So if a child is on fire and I have a fire extinguisher, it's ok for me to withhold help? Just stand there and let her scream? That seems moral to you?

What we are talking about is akin to whether it is morally permissible to create a world where it is possible for a child to get lit on fire or not; and I would say that it is.

To answer your question, which is completely separate and disanalogous, I think one has a legal right to withhold help all else being equal because no citizen qua citizen has the duty to rescue another. Morally speaking, I think it would be immoral not use the fire extinguisher all else being equal because it is trivial for you to do and their live is in danger. If you were to strengthen the risk on your end, though, I would say you are permitted to withhold help (e.g., if you would have to rescue them from a burning building).

Likewise, I was not saying that allowing evil is always permissible. I was saying that they are morally evaluated differently.

I never denied the existence of good and evil: I noted that goodness is real and evil is not real. Evil is the privation of what is good: so it exists, but is not a member of reality. It is a lacking of goodness; just like how darkness is not real but light is.

I will provide some quotes when I have time.

This idea occurred to me as a part of an argument that God cannot be a utilitarian:
Consider something with a small quantity of intrinsic goodness, maybe for the utilitarian the pleasure of smelling a rose, or for those of us with a more metaphysical idea of goodness, a hydrogen atom or a sugar molecule. Whatever it is, call it a "unit" of goodness. If one of these is good, two of them would be better, although not necessarily twice as good. And three would be better than two. This seems to go on without limit: for any N, N+1 units of goodness are better than N units. So there is no maximum amount of goodness that God could create, just as there is no largest integer. But utilitarianism requires us to cause the maximum amount of good possible. Therefore God cannot be a utilitarian.

I commend your cleverness and ingenuity here; but I think this is fallacious. Goodness is not quanitified over like an atom: it isn’t a concrete being but, rather, a property that concrete beings can have.

Think of it this way. Imagine we asked ourselves: what does it mean to be most perfectly circular? Your argument here is essentially in response: imagine we thought of circularity like it can be split into one basic unit-atom and that utilitarianism is true, then we would never be able to create something that is perfectly circular..

But circularity is a property and cannot be thought of as a unit like this. A perfectly circular thing is entirely metaphysically possible in isolation; and God, analogously, is a perfectly good thing.

 Now when you talk about a "best ordering to creation" or a best "ordering of things", are you talking about one thing or many things?

I am talking about more than one real being and how they would be ordered. One can order them relative to any principle; but I am looking at the principle of ordering them relative to what is perfectly good—which is God Himself.

I agree with that assessment so far. It's the killing of innocents that my OP is objecting to: I recognize that the Canaanites were doing horrible things and a war against them is justified. However, that doesn't justify purposely attempting to genocide the people in their entirety. — Bob Ross

Okay, fair.

First let's clarify that the ban on the Amalekites was a religious or cultural form of genocide, given that their cultic rites required the abominable practices in question. "Amalekite" is a cultic referent, and it is precisely the cultic practices which are abominable. It is precisely the religion that is to be wiped out (although there was no distinction between the culture and the religion, because they were the same thing). Among other things, what this means is that if all of the Amalekites abandoned their Amalekite religion, they would no longer be Amalekites, and they would not have to be killed. For example, the Israelite leader Caleb was born into the Kenizzites, who were very similar to the Amalekites on the points in question. Yet he became an Israelite.

So it is not a matter of "genociding the people in their entirety" because some of them were doing horrible things. It is actually a matter of "cutting off the abominations" per se. If the Amalekites were not engaging in abominations, they would not have been put under the ban.

Are we still on the same page? (I realize I still haven't gotten to children yet. :razz:)

I think it would be immoral not use the fire extinguisher — Bob Ross

That's correct. So what you're really complaining about is the the OT God doesn't conform to the Neoplatonic image. Neoplatonism is a type of monism, so everything is God. That gives rise the to the older version of the problem of evil: if everything is God, what is evil? Some say Plotinus was an eliminative idealist, which means he believed evil, which is the privation of the Good, and also matter, is a type of illusion. In other words, Plotinus was the Daniel Dennett of his day.

I tried once to find that in the Enneads, and I couldn't.

Origen isn't saying the wars didn't happen. He is speaking to how the Scriptures tie into the spiritual life, which is their main function (i.e. how they are meant to be read). Allegory doesn't nullify historical content. Nor do I think we are forced to choose between young Earth creationism and the whole of terrestrial animal life being descended from animals on board the ark on the one hand and the denial of historical content to the story.

Interpretation is multilayered. For example, Leon Kass's The Beginning of Wisdom is a good look at interpretation from the Jewish perspective. It considers the Flood and the expulsion of Eden on a number of levels. Whereas, treating the Bible like a witness report and then passing judgement on God or any of the other figures is alien to most of the traditions that use the text. Theology isn't the sort of thing where you pull out isolated passages and then try to make a statement about God or morality from it. It can, of course, be done this way. Psalm 14 can be taken as an endorsement of total depravity, etc. It just leads to wild inconsistencies because of both the hyperbole common to Biblical language and the nature of the text.

I am absolutely disagreeing. The quote you gave serves only as a poetic line (even if Elie meant it as more). It's an emotion response, and rightly so, to a horror. — Bob Ross

He meant it as more. It's fine to disagree with him, but I don't think you can interpret it to mean you agree with one another.

God allowing human evil is necessary in order for us to have free will; and we need that to choose Him. This does allow, then, for humans to commit atrocities against each other. — Bob Ross

This of course leaves unanswered the purpose of suffering not caused by humans, like babies dying in floods. But as to human evil, you must commit to whatever free will we have to be the perfect free will to have. If you say we have the free will to commit atrocity because without it the world would be lesser, you'll have to commit to the idea the free will we are deprived of (like the choice to fly like a bird) is an acceptable limitation.

Don't get me wrong. I am a theist, but I can't arrive at an answer for the problem of evil and I can't commit to the idea that all pain is for a higher good. There is true evil that had it been stopped, even if it meant an outstretched arm and a mighty blow from above, things would have been better. The OT is filled with such divine interventions. Why was Pharaoh"s free will imposed upon (hardened his heart) but not Hitler's?

Holding that all sufferimg leads to higher good might give great respect to God, but it doesn't for the suffering.

Do you think it is better to love God because He makes you; or love God because you love God? — Bob Ross

I don't place particular significance on love with God. It's overly anthropomorphic and reductive and it de-emphasizes doing as opposed to believing.

So, to your question, I can't say I love God or God loves me in a way you'd think of it, as in an all embracing glorious way that salvages one's imperfect soul. I'll assume no one is terribly interested in my particular beliefs, but I'll just point out that the centrality of love to God is idiosyncratic to Christianity and not a necessary primary component of theism.

The evidence we seek to evaluate in determining how an all-good God commanded the killing of children, will only be found in spirit

With all due respect, this seems like a non-answer that sidesteps the discussion. Is your rebuttle to the OP that we cannot know why God did evil, but that it is justified because you are biased towards God?

“therefore God has done evil in the OT” we are biased against the premise “God is all good and would never do evil.”

No. The OP demonstrates in a non-biased way that God cannot do what the OT purports God did. A bias is a prejudice that is irrational and not based in reason, evidence, and logic: I am not doing that in the OP.

 I know that God is all-good. I am biased in favor of God.

Is there any evidence of what is being purported as God’s doing that is evil that would tip the scales for you and make you question if the purported history of God was really history of God?

So when I see horrible acts in the OT leading me to conclude “God is doing evil” I immediately think something is wrong with my reasoning and my conclusions and my understanding of the OT, because God can never sin.

This is what the OP is getting you to question:

1. Genocide is evil.
2. The OT purports God did genocide.
3. Therefore, either the OT was wrong or genocide is not evil.

Your response seems invalid. You are saying: “God can’t do evil and I am biased towards that, so I am going to believe that whatever God does is good”.

However, this isn’t a response to the argument (summarized above). You either think Genocide is always evil and the OT purports that God did it or you don’t. If you do, then you have to bite the bullet and accept that either OT was wrong or genocide is not always evil.

Likewise, you could object to the 2 and give a historical account of what the passages really meant and how it didn’t portray genocide; but saying “God always does good” doesn’t help further the conversation: I agree God cannot do wrong, and that’s why I don’t think the OT is factually accurate.

It is precisely the religion that is to be wiped out (although there was no distinction between the culture and the religion, because they were the same thing).
…
Among other things, what this means is that if all of the Amalekites abandoned their Amalekite religion, they would no longer be Amalekites, and they would not have to be killed

I was not aware of that, and that’s fine as long as we agree then that:

1. Not all people who lived in the culture of the Amalekites were Amalekites, since an Amalekite is a religious affiliation and those who lack the capacity or choose not to engage in it were not be properly affiliated. To iron man this, I would be thinking of children and disabled people that were “Amalekites” but not because they have properly been affiliated with the cultic rites but because they simply live among them.

2. As far as my understanding goes of the passage I quoted in the OP, God commanded them to wipe out the entire city or cities that the Amalekites lived; so this would seem to include the children, disabled people, people who couldn’t leave but completely disagreed with the practices, and animals.

For now, I am leaving out the objection about animals, though, and we can focus on the children if you would like. I find it implausible that no one in an entire city had a cognitive disability (perhaps they always sacrificed those people?), a person that disagrees with the cult but lacks the means to escape, or were a child.

Are we still on the same page? (I realize I still haven't gotten to children yet. :razz:)

I think so! My only concern is that we are interpreting the texts as only fighting with those adults engaging in the cult but I don’t find that plausible in the text so far.

EDIT:

My worry is that, analogously, we are noting that it is a just war to invade the Nazis but also conceding that the invasion was done in a manner intending to kill all the women, children, disabled, and animals to wipe out the german ethnic group out. It seems like a just war has certain rules of engagement.

Neoplatonism is a type of monism, so everything is God

I don’t think it is a form of monism. Aristotle definitely wasn’t a pantheist nor was Aquinas.

I see. Can you respond, then, to the three examples I gave and explain how they are allegories and what they are allegories about? I find this implausible for, e.g., Exodus where they are outlining rules. Rules are not usually meant metaphorically or allegorically.

don’t think it is a form of monism. Aristotle definitely wasn’t a pantheist nor was Aquinas. — Bob Ross

Neoplatonism, Bob.

This of course leaves unanswered the purpose of suffering not caused by humans, like babies dying in floods.

What you are raising is the problem of evil, which is not relevant to the OP.

The answer to natural evil is that you need a world where there are regularties of behavior of the environment for anything’s good to be realized. I can’t live a virtueous life if the floor randomly turns into TNT once a week. You need natural laws to allow for the good of anything at all; and that necessarily allows for natural evil.

 If you say we have the free will to commit atrocity because without it the world would be lesser, you'll have to commit to the idea the free will we are deprived of (like the choice to fly like a bird) is an acceptable limitation.

I am talking about freedom to live in accord with one’s nature: not the nature of something else. It isn’t good for a human to be able to organically fly: it’s not in our essence.

Why was Pharaoh"s free will imposed upon (hardened his heart) but not Hitler's?

Yes, this is a fair Biblical objection; but this is another example of exactly what my OP is arguing. It seems like God in the OT is not really God.

I don't place particular significance on love with God. It's overly anthropomorphic and reductive and it de-emphasizes doing as opposed to believing.

Well, that’s a big problem; as love of God is love of love itself: It is to orientate one’s will towards what is perfectly good. If you reject that, then you do not want what is perfectly good for anything.

 I'll just point out that the centrality of love to God is idiosyncratic to Christianity and not a necessary primary component of theism.

I am not arguing from Christianity here. In this life, if you don’t love God, then you don’t love love itself or goodness itself. If you don’t love that, then you aren’t orientated towards what is good: that hurts you and everything around you.

You don't think Aquinas or Aristotle were neo-platonists?!?

You don't think Aquinas or Aristotle were neo-platonists?!? — Bob Ross

The Trinity is Neoplatonism, so Aquinas would have accepted doctrines that emerged from Neoplatonism whether he would have accepted the vision we associate with Plotinus or not. Aristotle was not a Neoplatonist.

I am not arguing from Christianity here. In this life, if you don’t love God, then you don’t love love itself or goodness itself. If you don’t love that, then you aren’t orientated towards what is good: that hurts you and everything around you. — Bob Ross

Sounds exactly like Christianity to me.

As I noted, your position is reductivist and anthropomorphic as it relates to love, where love is God (reduced to a term) and we are to somehow love that we shouldn't kill, lie, and do immoral acts, as if that's not metaphor attempted to be made concrete.

All your beliefs are perfectly valid as Christian beliefs but your comment

It seems like God in the OT is not really God. — Bob Ross

is where you present Christianity as The truth. If one is Christian, they'll say Amen, if not, then not.

Why is this? It's because the attributes of the OT God obviously vary from the NT God. You've located nothing not known. Your follow up that the OT God isn't God is just your assertion of Christianity as the Truth. You're telling those who accept a version of God closer to the OT than the NT, they don't believe in God. Lovely.

Your follow up that the OT God isn't God is just your assertion of Christianity as the Truth. You're telling those who accept a version of God closer to the OT than the NT, they don't believe in God — Hanover

Right.

I never denied the existence of good and evil: — Bob Ross

You do when you relate evil as privation of good. Good and evil are fundamental features of our experiences. We humans mostly prefer good over evil because of our genes. So we are biased.

I noted that goodness is real and evil is not real. — Bob Ross

Evil, of course, is real.

Evil is the privation of what is good: so it exists, but is not a member of reality. — Bob Ross

If something is not real, it cannot exist either, given the definition of real. So, I think you are contracting yourself.

It is a lacking of goodness; just like how darkness is not real but light is. — Bob Ross

There is no relation between evil and nonexistence.

What do you mean by neoplatonism? I mean any view that adopts but sublates Plato's view.

Aristotle adopted Plato's views but sublated it; and in turn Aquinas did the same with Aristotle. I would consider them both neoplatonists.

Also, do you believe Plato was a Trinitarian? I'm not aware of him believing in that: I thought it arose in classical theism with thinkers like Aquinas who were Christians.

It seems like God in the OT is not really God. — Bob Ross

is where you present Christianity as The truth. If one is Christian, they'll say Amen, if not, then not. — Hanover

But like so much of your posts, this is simply not true at all. Christians accept that the OT God is not God? What silliness is this? Marcionism is a very old Christian heresy.

The issue here is Biblical interpretation, and as a Reformed Jew you have a very loose way of interpreting the Bible.

The key to your position is found here:

not everyone who relies on the Bible relies solely on the Bible for all direction — Hanover

You would say, "I don't think God commanded the killing of the Amalekites," and the question is simply whether this view of yours is consistent with the Biblical testimony. There are a very large number of historical Christians and Jews who do not believe that such a view is consistent with the Biblical testimony. We can't just sideline these central questions and pretend that Reformed Judaism is the only possible approach.

But like so much of your posts, this is simply not true at all. Christians accept that the OT God is not God? What silliness is this? Marcionism is a very old Christian heresy. — Leontiskos

This isn't my position. It's @Bob Ross's. He said the OT description of God wasn't God, and I said if it's not, the he saying those who do accept it as God don't believe in God.

We can't just sideline these central questions and pretend that Reformed Judaism is the only possible approach. — Leontiskos

I never did. I've been consistenly open to other interpretations. I've only pointed out that if one claims to know what the true God is and then you claim others don't adhere to it, then you're just telling me your religion is right and mine wrong.

What do you mean by neoplatonism? I mean any view that adopts but sublates Plato's view. — Bob Ross

Neoplatonism

Read about Plotinus, the Enneads, and Augustine.

Also, watch this, somewhere in there he explains the Neoplatonic origin of the Trinity.

To clarify, I am saying that Christianity holds that the OT God is God; but that my OP is objecting by way of an external critique from classical theism to claim that it couldn't be God. Most importantly, I am interested to hear what Christian's think of my critique.

Also, I could make an internal critique that would suffice: if Christ is about love and mercy, then how does that cohere with the OT?

Either way, I think it is an issue Christian have recognized is noteworthy and something they need to respond to.

Frank, I've read about neoplatonism. What do you mean by it and how does Plato argue for the Trinity? I don't that happened. Just explain it briefly to me.

This isn't my position. It's Bob Ross's. He said the OT description of God wasn't God, and I said if it's not, the he saying those who do accept it as God don't believe in God. — Hanover

Do you think Christians would say "Amen" to the claim that "God in the OT is not really God"? Because that's what you said above.

I never did. I've been consistenly open to other interpretations. I've only pointed out that if one claims to know what the true God is and then you claim others don't adhere to it, then you're just telling me your religion is right and mine wrong. — Hanover

The OP is surely presenting arguments against a particular religious tenet, namely the divinity of the OT God. So yes, it involves the claim that such a religious tenet is wrong, along with any religion which upholds it.

Frank, I've read about neoplatonism. What do you mean by it and how does Plato argue for the Trinity? I don't that happened. Just explain it briefly to me. — Bob Ross

Honestly, you're coming across as kind of clueless.

Honestly, you're coming across as kind of clueless. — frank

You are the one coming across as clueless, Frank. You make weird, contentious claims about neo-Platonism and then fail to substantiate them, gesturing towards "somewhere" in an hour-long video.

@Bob Ross - The reason these threads are tricky on TPF is because asking TPFers religious questions is like going into a bar and asking the patrons about quantum physics. They will have a lot to say, and none of it will be remotely accurate. Toss in the large number of anti-religious cynics like Frank and the quality dips even further.

Do you think Christians would say "Amen" to the claim that "God in the OT is not really God"? Because that's what you said above. — Leontiskos

I do think Bob has clarified. He did say he didn't think the OT God was consistent with what he knew God was. And I do see why a Christian would need to sort out what is pretty clearly a change from OT to NT if there is a commitment they are the same.

That being said, it just seems you've got to start with the obvious and admit to the literal inconsistency, and if you're going to adhere to that literalism, you're just going to have to admit to inconsistency.

If your hermeneutic leads to inconsistency, you either (1) live with the inconsistency as not overly relevant, (2) declare humility and lack of grasp of the mystery, or (3) change your hermeneutic.

I go with 1 and 3. God didn't write the Bible, so inconsistency should be expected and I choose a very non-literalist interpretation. My objection was to the suggestion of an a priori knowledge of God as being consistent with the NT and a declaration of invalidity to all other beliefs in God.

That is, an option 4 was being chosen. The OT was being rejected as invalid. That's the equivalent of me saying the simple solution is to reject the NT. That would work too.

I do think Bob has clarified. He did say he didn't think the OT God was consistent with what he knew God was. And I do see why a Christian would need to sort out what is pretty clearly a change from OT to NT if there is a commitment they are the same. — Hanover

Well what is "pretty clear" to you is not at all evident to Christians. Here is the heresy I spoke of:

Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different and opposed to the malevolent deity, the Demiurge or creator deity, identified with Yahweh in the Hebrew Bible. — Marcionism | Wikipedia

So when you claim that Christians would say "Amen" to the heresy of Marcionism, you are making factual errors that misrepresent the religion. Throughout the thread @Bob Ross has emphasized that his argument is opposed to Christianity, beginning with to Tzeentch. So it's really weird that you would claim that Ross is taking a position to which Christians would say, "Amen." Every Christian in the thread is arguing against the OP.

If your hermeneutic leads to inconsistency, you either (1) live with the inconsistency as not overly relevant, (2) declare humility and lack of grasp of the mystery, or (3) change your hermeneutic. — Hanover

I basically agree. :up:

God didn't write the Bible, so inconsistency should be expected and I choose a very non-literalist interpretation. — Hanover

Good, that's what I was trying to get at.

My objection was to the suggestion of an a priori knowledge of God as being consistent with the NT and a declaration of invalidity to all other beliefs in God.

That is, an option 4 was being chosen. The OT was being rejected as invalid. That's the equivalent of me saying the simple solution is to reject the NT. That would work too. — Hanover

Is there something you believe to be wrong with "option 4"?

I think @Bob Ross is saying little more than, "I believe in God, and according to my beliefs the OT god is not God. Here are some arguments for why." He is of course offering his arguments tentatively, in the sense that he is looking to understand and address objections to his view.