(May 13, 2011 at 2:49 pm)fr0d0 Wrote:(May 13, 2011 at 2:21 pm)Girlysprite Wrote: Frodo - the perfect moral is not clear. Over the world hundreds of factions are trying hard to find the best way to interpet the bible, and they all get different results. And really, I'd rather not condone slavery as part of the 'perfect moral'. Just an example.I think you and I have the capacity to know Girlysprite. What you are talking about illustrates the point perfectly. It was the secular morality of the time that slavery was right. The biblical angle promotes fair treatment that would put to shame most of dealings with people over other people nowadays.
I think much of our morals have progressed. Yes, I'd certainly call it progression against the ages where witchburning, crusades and slavery were accepted, and excused with, or even caused by the bible.
Sure people have abused the bible by being amoral using it as their excuse. No one could ever say that they were following Christ or being perfectly moral.
I think you referred to this post when saying I didn't reply to it right?
As for slavery - it wasn't just the secular morality of the time. The bible is very clear in that slavery is accepted and normal. Some rules on tratment of slaves come across as quite ok. Others...not so very much. For example - you can't beat a slave to death. The rule goes on to explain that that just means that the slave shouldn't die within 2 days of the beating. If he dies after that, you're cool. It's also ok to have sex with female slaves. When it comes to treatment of all females in general, you'll find that their treatment is more akin to cattle and slaves then human beings. They are property.
I think that the morals of the bible were actually based on the general society rules and morality of that time. In that time, women were a possession of the men. In that time, slavery was totally ok. In that time, you could stone a woman to death if there is even a bit of doubt if she was raped or had sex with another man voluntarily. In that time it was ok to to wipe out complete villages that didn't belong to your tribe and take the little girls as slaves.
But that doesn't make it allright now. I think it didn't even make it allright in retrospect, but I guess that was just the culture of that time.
When I was a Christian, I was annoyed with dogmatic condescending Christians. Now that I'm an atheist, I'm annoyed with dogmatic condescending atheists. Just goes to prove that people are the same, regardless of what they do or don't believe.
