Farrell, your argument does beg the question and you know it. You
have made up your mind that Rahab was rewarded for lying and so now
you have to find evidence to fit your conclusion. I have watched
this thread for sometime now and one thing is painfully evident:
that is you are going to contend that Rahab was rewarded for lying
regardless.
Notice Farrells proof that Rahab was rewarded for lying.
1. Joshua told Israel to save Rahab because she hid the spies.
2. Rahab lied to the soldiers about not having the spies.
3. Therefore Joshua saved Rahab because she lied to the soldiers.
This would not work in any class on logic in this country Farrell and
you know it, that is unless the professor was an atheist with an
agenda.
TILL
Jerry is gone from the list, but since this was also posted on Challenge,
perhaps he will allow my response there too. If Jerry says that my argument
would not work in any logic class in the country unless the professor was an
"atheist with an agenda," then of course that must be right. However, let
me state the argument so that maybe he can see... uh, let me rephrase that;
let me state the argument so that even a biblicist professor with an agenda
will be able to see it. My argument is not that Joshua saved Rahab because
she lied to the soldiers but that Rahab had hidden the messagers by lying to
the soldiers, and it was by her lying that she was able to hide the
messagers and send them out another way, both of which were necessary for
her to be justified (James 2:14). With that in mind, I think I can prove to
the satisfaction of anyone who doesn't have an agenda that I am not begging
any questions.
First, I assume that Jerry and Lenny are willing to concede that Yahweh, who
is allegedly omniscient and omnipresent, had to know that Rahab had lied to
the king's men. That's a crucial point to keep in mind.
My argument, then, is that when a person (p) performs a deed (d) for which
he/she receives a reward (r), then (r) resulted from every act that (p) put
into the accomplishment of (d). The inclusion of EVERY act entailed in
performing (d) would most certainly be necessary if (1) any act entailed in
performing (d) should happen to be a socially unacceptable or socially
immoral act and (2) if the socially unacceptable or immoral acts entailed in
the performance of (d) should be known to whoever is responsible for
administering the award.
Now let's make (p) a student who wants to receive (r), which is the title of
class valedictorian upon his/her graduation. (D), which (p) must perform in
this case, is the achievement of the highest grade point average of all the
students in his/her class. (P) knows, however, that he/she has little
chance of achieving (d), because there are several more intellectually
capable students in the class. Therefore, (p) decides in his/her freshman
year to (1) bribe teachers to give him/her straight A grades, which action
we will designate (d1), and to cheat on all tests of teachers who refuse to
accept bribes, which we will designate as (d2). The fact that (p) is doing
(d1) and (d2) throughout high school is known to the adminstrators, but they
choose to do nothing about it. Hence, when graduation time comes, (p) has
achieved (d) by means of (d1) and (d2), and (r) is awarded to (p) at
graduation time.
Question: would it be correct to say that (p) received (r) because he/she
had achieved (d) and for no other reason, or would it be correct to say that
(p) received (r) because he had done (d1) and (d2), which resulted in (d)?
In other words, let's just put it into plain language. Was the student
rewarded for bribing teachers and cheating on tests?
The parallel here is so obvious that I see no need to identify it, so If
this is begging the question, please explain why. Anyone can just type
QUESTION BEGGING and click a "send" icon. Rebutting an argument, however,
isn't nearly so easy.
Farrell Till
Skepticism, Inc.
jftill@midwest.net