The Immorality of God - Slavery in the Old Testament

[Expired]

Enforced love, coz that always works[/sarcasm]

BINGO!

THAT is why God respects your free will, downbeat! He doesn't coerce your love or force you to believe that he exists.

Man, I love it when things come together like this!

No, he leaves his dirty work to people like you.

[athrock]

Actually God isn't an immoral monster, he's not even real! Imagine that.

Yeah, weird, isn't it?

Dawkins and Hitchens spent all that time railing against the supposed immorality of a god who doesn't even exist.

Imagine that.

[downbeatplumb]

Enforced love, coz that always works[/sarcasm]

BINGO!

THAT is why God respects your free will, downbeat! He doesn't coerce your love or force you to believe that he exists.

Man, I love it when things come together like this!

Except with threats of eternal torment and the constant demands for love like a hard to please girlfriend.
I mean have you seen the ten commandments! so needy.

[Cecelia]

Because, Cecelia, you're not simply judging God's behavior in light of today's standards. You're fallaciously attempting to read today's standards back into God's interaction with a more primitive people. You can't do that. Not honestly, anyway.

God acted then according to what the people then could handle. And in doing so, he moved all of humanity forward TOWARD today's standards because the written account of the people of God, the Bible, has had an undeniably positive impact on mankind.

Actually, the Bible has had an undeniably negative impact on progress.  Slavery, Women gaining the right to vote, and Gay Marriage.  All three are things that were impeded much by the bible.  Sure, some Christians were against Slavery.  Some were for women being able to vote.  And a very few were okay with Gay Marriage.  But their opponents had stronger backing by the bible.  

And how much bad has been done in the name of the Bible because of specific things it says?  How many people were stoned for Adultery?  How many were stoned for working on Sunday?  Or eating Shellfish?

The Hebrews couldn't even handle "Thou Shalt Not Kill", yet Yahweh is said to have given them that commandment.  Yahweh couldn't have given them other commandments they couldn't handle?  Really?  And he didn't foresee any of these negative effects of what he said, and the negative impact on progress the bible created?  Surely he could have at the very least given updates to the Bible regularly, so that people would stop using it as an excuse.

Your Bible has had little to do with any of the progress we've seen over the past several hundred years.  Sure, some Christians have been involved.  But that doesn't mean the bible had any thing to do with it.  In fact your bible has impeded progress a lot.  One might even say it's been the biggest obstacle for progress.  More than anything else it convinced people that they were absolutely right when they shared those ancient values that Yahweh apparently couldn't do anything about (which doesn't scream supreme being to me at all.  Why would a supreme being be limited?)

For that matter, why open his mouth at all on many of those subjects? If Homosexuality isn't an abomination according to Yahweh, why did he tell the Hebrews that? Why not just leave that out, what good does it do? What good does it do to say "Stone a woman for being raped"? Seems like a pretty terrible thing to say.

[Expired]

Actually God isn't an immoral monster, he's not even real! Imagine that.

Yeah, weird, isn't it?

Dawkins and Hitchens spent all that time railing against the supposed immorality of a god who doesn't even exist.

Imagine that.

Railing? What the fuck are you on about?

[downbeatplumb]

Actually God isn't an immoral monster, he's not even real! Imagine that.

Yeah, weird, isn't it?

Dawkins and Hitchens spent all that time railing against the supposed immorality of a god who doesn't even exist.

Imagine that.

Indeed they did because there are some people that still believe in childish fantasy and live their life as though it was real!
And when these people get together they can have a real impact on the actual world based on delusion.

[athrock]

You can't have it both ways athrock.  Either God's message was progressive and thus open to rejection, or it was simply reflective of the times.  You have no objection to this god introducing a truly progressive morality in the New Testament, yet at the same time being impotent to deliver a similar message on slavery.  You want to have it both ways, god being both potent and impotent to dictate morals to his people.  That's nothing but special pleading on the issue of slavery.

Either or thinking? What about both and?

Maybe God was BOTH progressive (and thus open to rejection by the Israelites) AND reflective of the times in which the Israelites were currently living.

Yeah, I'm gonna go with that.

As products of the ANE, the people we would come to know as the Israelites were a crude, barbarous bunch of "bronze-age goat herders". But, shazam, God decided to form them into something much, much better.

So, taking them where they were at as product of "the times" in which they were living, God began to reveal a progressive message that was open to rejection. 

He went slowly, taking a thousand years and more, giving them as much as they could handle, punishing them when they disobeyed, rewarding them when they were obedient, until they were ready to receive the fullness of His message, the Word, the incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ.

Yeah, I definitely can have it "both ways" when viewed like this.

[Cecelia]

Also people argue that Yahweh was immoral to argue that the bible is not a good source for morality. And it really isn't.

[Angrboda]

So, taking them where they were at as product of "the times" in which they were living, God began to reveal a progressive message that was open to rejection. 

He went slowly, taking a thousand years and more, giving them as much as they could handle, punishing them when they disobeyed, rewarding them when they were obedient, until they were ready to receive the fullness of His message, the Word, the incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ.

Would you like some paper on which to write your bible?

What God revealed to them either was not moral because today we have the 'correct' moral view on such things, according to your timeless god. Or, what god revealed to them was moral, and those Christians who oppose slavery are immoral, according to your timeless god. Which is it?

[LastPoet]

God did not change. He revealed a higher standard...the next phase in the formation of the people of Israel.

They changed...slowly, incrementally, begrudgingly even...over time.

Funny, he seemed very keen to wipe all life on earth at some point or a few. I guess he was testing the right method to subdue those creations of it. What a moral dude huh? It changes method, yet not changing. It is timeless, yet acts over time.

How awesome is your god. Tell me more... (You don't even deserve a willy wonka meme)