Thor's Day

There is a crack, a crack in everything ...

It's Thor's Day, when we traditionally honor the storm god here by unleashing the lightning of a robust, but hopefully civil, flamewar.

One of the first questions when approaching the subject of human nature tends to be are we essentially good or essentially rotten? The Christian answer -- "Yes!" -- can seem like a cop-out, or a contradiction, or a paradox (the euphemism theologian's use for those contradictions we like). The idea is that every human is of inestimable worth, bearing the very image of God through and through. Yet every human is also fallen, broken, corrupt, through and through.* And the matter of virtue and wickedness is only part of the equation anyway -- we're not just fallen, but also finite, fallible and fragile.**

Just in case Augustinian anthropology isn't inflammatory enough for a Thursday, let's add politics. This Christian understanding of human nature is particularly compatible with Madisonian democracy. The people all, equally, deserve and intrinsically possess inviolable rights because every person is of inestimable worth. Yet no person is virtuous enough to be trusted with unchecked power. We cannot trust in the benevolence of a philosopher king, so our leaders -- not rulers, but leaders -- must be subject to checks and balances and to the will of the sovereign people. Yet even the sovereignty of the people must be checked and balanced by those aforementioned rights so that the majority does not begin to tyrannize the minority/ies.

(This view of human nature also suggests the wisdom of an economic framework that avoids either the potential tyranny of a centrally planned economy or the potential tyranny of unregulated -- and therefore not perpetually free -- free markets.)

What I've never understood about Neocon foreign policy is why these people think the Madisonian system of checks and balances is necessary domestically, but not internationally. Their argument is basically that America is a benevolent country and therefore ought to be the unrivaled, unchecked superpower/philosopher king of the world. No, thank you. No kings, domestic or international.

(Let's see, theology, politics, economics, foreign policy -- not bad for a Thursday. I should probably have included something about sex, gender, Ron Paul and Cloverfield, too, but this should at least get the fireworks started ...)

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* The "total" in Calvin's term "total depravity" means something more like "pervasive." He was countering the idea that our fallenness was located in one particular aspect or another of ourselves, such as the idea that it is our physical bodies that are wicked, or our "will" (whatever that is), or our genitals, or whatever. Every aspect of every person, in total, is both inherently good and fallen, both in need of redemption and worthy of it.

** "It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people." -- Good Omens. It might displease Messrs. Gaiman and Pratchett to hear me say so, but there's some fine theology in that book.

Comments

[hapax]

Alas, Jesu, credit for converting me goes to Someone Else entirely, about thirty years ago.

And I thought both of my messages were perfectly consistent. Although the first was definitely pissier.

[Jesurgislac]

And I thought both of my messages were perfectly consistent

Not really: the second contradicted the first. In the first, you point people at Jesus/Christianity to resolve their problems. In the second, you agree with me that this is not the thing to do.

[Froborr]

Tonio: I agree, except on one point, which is that I don't think anyone actually *intends* to do evil. They may choose to do evil because they believe it will lead to ultimately good results, or they may not feel they have a choice, or they may have a very different idea of what constitutes evil, but I highly doubt anybody ever actually says to themselves, "Hmm, I think I'll do some evil today."

[hapax]

In the first, you point people at Jesus/Christianity to resolve their problems.

Mmm. No. Maybe it looked that way, though.

Rather, I would say that the Person and message of Jesus -- and the way of Christianity, insofar as the religion attempts to express both -- is a solution to the problem of the obsession with ego and authority. (I'll punt on the question of whether it is the ONLY solution. I can see great merit in some Jewish, Buddhist, and Muslim approaches. Most Paganism makes me laugh, which is of course the most important first step, but rarely gets me any further. Atheism -- except for a Bertrand Russell-ish Idealism, which has its own problems -- just puzzles me. But I suspect all that reflects culture and temperament more than any sort of great cosmic truth)

Unfortunately, humans being humans -- pace Tonio -- are capable of simultaneously grasping this solution, and completely screwing it up by tangling it up in the very problem its trying to fix. I don't THINK I have ever, ever, even suggested that the remedy for human brokenness was to wave your hands and say, "Hey, look at Jesus!" -- even less institutionalize that hand-waving and finger-pointing in a hierarchical structure.

If it sounds like I've said this, I do apologize.

[Geds]

hapax: This whole obsession with "who's in charge?", "who gets to give the orders?", and "who gets the credit and who gets the blame?" is EXACTLY the problem that Christianity -- or at least Jesus, which isn't the same thing, alas -- aims to solve.

You're painting with a pretty wide brush there, hapax...

What about those of us who are pretty ambivalent about the idea of god but extremely interested in fighting against the self-proclaimed authority of the church? I don't give a crap if you believe in god until you start telling me that I have to behave in the way god wants me to according to your definition of god.

To the authoritarian theist this attitude is indistinguishable from rebelling against the godhead itself. And, of course, the rhetoric turns anyone who takes this tack in to a petulant child.

Froborr: Anyway, an addition to her point: The adolescent rebellion against authority is, in fact, a necessary stage in becoming independent.

This, too. However, the issue of the "adolescent rebellion" changes depending on the authority. Parents who gradually allow their child to experience new things and to move further afield generally experience far less outright rebellion than the parents who clamp down and keep the children under lock and key at all times (this, of course, varies depending on situation and general psychological makeup). All of this "rebellion," be it against god or the structures of god's church, could be signaling something other than petulant adolescents pouting until they get their way.

It could, in fact, be signaling a human race that is preparing to leave the adolescent years and grow up. Or, at least, that a sector of the human race is preparing to do so. Religion played a part, acting as the mediator calling people to a larger good or stepping in to discipline during the human childhood. Now, with the arrival of the liberal society we're learning the importance of taking care of each other and our world and chafing at the rules that no longer apply. Don't go past the end of the block makes sense when you're five and might ride your bike in to traffic. It doesn't make sense when you're twenty and have your own car. Most of the religious precepts make a lot of sense for a tribal society attempting to maintain itself in a hostile world but make far less sense as we move towards a global society where I may well know someone from the other side of the globe better than I know my next-door neighbor.

At this point the Pat Robertson's of the world are holding us back from being as understanding as we could be. If there is a loving, graceful god I have no doubt that this would displease that god immensely. If there is an angry exclusionary god who hates all this acceptance stuff and plans to destroy us for it, then we should resist. I see no evidence of such, however. So I have no issues with god against which I plan to rebel, but plenty of issues with god's self-proclaimed spokespeople.

Jesu: ...but has no sense of taste.

Ever eaten Norwegian food? Swamp scum tastes pretty good afterwards...

[hapax]

oops, left out the important clause.

Instead, I would argue that a better solution is to take somebody's hand in mine and say, "Hey, let's try to do like Jesus!" -- in the whole "healing the sick, visiting the prisoner, feeding the hungry" sort of way.

Yeah, I do believe that the Incarnation accomplished all sorts of crucially important stuff on a metaphysical plane. And that the Institution of the Church in a very real way helps concretize all those things, as well as providing, not incidentally, a very useful and fairly efficient venue of doing all that Jesus-stuff.

But if human beings aren't doing those things -- if they are not making real and present and active Incarnations in their own selves -- all the doctrine and liturgy and structure and all the rest is pointless.

[Jesurgislac]

Ever eaten Norwegian food?

Only the gorgeous cheese that's caramelised - like fudge? There's a Scottish version that's even better.

[Froborr]

hapax: I think you are, rather unfairly, equating a desire for independence, self-reliance, and freedom to egotism or narcissism. Full maturity requires responsibility, which requires freedom, and freedom is impossible if there exist authorities which can control me. Thus, in order to be fully mature I must resist authority to the best of my ability. Any acceptance of authority is a denial of one's own responsibility for one's own life, and infantilizes one.

This whole obsession with "who's in charge?", "who gets to give the orders?", and "who gets the credit and who gets the blame?" is EXACTLY the problem that Christianity -- or at least Jesus, which isn't the same thing, alas -- aims to solve.

except that, as every rebellious teenager soon discovers, revolution juts replace sone tyrant with another.

Jesus' message is completely untenable. He's Trotsky, crying out for constant revolution, which is unsupportable as a social system for daily living. So, along comes Uncle Joe Stalin the early Church fathers who decides to replace one form of tyranny with another, just one in which they are the ones who decide "who's in charge", "who gets to give the orders", and "who gets the credit and who gets the blame".

[Keith]

That last anon post was me.

[Froborr]

Geds: Well, obviously, I'm not in a rebellion against God any more than I'm in a rebellion against Sauron or the Easter Bunny. But *if* I believed there was such a thing as a Universal Legislature -- a being or set of beings able to determine the laws of nature -- then, yes, I would demand elected, egalitarian representation for all sentient beings within that legislature. It does not matter whether God is benign or not; no person should have the power to make laws that affect other persons without their consent, period. As it happens, I don't believe there is such a legislature -- the laws of nature are not the product of any sort of agent, in the philosophical sense of the term -- so I have no need to campaign for this.

[Froborr]

Keith: So, who exactly would you say were the tyrants in, say, the U.S. from 1776-1826?

[Keith]

Keith: So, who exactly would you say were the tyrants in, say, the U.S. from 1776-1826?

If you were a Colonial, the British Crown (More accurately, the Whigs and other loyal Monarchists).

If you were a Native, The White Man (More accurately, the Whigs, other loyal Monarchists and Colonials who wanted your land).

Occasionally the French (when they weren't helping the Colonials win Independence)

Definitely the Spanish.

Missionaries, of course.

Have I left anyone out?

[Tonio]

I agree, except on one point, which is that I don't think anyone actually *intends* to do evil.

Absolutely. That was my point.

I would say that the Person and message of Jesus -- and the way of Christianity, insofar as the religion attempts to express both -- is a solution to the problem of the obsession with ego and authority.

I strongly suspect that any obsession with authority is learned and not inherent. My criticism of the authoritarian versions of theistic belief (which does not include yours, Hapax) is intended to emphasize that morality is not a matter of simply following authority. In fact, that inaccurate concept of morality actually encourages immorality as a form of rebellion against authority. (In part I'm echoing the ideas of Kohlberg, although I have only a thumbnail understanding of his concepts.)

Unfortunately, humans being humans -- pace Tonio -- are capable of simultaneously grasping this solution, and completely screwing it up by tangling it up in the very problem its trying to fix.

Can you explain the point that you see me as understanding? If humans are obsessed with ego, surely the solution would be the correct concept of morality as the effects of one's actions on others. In philosophical terms, this would mean the individual recognizing that the world doesn't revolve around him or her.

[Mark]

I have had great fun going through these comments and working out which of you are Saved, Unsaved, and really truly bonafidely saved.

[Jesurgislac]

Hapax saves. Fred invests. The rest of us spend. ;-)

(Hapax, my apologies: it appears I misunderstood you. "So what else is new?" Hapax mutters, sharpening her Thunder Axe.)

[Keith]

if...there was such a thing as a Universal Legislature -- a being or set of beings able to determine the laws of nature -- then, yes, I would demand elected, egalitarian representation for all sentient beings within that legislature.

Now that would be a fantasy novel! The newly elected representative of Earth arrives at the Celestial Court to find that the Heavenly Body is as dysfunctional a congress as any on Earth, with petty intrigues between the gods spilling over with unintended consequences on Earth. Our man In Heaven wants to sort things out but finds he has a task of Sysiphian heft before him.

[Froborr]

Keith: Apologies, I meant 1783-1833, and should clarify that I meant the U.S. of the time, not the future territory of the U.S. That eliminates the French, Spanish, English crown, and missionaries (who existed within the U.S., but did not rule). The point about Native Americans is a good one, but does not support the contention that a revolution leads inevitably to the replacement of one master with another -- no master was put into the position of the British crown (which had been a particularly mild tyrant, in actuality), and therefore the tyrant-tyrranized relationships that did exist in that period (you forget, by the way, about slavery) were not actually replacements of the tyrrany overthrown.

[Froborr]

Mark: I'm pretty sure there's something about wheat and taro, or is it sheep and cows? Anyway, my understanding is that's one of those things on the Christian no-no list.

Also, I should damn well hope I'm thoroughly Unsaved.

[alfgifu]

What's so wrong with authority? When it's imposed from above, as a tyranny, that's bad, but surely when it is delegated by the community to an individual who takes it responsibly, it makes everything work a lot better.

If Thor came stomping into the room and started issuing orders, some of which made more sense than others, when I was minding my own business in some inoffensive way then I might resent it. On the other hand, if I was part of a group heading to a drinking contest with our pride at stake, I don't think I'd hesitate before voting Thor captain. and if he issued orders at that point I'd take them (err, with a grain of salt. And probably not if he were a) drunk, b) in a fighting frenzy or c) in drag at the time).

There are two different kinds of obedience. There's childish obedience, which is acceptance without questioning, because the person giving the orders is bigger than you. Then there's adult obedience, which is the acceptance of orders because the person giving them is better than you. Adult obedience requires an independent understanding, because to know who is better than you you have to know what you mean by better - or by good and bad in general.

I don't think you always have to rebel in order to achieve an independent understanding, though sometimes it is necessary (mostly when the authority you have given childish obedience to refuses to let you question it). Rebellion is not a good in itself.

[Tonio]

hapax: I think you are, rather unfairly, equating a desire for independence, self-reliance, and freedom to egotism or narcissism. Full maturity requires responsibility, which requires freedom, and freedom is impossible if there exist authorities which can control me. Thus, in order to be fully mature I must resist authority to the best of my ability. Any acceptance of authority is a denial of one's own responsibility for one's own life, and infantilizes one.

While I didn't read Hapax's post the same way you did, the rest of your points are excellent. The wrong motivation for a moral act is to please authority or to follow the "rules" or "orders." The right motivation for a moral act is empathy for others and responsibility for one's actions. "Authorities which can control me" doesn't mean the authorities have evil intentions. It simply means that only an individual can take responsibility for himself/herself, and that even a benign authority's goals do not necessarily include individual responsibility.

[MikhailBorg]

Okay, now I have this mental picture of Hapax crying "Thunder... Thunder... ThunderAxe!!! HOOO!!!"

And then we all temporarily set aside our differences, jump into the ThunderTank and Feliner, and come to help save the day from the villainous LaJenkins, undead lord of the mutant PMDs.

[Geds]

I'm not in a rebellion against God any more than I'm in a rebellion against Sauron or the Easter Bunny.

I, uh, really didn't think you were. I was attempting to use your adolescent rebellion thing as a springboard to pontificate on the various flavors and necessities of rebellion itself. One of my biggest problems with discussions like this is that theists often come in and attempt to define the initial terms. Non-theists usually accept this as the terms are generally culturally accepted and if the terms are defined initially as "A," human tendency is to argue the point from an "'A' v. 'contra-A'" perspective instead of an "'A' v. 'B'" perspective. In A v. contra-A situations absolutely nothing productive happens and it generally ends up with name-calling and strawman baiting.

[Tonio]

What's so wrong with authority? When it's imposed from above, as a tyranny, that's bad, but surely when it is delegated by the community to an individual who takes it responsibly, it makes everything work a lot better.

No argument there in principle. That model of authority is really an exchange the authorities and the individuals - each gives something to gain something in return. However, that model is not a moral concept, and submission to such an authority should not be confused with morality. Do the authorities that claim to be moral agents tend to be tyrannical ones?

[Tonio]

I left out a word - "That model of authority is really an exchange between the authorities and the individuals..."

[Froborr]

Then there's adult obedience, which is the acceptance of orders because the person giving them is better than you.

No, that's still just childish obedience. Adulthood is when you accept a request (which may, if speed is important, be phrased as an order, as in a crisis situation) because in your judgement the request is probably a good thing to do. It has nothing to do with your opinion of the person giving it. If an idiotic jerk tells me to do something that happens, by coincidence, to be a good idea, I'm going to do it, because it's a good idea. On the other hand, I'm also going to disabuse him of the notion that he gets to give orders as soon as I have a good opportunity to do so.

[Geds]

Then there's adult obedience, which is the acceptance of orders because the person giving them is better than you.

"Better than [me]" how? If I have a friend who is a computer genius telling me how to properly set up a server farm and he tells me to run program X I'll do it, not because he's "better than me" and I need to submit to his authority, but because he's the expert in this field.

If that same friend turns around tomorrow and tells me to put sugar in to my gas tank to increase my gas mileage, I won't just obey him. I'll tell him he's an idiot and I'll take care of my own car thankyouverymuch.

He's not "better than me" in any sort of way that makes him an authority. But he might well be better than me at setting up a server farm, so I'll listen to what he says when I'm doing that.

[Victoria]

Um, can we get back to man-love song lyrics and incendiary homoerotic Jesus poems?

[Froborr]

Geds: Thank you, that is *precisely* the difference between authority (intrinsically evil) and expertise (intrinsically good).

Now add in the additional fact that moral expertise is impossible (or, rather, that one person's moral expertise is inapplicable to anyone other than that person), and you see why I hold such high requirements of responsibility and freedom.

[Geds]

Um, can we get back to man-love song lyrics and incendiary homoerotic Jesus poems?

But then it wouldn't be a Thursday Flame War. That would just be, um...Woden's Day...

[Froborr]

Sorry, Victoria, that request wasn't framed in the form of a flame and therefore, under the Law of Thursday, we cannot address it. Please try again, more aggressively. ;-)

[Bugmaster]

In the interests of fairness, I'd like to point out that if an infinitely good, infinitely wise, and infinitely powerful being gives you a direct order, you'd be a fool not to obey it, authority or no.

[Tonio]

Then there's adult obedience, which is the acceptance of orders because the person giving them is better than you.

Huh? Surely an authority figure is someone who has some inherent or invested power over other people. To be accurate, the definition would have to exclude the power someone would have if he pointed a gun at people and ordered them to do his bidding.

[Geds]

you'd be a fool not to obey it, authority or no.

Well, yeah.

But if Pat Robertson tells me an infinite being is giving me a direct order, I'd be a fool to obey him...

Although it also depends largely on how said infinite being does the ordering and what the order is. If it's one of those, "Run or you'll die," type things, then sure. But if it's, "I want you to do this," and a question and answer period is allowed afterward there's absolutely nothing wrong with asking a few questions.

Actually, one of the great ironies of the Bible is that it seems to allow far more dissention and questions in the Jewish section than the Christian section. Jesus himself was pretty good with questions but still considered his answers definitive and everything boiled down pretty much to "my way or the highway." Paul really had no room for dissention. But Abraham negotiated with Yahweh without any of the benefit of all those thousands of years of understanding and interpretation and whatnot. So, y'know, for what it's worth...

[hapax]

Any acceptance of authority is a denial of one's own responsibility for one's own life, and infantilizes one.

Okey-dokey. Nobody is the boss of you. I get that.

My point is, and always has been, it's not about authority. The universe works the way it does. People behave the way they do.

If you believe -- as I do -- that Somebody actually created the whole shebang, designed how things works, knows how and why people behave as they do -- well, you'd be ten kinds of fool to not listen to that One's recommendations (however you believe they are transmitted -- through an institution,through a text, through personal revelation, through reason, or some combination thereof) as to how to make things happier, healthier, and more pleasant.

If you believe that nobody's running the show, that we're all on our own here, the behaviors that tend to make things happier, healthier, and more pleasant tend to be surprisingly similiar to those most religions officially teach (putting aside the institutional demands peculiar to each religious structure). You'd be twenty kinds of fool, however, to over-ride your own experience and judgment with some other person's declaration of authority.

I honestly don't care which you believe. I honestly don't think God cares, either. I do care, passionately, that people treat each other decently, and I don't give a flying fantod WHAT motivates them to do so.

Fear of punishment, love of God, respect for humanist principles, or devotion to the number 23 -- what difference does it make WHY anyone behaves as they do? Either the poor are fed, or they aren't. Either the sick are healed, or they aren't. Which is why I say that obsessions about the authoritarianism of theism, or whether human failings are inherent or derived, are ultimately puerile.

[Jesurgislac]

In the interests of fairness, I'd like to point out that if an infinitely good, infinitely wise, and infinitely powerful being gives you a direct order, you'd be a fool not to obey it, authority or no.

First, it would have to convince me that it existed, possibly by inventing a Babel Fish or something of that nature, since my view is that an "infinitely good, infinitely wise, and infinitely powerful being" cannot exist.

Once it had invented a Babel Fish, I would know it existed, and so would everyone else: faith would become unnecessary. As without faith God is nothing, God would cease to exist.

For my next trick, I will prove that Hapax is Bugmaster, and we will all die on the next Slacktivist crossing.

[Froborr]

The Pharisaic tradition from which modern Judaism is derived strongly valued debate and dissent as methods of explicating the Law. Its ultimate expression is the Talmud, which, while arranged differently, is something like a discussion thread. It has a particular law in the center, and radiating out from it various "Rabbi so-and-so said this, but Rabbi whatsisname said this other thing, and Rabbi thingy said yet another thing" without any attempt to pick out one of them as being authoritatively right.

Also, "Israel" literally means "Fighter of God" in the sense of one who struggles *against* God, referencing the incident in which Jacob wrestled an opponent he couldn't see, who later turned out to be God. The Jews are an ornery and fractious lot, and perfectly happy to give God advice or a stern talking-to on the occasions he appears to need it.

Bug: "Infinitely good" presupposes the possibility of moral expertise, and is therefore meaningless.

[Froborr]

Bug: "Infinitely good" presupposes the possibility of moral expertise, and is therefore meaningless.

Whups, left out an important part: Unless by "infinitely good" you mean "infinitely good by your *personal* standards of good", in which case God isn't so much an independent being as a perfect extension of your personality (or, alternatively, you personality is an imperfect extension of God). In that case, you AND ONLY YOU can regard God as possessing moral expertise applicable to you.

[jamoche]

Now that would be a fantasy novel! The newly elected representative of Earth arrives at the Celestial Court to find that the Heavenly Body is as dysfunctional a congress as any on Earth, with petty intrigues between the gods spilling over with unintended consequences on Earth. Our man In Heaven wants to sort things out but finds he has a task of Sysiphian heft before him.

There's some of that in Steven Brust's Khaavren series - not the sorting out, but the intrigues spilling out.

[Keith]

no master was put into the position of the British crown (which had been a particularly mild tyrant, in actuality), and therefore the tyrant-tyrranized relationships that did exist in that period (you forget, by the way, about slavery) were not actually replacements of the tyrrany overthrown.

Posted by: Froborr

True, which is what made the American revolution exceptional, at least from the white man's perspective. And I did forget slavery! So taking that into account... well, no one's perfect.

[Froborr]

I apparently lost all ability to spell "tyranny", "tyrannized", etc. I shall now commit seppuku in the traditional manner of all copy editors -- ritual disembowelment with a blue ballpoint pen.

[twig]

Only the gorgeous cheese that's caramelised - like fudge?

Wait... what?

Cheese fudge? Please enlighten me on the nature of this cheese fudge. Please now. Noowwwww.

[Tonio]

declaration of authority

Hapax, you seem to be commingling the two separate definitions of authority. I'm talking about authority in the power sense, not the knowledge sense. One shouldn't assume that an authority in the power sense is also an authority in the knowledge sense, and vice versa.

what difference does it make WHY anyone behaves as they do? Either the poor are fed, or they aren't. Either the sick are healed, or they aren't.

It makes a huge difference. Someone who feeds the poor only because he believes it's a requirement could just as easily ignore the poor if he becomes persuaded that the requirement has changed. Teaching someone that submitting to authority equates to morality actually promotes immorality. That's because the person doesn't learn to recognize or value the consequences of his actions. The teaching gives immoral actions a false allure, turning them into temptations. The person learns to false equate immorality with rebellion.

[Geds]

"Infinitely good" presupposes the possibility of moral expertise, and is therefore meaningless.

That, right there, is a whole new can of worms...

Take the two-point political debate of monarchy v. democracy. The Tory would say that authority is best left in the hands of a single monarch who best knows how to run things due to experience, expertise, proper breeding, etc. The Jeffersonian would say that power is best left decentralized and in the hands of the people*.

Both the Tory and the Jeffersonian are working from a concept of the "greater good," and in both cases are looking to create a prosperous and strong** nation. In each case the government is creating a "good," but the pathway to reaching that good is quite different and the good itself might not be the same.

Which goes back to the thing I said at the top of this about the pastor waxing about the joys of living in a benevolent heavenly monarchy. My own Jeffersonian democratic ideals tell me that monarchy is not a good thing, no matter who is sitting up at the top.

*The concept of the people in question, of course, being a malleable idea. For the sake of the argument say it's universal suffrage, as opposed to the landed white males of the actual Jeffersonian age.

**Strong, too, being relative, Jeffersonian national strength and Hamiltonian definitions of national strength are two very different things.

[Jesurgislac]

twig: Cheese fudge? Please enlighten me on the nature of this cheese fudge. Please now. Noowwwww.

The Norwegian cheese is called Gjetost or Gudbrandsdalsost, and it's delish. It looks and smells like fudge, yet tastes like cheese. I have no idea how this works.

The Scottish version is, um... reddish, quite hard (harder than Gjetost), for sale in I. J. Wallis... I'd know it if I saw it... or if I tasted it... look, next time we're both in Edinburgh, look me up and we'll head over to I. J. Wallis for a tasting/shopping trip, okay?

[Keith]

In the interests of fairness, I'd like to point out that if an infinitely good, infinitely wise, and infinitely powerful being gives you a direct order, you'd be a fool not to obey it, authority or no.

Posted by: Bugmaster

Debatable but moot. No such animal exists here on Earth and neither do humans have the capacity to rationally determine Infinity+[fill in the virtue], making any such claim by an entity presuming Infinity+Virtue to be suspect.

If some bloke walked up to me and said, "I'm the son of God and posses Infinite Wisdom, Love and Temperance, now do as I say." I'd either laugh in his face or spit in his eye depending on my mood. If I were feeling whimsical I might respond, "Prove it, Kimosabe." At which point we'd be at a stalemate because you can't prove the above without resorting to an appeal to faith, usually quoting scripture that alludes to asses or seed sewing or some other such agrarian imagery which will just make me giggle.

[Lee Ratner]

Judaism teaches that people have both an inclination towards good and inclination towards evil. However, the inclination towards evil is not viewed as a bad thing, its viewed as a necessity. The ancient Rabbis taught that without the evil inclination, people would sit around and do nothing because its the motivation for nearly everything from doing well in your career to doing acts of loving kindness, because your evil inclination motivates you not to do evil. Its a bit of a confusing concept.

So Judaism is compatible with Madisonian democracy because Jews believe that people must be free and have the ability to follow their good and evil inclinations.

[alfgifu]

Geds: "Better than [me]" how?

This is where an independent judgement comes in. Example: the optician tells me to use eye drops a certain number of times a day. I do it, because I trust the optician to be better than I am at looking after my eyes. Or the computer genius is better than you are at handling your computer, in your analogy.

What Frobarr said in response to Geds' post - that the difference was between authority and expertise - suggests to me that we are talking about a very similar thing using different terms. I would say that authority is about obedience (as in, doing what you're told): someone who has expertise therefore would only have authority if they were also obeyed. If I refuse to use the eye drops, then the optician has no authority to make me use them, however much optical expertise backs up the command. Essentially, the authority is freely ceded by me to the optician.

I don't see anything wrong with this, and I don't see authority or obedience as intrinsically evil. Both are necessary elements of life, both require integrity, both are sometimes essential and sometimes unimportant and neither tend to produce good results in a strict hierarchy which limits personal responsibility.

This debate is moving far to fast for me, and everyone else is amazingly eloquent, so I think I'll stop trying to contribute and lurk for a bit. *sobs* I love you all!

[Jeff]

"They are leaning out for love, they will lean that way forever" is a fine theological statement of the human condition.

"She shows you where to look among the garbage and the seaweed" isn't bad either.

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I kind of like the imagery of Jesus as every man's boyfriend.

I'm pretty sure there's TONS of Jesus slash...

The link you posted is NSFW. You should indicate that.

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In fact, Eastern Christianity considers in its tradition that it is possible for a person to be righteous by rebelling against God. After all, if you rebel against God's infinite authority, you at the same time acknowledge it.

Yeah, that worked so well for Lucifer Satan!

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So I'm not flaming anyone.

Oh, you no fun! BTW, I know it's a loooooooooooooooong way from option to screen, but congrats on Benighted (as it will undoubtedly be known) being optioned!

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But parents discipline kids with the hope that when they are fully grown they will mature and behave, not from fear of punishment, but out of understanding of what is good and true.

What is God's "discipline"? When I did something wrong, my parents told me what it was, why I was being punished, and the nature of the punishment. As an adult, I may do things that one person calls a "sin" but another doesn't. There's no punishment, per se, for doing or not doing the thing, so which is right?

One of the biggest problems with "sin" is who gets to define it? If not Jerry Falwell or Fred Barnes, why not?

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In fact, any authority over adults is intrinsically evil.

Oh noes, not another libertarian! Please say you're not!

Since adults do stupid things that hurt (or kill) their fellow inhabitants, some authority (like the police and the courts) is necessary. Maybe it's a "necessary evil" to you, but that seems contradictory to me. Evil, by definition, cannot be necessary.

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Parents who gradually allow their child to experience new things and to move further afield generally experience far less outright rebellion than the parents who clamp down and keep the children under lock and key at all times

I saw a guy with a young daughter and a punk T-shirt (ram's skull and something like "a blinding light will f*ck the mind"). I told my girlfriend that the daughter will rebel by liking Liberace and Lawrence Welk!

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Um, can we get back to man-love song lyrics and incendiary homoerotic Jesus poems?

I would prefer not. Unless I get to post heteroerotic poems as well (like "The Jesus and Mary [Magdelene] Orgy Chain"!).

[Froborr]

Geds: Yes, but you work for your ideal because you believe it is good, and he works for his ideal because he believes it is good. I fail to see the problem.