I have a question regarding a show I watched on the History Channel about Moses and Joshua

[AmandaB]

It says that they killed and slaughtered all sorts of people “at God’s will”. I was horrified, because I did not know this before. They even killed women and children. Why and how could this be God’s will?? Doesn’t this go against his order’s not to kill-ESPECIALLY innocent people like babies??? This really bothers me…

 

[Mintaka]

I don’t know if this will be a good answer, because I’m not too knowledgeable about this stuff. Be sure to look elsewhere to find more definitive info.

First of all, the commandment translates literally as “do not murder”. God did not prohibit the Israelites from waging war. He made it clear that war wasn’t all that great, and that if everything were as it should be, there’d be no war. But God never said anything to forbid self-defense or war, though He did say that peace was preferable and that turning the other cheek was good.

Second, you have to understand the context. God was basically using the Israelites to smite these peoples, as a punishment for their disobedience. (And for not giving land to Israel when directed, if I recall correctly.) A lot of them had shadowy traditions of monotheism pretty much like Israel’s (not surprising in related peoples), but what they practiced was the worship of many gods – some of them very cruel gods, like Moloch. So there was smiting. As when He sent fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, or when He permits storms and earthquakes and disasters, God didn’t spare children or women.

But God always controls how all of us die, and we all die sometime. There aren’t many worse ways to die than in an ancient war; but it may well be that many of the innocent victims went straight to Heaven, and may be happier than we are. It’s a hard question.

Third, ancient war was usually about taking slaves, for work or sex, and taking spoils of gold and other goods. The only reason Israelites were sparing anyone was to get money from them or make them slaves. God did not want the Israelites to go to war for money or slaves. So He punished them if they took spoils or slaves for themselves; and anybody who hadn’t fled was killed.

Fourth, God did not establish all this killing in warfare as a general rule. In wars afterward, you see Israel being directed to conduct a fairly humane kind of warfare, as warfare in the ancient Middle East went. Christians received even more humane commands. But when He was setting up the Israelites in their land, He commanded much more sternly, in order to make sure that they became and stayed their own people.

It’s pretty rough stuff, I agree. I wouldn’t like to be smote by God in any way. But it’s not just random commands of limitless violence at all times and all places.

 

[NotWorthy]

It says that they killed and slaughtered all sorts of people “at God’s will”. I was horrified, because I did not know this before. They even killed women and children. Why and how could this be God’s will?? Doesn’t this go against his order’s not to kill-ESPECIALLY innocent people like babies??? This really bothers me…

It is a hard truth.

God had taught the Israelites to worship One God. The Israelites had proven that they were prone to paganism at the slightest moment (do you remember the golden calf incident?). God had explained that, if the Israelites didn’t rid Canaan of all Non-Israelite tribes, then these people would mix in with the Israelites and bring paganism with them leading Israel away from their worship of Yahweh. This had already been proven at Bel Peor.

The lesson to the Christian today is that, if we let sin remain in our lives, it will contaminate us and draw us away from God. Jesus emphasized this when He said, “If you hand causes you to sin, cut it off…”.

 

[Mintaka]

I forgot about Baal Peor.

Yes, it’s a sort of punishment of the Israelites, also. If they had stayed a people of holy priests as God had intended them to be, God could have trusted them to live among the pagan peoples as their priests and converters. But since Israel kept showing that it wasn’t solid in its worship of God alone, it couldn’t be trusted to live among pagans like a civilized people.

 

[NotWorthy]

I forgot about Baal Peor.

Yes, it’s a sort of punishment of the Israelites, also. If they had stayed a people of holy priests as God had intended them to be, God could have trusted them to live among the pagan peoples as their priests and converters. But since Israel kept showing that it wasn’t solid in its worship of God alone, it couldn’t be trusted to live among pagans like a civilized people.

Yes, and don’t forget Jeraboam. He splits away from Israel (with the 10 northern tribes) and what does he do? He creates two golden calves and places them at (False) temples at Dan and Bethel for worship!

Bad things happen when you separate yourself from God’s Covenants!

 

[AmandaB]

Ok, but it still doesn’t explain the babies?? They could have taken the babies and raised them Christian, no??? So, the slaughter of all those babies and children make no sense to me.

 

[NotWorthy]

Ok, but it still doesn’t explain the babies?? They could have taken the babies and raised them Christian, no??? So, the slaughter of all those babies and children make no sense to me.

Maybe I’m just looking for silver linings, but I always look at it like this.

Are you familiar with the martyrs at Bethlehem? All the babies that were killed by the order of Herod, hoping to destroy the Christ Child? I think the Catholic Church treats these as the first martyrs that died for Christ. Wouldn’t you agree that God has a special spot in His heart for those who died because of Jesus?

Well, in the case of the babies that were killed in Canaan, these babies were killed for the “greater purpose” as well. God has a special spot reserved for those innocents that have to die in order for His Will to be Done.

Remember, its not what happens in this life that matters. Its what happens in the next. When you look at things in this way, everything changes! :bowdown2:

 

[NotWorthy]

Ok, but it still doesn’t explain the babies?? They could have taken the babies and raised them Christian, no???

Well… considering that there would be NO christians for another 1000 years… Just pickin’.

 

[AmandaB]

Well… considering that there would be NO christians for another 1000 years… Just pickin’.

lol! I’m no good at history I guess I mean whatever religion they were back then? What religion was Moses? (I can’t believe I don’t know that) I guess Jewish? I guess your explanation about having a special place for the innocent makes sense, but it’s just hard to understand why he wouldn’t have just told them to spare their lives?? Oh well, I guess I’ll never know, until I (hopefully) go to Heaven!

 

[NotWorthy]

lol! I’m no good at history I guess I mean whatever religion they were back then? What religion was Moses? (I can’t believe I don’t know that) I guess Jewish? I guess your explanation about having a special place for the innocent makes sense, but it’s just hard to understand why he wouldn’t have just told them to spare their lives?? Oh well, I guess I’ll never know, until I (hopefully) go to Heaven!

First of all, Moses was an Israelite from the tribe of Levi. Jews weren’t around yet. The twelve tribes that made up Israel were God’s Firstborn Children, the Chosen People. These twelve tribes came from the twelve sons of Jacob, whom God renamed “Israel”.

But regarding letting the babies live. It seems it would have created a scene not-unlike Abraham and the destruction of Sodom. Do you remember Abraham telling the angel, “What if there were 50 innocents in Sodom, would you still slay them all? How about 40? Do I hear 30? C’mon 20, innocents, do I have a 20? Maybe 10?”

Well, I could see the Israelites doing the same thing if God said let the babies live. “What makes a baby? 2 years old? Why not 3? If 3 is young enough, what about a 4 year old? You know, those 8 year olds can’t be that devious… how about them?”.

You see my point. It’s like the proverbial, “give them an inch and they take a mile!”. I guess in ancient Israel it would be, “Give them a cubit, and they take a furlong!”

 

[Todd_Easton]

In the time of Moses and Joshua, God gave the general commandment against killing innocents but He also gave the exceptional command that certain innocent infants and small children be killed. Why God commanded that those particular innocents be killed while prohibiting the killing of all other innocents is a mystery. It is likely that God foresaw that it would be better for those particular innocents to die early and presumably go to heaven than to live longer, to fall into wickedness like their parents, and go to hell. See Wisdom 4:7-14, where early death is discussed.

 

[JP_Marat]

In the time of Moses and Joshua, God gave the general commandment against killing innocents but He also gave the exceptional command that certain innocent infants and small children be killed. Why God commanded that those particular innocents be killed while prohibiting the killing of all other innocents is a mystery. It is likely that God foresaw that it would be better for those particular innocents to die early and presumably go to heaven than to live longer, to fall into wickedness like their parents, and go to hell. See Wisdom 4:7-14, where early death is discussed.

RESPONSE

I always like those “it’s a mystery” explanations when there are no reasonable answers.

First of all, its necessary to realize that invading armies commonly practiced the geneocide of the conquered people.

Later on, when the stories were told around the campfires, the yarn developed that God told them to do it, so it was “God’s will.” Later still, this folklore was written down and became eventually our Old Testament.

So God probably had nothing to do with the slaughter of women and children. But claiming that God had commanded it removed the guilt.

 

[kamalayka9]

RESPONSE

I always like those “it’s a mystery” explanations when there are no reasonable answers.

First of all, its necessary to realize that invading armies commonly practiced the geneocide of the conquered people.

Later on, when the stories were told around the campfires, the yarn developed that God told them to do it, so it was “God’s will.” Later still, this folklore was written down and became eventually our Old Testament.

So God probably had nothing to do with the slaughter of women and children. But claiming that God had commanded it removed the guilt.

Hold your horses right there!!
First of all, the reason God gave us the commandment not to murder is because we do not have the right to. GOD DOES!!
And who is to say that the babies and children are not in heaven right now?

You can’t teach others to excuse the Sacred Scripture of God as “folklore,” and then stand before Him on the day of Judgment and expect to excuse yourself!

The Jewish people were VERY careful about Scriptures. Whenever they would copy a Book, they would literally make an exact copy. letters would be the same size, they would be the same distance from the edge of the page, etc.

To say that they just “added things” in God’s Name is a horrible blasphemy.
Eventually, you will go down that road and deny other books that don’t fit with *your *view of God, and then you start denying the historicity of the NT.

 

[BerhaneSelassie]

Why question the motives of an all powerful, all knowing God. He saw the future and that they would be wicked, so he had the killed before they grew. Death is not the worst thing that can happen to a human, people typically think it it, hell is the worst thing that can happen to someone. The adults probaby incurred God’s wrath in the age to come, whereas the children probably received some kind of mercy

 

[JP_Marat]

Hold your horses right there!!

First of all, the reason God gave us the commandment not to murder is because we do not have the right to. GOD DOES!!
And who is to say that the babies and children are not in heaven right now?<<

RESPONSE:

It’s also quite accurate and easily proven. For example, check out the story of the woman taken in adultery (John 8). When was it added to John’s gospel? Look it up. (Answer: sometime in the 4th century, earlier copies don’t have this yarn).

 

[ricmat]

RESPONSE

I always like those “it’s a mystery” explanations when there are no reasonable answers.

“Reasonable answers?” Reasonable to whom? You?

Why is it important to the rest of humanity that the answer be reasonable to you?

No doubt, by “reasonable” what you mean is that you expect God to conform to your own standards of reasonableness. But, of course, God does not ask Marat what he thinks is reasonable so that he knows whether to do it or not. God defines good and bad, not you.

God makes the laws for humanity. God does not need to conform to those laws. And yes, much of what God does and why he does it is a mystery. “Have you ever in your lifetime commanded the morning and shown the dawn it’s place?”

 

[BerhaneSelassie]

That section has traditionally been placed at the end of the gospel of John, when i did a search on this a while ago, the first reference i saw that i could find to it was by ST Augustine around AD 400

 

[Mintaka]

Not having any surviving copies from before a certain time doesn’t mean there weren’t any copies.

It seems pretty clear that the story was controversial and that many people didn’t think it should have been put into the Gospel. Some thought it made light of adultery, or was too useful for various heretics. But it also seems to have been accepted pretty docilely and quickly as a real part of the Gospel.

So we don’t know the whole story of how it made its way into the Canon; but it did. That can only be the work of the Holy Spirit. Probably scholarship will turn up more, someday.

OTOH, if the NT was just added to by many hands with great blitheness, the real question is why other attractive pseudo-Gospels or their stories weren’t added in. Why doesn’t the Gospel of Luke have the story of the lions and unicorns (wild donkeys) worshipping the Christ Child on the Flight to Egypt through the desert? Why don’t any of the Gospels have the famous Gnostic line that women can only be saved by becoming men? Why not the line from Papias, which probably Jesus did say, urging us to “be good bankers”?

But I think the OP’s question was one of theodicy, not of Scriptural authority. JP Marat’s answer to “Does God ever order bad things?” is more like “Does God ever really give revelation? No, of course not. Or only sometimes. You guess when.” If Scripture isn’t divine revelation, the OP’s question is entirely beside the point and he doesn’t have to give any logical answer.

“It’s a mystery” is an attempt to answer. What Marat said is an avoidance of not just the question, but of the OP’s right to take the text seriously.

 

[Fidelis]

I think the tactic of relying on modern Scripture scholars speculation that certain parts of Scripture were added later on is a weak one. No matter what the final editing process of the Scriptures was, the text must be dealt with as we have it without succumbing to the temptation to explain it away. You can understand this better by looking to history, logic and practical considerations.

One possible factor is the fact that, in ancient warfare, conquered peoples were almost never completely incorporated into the society that conquered them – either they were relocated (like the Jews in the Exile), or they were killed outright, or they were made into slaves. In a numerically small people like the Israelites whose survival and protection by God depended on keeping seperate from pagan idols and the unclean practices that went with them, this ws especially problematic. The tribes of Israel that conquered Canaan were small in number and uncentralized. They were in no position to banish large numbers of conquered Canaanites. Also, creating a huge slave class would have been problematic. Who was going to control all these slaves? What happens when the slave population gets large enough and it’s resentment at being an enslaved people develops to the point were they rebell and rise up against the Israelite tribes, which as I mentioned had no central government or standing army until about 250 years after the Conquest of Canaan?

There are numerous other considerations of course. The best explanation I’ve heard of this is by Catholic Answers apologist Jimmy Akin over at his blog, found here.

A good rule of thumb when reading history in general and Scripture in particular is to not judge ancient peoples by modern standards. They’re the ones that had to deal with these things in their own time and using what limited knowledge and tools they had: try to walk a mile in their sandals.

 

[NotWorthy]

RESPONSE:

It’s also quite accurate and easily proven. For example, check out the story of the woman taken in adultery (John 8). When was it added to John’s gospel? Look it up. (Answer: sometime in the 4th century, earlier copies don’t have this yarn).

I’m not sure if this is entirely accurate. It seems that it was in there, then it was taken out by Church officials who thought it was too lenient on those who commit adultery.

Here is what I found on AgapeBibleStudy.Com

Part of the problem is that the story of the adulterous woman is not found in any of the most important early Greek manuscripts that have survived, nor is it found in the Egyptian Coptic Church’s biblical texts. However, three eminent 4th century Church Fathers, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose and St. Augustan, all testify to its authenticity. J**erome included it in his Latin Vulgate Bible translation, which was translated using the oldest and best Greek and Hebrew texts that existed in the late 4th** century. **St. Augustan maintains that this story was always part of John’s Gospel but that it was excluded from many copies because Church authorities feared it would be misinterpreted to suggest that Jesus condoned adultery**.

The ease with which Jesus forgave the woman was hard to reconcile with the stern morality of an early Christian Church fighting pagan debauchery and licentiousness. Sexual purity was a very foreign concept to most pagan gentiles. Evidence to suggest the veracity of this claim does exist. M**any ancient manuscripts that do not contain this story have a blank space between the end of what we designate as John 8:2 and the beginning of the Light of the World discourse [8:12]. Some of these manuscripts not only have the gap but also have scribal notation marks indicating a missing passage. **

We also have the testimony of Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea who records that “*Papias *[Bishop of Hieropolis and the disciple of St. John the Apostle] *relates another story of a woman who was accused of many sins before the Lord.” *History of the Church III, 39:17]. Then too, **the 3rd century document the *Didascalia Apostolorum ***[II 24:6] gives a clear reference to this story of the adulterous woman brought to Jesus and uses it as a well known example of Jesus’ mercy and gentleness.
Since Jerome did include this passage in his Latin Vulgate [late 4th century] and since that translation became the official canonical translation of Sacred Scripture for the Roman Church, down through the history of the Church Roman Catholics, Byzantine Eastern Rite Catholics and even King James Version Bible Protestants have accepted this story as authentic.