Tanager: My claim is that one should think He is perfect because of the historicity of the resurrection, what Jesus’ resurrection tells us about who Jesus is and what his teachings are, and the reliability of the NT documents in giving us Jesus’ teachings which include that God is perfect.
Matthew 5:48 wrote:
“Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.”
King James Version (KJV)
Q: How do we philosophically break this down in order to find coherence re this advice?
But I thought we established that things can be perfectly what they are -
Not sure anything was established. Just ideas being thrown around.
perhaps you are perfect, even if you are obnoxious?
Perhaps among other obnoxious types, yes.
In truth, I think "Perfection" is a useless concept, especially the more we discuss it.
What is "perfect/perfection"?
The question has to do with the opening post specific to understanding what Jesus may have meant. "Q: How do we philosophically break this down in order to find coherence re this advice?"
(the advice - “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.”)
At least you gave it a shot, which is more than the Christians on this board have done.
I'm bowing out of the convo. I have reached what appears to be my own internal limit to deal with the subject. It's not you, it's me. i'm the problem. I am convinced that the idea of perfecting oneself is a meaningless term, other than a subjective feeling that you want to be better in some way (which may be the opposite of becoming perfect in some objective sense - which I don't think exists).
"Perfect" is the same as "best band" or "best artist". It's not an objective quality, and in terms of religion, we have no access to the thoughts of gods so it doesn't matter what a religion says.
I'm out. Let me know how it turns out.
“And do you think that unto such as you
A maggot-minded, starved, fanatic crew
God gave a secret, and denied it me?
Well, well—what matters it? Believe that, too!”
― Omar Khayyâm
