The question that shatters faith, forever.

[Neo-Scholastic]

God is the standard, so what ever He commands is Righteousness...

So essentially it is (what I call) morally right because God commands it. This means morality is arbitrary...

I think what Drich is trying to say is that deity is the absolute standard against which all other apparent standards are judged. For example, suppose you and I disagree on whether something is right or wrong. To resolve our different opinions, together we can look to a mutually agreed upon higher standard or principle for guidance. That standard could be the bible but it could just as easily be reason, compassion or any other agreed up source for moral judgments. From a theistic perspective, all valid standards for the goodness and truthfulness ultimately come from god.

[genkaus]

I think what Drich is trying to say is that deity is the absolute standard against which all other apparent standards are judged. For example, suppose you and I disagree on whether something is right or wrong. To resolve our different opinions, together we can look to a mutually agreed upon higher standard or principle for guidance. That standard could be the bible but it could just as easily be reason, compassion or any other agreed up source for moral judgments. From a theistic perspective, all valid standards for the goodness and truthfulness ultimately come from god.

What Drich does not understand is that any such supposed higher standard or principle must first be justified itself. So, simply saying "god is the source of good" is not enough, it must be justified as to why god is the source and whether he actually is. Otherwise, it is simply an empty and arbitrary assertion.

[Oldandeasilyconfused]

God is the standard, so what ever He commands is Righteousness...

At the Catholic school I attended ,we were taught:

A thing is not right or wrong BECAUSE God says so,he says so BECAUSE it is right or wrong. The point being that morality is objective and absolute, not capricious.

At age 12,that made perfect sense. Today,not so much. ( Ok,at all)


Drich, I'll put Catholic apologists before you any day. They are not only far brighter and erudite than your good self,they have had almost 20000 years practice. Yet I still think they are full of shit. That might give you a hint of my opinion of the drivel you post.

[Phil]

,they have had almost 20000 years practice.

After 20000 years you think they would get it right.

[Drich]

So essentially it is (what I call) morally right because God commands it.

No If God commands it it means it is God's Righteousness or God's righteous command. Remember Righteousness is not morality.
Morality is man's attempt at righteousness with the sin he is willing to live with Incorporated into that standard.. Which makes it "moral" or a half way point to true righteousness (Because of the sin you are willing to over look in your version of righteousness.)

Example: is it moral to lie to save a life? yes of course it is. However Lying for any reason falls short of the righteousness of God. Meaning it is a sin to lie no matter what the reason.

Morality in of itself is not a sin, but when one's morality overtakes the righteousness of God it is then referred to as self-righteousness. Meaning a righteousness (a supreme standard) founded not in God but in one's own sense of righteousness/morality.

Understand your "morality" is not based on some intrinsic force of good. "good" without the absolute standard of God is a subjective term. A term often times founded in society when God is ignored. Societies are known for being found at one extreme or the other all the while reconciling their deeds to their interpretation of "morality."

Or did you think Nazis really saw themselves as the bad guys?

This means morality is arbitrary.

YES!

---

God is the standard, so what ever He commands is Righteousness...

At the Catholic school I attended ,we were taught:

A thing is not right or wrong BECAUSE God says so,he says so BECAUSE it is right or wrong. The point being that morality is objective and absolute, not capricious.

At age 12,that made perfect sense. Today,not so much. ( Ok,at all)


Drich, I'll put Catholic apologists before you any day. They are not only far brighter and erudite than your good self,they have had almost 20000 years practice. Yet I still think they are full of shit. That might give you a hint of my opinion of the drivel you post.

Then please have them explain all the God sponsored carnage in the OT.

If Killing women and children was all ways wrong then why did God order their deaths????

(i have yet to hear a coherent biblically based explanation from a priest or a bishop on this one)

The general catholic understanding of God in this instance is in error.

God's standard is what sets the standard of "Good." If God said it was good end of story. Even if I do not fully understand or have been left to speculate, i can take comfort in that what He did was Good!!!

---

,they have had almost 20000 years practice.

After 20000 years you think they would get it right.

Time has nothing to do with one's personal relationship with, or understanding of God. God can take an uneducated fool who did not start to learn to read till he was 15, (with comic books because of the pictures) and start him out with wisdom that men who spend there whole lives studying religion do not fully comprehend.

1co1:27 But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

---

What Drich does not understand is that any such supposed higher standard or principle must first be justified itself. So, simply saying "god is the source of good" is not enough, it must be justified as to why god is the source and whether he actually is. Otherwise, it is simply an empty and arbitrary assertion.

according to who's authority? The popular culture? "society?" Weren't these checks and balances in place in 1930's Germany? What happened there?

What makes an absolute standard absolute, is the fact it does not need to be approved by anyone except the person in authority who put it in place.

[FallentoReason]

Or did you think Nazis really saw themselves as the bad guys?

Hitler couldn't have seen himself as the bad guy surely? As a Christian he would have understood the righteousness of God.

Example: is it moral to lie to save a life? yes of course it is. However Lying for any reason falls short of the righteousness of God. Meaning it is a sin to lie no matter what the reason.

So because God says you can't lie it means a life would be lost in this case? I.e. it was the 'righteous' thing to do? This is why Christians don't have a good track record. God's command always seems to be taking lives one way or another while the Christian thinks they're being 'righteous'.

[mediamogul]

I think what Drich is trying to say is that deity is the absolute standard against which all other apparent standards are judged. For example, suppose you and I disagree on whether something is right or wrong. To resolve our different opinions, together we can look to a mutually agreed upon higher standard or principle for guidance. That standard could be the bible but it could just as easily be reason, compassion or any other agreed up source for moral judgments. From a theistic perspective, all valid standards for the goodness and truthfulness ultimately come from god.

What Drich does not understand is that any such supposed higher standard or principle must first be justified itself. So, simply saying "god is the source of good" is not enough, it must be justified as to why god is the source and whether he actually is. Otherwise, it is simply an empty and arbitrary assertion.

He is saying something much more disturbing than that I believe. He is essentially saying that morality is an invention and the only "good" is obedience to god's will. Which of course begs the question what makes god's will any good? Simple observation yields an undeniable answer: nothing.

This is a pretty out there argument that basically allows for all manner of atrocity based on the percieved "will of god". It is a theology I doubt VERY much he actually subscribes to in any practical way. I imagine its more a way to avoid the problem of evil and explain the atrocities in the Old Testament.

[Neo-Scholastic]

Just speculating here because I haven't spent much time pondering the wholesale slaughter of every man, woman and child standing between the ancient Israelis and the Promised Land. Sometimes the choices we make are not between a good option and a bad one. Occasionally, one must choose between a bad option and a worse one. This may have been the case in some examples of OT atrocities. Guess I have something new to investigate.

[rbak923]

[quote='rbak923']
It is most likely your pattern seeking brain perceiving a correlation that does not exist. Our brains are highly adept at perceiving patterns where there are none.

Point taken, I guess this is a little bit like looking at a painting or watching a movie. No two minds percieve the same stimulus the same way... but perhaps if you try to understand a created thing through trying to know the artist who created it, you can understand what he was trying to convey by creating the object in the first place.

For example - by getting to know a painter and his works, you would train your mind on "what to look for" when trying to recognize his particular style of painting. Your brain would probably have to view several paintings to be "trained" in this fashion.

Perhaps the same might be said of listening to Christian Testimonies from lots of different people.

[Minimalist]

I would recommend reading some archaeology, Chad.

These tales which were written down reflect later realities. The "Israelites" are supposed to have fought with Arad, Edom and Moab but these states did not come into existence until the Arabian trade under the Assyrians in the 8th-7th centuries BC.

Joshua is supposed to have destroyed Ai and Jericho as part of his "campaign" but Ai was not occupied from the MBA to the Iron Age and even then it was a piddling shithole. Jericho was destroyed by an earthquake c 1,500 BC and, as archaeologist Bill Dever put it, "the real miracle of Joshua was that he destroyed a city that wasn't there."

Hazor and Bethel were destroyed in the 13th century. Dor and Megiddo in the 12th. Lachish has destruction layers in BOTH the 13th and 12th centuries!
Jerusalem, Debir and Hebron show no evidence of destruction at all.

The "Israelites" were directed to avoid the northern route where the Philistines were because their god...who had just allegedly kicked the Egyptian's asses...was too much of a pussy to save them from the Philistines. But the Philistines did not even arrive in the region until c 1150 BC as part of the Sea people migration and probably had a hand in some of the 12th century destuctions noted above.

This stuff never happened.

I recommend Dever's "Who were the early Israelites and where did they come from" ( Dever likes long titles!) or israel Finkelstein's "The Bible Unearthed."