That's the point. A rational person would make a relative distinction between the two based on the societal differences and the time delta. Thus the relative approach. Hotballa says its ok to "execute" people via the doctrines of deuteronomy because they are allowed by the law. Law that is now outdated to the point of ostracism. If the law of the levites is truly "gods law", then you are already taking a relative approach to it by ignoring it today. Something deliciously irritating about being told to think "rationally" by a religious person.
I have answers for both your points, but my question to you is are you more interested in a discussion or simply another thread where it dwelves down to you think religion is the bane of all mankind. If #2 is your interest, I'm sure there is an anti-religion thread in the D&D somewhere where you can post. I don't see you having any interest in a discussion, so I can only assume you are hoping this thread leads eventually to another anti-religion discussion, since you know, D&D doesn't have enough of those. You raise up a lot of interesting stuff in other threads, but quite frankly whenever religion is even mentioned near you, you tend to climb up on your soapbox and do your own brand of preaching.
Great to see a thread on this - I've been doing some readings on ethics lately and it's an extremely interesting topic. A lot of people have supported moral relativism on this thread by using a Diversity argument, i.e. we see that many cultures have different sets of values, and many have supported it (maybe unknowingly) my saying moral relativism can fit into moral realist framwork - the idea that there are some moral statements that are "objectively" true, or that exist regardless of what humans think - like the commands of God or the nature of the universe. But here's another alternative - are we even in a position to say moral statements are true or false at all? Perhaps, instead of being supplied by God or being a part of mother nature, morals are just our creation that result from DESIRES? So when I say "People should always share," perhaps it's just a desire of mine (maybe that results from a lifetime of my parents/friends rewarding me for sharing, etc.). The only problem with this framework it allows for immorality all over the place, but maybe morals are nothing but a creation of humans in order to preserve our survival via cooperation? This is just a another view.
pot? kettle? I'm not sure why your putting on this sanctimonious posturing considering that it has been little more than a friendly debate until you started gettting your panties in a wad and claiming that a relativist could "twist anything" if they try hard enough. Even after I ignored those poorly disguised barbs, here you are claiming that I am picking on you. If you did not want to debate this with respect to your beliefs, I recommend you either a) don't bring them up, or b) let me know you no longer wish to discuss it -- which I suppose you just did, and therefore I'll let it go. I did not bring religion into this... I can only assume this means I probed to far into the tender portion of your psyche that is incapable of listening or thinking about some difficult aspects of what you believe.
Why these criteria? I must admit I haven't given much thought to the time delta. I don't even know what you mean by it. I'm rational. I think you are missing the heart of the matter and are confusing the term relativistic to mean either society in some cases or the individual in others. You must first define many of these terms you are throwing out. You haven't studied much about Christianity, which doesn't look to put faith at odds with reason in the Thomastic tradition.
please stop. you brought animosty into the thread in the first place. Go through the thread see where it made a wrong turn. we could start with your dismissive comment, or perhaps we can refer to your answer to my calm reply Obviously from these posts, you don't believe I'm as well educated as you. and that may be the case, since it's true most ignorant people usually resort to religion because we have no hope of outarguing highly educated men. I didn't bring religion into it. I did't even touch the subject until your response to Weslinder. I defer to your logic. You are correct, I am incapable of listening or thinking about the difficult aspects of what I believe. My low IQ and multiple head injuries as a child prevent me from making logical decisions. Were it not for those head trauma injuries, I suppose I could have made something of myself instead of going on and on about a greater purpose in life. I mean really, every logical and well educated person knows that religion was created by liars for the ignorant masses. Only a fool would swallow such tripe about how love is spiritual, we all know that's just mere hormonal chemistry. I'm so stupid, I actually believe in respecting the people who lived before me. I mean, who cares, once you're dead, you're dead, just a piece of meat slowly turning to dust in the ground. Cemeteries are the biggest scam in the world, we should just burn every dead body and stop going through these silly burial rituals. How ignorant can a supposed civilized society get? and if you don't agree with all of those, then you're not realy a logical person. Logical people don't believe in fanciful things like spiritual love, nor visiting cemeteries when there's nothing there but dust and tombstones.
I assume you have read the previous portions of this thread. *grumble* ok - let me try this one more time, since it appears you now wish to communicate, as opposed to just swooping down and making judgements on my "rationality". 1) God writes the 10 commandments which say do not murder. 2) Levites/god (whatever) write laws that proscribe killing people (executions) 3) Ignoring the semantics of "murders" vs "executions" under the dubious conditions of leviticus-type law, hotballa et. al. says these are not murders, and therefore are not a refutation of the universal truth in the commandment. Rather, they are extensions to the same law. 4) Yet, modern society and modern christians do not adhere to the laws of deuteronomy because they are socially/logically ludicrous. This implies a morally relative stance to gods law, or else a misconception that these are laws of men, and not god. 5) If the latter is true, then I fail to understand how one can take an absolutist view towards truth in the bible, as it would be subjective based on the interpretation of any given society. Which is exactly what hotballa and weslinder already acknowledged, but then refused to admit was relativist. Your post rubbed me the wrong way for a variety of reasons, thus the spite.
I don't know what you call it but.... in any culture and people going back to the dawn of society when someone is stealing and the police (authorities) surprise them their reaction is usually not one of moral relativism. could it be that the first time a child steals a cookie (or whatever) and the parent catches them in the act a tinge of guilt rises... have you ever been speeding about 20 miles over the speed limit and passed a cop and not felt that little twitch in your foot to slow down?????????? I think the human conscience is meant to be a good indicator that there are moral absolutes inspite of anyones theory that they don't exist. If you have a pure conscience it is not hard to get moral absolutes. Repeated violations to moral absolutes leads to a deadening of the human conscience which leads to men coming up with relativism.
It could be that do not murder was God's command to man not to take an innocent life. In God's judgment an execution could be just and right. God destroyed Sodom. That was an execution (or judgment). Cain killed his brother. That was taking an innocent life without just cause.
Oh great and honorable, most benevolent, wisest of all sages, and most educated poster, rhadamanthus, do not rain your highly educated and much too logical wrath upon this humble backwoods ignorant man, but I just wanted to say that I didn't and don't acknowledge anything that you claim I did. That is all, please don't call me the ignorant, lowly educated, illogical person that I already know I am. All such postings by illogical men who swallow such tripe about religion deserve your spite! spite on!
Alternatively, I could have just meant that I did not understand you. Perhaps instead of b****ing and moaning you could have, oh i dunno, *gasp* explained where I went wrong. Instead you chose to make an ad-hominem attack that I was elitist, or intentionally picking on religion because it's just oh sooo enjoyable. I mean seriously, everytime I have argued with you on here you end up making some strange claim that I am talking down to you. If you think I'm wrong, tell me why. Don't just piss and moan that you feel belittled. That makes two of us. Let's kick weslinder's ass. Whatever. I was happily debating. I'm sorry that you took it so poorly.
I don't know where I ever got the idea that you're an elitist or tend to rail on religion. I felt that putting words in your mouth was the proper reply to this
ok I'm calmed down, I just don't like it when people try to put words in my mouth. I wasn't kidding when I said you always raise interesting points rhad, I just felt that you have a tendency to "rail on religion" as soon as it is brought up. We both got in our shots, let's move on.
I agree with this. But (as in a previous example), sections of levite law talk about killing your own son for being rebellious. Is that a just execution? I think the answer is that yes it was, for that society at that time. Which makes me question the premise that the ten commandments are excluded from relativism. Just a thought.
Murder will not always be wrong. That assumes that humans have and will exist eternally. If murder doesn't exist eternally than laws against it will not. Then the laws are not absolute, they are conditional.
Why don't we talk about the birth of Protestantism and the resulting relativism from personal interpretation of the Bible and splintering of sects within Christianity. How can one say that there is an absolute morality in the Bible when anyone and everyone is interpreting themsleves or condemning other (within Christianity) beliefs? For some dancing is immoral according to the Bible. For others...not so much. But then if we talk about that then we are perpetuating the hijacking of a general morality thread by Christianity. Boo on hijacking!
I agree with you. It's why I have a hard time with the view of the Bible as a rule book. Or as an instruction manual. It's an ancient narrative. It tells the story of God reaching out to man. I believe there are truths communicated in that story. But the issues like dancing, for example, are ridiculous to divide over, in my view. The church has spent centuries dividing over issues that I can make a legitimate argue for on either side using scripture as my base. It's silly to me. There was a time in my life where being "right" about an issue...particularly an issue of faith...would have been really important to me. To know what I believe is the RIGHT answer. It's not so anymore. I'm much more concerned with whether my life is a reflection of Christ for anyone (love, service, humility, etc --- and yeah, i fall dreadfully short)....and acknowledging the fact that God is so much bigger than any mental/dogmatic/religious "box" I might try to cram Him into in order to define Him. You might like this: http://www.ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Bible_Authoritative.htm print it out and read it.
Interesting post. As you know I’m very cautious about things that may lean toward legalism. I certainly wholeheartedly agree that by keeping the “law of love” a person will naturally be inclined to act in a way that is consistent with the law, but as humans we will all fail at times to do that and I think Christians, and non-Christians, need to understand that so they don’t feel defeated when it happens. I’m not saying that you’re saying otherwise. I’m just emphasising the point. I’m not really clear on your differentiation between choices of conscience and moral law, but the ten commandments include things like idiolatry and worshipping other Gods, (and many would say that that includes worshipping mammon), coveting the neighbour’s wife and possessions, and honouring your father and mother. These are things that can be very hard to define, and a great many Christians struggle with one or more of them, or at least slip up on them, at various times in their lives. I think almost any law, even the most extreme, from a practical point of view can get very muddy very quickly. Take murder for example. When is it self-defence, and who can tell for sure, other than the person involved, whether they needed to kill the other to save their own life? And given that that person can’t know what was in the mind of the other person, can even they know that? It can be very unclear, and as a result we have to make a lot of man made laws and tradeoffs to make some kind of legal decision in these situations. Innocent people were killed in the attack on Bagdad. Was this murder? Some argue that it was war, not murder, and that it was done for a greater good, but then can’t the 9/11 terrorists claim the same thing from their perspective? We can’t just decide that our side is always right and the other side is always wrong without considering the law, so what is the law and how does it apply to these situations? That’s not an easy question, and I think that from a Christian standpoint it’s not one we’re going to get an absolute answer to in this life. And then there is the problem of the mental state of a perpetrator. The Bible talks about demon possessed people who do terrible things, for example. Would these be people that we would today say are insane and not responsible for their actions, or are they what we would call psychopaths/sociopaths? If so, are they morally responsible for their actions? And are we always accurate in our assessments of whether a person is insane or a psychopath/sociopath? Again, very tough questions. I think it’s impossible for humans to make absolute moral judgements on almost anything. Is murder wrong? Yes it is, but having said that we have no way of knowing if a murder, in the moral sense, has been committed. We can and need to make laws, and convict people of murder in our courts, but we can’t ever know with absolute certainty what’s going on in other peoples’ heads and hearts in a given situation, and therefore we’re in no position to make absolute moral judgements about other people, imo.
