Stop Taking the Lord's Name in Vain

In My Humble Opinion
81

Taking the Lord’s name in vain (some translations say ‘uttering the name of the Lord to misuse it’) is roughly equivalent to heterosexuals using the word ‘faggot’ or white people calling someone a ‘fucking nigger’.

Should this be illegal? Well, it is offensive, either deliberately or by indifference.

As a Christian, I try not to make statements that are as offensive to other believers as this is to me. I don’t know what all these statements are, however, and ‘Buddha damn it’ is a statement whose theological implications are beyond my experience.

Do I offend atheists when I say nothing at all? :slight_smile:

Saying things like “God bless you” when people sneeze are not misuse of God’s name, IMO. This is an expression of wishes for the other person’s wellbeing, not the desire to see them burn in hell, even if either is frivolously expressed. You would have to be rather touchy to take offense at this. (Not that some people aren’t.)

82

Diesel,

I have never heard someone saying “unicorn” like what I talking about so I don’t think that is a valid point. For that matter, I think you were just trying insult my believe in God so I am not going to even bother to try to debate what you said.

83

I’m betting Wildest Bill doesn’t like my sig line too much, either. :stuck_out_tongue:

84

Wildest Bill wrote:

The Invisible Pink Unicorn shall smite thee for thy blasphemy.

85

*Originally posted by jab1 *

No, I don’t. But it really doesn’t matter what I think of it. But you might when you die if you are wrong about believing there is no God.

And Jab1 another thing I don’t understand if you are an athiest why would you even put something about “God” in you sig line? I just don’t get it. Sure you can say it is just a joke but it’s not even that funny especially to constantly have on a sig line so it shows up every time you post. So what is the real reason that is your sig line?

86

You know, Tracer, you aren’t doing yourself much good, running back and forth like that. It’s only prolonging the agony. Here - just stand still and I’ll throw a fast rock right at your forehead, and it’ll all be over.

BTW - it’s a moot point, whether or not religeons automatically cause atrocities. There has never been, nor will there ever be, an aetict society - and even if there is, who are we to say it would be any better? We have no way of knowing.

87

You know, Tracer, you aren’t doing yourself much good, running back and forth like that. It’s only prolonging the agony. Here - just stand still and I’ll throw a fast rock right at your forehead, and it’ll all be over.

BTW - it’s a moot point, whether or not religeons automatically cause atrocities. There has never been, nor will there ever be, an aetict society - and even if there is, who are we to say it would be any better? We have no way of knowing.

88

We shouldn’t pick on poor Bill. It’s not his fault he’s never been outside of the US, and has never been exposed to other religions. Bill is incapable of seeing outside the narrow confines of his own fundamentalist brand of Christianity. To him, God is real, and Jesus is Lord: you can debate him for a million years, and he will never understand that other points of view can be legitimate. There is only one way to believe, his way, and everyone else is wrong, end of story.

Bill is a good person at heart, and he means no harm.

89

In Quebec, the french canadians, have very colourful expressions when swearing in french, having mostly to do with the church. Until very recently (late 60’s) the Christian Church ruled a great majority of the quebecois with an iron fist. These expressions predate those days.

In north america, which is fairly accepted to be a largely christian society, expletives involving God and Jesus are as common as the day is long. They have also been around for a very long time and are commonly accepted by this essencially christian society.

In contrast, I don’t think you could find a curse in the russian language that has anything to do with god or Jesus. Despite this fact, a good honest russian peasant can swear for at least 15 minutes without repeating himself. Not surprisingly, god or christianity for that matter, hasn’t played a prominent role during the entire history of the soviet union.

What I’m trying to illustrate to you is that the use of god, jesus, what have you, as part of one’s more colourful expressions is a cultural thing. Thus, culturally, christian societies allow and promote this type of language. Non christian ones do not. Make of this what you will…

90

No it isn’t. I call this a false analogy. Using the word “faggot” is meant to disparage a person. The expression “God damn it” does not disparage anyone. The word “God” in itself is not deemed to be offensive.

There is a difference between someone exclaiming “Jesus H. Christ” and someone exclaiming “Jesus was a fucking nigger.”

91

Quicksilver very interesting stuff. I want to ponder on it for a while and then respond to it. I would now but am tired and can hardly keep my eyes opened much less thing I mean think see I to tired to use the back space for the letter “g” to make a “k” in think. Now I don’t know why I typed that other that just fatigued and still having this blasted kidney still in me.

Oh the reason I am tired my newlywed friends had a bit of domestic violence last night that I had to go brake up. And for some reason domestic violence always happened between 1 and 3 in the morning.

92

I can’t believe anyone would think this issue turns on the question of whether God exists or not, or that a person could imagine they could justify offending intentionally offending someone else on the grounds that God is a fiction.

Bill, you hold the name “God” in high esteem because of your religious beliefs, but you must realize that not everyone holds those same religious beliefs or degree of esteem. And they, like you, are allowed to say whatever they want, in whatever terms they want.

The question is one of politeness, not one of religion. If people know you and your beliefs, and respect you and your beliefs, you might imagine they would refrain from saying things they might reasonably be expected to know offend you. But if they do not know you, or do not respect you, or do not care about your beliefs, or do not feel that the discomfort you feel is large enough to curtail their self-expression, then they cannot be expected to moderate their means of expression in order to please you.

I am not Jewish, I am Christian. Many Jews on the Board refer to the Diety as “G-d” because they take the prohibition against using His name to include the term “god” as well as those words that others consider “names.” I do not believe this. I write “God” because I do not personally believe “God” is God’s name. Do I offend my fellow Jewish posters? I sincerely hope not, but even if I do, I am not willing to moderate my use of the word to reflect a tenet I do not hold. Maybe this makes me impolite, I don’t know; I hope not.

On a message board in particular, you cannot hope people will refrain from doing things they know or reasonably ought to know are offensive; sometimes people intentionally offend because they want to be “shocking.” I’m sure Jab is well-aware that his signature is quite likely offensive to a number of Christians – to Catholics, perhaps very offensive – yet he uses it anyway.

Your choice is to bite the bullet and overlook the mildly offensive in order to participate in the forum, or to decide that it is not worth it to participate and withdraw, or to ask that people refrain. You have chosen the third option, and they have responded by refusing to refrain, which of course they are free to do. How you deal with that information is up to you. Personally, I’m happy enough here to overlook a lot, but then I’m not personally offended by the use of “God” as an expletive. In fact, I’m worse than most, because I use it myself and I, as a believer, know I should not.

93

It’s simple, really. If God is offended by my using His name in vain (or any of my sinful behaviors), let Her take it up with me when I die. What’s that famous line? ‘Judge not lest ye be judged’?

94

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Arnold Winkelried *
**

Is it OK to use the word “nigger” in mixed company, so long as no African-Americans are present? After all, no one present could possibly be offended. By OK, I’m not asking if it’s illegal–we all know that, having read the myriad posts pointing out there is no obligation not to offend. I’m just wondering if there are any socially accepted prohibitions against offensive language that, as courteous human beings, we ought to follow as general rules.

Some one said earlier that while he/she didn’t approve of the word “cunt” in public, he/she didn’t expect others not to use that word just on the off chance some one might be offended. Isn’t this a little too liberal/tolerant? I do hope that people will behave in a civil manner (I’m just not shocked when they don’t).

95

Blasphemy is one of life’s little pleasures.

In Hebrew school, I tried getting a straight answer for why god would care if I took his name in vain (I certainly wouldn’t care if someone went around saying “Scottdamnit”), but they never could give a good one.

In the book “The Dispossesed,” the main character is from a anarchistic, godless benevolent society where sex isn’t something to be shunned. He also has contact with a civilization more like ours. He uses the other civilizations curse words, because his native tongue has none. It’s hard to swear when there is no notion of god and sex isn’t filthy. I really liked that observation.

Oh, I know how important Jesus and god are supposed to be. That’s why it’s fun.

96

You think English speakers are bad about taking Jehovah’s name in vain?

Ever heard the Quebecois curse?

Hostie de calice de saint-sacrement de crisse!
“Host of a chalice of the sacred sacrament of Christ!”

…which is the mildest example. Give me a running start and I can get the Virgin Mary, the Communion of Saints, a ciborium, a tabernacle, and a horny sheep in there.

I love this province.

97

Oh, hostie d’crisse. I see someone already mentioned the Quebecois.

I’ll just mention that for good measure, there’s a kind of Quebecois pastry called a pet de soeur - literally, a “nun fart”. (The supermarkets chickened out and translated it into English as “nun pastry”.)

98

(a) I say “damn it”, “God damn it”, “Jesus H. Christ”, and “Christ on a Pony” reasonably often.

(b)Of course Wild Bill doesn’t have the right to tell anyone what they CAN NOT say. But in fairness, he wasn’t. He was making a request, and (even if he had a bit of a supercilious tone), he was jumped on unfairly. Refusing his request is one thing. Saying “who died and made you God you censoring non-American probable-communist bastard” is another.

© As various other people have brought up, there’s an interesting line between language that is societally acceptable and that which is not. Going into any highly heterogeneous and strongly religious society where there are big angry armed people and saying “(insert revered person/diety here) is a homosexual pig fucker” loudly and frequently is almost certainly going to get you killed. But what if the people aren’t armed? What if you’re only saying it over the anonymity of the net? I’d expect that most people would still agree that that would be quite rude. But what if it’s only 50% of the population? Or what if you’re just saying “(insert revered person/diety here) damn it”? Or just “(insert revered person/diety here)”?

My point being that there are some things that one just doesn’t say because it’s unaccpetable (the words “nigger” or “faggot”, even if not used to specifically deride a specific person), some things that one could obviously not say without really insulting large numbers of people in certain societies of certain levels of heterogeneousness, and certain things that so grossly offend certain people, even if there is no particularly offensive single word, that they are usually not discussed an obvious example being casually mentioning the holocaust). So there are various slightly ill-defined sets of things that thoughtful and non-censored people don’t say. It is not unreasonable of Wild Bill to suggest that “God Damn It” might fit into one or more of them. And it is not unreasonable to disagree with him.
(d) I personally don’t believe in God. But if I did, I can’t believe God would be so rigid, judgemental, and/or insecure as to look at someone’s life and say, “Well, Fred there was a loving father and husband, gave generously to charity, truly cared about the happiness of people around him, and posted on the SDMB, meaning that he helped thousands of people to more fully appreciate and understand the wonderful universe that I’ve created for him… but he often, in moments of understandable frustration, uttered the words “God Damn It”. And despite the fact that the only reason he would have for not doing so are a collection of rules that I dictated to various people 4000 years ago and that have since been mistranslated and misused in a nearly limitless number of ways, and which I myself have done nothing in the past 2000 years to indicate are more valid than any of the other competing and false sets of “divine” rules, despite all this, he BROKE THE RULE. AND HE’S GOING TO HELL!!!”

99

How about this Wildest Bill, I (currently) don’t want to intentionally offend you. You can rest assure that when i speak of God, I’m not referring to your God. I’m speaking of a totally different god. Does that help?
And how come no one’s been using Zoroaster?
Great Zits of Zoroaster! Has a nice ring.

100

*Originally posted by oldscratch *

A little but not alot. ALso I gotta know and this is no offense either since you are (currently)not trying to offend me :wink: . Are you an older person? I only ask because of your handle. No matter if you are old or not I think it is is funny user name. How did you come with it?