All Creatures Great and Small

[Ekklesian]

your question is irrelevant.....

No it isn't. It's the very question of this thread.

where did ransom post scripture to support his view on what consitututes a christian relationship with nature?

He doesn't have to post Scripture for you to make a judgement about which view is more Scriptural. You just need a working knowledge of the Scriptures.

 

[aleshanee]

Don't watch the sacrifice scene of Apocalypse Now...

BTW, A real water buffalo was actually slaughtered in that scene. No fake special effects.

i saw that when i was really young... i had not even started school yet... .....i knew it wasn;t any kind
of special effect.. ..but it didn;t really affect me much... ....i was waiting for the next scene where they
showed a side of buffalo being turned and barbecued ...but it never came.... .. in the days after 9-11
when the whole country was one giant no fly zone we went to see apocalypse now redux... which is a
totally unedited directors cut that includes all previously deleted scenes... .... it was a long movie and
was very good... but they still didn;t barbecue that buffalo... ......after that i hung a "charlie don;t surf"
poster on the wall in my room.... but it;s been gone for a long time.....

 

[aleshanee]

No it isn't. It's the very question of this thread.


He doesn't have to post Scripture for you to make a judgement about which view is more Scriptural. You just need a working knowledge of the Scriptures.

do i even need to tell you what you can do with your opinions?...... you are the most arrogant and bigotted creep that has ever been been allowed to remain on these forums..... and that is saying a lot...... what does your "working knowledge" of the scriptures tell you about your perverted attitude towards women and the way you can never resist making crude comments about their bodies?....... do you think no one else sees it but me?...... ... ...... nothing you say about the bible or christianity can be validated or taken as serious when you build a reputation like that on the forum..... and i believe it;s part of the reason most people just brush past your posts without even reading them.......

but here;s a question for you.... you still haven;t apologized or taken down the lurid and suggestive comments you made about the pictures of female matadors and other women you have seen here.......... and in that time you have also posted pictures of someone you say is your daughter ... ... .. how would like it if some other creepy middle aged guy like yourself started making the same kinds of comments about her?....... how would you like for her to log in here and read the comments you have made about those other women?....... ... be warned... . your works will follow you.... and one day they will come back to haunt you.... . .....if you had a real "working knowledge" of the scriptures you would know that already.... .. and abstained from making such a fool of yourself......

 

[Ekklesian]

Well, this is an interesting article (https://bibleresources.org/hunting/) you can read. I guess the key part is this: “God looks on the heart and motives of men when it comes to how we treat His creatures and we shall be judged for it.”

This author, as are many here, is confusing forage hunting with sport hunting. It probably never occurred to her, as it apparently never occurred to many responding here, that there is a difference. She began with a verse that has nothing to do with any kind of hunting at all, or any kind of animal husbandry for that matter.

Peter's vision is completely irrelevant to the subject of hunting. It's about your baptism, and whether or not the Gospel is for you.

But here's the thing. I can Google. I don't need you to Google for me. So if you're going to Google, at least do a good job of it and offer something meritorious.

I don’t feel a guilty conscience when fishing or duck hunting. I would, however, feel a guilt for engaging in canned hunts or trophy hunting.

I can only speak for the bull fighting from my perspective. As I said before, I wouldn’t do it (not that I’d ever be brave enough to), nor would I buy tickets to attend such an event, but that’s my conscience. Others have a conscience that won’t allow them to hook fish for fun, or shoot ducks for even food. I guess that activity is between them and God.

Yeah, you've said all this before.

By the way, you’ve discounted the cultural component of all of this, but it can’t be completely discounted.

No, I don't discount the cultural component of any of it. I judge it, and I judge it by reasoning from the foundation of the Scriptures.

For example, I’m 99% sure you’re a city slicker/suburban boy.

LOL. Wrong as usual. I was raised in rural Missouri. Plowed fields, raised crops, tended livestock: cattle, goats, poultry.

I've shot more than one errant opossum and raccoon, feral cat and stray dog for getting too close to the chicken house. One opossum had six pups in her pouch no bigger than field mice that I drowned in bucket.

I've hunted small game, and dressed them, but I found I have no taste for rabbit or squirrel, and therefore quit.

I've never gone deer hunting, though. Never had the desire or need to. I've had venison, but prefer beef and pork...and frankly, it isn't the hunger for venison or the altruistic motivation for conservation that drives hunters into the woods every fall.

For the vast majority, it's the desire to make a kill, and you're working very hard to avoid that fact.

Your views in rural areas of America (particularly in the South and West) would get you mocked and laughed at, and probably viewed as a tinker bell, but that’s not really your fault because we’re all products of our environments.

You're copping out. We are not the products of our environment, we're the products of our education. And we have the unique ability to educate ourselves, and receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment. One doesn't have to be immersed in a culture to judge its observances. I don't have to live in Rio to make a judgment about the drunkenness, gluttony and promiscuity during Carnival,

And neither do I have to live in Spain or Mexico to make a judgment about the cruelty inflicted just so someone can look good doing it.

That doesn't impress me, no matter the musculature of the miss.

 

[Ekklesian]

do i even need to tell you what you can do with your opinions?...... you are the most arrogant and bigotted creep that has ever been been allowed to remain on these forums..... and that is saying a lot...... what does your "working knowledge" of the scriptures tell you about your perverted attitude towards women and the way you can never resist making crude comments about their bodies?....... do you think no one else sees it but me?...... ... ...... nothing you say about the bible or christianity can be validated or taken as serious when you build a reputation like that on the forum..... and i believe it;s part of the reason most people just brush past your posts without even reading them.......

but here;s a question for you.... you still haven;t apologized or taken down the lurid and suggestive comments you made about the pictures of female matadors and other women you have seen here.......... and in that time you have also posted pictures of someone you say is your daughter ... ... .. how would like it if some other creepy middle aged guy like yourself started making the same kinds of comments about her?....... how would you like for her to log in here and read the comments you have made about those other women?....... ... be warned... . your works will follow you.... and one day they will come back to haunt you.... . .....if you had a real "working knowledge" of the scriptures you would know that already.... .. and abstained from making such a fool of yourself......

All that to say you don't know.

 

[DrHuk&Duck]

For the vast majority, it's the desire to make a kill, and you're working very hard to avoid that fact.

I’m not so sure about that. I spent today fishing in the Gulf. We actually kept fish and had a nice dinner of spotted trout. I much more easily could have gone to the grocery store and bought fish, or for that matter, gotten some seafood at a restaurant. Subtracting the cost of gas, ramp fees, bait and time, it would have probably been cheaper than catching it myself. However, I enjoyed the time I spent with my family and being on the water today. A grocery store doesn’t exactly build memories and get a person some good vitamin D.

On a similar note, I recall once last year I was kayak duck hunting on a nearby lake. I had a small teal duck literally swim within ten yards of me and just stare at me. My gut told me that this duck was either very inexperienced (young) or had unfortunately been fed by humans. I could have easily blasted it and gone home with duck that day, but instead shooed it away and let it live and just enjoyed being on the water.

Are you starting to get it?

 

[Ekklesian]

Others have a conscience that won’t allow them to hook fish for fun

When I fish, I pinch the barbs on the hooks flat. I seldom use a treble hook.

But speaking of fishing:

Mat 17:24-27 KJV - And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute? He saith, Yes. And when he was come into the house, Jesus prevented him, saying, What thinkest thou, Simon? of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute? of their own children, or of strangers? Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then are the children free. Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and thee.

Matthew Henry has an interesting and enlightening commentary on this passage. (No it's not about fishing.)

 

[Ekklesian]

Are you starting to get it?

I get that you keep repeating yourself. You fish mostly for the fun of it, and you won't be told that you're doing wrong.

I'm not saying that you are.

But you sure kick at the very suggestion.

(There can be no rational argument about bullfighting. That's just cruel, appeals to illusions of the 'warrior princess' notwithstanding.)

But if you kept in mind that not one sparrow falls to the ground without the Father, and by extension, not one fish hooked or netted without Him either, and knowing that God is never indifferent, would that have an effect on the attitude with which you approach the activity?

 

[Jo]

i heard all those sounds your grandfather described when i was 10 years old.... the sound of flesh being ripped open and internal organs spilling out and hitting the floor.. the sounds she made both consiously - subconciously... when i witnessed the murder of my natural sister by her boyfriend... he had gone into a meth induced rage at the kitchen table...

it;s all part of the memory of that night that has haunted me ever since..along with the memory of her screams... until she stopped screaming and he let her fall to the floor....the unnatural way she fell... the sounds she made as she was dying.... the overwhelming smell of it all.... then the sound of him screaming and crying when he realized what he had done.... ... i remember it all clearly.... along with the sounds of my own screams as i huddled in the corner with my knees up under my chin.... ....

that was the night i first met the paramedic who would become my adopted dad... ...i have told that story in much greater detail on the fff before and i am not going to tell it again here... i only recount it now to say yes... memories like that follow you forever.... in many ways they mold you - especially when it happens in your childhood.... ...

but there is also another reason i mention it.... many people - mostly my friends, but even a few on the fff years ago - have asked me how i can still hunt and kill animals - even helping to butcher them after witnessing all those things as a child?.... and the only answer i have for them is i don;t know....

however... i do know i don;t associate the wild pigs we hunt and butcher with a human - especially with not my sister... ... and it was almost a decade after the incident where she was murdered before i started hunting with my adopted dad ... i didn;t just jump right into it... i had a lot of time to grow - to be raised loved and nurtured by him... taught how to see things..... ... plus we are also very careful in how we make a kill and also do the butchering.. ..there is a world of difference in what we do with the wild pigs and what was done to her.... you have to be able to understand that difference and see all the parts of an animal as just that - parts.... ..like car parts for lack of a better comparison... there was never a human soul there that has recently departed.... ... not even a pet with a name.... ..it was.. as many have said... an animal given to man by God for the purposes of providing food..

but that;s me.... i can;t impose my beliefs .. likes or dislikes.. ways in which i see or do things onto other people.. ..i don;t expect them to be able to do the things i can do... .and i also will not accept them telling me or trying to shame me into not doing something just because they cannot do it.... .we all have to make and live with our own choices...... ....

The Lord bless you and keep you, aleshanee. I'm so glad your adopted father stepped into your life. You have seen and heard more than any child should.

 

[aleshanee]

All that to say you don't know.

disagreeing with your twisted view of scriptures does not spell out as me not understanding them.... i don;t see either view as being more scriptural than they other because the issue at hand is not directly addressed in scripture.. .... what part of that do you not understand?....never mind... i;m begginning to see you don;t really understand any of it.... you see the bible as simply a means of validating your own biases...

at least ransom does leave room for people to disagree - unlike you who seems willing to consign people to hell over a disagreement about fighting bulls..... ... you are worse than jonah..... whereas jonah cried over the withering of a gourd all the while wanting God to burn innocent children in a firestorm..... you cry over spanish fighting bulls while being perfectly fine with the idea of what you consider "non-elect" children burning in hell........

why don;t you answer the question about how you will feel when your daughter sees the comments you made here about women?.. .... what will you do if ..(God forbid)... some middle age pervert makes the same kind of comments about her pictures that you made here about others?..... .....nothing?...... ... is it all just fake pictures and fake testimony from a creep who created a fake persona?..... . .... my dads theory about you possibly being dave hyles is starting to make more sense now......

 

[aleshanee]

The Lord bless you and keep you, aleshanee. I'm so glad your adopted father stepped into your life. You have seen and heard more than any child should.

thank you... .. may God bless and keep you as well.. ... i pray all is well.....

 

[DrHuk&Duck]

I get that you keep repeating yourself. You fish mostly for the fun of it, and you won't be told that you're doing wrong.

I'm not saying that you are.

But you sure kick at the very suggestion.

(There can be no rational argument about bullfighting. That's just cruel, appeals to illusions of the 'warrior princess' notwithstanding.)

But if you kept in mind that not one sparrow falls to the ground without the Father, and by extension, not one fish hooked or netted without Him either, and knowing that God is never indifferent, would that have an effect on the attitude with which you approach the activity?

OK, let me rephrase this because you’re not getting it. Bullfighting would be wrong for me because it’d go against my conscience and therefore my ethics. (The same would be true of me shooting the little duck that had obviously had too much human interaction and therefore would have been akin to shooting a pet rather than a wild animal.) I think the bullfighting is a gray area in which it might be a conscience concern for one person but not another person. I wouldn’t feel comfortable calling it sin. It’s kind of like alcohol consumption. Some Christians feel any consumption is wrong and it goes against their conscience, but others feel it only is a sin if they become drunk. Oh, and just like bullfighting, alcohol often has a cultural connection. If a kid grows up in an environment in which they witnessed their parents as occasional or social drinkers, they’ll be much less likely to believe that an occasional glass of wine might be a little sin. But if someone grew up with parents who were steadfast on no alcohol, they might be more inclined to view even a glass of anniversary champagne as going over the line.

 

[Ekklesian]

The Lord bless you and keep you, aleshanee. I'm so glad your adopted father stepped into your life. You have seen and heard more than any child should.

But not more than countless children have.

 

[subllibrm]

For the vast majority, it's the desire to make a kill, and you're working very hard to avoid that fact.

Do you have any research links to confirm that it's the desire of the vast majority? I personally wasn't involved in a survey on the subject but if I had been I would be in the vast minority.

But not more than countless children have.

While what you say is true, I don't understand why you feel the need to discount her experiences.

 

[Ekklesian]

While what you say is true, I don't understand why you feel the need to discount her experiences.

How does the truth discount her experiences, except to take away the license to falsely accuse and otherwise engage in hostile and otherwise bad behavior?

 

[DrHuk&Duck]

Do you have any research links to confirm that it's the desire of the vast majority? I personally wasn't involved in a survey on the subject but if I had been I would be in the vast minority.

I’m a hunter and I wasn’t surveyed either.

 

[Ekklesian]

disagreeing with your twisted view of scriptures does not spell out as me not understanding them....

And yet you can't exposit them well enough to tell me or anyone here how my view of the Scriptures is twisted.

i don;t see either view as being more scriptural than they other because the issue at hand is not directly addressed in scripture..

Yes it is. In more than one place, but even if it weren't, it's unquestionably implied throughout. You are still responsible to the implications of Scripture. The Pentateuch has no direct statement on the Resurrection. Yet Jesus said, "Have ye not read" how God said to Moses, I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob? He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. Ye do greatly err.

.... what part of that do you not understand?

See above.

....never mind... i;m begginning to see you don;t really understand any of it.... you see the bible as simply a means of validating your own biases...

Honestly, isn't it you who's relying on biases to avoid having to justify your positions? We wouldn't even be here if your head didn't explode over the mere suggestion that the activity of your matadoras was cruel and unattractive.

at least ransom does leave room for people to disagree - unlike you who seems willing to consign people to hell over a disagreement about fighting bulls..... ... you are worse than jonah..... whereas jonah cried over the withering of a gourd

When he should have had a burden for the souls of Ninevites. His sorrow over the gourd was misplaced and therefore ungodly. but where in the world do you get the idea that I've consigned anyone to hell? I think you're projecting. I think it's you who thinks that anyone who is not in your view a perfect angel is a devil.

all the while wanting God to burn innocent children in a firestorm.

*sigh*

Here we go again. I don't know how many ways I can say it. There are no children in hell. Neither are there any in Heaven. But hold on to your cherished biases and the lie of a way to the Father other than by grace through faith in Jesus Christ.

.... you cry over spanish fighting bulls while being perfectly fine with the idea of what you consider "non-elect" children burning in hell........

There are no children burning in hell. Earth is the only place a child can burn, but if finding animal cruelty unbecoming especially for a woman is crying, so be it.

why don;t you answer the question about how you will feel when your daughter sees the comments you made here about women?.. .... what will you do if ..(God forbid)... some middle age perver

I post nothing on the Internet I wouldn't want my dear Pentecostal mother to see, let alone my daughter. If she were to read this interaction, she would say you were being somewhat...what is that Gen Z word?...ah, yes...'cringe.'

If asked if I were the photographer, which of the photos of the matadoras I would have published, she would say the one on horseback.

Indeed the photo I replied to, in neither a lewd nor crude manner at all, is the one in which both the matadora and the horse were captured in an elegant and stately pose, and we're at least treated to an interesting angle of her lovely countenance. The roundness of her butt isn't the point of interest or even visible. I know you know, so don't try to deny it, that no one is, or would be first interested in the animal, or any other feature of the woman in the frame in the other photos. The compositions force it.

Now my daughter would say there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, but she also wouldn't feign indignance when a viewer didn't pretend not to notice, or that a 170 pound Nanny McPhee in their place wouldn't be absolutely ridiculous.

makes the same kind of comments about her pictures that you made here about others?..... .....nothing?...... ... is it all just fake pictures and fake testimony from a creep who created a fake persona?..... . .... my dads theory about you possibly being dave hyles is starting to make more sense now......

LOL. Deep thinking is apparently no prerequisite for deep sea diving or deep sea fishing.

Almost forgot. Happy Easter!

 

[Ekklesian]

OK, let me rephrase this because you’re not getting it. Bullfighting would be wrong for me because it’d go against my conscience and therefore my ethics. (The same would be true of me shooting the little duck that had obviously had too much human interaction and therefore would have been akin to shooting a pet rather than a wild animal.) I think the bullfighting is a gray area in which it might be a conscience concern for one person but not another person. I wouldn’t feel comfortable calling it sin. It’s kind of like alcohol consumption. Some Christians feel any consumption is wrong and it goes against their conscience, but others feel it only is a sin if they become drunk. Oh, and just like bullfighting, alcohol often has a cultural connection. If a kid grows up in an environment in which they witnessed their parents as occasional or social drinkers, they’ll be much less likely to believe that an occasional glass of wine might be a little sin. But if someone grew up with parents who were steadfast on no alcohol, they might be more inclined to view even a glass of anniversary champagne as going over the line.

If the commandments concerning wine had to do with how you treat it, as in the proper way to chill it or store it, then you would have a drawn a valid parallel.

But the issue you're citing about wine is about how to treat people, specifically your brothers in Christ with weak faith. If you're looked up to as one of strong faith, or as a leader in the church, and your behavior emboldens one to violate his conscience toward God, then you are not walking in love, and that is a sin. No one can have differences of opinion of what is walking in love or not and be on equal moral footing.

This isn't about one's sensibilities like how to dress at church or about how to wear his hair. An offense is something much more existential than that.

Things like wine, and meat offered to idols were integral parts of paganism, and new converts naturally had a conscience of those things as evil things. But more than that, they were weak in the faith, and were still apt to be drawn away by them. And if seeing one who is known to be a pillar of the church engage in the consumption of wine or sitting at a table in the market place to eat something from an animal that was killed in the worship of an idol, emboldened them to engage in the same not being fully persuaded in their own minds, it would be effectively the same thing as falling back into paganism and idolatry. They did something they were convinced was a sin against God. To violate one's conscience is a sin, and to put a stumbling block before one who is little child in the faith and cause him to offend his conscience, is a sin. It is not walking in love.

It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles one. It is whether or not that love is observed in the partaking.

It was for this reason in the Apostolic Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15) that as far as the Gentile churches were concerned, for the sake of the conscience of the Jewish converts, they should abstain from consuming things offered to idols, and from consuming blood and things strangled to death instead of killed with a blade where it would be drained of its blood.

God in His mercy was gradually weening His elect of the Hebrews from 1400 years of Sinai. It would be another 40 years before He finally erased the last vestiges of Judaism, and said, "Time to grow up."

So that's the issue with wine. It's not about the wine, it's about your brother.

That's not the case with "the moving creature that hath life" You don't get to decide what is cruel and what isn't. When it comes to the treatment of the animal, the regard of the righteous man isn't the life of his brother. The regard is the life of God's creature.

That takes it right out of the realm of conscience.

There will be disagreements, of course. But the different opinions aren't on equal moral footing. That's just an existential fact.

I didn't say I had it all figured out. That's why when you first brought up the subject, I said hunting for sport is 'problematic.'

However, your and Mumbles's request for a survey on what is really a self-evident fact shows that you at least concede that hunting for the main reason of making a kill is less than virtuous.

I would like your answer to the question I posed earlier . Doesn't the knowledge that "His eye is on the sparrow," have some kind of affect on the way you view that sparrow and imply a duty before God in how you engage it?

By the way, Happy Easter.

 

[DrHuk&Duck]

If the commandments concerning wine had to do with how you treat it, as in the proper way to chill it or store it, then you would have a drawn a valid parallel.

But the issue you're citing about wine is about how to treat people, specifically your brothers in Christ with weak faith. If you're looked up to as one of strong faith, or as a leader in the church, and your behavior emboldens one to violate his conscience toward God, then you are not walking in love, and that is a sin. No one can have differences of opinion of what is walking in love or not and be on equal moral footing.

This isn't about one's sensibilities like how to dress at church or about how to wear his hair. An offense is something much more existential than that.

Things like wine, and meat offered to idols were integral parts of paganism, and new converts naturally had a conscience of those things as evil things. But more than that, they were weak in the faith, and were still apt to be drawn away by them. And if seeing one who is known to be a pillar of the church engage in the consumption of wine or sitting at a table in the market place to eat something from an animal that was killed in the worship of an idol, emboldened them to engage in the same not being fully persuaded in their own minds, it would be effectively the same thing as falling back into paganism and idolatry. They did something they were convinced was a sin against God. To violate one's conscience is a sin, and to put a stumbling block before one who is little child in the faith and cause him to offend his conscience, is a sin. It is not walking in love.

It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles one. It is whether or not that love is observed in the partaking.

It was for this reason in the Apostolic Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15) that as far as the Gentile churches were concerned, for the sake of the conscience of the Jewish converts, they should abstain from consuming things offered to idols, and from consuming blood and things strangled to death instead of killed with a blade where it would be drained of its blood.

God in His mercy was gradually weening His elect of the Hebrews from 1400 years of Sinai. It would be another 40 years before He finally erased the last vestiges of Judaism, and said, "Time to grow up."

So that's the issue with wine. It's not about the wine, it's about your brother.

That's not the case with "the moving creature that hath life" You don't get to decide what is cruel and what isn't. When it comes to the treatment of the animal, the regard of the righteous man isn't the life of his brother. The regard is the life of God's creature.

That takes it right out of the realm of conscience.

There will be disagreements, of course. But the different opinions aren't on equal moral footing. That's just an existential fact.

I didn't say I had it all figured out. That's why when you first brought up the subject, I said hunting for sport is 'problematic.'

However, your and Mumbles's request for a survey on what is really a self-evident fact shows that you at least concede that hunting for the main reason of making a kill is less than virtuous.

I would like your answer to the question I posed earlier . Doesn't the knowledge that "His eye is on the sparrow," have some kind of affect on the way you view that sparrow and imply a duty before God in how you engage it?

By the way, Happy Easter.

A few posts ago you claimed the following: “For the vast majority, it's the desire to make a kill, and you're working very hard to avoid that fact.”

That statement was challenged by Sub, not Aleshanee (the person you refer to as “Mumbles” lately). You still have not provided any type of empirical evidence for this statement.

As for your biblical quote concerning the “eye of the sparrow,” context is everything. With as much biblical knowledge as you possess, I’m sure you’re aware that the verse is an illustration of the fact that God is telling Christians to engage in trust and faith, not fear, for he is in control and aware of even the smallest details in our lives.