Just_A_Guy

Well, she did watch him grow up . . .

I did not say you have dishonestly represented my position; I said you have "misrepresented" my position and that it "comes off" as dishonest. See my Post #61. It was intended as a semi-friendly warning, not an accusation. My apologies if it came off wrong. But the fact is, it is misleading to say that I'm forcing you to prove that killing babies is bad; because I have said (repeatedly) that your burden is much more limited. I have already agreed with you that it is bad for humans, of themselves, to take it upon themselves to end life. See my Post #36. Your burden is only to show that it is inherently wrong for God to end an innocent life. Appeal to Emotion (Repeated use of loaded terms, notably "baby" and "killing".)Appeal to Common Practice/Popularity ([Paraphrasing here]: "The common practice of the Church is to not allow such behavior/other people would despise anyone who engaged in it; therefore God would never do it.")Begging the Question ([Paraphrasing again:] "It's wrong for God to kill innocents. How do I know this? Because killing innocents is wrong!")Guilt by Association ([subtle implication]: "Rapists, looters, and murderers think like you do!")Hasty Generalization/Straw Man (Your repeated over-simplification of my position, as explained earlier in this post.)Such antics, in and of themselves, don't make your point incorrect because they are logical fallacies and your argument is not a logical one (indeed, one might reasonably infer that you yourself conceded in your Post #38 that your argument is emotionally based; though if you think I'm misinterpreting you I'm sure you'll correct me). But they do reinforce--quite clearly--the logical bankruptcy of your arguments thus far. You are welcome to provide quotes--or a link to a post--where I made a material claim I have not since supported. But I'd really appreciate it if you'd first lay a proper foundation for your assertion that it is immoral for God to end the life of one of His creations even though we may deem that life "innocent". It's not in discussion (currently) because you don't want it to be in discussion, and you try to change the subject. But it's the elephant in the room. The simple fact is, if you want to rewrite the scriptures because they allegedly impute immoral behavior to God, you have to demonstrate that the behavior is in fact immoral. This, you have utterly failed--even refused--to do. That was not my argument. Please try reading it again in context. I don't recall you addressing the topic after I responded to your "correction", in Post #40, as follows: It was an attempt to make you see how completely you've abandoned those virtues--logic and reason--you purport to hold in such esteem. No, I didn't. Look it up--Post #51. I said, On your demand for evidence I referred to 1 Nephi Chapter 4 and 3 Nephi Chapter 9. However, on a closer review of the post I see that, before throwing the question back at me, you changed my original verbiage from Post 51 into the following: I probably should have caught that and responded accordingly, but I did not. I frankly still don't think it's a material difference; but if you do then I can only extend my apologies. Of course. If we're trying to determine whether the Book of Mormon relates a particular event and its authors attitudes towards that event, "facts" are Snow's abstract, emotion-based arguments about the character of God in conjunction with Snow's wholly unsubstantiated interpretation of the code of morality that binds Beings like God. "Dogma", by contrast, is what we call Just_A_Guy's insane attempts to actually look at the text of the document. :)

This is awesome.

Except that those statistics were based on the President's numbers--which were presented as "proof" that we had to "Do Something". We "Did Something", all right: Are we happy now? Was it worth it?

The fact that you refuse to quote me in full--just make misleading paraphrases of my position--comes off as pretty dishonest. Why on earth would I complain to the moderators? I have not, and don't intend to. I'm perfectly comfortable letting the readers of this forum judge your ad hominems and logical fallacies--in all their glory--for themselves. The question of what limitations exist on God's authority is the subject. When faced with a serious discussion about divine law, all you seem to be able to do is repeat your "baby killer" mantra--which has no basis in anything except your own emotions. And then, as icing on the cake, you run to other threads and condemn all those other rubes in Sacrament Meeting whose emotions and "dogma" lead them to believe that they can "know" God exists, or that He routinely answers prayers--when you yourself are demanding the right to rewrite scripture based on the exact same bases. I said they "approvingly record" God's killing people "or ordering their deaths", which I think I have more than adequately shown to anyone who is willing to accept the text of scripture as evidence. But then, I should have remembered that you are not such an individual. My bad.

And we're back to that pesky burden-of-proof issue. As long as you're trying to rewrite scripture, the burden of proof still lies with you. This is interesting, and I think worth discussing more. Why is life sacred, would you say? What implications does this sacredness have? Does anyone have the prerogative to take life? If so, who; and under what circumstances? Nephi--in spite of great personal misgivings--accepted the idea of God ordering killings (see 1 Nephi 4). If Mormon objected to God's destroying entire cities (3 Nephi 9), he passed up a prize opportunity to express his objections (unless, as Maxel has said, you want to make the case that those cities contained no children). Are you arguing that it wouldn't be "immoral" for me, of my own accord, to burn, bury, or sink a city (or sixteen cities)?

Speaks for itself, I think.

I don't think LDS doctrine teaches that God and Jesus live in a sort of perpetual mind-meld. But that's beside the point. Your parsing out the "God Jesus" from the "Man Jesus" pretty much leaves the underlying point of my post #37 (which is the basis for this line of discussion) intact: a father sacrifices the life of one innocent offspring (who, at least in one phase of the trinitarian multiple-personality-disorder you attribute to Jesus, has a separate will that must be consciously bent to the parent's) for the benefit of a culpable offspring. Wholly unethical for a mortal to do; yet God the Father did it. I freely admitted that my own view (that a fully informed individual might well prefer the afterlife to this life, which is more or less what Joseph Smith taught as well) was speculation. But so is yours. If you want me to go along with your revision of scripture (and the underlying principle that if any portion of scripture challenges my conception of God, it is the scripture and not me who must change); it had better be based on something much stronger than "well, I love this telestial earth, and so must everyone else!" Other than repeating the loaded terms "baby" and "killing" in the same sentence ad infinitum, do you have any substantive arguments supporting the arguments I posed earlier, viz. "a) that there's a universal standard of morality that is equally applicable to men (in all dispensations of time) as well as gods; and b) that under the aforementioned standard, there are no justifiable reasons for taking innocent life"? And what do you make of the fact that the authors of the Book of Mormon, the Pearl of Great Price, the New Testament., and of the Doctrine and Covenants all approvingly record (or cite to other references of) God's killing people, or ordering their deaths? If something's true, then it isn't my fault that someone else chooses to pervert it for their own ends.

They are unified because Jesus chose to submit His will to the Father. Doesn't mean Jesus didn't have his own desires, thoughts, feelings . . . He just recognized the Father's supremacy. Consider Jesus' prayer in Gethsemane that the "cup" be taken from Him (or have I stumbled upon yet another part of the Bible you don't accept?). Er . . . what I originally wrote was and I later said that to assert otherwise was also speculation. And I stand by that. Imagine--a fully-informed being implicitly trusting his Father in Heaven!

All that Christ did, He did at the behest of His Father. Except that your position appears based on the *speculation* that they did not (and/or would not) consent.

Oh, I see it; if by "insanity" you mean "foolishness". And to be honest, I'm not all that bothered by it. :) Exhibit A: The Atonement (as I've been continually harping on). Exhibit B: AIDS babies. Shall I go on? Nice try. But no; I have no intention of taking the argument that far. I'm just pointing out that your attempt to rewrite scripture is based on a moral code to which you can't even demonstrate God adheres. Sophistry. You're taking something that was approved and accepted by the body of the Church, and making a calculated attempt to change the meaning thereof. Why? As far as I can tell, solely because you have independently concluded that you know the character of God better than did the person whose writings the Church chose to embrace as canon. As do I. Then I suspect you're in for a lot of disappointment, because the simple fact is that you aren't a god (yet!).

Snow, you're a sharp guy. I think you already understand this; but let me spell it out for you. Sometime back, you implied that someone who acted as stated in some scriptures with regard to children would: (note: I'm now incorporating your own quote to make my point) Well, if I sent an innocent child to his/her death in order to spare a culpable one, do you think for a moment that I wouldn't a) have my temple recommend yanked; b) be excommunicated; c) go to jail; and d) be despised and reviled? Our ethics say that yes, I should be. Yet God the Father found it perfectly acceptable to do this to His own Son. And to my knowledge, no code of ethics condemns Him for it. You state that Christ gave Himself freely. Yet, in the pre-existence, so did we all. Was Jesus' antemortal decision to sacrifice Himself somehow more "valid" than our own antemortal decisions to subject ourselves to whatever might transpire during our mortal probation? Yes, there's the issue that Christ consented to His fate in this life as well. But then, He had a lot more first-hand knowledge than we enjoy. Who's to say that any child (or even an adult) having the same degree of knowledge of the Plan of Salvation as Christ did at the time of His sacrifice, wouldn't gladly consent to the Father's taking his life if the Father deemed it expedient to do so?

I've gone over the rest of your post. I think most of your concerns would be alleviated by just re-reading what I posted. I would, however, like to respond to the following: Scary, isn't it? But it is demonstrably true that God the Father has demonstrably done things that it would not be considered acceptable for a mortal to do--the sacrifice of His innocent Son being the paramount example. Snow, such an obvious appeal to emotion is not like you. But I will concede that man, deciding of himself to kill babies and acting on that decision is bad. To get back to your point, though: the simple truth is that you are the one trying to rewrite scripture; you are the one making (hitherto) dogmatic claims that God is bound to the same code of behavior that applies to us; and so you do bear the burden of proof. The right to question sacred cows is not yours alone.

Snow, I'd appreciate it if you read my post in full rather than just knee-jerk disagreeing or nit-picking at everything I said. Had you read the quoted section, you'd see I was incorporating your own words into my point. I'll respond further after I've had time to digest the remainder of your post.

It means what it says. Anyone who sent one of his innocent offspring to his death in order to spare other offspring who are more culpable would most likely So, by your own criteria, an atonement would be against God's established rules and we may safely disregard any scripture that mentions such a heretical event. Right? We are also told, by those same scriptures and prophets, that all creation belongs to God and that He exercises, to a greater or lesser degree, control over life and death. We can either make a serious effort to reconcile all of these statements--perhaps by allowing for the vast difference between ours and God's powers, responsibilities, and prerogatives--or we can simply disregard the scriptures and prophets who disagree with our own worldviews. You'd first have to establish a) that there's a universal standard of morality that is equally applicable to men (in all dispensations of time) as well as gods; and b) that under the aforementioned standard, there are no justifiable reasons for taking innocent life. I haven't seen you establish either. Until you do, I see the whole thing as boiling down to a matter of "I can administer My own property; and you--not being My duly appointed agent in this matter--cannot."

You mean, knowingly and intentionally send one Child to an excruciatingly painful death in order to save the other children from the consequences of their own stupid decisions? Somehow, I don't think God plays by our rules.

And so help me, if I have to pull this discussion thread over you two are walking all the way home!

Oh, the irony . . . (it's "Quayle"). You've been slacking off on your Michael Moore viewership. Where was President Bush the morning of 9/11?

A Doctor's Plan for Legal Industry Reform. Don't worry. If you like your current law firm, I promise you get to keep it.

Mmmm . . . cream cheese . . .

What, you haven't seen MOE's avatar lately?

I think I can diagnose your problem. Wait 'til you start studying for the bar! :) Seriously--there's been some good advice here, and I hope you take it. Also, have you talked to your dean of students? At my law school, the dean of students would bend over backwards to make sure the students' needs were being met. He/she may be able to put you in touch with some additional health care resources. Good luck.

Of course, I was amused by the following from the above-cited website: HA! How quickly we forget the webcasts of the inauguration.

As I understand it, though, the Catholic Tolkien was quite disappointed that Lewis chose Anglicanism. I seem to recall Tolkien complaining that Anglicanism was a "sorry impersonation of the Mother Church", or something to that effect. Can't win 'em all, I guess. :)

Am I the only one who thinks this is getting blown out of proportion? It's the president, not a porn star. Why is he such a danger to our kids? If he were going to get up there and spout liberal rhetoric, that'd be one thing. But I don't see any credible evidence that this is going to be anything other than a (sorely needed) "get off your duffs and go to work" speech. What am I missing? Can someone point to specific passages of the current instructional supplements to the speech that they find objectionable?