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Houses, wives, servants, oxen and asses, and what ever stuff that your neighbor has that you "covet" is referring to ownership and property.
if multiple gods DID exist outside of time, they would have to be perfectly parallel. outside time, a being simply would be. all their characteristics would exist. how could one all powerful, all knowing individual being exist with a different all powerful, all knowing individual? any deviation of character would create a conflict, and conflicts presuppose change, which requires time.
superstructures are not mutually exclusive because they are not infinite. can superstructures occupy the same space at the same time? (i'm talking classical mechanics, matter consisting of fermions) no. if a superstructure took up all the space that there was, could another exist? no. the same condition would apply with god, although it has less to do with physical extension.
Originally posted by Bob Sholtz
reply to post by windword
Houses, wives, servants, oxen and asses, and what ever stuff that your neighbor has that you "covet" is referring to ownership and property.
i'd say that falls under adultery, not property ownership. "if a man looks at a woman with lust he has already committed adultery in his heart".
This commandment is immoral because it denies love, in a culture that sold women into marriage for financial and political gain.
Why would you use commandments from a book filled with contradictions and immoral teachings? There are many other alternatives than to erect a monument based on a book with so many horrific moral atrocities.
Society needs better examples than outdated myths...
Originally posted by AfterInfinity
reply to post by windword
This commandment is immoral because it denies love, in a culture that sold women into marriage for financial and political gain.
"Thou shalt not covet another man's woman..." How does this deny love? It denies the misapplication of lust, certainly. But love? I don't know about that. I see plenty of places where such a virtue could do some good.edit on 5-6-2013 by AfterInfinity because: (no reason given)
“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.“You shall have no other gods before me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.
5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.
And yet our laws reflect many of the morals conveyed in the 10 commandments. Should we abolish those as well? Are those laws protecting our lives and property no longer relevant?
Originally posted by AfterInfinity
reply to post by windword
Throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Some of the commandments are still perfectly good. That's like saying that you're an adult and too good for laws.
I can think of at least four commandments that society would do quite well to observe in today's world.
Do not kill
Do not steal
Do not covet another man's property
respect your parents
These commandments are still perfectly good in today's world.
Originally posted by AfterInfinity
reply to post by windword
No but a museum containing the shells of nuclear weapons is perfectly fine right?
We're obviously proud of the nuclear devastation we've unleashed with science.
Just because you don't care doesn't mean no one else does. Perhaps you should respect the desires of others if you want them to respect your opinions. From where I'm sitting you only care about what you think.
The Real Ten Commandments
Richard Carrier
I keep hearing this chant, variously phrased: "The Ten Commandments are the foundation of Western morality and the American Constitution and government." In saying this, people are essentially crediting Moses with the invention of ethics, democracy and civil rights, a claim that is of course absurd. But its absurdity is eclipsed by its injustice, for there is another lawmaker who is far more important to us, whose ideas and actions lie far more at the foundation of American government, and whose own Ten Commandments were distributed at large and influencing the greatest civilizations of the West--Greece and Rome--for well over half a millennia before the laws of Moses were anything near a universal social influence. In fact, by the time the Ten Commandments of Moses had any real chance of being the foundation of anything in Western society, democracy and civil rights had all but died out, never to rise again until the ideals of our true hero, the real man to whom we owe all reverence, were rediscovered and implemented in what we now call "modern democratic principles."
The man I am talking about is Solon the Athenian. Solon was born, we believe, around 638 B.C.E., and lived until approximately 558, but the date in his life of greatest importance to us is the year he was elected to create a constitution for Athens, 594 B.C.E. How important is this man? Let's examine what we owe to him, in comparison with the legendary author (or at last, in legend, the transmitter) of the Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments. Solon is the founder of Western democracy and the first man in history to articulate ideas of equal rights for all citizens, and though he did not go nearly as far in the latter as we have come today, Moses can claim no connection to either. Solon was the first man in Western history to publicly record a civil constitution in writing. No one in Hebrew history did anything of the kind, least of all Moses. Solon advocated not only the right but even the duty of every citizen to bear arms in the defense of the state--to him we owe the 2nd Amendment. Nothing about that is to be found in the Ten Commandments of Moses. Solon set up laws defending the principles and importance of private property, state encouragement of economic trades and crafts, and a strong middle class--the ideals which lie at the heart of American prosperity, yet which cannot be credited at all to Moses.
Let us now turn to the Ten Commandments of Solon (Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, 1.60), which run as follows:
1. Trust good character more than promises. 2. Do not speak falsely. 3. Do good things. 4. Do not be hasty in making friends, but do not abandon them once made. 5. Learn to obey before you command. 6. When giving advice, do not recommend what is most pleasing, but what is most useful. 7. Make reason your supreme commander. 8. Do not associate with people who do bad things. 9. Honor the gods. 10. Have regard for your parents. www.infidels.org...