Empathy

FireDragon76 · 2026-02-25T19:04:37-0600

zippy2006 said:
Rather, it isn't rational.

Over and over you inflate an opposing view in order to make it seem brittle.

"Religious formalism is about upholding boundaries." Well no, it's not. And no one here is engaged in "an airtight boundary-maintenance project." That's a strawman.

Beyond that, Jesus wasn't the guy who "walked through the ultimate boundary and kept going." That sounds like an appendix to Forrest Gump's long run. Jesus conquered death and sin; he "bound the strong man, entered his house, and plundered his goods." You are doing the thing I noted earlier, where one projects their own desires upon Jesus. You are making Jesus the open-borders savior. "Jesus walked across the border that no one is allowed to walk across; therefore all borders are open borders."

Are you suggesting there is a border that Jesus can't cross? When Jesus walked the earth 2000 years ago, he didn't much care for refraining from talking to the "wrong kinds of people"... what would change now?

Your deference to rationality assumes a kind of reason the ancient world wouldn't recognize. The logos the Fathers appealed to wasn't instrumental - it was participatory. Reason in that tradition is the image of God in us being restored through encounter with the divine Logos, not a tool for adjudicating who's in and who's out. You're using a post-Enlightenment conception of rationality to defend a pre-Enlightenment tradition, and the tradition itself won't quite bear that weight.

2PhiloVoid · 2026-02-25T19:05:25-0600

zippy2006 said:
@2PhiloVoid you can spin your wheels all you like and keep churning out the rhetorical handwaving, but it turns out that people of all different persuasions and perspectives are able to see through it. Lovely how you ended that post with more of the same self-aggrandizing claims.

If you want to engage in rational discourse and philosophical thinking at some point in your life, that will be up to you.

The sad thing is that you're so vague in your accusations that I have really no idea what specifically about my view of Christian Theology is so problematic or, what's more, by what supposed "authority" you show up to tout your accusations.

Care to explicate?

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:09:45-0600

FireDragon76 said:
Are you suggesting there is a border that Jesus can't cross? When Jesus walked the earth 2000 years ago, he didn't much care for refraining from talking to the "wrong kinds of people"... what would change now?

The Bible is full of boundaries, Old Testament and New. The Bible is full of distinctions between people, Old Testament and New. A sizeable portion of this comes from Jesus himself. You seem to have created a god in your own image.

FireDragon76 · 2026-02-25T19:11:59-0600

zippy2006 said:
The Bible is full of boundaries, Old Testament and New. The Bible is full of distinctions between people, Old Testament and New. A sizeable portion of this comes from Jesus himself. You seem to have created a god in your own image.

That's a remarkably flat reading for someone with your formation, Zippy. Yes, the Bible is full of distinctions - and it's also full of those distinctions being systematically undone by the very figure you're appealing to. Ephesians 2 calls Christ himself the one who abolished the dividing wall of hostility between the most fundamental distinction the tradition maintained. You can't just cite 'boundaries exist in the Bible' without reckoning with what the New Testament says happens to them in Christ

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:13:37-0600

FireDragon76 said:
Come on Zippy, that's lazy theological deduction and you should know better... That's the kind of thing I'd expect out of a backwoods fundamentalist, not somebody that's seriously engaging with the depth of the tradition or Christian spirituality.

And the ad hominem is sprung anew. A "backwoods fundamentalist"? Surely I must now agree with you for fear of crossing such a grotesque boundary!

FireDragon76 · 2026-02-25T19:20:35-0600

zippy2006 said:
And the ad hominem is sprung anew. A "backwoods fundamentalist"? Surely I must now agree with you for fear of crossing such a grotesque boundary!

Well, I did edit the post to be more explanatory, but the analogy holds. It's a flat reading of a very complex tradition, analogous to "The Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it".

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:22:07-0600

FireDragon76 said:
You can't just cite 'boundaries exist in the Bible' without reckoning with what the New Testament says happens to them in Christ

Maybe you should have a look at Matthew 25, where your "open-borders savior" starts drawing up everlasting borders between the sheep and the goats. Or Matthew 22, where those without wedding garments are thrown into the outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Or the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, I could go on...

Maybe the gospel authors didn't get the memo about how well "open-borders Jesus" would poll?

timewerx · 2026-02-25T19:34:13-0600

FireDragon76 said:
So what makes Jesus really unique isn't that he exercised judgement or discretion in interpreting Torah, but the people who he judged in favor of, that's what made him genuinely popular. He had compassion for people living as outsiders, which ties back to the notion that empathy is somehow "toxic": numerous times the New Testament uses the language of empathy to speak of Jesus reactions- Jesus feels in his body the appropriate reactions to injustice, and it demonstrates that preachers that say that empathy is "toxic" simply aren't taking seriously what biblical scholarship or actual contemplative traditions say about the character of Jesus and spiritual development in general.

It isn't just a matter of interpretation of the Torah.

Jesus is actually leaving important clues. In John 8:39-44 for example.

"Abraham did no such thing" (reject the truth, lie).

Yet, we find Abraham intently deceiving the Egyptians to take advantage of them (scam, con them) in the Torah (Genesis 12:1-20) and incredibly, God Blessed Abraham for his actions and punished the victims of his deceit.

In context of John 8:39-44, it opens a huge can of worms.

FireDragon76 · 2026-02-25T19:35:41-0600

zippy2006 said:
Maybe you should have a look at Matthew 25, where your "open-borders savior" starts drawing up everlasting borders between the sheep and the goats. Or Matthew 22, where those without wedding garments are thrown into the outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Or the parable of the wise and foolish virgins, I could go on...

Maybe the gospel authors didn't get the memo about how well "open-borders Jesus" would poll?

I simply don't see those texts supporting your point. You're interpreting them through later Catholic Integralist theology instead of looking at them in their 1st century context, which are clearly not about excluding immigrants, gender or sexual minorities, etc. They're about a religious establishment that has placed religious formalism and rigorism above the actual weightier matters that the Law gestures towards- compassion and embodied care. The Parable of the Wedding Feast in particular is about Pharisees being invited also, but refusing to behave appropriately to the occasion, whereas the prostitute, tax collectors, etc. know how to "dress" appropriately. It's a warning, not a verdict, for religious insiders that think they have boundaries all figured out.

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:42:34-0600

Hans Blaster said:
I have a much better idea who he is and why he make his arguments than I do about you.

It's quite simple: the empathy ethic is incoherent and the Christian tradition does not tend to support such incoherent ethics.

"Empathy is the best."
"Empathy is always good?"
"Yes. It is the cornerstone of ethics!"
"So should I empathize with the pedophile, the rapist, the murderer, the fascist, the MAGA supporter?"
"No, of course not those things! That's not what I mean by empathy!"
"Well what is your definition of empathy?"
*crickets*

If the empathy ethicist were abnormally honest this is what would happen:

"Empathy is paramount."
"Should we always empathize?"
"No, we should only empathize with the people and the causes that I favor. We should empathize with good stuff and not with bad stuff."
"So then it's really more about smuggling in your favored positions. It really has nothing to do with empathy per se."

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:46:14-0600

FireDragon76 said:
I simply don't see those texts supporting your point. You're interpreting them through later Catholic Integralist theology instead of looking at them in their 1st century context...

Lol. That's absurd, and I'm guessing you know it. The division of the sheep and the goats obviously involves a giant boundary. The casting of certain wedding guests into the outer darkness obviously involves a boundary.

So much of the New Testament flies directly in the face of your preferred interpretation of Jesus.

Hans Blaster · 2026-02-25T19:50:51-0600

zippy2006 said:
It's quite simple: the empathy ethic is incoherent and the Christian tradition does not tend to support such incoherent ethics.

Don't worry, you don't have to be concerned I will accidentally associate empathy, coherency, or decency with Christianity. You've done your part to ensure that.

zippy2006 said:
"Empathy is the best."

"Empathy is always good?"

"Yes. It is the cornerstone of ethics!"

"So should I empathize with the pedophile, the rapist, the murderer, the fascist, the MAGA supporter?"

"No, of course not those things! That's not what I mean by empathy!"

"Well what is your definition of empathy?"

*crickets*

If the empathy ethicist were abnormally honest this is what would happen:

"Empathy is paramount."

"Should we always empathize?"

"No, we should only empathize with the people and the causes that I favor. We should empathize with good stuff and not with bad stuff."

"So then it's really more about smuggling in your favored positions. It really has nothing to do with empathy per se."

zippy2006 · 2026-02-25T19:56:16-0600

Hans Blaster said:
Don't worry, you don't have to be concerned I will accidentally associate empathy, coherency, or decency with Christianity. You've done your part to ensure that.

And I am in no way worried that you will present an actual argument anytime soon, whether for your anti-Christian demeanor nor for any other issues that arise.

FireDragon76 · 2026-02-25T20:00:41-0600

zippy2006 said:
Lol. That's absurd, and I'm guessing you know it. The division of the sheep and the goats obviously involves a giant boundary. The casting of certain wedding guests into the outer darkness obviously involves a boundary.

So much of the New Testament flies directly in the face of your preferred interpretation of Jesus.

You're interpreting parables meant to gesture towards something abstract, representational, or formative and treating them as literal blueprints. That's a failure to understand the register that parables speak within. It also doesn't account for other parables, where Jesus gestures towards patience, nonjudgement, compassion, and accompaniment.

Hans Blaster · 2026-02-25T20:02:03-0600

zippy2006 said:
And I am in no way worried that you will present an actual argument anytime soon, whether for your anti-Christian demeanor nor for any other issues that arise.

I'm not interested in joining your bicker-fest.

2PhiloVoid · 2026-02-25T20:16:56-0600

zippy2006 said:
It's quite simple: the empathy ethic is incoherent and the Christian tradition does not tend to support such incoherent ethics.

"Empathy is the best."

"Empathy is always good?"

"Yes. It is the cornerstone of ethics!"

"So should I empathize with the pedophile, the rapist, the murderer, the fascist, the MAGA supporter?"

"No, of course not those things! That's not what I mean by empathy!"

"Well what is your definition of empathy?"

*crickets*

If the empathy ethicist were abnormally honest this is what would happen:

"Empathy is paramount."

"Should we always empathize?"

"No, we should only empathize with the people and the causes that I favor. We should empathize with good stuff and not with bad stuff."

"So then it's really more about smuggling in your favored positions. It really has nothing to do with empathy per se."

That's a misrepresentation of anything I've said on this specific thread, or the other similar thread. And I don't like being misrepresented.

Did you wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning? Or did you fail to receive your daily dose of empathy? I know you're single and all and that has to be difficult to deal with these days.

2PhiloVoid · 2026-02-25T20:23:36-0600

Hans Blaster said:
I'm not interested in joining your bicker-fest.

Ah, come on in, Hans! The water's warm................boiling really, but I hear one can adjust to it.

timewerx · 2026-02-25T20:36:14-0600

Hans Blaster said:
Did that happen in "Matthew"? I don't know in which gospels Jesus is said to do which things.

That one is definitely not in Matthew, and not even original to "John".

I have other thoughts, but I won't state them for reasons you can deduct.

Yep.

It's the easiest way to stay a Christian.

Jesus left clues to his Jewish audiences to beware of what they read.

But you're not allowed to "connect the dots" in Christianity so Christians don't even know these clues exist.

We have pushed as far as we could. I just hope there's still 1 parachute left for me.

Hans Blaster · 2026-02-25T21:03:39-0600

2PhiloVoid said:
Ah, come on in, Hans! The water's warm................boiling really, but I hear one can adjust to it.

Ribbit.

This thread seems headed for a shutdown but it won't be from me and the victimless crime of blasphemy.

Hans Blaster · 2026-02-26T00:41:44-0600

2PhiloVoid said:
Uh, I think you missed the actual point I was making, Hans.

The point I was attempting to make, however failingly I may have done so, is that if you critically study the Gospel of Matthew as literature in the same way you would if were reading Beowulf, Lord of the Flies or Dune, you would find literary devices being used that inferred certain meanings.

I would never read Dune that way, or Beowulf at all. I've read Dune a few times and did so for pleasure. I have no interest in "literary" or "critical? analysis. I worked hard to minimize my contact with literary analysis in college and that was a long time ago.

2PhiloVoid said:
Of course the 'jot and tittle' statement is not a part of other books in the New Testament. It's what 'Matthew' decided to select and include as a fixture of the overall message that he wished to convey, a message that by the end isn't really so different from that of Paul.

Sounds more like he was challenging Paul's theology as too dismissive of tradition.

2PhiloVoid said:
If you critically study the book of Matthew as I'm suggesting,

I might consider reading it...

2PhiloVoid said:
it doesn't make a hill of beans difference if it's true or fiction. It's the intended plot design of Matthew that is significant. And this means that 'jots and tittles' were being set aside and/or revised by Jesus as He went along in the narrative that Matthew cast for his character,

Is this what happens when you do "literary analysis"? It has the structural strength of a hill of beans.

2PhiloVoid said:
with one big bump implied by the onset of the Abomination of Desolation.

I still haven't figured out if the "abominatino" is a person or an event or what.

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