Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!bcm!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: lindborg@cs.washington.edu (Jeff Lindborg) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: questions about slavery. Message-ID: Date: 5 Mar 91 02:51:25 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: University of Washington Computer Science Lines: 55 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article sc1u+@andrew.cmu.edu (Stephen Chan) writes: >mib@geech.ai.mit.edu (Michael I Bushnell) writes: > Homosexuality, in orthodox jewish teaching, is wrong. It >is also wrong in traditional Christian morality. If you're trying to >argue that homosexuality is not a sin (in the context of >Christianity), then you'll have to overturn not only 2000 years of >Christian teaching, but also another ~2000 years of Hebrew teaching too. This caught my attention and sparked a thought about just what was and was not acceptable in traditional Hebrew and Christian teaching. Specificialy, if you're going to base your agument on the "traditional" acceptablity/unacceptability of a set of beliefs then how would you handle the situation if Michael, say, owned slaves? I'm curious to know because not only was it traditionaly acceptable to own slaves (and concubines) in the Old Testament, it was actualy condoned by GOD Himself in the laws passed from His mouth to Moses in Exodus (if God did not approve slavery He would not have created laws concerning their treatment or maltreatment and the sale of them etc...). Futher Paul states simply that you are to treat your slaves well. He does not disapprove of the idea of one human being 'owned' by another. Obviously this is an accademic question, but on what biblical grounds would you base your assumption that a slave owner was "living in sin"? Is it somehow more reprehesible to be homosexual than to own slaves? This must be the case because the bible goes through the trouble of condoning one and condeming the other... This is curious to me because homosexuality between conscenting adults harms no one. Yes slavery is, as I'm sure you'd agree, a terrible thing for those on the wrong end of it... >>How to you reply to my >>assertion that being gay is an inalterable fact of personality? Your >>statements offer no alternative but celibacy. Is that your true >>belief, or do you contest (with no experience upon which to do so) >>that sexuality cannot be changed? > Personality is not inalterable. Many people, including myself, would contest that homosexuality cannot be simply altered by, say, exercising more or doing more "manly" things (as I was told by my father once). If this were true I could tell you that you could become homosexual if you tried hard enough... obviously not true. > Unfortunately, for many people, this seems to be the case. > >>Ah, I don't blame you. I merely ask that you give me due credit. > > You have a right to your opinion. But the weight of tradition > and experience makes your protests seem very hollow. Again, tradition is not always right... see above. Jeff Lindborg