Very Disturbing Bible Passages

[TRUTH over TRADITION]

In the course of reading the Bible, if one spends a lot of time studying, undoubtedly one will encounter passages that bring them pause. For me one of the most hard to deal with passages is found in Judges starting in chapter 19 and extending into chapter 21.

The story of the Levite and his concubine is a horrific tale that only gets worse and worse! It begins with an apparently unhappy woman fleeing to her father to escape being a concubine and her 'husband' subsequently follows her intent on retrieving her. He gets there, parties with he father for several days as her father didn't seem to want to let him leave. Then, finally the man and his concubine leave and end up spending a night among the Benjamites where a repeat of the Sodom and Gomorrah scenario with the angels in Lot's home takes place. Some of the town folks surround the home the travelors are in and demand to have the male travelors come out to have sex with the townsmen. The home owner rebukes them and subsequently offers his virgin daughter AND the concubine of the travelor to the townsmen. The townsmen then abuse, rape, and ultimately leave the concubine for dead.
The next morning the 'husband' goes outside to leave, sees his concubine/wife lying on the ground and proceeds to tell the woman he allowed to be abused in his steed to "get up and let's go" before realizing that she was now dead. He then puts the dead concubine on his burro and returns to his home where he proceeds to cut her dead boby in 12 pieces so he could MAIL THE PARTS to Israel's 12 tribes!

The tribal leaders/spokesmen get the packages and then get together to come up with a plan. The plan ends up resulting in a series of GOD SANCTIONED and INSTRUCTED brutal battles and kills tens of thousands and wipes out all but 600 Benjamite men who were able to retreat to safety.

The other 11 tribes make an oath to not give any of their women to the 600 Benjys andare thenm saddened that 1 tribe will be lost, so after consulting the LORD, they devise plans that result in more bloodshed, some kidnipping, and extortion in order to procure women for their 600 Benjy bretheren.

 

[farouk]

T & T:

This just goes to show that dispensationally a heavenly people with heavenly blessings such as the New Testament church, and an earthly people with earthly blessings such as Israel, are distinct in Scripture. Some of those of earthly Israel were justified by faith, but there was also a mized multitude. Over and over, the Old Testament shows how Israel ended up behaving like the nations around it. The consequences are an instructive, solemn warning.

Blessings.

 

[smaller]

In the course of reading the Bible, if one spends a lot of time studying, undoubtedly one will encounter passages that bring them pause. For me one of the most hard to deal with passages is found in Judges starting in chapter 19 and extending into chapter 21.

The story of the Levite and his concubine is a horrific tale that only gets worse and worse! It begins with an apparently unhappy woman fleeing to her father to escape being a concubine and her 'husband' subsequently follows her intent on retrieving her. He gets there, parties with he father for several days as her father didn't seem to want to let him leave. Then, finally the man and his concubine leave and end up spending a night among the Benjamites where a repeat of the Sodom and Gomorrah scenario with the angels in Lot's home takes place. Some of the town folks surround the home the travelors are in and demand to have the male travelors come out to have sex with the townsmen. The home owner rebukes them and subsequently offers his virgin daughter AND the concubine of the travelor to the townsmen. The townsmen then abuse, rape, and ultimately leave the concubine for dead.
The next morning the 'husband' goes outside to leave, sees his concubine/wife lying on the ground and proceeds to tell the woman he allowed to be abused in his steed to "get up and let's go" before realizing that she was now dead. He then puts the dead concubine on his burro and returns to his home where he proceeds to cut her dead boby in 12 pieces so he could MAIL THE PARTS to Israel's 12 tribes!

The tribal leaders/spokesmen get the packages and then get together to come up with a plan. The plan ends up resulting in a series of GOD SANCTIONED and INSTRUCTED brutal battles and kills tens of thousands and wipes out all but 600 Benjamite men who were able to retreat to safety.

The other 11 tribes make an oath to not give any of their women to the 600 Benjys andare thenm saddened that 1 tribe will be lost, so after consulting the LORD, they devise plans that result in more bloodshed, some kidnipping, and extortion in order to procure women for their 600 Benjy bretheren.

God Purposefully split Israel into HEAD and BODY. It is a showing of a Divine Matter of intent. The construction of the tribes, head and body is even laid out upside down if you reconstruct on a map of Israel. It's quite interesting topic area in itself, allegorically speaking that is.

It was not without cause that TWO ISRAELS are shown in the Old Testament pictures. And in fact this same underlying principle is deployed throughout the text in numerous ways, which are fully intended to point us all back to viewing our own individual construction or even as units of believers.

It's a rather difficult topical arena, but Paul does just an excellent job in providing the footholds of allegory to begin to understand this matter, primarily in Galatians, where he summarizes in Galatians 4 and shows the same principle played out in Abraham and the two covenants and two wives and two mountains (good luck finding the second mountain!) and two sons. That identical theme is very very rich mining ground in the Old Testament scriptures and the event you describe and almost all other OT events will hinge on the same allegorical themes repeated over and over again. Again Paul lays out the basic ground work for students to crack into these episodes and get past the surface stories.

It's all really quite a beautiful piece of work. Totally astounding.

Always more to see too. If anyone tries to read the Old Testament in a literal only way they will always be frustrated, also by Divine Intentions.

1 Cor. 9:
9 For it is written in the law of Moses, thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen?
10 Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope.

Nothing in the Old Testament is as it appears on the surface. Nothing.

Not saying they weren't literal events, but they run much much deeper. Much.

Who would have ever saw JESUS coming through all of that? Yet that is WHO is within to see.

And we are also eventually going to perceive His Arrival within US.

It's all preparatory work.

s

 

[TRUTH over TRADITION]

Smaller,................................huh?

I get that allegories and symbolism is all over the biblical narratives, but in/for the specific passage of scripture that I put up for discussion it has very little if any relevance. The way the text was written, we must look at it as a historical account. If it was indeed a true story, then it is a lot to ponder as it details some horrific events, some sanctioned or commanded by God.

 

[Ryan]

Interestingly I was just reading these passages the last week. Of note, everything after Deuteronomy is a running commentary on how well Israel, did, or did not follow God's instructions from Genesis to Deuteronomy. Judges is one of the saddest states of where Israel became in just a short period of space since Joshua ruled. One has to take note of the last verse In Judges.

Judges 21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

Israel as a result was reaping what it was sowing. They were in a state of disobedience and were feeling the effects of the curses for disobedience. Hosea speaks to this in Hosea 9:9 and Hosea 10:9 about the level of depravity Israel became.

Of note to consider when reading this story:

1. The Levite (line of Priests) took a concubine and in the Hebrew she is described as being a harlot contrary to a Levite not being allowed to marry a harlot Leviticus 21:7. As you read through the verses, you will see the Levite was not a man of upstanding character or integrity.

2. The difference between a concubine and wife was that the wife had more rights, and had a marriage contract. The Levite was operating outside of a marriage covenant thus disregarding God's laws for marriage between one man and one woman.

3. The Levite gave his concubine to the men to save his own you know what. Which goes against everything the Lord instructed about protecting and loving one another.

4. The Levite used his skills acquired by being educated on how to butcher a sacrifice to cut up his wife. The Hebrew word used for him cutting her up is "nathach". This is a word directly used in relation to a sacrifice to offer up on the Altar of Burnt Offering. Suggesting the Levite was doing this in a distorted sense of piety making this into a religious act.

5. Enormous people gathered after the pieces were shipped out. Instead of leaders coming together to discuss the matter, and consult the Lord, they operated initially outside of the Lord's guidance.

6. The Levite lied when he said in Judges 20:5 that they intended to kill him. They wanted to have sex with him and he omitted the part saying he saved his own life.

7. Israel never sought to have this testimony corroborated as per Deuteronomy 19:15. If they did, they would have determined his testimony was false.

8. Instead they acted presumptuosly and sought vengeance and although it appears they have God's approval, they were defeated twice as God just told them who to go first. Isreal never consulted with the Lord at all about whether this was the Lord's will in the first place.

9. It wasn't until the third time they came before the Lord repentant and contrite did God say Benjamin would be defeated. Interestingly, it was Phinehas who came before the Lord to interced and seek his guidance before the Lord said they would gain victory.

10. Israel's actions after the defeat, they again did not consult the Lord or seek his guidance on how to deal with the tribe of Benjamin after their defeat. They made a rash vow. The vow was that no one from any of the 11-tribe coalition would allow his daughter to marry a Benjamite.

11. Everything proceeding that vow is a comedy of errors and even in Judges 21:3:4 they came before the Lord asking for direction to the vow they rashly made. I find it interesting the Lord did not answer them at all. So to the Israelites, they saw what they were about to do to the people of Jabesh-Gilead as a holy endeavor. It was holy to their minds because it was carrying out an oath made before God to kill all who refused to participate in the war with Benjamin. Now, was this a good thing before the Lord? Hardly. It was just another case of men making a rash vow, and they would rather follow through with it (no matter what the consequences to others might be) than NOT following through and accepting the consequences of their own sin of breaking that rash vow.

This was an example of God bieng true to his word when he says:

Deuteronomy 30:19
I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants,

Judges was a period of time when they choose the curses more often then not instead of the blessings.

 

[TRUTH over TRADITION]

Interesting you bring up the end of chapter 21. It echoes the sentiment found in the last verse of chapter 18 as well presumably illustrating the lack of national leadership. I find it interesting that having a king is not something God was a big fan of, so using the close of the book to that the land was somehow more evil due to not being ruled by a king ignores all the evils done under kingly rule from under Saul to David's lineage. Having a king rarely resulted in the land being more holy.

In chapter 20, we begin with the collection of people asembled before the LORD. Some argue this way not a sanctioned assembly, but whether it was or not, we find throught the chapter that the LORD actually interacted via instruction and answers to the people gathered before Him seeking His guidance and not once did He speak out against their thinking or decision making. What He did do at times was co-sign.

I reasonable question could be asked relating to why God in His continued discourse with these rash tribes, not ONE TIME rebuke them. Why did he not implore them to seek peace? Why did He not express disgust when He spoke with them concerning their actions?

 

[smaller]

Smaller,................................huh?

I get that allegories and symbolism is all over the biblical narratives, but in/for the specific passage of scripture that I put up for discussion it has very little if any relevance. The way the text was written, we must look at it as a historical account. If it was indeed a true story, then it is a lot to ponder as it details some horrific events, some sanctioned or commanded by God.

The huh signifies you may not be used to handling all OT matters as allegory.

I generally reject that sifter as inadequate.

I don't doubt it was a factual event, sanctioned and commanded by God, if that is what you are trying to get at.

s

 

[Ryan]

Interesting you bring up the end of chapter 21. It echoes the sentiment found in the last verse of chapter 18 as well presumably illustrating the lack of national leadership. I find it interesting that having a king is not something God was a big fan of, so using the close of the book to that the land was somehow more evil due to not being ruled by a king ignores all the evils done under kingly rule from under Saul to David's lineage. Having a king rarely resulted in the land being more holy.

In chapter 20, we begin with the collection of people asembled before the LORD. Some argue this way not a sanctioned assembly, but whether it was or not, we find throught the chapter that the LORD actually interacted via instruction and answers to the people gathered before Him seeking His guidance and not once did He speak out against their thinking or decision making. What He did do at times was co-sign.

I reasonable question could be asked relating to why God in His continued discourse with these rash tribes, not ONE TIME rebuke them. Why did he not implore them to seek peace? Why did He not express disgust when He spoke with them concerning their actions?

1 Samuel 8 speaks that Israel having a King apart from the Lord Almighty was not ideal.

In regards to Chapter 20 how many hundreds of thousands of men assembled before there was any type of formal investigation into this atrocity? The message is saying they were head hunting and wanted vengeance and revenge was on their mind. Not justice as their numbers easily dwarved Benjamins tribe.

Why would God have to rebuke them? They were already being cursed for their actions. Their rebuke was being cursed for disobedience. Their bible at the time, the Torah, gave them every set of instructions so it would go well for them. They were clearly violating God's laws every which way imaginable. They were being cursed for their sinful behaviour by being at war and under the rule of various nations and other people. It wasn't until they finally wept and sought forgiveness did the Lord finally bless them with victory. They recognized where their hearts were of seeking vengeance, and seeing the absolute moral decay of their nation that brought them to repentance.

 

[Rollo Tamasi]

Interesting you bring up the end of chapter 21. It echoes the sentiment found in the last verse of chapter 18 as well presumably illustrating the lack of national leadership. I find it interesting that having a king is not something God was a big fan of, so using the close of the book to that the land was somehow more evil due to not being ruled by a king ignores all the evils done under kingly rule from under Saul to David's lineage. Having a king rarely resulted in the land being more holy.

In chapter 20, we begin with the collection of people asembled before the LORD. Some argue this way not a sanctioned assembly, but whether it was or not, we find throught the chapter that the LORD actually interacted via instruction and answers to the people gathered before Him seeking His guidance and not once did He speak out against their thinking or decision making. What He did do at times was co-sign.

I reasonable question could be asked relating to why God in His continued discourse with these rash tribes, not ONE TIME rebuke them. Why did he not implore them to seek peace? Why did He not express disgust when He spoke with them concerning their actions?

1 Samuel 8 speaks that Israel having a King apart from the Lord Almighty was not ideal.

In regards to Chapter 20 how many hundreds of thousands of men assembled before there was any type of formal investigation into this atrocity? The message is saying they were head hunting and wanted vengeance and revenge was on their mind. Not justice as their numbers easily dwarved Benjamins tribe.

Why would God have to rebuke them? They were already being cursed for their actions. Their rebuke was being cursed for disobedience. Their bible at the time, the Torah, gave them every set of instructions so it would go well for them. They were clearly violating God's laws every which way imaginable. They were being cursed for their sinful behaviour by being at war and under the rule of various nations and other people. It wasn't until they finally wept and sought forgiveness did the Lord finally bless them with victory. They recognized where their hearts were of seeking vengeance, and seeing the absolute moral decay of their nation that brought them to repentance.

Good teaching Ryan, I feel better now having an understanding of this.

 

[Ryan]

Interesting you bring up the end of chapter 21. It echoes the sentiment found in the last verse of chapter 18 as well presumably illustrating the lack of national leadership. I find it interesting that having a king is not something God was a big fan of, so using the close of the book to that the land was somehow more evil due to not being ruled by a king ignores all the evils done under kingly rule from under Saul to David's lineage. Having a king rarely resulted in the land being more holy.

In chapter 20, we begin with the collection of people asembled before the LORD. Some argue this way not a sanctioned assembly, but whether it was or not, we find throught the chapter that the LORD actually interacted via instruction and answers to the people gathered before Him seeking His guidance and not once did He speak out against their thinking or decision making. What He did do at times was co-sign.

I reasonable question could be asked relating to why God in His continued discourse with these rash tribes, not ONE TIME rebuke them. Why did he not implore them to seek peace? Why did He not express disgust when He spoke with them concerning their actions?

1 Samuel 8 speaks that Israel having a King apart from the Lord Almighty was not ideal.

In regards to Chapter 20 how many hundreds of thousands of men assembled before there was any type of formal investigation into this atrocity? The message is saying they were head hunting and wanted vengeance and revenge was on their mind. Not justice as their numbers easily dwarved Benjamins tribe.

Why would God have to rebuke them? They were already being cursed for their actions. Their rebuke was being cursed for disobedience. Their bible at the time, the Torah, gave them every set of instructions so it would go well for them. They were clearly violating God's laws every which way imaginable. They were being cursed for their sinful behaviour by being at war and under the rule of various nations and other people. It wasn't until they finally wept and sought forgiveness did the Lord finally bless them with victory. They recognized where their hearts were of seeking vengeance, and seeing the absolute moral decay of their nation that brought them to repentance.

Good teaching Ryan, I feel better now having an understanding of this.

Thank you Allen, and I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them. Characters like Samson, although sometimes glorified, was a terrible Nazarite and a terrible Israelite. Almost nothing about him is honorable, and the whole book of Judges is a testment to the idolatry and rebellion of Israel and the consequences they had to bear as a result.

 

[smaller]

I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them. Characters like Samson, although sometimes glorified, was a terrible Nazarite and a terrible Israelite. Almost nothing about him is honorable, and the whole book of Judges is a testment to the idolatry and rebellion of Israel and the consequences they had to bear as a result.

That's part of the problem seeing through external sifters.

Hebrews 11 denies your 'tale.'

32 And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets:
33 Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions.

s

 

[TRUTH over TRADITION]

I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them.

I'm trying to understand how can you make such a claim when the texts seems to show the exact opposite on more than one occasion. The beginning of chapter 20 has the people assembling before the LORD and considering the situation from the previous chapter. Verse 13 has them saying the following: "Now, surrender the sons of criminals that are in BabaAh, and we will execute them to purge their wickedness from IsraEl". This course of action that it seems you are saying was the act of men going outside of God's sanctioned command does in fact fall in line with the commands of God initially declared in Exodus and then echoed again in passages like Dueteronomy 19. Taking vengeance upon the unrighteous was not only sanctioned, but commanded. The people were commanded by God to purse the land of Israel of evil offenders like the rapists in Judges 19.

 

[Zeuszoos]

In the course of reading the Bible, if one spends a lot of time studying, undoubtedly one will encounter passages that bring them pause. For me one of the most hard to deal with passages is found in Judges starting in chapter 19 and extending into chapter 21.

The story of the Levite and his concubine is a horrific tale that only gets worse and worse! It begins with an apparently unhappy woman fleeing to her father to escape being a concubine and her 'husband' subsequently follows her intent on retrieving her. He gets there, parties with he father for several days as her father didn't seem to want to let him leave. Then, finally the man and his concubine leave and end up spending a night among the Benjamites where a repeat of the Sodom and Gomorrah scenario with the angels in Lot's home takes place. Some of the town folks surround the home the travelors are in and demand to have the male travelors come out to have sex with the townsmen. The home owner rebukes them and subsequently offers his virgin daughter AND the concubine of the travelor to the townsmen. The townsmen then abuse, rape, and ultimately leave the concubine for dead.
The next morning the 'husband' goes outside to leave, sees his concubine/wife lying on the ground and proceeds to tell the woman he allowed to be abused in his steed to "get up and let's go" before realizing that she was now dead. He then puts the dead concubine on his burro and returns to his home where he proceeds to cut her dead boby in 12 pieces so he could MAIL THE PARTS to Israel's 12 tribes!

The tribal leaders/spokesmen get the packages and then get together to come up with a plan. The plan ends up resulting in a series of GOD SANCTIONED and INSTRUCTED brutal battles and kills tens of thousands and wipes out all but 600 Benjamite men who were able to retreat to safety.

The other 11 tribes make an oath to not give any of their women to the 600 Benjys andare thenm saddened that 1 tribe will be lost, so after consulting the LORD, they devise plans that result in more bloodshed, some kidnipping, and extortion in order to procure women for their 600 Benjy bretheren.

I don't mean any disrespect when I say this, but it is ignorance of history that causes various passages to be "disturbing" to people.

And by "history", I don't just mean a record of words and events. I mean the way that the various involved peoples lived, spoke, thought, ate, worked, rested, their customs, their geography, even what made them burp.

It is only by this, that we can even begin to understand the Scriptures! The Bible is not a compilation of 21st century, Gentile books and thus, cannot be read that way.

And if you ask how knowing this stuff could possibly change ones view on a given passage (it is easy to prove that it does), then again, sincerely, no disrespect intended, but then you would be stubborn on top of being ignorant of these things, because instead of saying, "Oh, cool!" and beginning your journey of learning thru research, you will have (if you were to choose that response), then you would have chosen instead, to remain ignorant, amen?

These passages, to me, do not present an issue. But that took time and I won't lay it all out here, because it would be too much typing and because I learned that the fun is in the journey!

I can however, provide you with a quick example of how a historical context can completely change ones view of a Scripture though and make what seems like a contradiction to many, a wonderful teaching instead, if you would like. Just to get an idea of what I mean.

The thing we must always remember, is that our understandings are limited. And so we need to stop trying to make God conform to our own world view and man's worldly view of right and wrong and trust Him that there is a thoroughly valid explanation that we, in our limited understanding, cannot yet see and ask Him for wisdom and understanding when we run across such things.

One thing is for sure; We will never understand something, by stubbornly hanging on to insisting that we see it right and God had darn well better explain Himself to us right now! <lol>

That's just plain ol' arrogant!


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[Ryan]

I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them. Characters like Samson, although sometimes glorified, was a terrible Nazarite and a terrible Israelite. Almost nothing about him is honorable, and the whole book of Judges is a testment to the idolatry and rebellion of Israel and the consequences they had to bear as a result.

That's part of the problem seeing through external sifters.

Hebrews 11 denies your 'tale.'

32 And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets:
33 Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions.

s

Maybe I should have said there is not much in the bible that says Samson was honorable. Most of his story told in the bible is his disobedience to God's Torah by having foreign wives, sex with prostitutes, disobeying and not honoring his parents, torturing animals, being yoked with unbelievers, etc. More I think about Samson, the more I realize how patient and long suffering God is with us. If you look at Judges 16:20, it speaks though that eventually God has a limit and will eventually as symbolically represented by the losing of his hair. This seems to be at the height of his arrogance and seemingly immortal life. But the time in prison I believe made him repentant, contemplative and realizing how fragile he was without the Lord. In verse 28 was the first time it was mentioned that he called upon the Lord. Albeit in a somewhat selfish request of getting revenge on the Philistines for gouging his eyes. His hair had grown back, and I believe this is symbolic of the Lord returning to him as well. So that gives me hope even in my sometimes selfish, and sinful ways, God will still extend to me his mercy and grace through my disobedient ways as he did to the patriarchs.

 

[Ryan]

I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them.

I'm trying to understand how can you make such a claim when the texts seems to show the exact opposite on more than one occasion. The beginning of chapter 20 has the people assembling before the LORD and considering the situation from the previous chapter. Verse 13 has them saying the following: "Now, surrender the sons of criminals that are in BabaAh, and we will execute them to purge their wickedness from IsraEl". This course of action that it seems you are saying was the act of men going outside of God's sanctioned command does in fact fall in line with the commands of God initially declared in Exodus and then echoed again in passages like Dueteronomy 19. Taking vengeance upon the unrighteous was not only sanctioned, but commanded. The people were commanded by God to purse the land of Israel of evil offenders like the rapists in Judges 19.

Deuteronomy 19:15-21

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

15 “A single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed; on the evidence of two or three witnesses a matter shall be confirmed. 16 If a malicious witness rises up against a man to accuse him of wrongdoing, 17 then both the men who have the dispute shall stand before the Lord, before the priests and the judges who will be in office in those days. 18 The judges shall investigate thoroughly, and if the witness is a false witness and he has accused his brother falsely, 19 then you shall do to him just as he had intended to do to his brother. Thus you shall purge the evil from among you. 20 The rest will hear and be afraid, and will never again do such an evil thing among you. 21 Thus you shall not show pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.

Imagine if Israel would have settled this dispute just by this simple protocol. Yes, the men who killed the concubine still had to face trial, and possibly justice. But Israel tool the Levites word without having it confirmed by the testimony of two to three witnesses. Although the Levite was correct they killed the concubine, he bore false witness and all it would have taken to contradict his testimony would have been to have the old man with whom they, or he spent the night with.

Israel was operating outside the scope of God's commandments as nowhere did it say he was with them until AFTER they wept and sought forgiveness and repented of their sins.


Judges 20

Complete Jewish Bible (CJB)

20 All the people of Isra’el came out, from Dan to Be’er-sheva, including Gil‘ad; the community assembled with one accord before Adonai at Mitzpah. 2 The leaders of all the tribes of Isra’el presented themselves in the assembly of the people of God, 400,000 foot soldiers armed with swords.

Nowhere does it say they consulted the Lord or sought his guidance for anything, until AFTER they made up their mind to go to war.

 

[VirginShallConceive]

In the course of reading the Bible, if one spends a lot of time studying, undoubtedly one will encounter passages that bring them pause. For me one of the most hard to deal with passages is found in Judges starting in chapter 19 and extending into chapter 21.

The story of the Levite and his concubine is a horrific tale that only gets worse and worse! It begins with an apparently unhappy woman fleeing to her father to escape being a concubine and her 'husband' subsequently follows her intent on retrieving her. He gets there, parties with he father for several days as her father didn't seem to want to let him leave. Then, finally the man and his concubine leave and end up spending a night among the Benjamites where a repeat of the Sodom and Gomorrah scenario with the angels in Lot's home takes place. Some of the town folks surround the home the travelors are in and demand to have the male travelors come out to have sex with the townsmen. The home owner rebukes them and subsequently offers his virgin daughter AND the concubine of the travelor to the townsmen. The townsmen then abuse, rape, and ultimately leave the concubine for dead.
The next morning the 'husband' goes outside to leave, sees his concubine/wife lying on the ground and proceeds to tell the woman he allowed to be abused in his steed to "get up and let's go" before realizing that she was now dead. He then puts the dead concubine on his burro and returns to his home where he proceeds to cut her dead boby in 12 pieces so he could MAIL THE PARTS to Israel's 12 tribes!

The tribal leaders/spokesmen get the packages and then get together to come up with a plan. The plan ends up resulting in a series of GOD SANCTIONED and INSTRUCTED brutal battles and kills tens of thousands and wipes out all but 600 Benjamite men who were able to retreat to safety.

The other 11 tribes make an oath to not give any of their women to the 600 Benjys andare thenm saddened that 1 tribe will be lost, so after consulting the LORD, they devise plans that result in more bloodshed, some kidnipping, and extortion in order to procure women for their 600 Benjy bretheren.

I don't mean any disrespect when I say this, but it is ignorance of history that causes various passages to be "disturbing" to people.

This portion of your post is simply a claim. And, it's a claim that you fail to verify. More disturbing, your claim(that lacks a sufficient explanation) is a response to a detailed summary of a biblical story provided by the OP.

And by "history", I don't just mean a record of words and events. I mean the way that the various involved peoples lived, spoke, thought, ate, worked, rested, their customs, their geography, even what made them burp.

Taking all that you listed into consideration, would you excuse their grotesquely immoral actions? Or am I assuming too much in my use of the word "immoral"?

It is only by this, that we can even begin to understand the Scriptures! The Bible is not a compilation of 21st century, Gentile books and thus, cannot be read that way.

I can't speak for the OP, but maybe the "fact" that Judges 19-21 needs to be read in a "special way" that involves throwing out all of the proper morality that has been taught to us throughout our entire lives is disturbing to some.

Are you really that surprised?

Welcome to the World of Reasonable Response To Seemingly Unreasonable Bible Passages!

And if you ask how knowing this stuff could possibly change ones view on a given passage (it is easy to prove that it does), then again, sincerely, no disrespect intended, but then you would be stubborn on top of being ignorant of these things, because instead of saying, "Oh, cool!" and beginning your journey of learning thru research, you will have (if you were to choose that response), then you would have chosen instead, to remain ignorant, amen?

Anyone who is uninformed of your "inside scoop" will continue to remain ignorant until your "inside scoop" is explained to them properly and also makes sense to them.

These passages, to me, do not present an issue. But that took time and I won't lay it all out here, because it would be too much typing and because I learned that the fun is in the journey!

This portion of your post could be given as a weak explanation for the Quran or the Book of Mormon, and it could bring forth the same result of "misunderstanding".

 

[smaller]

Maybe I should have said there is not much in the bible that says Samson was honorable. Most of his story told in the bible is his disobedience to God's Torah by having foreign wives, sex with prostitutes, disobeying and not honoring his parents, torturing animals, being yoked with unbelievers, etc. More I think about Samson, the more I realize how patient and long suffering God is with us. If you look at Judges 16:20, it speaks though that eventually God has a limit and will eventually as symbolically represented by the losing of his hair. This seems to be at the height of his arrogance and seemingly immortal life. But the time in prison I believe made him repentant, contemplative and realizing how fragile he was without the Lord. In verse 28 was the first time it was mentioned that he called upon the Lord. Albeit in a somewhat selfish request of getting revenge on the Philistines for gouging his eyes. His hair had grown back, and I believe this is symbolic of the Lord returning to him as well. So that gives me hope even in my sometimes selfish, and sinful ways, God will still extend to me his mercy and grace through my disobedient ways as he did to the patriarchs.

Well, it seems you extracted some spiritual benefits from the observations after all.

s

 

[TRUTH over TRADITION]

I don't mean any disrespect when I say this, but it is ignorance of history that causes various passages to be "disturbing" to people. And by "history", I don't just mean a record of words and events. I mean the way that the various involved peoples lived, spoke, thought, ate, worked, rested, their customs, their geography, even what made them burp. It is only by this, that we can even begin to understand the Scriptures! The Bible is not a compilation of 21st century, Gentile books and thus, cannot be read that way. And if you ask how knowing this stuff could possibly change ones view on a given passage (it is easy to prove that it does), then again, sincerely, no disrespect intended, but then you would be stubborn on top of being ignorant of these things, because instead of saying, "Oh, cool!" and beginning your journey of learning thru research, you will have (if you were to choose that response), then you would have chosen instead, to remain ignorant, amen?

Z, your belief that a person can only be bothered by such a text if they are ignorant to A.N.E. history is but an opinion that is not supported by much more than your personally entitled feelings.

I find it interesting that you brought up the history and presumably the customs, norms, and mores of that age, because in doing so it sheds a light on the mindset of the people (not just Israel) of that day and time. It was a far more barbaric and patriachial time, and rather than the people of God having traits that distinguished them from their contemporaries, their values and behaviors that spring from their beliefs more often than not mirrored other peoples of the day.

Knowing A.N.E. customs and history can change one's views for certain. On that point I agree with you entirely. The problem I am encountering is that the more I study history, the less 'Godly' the Hebrew texts appear.

 

[Zeuszoos]

I don't mean any disrespect when I say this, but it is ignorance of history that causes various passages to be "disturbing" to people. And by "history", I don't just mean a record of words and events. I mean the way that the various involved peoples lived, spoke, thought, ate, worked, rested, their customs, their geography, even what made them burp. It is only by this, that we can even begin to understand the Scriptures! The Bible is not a compilation of 21st century, Gentile books and thus, cannot be read that way. And if you ask how knowing this stuff could possibly change ones view on a given passage (it is easy to prove that it does), then again, sincerely, no disrespect intended, but then you would be stubborn on top of being ignorant of these things, because instead of saying, "Oh, cool!" and beginning your journey of learning thru research, you will have (if you were to choose that response), then you would have chosen instead, to remain ignorant, amen?

Z, your belief that a person can only be bothered by such a text if they are ignorant to A.N.E. history is but an opinion that is not supported by much more than your personally entitled feelings.

I find it interesting that you brought up the history and presumably the customs, norms, and mores of that age, because in doing so it sheds a light on the mindset of the people (not just Israel) of that day and time. It was a far more barbaric and patriachial time, and rather than the people of God having traits that distinguished them from their contemporaries, their values and behaviors that spring from their beliefs more often than not mirrored other peoples of the day.

Knowing A.N.E. customs and history can change one's views for certain. On that point I agree with you entirely. The problem I am encountering is that the more I study history, the less 'Godly' the Hebrew texts appear.

I will leave you with the following points and the statement that my response is not meant as an attack on you personally. I am just making some points about how I see your position, nothing more. I am not trying to be hostile and I am not angry wiyh you at all. Not in the least.

With that being said, you have it backwards, my friend.

You see, you read the text as being about God/people being immoral and horrible. I would dispute that.

The "backwards" comment will be explained in #5 below.

1) I suggested to you that you have set yourself as the judge of what is moral. But man is simply not qualified to do that.
2) Man judging what is moral, makes morality subjective, since people disagree about what is moral/immoral. But the truth is, that "subjective morality" is a self contradiction. An oxymoron.

3) When you start out by assuming yourself to be qualified to judge all and use your own version of morality as the ruler by which to measure the actions and beliefs of others, you will find that you end up judging all of mankind as failing and immoral, since no one would agree with you on every point of morality, neither by word, nor by deed.

4) What folks like you (those who think they are judge) fail to realize, is that when you set yourself up as judge of all, you do the very same thing you criticize God for doing and reveal yourself as a common, garden variety hypocrite, nothing more. And you should not bother trying to claim that you don't place yourself as judge, since the first thing you did, was start out by judging God, telling us how horrible and immoral He is.

5) Now as for the reason I said that you have it backwards, it is because you began by reading the text from a 21st century, Gentile point of view and pretended you could understand it without any knowledge of the history involved. You would not do that with any other ancient text. Unless you're just lazy and in that case, you shouldn't be commenting at all. <lol>

The problem here, is that when I told you that you cannot comprehend these ancient texts without a strong, solid working knowledge of the things I mentioned (and more), instead of doing the proper research (which would take years and an open heart and mind) and then coming back and reading the texts again in their proper context, you, after knowing this, came at it backwards.

How? By doing absolutely zero research and decided that what I said meant that it's okay to assume that without any understanding, you could just proclaim that it meant that those times (which by default assumes all the people in it) were therefore just as evil as your lack of knowledge or understanding told you the texts are.

This was why I told you that I was not going to discuss this any further with you, saying that it was because you simply are not interested in sn open, honest discussion about the involved texts. Because if you were, then you definitely would not have responded the way that you did. Especially not if you were what you claimed to be.

Rather, you would have been the honest, sincere Bible student and done some studying, seeking knowledge! Not ignoring your own ignorance of the history, then insisting that said ignorance meant that now, not only could you continue to judge, but indeed, were now somehow additionally qualified to make an even bigger judgment!

How does that work? And how could you possibly assume that if you intentionally, publicly reject knowledge and judge even more, that it would mean that people would somehow respond by putting even more validity to your comments? Huh?!?

If you truly sought "truth over tradition" and did not have this knowledge, then you would have sought to gain at least some before commenting like that again!

Or at least asked questions, like;

"What do you see in those texts then, please?"

What no sincere Bible student would do, is try to confess their ignorance, by hoping to somehow use it as ammo against the Scriptures!

Look man, like I said, I'm not trying to attack you! I'm really not! I have only repeated back to you, the thing you have said to in this thread! And you can use this, my response as the reason that I will not be going any further with you.

I spoke the truth here, as we both know. Your words are there for all to see.

And just FYI, when you have no problem with the NT, but do with the OT, then you are judging with a double standard, since there's plenty of judgment and punishment in the NT as well! The biggest judgment/punishment of all, as a matter of fact!

My advice to you, is that if you are not a believer, than just say so. Unbelievers are allowed here. And what motive could there be to hide it, except to try to sneak up on Christians and also to feign being the victim, trying to make it appear to the moderators like they're beating up on the poor little misguided Christian, who needs brotherly love and caring guidance, when in truth all you've done is attack God's word, calling it evil/immoral, without one good thing to say about it.

That's not... "Christian".


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[P31Woman]

I need to make it clear there was absolutely nothing God sanctioned by their behaviour at all during the course of these events. If they would have just listened to God's instructions to begin with, all would have gone well with them.

I'm trying to understand how can you make such a claim when the texts seems to show the exact opposite on more than one occasion. The beginning of chapter 20 has the people assembling before the LORD and considering the situation from the previous chapter. Verse 13 has them saying the following: "Now, surrender the sons of criminals that are in BabaAh, and we will execute them to purge their wickedness from IsraEl". This course of action that it seems you are saying was the act of men going outside of God's sanctioned command does in fact fall in line with the commands of God initially declared in Exodus and then echoed again in passages like Dueteronomy 19. Taking vengeance upon the unrighteous was not only sanctioned, but commanded. The people were commanded by God to purse the land of Israel of evil offenders like the rapists in Judges 19.

Deuteronomy 19:15-21

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

15 “A single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed; on the evidence of two or three witnesses a matter shall be confirmed. 16 If a malicious witness rises up against a man to accuse him of wrongdoing, 17 then both the men who have the dispute shall stand before the Lord, before the priests and the judges who will be in office in those days. 18 The judges shall investigate thoroughly, and if the witness is a false witness and he has accused his brother falsely, 19 then you shall do to him just as he had intended to do to his brother. Thus you shall purge the evil from among you. 20 The rest will hear and be afraid, and will never again do such an evil thing among you. 21 Thus you shall not show pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.

Imagine if Israel would have settled this dispute just by this simple protocol. Yes, the men who killed the concubine still had to face trial, and possibly justice. But Israel tool the Levites word without having it confirmed by the testimony of two to three witnesses. Although the Levite was correct they killed the concubine, he bore false witness and all it would have taken to contradict his testimony would have been to have the old man with whom they, or he spent the night with.

Israel was operating outside the scope of God's commandments as nowhere did it say he was with them until AFTER they wept and sought forgiveness and repented of their sins.


Judges 20

Complete Jewish Bible (CJB)

20 All the people of Isra’el came out, from Dan to Be’er-sheva, including Gil‘ad; the community assembled with one accord before Adonai at Mitzpah. 2 The leaders of all the tribes of Isra’el presented themselves in the assembly of the people of God, 400,000 foot soldiers armed with swords.

Nowhere does it say they consulted the Lord or sought his guidance for anything, until AFTER they made up their mind to go to war.