Warning: TLDBR (Too Long, Don't Bother Reading) 
Warning: TLDBR (Too Long, Don't Bother Reading)
Yes...... breaking that law could have flooded sickness amomgst the community in those times, just as Lev.18:6 could have opened the 'gates' to serious in-breeding weakmesses. They were potentially destruction of the whole people, back then.
We'll call this "your paradigm" in following comments. I agree with you, and want to applaud you for it, as it is a proper way to look at Mosaic law, at least some of it.
Every single law was seriously important, including laws such as: Not to wear garments made of wool and linen mixed together (Deut. 22:11). This may have been about segregation and status. Wool was the main clothing material for the five peasant classes. There was no middle class. Linseed/flax/linen was made for high class persons. And so maybe garments showed status and position? This is not new.
So if anybody wants to cling to old laws for old times and circumstances now, then it might be better for them to disband modern legislation and accept the whole lot, chapter and verse. All of them!
Derf said:
And I can ask the same thing about homosexuality: what about it back then was so dangerous for the people that those that participated were to be stoned? Apparently you think that homosexuals back then carried some kind of dread disease that if left alive, it would spread to the rest of the people, yes?
Not just homosexuals! ....... all people, and all creatures, which is why marriage...... no adultery, no homosexuality, no sodomy, no fornication, not eating of carnivores and carrion eaters ..... NOTHING... could be tolerated which could lead to mass infections. The punishments were there to hammer home the law...... dreadful but absolutely necessary.
All the above was still unnacceptable in Jesus's time. The risks had not reduced. Trouble was, the Priesthood, Levites... the upper ruling class had mostly turned 'quisling', excuse that Nordic 20th century term to describe Greedy, Hellenised, corrupted, hypocritical turncoats who were copying invader fashions, cultures and bad habits and forgetting about the old ways and laws which had protected everybody for eons. John the Baptist put it very nicely.
So up until John, at least, you believe the old laws were entirely to be enforced? Or were some of them ignorable by then? How did they know? Jesus said to continue doing what the Pharisees said, but don't follow their example. The example was that they weren't really following the laws--especially the principles involved of loving God and your neighbor--just pretending to and requiring others to do so for real.
But after Jesus' time? How do you know what laws don't have some kind of lasting consequence for a population? That takes some serious foresight and, dare I say, omniscience? (Sssssh, don't let God know you don't think He knows what He's talking about anymore!)
But some laws were changing. Jesus took the Passover meal a day early and he did not eat it in a Temple refectory (hall) as the law required, since half a million folks now needed to be 'fleeced' and got away, so visitors took rooms around the city to take that meal and probably not all during the same day. 2000 priests, 6000 Jewish Temple guards plus the Roman garrison which patrolled the Temple outer wall-tops (only). No wonder every satellite town around Jerusalem was booked up solid at major feasts. We know that count from a census taken by Augustus which counted the kidney pairs of sacrificial lambs, important since Rome took a cut of Temple bureau-de-change rates, a corrupt system which infuriated Jesus. No wonder he demonstrated in and picketed the Temple Courts two days running.
Old laws were being changed or ignored, and the upper-class was ignoring the lot when possible. Hypocrites.
This confuses me a bit. Why do you call them hypocrites for ignoring laws, when you say Jesus was beginning to ignore the laws, too? Does that make Jesus a hypocrite?
As far as I've read, the passover was a meal to eat with your family, or with other families around you. Certainly nothing to do with a temple refectory in Moses' time.
But today any couple should have the right to happiness, regardless of their sexuality.
And what if my and my partner's happiness involves something that brings on some plague (HIV, for instance) that kills hundreds of thousands of people every year? This is using your yardstick. Maybe until HIV drugs are reduced to a decent price and made available to the poor of Africa, the penalty for homosexuality and adultery ought to still be in place. Else the "rich" of our country (practically everybody), who can afford HIV drugs, are living it up at the expense of the poor in Africa. Seems to me you just made a solid case for the death penalty for homosexuality and adultery. (I hope your wife is still paying attention.)
But if you want redundant laws back, take them all........ and surely only Jesus's word should have the authority to change a line?
I missed the redundant laws part. What was redundant? And if redundance is the issue, then removing one doesn't eliminate the other, so no real change if a single law is revoked.
But regarding the "whole law" argument, we have some things that were definitely abrogated by Jesus (like sacrifices for sin and needing to be circumcised--oh wait, you still like those, since you reject Paul as authoritative). If we want to take the whole counsel of scripture, we want to see what things are appropriate to loving God and loving our neighbor. And once you remove the sacrifices and temple rites and unclean food and clothing laws, there seem to be reasonable utility for what's left. Take the parapet law (Deut 22:8). What complaint do you have with that one? We use that principle everytime we have an inspector come to "bless" our new construction projects. Are you saying we should do away with guardrails in high places, just because the Mosaic law requires them? Hey, if your going to do guardrails, you may as well do the whole law!! You don't really love your neighbor, do you?
Ah...... I see Genesis as beautiful metaphor, and I do know that this can irritate some Christians
Do you mean the early chapters or the whole thing. I have a hard time seeing how the Abraham through Joseph stories could be taken as metaphorical. Even if you take the first few chapters metaphorically, it still denotes a command/obedience sequence, with violent repercussions (death and destruction) for disobedience. By which, without specific authorization to ignore commands of God, you tread on dangerous ground--and worse, you do 2 more things: 1) you endanger those that also want to disobey by giving them permission you don't have authority to give, and 2) in
your paradigm you endanger others by your mere disobedience, since the laws are for your protection and for everyone around you.
......... I once asked a Christian (Unitarian)
in some people's minds you just contradicted yourself.
if in a World dominated by his church, did he want to see mass executions, stonings and burnings in public every week. He answered,'Oh we wouldn't stone them anymore..... it would probably be by injection.' And I know people who would like to see Sharia law in localities where the elected council is Muslim. There are people out there who would take OT laws and terrify even your followers with the consequences.
I think the proper answer to that question, "Do you want to see mass executions...", is "no". Just like God, in giving those laws originally did not want to see mass executions..., or do you feel God did want that. The idea of many of those laws was to eliminate the evil from the nation. So it is unlikely that the stonings and burnings would continue unabated, or that they would be "mass" executions, as long as the prinicples were followed.
I think your friend was being disingenuous to suggest that we hide the terror of executions by using injections. The whole idea of stoning was that 1. people would be terrified of being stoned, so they needed to
see the execution, and 2. (I think) that ordinary people would be involved to be able to show mercy (Joseph's desire to put Mary away privily is a good example of mercy). Hiding executions and the pain thereof, and making executioner an official position (like many of the ISIS beheadings, for instance) defeat the intentions of those laws.
And it fits into the mercy of God in your paradigm--that He was hoping to prevent more horrific occurrences (like genocide by plague, etc.) by executing on a small scale.
Be all that as it may, God was the instrument in a number of mass executions. Are you saying He's morally deficient because of these mass executions? Can you ask God the same thing you asked your friend: "God, do you want to see mass executions, stonings, burnings in public every week?" Those were His laws, after all. If that question doesn't apply to God, why would it apply more to those that want to enforce His law?
I recently asked some Christians if homosexuality is a mental condition, and they mostly answered 'yes' and still believed that hanging, stoning or any slow painful death would be a suitable sentence. So now some Christians are telling me that they would kill mentally disabled people.
I don't think God gave a special waiver for mentally deficient people, did He? As I talked about before, it seems that some mental deficiencies are expected when morals are deficient. And it almost seems like God was helping to prevent some of those mental deficiencies by executing those that would have been responsible for propagating such mental deficiencies around the nation--at least by your paradigm.
That won't help the expansion of Christianity. Let's try for any common ground. I don't want a world where religion, creed, nationality, colour, race, sexual orientation, disability, age, marital status is discriminated against, let alone mass executions taking place at half-time during soccer matches............. Well that's what happens in some mid-East countries as the norm, and their laws are exactly the same ones which we debate here, with a few additions sent by God to their prophet, or so they say........
So what I think you are saying by this comparison is that Moses was a crackpot that made up al those laws and pretended they were from God. I can see why you don't stay true to your paradigm if that's how you feel about Moses.
