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Forums → WEPR → Biblical Morality (or Religious Morality)
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This may or may not turn into another classic "Theism vs Atheism" thread, and I kind of expect that but I was hoping to keep it on a very specific topic with respect to Christianity. If anyone has another religion whose morality they'd like to discuss that'd be fine too. In general, I was hoping this could focus less on the "is God real" aspect of our discussion, which seems to be the driving force in most religious threads, and specifically on the "if this religion's god is real, is he/it moral?"
The topic is pretty general, but I'll try to start us off with some basic scenarios.
As many of us atheists may be ready to present, there are a lot of passages in the Bible about slavery (click here for specifics). I was wondering how this can be justified if these stories are part of the religion. The passages get pretty specific about how you can beat your slaves as long as they don't die and how they are your property. I find this immoral.
The second one that comes to mind is human sacrifice. Off the top of my head three stories come to mind. The first one, Abraham and Isaac, isn't really human sacrifice as God tells Abraham "just kidding" at the last second. Still, I find it odd that he is revered for his willingness to kill his own son in deference to his god. The second one, is the story of Jeptathah sacrificing his daughter to God since God let him win the battle, details here. We're talking about a God that let Jeptathah win the battle in exchange for Jeptathah sacrificing the first thing that came out of his house, and when it was his daughter, God should've come down and said "Hey, don't kill her, we're even. I don't accept human sacrifice." But he didn't. The third example I have is the most obvious one, Jesus Christ (no link necessary). God accepted the sacrifice of Jesus for repentence for our sins, who is supposedly (maybe not in all religions) considered fully human and fully divine. If this is the case, God accepted the sacrifice of someone fully human instead of just forgiving us without a sacrifice.
The last thing I want to mention is the idea of Hell. Eternal punishment for finite crime is immoral, in my opinion. If you believe God sends anybody to Hell, then he is immoral. Even Hitler doesn't deserve to be tortured forever because he would have to commit an infinite amount of crimes.
You by no means have to talk about every issue and add any issue you want to (even if Christians know an issue in their religion and want to bring it up to counter it, that's welcome). Final point, if the mods think this thread is too similar to another thread or just think this discussion should continue in the main one, I understand. But I was hoping the specific point of this thread could be morality of religions (I started off with the one I know best, my former one) and not whether or not to believe they are true.
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They're told to put their lives fully into serving God [Deuteronomy 6:5]. . Anything less is like a disappointment to Him.
what happened to free will?
Got a source? Why would they use the same word as the one used to mean visually, such as in His laws against carved images? Why wouldn't the words say "spiritual likeness"?whole bunch of comparisons, and that is what I have been taught in my religious education.
Find me a **** victim who wants to spend the rest of their life married to their rapist, and I'll refer than woman to a therapist.Who said they had to live together, they wouldn't have to look at each other, the rapist would just have to make sure she is cared for (and any children that may have resulted).
note, I am just theorizing.
~~~Darth Caedus
Who said they had to live together, they wouldn't have to look at each other, the rapist would just have to make sure she is cared for (and any children that may have resulted).
You can try and pseudo excuse it, but the text in the Bible explicitly says marry. Marriage implies living together. Further, marriage implies dominance over the woman at that period of time.
whole bunch of comparisons, and that is what I have been taught in my religious education.
From your own link:
"It is a likeness mentally, morally, and socially."
what happened to free will?
You're free to decide if you want to follow His laws or not.
You're free to decide if you want to follow His laws or not.
I don't consider it freedom when you have two choices, follow supreme dictator by mindlessly worshiping him or choose your own path in life and be tortured forever after.
Not that the Bible ever says that we have free will, if I recall...
what happened to free will?
Christianity's version of free will:
You're free to choose not to follow me. But then you'll go to Hell, where there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Or you can do exactly what I say and believe in me without me demonstrating myself. Then you'll be eternally rewarded.
It's the equivilent of the mafia boss pointing a gun to your head saying it's your choice to pay him but he'll shoot you if you don't.
Some (myself included) do realize how screwed up it is, but half-heartedness is about on the same level as sin, or at the very least, shameful.They're told to put their lives fully into serving God [Deuteronomy 6:5]. . Anything less is like a disappointment to Him.
Fair enough. Although what I was thinking was that the religious that believe this law maybe don't think of it as much, and while they believe they are following all of God's laws fully, they wouldn't **** an infant every day even if they believed god wanted them to. Some might, but not the generally decent but misguided religious.
Who said they had to live together, they wouldn't have to look at each other, the rapist would just have to make sure she is cared for (and any children that may have resulted).
note, I am just theorizing.
You're not winning me over. Since you can get stoned for just about anything else, the rapist should be stoned. The woman should not be punished. As Kasic pointed out, marriage back then was the joining of a man and a woman. If your house was robbed and they caught the robber, the correct course of action is to punish the robber with jail or, in the bloody biblical times, torture and death. The robber doesn't become your roommate and share the rent. That's insanity.
Most religions have some way of saying "follow these rules to prosper", such as the eightfold path. Nearly all religions each claim to have the only correct set of rules/guidelines, as they all stem from someone's/something's views of right and wrong.
Even when we find things in these rules that are good, they aren't good because god said them. They are good because they are good. What is least harmful and most productive for people is in general how we derive our morality. Religion was created by primitives so naturally it had a bunch of primitive, misguided, sadistic and evil rules within it. If it came from an all-loving god it would look much different than it does.
You're free to decide if you want to follow His laws or not.
and if i dont i got punished in hell for eternity.
now where exactly is the free will?
They are Laws. You can murdure if you like dont you?
In the bible it said, the seconde commanment if i belive, "dont speak the name of the lord for vain / for no reason". And yet juhova withnesess say it every time they identify themselves. You dont say/write juhuva by this biblical law.
In Islam and judisem, you also dont draw God. Yet Christians made god as a old bearded man.
Maybe i try to say - the christians law are so minor and flexibel, so they look more harsh, as they come "from nowher". Judism and Islam are a 'life style' religions. Judisem, together with telling the story of the jewish peoples from the beggining, also give a very precise and strict code, along with stories of what happened to peoples who didnt done so. Most of them just show the Siner as a bad man, not even showing any punishment.
now where exactly is the free will?
The consequence is considered seperate from the choice itself. ex: you can choose to put your hand on a hot stovetop, but you'll get burned. You're not restricted from putting your hand where you want to put it.
The consequence is considered seperate from the choice itself.
That sounds fair at a glance, but when you look closer, you find that it's either God's way or hell. There's no other choices.
You're not restricted from putting your hand where you want to put it.
Only if one doesn't consider having a Howitzer constantly pointed at you and your family "not restricted from putting your hand where you want to put it."
The consequence is considered seperate from the choice itself. ex: you can choose to put your hand on a hot stovetop, but you'll get burned. You're not restricted from putting your hand where you want to put it.
The difference is God set things up intentionally so that you would "burn your hand" if you did otherwise. If we are to go on the original sin bit God pretty much stacked the deck against us so that we would commit such a sin. If we are to further claim this God is omniscient, then God knew what that is exactly what would happen.
If Man Obeyed God
If you want to find more cruelty you can look through this list.
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/cruelty/long.html
And for a list of injustices.
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/inj/long.html
The consequence is considered seperate from the choice itself. ex: you can choose to put your hand on a hot stovetop, but you'll get burned. You're not restricted from putting your hand where you want to put it.
As others have mentioned, there's a differene between "You can make your own choices and live with the consequences" and "If you don't bow down on your knees and worship me, I'm going to throw you into a lake of fire for eternity". God's making the rules of the game, he can't shoulder his sadistic reality as our fault for whatever finite crimes we committed. He made the place, and he made the rules of who does and doesn't get there. He is ultimately responsible whether he wants to admit it or not.
You're free to decide if you want to follow His laws or not.
in layman's terms, the person that god created is free to do exactly what god wants him to do, regardless of the person's feelings about it. the concept of predestination, and free will cannot exist, and biblical free will is a joke. sounds to me like god consider's us playthings.
-Blade
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