Foundations

Originally posted by agryson
I suppose I'm one of those stinky moral relativists. The foundation for all of my morals is that they must remain relatively plastic. What is morally repugnant in one society could be run of the mill for another and that when we speak of morals, my belief, or foundation, would be that morals are what they are only within the framework of the society they exi believe that there is a common all encompassing morality to which we can as one subscribe to.

I think you raise a valid concern. On the one hand you want laws that you deem "moral" or what you deem is good for society. However, the focus often becomes twisted and it evolves into a selfish focus. The focus then becomes what is good for those in government or what is good for those who are religious authorities. There is a huge difference in controlling those you govern and in watching out for the welfare of those you govern. It is a fine line at times to say the least and especially in light of fallen man's nature. As a Christian I am often torn between standing up for the free will God has chosen to endow us with while at the same time standing against the free will of those that use their free will to manipulate others. Do keep in mind that the religious leaders of Christ's day also tried to control him with their "moral" laws. For example, they accussed him of breaking the Sabbath by healing on the Sabbath. Such legalism can be used for societies ill. Their focus was not what was best for society. After all he was healing people, rather, the focus was how to control someone they disliked or saw as a threat to their power base.

Originally posted by jaywill
Do you feel that there are some morals which are a little more universal, going across all societies ?

For example, are there any societies in which these actions might be the custom highly regarded by the members of that culture:


1.) That a man should grow up and marry his mother.

2.) That a man should marry his daughter.

3.) That m ...[text shortened]... g to find out what you feel about morals which seem to go across the framework of all societies.

These principals transcend both religious and national boundaries. And there are good biological (evolutionary) reasons for all of these.

Originally posted by jaywill
Do you feel that there are some morals which are a little more universal, going across all societies ?

For example, are there any societies in which these actions might be the custom highly regarded by the members of that culture:


1.) That a man should grow up and marry his mother.

2.) That a man should marry his daughter.

3.) That m ...[text shortened]... g to find out what you feel about morals which seem to go across the framework of all societies.

Oh, of course taken seperately it appears clear whether something is good or bad, but as I said, they must be taken into account according to the society they are in.
Incest has in fact been morally acceptable in several cultures. (I say incest because marriage itself may be a little specific) I believe in Papua New Guinea, there is a custom amongst one group that the first man a girl must sleep with is her father and this is seen as a good thing because the logic is that he will presumably not abuse her innocence when it is taken for the first time.
As for parents eating their children, I could see that as morally repugnant in todays society, but cannabalistic societies often had spiritual reasoning behind their activities. It is easy to imagine a situation where if your child dies, you must eat a part of it to keep it with you always.
As you can see, the level or degree of 'wrongness' depends entirely on the context and the society, it cannot be said "is this right or wrong" without understanding the reasoning.

(Murder does seem general enough across societies, but there are contexts in which it is just in some societies but still wrong in others. As for harming the physically disabled for fun, if we belong to a religion that views such people as evil (there's been a few such religions int he past I believe) then it would be perfectly fine to hurt such people for fun)
I won't come up with examples to all of them, I'm sure you can see that context is important and that virtually everything becomes acceptable in some way when the context is right, though maybe not to everyone.

P.S. As for the mores, there are several historical societies where some of these would be seen as weaknesses rather than virtues.

Originally posted by KellyJay
We all have some clue about the universe, what it is, what it isn't, and we build our lives around things that we think are true, be they some things we can see and handle, some things we can not, some things we accept as factual, some things we simply accept because we believe them to be true.

I have read you post over and over and I cant figure out what you are saying. You appear to be making two statements:
1. some things we accept as factual,
2. some things we simply accept because we believe them to be true
What is the difference between these two? Surely 'accept as factual' is 'believing to be true'?

Originally posted by twhitehead
I have read you post over and over and I cant figure out what you are saying. You appear to be making two statements:
1. some things we accept as factual,
2. some things we simply accept because we believe them to be true
What is the difference between these two? Surely 'accept as factual' is 'believing to be true'?

You still haven't accepted that meanings of Kelly's words is different between the two statements.

Originally posted by scottishinnz
You still haven't accepted that meanings of Kelly's words is different between the two statements.

I just want to know what the meanings are so that I can understand what he is saying. He keeps coming into all sorts of threads with "thats not fact thats faith" but I still cant figure out what he is trying to say.
Is he saying that nothing can be known to be factual?
Is he saying that things he doesn't personally believe in cannot be known to be factual?
Is he saying that we should use different terminology to reflect the fact that nothing can be proved beyond doubt? (though 'beyond reasonable doubt' is of course possible)
Or is he just trying to shed doubt on any topic he doesn't like.
Or is he saying that some things can be known to be factual but he is not sure what or how we can know that?

Originally posted by twhitehead
Or is he just trying to shed doubt on any topic he doesn't like.

I've had the same problem with him. He always tries to detract from others points without offering one of his own. Ne'er a rival hypothesis to be seen....

Anyhoo, I'm going for this one, because you never see him carrying on like that in a thread discussing the veracity of the bible.

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Incest has in fact been morally acceptable in several cultures. (I say incest because marriage itself may be a little specific) I believe in Papua New Guinea, there is a custom amongst one group that the first man a girl must sleep with is her father and this is seen as a good thing because the logic is that he will presumably not abuse her innocence when it is taken for the first time.
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What I am not sure about in this example is that the sleeping of the father with the daughter is just that or involving sexual activity.

As a baby my daughter slept with me and my wife. That was a nurturing not a practive of incest.

Could you clarify that the practice in New Guinea is father on daughter incest or simply nurturing by sleeping together?

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As for parents eating their children, I could see that as morally repugnant in todays society, but cannabalistic societies often had spiritual reasoning behind their activities.
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We all know that cannabalism has been practiced. I think in most cases it would involve enemies rather than family members. But I am no expert on it.

Starving explorers in the frozen Arctic have been known to be forced to cannabalize those of the team who died. But I think they still found it repugnant however necessary to remain alive.

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It is easy to imagine a situation where if your child dies, you must eat a part of it to keep it with you always.
As you can see, the level or degree of 'wrongness' depends entirely on the context and the society, it cannot be said "is this right or wrong" without understanding the reasoning.
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That it depends to a degree I have no argument. That it depends entirely I question.

If I reasoned biblically I could say that the sin nature often drives people to do things which offends the doer's conscience. This is not so much as acceptance of a new moral as it is not being able to resist the tendency to commit error.

I don't like to lie but I just cannot resist to sometimes exaggerate. This is giving into a stronger weakness against one's better conscience. This is not adopting a new morality of lying and saying it is to be esteemed.

Do you see a difference?

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(Murder does seem general enough across societies, but there are contexts in which it is just in some societies but still wrong in others. As for harming the physically disabled for fun, if we belong to a religion that views such people as evil (there's been a few such religions int he past I believe) then it would be perfectly fine to hurt such people for fun)
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Which religion would that be?

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I won't come up with examples to all of them, I'm sure you can see that context is important and that virtually everything becomes acceptable in some way when the context is right, though maybe not to everyone.
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I think there is an important difference between something becoming an esteemed standard of morality and giving in to a tendency which one is not strong enough to resist.

I think there are some things which are universally offensive to the human conscience. That we often cannot resist to perform such acts of "evil" does not mean that we have enshrined them as proper modes of behavior.

Furthermore, to keep relative peace in large democratic societies, we may have to protect large numbers of people, who for example, may want to practice some temptation to act against their own conscience because of weakness of the will.

Large numbers of people practicing conscience offending acts may be large numbers unable to resist temptation. It may not be that society has enshrined these acts as noble and normal. They are forced to tolerate them because something in man is weak in fully living up to what his conscience tells him is proper.

Originally posted by jaywill
Jake,

[b]Your evidence doesn't mean nothing to me, I don't think you have any evidence. I don't disrespect your religion or the members of your religion because of this, I just don't think there is an evidence base to your beliefs.

Well, Jake, I guess we should narrow this down a little and say "Evidence of exactly WHAT?"

Let's say do I ha ...[text shortened]... ord of the Bible.

What is it in the New Testament that you object to as amoral?[/b]

You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't. Sure we are took that people died for their belief in Jesus. If you can explain to my way them dieing for what they believed in makes them right, whereas those early Muslims dieing because of the teachings of Mohamed were wrong. Throughout human history people have killed and died for relgion. Your relgion is not special in that regard.

You ask how twelve people could suffer the same delusion. How do you expalin the spread of Islam or any other relgion for that matter? Your believe in Christianity means that clearly you believe that all other people of other religions are deluded. Religions evolve and develop. The coming of Jesus was not a sudden change where peoples way of thinking were vastly transformed. People living at the time of Jesus were looking for a Messiah. It was the perfect time, under the rule of the Romans. The authors of the Gospels were trying to write the story of Jesus in such a way as to furfil the prophesis of the Old Testament. There is stuff in the gospels thats just plain wrong. They contradict each other.

Paul in a way is the father of Christianity. It was him that invented the idea of grace. He clearly was willing to use any methods to convince his audience. He writes to the Gentiles and says that Jesus appeared to 500 people after his death. There is no record anywhere else of this happening. Paul is using numebrs to try and convince people. It is unlikly that anyone of the Getiles would have been able to speak to any of these 500 people, so Paul can basically make things up. Not because he doesn't believe in Jesus, but because he thinks its important to convince other people to believe to. How come the romans never left any record of this fairly major event? Someone they put to death as a trouble maker has appeared to 500 people? It would have been a big thing.


You have to remember that people do have reasons for trying to convince people. If they have to make assumptions about the begining of Jesus' life to make it fit propheses, then they will. Jesus himself never wrote anything. The historical Jesus is somewhat swamped by the words that others have wrote. Of course sometimes he is prehaps seen for example when he calls the Gentiles 'dogs.' It is very unlikly that Jesus ever said he was the Son of God. He was a monotheistic Jew and for him to say this would have gone against his faith. He was a Jewish holy man.



In terms of laws in the bible, its very easy for a Christian to say 'I', going to ignore the laws of leviticus, or the bits I don't like because Jesus taught a new way.' Heres what Jesus supposedly says in the new testament:

'For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven”'-Matthew 5:18-19


So you telling me that i don't need to follow Old Testament law makes you 'least in the kingdom of heaven.' Does that make Jesus happy?

Originally posted by Jake Ellison
You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't. Sure we are took that people died for their belief in Jesus. If you can explain to my way them dieing for what they believed in makes them right, whereas those early Muslims dieing because of the teachings of Mohamed were wrong. Throughout human history people have k ...[text shortened]... tament law makes you 'least in the kingdom of heaven.' Does that make Jesus happy?

You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't.

So what do you say?

You know that Christ is not the Son of God? You side with the Moslem's evidence?

Are you holding out to be non-committal about it, above the fray. Are you desireing to remain a detached and objective observer?

Who do you say Jesus is?

Originally posted by Jake Ellison
You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't. Sure we are took that people died for their belief in Jesus. If you can explain to my way them dieing for what they believed in makes them right, whereas those early Muslims dieing because of the teachings of Mohamed were wrong. Throughout human history people have k tament law makes you 'least in the kingdom of heaven.' Does that make Jesus happy?

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The historical Jesus is somewhat swamped by the words that others have wrote.
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Then I would ask you the same thing that I have asked others here, and not been able to get a specific answer.

There are 48 verses in the 5th chapter of Matthew's gospel. Could you list numbers 1 through 48 and place a J besides the verses spoken by Jesus and an O beside the words concocted by others?

Or could you take the 116 verses between John chapter 14 and chapter 17 and indicate which were spoken by Jesus and which were added by others?

Just list numbers 1 through 116 and place either a J or an O beside each number.

That would help me to see specifically where are these other words put among the words of Jesus as recorded by the Evangelists.

Originally posted by Jake Ellison
You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't. Sure we are took that people died for their belief in Jesus. If you can explain to my way them dieing for what they believed in makes them right, whereas those early Muslims dieing because of the teachings of Mohamed were wrong. Throughout human history people have k tament law makes you 'least in the kingdom of heaven.' Does that make Jesus happy?

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In terms of laws in the bible, its very easy for a Christian to say 'I', going to ignore the laws of leviticus, or the bits I don't like because Jesus taught a new way.' Heres what Jesus supposedly says in the new testament:

'For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven”'-Matthew 5:18-19


So you telling me that i don't need to follow Old Testament law makes you 'least in the kingdom of heaven.' Does that make Jesus happy?
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That's a great point. And to address it I would have to take more time than I have at the moment.

But there are different aspects of the law of Moses. There is the moral side of the law and the ritual side of the law - ordinances.

Morally, Jesus came to uplift the requirement of the morality of the law. Instead of do not commit adultery, He made it more penetrating. Do not even look at a woman to lust after her in your heart.

Morally, the law said do not kill. But Jesus says do not be angry with your brother in your heart without a cause.

Jesus uplifted the moral side of the law and made it higher. But the ritual side of the law He often undercut. He healed on the Sabbath. He declared all foods clean. He healed the blind by spitting in the dirt and seemed to go out of His way to do things differently from the Levitial priesthood - as far as the ritual side of the law is concerned.

He then shed His blood to replace the ordinace of the paschal lamb sacrifice. This is the new covenant in My blood shed for the forgiveness of the sins of many"

So that ritual side of the Mosiac law He certainly did come to replace. But the morality of the law He strengthened.

Now, the Demand to live up to this highest standard of morality is presented in Matthew. But the Supply to enable one to do so is in John. We cannot live up to this standard of morality unless we abide in Him as the living indwelling Savior and Lord:

"Abide in Me and I in you" is now His teaching in John's Gospel. Without Him we can do nothing. He is as the true vine. The believers are the branches grafted into Him.

The rich life of the true vine flows into the branches and enables them to live the highest standard of morality presented in Matthew in all of the passages "But I say unto you ..." something higher and more penetrating then the law of Moses.

Actually Jake, in Matthew Christ is describing His own being. He is talking about how He Himself lives. Now He must enter into man to empower man to live in union with Himself. In resurrection He becomes the life giving Spirit to impart the divine nature and life into His disciples:

"The last Adam became a life giving Spirit" (1 Cor. 15:45)

As the indwelling life giving Spirit of the resurrected Lord He can empower the beleiver to live this highest standard of living. He penetrates not only the outward action but the innermost motive.

From within He regulates not only the resistence to commit adultery but the look the, imagination, the tendency. He regulates from within the innermost being of the believer as "life giving Spirit".

So the bottom line of Jesus teaching is not "Okay you all go home and be good people like Moses taught." It is rather "Abide in Me and I in you"

To abide in Him He must be living. To be living He must have been raised from the dead. To have Him enter into us He must be in a form in which He can do that. "The last Adam became a life giving Spirit" (1 cor. 15:45)

"Now the Lord is the Spirit" (2 Cor. 3:17)

Jesus Christ today is in a pneumatic form. He is in the form of Holy Spirit. He is enterable. And He can enter into man's innermost being. There from within He is the true vine and the believers are the branches abiding in Him. In His Spirit is His sin overcoming life. This life is dispensed into man's life to mingle man with God.

So Paul says that the Christians lives by "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:2)

And it is Christ IN YOU that is the hope of glory. He wants to enter into your spirit and live in you. As the Father lived in Him He also desires to live in you. As He lived by the Father He intends that we live by Him:

"As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me even he shall live because of Me" ( John 6:57)

To eat Him is to take Him into us. To Receive Him into us is to eat Him. If we take the living Person of Christ into us we can live because of Him.


This is different from gritting our teeth and striving to keep the law of Moses. This is living in union with a new living law of a living Person - "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus."

Originally posted by jaywill
[b]You have as much evidence that Jesus was the Son of God as Muslims have that he wasn't.

So what do you say?

You know that Christ is not the Son of God? You side with the Moslem's evidence?

Are you holding out to be non-committal about it, above the fray. Are you desireing to remain a detached and objective observer?

Who do you say Jesus is?[/b]

I think Jesus was a Jewish holy man. I don't think he believed himself to be the Son of God. Don't worry. I think Christianity and Islam are equally wrong.

Originally posted by Jake Ellison
I think Jesus was a Jewish holy man. I don't think he believed himself to be the Son of God. Don't worry. I think Christianity and Islam are equally wrong.

If He was a holy man was He an insane holy man?

Was He a holy man out to deceive?

What characteristics would you point me to in the life of Jesus to indicate that He was not of a sober mind?

What instance would you point to to indicate to me that Jesus was unclear or befuddled about His surroundings or the motives of people?

Originally posted by jaywill
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The historical Jesus is somewhat swamped by the words that others have wrote.
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Then I would ask you the same thing that I have asked others here, and not been able to get a specific answer.

There are 48 verses in the 5th chapter of Matthew's gospel. Could you list numbers 1 through ...[text shortened]... ically where are these other words put among the words of Jesus as recorded by the Evangelists.[/b]

I doubt that any of the gospels are spesifc transcripts of what Jesus said. Viewing the bible as a historical source you have to doubt its reliability. You can't say with certainty if any of the Gospels are true accounts, and thus you have to choose between believeing the impossible or believing that they are not true. So its ridiculous to ask me to say exactly which, if any, words were spoken by Jesus. All you can do is study the Gospels, spot the written styles of the various authors of Jesus' words and spot those little out of character moments when you prehaps spot a little of the historical Jesus. But the gospels are not accurate enough to say that 'this sentence was spoken by Jesus, but this word here was changed.'

Lets not be ridiculous here. Belief in the bible is a matter of faith, and it cannot be rationalised through evidence.