Featured Ethics Question

Depends on how you do it. I believe that a lying tongue is dead wrong. God hates it, the Bible says. However, if the opponent misinterprets what he sees, and deceives himself, it is not my fault. Take the example of the 2nd Battle of Ai. God's plan allowed the arrogant people of Ai to deceive themselves--which was not God's fault at all. And God was not advocating lying. He was advocating what Sun Tzu did centuries later: appear to be weak in one area so you can be strong in another.

 

Do you believe the Germans who hid Jews from the Nazi's did wrong by lying to the soldiers who came to the door? I don't. I think they were heroes. I believe God would agree.

 

They were heros, but not because of their lying. They were heros in spite of it! It is entirely possible to accomplish their same goal without lying.

I'm a martial arts instructor and theoretician. I teach misdirecrtion. For example, if a man holds a gun on me, I can say, "Please, I hate it when someone puts a gun to my head." If then he, out of spite, holds the gun up to my head, I know several ways to take it away from him withhout any danger of being shot.

This is what God did at the 2nd Battle of Ai: misdirection. It is moral and right, unlike lying, which the Bible clearly teaches that God hates. Please, if you're going to deal with this issue, deal with the passage in Prov. I quoted. How do you interpret it if you believe lying is okay in some circumstances. (Which, by the way is situation ethics, and opens the way to a wide range of "justifiable" sin.) Shall we do evil that good may come?

 

I do not see a signifigant difference between your "misdirection" and a lie tell you the truth....I would certainly lie if necessary in a situation like that....but I wouldn't call it a "misdirection". I pull the kind of rhetorical spin you speak of with my wife...she never appreciates the distinction, and calls it a lie. I think you are "misdirecting" to yourself just a little bit here John. I thought you guys were supposed to be able to catch bullets in your teeth anyway :laugh::smilewinkgrin:

 

If lying and misdirection are the same thing, then you just called God a liar. Have you looked up the Second Battle of Ai that I have referenced? Check it out before you reject my argument. "Let God be true and every man a liar" (Rom. 3:4).

Lies are based on words. Misdirection is based primarily on action, though words may be used.

That was a guy named Aaron something years ago--and it was only a stunt anyway. :tongue3:

 

So, if the person put in a situation such as the heroes saving the Jews from the Nazis or facing a man with a gun they better be trained in 'misdirection' so as to avoid offending God by lying? Is that what you are suggesting?

Do you suppose God watched the kind people who hid a Jewish family from being killed and thinks to himself, well that family over there just used misdirection to hide their jewish guest, but that family over there lied. Shame on them! I'm now going to smite them. ???

This just seems a bit petty to me.

 

In that particular scenario, of course, I wouldn't equivocate......I'm not that daft.

No, never heard of it.....is that like in the Vedas or something????? But the conquest of Caanan was something of a unique occurence in World History not commanded by God before and never commanded by him again, I daresay God does not regularly command genocide either. I think we learn comparatively little about how God deals with mankind as a whole from that.

I have not rejected your argument....I actually think it has some merit...I rarely dismiss an argument out of hand....and it has caused me to think.....I think you have dismissed mine. We all benefit from challenges no?

If that is the particular definition you have just helped yourself to.....fine. But wasn't your particular example:

A set-up designed specifically to deceive...I think by this definition....If the wife asked me to get the oil changed in my van, and gives me 20$ to do so...which I subsequently spend at the bar....and I then procure/produce an old receipt from a lube 1 and merely conveniently place it somewhere where she is likely to find it, make her own assumption...and yet I never say a word about it....is that mere misdirection?? or a lie.

 

It is never right to do wrong in order to get a chance to do right. The ends do not justify the means.

Satan uses what I call enabling scenarios where "would you water board an person to find out the location of a nuclear bomb in order to save millions of lives?"

The actual issue before us is the same as a policeman or soldier using lethal force when the command of God says thou shalt not murder. So to lie for your own benefit, rather than tell the truth is wrong. No need to create a scenario where you must lie for a greater good. At its base it is a rationalization.

But to carry out the requirements of your office within an organization doing God's will, is not the same as hiding the truth of ungodly behavior.

But lets get down to brass tacks. How often do we hear a preacher embellish a story to pull on the heart strings of the audience. Paul specifically addresses that issue, and says it is wrong.

 

Years ago I was challenged by one of those (who has written some books on his work) who spoke at the university where I graduated. As he spoke he told about the time he went with a station wagon full of Bibles that were covered up in the back as he was at the border crossing into Czechoslovakia. He was asked if he had any Bible and he told the border guard that he did not have any. The man looked in the back and saw none.


Recently I was challenged by a book I just finished and in it the author dealt with the importance and priority God places on truths in scripture. The question I would ask is the truth the absolutely most important thing. I would contend that it is not. If one always gives out truth then it has the capacity to destroy and cause division. Now if I come along and help a person to live out the truth then that is different. That is where having wisdom is so important. How many of us can remember something said ot us or about us that was true and it was nothing we could do anything about. It did nothing to help us and Satan uses it today as we continue to struggle with it at times. I would contend that achievement standards as a measure of "godliness" is too often presented that way. When godliness has nothing to do with standards but relationship with God and man.

If I expect another pastor who is much younger than myself to be mature like a godly person who is older than me than I have told him the truth but I have not encouraged him to grow and I am not patient with him. While I may have given him the truth I may have also destroyed our relationship and humiliated him. So is the truth most important or encouraging him as the higher goal?

I think often times we do not place the same priorities on things in scripture as God does.

We see Jesus' disciples picking grain on the sabbath. Is the sabbath more important or the people more important? Both are truths but which is most important. God commands to love people and he also commanded to make the sabbath day holy.

 

Are you aware that this is precisely the kind of illustration situation ethics advocates use to justify their position? It is purely hypothetical. How about giving me a real situation of someone who lied to protect a Jew in WW2?

Now, please tell me, how does your ethical position here differ from Joseph Fletcher? Would you say adultery is okay if the end result is good? What about murder, would that be okay if we murdered the right person in the right situation for the right result?

Come on, Skandelon, you are capable of much better debating than this. This is a ridiculous paragraph. You know that I've not suggested any such thing. We all commit sins every day, and God does not smite us.

Instead of this kind of charade, how about dealing with the Scripture that God hates a lying tongue?

Discussing truth versus lying is petty? I completely disagree.

 

Didn't think so.

I wasn't looking down on you. I simply do not know you from Adam, since you are fairly new here on the BB. Some folk here don't have much Scripture knowledge.

Glad you're thinking! But I haven't dismissed yours. I just fail to see how it is different from the standard situation ethics argument that has been around since the 1960's.

You're right, I didn't present that particular case very well. But the action involved is clear. There has to be a fearful cringing (action) to make this example of misdirection work. If you stare at the gunman confidently and say in a tough voice, "I don't like guns pointed at my head," he's more likely to shoot you, not less likely. And of course my example involved reverse psychology--something no one suggests is lying.

This is clearly misdirection. (And any wife who fell for it deserves a car that still needs an oil change! :laugh

Lying involves words, not actions. It is a statement, not an action. Here's a definition: "a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth; a falsehood." (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/lie?s=t)

 

Surely you are not saying that there was a cause and effect going on between the lie and the guard not seeing the Bibles? The reason the man did not see the Bibles was because of the smuggler's faith, not his words. God could have done the exact same miracle if the smuggler had simply said, "Look for yourself," which was not a lie. I think God is more glorified by faith combined with truth-telling (even truth telling designed to misdirect) than faith combined with a lie.

I think the best way to answer this is to point out that the Decalogue does not prohibit all lying, but a specific kind of lying: false witness. A false witness is the worst kind of lie since it can destroy another's life. The lie told by the Bible smuggler was not false witness, which is harmful to another's reputation--which is what you are talking about in this paragraph when you mention something said about us that wasn't true and caused hurt.

Sorry, I've not advocated "telling the truth at all times," so your argument here is irrelevant. Obviously there are times when one should keep his mouth shut and not tell "the truth" when it may harm. That is not under discussion here.

 

Fallacy: Guilt by association.

Ok, suppose a real person lied to protect a Jew in WW2. Was that sin hated by God? Is it possible to lie in faith that what you are doing is the right thing?

Can you give an example of such a case?

Fallacy: Ad Hominem

I asked a question. I did not make an accusation. You may have read it as an accusation, but that wasn't its intent. I was merely attempting to draw a distinction in God's view of sin worthy of punishment (i.e. smiting) and justifiable deceptions (done in faith) that might actually please God (i.e. Rahab hiding Israelite spies).

Fallacy: Ad Hominem

I'm suggesting a lying tongue, as referred to in this text, is different from the situation above, because one deceiving another, as Rahab did, is praised by God, not hated. Why? The motive is pure and it is done in faith.

That is not what I said. I said, I think a view which suggests God hates it when a person lies to protect another from being tortured (Nazi situation), makes God appear to be petty. And I asked if that was what you were suggesting. John, please don't make this personal. It is just a good discussion.

 

Of everything you've said, this jumps out to me the most. An intentional untruth doesn't have to be spoken.

Please show me in the Bible where lying is only a statement of words, and not something more?

I'd just not assume use a man's dictionary.

If I witness an bank robbery, and I see the guy run out of the bank and go "A" direction, and the cops come up to me and ask me where he goes and I say nothing but point in direction "B"...I have lied. Simple as that.

Deceit is a lie. Misdirection doesn't have to be, but it can be. It's not foolproof one way or the other.

 

Not at all. I just remember how it grabbed my attention because I thought at the time to always tell the truth and "let the chips fall where they may." However I have struggled with the thought of should we lie to Satan to protect others whom he may want to destroy.

I agree but I have come to the thoughts that is there a time when God would put words in our mouth that even we are shocked by.

I agree and I think you said it well.

Because of my profession and the training and experience I have I often see things others do not. So when I am asked what I think about something that was done by them or a relative it bothers me especially when they think it might be a nice job and I know it is not. It bothers me because they are asking for my opinion after the fact rather than before they started. If I say nothing they would get the message that I do not approve or think it is a good job. I try to avoid those situations as much as possible.

 

I have been trained by one of the top craftsmen in the world in my work. When someone ask my opinion about something that someone they know did and I do not say anything it is an answer. They may be proud of what was done and I was done quite right. I was a judge at a juried national show and even what I saw there were violations of some basic principles. There was one Christian man who sincerely asked for my opinion and I gave it to him. He became better over time. I could tell he appreciated it a lot. However when I was pastoring there were people who asked my opinion of something that was already done and to say nothing would have given them my opinion. Sometimes it created a situation that I did not like. I was there to pastor not judge what had already been done. However I could easily do that. It is kind of like ignorance would have helped a lot.

 

Not guilt by association at all. I asked you a specific question about a specific philosophy, giving you the chance to clarify your position, but you did not. I'll ask it differently. If lying for a good cause is okay, what other sins are or are not okay if done for a good cause?

Work with me here. You're still giving a hypothetical. Was the lying false witness, a plain lie, or what is sometimes called a "white lie"?

Yes. Joseph Fletcher gave four such cases. You can read them at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situation_ethics

Not at all. I was not attacking you but expressing admiration for the debating I've seen you do here on the BB (as I PMed you once), and hoping you'd raise your level on this thread.

This is similar to what I did in my previous post to you, asking questions. But when I do it, you call it ad hominem.

At last I get an answer to Scripture. I agree that lying with a good motive is much better than lying to enrich one's self or for some other immoral reason. But that does not make the lie good.

Once again, you appear to be giving the exact position of situation ethics--if it is done for a good reason, the deed is okay. Please tell me how your position differs from that of Joseph Fletcher.

I'm willing to have a good discussion. But I believe you have made it personal by accusations of "ad hominem" when I simply asked questions--exactly what you did.

 

I think we need to ask the question is scripture consistent in every way according to the way we think. I would contend that it is not. I would contend that God is consistent but our Greek way of thinking does not allow that so we are forced to think out of the box and that which we do not normally communicate. There are things in scripture that seem contradictory but are they? I would argue that they are not when taken in context and the correct understanding. There are times when God's viewpoint is given and then man's viewpoint and we cannot say that both are God's or both are man's. Yet both are in scripture.

 

I think the phrase "lying tongue" (something God hates) in Prov. 6:17 makes it clear that spoken lies are what God hates.

I agree that a meaningful gesture can be a lie, since it is a form of communcation.

 

We have the 10 commandments, right? We know what they are, right?

While one verse in Prov 6:17 makes it clear God hates a "lying tongue"...our commandment mentions nothing about "thou shalt not lie...with your tongue"

Just because God hates a lying tongue, doesn't mean he also doesn't hate a lie that isn't spoken. I think you're walking a very fine line here.

Lying is lying is lying. I don't know if there are times that it's good or bad, but it's still a lie. I'll let God be the judge on that one.