Killer

[Wordleymaster1]

If you're to believe the bible, God kills. God also creates.
If you're a Christian, you love and follow God (or are supposed to at least).
Why do you follow a god that kills?
Charlie Manson has his followers. And he has killed (in one way or another - guilty enough to get jail time). Are Christians to be considered like his followers?
Or do Christians overlook God's killing and accept if as justifiable? Well I guess the answer is YES, so maybe the question should be WHY

Why do Christians overlook God's killing (the worst murdere in human history it would seem)?
Is it the same reason why Charlie's followers overlook his past?

Or will Christians take offense at the comparison?

[dianaiad]

.

BTW, why are you so exercised about someone having that sort of solid faith and belief in God? Aren't you just as certain that God does not exist?

Heck no I am not certain that a "god" does not exist. I have NEVER stated anything like that. In fact, I have stated over and over that ANY of the thousands of proposed "gods" MAY exist " all that is lacking is credible / convincing evidence.

erk,

My deepest apologies, Zzyzx. I wasn't paying attention to who was posting, and I honestly (and irresponsibly) thought I was responding to (blush) Wordleymaster, as you can possibly tell by the rest of my post. YOU have never used the sort of language I was talking about.

Why is it acceptable and right for you to be as certain as you are (and you must be pretty certain in order to use the sort of language you do about God) that He doesn't exist, but be utterly contemptuous towards those who believe that He does?

"Certain as you are", "utterly contemptuous"??? Where the heck does that stuff come from?

Is it a bad Monday?

OK, if you'll give me that excuse, I'll take it.

[dianaiad]

Certainty is not at issue.

I think ending a mortal life is wrong, regardless of afterlife. I think doing so without consent of the mortal in question or necessity on the part of the life taker is murder. I just do not see what this afterlife business has to do with a persons right to their mortal life , and murder is the crime of taking that moral life away. And it's a crime by any name.

Especially given the whole free will business. The Egyptian first born did not wish to die. They did not need to die. Many of them would have been helpless to change what they were being killed for.

And I am using die in the same way you are Dianiad, to be divinely moved from one place to another. Without consent.

Hmnn. Are you just as mad at Him for putting you here in the first place?

Just as an aside, and knowing that most of Christianity does not share this view: I was taught, and I believe, that we, each and every one of us, chose to come here. In other words, we GAVE permission to be born, and along with that, to have our mortal existences end.

Mortal life is very short, compared to eternity, I believe.
We chose, and gave permission for, what happens here from birth to death.
Our free will is not abrogated by our deaths any more than it was abrogated by our births.

[Jashwell]

[Replying to post 14 by dianaiad]

People can believe with certainty. People can believe without even recognising the existence of an alternative. That, to me, sounds a lot like 100%.

But it isn't, is it?

Isn't it? Not even realising an alternative could exist, not just that but never even considering it?

No, it's not.

For a very long time medical science went merrily on its way not recognizing, nor considering the possibility, of germs. Yet they existed.

For a very long time nobody recognized, nor considered, that there could be life on the bottom of the sea to which oxygen would be a poison, and which got its energy from 'smokers.' But they existed.

Human belief, or faith, in something can be extremely strong, and sometimes its even right...but that's not the same as absolute knowledge.

Here's another analogy I have often used.

Right now the sun is setting...just finishing up, actually. beautiful sunset. But do I KNOW that the sun is shining?

No. I only KNOW that it was shining eight minutes ago. Someday, some critter will look up into the sky believing that the sun is shining...and be utterly wrong. It will have exploded four minutes earlier.


Absolute knowledge is about what is, not what we believe...even if our belief is rock hard concrete and based on extremely good evidence.

I was saying that people could be absolutely certain, not that they were certainly correct, just that they thought they were.

It seems plausible to me that someone could be absolutely certain that their belief is correct. Whether or not this certain belief is fact or not doesn't affect their moral culpability. (And imho, I use knowledge to mean well justified belief, not justified 'true' belief)

Why would someone have to have absolute knowledge anyway?
If I was extremely sick and you were almost certain stabbing me repeatedly in the chest would heal me instantly, sure, you'd be wrong but I don't think you'd be morally wrong - just missing important details.

When talking about whether God is committing murder, those details are important, indeed.

I don't see how this addresses what I've said, you've just repeated the claim I oppose.
I don't think someone would be acting immorally to stab me if they were as certain that it would heal me, as you are currently certain that it would harm me. I think they would be acting virtuously, wrongly as in incorrectly not as in immorally.

The point is, if God is, and everything that comes with Him also is...like an afterlife, absolute knowledge IS absolute knowledge. Not 'absolute trust,' or 'not recognizing the existence of an alternative," but knowing that there isn't one. Not recognizing doesn't mean that it's not there. Knowing it's not there is very different.

Are you saying that how accurate someone's perception of reality is matters as to whether or not they are culpable or guilty?

erm....yeah....but that's a bit of a side track, don't you think?

Now we are talking about responsibility, not fact, and it certainly doesn't help your argument.

We were talking about morality, and morality often involves culpability, and I don't think that someone is morally wrong or culpable for simply being wrong or even crazy (to put it one way).

If someone was delusional, but they still chose to save everyone and tried to make everyone as happy as possible... but in their delusional state ended up making everyone's lives worse, I wouldn't say they were morally wrong. I would say that they were factually wrong.

OK....and your point is?

A Creator God would, of course, be factually NOT ending life, simply moving it.

That's what absolute knowledge means.

Whether people are responsible for their choices is a whole 'nuther topic.

IF the FACT matters, then murder isn't wrong
IF one's CERTAINTY matters, then it doesn't matter whether or not you're God.

The only distinctions I can see in the scenario, are:
1) if you continue to argue for a ~100% (100ish) belief vs 100% certainty in knowledge difference (which seems to have a range of weird outcomes, e.g. God can only be certain in belief, without begging the question he can't ever know that belief is knowledge)
2) if you make special exceptions for God

It doesn't matter to me whether or not an afterlife exists with regards to whether or not I want to stay in this one.
It seems to me that you're just trading murder for kidnapping.

that's quite a trade. Kidnapping ain't murder.

Yeah, but when there's no such thing as death, murder is pretty hard.
God could always trade murder for kidnapping for public transport to and from this afterlife, or even just disclosure.

Huh?

"No such thing as death?"

Define 'death' for me, please.

death: the action or fact of dying or being killed; the end of the life of a person or organism

life:the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death; the existence of an individual human being or animal.

(more the latter I emphasise)

What I mean is, it's not really death if you're just being moved.
Death is the final part of life, 'afterlife' implies your life after life.
To be more specific, when I say life with regard to the latter definition I think I'm talking more about continued experience/sensation, that to me seems to be what it is to be alive. If that carries on after "death", then you aren't really dying.

Either way, murder certainly isn't as bad if there's an afterlife. But that isn't relevant, what's relevant is that a murderer does the same thing as God, so when you say "kidnapping is better than murder", the same thing applies to actual murderers. They're just kidnappers.

[higgy1911]

[Replying to dianaiad]

I'm not mad at God I'm saying I think he did something immoral if the Old Testament is literally true.

I have heard a few Christians postulate about us choosing to be here and having given consent for whatever happens to happen. If that's correct then the crime against the first born of Egypt might not be murder. I still find it distasteful to involve people who aren't responsible in a punishment even if you have their consent to do so. But I would say it isn't straight up murder. Consent makes the difference.

I won't address the idea that we chose to be here and consented to all that happens as that seems another topic. But if we did then I will grant you the possibility that the plague on the first born was not a murderous slaughter.

[dianaiad]

<snip to here>

Absolute knowledge is about what is, not what we believe...even if our belief is rock hard concrete and based on extremely good evidence.

I was saying that people could be absolutely certain, not that they were certainly correct, just that they thought they were.

OK....but thinking that you are correct, no matter how justified that belief, is not the same thing as the absolute knowledge that you are correct.

God, should He exist, has that absolute knowledge that no mortal has.

It seems plausible to me that someone could be absolutely certain that their belief is correct. Whether or not this certain belief is fact or not doesn't affect their moral culpability. (And imho, I use knowledge to mean well justified belief, not justified 'true' belief)

Why would someone have to have absolute knowledge anyway?
If I was extremely sick and you were almost certain stabbing me repeatedly in the chest would heal me instantly, sure, you'd be wrong but I don't think you'd be morally wrong - just missing important details.

When talking about whether God is committing murder, those details are important, indeed.

I don't see how this addresses what I've said, you've just repeated the claim I oppose.
I don't think someone would be acting immorally to stab me if they were as certain that it would heal me, as you are currently certain that it would harm me. I think they would be acting virtuously, wrongly as in incorrectly not as in immorally.

The point is, if God is, and everything that comes with Him also is...like an afterlife, absolute knowledge IS absolute knowledge. Not 'absolute trust,' or 'not recognizing the existence of an alternative," but knowing that there isn't one. Not recognizing doesn't mean that it's not there. Knowing it's not there is very different.

Are you saying that how accurate someone's perception of reality is matters as to whether or not they are culpable or guilty?

For mortals, you and me...I'm not absolutely certain what you are talking about here, but...

Are you talking about the difference between an ER surgeon stabbing you in the neck to get an airway going, and the average guy on the street who saw the procedure in an episode of "Emergency" forty years ago and thinks he can do it too?

I'm not certain what you are alluding to here.

But you and I are not God. We didn't create the universe. We didn't make it possible for us to live on this planet. We didn't create life. God, should He exist, DID. He's the only One who does have the absolute knowledge that there is an 'afterlife,' and that physical death doesn't mean complete non-existance, and He knows this because He created it.

None of us have those qualifications.

This should be a familiar idea to folks who do hold people to different standards and allow different levels of behavior according to what they know....

Like allowing a doctor to stab you, but that guy on the street had better not, because the doctor knows what he's doing and the rest of us don't.

In this case, the Only One Who knows what He is doing would BE God.

erm....yeah....but that's a bit of a side track, don't you think?

Now we are talking about responsibility, not fact, and it certainly doesn't help your argument.

We were talking about morality, and morality often involves culpability, and I don't think that someone is morally wrong or culpable for simply being wrong or even crazy (to put it one way).

Morality and culpability are different ideas. "Killing," in the terms most of those who accuse God of being a killer, means 'destroying all conscious existence.'

It's a most circular bit of reasoning.

There is no afterlife therefore
God is evil because He kills people and
Therefore there is no God.

But if there is an afterlife, and 'killing' means 'ending existence,' then God isn't killing anybody.

If there is no afterlife, then God (as described by most Christians) doesn't exist either, and therefore He still isn't killing anybody.

there is no scenario in which God may be accused, accurately, of killing anybody. Moving them from one state of existence to another? Certainly...but of ending existence? No.

And that is compounded, in the eyes of some folks (like me) who believe that we gave permission for this whole shebang in the first place, both birth and death.

Responsibility doesn't enter into it. OF COURSE God is responsible for death. The question isn't 'responsibility,' it's whether, when He does it, it's a bad thing to do in the first place.

You know, like the ER doc is absolutely responsible for stabbing someone between the ribs and sticking a hose in there, it's going to hurt like hell...and the guy he stabbed is going to thank him for it?

If someone was delusional, but they still chose to save everyone and tried to make everyone as happy as possible... but in their delusional state ended up making everyone's lives worse, I wouldn't say they were morally wrong. I would say that they were factually wrong.

OK....and your point is?

A Creator God would, of course, be factually NOT ending life, simply moving it.

That's what absolute knowledge means.

Whether people are responsible for their choices is a whole 'nuther topic.

IF the FACT matters, then murder isn't wrong

It is if you know know that life does not end...as in 'absolute knowledge."

Only God knows that,

Just as only a fully trained ER doc knows when it is appropriate to stab someone between the ribs.

Anybody else trying it is going to get arrested...and hopefully only for assault. Motive matters, though, even for people.

IF one's CERTAINTY matters, then it doesn't matter whether or not you're God.

Certainty and absolute knowledge are not the same thing. One can be completely certain of something...and be wrong. If one has absolute knowledge, there is no chance that he is wrong. Absolute is absolute.

The only distinctions I can see in the scenario, are:
1) if you continue to argue for a ~100% (100ish) belief vs 100% certainty in knowledge difference (which seems to have a range of weird outcomes, e.g. God can only be certain in belief, without begging the question he can't ever know that belief is knowledge)
2) if you make special exceptions for God

You still aren't understanding the difference between belief and absolute knowledge.

belief and certainty are what we think about fact. Absolute knowledge is what IS fact. I don't care how 'certain' one is about something, if there is even the most infinitesimal chance that you are wrong, it's not knowledge.

There is a spectrum of belief, I suppose, that ranges from "I don't think this is true but there is the tiniest of chances that it could be" to "I am absolutely, rock hard certain, that this is true."

Absolute knowledge isn't on that spectrum at all. It's an entirely different concept.

It doesn't matter to me whether or not an afterlife exists with regards to whether or not I want to stay in this one.
It seems to me that you're just trading murder for kidnapping.

that's quite a trade. Kidnapping ain't murder.

Yeah, but when there's no such thing as death, murder is pretty hard.
God could always trade murder for kidnapping for public transport to and from this afterlife, or even just disclosure.

Huh?

"No such thing as death?"

Define 'death' for me, please.

death: the action or fact of dying or being killed; the end of the life of a person or organism

life:the condition that distinguishes animals and plants from inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity, and continual change preceding death; the existence of an individual human being or animal.

(more the latter I emphasise)

What I mean is, it's not really death if you're just being moved.
Death is the final part of life, 'afterlife' implies your life after life.
To be more specific, when I say life with regard to the latter definition I think I'm talking more about continued experience/sensation, that to me seems to be what it is to be alive. If that carries on after "death", then you aren't really dying.

OK.

So you think that God kills people according to your definition of dying?

That is fairly typical...and you are correct. If your definition, which is fairly standard especially for non-believers, is true, then there is no death.

Except that, of course, we mere mortals don't KNOW that, do we? WE don't have the absolute knowledge required to act on it. We could be wrong. Ending a life could be, y'know, ending the life.

But God, should He exist, knows it's a move, not life ending. Ergo, He doesn't kill anybody.

Either way, murder certainly isn't as bad if there's an afterlife.

It is if someone who doesn't have absolute knowledge does it, and no mortal human has that.

But that isn't relevant, what's relevant is that a murderer does the same thing as God, so when you say "kidnapping is better than murder", the same thing applies to actual murderers. They're just kidnappers.

Like that guy who tried to murder his wife but ended up saving her life, instead?

Well, true...but he wanted to kill her, the motive was to get rid of her and to end her existence, so he went to jail. He IS guilty of murder.

Oh, as to having your permission?

You are talking to someone who honestly believes that you gave that permission before you got here. Sorry about that. Death is a part of this experience we are all going through.

(edit to fix the quotes...whew..)

[Jashwell]

We're arguing about two different things at the same time.

One, whether or not the end result of a scenario is good or bad.
Two, whether or not one is justified in performing an act.


With regards to one; the established facts DO matter. But the end result being good doesn't mean you are justified in acting.
With regards to two, I don't accept a difference between belief and knowledge /for this context/ - intent is all that matters for moral culpability.

Assuming God DOES have absolute knowledge; someone who is almost or is absolutely certain about the same conclusion is exactly as morally justified as God.

The former isn't actually that relevant for this bit, but it is relevant for the fact that God is still kidnapping in this case.
(This is what I'm arguing, that under the definitions I was trying to say, death doesn't /really/ exist in an afterlife scenario, at least it's not what it's remembered for or largely implied in use - the finality of it)

Going back to two, if someone DID stab me multiple times to try to save them, I might well WANT them to get jail time or something, or I might be encouraged to hold them personally morally culpable, but I would be wrong to do so. They shouldn't be held morally culpable, they shouldn't be sent to a jail, they should be sent to a school or mental asylum.

(Though there are cases like tort law (e.g. suing for damages) which may well be practically necessary but aren't about moral culpability)

And what I am also trying to say is, God BELIEVING with certainty that his beliefs are knowledge would be the same personal experience as any person believing that his beliefs were knowledge. Even if you assume that God is correct, the others would still THINK they're correct - whether or not it's true knowledge or belief doesn't matter with regards to moral culpability. (I say true knowledge because I disagree that knowledge needs to be certain fact)

(Though I'm not even sure what it means for someone to say "he is all knowing" means - knowledge must be justified belief, he can't just know - that isn't knowledge; accurate or otherwise)

[Zzyzx]

.

I think the comparison is not correct, Manson has not given life.

Are you certain Manson produced no children?

Personally I think God has every right to decide how long people live, because he has given life.

The same can be said for any parent

And if we really believe what the Bible tells, the death of body is not the end. Soul or spirit can live forever, even if the body dies.

Many bible believes think that humans have a "sou.l" However, there is no evidence that such thing exists outside imagination, conjecture, or religion-promotion material.

[dianaiad]

.

I think the comparison is not correct, Manson has not given life.

Are you certain Manson produced no children?

Personally I think God has every right to decide how long people live, because he has given life.

The same can be said for any parent

And if we really believe what the Bible tells, the death of body is not the end. Soul or spirit can live forever, even if the body dies.

Many bible believes think that humans have a "sou.l" However, there is no evidence that such thing exists outside imagination, conjecture, or religion-promotion material.

Well, nobody can prove that God exists, either, but that doesn't stop 'em from deciding that He is an evil so and so anyway.

It doesn't seem, er, logical to me to discuss God, and, not liking the context of the story that surrounds Him decide that y'all are right because He doesn't exist any way.

After all, if He doesn't exist, how can He be guilty of anything?

If He does, then what comes with Him (i.e, the after life) does too...and He's still not guilty of murder.

as to Manson giving, or not giving, life...

Well, that's a strawman argument too, since the life we 'give' here is limited to our physical forms, and frankly, we don't have a whole lot of control over what life gets created.

If there is a 'soul' (or spirit, actually) then God created that, the spirit is what goes on, if God exists, and we mere mortals have had nothing to do with that.

So we can't prove that a spirit exists? So what?

Again, we can't prove God exists, either, but that doesn't stop the non-believers from vilifying Him as some horrific evil Being anyway.

The logic, frankly, isn't logical.

[higgy1911]

So to me this has all gotten pretty far afield. For purposes of the argument I am assuming and think we all should that god and the afterlife are real and that they are described accurately in the bible.

It is my position that the bible describes god committing several immoral acts, murder among them. Granted this may be according to my definition of murder. But I can't help it if the bible has lower moral standards than I do. The bible lays out its standards and claims they are correct. For the sake of argument I concede the bible describes God and his standards. I deny it's claim to be an ultimate standard. It offers nothing that would make me think snuffing out mortal life when it is unnecessary is not murder.

It's wrong to do that and worse than a good many things the bible prohibits. This life is ours to live and it's wrong to take it without consent or need. Certainty isn't relevant. After life isn't relevant. I don't want anybody changing my incarnation without consulting me. I deny their right to. And I'll fight it when I can.

[Wordleymaster1]

[Replying to post 2 by Overcomer]

Because of sin, humankind was separated from God.

But didn't God let Satan in the Garden so He could tempt them? Surely free will blah blah blah but there would be no need to exercise this free will if God wouldhave stepped in before the whole mess started. Or, better yet, not allows it to start to begin with