So you would try everything ─ drugs, torture &c ─ rather than stop trying to find the bomb in time?
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The ends justify the means?
- Thread starter 74x12
- Start date
74x12
Well-Known Member
God did not do evil; but gave Himself into the hands of evil. This is about people who commit immoral acts to further a supposedly "righteous" cause.So you just gave yourself an answer.
If god can do evil to generate good, than evil can be a good thing
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber
That basically describes every attack Jehovah ordered.
I suppose one could look at this in any number of ways.
What if there was, in fact, no bomb at all, and the suspect was tortured for no reason at all?
What if someone else planted a bomb and made you think that someone else planted it?
Or suppose he did plant a bomb and wouldn't talk if you just tortured him, but might crack if you bring in his wife and kids and tortured them instead?
Or maybe it's not an atomic bomb but a conventional bomb? Or maybe it's not a bomb at all, but someone just wrote a seditious screed which someone deemed "dangerous"? That's the way down the slippery slope.
Don't get me wrong. I mostly agree with what you're saying here, although it's a judgment call that has to be made and later justified. Perhaps it's not morally ideal, but a matter of practical necessity, which can sometimes override moral considerations. As the line goes, "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few - or the one."
I know. So does our efficiency-conscious hero in the example, and accordingly he or she saves it till last, in case it works this time. After shooting the suspect's family in front of him or her has failed, for example.
My point is simply that there will be ends which indeed justify the intelligent application of any and all available means. There are no moral absolutes.
74x12
Well-Known Member
I must disagree because God can't be immoral. (James 1:13) I think you were not present at these wars. So you can't judge very well the right and wrong of the situation. I trust that God was right.
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber
Genocide and sex slavery are never moral. It doesn't matter if I was there or not. What is written in the Bible is not a very flattering account. God's wrath is so much over kill that he kills off innocent animals because he's mad at humans.
Thief
Rogue Theologian
including Sodom and Gomorrah
74x12
Well-Known Member
The Lord gives and takes away. (Job 1:21) God gave life; He can take it. But who knows what spirits will be spared? Just because someone dies that's not the end of them. There is a resurrection. Everyone has an appointed time to die anyway which God apparently does decide. So please understand this is another form of questioning God's sovereignty and His decision of when someone must die. Well, what can I say to that?
We have to do the right thing and repent so we can be saved in the resurrection. What else could I say?The judgment of God is right and if nations repent they don't have to face it. Just see how Nineveh was spared in the book of Jonah when they repented. God uses "natural" disasters and enemy armies to punish nations and in this case He used the armies of Israel to punish certain nations that He had already decided deserved to be punished. If not Israel, then some other disaster would have taken place. And please note that Israel itself was not exempt but was judged and destroyed as a free people by the Assyrians, Babylonians and the Romans. Unfortunately for the world, the judgment of God has to take place. He judges nations right now and individuals in eternity. If nations would only repent then nothing bad will happen to them. On the contrary; they'll be blessed with prosperity. And if individuals repent then they may have eternal life in the resurrection; who knows?
God wants people to fear Him. That means show Him respect He deserves as the righteous Judge. God wants the nations not to do evil things. He wants nations not to be corrupt, not to make evil laws, not to oppress the poor, not to worship idols. Especially not with human sacrifice etc. It's really basic stuff. And I believe God is rather lenient anyway. If people would only understand. God doesn't withhold good things to whoever fears Him.
I believe the spirits of the animals come from the earth and return to it. Anyway I believe it's mankind's fault that animals die in the first place because we sinned.
As for sex slavery it was a fact of life and warfare in the bronze age. Basically everyone did it and the Hebrews were not excepted in those days. They forcefully married their captives but it was normal for the time. Just read Homer's Iliad. They didn't think like we do about it.
I've said it before; God gave some allowances in those days because of the "hardness of their heart" (Matthew 19:8) But that doesn't mean God liked it. The point is that God was not trying to start a revolution to overthrow all of bronze age society. The people were not ready even to obey the laws that He did give them. He was beginning something good that would grow. (Matthew 13:33)
That's not what "the end justifies the means" is about, though. The point of the expression is something like "if you can get good fruit from a bad tree, then that's fine." But you're arguing that getting good fruit from a bad tree is impossible. It's apples and oranges.
74x12
Well-Known Member
God has a right to judge. God is the Judge. The people there should have not been preying on helpless travelers; then they would have passed the test when the angels came disguised as travelers.
If we (God's "fruit") are immoral, then God (the "tree") must be immoral too, no?
Like Lot, who passed the test by offering up his daughters to be gang-raped. Very morally upstanding.
Edit: that story actually makes a good example scenario. In the Sodom and Gomorrah story, "the ends" was Lot and his family (minus his wife) being saved from God's wrath. "The means" was Lot handing his daughters over to be gang-raped. Did the ends justify the means in that case?
74x12
Well-Known Member
In this case I am yes. Every communist dictator so far for example has supposedly had lofty goals. Some kind of utopia was planned. Look how it turned out. Some kind of cesspool of tyranny.
Maybe he panicked I don't know. What would you do? Anyway they got their revenge because they raped him. I'm joking, but seriously ... they did. But yes we all can make mistakes, but the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were purposefully preying on innocent travelers. This obviously wasn't the first time.
74x12
Well-Known Member
But Lot didn't hand his daughters over. If you read the story the angels shut the door on the crowd of people and blinded them so they couldn't find the door. Basically the angels did everything to give Lot and his family a chance to escape. Nothing happened to the daughters.
So then you aren't even arguing that "the end justifies the means" is false.
So the ends justified the means?
He offered them; that's what I was referring to.
So the ends (nothing bad happening) justified the means?
There's no sign in the story that Lot knew that any of this would happen when he decided to let his daughters be gang-raped.
74x12
Well-Known Member
Why do the ends justify the means? Like let's say ISIS wanted to establish a global Caliphate full of peace and goodwill and what not. Everyone would be Muslim and obey the Sharia. Is beheading people and blowing people up a good way to go about it? Will that be a happy utopia? Or will the leaders go on being what they have already proven themselves to be? Ruthless killers and psychopaths? You see where I am going with this? You can't take the psycho out of the psycho. He's still psycho even after he achieves everything he wanted to achieve.
How do you draw that conclusion?
74x12
Well-Known Member
Yeah, he's human. He made a mistake. He probably panicked. Anyway, the fact is he's still not as bad as the people of Sodom who were intentionally trying to rape peaceful travelers and probably kill them and steal their stuff.
Okay, so Lot's not a paragon of virtue? Are you saying that people have to be perfect?
Shushersbedamned
Well-Known Member
What I mean is that I do not "hold that the end never justifies the means".