Discussion On Abortion

A YouTuber named Craig sent me a PM regarding my video on abortion. His comments and my responses were too large for the YouTube video comment section:

Craig: And you also may be missing the point a bit. Consider the fact that if the overdue baby (who, again, is healthier, more developed, and far more capable of independence outside the womb) has a scissors jammed into the back of his head and his brain sucked out, the law is silent. However, if that 23 week old baby on life-support had the same procedure done, the perpetrator would be tried with murder...EVEN IF the mother had requested it (in which case she'd be charged as well).

How is it obvious to you that the absence of having drawn oxygen into his lungs somehow makes this morally and legally sensible?

Me: There is nothing obvious about any of this, especially late term abortion as you describe. In the case of the baby still in utero (late term abortion) the reason must have to do with the safety of the mother. The killing of an already delivered baby in an incubator, as you describe, is not a fair analogue, nor would it happen.

I also am horrified by the idea of late term abortion. But I have to repeat, I don't know what the cause might be for performing one. I can't believe that any doctor would undertake such an action lightly. If I were a husband faced with a choice of wife or baby, I think I'd choose to save the wife. I am way past that now, but I would hope that you never are faced with such a choice.

Craig: Admittedly, they ARE both an "interference" in what would have happen if nature just ran its course. But to equate an interference that sustains life with an interference that destroys life is a logical disaster. Would you equate "feeding a quadriplegic" with "starving a paraplegic"? In both instances, we are "interfering" in what would normally happen if nature were left to her own devices. Of course not. There is simply no comparison with an "intervention" that sustains life and an "intervention" that destroys it. By this logic, we could equate Dr. J. Mengele with Dr. W. Mayo...both were just "interferers".

Me: I think your comparisons here are extreme. Mengele and Mayo? Mengele experimented on people against their will, while Mayo tried to aid them in recovery. Intent has a lot to do with it. Intervention isn't always the same. I'm sure that's your point, but your approach is an appeal to emotion, which was my objection to the so-called pro life movement in the first place.

Feeding a person who wants to live and can't feed himself is perhaps an intervention, but who starves a paraplegic? Can you cite me a case? If you bring up a case like Terri Schaivo you will be equating paraplegia with persistent vegetative state, which is not analogous at all.

Craig: We can agree that abortion is a complex issue; but I don't see how complex issues justify inconsistent thinking. It seems to me that some consistent thinking and some fundamental commitments are precisely what we need to think our way through complex matters.

Me: It would be great if in this life we could always be consistent. But circumstances are not consistent. The case of a fetus killed (think Sharon Tate) when the killing was done in malice and to a fetus whose arrival was anticipated with joy is not the same as aborting the fetus produced through rape or incest, or one which would endanger the life of the mother. A certain inconsistency is required in life. We are not machines.

Craig: The way I see it, Largo, is that there is an atrocity in our midst...an absolute blood bath right on our front doorsteps. 53 Million abortions in North America in the last 40+ years. And this blood bath is being justified and euphemized by misleading rhetoric and admittedly inconsistent thinking.

ME: I can agree that there are far too many abortions, and for reasons of convenience or laziness in birth control. But think of the alternative. Abortions were performed when they were illegal, too, but frequently under unsanitary conditions and by practitioners who were unqualified and may have killed the mother. To outlaw abortions would never end them. But it would make them more dangerous.

The rest of your letter seems to rest on your belief that the unborn have the same rights as the born. I already explained that a blastocyst is not a baby, and calling a fetus a baby as if it had a personality is rhetoric on your part, designed to evoke emotion and a visceral rather than an intellectual response.

I agree with you that abortion generally is a bad idea, because, as I said, most abortions are probably done because people didn't take precautions against pregnancy in the first place and are not ready to deal with the consequences. But I am not ready to call it murder. On this we simply do not agree.

The "breath of life" argument, by the way, was from the bible. I'm not a believer myself, but many of the "pro life" faction are, and I referred them to scriptures saying that Adam, for example wasn't born with a living soul, but became one when the breath of life was breathed into his nostrils (and thence, one would suppose, into his lungs).

I have tried here and in my video to present a civil argument without rancor. I hope that can be maintained, even as we disagree.

Re: Issues of Philosophy

Craig: It was not an appeal to emotion. I was not suggesting something was true or false on the basis of how it makes you feel. I was deducing very logically what the implications would be if we took the philosophy undergirding that comment and applied it beyond the abortion issue.

Me: I don't think so. Your Mengele/Mayo comparison was not to the point, unless appeal to emotion was your intent. No one thinks Mengele was justified in experimenting on human beings against their will. But many people see abortion as a necessary, if distasteful procedure in some cases. Applying an example like that in comparison to an abortion doctor is disingenuous. You could hardly have expected other than an emotional reaction.

Craig: As hypothetical as the example is, its sole purpose is to illustrate the impropriety of indiscriminately lumping life-sustaining (Mayo) and life-destroying (Mengele) "interferences" into the same category.

Me: I did not group life sustaining interferences with life destroying ones, you did with your Mengele/Mayo comparison. Again I ask you to cite a case where anyone denied food to a paraplegic. That would be a fair analogue. And again, I caution you not to use Terri Schaivo, since all that could be called personhood was already absent from her body before the support was removed.

Crig: Many late term abortions are done for the same reasons early term abortions are done. The mother does not want the child.

Me: If you can document this, I might take you seriously. But to me it sounds like posturing in the absence of an argument. What doctor would do such a procedure with "I don't want this kid" as the reason? If there are doctors who would do so, they are bereft of any ethical values. But, as I said, I think doctors only perform late term abortions for very compelling reasons. Prove me wrong, and I will agree with you. Your unsupported assertion that this is so is not enough.

Craig: Then why is that your position? Perhaps "obvious" was too strong a word. Perhaps I should reword it to simply say, why is that a compelling enough line in the sand for you to hold that as the point of legal protection as opposed to another point (like conception)?

Me: I explained that MOST people who oppose abortion do so for religious reasons, and I pointed out scripture about the "breath of life." Obviously that did not resonate with you. I am not willing to say conception is the beginning of any more than a process, which may be interrupted, either naturally or extranaturally at any point. I pointed out in the video that a great many abortions occur spontaneously (naturally) for various reasons.

With regard to scripture, you should note also that in the bible (Hosea 13:16 for example) not only does the lord order infants already born to be "dashed in pieces," but "women with child ripped open." How's that for a late-term abortion, and at the command of god!

Check out also Isaiah 13:18 "...they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb. Their eyes shall not spare children."

If your argument is purely secular you haven't made your point.

Craig: It is also a strawman to suggest that the entire pro-life movement can be labeled and thus dismissed as an appeal to emotion.

Me: Perhaps some individuals don't appeal only to emotion. But what do you call the signs protesters carry of partial birth abortions and fetuses in the womb? I have seen them. They are highly emotional. Add to that the "pro-life" label, the obvious opposite of which is "anti-life" and you have nothing BUT an appeal to emotion. Perhaps not everyone in the movement deems personhood to begin at conception. But most do. Why else would stem cell research be such a hot button issue?

Craig: I agree that some late term abortions are done to protect the life of the mother (an exception that I am inclined to defend legally; I can also respect an exception in the case of incest and rape).

Me: I'm glad you can see at least some exceptions.

Craig: The objection is obvious. The victim has inalienable rights. No man should ever have the right to hit his wife, and no adult should ever have the right to have sex with a child.

Me: Then why do you even propose that? In practically the next sentence you say that that is MY philosophy extrapolated. That is simply not true. My thoughts on abortion apply only to that narrow subject. To accuse me of holding that spousal abuse and child rape could ever under any circumstance be acceptable is false and repugnant. You have no way of knowing what I think beyond what I told you. To say that you know my unexpressed "philosophy" is beyond hubris.

You yourself admit to making an exception in the case of incest or rape or danger to the life of the mother. Yet you expect some kind of superhuman consistency of me. You say you "draw the line" at conception. If that is true and absolute, how can you have any exceptions at all? It is as I said, inconsistency is a necessary part of life. Circumstances change. That is not a tautology. We merely have a difference of opinion.

Aldous Huxley famously said that the only consistent people are the dead. I agree. If you must have consistency, you need to stop debating, because you will never achieve it, either from your opponent or from yourself.

Thanks for the stimulating discourse. I appreciate that, unlike some in that comment section, you haven't lost your temper or damned me to hell. (Or was that in some other comment section? I get that a lot.)

Best regards,

Larry

To the argument: “God didn’t lie in Genesis. He just meant that Adam and Eve would die ‘spiritually’. Anyway, they did die instead of having eternal life because they were kept away from the tree of life.”

I hear this argument all the time. It's ridiculous. Genesis doesn't say Adam was told, "Do this and you will die spiritually." It says "Do this and you will die." Do you have any idea how desperate it sounds when you get backed into a corner by the very words printed on the page, and you have to make a silly excuse like that? "Well, he didn't really say they would die. You have to read between the lines."

Right!

The book that is supposed to be the perfect guide seems to be incapable of stating plainly what it means. That's very convenient, IF the real purpose of the book was to raise a priestly class with special insight and the ability to interpret the book. Now, think about that. Who would profit most from making the guidebook vague and needing interpretation? Why, the interpreters! And they still do, don't they? Or do you not pay tithes and make offerings?

If you take the story of Adam and Eve literally, as many biblical apologists do, you must know that Adam, being newly created, would have no way of knowing that a day meant any more than one period of light and darkness. As it was put in Genesis, it was supposed to be a threat. How much of a threat would it be to you if someone told you, "Now, don't do this, because if you do, sometime within a thousand of your years I'm going to punish you for it."? Keep in mind, Adam may not have experienced even one year. How was he to know what a thousand meant? Also, up to that time, death hadn't been witnessed. How was he supposed to know what death meant?

Your objection to this line of thinking is typical of people who want to have it both ways. You want the bible to be true and perfect, but when it says something that is counter to what you believe you simply refuse to recognize what is right before you.

you write: "God didn’t say you are going to die right away.. he said you will surely die "

Do you have a bible? Can you read? It says in Genesis, Chapter 2, verse 17 (KJV) "But the tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for IN THE DAY that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." In the day means immediately. It means before the sun goes down once. It means what it says. That's not an interpretation. that's exactly what the bible says!

You write "how can you say something sudjesting (sic) God lied first when God is perfect and when he made you in the first place?"

I think you mean "suggesting." I'm not suggesting that god lied. I'm saying directly and clearly that, by the testimony of the words in the supposedly perfect bible, he said they would die on the same day that they ate from that tree. Adam lived over nine hundred years according to the same book. He didn't die in the same day he ate the forbidden fruit.

The serpent told the truth and god lied. Simple. It says so.

Another person offered (on another topic): "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed." (NIV) John 20:29

My answer:John 20:29 That kind of statement is perfect for bamboozling people who might otherwise be tempted to think. Believe what you can't see. You get more credit for believing without evidence. It proves that you can be led by anyone with a big enough promise.

::Side-show barker:: "Step right up, Sonny. Do everything I tell you and you will get ee-ternal life. What’s that? Proof, you say? Why, it's more sure without proof. Only fools ask for proof. They will die and go to hell. You can look down from heaven and laugh at 'em!"

What Is Moral?

A YouTuber in Australia posed a number of dilemmas to me and asked what I thought the moral action would be in each case. They were the type of dilemma that really has no right answer because in no case is there a satisfactory resolution. One of the questions was about "Sophie's Choice," whether any choice she made could be moral. What follows are some of his later questions and my responses.

>>" I wonder if you may expand on your point about the specific examples given not being moral issues, to stop any further confusion (if you see any)? "<<

I'll try. As I said before, I think questions of this kind are idle because they really allow no good result. You can make yourself crazy with exercises like this and wind up no wiser than when you started, because there simply IS no correct answer. Or, it’s entirely possible that you are a deeper thinker than I am. I say that without irony or rancor. Your mind seems to have a facility for philosophy that mine simply doesn’t. I get bogged down mentally in philosophical questions, and I’m never sure that I’ve addressed them well enough.

>>”Ultimately I would say moral decisions are inconveniently subjective (observing how even those with supposedly objective versions of morality, like the religious, wax and wane is evidence for that). “<<

I think moral questions are always subjective. For there to be an objective morality there must be one correct answer dictated by authority. If you accept that, you are then left with the question, “whose authority?” If you rely on the authority of a god, you should consider that for that god – that law GIVER - all answers must of necessity be subjective, since he/she/it answers to no other authority.

Religious people tell me that god decides what is good and what is evil. Supposing that is true, then to god, there really is no difference. God could as easily define an action as good that we now take for evil and vice versa. The entire concept of good and evil becomes moot. Good is good because god says so.

The foregoing is my clumsy paraphrase of Bertrand Russell. But I think it sums up the objective vs subjective idea.

I mentioned in another video that the word “moral” comes from a Latin root meaning “custom.” The word “ethics” comes from the Greek “ethos,” which means the same thing. Human beings are social animals with enough intelligence to realize that their ultimate well being depends on their relationship with their fellow creatures. We get along best when we make decisions based on what we perceive to be the greatest good for the social network in which we live.

There are, of course, pitfalls in a subjective morality. For some tribal peoples the custom demands hunting of rival tribes, taking heads as trophies of their power and even eating their enemies as a means of gaining their strength symbolically. Such an “ethic” might actually work in societies that are small enough and remote enough, and, indeed, did work for many centuries in places like Borneo.

In my first video on whether the Prophet Muhammad was a pedophile I opined that, for his time, when increasing the tribe was of paramount importance, it might have been reasonable for girls to be married as soon as they had entered puberty. That Aisha was only nine makes her just a child in a modern person’s understanding, whether she had menstruated or not. But 1400 years ago, assuming she had entered puberty and was capable of conceiving, that fact would have been the ONLY thing considered. Those people knew nothing of child psychology, nor of the physical damage that could result from that kind of union. I mentioned that the average age for girls to be married at the time of the alleged Jesus’ birth was about 13, the normal time for the onset of puberty. That would be considered immoral today, because our society’s customs are based on greater knowledge than those people possessed.

The point is that morality may change with the degree of a society’s knowledge. It is a matter of custom. I did point out that “thighing” was a different matter, and in my opinion, was always wrong. The custom of every civilized society has been to protect, not abuse its children. Many Muslims have told me that that practice was never allowed, while others admitted that it was long ago. Others, Sunnis, have told me that only Shiites ever did such dreadful things, and that “they aren’t real Muslims anyway.” That, of course sounds like a Baptist telling me that a Catholic is not a “true” Christian.

I seem to have gotten off the track. Back to your message.

>>”Also, it may seem that we are bound to be savages, each with totally incompatible ideas about how to run a community and we therefore are unable to fairly make decisions, but thankfully we are blessed with the idea of democratic society. This fortunately allows a general consensus to be reached on a code of conduct (or on more specific issues) for a group; where each member agrees to abide by these rules if they are to be a part of it, thus providing some objective law”<<

That code of conduct is arrived at by purely subjective means. Again, if obedience to authority, whether that authority is agreed upon democratically or not, can be called objective, it is still only objective in the sense that it is followed unquestioningly. Following the law is objective, while making the law, in a democratic society, at least, is subjective. Morality, if it can be said to exist at all, falls somewhere in the gap between the two.

>>"A simplified version of my requirements would be that the aim in any decision is to maximize the amount of future pleasure for all those involved. Most of us value our lives based on the amount of joy we can cram in, so a moral ideal which takes the length of life and its quality into account, seems appropriate. "<<

I can agree with this definition. I dumbed it down a little in a video by saying that what is moral does good while what is immoral does harm. Simplistic, of course, but to the point. One can always get an argument, though. Not everyone agrees on what is harmful, for example.

The best moral statement, to my mind, is still what we know as the golden rule. Christians will jump on that statement and claim that their Christ said it. But they neglect to mention (or don't know) that Confucius said the same thing in slightly different words five centuries before the birth of the alleged Jesus. You can also count on some person pointing out that if you are a Masochist and like painful things done to you, you might follow the rule, but do harm. You will never argue morality in any form without dissent from someone. I guess that's part of what makes life interesting.

Frankly, if there were an afterlife in a heaven of utter bliss, with no problems, no dissent, everyone thinking, feeling and doing the same thing, I wouldn't want to go there. I called it the Eternal Ennui. Boredom that lasts forever!

The book of Job was one of the first things that began to turn me away from my Christian upbringing. I was troubled by what god did to his most obedient servant. I was told that the terrible things were justified because of Job’s pride. A YouTuber was giving me the same message. This was my answer:

Me: You miss the point about Job. The story clearly shows the caprice of god, who allows the torture of a man who has done only right. God himself tells Satan that Job is righteous. Then he allows Satan to injure Job in ways too horrible to contemplate. Just think how you would feel if (supposing you have children) your entire family were murdered. Do you really think it would be all right, since, after all, god gave you another family? And what about all those lives snuffed out? Had they no value?

You simply cannot spin the book of Job to be anything other than a description of a monster toying with an innocent. In this story the devil is supposed to be the evil one, but, as I have said many times, the god of the bible is revealed by his own "biographers" to be evil enough that a devil is redundant.

YT: Sure God never changes. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Could it be that people in the Old Testament did not really understand what he stands for and hence have the wrong idea of who God is? There are verses in the NT that points to that fact. A typical example is when the teachers of the law wanted to stone a adulterer..

Me: The "people in the Old Testament," as you put it, are some of the "inspired" ones who described god and his actions/orders. Are you saying they were inaccurate? The book is not necessarily true? Its imperfect?

What I have pointed out is that the actions of this god as described by his inspired ones are not only often unloving, but downright vile. The New Testament (1 John 4:8 and 16) says god is love itself, but that is contradicted by many horrors in the Old Testament, and the expected horrors of hell in the New Testament. Your god is a monster.

YT: Yes immortal, however Jesus did strip himself of his immortality:

"The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again.

No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again.

This command I received from my Father."

Me: I bet your English teachers loved you. You still don't understand the meaning of the word "immortal." It means incapable of death. One cannot be both immortal and mortal. All these quotes of the alleged Jesus make no sense in light of the fact that he wrote nothing himself, and was quoted, supposedly exactly, up to 110 years after he was dead. My memory should only be that good.

Oh, and while I'm at it, if Jesus was the son of god, referring to his father in the second person, where do you get monotheism? Two gods plus that spirit thing equals polytheism. Or did you fail math, too?

YT: John 7:53-8:11 in the King James Version: 7:53 And every man went unto his own house. 8:1 Jesus went unto the Mount of Olives. 2 And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them. 3 And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, 4 They say unto him, Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. 5 Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou? 6 This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground, as though he heard them not. 7 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. 8 And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground. 9 And they who heard it, being convicted by their own conscience, went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even unto the last: and Jesus was left alone, and the woman standing in the midst. 10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee? 11 She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.<

Me: Perhaps you are unaware that scholars, among them Bart Ehrman, whose video I will reference for you, say that the above is an interpolation. That means it was added (defined for you, since you seem to have trouble with words like immortal). These verses were not in the earliest manuscripts found for John. The story, if it were true, and demonstrates anything, suggests that Jesus was literate (he wrote on the ground), again urging me to ask why, if he had the most important message for mankind, did he not write it himself?

My answer, of course, is that there was no Yeshua bar Joseph - that he is as mythical as King Arthur or Paul Bunyan.

YT: You have free choice. But that does not mean you can do everything and get away with it. Under democracy we are free too, but again, you cannot do everything as some actions will lead to dire consequences.

Me: Of course I have free choice. I am a good citizen. I do my best to get through life without hurting others, and in fact, helping when I can. You haven't, at least so far, said that one cannot be moral without the bible. But no sane person would choose to go to hell. What I have difficulty with is all the otherwise sane persons who believe there is one.

YT: BTW you cannot commit the sin against the holy spirit if you don't believe in him in the first place. This sin can only be committed by believers.

Me: Oh, but I did believe once. I just came to see that the story was nonsense. So again I deny the so-called holy spirit. It no more exists than the god and the son which, while three entities including the spirit yet claim to be but one. Nonsense, I say.

YT: As I have said, I have time for someone who is prepared to sit and really analyse this topic from an objective perspective. I'll do the same.

Me: I suppose I should be grateful that you would condescend to instruct me. But I've sat through all the sermons I care to long ago. Why you assume that I need your guidance is a mystery, as I am your senior by some 28 years (if your channel bio is still correct).

The following is a playlist of a Stanford Lecture by Bart Ehrman. I hope you will watch it when you have time. Whether you will be edified by doing so remains to be seen.

www.youtube.com/my_playlists?p=08B95E503291F78B

The Ten: Commandments, That Is

Since the Columbine massacre many people have said that the ten commandments should be posted in school classrooms. Somehow they think that Exodus, Chapter 20 is the beacon of righteousness for the world.

Let us examine the “commandments” and see just how much guidance and inspiration they contain for the modern world.

Beginning with Exodus 20:1 The author of the document identifies himself. (Ex. 20:1) And God spake all these words saying, (Ex. 20:2) I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. [He identified himself, so the people would know who was the author of the law, and for whom it was intended. He was very specific: he was the god of the fathers of the Hebrews. In Exodus 3:6 he is even more specific when he tells Moses that he is the god of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.]

(Ex. 20:3 Commandment #1) Thou shalt have no other gods before me. [Modern Christians insist this law should apply to everyone, including Muslims, Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus or any of hundreds of other groups with hundreds of other gods. Since God was specific about whom he was giving this law to, and since at no time did he deny the existence of other gods, it is reasonable to assume that everyone but the Hebrews could worship any god they chose. Only the Hebrews were expected to obey this commandment, and even they were tacitly allowed to worship others as long as the I AM was first.]

(Ex. 20:4-6 Commandment #2) Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. [Although it seems to say that the I AM didn’t like carved, sculpted or engraved images of anything at all, this is usually interpreted to mean icons of other gods the Hebrews might otherwise worship, probably because a visible god is easier to keep in mind than an unseen one. This appears to be only the first half of the commandment, which continues:] Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them. For I the Lord they God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. [If you have graven images you are not to worship them. Within this commandment the I AM reveals himself to be jealous, a distinct weakness psychologists say is characteristic of insecure people. Then he warns that he punishes not only those who offend him, but their heirs as well, though they be innocent of the offense.

(Ex. 20:7 Commandment #3) Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. [Though he is Master of the Universe – if his press notices are true – he is as offended as any Hollywood celebrity if his name is misused.]

(Ex. 20:8-11 Commandment #4) Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day wherefore the Lord blessed the seventh day and hallowed it. [This clearly is intended to remind the Hebrews on a regular basis just whom they owed everything to. Interestingly, even those who want to post this commandment in schools with the other nine pretty much ignore it. Even the most orthodox of the Jews, who won’t light a candle after sunset Friday, hire a Shabbes goy, a non-Jew, to light candles for them on the Sabbath, though manservants and maidservants are expressly forbidden to work by the commandment.

None of the first four commandments has anything to do with making people better or kinder. None seeks to regulate the behavior of people toward one another. All are aimed at worship, and letting people know who’s boss. Rules to live by if you are an ancient Hebrew, but the I AM made it clear he wasn’t interested in the behavior of any other people.

(Ex. 20:12 Commandment #5) Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which the lord thy God giveth thee. [This is the first of the commandments that has anything to do with what most societies would call morality. But even then it supposes that ones parents are honorable. In the modern world, is a child supposed to honor a father who is abusive or a mother who sells herself to support a crack habit? Are we to suppose that before this sentiment was codified Hebrew children were not expected to honor their parents? Can anyone find a society anywhere in the world where the honor of the (honorable) parents was or is not considered among the virtues taught to children? This is preaching to the choir.]

(Ex. 20:13 Commandment #6) Thou shalt not kill. [Good one! But it was by no means final. The Lord may have desired that the Hebrews not kill each other, but he directly ordered them to kill many thousands of others (even their herds – Deuteronomy 20:16 – but of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth…) Every society of human beings has prohibited murder – and encouraged slaughter in war. Seems they all followed Jehova’s commandment, not to say his example, even if they never heard of him. Harris and Klebold of Columbine infamy knew better than to kill, but did so anyway. It is doubtful that having the Ten Commandments posted in their classrooms would have prevented this tragedy. ]

(Ex. 20:14 Commandment #7) Thou shalt not commit adultery. [Probably every society in history has forbidden adultery, although historically few ever heard of the Hebrew Bible. And didn’t Jehova himself commit adultery with the wife of Joseph? Or was that rape? Isn’t the taking of a woman who has not the right to say no a rape by definition? In fact, adultery is enjoined in every civilized society, commandment or no, because all people wish to protect their connubial “rights.”]

(Ex. 20:15 Commandment #8) Thou shalt not steal. [Another commandment which is adhered to by every society, with or without knowledge of “The Ten,” because protecting everyone’s property protects one’s own. Simple self-interest.]

(Ex. 20:16 Commandment #9) Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. [What is false witness? Is that testimony, as in court? Is it lying to procure advantage or favor? Is fibbing to protect the feelings of another equally forbidden? The general virtue of truthfulness is taught by every society. But exceptions have always been made. Even God deceived his first children when he told Adam and Eve (Gen. 2:17 “. . . for in the day thou eatest thereof {the tree of knowledge} thou shalt surely die.”) That Adam lived for more than 900 years, according to the same book, seems to show that God himself was careless with the truth.

(Ex. 20:17 Commandment #10) Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbour’s. [The first thoughtcrime! The other commandments dealt with what the chosen people were to do. This one tells them even their thoughts can be sins. If they desire something belonging to another, whether or not they do anything about it, they are guilty. Clearly now, “neighbour” means other Hebrews, because just before God led them to the place where they received the commandments, he ordered them to spoil the Egyptians among whom they had been living. Then it was okay not only to desire the property of others, but to steal it (contra commandment #8).]

My conclusion is that the Ten Commandments are defective at best as a moral compass for all mankind. It would be better (and easier to read) to post “DO UNTO OTHERS AS YOU WOULD HAVE THEM DO UNTO YOU” in schools, and to consider those words in class, with discussions on their meaning. That is a moral compass that can be understood by all, religionist and apostate alike.ebrews were expected to obey this commandmenH

My First Blog

This will be a compilation of comments on my YouTube channel and my answers to them. I hope you find them interesting. 

  On the "nipple" of religion: YouTuber Razua77, commenting on my video on Noah's Ark said:

The excuses are terrible...Noah's Ark is a fable created by the ancient society that somehow (as laughable as it is) is still believed today by those that refuse to get off the nipple of religion.

My answer was:

I like that..."the nipple of religion." That's even better than "opiate of the people." And it makes more sense. Not everybody wants to be drugged out of their minds, but most would love to get back to that safe place on Mommy's breast where they didn't have to think. Mommy's nipple provided food, and Mommy even cleaned up your pooped-in diapers. How easy could you have it? Religion doesn't feed you or clean up your poop, but it does relieve you of having to think.

On sin And Repentance: (A YouTuber warns me that I'd better stop all that sinning, which he thinks I love). YouTuber Search4Truth wrote:

God destroyed the whole world once for its wickedness, save Noah and family. And one day he will destroy you too for wallowing in your ignorance and arrogance. The profound wisdom of the Bible is not available to those who love their sin as you do. It is foolishness to them because they are dead in their sins. Just like the Bible says. You can make up as many excuses as you like, out of your ignorance and arrogance. You will still die in your sins and be condemned if you don't repent.

My reply:

You don't know anything about me, and yet you feel qualified to say I love my sin. You call yourself Search4Truth, but you aren't really searching for anything. You think you already have the truth, so there's no reason for you to search. You will never learn anything at all. Search4truth continues:

You are no mystery foolish man. Godless men have two things in common; their contempt for righteousness and consequently, their love for their sin. But if would learn anything, let it be this, that Christians become so in part because they are willing to admit they know nothing, and that God knows everything. So they submit to the all powerful, all knowing, all wise, God of all creation. But your arrogance precludes you from this. So you will remain a slave to your sin and condemned by God.

Me: You are so smug and self-righteous. ALL godless men are contemptuous of righteousness? You mean YOUR righteousness? Do you really think people who don't believe as you do are all evil? What an ignorant and pitiful little person you are. 

On Holy Books: The arcane nature of holy books has a single purpose. That is to provide a source of power and wealth to the priestly class that interprets them. If any god actually existed his/her/its relationship with humans, if it wanted one, would be direct, individual and unambiguous. There would be no need for intercessors and interpreters. There would be no religious wars.

"All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice. I should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed." -- Montaigne