a Meditation on "A Meditation God's Law"

[Spacefoetus]

For those wondering what I'm on about, this is a response to "A Meditiation on God's Law" which I posted a couple of days ago, and is an article written by an athiest I sortof, inter-know ("inter-know" as in, "know over the internet).

Couple of things to note before you read this:

1. I'm currently writing this down while listening to "I Am The Walrus". As I type John Lennon is crying "goo goo ga joob!", so my thoughts tend to get broken as I listen to music, and sentences may end strangly and some things probably won't make sense.

2. I'm no expert on philosophy, in fact it would be safe to say I know NOTHING about it, aside from a few things I've read here, an article I once scanned about Descartes Ontology and www.christiananswers.net explanation as to how we know God exists. Still though, I'm bored, until I get that girlfriend, what else do you want me to do? Revise for my exams?! hah.

3. I'll go all "Stephen King forward" on you now and tell you where I got these, probably unoriginal and boring thoughts. I came in for a Maths revision class today in school (I'm on study leave) ridiculously early- so I decided to walk about, looking for people in my year to talk to- sadly they'd come in at the right time, so I was stuck for an hour just walking about thinking. And somewhere, during the course of my thinking, this little train of thought started.

4. Well, my extended introduction is pretentious enough (as, is it just me, or is unsing the word "pretentious" pretty pretentious?) and I don't feel comfortable calling something a "meditation" as it makes what I'm writing sound all deep and stuff. so, from here on in, this thread will be known as "Philisophical Crap I Thought of One Day".

and oh yeah- http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/sh...d.php?t=113398 thats where the original "Meditation is"

anyway, here goes:

In "A Meditation on God's Law", the writer, philosophy student Gabreil Neil, puts forward the interesting idea that God's Law is not an absolute standard, rather it is God's opinion. He uses the case of Homosexuality, a hot topic today, to prove his point- Gabe rekons that its perfectly natural, a bi-product of human evolution, yet God belives its an abomination, unnatural and sinful.
Now right now, us (non-liberal) Christians are bound to say, "well, God's right, thats that, night night!", but reading on Gabe questions God's motives.
He (rightfully, in my opinion) claims that homosexuality causes no harm to others and is NOT detrimental to society, therefore he sees no reason why it should be wrong. He takes the point that murder is wrong because it harms people, stealing is wrong as it harms people and so on. Yet homosexuality harms no-one- why then can it legitimatly be called wrong?
He anticipates the expected Christian response that its harmful as it causes people to go to Hell- yet Gabe shows that this is wrong with his near blasphemous, yet guiltily humourous imaginary conversation with God.

"God: Don't do homosexual acts.

Human: Why not?

God: Because it is wrong.

Human: Why is that?

God: Because it is a universal law.

Human: And where did that universal law come from?

God: Me.

Human: So I shouldn't do it because you say so and will punish me if I do. It's not because there is anything harmful in it, you just don't like it.

God: Exactly! Now you're getting it!"

He argues that God's Laws are often arbitary, showing no real purpose and so His morality is bankrupt and shouldn't be followed.

I have heard this train of thought before, and apologists regularly try to conquer it by making claims such as "studies show that homosexuality causes more people to be child molesters!". Often, these claims are wrong, yet, even when they are correct, they don't apply to the norm. Its ridiculous to assume that all homosexuals will be child molesters- using that logic, we'd have to ban catholic priests! (no offence, Catholic Priests)
I believe that there is no need for apologists to do this to prove that God isn't some weird arbitary law maker.

Lets think about gabriels (and many others) view of morality- if it hurts others, or the perpetrator, then its immoral. Well, thats a slightly simplified version, as it would imply that PRISON is immoral, but you get the point.

And he seems to be right- fair enough, hes an atheist- he believes morality has evolved as a means of survival. How else can we judge right and wrong, but by how detrimental the effect is to human beings?

I believe Gabe is only scratching the surface of morality.

We can take what Gabe says about morality, agree with it, forget it, go out and party while the issue still has a little graze on the skin.

But I don't want to leave it at a graze. I want to perform surgery on the sucker.

Because its all well and good saying things are wrong because they harm people- but then we have to ask-

Why IS harming people harming people wrong?

Right now you're going "oh, Space Foetus, you ARE a retard!! Of course harming people is wrong!!"

am not going to dispute that,

But why?

The justification for calling things wrong is because it harms people- harming people=wrong

So why is harming people wrong? Well, we can only say "because it is". Wrong=wrong because....wrong=wrong.

Then what of God's opinion towards homosexuality? Its wrong....because its wrong. Why should He have to provide any more justification when we don't? Especially since He is far higher than us in wisdom.

I believe that THIS is how God decided morality- He created how he wanted it- yet allowed us go completely opposite to his original intentions. Why he did this? Thats another question for another thread, but in my opinion, this is how it went. What is "good" is what God originally intended. What is "bad" is what he didn't intend. Its as simple as that.

I believe that we naturally WANT to do what God wants- that is why we have a sense of morality. It is also why we will often obey our moral instinct when it collides with personal interests. It is also why when we do obey our personal interest, we feel guilty, even when what we do causes no harm to others or us.

It is my opinion that morality can be split into two sections:

1. Divine morality
2. Human morality

Breaching Human morality, is when we do something against another human, or too ourselves, something harmful that illicites painful emotions. This includes murder, stealing, bullying and self harms like, well, self-harm, suicide, gluttony ect.
Breaching Divine morality is when we go against God's original purpose. The breach of Human morality is included in this section, however there it is not limited to human morality- it also includes things which do not necessarilly cause harm yet are against God's original intentions anyway. Homosexuality, for example.

Now, the reasone why many humanists and atheista believe that morality relates to the harm caused on other people, is because they only have the concept of Human Morality. Because they do not believe in the Divine, the concept of Divine Morality is foreign to them, since there is no "original purpose" at all.

This is fair enough, and if there is no God like the atheists say, then human morality IS all we have, and morality Is just a survival technique. But the problem with Gabe's thoughts are that he is bringing that human, atheistic view of morality, then using it against God. Since the blog assumes the Judeo-christian God exists, this is illogical, because it means that morality IS NOT to be decided in this way at all, and it is rather a reflection on God's original purpose. Basically, by definition, morality is what God says- anything God says to do is moral, because thats what morality is. (am I making sense here? I'm listening to this awsome British band called Enter Shikari that blends metal and techno, I'm kinda singing along to it.)

I do believe, by the way, that atheists are occasionally capable of thinking beyond Human Morality and reaching into the upper ranks of Divine. Say, for example, an atheist discovered that his next door neighbour frequently fanatsised about molesting children, then violently killing them. I believe (you can confirm or deny this, atheists) that the atheist would feel appalled, even though the mans thoughts harmed no-one.

Hell is a state of shame- it is when we realise that we HAVE gone agaisnt God's original purpose, and we feel shamfull about it. We realise that we have been led astray by Satan and we feel utmost shame.

God however, for whatever reason loves us. He does not want us to experience this shame that we so deserve. He wants us to get what we truly long for- a restored relationshop with him.

So, he was willing to come in the flesh as Jesus and die horrendously as an atonement, so that he felt the shame. Not only was the crucifixtion itself extemely shamefull, but the additional fact that God was being killed by his own weak creation makes it even more so. I often wonder if this time locked event of shame still impacts God, as he outside of time?? I dunno. What I do know is, that if we believe in this event and acknowledge God's sacrifice and ask him for forgiveness and truly WANT to repent, God will allow us what we want.

after all, Heaven isn't some party in the clouds- its THE EARTH RESTORED TO ITS ORIGINAL PURPOSE.

Well, thats my thougts. Feel free to comment on/ridicule what I've written. Please excuse any spelling errors and instances where it seems as though the train of thought was de-railed.

Thanks for reading anyway.

Cheers and God bless yas all!!

Andrew

[ENeGMA]

Why IS harming people harming people wrong?

It isn't, necessarily.

We just regard it as wrong because people don't like being harmed and won't often stand for it.

There's no necessarily moral reason, only a pragmatic reason. Why call things that harm people wrong? To get people to not do those things.

Are these actions "really wrong" though? Sure. At least in the sense they're wrong in that if you do them to anyone, they'd think it was wrong. If they were done to you, you'd think it wrong. If it went before a court, they'd throw you in jail, etc.

So harming someone is subjectively wrong.

But that it's subjectively wrong is an objective fact. You can take an opinion poll to prove this, for example.

And since humans are responsible for making and enforcing their own laws (even if you think God made the ultimate laws, you still have to realize that we must interpret them, which isn't so easy) we may as well use some principle that we can make sense of.

Then what of God's opinion towards homosexuality? Its wrong....because its wrong. Why should He have to provide any more justification when we don't? Especially since He is far higher than us in wisdom.

I think I can provide a better justification than that of my beliefs.

And if I couldn't I would regard them as irrational.

Are you willing to admit that God's laws are similarly irrational?

Could God just as easily have made "having red hair" a mortal sin? Liebniz, I think, successfully refuted this idea long ago:

" In saying, therefore, that things are not good according to any standard of goodness, but simply by the will of God, it seems to me that one destroys, without realizing it, all the love of God and all his glory; for why praise him for what he has done, if he would be equally praiseworthy in doing the contrary? Where will be his justice and his wisdom if he has only a certain despotic power, if arbitrary will takes the place of reasonableness, and if in accord with the definition of tyrants, justice consists in that which is pleasing to the most powerful? Besides it seems that every act of willing supposes some reason for the willing and this reason, of course, must precede the act. This is why, accordingly, I find so strange those expressions of certain philosophers who say that the eternal truths of metaphysics and Geometry, and consequently the principles of goodness, of justice, and of perfection, are effects only of the will of God. To me it seems that all these follow from his understanding, which does not depend upon his will any more than does his essence. "

Oh snap.

If it turns out that morality is always going to boil down to something like this, then I don't see why we should have to follow God any more than we have to follow a dictator or king.

Just because he's more powerful? That doesn't work.

Neither does 'because he's more wise'. I don't care if someone is wiser or knows better than me: I still wouldn't permit someone (the government, say) from running my life for me.

What kind of principle is that?

So because we can't justify our morality, you don't have to justify yours?

How does that work?

I believe that THIS is how God decided morality- He created how he wanted it- yet allowed us go completely opposite to his original intentions. Why he did this? Thats another question for another thread, but in my opinion, this is how it went. What is "good" is what God originally intended. What is "bad" is what he didn't intend. Its as simple as that.

But that doesn't make any sense.

How could the world have gone contrary to how God intended unless he intended to go that way?

Did he make it wrong? "Oh, darn, I forgot to get rid of that snake! *smacks forehead*"

If he allowed it to go contrary to how he made, he must have WANTED it to go contrary to how he made it, right?

So God made a world he didn't want, and then changed it?

I don't feel as if this is going to get off the ground.

I believe that we naturally WANT to do what God wants- that is why we have a sense of morality. It is also why we will often obey our moral instinct when it collides with personal interests. It is also why when we do obey our personal interest, we feel guilty, even when what we do causes no harm to others or us.

I don't think gay people feel guilt over being gay. They might because of the [censored] culture we live in, which demonizes them and is antithetical to them, but that's not their fault

If God is a homophobe that doesn't make homophobia okay, even if God is "really wise."

This is fair enough, and if there is no God like the atheists say, then human morality IS all we have, and morality Is just a survival technique. But the problem with Gabe's thoughts are that he is bringing that human, atheistic view of morality, then using it against God. Since the blog assumes the Judeo-christian God exists, this is illogical, because it means that morality IS NOT to be decided in this way at all, and it is rather a reflection on God's original purpose. Basically, by definition, morality is what God says- anything God says to do is moral, because thats what morality is. (am I making sense here? I'm listening to this awsome British band called Enter Shikari that blends metal and techno, I'm kinda singing along to it.)

I don't think your ideas make sense. Leibniz, quite a decent theologian in his own right, didn't.

If "what God says goes" is always true then God could say "x is moral" and it be so. And then he could say "x is immoral" and it would be so.

So your system permits a contradiction.

God however, for whatever reason loves us. He does not want us to experience this shame that we so deserve. He wants us to get what we truly long for- a restored relationshop with him.

What's shameful about homosexuality?

To be shameful is to be shameful FOR some reason.

Why do you think gays should feel shame?

Well, thats my thougts. Feel free to comment on/ridicule what I've written. Please excuse any spelling errors and instances where it seems as though the train of thought was de-railed.

Thanks for reading anyway.

Cheers and God bless yas all!!

Andrew

It was a good try, but I don't think your thesis holds water.

Then again I'm an atheist.

But I think your theory fails on purely logical grounds.

And I think there are ways of saving 'humanistic' morality, although probably not ways you'd like.

[Spacefoetus]

Thanks for your thoughts Enigma.

I'd respond, but I'm tired and need to formulate a response, which I havn't done it yet.

I would appreciate it if anyone came along and pointed out any mistakes Enigma has done

(yeah, to be honest, what I'm trying to say here, is I couldn't be bothered to respnd yet and want someone more experienced to do it for me.)

Cheers and god bless ya Enigma

Andrew

[Zarathustra]

Learn through doing and retort!

[Spacefoetus]

All I can say is, I'm beaten...

BUT

I recommend listening to Dr. Jack Baur's Beretacast episode 4.

[Psychic Missile]

I know somebody has already responded but I think my response might provide some sort of learning experience, however small.

Why IS harming people harming people wrong?

Right now you're going "oh, Space Foetus, you ARE a retard!! Of course harming people is wrong!!"

am not going to dispute that,

But why?

The justification for calling things wrong is because it harms people- harming people=wrong

So why is harming people wrong? Well, we can only say "because it is". Wrong=wrong because....wrong=wrong.

It's not that simple. It could be wrong because it decreases overall happiness, it harms us as a species, it prevents group cooperation, etc. There are also many different answers proposed by many different philosophers, but these are general answers from evolutionary psychology.

Then what of God's opinion towards homosexuality? Its wrong....because its wrong. Why should He have to provide any more justification when we don't? Especially since He is far higher than us in wisdom.

There's little reason to follow rules if nobody knows what they're there for. Why hide it from us?

I believe that we naturally WANT to do what God wants- that is why we have a sense of morality. It is also why we will often obey our moral instinct when it collides with personal interests. It is also why when we do obey our personal interest, we feel guilty, even when what we do causes no harm to others or us.

If we naturally want to do what God wants, then why does half of the human population disobey the first commandment? Why does a similar number disobey the second? I could go on. Did you mean that we naturally want to follow human morality, but not divine morality, as you describe them?

I do believe, by the way, that atheists are occasionally capable of thinking beyond Human Morality and reaching into the upper ranks of Divine. Say, for example, an atheist discovered that his next door neighbour frequently fanatsised about molesting children, then violently killing them. I believe (you can confirm or deny this, atheists) that the atheist would feel appalled, even though the mans thoughts harmed no-one.

Morality can extend beyond "harm to others". We have laws against attempted murder, for example. How does being disgusted by a pedophile or psychotic come from divine morality and not human morality?