Slavery Among The Germanic Tribes

Among the topics Roman historian Tacitus writes about regarding the Germanic tribes in Germania, he covers their form of slavery.  Even if everything Tacitus wrote about events and states of affairs is accurate, it would not mean that different forms of Germanic slavery did not come about afterward, so his words are irrelevant to anything beyond the exact timeframe he writes about.  It is not as if we can know the correctness of his historical claims regardless.  Only logical facts and introspective states of mind, themselves matters of logical truth and possibility, allow for absolute certainty.  The words of Tacitus still provide genuine but potentially misleading evidence as to what slavery was like among the Germanic tribes.  As a rationalist, I reiterate such things often because, in addition to them being important, so many people overlook such objective truths if they are not brought up to them by someone else, and even then they might deny them due to shock or discomfort.

The type of slavery he reports among the tribes is far more mild than many others that might come to mind as moderners reflect on historical examples, with one very complicating factor to be mentioned later on.  In fact, in chapter 24 of Germania, Tacitus claims that some of the tribespeople would eagerly bet their own freedom in dangerous competitions, which he calls a "bad practice" clung to out of stubbornness despite the people he writes of considering it an honor.  Then, he shifts his focus to a more general slavery practiced among these communities.  That he has just written about the phenomenon of people offering their own freedom as the stakes for competitions is why the quotation below from chapter 25 starts with a reference to "other slaves" besides the ones who consented to gamble their freedom away.

"The other slaves are not employed after our manner with distinct domestic duties assigned to them, but each one has the management of a house and home of his own.  The master requires from the slave a certain quantity of grain, of cattle, and of clothing, as he would from a tenant, and this is the limit of subjection.  All other household functions are discharged by the wife and children."

This excerpt from Germania gives the impression that the slave was to provide animals, food, and clothing to the master.  In Biblical slavery, the master has to provide the slave with sustenance and clothing, not the other way around, though the slave might labor for food or housing-related purposes for the sake of assisting the master's house.  At least, this would not Biblically be the other way around in any other kind of sense, where the slave must specifically hand over animals or clothing, as opposed to tending to the master's or mistress's animals or other resources.

Although the passage is more about the rights and obligations of spouses towards each other, Exodus 21:10-11 is relevant to this with its emphasis on provision within marriage, as the wife of the master in question once worked as his servant.  Of greater immediate clarity is a portion of Deuteronomy 15, where the slave's condition of being well off because of their master's provision is said to be a prerequisite for the optional, voluntary choice of the slave to stay with their master or mistress for life rather than automatically go free in the seventh year, even with resources of their own as a sort of severance payment that would help them establish financial independence (15:13-14).

Deuteronomy 15:16-17—"But if your servant says to you, 'I do not want to leave you,' because he loves you and your family and is well off with you, then take an awl and push it through his earlobe into the door, and he will become your servant for life.  Do the same for your female servant."

There is certainly nothing domineering or dehumanizing about the type of slavery allowed in Biblical ethics both by lack of condemnation and by expressly permitting it, as is the case in Deuteronomy 15 and elsewhere.  The Biblically permissible kind also is rigidly gender egalitarian, which is not emphasized in what Tacitus says about Germanic slavery.  All the same, the form of Germanic slavery Tacitus addresses does not seem especially demanding or confining on its own, since the master receives a proportion of the slave's own personal domestic output, which is otherwise the latter's.  This dynamic is more akin to a ruler receiving a tax from a subject than to a savage form of slavery inherently at odds with the Biblical kind.  It does not necessarily involve any element of brutality, exploitation, or even a sharp difference in economic standing between the individuals at both ends of the hierarchy.  

But the historian notes a marked exception to largely gentle Germanic servitude.  On one hand, he indicates that the striking of a slave or other harsh or punitive measures were very uncommon.  On the other hand, he expressly says that masters often killed slaves out of passion with impunity.  That is, there was supposedly no punishment for the slave killer, at least when the person they were serving killed them (perhaps it was treated differently if someone outside the household killed another person's slave).  Here are the exact words, also from chapter 25:

"To strike a slave or to punish him with bonds or with hard labour is a rare occurrence.  They often kill them, not in enforcing strict discipline, but on the impulse of passion, as they would an enemy, only it is done with impunity."

Does this mean that the masters (or mistresses) frequently killed slaves in this manner, or do the words mean that when a master killed a slave, it was often in a bout of abrupt passion and received no penalty?  The previous comment about how rare an occurrence it was for a master to strike a slave seem to point towards the latter.  It would appear from the summary of Tacitus that violence of any kind, great or small, was seldom practiced in the context of Germanic slavery.

In either case, the killing of a slave was reportedly treated with extreme lack of legal and probably moral uproar in the community.  The fairly relaxed version of service described by Tacitus still did not come with full regard for the humanity of slaves.  Such a deed going without formal punishment is sharply contrary to the human rights affirmed in the Torah's laws, according to which the murder of a slave must be punished.  As controversial as the verse is for not forbidding slavery altogether (but only emotionalism or cultural norms would ever lead someone to think all forms of slavery must be evil [1]), Exodus 21:20 fiercely emphasizes that there certainly should be no impunity when someone kills their slave.

Exodus 21:20—"'Anyone who beats their male or female slave with a rod must be punished if the slave dies as a direct result,'"

No exact penalty is specified here.  But, it is clear from this verse alone (along with logic; I mean this verse apart from other verses!) that to forgo punishment of the master or mistress who directly kills their slave during or as a direct consequence of, for instance, a beating, is wicked.  Perhaps Germanic masters killed their slave more spontaneously than by beating them, but the lack of consequences is unjust.  The ESV uses the term "avenged" to emphasize that the dead slave's illegitimate killing should never be ignored.  Exodus 21:12 and 14 already clarify beforehand that killing someone intentionally outside of valid capital punishment or self-defense (see Exodus 22:3) deserves death, but Genesis 9:6 affirms that murder deserves death fairly early in the first book of the Bible.  And the principles of Genesis 9:6 have no exceptions based on who the victim is.  Everyone bears the image of God according to Genesis 1:26-27 and 5:1-2, men and women equally, and should never be killed by other people outside of very specific parameters.

Exodus 21:22-23 also make it clear that negligently fighting with one person and recklessly harming an outside party, up to killing them, merits the same punishment as intentional harm of the same kind.  Also, Exodus 21:28-32 addresses how failing to take action to save a human life when one had 1) evidence of lethal danger and 2) the capacity to intervene is also a sin deserving of execution.  Beating someone to death with an instrument like a rod as used in the example within Exodus 21:20 is much less removed from intentional murder than this even if it is not purposeful.  A weak or sick person could easily show outward signs that beating them at all or with a particular severity could end their life, for one thing.  Whoever is administering the beating would have to react carefully and immediately to any evidence that the slave is about to die, or they are guilty of murder if it gets to that point.

Is beating one's slave for any reason permissible as long as it does not result in death?  No, though the verse right after Exodus 21:20 is sometimes misinterpreted that way.  Exodus 21:21 generates more dramatic controversy, as it appears to some people to dismiss the condition of a slave as trivial given that they do not die from a beating.

Exodus 21:21—"'but they are not to be punished if the slave recovers after a day or two, since the slave is their property.'"

Exodus 21:20-21 accomplishes several things.  It directly affirms that slaves are not exceptions to the right to not be murdered because of their social status, that murdered slaves must be avenged in the proper way by punishment of the guilty master, that the slave's death more than two days after the beating is not to be punished as careless or intentional murder, and that men and women are equal and thus should be treated identically as victims of the same acts.  Regarding the last point, Exodus 21:20 is not the only verse in Exodus that acknowledges gender equality.  Exodus 20:8-10, 12, 17, 21:4, 15, 17, 26-27, and 28-32 all do this as well, often with respect to slaves, and the same principle is the case with free men and women; Leviticus 25:5-7, 44-46, Deuteronomy 5:12-14, 12:12, 18, 15:12-18, 16:9-11, and 13-14 also affirm gender equality when it comes to the moral treatment of slaves/servants.

So many of the explicit words and logical ramifications of Exodus 21:20-21 which uplift slaves and by extension all humans are ignored because some people fixate on the assumption that the Bible permits beating slaves without restrictions as long as they do not die from it.  The latter verse is widely misunderstood to mean any treatment is permissible or at least not deserving of punishment if the slave survives.  Really, verse 21 is about how the master should not be punished for murder if the slave recovers.  If he or she died after recovering, there might be no link between the beating and the death anyway.  Unintententional killing is also not subject to the same outcome as intentional murder when free people are on the receiving end as well (Exodus 21:12-14).  Like Exodus 21:12-14, verses 20-21 are in part about when not to punish for murder.  Someone who beats their slaves only to express personal urges has no refuge in Exodus 21:21 whether or not the slave dies.

Beatings with no basis other than whim are denounced as tyrannical by Deuteronomy 25:1-3, for the recipient must have committed some genuine wrong to deserve flogging.  Deuteronomy 25 is clear that the strikes must fall on the person's back and not, among other things, their face or stomach, parts of the body where the offender would be more vulnerable to lasting injury or lethal damage.  And anything more than 40 lashes at the absolute most is a form of vile torture that no one deserves.  Elsewhere in Deuteronomy, slaves are presented as having the right to flee abusive owners and not be oppressed wherever they go (23:15-16).  Illicit beatings would certainly fall under abuse.

But within Exodus 21 itself, verses 26-27 are stark about how slaves, and anyone else for the same ultimate reasons, must be allowed to go free for mistreatment.  The examples in these two verses are permanent harm to an eye and the loss of a tooth, which a wild beating driven by a master's or mistress's emotionalistic, baseless rage could result in.  According to Exodus and broader Mosaic Law, there is no impunity for masters even in singular instances of abuse that do not kill the slave.  The slavery of the ancient Roman Empire could be far, far more cruel than anything Tacitus attributes to the Germanic tribes, so Biblical morality uplifting slaves as humans with all the actual rights thereof distances Biblical slavery from the Roman kind even more than from the relatively benevolent Germanic kind.

[1].  Maybe there is no such thing as good and evil.  Maybe Biblical morality or something very similar is true.  Or, perhaps slavery is morally required (which would render Biblical ethics incorrect on this matter since slavery is never prescribed with the exception of certain scenarios of military victory [Deuteronomy 20]).  All of these things are logical possible, so it is not obviously true that all kinds of slavery are evil.  The irrelevant feelings or intuitions some people have which make it seem as is slavery is an inherent wrong are just that: irrelevant.

Does The Sabbath Start At Twilight? (Part Two)

The first post in this series was centered on how an annual Biblical holiday, Passover (which leads to a day of rest akin to an ordinary Sabbath), starts with onset of the evening at twilight.  This on its own has no ramifications for the timing of the Sabbath each week, despite conventional Jewish practice reportedly entailing that the weekly time of rest from work starts at twilight or sunset, one way or another around the evening time.  Similarly, they often propose that evening (whatever precise moment they mean by this) marks the beginning of every day, Sabbath or not.  The closest thing to a statement in the Bible affirming this Sabbath habit is in Leviticus 23 regarding the Day of Atonement, or Yom Kippur in Hebrew.  More specifically, Leviticus 23 indicates that the period of rest tied to this holiday should stretch from one evening to the next—not necessarily with sunset precisely, but from evening to evening.

Leviticus 16:29 says to do no work on the Day of Atonement, reiterated in Leviticus 23:28-31 alongside details about other holidays, with verse 31 of chapter 16 adding that this holiday is a "sabbath of rest".  Similar phrasing about rest appears in Leviticus 23 as well.  The Torah very much affirms that there must be a time of rest with defined boundaries for Yom Kippur.  Leviticus 23:32 again calls the Day of Atonement a sabbath, a sabbath of rest, and only in this verse it is specified that this exact duration without work lasts from the evening of the ninth day of the seventh month until the next evening.

Since the tenth day specifically is the Day of Atonement itself on which work should be abstained from according to Leviticus 16:29-30 and 23:27-28, that the Bible prescribes a sabbath beginning on the ninth day actually refutes the idea that each Biblical day starts at evening because then the special sabbath starting on the ninth day would not overlap with two separate days, but would encompass a single evening-to-evening period that is identical to the entirety of the tenth day alone.  The evening of what the Bible calls the ninth day would then really be the start of Yom Kippur, the tenth day.  Yet the Bible both says this annual sabbath begins with the evening on the ninth day and says that the next day, the tenth day, is the Day of Atonement on which one should do no work.  This sabbath does not really overlap with the entirety of either the ninth or tenth days, but a portion of both of them.

Clearly, the time of sabbath rest in this case really includes part of the ninth day and most of the tenth day.  The Bible itself says it spans two distinct calendar/natural days, albeit not quite as directly as I have worded it.  Also, the singular yearly sabbath connected with the Day of Atonement clearly begins and ends with an evening, but does this mean all Sabbaths do?  Not at all.  As with the annual days of rest associated with Passover (Exodus 12:14-16, Leviticus 23:5-8), that something central pertaining to Yom Kippur begins at evening has nothing to do with the regular Sabbath.  It does not follow that the weekly Sabbath also starts at evening or that each day itself begins with evening, as some traditionalistic Jews and Christians influenced by the baseless traditions of the former—and this conception of what constitutes a day would indeed contradict what Leviticus teaches about the distinction between the ninth and tenth days anyway.

The qualities that make a day a sabbath of whichever kind must be shared by all of them, whether they occur every week or once a year.  However, the qualities of a special, annual "sabbath of rest" do not necessarily apply to the ordinary Sabbath that occurs from one week to another.  Leviticus 23 prescribing the Day of Atonement's sabbath from the evening of the ninth day of the seventh month to the evening of the tenth day thus in no way requires that the weekly day of rest really starts with the evening.  It seems like the real reason why so many adherents of Rabbinic Judaism think all Sabbaths begin at evening is because they believe, on the basis of nothing but assumptions, and ideas that are incorrect in addition to being assumed, that every day starts at evening.  In the next installment of this series, attention will shift to how none of the Biblical prescriptions of a day of rest for every six days of work mention the evening.  The normal Sabbath is never said to initiate at twilight!

Game Review—Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 (PS4)

"I don't have a political philosophy."

—Raven

Neither an on-rails shooter nor one where you are confined to small walking areas at a given time, Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 (yes, a mouthful of a title) is like a far more strategic, slow-paced version of a Call of Duty game set in the modernish era.  This is not strictly a sniping game.  Other firearms, stealth melee kills, and collectible hunting are all available across the six total missions.  The small number of campaign levels after training is somewhat offset by just how long missions can be.  There are only six levels, but most can take well over an hour just to initially complete them; replaying some of them is mandatory to achieve all of the in-game achievements and any corresponding PlayStation trophies since there is no way to achieve diverging outcomes in the same playthrough.

Protagonist Raven is left to, most of the time, approach objective areas within each map in the player's preferred order and can fulfill some objectives in a variety of ways.  An example is that you can kill a high-priority target while they are walking, which can be very difficult from a vast distance, or use the surrounding environment or special technology to distract them for an easier shot.  Although features like strategic flexibility in levels and an increasing arsenal of weapons and abilities strengthen the gameplay, Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 is very light on story and, more importantly, philosophical exploration.  Almost every single plot thread and moral or political concept it introduces is given basic acknowledgment with no serious thoroughness.  Also, the final mission is in some ways highly disjointed from the rest of the narrative.  It features a previously unreferenced Russian scientist and her malevolent activities in a level that seems like an afterthought on the part of the developers.

Oh well; there are some positive qualities of the game anyway.

Production Values

The PS4 has seen better graphics than these.  Serviceable enough to not fall into abysmal quality but not particularly detailed and with flickering background scenery at times, the visuals are sufficient to frame the main attraction: lots of fighting, especially with a sniper rifle.  Some character or environment models fare better than others as is the norm in gaming.  For instance, Raven's mask which always covers his face from the player's view (when a sniping kill animation briefly switches away from the first-person viewpoint) is a high point.  Among the aesthetic low points are the glitches.  When he climbs up a ladder, Raven's hands do not quite align with where they would need to be to actually grip the handles, as they appear a little lower than each bar.  But upon staying still while on a ladder, his hands suddenly grasp the bars properly.  Descending a ladder did not involve this issue for some reason, as the hand placement was correct.  The audio is relatively unblemished, though, the sounds of firearms particularly standing out as is appropriate for such a title.  The game does have some strong voice acting, just with very repetitive dialogue between pairs of enemies that patrol an area or stand in place unless attacked.

Gameplay

A mixture of observation, navigation, sniping, and direct combat, Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 alternates between slower and faster paced segments.  Isolated stretches with both paces can be very hard (timed objectives, swarms of enemies, etc.) and require much patience or multiple attempts.  The way the game saves complicates this in some instances, and rather severely.  In place of a manual save option that the player can use as needed or desired, it spontaneously saves almost at random.  This might occur after you eliminate an individual enemy or a small group, leaving you better positioned to kill others in the area.  It can also occur in moments right after you were seen by enemies standing very close, which means if they kill you, you restart at the same time and place they saw you.  Obviously, this might lead to many repeated, almost immediate deaths, which can be escaped with some difficulty (I had to do this once and barely melee killed everyone around me before dying), but otherwise, you would have to restart the entire level.

Interrogations and stealth kills can alleviate this issue by taking care of foes one by one without triggering an alarm.  Sometimes the former, which also involves a stealth kill after a short verbal exchange, also results in ammunition supplies appearing on the map (they are already there, it seems, but they are unmarked unless you interrogate).  Not all interrogations actually yielded me dialogue, though on at least one occasion, this approach fulfills an optional challenge.  A variety of offensive options are available besides these quiet melee assassinations and the more prominent sniping for those who want to take a more explosive approach or find themselves thrust into an explosive situation accidentally.

You can use firearms other than sniper rifles, but for them to be effective, there must be a much smaller distance between Raven and an enemy.  This risks alerting them or perhaps entering sustained, open combat if multiple units are nearby.  I emphasize again that it can be very easy to die in such situations!  Only sniper rifles trigger unskippable slow motion cinematics of the bullet approaching an enemy, passing through their body, and sometimes tearing off a limb or imploding their skull, although these stylized videos do not occur with each sniper kill.  And when shooting across great distances, sometimes at a target more than 1,000 meters away, factors like wind and the bullet dropping significantly impact the aiming process.  

It is necessary to toggle scope magnification and a separate distance calibration (which is about the bullet trajectory more than just visually zooming in) to properly kill foes at such ranges.  Alternate bullets with special utilities thankfully make achieving long-distance kills or other objectives easier.  One, for example, ignores wind and simply strikes wherever the reticle is aimed.  Another triggers an EMP upon impact and can disable remote turrets.  But only select weapons are compatible with specific alternate ammunition types, and their supply is far more limited than conventional ammunition.  Some classes of sniper rifles are better suited or all but mandatory for certain missions.

Contracts 2 has a very unique "exfiltration" mechanic, whereby you can leave a map/mission at certain intervals (after completing one of the primary objectives) to customize weaponry or unlock abilities.  You can then redeploy into the level and continue where you left off—but new purchases will not be equipped unless you start a mission, called a contract, over, resetting formerly completed objectives.  There remains some potential incentive to replay missions due to the differing objectives and corresponding resource bonuses, as well as for the sake of finding any undiscovered collectibles if one has completionist tendencies.  Finding these scattered items is easier than it might seem at first: the mini radar in the bottom left corner of the HUD will give an indicator as to whether one is nearby and as to which direction it is in.

As for exploring an area ahead of time without the vulnerability of walking over, you can utilize the binoculars, which allow the permanent marking of people and some objects from a distance, or you can use the Muav "falcon" drone can be used for reconnaissance, hacking, or even quiet offense thanks to poison darts.  One mission even has an optional challenge to shoot five enemies with these darts, which awards easy in-game currency.  That said, the controls for the drone do not lend themselves well to smooth maneuverability.  In combination with the rapidly dwindling battery life for each deployed drone, this makes it challenging to perform certain tasks with the device efficiently.  Beyond this, some areas have technology in place that renders the drone unusable unless it is deactivated.  By stealth or open assault, there is nonetheless always a way to proceed without the drone.

Story

The fictional Middle Eastern nation of Kuamar has become targeted by a Western-aligned political entity after its president has died and his widow Bibi Rashida has taken primary power over the country.  For 20 years, so Raven is told, the couple helmed a cruel regime, but the group that hired Raven did not think there was a reason to interfere until . . . Rashida began preparing for war on a nearby state that could impact global oil prices.  Yes, the opening cinematic says the game's central Western interference in Kuamar is one way or another about oil.  At least the United States is not officially invading to look for or seize control of oil reserves in the game!  Rashida has gained a number of eccentric allies with philosophical motivations that could come into conflict with each other.  The game's solution?  Do not go into almost any detail outside of very specific scenes about what these miscellaneous individuals and their worldviews are really like!

Intellectual Content

These days, it is very common for people to believe or at a minimum talk and otherwise live as if politics is the foundation of all reality (not that this is some novel, modern phenomenon).  Since logical axioms are inherently true, they alone are the core of reality, and this could not have been any other way.  Only the necessary truths of rationalism deserve such regard, certainly not political philosophies like conservatism and liberalism or particular situations in a given country that receive so much exaggerated emphasis in the current climate.  All political issues are logical and/or moral issues first and foremost, which frequently goes overlooked; this alone is the basis for why political matters can be objectively correct or important and not sheer social constructs.  Raven himself claims to have no political philosophy, but this is either a weak, deluded denial of his real stances or something he says with intentional insincerity to stay guarded with his handler.  After all, Raven actively engages in contracts that have major ramifications for the political stability of certain regions and seems to not collaborate with people like the enemies of the game.

Unfortunately without delving very deep into the issues, the game's story touches on some matters which have remained highly relevant to general American besides Western influence on other countries, particularly in the Middle East.  One that surfaces from time to time is how Raven's handler comments on how Western news and influence will now be allowed in Kuamar, when it is not Western values or media that grounds truth, but reason.  Instead of affirming that ultimate truths do not depend in the circumstances of nations, the handler betrays his biases in favor of Western civilization with all of its own logical errors and moral deficiencies.  But the most overtly yet briefly emphasized issue the game acknowledges, only to scale back its thematic engagement, is the nature of capitalism.  While capitalism has no singular form, as it is the philosophy and practice of utilizing capital (equipment, buildings, workers, etc.) to produce a profit and there are many possible ways to accomplish this, American-style capitalism and the actions of international conglomerates do indeed oppress people.

Secondary antagonist Lars Hellström objects to the latter but distinctly insists that genuine capitalism must reign.  Short descriptions you can read outside of missions describe Lars as opposing multinational corporate power, which he thinks truly dictates world events and interferes with the implementation of true capitalism.  Well, that very much seems to at least be somewhat correct, and it is hilariously hypocritical for conservatives to oppose anything they perceive as "big government", however benevolent, while supporting "big business" or massive corporations while they openly engage in very malevolent practices.  Lars insists appears to legitimately want to bring about world conditions that allow individuals to prosper.  

In other words, Hellström opposes extreme corporate power but distinctly insists that it is a deviation from pure capitalism that must be overthrown.  He seemingly equates any sort of regulation or externally imposed limitation with a stifling of capitalistic competition—which is true to an extent, though restricted capitalism is still capitalism and competition can still occur—and then probably conflates the meddling of ultra-wealthy bussinesspeople and investors with anti-capitalistic social structures.  However, they would still be practicing capitalism, albeit a hyper-predatory version of it that absolutely devastates individuals and countries.  The death of Lars early in the game means in this case that crypto-anarchism, capitalism, and corporate oligarchy are never again brought up—exemplary of how Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 handles much of its overtly philosophical subject matter.

Conclusion

Oh, this is nowhere near the most thoughtfully crafted or content-rich first-person shooter.  Games like Metroid Prime, BioShock, and Call of Juarez: Gunslinger [1] are much better representatives of such qualities.  For what it is and aspires to be, all the same, Sniper: Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 does enough right to offer solid gameplay.  Everything else suffers due to lack of development or proper attention.  As woefully inadequate as the story and its philosophical underpinnings turn out to be, the narrative backdrop still manages to provide somewhat diverse environments and times of day to vary the content.  And between the length of each individual mission and the replayability, the very limited number of levels is not as restricting a factor as it might seem at first.  There is artistic competence to be found in this title, but it does not encompass the majority of the game's various aspects, mostly having to do with the combat and unlockables.

[1].  I have reviewed both of the other games listed here as well, but Gunslinger is the least culturally visible of the three:

https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2021/06/game-review-call-of-juarez-gunslinger.html

Eternal Torment

Almost no one who mistakenly believes in eternal torment of any kind after death—mistakenly in that the Bible does not teach it and in that even eternal pain in an amoral hell could be believed but not proven (eternal torture would be morally unjust by logical necessity)—actually takes it as seriously as its nature would merit.  They might say that death is worse than torture or go about their lives as if there was no overwhelming urgency at all in the fate of many in the afterlife.  Torture is far worse than nonexistence at best when it is severe or lasting enough.  The smallest of endless tortures would become in its ongoing entirety worse than almost any individual logically possible experience in this life.

Eternity has no end.  Time must have been created, or else there would have been an infinite number of moments until now, which means the present could never have come to pass.  It cannot have always been in existence even though it could have preceded the cosmos (there could be time without a universe, but no universe and its events without time in which they occur).  Even hypothetical billions or trillions of years would have an end, as vast as the scale would be.  Eternity could not, or else it could not be eternity.

The fact that the Bible does not actually teach that eternal conscious torment awaits all the unsaved after death aside (Romans 6:23, for instance), and even aside from the more fundamental fact that endless torture would logically always be disproportionate no matter the severity of a moral offense, eternal agony is so much worse than what most people who believe in it actually think that their lives would look incredibly different if they did take it seriously.  There would be far more frequent, sober reflection on and talk of the logical ramifications of eternal torment of any kind if people as a whole inside or outside of the church really focused on it, all while making no assumptions.

Some people would of course be stupid enough to still do certain things even if they knew with absolute certainty that they would result in eternal torment for amoral reasons (a non-theological or unconventional hell where people suffer forever, but not for supposed justice, does not contradict logical axioms), though eternal torture is morally illicit by default.  Without the absolute certainty part for reasons of epistemological limitations and erroneous beliefs about Christianity alike, this is how many evangelicals are.  They falsely believe that eternal suffering in hell is justice but also commit so many petty, blatantly stupid sins anyway.

Some people might actually believe or at least profess that this allegedly Biblical eternal torture is less severe a fate than permanent death, yet this is pathetically irrational.  Others might think that eternal torment in an afterlife is actually why murder is less vile than the worst tortures on Earth: I have spoken with someone who actually asserted that murder of the least painful kinds would be less severe than prolonged torture because the person killed might go to endless suffering.  Torture is the reason why they thought death is less severe than torture!  Again, almost no one who invalidly believes in eternal torment really even takes their own premise and its true intensity as seriously as its nature would demand.

Does The Sabbath Start At Twilight? (Part One)

Twilight is observable without technological aid, and perhaps this is one reason why the tradition endures of treating twilight, when evening begins and night approaches, as the start of the Sabbath.  Mere traditions, of course, are at worst invalid and at best optional but without any inherent significance, so tradition holds no philosophical weight.  If an idea is true, it is not true because people have believed or practiced it for generations; if it is false or non-obligatory, a mere social construct, it would be irrational for anyone to think otherwise.  As for the Biblical Sabbath, is there anything in the Bible actually in favor of what is otherwise an asinine tradition inherited by one generation of irrationalists after another?

First, I will provide the general Biblical information on this day of rest.  Of course, as with anything that does not pertain to literal genitalia, the Sabbath is for men and women, and it is also for the native-born and foreigners, for servants and the free, and for even animals to be refreshed (Exodus 20:8-11, 23:12, 34:21, Deuteronomy 5:12-15).  Sabbath violation absolutely does not have parameters as strict as some people might assume, for Numbers 28:9-10, Jeremiah 17:19-27, Matthew 12:1-13, and Mark 3:1-5 clarify that conducting priestly sacrifices, merely walking around, and healing other people are not prohibited work.  Even so, Exodus 31:12-17, 35:1-3, and Numbers 15:32-36 teach that the person who breaks the Sabbath deserves execution.  None of this is revoked in the New Testament as so many assume (Matthew 5:17-19, Mark 7:1-13, and so on).

Holding the Sabbath properly, therefore, is a fairly significant moral issue (though any moral issue is significant in itself), hence why the timing would be no small thing.  Some people point to Exodus 12 as confirmation that the day starts precisely at twilight/sunset according to the Bible.  However, what does the text say?  Exodus 12:6 says to slaughter the animals to be eaten for Passover at twilight.  The subsequent meal was initially to anticipate and then to commemorate (in later years) the death of the Egyptian firstborn and the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt, which Yahweh would bring about that first Passover night (Exodus 12:7-13, 29-31, 42).  This is the reason why twilight is an integral part of both the narrative and the prescriptions for how to prepare for and partake of the meal.

This passage is about Passover in particular, not about recurring Sabbaths.  If there is a verse that directly addresses the Sabbath allegedly starting at twilight, it would not be found in Exodus 12, the reference to twilight concerning something else altogether.  Along with there being no direct affirmation that each day, according to the Bible, starts when the sun begins to set, there is nothing here to indirectly necessitate that the Sabbath must be kept starting specifically at twilight.  An annual Passover is not the Sabbath one is to have from week to week, only increasing the distinctions between them.  This chapter of the Torah is irrelevant to the subject of the Sabbath except for the parallels in how work other than that of making food is condemned on the first and seventh days of eating unleavened bread, which is connected to Passover (Exodus 12:16).

Germanic Restitution According To Tacitus And Its Flaws

Germania (in my Everyman's Library copy, it is also called Germany And Its Tribes) by the Roman historian Tacitus addresses various aspects of the Germanic tribes, spanning subjects like their religious worship, marriage norms, and warfare practices.  Of special focus in this post is what he claims about their means of punishing or "resolving" some offenses.  Just to acknowledge a crucial fact up front yet again, yes, no one can know what has really happened or not happened in the natural world or in human societies of the past; written sources and verbal hearsay prove only that there is evidence for or against a particular historical occurrence, including any event presented in the Bible.  But what is ascribed to these Germanic people connects with things of greater significance than mere history.

Perhaps a type of punishment besides restitution is true justice for an act like theft, which I am fully aware 1) is logically possible and 2) would mean Judeo-Christianity is objectively false on this point, but no matter what, the form of restitution attributed to the Germanic peoples in Germania could only be unjust if morality exists.  Why?  It involves a payment to entirely unrelated people, the ruler being the most irrelevant figure.  Chapter 12 holds the summary of Tacitus.  He claims these communities imposed capital punishment for treason or for being "unwarlike", yet for unspecified lighter offenses, almost certainly including theft, he says the following:

"Lighter offences, too, have penalties proportioned to them; he who is convicted, is fined in a certain number of horses or of cattle.  Half of the fine is paid to the king or to the state, half to the person whose wrongs are avenged and to his relatives."

Half of the payment going to the ruler is an easy way for someone in power to become more entrenched by claiming resources that have literally nothing to do with them personally.  The monarch (or any other political leader) was not the one victimized in this instance, so it could not be justice to direct any portion of the restitution to them, much less half every single time such amends are made with a person in this manner.  Customs of this kind, if restitution is ever morally required, would misappropriate that which is owed to one party, and especially when half of the payment is taken for the ruler or their class.

Of what is left, Tacitus says the animals are given to the wronged party and to their family.  Note that he does not say the animals go to the wronged party or to their family if the former is no longer alive or is unavailable for some reason.  His "and" absolutely seems to clarify that both the victim and their family receive the payment.  The victim's family at least is not as far removed from the victim themself as the king or some other such figure.  However, while the ruler getting an automatic share of the animals used to pay the "fine" is more egregiously illogical and unjust (if there is such a thing as deserved restitution), their family automatically getting a share would be baseless and even erroneous for the exact same core reason.  Their parents, siblings, and so forth are not the victimized party just because they are biologically related!

So, according to Tacitus, the Germanic people diluted all restitution payments—or at least this was assumed to be and practised as if ideal—by taking half for the ruler/ruling class.  Then some amount of the other half is divided further between the victim and their relatives.  A sliver could have been all that hypothetically made it to the actual victim, since on the system Tacitus presents, there is not necessarily a fixed amount of the second half of the fine that was supposed to be guaranteed to the wronged person.  But as for the ruler in power at the time, they would have received financial gain simply by holding their position!

How very different much of this is from the restitution prescribed by Yahweh in the Old Testament.  Because there are so many verses between Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers about restitution, I will focus on one that is particularly relevant by direct wording to many of the points I brought up above.

Numbers 5:5-8—"The Lord said to Moses, 'Say to the Israelites: "Any man or woman who wrongs another in any way and so is unfaithful to the Lord is guilty and must confess the sin they have committed.  They must make full restitution for the wrong they have done, add a fifth of the value to it and give it all to the person they have wronged.  But if that person has no close relative to whom restitution can be made for the wrong, the restitution belongs to the Lord and must be given to the priest, along with the ram with which atonement is made for the wrongdoer."'"

Like the already quoted portion of what Tacitus wrote, Numbers 5:5-8 does not say that theft alone is in view.  Still, the scope of these verses does clearly encompass sins involving another person's property since the wording of making restitution and adding one-fifth of the value pertains to some sort of financial offense.  Other places in the Torah make it very clear that theft, except for the capital sin of theft of a human (Exodus 21:16, Deuteronomy 24:7), is a sin purely punished by financial restitution (Exodus 22:1, 4, 7-9, Leviticus 6:1-5).  For those men and women unable to pay restitution, which always involves something beyond restoring the original item or financial loss, thief must labor as a slave/servant until they achieve the restitution, go free in the seventh year (Exodus 21:2, Deuteronomy 15:12-14), or are mistreated by their master or mistress (Exodus 21:26-27, Deuteronomy 23:15-16).

If the thief who becomes a slave is employed by the very person they stole from and could not repay, perhaps abuse of the thief by the other party entirely nullifies the obligation to pay off whatever debt remains.  If they are employed by a third party, then this obligation to finish making restitution would not cease.  And if the victim of the theft or adjacent criminal sin has died before the offender voluntarily confesses or can fully make amends, then the restitution should be given to the victim's family members, if there are any, as is the blatant implication of Numbers 5.  The Biblical treatment of theft as a crime is objectively better for the offender and the victim than modern incarceration!  Clearly, while there is no strict logical necessity in Biblical morality being true, it does entail an objectively far more humane approach to all involved than imprisonment and a much more relevant approach than the form of restitution allegedly practiced by the Germanic people.

There is another way that Germanic practice deviates from Biblical prescription, though in this case it is not inherently unjust if morality exists and murder is evil (yes, murder is just immoral killing of a person, so this really would just mean that there is such a thing as murder).  A later part of the same work by Tacitus mentions how even murder was handled with fines of animals.  From this, it would seem likely that the same would be true of other acts like kidnapping.  Restitution for murder was also made by the offender giving a number of animals to the family of the victim, who in the case of homicide would no longer live to benefit from them.  The Germanic people, so says Tacitus in chapter 21, did this to thwart feuds between families that would risk the safety of the general region:

"It is a duty among them to adopt the feuds as well as the friendships of a father or a kinsman.  These feuds are not implacable; even homicide is expiated by the payment of a certain number of cattle and of sheep, and the satisfaction is accepted by the entire family, greatly to the advantage of the state, since feuds are dangerous in proportion to a people's freedom."

While it is necessarily true that it cannot be justice to split restitution between a governing official, the family of a theft victim, and the victim themself—which does not mean that undivided restitution to the victim must be justice instead of another penalty—it is not necessarily the case that murder would have to deserve execution (though certainly not elaborate, dehumanizing tortures literally worse than murder itself as some have thought).  But compare the reported Germanic handling of homicide with the inflexible Biblical punishment for murder as opposed to accidental killing of a person (manslaughter):

Numbers 35:30-31—"'"Anyone who kills a person is to be put to death as a murderer on the testimony of witnesses.  But no one is to be put to death on the testimony of only one witness.  Do not accept a ransom for the life of a murderer, who deserves to die.  They are to be put to death."'"

Of course making restitution payments to the family of the murder victim is less unjust a reaction than murdering additional people in some feud merely because they are the family of the killer.  Yet, the Biblical position does actually regard human life, in this case the life of the murder victim, much more highly than the moral-legal philosophy expressed by Germanic people according to Tacitus.  The German tribes reportedly executed people for desertion, but not for something like murder!  Numbers 35 partly reiterates what Yahweh prescribes as early as Genesis 9:6 and addresses next in Exodus 21, with Exodus 21:20 emphasizing how murdered male and female slaves are no exception: murder of a human always deserves execution by other people.  The book of Numbers goes further by universally forbidding any sort of compensation to escape the death penalty.  

While some have misunderstood this to mean that other general capital sins can be alleviated by monetary payment although the verses addressing them also inflexibly prescribe execution (but without mentioning that a ransom payment is evil), such as with attacking one's father or mother (Exodus 21:15), Numbers 35 really just clarifies Exodus 21:28-32.  Negligently allowing someone else to die, in the provided example by not confining a previously aggressive bovine one owns before it kills a person, is a capital sin unless the family of the deceased is willing to accept a financial ransom to have the life of the sinner spared.  Intentional murder does not have this option.  If it was not for Exodus 21:28-32, Numbers 35:31 still would not mean that other capital sins can have a payment of money substituted for execution.

Whether or not Biblical philosophy is true (yes, all theology is inevitably philosophy), the supposed restitution practices of the Germanic tribes in the day of Tacitus trivialized victims.  On one hand, in matters where the victim survived, the fine they received was only a portion of the resources extracted from the offender, which was for some reason split among other parties who were not victimized.  On the other hand, should the victim not survive in the case of murder, they would not have been around to enjoy the restitution for that which the Torah calls so wicked that loss of money on the murderer's part can never suffice in place of their own death.  The purpose of Tacitus seems quite far from indirectly highlighting how much more highly Judeo-Christianity regards victims of interpersonal criminal sins than did Germanic philosophy and custom, but the Biblical treatment of restitution is all around better for victims.

The Divided Families Of Micah 7 And Mathew 10

Family can be a wellspring of great suffering.  Offering examples of severe familial breakdown, the book of Micah briefly elaborates in chapter 7, verse 6, on extreme relational dysfunction in the titular prophet's lifetime as depravity leads to abundant strife.  Some present day readers would only be familiar with Micah's phrasing because it is referenced by Jesus in the New Testament.  More specifically, Micah 7:6 is referenced in Matthew 10:35-36 concerning himself.  But that does not mean what some might assume.  Reading Micah 7:6 with some of the previous verses gives not only an additional example of a family relationship for the prophet's audience to be wary of, but also part of the context as to how things became so dire to start with, as well as some illumination about why Jesus would use similar language.

Micah 7:2-6—"The faithful have been swept from the land; not one upright person remains.  Everyone lies in wait to shed blood; they hunt each other with nets.  Both hands are skilled in doing evil; the ruler demands gifts, the judge accepts bribes, the powerful dictate what they desire—they all conspire together.  The best of them is like a brier, the most upright worse than a thorn hedge.  The day God visits you has come, the day your watchmen sound the alarm.  Now is the time of your confusion.  Put no trust in a neighbor; put no confidence in a friend.  Even with the woman who lies in your embrace guard the words of your lips.  For a son dishonors his father, a daughter rises up against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man's enemies are the members of his own household."

The prophet's day was characterized by such sin, including those mentioned in verses 2-3, and such confusion that it was unsafe for friends, immediate family members, and extended family members (by marriage as well as by blood) to speak honestly and openly with each other.  Verse 5 subtly addresses how husbands and wives should be able to have conversational intimacy if not for the chaos that sin can wreak upon relationships.  Yet evil has become so widespread in the land that judgment is at hand.  In this time of great urgency, it is as if "not one upright person remains" besides the prophet Micah himself, for this statement in verse 2 would have to be extreme hyperbole in light of the titular figure of the book itself, at the least.  Besides the commonplace tendency for those in the region to do wrong, immense stress due to internal societal decay and external threats as God removed his protection could easily have produced sharp divisions within households.

Jesus uses words in Matthew very similar to Micah 7's own words about divided families, though they are not entirely identical.  If anything, this is far more likely to be where modern churchgoers have encountered the statement about sons against their fathers and daughters against their mothers.  The part that might surprise some of these people is the manner in which Matthew brings up the phrasing so distinctly associated with Micah, which is in the context of Matthew and Micah alike not about a prophetic Messiah figure.  Micah 7:6 is a warning about confiding in or relying upon confused and probably very selfish people, even if they live in one's own home.  Matthew 10:35-36 is a simple summary of what it might be like when part of a household embraces Christ and the rest does not.

Matthew 10:34-36—"'Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth.  I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.  For I have come to turn "a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—a man's enemies will be the members of his own household."'"

All Jesus says is that he has come to by his actions and worldview stir up conflict between his followers and those who do not follow him.  Namely, his followers simply holding to his doctrines will be a source of deep contention within certain families.  In his words is no trace of a declaration that the words of Micah were really and solely about the impact of his then-future life.  One can see rather easily from the way he embeds the reference to Micah 7 into his own words that this is not necessarily even supposed to be a perfect quotation, but more of an allusion to a thematically relevant Old Testament passage.  The quotation marks do not appear in, for instance, the King James Version unlike in the New International Version as shown above.

Micah 7:6 is not a prophecy even in its original context, so it cannot be some clear Messianic prediction fulfilled by Jesus.  It is rather a declaration of what is said to have been the perilous state of families and the broader culture in the time of the prophet.  However, Jesus rejects none of this, pointing out a similarity between the familial division described in Micah and the divisive outcome of some people committing to him (and his philosophy) while other people are perplexed by or antagonistic towards this.  Conflict over legitimate reasons is, vitally, not a problem except on the part of the one in the wrong.  Hence, Jesus does not condemn Christians for causing or living under relational strain due to controversy.

It is very plain that Jesus does not assert he has fulfilled some prediction in Micah 7:6 about himself.  He alludes to a conceptually relevant verse, and that is all.  This happens over and over in the New Testament: a portion of the Old Testament is brought up for reasons that are not attributed to fulfilled prophecy.  Now, sometimes the Old Testament is cited specifically for the purpose of attributing a New Testament figure or event to the fulfillment of a prophecy distinctly about that very person or occurrence.  For example, Acts 2:14-21 credits Joel (the second chapter) with predicting aspects of early church history as described earlier in Acts 2.  Like it or not, that is not the point of Matthew 10:35-36's connection with Micah 7.

Actually, besides acknowledging the fact that people having differing worldviews can lead to entrenched conflict and that his own life and worldview will inspire such division, Jesus does provide the reason why he borrows from Micah's words.  Immediately after giving examples of one member of a family turning against another, Jesus declares that whoever loves their father or mother or son or daughter more than they do Christ himself is not worthy of him (Matthew 10:37).  The same would be the case of other family members not mentioned or of others beyond one's family.  He proceeds to say that anyone who is unwilling to face at least some hardship because of their affiliation with Jesus is not worthy of him (10:38).  

In other words, someone who is utterly unwilling to experience inconvenience or risk emotionally upsetting their family for the sake of Christ (and by extension a truth or idea underpinning Judeo-Christianity) is unworthy and cannot be a genuine Christian.  This is not exactly the superficially uplifting philosophical point so many espouse who would claim allegiance to Christ.  Somehow, many in the church actually regard relationships with biological family as supremely or borderline supremely sacred pillars that should never be challenged or toppled.  A person's parents (despite being owed a special honor for bringing someone into the world; Exodus 20:12, 21:15, etc.), siblings, and children, as well as extended family members, are just people.  Anyone who lives for their family or for their own personal comfort above grand truths is not worthy of living forever or being treated like a paragon of rationality and righteousness, for they are shallowly devoted to inferior priorities.

Memory And Concentration

Memory problems can trigger exhaustion; exhaustion can trigger memory problems.  Whichever one comes first makes no difference as to the devastating consequences and almost inescapable downward spiral that could come about.  The same is true of memory and concentration: memory problems can impair concentration and vice versa.  Whether someone has realized it or not, memory is essential to navigating the practical elements of everyday life and to easily concentrating on the abstract necessary truths that are the foundation of reality alike.  Ironically, even someone who was once neglectful or antagonistic towards rationalistic philosophy and unconcerned with ultimate matters of reality could find themselves desperate for some sort of stable ground and absolute certainty if their memory significantly deteriorated.

A vicious cycle that weakens memory and concentration, or at least prevents the inprovement of both, could easily result.  The person struggles to remember, which not only can inflict a deep and ongoing exhaustion that does not help whatsoever, but also can distract them as they mentally scramble to recall what has just led up to the present moment.  Then, the present moment is for a variety of reasons even harder to focus on, which in turn adds more to what the person might need to or strive to remember, which can leave them more overwhelmed, disoriented, and exhausted.  As an unfortunate consequence, whatever strongholds of memory might remain could start requiring more effort to maintain or the person's memory could weaken further due to the stress.

Inversely, having a strong memory can facilitate concentration on a moment to moment basis, and stable concentration can make it far easier to memorize things.  Fastening a memory within one's mind is after all nowhere near as complicated when one is not constantly trying to recall what happened in the preceding moments.  It could actually be basically effortless in this case, as opposed to the alternative where committing the most minute or simple details to memory and then actually recalling them with immediacy can be immensely tiring and daunting.  Someone with a stable memory, whether a rationalist or not, has a much easier life than they otherwise would, with the exception of remembering something traumatic or frustrating when they strongly wish otherwise.

A true crisis of memory is more existentially, personally destabilizing that many might dare to think because this state seems so far from their current experiences—and because they have not discovered the logical truths already stated in this post.  However, there is no logical guarantee that such a condition will not befall someone at any time without evidential warning, even wholly apart from grand or numerous external pressures that drain someone's energy or directly tax their memory.  Neither a history of stable memory functioning nor self-perpetuated philosophical ignorance (including of how one's memory could suddenly and severely decline) mean that the smoothness of one's memory will continue.

Not all hope would be lost.  The fact that logical axioms are inherently true because their falsity still requires their veracity, that person's own consciousness exists, and other miscellaneous logically necessary facts could still be grasped in the moment by adhering to reason and not because of memory, but focusing on multiple truths simultaneously could be greatly challenging or impossible for someone whose memory and concentration are in such disarray.  For a non-rationalist, though, such an experience might bring them to grapple with the sheer facade that the more practical layers of life were ever knowable beyond veils of potentially misleading perceptions.  On a personal level as well as for the sake of truth itself, it is better to seek the deep truths of reason that underly all else before a hypothetical memory disaster strikes than to clamor with greater difficulty to hold to truth and certainty.

1 Corinthians 5:11 And Abuse

By no means does 1 Corinthians 5:11 only deal with abuse, nor does it directly speak on every category of abuse, much less every possible example within each category.  This verse also refers to sins like greed, idolatry, and voluntary drunkenness, with Paul insisting that Christians not even eat with someone who calls themself a spiritual brother (or sister) while practicing these and other miscellaneous wrongs.  How does this verse relate to abuse?  Among the kinds of people he cautions against even having a meal with, he brings up revilers, as the ESV and NKJV put it, or slanderers, as the NIV calls them.  In overt view here is a verbally abusive person who engages in this type of sin on an ongoing basis while claiming in some way to be aligned with God.  Whether they are not even a Christian or are only partially faltering, Paul's encouragement for how to react to them is the same.

And if verbal abuse like slander or unjust/malicious insults is immoral enough to warrant basically excommunicating someone until they repent, physical abuse would be even more worthy of this reaction.  Furthermore, if people who unrepentantly abuse others can be legitimately shunned to the point of not even eating with them, an abusive spouse would be no exception; of course this passage by extension allows separation within marriage or termination of a marriage over not just slander/reviling, but also any of the other misdeeds listed.  The core idea of 1 Corinthians 5:11 also would at at least allow the same for any worse form of mistreatment or other sin.  With as seemingly random as many New Testament ethical declarations are, it might appear to some readers as if only the listed sins are applicable to what Paul urges us to do.  This is not so.

Any truths about religious or moral concepts, including which ones are even possible and what would or would not be true if these concepts are/were true, are grounded in logical necessity.  This is in part why God would not need to address every single possible instance of abuse in Mosaic Law.  Reason already requires that if one form of abuse entitles someone to depart from or shun the abuser, then at a minimum, so would any other form of abuse in the same category or worse.  

Exodus 21:26-27, for instance, says as much about physical mistreatment: even male and female slaves must be emancipated for physical abuse, such as permanent injury to an eye or tooth.  These verses still apply in their ethical principle to relationships between modern employers and employees and spouses (in both directions, not just with male abuse of women).  So too would 1 Corinthians 5:11 for various logical reasons relate to far more than just verbal abuse and just ostracism in a specific local church congregation.  Like many parts of Yahweh's revelation in the Torah, 1 Corinthians 5:11 by extension addresses more than the kinds of abuse literally mentioned.

It is more overt in one sense that the moral prescriptions of the Torah often take the form of case laws that illustrate how to handle a very precise situation.  There are other possible physical or mental disabilities than blindness and deafness, the examples Leviticus 19:14 provides when condemning the exploitation of the disabled.  Again, there are far more possible injuries, with some forms of physical abuse leaving no injury of either a temporary or permanent sort, than the loss of a tooth or damage to an eye, which Exodus 21:26-27 uses as examples of injuries that an abusive master or mistress must let their slaves go free for.  Weapons and other objects besides iron instruments, stones, and wooden items can be used as tools of murder, though Numbers 35:16-18 only mentions these specific categories.  In the same way, there are sins worse than some mentioned in 1 Corinthians 5:11, with it following logically that physically mistreating someone is worse than merely speaking to them with undue harshness or of them with slanderous words if the latter is wicked.

Between Exodus 21:10-11, 26-27, Deuteronomy 23:15-16, 1 Corinthians 7:15, and 1 Corinthians 5:11, the passage of main focus in this post, the Bible is quite clear that all people have the moral right to flee or separate from abusers of all kinds; some of these verses even specifically address men, women, and slaves as abuse victims, whom some would fallaciously think deserve what Biblically amounts to mistreatment because of one aspect of their identity or another (gender, class).  Using various examples which themselves would necessitate other unspoken examples, these verses individually and together reinforce that if someone is mistreated, even verbally, they do not themselves err by departing from the abusive party for their own protection.  

However, 1 Corinthians 5:11 goes beyond just authorizing separation from abusive people on their victim's part.  Other parties are likewise free (and encouraged by Paul) to separate from an abuser to distance themselves from the latter's evil or pressure them to change for the better, and 1 Corinthians 5:11 also clearly addresses shunning someone for other sins.  If someone claims to be a Christian, other Christians do not sin by refusing to so much as speak or eat with someone who disregards the truth (though of immediate focus in the verse is the truth about their moral failure and hypocrisy).

Would this mean that any sin warrants cutting them off relationally, at least to the extent of not voluntarily interacting with them in a mutually cordial way?  Would this mean that divorce is permissible in all such cases, including those far beyond the exact sins of drunkenness, idolatry, verbal abuse, and so on as addressed in 1 Corinthians 5:11 along with anything adjacent but worse (physical as opposed to verbal abuse) or separately addressed by example as grounds for divorce (Exodus 21:10-11, 1 Corinthians 7:15, etc.)?  Absolutely.  Mercy is always by nature optional, unless someone seeks it in genuine repentance, and it would be merciful to interact with a flagrant sinner as if they are not in failures of their own doing.

And Deuteronomy 24:1 literally allows divorce in any case of the other spouse's moral failure.  I will again point out that if it was not for this verse, two things would necessitate that divorce for even amoral displeasure would be nonsinful according to the Bible: 1) the lack of condemnation of such divorce anywhere else in the Torah and 2) Deuteronomy 21:10-14 treating a divorce as legitimate simply because one spouse is not pleased with the other.  Only the clarification in Deuteronomy 24:1 that nonspecific moral indecency must have occurred points to the requirement of a moral failure for legitimate divorce.  

Otherwise, the clear Torah doctrine of divorce would be that it is fine to end a marriage as long as you are no longer pleased enough with your spouse to stay married, even if they did not commit a wrong.  Either way, 1 Corinthians 5:11 is clear.  Those who believe or claim themselves to be Christians can be ostracized for unrepentantly sinning, with there being no exception for how one spouse is permitted to treat the other.  Since this ostracism is valid, this same separation is fine even if the one being distanced from is one's marriage partner.  The inverse is also independently true.  If divorcing a spouse is not evil when they profess or think themselves to be on the side of reason and morality yet habitually sin, including when it comes to verbal abuse or worse, then of course it would be fine to end or suspend a relationship with acquaintances or biological family members whom one cannot choose as one can a spouse.  

Sin is always severe simply because it is evil, and abuse is a specially egregious class of sin, although not everything people might feel or believe is abusive necessarily is.  Personal whims, societal expectations, intuition (including conscience), and persuasion are all of no authority.  Yet, abuse of the lowest category, that of words, is blatantly affirmed by Paul to be basis enough to not even eat with someone who would profess themselves as aligned with God or Christ.  Spouses and one's own father or mother are not exempt on the receiving end.

See, even at a superficial level, the New Testament absolutely takes both sins of abuse and abuse victims seriously, though not with the same varied directness as the supposedly oppressive Torah, all while indirectly acknowledging that mistreatment other than abandonment (1 Corinthians 7:15) allows someone to divorce as do other general sins—see also the logical ramifications of 2 Corinthians 6:14-18, Ephesians 5:3-7, and 2 Timothy 3:1-5 for marriage and divorce.  It is "almost" like both the Old Testament and New Testament are gravely misunderstood by those with the greatest cultural visibility!

Fallacious Ideas About AI Writing

The great flood of generative AI use has led to some writings conventions or styles getting assumed to be indicators that something was written by AI rather than a person.  Among these things is usage of the em dash—like this one!  I know I am writing this myself instead of having AI generate something with my textual inputs (and I will never utilize the latter for my blog).  I have used em dashes in my blog posts for years and years, in fact.  The evidence is there in the form of many previously published posts.

However, the foundational reason why something is or is not true is because logical requires it.  Concrete examples are secondary at best, examples of something that is already true or possible because of pure logic.  Whether an em dash has been placed by a human or by an AI is hardly as important an issue as all sorts of basic or nuanced things that go overlooked by the non-rationalist masses in favor of some matter of current events or personal interest.  All the same, all truths about artificial intelligence hinge on logic, and even the least severe assumptions or errors regarding AI on someone's part are still irrational.

An AI, whether truly sentient or not, could write sentences exactly like a human would, but there is no single way a human can write a sentence.  A human could use dashes improperly or not use them at all.  A person could write incredibly ineffective strings of run-on sentences or write in grammatically perfect statements (though grammar is an arbitrary construct that could be revised to some other arbitrary, contrived system).  Or, someone could use any other alleged conventions of generative AI writing, such as "It's not A; it's B" and could have started using them long before something like ChatGPT prompted a cultural association of this phrasing with AI.  It simply does not follow from human or AI origins that writings will have any particular syntax or punctuation usage.

Moreover, a human could try to write in a manner fallaciously assumed (as if all assumptions are not epistemologically fallacious) to be the hallmark of AI generation because they like the writing style or simply want to toy with idiots—it would always be the fault of the one making the assumption for being stupid.  Avoiding the use of dashes to tread carefully because some other people are fools with a false belief, though, does not mean someone is irrational, as long as they do not believe that dashes must be from AI and only avoid using them in order to navigate, for instance, the workplace without accusations of inauthentic writing.

Here is yet another example of multiple non-rationalists leaping onto a current events bandwagon philosophy that is utterly untrue.  There is absolutely no logical connection between particular kinds of punctuation and human or AI authorship.  At most, there could be a happenstance or situational connection, but this is not one of strict logical necessity as some might perceive it to be.  The relationship is thus never inherent and cannot prove that a given sample of writing has been brought about by one or the other.  As much as some might believe otherwise or want it to be true, there is no such thing as absolute confirmation that a given writing sample originated from humans or software!

To provide another example, bullet points with repetitive, brief, or very simplistic content in them could come from generative AI.  Entire articles might be stuctured in this manner that does not flow very well or really touch on distinct ideas or facts about a subject.  But again, this does not necessitate that AI must be responsible in any specific case because it is logically possible for someone to write like this (it does not contradict logical axioms!) because it is/already was actually their personal style, because they intend to parody or mock supposedly giveaway components of AI writing (whether they believe this or not), or because they want to actively lead others (who would only be assuming anyway) to think AI is responsible.

People are often very incompetent both in grasping logic and in articulating themselves, so on this level as well, it would not matter how illogical what is being articulated is or how poorly or repetitively it is worded or punctuated.  Try as hard as you might, you will never know with absolute certainty—the only way to truly know something—from the writing output whether it was created by a person or by a generative AI.  You can know in the moment that you are writing something.  You can know it is logically possible for humans or software to produce writing of a given sort.  As for writing that is circulated on the internet or provided to you by another person, at best, you might have highly fallible evidences that never amount to logical proof.