GameBanshee Forums

Originally posted by frogus
just humour me @SS...If you came to the conclusion yourself without God's input, then I would hope that you did it through some sort of reason. One can assume things with no factual evidence or logic, but only if one believes in God, and is prepared to say tht he causes things for which there is no earthly explanation. Now, if you decided that marriage was better than partnership without god's input, you must have done so by deducing it or observing some 'earthly explanation'. If you say that the conclusion that marriage is better than partnership can be reached without explaining it away on god's word (which you did, just a couple of posts ago) then tell us how.

EDIT: god's word backs up your belief as far as you're concerned, but as you are arguing with atheists, you are either going to have to say something other than 'because god made it, so it is', or tell us that that is your only argument in which case the debate can go forwards no longer.

If you look at the "moral teaching" in the Bible, you will find support for marriage that does not rely on the "because God made it, so it is." That is the support I was showing, though yes, some if it did include statements about what God says; but they are still relevant, even if you remove that part. For example:

Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure ~ Hebrews 13:4a

You want examples that support marriage but are not directly quoted from the Bible? Alright.

My parents have been married for 23½ years. My mom was a virgin when they married.

There was a couple that attended the church I went to when I lived in Burton, Texas. She was 16 and he was 18. They got married when they were still that age because of the fact that they had been having premarital sex and she got pregnant outside of marriage. I think Waverly will agree that that's a little young. If they had not ****ed up(pun intended...), they could've waited 'til they were really old enough to deal with the responsibility that comes with getting married and having a child.

There's a 15-year-old girl that used to attend my church here in Coolidge that got caught by her mom in her bedroom having sex with her boyfriend. They broke up a week later, which was rather emotionally traumatic for her.

If you want anymore examples, I'm sure I can find'em. It takes time though to remember specific things.

Originally posted by Waverly
Does it matter? Surely you would not suggest that we should ignore their POV because you don’t think they are present. And for the record, there are people here who do not fall into the bins you mention.

Yes, it does matter. I, myself, do not have access to a copy of the I Ching, so I can't quote it. If there is a Daoist or Confucianist here who wishes to quote from the I Ching, that's fine. If someone else wants to, then that's fine with me, too.

As to the 'bins' I mentioned, notice that I said "as far has been said," or something like that, indicating that all I know for sure is that, in this discussion, there are those who are Christian, those who are Athiest, and I'm pretty sure that there have been some who have claimed to be Agnostics. As to what else there is, I haven't a clue as no one has specified anything other than Christian, Athiest, and Agnostic. Don't bother attempting to play with semantics, Waverly. It won't work.

Originally posted by Sailor Saturn
Then I suggest you stop spamming/flaming/whatever-it-is-you-call-what-you-do-here-in-SYM and go spend more time reading your Bible. It would seem that you have missed quite a bit.

Only if you take it for something other than fiction - which might not be the case.


BTW you have the right to be wrong to you know

Originally posted by Xandax



Only if you take it for something other than fiction - which might not be the case.


BTW you have the right to be wrong to you know

Of course, but unlike Waverly, I choose not to exercise that right.

Originally posted by Sailor Saturn
My parents have been married for 23½ years. My mom was a virgin when they married.

There was a couple that attended the church I went to when I lived in Burton, Texas. She was 16 and he was 18. They got married when they were still that age because of the fact that they had been having premarital sex and she got pregnant outside of marriage. I think Waverly will agree that that's a little young. If they had not ****ed up(pun intended...), they could've waited 'til they were really old enough to deal with the responsibility that comes with getting married and having a child.

There's a 15-year-old girl that used to attend my church here in Coolidge that got caught by her mom in her bedroom having sex with her boyfriend. They broke up a week later, which was rather emotionally traumatic for her.[/color]

How do any of these prove anything? Maybe your parents have been married for that long because they are committed to each other, rather than because your mother was a virgin when they married. The second couple - well, that's certainly not a good advertisement for marriage. The point is not that they should have waited until they were married to have sex, but that maybe it would have been better if they had a committed relationship and a secure environment in which to raise a child - not necessarily within marriage. It wouldn't have been any better if they had married at that age prior to having sex, and had a child, especially if they had married just for that reason. Third example has absolutely nothing to do with marriage. You can't blame every sexual mistake that people make out of wedlock on the fact that they didn't wait until they were married, just like you can't attribute every good thing that happens to a married couple to the fact that they're married.

I'm with Georgi...come on SS, we could sit here telling each other about various doomed partnerships and flourishing marriages until the cows come home, but what we have yet to see in this thread is a logical reason why being married makes a relationship better.

I don't want to see that some marriages have been good relationships, nor do I want you to tell me that ALL marriages are good relationships, thought this may or may not be true. I don't want you to quote the bible at me or tell me about your parents. I want a logical reason why any given relationshop will be improved by marriage and only marriage. I understand that people who want to get married are often commited (maybe more so than other people) but there is no reason why unmarried people can't be just as commited. So I would like to remove all factors other than actual marriage itself.

@ SS, I have one question to ask you.

Do you believe in everything you read?

Once you answer this, I will complete my response.

Will somebody please hurry up and quote something from Moby D!ck or the I Ching?

BTW, both my parents had sex with each other before they got married, and neither of them was a virgin when they started dating, yet in spite of this they've been happily married for 24 years now. So I've got to agree with Georgi.

@SS-What was the reasoning that led you to reach your conclusion?

Originally posted by frogus
I'm with Georgi...come on SS, we could sit here telling each other about various doomed partnerships and flourishing marriages until the cows come home, but what we have yet to see in this thread is a logical reason why being married makes a relationship better.

In a world where one can get married within 24 hours of meeting someone (Vegas) i don't think that Marriage has any sanctity anymore, marriage is purley symbolic in my eyes.

Frogus, wouldn't it be interesting if someone of the non-marriage fraternity tries to come up with a reason why marriage is better, it can't be that hard to take on a different perspective in this discussion, in fact it would be fair to Eminem and SailorS if someone was willing to do what you have been asking them to do throughout this entire discussion.

@Ode, "and a big whale he was" - Mr Sleep's Moby ****, abridged

I have been living with my girlfriend for 15 years. We are just as committed now as at any time in our relationship. I think that we have been together longer than my parents were married (hers still are).

There are probably legal and tax resons (in the UK) that we would be better off married. We just have never gotten arround to it - or been that interested.

We don't have any kids, but if we did we would probably get married fairly quickly. Regardless of what anyone says, I still think that there is a stigma attached to the children of unmarried parents, even though the relationship is fairly accepted now days.

I gave up a long time ago trying to predict the success of relationships. Marriages I thought strong have broken quickly (or not) very superficial 'shaking up' types are still going strong (or not). I just look at what works for me and the relationship I am in.

Miss Saturn:

Then I suggest you stop spamming/flaming/whatever-it-is-you-call-what-you-do-here-in-SYM and go spend more time reading your Bible. It would seem that you have missed quite a bit.

Quite the contrary. I have a pretty good idea of what is in the bible. But I don’t limit myself to the trite quotes that support the stereotypical fundamental views or allow someone with an axe to grind to interpret them for me.

Familiar with Numbers Ch.5? It describes the forced abortion of a wife suspected of adultery. Strangely this never made it into the mainstream dogma.

How about cannibalism: II Kings 6:28,29 "And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow. So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son."

Jesus loves? Luke 14:26 Jesus speaking, "If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."

Divorce – set aside your wife and cause her to be seen as an adulteress: Matthew 5:31,32 "But I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement: But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery”

Man offers his daughter and mistress up for rape and torture: Judges 19:24-29 "Behold, here is my daughter a maiden, and his concubine; them I will bring out now, and humble ye them, and do with them what seemeth good unto you: but unto this man do not so vile a thing. But the men would not hearken to him: so the man took his concubine, and brought her forth unto them; and they knew her, and abused her all the night until the morning: and when the day began to spring, they let her go. Then came the woman in the dawning of the day, and fell down at the door of the man's house where her lord was, till it was light. And her lord rose up in the morning, and opened the doors of the house, and went out to go his way: and behold, the woman his concubine was fallen down at the door of the house, and her hands were upon the threshold. And he said unto her, Up, and let us be going. But none answered. Then the man took her up upon an ass, and the man rose up, and gat him unto his place. And when he was come into his house, he took a knife, and laid hold on his concubine, and divided her, together with her bones, into twelve pieces, and sent her into all the coasts of Israel." Apparently the mistress had not suffered enough, as the man saw fit to cut her into pieces. Well, at least his guest was safe.

David love Jonathan (yes, in that way): David II Samuel 1:26 “I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women."

Moses likes little girls: Numbers 31:18 (Moses to his soldiers) "But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves."

Not to leave out the incest of Lot’s daughters, the rape of Dinah, etc. but this is getting overlong.

On the other hand, the Bible deals constantly with trust, love, and commitment

Because you say it does? You could find a dozen books in the self help aisle at Barnes and Noble with more relevant relationship advice. Why dwell on this particular book?

I am sorry that you do not see it that way, but you must remember that you have the right to be wrong.

Wrong, or just not a blind follower of an arcane book? OK, ok, I know you were just teasing, so:

Don't bother attempting to play with semantics, Waverly. It won't work.

I don’t think that word means what you think it means [/Indigo]

I don’t think that word means what you think it means

yeah..I too have noticed how popular this piece of jargon is in the debating circles of SYM...does anyone actually know what semantics means? I sure as hell don't.

Meaining of Semantic

If that isn't an oxymoron.

These biblical quotes (aside from those @Sailor Saturn provided initially when I asked for support of marriage) are getting more than a bit far afield from our topic of discussion. I've no problem with a discussion of the bible's contents, but let's put it up under a different thread--unless the quotes are relevant to a particular point of view on our marriage vs partnership theme.

Fable: I disagree. The bible has been brought out as guideline and manual for human relationships. Certainly it is worthwhile to spend a post or two impugning it as the ultimate resource in such matters, no?

Originally posted by Waverly
Fable: I disagree. The bible has been brought out as guideline and manual for human relationships. Certainly it is worthwhile to spend a post or two impugning it as the ultimate resource in such matters, no?

Why debunk the Bible as a whole in this discussion i think Fable's link earlier did as good a job as it is possible to do. Perhaps debunk SailorS' comments directly not the Bible as a whole. That way the conversation doesn't stray to a Religion vs Non-Believer discussion. How does that sound?

Originally posted by frogus
yeah..I too have noticed how popular this piece of jargon is in the debating circles of SYM...does anyone actually know what semantics means? I sure as hell don't.

Semantics is a part of language philosophy.

semantics n.pl.
(usu. treated as sing.) the branch of linguistics and logic concerned with meaning. Two main branches of semantics may be distinguished: logical semantics is concerned with matters such as sense and reference, presupposition and implication, the scope of quantifiers, modality (necessity and possibility), and the meaning of connectives such as `and', `or', and `if...then'. Lexical semantics is concerned with the analysis of word meanings and the relations between them such as synonymy, antonymy, and hyponymy.
Derivative
semanticist n.
semantician n.

The Oxford English Reference Dictionary, © Oxford University Press 1996

@Waverly, Sleep's pretty much answered for me. I don't mind discussing the bible as specific points relate to the theme of this thread. What's out of bounds in this thread is the bible as a central subject for discussion. By all means, start up a new topic on that. But if the bible is something you want to argue about in Marriage vs partnership, it should be the biblical treatment of marriage, divorce, women, and perhaps familial relations among the Semitic cultures of the period.

Originally posted by Waverly
Miss Saturn:
I don’t think that word means what you think it means

Don't worry, I know what that word means.

If you would like, though, here is another way of saying what I was saying. Don't bother trying to manipulate what I say to turn it against me. It may work agianst others, but it doesn't work against me.

I don’t limit myself to the trite quotes that support the stereotypical fundamental views or allow someone with an axe to grind to interpret them for me.

Neither do I limit myself to the trite quotes that support the stereotypical fundamental views. To do so would suggest that I'm a fundamentalist, which I most certainly am not. I also find it highly offensive that you think that of me, but you obviously don't know any better.

While I have a firm grasp of what I believe, I also have a very open mind to new ideas. However, unlike others, I know that an open mind means open to looking critically at the new ideas and making an educated guess as to the veracity of those ideas rather than just accept any new idea as absolute truth without any justification.

I do not know what you mean by "someone with an axe to grind," but I can tell you this. I have been providing scripture references as requested. I have, on some of them, given my input as to my interpretation of them. However, I have not told anyone that they should believe that. I assumed that those I have been debating with on this issue are smart enough to critically read and decide for themselves whether or not they agree with my interpretation and whether or not they agree with what it said at all. Anyone who would blindly accept my interpretation as 100% fact without first critically reading what is said and comparing to what others have said and what they already know is a fool, for all I have been doing is providing information and my opinion on that information for others to consider.

Oh, and Waverly, don't mistake me for a fool. I always make my own decisions, come to my own conclusions, and formulate my own opinions.

How about cannibalism: II Kings 6:28,29 "And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow. So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son."

I'm not going to bother commenting on how you've twisted things from other parts of the Bible, but I will comment on this one. Don't worry, Mods, I'll try to keep the rest of this post on topic.

You have taken that scripture out of context. Here's the rest of that passage.

Some time later, however, King Ben-hadad of Aram mobilized his entire army and besieged Samaria. As a result there was a great famine in the city. After a while, even a donkey's head sold for two pounds of silver, and a cup of dove's dung cost about two ounces of silver.
One day as the king of Israel was walking along the wall of the city, a woman called to him, "Please help me, my lord the king!"
"If the LORD doesn't help you, what can I do?" he retorted. "I have neither food nor wine to give you." But then the king asked, "What is the matter?"
She replied, "This woman proposed that we eat my son one day and her son the next. So we cooked my son and ate him. The next day I said, 'Kill your son so we can eat him,' but she had hidden him."
When the king heard this, he tore his clothes in despair. And as the king walked along the wall, the people could see that he was wearing sackcloth underneath next to his skin. ~ 2 Kings 6:24-30, New Living Translation

Oh, and Waverly, might I suggest you get a better translation than the KJV? The manuscripts used to translate it are more recent, thus further from the originals, than the manuscripts used in translating the NIV, NAS, and NLT. Also, the old style language is more difficult to understand than the translations that are written using modern English.

Because you say it does? You could find a dozen books in the self help aisle at Barnes and Noble with more relevant relationship advice. Why dwell on this particular book?

You say you've read the Bible, but you keep sounding like one who hasn't. Throughout the old Testament is shown the disobedience of children(Israel's disobedience of God) and the consequences of that disobedience, as well as the good that comes about through obeying our Heavenly Father.

The New Testament shows us how, even though we're disobedient, God still loves us and sacrificed his only son so that we can enter into the kingdom of heaven.

Also in the Bible are guidelines given to us by God telling us how to live a good, productive life. This includes guidelines for marriage and sex and these guidelines are very relevant to the discussion at hand.

Then there is the fact you seem to have ignored which is the fact that fable requested quotes from the Bible that were about the topic of marriage, which is why they were brought into this discussion in the first place.

To be honest, I would've left Biblical quotes out of this discussion because of the fact that my "opponents" in this discussion do not believe in the veracity of the Bible.

Originally posted by Mr Sleep
In a world where one can get married within 24 hours of meeting someone (Vegas) i don't think that Marriage has any sanctity anymore, marriage is purley symbolic in my eyes.

Sadly, this seems to be true; however, your view combines with the views of others to continually lower people’s respect for marriage.

Originally posted by Ode to a Grasshopper
@SS-What was the reasoning that led you to reach your conclusion?

I came to the conclusion sometime early last decade, though I have been adding more and more information to the ‘equation’ since then, just as I do with all my beliefs. To define exact reasons of how I came to my conclusion is impossible as I do not remember most of them in much detail at this moment, but perhaps you’ll find the answer as I respond to some of the other comments.

Originally posted by Frogus
I want a logical reason why any given relationshop will be improved by marriage and only marriage. I understand that people who want to get married are often commited (maybe more so than other people) but there is no reason why unmarried people can't be just as commited. So I would like to remove all factors other than actual marriage itself.

You want logic? You want logical reasons why an emotional thing is better under this situation than that situation? I have to ask…how is that logical?

Alright, how’s this for logic?

If you go back and read some of my earlier comments, you’ll see that I have said that a not-married couple can have just as much commitment for each other. The problem is that there isn’t a requirement for commitment if you’re not married. You’re not truly committed. You’ve left things open so that you can easily leave the relationship whenever you want with no hassles. How is that committed? To me, it shows nothing but fear and cowardice. You afraid of being “tied down” so you make up an excuse saying that living together and having sex together is enough to be “married” so that you don’t have to really make the commitment. And let’s not forget the fact that if you choose to sleep around, you’re not committing adultery. What’s wrong with that? That’s another plus isn’t it? Absolutely not. If you’ve committed your life to someone, whether married or not, having sex with other people is wrong. Oh, but it’s not that big a deal if you’re not actually married. I mean, what’s the worst she can do to you? Pack up and leave? Or maybe make you pack up and leave? Big deal, you’ve already got another girl anyway, so just move in with her.

Marriage, however, requires you to be committed. If you’re too much of a coward to seriously make the commitment, not only should you not get married, but you shouldn’t even sleep with her. If you’re too much of a coward to seriously make the commitment required by marriage, then you don’t deserve to share the intimacy of sex with that person.

Originally posted by Nippy
@ SS, I have one question to ask you.

Do you believe in everything you read?

Once you answer this, I will complete my response.

I’m not sure I understand your question, Nippy, but I’ll try to answer it anyway.

When I read something, I read it critically. I form my opinion on the veracity of something based on previous experience with things, previous knowledge of the subject, whether or not the thing being read claims to be truth, how accurate the majority of information in it is, and what other people think of the thing being read.

If I am still unsure after this point, I do more reading on the topic, then compare and contrast it with the other sources.

Does that answer your question?

Originally posted by Sailor Saturn


Sadly, this seems to be true; however, your view combines with the views of others to continually lower people’s respect for marriage.

I have respect for people who are married for the right reasons, i can not respect marriage as an institution that is forced on people who don't want to be part of that institution.