The worst of the good book?
25 November 2007 by vastleft
Those of you who have seen my links in some posts and comments know that I’m slooowly reading the Holy Bible and assessing what it means to a modern reader — not historically, but literally and metaphorically.
As I’m nearing the end of the third book of sixty-six (Leviticus, that is), I’ve encountered one of the most disturbing passages yet:
16 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying,17 Speak unto Aaron, saying, Whosoever he be of thy seed in their generations that hath any blemish, let him not approach to offer the bread of his God.
18 For whatsoever man he be that hath a blemish, he shall not approach: a blind man, or a lame, or he that hath a flat nose, or any thing superfluous,
19 Or a man that is brokenfooted, or brokenhanded,
20 Or crookbackt, or a dwarf, or that hath a blemish in his eye, or be scurvy, or scabbed, or hath his stones broken;
21 No man that hath a blemish of the seed of Aaron the priest shall come nigh to offer the offerings of the LORD made by fire: he hath a blemish; he shall not come nigh to offer the bread of his God.
In other words, keep those creepy physical defectives away from my holy altar! God is love, doncha know, God is love.
There are so many unsavory passages in this vaunted tome, such as…
- The punishment of all women because Eve dared to eat from the Tree of Knowledge
- The destruction of nearly every living thing, because God got it in his head that “the wickedness of man was great”
- Completely uncriticized slave-banging and otherwise legitimizing slavery as a legal activity
- A Bible hero offering up his virginal daughters to an angry mob (and them subsequently raping him)
- God insisting that Abraham be willing to stab his son to death on a sacrificial altar, and surely traumatizing the kid in the process
- Members of the YHWH’s favorite family avenging a single act of rape by tricking an entire city of men into getting circumcised and then killing them all
- After killing a young man the Lord deems wicked, killing his brother for not wanting to impregnate his sister-in-law
- God randomly trying to kill his right-hand man, Moses
- The plague after plague unleashed on the Egyptians — including the slaves and animals — because God hardened Pharaoh’s heart so he wouldn’t let the Israelites go and have a picnic in His honor. And making an annual celebration of the killing of every firstborn Egyptian.
- Yahweh claiming ownership of every firstborn male, including of the human variety, with the seeming implication that he wants them sacrificed in his honor
- Meting out punishment not only on infidels, but on three or four generations of their offspring
- Repeated calls to execute people who work on the Sabbath
- A 9/11-sized massacre of fellow Israelites because they dance around a golden idol
- Endless descriptions of reasons and methods for absolving human sins by ritually sacrificing animals, including rituals where one animal is soaked in the blood of its butchered brethren
- The Good Lord burning two children alive for lighting some incense, and then forbidding their father — His #1 priest — from grieving the loss
- And countless other reasons for people and animals to be slaughtered, including for being gay and for being a critter who’s the victim of bestiality. And you’ll be excommunicated for many other sins, including having sex with a menstruating woman.
Beyond that there is constant rewarding of people who steal others’ birthrights and who rip off innocent Egyptians and punishing of people who aspire to God-like accomplishments.
The major story of the Pentateuch is that God is going to kick all the natives out of Canaan and give it to a small group of people that are his favorites. Doesn’t that sound like the nicest little deity you’ve ever heard of?
For y’all, who may have read much more of the One True Infallible Guide to Morality, what are your favorite examples of bad messages in the Good Book?
* * *
Update:
Bonus out-of-context Bible quotes:
The coolest (so far) is from Genesis 27:11 — “I am a smooth man.”
The cruelest, so fitting for today’s Religious Right Repubs, from Leviticus 19:15 — “Thou shalt not respect the person of the poor.”
The truest, from Exodus 15:3 — “The LORD is a man of war.”
25 November 2007, on 6:31 pm
Not just kick everyone out of Canaan, but murder them to the last man, woman, and child. For the sole reason that they didn’t worship YHVH.
25 November 2007, on 6:37 pm
For whatever reason today, I suddenly came up with a question to ask a babble thumper: Would you want your wife to have painkillers during childbirth?
Or perhaps, would you let your wife have painkillers during childbirth if she wanted them?
Just to see how gawd fearing and babble believing they really are.
25 November 2007, on 6:50 pm
Revenant,
It seems that YHWH has no interest in other people believing in him. There are thems that are chosen and f— the rest of them.
25 November 2007, on 6:51 pm
AUM,
Good point. How dare women not suffer properly because 6000 years ago a rib-woman ate some fruit!
25 November 2007, on 7:39 pm
I recall being informed of my ‘natural’ sinfulness and the fact that women are the cause of all the world’s problems.
I also recall laughing out loud at the time and wondering how anyone could be so damn stupid.
Priests don’t appreciate a woman with a sense of humor.
25 November 2007, on 9:00 pm
This has nothing to do with this thread in particular, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Here in Central NY which is fairly acrawlin with fundies, right to lifers, bushbabies and guns–a group of “Old Order Amish” are having a hard time fitting in. Now, as fundies go, they are fairly moderate (as regards making other folks fit their molds) but apparently they are a threat to the order of the town they’ve started to move into. The town managers say that they are not being singled out for any grief, but that they “have to obey the law” like everyone else (turns out one of the “laws” is not on the books).
In any event I was going to pen a sarcastic letter to the editor suggesting that if they want to be let alone or, better yet, helped out, they should bomb a few abortion clinics and start protesting at the funerals of US soldiers killed in Iraq. But, then I realized it might give some idiot ideas.
25 November 2007, on 10:19 pm
So much for god loves you just the way you are!
True fundies would have to change it to: god loves you just the way you are, as long as you’re not physically disabled, blind, ugly, dirty, short, or have any broken bones!
I noticed that homosexuality wasn’t included in those verses. Where could it be? Maybe they’ll include it in an updated version. God’s gotta keep up with the times, ya know.
25 November 2007, on 11:35 pm
vastleft: May I gently suggest that you refer to this book you’re reading as the “Christian bible”, rather than as the “holy” bible. From your description (and my recollection), it doesn’t sound “holy” by any definition that I understand.
Sarah: the best “stone the queers” verses are in the 18th and 20th chapters of Leviticus. Our friend vl quoted from the 21st chapter, and so should already have run across those gems. The 18th chapter is a laundry list of Hebrew sexual hang-ups. The 20th chapter is a bloodlust laundry list of stoning and excommunication offenses: visiting fortune-tellers, sleeping with a woman during her period (excommunication); cursing parents or *being* a fortune-teller (death by stoning). One could be forgiven for overlooking a couple of anti-gay verses among all the carnage….
25 November 2007, on 11:37 pm
Sarah,
Please see the last bullet in the list.
26 November 2007, on 12:46 am
Vastleft,
I found part about homosexuality in your link. But it really seems that god hates just about everyone, not just gays! Why do the fundies pick on gays so much when the bible states that god is pissed at everyone?
On another note, my new favorite bible verse is: Then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that go a whoring after him, to commit whoredom with Molech, from among their people.
That verse made me giggle. Am I weird?
26 November 2007, on 1:14 am
Sarah, the whole Molech thing is quite intriguing, a little glimpse at what the jealous Lord is jealous of. One of numerous references that suggest that there isn’t just one God in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
My favorite Bible quote is from Genesis 27:11 — “I am a smooth man.”
26 November 2007, on 1:20 am
Steve,
What do you mean that the Bible isn’t holy? It’s the one perfect book in the world and the only source of morality. What the hell were you thinking?
26 November 2007, on 1:37 am
My niece’s cat begat a whopping litter of eleven kittens once, four score and seven years ago. These evil little cats made nothing but mischief and refused to make sacrifice and hecatombs to the big boss man, who is me. After a final attempt at bringing them to order- a come to Jeebus meeting before there was even a Jeebus to come to, and smiting all of their carpeted idols to false gods, I called down the rains from heaven upon their litter box, which is also a bathtub and capped it with plywood from the center of the earth. I did instruct Patches, the one righteous kitten of the litter, to build an ark with popsicle sticks and chewing gum. Unfortunately, his lack of opposable thumbs prevented him from doing so and he spent his last weeks stoned on catnip and having incestuous relations with his siblings. At least I didn’t need to waste the dove and the light machine.
I learned this from Gob.
26 November 2007, on 2:08 am
“…or hath his stones broken;”
Shit! My friends and co-workers are constantly busting my balls. Does that mean I can’t approach the Lawd?
I found this post particularly relevant to my role as a health care worker. It amazes me that so many of my patients expect Gob to help them through their disability. I’m guessing our hospital chaplin skips over this delightful passage during her visits with patients.
Makes sense though, really–the folks that wrote this fine, iron-age tome likely believed those with physical disablities to be cursed by their loving and merciful Yahweh.
Sarah–good point about gob hating everyone. If one adds up all those for whom Gob holds a grudge, there are very few left not in his Lamb’s Book of Shit-Lists.
Also, Sarah, my personal new favorite Wholey Babble verse is Ezekiel 23:20–”She lusted after their genitals – as large as those of donkeys, and their seminal emission was as strong as that of stallions.”
Vastleft–Glad you brought up Onan in this post. Since I am neither gay, nor possessing crushed testicles (or any other physical disfigurement), when I was a believer during my teenage years, the cautionary example of Onan was the only thing keeping me from the Lawd’s merciful salvation. This was by far one of the scariest verses for me during that period of my life (this was the Babble passage I submitted in the comments to the post on Halloween about scariest bible verses.) Of course, as you pointed out, Onan’s crime wasn’t technically masturbation, but rather the money shot.
If only Ron Jeremy knew the terrible fate that will befall him…
26 November 2007, on 5:57 am
Can I offer a rare example of a good verse in the Bible?
Deuteronomy 23:12-13 actually makes sense. Now if only some of the people who visited the Peak District would read it …..
26 November 2007, on 7:42 am
AJS,
Mr. Bible Writer man clearly knew a thing or two about shoveling shit.
26 November 2007, on 8:45 am
Fritzy,
I’ve already encountered a few references to people having to “atone” for their ailments. So, yes, people were condemned for their illnesses.
Lepers (Leviticus 13:45) are supposed to sit around yelling “unclean, unclean.”
And the prohibition (Leviticus 20:18) on having sex with a menstruating woman is priceless:
And if a man shall lie with a woman having her sickness, and shall uncover her nakedness; he hath discovered her fountain, and she hath uncovered the fountain of her blood: and both of them shall be cut off from among their people.
26 November 2007, on 9:29 am
I resolve to build a gopher wood shed at the back of my yard in which to house my bloody fountain of a girlfriend on her comparatively unclean days of the month, should she suddenly opt off her birth control pills and actually become a fountain!
The B-B-I-L-E! Yes, that’s the book for me…
26 November 2007, on 9:46 am
RDZ,
Yahweh prefers “shittim” wood.
26 November 2007, on 10:45 am
Okay, so the cripples aren’t welcome. What if you’re lactose intolerant?
26 November 2007, on 10:54 am
Brooklyn Boy,
Then you’re probably not cut out for “the land of milk and honey.”
26 November 2007, on 12:17 pm
AUM:
It’s funny, the will of God, an all powerful being, can be undone with a few magic pills from modern medicine.
26 November 2007, on 1:17 pm
Wow. Was it all that common for a guy to have his stones broken or his “privy member” cut off in those days? I’m imagining some Jewish Mafia going around collecting ‘debts’, and this was the bronze age version of knee-capping.
26 November 2007, on 1:42 pm
karen,
Coulda just been shaky-handed mohels, what with people living eight- or nine-hundred years back then.
26 November 2007, on 1:54 pm
Didn’t Colt 45 Malt Liquor use that one?
26 November 2007, on 2:44 pm
Aw, someone beat me to it. I was gonna comment on the “broken stones” part.
26 November 2007, on 2:46 pm
I know! They got their stones broke by riding bareback on the stegosaurus! That’ll learn ‘em!
26 November 2007, on 6:35 pm
2 Thessalonians 3:10:
For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “If a man will not work, he shall not eat.”
Wouldn’t that make feeding the hungry be against gawd?
26 November 2007, on 7:56 pm
[...] What would it be like if I did base my morality on the Bible? From a recent post at God Is For Suckers!, we can get a general idea: [...]
26 November 2007, on 9:39 pm
I got wind of the 4 bidden fruit today.
Everyone knows that a fruit is a gay or a fag. Well, listen to this. Bidding someone is calling out to them. And, 4 is a four letter swear word. So, it makes sense that - a forbidden fruit is a queer that you have to swear at.
26 November 2007, on 11:51 pm
I came to the US on a student visa. Before I got my US citizenship, I was forced to eat roadkill….
Deuteronomy 14:21 (New International Version)
Do not eat anything you find already dead. You may give it to an alien living in any of your towns and he may eat it, or you may sell it to a foreigner…
27 November 2007, on 11:35 pm
Here’s a rather interesting atheist Site that I…erm…’stumbled on’…
with the heading:
“in Alfred’s (head) Space”
http://home.mweb.co.za/it/iti04330/index.htm
In particular…
Listed there, under “On Religion and Atheism”…
Check out this rather interesting, rather thorough, and somewhat lengthy atheist article…
It sums up a whole lot of what we jabber on about here on GifS…
and he does it…to my way of thinking…in both a ‘most deliciously nasty’(?), and extremely accurate manner.
See what you guys think? [erm...Mods?...maybe add his link to our right panel]
To go directly to the article…
“RAGE AGAINST THEISM” by Alfred Karius:
http://home.mweb.co.za/it/iti04330/atheist1.htm
Enjoy?
28 November 2007, on 6:54 am
There are some gems you will find in your further reading. This is a spoiler for Isaiah 13,
13 Therefore I will make the heavens tremble;
and the earth will shake from its place
at the wrath of the LORD Almighty,
in the day of his burning anger.
14 Like a hunted gazelle,
like sheep without a shepherd,
each will return to his own people,
each will flee to his native land.
15 Whoever is captured will be thrust through;
all who are caught will fall by the sword.
16 Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes;
their houses will be looted and their wives ravished.
17 See, I will stir up against them the Medes,
who do not care for silver
and have no delight in gold.
18 Their bows will strike down the young men;
they will have no mercy on infants
nor will they look with compassion on children.
28 November 2007, on 7:10 pm
bernarda,
Holy shit, that’s disturbing stuff. Something to look forward to, sort of. Thanks!
2 December 2007, on 2:03 am
Numbers 31:17-18 [After the Israelites have slaughtered all the adult males of Midian, Moses says the following:]
“Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known man by lying with him. But all the young girls who have not known man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.”
Take a while to study this passage, and think about what it says.