Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: ok@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au (Richard A. O'Keefe) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Moral reasoning (was Re: draft of Identity Task Force statement) Message-ID: Date: 29 Nov 90 04:46:16 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Comp Sci, RMIT, Melbourne, Australia Lines: 273 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu How can there be justice without peace? How can there be peace without understanding? How can there be understanding without explanation? Therefore the Most High has said "Blessed are the peacemakers" and the Holy One would have us honour those that teach us. In article , i wrote > It would be a very great comfort to me if I could be shown how someone > claiming to get their moral views from the Bible could plausibly come > to a view which appears to be diametrically opposed to what the Bible > seems to teach. I'd have to eat a lot of crow, but I've been > sufficiently unhappy this year due to my inability to do what I saw as > a betrayal of my God that I am *eager* to eat that crow *if* I can do > so with integrity. Every time someone refuses to explain to me, that > just reinforces my suspicion that they haven't _got_ a rational > explanation, but hold their views because it is expedient to do so. I am not particularly interested in the subject of homosexual behaviour. I proposed consideration of a specific question: May Richard O'Keefe visit a legal brothel in Victoria? Several people have been kind enough to explain to me why I shouldn't. I know why I shouldn't, and that is why I shan't, although the temptation isn't negligible. What I want is an argument, either for "yes" or for "no", from someone who _doesn't_ basically reason "the Bible says no". I want this not for the sake of argument, but because I want to understand. If you don't want to carry on a discussion in this newsgroup, just send E-mail to me. If you don't want to _discuss_ it, but want to stop my mouth so that I can no longer say "those people *never* offer any reason" (again I want to stress that I have been told by ministers identifying themselves as liberals "we won't discuss it with you, you must just believe and accept"), then send me E-mail saying "here is my position and I don't want to discuss it _further_." Our moderator was kind enough to summarise what the problem is, except that he made a mistake at the beginning. > Since you ask how one can possibly > believe that the Bible allows homosexual behavior, I will try to > summarize the arguments we have heard in the past. No, that wasn't my question. My question was about fornication, a heterosexual mode of behaviour. Surely, if it is ok for two unmarried adult men to copulate, it must be ok for two unmarried adults of complementary sexes to copulate. I have been assured by some people identifying themselves as liberals that this is so, and that neither love nor commitment is necessary to make such heterosexual copulation good. THAT is what I am asking about. It's worth noting that the argument > (3) The sorts of homosexual > relationships that typically occured in the 1st Cent. are not those > being advocated by homosexual Christians. (They were often associated > with pagan worship, and they often involved exploitation of slaves and > children.) clearly applies, mutatis mutandis, to visiting a legal brothel in Victoria. Prostitution at the time of the NT was very often associated with pagan worship, and it often involved exploitation of slaves and children. Indeed, one of the standard arguments of the apologists was "When you visit a brothel, it might be one of your own daughters that you exposed to die as an infant that you copulate with". That is not the case in the Australian state of Victoria. So if that argument is sound, then the prohibitions of "fornication" are equally invalidated. Here's the moderator's summary of the problem: > There is clearly a difference in attitude towards use of the Bible. > Conservative Christians -- and I believe in this case we are talking > about the great majority -- believe that we can look to the Bible for > specific rules. Usually this means that (1) portions of the OT Law is > taken to be moral rather than ceremonial, and still applies to us. > (2) What Paul wrote to his congregations can be applied directly to > the 20th Cent. unless there is very clear evidence that it was > intended only for a specific circumstance. Liberal Christians > interpret Paul as saying that the Law has been abolished for > Christians, and that Paul's writings ought not to be used to create a > new Law, since they are often limited by the cultural context and his > beliefs. ... It is obvious to our liberal > readers that conservative Christians are ignoring the basic message of > both Christ and Paul, and are turning words that were intended to free > us from the Law into a new Law. I am slowly beginning to despair of > these discussions. There seems to be a paradox here. It is precisely this kind of thing which I don't understand and honestly _want_ to understand. If Paul's moral commandments "So put to death those parts of you which belong to the earth--fornication, indecency, lust, evil desires, and the ruthless greed which is nothing less than idolatry; on these divine retribution falls" (Col 3:5--6) are lacking in authority, how can his alleged abolition of the Law have any authority? How come Paul is a greater authority than the author of Matthew who put "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets ... Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingom of heaven ..." (Matt 5:17--20) on Jesus' lips? If fornication is now permitted, (contra Paul and Jesus both), is "greed" now permitted to us? These are honest questions: how does one tell what part of Paul's teaching is to be elevated to an absolute principle (you, my brothers, were called to be free -- Gal 5:13a) and what part is to be disregarded (but do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature -- Gal 5:13b)? What criterion is available to us that will enable us to be confident that it is _right_ to accept Galatians 5:18 and ignore Galations 5:19--21? I can imaginatively understand how someone who is not a Christian could look at the Bible and say "I like that bit, yes that bit's right, this bit fits, but _ugh_ that bit's wrong and that bit is evil". I can imaginatively understand a Jew quoting "the Torah has been given to men" and using that to explain how Gershom could ban levirate marriage. I can imaginatively understand the Mormon belief that they have a _continuing_ prophetic leader and that through the first presidency G-d has the power to change His mind (polygamy was sort of ok in the OT, then it was an "abomination" in the BoM, then it was an "everlasting convenant", and then it was off again). I don't agree with the presuppositions of any of these positions, but they make sense to me. But I honestly do not understand and very much *want* to understand how one can say (as some people identifying themselves as Liberals have said to me) "the Bible is the basis of my moral beliefs" and yet pick and choose a few bits from it and leave the rest to one side. What I do not understand is where we can get the principle for that choice. There is presumably some *reason* why it is known to be *right* to accept "you were called to be free" and Matt 5:17--20. I do not see how we can derive such a reason from a book containing both. So where _does_ it come from? Clearly, if the position that our moderator has outlined is correct, then I am radically mistaken in my approach to the Bible and I am in bondage. If anyone holding that position reads this: your giving me an explanation of how to pick the right bits and leave the rest could at best liberate me from bondage, at "middle" could make peace between me and someone very dear to me, and at worst would give me a good impression of you. > It would also be nice if sometime people would be satisfied with a > summary of this sort. But how _can_ I be satisfied with your excellent summary? It is a summary of the QUESTION, not a summary of an answer! How could I be satisfied with something that leaves me exactly where I stand? -- I am not now and never have been a member of Mensa. -- Ariadne. [Sorry for misunderstanding your question. I was commenting specifically on homosexual activity, not extra-marital intercourse. I see why you might conclude that the argument I summarized for allowing homosexual sex would generalize to allowing extramarital heterosexual sex. However the folks arguing for homosexual relationships in the past seem to have been talking about a relationship involving a long-term commitment. While they did not always say so specifically, I took them to mean a commitment of the same sort as marriage. I don't recall any past proposals here that Christians should engage in sex outside of such a relationship (unless you are making such a proposal, and you don't seem to be). Nor do I believe any of them proposed ignoring Paul's calls for sexual purity. They were instead suggesting a generalization of the sorts of relationships that would be recognized as pure. You raise a number of issues that could be pursued. I'm going to comment on two. First, you seem not to be convinced that the Law does not apply to Christians. You quote Mat. 5:17-20. There are several possible responses, one of which is that this was a hot topic in the early Church and the source behind the saying in Mat 5:18 may have been one of the Judaizers. However let's try taking it at face value. The simplest way to reconcile this passage with others that seem to challenge the Law is that in Mat 5, Jesus was preaching to Jews. The agreement in Acts 15 (and Paul's position) neither abolished the Law nor challenged its application to Jewish Christians. Jesus intended to call people to a life of moral strictness. For Jews that means obeying the Law, though with an emphasis on the spirit rather than the letter. While Mat 5:18 taken alone might seem to suggest a sort of ultra-legalist position, Jesus' known position on such issues as working on the Sabbath, the rest of Mat 5, and Mat 7:9-15 suggest that this cannot be what he meant. In 7:15 he seems to be uprooting all of the kosher laws, and the comment at the end of 7:19 makes it clear that this is the way the passage was understood by the editor. So I have to believe that his statement in 5:18 about not breaking the least commandment is to be thought of primarily as emphasizing degree of moral commitment required, and not as requiring attention to the letter of the Law. But even if this were not the case, we are not Jews. (At least I'm not. I don't know your background, but I'm going to assume for the moment that you are a Gentile Christian. The situation of Jewish Christians is sufficiently delicate that I do not presume to offer them advice.) Thus according to both Acts 15 and Paul's arguments, the Law does not apply to us. That does not abolish the Law, and thus does not contradict Mat 5:18. It simply argues that the Law does not apply to us. We are still called to a life of obedience and moral strictness, but the moral strictness is not necessarily going to be based on the Law. We do have an example of Jesus dealing with someone who was outside the bounds of the Law. In Luke 7 Jesus deals with a Centurion. He is clearly not Jewish. The elders (in 7:5) speak of him as apart from the Jewish people. Jesus (in 7:9) refers to him as not being part of Israel. Yet the Jewish leaders praise him as a righteous man, and Jesus accepts this judgement. Based on what is known of 1st Cent. Judaism, it seems reasonable to conclude that he was a "God-fearer", i.e. someone who accept Israel's God and presumably obeyed the Noahic laws, but not the Law. Such people were regarded as being as righteous as an Israelite, but as outside the range of applicability of the Law. So you ask, how do we decide what to take from the Bible. I think I disagree with your basic intent. Your basic presumption seems to be that the Bible is a source of rules, and that what I'm saying is that we somehow pick only some of them. I'm saying quite the contrary: I do not expect it to be an authoritative source of rules at all. I do not ignore any of Gal 5:13-21. I accept both that we are to be free and that we are not to use that freedom to indulge our sinful nature. I also accept his call to put to death those parts of us that are earthly (Col. 3:5ff). However I insist that some of his specific judgements on things that are wrong are open for discussion, because I do not believe Paul intended for his advice to be turned into a new Law. It was good advice: certainly good for the people to whom it was addressed, and by and large good even for us. But it is not a Law, and therefore is open to reexamination. The issue that you raise is how we can claim Biblical authority for standards when we also claim the freedom to change those standards. The best treatment of this question I've seen is in C.S. Lewis' book "The Abolition of Man". In it he discusses the development of morals. He suggests that it is an organic process carried out by people within the tradition. He doesn't say specifically what causes them to accept changes, but implies that normally it will be clear to people when changes are a further development along the direction of the tradition. E.g. (and I don't recall that this is an example he uses), it is obvious to most Christians that slavery is unacceptable. In fact the Bible accept slavery, even giving principles for relations between master and slave. But experience in trying to carry out those principles shows that it is impossible. It's all well and good to say that the master must treat the slave as a brother in Christ, and if one could do that, slavery might be acceptable. But experience shows it is not. Slavery involves too much power over our fellow man to be safe in the hands of sinful people. I claim that this conclusion is a genuinely Christian one, even though it is not present in the Bible, and is in some sense even contradicted by what the Bible says. To allow a process of development involves faith that the Holy Spirit will continue to guide Christians. It also requires a tolerance for disagreement. Not everyone will agree on a given change, at least not immediately. If you demand that Christianity give authoritative answers to all questions, this is going to seem unacceptable. Perhaps the most basic difference between "liberals" and "conservatives" is that liberals do not demand guaranteed rules, and this seems to be what conservatives want out of Christianity. I do not, however, suggest "situation ethics". This is the concept that you go into a situation with no fixed guidelines, and simply do what seems most loving at the time. This is dangerous, because it is too easy for momentary passions to overcome good sense. It also does not allow a place for long-term commitments, which are important in structuring our relationships. (I refer you to "Deeds and Rules in Christian Ethics" by Ramsey, for a more detailed discussion of why it is important to have rules.) I do believe we need ethical rules, and I do believe in carrying out commitments. However I argue that rules are subject to change over time. Presumably slow change, and with lots of discussion by the community, because of the temptation to ignore long-term considerations. One of the rules I am committed to is against sex outside of marriage (or an equivalent commitment for homosexuals). I have not seen any experience within the Church to suggest that this rule should be changed. (Indeed I haven't even seen any suggestions to do so, beyond some of the excesses of situation ethics.) You may believe otherwise. If you do, I trust it comes from serious consideration of the consequences of similar acts filtered through the experience of the Church. I will believe you are making a misjudgement, but I will not accuse you of violating the Law. --clh]