revelation 6:10 has the saints crying for God to avenge their blood...(it seems they haven't forgotten)...forgiveness is complexIndeed it is, myelaine.
Is Forgiveness Overrated?
by leavingwt 195 Replies latest jw friends
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journey-on
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Terry
"Anyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultry in his heart."
The key phrase is "in his heart". He has committed a sin, but not a crime. In biblical times, adultery was a crime worthy of stoning.
But, what this scripture shows is that it all begins with desire. Once you allow the desire to enter, take root, and grow by feeding it, your goose is as good as cooked. It's just a matter of time and opportunity till the desire becomes action.
The battery in the flashlight which makes the light turn on when you press the button is THINKING. No thinking (no battery) no SIN (no light.)
Actually, first cause is not the battery. First cause is the DESIRE for light. Once you want light, you take the next step....thinking about how to get it and what it would be like to have it.
Aristotle erroneously assumed the seat of human intelligence was in the actual heart in particular! Aristotle was unassailable in ancient times as THE authority. The writers who redacted scripture would not dare over-rule Aristotle. Aristotle believed the "head" was used to cool the blood!
Desire is a sensation which must be INTERPRETED by the brain. This engenders THOUGHT which may/may not include ACTIONs to satisfy.
There are no crimes without the actions which produced them.
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journey-on
There are no crimes without the actions which produced them.
Agreed. But, there is sin, as you so adroitly pointed out by quoting scripture.
The heart and brain work hand in hand and back and forth. Intelligence may be seated in the brain, but for action to manifest from a thought, it requires emotion. Actually, there is a triad at work and it is impossible to speak of one without speaking of the others. You have the energetc quality of consciousness (mind), which generates feelings/emotions, thoughts, images (generally thought of as "heartstuff"). It's an interaction of instincts, feelings, emotions, thoughts, and concepts.
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journey-on
Sorry...I left out my final sentence above. I meant to conclude that even though there is no crime without action, there is sin when you imbue the desire-thought with feelings/emotion and allow an interaction back and forth creating concepts and allowing images to form.
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THE GLADIATOR
What the conscious mind dwells on becomes habitual thought. Once this is accepted into the subconscious mind a value is attached. Emotion is produced and a desire to satisfy a perceived need follows.
The mind then organises the body to carry out the desire in motor action. An act is then carried out in the real world.
Who rattled my cage? :)
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journey-on
Who rattled my cage? :)
I like it!!! -
ziddina
My personal belief is that forgiveness should be extended to the offender ONLY when the offender has shown a clear change in their pattern of behavior... An effort to prevent such abuses from arising in future...
Otherwise, an apology or a request for forgiveness are merely empty words...
There's a telling scene in the movie "Worlds Apart", in which the JW mother chooses to separate from the adulterous JW father. Her children don't understand why she cannot just "forgive" the adulterous JW father...
When I first saw that scene, I wondered why the JW mother didn't just explain to her children that she needed to SEE strong evidence that he'd changed his underlying behavior pattern, not just mouthing an apology and expecting "all to be forgiven"...
Oddly enough, Jesus' comments that his followers were to forgive, "not seven times, but seventy times seven times", seems to indicate that the bible reinforces forgiveness based on the empty apology, as opposed to a real change in behavior patterns...
Of course, changing a behavior pattern is MUCH more difficult than just mouthing an empty apology....
Empty apologies mean nothing, but are all too common when dealing with humanity...
Just look at the behavior of batterers... They beat up and abuse, then apologize profusely.... Their spouse 'forgives' them....
And then the brutal dance starts all over again.
Zid
[Edited...]
And when I read a little farther, Long Hair Gal nailed it...
"Forgiving mostly involves letting go of the 'hate' and negative emotions. It does NOT mean that the person or persons who have done you wrong are or should be welcome back into your life. It is mostly about you moving on and not having the rest of your life consumed with resentment and negativity. ..."
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GLTirebiter
Forgiving others isn't just for the other person, it's also important for our own well-being. I can't explain it better than this, quoted from today's Dear Abby column:
"As a recovery counselor, I work with people to help them forgive those who had hurt them -- whether or not the offenders deserved to be forgiven. Why? Because resentment hurts the resenter far more than it hurts the offender. Grudges are cancers in our souls. Forgiveness isn't a gift we give to others, but a gift we give ourselves."
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PSacramento
"As a recovery counselor, I work with people to help them forgive those who had hurt them -- whether or not the offenders deserved to be forgiven. Why? Because resentment hurts the resenter far more than it hurts the offender. Grudges are cancers in our souls. Forgiveness isn't a gift we give to others, but a gift we give ourselves."
Pretty much every counselor or therapist will agree on that.
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Terry
There are no crimes without the actions which produced them.
Agreed. But, there is sin , as you so adroitly pointed out by quoting scripture.
The heart and brain work hand in hand and back and forth. Intelligence may be seated in the brain, but for action to manifest from a thought, it requires emotion.
Here is how I look at it; you may or may not agree.
We form our opinions and tastes over the course of our lifetime and these constitute our collective VALUES.
It is those VALUES which fuel the spontaneous and involuntary physical EMOTIONS.
If you believe something is very dangerous it fuels FEAR when you encounter it.
If you believe something is extraordinarily wonderful it fuels Admiration or even Love.
Etc.
That which you are calling SIN deserves some genuine scrutiny.
The values which trigger harmful thoughts (which may or may not lead to harmful actions) can come from TWO sources:
1.Voluntary appraisals, analysis, experiences and rational considerations
or
2.Passive absorption of enviornment, opinion, culture, hearsay, associates, etc.
The first is conscious VALUEs and the second is unconscious or passive VALUES.
Whatever way we form our values is reflected in the SUBSEQUENT emotional responses or feelings we involuntarily experience.
Until we open up that vault where our VALUES reside and examine them one by one and consciously and skeptically address WHY we hold them dear---we can't change our emotions or our thoughts or our actions.
In other words---IF we choose to re-examine our values and discard the unhealthy and destructive ones WE CAN CHANGE.
This is not the traditional understanding of SIN as an "inherited" blotch.
In my view, SIN is just an unfortunate superstitious way of mislabeling VALUES which are destructive.