|
Christian Morality Derivation of Principles Gary Novak
Paul Claims God blundered in creating flesh. Paul's argument in Romans and Galatians is that before there can be sin there must be law; and before there can be law, there must be flesh. Spirit is the answer, because spirit is not flesh; and there can be no sin without flesh, because there is no law without flesh. He tried to say that God created sin in creating human life; then God blamed humans for defying him; but someone straightened out his thinking by killing Christ. 1. (Rom 4:15) Indeed, the law worketh to bring down wrath, for where there is no law there is no transgression. (The purpose of Congress is to bring down wrath upon the public.) 2. (Rom 7:1) Are you not aware, my brothers... that the law has power over a man only so long as he lives? 3. (Rom 6:7) For he that is dead is freed from sin. 4. (Rom 7:5,6) When we were in the flesh, the sinful passions roused by the law worked in our members and we bore fruit for death. Now we have been released from the law - for we have died to what bound us - and we serve in the new spirit, not the antiquated letter. 5. (Rom 7:7-9) I should never have known what evil desire was unless the law had said, "You shall not covet." Sin seized that opportunity; it used the commandment to rouse in me every kind of evil desire. Without law sin is dead... (7:15-18) I do not do what I want to do but what I hate...it is not I who do it but the sin which resides in me...no good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh... 6. (Rom 8:2) The law of the spirit, the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, has freed you from the law of sin and death. 7. (Rom 8:3) Then God sent his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as a sin offering, thereby condemning sin in the flesh... 8. (Rom 5:9,10) Now that we have been justified by his blood, it is all the more certain that we shall be saved by him from God's wrath. For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him by death of his Son... (Notice that what people need to be saved from is not their own corruptions but God's wrath.) 9. (Rom 8:6) The tendency of the flesh is toward death but that of the spirit toward life and peace. 10. (Gal 2:16) Nevertheless, knowing that a man is not justified by legal observance but by faith in Jesus Christ, we too have believed in him in order to be justified by faith in Christ, not by observance of the law; for by works of the law no one will be justified. 11. (Gal 2:21) If justice is available through the law, then Christ died to no purpose! 12. (Gal 5:16,17) My point is that you should live in accord with the spirit and you will not yield to the cravings of the flesh. The flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh; the two are directly opposed. 13. (Gal 5:18) If you are guided by the spirit, you are not under the law. 14. (Gal 5:22) ...the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patient endurance... Paul indicated that flesh causes sin, as if he were speaking of biological flesh; then he drifted into metaphor; then drifted into spiritual flesh; and then indicated that the death of spiritual flesh ends sin. There is no such thing as death of spiritual flesh, and it wouldn't end sin if it occurred, because sin permeates all realities, attitudes and values in the mind. Christ said that not the smallest letter of the law is to be done away with (Mat 5:18). Paul said that God created two contradictory sets of laws. First he created biological laws through flesh, which created passions and resulted in bad conduct. Then God created commandments which say it is sin to succumb to the laws of flesh through passions. Of course, God got angry when the sin occurred. Crucifying Christ supposedly had the purpose of alleviating God's anger. Note that by spirit, Paul is not referring to the Holy Spirit but the person's own spirit. He is saying that the spirit is a moral influence (14), while flesh is a corrupting influence (5). Paul does not say how to get from point A to point B except as faith in Christ (10). How does faith go from flesh to spirit, and why are Paul's admonishments and moralizing necessary? Is there a path involved? Paul claims the only purpose of Christ's death is to justify someone, and law does not produce justice (10). So much for government. Paul is saying there was no sin before human life was created, because flesh creates law (2, 4, 5, 12), and law creates sin (1, 5). He tries to indicate that sin is not possible in the spirit world (2). Of course, it is, as satan and evil spirits indicate. There is plenty of evidence that the opposite is true. Power corrupts, and spirit powers are the primary source of power. Most evil and sin come from the spirit world. Another implication of Paul's is that God created the problem of sin by creating human life (4). Besides being patently absurd, the fix would not be killing Christ. Paul isn't quoting Scriptures or delivering a message from God. He is describing what is supposed to be the self-evident logic of the subject. He is saying that flesh has a problem with it, because it creates passions. So God forbid certain behaviors. Instead of God's commands fixing everything, it forced people to defy him, which became the essence of sin. God supposedly got angry because of the defiance, but killing Christ dampened his anger and fixed the problem (8). That aint no way, shape or form what happened - not by the Scriptures, not by logic and not by the evidence of objective reality. Sin goes far beyond flesh and began long before human life began. The serpent knew all about sin when tempting Adam and Eve. Why would killing Christ dampen God's anger? Paul's logic indicates that sinners made a believer of God by showing him that they could not live by his laws, and crucifying Christ was the result. So God relinquished his demands. One reason why Paul's claims about the crucifixion are false is because God designed the crucifixion, not sinners, and his purpose was not to influence himself (Mark 8:31-33). After the resurrection, Christ said penance is to be preached for the remission of sins (Luke 24:47). Therefore, the crucifixion did not end the problem of sin or change its significance or the means of overcoming it. The obvious purpose of Christ's crucifixion was to create truth about sin, its characteristics, who perpetrates it and why. It showed that religious authorities and corrupt persons would crucify God for healing the sick, feeding the hungry, raising the dead and producing moral truth. Paul reversed the meaning of the crucifixion by portraying the murder of Christ as the process of salvation rather than the sin which people are to get saved from—salvation through murder rather than salvation from murder—murder as the answer rather than the problem. If Paul, the admitted murderer of Christians, could be fixed with lightening, why is there a religion, and why so much human misery? Why not fix everyone so easily? Christ's words can only be known to be God's words by testing them against the objective lessons of life, as Christ taught (Mat 15:10)(Mark 7:14)(Mark 4:13, 7:14, 8:21)(Luke 24:45)(J 8:43)(John 4:22)(Luke 12:57). Paul's words need to be tested against objective lessons of life and Christ's words; but instead, they are used to contradict Christ. Taking away a debt for sin through atonement does nothing to improve human standards, it only allows the sin to be rationalized. Christ said to forgive without payment (Mark 11:25). Why wouldn't God do the same. Christ forgave sins before the supposed atonement (Luke 5:20). God said atonement is not a proper ritual (Isaiah 1:11)(Jer 7:22)(Hosea 6:6)(Psalms 40:7, 50:8-15)(Mat 9:13, 12:7)(Mark 12:33). Paul rewrote Christianity omitting all of the critical truths which Christ produced, while he taught by example arrogance, domination, elitism, and strife. His version is then used by the world to sanctify its corruptions. Christ's name is used for justification, while Paul's version of religion sanctifies the world's sin. Paul claimed that Christ told him to preach (Acts 22:6, 26:12). But there was no claim that Christ told him "what" to preach, that the result would be infallible truth or that the rest of us would be bound by it forever after. Since Paul lied about everything else, he would have lied about Christ telling him to preach. Paul's logic was extremely tortured (claiming flesh creates law and sin, and God could not forgive without a blood offering) and in conflict with Christ's teaching (that overcoming sin is the path to life). Therefore, Paul's theology did not originate with God or Christ. Paul's theology was extremely technical—"straining out gnats and swallowing camels" (Mat 23:24). The gnat of "justification" replaced good deeds. Even if Paul's technicalities were true, they were God's concern, not man's, and they were no excuse for omitting "the weightier matters of law, justice and mercy..." (Mat 23:23), as Paul's followers assert. It is common for the followers of Paul to say humans cannot do anything to overcome sin, and that's why sin had to be taken care of on the cross. A second rationale is that even if humans could overcome sin, it would not justify their earlier sinfulness, and that's why murdering Christ had to occur for justification. Paul used a flimsy logic for all of his points demonstrating that human logic was his basis, while his logic was never adequate, and endless muddle was the result. Using technicalities such as "justification" for theology says no one could get saved before Christ's time. Based on Paul's theology, Isaiah or Jeremiah would not have gotten saved. By contrast, Christ abhorred such technicalities (Mat 15:3) and described responsibilities which would be the same always and everywhere. Christ accomplished an extremely demanding task in teaching how to overcome sin. The entire context of his life and teaching are integrated into a complex whole which defines the subject. For Paul to rewrite the subject is to destroy the message. Other writers passed on human knowledge. Paul tried to replace God. The followers of Paul are not concerned about overcoming sin, because sin was supposedly taken care of through atonement on the cross. They defy Christ's teaching putting Paul above Christ. Paul said, through much theological detail, that there is no sin beyond a problem in God's head. Supposedly, atonement changed God and solved the problem. Specifically, Paul said sin made humans "enemies" of God's, but Christ's death removed God's "wrath" and "reconciled" humans to him (Rom 5:9,10). Paul absolutized his attack on law, which not only negated the archaic trivia of Mosaic law but also the Ten Commandments. Christ said not the smallest letter of the law is to be done away with (Mat 5-18). What made Paul an authority over Christianity? His repenting is not a basis for authority. If he had some knowledge to share, that does not make him any more of an authority than anyone else; and his knowledge consisted of incoherence. When he is quoted, half sentences and phrases are used, because he produced few coherent sentences. Paul also served the purpose of creating a figurehead, as Freud and Einstein do. The world needs figureheads to attribute source material to, so authorities can pretend that they are not originating it. If they originated it, they would have to explain the logic of it. As a figurehead, Paul is quoted dozens of times for every time Christ is quoted once. The quotes do not refer to anything significant, which is what makes Paul so easy to quote. As a figurehead, Paul detracts from the important message which Christ produced. There is not one element of anything Christ taught to be found in Paul's words. Christ and Paul literally described two different subjects. Christ described how to overcome sin; Paul described how to be a good Pharisee. (Pharisee means religious authority of the time, which would not be any different from Christian ones in terms of corrupting religion. The purpose in attacking Pharisees was not to degrade Jews; Christ was a practicing Jew.) Paul literally picked up where he left off in the Jewish religion—making himself an authority over a religion while contributing nothing but corruption to it. How could he have done otherwise, when that mentality was the only thing he ever knew? The primary means of corrupting Christianity is by producing a substitute, which is what Paul did. He created a substitute for Christ's purpose of overcoming sin. What does Paul say about sin? Very little beyond trivia. He mentions a few personal weaknesses, and they supposedly come from flesh, nature or law. He does not put sin into the context of corruption in the world creating an environment of sin and influences which are sinful. Paul says things several different ways by using corrective statements which reverse other points. His reversals do not remove the rest of his theology. In Paul's theology, atonement is applied to mean that sin was taken care of on the cross; and on that basis, moral responsibilities are shunned by the followers of Paul. Atonement implies that the sin of crucifying Christ was a good deed. Historically, atonement was developed as a ritual of sacrificing animals on an altar. Doing so was supposed to be a good deed. The blood and smoke were supposed to be an offering to God. Eventually, God said through the prophets that he does not want the blood and smoke, and other methods of worship should be used (Isaiah 1:11)(Jer 7:22)(Hosea 6:6)(Psalms 40:7, 50:8-15)(Mat 9:13, 12:7)(Mark 12:33). Therefore, the concept of atonement should not have been applied to Christ's crucifixion. God said it is not an appropriate method of worship. Notice that blood offerings do not please God. Yet atonement theology says that God was appeased or pleased by Christ's crucifixion, because it was supposedly atonement. If atonement were the purpose of Christ's crucifixion, he would have had to tell the apostles that God was angry at them, but if they killed him, God would be appeased. Since the authorities killed Christ, atonement would have had to overcome the sin of the authorities. But they did not repent. So overcoming their sin was not the purpose. Moral persons would not use murder as payment for a debt any more than they would go to a satanic ritual. God is supposed to be a moral person. Christ said, "The reason I was born, the reason why I came into the world, is to testify to the truth." (John 18:37). It means Christ's purpose was not to fix a quirk in God's head. A major preoccupying argument of Paul and his followers is justification. They say people are justified by faith rather than works. The simple reason they give is that people cannot save themselves (Rom 3:24). That point is not relevant. No one else ever claims people can save themselves. Justification is a totally different subject from Christ's teaching. It is a technicality which humans should not have to study. If there were such a thing as justification it would be between Christ and God. But it is argued endlessly, because it is given an absurd interpretation which conflicts with all evidence, and there is a general tendency to use it to replace what Christ taught. The technical argument is that Christ's crucifixion justified the sin of certain select persons. After being justified, salvation supposedly occurs without overcoming sin. The logic is that no one could overcome sin if they wanted to, and the only question is convincing God of something. Why then did Christ teach? He taught how to overcome sin. The technicality of justification is irrelevant, because it says justification is the "allow" mechanism for salvation, while there never was a "disallow" mechanism. Moral persons do not want sin to be justified, they just want it to end. There is no justification for sin. The rationalizers contrive a disallow mechanism for salvation on the basis of some oddity of God's, while there is no evidence, logic or quotes that indicate God ever had such a quirk in his head. Sin cannot be justified. Ending it is the only relevance. Since there is not a justification for sin, the fundamentalists say only the crucifixion could justify it. In saying that, they falsify the meaning of the crucifixion and replace moral concerns with a mindless argument. The real purpose of the crucifixion was to produce truth. It showed that humans would crucify God for doing good deeds and teaching morality. The justification argument is a defacto argument for the intimidation and coercion motives of the demons who created the pagan ritual of sacrifice. People had to perpetrate a sin, like murdering their children on an altar, to show their allegiance to the demons, or some calamity might strike them. To murder Christ, to please God, to get saved is the same logic. A quote which is used to rationalize justification is Luke 18:9-14. It says two persons, one arrogant and one humble, prayed. The humble one was justified, but not the arrogant one. Since the word justify is in that parable, fundamentalist claim that justification is supposed to be a part of Christianity. But the concept of justsify has an opposite meaning in the parable. The praying person justifies himself by doing something proper and constructive. And the parable does not say the justifying took away the sins of the person who prayed. In other words, just because the concept of justification exists does not mean it can be used to turn Christian theology upside down. The parabale that Christ used shows the common sense of the subject, while the dogma of justification contrives absurdities about God using the murder of one person (Christ) to justify another person (the common sinner). In regard to salvation, Christ said that on judgment day, the sheep will be separated from the goats on the basis of who fed the hungry, clothed the naked, etc. (Mat 25:31-46). Those good deeds are how sin is overcome. Also, Christ said each persons will be repaid according to his conduct (Mat 16:27)(John 5:29). The justification theology of Paul says the opposite. Christ described his crucifixion as "ransom," not atonement (Mat 20:28, Mk 10:45). Ransom is paid to destroyers, not to God. Christ said, "The reason I was born, the reason why I came into the world, is to testify to the truth." (John 18:37). It means Christ's purpose was not to fix a quirk in God's head. The atonement problem must be difficult for some persons to understand; so let me create an analogy and walk you through it. First, a trace of history. Before religion was organized, burning carcasses to God had become a ritual. It was a logical extension of cooking meat on an open fire, which is how the primitives did it. So after God got religion rolling, he accepted the practice of offering animals on an altar, but he often said that it was not the best way to worship; and he gradually raised the standard. First he created Ten Commandments, and then he taught the details of moral responsibilities through Christ. Now consider this analogy. Some parents (the Joneses) want to teach their kids responsibilities. They have three kids: a 15 year old, an 8 year old and a 3 year old. Every morning at 8 am the kids are supposed to clean their bedroom. The 15 year old has the primary responsibility including sweeping the floor and whatever else needs to be done. The 8 year old is supposed to pick up dirty close. The 3 year old picks up a piece of paper which was placed on the floor and throws it in the garbage. It wastes a piece of paper each day, but the task is symbolic. The task of the 3 year old is analogous to atonement; the task of the 8 year old is analogous to the Ten Commandments; and the task of the 15 year old is analogous to Christ's teaching of moral responsibilities. Now there is a professor Finkledim, who heads the Advanced Institute for Child Behavior and Prognosis. He has never seen the Jones family, but he hears about the 3 year old and decides that his task is just the way to teach kids responsibilities. So he writes a book on it. Half of the parents in the country take his advice and have their kids pick up a piece of paper each morning. Without the other tasks, the kids only learn how to waste paper instead of how to clean a room. The religion was supposed to have advanced far beyond atonement. For Paul to relate Christianity to atonement is to erase what Christ taught about moral responsibilities. It places all of the responsibilities with God instead of the individuals. The word "reconciliation" is usually used with atonement, and it means that God changes instead of the individuals changing. To Chapter 10. |