@KellyJay saidRefer to my previous post about the paradigm shift from OT to NT in the case of the adulteress. Your own religion also undergoes evolution, or development if you prefer a different word. Ex 22.18 was revised, after much killing and suffering, but the Church doesn't do that sort of thing since the Salem witch trials. Ecumenical Councils are periodically convened to update the doctrine. It is merely pedantic to make pronouncements now about what people thought was "good" or "bad" centuries ago. One can, however, identify momentous moments in history when a paradigm shift was in progress, for example when Jesus was alive, or Socrates, or Mohammed, and recognise that not everyone was willing to go along with the innovation, whatever it was (I hardly need mention that the Sadducees were not going along with Jesus's innovation). So it is today, too; we are still living out the momentous changes wrought by universal suffrage, the abolition of slavery, and de-criminalizing what consenting adults do in the privacy of their bedrooms; some people don't like it, and they may protest if they are peaceful about it, but if they ultimately prevail in turning back the clock to the Dark Ages, they won't like it when the Inquisition comes knocking on their doors. We are well-rid of torturing people to death for thought-crime.
So you believe for those who lived earlier what was good then could be bad now, and what is bad now wasn’t always bad it could have been good? There is no constant for what is good and bad due to culture or is it due to time that it changes? Personally I don’t see you being able to continue this before you have to say I am not answering any more of your questions, again.
@moonbus saidPeople can take a good thing and turn it into some thing evil, that does make the good thing evil just those who abuse it.
Refer to my previous post about the paradigm shift from OT to NT in the case of the adulteress. Your own religion also undergoes evolution, or development if you prefer a different word. Ex 22.18 was revised, after much killing and suffering, but the Church doesn't do that sort of thing since the Salem witch trials. Ecumenical Councils are periodically convened to update the ...[text shortened]... ition comes knocking on their doors. We are well-rid of torturing people to death for thought-crime.
@KellyJay saidPeople can take a good thing and turn it into some thing evil, that does not make the good thing evil[,] just those who abuse it -- I assume you meant 'not'. See, I actually read what you write and think about it.
People can take a good thing and turn it into some thing evil, that does make the good thing evil just those who abuse it.
@KellyJay
You asked whether everyone should follow the same rules. At a certain extremely primitive level, the answer is yes. Everyone should refrain from homicide, theft, fraud, telling lies and bearing false witness. This is the most primitive level for any kind of social order at all. However, at the level of nice-to-have but not strictly necessary for social order, the answer is: it’s not so simple as that. You would be wise to loan money to a wise man, because he would be very likely to pay it back. However, you would be foolish to loan money to a foolish man, because he will probably squander it and you may not get it back.
A similar principle applies to electing people to high office. It would be wise to elect a wise person to high office, because a wise person’s instincts and impulses are well disciplined and likely to be employed to socially beneficial ends; whereas, it would be foolish to elect an emotionally immature person to high office, a person whose instincts and impulses are not under control, because he will probably do things only in his own interest, and not in the general interest.
In my opinion, people who hold high office should be held to a much more stringent standard of conduct, and especially to an absolutely transparent standard of financial accountability, compared to private citizens. So, no, the same rules should not apply to all people all the time. More stringent rules should apply to some people some of the time. This also holds for people convicted of armed robbery: upon release from prison, they should not be allowed to own or carry firearms, ever again, because they proved themselves not (morally) mature enough to exercise their right to bear arms responsibly.
I will give one more example and then stop. Certain people in the west criticize Islam on the grounds that Mohammed was married to Aisha when she was nine years old, and they claim that Islam sanctifies pedophilia. I think it is fair to assume that the marriage was not consummated until she was 12. Why 12? Because that’s what the age of consent was in the Roman Empire, which covered, from time to time, Central Europe, the whole of North Africa, and the ME as far as India. Who are we to condemn the Roman empire, to say they were "bad" people, when it has been not been so very long since people were tortured to death for witchcraft in Salem Massachusetts? It’s a pretty presumptuous thing to pass judgment on an entire civilization, to say they were bad people, just because they had sex with 12-year-olds. 1300 years from now people will look back on America and wonder how Americans could’ve been such savages for things they now take for granted. I venture there were not 56 school stabbings in a year during the Roman Empire. 1300 years from now people may look back on you and wonder how Americans could possibly have allowed tens of millions of firearms to accumulate in private hands, or how a convicted sex offender could been elected president, twice. So, no, the same rules do not apply across all times and all cultures.
@moonbus saidI’m not sure why you would call the rules everyone should follow primitive. If everyone should follow them why would you call them that and not the higher ones instead? Because, even in your opinion, we should all be following them, and if we don’t, does that reveal flaws in the whole race? The flaw is that we are all a mixed bag; we are quite capable of following them, and sometimes we do, and sometimes we don’t, for various reasons, sometimes for all the right reasons, sometimes for very selfish ones, making us all flawed without exception.
@KellyJay
You asked whether everyone should follow the same rules. At a certain extremely primitive level, the answer is yes. Everyone should refrain from homicide, theft, fraud, telling lies and bearing false witness. This is the most primitive level for any kind of social order at all. However, at the level of nice-to-have but not strictly necessary for social order, the ...[text shortened]... een elected president, twice. So, no, the same rules do not apply across all times and all cultures.
@moonbus saidIf people take a good thing and abuse it, that does NOT make the good thing evil; it makes those who abuse it evil. We can clammer about being racist to the point we become racist, we go on and on about freedom of speech being hindered until we start hindering freedom of speech in the name of freedom of speech.
People can take a good thing and turn it into some thing evil, that does not make the good thing evil[,] just those who abuse it -- I assume you meant 'not'. See, I actually read what you write and think about it.