Shuck and Jive


Saturday, June 02, 2007

October 23, 4004 BCE


in 1650, Bishop James Ussher calculated that the universe was created October 23, 4004 BCE. Ussher was calculating about the same time that the Westminster Divines met to draft the Westminster Confession of Faith. This confession held sway for 300 years and still retains a prominent place in the PCUSA Book of Confessions. Ussher's date of creation still has a prominent place in fantasy-based religion.

Bishop Ussher calculated his figure based on information in the Bible. You can trace the genealogies, reigns of kings, and so forth to calculate the time periods. I have the Bible I was given in Sunday School when I was six. It is a King James Bible. In one of the tables in the back under the heading: "Great Periods in Bible History" you find ten periods of "Bible History" corresponding with Ussher's date.

The 17th century was a heady, rationalistic time. The Bible was the source of history and all knowledge. Everything had a place. Science served the glory of God. The Westminster Divines even postulated that God knew the number and identity of everyone who would be saved or damned. It was all fixed.

That was the 17th century. They wrote what they knew. Four hundred years from now our descendants (if they survive) will marvel at what we thought we knew. Since the 1650's, the date of creation changed. It wasn't until the 1950's that scientists have given us the date of the Big Bang at around 14 billion years ago.

The interesting question is why did the biblical authors date creation to that time period (around 6,000 years ago)? John Dominic Crossan asks this in his book God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now. In a fascinating chapter entitled, "God and the Ambiguity of Power":

Why does the Bible itself date creation to around 4000 BCE? Why date creation around four thousand years before Christ and not any other nice round number, such as 10,000 or 100,000 BCE? What is special about a date around six thousand years ago?

When the biblical tradition raised inaugural and fundamental questions of meaning in Genesis 1-11, it selectively adopted and serenely adapted very ancient stories passed down from the Sumerians, those intensely competitive and magnificently creative people who lived in sourthern Mesopotamia from about 4500 to 2500 BCE. What they were attempting to think through in those narratives was the Neolithic Revolution of their own contemporary world. In, for example, their parables about the disputes between summer and winter, between cattle and grain, between plow and pickax, or (as discussed later between shepherd and farmer), the divine judment is always given to what we might call the evolutionary future among those options.
Genesis 1-11 was using, in other words, stories that dated back to the Neolithic Revolution and were originally formulated in Sumer to think through its implications. In more ways than we might want to imagine or face, therefore, our world was "created" about six thousand years ago. (p. 50)

The Neolithic Revolution (from Bartleby):
The term neolithic is used, especially in archaeology and anthropology, to designate a stage of cultural evolution or technological development characterized by the use of stone tools, the existence of settled villages largely dependent on domesticated plants and animals, and the presence of such crafts as pottery and weaving.
The story of Cain and Abel is the biblical version of the rise of civilization. Cain (the Farmer) and Abel (the Shepherd) offer their gifts to God. God accepts Abel's gift but not Cain's. Cain kills Abel. Crossan writes:

That inaugral fratricide was the murder of a shepherd by a farmer on his own farm. That is the first act in the invention of human civilization--the farmer replacing the shepherd--and God does not punish the farmer but only marks him forever as the future of a lost past. There is not counterviolence from God--not even the appropriate divine vengeance when, as God, says, "your brother's blood is crying out to me from the ground!" p. 60-1)

God does not want Cain's offering. Cain represents civilization. Yet civilization is where humanity is headed. Crossan writes:

Next comes the second act in the rise of civlization's normalcy. After the birth of his first son from an unnamed wife, Cain "built a city, and named it Enoch after his son Enoch" (4:17). The farmer displaces the shepherd a builds a city--with a few biblical sentences covering several evolutionary millenia." (p. 61)
Cain introduces violence to the biblical narrative. It is no coincidence that Cain is also the father of civilization. Crossan quotes Robert McElvaine in his 2001 book Eve's Seed: Biology, The Sexes, and the Course of History:

"Cain, the introducer of violence, is, moreover, identified as the father--or grandfather--of sedentary culture or 'civilization.'...This story corresponds neatly with the understanding that agricultural surplus eventually led to an increase in individualism, aggression, warfare, and greed." (p.100 McElvaine, p. 61 Crossan)
These are the questions:
  • Is God violent or non-violent?
  • Is human violence a product of our nature or is it a product of civilization?
  • Are we headed for a Final Banquet or a Final War?
A violent God, a violent nature, and a violent end are not inevitable. But humankind must choose. For Christians, the life of Jesus is the criterion. Look at the life of Jesus. Was Jesus violent or non-violent?

This morning, we celebrated Trinity Sunday in which is Jesus as the second person of the Trinity reveals the character of God. The answer for Christians is clear. How do we decide between a violent and a non-violent God in the Bible? As Jesus was non-violent, so God is non-violent.

Therefore, the work of the Holy Spirit is non-violence. A non-violent God pushes against the violence inherent in civilization. Civilization is not humanity, nor is it the crown of humanity's work. We can (and must) move beyond the normalcy of civilization to a non-violent future in which we seek and make peace through justice.

31 comments:

  1. Have you read any Daniel Quinn, John? I think you would enjoy it.

    It is fascinating how much of the OT is absorbed from the milieux of the ancient near east. Babylonian/Sumerian/Assyrian myths and images riotously tumbling over one another. What is even more interesting is how the OT tends to overturn those old stories, subtly critiquing and mocking them.

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  2. ((As Jesus was non-violent, so God is non-violent.))

    Oh, really? So then, most of the OT prophecies and laws are bogus? Man made tripe? Jesus affirmed the Law and Prophets as the unbreachable Word of His FAther, wherein not one jot or tittle can be broken or abrogated. Ever read the Law and Prophets, John? Pretty violent stuff in there, and Jesus is affirming ALL OF IT.

    And let's not forget that Christ also fashioned a whip, threatened the temple traders with it, overturned their tables, and drove them out of the Temple at the end of that whip. No violence?

    Or what about the Book of Revelation (oh, I'm sure you'll find some excuse to deny that it represents Christ, or that it's just more fantasy)? Chapter 19 tells us that Christ will return to wage justice and war. He will fight the Battle of Armageddon where 200 million soldiers will die. He will stand of the Mount of Olives and the the Middle East will quake. Thousands will die in that quake. Still no violence, John?

    Or what about Exodus 15:3? "God is a warrior". More fiction?

    Do you deem everything that you find distasteful as "fantasy", John? How about hell? How about the cross? Are all of these just one big fantasy?

    You're still leading your sheep astray, my friend. You may be worshiping a god, but it's certainly not the God of the Bible.

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  3. Alan,

    I'll take a page from John Shuck's book and be as courteous as I possibly can be to you.

    It is a horrible misreading of scripture and a great injustice to the gospel truth in the old testament whenever people read it as a legitimation of violence. Jesus affirms it, yes, ALL OF IT, and he is nonviolent so therefore the reading of the OT he gives must be a nonviolent one.

    Read this for an accurate treatment of violence according to the gospel:

    http://faith-theology.blogspot.com/2006/10/ten-propositions-on-peace-and-war.html

    Read this for my own view on how the OT treats violence:

    http://aricclark.blogspot.com/2006/10/10-propositions-on-violence-in-old.html

    Read this to see how your understanding of revelations is flawed:

    http://levellers.wordpress.com/2006/08/15/violence-nonviolence-in-revelation-pt-1/

    Please stop your vitriolic rants and read some Moltmann, or Girard, or Jensen, or Barth - or countless other theologians and biblical scholars who will make your comprehension of the gospel seem as small as it is.

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  4. Aric,

    I have not read Daniel Quinn. I will check it out. Any particular work of his you recommend?

    Alan,

    Is God violent? More on that next time.

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  5. If you want to read Daniel Quinn, start with Ishmael.

    http://www.amazon.com/Ishmael-Adventure-Spirit-Daniel-Quinn/dp/0553375407/ref=pd_bbs_2/103-5377857-0525428?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1180934625&sr=8-2

    It's really a great read, all about the neolithic revolution and its impact on our culture.

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  6. Mr. Clark,

    I don't need to read your references, although I did take a peek at the first one you gave. Most of those 10 propositions are just silly spin. I'm not interested in some scholar's spin on the Bible. I'm more interested in what the Bible says, not what some fellow thinks the Bible says.

    Let me clear something up for you, my friend. I happen to think that Mr. Bush has wagered a very foolish war, but I wasn't speaking of Mr. Bush in my "rant". John suggested that God is a God of non-violence, and I proved otherwise by simply deploying Scriptures that show this is not true. Your references can put all the spin they want on to those passages, but those verses speak very plainly for themselves. God is willing to employ violence when it is needed.

    Is Christ the Prince of Peace? Of course He is, and He will rule the world for a thousand years of peace. Is He a pacifist, who never lifts a finger against His enemies? Of course not. He will wage war against the Antichrist(Revelation 19). Is God a warrior God? Yes He is (Exodus 15:3). Should Christians go to war for God? No......unless He is right there in person leading the way, as He does in Revelation. Do modern day presidents get their marching orders from Jehovah God to fight in Iraq? Of course not.

    But that in no way, shape, or form means that God never employs violence to accomplish His means. To suggest otherwise is to do what you good folks like to do.....throw a good portion of the Bible in the garbage.

    As a Christian, I'm not prepared to do that.

    Oh, and John, when will you ever move from empty rhetoric into actual substance? Stop quoting other thinkers, and start doing some thinking for yourself.

    Somehow I don't think I'm the one doing the ranting around here.

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  7. Alan,

    Its interesting that you say you don't care about "some scholar's spin on the Bible". Why should we value the spin *you* put on the Bible? Because from my point of view at least, what you present as evident isn't evident at all, but is just you cherry-picking the Scriptures to justify your position.

    You're not unique in doing this - we all do it. What's problematic is that you don't admit it, but rather claim that *your* view is the *only* possible view, which is patently absurd, and is contradicted by thousands of years of people who disagree with you, who were/are reading the same Bible.

    You're going to have to do a lot better than this to make your point.

    I agree with you about the war in Iraq, and I'm glad that you seem committed to a pacifist position for Christians, except in the case that God is clearly leading us to war, which you seem to expect to happen in the Middle East in the near future. I definitely reject this view, but obviously you're welcome to it. The part that bothers me about it is that you seem to be in favor of warfare and suffering in the Middle-East because you believe it is heralding Jesus' immanent return. I, on the other hand, will never welcome war and violence for any reason.

    If Jesus actually does appear in the Middle-East to begin slaughtering people, I'll definitely have a lot to reconsider. I'm sure we agree there...

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  8. John’s post was an excerpt of this Sunday morning’s sermon, which was excellent. John asked all of us what the nature of our God is and gave the congregation much to reflect on. I don’t believe God is violent; I believe we as human beings have projected that trait unto him/her. And to wait around for revelations to occur is about as nutty as a fruitcake; that tends to absolve true believers from doing anything to make the world a better place themselves since it will all be taken care of for them.

    I know the story of Cain and Abel, but I never thought of Cain representing Civilization. If Civilization is the way of Cain, what is the alternative?

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  9. Ah, but Doug, I'm not spinning the Bible at all. I'm simply letting it speak for itself, which is what God intended. The Apostle John summed it up best when he said: "I am writing these things to you about those who are trying to lead you astray (i.e. those, like you, who wish to soften God's Word and/or spin it for personal gain). As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit—just as it has taught you, remain in him." (1 John 2:25-27) This is why I don't need someone else's spin.

    As for cherry-picking I'm more than happy to pick from the abundance of God's Inerrant Truth and make a hearty meal out of it, or even take a little snack. The sad thing that I see on this blog is that many whom have been invited to God's banqueting table are convinced that much of what He's serving is bogus -- that most of the cherries on God's tree are rotten or fake. This, of course is impossible since God does all things well and a good tree cannot bear bad fruit.

    But spiritual pride makes us connoisseurs, doesn't it? We then begin to critique God's menu and insult His Spirit of grace by rejecting portions (or in many cases, all) of the meal that God has prepared.

    Kind of a shame, really. It makes for anorexic Christians.

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  10. The moral corner that believers in an inerrant Bible paint themselves in can always be found when it comes to the question of violence. The example I cite the most often on this score is the book of Joshua, which claims that God sanctions genocide. I noticed on Aric's blog that he has made some efforts at finding the good in the book of Joshua despite the obviously evil elements to be found there. I haven't had a chance to digest fully what Aric has written on the topic, although I do think that the Bible has positive and negative elements in many areas, and sorting through them and finding the value in the Bible despite its human failings is always a worthwhile challenge.

    I am not addressing here the probability that Joshua may not be a historically accurate reflection of the Jewish settlement of Canaan; instead I am focusing here on the theology that lay behind the stories in that biblical book. The fact remains that no one with a modicum of conscience can possibly look at the book of Joshua and claim that its bloodthirsty details about divinely-sanctioned genocide are a legitimate description of divine will. And yet, we've seen throughout history examples of Christian genocide, enslavement, and conquest of other peoples. Fortunately, most modern Christians, except apparently the Pope when he makes pronouncements about natives in South America, think that the Christian conquest and enslavement other peoples was not such a great thing to have done. But it isn't hard to see how Christians could have thought that this was acceptable behavior; they need only look at the book of Joshua.

    The fact that believers in inerrancy will make excuses for or otherwise justify the notion of divinely sanctioned ethnic cleansing as detailed in Joshua just goes to show the moral bankruptcy that a doctrine of biblical inerrancy can lead you to. Apparently all these believers in biblical inerrancy, if they were magically transported thousands of years ago among the Jewish settlers of the region, would have themselves put the knife to Canaanite infants living in Ai or Jericho.

    This is not a mere academic exercise about remote historical events that may not even have happened; one only need look to what happened in the former Yugoslavia or in Rwanda to note that ethnic cleansing is a very real problem in the modern world. The Bible claims that God ordered the murder every single person, including children, in a community. And if you are a believer in biblical inerrancy, this is what you are forced to believe also.

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  11. Yes, you are quite right. But then doesn't the potter have the right to do what He wants with the vessel that He has made? Let me remind you of what the Apostle Paul says (and it seems that our resident guru, John, accepts Romans as the authentic writings of Paul):

    What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth."Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

    One of you will say: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction?

    For the Lord will carry out
    his sentence on earth with speed and finality." (Romans 9)

    Paul says that God raised up Pharaoh to display His own glory. And what did God do to Pharaoh? Blight after blight. First-borns died, etc. Then He eventually "slaughtered" the soldiers in the sea.

    Yes, people who believe in biblical inerrancy are willing to take the good with the bad. We are willing to acknowledge that a holy God has every right to remove any human being from this planet in any way that He chooses. This is also played out in the death of hundreds of millions all over the world. Some die by car accidents, some by suicide bombs, some by cancerous diseases, some by famines, others by natural causes. Some live to a good old age and die in their sleep. But all of it is ordained by a good and holy God (Psalm 139:16)

    The mistake you are making is that you are attempting to lean on your own understanding, rather than God's. And that always comes from spiritual pride.

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  12. Thanks all,

    And thanks, Bobby, for asking an important question that I think needs asking and answering, "If civilization is the way of Cain, what is the alternative?"

    I wonder if that alternative is something we are just beginning to imagine.

    I don't know the answer, but I think we are beginning to catch glimpses...

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  13. Alan,

    **Ah, but Doug, I'm not spinning the Bible at all. I'm simply letting it speak for itself, which is what God intended.** But you do need a scholar's interpretion, in order to understand the cultural context. It's also needed to understand why the Bible is translated a certain way.

    **We are willing to acknowledge that a holy God has every right to remove any human being from this planet in any way that He chooses. This is also played out in the death of hundreds of millions all over the world.**

    The problem with that view is that it can lead to people protesting advances that can help out humanity. How can you tell if a vaccination is the result of 'God's will' or 'man's spiritual pride,' then? After all, AIDS could be a way that God chooses to remove humans, so then what justification is there to try and combat it? Or why try and stop violence, since that could also be God's will? You could say that God's will prevails regardless, but how will you know if you're working against God? The Bible supports both a violent view and a non-violent one. Just look at the battles over slavery -- both sides were using the Bible to justify their position, and could have easily used the argument that the other side were merely relying on their own understanding, and thus spiritual pride.

    **Some live to a good old age and die in their sleep. But all of it is ordained by a good and holy God (Psalm 139:16)** But how are we to determine that God is good and holy based on the manner of death? If a good tree can only produce good fruit, then we're forced to re-define what 'good' is, if someone is murdered, and that's used to accomplish a plan. That's where many non-inerrants run into problems, because it seems like things get twisted in ways that they wouldn't in any other situation.

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  14. The mistake you are making is that you are attempting to lean on your own understanding, rather than God's. And that always comes from spiritual pride.

    Give me an effing break. We aren't talking about God killing people by some sort of lightning bolt from the sky; we are talking about God supposedly sanctioning human acts of genocide against men, women, and children--and the murderers who are willing to do so because they think that God told them to do it. If you think that genocide is acceptable, all I can say is, there are a lot of people in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia who would agree with you. Fortunately, I will not stand for such morally bankrupt notions. It is sickening and disgusting that fundamentalists will sit at their keyboards with a straight face and make excuses for and justify the wholesale slaughter of thousands or millions of men, women, and children. It shows the depths with which fundamentalism will sink.

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  17. Well, Mystie, if you're having a hard time with the idea that God has the right to take the life of any sinner that He chooses, you're going to have a real hard time when He pulls you up before His judgment seat, examines your heart, and orders you into the eternal fire.

    You're also going to have a real hard time if He chooses to remove the life of a loved one before his/her time. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if that's part of what's behind your inability to accept that God is sovereign, and that He has the right to do whatever He chooses to whomever He chooses.

    Oh, and BTW, you must have missed my post a few frames up where I said:

    "Should Christians go to war for God? No......unless He is right there in person leading the way, as He does in Revelation. Do modern day presidents get their marching orders from Jehovah God to fight in Iraq? Of course not."

    So, how you get the idea that I am a right-wing-fanatical-fundamentalist-who-is- sanctioning-modern-genocide, I'm not really sure.

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  18. **you're going to have a real hard time when He pulls you up before His judgment seat, examines your heart, and orders you into the eternal fire. ** So ... mystical seeker should accept that God is soverign simply to avoid the lake of fire? That may not be what you mean, but that's how it's coming across. The difficulty I have with this view is that it's almost impossible to completely love if the element of fear is heavily woven throughout the response. It's basically someone saying, "You have a choice in loving and following me, but if you don't, your eternal destination is a lake of fire."

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  19. So, how you get the idea that I am a right-wing-fanatical-fundamentalist-who-is- sanctioning-modern-genocide, I'm not really sure.

    Well maybe God did sanction modern genocide and neglected to tell you. If that’s the case, you better watch it, you could be cast in the lake of fire for that kind of talk.

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  20. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if that's part of what's behind your inability to accept that God is sovereign, and that He has the right to do whatever He chooses to whomever He chooses.


    I happen to think that telling people to commit evil is contrary to God's nature. Silly me. The funny thing about this whole logic of "God can proclaim something like genocide as morally good yesterday and horribly evil today" is that it assigns to God an interesting degree of moral relativism, and given that religious conservatives are usually aghast at the idea of moral relativism, it just goes to show that religious conservatives talk out of both sides of their mouths.

    So, how you get the idea that I am a right-wing-fanatical-fundamentalist-who-is- sanctioning-modern-genocide, I'm not really sure.

    I am not saying that you sanction modern genocide; I am saying that there is a direct line between accepting ancient, biblically justified acts of genocide, and later acts of genocide throughout history. When European Christians enslaved and killed Indians, Pope Benedict notwithstanding, they were simply taking the book of Joshua to heart.

    I will note that you made a point of specifically referring to "modern" genocide, thus refraining from disassociating yourself from any moral condemnation of ancient acts of genocide. I am describing acts of genocide that allegedly occurred and which the Bible claims in the book of Joshua were supported by God. I know it seems like a mere academic exercise to discuss events that may or may not have happened three millenia or so ago, and perhaps it is. But my point is simply that once you tread down the slippery slope of making excuses for a theology that says that genocide is ever acceptable, you've already gone too far.

    We have seen time and time again how people use the Bible to justify evils--from slavery to sexism, from war to genocide. Given that people have used the Bible as a justification for all sorts of sins, the danger of taking the Bible literally on a subject like the legitimacy of genocide is dangerous. I am saying that if you think that genocide was morally acceptable 3000 years ago, then you hardly have a moral leg to stand on if you claim that it is a horrible evil today.

    As for threatening me with eternal torment in the "lake of fire", can I quote you on that? I think you ought to win some sort of award for that comment. I gotta credit you with chutzpah. Really, though--God knows what is in my heart a tad more than you do. So I'll give that comment all the respect it deserves.

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  21. ((I happen to think that telling people to commit evil is contrary to God's nature.))

    Are you suggesting that God has no right to take a man's life if He so chooses? When God gave the commandment not to murder He was reserving the right to Himself to make the decisions about who may live and who must die. He knew perfectly well that a man's heart is wicked and self-centered and would seek personal gain out of taking another man's life. Therefore He ordered that no man may take another man's life without God's permission.

    However, God has no such conflicts within Himself(no shadow of darkness - James). He is perfect in all His judgments, and if He chooses to punish the Caananites for their unrelenting evil, then He is simply exercising right and authority as their Creator to exercise judgment and justice against them. And the Israelites (who hated doing it, by the way, and eventually disobeyed and stopped)were simply carrying out God's command.

    ((The funny thing about this whole logic of "God can proclaim something like genocide as morally good yesterday and horribly evil today" is that it assigns to God an interesting degree of moral relativism))

    Not at all. You are completely missing the point. The point I have been arguing throughout my posts is that God in His holiness and particular election of the Jewish nation to serve and worship Him, reserved the right to order and punish wicked people like the Caananites through His chosen people to accomplish His holy purposes.

    Today's genocides have nothing to do with God's holy purposes. They are simply man-gone-wild. The Crusades were a disaster, because they had nothing to do with God's order to massacre the Arabs. Prophecy is closed. God didn't suddenly beginning speaking new things during the Crusades. They had no more right to slaughter the Arabs than the Arabs currently do to slaughter the Jews.

    You might want to check out this site (http://www.spiritandtruth.org/teaching/documents/articles/27/27.htm) if you're honestly interested in exploring an opinion other than your own.

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  22. Are you suggesting that God has no right to take a man's life if He so chooses?

    I am not talking about God taking a life. I am talking about humans commit horrible crimes and claiming divine sanction for their war crimes.

    The point I have been arguing throughout my posts is that God in His holiness and particular election of the Jewish nation to serve and worship Him, reserved the right to order and punish wicked people like the Caananites through His chosen people to accomplish His holy purposes.

    Yeah, there's a name for that. It's called genocide.

    Throughout the history of the world, many people claimed to be doing God's will when they commit acts of barbarism. Oh, but wait--it's okay in your case because, unlike those others who claimed to be doing God's will, you really are! Ahem.

    Your defense of these hypothetical acts of genocide only seems at some level less vile and barbaric because you say you would not support such acts nowadays, and because these ancient events seem remote and possibly didn't even happen as depicted in the Bible. The only way you could possibly defend these past hypothetical acts of genocide is if you personally haven't internalized a moral revulsion at wholesale slaughter. Otherwise, you are telling me that you wouldn't have any compunction, had you been transported magically back in time to that era, of commiting such acts yourself. If genocide doesn't sicken and disgust you at a fundamental, visceral level, then that speaks for itself.

    It illustrates why I have no use for fundamentalism, and why, when push comes to shove, it proves to be so morally evil. I often bring up this issue of the book of Joshua with fundies, and they always answer the same way--they paint themselves in the moral corner of making excuses for horrible, barbaric crimes, and then justify it by showing that they haven't even internalized the most rudimentary moral values about murder and other forms of violence.

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  23. Alan,

    It's little use. The dominant idea of "justice" around here has everything to do with redistribution of wealth (preferably at the end of a gun from the all-mighty socialist government) and with redressing perceived slights on minority status claimants. It has little to nothing to do with righteousness or the understanding of human transgression against the good and perfect law of a holy God.

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  24. Chris,

    I understand that. But it's still kind of fun gettin' under their skin, don't you think?

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  25. As usual, Chris has his head in an unfortunate orifice. His caricature of one type of justice, known as distributive justice, is actually one of several types that fall under that term. I'd refer him to Tillich's book "Love, Power and Justice" for a more detailed examination of this concept, but the book is highly philosophical in tone and is probably over his head.

    Then again, those who come from the pro-genocide crowd don't really understand that God's justice is found not just in her aims but in her means of achieving them.

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  26. Those ain't pearls that come out of that particular orifice.

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  27. **It has little to nothing to do with righteousness **

    Actually, I would say that concept of justice has everything to do with righteousness. Part of God's justice/righeouness was in liberating the opressed.

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  28. Part of God's justice/righeouness was in liberating the opressed.

    Excellent point. And one of the ways this was accomplished after the liberation from Egypt was through the imposition of economic justice. The sabbath and jubilee years were ways of redistributing wealth from the rich back to the poor.

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  29. Mystical,

    The Jubilee wasn't about taking from the rich and giving to the poor. It was about re-establishing God's division of the land into the tribal properties of Israel. It was about family solvency and honoring the ordained land-grants.

    Some properties were quite wealthy (such as the land the Danites took in Judges 18-19), while others weren't (such as the plot of land they left). There's no indication in the text that the land was divided in such a way as to insure equality among the tribes or the people within the tribes. The established case law in Numbers 36 underscores that family solidarity and (dare I say it) tribal divisions be maintained.

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  30. That's one opinion, but I would argue that debt forgiveness (and the freeing of slaves) had everything to do with redressing social injustice. It was rather impossible to accumulate very much additional wealth under those circumstances.

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