'Mousetrails' and the dark side of the Old Testament

reply to post by TheAncientsKnew


Context dude, context.

Something taken out of context is actually a pretext.

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by TheAncientsKnew

 

Context dude, context.

Something taken out of context is actually a pretext.

Maybe... but sarcasm enlightens no one.

Originally posted by TheAncientsKnew

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by TheAncientsKnew

 

Context dude, context.

Something taken out of context is actually a pretext.

Maybe... but sarcasm enlightens no one.

Does illumination matter much to the blind in the grand scheme of things?

My agenda, as you put it, is to find out why the actions of this so-called 'God' in the Old Testament do not conform to the caring and loving deity which he is described as being by most, if not all, Christians. Oh, and also I'd like to become less ignorant through sharing in your boundless knowledge..........

Yes, I'm quoting passages that serve to highlight the points that I'm making. I'm not saying that there are no other passages in the Old Testament but I'm pointing out that there are numerous passages similar to the ones that I quote and then I quote them to show everyone the type of thing that I'm referring to.
Unless you want me to copy and paste the whole of the Old Testament and then highlight all the relevant areas then I feel that I'm justified in showing the ones I have. This is a fairly easily obtainable piece of source material, so I figure that referring to certain points may be the logical thing to do.

(I do find it funny, however, that I see cherry-picked bible quotations all the time which religious people see fit to add to posts, sometimes instead of actually commenting. I'm quite happy that I did my quoting in good faith - just for the sake of example)

Your 'Moby Dick' example was so off the mark to be merely humerous. At no point have I tried to trick or deceive anyone - I'm merely bringing in examples of what I'm saying.

Please do not try to talk down to me in an attempt to suggest that my points are based on subterfuge or lack of knowledge of the source material.

The simple point is that this 'God' was responsible for over 6.5 million human deaths in the Old Testament and the only explanations I have received for this thus far are:

a) they deserved it because they would not worship him as their only 'God'.
b) they deserved it because they didn't do what he told them to do.
c) the Old Testament is a story about an early barbaric humankind who were excusing their actions by saying it was God's will when in fact 'God' had nothing to do with it and wasn't involved in those 'brutal nasty bits' but was only involved in the nice 'creating the world bits'.
d) there was more than one 'God' in the Old Testament. The nice one who did the creating and all the nice, giving stuff and the nasty war 'God' who was responsible for all the killing and looting.

So what's it to be guys? If you truly believe that the Old Testament is true then does your 'God' fit into one of those four categories?

Originally posted by Lemon.Fresh

Originally posted by JonU2
. . .
This is just one example amongst numerous for gold and treasure as well as other specific demands such as: “You shall not delay the offering of your harvest and your press. You shall give me the firstborn of your sons. You must do the same with your oxen and your sheep;” (Exodus 22:28) and he made sure that his followers were aware that he must be paid constantly: “No one shall appear before me empty handed.” (Exodus 23:15)

Reading through the many passages where 'his beloved people' had to give their tithes to 'God' you see an amazing amount of money and gold being given to him. In the following passage think of how much this is: 'One beca apiece, that is, a half shekel apiece, was received from every man twenty years or more who entered the registered group; the number of these was six hundred and three thousand five hundred fifty men.' (Exodus 38:26)

Perhaps you should read up on why tithes were important.

I will give you a small hint. Tribe of Levi.

So, this all-powerful, omnipresent 'God of love' throughout the whole of the OT was demanding gold, silver, money, food, animals and even blood sacrifice

Material items were set apart.

from his followers for his protection,

The blood was not for protection. It was to cover the breakings of the law. The blood sacrifice was symbolism.

whilst ordering them to continue to massacre settlement after settlement to obtain more and more gold, silver, money, food, animals!!!!

The point of the massacres was not to amass wealth. You really do fail at understanding the Torah.

This doesn't sound like a God that is merely punishing people for not following him!!!

It doesn't sound like it, because you are being ignorant.

Why does this God need all these riches? Sounds like a modern-day tyrant to me - maybe he wasn't actually a God after all?

He doesn't need it. Perhaps instead of picking and choosing certain passages to suit your agenda, you should actually study the writings to get the whole story.

It is akin to taking the following excerpt from a book:

--"denoted the fond, throbbing trust, the loving alarms, with which the poor bride gave her bosom away."--

And saying that the book is obviously a Harlequin romance novel, and the author was a lustful sex maniac.

Well, damn. That excerpt is from Moby Dick.

Apologies, my last post was a reply to the above post from Lemon.Fresh

reply to post by JonU2


I say God is the ruler of the universe, not a carebear.

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
They were Hebrews, Abraham was the first "Hebrew" when he circumcised himself and all those in his camp. His son and grandson, and great grandson's were all monotheists. Idolatry and Paganism was a problem when the Jews were captive in Egypt.

They were polytheistic Canaanites, according to the Torah, which is a book edited for a thousand years since the first book for written (which was not Genesis 1). They worshipped one of many Canaanite gods. Idolatry and Paganism appeared long after the initial Exodus, even according to the Bible. There is no archaelogical evidence for mass slavery in Egypy, let alone the enslavement of a whole race. Of course there was some slavery though.

Originally posted by NOTurTypicalYeah, Jesus is not only the Most High God, He's the only true and living God.

Jesus, if he existed was not God. He never said he was God. The Council of Nicea was convened to discuss his divinity, at which time it was decided Jesus was divine. He has also been dead for 2,000 years.

Originally posted by NOTurTypicalNo thanks, I can find more creative and less time consuming ways to become ill-informed.

Understood. Which is why I don't debate Christians or Politicians. Nothing I say will change anyone's mind but it can be fun debating people purely on their own beliefs and merits. Nothing I've said is untrue, it all comes from the Torah. We need look know further to discover the real Truth.

Originally posted by NOTurTypical
reply to post by summer5

 

The bible claimed that if you had the faith of a mustard seed, and asked and believed, it would be yours. Well, I did, and it never happened.

God is not a genie in a bottle, Christ said if one had the faith of a mustard seed they could move/sway a mountain.

Your fail was in not realizing "mountain" is a Hebraism for "nation". You didn't learn Hebraisms and figurative literary devices when you studied Hebrew?

Very good point. Just shows how easy it is, and has been, to misinterpret the Bible and Jesus's teachings. Because he taught by allegory and parable his teachings (if they are his teachings) can be subverted, miscontrued and used to serve the idealogy of certain people and periods in history.

Originally posted by TheAncientsKnew
So- Just to clarify...reading other sources than the Bible will make you ill-informed? In fact, restricting your reading selection to one source inhibits your ability to make an unbiased and thoughful decision.....

Yep, you got it. Science is irrelevant.

Originally posted by trisvonbis
Stalin - Hitler - Pol Pot - Bush

One of these things is not like the others...

reply to post by Aphek


Pol Pot's real name was actually Saloth Sar so, yes, he is the only one with a pseudonym..............(BTW, Hitler was probably responsible for the least deaths of the four)

reply to post by JonU2


If anything this is just another example of just how evil, cunning & deceptive some human beings are. I personally don't believe in an interventionist God and religious texts are simply written by man and contain our worst deeds. Then again I may be wrong and we are being manipulated by something truly evil.

dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com...

Drunk With Blood: God's (Cough! Humans) Favourite Top 50 killings in the Bible.

1 God killed every first born Egyptian child Ex 12:29-30
2 God sent two bears to rip apart 42 boys for making fun of a prophet's bald head 2Kg 2:23-24
3 God killed 14,700 for complaining about his killings Num 16:49
4 The Amalekite genocide 1Sam 15:2-3
5 God killed 70,000 because David had a census that he (or Satan) inspired him to have 2Sam 24:15, 1Chr 21:14
6 God slowly killed David's baby boy to punish David for adultery 2Sam 12:14-18
7 Jephthah sacrifices his daughter to God as a burned offering (to pay him back for helping him slaughter 20 cities) Jg 11:39
8 The Flood of Noah Gen 7:23
9 When the people complained, God burned them to death Num 11:1
10 Sodom and Gomorrah Gen 19:24
11 God killed 50,070 for looking into the ark of the Lord 1Sam 6:19
12 God and Satan kill Job's children in a bet Job 1:18-19
13 The opposing party is buried alive (with their families) Num 16:27
14 Jeroboam's son: God kills another child 1Kg 14:17
15 Elijah kills 450 religious leaders in a prayer contest 1Kg 18.22-40
16 God killed one million Ethiopians 2Chr 14:9-14
17 The Midianite Massacre: Have you saved the women alive? Num 31:1-35
18 Onan for spilling his seed Gen 38:10
19 The massacre of the peaceful, unsuspecting people Jg 18.27
20 Who is on the Lord's side? (Family and friends are forced to kill each other because of Aaron's golden calf) Ex 32:27-28
21 God made Jehoram's bowels fall out 2Chr 21:14-19
22 David killed 200 Philistines for their foreskins (to buy his first wife) 1Sam 18.27
23 Phinehas' double murder stops God's plague (after 14,000 were killed) Num 25:1-11
24 God burns Aaron's sons to death for offering him "strange fire" Lev 10:1-3
25 God sent snakes to bite people for complaining Num 21:6
26 God commands a blasphemer to be stoned to death Lev 24:10-23
27 God burned to death 102 men for asking Elijah to come down from his hill 2Kg 1:10-12
28 Herod was eaten by worms for not giving God the glory Acts 12:23
29 God sent a lion to kill a man for not smiting a prophet 1Kg 20:35-36
30 God smote them with hemorrhoids in their secret parts 1Sam 5:1-12
31 God sent lions to eat those that don't fear him enough 2Kg 17:25-26
32 An angel killed 185,000 sleeping soldiers 2Kg 19:34, Is 37:36
33 250 are burned to death for burning incense Num 16:35
34 Achan and his family are stoned and burned to death Jos 7:10-12, 24-26
35 Ananias and Sapphira were killed by God for not giving Peter all their money Acts 5:1-10
36 God kills Ezekiel's wife and tells him not to mourn her death Ezek 24:15-18
37 God killed Uzzah for trying to keep the ark from falling 2Sam 6:6-7, 1Chr 13:9-10
38 Samson kills 3000 in a suicide terrorist attack Jg 16:27-30
39 Ehud delivers a message from God: A knife blade into a fat man's belly Jg 3:15-22
40 A man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day Num 15:32-35
41 Seventy heads in two heaps 2Kg 10:6-10
42 Samson murders 30 men for their clothes Jg 14:19
43 Jehu assembles the followers of Baal and then slaughters them all 2Kg 10.18-25
44 God killed Nabal (and David got his wife and other stuff) 1Sam 25:38
45 Samson kills 1000 men with the jawbone of an ass Jg 15:14-15
46 A holy civil war (called by rotting concubine body part messages) Jg 20:35-37
47 Jeroboam's family: God kills a family 1Kg 15:29
48 God stops the sun so Joshua can kill in the daylight Jos 10:10-11
49 Baasha's family and friends: God kills another family 1Kg 16:11-12
50 A tale of two prophets 1Kg 13:11-24

dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com...

dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com...

Who has killed more, Satan or God? The answer is God 2,476,633 & Satan 10.

dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com...

Most religious texts are plagiarized from other sources or texts and even the Bible itself is very much plagiarized from other sources. Therefore no one should automatically assume that these texts & their meanings are genuine & authentic.

Maybe there really was a benevolent God or Gods and it's probably human beings that took the words of this God and twisted them out of context to make God sound as evil as human beings. Humanity's motto: As below, so above.

reply to post by JonU2


the same reason atheists and such only focus their efforts on fundamentalists and crazies,
instead of listeting to the message.

reply to post by kindred


Thank you for posting but I feel your list misses a lot of the cities, villages and towns where 'God' led the Israelites to slaughter the innocent.

The total exceeds 6.5 million by far but I'm happy that 6.5 million represents an horrendous number already.

I label them innocent above because I don't feel that the Old Testament actually explains any reason (is there one, really?) that they had to be all massacred.

Again, thanks for the list.

reply to post by psyop911


What is the message in slaughtering 6.5 million people? Could it be: "Don't f*ck with me!"?

reply to post by JonU2


I've studied most religions and I don't believe for one moment that any of them are authentic. The true teachings and meanings are more or less completely lost. They have been rewritten and plagiarized more times than I've had hot dinners. These texts were written by humans and are just another reminder of how barbaric human beings are. I very much doubt any of these deaths had anything to do with a God.

reply to post by kindred


So, you've decided which God you believe in? Isn't that another human decision?

I apologise, I missed the 'a God' and read it as 'God'. Please ignore my questions unless you feel like answering.

reply to post by traditionaldrummer


True, but then human beings are even more abhorrent for carrying out his orders.

If God suddenly appeared to you in a cloud of smoke and told you to massacre everyone in your neighbourhood. Would you?

I sincerely hope not, but you can't say the same about human beings in ancient times. These evil butchers were only too happy to carry out the orders of their God and were probably only too happy to use God as an excuse. That's probably closer to the truth. Mankind knows no bounds when it comes to butchery. We certainly don't need any help from a God.

reply to post by kindred


Yes, I certainly agree with regards to humanity. I guess my main thrust is to find out why people have a need to believe in a loving and caring deity.

There is certainly no evidence of one when you look at the world now and it's history. The amount of people who pray more than once daily can explain the amount of 'prayers answered' that actually occurs.......

I just think that it's a weakness in humankind that a lot of people need to have the nice, warm feeling of a benevolent God who is looking after them - and that is what is being preyed upon by the majority of religions.

reply to post by JonU2


I'm not really sure at what you are trying to say, but personally I don't believe in a interventionist God, only the God within and what I stand for as a human being. In regards to my own well being, Yes I make all the decisions.