Moving Past Milk

Conservative bloggers, Marshal and Craig, are complaining that I "never" make my case for my positions or to explain what's wrong with the conservative's position when I engage in conversations with conservative religionists with whom I dare to disagree.

Of course, this whole blog, for over two decades, has largely been devoted to doing just that - me explaining, step by step, reasonably and looking at what the Bible says (although I don't view the bible as a rulings book in the way they do anymore), why I disagree with their human theories. They're complaining about it now, saying that another blogger, Stan, has recently posted about his theories on sin and it's "full" of biblical citations. The post:

https://birdsoftheair.blogspot.com/2026/05/consider-sin.html

Now, setting aside that I've been methodically disputing these human theories for years now, let me tackle it more directly from what they view is the "biblical" point of view (which is, of course, their personal human interpretations of various selected passages and how they use those interpretations of theirs to form another opinion that's not in the text.

So.

Stan:

Sin is not small because God is not small. Our culture measures sin by the size of the act; Scripture measures sin by the worth of the One sinned against. David understood this when he prayed, “Against You, You only, have I sinned” (Psalm 51:4)

I won't cover the whole of this entry, not today. But let me start here. Stan begins with an unsupported assertion: "Sin is not small because God is not small."

To which I respond, as always, says who? In this case, it's Stan who says this. Jesus didn't say anything like this nor is there a text anywhere in the Bible that says this. It's Stan's personal human take as he starts building his personal human case for his personal human theories about "sin," "Sin nature," "SIN," "Inheriting a 'sin nature' from Adam," and related topics.

It's not at all a given that "sin is not small because God is not small." I mean, if my children disobey me in some minor way and I respond, "HEY! Even though you THINK that was a little white lie, you told it to ME and that makes it BIG!" It just doesn't follow or is not a given. It's literally an unsupported theory at this point that I suppose Stan thinks he's going to support. Moving forward then.

Our culture measures sin by the size of the act. Presumably Stan is noting that we judge how horrendous a misdeed is by its awful, harmful impact on others. A person who drives 28 MPH in a 25 MPH zone is committing a civil wrong, but we DO view it as relatively minor as compared to the person who is drunk and driving 70 MPH in a 25 MPH school zone, which is a greatly bad behavior, and made worse when that person actually kills a child as a result of his bad behavior. So, YES, we do measure sin by the size of the harmful impact of that sin, and rightly so. I suspect that if we pushed Stan, Craig, Marshal, et al, they could probably agree. Genocide is vastly more evil than stealing a cookie, which barely rises to the level of "bad," much less evil. At least to rational people. Again, our conservative theorists probably can agree.

Continuing:

Scripture measures sin by the worth of the One sinned against.

There are no biblical texts that say this. Presumably Stan will try to make his case, and he begins with David repenting for his truly awful sin when he raped/seduced Bathsheeba, then arranged for the murder of her husband, Uriah. Psalm 51:

Have mercy on me, O God,
    according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
    blot out my transgressions.
Wash away all my iniquity
    and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know my transgressions,
    and my sin is always before me.
Against you, you only, have I sinned
    and done what is evil in your sight...

So, yes, David says that his sin (rape, abuse of power and murder to cover up his rape) was against God only. But is that factually correct OR is David, in his penance, engaging in hyperbole?

In this case, David's sin is literally NOT against God only. He abused his power to seduce or rape this woman. He abused his power to arrange for Uriah's death so he could "have" Bathsheeba as his own wife. His sin is against many people, including his whole nation. He is NOT literally correct in this claim.

Reading Rabbis talking about this topic, they will note that David's actual crimes merited the death penalty. David was desperately pleading for his life and of course, engaging in hyperbole to sound penitent (and he probably was truly sorry, if we want to give him the benefit of the doubt.)

But that David engaged in hyperbole here is NOT biblical or rational proof that his "sin was against God alone" OR that Scripture measures sin by the worth of the one sinned against. THAT claim of Stan's is simply not supported in this verse. At all. Literally not supported. It's an extension of an idea that Stan is trying (and failing) to extrapolate out some reasoning for his personal human theory. And he fails.

Continuing, Stan made more empty claims:

He had sinned against Bathsheba, against Uriah, and against Israel, but he recognized that the ultimate offense was against God Himself. Sin is not primarily horizontal; it is vertical. A crime against a neighbor is finite. A crime against the infinite God is not.

David HAD sinned against multiple people, Stan acknowledges. THEN Stan theorizes that David's claim (against you, alone, God, have I sinned) is that 

a. David was making a claim that "the ultimate offense was against God..." The text does not say that. Stan is reading that INTO David's hyperbole.

b. Sin is not primarily horizontal, it is vertical" Another unsupported and empty claim. The text literally does not say that, Stan is reading that INTO the text. And again, if you read Rabbis speaking of this passage, they will not take that stand, but rather emphasize that David was desperately begging for his life.

c. "a crime against a neighbor is finite, a crime against God is not." The text does not say that, reason does not insist upon that. It's Stan's unsupported theory to try to build his case.

But he is failing on every point so far. 

So, you can see that a rational person can look at Stan's theorizing and recognize holes right away, but it takes some time to wade through and play the Bible game that these Bible-as-rulings-book conservatives like to do and, truly, it's a waste of time. But I will continue for at least a bit more, later. Just to point out how devoid of both reason and biblical acuity this line of conservative religionism is.

Stan, Craig, Marshal, can you at least concede that, at least THIS far into Stan's attempt to make a case, he hasn't done it yet? That indeed, so far, as he's done is make several empty claims?