For example, I noticed that the English word 'commandment' is heard by most British and American readers as if it were an order that should be obeyed. In Arabic it is heard as an important advice given by a loving father to his beloved sons. After all, love cannot be commanded; otherwise it can be called anything but true love. — KerimF

Whoo- a commandment can be ignored? In war, it is essential to follow the commander. I am groping here because I understand the word as Americans do and it seems our understanding of a commandment is associated with war as the rigid formation of a Roman army. There are those who command and those who follow. This is heavy in our culture with strong religious reasons.

Martin Luther, the founder of Protestantism, thought God determines who is to rule and who is to serve, and feudalism was strictly controlled by the church. People were thought to be part of the property owned by landlords. The argument that Muslims can not be democratic expresses ignorance of our history and major denial. Come to think of it, my present-day concern about the problem with Christian thinking did not include our history when things were much worse. Coming from our history, it is amazing we have democracy and a notion of equality. But boy, are we struggling with what is in our cultural subconscious and the principles of democracy.

An Arabic point of view throws me into a space that is unknown to me. Do you know of Arab military strategy? I have heard much from Muslims about respect and love. What they are saying is nothing like our image of those we call terrorists. And what you say seems to speak of freedom and tolerance. But how does that right with a father who kills his daughter because she was alone with a man? That is pretty controlling. I have an idea of Arab men as very controlling? Yet the holy book seems an effort to curb the way men treat women and perhaps give women more protection than the Christian Bible.

My goodness, I was not expecting the concern of religion and sexism to come up, but clearly it is a serious issue. The religions are patriarchal and women have been repressed for thousands of years. I am very excited by the power women have gained and the potential for change.

What a brilliant idea Athena .. maybe soon we'll be able to make bombs that can blow up entire continents instead of just regional areas. I mean, according to Darwinism if you're smaller or weaker or less intelligent than myself, I just about have a duty to consume, eat, kill, or otherwise "assert my superiority over you" and if I do so, that's just helping the human race. To not do so is to leave us all handicapped.

There's no reason you can't have both. — Outlander

:lol: Obviously you have not read what Darwin said but appear to have a Christian understanding of science. Christians worry a lot about aborting children, and without science, we would be back in a time when people didn't name their children until they were 3 years of age because so many children died before age 3 and life expectation was half of what is today living the world run by youth without the much wisdom of age.

The blessings we have today came from science. Our democracy and liberty depend on science, so it is pretty important to me, people have a better understanding of science than you appear to have. We are not God's favorite people and it is not our God-given destiny to spread out of Rome, killing all indigenous people in our path as we cross Europe and into the Americas. Enslaving people and killing people in the name of God is not moral but it is Christian. People like Billy Graham who tell us God wants us to send our sons and daughters into war, are wrong, and our invasion of Iraq was our shame not the power of glory that Bush wanted us to think it was. People who believe they are doing the will of God have killed more people than atheist. So being a Crusader against science, may not work so well for you.

Just something to think about.. Judgement of sin divorced from its original context means nothing. Sin has to do with not following some of the commandments in the Books of the Law (Torah). Anything outside of this is some reconstruction done by various Romanizing forces that took the little Jesus Movement and reworked it into the Greco-Roman world where ancestral laws of a specific tribe of people didn't matter. — schopenhauer1

Doesn't the Bible say we were born into sin? Something akin to evil? If not why did God sacrifice his own son? Why do we need to be saved by Jesus, instead of science?

Doesn't the Bible say we were born into sin? Something akin to evil? If not why did God sacrifice his own son? Why do we need to be saved by Jesus, instead of science? — Athena

I'm not sure why, but didn't get notification for this when you mentioned me. Anyways, so you are giving me the Romanized reconstructed version of this, which was exactly as I said was not the original construction which was pretty much following a set of commandments for a group of people. How well you follow these rules, is the model you are "judged" if that is the appropriate word. There are commandments for not eating pigs, and animals that don't chew their cud, and don't have certain type of feet, etc. There is a commandment to drain as much blood as possible from meat. There is a commandment to build open air huts on a certain day of year, there is a commandment to eat unleavened bread on another day of year. There is a commandment not to murder and covet thy neighbor's ass or wife. Those are the things.. Once divorced of this context, it becomes a mish mash of whatever the storyteller wants to sell their believers. I provided the historical context.. It was mainly people like Paul who came after the actual Jesus Movement and moved outside the main Jesus Movement's influence in Jerusalem. The rest is history. See my post again for how I think that history went in a very summarized form.

Good job. Now the question is how to get Christians to learn about such things, and all the warring and power games that lead to the Bible we have today? This information was not available 20 years ago, but it is rapidly becoming available, along with science about why we succeed and fail. We need to unhook our nation from mythology but Christians are not motivated to do so.

Our failure to understand what science has to do with good moral judgment and what education for higher-order thinking skills has to do with better logic is a huge problem! AsOutlander argued the world would collapse into sin without Christianity fighting back against Satan. Well, those are not his exact words but I think that is how he sees things. That kind of thinking is not scientific and it is what is wrong with Chrisitanity.

We need to build a better understanding of moral thinking being scientific thinking of cause and effect to combat the notion that we must have religion to be moral. We also have a serious problem with Islam because it is so easy to see US imperialism, and capitalism, as the embodiment of evil. One religious zealot arguing with another, but a different religion, is more apt to escalate problems than resolve them. Democracy when understood as rule by reason, gets us past the holy wars.

True, Christians do judge. Not sure you can judge Jesus exists or not as judgement is more about decisions than believing truth or untruth. Christianity is unique- Jesus was crucified, He also died and rose to Heaven, He was a Jew and never founded the Christianity movement and he understood existentialism extremely well. — david plumb

Fascinating statement- that judgment and belief are different. I think that is exactly the point I have been trying to make.

Before Jesus there was Mirtha, and later Mohammad also rose to heaven at the site of the rock in Isreal. Either people believe such things happen or they don't. It is silly that when they agree such things happen, they then argue about which religion is the true one when all this religious stuff is based on belief, not scientific judgment such as the judgment of Hippocrates, the father of medicine.

Technically, Christianity is about retiring the Old Testament and heh christening a new one. Kinda like "yeah it happened but we don't really do that so much now" .. take that how you please. — Outlander

I have thought if the Bible did not include the old testament, that would be an improvement. Then we could have in the beginning was logos, instead of the story of the Garden of Eden. But then why would anyone need to be baptized and saved by Jesus if Eve didn't eat from the forbidden fruit and we didn't believe in supernatural powers and a God who curses people?

From what I’ve read, it seems like your conclusion is that Christianity calls Christians to judge others. To start, I think Christians definitely have a bad reputation for passing judgments where they have no right to. I think it is very common to perceive Christians as judgmental and ignorant. However, I do not think that Christianity itself calls people to judge others at all. I think it is pretty clear in the Bible that we are supposed to love each other unconditionally and that God is the only Judge. I think it is then the people who call themselves Christians and proceed to judge others as if they are God that cause this problem. In other words, people can say that they are Christians and act contrary to what Christianity actually calls for.
I also would like to discuss what you said about morality having to do with cause and effect. If I am interpreting you correctly, I think you are saying that we can know what the bad action was, but we can’t know what caused it. In other words we don’t always know what leads people to make poor decisions or what their intentions are. I agree with that and I do believe that there are cases where intentions can be important in determining judgments. I think a distinct difference between human beings and God is that we lack impartiality. It is nearly impossible for us to be impartial to certain people. That being said I have a small argument that might coincide with what you are trying to convey:
If something cannot be impartial, then it should not judge others.
Human beings cannot be impartial.
Therefore, human beings should not judge others.
Not sure if you would agree at all, but I personally think this is a major reason that human beings should not judge others.

In other words we don’t always know what leads people to make poor decisions or what their intentions are. — Emma

Why would the reason for the person's poor decision matter? Usually it is ignorance. Often it is good intensions. So, why does a person's reasoning matter?

On the other hand, if a female becomes pregnant, we can be sure she had intercourse with a male. If she does not have a home for a child, can not feed the child, and does not have help, she is in trouble. I can not think of a time when we can not know the cause of an effect.

I do believe that there are cases where intentions can be important in determining judgments. — Emma

I am confused. What is being judged? The cause of something?

If something cannot be impartial, then it should not judge others. — Emma

I disagree with that statement. If the actions of a person cause harm to another, we do need to judge that person. Same as we need to judge wild animals. Is the person or animal likely to cause harm?

I don't know if there is any reasoning in this post or not. :lol: I think I argued myself into a corner I can't get out of? This is totally looking like philosophy. Very nit picky. I know some people who are apt to do serious wrongs, and I see the good in them. So now we have good people do bad things? But do all of us see the good in others? Do we tend to think bad people do bad things and not good people?

It seems like the thought you were having was something like this:

1. If something promotes arrogance, it is immoral.
2. Christianity promotes arrogance by setting people up to judge each other.
3. Therefore, Christianity is immoral.

I think in this case premise 2 is objectionable. I’m not sure how Christianity sets people up to judge each other. It’s not really clear what you meant by judging a person, but you said it’s something “a God” does and through the title of your post I see that this is a discussion about the Christian God. I think the two ways the Christian God can be said to judge are whether or not someone should receive a punishment or a reward or simply whether or not someone has done something morally good or bad.

I don’t see how Christianity sets people up to judge each other in either of those ways. There are several verses in the Bible about not judging others. One example is James 4:12 (ESV), which says, “There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?” This is clearly saying that only God is supposed to judge.

You may be thinking about certain Christians who do judge others. I don’t think it’s specific to Christians though. I think all people have judged others. We definitely all think judgments of other people, but I feel certain that we have all audibly judged another person as well. I’d be surprised if there is a person out there who can fully express their thoughts and has not said that another person did something morally wrong. People in general also say things like, “She deserved to live a longer life.” This would be something that only God can judge, but I don’t think most people would consider it wrong to think or say.

Maybe you were thinking of Christians who condemn things that they believe to be sins because the Bible says they are. In this case as well though, it’s not Christianity that is setting people up to judge each other. People already naturally do this themselves, but Christianity also says that only God can judge, like I have mentioned before.

Hi Athena, you pose interesting questions when it comes to the Christian place in judging others and what the role of a Christian should look like in that respect. I think there needs to be a clarification on the term “judgement”. There is nothing wrong with the term in and of itself. It is simply a neutral term that is the act of coming to the conclusion of something. In this post I will attempt to shed light on what I think the meaning and role of judgement should look like for a Christian according to the Bible.

In John 12:47 Jesus says “If anyone hears my words but does not keep them, I do not judge that person. For I did not come to judge the world, but to save the world.” If Jesus truly walked this earth, then he was the most morally excellent person to have ever walked the face of the earth and, according to Christian doctrine, he was God in the flesh. Now, if he was clear to say that he doesn’t come to earth to judge people, but to save them, then I think it’s safe to assume that’s a mentality that Christians are also meant to have. Granted the judgment that Jesus speaks of here is about the judgement of people’s souls, which only God the Father will decide, but I think it still rings true to the purpose of a follower of Christ. If Jesus said he didn’t come to judge, then who am I, as a Christian to be one to judge.
Furthermore, in Matthew 7:1-6 is a segment from Jesus’ sermon on the Mount in which he magnifies the ten commandments and helps people realize that it’s all about the posture of one’s heart that matters and not being without sin. Jesus starts this off by talking about how you must not judge, lest you too be judged. Again, just like in John 12:47 this states that as Christ followers our duty is not to judge other people. However, if we read a bit further in Matthew 7:3-5 alludes to the fact that there is a time and place in your life when you can bring judgement, but only when two criteria are met. The first is that you look at yourself and are sure that you too aren’t struggling with whatever you are going to judge a person on. The second is that when you judge someone it is important that is be constructive ang loving. It should be an act that betters someone’s character and doesn’t bring them down. It is wrong to say that there is never a time to be critical and judge someone based on their character because otherwise hardly anyone would one grow and mature. The final scripture I will use to back up my claim that there is a time and place for judgement is Proverbs 27:5-6 “Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.”

To summarize, I think that as Christians we are not meant to go around thinking of ourselves as better than others and constantly judging them for “sinning”, but instead we are to humble ourselves and realize that had it not been for Christ we would have already been judged by God as guilty sinners. There is a time and place to judge and it should always be for the betterment of the other person.

I disagree that Matthew 7:3-5 suggests a time and place for judgement of others. Rather, it corresponds to the ‘slim’ allowance for judgement that he also makes in John 8:7, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” The reality is that none of us could claim to be ‘without sin’, and neither could we claim to be free of debris in our own eye such that we would be so righteously concerned with the speck in our brother’s. Judgement should be reserved for our own character - we have enough work to do there, and our efforts would be far more effective.

As for Proverbs 27:5-6, this, too, should not be taken as permission to judge others, but as a guide to choosing between expressing criticism and withholding love, when someone does wrong by you. In such a situation, I would argue that the latter would be judgement, rather than the former.

That was a very good argument, but why does anyone need to be saved? Saved from what?

"If Jesus truly walked this earth, then he was the most morally excellent person to have ever walked the face of the earth and, according to Christian doctrine, he was God in the flesh."

Why do you believe that? Are you familiar with Confucius and Buddha so you can make an independent decisions of who is most worthy of our attention?

What is sin?

I believe it’s an outdated term that relates to guilt, particularly in reference to Jewish Law. When you consider that to follow the Law was to ‘walk with God’, then the basic idea of ‘sin’ was to be ‘out of step’ with God, so to speak. For Jesus, it was more about one’s relationship with God than with the law itself.

That sounds like reasonable explanations.

The Wikipedia explanation is more in line with the one I am familiar with.

t is also taught among us that since the fall of Adam all men who are born according to the course of nature are conceived and born in sin. That is, all men are full of evil lust and inclinations from their mothers' wombs and are unable by nature to have true fear of God and true faith in God.

Original sin - Wikipedia — Wikipedia

Isn't that belief a judgment of all people?

How does Jesus save us?