If you were God, what kind of God would you be?

Hi Bluejay,I just wanted to say kudos. Some of the most torturous and disgusting apologetics we see here are those by folks who are unwilling to say this; It's a simple thing to admit, but some Christians have trouble with it for some reason. Mike's unwillingness to condemn rape stands as a good example of this. Nice to see a more moderate Christian set a counter-example.

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Oh and, Dr A; don't rape Suzy. In fact, I just got an email from Suzy and she says that you shouldn't rape her. She also says that she has a boyfriend and she doesn't fancy you.Of course, since Suzy isn't perfect, I guess by Mike's logic, she doesn't get to make a moral judgement on whether she should be raped or not.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

Hi Peg,I notice that nowhere in your post did you actually find it in yourself to say that rape is wrong or bother to utter the words "Don't rape Suzy". The nearest you get is claiming that the Bible forbids it, which it does only half-heartedly, presenting it alongside the notorious instances of divinely ordained rape.

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rape is clearly forbidden in the bible, in fact it holds the same punishment as a murderer which shows that God in no way permitted it.

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This is of course a lie.

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The mosaic law was clear that a rapist was to be put to death

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Don't waste your time telling me grotesque and facile lies. We all know what it says in the verse down the page; Of course marrying the victim is a little tricky when you've murdered them... I guess the punishments were not quite the same.

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For anyone to say that God commanded men/soldiers to rape women is nothing but slander... perhaps this is why christians are not bothering with the question being posed.

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Except that Bluejay and Bailey seem not to have had trouble responding.This kind of apologetic for rape (along with similar efforts for slavery and genocide) disgusts me, especially when it is being promoted by a woman. Please, spare me. If I want to vomit, I'll just stick my fingers down my throat. It's quicker.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

I thought I asked you to stop lying. Maybe I imagined it.

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God had a death penalty because he considers it a vile act

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God had a death penalty for some rapes. In other cases, the "penalty" was to marry the victim. Hardly an appropriate response to a "vile act".The fact that you seem to think that "forbidden by God" and "morally wrong" are synonyms seems to me to be the root of the problem here.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

I couldn't respond to this earlier. I was at a wedding. It was a beautiful day. The bride was radiant, the groom was brimming with pride, and everyone was incredibly happy. It was very moving. I nearly cried.Of course, if the bride had been kidnapped after the slaughter of her family, I'm pretty certain I would have cried, just not for quite the same reasons.

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You may not realize that only girls who were virgins were considered for marriage by Isrealite men.

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Proving what a morally stunted bunch of scumbags they were. I notice that God's laws fail to address this horrendous attitude.Of course, this is another lie. The passages governing the forced marriage of female captives of war are sufficient to prove that requirements of virginity were not universally the case. Stop lying. You are a Christian. You are not supposed to lie.

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In the case of a girl being raped by either someone she knew or a stranger, then that girl would be given a life sentence.

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Again, all this proves is that God's chosen people were total bastards and that God, instead of addressing their prejudices, chose to reinforce those prejudices.He chose not to say "Don't ostracise non-virgins".He chose not to say "Don't punish rape victims".He chose not to say "Respect women's rights to own their own bodies".Instead he specifically ensures that these immoral attitudes and practises are enshrined as holy writ. God, if he had any morality at all, could have instructed the Israelites to behave in a way that we might recognise as morally acceptable, but he did not. He chose instead to damn Israelite women to a lifetime of rape and humiliation.I don't have any swear words sufficient to describe those levels of evil.

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So the greater punishment fell on the man.

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Greater than being forced to marry one's rapist and then being raped again and again, for the rest of one's life? Are you fucking serious? Have you completely lost your mind? Do you have a psychopathic personality disorder? Or are you just lying again?

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The girl was spared the humiliation of being an outcast in her community

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By subjecting her to the far greater humiliation of being forced to marry her rapist and then being raped again and again, for the rest of her life.Peg, this is not a good deal. It makes an already terrible situation much, much worse.God could have commanded that rape victims be treated with respect and dignity, but instead he commanded that they be treated as chattel and have indignity after indignity piled upon them. God's law enshrined acts of utter evil. All I am doing is judging him by his supposed acts.

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Im not saying this is something we would practice in our society, but in their society it was a necessary evil for it protected the girl from further humiliation and harm...

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...by having her marry her attacker and be raped by him at his whim for the rest of her life. Classy. And even worse, none of this addresses the rape of a non-engaged woman. Presumably that's OK.How does that qualify as protection from harm? The answer of course is that it doesn't, you are just lying again. Why? What makes you think your pathetic lies are going to convince anyone?The truth here is that you are willing to make extensive apologies for rape (even real-world rape that is happening right now, such as in Message 150) rather than utter one tiny and obvious criticism of the Bible.Look, it's easy;"The Old Testament has some nasty bits in it. Its pronouncements on rape are one example of this. The attitudes to rape in the Old Testament are immoral. They are not the words of a moral God, but the words of immoral men."That's all you need to say. It's not a big deal. It is one tiny criticism of the Bible, one that everyone who is not a fundamentalist Christian (or Jew) can tell is well founded. Unfortunately, you are unwilling to utter even the slightest criticism of the Bible. You would rather defend the filth of the human species, defend rape, slavery and genocide than make the slightest possible criticism of your precious favourite book.I find this reprehensible in the extreme. Shame on you. You are frightening sick in the head and as far as I can tell, it's the Bible that has made you this way. Shame on you Peg.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

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this 'horrendous attitude' had everything to do with morality...sexual intercourse before marriage was considered immoral, not only by the people, but by God also.

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Again, this only manages to prove just how morally stunted the Israelites and their vile sky-tyrant really were.

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Now to us this seems absurd because our morals are much looser, but they had very high morals.

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This is the opposite of the truth. Morality is not characterised by forcing a girl to marry her rapist. Morality is defined by respecting human rights.

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It's because you keep telling lies. One minute you say "You may not realize that only girls who were virgins were considered for marriage by Isrealite men." the next you say "Of course, widows who were not virgins could remarry because it wasnt about being a virgin...

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Only one of the statements can be true and, since you are intimately familiar with the content of the OT, this is not happening because you are honestly mistaken. You know fully well what the Bible says, you just choose to misrepresent it whenever it seems convenient.You say that "in fact {rape} holds the same punishment as a murderer" when this is patently not the whole truth. If an engaged girl is raped in the country it's marriage and a fine. If she is not engaged to be married, no penalty is discussed. You know this perfectly well, you just don't mention it, making it a lie.You are only able to defend your position by lying. This is not a playground taunt, it is a legitimate debate tactic; you are being dishonest, therefore you forfeit the right to have your argument taken seriously. You also run the risk of forfeiting your right to call yourself a Christian, since I believe Jesus is quite down on this sort of thing.I mean, just look at the kind of extreme dishonesty that you are peddling; To make statements which are so clearly contradictory, I see only three possibilities;a) You are insane.
b) You are suffering from some sort of personality disorder.
c) You are lying.The only thing that I can say in your defence (not that you deserve to be defended) is that you appear to be lying to yourself as well as the rest of us.

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prove me wrong scripturally

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I already have Peg. You claimed that thee penalties for rape were the same as for murder and I used scripture to call you on your lie. You're just too deep into your self-delusions and rationalisations that you didn't notice.The only way you can defend your precious scripture from this wholly justified charge is to lie, dissemble and ignore the vast majority of what is said to you, as you have done in this scanty excuse for an answer.You say that rape is wrong. Okay. Where does in the Bible does it say what punishment a man receives for raping a non-engaged, non-married woman who is not a virgin?Answer; it doesn't. Apparently raping such women is just fine.This is sick and evil and your failure to denounce it as such is monstrous. You should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

Peg are your own contradictions invisible to you or something?One moment you say; and; The next you say that you would not kill a child if God told you to. On what basis can you refuse? You have already stated that your moral judgement is inferior to God's and that he must have a good reason. He knows best Peg! Kill the kid!Here's another nice contradiction; Yeah! Violent rotters! Wipe them out! Including, one assumes, all the children, even those only days or minutes old.Yet only a heartbeat later; What, so child sacrifice is wrong now? It was fine a moment ago, when God was willing to sacrifice the lives of every child on Earth in order to punish them for sins committed by others. Y'know, there's this book that shows that God is more than willing to ask people to kill infants. It's called "The Bible". In that book, you'll find plenty of divinely sanctioned infanticide. You should try reading it, it's a real eye-opener.So, just to recap, that's rape, infanticide and genocide you're willing to apologise for, rather than simply say "Some of the Old Testament isn't very nice.". Classy.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

This comparison is absurd. The idol-worshippers were not at war. They had not taken up arms against Moses or God. They were simply worshipping in the way they saw fit (and dancing around naked).What modern democracy has gone to war to stop people from pursuing their religion Peg? How about the Great War Against Naked Dancing? When was that?Furthermore, the deaths of children in war are collateral damage. I'm not saying that this necessarily excuses the governments involved, but at least they are not deliberately targeting children. If they could avoid hurting children, they would; sadly bombs are indiscriminate. God, on the other hand, who one imagines could target whoever he likes, is described as deliberately targeting innocent children.

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And all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the first born of Pharaoh that sitteth upon his throne, even unto the firstborn of the maidservant that is behind the mill; and all the firstborn of beasts.

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Not even the baby animals get a pass! God deliberately kills puppies!God could easily have visited his wrath upon the Pharaoh (even though it was God who had already hardened his heart) but instead he chose to kill children. Specifically. Deliberately. In cold blood. With a free range of targets, including, one presumes, just about anybody in Egypt, God chose to slaughter infants, en masse.There is a big difference between that kind of act and the actions of modern military forces, who at least make an effort to minimise innocent casualties.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod

a) God hardened Pharaoh's heart remember. Pharaoh was not morally culpable for his actions, God was.b) If you chose to redefine "act of war" to fit in with whatever is most convenient, anything could be an act of war. Drinking a cup of coffee could be an act of war, if you redefine "act of war" to include coffee drinking. That doesn't make it a meaningful statement.Describing the free choice made by Aaron and the other idol-worshippers as an "act of war" is nonsensical. They attacked no-one. They took up arms against no-one. Moses started the hostilities, not Aaron. All Aaron did was dance around in the nuddy in front of a big bull, which sounds like a reasonably fun night out to me. Calling it an "act of war" is patently absurd and a touch desperate.You are trying to define yourself into a morally acceptable position by means of equivocation. Fortunately, for society as a whole, that doesn't fly. No-one except all the people who do say that. Don't be silly. Many people oppose wars, both specific conflicts and war in general. the suffering of children is a prime reason given. You are missing the point (or ignoring it). This logic is all well and good when applied to a human war; we would all like to avoid innocent casualties, but sometimes we can't if we are to achieve our goal. Sometimes it is unavoidable. This logic does not and cannot apply to God.God can avoid innocent casualties if he wishes; or do you think it beyond his powers?God specifically chose to target the children of Egypt; he could have chosen another way; or do you think that beyond his powers?And of course, God could simply not have hardened Pharaoh's heart in the first place, and so removed any need to slaughter any innocents. He deliberately engineered a situation where he was defied and then punished innocent children for the defiance he created, even though those children had nothing to do with it.There is no comparison to made between human conflicts and the actions of an enormously powerful entity like God. He has the power to achieve his aims without shedding innocent blood, yet he still murders infants, again and again. Maybe he just likes a bit of blood.Mutate and Survive

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"A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it." - Jacques Monod