Do good and evil consist of thoughts, deeds or both?

[Petrel]

Funny, I think you keep making my points for me.

Hitler's intentions were not in the right place. His thinking may have been internally consistent (I don't think it was, I think he was quite neurotic, and indeed driven by hatred and fear and not love), but it was not aligned with God. His mindset was evil, so the things he did were evil.

 

[Salamander]

Craig, God is not an "it"

 

[Paul33]

Originally posted by Petrel:
Funny, I think you keep making my points for me.

Hitler's intentions were not in the right place. His thinking may have been internally consistent (I don't think it was, I think he was quite neurotic, and indeed driven by hatred and fear and not love), but it was not aligned with God. His mindset was evil, so the things he did were evil.

You can only claim that his mindset was evil if you have an objective standard that says his actions were evil.

The Bible is that standard. The Bible says being joined together with a prostitute is a sin. It doesn't matter what my intentions are. If I am joined to a prostitute I have sinned against the objective standard. Thus, a physical act can be sinful in and of itself.

 

[Paul33]

Numbers 15:22-26 describes the process of being "forgiven" for sinning unintentionally.

Apparently, physical acts of disobedience are sinful even if unintentional!!!!!!

 

[Paul33]

Ignorance of the law is no excuse!!!!!!!!!!

 

[John of Japan]

Both Petrel and Craigbythesea have affixed the adjectives "good" and "evil" to the word "deeds" (or a synonym) on this page (page 3). They might deny it ( ), but I think they are agreeing with me. Deeds become good or evil based on intent--but deeds are still characterized as good or evil by both God and man (including Petrel and Craigbythesea).

 

[Petrel]

You keep arguing against things that I never said.

I have never denied an objective standard.

The objective standard is God's nature. Some of God's nature is communicated in the Bible. A person's morality is measured by how closely that person aligns with God's nature. God's nature demands that we love others and do what is best for all. Sex with a prostitute is wrong for a multitude of reasons--using another person for one's own ends, contributing to the degradation of another, possibly betraying one's spouse, etc. A person whose mind is aligned with God will therefore not do this. A person whose mind is depraved won't have these compunctions. The action flows from the mindset.

Additionally let's note that the physical act in this case is sexual intercourse. The facts that the two people are not married and that one is a prostitute are characteristics of the two actors involved in the physical action. So pared down to the essence the physical action of sexual intercourse is nonmoral. It is only when you introduce various characteristics of the actors that a moral judgement can be drawn. To put it another way, an action divorced from a human mind making (or failing to make) a moral choice has no moral significance.

Intercourse between a husband and wife is good as it is an expression of love. Intercourse between a married person and a person not their spouse is wrong because it involves betrayal of the husband or wife and devaluing of marriage, which is detrimental for society as a whole. Forced intercourse is wrong because it is purely selfish and cannot arise out of agape love--it objectifies a person and takes advantage of their weakness.

I hope this clarifies things. I think that we're almost but not quite saying the same thing!

 

[John of Japan]

Originally posted by Petrel:
I hope this clarifies things. I think that we're almost but not quite saying the same thing!

I believe you have clarified things, Petrel, but this is a very nuanced discussion. I'm still not sure yet where you are agreeing with Craigbythesea and where you are not--or where I am or am not, but the way!

 

[Petrel]

I'm not sure if I completely agree with Craig or not. Unfortunately the discussion has been splintered over three different threads. I think that we mostly agree on this case, which is rather unusual.

In reply to your earlier post, I'm not saying that a deed can't be evil, I'm saying that we can't draw up a chart and label every action as absolutely "good" or "evil." I think that sometimes with the way we talk about morality we give the impression that God just arbitrarily picked a list to be good actions and another list to be evil actions. I think that's a simplistic approach. There's no attempt to reason about why the action is good or bad. In the Gospels we see that actions that we consider good (praying, giving money) may actually not be appreciated at all by God if we are doing them for the wrong reason. Then again we would usually consider killing a person evil, but if it is done in warfare or as capital punishment, it may be amoral or even good.

Interestingly I've been doing some reading about ethics trying to see what philosophers have come up with. I seem to fall most in line with Kantian ethics (although I would lie to the Nazis!), with a bit of utilitarianism and virtue ethics thrown in. The idea that physical actions can't be judged without knowing the actor was supported by Kant.

 

[John of Japan]

Originally posted by Petrel:
I'm not sure if I completely agree with Craig or not. Unfortunately the discussion has been splintered over three different threads. I think that we mostly agree on this case, which is rather unusual.

The reason for this third threads is, it was sidetracking the idolatry thread, and I didn't like the OP in the other thread making the emphasis sexual (which IMO distracts).

Gotta get some work done--it's broad daylight here in Japan.

 

[John of Japan]

Originally posted by Petrel:
I'm not sure if I completely agree with Craig or not. Unfortunately the discussion has been splintered over three different threads. I think that we mostly agree on this case, which is rather unusual.

The reason for this third thread is, I felt the issue was sidetracking the idolatry thread, and I didn't like the OP in the other thread making the emphasis sexual (which IMO distracts).

I appreciate your contributions, Petrel. Gotta get some work done--it's broad daylight here in Japan.

 

[Paul33]

But actions can be judged without knowing the actor.

Numbers 15 teaches that unintentional acts of disobedience are still sinful.

 

[Paul33]

Walter Payton was thrown out of a football game for touching a referee. He did not intend to touch the referee, but stumbled and put his hands on the ref. He was thrown out of the game.

His intentions were irrelevent. He touched the ref and was tossed.

Physical actions can be sinful despite one's intentions.

 

[Paul33]

John,

It's a shame your sensibilites are so easily scandalized. There is much of Scripture you will need to stop reading. I'm sorry you are so easily offended.

 

[John of Japan]

Originally posted by Paul33:
John,

It's a shame your sensibilites are so easily scandalized. There is much of Scripture you will need to stop reading. I'm sorry you are so easily offended.

Sigh. I wasn't offended. The word I used was "distracted." And I was just trying to edit my previous post to say, "no offense intended to the author of the OP of the other thread" at the exact time you posted, so my addition evidently didn't make it on. All okay?

 

[Petrel]

Touchy, ehh?

I think we can all agree that negligence is wrong.

I don't think football rules can be extrapolated to moral law. . .

 

[Paul33]

John,

Petrel,

 

[John of Japan]

Originally posted by Petrel:
I'm not sure if I completely agree with Craig or not. Unfortunately the discussion has been splintered over three different threads. I think that we mostly agree on this case, which is rather unusual.

In reply to your earlier post, I'm not saying that a deed can't be evil, I'm saying that we can't draw up a chart and label every action as absolutely "good" or "evil." I think that sometimes with the way we talk about morality we give the impression that God just arbitrarily picked a list to be good actions and another list to be evil actions. I think that's a simplistic approach. There's no attempt to reason about why the action is good or bad. In the Gospels we see that actions that we consider good (praying, giving money) may actually not be appreciated at all by God if we are doing them for the wrong reason. Then again we would usually consider killing a person evil, but if it is done in warfare or as capital punishment, it may be amoral or even good.

Thanks for your clarification. I essentially agree with this statement. The Sermon on the Mount is key to understanding what you and Craig are saying, of course. Morality/holiness must be rooted in the nature of God, or it becomes external righteousness which is as "filthy rags."

This is something we face big time in Japan. You've heard of how Asians believe in "saving face." Therefore the external is more important to the internal to the typical Japanese. They even have words describing this: "tatemae" is the front you put up, "honne" is your real belief about something. And they seldom want to tell the "gaijin" (foreigner, literally "outside person") missionary their "honne."

My main hangup with Craig is his position that deeds are amoral and cannot be called good or evil--only the intent, hate, lust, etc. is evil. But this is a very nuanced discussion, and one that I don't remember reading anywhere, so that I might eventually agree with him, too, who knows.

Interestingly I've been doing some reading about ethics trying to see what philosophers have come up with. I seem to fall most in line with Kantian ethics (although I would lie to the Nazis!), with a bit of utilitarianism and virtue ethics thrown in. The idea that physical actions can't be judged without knowing the actor was supported by Kant.

I kant imagine HIM posting on the BB, even in the "other denominations!"

 

[Paul33]

Numbers 15 refutes cbts's argument.

Unintentional "acts" are sinful and must be atoned for.

Therefore, acts in and of themselves can be sinful if they violate God's law even if the one committing the act does not know that he is violating the law.

 

[Craigbythesea]

Originally posted by Paul33:
Walter Payton was thrown out of a football game for touching a referee. He did not intend to touch the referee, but stumbled and put his hands on the ref. He was thrown out of the game.

His intentions were irrelevent. He touched the ref and was tossed.

Physical actions can be sinful despite one's intentions.

A football player who, during a football game, stumbles and consequently and accidentally touches a referee has sinned against the referee proving that the act, in and of itself, completely severed from the state and intent of the mind of the football player, is evil; and this is proven by the fact that the player was thrown out of the game.

Which verse in Numbers 15 did you read that?