BTW - what the hell is this doing in a book for children anyway?
Good question. One of my daughters used to ask for the story, "Cut the baby in half"
Now there's a child-friendly tale if there ever was one.
A "My Book of Bible Stories" tale that I've always hated
by JimmyPage 72 Replies latest jw friends
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WTWizard
This was a set-up, either way. Jehovah set this up by creating the problem in the battle, and then wouldn't turn it in his favor until this promise was made. And then that Almighty Lowlife Scumbag set it up so his daughter would be the one to be offered to the temple.
Since when does that Almighty Lowlife Scumbag have the right to set anyone up for a lifetime of celibacy? Regardless of whether it's by intimidating people to making promises like this or setting one aside to prevent getting His own hands dirty on plunging the whole world into the Second Dark Ages, Jehovah had no right to do this. I would like to offer Jehovah up to myself as a sacrifice to myself, making Him suffer immensely, and thereby putting the source of society's irrationality and "everything you do is what someone else tells you to" rulers out of business in the process. Then religions like the Washtowel Babble and Crap Slaveholdery that like to further twist the message would not have anything to stand on.
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Edington
When I first saw this book after it's release, I thought there were way too many illustrations depicting anger & violence.
Totally unsuitable pictures for a young child's mind to dwell on as mummy or daddy reads the 'nice' bible stories.
Glad I now know I'm not alone in this view.
Ed
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Narkissos
Muchas gracias BTS :)
Human sacrifice is just one (exceptional, actually) feature of the older Israelite religion which the Torah condemns and excludes retrospectively. Similarly it promotes the exclusive worship of one god in one temple through one priesthood, a very unrealistic system at least down to the fall of the Northern (Samaritan) kingdom, which is both the central message of Deuteronomy (formally reminiscent of 8th-7th century BC Assyrian treaties, where Yhwh is the suzerain who exacts exclusive allegiance from his vassal people) and the agenda of Josiah's reform in Judah, explained by the "finding" (inventio)of a mysterious scroll in the royal temple of Jerusalem in 2 Kings 22--23. It is pretty difficult not to connect the dots. Backdating the Torah to "Moses" provides the leitmotiv of the so-called "Deuteronomistic" historiography, which cannot erase the collective memories of the older religion but portrays them as consistently as possible (overlooking a few "seams" nonetheless) as deviations from a pre-set standard: local sanctuaries ("high places") and priesthoods, worship of Baal, Asherah, priestly divination, necromancy, temple prostitution, worship of Baal, Asherah, bull ("calf") representations of El and/or Yhwh, ophic cults (Nechushtan) and so on, all of this is now "apostasy". History (re-)written under "new light" or "progressive revelation" if you will. There is a huge network of evidence from both archeology and the Bible texts themselves which leaves us little doubt on this general pattern, even though details about the composition of the Torah from the 7th to the 4th century are quite open to discussion.
Now on the "children" aspect: none of the Bible texts was probably meant as a story for children specifically, but children were never excluded from the audience either. Traditional children tales in our society used to have a lot of scary features which were not all solved by a "happy ending" in modern Disney fashion. From a religious standpoint, perhaps the most difficult thing for us to understand when we approach ancient texts is that the divine, the sacred, the numinous were first of all perceived as potentially dangerous, and not unilaterally benevolent. Fear of the gods was the essence of religion. Sometimes the best of gods just wanted to kill (the case of Moses' son in Exodus 4 comes to mind) and man just had do figure a trick to prevent them from doing so, often in a "lesser evil" way. Iow the ancient gods were much more like reality in its sometimes graceful, always threatening aspects.
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Heaven
Welcome, Edington! I agree with you about the violence in the pictures being inappropriate. Which is why I believe some of the Bible is inappropriate for young children as well. The WTS loves to focus on a lot of negative things. This is truly harmful.
I don't know if it's just me, but I never really made any connection with any of the stories in that book. The pictures and stories depict people in ancient times and it's hard for me to relate to any of it.
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Crazyguy
Bump. I just got done reading many examples of how the god/gods of the Hebrews was not loving but a complete scum bag that liked barbeque, so I believe that this girl was indeed killed. A truly loving god could of made the promise land become desolate during the 400 years the Hebrews were supposedly in Egypt, causing the inhabitants to leave then just as the Hebrews entered the land make it rain and all the waters come back etc. But no let kill, kill, kill and kill some more. Lets rape and rape and rape and enslave lots of people too what fun!! Truly a god of love!!
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FeelingFree
Thanks for bumping this post Crazyguy. I totally agree with you! The more I look into the OT the more I realise how horrific it actually is. I have always been bothered by all the scarafic and killing, I cant get it to marry up with this God of love I have been taught about all my life.
When my little one was born we started reading her the Bible story book, it wasn't long before we decided it was not suitable for any child to hear and stopped straight away! I don't understand why anybody would think it was a lovely book for the children? Morons!
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Justnowout
I have long susspected that such tales were included in that book as a way to desensitize dubbie kids to kids all and to feed them the dubbie line early on in life. When taught young to accept the dubbie version of a story people dont question when they grow up
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humbled
Interesting to find this thread.
Approximately 7 years ago I took My Book of Bible Stories in to a meeting with the elders and used the story of Jepthah's daughter to nulify the idea that God actually requested the slaughter of Isaac as a test of Abraham's faith. I asked how was it that Jepthah knew not to slay his daughter if it had not been previously perceived by Abraham that "burnt offering" was a spiritual all-giving instead of a slash-and-burn.
It was clear to me that if God had commanded the slaughter of Isaac, then he stood as a lying S.O.B. and monster according to all the measures that His Words in scripture laid out.
I said I could not promote the story as told in the storybook--neither to children OR adults.
This demand for humanity and sanity made the kind of trouble ya'll are familiar with. I am no longer a JW. No longer expect the Bible to make sense.
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Crazyguy
I'm not sure what you mean humbled could you explain it in layman's terms, I must be slow today.