I meant the 10 commandments. For example do you think you ought to honor your parents if they are complete degenerates who treat you and your family like trash for no good reason? You're supposed to apply discernment and not follow the commandments like a freaking robot. God endowed man with reason and we should use it appropriately.
And it's not invalid. Why do you believe they're not confusing?
You're making the positive claim - what makes them confusing? Give an example how any of the above is confusing? If you lie to a demon to save the life of some innocent man is that bringing confusion? You see, this is why commandments cant be taken as universal maxims but should be examined case by case with wisdom. This is Kant's categorical imperative level idiocy.
Of course, reason alone is not enough and we're not rationalists or pragmatists. If a person is spiritually mature, if he partakes in the divine sacraments and follows the teachings of the Church and the advice of his spiritual father, then it gets much easier to discern.
PS: On the funny side, my favorite command is "Thou shall not gang bang". On a more serious side, genocide is a modern concept. I mean, what constitutes a genocide? Did the Israelites genocide the neighboring nations when they settled down or did they just ask them nicely for their land?
For example do you think you ought to honor your parents if they are complete degenerates who treat you and your family like trash for no good reason?
Uh, yes, you honor them by obeying them up to the point of conscience and by telling them when your conscience forbids your obedience (because they have given an immoral order, which abrogates their authority). It is a principle of US Con Law that a law repugnant to the Constitution is no law and can be disobeyed freely; but the sovereign citizen must make that judgment in the moment before a court weighs in and rules the law unconstitutional in accord with the sovereign's judgment.
You're supposed to apply discernment and not follow the commandments like a freaking robot.
If they are God's commands I see no alternative but to obey them in exactly the same way that rocks obey his commands. This doesn't apply to immoral human commands as judged by the light of conscience. But your language making it ambiguous which commands shows that, once again, you've placed authority in the earthly institution that you do not count as derivative from the only Lawgiver. And you did that by using your own judgment, which you don't admit using.
If you lie to a demon to save the life of some innocent man is that bringing confusion?
A literal demon is not deceived by human lies because he doesn't trust anything. A demonic human still has the image of God in him and should either be treated as such or, in extreme cases, told formally that his actions have lost him the right of being treated by you as human. If you declare war against him in that formal, regulated way, then what you say afterward is not directed to him and he is left to deceive himself about what he overhears.
You see, this is why commandments cant be taken as universal maxims but should be examined case by case with wisdom.
The specifics do not contradict the generic because they involve different combinations of cases than the generic. If they were perceived as permitting one to punch holes in the generic freely without distinguishing the difference of case, then the generic would no longer be the generic and one would be making a false equivalence.
You're still on the hook for claiming there are times when one might steal or commit adultery or take the Lord's name in vain or have other gods before him. I might call you on that too.
"Genocide", a word coined by a Jewish lawyer, is defined with duckspeak so that a single statement that another takes as offensive is as genocidal as the Great Leap Forward. The reality is, as I've indicated, the just-war doctrine that one does not aggress another. When one declares war one offers terms of peace. The short answer is that 31 kings of Canaan refused terms of peace, and 1 king (in Gibeon) accepted them. There are very long answers on the subject posted here too, but if you start to question moral unity because you haven't yet understood the details of the OT wars then you're in the same position as the atheists, who first made this a fad. I know you don't want that in Orthodoxy.
So I continue counseling you to recognize your assumptions and realize that only God is the perfect self-consistent Law and his expressions of that Law in the Bible are sufficiently inspired formulations that we receive and model with some imperfections. That means that everything in our experience is our limited judgment and only God can count as the source of unlimited judgment. He gifts both the church and the individual with judgment powers and neither takes the other's place.
Uh, yes, you honor them by obeying them up to the point of conscience and by telling them when your conscience forbids your obedience (because they have given an immoral order, which abrogates their authority).
But wait, that means you will break the commandment and you won't honor them? I thought commandments don't contradict each other? Uh oh.
If they are God's commands I see no alternative but to obey them in exactly the same way that rocks obey his commands.
You're in a contradiction, bro. You just said you honor your parents up to a point which is not what the commandment asks. You're making clauses up stuff and adding to God's law.
Reading comprehension, friend. "Honor" does not mean "obey to the point of dishonor". See Acts 4-5, we must obey God rather than men. You honor an unjust command by straitly telling the commander you cannot obey and will take the punishment, Daniel 1. (Also Luther, here I stand ....) Your quest to see contradiction and exception in the moral law is, well, doomed.
I said honor by obeying to the point of conscience and by communicating beyond that point. You changed that to honor to a point (and not beyond). You're the one changing the clauses. The tight place is only misperceived by you.
Further, the argument is becoming needlessly pedantic and unfitting of the true Church you represent. It might be time for one or both of us to take a break. (Guy is doing fine AFAIK, we might both be better off listening to him instead.)
Are you a lawyer irl? I can smell one from any distance.
"Honor" does not mean "obey to the point of dishonor". See Acts 4-5, we must obey God rather than men. You honor an unjust command by straitly telling the commander you cannot obey and will take the punishment, Daniel 1. (Also Luther, here I stand ....) Your quest to see contradiction and exception in the moral law is, well, doomed.
I never said anything about obeying so don't present strawmen. Let's stick to the wording of the commandment and my hypothetical:
For example do you think you ought to honor your parents if they are complete degenerates who treat you and your family like trash for no good reason?
You'll notice that in this case you don't disobey or dishonor God in any way. On the contrary - following your logic, your refusal to follow the commandment is disobedience to God. If you're supposed to follow the commandment indiscriminately as a rock does, then you'd have to agree you should still honor your parents even if they abuse you and your family. I can push the hypothetical even further if you need me to.
I meant the 10 commandments. For example do you think you ought to honor your parents if they are complete degenerates who treat you and your family like trash for no good reason? You're supposed to apply discernment and not follow the commandments like a freaking robot. God endowed man with reason and we should use it appropriately.
You're making the positive claim - what makes them confusing? Give an example how any of the above is confusing? If you lie to a demon to save the life of some innocent man is that bringing confusion? You see, this is why commandments cant be taken as universal maxims but should be examined case by case with wisdom. This is Kant's categorical imperative level idiocy.
Of course, reason alone is not enough and we're not rationalists or pragmatists. If a person is spiritually mature, if he partakes in the divine sacraments and follows the teachings of the Church and the advice of his spiritual father, then it gets much easier to discern.
PS: On the funny side, my favorite command is "Thou shall not gang bang". On a more serious side, genocide is a modern concept. I mean, what constitutes a genocide? Did the Israelites genocide the neighboring nations when they settled down or did they just ask them nicely for their land?
Uh, yes, you honor them by obeying them up to the point of conscience and by telling them when your conscience forbids your obedience (because they have given an immoral order, which abrogates their authority). It is a principle of US Con Law that a law repugnant to the Constitution is no law and can be disobeyed freely; but the sovereign citizen must make that judgment in the moment before a court weighs in and rules the law unconstitutional in accord with the sovereign's judgment.
If they are God's commands I see no alternative but to obey them in exactly the same way that rocks obey his commands. This doesn't apply to immoral human commands as judged by the light of conscience. But your language making it ambiguous which commands shows that, once again, you've placed authority in the earthly institution that you do not count as derivative from the only Lawgiver. And you did that by using your own judgment, which you don't admit using.
A literal demon is not deceived by human lies because he doesn't trust anything. A demonic human still has the image of God in him and should either be treated as such or, in extreme cases, told formally that his actions have lost him the right of being treated by you as human. If you declare war against him in that formal, regulated way, then what you say afterward is not directed to him and he is left to deceive himself about what he overhears.
The specifics do not contradict the generic because they involve different combinations of cases than the generic. If they were perceived as permitting one to punch holes in the generic freely without distinguishing the difference of case, then the generic would no longer be the generic and one would be making a false equivalence.
You're still on the hook for claiming there are times when one might steal or commit adultery or take the Lord's name in vain or have other gods before him. I might call you on that too.
"Genocide", a word coined by a Jewish lawyer, is defined with duckspeak so that a single statement that another takes as offensive is as genocidal as the Great Leap Forward. The reality is, as I've indicated, the just-war doctrine that one does not aggress another. When one declares war one offers terms of peace. The short answer is that 31 kings of Canaan refused terms of peace, and 1 king (in Gibeon) accepted them. There are very long answers on the subject posted here too, but if you start to question moral unity because you haven't yet understood the details of the OT wars then you're in the same position as the atheists, who first made this a fad. I know you don't want that in Orthodoxy.
So I continue counseling you to recognize your assumptions and realize that only God is the perfect self-consistent Law and his expressions of that Law in the Bible are sufficiently inspired formulations that we receive and model with some imperfections. That means that everything in our experience is our limited judgment and only God can count as the source of unlimited judgment. He gifts both the church and the individual with judgment powers and neither takes the other's place.
But wait, that means you will break the commandment and you won't honor them? I thought commandments don't contradict each other? Uh oh.
You're in a contradiction, bro. You just said you honor your parents up to a point which is not what the commandment asks. You're making clauses up stuff and adding to God's law.
It seems you got yourself in a tight place here.
Reading comprehension, friend. "Honor" does not mean "obey to the point of dishonor". See Acts 4-5, we must obey God rather than men. You honor an unjust command by straitly telling the commander you cannot obey and will take the punishment, Daniel 1. (Also Luther, here I stand ....) Your quest to see contradiction and exception in the moral law is, well, doomed.
I said honor by obeying to the point of conscience and by communicating beyond that point. You changed that to honor to a point (and not beyond). You're the one changing the clauses. The tight place is only misperceived by you.
Further, the argument is becoming needlessly pedantic and unfitting of the true Church you represent. It might be time for one or both of us to take a break. (Guy is doing fine AFAIK, we might both be better off listening to him instead.)
Are you a lawyer irl? I can smell one from any distance.
I never said anything about obeying so don't present strawmen. Let's stick to the wording of the commandment and my hypothetical:
You'll notice that in this case you don't disobey or dishonor God in any way. On the contrary - following your logic, your refusal to follow the commandment is disobedience to God. If you're supposed to follow the commandment indiscriminately as a rock does, then you'd have to agree you should still honor your parents even if they abuse you and your family. I can push the hypothetical even further if you need me to.