From: jacksonk@fornax.cs.rpi.edu (Keith Jackson)
Subject: Re: Anti-religious fanatics (Was Re: School Choice )
Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 19:56:43 GMT

In article <25188@castle.ed.ac.uk> fofp@castle.ed.ac.uk (M Holmes) writes:
& jacksonk@gehrig.cs.rpi.edu (Keith Jackson) writes:
& , i.e. only God has the power to do it, and regardless runs
& # completely contrary to the "love thy enemy", "turn the other cheek", etc.
& # philosophy. 

& Well, yes. It's a case of "Do as I say, not as I do." God, if the Bible
& is to be believed is the Universe's numero uno Hypocrite.

Well, let me explain it a different way -- think about a parent
disciplining a child versus sibling "discipline", i.e. fighting or
bullying.  Surely the parent, being more mature knows better when and how
much to punish.  Now multiply this by a huge number (take a guess how much
smarter an omniscient being is than a human.)  The idea is that this God
would know best what to do, while we mere mortals cannot fathom the
infinite complexity of the universe and hence our idea of justice will
always be distorted by our petty emotions.

& # If someone who claims to be Christian but disregards these
& # rules, surely you cannot say that that persons religion caused him/her to
& # commit some attrocity;

& There are injunctions in the Bible to kill people as has already been
& discussed here. Certainly there are also injunctions against killing
& people.

Well, there are parts in the Old Testament in which God commands the
Hebrews to kill their enemies, but these are not put forth as guidelines
for all behavior, but an immediate command for short durations.  Certainly
by the time of the New Testament, these killing sprees had ended and Jesus
taught that one should "love your enemy" and "turn the other cheek" and all
that.  A person looking for consistency would say that it is wrong to kill
others, but that the ancient Hebrews were excepted from this rule since
they were told to by the rulemaker.

& The Bible is inconsistent 

Well, I think you'll have to work harder to find "inconsistencies" since
these can be explained by the assumption that this God makes the rules and
doesn't have to play by them.

& and folks maybe just believe what they
& figure is best.  You believe folks shouldn't kill in the name of religion
& and various Church Leaders have believed that they damn well ought to do
& just that.

Yes, but by reading the New Testament, for Christians the final authority
on matters, one cannot justify murder.  To do so is hypocrisy.

& #  (3) the idea of an omnipotent, omniscient God who
& # creates a universe and life forms in this universe being guilty of genocide
& # or murder is quite silly as this God would have ultimate control over these
& # life forms, as well as responsibility for them (to whom? a bit technical
& # and overly metaphysical for me) and would be able to choose whether a
& # person dies of old age or through some "natural" disaster. 

& Killing someone is killing someone whether you have responsibility for
& them or not. Infanticide is a crime for instance despite the fact that
& it might be your own baby and you'd be responsible for it. In fact, if
& you are responsible for someone's welfare and you kill them, it betrays
& an awesome betrayal and lack of the responsibility which has been
& entrusted to you.

Since this God already decides how each and every person dies, whether
by "natural" causes, "natural" disaster, by the hand of another, or even
suicide, etc., how can this God be guilty of "wrongful death" if it decides
that a person should die in a flood?  Human beings are on the same "level"
and thus killing one another is considered wrong -- however, if you believe
in this omni- God, this God is definitely well above our level.  To act as
if this God should be on our level is akin to a microbe expecting to have
the civil rights of a human.  It all depends upon your personal notion of
God -- assuming you believe in God.  You could, for example, have the
notion that God had an IQ of, say, 8000, and thus put limits on him.  Or,
you could say he/she had infinite capacity.  The common view of Christians
is that their God is infinitely smart/wise and powerful -- thus
accountability in human terms is pretty much meaningless.

& # Besides, even
& # if this God were "guilty", what are you going to do about it?

& Well, without identifying the source (if it exists :-) and having the
& weaponry to combat the threat. Nothing. Still, if I did believe in this
& threat, I wouldn't regard craven collaboration as an option. I guess I
& just have moral scruples about things like genocide.

Yeah, the microbe on your hand wants to hold you accountable for killing
all his buddies when you washed your hands this morning.

& # Religious people,
& # on the other hand, don't tend to be this way any more than the human race
& # in general -- hence their religion doesn't cause them to do things, rather
& # their human nature.  They may justify acts by rationalizing some religious
& # reason, but this is purely cosmetic.  It is also part of human nature to be
& # bigots against those groups we don't belong to -- like a racial group, sex
& # group, or religious group.

& Except that no-one expects someone's race to tell them to act in a
& certain way. Ideology and religion does behave in this way.

The religion in question emphasizes non-violence, peace, and love as
its basic tenents, so bigotry against them because of this is kind of
silly.  For those who are hypocritical and don't follow these tenets, blame
them for their hypocrisy, but don't indict an entire religion.

& What you seem to be saying in the above is that despite their religion,
& religious folks behave no better than anyone else.

I didn't say they behaved worse or better.  Who's to say?  There's no way
(for us mere mortals :) ) to figure out who's behaved better than whom.

& Why therefore, *have*
& the religion?

Why do anything?  If it makes some people feel good, leave them alone.  If
someone gets in your face with it, then react to THAT person.  Right now
I'd like to run Pat Robertson out of the country and ban him from TV (I'm
being figurative here, if you haven't figured that out) because of HIS
silly remarks lately which are being lapped up by the Republicans -- but I
don't associate his stupidity with all persons who call themselves
Christians -- to do so is nothing but bigotry.
-- 
            ^  >
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           >=-=<        Keith Jackson == jacksonk@cs.rpi.edu      |O
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