Johnny Skeptic

Old Testament Jews killed their own people for working on the Sabbath Day, for cursing at their parents, and for practicing the freedom of religion by worshipping other Gods. That was immoral.

sschlichter

This is a bad basis of morality. The law changes. It was law to kill Jews in Germany at one time. It is legal to kill babies in our nation by injecting them with saline or twisting their head off while they are being born. An evil people make up evil laws.

Your answer is both inaccurate and immoral.

Inaccurate because the current law states that those who commit crimes lose their freedom. they are imprisoned , sometimes for life. this is the law and it is the same thing as slavery except it is to the state.

Immoral because what you are suggesting perverts justice. A law of a democracy is simply the will of the majority. When the majority are wrong (such as in the case of slavery in America) then the law is immoral.

~Steve

Johnny Skeptic

Message to sschlicter: Old Testament Jews killed their own people for working on the Sabbath Day, for cursing at their parents, and for practicing the freedom of religion by worshipping other Gods. That was immoral.

Perhaps you would like to argue that at one time, it was moral for people to do anything that they wanted to do since they did not know any better.

I invite you to make post in my thread at http://www.freeratio.org/showthread.php?t=260062 at the General Religious Discussions Forum that is titled "The God of the Bible is not moral."

Sheshbazzar

Perhaps in the most primitive and unrestrained form of "democracy".
It needs pointed out however, that democracy as it is understood and practiced in the modern world, most certainly does not work in that fashion,
being so constrained as to provide for the protection of the rights of, and of certain privileges of minorities.
Thus, there are thousands of U.S. Federal Laws, and various state laws on The Books, that are absolutely in opposition to "the will of the majority".
A legal decision arrived at and consented to, by seven U.S. Supreme Court Justices, overrules the will of any other majority.

But returning to the subject of slavery and of morality Steve.
Under Old Testement Law, certain women, and those children that are born to them in slavery, are granted as being the permanent property of their slave-owner master, to be inherited by that slave-owners children, and by implication, to remain as a permanent slave class forever.
(or at least for as long as the nation of Israel is permitted to remain, and to live by its own perfect Laws.)
There is no provision within the The Law, for any slave being so born into slavery, or being so held, to be assured of, or granted any opportunity to freedom.
(other than that single one provided by the suffering of a disfiguring, debilitating injury directly inflicted by the slave-owner)

Not contrasting with the practices of other contemporary nations, (for after all, the god of Israel was, and is, proclaimed to be far above their levels,- and even ours) Does it seem entirely reasonable and moral to you, that a people should be so held in a state of powerless and permanent slavery generation after generation, for hundreds of years on end, through no fault of their own, other than suffering the misfortune of being born into slavery?

Exciter

Didn't Jesus change all the OT laws? Didn't Paul say Gentiles didn't need to obey Jewish laws?

I don't doubt this entirely, but the Nazis saw Jews as the reason Germany lost WWI and and saw Jews as the reason WWII was started. Killing all the Jews was seen as the only way the Nazis saw as preventing more German deaths and the economic depression caused by WWI and it's aftermath on the Germans.

Wouldn't this be the same as the Israelis killing the Hittites, or the US Army's bombing of Japan?

When you were running around with bullets and hand gernades who was it that the US Army was training you to believe was the enemy? Wouldn't you want to kill them as quickly and efficently as possible with the least threat to your own life?


Since when? Being a man, I must admit that I have never had an abortion. I feel it would be immoral if people are actually being killed like that while being born, and it should not be supported.

What would be the alternative to preventing unwanted births? Don't get me wrong, I know several methods to prevent unwanted births, but someone somewhere could say it's immoral. Do you believe life begins at conception?

You probably think homosexuality is immoral, but what about unmarried men and women, is it immoral for them to have sex without being married?

What about Islamic or Hindus? Since they don't believe in Jesus as God, are they immoral for having sex outside a Christian marriage?


Was the US government evil when they dropped bombs on Hiroshima?


It's not like the slavery in the Bible we have discussed though. You mentioned that a theif could be sold, unless he could pay back double what he stole, should we allow rich people to be able to murder if human life becomes equated in dollars?
How was slavery in America any less moral than the slavery in the Bible in your veiw?

arnoldo mentioned that slavery during Biblical times was somewhat due to the agriculture economy of the time, so was the slavery in America.

sugarhitman [lol] preached "eveybody has to serve something", but I see he gets all bent out of shape over the African slaves that served his Christian brethern slave owners in America and considers it immoral.

You mentioned people who stole or who were conquered being made to become slaves, how is that any different then the African tribes who sold other Africans they conquered or who were thieves into slaves for the agriculture economy of America?

Johnny Skeptic

Sure, and dictators like the God of the Bible arbitrarily rule by "might makes right."

sschlichter

and over time, the majority elects those who replace the judges, which is how justice is in the hands of the majority.

You are confused on what the slavery of foreigners looked like. It was true it was a jugment against them (both being killed and being slaves). that was the reason the Jews were even sent into the land anyway.

(Deut 9:1) Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan so you can dispossess the nations there, people greater and stronger than you who live in large cities with extremely high fortifications.
(Deut 9:2) They include the Anakites, a numerous and tall people whom you know about and of whom it is said, "Who is able to resist the Anakites?"
(Deut 9:3) Understand today that the LORD your God who goes before you is a devouring fire; he will defeat and subdue them before you. You will dispossess and destroy them quickly just as he has told you.
(Deut 9:4) Do not think to yourself after the LORD your God has driven them out before you, "Because of my own righteousness the LORD has brought me here to possess this land." It is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is driving them out ahead of you.
(Deut 9:5) It is not because of your righteousness, or even your inner uprightness, that you have come here to possess their land. Instead, because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out ahead of you in order to confirm the promise he made on oath to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
(Deut 9:6) Understand, therefore, that it is not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is about to give you this good land as a possession, for you are a stubborn people!

However, if you look at an example if what the slavery of foreigners looked like, it is nothing like you describe.

Consider the Gibeonites:

(Jos 9:11) Our leaders and all who live in our land told us, 'Take provisions for your journey and go meet them. Tell them, "We are willing to be your subjects. Make a treaty with us." '

They became servants but it was unlawful for the Isrealites to break their oath wirth them, they were not allowed to be killed, they were not taken from their homes, no beatings, no raping. They were vassals. It is a role of submission but it was not unlike every other common life of the time.

sschlichter

I think you are finally understanding that God dictates right from wrong - that is what the tree of the knowlege of good and evil represents. God's right to be God and the one who discerns good from evil.

Exciter

So your God is like Adolph Hitler or Joseph Stalin then, very interesting.

sschlichter

[QUOTE=Exciter;5744324]No, Jesus did not change the laws.

exactly. They did not have the moral capacity to know right from wrong.

So, rounding up families and children from among your own citizenry and gassing them is the same as bombing a country that has declared war against you?

I am sure I am misunderstanding you.

yes, but if they are wrong then the blood of those killed is on my hands.

It is supported at the rate of over 1 million / year. Do you need pictures?

I think life could start at conception and it is immoral to kill those who might be human.

yes, it is immoral but no more immoral than it is to hate those that you feel are being immoral.

yes, but they are typically smart enough to know it without the law of Moses.

No, I do not think so.

No.

it was illegal to kidnap people and make them slaves. these are not people that were threatening to America, were near America. Anytime someone was kidnapped, harmed, raped, taken from family, branded, etc it was immoral.

because they were not at war, they were kidnapped. (Exo 21:16) "Whoever kidnaps someone and sells him, or is caught still holding him, must surely be put to death.

This was frowned upon in the OT and the NT.

(1 Tim 1:10) sexually immoral people, practicing homosexuals, kidnappers, liars, perjurers - in fact, for any who live contrary to sound teaching.