Posted on 02/04/2010 2:42:12 PM PST by Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus
I do not morally excuse anti-Semitim. It is morally wrong, and that has been my consistent view.
I do however surmise that those who wish to morally excuse anti-Semisim might make a "Christ killer" argument.
Are you too stupid to tell the difference?
Do you seriously think I am an anti-Semite?
So then, quite literally you think Jews are soulless. And you think black people are soulless. And you think homosexuals are soulless.
None of which means what it sounds like it means, which I freely admit because I don't think it is fair to use that kind of argument.
Understanding motives for evil is not the same as justifying that evil. If you refuse to get that difference so you can accuse me of supporting something vile, than you are deciding to be evil, and deserve no place in civil discourse.
The paragraph in question was:
Let us grant your contention that "Christianity" waw responsible for the brutality of the Nazis against Jews for a minute. If so the obvious reason was being mad over the Jews turning Jesus over to the Romans for crucification right? Please note, this has nothing to do with "revealed truth", but the regular secular reasons that people get riled up about things. Something like "Hey they got one of ours, we can't let them get away with that! Lets get the bastards!".
Note the words: "Let us grant your contention that "Christianity" waw responsible for the brutality of the Nazis against Jews for a minute."
Note the words: "Brutality of Nazis against the Jews".
Note that the hypothetical justification was a hypothetical Nazi position, not a position of my own.
Note that I have repeatedly denounced such a position in other posts, and as is universal in FR culture view it as one of the clear epitomes of what is atrocious and evil.
There is no way I can see any thinking person seriously thinking I was offering justification for what I just called a "brutality".
And so I must conclude you are willful and malicious when you make your false accusations about me supporting this infamous and vile atrocity.
I am? Heck everyone of us Christians is a sinner and deserves to go to hell. Since this is a central Christian doctrine, why would I wish to dismiss evidence for it?
I think Christianity is full of sinners doing sin. I do reject the notion that the Christian faith is responsible. People sin with and without this faith.
Certainly people know about the crucification of Christ primarily from the New Testament, this is a premise that you should feel free to claim without acting like you need me to sign off on it.
My objection is not to such a premise, but that you seem to be assuming the implied cause effect relationship establishes moral culpability. Do you really think this? It seems to be a ridiculous standard of ethics when you think of all the different implications.
As to your repeated accusations that I am focusing on only selected parts of the New Testemant in establishing the ethical position of Christianity, this is true. I am only concerned with relevant details. And all of the relevant details I find support me. Not just the ones I mentioned before. For example, Jesus commands us to love everyone. Very relevant. Jesus commands us to turn the other cheek. Very relevant. Jesus asks his Father in heaven to forgive the one's who were responsible for crucifying him...Did you forget this one? Jesus is very harsh on religious hypocrites, and lambastes the religious leaders who are only in it for fun and profit as broods of vipers. I shudder to think of what he would call the various medevil church leaders (actually He does seem to address them in Revelation according to some scholars).
Also there was the parable of the man forgiven huge debt by a King who turned around and demanded payment from a fellow servant for a minor debt. Remember how that one ended? Did you get the moral of it?
You have no where to turn for moral teachings in the New Testament, so now you turn to biases that certain events in the New Testament might cause in the hearts of fallible man.
Well, of coarse humans are all fallible...as Christ taught we are (please tell me you get that).
Rather you would rather focus away from what Jesus taught we ought do, and focus on the failings of Christians in history to do so.
This all proves my point, and demolishes yours.
I am focusing on the moral teachings of Jesus Christ rather than the latter moral teachings of Martin Luther after he started hating the Jews as a basis for the moral position of the Christian faith.
Martin Luther's opinions on morality mean nothing to any true form of Christianity, excepting that they coincide with the opinions of Christ. His earlier positions concerning the Jews were kindly and seemed in step with Jesus. However you chose to focus on the opinions he held in the latter part of his life as being the epitome of Christian ethics. Well apparently something had happened to change his opinion of Jews profoundly and I'm not a historian and not sure what turned his heart to such an evil position, but I'm very dubious that it was because he finally got around to reading the gospel of John.
Yes Martin Luther used information gleaned in the New Testament to justify his latter evil opinion. But his opinions directly contradicted the ethical standard set up by Jesus. His opinion therefore became less like those of Jesus, meaning less Christ-like, meaning less Christian.
The conclusion of all our examples is that the problem is not listening and obeying the moral teachings of Jesus Christ. Whether we claim to be Christians or not.
It seemed to be a specific issue that you insisting on addressing. And now you say it doesn't matter? Kind of like publicly suggesting somebody is child molester, and then expressing uncertainty and dismissing it as irrelevant. While I know this is a semi-anonymous philosophy discussion, and I freely admit to having some moral flaws. Something like that I take very personally. I am perhaps not as good at turning the other cheek as I should be.
But I do appreciate that you have given up leveling the charge against me at the least.
And perhaps I was guilty of something like this to in my attitude towards you in various posts. I did accuse you of anti-Christian bigotry, and that was not a necessary thing for me to bring up or speculate on either.
So will you finally just answer the question?
Do you also ask people if they have stopped beating their wives and demand only a yes or no with no correction of the inference you are trying to draw?
I’m sorry.... I seem to have missed your answer.
What, again, was your source for the portrayal of the Jews as “Christ Killers” if not the Gospels?
Is Godgunsguts OK?
I haven’t seen a post from him in a while.
Prayers for you 3G!
Well certainly you have missed an answer you wanted.
What, again, was your source for the portrayal of the Jews as “Christ Killers” if not the Gospels?
Your question is loaded with a false counter-distinction. I did answer it in post 50, but I unloaded it first. Please let me try to clarify further:
The primary source of information about the Crucification comes from the New Testament (not just the gospels, its mentioned elsewhere). According to this account Jesus, Jesus's friends, and those that wished him crucified were pretty much all Jews. Makes sense, because it happened in Jerusalem around the passover. However, the term "Christ Killers" in the context of a justification for the Holocaust certainly did not come from the New Testament. Rather, an atitude very alien to that view is taught.
The attitude you associated with this information came from the normal fallible nature of those that chose to adopt that attitude.
Thus, you seem to be trying to assign moral culpability to information rather than human intent. Do you feel other kinds of information that might make one group of people angry if they found out should be suppressed? Certainly any kind of negative report might serve as part of a chain of causes that result in some evil retaliation.
You are using the word "portrayal" to mean two distinct things. Do you not see this?
You mean Paul or Peter?
It is simple historical fact, testified to in the writings of the Church fathers themselves, that this information is both the proximate and ultimate cause of their own anti-Semitism, as well as 2000 years of general anti-Semitism in Christian Europe. There is no need to even explore the inconsistency of that information with the historical facts of Roman history and law. The dots have been neatly and solidly connected.
Doesn't pan out does it? It sounds like you are trying to blame information morally. Sounds pretty stupid really.
So lets try the other meaning of portrayl you had in your conter-distinction, which is "attitude":
It is simple historical fact, testified to in the writings of the Church fathers themselves, that this attitude is both the proximate and ultimate cause of their own anti-Semitism, as well as 2000 years of general anti-Semitism in Christian Europe. There is no need to even explore the inconsistency of that attitude with the historical facts of Roman history and law. The dots have been neatly and solidly connected.
Well that sounds better as a source of moral cupability...but sadly for your argument, it is hard to argue that the attitude came from the New Testament with the "father Forgive them" plea from Jesus, et al.
So you, unconsciously I suppose, commit a logical fallacy and fail to distinquish between the two meanings. You use the meaning "knolledge" to establish the veracity of your premise, but then use the meaning "atitutde" in order to assign moral cupability.
A very common logical error. Don't feel too bad, I think you are smart enough to see them if you try, its just you apparently have bad attitude on this particular subject.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.