Disturbing Passages in Holy Books

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Yeah.
Its a great story for kids.

But for grownups it makes zero sense.

Not only is the Noah's Flood devoid of any either external and internal logic as an account of an event, but it lacks moral logic.

God is supposed to infallibe and not make mistakes...but then why did he have to reboot the whole planet that time with the Flood?

^^ One thing to be said for the gods in Ancient Greece is that they don't claim to be all-loving and just. They appear to be openly petty, vindictive, and cruel without regularly emphasizing that their evilness is perfectly good and/or perfectly justified (gaslighting). For this reason, I'd rank them slightly above YHWH on a tier list.

I think it's an awful story for kids when it's presented as fact because it instills fear and promotes ignorance as far as science is concerned.

From a moral standpoint, it reminds me of various acts of genocide in the Bible. Going to war over land is bad, but encouraging the slaughter of everyone - even infants is horrifying. There's no way to justify it.

I agree. The Greeks believed that the Gods were best avoided because getting involved in their affairs always led to trouble.

As Cersei said in the show Game of Thrones

"The Gods have no mercy that's why they're Gods".

As for the Great Flood story, it kind of makes me think of Climate Change.

The story of the Great Flood pulls heavily from the Epic of Gilgamesh and preexisting flood myths in general. It doesn't surprise me that it's something humans would come up with, especially in cultures that experienced local floods now and then.

Ah, the great flood. And then God said "next time I'll use fire!"

Jesus is trying to discourage critical thinking here:

Luke 18:15-17: People were also bringing babies to Jesus for him to place his hands on them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. 16 But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. 17 Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.

It's also a bad idea to encourage children to hang out with adults they don't know well and to have said adults touch them unless there's a medical reason (not faith healing!) or immediate safety concern. Personally speaking, I'd probably choose to keep my kid away from vagabonds who profess to be the Son of God.

I just remembered the story of the golden calf. I don't think it's come up in this thread yet. It's a story I was very familiar with when I was a kid because it was in the JW publication for children My Book of Bible Stories.

Moses was hanging out with God on Mt. Sinai. Exodus 31:18 "When the Lord finished speaking to Moses on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the covenant law, the tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God."

The following takes place in Exodus 32.

Moses was gone for a long time. The people started getting antsy and were worried that their illustrious leader wouldn't return. When they voiced their concerns to a guy named Aaron:

I'm not sure what "revelry" is referring to here, but it sounds like a good time.

Anyway, when God saw that the people were worshipping a golden calf, he got very angry. Apparently, God finds golden livestock threatening. Maybe it makes him feel inadequate. God is so pissed off that he wants to destroy them all (verse 10), but Moses talks him out of it (11-14).

When Moses arrives back at the encampment, he has a hissy fit and breaks the stone tablets that God gave him when he's confronted by the extreme wickedness of calf worship. People are even dancing! (It's strange that God couldn't come up with a better leader than this guy.)

Forcing people to drink the remains of a cherished bovine idol doesn't sound very humane to me.

In any case, when Moses asks Aaron why he got the people to engage in idol worship, Aaron says that Moses shouldn't blame him; he was just trying to help (verses 21-24).

People are "running wild" (25)

On top of the 3,000 individuals who were killed, "the Lord struck the people with a plague" (verse 35).

Moral of the story: killing people isn't too big of a deal; worshipping livestock made out of gold is just going too far.

Something silly but unrelated I happened upon in Exodus 20:24-26. God says:

After the golden calf episode, in Exodus 33:1-3:

At least God has some insight on his own personal triggers. It’s good that he chose to avoid what might have been an Irresistible Temptation. Credit where credit is due.

However, it’s a shame that attempting to have the Israelites coexist with other groups wasn’t even considered. Driving out various tribes from their homeland isn’t what I would consider just or fair.

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 04 Jan 2024, 3:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Golden calves are bad.

But red heifers are good.

Speaking of cows, the account about Elijah and the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18 is disturbing. The people are divided on which god to worship - Yahweh or Baal - because agreeing on which imaginary being you want to worship is extremely important. In verse 22, Elijah says that he's the only prophet left for Yahweh, but there are 450 for Baal. (King Ahab and Jezebel were pro-Baal and had Yahweh prophets put to death in verse 13.) To prove which god is the right one, Elijah states:

This is how it goes for Baal's prophets:

I can't believe that the self harm didn't work. Maybe they should've tried cutting off their foreskins. At any rate, when it was Elijah's turn for the dance off test, this is what happens:

Elijah was victorious. The grotesque part occurs next:
Killing 450 people for believing in the wrong god seems a bit extreme although consistent with this portion of the Bible. Anyway, moral of the story: you might want to reconsider going into the prophecy field if you are considering that as a career goal.

In Genesis 32:22-32, God gets into a wrestling match with Jacob and injures him in the process although, in a surprising upset, Jacob ultimately wins. I envision it looking something like this:

Maybe I should talk about Jacob being an ass in a separate post. (Once again, couldn’t God have found someone better?) Still, I don't think the wrestling match was necessary or appropriate. I suppose God was in one of his violent moods again.

Moral of the story: start lifting weights, taking wrestling/martial arts classes, and using steroids. You don't want to find yourself in a wrestling match with God unprepared.

(Disclaimer: the writing in Hebrew is ambiguous. My former church taught that Jacob wrestled with an angel. Others, believe that it’s entirely figurative. Given that it says that Jacob saw God face-to-face, I think the writer most likely had God in mind, especially considering similar myths involving deities interacting with humans that were popular at the time. Figurative or literal, the idea of violence/corporal punishment in this context is disturbing just the same.)

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 08 Jan 2024, 2:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Do not eat the thigh meat attached to the hip of an animal?

Yeah, just don’t.

CW: mention of CSA and SA

Sometimes the Bible is disturbing due to what it doesn’t say.

The Bible talks about bestiality specifically on 4 separate occasions. It never talks about child sexual abuse, and it encourages parents to physically abuse their children (Proverbs 23:13-14) in a way that is similar to its approach towards beating slaves (Exodus 21:20-21). Certain passages of the OT, such as Numbers 31:17-18 and Deuteronomy 21:10-14, appear to justify having sex with raping young female slaves/captives. (Forced marriage doesn’t equal consent.) Anyway, given the ongoing issues with child sexual abuse both within and outside of religion, one would think that God would talk about it at some point if the Bible were his Word AND if he were an omnipotent, omniscient, loving and just god although the cited scriptures and the existence of suffering seem to make that specific combination of factors an impossibility. Sure, CSA could qualify as “sexual immorality”/“fornication,” I suppose, but it seems a bit lax on God’s part not to talk about it outright given how devastating and prevalent it is.

Mentions of bestiality:

First, Exodus 22:19 states, "Whoever lies with an animal shall be put to death."

Second, Leviticus 18:23 commands, "And you shall not lie with any animal and so make yourself unclean with it, neither shall any woman give herself to an animal to lie with it: it is perversion."

Third, Leviticus 20:15-16 says, "If a man lies with an animal, he shall surely be put to death, and you shall kill the animal. If a woman approaches any animal and lies with it, you shall kill the woman and the animal; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them."

Fourth, Deuteronomy 27:21 notes, "'Cursed be anyone who lies with any kind of animal.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'”

Although I’m not a fan of capital punishment, I’m glad that most Bible followers know that bestiality is wrong through reading the Bible, and I’m glad that almost everyone else figured it out somehow. However, maybe God should’ve replaced a couple of those scriptures (or, better yet, just added others) with: don’t sexually abuse children and don’t sexually abuse adults (both inside and outside of marriage). He should’ve cut out large portions of the Bible that are horrifically immoral and that still cause problems today. Some guidelines on an appropriate age of consent would’ve been helpful, too. It’s almost like the Bible was written solely by people with the values of their specific times and locations sans the involvement of any deity whatsoever. (Obvious snark.)

We see things very differently.

Sometimes women do not cry out during rape because they freeze through fear. The Bible writers probably had no concept of that.

I think the problem is that the Bible was written in ancient times by ignorant men and is mostly inapplicable for our day.

Last edited by TwilightPrincess on 08 Jan 2024, 5:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.