tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post3738262599888366626..comments2024-01-24T04:02:06.466-05:00Comments on Why I De-Converted from Evangelical Christianity: William G. T. Shedd's Attempt to Justify Penal SubstitutionKen Pulliamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12161943466797514854noreply@blogger.comBlogger13125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-34331415682732025632018-06-18T07:30:01.196-04:002018-06-18T07:30:01.196-04:00Mercy and the letter of the law may be incompatibl...Mercy and the letter of the law may be incompatible, but the purpose of mercy is to allow justice to be satisfied when the law cannot satisfy it.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01097803887631391076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-16246621528622176982010-05-26T01:51:09.620-04:002010-05-26T01:51:09.620-04:00As I see it, to support the claim that PST is inco...As I see it, to support the claim that PST is inconsistent, you must defend at least one of the two following positions:<br /><br />1) That the Biblical definition of "justice" forbids wrath to be disspated on a substitute. I don't think you've even tried to do this. Scriptures clearly teach that God's wrath can sometimes be disspated on specific substitutes.<br /><br />2) That for the many daily cases where someone accepts wrath in the stead of another, the person accepting the wrath is <i>actually culpable</i> in the sense of having committed a related crime. You have asserted as much, but haven't offered any evidence beyond assertion. I believe that there are several ways to falsify this thesis, so I don't find it convincing.<br /><br />If you fail to defend either of these points, then I believe you are left condemning PST on the grounds that it is repulsive to modern jurisprudence, or that it is not utilitarian. These are strong points, but fall short of demosntrating PST to be "inconsistent".<br /><br />...<br /><br /><i><br />the person would not be innocent but sharing somehow in the culpability of the crime. I think that is what Hare tries to do with his "merger-identity" scenarios.<br /></i><br /><br />You know, I've read the lecture several times, and I just don't see how you could get this from Hare. He never uses the word culpability, and I believe he uses the first example specifically <i>because</i> the baby's throw-up is an amoral event (as you say). If any event could be squarely blamed on God, this would be one. I don't believe that Hare, or indeed any typical person, would arrive at your conclusion that the mother is culpable because <i>"if she had not handed the baby over, this would not have happened"</i>.<br /><br />Hare is describing how people who are united, typically by love, tend to take on one another's pride and shame, without being <i>actually culpable</i>. Coincidentally, it is these same scenarios where an offended part is most likely to accept substitution.<br /><br /><i><br />What I meant is that sometimes someone might inflict harm on a substitute but that is because they are not acting rationally. This could not be said about the God of the Bible, could it?<br /></i><br /><br />Rational is contrasted against "instinctual". When a man throws himself in front of a train to save his brother's life, no rational calculation is made. When a woman exacts terrible vengeance on someone who is abusing her son, no rational calculation is made. Both reactions are instinctual and necessary.<br /><br />Reason is servant of justice, it is not lord. When someone passes a wounded and naked stranger at the side of the road on the way to give a speech about the dangers of religion, this person could excuse himself by reasoning that the delay would cause him to miss the speech. He believes that the speech might save thousands of people from death by religion, so the stranger's life, in balance, is worthless.<br /><br />In contrast, instinct screams out, "Do not pass the stranger!".JSAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00681934865643964687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-72916671927591579552010-05-25T18:57:50.139-04:002010-05-25T18:57:50.139-04:00Joshua,
You say: Retributive justice isn't a...Joshua,<br /><br />You say: <i> Retributive justice isn't about rational, utilitarian considerations. </i> But is supposed to be <b> justice</b> not just the venting of wrath. What I meant is that sometimes someone might inflict harm on a substitute but that is because they are not acting rationally. This could not be said about the God of the Bible, could it?<br /><br />You indicate in alternative (a) that punishing a substitute is innately just. That precisely the opposite of what I am arguing. Can you provide analogies of where the punishing of an innocent substitute is innately just?<br /><br />I think (b) is the only possible way to defend punishing a substitute but in that case the person would not be innocent but sharing somehow in the culpability of the crime. I think that is what Hare tries to do with his "merger-identity" scenarios.<br /><br />I believe (c) to be correct but it is not the teaching of the Bible and it is not the foundation of the PST. I am trying to show that the PST is internally inconsistent with biblical theology.Ken Pulliamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12161943466797514854noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-70259385506482625062010-05-25T17:18:45.386-04:002010-05-25T17:18:45.386-04:00Now I am not saying tha some human beings might no...<i><br /> Now I am not saying tha some human beings might not do it, i.e., punish a substitute, but it seems that they are acting out of haste or rage or some other non-rational basis when they do it.<br /></i><br /><br />Right, they are, <i>by definition</i>, acting out of wrath. That's what retribution is. Retributive justice isn't about rational, utilitarian considerations.<br /><br /><i>It seems to me that the ONLY legitimate basis for punishing someone else is that the someone else shares culpability somehow. If he/she doesn't, then you are punishing the wrong person and committing an act of injustice.<br /></i><br /><br />In a utilitarian context, perhaps. In a retributive context, not at all. There <i>are</i> cases where most people would find substitutionary expiation unjust (for example, if the substitute was unwilling, or was not of the appropriate kind). But there are other common cases where people find substitutionary expiation to be acceptable.<br /><br />To explain these common cases away, we have only three choices:<br /><br />A) Argue that our innate sense of justice is flawed in these cases, and that these substitutions are wrong despite people's instincts. To do this, we must appeal to a higher authority than empirically observable fact or the Bible, since both teach that substitutes can sometimes satisfy retribution.<br /><br />B) Argue that the substitute in all cases is actually the one culpable. As we've seen, this argument can be reduced to an absurdity. There is no evidence that the people who commonly accept substitutes in daily life are operating under this mindset.<br /><br />C) Claim that retribution is barbaric and wrong, because it cannot be defended on utilitarian grounds. That's a fine approach, but then the discussion is no longer about PST, it's about retributive justice.<br /><br /><i><br /> I think that is why you don't see substitutionary punishment in legal settings.<br /></i><br /><br />Do we even see <i>retributive</i> justice in modern jurisprudence? Most modern adults find it barbaric, and even things like the death penalty are defended primarily in terms of deterrence or prevention.JSAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00681934865643964687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-854030836590266862010-05-25T14:57:55.614-04:002010-05-25T14:57:55.614-04:00Thus the Christian Testament objurgates itself as ...Thus the Christian Testament objurgates itself as misanthropic!Misanthropes wrote it. The divine protection racket is one of the scams of the ages! John 3:16-18 ranks amongst the hate lines of the ages!Carneadeshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18262312075652707760noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-12993578995800110322010-05-25T05:54:11.427-04:002010-05-25T05:54:11.427-04:00Joshua,
You asked: what was the calculation that...Joshua,<br /><br />You asked: <i> what was the calculation that the offended party made before accepting the substitute?</i><br /><br />That is an excellent question. It seems to me that the ONLY legitimate basis for punishing someone else is that the someone else shares culpability somehow. If he/she doesn't, then you are punishing the wrong person and committing an act of injustice. I think that is why you don't see substitutionary punishment in legal settings. Now I am not saying tha some human beings might not do it, i.e., punish a substitute, but it seems that they are acting out of haste or rage or some other non-rational basis when they do it.Ken Pulliamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12161943466797514854noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-74578951557835028022010-05-24T00:36:47.926-04:002010-05-24T00:36:47.926-04:00That's,because we find theologians to be come...That's,because we find theologians to be comedians and their jokes on the poor blokes who follow their silly sophisticated sophistry.<br /> The joke of jokes is that God is love but the pointless evils deny that. Now, if God is Allah or Yahweh, then their particular evils add to the evils. The latter has a couple sentenced for what He supposedly requires for soul-making - the knowledge of that tree! Not content with that, the fool condemns their posterity by original sin. Not content with that comes the divine protection plan that those misanthropic verses of John 3: 16-18 that theologians call the love verses in effect. So then comes up this notion of the ridiculous Atonement with its requirement for blood sacrifice of His son, one of His two other selves, to keep Himself from sending sinners to Hell. That the fool has two other selves is senseless unless He's a disordered individual. No, such as that comedian- theologian John Hick marshals all the comedic effects he can about universalism- that all will go to Heaven, as he can read the verses contrary to what the literalists writers meant just as Christians can make the prophecies of the Tanakh apply to that jerk Yeshua! William Kaufmann states that people read onto the scripture and Yeshua their own ideas: eisegesis is exegesis!<br /> Rather than making a compelling case for God, they in effect affirm ignosticism- the supernatural has no function as being vacuous!<br /> Spong and other theologians unwittingly are our Trojan horses! <br /> Remember it's Christiansanity, Moses's Folly [but no Moses!], Mohammad's Fits, Smith's Fraud, the Church of Nescientology, Mary's Christian Nescience, Ellen's Black Magic, the Hindu Illusion,the Dao No Way and the Buddhist?.<br /> nescience = ignorance<br />Educated folk can ensconce themselves further into superstition so the rationalist fallacy is to assume that with more education, less superstition.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-80359428445512805872010-05-24T00:20:19.097-04:002010-05-24T00:20:19.097-04:00Clarification: And by PSAP, I mean "Point Sub...<b>Clarification:</b> And by PSAP, I mean "Point Subtraction Aggression Paradigm" -- apparently that would be ambiguous if you just Googled the acronym. PSAP doesn't test anything about substitution, but could easily be modified to do so.JSAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00681934865643964687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-57124607586220198372010-05-24T00:14:58.683-04:002010-05-24T00:14:58.683-04:00@Ken - The discussion on p 456 is, indeed, interes...@Ken - The discussion on p 456 is, indeed, interesting. I was going to ask about this on the other thread.<br /><br /><b>Context:</b> It seems that people often allow their wrath to be satisfied by "taking it out" on a substitute, rather than on the offender. Parents, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters will periodically volunteer to catch wrath in another's stead. This is a pretty primitive thing, but is still quite common. We have all seen this happen before, and maybe even done it ourselves.<br /><br /><b>Question:</b> However, people don't accept just any substitute. What are the reasons that a person will accept a certain substitute? You suggested that one reason would be that the substitute is considered personally culpable. While I admit that this could be true in some cases, it doesn't seem to ring true in the majority of cases. In these other cases, what was the calculation that the offended party made before accepting the substitute? I can think of some possible reasons, and Shedd offers up another possible explanation at p 456.<br /><br />But conjecture and anecdote isn't the best way to do science. Has anyone done any surveys, anthropological research, or better yet, controlled experiments? It seems like it would be relatively easy to empirically figure out how humans innately process substitutionary expiation, and this data would be useful in analyzing the good/bad about PST. I'm aware of behavioral psychology experiments about tit-for-tat, PSAP comes close, and so on; as well as empirical evidence about conditions where people will voluntarily make sacrifices for others. But I'm not aware of anyone having tested the specific scenario of an aggressor directing wrath at a substitute. Have you investigated this angle?JSAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00681934865643964687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-52244147744432152742010-05-23T23:09:19.847-04:002010-05-23T23:09:19.847-04:00SteveJ: But why doesn't the inability to simpl...SteveJ: <i>But why doesn't the inability to simply discharge sin and let it go without punishment also compromise the sovereignty of God?</i><br /><br />Because God cannot lie (Titus 1:2, Hebrews 6:18, Romans 3:4). God keeping His own promises is not seen as a compromise of his sovereignty.JSAhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00681934865643964687noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-11824440567230590142010-05-20T22:17:23.473-04:002010-05-20T22:17:23.473-04:00It is amazing to read these creative attempts to d...It is amazing to read these creative attempts to defend penal substitution. That part about God punishing sin in the abstract sounds like it should be a heresy---not that I know enough about heresies to identify which one!James Patehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14247799389009268470noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-67447263222291952552010-05-20T13:53:44.974-04:002010-05-20T13:53:44.974-04:00Nice post. This is just my confirmation bias barki...Nice post. This is just my confirmation bias barking here, but it seems to me that theology in general is, still, castles in air. Flowery, lofty, impressive, maybe even internally coherent - and entirely bereft of grounding in the real world.<br /><br />Mercy and justice are incompatible at their cores; one cannot meaningfully be both at the same time.GentleSkeptichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10635966921313379917noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-882699495059104312.post-10634812857182037542010-05-20T08:35:51.673-04:002010-05-20T08:35:51.673-04:00"Shedd maintains that God would not be sovere..."Shedd maintains that God would not be sovereign if he could not allow a substitute to suffer the penalty for sin ..."<br /><br />But why doesn't the inability to simply discharge sin and let it go without punishment also compromise the sovereignty of God?SteveJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04525881183798559993noreply@blogger.com