Actually you don't know which way I vote or who I vote for.
To get a good feel of Jewish thoughts you need to talk to a lot of Jewish scholars, honestly lots and lots.
O'Reilly -Tides prove God!
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Actually you don't know which way I vote or who I vote for.
To get a good feel of Jewish thoughts you need to talk to a lot of Jewish scholars, honestly lots and lots.
A few things. Prager is no Torah scholar. Most of the members of my synagogue could run circles around him. And if you knew anything about Jewish Torah study, you would know that a lot of interpretations are bandied about. Some really far fetched. Some brought up just to generate an argument and to look at the text in a different light.
Don't mind you bringing it up, but Tez and I are in a better position to let you know what the normative Jewish position is. We have no agenda. If you keep it civil, feel free to discuss. And what does we pointing out flaws in your argument have to do with 'the left'?
Bill, ever heard the expression "2 Jews, 3 opinions"?
I've heard Jewish scholars argue both sides of a debate. We argue and interpret Torah for fun.
3 Jews, a Torah, bagels, cream cheese, some scmaltz herring, maybe a little schnaps and we'll be there all day. :ultracool
Exactly, that's why I suggested he talks to lot and lots of Jewish scholars lol, it'd keep him away from here for weeks!
Bill's idea of finding a 'quick Jewish Biblical scholar' had me laughing loudly.
Here's an insight on how Torah study works.
On the day after the holiday of Simchat Torah, we restart the annual cycle of reading Torah. The study leader opens a copy of Torah at Genesis 1:1. He reads "B'reshit' and asks why does Torah starts with the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet? 4 hours later, we break for lunch...
There is no such thing as a "quick Jewish scholar".
On the day after the holiday of Simchat Torah, we restart the annual cycle of reading Torah. The study leader opens a copy of Torah at Genesis 1:1. He reads "B'reshit' and asks why does Torah starts with the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet? 4 hours later, we break for lunch...
There is no such thing as a "quick Jewish scholar".
We don't have preachers/priest/vicars whatever to tell us what things mean. There's no sitting down and being idle by letting others tell you, it has to be worked at.
How can you be sitting down when you constently have to get up for another bagel? :uhyeah:
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Hence the implied question in my post: name two. That, and it's about all I can type on a 'droid.....:lol:
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And yet that same God continued to support King David, because he "loves" him, in spite of his being a drunken,deceitful, traitorous, injust, possibly bisexual, adulterous murderer......who really knew how to repent.:lol:
Two things with this.
One, we may have to disagree on whether reason would be a better barometer. I suppose that if you live in a vacuum wherein logic is the only thing that one uses to make decisions, then you may be right. But people always infuse certain aspects into their reasoning, such as cultural norms, emotions, etc. Having that understanding, perfect reasoning can never exist. It will always be biased. Until the point where we evolve into Vulcans, that is.
The bolded part is really what I was trying to emphasize, however. There are times when religion may be better, or reason may be better. It all depends on what you are trying to address. I love reasoning with people and showing them how much smarter I am then them. :boing2:
It's not just that. Even if the standard is avoiding harm, for instance, one would have to determine what harm is. As expressed by my previous example, is it more harmful to spank a child for their wrongdoing, or spare the rod, so to speak.
What is the greatest good? Is it the greatest good that I illegally search a gangster's car that a reliable informant told me contains assault weapons which he is going to use to kill someone? Or is following the rule of law regarding search and seizures better?
The fact of the matter is is that subject to interpretation, both can produce "good" results, and reasonable people can disagree over the sound logic and reasoning behind their approaches.
It addresses your comment. I wasn't arguing about god's love being moral or not. I was addressing the comment regarding Socrates' central question to be asked of all religions. The question does not apply to all religions.
Or perhaps I misunderstood your intent in posting it.
That would be to make the argument that it is the primary intent of the gods of various religious is to be loved by man or to love man. That's just not true. For instance, Shintoism does not demand the love of an all-powerful god. Therefore the question is invalid.
Yes, but supernatural does not have to necessarily include a god. Therefore, you can have a religion without a god, and therefore, once again, Socrates' question is irrelevant. Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism. These are all non-theistic religions that do not depend on love to or from a god.
If that is how you frame the debate, then so be it. But I don't.
If you are refering to the Christian religion (as this is the only theistic religion that I can claim to have any detailed knowledge of), you can engage is behavior that is moral by God's standards and still not be "saved". Not only that, but God recognizes that all men are sinful, and fall short of God's demands, but are still "rewarded" with heaven.
Hence, it is not moral behavior which is the issue, but one's belief in God. One will choose to behave in a moral fashion if one believes in God, but nothing says that only those who believe in God can act morally.
If you mean the context of "I make the rules of the universe and all things exist based on my will alone, even you," then it means everything.
If God, the objective ruler of all existance, tells you to kill someone, then is it murder, which is a legal definition.
If God, the objective ruler of all existance, tells you to kill someone, then is it murder, which is a legal definition? As one Christian apologist has said: "Does not the potter have the right over the clay, to make some vessels for noble uses and some for profane uses? Who are you, O man, to talk back to God?
And where do you get your information regarding the rape of Canaanite women? It's certainly not in the Bibles I have read.
That is a matter of perspective. If God is indeed real and makes up all the rules, then no, we are not.
I don't get how asking about the nature of the relationship between love and god reflects an arbitrary desire, but then I have not read the entire context of the text.
Not so much. From the DSM-IV, rationalization occurs "when the individual deals with emotional conflict or internal or external stressors by concealing the true motivations for his or her own thoughts, actions, or feelings throught the elaboration of reassuring or self-serving but incorrect explanations."
What you are forgetting is the factors included in reason in regards to moral questions include societal norms, ignorance of information, or even moral factors being raised.
As the famous question is posed, which is more moral: steal a drug to save a life, or refrain from theft and let the person die. These are moral questions, not just reasoned questions. How does one make a reasoned decision on which to base their behavior in this context? Both will have reasoned thoughts, none of which will be satisfactorily answer the moral dilema.
The same thing goes with larger issues. I need "X" from this group of people for my country to survive, however, they are refusing to trade in a manner that allows me to do so. Do I do nothing, causing my people to suffer, or kill them in order to secure what I need. Was the "coup" of the English colonies against Great Britain moral or immoral based on "reasoning". You will get several answers, depending on who you talk to, few of whom would call it "rationalizing".
It wouldn't be true in the definitive sense. We can argue wheter the reasons are valid or sound (as some people are wrong, not intentionally, but through lack of information), but to call it rationalization would be incorrect.
And yet that same God continued to support King David, because he "loves" him, in spite of his being a drunken,deceitful, traitorous, injust, possibly bisexual, adulterous murderer......who really knew how to repent.:lol:
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
[FONT=arial,helvetica] Admit impediments. Love is not love[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]Which alters when it alteration finds,[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] Or bends with the remover to remove:[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]O no! it is an ever-fixed mark[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] That looks on tempests and is never shaken;[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]It is the star to every wandering bark,[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] Within his bending sickle's compass come:[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] But bears it out even to the edge of doom.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica]If this be error and upon me proved,[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] I never writ, nor no man ever loved.[/FONT]
[FONT=arial,helvetica] William Shakespeare [/FONT]
the only type of love worth having is unconditional love, goes for religion as well as life.
SensibleManiac
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So then I could kill someone and say that God told me to and I would be right?
Let's add that I was on LSD and hallucinating that god told me to kill, is that your idea of morality?
According to your post, that's morality.
Your post proves that what you are saying is wrong.
Emotion, societal norms, and ignorance can not be used as excuses for a crime in a court of law, what are you saying that God would approve of what we know is wrong in a court of law.
If someone was a rapist, then claims he was brought up in a culture that has no respect for women, is that an excuse for his immoral behaviour?
If someone claimed he didn't know it was wrong to rape and murder because his mother taught him it was right since he was a child, does that mean it's moral for him to behave that way?
This is rationalization, (I didn't know any better,) it won't hold up in a court of law and definitely can't be confused as being moral.
Many criminals rationalize after the fact that they were right, they're just trying to find reasons to justify their actions, which BTW has absolutely nothing to do with being rational, and using reason. If they were using reason they would not have commited those crimes to begin with.
And that my friends is why I am a huge proponent of reason.
We don't need to become vulcans, we can still have emotion and especially love and compassion, we just don't need to be enslaved by our emotions.
You know, when I read this I wasn't sure if you were making a joke or not. But I'll take you at your word.
No, I did not say that just because you said or even believed that God told you to kill someone then it would be all right. Neither did I say that ingesting a hallucinagenic drug would make the act of killing someone moral because they believed God spoke to them.
What I said was that if the actual God of the universe, arbiter of all that is right and wrong, orders you to kill someone, then by it's very nature the act is the right one.
Since when did we begin to speak about the law? Not only that, but what does the law have to do with morality? Are you telling me that if I don't wear a motorcycle helmet in a state that requres it that I am then an immoral person. Not only that, but since some states require motorcycle helmets and some do not, does that mean that one state's law are moral and the other's are not?
But to continue on your irrelevant tangent, what if it is perfectly all right in a country to commit what we in the U.S. would call spousal rape, as they do in some Middle Eastern countries? Are they moral or immoral people? According to your argument, they are moral because they haven't violated any laws.
We don't allow stoning in this country because it would be against the Constitution's Eighth Amendment. But some countries do. Which country is the moral one? On what basis do you make the claim that one is more moral then the other.
By the way, laws are often based on societal norms.
Who says that it's immoral? Is it based on your personal beliefs? Mine? The collective moral belief of the United States? Morality is a culturally based concept.
It's funny, because unless you believe in an over-arching power which controls the universe, there can be no reasoned hypothesis that something is objectively immoral, only subjectively so. You can base it on some type of Utilitarianism philosophy, but even then what is most utilitarian will be subject to debate depending on your goal.
Besides, even in your argument, one's actions still would not negate the laws of this country just because one thinks one's actions are moral.
Once again, you are equating morallity with the law, or even more precise, you are advocating that violating the law is immoral. To that end, you are saying that all laws are moral. So I guess Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was an immoral man.
Rationalization occurs when there is an inner emotional conflict, as I said before and you conveinently disregarded. If a person truely believes that what they did was correct action, then there is no need for rationalization because there is not internal emotional conflict.
Once again, seeing as how you have come to equate the law with morallity, I can easily show how slavery, segregation, and the lynching of free black men are moral, because it was legal.
This is actually a point that I can agree with you. We shouldn't be slaves to our emotions, and we should use reason. My point, though, is that reason is not the objective standard that you seem to say that it is, and can be flawed / limited based on limited knowledge / understanding and cultural standards.
SensibleManiac
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Ok, believe it or not I agree with you about the law and morality, the two are separate on most levels.
That is not my point.
My point is that the law is loosely based around morality AND many other factors. However a COURT of law depends on evidence and not loose ideas that people have, which I will get to in a second.
BTW the argument you make about morality being subjective is crazy,lol.
Ok, it's very true that what people regard as moral is subjective and culturally dependant but that doesn't make morality on a level that we can develop truly subjective.
It's completely idiotic, (and many would argue a liberal viewpoint) that the law is subjective. Which I'm not sure if you are arguing, (I understand that you are arguing that morality is subjective.
So if my culture thinks it's right to kill infidels then you believe that morally I'm right?
That's ridiculous.
It's immoral and just becauee some cultures have rididulous views of morality then that doesn't make them right (ours included.)
Now on to my point,
So since the (actual) God of the universe, BTW does this refer to only our universe or others as well, do they have other gods? Where is your proof, Oh I forgot, you for some reason don't need any, because accordng to billcihak's argument, god is above and beyond nature.
So my simple question is, if we have no way of relating to God, because he is completely above nature, then how are we ever to understand that he's ordering us to do anything?
How would he order us and how are we supposed to know, BTW most people who are hallucinating be it because of madness or drugs aren't able to tell the difference between their hallucination and reality.
So how would they know, according to your thinking, they are right to think anything and do anything sfter all according to your above sentence they are right because they believe the are doing gods will, just like terrorists, right???
Wrong, in reality we can base our morality on logic, does this mean we'll have all the answers, probably not, but we're way better off than subjective cultural norms.
When based on logic and well being, we get alot further in terms of progress and sanity than anything else seems to be able to bring us
BTW if there are many typos, sorry I'm typing as fast as possible because I'm pressed for time.
That is not my point.
My point is that the law is loosely based around morality AND many other factors. However a COURT of law depends on evidence and not loose ideas that people have, which I will get to in a second.
BTW the argument you make about morality being subjective is crazy,lol.
Ok, it's very true that what people regard as moral is subjective and culturally dependant but that doesn't make morality on a level that we can develop truly subjective.
It's completely idiotic, (and many would argue a liberal viewpoint) that the law is subjective. Which I'm not sure if you are arguing, (I understand that you are arguing that morality is subjective.
So if my culture thinks it's right to kill infidels then you believe that morally I'm right?
That's ridiculous.
It's immoral and just becauee some cultures have rididulous views of morality then that doesn't make them right (ours included.)
Now on to my point,
So since the (actual) God of the universe, BTW does this refer to only our universe or others as well, do they have other gods? Where is your proof, Oh I forgot, you for some reason don't need any, because accordng to billcihak's argument, god is above and beyond nature.
So my simple question is, if we have no way of relating to God, because he is completely above nature, then how are we ever to understand that he's ordering us to do anything?
How would he order us and how are we supposed to know, BTW most people who are hallucinating be it because of madness or drugs aren't able to tell the difference between their hallucination and reality.
So how would they know, according to your thinking, they are right to think anything and do anything sfter all according to your above sentence they are right because they believe the are doing gods will, just like terrorists, right???
Wrong, in reality we can base our morality on logic, does this mean we'll have all the answers, probably not, but we're way better off than subjective cultural norms.
When based on logic and well being, we get alot further in terms of progress and sanity than anything else seems to be able to bring us
BTW if there are many typos, sorry I'm typing as fast as possible because I'm pressed for time.
I would say that he makes himself known when he has to. You'll know it when he wants you to know it.
