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Is Redemption Unethical?

#1
Secular Sanity Offline
Is it ethical to believe that your sins can be forgiven by the punishment of another person?

Redemption: What does it mean? 

Is it just an unconscious self-defense mechanism?

Projection:
Unwanted thoughts and feelings can be unconsciously projected onto another who becomes a scapegoat for one's own problems.

I think the teachings of Christianity are immoral...

"The central one is the most immoral of all, and that is the one of vicarious redemption. You can throw your sins onto somebody else, vulgarly known as scapegoating. In fact, originating as scapegoating in the same area, the same desert. In the Bible, a scapegoat is an animal which is ritually burdened with the sins of others, then driven away. The concept first appears in Leviticus, in which a goat is designated to be cast into the desert to carry away the sins of the community.

I can pay your debt if I love you. I can serve your term in prison if I love you very much. I can volunteer to do that. I can't take your sins away, because I can't abolish your responsibility, and I shouldn't offer to do so. Your responsibility has to stay with you. There's no vicarious redemption. There very probably, in fact, is no redemption at all. It's just a part of wish-thinking, and I don't think wish-thinking is good for people either."—Christopher Hitchens

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#2
Zinjanthropos Offline
Who goes unpunished in this life? With or without a redemption policy.

Wasn't what happened at the end of the first world war thought to be some sort of divine redemption? I speak of a pandemic of Spanish Influenza that killed/affected just as many if not more than the people who actually died in the conflict.

From Wiki: It infected 500 million people around the world, including people on remote Pacific islands and in the Arctic, and resulted in the deaths of 50 to 100 million (three to five percent of the world's population),making it one of the deadliest natural disasters in human history.
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#3
Syne Offline
(Nov 24, 2018 11:31 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote: Is it ethical to believe that your sins can be forgiven by the punishment of another person?

Redemption: What does it mean? 

Is it just an unconscious self-defense mechanism?

Projection:
Unwanted thoughts and feelings can be unconsciously projected onto another who becomes a scapegoat for one's own problems.

I think the teachings of Christianity are immoral...

"The central one is the most immoral of all, and that is the one of vicarious redemption. You can throw your sins onto somebody else, vulgarly known as scapegoating. In fact, originating as scapegoating in the same area, the same desert. In the Bible, a scapegoat is an animal which is ritually burdened with the sins of others, then driven away. The concept first appears in Leviticus, in which a goat is designated to be cast into the desert to carry away the sins of the community.

I can pay your debt if I love you. I can serve your term in prison if I love you very much. I can volunteer to do that. I can't take your sins away, because I can't abolish your responsibility, and I shouldn't offer to do so. Your responsibility has to stay with you. There's no vicarious redemption. There very probably, in fact, is no redemption at all. It's just a part of wish-thinking, and I don't think wish-thinking is good for people either."—Christopher Hitchens


Biblical redemption isn't the externally meted punishment of another person; it's the voluntary sacrifice of another as an act of grace. As such, there is nothing unethical about it. Grace is forgiveness offered without merit...which we often grant family members and friends. Redemption, in general, is just atonement...which includes everything from a recovering alcoholic seeking to make amends for past wrongs to someone confessing their sins to god. It's a sincere apology that can't necessarily be "fixed" by any present action and can only be accepted through an act of generosity. Those who forgive are "sacrificing" by accepting the fact that they may never be made whole after some harm, be it physical, emotional, and/or tangible.

Not sure how it would be projection when it can only be granted by another and we have concrete examples in our own lives. I guess someone could falsely claim redemption while not being contrite, but that's just run-of-the-mill lying. It has nothing to do with redemption itself.

Sin cannot be thrown on someone else, and conflating NT redemption with OT sacrifice is intellectually dishonest or just ignorant. In the OT, scapegoating was a first step in civilizing people who needed each other for mutual survival, regardless of how they may have wronged each other. A ritual to let go of socially crippling grievances and guilt. The NT introduced the concept of grace, with the example of personal sacrifice. It internalized forgiveness.

And it's not about absolving another of their responsibility. It's about letting go of the poison of blame, which can become an excuse for one's own bad actions or even just a crutch for not achieving one's potential. Even in penal law we accept that some measure of punishment is sufficient, even though it could never make up for the criminal act. When we forgive others and their contrition is genuine, they know the gift they've been given, specifically despite their inability to make it up to us.


Now if you think people being willing to forgive others is unethical....
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#4
C C Offline
(Nov 24, 2018 11:31 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote: Is it ethical to believe that your sins can be forgiven by the punishment of another person?

Calls to mind that "Sin-Eater" installment of Night Gallery(video episode). Limited to simple situations, such expiation practices certainly don't seem just or sound to the modern mind.

Quote:Redemption: What does it mean?

Setting aside the religious expressions of it... Under the weight of guilt a person can arguably deteriorate into societal uselessness, substance addiction, a perpetual "hazardous to be around" state of distraction, or sink into full-blown monsterhood. So some avenue of atonement minus the scapegoating seems necessary for those who either had a conscience to begin with or eventually developed one. Whether it's a combination of remorse, penance, community do-gooding, and personal reform slash forgiveness by the neighborhood, or whatever.  

Non-theological redemption became a common theme in even non-cable television once the moral code practices in broadcasting relaxed enough to allow imperfect heroes. Where "bad guys" and "morally ambiguous characters" began serving as lesser level and even lead protagonists -- yielding more complicated and less predictable storylines but arguably going too far in extremes with the antihero theme at times ("Scandal" might be a quick, familiar example).

Unlike the old days, wickedness either converted to or pursuing a good cause didn't necessarily have to be deprived of a happy ending or be punished (and especially killed off) at the end of an episode or somewhere in the course of the series. The classic movies of the old days were restricted to a justice requirement, too. (Lana Turner had to wear white throughout The Postman Always Rings Twice to diminish the adulterous / murderous aura of Cora Smith, and of course the latter eventually received a fatal automobile accident.)

~
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#5
Secular Sanity Offline
(Nov 24, 2018 07:42 PM)Syne Wrote: Biblical redemption isn't the externally meted punishment of another person; it's the voluntary sacrifice of another as an act of grace. As such, there is nothing unethical about it. Grace is forgiveness offered without merit...which we often grant family members and friends. Redemption, in general, is just atonement...which includes everything from a recovering alcoholic seeking to make amends for past wrongs to someone confessing their sins to god. It's a sincere apology that can't necessarily be "fixed" by any present action and can only be accepted through an act of generosity. Those who forgive are "sacrificing" by accepting the fact that they may never be made whole after some harm, be it physical, emotional, and/or tangible.

Not sure how it would be projection when it can only be granted by another and we have concrete examples in our own lives. I guess someone could falsely claim redemption while not being contrite, but that's just run-of-the-mill lying. It has nothing to do with redemption itself.

Sin cannot be thrown on someone else, and conflating NT redemption with OT sacrifice is intellectually dishonest or just ignorant. In the OT, scapegoating was a first step in civilizing people who needed each other for mutual survival, regardless of how they may have wronged each other. A ritual to let go of socially crippling grievances and guilt. The NT introduced the concept of grace, with the example of personal sacrifice. It internalized forgiveness.

And it's not about absolving another of their responsibility. It's about letting go of the poison of blame, which can become an excuse for one's own bad actions or even just a crutch for not achieving one's potential. Even in penal law we accept that some measure of punishment is sufficient, even though it could never make up for the criminal act. When we forgive others and their contrition is genuine, they know the gift they've been given, specifically despite their inability to make it up to us.


Now if you think people being willing to forgive others is unethical....

C C took it outside of Christianity, which is the smart thing to do.

We project our thirst for vengeance onto a god and then we project our guilt onto a savior. God becomes our scapegoat. The German word for debt also means guilt. If people were indebted to someone, and unable to pay, they could take joy in torturing them. Nietzsche suggested that we find the origins of conscience, guilt, and duty in the festiveness of cruelty: their origins were "like the beginnings of everything great on earth, soaked in blood thoroughly and for a long time. We have come to see suffering as a great argument against life, though creating suffering was once the greatest celebration of Life.

Forgiveness is beautiful. Nothing immoral there. It heals both parties, but Hitchens was talking about vicarious redemption and we all know that means. It's the biblical version of redemption, which is only possible through the redeemer.

Quote:In particular, his universal role means that through him the deadly forces of evil are overcome, sin is forgiven, their contamination purified, and the new existence as God's beloved, adopted children has been made available. This New Testament sense of Christ's indispensable and necessary role for human salvation could be summarized by a new axiom: extra Christum nulla salus ("outside Christ no salvation").

This is one of the basic tenets of Christianity. You know that. It’s what keeps it alive—the good ole fear of hell.

Do you want to take a glance at Jordan Peterson’s definition?

So, redemption, what does it mean?
It means that we’re not in a state of grace. Why? We’re self-conscious, we’re aware of the tragedy of our being, we’re unwilling to take responsibility for it, or we’re ignorant about how to do that and that leaves us bereft. How do we solve that?

I believe that what is outlined in narrative form in the New Testament is psychologically correct. I believe that the idea that endless microdeath and renewal produces a state of proper adaptation to being. And that the prerequisites for that, that are laid out in the narrative structure that underlies the New Testament, are fundamentally correct. So to be redeemed is to aim at the highest value, to sacrifice what’s no longer useful and valid in yourself, and to tell the truth. The consequence of that is existence in a deep state of meaning that justifies the tragedy of being and the possibility of transforming your own life in the most beneficial positive direction while simultaneously doing that for the people around you. And that’s redemption.  sourse
His biblical interpretations are as poor as his interpretations of Nietzsche. But unlike Jordan Peterson, Nietzsche doesn’t tell us how to live, or how to think. He didn’t want followers. That was reserved for his last sin.
"FELLOW-SUFFERING! FELLOW-SUFFERING WITH THE HIGHER MEN!" he cried out, and his countenance changed into brass. "Well! THAT—hath had its time!

He's concerned with artistic creation and aesthetic value. You become a spiritless camel by caring bearing a heavy load. "God is dead!" You become a lion by creating your own values. You’re free from society’s labyrinth. You become a child in which Life celebrates its own glorification.

"I want to learn more and more to see as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who make things beautiful. Amor fati: let that be my love henceforth! I do not want to wage war against what is ugly. I do not want to accuse; I do not even want to accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation. And all in all and on the whole: someday I wish to be only a Yes-sayer."

I like Nietzsche. Jordan Peterson? Not so much.  Undecided
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#6
Syne Offline
(Nov 25, 2018 03:17 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote:
(Nov 24, 2018 07:42 PM)Syne Wrote: Biblical redemption isn't the externally meted punishment of another person; it's the voluntary sacrifice of another as an act of grace. As such, there is nothing unethical about it. Grace is forgiveness offered without merit...which we often grant family members and friends. Redemption, in general, is just atonement...which includes everything from a recovering alcoholic seeking to make amends for past wrongs to someone confessing their sins to god. It's a sincere apology that can't necessarily be "fixed" by any present action and can only be accepted through an act of generosity. Those who forgive are "sacrificing" by accepting the fact that they may never be made whole after some harm, be it physical, emotional, and/or tangible.

Not sure how it would be projection when it can only be granted by another and we have concrete examples in our own lives. I guess someone could falsely claim redemption while not being contrite, but that's just run-of-the-mill lying. It has nothing to do with redemption itself.

Sin cannot be thrown on someone else, and conflating NT redemption with OT sacrifice is intellectually dishonest or just ignorant. In the OT, scapegoating was a first step in civilizing people who needed each other for mutual survival, regardless of how they may have wronged each other. A ritual to let go of socially crippling grievances and guilt. The NT introduced the concept of grace, with the example of personal sacrifice. It internalized forgiveness.

And it's not about absolving another of their responsibility. It's about letting go of the poison of blame, which can become an excuse for one's own bad actions or even just a crutch for not achieving one's potential. Even in penal law we accept that some measure of punishment is sufficient, even though it could never make up for the criminal act. When we forgive others and their contrition is genuine, they know the gift they've been given, specifically despite their inability to make it up to us.


Now if you think people being willing to forgive others is unethical....

C C took it outside of Christianity, which is the smart thing to do.
Perhaps you missed the many non-religious examples I gave. Considering the OP was wholly about religious redemption, I thought it odd to just dismiss that aspect.
Quote:We project our thirst for vengeance onto a god and then we project our guilt onto a savior. God becomes our scapegoat. The German word for debt also means guilt. If people were indebted to someone, and unable to pay, they could take joy in torturing them. Nietzsche suggested that we find the origins of conscience, guilt, and duty in the festiveness of cruelty: their origins were "like the beginnings of everything great on earth, soaked in blood thoroughly and for a long time. We have come to see suffering as a great argument against life, though creating suffering was once the greatest celebration of Life.
If vengeance is god's alone, you don't need to go kill your neighbor who wronged you, start a feud, and destroy the community. And if your neighbor's guilt can be forgiven, by god or himself if not by you, then he can believe he can recover his productive status, at least in his own eyes if not in those of the community. I don't see where either is a scapegoat. The former isn't unlike foregoing vigilante justice in deference to legal punishment, and the latter not unlike a criminal receiving leniency. Are you projecting your thirsty for vengeance on the police or judges? Is the criminal projecting his guilt on the judge who shows leniency?

No Christian believes that they can absolve themselves by making Jesus guilty. That runs completely contrary to personal responsibility and accountability, which are hallmarks of Judaeo-Christian thought. Jesus' sacrifice is a lesson, by example, of showing forgiveness in the face of being personally wronged. Real forgiveness lets go of vengeance.

Whatever one's own sentiment on vengeance and cruelty would seem to be one's own projection on the nature of redemption. Interesting that it seems an assertion of projection is likely, itself, a projection.
Quote:Forgiveness is beautiful. Nothing immoral there. It heals both parties, but Hitchens was talking about vicarious redemption and we all know that means. It's the biblical version of redemption, which is only possible through the redeemer.
Hitchens is well known for being ignorant of or straw manning religion, as he is doing here. All redemption is vicarious. If I forgive you, you are redeemed through me and my grace. You can be contrite, but that is not forgiveness. There is no magical difference between biblical and non-biblical redemption. But if you can find where Hitchens, or anyone else, has contrasted biblical and non-biblical redemption, I'd be interested in seeing it. Otherwise, Hitchens is simply straw manning redemption, introduced in the NT, with sacrifice, ended by the NT, and failing to understand how the notion was in the process of evolving between the two (likely with Jesus introducing some Eastern-like religious aspects).
Quote:
Quote:In particular, his universal role means that through him the deadly forces of evil are overcome, sin is forgiven, their contamination purified, and the new existence as God's beloved, adopted children has been made available. This New Testament sense of Christ's indispensable and necessary role for human salvation could be summarized by a new axiom: extra Christum nulla salus ("outside Christ no salvation").

This is one of the basic tenets of Christianity. You know that. It’s what keeps it alive—the good ole fear of hell.
Do you really think anyone but children and the newly converted are afraid of hell? I don't know that they are, except maybe those who don't believe in grace or fear dying without the last rites (although I think that just leads to purgatory). What does create a hell of this life is guilt, the feeling of being irredeemable, and the corresponding diminishing of self-esteem and personal well-being. Christian means Christ-like, as an admonition to following the example of Jesus. Without any fear of hell, most Christians still believe they will be held accountable for their actions...in heaven.
Quote:Do you want to take a glance at Jordan Peterson’s definition?

So, redemption, what does it mean?
It means that we’re not in a state of grace. Why? We’re self-conscious, we’re aware of the tragedy of our being, we’re unwilling to take responsibility for it, or we’re ignorant about how to do that and that leaves us bereft. How do we solve that?
I believe that what is outlined in narrative form in the New Testament is psychologically correct. I believe that the idea that endless microdeath and renewal produces a state of proper adaptation to being. And that the prerequisites for that, that are laid out in the narrative structure that underlies the New Testament, are fundamentally correct. So to be redeemed is to aim at the highest value, to sacrifice what’s no longer useful and valid in yourself, and to tell the truth. The consequence of that is existence in a deep state of meaning that justifies the tragedy of being and the possibility of transforming your own life in the most beneficial positive direction while simultaneously doing that for the people around you. And that’s redemption.  sourse
Of course. How can you be forgiven if you're already in a state of grace? There's a process, as we mature and if we're lucky, of learning how to take responsibility, first for our own actions and then for our own mental baggage and reactions surrounding the actions of others. We learn to accept past wrongdoings from others for our own well-being. It is not useful or valid to hold onto blame, of oneself or others. And our own desire for redemption teaches us about the value of forgiving others.
Quote:His biblical interpretations are as poor as his interpretations of Nietzsche. But unlike Jordan Peterson, Nietzsche doesn’t tell us how to live, or how to think. He didn’t want followers.
Until or unless I see a critique from you, personally, on Peterson's take on Nietzsche... Rolleyes
Nietzsche's criticism of normative morality seems to reside in his notion of the "superior man", which is fraught with racism/classism/elitism overtones, although he did posit the ubermensch as a goal, which is normative.
Quote:He concerned with artistic creation and aesthetic value. You become a spiritless camel by caring bearing a heavy load. "God is dead!" You become a lion by creating your own values. You’re free from society’s labyrinth. You become a child in which Life celebrates its own glorification.
So you think there's more value in reveling in your own glorification? Does that include your own "thirst for vengeance" and "festiveness of cruelty"?
What heavy load? The guilt and blame Christianity gives a blueprint for accepting and releasing?
Quote:"I want to learn more and more to see as beautiful what is necessary in things; then I shall be one of those who make things beautiful. Amor fati: let that be my love henceforth! I do not want to wage war against what is ugly. I do not want to accuse; I do not even want to accuse those who accuse. Looking away shall be my only negation. And all in all and on the whole: someday I wish to be only a Yes-sayer."

I like Nietzsche. Jordan Peterson? Not so much.  Undecided
Teaching yourself to see beauty in the necessary is not making things beautiful; it is convincing yourself to accept the harsh when you could be transcending it and creating real beauty in its stead. Accepting necessity presumes it is, in fact and a priori, necessary. It only reinforces the necessary, instead of questioning or seeking/allowing alternatives.

One is positive and constructive, the other is pessimistic and withdrawn.
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#7
Magical Realist Offline
Quote:No Christian believes that they can absolve themselves by making Jesus guilty.

Most christians believe they are absolved by Jesus being sacrificed for their sins. It's all thruout the New Testament. Jesus was punished as guilty to pay for our sins, so that we can be forgiven them. That's the core message of the Christian gospel.


1Peter 1:

18 "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers;

19 But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot"...

1 John 2:2

"He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world."

“This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

Roman 4:25

"He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification"

Hebrews 9:15

"For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance."

Romans 5:8

"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."
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#8
Syne Offline
(Nov 25, 2018 05:51 AM)Magical Realist Wrote:
Quote:No Christian believes that they can absolve themselves by making Jesus guilty.

Most christians believe they are absolved by Jesus being sacrificed for their sins. It's all thruout the New Testament. Jesus was punished as guilty to pay for our sins, so that we can be forgiven them. That's the core message of the Christian gospel.

And? They do not believe that Jesus can be made guilty of their sins. In fact, it's his sinless nature ("a lamb without blemish and without spot") that is believed to allow for his redemptive sacrifice. A punishment implies something imposed externally, where Jesus voluntarily sacrificed himself (albeit with last minute misgivings). And considering the vast acceptance of the trinity doctrine, there isn't even any external source that could impose such punishment. Jesus was only externally sacrificed by men, as a fitting analogy to OT animal sacrifices, which ended upon his death with the grace it bestowed as substitute.

So...why no verses showing Jesus guilty, other than the kangaroo court of men? Because they do not exist. No one believes Jesus was ever guilty, only that he took on and absolved the guilt of others. He accepted man's guilt, much like anyone who forgives another their wrongdoing.
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#9
Magical Realist Offline
Quote:They do not believe that Jesus can be made guilty of their sins.

Jesus was punished for our sins as a sacrifice to God. Ofcourse he was guilty of those sins. That's how atonement works. The sins are placed on the scapegoat or lamb and he is banished or killed in stead of the sinners. The guilt is transferred FROM the sinner to the atoning victim. If there was no transfer of guilt then there was no atonement. That's what the Bible teaches. Read it sometime.. You might learn something.

Here's a Christian website to explain it all to you:

http://www.realchristianity.com/become_c...r_sin.html
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#10
Secular Sanity Offline
(Nov 25, 2018 05:05 AM)Syne Wrote: So you think there's more value in reveling in your own glorification? Does that include your own "thirst for vengeance" and "festiveness of cruelty"?
What heavy load? The guilt and blame Christianity gives a blueprint for accepting and releasing?

I sort of agree with Peterson on the account that our need for redemption might reflect our need for acceptance, which sparks a quest for meaning—something sacred and eternal. Something that rose from an impersonal force, "spirit" if you like.

The eye of the needle from the Talmud is used to express the impossible. A camel cannot pass through an eye of a needle. A needle is used to weave a single strand. You are but one among many strands sewn into the tapestry.

The desert represents an existential crisis—"the loneliest desert."

The camel bears the burden of morals and truth and goes out to face the harsh conditions of the desert. It has reverence for morality and wants to do the right thing. These are the burdens placed upon its back, but the camel is not free, and kneels to an external authority with rules disguised as absolutes.

"Verily, to him it is preying, and a matter for a beast of prey. He once loved "thou shalt" as most sacred: now he, must find illusion and caprice even in the most sacred, that freedom from his love may become his prey: the lion is needed for such prey."

The lion is needed for a resounding "No" to traditional values. This is the last god—the dragon—his last battle.

"The values of a thousand years glitter on those scales, and thus speaketh the mightiest of all dragons: "All the values of things- glitter on me."

He wants us to value life, not out of duty, but out of love by creating our own value—our own meaning. Something that is worth fighting for.

In the whip picture Lou represents his love of life along with the spring of lilacs, and he’s now proud to be the beast of that burden—to labor for the benefit of man (humans).

"Pity! Pity for the higher men!

My suffering and pity—what do they matter! Do I strive for happiness? I strive for my work!
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