Living The Rules Of 2-4,000 Years Ago

[mark46]

The Amish want to live as they lived in the 1850's. Many evangelicals want us to live according to their 1950's interpretation of Scripture. The Church clearly teaches Scripture is inerrant in everything it says with regards to faith and morals.
==============
Individually, we need to come to terms with what it means to accept the rules of Judaism of 4000 years ago, and other rules set down in Scripture in both the Old and New Testaments.

How do we decide which of the rules of Leviticus and Deuteronomy that apply to today? Jews have documented thousands of years of interpretation in their Talmud and Midrash. They understand Scriptural verses or stories from the Old Testament cannot stand on their own. As Christians, as particularly as Catholics, we seem at a loss with regard to how to use the words of Scripture.

As Catholics, we understand that our relationship is with God, and especially with Jesus. We are to learn from the birth, life, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. Scripture was written to reveal the nature of God and to expelling the Good News to us.
===============
Is the Old Testament really a rule book for the 21st Century? Is the New Testament? Orthodox Jews don't eat shellfish. The Old Testament is very clear on the matter. Using the Old Testament as a model of behavior would have us be polygamists and have us marry our siblings. (well at least half sisters). We would know that wars mean killing 100% of the enemy, man, women, child and all their animals. To fail is to be severely punished. IMHO, picking an choosing rules is very risky. To use the Old Testament to show us examples of traits that we should admire is another thing entirely.

Then what of New Testament? Didn't Jesus clearly teach that there were but two commands, and give the example of how to live in the Beatitudes.
==================
IMHO, we have come to a really difficult point in the 21st century. We are trying to live in a 21st Century reality with rules written 2000 to 4000 years age. Sure, we have the Tradition of the Church. That helps some.

For the 21st century, the #1 priority is NOT to have enough children to work the farm and support us in old age. Our #1 goal as men is not to have a male child to which we can pass the family name, property and power.

I digress; enough for now
===================

 

[LoAmmi]

If this was on OBOB, I'd be firing up some popcorn and kicking back to read the fallout.

 

[Gnarwhal]

I'm a history nerd, so I don't mind the idea of living in the past.

 

[GoingByzantine]

The Amish I know seem very happy in their lifestyle. There is something to be said about life focused on family, simple sustenance, and God.

 

[Fish and Bread]

I got into this a little bit over here:

http://www.christianforums.com/showthread.php?p=67487056#post67487056

Hopefully it is not too obnoxious to quote a few of those paragraphs here to help out with this discussion:

If I were Pope for a day, I would like to have that same sort of inclusivity when it comes to communion, and if I were God for a day, to heaven. I've never much cared for the idea of hell. I often believe that it exists, but I rarely can bring myself to consider it ethical. You don't torture people for all eternity, you purify them and bring them to heaven, or build some place like limbo where they spend eternity in physical confort if they technically can't be in heaven. Give them the equivalent of their own eternal Star Trek holodecks. I don't buy this they can either be with God or burn to death over and over forever and those are the only two things God was "allowed" to come up with, as if an omnipotent God couldn't create some better alternatives to hell for the people who he'd otherwise assign there or allow to fall into that if he wanted to. I mean, in a pinch, if he couldn't come up with a better alternative, he could always just let people be dead when they die instead of reviving them in an afterlife where they are going to be tortured in fire for an eternity. I mean, really, what kind of ethical being tortures people for all of eternity or allows them to be tortured when he could prevent it easily? Hell is unjust for anyone because no one can commit a crime in a finite lifetime that requires a eternal punishment- that's not abolishing an eye for an eye for something more merciful as Christ did in the bible, but replacing it with something *harsher* than an eye for an eye, a lifetime of whatever for an infinite punishment.

This is part of where I feel our outlook on God is stuck ethically in some sort of tribal mentality. He's like the God a primitive tribe or ancient civilization would think of as very ethically advanced, but not quite where we should be today.

One of the reasons why I sometimes categorized myself progressive as opposed to liberal, though I am both, is that I feel religion should progress and become more ethical rather than remaining static in old understandings.

 

[mark46]

If this was on OBOB, I'd be firing up some popcorn and kicking back to read the fallout.

Yup. Folks here aren't even interesting in discussing to what degree biblical moral statements apply to today.

 

[Rhamiel]

the OP seems to be really confused on how to study the Bible

in the Old Testament we see moral law and ceremonial cleanliness laws

ceremonial cleanliness is not really something we have a concept of in modern cultures
for example, the Jews did not eat the blood of animals
Deuteronomy 12:23
But be sure you do not eat the blood, because the blood is the life, and you must not eat the life with the meat.

so ceremonial cleanliness is not so much about "hygiene"
it is that some things are sacred, the powers of life and death belong to God, and since blood was associated with life, it was to be avoided

also, some of these ceremonial laws were about causing a distinction between the Jews and the pagan tribes who were around them

the Catholic Church has done a pretty good job of pointing out that some things were ceremonial laws that we do not need to follow anymore (dietary laws) and which laws are moral laws (murder, theft, dishonesty, fornication)
we can see that the New Testament also supports the moral laws, but Jesus tells St. Peter in a vision that he is no longer bound by Jewish dietary laws (Acts 10:15)

also, there were specific times when God commanded the Jews to wipe out an entire city, those were specific examples directly commanded by God, not the standard law of how to go to war

 

[mark46]

the OP seems to be really confused on how to study the Bible

in the Old Testament we see moral law and ceremonial cleanliness laws

ceremonial cleanliness is not really something we have a concept of in modern cultures
for example, the Jews did not eat the blood of animals
Deuteronomy 12:23
But be sure you do not eat the blood, because the blood is the life, and you must not eat the life with the meat.

so ceremonial cleanliness is not so much about "hygiene"
it is that some things are sacred, the powers of life and death belong to God, and since blood was associated with life, it was to be avoided

also, some of these ceremonial laws were about causing a distinction between the Jews and the pagan tribes who were around them

the Catholic Church has done a pretty good job of pointing out that some things were ceremonial laws that we do not need to follow anymore (dietary laws) and which laws are moral laws (murder, theft, dishonesty, fornication)
we can see that the New Testament also supports the moral laws, but Jesus tells St. Peter in a vision that he is no longer bound by Jewish dietary laws (Acts 10:15)

also, there were specific times when God commanded the Jews to wipe out an entire city, those were specific examples directly commanded by God, not the standard law of how to go to war

You seem to think that the distinction between ceremonial and moral examples are clear.

How should we act toward women? Are they property as is the OT example?

Should men be free to have more than one wife?

Should a man be free to marry his half sister?

When God commands someone to kill everyone is a city because of a transgression, what kind of message should that send to us?

Should we own slaves?

There are dozens and dozens of more examples. Even if we eliminate the dietary laws, there questions with regard to other laws. Also, when 20 or so transgressions are listed in Deuteronomy next to one another, should we presume that some were meant for today and some were not.

 

[Rhamiel]

well Jesus speaks about marriage and gives it in the context of Adam and Eve
so one wife and one husband
he said that divorce was allowed in the days of Moses because the people at that time were stiffnecked

I do not think all of this is clear, but we have a Church that has had some of the greatest minds of all time pouring over this stuff for centuries
so it is not like we are totally lost on these topics, look to the Church and be faithful to her teachings

slavery is an interesting topic
in both the OT and the NT were both written in cultures that had slavery
one interesting thing to think of, Christianity seems to lead away from slavery
I fear as we become more secular, slavery might make a return