How on earth did I ever become a God's advocate?
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How would that be clear in a world with no death? How are Adam and Eve supposed to know what "die" means?
Who said there was no death in the world? I've heard some bibleboppers use that claim, but have never seen the evidence that the Bible says any such thing. Even if Adam and Eve could not they could certainly see it in the things around them.
This is not to mention that the Bible clearly shows that Eve was well aware what death meant. It terrified her quite a bit. The serpent had to convince her that death was not going to happen for her to eat from the tree.
Oh please don't let anyone think I am saying this as some sort of factual statement about world history. But the fact is that in that fairy tale Eve does know what death is and that is what prevented her from even touching the tree.
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"Good and evil" as a shorthand for "internalizing a moral code sufficiently close to society's." I assume that you've been able to do this; otherwise you're a very careful psychopath.
Oh this one is a very juicy topic, worthy of its own thread and not cluttering up this valuable one. Let me just say this very short thing...
The conditioning of people to react to their desires in certain ways has nothing to do with morality. It is simply conditioning and requires no concept of good or evil.
I myself have no moral code to speak of, and certainly have not internalized anything close to one. It seems all very funny to me. I have internalized the more ancient concept of virtues and vices. This is about judging traits and not actions.
However, I have been conditioned (and realize the practicality of) not slaughtering coworkers when they disagree with me, or taking things without paying when people aren't looking.
In defense of my argument I will point out that many very "moral" people continue to do things that are "evil", and that they even admit this but must fight it at every step... that's because in spite of learning a morality, they have not been properly conditioned. I on the other hand never even have an itch to steal (can't say I've never been tempted to kill someone). I view the level of temptation as simply the lack of conditioning.
We can review this in another thread if you want. I really think it is a side issue and not needed to make your point.
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Perhaps you misunderstand. It's not the gun itself that is good or evil. The point is that to obey a moral God is to make a moral choice, but prior to the eating Adam and Eve are incapable of moral choice - therefore God's admonitions are meaningless.
His admonition was not that it would be immoral, only that it would be dangerous. Once they did it anyway, he came up with the sin angle.
But this is besides the point. While it may be questionable why he gave them access to a tree that he never wanted them to eat from, I don't think that in itself is the bad thing he did. Although I must admit that after they ate from it he did a pretty good job of securing them from Eden (posting guards and all that), so why he didn't for the tree earlier? I guess it came down to trust...
In the end the tree didn't do anything to anybody (if taken literally), other than grant them knowledge (false or real) of morality.
It was the snake that was the real danger. There is about 0 question that they would never have eaten from the tree except that the snake tricked them into it.
So the tree is besides the point. The question is why did God allow there to be the serpent in his garden, and if he just had to, why didn't he put in safeguards so that Adam and Eve would be safe from his trickery. Not to mention, why did God punish them at all when it was obvious that they were tricked by this other creature?
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No matter how many times I tell a 2-year-old "don't touch my shotgun" I'm still responsible if they blow their head off. Hell, that's even true for adults, in our society - if I leave dangerous items unsecured, I'm responsible for mishaps even if I told you they were dangerous.
Well I think this idea of responsibility is a load of crap. It is the result of everyone these days wanting to punish someone for every bad thing that happens. Life happens. And kids, while perhaps not the most intelligent agents, have their own will and so responsibility.
I think it may be negligent for a parent to leave something lying around that is surely going to have negative consequences if a kid simply touches it (which is probably the definition of anything with a trigger), but I don't believe that parents should be punished any more than they already have been if their kid blows their head off.
I watched an interesting documentary years ago on a tribe of Indians in Canada. They still lived according to tradition. In their culture kids had access to all the dangerous things that parents had. They were warned about the danger, but things were not kept away from them.
In one scene a father has ended chopping wood and one of his young sons picks up the axe and starts playing with it. The doc guy asks with concern about why the father is letting this happen, and the father relates their culture's idea that individuals must learn on their own from experience and the best parents can do is warn their kids of the danger. When asked what happens if the kid cuts his hand off the father quickly replied "Then he probably won't mess around with an axe again."
Is this guy negligent, or is this a "wrong" attitude? Personally I don't think so. Of course I would not leave a loaded gun near a child, and I doubt this guy would either. I suppose if he did and his kid blew his own head off, the father would learn not to leave loaded guns lying around.
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It's my responsibility to take reasonable precautions against your willful stupidity, as it was God's responsibility in this case.
What am I your kid or something? Why do you have responsibility over my willful stupidity? If so, you may be in for a lot of work.
Heheheh.
Just bustin' yer balls. Honestly, all I am saying is I think your point could be made without analogy to the tree, or to leaving guns lying around.
Probably a better example would be the snake, and letting a drugpusher have direct unsupervised access to your kids 24/7.
holmes
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