It’s not like you’re born at a certain level of goodness and stuck with it. There’s room to get better, but it takes humans relying on God and not themselves.
You responding to me? Look, if you want to argue that Jesus never healed anybody, full stop, then don’t let me stop you. What you can’t do is stop at some halfway house where you insist that he grabbed some random hobo who could perfectly well be a plant, and claimed to have healed him.
Look up this whole “False Dilemma” thing some time and then tell me why exactly it is that if there’s some word in the book that I don’t believe, I must therefore disbelieve every word.
Untrue. Christians acknowledge that the Mosaic commands were meant for Israel, and only for a time. As Paul said, the Sabbath was a mere shadow of things to come (Colossians 2:16-17).
Also not true. Paul teaches that if you’re a slave, you should endeavor to serve with diligence and integrity. Obviously, this is NOT the same as saying that people should demand slaves to be “good and obedient” (however one wishes to construe those terms).
Egg-zactly. The message is not “Hey, masters, God says slavery is fine, so go ahead, as many as you like!” but “Hey, slaves, don’t sweat it - the Good News is for you too!”.
If I offended you at all Malacandra, I appologize. But this is truly how I feel. I have nothing against anyone of any religion anywhere. I’m just stating what I think. And thanks to your comment, I’ve started my own thread with the question you brought up. And now, I’ll stop hijacking this thread and move off to my own.
Sorry again for the hijack Derleth, guess I just got a little worked up there.
Exactly. The all-powerful bribe, given humankind’s innate (and in some ways quite understandable) fear of death. A secular moral code couldn’t have that sort of bargaining power behind it, sadly.
Let me tackle these points in reverse order. First, I never said or suggested that most or all humans were “moral morons” or “playing by baboon rules”. Indeed I’d never think to insult baboons in that manner. What I said was that humans have no innate moral sense, or at least not one sufficient to hold up human society on its own. Some humans are not moral morons for the same reason they’re not math morons or language morons; other people taught them and thereby raised them above the moron level.
As for your assertion that historical precedent shows that following the crowd is immoral, I disagree vehemently. In fact historical precedent shows that following the crowd is the best moral choice. The vast majority of human beings who ever lived followed the crowd for the most part. (By “vast majority” I mean well over 99 percent.) Those crowd-followers, the common people, formed the core of every civlization; without them there would never have been any civilization.
You go on to say that crowd-followers can at best hope to “not make the world much worse than it already was.” Firstly, not making the world worse than it already was can be quite an accomplishment, especially when you have outsiders aggressively campaigning to make the world worse. Second, crowd-followers can make the world a much better place. If the crowd is providing food for the homeless or building hospitals for the rural poor in Ecuador, then crowd-followers are superior to others. Of course that reasoning would be largely irrelevant in a secular society, since it’s primarily Christian crowds that do such things.
You were saying Koresh wasn’t god because he was a nutjob. So, how irrelevant? Is it because Koresh doesn’t fit into your religious box? Jesus didn’t either. Or is it because Jesus did the odd miracle here and there? Then where is your faith?
Some people are born psychopaths. Perhaps today they can be treated with drugs, but they are not such as to become good guys just by wishing. Some of us probably are incapable of doing certain types of evil. We are not blank slates, to be good or evil just by will. If God made psychopaths psychopaths, then he has some responsibility. If he designed our genes so there would be psychopaths, then he does too. If it is just a part of natural variation, however, no issue.
No programmer thinks he is without error, since the output of our code tells us differently on a daily basis. If the Bible cannot be interpreted without error - which is a reasonable view - how do we figure out what to do? Vote? Extra-biblical logic? Wait for Jesus to come back and grade our papers?
My grandmother kept kosher. Paul said you guys don’t have to so the Roman soldier could enjoy his prawns. Who’s right?
See response to Quiddity. We are born with a certain level of goodness. I’m excessively rules abiding, which is not necessarily always a good thing. It does not come from any willed goodness. Psychopaths don’t necessarily want to be that way. Really, the guys who believed in demonic possession were closer to the truth than you are.
There will be pie up there in the sky, so think about that, not freedom. Good message - for the masters. :rolleyes:
Sigh. Then I’ll go look up things that really were said in the Bible, there are plenty of them. This was meant to show what would happen if people took what was really in the Bible as how to act. What was the punishment for not obeying your father & mother?
And your second point misses it totally. Paul said that slaves should serve. Period. He was for slavery, and so should anyone who gets their morality from the Bible. He wasn’t for slavery because he was an evil bastard, he was for slavery because thats how society was at the time.
God works in mysterious ways. His methods and motives are beyond hope of comprehension by our puny mortal minds.
Oddly enough, the above axiom is temporarily suspended any time some thunder-tongued yutz with noteworthy hair is explaining to us how and why God has chosen him to detail how we’re supposed to live and what we’re supposed to be doing with ourselves.
Funny, that.
Given the number of human beings who have lived, the length time they’ve alive through, and the resources available to them, there has been ample opportunity to dream up and write down any imaginable set of moral rules. Many such sets are on the shelf. If no such set has triumphed over Christianity, it’s surely because no set is superior to Christianity.
To suggest that Christianity has only persevered through the appeal of the reward of eternal life is a pretty lame excuse. Firstly, various branches of Christianity have believed that there is no eternal life, or that nothing a person does can alter his or her eternal destination. If eternal life was the only pillar upholding Christianity, those branches would never have existed. Secondly and more importantly, Christians don’t by-and-large hold eternal reward after death as the reason for choosing Christian morality. Rather, they hold the theoretical and practical advantages of Christain morality as the reason for choosing morality. No Christian walks into a store constantly thinking that it would be nice to steal some of the display jewelry, but they’ll refrain because it would hurt their chances for Heaven. They refrain from stealing because refraining from stealing is a moral act, that, when it becomes widespread, makes the world function better.
This is fairly obvious to anyone who thinks about it. If it’s not obvious to most atheists, that’s because of their lack of thinking. Indeed, the generally unsuccessful recruitment efforts for atheism might be partly explained but their continual harping on the non-existence of the next life while largely ignoring the existence of this one.
The societies inhabited by most Christians are based on biblical principles. Stating that Christians get our morality from society does not disprove that we get it from the Bible, but rather proves it.
Here you claim that Christians don’t preach anything that disagrees with societal norms. In the following paragraph you say that they do preach many things that disagree with societal norms. Contradict yourself much?
Perhaps I’m missing part of the logical connection in your argument. Just because a certain action is commonplace today does not necessarily tell us anything about Christian moral standards, since there are so few Christians today. If some action, such as adultery, is more widely accepted today than in 1957, it primarily reflects the changing standards among secular people. (We note in passing that it thereby debunks any claim to absolute moral standards in the secular world.) Christians hold adultery to be as evil today as it is was in 1957.
(One sees this demonstrated in comparing different parts of the western world. The most secular part of the world, Western Europe, is also the most morally decadent.)
That’s quite a compliment.
Whether society has advanced or devolved is, of course, a matter of opinion.
Let me get this straight, you’re saying that any form of christianity that does not subscribe to the eternal life debate would have never existed? And then you quote ones that did, but no longer do? Why do you think that particular branch doesn’t exist anymore? Is is not possible that those said christians moved to something that DID have a promise of eternal life, therby letting the one that didn’t collapse?
And as far as the moral rules debate, a lot of people are saying that we are born with a set amount of goodness in us and that it is up to us to mold it to be better? Morals are picked up and taught by those that came before us. Let just say canabilism, VERY morally wrong to almost everyone in the world. But it is still practiced by certain tribes and they see nothing morally wrong with it. Where does birthrite morals fit into this equation?
I for one would like to think I am a good person and help my fellow man because that is the way I was taught and the way I personally want to act, not that I was born to be a nice guy and I’m just following in lifes great path.
Is this post supposed to be addressed to me? If so, I’ll respond as best as I can. I said, “If eternal life was the only pillar upholding Christianity, those branches [that reject the notion of eternal award for faith and acts] would never have existed.” It’s basic logic and I mean what I said.
No, I never quoted any forms of Christianity that formerly subscribed to eternal life but no longer do, nor am I aware that any such form of Christianity exists. I have no earthly clue why you wrote this question, since, interpreted in plain English, it has nothing to do with anything I wrote.
I can’t say anything about “this particular branch” until you tell me which branch you’re talking about. I cannot discuss “said Christians” until you actually say some Christians.
This is a statement, and, improbably enough, it’s a correct one. I’m not sure why you ended it with a question mark.
Where does birthright morals fit into this equation? If you want to find out, I guess you should ask somebody who believes in birthright morals, rather than the one person in the thread who doesn’t. (Correct spelling and grammar would also improve the odds of your question being answered.)
Wow. Holier than thou, eh!
You do realize there’s a big old world out there, right? The secular world is hardly monolithic; there are plenty of cultures that are “secular” but retain absolute moral standards.
Similarly for the Christian world; the set of absolute moral standards varies from sect to sect, but that’s no reason to dismiss the lot as not having any.
As for the thread, I find kanicbird’s words chilling as well, and there are numerous examples–in WWII particularly–where blind obedience lead to terribly immoral actions.
That said, there is logic in following God without question, but when doing so requires me to follow (fallible) representatives on Earth, I would not do it.
Here, here, and here, Paul commands obediance.
*Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ. Eph.6:5
Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God. Col.3:22
Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again; Not purloining, but shewing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things. Titus 2:10-11*
I don’t mean to pick on you specifically, but your insistence that hotflungwok is unable to understand the Bible, and that you alone have a firm grasp on Paul’s words is ludicrous.
You have provided a prime example, that the Bible is cryptic enough to be interpreted to suit almost any cause or argument- even if that argument mistreats, excludes, or otherwise maligns an individual or group. How can that use (or misuse) of the Word be moral?
True morals come from personal accountability, not an ancient, contradictory text that is full of hate and love in equal measure.
The problem with “relying on your own moral code” is that, push come to shove, people are extremely good at convincing themselves of what they want to believe (take it as you wish, atheists and believers alike). People talk nobly and dramatically aof not “following the crowd” and “following their heart,” but I very much doubt that most of them do. To truly develop your moral sense is as difficult as deciphering a foreign language word by word: breaking down a code. It takes constant study, thought, and self-reflection, and very few people can do that. Perhaps we all could in theory, but generally things like eating get in the way. It doesn’t take all that much brains, but it does take hard work. And most people prefer the easy way if they can get it.
I freely admit I’m not a sufficient moral genius to judge some things. I take them on faith, because the alternative is doing what I please simply because I please it. And I read about the great saints and theologians, and try to emulate their best, because I’m not good enough for it. I don’t understand it all, but they left us maps of the way, so that we would understand someday.
What would you consider as secular morality triumphing over Chrisitian morality? And what Christian morality are you counting? In Shakespeare’s time, usury was a sin. Is the fact that it no longer is, even for Christians, a triumph of secular morality or has it beome retroactively moral for Christians?
Theft is against the morality of pretty much all religions and ethical systems. Saying that the prohibition of theft is particularly Christian is bullshit. It was obviously forbidden by Jewish morality before you guys were ever around, and we didn’t exactly invent this law either.
We can distinguish moral rules that make the world better, like the prohibition of theft, from those that are randomly created by religion, such as the Mormon prohibition on hot drinks. Moral rules that make sense are fairly universal, and can’t be associated with any religion. Moral rules that don’t are beginning to die out, or are followed by religionists only, because the state is no longer enforcing purely religious rules. We can argue about where adultery falls (I’m not that sure myself) but let’s consider premarital sex. That’s a religious only rule today, and I don’t think you can Christian morality has triumphed exactly.
As for why Christianity has been so popular - most people who were converted did not become Christians from a dispassionate look at the pros and cons. Their prince was converted, and it became worship or die. Again, in Shakespeare’s time former Catholics attending CoE services didn’t do it from studying the differences. They attended church, or were fined, and it was illegal to possess Catholic religious paraphenalia. Catholics who came from France or Italy to support those who were trying to stay Catholic were caught, executed, and had their heads put on pikes. so much for Christian morality.
(Cite: Will in the World, which I am now listening to in my car. Highly recommended!)