The term "God given rights" doesn't make sense. Humans didn't have rights in the Bible, God was okay with owning people as property. Human rights were invented in the enlightenment.
>>18010517You're only party correct. The idea of universal rights has a long history that definitely predates the Enlightenment, the first recognized human rights advocate was Bartolomé de las Casas in his defense of Amerindian natives.
>>18010517American Christians often like to try to biblically justify their republic founded in the aftermath of a successful revolt as much as they could, despite that not everything, if much at all, lines up with the scriptures. The Bible does not clearly endorse any particular government or ruler in post-biblical times except for the currently spiritual Kingdom of Heaven, rather than it existing as a physical realm, which is yet to come with Jesus Christ's physical return to Earth. Christians are supposed to not rock the boat within worldly realms and just be decently law-abiding citizens, in the meantime. Arguably, the Enlightenment movement could be said to have been hardly biblical at all, if at all there are direct scriptural influences more than a few supportive-sounding Bible verses taken in insolation from their original contexts.
Well, if thinking about these things gives you peace and helps you sleep, then you already have your personal answer.“God-given rights”?God doesn’t play on the social board you grew up with. That’s a human invention, a structure to organize what is created.God is not something you can label or reduce to definitions. God is the source, the very origin, not a figure within the system.It’s good that you ask yourself spiritual questions, because that’s where the true path begins. Just remember: what is created belongs to the world of the created, but what is of God belongs to God. And when you understand that difference, the search stops being about human rights or rules, and becomes about unity with the Source.
>>18010517>The term "God given rights" doesn't make sense.Sure it does. It means recognizing that God has granted life to, and allowed certain people to live.The implication is that that as long as God keeps giving them life, we should not (have no right to) interfere with it.God given rights are a very coherent concept when looked at from a theistic worldview of any type, which is what the founders did.>Human rights were invented in the enlightenment.This seems to be an irrelevant sentence because we were talking about "God given rights" a second ago, not "human rights.">>18011650>Christians are supposed to not rock the boat within worldly realms and just be decently law-abiding citizens, in the meantime.If I was alive in 1775-1776, I would be arguing that George III was rocking the boat, because the "powers that be" as mentioned in Romans 13 is actually the great charter and the colonial charters, which he willingly violated.British history also supports this because look at what happened to James II, and before him, Charles I in the 17th century and king John Lackland at the start of the 13th century. They all ran afoul of the great charter, which is the true "higher power" that God has set up in this situation. Even today, this "higher power" can now be said to be represented by the U.S. Constitution, which is a situation brought about by the Providence of God ultimately.I believe this is also the standpoint the Christians during the American Revolution had, although it has largely been forgotten or misunderstood today. I don't think they saw themselves as rebels and I can see how they thought they were on the right side of this.
>>18010517What does "right" mean? Are you entitled to your existence at the metaphysical level? Of course not, God has supremacy over you and every conceivable convention we observe is a derivative of what he gave us, which of course he can take away.
>>18010517>The term "God given rights" doesn't make sense.It's a way of pinning your arbitrarily declared rights on a supreme authority that you claim transcends earthly governments.>why do I have the right to own property and fuck my wife even when she's not in the mood?>because God>>18011681>God has supremacy over you>but it's up to me to enforce these God given rightsNope. It's just you declaring your rights. You're hallucinating authority beyond your ability to physically do so.
>>18011688Do you believe if God decides to great-flood us, that he is violating a right of ours? Of course not, he is God, all rights are given and taken from him to begin with.
>>18010517Sure, but no one wants to say nation-states given rights
>>18010517"God given rights" does not refer to the God of the Christian bible.
>>18011937>nation-states given rightsDo you think nation-states existed before life did and brought life into existence?
>>18011697"The right to not die in a natural disaster" is not a natural right as far as I'm aware of.
>>18010517It doesnt make sense because you are following a latter day reinvention of the term.Originially it just meant that before society mankind was naturally free (god given) and that by entering society they are giving up some freedom in exchange for safety. However, if the society impedes on certain essential freedoms, then man has the right to resist or rebel.This is just a long winded argument to say that rebels during the 18th century had the right to rebel against the sovereign they felt was mistreating them.Its only later that it was reinterpreted as "human rights".
>>18010517>Humans didn't have rights in the BibleYes they did, that's what most of the Torah is about.>God was okay with owning people as propertySlaves had rights.
>>18012742>Slaves had rights.Only Israelite indentured servants. Not foreign slaves, an Israelite could keep them as property for life.
>>18012756Those had limited rights, but still had them, they couldn't have been beaten to death, their injuries were compensated, nobody was to be kidnapped into this kind of slavery etc.
>>18012765>nobody was to be kidnapped into this kind of slavery etc.No, you had to travel to a foreign land and buy them from a slave market. How is that morally better than kidnapping someone? Why didn't God decree that owning other human beings as property is wrong and a sin?
>>18012769because it's not
>>18012742>Slaves had rightsThomas Jefferson's nephews were arrested for killing their slave after neighboring slaveowners found out. Slavery was always regulated in every society
>>18012772Would you like to be a slave for life?
>>18012775No, but I also wouldnt want to be you either. However both are irrelevant to what constitutes sin in abrahamic religion.
>>18012769We're talking about God-given rights. The fact you could not just take someone against their will means it was a God-given right that you couldn't just take away. If in some society someone gave up or was robbed of his rights that's a different story and not one that the Old Testament aims to solve, the Old Testament takes Hebrews as its subject of transformation.>Why didn't God decree that owning other human beings as property is wrong and a sin?Hebrews weren't ready.
>>18010517How do you deal with the fact that neither Thomas Jefferson nor some thinkers of the rebellion against the king like Thomas Pain has been Christian in the traditional sense?The American founding fathers seems to believe in some god-given rights. However, the fact that the rights are god-given doesn't imply that they are declaired through the bible.Even in mediveal Europa, the scholastic class believes in something like "nature law".
>>18012780>However both are irrelevant to what constitutes sin in abrahamic religion.So you don't actually care about right and wrong, just what YHWH arbitrarily decides he likes or dislikes
>every man "has a Property in his own Person" >"Men being all the Workmanship of one Omnipotent, and infinitely wise Maker; . . . they are his Property".
>>18012783>Hebrews weren't ready.The perfect all powerful God who created the universe could have found some way to explain it to him. Do you think that was beyond his power to do?
>>18012792No, I don't. And seeing that the people of the covenant were in the end the prime factor behind abolishing slavery, he explained it fairly well. But your question was why not during OT period. And the answer is that Hebrews weren't ready. They were itching to behave like other nations.
>>18011650Some American radical Christians want to make us believe that Christianity is a necessarly pre-requiment for something like the right of the individual.They are partly right. You can argue in favour of such rights from the idea of the "Image of God". Yet, there are clearly other ways to justify this claim.>>18012799>But your question was why not during OT period. And the answer is that Hebrews weren't ready.There were some gentlemen in the south that weren'd ready either.Anyway, you actually have a point in here. You're just unaware of it.
>>18012808>>But your question was why not during OT period. And the answer is that Hebrews weren't ready.>There were some gentlemen in the south that weren'd ready either.And that would matter greatly if the gentlemen in the south were the focus of the covenant.
>>18012785>How do you deal with the fact that neither Thomas Jefferson nor some thinkers of the rebellion against the king like Thomas Pain has been Christian in the traditional sense?Make the distinction between general revelation (that which is revealed by nature) and special revelation (that which is only known by inspired Scripture).There are facts that are accessible to all men of any time, with the existence of God, as well as God-given rights being some of those facts. They do not even require special revelation from Scripture to understand.
>>18012792There will always be some form of impoverishment in the world, even if things have improved since pre-industrial times. A society can end indentured servitude if it is no longer needed for survival due to industrialization, but there will still be poverty of some kind in any society. That's not to say that slavery or living in poverty are "good things" - they're not.
>>18012880>There will always be some form of impoverishment in the worldslavery is a moral evil, not just impoverishment
>>18012898>slavery is a moral evilNot necessarily. God endorses and regulates slavery in the OT, so slavery can be done morally.
>>18012898>slavery is a moral evilIf by slavery you specifically mean taking away people's God-given rights, then yes I would agree.The issue seems to surround where you decide to draw the line and make the call about what is, or is not, slavery. There may be perfectly moral situations that some people would say is slavery but really isn't. Having enforced marriage laws for example is not what I would call slavery.
>>18012920>Having enforced marriage laws for example is not what I would call slavery.Well it is. You are not an authority on human freedom.
>>18010517God given is just a fancy way of saying natural, as nature is that which is made by God. You have natural rights.
>>18012939>You are not an authority on human freedom.I'm not basing my views on my own authority though. Based on what I can tell, you are.
>>18010517>The term "God given rights" doesn't make sense. Under the new covenant, the people who are of God form the body of God (in Christ) to do whatever is required for their salvation and dominion over the creation of the Father while using the name of the God for their justification. So what rights does the body of God have? Life, liberty, etc., because you can put no constraints upon the rights of God. That is why the first amendment mandates that the government shall make no law infringing upon the freedom to practice religion.>Humans didn't have rights in the Bible, God was okay with owning people as property. Those who are not of God, who are not part of the body of God, they have no rights and that is why enslaving those peoples who are not of God is not contrary to God's will for the salvation of his people. >Human rights were invented in the enlightenment.The enlightenment sought to erase the distinctions between all people and to universalize the definitions so that they included all. The catholics embraced it, and caused the protestant schisms.
