by william draper 75 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Kill Fortunetellers
A man or a woman who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning; they have no one but themselves to blame for their death. (Leviticus 20:27 NAB)
Unless you are one of their fortune tellers / prophets - then you have to do exactly as they say.
Good list! :thumbsup:
Here's some more delightful moral social standards by the once active Hebrews.
Kill Sons of Sinners
Make ready to slaughter his sons for the guilt of their fathers; Lest they rise and posses the earth, and fill the breadth of the world with tyrants. (Isaiah 14:21 NAB)
God Will Kill Children
The glory of Israel will fly away like a bird, for your children will die at birth or perish in the womb or never even be conceived. Even if your children do survive to grow up, I will take them from you. It will be a terrible day when I turn away and leave you alone. I have watched Israel become as beautiful and pleasant as Tyre. But now Israel will bring out her children to be slaughtered." O LORD, what should I request for your people? I will ask for wombs that don't give birth and breasts that give no milk. The LORD says, "All their wickedness began at Gilgal; there I began to hate them. I will drive them from my land because of their evil actions. I will love them no more because all their leaders are rebels. The people of Israel are stricken. Their roots are dried up; they will bear no more fruit. And if they give birth, I will slaughter their beloved children." (Hosea 9:11-16 NLT)
Kill Men, Women, and Children
"Then I heard the LORD say to the other men, "Follow him through the city and kill everyone whose forehead is not marked. Show no mercy; have no pity! Kill them all – old and young, girls and women and little children. But do not touch anyone with the mark. Begin your task right here at the Temple." So they began by killing the seventy leaders. "Defile the Temple!" the LORD commanded. "Fill its courtyards with the bodies of those you kill! Go!" So they went throughout the city and did as they were told." (Ezekiel 9:5-7 NLT)
God Kills all the First Born of Egypt
And at midnight the LORD killed all the firstborn sons in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn son of the captive in the dungeon. Even the firstborn of their livestock were killed. Pharaoh and his officials and all the people of Egypt woke up during the night, and loud wailing was heard throughout the land of Egypt. There was not a single house where someone had not died. (Exodus 12:29-30 NLT)
Kill Old Men and Young Women
"You are my battle-ax and sword," says the LORD. "With you I will shatter nations and destroy many kingdoms. With you I will shatter armies, destroying the horse and rider, the chariot and charioteer. With you I will shatter men and women, old people and children, young men and maidens. With you I will shatter shepherds and flocks, farmers and oxen, captains and rulers. "As you watch, I will repay Babylon and the people of Babylonia for all the wrong they have done to my people in Jerusalem," says the LORD. "Look, O mighty mountain, destroyer of the earth! I am your enemy," says the LORD. "I will raise my fist against you, to roll you down from the heights. When I am finished, you will be nothing but a heap of rubble. You will be desolate forever. Even your stones will never again be used for building. You will be completely wiped out," says the LORD. (Jeremiah 51:20-26)
(Note that after God promises the Israelites a victory against Babylon, the Israelites actually get their butts kicked by them in the next chapter. So much for an all-knowing and all-powerful God.)
God Will Kill the Children of Sinners
If even then you remain hostile toward me and refuse to obey, I will inflict you with seven more disasters for your sins. I will release wild animals that will kill your children and destroy your cattle, so your numbers will dwindle and your roads will be deserted. (Leviticus 26:21-22 NLT)
More Rape and Baby Killing
Anyone who is captured will be run through with a sword. Their little children will be dashed to death right before their eyes. Their homes will be sacked and their wives raped by the attacking hordes. For I will stir up the Medes against Babylon, and no amount of silver or gold will buy them off. The attacking armies will shoot down the young people with arrows. They will have no mercy on helpless babies and will show no compassion for the children. (Isaiah 13:15-18 NLT)
More of Samson's Murders
(The Lord saves Sampson from standing trial for 30 murders and arson by allowing him to kill 1000 more men.) When he reached Lehi, and the Philistines came shouting to meet him, the spirit of the Lord came upon him: the ropes around his arms become as flax that is consumed by fire and the bonds melted away from his hands. Near him was the fresh jawbone of an ass; he reached out, grasped it, and with it killed a thousand men. (Judges 15:14-15 NAB)
Peter Kills Two People
There was also a man named Ananias who, with his wife, Sapphira, sold some property. He brought part of the money to the apostles, but he claimed it was the full amount. His wife had agreed to this deception. Then Peter said, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart? You lied to the Holy Spirit, and you kept some of the money for yourself. The property was yours to sell or not sell, as you wished. And after selling it, the money was yours to give away. How could you do a thing like this? You weren't lying to us but to God." As soon as Ananias heard these words, he fell to the floor and died. Everyone who heard about it was terrified. Then some young men wrapped him in a sheet and took him out and buried him. About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. Peter asked her, "Was this the price you and your husband received for your land?" "Yes," she replied, "that was the price." And Peter said, "How could the two of you even think of doing a thing like this – conspiring together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Just outside that door are the young men who buried your husband, and they will carry you out, too." Instantly, she fell to the floor and died. When the young men came in and saw that she was dead, they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. Great fear gripped the entire church and all others who heard what had happened. (Acts 5:1-11 NLT)
Mass Murder
This is what the Lord of hosts has to say: 'I will punish what Amalek did to Israel when he barred his way as he was coming up from Egypt. Go, now, attack Amalek, and deal with him and all that he has under the ban. Do not spare him, but kill men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and asses.' (1 Samuel 15:2-3 NAB)
You Have to Kill
Cursed be he who does the Lords work remissly, cursed he who holds back his sword from blood. (Jeremiah 48:10 NAB)
The Danites Kill the Next Town
But the territory of the Danites was too small for them; so the Danites marched up and attacked Leshem, which they captured and put to the sword. Once they had taken possession of Lesham, they renamed the settlement after their ancestor Dan. (Joshua 19:47 NAB)
God Kills Some More
Then the LORD said to me, "Even if Moses and Samuel stood before me pleading for these people, I wouldn't help them. Away with them! Get them out of my sight! And if they say to you, 'But where can we go?' tell them, 'This is what the LORD says: Those who are destined for death, to death; those who are destined for war, to war; those who are destined for famine, to famine; those who are destined for captivity, to captivity.' "I will send four kinds of destroyers against them," says the LORD. "I will send the sword to kill, the dogs to drag away, the vultures to devour, and the wild animals to finish up what is left. Because of the wicked things Manasseh son of Hezekiah, king of Judah, did in Jerusalem, I will make my people an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth." (Jeremiah 15:1-4 NLT)
God Promises More Killing
I will make Mount Seir utterly desolate, killing off all who try to escape and any who return. I will fill your mountains with the dead. Your hills, your valleys, and your streams will be filled with people slaughtered by the sword. I will make you desolate forever. Your cities will never be rebuilt. Then you will know that I am the LORD. (Ezekiel 35:7-9 NLT)
The Angel of Death
My angel will go before you and bring you to the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, and Jebusites; and I will wipe them out. (Exodus 23:23 NAB)
Destruction of Ai
Then the LORD said to Joshua, "Do not be afraid or discouraged. Take the entire army and attack Ai, for I have given to you the king of Ai, his people, his city, and his land. You will destroy them as you destroyed Jericho and its king. But this time you may keep the captured goods and the cattle for yourselves. Set an ambush behind the city." So Joshua and the army of Israel set out to attack Ai. Joshua chose thirty thousand fighting men and sent them out at night with these orders: "Hide in ambush close behind the city and be ready for action. When our main army attacks, the men of Ai will come out to fight as they did before, and we will run away from them. We will let them chase us until they have all left the city. For they will say, 'The Israelites are running away from us as they did before.' Then you will jump up from your ambush and take possession of the city, for the LORD your God will give it to you. Set the city on fire, as the LORD has commanded. You have your orders." So they left that night and lay in ambush between Bethel and the west side of Ai. But Joshua remained among the people in the camp that night.
Early the next morning Joshua roused his men and started toward Ai, accompanied by the leaders of Israel. They camped on the north side of Ai, with a valley between them and the city. That night Joshua sent five thousand men to lie in ambush between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of the city. So they stationed the main army north of the city and the ambush west of the city. Joshua himself spent that night in the valley. When the king of Ai saw the Israelites across the valley, he and all his army hurriedly went out early the next morning and attacked the Israelites at a place overlooking the Jordan Valley. But he didn't realize there was an ambush behind the city. Joshua and the Israelite army fled toward the wilderness as though they were badly beaten, and all the men in the city were called out to chase after them. In this way, they were lured away from the city. There was not a man left in Ai or Bethel who did not chase after the Israelites, and the city was left wide open.
Then the LORD said to Joshua, "Point your spear toward Ai, for I will give you the city." Joshua did as he was commanded. As soon as Joshua gave the signal, the men in ambush jumped up and poured into the city. They quickly captured it and set it on fire. When the men of Ai looked behind them, smoke from the city was filling the sky, and they had nowhere to go. For the Israelites who had fled in the direction of the wilderness now turned on their pursuers. When Joshua and the other Israelites saw that the ambush had succeeded and that smoke was rising from the city, they turned and attacked the men of Ai. Then the Israelites who were inside the city came out and started killing the enemy from the rear. So the men of Ai were caught in a trap, and all of them died. Not a single person survived or escaped. Only the king of Ai was taken alive and brought to Joshua.
When the Israelite army finished killing all the men outside the city, they went back and finished off everyone inside. So the entire population of Ai was wiped out that day – twelve thousand in all. For Joshua kept holding out his spear until everyone who had lived in Ai was completely destroyed. Only the cattle and the treasures of the city were not destroyed, for the Israelites kept these for themselves, as the LORD had commanded Joshua. So Ai became a permanent mound of ruins, desolate to this very day. Joshua hung the king of Ai on a tree and left him there until evening. At sunset the Israelites took down the body and threw it in front of the city gate. They piled a great heap of stones over him that can still be seen today. (Joshua 8:1-29 NLT)
Killing at Jericho
When the people heard the sound of the horns, they shouted as loud as they could. Suddenly, the walls of Jericho collapsed, and the Israelites charged straight into the city from every side and captured it. They completely destroyed everything in it – men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep, donkeys – everything. (Joshua 6:20-21 NLT)
God Kills an Extended Family
"You have done more evil than all who lived before you. You have made other gods and have made me furious with your gold calves. And since you have turned your back on me, I will bring disaster on your dynasty and kill all your sons, slave or free alike. I will burn up your royal dynasty as one burns up trash until it is all gone. I, the LORD, vow that the members of your family who die in the city will be eaten by dogs, and those who die in the field will be eaten by vultures.'" Then Ahijah said to Jeroboam's wife, "Go on home, and when you enter the city, the child will die. All Israel will mourn for him and bury him. He is the only member of your family who will have a proper burial, for this child is the only good thing that the LORD, the God of Israel, sees in the entire family of Jeroboam. And the LORD will raise up a king over Israel who will destroy the family of Jeroboam. This will happen today, even now! Then the LORD will shake Israel like a reed whipped about in a stream. He will uproot the people of Israel from this good land that he gave their ancestors and will scatter them beyond the Euphrates River, for they have angered the LORD by worshiping Asherah poles. He will abandon Israel because Jeroboam sinned and made all of Israel sin along with him." (1 Kings 14:9-16 NLT)
Mass Murder
The men of Israel withdrew through the territory of the Benjaminites, putting to the sword the inhabitants of the city, the livestock, and all they chanced upon. Moreover they destroyed by fire all the cities they came upon. (Judges 20:48 NAB)
The Angel of Death
That night the angel of the Lord went forth and struck down one hundred and eighty five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. Early the next morning, there they were, all the corpuses of the dead. (2 Kings 19:35 NAB)
Kill Your Neighbors
(Moses) stood at the entrance to the camp and shouted, "All of you who are on the LORD's side, come over here and join me." And all the Levites came. He told them, "This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Strap on your swords! Go back and forth from one end of the camp to the other, killing even your brothers, friends, and neighbors." The Levites obeyed Moses, and about three thousand people died that day. Then Moses told the Levites, "Today you have been ordained for the service of the LORD, for you obeyed him even though it meant killing your own sons and brothers. Because of this, he will now give you a great blessing." (Exodus 32:26-29 NLT)
Kill the Family of Sinners
And Joshua said to Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to the LORD God of Israel, and make confession to him; and tell me now what thou hast done, hide it not from me. And Achan answered Joshua, and said, Indeed I have sinned against the LORD God of Israel, and thus and thus have I done. When I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight, then I coveted them, and took them, and behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it." [Note that the sin is not looting, but failing to give the loot to the treasury of the Lord.] "So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent, and behold, it was hid in his tent, and the silver under it. And they took them from the midst of the tent, and brought them to Joshua, and to all the children of Israel, and laid them out before the LORD. And Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses, and his sheep, and his tent, and all that he had: and they brought them to the valley of Achor. And Joshua said, why hast thou troubled us? the LORD shall trouble thee this day. And all Israel stoned him with stones, and burned them with fire, after they had stoned them with stones. And they raised over him a great heap of stones to this day. So the LORD turned from the fierceness of his anger: wherefore the name of that place was called the valley of Achor to this day. (Joshua 7:19-26 Webster's Bible)
Kill Followers of Other Religions
While the Israelites were camped at Acacia, some of the men defiled themselves by sleeping with the local Moabite women. These women invited them to attend sacrifices to their gods, and soon the Israelites were feasting with them and worshiping the gods of Moab. Before long Israel was joining in the worship of Baal of Peor, causing the LORD's anger to blaze against his people. The LORD issued the following command to Moses: "Seize all the ringleaders and execute them before the LORD in broad daylight, so his fierce anger will turn away from the people of Israel." So Moses ordered Israel's judges to execute everyone who had joined in worshiping Baal of Peor. Just then one of the Israelite men brought a Midianite woman into the camp, right before the eyes of Moses and all the people, as they were weeping at the entrance of the Tabernacle. When Phinehas son of Eleazar and grandson of Aaron the priest saw this, he jumped up and left the assembly. Then he took a spear and rushed after the man into his tent. Phinehas thrust the spear all the way through the man's body and into the woman's stomach. So the plague against the Israelites was stopped, but not before 24,000 people had died. (Numbers 25:1-9 NLT)
Murder
At the customary time for offering the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet walked up to the altar and prayed, "O LORD, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, prove today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant. Prove that I have done all this at your command. O LORD, answer me! Answer me so these people will know that you, O LORD, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself." Immediately the fire of the LORD flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust. It even licked up all the water in the ditch! And when the people saw it, they fell on their faces and cried out, "The LORD is God! The LORD is God!" Then Elijah commanded, "Seize all the prophets of Baal. Don't let a single one escape!" So the people seized them all, and Elijah took them down to the Kishon Valley and killed them there. (1 Kings 18:36-40 NLT)
Kill All of Babylon
"Go up, my warriors, against the land of Merathaim and against the people of Pekod. Yes, march against Babylon, the land of rebels, a land that I will judge! Pursue, kill, and completely destroy them, as I have commanded you," says the LORD. "Let the battle cry be heard in the land, a shout of great destruction". (Jeremiah 50:21-22 NLT)
Micah Kills a Whole Town
Then, with Micah's idols and his priest, the men of Dan came to the town of Laish, whose people were peaceful and secure. They attacked and killed all the people and burned the town to the ground. There was no one to rescue the residents of the town, for they lived a great distance from Sidon and had no allies nearby. This happened in the valley near Beth-rehob.Then the people of the tribe of Dan rebuilt the town and lived there. They renamed the town Dan after their ancestor, Israel's son, but it had originally been called Laish. (Judges 18:27-29 NLT) (Note that God approves of this slaughter in verse 6.)
No William - you are the one pointing the finger. You started this post with an invitation to hear what we thought and you have consistently failed to even listen. Your comment about our pointing the finger at God is manipulative and exposes your agenda to use this as a platform to preach.
I agree with nicolaou's conclusion!
A typical tactic for Christian apologists is to cherry pick only the objectively good redeeming social values out of the bible and disregard all the not so good .
or cherry pick out only the Scriptures that they want to use themselves, as a means to vilifie support for their own idealogical endeavors.
......but still describe it as solemnly sacred words inspired by god.
YOU ARE NOT GOING TO QUESTION THE HAND OF GOD? How nice of you. The biggest point about questioning is allowing it to first see that such a God that allows these things is not worthy of worship and second to see that such a monster probably does not exist. It is the anecdotal evidence to combat personal revelations.
Whether God allows children born to parents worshipping the wrong deity to be killed for that or just put into a forced marriage to the very men who killed their parents (in the case of vigin girls) is disgusting either way.
The fact is that we know that God allows these things to happen ; which brings up another point , where do we find the best explanation as to why God allows these things to happen . I don't like this , but what can I do , what can we do , possibly as a people we are not doing enough of the right things , we allow so much corruption in our society , and then we look at God and say . . . we don't like what you do , and we are ourselves not doing right and making excuses for our selves .
william draper,
"...we allow so much corruption in our society , and then we look at God and say . . . we don't like what you do..."
Which simply means that we and our imagined god both have a problem. Isn't your god supposed to be perfect unlike us?
I am often perplexed by the way some non-Jews hold the Bible up as the source of truth or most perfect of books. While I don't think any person, theist or atheist, questions the sincerity of this type of belief, I as a Jew think it is quite misdirected and often destructive.
This is a book not of facts but of truths. It is a book of lessons, hard learned by my stubborn ancestors. It has stories about us constantly failing, proving unfaithful time and again, and stoning practically every prophet God sent to us.
We took these lessons and placed them in various narratives, sometimes poetry, other times mythology, mixed in parable and proverb, and often dressed them up dramatically for effect. But the end story has yet to be written. And this is probably what most religious people miss too often.
There is so much fighting in the Bible, so much hatred, so much argument, so much unnecessary killing. It is not by chance that such things litter the narrative of Scripture from its beginning to end, but it is often what believers ignore the most. These things are connected, very much connected.
It does nothing to love and honor the Bible more than the human who lives beside you. It doesn't matter if that human worships a hundred gods or none. If you can't learn to love your neighbor, sooner or later one of you is going to stab the other and blood will be shed. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the Bible is about people of various religions constantly at war and shedding blood...people who are religious. I don't recall seeing an atheist in the Bible doing these things.
It isn't religion or lack of religion that creates hatred. It isn't religion or lack of religion that distorts love. Humans have the capacity to blame and point the finger at everything and anybody else but themselves when it comes to the real problems in life. A book, no matter how sacred or its source will not and cannot solve our problems and bring us peace if we aren't willing to really bring those things to everybody, regardless of who that person is.
We, humans, distort all things. We distort religion, we distort atheism, we distort science, we distort one another. We are the distortion. We have the ability to continue down this path or stop ourselves, but we would rather not stop ourselves if this means admitting we are wrong. We'll do anything but that, and will even take another's life before we give up our pride whether we are religious or not.
The Bible is not the story of the chosen people of God being better than everyone else. It's about God choosing to love people who don't deserve it. It's a demonstration of how far God is willing to go to love even the good and faithful, let alone my people who have abandoned him many times throughout history.
The stories don't have to be fact-filled to be true. By considering that our own point of view is correct and that our neighbor's is automatically wrong when it does not align with our own shows we don't get the Bible at all. We are often what is the most false about the Bible, not its words.
The Bible is about God loving people who don't love him back. It's about God loving people who don't believe in him, who constantly run after ever other god imaginable but him, who don't deserve God's care and affection and love...but who get it anyway, because that's how loving God is.
If you constantly bring up points that aggravate your neighbor instead of loving them for who they are and where they are, then how is that bringing the Bible to them? Shouldn't we be imitating God by loving people who don't love you, who don't worship God, who don't believe in him or your views, loving them because God loves them regardless of what they think of him? If you can't do that, all the arguments you raise here to try to convince others about the Bible's value are moot.
The Bible is not true because of what's written on its pages. It's true when it makes others like the God in its pages. If you don't love the failures, the faithless, the haters, the hated...they won't believe in you.
People only believe in those they love. People only believe in things they choose to believe in. Belief is a choice. Why choose to believe in something when that something or someone doesn't show that they believe in you? I don't believe in the message of people who hate me or even do as little as show disrespect for my point of view. I don't believe others owe me any different if I treat them that way.
In my opinion, it shows great disrespect to people of other convictions, philosophies, creeds or lack thereof to constantly parade the Bible as something they are failing. I believe when believers do that, it is they, the believers who are truly failing the Bible.
Francis of Assisi stated that Christians should proclaim the Gospel at all times, and when it called for to use words. What he meant was that the Bible's message was not something you find in a page or can argue about on a forum like this. It's found in acts of love that believers perform willingly and to everyone, regardless of creed. If people are arguing back at you when you think you are championing the Bible, it might mean that they do not feel loved by what we are doing.
And if people don't feel loved by what we are doing to them, how is that recommending the Bible?
where do we find the best explanation as to why God allows these things to happen
Maybe its because no god ever existed but through are own desire, need and necessity..
Logically then blame shouldn't be pointed out to the gods we envision but are selves.
Perhaps then the weight of are existence might be simply within are own inherent capabilities and responsibility.
Until a supernatural creator shows up and fixes everything and wouldn't that be nice !
