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[FONT="]Do Not Miss The Forest For The Trees. A Response to the Article [/FONT][FONT="]“Critics of gay marriage often base their arguments on the certainty of their religious convictions. But societies without doubt are dangerous places, argues Adam Gopnik.” [/FONT][FONT="]by Mark Jennings.
Part 3 of 5
[/FONT]
[FONT="]Before moving on—here is a brief summary of what’s been said so far. I’ve…[/FONT]
[FONT="]Contrasted two basic bases for the foundation of reason—one that promises objectivity in exchange for the problem of determinism and one that introduces uncertainty in exchange for personal freedom.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Introduced the idea that science itself is based on philosophical assumptions so its claim to objectivity in obedient service to the ‘facts’ is simply not true. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Talked about these opposing bases of reason relate to the origin, understanding, and practice of human law. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Recognized Gopnik as being someone who really does not doubt his position even though he is calling all of us be doubters for the sake of peace. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Claimed Gopnik’s position implicitly argues for a man-centered origin for law which effectively destroys the foundation for the United States Constitution. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Offered the atheistic interpretation of history in which men claim the authority of a powerful being for use as a weapon against those they wish to oppress.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Explained why I believe embracing universal doubt and man-centered law will not bring freedom but rather creeping tyranny. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Given some reasons why I believe atheism provides no firm foundation for morality while explaining why we do not need to believe in God to act benevolently. (But there is abundant evidence that the fear of God does greatly inspire charitable action.)[/FONT]
[FONT="]Offered a few reasons why I am not an atheist and have embraced the Christian faith.[/FONT]
[FONT="] [/FONT]
[FONT="]Now we can move on towards why I think religion becomes corrupt, and to the roles of church and state and why they must not be institutionally merged. [/FONT]
[FONT="]If my position is correct that mankind has been infused with a moral nature and God has intervened in history to give us His Word, what then keeps going wrong? I’ll offer an alternative interpretation of history—one is which God exists and man is in rebellion. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Religion has gone wrong in so many ways—crusade-initiating, heretic-burning, war-starting, cult-forming collection of people populate our ranks throughout history. Fact. Now are these perversions authorized by God or are these perversions authored by us? How many times have we said, ‘God says…’ or ‘God told me…’ or ‘God must have…’ when we are really trying to put authority behind our own words? Countless times… This is nothing new; we read about this happening many times in the Bible itself. Read about what Job’s friends said about God and His will or read the story about King Saul going to relieve himself in a cave in which David’s men were trying to convince David to take that opportunity to kill Saul (1 Samuel 24.) This still happens today with the long line of date-setting concerning the end of the world. (Take make this clear—I do not believe in the rapture or any of that ‘Left Behind’ stuff. They are man-made stories which have made a lot of people a lot of money. There is nothing in the Bible which substantiates the view without severe abuse of the text.) What if all the history of religious perversion, murder, and cruelty stem from our religious attempts to imitate the theocracy of ancient Israel? How many imitators of Moses have there been? [/FONT]
[FONT="]Again—countless…[/FONT]
[FONT="]My thesis argues for our own authorship of the beliefs and laws which have caused so much havoc in our history (as they have falsely appealed to the authority of Natural Law) has added to the relatively short list of God’s rules (the basic principles found in the Ten Commandments) a long list of regulations which has massively burdened mankind. Some people make fun of the 613 commandments observant Jews had to follow in the Old Testament times. Any guesses as to how many laws and regulations we the enlightened have on the books? We have thousands and thousands of them with countless ‘regulations’ meant to administer those laws. Glass houses anyone? Read what Jesus said about men and their laws in Matthew 23:4. There is nothing new here; then, as is now, there are those in positions of power who regularly exempt themselves from the laws the rest of us must follow (or face the wrath of the state.) [/FONT]
[FONT="]There is a substantive difference between real and counterfeit. Ancient Israel was the only authentic theocracy as its creation was necessary to prepare the way for God’s greatest intervention in the world. Jesus Christ testified to the validity of Moses, the Law and the Prophets—all others who have added to or altered the nature of this testimony are pretenders. Under the Old Covenants, Israel struck a bargain with God as His people who then were His chosen instrument of justice against a people who burned their children in sacrifice and were extremely sexually perverse (even with animals.) Pretenders do not have this authority and so the blood is on their own hands when they purpose to act on God’s behalf. (Hebrews 10:30.) [/FONT]
[FONT="]The Israelites demonstrated completely our failings as human beings, they were corrupt, and were ultimately rejected by God as His people with the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in the First Jewish War as recorded by Josephus. (This assertion will cause many gasps among my ‘kind.’) A new covenant has been made in which the intermediary between God and man is Jesus Christ (see Hebrews 8.) Salvation is now direct.[/FONT]
Part 3 of 5
[/FONT]
[FONT="]Before moving on—here is a brief summary of what’s been said so far. I’ve…[/FONT]
[FONT="]Contrasted two basic bases for the foundation of reason—one that promises objectivity in exchange for the problem of determinism and one that introduces uncertainty in exchange for personal freedom.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Introduced the idea that science itself is based on philosophical assumptions so its claim to objectivity in obedient service to the ‘facts’ is simply not true. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Talked about these opposing bases of reason relate to the origin, understanding, and practice of human law. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Recognized Gopnik as being someone who really does not doubt his position even though he is calling all of us be doubters for the sake of peace. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Claimed Gopnik’s position implicitly argues for a man-centered origin for law which effectively destroys the foundation for the United States Constitution. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Offered the atheistic interpretation of history in which men claim the authority of a powerful being for use as a weapon against those they wish to oppress.[/FONT]
[FONT="]Explained why I believe embracing universal doubt and man-centered law will not bring freedom but rather creeping tyranny. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Given some reasons why I believe atheism provides no firm foundation for morality while explaining why we do not need to believe in God to act benevolently. (But there is abundant evidence that the fear of God does greatly inspire charitable action.)[/FONT]
[FONT="]Offered a few reasons why I am not an atheist and have embraced the Christian faith.[/FONT]
[FONT="] [/FONT]
[FONT="]Now we can move on towards why I think religion becomes corrupt, and to the roles of church and state and why they must not be institutionally merged. [/FONT]
[FONT="]If my position is correct that mankind has been infused with a moral nature and God has intervened in history to give us His Word, what then keeps going wrong? I’ll offer an alternative interpretation of history—one is which God exists and man is in rebellion. [/FONT]
[FONT="]Religion has gone wrong in so many ways—crusade-initiating, heretic-burning, war-starting, cult-forming collection of people populate our ranks throughout history. Fact. Now are these perversions authorized by God or are these perversions authored by us? How many times have we said, ‘God says…’ or ‘God told me…’ or ‘God must have…’ when we are really trying to put authority behind our own words? Countless times… This is nothing new; we read about this happening many times in the Bible itself. Read about what Job’s friends said about God and His will or read the story about King Saul going to relieve himself in a cave in which David’s men were trying to convince David to take that opportunity to kill Saul (1 Samuel 24.) This still happens today with the long line of date-setting concerning the end of the world. (Take make this clear—I do not believe in the rapture or any of that ‘Left Behind’ stuff. They are man-made stories which have made a lot of people a lot of money. There is nothing in the Bible which substantiates the view without severe abuse of the text.) What if all the history of religious perversion, murder, and cruelty stem from our religious attempts to imitate the theocracy of ancient Israel? How many imitators of Moses have there been? [/FONT]
[FONT="]Again—countless…[/FONT]
[FONT="]My thesis argues for our own authorship of the beliefs and laws which have caused so much havoc in our history (as they have falsely appealed to the authority of Natural Law) has added to the relatively short list of God’s rules (the basic principles found in the Ten Commandments) a long list of regulations which has massively burdened mankind. Some people make fun of the 613 commandments observant Jews had to follow in the Old Testament times. Any guesses as to how many laws and regulations we the enlightened have on the books? We have thousands and thousands of them with countless ‘regulations’ meant to administer those laws. Glass houses anyone? Read what Jesus said about men and their laws in Matthew 23:4. There is nothing new here; then, as is now, there are those in positions of power who regularly exempt themselves from the laws the rest of us must follow (or face the wrath of the state.) [/FONT]
[FONT="]There is a substantive difference between real and counterfeit. Ancient Israel was the only authentic theocracy as its creation was necessary to prepare the way for God’s greatest intervention in the world. Jesus Christ testified to the validity of Moses, the Law and the Prophets—all others who have added to or altered the nature of this testimony are pretenders. Under the Old Covenants, Israel struck a bargain with God as His people who then were His chosen instrument of justice against a people who burned their children in sacrifice and were extremely sexually perverse (even with animals.) Pretenders do not have this authority and so the blood is on their own hands when they purpose to act on God’s behalf. (Hebrews 10:30.) [/FONT]
[FONT="]The Israelites demonstrated completely our failings as human beings, they were corrupt, and were ultimately rejected by God as His people with the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in the First Jewish War as recorded by Josephus. (This assertion will cause many gasps among my ‘kind.’) A new covenant has been made in which the intermediary between God and man is Jesus Christ (see Hebrews 8.) Salvation is now direct.[/FONT]