Dear diver dan,

You charge: “Your reference to your own chestnut of evil Israel Folau’s condemnation of homosexuality and his reference to biblical text to support his view, does illustrate exactly the flaw in the interpretation of ethics.”

You have completely missed the point. If Folau had not included homosexuality in his presentation of that particular scripture but correctly quoted one the two places it is discussed in the bible then I wouldn't have had an argument about his ethics, As he is a god fearing man and a part time preacher I find in inconceivable that this wasn't deliberate on his part and thus unethical. Why don't you agree?

SR

What’s in a word?
We could argue till the cows come home on this. I get the point of your argument.

I’ve finished now, reading a thousand pages of Watchman Nee’s “the spiritual man”.
Effectively, he attempts to correct misunderstandings of scripture among his followers, by priming their conscience towards a more pure interpretation of Christian concepts.

The key here is conscience. A conscience can be rather easily manipulated towards a certain line of thought as being legitimate. An adjustable moral path.
But there is a centre line, or a median line to which a reference can be made towards legitimacy of that path.
For Christians, it’s the interpretation of scripture which defines the morality of the individual believer. No two Christians have the same exact moral standard.
The welfare of the spiritual man is the key driver for morality imperatives.

Ethics slides around (using your duality argument), in a similar way, but the path of ethics, as it is attached to the carnal man, (from the view of the moralist), has but a flimsy anchor, not so morality, with its attachment to a religious view of the spiritual man.

It’s why a theist State is preferable to a Secular State. A theist State is highly stable.
Which system would you prefer to be ruled by, a confused State with no guiding principles, or a stable State, with clear moral guidelines?

What would Socrates have to say on the subject?

Dan

Dear Diver Dan,

It was the act rather than the word itself. Perhaps I have an inordinately low tolerance for people doing this, particularly when it is used to decry a group in society.

When a person reads the scriptures unencumbered by the moral overlays the various denominations have placed over them they are a revelation.

To have Abraham, who by any reading is a deeply unethical man in so many regards, challenging his God to spare Sodom and Gomorrah it up-ends so much. Here is a pretty venal character normally doing some rather outrageous things to look after himself, but then risking the wrath of God to have him act differently.

God is forced to hide from Abraham his intentions. What a sublime example of someone finding an ethical voice, and ultimately being elevated above his God in that particular exchange.

So when you say: “the path of ethics, as it is attached to the carnal man, (from the view of the moralist), has but a flimsy anchor, not so morality, with its attachment to a religious view of the spiritual man.” I again go to slavery.

Jesus enjoining the slave to obey his master is still a good example. People have deemed slavery to be against their ethics, something not portrayed in the scriptures.

You ask “Which system would you prefer to be ruled by, a confused State with no guiding principles, or a stable State, with clear moral guidelines?”

I want a state which can move past fixed religious moral guidelines, to give women the vote, to accept the earth moves around the sun, and to legalise same sex marriages.

What distinguishes your ideal state from the Taliban?

As to Socrates I do like his quote: “There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.”

SR

Keeping strictly to the script, Abraham pleaded to God to spare Sodom and Gomorra, for the sake of the righteous inhabitants. In the end though, there only appeared Lot and his family eligible.

But the key question in this story is, will God destroy the righteous along with the evil doers in his wrath, against sinful behaviour?
It’s pretty obvious that the next step in the destruction from a natural disaster wipes out all and sundry. That’s simply physics at work. Any human, righteous or otherwise can only live so many seconds without breath under a tsunami.

But of course the omnipotent God, can choose that moment of mass death to seperate the righteous for salvation, while casting the evil into hell. So that effectively covers that base.

Now SR, you stretch the bow long now, by conflating the rights of homosexuals to engage in whatever turns them on, to that of women’s rights.
Do you really believe I’d fall for that one?

Women have a role to play which is clearly defined in scripture. The righteous are obligated to follow the rules. That’s morality at work, not persecution against women.

And finally, there is no distinction between morality and ethics in philosophical debate. They are one and the same.
It’s really quite crude of you the way you conflate facts SR, I’d expect better!

Dan

Dear diver dan,

I'm not sure further discussion will be all that fruitful and I'm certainly not about eroding any faith you might have.

However I do have a question.

Given the following scripture from Genesis 18:

16 When the men got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way. 17 Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?"

Why do you think God was wary of Abraham's judgement?

SR

True. This could go on forever.
I’m a traditional Christian. The product of the “give me the first seven years” childhood.
But I’m an unashamed traditionalist, and will no doubt happily die as one.

But on a more interesting note of edification. I’ve lifted this extract from an intriguing book by Jno Cook’s book “recovering the lost world”.
Which gives astronomical explanation for space phenomena depicted in ancient texts.
Not only Jewish text.

http://saturniancosmology.org/polar.php

Lifted:

*...A series of approaches between Venus and Earth started in the year 1492 BC, with the second some 50 years later in 1442 BC (originally thought to be 52 years, and 1440 BC). Venus, on an inner orbital path, aligned with the Earth and Sun. This approach was apparently much closer (about 10 million miles) than the previous contact of 800 years earlier (about 20 million miles). Following a massive compressive slam in the Pacific Ocean below the equator by a few degrees at most, an arc from Venus to Earth was delivered laterally, traveling (perhaps) a number of times around the globe...*

Dan