el_joven said:
I have some familiarity with that. However, it seems appropriate to see the surrounding context:
Moses said:
(It is widely claimed that Moses wrote the first five books, including Exodus, right?)
Chapter 20, Verse 1: And God spake all these words, saying,
The Ten Commandments immediately follow that verse, and more verses directly flow into Chapter 21, all supposedly being words that God spake.
But consider the statement, "It is widely claimed that Moses wrote Exodus." That is either a true statement, or it isn't. If it isn't, then we have the situation of a third party claiming that Moses claimed that God spake various words. Well, have you ever played a game called, I think, "telephone"? A bunch of people sit in a circle and a message is whispered from one person to the next, and back to the first. The fun is in comparing the "before" and "after" versions of the message. With two levels of claims in the situation above, the possibility that Moses did not write Exodus, don't you think there should be some doubts about the accuracy of those claims, about what God supposedly spake?
Of course, the alternative possibility, that Moses did write Exodus, leaves us with, "Do we believe him or not?" Where is the evidence to support those claims about what God supposedly spake? In the Bible, there are just more claims, and nothing else! I suggest you do some searching of not-so-distant history, and study how Hitler mesmerized 1930s Germany, just by making
claims. So what is the technical difference between Moses' claims and Hitler's claims, if there is no supporting evidence for either ("God said such and such" vs "all Jews are bad people")?
One obvious fact about some of those books is that Moses was creating a "theocracy", which is government of the people by the preachers and for the preachers -- and Moses was the top-dog beneficiary of that theocracy. And from that perspective, everything Moses wrote becomes suspect, a political conflict-of-interest thing.
Now, getting specifically to Exodus 21:22-23, those versus have been interpreted as saying that if a woman is harmed, "an eye for an eye" can be the punishment, but if a fetus is harmed, an arbitrary fine can be set. I personally focus on that word "arbitrary"; the verses state that the woman's husband can set the fine, and it doesn't say how much or how little. Which obviously means to me, if the husband approves of abortion, then the fine could easily be zero, right?
As a Christian you supposedly claim that God specified what was written in Exodus 21:22-23. And I already wrote in my last message that preachers have been known to argue both sides of the interpretation of things attributed to God. You can find much of the above interpretation quite easily on the Internet, by preachers. Just as I can easily find an alternate and more restrictive interpretation, by other preachers. Which just goes to show:
FutureIncoming said:
despite God not making a mistake, what is written in the Bible about what God supposedly said isn't specific enough.