Does Jehovah accept human sacrafice or not?

by gumby 87 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  BlackSwan of Memphis

  Ok I looked this up in my new Quest bible, it?s a NIV. What?s really interesting about this bible is that it tackles these hard questions. Now, I completely understand if when people read this, they think the arguments are not quite enough, it?s just a thought from a nonjw source that gives an explanation based on traditional Christianity.

  Ok, as far as the vow that Jepthah made to God?.

  Interestingly, Judges chapter 11 verses 29 through 31 make the point that holy spirit had come upon Jepthah when he made the vow. So, did the holy spirit make him make this vow in the first place? In a sidebar it makes the point that ?possessing holy spirit for a special assignment does not guarantee a person will be faultless in other areas of life. Jepthah?s vow was an attempt to strike a deal with God instead of trusting him.? Then it points to Leviticus 5:4 (Or if a person thoughtlessly takes an oath to do anything, whether good or evil- in any matter one might carelessly swear about- even though he is unaware of it, in any case when he learns of it he will be guilty. Vs. 5 says When anyone is guilty in any of these ways, he must confess in what way he has sinned 6, and as a penalty for the sin he has committed he must bring to the Lord a female lamb or goat from the flock as a sin offering and the priest shall atonement for him for his sin.?) The side bar to that is ?How could someone take an oath and not know it? This refers to an oath made before all the implications have been considered. The phrase describing such an oath could literally be translated chattering with the lips talking without thinking. A broken oath was considered a serious offense in the ancient world, especially if it had been made to God. This explains why Joshua kept the vows made when deceived by the Gibeonites and why Jepthah kept his foolish vow.?

  Then when you actually get to the verses pertaining to when his daughter comes out to greet him and he freaks?.

  The sidebar brings up Deuteronomy 23:21 through 23. Joshua 9:19 and Ecclesiastes 5:1 through 5. It asks the question can God be honored by human sacrifice? ? No, fulfilling a vow was a high priority in ancient times, Joshua and Jepthah apparently didn?t want to be humiliated by reversing his promise. But God had outlawed human sacrifice. God disapproves of sin, even one committed to fulfill a vow. ?

  Ok. After reading all of these things, my first thought was yeah, it makes sense. You can?t bargain with God. His daughter went along with it because she understood the importance of the vow. She didn?t want to dishonor her father. After all, when she took off to the wilderness for 2 months she could have taken her chances in the wilderness and left town. She didn?t. Why not? Because it was a vow.

  Now as far as Jepthah being a bastard. The only thing I really found that the reason why he was chosen for the service was because no one else stepped up to do the job.

  All this being said?.

  1) If human sacrifice was a detestable thing to God, why is there no record that Jepthah was punished for his mistake?

  2) There is no record that Jepthah made the appropriate sacrifice to God regarding his frivolous vow.

  Hope I haven?t stepped on any toes and repeated anything.
• 

  gumby

  BlackSwan,

  1) If human sacrifice was a detestable thing to God, why is there no record that Jepthah was punished for his mistake?

  2) There is no record that Jepthah made the appropriate sacrifice to God regarding his frivolous vow.

  Hope I haven?t stepped on any toes and repeated anything

  1) Exactly! God gave Jepthah the victory knowing full well of the human sacrifice Jepthah would give of someone from his own household. God surely could have told him he detested an offering such as that, yet he stays quiet, blesses him with victory, then let him lead Israel for 6 more years and gave him another victory over the Ephraimites shortly after he sacrificed his daughter to god.

  2) Yes there is a record of it. It plainly says Jepthah did just as he vowed. Read it again.

  You haven't stepped on anyones toes. Comments and research as you have done is much appreciated.

  You mentioned there is no record Jepthah carried out the vow, yet my NIV ( the one you used) says in the footnote "it's obvious Jepthah offered her as a human sacrifice".

  Gumby
• 

  Narkissos

  BlackSwanof Memphis:

  Would the Torah have accepted human sacrifice?

  As for the firstborns which were once sacrified by priestly law (cf. the above quotation of Ezekiel), the extant Torah explicitly says that the firstborn of humans have to be redeemed (Exodus 13:13b,15; 34:20; Numbers 18:15).

  A similar substitution occurs in the case of vows (ndr, as in Judges 11): this is the issue of Leviticus 27:2ff.

  Obviously the above law is unknown in the story of Jephthah.

  The only apparent exception is for things "devoted to destruction" (cherem, anathema) in Leviticus 27:28f, a term most often used in reference to enemies (and their goods) in holy war (e.g. Deuteronomy, Joshua) but perhaps originally wider in scope, as the context of Leviticus 27 refers to vows and not to war; cherem is also associated (or juxtaposed) to the firstborns case in Numbers 18:14ff.

  So in Leviticus 27:28f we might have a vestige of a priestly acceptance of human sacrifice under a cherem-vow, which would have survived in the Bible text because of its ambiguity, due the overwhelming deuteronomistic reference to cherem in holy war.

  If anyone has a recent critical commentary of Leviticus at hand, I'm curious to know what it says about 27:28f.
• 

  gumby

  Pretty much....good ol' common sense will tell you that regardless of the reason behind it....it's one sick act to accept from any god. I hope the dude gets herpes or sumpin. Why this moron of a bible god ever sais we were created in any way shape or form...IN HIS FREAKIN IMAGE, is beyond me. To sacrifice a human is beyond what I'd hope to imagine any god would ever accept.

  God educated Adam and Moses, but he couldn't educate Jepthah not to offer such a thing. For some reason god was never consistant to speak up when he needed to. I still say the dudes manic depressive.

  Gumby
• 

  LittleToe

  Gumbydude:
  You never call! When I call you, you screen my calls. You don't love me anymore, do ya?

  So, given that you have this big issue with God not speaking to you, why do you take issue when some ancient dudes decided that their actions were sanctionable, and then attributed then to God? Bear in mind that some folks took a thunderclap as an answer from God (depending on which answer they wanted).

  In the case of Jepthah, he made a bargain and heard nothing from God. However he took his winning the battle as an answer. Sorry, dude, but I fail to see where God had any part of it...

  If it's any consolation, your thread has given me much amusement for days
• 

  marsal

  Gumby,

  I have always found the account of Jephtha disturbing.

  However, some commentaries state (and I hope that they are correct) that Jephtha's fullfillment of his vow was not actually offering her as a burnt offering, but that he dedicated her for life for services at the tabernacle (such as Hannah gave up Samuel for temple services). His daughter would have to remain unmarried for the rest of her life.

  Also, the rank and file (?) Isralites did not perform their own sacrifices. They had to take their offerings to the priests who performed the actual sacrifice. It would be very hard to imagine a priest that would allow such an abhorrent sacrifice.

  Marianne
• 

  Narkissos

  As to the (perceived) efficiency of child sacrifice in the context of war, 2 Kings 3:24ff which was mentioned before is worth reading:

  But when they came to the camp of Israel, the Israelites rose up and attacked the Moabites, who fled before them; as they entered Moab they continued the attack. The cities they overturned, and on every good piece of land everyone threw a stone, until it was covered; every spring of water they stopped up, and every good tree they felled. Only at Kir-hareseth did the stone walls remain, until the slingers surrounded and attacked it. When the king of Moab saw that the battle was going against him, he took with him seven hundred swordsmen to break through, opposite the king of Edom; but they could not. Then he took his firstborn son who was to succeed him, and offered him as a burnt offering on the wall. And great wrath came upon Israel, so they withdrew from him and returned to their own land.

  This is to be understood in the context of polytheism: to each god his people and territory. Cf. Deuteronomy 32:8f, and Jephthah's own argument in Judges 11:23f:

  So now Yhwh, the god of Israel, has conquered the Amorites for the benefit of his people Israel. Do you intend to take their place? Should you not possess what your god Chemosh gives you to possess? And should we not be the ones to possess everything that Yhwh our god has conquered for our benefit?

  In 2 Kings we have a case of one god (Yhwh) overstepping his boundaries and encroaching on the next god's (Chemosh's) territory. The supreme sacrifice is an appeal to a higher instance (whether El or the pleniary assembly of gods, or even impersonal and supra-divine justice) to right the wrong. And it works, against Yhwh and Israel, forcing them back into their own borders. The impersonal "wrath" (qeçeph) which the sacrifice triggers is very much like Greek nemesis, to which both gods and mortals are subject and which puts them back into their limits when necessary.
• 

  LittleToe

  Didier:

  In 2 Kings we have a case of one god (Yhwh) overstepping his boundaries and encroaching on the next god's (Chemosh's) territory.

  Or one people stealing land of an adjacent people, and attributing the win to their deity
• 

  Narkissos

  Ross:

  Yes, of course -- although that's a kind of ethnocentrism: choosing to explain a given imaginary structure and function by our standards (we don't really believe in gods) rather than its own.

  What remains remarkable imo is that, in this israelite story, a human sacrifice by a foreign king to a foreign deity is viewed as efficient against Israel.
• 

  LittleToe

  Didier:
  I have to say that I find that fascinating, too.
  Does that excerpt harken back to a polytheistic time?