Religion: pros & cons pt1 (Religion)

by Balance_Maintained , U.S.A., Sunday, October 26, 2014, 01:45 (3464 days ago) @ dhw

DHW:A different interpretation. Leviticus 17 repeatedly prohibits the EATING of blood, in the context of food. It gives instructions about using blood as a sacrifice (though I think you said the new covenant invalidated that). -There is also the prohibition about having sexual relations with a woman while she is bleeding. Don't you find it the least bit odd that there are all these prohibitions about even the possibility of exchanging blood with another creature, even through sexual intercourse? If the prohibition was simply against eating it, why the additional exclusions?-
 
> DHW: .. Even if the bible was the Word of God, only God knows what he meant, because there is no consensus among his human interpreters. -You know, to a large extent I actually agree with that statement. I have shown before where the Bible clearly states that things were hidden. It also states that things were especially hidden from those who are wise in their own eyes. (Matt 11:25) See, in my opinion, it doesn't matter if I am wrong about blood. If I am wrong, but my motives are correct, then there is a chance at least that my mistakes will be forgiven. So we err on the side of caution.-
 On the Law-Because the the Nation of Israel was continuously under assault. The Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, and others all at one point or another made war against them. The difference in wording between those passages is one refers to the lands of Canaan, which Jehovah gave to them. Those are the ones that were supposed to be utterly destroyed. The 'lands far away' consisted of essentially the entire rest of the world at that time. Even you have to admit that it was a damned bloody time in history. All of the nations at that point were pretty into the wholesale conquering of their neighbors. If someone attacks, are you just supposed to wall yourself up in your cities and wait to die? Wars don't work that way. To claim that setting rules and limitations on what the standard of conduct during war is, or what the standard dispensation for POW's is during wartime is a carte blanche to attack anyone you want is akin to saying that the Geneva convention is a carte blanch for the modern world to attack everyone they want. -What you do here is to look at one bit to the exclusion of everything else, without looking at how ALL the laws work together. Yes, there was the Death penalty and no prison. Prison is a drain on society with absolutely no benefits to either the prisoner or the public. The only thing the catch and release program benefits is the State. Prisoners earn no money to pay restitution to their victims, then turn around and get free room, board, education, medical care and other benefits paid for by their victims tax dollars. -Now, you cry foul over some of the things punishable by death, but you are not putting them in their historical context either. -In the case of slavery, consider things as a system for a moment. If a man took a woman as a captive, he was not allowed to have sex with her without marrying her. So, no rape. If he did marry her, and they had sex, he either had to keep her as her wife with all the rights and privileges thereof, or let her go freely with all the rules regarding the assets to be given to a wife applying. Being someone's slave did not exempt them from the law in regards to their actions towards the slave, nor was a person allowed to take a free individual and enslave them except through the course of a war. They were free to marry, have children, earned wages, and had protection under the law. If they had a wife, the wife had to be set free with them so that the families weren't torn apart. -The section you stated regarding the 'if you beat your slave and..' was to protect slaves from abuse. If the owner beat the slave with a lethal instrument, and the slave died, that signaled that they intended to kill the slave and they were put to death. (They were allowed to be disciplined, but the law protected them from permanent harm and provided terms of restitution if that law was broken. At the same time, it also protected citizens from being killed over accidental deaths, but even that was up to the judges of the city who would judge the intent behind the case. In fact Ephesians 6:9 and Collosians 4:1 Put that in a pretty good perspective for you. "Also, you masters, keep treating them in the same way, not threatening, for you know that both their Master and yours is in the heavens,+ and there is no partiality with him."-So, when taken as a whole, the law protected victims and allowed for restitution, protected the life of people from cities captured during war as well as their rights and safety during their captivity, and protected individuals from being put to death over accidents.-There is a pretty good article on it here:http://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200004160?q=slavery&p=par-And lastly, the bible says we are all slaves, bought at a high price through the sacrifice of Christ. So, I suppose in a way you could say that the New Law Covenant didn't abolish slavery, it just made slaves of us all, for a time.

--
What is the purpose of living? How about, 'to reduce needless suffering. It seems to me to be a worthy purpose.