“why couldn’t they have been eliminated just the way they various other places of immorality were zapped out of existence.”
“Phasers set to kill”? Well, 1st, God typically uses people to do what they can, and 2nd, them exacting justice would also affect them, and remind them that judgment does happen, and war is not a neat antiseptic thing, and with such in mind, Israel would be warned that it could happen to them if they continued in immoral rebellion.
It would also remind then that the world not a safe playground, but a battleground. And in which the fallen sinful nature of man is constantly manifest, and there are consequences of such and measures to be taken. While liberals imagine this not to be true, and that wars are never necessary, this delusion results in more deaths of innocent.
“...history teaches with unmistakable emphasis that appeasement but begets new and bloodier wars.” “There can be no compromise with atheistic Communism - no half-way in the preservation of freedom and religion.” - Gen Douglas MacArthur.
“It would harden any heart to beyond the point of repair.”
False (and i suspect you are female, no offense). As an unjust practice it can, or as in video games as gratuitous violence, but dropping the A bomb on Japan did not necessarily require or effect such.
“Once war is forced upon us, there is no other alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War’s very object is victory, not prolonged indecision.”
“The soldier above all others prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. “ - Gen Douglas MacArthur.
“It is plainly vile and contradicts everything that the New Testament is about.”
Negative again, as once again the Lord and those who belong to Him will wage war against a recalcitrant multitude, in a manner that makes it unmistakeably clear that it is of Him. (Rev. 19:14-21) But the time will come when all they shall “not learn war any more.” (Is. 2:4; Mic. 4:3) Thanks be to God.
“Your justification is basically that the divine entity presented itself to the people in a very “real” sense...I would have wished for a deeper justification than that.”
Did you read thru #20? (see also 28 and 38) I presented much more than that. The author of life has a right to take it, which you concur with, and justly executed a wicked people, while delivering the innocent form further perpetuating such, and from requiring Israel to carry a burden they could not handle. Your remaining object seems to be the manner in which killing of innocent was done.
“I tried to peruse through the other link that was posted in response, but all I got...”
Read more. Driving the defiling Canaanites out seems to have been the main solution, but total annihilation to a degree did happen, rarely, but not wantonly, but justly.
“The only problem with that is you are resorting to the words of the source to justify the source.”
The Divine source of the Bible is another issue, but that is not a problem in this argument for me, but for you, as you are the one who is objecting to what is says, but reject its totality when interpreting it. If you object to what it says in one place, then you must consider its larger context. For your arguments to work you must reject parts of the Bible as well as reasonable possibilities, which presumes that you are more qualified moral authority, but which neither history nor your polemic here evidence.
And we can see where rejection of immutable Biblical moral laws (and understand thre are different categorizations of law) is taking us.
“Phasers set to kill”? Well, 1st, God typically uses people to do what they can, and 2nd, them exacting justice would also affect them, and remind them that judgment does happen, and war is not a neat antiseptic thing, and with such in mind, Israel would be warned that it could happen to them if they continued in immoral rebellion.
No, the smiting and smoting kind, instead of forcing people to commit genocide, and more specifically, infanticide. War is no excuse for deliberately targetting the innocent.
It would also remind then that the world not a safe playground, but a battleground. And in which the fallen sinful nature of man is constantly manifest, and there are consequences of such and measures to be taken. While liberals imagine this not to be true, and that wars are never necessary, this delusion results in more deaths of innocent.
“...history teaches with unmistakable emphasis that appeasement but begets new and bloodier wars.” “There can be no compromise with atheistic Communism - no half-way in the preservation of freedom and religion.” - Gen Douglas MacArthur.
False comparison. World War II was not about targetting innocents and non-actors, specifically.
“It would harden any heart to beyond the point of repair.”
False (and i suspect you are female, no offense).
Another erroneous presumption, but let's leave this aside for now. It has no relevance beyond revealing an attempt at straying from the debate.
As an unjust practice it can, or as in video games as gratuitous violence, but dropping the A bomb on Japan did not necessarily require or effect such.
“Once war is forced upon us, there is no other alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War’s very object is victory, not prolonged indecision.”
“The soldier above all others prays for peace, for it is the soldier who must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. “ - Gen Douglas MacArthur.
Totally unwarranted comparison. Was the A-bomb dropped with the intention of killing innocent children? Was the bomb tweaked in a way so that children would be specifically wiped out? No.
1 Samuel 15:3 however, does just that. And that makes it immoral.
“It is plainly vile and contradicts everything that the New Testament is about.”
Negative again, as once again the Lord and those who belong to Him will wage war against a recalcitrant multitude, in a manner that makes it unmistakeably clear that it is of Him. (Rev. 19:14-21) But the time will come when all they shall “not learn war any more.” (Is. 2:4; Mic. 4:3) Thanks be to God.
The character of Jesus, as portayed, would be incapable of advocating deliberate child-slaughter.
“Your justification is basically that the divine entity presented itself to the people in a very “real” sense...I would have wished for a deeper justification than that.”
Did you read thru #20? (see also 28 and 38) I presented much more than that. The author of life has a right to take it, which you concur with, and justly executed a wicked people, while delivering the innocent form further perpetuating such, and from requiring Israel to carry a burden they could not handle. Your remaining object seems to be the manner in which killing of innocent was done.
A "burden they could not handle" is not an excuse for child-slaughter. The "author of life" can take what's given any time, but there is something twisted when the "taking away" is done by people claiming divine sanction. This problem wouldn't have existed if the "taking away" was done by the "author of life" itself. Sodom and Gomorrah underwent that. Zap?
I read through all that you'd typed here, and perused through the links, but no good case was made in any of them. What I argued earlier, still stands.
“I tried to peruse through the other link that was posted in response, but all I got...”
Read more. Driving the defiling Canaanites out seems to have been the main solution, but total annihilation to a degree did happen, rarely, but not wantonly, but justly.
There is no justice in butchering innocent children and infants, deliberately. There is ertainly no meaning to the above argument if donkeys and assed were needed to be done away with, as well.
Once again, as before, in spite of lengthy and verbose compositions on your part, the basic morality that is completely and totally absent in ritualised child-slaughter, remains to hold true. "Divine sanction" is no excuse for the same. It is a common tactic to avoid specific replies by posting lengthy tracts which don't address the arguments. If a case can be made for justifying child-slaughter, it wouldn't require verbal acrobatics.
If your arguments to this are going to be a re-hash of the earlier ones, I think the purpose of furthering this debate is futile. I will, as always, continue to insist that child-slaughter cannot be justified under any circumstance. Any person, entity or claimed divinity ordering the same to be carried out by human mediators, is of suspect moral character.