Water under the bridge

Submitted by Michael S (United States), Sep 24, 2015 at 04:57

Hi, Moh Waz. You said,

But to the imam - by not doing what they think God tells muslims should expect non-muslims to do - you're not following 'God' . (or their interpretation thereof. Just like they don't follow your interpretation. )

I didn't say anything about interpretations. I said, 'what is "right", is to obey God; and what is "wrong" is to disobey Him. That ought to be obvious.'

Then you said,

Why would God want anything of the sort?

"Why?" is not an appropriate thing to ask of God. It presupposes that you would be able to understand the answer. You went on,

The commandments in the Koran, Gita, Bible....etc? Mohammed?

There's only one God, the God of the Bible. There isn't room for more than one -- not in the spirit world, and not in the natural. If the Koran god is God, then the Bible God isn't -- you can't have both: That's the whole nature of the thing. As Elijah said,

1 Kings 18:
How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him

Concerning the Viet Cong, you said,

On the ground, they were also trying to kill Americans and anti-communist South Vietnamese - so it was either you or them

You ignored the obvious -- I didn't have to go to Vietnam; I could refuse to go, and take the consequenses. That's the path I chose, and I didn't have to kill anyone. What's more, no Viet Cong have ever come to America, trying to kill me. I read the North Vietnamese newspapers: They weren't telling their people to fight for communism. They were telling them to fight the American bandits, until final victory. Once we left, they stopped saying that.

I also read the South Vietnamese papers, which hardly ever mentioned the war. I also was taught, in the US Army, by a native Vietnamese teacher, that the only South Vietnamese who supported fighting the Communists were the Roman Catholics, who represented 12% of the population and 33% of the Army. Today, the Vietnamese are our allies; and American deserters and draft dodgers were all granted amnesty. The choice was there to make; and to me, it was obvious which way to choose; yet over 99% of the men in my outfit, who had the same information I had, went overseas to kill people who had no quarrel with them. That didn't make sense to me, but it seemed to make sense to them. Go figure.

That's all water under the bridge. What ISN'T under the bridge is what will happen in the future, when Americans and Australians are ordered to fight against Israel. Over 99% will obey those orders, and go. People do what they do, essentially out of selfish motives. Then their brains perform mental gymnastics, to make them think they did the right thing. That's human nature. You went on,

Yes, funny isn't it - we can't even really trust ourselves - but still put faith in other people!

I don't trust any human. I trust God -- that's sufficient.

Spring starts September 1 here - I don't think you wrote this 26 days ago! I can only think you guys must mark spring at the equinox then.

I suppose Spring begins when Big Brother says it begins. Yes, it comes at the vernal equinox here, and has since I was a boy. It has nothing to do with the weather -- I was in Sydney a whole year, and never experienced "winter" weather -- just about three months of intollerable heat, followed by nine months of what I called "Springfall". In the Midwest, where I grew up, "winter" weather changed to "summer" weather and back again in the space of three days. In Oregon, it's more like Australia; but unless Big O changed the rules while I wasn't looking, we still count the seasons from the solstices and equinoxes.

Yom Kippur is over; the past is behind us. Tomorrow I can start building my sukkah.

Shalom shalom :-)

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