the fonz

After looking into stuff on the OT God killing the infants and just bad things in general (I really don't want to get off on specific instances)...
Like the usual Christian apologist will claim that yes, killing infants is bad, but god may have had a good reason for it. Therefore, it doesn't constitute a contradiction in God's character to kill infants and be morally perfect.
I agree with this. At times, it's possible to be morally justified in killing infants.
However, I think there is a presumption that the act of killing infants (or the command to) should be thought of as wrong unless there is good reason to think otherwise. This is because out of the set of possible circumstances one can be in, the number that allow the killing of infants is relatively low.

Stated more formally:

1. Out of the set of possible circumstances person A is in, the number that would morally allow killing infants is relatively low.
2. Person A commands the killing of infants.
3. Therefore, the act should be thought of as wrong unless proven otherwise.
4. There is no evidence to prove otherwise.
5. Therefore, the act that was done by person A is wrong.

This, I think, is a good sidestep for the Christian apologists who want to escape a certain instance from impinging on God's moral perfection. There is no maybe god had a good reason here.

I was going to add this argument on my website, but I saw a problem. Here it is.

Sure God out of the possible circumstances God could be in, the number that would allow the command are relatively low. However, God is more likely to come across these circumstances therefore, this reverses the a priori presumption this argument has.

God is more likely to come across these circumstances because of his high level of responsibilty. He is the ruler of the universe. So, he comes across the circumstances to allow things we would normally find morally repugnant. Therefore, this reverses the a priori presumption (or denies it, I can't figure out which).

Usually, I can find my own way out of problems like this. However, my knowledge of logic is rather limited.

So, does this objection render the entire approach inconclusive? Or does the objection confuse something?

Amaleq13

Shouldn't God's omniscience and omnipotence require that the killing of infants never be the only possible solution?

"god may have had a good reason for it" is special pleading and not a valid escape from the apparently immoral command.

I think you can word the first line MUCH more strongly than "relatively low". I can't imagine any circumstance where murdering infants constitutes the only moral option. Certainly not if I was omniscient and omnipotent.

Vinnie

This is just bad. For a valid attempt at sidestepping the conservative hermenuetic, go here.

I am glad you found your own objection against it at the end. It is flawed and you raised one very valid reason why. Let me offer critiques of other parts:

First I would challenge this. Sometimes in acts of war and so on it may be necessary and more humane to kill infants but God is omnipotent. Human soldiers are not. Major distinction. I am not so willing to allow that an omnipotent God could be morally justified in ordering the death of innocent children--especially not the literal biblical version.

Glenn Miller used similar thinking as you and I challenged this in my article Eradicating the Amalekites. Its short

This is completely arbitrary and unconvincing. Why shouldn't the presumption be innocent until proven guilty. Or how about "no judgment" until evidence comes through either way?

And the number of incidents where God is reported as ordering the killing of such infants is relatively low. What can you provide us with? About a half a dozen given the entire history of humanity?

This is a non-sequitur for the reasons mentioned previously and alos the fact that for number 4, that you do not posess any reason to prove otherwise does not make it so or not so. In an absence of evidence agnosticism is the prudent course.

Furthermore, to religionists, the fact that it is in the Bible and done by God --who by definition is incapable of evil--is proof enough that it was justifiable.


Vinnie

Magus55

Maybe if you have a warped understanding of omnipotence and don't balance God's omnipotence with His other divine attributes. Omnipotence does not have to mean able to do anything imaginable, nor does it have to supercede other divine characteristics.



Keeping the infants from growing up and spending a eternity in Hell because they would have inevitably turned evil and required punishment sounds like a good circumstance to me. What would be more important to you - keeping an infant alive to spend an eyeblink of time compared to eternity living in a purely corrupt and evil world, only to grow up and most likely turn evil themselves forcing judgement to be cast on them and have them spend eternity in Hell, or end their life prematurely and take them right to Heaven? Now we could get into the question of whether infants actually do automatically go to Heaven, which the Bible allows for, but doesn't make perfectly known, but most Christians believe they do.

Demosthenes

This thread seems to be appropriate for the MF&P forum.

Cheers

Vinnie

Maybe not never, but in the case of the Amalekites...

Time out pop-apologizer! I am sorry Mr. Laplace. Determinism is dead and "inevitably" so is your response.

Make my False Dilemma Fallacy to go, please. Thank you.

If Jesus had wanted Christians to so strongly believe little babies go to heaven don't you think he would have written about it in the Bible? Besides, being tainted by original guilt, babies do not consciously accept Jesus and thereby, are destined to hell. You may not agree with this but its what the doctrines teach when followed to their logical conclusion. Your subjective feelings cannot over-ride the infallible teachings of God. Sorry.

Vinnie

Amaleq13

Such a "warped" understanding of omnipotence is neither implied nor required by my comments. See below for an example of how a truly omnipotent God should never be forced to such a blatantly immoral extreme. Nice straw man, though.

Sounds to me like a less than credible attempt to rationalize OT infanticide attributed to one's God. It also sounds like it completely ignores the implications of such an act for such a reason. Clearly God has not shown the same "consideration" for the infant Hitler, the infant Saddam, or the infant Osama so that kind of makes God look a bit on the arbitrary side. Then again, I suppose you think Job should have been happy with the new family God gave him after allowing Satan to kill his old one?

"Inevitably" is contrary to the "free will" God has allegedly bestowed upon his creations so this excuse creates more problems than it fails to solve.

An omnipotent God could choose to whisk the infants away into happy homes where they could be raised to be good little worshipful Hebrews. This would avoid violating their free will and likely reduce the chances they would all grow up evil. All of which I would expect a truly omniscient God to know. What divine attributes are violated by this solution?

The only thing "warped" around here is the idea of trying to justify the murder of infants.

Doctor X

Read! Read!

--J.D.

Kuu

If Moses was alive today, and committed the acts that it is said in the Bible he did, he would tried for crimes against humanity for what did to the Midian boys and women in the name of his god.

I remember as a little girl being upset by a book of Bible stories I had. It showed a picture of Noah's Ark and it depiected people on top of mountains pleading for help. One of the women was carrying a baby. If I, as a little girl, could see something wrong with punishing little babies because they happen to be born into the 'wrong' family or crime - why can't Christians admit that even their god had no right to do such a thing.

Not that I ever believed that a god exists.

BDS

As God told Job:

'Where were you when I hung the stars in the sky."

We need some decent Christian apologists here, who, I'm confident, could answer these concerns. I'm not equipped to take up the battle for them, being an agnostic myself, but I you are all battling straw men.

In any event, "who can know the mind of God?" Also, why are infants any more deserving of God's mercy than anyone else?