{"id":1408,"date":"2013-09-11T10:43:17","date_gmt":"2013-09-11T18:43:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/?p=1408"},"modified":"2013-09-11T10:43:17","modified_gmt":"2013-09-11T18:43:17","slug":"commandments-guidelines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/?p=1408","title":{"rendered":"Commandments &amp; Guidelines"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The following cartoon has interesting wording:   <br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/09-11-2013-012344PM.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" title=\"09-11-2013 01;23;44PM\" style=\"border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; border-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px\" border=\"0\" alt=\"09-11-2013 01;23;44PM\" src=\"http:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/09-11-2013-012344PM_thumb.jpg\" width=\"525\" height=\"171\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This is a deep misunderstanding of the nature of law. For the word \u201cgovernment\u201d substitute \u201cnecessary,\u201d because it is childish to think that the ten commandments are not ambiguous. For \u201cguidelines\u201d substitute the word \u201cinterpretations.\u201d Think of what the Talmud was about, and modern-day Bible classes in many mainstream and alternative Protestant churches. They\u2019re about \u201cexegesis,\u201d which is one or a few people daring to offer their interpretation for what a given passage in the Bible means. That government offers guidelines is implied as foolishly extravagant, but in fact most laws require interpretation as people skirt the edges of the letter this way and that. This is why there are judges and supreme courts. Furthermore, as Shakespeare has Portia argue in The Merchant of Venice, \u201cThe quality of mercy is not strain\u2019d.\u201d This means that mere technical legality is not always the test of what is actually moral. <\/p>\n<p>The cartoon digs at guidelines and regulations as artificial and un-necessary, and appeals to that part of some people\u2019s minds who want it to be simple, and based on that desire, believe it can be and really is that simple, if it weren\u2019t for the intellectuals making it complicated. To say again, this cartoon seems to me to be an appeal to the ignorant and their illusion that things should be simple, really are simple, and only seem complex. In fact, things are unendingly complex and it\u2019s just tough. As the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead wrote, \u201cWe should try be as simple as possible, but not simpler.\u201d In other words, beware of over-simplification. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The following cartoon has interesting wording: This is a deep misunderstanding of the nature of law. For the word \u201cgovernment\u201d substitute \u201cnecessary,\u201d because it is childish to think that the ten commandments are not ambiguous. For \u201cguidelines\u201d substitute the word \u201cinterpretations.\u201d Think of what the Talmud was about, and modern-day Bible classes in many mainstream [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,13,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-papers","category-spirituality-and-philosophy","category-wisdom-ing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1408"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1408"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1409,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1408\/revisions\/1409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}