Maryland Shrugs

And you would be correct. If I don't get more cops and firetrucks when I dial 911, I shouldn't pay more in taxes. The services that individuals do use more or less of should be funded by usage fees. "Fair" is not contingent on your ability to pay, but on the direct benefit you receive.

I don't know about that... if you've got a hundred-acre estate with some woods and there's a forest fire, you do get more fire trucks than someone in a bedroom community apartment in the middle of suburbia.

In which case the usage fee approach would kick in. But the fact that someone may have more money than his neighbors does not mean he is receiving that much more of a benefit from public services.

Three things:

1. The date of composition of the Book of Job is thought to be in the 4th Century BCE, after the Babylonian Captivity. Source.

2. Moses was almost certainly not the author of any of the so-called "Books of Moses." Source.

3. In the oldest texts, "Satan" is never mentioned by name in Job. He is referred to as "the Adversary." Source.

It seems logical that the Hebrews, who credited Yahweh for giving them a homeland, must've come to the invention of Satan as an explantion for the their losing it. Doesn't Job's theme of the righteous sufferer seem to fit well with the situation the Hebrews were in?

I weep for my home state.

Wrong. Ever read Job 1 and 2? That dates from before Moses' day. The Hebrews borrow nothing from the Eastern religions in that regard.

How do you know this?

I think much of the Hebrew Bible was composed at a far later date than the events it purports to chronicle...

"Never argue with a man whose job depends on not being convinced"
- H.L. Mencken.

There is some controversy over the date that Job was compiled but the oral tradition, as I said, is accepted by most religious scholars to be much older than Moses. As far as "Satan" versus "Adversary", it's irrelevant as the concept is the same. It's like saying Yahweh is not God. They're different names for the same being. The Wiki entry address the name difference and brushes it aside while only discussing the origin of the written version without talking about the origin of the oral one. It would be impossible to nail down that one, so there's probably no way to state it to everyone's conclusive satisfaction.

As I asked Bulldog, how would you know?

Does the word "satan" occur in the five books of Moses (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Numbers)? If not, how do you account for such an absence?

That much is probably certain.

The lack of "satan" or "adversary" in those books may or may have any meaning at all. Genesis does very specifically talk about the serpent. It's pretty commonly understood that this wasn't an animal but Satan coming to tempt man (Adam and Eve literally or humanity generally) and not a literal snake just as the apple wasn't literally an apple or even a literal fruit.

As for his absence in the rest of the books, I can't think of a counter-example right now but a) that doesn't mean I'm remembering everything that was there and b) there was plenty of other, more pressing business being taken care of by those books. To me, it's kind of like why North America isn't specifically mentioned in the Bible. It just wasn't a relevant part of the story right then.

Maybe not. Absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence, after all.

Still, it seems that--in books like Job--the "adversary" has a pretty big role. It's strange such a character--who can stand in opposition to God--hadn't come up before.

"Understood" to be Satan, but never explicitly referred to as such. Indeed, God seems to curse the animal itself (as well as its kind) in retribution. I have no doubt the snake represents the temptation of sin, but it's not at all clear to me that this is the same "adversary" that appears later.

To come at this from another angle: does the "adversary" in Job seem like the same character as the snake from Genesis? The story of Job must, of necessity, take place after the story of Genesis and yet God seems on pretty decent terms with his "adversary..."

There are books of the Old Testament that were almost certainly written before the Babylonian Exile. Certainly, the Torah was and, careful analysis of it reveals multiple traditions (two accounts of creation, two accounts of the Red Sea incident, etc.) that may have had their origins very far back, even before the Hebrews became monotheists (references to God in the plural, "no other god before me," etc.).

But other books came later. The books of the Deuteronomistic History (Joshua - Kings, Jeremiah) explain Hebrew history as ebbing and flowing depending upon how faithfully the Hebrews have kept their covenant with God...and so was likely composed during the Exile, when their fortunes were at an all-time low. Job was composed around this time. (It just stands to reason: why would a people need a story about enduring righteous suffering?)

It is interesting that Satan comes about as a real bona-fide character after (or near the end of) the Exile, before they are returned to their land by the Persians. It's also interesting that the Persians had a highly dualistic theology...

I think they are trying to compete with California for the most incompetent law making body award.

Satan lives, but he's from Illinois.

How exactly is what Paris Hilton does any of your business.

The morons on Capital Hill have never allowed themselves to be duped because they are the rich as well.

They know what they are doing and are doing it on purpose.

The whole tax system has to be scrapped and IMHO we need the Fair Tax. No loopholes for anyone and everyone from the homeless guy to Warren Buffet has skin in the game.

I've never seen someone suggest a flat dollar amount and you couldn't even do that because at what dollar amount would you set it?

With tens of thousands of pages, there's no way to make a convincing argument that the tax code promotes any identifiable good. Such a Byzantine puzzlework only serves to empower bureaucracies and to conceal Congressional patronage to special interests.

I agree: the time has come for a flat tax.

The head tax--everyone pays a set amount--is the MOST fair tax, since everyone pays an equal amount for their government, but it's unworkable in practice because the poor (who are always much, much more numerous than the rich) can't afford to pay much. On the other hand, the "progressive" income tax invites class warfare and a whole lot of government involvement in our personal finances; do away with it and the IRS can be reduced to a single computer.

I'd like to see a flat tax with the rate set at 18% above some minimum. I'd probably set the minimum at something like $12,000 per year and let it increase $3000 for a dependent spouse, $2500 for the first kid, $1500 for the second kid...and that's it. Anything after that? 18%.

No deductions. No itemizations. Nothing. No breaks for this or for that. No college tuition breaks, no mortgage interest deduction, no charitable write-offs. Earn a buck and you're above the limit? 18 cents, please. Inherit a million dollars? $180,000 in the til.

No more screwing around. Total transparency. And it would end the class warfare nonsense. Everyone would pay the same rate, and that's fair and sufficient for any reasonable amount of government.

I've seen people here suggest a flat percentage... But who am I to question the board entomologist?

In practice this would be a massive tax increase for the poor, and a moderate one for the rich. I don't like that. [-]At least the working middle class might get a break.[/-] Nope, even my federal taxes would go up ~$2200/year on this plan. Even if I had only taken the standard deduction and personal exemption, that's still nearly $2000 my taxes would go up. [-]But[/-] And you're still thoroughly screwing over any sole proprietorship who currently files a Schedule C. You'd just as well put a gun to their heads and say "get out of business" as take 18% off gross revenues like that.

So no. No, no, no, no, no. A thousand times, NO.

And you choose to illustrate this by pointing out that Germany has 8.4% more millionaires now? That doesn't make any sense.

Before? Job is regarded as one of the oldest of the books. Again I'm speaking of its overall tradition and not from the time it was put in written form.

I'm probably not going to be able to do the subject the justice Bulldog, Asyncritus, or a real preacher would do but, as I understand it, Satan is not bound at this point in God's plan. (from our perspective, not God's. I'm not sure how he perceives time) Having free will, humanity is still allowed to be tempted by Satan and Job shows us a little of the "behind-the-scenes" stuff that goes on and has been going on since creation. We obviously don't understand everything else the death of Job's original family and destruction of his property wouldn't trouble us so much.

"Seems to" being the key phrase. Don't mix what you take as allegory with what you take to be literally true. Satan could've come in the "form of a snake" and tempted with an "apple" just as the Earth was created in "seven days". Remember, both these incidents were related in the first chapters of Genesis. They could be allegory just as the "whale" that swallowed Jonah could've either been a great fish prepared specifically for this task by God or some other process whereby Jonah had a few days in timeout to get his head on straight about his whole mission. The key point, God got his attention focused on the task.

Different aspects of the same personality, perhaps? A literary device to deal with just what was relevant to the subject at hand? The passage of time causing some detail to be lost? Who knows? Besides all that, this isn't a human personality we're dealing with here.

The representation I see of God dealing with Satan is that of a king dealing with a hostile, weaker, king in his royal court. God hasn't chosen to take him out, but deals with him sternly yet civilly.

It is interesting (though I think Satan was a bonafide "actor" long before the Exile) that Job was written down about this time and you make some good points about the connection but the story of Job and enduring righteous suffering and certainly the battle of good and evil are all timeless.

One other thought about converting oral traditions to written records. Captivity in Babylon seemed to have given the Jews plenty of time for such activity. While I'm sure there was plenty of influence from the environment, no doubt a lot of the psalms and other records we have today were transcribed at that time that wouldn't have made it to us otherwise.

Everyone needs to pay something, unless they are below subsistence; otherwise, they have ZERO motive to limit taxation. And I don't see how this would be an increase on the rich; they're already subject to AMT which is higher than 18% (28%).

Really? I'm open to tinkering with the details to make this more comparable to the current levels, but I pay 28% net right now. An 18% rate would save me quite a bit.

I'd certainly allow business taxes to be handled differently. Certainly, people who operate businesses are going to have more complicated taxes than people who simply get W-2s.

Tell me how YOU would do a flat tax. Or are you philosophically opposed to the concept?

Cost to run the government divided by the number of employed adults. If the resulting burden is too high, then the government is trying to do too fucking much.

I would actually be curious what tax revenues would be using your approach.

Good idea, BTW.

He had me with all of it but the inheritance tax. That money was already taxed and is merely being transfered. However, any interest or other income off of it, yeah, 18%.

What Uncle Albert said doesn't match with what you said.

A usage fee, collected when you use something, is not the same as one flat amount regardless of income.

It is if the fees are administered privately and have nothing to do with the subject of taxation.

Stop trying to find a reason to argue with me for just once and read the first statement in UA's response.