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The horrors of the Bible Already in elementary
school* we were taught – as if it was an undeniable fact – that the Bible was
all about an infinitely kind, loving, just and forgiving God, who's basic
message to mankind was pretty accurately represented by such memorable quotes
as the "golden rule". Because this claim was never challenged, I
grew up thinking that what I had been taught as a child was probably not too
far from the truth.
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1.
Genocide and war crimes
The biblical God himself
sets the bar early on by exterminating all life on earth (apart from
the ones on board the Arc) in the great flood (Genesis 6:7, 6:13, 6:17, 7:4, 7:21-23).
As usual the massacre is justified by demonizing the victims including
every man, woman, child, infant or animal (!) on the planet. In most cases
however, the main accusation turns out to be worshipping other gods, making
graven images or some other entirely theological "sin" that
has nothing to do with actually hurting anyone. If you measure evil by the
amount of actual harm or suffering it causes to others, nobody has
more evil to answer for than the biblical God himself (Genesis 19:24-25,
Numbers 16.20-35, 26:9-10, Deuteronomy 4:3, 32:42, Isaiah 26:11, Isaiah
65:11-12, Psalms 9:6, 10:16, Isaiah 33:12, 34:1-5, 60:12, 62:3-6, 66:16-17,
66:24, Jeremiah 12:17, 27:8, 29:16-19, 46:10, 47:4, Ezekiel 14:13-21, 28:6-10,
21:28-32, 26:19-21, 28:18-19, 26:3-11, 28:22-23, 29:8-9, 30:4-8, 30:10-26,
32:11-13, 32:20-31, 33:27-29, Amos 1:8, Nahum 1:8-9, 3:3-4, 3:8-10, 3:15,
Zechariah 12:9, Hosea 8:3-4, Zephaniah 2:5, 2:9, 2:12, 3:6).
See the following verses
for more examples: Exodus 32:27-29, Leviticus 26:7-8, Numbers 31:7-12, 14-17,
Deuteronomy 2:31-35, 3:3-7, 7:1-4, 21-24, 13:12-16, 20:10-17, Judges 1:4-6,
1:8, 1:17, 3:28-29, 8:16-17, 11:32-33, 12:5-6, 20:35-37, 43-48, 21:8-12, 1.
Samuel 11:11, 14:12-14, 15:3, 7-8, 17:52, 18:27, 27:8-11, 2. Samuel 8:1-6,
8:13, 10:18, 22:38-41, 23:8-12, 18-23, 1. Kings 20:13-20, 29-30, 2.
Kings 9:6-10, 10:10-17, 19-27, 14:7, 1. Chronicles 18:5, 2. Chronicles
13:15-18, 14:12-15, 25:11-12, 32:21
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2. Monstrosities
Here we find some of the most utterly disgusting
utterances ever made. For example the Biblical God multiple times threatens
to force those who don't obey him to eat
their children: "'Yet
if in spite of this you do not obey Me, but act with hostility against Me,
then I will act with wrathful hostility against you, and I, even I, will
punish you seven times for your sins. 'Further, you will eat the flesh of
your sons and the flesh of your daughters you will eat."(Leviticus
26:27-29). "Jehovah will bring a nation against thee from far, from the
end of the earth, [...] that shall not regard the person of the old, nor show
favor to the young,[...] Then you shall eat the offspring of your own body,
the flesh of your sons and of your daughters whom the LORD your God has given
you, during the siege and the distress by which your enemy will oppress
you."(Deuteronomy 28:49-53). " The man who is refined and very
delicate among you shall be hostile toward his brother and toward the wife he
cherishes and toward the rest of his children who remain, so that he will not
give even one of them any of the flesh of his children which he will eat,
since he has nothing else left, during the siege and the distress by which
your enemy will oppress you in all your towns. The refined and delicate woman
among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot on the ground
for delicateness and refinement, shall be hostile toward the husband she
cherishes and toward her son and daughter, and toward her afterbirth which
issues from between her legs and toward her children whom she bears; for she
will eat them secretly for lack of anything else, during the siege and the
distress by which your enemy will oppress you in your towns."
(Deuteronomy 28:54-57. "I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and
the flesh of their daughters, and they will eat one another's flesh in the
siege and in the distress with which their enemies and those who seek their
life will distress them" (Jeremiah 19:9). "therefore, thus says the
Lord GOD, 'Behold, I, even I, am against you, and I will execute judgments
among you in the sight of the nations. 'And because of all your abominations,
I will do among you what I have not done, and the like of which I will never
do again. 'Therefore, fathers will eat their sons among you, and sons will
eat their fathers; for I will execute judgments on you and scatter all your
remnant to every wind" (Ezekiel 5:8-10). " What is to die, let it
die, and what is to be annihilated, let it be annihilated; and let those who
are left eat one another's flesh" (Zechariah 11:9). Other threats include multiple references
to dashing infants to pieces against the rocks as well as having women raped
and pregnant women cut open. The verses speak for themselves: "How
blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones Against the
rock" (Psalms 137:9). "Their little ones also will be dashed to
pieces Before their eyes; Their houses will be plundered And their wives
ravished" (Isaiah 13:16). "Samaria will be held guilty, For she has
rebelled against her God. They will fall by the sword, Their little ones will
be dashed in pieces, And their pregnant women will be ripped open"
(Hosea 14:1). "For I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to
battle, and the city will be captured, the houses plundered, the women
ravished" (Zechariah 14:1-2). "I will feed your oppressors with
their own flesh, And they will become drunk with their own blood as with
sweet wine" (Isaiah 49:26). " They shall drink and roar as if with
wine; They shall be filled with blood like basins, Like the corners of the
altar" (Zechariah 9:15), "The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth
the vengeance: He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked"
(Psalms 58:10) " But God will smite through the head of his enemies, The
hairy scalp of such a one as goeth on still in his guiltiness. The Lord said,
I will bring again from Bashan, I will bring them again from the depths of
the sea; That thou mayest crush them, dipping thy foot in blood, That the
tongue of thy dogs may have its portion from thine enemies" (Psalms
68:22-24). " And I will lay thy flesh upon the mountains, and fill the
valleys with thy height. I will also water with thy blood the land wherein
thou swimmest, even to the mountains; and the watercourses shall be full of
thee" (Ezekiel 32:5-6). "their blood shall be poured out as dust,
and their flesh as dung" (Zephaniah 1:17). Se also: Leviticus 26:14-30 and
Deuteronomy 28:15-68 for some more of the worst utterances ever made. |
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3. Cruel and unusual punishments
The Biblical God demands the death penalty
for a long list of mostly theological "sins" - sins that have nothing
to do with actually hurting anybody, including not being circumcised as a
male (Genesis 17:14), eating leavened bread during Passover (Exodus 12:15,
12:19), cursing one's parents (Exodus 21:17, Leviticus 20:9), witchcraft
(Exodus 22:18), making certain kinds of anointing oil or incense for
non-religious purposes (Exodus 30:31-33, 37-38), working on the Sabbath*
(Exodus 31:14, 35:2, Numbers 15:32-36), eating from the peace offerings while
unclean (Leviticus 7:20-21, 22:3), eating the fat of the animal from which an
offering by fire is offered to the LORD (Leviticus 7:25), eating bloody meat
(Leviticus 7:26-27, 17:10-14), failing to bring God's offerings to the
doorway of the tent of meeting to present it as an offering to the LORD
(Leviticus 17:3-4, 8-9), adultery (Leviticus 20:10), homosexuality (Leviticus
20:13), having sex while the woman is having her period (Leviticus 20:18),
working or eating on the 10th day of the 7th month (Leviticus 23:26-30), not
celebrating Passover** (Numbers 9:13), touching a corpse (Numbers
19:13), not cleansing oneself while unclean (Numbers 19:20), not obeying a
priest or a judge (Deuteronomy 17:12-13) or making false prophecies
(Deuteronomy 18:20-22)*** Oh, and by the way, if somebody pretends to be a
prophet, his own parents
must pierce him through (Zechariah 13:3). As if this wasn't bad enough, God has a
special fondness for the exceptionally cruel execution method of stoning. This barbaric
practice is prescribed for the following offences: being a medium or
spiritist (Leviticus 20:27), blasphemy (Leviticus 24:16), worshiping or
proselytizing for other Gods (Deuteronomy 13:6-10, 12-16, Numbers 25:3-5),
breaking God's law (Deuteronomy 17:2-6, Hebrews 10:28), disobeying one's
parents (Deuteronomy 21:18-21) or failing to prove your virginity on your
wedding night as a woman (Deuteronomy 22:13-21). And just when you thought
that it could not possibly get any worse, God tops himself by demanding that
if a woman fails to scream
loudly enough while being raped, she must be stoned to death
together with her rapist! (Deuteronomy 22:23-24)
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4. Injustice
By any rational standard the whole idea that the
crimes of one person can be paid for by punishing somebody else (a.k.a.
scapegoating) is 100 % insane. But this very idea represents one of the central
premises of Christianity. Not only does the biblical God regularly punish
people for the crimes of their ancestors (Exodus 4:23, 20:5, 34:7, Numbers
16:27-33, Deuteronomy 23:2-3, 2. Samuel 12:13-14, 1. Kings 2:33, 1.
Kings 11:11-12, 14:10, 21:29, 2. Chronicles 21:12-14, 21:16-17, Job 27:13-14,
Isaiah 14:21-22, Jeremiah 2:9, 5:17, 11:22, 13:14, 14:16, 16:3-4, 32:18,
Lamentations 2:20-21, 5:7, Ezekiel 23:46-48, 24:21, Hosea 2:4-5, 9:12-13),
but the doctrine that Jesus died for our sins makes absolutely no
sense without such a premise. Also, according to the doctrine of
"original sin" (Genesis 2:17, 3:16-19), all humans are born
as sinners in need of forgiveness because of something that somebody else
did long before they were born. As if this was not bad enough the biblical God
on multiple occasions meddles with the minds of sinners, causing them to
sin, just to give himself an excuse to punish them afterwards (Exodus 4:21-23,
7:3-4, 9:8-12, 10:1-2, 16-20, 24-27, 11:4-10, 14:1-4, 14-8, 15-17,
Deuteronomy 2:30-35, Joshua 11:19-20, Isaiah 6:10, 2 Samuel 24:1-15, Ezekiel
14:7-10, 20:26, Romans 9:18-22, 11:8-9, 2 Thessalonians 2:11-12). For example
God allegedly "hardened the Pharaoh's heart" no less than 10 times
to make sure that he would not let the Israelites go, and then made all
Egyptians suffer for something that God himself had ultimately
caused. Jesus, by the way, tells his disciples that he is talking in parables
to prevent sinners from understanding his message lest they might be
converted and saved (Mark 4:10-12), which only makes sense if Jesus actually wanted
some people to be damned. In several places it even says that God himself
creates some people as sinners just to punish and destroy them (Proverbs
16:4, Romans 9:18-23). Who will be saved and who will be damned is
predetermined from eternity (Acts 13:48, Romans 8:29-30, 9:11-13, Ephesians
1:4-6, 1:11, 2. Timothy 1:9). |
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5.
Intolerance and oppression
Slavery is endorsed by God as long as the slaves
are not Israelites (Leviticus 25:44-46). Female slaves shall not be set free
after 7 years like male slaves (Exodus 21:2, 21:7). If a slave is to be set
free, but doesn't want to be separated from his wife and children - who still
belong to the slave-owner, his master shall pierce his ear with an awl and
the slave shall serve him forever (Exodus 21:4-6). If somebody beats his
slave to death, he shall not be punished as long as the slave doesn't die too
quickly, because after all the slave is his property (Exodus 21:20-21). The Biblical view of women makes
Afghanistan under the Taliban seem downright liberal. The Bible early makes
it perfectly clear that woman was created for man's sake (Genesis 2:18,
2:21-22, 1. Corinthians 11:9). The original sin was the woman's fault, and all
women shall be punished (Genesis 3:6-12, 3:16, 1. Timothy 2:14). Lot
offers his daughters to a gang of rapists. The same Lot is elsewhere referred
to as "righteous" (Genesis 19:4-8, 2. Peter 2:7-8). A woman shall
be unclean for 22 days after giving birth, and twice as long if the child
is a girl. She must then make a sin offering, which only makes sense
assuming that childbirth a sin (Leviticus 12:2-8). Women must also make sin
offerings because of their natural bodily functions (Leviticus 15:19-30). A
woman shall be punished it there is only a suspicion of adultery, but
if she is innocent it shall not hurt her (Numbers 5:11-31). A woman's wow of
celibacy can be overruled by her father or husband (Numbers 30:4-14). Moses
is furious because his generals have spared the women of the midianites. He
orders all young boys and women who aren't virgins to be slaughtered (Numbers
31:15-17). The women of the enemy can be taken as loot. Since it is stressed
that the women have to be virgins, it doesn't take much fantasy to
imagine the rest… (Deuteronomy 22:28-29). Bigamy and concubines are common
among the Lord's servants. Nothing suggests that God has any objections as
long as one stays away from foreign women (Genesis 4:19, 25:6, Judges
8:30-31, 1. Samuel 1:1-2, 25:42-43, 2. Samuel 5:13, 2. Samuel 12:7-8, 1.
Kings 11:2-3, 2. Chronicles 11:20-21, 2. Chronicles 13:21, Song of Solomon
6:8). Man is the head of the woman. She shall be subservient to her husband
and obey him in all things (1. Corinthians 11:3, 7-9, 14:34-35, Ephesians
5:22-24, Colossians 3:18, 1 Timothy 2:11-14, Titus 2:3-5). Homosexuality is an abomination deserving
of death (Leviticus 20:13, Romans 1:26-32, Leviticus 18:22, 1. Corinthians
6:9, 1. Timothy 1:10-11). The Canaanites are to be discriminated because
Canaan's father saw Noah naked (Genesis 9:21-27, 10:15-18). The Moabites are
the result of incest (Genesis 19:30-37). The Edomites are to be discriminated
because God favored Jacob over Esau before the twins were even born (Genesis
25:23-25, 36:9, Romans 9:11-13). No one who has a handicap, no one who is
born outside of marriage, no Moabite and no Ammonite shall be part of the
Lord's congregation (Leviticus 21:16-21, Deuteronomy 23:2-3, Nehemiah
13:1-3). Jesus refuses to answer a woman from Canaan, and
rejects her plea for help because he
has only come to help the Jews and not the gentiles. He compares helping
a gentile with taking the bread from the children and throwing it "to
the dogs" (Matthew 15:22-26). Jesus also instructs his disciples not to
visit the cities of the Gentiles or the Samaritans (Matthew 10:5-6). |
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6
Human sacrifice
In order to test Abraham's faith God orders him
to sacrifice his son Isaac as a burnt offering. When Abraham proves willing to
slaughter his son on command, God is pleased and rewards him (Genesis
22:1-18). Ironically Abraham could have shown moral character by refusing
to obey this evil request. If God wanted to test Abraham's morals, and not
just his faith, Abraham should have failed the test by obeying. Jephthah promises to sacrifice the first person
who comes out of his house to meet him if God will help him defeat the
Ammonites. God accepts the bargain, and Jephthah has to sacrifice his
daughter (Judges 11:30-39). King Josiah of Judah is described thus:
"Before him there was no king like him who turned to the LORD with all
his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all the
law of Moses; nor did any like him arise after him." (2. Kings 23:25): What was it that this Josiah did that was
so pleasing to God? The answer is prophesized in advance and later carried
out: "O altar, altar, thus says the LORD, 'Behold, a son shall be born
to the house of David, Josiah by name; and on you he shall sacrifice the
priests of the high places who burn incense* on you, and human bones shall be
burned on you" (1. Kings 13:2). "All the priests of the high places
who were there he slaughtered on the altars and burned human bones on them;
then he returned to Jerusalem" (2. Kings 23:20) Some more verses in which God seems to demand
human sacrifice. It is unclear what is meant by "giving" every
firstborn to the Lord etc. if they shall not be sacrificed: Exodus 22:29,
34:19-20, Leviticus 27:28-29, Numbers 3:13, 31:28-29 *Note that the heathen priests only burned incense
on the altar whereas the favorite servant of Yahweh burned humans. |
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7. Is the New Testament really an improvement?
Nobody who reads the Old Testament honestly
can claim that Yahweh on balance comes through as kind, loving, tolerant or
just. With a God like that, who needs the Devil? If there is any consistent
message to be derived from this holocaust of a book, it is that God will
spare no means what so
ever to root out heresy along with a long list of other, mostly theological,
"sins". There is however a common perception, even among atheist,
that the New Testament, and especially the message of Jesus, represents a huge
improvement over the Old Testament in moral terms. By carefully
cherry-picking Bible verses it is even possible to find some pretty
decent quotes in the New Testament like the golden rule. On the other hand Jesus is the main
advocate of Hell,
and makes it perfectly clear that he
himself will return to earth* to lead the greatest genocide in
history and throw most people into the "furnace" to be tortured for
all eternity (Matthew 13:40-42, 49-50, 25:41, John 15:6, Revelations 14:9-12,
21:8). The greatest difference from the Old Testament in this respect is that
God's terrible punishment is postponed from this life to an eternity after death. If you are horrified
by all the killing in the Old Testament, what awaits most of us after death
according to Jesus himself is even
worse (Hebrews 10:28-31). Many Christians have tried to distance
themselves from the barbaric laws of the Old Testament by arguing that these
only applied to the "old covenant" between God and the Israelites,
which was replaced by a new covenant when Jesus died on the cross. And to be
fair, Paul really does seem to say something like this. However Jesus himself
according to the gospels makes it perfectly clear that "until heaven and
earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law
until all is accomplished" (Matthew 5:17-19, Luke 16:17). As far as I
can tell this can only be interpreted as a complete endorsement of the Law of
Moses, with all its barbaric rules, by Jesus himself. But it is worse than that: The God who made
the "new covenant" is supposed to be the same God who made the
old one. It is tempting to ask how it could ever have been right in the eyes of God to
stone people to death for such non-offences
as working on the Sabbath if it is not right today. It is unclear whether
God's morals are changing
over time, or if he deliberately instructed the Israelites to do
wrong, but perhaps this gives us a clue: "I also gave them statutes that were not
good and ordinances by which they could not live" (Ezekiel 20:25). While “sin” in the Old Testament was mainly
associated with physical
actions, the New Testament redefines it as thoughtcrime (Mark
16:16, Johannes 3:18). The concept of sin is broadened to include all
actions or thoughts that
are not rooted in faith (Romans 14:23). Whoever thinks a sinful
thought has already sinned
whether he chooses to act on it or not
(Matthew 5:21-22, 27-28). Then there's the doctrine that Jesus died
so that we could be saved** (Romans 3:25-26, 5:6, 9-10, Ephesians 1:5,
Hebrews 9:28, 10:10, 1. Peter 2:24). Notice first how subtly the true message
is implied, namely: You need to be saved (or else…!) If someone came to your door bearing the
"good news" that you had been granted a chance to be saved, your
first reaction might be to ask why you should need to be saved in the first
place. Saved from what?
So, if it wasn't for the death of
Jesus we** would all go to Hell or what? What exactly was it that the
crucifixion of Jesus saved us from that
we would not have been saved from otherwise? If God was only willing to refrain from
condemning all humans to death and eternal torture on the condition that somebody else would die
in their place, what does that tell you about God? If he was willing to
pardon us anyway, what's the point of this whole farce? If God is almighty it
is not as if anybody could force
him to do it, is it? By any rational standard, the whole idea of punishing
someone for the crimes of others is 100% insane. What is the point of
punishing anybody at all,
if it is not the person who committed the crime? Regardless of why we needed
forgiveness in the first place, how could there be any more reason for God to
forgive us because of a complete miscarriage
of justice? Apparently what mattered most to God was taking his
blood thirst out on somebody,
whether they were guilty or
not. *According to the writers
of the earlier texts, this was supposed to happen in the lifetime of (at
least some of) the apostles. ** 'We' is actually the wrong
word since this only applies to believing Christians. The rest of us are doomed no matter what. |
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