@fredsbend I pretty much agree with your answer there. During the transfiguration of Jesus in Matthew 17, the disciples could identify Moses, which may also prove that Moses looked almost exactly like how he was on earth, including his masculine look. Elijah was not in Spirit form, it was a different matter.

@fredsbend There is significant difference that I find in C.SE. from Stackoverflow. In SO, the answer can be either right or wrong, the code is working or not. But in C.SE, it's hard to make decision for the questioner sometimes, I think.

@Mawia Yes --- what makes an answer right or wrong here is not absolute truth but faithfulness to the viewpoint of whatever larger body is being questioned. "Christianity" when defined the way our site scope is has no global consensus so it is pretty rare that a straight up factual answer on a doctrinal position can be posted without any further scope.

This is reflected in "biblical basis" questions. These are frequently not answerable as asked because interpreting the text is never done in a vacuum and doctrinal frameworks affect how the Bible's position on any given issue is understood.

@fredsbend their ladies

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

@fredsbend christianity.stackexchange.com/q/14872/3941 I have no problem with the word you chose, it's actually one of the most direct answer's I've seen.

The problem is that in the question, I define sin three times as an act, or deed, or "things that are done", so the opposite should be some sort of act. If I see someone doing something good, what should I call that?

I've tried to find an answer online, and the answer I gave was the best I could find. Narnian focuses on "obedience", which is fine, though it seems to me that keeping the law results from obedience, and obedience itself seems to result from "saying Yes to God" (which is why I chose faith instead of obedience in my answer).

If you answered the question yourself with "righteous acts", I don't think this would at all be the same as Narnian's "obedience" answer. Obeying God's law is different than acting in accord. An atheist can be righteous (acting in accord), but he can't obey God's law, because he doesn't think God exists.

@Alypius Romans chapter 2 would seem to indicate that atheists can obey the law of God, because it's written on their heart, and they have a conscience. They simply choose to deny the source of their ability to know right from wrong.

@Mawia Yes. I was just thinking that there is surely more than the current answers are giving. I guess I will just have to research it a bit.

@TRiG ????? What are you saying?

@Alypius With this and your comments on the post I am now just confused what you are looking for.

@Alypius I dont see the logic here.

@fredsbend I'm saying that I'm not taking you very seriously.

@TRiG The whole statement or that my friends do not have serious live in girlfriends with children too and are basically a family and married but are not legally married? Not taking what seriously?

@fredsbend I'm just saying that you sound like a sexist dick. I'm not saying you are one; just that you sound like one. Y'know?

@TRiG What is this judo? The video is spot on, but I have very conflicting emotions about the rest of your chat item.

@TRiG I like the video. Very good. I fail to see how calling a woman a lady and calling two women ladies sounds sexist. I suppose you object to the possessive connotation of 'their'. I think that is jumping to conclusions about my friends' relationships with their ladies rather than making the reasonable assumption that I mean to say they are in committed, monogamous, marriage-like relationships. How might 'their ladies' be different from 'their wives'?

But I cannot use the word wives because they are not wives. I think ladies is a pretty good substitute.

I sometimes introduce my wife as "my lady". Sounds much more on the other side of the spectrum doesn't it? Although, when I am upset with her I introduce her as "the ghost that was my wife."

jk about that last one.

@fredsbend Technically, their ladies is not any more possessive than their wives, I suppose (I'm not actually entirely sure whether I agree with this), but it does, to my ear, have very different connotations.

@TRiG Ok, but how?

@fredsbend The words wife, husband, boyfriend, and girlfriend are used to define a person's relationship with another person. That's what the words are for. As such, matching the words with a possessive adjective is not really demeaning. However, using a word like lady in that position does seem odd. It may be intended as just a humorous figure of speech, but it does have awkward connotations.

@TRiG This definition flies in the face of the connotation that 'live-in girlfriend' gives to me. Simply girlfriend means nearly nothing about the seriousness of the relationship. Two dumb 13-year-olds are boyfriend-girlfriend and so is my friend and his girlfriend who has been with the same woman for years and intends to for the rest of his life, however, he is against marriage for a number of reasons. They deserve different words.

I agree it might sound odd, but not sexist

@fredsbend Sorry. You're not competent to dispute that. ;)

Seriously, I am the only authority on how something sounds to me. You can say that it wasn't intended as sexist, but you can't say that it didn't sound sexist to at least one member of your audience.

magic, eh?

@fredsbend And yes, our language currently has a paucity of terms for such relationships. No doubt this will sort itself out in time (partner might be one candidate). In the meantime, things are confusing, and miscommunication will happen. All we can do is try our best to clarify.

@TRiG No I guess not, but I can say assuredly that it does not sound sexist to me and that you are not doing a very good job convincing me that it might be generally considered sexist. I want to to convince me that it is sexist.

@TRiG Partner is no good. That would make a lot of western movies really weird. Plus it is used much in business.

@fredsbend A lot of western movies are already really weird, for any number of reasons.

@TRiG True. way too true

My argument for using the term lady is that it is about the highest 'social' title that a woman can have. I use it to show how I think of these women. I think of them highly and respect them greatly.

@fredsbend Trying to find a reply to this. I can tell you that I didn't just decide to make a thing out of this: that was my straightforward, immediate, honest reaction. The phrasing jumped out at me and made me uncomfortable. And while I can't be certain that this would be a "general" reaction, I suspect I'm not the only one.

And since we really do not have 'Ladies' any more, like The Lady so and so, I think it is a good re-appropriation of the word.

@Alypius I am disenchanted with actually answering your questions. It seems there is always a problem with them in your mind and you have only selected one answer out of your 23 questions. Kind of feel like it is a waste of time.

We have a real expert now. Pretty cool. This site is awesome.

@fredsbend ...interesting, I actually find that to be a valid objection. There used to be a number under everyone's profile on their questions that showed their accept-answer rate, but it was removed quite some time ago because it wasn't working as intended nor was it working well. However, you do have a good point. The person that comes to mind when I think of low numbers of accepted answers is Caleb, and he has accepted 20 out of 80.

@fredsbend Cool! And he's Mormon! (The other outstanding Mormon on the site that I can think of is Mason Wheeler.)

@fredsbend it's actually been proposed that this mechanic be removed entirely from this site (@JonEricson proposed that). While I object to that, remember that accepting an answer is entirely optional and the OP is encouraged to select the answer that works for them not the best or correct one. It may be that the OP hasn't seen an answer that works for them. Obviously that's highly subjective in a religious environment.

@El'endiaStarman there a couple of others who pop up from time to time, but Mason is the only true regular

@waxeagle I realize it is completely up to the OP, but that doesn't suddenly enchant me to participate. We should definitely keep the feature, else, actual correct answers might be dwarfed by popular, highly voted answers. I don't see how it could remain a q and a site without the OP being able to select an answer as correct.

@El'endiaStarman 20 over 80 is better than 1 over 23. About four times better. I would still feel about the same on one of Caleb's in light of this.

Well not the same, but Caleb's seems unlikely to be selected where Alypius seems impossible.

@fredsbend The auto-bump feature can and has been somewhat abused.

@fredsbend and @waxeagle: if the "Accepted" answer means anything, it means the answer that made the most sense to the asker. Therefore, it will be awarded in an entirely idiosyncratic manner. I'm actually fine with that.

What's not so great is that the accepted answer looks "official" or something to new users who don't know the meaning behind it. So we are left with high scoring answers being second to low scoring answers for reasons only one person might understand.