Alonzo Fyfe

The same primative tribes cited as an authority for their wisdom in declaring murder and theft immoral, also declared it immoral to collect interest on loans -- unless those loans were made to foreigners. (Leviticus 25:36,37; Ezekiel 18:8,13,17)

It demands capital punishment for work on the sabbath. But on the seventh day there shall be to you an holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the LORD: whosoever doeth work therein shall be put to death. (Exodus 35:2)

Other capital crimes include swearing, and attempting to promote a religion other than Christianity (passages that justified such historical attrocities as the Crusades and the Inquisition). It sanctions slavery, giving rules as to who may and who may not be enslaved and the proper treatment of slaves.

Clearly, it is the case that not everything forbidden in the bible is indeed wrong. Prohibitions against mixing crops betray the agricultural ignorance of those who were responsible with the creation of the bible, just as prohibitions on usury betray a primative understanding of economics. We now know better, and count these restrictions as mistakes.

Each clear-thinking individual must look at each listed crime and determine if it is to be case into the same category as murder and rape (moral issues that the bible got right) or in the same category as slavery, usury, and working on the sabbath (moral issues that the bible got wrong).

Condemnation of homosexuality falls into the latter category -- moral issues that the bible got wrong. They were written by people who had a primative understanding of psychology, and in their ignorance responded to their tendency to hate, fear, and even kill those who they did not understand.

It is an element of primative barbarianism that we should have progressed out of long ago.

yguy

Obviously you have no idea what "Chrisitanity" in the latter days of the Roman Empire looked like. Therefore, you have no way of knowing if they actually followed Christ's commandments. When you have evidence that they did, we'll have some fodder for discussion. As it is, a dispassionate assessment of your argument leads me to the tenatative conclusion that you are taking disingenuous advantage of the semantics of the situation, in the same way that some absurdly argue that Hitler was a Christian because he gave some of its tenets lip service.

The thread is about homosexaulity, and homosexuality is about
compulsion, just as gluttony is. To talk about an aberrant behavior without considering what motivates it is like discussing celestial mechanics exclusive of the influence of gravity.

So it was Christianity that brought down the Roman Empire?

I haven't made such an assertion. I merely pointed out that nominal Christianity is meaningless if the same behaviors that happened before conversion continue after it.

If we were arguing about gluttony, and you weighed 500 pounds and were defensive about your problem, I couldn't give you any credible (to you) reasons either. If you know what homosexual activity is, and think it is benign, there is no amount of reasoning that will convince you - and I don't intend to try.

yguy

Baloney. Those of us who find homosexuality aberrant don't do so on a Biblical basis. The Bible in this case only confirms what we know.

yguy

I don't guess Nazi Germany was doing all that badly before the Allies kicked their asses either.

More to the point, though, is that you obviously have no idea how well S&G were doing before they got divinely nuked.

The more self-indulgent you are, the less able you are to say no to whoever supports that self-indulgence, whether it's, your girlfriend, your pusher, or your politician. They can hardly help but take more and more advantage of you. Given enough years, it is possible to breed a large segment of the population which is entirely parasitic, and which will submit to whoever promises the most goodies or the least hardship.

Dr Rick

How is it that neither you nor the other poster can "have no idea what 'Christianity' in the latter days of the Roman Empire looked like," but you can know enough about Rome's "if it feels good do it mentality" to ascibe it to the empire's fall? If you don't know what the religion "looked like" back then, how can you know so much about the "complacency" and "mentality" that "corrupted the populace?"

So then a thread about heterosexuality would also be "about compulsion, just as gluttony is?"

"If you know what heterosexual activity is, and think it is benign, there is no amount of reasoning that will convince you."

yguy

My view on this is based on reading I did on the subject years ago, and I've forgotten most of the details. Until someone provides evidence that the fall of Rome had some other cause, I'm sticking with the program. As to the general principle, an entity can only be as strong as those sub-entities of which it is composed; therefore, if an empire attains world dominance and then declines, it is reasonable to attribute such a decline to a fault in its populace.

If you refer to heterosexual activity outside of marriage, that would be correct.

Odemus

Sticking your penis in another guys butt is just plain gross.

That's my philisophical contribution.

The Naked Mage

Those vile Sodomites and their conquest of neighboring Poland! Those fiendish Gamorrans and their campaign of ethnic cleansing!


Oh, OBviously! <snort, snort> And...you do?

(I can tell I'm gonna get a lot of use out of that smilie.)


Okay.


Jesus, whatever happened to the Burden of Proof? "My assertion that the twelve-year stalemate/quagmire in Vietnam was due to reality-warping star vampires is based on reading I did on the subject which may or may not have been while I was sober years ago, and needless to say, I don't remember a lick. But until one of you proves me sorely mistaken, I'm sticking by my theory."

yguy

The presumption here, evidently is that these people did nothing beyond what we now call sodomy. Such a presumption has no basis in fact.

No, but I have made no characterization of S&G's viability. You have.

It is a common misperception that he who asserts bears the burden of proof. The truth, of course, is that the burden of proof falls upon him who accepts the burden. In this case, I don't accept it at this time, because I don't think proving it would make any difference to my adversaries here.

Dr Rick

Statements such as these don't do much for one's credibility, particularly for one who has very little already.

Why even bother posting here? You're not promoting your beliefs or opinions; all you are doing is inviting ridicule.