LuftWaffle

I'm willing to have a reasonable discussion using scripture, theology and philosophy about this issue. If you're going to attempt to get personal and paint me as a danger, then that isn't much of an argument. Now, you said that the soul doesn't die, and yet Jesus says: And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Mat 10:28) Are you sure that you're not the one on the wrong side of God's word? The only evidence that you've offered for you claim is that souls must be immortal because otherwise the lake of fire wouldn't be necessary and I'm assuming that you're assuming that the lake of fire is a place souls live forever in torment. In essence then you assuming what needs to be proved. I believe the lake of fire will in fact be how the unsaved will be killed, so my view is perfectly compatible with the existence of a lake of fire.

But surely you can agree that we should believe what the bible teaches and not what is most scary to unbelievers? Do you believe that all human beings are immortal? If so then why does Paul state that we are perishable and mortal and that we must put on immortality through Christ For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. (1Co 15:53) If both groups are already immortal and imperishable, wouldn't that go against what Paul is teaching here?

What is the scriptural support that both the saved and the unsaved will live forever? The entire traditionalist doctrine is based on the belief that both the saved and the unsaved will live forever in different locations (heaven and hell) whereas the bible is full of descriptions giving eternal life to the saved and death, destruction and perish for the unsaved. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. (Joh 3:16) "Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. (Mat 7:13-14) Our God is a God of salvation, and to GOD, the Lord, belong deliverances from death. (Psa 68:20) For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: "Death is swallowed up in victory." "O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?" The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. (1Co 15:53-56) For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom 6:23) Humour me for a second, if you don't mind: Suppose, just for the sake of argument that the proposition is true: That the bible teaches that only the saved will inherit everlasting life, and that the unsaved will be killed/destroyed: would you grant that above verse I quoted are consistent with that proposition? Would you admit in fact that the verses that would be consistent with the proposition would be a great number indeed because the bible talks about life and death all the time?

Isaiah 66:24 refers to dead bodies being consumed by worms and burned up by fire. I'm sure Shiloh will affirm that in Jewish culture nothing is worse than for the bodies to be exposed to decay and devoured like this. The loathsomeness of this scene is the fact that these corpses are exposed and being devoured by worms. Isaiah isn't sketching a scene that supports the traditional view of people living forever in torment will immortal worms eating immortal bodies, but rather a scene of large scale slaughter. The verse in Daniel juxtaposes the everlasting life to the shame and the contempt. If both groups were living eternally, then wouldn't it have been much better if the verse in Daniel had read, some will awaken to everlasting life in heaven, others to everlasting life in hell. Daniel says that only one group gets everlasting life, and you're assuming that the shame and contempt is felt by those in hell, but it's much more likely that the living are the ones viewing the lost with shame and contempt as the Isaiah verses so clearly shows, contempt and shame is felt toward the dead. In terms of Matthew the word eternal fire, is just a reference to fire from heaven. The traditionalist side makes the assumption that eternal fire means a fire that burns forever and thus the fire must have something to burn forever. But eternal fire when used elsewhere in scripture is a figure of speech referring to heavenly fire. ...just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire. (Jud 1:7) In terms of Revelation 20:14-15, wouldn't you say that there's a book of life, is support for the view that only those whose names are in the book will inherit life?

Chairs exist, but they aren't alive. Square-circles neither exist nor are they alive. So there's an obvious distinction between existing and living. The focus on cessation of existence places the burden of proof on me to show that the unsaved will vanish, but I hold a more modest view, which is merely that the unsaved will not live. If we take John 3:16 then it seems to teach that one group, the saved, will inherit eternal life, and those who do not believe will perish and die. I take this at face value. Does that make sense?

I believe that the saved will inherit eternal life (literally) and the unsaved will die and be destroyed (literally). Whether the end result is that nothing will remain of the unsaved is not a necessary part of my view. In other words attempting to disprove cessation of existence does nothing to disprove my view, because it's not essential to my view.

Thanks for opening this thread, Shiloh. No, I don't believe in eternal conscious torment. I believe the unsaved will be killed/destroyed and thus, not be conscious. Whether or not they are utterly annihilated is to me irrelevant, which is why I want to draw a distinction between cessation of life and cessation of existence.

I'm not sure I see the problem with accepting Christ leading to eternal immortality, but rejecting Christ resulting in eternal death. I want to be very clear that I'm not arguing cessation of existence. My view is that the unsaved will be killed/perish/destroyed, whether or not bits of their corpses remain are irrelevant to me. So, I'm not arguing for complete and utter cessation of existence, I'm simply arguing that everlasting life is a gift to the saved and that the unsaved will experience cessation of life.

I believe the second death is eternal. The distinction is as follows, as I see it: for the traditionalist it is between going eternally to the happy place (heaven) or the sad place (hell), but for the conditionalist it is between living forever and being dead forever. Both consequences are eternal for both views. That's the conditionalist hypothesis, and I think it has significant scriptural support. In fact, that seems to be the essence of the entire salvation story, that Christ purchased life for us.

ahh, ok.

Would you believe me if I told you that most of the proof texts for eternal conscious torment including the one you cited above, upon closer examination seem to support the conditional immortality view better than it does the notion that the wicked will live forever in torment? Cessation of existence isn't a necessary aspect of the view I hold. In terms of SDAs and JWs also believing in annihilation, I'm a Trinitarian who mows the lawn on Saturdays

Hi Hawkeye, I've also become convinced that the traditional view of eternal conscious torment is incorrect and that the bible seems to rather clearly teach that immortality is granted only to the saved. I've never heard the term "modified annihilationism" though, what does it mean? I prefer to avoid the term annihilation and focus on the (im)mortality aspect, so I like the name Conditional Immortality, because that avoid the red herring of whether the unsaved cease to exist.

Would you mind clarifying your concern. Are you concerned that God is offering redemption, predestination, or is your concern about hell?

Atheists tend to consider themselves to be morally and intellectually superior to Christians. As a result of this, they get severely triggered when it is shown that atheism entails moral nihilism and that the moral high horse they're sitting on, has "Property of Jesus Christ" written on it. Their recourse in such instances is to take jabs at Christianity and their goto for this is usually the slavery issue. As such I am pretty familiar with all the verses about slavery because it's impossible to have a conversation about moral ontology without having to deal with these red herrings. Atheism's inability to ground morality in anything but mere subjective preference, doesn't evaporate simply because the word slavery appears in the Bible. You need to deal with it. Having said that, the primary purpose of slavery was endentured servitude. It was a system by which citizens of Israel could work off any debts. Servants if they choose, could get a piercing and remain with a master if they liked working for that master. Jacob for instance slaved for Laban as a way of earning the right to marry his daughter. This flies in the face of the misleading atheistic narrative that slaves were to be treated as mere possessions. That is was atheists are going for were they bring up the slavery issue, is to make it appear as though slaves were dehumanised and considered to be mere things. This couldn't be further from the truth, and you and I have had this conversation before. In terms of the verse in question, yes Israelite citizens had better rights than slaves coming from outside nations. This is true for almost every nation on earth where the citizens of a nations enjoy better priviledges than foreigners. What's the problem? Enslavement of enemy forces was actually a mercy since it gives them a chance at life, instead of being killed on the spot. War happens, but of course in our day and age where most softhanded Western liberals have never had to fight for anything, the idea of hurting people in war seems barbaric. Lastly keep in mind that Israel's policy was that one could become an Israelite if one accepted the beliefs. Israel wasn't so much a race as it was a family with lots of adopted children. Those in the family got special treatment, simple. So a foreigner could become a citizen of Israel by accepting the Israelite faith. See for instance the book of Ruth and the loads of Egyptians who escaped Egypt with Israel and so on. What I mean by contract is that slaves were considered as part of a man's wealth in an economic or contractual sense, not that slaves were to be treated inhumanely, which is what you were hoping for. The reason I didn't elaborate too much on the contractual thing is because a) we've had this conversation before and b) this is a red herring to get away from the fact that atheism cannot make sense of morality. Which is why I added, "In the grand scheme of things". It seems we're both in agreement that people not dying is far more important than women's rights to vote. My point was that both you and Siegi were trying to prove moral inconsistency by reaching for Western luxuries such as a woman's right to vote, same-sex marriage and pot legalisation. These issues are important in the West because the West is rather safe and peaceful, were citizens enjoy the kind of freedoms and self-actualization unheard of in history. It challenges your claim that morality is obscure and that it evolved in a messy fashion. My point is that the fundamentals were always the same. Christian values or human stubbornness? I'm glad though that your argument has moved from "I don't see any evidence of moral progress as a result of Christian beliefs" to "why did it take so long". I get that you'll never accept that Christianity did good in the world, so I'll take this as a half-hearted concession. hmmm. https://www.englishclub.com/grammar/nouns-adjective.htm Christian West refers to the West that is Christian. Sometimes nouns can be used as adjectives. My point is that Western civilisation has traditionally been and still is largely influenced by Christianity. As such you'll find statements like "God save the queen", "In God we trust", "Soli deo gloria" and such in Western countries' things. You'll also find that the great universities of the West that have shaped and bettered the world are steeped in Christian tradition, founded by Christians and covered in plaques and spires that make them look more like churches than institutions of learning. It is from here that we get great mind like Newton, Tesla, Pasteur who believed that those who studied the sciences were honouring God. Then you can look at the fact that most grand old hospitals in the West are named after Saints, that the greatest and oldest Humanitarian organisations are the Salvation Army and the Red Cross, that the Greatest moral reformers of the world, Mother Theresa, Wilberforce, Martin Luther King and so on were all Christians. Some say the American constitution is the greatest constitution ever written: and I believe that this too is thanks to it's formulators belief that men are created equal and that as such they have inalienable rights endowed by a moral authority, right? But sure, go ahead and believe the made up atheist story of Christianity, which reads roughly: in the beginning was a primordial soup from which people emerged randomly after as many years as it takes for this totally scientific process to occur. Some wicked (according to our best subjectivist definition of wicked) people invented religion as a way to control others back when people were gullible and would believe anything. These people had slaves and genocided a lot. Then the inquisition and crusades happened, which, in conjunction with slavery and genocide is basically all we need to know about Christianity. Then we got science which has shown that we don't need god (lowercase is super important even though it's a proper noun) anymore. Some Christians try to be as clever as we are by attempting to argue for the existence of God, but if they were rational they'd realise that any argument that leads to God is either circular, or is undercut by slavery. Define rationality? Also, please elaborate on how a rational proposition becomes a moral imperative. Are you a determinist? By this I mean do you believe that all human actions are ultimately caused by the inevitable workings of the laws of nature?

I don't think it's wrong to own people as servants in a contractual sense (which is how the bible defined it), so I'm not sure what your point is with that. In terms of women voting: don't you think the very fact that this is the issue you're raising is pretty telling in and of itself? People instinctively know that murder, rape, theft, adultery, hypocrisy, pride and so on is wrong. Even murderers won't claim that murder is right, instead they'll try to tilt the scale by attempting to justify murder by saying the person had it coming, or that murdering so-and-so was for some greater good. It seems to me then that apart from superficial (in the grand scheme of things) issues like woman's rights and social status, mankind indeed is pretty consistent in its moral sense. What changes are the justifications, not the morals themselves. Pro-choice advocates believe that murder is wrong, they just don't believe that it's a baby being murdered, or they elevate the autonomy of the woman above the rights of the fetus. Both parties agree that murder is wrong. Even dictators will not command genocide because they believe subjectively that genocide is a good thing, they believe it's a means to a better end. Can you look back in history and find a culture that celebrated cowardice? Or didn't mind theft of personal property? That considered murder to be morally benign? I doubt it. In terms of the finer moral points like equal rights and so on these virtues gradually arose in the Christian West, and basically nowhere else. Now this makes sense: If morality is objective then it is discoverable: progress is possible, just like scientific progress is possible if one believes that there are right and wrong answers in nature, another deliverance of the Christian worldview... You're welcome But if morality evolved as you say, then what becomes of right and wrong? Ask an evolutionary psychologist where anti-social behavior comes from and they'll say it's our evolutionary instincts. Ask the same evolutionary psychologist where our social behavior comes from and they'll also say it's a result of our evolutionary instincts. Should sociopaths be sociopaths because their genes determine their behavior and should the virtuous be virtuous because their genes determine otherwise? Do you have a particular preference?

My point is that objective morality does depend on God, which is why the existence of objective morality would constitute evidence for there being a God. It seems you have a problem with the fact that the premises of an argument lead to the conclusion, but that's exactly what a valid argument is supposed to do.

Hi Bonky, Saying "We are social creatures" is basically just a statement about the statistically average behavior of human beings, but it says nothing about how humans beings ought to behave. A Sadistic psychopath will state that their own behavior is not statistically average and that they are not social creatures. Morality entails far more than mere descriptions of what sort of behavior one can expect from the average human being, but instead is a set of normative rules about how the world ought to be.

Hi Siegi, To do quotes you need to click the button that looks like this -> ˝ in text box where you type your posts While I'm glad that you're not arguing for Positivism I'm not sure that the mathematical concept of "constructivism" can be applied to ethics. I think pretty much all mathematicians agree that infinity isn't really a thing, it's just a placeholder for the concept of an unending set of numbers. So it's a mathematical impossibility to determine certain outcomes ad infinitum, but why should such a notion be applied to ethics. I don't believe ethics have infinit variables. Some moral dilemmas are complex, but never infinitely complex, so I think there is a best answer to every moral dilemma, albeit sometimes hard to find. So, I guess I don't see the need to categorize ethics in the same way as certain mathematical concepts. In fact I think doing so probably commits a category error. The point is that, if our moral sensibilities railing against the idea that "rape is benign" is merely an incidental impulse of our evolution, it's just like saying "fire is cold" rails against our sense of touch and claiming that our sense of touch is just an illusion seems just as silly. Now if our moral sensibilities are mere incidental traits of our evolution what's wrong with flipping a coin to make moral decisions? What is your principled case for not just flipping coins when making moral decisions? Any argument for subjective morals will be based on evidence that's less obvious than any argument for objective morals. Think about it. One can look at the reaction of a four year old child when they are wronged and it's obvious that they perceive a wrong has been committed. Then one can listen to the waffling of an ethics professor claiming that morals are subjective who still expects that his students not murder him and take his belongings. You have as much a burden of proof to show morals are subjective as I have to show they're objective. In fact most atheists who are subjectivists only became subjectivists after they learnt about the logical consequences of moral objectivism. That is how obviously true objectivism is, and how obscure the notion of subjectivism is. Can I prove to your satisfaction that morals are objective? Probably not, because I can't show you a moral and weigh it and measure it, which is what you're demanding. I don't think objective moral values are independent of the character of God, but I don't see how having them grounded in the character of God makes the argument circular. The moral argument as offered by most apologists is a basic Modus Tollens argument taking the form: 1. If P then Q, 2. Not Q 3. therefore Not P Here's the argument: 1. If God does not exist then objective morals do not exist. 2. Objective morals do exist 3. Therefore God exists If the argument were circular as you claim then "God exists"would have been assumed in the premises 1 or 2, but it's not there. So I guess I'm not seeing the circularity. Well, Siegi, if you dont find the argument to be satisfying all your questions, is that the fault of the argument or you wanting more than where the premises and conclusion leads. The argument is a simple piece of evidence intended to reason toward a theistic conclusion based on the existence of right and wrong. Simple as that. If you want to know what God thinks of you, then read the words of Jesus. I for one, am a huge fan of the moral argument for the existence of God, because those who disagree with it, never really attack the argument itself. You're not alone in wrongly trying to claim that it's circular, or trying to divert away from it by talking about slavery in the Bible, or claiming that it doesn't prove all the tenets of Christianity and so on. The very fact that all these excuses are made instead of actually tacking the premises and the conclusion of the argument is actually something that should show you something.

Hi Siegi, The fact that an issue is unresolved does not mean that it's not worth thinking about. After all in science there still isn't a unifying model between Newtonian physics and Quantum physics, but that doesn't mean that science is meaningless or wishy-washy. Also, sometimes people refuse to accept what is obvious, because they don't like what it entails, and I suspect many moral relativists aren't so by choice but because of their worldview that cannot accommodate non-physical realities such as morality, God, souls etc. This is reminiscent of an idea called Logical Positivism which was popular in Germany and Scandinavia half a century ago. Here's a link to a Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_positivism Basically the idea is that something should be considered meaningless unless it can be empirically verified or logically deduced. Unfortunately Logical Positivism itself cannot be empirically verified nor logically deduced, so idea committed suicide shortly after its inception. The reason I think it remains popular is because it allows people to dismiss issues they don't want to talk about, by describing them as meaningless based on this arbitrary rule for meaning, without really dealing with the claims. In other words Logical Positivism is a lazy cop-out. As you can probably tell, I don't think much of this view The other thing is that meaning is actually very straightforward, so the claim is rather silly. In order for something to be meaningful all it needs is a definition. So it's possible to have meaningful conversations by simply defining what one is talking about. This is how philosophers have been able to have meaningful conversations about ethics and morality for millenia as you rightly pointed out. Without a generally accepted proof of "constructivism" being a right or wrong claim it's not even the case that "constructivism" is right or wrong. See the problem? If morality is objective, it means that it's not a matter of deciding what is right or wrong. That's the whole point! Moral obligations aren't down to mere preference and no person gets to pick what they want morality to be, just like the shape of the earth is an objective fact and not a decision. So your question of who gets to decide what is right or wrong doesn't apply to objective moral values. This is only a problem for relativists. Now, what you might be referring to are moral dilemmas where the lesser evil or greater good isn't immediately obvious. In the case of objective morals there is still a right answer, the answer just may require careful consideration of all the influences. That's why moral dilemmas don't disprove objective morals, in fact moral dilemmas are at home in moral objectivism. If morals are subjective, then flipping a coin is no less random than the evolutionary happenstance that brought about our illusory moral preferences, isn't it? The controversy around the death penalty isn't tricky because morals are subjective but because the issue is complex. Let me illustrate what I mean this way: Suppose you fill a balloon with helium and you tie a number of objects to the string, will it go up or down? It depends, right? How much volume does the balloon have, what do the objects weigh, how pure is the helium, what's the air pressure, what planet are you on and so on? If we tie a feather to a standard party balloon we have a clear case, and we know the balloon will go up. If we tie a Grand piano, an anvil and a tombstone to the string we also have a clear case. The balloon will not go up. But what about a slight wet, empty box of matches? Now we have a difficult one, right? So are we now to conclude that gravity is subjective because we have a hard time figuring this one out? Of course not. This is a knowledge (epistemology) problem and has nothing to do with the essence (ontology) of gravity. Likewise some moral questions are complex because some moral values pull the scale one way and others pull the scale another way, such as the death-penalty which have pros and cons. The moral argument is a theistic argument, not an argument for the doctrines of Christianity. Asking which God is therefore irrelevant, because it's not what the argument is attempting to show. The moral argument forms part of a cumulative case for God and cumulative cases are a perfectly valid way to reason. In fact most court cases are based on cumulative reasoning. Does the fingerprint at a crime scene prove a murder? No, it proves that a particular person was at the scene there. Should fingerprint evidence therefore be dismissed because it doesn't prove everything you want it to prove, of course not. So why should the moral argument be dismissed because it doesn't lead all the way to what you want it to lead?

So the rule is, "If you don't want problems, done be rule minded"?

Let me try to explain what is meant by objective and subjective using an example. Suppose you place a glass of water on your desk. If one were to then make the claim, "There is a glass of water on my desk", what is it that makes the claim a true claim? Is it the fact that you can see the glass of water sitting on your desk? No, that's not it, because if you closed your eyes the glass of water wouldn't disappear, right? So, the fact that you're perceiving it with your senses isn't what makes it true. What about your knowledge of having placed the glass on the desk? Is that what makes the claim true? Well, then one must ask whether the glass would disappear if you forgot that you placed it there? No it won't. The claim "there is a glass of water on the desk" would be true even if nobody knew it was there. What makes the claim true is the fact that there is a desk with a glass placed upon it. The truth-maker in this instance is therefore objectively true because the truth of the claim is grounded in the object itself (the glass upon the table) and not the beholder (subject). So if we take this to morality when we claim that rape is wrong, what does it mean? If morality is objective then the claim says something about rape, namely that it is wrong. If morality is subjective then the claim says something about the person making the claim (the subject), namely that they would prefer a world where there wasn't rape. According to moral-subjectivists there is no real moral difference between raping and not raping, the distinction therefore is not the act of rape but in their own preference regarding the act. This is why moral objectivists are also referred to as moral realists, because they believe moral categories are real (Don't confuse real with physical). Moral subjectivists or moral relativists on the other hand believe that moral categories are not real and thus are mere constructs in the observers mind. Thus a shorthand way of making the distinction is referring to objective as mind independent, and subjective as mind dependent. Hope that helps.

Bonky, You're making a common mistake, by not distinguishing between absolute morals and objective morals. Absolute morals would describe a moral claim that true independent of circumstance or context, such that the claim "X is wrong" is true no matter what the place, time or circumstance. Some have offered, "It is wrong to torture babies for fun" as an absolute moral claim. Objectively morals on the other hand describe obligations or values that are true mind independently, but not necessarily circumstance independent. Thus, offering up examples of where cutting someone is morally justified does nothing to disprove moral objectivity.

Bonky, You're confusing objective morals with objective declarations about morals. They're not the same.

I've always found trick questions that are meant to prove that we don't really believe in Jesus as rather pointless. If the proof that we don't really believe in Jesus goes through, then nothing is gained by mocking or opposing our beliefs, since we don't actually hold them in the first place, right? You can only persuade someone toward an idea if they're not at that idea to begin with, so in a sense, the proof that we don't believe needs to assume that we do, otherwise it doesn't persuade. If on the other hand you're just trying to show that we don't take every word of scripture to its maximal literal meaning, then sure. And you point is? If you're trying to show that our certainty isn't as strong as it should be. Again this is as trivial as the previous point to which we'd all agree, but that raises one question because atheists are always chastising us for our "certainty" and they claim that doubt is so much more noble. Does this mean that since we're not as certain as once thought that atheists will now see us as more noble?

I'm not sure what to make of this post to be honest. On one swoop you're talking about newspapers and TV as if you're interested in facts while at the same time committing a gross generalisation by branding "religion" in general as violent based on the recent actions of a single violent religion namely Islam. That's like saying all people of colour are violent based on the recent spate of BLM killings. Not only that but you claim that "virtually all violence perpetrated is explicitly caused by religion" is simply ridiculous. Looking at wars, which is the topic in question, the Encyclopedia of war chronicles 1763 wars of which 123 were religious in nature, which is just over 6 percent, of which about half of those were Islamic. In terms of violence in general most violence in Europe and America are drug and gang related, not religious. The most violent regions are South America and Africa, and the violence there is chiefly around politics, territory, tribal conflict and greed so even moving the focus to violence doesn't get you anywhere close to "virtually all violence is perpetrated by religion". I'm indeed cheerful that at least it isn't my religion. In fact I'm quite proud of all the hospitals and schools and universities that were built by Christians throughout the world. Not to mention international charity organisations like the Red Cross and the Salvation army who has brought hope and support to millions. Not to mentions all the small support groups, the inner-city soup kitchens, the drug counsellors, rape crisis centres and so on that are mostly run by Christians. So yeah....not doing too well in the facts department are you, Andrew?