unless you look at others. You won't, for instance, be having too many abortions (hopefully.) For another thing, people tend to be very biased and selfish when judging themselves. Often (especially with little kids who are new at this) you can't see what's wrong with an act until you observe someone else doing it, and judge them as wrong. Thirdly, and probably most important of all, a large part of learning morality is interacting with the moral views of others. If left to your own devices, you'll probably come to very distorted conclusions.
Why would you need any experience, Tresopax? I don't need to actually burn my hand on the stove to get that it's hot (I hope - but don't ask my mom about that one.) I would hope that my ability to determine the rightness/wrongness of an action FOR MYSELF is intact (I beleive we call it a conscience) so that I can choose to A) not kill the strange looking man walking down my street for the hell of it, or B)choose to to take out in any way possible the strange looking man threatening to say, rape my sister. At this point, the jury kinda gets to make a choice, too, but the "take action" decision is mine. Are you really suggesting that people must first "experience" this stuff to decide one way or the other about it? I'll ask you the question my folks asked me when I was a kid (so many decades ago): If all your buddies were jumping off of a bridge into a raging river 'cause it was fun, would you need to follow their example and have that experience to actually know it's dangerous?
And then you bring up abortions. I would add to that I hope you wouldn't be having too much unprotected sex and risking pregnancies. Hmmm - that 'ole argument is exactly that, old. Abortion might be a moral wrong for some, but I think it's just as morally wrong (in that case) to screw around and test the waters. Of course, by your definition, abortions will happen anyway, because the experience is needed to be able to decide whether it's right or wrong. In the case of intimate relations, I suppose a strong statement could be made for the experiential nature of it - after all, it's just messy play for adults . . .
Part of raising children is providing a model for behavior and belief, Tres. And a really huge part of raising children is giving them a good foundation of respect for others and self, accountability, discipline, self-esteem and then allowing them the freedom to think for themselves. Hopefully, the attachment has been sufficient that said children will continue to discuss important issues with their parents or other trusted adults, rather than feeling like they have to head on out there and "experience" killing (or whatever questionable experience it may be) first.
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Javert - I would hope your self-preservation instict stronger that that!
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
"They all deny that any standpoint is uniquely privileged over all others."
This could be the problem. I don't believe this. But I still maintain that conditions change the meaning of actions, and those meanings determine the severity (or justification) of the sin.
The American Heritage Dictionary definition: "A theory, especially in ethics or aesthetics, that conceptions of truth and moral values are not absolute but are relative to the persons or groups holding them."
My own definition reduces the emphasis on "persons or groups" and places it on "conditions and situations."
If conditions can alter whether the act of murder is a sin or not, how can that moral act not be relative?
Actually I suspect my core problem with these arguments is that I don't have morals anyway, since I don't believe in a religious basis for codes of behavior. I prefer ethics. Moral relativism as you (and apparantly most others) understand it is too often used to justify everything or denounce moral viewpoints, and that is not my goal.
[ January 06, 2004, 10:48 AM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
Slightly off-subject but kind of still on it:
quote:Ryuko, the ones to really watch out for are those who advertise as operating a "Christian" business. I've never been ripped off more blatantly than by people who put a fish symbol on their ad in the phone book.
*sigh*
So true. So very sad but true. A "Christian" company with the fish symbol and scripture in their yellow pages ad quoted a lady a price of $4,200 to replace her water heater.
We did it for our standard fee of $450. She was a bit shocked one might say. She even showed Wes the quote.
The company insisted she needed an entire new vent system to bring the house up to code and that she needed all kinds of safety precautions built in that simply weren't necessary. The house was in code, the precautions suggested are only required for gas water heaters placed in garages, this was an electric one in a laundry room upstairs.
*shakes head*
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I'd just like to point out that when people say that they KNOW what sin is, their knowledge of what is a sin is still based on their belief, even if it is scripture based. Why? Because your faith in scripture is based on a belief as well.
1) You believe Scripture to be the word of God, or at least divinely inspired. 2) You interpret what scripture says to some extent, and then believe that interpretation to be true. 3) When there are conflicting messages in scripture, you choose one or the other, or live with the inconsistency and believe in your choice.
Now, when you pray for guidance, you also have the added belief that whatever solution is arrived at, it was from God (or the Spirit) and is thus true and not of your own making.
Given all that, and the fact that devout Christians of good conscience find room to disagree about many of the finer points of scripture, I have to humbly assert that to claim scripture is a source of unbiased, unified, unerring and unwavering knowledge of "what is sin" is only true at the individual or small group level. It is the best example of subjective truth I have ever seen, frankly. The Baptists believe one thing. The LDS believes similar but different things. Catholics yet another, and so on and so on.
And everyone claims to be right.
And everyone claims that there is an objective truth out there and they have the key to it.
The most parsimonious explanation for this situation is that we are all wrong in some ways. And, because of the assertions made by all sects of having a handle on the TRUTH, wrong in one thing means that the claim of objective truth is utterly wrong.
So, simple logic leads us to the conclusion that while there may be an objective truth, there is no-one who can say for certain that they have access to it. Unless that person is also God.
And I haven't heard anyone here make that claim, so...
We're back full circle, are we not?
Say it with me now... "I BELIEVE <insert your particular truth here> to be true."
Not
"<insert your particular truth here> is true."
Oh and by the way FarmGirl...how did you find my Voy forum. I haven't been out there in a year. I've even forgotten the link to it, and my admin password. Ooops.
I lost interest in it when people started posting advertisements for their particular derailment of Christianity. Instead of discussion, it became a place where people posted their sales pitches.
edited 1st paragraph for clarity's sake!
[ January 06, 2004, 11:07 AM: Message edited by: Bob_Scopatz ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
*sigh* Not today.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
By the way, homosexuality is not a sin.
Sex without love is the sin...
I believe this message is far more consistent with the message of the New Testament than the one that homosexuality is a sin.
The only reason people still have for believing that homosexuality is a sin is that they want to. This allows them to ignore the bizarre inconsistencies in interpreting the OT scriptural references out of their context, and the problems of emphasizing what Paul says over what Jesus says.
Posted by zgator (Member # 3833) on :
Bob, you forgot to say "I believe" homosexuality is not a sin. Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
quote:The only reason people still have for believing that homosexuality is a sin is that they want to.
Bob, this is SO not true.
You can't claim that you know why everyone beleives what they do.It's a stereotype, and it's a wildly inaccurate and unfair one.
At the minimum, Old Testament scripture, NT scripture, modern scripture, and modern revelation all say it is a sin. That's hardly "because they want to."
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
(Sorry, Bob - while I agree with your belief, it was too much temptation to resist!)
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Javert: These scriptures point out many other things they say is sin, too. Which are not carried out, currently practiced, believed . . .
Hmmm - if my husband dies, I get first dibs at marrying his brother if I wasn't "gotten with seed" . . . hmmm . . . .
Like, don't look at or talk to or get near a menstruating woman lest you become corrupted. They have to go confine themselves to solitude . . .
hey! I like that one! That's what women need today! A little break . . . some solitude . . .
Tsk.
Interpretation matters more than a little, I think -
(Edited to address comment and fix a spelling boo-boo.)
[ January 06, 2004, 11:33 AM: Message edited by: Shan ]
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
quote: And everyone claims that there is an objective truth out there and they have the key to it
Not all LDS may agree with me but our truth is based on it being changeable. 10 years ago, there was a sense, at least among young progressives like myself, that the LDS church might do something to validate homosexuality. Keep in mind that 17 years ago, the president of the church was a former Republican cabinet member, and it was the height of the "you have to be a Republican to be a good Mormon" sentiment.
Then we went through many years without any direct input from the prophet, because of advanced age. Then... when was it? Has Hinckley been prophet for 10 years We get this new, dynamic young prophet. One of his counselors is a card carrying democrat. There is a lot of agitation going on from gays wondering if there will be a place for them, since spirit is more important than what you happen to be doing with your body. The most visible excommunications are for BYU professors being excessively parochial. In this climate, a soft headed young person like myself thought it might happen.
But there was a statement to the contrary issued. I was upset at first. But I decided to exercise faith in the matter. After a couple of years I had a dream that made it all clear to me. But I know it was only for me, with my personal situation. I don't really worry about the scriptural proofs of homosexuality being a sin. I know that I still have many sins in my own life, and we are all doing our best.
A recent insight I've had that may be more sympathetic is that I feel an excessive focus on sex causes a lot of misery in the form of people who stay in abusive relationships, which is much more of a problem for heterosexuals. And I don't have a problem will looking at folks and recognizing that is what's happening. But I don't try to drum it into their skulls, because I'm pretty sure it would make matters worse.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
"At the minimum, Old Testament scripture, NT scripture, modern scripture, and modern revelation all say it is a sin. That's hardly "because they want to." "
Ah, now we're back in familiar homosexual thread territory...
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
quote: The only reason people still have for believing that homosexuality is a sin is that they want to. This allows them to ignore the bizarre inconsistencies in interpreting the OT scriptural references out of their context, and the problems of emphasizing what Paul says over what Jesus says.
I'll throw in a bit or two while I'm here.
I think that one of the major if not THE major purposes of Christianity is to develop a stable community where people can be their very best selves. When most folks look at the commandments they view them solely in terms of "how does this affect me?" In Christianity one's salvation is a very personal kinda thing and so that is how we generally think of all the commandments- what I can or can't do.
I believe, however, that the primary reason for many commandments is only tangentially related to personal salvation but is instead geared toward developing a stable community.
Take the law of chastity. Obviously there is nothing wrong with sex in and of itself because (most) Christian churches think that sex within marriage is a grand thing. Even having sex with multiple partners isn't bad if we accept that God sanctioned the polygyny of men like Abraham.
So why the stricture against extra-marital sex? I think that it is all about forming stable communities with families as the foundation. Although doubtless many will disagree, I think that the Christian teachings against homosexuality can be seen in the same light. It isn't so much about sex as it is about defining a family composed of husband, wife and children as the basic unit of society.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Chris:
Yes, it is familiar territory. But people don't believe homosexuality is sin merely because "they want to."
With all those things pointing to one direction, it is far more likely that they are dimissed and people believe it is NOT a sin because they want to, so they look for a reason to ignore it.
Never mind that in many protestant churches, pre-marital sex is barely being seen as a sin. I have a friend who was Unitarian minister, and when she started living with her now-husband but then boyfriend, there was not a murmer either from her congregation or from what authorities exist as such in the church. That actually surprised her, because she didn't agree with what she was doing. It's part of the reason she became disenchanted with that religion.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
The discussion of whether something can be a sin for one person but not another reminds me of one of Wesley’s more famous sermons. It is part of a discussion about employment, and what types of employment are suitable for a Christian.
quote: There are yet others which many pursue with perfect innocence, without hurting either their body or mind; And yet perhaps you cannot: Either they may entangle you in that company which would destroy your soul; and by repeated experiments it may appear that you cannot separate the one from the other; or there may be an idiosyncrasy, -- a peculiarity in your constitution of soul, (as there is in the bodily constitution of many,) by reason whereof that employment is deadly to you, which another may safely follow. So I am convinced, from many experiments, I could not study, to any degree of perfection, either mathematics, arithmetic, or algebra, without being a Deist, if not an Atheist: And yet others may study them all their lives without sustaining any inconvenience. None therefore can here determine for another; but every man must judge for himself, and abstain from whatever he in particular finds to be hurtful to his soul.
I always got a giggle out of that one. And at the same time I’m relieved that JW did not just decided that mathematics were the work of the devil. He left room for people like me, who see in mathematics a window on the divine, even though he himself could never see it that way.
Bob, I would agree that your earlier definition could be included in the one I gave.
Shan, I’m not sure how well the paper stands alone – since it was for a class it responds to a lot of particular authors and uses a lot of theological short-hand. (It would have to – the assignment was “ in light of your core commitment summarize your views on theological method, sources, norms, authority, God, humanity, sin, salvation, the church, the sacraments, eschatology and the Christian life. 12-15 pages.” ) But if you want to read it I’d be happy to send it to you.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
quote: The only reason people still have for believing that homosexuality is a sin is that they want to. This allows them to ignore the bizarre inconsistencies in interpreting the OT scriptural references out of their context, and the problems of emphasizing what Paul says over what Jesus says
dkw -- get back in here and help us out with this!
I disagree with Bob's statement, but I'm having a very difficult time putting it into words that makes sense on a written forum. Everytime I write it, I see how some of the things I say can be taken in a way I'm not meaning..... <sigh>
FG
[edited for spelling]
[ January 06, 2004, 11:40 AM: Message edited by: Farmgirl ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
"what Jesus says"
Which is nothing. Are you saying silence implies consent?
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
Ha -- dkw posted when I was still writing my plea for her to help!
FG
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Kat, the UUs are not a protestant denomination. In fact, they (as a denomination) are not even Christian, although many of their members are. (That's not my judgement, it's the formal position of the denomination. Some members consider themselves Christian, others don't.)
So don't use them as the example when you're talking about liberal protestants, please?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Now I've got too many directions to go. Do I argue Javert's opinions on homosexuality as a religious sin, or discuss community building with Jacare about how providing a social structure for homosexuals would strengthen society, or go back to writing new hymns for the Church of Bob. Decisions, decisions...
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
I would still love to read it, dkw - thanks for the offer!
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
From the Post "Partway Gay" article:
quote:In the eight years she has been following these women, almost two-thirds of them have changed labels. "They've gone from unlabeled to bisexual, lesbian to bisexual, lesbian to 'heterosexual and getting married but may be attracted to women in the future,' " she says. Another word she heard was "heteroflexible." [
"The reason one person ended up gay might be very different from another person," she continues. "One might know at 4, another at 30."
Diamond's research, reported in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, among other publications, confirms the experience of Diane Elze, who has counseled gay and lesbian youth for two decades.
"Women who come out as lesbians but lived most of their lives as heterosexuals -- does that mean they were always lesbian? I don't think so," says Elze, assistant professor of social work at Washington University in St. Louis. "Probably we're going to find out there are multiple pathways to homosexuality and that could vary by gender."
So I again advance my belief that the "gay only, gay always" lobby is oppressive of women.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
dkw, I didn't know Unitarians were not considered to be part of Protestant Christianity. I apologize.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
No problem kat, some of them are, but some of the ones who aren't get downright testy about it. Most confusing religious community I've ever worked with.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:After all, Jesus sort of did provide a clue when he said outright that all the commandments flow from the first two. If you do those two right you aren't going to violate the others.
Seriously, I having a Back to the Future thing going on here. If it wasn't for kat's implacable emnity I'd feel like people all have a filter that erases my posts before you read them. People can read this, right? I thought that I had demonstrated that canonical Christian scripture explicitly states that love is the basis of all law, but no one, on any side of this issue, has seemed to me to have even read it. I'm not (or at least trying not to) whine about being ignored here. I'm really trying to resolve whether, with Ralphie AWOL and kat being what she is (and appologies to dkw), I show even bother posting the little bit that I do here. I feel like the tree falling in the forest with no one around.
Of course, in direct contradiction to that, I'm going to post some more.
---
Farmgirl,
quote:homosexuality is a sin (that the SCRIPTURES say that, not me)
There are quite a few Christians (such as dkw) and some non-Christians who still study the Bible (like me) who believe that the Bible does not necessarily say that homosexuality is a sin. In fact, I'd argue that the evidence is on the side of it not even being considered in New Testament writings. This pops up every once in a while. I think that the last time it did was here.
---
Tres, I'm with Chris here. I fully believe that I am a moral relativist and yet I regard your definition (and the definition coming from the objectivist western philosophical tradition) as being absurd. For one thing, you're turning a continuum into a dichotomy. Absolutism/relatism isn't an either or situation; it decribes instead a range of possible views. I could just as easily say that, if you don't accept that there is no standard of moral judgement, then you must believe that only actions themselves, rather than any situational considerations, define morality. In this case, killing someone in self-defense is equivilent to killing someone to steal their sneakers. That's the extreme range of absolutism.
Cocommitant with this fault, you also severely misrepresent the complexity of moral relativism. I'm not going to restate what Chris has already said so well, except to reemphasize what I think is the most important point. Moral relativism, at it's most basic, is the idea that, in order to completely know the morality of an action, you need to understand the entire context that it took place in. Thus, absolute moral judgement is theoretically possible. The only precondition is omniscience. Since I don't think that any human being can ever know all that goes into an action, I reject absolutism as a possibility. However, this leads to an existential-type crisis on the order of not being able to be sure that my senses accurately represent the world. Just because I have no justifiable method of determining morality, doesn't mean that I can survive not doing so. Some guiding system seems necessary. I think that it is because of this that so many relativists (at least in my acquaintence) are utilitarians.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Dang it, this one I would take responsibility for. Please don't go. I'll be quiet if that's what it takes.
[ January 06, 2004, 12:21 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
dkw, If I didn't have a philosophical system that regarded conversion as meaningless, I'd have to give serious thought to converting to what you got.
Posted by Suneun (Member # 3247) on :
I love the Unitarians. So quirky and neat =)
I was in one of their churches, and a big carved door leading to one of the halls had something written on it like, 'Things we hold to be truths now may be falsehoods in the future'
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
kat, Don't worry, my decision to leave (which I seem to be making in stages) won't depend on you. Your responses really don't bother me.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"So why the stricture against extra-marital sex? I think that it is all about forming stable communities with families as the foundation."
All the more reason to endorse same-sex marriage, of course. Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Mr Squicky, I used your post to make sure I had it right. Sorry I didn't give attribution.
- Bob
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Bob, I'm really not trying to bitch about not getting credit or attention. I was quite honestly unsure if people even read what I wrote. If people do, that's great.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Squick, you've been weeping that no one reads your posts for YEARS now.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
zgator...I missed your prior post. LOL!
I believe that others believe homosexuality is a sin primarily because they want to. The scriptural basis for the belief is tenuous and requires reading OT passages out of context (divorced from other supposedly equally bad sins that are really cultural norms -- like don't eat shellfish-- and display the ignorant superstition of the forefathers in all their glory -- see the passages on menstruation, for example). As for the NT testament passages, people seem to really like Paul's statements, but miss a fundamental point, it seems to me, about Jesus' mission that I think even Paul missed -- having not actually been there or met Jesus except as a blinding flash of light on the road after His death.
I mean really, why is Saul/Paul considered such a reliable source? He was at odds with the other apostles from the get-go on many things, not just conversion of gentiles. It's like he's our favorite because he was the one who made such a point of converting non-Jews. Without him, there might be far fewer Christians who weren't Jews first. Or Peter's dream might've come anyway and the mission to go beyond the Jews would've started then. Who knows.
But Paul is a weird guy to me and someone I would think twice about following anywhere, let alone into faith.
Remember folks, God may not have been the driving force deciding what became Canonical Scripture too. Maybe the closest Gospels to the truth came from sources now lost or at least stuck on the sidelines in non-Canon scripture.
Wouldn't we be better off using our intellect? Paul actually says some places that what he's expressing is "his opinion." Suppose he just forgot to say that a few times where it matters most today in his letters? Those letters were written for specific people at a specific time. Maybe he'd spoken to them directly about how he was always giving his opinion unless he was quoting scripture (which he also took very seriously, of course).
Did Paul believe he was writing Scripture? I don't think so.
So why take it as such?
And how does a letter we know is from a man become the literal word of God that we then take as providing proof for all time of what is and is not a sin?
[ January 06, 2004, 12:39 PM: Message edited by: Bob_Scopatz ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
So your belief that it isn't a sin rests on your dismissal of Paul.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
[Edit--this was intended to appear above Bob's most recent post; the first line is intended to be a continuation of what kat is saying in her response to Squick]
...and if you leave, it won't be the first time you've done so.
Squick, you've been here long enough to know that we *all* feel like we're being ignored, right? Everyone, except maybe Ralphie and Bob Scopatz, goes through periods where they feel like they don't know why they bother posting, since no one ever reads or responds to their stuff anyway. What people are forgetting, when they fall into this mindset, is just how often they read a post, think about it at some length, and then for one reason or another don't respond directly to it. You may not do that yourself, but if you don't you're in the minority.
Just because I'm able to type this, by the way, doesn't mean that I haven't fallen into exactly the same trap myself. It's easy to feel ignored here.
I hope that you stick around this time. If you go, I expect you'll be back. I'll be glad to see you return when you do, and so will many, many other people here.
[ January 06, 2004, 12:47 PM: Message edited by: Noemon ]
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Kat, you read 1/2 of the post...
There are two main scriptural references cited to bolster people's belief that homosexuality is a sin. One comes from the old testament and has bizarre context that should not be ignored.
The other is from Paul whom, I believe, was not always clear in stating when he was telling us his own opinion and when he was citing something he knew to be "of God." To me, that would almost ipso facto disqualify his letters as scripture. If the author says "here's my opinion" and you go ahead and turn it into scripture anyway, aren't you ignoring Paul's own testimony about what he wrote? Of necessity, you are ascribing to it at least some Divine inspiration if not actual God-breathed source equal to what is claimed for the rest of scripture.
I find that completely baffling. If the acknowledged author isn't even claiming that status (and why would he, he's writing a letter to a bunch of people in Corinth or Ephesus, etc.?) why should I?
And in giving Paul's letters equal status with the rest of scripture (including words ascribed to the man we believe to be the Son of God) aren't we devaluing the rest of Scripture. I mean, if we know Paul was just stating his own opinion and not claiming Divine inspiration, to then say his writings are the same as Jesus' teachings is just being stubborn.
So, knock off the stuff from Leviticus and give Paul his due as a enlightened man who truthfully told us he was stating his own opinions and what is left in Scripture that bolsters a claim that homosexuality is an important sin we should all get wrapped around the axle about?
Aren't we allowed to exercise a little common sense when it comes to Scripture? Just because some Romans almost hundreds of centuries ago figured this was the set of books we should all agree on doesn't mean they were right for all time.
Surely the LDS has a handle on that concept.
So if y'all can write new scripture from time to time, I don't see why I can't argue that some of the old "scripture" was included by mistake.
It's all done by flawed sinful men anyway, right?
Posted by Bokonon (Member # 480) on :
What Noemon said.
-Bok
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Shan, I just sent the paper to the address in your profile. But my e-mail's been a little flakey lately, so let me know if you don't get it.
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Squicky - I've pointed out that very "commandment" many times, but it obviously takes all the fun out of the argument. I still think we ought to resurrect the menstruate in private deal, though . . .
dkw - thanks! received! looking forward to reading it . . . Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
quote:So if y'all can write new scripture from time to time, I don't see why I can't argue that some of the old "scripture" was included by mistake.
Bob, you don't believe in modern revelation, right?
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
quote: Wouldn't we be better off using our intellect?
Okay, if you are going to throw out scripture in teaching my children (that was the original idea of the original post) about what is right/wrong, then we are probably just going to go round in circles on this thread. Obviously I do consider Paul to be a scriptural authority, but I'm not going to debate that in this thread.
So -- if you are tossing out scripture and just "using intellect" (as you say above) -- and in that way discarding the use of the word "sin" then we just have to ask this -- would a creator considered it to be "natural" or "normal" for there to be homosexual behavior? However, if we are just going to get back into THAT argument, there are plenty of old threads in the archives we can revive to box around those issues...
Farmgirl
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:Moral relativism, at it's most basic, is the idea that, in order to completely know the morality of an action, you need to understand the entire context that it took place in.
You can give your beliefs whatever name you want, but that's not the moral relativism I was complaining about, and it's not the thing that philosophers and ethicists normally call moral relativism. The moral relativism I'm talking about, at it's most basic, is the idea that the morality of an action is determined relative to the person or society judging that action.
Here's a couple more links I've found to the definition: This one from Encyclopedia Britannica explicitly refutes the suggestion that moral relativism is simply saying morality depends on circumstances:
quote: Philosophical view that what is right or wrong and good or bad is not absolute but variable and relative, depending on the person, circumstances, or social situation.
Rather than claiming that an action's rightness or wrongness can depend on the circumstances, or that people's beliefs about right and wrong are relative to their social conditioning, it claims (in one common form) that what is truly right depends solely on what the individual or the society thinks is right.
Here's one from a professor at VMI that has a nice summary:
quote:Relativism is the theory that the truth is different for different people (not just that different people believe different things to be true). Ethical relativism is the theory that the truth about what is right and what is wrong is different for different people.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Then I'll have to come up with a different name for my beliefs, then, because those don't fit at all. The definitions stated lead inexorably to the conclusion that ultimately nothing is right or wrong, everything is okay somewhere. I don't believe that.
But I also don't believe in an absolute morality that ignores conditions, situations, and motives. So where does that put me? Applied ethicist?
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
contextualist
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:would a creator considered it to be "natural" or "normal" for there to be homosexual behavior?
Who am I to second guess what the creator can and can't do? Besides, didn't the creator create the homosexuals?
Anyway, I realize I've departed from the original post in that I'm no longer concerned about what you teach your children -- hey, they're your kids. As long as you teach them to stay off my lawn, we'll be great neighbors.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
::looks up from setting up croquet set on Bob’s lawn::
Hmm? Oh.
::takes wickets and goes home::
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Y'know my front yard would be quite good for croquet, since it has such a huge setback from the street. I guess we will have to wait until it isn't covered with 6 inches of snow though!
AJ
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
You know, I've never understood the obsession with lawns - they're made to be stomped into nonexistence!
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Dang, you're going to hell for sure!
<pulls out lawn darts>
Hey Chris, ready for your favorite childhood game?
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Woo hoo! Here, let me close my eyes first...
Posted by Sopwith (Member # 4640) on :
Lawn darts, a game best played with sobriety, but never forgotten if played with drunkeness...
<that scar will never heal>
But hey, it makes a nice yard aereator.
(tried to make an explanatory cartoon with smileys... not very successfully)
[ January 06, 2004, 04:32 PM: Message edited by: Sopwith ]
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
For lack of a better, I'm going with "situational ethicist" for now.
Situational ethics (American Heritage Dictionary): A system of ethics that evaluates acts in light of their situational context rather than by the application of moral absolutes.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I prefer the word "plethics" to describe it. It is a combination of the word "plastic," which we all know are wonderful and useful products that enrich our lives, and the word "ethics" which is a word that resonates better with a "pl" sound in front of it.
Plethics is the self-contained, but malleable system of philosophy that teaches us that the eye of the beholder is often suffering from macular degeneration and cataracts and should be mistrusted at all times. What truly matters is the brain of the beholder which, through constant abuse since before birth, has turned to mush. Mush is a good thing to store in plastic containers, so not to worry. This is how we keep our ethics fresh -- we store them away in burp-sealed environments to be brought out whenever it is absolutely necessary such as when children ask a difficult social question or the coctail party banter has ranged too close to the illegal deal we struck that afternoon with a swarthy man named "Shotglass." (Who, by the way, you should never, on pain of death, call "Jigger." It'd be your last mistake, let me tell you!)
Oh yeah, back to plethics. It has a closely related area of thought dealing with the gross stupidity of the universe. That's called plethicks and is practiced by practically everyone at some point in their lives. Some more often than others.
Plethics can be very rewarding for the true afficionado (whatever the heck that is). To be a master plethicist, one need only appear to change ones mind while in fact holding steadfastly to the idea that it isn't ones mind that changed, but the surrounding world in which your actions and thoughts are interpreted. See? Exactly. Plethicists are the rock around which all other things revolve in utter confusion, in a shambling gait reminiscent of the "Thorazine shuffle."
<check's "Thorazine shuffle" off the life list of words and phrases to drop casually into a conversation or BB post.>
All right, you may ask, what has this got to do with the subject of this thread. Well, if you have to ask, you must not know the answer. So I'll give you a rhetorical answer (which is the much less successful second fiddle to the rhetorical question). My answer is, I don't know. Unsatisfactory? Perhaps. Or maybe you're just looking at my answer through the filter of your own plethics.
No sin in that.
But then again, plethics teaches us that there is either no sin at all, or that everything is a sin, even the act of atonement. I find myself sort of in the middle on that one.
Oh well. You've had enough, I can tell. So I will close by saying that you've all been wonderful to me in this thread and I regret that I will not be allowed to post on Hatrack for as long as a full week. I will be away on a business trip and I'm not sure I'll be able to connect to the internet in the interim. Or even in the hotel room.
The person to whom I've proxied my slice of Hatrack has been instructed to keep you amused to the best of his/her ability. I don't hold out much hope though.
Catch you on the flipside.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
My name is Shannon and I'm a recovering plethicist.
Bob, will you be my sponsor?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Shan, you are too far gone to recover. But interventions and deprogramming sessions are fun, so we've scheduled one for Tuesday a week from now under the half-dead hollow sycamore tree. You know the one.
Bring wine.
Posted by Wussy Actor (Member # 5937) on :
I left my plethics on the dashboard of my car last summer and they melted.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Tres, I totally believe you that that is the accepted definition of moral relativism in mainstream western philosophy. The thing is, my use of it didn't come out of the top of my head. The definition that I used is not my own, but rather one I culled from cross-cultural psychology, comparative mythology and religion, and the study of heresy in the Catholic Church. Other people in other fields have been using that term to mean something else, and I personally think that their definition makes a lot more sense.
This is especially in light of the way that you are using the term.
quote:I don't believe it is correct to say that something can be a sin "for me" but not "for you." If something is a sin, it is a sin for everyone, whether they think it is or not. This is especially true for the religious, who tend to strongly reject moral relativism.
I also think it would be particularly dangerous to teach kids to be moral relativists. I would think it would often lead them to think whatever moral system they've been taught is no better than any other, and thus can be discarded. After all, they are bound to ask at some point "Why is it a sin for me and not them?"
You are explicitly setting your definition of moral relativism as the logical opposite to moral absolutism, and yet, not only do I think that my definition is a much better opposite, I also think that it fits the situation that you're disagreeing with here. For example, Bob's definition of something being wrong for one person because of the context they bring to it but not wrong for another person with a different context fits exactly into what I said, but I really fail to see how it would work as an example of your definition. Or, in reference to the scripture that I brought up, the idea that the emotional context of actions is the defining aspect of their morality is a relativistic one as opposed to the absolutist idea that the actions themselves are the seat of moral rightness, regardless of why they are performed - such as an action approved by the Bible but intended in a specific instance to hurt someone else being ok. I fail to see how such a situation is could be called relativistic in your schema. Could you tell me what would the name for it be?
You say that we're using a term to mean other than it does. I'm fine with that. I'll call it whatever you want. The thing is, I think you're doing the same thing. What you oppose by calling it moral relativism is what I believe it to be and not what you're saying it is. You've defined the opposite of your preferred system as something that is neither a logical opposite nor even a particularly tenable idea. I don't know what they call that in philosophy, but in my field we call it a defense mechanism.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
WA: did your plethics melt or did the rest of the world solidify?
See...it's easy!
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Plethics is far too close to pleather for me to be comfortable with it. Everybody knows those pleather people are a cult, with their plush, smooth clothing...and their haircuts...and their ways of talking. Then, 2 days later, I'm locked in a bathroom in the middle of New Hampshire with half a saltine cracker and a parrot that keeps repeating the lyrics to Beatles songs backwards. You can't tell me that's right.
[ January 06, 2004, 11:32 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
All you need is love Love is all you need
<repeat>
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
Mr. Squicky is win!
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Bob-
quote:I mean really, why is Saul/Paul considered such a reliable source? He was at odds with the other apostles from the get-go on many things, not just conversion of gentiles.
Why do we even have the Gospel of St. Luke? Or Acts? Luke was a gentile, NOT a part of Jesus' ministry, never an apostle. . . His only claim to fame was that he was supposedly on speaking terms with Jesus' mother.
Paul, at least, was an apostle, and recognized as being a leading member of the early Christian church.
Why trust ANY portion of the Bible? None of it was written by the Protagonist. Feasibly, it was written by the followers of a martyred supposed prophet who only wanted to retain their power base. Why trust ANY of it?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
ScottR: Easy answer, you're right, there isn't a book in the Bible that doesn't have some sort of checkered past or question surrounding its source, treatment through various translations, and ambiguous interpretations over the years.
Better answer: Take Paul at his word. He was a holy man and certainly worth listening to. But he's not perfect and many of his prejudices are more to be forgiven than emulated.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Which prejudices shall we discard?
More to the point, WHY discard them? We are presumably no better than Paul-- how do we know what is God's will for humanity?
Are you willing to usurp Paul's place as an apostle and say you know better than he about God's will?
[ January 07, 2004, 07:42 AM: Message edited by: Scott R ]
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
He'd be in good company.
Albert Schweitzer: "Where possible Paul avoids quoting the teaching of Jesus, in fact even mentioning it. If we had to rely on Paul, we should not know that Jesus taught in parables, had delivered the sermon on the mount, and had taught His disciples the 'Our Father.' Even where they are specially relevant, Paul passes over the words of the Lord."
Carl Jung: "Paul hardly ever allows the real Jesus of Nazareth to get a word in." (U.S. News and World Report, April 22, 1991, p. 55)
George Bernard Shaw: "No sooner had Jesus knocked over the dragon of superstition than Paul boldly set it on its legs again in the name of Jesus."
Bishop John S. Spong (Episcopal Bishop of Newark): "Paul's words are not the Words of God. They are the words of Paul- a vast difference." (Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism, p. 104, Harper San Francisco, 1991)
Thomas Jefferson: "Paul was the first corrupter of the doctrines of Jesus."
Thomas Hardy: "The new testament was less a Christiad than a Pauliad."
Wil Durant: "Paul created a theology of which none but the vaguest warrants can be found in the words of Christ." & "Fundamentalism is the triumph of Paul over Christ."
Walter Kaufmann (Professor of Philosophy, Princeton): "Paul substituted faith in Christ for the Christlike life."
Carl Sagan: "My long-time view about Christianity is that it represents an amalgam of two seemingly immiscible parts--the religion of Jesus and the religion of Paul. Thomas Jefferson attempted to excise the Pauline parts of the New Testament. There wasn't much left when he was done, but it was an inspiring document." (Letter to Ken Schei [author of Christianity Betrayed])
Hyam Maccoby (Talmudic Scholar): "As we have seen, the purposes of the book of Acts is to minimize the conflict between Paul and the leaders of the Jerusalem Church, James and Peter. Peter and Paul, in later Christian tradition, became twin saints, brothers in faith, and the idea that they were historically bitter opponents standing for irreconcilable religious standpoints would have been repudiated with horror. The work of the author of Acts was well done; he rescued Christianity from the imputation of being the individual creation of Paul, and instead gave it a respectable pedigree, as a doctrine with the authority of the so-called Jerusalem Church, conceived as continuous in spirit with the Pauline Gentile Church of Rome. Yet, for all his efforts, the truth of the matter is not hard to recover, if we examine the New Testament evidence with an eye to tell-tale inconsistencies and confusions, rather than with the determination to gloss over and harmonize all difficulties in the interests of an orthodox interpretation." (The Mythmaker, p. 139, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1986)
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Look, when Paul says "hey, this is my opinion." I don't feel obligated to treat the rest of what he says as unquestionable. I reserve the right to use my own conscience and intellect. That's all.
I don't have to be "better" than Paul to realize that he may have been wrong in some of his opinions.
And certainly it's a matter of conscience as well as intellect to decide whether to follow someone's advice, no matter who it is. Otherwise, what are you doing but attempting to become an automaton. A knee-jerk Christian? Who ever heard of such a thing? Not something I aspire to at any rate.
Perhaps you can intellectualize a belief that what Paul says must be true in all respects, but I can't and never have been able to. That doesn't mean I haven't considered his point of view. It means I've considered it and rejected some parts of it as being antithetical to what I believe is true about Christ's teachings.
I have a very difficult time reconciling statements like "I don't let women teach men" (I'm paraphrasing of course, but that's basically what he said) with a message of love and Christian community. Why would that be in any way desireable? Because the men can't keep their hands off of the women? Because their pride would be hurt? Because women make mistakes when they teach that a man wouldn't make? Some of the most important lessons of my adult life (and childhood of course) have been learned from women. If I were closed to that source, I'd be less of a man and less good as a person. Paul's message runs exactly counter to my experience.
His stuff on celibacy is also not very easy to reconcile with the larger message I read in the New Testament. Even today's Christians justify their stance on homosexuality based in part because it is considered anti-family. How much more anti-family can you get than celibacy?
Frankly, it sounds like the echo through the ages of a guy who had trouble with women and was screwed a little too tight. I don't like this kind of thing in the people I choose as my models. Jesus wasn't like that.
Also, I've read The True Believer and recognize a lot of what is in there in Saul/Paul. The sudden conversion from one movement to its polar opposite and rabid devotion to the new faith. There's a lot to admire in Paul, don't get me wrong, but I'm always skeptical of people like him when I meet them in real life. So when I read him in the Bible I can't help but wonder whether he was an UberChristian for reasons that had less to do with a calling from God and more to do with a basic flaw in his character.
Seeking power and influence, for example.
And that kind of rabid devotion to a cause is almost always dangerous, IMHO. It can pervert the true faith and derail it from the path set by those who actually started it.
Now, I'm not saying Paul's influence has been wholly negative. But he is the source of much that is unbalanced in modern Christianity, IMHO. The call for Catholic priests to remain celibate. The barring of women from ministerial callings by some sects. The separation of men and women's worship in some sects. The continued "issues" with homosexuality and sex in general.
All of these "wound too tight" attitudes are to be found in Paul more than anywhere else. Is that a coincidence? Was Paul speaking for God? Or was Paul a bit over the top?
If Paul were a friend of mine, I'd be worried about him. I'd want to try an intervention or something.
I don't have nearly the problems with people trying to follow Jesus' example as I do with people trying to follow Paul's.
Something about him just doesn't feel right.
Oh well. That's just my opinion.
I'm not trying to start a new religion. Or get anyone to renounce an old one.
Paul just doesn't do it for me. He speaks and I cringe. He's not a good source of learning or doctrine for me. That's all.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
*sigh* *raises hand*
Paul drives me nuts. I have a list of scriptures of things he wrote that drive me crazy and I can barely believe. If the only testament of Christ I had was Paul, I'd have a hard time believing in Him. The best of what Paul wrote is mentioned in more detail in other places in the scriptures.
Homosexuality is a sin (for everyone), but, fortunately for clarity, Paul is NOT the only prophet to speak of it as such.
[ January 07, 2004, 02:04 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
I do hope Paul isn't invited to the plethics intervention session . . . but just in case . . . *finds extra-strength gut-rot to serve* (JOKE, people, just an early-morning JOKE)*
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
I'm afraid this conversation has escaped my ability to catch up.
But Javert, it's Paul who drives you nuts? Jesus (at least as the Gospel writers portray him) talks about hell ten times as much as Paul. It was Jesus, not Paul, who took a whip to a bunch of seemingly inoffensive merchants on the temple grounds. Jesus wasn't any less argumentative than Paul; perhaps more so, considering the limited scope of his preaching.
You know what, though? I like him that way. I like my religion to challenge me, not just match up perfectly to what I already think is right. Most of the time the positions people find me arguing about morality, here, are not my positions in the sense of growing out of my personality or the things I think are appropriate. They're the positions I think Christianity teaches. My personal preferences? Dust and ashes. I might as well complain that I'd like a flat Earth better.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Kat, Paul is the primary NT source for that doctrine.
The OT source is mainly Leviticus, isn't it?
I'm drawing a blank on the other "prophets" who mention homosexuality as a sin -- fortunately or not. Unless you are referring to LDS scripture, of course.
Oh, by the way, I never answered your question about modern revelatory scripture.
I think that anyone deciding what is and what is not scripture is taking on a job that is either the province of God or the province of every person on their own -- i.e., what to believe. Believing oneself to be devinely inspired is usually hubris. Believing that someone you trust is divinely inspired seems fine, but does it matter? I mean, if a trusted spiritual advisor recommended a book, wouldn't you read it and look for it's message to you, regardless of whether that person said it had the "force of scripture" or not?
What is scripture but a set of books that men in the past have decided belong on everyone's list of good books to learn from? Did God dictate it...I'm not convinced of that. Does that make it less valuable? Not to me. What other written sources have such continuity and depth? I read it because it is what it is, not because someone said I should or must.
What I believe about its origins doesn't affect it's message one iota, IMHO.
Modern scripture is the same as old scripture as far as that goes.
If it is good and useful in my life, does it matter where I found it or whether I believe that God intended me to read it?
I'm not sure I need a NEW scripture, though. I mean, if the new is inconsistent with the old, I'll end up rejecting it anyway. If it is consistent with the old, isn't it more or less redundant? Perhaps I'm better off viewing new "scripture" more as reinforcement, commentary and expansion on the old?
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
quote: I'm not sure I need a NEW scripture, though. I mean, if the new is inconsistent with the old, I'll end up rejecting it anyway. If it is consistent with the old, isn't it more or less redundant?
Fascinating. And here I thought we had nothing in common religiously, Bob.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Bob, I'm not talking about the NT.
quote:Perhaps I'm better off viewing new "scripture" more as reinforcement, commentary and expansion on the old?
Sure. That works perfectly.
The Lord sent his people prophets in the past to lead them. If one prophet said everything, then why stop when it did? Why not stop the OT prophets with Isaiah?
Reinforcement The Book of Mormon is another testament of Christ, and it comes from a different part of the world, from a different people, and speaks of the same message that was told to those in Jerusalem. It's more evidence of a caring and loving God who really meant what he said over there. It's a second witness to an event. Reinforcement is always nice.
Commentary When Lehi and his family left Jerusalem, they carried the scriptures that had been written up to this time. This includes Isaiah, and a big chunk of the first third of the Book of Mormon consists of quotes of Isaiah and commentaries on it by Nephi and Jacob, Lehi's sons. This is great.
Expansion I don't think prophets work by downloading all of God's knowledge. Like with us, they get answers to questions that they have, and not all the prophets had all the same questions. There's a section in Alma where Alma is questioned about what happens after people die, and he goes and prays about it, and then teaches the people what the Spirit has taught him. It is an expansion, and it's an expansion brought on by some specific questions that this prophet had.
Nephi said that the Book of Mormon and the Bible work together. That the two books would testify of each other. I do know that a good chunk of the reason I do value the Bible - especially after reading Paul - is because its veracity is attested to in the Book of Mormon. It's still scripture, and it's scripture that supports and expands the scripture we have now. Much of the Bible is an explanation and commentary on what happened before. Jesus spends a fourth of the gospels explaining the prophecies that came before and how he is come to fulfill them.
As for modern revelation, the Lord sent prophets to lead his people before. Why not now?
[ January 07, 2004, 10:29 AM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Javert> Because we've got a Bible. We don't need any more Bible. Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Oh baby, good intentions... Posted by Sopwith (Member # 4640) on :
Because after God's Revelations to John which set forth the End Times, there was nothing more to prophesize and foretell?
Jesus came and set forth how to live and why to live that way. God revealed to John how it would end. After that, why would God need to reveal more?
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
To clear up the homosexuality thing?
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
quote: If it contains more than the Bible, it contains too much. If it contains less than the Bible, it contains too little. If it contains something different from the Bible, it contains the wrong thing. And if it is exactly the same as the Bible, why not just use the Bible?
(Source unknown--it's been repeated too many times. Originally was in reference to creedal statements.)
[Addit: I'm inviting comment, preferably with a sense of humor, not trying to make this a debating point.]
[ January 07, 2004, 10:41 AM: Message edited by: Maccabeus ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Why do you believe that statement?
It isn't in the Bible.
[ January 07, 2004, 10:42 AM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:To clear up the homosexuality thing?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:To clear up the homosexuality thing?
By the way, I really liked Chris Bridges' post up there. I never knew any of that. I came to my opinion of Paul's stuff mostly on my own (after seriously studying the Bible for the first time a few years ago). He just didn't fit...for me.
But that was great stuff. I'd love to see what Thomas Jefferson did in trying excise Paul. I wonder how he'd do if he had access to more recently discovered texts.
As for the Book of Mormon, etc., I can't really say I've formed much of an opinion. I never really finished reading it. I didn't get far enough into it to figure out whether there was a message there for me. It was more like an unfamiliar history that I had no way to judge the veracity of.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Bob, I'm honestly not sure if you're laughing at my wit or at me, but I'm going to comfortably assume you think I'm as funny as I think I am.
I have to agree with you about Paul. He just seriously, seriously bothers me, and has since I read the New Testament. I found my list, and this is an example:
quote:From 1 Corinthians 5:
7 Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:
8 Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.
9 I wrote unto you in an aepistle not to company with fornicators:
10 Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world.
11 But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat.
12 For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within?
13 But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.
What the heck? Don't hang out with people with a bad reputation because it looks bad? Don't let people who have sinned come to church because it looks bad? That not only goes against what Jesus DID, it goes completely against what the Book of Mormon says (3 Nephi 18: 28-34). It just bothers me from both ends.
Paul did say lots of things that I like, and I'm sure that the above passage could be justified in some way, but I just don't like it.
[ January 09, 2004, 10:51 AM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Javert, I think you're misreading this passage. "The wicked person" Paul is talking about is someone in the church. The local church has been avoiding people outside the church on the grounds that they are sinners, but freely associating with blatant sinners who are Christians. Paul points out that they've got it backwards--they have an obligation to judge those inside the church, but people outside it are out of their jurisdiction.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Laughing WITH you kat. That was hilarious!
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
Food for thought from Mr. Card himself, taken from his essay confronting virulent protesters of his Homecoming series - I thought it might apply to the conversation at hand:
quote:There is an unfortunate tendency among some members of the Church not many, but enough to cause great grief to many to think that their obligation as Saints is to spend their time watching for and stamping out all incorrect actions or incorrect opinions.
Hmmm. I'd like to interpret church in the "catholic" or "universal" sense.
(Edit: spelling)
[ January 10, 2004, 12:16 AM: Message edited by: Shan ]
Posted by Tresopax (Member # 1063) on :
quote:For example, Bob's definition of something being wrong for one person because of the context they bring to it but not wrong for another person with a different context fits exactly into what I said, but I really fail to see how it would work as an example of your definition. Or, in reference to the scripture that I brought up, the idea that the emotional context of actions is the defining aspect of their morality is a relativistic one as opposed to the absolutist idea that the actions themselves are the seat of moral rightness, regardless of why they are performed - such as an action approved by the Bible but intended in a specific instance to hurt someone else being ok. I fail to see how such a situation is could be called relativistic in your schema. Could you tell me what would the name for it be?
I'm not sure what you mean by bringing a context to the situation.
But as for the instance of an action approved by the Bible but intended in a specific instance to hurt someone, I think that action would be wrong, and I think that should be called an example of absolutism.
Absolutism isn't just saying "X is always wrong, no matter what the circumstances." It also includes context-specific moral theories, like "It was okay for Bill Clinton to lie to the American people about his affair to protect his personal privacy during the Lewinsky scandal, in that particular instance." I think it includes any moral theory in which there are objectively correct moral answers to situations, whether deciding it with universal laws or situation-specific judgement.
The thing all absolutist theories have in common is the suggestion that if you were in the exact same situation as me, the right thing for you to do would be the same as the right thing for me to do in that situation. Or, in other words, the right action doesn't depend on who is judging it. Right is right, and wrong is wrong, as they say. Relativism is the opposite - suggesting that we could be in the exact same situation, yet the right choice for me in that situation might be the wrong choice for you. With relativism, the right answer changes based on who is doing the judging.
Posted by Sopwith (Member # 4640) on :
Actually, I believe that the issue on homosexuality was settled by Christ, if not in word, then by his deeds and associations. To understand, however, you must look at who Christ spoke to and his overall message: love of each other, no matter what and faith in our individual salvations no matter our individual sins.
While homosexuality is mentioned in the Old Testament, it is mentioned far less than the sins of prostitution, usury, robbery and others. But whom did Christ associate with? Who did he speak to? Who are some of the most important personalities in the New Testament? They came from dubious backgrounds and some downright "sinful" ones. And who did he speak against? Pharisees and Sadducces (sp?) who believed in their own personal holiness at the expense of those around them, their willingness to be the first to cast a stone.
In Jesus' entourage were former prostitutes, moneylenders and others. Who was the first to be guaranteed a place in Heaven? A thief crucified right beside Christ. He not only spoke of love for his fellow human beings, but also acted upon that, offering the greatest of blessings to anyone, no matter their circumstances.
His words may have omitted speaking directly about homosexuals, but his actions show that everyone was and is welcome in the salvation he offers. To believe otherwise is to place words in his mouth that one cannot back up.
Now Paul, well, he is a tough one to reconcile at times and I will be reading his writings in a slightly different light this time around. I thank you for providing that bit of different insight into his life and times.
But, let's look at Corinthians as Kat has quoted there. We shouldn't take it out of context necessarily, though. According to the historical interpretation found in The Life Application Study Bible , NIV, 1 Corinthians was sent as an epistle to the Christian chuch at Corinth as certain outside pressures threatened to decimate its membership.
The Corinthians, living among the Greeks, had to deal with a society that was much more open to what we might call sexual freedom and other mores that might cause us to blanche in this day and age. In short, they were losing membership in the congregation to basically the decadence of a long-standing society.
Paul's advice was to do something that preachers to this day still take up as a tool of their work: the idea of revival and a call back to doing what is right. The trick to salvation is that once you've been saved, it is your job to live rightly as best you can after that point. His words of advice to the church leadership there were to cajole and condemn those who were getting too involved in the Greek lifestyle in the hopes that they would be shamed into coming back or possibly strengthened in their resolve to live and do better.
Still, like I said, this time through the Bible, I will pay more attention to reading Paul's letters and contrasting that to Jesus' teachings. I'm a Christian, but I am still a striving Christian with much, much more to learn.
And I'm sorry if I can't speak on Mormon teachings about homosexuality, but in light of my personal beliefs, I'll put my faith in what the Bible says first and foremost.
Posted by Argèn†~ (Member # 4528) on :
Psst, not Greek lifestyle. Roman. And as for homosexuality, when did Christ ever mention it? He did mention loving others as we would ourselves, and yet we don't afford those gay others the same legal rights we do ourselves. How Christ like we must be.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Why should we accept the current version of the Bible when it is filled with inaccuracies and contradictions?
Here is an interesting URL; I apologize for the apologetics, but you take what you get. The only other site that I found that actually listed the 'missing books' of the bible was an Islam site that muddled Christian beliefs.
Keep in mind that we're not talking apocrypha above.
EDIT: One exception I take with the apologetic link above is this:
quote:Jeremiah possibly edited and/or condensed the original source (by inspiration of the Holy Spirit) into the book of Kings, sometime before or during the Babylonian exile. This new, inspired book of Kings provided a summary of the histories of Israel and Judah for the captives to carry with them—a much smaller, lighter book than the original detailed work.
My understanding of Jewish scripture writing is that no Jew would ever attempt to condense scripture. Each word was to have been copied precisely-- and if one was miscopied, the whole text was tossed.
I could be wrong though. It's happened before. Once.
EDIT PART DEUX: I completely disagree with Smith's conclusion-- basically, that these books aren't important at all, and that we have what God wants us to have. For proof, he offers nothing other than tradition and his own word.
Discussions like this (whether or not homosexuality is a sin) make a good point to the idea that the Bible really isn't clear on some things, and that some clarification is needed.
[ January 10, 2004, 07:49 AM: Message edited by: Scott R ]
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Sopwith, yes, those people were part of Jesus' entourage. But how did they come to be there? Why did they listen to him? These people gave up their sinful activities. They repented. Nothing prevented Pharisees from doing the same, except that most of them were blind to their own faults.
When people weren't willing to repent, generally they decided Jesus wasn't for them and left. (I wonder why?) Occasionally some people tried to make unrighteous use of Jesus himself, by making him a focus of a rebellion. He slipped away and left them.
I see nothing in the Scriptures to indicate that Paul's standards were any different from Jesus'. But Paul, unlike Jesus, did not have the opportunity to remain with the same group of disciples at all times, so that sometimes people got out of hand. So we end up having more of the restrictions spelled out by Paul as he tries to restore order.
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Scott, what exactly does the site have to do with your accusation of contradictions and inaccuracies?
(It's nice to see Apologetics Press is still up and running. Hadn't seen anything from them lately.)
[ADDIT] As I understand it, only those writings considered sacred are copied in the painstaking manner you describe. Royal annals would ordinarily not fall into that category. Does anyone know better?
[ January 10, 2004, 08:08 AM: Message edited by: Maccabeus ]
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Nothing, to tell the truth, Macc.
The idea of 'missing books' is seperate from the bible being inaccurate and contradictory.
I should have made it clearer. Maybe I should be a Biblical writer?
[ January 10, 2004, 07:52 AM: Message edited by: Scott R ]
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Just a neat link.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
As for contradictory, here's something off the top of my head:
quote:Acts 9: 3 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven:
4 And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?
5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
6 And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do.
7 And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man.
Acts 22
6 And it came to pass, that, as I made my journey, and was come nigh unto Damascus about noon, suddenly there shone from heaven a great light round about me.
7 And I fell unto the ground, and heard a voice saying unto me, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?
8 And I answered, Who art thou, Lord? And he said unto me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom thou persecutest.
9 And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me.
Not to mention the contradictions of faith vs. works or other doctrinal quandries.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Tres:
quote: Absolutism isn't just saying "X is always wrong, no matter what the circumstances." It also includes context-specific moral theories, like "It was okay for Bill Clinton to lie to the American people about his affair to protect his personal privacy during the Lewinsky scandal, in that particular instance." I think it includes any moral theory in which there are objectively correct moral answers to situations, whether deciding it with universal laws or situation-specific judgement.
The thing all absolutist theories have in common is the suggestion that if you were in the exact same situation as me, the right thing for you to do would be the same as the right thing for me to do in that situation. Or, in other words, the right action doesn't depend on who is judging it. Right is right, and wrong is wrong, as they say. Relativism is the opposite - suggesting that we could be in the exact same situation, yet the right choice for me in that situation might be the wrong choice for you. With relativism, the right answer changes based on who is doing the judging.
I think you've defined something that might be called contextual absolutism, which is not absolutism in any sense I've ever heard of it before. Absolutism has never meant "know the context" in any way that I've ever heard it explained to me (by it's proponents at least, not actual trained philosophers).
And frankly, it smacks of humanism. "If you were in my shoes, you would've done the same thing..."
Also, I think you have a mistaken impression of relativism. The acting person's context is the same as saying "if you were in my shoes (being a Somali street urchin or a Wall Street CEO, or whatever) you would do the same thing I did..."
The actor and the judging person each have contexts that go beyond the proximal situation. They have a culture, their own family background, etc. etc.
Once you let "context" in at all, it becomes more and more important in deciding whether something is right or wrong. Where do you draw the line with something like "context?"
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
"The acting person's context is the same as saying "if you were in my shoes (being a Somali street urchin or a Wall Street CEO, or whatever) you would do the same thing I did..."
I think you're looking at different variables than I am. I wasn't suggesting that the people be judged by the context of their actions. I was suggesting that the actions be judged in the context of the situation. I even used the words "conditions" and "situations" several times, honest.
If two different people were in the exact same situation with the exact same conditions and they reacted in different ways, I would judge them on what they did and why.
If two different people were in different situations and committed the same action (the killing in self-defense vs killing for sadistic fun thing) I would judge them on their actions in context.
But even still, an action can be sinful for one person and not for another, because the sin is not truly in the action. Bob's pastor and his injunctions against alcohol is a good example.
For the pastor, indulgence in alcohol is a grave error that will cause harm to himself and others. For Bob, it's a beverage that goes nicely with Italian food. That's because alcohol is not at all sinful, but indulgence and selfishness (putting your own desire for the drink over the consequences of drinking it) is, and that's what the pastor should have been preaching against. That's the kind of judgment that I flatly disagree with.
When should context cease to matter? When context no longer changes the intent of the action.
[ January 10, 2004, 02:38 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Scott, the particular "contradiction" you listed is downright easy to reconcile. I'd do it, but all that has accomplished in the past is causing someone to hand me a laundry list of supposed contradictions. Most are simple, like this one, generally the result of variations in the way particular words are translated, or are used in English. "Stood", for instance, has become a common way of saying "stayed", or "remained" and doesn't inherently suggest a particular posture. I understand in some parts of the South it's perfectly legit to wish you'd stood in bed.
But I digress, and I always forget threads if I take time off to actually research. Sooner or later I'd have to go hunting for the solution to some knotty problem you posed, and when I forgot to come back with the answer, it'd just confirm to you that you were right, there are contradictions.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Macc- I agree; but the contradictions are there. Paul's strong reliance on faith vs. Christ's emphasis on works, for example.
If the Bible were a perfectly complete document, I submit that there'd be no room for interpretation. But with 2000 plus Christian churches in America alone, it's pretty easy to see that a great many people are confused by what is written therein. The ordinance of baptism, the nature of the Holy Spirit, resurrection, even the weekly holy day-- all are debatable topics, and all positions are supportable using verses from scripture.
Thus, IMO, the need for living prophets and modern day scripture.
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
I understand why you would think that, Scott. But to me, the introduction of living prophets only complicates matters more--since, basically, anyone can claim to be one and there's really no way to verify it.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Is there any way to verify the Bible's spiritual worth?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Beyond personal experience, you mean?
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
The Bible never comments on itself. By the time the books (Bible = biblia = books) were put together, the scriptures in the old world had stopped being written. The editors and compilers didn't add an epilogue, and Revelation occurs at the end because it discusses the end times, not because because it was the last book written.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
If Paul is indeed Scripture, then the Bible does comment on itself. Baptists are very VERY fond of the quote from Paul about Scripture being the word of God and useful in instruction, etc. etc.
Sorry I don't have my SWORD software on this laptop, or I'd copy the exact passage.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
It comments on scripture, but not to the Bible as a whole book. It's the passage from Timothy, and it's great, and there are lots of passages that comment on the goodness/usefulness of scripture, but there's nothing that talks about the books we know as the Bible, as a whole. No epilogue at the end, and no "this is all there is."
There is the scripture in Revelations, but considering Revelations was written before most of the New Testament, it either could only refer to Revelations or else we have throw out most of the testament.
[ January 13, 2004, 02:44 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by ginette (Member # 852) on :
I didn't read the whole thread, but as to Bob's original question:
We have to make choices. Therefore, we have to judge. You cannot make choices without judging.
It is ok to judge the 'why', the 'what' and the 'how' or in other words peoples behaviour and deeds. It is not ok to judge the 'who'. To judge who someone really is, whether they are evil or have no love, that's not for us to do. So never reject a person, only what a person does.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I don't know if this thread is dead or what, but I'll throw my say in anyway.
It's important to recognize who Paul was and what prupose he working for when you're talking about his writing. In contrast to Peter and James and the rest of the Nazarenes, Paul was a highly educated and cosmopolitan guy. He grew up in Greece, and, as a young man came to Israel to rise in the Jewish hierarchy. As such, he initially participated in the Jewish persecution of Christians. -Sidenote: I think it's also important to realize that Jews around Jesus's time enjoyed a favorable position in comparision to other Roman conquests. They were given a degree of freedom and self-grovernment far beyond most other Roman subject populations. Thus, their persecution of Jesus and his followers takes on a different shade when you see it as a sort of "Stop pissing off the overlords." thing. -
However, Paul converted to Christianity, although his version was extremely different from that of the Apostles. While they were content to preserve the teachings of Jesus and more or less keep Christianity to a limited group of people, Paul felt that his role was to bring as many people to Christianity as possible. It's important to recognize that the thinking of the time was the second coming and thus the end of the world was right around the corner. Paul was trying to get as many people under the wire as he could. Even later, when he realized that maybe Jesus wasn't coming right back (Some of the people Jesus had told "You'll be alive when I return." had died.) and he made the remarkable shift to "God is just and as such is waiting to end the world until we can get a whole mess of people to convert to Christianity." he was desparately trying to convert people. Because of this, Paul adopted a political orientation and used a certain latitude when it came to the definition of Christianity. For example, he pretty much introduced the idea of blatant syncretic adoption whereby pagan beliefs and festivals got pretty much wholesale copied into Christianity. Also, Paul played upon his audiences' sympathies. Where they were pro-Roman, he (and his version of Christianity) was pro-Roman, where they were anti-Roman, so was he. His number one goal was to get as many people as possible to adopt Christianity (whatever it's particulars) as their one and only path to salvation.
I think this makes some of his more bizzare statements more understandable. In Jewish society of the time, marriage was almost a sacred duty and an unmarried man was held in low regard. And yet, Paul advocated people to adopt abstinance, resorting to marriage only if they couldn't control themselves any other way. From a viewpoint of establishing a 2000 year tradition, this doesn't really make a lot of sense, but if you understand that Paul thought that the world was going to end, maybe as soon as next week, I think it seems more rational. Likewise, Paul directs many of his admonitions towards what other people (i.e. potential converts) will think. He was geared towards making the emerging religion as palatable as possible, even if this meant adopting local customs even when they conflicted with parts of Christ's message. Only Paul really put forth the idea that faith in Christianity is the sole component of salvation. Again, all this makes sense if you understand the purpose he was directing his ministry towards.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Paul's notorious practice of softening and sweetening up the gospel to attract people is actually another one of the things that bug the crap out of me.
Of course you make yourself accomodating to people, but you don't take it upon yourself to change doctrine to do it!
And if Paul didn't mean to change the essential message - if he thought of what he was writing as press releases rather than as canonical as the gospels - then the Bible's editor is starting to bother me.
[ January 14, 2004, 01:12 PM: Message edited by: Javert Hugo ]
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:For example, he pretty much introduced the idea of blatant syncretic adoption whereby pagan beliefs and festivals got pretty much wholesale copied into Christianity.
Where did he do this?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I think he did think of himself as a press release editor for most of his writings (a very highly placed press release editor, such as the pope is). His letters are clearly persuasive and political in intent.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Tres, I've never come across that definition of relativism anywhere. I'd be highly suprised if anyone, anywhere ever formulated a system that sounded like that.
I think I may have to crux of our misunderstanding (well, other than your view of what I see as a continuum as a dichotomy).
quote:With relativism, the right answer changes based on who is doing the judging.
From all I know of it, this is patently false. However, this is no so much because the statement is wrong as it doesn't make sense. Relitavism doesn't concern itself with absolute, objective issues of right and wrong. Speaking of the "right answer" in relativism is missing the point. Moral relativism speaks to the subject, to the specific situation. It talks about the responsibility that someone bears for their actions, not whether those actions were right or wrong.
A good example comes from Speaker for the Dead (don't read any more if you don't want the book to be spoiled). The pequinos killed people. This was bad. However, from their understanding of the world that formed the context of their actions, they were giving those people the greatest gift they could. From the pequino perspective, they intended and were doing great good. When Ender help changed their perspective, they perceived how wrong their actions were and went wild with grief. In their new context, killing humans (as Warmaker does) would be a terrible thing. The same actions, different contexts, and thus different responsibility. Now, the absolutist tradition, as represented by Ender's Calvinist student, states that "Their reasons are irrelevant. Murder is murder. They murdered, thus they are evil."
A further expansion of this thought, which lays further on the continuum between absolutism and relativism, is the concept of diminished responsibility. That is, the idea that people's acts are partly (or even completely) determined by external forces. If a person has no control over these influences, they can't logically be held responsible for them. In the completely deterministic view of the world, people are without any moral responsibility whatsoever. The amount of free will you assign to people determines the amount of responsibility you can logically attach to them.
Before, we talked about people from identical backgrounds making different choices. A good illustration of this point is people from different backgrounds making identical choices. Let's say, I, a relatively priviledged member of society made the same decisions in my life as a less priviledged person, say a drug-addicted deprived product of a single abusive parent home. Wouldn't it be logical to assume that they are actually a better person than I am? They had to work so much harder than I did to be the type of person that they were. From an absolutist standpoint, we are morally equivilent. From my standpoint, the parable of the talents and the idea of "To whom much is given, much is expected." cuts both ways. Your outcomes must be judged based on your inputs.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Scott, It depends on who you ask. Almost no one (that I've read anyway) disagrees that Paul reformulated pagan holidays into Christain celebrations, in sort of the same way that some of the Germaninc and Celtic gods got added to the Catholic role of saints. They were performed pretty much as before, but they were dedicated to Christ rather than whatever god they were before.
Some people that Paul's introduction of pagan aspects into Christianity, although paling in comparison to Constantine's, was more widespread and fundamental. For example, there are indications that the Mass is heavily borrowed from the Orphic cult of Dionysis. Some people believe that Paul adapted the myth of a dying and resurrected god whose worship included the infusion of divine essence into bread (for Demeter) and wine (for Dionysis) into Christianity for his ministry in Greece.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I'd like to reformulate Bob's question. What would be a preferrable situation: having a child who believes that homosexuality is wrong and who hated homosexuals, or having one who believes that homosexuality is ok because it doesn't violate their basic moral ideals of love?
I think that there is a pretty strict division in our country between christians and CHRISTIANS, between those who view their religion as a personal set of ideals and others as more of a social labeling thing. I started a thread a little while back about the tendency of moderately dedicated religious Americans to be more prejudiced than either non-religious or highly dedicated religious Americans. I think that this fits in wonderfully here. Can you imagine someone believing that love for others is the basis of following the law participating in a lynching or being an active part of Hilter's Germany? I think there is often a big difference between people who follow the teachings of Jesus and people who self-identify as Christian.
That's in large part what this comes down to. Is your religion or morality or whatever something you use for self-discovery and self-improvement and maybe as a helpful guide to respectfully share with others or is it something that you use to tell you who it's ok to dehumanize and mistreat? I'll always try to support religion used a tool, but, on the other hand, I'll always oppose it when used as a weapon.
[ January 14, 2004, 02:08 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:What would be a preferrable situation: having a child who believes that homosexuality is wrong and who hated homosexuals, or having one who believes that homosexuality is ok because it doesn't violate their basic moral ideals of love?
Of course, conflating belief that homosexuality is wrong with hating homosexuals begs a large part of the question, doesn't it?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dagonee, You misunderstand me. I'm not saying that thinking homosexuality is wrong necessarily means that you'll hate homosexuals. I've set up two opposing situations in which the is one aspect conforming to Christianity and one departing from it. In the first, the child conforms by thinking that homosexuality is wrong, but diverges in hating. In the second, the child diverges by thinking that homosexuality isn't wrong, and conforms by regarding love as the basis for his moral decision.
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
Are these the two most likely/relevant scenarios, or just the scenarios for which you have an answer?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Got you, MrSquicky. You're asking which deviation is a greater deviation from Christianity, then?
That makes sense, but in my mind it's too easily used as an excuse to avoid some of the more uncomfortable (to us humans) portions of Christianity.
Almost all goods require us to dance between opposing evils - that's why morality is a tough concept. Avoiding teaching that dance to children leaves serious gaps in the children's moral education.
Dagonee
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dagonee, I can understand the slippery slope argument there, but I quite honestly don't think that this is anywhere near to the way this situation is dealt with in most of contemporary Christianity. One of the things that generally comes up in debates of religous pratices is that people feel that they can't go against their scripture. It's been said in this thread. "The Bible is against homosexuality, so I have to be too."
However, the pieces of the Bible that I brought up (and how many people really knew about the second one?) are, in my opinion, some of the most ignored pieces. I'm of the opinion that they clearly set up the exactly basis of morality. Jesus specifically says that the Commandment to love your neighbor is higher than any other and that this love is the basis for all the other laws. Be honest, how often is this talked about in Christian contexts. In my 12 years of Catholic schools, this was never taught. I learned it on my own through personal study of the Bible. Instead of this simple, all-pervaisive, and in-touch with human nature definition of morality, I got a bunch of Paul and Augustine and Aquinas and learned all about authority and about external rules of right and wrong.
I can literally count the number of times in my 3 years on Hatrack where I came across people talking about the ideas contained in those passages. It's one. In all the discussions of Christianity and morals and whatever that I've read, I'm the only person I can think of who ever talked about them in reference to what Jesus himself said was the most important commandment. I can't tell you how many times I've heard about the 10 commandments or stories from Genesis or Mosaic law or the ideas of midievel theologians. But the highest law of Christianty? Just once, just me, a non-Christian.
Like I said in the other thread, the highly dedicated to Christianity make up a very small percentage of the people who call themselves Christian and even follow the Bible, in their own way. Again from the other thread, the people who aren't dedicated are the ones who do all the bad things that people criticize religions for. I referenced Gordon Allport's intrinsic versus extrinsic relgion, and, if you look at it, I think you can see how it fits into people who recognize love of the other as the foundation of morality and people who use a legalistic authority based concept of morality.
Experience tells me that many people are going to read all that I wrote as attacks both on themselves as persons and on Christianity as a whole. I'll state again, I know Christianity pretty well. It's got many good points and, just like any other belief systems, some bad points. However, I am not against Christianity. I'm against bad Christians. I believe that if all the people who claimed to be Christians actually were Christians, the world would be indescribably better.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:esus specifically says that the Commandment to love your neighbor is higher than any other and that this love is the basis for all the other laws.
Actually, loving God is the 'greatest' commandment.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Interesting take on this issue.
I'm still wondering if homosexuality is truly "wrong" from a Christian perspective. I like the idea of asking which thing is MORE wrong though.
How come most questions about Christianity start from the negative side of things though, that something is wrong, a sin, improper, etc?
Is that just human nature or is it somehow a characteristic of Christianity?
Or of most people's understanding of Christianity?
Not to derail my own thread, of course...
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:MrSquicky said: I can understand the slippery slope argument there, but I quite honestly don't think that this is anywhere near to the way this situation is dealt with in most of contemporary Christianity.
I wasn’t making a slippery slope argument. I was making a “pick and choose” argument.
You asked which of two possible situations was a greater deviation from Christianity. I tend to agree with your choice there, but the larger point is it doesn’t matter – they are both deviations.
Giving in to the first form of departure from Christianity, just because you’re scared of the second, is still a departure.
The question should be, “How do I teach my child that homosexual actions are wrong while still teaching them to love everyone?” Not “Which aspect of Christianity is it better to fail to teach my children.”
quote:MrSquicky said: I think you can see how it fits into people who recognize love of the other as the foundation of morality and people who use a legalistic authority based concept of morality.
Again, I think you are creating an unnecessary distinction. It is possible to recognize love as the foundation of morality and still acknowledge the validity of “legalistic” (a word I’m only using for convenience) portions of morality.
quote:MrSquicky said: Again from the other thread, the people who aren't dedicated are the ones who do all the bad things that people criticize religions for.Emphasis added.
Absolutely not. Abolitionists were criticized for being “unrealistic” about their religion. Anti-abortion activists (even those who solely engage in peaceful protest) are criticized for being uncompassionate. Even Christians who merely follow the rules of chastity, never even proselytizing about them to others, are likely to be called repressed or prudish.
quote:MrSquicky said: I am not against Christianity. I'm against bad Christians.
But you only seem to be against Christians who are “bad” in the way you think is bad. And in doing so you have set up a dichotomy that does not need to exist. It seems you’re saying, “Christianity is OK as long as only the parts I like are believed.”
I stand by my earlier statement that true moral fiber is about being able to avoid opposing wrongs.
Dagonee
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote: How come most questions about Christianity start from the negative side of things though, that something is wrong, a sin, improper, etc?
Because arguing about whether or not something is a virtue just isn’t as controversial?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Yeah, I suppose that's true.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Well in the fundamentalist evangelical Christian tradition in which I was raised, we definitely learned, the first and greatest commandment and the second like it, before we learned the ten commandments. (paraphrasing to the best of my memory)
quote: Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment and the second is like it, love thy neighbor as thyself, on these hang all the law and the prophets.
I'll have to cross check the King James to see how close to word perfect I got to see how well it was pounded into my memory banks, since I haven't recited it in years. Don't remember the exact reference either, though I'm leaning towards either Mathew 6 or 7 or maybe that was the verse not the chapter. I can definitely tell you that my brothers and I learned it by the age of four and didn't memorize the ten commandments (except in a watered down song version) til 4th or 5th grade.
We were also taught (as I believe the Jewish rabbis teach... rivka back me up or shoot me down on this) that the first five were about how you related to God and the second five were about how you related to others, exactly as the Mathew commandments sum up.
Interestingly enough even though there was a degree of homophobia in the churches we went to, I have never seen my parents exhibit any. I remember that there was a gay guy who regularly attended one of the bible studies my dad led for a while. In fact in actually relating with other people they always exhibited an extreme degree of tolerance, though a lot of it is viewed through a particular "bubble" world view. However if you were inside their bubble the amount of intolerance for non conformity was much much higher. I paid the price.
AJ
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote: We were also taught (as I believe the Jewish rabbis teach... rivka back me up or shoot me down on this) that the first five were about how you related to God and the second five were about how you related to others
*nods*
*starts to look for a link; realizes this is not that thread*
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dagonee, I think you'd have a very difficult go of it trying to support that I equate bad Christians with people who believe things that I disagree with. I understand that this is how I look in your mind, but I really don't think that is is true. I believe that if you go back over my statements with a more objective eye, you'd have a different perspective. I'm really not that bad of a guy, I don't think.
I disagree with you about the dance, at least from a Christian perspective. I believe that, taking what Jesus actually said seriously leads to a very difficult way of living. The dance you describe, I believe, involves reconciling this way of living with "reality". For example, Jesus' admonition to extreme pacificism even to the point of willingly helping our enemies with the world of "Onward Christian Soldiers". As I said, I think that it is very clear that the foundation of all Christian morality is love. The Bible specifically states that, if someone truely loves God and their neighbor, it is impossible for them to sin. While such perfect love requires an impossibly perfect person, it's still not consistent to the message of the Bible to pretend that this is not the central basis of being a Christian.
It still comes back to the legalistic versus idealistic way of looking at things. When we're talking about the deviations in the example above, we're really talking about two different classes of thing. The homosexuality thing is a straight trangression of a moral rule. The hate thing, though, is a meta-morality issue, and, as such, can't really even be compared to the homosexuality. It's not just the breaking of a rule; it's a perversion of the entire moral system. The first case may be a sin, but, from the Christian perspective, hate is SIN, the apotheosis of human failing. There is no responsible dance around this. If you hate, you sin, much like the Pharisees that Jesus condemns for obeying all the moral laws but perverting their entire spirit.
In the legalistic tradition, there is no meta-moral level. The apotheosis of sin is merely disobedience. Their positive side is thus authority and you can hate all you want, as long as you follow all the rules. Hide it as much as you want, the main justification for authority systems is always power. Rules are followed because you are rewarded for doing so and punished for failing to do so, not because of any inherent rightness. This is reflected in the older form of the Catholic Act of Contrition, in which the penitent expresses regret of their sins specifically because they "fear the loss of heaven and dread the fires of hell."
My contention is that it is clear which mode Jesus makes a commandment and that it is equally clear, from looking at Christian history and it's current state, which one has been followed by the vast majority of Christians. I could dive back into intrinsic versus extrinsicity in religion, morality, and, ultimately motivation to show exactly why a content-irrelevant reward-punishment system is going to lead to exactly the sort of ignorance, prejudice, and all around bad stuff that I'm decrying, but, I'm going to need some indication that it would actually be worth the effort.
The important thing to realize here is that I'm not characterizing any specific beliefs as bad. Support of homosexuality may be bad or good, or indifferent. That's not the issue here. Rather, it's a matter of how these beliefs are held.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
You know, Paul, taken in perspective, is one of my favorite people from early Christianity. Of course, most of the rest of them were considered heresiarchs, so you may not want ot take my opinion of him. I think you've got to look at him in context. Sure, he looks bad when viewed by modern standards. The man founded the doctrine of the divine right of kings, for Pete's sake. However, I don't think that Paul deserves any of the bad stuff that's heaped on him.
Consider that he was as he represents himself, a guy who received a revelation from God and then lived the rest of his life trying to share that revelation with other people. That's pretty close to how I see him. It's only when you believe that God was looking over his shoulder the entire time, forcing him to write and say the exact message that you kind of paradoxically start to look at him negatively.
In a time where the Jesus Movement was pretty much content to sit in Jerusalem and look down on everyone else while counting down for the end of the world, Paul was moved by compassion for the Gentiles. He threw himself into his mission and was pretty much constantly writing and teaching and traveling. When he came to meet with James and Peter, despite the widely divergent views they held, he was extremely respectful and desirous to learn from them. Unlike other Christian leaders (Peter for example) he bravely went about his mission with little fear for the consequences.
I feel that most of the negative parts of Pauline scripture were the consequence of the dual factors of 1) the morally primitive (from our perspective) world that he lived in and 2) his sincere belief that his world could quite likely end tommorow. I think that it's also important to acknowledge that much of the time, Paul was contesting with people who interpreted Jesus' message as a call for licentiousness. I honestly believe that, were Paul around today, he'd be one of the lights of the world, and I don't know how true that would be for many of the other early Christian leaders/
Posted by Posable_Man (Member # 5105) on :
Squicky,
That's nice. I appreciate that Paul was focused on his mission.
My objections to "Paul" are really objections to turning everything thats in Scripture of his into Scripture in the first place. I.e., deciding that it is the word of God as opposed to the word of Paul.
I kind of have to wonder, you know, why someone like Paul would be included in canonical Scripture when some of the other early Christian writings are not. Or even some of the more modern Christian writings...
And I think the fault lies with the Council of Nicea first and foremost. Then with successive generations of Christian leaders who haven't straightened the whole thing out.
And then I realize they haven't done it either because: a) They truly believe that everything Paul wrote IS bona fide word of God, or b) They aren't really all that worried about what is or is not canonical Scripture.
Since I fall squarely in the second camp, I just feel free to decide on my own that Paul, like all of canonical scripture, has some good, some bad, and some just plain irrelevant material. And it is my job, as it is the job of every Christian, to think about it and apply what works. I'll just try not to get too worried about the rest of it. My goals are, pardon the joke, less lofty than others. I figure I can only decide for myself.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Kat, I understand the LDS objection to the council of Nicea, but I think you'd have to look much earlier for where screwing around with canonical scripture started. Also, there's a whole mess of issues that you get into when you start looking outside the canonical Bible.
I think that the biggest issue of competing interpretation during early Christianity was the nature of Jesus. To put it simply, was he all god, part man and part god, or all man with divine inspiration? Beginning a little after the start of the 2nd century, there were writings and letters from some groups calling other groups heretics. The most acrimonious (for what I've read) where from people who believed that Jesus was divine, either all or in part, against those who believed he was a divinely inspired man. One of the prominent bishops whose name escapes me at the moment championed the current 4 gospels (M, M, L, and J), which clearly claim that Jesus was divine, and called for what was essentially a crusade against people who held othe books canon, so that they be killed and their scriptures destroyed. Historical records are really spotty about this, but I believe that this is pretty much what happened.
If you look at them with a critical eye, you'll notice that there is a great deal missing from the Gospels as a story of Jesus' life. You get the prelude, the birth, and then 3 years of teaching. That's pretty much it. Almost everything else is missing. However, that's not because people didn't write about it, but rather, for whatever reasons, it wasn't included in the canon. My belief is that it made Jesus seem too human and showed that his message developed over time, rather than being beamed down from heaven.
I'm again going to bring this back to legalism versus idealism. My belief is that this formed the main basis of contention between the divine/non-divine groups. From a idealistic perspective, it almost doesn't matter if Jesus was divine, or even, if he ever even existed. The message and the meaning is what is important. It is, as Jesus said, that he was an example for people to follow, not a ruler to command them. On the other hand, you have people who put their trust in authority. As such, Jesus had to be divine or else his message didn't deserve unquestioned obedience. My theory is that the authoritarian, legalistic viewpoint became canon specifically because those were the guys who were willing to kill, rape, and burn the opposition. They were centered on power and thus got the power to make the decisions.
Of course, all of that is completely my opinion, so take it for what it's worth, i.e. not very much. I'm sure that I've made the conjectures I've made on little evidence sound a lot more supported than they are. As I said, records from this time are extremely rare, so most of what I said is me projecting what I think would happen in that sort of situation.
---
Oh, I was thinking about some of the jazzier things Paul said. One of the things that I really like about him is his emphasis of community over law, like when he says that if you take another believer to court, you've already lost. That's not the sort of thing you'd heard from other leaders around his time.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I'd like to add another possibilty to that list.
c) They were unsure about what was canon and what wasn't, but were heavily invested in the idea that they shouldn't be unsure. They cared but were unable to rationally countenance doubt. So they looted Constantinople.
I think that the people making those decisions were pretty much like you and me, rather than some sort of giants or villians in history. They were just people, generally trying to do the best they could.
[ January 26, 2004, 11:23 AM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Javert Hugo (Member # 3980) on :
I like many of the things that Paul said. I love the treatise on charity/love/agape. I like his pleading for the saints to become one. I love the scriptures about spiritual things being understood spiritually. I just don't like everything.
This does present something of a dillemma for me. Paul's the only prophet whose words I've read and the inner response has been "What the crap?" It can't be sheer personality - Moroni's and Nephi's also have loads of personality. Maybe it's just PAUL's personality.
It's on my list of questions. They are not faith-breaking questions - most of what Paul said is duplicated elsewhere, and my testimony of Christ and the veracity of the Bible rests much more on the gospels than Paul's letters anyway, and I trust there is an answer I do not yet understand - but I do wonder.
Yay for additional scripture. It's nice to have backup.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote:You get the prelude, the birth, and then 3 years of teaching. That's pretty much it. Almost everything else is missing. However, that's not because people didn't write about it, but rather, for whatever reasons, it wasn't included in the canon. My belief is that it made Jesus seem too human and showed that his message developed over time, rather than being beamed down from heaven.
The problem with that theory is that the non-canonical childhood narratives all show Jesus as less human and more divine. Stories about him working miracles in his father’s carpentry shop and raising dead baby birds to life. The major canonical arguments were with the Gnostics and Marcionites who didn’t believe that Jesus was fully human – they taught that he was a divine spirit who merely took on the appearance of a human body.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:MrSquicky said: There is no responsible dance around this. If you hate, you sin, much like the Pharisees that Jesus condemns for obeying all the moral laws but perverting their entire spirit.
The point of the “dance” isn’t how much to hate in acknowledging the sin in homosexual actions is permissible – it’s about how to acknowledge the sin without hating at all.
Similarly, the command to love does not give one license to pretend homosexual actions are not sinful for fear of hating (or for fear of being perceived as hating).
I’m not disputing any of your analysis on the centrality of love to Christian doctrine. However, part of loving someone is providing moral guidance when necessary, especially when raising your own children. When a child is baptized in the Catholic Church, for example, the parents and godparents each make solemn vows (as solemn as wedding vows) to teach the children the beliefs of the Church.
I don’t think you’re a bad guy. I think you have accurately focused on one of the core concepts of Christianity, but have set up the false choice between that core concept and another one.
quote:MrSquicky said: I could dive back into intrinsic versus extrinsicity in religion, morality, and, ultimately motivation to show exactly why a content-irrelevant reward-punishment system is going to lead to exactly the sort of ignorance, prejudice, and all around bad stuff that I'm decrying, but, I'm going to need some indication that it would actually be worth the effort.
I doubt it would be worth the effort, because each time you’ve presented that argument you have pretty clearly stated or implied that the “ignorance, prejudice, and all around bad stuff” is a direct and inevitable result of any sort of specific rules-based morality (I won’t use legalistic here).
The point is that every good can be used to justify something bad. “Perfect love” does not imply loving to the exclusion of all else. And misdirected (I won’t say excess) compassion can cause people to act sinfully. For example, failing to discipline a child out of love and compassion (and I’m not talking “spare the rod” type of mentality here, just normal “eat your vegetables” stuff) can doom a child to an ineffective, ever-disappointing adulthood. Think of a parent not getting a child vaccinated because the child hates shots. Protecting a child from pain and suffering is good. What the parent fails to take into account is that subjecting the child to the shot to avoid future pain and suffering is even better.
Perfect love may require telling certain people their actions are wrong. Think abolitionists, for example. A clear case where loving (both of captive slaves and the slaveholders) required a clear, bold statement that someone was doing something wrong. Failing to do so would have been a failure to love both the slave and the slaveholder.
Clearly homosexual actions do not approach the evil of slavery. I happen to think that some Christians get too exercised over the sexual aspect of morality to the exclusion of other aspects (such as love). But I think a Christian parent who believes homosexual actions are sinful is not excused by the overriding importance of love from teaching his children.
Dagonee
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Darn it dkw, I was trying to get away with not talking about the Gnostics, as it is a much more complicated issue that I don't think is really relevant. Short answer, yes, the Gnostic thing was a huge deal, but it was (in my opinion) largely about the extreme matter-spirit dualism of the Gnostics, the twin problems of orgiastic licentiousness or ascetic withdraw from the world, and the Marcionist-type belief that the Jewish scriptures were oppositional to the Christian scriptures. That is, it was not specifically about the issue of Christ's divinity, although some of the more "He was just faking being human" probably did make it a bigger issue than I'm claiming. Also, while many (more likely most Gnostics) considered Jesus all-spirit, some other Gnostic groups again denied that he was anything but a divinely inspired man. Also. I still maintain that one of the most acrimonious (maybe the most was overstatitng it) divisions was between the divine/non-divine crowds.
As for non-canonical writings, I've never read any gospel from that time that talks about Jesus as purely human. However, I feel like this is good evidence for my point, that they were systematically destroyed. We know that there were groups of people who believed this and that they had writings. The call I talked about above (and I was hoping you could tell me who it was from, I think it was a bishop in the 120s) specifically mentioned the destruction of their writings. Now, it's possible that they were self-referential writings not claiming to be an accounting of Jesus' life, but I think there is room to believe that they might have been more than that.
I want to make it clear that at best I consider myself a dilletante in Christian history and such. I pick up things here and there as they interest me, but I've never put into the sort of serious, systematic study that would justify a large degree of confidence in what I'm saying. But, I like to talk about the ideas, especially from a social dynamics standpoint, where I am qualified to talk with confidence.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Holy crumb, Squicky, every time you tout your credentials, I want to give you a swirlie.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
If it makes you feel better, kat, you can look at it as Squick saying he's NOT qualified to talk about anything else with confidence. Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
quote:However, I feel like this is good evidence for my point, that they were systematically destroyed.
*snort*
My favorite gospel is the one where Ector claimed Jesus was really the bastard son of Marius, and he was killed by enemies of Caesar to prevent confusion in terms of succession to Rome.
What, you haven't heard of that one? Proves my point! It was SO right, they got rid of it!
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Squicky, why would the groups who believed Jesus was only a divinely inspired man have written about his early life? There wouldn’t have been any point in it for them. Many of those groups believed that when the Holy Spirit came upon Jesus at his baptism that was his “adoption” as the Son of God – a received title. But that fits perfectly well with the canonical gospels – particularly Mark, which starts the story with Jesus baptism. Who would bother to write about his perfectly ordinary childhood before that point?
Edit: Almost forgot -- are you thinking of Irenaeus?
[ January 28, 2004, 12:35 PM: Message edited by: dkw ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dagonee, I don't think what you described as a parent preventing their child from being innoculated because it's a bit of pain that is for their benefit can accurately be described as love, especially in the sense current when Jesus was teaching. To me, it is a great deal more like selfishness. Love is not the desire to keep all pain from someone. That's possessive identification. Love is an engagement with the total person and a desire for them to be as fully themselves as they can be. Likewise, love is not avoiding truths that are unpleasant. Love, in Jesus' time, carried a strong component of knowlege along with it. The word for sexual intimacy and to know was the same. Thus, we use "knowing in the Biblic sense" as a euphamism for having sex with someone. To love, to know someone is to acknowledge both good and bad about them.
Also, I'm not entirely sure where we are here. Are you agreeing with me that love is a more important basis for Christian morality than obediance is? If so, then the issue becomes whether or not we agree that this basis is largely rejected or ignored by Christians in history and currently.
I'm going to quote john Stuart Mill here, because he's an dead guy who is well regarded, so he can get away with saying things in a way that I can't. Also, I think the world would be a better place if more people went around quoting On Liberty.
quote:To what an extent doctrines intrinsically fitted to make the deepest impression upon the mind may remain in it as dead beliefs, without ever being realized in the imagination, the feelings, or the understanding, is exemplified by the manner in which the majority of believers hold the doctrines of Christianity. By Christianity I here mean what is accounted such by all churches and sects - the maxims and precepts contained by the New Testament. These are considered sacred, and accepted as laws, by all professing Christians. Yet, it is scarcely too much to say that not one Christian in a thousand guides or tests his individual conduct by reference to those laws. The standard to which he does refer it, is the custom of his own nation, his class, or his religious profession. He has thus, on the one hand, a collection of ethical maxims, which he believes to have been vouchsafed to him by infallible wisdom as rules for his government; and on the other, a set of everyday judgements and practices, which go to a certain lengthwith some of the maxims, not so great a length with others, stand in direct opposition to some, and are, on the whole, a comprimise between the Christian creed amd the interests and suggestions of worldly life. To the first of these standards he gives his homage; to the other his real allegiance. All Christians belive that the blessed are poor and humble, and those who are ill-used by the world; that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven; that they should judge not, lest they be judged; that they should swear not at all; that they should love their neighbor as themselves; that if one take their cloak, they should give him their coat also; that they should take no thought for the morrow; that if they would be perfect, they should sell all that they have and give it to the poor. They are not insincere when they say that they believe these things. They believe them, as people believe what they have always heard lauded and never dicussed. But in the sense of the living belief which regulates conduct, they believe these doctrines just up to the point to which it is usual to act upon them. The doctrines in their integrity are serviceable to pelt adversaries with; and it is understood that they are to be put forward (when possible) as the reasons for whatever people do that they think laudable. But any one who reminded them that the maxims require an infinity of things which they never even think of doing, would gain nothing but to be classed amoung those very unpopular characters who affect to be better than other people. The doctrines have no hold on ordinary believers - are not a power in their minds. They have a habitual respect for the sound of them, but no feeling which spreads from the words to the things signified, and forces the mind to take them in, and make them conform to the formula. Whenever conduct is concerned, they look round for Mr. A and B to direct them how far to go in obeying Christ.
This largely captures my feelings. As I said before, many people claim that they have no choice over what they believe, that they only follow the Bible. And yet, they consistently don't follow the Bible in cases where they don't even think about it. I don't think that anyone with any respect for their own integrity could suggest that all but a very few Christians have ever followed those explicit Biblical doctrines which Mill lists above.
And, it's not primarily a question of human weakness. The problem isn't that people just don't measure up to these standards. It's that they don't even use them as standards to begin with. There is an enormous difference between not keeping a commandment, say to love your neighbor as yourself, because you were not strong enough to resist temptation not to and not keeping it because it has never entered into the pattern of your life.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
dkw, I think that it might be a consequence of my own understanding of divine inspiration, such that it is not a replacement of what was in someone with a divine message, but rather sort of an enhancement of what is in the person already. I'd expect that Jesus' message grew out of his life and, as such, his life would be of extreme interest to the people who believed his message. But, I could see how, from an active conversion perspective, Jesus could have been an ordinary guy that God just zapped with revelation. In that case, it wouldn't make sense to be interested in his life.
edit: Although, that brings up an interesting question to me. If you believed that Jesus had a divine nature (be it mixed with human or not) wouldn't you want to know everything about his life, and not just about his divine provenance and then his ministry?
[ January 28, 2004, 12:58 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I tend to agree with your understanding of divine revelation. I just don’t think anyone was writing that sort of historical-analytical biography at the time. It’s not a genre that developed until much later, I think.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Oh and yeah, I think that was they guy. Thanks, I'll have to write that down somewhere.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I'd like to return to this by Dagonee:
quote:Similarly, the command to love does not give one license to pretend homosexual actions are not sinful for fear of hating (or for fear of being perceived as hating).
TO all, not just Dagonee:
Well, suppose I just take a different tack altogether. That is that I am convinced, convicted and just plain sure to the marrow of my bones that God is not worried about homosexual actions and the stuff that's in the Bible about it came from man, not God.
How am I convinced of this?
Because the closer I get to God, the less I care about it.
And people I know who are close to God and whom I most respect as examples of good God-loving and God-living people don't worry about it.
And then there's the obverse that MIGHT prove the point. As in, IF I could also say that "anyone I've met who is all worked up over homosexuality and sin has never turned out to be a good example of Christianity in the other respects that I find most important." I would then be convinced totally of my interpretation.
Unfortunately for that pat conclusion, I have also met some good people who are in most respects very good examples of what it means to be a Christian who are convinced to the very marrow of their being that homosexuality is not just a sin, but a very important and greivous sin.
But I have also met some downright ignorant, violent people who are anti-homosexual. And I count them among the LEAST God-loving, God-living people on the face of the planet.
So, where does that leave me?
With my conviction that those who are absolutely convinced that homosexuality is a sin are wrong on this one score. But also with the concern, as expressed in the post with which I started this thread, that I may have this whole thing (CHRISTIANITY IN GENERAL) horribly, horribly wrong.
And if that's the case, I would sooner renounce my claim to being a Christian before I renounce the conviction of what I believe is not just true, but TRUE.
And that is: 1) Sex in general, and homosexuality in particular matters a lot less than people seem to think it does.
and
2) Men inserted a lot into Scripture, to the point where trying to decide what is WORD OF GOD, what is INSPIRED BY GOD, and what is JUST SOME GUY'S OPINION is nearly impossible (except in specific spots where it is made clear). The politics of canonicity are just one example of why this view seems reasonable to me.
and
3) The best ANYONE can do is try to figure it out, pray for help, and listen to people who have studied it. And also, recognize that we don't have it ALL right, no matter who we are and how literally we take the Bible, or give ourselves to the Spirit, or walk in the way, etc.
and
4) Most importantly, judging the sins of others is not our business. Period. And this is VERY important. That doesn't mean you can't learn from others mistakes or decide to avoid someone because you don't want the influence of their behaviors in your life. But it does mean that there is a limit to what you can and should say in pointing out the "sins" of others, or trying to control other people's lives.
I think about it this way. If God wanted us to control each other's lives, he would've found a way to state that principle outright SOMEWHERE in the huge volume of scripture. And he would've reiterated it in the renewed covenant. I'm serious here. I'm looking for a statement like "It's okay to point out the sins of homosexuality publicly."
Most importantly, I think if God wanted that level of control over individuals, He probably would've just reserved it for himself seeing as how he would do a far better job than the rest of us ever could, individually or collectively.
So, in imitation of God, I believe that religious people should never seek to stop people (other than their own offspring/dependants) from engaging in actions that harm themselves, or might harm themselves. Or, if you do, you should do it from the standpoint of pointing out the potential for harm, not the "sinful" nature of it.
I know, I know, we are supposed to be concerned for the harm that sin does to the immortal soul. But this is EXACTLY where God did draw the line in telling us not to go around judging the status of each others' souls. His job. Not our job. So, if you see someone doing something that you believe is harmful to them spiritually, surely you can find some way to approach the subject without the need to harp on their sin.
Or, if you do, then maybe it should be okay for everyone else to harp on your sins.
I wouldn't want that.
Who would?
Since the list of sins is ill-defined and probably infinite (especially in some people's viewpoint), I think concentrating on spotting and pointing out sin is the exactly the kind of activity that would land one's soul in a heap of trouble in the sweet by and by. Why?
Because: 1) It would mean a life of unGodlike behavior 2) It would mean a life of taking unto yourself that which is purely God's province. 3) It would mean following a path of negativity, constantly. 4) And it would mean concentrating on everyone else, and not on yourself and your own need to improve.
Again, unless I'm just horribly, horribly wrong.
(NOTE: Please don't launch into the reductio ad absurdummy argument here about society having the right to control murderers and rapists, etc. I think you know that the line between those kinds of behaviors and what we are talking about here is fairly clear, and also where we should err on the side of personal freedom).
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
Not exactly the same thing but something that I'm finding related is my take on Paul's "Love Chapter" 1 Corinthians 13.
I guess I'll quote the more relevant parts here. I was discussing long-term relationships and how I don't know if the "godly ideals" in the chapter are actually practical for human relationships.
quote: I was also contemplating I Corinthians 13 the famous "love chapter" and trying to bring it to a more human perspective.
Love is patient True, but sometimes love requires a kick in the behind when the other person is screwing up
Love is kind True however, what one person views as unkind isn't necessarily the same in others. Steve and I give each other a lot of sarcastic flak on a daily basis, and we enjoy it. However it takes some of my female friends completely aback, because they think we are being mean to each other.
Love does not behave itself unseemly. True but once again you have to have similar definitions of "unseemly". For example, my mother can't believe I would take off on weekend long dog shows or hatrack get togethers without Steve. She views it as a huge failing in our relationship. I on the other hand feel lucky to have found a guy that is secure enough in himself and in his trust of me, that he wants me to go do things I enjoy with or without him. Some of the things I enjoy, he doesn't, but that doesn't mean I have to stop participating in them. The same is true in reverse as well. I'm not really into RPGs and computer games, but if they make him happy, why not?
Love seeks not her own. True, unselfishness is key.
Love is not easily provoked. I know some relationships where one or the other will fly up into cinders over small things. However the reason those relationships are still together is because they don't hold grudges against each other. Not holding grudges is probably to me the more key thing than not provoking each other.
Love rejoices not in iniquity but rejoices in the truth.
Trust is key. I think more trust than honesty. Sometimes one person has to trust the other that they really don't need to know all the facts of whatever at the moment because it would make everything worse. But if you trust the person, then you know that what they aren't telling you is for a good reason. For a personal example Steve reads all my psychotic grandma mail before I do. Sometimes he never gives me the letter just the synopsis. Do I really want to know all of the hurtful things she said most recently? Not really, even if I might be curious about it. So I trust him to make the judgement call for me.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
At this point I believe he had to be refering to God, not humanity because there are certian things that shouldn't be put up with like abuse. This last line I have the most problem with I guess, because it would make someone incredibly naieve and easily victimized.
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
Bob, it seems to me that your contention is that the largest sin - the worst thing you could do - is to judge.
It seems that this is your contention because, and forgive and correct me if I am misinterpreting you, saying someone is not performing a godly action feels wrong to you, but the action they are pointing out doesn't. I know you're a good guy, and you are sincere in questing about this.
Okay.
Okay, I have a theory, and I almost hate to say it because I don't want to disturb the good-Katie-will I somehow engendered. If you get annoyed, just remember the words of Slash and Olivia: "She's much nicer in person."
Maybe the reason one feels like a greater sin to you than the other is because you have a problem with the first and not the second.
I've noticed that I get all prickly about some actions, but don't even blink at others, when empirically and doctrinally they seem to be about the same. For instance, disobedient missionaries bug the crap out of me. I feel like you can do whatever you want, but go home and take the badge off first. There's no excuse for screwing around when you're supposed to be on the Lord's errand.
On the other hand, other things phase me not at all. It doesn't strike any sort of recognizable chord. I believe they're a sin, but they don't get under my skin like disobedient missionaries do.
------
Bob, I do believe the law of chastity is a commandment, and homosexual relations isn't part of it. The Lord doesn't give us commandments just to be capricious and goof off - they exist for a reason. For us to be happy. He isn't making up rules - he's describing a way to live that will make us the most happy.
I don't agree with Tres that adults need to be children to one another (I have a vivid memory of being told I was not "teachable" and thinking I would be if he had anything to say.), but we are children to God.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:One of the prominent bishops whose name escapes me
Squick, are you thinking of Irenaeus?
I'm still only midway through page 5, so if this got answered in a post after the one I'm quoting, sorry. Anyway, back to reading through the thread.
Edited to fix the quote, and to say "Oh, looks like dkw beat me to it".
[ January 28, 2004, 03:52 PM: Message edited by: Noemon ]
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
quote:Holy crumb, Squicky, every time you tout your credentials, I want to give you a swirlie.
Kat, you should have just posted a link to that picture from Lost in Translation.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
What law of chastity? LAW??? L.A.W.???
Anyway, Kat, you may indeed be correct, but I think there's more to it than just my own comfort level. When I read scripture, the parts that bubble to the surface for me are the ones that talk about the positive aspects of leading a Christian life, loving God, loving each other, and so much more.
I don't think the biggest possible sin is judging someone else.
I do think it is the most common sin on the planet and one that almost all humans are prone to, almost to the point of it being unnoticeable and "like breathing."
And, paradoxically, I have no problem pointing that out to people.
I just think that if we're going to start pointing out sins, we might as well start with one we can all relate to.
Oh, and I didn't think you weren't being nice. I posted that opinion for people to react to. This thread is entirely sincere on my part. I feel like I'm so far off-base after listening to opinions about homosexuality that I must be creating my own religion off on the sidelines of Christianity or something.
People truly seem to think that proscriptions against homosexuality are somehow central to Christian and Jewish faith.
I see that stuff as so peripheral as to be something to be completely ignored. I think the passages mentioning this stuff in the Bible are so idiosyncratic as to be easily edited out without any damage to the overall message of Scripture.
So, if I'm wrapped around the axle on this one, it is not because I am waiting for God's go-ahead to become homosexual. Or because I have this fetish for pointing out the nasty little secrets of our almost universal "sin" of negativity and judgemental attitudes.
It's because I don't understand how something that people tell me is central and important can feel so downright silly and peripheral to me. It's not like I'm completely ignorant of Scripture. It isn't like I never heard the "sex talk" from a priest or minister.
It's just that I would not even want to live in a world without the gay people I have known. And if they are here (and, yes, queer), is it so important to stop them from enjoying a sex act now and again?
This brings me back to your larger issue of chastity. I think chastity is greatly important if you are going to have children. But that is not the only successful way to live a life. And of all the criteria by which I might decide to keep a person in or out of my life, their sexual behavior unrelated to ME is simply unimportant. I might get bored of talking about their latest conquest, but people who I have as friends usually have a wealth of topics they can work from.
Anyway, does this give a little more feeling of depth to it, or do you still think I'm just reacting to the perception that "judgement is a sin?"
I don't think that's the case, but I do admit that it is something that bugs me more than a lot of other things people do to/for/about each other.
And that's probably something I should deal with someday.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Bob,
I think the better quote to pull out of my post would have been, “But I think a Christian parent who believes homosexual actions are sinful is not excused by the overriding importance of love from teaching his children.” (emphasis added) I’ve made no attempt to convince anyone that homosexual actions are sinful, nor would I in the context of an online forum. However, I assumed since you asked the question that started this thread that you thought so, since otherwise why would you be worried about you taught it to your children?
I agree that it is generally not our place to call out other people’s sinful actions. That’s why the Catholic Church has a private confessional. Breaking the seal of the confessional is close to the most serious offense a priest can commit.
There are situations where this is called for, however. Sins that touch on social justice issues (slavery, abortion, racism, economic oppression), for example, almost demand to be pointed out.
Other, more personal sins do not cry out for public condemnation, especially in a lopsided manner (ignoring heterosexual promiscuity while condemning monogamous homosexuals). However, in some cases it is necessary. Suppose a good friend asks your opinion on an aspect of his behavior? I think being a good Christian demands answering as honestly as possible.
All of this aside, however, there is a huge difference between teaching someone, especially a child, that a particular action is sinful and “judging the sins of others” or “concentrating on spotting and pointing out sin.” If you truly believe that homosexual actions are not wrong, then you should not teach your children that.
However, this doesn’t absolve you of your problem, it just moves it one step back from homosexuality. For example, if you think unbounded promiscuity is sinful, or even if you just think it’s unsafe, you’ll need to teach your children this while also teaching them not to judge others.
Even if you really mean that any sexual behavior is OK, you might have the same problem with drug use or some other action. If you teach your children not to do something (either because it’s wrong or it’s stupid), you run the risk of teaching them to judge others who choose to do it. So you still need to know how to balance the teachings of the core values of the Christian faith with the ability to choose a course of action wisely.
Dagonee P.S., has anyone ever read Lewis’s account of homosexuality at his prep school in Surprised by Joy? He makes a point of saying that he’s not going to lecture on the morality of it because it’s one of only two sins he’s never been tempted to (the other being gambling), so he doesn’t feel qualified to talk about it. While still saying such actions were wrong, he also pointed out that in some ways these relationships were the only vestige of love available in the school.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Dagonee,
The reason I quoted that part of your prior message was that I disagreed with it. It implied that I was deluding myself (as in you know for certain that God thinks homosexuality is a sin, and therefore I was just "pretending" it wasn't). As opposed to, maybe, having the thought in your mind that you could be mistaken, and that the scriptures (and/or interpretations of them) could also be less than 100% reliable on this issue.
I have absolutely no issue with you on things like parents' responsibility to teach their children the best they know how.
I might wish that some parents would go beyond teaching that something is "stupid" or "a sin" and give actual reasons for their beliefs, but then, they aren't my kids. And maybe at some ages, that's all a kid is equipped to absorb.
Learning not to judge is probably a lot harder than learning to judge. Learning how to judge well, is darn near impossible. And I assert that this is true even WITH a lifetime of studying Scripture and God.
And yet, so many think they do it so well that they believe they should decide for the rest of humanity too.
And that premise, I reject not just because I think it is anti-Christian, but because I know it is just plain wrong.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I think there may be too many different discussions going on here – I’m responding to AJ’s post about I Corinthians 13.
To put it in context, Paul wasn’t talking about love between two people, he was talking about how to behave toward one another in a Christian community. This isn’t a beautiful meditation on romantic love (in spite of the fact that it’s so often used that way at weddings) it’s a letter chewing out the Corinthian church for failing to act like a part of the Body of Christ.
Paul was concerned about the difference between how the Corinthians as a community were acting and how they were supposed to act. Every line that you quote refers back to an earlier part of the letter. And chapter thirteen is right in the middle of the discussion of spiritual gifts. The Corinthians have apparently been arguing about who’s the most spiritual, Paul tells them that the most important of the spiritual gifts is love, and then tells them about love so they can see how well they measure up. (Answer – not particularly well.) Then he goes back to reminding them that the purpose of spiritual gifts is to build up the community.
In the case of a husband claiming that his wife should “endure” being hit if she loves him, I’ve found it redirects things nicely to say, “let’s put aside for the moment what she should or shouldn’t do. How well are you doing at showing love for her?” Then he has to admit that hitting isn’t exactly loving behavior and maybe he should work on the log in his own eye. (And yes, I’m speaking from experience here. It’s remarkable how many people do use this passage to try to justify abuse.)
Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :
*scowl* dk, I believe it. I firmly believe there's a special place in hell for people who use religion as a weapon. That's the reason I have such an affinity for Javert, and it's one of the reasons I absolutely adore Jacob in the Book of Mormon. Right before a big speech where he chastised everyone for pride and vanity and then ripped the men apart for sleeping around and destroying the trust of their wives, he apologized for the pain his words would cause, and related how he obtained his errand from the Lord. I have a feeling Jacob knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of a selfish twisting of scripture.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
dkw...
Thanks. That was great.
Posted by BannaOj (Member # 3206) on :
I realize my diatribe was a bit of a tangent from the main discussion. In my fundamentalist Christian years, that whole chapter was held up as the golden standard for love and it kind of bugged me. Went through the book of Corinthians in Bible studies listened to sermons through the book from the pulipit a couple of times and nobody explained it like you just did dkw.
AJ
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Bob_Scopatz said The reason I quoted that part of your prior message was that I disagreed with it. It implied that I was deluding myself (as in you know for certain that God thinks homosexuality is a sin, and therefore I was just "pretending" it wasn't).
As I stated in the earlier post, I was acting from the assumption, derived from your initial post, that you believed homosexual actions were sinful. “Pretending” did not refer to you “deluding” yourself but rather to not naming actions you believe to be sinful as sinful for fear of teaching your children to be judgmental. And that statement only came out after some philosophical meanderings with MrSquicky, who, as best I understand it, was stating that the meta-moral emphasis on love in Christianity is incompatible with (or at least harmed by) the rule/commandment portions of the faith.
The statement only makes sense in the context of a Christianity that demands both non-judgmental love and adherence to a particular moral code. Almost any “victimless” sin (in the sense that the only apparent victims are God and the actor) could be substituted in that statement for homosexual actions.
If you truly don’t believe homosexual actions or are sinful (i.e., think they are not sinful or are not sure), then that part of the message doesn’t apply to you. But if that’s so, what is this thread about? That you shouldn’t teach your children something you don’t believe? I think we all knew that already.
Dagonee
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dagonee, That's not exactly what I'm saying. I'll try to say it a litle clearer. I'm not setting rules explicitly against love, not really. Instead, it's a matter of what the ultimate end is. When I talk about the legalistic tradition (it's a real thing, honest, not just something I made up), I'm talking specifically about the idea that the end of morality is the following of rules, with no more meaning than that. It's entirely possible - I'd even argue necessary due to human imperfection - to have a system of rules as a guide and a gauge. It's when these rules are followed for their own sake instead as a path towards the ideal, or at least made more important that the meaning behind them, that the problems come in.
For example, take the 10 Commandments thing. There is a certain group of people who believe that posting the 10 Commandments in our schools is going to make our children more moral. The reasoning seems to me that somehow, without any conscious effort on the children's part, having those rules posted is going to affect their behavior. Now, not once in the attempts to put these rules up has anyone suggested posting the part in the Bible that I've been referencing, where Jesus says that the root of morality is love for other people. And they never will. That's not the goal of their religion, even though it is the core of Christianity.
Forget posting it. That's a maxim that I think we should work into our classroom lessons themselves. I'd welcome it almost as much as I'd oppose forcing the 10 Commandments on people. Do people have a problem presenting it in it's religious-oriented Biblical context? No problem. The message and meaning is easily translated into secular terms. Teach from the principle without any religious connotations, and, if the kids are taken by it, they've become good christians, even if they aren't good CHRISTIANS.
But, again, that's not going to happen. I'd say that nearly all of the trying to infuse religion into our schools would much prefer CHRISTIANS to people who follow the fundamental essense of Christianity, but pray to a different god, or to no god at all.
I really am curious to know who much of what I'm saying you agree with, or at least how much you can understand why I think that way. What do ya think of old J. S. Mill up there and what do you think of me saying that a large part of the Christianity that people ignore is the core and best parts of the religion? Or maybe you can show me how either that's not the best and most core parts or how my perceptions are totally off.
[ January 29, 2004, 10:52 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Speaking as someone who's seen something like it...
Perhaps these people figure that these core beliefs are so completely basic that no one can fail to know them. What is missing are certain less-obvious applications. So they focus on the applications and leave out what they consider obvious.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Mr. Squick: In regards to Paul transmuting pagan ritual to Christian ones, can you provide a link, or the name of a book?
Because I don't see anything from him in the Bible regarding that sort of policy.
In addition, you'll note that Christ himself organized the first communion. Remember-- 'Do this in remembrance of me?' Now, if you're going to make accusations about the sacrament not being an original Christian product, fine-- but don't point the finger at Paul, 'cause he isn't the one who promulgated the idea first.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Actually, Dagonee, the thread wasn't about asking advice for training my own kids, but asking what Christian parents do when faced with this problem.
IF you believe homosexuality (for example) is a sin, but you also believe in training your children not to judge others...etc.
I know what I believe about it, but my beliefs are sort of irrelevant to the discussion. I was asking because I thought I knew what the correct response for a CHRISTIAN would be. I obviously was not in the mainstream on my thinking -- hence the concern "how could I be so wrong???"
So, that's what this thread was initially about. It's gone in some other directions since then.
I do find it gratifying in all of this that you couldn't tell right off what I believe about homosexuality. Thanks for that! I was hoping not to bias the discussion or turn it into yet another Hatrack "homosexuality IS/ISN'T a sin" thread. We've got enough of those in the archives already.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Oh, and by the way, in order to answer you, I did have to go back to my original post and figure out what the heck I had said in there. So it's not like my thoughts haven't wandered over the multiple pages of this thread.
The issue is still an important one for me and you are right that it could be broadened to apply to any victimless sin. (I'll leave God out as a "victim" because I just can't believe that God is in anyway "harmed" by the sins of man, so if He's a victim, it's sort of a weird usage of the word.)
My quandry would be over what to teach a child about judging others when I so clearly am willing to pass judgement against judgemental people. Circular in the extreme, no? And a lot less easy to explain in a post on a thread.
But now that we've got 6 pages under our belts, I can ask for myself in the area where I would need the most advice and assume that MOST everyone here would "get it."
So, whaddya think? Is judging the judgemental as much of a sin as judging other sinners?
I think it is.
So, the problem is am I acting in willful disobedience or am I just protecting my kids from an evil I see in the world when I train them to make this judgement?
I gather most of the respondents here would think I'm in the right. Sinning, to be sure, but I wouldn't have a choice if I wanted to raise my children to righteousness -- or at least towards it.
Or is this situation radically different from judging homosexuality as a sin?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Note also, I wish that I was smart enough to have PLANNNED this particular transition in the thread. But I'm not. It really did just occur to me now that my own hypocrisy could be instructive in the debate. Before, I just thought it was a failing best left private since no-one could possibly care.
Posted by MaureenJanay (Member # 2935) on :
quote: The issue is still an important one for me and you are right that it could be broadened to apply to any victimless sin. (I'll leave God out as a "victim" because I just can't believe that God is in anyway "harmed" by the sins of man, so if He's a victim, it's sort of a weird usage of the word.)
I didn't really read the whole thread and I'm skipping a lot and I don't really know how anyone feels about this. I do think that God is harmed by our sin. We are made in his image, complete with emotions/feelings. I think it hurts him to see us fail so miserably. That's all.
added: Especially if we claim to love him.
[ January 30, 2004, 09:31 AM: Message edited by: MaureenJanay ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Macc, Sure, that's possible. Speaking as an interested observer, I really don't see it. Like I've said, I don't stand against Christianity. I'd love to see people pushing the fundamentals of Christianity. I just really don't. Can you give me reason to believe that they are?
The thing that maybe isn't coming out here is that I grew up a devout Catholic. I was one of those kids that read the Bible through at least once a year. I think that it is particularly because of this that I am no longer Christian. I took my religion too seriously to excuse what I saw as a betrayal of it everywhere I looked. I didn't have the chauvanism towards my religious community that I think underlies a lot of the problems that religions suffer. When I saw the Catholic Church as doing something wrong, I didn't go all apologist trying to explain it. I didn't lie about it or try to deny it or twist things like I saw some many other people doing. I just thought that they were doing wrong.
I derived the Pelagian heresy from my reason and understanding of the Bible when I was 8. The Church's insistence that anyone not baptized was doomed to hell was the primary reason why I split with it. Nor was this the only heresy I developed more or less by myself that I think grew organically out of my devotion to Christianity.
Later, I came to realize that the truths that I clung to in Christianity were not endemic to it, but rather existed through certain strains of nearly all religions and I embraced a much more catholic attitude than that of the Church I grew up in. Instead of limiting my viewpoint to the revealed content of one religion, I turned to a more general search for underlying truth.
---
I doubt that anyone could claim that historical Christianity lived up to Jesus' teachings. It's way to full of atrocities for that. Actually, rather it way to full of justifying atrocities for that.
Thus, there would have to have been some sort of revolution to bring Christianity back to Christ's message. It certainly wasn't the Reformation. The three main sects coming out of it were the Calvinists, who believed in complete submission to God's will as the only virtue and denied man's capacity for loving each other, the Lutherans, who based being Christian as sort of a self-identification thing, completely divorced from acts and from attitudes towards other people, and the Anglicans, who were pretty much like Catholics with some changes. In America, we've had two renewals. The First Revival is epitomized by Johnathan Edwards, he of the the Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God speech. Love was certainly not tops on their agenda. The second Revival was a turn towrds the extremely personal (and many said ignorant) concept of religion, where the person's own feelings became the center of religious life. This is probably best exemplified in current society by the Southern Baptists, and I doubt anyone's ever going to nominate them for the best example of loving their neighbors.
I ask then, where was this revolution? If you admit that historical Christianity was extremely off message, how has contemporary Christianity gotten on message? Also, why do so many outsiders (or insider-outsiders, like myself) not see this love of neighbor in mainstream Christianity? Why hasn't there been greater progress in ecumenical Christian movements where the recognizition of the shared core outweigh the obviously more peripheral doctrinal differences? Why do scientific studies of such social ills as prejudice and authoritarianism consistently find higher levels amoung Christians than among non-religious people? How could Hitler fight his wars with a population the majority of which was Christian and with the support of the current Pope(if you look at the other thread, you'll see that this isn't just a Godwin)?
edit: With apologies to dkw, about the revolution thing, but how many mainstream Christians know who John Wesley was, let alone read his writings, or follow them?
[ January 31, 2004, 03:55 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Everyone in my congregation darn well better. We've spent the entire last year celebrating his 300th birthday.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I think there are some really important soul-searching questions there, Mr. Squicky.
I guess I have a problem though. See, it could be that the truth of the situation is that it is just darned hard to BE a good Christian and that "CHRISTIANITY" the "religion" is not really all that well defined or useful a concept. What ultimately matters is one's own relationship with God, neh?
Rejecting Christianity because of the actions of Christians, if you truly feel like you are or want to be a Christian would be a shame. You would go off and waste a bunch of time and effort trying to find something that feels more right to you. When in fact, maybe Christianity (the religion) needs you just as you need it (the promise).
I guess what I'm saying is that the Christians I most admire don't seem to be wrapped in what other Christians are doing or thinking -- unless it's in a "fellowship" sense. They are on a path. It's Pilgrim's Progress -- a solitary quest with help and advice from those who are living the faith.
Given that, I suppose this whole thread could be considered off base -- "What do Christians do" is not a realistic question.
On the other hand, sometimes it is worthwhile to stop one's individual quest and see whether one is going off in a direction that doesn't make sense. I find myself often to be outside the mainstream of what most Christians seem to believe. Sometimes that's because I'm dead wrong. Other times, I'm convinced it's because I'm dead right.
Most of the time, I come away convinced that we're all wrong and there's very little we can do about it. But pray and hope and keep on the quest.
I have a hard time going to church, mainly because of the other parishioners, or rather my negative reaction to what they think is Christianity. Until I get over my own judgementalism, I don't think I'm very useful at Christian fellowship. And I don't think I'm the right person to go out talking about God to incipient Christians.
I shouldn't even post about my thoughts here for fear of inadvertently leading someone down a path that I'm not even sure of.
But where's the fun in a BB where Bob doesn't post?
So, I keep posting. And I wish I had the certainty that others seem to have. But then I read how uncertain were the people I admire the most and take a hint from that as well. That if they could hold onto the core convictions even when they weren't sure of what they should do next, it's a better thing than just giving up.
By the way, I can't really recommend reading Pilgrim's Progress because it is sort of heavy-handed and stretches a metaphor well past the breaking point. But, in many ways it is also a beautiful story that might stick with you long after you've read it.
(here I am assuming you haven't read it, and maybe you have...)
Oh well, I'm going to bed soon. Tired and I have a trip in the morning at Oh-dark-thirty.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I'm a little dismayed that no-one wanted to answer my prior posts on this page. Is the question too dumb or the answer too obvious?
Am I drawing a parallel that should not be drawn?
Posted by Maccabeus (Member # 3051) on :
Bob, I've already said at least once that I think you're confusing two different kinds of judgement. If I'm wrong, well...I don't think there's any other way to resolve this paradox.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
I think it was Kathleen Norris who, when a friend asked how she could stand to go to church on Sunday when so many Christians are such hypocrites, replied “The only hypocrite I need to worry about on Sunday morning is myself.”
I know no perfect Christians. But pretty much every regular church attendee I know wants to be a better Christian than they are, and believes that goal is more likely to be accomplished by working together with other people involved in the same struggle.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:I know no perfect Christians. But pretty much every regular church attendee I know wants to be a better Christian than they are, and believes that goal is more likely to be accomplished by working together with other people involved in the same struggle.
Yeah, I've heard that before. I even believe it. Sort of. You see, I had this really crummy experience with a church that shall remain nameless. The parishioners who seemed most interested in "fellowship" were also most interested in showing that they knew more about it than everyone else. It was particularly annoying and it wasn't until recently that it finally dawned on me that I was being just a tad judgemental. Unfortunately, I just found myself getting angry and frustrated.
I know a few good people who are also highly intelligent and with whom I feel I can have fellowship, but I have almost no interest in going to their church, where, I just KNOW, I will find a bunch of Republican Texans who want to talk about how God wants GWB to be president again.
I keep away because I can't trust myself not to just get frustrated all over again.
I bet God has actually annoted my entry in the book as "High Maintenance" afterall.
Shoot.
I guess I should try a few more churchs around here and see what's up. It's not right to prejudge.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
quote:Bob, I've already said at least once that I think you're confusing two different kinds of judgement. If I'm wrong, well...I don't think there's any other way to resolve this paradox.
Sorry Macc. It's probably not you. I probably am confusing two different kinds of judgement. I see one as more important than the other, but I'm also not convinced that I'm right on that score either. I'm more worried that I missed the page in the Bible where this was spelled out.
Or I'm just not wired to understand it.
Not raising children may have something to do with it to. I bet if I were raising children, I would not have to think about this issue. I'd teach them the lessons they were capable of understanding at whatever stage of development they had reached. And I'd worry that there was never enough time or energy or opportunity to cram it all in.
You know, being a shepherd was probably an ideal child-rearing environment, when you think about it. Tons of time together with your kids with nothing much to do but watch sheep graze. You could talk about everything, all the time.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
quote:I know a few good people who are also highly intelligent and with whom I feel I can have fellowship
Not to be judgemental or anything. . . but maybe this statement sums up your problem with fellowship.
How much of a requisite is it for you that the people with whom you seek fellowship be 'highly intelligent?' What criteria are you using for 'highly intelligent?'
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I set the bar pretty low, Scott R.
Given the chance, though, I would rather hang around smart people.
But thanks for reading more into my post than I intended.
I guess that could be taken the wrong way, now that I read it.
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abortions. I would add to that I hope you wouldn't be having too much unprotected sex and risking pregnancies. Hmmm - that 'ole argument is exactly that, old. Abortion might be a moral wrong for some, but I think it's just as morally wrong (in that case) to screw around and test the waters. Of course, by your definition, abortions will happen anyway, because the experience is needed to be able to decide whether it's right or wrong. In the case of intimate relations, I suppose a strong statement could be made for the experiential nature of it - after all, it's just messy play for adults . . . ![[Mad]](mad.gif)
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