Tag Archives: religion

Why Context Shows Historical Intent for the New Testament but Not the Old Testament

31 Tuesday Aug 2021

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, scripture

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In the New Testament Jesus tells many stories.  For the most part there is no reason to think he is even attempting to give literal historical events.  For example, he talks of people getting the same wages even though they start working later than others.  He tells the story of a person allowing another to watch his property. He tells a story of someone selling everything for a pearl.   He tells a story of a wedding and a prodigal son etc. etc.

 If he told those stories today I feel like many people (including Christians) would interrupt and say “wait a second, whose wedding was this?  Are you talking about the Jefferson’s wedding because that wasn’t what happened!”   Or “wait a second are you talking about John?   Yeah sure he did some bad things but he didn’t actually get his father’s inheritance early!”     I mean he does not always start his story by making it clear to everyone this is not offering a literal history. (Keep in mind the subtitles are not part of the actual scriptural text) Could the story of the prodigal son be literally and historically true?  It seems possible.   If we found out it was true in a literal and historical sense what difference would it make?  Absolutely nothing.  The actual literal history is completely irrelevant to the point of the story. 

When we read scripture we do not think God is telling us these stories because God is randomly picking various historical facts that he wants us to memorize.  No the stories of the old testament, just like the stories Jesus told, are told because there are meanings that God is trying to convey.  Whether the story is historically true or false is often completely irrelevant.   Take the “cloud of witnesses” from Hebrews.  The author goes through scripture and offers stories that God gave us to understand how he will reward faith.  Just like Jesus gives stories that help us understand other aspects of God. Whether the events actually happened or not does not change the point of the stories. 

But then does that mean it is always irrelevant if a story is fictional?  No.   The point of the story helps us know whether it is important that the story is fictional or not.  And sometimes in scripture the author is explicit.  For example in Luke and John they explicitly offer their intentions.  Luke starts out with this:      

“Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled[a] among us, 2 just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. 3 With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=luke%201&version=NIV

John explains that that purpose of telling us about Jesus Miracles:

“Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. 31But these are written that you may believe b that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

https://www.biblehub.com/niv/john/20.htm

So it would be odd to say John did not intend at least some of his stories of signs to be taken literally.  I think there many questions that are addressed in the bible but modern readers tend to read the bible as though it is only addressing one.   Here are just a few questions the authors seek to answer:

  1. Is there a God?
  2. Is Jesus a reliable mouthpiece of God?
  3. How should we understand our relationship to God and others?
  4. What does God want us to do?

Modern readers seem hung up on the first question but I think that is very rarely what the author is addressing.  John makes it explicit that the second question is something he is addressing.  I believe the other gospels and NT scriptures have that intent as well. 

I think much of the Old Testament human authors are rarely dealing with questions 1 and 2.  They already believe in God so they have moved on from the first question.   They do not know much about Jesus yet so it would not be informative to establish he is a reliable source of God’s will.  But three and four would be important.  But as we have seen from Jesus’s parables it is irrelevant if the stories that convey answers to questions three and four are literally true.      So the literal historical truth of the OT stories are in fact largely irrelevant.

But what about the New Testament?  Well two seems to be a very important message of the New Testament writers.  So how can they establish that Jesus is a reliable source of God’s will?   Let’s just think this through for ourselves – without a bible.  If I were to say I am a mouthpiece of God, how could I give evidence of that?  One obvious way would be to perform a miracle.  This would be a sign from God that yes I am not just like every other person but God is singling me out.    But, of course, there is nothing miraculous about just making up fictional stories of miraculous events.   So the only way to serve that purpose of proving I am singled out by God would be is if I actually performed miracles.      That is why the New Testament is understood as intending to tell actual history.    

This is not just me cherry picking what I will decide to read literally or what I won’t.  I am just applying common sense to the text. 

Randal Rauser: Interpretting the Old Testament Part 2.

12 Thursday Aug 2021

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, philosophy, scripture

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Randal Rauser wrote a very good book about Old Testament Passages. 

I mostly agree with him and I am glad he wrote the book.   I do not intend to do a review of the book as much as do a few blogs where I talk about a few places where I diverge from his views.  Do not think because I am disagreeing with the book I think it is not worth reading.   It covers many important issues. 

One topic is how we might interpret Old Testament passages.   I definitely take what he calls the “spiritualized” approach to some of the Old Testament.  I believe Origen used the term “spiritualize” to describe his own non- literal reading of scripture and indeed I draw many of the same conclusions Origen did.  However, I would simply say I am taking a “non-literalist” approach to many parts of the old testament.   

I think saying I “spiritualize” the text suggests that I promote a certain particular interpretation.  Sometimes I do, but often I don’t have any interpretation other than to say I would not take that passage literally.   If I had to choose how to interpret the Old Testament passage of the Canannites I would choose the method chosen by Origen. (I was not aware he interpreted it the same way I do until I read it in Rauser’s book)  But I am not saying I believe it is, more likely than not, the true intent of the author.  I just think the probability that Origen’s interpretation is correct is higher than the probability a literalist reading, or other options, are correct/true. 

Over all, I am happy to admit I am not sure what message was intended by particular passages of the old testament – including that one.    And indeed much of the old testament may not even be true or false.   It can be artistic.  Is a poem or work of art “true or false”?  Scripture may be intended to invoke feelings and mindsets rather than just offer literally true and false facts about the world.  How would those feelings and mindsets have played a role for cultures distantly removed from us in time is often just an exercise in wild speculation. 

It is for this reason that I do not find fault with the Church for omitting certain parts of the Old Testament from the lectionary.  If we don’t know what message the Holy Spirit is trying to convey why would we spend time on that passage as opposed to other passages that are more clear?  Christ is our guide and he was repeatedly challenged with this or that particular passage from the old testament.  Again and again he reinforced what the fundamental take away of the old testament was.

He did not get into the weeds about what this Hebrew word meant and how we can understand it this or that way.  So it is just not concerning to me that I must admit I am not sure what specific message the Holy Spirit was trying to communicate in a particular passage.  And often I think we don’t know very much at all about what the Holy Spirit was doing to guide people.    

Let’s say you find this song.

Further assume you know nothing about the context of the song, you don’t even know who wrote it let alone what the political issues of the day were let alone what his political or religious views were.  You can at least translate the song and when you translate it you can see that some of the lyrics are things like, “We’re moving night and day to go to Meadowlands / We love Meadowlands.”   Based on the beat and the lyrics you might think the writer of the song really liked the meadowlands and was happy to move. 

In reality, it was written as a protest song in South Africa protesting the forced move many black people had to make from Sophiatown to the Meadowlands.   South Africa had censorship of music that went against government policy.   So the music was deliberately upbeat to suggest to the government it was in favor of the move.   But in fact the upbeat nature just added to the irony and sarcasm that was intended by the author Strike Vilakazi, and his audience that heard it. 

Some officials in the South African government took it literally and so they played the song on the radio.  Those government employees were living in the context but still misunderstood.    The joke was on them and that inside joke shared by a community makes the song inspiring.  But how do we know this?  We know this because the song was written less than a century ago at time long after the printing press and even video cameras that documented the history and intent of the author.    But what if you just found this song without any of that context.  What if you didn’t even know who wrote the song, all you could do was translate it?  Almost certainly you would get a completely wrong message.    

The way this song played a role in South African history is wonderful.    I might even call it historical scripture.  Is the song “true”?  Did people misunderstand the song then, and might they misunderstand the song later if they lack the context?   Yes but their ignorance adds to the songs brilliance.    

When we read the Old Testament we should not pretend we know all the meanings or purposes the writers had in mind if, in fact, we know precious little.  But some people will insist they know God wants them to read it literally as a default.  How they know this I have no idea.   Instead I think the view of interpreting scripture and other material literally has come about as a consequence of sola scriptura and also the printing press.  I will explain that in another blog. 

Origen is one of the earliest commentators on Old Testament passages whose works still exist.  He was onve of our closest in time sources to understanding what these authors would have intended.   He did not interpret them literally.  My own approach is I might read a passage where “God says” kill every soldier, and I think ok, but, if this is literal how do we know this is God saying this and what does he look like etc.  But ok maybe we can get past that.    But then “God says” kill every male even if they are not a combatant.  And there I think hmm that seems questionable based on other writings like the fifth commandment not to mention what God said and did when he came to earth as Jesus.  But then I read “God says” and kill every woman.  At this point I am definitely thinking the author is up to something other than literal history.  More likely than not this is not simple recording of literal history.    And then “God says” kill every infant!  And here I am definitely thinking God is communicating in a non-literal way.  Beyond reasonable doubt this is not literal.    But then even if you are still not understanding this is not intended as literally what God said the author writes God also said kill every one of the enemies donkeys!  Ok at this point unless your name is Dwight Schrute you have to be thinking the author is up to something other than a simple transcript of what God literally said. 

Is the author making an inside joke about certain hard line priests/rabbis/political leaders of his time?  Would certain rabbis misunderstand the intent that more sensible Jews/Rabbis understood as happened with the song meadowlands?    I am not necessarily saying that.  I am saying we don’t know.  And I am certainly saying that I think that is much more probable than the intent was that he literally believed God thought we should take vengeance on the farm animals of our enemies.  I also believe that inside jokes against arrogant powerful leaders is likely one of the oldest forms of entertainment and expressions of solidarity for oppressed people.  If it was intended as a jab at certain overzealous preachers of the day I can see why it was handed down as a classic. 

My own view – if I had to choose one – is that the author was using symbolism where the canannites represented sin. My view is similar to Origen’s view.  But even that I do not think is more likely than not true.  I just think that is more probable than a sarcastic interpretation.  Both of those interpretations are not combined to be over 50% in my mind. But either the sarcastic or symbolic interpretations seems much more likely than a literalist interpretation.    The biggest part of this pie graph is – we really can’t say what to make of this passage.   

I often hear/read that authors of this literature lived in a time where science was non-existent and therefore ignorance was everywhere.  We hear that most people could not read and write and therefore they must have been very stupid.   I have read many times claims that people in ancient times thought things like thunder was made by Thor banging his hammer.  And they thought the world was on the back of a tortoise etc.  And I wonder how do these people know what the ancient authors thought?  Today we tend to read this literally and so we project our views on the author.  But how do we know they interpreted these stories literally?    And if I am able I will ask the person making the claim how he knows that.  Rauser offers some decent reasons in support of a literalist interpretation, (which I will address in another blog) but for the most part there is no response other then they repeat what is said and assume it is to be taken literally.   

But If some myth author suggested that the earth rested on the back of a tortoise and some person asked the author “what does that toroise stand on?” or   “well how does the tortoise get enough water to drink”  I think the author of these myths would not praise this person hung up on literalism for their insight, but rather shake their head and possibly consider them someone that is difficult to communicate ideas to.   I don’t think the ancients writing myths and stories that were handed down for centuries in any culture were just dumb people.   In particular I certainly do not think that of the ancient Jews that wrote the stories that were considered scripture for their culture were dumb. 

People often assume they are smarter than others.  They especially think other people distant in time, culture or space lack their understanding.  I really think we apply this prejudice to ancients, in ways that are not unlike what the South African apartheid government did to black people.  The joke was on the government leaders.  The culture that revered the books of the Old Testament was not a culture of idiots.  But I think there is a certain prejudicial arrogance that allows some modern people to think their literature really was just crude ignorance in word form. 

The bible has 73 books.  We should not claim we know what every passage means.  It is ok to say we don’t know what that particular passage means.  Just because all scripture is good for instruction 2 Timothy 3:16 that does not mean every passage is good for every person at every time in history.  It may very well be that parts of the bible were revered for reasons that are lost.   Denying this possibility is not going to help anyone gain understanding. 

It is for this reason that I would push back on Randall Rauser’s view that we shouldn’t “omit” certain Old Testament passages.   I think there are Old Testament passages that we do not really understand well at all.  I think they are properly left out of church lectionaries and Sunday school.  Why read scripture when we don’t know what to make of it?  Especially when there is so much scripture that we can understand and provides wonderful instruction in how to live in the modern world? 

But people might say well how could God let this happen?  Why wouldn’t God make sure people always understood what the author was communicating?  And I would respond, why should he?  God reveals himself differently to people at different times.  Why would we assume we need exactly the same messages people of a different time and place needed?

 And anyway the answer is that in reality the meaning of written words in our world/reality does often get lost.  The written words may stay but the full meanings are often lost not just in scripture but other writings as well.    So what would we expect God to do to help us not be lead astray?  Well Scripture tells us 1) he wrote his law on our hearts as a guide. 2) He created a Church,  and 3) if you are Christian you also believe God came down from heaven and told us the important takeaways from the old testament.  I don’t think it is reasonable to ignore God’s commentary on the Old Testament just because you decided literal readings should be the default.  Start with God’s commentary on the Old Testament.  If someone’s literal interpretations puts them at loggerheads with the author’s interpretation of his own work we can acknowledge the literal interpretation is wrong.  We should do the same with scripture.    

Theism’s Role in the Roots of Political Disagreement

06 Thursday Aug 2020

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, christianity, law, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, politics, religion

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In the last few blogs I have posted about some economic data that I think is relevant to political discussions in the US. I have also commented on Eric’s blog trying to explain why some Christians may vote republican and why Jesus was not a socialist. We quickly got in the weeds about data and why we think our data is more important and why we think the facts we mention are more important etc. I think all of those arguments are important in political debate. But neither Eric nor I are really trying to run a political blog. I want my blog to be more philosophical with an aim to show why being a theist is more intellectually fulfilling and coherent than being an atheist.

That topic will necessarily cover a wide variety of subtopics from meta-ethics, morality, to free will, to science, history, scripture, and yes politics. I think Eric and I would both agree that certain political views are anti-christian. But my disagreement with him was that we shouldn’t consider people who vote for one party or the other as Christians. Each party has a wide range of policies that they adopt and rarely are you going to find a party that perfectly matches our christian views. To the extent we are going to say political views on certain policies are christian or anti-christian those policies need to be considered individually. That is why I think Christians can be Democrats or Republicans or even Socialists.

The Catholic Church I believe has done a decent job (although far from perfect) of navigating these debates in this way. It has taken specific stances on issues that it believes are anti-christian but by and large has not emphasized certain political parties as being “Christ’s party” or the “anti-christ’s party”. It should be obvious to anyone reading the Gospels that Christ was not a politician and he was not preaching a political agenda. This is a difference between Islam and Christianity.

But part of the debate between theists and atheists is more centered around which view leads to better government. This is a much more philosophical question. So you might ask if Jesus was not a politician why would we say a theistic outlook is could lead to a better government? And the answer is because the theist has a fundamentally different view of what they are and how they get rights than the atheist. And this fundamentally different view has led to various issues over the past couple of centuries.

All laws are intended to promote certain goods. So questions of about whether morals exist, what they are, and how we know them, will be foundational for any government that is enforcing laws. Most of my blog explains why I believe an atheistic worldview completely fails to establish a coherent view of morality. Without real morality debating laws is essentially the same as debating whether red or white wine is preferable (subjectivism) or whether batman would beat the silver surfer in a fight (fictionalism).

The foundational belief that all humans are made in the image of God is the great equalizer and has provided a basis to reject slavery, racism and killing humans deemed undesirable. Rejecting the idea all humans are made in the Image of God removes a massive barrier to these practices. Efforts to create any similarly sized barrier have not yet materialized.

Theism supports the belief that our rights come from God and therefore the state can violate them. Atheists will often argue that rights are a creation of the state. This is a very different view and has had catastrophic consequences throughout history.

I am not saying Atheists can not run a government or have a moral society. But since they reject the notion that we are all made in the image of God that can be a severe foundational problem. We see this foundational crack play out in many different policies from racism, life issues, free speech, animal rights versus human rights, the relationship between the government and the individual, the relationship between church and state, and many more.

I have drafted a few blogs about some of these issues and hope to post about them in the future.

But for now I would recommend a pretty interesting interview that touches on some of these concerns. Ben Shapiro is a Jewish political commentator that worked his political views back to philosophy. (Yes many of the philosophical arguments I make would also support the Jewish theism.) Whereas I think I worked out philosophy to its political implications. So I think we sort of came at it from different directions but ended up meeting on some common philosophical ground. Now my goal is not to say people should adopt Ben Shapiro’s political views. I do think he does a good job representing conservative positions but I also think people should make sure they understand the positions of democrats and socialists.

Rather I recommend this video for the more philosophical aspects of his discussion. This is mostly covered in 20:00 to about 47:20 so if you are not interested in his personal life you may want to skip there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZETvBSlu1tg&t=3914s

Viable Scenarios and Rationality

13 Thursday Feb 2020

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Athesism Christianity, Catholic, christianity, epistemology, metaethics, philosophy, religion, Uncategorized

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A common view is that we are rational when we weigh the evidence for and against any belief we hold, and if the weight of the evidence says it is more likely than not true we can/should continue to believe it.   If not, then we shouldn’t continue to believe it.   Another approach is to say we should “apportion our beliefs to the evidence.”   These approaches are different from each other, but as far as they go they seem ok and I am not trying to parse them out here.  Instead I want to suggest there is more to having rational beliefs than simply following either of those approaches.

Consider the various Cartesian skeptical scenarios.  These scenarios force us to ask how we know anything about the external world. ( BTW throughout this  blog I am using “know” as imprecise short hand for “reasonably  believe.”  I think “knowing” something does require more certainty that what we “reasonably  believe”  but my sentences are awkward enough so I am sticking with the term “know”)     We might be dreaming.  Some god or evil genius may be manipulating a brain in a vat somewhere causing us to have these experiences etc.  If that was the case it would seem there is still something (a thinking thing) having an experience and so in some sense “I” (this thinking thing) would still exist,  but nothing external to my mind would need to exist as I perceive it.  This is where we get the famous “I think therefore I am.”

Perhaps the easiest way to start getting the idea of these scenarios is the dreaming argument.  Everything I know about the external world is due to my experiences.   However, since I have had dreams where the experiences were such that I couldn’t tell I was dreaming it seems at least possible that I could be dreaming now.   Do I have “evidence” I am not in a very detailed dream?   We can’t step outside of our experience to see what is causing our experiences, so no I do not.  Yet I believe I am not in a detailed dream.  So that would seem to violate the notion that rationality involves “apportioning belief to the evidence.”

Moreover, my rejection of the dreaming argument seems to violate a notion of parsimony.   Every time I have the experience of oncoming headlights traveling opposite my direction on a highway, not only do I have that experience, but I also believe there are physical people with minds and lives of their own in those vehicles. And not only that I think those people will pass headlights and behind those headlights will be real people with real lives and concerns etc.

We do not think there actually are physical things (that may have their own minds) that correspond to the imagery we experience when we dream.  We just think there is the experience of seeing people in our dreams, but those people don’t really exist with minds of their own.   It is possible there are material things existing somewhere that somehow correspond to the dream experiences we have, but our experience does not require that these material things actually exist.   It seems absurd to think any material things exist somewhere corresponding with our experiences – at least when we are talking about “dream experiences.”

But when we talk about experiences we have when we believe we are awake, we somehow think the opposite.   Belief in all those extra material things and minds suddenly seems justified – even though we know from dreams – we could be having the experience without the extra material things or minds existing.

My point is not to try to convince people we should believe we are in a dream or other skeptical scenario – I generally don’t try to convince people of things I do not believe myself.   But rather I want to point out that it is not the “evidence” that is apportioning our beliefs here.  The various skeptical scenarios take up a very small percentage of real estate in my mind.  Most of my beliefs are formed around the notion that I am a real person moving around with other real people with minds of their own.   I do this even though I have no evidence against one of the skeptical scenarios being true.     So in doing that I am certainly not “apportioning my belief to the evidence.”   So if it is rational to believe I am not in a skeptical scenario then there must be more to rationality than “apportioning  belief to the evidence.”

I think there is at least one other reason we do not orient our  beliefs towards a  Cartesian Skeptical scenario.  That is because it is hard or impossible to know what we should do in such a scenario.  The converse is also true.  If we did know exactly what we should do if we were in one of these Skeptical scenarios then it would be a much more rational to orient our beliefs to account for this scenario.  It would be a possibility we could better account for because we would have an understanding of how we should deal with it.   Thus whether we could have some idea what we should do in a scenario is important to whether we should consider it a viable scenario.   But without any understanding of how we should deal with or act in such a scenario, that scenario seems a dead end.   It is only rational to orient our beliefs to viable scenarios not dead end scenarios.

Now let’s get back to reality as we believe it exists.  We see things and believe many of them exist in a material form independent of our experience of them.   But does having this “materiality” actually answer how we should deal with this scenario?   Some would say it does, but I don’t think knowing about how things are tells us how they should be.  So I think just adding materiality to the scenario accomplishes very little if anything.

But regardless of where you stand on that question, you still may agree with me that the viability of a scenario does depend on whether we have any hope of knowing what to do if we are in that scenario.   If we don’t know what scenario we are in then, any scenarios where we would have no clue how to act anyway should be discarded from consideration in orienting our beliefs/actions.   This is because by definition whatever beliefs or actions we orient to would not  be  better or worse than any other in those scenarios.  So a rational person focuses on the possible scenarios where we could know what to do and form their beliefs based on the possibility of those scenarios being true.   Those are the “live options” or what I call the “viable scenarios”.

But do we have to “really” know what to do or can we make up what to do?  That is, do we have to be a “moral realist” or can we be an anti-realist and just admit we are making things up  based on our experiences.    It seems to me that if we can just make up morality through a form of constructivism it wouldn’t matter that we are in a real world as opposed to a skeptical world.   It would seem we could just as easily make up morality if we are dreaming or a brain in a vat.  It is also at least possible that there is real morality even though we are a brain in a vat.  And it is also possible our beliefs and intended actions are morally relevant.  But the important point is that if the real world we think we live in does not offer anything better than a form of anti-realist morality, then it is no more “viable” than a Cartesian skeptical scenario.

It seems to me a “viable scenario” requires that 1) moral realism is true and 2) we have a way to know what morality requires.  That is we have a way to know how we should act and what we should believe.      A scenario where we can’t possibly know what to do in it, is not a viable scenario.  Whether viability is an on off switch, or more of a sliding scale may not be all that clear.  But let’s just say any scenario where 1 and 2 are not met is not a very “lively” scenario.  They would share the same trait that makes the Cartesian doubt scenarios non-viable.

Now consider the possibility that naturalism is true.  We can look at the possibility that naturalism is true without any preconditions and we might say the probability is X.  But then let’s consider the probability that naturalism is true if we are in a scenario where moral realism is true.  Some, myself included, would say that if they knew Moral realism was true then they would think the probability naturalism goes down.  So on moral realism the probability of naturalism becomes X minus Y.    Others might not agree.    But one thing I am fairly certain of, is that if the scenario we are in, includes 1(moral realism is true) and 2 (we have a reliable way to know what morality requires) then the probability of naturalism being true is very low indeed.

The logic of the arguments made by Sharon Street, Mark Linville and Richard Joyce demonstrate this.   They persuasively argue that if naturalism and evolution is true, even if moral realism is also true, we have no way to reliably know what morality requires.  Street and Joyce believe in naturalism so they reject the idea we can reliably know what moral realism requires even if it is true.   Linnville, and I, think that in light of this sort of argument we should reject naturalism.

For the reasons I stated above I think rejection of naturalism is the more rational option.  That is because holding on to naturalism leads to believing in a non-viable scenario, and rational people orient their beliefs around viable scenarios, naturalism should  be rejected.    If naturalism is a scenario where the probability of 1 and 2 is extremely low, then naturalism implies a scenario that shares the same trait that makes the Cartesian skeptical scenarios non-viable.

Of course, people can dispute whether 1 and 2 are necessary for a viable scenario.  They can also disagree whether 1 and 2 make the probability of naturalism low and vice versa.  But I think this is the best way to understand the structure of my moral argument for God.

We Can’t Control Ourselves but We can Control Others?

05 Wednesday Feb 2020

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, law, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, politics, rationality, religion, Uncategorized

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Do we have free will?  I don’t have anything more to offer as far as evidence.  But I do think it is clear that morality and our justice system is a complete flop if we don’t have free will.   Most proponents of determinism agree that, if they are correct, we are not morally responsible/culpable for our actions.  But they still might believe there is a right and wrong way to act.    So, they don’t completely abandon hope of morality or a rational justice system.

 

In my opinion determinism allows only a crippled view of morality.  It doesn’t matter what direction morality points us we are on a train going wherever we are going and we can’t get off anyway.  Our hope for a rational justice system would also seem to rely on dumb luck.    How might our meta-ethical views concerning determinism impact our criminal justice system?

 

Traditionally criminal laws were grounded on four different notions, vengeance, retribution, deterrence and/or rehabilitation.   Retribution has replaced vengeance, although sometimes people fail to draw a distinction between the two.   I am not aware of anyone who believes in hard determinism but still maintains we should keep retribution as a grounds for our criminal justice system.  Retribution is the most important aspect of our criminal justice system but that will be the topic of another post.  Here, let’s consider the claim that even if determinism is true we can still pass laws for deterrence or rehabilitation purposes.

 

For example, Sam Harris says if you are a determinist like him:   “We could forget about retribution and concentrate entirely on mitigating harm. (And if punishing people proved important for either deterrence or rehabilitation, we could make prison as unpleasant as required.)”

https://samharris.org/life-without-free-will/

 

He like many determinists agree retribution is out.  But he claims we can still hope to achieve two other goals of our criminal justice system – rehabilitation and deterrence.   Deterrence is the idea that we can prevent people from committing crimes if they think undesirable things will happen to them as a result of those crimes.  So we can pass laws with punishments that are unpleasant and thus we make it less likely people will commit crimes.    Rehabilitation, at base, is the notion we can do things to criminals such that they will act in a way we want in the future.

 

So, if we accept determinism and still think deterence and rehabilitation are viable, we find ourselves saying we have no influence or control over our own behavior, but we do have influence and control over other people’s behavior.  Traditional wisdom suggests the opposite.  Common sense suggests we have more influence over our own actions than we do over other’s actions.  Is it possible that we can have no influence over our own actions, yet we are still be able to influence other people’s actions?  No, not in any meaningful sense.

 

I think this is an example of people not fully appreciating the far reaching implications of their position.  If determinism is true then even saying “we could make prison as unpleasant as required” plays on an ambiguity and is not actually accurate.  The ambiguity is in the term “could.”  “Could” can mean: we have the option.  Or “could” might mean: it is possible.

In Harris’s usage he seems to suggest “we have the option to make prison as unpleasant as required.”  But of course, on determinism we have no options.  We must do what we are going to do, and can’t do otherwise.  So that meaning of the word “could” leads to a contradiction in his beliefs.

 

If he means just that “it is possible that we would make prison as unpleasant as required….”  Then we might ask so what?    It may be possible, but we have no influence over our actions so we have no way to make that possibility a reality.

 

Our very sense of self is obliterated by determinism.   We are like ping pong balls in a lottery machine.  Yes we “could” bounce into other balls causing them to jostle and become a winning number.  In the sense of “could” that “it is possible” that happens.  But, of course, those ping pong balls have no control over themselves so it is not an option they have.

 

It makes no sense to take the perspective of the ping pong ball.   If we throw out free will then we throw out our whole notion of self.   It is no longer even sensible or meaningful to think in terms of what we “can” or “could” do.   We are just parts of a system that must act however we are going to act.

 

For those who are interested in the free will debates I highly recommend this set of lectures:

https://www.audible.com/pd/Great-Philosophical-Debates-Free-Will-and-Determinism-Audiobook/B00DGDBO2Q?qid=1580847985&sr=1-1&pf_rd_p=e81b7c27-6880-467a-b5a7-13cef5d729fe&pf_rd_r=FNSXY98EKBP6E5CPEM6G&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1

Two Aspects of Rational “Belief”

06 Friday Dec 2019

Posted by in apologetics, christianity, epistemology, logic, metaethics, philosophy, rationality, Uncategorized

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We see everyone claiming to be rational but then we find that they view being “rational” as having a mindset that leads to their conclusions.  My second blog was on what it means to be rational in general terms here.

Those views seem correct now just as they have for decades before I wrote that blog.  But there is still a tension in what it means to “believe” something that I have been thinking about for decades and I have ultimately concluded that the term “belief” has two different meanings that are essential to our understanding of the term but can sometimes conflict.  This blog is intended more as one that explains a problem that I see rather than provide a solution.  Hopefully others will have a decent solution or at least understand the problem so their discussions can be a bit nuanced.    Here are the two essential aspects of belief that I think most philosophers would at least agree are valid considerations as being part of the term “belief”:

  • The second view is that a belief is something you properly hold if you believe the evidence supports the conclusion that the claim is more likely than not true.

Although I agree the second definition is a view that seems to capture an essential part of the term “belief” I also think it has problems that I think never get enough press in professional philosophy.    I want to discuss the problems I see with the second view but then, in the end, will explain why I think it is, nevertheless, hard to just do away with it.

I think this second view of belief leads people to think rational people should be constantly weighing the evidence of each individual belief and then trying to banish those where the evidence does not measure up.  Our beliefs are much more complicated than that.  That simplified view does not even give us an idea of what beliefs should be examined and which shouldn’t or the pragmatic considerations.  For example under that view a rational person could be memorizing facts out of a phone book as much as they investigate whether they should believe it is ok to have an abortion.  Obviously being rational means more than just filling our heads with random facts which the evidence suggests are more likely than not true and expunging those beliefs that seem not to have that evidence.

But there is another problem.   A logical problem with this view is that many decisions are not exactly binary.   Either the Christian God exists or he doesn’t.  That’s true.  But that doesn’t mean, unless we think the evidence supports that the Christian God exists is more likely than not true, we are irrational for believing in that God.  We have to consider the alternatives.  And there seem to be many alternatives to believing in the Christian God.  There are Gods as explained by other religions.  There is the possibility to believe in a God that is not explained by a religion.  All of these are possible beyond just either the Christian God exists or no God exists.

So lets analyze a hypothetical situation.  Let’s just say I believe:

  • Christian God is 30%
  • non-Christian God(s) aggregate to 40% but all individually are less than 30%

and

  • no God is 30%?

Sometimes people say that if we don’t have evidence that supports any of those beliefs are more likely than not true then we should “withhold belief.”   Sometimes people say that means you are “agnostic” and some people would say that an “atheist” might fit that description as well. The arguments about the terminology seem more pedantic than helpful so I won’t address them.

But ultimately I still have to decide things like:

  • Am I going to Church Sunday morning?
  • Am I going to treat human life as though it is a sacred gift from God?
  • Am I going to treat all humans as though they are made in God’s image?
  • Am I going to teach my children these things?

These are a few Christian teachings that you are either going to live your life by or you are not.   You need to act now.

If you can pause life then ok.  But I can’t.   So in the meantime my actions are going to reflect my beliefs.  And it is hard to understand what it would mean to be agnostic here.  Would that mean I sometimes go to church on Sunday?  Should I try to go 30% of the time?  If I never go to church on Sunday or act in accordance with the Christian teachings then am I not adopting the belief that the Christian God does not exist? And other religions are even less likely so I would act as though there is no God.    But in my hypothetical the evidence doesn’t support that belief as being more likely than not true either!  Does the agnostic know how to pause his life?  Can he teach me how to do that?

Notice these issues arise before I even start to get into the fact that this is only dealing with “theoretical rationality” and not “pragmatic rationality.”   It is irrational to ignore pragmatic reasons which can effect what views we should adopt, but these problems arise when we just consider the theoretical model on its own.

But let’s dig a bit deeper.  Some say we can act as though something is true even though we don’t believe it is true.  That sounds a bit like lying to yourself.    But let’s go along with this a bit.   We still need to ask which way should I choose to act when the evidence doesn’t support any relevant belief is more likely than not true?  Should I just act and adopt views however I feel like at the moment?  Ok but are we going to claim that is rational?

I’m sorry but the second view (where we rationally believe something if and only if the evidence supports that it is more likely than not true) is too simplistic and just won’t work in life.  Any approach to being rational in a situation must address all the different probabilities and their pragmatic consequences.    Yes it’s complicated but oversimplifying rationality only masks the problems.

So I think the first view is important.  But the second view does have this going for it.  If I say “I believe O.J. Simpson murdered Ron Goldman”,  then it seems I am saying it is more likely than not true that OJ Simpson murdered Ron Goldman.    It is hard to remove that aspect of the term “belief” without doing an injustice to language.    I don’t have a solution, but I think we should understand these two different meanings of “belief” especially when we talk about whether beliefs are rational or not.

Love of the Gospels and Mark in Particular

04 Wednesday Dec 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, philosophy, religion, scripture, Uncategorized

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I started to question my faith at least by junior high.  I still vaguely remember arguing with a friend who was a year older – he was in a Catholic high school and I was in a public junior high.   We were basically arguing the free will issue and whether it could exist if God knew everything .  It came up because that was something they were discussing in his freshman high school religion class.   It wasn’t something we did often – and in fact it may have just been that one time with that particular friend.  But I do recall feeling, that I set my friend straight that the Christian perspective couldn’t work and excited to attend the same Catholic High School and take this up with the teacher.

 

And it all came to pass splendidly.  I did discuss/argue this with the teacher at that Catholic High School. And the thing is I think the teacher enjoyed the argument and discussions as much as I did.  Of course, he was probably very happy to have a student engage the material.  And I was happy to find some school material I wanted to engage.

 

But I certainly never thought any questions were out of bounds for any of my Catholic teachers.   And I have to say my experience with adults in the Catholic Church tended to be that way.  It could be that I would pick out adults with a interest in the philosophical.  I guess if just blindly picked people my experience wouldn’t be so good.  But as it was, I never had the experiences many seem to have had where the adults in their Church just want to avoid the tough questions.

 

In my experience Catholics tend to fall in two camps when it comes to these philosophical questions. Camp one:  I will give them a big analysis of how God couldn’t exist and they will shrug and say “yeah maybe.”  Camp two: I give the analysis and they will share their own arguments pro and/or con.  But I don’t recall every getting the Aretha Franklin “Don’t you blaspheme in here, don’t you BLAAAASPHEME in here!”

 

In my opinion this is good.  But of course it does mean it was easy for me to fall away from the faith.  And I did.  I never decided to declare I was an atheist, but I certainly didn’t go to church on Sunday or particularly care about what the church thought was sin.  But my love of philosophy never faded.   So I majored in it and took classes in epistemology and philosophy of religion, reasoning and logic etc.  I spent quite a bit of time reading, learning and thinking about philosophical issues.

 

About the time of College I started hearing all sorts of odd views from protestants on Christianity (“Faith alone” “actions don’t matter” etc etc.) and atheists.  And all of them would have bits and pieces of scripture that would seem to support their views.  So I really started to question if I knew what Christianity even was.  Whatever they were talking about seemed foreign.   I knew quite a bit of scripture from the times I went to mass but did the church leave big parts out?

 

So what to do?  I wasn’t interested enough to read all 73 books of bible.  And I knew Paul’s letters were there to address specific concerns of churches.  I decided to read a Gospel.  After all it is through the gospels that we learn about Jesus and spread the faith.  It is through the Gospels that we learn the most about Jesus.    But which Gospel?

 

Mark doesn’t have the wonderful “Sermon on the Mount” like Matthew, nor the “Prodigal Son” or “Good Samaritan” like Luke.  And it doesn’t have the adulteress or any of the wonderfully poetic and touching narratives in John.  But it did have one thing that was the most important at the time.  It was short enough to easily be read it in one sitting.   I had no excuse.

I still remember some trepidation at the time not knowing what this gospel would say.  Would it have what I considered some pretty nutty doctrines atheists and protestants were espousing?  Was I really that ignorant?    I had to find out.  So I read it, with the intention of learning about Jesus’s life and what he wanted us to learn according to Christian Scripture.

 

What did I think?  First, it is beautiful.  The narrative is fantastic for any time but especially when compared to other ancient writings.  Second, it depicted the Jesus I grew up learning about in Catholic Churches and Schools.   I followed up with the other Gospels.  There were no surprises and I definitely felt my Catholic upbringing accurately represented Jesus and his teachings.  I found many protestant and atheist views were very hard to square with what Jesus taught in the Gospels.  I now understand why protestants often appeal to other parts of the new testament (such as Paul’s letters) and atheists appeal to the old testament.

 

As a Catholic we have scriptural readings that we rotate through every three years.  You can know what scripture Catholics read every day around the world at church by picking up a missal or looking here online.   I believe Catholics read from a Gospel every Sunday, if not every day.  So we tend to cover the Gospels and therefore Jesus pretty thoroughly.

 

Although I can’t quote chapter and verse by heart, I can often tell what the story is by the name of the gospel general chapter number which is announced, and the first sentence or two as well as the prior readings.  Catholics who try to attend mass on Sundays and pay attention will learn the Gospels and therefore what Jesus taught.

 

Now that I go to mass every Sunday  I am often amazed how the priest will have a new insight into the same text.  Often it is how passage might relate to our lives, but it also could be based on how the Greek is translated, or its connection with Old Testament scripture, or history, or just a small detail in the text.

 

Lately I have been introduced to some podcasts from Travis They take a more secular approach to the Scripture and I know at least one is an atheist.  But they all seem to also have a great appreciation for the Gospels and an interest in what deeper meanings the writers may be trying to convey.   I have been blasting through them and really enjoying them.

 

Of course, I am familiar with the historical Jesus research and especially Dr. Ehrman’s popular work which I recommend to people as well.  But with all due respect to Dr. Ehrman I think he often misses the forest for the trees.  Why are the gospels so important?  I suggest it is not because we can find inconsistencies between the gospels or from copies of the gospels.   All of that is interesting and worth being taught.   But I think if you had a teacher teach you Shakespeare and the majority of his focus was on picking nits of plot inconsistencies and whether the copies accurately reflect what Shakespeare wrote, you would be missing out.   Of course, Dr. Ehrman was a Moody Bible institute graduate and so his background does suggest his approach.  Nevertheless, when I listened to his classes he starts out saying these texts are hugely important to human history.  And I agree they are.  But I don’t think his class really conveyed how that came to be.

 

What is my point?  Read a Gospel.  But don’t read it with the intent of trying to nit-pick flaws or justify doctrine or politics.  Just read what happened to Jesus and try to understand what Jesus is trying to teach us.  And then, regardless of your religion or lack of religion, you will begin to understand why Jesus has had such an impact in human history.

 

Anti-theists and Pharisees can Interpret the Old Testament the Way they Want, I will Interpret it the Way God Wants

12 Tuesday Nov 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Athesism Christianity, Catholic, christianity, history, law, logic, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, rationality, scripture, Uncategorized

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This a second post about how Christians should deal with the objections to Christianity based on Old Testament verses.  Often opponents of Christianity will try to tell Christians about the parts of the bible that were not “cherry picked” by their Church or Sunday school teachers.  They will often talk about how they read “the whole bible.” And then start spewing out all these obscure bits and pieces of the Old Testament – and then accusingly ask “do you believe that!?”  If you try to interpret the scripture in a way that complies with the basic gist of your faith, (as opposed to their hyper-literalist reading) they will say you are just making up that interpretation.  If you simply say, well I don’t know what to make of that scripture they will say aha! You don’t even know your own scripture.   If this is troubling you then this blog is for you – and hopefully those opponents of Christianity who engage in this line of argument.

I think the best response to this is to test out how much they actually know about the bible.  Simply ask them: What did Jesus say about the old testament scriptures?  The Gospels are full of Jesus being tested on interpretations of the old testament!  We will get to these in a bit.

Don’t be surprised if the only thing the Christian opponent will remember is the “one jot” passage from Matthew  that I blogged about here. I get that as a response so often that I chose to just blog about it first.  When you get this passage  (and you inevitably will if you do this apologetics schtick long enough)  Ask them if they know when Jesus said that and how he elaborated on what he meant.  The above blog deals with that quote and the context much more extensively, but in sum, the quote was part of his famous the Sermon on the Mount.    He clearly elaborates what he means and likely contradicts the anti-theist’s approach to the old testament – which are usually literalistic and amazingly similar to the Pharisees of Jesus time that often wanted to “test” him.

Ask them if Jesus ever summarizes the old testament.   Does he give us guidance as to how we should understand the old testament as a whole so that we live the lives he calls us to?  People who have actually read the Gospels will know he does, repeatedly.  The Gospels record numerous situations where Jesus repeatedly teaches by his actions and words how we should understand the Old Testament.   It would be good to see if the remember any.   I have gathered up several passages where Jesus himself addresses the Old Testament Scriptures.

But before I begin why just quote Jesus?  Why not Popes or other Scripture?   I certainly could, but, Jesus is the lens through which we should read all Christian writings, not the other way around.    When we interpret scripture we of course should make sure we are interpreting it in a way that God directly tells us we should!     Jesus himself informs us that scripture is not just the word of God – it has dual authorship.  See e.g., Mark 10:1-12.

Regardless of how one might understand scripture the vast majority of Christians will agree that when Jesus says something it is God speaking very directly.  Jesus is the head of the church (Colossians 1:18) not the pope, not the bible, but Jesus.  Christians can disagree with each other about scripture.  Martin Luther even said James contradicted Paul.  But if Jesus himself is telling us how to interpret the old testament, a Christian should listen up.  ( Even scripture says we should take special notice if we are getting this directly from Jesus as opposed to Paul e.g., “And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband” 1 Corinthians 7:10)

What did Jesus say?   The most important point is that Jesus repeatedly summed up the old testament.  He did not dive in and give us rules for each and every verse of all forty-six books of the old testament.  That would be a continuation of the rules model that he superseded.  Instead he repeatedly tells us we should understand a general bottom line from the old testament and repeatedly rejects precisely the literalist interpretations offered today by certain anti-theists.  (Although, it was religious leaders taking the literalistic view of the old testament in Jesus’s day.)    So what is the bottom line God explicitly tells us we should take from those 46 books?  Let us quote God directly from the Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John:

Matthew:

 “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” Matthew 7:12

This is then repeated:

“Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.””

Matthew 22:34-40

Mark:

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[e] Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’[f] The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[g] There is no commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:28-31

Luke:

“ On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b]”

“You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

[Jesus responds with the Parable of the Good Samaritan]

Luke 10:25-37

And John:

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.  My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command.  I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other.”

John 15:9-17

It isn’t a pope who is saying these things.  It isn’t a protestant reformer or a Sunday School teacher.   It is God himself telling us what the bottom line is.    If you are interpreting any of the old testament in a way that goes against this then are you going against God’s interpretation.  I am not interpreting God, I am quoting him.   Accordingly, churches are not “cherry picking” passages but rather being mindful of what God explicitly told them they should take away from the scripture.   Sure they will focus on the passages that they feel deliver the message God told us we should get from the Old Testament and not dwell on passages where it is hard to see the connection.  But that is not cherry picking that is being obedient to God.

Scripture is God revealing himself to us at very different times and environments.  But God is infinite and our understanding is finite.   It should not be surprising that God will use different tools that work better for some times and places than they do for others.  And it should not be surprising that scripture will never entirely reveal everything about God so we can completely understand God as a whole.  So the fact that we look at some verses of the 73 books and have to shrug our shoulders should not be surprising!  An infinite being revealing himself is not the same as telling the story of Harry Potter.     Does God give us enough direction to live a moral life.  I think any honest reader of the gospels would agree he does.

God took the time to give us a summary of the old testament.   I do think Christians should at least understand this often repeated summary.  Love God and love each other.  So if we read a passage and we don’t see how it yields what God told us it should, then it is fine to say we are not sure what we should make of that passage.    Perhaps the story is conveying a message to people based on understandings we have lost.   Perhaps what seemed loving and forgiving to the ancients no longer seems so.   Jews and Christians have made quite a bit of moral progress over the last several centuries.  An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth may seem extreme to us but it may have been a very moderate statement if the culture typically asked for the heads a culprit’s whole family in exchange for a tooth.  As we might expect God’s guidance has helped us make moral progress!

Jesus said as much himself.  At times scripture was written as a practical tool to guide people in the state they were in at the time.  See e.g., Matthew 19:1-9 and Mark 10:1-12.  Where Jesus says although the old testament allowed divorce that was not really how we should live.   (I would note Paul points out Jesus said this and that would be very hard to square with the view that Paul did not think Jesus was alive on earth as some Mythicists would claim.  “And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband” 1 Corinthians 7:10.)

Let’s look at how Jesus himself applies his bottom line summary in response to the Pharisees who often would raise almost the identical issues that Christian opponents raise today.

Stoning People

John 8:2-11 is an obvious and direct answer from Jesus on how we should deal with old testament laws:

“At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them.  The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group  and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.  In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”  They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger.  When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”  Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

“No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

These ancient codes like Lev. 20:10; Deut 22:22 have been so often quoted by Christian opponents you would think Jesus never addressed any of them, let alone addressed them directly and explicitly.

Many atheists will talk about how this passage from John does not appear in existing early texts.  But that is a red herring.  All Christian Churches I am aware of include this passage in their scripture.   Whether it was in early transcripts and taken out of some – or was a story about Jesus that was passed on and later included into John is unimportant.  It is part of our scripture and it tells us what God said.

In any case this is just one of many examples where Jesus’s bottom line that old testament laws must be understood in terms of treating others as you would like to be treated.  That would of course include judging others as we would like to be judged.    See e.g., Matthew 7:1-5, Luke 6:37-42 and Luke 6:31-36.  Where Jesus tells us to focus on our own shortcomings instead of trying to judge others for theirs.    These teaching not to judge others guts the penal aspects of the old testament across the board.  But let’s move to some other specific examples.

Healing on the sabbath, another rule broken! 

“Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there.  Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath.  Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Stand up in front of everyone.”

Then Jesus asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they remained silent.

He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored.  Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.”

Mark 3:1-6.  See also Matthew 12:10-13, Luke 13:10-17

Harvesting Grain on the Sabbath was explicitly forbidden in Exodus 16:23–29 even gathering sticks was not permitted Numbers 15:32–36.  So we should not be surprised by the Pharisees who are so similar to many of today’s literalist rule obsessed Christian opponents.

“At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them.  When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.”

He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry?  He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests.  Or haven’t you read in the Law that the priests on Sabbath duty in the temple desecrate the Sabbath and yet are innocent?  I tell you that something greater than the temple is here.  If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent.  For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”

Matthew 12:1-8

“Unclean” woman and Jesus.

Leviticus 15 talks about how women who are menstruating are unclean.  It is not just that an unclean person should not touch be touched by anyone, but you become unclean even if you touch things they touch! They are not supposed to touch anyone, and they are supposed to yell they are unclean so that others won’t contact them.   Yet she touches Jesus and Jesus does not condemn her for violating the Rules.   Indeed, he even praises her for her faith and heals her!  Matthew 9:18-23 Luke 8:43-48  and Mark 5:21-34.

According to Leviticus 13:45-46 and Numbers 5:2 lepers are also unclean.  So people are not supposed to touch them.   But what does Jesus do?  Yep he “reached out his hand…. but quickly pulled back saying ‘the rules say I can’t touch a leper, sorry dude!’ and walked on by” Anti-theist bible page 752:42.

For those interested in Christianity here is what the Christian Gospels actually say:

“When Jesus came down from the mountainside, large crowds followed him. A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”

Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”

Matthew 8:1-4

See also Luke 5:13 “Then He put out His hand and touched him…”

Rules says we are not supposed to touch corpses Numbers 19:11-22 and number 5:2. But he seems to do just that when he takes a dead girl’s hand in Matthew 9:23-25.  Now Jesus said she was just “sleeping” but I do think the author intends us to think she had died in the sense we would mean by it.

Jesus also cuts against the teachings that one might read in the OT that misfortunes are the results of our sin or those of our ancestors.  Exodus 20:5 Deuteronomy 5:9 and Second Samuel 3:29.  No doubt passages like these lead the disciples to ask whether a man blind from birth was suffering due to his own sins or those of his parents.  Jesus said “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” John 9:3. See also Luke 13:4-5

“Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”

In my last blog I talked about the rule based systems Jesus is here repeatedly and emphatically moving away from and rather pointing us in a moral direction.  That direction can best be expressed by loving God and treating others as you would want to be treated.   That is the basic rule Jesus applied above and it can serve us to address all these “tests”.

Imagine this from the perspective of the woman caught in adultery and the rule Jesus is asked to address.    Imagine being a person suffering from paralysis or blindness and believing Jesus can heal you, but unfortunately the time Jesus comes near just happens to be the Sabbath so he follows the rule and says he will not work that day so you are out of luck.   What if you were the woman who suffered from hemorrhaging for years (thus preventing you from going to temple and forcing you to be considered unclean causing you to be outcast from society) knowing that if only you touched him you would be cured.  But when you did touch him instead of healing you he reprimanded you for breaking the rule!  Lepers obviously suffered.  They also had to announce to others they were unclean.  Jesus could heal you with a touch but sadly touching was against a rule so he walked by.  Putting ourselves in the shoes of others is the key that now makes all these “tests” seem easy.   If you were a Pharisee listening to the Gospels at Jesus time I am not sure you would always anticipate how he answers these tests.  Jesus directly and radically changed the rule based system.   That is one of many reasons why the Gospels are so amazing.

Am I saying that God Changed what is Moral?

People often misunderstand what relativism is or at least when it is objectionable to the moral realist.  The moral realist does not say that a certain action – say killing someone is always immoral.  Rather they say that it is not dependent on the mind of the person judging.   So there may not be anything wrong with someone making an “eeeeee” sound.  But if you know that action is aggravating/effecting those around you then it may be immoral.  The moral realist is fine with that view.  The moral realist agrees the surrounding facts can effect the morality of a specific action.  However the objective moral realists says the rightness or wrongness of a given set of facts is not relative to the mind of the person doing the judging.  So if Jesus not stoning the adulteress (assuming all the facts and circumstances of her case) then it is not evil then it doesn’t matter if some Pharisee thought it was evil.    The relativist would say his not stoning her could be morally good for Jesus but not morally good for the Pharisee.  I address this common misconception of relativism here.

The passage from Mark 3:1-6 is especially illuminating on this point.   Jesus states “ Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil….”  Of course, if it were objectively evil to break a rule (do any work on the sabbath) his statement would not make sense.  But they know what Jesus did was good and not evil despite the rule!  And Jesus knew he did not need to explain.  How did he know?  Because God is a loving relational being and he made us in his image.  Yet we are so attached to rules that even today people will still ask is ok to work (in a hospital healing people no less) on the sabbath?  Following Jesus does not require a high IQ and an understanding of a complicated rule system.  That is not why it is hard to follow him and do good.

Hopefully anyone can see one of the main messages that Jesus repeatedly taught was that specific rules are often twisted so that they work against their intended goal.   He repeatedly tells us what the moral goal is (love) and shows us how to apply that goal to our thinking.   This is why I am somewhat baffled by people asking why didn’t Jesus just simply announce another rules against [insert whatever specific rule you want].    “’Are you still so dull?’ Jesus asked them.” Matthew 15:16

It is likely just that people haven’t read the Gospels, or if they did, they read them with a motivation other than trying to understand what Jesus was trying to communicate.      The anti-theists of today are so much like the Pharisees thinking they could teach morality better than Jesus by using the rule based system.   It is almost miraculously prophetic how Jesus addresses this same issue so directly and repeatedly.  It is also interesting that just as in Jesus day those who want to harden their hearts to his message will succeed and not understand even the basics of what he repeatedly taught.

So when Christian opponents say we are “cherry picking” passages or reading the passages in ways that allow us to be loving, we should admit it is true.  That is what God told us to do.   Don’t let their ignorance of even the basic, repeated, and explicit teachings of Jesus lead us off the path God told us to take.

Christ’s “Moral Direction” Versus “Moral Rules” Approach: Surpassing “Every Jot”

09 Wednesday Oct 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Athesism Christianity, Catholic, christianity, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, rationality, religion, Uncategorized

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I have a few blogs drafted on understanding the Old Testament.  A common attack on Christianity will be to take a passage out of the Old Testament and try to use it a sort of “Gotcha!” statement.   And sometimes it will be a gotcha statement for people who are raised Christian because Christians usually do not dwell on these passages – for good reason.  The reason is because God himself in the body of Jesus gave us instruction on how we should understand the Old Testament.  So by focusing on Jesus’s teaching we can see the Old Testament as God intended.   I Hope that by reading these blogs atheists and theists will gain a deeper understanding of how Jesus calls us to live.

 

Quite a few atheists will ask questions like: Why doesn’t Jesus say it is wrong to have slaves?  Why doesn’t he say it wrong to discriminate based on  [insert category]?  Why didn’t he command [insert rule]?      This is what I call the “rules model” of moral behavior.  Certainly, taking individual actions and saying you must (or must not) do X is one way to inform people how to act.  But Jesus overwhelmingly took a different approach.  He gave us a moral direction not more rules.  That is why early Christians were “followers of the way” rather than “keepers of the code.”

 

Both models have their advantages and disadvantages.  The atheist complaint that there are a lack of more simple minded rules, that the rules model offers tends to misunderstand Christianity at a fundamental level.   But that is not to say I do not understand where they are coming from.  There is a certain comfort in having a set of rules and believing as long as I follow these I am ok. Regardless of the authority figure, parent, police, referee, school teacher it seems obvious and fair to have the rules set forth in a plain way.   So we see that just as we want to know the rules today, Jesus was also asked for the rules.  What are the rules to get past those pearly gates?

 

But there is another reason we want the rules.   And here we are getting into a drawback.   We want to know the minimum.  We don’t pay more for items than the price tag, we don’t overpay taxes, etc. We often think of morality as a restriction similar to a lack of money – in that it can limit our pleasures and increase our suffering.   We really don’t want that.  We don’t want to give up more of our worldly pleasure than is necessary.   This focus of living a life of earthly self-centered pleasure and avoiding suffering is often understood as a form of slavery in Christianity.  It can keep us from living a life of love, and service to God and others.

 

Because “rules model” tend to make moral minimums the bar, it makes sense Christ would not dwell on specific rules.  That model tends to cap off our goodness.   With rules you only have to go so far and you can comply with a code/rule, but Jesus wants us to always strive to go further in a moral direction.  Does anyone really think they are a good person just because they do not own slaves?   It is obvious that Christ wants much more.

 

Yet often Christians – including myself – when we think about whether we will go to heaven we will naturally at least go through the ten commandments and consider if we have kept them.  Jesus does not entirely discourage this, but obviously he goes beyond that.  see e.g., Matthew 19:16-28    We should love each other so, obviously, we shouldn’t murder.  But we are not ethical just because we follow the rule and do not murder someone.  Jesus wants more from us than a simple minded rule model suggests.  Jesus teaches the basis of the rules and then tells us to take the basis to the fullest.  Because his moral directional teaching does not put a cap on our morality like rules based morality Christianity has lead to unprecedented moral progress in the west where Christianity has had the longest and most intense effect.

 

“Rules models” have at least four downsides.  First, As explained above and below they tend to suggest we can cap off our morality.

Second, They are subject to gamesmanship in interpretation e.g., what is slavery?  Are indentured servants slaves?  Are all workers in communist countries slaves?  Is saying if you don’t work you don’t eat forced labor?   Is slavery ok in prisons or for prisoners of war?   There are many questions we could ask just about slavery.  The bible might have to be an infinitely thick rule book to cover all the different and wide ranging moral questions.  Human laws are always restricted by our lack of ability to understand someone’s true intentions.  We can only make inferences about their intentions from their behavior.  Thus people often play games and try to technically comply with rules even though they violate the spirit of the rule.  See e.g., Jesus healing on the Sabbath.   Unlike human laws that can only deal with what humans can learn, God’s law addresses our intentions and scripture consistently makes it clear that we should not think we can fool God.  “But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7 God does not have to rely only on the outward behavior we can observe, so his judgment is not so limited.

 

Third, people want to know the reasons for the rules not just have a list of dos and don’t “because I said so.”  We don’t want to do things that seem arbitrary.

 

Fourth,  by addressing who we are and why certain moral rules exist we can understand and develop many moral understandings.  So not only do we go further than each rule we can develop our own rules on different issues.    For example understanding that all human life is sacred and made in God’s image not only prevents murder but it can, and has, lead to much more, including the understanding that slavery and discrimination is wrong.

 

Where is the scriptural evidence that Jesus ended the rules model of the old testament but not the moral commandments in a directional sense?    It was the point of his statement about “the smallest letter or least stroke of the pen” from Matthew.  It is perhaps one of the most quoted passages from Jesus by atheists trying to buttress their “gotcha” verses by claiming it means that Christians must follow every “jot” of the old testament in a literal sense.    But that takes Matthew 5:17-20 way out of context and can even contradict Jesus.  First here is the passage:

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 5:17-20

 

What is the context?  Jesus said this near the beginning of his famous “Sermon on the Mount.”  And we have three full chapters of Jesus himself explicitly elaborating what he means by that quotation.  Those chapters are Mathew 5, 6, and 7.  And indeed when you understand that statement in the context of rest of the sermon on the mount, you will see why atheists not only misunderstand the context but often try to use that quotation to contradict what Jesus explicitly said when he elaborated on what he meant.

 

In that sermon Jesus famously blew the “cap” off of many Old Testament moral commands.  He kept the intent but insisted we go further in our moral development.   He explicitly says how we are called to not just meet the morality of pharisees and teachers of the law but “surpass” them.  He then goes on to specifically articulate how we should “surpass” them.

 

I always encourage people to read the gospels but here, I won’t quote all three chapters but rather just paraphrase with citations.   Not murdering is not sufficient don’t even get angry or disparage others.   Mathew 5:21-22   Don’t just avoid literally committing adultery.  Do not even look at another woman with lust.  Mathew 5:27-30.   Not only should you be required to give a bill of divorce before leaving your wife, you shouldn’t divorce her at all.  Mathew 5:31-32  Not only should you not violate your oaths but you should always speak the truth.  Mathew 5:33-37  Not only should you limit your vengeance based on the violation you suffer (“eye for an eye”) but instead you should not take any vengeance and instead give your enemy more than they wrongly took and the beggar more than what they ask for.  Mathew 5:38-42 He expands the love of neighbor to everyone even enemies.  And directs us to love our enemies. Mathew 5:43-47  “Be perfect…” Mathew 5:48.

 

Don’t just give to the poor but give to the poor silently without a big show. It is to be done out of love of others not to improve your image. Mathew 6:1-4 Likewise pray but your prayers should be for your relationship with God not in order to make you look holier than thou.  Mathew 6:5-6  Forgive everyone like you want God to forgive you.  Mathew 6 9-15.  Fast but do not do it so others will be aware of your holiness but again make the sacrifice without letting everyone know.  Mathew 6:16-18   Desire for money and greed should have no place as they will control you instead of God. Mathew 6:24  In all things rely on God and don’t be a slave to worldly possessions Mathew 6:25-34.

 

Notice Jesus specifically rejects the atheist interpretation of the harsh punishments of the old testament and specifically that we should not to judge others. “Do not judge, or you too will be judged.” Matthew 7:1 and we see this theme of not retaliating but instead forgiving throughout the above sermon.     He says we should focus on our own moral shortcomings rather than those of others and understand that we are always biased to think we are morally better than we really are. Matthew 7:1-5.

 

“So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” Matthew 7:12. “When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law.” Matthew 7:28-29

 

Amazing indeed.  He changed our morality from the simple minded view of “ok just don’t do these things and you’re good” that atheists often claim to want, to the much more challenging call to love others as best you can.    This change in approach has lead to moral progress never seen before or since and of course will lead us to even greater moral progress if we continue in this direction.

Ad Hoc Reasoning Suits Moral Subjectivism and Anti-Realism

25 Tuesday Jun 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, christianity, epistemology, metaethics, Morality, rationality, Uncategorized

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The subjectivists I speak with seem to treat the topic of morality as though we can have a reasoned discussion in the same way we might about facts of reality.  I think many times the moral anti-realist doesn’t fully appreciate the problems with this view.   I explain why I think the subjectivist will have trouble with the very notion of having any sort “good reason” to believe here and here.

There I argued that there are 3 general types of “good reasons” to believe something.  First are theoretical reasons, second pragmatic reasons (see this blog for a philosophical explanation of the distinction) and third we would have good reason to believe something if not believing it caused a contradiction in our beliefs.  In the earlier blog I merely said that it is simply too low a bar to only ask that the views not lead to logical contradiction.   But I want to discuss the coherency condition more fully here.

I do concede that the constructivist can at least appeal to internal coherency as a way of preferring beliefs.  Overall, I think this bar is too low but it is especially low when we understand that objective reality itself will not constrain the beliefs we do come up with.  This blog will explain how the rational quality/virtue of consistency/coherency is trivially easy for the subjectivist.

Consider the fact that many people thought Hitler had many internal inconsistencies in his thought.  A subjectivist might say this would prevent them from following his moral scheme.  But let’s consider one such inconsistency that we often hear and see how that really would not be a problem for the subjectivist.   Roughly the argument is made that Hitler was inconsistent in saying

  1. The proper German must be, blond haired, blue eyed, and have great genes for athleticism.
  2. Yet he had none of those traits

and still he thought

3.He was a proper German.

Now if these were the views he held, and for the sake of argument let’s say they were, then I would agree they are inconsistent.

So what could he do?  Well he could just add to the first claim that “…. unless that person was Adolf Hitler.”   There that takes care of that inconsistency!  You might say well there might be another Adolf Hitler that he wanted to exclude from being a proper German.  And we can just say that “…. unless that person was Adolf Hitler who was born on such and such a date and hour at such and such a place…”  We could also make these exceptions for Goering and Himmler etc.

These exceptions seem dubious because they are “ad hoc.” Ad hoc additions to a theory are those that seem irregular from the overall theory but they are included for the sole purpose of saving our theory or view.  Normally we frown on ad hoc explanations.

One of the reasons Kepler’s heliocentric theory of elliptical orbits was preferred over the Copernican system involving perfect circles (the Greeks like Ptolemy thought circular motion was more perfect) was because the Copernican system had epicycles.  Smaller circular motions of the planets were added as well as the larger orbit.     http://www.astro.sunysb.edu/fwalter/AST101/keplers_laws.html

Epicycles are I think it is fair to say another example of ad hoc reasoning.  In that I am sure Copernicus would agree he was only including the epicycles to shoe horn his theory of perfectly circular orbits into the reality he observed. That was the sole reason to posit the existence of epicycles.   If the math and observation worked without epicycles then Copernicus would not have suggested them.   Once Kepler showed that the math works with ellipses (no epicycles needed) people tended to prefer that system.   This was all before Newton and his theories about inertia etc.

Why should we be suspicious of ad hoc reasoning?  It is because as the products of the culture of Athens and Jerusalem we tend to think A) that reality/truth is not created by our beliefs about it so it is not going to be different so it suits our beliefs, and B) Copernicus was making a claim about objective reality.

Of course, if you are subjectivist you think differently.  Subjectivists think the truth about morality is dependent on our view of it.  So in that case A is not something we accept.    To the extent you think our moral constructs are unconstrained by objective reality then you also reject B.     There is no objective reality we are trying to explain.   Rejecting either A or B seems to take all the sting out of the charge or ad hockery.   Morality is what we make it – or so they say.    So there is no reason to prefer the regularity we see in objective reality.

I mean I can’t like and dislike the taste of the same pickles at the same time in the same way, but it is just fine that it used to be those pickles tasted bad but now they are good.  No explanation is necessary.  My mental state makes it “good” and that can change in an arbitrary way.   And once we break from objective reality and its apparent regularity, it is ridiculously easy to be consistent.  It was OK for me to kill a minute ago but I wouldn’t do it now?  Ok no problem, it’s just that my relevant mental state is different now.   We are not saying our beliefs about morality corresponds with any objective reality – indeed we are saying no such objective reality exists for them to correspond with – so there is no reason to be against ad hoc views.

Do we see ad hockery in moral theories?  Yes I gave a few examples that I think are common.

We should care about well being of all sentient creatures except when we don’t.  See animal rights 

In suffering being the key – except when it is not.  Oral Surgeon case. 

Empathy is great even though it seems to add suffering – well we like it anyway!

Of course, people, especially anti-realists, can have all sorts of views on morality so it is hard to explain any case that will apply to everyone.  But for me it was just a matter of really thinking through moral issues and being honest with myself about the grounds I claimed to have as a basis.  I think most people try to be honest with themselves, but I don’t think people often try to think through moral issues that frequently.

In law school we study a huge number of cases involving difficult moral issues. How much the students tried to understand the reasoning as opposed to just learn the law seemed to vary.  Moreover, law school and legal cases do not usually dive into the deep understanding of moral concepts but rather just tends to refer to vaguely worded values.     And, of course, most people have not gone to law school or had any similar exposure to the variety of moral cases that are involved.    Coming to this realization (that creating your own morality with no objective anchor is extremely arbitrary) requires both an inclination and experience that are both uncommon.   So I am not surprised that many people think the amount of ad hoc reasoning might be rare.

When what we decide defines a very concept like “pickles are good” means, such and such fact about my view toward them, then we hardly need to come to any principled reasons for why pickles were “bad” before but now they are “good.”    If I didn’t like pickles yesterday but do today, it’s no big deal.

I see no reason for the subjectivist to reject ad hoc explanations.  But for me it made this whole exercise of supposedly “deliberating” about morality in order “decide for myself what matters” too much of a charade.  I am constantly reminded of the people in allegory of the cave who keep insisting to the philosopher who saw reality that what they are doing with the shadows is important.  I simply have no interest in playing.  My missing out on this involves extremely low stakes.

So yes it may be correct that there is no objective moral realism.  So I don’t discount that possibility.    And if I live my life based on a false belief in moral realism then I agree it was in vain.  But if I just missed out on this big charade, I am perfectly at peace taking that risk.   In fact, I am not sure I can fully express how much at peace I am about taking that risk.