Explain Jephthah.
Explain the book of Job.
The Book of Job is allegorical. It is meant to convey that no matter what happens to us in this life if our faith in God is strong he will sustain us and furthermore reward us for trusting in him. I can’t tell you how much this book as helped me in my worst moments in life.
(Deuteronomy 22:28-29 NLT)
If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.it
What kind of lunatic would make a rape victim marry her attacker? Answer: God.
Before we discuss this further, refrain from using words like “lunatic” when speaking of God, okay?
When a woman was raped she was considered damaged goods (these were different times) and therefore lost her chance to be married and cared for, God understanding this ensured that even though she had been raped she would not live in poverty (her family could not indefinitely take care of her).
“Women would have grown up within a small town and stayed there. She was dependent upon her father’s house and a future marraige to a man for survival. The community would have known who had lost her virginity through rape or adultery. Her chances for future marraige were gone after rape. The man who raped a woman ruined her future - UNLIKE - our society where women can expect to marry after rape and work past it. The woman is scarred emotionally for sure, but her future survival is now a problem. Making her an “old maid” in her father’s home would neither remove the emotional scar nor solve her problem for her future provision. She and her family would suffer from this crime for the rest of her life through dependence upon her family because no one would marry her.”
“Instead God commands that the man who took the virginity away from the woman, and her chances for marriage, must now take upon himself the responsibility of providing for that woman for the rest of her life. Certainly her marriage to this man was emotionally painful - but not necessarily less painful than living with the scar AND no future provision. Pain without poverty is not necessarily worse than pain with poverty. As reprehensible as this sounds to some people - there is even actually a possibilty for some sort of relationship to arise between the two over the years. Families of murder victims have been known to reach out to murders and their families themselves.”
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Lo, a day shall come for the Lord when the spoils shall be divided in your midst. And I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem for battle: the city shall be taken, houses plundered, women ravished; half of the city shall go into exile, but the rest of the people shall not be removed from the city.
This is talking about the end times, and how Jerusalem shall be for awhile anyways controlled by the forces of the anti-christ.
Kill People Who Don’t Listen to Priests
Anyone arrogant enough to reject the verdict of the judge or of the priest who represents the LORD your God must be put to death. Such evil must be purged from Israel. (Deuteronomy 17:12 NLT)
This passage is meant to convey the extreme importance attached to priests and judges as they were the representatives of God (so people were shown through extreme language how necessary it was to adhere to their authority for the purpose of cohesion and maintenance of truth).
You should not let a sorceress live. (Exodus 22:17 NAB)
Well, witchcraft is evil and as such God is ensuring that his people do not dabble in the occult (which was a form of devil worship).
“If a man lies with a male as with a women, both of them shall be put to death for their
abominable deed; they have forfeited their lives.” (Leviticus 20:13 NAB)
Again, God is telling his people that such activities are evil and aberrrant.
A man or a woman who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning; they have no one but themselves to blame for their death. (Leviticus 20:27 NAB)
Fortunetelling is a form of witchcraft that conjures up evil spirits, God in his infinite goodness is telling his people to refrain from such activities and Moses (who was believed to have written Leviticus) used extreme language to convey this message.
The same can be said of all the other objections you have made concerning God’s laws. I will continue this discussion at a later date in order to drive home that God was completely within his bounds to apply such moral strictures as he was intent on keeping the Jews untainted by the evils present during the times that these laws were laid (up until the Messiah would come to free them from sin and it’s consequences).
P. S. Do you believe moral absolutes exist? .
