SPLIT THREAD - Control and Addiction in the Local Church

[OBW]

Originally Posted by djohnson

Ohio in your post #39 you bring out an interesting point regarding Lee's behavior and those of his followers i.e. what and who did he really control? His claim that he controlled nobody is actually true in the literal sense. What did Lee actually make someone else do?

It's an interesting phenom. Why did people living in a country like America, Canada etc i.e. free societies feel controlled by a guy like Lee? Why do some still act like they are under his control after he is dead for over a decade? And even act like he is not really dead. At what point on the curve do we say: a person is responsible for their own emotions and thoughts and if they feel or think they are under control it is an internal reality but not an objective one?

I hate to say it, but you are correct, and incorrect all in the same breath. In a free society in a religion that speaks of free will, control is exercised only on those who grant it (assuming you are not talking about prison or some other forced servitude).

But just like that question that got a bunch of people riled up at you in the other forum a couple of years ago in which you questioned the exercise of free will, the fact is that human nature causes many people to abdicate their free will in situations in which they would not do so if they had all aspects of their faculties and free will working properly. It is a little like the elephant that is said to never break away from the relatively small rope tied around its leg and a stake in the ground even though they have more than enough power to walk away without hardly noticing it. (I do not know if that is true or jungle legend.) The mind is a fragile and quirky thing. When you think there is authority, then you tend to follow it even if there is no actual authority. And if you revere that authority highly enough, you tend to allow it to get away with more than it should.

Now those of us who tend to over-think things first, then slowly submit where we see valid authority, we get upset at such displays of control and eventually will either speak out or just leave the situation. But everyone is not the same.

So in pure terms, you are right. But because of the nature of man, you are not entirely right.