Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Gamecock]

Seoulunitarian,

Fundamentalists don't seem to have any problem justifying ridiculously immoral things in the "old covenant." A family values issue from the NT you might want to research is that of polygamy. Nowhere is having more than one wife condemned in the NT, with the exception of Paul's admonition that Elders should only have one wife. This statement makes it clear that for NT Christians (who are not elders) polygamy was commonly practiced and it was fully acceptable to have multiple wives.

For all the Christian Right's talk of how God created marriage to be ONE man and ONE woman, there seems to be little Biblical evidence.

[seoulunitarian]

[Grimalkin]

[seoulunitarian]

If one hundred people were to give a definition of the word traditional, there would be one hundred different definitions. Traditional can point back to as few as two hundred years, or it can be used to define the way things have always been. It�s always best to start with a dictionary definition, and to come to a working definition from there. The Cambridge University Dictionary defines traditional as �following or belonging to the customs or ways of behaving that have continued in a group of people or society for a long time without changing.� As you can probably already see, there is a problem from the beginning because �a long time� is a subjective measurement. So we must attempt to figure out what the word traditional means to fundamentalists, and how long a long time is.

John McArthur Jr. is the conservative pastor of Grace Community Church in California. In a sermon entitled �The Creation of Woman� he preached in 1999, he says,

"This was given to the inspired writer Moses who wrote, of course, the book of Genesis. Verse 24. Now God's going to make a comment on this relationship. "For this cause, a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh." That is a comment from the creator. And this, beloved, establishes the foundation for marriage. And it also establishes the foundation for sexual behavior. There's only one kind of sexual behavior that God recognizes in the human realm, and that is the sexual behavior between a man and a woman who have left father and mother and, cleaving to each other, have become one flesh. That is the only context in which God has ordained and recognized sexual conduct.

So you had not only the creation of man on day six, but you have, in the creation of man, the creation of marriage. And you have in the creation of marriage the definition of sexual conduct: One man, one woman, leaving and cleaving, becoming one flesh for life. And what God established in the garden has never changed. Never changed. So that you have marriage defined right there in the classic statement of Genesis 2:24.

And marriage is defined as one man and one woman, leaving and cleaving, becoming "one flesh" for life. That is the only Biblical definition for marriage. Two women do not make a marriage. Even though there's a lobby group in the State of California trying to pass laws to recognize that as marriage, that is not marriage. Two men coming together, that is not a marriage. God does not recognize that as a marriage. Both of those are sins. They are iniquities of significant proportions; not to be recognized as marriage, but to be recognized as perversion. Any sexual conduct outside of marriage is also a violation of God's design. What you have here is the exclusion of homosexuality, the exclusion of fornication and the exclusion of adultery. All sexual behavior is excluded, except that which is conducted within a marriage between a man and a woman who have left their parents, covenant together, make a lifelong bond and become one flesh. That's what God established in the very beginning."

[seoulunitarian]

Dr. James Dobson is the founder of Focus on the Family, a conservative evangelical think tank located in Colorado Springs. Dr. Dobson said the following in a February 7, 1998 speech to the Council for National Policy:

"And in this passage, Proverbs 8:22-30, wisdom is speaking in first person, metaphorically. Wisdom is, as we know, throughout this book, God's point of view. Wisdom is His way of seeing things. Wisdom is His value system, and so wisdom, here, is talking about itself and this is what it says: "The Lord brought me forth as the first of His works before His deeds of old. I was appointed from eternity, from the beginning, before the world began. When there were no oceans, I was given birth. When there were no springs abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth. Before He made the earth or the fields or any of the dust of the world, I was there when He set the heavens in place."

"When He marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when He established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep. When He gave the sea its boundaries so the water would not overstep his command, and when He marked out the foundations of the earth. Then, I was the craftsman at His side."

What this is saying, in other words, is that the moral law of the universe antedated the physical universe, it came first. It was not as though the children of Israel wandered into the wilderness and the Lord looked at their behavior, and they're worshipping idols and they're doing all these wrong things, and he says, "Hmmm. Those folks need some rules," and so he calls Moses up into the hills and said, "Here are the Ten Commandments. This will help those people do better."

It is not that way at all. That moral foundation, that moral law, is eternal because it's an expression of God's own nature and it pre-dates the universe and it will outlast the physical laws. You can no more defy that moral law than you can jump off a ten-story building, because if anything, the moral law outranks the physical law. The physical law is going to pass away. His book says, "The heavens and the earth shall be rolled up like a scroll, and there will be a new heaven and a new earth, there'll be new physical laws, but the moral law is eternal."

Now, here we begin to see how the word traditional is used within conservative/fundamentalist Christianity. When a fundamentalist Christian speaks of tradition, specifically when it comes to moral tradition, they are speaking of customs established from the beginning of time. What the dictionary describes as �a very long time� actually means �from the beginning of time� to the fundamentalist. Now, to be fair, McArthur also states in the sermon I quoted from above that when sin entered into the world, sexual ethics changed, and Jesus set them straight again when he pointed back to the Genesis story. But then, I suppose that would make the Genesis example traditional with a huge gap in between. In other words, it�s not traditional at all, but one example of a historical relationship popping up in two different historical time periods.

All throughout the Old Testament (and the entire Bible for that matter), specifically within the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, there is ample evidence that God �invented� new morals or changed morality from what it was before into something else. Now, of course, I am referring to scripture as a fundamentalist would refer to it � as the literal words of God. I do not believe God actually changed his mind, but I cannot believe how fundamentalists can say there has been a God-ordained traditional family ethic from the beginning of time.

The point of the matter is that traditional can be used to mean anything, and when it is used that way it really means nothing. For the purposes of critiquing the fundamentalist claims of traditional family values, I will adhere to their definition of traditional as �that which goes back to the Genesis story.� Therefore, the passages of various family relationships I will later present between the Genesis story and now will show that traditional family values cannot refer to the Genesis story since there has not been a steady stream of God-condoned family relationships like the Genesis marriage relationship from that point in history up to now.

[seoulunitarian]

Defining the fundamentalist concept of values will inevitably be intertwined with the fundamentalist concept of traditional. But first, let�s define values according to the Cambridge University Dictionary: �the beliefs people have about what is right and wrong and what is most important in life, which control their behavior.� That�s a pretty objective definition, and one which I am confortable with. I assume it is also a definition most fundamentalists would also be comfortable with, though the values that comprise their values would be very different from the values that comprise my system.

In the previous section, I submitted portions of a speech by Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Focus on the Family is the largest fundamentalist organization of its kind in the United States, and it is actively involved in political affairs. The following list of principles (i.e. values) is from the website of Focus on the Family:

Guiding Principles: Since Focus on the Family's primary reason for existence is to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ through a practical outreach to homes, we have firm beliefs about both the Christian faith and the importance of the family. This ministry is therefore based upon five guiding philosophies that are apparent at every level throughout the organization. These "pillars" are drawn from the wisdom of the Bible and the Judeo-Christian ethic, rather than from the humanistic notions of today's theorists. In short, Focus on the Family is a reflection of what we believe to be the recommendations of the Creator Himself, who ordained the family and gave it His blessing.

� We believe that the ultimate purpose in living is to know and glorify God and to attain eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord, beginning within our own families and then reaching out to a suffering humanity that does not know of His love and sacrifice.
� We believe that the institution of marriage was intended by God to be a permanent, lifelong relationship between a man and a woman, regardless of trials, sickness, financial reversal or emotional stresses that may ensue.
� We believe that children are a heritage from God and a blessing from His hand. We are therefore accountable to Him for raising, shaping and preparing them for a life of service to His Kingdom and to humanity.
� We believe that all human life is of inestimable worth and significance in all its dimensions, including the unborn, the aged, the widowed, the mentally handicapped, the unattractive, the physically challenged and every other condition in which humanness is expressed from conception to the grave.
� We believe that God has ordained three basic institutions � the church, the family and the government � for the benefit of all humankind. The family exists to propagate the human race and to provide a safe haven in which to nurture, teach and love the younger generation. The church exists to minister to individuals and families by sharing the love of God and the message of repentance and salvation through the blood of Jesus Christ. The government exists to maintain cultural equilibrium and to provide a framework for social order.

The points under the �We believe� sections are typical of most conservative Christian groups. I would like to briefly point out the defining characteristic of fundamentalist values under the �Guiding Principles� section. Notice when referring to ethics (i.e. morals or values), Focus on the Family uses the phrases �the Judeo-Christian ethic� and �the recommendations of the Creator.� The definite article is no used by chance, for fundamentalists truly do believe there is a singular ethic presented in the Bible and a singular stance on moral issues taken by God Himself.

So when we add the fundamentalist definition of traditional and values, we see that they mean �principles established from the beginning of time.� Again, I am not saying this I what I believe, but this is what fundamentalists believe when it comes to addressing the topic of traditional family values. To fundamentalists, God-given traditions do not change over time, nor do true values.

[seoulunitarian]

The words traditional and values are a bit tricky, but when it comes to a definition of what comprises a biblical family, the fundamentalists are clear if they are anything. As we have seen in the previous quotes from Dr. McArthur and Dr. Dobson, a family is comprised of one man and one woman � and hopefully some children. I think everyone can agree that family is important. The disagreements arise when we attempt to define what people can make up a family.

Basically, the issue usually centers on the acceptability of homosexual families. Of course, the fundamentalist stance is that families are strictly the domain of heterosexual couple; on the other hand, more liberally minded folk may agree that families can include more variety. Suffice it to say, as a fundamentalist definition, family equals a heterosexual monogamous couple. Whether or not this is the way biblical history presents families is an entirely different question.

So we now have a working fundamentalist definition of traditional family values. Basically, it is the idea that God has eternally ordained the family to be made of one man and one woman, and that no variety can exist within this framework.

[contrarian]

polygamy was an understood norm in New testament times. For example jesus gave the parable of the 10 virgins. All 10 were waiting for the bridegroom (singular) to come. 5 were prepared and had oil for their lamps they were acceptable, the other 5 were shown the door.

One bridegrrom married 5 virgins.

[seoulunitarian]

[contrarian]

Try asking them. But I'll bet someone like the bald eagle will be fulminating if they read that.

[Qinella]

[djsmnc]

If you want to go to heaven your family has to be like this:

[Demophobe]

[seoulunitarian]

[Bramble]

The Rockwell family gives me the creeps. Some might prefer nonexistence to that "heaven."