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57Coastie wrote:I must ask our biblical scholars whether or not the BG's life might also be a gift of God, and whether taking that life unnecessarily, the one and only point to my earlier post, might also dishonor God.

God lays down the Biblical foundation for the right of self defense in Exodus 22:2 (Exodus 22:1 in the Torah for our Jewish friends):

If a thief is found breaking in, and is killed, no bloodguilt is incurred.

(Note this is the Hebrew translation).

This quote is universally found to show that God allows the killing of another person in self defense.

As the passages which deal with this are from the Old Testament, and specifically from the portions of the Old Testament which make up the Torah, I found a good website from a Jewish Rabbi explaining the right of self defense. In fact, he refers to self defense as both a duty and an obligation. http://www.gunownersalliance.com/Rabbi_0362.htm

He also makes this statement:

Killing is not always murder. Killing and murder are dissimilar as night and day. Hebrew uses two distinct words to differentiate between the two.

PappaGun wrote:I never get the I am a Christian and I don't want to hurt anybody part.
Be a man. The Bible does not say you can't hurt another.

I agree. Too many people don't realize the Commandment "Thou shalt not kill" is actually "Thou shalt not murder" in the original Hebrew. It was mistranslated by William Tyndale in 1525 while starting a translation of the Old Testament into the Old English which was spoken at the time. His translation of the Old Testament was later used as the basis for the King James Version of the Bible in 1611 when it was written to conform to the teachings of the Church of England. The KJV has been used for centuries as the English version of the Bible until recent modern translations, some of which now say "You will not murder" and some of which keeping the "You will not kill".

The only reason I know this, by the way, is due to a talk with my unit chaplain when I was in the Army. As an infantryman I had a question regarding my job and duty to kill the enemy in battle and the prohibition in the Bible not to kill. My chaplain explained the "Thou shalt not murder" issue to me and explained where in the Bible God allows for the killing of other people by the Israelites, as well as outlining certain rules of warfare in Deuteronomy.

I've also heard it explained this way by a later minister who took on this topic one Sunday. Here's the Reader's Digest condensed version:

Your life is a gift from God. By not doing everything you can to safeguard and protect that gift you are dishonoring the gift of life God gave you, and are therefore dishonoring God.