Pastor AIO:
If you stopped trying to define God and stopped taking seriously those that do then you might find it a lot easier to deal with the evolution of morality. Or the evolution of absolutely everything else.

Mr_Anony:
Allah will have to satisfy our criteria for ultimate moral judge then we will accept the lawfulness of the terrorist's actions.

Purist: lmao. Mr Anony has tried his best, really. Isn't it telling that many of his brethren simply avoided this thread like a plague? It would have been better if he had simply gone the usual route of proclaiming that all his God-related beliefs are simply by faith, not logic, and he would have avoided all these long back and forth arguments.

Mr_Anony:
Now how does any of those killings you mentioned become unlawful if it is the law itself that sanctions them?

cyrexx:

Mr_Anony:

I'll quote myself from another thread. This is what I said:

".........I will go on to say that for anything to be a true standard for morality
1. It must be all-powerful or at least more powerful than man i.e. must be powerful enough to punish evil and reward good.
2. It must be omniscient i.e. must be able to properly know and understand everything and every motive
3. It must be all-seeing i.e. must be able to see a case from every possible angle. No evidence should escape it.
4. It's laws must agree with man's conscience but must be able to determine when man deviates from the dictates of his conscience.
5. It must be impartial and must deliver justice irrespective of persons.
6. It must not waver and must not change with the wind i.e. what was once evil will not suddenly become good and vice versa(note this is different from it's permissiveness)
7. It must essentially be singular i.e. it must be of one mind and purpose and must not be self-contradicting.

It is to the extent that our legal systems meet these criteria that we justify them. Do you agree?"

Mr_Anony:
See page 2 and 3

Purist: Just to point out something here:

Agreed, the law sanctioned those killings, making the act at that time lawful indeed. However, your implicit submission here implies that God has failed to meet one of the criteria you set for him (a result of trying to define God). It is the criteria that says:

"It must not waver and must not change with the wind i.e. what was once evil will not suddenly become good and vice versa(note this is different from it's permissiveness)"

Today, we all know Jesus supposedly came to redefine certain things concerning the law (the story of the adulterous woman readily comes to mind). This therefore implies that God indeed wavered and changed with the wind. What was once good (and permissive) suddenly became evil (and not permissive).

Purist:

And just as many others have pointed out, the Christian God barely meets these criteria, at least from all we know and read of him; #4, 5, 6 and 7 especially. Also, just about any other God meets criteria #1, 2 and 3. In fact, you only just succeeded - with this list - in lumping your god with every other god out there.

cyrexx:

you mean this:

".........I will go on to say that for anything to be a true standard for morality
1. It must be all-powerful or at least more powerful than man i.e. must be powerful enough to punish evil and reward good.
2. It must be omniscient i.e. must be able to properly know and understand everything and every motive
3. It must be all-seeing i.e. must be able to see a case from every possible angle. No evidence should escape it.
4. It's laws must agree with man's conscience but must be able to determine when man deviates from the dictates of his conscience.
5. It must be impartial and must deliver justice irrespective of persons.
6. It must not waver and must not change with the wind i.e. what was once evil will not suddenly become good and vice versa(note this is different from it's permissiveness)
7. It must essentially be singular i.e. it must be of one mind and purpose and must not be self-contradicting.

It is to the extent that our legal systems meet these criteria that we justify them."

now tell me why an islamic jihadist is not justified by own similar moral authority that you are using to justify Yahweh and his moral authority?

Mr Anony

Ok so we all agree that they are all supreme but then there cannot be multiple supremes, there can only be one supreme. We'll start by comparing who is more supreme than the other.

Krishna fails at this point because Krishna has an origin and was not powerful enough to bring himself to be so he is not supreme enough he's out of the race.
The Sikh Holy Gurus were men (at least to the best of my knowledge) and this also dents their supremeness. They are also out of the race.
This leaves us with Allah and Yahweh who many believe to be the same but they can't be the same as one is monopersonal and the other is tripersonal. Now Allah by his nature contradicts his very essence because the muslims believe that Allah can love but that raises the question. If Allah can love, who or what did he love before the creation? If love came after the creation, it implies that love is not subject to allah but allah is subject to love. Allah is now out of the race.

We are left with Yahweh who I put it to you satisfies all the criteria better than anything else you can put up.

Mr_Anony:

This leaves us with Allah and Yahweh who many believe to be the same but they can't be the same as one is monopersonal and the other is tripersonal. Now Yahweh by his nature contradicts his very essence because the Christians believe that Yahweh can love but that raises the question. If Yahweh can love, who or what did he love before the creation? If love came after the creation, it implies that love is not subject to Yahweh but Yahweh is subject to love. Yahweh is now out of the race.

We are left with Allah who I put it to you satisfies all the criteria better than anything else you can put up.

Mr_Anony:
Fine, finally it seems someone is talking.

Jesus did not come to redefine morals. He came to fulfill the law. Sin is still sin. The only difference is that judgment has been in a sense postponed until after death.

Mr_Anony: @Martian, your poor attempt at parody.

Purist:

I didn't say Jesus came to redefine morals. According to the bible, his fulfillment of the law meant that we were no longer bound by the letter of the law, but by the spirit of the law. In essence, certain things that were lawful and permissive in the mosaic law (such as those in the verses cyrexx posted), became no longer permissive in the new dispensation (of grace). In other words, there was a change, there was a wavering. Now, if your list is anything to go by, the Christian God cannot be a true standard for morality since his failure to meet your criteria #6 has been demonstrated.

Martian:

Your beliefs are only fit for parody.

Mr_Anony:
It is interesting how whenever you run out of meaningful things to say, you resort to mockery. Anyway, I don't have to keep replying you. Once again, you are welcome to the last word.

Martian:

What makes you think that your arguments are even viable. What's the difference between this

This leaves us with Allah and Yahweh who many believe to be the same but they can't be the same as one is monopersonal and the other is tripersonal. Now Allah by his nature contradicts his very essence because the muslims believe that Allah can love but that raises the question. If Allah can love, who or what did he love before the creation? If love came after the creation, it implies that love is not subject to allah but allah is subject to love. Allah is now out of the race.
We are left with Yahweh who I put it to you satisfies all the criteria better than anything else you can put up.

and this ............

This leaves us with Allah and Yahweh who many believe to be the same but they can't be the same as one is monopersonal and the other is tripersonal. Now Yahweh by his nature contradicts his very essence because the Christians believe that Yahweh can love but that raises the question. If Yahweh can love, who or what did he love before the creation? If love came after the creation, it implies that love is not subject to Yahweh but Yahweh is subject to love. Yahweh is now out of the race.
We are left with Allah who I put it to you satisfies all the criteria better than anything else you can put up.

If you think that parody is out of line, you've been drinking too much of the blood of jesus.

Mr_Anony:
Doesn't this raise the question; Justified by who?

Mr_Anony:

On the contrary, that is exactly why it meets criteria 6. Good is still good, evil is still evil. All that has been lifted is the punishments for evil need not be carried out within the time period of one's lifetime.

6.It must not waver and must not change with the wind i.e. what was once evil will not suddenly become good and vice versa(note this is different from it's permissiveness)

For instance if the government for whatever reasons says that cases of theft will no longer be punished immediately but that criminals will be given the grace period of one month to make amends and return what they stole, failure to do which, they will now be arrested. It doesn't automatically legalize theft. It is simply a grace period. That's the difference between changing the law and the law's permissiveness.

Purist:

@bold part: In other words, God CHANGED his methods. Exactly why he fails criteria #6.

Your analogy does not fit. If a government decided a particular punishment for a particular crime 20 years ago, and today, they decide that the punishment is no longer a good method, but instead, define a new kind of method to curtail the crime, wouldn't we be right to say that the government has changed/wavered? Wouldn't we say that the government has become softer or more cruel, depending on the nature of the law they have now come up with?

"what was once evil will not suddenly become good and vice versa"

It was once good to stone adulterers as commanded by God. Today, it's an evil thing to do, as exemplified by Jesus (God). There has been a change. Criteria #6 has not been met.


And about trinity, it's not even a settled issue within Christianity. Many other Christians will vehemently disagree with your "three person relationship" hypothesis.

Ihedinobi: I have been following this thread from a distance for awhile now. My annoyance is just that I've been in an area with very poor Internet for a few days now so responding is a task. In addition to that Mr Anony has been holding up very nicely, he doesn't need much help. I'll keep following until I find something to answer. I can't find any now, Mr Anony has done all the work!

cyrexx:


nice and commendable coalition both of you in the S.A.F. (Spiritual Allied Force)

Jenwitemi: Mr Anony, this is for you.

A person, whatever that person might want to be known by(angel, deity, fairy, whatever), who wants to be seen as a source of moral authority, must be ready to live an open life full of such wise and humane acts and deeds that every other human being would aspire to copy and emulate such in their own lives. That is my own idea of a moral authority personified or deified. This person or deity called yahweh is neither such a person nor such a deity.

Jenwitemi: RAF (Religious Allied Force) more like it.

Mr_Anony:
God ticked that box when He came in the flesh as Jesus Christ. I give you Jesus Christ as your standard for morality. Emulate Him and you can never go wrong.

Mr_Anony:
God ticked that box when He came in the flesh as Jesus Christ. I give you Jesus Christ as your standard for morality. Emulate Him and you can never go wrong.

cyrexx:

but why not emulate his father Yahweh, how do you separate a son's character from his father's especially when the father has not disowned his son and the son never condemned his father's actions?

Jenwitemi:
Moreover, just for the record, i do neither believe nor accept that Jesus was the return of the butcher god Yahweh. Jesus was his own man and that showed in his ways which was far far away from that of the bloodthirsty butcher god of the OT.