God and Right/Wrong - Bad argument for Mormons

[_The Nehor]

The theological problem is that if you divorce God from the Law and make it his Master then there is a higher entity or truth then God. LDS theology can adapt to this easier then most but I think it is wrong. If there is no absolute moral Law and there is still a God then you are not obeying and worshiping the ultimate Good and are just following what you happen to like. Under this system, there is no divine morality and one can worship the devil as easily as God and it's solely a conflict of opinion. Even worse, you can say that God could just as easily have commanded us to hate each other as he could have to love one another. This theology had it's followers in the past and it led to some rather sick things. At that point I might only worship God out of fear, not out of love. It sounds like the pagan deities of the past that you may not agree with and may not be good but need to be satisfied to live a life free of their meddling.

It's a complicated question. Sometimes I think I'm asking the wrong questions and that there is no way for God to answer me on this until I can figure them out.

[_Buckeye]

I'll add my two cents to the OP.

I think you have to recognize a distinction between "natural law" and "sin". I believe there is a natural law to which God conforms and eventually we will be fully under. However, because of his mercy, which is effectuated through the atonement, God suspends the natural law for us for a time. In its place, he gives us his laws, which are designed to allow us to fully comply with the natural law before being overwhelmed with it. Disobedience to God's law is sin.

For example, if my 5 year old lets his anger get the better of him and he hits his younger brother, this is wrong under nature's law. But it is not a sin, because it is covered by the atonement. If my son does the same thing when he is 20, it is both wrong and a sin, but because his probation is still open, he can correct the wrong (in reality place it on Christ) by repenting. At some point the probation will end.

[_Sethbag]

I'll add my two cents to the OP.

I think you have to recognize a distinction between "natural law" and "sin". I believe there is a natural law to which God conforms and eventually we will be fully under. However, because of his mercy, which is effectuated through the atonement, God suspends the natural law for us for a time. In its place, he gives us his laws, which are designed to allow us to fully comply with the natural law before being overwhelmed with it. Disobedience to God's law is sin.

For example, if my 5 year old lets his anger get the better of him and he hits his younger brother, this is wrong under nature's law. But it is not a sin, because it is covered by the atonement. If my son does the same thing when he is 20, it is both wrong and a sin, but because his probation is still open, he can correct the wrong (in reality place it on Christ) by repenting. At some point the probation will end.

If one orangutan hits another orangutan, is that wrong under natural law?

Do you suppose that there might be some planet out there in the universe with a race of intelligent and highly advanced, both socially and technologically, creatures, who one day cease to exist because their star goes Supernova, and anyone or anything in the universe knows or cares? What about the one alien who was vaporized with his penile tentacle buried deeply into another aliens reproductive orifice in an adulterous affair, at the moment of vaporization? Is natural law going to do something about it?

[_Scottie]

What about the one alien who was vaporized with his penile tentacle buried deeply into another aliens reproductive orifice in an adulterous affair...

I see you've been reading my fantasy blog... :)

[_Droopy]

The only argument Mormons could have which has much potential, in an argument with an atheist, is that listening to God is a more accurate and more reliable method of obtaining knowledge of what is right and wrong, than is attempting to figure it out by any other means. And, given the past record of revelatory performance by LDS prophets in such matters, and questionable ethical examples from scripture (to understate it dramatically), I think this would be a highly dubious claim at best.

The atheist has no means whatever of ascertaining right or wrong in any epistemologically non-relative sense. The atheist has three fundamental epistemological approaches to moral questions, or variations upon them: relativism, nihilism, and sundry forms of utilitarianism. Although each of these have philosophical premises that differentiate each from the other, they are all of a piece in the sense that they are all contingent systems of morality that rely solely upon concepts and assumptions relative to the time, structure, and zeitgeist of the particular culture in which they arise. In other words, all purely humanly created systems of morality are bound and conditioned by the severe delimitations created by the very human weaknesses and moral goalpost shifting that any system of morality is, in theory, created to address in the first place.

I won't address Seth's Madalyn Murray O' Hairesque posturing about supposed "questionable ethical examples" from scripture at this point, as he doesn't know what he's talking about and I don't have the relevant sources or knowledge at my fingertips at this time. Suffice it to say, Seth's biblical exegeses and knowledge of the theological, cultural, and contextual origin of such texts is just about at the level of Richard Dawkins, who, given his performance within his shoddy secular humanist screed The God Delusion, appears to be somewhere within the precincts of zero.

[_Sethbag]

And what have you got for determining right from wrong, Coggy? That the voices in your head tell you?

Yeah, that's a huge difference.

Frankly, I'm OK with the idea that human beings ourselves are involved in deciding, for ourselves, what we consider to be right and wrong.

The notion that there is this overarching "natural law" out there somewhere which requires that a 5 year old kid who hits another 5 year old kid is doing "wrong", such that were it not for Christ having his body tortured and killed, that child must suffer some kind of eternal punishment, is not only irrational and insupportable by any kind of evidence, it's also revolting.

[_Scottie]

The atheist has no means whatever of ascertaining right or wrong in any epistemologically non-relative sense. The atheist has three fundamental epistemological approaches to moral questions, or variations upon them: relativism, nihilism, and sundry forms of utilitarianism. Although each of these have philosophical premises that differentiate each from the other, they are all of a piece in the sense that they are all contingent systems of morality that rely solely upon concepts and assumptions relative to the time, structure, and zeitgeist of the particular culture in which they arise. In other words, all purely humanly created systems of morality are bound and conditioned by the severe delimitations created by the very human weaknesses and moral goalpost shifting that any system of morality is, in theory, created to address in the first place.

Moral goalpost shifting?? God is the most morally inconsistent entity ever devised!!

[_Scottie]

The notion that there is this overarching "natural law" out there somewhere which requires that a 5 year old kid who hits another 5 year old kid is doing "wrong", such that were it not for Christ having his body tortured and killed, that child must suffer some kind of eternal punishment, is not only irrational and insupportable by any kind of evidence, it's also revolting.

Duh! 5 year olds haven't reached the age of accountability yet, stupid!! Geez!! :)

[_Droopy]

And what have you got for determining right from wrong, Coggy? That the voices in your head tell you?

Yeah, that's a huge difference.

Frankly, I'm OK with the idea that human beings ourselves are involved in deciding, for ourselves, what we consider to be right and wrong.

The notion that there is this overarching "natural law" out there somewhere which requires that a 5 year old kid who hits another 5 year old kid is doing "wrong", such that were it not for Christ having his body tortured and killed, that child must suffer some kind of eternal punishment, is not only irrational and insupportable by any kind of evidence, it's also revolting.

You know Seth, if you ever want to be taken seriously as a critic of religion, at some point your going to have to disgorge the Madalyn Murray O' Hare style of cocky, dismissive diatribe and engage is some substantive, reasoned, critical argumentation. Anybody can engage in the kind of American Atheists jeering and cat calling that passes for argumentation among many Atheist true believers, but all you're doing thereby is excluding yourself from consideration as a serious participant in the arena of ideas.

[_Droopy]

Moral goalpost shifting?? God is the most morally inconsistent entity ever devised!!

Upon what criteria?