ARGH!!! Calvinism makes me furious!!!

[Clete]

Jim,

First, I want to again thank you for you patience with my delayed response and for your indulgence in shortening your post.
It was a good post which I will absolutely respond to directly if you wish, but you might find it to be unnecessary after reading the next two posts!

I was listening to a Bible study of Bob Enyart’s on the book of Acts and as chance would have it, he mentioned the very subject that you and I have been discussing, that being, whether God is good because he says so, or because there is an objective standard which He holds Himself to.
It seems our debate is more than just a few weeks old because I later found out that Bob had addressed this issue with Zakath during Battle Royale VII and that Plato had written about it some 2400 years ago!

It had been my intention to read up on this and write up a post based on what I had read. However, after having read the material, I found that nothing short of quoting it in its entirety would really do. Heaven forbid anyone accuse me of plagiarism again!

The following is a portion of Zakath’s 7th post on BR VII where he presents something known as Euthyphro's Dilemma. Take a look at it and see if you don’t agree that it sums up our debate rather nicely.

(Sorry about the length, it was unavoidable!)

Posted by Zakath on 7-14-03
Battle Royale VII
Zakath’s Post 7(excerpt)


God's nature defines the absolute standard of right and wrong.
With his claim that "many Christians have unwittingly undermined the holiness of God by suggesting that he can be spiritually arbitrary, because he is God.", Pastor Enyart posts an answer to an argument that I have not yet posted. (His point actually sounds like even more support for my Argument from Confusion). To be fair, I'll now post the argument, Euthyphro's Dilemma, so you can have a bit of context to understand where he's coming from.

Euthyphro's Dilemma

More than 2,000 years ago, the Greek philosopher Plato discussed the issue of how ethical standards come from deity and what the different theories mean to theists in his dialogue Euthyphro, a young man of that name meets Socrates. They have a discussion while Euthyphro is on his way to court to act as a sort of "state's attorney" to prosecute a murder case. Unfortunately for Euthyphro, the man he will be prosecuting is his own father. Since the Greeks (and their gods) valued loyalty to family highly, Socrates asks Euthyphro to explain why his prosecution of a family member is not immoral in the sight of the gods. During the ensuing discussion, Euthyphro attempts to defend a position called "divine command theory" of ethics. This theory, apparently held by Pastor Enyart and many other theists, states that we humans know what is good because a deity tells us what is good. If Pastor Enyart does not believe this, I hope he will explain just what he does believe?

Plato's story proceeds to one of Socrates' famous two-point questions (called a dilemma, in Greek):
a) Is something morally good (pious) because the gods command it? or

b) Is something morally good (pious) because the gods recognize it as good?


In the ensuing twenty centuries, these two questions have become known as Euthyphro's Dilemma. A discussion of these two questions may shed some light on Pastor Enyart's views on the relationship of absolute morals and his deity. Let's begin with the first point; that something is good because God commands it. In essence we are saying that God's will defines what is good.

A. God's will defines good
In this position, the one Pastor Enyart appears to hold, we find that, quite literally, anything goes as long as it is the deity's will. What kinds of things are included in Pastor Enyart's deity's will? He has refused to discuss the Bible, but for most Christians it provides a touchstone for describing the will and nature of the Christian God. According to the Bible, genocide, murdering children, incest, killing the unborn, even stealing virgins for brides are all acceptable acts to God because he ordered them. Remember that the basis of the "divine command theory" is that if God commands it, it's good. So by definition, good and evil exist only at the whim of the deity.

As the philosopher Bertrand Russell pointed out:
"If the only basis for morality is God's decrees, it follows that they might just as well have been the opposite of what they are; no reason except caprice could have prevented the omission of all the "nots" from the Decalogue." (Russell, B. Human Society in Ethics and Politics. New York. Simon & Schuster, Inc. 1962, pg. 38)

Essentially, Russell is saying that the Ten Commandments (the Decalogue) could have been just the opposite of what they are and they would still be the will of God, since that is the definition of good, in this viewpoint.

Theists who accept this horn of Euthyphro's Dilemma must admit that they do not operate from or even have a standard of ethics. They have replaced their ethical standard with obedience � they do what their God commands. Unfortunately, they have confused the obedience of a slave with ethics.

Next, it makes little logical sense to say that "God is good" if god is the standard of goodness. After all, if God is good, in the sense that God is identical to the standard of goodness, then to say "God is good" is merely to say "God is god." Such a statement is fundamentally uninformative. In such a statement the subject and predicate nouns are the same object so the sentence loses its meaning.

Furthermore, this stand of Divine Command Theory makes it difficult, if not impossible to tell if a given being is a deity. There is no set of standards with which one could compare that being to identify it as "God." In human experience, if I want to determine whether a person is a clinical psychologist, I can develop a list of actions which I might expect a person knowledgeable in psychology to perform. This might include things like understanding how to conduct a patient interview, having a particular type of university training, knowing a variety of psychological theories, etc. In addition, I can also develop a list of actions that would indicate that the subject is not a clinical psychologist. Such a list might include failure to be properly licensed, not understanding a range of psychological theories, never having conducted a patient interview, etc. I can then measure my candidate against my concept of a clinical psychologist. If the individual measures up, I can declare him or her a clinical psychologist. In the case of God, when Pastor Enyart declares that "God is the standard", there is no list or set of criteria to identify whether such a being is the good God or something else entirely. Since God can perform or command any act because he is the standard, what kinds of acts could we put into our identification list? There is no action about which we could ever say, "An evil being might command these but a good being would not." All we would be doing is placing our preferences on an allegedly absolute standard, a process it's likely that Pastor Enyart would abhor. Thus no action could be required or ruled out with regard to God since the deity could always decide to perform or command the opposite of any given criterion. After all, GOD SETS THE STANDARDS, doesn't he? Without an independent standard of moral and immoral acts against which to measure him, god could never be identified by his moral standard. We risk falling into the trap of applying our subjective preferences to the behavior of God with which we agree (blessings, financial prosperity, healing, or otherwise meeting our needs) while selectively ignoring or rationalizing away those behaviors we may find disagreeable (genocide, child slaughter, murder, human sacrifice, human slavery).

Morally speaking, there is no objective way to distinguish between being a slave to an evil demon (a very real possibility, according to some religionists) as opposed to being a slave to a god (the belief of Christians). In both cases the one in command could order any action whatsoever and carrying out that command would be, by definition, a good, moral act. Anything from rape to murder to genocide can be considered good if commanded by the being who serves as the standard.

One objection commonly raised by theists to this argument is the proposal that God will not act against his own nature. Unfortunately, to define the nature of a being we cannot see, touch, hear, or smell, we must look at his actions in the physical universe. So, we must define God's nature based on what God does. You may see how this rapidly becomes a circular argument. In addition, we have already shown that no action can be forbidden for the being giving the commands because the being giving the commands would not have any independent standard of morality by which it could be limited to a certain set of acts. So no action performed by God can be out of his character

If such a situation exists, the only true immoral (evil) act is disobedience to God. His followers must be committed to a system of blind obedience to a being who cannot meaningfully be called "good".

For theists, this option is undesirable.

B. God recognizes another standard of good
The other horn of the dilemma is that God recognizes what is good from a source outside himself, and then wills in accord with that good.

Pastor Enyart has NOT chosen this horn of the dilemma, but for interested readers, I'll explain it briefly.

When a theist chooses this path, that God commands what he recognizes as good, the theist is admitting the standard of good and evil is independent of God and that God, in fact, is not the standard of morality. This is because this view tells us that God, in some way, observes or "sees" what is good and the n tells us what to do on the basis of that observation. Since the action observed by God is what he commands, he is not acting as a source of morality, but merely a channel. In this view God becomes an intermediary or a reporter about ethics and morality, but not the source.

This is undesirable for the theist since it admits that God is not the source of their ethics and morals. This horn of the dilemma is particularly unpopular because if God is not the source, there is no sound argument which demonstrates that atheists could not have an ethical system apart from God.

In the question of whether or not God can be the source for "absolute morals", the choice for the theist boils down to this choose between:

admitting that he has no real standard of morality, only a morality based up on the slavery of blindly following orders; or

Admitting that God is not the source of morality.

Neither position actually allows for the possibility that god is source of a system of ethics or morals. The Euthyphro Dilemma demonstrates that the Divine Command Theory of ethics and morality cannot work.

 

[Clete]

The following rebuttal not only answer’s the dilemma but resolves my earlier self admitted, circular reasoning and thus is as good a resolution for our debate as I could imagine!
There are other issues that we have brought up that still need ironing out, specifically the issue of God decreeing evil so stay tuned, I will respond on those issues in due time.


The server change that TOL recently went through had some goofy effects on some of the posts. It seems to have changed all of the quotation marks and apostrophes into question marks if the poster used MS Word to write their post. I have gone through and fixed most if not all the mess ups on both this and Zakath’s posts, but I don’t guarantee that I did so flawlessly.

Here’s Bob’s rebuttal…

Posted by Bob Enyart on 07-16-2003
Battle Royale VII
Bob Enyart’s Post 7b(excerpt)


God’s Accountability to an Unchanging Standard: This section goes beyond the point in the Absolute Nature of Laws section above, where Zakath said that I hold to an �anything goes� morality and that for this morality, “by definition, good and evil exist only at the whim of the deity.� (Interestingly, atheists often do this with humans, justifying homosexuality as an inborn nature, denying the personal responsibility of drug addicts, and some even defending rapists and murderers as simply living out their natures.) Zakath then carried this one step further claiming that therefore: “no action performed by God can be out of his character;� that is, because if God does something, then by definition it is in His nature to do it, and we theists would also declare anything He does as righteous. So Zakath misrepresented my position by implying that I had not already responded to this. He ignored an important clarification in my post:

Bob: “God could not do evil (anything against the present description of His nature), and remain holy.�

Why did I insert the word present into the above sentence? Zakath, if you read carefully, I will resolve Euthyphro’s Dilemma for Plato and Socrates, and deny you the honest use of it in the future. But Zakath, if while reading this section you allow your mind to fly through a thousand counter arguments, without discipline, you will once again fail to even understand the point. So please put your auto-pilot Bible rebuttal mode in its upright and locked position, and first comprehend this new material.

God’s nature is not sufficiently pliable that it could embrace truth and perjury, private property and theft, loyalty and disloyalty, and punishing and rewarding of the same behavior. Thus, God could conceivably violate His own nature, because once His nature is described (in what becomes a definition of righteousness), then anything God does contrary to that description would correctly be deemed as unrighteous. For example, using the biblical paradigm, if Jesus Christ gave into temptation by submitting to evil and worshipping Satan, then He would not have remained righteous.

It is not that anything God conceivably could do would therefore be moral, just because He did it. It is that we expect God to remain steadfastly good, consistent with the existing description of His nature. God does not save those who trust Him because He has no choice, but because He wills to, but if He willed to embrace evil (as described currently by His nature) then He would no longer be the righteous God. Quoting the overlooked sentence again:

�God could not do evil (anything against the present description of His nature), and remain holy.� Thus, moral inconsistency is an absolute determinant for wrong. Plato and Socrates missed this important test partly because their dialogue was replete with mentions of Greek gods who, as Socrates noted, contradicted one another as to goodness. Thus the contradictions within the mythical pantheon of Greece falsified any claim of absolute morality made by Euthyphro on behalf of his gods and goddesses. But Plato recorded this dialogue without the knowledge that you possess Zakath, that of the claim of a Christian God who has no such internal inconsistency. God does not fight within Himself about what is right and wrong; but if He ever did, then He would no longer remain the holy God. And there is nothing remotely circular about this. We look for inconsistencies in courtroom testimony because inconsistencies reveal lies and deceptions. Thus consistency is a necessary property of righteousness (and thus of being right). �A faithful witness does not lie, but a false witness will utter lies [and inconsistencies]� (Proverbs 14:5). Again, moral inconsistency is a litmus test for evil. Thus a religious book like the Bible generally claims in forty passages that the steadfast love of the Lord never changes in that He is faithful, that is, He is consistent.

Humans are social beings, and our morality magnifies itself in our actions toward others. But because we are social beings, even actions committed against ourselves affect others, as for example when we hurt ourselves to manipulate others, like Gandhi did; or even the person seeking to escape his own pain by committing suicide, who hurts those around him. Thus because morality is social, a social God who interacts with multiple persons has an additional context in which to objectively demonstrate His morality. Let me illustrate the implications of this using the Christian conception of the Trinitarian God, Father, Son and Spirit, three persons in one God. If God is a Trinitarian God, then He has an eternal track record of interaction between the persons of the Godhead. And if during that eternal fellowship, if any moral inconsistency appeared, then God would be objectively evil. But an atheist may ask, “What if there was no inconsistency because this God is consistently evil?� A God with other persons to interact with has other frames of reference, that is, other perspectives from which to declare Himself. Thus if the Son willingly submits to the Father, because He implicitly trusts the Father from whom He has never experienced harm, and the Spirit brings glory to the Son, because He has never felt threatened by the Son, and the Father loves the Son and the Spirit, never having His well-being jeopardized by either, then “by the mouth of two or three witnesses the matter shall be established.� Thus even though it is the only standard He has ever known, God the Father can determine that His own standard is righteous because He has never violated it, and because the independent persons of the Son and the Spirit testify that the Father has never violated their own self-interests [Luke 16:12].

This process is greatly amplified when God creates other beings, and as He reveals Himself to them in various ways. For, He must behave toward them in their own best interest, or else He violates His own standard of love. And He must punish those who hurt others, or else He violates His own standard of justice. And if God’s intention was not for the welfare but for the harm of created eternal beings, then He would have violated His own declared standard.

Thus while moral inconsistency indicates wickedness, eternal consistency proves either continuous good or continuous evil; and multiple perspectives from independent persons provide information regarding whether God acts on behalf of, or against, their best interests. Of course, an atheist will accuse the Bible’s God, if He exists, of endless evils, but since atheists deny any system of absolute morality, for their logical argument to succeed, they would have to show that the concept of the Christian God is internally inconsistent, violating His own standard of righteousness.

In his talk, “Why I Am Not a Christian,� Bertrand Russell wrote that: “if you are quite sure there is a difference between right and wrong, then you are in this situation: Is that difference due to God’s fiat [arbitrary decree] or is it not? If it is due to God's fiat, then for God himself there is no difference between right and wrong, and it is no longer a significant statement to say that God is good. If you are going to say, as theologians do, that God is good, you must then say that right and wrong have some meaning which is independent of God’s fiat, because God’s fiats are good and not bad independently of the mere fact that he made them. If you are going to say that, you will then have to say that it is not only through God that right and wrong came into being, but that they are in their essence logically anterior to God.�

Plato, Socrates, Bertrand Russell? morons. (Actually, I’m just quoting from Princess Bride, one of our favorite movies.) Well, not morons, but fools yes, because they denied the Creator. Because of their prejudice against God, their fertile minds did not conceive of the simple possibility that a description of God’s nature is independent of His nature itself, and thus, God could hold Himself to that description of His nature, which description I admit initially existed only within Himself, but after Creation it would exist in any of the manifest ways in which God has revealed Himself. And so, right and wrong are not due to God’s arbitrary decrees, but flow from the description of His nature, a description which He could theoretically violate. Thus, the system of morality based upon God is not logically unsound as claimed by atheists.

Because Zakath uncritically accepted the popular atheist use of the Euthyphro Dilemma, he summed up its challenge this way: “In the question of whether or not God can be the source for “absolute morals,� the choice for the theist boils down to this, choose between: admitting that he has no real standard of morality, only a morality based upon the slavery of blindly following orders; or admitting that God is not the source of morality.�

Zakath, do you agree that I have solved Euthyphro’s Dilemma by observing that, if God exists, a description of God’s nature can be independent of His nature itself, and thus there is no logical contradiction in the possibility that God’s nature defines an objective moral standard?

If there were no God, then absolute right could not exist. Thus, atheists reason correctly from their atheistic premise when they declare that absolute right and wrong do not exist, for if God did not exist, neither would right and wrong. Thus, for the reader questioning the existence of God, weigh the evidence: ask yourself, is it really wrong to rape a woman, lynch a black, torment a child, or are these not absolutely wrong, but simple valid preferences of others. If such crimes are not really wrong, then there is no God. If crimes are truly wrong, then a personal, loving, and just God does exist and you should ask Him for forgiveness for the hurt that you have inflicted upon others.

Also, you attempted another slight of hand with this: If “�God is good� [and] if god is the standard of goodness� then to say “God is good� is merely to say “God is god.�� Oops. You are confusing the property of an entity with the entity itself. If the boss is also the janitor, you do state a pointless tautology by substituting one for the other to get the boss is the boss. But to say that the boss is the janitor speaks volumes. And to say God is love [meaning that His nature defines commitment to others], or that Michael Jordan is the standard [meaning that he has defined basketball skill], does not require us to reduce either to God is God or Michael is Michael, as though nothing real is being communicated. Otherwise, you make the bizarre claim that no aspect of a thing could ever conceivably set a standard. For example, by your faulty logic, the speed of light cannot even theoretically be an absolute, because then all Einstein said was, “the speed of light is the speed of light.�

(I can already hear the atheists in the Grandstands whining: “Wha wha wha, none of that proves that God exists!� Quick, somebody call them a whambulance! I offer the above not as proof but to rebut this argument of atheism.)

So to sum it up, it seems from a certain point of view it could be said that we are both right.
God is indeed good because He does good things and at the same time, God is good because God says so, in that it is the individual members of the Trinity who testify that the other members of the Trinity have done those good things.

I think this resolves the issue rather nicely!

What do you think?

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[Big Finn]

You simply don't get. It's not a matter of available choices. It's a matter of what the person wants to choose -- his will.

Nope. Hilston. You don't get it. If it is not possible for someone to do other than they did then there is no fork in the road at which they can make a choice.

You can't make a mockery of the English language and expect people to swallow the illogic of saying people have the ability to do something but it isn't possible for them to do. By definition something must be possible for ability to enter the equation in terms of choice.

It's simply not possible to use the English language the way you are and expect to have a meaningful sentence. The English language, and I'd say any other languate in which these concepts are expressed, simply can't be bent to fit what you are saying. It doesn't reflect reality in any way.

As to my wording.... If God is the one who decrees something, then He is the first one to imagine the scenario. It originates in His mind, not in the minds of those who carry it out. They are simply carrying out what He set forth. Thus, if God is the one who has decreed all evil then He is the one who invented it, who gave it birth and substance. No one else. Just God.

It would seem that you don't understand very well the implications of what you believe. In a closed view the author of all actions must be the originator of every action. Everything that happens springs forth from the imagination of one mind--the mind of God. Thus God has to be the one who concieves of, plans, and then causes all others to do what He imagines. It must come from His mind first before it can enter the mind of anyone else. Otherwise contingency exists and so does free will. If God is not the author and originator of all evil thoughts then free will must exist. There is no way around it.

That's why you see people saying evil doesn't exist. Because they recognize that if they are to maintain their attachment to the CV, and not attribute evil to God, then evil must not really be evil because it came from God. This again is just another form of calling evil good, and good evil. It makes a mockery of any language in which it is spoken.

 

[Yorzhik]

They could only have relented if it were possible to choose against one's own will.

No, the question is, could they choose against God's will. It was God's will that Jesus suffer and die. But not all the Jewish leadership agreed to kill Jesus – they went against God's will; and God was happy with that. But what if there were more of the leadership that didn't agree to kill Jesus (to the point where Jesus wouldn't be murdered), then what was God supposed to do? At least a couple things – you mention one in your next quote. Or, there may have been another way to achieve the sacrifice of Jesus and still uphold all of the prophesies. Somehow I don't think a bloody nose + heart attack would have done it, to say the least. But there is no requirement that every person do what they did during the Passion. All that was required was that Jesus be murdered and the prophesies fulfilled. There, I've stuck my neck out again. Is it okay that I answered directly?

Now I know you've read that I don't believe all of God's prophesies are fulfilled. Yet, there are some prophesies that will happen because God makes them happen. If that requires putting hooks in the jaws of evil men to do their evil in a way that will accomplish God's purpose and will ultimately work against them, then God will do it.

But that is impossible. No one can choose what he does not want to choose. They chose what they wanted to do, and God put it in their hearts to want that. Just like in Rev. 17

12 And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast. 13 These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.

...

16 And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire. 17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.

Oh, yes, to have a machine that could make people *want* certain things instead of forcing them to do certain things would be MUCH MORE effective. That is true control. Even we humans can frequently get other humans to do what we want - but we have no control over free-will directly. That isn't nearly the kind of control that would be truly powerful. It is the power to make someone want to do what we want that is truly powerful. So if God can merely turn on the "want" switch, He can get someone to do whatever He wants. He can even make everyone want to love Him.

Or, perhaps God doesn't have a switch, and He has to get people to want something the way we all do – without violating free will.

For example; that's what all we parents want, really. I mean, we can make our kids act a certain way, but what we want is for them to want to act a certain way. We can get them to want what we want, but it takes time and energy doing things that cannot involve a "want" switch because we have no access to such a switch (if it exists at all).

God said repeatedly "circumcise your hearts" to the Israelites. He didn't want them to just follow the rules, He wanted them to want to follow the rules because they loved God.

Also, it's a good thing that they couldn't choose otherwise, because if Christ had not been tortured, mocked, beaten, spit upon, executed, entombed, and resurrected, we could not be saved. "And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins." 1Co 15:17.

Or is it your view that Christ's sacrifice could have gone differently? In God's decree, what was the minimum requirement? That Christ shed His blood and die willingly? Or more than that? If the former, then wouldn't it have sufficed for Christ to get a bloody nose (shedding of blood, He 9:22) and then starve Himself to death (willing sacrifice)?

Yes, Christ's sacrifice could have gone differently. Your next question… how? I don't know. Maybe one of the Centurions could have tried to stop the whole affair and we could have had an extra story in the bible about that guy getting executed. I mention above a more general set of requirements.

-------------------------------------

Wow, Clete and I are posting other people's comments relating to the subject. What is written below IS kind of a tangent. So take it for what it is.

Here is what Tim McMahon says about Hilston's proof text, Rev. 17:17. I would have let my post stand as it is (it was mostly written before I received this from Tim), but after reading this I just thought it should be something for everyone. It's more thorough than anything I could write. The question I asked Tim was more a general question about the Calvinist/CV (I know you are not a Calvinist Hilson) position and Rev. 17:17, so if this doesn't address Hilston's non-Calvinist view, I would like to know where it is.

I'm not sure that Revelation 17:17 directly affects the question of openness. To those who would cite it as an example of God overruling or manipulating people's wills, I would respond that the exceptional nature of the divine activity in this verse shows that free will is the prevailing reality: the exception that proves (tests) the rule, so to speak. If God makes everything happen, why point out that He's making one particular thing happen?

There's actually a great deal of Scripture which addresses the issue of God manipulating the actions of someone — generally, if not always, a ruler — to bring about His ends. The most prominent example… is Pharaoh. The long and the short of it, when you read the entire relevant section of Exodus, is this. Pharaoh is an evil man who chooses to do evil in opposing God and opposing His people Israel When God sends Moses to instruct Pharaoh to let Israel go, Pharaoh "hardens his heart" in opposition to God. God seizes upon Pharaoh's obstinacy to make an example of him and to demonstrate His glory. When the plagues God sends against him prove too much for him to bear, Pharaoh relents and says he will let Israel go. But he doesn't mean it; he's not repenting, not changing his heart. He's just cracking under the pressure. God isn't about to let Pharaoh off so easily. He isn't about to bring Israel out of Egypt with a whimper; He insists on doing it in style. So God actually hardens Pharaoh's heart to ensure that Pharaoh will follow through on his evil plan to oppose Israel with all his might. God isn't the source of Pharaoh's evil; Pharaoh is responsible for his own choices. It isn't as if Pharaoh wanted to do good and God hardened him to do evil; God merely took Pharaoh's own evil heart's desire and manipulated him to bring about an outcome that maximized His glory in the sight of Israel and of the nations they would encounter in the land.

When calvinists present their take on Pharaoh — that God hardened his heart to make him do evil — I always ask them: if Pharaoh was totally depraved and incapable of doing good, how is it that God had to harden his heart to compel him to do evil? Wouldn't Pharaoh do evil all by himself? One can harden only what is soft in the first place. The calvinist take on Pharaoh implicitly contradicts their foundational doctrine of total depravity. If God had to make Pharaoh do evil, then Pharaoh must have had the choice to do good (and been inclined to do so). What kind of God claims to be all-good and yet forces people who are inclined, despite all the enticements and pressures of evil, to do good, instead to do evil, and on top of that condemns them for doing what He forced them to do against their will?

The kings in Revelation — whoever they turn out to be — are in the same boat. They're evil; they're in this for their own aggrandizement. God doesn't make them evil, or manipulate them away from the good they would have done if only He'd left them alone. They have already committed themselves to evil and planned their evil course. It's just that, like Pharaoh, the specific course of evil these guys would pursue if left to themselves is inconvenient vis-Ã_-vis God's purpose in the tribulation of wrapping up evil and crushing it through the revelation of Jesus Christ. My take on Antichrist and the tribulation and all that is this. The world is evil, but it's not a well-organized evil. Typical of evil, you've got a million strands, a million conflicting self-interests going every which way. What God wants to do at the return of Christ is to deal evil a death blow. (It actually works out as two blows, one at Christ's return and the other at the conclusion of the millennium when Satan is released and the whole thing repeats itself, but that's another story.) But a non-directed, disorganized, every-which-way evil doesn't lend itself to a spectacular, glorious triumph of right. So God uses Satan and Satan's plan to unite all the various and sundry evildoers into one united force of evil, one ultimate Foe, so He can crush it once and for all. (Okay, twice and for all.) That's where these kings fit in. The ultimate Foe must subsume all rivals into a united rebellion against God, and God does a lot of manipulation to get this accomplished in a short timeframe Again, God isn't making anyone evil, or forcing anyone to be evil, or enticing, manipulating or forcing anyone away from goodness and righteousness. They're all disposed to evil in themselves. God is merely manipulating the details to serve His purpose. This is the essential truth behind Proverbs 21:1, "The king's heart is an irrigation ditch in the hand of HaShem; He turns it wherever He will."

Probably the best passage of Scripture to illustrate the principle of God's manipulation of evil is Isaiah's oracle about the king of Assyria (Isaiah 10:5-19):
Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger, the staff of my fury! Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I command him, to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. But he does not so intend, and his mind does not so think; but it is in his mind to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few; for he says: "Are not my commanders all kings? Is not Calno like Carchemish? Is not Hamath like Arpad? Is not Samaria like Damascus? As my hand has reached to the kingdoms of the idols whose graven images were greater than those of Jerusalem and Samaria, shall I not do to Jerusalem and her idols as I have done to Samaria and her images?"

When the Lord has finished all his work on Mount Zion and on Jerusalem he will punish the arrogant boasting of the king of Assyria and his haughty pride. For he says: "By the strength of my hand I have done it, and by my wisdom, for I have understanding; I have removed the boundaries of peoples, and have plundered their treasures; like a bull I have brought down those who sat on thrones. My hand has found like a nest the wealth of the peoples; and as men gather eggs that have been forsaken so I have gathered all the earth; and there was none that moved a wing, or opened the mouth, or chirped."

Shall the axe vaunt itself over him who hews with it, or the saw magnify itself against him who wields it? As if a rod should wield him who lifts it, or as if a staff should lift him who is not wood! Therefore the Lord, HaShem of hosts, will send wasting sickness among his stout warriors, and under his glory a burning will be kindled, like the burning of fire. The light of Israel will become a fire, and his Holy One a flame; and it will burn and devour his thorns and briers in one day. The glory of his forest and of his fruitful land HaShem will destroy, both soul and body, and it will be as when a sick man wastes away. The remnant of the trees of his forest will be so few that a child can write them down.

Notice the symmetry: the Assyrian has his interests, God has His. It isn't like the Assyrian king is a some kind of peace-and-love dude singing Kum Ba Ya to all the other countries, but God, wanting a warrior, tempts or coerces him into becoming an evil oppressor. The Assyrian has made up his own mind to conquer and ravage many nations. God simply reaches down and manipulates within and around him in order to use him to chasten His disobedient people Israel. Afterward, God punishes the Assyrian for his haughtiness and for exceeding God's intentions with his destructiveness (cf. Zechariah 1:15). Antichrist is the Assyrian on steroids, ratcheted up to worldwide scope.

We see the same phenomenon in the Gog/Magog oracle in Ezekiel 38-39. God tells them, "I will put hooks in your jaws and bring you forth" when they start to beat a retreat from their attack on Israel. Again, God is not the source of their evil. Once they have given themselves over to evil, God is free to manipulate the specifics of their evil enterprise on behalf of His own good purpose.

 

[Hilston]

Big Finn,

I don't know why you're having such a hard time with this. Let's try again.

Big Finn writes:
Nope. Hilston. You don't get it. If it is not possible for someone to do other than they did then there is no fork in the road at which they can make a choice.

You have it backward. There's a fork, but the choice of the chooser is bound by his will. Put brusselsprouts and brocolli in front of me. Is there a fork (besides the one I'm eating with)? Of course. Choose veggie A (yuck) or veggie B (yum) [The great cosmic balance of yuck and yum that]. Is there a fork? Of course. Is there a choice? Of course. Is there any doubt that I'll choose brocolli? Absolutely not. Can I choose brusselsprouts over brocolli in terms of ability? Of course. Can I choose brusselsprouts over brocolli in terms of my will? Absolutely not, because I hate brusselsprouts. It's not that difficult, Big Finn, but you just go right ahead and keep pretending that you don't get this.

Big Finn writes:
As to my wording.... If God is the one who decrees something, then He is the first one to imagine the scenario.

"Imagine"? Will indeterminists never cease to come up with ways of denigrating and humanizing of God?

Big Finn writes:
It originates in His mind, not in the minds of those who carry it out. They are simply carrying out what He set forth.

Not "simply." It is quite complex, actually. And they are carrying out what He has planned, but all according to their own volition.

Big Finn writes:
Thus, if God is the one who has decreed all evil then He is the one who invented it, who gave it birth and substance. No one else. Just God.

There are plenty of examples one could come up with to show the fallacy of this oversimplistic reasoning. The architect who drew up the blueprints "invented" the home, "gave it birth" and "gave it substance," but only in terms of the planning (the "decree," if you will). He doesn't actually build the home. He doesn't purchase and deliver the materials. He doesn't lift a hammer or a nail. He decreed the house, but did not build it. He planned for nails to be driven and wood to be measured, but he did not cause the driving of nails or the cutting of wood.

Big Finn writes:
It would seem that you don't understand very well the implications of what you believe.

How could I understand very well the implications of what I believe if I'm making this up as I go along?

Big Finn writes:
In a closed view the author of all actions must be the originator of every action. Everything that happens springs forth from the imagination of one mind--the mind of God. Thus God has to be the one who concieves of, plans, and then causes all others to do what He imagines.

Conceives of ... plans ... yes. "Causes"? No.

Big Finn writes:
It must come from His mind first before it can enter the mind of anyone else. Otherwise contingency exists and so does free will. If God is not the author and originator of all evil thoughts then free will must exist. There is no way around it.

I agree. It first came into God's mind that the evil actions of Joseph's brothers, by selling him into slavery, would result in the salvation of Israel from famine. It first came into God's mind that the evil actions of the Jews and Romans against Jesus would result in the salvation of elect Israel from damnation. Thus, all history is predetermined. Including the famine itself. Including the sin of Adam.

Big Finn writes:
That's why you see people saying evil doesn't exist. Because they recognize that if they are to maintain their attachment to the CV, and not attribute evil to God, then evil must not really be evil because it came from God.

Not at all. Evil is decreed but not coerced. The fact that God decreed it doesn't make it less evil. The fact is, we have biblical warrant to understand that God intends evil to accomplish His good purposes, as it was in the case of Joseph and the torture and execution of Christ.

Big Finn writes:
This again is just another form of calling evil good, and good evil. It makes a mockery of any language in which it is spoken.

You seem to really misunderstand that verse. It isn't a prohibition against acknowledging that God decrees evil for good purposes, but rather of calling an evil thing or action a good thing or action. No one here is saying that the evil committed against Joseph or against Christ was good. It was evil to sell Joseph into slavery. It was evil to unjustly torture, mock and execute Jesus. But those evil actions were intended for good. The antecedent actions were evil; the results were good. That is NOT calling evil good or good evil.

 

[Big Finn]

"Imagine"? Will indeterminists never cease to come up with ways of denigrating and humanizing of God?

Not "simply." It is quite complex, actually. And they are carrying out what He has planned, but all according to their own volition.

So, Hilston, explain how God planned something without first imagining it--seeing it in His mind? Explain how God plans evil things without thinking about them.

Tell me how an act such as a rape can be planned in advance and the planner of that rape not see it his imagination--in his mind.


Tell me how anyone can plan any action, even a good action without first seeing it his imagination--in his mind?

As to trying to put the blame on me for what you believe, that's ridiculous. I'm not the one saying God is decreeing in advance the evil men do, you are. You're the one saying that God knows all these things in advance.

Your very theology says God has to know all these things in advance, and that He is the cause of them, the ordainer of them. God can't say that a man will rape a woman and not know what a rape is. That's just foolishness and stupidity. If He doesn't know what it is, or what it entails, He certainly can't decree it.

How can God not know what something is? How can God not be able to picture things in His mind? Do you think He created all the beauty in nature, the humor of things like the looks of giraffe or racoon, and didn't imagine it first? Do you think that God created all the systems we find in nature and the human body without first planning them out? Does not planning something out necessitate the ability to imagine that very thing? Do you somehow think God creates randomly and by happenstance so that His mind is divorced from what He does? You're so far off in outer space in your logic it isn't funny.

 

[Hilston]

Big Finn,

Post of the Day!

:first:

Congratulations!

 

[Yorzhik]

There are plenty of examples one could come up with to show the fallacy of this oversimplistic reasoning. The architect who drew up the blueprints "invented" the home, "gave it birth" and "gave it substance," but only in terms of the planning (the "decree," if you will). He doesn't actually build the home. He doesn't purchase and deliver the materials. He doesn't lift a hammer or a nail. He decreed the house, but did not build it. He planned for nails to be driven and wood to be measured, but he did not cause the driving of nails or the cutting of wood.

Conceives of ... plans ... yes. "Causes"? No.

Okay, so the architect designs it so that the building will fall at the first big rainfall. Who is at fault? the designer or the builder?

 

[Hilston]

Yorzhik writes:Okay, so the architect designs it so that the building will fall at the first big rainfall. Who is at fault? the designer or the builder?

Fault? Culpability doesn't apply in the example. The intent of the example was to show the difference between a decree and a cause. If the architect wanted the building to fall and designed it that way, it's his choice. He decreed the collapse. The cause was the rainfall.

 

[Big Finn]

Fault? Culpability doesn't apply in the example. The intent of the example was to show the difference between a decree and a cause. If the architect wanted the building to fall and designed it that way, it's his choice. He decreed the collapse. The cause was the rainfall.

Hardly, Hilston. The design is the problem.

There are two buildings standing side-by-side. Biulding One is designed to collapse during the first big rainfall and Building Two is designed to withstand the rainfall. So, when the first big rainfall comes and Building One falls, what is the cause? Not the rain, because Building Two didn't fall during the rainstorm. The cause is the design of Building One for Building Two withstood the same rainfall. The design is the difference between the two buildings, thus it is the cause of the failure.

Anything designed to fail has as the cause of its failure its design.

If you read structural engineer's reports on building failure after an earthquake you will find that they blame the design of the building, not the earthquake itself. They point out design insufficiencies as the root cause of the failures.

 

[Hilston]

Big Finn,

The problems with your post seem so obvious, it makes me wonder if you're being deliberately dense.

Can anyone else help Big Finn out with the errors in his plaint?

Or, how about a test of intellectual honesty: What would you guess to be my response to your claims?

 

[Yorzhik]

Fault? Culpability doesn't apply in the example.

Only if A) the designer is ignorant of rain – or - B) that buildings are supposed to fall in the first rain.

The intent of the example was to show the difference between a decree and a cause. If the architect wanted the building to fall and designed it that way, it's his choice. He decreed the collapse. The cause was the rainfall.

True. But, we are arguing that the designer said that the building was not designed to fall, but that you are saying that the designer built the building to fall. Our problem with your line of thinking is that either the Designer is lying, or you are wrong about the building being designed to fall.

 

[1Way]

Hilston's designer/planner does not imply culpability, is without integrity, righteousness is not arbitrary.

Consider another designer/planner, Hitler, for example. Did he personally murder and terrorize millions of Jews, or was he the presiding authority (designer/dictator/planner) over the holocaust? Of course the answer is obvious. Yet, if we take Hilston's designer is not morally culpable mentality, Hitler did not cause anything, Hitler is guilt free of the holocaust, and that is rediculous.

What does the bible teach about moral plans and the issue of moral culpability? Consider this.

• Mt 5:28 "But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Sounds morally culpable to me, even though no physical thing was caused, just a personal desire in concept only.

Hilston, if you have not listened to Clete's call into Bob Enyart live, you should, Bob and Clete does a good job generally arguing against your view that holds that absolute right and wrong do not exist. My latest for you from that show bolsters my point that I already made that God holds Himself accountable to Himself like when He swears by Himself since there is none greater than Himself to swear by. The bolstering comes in when Bob teaches

• De 19:15 "One witness shall not rise against a man concerning any iniquity or any sin that he commits; by the mouth of two or three witnesses the matter shall be established.
  
  Mt 18:16 "But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.’
  
  Joh 5:30 "I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.
  31 "If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true.
  32 "There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true.

God even says that His testimony is not TRUE (~ valid) if it is not righteously corroborated by the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses. So God not only swears by Himself since there is none higher to swear by, He also holds Himself to His own standard of justice saying that concerning matters of moral conviction, even God's testimony is not true, it is not just or binding unless it is backed up by 2 or 3 witnesses.

Hitler's plans and personal authority over the Holocaust makes him culpable even if he only murdered in his own heart. God does not arbitrarily say what is right and wrong, absolute righteousness comes from God's eternal and faithful character, which necessarily applies to Himself, it applies to all things. God is righteous, it is one of His attributes, it describes who God is. It is a blasphemous idea to say that God is not righteous objectively or by His character.

 

[1Way]

Hilston

And just as there is a difference between interpretation and application of a teaching, there is also a difference between the righteous standard and the punishment involved for breaking that standard, so that dispensational changes in punishment never altered absolute right and wrong. Also, adding amoral laws does not alter absolute right and wrong either, because, they are an amoral issue, righteousness is a moral issue. Just because God commanded the death penalty for breaking the Sabbath does not mean that keeping the Sabbath is an inherently moral command, obeying God is an inherently moral issue. God can and does change the commands that men must live by, but God never changes the absolute standard of right and wrong.

Murder is always wrong no matter what the punishment is for it. Cain slew Able and he feared for his life, why? Not because God had established His capitol laws, He had not! He knew it was wrong because it is absolutely wrong, he naturally new he was wrong.

• Consider, is it ever wrong to oppose sin and evil?
  
  Is it ever right to oppose godly righteousness?

Morality is an issue of absolutes, and right and wrong are mutually exclusive to each other.

Thus a precept of biblical morality is that something is morally wrong no matter what the punishment is for it. Murder was not right just because God forbade the death penalty for murder. Doing something, and the consequences of doing something are two separate but related issues, just as interpretation is different but related to application. The teaching is to obey God. Prior to the dispensation of Grace and mystery, the application of that teaching basically meant to keep the commandments! However, in this dispensation of grace, the application of that teaching is to leave the law like leaving a tutor, instead love and put your faith in God. It's always wrong to disobey God, but it's not wrong for God to change the "house rules".

 

[Clete]

1 Way,

Post 1134 is incredible!

You absolutely took the words right out of my mouth! I was just fixin' to write a nearly identical post!

As such, it is my POTD! :first:

Resting in Him,
:Clete:

 

[Big Finn]

Hilston,

Cause: a person or thing that is the occasion of an action or state;

In the case of a designer purposely creating a building that will fall when it rains, well, the designer is the one who brought about the state of the building. That state being: when it rains the building will fall. Thus, the underlying cause to the collapse is the design of the building, and the designer is the one who brought that into being.

This principle has been upheld in courts of law over and over again. If a roof design has been insufficient to hold up the load of snow in a country in which heavy snowfall is to be expected he is held culpable every time as being the cause of the collapse. There is a really famous case of a mall roof collapsing in Minnesota that illustrates this very well.

One can not purposely design something to fail under conditions that are known to exist and not be the cause of the failure for the designer is responsible for the state of the object. .

 

[Clete]

Also, on this point of culpability…

If someone's negligent actions cause the death of a person then the negligent party is to be put to death according to the Bible.

That seems to pretty much put a cork in it, Biblically speaking.


Oh, and by the way, in response to an earlier question...

Yes, the government should execute disobedient children via due process of law.

Resting in Him,
Clete

 

[Hilston]

Reply to Yorzhik's post:

Hilston wrote: Fault? Culpability doesn't apply in the example.

Originally posted by Yorzhik
Only if A) the designer is ignorant of rain – or - B) that buildings are supposed to fall in the first rain.

Didn't you stipulate the following?:

"Okay, so the architect designs it so that the building will fall at the first big rainfall."

How could he be ignorant of rain if he designed it to fall at the first rainfall? Isn't the building designed to fall? You've really got me confused.

Hilston wrote: The intent of the example was to show the difference between a decree and a cause. If the architect wanted the building to fall and designed it that way, it's his choice. He decreed the collapse. The cause was the rainfall.

Originally posted by Yorzhik
True. But, we are arguing that the designer said that the building was not designed to fall, but that you are saying that the designer built the building to fall.

Didn't you say the following?:

"Okay, so the architect designs it so that the building will fall at the first big rainfall."

Originally posted by Yorzhik
Our problem with your line of thinking is that either the Designer is lying, or you are wrong about the building being designed to fall.

Why did you just capitalize the "D" in designer? Did you just shift the discussion to talking about God?

In terms of God's decrees, since I believe God did in fact exhaustively design/decree all of biblical history, what would the "Designer" be lying about according to your view?

 

[Hilston]

Originally posted by 1Way
Hilston's designer/planner does not imply culpability, is without integrity, righteousness is not arbitrary.

What are you talking about? It was an example showing the distinction between design and action. What does "integrity" and "righteousness" have to do with the example?

Originally posted by 1Way
Consider another designer/planner, Hitler, for example. Did he personally murder and terrorize millions of Jews, or was he the presiding authority (designer/dictator/planner) over the holocaust? Of course the answer is obvious. Yet, if we take Hilston's designer is not morally culpable mentality, Hitler did not cause anything, Hitler is guilt free of the holocaust, and that is rediculous.

In the case of Hitler, the designer is culpable for commanding evil to be done. In the case of the architect, there is no evil that is done. He designed a building to fall after the first rain (per Yorzhik's stipulations), and the result was in perfect accordance with his design. There is no culpability because there was no moral infraction.

Originally posted by 1Way
What does the bible teach about moral plans and the issue of moral culpability? Consider this.

• Mt 5:28 "But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Sounds morally culpable to me, even though no physical thing was caused, just a personal desire in concept only.

This is the sort of thing that makes these discussions so annoying. Has anyone claimed that sinful thoughts are somehow not sinful? Has anyone claimed those who engage in sinful thinking are somehow not culpable?

Originally posted by 1Way
Hilston, if you have not listened to Clete's call into Bob Enyart live, you should, Bob and Clete does a good job generally arguing against your view that holds that absolute right and wrong do not exist.

They don't even come close.

Originally posted by 1Way
My latest for you from that show bolsters my point that I already made that God holds Himself accountable to Himself like when He swears by Himself since there is none greater than Himself to swear by. The bolstering comes in when Bob teaches

• De 19:15 "One witness shall not rise against a man concerning any iniquity or any sin that he commits; by the mouth of two or three witnesses the matter shall be established.

• You've missed the context. De 19:15 is a prescription for ascertaining guilt, as is Mt. 18:16. Neither apply to Jn 5:30ff.
  
  Mt 18:16 "But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.’
  
  

  Originally posted by 1Way
  Joh 5:30 "I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.
  31 "If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true.
  32 "There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true.

God even says that His testimony is not TRUE (~ valid) if it is not righteously corroborated by the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses.

This is because the incarnate Son of God emptied Himself of His inherent power and authority, submitted to only the empowerment of the Spirit in obedience to the Father, and exercised only the authority that was given Him by the Father. Thus, He was fully submitted to the Father's authority and could only do those things which the Father gave Him and empowered Him to do. Jesus was addressing the question of whether His judgment was righteous and on what basis. Having emptied Himself, He could not speak with His own authority, or even assert His role as Messiah. His works had to testify that He was the promised One in the flesh; the Father had to testify of Him as well. Jesus appealed to the prophetic scriptures as evidence testifying to His works; Jesus appealed to the declarations of the Father as evidence testifying to His obedience to Him. The triune Godhead does not submit to any court, let alone requiring the testimony of witnesses to justify Him.

Originally posted by 1Way
So God not only swears by Himself since there is none higher to swear by, He also holds Himself to His own standard of justice ...

This is contradictory. If there were a standard of justice that God could hold Himself to, then He could swear by that. The fact that He swears only by Himself, and doesn't swear by a standard of justice, proves that there is no standard to which God is held.

Originally posted by 1Way
... saying that concerning matters of moral conviction, even God's testimony is not true, it is not just or binding unless it is backed up by 2 or 3 witnesses.

It is a major mistake to develop one's understanding of the nature of the Triune Godhead via an examination of Christ in His humanity, considering the fact that He emptied Himself of His divine attributes in order to become incarnate. It's like saying that God can't do anything without first praying about it because that's what Jesus did.

Originally posted by 1Way
Hitler's plans and personal authority over the Holocaust makes him culpable even if he only murdered in his own heart.

I fully agree.

Originally posted by 1Way
God does not arbitrarily say what is right and wrong, ...

Nobody has claimed that.

Originally posted by 1Way
... absolute righteousness comes from God's eternal and faithful character, ...

You've yet to prove such a thing as "absolute righteousness." How do you define "absolute"?

Originally posted by 1Way
... which necessarily applies to Himself, it applies to all things.

Do you have a chapter and verse that supports this, or will you just continue to assert it without proof?

Originally posted by 1Way
God is righteous, it is one of His attributes, it describes who God is.

God's righteousness is always manifested to His people in dispensationally specific ways. To the Jew, God is seen as the righteous Messiah and Savior of the Jews and the Gentiles via ethnic distinctions. To the Body of Christ, God is seen as the Head of the Body and Savior of Jew and Gentile alike.

Originally posted by 1Way
It is a blasphemous idea to say that God is not righteous objectively or by His character.

Please explain or define what you mean by "righteous objectively."

 

[Hilston]

Originally posted by 1Way

And just as there is a difference between interpretation and application of a teaching, there is also a difference between the righteous standard and the punishment involved for breaking that standard, so that dispensational changes in punishment never altered absolute right and wrong.

You continue to beg the question every time you use a term that you've not yet proven. If there were such a thing as "absolute right", then by definition, it could not change. Prove there is such a thing and I will concede the point. Until you do, you beg the very question by your use of the term.

Originally posted by 1Way
Also, adding amoral laws ...

Amoral laws?!?!?! Like what?

Originally posted by 1Way
... does not alter absolute right and wrong either, because, they are an amoral issue, righteousness is a moral issue. Just because God commanded the death penalty for breaking the Sabbath does not mean that keeping the Sabbath is an inherently moral command, obeying God is an inherently moral issue. God can and does change the commands that men must live by, but God never changes the absolute standard of right and wrong.

The commands define right and wrong. Since the commands change, right and wrong cannot be absolute. You've yet to prove otherwise.

Originally posted by 1Way
Murder is always wrong no matter what the punishment is for it.

Murder is always wrong, but not for the same reasons from one dispensation to the next. The sin of murder is wrong for different reasons depending on what dispensational law is in place. You cannot separate the law from the reasoning behind it, or the consequences of violating it. When we discipline our children, it is important for them to know why their behavior was wrong and what the consequences are.

Originally posted by 1Way
Cain slew Able and he feared for his life, why? Not because God had established His capitol laws, He had not!

Sorry, 1Way. You make a fallacious argument from silence. God had certainly established laws concerning murder, just as He had established laws concerning sacrificial offerings. We rightly infer this from the context. Right sacrifice vs. wrong sacrifice. Right behavior vs. wrong behavior. Sin = "missing the mark." If Cain's behavior was sinful, then there must have been a "mark" established. "Thou shalt not kill" had been communicated to Cain.

Originally posted by 1Way
He knew it was wrong because it is absolutely wrong, he naturally new he was wrong.

How did he know?

Originally posted by 1Way

• Consider, is it ever wrong to oppose sin and evil?

Sure it is. If I'm at work, and I have a deadline to meet, I am wrong to use my employer's time to stop and oppose a Mormon co-worker's evil indoctrination of another colleague.

Originally posted by 1Way

• Is it ever right to oppose godly righteousness?

I would say no, however, what is godly righteousness changes. If I were a Jew in ancient Israel, I would not oppose the keeping of dietary laws. As a member of the Body of Christ, I would oppose the keeping of dietary laws.

Originally posted by 1Way
Morality is an issue of absolutes, and right and wrong are mutually exclusive to each other.

Right and wrong are mutually exclusive, but they change. Sabbath-keeping (good) and Sabbath-breaking (bad) are mutually exclusive for Israel. For the Body of Christ, Sabbath-keeping (bad) and Sabbath-breaking (good) are mutually exclusive as well, but for differnt reasons.

Originally posted by 1Way
Thus a precept of biblical morality is that something is morally wrong no matter what the punishment is for it. Murder was not right just because God forbade the death penalty for murder.

No one has claimed otherwise.

Originally posted by 1Way
Doing something, and the consequences of doing something are two separate but related issues, just as interpretation is different but related to application.

Are interpretation and application absolutes?

Originally posted by 1Way
The teaching is to obey God. Prior to the dispensation of Grace and mystery, the application of that teaching basically meant to keep the commandments!

Do you keep Paul's commandments?

Originally posted by 1Way
However, in this dispensation of grace, the application of that teaching is to leave the law like leaving a tutor, instead love and put your faith in God. It's always wrong to disobey God, but it's not wrong for God to change the "house rules".