Sex and marriage and sin
Lets start with this, from Terry Pratchett, in Carpe Jugulum. This is a conversation between Granny Weatherwax and a man named Mightily Oats:
And sin, young man, is when you treat people as things. Including yourself. Thats what sin is.
Its a lot more complicated than that
No. It aint. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means theyre getting worried that they wont like the truth. People as things, thats where it starts.
Oh, Im sure there are worse crimes
But they starts with thinking about people as things
We couldve chosen a similar statement from Kant or John Rawls or dozens of other eminent moral philosophers the idea here is not original to Granny Weatherwax or to Pratchett. But this is clear, concise and to the point: Sin is when you treat people as things. It is, to borrow a phrase from another of Pratchetts wise crones, a nice and accurate definition of sin. Its straightforward, its non-sectarian, and it works .
The story doesnt say what it was that Jesus wrote with his finger. I like to think it was something like, Sin, young man, is when you treatpeople as things.
There may be more to say on the subject,* but any such complications would be derived from this starting point, not exceptions to it. Anything more we want to say about sin about ethics and morality and oughts and shoulds and right and wrong can be built atop this foundation. And if we want to say something more that doesnt seem to agree with this, then we have a hint that something may be amiss with what were trying to say.
That last point is why people like Granny Weatherwax are upsetting to people like Mightily Oats to anyone who bases their claim to authority and power on a sectarian rulebook. Its not that such religious experts in the law would quite want to say that treating people as things is necessarily ever good or right or acceptable. But theyve got a lot invested in all their commandments, particularly in those that may seem odd or arbitrary, and all that they have invested in that seems threatened when someone comes along and offers a simple principle that seems to make all of their lawyerly expertise redundant. Even worse, such principles call into question some of the rules and commandments themselves those rules that dont seem to have anything at all to do with treating people as things, and especially those rules and commandments that seem to require treating people as things.
(This is why Jesus got in trouble for having the audacity to summarize all the law and the prophets in a simple Golden Rule. Paul wouldnt have been quite so dangerous a troublemaker if hed been content to argue thatlove is obedience to the law, but he didnt stop there. He said love is the fulfillment of the law the culmination and consummation, the end of it. He was replacing the latter with the former in a way that threatened every institution, tradition, authority, career and identity that was based on the latter.)
And but so, lets start here, with this: Sin is when you treat people as things. And lets consider what this suggests about sex and marriage and the relationship between those two things.
I would guess at this point that some of my friends who advocate/enforce a traditional, authoritative set of rules for sexual morality are getting nervous and perhaps a bit defensive. Theyre probably worried that I heading toward a discussion in which I will question the rule that says sex can only be moral within the context of traditional marriage.
But Im afraid its worse than that. What interests me here is not the question of whether or not sex can only be moral within the context of traditional marriage, but the question of whether it is possible for sex to be moral within that context at all.
Spoiler alert: I am married, and I would not have gotten married if I did not believe that it was possible to do so without treating people as things. Nor would I have bothered getting married if I did not believe that doing so can be one helpful way of structuring life to guard against the potential for treating people as things. But the qualified, conditional nature of that endorsement seems unlikely to be very reassuring to my traditionalist friends.
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* Cruelty to animals, for example, is a kind of sin a kind of wickedness that may take a bit more considering to line up with this starting point of a definition. But I dont think it amounts to an exception.
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Sex and marriage and sin (part 1)
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Christ's message was very, very simple. "Love one another." There were no asterisks, no exceptions. His parables are very largely dedicated to demonstrating the inclusiveness of His ministry.
Anyone who tries to use His name to exclude is, as John said, a liar .
Good article Bob and I'm sure you don't treat your wife as a thing but as another human being and one you probably love very much.
Selflessness is essential to any good relationship, whether spouse or otherwise.
When I wake up in the morning, I don't get my coffee before I feed Wally. He comes before me. When the girls were little, I fed them before me. The bible teaches us, to take care of those we love before we take care of ourselves.
I don't think of any being as a thing, including the membership here.
But then again, that is a state of mind.
Ummm........ well..... lemme think about this....
Interesting concept, Bob. I need to think about this one.
Dear Friend Perrie Halpern: We best serve G-d by serving all He created.
Good point,
All best wishes for a great summer weekend.
E.
I'm with ya all the way 'till the end on this one Bob, ...
...what would you consider as possibly immoral about sex in a traditional marriage? I'm not arguing a point, I'm confused.
Are you aware that Bob has "left the building" ? Don't expect an answer from him ...