Surely if the actual creation is significant, so should be any actions and consequences exhibited by that creation. Wouldn't that be a sound logical deduction?
Of course. But significant to whom, and significant for what reason? Ethical conduct matters a lot to us - and it ought to, because our mental and physical health depends upon it. We are a social species, and thus need to maintain a communal code of ethics in order to flourish, both on the individual and on the communal level. Place a human being in isolation, and his or her health will deteriorate quickly.
Our customs and morals (IOW, all the addenda pertaining to food, clothing, sexuality and so forth) are a different issue, of course. And none of that affects the universe in any way, shape, or form.
Your example is not a good example of the real problem with mankind. It is not the bacon and shrimp, but sin. Those were restrictions placed upon only one set of people who coincidentally were separated from everyone else for a specific purpose. We are not even talking about the entirety of mankind when you bring up the bacon and shrimp issue. It was important to God to bring about revelation via this oracle (Israel); so, that is all that matters. You are the one who is putting the labels on stuff and then tearing down the paradigm. That looks like a strawman to me.
Far from it. Are you aware of the origin of the term "taboo"? It originated on Fiji, where it referenced a sacred prohibition, pertaining to acts that were forbidden because people believed that engaging in them would spiritually pollute the culprit and enrage the gods.
Captain James Cook noted about the indigenous population of Tonga:
"When any thing is forbidden to be eaten, or made use of, they say, that it is taboo."
This is EXACTLY what you find in the OT-laws. The Israelites aren't special in that regard - you can find that kind of prohibitions all across the globe, in virtually every culture.
And naturally, the merely cultural/religious taboos ("keep the Shabbat sacred") are always mixed in with the slightly more universal socio-ethical restrictions ("do not murder"), without any real differentiation between the two.
Even before those restrictions on Israel, there were already standard laws such as the Noahide laws and the Ten Commandments which apply to all humans. None of those laws involved such detail as what cloth to wear or what specific foods one couldn't eat, but for a few exceptions involved in worship.
The Ten Utterances are quite culture-specific, as referenced above. They mix in specifically Israelitic religious taboos ("honour no god but YHVH", "keep the Sabbat holy") with moral prohibitions that virtually every functional society in history or pre-history came up with on its own (IOW, killing your fellow tribesman is not a good idea, as is taking his stuff).
I don't really think that you can substantiate this conclusion of yours. It sounds like a stretch of your imagination to prove a point. Care to substantiate this?
Why do you consider it a stretch of the imagination? And what exactly would you accept as conclusive evidence?
Consider this: if the Earth is but a small planet revolving around a sun, rather than being at the centre of the cosmos and having the sun affixed to a solid sphere that revolves around it along with all the other planetary spheres - how does that detract from God's glory? How does that diminish anything but Man's physically exalted place within the cosmic order?
And if Man came into being through an extended developmental process spanning billions of years rather than starting out as a literal, animated mud figure - how does that diminish God's glory? Is the miracle of life unfolding on its own (potentially according to a divine plan that was put in place before the universe even came into being) subtracting anything from God - or isn't it rather the insulted pride of Man, who feels that sharing a common ancestor with "inferior" species belittles him?
The image of man in relation to God is not physical; neither is it essentially spiritual; for it is also neither. There exist consciousness, emotions, thoughts, intelligence, etc. that are both non material and non spiritual.
Whatever. That is hardly relevant, as all of these hypothetically exclusive traits you cite (which we share with many other species, by the way) could just as well have been the (divinely planned) result of evolutionary processes. One needn't believe in a literal six-day-creation taking place a few thousand years ago in order to "give God his due".
But this deity that Christians worship created us and holds us accountable for what we do and don't do; so, it is hardly the case that we are just going to appease Him on occasion so that we can feel so proud of ourselves that we gave Him a little showtime.
You are really lost in the sauce, I fear, when it comes to depicting a Christian perspective. This looks to me like you would be attempting to get brownie points with your deity for your efforts. What I see you doing is judging the deity instead of the deity judging you.
I think you misunderstood what I was saying there. I merely wanted to express pretty much what I expressed above:
it's not the presence of a hypothetical deity that's the aim of my criticism and judgment here, it's the utterly anthropocentric perspective inherent to Christianity and its "descendants".
I don't think that this is entirely true by a long stretch, but you must admit that your post wreaks of those adjectives too.
Could you be talking about yourself at the same time?
I must admit no such thing. ("wreaks?")
Come on, even you could do better than offering a silly tit-for-tat response. My world view isn't anthropocentric by a far stretch. I consider people important because I love them, and because I admire our mental prowess and its fruits (arts, architecture, literature, philosophy, etc.). But I do not consider us to be at the metaphorical centre of everything - we are just a simple species on a tiny planet.
Because sin separates us from God, who is sinless. You should be able to deduce that sinless does not mingle with sinful and still remains sinless, or shall I say, uncorrupted by contact. Our communion was broken with God when man first sinned; so, that is why Jesus purposed to save us to eventually restore us to our pristine state before God.
What do you make of Satan appearing before God in the book of Job? Or of the EO concept of God's presence being both heaven and hell - just experienced differently by the saved and the unrepentant?
Besides, as many Christians have assured me, salvation does not consist of becoming literally perfect: even the saved continue to stumble and sin throughout their lives - it's merely that they are forgiven for it; as if they were camouflaging themselves with blood. So, how does that return us to our "pristine state"?
By sinning. That is Christianity 101, which I would have expected you to know. Sin is unholy in God's eyes. Before sin, man had a perfect relationship with God and was in direct and perfect communion with Him. At that time, there was no problem. Man's ego was in check and his spirit free from corruption. Those issues that you have brought up were non issues at the beginning of humanity. To reject God, one does not have to make some concerted effort because rejecting the signs that God gives is enough to show a rebellious heart. Sin is ultimately a spiritual thing that manifests itself in the physical realm sometimes. I think that you probably don't consider sin since it is also a non physical concept. I am assuming that you are a materialist.
I'm not a reductive materialist, basically subscribing to cosmic dualism and then chucking out the "spiritual" half.
But I'd say that a properly enlightened deity would know better than to condemn finite creatures for their follies, or to set impossible standards yet expect them to keep them.
It is no different that when a parent knows that the child will break a rule; yet, the parent has to give the child the opportunity to break the rule; otherwise, the parent would have to take away the free will the child naturally exhibits. Would you rather the parent(s) lock the child up so that the child can't break the rule? Even worse, having some way of preventing the child of even thinking of breaking the rule? What would be your remedy? If you say, you wouldn't have birthed the child, then you would only be facing another dilemma of preventing yourself from performing a natural process that would be void of any wrongs, or shall I say sins. God, as the parent, holds us accountable for what we are freely open to do against His will, just as the natural parent does.
Ah yes, the parent-and-child metaphor.
The thing is: even if parents expect their children to break rules, they don't banish them from their household. Quite the contrary: breaking rules is part of the socialization process, and necessary for children to eventually grasp why doing certain things is harmful to themselves and others.
And considering the sheer scope of the whole dilemma of sin in a Christian context, God would have to be a parent who leaves a loaded gun lying around on the kitchen table, and then leaves for a couple of hours knowing fully well that his children will play with it even though he instructed them not to. In fact, knowing a thing or two about curiosity and the lure of the forbidden, he's fully aware of what's going to happen.
I'd love to address the rest of your post straight away, but it's just too freaking long. Maybe I'll return to it later.
ABBA'S FOOL,
