That is a transient emotion. When the biblical scriptures speak about love, that is predominantly something else than an emotion. Emotion is often involved but love is rather a decision to act in a loving way than a transient emotion. If a marriage is founded upon a transient feeling like the emotion of love, the marriage will not last beyond the first 2-4 years. The same is true with our relationship with God - emotions are transient, a feeling of love and faith is great but will not last.
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First off, oxytocin is thought to be involved in long term social bonds, such as between a mother and child. But that is neither here nor there. I donāt think anyone here is that concerned with neurochemistry.
How do we determine if an act is done in a loving way? Through our emotions, most notably through empathy. We judge for ourselves what emotional responses we would have to an action, and we adjust our behavior accordingly.
The main point I am making is that love is subjective. That doesnāt make love a fantasy, but it also isnāt objective in the same way as the absorbance spectrum of a star.
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I agree.
Principle? no. phenomenon? no. power? NO! just an emotion? no.
First and foremost, here on this forum. Love is a word. And words point to many meaningsā¦ gathering them together in a complex network of human experiences linking them together.
Some people have certainly looked at love as a disease. But for most this simply cause for laughter. Let us look at these words of Paul.
1 Cor13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; 5 it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends;
Well first off, is all this true? Is love always patient? not hardly. Is love always never-ending? you have to be joking. Soā¦ is Paul lying? LOL No. Paul is telling how love SHOULD be. And frankly what he says rings trueā¦ at least this is what we desperately want love to be. Does this remind anyone of somethingā¦ like in science? When someone does science is it always objective? Do they always accept the verdict of their tests? No and no. We are likewise speaking of the way it should be. They are ideals ā things worth striving for.
Is love an ideal? no. no? This is another one to add to the list of things linked up with this word āloveā. For there certainly is an emotion, and a concept, and a phenomenon, and an ideal (and maybe I am playing favorites here cause I donāt like principle or power very much LOL). But yeah there is a great deal of subjectivity involved and people likely experience love in different ways. Soā¦ subjective? definitely!
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And the reference/evidence for that is?
ouch
I think you can.
Another ouch.
Love is a principle inasmuch as it encompasses all the guiding "Lws and surpasses them. If you have love, you do not need the Law,
But, I guess, its a matter of perspective,.
It is a shame that you do not seem to value individual persective
Richarrd
@T_aquaticus
How do we determine if an act is done in a loving way? Through our emotions, most notably through empathy. We judge for ourselves what emotional responses we would have to an action, and we adjust our behavior accordingly.
The word āloveā is used in many meanings and that may lead to confusion. Although I do not know much Greek, the Greek has many words for different kinds of love or comparable affectionate and friendly behaviours - eros, storge, philia, philautia, ludus, pragma, mania, xenia, agape.
Emotions, including passion and empathy, are strong drivers in some of these types but some focus more on an attitude and decision to behave in a particular way. In long-term relationships, the key is in the attitude and decision - no feeling lasts the same for several years. Marriage and the personal relationship with God are examples of long-term relationships where emotions fluctuate but a correct attitude and decision may carry until death.
The list in 1 Cor 13 helps to see what kind of loving behaviour is expected:
patient, kind, not jealous or boastful, not arrogant or rude, does not insist on its own way, is not irritable or resentful, does not rejoice at wrong but rejoices in the right, etc.
To live according to these characters, emotions or even a decision are not enough - I believe we need to let the Holy Spirit change our inside to be able to experience more of this kind of love in our life.
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I am pretty non-concordist in my view of Genesis, so agree with you as well, but would point out that there are quite few who write about localized floods, not as a way of verifying religious texts, but rather as as way of explaining how those stories got started in the first place. A good example is this article published in the ASA journal which goes into archeological evidence of local floods and speculates that one of those floods may have been part of the cultural memory that led to the flood accounts.
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The Jewish word used in the OT is Ämar which does not necessarily mean āspeak with a voiceā. Factually, like a lot of words in Hebrew, what it means, depends on where it is put, what is written before and after, and in what context it is used. The listing in the Interlinear Bible is quite extensive.
But that is the entire account of God in the Bibleā¦āwe just cant knowā is your answer to that and yet you are certain he exists right, so why deny the rest because atheistic men came up with an alternative Darwinian theoryā¦which has even more flaws and inconsistencies than the creation/flood/Exodus/Sodom and Gomorah, and incarnation/death/resurrection/ascention/second coming of Christ claims/truths?
Your problem is that you try too hard and relate everything to Darwinism. There is more to science than evolution, and modern evolution is not pure Darwinism.
Richard
PS and Theistic evolution changes even more. from Darwinism. You can bury your head in the sand (or Scripture) but the basic evolutionary process exists. It is only the extrapolations (ToE) that ignore God
All of science ignores God in how it proceeds, because it cannot measure Him. God may (and should) form the reference point for scientific ethics, and is the only reason that science can exist, but science has no means by which to detect God or say anything about Him, beyond questions like āDid He do this?ā.
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That is not the point. That has never been the point.
The point is that there are two extremities in viewpoints
All science is flawed because it does not include God
All science is valid because it is identifying how Godās creation functions
I would put Adam at one end and BioLogos at the other.
I am somewhere in the middle (as usual) Science is as good and accurate as it can be within its methodology, but, because it cannot see the hand of God it may come up with some flawed views.
The reciprocal problem is that scientists tend to be very protective of their views and take offence if anyone dates to challenge them.
Richard
So you believe:
- the world was created in 7 days
- It was destroyed by a global flood (a claim recorded at least twice in Koine Greek by Christ/son of God and the apostle Peter, 1000 years after Moses wrote it in Hebrew)
Hmmm, so we cant test for God using social sceliences? Id suggest that we absolutely can test for Him in that regard.
Second, is archeology not a means of scientific evidence tracing? Id suggest it is scienceā¦especially when you use the fossil recordā¦which usually has to be ādug upā. Id claim archeology and finding fossils and studying them are very closely related.
I think we can answer far more than just ādid He do thatāā¦we can certainly determine claims of āwhenā historically and archeologically many if not all of the bible narratives.
Ps What the heck is a paraleptopectan? Google AI cant seem to find any documents related to that term
It is more than simple belief.
You can ignore what is around you ad bury your head in Scripture if you wish, but
Christianity does not rely on a 7 day creation or a specific view of Scripture.
Scripture is the basis of faith, not science, or even sociology. (AKA sin)
Faith also grows when you learn to think for yourself instead of relying on what you have been taught (or read). God is understood much better when we have a relationship with Him instead of slavery to a view of Scripture.
Richard
- The ToE was not developed by āatheistic menā.
- ToE is not an alternative to scripture.
Until you grasp especially the second one . . . well, youāll never actually be communicating with others.
Richard is correct here:
A Christian begins with the premise that God did everything that has been done, in terms of science; there are really only two questions: āHow did He do it?ā āWhy did He do it that way?ā
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- Moses didnāt write about a global flood.
- Christ and Peter did not affirm a global flood.
Archaeology refutes any claim to a global flood; the chronology from Eridu on to the time of Alexander of Macedon (and beyond) is not anywhere interrupted by a deluge, and none of the other culturesā records show any indication of a global flood.
Social sciences have been used to show that the emergence of the Christian church as the dominant religious force in the Roman Empire was a purely human phenomenon.
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Can God be measured? No. Can we detect Him using anything material? No. Can we learn about Him from material things given an immaterially-originating knowledge of Him? Yes.
Paraleptopecten is the genus of scallops to which the one in the profile picture belongs.
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Genesis 1 affirms that all things are parts of Godās good creation. Everything has its place, even things like the sea that surrounding cultures saw as chaotic and evil. Thus, we can be confident that things will behave consistently.
Because everything and everyone are parts of Godās creation, it is worthwhile to learn how to take good care of them.
But God is far beyond us. He can work miraculously when He sees fit. We are finite, fallinle, and fallen. We cannot rely on assuming that my idea of how things ought to work is in fact correct.
Thus, science is in fact the biblical method to find out the normal physical workings of creation. Godās working is supra scientific, not unscientific. Science is limited in its scope, but that is no excuse for rejecting it within that scope.
Science doesnāt tell us that angels do not maintain planetary orbits. Whether they do or not would require data not available to science. But science does tell us that the orbits follow patterns approximated by Newtonās law of gravitation and better characterized by relativity.
The problem with young-earth creationism is not that it invokes miracles. The problem is that it invokes miracles for which there is clear evidence that they did not happen, and makes false claims about the evidence.
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That has nothing to do with science, and little to do with observation.
I am not, I am claiming that because of the limited scope, some f the conclusions are inaccurateā¦ (And there is nothing scientists can do about it)
Richard