Disqualified From The Prize Of Salvation

There is a very specific point Paul promotes in 1 Corinthians 9 when comparing the persistence necessary for a Christian to receive their crown that lasts forever, whether a literal crown is given only to those with eternal life or eternal life is figuratively the crown.  That point is not that Christians have to outperform each other as athletes do because "slots" for salvation are not as plentiful as the people who seek them.  Not at all!  Rather, Paul uses the extreme dedication of a certain kind of athlete, who practices intently and relentlessly in order to win a prize, as a valid analogy for the dedication of the Christian, who must remain steadfast to the point of not disqualifying themself from the race.  The prize lasts forever, Paul says, so in some way it has to do with the eternal life that the righteous and repent are to taste, but the apostle is stark about how he does not want to forfeit his prize.

1 Corinthians 9:24-27—"Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize?  Run in such a way as to get the prize.  Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training.  They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.  Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight fight like a boxer beating the air.  No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."

The above passage is one of several (such as 1 Corinthians 15:2, Galatians 6:8-9, 1 Timothy 4:16, and 2 Timothy 4:7) where Paul is not indirect about saying or very strongly implying, in one way or another, that Christians can lose their salvation, their means of receiving eternal life.  It is neither logically impossible nor Biblically false for someone to live in dedication to God with all of what that actually entails and then blunder so as to become "disqualified", unless he or she repents.  Actually, with how often Paul deals with this issue alongside Christ's own instances of addressing the issue (including in Matthew 6:15 and 10:33), it would be difficult to read through the New Testament and ignore applicable verses unless someone is trying to sidestep or misinterpret them.  We must run in such a way as to actually get the prize, or as Paul similarly puts it in 2 Timothy 4:7, we must finish the race.  Disqualification from salvation is dreadfully a part of New Testament theology.

Lack of ongoing investment is catastrophic for one's moral standing and relationship with God; ceasing to care about truth (not even for pure reason's sake) and maintaining apathy after casual ethical failures absolutely can squander salvation.  While life, and in the ultimate sense eternal life in the bliss of New Jerusalem, is never truly beyond the reach of any wicked being that still lives and thus can repent, refusal to submit to the truth is not automatically overlooked by divine mercy.  So many people seem to almost rejoice in the illogical and unbiblical, hence heretical, idea that they are "saved" regardless of their philosophical alignment and moral character that they do not even entertain the possibility that they have only assumed this idea is true because of its obvious personal convenience.

The salvation of Yahweh and Christ from sin and its just punishment of death with no restoration to life (Romans 6:23) for all of eternity is not secured by insincere or misguided thoughts or prayers of self-interest by those who make assumptions, including those which favor their immutable salvation no matter what they do, assumptions driven by cultural conditioning or subjective allure.  Such uncommitted, delusional people could easily hear Christ's words after the resurrection: "I never knew you.  Away from me, you evildoers!" (Matthew 7:23).

But more than some people unexpectedly finding themselves cut off from God and Christ through the second death (which really is death and not endless torture), people who genuinely were rational, righteous, and committed to God and his Son (they are not the same entities!) can falter in any of these qualities.  With flagrant, unresolved faltering comes the risk of someone losing salvation and not caring enough to rectify their standing by continuing in unrepentance, whether neglectfully or with aggressive intention.  They can be denied the "crown" of eternal life they so diligently pursued up to a point because they disqualified themself.

Still, even a relevant passage with a very dire warning about how past righteousness will not exempt someone from death for later sins in Ezekiel 33 points to a basis for hope for someone who is wicked, even if they were formerly perfect in their ethical conduct.  Just as the righteous person who errs is now wicked (33:12a, 12c, 13, 18), and if their wickedness is severe enough, God might bring about their death, the inverse is affirmed.  The wicked person who becomes righteous is now restored or perhaps for the first time on the course to life (33:12b, 14-16, 19), with the greatest scale of such principles being that of eternal life and eternal death.  The optimistic side of this does not affect how anyone can step away from their righteousness or their salvation by unrepentant sin, excluding themselves from what would have otherwise been theirs.

Pain And The Present Moment

The present moment is the only time in which one can actively reflect, and by the time one has focused on the present moment, it has already given way to a new moment.  This makes it the only time in which one can suffer, or feel joy, or experience peace.  There is no other time in which one can feel happiness or dread or despair.  Even for people who have not realized such things, or who have thought about them only on the basis of making assumptions rather than looking to reason's necessary truths and absolute certainty, it remains true that pain is so difficult in part precisely because one is in the midst of it as long as it persists.  Any future moment where one will be free of it or in less turmoil is still future.

Of course, one's experience is always of one present moment being replaced by another, so any lifetime up to any hypothetically enormous length is not the prolonged experience of one single moment.  It is the experience of a chain of moments, the only one to be "here" at a given point being whichever is present.  Presentism is false.  There by logical necessity could not be only the present moment because, even if all a being's memories are illusory because they were created in the very moment they are perceiving with misleading memory evidences (an entirely possible but unverifiable thing), that present moment has already gone to the past in the same duration it takes to shift their focus to it.

A person does not escape anything more than the moments that were once the present, though.  Mental states like emotions can certainly last from moment to moment.  To even maintain concentration regarding anything requires that some sort of mental state has not dissipated or changed entirely across time.  As long as one exists in time, the very continuation of one's existence means another once-future moment—if a moment was going to elapse, it was always true that it was going to be so—has reached the present and one has experience within this.  This is why it is possible for people to feel trapped or overwhelmed across great periods of time: individual moments come and go and yet their suffering still exists as a mental experience.

To focus on the present is to concentrate on what is incredibly fleeting.  All the same, it is the only way to fully face one's own mind in active introspection rather than passive experience.  The present is the only time one can actually experience trials in, for any past times one has suffered in were once present and any times one will eventually suffer in have not yet arrived.  In the present, however, there is no immediate partaking in the hopeful relief to come.  There is the pain directly at hand.  If suffering seems like it will come to an end at some point, enduring the "right now" can be personally desirable, subjectively fulfilling, even.  It is when the pain seems constantly unrelenting or lesser than the relief or joy of the future (which cannot be known to await one since the future has not happened yet) that extreme despair might set in.

Following Justice Alone

Like in the time of the Judges and other points in Biblical narratives, many who identify as followers of the Judeo-Christian deity today either disregard Yahweh's commands or think they are unjust (Ezekiel 18:25, 29).  This wholly depends on whether or not Christianity is true rather than any subjective conscience or pathetic social consensus, which are irrelevant to dictating moral metaphysics or epistemologically revealing it altogether.  As if this would not already be true by logical necessity if morality exists, by virtue of what justice is (what should be done in accordance with what someone deserves), the Torah affirms that justice is to be unflinchingly pursued—Deuteronomy 16:20 says to follow justice and justice alone.  What are some of the qualities or expressions of justice according to the Torah?

It would involve never punishing someone on the testimony of only one witness (Numbers 35:30, Deuteronomy 17:6, 19:15), never going further than the prescribed limitations of punitive justice into oppression and especially when it comes to physical torture (Deuteronomy 25:1-3, 11-12, and more), never punishing an innocent person as if they are guilty (Exodus 23:1, 7), never siding with someone on the basis of socio-economic class (Exodus 23:3, 6, Leviticus 19:15), never discriminating against male and female perpetrators or victims (Exodus 21:26-32 and Numbers 5:5-7, among many other relevant verses [1]), never mistreating foreigners or giving them harsher or lighter sentences (Exodus 23:9, Leviticus 19:33-34, 24:22, and more), and so on.

Another criterion would be not seeking monetary gain through a bribe in a legal context, something condemned in both Exodus 23:8 and Deuteronomy 16:19.  Bribery to, say, accelerate a nonsinful business transaction or accomplish some other permissible goal unrelated to the administration of justice is not immoral by extension of this because it is only bribery with illicit objectives that is prohibited.  The entire reason for bribery being sinful when used in this way would not apply to all expressions of or motivations for bribery.  The exact penalties of Mosaic Law or what logically follows from them in a circumstance not directly addressed by the Torah [2] are what we are to follow without allowing bribes to dissuade us.

It is true that while all of these aforementioned things are tenets of Biblical justice, it is impossible for justice to be adhered to without also adhering to or pursuing other things.  The phrase "justice alone" is about justice as opposed to injustice.  One would have to "follow" (align with) reason to follow justice or else one is just making assumptions or doing as one pleases, which is irrationalistic if morality exists since it entails what one should do no matter what one finds desirable or subjectively persuasive.  More importantly, logical axioms are true by self-necessity (their falsity still would require their veracity), so neither God nor justice or anything else could be ungoverned by them; nothing is true or knowable apart from reason, including what the Bible says about justice.  

There could also be no morality without the uncaused cause having a moral nature, so in this sense as well, it is logically impossible to follow justice alone without regard for anything else since justice already depends on other things.  One would be obligated to follow justice alone in the sense of not diluting truly deserved (not socially constructed or personally appealing) criminal penalties for emotionalism or personal gain, such with the type of bribery condemned in Deuteronomy 16.  Altering just punishments so that they under-punish or treat someone cruelly, ignoring Biblically criminal offenders out of convenience or disinterest, or punishing people even with the right penalty when there is insufficient evidence against them, among other things, are the injustices to be shunned and abhorred.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2023/10/deuteronomy-2213-21-part-two.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2023/12/what-logically-follows-from-biblical.html

Psalm 119 On Yahweh's Torah Laws

If those who walk according to the laws of God are blameless, as Psalm 119:1-3 says, there cannot be any moral blemishes in those laws.  In agreement with what Paul, the alleged antinomian, explicitly affirms in the New Testament (Romans 7:7, 12, 1 Timothy 1:8-11), Psalm 119:7 and 75 say that Yahweh's laws are righteous.  This is not the only Psalm to articulate such things.  Psalm 1:1-2 contrasts obeying Yahweh's laws with acting wickedly, as 1 John 3:4 does, and it presents meditating on God's law—that is, the Torah's Mosaic Law—as righteous.  In fact, Deuteronomy 6:6-7 prescribes talking about the tenets and justice of Mosaic Law at different times of day as one goes about life.  After all, if there is something morally obligatory, it is what should be done, and if it should be done, it should be reflected on rationally (free of philosophical errors) as well as holistically committed to.  This includes the penalties the Biblical God reveals as just.  What is now called Mosaic Law is said to be from God, not Moses (Exodus 20:22, 21:1, Numbers 6:1, and more).

It is not as if the New Testament actually says anything contrary to any of this; verses like 1 John 3:4 are as unambiguous as they can be that violating the Torah's laws is sin.  None of this changes because time has passed or Jesus was born, died, and ascended.  It is not slavery that is Biblically evil, therefore, but slavery based on kidnapping (Exodus 21:16), or the physical abuse of slaves (Exodus 21:26-27), and so on.  There is no such thing as slavery, among other things, in the form codified in the Bible (such as in Exodus 23:12 and Deuteronomy 15:12-18) being evil on Christian philosophy.  It cannot possibly be the case for capital punishment to be unjust as far as the methods and instances Yahweh prescribes if Christianity is true.  To punish differently or not punish at all is what would be unjust, because justice is enacted by obeying God's commands.  I have seen people quote Psalm 119:105 on how God's word is a lamp for their feet and a light for their path, all while probably having no idea that the author of Psalm 119 would be shocked or infuriated at their stances on criminal justice, moral epistemology, and the nature of the so-called Old Testament deity.

Would these imbecilic, philosophically delusional pseudo-Christians ever say something like "The law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold" (Psalm 119:72)?  How about "Oh, how I love your law!  I meditate on it all day long" (119:97) or "I hate double-minded people, but I love your law" (119:113)?  No, not with any sincerity, or else they could not believe or profess such Biblically heretical ideas.  They might, however, think that according to the New Testament God's law is evil (directly denied by verses like Deuteronomy 4:5-8, Ezekiel 33:17, 20, Hebrews 2:2, and James 1:13), that God changed his moral nature (directly denied by Malachi 3:6, James 1:17), that loving people is a "new" command contrary to what Mosaic Law already requires (directly denied by Leviticus 19:18, Deuteronomy 6:4-5, 10:19, and Matthew 22:34-40), that sin and justice for sin are culturally relativistic (directly denied by Leviticus 18:1-5, 24-30, 20:22-23, Deuteronomy 4:5-8, etc.), or that Jesus and Paul condemned Mosaic Law (directly denied by the likes of Matthew 5:17-19 and Galatians 5:13-14).

Ironically, such fools might think that the "Great Commission" of Matthew 28:16-20, though given only to the apostles who saw Christ after his resurrection is for all people/Christians to fulfill, or that Paul's letters to individual churches contain nothing but universal moral demands (even where this would contradict what the Old Testament says comes from God), but that God revealing what is and is not sin to the Israelites would somehow mean that the same things are not also good or evil for people of other regions or cultures.  Now, God's revealed obligations for Israel would only be righteous and obligatory if what he is prescribing really is morally mandatory independent of time and culture, save for that which is by necessity limited to context, such as the regulations tied to an active Levitical priesthood.  Of course, Jesus pushes back against the misconception that he in any way came to abolish the Torah's laws in Matthew 5:17-19 and goes so far as to say that anyone who teaches others to break the most relatively trivial commandments will be least in the kingdom of heaven.  Elsewhere, he firmly or even fiercely condemns people setting aside God's commands for subjective preferences and human traditions (Matthew 15:1-20, 23:1-3, 23-24, Mark 7:1-13).

Aside from the Bible, it is logically impossible for God to be evil as opposed to amoral or terrifying but still good (only the divine nature could ground morality rather than irrelevant moral feelings/preferences or petty social norms), for cultural relativism to be true, and so on.  The Bible is consistent with these necessary truths, yes, but neither the independent truths of reason (independent of God as necessary truths [1]) nor the doctrines of the Bible as literally put forth are heeded by antinomians who think themselves committed Christians.  If murder is wrong because people are made in the image of God (Genesis 9:6; 1:26-27, 5:1-2), and the image of God is not removed from humanity after Christ, then this would not be altered by time, geography, or culture.  Few of them might deny this exact ramification, but the same would have to be true of all other interpersonal obligations (such as those of Exodus 21:15-36 after those of the murder passage in 21:12-14), including those concerning how to punish particular sinners in this life, because they are also about how to rightly treat people made in the image of a God who does not change.  Psalm 119 acknowledges Yahweh's Torah laws as righteous because they come from God, who is righteous, emphasizing that they are true and good not be because of time and place but because this is their very nature.  If Christianity is true, all of this is the case, whether someone likes it or not.  How unlike the irrationalistic and unbiblical philosophy of many who identify as Christians in America!

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2023/07/god-and-empty-space.html

Thinking About Work On The Sabbath

It might seem like something expected from a specific kind of Christian who overemphasizes or distorts Matthew 5 with its attention on inward attitudes or intentions behind acts of sin: the idea that it is evil to as much as think about work on the Sabbath.  But I have instead seen this idea largely promoted by adherents of Rabbinic Judaism, which, like evangelicalism and other irrationalistic and heretical "versions" of Christianity, contains extensive and severe deviations from reason and Old Testament doctrines.

Contrary to some mere social constructs of tradition, not even the Old Testament forbids all physical activity on the Sabbath, only unnecessary labor, particularly of a physical or professional kind (Exodus 34:21) [1].  People are not ethically required, among other things, to starve, forgo urgent medical treatment, sit in place all day, or, as some religious Jews also arbitrarily think, to not use electronics.  But the issue at hand is if there is a mental requirement to not even think about work during the Sabbath in addition to keeping oneself from certain acts of work.

Even the most elaborate verses addressing the moral duty to rest on the Sabbath (Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15) do not say that it is wicked to remember or anticipate work, including the previous day's labor or tasks that will need attention right after the Sabbath.  Nor do these verses say to not think about the concept of work on the day of rest, whether as something governed by logic as all things are or as the concept relates to Judeo-Christian philosophy, as with the Sabbath obligation itself.  In fact, not thinking about work whatsoever could backfire in a far worse way than contemplating or recalling work, though such thoughts would be evil in themselves if they were immoral and not because someone might be tempted to commit an outward behavior that does objectively violate the Sabbath.

How else could someone keep the objective logical distinction between (unnecessary) labor and rest in mind unless one is indirectly thinking about work and abstinence from it?  And without focusing on this distinction to some extent, one would only be resting in a haphazard, perilous manner.  One could accidentally perform some illicit action on the Sabbath simply because one forgot to even think about the concept of work or about particular types of labor one does or needs to do, either on a regular basis or in that particular month!  This is vastly different from careless or intentional Sabbath violation, of course.  Yet, not even thinking about work could ironically lead to improperly working on the Sabbath.

I again emphasize that not thinking about work (such as just remembering something to do the next day) is not part of the command to have a day of rest for every six days of work (not even by logical extension).  Also, not thinking about work at any level on the Sabbath could easily result in exactly the very thing the legalist hopes to avert.  Now, if, after thinking about some pressing activity that needs to be done the day after, someone began engaging in some sort of gratuitous professional or physical labor to get ahead of the next day's tasks, this would absolutely violate the Sabbath obligation.  Remembering work that must be handled the following day, especially work necessary for health and survival, is not sinful at all.

If it was evil to think about "work" on one's required day of rest, at least when the thought is within one's power to cast from one's mind (truly involuntary thoughts can never be evil!), it would be evil to allow oneself to think about any labor forbidden for that day.  But this is neither the content of the Biblical obligation nor a logical ramification of it.  Focusing on the difference between work and rest can actually deepen one's appreciation for Sabbath rest and the special opportunity it poses for everything from relaxed introspection to unhindered prayer.  Weekly, intentional celebration of rest can be all the more liberating because one does not forget about the philosophical nature of work and the specific work that is part of one's own life.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/09/a-sabbath-walk.html

Bias, The Most Severe Type Of Assumption

Along with the fact that logic cannot be false without still being true (this is the case with a handful of specific, separate logical axioms) and that their own consciousness exists and grasps these truths, the fact that making assumptions is always irrational and unwarranted, since this one way or another involves belief for a reason other than genuine proof, is one of the very first things a new rationalist would realize.  Everyone who is not a rationalist makes some kind of assumption, as they necessarily do not know that/why reason is true in itself—and it is impossible to consciously exist and think without believing something.  Even someone who thinks they have no beliefs would have to believe this by regarding it as correct.  But not all types of assumptions, separate from the ideas themselves, are equally irrational.

Bias is more severe than a casual assumption: a persistently biased person would hold to their assumption or worldview even if someone else points out that it by logical necessity must be false or when evidence mounts that it is not true (of course, there is no excuse for conflating logic and evidence or for waiting for others to point out strictly logical facts, since they are true by necessity and thus immediately knowable and accessible).  In other words, being biased entails more than simply making an assumption.  Having a bias means making an assumption or acting as if something is true just because one wants to do so or sincerely believes a given thing basically no matter what.

Someone making an assumption with a lesser degree of commitment is irrational, including the person who assumes something without any emotionalistic passion, but at least they are not necessarily holding to it with such stubbornness or ferocity that they would not relinquish the belief for any reason.  Making any assumption is stupid, no matter the issue.  Still, embracing or maintaining a bias is an even more egregious form of irrationality than casually assuming the very same thing.

When certain people admit they are biased with laughter or fierceness, they are only compounding their stupidity.  Treating their philosophical delusions as comedic does not make them so, and no amount of sincerity or conviction will ever legitimize making an assumption about the slightest matter—even if the thing assumed is both true and demonstrable.  The problem is that, regardless of whether an idea is correct or verifiable, the concept is believed on the basis of something, whatever it is, besides sheer logical necessity and the absolute certainty it alone allows for.  There are no exceptions.

The rectification of bias or any kind of assumption can only be done by letting go of any unproven [1] or unprovable idea, recognizing that necessary truths start with logical axioms, and intentionally forgoing any assumption in favor of rationalistic confirmation.  This process of philosophical rectification might be very painful, so it is easier in a sense for a non-rationalist to remain in the total ignorance of believing a worldview based on assumptions (though the ideas assumed might be true), familiarity, and their own persuasion in the moment.  There is still never a justification for remaining unaware of logical axioms and in the grip of assumptions, which is always entirely voluntary and avoidable.

[1].  This means that the individual has not properly looked to reason to discover the proof, not that no one else has realized why the idea is logically true or that relevant logical facts are not already objectively true.

Theft And The Withholding Of Wages

There are many miscellaneous commands in Leviticus 19 about everything from honoring one's father and mother (19:3) to not taking advantage of the disabled (19:14) to not eating meat with blood (19:26).  Amidst these are a handful of commands that restate or are related to the Ten Commandments.  The Ten Commandments do not prohibit all lying, only the giving of false testimony (Exodus 20:16, Deuteronomy 5:20); it is only Leviticus 19:11 that outright condemns general lying, despite how it is permissible and even righteous to lie in order to prevent someone else from succeeding in an even more wicked act like murder (see Exodus 2 and Joshua 2 with James 2:25).  Some Biblical commands that might appear like sheer gratuitous repetition in the text, which itself would not logically necessitate anything more than that there is repetition (such as that they are the product of multiple scribes across centuries with no divine prompting/inspiration), are actually not.

However, when Leviticus 19:11 says not to steal, this is indeed a direct restatement of something Yahweh has already prescribed against in Exodus in Exodus 20, with a great part of Exodus 22 detailing the just response to various forms of theft or destruction of another's property due to negligence (see also Leviticus 6:1-5 and Numbers 5:5-8).  Why would God, if the Torah is indeed an account of divine revelation to the Israelites, randomly emphasize this again?  It is shortly after Leviticus 19:11 that a verse condemns defrauding and robbing people in particular, subcategories of theft having to do with deception and threats of violence respectively, along with another kind of mistreatment:

Leviticus 19:13—"'"Do not defraud or rob your neighbor.  Do not hold back the wages of a hired worker overnight."'"

Though they could be presented as similar but distinct forms of injustice, Leviticus 19:13 does suggest that to pay a worker as late as after the next night is theft.  Deuteronomy 24:14-15 later clarifies that the wages must be paid before sunset in particular.  Holding back the payment until half the night has passed would not be withholding compensation overnight, but it would still be waiting until after sunset.  Yes, paying them three days or two weeks later does not entail permanently withholding wages from them.  The workers affected nevertheless have already labored to earn their pay and might need money immediately.  There is no ultimate reason other than egoistic whim to make anything but quick payment an ordinary business practice, perhaps to foster greater dependence of the employee on the employer and thus induce desperation or submission.

It is still depriving others of what is rightfully theirs if one does not pay workers their wages before the next sunset.  Do not even wait until night has fallen altogether, Deuteronomy says.  As the "Second Law", Deuteronomy oftentimes repeats earlier laws from Yahweh with additional details.  The last book of the Torah does not need to strictly say that withholding wages even a few minutes past sunset is a loose form of theft, and at worst an egregious, classist sin against those in dire need.  This was already said!  What Deuteronomy adds, although this would still be true by logical necessity if the obligations of Leviticus 19:13 exist one way or another, is that foreigners and the poor must not be excluded from this treatment because the poor rely on quick payment in order to live.  As if to mock the asinine idea in Rabbinic Judaism that there are only an alleged seven moral obligations that Gentiles have, the text calls delaying the payment of wages past sunset an intrinsic sin people of any descent can cry out to God for.

The form of theft in question might not be as easily recognized as such.  It does not, after all, involve one person illicitly taking a physical belonging from another person that was already in the latter's possession.  This makes no difference as to whether it is sinful in itself no matter who the victim or the perpetrator is.  Perhaps few forms of theft would be as vehemently denied as having this nature by the sort of evangelical who pretends to honor the Biblical God, all while dismissing what the Bible commands as universally obligatory (much of the Torah's laws!) and opposing entirely innocent activities (showing physical affection to opposite gender friends, using profanity, and so on).  Such a widespread practice is not made morally valid because it would disrupt the comfort of oppressive employers or deviate from established national convention.  As the Bible puts it without using the exact words, holding back the wages of a laborer until after the next sunset is a less direct type of theft, and habitually unrepentant thieves are said to not inherit the kingdom of God after the resurrection (1 Corinthians 6:9-11).

Still In Support Of Democracy

Contemporary American liberalism, irrespective of what individual liberals might think, is absolutely a democratic philosophy when it comes to its mechanism of appointing politicians.  That is, it holds that officials should be elected by the will of the majority of the governed people rather than, for instance, given power on a hereditary basis.  Many liberals are still in fierce or open support of democracy even as the inevitable fruit of a true democracy is on flagrant display thanks to Trump's administration.  Whether Trump stole the 2024 election as he claims Biden did in 2020 and that one such administration does not mean others would be similar would not change the fact that if this is what enough citizens actually wanted, the present situation would be the product of a consensus-based approach to politics that is, more importantly, contrary to the nature of truth itself.  Free and fair elections and an educated populace, which is never the same as an intelligent/rationalistic populace, can never erase the errors of democracy.

With democracy, the entire purpose of the system is to enact the will of the majority (at least the majority of the voters), so it does not matter what exactly that will entails in a given case; no matter the idea at hand or the intended or actual outcome, as long as 51% of the populace agrees on appointing a figure to office or implementing any policy, acting as the majority desires is never a misuse of democracy, but a basic manifestation of democracy.  And since ultimate truth, including truths about morality and laws, does not depend whatsoever on anyone's consent or preference or agreement with any amount of other people, democracy is inherently antithetical to the necessary truths of rationalism and justice (if good and evil do exist).

Beyond its philosophical underpinnings being entirely contrary to reason, democracy also offers no genuine protection from the majority.  Whatever the majority wants is imposed, or else there is no true democracy in place.  Either one can deny the majority their wish, which is intrinsically anti-democratic, or one can give into it, no matter how erroneous it is.  Of course, since truth itself (starting with logical axioms) is not dependent on belief, consensus, or comfort, no one could support democracy without irrationalistic rejection of the very core nature of reality.  There is no such thing as some arbitrary degree of political democracy being valid and another degree being invalid; all democracy is erroneous for the same fundamental reason.

And what of the politician(s) installed by the will of the people?  If a tyrant like Donald Trump takes power through democratic means, the only way to remove them from power that is consistent with the tenets of formal democracy, with its recurring elections, is to vote them out—either at the next election in which the general population participates or in some election by representatives chosen by the people.  Obviously, this does nothing to truly stop irrational or depraved leaders immediately if there is a rigid voting schedule, and it does certainly does not honor reason, although liberals might hold to it anyway because they wrongly think that the only alternative to democracy is authoritarianism, which is also irrationalistic since logic and morality are the only valid authorities [1] and not any human desire or leader.

Not even the most staunch liberal proponent of democracy would likely think the current actions and professed philosophical ideas of Trump and his underlings are not logically or morally legitimate.  Thus, they would probably think that not all results of democracy are valid, even if they are idiotically only reacting to concrete examples in their lifetimes rather than objective logical facts which transcends all examples.  Yet, they foolishly continue their allegiance to democracy.

Something that either inherently or haphazardly produces evil cannot be amoral or good even if the overwhelming majority of a population craves a certain course of action.  Then, again, entirely aside from any possible moral dimension, democracy is irrationalistic because truth is not grounded in or revealed by any sort of agreement, save for the fact that people agree about a particular issue in a given case.  Anyone who participates in democracy, however, is morally culpable for any evil committed by the person they helped put in office, especially if they voted for a certain idea to be championed or for a law to be passed despite that idea or law being illogical and/or unjust.

Instead of looking to reason's necessary truths and then recognizing that some political philosophies cannot be correct, including democracy and authoritarianism alike, liberals still prefer some semblance of democracy and fail to grasp its objective errors.  Democracy at least partially gave us Donald Trump's presidency and the catastrophic chaos brought about by the egoism, hypocrisy, and classism (all rooted in irrationalism) of Trump and his Republican party.  But foundational truth is not determined by mere consequences either, as democracy is inherently false as a philosophy, however stubbornly liberals admire or praise it and however much a democratically-appointed leader benefits a country.  Democracy is good and right, liberals would believe, but the things democracy brings about by virtue of being democracy are (in this instance, at least) asinine and wicked.  The former cannot be true if the latter is!

[1].  But God would only be authoritative for logically necessary reasons, and something like the Bible, a text and not a necessary truth or a conscious entity, could only be authoritative to the extent that it is at least consistent with reason and morality, like a human political leader.  The authority of such things as the Bible and a politician is still derived from something that is authoritative and is surrendered proportionately at any deviation from logic and morality.

Religion, Vulnerability, And Power

It does not logically follow from a person being religious, irrespective of the particular religion's veracity or falsity, that they are seeking power over other people, whether their religious adherence is sincere or insincere.  This alone means there is no inherent connection between commitment to or practice of a religion and egoistic motivations.  One religion can differ from another, and personal or organized practice might not reflect the actual philosophical doctrines of a religion; there is absolutely no way that all religion itself or everyone's practice of a given religion, whether it is really in conformity with the ideology or not (for many people, it is not!), is necessarily about egoism and power.

Anyone who, say, sincerely devotes their free time to helping the sick or poor despite their own poverty in the name of Christianity is absolutely not doing so because they gain material riches or immediate political power through this.  Simply put, it could not in itself be about exerting power over the masses or the vulnerable within them.  Yes, Judeo-Christianity's doctrines are absolutely no a stranger to exerting power and enforcing specific moral tenets using limited violence (for instance, see Exodus 21:12-17 and Deuteronomy 25:1-3).  At the same time, passages like the following from the ostensibly anti-humanitarian Old Testament laws attributed to God himself could in no way on their own be about holding power over others and using it arbitrarily out of egoism to manipulate others:

Exodus 21:26-27—"'An owner who hits a male or female slave in the eye and destroys it must let the slave go free to compensate for the eye.  And an owner who knocks out the tooth of a male or female slave must let the slave go free to compensate for the tooth.'"

Exodus 22:25—"'If you lend to one of my people among you who is needy, do not treat it like a business deal; charge no interest.'"

Leviticus 19:9-10—"'"When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest.  Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen.  Leave them for the poor and the foreigner.  I am the Lord your God."'"

Leviticus 19:33-34—"'"When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them.  The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born.  Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt.  I am the Lord your God."'"

Deuteronomy 5:12-15—"'Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you.  Six days shall you labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God.  On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns, so that your male and female servants may rest, as you do.  Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm.  Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.'"

Deuteronomy 15:7-9—"If anyone is poor among your fellow Israelites in any of the towns of the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not be hardhearted or tightfisted toward them.  Rather, be openhanded and freely lend to them whatever they need.  Be careful not to harbor this wicked thought: 'The seventh year, the year for cancelling debts, is near', so that you do not show ill will toward the needy among your fellow Israelites and give them nothing.  They may then appeal to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin."

Deuteronomy 16:9-12—"Count off seven weeks from the time you begin to put the sickle to the standing grain.  Then celebrate the Festival of Weeks to the Lord your God by giving a freewill offering in proportion to the blessings the Lord your God has given you.  And rejoice before the Lord your God at the place he will choose as the dwelling for his Name—you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, the Levites in your towns, and the foreigners, the fatherless and the widows living among you.  Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and follow carefully these decrees."

Deuteronomy 17:16-20—"The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, 'You are not to go back that way again.'  He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray.  He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.  When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests.  It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees and not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites and turn from the law to the right or to the left.  Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel."

Deuteronomy 23:15-16—"If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand them over to their master.  Let them live among you wherever they like and in whatever town they choose.  Do not oppress them."

Deuteronomy 24:14-15—"Do not take advantage of a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether that worker is a fellow Israelite or a foreigner residing in one of your towns.  Pay them their wages each day before sunset, because they are poor and are counting on it.  Otherwise they may cry to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin."

Obviously, anyone who lets slaves go for abusing them as according to Exodus 21:26-27 is losing some of their power, if anything.  This is about what the Torah presents as intrinsic justice rather than winning over already-liberated slaves as a political support base, for the master or mistress who mistreats them has already entitled them to immediate freedom no matter the reason why they are a servant/slave (Exodus 21:2-6, 22:3, Deuteronomy 15:12-18, 20:10-11).  This cannot be about empowering anyone but the slaves or servants who go free.  And while someone could be kind to others with the secret intention of manipulating the latter into giving fame, allegiance, or money to the former, this is not at all what the Torah prescribes.  

You are to give because giving without expecting repayment is righteous (Deuteronomy 15:7-9); you should have a day of rest and not deprive others of one day of rest out of every seven, even if they are foreigners or your slaves, because it is their human right (Deuteronomy 5:12-15; see also Exodus 20:8-11 and 23:12).  Such prescriptions and many others could hardly have some inherent bent towards the subjugation of those without power, as some mischaracterize the goal of all religious philosophy and practice.  On the contrary, they are plainly about protecting and caring for the powerless, or at the very least those who in one form or another lack power.

The Judeo-Christian religion as it really is, not as it is misunderstood or assumed to be by fools, certainly is not about enriching or preserving the general power of an elite upper echelon of society like monarchs or a class of clergy.  One of the most ironic things is that this religion more than many others is misunderstood as being oppressive, classist, sexist, racist, and so on, as opposed to some people who pay lip service to it try to use it as a tool for their own corporate, political, or ecclesiological power.  The egalitarian, anti-authoritarian philosophy of the Torah [1] is indeed utterly against seeking power for its own sake, exercising power however one wishes, or submitting to authority figures just because they have societal prominence or privilege.

Indeed, there are no exceptions for the monarch (Deuteronomy 17:18-20), both necessarily in light of many other commands of the Torah having no exceptions based upon a person's social standing and the text of Deuteronomy 17 literally saying that the king must not turn to the right or the left from the Law and the moral obligations the written Law reflects.  This contradicts the allegedly Christian idea that the monarch has absolute authority from God to demand universal submission to their subjective, petty, irrationalistic whims.  One can assume that the Torah teaches this, but it does not.  Genuine authoritarian submission to other people is contrary to its blatant tenets.

Once again, nothing at all about religious philosophy or commitment to it by logical necessity has to be about obtaining power.  With Judeo-Christian philosophy, having power is not sinful.  One can legitimately be born into financial or political power or obtain power of various kinds for oneself without sinning.  Power is not the problem; using power in certain ways is evil.  It is these kinds of abuses of fellow humans that Yahweh's Law condemns repeatedly in many different contexts, whether the other person is a slave, an employee, a widow, a foreigner, an impoverished person, and so on.  Not even royalty is above any of these moral obligations, as addressed.  Judeo-Christian moral philosophy is not about an elite class of wealthy people ruling over others for their own gain as they egoistically trample on or mislead the masses; whether true or false, it is about treating people as they deserve, and part of this is about not using power to trample on others in a host of particular ways.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/01/miscellaneous-torah-denounciations-of.html

Getting Rid Of Evil

Evil could not exist apart from evildoers, for there is no one to carry it out apart from them.  Without the practicer of immorality, there is only the logical possibility of a given being committing evil.  There is thus only one way to truly, completely eradicate evil: purge the incorrigible evildoer from existence.  Of course, this could only be achieved by inflicting a state of true death on them, and for it to be true death, they cannot exist as either an unembodied or embodied consciousness in some eternal afterlife.  Forcing someone to avoid evil is impossible for a being of particular metaphysical limitations, as with one person being incapable of making another living, conscious person stop evil thoughts—yes, they could render them unconscious or kill them, but this is not at all the same as willing that another person cease their evil and making them mentally comply.  Otherwise, such an ability would be reserved for some being of superhuman power, like a deity who could override another entity's free will if it chose to so that they still live and yet no longer engage in certain thoughts or behaviors.

In Deuteronomy, there is repeated emphasis on how capital punishment, exclusively in the cases which and with the methods which make it righteous (for anything else could only be unjust), purges evil from a community.  See Deuteronomy 13:5, 17:7, 12, 19:13, 18-19, 21:20-21, 22:21-22, 24, and 24:7 for instances of this.  How can one purge evil from among a group?  Again, this could only be accomplished in the strictest sense by the death of the wrongdoer.  In this way, there is no possibility for the sinner to be expelled or flee so that they bring continued evil elsewhere.  Not even exile accomplishes this.  No, if they are dead, their sin perishes too.  Certainly, not every Biblical sin deserves the premature death of execution carried out by other humans despite how all sin deserves death (Ezekiel 18:4, 20, Romans 1:32, 6:23).  The Bible clarifies which sins merit such a human response.  However, not a single sin of any severity could deserve eternal torture, more importantly.  The Bible agrees, condemning such treatment by virtue of declaring anything past certain thresholds inherently evil (Deuteronomy 25:1-3, Luke 12:47-48).  It would crucially be true independent of Christianity, by strict logical necessity, that infinite torture for finite sins, no matter the degree of torture or the sins being punished, could only be unjust because of infinite disproportionality—the greatest category of evil.

Hell is just, and so hell does not involve eternal torture.  It is where people are killed for their sins unless they repent (Matthew 10:28, Psalm 37:20, Romans 2:7-8, and many more).  Death in hell is the ultimate capital punishment in its effects.  People, as Jesus says in Matthew 10, can kill the body but not the soul.  Once the wicked soul is restored from the unconsciousness of Sheol (Ecclesiastes 9:5-10) at the resurrection (Daniel 12:2), God can then kill body and mind once and for all, with no opportunity for another resurrection.  Only the righteous will have eternal life.  It is logically impossible for someone to be given what they already have.  A person can be given wealth when they already have wealth, but a belonging they already possess cannot be given to them.  Someone either has eternal life or they do not.  Only if they do not can they receive it as a gift from God.  If only the righteous live without end, however, then evil really will be no more.  There is also no other way that the old order corrupted by sin can pass away so that there is no more evil or death (Revelation 21:1-4).

Evil truly would then have been purged from creation; the enemies of God, of righteousness, are destroyed in the second death (Revelation 20:15) so that death itself never again occurs, death itself being the last enemy of God to be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:26), which requires that the others have already been banished from existence.  There is no more evil and no more deserved death due to evil because none are left who practice it.  Instead, the lifeless bodies of those who unrepentantly opposed God are seen by the righteous (Isaiah 66:22-24).  Execution in hell is the grand, universal capital punishment for everyone who persistently refuses the truth.  In perishing (John 3:16, 2 Thessalonians 2:10), they no longer exist in order to do evil.  This is justice and it also has the effect of cleansing reality from the presence of evildoers.  Sin gives birth to death (James 1:13), the latter of which is the wages, the just earnings, of the former (Romans 6:23).  Yahweh is not a utilitarian.  Annihilation of sinners in hell is not justice simply because of the positive consequence of there literally being no more sin in existence any more than eternal torture is just because it could inspire dread to the point of deterring all sin.  Any alternative to annihilation, though, would involve the permanent existence of evildoers and thus of evil.

Financial Entanglement In Marriage

It is not just a Biblical doctrine that marriage unites two people so that it is as if they are one.  Logically, a sincere marriage will accomplish this to some extent.  Upon marrying, each part of a couple brings their individual personalities, aspirations, and finances with them into a partnership (and this is as true of relational marriage as it is of the mere social construct of legal marriage).  Some might assume that one error or another concerning marital finances is true, each of which inaccurately reflects the true level of both oneness and individuality that marriage entails whether people like it or not.  For instance, what about spending within a marriage?  Is money a given spouse earns theirs to spend at their whim or the couple's to mutually decide upon using for a particular end?

Yes, a unified couple's money is their money on one level, regardless of who is actually laboring to earn a given amount.  If both have their own income and both contribute as needed to shared necessary expenses, then as long as they are not spurred on by irrationalistic beliefs or engaging in some sort of sinful activity, they are nonetheless free to spend their own money as they wish.  It is in one sense still their money, not that of their husband or wife, who did not earn it and would not have an automatic moral right to it in the case of separation or divorce.  There is nothing antithetical to sheer egalitarian, relational unity within a marriage about striving to earn, keep separate (to an extent), and spend one's own money.  Is a husband's or wife's money their own or their partner's?  Depending on what is meant, it is both!

A couple is a unit, and ideally each side of the relationship would be in perfect relational sync as individuals; all the same, the truths of individualism are not nullified by marriage, however passionately connected a husband and wife are.  No depth or length of marriage could ever erase the metaphysical individuality of each partner.  Marriage also cannot be more important than the individuals that it cannot exist apart from.  In the tragic case of divorce (which is absolutely permitted by the Bible for all kinds of spousal wrongs [1]), each person has to return to living as more of an individual, though they could still cohabitate with their former spouse for economic or other reasons.  There are ways to go about marriage that gratuitously injure the ability of each person therein to be self-sufficient as much as possible inside and (if applicable) after the marital bond.

Even in the case of debilitating illness of the "breadwinner", the other spouse can quickly be prompted by experience to realize the perils of intentionally relying on one income earner that could be ignored for asinine reasons until the last possible moment.  A spouse who did not work just because they could rely on their partner's income has in either instance set themself up for disaster.  Women might be pressured by sexist stereotypes to do this simply because they are women, but unless they are forced to refrain from working by an abusive/sexist partner, it is entirely on them for actually choosing this course of inaction.  Men of course need financial stability and independence as well; while the idea that men need to work by default whereas it is morally/pragmatically optional for married women to work is utterly sexist (against men primarily!) and therefore illogical, men and women alike need to hold onto financial independence where they can.  This need does not disappear when someone gets married.

Protecting yourself financially on a personal level during marriage not only gives you a stronger chance of weathering a divorce or the death of your spouse, but it also can ease a great many tensions within the marriage or subvert them altogether.  In the more troubled moments that might arise in the relationship, having as much clarity as possible about the security of your money or possessions can make adversarial exchanges less prominent or necessary.  Unfortunately, an abusive or unhealthy marriage can severely jeopardize your career, job security, and savings, but a peaceful marriage can benefit your finances significantly, and not just because of pooled income—and stable personal finances can contribute to marital peace.

It is just that pooled income does not mean that the husband and wife are not entitled to a portion of their own respective earnings which they can utilize as they wish, given that they do not sin in the process.  The husband and wife are individuals and never cease to be their own persons, yet they are in a relationship that inherently unifies them, at least when it is not trivialized to the point of neglect or more severe abuse.  The logical truth about financial entanglement in marriage is therefore neither that all resources are beyond the claim of a particular person nor that being in a marriage is irrelevant to the individual's ownership of money, whether it was obtained beforehand or while married.

[1].  See here or other articles tagged under "Divorce":  

https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2024/06/tearing-apart-one-flesh.html

Fury Of Darksiders III

The third Darksiders game introduces Fury as a playable character, the first female horseman of the four loosely modeled after Revelation's—and I do mean very loosely, since the names War, Fury, and Strife are not even used in Revelation 6, unlike how Death is explicitly mentioned as the name of the fourth horseman (6:7-8); at least War is still named after the function of the horseman in verses 6:3-4, who removes peace so that people kill each other.  Not even he gravitates so naturally and so passionately to conflict as his sister.  Burning with rage and quick to pursue violence, Fury certainly lives up to her name as she hunts down and defeats the Seven Deadly Sins.

In fact, near the beginning of the game, Fury says to her horse in quiet moment that if she didn't love him so much, she would kill him just to alleviate her sheer boredom.  This is rather extremely antithetical to the utter myth that women are calm, passive, delicate beings that can only instigate harm of a lesser kind than "men's" or gravitate towards nonphysical harshness.  At the very least, women are fallaciously considered naturally more likely to have these traits by the typical religious and secular complementarian.  The conjoined, philosophically inseparable myth is that men are inherently or more likely to be angry, brutal, and physically violent than women.  Each of these stereotypes, though logically false, would necessitate the other.  If men were prone to anger or violence because they are men, then women would have to be prone to the opposite because they are women.

Fury might not have been intended to exemplify the errors of gender stereotypes, but as a far more aggressive and emotionalistically (not just emotionally) volatile character than her brothers War and Death from the first two games, she certainly accomplishes this.  It is not that the other characters in the game scoff or marvel at her ire because she is a woman, though even this could have been used by the game's creators to push back against false ideas.  She is presented as physically and magically powerful and emotionally fierce, but also as lacking almost any self-control or recognition of how her emotions do not dictate the nature of reality, such as matters of strict logical truth or moral correctness.

Of course, nothing can be portrayed in fiction unless it really is true or possible (though something being possible is still a truth)—as opposed to characters or real-life storytellers claiming something contrary to reason.  It is true that one man's or woman's mental traits do not mean another person of the same gender also possesses the same characteristics.  It is true that having one kind of genitalia or chromosomes does not logically necessitate having an irate or demure personality.  These things are true due to reason's inherent veracity; it does not matter what someone wishes or feels or believes!  Wherever a man or woman is not reflecting their true natural personality, they could only be bowing to the nonexistent authority of social conditioning, perhaps mistaking the fallacies and errors other people tell them for logical facts.  If personality is not dictated by gender, it can only be individualistic.  There can be nothing unrealistic or impossible about Fury's intense disposition.  Furthermore, Fury's characterization is not an affirmation of the stereotype of women as unstable, but an example of how women do not "normally" or inevitably lack ferocity.

As distorted yet artistically excellent as the elements of Revelation are in Darksiders, the franchise is still based on Biblical theology to an extent, and the Bible does not discriminate against men and women as victims or perpetrators of violence.  Beyond an utter absence of this discrimination which is rather popular in some American communities (against each gender in varying ways), there are in fact many direct statements of gender equality regarding physical and verbal violence (Exodus 21:15, 17, 20-21, 26-32, Leviticus 20:9, Deuteronomy 12:31, 18:10), as well as related passages that do not exclude the same egalitarianism (see Exodus 21:22-25 and Leviticus 24:19-21).  This alone clarifies that the passages which do not overtly emphasize gender equality without contradicting it, including murder laws outside of Exodus 21 (for examples from various categories, see Exodus 21:18-19 and Deuteronomy 19:11-13), would be applicable to men and women as Genesis 1:26-27 and 5:1-2 also necessitate on their own.

Do I think that the developers of Darksiders III had any of this in mind, logically or Biblically?  No, because even if this was the case, I have no way of knowing.  It is still fitting that a game series that borrows some concepts from Judeo-Christianity—and from popular misrepresentations of it, like Lucifer and other demons ruling in a hell that does not even have any inhabitants yet when hell is not a place ruled over by the sinners condemned to die within [1]—would reflect its teachings on a matter very neglected in the church.  Women are no less violent than men because there is no such thing as a gender-specific psychological bent.  They are repeatedly and sometimes forcefully given less opportunities to show their true selves as individuals, which would in some cases, as with men, entail them being violent and even sadistic.  Men who are violent are not this way because they are men, and the women who truly are naturally nonviolent or emotionally calm, as opposed to those who have only been culturally conditioned to not express anger, are not of this personality because they each have a vagina.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-myth-of-satan-reigning-in-hell.html

The Person Who Attacks Their Parents

Exodus 21:15 says if someone strikes their father or mother—something like self-defense being an exception (Exodus 22:3)—he or she is to be put to death.  This is one of the only assaults other than the kind involving murder (Genesis 9:6, Exodus 21:12-14, etc.) that is directly prescribed the death penalty, though it would follow from Deuteronomy 17:12 prescribing execution for the mere verbal display of contempt for a righteous judge of Yahweh's Law (similar to how cursing one's father or mother deserves death according to Exodus 21:17 and Leviticus 20:9) that attacking them physically, a greater offense, would also deserve death.  But what of a child, not in the sense of biological relationship but of age, who attacks their parent?

While a very young son or daughter striking their parent out of malice might seem petty to some, they have still intentionally struck their own parent without a morally justifiable reason, and they would still be the type of offender condemned to die by Exodus 21:15.  It would not matter if the offender is six or 10 or 15 years old: they would deserve to die all the same, just as they would if they committed murder (see also Numbers 35:31) despite their age.  Children are, like adults, individuals who are capable of sin that varies in motivation and intensity from person to person.  Age (like race, class, and gender) does not exempt someone, if such an act is truly immoral, from the guilt of murder, and the same would by necessity be true of attacking one's parents maliciously.

The seven year old who willfully strikes their father or mother—such laws as this one and those of Exodus 20:12, 21:17, Deuteronomy 5:16, and 21:18-21 are explicitly egalitarian, in contrast to what some assume the Torah teaches about fathers—simply deserves to perish.  1 Timothy 1:9 says that those who kill their fathers and mothers are among those who deviate from God's commands, possibly referring to an extreme case of the child-parent assault described in Exodus 21:15.  It is utterly untrue that the New Testament revokes such penalties, as if Jesus and Paul could possibly be on Yahweh's side (a deity whose moral nature does not change according to Deuteronomy 5:29, Malachi 3:6, and James 1:17) while promoting anti-theonomist philosophy.

Jesus very directly acknowledges that those who curse their parents as addressed in Exodus 21:17 and Leviticus 20:9 deserve to die (Matthew 15:3-6, Mark 7:8-13), as if he had not already said he did not come to abolish or alter the obligations of Mosaic Law (Matthew 5:17-19).  Paul, who repeatedly affirms Mosaic Law as being of divine origin and thus perfect righteousness (Acts 23:1-5, 24:14, Romans 7:7, 1 Timothy 1:8-11, and so on), says the kind of disobedience to parents mentioned in Deuteronomy 21:18-21 deserves death in Romans 1:28-32.  The New Testament rather overtly does not in any way contradict the Old Testament on a plethora of moral matters, which of course includes terrestrial justice, and if it did, the New Testament could not possibly be true since it would then conflict with what it stands on.

Eternity And Boredom

When faced with the harsh transience of this life, eternal life might seem preferable.  Setting aside the even more extreme reason why eternal life alone does not necessarily entail eternal bliss [1], there is a reason, however, why eternal life of a calm or initially pleasant kind could become a massive burden: one might grow bored having a perpetual remainder of time to exist and a limited range of logically possible things to do (whether on a mental or physical level), especially if one's personality is such that familiarity with an activity or experience dulls whatever thrilling excitement was once stirred by it.

It might not involve vicious external torments or moralistic punishment (obviously, eternal torment cannot be morally legitimate punishment because of the intrinsic, supreme disproportionality), but boredom could wear down any happiness a being has at the prospect of eternal life, even if they had the freedom, whether pragmatic or moral, to do anything they would like to do, as long as it is logically possible.  The existential desperation of having an infinite amount of time to live through and a declining or collapsed satisfaction with one's conscious existence could lead to immense psychological anguish precisely because there would be no upcoming, looming death to bring an end to the suffering.

If one person was to descend into boredom during their eternal life, it would not mean that another person would.  Nor does it follow from having eternal life, however many people would possess it, that an individual must experience eventual boredom.  Those who think the possibility of boredom means the very idea of eternal life could not be positive, even the version of it in Judeo-Christianity, would be wrong.  All the same, the concept of living forever is not inherently positive as fools with a contrasting stance might think.

Ultimately, and thankfully, nothing about eternal life logically requires that someone would wind up bored or frustrated simply by virtue of living forever; but, should they not have the ability to eradicate their consciousness from existence or plunge themselves into a state of no perception (as with the Biblical Sheol), then there would be no escape from the boredom unless it happens to vanish from their mind at some point just as it happened to come about.  Otherwise, it would last forever, just as their consciousness would exist forever.

That would be no small thing.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2024/02/to-live-forever.html

The Multifaceted Connection Between Exercise And Mental Health

Is it logically possible for physical exercise to result in improvements to mental health?  Absolutely.  Read commonplace statements about this issue online, however, and the information presented can be very incomplete or outright inaccurate.  Causal oversimplification and neglect of how mental and physical health are separate but still significantly intertwined are easy to encounter.  For instance, a site might just say that exercise alleviates or can alleviate depression, with no clarification about why this could or would be the case or how highly individualistic variables relate.  There are in reality many ways that exercise can elevate or reinforce mental health that are far more precise and existentially charged than the one merely following the other sequentially, as if physical activity always or inherently produces positive mental states.

Doing something that benefits one's physical health, on the more simple side of things, could inspire a contentment with or inner celebration that one has taken measures within one's power to protect one's bodily wellbeing.  Since one's mind inhabits the body, there is a connection between physical and mental wellbeing, and such satisfaction with simply trying to improve or maintain one's health is one possible way to appreciate this connection.  Or, successful exercise could highlight that one still has the capacity to physically (or mentally) carry out certain activities and stir up a sense of joy or gratefulness—especially pertinent to ill or older individuals who could find immense relief that their bodies have not deteriorated to a greater extent.  The latter is really about expressing or maintaining mental autonomy through bodily action rather than about exercise for the sake of largely/exclusively physical benefits (a stronger heart, reduced inflammation, etc.).

Still other potential ways exercise could be tied to uplifted mental health, should someone remain consistent in their endeavors, include exemplifying a sustained commitment or crossing new thresholds of personal achievement.  The exact motivations could vary between individuals, as motivation is always an individualistic matter even when two people ultimately have the same core intentions or feelings.  But in some way, mental health improvements or stability derived from exercise are always about more than just physical processes and outcomes, whatever form they take in a particular person's case.

Never is it intrinsically as simplistic as physical activity automatically triggering the likes of happiness, excitement, or fulfillment divorced from any entirely psychological/phenomenological factors, which are themselves nonphysical in nature and highly personalized.  A reductionistic philosophy of exercise, such as one rooted in sheer metaphysical naturalism (materialism), would conflate the two or deny that the mental component is anything more than some sort of illusion (obviously incorrect since logic requires that consciousness cannot be illusory).  A less explicitly abstract or extreme but incorrect philosophy of exercise might still conflate physical and mental health, with its adherents just assuming that the former entails or leads to the latter in some ultimately erroneous manner.

Even exercise tiring someone to the point that they fall asleep more easily and perhaps feel less exhausted upon waking, instilling an upbeat mood that could help ward off or diminish something like depression, does not involve as sharp, direct, or personal an impact of physical health on mental health as some of the scenarios provided in the second paragraph.  Yes, there is a relationship between mental and physical health since we experience what we do with our bodies and whatever physical advantages might come about (even non-rationalists who by nature have no actual knowledge can still experience), but that relationship can be manifested in far more layered and diverse ways than reductionistic science-oriented articles address.

A Legitimate Form Of Pessimism

There is much to be bitter about almost by default in human life, from explicitly abstract, weighty issues of truth (like the fact that one cannot know if there is an afterlife or how terrible it might be) to personal tragedies (an agonizing disease, among other things) and even the accumulation of otherwise minor inconveniences.  Even a total non-rationalist who sidesteps the first of these three categories due to their own irrationalistic neglect can still find themself struggling under the burdens that fall within the latter two categories.  In certain cases, people respond irrationally by clinging desperately to some kind of philosophical (as in, ideological) optimism that helps them feel less overwhelmed.

Some within this group might go further by rejecting the legitimacy of pessimism outright, either as something that is perhaps philosophically true, whether one likes it or not, or as a personal means of coping with suffering.  Almost inevitably, the real reason why some people oppose all degrees of pessimism or outward complaining from others is because it impacts their mental health, which obviously changes nothing about the objective logical nature of the matter in question.  Their unwillingness or even potential inability to not handle the truth is no justification for others to always withhold complaints or to embrace emotionalistic optimism.  The genuine failure is their own.

This life is—or at least it is entirely logically possible for it to be—a massive series of setbacks, pains, and labors that entails so much that is worthy of frustration or anger, whether or not Christianity is true.  Of course, complaining about stupidity, sin, and amoral misery is not at all the kind of inward/verbalized complaining that the New Testament does condemn [1].  But even if there was some supposed moral problem with persistently complaining in one's speech or dwelling on the oppressive nature of anguish, it would change nothing about the logically necessary nature of some concepts or circumstances.

Depending on the form of the pessimism, the idea is an objective philosophical truth (such as that some things are worthy of lament or bitterness and that it could not be irrational or evil to recognize this), far from a mere subjective state of mind that would only ever appeal to or be found in someone already in the throes of suffering.  But many people seem to adopt pessimistic thoughts when their resolve is weakened without ever trying to consider the necessary truths about the subject, which by their very nature do not depend on thought or some challenging situation.

As more than a mindset, which corresponds only to a being's consciousness and not to the likes of transcendent logic or external scenarios, a particular variation of pessimism is simply correct.  Some things are not positive and might be incredibly difficult or unfavorable, either/whether objectively or subjectively, and it is entirely legitimate to accept, speak about, and dwell on these facts.  One does not have to pretend like everything is beneficial or pleasant to be in the right or to be have the psychological strength to weather trials.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/09/paul-on-complaining.html

Interfering With A Person's Livelihood

With malicious intentionality or some other motivation, interfering with a person's livelihood—when the job itself is not wicked—is a form of mistreatment that strikes at their very ability to survive or have a life of comfort.  The Bible does not say to not obstruct a person from making a living as directly as the wording of "Do not obstruct a person's career unless their profession is immoral."  It does not have to.  What it does say of direct relevance would be found in two passages from the Torah, Exodus 21:18-19 and Deuteronomy 24:6.  The situations covered in each text relate to obligations that are far broader in scope and ramification than just the two exact circumstances mentioned.

Exodus 21:18-19—"'If people quarrel and one person hits another with a stone or with their fist and the victim does not die but is confined to bed, the one who struck the blow will not be held liable if the other can get up and walk around outside with a staff; however, the guilty party must pay the injured person for any loss of time and see that the victim is completely healed.'"

Deuteronomy 24:6—"Do not take a pair of millstones—not even the upper one—as security for a debt, because that would be taking someone's livelihood as security."

The first, Exodus 21:18-19, is a crucial passage about a particular kind of physical assault, a largely separate issue.  Still, restitution for time the victim had lost would include time they would or could have engaged in professional labor to make money for themselves.  The assault and injury, though not of a lethal or permanent nature and thus deserving of neither capital punishment (Exodus 21:12-14, 20-21) nor Lex Talionis (Exodus 21:22-25), deprives them of opportunities that should not have been robbed from them whether or not they were going to earn money.  Again, while not strictly or primarily about depriving someone of work or the resulting monetary means of survival, such a thing is within the literal scope of the passage.

The second passage, Deuteronomy 24:6, says not to take the instrument a person uses to make a living as security for a debt, the example of a millstone being given in the text, precisely because that would hinder their livelihood.  Thus, the Bible does condemn even more blatantly than in Exodus 21:18-19 the interference of one person in another's ability to make money by nonsinful methods.  Not even debts are justification for taking from a person that which they rely on in order to survive without resorting to theft or reliance on the arbitrary generosity of others.  Of course, even if someone was to lose their ability to work, the Bible prescribes a number of safety nets for the poor (Exodus 22:25-27, Leviticus 19:9-10, Deuteronomy 15:1-18, 24:14-15, and so on) so that no man or woman is without a divinely prescribed or permitted means of softening or escaping poverty altogether, with or without regular professional labor.

If killing a man or woman in a rapid act outside of allowances like justice (Exodus 20:13, 21:12-14, 20-21, Deuteronomy 19:11-13, and so on) or even negligently allowing them to be killed by a danger one expected or was warned of (Exodus 21:28-32, Leviticus 19:16, Deuteronomy 22:8) is a capital sin, then it should not be surprising that intentionally interfering with their livelihood so that they can avoid a slow death by starvation is of course a great immorality.  A person's flourishing, as long as it does not come about due to sin, should not be obstructed, as their livelihood is a way to stabilize their flourishing as a being made in God's image and to provide for any dependent family members.  As with so many other things, Biblical prescriptions about restitution for minor assault and not taking millstones as a security for debt address so much more than just these exact scenarios.

The Biblical Rejection Of Looking To Moral Intuition

Morality cannot be demonstrated to exist or not exist [1], and certainly not by personal feelings or appeals to human governments or norms, but a person can, without they themself or their audience making assumptions, realize and share accurately what Mosaic Law is, what the logical prerequisites or ramifications to its various laws would be, and what evidence there is for Christianity, and thus for Biblical ethics being true.  The existence of morality itself is entirely speculative either way, but at least Christian ethics is logically possible (it does not contradict logical axioms or other necessary truths) and has actual evidence in its favor; all other moral systems have none at all or contradict themselves or something else about reality that is true by logical necessity (for example, see just one of my many refutations of Islam here [2]).  See these excerpts from Deuteronomy and Isaiah specifying that children do not know morality and have to in some way learn it (again, no person can actually know the existence or particulars of moral obligation, if it does exist, but one can teach to them the tenets of Judeo-Christianity and the evidences for them, and so on, or they can recognize them without social prompting):

Deuteronomy 1:39—"'And the little ones that you said would be taken captive, your children who do not yet know good from bad—they will enter the land.  I will give it to them and they will take possession of it.'"

Isaiah 7:14-16—"'Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.  He will be eating curds and honey when he knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, for before the boy knows enough to reject the wrong and choose the right, the land of the two kings you dread will be laid waste.'"

I used the New International Version above, which still conveys that in both cases, children do not know moral right and wrong left to themselves, though this is even more explicit in translations like the King James Version and the English Standard Version.  According to very direct Biblical statements, no one knows morality by default.  No one would have to learn or teach God's revealed laws from or to other people (Deuteronomy 6:6-7) if everyone just "knows" from subjective feelings what is right or wrong, which is already a logically impossible thing.  God would have never had a reason to reveal any commands at all if this was the case.  Emotions only require and prove that one's own emotions presently exist.  Feelings have nothing to do either metaphysically or epistemologically with whether morality exists or what obligations there are.  Since reason is inherently true, and thus the Bible would have to be consistent with logical necessities in order for its philosophy to even possibly be true, it is no small thing that the Bible does plainly deny innate moral knowledge.  In fact, many people who claim to be Christians and profess moral knowledge through conscience would actively disregard or oppose Biblical commands while thinking that unrelated or innocent things are moral evils.  

Conscience would not be any less subjective even if everyone's was the same, but would your conscience suggest that you always pay your laborers (employees or hired workers) before the next sunset (Leviticus 19:13, Deuteronomy 24:14-15)?  Have you, if you have a conscience, ever been stricken left totally to yourself because you ate pork (Leviticus 11:1-3, 7-8, Deuteronomy 14:8) or thoughtlessly vowed to do even something good (Leviticus 5:4-5), not that you can know what is good beyond what is good if a given worldview is true?  Such a feeling would still only require that you are experiencing guilt or moral concern, not that the thing itself is immoral, and you could never know objective morality from subjective conscience anyway.  What about your feelings about the mandatory stoning of a family member to death for enticing you to worship anything besides Yahweh (Deuteronomy 13:6-10) or about the release of male and female slaves, which are Biblically permitted but so very different from the slaves of many other times and places, every seventh year and their furnishing with resources upon the end of their service (Deuteronomy 15:12-14)?

I doubt that anyone I have known would have ever had their conscience make it seem as if these and other such exact things are respectively obligatory, permissible, or evil.  Even if someone's conscience did make them feel like these are the moral obligations that exist, the Bible concurs with what is logically true either way: no one "just knows" morality from conscience, which is purely subjective, not that everyone has a conscience to begin with, and not that everyone who has a conscience will not lose it or see it change.  You cannot be taught by God or fellow humans what you already know, just as you cannot be given eternal life if you already have it and thus the unrighteous will not live, and hence cannot be tortured, forever (John 3:16, Romans 2:7-8, and so on).  Perhaps a misinterpretation of Paul's writings in Romans 1-2 is what many Christians I have encountered base their philosophical notion to the contrary on, at least as far as what they think the Bible teaches on the subject of moral epistemology.  Was this actually what Paul means, then his writings would contradict both the inherent truths of reason and the Old Testament doctrines he supposedly champions.  The New Testament or certain parts of it can be false if the Old Testament is true, but not the other way around.

It is not as if the belief that conscience is an genuine confirmation of objective morality is limited to only evangelical Christians, however; it is quite a popular belief, or at least many talk and act as if they believe it, whatever the rest of their worldview is like, though this idea and all that it entails could by logical necessity only be false.  People who have literally never paused to even examine the mountain of sheer assumptions on which their passively constructed worldview stands might have a thriving yet intrinsically arbitrary, irrelevant, and meaningless conscience; atheists, Muslims, and any other category of philosophical adherent could have a passionate conscience.  Not even believing in moral nihilism, which cannot be proven or as much as evidentially supported even if it is true, necessitates that someone is without a conscience, and neither does lacking a conscience mean someone is not a fierce moralist of one kind or another.  Not once does the Bible, its moral doctrines most precisely and almost exclusively introduced in the Torah's Law of Moses, say anything that denies any of this.

[1].  See here for a handful of my posts on this matter:

A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/12/denial-of-conscience.html

B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-myths-about-moral-agreement.html

[2].  For instance, see here:

A.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2018/03/quranic-punishment-surah-538.html

B.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/05/the-food-laws-of-quran.html

C.  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/09/the-quran-on-corporal-punishment.html

The Multiple Affirmations Of Annihilationism In 2 Peter 2

2 Peter 2:6 says that the wicked will be literally burned to ashes like the people of Sodom and Gomorrah—at least in something like the New International Version.  In the King James Version, or in certain other translations, the wording is as if the cities being burned to ashes is a general warning to God's enemies, not a prediction about an eschatological judgment.  However, if this verse conveyed something different in the original language, or if a translation like the King James Version is used, which describes what happened to Sodom and Gomorrah (being burned to ashes) as an example to wicked people who live later in history instead of an example of what will happen to the wicked, it is not so that the rest of the chapter says nothing that still affirms the eventual annihilation of the wicked.

Peter says, first, that destruction awaits false teachers in the opening three verses of the chapter.  Destruction by God in hell is what Matthew 10:28 contrasts with the mere killing of the body but not the soul by humans; obviously, this verse means that the wicked will die in hell unless it is using language in incredibly misleading ways.  Other parts of the Bible say the wicked will ultimately be destroyed so that they are no longer alive (see also passages like Philippians 3:18-19), but nothing in 2 Peter 2:1-3 requires that this destruction of false teachers is only their natural biological deaths or a premature death from God in this life.

What Peter says about the fate of false teachers, whom he describes as having, for one thing, lives based around greed, is that they are like animals that will perish (2 Peter 2:12).  The word perish alone already references actual annihilation, certainly not endless torture, and John 3:16 contrasts perishing with having eternal life—as if stating that eternal life is only possessed by the righteous or forgiven does not already necessitate that anyone else does not live forever, thus making their eternal torture impossible.  Furthermore, it is the comparison to the fate of irrational, wicked teachers to that of animals that perhaps alludes to a handful of verses from the Old Testament.

Does the Bible say animals will exist in an afterlife forever by default, or be tortured forever more specifically?  No.  Actually, Psalm 49 speaks as if humans and sheep alike go to Sheol, which the Bible very clearly says is where the dead perceive nothing at all because they are totally unconscious (Job 3:11-19 and Ecclesiastes 9:5-10, for instance).  Humans have no advantage over animals in the first death (Ecclesiastes 3:18-21) because both have the same breath of life from God [1], and their dead all go to unconsciousness by means of soul sleep.  However, only humans are said to be eventually resurrected (Daniel 12:2, John 5:21-29, and so on), and the unrepentant wicked will then face a permanent second death, a literal death with no additional resurrection (Revelation 20:11-15).

As 2 Peter 2:6 puts it, at least in the NIV and ESV, being burned to ashes as happened to the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 19 is what will happen to the unrighteous.  This is not the only place where such a thing is directly addressed, as in the case of some other verses I have referenced here, but in this form, 2 Peter 2:6 is a very plain statement of annihilationism.  Regardless, other parts of 2 Peter 2 itself are not only consistent with annihilationism, the idea that the wicked will at some point cease to have conscious life as punishment from God, but they also point to them perishing instead of eternally suffering—something that could not possibly be just, logically or Biblically [2].

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2024/10/the-breath-of-life-in-animals.html

[2].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2024/06/death-is-not-worst-fate-logically-or.html

Alleged Bible Contradictions: Exodus 18:13-26 And Deuteronomy 1:9-18

I would not have even thought about the idea that Exodus 18:13-26 and Deuteronomy 1:9-18 do contradict each other, with both addressing how Moses installed judges to prevent all cases of interpersonal offense from being brought to him, any longer than is necessary to casually but rightly notice the genuine overlap of the two passages (with variations in what is clarified) if it was not for seeing someone claim that they are indeed in contradiction.  Unlike some verses that can absolutely appear to contradict other verses (including 1 Corinthians 7:19 and Genesis 17:9-10/Leviticus 12:3 [1]), there is no apparent discrepancy of the illogical kind between the aforementioned parts of Exodus 18 and Deuteronomy 1, only a difference in the details provided in each account.

Exodus 18:13-26 tells of Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, advising Moses to not act as the exclusive judge for the large number of people who come to him, because he is only exhausting himself gratuitously.  The proposed solution is having others act as judges as opposed to simply having no one hear the numerous cases that would have been brought to Moses.  In Deuteronomy 1:9-18, Moses retells these events, but leaves out a reference to Jethro and adds his own words to the new judges.

Exodus 18:13-26—"The next day Moses took his seat to serve as judge for the people, and they stood around him from morning till evening.  When his father-in-law saw all that Moses was doing for the people, he said, 'What is this you are doing for the people?  Why do you sit alone as judge, while all these people stand around you from morning till evening?'

Moses answered him, 'Because the people come to me to seek God's will.  Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God's decrees and instructions.'

Moses' father-in-law replied, 'What you are doing is not good.  You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out.  The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone.  Listen now to me and I will give you some advice, and may God be with you.  You must be the people's representative before God and bring their disputes to him.  Teach them his decrees and instructions, and show them the way they are to live and how they are to behave.  But select capable men from all the people—men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain—and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens.  Have them serve as judges for the people at all times, but have them bring every difficult case to you; the simple cases they can decide themselves.  That will make your load lighter, because they will share it with you.  If you do this and God so commands, you will be able to stand the strain, and all these people will go home satisfied.'

Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said.  He chose capable men from all Israel and made them leaders of the people, officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens.  They served as judges for the people at all times.  The difficult cases they brought to Moses, but the simple ones they decided themselves."

Deuteronomy 1:9-18—"At that time I said to you, 'You are too heavy a burden for me to carry alone.  The Lord your God has increased your numbers so that today you are as numerous as the stars in the sky.  May the Lord, the God of your ancestors, increase you a thousand times and bless you as he has promised!  But how can I bear your problems and your burdens and your disputes all by myself?  Choose some wise, understanding and respected men from each of your tribes, and I will set them over you.'

You answered me, 'What you propose to do is good.'

So I took the leading men of your tribes, wise and respected men, and appointed them to have authority over you—as commanders of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties and of tens and as tribal officials.  And I charged your judges at that time, 'Hear the disputes between your people and judge fairly, whether the case is between two Israelites or between an Israelite and a foreigner residing among you.  Do not show partiality in judging; hear both small and great alike.  Do not be afraid of anyone, for judgment belongs to God.  Bring me any case too hard for you, and I will hear it.'  And at that time I told you everything you were to do."

According to Exodus 18, Jethro encourages Moses to dilute his bloated workload by appointing other figures to judge cases themselves.  According to Deuteronomy 1, Moses installed such figures to act as judges, insisting that they (as reason and Yahweh's prescriptions require) harbor no bias towards or against anyone, regardless of his or her ancestry and social or economic standing.  The summary of his own actions Moses provides in the first chapter of Deuteronomy does add points about how he addressed those placed in authority.  But, none of these details contradict the exact particulars of the account in Exodus 18.

The beginning of Deuteronomy summarizes the outcome of the incident described in Exodus 18:13-26.  True, the second book to address the historical appointment of Israelite judges acting on behalf of Moses and ultimately God does not mention Jethro.  Nor does the Exodus narrative bring up the charge of Moses that these judges rightfully refrain from any discrimination against Israelites, foreigners, the rich, and the poor, though it does state that Moses acted in accordance with Jethro's advice and that the judges brought the most challenging cases to Moses, handling the rest on their own.  Nothing about the one book's alleged sequence of events is incompatible with those of the other.

It is important that Moses was actually already receiving divine revelation about morality, including the just penalties for various wrongs, before the Sinai covenant (see also Exodus 16 regarding the Sabbath and Genesis 26:5 regarding Abraham's righteousness), which is yet another reason why the moral revelation codified in Mosaic Law that begins only two chapters later could not be only for the Israelites—except where its content logically could not apply to a non-Israelite as with Leviticus 21:1-4 and Deuteronomy 25:17-19.  That is why miscellaneous acts condemned in the Law are said therein to be evil for non-Israelites as well, such as in Leviticus 18:5-30 and Deuteronomy 18:9-13; such immoral acts and many others are capable of being performed by people of any nation or lineage.  Morality is morality, applying to all people except where there is some logically necessary exception.  Exodus 18 has relevance to such vital facts.

Moreover, the chapter touches on the legitimacy of not burdening oneself needlessly to the point of damaging one's mental health even for the sake of God, something lurking more in the background of Deuteronomy 1:9-18 but still touched on in verse 12.  No one needs to go above and beyond for either God or other people.  While Exodus emphasizes this far more than Deuteronomy's looser overview of the need for judges besides Moses as well as his words to those appointed, the details of the events as described in both Exodus 18 and Deuteronomy 1 are wholly consistent with each other.  Numerous times, Deuteronomy restates or adds information about earlier events or moral laws affirmed throughout Exodus and Leviticus, which does not require that there is a contradiction.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2025/04/paul-on-circumcision-in-1-corinthians.html