Are believers less likely to sin?

[Heyo]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

Answering the literal question, I voted "no". I don't sin. I can't sin because it's a concept I don't believe in.
For the figurative question "are believers less likely to break the law or act immoral" the answer is still "no" but with less confidence. As @Audie pointed out, atheists are under-represented in prisons so there is statistical evidence. But we still don't know the mechanism.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Atheists are proportionately underrepresented in American prisons

That's because we're sneakier...

*nods solemnly*

 

[sun rise]

I assume you are referring to not sinning due to my religious faith.

That is a good point... what may be a sin for one may not be a sin for another. I wasn't exactly thinking along those lines.

I answered not less likely based on what is sin for followers of a certain religion. For example, using birth control pills is a sin for Catholics but how many Catholics in the US avoid chemical or mechanical birth control? Alcohol is a sin to Muslims. The Bible OT is full of sins punished by putting people to death but how many are killed for wearing cloth from two sources these days or for insulting their parents?

Beyond that, many if not most believers are superficial believers who don't really try to put their morals into practice. The few who do I believe would "sin" less but how many are truly committed to following the tenants of their religion - not many I warrant.

 

[ChristineM]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

Believers are the only ones who can sin.

Sin is s religious concept, a transgression against god.

Non believers have no god to sin against.


As for immorality. I.e. using human morality and not the bastardsised religious, versions i would say it's a close run thing with religious just a nose ahead for immoral behaviour. I come to this conclusion by following various statistics, divorce rates drug use, teen pregnancy, prison population etc.

 

[LuisDantas]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

It depends on what is believed in.

As a rule, surrendering one's moral discernment to a hypothetical deity is conductive to immorality.

But there are other kinds of belief, of course.

 

[1213]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

I think everyone believes in something. So, this depends on, what believer. If person believes what Jesus said, he probably doesn't rape/assault.

 

[Audie]

That's because we're sneakier...

*nods solemnly*

I've never been busted

 

[Audie]

I think everyone believes in something. So, this depends on, what believer. If person believes what Jesus said, he probably doesn't rape/assault.

Most of us don't, regardless.

Do you suppose all the paedophile priests
don't believe?

What is or is not rape / robbery / assault etc
is regional, legal matter.

Your idea is awful simplistic.

 

[Audie]

I answered not less likely based on what is sin for followers of a certain religion. For example, using birth control pills is a sin for Catholics but how many Catholics in the US avoid chemical or mechanical birth control? Alcohol is a sin to Muslims. The Bible OT is full of sins punished by putting people to death but how many are killed for wearing cloth from two sources these days or for insulting their parents?

Beyond that, many if not most believers are superficial believers who don't really try to put their morals into practice. The few who do I believe would "sin" less but how many are truly committed to following the tenants of their religion - not many I warrant.

" Tenets"

 

[Colt]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

Sin is deliberate disloyalty to deity. Much of what we call sin isn't sin.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

Depends what we understand by "believer" and what that entails exactly.

If we are talking about the species of "believers" who adhere to an "objective" morality that is dictated by their religion... then I consider they very moral compass to be immoral to start with and the question becomes moot.

Such believers' moral compass isn't actually a moral compass. Instead, it consists of mere obedience to a perceived authority.

If however the believer uses an actual moral compass, based on well-being of sentient creatures, then mostly that person's morality will be pretty much on par with non-believers.

Although religious beliefs tend to override ones personal moral judgement. Which by itself is also a dangerous situation.

For example...
If you personally believe it is wrong to rape your wife, but your religion says it's fine.
Should you then feel bad about it?

 

[Wandering Monk]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

No. Forbidden fruit is always the sweetest.

Also, cognitive dissonance forces them to hide their sins.

 

[BilliardsBall]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

A Christian believer? Of course--skeptics don't honor even half of the Ten Commandments!

 

[Wandering Monk]

I think everyone believes in something. So, this depends on, what believer. If person believes what Jesus said, he probably doesn't rape/assault.

But they might be looking at porn or abusing their spouse.

 

[blü 2]

In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

For a start, you HAVE to be a believer to sin. It's beyond the power of unbelievers to intend to defy or offend a god.

As for acting immorally, that will depend on who, when and where. You have only to read the bible to realize how barbaric their morality was by modern standards, a king with a thousand "wives", God's rules for owning slaves, God ordering massacres of surrendered populations and mass rape and so on and so on.

But as for the here and now, I dare say there are stats about the matter, and we unbelievers have been bragging about our underrepresentation in the US prison population, and so on, but in the end I'd say you can believe and be a moral person and you can unbelieve and be a moral person.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

That is impossible to answer, because there is no objective standard for believer, sin or act immorally.

 

[firedragon]

Atheists are proportionately underrepresented in American prisons

Where do you get the statistics from? Whats the research method? Can you provide the statistics and the causation analysis?

Thanks.

 

[firedragon]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

There are some believers who believe God exists but also believe they are saved no matter what they do. By default.

This "sin" and "Immorality" should be defined by you I think.

All that said and done, there are religious people and atheists who are such good human beings not allowing any kind of generalisation of anything to anyone. It's bigotry.

 

[Father Heathen]

Typically believers tend to concern themselves with other people's "sins" rather than their own.

 

[Messianic Israelite]

In another thread, someone shared their opinion to me.

A "believer" is less likely to r*** / assault his wife was the opinion.

Tell me your opinion. In general, is a believer less likely to "sin" or act immorally?

Hi Xavier Graham. Good afternoon. A believer is less likely to sin. I would of thought that would be apparent. Without faith, we won't be asking Yahweh for help to overcome our problems. We will be violating the first of the Ten Commandments. The first of the Ten Commandments tells us we must have faith in Yahweh, saying:

"And Elohim spoke all these words:
2 “I am the Yahweh your Elohim, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other elohim before me."

That means we must have faith in Yahweh. We must come to Yahweh with faith. Faith is exceptionally important if we don't want to sin. In Ephesians 6:16, Paul describes faith in the armour of Yahweh as being like a shield. It says: "In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one." Without Yahshua the Messiah and faith in Yahweh I know I wouldn't be able to overcome sin. I wouldn't have a defence against Satan's attacks (fiery arrows). They are many times when I have prayed about some problem that I have confronted and Yahweh has answered that prayer. Without faith, we might well be trying to keep out sin, but it won't be successful. You cannot rely on yourself to reach a level of perfection. We need Yahweh's help. Satan is far too powerful to try to take him on by ourselves.

Romans 3:31 tells us that faith upholds the law. "Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law." Faith in Yahweh upholds the law.

I just want to make it clear here that you have asked if a believer is less likely to sin. Sin is the transgression of the Biblical Law according to 1 John 3:4. So in other words, you're asking whether a non-believer would keep Yahweh's Law better than a believer. How could that be when the unbeliever doesn't even believe in Yahweh's Law? Further, if we don't believe in His Word, we will be believing in lies. It may be that non-believers might choose to keep some of Yahweh's Law through their own logical reasoning, for example, I know of some unbelievers who do not eat shellfish, or pork, but if we want to keep all of the commandments and not sin, we must have faith in Yahweh and Yahshua. Righteousness comes through faith, Romans 4:13.

If we have faith in Yahshua, we will realise it is possible to live a sin-free life and we will believe in the power of Yahweh to forgive us for our previous sins and allow us to walk in newness of life through baptism and the righteousness that comes through the keeping of the commandments.

Conclusively, Hebrews 11:6 says "And without faith it is impossible to please Yahweh, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him."