by just n from bethel 168 Replies latest jw friends
you missed a part---the part about killing babies. He did do that.
The babies were killed by the sword of the men who told everyone that it was God's command to slay them. That doesn't mean God killed babies... it does mean that for many, it's OK for God to decree genocide.
-Sab
God wanted another angel so that's why he took someone's child'.
No, that's not what I'm saying at all. I'm saying that if a righteous person was killed (including a child) then God would not make it permanent.
Don't worry about offending me. I'm not leaving because of the opinions of people. I used to take things too personally. I'm changing that. I know that however much you think it could never happen, there is a chance that God has chosen you to be His, and that you may one day become a Christian. So why judge you? I think your wrong, but that doesn't take away from me respecting you and your thoughts.
His genocide degree was behind closed doors as well. He commanded the men of Israel to cut down infants and wouldn't even look them in the eye before they went and did it.
If he were a human king, how could such a deed be received?
-Sab
To Brotherdan: Respect (Ali G)
I wasn't avoiding the death of children. In fact I started a thread about it a few months ago.
People tend to assume that ALL children are innocent, even if their parents are doing bad things. The assumption is unfounded. For example, Palestinian Muslim children are officially taught in grammar school to hate their Jewish neighbors.They are so well indoctrinated that some of them give up their lives in suicide bombings as children.Corruption literally does breed corruption, which is why God did not want the Hebrews tainted by the other corrupt cultures of the Middle East.
Do I justify the killing of children? Of course not. But God in his Omniscience knew what the outcome would be if they did not devote all things to destruction in Canaan. And true enough, when they did not devote all things to destruction, they were corrupted.
What crime could be so great that entire populations of cities were designated for destruction? God told Moses that the nations that the Hebrew were replacing were wicked. How "wicked" were these people? The text tells us that they were burning their own sons and daughters in sacrifices to their gods. So we see that these people were not really innocent. For these reasons (and others), God ordered the destruction of the peoples whom the Israelites dispossessed.
It amazes me, with all that has been uncovered on this site, that people who have spent considerable amount of time here still cannot comprehend that the Bible is a product of the Catholic Church! Whatever canon was "decided" upon at the councils continued to be revised down through the centuries as they saw fit. Consider the 19th century "Revisionists" like Westcott and Hort, here's a prime example of evidence that Jesus was exposing the OT God as the a-hole that MOST of us know he is... this is what was left in the Bible that later had to be redacted:
Luke 9:54-56 (KJV) And when his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did? But he turned, and rebuked them, and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.
Now this is all you will find in the Watchtower Bible:
When the disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, do you want us to tell fire from heaven to come down and annihilate them? But he turned and rebuked them.
Makes a lot of sense, doesn't it? Rebuked them for what? For simply doing what Elijah did? What would be so bad about that if the OT God was so loving and perfect?
The truth that WAS being made known here:
The OT God was into destroying men's lives, not saving them! He had an evil and vindictive "manner of spirit". Some god of love, eh?
What crime could be so great that entire populations of cities were designated for destruction? God told Moses that the nations that the Hebrew were replacing were wicked. How "wicked" were these people? The text tells us that they were burning their own sons and daughters in sacrifices to their gods. So we see that these people were not really innocent. For these reasons (and others), God ordered the destruction of the peoples whom the Israelites dispossessed.
I thought you said you were NOT justifying the killing of children. That's a lot of justification!
Do I justify the killing of children? Of course not.
So, the canaanites were extremely wicked because they killed their children, but the israelites were NOT wicked whey THEY killed canaanite children. So, god's response to humans killing their children was to actually order the killing of said children. But we are not justifying the killing of children. No, not at all. And yet, those children have wicked parents and so the children clearly are not innocent, so it is right to kill them. Not that we justify killing children. Some children will become suicide bombers, but MOST will not. But that is okay, kill them all because of who their parents are, but not justifying it, just saying.
I'll stop now. I'm just so grateful that I don't have to harbor that kind of hate in order to justify, (i mean NOT justify) the actions of a hateful god that doesn't exist but validates my intolerance.
I wish I could break through the cognitive dissonance, but I can't. I know that because I lived under that veil for many years myself. Unfortunately, it is hard to make my point without being a bit insulting. I understand why you need this, and I'm going to work on being more understanding.
I never thought I'd say this but Prodigal Son is the voice of reason in this thread!
When it comes down to it, you are rejecting God based on what happened in an ancient culture thousands of years ago. We can't even comprehend what mind set people had in those cultures. It definitely wasn't the same mind set that we have in ours.
If you take only the judgements of God and not the love and justice, then you will come to the conclusions that you've come to. But before you can "judge" God, you have to take what the ENTIRE Bible says about Him and then make your judgement. It sounds like you stumbled on some things you didn't like about Him and wrote it all off without considering the consequence.
