Sunday, September 29, 2024

How The Bible Directly And Indirectly Addresses Moral Issues

Even if the Bible does not explicitly mention all of the major ramifications of its moral tenets--and sometimes it does--it logically would follow that certain things are in fact illuminated within the context of Biblical ethics whether the text specifically says so or not.  For instance, with the Bible using the particular example of an engaged woman being raped in Deuteronomy 22:25-27's capital punishment law, it would absolutely not follow that it is teaching that the rape of unengaged/unmarried women, men of any marital status, or children is not sinful or that the perpetrators in other situations, regardless of motivation or gender, do not also deserve death.  Not only does it not follow and is nothing said to teach this, but it would be inconsistent with what the Bible already says: the gender equality of Genesis 1:26-27 and the very verse in the Deuteronomy passage saying that rape is like murder, which always receives the death penalty (Exodus 21:12), would mean that all rape is like murder.  The comparison would not and could not only apply to an engaged woman raped by a man!

Another favorite example of mine is that what the Bible says about alcohol use would be the case wherever drug use parallels it.  Mosaic Law and much of the New Testament does not bring up substances like marijuana or other drugs.  Nevertheless, Deuteronomy 21:20 and Ephesians 5:18, for instance, address drunkenness, and hedonistic or self-destructive drug usage would be equivalent since alcohol and drugs are mind-altering substances.  One could not be permissible unless used for intentional intoxication (alcohol) if using the other is universally immoral except perhaps in strictly medical contexts.  Drugs are simply far more varied in forms, effects, and applications than alcohol, but wherever the exact overlap is present, the Biblical stance would obviously be that the two are morally equivalent when not misused.  If a drug could be used without getting high, then the ethics of its use would be the same as with alcohol.

By saying not to add to its commands in Deuteronomy 4:2, the Bible also provides all it needs to about a vast number of things.  One might hear of people agonizing over how the Bible does not mention specific activities that they are interested in and they misunderstand this silence for Biblical uncertainty.  One example is how conservative Christians might act like there is genuine conceptual ambiguity about whether Biblical ethics allows people to kiss outside of marriage!  It never mentions kissing being sinful or says anything from which it follows by necessity that kissing someone outside of dating or being married to them is sinful.  It is not condemned directly or indirectly, so it cannot be anything other than Biblically permissible!  For a more controversial example (and I love the discomfort many people have with this), the Bible does not need to talk about flirtation to indicate that according to its standards, flirtation is absolutely nonsinful in itself, no matter the marital status of anyone involved, since extramarital flirtation is not inherently adulterous and can be done with wildly varying intentions.  However, without mentioning the issue, the Bible has by what it says and does not say already clarified the matter in full as far as the Christian worldview goes.

For a category more important than most by far, the Bible clarifies a lot about issues like torture without using the word and providing a detailed singular list of all of the prohibited forms and contexts of torture.  In prescribing financial damages for theft of things other than people, which specifically receives execution (Exodus 21:16, Deuteronomy 24:7), anything from the amputation of hands (Surah 5:38 in the Quran), capital punishment (as with Roman crucifixion and English hanging), or anything more severe than paying at a fixed ratio is clarified as sinful according to Christianity.  The thief who cannot repay works their debt away, to be released after seven years no matter the outstanding amount (Exodus 21:2, Deuteronomy 15:12-15), and he or she goes free if they are abused (Exodus 21:26-27).  In saying that the corpse of an executed man or woman can be displayed for less than 24 hours (Deuteronomy 21:22-23), the Torah is excluding forms of cruel and Biblically unjust punishment like nailing a loving person to a cross to suffer as long as they can as with, again, Roman crucifixion.

The Bible says a great deal not just with direct words, but by its silence combined with what it does state, and logical necessity requires that some unmentioned ideas would have to be the case if Biblical premises are.  This is not fucking difficult to grasp unless someone is used to looking to ecclesiological tradition, conscience, or approval from random people and making assumptions or refusing to let reason reveal what does and does not follow from a specific thing.  Whether or not the Bible is true, nothing I have said here misrepresents it, and yet these and other matters would enrage or sadden plenty of Christians.  What thorough imbeciles claim to know what the Bible speaks of morality, when they have never read much of it, never discovered what does and does not logically follow, and are interpreting what they do read through the assumptions of hearsay, conscience, and general tradition.

Logic, people.  It is very fucking helpful.

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