Europe and U.S. move away from morals originating in the Bible
Dates from Physics Timeline (https://sites.google.com/site/solderandcircuits/home/more-circuit-design/physics-timeline)
1404 B.C. (within some years of crossing the Jordan) The Israelites remember Jehovah proving himself to them as they left Egypt and wandered 40 years, eating the supernatural manna. But they reject Jehovah's laws, which are the height of morals at the time. Moses, at the end of his stewardship, addresses a new generation concerning the covenant. (It is a covenant of love, Deuteronomy 7:12.) Deut 29: "If there is a leader among you, a root producing bitter poison, who secretly says to himself, 'I will be safe even though I persist in going my own way,' the Lord will never forgive him. The Lord will single him out for disaster. This law that the Lord has revealed belongs to us forever so that we may follow its words. This is not too difficult for you. The word is in your mouth and in your heart. See, I set before you today life and prosperity. Love the Lord your God. I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life." Judges 17: After the promised land was conquered, the people forgot this covenant and the Levites did not reign them in. "Each man did what he saw fit." There was limited freedom of thought in the nation of Israel because they were not to permit anyone to "go his own way."6
725 B.C. Isaiah 33:14-16 lists morals that sound like modern morals.
697 B.C. Isaiah 45 I the Lord have not spoken in secret. I declare what is right. This is another high point in moral direction but it is near the end of Judah, when Israelites have persisted for years in idolatry and murder. Isaiah 66: Their souls delight in their abominations.
1513 Machiavelli
1541 Michelangelo paints unclothed figures in the Sistine Chapel and starts a European trend. See main timeline, 1541. This was especially scandalous because the Sistine Chapel served men who vowed celibacy. A modern observation in the age of uncensored on-line information: men who look freely at women who aren't their wives become dissatisfied with their wives. Is this harmful to families or what? See main timeline at Ap 11 2016 Time Magazine.
1637 Descartes is an early leader in breaking free from God's morals
1651 Hobbes leads people to become a rights-demanding, passion-driven collection of self-willed individuals hell-bent on getting whatever they desire.
1679 on the topic of abortion, Pope Innocent XI starts coming around to the modern Catholic position on abortion, abandoning Aristotle and Aquinas. See more at 1679 in the main time line. U.S. politicians who seek support from so-called pro-choice voters often say they are personally against abortion but vote pro-choice to avoid imposing their beliefs on others (a slippery slope, morals can be different between people) and to uphold the wall between church and state, which isn't what most people say it is, anyway. Pro-choice Catholics in the U.S., such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Biden, are rarely denied the Eucharist.
1690 Locke starts up empiricism, but some say empiricism cannot determine truth
1713 Discourse of Free-Thinking
mid-1700s the Enlightenment gets people accustomed to thinking for themselves
1755 Rousseau abandons his own babies and sets the stage for Marxism and modern free love
1770 Thomas Jefferson makes a Bible version, discarding anything unreasonable, such as all Jesus' miracles
1788 Kant ignores Bible, says the world just needs democracy and international cooperation
1789 After the Bastille revolt, French no longer consider royalty to be absolute. Upon Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, Catholicism is more and more subject to the state.
1793 French priests compelled to marry
1794 Age of Reason by Paine
1800 President John Adams
1827 Free Press Association
1828 materialist theory of the mind; everything originates in matter and remains matter, and therefore nothing really matters in the meantime
1843, 1849 Marx diamat Radical Individualism (Autonomy)
1859 Darwin evolution also 1844
1863 John Stuart Mill advocates that those who have experienced it all (including gross sin) be the ones to decide for everyone what is best
1883 modern eugenics
1886 Nietzsche
1899 apostolic letter by Pope Leo XIII warns of a U.S. heresy: individual conscience establishes faith and morals. The heresy spreads through Europe.
1907 Pope Pius X names the heresy that Pope Leo wrote of: Modernism
1908 Woodrow Wilson (progressives)
1912 Sanger founds Planned Parenthood. In 1990s, abortion comes to be the foundational belief of the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party platform in 2016 approves of abortion for any reason at any time.
1916 Goodnow (progressives)
1917 Lenin
1922 Sanger
1927 eugenics (also 1920s) secular humanism
1927 Freud makes up a lot of humanistic baloney. Thinking in the West continues to be deeply influenced by Freud's baloney.
1928 Margaret Mead leads people astray, advises lots of sex early
1928 John Dewey
1929 Oliver Wendell Holmes
1948 Kinsey
1955 Marcuse writes Eros and Civilization. It has cultural Marxism.
1959 French movies & sexual revolution
1960s Dawson, British historian, views religion, and not economics or class warfare, as the lynch pin holding all civilizations together...when any civilization loses contact with its religious roots, it loses its life force and dies.
1967 Land O'Lakes Conference, Catholic universities rebel
1977 Dust in the Wind by Kansas reaches #6 on the charts with a message of nihilism5
1992 SIECUS seeks to indoctrinate even kindergartners about free sex.
2016 War on Religion can be traced within John Engelbrecht's Physics Timeline, https://sites.google.com/site/solderandcircuits/home/more-circuit-design/physics-timeline/physics-time-line-1900-present, at these entries: 2006 Weigel...public square shorn of religiously informed morals 2006 July 22...cold atheism despises unsophisticated American religiosity 2008 Pres. Obama's bitter clingers speech attacks religion. 2010 Ferrara... anathematizes orthodox religious believers. 2011 Benjamin Wiker...the secular left makes religion the antonym of thought. 2012 Dawkins and Harris publicly denounce faith. 2015 war on religion. 2016 Sean Carroll...morals do not come from physics.
The preceding list is as dry as can be. But, for any individual, it takes on some life when three things happen. 1) When you meet someone whose life has been ruined by bad morals. 2) When you study on your own to see what is evil and what is good. 3) When you offer advice to someone.
Getting Specific About What Morals Are
The following Bible verses relate how humanism and atheism of the last 300 years steer people away from God. People invent their own morality, just look at the mess that makes in the world. (The argument that religion has created great suffering is not exactly the way it is; for the most part, it was European despots persecuting people in ways alien to the way New Testament evangelizers operated. Did Paul kill people? Yes, before Jesus appeared to him. After that, Paul led as many people who were willing to form churches, and those not willing he left alone.)
Romans 1 Unrighteous men suppress the truth. What may be known of God is manifest in men, for God has shown it to them. Since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made...they are without excuse. Although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were they thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened...God gave them up to uncleanness in the lusts of their hearts. [free thinkers ignore what God is showing, professors make fun of orthodox Christians, and atheist scientists turn away from any consideration of God as they deny accountability to God]
John 1 The Son of God was the true Light which gives light to every man.
John 3 This is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather that light, because their deeds were evil.
Romans 2 Even Gentiles show the work of the Jewish law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness.
2 Peter 3 In the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” But they deliberately forget...the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly...he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.7
The solution for man is at Romans chapters 3 through 5. "A righteousness from God...has been made known...it comes through faith in Jesus2 the Messiah, to all who believe....At just the right time (when there was Pax Romana, Roman roads, and Greek language)...Jesus died for the ungodly...while we were still disobedient, Jesus died for us," and then he took back a hold on life and now sits at the right hand of the Father.
Man has been deciding for himself what is good, and for so long (300 years and more, see the top of this web page), that this Bible passage begs for some interpretation. It is uncommon nowadays to understand faith, belief, and righteousness. 1) The "righteousness from God" is a perfect right-ness, coupled with Jesus' forgiveness. This is important because being right with God is a prerequisite for ending up with God in his Heaven. Anyone who retains any degree of disobedience (sin) does experience Heaven briefly (Revelation 20:11-15), sees the perfection of God, compares it to his own disobedience, is shamed by the realization of his imperfection, is dreadfully fearful1 of God, and is relieved to exit toward Hell.3
2) "Faith in Jesus...all who believe" means two things. Faith is having confidence in what is promised even when there is no proof. (Faith is the opposite of proof, God made our brains to be so smart that we don't always need proof!) Belief is believing all the things Jesus said about himself, a topic too broad to include on this web page, but it is the Bible's Matthew-Mark-Luke-John and sprinkled in the rest of the New Testament. Romans 10: If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
3) At just the right time leaves no room for Man or a man to make himself ready or more worthy. The common excuse is, "I need to stop some of my sinning before I meet God." The proper time is now, there is no need for self improvement. Most of the time, Man is sinking deeper, not getting better. There are times that valid spiritual leaders lead society to be better, then it is back to the slippery slope.
4) Jesus' death for the ungodly is in the manner of the Old Testament Jewish blood sacrifice of animals, the sacrifice of atonement, which modern Jews can't perform because they don't have a Temple (not since the Jewish rebellion in 70 A.D.). The Old Testament sacrifice had to be done by each family, yearly at the Passover time (Christians time Easter to coincide with Passover, http://www.rayfowler.org/writings/articles/determining-the-dates-for-easter-and-passover/), whereas Jesus' blood sacrifice was done once for everyone. Romans 5:15: by the grace of one man, Jesus, God's gift overflows to many.
5) Jesus' resurrection, on the third day after he died on the cross, sets him apart from every other claimed savior. Jesus is the only one not in a grave. Jesus and his Spirit sift your thoughts and even the attitudes of your heart, Hebrews 4:12. When you pray, Jesus is listening. But you must pray in faith, not seeking proof.
Pastor Steve McMeans Feb 17, 2002 Brownwood TX Drawing from Romans ch. 5. Many (in fact, all men) die due to the disobedience of one man, Adam, because we aren't any more obedient than him. But God's grace and forgiveness flow to as many men as receive the one man, Jesus. Every person now identifies with Adam or with Jesus. The saving grace of God comes to each person, or doesn't come, depending on what you think and who you identify with, as shown in your daily life. People who scorn Jesus can, during their lives, listen to Jesus' message in the Bible, turn around, and receive him.
Romans 9 has a remarkable statement. What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! It does not depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. One of you will say, "Why does God still blame us?" Who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Would you say, "Why did you make me like this?" What if God bore with great patience man's disobedience? What if he did this to make his glory known to us--even us, not only his chosen people the Jews, but also us Gentiles?
The June 12 2016 mass murder at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, FL, points up a dilemma of morals resulting from cultures. The shooter and his son had observed homosexuals kissing in a restroom. Homosexuality is haram in Islam and among Arabs and many Africans, and alcohol as beverage is haram in Islam. The shooter's offense is said to culminate in the mass murder at the homosexual nightclub. This points up many conflicts of morals between cultures, and there is no way around the conflict. Another example from Arab culture: a raped woman is guilty. United Arab Emirates in 2013, a Norwegian woman who reported being raped by a colleague was sentenced to 16 months in jail, charged for having unlawful sex, making a false statement and the illegal consumption of alcohol. Marte Deborah Dalelv was later pardoned by Dubai's ruler. Arab women who are raped are often killed by kitchen fires, by their families, due to the dishonor to the family. The dishonor cannot be tolerated by the family. This happens in the U.S. An Arab woman who fails to bleed on her wedding night is liable to be killed, as this is evidence of not being virgin. It sometimes happens that an older, female family member will hide in the bedroom of the new husband's family's residence before the marriage is consummated, will receive the sheet bearing blood right after consummation, and will display it to the husband's family, to great joy. But if there is no blood, it is a grievous dishonor, especially to the father of the bride, who wouldn't be present in any case.
2016 http://barbwire.com/product/hating-jesus-the-american-lefts-war-on-christianity/ Just a few short decades ago a church-going man who publicly supported the right to life, backed laws protecting marriage, and spoke freely of Christ’s love for fallen man, would be universally recognized as a fine and upstanding citizen. He would be welcomed anywhere, including at the highest levels of power.
But things have changed. In today’s America, the “progressive” left actively endeavors to destroy such a man. Modern American leftists start by vilifying Christians. They then begin scheming...to get Christians terminated from employment...The ultimate goal? Conform to their pagan demands, or face incarceration. American progressives have co-opted every elite institution: schools, government, the media, Hollywood and the arts; even, at an increasing rate, many conservative organizations [Boy Scouts]. The secular left doesn’t merely have a disagreement with Christianity. These are not people with whom one may reason, compromise or even disagree. They are dedicated to evil. They demand nothing less than the abolition of the biblical worldview. Hating Jesus by Matt Barber
Isaiah 30 The rebellious people of Israel say to the prophets, "Give us no more visions of what is right! Tell us pleasant things. Stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel!" Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you. The Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!
Since the Enlightenment, modernists have the attitude of the rebellious people of Israel. They don't want God's discipline. Post modernists don't even agree that there is universal right and wrong. Free thinkers vainly think Man can be perfected. But those who trust the God of the Bible will get justice, though they must be patient.
Footnotes for this web page
1 This fear of God is like the Israelites experienced at Mt. Sinai when Moses received the ten commandments. Exodus 19 and 20: In the midst of lightning and shaking thunder, there was a very loud trumpet blast from Mt. Sinai, which was shrouded in fire and smoke. Everyone in the camp trembled. As Moses led them to the foot of the mountain, the whole mountain quaked and the trumpet just grew louder. The people begged Moses, "You go talk to God, then come back and tell us. But do not have God speak to us or we will die." Moses himself trembled in fear (Deut 9:19, Hebrews 12) but went up into the thick darkness. To anyone who is offended that God would frighten people so much, I can say that a study through the Bible shows this to not be the only time when people were afraid before God. God hasn't set the world up to make life a breeze for everyone.
2 Jesus is the only one God wants us to believe in. Multiculturalism's influence (also feminism) leads many to be offended that Jesus claims to be the only one. But Jesus said in John 14:6, "I am4 the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me." Those who are offended by this should look at the self-giving love Jesus had. His love offended the religious authorities because it broke through the cultural barriers of the time. It extended to women (even dishonorable women) and non-Jews, as shown in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. A study of what Jesus did is best carried out using a chronological Bible, which puts the events of these four gospels into a single, coherent thread. It is said that there are many ways to God. This is a claim springing from modernism (see the timeline entries for 1899 and 1907, excerpted at the top of this web page), and it seeks to honor Buddhism, Hinduism, etc. Orthodox Christianity does not flinch when it says Jesus is the only way and the other ways are inventions of man. Why spend time on pursuits that are repudiated in the Bible? Again, look at how the Spirit leads people to love, and compare to Hindu and Buddhist cultures.
3 Conditions in Hell are not well defined in the Bible. There is thirst, burning, and gnashing of teeth. Various people have said that Hell is stinky and loud (no peace). The joke is, "I may be going to Hell, but I will be in good company!" But there is evidence in the Bible that every person in Hell is continually isolated, not in good company. There is no shoulder to cry on. There is awareness of Heaven, and maybe a view of Heaven. There is surely remembrance of life on earth, whereas the residents of Heaven remember nothing bad. All their experience with badness is forgiven.
4 "I am" in the Bible often means the name of God, as in "I am that I am." The Greek New Testament is the arbiter, but usually when Jesus says "I am" in an English Bible he is saying he is God.
5 1977 Dust in the Wind reaches #6 on the charts with a message of nihilism. (The guitar music is so neat.) "Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea. All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see. Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind. Now, don't hang on, nothing lasts forever." https://thedailyhatch.org/2014/07/26/nihilist-kerry-livgren-wrote-the-song-dust-in-the-wind-then-came-to-christ-here-is-his-story/
In 1978 I heard the song “Dust in the Wind” by Kansas when it rose to #6 on the charts. That song told me that Kerry Livgren the writer of that song and a member of Kansas had come to the same conclusion that Solomon had. I remember mentioning to my friends at church that we may soon see some members of Kansas become Christians because their search for the meaning of life had obviously come up empty even though they had risen from being an unknown band to the top of the music business and had all the wealth and fame that came with that. Both Kerry Livgren and the bass player Dave Hope of Kansas became Christians eventually. Kerry Livgren first tried Eastern Religions and Dave Hope had to come out of a heavy drug addiction. I was shocked and elated to see their personal testimony on The 700 Club in 1981 and that same interview can be seen on YouTube today. Livgren lives in Topeka, Kansas today where he teaches “Diggers,” a Sunday school class at Topeka Bible Church. Dave Hope is the head of Worship, Evangelism and Outreach at Immanuel Anglican Church in Destin, Florida.
British humanist H.J. Blackham: “On humanist assumptions, life leads to nothing, and every pretense that it does not is a deceit. If there is a bridge over a gorge which spans only half the distance and ends in mid-air, and if the bridge is crowded with human beings pressing on, one after the other they fall into the abyss. The bridge leads nowhere, and those who are pressing forward to cross it are going nowhere..It does not matter where they think they are going, what preparations for the journey they may have made, how much they may be enjoying it all...atheists should agree with the comics Doug Stanhope and Woody Allen that nihilism should be embraced by atheists or they should consider the fact that God does exist and that will change everything.
Dust in the Wind has a connection to the 1968 photo from Apollo 8 of the crescent Earth, seen beyond the rim of the Moon, and also the 1972 Apollo 17 photo of the fully lit Earth, the blue marble. All that is inhabitable in the the whole universe is on that blue marble. Then why did God make so much universe, when there is no one to inhabit it? People don't have a very good vantage point to speculate about this, but consider that, when Jesus created it all, it was not hard for him to create it. He did not sweat creation. See in the main timeline: 1973 astrophysicist writes about anthropic coincidences
6 1404 B.C. There was limited freedom of speech: Deuteronomy 18: a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded...must be put to death. Leviticus 24: blasphemed the Name with a curse...take him outside the camp and stone him.
There was not only limited freedom of speech, there was limited freedom of action. 1 Cor 10:23 "'Everything is permissible'--but not everything is beneficial or constructive...seek the good of others." 1 Cor 10:32 "Do not cause anyone to stumble." 1 Peter 2:16 "Do not use liberty as a cloak for vice." 1 Cor 8:9 "Do not let your exercise of freedom become a stumbling block to the weak."
7 Since the Renaissance, freethinkers imagine they can ignore God's authority. They imagine they can be autonomous, and they manufacture their own morals, causing many to go wrong. When such people look at Christianity, they think, "Oh, I have to be good enough." But the Bible makes it clear that no one can be good enough. The New Testament shows that Jesus fulfilled the Old Testament requirement for a blood sacrifice, and people can be right before God only by receiving Jesus' forgiveness. (Search Internet for Roman's Road.) Being autonomous is destruction. People need to be humble and receive Jesus' forgiveness.
Another reason people ignore Jesus is that they think, "Oh, I would have to give up everything that is fun." This is not to the point. Receiving Jesus' forgiveness does require turning away from disobedience, and then the forgiven person learns there are wonderful things opening up to him.
This web page is linked from https://sites.google.com/site/solderandcircuits/home/more-circuit-design/physics-timeline/physics-time-line-1900-present, at 1976 Freedom From Religion Foundation
unregistered copyright (c) 2016 John Engelbrecht