> > ----- @cornell.edu> > Sent: Sunday, January 27, 2002 1:46 PM > Subject: Re: The Yom Kippur War [was: Fwd: CNN reaking News] > > > > > > > > > Rules exist because humans have a hypocrite mind. The only > > > reasonable rule for war should be: "don't". > > > >I think this not the way to look at war or any species wide behavior. War > is a consequence of the sort of >social animal that we are. Our ancestors > and living related species lived in groups of related individuals. >They > routinely attacked other groups when they came into contact with them (that > didn't happen too >often when there were a lot fewer of us). > > I didn't respond a month ago when you said this, but I'd like to point out > that the generalization of caring for every human goes back a long way. > Indeed, development in the Old Testament (some call this the Hebrew > Scripture...but some of it was originally written in Greek and Aramaic..) > shows this. In Exodus, one sees the requirements to go beyond tribalism, > and to accept a rule of judges. In Isaiah, we see a foreign king hailed as > Messiah. Later, we see the God of Israel as the God of all, instead of just > the tribal God. > > To me, this development is seem clearly in the teaching of Jesus: with > stories about Good Samaritans and a demand that his followers must love > their enemies. It is true that Christians often/usually fall short of this > requirement, but it doesn't mean that the requirement isn't there. > > In short, the latest one can put the understand that all people must be > loved as oneself is 2000 years ago. >
> Dan M. Bob Z I am sure you are right the antiquity of the idea of all people being part of the same tribe and therefore entitled to the same rights. In fact I would assume that the idea is older than 2000 years. But the key is that these ideas were not then and are not now universal. I was simply arguing that war is not a logical moral thing, it is a species specific behavior that evolved in our ancestors. They lived in a different environment than us but we must live with the consequences of this bit of history.
