While I of course don't expect you to agree with my point of view, I am once again perplexed by the inability of believers to at least UNDERSTAND such a common view.
Ever hear of Aesop's Fables? They don't come from God, they come from tales told among just regular folks, assembled by a slave.
I'm not comparing these to the Bible in any way except to say these are morality tales, and they at no time have been said to come from God.
They came from the accumulated wisdom and observation of...people.
Again--you don't have to agree with my point of view, but it's bewildering to me why you can't simply understand what I mean when I put forth my belief that the Bible tales are invented stories meant to show what some have decided is morality based on the ethical beliefs that emerged over thousands of years of human behavior, during which a society or societies saw what, in their view, worked for them, what didn't; what actions were justified and which weren't.
The Bible says there are some actions which are justified, even killing, and others which are not; there are countless moral codes of lands, tribes, nations, religions which do the same, and they don't come from the god you choose to believe in.
You label your moral code as superior because it comes from God the Creator. Fine. Others say your god isn't the creator, and guess what? Their opinion matters TO THEM as much as yours matters to you.
You can say "But MINE is the right one!" all you like, and it doesn't change the situation, which is one person claiming his is THE God, his THE morality.
You're perfectly within your rights to do so. But that doesn't change for one second that I don't believe it, nor do I have to believe it.
Again, I'm not asking you to like it--I don't care whether you do or you don't. But can't you at least understand the position?
Darkwolf377...
I’m probably the last person you want to hear from and a delayed response at best!
I know I come across harshly for which I apologize. I also apologize if it is inappropriate to answer and divert from the original subject matter, but I see this happening with all kinds of subject matter in FR, so I assume it is acceptable to some degree(?).
For brevity - here are your quotes, and then I’ll make a comment or two about them on the whole afterward:
“They (morality tales) came from the accumulated wisdom and observation of...people.”
“Bible tales are invented stories meant to show what some have decided is morality based on the ethical beliefs that emerged over thousands of years of human behavior, during which a society or societies saw what, in their view, worked for them, what didn’t; what actions were justified and which weren’t.”
“...it (morality, good/evil) came from the human experience of that behavior which benefits the individual while at the same time allowing society to function based on local custom and prefered behavior...”.
Ok - let me clarify that I do understand people make choices in what they believe and I don’t want to come across as beligerant and telling you - you are dead wrong. That is not at all what I want to say.
Certainly I cannot and will not force or push my stuff onto you.
So, it is good tho, to attempt to prove things out and/or at least discuss, right?
Your three quotes above are your answers to questions I posed in asking you (anyone) to explain how those first beings in the human chain (at any point) came up with that ‘sparkle’ to even consider intangibles such as ‘good’ and ‘bad’?
I need this explained in really simple terms. Fuzzy terms like “emerged over thousands of years of human behavior” just doesn’t tell me a thing about that one ‘person’ that first came up with ‘good’ and ‘bad’. That initial spark of knowledge of something not seen, not ever even thought of prior to a certain moment in ‘evolutionary history’, yet it “emerged” some how, some way.
That is the moment I need explained in detail. I need for you to tell me what put the bug in their ear that made them consider something inconceivable prior to that moment in all of world history. This knowledge of good and evil emerged from what exactly?
Also, several of you seem to place this event or ‘emergence’ of knowledge of good and evil in relatively modern days and not something that would or could(?) have occured with our cavemen friends from the past, or even earlier in the chain. It would be interesting to hear how any evolutionist would arrive at a time frame within such a monumetal event could have occured - this kodak moment when that first ‘person’ suddenly thought of ‘good’ and ‘bad’.
You can say it emerged all day, but it had to emerge from someone somewhere at a specific moment the first time.
So if I hear correctly from your standpoint, humankind went from the basics of eating, sleeping, reproducing surviving existence - basically the animals life as it had been for.....a long time........to the one unique set in the ‘animal kingdom’, and one individual from that set of animal life at some point in time conceived from nowhere, this notion of good and/or evil?
I’m going to say it one more time. The emergence came from somewhere the first time it occured. Tell me all about that moment, please.
(And I must say, the third quote of yours sounds like it is straight out of a book or dictionary.)
While this definition would suffice as the ‘end all’ giving some a nice warm fuzzy, it does nothing to provide an answer as to the origination of morality from a point in time when - just before that moment - was never dreamed of by these human animals....or wait....is it animal humans?
It is difficult to absorb your point of reference when you speak of humans rather than us as - just animals. We are in fact - just ‘animals’ by the default rule of evolution - once wild, then magically ‘domesticated’ over time and accrued this thing known as morality. Or have we acheived something higher than the plane of the animal kingdom?
So when I replace all your references of “human” with “animal” - then attempt to come up with a point in time that a single animal (that first one) came up with this good/bad thing...it truthfully becomes quite silly....