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My guess is that he doesn't want to openly admit his position on slavery. RM's the most consistent biblical literalist I've encountered.

RM is no more dense now than times past. What RM has figured out is: what you want to hear from him and as long as he does not say it, no matter how trivial, you will remain engaged in the conversation. That is his need and what draws him here.

Although it may seem otherwise, RM has no qualms agreeing to whatever the Bible says, no matter how politically incorrect it is. That is his shtick.

It is of no consequence to RM's cosmology if God condones slavery. In fact, his cosmology would remain fully intact even if God invited Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin and Osama bin Laden to hang out in his skybox, smoking reefer, having round robin butt sex while drowning babies as long as it was written in the Bible.

I know what I posted is a little too advanced for y'all. I didn't really expect you to read it, much less grasp it.

Please, oh enlightened one,put it in terms that we can grasp.

Click the link!

And I guess you didn't read what was written in my thread comments. It's in bold and is underlined for you to peruse.

Yes, I read it (last Chapter of the NT) and I believe it, too. As some might say: It's coming around.

Your turn.

12th Imamist on one side, Revelationist on the other, all at least waiting for the end of the world, and some working to make it happen......we could all be so screwed.....

It's been ending since it began.

billhilly,

Thanks for the compliment.

antelope_sniper,



Up to now, I considered you question about slavery foolish. But when billhilly posted what he did, I decided this is serious and should be answered seriously.

You keep forgetting one man's morals may not agree with another's morals. You and I are prime examples. You are using the word "moral" like you are the final authority. I reject that our of hand. God is the Arbiter of morals. When a friend of mine went to Africa he wanted to buy me a spear as a gift. After choosing one the shop keeper asked,
"Would you like to break it in, correctly?"
"Break it in? What do you do to break it in?" Scott wanted to know.
"We will sneek into a neighboring village and kill someone with it. That way it will be a good gift!"
"Nevermind," Scott told him. The shop keeper's morals were like your's: Self established.

After considering God's Word I choose to believe owning a human as a slave is not immoral. It is objectionable to me, but not immoral. Loaning money at interest is immoral. God gave the rules. He told the slave masters not to treat their slaves harshly because they have a Master in Heaven. And he told the slaves to work like they were serving God. Afterall we are all slaves: Either of righteousness or sin (Romans 6).



I may be dense. I am certainly intense and closed minded. Forty years ago, when I was an new Christian, I was very open minded. Over the next ten years I have no idea how many times I went through God's Word. I did that to discover what I believe. Also I became close minded to Bible commentaries as they tried to convince their reader God's Word does not mean what It says.

Also I discovered the vast majority of "Christians" are not serious any more than the vast majority of athletes are not serious. But intensity is in my genes.

When I was twenty-two years old I decided I wanted to be strong enough to walk into the gym and military press 170 pounds without a warm up. I weighed 150 at the time. The first day, after a warm up, I pressed 145. By the end of the first week it was 165 pounds, after a warm up. At the end of week eleven I reached my goal. I walked into the gym feeling like I could do it that day. I did the 170 cold. After a warm up I pressed 200 pounds military and 210 pounds Olympic style. I tried to get others to use the same procedure but they didn't want to put in the effort. Not serious.

Years ago I had an office at work. Lots of folks would come in at lunch. Two of the guys "did time". One for armed robbery and kidnapping. The other for attempted murder and drug dealing. The one who was not good at murder told me he was in the Hell's Angels. He said most were wannabees and wanted to hang out with the serious guys like himself. He said most folks are just not serious about anything.

Walking into a bathroom after the previous user just took a big sch!t is 'objectionable'. The fact that any man calling himself a 'Christian' could justify owning a slave is very telling. No man...with as much as a hint of a conscience...could ever pretend that owning another human being wasn't evil to the core. I don't think anyone here, on this board, is surprised in the least that you don't find owning a human being as a slave to be immoral.

Just another person lead astray by Divine Command Theory.

Ringman would actually be a pretty smart guy if he would just choose to think for himself instead of following a 2,000 year old story book written by primitive goat herders.

I also think deep down he is more moral then his Bible, he just doesn't want to admit it.

The admission that he finds the slavery policy of his God to be objectionable is somewhat surprising. Especially when the far greater abominable policy of mass homicide/genocide is hunky dory with him.

Originally posted by Ringman

" I became close minded to Bible commentaries as they tried to convince their reader God's Word does not mean what It says."


Even Ringman can can tell the difference between piss and rain water.

Take a lesson.

Yes, Unlike most Christians, Ringman can actually read the words on the paper.

Most Christians don't wish to acknowledge it, but to some degree, they are all developing their own Secular Morality. We see it in our friend Ringman who last night finally acknowledged that slavery, although endorsed by his bible, is probably not the best practice.

We have many others who just choose to place more emphasis on the NT vs. the OT. Don't dash the babies on the rocks, but instead love thy neighbor, and then they conflate neighbor with everyone, not just the chose in group identified by the Bible. But at some level, these are interpretive decisions they are making based on their own sense of right an wrong.

Since they are already picking and choosing, why not just drop kick the entire musty old book of bronze age fairy tales and start building a true moral system not based on Divine Command Theory.

Having to give up the authority of the God to hate is no small matter to overcome.

Consuming pork bacon against Biblical admonition, however, took no effort at all.



So there is hope.

dang this thread kicked the bucket...................

wonder if ringman is now a catholic

sure hope so, for his eternal souls sake

We were all just being respectful for Easter.

Now that Easter is over, we can start let the insults fly again.

Why? Seems like this thread has gotten pretty convoluted. Why not just let it go?

I see the usual suspects are out in force.

Paul said that ultimately, nothing was unlawful for the Christian but on the other hand, generally Christians were going to be held to and convicted of a higher standard. Further, Jesus said that Law ultimately boiled down to two commands: love God and love your neighbor.

I don't get at all the Bible condones slavery. It doesn't condemn it, but it doesn't endorse it. Mostly it simply acknowledges it as a reality. Slavery is and has been a fact in every culture, in every era, throughout the history of the world. ONLY in the last few hundred years and ONLY because of Western nations that were at the time TRULY CHRISTIAN in outlook and form, has it come to be seen as immoral. But when Jesus was around? It was merely a fact of life.

Further, there were lots of kinds of slavery in those days as well. A substantial number of slaves were slaves because of indebtedness and many even voluntarily became slaves to pay off debts or provide money for their families. Was that immoral? Maybe, but the answer isn't as clear. Should a man have the right to freely contract himself into slavery?

Morality is changing, but I submit that just about every positive change over the last 2,000 years is a result of evolutions in CHRISTIAN western culture. Place one of these so-called "secular" moralists down in pagan Rome and let's just see how much his morals have been influenced by Judeo-Christian ideas.

Hey Atheists! I don't give a lick what your non-existent god cares about. He/She probably would feel the same about me, if they could...

Speaking of not GAF, this thread really could use a bit of deflave.