Why does god kill children? (page 15)

tec

Goodnight Humbled! I don't know anything about the bad day that you are having, but I hope that things are better for you soon, and wish you both love and peace, as Christ gives these.

Your sister and fellow servant in Christ,

tammy

EntirelyPossible

You are not correct on this, EP. The Slaughter of the animal was one action-- the slashing and the blood.

Indeed I am.

Perhaps the best-known class of offerings is the burnt offering. It was the oldest and commonest sacrifice, and represented submission to G-d's will. The Hebrew word for burnt offering is olah, from the root Ayin-Lamed-Hei, meaning ascension.

Or...

These were wholly animal, and thevictims were wholly consumed . They might be from the herd or the flock, or in cases of poverty birds might be substituted. The offerings acceptable were: (a) young bullocks; (b) rams or goats of the first year; (c) turtle-doves or young pigeons. These animals were to be free from all disease or blemish. They were to be brought to the door of the tabernacle, and the offerer was to kill them on the north side of the altar (if a burnt offering), except in the public sacrifices, when the priest put the victims to death, being assisted on occasion by the Levites (II Chron. xxix. 34). The blood was then sprinkled around the altar. The victim, if a large animal, was flayed and divided; the pieces being placed above the wood on the altar, the skin only being left to the priest.

Olah, which God commanded Abraham to do with Issac, meant something was going to die for God.

But if you, like them, would rather have the story go that the Monster Son-of-a-Bitch told Abe to do Isaac kosher, go ahead.

The story is what it is.

I don't trust the bible either, EP. So we are left to argue our prejudices, perhaps. Because you argue using it, too.

I find it interesting that the same people that say they don't trust it go to great lengths to explain why it doesn't say what it plainly says.

cofty

So how do you completely burn your son in fire without killing him?

That would be a good trick.

AndDontCallMeShirley

tec:

Want to know God? Look at Christ.

So very simple.

Yes, there is a difference between Christ and God

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It's "so very simple", but you can't even agree with yourself, tec.

AndDontCallMeShirley

humbled:

Respectfully, the scripture doesn't say "Kill your son" the story has God saying " offer your son as a burnt offering" to Abraham.

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So the knife that Abraham had in his hand, you know, the one he was about to plunge into Isaac's chest and the angel stopped him, that was just part of the joke?

You're arguing semantics and nonsense. And, you're using the same idiotic "get out of jail free" excuse that a couple other fundamentalists here are trying to use, namely, that the Bible story was changed and things didn't really happen like the Bible depicts. You cannot accept the BIble account as written because you know if you do any arguments you make after that go right out the window.

Critics of the Bible and Christianity have a pretty easy job- all they have to do is let a Christian ramble on. It doesn't take long for the Christian to completely undermine their entire foundation of belief by discounting virtually everything their holy book says. It's quite laughable.

Comatose

I respect the more practical arguments Humbled makes, but I fail to see how offering his son up as a test can be explained? Whether its with a cutting chopping meaning or a burning meaning, it's still a sacrifice. Why does god always feel the need to test humans in some crazy way? The Garden of Eden had a tree made specially to test out people who were perfect in gods image and should have been unable to do bad. Then Abraham gets his test. It's always like this with the bible and god.

yourmomma

The "god" of text is the projection of those who were sociopaths...

I think this is brilliant because its so simple but basicly what I have come to believe. I remember I studied the new testament, and came away still a christian. But I felt that to be fair, I had to study the OT just as deeply. So I did, and I think I got until Joshua before realizing what Terry posted above. I mean, not exactly what Terry posted, but one observatio is its clear that the OT was written by a group of men who were trying to make their God look like the baddest mofo on the block!

And then when you break it down deeper, you can clearly see that the God of the OT is not a "god of love", he makes Hitler look like Ghandi. And none of the defenses christians come up with for these deeply disturbing passages make sense and many times just make them look foolish or cold blooded.

AndDontCallMeShirley

but I fail to see how offering his son up as a test can be explained?

I agree, comatose.

Christians look at the account of Abraham being told to offer up Isaac as a sacrifice and say, "oh, what a wonderful example of putting faith in god and doing what you're told." (In fact, Michelle made that very argument). Christians find it admirable that Abraham was able to nullify his own conscience to do an immoral thing (also argued by Michelle).

The question the Christian never asks is, "what kind of god would tell a person to do such a thing?"

The second question Christians never ask is, "if the account is true, why would I want to serve a monster god like that?"

If there's some kind of positive moral lesson in that story, I fail to see it.

humbled:

But in the interest of accuracy ir must be said that God never commanded Abraham to kill and burn his son.

I disagree. The Bible account uses the words "sacrifice" and "burnt offering". Also, if no sacrifice/killing was intended, why the knife? and, why was Isaac tied up as the one intended to be the victim? There's no indication in the account that Abraham didn't think he was supposed to kill his son. If it was merely symbolic as humbled claims, then it wasn't a test at all, so any "positive" lessons a person is supposed to draw from the story also fall by the wayside.

At best, the account exposes god as a sick practical joker, not a god of love.

AndDontCallMeShirley

And none of the defenses christians come up with for these deeply disturbing passages make sense and many times just make them look foolish or cold blooded.

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And this is precisely why they come up with a list of absurd rationalizations to excuse the stories.

Many such absurdites have been said on this very thread.

Christians cannot make the stories moral as-written, so they are forced to come up with various fictions to get the story to jibe with normal moral sensibilities.

Yan Bibiyan

I have a different question...

If all those atrocities and "misinterpretations" were made some 4,000 years ago reading the same (then much more accurate book), why use the same, much more erroneous, book today?

I mean, if they got it wrong, when god spoke to them directly and the ink was fresh, what about us now?

Why does god kill children?

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