If Abraham was so great, why was he constantly prostituting his wife?

[Aloysium]

God, the ultimate arbiter as to what and what is not good and righteous declares Lot as such. If offering up your daughters to be raped by a mob doesn’t tarnish one’s righteousness, then God condones it in at least in the circumstances you quoted above.

Didn’t read where God let them do it, so I’m not sure what you mean. At any rate, i get the impression that you would have killed all of them.

Read the news and see what God is permitting now. It is concerning to believers because the consequences are clear and ppl do not want to listen.

As I stated earlier, “I don’t like making such comments because it feels like I am setting the standard by which I will be judged, in this case by rules that I never heard of and sensitivities that do not yet exist.”

 

[RobbyS]

The point of Abraham story was not that he was perfect flawless man who never made a mistake, but someone who at certain key points in his life had faith in God and obeyed that faith. When he was called to leave home for an unknown land he trusted in God. When he was told to sacrifice his own son, he was willing to trust that God would make it right, since God promised that his son Isaac was the child of promise. When Abraham and Sarah tried to fufill God’s promise of a son their own way by using Hagar as a surrogate they suffered serious consequences. Like Moses and David who also made errors in judgement, Abraham was an imperfect type or preview of the perfect Jesus Christ who made no mistakes, had perfect faith and a perfect relationship with God the Father. Imperfect as Abraham was, he had a heart for God, and Faith and trust in the Lord that we should try to emulate.

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An even better example is Jacob, who was anything but a straight up guy.

 

[RobbyS]

Your problem, Mike, is that you’re insist on viewing scripture through present-day eyes, applying present-day standards, and assuming that present-day family relationships are unchanged throughout history. Your opinion of the bible is skewed because you aren’t making even the slightest effort to read it in the context of the time when the stories happened.

These events happened 4,000 years ago, when fathers practically owned their daughters, when it was more shameful to dishonor a guest than to harm your own self (and your family was an extension of yourself), when daughters and sons put more emphasis on family honor than on their personal desires, when a man took a bride from his own close family to ensure the family wealth stayed in the family, when polygamy to ensure an heir was normal. Outside of the Muslim countries, few of these 4,000 year old societal norms still exist.

But until you cast off your modern-day glasses, until you view the events of 4,000 years ago within the context of society as it existed 4,000 years ago, you will be totally clueless when it comes to understanding the motives of the people involved.

Well, many Muslim’s today see things with the same eyes. Consider the many honor killings.

 

[RobbyS]

Before we go any further can we agree that the angry mob outside of Lot’s house were looking to rape the angels inside? Can we agree that Lot was telling them to rape his daughters instead? Finally can we agree that Lot is affording the angels a level of protection far greater than that of his daughters or even his sons-in-law?

I was only talking about Lot here, but I’m more than fine with showing how repulsive Yahweh is in this scene.

1. Two angels (searching for 10 righteous men) visit Lot’s house and break bread with him. When the mob storms the house the angels (assumedly acting as the hand of God) transport Lot, his two daughters, and his wife out of the city just before God destroys it. God, the ultimate arbiter as to what and what is not good and righteous declares Lot as such. If offering up your daughters to be raped by a mob doesn’t tarnish one’s righteousness, then God condones it in at least in the circumstances you quoted above.
2. By stating an act can be evil or good depending on the situation, that is moral relativism. Now I’m not against it as a concept but different people will put different constraints on it. Every once in a while there will be a thread on CAF questioning whether bearing false witness is allowed depending on the situation. Often times this will come in the form of, “Would it have been ok to lie to a Nazi as to the whereabouts of a Jew in hiding?” Those in favor will argue the good that comes from it outweighs the sin.

The thing is even those who disagree with that notion of good lieing can at least see where those in favor are coming from. Here you’re arguing that the good of the rape offer outweighs the sin of letting your daughters be raped. Not only is this clearly moral relativism but it’s of a scope far greater than helping a people escape genocide.

I see that you’re repeatedly banging your head against a brick wall. Only via multiple concussions could a person assume that arguing that rape is never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever good equates with trolling.

You seem to miss the point of the story.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Before we go any further can we agree that the angry mob outside of Lot’s house were looking to rape the angels inside? Can we agree that Lot was telling them to rape his daughters instead? Finally can we agree that Lot is affording the angels a level of protection far greater than that of his daughters or even his sons-in-law?

I suspect you are completely missing the point of the story. The angels are sacred, holy beings. When Lot met them he bowed down to them out of profound respect for the holy. That Lot would sacrifice his daughters meant that Lot understood the terrible sacrilege the mob was about to commit by desecrating the holy. Lot was offering the mob a way out of their monstrous intent by attempting to dissuade them from committing it.

The problem is, I suspect, that you may not have a sense of the sacred but believe that everything has a merely human imposed value and that the holy is really nothing of any special worth.

What made Lot a just man was not that he offered his daughters to the mob, but that he had a refined sense of the holy and tried to protect the mob from committing a sacrilege against the holy by attempting to deter them with the offer of his daughters. If you can’t see Lot’s act as one of great sacrifice and heartbreak to himself in that his daughters would be defiled, but he still chose that option because he understood the gravity of the sin against God that the mob was about to commit and tried to protect them by stopping them from carrying it out.

The problem is that today we lack a deep and profound sense of what the sacred really is. Lot obviously had a fierce understanding of that, as did Abraham and Moses.

Speaking of sacrificing daughters, we live in a culture that thinks nothing of aborting sons and daughters as disposable commodities for the sake of retaining wealth, prestige or position. I am certain that Lot would be horrified by the prospect of killing his children for the sake of retaining any of those mundane goods. He did what he did as a result of a far deeper sense of where the source of real value is to be found. He loved on a far deeper and profound level than any of us have a right to question, which is why he understood what was truly at risk if the mob’s intention was carried out.

 

[Nan_S]

One other thing you are ignoring, Mike:

Lot acted within the norms of society in his time, offering to do go to whatever extreme was necessary to protect his guests. He was boxed into a situation of his own making - not God’s making - with no way out. The only thing Lot could do was choose between two bad options: protect his guests and preserve his family’s honor, or protect his daughters and sacrifice his family’s honor. If choosing between two bad options makes you unrighteous, what does that say about you every November when you go vote?

God understood why Lot made the offer, but God had a better plan which was completely beyond Lot’s ability to anticipate, completely beyond Lot’s ability to do. The angels never said, “Sure, throw the daughters out there, lets grab some chairs and watch.” Instead they intervened to provide a solution that negated the problem, halting the antagonists’ advance and helping Lot’s family to escape, protecting both Lot’s family members and his family honor.

You are wrong when you say God is abhorrent because Lot offered his daughters to the mob. God didn’t put Lot in the city, and God didn’t tell Lot to choose between his daughters and his honor. Lot made those choices himself, then God provided better solutions to both the problem of his family honor and the problem of escaping the city.

 

[LilyM]

An even better example is Jacob, who was anything but a straight up guy.

And Jacob gets the odd taste of his own medicine straight back at him - for example when Laban pulls the old switcheroo with Rachel and Leah to ensure Jacob works for him for an extra seven years. More particularly when he is woefully deceived first by his other sons into thinking that Joseph is dead, and then by Joseph into thinking that his favourite son Benjamin will also be lost to him. He ends his days essentially with nothing due to severe drought and dependent on Joseph’s good graces in Egypt.

I think his life is as much a moral tale about the scrapes trickery can get you into as anything.

 

[RobbyS]

And Jacob gets the odd taste of his own medicine straight back at him - for example when Laban pulls the old switcheroo with Rachel and Leah to ensure Jacob works for him for an extra seven years. More particularly when he is woefully deceived first by his other sons into thinking that Joseph is dead, and then by Joseph into thinking that his favourite son Benjamin will also be lost to him. He ends his days essentially with nothing due to severe drought and dependent on Joseph’s good graces in Egypt.

I think his life is as much a moral tale about the scrapes trickery can get you into as anything.

Reminding me that Joseph is one of the few ‘saintly” persons in the Old Testament. Infidels who rant and rave about the slaughters in the Bible have no clue about the meaning of the narrative. Even the “heroes,” by and large are painted with warts and all. And even a prophet like Eliseus, who raises up Jehu to bring down the House of Omri comes off oddly in my reading. For Jehu is anything but a good king.

 

[Fragile]

I believe it was Mother Angelica who said; “the Saints were not perfect, but they got up and pressed on!”

 

[Gorgias]

I can’t see how offering up your daughters to a mob of rapists is virtuous, no matter the intended result. It’s just wrong.

Mike,

As others have mentioned, it’s not “offering up your daughters to be raped”, but “making a sacrifice for the good of others.” The image that comes to mind is one from a movie I once watched (but cannot remember its title): a group of Jewish refugees is holed up, hiding from the Nazis. Among them is a woman with her baby. As the Nazis search the house in which they’re hidden, the baby begins to fuss. The other refugees look anxiously at the woman, and their glances betray their thoughts: they know that the baby’s cries will give away their position. The mother hugs the baby to her chest, and the child quiets down. After the Nazis have left, the camera shot returns to the mother, who is sobbing quietly – in order to save the others’ lives, she has smothered her baby to death.

I would cast the story of Lot that we’re discussing in a similar way: he’s making a sacrifice, among his own family, for the good of the entire group. (Let’s not be naive here, as well: if the angels hadn’t intervened, the crowd would’ve broken down the door, overpowered Lot, and taken the visitors. Do you really think that they would have spared everyone inside? Do you really think they wouldn’t have violated Lot’s family, out of anger and spite?)

 

[LaSainte]

Mike,

As others have mentioned, it’s not “offering up your daughters to be raped”, but “making a sacrifice for the good of others.” The image that comes to mind is one from a movie I once watched (but cannot remember its title): a group of Jewish refugees is holed up, hiding from the Nazis. Among them is a woman with her baby. As the Nazis search the house in which they’re hidden, the baby begins to fuss. The other refugees look anxiously at the woman, and their glances betray their thoughts: they know that the baby’s cries will give away their position. The mother hugs the baby to her chest, and the child quiets down. After the Nazis have left, the camera shot returns to the mother, who is sobbing quietly – in order to save the others’ lives, she has smothered her baby to death.

I would cast the story of Lot that we’re discussing in a similar way: he’s making a sacrifice, among his own family, for the good of the entire group. (Let’s not be naive here, as well: if the angels hadn’t intervened, the crowd would’ve broken down the door, overpowered Lot, and taken the visitors. Do you really think that they would have spared everyone inside? Do you really think they wouldn’t have violated Lot’s family, out of anger and spite?)

Well, according to Catholic morality, the Jewish mother would indeed be guilty of a major sin, as the ends never justify the means. You cannot kill an innocent person even to save the life or lives of others. This is why abortion is unacceptable, even when the life of the mother is at risk. Also, I believe this falls under the principal of Natural Law (correct me if I’m wrong), because no matter what faith you are, every human being has it written in their hearts that it is wrong to kill an innocent human being no matter what. Isn’t that part of the law that “is written on the hearts of men”?

Anyway, does the same apply to Lot, or are you saying that the ends justify the means here? Doesn’t that go against everything we believe as Catholics? Does Natural Law apply here?

And like I said, if Lot knew that these guys just wanted some hot man-on-man action, why didn’t he just offer HIMSELF up to be raped? Just wondering…

 

[Gorgias]

Well, according to Catholic morality, the Jewish mother would indeed be guilty of a major sin, as the ends never justify the means. You cannot kill an innocent person even to save the life or lives of others. This is why abortion is unacceptable, even when the life of the mother is at risk.

Correct, of course. However, I don’t think that’s what the scene I related is trying to depict. Rather, a mother – who is trying to keep her baby quiet in order to save the room full of people – smothers her baby in the process. I don’t think that the scene shows that she had intended to do so, but rather, had simply intended to quiet her child. It’s the same in the Lot example, I think – Lot isn’t intending harm, but rather, is attempting to prevent harm and/or death to come to his guests (and, if my intuition is correct, to his family as a whole).

Anyway, does the same apply to Lot, or are you saying that the ends justify the means here?

No; I’m not trying to go for an ‘ends justify the means’ approach.

And like I said, if Lot knew that these guys just wanted some hot man-on-man action, why didn’t he just offer HIMSELF up to be raped? Just wondering…

Hmm… because they weren’t interested in Lot to begin with? Besides which, if Lot sacrificed himself, who then would be able to protect his guests and his family? It seems that many are still trying to view this story through 21st-century lenses…

 

[LaSainte]

Correct, of course. However, I don’t think that’s what the scene I related is trying to depict. Rather, a mother – who is trying to keep her baby quiet in order to save the room full of people – smothers her baby in the process. I don’t think that the scene shows that she had intended to do so, but rather, had simply intended to quiet her child. It’s the same in the Lot example, I think – Lot isn’t intending harm, but rather, is attempting to prevent harm and/or death to come to his guests (and, if my intuition is correct, to his family as a whole).

No; I’m not trying to go for an ‘ends justify the means’ approach.

Hmm… because they weren’t interested in Lot to begin with? Besides which, if Lot sacrificed himself, who then would be able to protect his guests and his family? It seems that many are still trying to view this story through 21st-century lenses…

Gotcha. I seem to remember that scene too, but I can’t necessarily remember what movie it was. Inglorious Basterds?

Anyway, maybe I AM viewing it through 21st century lenses, but the way I understand it, it’s a pretty clear decision using the logic that the Church has taught us, right? You can’t just commit a lesser evil (offering your daughters up to rapists) to prevent a “greater” or different kind of evil. I too, have a hard time figuring out why Lot was so “righteous”. Meanwhile, his wife gets turned into salt for glancing backwards.

Out of curiosity, are we really supposed to believe this story anyway, or is it an allegory? If it is an allegory, it’s easier to let more slide.

Isn’t the idea behind Carholic morality that it is NEVER relative? If that’s the case, and Lot’s actions were righteous, then if the same thing happened today, I would be expected to offer my children up to be savaged before letting anything happen to some random strangers in my home rather than fighting the evil head-on and possibly having us all die in the process?

Would it be ok for me to do the same thing today? If not, why not?

 

[Gorgias]

Out of curiosity, are we really supposed to believe this story anyway, or is it an allegory? If it is an allegory, it’s easier to let more slide.

I don’t know that the inspired author meant it as allegory; it’s possible, but in order for that to be the case, the author would have to have either invented ‘Lot’ as a character within the framework of the historical person Abraham or would have had to have invented this story, using historical characters. On the other hand, the notion of Lot’s daughters’ incest, as a means of identifying the beginnings of the Moabites and Ammonites, as well as the sudden appearance of wine in their cave, seems to present the opportunity to think otherwise. The Church doesn’t have a definitive interpretation of this story, to the best of my knowledge.

Isn’t the idea behind Carholic morality that it is NEVER relative?

Well, not relative, but certainly situational: some things are never just (i.e., abortion), but others are capable to be contextualized (e.g., in a just war, it is possible to kill an aggressor in the attempt to stop him; yet, it’s not moral to kill that same aggressor, let’s say, if he is unarmed and you can capture him).

If that’s the case, and Lot’s actions were righteous

I’m not certain that I’m saying that Lot acted righteously, per se! However, I think we can say that there’s not the culpability that we would assign to a person who acted similarly today. For one thing, we are held to Christian standards that didn’t exist in that day. So, I don’t think I’m being two-faced if I suggest that, while we shouldn’t castigate Lot for not following standards of Christian morality, we also shouldn’t hold him up as the paragon of fatherly virtue.

Would it be ok for me to do the same thing today? If not, why not?

Because you’re held to the standards of the New Covenant, not the Abrahamic covenant…?!!

Edited to add:

I seem to remember that scene too, but I can’t necessarily remember what movie it was. Inglorious Basterds?

Ugh… I hope not! I hated that movie, for a variety of reasons! (Isn’t that the one that portrayed Hitler as a cross-dresser?)

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

Sorry, I’ve got a lot to respond to. This is part 1 of 2.

Your problem, Mike, is that you’re insist on viewing scripture through present-day eyes, applying present-day standards, and assuming that present-day family relationships are unchanged throughout history. Your opinion of the bible is skewed because you aren’t making even the slightest effort to read it in the context of the time when the stories happened.

Believe me, I’ve tried to put myself in Lot’s position. Imagining myself in his shoes in his setting just makes the premise that much more ridiculous.

These events happened 4,000 years ago, when fathers practically owned their daughters, when it was more shameful to dishonor a guest than to harm your own self (and your family was an extension of yourself), when daughters and sons put more emphasis on family honor than on their personal desires, when a man took a bride from his own close family to ensure the family wealth stayed in the family, when polygamy to ensure an heir was normal. Outside of the Muslim countries, few of these 4,000 year old societal norms still exist.

But things like arranged marriages and polygamy are not the same as throwing them to the wolves – or more specifically a gang-raping mob.

But until you cast off your modern-day glasses, until you view the events of 4,000 years ago within the context of society as it existed 4,000 years ago, you will be totally clueless when it comes to understanding the motives of the people involved.

The only metaphorical glasses involved are ones of rationalization. I refuse to put them on and try to handwave such a vile act as both accepted and acceptable.

Didn’t read where God let them do it, so I’m not sure what you mean. At any rate, i get the impression that you would have killed all of them.

No, God didn’t let them do it; but that’s not the issue here. Remember God in Matthew 5:27-32 equated thoughts of adultery with acting upon it. And I’ll get to more on God’s position as I go along.

Read the news and see what God is permitting now. It is concerning to believers because the consequences are clear and ppl do not want to listen.

I want to focus on the story of Sodom and not the present day, because in the story God made a very specific threat (which he followed through on) against the people of Sodom as opposed to say Las Vegas or New York.

As I stated earlier, “I don’t like making such comments because it feels like I am setting the standard by which I will be judged, in this case by rules that I never heard of and sensitivities that do not yet exist.”

And that’s fine. The problem comes later where if you can accept a man giving up his daughter to gang-rapists you leave yourself little to no room when it comes to the idea of moral absolutes.

I suspect you are completely missing the point of the story. The angels are sacred, holy beings. When Lot met them he bowed down to them out of profound respect for the holy. That Lot would sacrifice his daughters meant that Lot understood the terrible sacrilege the mob was about to commit by desecrating the holy. Lot was offering the mob a way out of their monstrous intent by attempting to dissuade them from committing it.

There is dissuading and there is an act so heinous that only someone completely devoid of love for their children could even fathom it.

The problem is, I suspect, that you may not have a sense of the sacred but believe that everything has a merely human imposed value and that the holy is really nothing of any special worth.

What made Lot a just man was not that he offered his daughters to the mob, but that he had a refined sense of the holy and tried to protect the mob from committing a sacrilege against the holy by attempting to deter them with the offer of his daughters. If you can’t see Lot’s act as one of great sacrifice and heartbreak to himself in that his daughters would be defiled, but he still chose that option because he understood the gravity of the sin against God that the mob was about to commit and tried to protect them by stopping them from carrying it out.

Wouldn’t a person in that position, someone who has touched and eaten bread with the angels themselves, after seeing that a mob was on their way to defame such holy creatures cry out to God for help? Wouldn’t he ask the angels for assistance? Why is his first reaction to have his daughters defiled in defense of those with all-mighty all-powerful creator on his side? It’s not even God telling Lot to do this for him. Only someone twisted or psychopathic would conjure such a thought in his head.

Speaking of sacrificing daughters, we live in a culture that thinks nothing of aborting sons and daughters as disposable commodities for the sake of retaining wealth, prestige or position. I am certain that Lot would be horrified by the prospect of killing his children for the sake of retaining any of those mundane goods. He did what he did as a result of a far deeper sense of where the source of real value is to be found. He loved on a far deeper and profound level than any of us have a right to question, which is why he understood what was truly at risk if the mob’s intention was carried out.

I have every right to question it. What Lot was said to have done is completely inexcusable. As LaSainte brilliantly noted, Lot did not offer himself for sacrifice. If he felt so strongly about stopping the sin the mob was to commit, surely place the burden on himself and show even a modicum fof love and compassion for his daughters. The character of Lot is irredeemable.

 

[Mike_from_NJ]

One other thing you are ignoring, Mike:

Lot acted within the norms of society in his time, offering to do go to whatever extreme was necessary to protect his guests.

Show me another example, preferably non-biblical.

He was boxed into a situation of his own making - not God’s making - with no way out. The only thing Lot could do was choose between two bad options: protect his guests and preserve his family’s honor, or protect his daughters and sacrifice his family’s honor. If choosing between two bad options makes you unrighteous, what does that say about you every November when you go vote?

That’s just it. There are more than two options. What level of insanity must Lot have possessed to think the only two options were 1) Let a mob rape his angelic guests, or 2) Let them rape his two daughters and hope the mob is honorable enough to stop there? Who on earth decides letting your offspring be gang-raped is a viable option? Again, ask God for help. Ask the angels for help. Offer a monetary bribe to the mob. Nope, Lot goes straight to the rape plan.

God understood why Lot made the offer, but God had a better plan which was completely beyond Lot’s ability to anticipate, completely beyond Lot’s ability to do. The angels never said, “Sure, throw the daughters out there, lets grab some chairs and watch.” Instead they intervened to provide a solution that negated the problem, halting the antagonists’ advance and helping Lot’s family to escape, protecting both Lot’s family members and his family honor.

I agree, it wasn’t God’s plan to have Lot offer up his daughters like he did. My problem is afterwards. He destroys the city as promised killing the unrighteous inside. He makes sure to save Lot’s wife and Lot’s daughters. He makes sure to save Lot, the man whose offer brings new meaning to the term dispicable. Not only that, there is not a mention that Lot had to repent for such a sin. He was one of only four righteous people in the whole town (and one of three after his wife had the audacity to turn around – but that’s for another thread).

You are wrong when you say God is abhorrent because Lot offered his daughters to the mob. God didn’t put Lot in the city, and God didn’t tell Lot to choose between his daughters and his honor. Lot made those choices himself, then God provided better solutions to both the problem of his family honor and the problem of escaping the city.

God didn’t punish Lot as he should have. Lot’s action was disgusting and he should have burned in a fire with all of the other attempted rapists. No, God did not make him choose his actions but he sure approved of them.

Mike,

As others have mentioned, it’s not “offering up your daughters to be raped”, but “making a sacrifice for the good of others.” The image that comes to mind is one from a movie I once watched (but cannot remember its title): a group of Jewish refugees is holed up, hiding from the Nazis. Among them is a woman with her baby. As the Nazis search the house in which they’re hidden, the baby begins to fuss. The other refugees look anxiously at the woman, and their glances betray their thoughts: they know that the baby’s cries will give away their position. The mother hugs the baby to her chest, and the child quiets down. After the Nazis have left, the camera shot returns to the mother, who is sobbing quietly – in order to save the others’ lives, she has smothered her baby to death.

I remember this was also a plot point in the last episode of MASH. It is very heartbreaking stuff. The analogy doesn’t hold though. In the situation you describe there truly are only two options. As I noted above, everyone here is presenting a false dichotomy. There are many options. In fact, the options I gave not only didn’t involve having his daughters raped but also were FAR more likely to succeed.

I would cast the story of Lot that we’re discussing in a similar way: he’s making a sacrifice, among his own family, for the good of the entire group. (Let’s not be naive here, as well: if the angels hadn’t intervened, the crowd would’ve broken down the door, overpowered Lot, and taken the visitors. Do you really think that they would have spared everyone inside? Do you really think they wouldn’t have violated Lot’s family, out of anger and spite?)

I agree they would not have stopped, just as they would not have stopped after raping his daughters and continued inside for the angels.

I don’t know that the inspired author meant it as allegory; it’s possible, but in order for that to be the case, the author would have to have either invented ‘Lot’ as a character within the framework of the historical person Abraham or would have had to have invented this story, using historical characters.

Even if we take it as allegory, it’s meant to explain what God expects of us and what God believe is right and wrong. And that is a very chilling thought.

 

[Peter_Plato]

Wouldn’t a person in that position, someone who has touched and eaten bread with the angels themselves, after seeing that a mob was on their way to defame such holy creatures cry out to God for help? Wouldn’t he ask the angels for assistance? Why is his first reaction to have his daughters defiled in defense of those with all-mighty all-powerful creator on his side? It’s not even God telling Lot to do this for him. Only someone twisted or psychopathic would conjure such a thought in his head.*

Consider that Lot knew something of the evil dispositions of the city and what would or would not work to dissuade the mob. Perhaps Lot himself was not an “attractive” option. He likely knew it so he dismissed it as an option.

It is not the insanity or mind of Lot that needs to be considered. What you are not taking into account at all is the mob. What they were capable of and what their intention was are two of the key considerations, yet you are saddling Lot with responsibility for the entire event, which is ludicrous. It is as if you believe the mob was a morally neutral “event” and not individuals making a choice.

Praying to God is a suggestion that misses the point as well. Lot knew God had passed judgement and declared the city an abomination. Lot was giving the mob a kind of last option that perhaps a shred of human decency would win out over their abominable practices. That they would see how heinous they had become and that they had reduced the situation to a choice between two abominable alternatives. This was a choice Lot had left to the individuals that comprised the mob before their final judgement.

 

[Peter_Plato]

I have every right to question it. What Lot was said to have done is completely inexcusable. As LaSainte brilliantly noted, Lot did not offer himself for sacrifice*. If he felt so strongly about stopping the sin the mob was to commit, surely place the burden on himself and show even a modicum fof love and compassion for his daughters. The character of Lot is irredeemable.

Again your suggestion is problematic concerning Lot offering himself. An important detail in the story is that there was something ethereally beautiful about the two visitors, This is very clear from the fact that there was a mob to begin with that sought after them. Are you claiming this was a common practice? That mobs formed whenever any visitors come into the city? If Lot was a viable option, then why wasn’t he accosted in the same manner when he made his first entrance into the city? He wasn’t, so clearly offering himself would have meant nothing.

As to your point concerning doing evil as a means to an end, that is only true if Lot were the one doing the evil, he wasn’t, the individuals making up mob were. His situation was more like promoting the lesser of two evil possibilities when those were the only two live options.

 

[LaSainte]

This might provide some insight:

johnsanidopoulos.com/2012/10/why-is-lot-called-righteous-if-he.html?m=1

Makes more sense than trying to justify Lot’s actions, which were clearly wrong.

 

[Bookcat]

I imagine at this point others have commented and answered in some detail regarding the original question. So I want to add this quote which is good to keep in mind with some of the things one reads in the Old Testament – from Pope Benedict;s Verbum Domini.

The “dark” passages of the Bible

1. In discussing the relationship between the Old and the New Testaments, the Synod also considered those passages in the Bible which, due to the violence and immorality they occasionally contain, prove obscure and difficult. Here it must be remembered first and foremost that biblical revelation is deeply rooted in history. God’s plan is manifested progressively and it is accomplished slowly, in successive stages and despite human resistance. God chose a people and patiently worked to guide and educate them. Revelation is suited to the cultural and moral level of distant times and thus describes facts and customs, such as cheating and trickery, and acts of violence and massacre, without explicitly denouncing the immorality of such things. This can be explained by the historical context, yet it can cause the modern reader to be taken aback, especially if he or she fails to take account of the many “dark” deeds carried out down the centuries, and also in our own day. In the Old Testament, the preaching of the prophets vigorously challenged every kind of injustice and violence, whether collective or individual, and thus became God’s way of training his people in preparation for the Gospel. So it would be a mistake to neglect those passages of Scripture that strike us as problematic. Rather, we should be aware that the correct interpretation of these passages requires a degree of expertise, acquired through a training that interprets the texts in their historical-literary context and within the Christian perspective which has as its ultimate hermeneutical key “the Gospel and the new commandment of Jesus Christ brought about in the paschal mystery”.[140] I encourage scholars and pastors to help all the faithful to approach these passages through an interpretation which enables their meaning to emerge in the light of the mystery of Christ.

~Pope Benedict XVI

vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_ben-xvi_exh_20100930_verbum-domini_en.html