Abraham/Isaac sacrifice

[jay santos]

Originally Posted by JohnnyLingo

It is odd that none of the firstborn sons of the Old Testament manage to keep the birthright.

Maybe it's a lesson on how we can't ever think we have it made. Just because there may be certain blessings associated with membership in the Church or whatever doesn't mean we can't lose those blessings.

What a beautiful message.

[Archaea]

Without Pelagius's voice reason this thread would be a total goner. However, I agree with his hermeneutic in interpreting OT narratives.

[SoonerCoug]

Originally Posted by Archaea

Without Pelagius's voice reason this thread would be a total goner. However, I agree with his hermeneutic in interpreting OT narratives.

If an OT story (or NT/Book of Mormon story, for that matter) flies in the face of Jesus Christ's teachings or the concept of a loving, merciful God, then I automatically categorize the story as literature or mythology (which may or may not be inspired to any degree).

Analysis of Mark Twain has MUCH more value than dissecting Onan.

Antiquity and context do not make the Onan story less stupid. Opium for the people. Marry your brother's widow as you're told, or God might kill you. Let Joseph have as many virgins as he wants, or God will destroy you, Emma. It's about powerful people controlling weak people. Even if you can stretch to find a modern day application, the story is still stupid, uninspired garbage.

I have a hard time looking past what I believe to be the obvious original intent of many of these stories.

I can read Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day and get much more modern day application per time invested reading.

[pelagius]

Originally Posted by SoonerCoug

If an OT story (or NT/Book of Mormon story, for that matter) flies in the face of Jesus Christ's teachings or the concept of a loving, merciful God, then I automatically categorize the story as literature or mythology (which may or may not be inspired to any degree).

Analysis of Mark Twain has MUCH more value than dissecting Onan.

Antiquity and context do not make the Onan story less stupid. Opium for the people. Marry your brother's widow as your told, or God might kill you. Let Joseph have as many virgins as he wants, or God will destroy you, Emma. It's about powerful people controlling weak people. Even if you can stretch to find a modern day application, the story is still stupid, uninspired garbage.

I can read Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day and get much more modern day application per time invested reading.

I could be wrong but I think you brought up the story of Onan because you thought it was a clear example of a story with no redeeming value. I gave what I think is a reasonable approach and that at the very least does suggest that the story can provide theological insight. I would hope that this would give you pause to consider the OT more seriously instead of dismissing it nearly outright because it doesn't conform to your notions of what is or isn't inspired. I certainly agree that the OT writers don't express a theology that is the same as Mormonism. However, that doesn't mean the book isn't inspired and valuable. You may find Mark Twain more valuable personally but surely we have a responsibility as a part of a community of believers to take the OT seriously and look for inspiration in its pages by virtue of the fact that our community has privileged the text via canonization. I think being part of the community of faith brings with it an implicit contract to take its sacred texts seriously and to look for the inspiration in these texts and not for excuses to dismiss them with only superficial analysis. This doesn't mean you can't ultimately dismiss some parts as uninspired or less than helpful (afterall we don't believe in revelatory inerrancy). But I would hope that we as a community of believers would approach our sacred text first with faith and not dismissal.

[Indy Coug]

As far as the "a loving God wouldn't toy with Abraham and have him kill his son" line of reasoning goes....

I'm amused by how mortals with limited knowledge and understanding can sit in judgement of what God would or wouldn't do in all situations because it doesn't reconcile with their own biases and ignorance.

I think God is perfectly capable and justified being behind things like Abraham/Isaac, Noah, Job, the circumstances of Christ's birth, destruction of the wicked at the Second Coming, etc. and it's not due to being petty, capricious, etc. etc. etc.

It's because God knows the end from the beginning and has a perfect understanding of all laws and principles that he governs by and subjects Himself to and the appropriate hierarchy of which laws and principles supercede others.

It's extreme hubris to think we have a better grasp on what God is or isn't capable of or justified in doing than He does.


P.S. SoonerCoug has some serious issues with his sexual preoccupations.

[Indy Coug]

Originally Posted by Adam

This is the exact reasoning that lead the Laffertys down their path. I'm not kidding. Have your read about the Laffertys thinking? You are quoting it nearly verbatim.

If God tells you to kill your son (or sister-in-law), just say No and walk away. Seriously.

God hasn't even told me to go the church or help an old lady walk across the street, so I doubt he'd suddenly start up a dialog with me by opening with "why don't you puree Mrs. Jones?"

Abraham wasn't exactly strangers with God when he got the "Isaac Directive". Abraham had communed with God for years and years, on a level that few mortals, if any, have experienced. Trying to analogize the Laffertys with Abraham/Isaac is to gloss over the huge differences between the two and how they arrived at that critical moment.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by Adam

This is the exact reasoning that lead the Laffertys down their path. I'm not kidding. Have your read about the Laffertys thinking? You are quoting it nearly verbatim.

If God tells you to kill your son (or sister-in-law), just say No and walk away. Seriously.

Don't forget the seminary teacher in Utah that killed his baby because "God told him to".

[Indy Coug]

Why be so deliberately obtuse? Just because God is capable of doing or commanding certain things to happen doesn't mean that precedent has been set for us to justifiably follow suit.

Anyone think the conception of Christ has given us the green light to impregnate betrothed virgins?

Using mentally ill people as counterexamples is stupid. Some mentally ill people think God tells them to eat their own feces, or to run as a presidential candidate for Democratic Party.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Tex

As I was reading Elder Maxwell's excellent One More Strain of Praise this evening, my thoughts were drawn back to this conversation, and this concept in particular. Although Maxwell is well known for his verbosity on the subject of discipleship, this book in particular was his first after his initial bout with leukemia. In my opinion he is much more autobiographical and personal in this instance, having had a much more intimate acquaintance with suffering than before.

In that context, two additional thoughts on this topic came to mind.

Number one: we ought to be careful in making a comparison to men such as Nephi, Abraham, and Joseph Smith (the committers of the alleged misdeeds). These were men who were each either literal or effective heads of their own dispensations. They were each brought forth in eras of great apostasy, and as a result of their prophetic calls built great nations and organizations grounded in the truth. They were men of exceptional character, equal to the challenge of doing an extraordinary work; men on whom the Lord knew he could count; men who would not, as he told a later descendant, "ask that which is contrary to my will." The suggestion that God would issue a command to us equal to the command he gave them is presumptuous indeed. Don't worry about being asked to kill someone. Worry about doing your home teaching, Naaman.

Number two: a cautious word is in order to anyone who insists on delineating the boundaries of his discipleship to the Lord. My anecdotal experience has been that the Lord finds ways to teach his children what he wants them to learn, whether they want to learn it or not. I think of it as a cross between C.S. Lewis's "living house" and President Benson's "God will have a humble people. Either we can choose to be humble or we can be compelled to be humble." I do not feel, Jonah-like, too anxious to dictate my own course to the Lord, what I will or won't do, or what commandments I will or won't obey. The Missouri river still flows downstream, after all. Kicking against the pricks typically hurts only the kicker.

http://cougarguard.com/forum/showpos...2&postcount=93

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by Indy Coug

God hasn't even told me to go the church or help an old lady walk across the street, so I doubt he'd suddenly start up a dialog with me by opening with "why don't you puree Mrs. Jones?"

Abraham wasn't exactly strangers with God when he got the "Isaac Directive". Abraham had communed with God for years and years, on a level that few mortals, if any, have experienced. Trying to analogize the Laffertys with Abraham/Isaac is to gloss over the huge differences between the two and how they arrived at that critical moment.

IF, that is how it happened. Perhaps it happened just that way, and perhaps it didn't. I don't believe a witness in the restored Gospel requires a witness of all the events in the OT as historically accurate. However, I believe, a little like Pelagius, we have an obligation if we are to remain believers to look for value even in those extreme situation. And yes I'm familiar with the orthodox understandings of the Abraham/Isaac sacrifice.