Reply to Roderick Long

In reply to Roderick Long's comments on my earlier observations about his previous discussion of differences between Abraham and Mrs. Laney:

Since I have never myself talked to God, in any of his/her/its various manifestations in a number of religions, I have some doubt that others, among them Abraham and Mrs. Lacey, did so.

Certainly, Mrs. Lacey may have thought she did so, but most of us would consider that God to be a very perverse one in ordering a mother to kill her two sons.

Abraham found himself in a culture where infanticide of the first-born male as a sacrifice to the God Molach-Baal was accepted practice. Given the many years and several different scribes who created those first books in what became common scriptures for Jews and Christians, derived as they are from many stories common in the several civilizations in that area -- and my doubts that Abraham conversed with God -- I cannot determine what social pressures, including the envy I discussed, might have been at work causing him to place his son on the sacrificial alter in the first place.

His decision not to kill his son formed the beginning of Judaism. It was a brilliant stroke to rationalize that as an order from God. Abraham's seeming willingness to kill his son on God's order, resulted in God sparing him and making promises about the future; if that is not a Covenant, I don't know what one would call it.

Nowhere did I imply that dietary practices were mentioned in that passage, but rather noted,"On a related point," and then discussed those as a means whereby religious groups have sought to create, perpetuate and separate themselves from others, a special problem for the pastoral Jews, located as they were at the intersection of several advanced urban civilizations. I doubt Mr. Long is a poor reader and conclude he was simply distorting things to make debate points.

One does not have to be either a Jew or a Christian to conclude that these religions are ethically superior to the worship of Moloch-Baal and that this was a step forward in the development of civilization.

Finally, the Carthaginians developed one further cultural barbarity, crucifixion, unfortunately borrowed by the Romans to dramatize what happened to those who challenged the Empire. Ah well, without that cultural adoption Mel Gibson would have had difficulty making such a bloody film.