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Old May 19, 2007, 10:23 AM
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Perna Perna is offline
Pandita-in-training
 
Member Since: Sep 2006
Location: Maryland
Posts: 27,289
I don't agree with Pensees idea of "judge" as in "No one (but a psychopath?) would agree that we shouldn't judge a murderer." I think as Alexandra says, there are other non-Christian works that would bear this out, Les Misérables and the stealing of a loaf of bread when one is starving make true judging a loaded question. It's never my place to judge a murderer, that's God's "problem" because only He can know the circumstances wholly. I don't know their circumstances and so don't want to be around a murderer as I find the situation volatile and frightening but that's just me.

I want to use "judge" to apply only to what I think is good for myself. I can judge whether this person is a good one for me to be friends with but not, one should note, whether that person is a good friend! I can't judge another person's characteristics and traits except as they apply to my life and circumstances and what I want or believe I need.

Just as I don't believe I can say, "That person is going to Hell" since I'm not in charge of Hell :-) or that person the only way I can "influence" that person is with my own life and ideas, expressed as what I believe for myself. I can't, for sure, even say they'd work for another person as God may have another "route" for that person and telling another person I have The Answer when they haven't first asked me The Question is, for me, an arrogant assumption/judging of the other person and their needs.
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