An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

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JoeMama
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An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #1

Post by JoeMama »

"This is what the Lord Almighty says: "Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and suckling babes...."

Why so cruel? The God the Bible speaks of allegedly created Earth and the heavens with a wave of his hand. If God had good reason for wanting the sucklings to be killed, couldn't he just have killed them himself, with one wave of his hand, instead of ordering Saul to put them through the agony of dying by the sword?

Christians, which makes more sense to you?

1. God ordered the sucklings murdered.
2. God did not order their murder.

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #2

Post by Miles »

JoeMama wrote: Fri Jun 09, 2023 8:17 pm "This is what the Lord Almighty says: "Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and suckling babes...."

Why so cruel? The God the Bible speaks of allegedly created Earth and the heavens with a wave of his hand. If God had good reason for wanting the sucklings to be killed, couldn't he just have killed them himself, with one wave of his hand, instead of ordering Saul to put them through the agony of dying by the sword?

Christians, which makes more sense to you?

1. God ordered the sucklings murdered.
2. God did not order their murder.
As the story goes, I believe god delighted in his order to "utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass." and in some translations, "children" as well. [1 Samuel 15:3]

However, I don't believe there was any law against such killing, so it wouldn't have qualified as murder in either case. (Murder: the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another;) however, god was quite po'd because of what the Amalek did to Israel, so in a fit of vengeance he did order the sucklings killed---gotta go along with the story.

As far as making any sense, as an atheist I believe it makes all kinds of sense for a bitter, vengeful, and cruel god to do such a thing.

.

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #3

Post by JehovahsWitness »

WHY DIDNT GOD SAVE THE BABIES?

Because the God given right to procreate carries the divine responsibility for the lives of ones children; God could not violate his own natural law and it's unlikely any enemy nation would have agreed to surrender their children for safe keeping in a pre-war agreement even if the offer were made. The nation had been condemned to total annihilation for their wickedness and that wickedness included not surrendering and vaccating the vacinity when instructed by divine mandate to do so. Sadly their children had to suffer because of their parents bad decisions.

That said, there is no human decision can thwart divine justice and it is reasonable to believe God will resurrect the children (and even individual adults) that suffered innocently in the past.





Does the bible advocate the dashing of babies against rocks?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 65#p827065

Did Jephthah kill his daughter?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 41#p900641

Does the global flood prove God a "baby killer"?
viewtopic.php?p=979190#p979190

Did Elisha's bears kill little children?
viewtopic.php?p=830572#p830572
To learn more please go to other posts related to...

BABIES , CHILDREN and ...HEAVENLY LIFE
Last edited by JehovahsWitness on Sat Jun 10, 2023 1:23 pm, edited 2 times in total.
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #4

Post by TRANSPONDER »

Usual excuse for the reprehensible actions of the old bronze age idol of the Hebrews. They were all bad people; they deserved it. The apologists wabble forever between 'Oh - He didn't do it, it was men not doing his orders and" **** they will not spit it out "God ordered the genocide" *** But it was justified; they were wicked; they had it coming.

I don't believe it. I am glad I don't believe it. I don't know how I could live with trying to excuse or justify the evil doings of a celestial dictator. I frankly don't know how Bible apologists live with daily having to lie to themselves and others. I have said before that the What (in the debate) is done, the how is done, and it's the Why. Though I reckon I know why - the instinct of Faith. The instinct to self -justify, lie to keep credibility and go into denial. I can't recall ever seeing a discussion between a Believer who dismisses the OT with 'Jesus made everything new' and a fundamentalist who sees the OT as fundamental to the religion and the blood- spattered doings of this hideous idol excused and justified. When push comes to shove, they agree on one thing - squash the atheists.

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #5

Post by JoeMama »

[Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #3]

JW wrote:

"Sadly their children had to suffer because of their parents bad decisions."

JoeMama:
Doesn't the Bible teach that "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father"? (Ezekiel 18:20)

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #6

Post by JoeMama »

[Replying to TRANSPONDER in post #4]

When push comes to shove, they agree on one thing - squash the atheists.

JoeMama observes:

Happily, they're not doing a very good job of it. In 1972, a national survey showed that 90 percent of respondents said they were Christians. In 2023, it was only 63 percent.

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #7

Post by Miles »

JoeMama wrote: Sat Jun 10, 2023 8:32 pm [Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #3]

JW wrote:

"Sadly their children had to suffer because of their parents bad decisions."

JoeMama:
Doesn't the Bible teach that "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father"? (Ezekiel 18:20)
Yes it does, and it also teaches that:

Exodus 34:6-7
6 That is, the Lord passed in front of Moses and said, “Yahweh, the Lord, is a kind and merciful God. He is slow to become angry. He is full of great love. He can be trusted. 7 He shows his faithful love to thousands of people. He forgives people for the wrong things they do, but he does not forget to punish guilty people. Not only will he punish the guilty people, but their children, their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren will also suffer for the bad things these people do.

So even god can't make up his mind, which isn't all that surprising. Sometimes the kids can be punished and sometimes they cant. Gotta hope you catch him on a good day I guess.



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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #8

Post by TRANSPONDER »

JoeMama wrote: Sat Jun 10, 2023 8:32 pm [Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #3]

JW wrote:

"Sadly their children had to suffer because of their parents bad decisions."

JoeMama:
Doesn't the Bible teach that "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father"? (Ezekiel 18:20)
Well, that's 'discrepancies'. It is inconsistencies, things wrong and self -contradiction that makes us (Bible skeptics) look and say 'That's made up stuff by different people'. The problem of evil, the doing of evil, the poor morality makes for reasons not to trust the Bible, NT and old. The excuses, denial and illogical apologetics ("unless you can disprove 100% that it could not possibly be true, it must be taken as true") just confirms for me (and I'd guess others who are still able to assess and question) that they can't adequately explain and convince, but must in the end, deny everything.

An opponent on a former board debated using the Philosophy approach. :) (Philosophy is a favorite as it just invites fiddling about with words, semantics and logical constructs that can be misused) in a persistently annoying manner (he had a Thing; an 'atheist stumper' he thought he'd found 'Evidentialism is dead'. That turned out to be one of the philosophical positions that nobody uses in practice (1) as even if some philosophical extreme position (like determinism) had been refuted or was out of fashion, it made not the slightest atom of difference for the continued use of evidence to validate claims. But I had to keep saying so as he kept posting the same argument apparently expecting a different result.

Point is, we had a long discussion about the problem of evil and it ended up with...damn' my memory... yes, all the bad (which in the end he couldn't refute God allowed or did) was justified because it was part of God's Plan, which was Good in the end. I pointed out that this was a faithbased assumption. He said it didn't matter as it couldn't be disproved. So of course I said that that it didn't matter if he was in denial, it didn't make a case to me or to anyone (reasonable) who had followed the debate. And we see it here too, with an initial (as in Atheist Experience phone ins :D) "I have proof of God, Jesus, Bible (95 times out of 100 lifted from an apologetics book or website) it ends up with caller rummaging for excuses, and then just chanting denial before they have to end the call.

Point is :D The ones who lean on poor excuses to keep their faith are not winning if they can't convince others, let alone the atheist. The only thing that will defeat the atheist case is for it not to get heard. The battle and war is not for the case, but for the public voice.

But all that said, you are right that the OT is full of evil done or ordered by a god who seems confused, vile, stupid and immoral. Which, sorry ladies, proves that God ain't a woman (2). And this (another common theist apologist error) doesn't mean we think that God is evil, we think the god - claim is incoherent. And the problems all through are a solid case that we have a book of myth or tall stories, even if some history is mixed in.

(1) e.g metaphysical naturalism which postulates that everything is natural and cannot be supernatural. But mechanical or practical naturalism only says that all that we know works fine without the supernatural. So using philosophy to wrongfoot atheism on an untenable claim is a canard.

(2) not least because from Hatshepsut to Elizabeth I I can't think of a queen who initiated war; rather they preferred trade. (Theresa of Austria responded to Prussian conquest, and maybe Isabella and Theodosia rather supported their husband's 'reconquistas').

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #9

Post by JehovahsWitness »

JoeMama wrote: Sat Jun 10, 2023 8:32 pm [Replying to JehovahsWitness in post #3]

JW wrote:

"Sadly their children had to suffer because of their parents bad decisions."

JoeMama:
Doesn't the Bible teach that "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father"? (Ezekiel 18:20)
Yes it does; did I say the Children will be punished for the sins of their parents or did I say children then (as well as to this day) sadly suffer because of the bad decisions of their parents?
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http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


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Romans 14:8

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Re: An Unnecessarily Cruel God?

Post #10

Post by JehovahsWitness »

DID GOD PUT THE CANANITE CHILDREN TO DEATH FOR THE SINS OF THEIR PARENTS?


No He did not. The bible says that Children should not be put to death for the sins of their parents. It would be more accurate to say Canannite children suffering the "consequences" of their parents bad decisions rather than they were "punished". They were in the wrong place at the wrong time and sadly were not protected by their parents.
To illustrate: If an alcoholic father is irresponisble and crashes the car, the whole family, including any children that weren't even alive when it happened, suffer. The family may go for years without a car, the children later born may have to walk to school, worse someone may have been injured in the accident and suffer permanent pain or even been killed. Was the child that died put to death for the alcoholism of his father or did he simply suffer because of the alcoholism of his father?
In a similar way children born into pagan nations may have been sacrificed to false gods, suffered the infliction of immorality or not been able to recaputlate before an invading army. As the bible indicates, evil people leave a legacy of hardship behind them. NOTE Exodus 34:7 which points out that even after punishing the guilty, {quote} " their children, their grandchildren, and their great-grandchildren will also suffer for the bad things these people do." So suffering (note there is no mention of these children being "guilty" of anything) doesn't end with the wicked.
To illustrate If a man sexually abuses his children, those children will "suffer for the bad things [he did to them]"; they might themselves turn to abuse, or alcoholism which will effect their own children (the grandchildren). Thus disfunction may go through many generations
CONCLUSION God does not punish children for the sins of their parents but this does not mean their parents sins will not cause suffering for them or subsequent generations.

JW
Last edited by JehovahsWitness on Sun Jun 11, 2023 8:18 am, edited 3 times in total.
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


"For if we live, we live to Jehovah, and if we die, we die to Jehovah. So both if we live and if we die, we belong to Jehovah" -
Romans 14:8

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