What Exactly Are Sins?

[Pyrrho]

Indeed.  Promoting such a ridiculous idea promotes actually acting on those feelings.  After all, if you are going to burn in hell for thinking about your neighbor's wife, you might as well really have an affair with her, if she is willing.

It is really a stupid, moronic idea that thinking about something is as bad as doing it.  But because this stupid, moronic idea is in the Bible, many people believe it.  But the simple fact is, it is impossible to not ever have "bad" thoughts, and it does not hurt anyone if you do have such thoughts occasionally.  Acting on them, though, is an entirely different matter, and it is an insane "morality" that does not properly distinguish between the two.  They are not even close to being equivalent.

If the mass of Christendom didn't pride themselves on ignorance, what all too often appears to be an obviously half-baked and primitive morality could easily be spun into a piece of practical wisdom. In this instance, one could say that Jesus is referring to the hypocrisy of those who snub their noses at degenerates and is making the point that intentions are far more important than actual deeds, at least in many instances. Of course, as evidenced by our resident Christians, most believers have an extremely vulgar and simplistic view of the world, and hence, their faith, and think all sins are no-no's of equal merit because even the most harmless earns its offender hellfire on the Day of Judgment. All that said, you won't ever hear a defense from me of the really ridiculous shit that the NT advocates under the pretense of righteousness.

The thing is, there is a difference between looking at someone with sexual desire, and actually intending to have sex with the person.  If, as a passing thought, my wife does the former with someone else, it is not anything I care much about, but I very much care if she actually intends to have sexual relations with someone else.  The difference on this is important.  An idle fantasy and an actual plan of action are quite different from each other.

Also, I don't think intentions are usually more important than actions.  Intentions might reflect more on the morality of the person, but it is their actions that impact the world.  If you intend to cut off my arm, but don't, that will bother me less than if you don't intend to cut off my arm and you do.  My guess is that you feel the same way about my intentions and actions and your arm.