Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Rational BAC · 08-08-2005, 01:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by macintologist

Credit to spl.

WARNING:
This post contains explicit description of violence which may be upsetting to some readers.

A quote from the Christian Bible (also in the Hebrew Bible):

In the following story, you see through the eyes of Moses. You are Moses.

It is a joyous day for you. The war against the Midianites is finished, the Lord God has blessed you, and you have been victorious. You have taken all the women of Midian captives, and their little ones, and taken the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks, and all their goods, as the Lord commanded you.

Two of your soldiers come towards you, between them there is a young Midianite woman. They grasp her shoulders and clothes tightly to prevent her from escaping. In her arms, she protectively holds her small baby. Seeing this, you tell your soldiers to hold her, and you stride towards her. As you reach for her baby, she struggles to free herself, but your soldiers hold her well.

The baby cries as you grapple with him, trying to pull him away from his mother. Suddenly, you give the mother a heavy slap across the face. In the moment when she is stunned, you pull her baby away from her. Her voice thick with emotion, she says, "Please don't take my baby! PLEASE! Please I beg you!"

Without answering her, you carry the crying baby away, but order your soldiers to bring the mother. After a short walk, you reach a rocky patch of ground that is littered with jagged beige stones of medium size. Using both hands, you raise the baby, still crying, above your head.

The mother screams frantically, "NOOOO!!! PLEASE DON'T KILL MY BABY! I beg you! I will do anything for you, anything! PLEASE!!"

You ignore her pleas. With all of your strength, you hurl the baby towards the stones. The mother covers her face with her hands, unable to look at the imminent death of her baby. There is a loud cracking sound as the baby's skull hits a rock and breaks, along with other fragile bones. However the baby does not die instantaneously. His arms and legs slowly twitch as his blood starts to seep out of his broken body and stain the rocks and the ground with bright redness. After some time, his body ceases twitching, and he is dead.

The mothers legs have collapsed, and she has fallen to the ground. Tears are streaming down her face making dirty streaks, and her body is shuddering with uncontrollable sobs.

You look at what you have done, and you feel happy. You smile at your soldiers. You feel honored to be serving the almighty God. You turn to face your people, and you say unto them, "Have ye saved all the women alive? Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves."

You gaze with approval as a group of your men kick the legs out from underneath a Midianite girl of about 14 or 15 years of age, causing her to fall to the hard ground. She screams in terror and kicks frantically, but your men hold her arms and legs, stretching her out on the ground. One of your men pulls up her dress and examines her hymen, poking and prodding with dirty fingers splattered with dried blood from earlier activities, in an attempt to determine whether she is a virgin and thus whether she will be killed or kept alive for the pleasure of the men.

Satisfied that she is a virgin, your men then proceed to throw dice to determine who will have sex with her first. You nod, and praise and thank the Lord for all that He has given you today.

Wonderful extrapolation.

You would make a great Baptist minister.

Enda80 · 11-18-2005, 07:14 PM

You know, I used to feel awkward criticizing Moses, since though a murderer, he was a Hebrew, not a German. (When the alleged Moses existed, the Germans still worshipped Odin, right? Had Odinism begun by 1300 BCE?) However, I have since come to feel disdain for the Orthodox and Conservative Jews, who based on the antics of Ariel Sharon, Meir Kahane, Doctor Goldstein, and Yigal Amir I can heartily say do not contribute to liberalism. So I care less what happens to them.

http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.co...democracy.html

Num.16:1-35 "Now Korah...and Dathan and Abiram...and On...rose up before Moses, with...250 princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown: And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the LORD is among them: wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the LORD?...And the LORD spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment...And it came to pass...that the ground clave asunder that was under them: And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and ... they, and all that appertained to them, went down alive

By contributing to illiberalism, these conservative Judahites will only bring about their own demise, as conservatism breeds more conservatism, and envetually those Dixieland troublemakers will get the notion to get rid of Judahites violently.

Now, liberal Judahites will bring about the extinction of Judaism anyway as the vile legendary Moses' race laws were created to keep people from mixing, and in tolerant societies (especially largely agnostic ones such as Sweden) people mix quickly. The liberal Judahites, having abandoned largely Moses' race laws, will have little to demarcate themselves.

countjulian · 11-18-2005, 08:35 PM

Why worry so much about the Isaac incident? After all, Abraham let he go. Besides, a much better demonstration lies in Judges 11:30-39:

2 Jephthah made a vow to the LORD. "If you deliver the Ammonites into my power," he said,
31
"whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites shall belong to the LORD. I shall offer him up as a holocaust."
32
Jephthah then went on to the Ammonites to fight against them, and the LORD delivered them into his power,
33
so that he inflicted a severe defeat on them, from Aroer to the approach of Minnith (twenty cities in all) and as far as Abel-keramin. Thus were the Ammonites brought into subjection by the Israelites.
34
When Jephthah returned to his house in Mizpah, it was his daughter who came forth, playing the tambourines and dancing. She was an only child: he had neither son nor daughter besides her.
35
When he saw her, he rent his garments and said, "Alas, daughter, you have struck me down and brought calamity upon me. For I have made a vow to the LORD and I cannot retract."
36
"Father," she replied, "you have made a vow to the LORD. Do with me as you have vowed, because the LORD has wrought vengeance for you on your enemies the Ammonites."
37
3 Then she said to her father, "Let me have this favor. Spare me for two months, that I may go off down the mountains to mourn my virginity with my companions."
38
"Go," he replied, and sent her away for two months. So she departed with her companions and mourned her virginity on the mountains.
39
At the end of the two months she returned to her father, who did to her as he had vowed. She had not been intimate with man.

Praise the Lord! I wonder how many pious Christians and Jews over the centuries have followed Jephthah's example? Even those who did not sacrifice their daughters, I would say, follow Jephthah in the spirit of ther thoughts and actions.

Anat · 11-18-2005, 11:59 PM

countjulian, in Jewish tradition Jephtah is considered to have been foolish for making his vow. His story serves to teach the lesson that such conditional vows should be avoided. The Yom Kippur prayer service starts with 'kol nidrei' which is a request to absolve vows.

countjulian · 11-19-2005, 06:08 AM

Quote:

countjulian, in Jewish tradition Jephtah is considered to have been foolish for making his vow. His story serves to teach the lesson that such conditional vows should be avoided. The Yom Kippur prayer service starts with 'kol nidrei' which is a request to absolve vows.

Later accretions. This is merely a way that later people rationalized what he had done. The myth itself is clearly stolen from Greek mythology, where Agamemnon sacrifices his own virgin daughter.The best rendition, IMHO, of it is in Lucretius, although the myth itself is attested far before him. In fact, I think perhaps his eulogy to the sacrificed virgin might be adaptable to our case:

Religion mothers crime and wickedness,
Recall at once how Jephthah, when the Israelites
Those chosen by peers, the very first of men
Defiled, with a girl's blood, the altar-stone
Sacred to Yahweh. The princess stood
Wearing a sacred fillet or a veil,
And sensed but could not see the king her father,
Jephthah, standing sorrowful
Beside the altar, and the priests near-by
Hiding the knife-blade, and the folk in tears
At what they saw. She knelt, she spoke no word,
She was afraid, poor thing. Much good it did her
At such a time to have been the very first
To give the king that other title, Father!
Raised by men's hands and trembling she was led
Toward the altar, not to join in song
After the ritual of sacrifice
To the bright god of war. No; she fell
A victim of sacrificing stroke
Her father gave, to shed her virgin blood-
Not the way virgins shed it- but in death,
To bring the army a happy victory!
A mighty counselor Religion stood
With all that power for wickedness.

-Adapted from De Rerum Natura, Humphries translation, page 22 top.

Enda80 · 11-19-2005, 04:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eldarion Lathria

The source is De Squalor Bibliam by Stephanus. It is also referred to in Gerson's Auferabilitate Ecclesia ad Papam It is entered into evidence at the trial of Yahweh for war crimes on Mount Olympus.

Eldarion Lathria

Actually those Olympian deities were not very moral either.

John A. Broussard · 11-21-2005, 08:01 AM

Since the defenders of Moses seem to have given up in this thread, is it now safe to assert categorically that he was indeed a baby killer?

countjulian · 11-21-2005, 12:42 PM

Quote:

Since the defenders of Moses seem to have given up in this thread, is it now safe to assert categorically that he was indeed a baby killer?

And no one bothered to defend God for accepting Jephthah's human sacrifice (or for accepting the deal in the first place- he knew what would happen), or even saying that the sacrifice was unnacceptable.

We win!

:notworthy :notworthy :notworthy :notworthy :notworthy

Eldarion Lathria · 11-23-2005, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Enda80

Actually those Olympian deities were not very moral either.

Olympus is the merely venue for the trial.

Eldarion Lathria

Equinox · 11-23-2005, 08:43 AM

countjulian Quote:

Quote:

Since the defenders of Moses seem to have given up in this thread, is it now safe to assert categorically that he was indeed a baby killer?

And no one bothered to defend God for accepting Jephthah's human sacrifice (or for accepting the deal in the first place- he knew what would happen), or even saying that the sacrifice was unnacceptable.

We win!

'Looks like it.

I find these dramatizations to help make the barbary of such stories more clear. Here is a very short one I wrote about Deut 13: 6-12

You've got to be kidding. Think about it, a brother (say, Abib) hears about a cool activity, and mentions it to his sister (Ashar). Their father finds out, and Abib must be publicly stoned to death, starting with a rock thrown by Ashar. Ashar cries, but the mob brings them to the town square. They make her throw the first rock. It hits Abib on the shoulder. Then the mob starts throwing rocks. A large rock hits Abib's forearm as he tries to shield himself from the pelting, sharp rocks. More rocks, thrown hard.... Abib's face is bleeding, he is sobbing for mercy. He falls to the ground, pitifully trying to shield his head. Bleeding from many places, he convulses and shrieks, begging for them to stop, then finally lays still. Imagine being Ashar, living with this final, bloody image of your brother for the rest of your life. Or imagine being Abib - and not having the rest of a life to live with anything.......

Maybe it would be good to start a Wiki or central store of these? It would be useful not to have to write a whole new one for each part of the Bible each time the stories came up. It could go next to the errancy wiki.

-Equinox

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

11-18-2005, 07:14 PM	#462
Enda80 Regular Member Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Boston Posts: 190	You know, I used to feel awkward criticizing Moses, since though a murderer, he was a Hebrew, not a German. (When the alleged Moses existed, the Germans still worshipped Odin, right? Had Odinism begun by 1300 BCE?) However, I have since come to feel disdain for the Orthodox and Conservative Jews, who based on the antics of Ariel Sharon, Meir Kahane, Doctor Goldstein, and Yigal Amir I can heartily say do not contribute to liberalism. So I care less what happens to them. http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.co...democracy.html Num.16:1-35 "Now Korah...and Dathan and Abiram...and On...rose up before Moses, with...250 princes of the assembly, famous in the congregation, men of renown: And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the LORD is among them: wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the LORD?...And the LORD spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment...And it came to pass...that the ground clave asunder that was under them: And the earth opened her mouth, and swallowed them up, and ... they, and all that appertained to them, went down alive By contributing to illiberalism, these conservative Judahites will only bring about their own demise, as conservatism breeds more conservatism, and envetually those Dixieland troublemakers will get the notion to get rid of Judahites violently. Now, liberal Judahites will bring about the extinction of Judaism anyway as the vile legendary Moses' race laws were created to keep people from mixing, and in tolerant societies (especially largely agnostic ones such as Sweden) people mix quickly. The liberal Judahites, having abandoned largely Moses' race laws, will have little to demarcate themselves.

11-18-2005, 08:35 PM	#463
countjulian Veteran Member Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: In the torture chambers of Pinochet's Chile Posts: 2,112	Why worry so much about the Isaac incident? After all, Abraham let he go. Besides, a much better demonstration lies in Judges 11:30-39: 2 Jephthah made a vow to the LORD. "If you deliver the Ammonites into my power," he said, 31 "whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites shall belong to the LORD. *I shall offer him* up as a holocaust." 32 Jephthah then went on to the Ammonites to fight against them, and the LORD delivered them into his power, 33 so that he inflicted a severe defeat on them, from Aroer to the approach of Minnith (twenty cities in all) and as far as Abel-keramin. Thus were the Ammonites brought into subjection by the Israelites. 34 When Jephthah returned to his house in Mizpah, it was his daughter who came forth, playing the tambourines and dancing. She was an only child: he had neither son nor daughter besides her. 35 When he saw her, he rent his garments and said, "Alas, daughter, you have struck me down and brought calamity upon me. For I have made a vow to the LORD and I cannot retract." 36 "Father," she replied, "you have made a vow to the LORD. Do with me as you have vowed, because the LORD has wrought vengeance for you on your enemies the Ammonites." 37 3 Then she said to her father, "Let me have this favor. Spare me for two months, that I may go off down the mountains to mourn my virginity with my companions." 38 "Go," he replied, and sent her away for two months. So she departed with her companions and mourned her virginity on the mountains. 39 At the end of the two months she returned to her father, who did to her as he had vowed.** She had not been intimate with man. Praise the Lord! I wonder how many pious Christians and Jews over the centuries have followed Jephthah's example? Even those who did not sacrifice their daughters, I would say, follow Jephthah in the spirit of ther thoughts and actions.

11-18-2005, 11:59 PM	#464
Anat Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: home Posts: 3,715	countjulian, in Jewish tradition Jephtah is considered to have been foolish for making his vow. His story serves to teach the lesson that such conditional vows should be avoided. The Yom Kippur prayer service starts with 'kol nidrei' which is a request to absolve vows.

11-21-2005, 08:01 AM	#467
John A. Broussard Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Hawaii Posts: 6,629	Since the defenders of Moses seem to have given up in this thread, is it now safe to assert categorically that he was indeed a baby killer?

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.