According to the Old Testament aren`t YHWH God and the then Nation of Israel guilty of War crimes by today`s standards? ?

by smiddy3 12 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  smiddy3

  Just going by memory here with regard to the "Old Testament' when God promised the land he chose for the Jews ,flowing with milk and honey ?. Their is no record in the bible of God ever giving an option to all the nations that already lived their to move on and he would compensate them at a new destination.?

  Apparently without warning he just charged up the Israelite`s for war with these nations to evict them from this territory that they had resided in for who knows how long.

  Not only that ,they apparently spared no one in their conquests killing man,woman and even dashing children to pieces ,and not feeling sorry for anyone.

  Don`t people think that this is a bit barbaric ?

  And for spoils of war victories won, they could take virgin women with whom they could to do with whatever they pleased.

  And they held slaves didn`t they ? of those they conquered ?

  So YHWH / Jehovah God was o.K. with all of that going on back then , but now he isn`t ?

  Doesn`t the Bible say that God is the same today as he was yesterday and is the same tomorrow ?

  Doesn`t the bible also say that God never changes ?

  I suppose apologists would say statutes of limitations would apply it happening so long ago.
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  cofty

  The moral monster of the Old Testament is the 'God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ'.
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  zeb

  If the peoples of the land of Canaan etc were deserving of death why didnt he do it with natural forces.?

  By using humans he would have known as in all massacres many will survive to tell the tale and to 'blend' in with the conquerors (thereby influencing them with belief, practices) and the those doing the killing are then brutalized to a terrible degree .

  Is this why Jesus came to show a better way? Was there a disagreement in heaven?

  and what of the casualties and the despair of those families who lost their loved ones in these battles. It always worried me that there is no mention (or scarcely any) of Israelite casualties.

  A very depressing subject to ponder.
  
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  LoveUniHateExams

  Yes, the OT and the biblical nation of Israel are guilty of war crimes - genocide, stoning of gays, adulteresses, apostates, etc.

  But this issue isn't really pressing because there aren't radical Jews today calling for the restoration of Mosaic law, as far as I'm aware.

  The world's only Jewish state, Israel, is a Western democracy with an annual Gay Pride march in Tel Aviv.

  (If you're gay and Arab, the best place to live in the Middle East is Israel, no doubt.)
  
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  FatFreek 2005

  God has a learning curve?
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  Pete Zahut

  Biblical accounts such as this make it easy for JWS today to “ dehumanize” the rest of the non JW world so they can feel positively giddy at the thought of them all soon being destroyed.
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  nowwhat?

  I can see killing the enemy on the battlefield. But then the Israelite army going in the city and butchering women and children? If God had to cleanse the land couldn't he just mercifully vaporize them out of existence? By today's standards they were just as barbaric as isis
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  johnamos

  Smiddy, I have often thought the same, but instead of looking at it as the Israelites going into the land and evicting those that were already there, I thought why not let the Israelites stay in the desert and just transform that to be the so-called land flowing with milk and honey.

  But here is what you have to think about, everything that is viewed as “barbaric", etc.…in regards to Jehovah, he himself had all that info recorded. Do you think that info that shows him in a negative way and that as a result we were going to read it and just turn around and rip him apart that he could have just chose not to have it written down? Yet he has no issue with given us that information! Do you think that if he created man to have the emotions we do and a sense of right and wrong, etc.…that you are going to have a better stronger sense of any such emotions or views, then the one that created that within us to begin with?
  
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  smiddy3

  It always worried me that there is no mention (or scarcely any) of Israelite casualties.

  And of course there were casualties That`s why David sent Uriah in front of the battle lines knowing he would be killed...So he could take Bathsheba for himself.
  By today's standards they were just as barbaric as isis......I totally agree.

  The moral monster of the Old Testament is the 'God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ'.

  And why couldn`t he have just set aside somewhere else and transformed that land into one "flowing with milk and honey" or could he only do an Eden once?

  And really it doesn`t say much for Jesus who obviously wholeheartedly supports the God of the "Old Testament"

  Maybe Jesus is just playing at being a good politician promising you "paradise" but once you get their it`s a totally different ball game.

  " Be careful what you pray for "
  .
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  careful

  Judging anything from the ancient world by modern standards will always have this result. I remember a history professor in a course on ancient Rome saying 95% of the people in the Roman world would be labeled sexual predators for life if they were to be judged by the norms of modern western society.

  He showed a video about archaeology and the academics in it kept saying over and over how we should not judge the ancient world by modern standards, but by the standards of that time—so very different from our own. The course professor asked if we thought it would be right to for people 2000 years in the future to judge us today by the standards that those in the future will have. The class got the point.