KnightWhoSaysNi

Getting back to the OP, that was insightful narrative. No doubt many Christians would be offended by it, but if it actually happened, then there's was nothing morally wrong with it according to their religious moral philosophy. It presents a powerful reason why I can never become a Christian.

Often when skeptics bring up such verses and OT atrocities, fundamentalists respond by turning it into a philosophical debate, claiming nontheists don't have an objective foundation to claim that such atrocities are morally wrong.

The difference is that I am being pressed to defend a philosophical position. The fundamentalist is forced to defend hacking up chidren and infants because God or some holy figure says so. I'd rather be in the former position.

Jason

BadBadBad

You seem to trust that God's judgements define morally good. I wonder Lee, if you really would trust God's judgements if it were you who was being asked to carry out his vengeance?

lee_merrill

Hi everyone,

No, I can't, nor can God! He knows what he is going to do, too, though I believe he is not restricted to one point in time like we are, so the future is not something I believe God is waiting for (re 2 Pt. 3:8).

This description might not be how it happened, though. Supposing they went down supernaturally, for example?

Acts 5:5 When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened.

Knowing what I have come to know of his character, I would trust his decision.

I'm not saying it's right by definition! I am saying that God is righteous, as we mean and understand this word.

John 6:67-69 "You do not want to leave too, do you?" Jesus asked the Twelve. Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

Believing, but also knowing...

Regards,
Lee

John A. Broussard

So you have no free will. You have no way of doing anything whatsoever about your salvation. If you're saved, it's because god wanted to save you, not because of any behavior on your part.

Am I reading you correctly?

BadBadBad

You would trust his decision, but would you carry out his decision? I have a hypothetical for you. Let's assume you were with Joshua's army and you were ordered by Joshua to kill all that breath. Unfortunately, you don't really get the opportunity to trust in God. You'll have to trust in Joshua and Moses. They tell you that you must kill all that breathe, and in the chaos of slaughter they come across a boy, an Amorite boy. Joshua hands you the sword.

I know the Bible talks about the glory of killing all that breathe, but it's not really that glorious as the blade shatters the bone. So, I think we need a real story of exactly what it's like to slaughter babies. Let's consider slaughter by sword in Rwanda 1994. It's a very disturbing story, but I want you to consider it.

Hutu with Tutsi relatives faced wrenching decisions about whether or not to desert their loved ones in order to save their own lives. At Mugonero church in Kibuye, two Hutu sisters, each married to a Tutsi husband, faced such a choice. One decided to die with her husband. The other chose to leave because she hoped to save the lives of her eleven children. The children, classed as Tutsi because their father was Tutsi, would not ordinarily have had the right to live, but assailants had said that they could be allowed to depart safely if she agreed to go with them. When she stepped out of the door of the church, she saw eight of the eleven children struck down before her eyes. The youngest, a child of three years old, begged for his life after seeing his brothers and sisters slain. “Please don’t kill me,� he said. “I’ll never be Tutsi again.� He was killed.

So all I want to know Lee is if you who proclaim God's justice and morality would or would not butcher this boy with Joshua's sword soaked in the blood of his siblings, while his mother cries and he begs he'll never be an Amorite again? In that butchering babies with Joshua is a matter of God's vengeance, how would you determine just how brutally you should slaughter the little boy such as to satisfy God's vengeance? Would you kill him quickly, or would you hack off an arm, and a leg, then perhaps run him through with your sword and then look back at his mother as you slit his throat to see to it that she too suffers sufficiently for God's vengeance? How would you determine the brutality necessary to satisfy God's vengeance?

Also, in that this is a matter of pitting human morality against God's morality, do you have a child Lee? If not, how about your mother, a wife, or your sister? You see, I don't like you and Joshua's behavior today, and I'm holding your loved one right here with my sword to their throat. I don't like your behavior, and if you continue to behave this way, there will be severe social consequences. So now, you're faced with a quandry where you're not just trusting Joshua's command from God to kill a damned and dishonored sinner. The baby is merely a cockroach, just like the Tutsis, and God wants you to squash him under your foot. Joshua and his army were fine with that. There were no social consequences, but now their are. I just want to know if you will follow God's morality, and if so don't forget my question about the level of brutality necessary to satisfy God's vengeance. Will you follow God's morality or will you follow mine?

lee_merrill

Hi everyone,

I do believe that about salvation (it's called being "born again," and babies are not active in their coming into the world), and yet God sets people free, after this, and then they can choose, within God's will … like He does!

Revelation 3:21 To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne.

Which implies choosing, and real choices, like God makes them.

But neither the Hutu nor the Tutsi genocidaires thought they were carrying out judgment from God in any way, quite the contrary.

And again, this might have been different than swords, it might have been supernatural.

2 Kings 1:10 Elijah answered the captain, "If I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men!" Then fire fell from heaven and consumed the captain and his men.

This implies a bad motive, though, and a bad result. If there is indeed life after death, and if God can turn evil experiences for good, and even only for good, then we do not have a necessary conclusion here that God is doing evil in judgment, even in judgment that people are involved in carrying out, again, perhaps in a different way than we might expect.

Writing a script is not writing history...

Regards,
Lee

John A. Broussard

So you believe it's alright for god to kill unborn children, or am I completely misinterpreting what you are saying here.

BadBadBad

No, but then that wasn't the point of bringing them into the discussion. One the Rwanda genocide stories show us what the stories of Joshua didn't. They show us the real horror of going into villages and killing all that breath men, women, and children with the edge of the sword. Second, the Hutu believed in the propaganda of genocide enough to carry it out. I noticed you never answered my question as to whether you too could be so devout to your own dogma that you could butcher babies with such horror and brutality.

Nice try, but you know that's not what the story says. The story is Joshua, not Kings, and if we want to understand what happened perhaps we should just read the story:

6:21 And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.

You're missing the whole point. It's not a matter of what God did or could do or why. It's a matter of what you will do. Do you have enough faith in your religion and those that brought it to you? Do you have enough faith in Joshua? Do you have enough faith to hack and butcher a child, and if so how much brutality in the slaughter must you bring to satisfy God's vengeance?

Remember, that's what the slaughter is all about, God's vengeance. He could have just opened up the Earth and swallowed up all the Midianites or he could have sent plagues or floods or disease. It's vengeance God wants and he wants it at the edge of your sword. It's up to you to decide how much brutality and utter cruelty to levy on this child such that God's vengeance can be satisfied.

DT 41 If I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate me. I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh; and that with the blood of the slain and of the captives, from the beginning of revenges upon the enemy.

So now, it's time to answer the questions Lee. Will you slaughter this child like a goat? How much brutality and cruelty will you levy to satisfy God's vengeance? As I hold my sword to the throat of your loved one, who's morality will you follow? God's morality, or mine?

lee_merrill

Hi everyone,

This does seem to be asking if I believe it's right for God to do wrong, though. Now we first have to establish if God has the prerogative to determine the time and manner of a person's death. I believe he does, since I also believe he knows the future, and has each person's best interest in mind, even in bringing about pain, which he also bears.

I would also ask if endless life here on earth is best, if more life here is better?

Like they did. Yes, I agree that this is horrific.

But they didn't hold that they were carrying out a command of God, which indeed, they weren't.

No, I wouldn't, because God would not say "Butcher babies with this brutality." The point again is if God has the prerogative to determine the time of death, and if people are ever called to be involved in carrying out his sentences.

I wouldn't want to be the one to push the button on the electric chair, either!

Well, I didn't recall that, so I appreciate having that pointed out.

Maybe God bears pain (though the genocidaires did not do this)? As in the cross, and then he isn't a sadist.

Jeremiah 9:1-2 Oh, that my head were a spring of water and my eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and night for the slain of my people. Oh, that I had in the desert a lodging place for travelers, so that I might leave my people and go away from them; for they are all adulterers, a crowd of unfaithful people.

But if this was a real command of God to carry out a judgment with a sword, I would ask for grace to do this, without brutality, and without cruelty, and without malice, and if such grace was not forthcoming, I would conclude that I had misunderstood, that this was not God's command, and I would put the sword away.

Regards,
Lee

Yahzi

6:21 And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.

This passage clearly indicates that they followed God's orders. God ordered them to kill the children. God did not provide any supernatural painless baby-killing magic. God not did not object after the fact to their use of the sword, and in fact goes on to have them kill more people later. With swords.

God did say it. It's right there in the Bible.

So: unless God gives you valium, you won't follow his orders.

We often hear how atheists are allegedly rebelling against God; but we aren't. We can't rebel against something that doesn't exist. You, however, do believe in God, and here you are announcing your intent to disobey.

The Bible quite clearly does not object to brutality. It certainly does not consider squeamishness an adequate reason not to follow God's commands. You must now choose between obedience and your own moral code. Which, of course, is the point of the Bible from start to finish.

Pick one: either you do what God demands, with a willing and glad heart, or you might as well join us atheists. God isn't going to let you into heaven for half-measures; you can't do what God demands as long as it's convienent. Even we atheists know that much.

Either you stand up for the glory of baby-killing, or you chuck it in and become an atheist. It's your choice: the only thing you're not allowed to do is be contradictory.