That old Euthyphro thing

[Von Smith]

Not really; I don't agree the men in these cities were POW's, but combatants.

*blinks*

POWs *are* combatants, or at least, former combatants. Any combatant who falls into the enemy's power no longer currently able or willing to fight (whether through injury, illness, forcible disarmament or surrender) is a POW.

After siegeworks break through the defenses, there's always a battle. Noone stands there and surrenders. The Lord delivers in this immediate context, 'If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, (lay siege to that city. 13 When the LORD your God delivers it )into your hand, put to the sword all the men..' When the siege is over, not the battle, God says kill only the men. The reason He says this is to distinguish between the conduct towards the cities promised (i.e, wipe out everything, animals, women and children) and the unpromised ones (kill just the men, take as spoil everything else). IMO, even if they were taken as POW's, and I think the text clearly doesn't say this, God still has the right over human life.

Unless you are assuming that every defender remains able-bodied and fights to the death, that there are none incapacitated by injury or illness before being taken hors de combat, or who get disarmed and overpowered while they are still alive, or who individually throw down their arms and sue for quarter when they realize the game is up, then what you describe still entails killing prisoners of war.

And the excuse: 'God still has the right over human life' basically amounts to abandoning any attempt to defend the position that God has a consistent moral standard for treating prisoners of war, which was the issue I originally raised; you're just saying it's OK that He doesn't.

[Von Smith]

Well, the nations around Israel practiced very cruel torture techniques and pagan ceremonies that included horrid and gruesome deaths. One has only to study the practices of these surrounding nations such as Assyria which was an extremely cruel nation, their inscriptions talk about flaying their enemies alive as well as making hills out of the skulls of their victims. Other cultures around Israel would stoke flames underneath a giant metal statue that had its hands outstretched over the flames with the palms together almost as if cradling water in them. However, after these hands would get red/white hot... mothers would throw their infants into the partially cupped hands where these babies would fry and sizzle to death shrieking in agony as they died.

So when God gave rules for the nation of Israel to reference during a time of war with these pagan nations and how to handle these warrior nation's captives when Israel didn’t have a standing army but a civilian army is very rational and moral.

Appealing to social expedience and to what everybody else is doing ought to be irrelevant, if morality really comes from God, as opposed to simply being based on, well, social expedience and what everybody else is doing.

Not only that, but what standard of evil is Von and others using? One only has to listen to the student questioner at Harvard trying to ask a similar question (of sorts) of Ravi Zacharias to totally destroy the main premise behind Von’s and others points (its only 8-minutes long… listen to it):

http://religiopoliticaltalk.blogspot...-argument.html

Do you get it? They are borrowing from the Judeo-Christian ethic to disprove said Judeo-Christian ethic.

That there is such a thing as a consistent "Judeo-Christian ethic" is precisely the contention I am questioning. What is the Judeo-Christian ethic concerning the treatment of prisoners of war, and how does it jibe with what God is supposed to have proscribed in Deuteronomy 20?

[Red Wine]

*blinks*

POWs *are* combatants, or at least, former combatants. Any combatant who falls into the enemy's power no longer currently able or willing to fight (whether through injury, illness, forcible disarmament or surrender) is a POW.

Dead people are no longer currently able to fight. You're overlaying a modern view onto the text.

Unless you are assuming that every defender remains able-bodied and fights to the death, that there are none incapacitated by injury or illness before being taken hors de combat, or who get disarmed and overpowered while they are still alive, or who individually throw down their arms and sue for quarter when they realize the game is up, then what you describe still entails killing prisoners of war.

And the excuse: 'God still has the right over human life' basically amounts to abandoning any attempt to defend the position that God has a consistent moral standard for treating prisoners of war, which was the issue I originally raised; you're just saying it's OK that He doesn't.

I'm assuming nothing, I'm going by the text. The phrase 'POW' is used by you exclusively, not the text. The onus is on you to prove by the text. I've set my reasons out (above), and they gel with the text. You haven't. 'POW' is an idea born of the 20th Cent. I don't see this idea in the text (in fact, I've given good explanation against, using the text), and nor do I see the Geneva Convention.

Are you honestly wanting ancient Hebrew texts to conform to your understanding of war? You're entitled to your opinion of course, but scholars and others probably won't take your view seriously.

[Von Smith]

Obviously you do not wish to have a dialogue. Maybe a monologue is what you are looking for.

You aren't in a position to fault other posters for not answering questions, though, are you.

In post #46 of this thread, I responded to your post #45. In that response, I posed six questions, not one of which you have addressed, and three of which you would have had to read past and decide to ignore before coming to any mention of prisoners of war. I also asked you a question in another thread (the Gym Debate commentary thread regarding the argument from reason) which you haven't responded to, either.

[Red Wine]

[Red Wine]

Off to sleep, perchance to dream :)

[Von Smith]

Dead people are no longer currently able to fight. You're overlaying a modern view onto the text.

It's not a "modern view" that not all combatants are killed outright in combat, that some get injured, fall ill, get overpowered and disarmed, or throw down their weapons and beg for mercy. These things always happen in war. Do you deny that Deuteronomy 20 gives the Israelites a mandate to slaughter the wounded, and to grant no quarter to any who threw down their weapons and asked for it? It is my understanding that such acts are *morally* reprehensible. Do you disagree?

I'm assuming nothing, I'm going by the text.

So am I. And unless you are claiming that every male defender is always killed outright in combat, the things I describe above will always happen. So you will always have POWs, and you won't be able to put every male to the sword unless you kill them, too.

The phrase 'POW' is used by you exclusively, not the text. The onus is on you to prove by the text. I've set my reasons out (above), and they gel with the text. You haven't. 'POW' is an idea born of the 20th Cent. I don't see this idea in the text (in fact, I've given good explanation against, using the text), and nor do I see the Geneva Convention.

I know you don't see the Geneva conventions. That is precisely the problem. Why *don't* you see the Geneva Conventions, if:

1) there is a moral imperative to treat the people we now designate as POWs humanely;

2) moral imperatives come from God, and

3) God's moral principles are unchanging?

The people who created the Geneva Conventions didn't see themselves as just arbitrarily changing some speed limits or something. They saw the conventions as embodying compelling *moral* norms, norms binding to and applicable to all humanity, norms that any civilized society ought to follow and enforce. Were they wrong? Are you taking the position that humane treatment of combatants who fall hors de combat is just some newfangled PC liberal thing, like allowing gay marriages or abolishing slavery? That it carries no moral obligation that anyone professing a Judaeo-Christian ethic is compelled to follow?

Earlier, I said that no Christian I had discussed this with had ever successfully reconciled three considerations:

1) God really said those things attributed to him in the Bible;

2) It's morally unacceptable to slaughter prisoners of war and take their women, and

3) God's moral standards don't change arbitrarily.

It sounds to me like your solution is simply to reject point 2). Is that correct?

Are you honestly wanting ancient Hebrew texts to conform to your understanding of war?

Not at all, but then I'm not the one who thinks there's anything particularly morally authoritative about those texts, or that moral principles are any less manmade constructs than are legal designations.

[seang200]

What is the Judeo-Christian ethic concerning the treatment of prisoners of war, and how does it jibe with what God is supposed to have proscribed in Deuteronomy 20?

There is no religious ethic for treating prisoners of war outside of Natural Law. You are imposing the micro onto the macro and then debating it as if it is a macro. Deut is not prescriptive, it is descriptive. Descriptive of a certain period in time with certain cultures involved. If you say that that treatment is wrong by applying your 21st century views onto that time-period and culture, then Darwinism is wrong because Darwin was a patriarchal racist.

O.T. - not prescriptive, it is a description of history.

Quran - is prescriptive and every cultural edict is continued to this day, which is why the Middle-East is stuck in the seventh-century.

You are setting up straw-men and then whacking at them.

[Von Smith]

There is no religious ethic for treating prisoners of war outside of Natural Law.

What is the ethic within Natural Law, then, and is it consistent with the instructions in Deuteronomy 20?

You are imposing the micro onto the macro and then debating it as if it is a macro. Deut is not prescriptive, it is descriptive.

Rubbish. God is clearly telling His people what to do, not simply commenting on what they do.

Descriptive of a certain period in time with certain cultures involved. If you say that that treatment is wrong by applying your 21st century views onto that time-period and culture, then Darwinism is wrong because Darwin was a patriarchal racist.

So, you are opting to reject statement 2) as well. It isn't really morally unacceptable to kill prisoners of war; it's just one of those trendy PC liberal things. I'll remember that the next time some theist tries to convince me of the ills of moral relativism, and try to sell me the "atheism leads to the Holocaust" schtick.

O.T. - not prescriptive, it is a description of history.

Right, so the ten commandments aren't prescriptive. Got it.

Quran - is prescriptive and every cultural edict is continued to this day, which is why the Middle-East is stuck in the seventh-century.

You are setting up straw-men and then whacking at them.

[seang200]

What is the ethic within Natural Law, then, and is it consistent with the instructions in Deuteronomy 20?




Rubbish. God is clearly telling His people what to do, not simply commenting on what they do.




So, you are opting to reject statement 2) as well. It isn't really morally unacceptable to kill prisoners of war; it's just one of those trendy PC liberal things. I'll remember that the next time some theist tries to convince me of the ills of moral relativism, and try to sell me the "atheism leads to the Holocaust" schtick.



Right, so the ten commandments aren't prescriptive. Got it.

Well, the nations around Israel practiced very cruel torture techniques and pagan ceremonies that included horrid and gruesome deaths. One has only to study the practices of these surrounding nations such as Assyria which was an extremely cruel nation, their inscriptions talk about flaying their enemies alive as well as making hills out of the skulls of their victims. Other cultures around Israel would stoke flames underneath a giant metal statue that had its hands outstretched over the flames with the palms together almost as if cradling water in them. However, after these hands would get red/white hot... mothers would throw their infants into the partially cupped hands where these babies would fry and sizzle to death shrieking in agony as they died.

So when God gave rules for the nation of Israel to reference during a time of war with these pagan nations and how to handle these warrior nation's captives when Israel didn’t have a standing army but a civilian army is very rational and moral.

Not only that, but what standard of evil is Von and others using? One only has to listen to the student questioner at Harvard trying to ask a similar question (of sorts) of Ravi Zacharias to totally destroy the main premise behind Von’s and others points (its only 8-minutes long… listen to it):

http://religiopoliticaltalk.blogspot...-argument.html

Do you get it? They are borrowing from the Judeo-Christian ethic to disprove said Judeo-Christian ethic.

The Ten Commandments are different than how Israel should wage war in order to survive when attacked by people who are worse than the Third Reich. Did we (our current culture) put the Nazi doctors and leaders to death? Same idea here.

The Ten Commandments are imbued in the idea that if you rape and pillage (fillet people while they are still alive or burn infants to death), expect to meet death as justice.

Are you saying putting the Nazi Doctors to death was morally wrong?

Stay on course. I let you know whom God told Israel to kill if captured during battle. that was an edict for a certain time and place that used some concepts mentioned in the 10-Commandments. The 10-Commandments are for not only a specific time and place but also for our time. So the rules of engagement we use today would incorporate some of the 10-Commandments as they are the basis for Natural Law, which was used in writing the treaties we signed in regards to this.

if you do not know much about natural law, Finnis or Robert P. George are two authors that are a great place to start.

Do you live in the United States? If you do, you should care enough about the Constitution to understand the theology as well as the philosophy behind it.

[shunyadragon]

The Ten Commandments are different than how Israel should wage war in order to survive when attacked by people who are worse than the Third Reich. Did we (our current culture) put the Nazi doctors and leaders to death? Same idea here.

The Ten Commandments are imbued in the idea that if you rape and pillage (fillet people while they are still alive or burn infants to death), expect to meet death as justice.

Are you saying putting the Nazi Doctors to death was morally wrong?

Stay on course. I let you know whom God told Israel to kill if captured during battle. that was an edict for a certain time and place that used some concepts mentioned in the 10-Commandments. The 10-Commandments are for not only a specific time and place but also for our time. So the rules of engagement we use today would incorporate some of the 10-Commandments as they are the basis for Natural Law, which was used in writing the treaties we signed in regards to this.

if you do not know much about natural law, Finnis or Robert P. George are two authors that are a great place to start.

That also includes the killing of every woman, child and infant, oh and all animals on some cases, and rape of the women on others.

Do you live in the United States? If you do, you should care enough about the Constitution to understand the theology as well as the philosophy behind it.

If the Constitution was based on Biblical law, slavery would be legal, rape would only apply to certain cases, and we would be publically stoning violators according to ancient Jewish Law.

[seang200]

If the Constitution was based on Biblical law,

It is based on the Ten Commandments in that they are the basis for Natural Law. Not to mention the understanding of the Founders of where much of their thinking... for example:

The Founders Sources

• George Washington pointed out that the two foundations for political prosperity in America were religion and morality, and that no one could be called an American patriot who attempted to separate politics from its two foundations: “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion [the Christian faith, denomination] and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim tribute of patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars.”

• In 1811 a court made a ruling, which was subsequently cited by the U.S. Supreme Court. That court declared: “Whatever strikes at the root of Christianity tends manifestly to the dissolution of civil government.”

Our Founding Fathers delivered to us a system of government, which has enjoyed unprecedented success: we are now the world’s longest on-going constitutional republic. Two hundred years[+] under the same document – and under one form of government – is an accomplishment unknown among contemporary nations. For example, Russia, Italy, France, and other nations underwent revolutions about the same time as the American Revolution, but with very different results. Consider France: in the past 200 years it has gone through seven completely different forms of government; Italy is now in its 51st; yet we are still in our first.

Where, then, did our Founding Fathers acquire the ideas that produced such longevity? Other nations certainly had access to what our Founders utilized yet evidently chose not to. From what sources did our Founders choose their ideas? An important question!

Political science professors at the University of Houston asked this very same question. They rightfully felt that they could determine the source of the Founders’ ideas if they could collect writings from the Founding Era and see whom the Founders were quoting.

The researchers assembled 15,000 writings from the Founding Era – no small sample – and searched those writings. That project spanned ten years; but at the end of that time, the researchers had isolated 3,154 direct quotes made by the Founders and had identified the source of those quotes.

The researchers discovered that Baron Charles Montesquieu was the man quoted most often by the Founding Fathers, with 8.3 percent of the Founders’ quotes being taken from his writings. Sir William Blackstone was the second most-quoted individual with 7.9 percent of the Founders’ quotes, and John Locke was third with 2.9 percent. Not surprisingly, the researchers discovered that the Founders quoted directly out of the Bible 4 times more often than they quoted Montesquieu, 4 times more often than they quoted Blackstone, and 12 times more often than they quoted John Locke. Thirty-four percent of the Founders’ quotes came directly out of the Bible.

The study was even more impressive when the source of the ideas used by Montesquieu, Blackstone, and Locke were identified. Consider, for example, the source of Blackstone’s ideas. Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws was first introduced in 1768, and for the next 100 years America’s courts quoted Blackstone’s to settle disputes, to define words, and to examine procedure; Blackstone’s Commentaries were the final word in the Supreme Court. So what was a significant source of Blackstone’s ideas? Perhaps the best answer to that question can be given through the life of Charles Finney.



Charles Finney is known as a famous revivalist, minister, and preacher from one of America's greatest revivals; the Second Great Awakening in the early 1800’s. Finney, in his autobiography, spoke of how he received his call to ministry. He explained that – having determined to become a lawyer (then a noble position) – he, like all other law students at the time, commenced the study of Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws.

Finney observed that Blackstone’s Commentaries not only provided the laws, it also provided the Biblical concepts on which those laws were based. Finney explained that in the process of studying Blackstone’s, he read so much of the Bible that he became a Christian and received his call to ministry.

Therefore, while 34 percent of the Founders’ quotes came directly out of the Bible, many of their quotes were taken from men – like Blackstone – who had used the Bible to arrive at their conclusions. So the percentage is much higher.

Numerous components of our current government can be shown – through those early writings – to have their source in Biblical concepts. For example: the concept for the three branches of government can be found in Isaiah 33:32; the logic for the separation of powers was based on Jeremiah 19:9; the basis for tax exemptions for churches was found in Ezra 7:24; and on and on!

Whether you like it or not, this is a nation founded on and defined with the Judeo-Christian moral philosophy realized. The further you reject this philosophy as a whole, the closer you get to the guillotine of the French revolution.

Bibliography

Donald S. Lutz, The Origins of American Constitutionalism (Louisiana State Univ. Press; 1988);

David Barton, Original Intent: The Courts, the Constitution, & Religion (WallBuilders Press; 1997).

http://www.light1998.com/Guillotine_Execution2.htm

[Von Smith]

The Ten Commandments are different than how Israel should wage war in order to survive when attacked by people who are worse than the Third Reich. Did we (our current culture) put the Nazi doctors and leaders to death? Same idea here.

OK, so we've gone from trying to deny that Deuteronomy 20 actually prescribes any course of action to rationalizing the course of action it prescribes. It's OK to summarily kill prisoners of war as long as we can pass them off as "bad people".

The Ten Commandments are imbued in the idea that if you rape and pillage (fillet people while they are still alive or burn infants to death), expect to meet death as justice.

Unless of course you're an Israelite. Then it's OK.

Are you saying putting the Nazi Doctors to death was morally wrong?

The appropriate analog would be: Would it be morally wrong to summarily slaughter *all* German males?

Stay on course. I let you know whom God told Israel to kill if captured during battle. that was an edict for a certain time and place that used some concepts mentioned in the 10-Commandments. The 10-Commandments are for not only a specific time and place but also for our time. So the rules of engagement we use today would incorporate some of the 10-Commandments as they are the basis for Natural Law, which was used in writing the treaties we signed in regards to this.

How did you decide which bits of the Old Testament apply today, and which applied only to Israel at a specific time and place? And how is: "Well they only did it once and they've stopped" a defense of the actions described -excuse me, *prescribed* in Deuteronomy 20?

if you do not know much about natural law, Finnis or Robert P. George are two authors that are a great place to start.

OK, fair enough. But I note that when I gave a similar "Look it up yourself" answer to one of *your* questions, rather than spoon-feeding you the answer, you threw a hissy fit about my preferring a monologue to a dialogue.

Do you live in the United States? If you do, you should care enough about the Constitution to understand the theology as well as the philosophy behind it.

So, Deuteronomy 20 is part of the "theology as well as the philosophy" behind the Constitution? That would explain a lot about the current administration's policies.

[shunyadragon]

It is based on the Ten Commandments in that they are the basis for Natural Law. Not to mention the understanding of the Founders of where much of their thinking... for example:

The Bible did of course influence the founding fathers of our country and our constitution, but it is not based on the Bible. Our founding fathers included both Theists and Deists, like Jefferson, and Common Law of our Anglo-Saxon and Celtic origins, which predate Christianity is at the very foundation of our Constitution and Law. The form of government we chose is not Biblical, it shares more in common with the democracy of the Native American Iroquois Confederacy, who were represented at the Constitution Convention..

The 10 Commandments are not just the 10 Commandments, they part and partial with the Biblical law of Deuteronomy and Leviticus, which fortunately for us, does form the basis for our Constitution, form of government and Law.

Unfortunately because of our heritage, slavery was an unresolved issue, and we lacked guidance form the Bible to end it Constitutionally until after a bloody unnecessary war.

[Lenoxus]

If I may (although I realize that I don't have any official "power" here, thank goodness!) I would like to try to direct the thread back to my original question about the Euthyphro dilemma.

There's basically one question for theists I'm still curious about, and it would be this: Does the "moral value" of any given action (its goodness or badness) ever depend on its consequences for the actor? To put it in a more concrete sense, if a (we'll say male) person harms another, and himself suffers no consequences for having done so, can he still be said to have done something "wrong"?