Its not the belief that's the same. Its the people and their failings that are the same.

This is not that tough. I think you are being intentionally obtuse in some valiant but failed attempt to assert a point. I am out.

If my wife required a condition of me, then (as long as it's moral) my adherence to that would be included in part of my adherence to the "rules" set forth by my God. So there's no clear way to parse between them.

The theology is still completely wrong, so I don't really have a meaningful answer to the question.

I haven't been following this super closely, and I expect some of this is slightly redundant, so apologies in advance.

I believe this question, or the question of the OP, actually has a fair amount of validity to it. The chances are, if you stopped by a church in the US this last Sunday and listened to the service, you would hear some sort of exhortation towards deeper commitment to religious practice, whether that is in terms of supporting the church, being charitable, forgiving of others, praying more, attending services more often, etc etc.

Or you can open the New Testament and read any number of passages about the singular value of faith. For example that the Kingdom of Heaven is like a hidden treasure that inspires a person to sell all that they have in order to purchase it. Or what good is it to gain the whole world but lose one's soul?

So I don't think the question is entirely ludicrous, and certainly from a Christian perspective faith in God is not supposed to be like other kinds of beliefs. The existence of monasticism as a practice also testifies to this idea.

So I don't think there's an argument about whether Christians should be motivated more by their beliefs to live in a certain way. Christian teaching plainly says they should, but even the most dedicated struggle to do so. So the question is not so much whether or not they should but whether or not a failure to do so is an argument against the actual strength or truth of those beliefs.

And what everyone else is trying to point out is the conclusion only follows if it's generally the case that strongly held beliefs manifest themselves absolutely in people's actions. As OrP said, it's a faulty model of psychology. The question still perhaps supports an abductive argument that says it doesn't seem to make sense for a God to exist, make certain demands, and then not provide the capacity to fulfill them, but that's a different sort of argument from the one being made implicitly by the line of questioning.

And just as a footnote, or as interesting juxtaposition with the parable of the hidden treasure or the pearl of great price: Christian teaching also recognizes this limitation in human nature. The very disciples of Jesus who were with him every day could not watch one hour with him in prayer at Gethsemene. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak". There is also an example in the bible of someone who said something very much like "If I believed in god, I would follow his guidance to the letter." Peter said he would never betray Jesus, but then denied him three times that very night, according to the story. The weakness of human will is a central idea in Christian teaching.

Sorry if this is rambly, it's mostly just an excuse to post all the various slightly unrelated thoughts I have on the topic :P

Fair point, it doesn't stop people from trying but in general when you already have in your mind, "I can't", then your attempt won't be as good and you're less likely to succeed with whatever it is you're attempting.
But don't a lot of people view it exactly that way? Not everyone really knows the theology of their own religion.

Or nah, I guess people think more along the lines of, "If I'm basically good then I'll get into heaven." They don't think the risk of hell is high if they're not doing any serious sins, so they can do what they want for the most part and still get into heaven. The god people believe in doesn't send people to hell for not being obsessed with religion. Maybe a combination of this and what OrP referred to.

wp

That's not really what I asked and I think you know this. I'm trying to ascertain whether or not there are some beliefs that you hold and consider more important than other of your beliefs.

Your wife asks something of you that directly contradicts and requires you to clearly ignore and break the "rules" set forth by your God. Is there a conflict? What do you choose to do?

So lets say she says "Go kill this guy that cut me off in traffic." I wouldn't do it. And I hope I'd be smart enough to have not married the psychopath in the first place.

Ok, I tried to use your 'wife' analogy but it isn't really helping me so I'll just come right out with the question, only this time I'll add a question mark so you're clear that it's a question. 'Do you have any beliefs that are more important to you than any other of your beliefs?'

I'll anticipate that the question will be answered this time and go straight to question two: 'If so, one of them has to be the most important, which is it?'

Agreed.

And if religion is a belief like any other.

I don't think that argument is going anywhere because it's too easy for theists to give counters 'god works in mysterious ways' or 'it's a test of our faith' etc etc

This is the crux of it IMO. We fail because it says in the bible that we're supposed to fail because we're only human and can't be expected to approach the ' perfection of god or Jesus. But... there are levels of failing.
Denying Christ, to avoid crucifixion, is not the same kind failing as the type of sinful pleasures that risk eternal damnation and yet are regularly partaken of by theists. The latter should be easily avoided if the believer truly believes that they risk an eternity in Hell, no?

I'm a very occasional smoker, despite knowing and truly believing that smoking can kill you in very unpleasant ways, but I don't really believe that it's going to happen to me. If you told, hands down no doubt at all that smoking WILL give me cancer, I wouldn't smoke and it would be an easy decision. And all we're talking about here is a few months maybe of suffering which is nothing when compared to the eternity of torment that Christianity promises for sinners.

at the risk of being overly nitty, it may be an easy decision and yet not be easy to actually follow through on that decision. A believer may decide to radically change their former habits of thinking, speaking, and behaving, but it's not necessarily easy to actually do so.

Or maybe you think you would have no difficulty actually quitting. Perhaps that is true, I don't know you at all, but I would say there are good reasons to suspect that you are mistaken. Physical addiction is not particularly sensitive to anyone's beliefs about how likely smoking is to kill them, even if some have an easier time of it than others.

Not all behavior is physically addictive in the way that cigarettes are, but many of the kinds of habits that a Christian would ideally like to change have that kind of weight or inertia attached to them, if perhaps not all at the same level. In the eastern Christian tradition they call them "passions", which is a way of distinguishing between the idea of a long-standing and difficult to break habit from some individual sinful occasion. For example it says that to be angry with your brother without a cause is a sin. One can decide they do not wish to act in anger but not actually have complete emotional control. It may be a struggle over a long time to gain that kind of control and maturity. Many passions are of this sort. Much of human thinking and behavior is this way. It's not completely rational or explicitly controlled by our conscious wishes. If you can look at your own habits and thoughts and say that you never react in a way that is not in total accordance with your idea of how you ought to act, than I think you are rather unique in that regard.

Sure. I would think this is pretty standard for all people.

It's not clear that there must be a singular "most important" belief. Furthermore, there are different ways of measuring the "importance" of beliefs that can vary from situation to situation.

There are people who are told hands down that they won't be able to see their children again if they can't stay clean and sober. Many of those people fail to stay clean and sober, and don't see their children again. It's such an easy decision. Yet they don't do it AND they have the immediacy of feeling the consequences of their failure AND they don't like it.

Your model of human behavior is almost certainly flawed.

Well it might not be the greatest analogy because of the things you point out but it's pretty hard to come up with meaningful, accurate comparisons to religion (which is one of the reasons that I think that it's 'special').

My point, is that given a great enough incentive, and I don't think they get much bigger for a believer than whether or not you experience eternal bliss in heaven or eternal torment in Hell, it should be easier to act accordingly and in particular with regard to those very minor and easy to avoid 'sins of pleasure'. Frankly, MToM seems like a post hoc or special pleading type of deal to me.

Also, this raises all sorts of questions for me about who actually does get into heaven and who goes to Hell and if no one is perfect then there must be a threshold so what is it, etc etc?

this is very pertinent and you should have hit on it earlier. your posts the whole way through have taken it as a given that a person believes they will go to hell for eternity every time they sin, but this isn't so. most will probably believe they "have a chance" even if they do sin repeatedly. indeed christianity teaches that everyone has a chance if they repent etc. so this idea of you "snap calling" a perfect, sin-free life and sticking to it (which christians are taught is impossible anyway) is pretty much bollocks.

You're comparing this to eternal torment in Hell?

In any case, there are also plenty of people who do sober up because not losing their children is a convincing incentive.

lol, I guess we have something in common then. Seriously, who's 'model' isn't flawed? You think you have it all sussed out and people are transparent to you?

And plenty don't. This is another example of you cherry-picking evidence so that you can ignore the things that work against your position and only focus on the things that support your position. Your model of human behavior clearly fails.

This just makes you look like you have the mental development of a 6-year old.

I'm not proposing that I have a model of human behavior, you are. You're the one who declared that his behavior would be perfect if he were a believer. Your model for human behavior came right at the start of this thread:

You're trying to say that people don't behave in accordance to their beliefs (in this case, they aren't happy all the time) because they don't actually believe in heaven. You expanded on this later by saying that people don't behave perfectly because they don't really believe in hell.

This model is wrong and stupid.

Oh Aaron, it's becoming very tedious and unpleasant to discuss anything with you. You just make stuff up and insult me all the time. I don't have a 'model', I just went along with your phrasing, I never used the word 'perfect', You bring up drunk parents putting alcohol before their kids and when I point out that some go sober to keep their kids you accuse me of 'cherry picking'... I mean it's just lawz all the way. I can't take you seriously at the moment. I've put you on ignore and I'm taking a break from you.

That's okay. I don't think anyone has taken you seriously here in a long time. I know I haven't.

Lol.

I also think I'd behave "perfectly" if I were still a believer (though I'm not extending my own behavior to model human behavior). And that's not as arrogant as it sounds (lol), here's why.

1) I'm sure I'd still have imperfect impulses and impure thoughts, but I wouldn't act on them and I'd redirect my attention to pure thoughts. (I know, easier said than done and there's no way to perform this experiment now but w/e.)

2) If "perfect behavior" simply equals "obeying X set of commands" then the word "perfect" doesn't have as strong a meaning. Obviously I myself wouldn't be perfect, but I'd behave "perfectly" for a human. I agree that being perfect would mean being superhuman which I am not.

3) It's much easier to follow X set of rules when you're not following them for them. For instance if the only reason I don't do Z is because I know God says Z is a sin, then that's not as hard as not knowing Z is a sin and still choosing not to do Z. If Z is indeed a sin and doing Z = imperfection, then it takes more "perfection" to have never heard the commandments and still not perform action Z (to just naturally not have any inclination to do Z, or to have the inclination but still see whatever wisdom there is in resisting the urge).

4) In my environments, I wouldn't have many temptations to sin in the first place, so it would be easier for me than a lot of other people*. For instance I said that I'd probably be in a monastery by now, or on my way to getting into one. Chances are the other monks wouldn't be doing things to piss me off and there wouldn't be many bad temptations around me in a monastery, so I feel like it would be pretty easy not to sin there.

(*Though I guess Christians believe everyone gets tested equally hard, regardless of environment?)

Note: I'm not implying by #3 that "well-behaved" atheists are "more perfect" than well-behaved believers (especially since I don't believe in an objective morality or a such thing as better/worse behavior). You can substitute "knowing Z is a sin" with "having X set of principles for whatever nonreligious reasons", so that to obey X set of principles still doesn't require that you be free of anti-Z impulses.

Edit -- furthermore, I feel like there must be some "perfect-behaving" people in the world. Maybe some monks, pastors, nuns, imams, gurus etc. (I would include priests but lol...). How much sinning could Mother Theresa have been doing in her later years?

We may not be able to run this experiment on you, but if we assume that you are generally like the other humans on the planet, observational experience suggests that you're wrong.

Given MB's setup, he's talking about observable behaviors. But see #1.

This is getting strange and doesn't address your main point in any meaningful way. The "level of difficulty" does not matter here.

* is not consistent with a broad range of Christian perspectives... probably all of them. Also, see my response to the previous one.

At this point, you've got a really awkward theology of sin. It appears that you are using "sin" as only a restrictive list of behaviors. It does not appear, given how you've constructed your argument, that you are using "sin" in a way that does not include a failure to behave in a certain manner. "Not getting angry" is a lot different from "Being at peace" or the even stronger "Behaving in a manner that brings peace to others."

See above, and also, Mother Theresa probably would disagree with your assessment of her behaviors. What does that does that mean for your viewpoint? Also, a singular failure would constitute non-perfection.

In general, you ought to go on these speculations less often. You haven't actually produced anything useful here.

if i still played basketball, i'd be dominating the nba by now because i'd spend every spare second training and studying the game and wouldn't allow myself to be anything less than better than lebron james.

kinda what some people on here are saying isn't it?

No time to respond to much now but can't disagree with that quote lol.

You might view it that way but I've given reasons why it's not like that at all. When I was still christian, I wasn't sinning much. But I was only 11-12 and my group of friends didn't get into trouble, so again see #4, it has been pretty easy for me personally not to "sin" due to my lucky environment. But if we must use completely exaggerated analogies, it's more like saying I was already in the NBA, retired at age 24 and telling you now that had I not retired I'd still be in the NBA at age 34. (Like it's as hard to behave well as it is to be a professional athlete...)

Also understand that now as an atheist, I don't think there's even a such thing as "behaving well", so it's not like I think any of this is something to be proud / egotistical about. I don't view behavior as an accomplishment, hence I'm not bragging or saying any of this with pride. I'm mostly just saying that if I'm programmed to follow X commands, I'll follow X commands. I am just a brain and a brain is nothing but a machine. I'm just not as easy for others to program anymore

LOL - Please stop. You're embarrassing yourself.

Yeah, because *THAT* is a more believable story. Let's ignore the reality that the average NBA career is something like 5-6 years.

This has its own set of problems... but I'll leave it for someone else if they want to get into it with you.

Didn't know that, I thought they played much longer. Guess I'm thinking of a few outliers. I definitely would have used different numbers in my analogy had I known.

I don't feel like arguing this anymore. The only point I was trying to make is not that I'm awesome, but that imo people overestimate the difficulty, all because some book says it's impossible.

I did want to comment on your Mother Theresa remark though. Yes, she'd have disagreed with me, but that's because she would have felt immodest agreeing with me, whether or not she really was on a non-sinning streak. She probably had the same idea that it was sooo impossible, and might not have even realized if she was already achieving it.

But I'll give ground, chances are I was underestimating. So my final answer is that the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

Also, I wasn't saying I wouldn't slip ever, I was saying it would be very infrequently.

Now, unrelated to my OP but I'm curious and thread is bout done anyway. If everyone doesn't get tested equally, then getting into heaven/hell is partly a matter of luck? That can't be the official theology?

edit -- or does God grade on a curve?