Random destinies

[SoulBiter]

That opens a whole nother discussion. Can God murder? When God flooded the entire world with water to start over, allowing only Noah and a few others to live, was this murder? When God does not intervene (even though he has the ability) and save people from disease, war, sickness, etc. etc.. Is that murder? Does withdrawing Godly protection from someone and allowing bad things to happen to them or their family constitute murder?

[Avatar]

That opens a whole nother discussion. Can God murder?

There's a name for people who make rules that only apply to everybody else...

--A

[Tjol]

Don't worry overly much if we don't all see it the same way you do, Tjol. Everything in life is a Rorschach test, eh? Even if we were all viewing this particular inkblot from the same perspective - that is, with the same thoughts and beliefs - there's bound to be some differences in how we would see it. No two people are exactly alike. But since we're viewing this from extremely different perspectives... Know what I mean?

I do, it is in my opinion what makes good art and good writing. I'm not dismayed, or disappointed, and I understand that my sense that things are getting towards repetition is a mutual experience.

As far as Job goes...

Is God's creation of the context for Job to prove righteous in spite of Satan's cruelty acknowledged here?

I still say a whole lot of people died horrible deaths so that Job could be proven righteous. Servants put to the sword or burned, his children crushed when the house collapsed. Where's the righteousness in all that?

Well, the ending of Job is a little bit of Euripides... it's wrapped up a little too cleanly, which seems to spell it out as an allegory rather than a literal historical account.

People died for the sake of Job proving his righteousness, but at the same time, we are thinking of these things as their usual permanent forms, not of the temporal forms that they existed as in Job. Do you know of people who were killed, and went on to live long happy lives? I could suffer being killed to have a long happy life, as much as I wouldn't appreciate being killed and having death persist.

I have a scar in my abdomen, put there by a knife, in the hands of another human being, who deliberately created that wound that the scar resulted from. I no longer have a burst appendix in my abdomen, and my life expectancy is substantially extended from what it would have otherwise been had that human being not cut me with their knife.

Normally I wouldn't appreciate being cut open by another person. I would think it criminal. But in this case, the sum total is greater than what preceeded it.

I guess first people would have to acknowledge righteousness as an acheivement, or even understand it as an acheivement. But in the narsicistic present that leans so hard on disavowing of right and wrong, I suppose the acheivement of righteousness is hard to grasp.

You may be right. I don't know if there are very many objective rights and wrongs. Most things can be seen in different ways, depending on their context. I know the things I believe are right and wrong. One of them is demonstrated in Job. Murdering a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And allowing the murder of a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And if I thought this God existed, I'd tell him so.

I think God exists, and I don't think he minds being questioned, so long as it's the kind of questioning that seeks after understanding, rather than justification. For what it's worth that kind of question that you ask, seems like the former more than the latter.

[Fist and Faith]

You may be right. I don't know if there are very many objective rights and wrongs. Most things can be seen in different ways, depending on their context. I know the things I believe are right and wrong. One of them is demonstrated in Job. Murdering a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And allowing the murder of a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And if I thought this God existed, I'd tell him so.

But... if the people that were murdered or killed in some way were given eternal life in heaven would you feel the same way? Life is transitory and in the context of eternity encomposes a very small amount of time.

Did all of the people killed to test Job's righteousness get eternal life in heaven?

[SoulBiter]

Another of the many unknowns in this story of Job.

[Tjol]

You may be right. I don't know if there are very many objective rights and wrongs. Most things can be seen in different ways, depending on their context. I know the things I believe are right and wrong. One of them is demonstrated in Job. Murdering a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And allowing the murder of a bunch of people in order to test someone's faith is wrong. And if I thought this God existed, I'd tell him so.

But... if the people that were murdered or killed in some way were given eternal life in heaven would you feel the same way? Life is transitory and in the context of eternity encomposes a very small amount of time.

Did all of the people killed to test Job's righteousness get eternal life in heaven?

That's more a question of Christian theology. The hebrews didn't believe in an afterlife, so it wouldn't stand to be understood that Job had everlasting life, nor any of his family or friends, or workers, etc.

In Job they are brought back to life, I presume not in the Monkey's Paw fashion either.

[Fist and Faith]

Job's family and all the servants are brought back to life?? I never heard it said that way, and it doesn't look that way to me.

[Avatar]

Yeah...I thought it said he just married again and had even more children?

Hang on...

After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before. 11 All his brothers and sisters and everyone who had known him before came and ate with him in his house. They comforted and consoled him over all the trouble the Lord had brought upon him, and each one gave him a piece of silver and a gold ring. 12 The Lord blessed the latter part of Job's life more than the first. He had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen and a thousand donkeys. 13 And he also had seven sons and three daughters. 14 The first daughter he named Jemimah, the second Keziah and the third Keren-Happuch. 15 Nowhere in all the land were there found women as beautiful as Job's daughters, and their father granted them an inheritance along with their brothers. 16 After this, Job lived a hundred and forty years; he saw his children and their children to the fourth generation. 17 And so he died, old and full of years.

(Interested to see "trouble that the Lord brought on him... )

--A

[Tjol]

One of these days I'll learn greek hebrew and latin, lol.

There's a little vaguerie here, how many sons and daughters did Job have before? Who was this new wife that bore these new children?

I understand your interpretation, and I also see why I remembered everything being restored to him and then some (verse 10 in your quote).

[Avatar]

Well, it doesn't say anything was restored, just that he was given twice what he had before.

--A

[Cybrweez]

That opens a whole nother discussion. Can God murder? When God flooded the entire world with water to start over, allowing only Noah and a few others to live, was this murder? When God does not intervene (even though he has the ability) and save people from disease, war, sickness, etc. etc.. Is that murder? Does withdrawing Godly protection from someone and allowing bad things to happen to them or their family constitute murder?

Well, if I'm God, I define murder, not you. But, even in our definition, we don't call it murder if we execute convicted criminal.

[Avatar]

That doesn't mean we shouldn't though. As for the definition, see my post above where SB first mentioned it.

--A

[Cybrweez]

That doesn't mean we shouldn't though.

So, we can't agree on what murder is, but hold God to "it"?

As for the definition, see my post above where SB first mentioned it.

--A

What's the name? And does it apply to something that makes everything?

[Fist and Faith]

Well, if I'm God, I define murder, not you.

Nope. If there's a God, and he's doing bad stuff, I'll let him know.

[Avatar]

What's the name? And does it apply to something that makes everything?

Tyrant and dictator spring to mind. As does hypocrite. And yes, it applies to everything.

--A

[Cagliostro]

He had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, a thousand yoke of oxen and a thousand donkeys. 13 And he also had seven sons and three daughters.

Now I understand why they say "You must have the patience of Job."

[Cybrweez]

Nope. If there's a God, and he's doing bad stuff

Do you see any problems w/that statement?

Sorry Av, your definition really wasn't for murder. It was just a shot. So, it seems we can't even define murder, yet we are willing to hold God to it. We can't define bad stuff, but we can hold God to it. There's a reason the Bible uses God as Father and us as children, this all sounds just like that relationship. You discipline kids, you set ground rules for kids, for their benefit, and their typical response is that you are doing bad stuff, you don't really love them, if you did, how could you <fill in the blank>. But when talking about God, we honestly believe we know better, and therefore can make statements like He does bad stuff.

[Fist and Faith]

Nope. If there's a God, and he's doing bad stuff

Do you see any problems w/that statement?

Obviously not. I do not believe the power/ability to create sentient, or even feeling (as in animals that can feel pain, even though they don't think), things gives one the moral right to do with them what one pleases. I have my morals, and I'd be more than happy to share them with any creator I have contact with.

Of course, it's all hypothetical to me, since I don't believe there is any creator. But if the God you believe in does, indeed, exist, he already knows how I feel about pretty much everything, eh?

[Cybrweez]

My point Fist, if there's a God, He determines bad stuff, regardless of your opinion. If there is no God, there is no bad stuff.

[aliantha]

So, Weez, there's no possibility that ancient people might have bound together as a society and determined that some behaviors were good for the group, and some behaviors were bad? And there's no possibility that some in that society then invented a High Moral Authority -- oh heck, let's call him/her God -- to enforce the society's standards of good and bad?

Apart from that, I would just observe that Aristotle developed a code of ethics without any input from the Christian God whatsoever.