Rommel's- he committed suicide to protect his family.

I would go further, and say this was not a suicide at all, but an execution. Rommel was permitted a limited choice of methods of execution, and chose the self-administration of poison provided by his executioners. He acquiesced in the sentence of death, certainly, but so do most condemned persons.
(Famous exception: the game old Countess of Salisbury in the 1540s, who made them chase her around the execution scaffold and drag her to the block for beheading, and even then kept on pulling her head away - and good on her, I say! She was around seventy at the time.)

As for the unforgiveable sin - surely the point is that this sin, whatever it is, cannot be forgiven even after repentance? And we know for a fact that that does not apply to being a non-Christian!

I know there is not many on this site but for non- believers of heaven. answer the following questions. I had this discussion on another forum and found it interesting.

If a stranger is just a dollar short for a bus, and you happen to have plenty of money. Is there any reason to give this person a dollar? Your not going to get any kind of reward in any way. So why even help this person?

Someone is about to do suicide. This person is actually a jerk but you know you can help this person if you wanted to.
This person is a jerk, and you know he's not going to thank you in any way. Is there any reason to help them?

You see your mate falling, and if you try to catch him/her you can save him/her but you will be crushed and die. Is there any reason to save your mate at all?

I also agree that seeking medical help would be better, preferably with the consent of the person affected.

I'd go as far as to say that one should seek medical help whether or not the other person consents. There can be an extent to which a suicidal person (usually, one who appears to be just making jokes or references about killing oneself, but trying to pass it off as nothing serious) will not want to seek help, but their friend knows better and drags them kicking and screaming to someone who can help.

I do not consider it an unforgiveable sin for people to be Jewish or to be Islamic, Hindu or anything else, even though I disagree with their point of view. They may be unforgiven as yet, but they are not unforgiveable. ...

Again, for each and every one in the world, it is between the individual and God to judge whether they are unforgiveable, even if they have as yet not been forgiven.

Indeed, and perhaps I was too simplistic in my statement, which was meant to boil down the whole "unforgivable sin", which I think some people try to make too complicated, into something which I believe is really simple.

Perhaps, though, some of those "Jews" or "Muslims" or "Hindus" or "Shintos" really are, as far as God's forgiveness is concerned, Christians. It could very well be a case like Emeth's, where they don't know that the God they are following is the Christian God, even though it bears a different name. (Of course, they actually have to be following the Christian God; this certainly isn't saying that everyone who is "good" goes to Heaven. Tricky topic, I'd say; perhaps I'll say more when I have time later.)

If a stranger is just a dollar short for a bus, and you happen to have plenty of money. Is there any reason to give this person a dollar? Your not going to get any kind of reward in any way. So why even help this person?

It depends on if the good feeling you get from helping a random stranger outweighs the work you had to do to earn your dollar. If I'm rich (which can be assumed in this situation since I have "plenty of money"), sure, I'd do it. Rewards don't have to be objects. Sometimes just a "thank you" from a stranger can be enough.

Someone is about to do suicide. This person is actually a jerk but you know you can help this person if you wanted to.This person is a jerk, and you know he's not going to thank you in any way. Is there any reason to help them?

That's a tough question because many of the aspects are so vague. How is the person a jerk? Why does he want to commit suicide? How am I able to help this person? I can't really give an answer for that situation.

You see your mate falling, and if you try to catch him/her you can save him/her but you will be crushed and die. Is there any reason to save your mate at all?

The reason to save my mate would be to avoid having to live the rest of my life with the tragic memory of him/her falling to a splattery death in front of me.

Would that be reason enough for me to forfeit my life? The situation described makes it more difficult by giving me information I wouldn't have in real life (that I will die if I save him/her). Again, I really don't know.

I find that situation more interesting from a Christian's moral perspective, though. If I jump out to save him/her with the knowledge that I will die, I'm committing suicide. But if I stand and watch, I'm committing murder because I could've saved their life but didn't. What course of action is the most moral?

Unfortunately, you don't know Alllah's perspective. In Islamic theology, we really don't know what God is like: God is arbitrary and all-mericiful and therefore (really) people of the book (Christians and Jews) have as much of a chance of getting into heaven as anyone else.

Really?

Unbelievers are those that say: "God is the Messiah, the son of Mary." For the Messiah himself said: "Children of Israel, serve God, my Lord and your Lord." He that worships other gods besides God, God will deny him Paradise, and the fire shall be his home. None shall help the evil-doers. (Sura 5:72)

You cannot judge God except on God's own terms, which are the terms of His covenant. You have broken that covenant and therefore cannot expect mercy except at His good pleasure.

Exactly! God only gives mercy with an ultimatum. I haven't fulfilled his ultimatum, so I wouldn't expect his mercy (but since I don't think the Christian God even exists, I am no more scared of this than you are scared of going to the hell of a random god that you don't believe in).

This wouldn't be much of a problem if the exact details of the covenant were universally known. But not everybody on the planet even knows about this covenant, and those that do disagree on the details quite a lot and spend a huge amount of time and energy bickering over it.

But he was, therefore it's possible. Here again you forget that there is an eternal distinction between the members of the Trinity---it is precisely from texts like this one that we get our doctrine of the Trinity.

This is only an attempt to justify one "divine mystery" with another "divine mystery". I've heard this sort of reasoning before and I hate it. When I was still a Christian, I went to a Youth Group once where a Biblical contradiction was brought up. The youth pastor used the Trinity as proof that contradictions shouldn't be a problem to us because, after all, the Trinity is a contradiction but we all know it's true!

He was a man who didn't sin: He was God who became man. There is nothing in the term "man" that entails "sinner." Yes, all men are sinners now, but Adam before the fall was not a sinner. Jesus is both God and man.

Exactly, all men are sinners now. Before the fall of Adam, there was never an opportunity for Adam to sin. But once evil spread across the world, there was pretty much never not an opportunity to sin. At the time of Jesus, sin, poverty and sickness was running rampant. I was taught that if we can help people but choose not to, that was a sin of omission. Well, Jesus had divine powers at his disposal. So he could've helped everyone infinitely! But he didn't.

Do you want God to exist?

Well, you already know what I think of the Yahweh that has been portrayed to me...so heck no. (That doesn't mean I don't want any God to exist, though.)

If you became convinced that He did, would you want to love and serve Him?

I probably would, reluctantly...the eternal consequences would outweigh the short-term gains of a glorious few decades of rebellion against the tyrannical bully. If God really is all-powerful, then I can't fight him.

If you became convinced of the existence of the God Bældæg, would you want to love him and serve him?

Granted---judge God by His own standard, though, not by your own definitions.

If I judge God by his own standard, then of course God's going to be perfect. God's standard is that everything God does is good. Then I'm stuck with a God whose doctrine is, "Do as I say, not as I do."

No one comes to God unless God has specifically called that person. It's not about what you do or what you choose, but about God's sovereign love for His covenant people.

Then I'll get back to you when God specifically calls out to me. Other Christians have told me they've felt God's presence in their hearts since the age of 3, but I never felt a darned thing even when I was a Christian. I suppose I just need to wait until God's interested in me.

Ah, the Church of Rome. Not a member---I'm a member of the one holy catholic and apostolic Church. When I talk about the witness of the Church, this is what I am talking about.

When exactly did the popes stop being the leader of the one holy catholic and apostolic church?

Nicaea made no pronouncements regarding canon. The first council that established apocrypha as Scripture was Trent in 1463. Nicaea was convened to address the Arian controversy---and even then, it wasn't until first Constantinople, sixty years later, that the creed was finalized (minus Filioque).

Do you mean to tell me that the Deuterocanonical books were not considered Scripture during the 1,000 years that they appeared in every Bible on the face of the planet? How could anybody possibly know which books of the bible to view as authority and which not to? It doesn't make any sense at all.

In the first century there were at least four Old Testament Canons in use by different Jewish Groups. The Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Ethiopian Jews and the Diaspora/Essene Jews all had their own canons. Jesus and the disciples used the Septuagint which was the canon of the Diaspora/Essenes, and we know this because it is quoted in the New Testament (as perspacity has demonstrated in previous posts). This canon continued to be THE canon of Christians until the 17-1800's when the Protestants stopped including the Deuterocanonicals in their Bibles.

The Jewish canon that you have in your bible wasn't universally accepted by Jews until long after Christ had already died!

But it is not essential: my debate with you is whether there is a truth to be known. If there is an infallible set of Scriptures, then the debate is relevant and interesting. If, however, there are no infallible Scriptures, then the debate over them is meaningless and uninteresting. The only way we can have a meaningful discussion on the matter is if we accept that Scripture is infallible.

It is essential. I need to know what Scriptures I'd have to accept as infallible. I don't need to be a Christian to debate you on this. Rarely has the question of "Is there a God?" even come up. The primary question seems to be, "Is there Yahweh?" Since the ultimate source of authority for information about Yahweh is the Bible, I need to first have the correct ultimate source of authority, do I not?

The very fact that there is so much debate over what is the correct set of infallible scriptures is one of the very reasons that leads me to think that there are no infallible scriptures. I know it isn't proof of any sort, but it certainly makes the situation less than inspiring. Since at least half of all Christians today believe in the infallibility of a Bible that is not infallible (or at the very least incomplete), God has certainly made it very difficult for one to have the correct ultimate authority.

I find that situation more interesting from a Christian's moral perspective, though. If I jump out to save him/her with the knowledge that I will die, I'm committing suicide. But if I stand and watch, I'm committing murder because I could've saved their life but didn't. What course of action is the most moral?

If you're sacrificing yourself in order to save someone else, I don't think God counts it the same way as a suicide. It's one thing to be a self-sacrifice, and another to just kill yourself by putting a gun to your own head because you're fed up with life. The first is done out of love, the second is not. The first is following in the footsteps of Christ, since He sacrificed Himself for us. And John 15:13 says, "Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends."

So taking the fall to save someone else would Biblically be considered a virtue, not a sin.

~Riella

Unbelievers are those that say: "God is the Messiah, the son of Mary." For the Messiah himself said: "Children of Israel, serve God, my Lord and your Lord." He that worships other gods besides God, God will deny him Paradise, and the fire shall be his home. None shall help the evil-doers. (Sura 5:72)

That's not Q'uran, it's in English.

This wouldn't be much of a problem if the exact details of the covenant were universally known. But not everybody on the planet even knows about this covenant, and those that do disagree on the details quite a lot and spend a huge amount of time and energy bickering over it.

I refer you to Romans 1, yet again. Ignorance is no excuse.

This is only an attempt to justify one "divine mystery" with another "divine mystery". I've heard this sort of reasoning before and I hate it. When I was still a Christian, I went to a Youth Group once where a Biblical contradiction was brought up. The youth pastor used the Trinity as proof that contradictions shouldn't be a problem to us because, after all, the Trinity is a contradiction but we all know it's true!

Yes, he was being an idiot about it. Clearly he didn't understand distinctions like Substance and Person and hypostasis. You have to be careful here: the distinctions made in Trinitarian theology are incredibly subtle, sometimes. However, there isn't a contradiction---not really. The problem here is merely the age-old problem of the one and the many, which every philosophy has to deal with.

I was taught that if we can help people but choose not to, that was a sin of omission. Well, Jesus had divine powers at his disposal. So he could've helped everyone infinitely! But he didn't.

Yes He did: He did the Father's will---perfectly. This is the testimony of Scripture and the teaching of the New Testament. Jesus, the God-man, never sinned.

If I judge God by his own standard, then of course God's going to be perfect. God's standard is that everything God does is good. Then I'm stuck with a God whose doctrine is, "Do as I say, not as I do."

But here we're getting somewhere, for God says "follow Christ." There are rights that God reserves to Himself alone. Do you know why it is, for instance, that God says "Don't take vengeance"? It's because God reserves that right to Himself: He says, "wait on my time and let my justice take care of it. As for you, you must forgive." The call to love our enemies stems from a recognition that God may choose to extend mercy.

When exactly did the popes stop being the leader of the one holy catholic and apostolic church?

They never started. The Church catholic exists independently, transcending the Church visible. The only head of the Church catholic is Christ Himself.

If you became convinced of the existence of the God Bældæg, would you want to love him and serve him?

Not familiar with that particular mythology.

Do you mean to tell me that the Deuterocanonical books were not considered Scripture during the 1,000 years that they appeared in every Bible on the face of the planet? How could anybody possibly know which books of the bible to view as authority and which not to? It doesn't make any sense at all.

There was considerable debate over this in the early centuries, as a matter of fact. While the NT canon was settled relatively quickly, the church had significant debates over whether to use to canon of the Septuagint (which varied from manuscript to manuscript) or the Hebrew Tanakh. Interestingly enough, St. Jerome (translator of the Latin Vulgate) considered the latter to be authoritative.

The very fact that there is so much debate over what is the correct set of infallible scriptures is one of the very reasons that leads me to think that there are no infallible scriptures.

But you'll never come to a conclusion on the former question unless you accept the latter. And as I have pointed out, time and again, there is a consensus on 66 books. We can go back and forth on Deuterocanon, but the fact remains that all Christians accept that these 66 are revelation, at least. We may at least say that revelation includes at least these books.

And of course, you seem to have forgotten that the primary revelation of God is found in Jesus Himself: the God-man. Theologian Karl Barth puts it this way: God reveals Himself; He reveals Himself through Himself; God reveals Himself.

Tim Keller argues that in the end the question really does boil down to whether Christ is who He said He is. If so, then we have to take Scripture seriously, because Christ did so.

TBG

That's not Q'uran, it's in English.

Can't the Q'uran be translated into English?

~Riella

That's not Q'uran, it's in English.

Can't the Q'uran be translated into English?

~Riella

No. Q'uran is not like the Bible: we treat translations of Scripture as being authoritative, whereas a Mslim would not. For the Mslim, Q'uran is only Q'uran in the original language, because (in their theology) Q'uran is eternal. The Christian Bible is considered to be revelation from God: the Mslim considers Q'uran to be something akin to incarnation of God.

Also, see Surah 2:62 for a slightly different approach to "peoples of the book."

TBG

Of course the Qu'ran can be translated, especially if a non-Arabic speaker understands Arabic well enough to read it in Arabic.

However, Islamic clerics have gone on record to say it isn't as good in the translation, that translations are never exact etc., that translations distort the meaning. This is their gripe against the Bible, that it has been translated too often. That argument does not really follow since surely the people who embrace Islam are not always Arabic speakers, and still have a right to know and understand exactly what it says, having learned what the Qu'ran says and not by rote in Arabic, either.

I also agree that seeking medical help would be better, preferably with the consent of the person affected.

I'd go as far as to say that one should seek medical help whether or not the other person consents. There can be an extent to which a suicidal person (usually, one who appears to be just making jokes or references about killing oneself, but trying to pass it off as nothing serious) will not want to seek help, but their friend knows better and drags them kicking and screaming to someone who can help.

I'd say to be very careful about jokes and assuming either too much, or too little. And I'd stop people joking about such things and thinking it is funny. And it is very important, if you think that is what is happening, to try to persuade a person who needs help to seek it voluntarily, and as soon as possible. A gung-ho attitude to someone else's possible mental illness can do more harm than good, plus interfering with someone's civil rights. Once the police get involved, laws about suicide and mental illness definitely will be enforced. The police will be involved in the process of deciding whether that person is a danger to themselves or to others, and that can make a big difference to how the person is treated, what the outcome will be, when they can leave hospital, and it will also impact on the rehabilitation process.

There is a lot of unwarranted prejudice about mental illness, and we as Christians must be aware that Christ is the great healer, who cast out devils, and who never showed that sort of prejudice to anybody in need, or to those who have had a past history of such troubles.

By the way, stardf29, in the rest of your post, I did think of Emeth. C.S.Lewis's biblical background for that character is in St Paul's letter to the Romans.

That's a tough question because many of the aspects are so vague. How is the person a jerk? Why does he want to commit suicide? How am I able to help this person? I can't really give an answer for that situation.

IloveFauns' question shouldn't be a tough question at all for you, regardless of whether you believe in Christianity or not. Regardless or not of whether a person is known to be a jerk, whatever you know of their reasoning for wanting to commit suicide, if you can see that they are about to try to commit suicide, you must dial 000 if in Australia, 911 if in USA (I think that is the number) and summon help. Really! If that person is known to be a jerk there is a stronger likelihood they could have harmed, or be about to harm others as well as what they are about to do to themselves. This is your civic duty, regardless of your religious beliefs. A Christian person would be expected to try to help appropriately anyway, because this is also what Jesus commands us to do.

I do hope the mods do not take umbrage at my emphasis as this info needs to be put strongly.

I find that situation more interesting from a Christian's moral perspective, though. If I jump out to save him/her with the knowledge that I will die, I'm committing suicide. But if I stand and watch, I'm committing murder because I could've saved their life but didn't. What course of action is the most moral?

In IloveFaun's scenario, of course you would not be committing suicide. Even if you survive, you would probably get a medal for bravery, not a spell on suicide watch in a secure unit at the local hospital. A Christian would say, though, that you should attempt to save your friend because God commands you to love others, as God has loved you, not in the expectation of getting awarded a medal later on. What was that verse again, said by either St Paul or Christ, that I can't remember exactly?

'Greater love hast noone than he who lays down his life for others?'

Good answers everyone and now it is time for my answers.

If a stranger is just a dollar short for a bus, and you happen to have plenty of money. Is there any reason to give this person a dollar? Your not going to get any kind of reward in any way. So why even help this person?

I have given people money in shops a couple of times because they are 50 cents short ect. I do it just to be nice because I know how it feels like to be in that situation. It is rather embarrassing and awkward.

Someone is about to do suicide. This person is actually a jerk but you know you can help this person if you wanted to.
This person is a jerk, and you know he's not going to thank you in any way. Is there any reason to help them?

I would have to help them because if I didn't, I would never be able to get it out of my mind. I would feel guilty for the rest of my life but it also depends on who the person was. If he/she was a murder I would let them die but if they had just said the odd mean thing to me I would save them.

You see your mate falling, and if you try to catch him/her you can save him/her but you will be crushed and die. Is there any reason to save your mate at all?

I guess I would let them keep falling. As nasty as this sounds. I would rather me live with the guilt than let them live with the guilt.

Guilt is a bad motivator for doing anything. I am defining guilt here as that feeling that "because something bad happened that seems to be my fault, I feel like a bad person."

Guilt is problematic for two possible reasons. The first reason is, of course, the problem of false guilt. There are many things that happen that may seem like it is our fault, when really, it is not. And even if we do contribute somewhat to it, so many other factors can be at play, so the feeling of guilt that often says "it's all my fault" is a lie. Is it your friend's fault if you died trying to save them? Well, maybe your friend didn't fall on his own accord; somebody pushed him accidentally, or there was some other unforeseen cause of the accident. And, well, you were the one who made the choice to sacrifice your life to save him. That choice certainly wasn't his responsibility.

But let's say there is an extent to which something bad that happens is our fault, and it's pretty significantly our fault. Should we feel guilty? Well... according to the definition, no.

The second problem with guilt is that it is a self-centered way of dealing with our faults. "I am a bad person because this happened." "I cannot live with this guilt." "I am doing this because I would feel guilty if I did not." It's all about "I"... and not a bit about others. Everything is done out of obligation, not out of love.

Guilt is a type of worldly sorrow; there exists a Godly sorrow, which I shall call remorse, which is the other reaction we can have when we realize something bad that has happened is our fault. Remorse says that "I feel bad because I have hurt someone I love." It then drives us to make amends with this person if possible, and to avoid doing the same thing again.

2 Corinthians 7:9-11 talks about the difference between worldly sorrow (guilt) and Godly sorrow (remorse). Paul refers to his earlier letter to the Church of Corinth, where he had reprimanded them; he notes how the people are sorry, and says that he is happy not because they are sorry, but because their sorrow lead to repentance. And the key here is this: Godly sorrow leads to repentance; worldly sorrow just leads to death.

Recognizing our actions can hurt people and doing things to prevent that is also better than just trying to prevent guilt. Certainly, we could save our friend's life to not feel guilty, but we could also save our friend's life because, well, it would hurt our friend if he died. (Yeah, it's more complex than that, but it's late and I know some of you are going to come up with various counterarguments to this and I don't really have the time to go into the full explanation of love for all this, so let's just say that Jesus did indeed say that there is no greater love than that where a man lays down his life for a friend and there's a deep aspect to that which covers this situation in many different aspects and leave it at that. )

Point of it all is, guilt is not a good thing. Ever. Responsibility is, and remorse is, but not guilt. And anyone who tells you that you should feel guilty for doing something... try replacing "guilt" with "remorse" (or "guilty" with "remorseful") and see if that works better, because semantics is kind of weird like that.

Edit: Okay, there's a bit more than just "guilt is never a good thing". First of all, if you are getting a lot of guilt messages, that could be a sign of growth. The messages themselves are bad if you listen to them, but the fact that you're receiving them could be good.

Second, there's another definition of guilt, one that the Bible uses: the state of guilt, in which we are sinful, unforgiven, and condemned. This is the default state of all people, and, well, the state itself isn't a good thing (it means we're going to Hell, after all, unless something is done about it), but the realization of being in that state is good, since it exposes our need for a Savior. Hence why the Holy Spirit seeks to convict the world of guilt (John 16 so they can realize what they need. However, that is different from the feelings of guilt that come from various life events.

It all depends on the circumstances and how I would react. I highly doubt i would jump off something and save someone because I am not the sort of person who would do that because I know we would both die due to my lack of physical ability to save someone.

If he/she was a murder I would let them die but if they had just said the odd mean thing to me I would save them.

It's a difficult thing, I know, but let me give you a scenario, ILF . You save the life of a murderer (purely hypothetical, of course). As a result of this action the murderer might be led to change thier way of life, provided of course God points them in that direction. What then?

I know there is not many on this site but for non- believers of heaven. answer the following questions. I had this discussion on another forum and found it interesting.

If a stranger is just a dollar short for a bus, and you happen to have plenty of money. Is there any reason to give this person a dollar? Your not going to get any kind of reward in any way. So why even help this person?

Someone is about to do suicide. This person is actually a jerk but you know you can help this person if you wanted to.
This person is a jerk, and you know he's not going to thank you in any way. Is there any reason to help them?

You see your mate falling, and if you try to catch him/her you can save him/her but you will be crushed and die. Is there any reason to save your mate at all?

So you're saying you'll only help someone if there's something in it for you? You're thinking "God is watching, so if I do something nice I'll get a reward"? Like a child who's nice to her brother because she knows Mommy's watching?

Just this evening my wife and I were at a two-part, 4 hour movie (my aching butt ). I had to line up for an hour in the rain to get tickets; it was something I'd been looking forward to for weeks.

During the intermission, we stepped outside. There was an old guy on the road in one of those electric scooters, and he'd run out of power. He was trying to push it with one foot; it was raining, he didn't have an umbrella, raincoat or a roof on the scooter, and no-one was offering to help him. I went over and offered him a push, and ended up pushing him for 20 minutes in the pouring rain while he kept saying "it's just a little farther; just the next block; no, down this street a little; now turn left."

I ended up running back, getting there late, soaking wet. No-one else noticed and my wife even scolded me for not just pushing him someplace dry and letting someone else worry about it.

But I felt good- no, God wasn't looking; no, I ain't going to Heaven because of it.
And I bet a lot of people, no matter what their religion (or none) would do the same- not for hope of reward, just because we're wired to (sometimes) help others.

It's only a question you quoted, I said nothing about getting rewarded.

@ shadow I don't believe murders can change there ways. They shouldn't deserve to live if someone more pure etc than them couldn't because they killed them.