I had missed this one, sorry. Well, I do love humor but I do not get all forms of humor. Anyway now that I am forewarned your going to be joking I will allow for it.
NP at all. I talk a lot of rubbish. Some people find it funny, some find it annoying and some find it confusing, so I'll keep my serious pants on for the rest of this thread. I should, since it's a serious topic, and not in the Jokes area. Apologies again for any confusion
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I do not judge any books wisdom or value based on word count. I do not value the bible because it has a lot of words.
Yeah, I know. You'd mentioned about the Bible having 750000 words, but I could care less, and to be honest, I don't think it matters to you either. You judge it on it's wisdom and truth, I expect. No biggie, was just a throwaway line really.
Pretty close. God has sovereignty over everything, is the creator of everything in an ultimate sense, and all truth finds it's ultimate explanation in him. But it is not really my views that suggest this. These are views that have been around for thousands of years. Long before we knew that these attributes answered any necessary questions. IOW the characteristics of God were given long before we knew they were necessary. We did not know about the precision in cause and effect relationships yet God resolves them all. I found God's description both pre-existing and logically deduced. Even the modern generic philosophers God has most of the same features.
I suspect we'll talk past each other on this, but what you often argue for sounds like Deism to me. Not to say it doesn't also fit Christianity, but I would never bother to argue against Deism. Perhaps there is a God? I certainly can't prove there isn't. The difference, is in how we view that God (regardless of the religious trappings). I would view him as very powerful and intelligent, if I imagined such a being. But I am unsure how we can make the leap that this God is ultimate truth or ultimate moral authority. A poor analogy, but hopefully enough to illustrate my point...when I was a school teacher, I was the most powerful person in my classroom (by most measures). I also determined how the class would run, what rules would be put in place, what rewards and punishments. I strove hard to get my kids to behave in as altruistic and moral a manner as possible, and feel like this was a strength of mine (I was given a lot of kids from bad home situations because I could provide a safe, consistent environment for them). However, whilst I would go so far as to describe myself as moral, and the rules I put in place as just, they were obviously not perfect.
*ponders*
So I suspect our difference is that you imagine God as perfect, therefore his morals are necessarily perfect, whilst perfection doesn't make sense to me. It's unachievable. Meh, I have no interest in trying to change your mind on that, but do you think that is the difference in our view on this, ultimately?
There are many lines of reasoning that demonstrate this. So many I will not have space or time to get into them but if you study divine command theory and cause and effect relationships in detail you will find plenty.
Cause and effect relationships is something I have read about. I wouldn't say 'at length', but more than a smattering. How recent are your readings in this area? It's far to say cause and effect, and the importance of this to many scientific viewpoints is something that is fast moving.
Divine Command Theory I am unfamiliar with, so I'll take a peek around Google. If you have any good, accessible sources, let me know.
This is called a false optimality argument. It is the mistake of thinking a perfect God would only allow perfect effects. Christian teaching clearly teaches that our sin has estranged us from God. It compares it to our being suddenly thrust into darkness. The bible's primary purpose in not to fix this broken world, it is to cause us to recognize it is broken and to save those who do so out of it ultimately. Then and only then will we be resorted back into the pure light of truth. I would have to give entire chapters of doctrines to fully explain this but this is a start anyway.
Interesting. I don't think I am guilty of False Optimality, to be honest, although I've heard that argument more commonly applied to the design flaws apparent in nature than in this context. Is the intent of the Bible to allow those who approach it honestly, humbly, and invest sufficient time and study into it to lead a life as per the tenets of God? I am not about to suggest I have done these things, but there are Christians with varying views on many key concepts of Christianity. I have trouble reconciling this, unless you subscribe to the view that intent is important, but specifics are not. Example, example...*thinks*...would a honest, humble God-fearing (for wont of a better term) Trinitarian be saved, but an honest, humble God-fearing Monophysate not?
I have said a lot of things in this thread but I only have about 3 primary claims.
1. God is necessary for objective morality.
2. Without God mere opinion is the best we can do.
3. That using the bible for morality would be BETTER than naturalism, evolution, etc...
Without rehashing everything, some quick points on this.
1. I would say that without God there is no objective morality. I am less convinced than you that God = objective morality (even assuming existence)
2. With God, our opinion shifts from our own arguments to text interpretation. I think the Bible was written by men, so we shift from our own arguments to interpretation of arguments made 2000 years ago in a foreign language, which seems a poor way to determine anything to me. However, I agree, opinion is the best we can do without God. Opinion doesn't need to be selfish, ill-informed or immoral by neccessity (although I am talking about subjective morality...worth considering that there are different opinions on what 'subjective morality' means...my opinion would doubtless not be the same as yours.
3. Naturalism, and (in particular) evolution are horrendous methods for determining morality. I would fight right alongside you on that.
That is not to say using the bible would be easy. It was not designed to run a state. I was designed to be adopted personally. However whatever faults it may be said to have all alternatives are worse. You suggest we may have to use our opinion on what God wants, but without God there is not truth to try and find. You may suggest people will disagree about an instruction. Without God we still will and there exists no fact of the matter to settle who is right. In every category the bible exceeds all competitors, even if it has problems being converted into societal laws it's self.
You state these things with blanket certainty, which always worries me. There are specific moral issues of which the Bible does not mention. Even the most honest follower is left with a choice of applying their own morality, at best guided by the 'vibe' of Jesus' message, or trying to extrapolate or interpret individual passages from the Bible in order to determine their moral position. Ultimately, every person on earth is left with determining their morality, hence the difference between Christians in many areas. For me, this is a recurring thought : Even assuming God has objective moral truth at his fingertips, it cannot be extrapolated that humans do.
Oh, and your point about the Bible being not designed to run a state is well made, and important to remember. Cheers.
The bible is not binding on your because I say it is, it is bonding on you because your ultimate judge will hold you accountable to it if he exists.
It's binding on me because God can kick my arse? If God is willing to judge me by my actions, rather than my faith, then I am satisfied.
Now if you asking about legality, society agrees to adopt certain principles whether everyone agrees with them or not. We do not live as 6 billion little fiefdoms. So we are all going to have to be bound by rules we did not make in either case. If God exists those rules can reflect the fact of the matter and are binding whether we like it or not, without God we are still somewhat bound by rules but in that case there is no potential ultimate truth behind them.
A universal law with a omnipotent enforcer can bind us to laws regardless of our acceptance of them. Yeah, makes sense. And I agree we are not 6 billion little fiefdoms, nor would I see that as desireable.
Well of course this assumes we had picked the best source. There are very very compelling reasons not to pick the others. The Torah contains laws and rules that only applied to the Hebrews and had an intended purpose that has expired. Even Israel does not follow the Torah these days in general. If Allah existed we should follow him but we have no chance to do so. A guy named Uthman simply collected what parts of the Quran he liked and burned all others, and the text was strictly controlled. There is no way what so ever we can know what Allah revealed. I will add however if Christianity turned out to be false and another faith turned out to be correct then it should be followed. Even adding potential rivals there is still some truth to moral questions that can be found. You have only made it a wider search but without any God any search is in vain.
Not sure about a couple of the specifics, but in general this all makes sense to me. You elevate the Bible above where I would, but that's kinda self-evident to both of us. I'm more interested in understanding your position, and therefore have no questions on this.
