RE: Four questions for Christians
July 11, 2013 at 8:52 pm
(This post was last modified: July 11, 2013 at 8:54 pm by Dionysius.)
(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: Sin is disobedience to a command.
So if god tells you to rape young virgins, as he did in the OT to not do so, is a sin? Or better yet if a crying baby is found on the battle field and you don't dash it upon the rocks would that be a sin?
Are you only required to keep the ten commandments or do the other 613 mitvoh apply? Failure to obey which of these is sin?
(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: The pagans who worked on the Sabbath weren't struck down, but the Israelite who had been specifically told to do so during the Exodus was. God gave this man more reasons to respect that commandment, so his refusal to do so was more serious than it was in later generations and had to be punished severely and immediately.
What is so significant about the Sabbath that no work could be done?
(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: Killing is killing. But the reasons it is administered vary. Soldiers in armies die, hostile intruders die, and God, in many instances, kills those who reject him by doing wrong.
My point was, "What is wrong is subject to change; relative."
(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: The laws in the Torah showed the faith and obedience of the Jewish people to their God. It is not the eating of pork that was sinful, but the disobedience to God it indicated. They were outward indications of what was inside hearts and minds.
So pork was incidental and the entire mosaic law was meaningless aside from it relevance in instituting limits to gauge obedience?
(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: God can't prevent us from doing anything, but he remains in the position to give the laws and punish when they are broken. Sometimes the punishment comes from the lawbreaking itself, hence, "not all things are profitable".
The laws that serve no purpose other than to test an individuals integrity?
(July 11, 2013 at 8:33 pm)Maelstrom Wrote:(July 11, 2013 at 8:22 pm)Consilius Wrote: Isn't this what sin has always been and always will be, within and outside of religion?
Your quote came from Robert A. Heinlein.
For some reason, I always thought it was Buddha.
I digress, however. Theists consider certain acts to be sins that do absolutely no harm to anyone, and that is why the theistic notion of sin is nonsense.
Doing a quick search, I found a Buddhist quote regarding sin but it looks as though it might be something you'd find in the Judeo/Christian religion.
“If a man possesses a repentant spirit his sins will disappear, but if he has an unrepentant spirit his sins will continue and condemn him for their sake forever.” - Buddha
"This time the bullet cold rocked ya a yellow ribbon instead of a swastika?" -RATM