7 ms·

> violence is often the moral outgrowth of those who have grown so assured of their righteousness I like that. This idea is also present in Buddhism, though t

> violence is often the moral outgrowth of those who have grown so assured of their righteousness I like that. This idea is also present in Buddhism, though they take it a step further and say that all suffering (everything from external violence to internal dissatisfaction with life) is caused by some form of judgment. They say the same thing that you mentioned above: violence is caused by the judgment, "I am right, you are wrong".

russnewcomer 11y ago
I'm not sure that I expressed myself the best above based on your response, but partly that's because of the difficulty in discussing topics like this across religious traditions. I would disagree that violence is caused by the judgement, 'you are right, I am wrong'. I think that violence is ultimately caused by sin, vis a vis Augustinian total depravity. But the justification for violence, often among Christians, is self-righteousness (or put another way, pride). But again, this is a difficult issue to discuss between religions because the basic assumptions are different and terminology has slightly different meanings.
- pekk 11y ago
  Where "sin" means essentially not being Christian enough, I am skeptical that the correct diagnosis for violence is "sin" when people who identify as Christian do not seem especially less likely to commit violence than people who identify as adhering to some other worldview with moral entailments. Frankly, if you want everyone else to believe that Christians are less violent than people of other religions, you have to bring data rather than just saying that "sin" (non-Christianness) is the cause.
  - Rusky 11y ago
    In this case, "sin" doesn't quite mean "not being Christian enough." Other religions (and ethics in general) often advocate very similar behaviors, so it wouldn't be surprising to see a Christian who is more of a sinner than a non-Christian. The argument is that violence comes when someone has convinced themselves that they are already righteous enough to override the sin inherent in the violence.
    - AnimalMuppet 11y ago
      I think it's more than that. It's when the logic of their position means that the violence is right. (In doing so, they usually go off the deep end even within the framework of their chosen ethic...)
      - mcbutterbunz 11y ago
        Or even that their lack of violence is wrong. Its the old "if youre not for me, then youre against me" view.
  - rosser 11y ago
    This is neither constructive, nor based on anything that your comment's parent's author has said anywhere in this discussion.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - humanrebar 11y ago
    > Where "sin" means essentially not being Christian enough... "sin" in Christian theology is disobedience (and therefore rebellion) against God. Defining it as "not being Christian enough" is problematic for at least two reasons: 1. If people self-identify as Christian, how do we identify the liars and the self-deluded? 2. If we can't trust people to identify themselves properly, how do we identify each other as Christians? What is the standard? The Bible actually says that we can know Christians by how well they follow the commandments of Christ (a). Among the commandments of Christ is the commandment to be at peace with each other; we are supposed to reconcile with each other even before we perform (therefore insincere) religious rituals (b). ...the Bible doesn't say that "sin" is the cause of violence since violence (and hate generally) is itself sin. Instead, Paul teaches that sin, including murder, is a result of rejecting God for other things (c). So given all that, it's tautological from Biblical principles that violent people are not followers of Christ. In fact, the Bible is full of warnings about people who claim to be Christian and are actually false teachers. It's actually where the "wolf in sheep's clothing" metaphor comes from. (a) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+2%3A4-5&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+2%3A4-5&... (b) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A21-24&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A21-... (c) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1%3A28-31&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1%3A28-3...
    - notdonspaulding 11y ago
      > So given all that, it's tautological from Biblical > principles that violent people are not followers of > Christ. Then, given that all wars are inherently violent, is it your opinion that all wars are unjust? Would you also consider that every human life that is ended prematurely by another "murder" (capital punishment, war, abortion)?
      - humanrebar 11y ago
        I have opinions, of course, but I aspire to have them grounded in scripture. However, you asked, so I'll try to share my take on violence and sin. Keep in mind that I'm not an expert theologian. I'm willing to be wrong on these points if someone can show me how I'm missing some detail or theme in the teaching of the Bible. Also, since the importance of sin is in the intention behind the thoughts and actions and not in the actions themselves, it's possible for both violent and nonviolent acts to be sinful (a). To start, most forms of violence are currently illegal, and Christians are supposed to submit to their government, even oppressive ones. There are quite a few references for this (b) (c). Finding more examples isn't difficult if you want more. So for violence to be OK, it has to be legal, at a minimum, which is a reasonably high bar in Western countries. In the Bible, it is made clear that governments are supposed to enforce justice, including with violence (d). It's not clear if "the sword" must extend all the way to capital punishment, but given the fact that capital punishment was prescribed in the Mosaic Law, it seems to be in the picture in some contexts. That being said, I think people can argue in good faith that modern Western countries are civilized and rich enough to afford every possible chance at rehabilitation. But to insist that capital punishment is necessarily murder is ethnocentric at best and possibly false teaching if someone claims to speak for God. As far as war, it's clearly not sinful in itself (e). Neither is being a soldier or general. Many (most?) of the judges in Judges were involved in battle in one way or another. As were Abraham and Moses. As was King David (he killed Goliath, remember?). But can countries sin by prosecuting unjust wars? Certainly. Can soldiers sin in their behavior on the battle field? I'm sure it's difficult not to. Ultimately in any behavior, violent or not, God promises rewards and punishments will be fair at the end of the day (f). Christians are supposed to live without sin, with truth, and in love. Of course they have failed and continue to fail in this. But God promises to make everything right, with his blood if necessary. And according to the Bible, it was necessary, because Jesus came to save the world, not condemn it (g). Is abortion murder? It's a sin in the cases that it's motivated by self-interest, callousness, or even fear. For a Christian that should be reason enough not to do it. What would the point be in calling it murder? To damn people? We don't have to reach far to find that we are all flawed (h). Lust, lying, hate, despising people, neglecting charity, being unforgiving, envy, greed, addiction, gossiping, cheating, consumerism, coveting... everyone does these things already. There's not much point in trying to rub peoples' noses in how they don't follow God's commandments. They either already know they're not following God or don't care (which is basically the same thing). (a) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+14 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+14 (b) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13 (c) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Peter+2%3A13-25&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Peter+2%3A13-... (d) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13%3A4&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13%3A4&v... (e) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+3%3A1-8&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+3%... (f) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=collosians+3%3A23-25&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=collosians+3%3A... (g) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john+3%3A17&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john+3%3A17&ver... (h) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:21-30 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:21-...
  - russnewcomer 11y ago
    It seems, based on your comment, that you have experienced Christian practice not meeting Christian teaching, which saddens me. Sin, in Christian theology based around total depravity, is not 'essentially not being Christian enough', but is rather a failure to obey God. As I said before, this is an area where different religious backgrounds or experiences make discussing this issue difficult. I certainly don't mean to say that Christians are less violent, but that they should be. This feels like a discussion quickly falling away from the article and off-topic for the thread, so if you'd like to continue it, feel free to email me, my username at gmail.
    - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 11y ago
      > Sin, in Christian theology based around total depravity, is not 'essentially not being Christian enough', but is rather a failure to obey God. Except that when you say "failure to obey God" you mean "failure to behave as christians have defined a supposed god wants you to behave", or in short "not being christian enough". Simply attributing your rules to an entity whose existence you haven't even demonstrated is simply a rhetorical device to obfuscate the easy to understand statement "sin is when you don't follow my/our rules". Just consider whether you would be willing to substitute any definition of god out there in your statement instead of the christian one. How about Allah? Then your claim would be that in christian theology, it's sin to not obey Allah (that is, behave as Muslims define that god wants you to behave). If you aren't willing to accept that, your argument doesn't hold, and if you are, you have to deal with a huge pile of self-contradictory doctrine from all the world's religions.
      - dragonwriter 11y ago
        > Except that when you say "failure to obey God" you mean "failure to behave as christians have defined a supposed god wants you to behave", Its a not-uncommon bit of Christian theology that sin is not acting how God has specifically and personally directed you, individually, to behave. Now, Christians holding to that model have (varying, even among Christians) beliefs, to which they ascribe varying degrees of certainty, about things which they thing God commands of all people generally, which are therefore incorporated into that. But those beliefs are conceptually separate from the definition of sin.
  - epaga 11y ago
    "sin means essentially not being Christian enough" The Apostle Paul would strongly disagree with that definition, I think. "The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost." http://ref.ly/1Tim1.15 http://ref.ly/1Tim1.15 Note his use of the present tense in that last phrase.

russnewcomer 11y ago

I'm not sure that I expressed myself the best above based on your response, but partly that's because of the difficulty in discussing topics like this across religious traditions. I would disagree that violence is caused by the judgement, 'you are right, I am wrong'. I think that violence is ultimately caused by sin, vis a vis Augustinian total depravity. But the justification for violence, often among Christians, is self-righteousness (or put another way, pride). But again, this is a difficult issue to discuss between religions because the basic assumptions are different and terminology has slightly different meanings.

pekk 11y ago
Where "sin" means essentially not being Christian enough, I am skeptical that the correct diagnosis for violence is "sin" when people who identify as Christian do not seem especially less likely to commit violence than people who identify as adhering to some other worldview with moral entailments. Frankly, if you want everyone else to believe that Christians are less violent than people of other religions, you have to bring data rather than just saying that "sin" (non-Christianness) is the cause.
- Rusky 11y ago
  In this case, "sin" doesn't quite mean "not being Christian enough." Other religions (and ethics in general) often advocate very similar behaviors, so it wouldn't be surprising to see a Christian who is more of a sinner than a non-Christian. The argument is that violence comes when someone has convinced themselves that they are already righteous enough to override the sin inherent in the violence.
  - AnimalMuppet 11y ago
    I think it's more than that. It's when the logic of their position means that the violence is right. (In doing so, they usually go off the deep end even within the framework of their chosen ethic...)
    - mcbutterbunz 11y ago
      Or even that their lack of violence is wrong. Its the old "if youre not for me, then youre against me" view.
- rosser 11y ago
  This is neither constructive, nor based on anything that your comment's parent's author has said anywhere in this discussion.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- humanrebar 11y ago
  > Where "sin" means essentially not being Christian enough... "sin" in Christian theology is disobedience (and therefore rebellion) against God. Defining it as "not being Christian enough" is problematic for at least two reasons: 1. If people self-identify as Christian, how do we identify the liars and the self-deluded? 2. If we can't trust people to identify themselves properly, how do we identify each other as Christians? What is the standard? The Bible actually says that we can know Christians by how well they follow the commandments of Christ (a). Among the commandments of Christ is the commandment to be at peace with each other; we are supposed to reconcile with each other even before we perform (therefore insincere) religious rituals (b). ...the Bible doesn't say that "sin" is the cause of violence since violence (and hate generally) is itself sin. Instead, Paul teaches that sin, including murder, is a result of rejecting God for other things (c). So given all that, it's tautological from Biblical principles that violent people are not followers of Christ. In fact, the Bible is full of warnings about people who claim to be Christian and are actually false teachers. It's actually where the "wolf in sheep's clothing" metaphor comes from. (a) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+2%3A4-5&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+John+2%3A4-5&... (b) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A21-24&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5%3A21-... (c) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1%3A28-31&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+1%3A28-3...
  - notdonspaulding 11y ago
    > So given all that, it's tautological from Biblical > principles that violent people are not followers of > Christ. Then, given that all wars are inherently violent, is it your opinion that all wars are unjust? Would you also consider that every human life that is ended prematurely by another "murder" (capital punishment, war, abortion)?
    - humanrebar 11y ago
      I have opinions, of course, but I aspire to have them grounded in scripture. However, you asked, so I'll try to share my take on violence and sin. Keep in mind that I'm not an expert theologian. I'm willing to be wrong on these points if someone can show me how I'm missing some detail or theme in the teaching of the Bible. Also, since the importance of sin is in the intention behind the thoughts and actions and not in the actions themselves, it's possible for both violent and nonviolent acts to be sinful (a). To start, most forms of violence are currently illegal, and Christians are supposed to submit to their government, even oppressive ones. There are quite a few references for this (b) (c). Finding more examples isn't difficult if you want more. So for violence to be OK, it has to be legal, at a minimum, which is a reasonably high bar in Western countries. In the Bible, it is made clear that governments are supposed to enforce justice, including with violence (d). It's not clear if "the sword" must extend all the way to capital punishment, but given the fact that capital punishment was prescribed in the Mosaic Law, it seems to be in the picture in some contexts. That being said, I think people can argue in good faith that modern Western countries are civilized and rich enough to afford every possible chance at rehabilitation. But to insist that capital punishment is necessarily murder is ethnocentric at best and possibly false teaching if someone claims to speak for God. As far as war, it's clearly not sinful in itself (e). Neither is being a soldier or general. Many (most?) of the judges in Judges were involved in battle in one way or another. As were Abraham and Moses. As was King David (he killed Goliath, remember?). But can countries sin by prosecuting unjust wars? Certainly. Can soldiers sin in their behavior on the battle field? I'm sure it's difficult not to. Ultimately in any behavior, violent or not, God promises rewards and punishments will be fair at the end of the day (f). Christians are supposed to live without sin, with truth, and in love. Of course they have failed and continue to fail in this. But God promises to make everything right, with his blood if necessary. And according to the Bible, it was necessary, because Jesus came to save the world, not condemn it (g). Is abortion murder? It's a sin in the cases that it's motivated by self-interest, callousness, or even fear. For a Christian that should be reason enough not to do it. What would the point be in calling it murder? To damn people? We don't have to reach far to find that we are all flawed (h). Lust, lying, hate, despising people, neglecting charity, being unforgiving, envy, greed, addiction, gossiping, cheating, consumerism, coveting... everyone does these things already. There's not much point in trying to rub peoples' noses in how they don't follow God's commandments. They either already know they're not following God or don't care (which is basically the same thing). (a) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+14 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+14 (b) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13 (c) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Peter+2%3A13-25&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Peter+2%3A13-... (d) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13%3A4&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+13%3A4&v... (e) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+3%3A1-8&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+3%... (f) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=collosians+3%3A23-25&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=collosians+3%3A... (g) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john+3%3A17&version=ESV https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=john+3%3A17&ver... (h) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:21-30 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%205:21-...
- russnewcomer 11y ago
  It seems, based on your comment, that you have experienced Christian practice not meeting Christian teaching, which saddens me. Sin, in Christian theology based around total depravity, is not 'essentially not being Christian enough', but is rather a failure to obey God. As I said before, this is an area where different religious backgrounds or experiences make discussing this issue difficult. I certainly don't mean to say that Christians are less violent, but that they should be. This feels like a discussion quickly falling away from the article and off-topic for the thread, so if you'd like to continue it, feel free to email me, my username at gmail.
  - zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC 11y ago
    > Sin, in Christian theology based around total depravity, is not 'essentially not being Christian enough', but is rather a failure to obey God. Except that when you say "failure to obey God" you mean "failure to behave as christians have defined a supposed god wants you to behave", or in short "not being christian enough". Simply attributing your rules to an entity whose existence you haven't even demonstrated is simply a rhetorical device to obfuscate the easy to understand statement "sin is when you don't follow my/our rules". Just consider whether you would be willing to substitute any definition of god out there in your statement instead of the christian one. How about Allah? Then your claim would be that in christian theology, it's sin to not obey Allah (that is, behave as Muslims define that god wants you to behave). If you aren't willing to accept that, your argument doesn't hold, and if you are, you have to deal with a huge pile of self-contradictory doctrine from all the world's religions.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      > Except that when you say "failure to obey God" you mean "failure to behave as christians have defined a supposed god wants you to behave", Its a not-uncommon bit of Christian theology that sin is not acting how God has specifically and personally directed you, individually, to behave. Now, Christians holding to that model have (varying, even among Christians) beliefs, to which they ascribe varying degrees of certainty, about things which they thing God commands of all people generally, which are therefore incorporated into that. But those beliefs are conceptually separate from the definition of sin.
- epaga 11y ago
  "sin means essentially not being Christian enough" The Apostle Paul would strongly disagree with that definition, I think. "The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost." http://ref.ly/1Tim1.15 http://ref.ly/1Tim1.15 Note his use of the present tense in that last phrase.