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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Shouldn't we repudiate parts of the bible?
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
originally posted by no prophet:
Was wrongly informed that Anglicans consider reason and tradition in addition to scripture?
Were wrongly informed about what that means. Many progressives are.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
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The Silent Acolyte
Shipmate
# 1158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
Laws that codify slavery and that say the sons of
slaves are slaves for ever
It was this statement for which I was looking for a citation. This is important, because you ransack the OT for scattered citations that you think support your argument.
You say that because slavery is depicted in the bible it must be good in God's eye. That because a bronze-age document doesn't offer a full-throated 19th-century denunciation of slavery, the divine inspiration for that document must eternally approve of slavery. This is bollocks.
The laws concerning slavery in the OT regulate and ameliorate a vicious institution.
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
You have it almost right, TSA; you have only flipped reason & tradition.
My bad. Thereby exposing my clear Catholic bias for all to see. The cite is Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, Book V, viii, 2. The text is available online.
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Many progressives are.
No need to call names.
[ 30. July 2014, 16:45: Message edited by: The Silent Acolyte ]
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
To my dying shame I did and worse.
I keep thinking, praying, "What if I'm wrong?".
And I don't care. VERY mainly because of the utter poverty of theodicy for flatland God here. Which is the best there is.
God the pragmatic killer utterly irreconcilable with Jesus will forgive me. But my brow will remain furrowed until He squares that circle, even though the Amalekites will be fine.
[ 30. July 2014, 16:52: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
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Love wins
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
Oh, me too; I'm inclined to consider Tradition to be at least on the same level as Reason.
Unlike some continuers, I don't canonize Hooker's opinions; I disagree with him, for example, that the episcopate is not essential to the Church.
Still, those who quote him should quote him properly and not mangle his words in order to make them serve their own purposes!
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Yeah, with scripture, they are all in the gutter.
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Love wins
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
Oh, me too; I'm inclined to consider Tradition to be at least on the same level as Reason.
Unlike some continuers, I don't canonize Hooker's opinions; I disagree with him, for example, that the episcopate is not essential to the Church.
Still, those who quote him should quote him properly and not mangle his words in order to make them serve their own purposes!
Agree wholeheartedly
That said
Would Hooker really repudiate scripture based on the opinions of modern anthropology, sentiment, and middle class prejudice?
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by no prophet:
Was wrongly informed that Anglicans consider reason and tradition in addition to scripture?
Were wrongly informed about what that means. Many progressives are.
You know I wasn't exactly expecting you to agree with me. ![[Biased]](wink.gif) But I see the consequences of Israelite exceptionalism as one of the great evils in the world, as empire and country after empire and country in history and present have used these ideas to follow the same terrible path. I don't really think that anyone can accept that the model as shown in the OT is one to be followed - you wrote something along these lines - but I fault clergy and others who fail to point it out, and grievously fault those who support it. Most often I see support. Are you suggesting that believers and clergy who hold views such as your's regularly take on the misuse of scripture that allows pursuit of agendas along these lines? This is a repudiation of the bare minimum: of the institution of national agendas based on this.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
My point is merely that they are two different things, genocide and holy war, though they wind up in pretty much the same place with respect to the carnage.
The point of genocide is to totally destroy a people. And, while we're at, let's collect and appropriate for our own use all their stuff. It's usually motivated by greed.
Holy war in the OT, on the other hand, is a total destruction of the people and their stuff, making both an offering to God. It is warfare waged at personal risk, but without the gain of possessions, herds, flocks, and slaves.
There are a number of instances where biblical characters are punished for holding back from total destruction of the enemy's goods. It was a stealing from God's portion, for all the booty was to offered to him, consumed with flame.
The object was to gain the land, fulfilling God's promise to his people. The destroyed people's goods were not the object.
I'm not saying this to make anyone like the depiction, rather just to write an accurate account of it and to distinguish it from garden-variety, 20th-century genocide.
It takes a rather bizarre course of logic to reach this position, quite apart from being wrong about the motives for what you term genocide. Contrary to what you say, it is NOT motivated by greed. The Nazi attempts to eliminate Jews and homosexuals (and many others) was not primarily about greed. It was about fear and about perverted ideas of purity. As such, it was actually very similar to the "holy wars" of the OT. The same applies to Rwanda, to former Yugoslavia and a whole host of other recent genocides I can think of. In all such cases, whilst they may have ended in victors taking the spoils of war, their motivations were somewhere else.
Your distinction between "holy war" and "genocide' is a false distinction and a dangerous one at that. I say dangerous for two reasons. First of all, it reveals a sad lack of moral awareness and an appalling view of God as one who would approve and even command such actions. And secondly, it leaves you an atom's breadth away from joining the Islamists who slaughter in God's name. If "holy war" is acceptable, then what is to stop Christians applying those principles in Nigeria or Sudan or.....
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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Steve Langton
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# 17601
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Posted
by Croesos;
quote:
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Christians don't believe God will ever command holy slaughter.
Croesos response; Again, why not? Sure, Christians believe that they're under a new, different covenant, but they seem to have retained some bits of the old covenant (e.g. Ten Commandments) and repudiated* other bits (your example of animal sacrifice). Why did the genocidy bits get chucked over the "repudiate" side of the fence?
Sadly there have been a few too many Christians who have believed God might still command holy slaughter - the various Crusades and wars like the English Civil War supplying sad examples; but in so doing they went against NT teachings.
Accepting for the moment that in the circumstances of the OT God may have commanded particular slaughters for good reason as part of a larger providential plan, the 'genocidy' bits are not totally repudiated, but are not supposed to be followed by Christians because the 'new covenant' changes the nature of "God's people" from a particular nation (Israel) to a different kind of 'holy nation' (the Church/those-who-have-faith-in Jesus) - a preparatory period is over, things can now be done in a way impossible before the revelation made through Jesus.
In the new covenant God's people are not to be a normal 'this-worldly' geographic or ethnic nation, but all those who follow Jesus throughout the world. As such they are portrayed living as peaceable 'resident aliens' who bring people to share their faith through persuasion, not coercion. Indeed, following the example of Jesus, they are willing to face martyrdom in order to live that way.
Retaining the 'Ten Commandments' reflects that they are basic moral rules; even so Paul, it should be pointed out, says that Christians are not obligated to keep the Sabbath and other holy days/festivals (Col 2/12 I think - I'm not currently at home with easy access to an NT). Although the later state churches did impose Sunday observance - itself not strictly Sabbath/seventh-day observance - I think Paul should be understood as meaning the principle still implies, in terms of ensuring adequate rest and time positively given to God, while in the church's aforesaid 'resident alien' status the precise OT rule need no longer be slavishly followed.
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
Your distinction between "holy war" and "genocide' is a false distinction and a dangerous one at that. I say dangerous for two reasons. First of all, it reveals a sad lack of moral awareness and an appalling view of God as one who would approve and even command such actions. And secondly, it leaves you an atom's breadth away from joining the Islamists who slaughter in God's name. If "holy war" is acceptable, then what is to stop Christians applying those principles in Nigeria or Sudan or.....
The only principle at work in the OT massacres is the commandment of Almighty God. The question is whether you believe God commanded them to do as they did or not. My personal reaction to the eradication of Canaanite tribes is irrelevant to settling that question.
In the absence of a divine commandment to massacre Nigerians or Sudanese (and let me observe parenthetically that current events in Nigeria and Sudan suggest that it is Christians and not non-Christians who are being victimized), your hypothetical is also irrelevant. The idea that Christians have a right to massacre non-Christians is held by only the tiniest of minorities, and a minority which is clearly unbalanced at that. Of course, from all the neo-Christian handwringing on this thread, you'd think half the Church was champing at the bit to murder the Buddhists and take their stuff.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
the various Crusades and wars like the English Civil War supplying sad examples; but in so doing they went against NT teachings.
Red herring. Neither the Crusades nor the English Civil War were about holy slaughter.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Beziers
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Love wins
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Beziers
You and I are in agreement that the massacre at Beziers was a horrific and evil event, but there's no evidence that those who perpetrated it did so following OT precedents.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
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Steve Langton
Shipmate
# 17601
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Posted
by Fr Weber;
quote:
Neither the Crusades nor the English Civil War were about holy slaughter.
But in claiming to be in the name of God, they were not so far off it, either. A bigger question would be whether you are approving of them, whatever technical distinctions you might make about them.
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The Silent Acolyte
Shipmate
# 1158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
First of all, it reveals a sad lack of moral awareness and an appalling view of God as one who would approve and even command such actions. And secondly, it leaves you an atom's breadth away from joining the Islamists who slaughter in God's name. If "holy war" is acceptable, then what is to stop Christians applying those principles in Nigeria or Sudan or.....
For this you should apologize. You accuse me of having a lack of moral awareness, an appalling view of God. You accuse me of having common cause with the Islamists, with those who slaughter in God's name. Play the ball, not the man.
I started that post [link] by saying that the depiction of holy war in the OT was nasty business. I further asserted that genocide and holy war in the OT were two different things. To casually conflate them is to fail to think critically about what God was up to.
To distinguish them enables us to understand wtf is going on in these deeply disturbing stories. It's critical to really look and see what is said and to struggle to come to terms with it.
What I wrote, I wrote in an attempt to lay bare some of the structure of the narrative of holy war. Here is the meat of what I wrote: quote:
Holy war in the OT, on the other hand, is a total destruction of the people and their stuff, making both an offering to God. It is warfare waged at personal risk, but without the gain of possessions, herds, flocks, and slaves.
There are a number of instances where biblical characters are punished for holding back from total destruction of the enemy's goods. It was a stealing from God's portion, for all the booty was to offered to him, consumed with flame.
The object was to gain the land, fulfilling God's promise to his people. The destroyed people's goods were not the object.
Please engage with that, with what I said, not with what you think I mean.
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Steve Langton:
by Fr Weber;
quote:
Neither the Crusades nor the English Civil War were about holy slaughter.
But in claiming to be in the name of God, they were not so far off it, either. A bigger question would be whether you are approving of them, whatever technical distinctions you might make about them.
Well, I'm not a pacifist, so in principle the Crusades might have been noble. The original idea was to detach the Holy Land from the Turks' control so that Christians could make pilgrimages without paying fees. In actual deed, however, as we both know, they were often grievously sinful.
The English Civil War is a complicated case. Although it's true that there was a lot of "Deus le vult" speechifying on both sides, the major issues seem to have been related to governance; the polity of the English Church was related to that, but I wouldn't rate church polity as the major or defining issue of the war.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
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Ikkyu
Shipmate
# 15207
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
Laws that codify slavery and that say the sons of
slaves are slaves for ever
It was this statement for which I was looking for a citation. This is important, because you ransack the OT for scattered citations that you think support your argument.
It was just one citation.
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
You say that because slavery is depicted in the bible it must be good in God's eye. That because a bronze-age document doesn't offer a full-throated 19th-century denunciation of slavery, the divine inspiration for that document must eternally approve of slavery. This is bollocks.
The laws concerning slavery in the OT regulate and ameliorate a vicious institution.
First Idiotic now Bollocks? I wonder what comes next. First you put words in my mouth "the divine inspiration for that document must eternally approve of slavery." I never said that. I just said that the bronze age document that you deem inspired, not me, approved of slavery. I never said it means that God approves of slavery forever. I just said that there are texts in the bible that claim God dictated laws to regulate slavery. And you just admitted to that by saying that since its the bronze age it was an improvement to have laws that regulate it.
Other Christians in this thread would,I believe,argue that the god that they believe in would dictate no such laws.
I just quoted 1 example but this was not a harmless example. The Bible was used for centuries to justify slavery with quotes just like my example. Repudiating such parts of the Bible would signal to everyone that those that repudiate them are against such uses of the text.
Claiming that "the Bible does not say that" or that Biblically sanctioned slavery was an improvement over what was there before, is in my opinion less helpful. And you claim that without citing any evidence that the Israelite practices of slavery were any better than their neighbors or an "improvement". I would argue you think that because since its in the Bible there has to be some redeeming factor to it.
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The Silent Acolyte
Shipmate
# 1158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
First Idiotic now Bollocks?
You are right, especially in view of my umbrage at the Grouch. I apologize. quote:
I just said that there are texts in the bible that claim God dictated laws to regulate slavery.
This isn't in dispute. Because there are laws that ameliorate a vicious institution doesn't mean that God eternally approved of slavery. quote:
Other Christians in this thread would,I believe,argue that the god that they believe in would dictate no such laws.
That's a problem for them, for it causes them to break with a key Christian tenet on the sufficiency and inspiration of scripture—all of it. quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
Laws that codify slavery and that say the sons of
slaves are slaves for ever
I guess I was annoyed at your failure to support this statement. I keep asking for the citation that supports it. I'll stop.
Posts: 7462 | From: The New World | Registered: Aug 2001
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Ikkyu
Shipmate
# 15207
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
Laws that codify slavery and that say the sons of
slaves are slaves for ever
I guess I was annoyed at your failure to support this statement. I keep asking for the citation that supports it. I'll stop.
Ill admit it was a poor paraphrase of
"You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life" I now understand your annoyance.
But what I meant was just that that there
are defenses of slavery in the Bible.
That are explicitly said to be the word of God.
Of course once you admit that fact what to do about it is up to each person.
[code]
[ 30. July 2014, 20:11: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posts: 434 | From: Arizona | Registered: Oct 2009
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
First of all, it reveals a sad lack of moral awareness and an appalling view of God as one who would approve and even command such actions. And secondly, it leaves you an atom's breadth away from joining the Islamists who slaughter in God's name. If "holy war" is acceptable, then what is to stop Christians applying those principles in Nigeria or Sudan or.....
For this you should apologize. You accuse me of having a lack of moral awareness, an appalling view of God. You accuse me of having common cause with the Islamists, with those who slaughter in God's name. Play the ball, not the man.
I started that post [link] by saying that the depiction of holy war in the OT was nasty business. I further asserted that genocide and holy war in the OT were two different things. To casually conflate them is to fail to think critically about what God was up to.
To distinguish them enables us to understand wtf is going on in these deeply disturbing stories. It's critical to really look and see what is said and to struggle to come to terms with it.
What I wrote, I wrote in an attempt to lay bare some of the structure of the narrative of holy war. Here is the meat of what I wrote: quote:
Holy war in the OT, on the other hand, is a total destruction of the people and their stuff, making both an offering to God. It is warfare waged at personal risk, but without the gain of possessions, herds, flocks, and slaves.
There are a number of instances where biblical characters are punished for holding back from total destruction of the enemy's goods. It was a stealing from God's portion, for all the booty was to offered to him, consumed with flame.
The object was to gain the land, fulfilling God's promise to his people. The destroyed people's goods were not the object.
Please engage with that, with what I said, not with what you think I mean.
I know exactly what you wrote and I don't back down. Your position IS akin to that of Islamists, whether you like it or not. I refute absolutely your attempt to differentiate between genocide and "holy war". They are both about extermination of people, young and old alike. Claiming that it's not for personal benefit or that it's at God's command doesn't make any difference. It's genocide.
And if you think that "holy war" can in any way ever be justified, then your moral awareness is indeed screwed. Any decent, thinking person would say "indiscriminate slaughter is always wrong. There is NEVER any justification." Labelling something "holy war" doesn't provide a get out of jail free card.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
hosting ![[Axe murder]](graemlins/lovedrops.gif)
No, an apology, so all is self-regulatingly well.
hosting
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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The Silent Acolyte
Shipmate
# 1158
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Posted
Oscar the Grouch, so you don't feel an apology is necessary? That's fine. I retract my assertion you should make one.
But, understand: I haven't asserted that either holy war or genocide is justified.
I have never on this thread asserted that indiscriminate slaughter can be justified.
Don't tell otherwise; to do so is either to misread my words, or to be disingenuous. Examine my posts and you will see that they have dealt exclusively with the text, the relation of scripture to the church, and how scripture can be interpreted. Oh, I also through a rock hard at Martin's eschatology.
My entire project on this thread has been to protect scripture from our modern despair over stories we find appalling.
Here is what I said about Paul's statements about women on the bottom of page three. A parallel, but more complicated, set of statements could be crafted about OT holy war. quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
So, we back away from excise to repudiate.
To protect scripture from a mixtum-gatherum ransacking, I would substitute this language for repudiate:
We now recognize that, for example, some of Paul's dicta on women, which were grounded in the societal norms for his times, are no longer suitable norms for our times, because we can no longer conform these norms to the greater biblical norm of equality.
I reiterate however, that your moral dudgeon at genocide and holy war clouds your judgment and your ability to grapple with the OT texts about holy war. You collapse the two and so you abandon the possibility of gaining meaning from the texts, because you can only view them through a 20th-century lens.
quote:
Originally posted by Ikkyu:
Ill admit it was a poor paraphrase of
"You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life"
Ikkyu, thank you for this. But, it wasn't a poor paraphrase. It was wrong: an incorrect restatement of the Leviticus text, making it say what it didn't say.
Posts: 7462 | From: The New World | Registered: Aug 2001
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
My entire project on this thread has been to protect scripture from our modern despair over stories we find appalling.
And my point is precisely this - that your "project" is misguided and has the potential to lead towards dangerous conclusions. If we find stories from scripture appalling, surely we should say so. Why should scripture need protecting in this way? And if we don't find the stories of mass extermination appalling, then something is deeply wrong in our moral compass.
quote:
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
I reiterate however, that your moral dudgeon at genocide and holy war clouds your judgment and your ability to grapple with the OT texts about holy war. You collapse the two and so you abandon the possibility of gaining meaning from the texts, because you can only view them through a 20th-century lens.
To which my response remains that my judgement is far from clouded and that my ability to grapple with OT texts is just as good as yours.
I refute the allegation that I cannot gain meaning from the texts. What I cannot do - and what I suggest that no-one can do - is gain a positive meaning from something that is undeniable and irredeemably negative.
I also find it offensive and rather insulting that you appear to think that I am unable to consider matters in any other way than "through a 20th century lens" (whatever that is supposed to mean). Your implication is that I (unlike you, of course) am unable to see beyond my own cultural limits. I doubt that I am any more of a slave to cultural limitations than you are.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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The Silent Acolyte
Shipmate
# 1158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
What I cannot do … is gain a positive meaning from [the disturbing OT texts].
And at that we part ways for I believe the Christian is obliged to strive for this.
Posts: 7462 | From: The New World | Registered: Aug 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
No parting is necessary. We Christians have striven and transcendence has been provided. In Christ. The trick is to see ALL through His lens, not see Him through a flat Bronze Age lens.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
TSA, Oscar the Grouch
You are now showing signs of a developing personal conflict. Probably time to check out Commandment 4?
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
What I cannot do - and what I suggest that no-one can do - is gain a positive meaning from something that is undeniable and irredeemably negative.
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
Well put.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
Something perhaps to consider re some of the "hard" parts of the Bible, including all of the stuff in which God seems to command things we are definitely not, as Christians, supposed to do...
To quote C.S. Lewis on "hating" one's father or mother,
quote:
The hard sayings of our Lord are wholesome to those only who find them hard. There is a terrible chapter in M. Mauriac’s Vie de Jésus. When the Lord spoke of brother and child against parent, the other disciples were horrified. Not so Judas. He took to it as a duck takes to water ... For there are two states of mind which face the Dominical paradoxes without flinching. God guard us from one of them.
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
quote:
Originally posted by Oscar the Grouch:
What I cannot do - and what I suggest that no-one can do - is gain a positive meaning from something that is undeniable and irredeemably negative.
Well put.
Based entirely on sentiment and circular reasoning... but...whatever...
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Based entirely on sentiment and circular reasoning... but...whatever...
Based on dismissive labelling of those who disagree, and irrationality.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
I'm sorry was some rational reason given for me to repudiate scripture? Seriously...I've been asking for 5 fucking pages and have gotten bupkis from the Shipmates supposedly all about reason. I'm calling bullshit. It has nothing to do with reason or anything other than decent people like me just don't believe that anymore. Would somebody have the honesty to admit that this has nothing to do with reason? Admit it's based on sentiment. Admit it's based on your political beliefs. Admit it's based on the fact you think people like yourself are just morally superior than people who disagree with you. If you want to use reason, then come up with something that isn't a load of circular bullshit. In other words, fish or cut bait.
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
TSA, Oscar the Grouch
You are now showing signs of a developing personal conflict. Probably time to check out Commandment 4?
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
Thank you for the reminder, B62.
I don't think that there is much to be gained from prolonging this spat. I've already deleted three or four rather intemperate posts, which I guess is a sign I need to pull back. I've said what I wanted to say.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
I'm sorry was some rational reason given for me to repudiate scripture?
I think the argument is basically thus:
(1) The Israelites in the distant past believed that God was telling them that things like genocide and slavery were OK or even commanded;
(2) As Christianity developed over the centuries, Christians grew to understand that those things were not only a tad awkward but downright evil and never justifiable;
(3) Therefore, despite prior belief that He did, God could never have truly commanded or accepted those things;
(4) And therefore Christians should revise their understanding of those sacred texts to reject the ones which claim that God has ever truly commanded or accepted such behavior or practices.
I think the above is a quite rational argument, but I do not agree.
Myself, I believe that:
(1) Whatever we read in those troubling passages in the Old Testament, we--the Church--specifically have our orders from Him now: Love God and love our neighbors, even our enemies (which lets out genocide for us completely, though self-defense has been accepted as valid).
(2) We have been told specifically that He loves everyone; this must include all of those who were slaughtered by the Israelites, all of the firstborn killed in Egypt, and so on.
(3) We now see "through a glass darkly," and later we shall see face to face. I am sure that the One Who is Love will make such things plain.
(4) Not to mention that earthly death is not the same as spiritual death. We tend to think of death in this world as The Worst Thing That Can Happen--even though it happens to every single one of us eventually... Who knows, perhaps some of those killed in those massacres will be the ones to explain it to us when we meet them? As C.S. Lewis said (but please also note that Lewis did not excuse this behavior as something God commanded), just as we look back at much of the bloodthirstiness and cruelty of the ancients, so too might they look at our era and attitudes with astonishment at our own behavior and blind spots. We have the advantage of being able to compare our society with theirs, of course, and learn from their mistakes--but again this doesn't really address the question of God's role in the stories in which He commands Israel to do the things discussed above.
(5) Especially with (3) in mind (our vision here on Earth being clouded and blurred, and our judgment very imperfect), I do not believe that we have the authority to chuck out parts of the holy texts the Church established as canonical centuries ago. We seem to see a glaring contradiction--and yet somehow we have the texts there and the church has not seen this as a problem for centuries. Perhaps there is something we are missing. Perhaps there is a way we are to understand those passages that is not the way we read them now. Perhaps God did command such things and His doing so will make more sense to us when we see Him in Heaven. Perhaps He did not command such things and the Israelites were confused and attributed them to Him. Perhaps there is some option we cannot imagine here and now to make it all make sense, and, again, it only will in Heaven. But these are the texts we have, and I believe we have to work with what--if we believe that the Holy Spirit was guiding the Church in selecting what was canonical--we have been given.
[ 31. July 2014, 06:38: Message edited by: ChastMastr ]
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
Some of this argument sounds suspiciously like that in the Bhagavad Gita in which Arjun demurs at killing his opponents at Kurukshetra (sp?) and Krishna says it's OK because Arjun doesn't understand how the next lives of said opponents will give them the opportunity to develop beyond where they stand now. Or something. I tended to agree with Arjun on that one. It'll all be all right in a) the next life or b) the afterlife cannot be proved to us since all we have is literary accounts, and I feel it would be better to act as if we were atheists, and this life were all the life those children had.
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
Well, scripture is available for reproof and correction. Of course we take that to mean of ourselves. 2 Tim 3:16 is of course circular. The Bible is inspired because the Bible says it is inspired. Which makes 2 Tim 3:16 some kind of non-proof proof text.
But perhaps there is a lesson to be learned from that? Don't throw these ancient violent texts away. Rather keep them, perceived "warts 'n all", as a record of a deeper truth. That the understanding of God by the people of God has indeed changed through time. As has the understanding of what it means to love both neighbours and enemies.
These ancient texts are indeed a reproof. They are a reproof of any complacent notions we may hold about God, ourselves, and the human propensity to justify violence against others.
And I do think we must teach that. Some aspects of the recorded history (however historical that might be) of the people of God are deeply shaming. We need to avoid going forth and doing likewise. We can learn good lessons about the power of the religious misconception to lead us up potentially disastrous garden paths.
Probably a bit Dead Horsey, but the shadow of inerrancy hangs over all discussions like this.
[ 31. July 2014, 07:09: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
It'll all be all right in a) the next life or b) the afterlife cannot be proved to us since all we have is literary accounts, and I feel it would be better to act as if we were atheists, and this life were all the life those children had.
Um... which would not really be so much chucking out those bits of the Old Testament but that and all of Christianity... If "this life were all the life those children had"--and all that we have--then as St. Paul says, "If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied."
PS: Barnabas62 re warts and all:
[ 31. July 2014, 07:14: Message edited by: ChastMastr ]
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
seconded
There's no going back.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Eliab
Shipmate
# 9153
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by Eliab:
I genuinely don't get your point. Surely you can appreciate that there's a difference between listening to one's conscience and taking moral responsibility for one's values and "acting as the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong".
Not in the way you are proposing there isn't. Everybody faces moral conundrums to which their is no clear and easy answer. In those circumstances, a properly formed conscience is the best guide in individual decision making. However, using your conscience to judge the actions of people who lived several thousand years ago is making yourself the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong.
Why? We all do, in fact, make moral judgments about the actions of people who lived several thousand years ago, and we surely can’t all be the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong. I’d guess most of us would consider Judas wrong for selling out his teacher and friend, for example, and wouldn’t need to scratch our heads murmuring “but it was a long time ago” or “but we don’t know exactly how much thirty pieces of silver was worth back then” before coming to that conclusion.
If you are making some point about the need to judge in context, then I’d probably agree to some extent. I don’t know how culpable people are who commit acts which I think evil, but which were acceptable in their culture. But I don’t need to go back several thousand years to make that point – I can’t condemn, for example, a C19 racist (who may genuinely have thought that the best scientific and scriptural evidence available proved black people to be inferior to whites) with quite the same force as I can condemn modern racism, which has no such excuse. I’m not sure what that has to do with being an ultimate arbiter or right and wrong, though.
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by Eliab:
I don't think that no_prophet accepts that premise, and I certainly don't. It simply isn't true that if I reject the uncritical approach to scripture that you argue for, I have to endorse some other standard as being beyond criticism. I don't. Why should I?
And yet you aren't claiming to be the ultimate arbiter of right and wrong...
I had to read that several times before I could even guess at what you meant by it, as it seemed at first reading to be a bizarre non sequitur.
Here’s my guess: you think that because I’m rejecting every other claim for some accessible* standard of right and wrong to be beyond criticism, I must of necessity be nominating myself for that status. And you think that this is self-evident.
If so, you’re just wrong. I make no such claim. I don’t see how any reasonable person could take such a claim to be implicit in my argument. If every other source of moral authority in the world were flawed, that would not somehow magically elevate me to the status of infallibility, and I’m baffled as to why you think that I’m suggesting it would.
A non-moral illustration: take a historical question – Did King Richard III have his nephews murdered? Short answer – no one knows for sure. Distinguished historians who know much more about the period than I do come to different conclusions. There is no infallible source available to me that will answer that question certainly. I’m not a distinguished historian, but suppose my daughter has just watched ‘Horrible Histories’ and asks me what I think. One thing I do know, is that all the authorities on the subject are open to doubt and can be examined critically. Now on your logic, I’ve suddenly become the ultimate arbiter of the guilt of the notorious monarch, simply by virtue of the fact that no one else is! Woo hoo! I had no idea that I knew so much! Or would that not be just a little ridiculous?
Substitute some moral question for the historical one – is it OK to masturbate, use contraception, beat your children with sticks, keep your wife silent during worship, or some other point on which scripture is either silent or, to my best judgment, wrong, and I won’t be able to point you an unquestionable source of authority for the answer. That doesn’t mean that I’m one. I can have opinions about those things, and I can be wrong.
(* “accessible”, because I hope we’d both agree that God, if we could consult him directly on every moral question without the possibility of misunderstanding, would be the ultimate moral standard)
quote:
Animal sacrifice is not a part of the new covenant. Nowhere does scripture command animal sacrifice and in fact condemns it. Still, in Acts 21, we have Paul seeming to sponsor animal sacrifice in the temple. Do I repudiate Acts 21? Absolutely not. I understand that given the context Paul had a legitimate reason (and actually reading the entire pericope along with Paul's epistles makes the reason quite obvious)for what he did. Now, if somebody taught that Christians should sacrifice animals based on Acts 21, I would repudiate that teaching.
Sure, you can do that, if you treat Acts 21 as being all about Paul.
Of course, it isn’t. It’s about the Jerusalem church as well. Sacrifice for them appears to have been a normal, acceptable and accepted, part of Christian worship.
I agree you couldn’t argue from Acts that animal sacrifice is obligatory for Christians, but you could certainly argue that it was (while we still had a Temple) legitimate for Christians – that it was permissible, acceptable to God, and an appropriate form of worship under the new covenant. Paul’s endorsement (and Luke’s) is certainly good enough for that, even if neither thought it compulsory. Your views as expressed here are a de facto repudiation of that position. You might not like the word “repudiate”, and I’m not committed to that word myself, but the point is that on this issue your approach to scripture is a critical one. You are using your reason and conscience, and the teachings of other scriptures, to reject something which is clearly implicit in Acts taken alone. And that’s exactly as it should be. You saying so wouldn’t cause you to metamorphose into a despised Progressive or Sentimentalist, you know.
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"Perhaps there is poetic beauty in the abstract ideas of justice or fairness, but I doubt if many lawyers are moved by it"
Richard Dawkins
Posts: 4619 | From: Hampton, Middlesex, UK | Registered: Mar 2005
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Well, scripture is available for reproof and correction. Of course we take that to mean of ourselves. 2 Tim 3:16 is of course circular. The Bible is inspired because the Bible says it is inspired. Which makes 2 Tim 3:16 some kind of non-proof proof text.
Of course, when 2 Tim was written "Scripture" meant the Old Testament only. So it certainly wasn't written as a circular argument, even though it's often used that way today.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
Posts: 2512 | From: Oakland, CA | Registered: Feb 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Thank-you Eliab for your excellent clarification. I am open to a different word than "repudiate". I thought of "reject", but I don't reject them, I think we must speak clearly that use of the bad parts of the bible to justify or motivate any current behaviour is wrong. I also think that the people who wrote up the stories - the bible is a very human document - selected from the campfire stories in the desert, did so for personal and community reasons in many or most cases, not because God's covenant required them to slaughter and destroy.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Fr Weber
Shipmate
# 13472
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Posted
I can certainly agree that we should repudiate the use of those texts to justify genocide. The New Covenant holds us to a different standard than the Old did. But that doesn't mean that the texts are lying about God having commanded the Israelites to slaughter the tribes of Canaan. If I find, when I at last come face to face with God, that the author of Joshua was dishonest about God commanding such a thing, I won't be terribly disappointed; until then, I will take what is written in Scripture as true a priori unless given evidence otherwise.
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"The Eucharist is not a play, and you're not Jesus."
--Sr Theresa Koernke, IHM
Posts: 2512 | From: Oakland, CA | Registered: Feb 2008
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
There's nothing dishonest about it.
But if they were accurately reporting what happened 3500 years ago - which is impossible - then we don't know God in Jesus. Which we therefore don't need to. We follow Jesus in His radicality regardless that He is NOTHING like God in Israel's prior experience.
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Fr Weber:
I can certainly agree that we should repudiate the use of those texts to justify genocide. The New Covenant holds us to a different standard than the Old did. But that doesn't mean that the texts are lying about God having commanded the Israelites to slaughter the tribes of Canaan. If I find, when I at last come face to face with God, that the author of Joshua was dishonest about God commanding such a thing, I won't be terribly disappointed; until then, I will take what is written in Scripture as true a priori unless given evidence otherwise.
You say "lying", I would say "believed something false" maybe consciously in good faith, but still false.
If I found that God actually did instruct the Israelites to kill as Joshua describes, I would have to reject God and faith, with all of the implications of that. If I allow my feelings to come into it, I would have to say as Sophie did "fuck Gott and all his hande work" (William Styron, Sophie's Choice, from memory).
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Magic Wand
Shipmate
# 4227
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
There's nothing dishonest about it.
But if they were accurately reporting what happened 3500 years ago - which is impossible - then we don't know God in Jesus. Which we therefore don't need to. We follow Jesus in His radicality regardless that He is NOTHING like God in Israel's prior experience.
I'm probably going to regret this, but...
If Jesus isn't God (or how we know God) then what do we care about following Jesus' radicality, or anything else about him?
Posts: 371 | From: Princeton, NJ | Registered: Mar 2003
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Callan
Shipmate
# 525
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Posted
Originally posted by The Silent Acolyte:
quote:
There is no dressing up, no euphemism, no attempt on my part to make it any less the nasty business that it plainly was.
My point is merely that they are two different things, genocide and holy war, though they wind up in pretty much the same place with respect to the carnage.
The point of genocide is to totally destroy a people. And, while we're at, let's collect and appropriate for our own use all their stuff. It's usually motivated by greed.
Holy war in the OT, on the other hand, is a total destruction of the people and their stuff, making both an offering to God. It is warfare waged at personal risk, but without the gain of possessions, herds, flocks, and slaves.
There are a number of instances where biblical characters are punished for holding back from total destruction of the enemy's goods. It was a stealing from God's portion, for all the booty was to offered to him, consumed with flame.
The object was to gain the land, fulfilling God's promise to his people. The destroyed people's goods were not the object.
I'm not saying this to make anyone like the depiction, rather just to write an accurate account of it and to distinguish it from garden-variety, 20th-century genocide.
It might be fairer to say that it is a highly idealised and fictional account of genocide, probably written after the exile to justify a policy of splendid isolation among the Israelites in their dealings with the people of the land. My guess is that, if there is a kernel of historical truth in the account, it is based on the destruction of Canaanite cities at the end of the bronze age. Of course, it doesn't look anything like a historical genocide if it isn't one.
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How easy it would be to live in England, if only one did not love her. - G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 9757 | From: Citizen of the World | Registered: Jun 2001
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itsarumdo
Shipmate
# 18174
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Magic Wand:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
There's nothing dishonest about it.
But if they were accurately reporting what happened 3500 years ago - which is impossible - then we don't know God in Jesus. Which we therefore don't need to. We follow Jesus in His radicality regardless that He is NOTHING like God in Israel's prior experience.
I'm probably going to regret this, but...
If Jesus isn't God (or how we know God) then what do we care about following Jesus' radicality, or anything else about him?
Isn't this one of the difficulties in having a Trinitarian doctrine? If everything is an emanation from God then it's a lot simpler a lot of these quandaries disappear. Swedenborg was interesting from this pov - and his description of different degrees of spiritual emanation - a creative hierarchy that nevertheless comes from one source feels right to me.
I think in old testament times people maybe worshipped Gods that were not really the One. But also, the Kabalistic and Swedenborgian interpretations are interesting. It's not necessary to stretch the imagination too far to (on one level) e.g. see the original inhabitants of the land as being symbolic of old preconceptions and habits, and the Israelites as being representative of habits, attitudes, whatever else you might envisage on the landscape of the mind that is more in line with the divine.
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"Iti sapis potanda tinone" Lycophron
Posts: 994 | From: Planet Zog | Registered: Jul 2014
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ChastMastr:
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
It'll all be all right in a) the next life or b) the afterlife cannot be proved to us since all we have is literary accounts, and I feel it would be better to act as if we were atheists, and this life were all the life those children had.
Um... which would not really be so much chucking out those bits of the Old Testament but that and all of Christianity... If "this life were all the life those children had"--and all that we have--then as St. Paul says, "If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied."
Quite. But if arguments are put forward suggesting that in Heaven things are going to be all right for the victims of genocide, and therefore implying that there's no need to be too troubled about it (and I sort of picked that up in one place, maybe wrongly), then taking a position where that argument cannot be used might be better for the victims.
Posts: 5833 | Registered: May 2009
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Of course Jesus is God! But not as we know Him in the gutter press.
Unless Bronze Age myths are accurate reporting.
[ 31. July 2014, 22:06: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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ChastMastr
Shipmate
# 716
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
and therefore implying that there's no need to be too troubled about it (and I sort of picked that up in one place, maybe wrongly)
Yes, that wasn't what I meant--but (unless someone develops a time machine, and God knows how badly we'd screw things up if we were allowed to!) there is nothing we can do to affect what happened back then at all. I find it greatly troubling--but I also must trust God that somehow it will all make sense in the end, and in presumably... let's see, I'm 46 now, so probably in the next 40 years or less... I'll get to ask all the questions I want. And no one has mentioned so many more things that are just plain terrifying, like Abraham and the sacrifice of Isaac and the like.
But till then I have been told to trust Him and be anxious for nothing, which I think holds true for both the next month's rent and what happened to people who died several thousand years ago. (Or longer. One of the very first questions I asked when I was receiving catechism was where the cavemen went when they died, because surely God loved them too...)
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My essays on comics continuity: http://chastmastr.tumblr.com/tagged/continuity
Posts: 14068 | From: Clearwater, Florida | Registered: Jul 2001
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