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Guibox

H

Heidi

Member
Guibox,

I'm going to give you a scenario and you tell me which man you would trust in this situation:

A man dies and leaves millions of dollars to his son. But the trustee of the estate says that it was the wish of the dead man to change his will and leave the money to a charity. But the son says that's not true. Now assuming they cannot find the new will and are of course obligated to honor the current one, the outcome is moot. The question then becomes; which person do you believe? The trustee who has nothing to lose by his claim that the dead man wanted to change his will, or the son who had millions of dollars to lose if the trustee was right? Please explain your answer. :)
 
The question is..who do I WANT or SHOULD believe.

Because of our mistrust and greed our instincts tell us to believe the trustee. That doesn't necessarily make it the right choice.

Putting yourself in the son's place, assume that he is correct and now people are trying to bilk you out of a fortune that rightfully belongs to you, his heir?

Don't you think you'd come across as a greedy gold digger to people by trying to fight for the money?

Who knows what the trustee's motives are. Perhaps he despises the son or figures he could very well squander the money. Perhaps there is a tax break on his portion if it goes to a charity. Perhaps he misunderstood the rich old gentlemen who could very well have verbally changed his mind or said two different things. If it is not written down and there is a dispute, there is usually that possibility.

Where are you going with this?
 
guibox said:
Who knows what the trustee's motives are. Perhaps he despises the son or figures he could very well squander the money. Perhaps there is a tax break on his portion if it goes to a charity. Perhaps he misunderstood the rich old gentlemen who could very well have verbally changed his mind or said two different things. If it is not written down and there is a dispute, there is usually that possibility.

Where are you going with this?
Click to expand...
Perhaps said trustee is CEO of said charity and he is skimming money from said charity. :o Perhaps his "kickback" is 30 pieces of silver for betraying the son.


:-D Hey, it happens. ;-)
 
guibox said:
The question is..who do I WANT or SHOULD believe.

Because of our mistrust and greed our instincts tell us to believe the trustee. That doesn't necessarily make it the right choice.

Putting yourself in the son's place, assume that he is correct and now people are trying to bilk you out of a fortune that rightfully belongs to you, his heir?

Don't you think you'd come across as a greedy gold digger to people by trying to fight for the money?

Who knows what the trustee's motives are. Perhaps he despises the son or figures he could very well squander the money. Perhaps there is a tax break on his portion if it goes to a charity. Perhaps he misunderstood the rich old gentlemen who could very well have verbally changed his mind or said two different things. If it is not written down and there is a dispute, there is usually that possibility.

Where are you going with this?
Click to expand...

We're assuming that the trustee is a banker and the will is legally protected by the terms of the trust which means the trustee gets nothing personally from the trust except his salary as a banker regardless of the outcome of the will. So without reading into the trustee facts that cannot be documented, who again would you trust? The man who has nothing to lose or the man who has everything to lose? :o
 
Alright, let's see where this is going.

*ahem* "I guess I would choose the trustee."

Let's hear it, Heidi...
 
The answer to the scenario as stated is simple:

You stated that the man 'left' his fortune to the son. An obvious indication that as far as a will i concerned, the man stated that the money would go to his son. Regardless of who may or may not try to change that the answer is clear.

We do live in a society of rules. If the man changed his mind at the last moment and was unable to make the proper changes to his will, in a court of law, his original wishes would most likely be upheld.

As far as my personal view is concerned, the wishes of the man at the time he was most capable of making a stable decision would be the guiding factor of my decision.

There are many possible variables that could alter ones feelings at any 'moment' that may NOT be the 'true' wishes of an individual. Emotion can be an interesting factor facing those that have important decisions to make and this can vary from day to day, or even minute to minute.

And this doesn't even take into account unusual or extreme circumstances one often faces such as, dying from the result of a tragic accident or even, dying from any reason with time to think about it before actually slipping away.

And what we are talking about here is physical wealth. If your question indicates that the man with the decision to make, as far as where his money went, if he were changing his will thinking that this act would alter his final judgement, I believe that he would have been really confused about the truth to start with.

I assume that it is possible to be saved upon ones death bed, but unlikely. God knows what's in ones heart. So, with this in mind, it's hard to conceive how one could live a life oblivious to the will of God and then, moments before death, change a lifetime of 'hardening of the heart' disease. Anything is possible, but many things are very unlikely.

There will be and have been many, I'm sure, that upon facing their mortality, became extremely afraid of the ultimate answer to the question of eternity. And upon facing this this fear, begin or began to beg for mercy. I don't know how God judges the hearts of men, but I would imagine that when it comes to seeking the kingdom through ones fear of the alternative, God would see the selfishness of such motive and this wouldn't play much of a factor upon final judgement. If anything, it would simply show the weakness of the individual that had chosen a lifetime of 'self' instead of God and their inability to face up to their decision.

I would trust the son.
 
Do you know what the phrase "A man is a slave to whatever masters him" means, Imagican?

How can the son know what the owner of the will said to another person? :o He obviously cannot. Therefore, his desire to get the money was more important than finding out the truth. And that's why he cannot be considered trustworthy, even if the trustee was only playing the devil's advocate to find out what masters the son.

By the same token, a member of an SDA church for example, has much more to lose when interpreting the bible than people who have no denominational ties and only want to understand the bible. And that is why Jesus said that we have one teacher and that is the Christ. But the whole belief system of the SDA hurch hinges on the Jews' interpretation of the bible. Therefore, it will be much harder for them to read the bible objectively, than someone who holds no preconceived notions. :)
 
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