Dear Bro. Rolheiser,
For the past month and a half I’ve been reading your column, In Exile, in the L.A. The Tidings. I’ve appreciated your spirit – to free your readers from the exile of ignorance and misinformation. I’ve also been quite impressed with the breadth of your reading as well as the depth of your wisdom and understanding. And, as I perused your website, it confirmed my guess that you had a much larger readership than simply Los Angeles.
And that readership is actually what triggered my anger as I read The Tidings 2/16/16 article, “On reading difficult passages in Scripture.” I feel very strongly that some things you wrote undermine a person’s ability to trust “the living word of God.” (1 Pet 1:23) “For the Word of God is living… and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” (Heb 4:12) Additionally, Paul wrote, “All Scripture is God-breathed, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfected, thoroughly furnished to every good work.” (2 Tim 3:16-17) We need to be able to trust God’s Word without “adjusting” it unnecessarily.
You provided three examples of scriptures that are hard to understand: God’s killing 70,000 Israelites when king David took a census; God’s commanding that all men, women, children, and even animals were to be killed as His children took over the Promised Land; and Jephthah’s “sacrifice of his own daughter on the altar of sacrifice.”
And then you explain that, “If one were to take these texts literally they could be used to justify the exact type of violence that extremist groups like ISIS and Al-Qaida carry out under the belief that God loves them alone and they are free to kill others in his name.” I’ll return to this a bit later, but first let me continue with your reasoning. “These texts, as biblical scholarship makes clear, are not to be taken literally. They are anthropomorphic and archetypal.” Then, quite properly, you follow up with an explanation of what that means.
Ultimately, your justification for not taking these Bible passages literally is, “…all individual texts in Scripture must be seen within the larger overall theology of God, and as such, they demand an interpretation that is consistent with the nature of God as revealed overall in Scripture.”
And, Bro. Rolheiser, I absolutely agree with you on that point. Actually, that is precisely the reason I believe those passages should be taken literally, even though, if taken out of context of “the larger overall framework of Scripture…” they make God seem “arbitrary, heartless, violent, demanding violence from believers and completely calloused about the lives of those not among the chosen favorites.” I’ll speak about His “chosen favorites” in a moment. See Rom 2:11
Please allow me to explain my point of view. In this missive I’m going to only touch briefly on the larger biblical picture we must see if we are to love God in spite of all the killing He commanded. (Incidentally, seeing these and similar events as anthropomorphic renders them less archetypal.) I’ll go into much more depth if something I say here resonates for you, and you want to know more.
Pre-Christian history
First of all, let’s acknowledge that in the OT God commands a massive amount of killing beginning in Noah’s day when God killed every human on the earth but the eight on the ark. (Gen 6:7, 11-13) Then we read of the ten plagues that ended with the deaths of every first-born. (Ex 12:29-30) That was followed by the death of Pharaoh’s entire army in the collapsing Red Sea. (Ex 14:7, 27-28; 15:1) Then God ensured that every man and woman over the age of twenty, whom He had just rescued from Egypt, would die in the desert. (Num 14:29, 32–33) Next is the command to clean out all pagans from the Promised Land so that His people wouldn’t be misled into worshiping any god but Himself. (Deut 20:16-18; Jos 6:17-21;) Following that, the book of Judges tells us that God’s people did, nonetheless, succumb to false worship on numerous occasions. So, God would lift His hand of protection, and the surrounding nations would attack. The Israelites would eventually get the message, call God to rescue them, straighten up for a while, then repeat.
Even after they had demanded a king, they still wouldn’t remain loyal to their, and our, Creator. Less than one hundred years later, the northern ten tribes (Israel) split from Judah where the temple was located, and started their own form of worship. (1 Kin 12:19-20, 28-29) They became the “lost ten tribes of Israel” when the Assyrians wiped them out about two hundred and fifty years later, in accord with God’s decree against false worship. (2 Kin 17:3-7) But God also condemned Judah for filling the temple with idols, and the Jews went into exile 150 years after their northern brothers did. 2 Kin 23:26-27; 25:8-11, 21
The pattern we see here tells us something very important about our God – His commandments, the first and second of the Ten Commandments, (Deut 5:7-9) are to be taken seriously! As we look at all the God-mandated deaths from the flood to Judah’s exile, we see that they all had one thing in common: those killed were ignoring their Creator to a lesser or greater extent, and making up their own gods.
A Christian perspective
God warned Adam and Eve that they would die if they ignored Him. We must take that literally. And if that be the case, then all the people whose death God commanded were simply experiencing what they had been forewarned would happen when they turned their backs on Him. But taking all this literally, can in no way justify a Christian’s engaging in the kind of violence practiced by ISIS. The reason is simple. All the above mandated deaths are found in the OT, when God was dealing with people in a physical way because they, as a populous, weren’t yet mature enough to handle God’s spiritual principles, though some would be by the time Jesus was incarnate. As a part of His raising humanity to that level, He set up fleshly Israel, to foreshadow the spiritual Israel that would come into existence when the Messiah arrived. (Exo 19:6; 1 Pet 2:9; Rom 9:6; 2:17, 25-26, 28-29) We spiritual Israelites have Jesus’ command “love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,” (Mat 5:44) as well as Paul’s explanation, “for the weapons of our warfare are not fleshly… (so we) are bringing every thought into the obedience of Christ.” (2 Cor 10:4-5) Nowhere in the NT do we find any command to kill. To the contrary, we are to die to ourselves. (Mat 16:24; Gal 2:20) Death in the NT is spiritual in nature, not physical because as Jesus said, “It is the Spirit that makes alive, the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit and are life.” (Joh 6:63) And nowhere are Christians commanded or even given permission to kill others. That’s why our armor and our weapons are spiritual, (Eph 6:13-18; 2 Cor 6:4-7) not physical. So, a Christian who is obeying Jesus would never, under any circumstances, act like ISIS.
To really lock that in, let’s consider Jesus’ primary objective for His disciples. In His final public prayer, He gave an accounting of His ministry, then prayed for His disciples, and finally for those who would believe in Him through their word. In Joh 17:11 we find “…that they may be one as We are.” Joh 17:21-23 “that all may be one, as You are in Me, Father, and I in You, that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And I have given them the glory which You have given Me, that they may be one, as We are One: I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected in one; and that the world may know that You sent Me and loved them, even as You loved Me.” Christians cannot be killing one another and “be one as We are one.” It is the very ecumenical unity that Pope Francis is promoting that identifies us as different from the world, that makes our God worth worshiping. This is the ultimate distinguishing characteristic of His disciples- Christians. Joh 13:34-35
God’s character
So, does all the slaughter our heavenly Father commanded undermine His character? Quite the contrary, it affirms His determination to ensure that His children gain life, and that in abundance. (Joh 10:10) That is the excellence He wants for His people. Admittedly, when scriptures are taken out of context, the Bible can seem to paint God as a Bad Guy. For instance, Isa 53:10 tells us that God delighted in crushing His Son. Are we to take that literally? Of course! But we need to be a little flexible. As the rest of the verse goes on to say, His (Jesus’) days would be prolonged and He would accomplish God’s will (in redeeming God’s children through His death.) And how did Jesus feel about it? Heb 12:2 tells us “…for the joy that was set before Him, He endured the cross… and sat down at the right hand of God.” Like Jesus, God’s delight was not in Jesus’ suffering or death itself, but rather in the results of that death, the redemption of mankind.
Similarly, if we are to love God even though He instigated all the death commanded in the OT, we must look at the larger framework of Scripture. Jesus tells us that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous to life and the unrighteous to judgment (Joh 5:28-29) in the last day. My current understanding is that that resurrection takes place during Jesus’ millennial reign. (Rev 20:6) So all those slaughtered in OT times (as well as those who have died since then,) will actually be resurrected into a much better environment than what they had known. It won’t have Satan, who has been abyssed, (Rev 20:1, 3) misleading people, sowing mistrust and fear by his lies.
God decreed all those deaths within the context of His Son’s coming kingship over the earth. He knew their deaths would be temporary and that when they returned to life it would be to a life far better than they had ever imagined possible – in Paradise. They knew the story of Eden, but they didn’t know that was actually in their future. They didn’t know what Isaiah would prophecy many years after most of them were gone –
“And He shall judge among the nations and shall rebuke many people. And they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they learn war anymore.” Isa 2:4
Isaiah’s further description in Isa 11:1-9 describe more of the results after telling of the Messiah’s character and His taking rulership –
“And the wolf shall live with the lamb; and the leopard shall lie with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little boy shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall feed, their young shall lie together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the infant shall play on the hole of the asp; yea, the weaned child shall put his hand on the viper’s den. They shall not do evil, nor destroy in all My holy mountain. For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of Jehovah, as the waters cover the sea.”
There are those who say this shouldn’t be taken literally, that it’s just a metaphor. Actually, if these verses are taken literally, they strengthen our faith in God’s word. Here’s why: Isa 55:9-11 says:
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain comes down, and the snow from the heavens, and does not return there, but waters the earth, and makes it bring out and bud, and give seed to the sower and bread to the eater; so shall My Word be, which goes out of My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall certainly do what I sent it to do.”
We remember that Adam and Eve were told to multiply, fill the earth, and to have in subjection all the fish, fowl, and land animals. (Gen 1:28) Up to our present time, that hasn’t happened. But in the above verses, (Isa 2:4; 11:1-9) we see that command brought to fruition. Though man under Satan’s rulership (2 Cor 4:4) couldn’t fulfill God’s will, under Jesus’ kingship, and without Satan’s interference, the meek who inherit the earth (Mat 5:5) will transform the earth into the Paradise for which Eden was the archetype.
The nature of death
One final point that flies in the face of tradition, yet, within the larger framework of Scripture must not be ignored – the nature of death. Eccl 9:5-6 tells us,
“For the living know that they shall die; but the dead do not know anything; nor do they have any more a reward, for their memory is forgotten. Also their love, their hatred, and their envy has now perished; nor do they any longer have a part forever in all that is done under the sun.”
Henry’s commentary says in explaining these verses, “The dead know they are dead, and it is too late…” But the scripture actually says they know nothing! A Hebrew interlinear gives us this:
ם u·e·mthim “and·the·ones-being-dead” ם ain·m “there-is-no·them” י’דְ עִ ים iudoim “ones-knowing” מְ אוּמָ ה maume “aught”
Two dozen Bibles all said the same thing. God’s people used to know this. Notice:
Psa 6:5 For there is no memory of You in death; who shall give thanks to You in Sheol?
Job 14:13-15 Who will grant that You would hide me in the grave (Sheol,) that You would keep me secret, until Your wrath is past, that You would set me a fixed time and remember me? If a man die, shall he revive (awaken of his own accord)? All the days of my warfare I will wait, until my change comes. You shall call, and I will answer You; You shall have a desire to the work of Your hands.
Psa 146:4 His breath goes forth; he returns to the earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.
Act 2:29 Men, brothers, it is permitted to say to you with plainness as to the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Act 2:34 For David has not ascended into the heavens, but he says himself, “The LORD said to my Lord, Sit at My right hand
Joh 11:11-13 He said these things; and after that He said to them, Our friend Lazarus sleeps. But I go so that I may awaken him out of sleep. Then His disciples said, Lord, if he sleeps, he will get well. But Jesus spoke of his death, but they thought that He had spoken of taking rest in sleep.
So God knew that all those whose deaths He had decreed were “asleep”, until resurrected. For them, their death would seem like only an instant because they were conscious of nothing at all while dead. That’s why Paul wrote, “But I would not have you ignorant, brothers, concerning those who are asleep, that you be not grieved, even as others who have no hope.” (1 Thes 4:13) When they are resurrected in the new system of things, it will be into an earth well on its way to being the Paradise predestined by God. Prior to their arrival, those who were born after them would have already been resurrected as implied by Jesus’ comment, “But many who are first shall be last; and the last shall be first.” (Mat 19:30) God knew what lay ahead for those whose deaths He required. So why all that death? To teach a simple, but VITAL lesson to humanity as a whole: He alone is the source of life; false gods are the source of death.
God’s objective
An uncaring, unloving God? That’s not what we see when we look at the larger picture.
A part of that larger picture is, of course, Jesus, who said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father but by Me.” (Joh 14:6) And our coming to our Father, our reconciliation with Him, our becoming one with Him, of course, has always been His objective; to create a family for Himself has always been His greatest desire. His big picture is bigger than ours.
Bro. Rolheiser – I know that to take to heart some of the things I’ve shared with you, and to actually use them in your writing and speaking will cause you to run afoul of your culture. It could possibly undermine your career. But I pray, for the sake of those whose lives you touch, God’s children, give them the truth. Please don’t let any questions or doubts this letter produces go slipping to the back of your mind, to be eventually forgotten as you move on with your life and duties. Please deal with them in prayer, do your research, and ask questions.
I’m afraid I haven’t been as brief as I had intended. I have explained that God commanded so much killing to illustrate His point that being unplugged from Him leads to death. I didn’t explain why God killed 70,000 of David’s subjects, nor anything about Jephthah’s daughter. I will, should you want me to. I will also go into the relationship between those living on the earth after His second coming with those who say, “when He shall be revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.” (1 Joh 3:2) And I will, naturally, provide the scriptural basis for all my comments.
Thank you for your service to our Shepherd, Bro. Rolheiser. May He continuously bless your ponderings, prayers, and passion for Him.
Terry
P.S. – If you’re interested, I’ll send you an article I wrote some years back titled, Should Christians God To War?
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