Tuesday, 14 July 2009
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(argument map) Could Jesus Be Lying About Hell? (version 18)
Intro:
I thought I'd actually create a post so that the photoblog comments wouldn't keep getting cut off with word count limits. Also, I got tired of updating the links on the previous versions. Below is the argument map of my discussion with pychen, LSP1, musterion99, and oeshpdog2 (as I see it) that has been archived here. You can click on any of the thumbnail images below the big one to see other tangent conversations that contributed to the map. Also, see the research archive on 2 Thessalonians 2:11 here.
All of these are the same argument map, so don't get overwhelmed. There are just numerous updates. The biggest one is the current one. Click on these to get the full resolution pics that can actually be read.
Please let me know if there are any spelling mistakes or any corrections to the argument path that would be more fair. And feel free to submit new rebuttals, but be sure you aren't just rehashing what others have already argued to death.
Previous versions:
I used "argunet" to make the diagram and with Andrea's (link) help was able to finally figure out how to export an image directly. Luke Muehlhauser on Common Sense Atheism was recommending argument mapping software (link) and I was excited to give it a try with arguments fresh on my mind that were basically complete.
I would like to know if an argument map is easier or more difficult to follow than reading a seemingly unending comment archive. Is it just a different difficulty level? It is helpful to me regardless (and fun to make), but I really have no idea if someone who isn't me gets a clearer picture of the deal. Perhaps it depends on your learning style. I was just curious.
Outro:
If we accept that God's "righteous lying" (by implication or by proxy) is acceptable, then this allows us (with Premise 2) to conclude that God is still ultimately trustworthy on foundational spiritual matters (as I allowed for in Rebuttal 6B criteria D). There's no deal breaking issue here depending on your expectations. What there is is a direct Bible based argument that addresses conservative Christians when they attempt to stop the conversation with "the Bible says so" in opposition to good evidence in important cultural debates (creationism would be a good example). They know liberal theologies aren't very consistent, but here I've provided an intellectually consistent in-house Christian argument that allows them to believe things that the much of the world embraces with intellectual integrity. Many Christians are basically ideologically coerced into accepting positions they might not normally accept whether or not they have good direct evidence for that specific conclusion. It's not because they are stupid or even uninformed, it's because they are loyal. God is always wiser than the science establishment or anything a mortal can say about any issue and so any ad hoc absolutely implausible excuse is justified. This humanistic travesty shreds solidarity and science. However, the line of reasoning I've presented has the ideological potential to open up that inquiry regardless of what they conclude honestly after that. That's the idea anyway.
Ben
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Comments (71)
Wow. Just... wow. I don't know how much more clear this makes it, but it's pretty to look at.
@GodlessLiberal - hehe, I have a neato printed out version that's been laminated, too. I should post a pic. :D
too much awesome.
@lalalandsucks4ever - Is there really such a thing?
Are you still planning on adding my last comments in?
@LSP1 - There was some dispute (link) about meaning that wasn't clarified on the 9B_5 and I did add in the "see Rebuttal 5G" part off of 8F. I can add in the "use our brains?" "but that accuses god of unrighteousness" "see premise 2" back and forth (link), if that's what you are referring to. Am I missing anything else?
Ben
@WAR_ON_ERROR - I guess my only other comment would be to 9b_4A - "Following God to a Christian means that God is all-knowing and we are not. We cannot know and understand everything that God knows and does.
@LSP1 - Done.
@WAR_ON_ERROR - Whew! Finally. (I think)
@LSP1 - :D
great if you could add this:
Rebuttal 9A:
Your example is false because there was one word used for murder, and there was also textural context to distinguish manslaughter, and another word used for killing of animals. Much like English. Thus you are wrong. The words, "God does not lie." is very clear and you are without any contextual explanation to say that God lies, when the text clearly says that he does not.
I did not when noticed your list in orange. your # 5 is not speaking from the Christian. worldview. The Christian view is "Eternal damnation is morally justified." You may want to move number 5 to six and add #5 as "Lying is a sin (Colossians 3:9) and Jesus is without sin (Hebrews 4:15). Then it follows that Jesus was not lying. If Jesus lied, he would not be sinless and thus could not be the Savior. It also follows that no Christian would claim that Jesus lied, they would refute their own confession.
Add a #7 Satan/The devil is "a liar and the father of lies" (John 8:44)
Add #8 Those who lie "do not live by the truth" (1 John 1:6); no lie comes from the truth (1 John 2:21)
by the way, good joy on putting this chart together. It is a nice way to map things out. Thanks for pointing out this software to me. I will using it as well.
@pychen - Thanks, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can (on everything, +updates).
OMG, soon you'll need a plotter.
@pychen - Hey Peter,
I added your 9A and a 10A. Version 15 is up.
As for your extra premises, I think some of them are redundant and others are unnecessary. If God can lie for good ends, then Jesus can do so as well and still be considered sinless, so there's no need to clutter things up. And we're not talking about Satan and evil lying, so that's unnecessary.
Ben
@WAR_ON_ERROR - Is this going to be a chart that reflects the conversation we have or is it going to be just one sided?
At this point, it seams like to me, anyone who wants to know what is really going on in the conversation has to read the conversation itself and not this cut and paste done by one side of the argument. Which is nothing more than your opinion on the conversation that happens to distorted the facts what the other person, myself, has to say about the matter.
Any honest person looking at this should be able to pick up the fact that your # 5 is not speaking from the Christian. That is your belief. Not Biblical and not Christian. Yet you stack them together with the Christian views. Why?
@pychen - Are you serious? This argument map is a specific argument of mine and hence the 5 premises that go into that directly reflect the 5 premises of MY argument. I'm sure all of the other Christians that have participated in the chart understand that. There's no conspiracy.
Obviously if eternal damnation *can* be morally justified, then that factors right into the argument map and already has representation with 7B_2. In other words, there's no reason to use the "white lie" theory because there's no good evidence from anywhere that God is lying about anything. See how easy that works? I'm quite sure I'll end up making an argument map explicitly about
whether eternal damnation can be morally justified, but we can save all
of that for a different day.
Ben
@WAR_ON_ERROR - [Are you serious? This argument map is a specific argument of mine and hence the 5 premises that go into that directly reflect the 5 premises of MY argument. I'm sure all of the other Christians that have participated in the chart understand that. There's no conspiracy.]
My mistake. I really thought that there was an attempt to truly reflect the conversation. It is great that you clarify that point that it really is just your opinion of the conversation as you want to see it.
I am puzzled at YOUR 5 points, because they start out to sound Christian, then you are saying that they are your views. Am I to understand by that that you agree with the 4 points? If not, then why the supposed claim that you hold to the 1-4, when you don't? It seams like you are making up your own god and your own Jesus, and thus, I would agree with you that your god and your Jesus would be a lier much like any other human made gods after their own maker. To make it clear to the viewer of your chart, maybe you wan to put those five in your own color, and say that you also do not believe 1-4 (Unless I am mistaken and you became a Christian).
[Obviously if eternal damnation *can* be morally justified, then that factors right into the argument map and already has representation with 7B_2. In other words, there's no reason to use the "white lie" theory because there's no good evidence from anywhere that God is lying about anything. See how easy that works? I'm quite sure I'll end up making an argument map explicitly about whether eternal damnation can be morally justified, but we can save all of that for a different day.]
I am glad you agree that, yes it is meaningless for your claim of "white lie" given the Biblical case. It really is just your made up god and made up Jesus and made up hell, and made up humans that is not able to account for the reality of hell, and thus you reject it as false. I entirely agree with that.
However, you are talking about your made up world and made up god and so on, and not about Christianity. If that is what you want to do with your time, that is okay. But then you want to interact with the subject of hell as the Bible/Christianity views it, then let me know and we could talk more on it.
If you could pull my arguments and screen name out from the chart that would be great, because I was talking under the impression that we were talking about the Christian worldview (as you said that you were able to do), and not your made up worldview.
Peter
@pychen - Peter, I think you are just over-reacting. In order to argue consistently it does not require that either of us agree with all the premises. Only that we take them seriously in at least a hypothetical sense for the sake of this particular argument. You knew from the very beginning where I was coming from with my first comment on your post and this argument map fleshes all of that out from there. There are no false pretenses here for you to appeal to. Since that is the case, it seems that it is your perspective that distorts the conversation. You are free to build your own version if you like if you still think this is unfair. It is my opinion that you are being unfair.
Ben
@WAR_ON_ERROR - Ben,
It is not an over reaction at all. Given the context of what you are trying to talk about, you are dealing with the teachings of the Christian worldview, but what you are saying is that that is NOT what you are talking about, but you are talking about your own madeup god and madeup Jesus and your own madeup humans and your inability to put your made up view with the thought of hell, and as I said it makes good sense for your makeup world to do without a hell. For your view, hell is NOT morally justifiable. I have no problem with that conclusion at all.
But that is not the Christian view, and that is not the conversation that you were responding to. Please note what I wrote you back:
Hi bud. Thanks for your taking the time to
comment. Given the subject here. I don't think you have the basic frame
work that is meaningful to talk about what the Bible really teach,
because, what little I know of you, you don't believe the Bible to be
the word of God--the authority that provides the answer to the
questions at hand.
But you said:
It seems you think I can't think outside
my atheist box long enough to follow one perspective or the other on
the plausibility of interpreting a text? I'm hurt. ;)
I took you at your word that you were able to think outside of your atheist box and follow the Christian "perspective." But as I have pointed out, you did not do so. I have stated that in the conversation, and I am saying the same thing now.
Just answer me this, #1-4. Do you believe those as representative of your worldview? Let me put it again, Premise 3: Jesus is God. Do you believe this to be coming from your worldview? If not, as I don't think any of those are, then you are supposed to be talking about the Christian worldview, and talking from the Christian worldview. If you are not able to do that, then it seams the charts is falsify from the ground up. The green box is NOT a conclusion, it is your opinion. But that is not all, even #5 is not coming from your worldview, for you do believe that there is eternal damnation, and your worldview has no basis for morality. Thus to even talk about the subject, all you are doing is to take the Bible here and there as you see fit. Yet you do so arbitrarily - without any meaningful basis, and force you own atheistic opinion into the Christian conversation. As I have said, you do not have the frame work to talk about the subject. You do not hold to the same worldview. Had you been willing to hold to the Christian worldview consistently for the sake of conversation, I would not have to point this out.
If what I am saying is wrong, point it out. Don't worry. I don't care much about fair. You have made the point very clear here, that these charts are YOUR own opinions of the conversation and not reflecting the real interactions.
If you want to continue the talks. I would love to. Don't think that I am upset with you. These are just needed points to come out.
Peter
@pychen -
Peter,
When I said "MY argument" I meant the first five premises and the first conclusion represents MY argument. That should have been perfectly obvious. I was responding to this of yours: "Any honest person looking at this should be able to pick up the fact that your # 5 is not speaking from the Christian. That is your belief. Not Biblical and not Christian. Yet you stack them together with the Christian views. Why?"
And you even let that part go when you said, "For your view, hell is NOT morally justifiable. I have no problem with that conclusion at all," so what is there to dispute?
Thinking outside of one box doesn't mean directly inside someone else's box. It's like you aren't aware that there is something to debate. Ideas are open source material and any Christian can come along and correct another Christian's theology if in fact they are mistaken. Ideas are just ideas and in fact anyone can come along and critique them. There's no thought club where only members are allowed to think certain thoughts. It doesn't matter who thinks them or why as long as they are consistent with the given premises. And premises 1-4 shouldn't be contentious for any of you. Premise five was born from the original conversation as I just linked to. You didn't think my suggestion there was feasible in your worldview and to the contrary I've shown on this argument map how it is perfectly consistent given the tenets and full spectrum of your worldview to think God is free to mislead people for their spiritual benefit. And I've shown how that could apply if something like premise 5 is correct. Logically we could substitute in any contentious issue for Christianity where it seems the evidence stacks up against what God's opinion is supposed to be. Tons of things are debated heavily in Christian circles, Peter. Don't pretend like any Christian has absolute access to 100% perfect doctrine. That's lying. The bad kind.
If I'm correct, Christians would be ideologically free to suspect that perhaps some Bible teachings really aren't God's opinion after all and that he had a different motive for having them included. All I hear from you and LSP1 is that you are against thinking for yourself as though God can't take it. I've even shown LSP1 where Moses rebukes God based on the opinions of other humans! And God listened! (Exodus 32:11-14) All you seem to want to do is shut your brain off and assume your a priori conclusion no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary even if it's directly from your own source book. Sorry. I can and do think for myself. I'm not a slave to what you only think your doctrine is supposed to be. That doesn't mean you are correct even on your own terms. Don't you think atheists are living inconsistently on their own terms? Don't you feel perfectly free to point that out? See, you believe the exact same things I do about what is acceptable critique and you don't see me senselessly reminding you that you are a Christian and that I am an atheist.
I understand this isn't a conclusion you like, but nonetheless, I've shown how it's feasible and logically consistent with your worldview and how that backfires if you disagree. Even without a premise 5 at all, it really doesn't matter. I've shown how there's no reason to think God couldn't or wouldn't tell humanity less than true things just to get the spiritual job done. LSP1, musterion99, oeshpdog2, and yourself have been unable to counter it successfully in my opinion. I've also shown how all of your extra suggestions for premises are ALREADY ACCOUNTED FOR on the argument map. There's just no reason to clutter things up and that's not an excuse for you to totally jump ship like the entire argument map has absolutely nothing to do with the conversation we've had or your worldview. That's over-reacting.
If you aren't mad, then why didn't you already understand all this?
Ben
@WAR_ON_ERROR - Ben,
Please answer my questions.
Do you hold to the 1-4 premises? Do you believe Jesus is God? Are you claiming to be a Christian?
Christians are able to talk about what the Bible teach, keeping it withing the Bible instead of pushing one's own "atheism" into the verse. I think you are entirely mistaken if you have not realized that you have clearly taken your self out of the conversation. Again, Do you believe that God exist and do you believe the Bible to be the word of God? IF NOT, then you have no frame work that is meaning full to talk about Hell. You are insisting that god can tell lies, and Jesus can tell lies, when you don't believe in god or in Jesus. You don't believe 1-4, and even 5, as I have already explained.
You seem to misunderstand me or just take my words out of context, but you did not respond to this object. Why? Is it that you also agree with my point? You are talking about your own made up god and made up Hell, and not that of Christianity. That seams to be a fact to me. Do you think I am mistaken in saying so?
What you said with LSP1 is what you said to him. I did not follow the conversation. If you want to raise issue with me you may do that. No, I and him would not give the same response. But we both have the same foundational authority, and you reject that authority. If you care to keep talking about the Christian worldview, then hold consistent to the Christian worldview as a Christian would, then try to see if there are any inconsistency.
The Issue I am raising with you is simple. You are distorting the Christian worldview and not holding to it, but have interject your own opinion to override the clear teaching of the text with your atheist assumptions, and or subjective injectures. Let me put it in a way you may understand it. IF I were to say something about Darwinism believes all living animal and humans came from only one cell that happen to developed and reproduce itself in different ways to form all kind of animal and human life that there is on the earth now, then I say how that is false and therefore I have disproved Darwinism; I think any real Darwinist would be able to point out that I have made a straw man of Darwinism and have attacked my own false conjecture of it. Would you agree that to be a foolish way of arguing? I would agree. I tend to let the atheist talk for himself what he believes, then try to see what is wrong with it.
As I have said "you are talking about your own madeup god and madeup Jesus and your own madeup humans and your inability to put your made up view with the thought of hell, and as I said it makes good sense for your madeup world to do without a hell. For your view, hell is NOT morally justifiable. I have no problem with that conclusion at all." Because you are talking about your strawman of Christianity and not real Christianity, I have no problem with your conclusion. In fact I expect it, and agree with you in rejecting your hell as immoral, and your made up god is a liar. I agree with your conclusion. I have no problem in thinking with you in your worldview, as I have no problem thinking with you in my worldview, as long as you are holding to it consistently, instead of arbitrarily. All kind of people think, but it is another issue to think soundly and rightly. But again, here you talk about thinking, as if you are able to account for the laws of logic, still not yet. It is the Christian who is able to think and also account for thinking logically.
The former conversations were said under the assumption that you were going to talk from the Christian frame work, and there was non for these false premises in the conversation. Now you clearly are saying that you are not trying to talk from the Christian framework and therefore, I do insist on removing my scream name and comments from your chart. You are taking my words out of context by putting them in a false context from the conversation.
Peter
@pychen - @WAR_ON_ERROR - I can see where both of you are coming from. Peter, Ben is basing his premises on his belief that God lied or mislead Abraham when he told him to sacrifice Isaac. Even though we don't agree with Ben's conclusions, our arguments against what he's saying, are still on the map. I don't think you should remove them. I think people should be able to read what you said. But if you feel you want them removed, that's up to you.
All I hear from you and LSP1 is that you are
against thinking for yourself as though God can't take it. I've even
shown LSP1 where Moses rebukes God based on the opinions of other
humans! And God listened! (Exodus 32:11-14)
Ben, I think you're mistaken. I don't recall ever discussing those verses with you. I do remember telling you that we can think for ourselves, but if it accuses God of unrighteousness or clearly contradicts scripture, then we should trust God. As for those verses, rebuke is a strong word. It doesn't say Moses rebuked God. Yes, he gave his opinion and God listened to Moses advice. This is where Peter and I might not totally agree. How I look at that is that God foreknew that he would listen to Moses. God can allow this and in his sovereignty still work things out according to his will. I like the analogy of playing chess. If a Grandmaster (representing God) plays a novice (us) in a chess game, he allows the novice the freewill to make any move he wants, but in the end, the Grandmaster will always win (God's will is always done).
@pychen - I'll answer your questions because you think they need to be answered.
'Do you hold to the 1-4 premises?"
I held to premises 1-4 on the argument map. Off the argument map, I believe Christianity is epistemically weak on all significant fronts (contra premise 1), I believe the argument from evil against the existence of an all powerful all knowing benevolent creator God is valid (contra premise 2), I believe that if Jesus existed that he wasn't God (contra premise 3), and I do believe the character Jesus in the gospels teaches eternal damnation and expects us to believe it is really going to happen (premise 4).
"Do you believe Jesus is God?"
No.
"Are you claiming to be a Christian?"
Nope.
"Again, Do you believe that God exist and do you believe the Bible to be the word of God?"
Nope and nope.
"You seem to misunderstand me or just take my words out of context, but you did not respond to this object. Why?"
I understand you perfectly loud and clear and flatly disagree. You don't understand how anyone can understand you and not also agree with your point of view. That's the problem.
"Is it that you also agree with my point?"
Nope.
"You are talking about your own made up god and made up Hell, and not that of Christianity. That seams to be a fact to me. Do you think I am mistaken in saying so?"
Yes, I believe that you are mistaken as the argument map already demonstrates. All the verses I am basing my position off of on the argument map come right from your Bible. If the Christian worldview also owns the ontological copy rights to coherent thought, then certainly all of that I've demonstrated is completely consistent with your worldview as well. ;)
"IF I were to say something about Darwinism believes all living animal and humans came from only one cell that happen to developed and reproduce itself in different ways to form all kind of animal and human life that there is on the earth now, then I say how that is false and therefore I have disproved Darwinism; I think any real Darwinist would be able to point out that I have made a straw man of Darwinism and have attacked my own false conjecture of it. Would you agree that to be a foolish way of arguing?"
I don't even understand what you are saying to know how to respond. I'm just going to imagine the standard caricatures that theistic philosophers like Plantinga make of how natural selection would and wouldn't work and agree those are quite foolish ways of arguing. Now, if only you were correct that I'm making a straw man out of Christian doctrine, that would be one thing, but for you to just assert that your doctrinal views account for everything already is to pretend like there is no debate at all as I've already said. All you are doing by saying the Bible clearly agrees with you is asserting your conclusion since I've clearly shown how the Bible has more to say on the subject that you would prefer to allow. That's not a fair conversation or debate by a long shot. The proper course of action is to show me how my arguments are mistaken on the argument map. It appears you are unable to do that since you've taken the discussion here instead of there. Taking all your arguments off the argument map is basically forfeiting (if anyone is even keeping "score").
I answered all your questions, Peter. If you would like to contribute a non-conclusion asserting rebuttal to the argument map, I would be happy to comply. I will be getting back to you on logic, morality, and eternal damnation as time permits.
Ben