In my Bible classes, I often will come up with a topic that relates to what we’ve been studying, and I’ll ask the students to prepare to debate either side of a proposition related to what we’ve learned.
I thought this week’s topic would make for an interesting topic of discussion. Our students, like any group of students, really dislike group punishment. So now that we have completed most of our study of the Old Testament, I’ve got them working on debating the following proposition.
“God’s use of group punishment and group blessing in the Old Testament is inherently unfair.”
Groups in this case are families, cities, nations, tribes, even the whole world.
So, what do you say? What would be your criticism, defense, questions, examples or insight? What would you contribute to our discussion?
The Internet Monk Archives 
I like Keith’s response in bringing up the inaction of the group as grounds for summary judgement. Bruce Bradshaw has a similar approach in dealing with the Woman who was stoned for collecting firewood on the Sabbath. In a sense, the stoning of the Woman was a punishment on all of Israel for their lack of support for that woman. Allowing her (and anyone else) to slip between the cracks was a major disruption to the Shalom of Israel.
I also like Ravi Zacharias’ response to the question of God’s justice in ordering the destruction of human life. God is able to take life (and order the taking of life), because God is the one with the power to restore it again.
Israel was only ever justified in taking life on the command of God because God is the author and resurrector of all life.
I’m convinced that the people of Zimbabwe should overthrow Mugabe, but that they won’t as long as they buy his rhetoric of global conspiracy.
In one sense, their misery is upon their own heads, however this does not diminish our responsibility to minister grace and charity to them.
Forgive me if my tone is perceived to be harsh, as it is not my intention. I am trying to reconcile realism with ideology which affirms the revealed character of God as the very definition of Good.
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I haven’t read through the comments, this one’s on the original post.
St. Siluan said:
I think this gets at it relatively well. God is not unjust for punishing anyone who thinks he is being punished unjustly for someone else’s sins. And anyone who thinks he is being punished justly, would choose to suffer with his people rather than separate himself off from them, as indeed God Himself did.
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Hebrews 11:4 By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.
Abel is listed as an OT hero of faith. Faith is demonstrated in the early chapters of Genesis as believing God. Faith isn’t defined, but its results are demonstrated. (Enoch, Noah, Abraham.) The first definition is Gen 15:5-6.
I don’t think the makeup of the offering was the issue. Cain’s subsequent actions indicate he is not a person of faith, but a person who acts willfully against God’s explicit, revealed commands.
Yet God has mercy on him. twice.
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Carolyn said: “Likewise, Abel obeyed God and brought a blood offering. Cain discounted the will of God and brought veggies.”
I’d like IMonk to please offer his opinion on this, because I have heard this explanation again and again of why Abel’s sacrifice was accepted by God and Cain’s was not, was because Abel’s sacrifice was a blood sacrifice and Cain’s was not. So Cain, through an offering of vegetables, was trying to come to God through his own means and was not approaching God on God’s terms. Yet does anything in the Old Testament (or the New) concretely support this theory? As in, explicitly supports it?
Frankly, when I read the story of Cain and Abel as a small child, I always believed that the two brothers had simply gone into different ‘businesses’ (one was a herder, the other a farmer), and that they were offering God the best of their two respective products as a gesture of thanksgiving. I never connected any atoning sacrifice with this story at all. I always believed that Abel’s sacrifice was accepted and Cain’s was not, because Abel came with a different attitude, not a different thing to sacrifice, and that Abel was genuinely thankful for his animals whereas Cain’s thankfulness was somehow feigned.
Apparently, R.C. Sproul supports my theory (or maybe it is the other way ’round), and I have never really heard anyone else championing it. Everyone always seems to assume that the two brothers’ sacrifices were for atonement for sins, when I always assumed they were sacrifices that showed thanksgiving to God.
I know this is something of a tangent, and for that I apologize. I just wanted to ask this question.
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Make that:
killing every man, woman, child and animal in some cities of Europe and Japan during WWII.
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I don’t think that these are merely actions of some OT God. This is who we are right now. With single-mindedness we firebombed and vaporized cities killing every man, woman, child and animal in Europe and Japan during WWII. This still is U.S. policy based on our large arsenal of nukes and chemical weapons. We have our reasons and so did God.
[Gen 3:22] Then the LORD God said: “See! The man has become like one of us, knowing what is good and what is bad! ”
Maybe we are more god-like than we realize.
Also, to say that, because of original sin, we “deserve” to suffer is stretching it. To say that innocent people/children deserve (torture, rape, starvation, burns and disease) because of the sin of Adam is crazy. In a world with freewill evil must exist, and sin has inseparable consequences.
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“God’s use of group punishment and group blessing in the Old Testament is inherently unfair.â€
I would argue that God is Right when he judges the people of the Earth as groups. (I think “fair” and “unfair” is an individualistic concept that we use to try to justify, explain or condemn actions we view as Right or Un-Right)
In actuality, through the course of most recorded history, the group, tribe, clan, nation, etc. is responsible for the actions of that group. The people let the leaders lead, the people can overthrow the leadership, or let it stand. Do you not think that how-many-billion Chinese people couldn’t overthrow their communist government? “We the People . . .” overthrew the King of England. So whether God judges the group or the leader, it’s Right.
Now you will say that God sets up leaders and authorities and governments, and he does, but not exclusively, without letting the times and situations of a nation work also. The people of Israel wanted a King, they got it. Why would we think it would be wrong to judge them or their King together? The people of Germany, wanted a Hitler, the time was ripe, and they got it. (My view is an unknown balance, in total control of God, between Free Will and Sovereignty. Or that God is so Sovereign that he let’s an unknown amount of Free Will happen.)
I think an interesting term used a lot lately is “Zeitgeist” I think there is a spirit of the times that people as a group feel, and are moved by. I think it explains the election of Senator Obama. I think we feel that there needs to be a change in places like the Congo and Zimbabwe, but evidently the people there don’t feel it yet, or they’d overthrow Mugabe and kill the left-over rebels from Rwanda that are causing trouble in the Congo.
There is also a harder question that this brings up, is Militant Islam really supported by the whole Muslim people? Again, if a group feels something is wrong, they should act to end it. Thomas Friedman has written a lot on this idea that the moderate Muslims speaking out will be the key to ending Islamic terrorism, Palestinian and Israeli tension, etc.
As individuals, we either go along with the times, or not, but as Christians, our highest calling is to, no matter the times, follow Jesus. While God punishes or blesses as a group, in His Sovereign, Righteous Power, He is always faithful to His own.
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jeuby
“and let’s say that the age of the children spared is kept fairly young. what would you say to that? why would God command the killing of small children that could have been adopted and assimilated into the israelite community?”
I’m not there under the command of Joshua or whoever and didn’t grow up in the “system” so it’s very hard for me to say what I’d do back then. But as MS said, it would be very hard for me to kill “innocent” kids just now. Very hard. But then again, one of the points of boot camp and infantry training is to desensitize you to the acts you must do in war. But we have codes of war based on current western standards of ethics which would stop most of this and allow you to turn in anyone giving such orders. But this is now and that was then. Apples and oranges. It you want a head bender of a phrase, look up the origins of decimate.
As to assimilate into the Israelite community, why do you think this would even be feasible in less than dozens of generations. In the culture of the times, they’d be 2nd class citizens or likely worse for many many generations.
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Jenna: I’m pretty much speechless. A wonderful story, and well written. Blessings on your little guy.
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Jenna,
Saw your site – gosh you must be strong, and this pulls at my heart – prayers for you and yours always…
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Again, we are looking at this through 21st century eyes. The writers of these pieces of the Old Testament, or the Oral Tradition that came down before these stories were written down were of another time, when women were considered possessions, slaves were commonplace, revenge of family name the norm and wars were devastating. Children were not valued the way they are today (at least those children that were not first-born male). It’s like reading history and stories from the early middle ages of Western Europe. Why would a person ever want to swaddle their baby – wrapping it so tight that it couldn’t move and it’s pulse would slow dangerously low and hang it up for hours at a time so that he/she could get their work done – horrific in our time but commonplace in that time.
And, as Obed mentioned, some of this was metaphor, be it Yahwist, or Elohist or Dueteronomic or Priestly point of view or purpose.
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At what point did Jacob develop a “heart for the things of God?” Up to Bethel he has no thoughts of God. After Bethel he’s in an “you take care of me and I’ll eventually honor you” relationship. Only after Jabbok is Jacob a man who says “I will not let you go until you bless me.” Pretty late in the game.
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So the whole nation (every individual) was wicked? And the whole of Israel was righteous? Hmmmm….
Actually, like was mentioned above, “Jacob” and “Esau” were metaphors for Israel and Edom, respectively. But nonetheless, does Jacob’s “heart for the things of God” include scheming his brother out of his inheritance?
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OBED…What about passages where God declares that he loves Jacob but hates Esau?
He loved Jacob because Jacob had a heart for the things of God. Esau put his trust in things of the flesh (beans) to sustain life rather than in the promises of God. Scripture says Esau ‘hated’ his birthright. Also, Esau lied. He had no intention of keeping the bargain. Likewise, Abel obeyed God and brought a blood offering. Cain discounted the will of God and brought veggies.
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Just reading this now and honestly, I agree with the initial agrument. It is unfair. I cannot come up with a way to justify in my mind the “God” character in the OT endorsing mass genocide. I put my hope in the thought that the “new covenant” has wiped out this mentality.
And I don’t buy the argument that its perfectly fair just because humanity is sinful. What about children? I’m really not comfortable with them being murdered in the OT. And I don’t believe that children are sinful. My toddler is not sinful yet and he has experienced more pain already than most people do in their lifetime – in my opinion, probably more pain than crucifixion. I work regularly in a medical setting with other children in similar situations. I will not chalk up that kind of suffering to being a “consequence for original sin of humanity”
If I had to chose between accepting God’s omnipotence and his love I’d pick the love. I don’t think that Jesus came to punish.
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On another note…..I have to agree with the way JP sees Romans 9.
The “what if” always makes me think Paul himself doesn’t have a precise answer and is trying to convey his thinking about the paradox. I don’t take that as a “this is absolutely the way that it is”…..more like “this is how I make sense of it in my head/experience”.
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Is that a general “you” which you are using? Because if not…there is a breadth of assumption about me, and what I believe, in that statement that is breath-taking.
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During our years of Christian experience, we have been indoctrinated to believe various scripture according to the interpretation of carnal man rather than allowing the author of the Book to reveal the meaning and intent of His words. For example, we rant and rave about Jonah….accusing him of disobedience for going to find a boat rather than to Nineveh. During the ‘boat’ experience, Jonah ‘gave himself’ to deliver the men on the boat….like Christ would do later. He died, was buried in the belly of the fish, and resurrected after three days. How much more empowered sermon do the think he delivered at Nineveh ….after the experience? Jonah’s experience was a concrete lesson to help us understand the death Jesus would die….dead, buried in the belly of hell, resurrected after three days…all for the purpose of ‘saving the boatload’ of fallen man.
There is nothing the ‘vessel’ can say to the potter.
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Rats! This always happens, I end up agreeing in principle and heart with Closet fundies! Yet they reject me, sigh..
Terri , of course god still operates that way, there are peoples of the earth being wiped out now as I type. I hope and pray that Jesus’s death and resurrection changes your relationship with Him as an individual and with the Church as a group.
God has always “done things” based on the death and resurrection of Jesus. Man kind was banished from the garden with the idea that the death and resurrection of the Messiah would rejoin us spiritually. David was forgiven based on the blood of Jesus. That is what it is all about.
This tread made me nuts. You just can’t compare God’s behavior to a class action suit! Sorry. Imonk, just teach the kids out of the New Testament, stick to god is love and He made puppies. this is hard!
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The first instance I see is when God punished the human race for Adam’s sin.
Scripture shows the ‘fall’ was planned by God. He wanted man ‘in our image’, knowing ‘both good and evil.’ That ‘knowing’ didn’t happen until the encounter at the Tree of Knowledge. Afterwards God said, ‘behold, now man has become as we..knowing both good and evil.’ We are ‘appointed’ once to die (group death/the fall). The ‘fall’ was the fulfilling of the creation of man like Jesus was the fulfilling of the Law.
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IMonk,
(slaps forehead) I didn’t realize it at first, but I guess there is a very simple hyper-Calvinist explanation for group punishment, group blessing, and the ability of Israel to slaughter every man, woman, & child of a sinful, non-elect Canaanite nation.
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Obed,
Again the “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated” reference is also from Romans 9, but if you look at the verse Romans 9:13, the Apostle Paul is quoting directly from Malachi 1:3. And, in the context of Malachi 1, Jacob is the nation of Israel and Esau is the nation of Edom – “they will be called the Wicked Land, a people always under the wrath of the Lord.”
So in “those passages” it is NOT saying that God reserves the right to hate only some individuals and love only some individuals. God hates and punishes the evil of nations. And He will punish a nation as a whole. But this is completely different from saying that God creates some individual people specifically so that he can hate and punish them eternally – because THAT brings Him glory. I, like George MacDonald, would rather be an atheist than believe in a tryant divinity like that.
Scripture is clear that God does bless and punish groups or nations. Scripture is also clear that God loves and deals fairly with every single individual human being He created (particularly regarding that person’s eternal state), regardless of whether that person was a descendant of Jacob or of Esau.
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If we as a group can be saved on account of another man’s righteousness, then we as a group can be judged on account of another man’s sin.
Because humanity fell corporately by the sin of the first Adam, the church is saved corporately by the righteousness of the second Adam, Jesus.
All lesser instances of corporate judgment or blessing are subsumed in that.
Also, why limit the question of group blessing/judgment to the Old Testament?
Mt 23.35: “[S]o that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.”
Note the “you” in the “whom you murdered.” If corporate blessing/judgment is wrong, then Jesus is wrong and unrighteous.
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dad-gum html tags!!!!
AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHH!
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As others have brought up Adam and Jesus as addressing this issue, and the issue of God’s justice being “fair” or not, here is my take.
ISTM that insomuch as we all share our part in the curse of Adam–and the Apostle Paul seems to state clearly we all do–we all share our part of of the group punishment of the Fall. If we agree with Paul’s statement that “all sin”, then the fairness argument seems to me to fall flat. Subsequently, all the exterminations, massacres, pillages, and other horrors of the OT are merely a sub-plot to the Curse we all are taking part in. “We all got it comin’, kid,” said a wise sage.
The OT, IMHO, is the story of God manipulating the circumstances and events of the Curse to bring about its own end. If I understand anything about covenants, then it seems to me that in the covenant with Abraham God stated unequivocally that He, Himself, would take the fall if Abraham failed to live up to his side of the bargain. In the end, Abraham and his seed failed. In turn, God, in Jesus, took the fall on the Cross. The Cross and the Resurrection put an end to the Curse.
Now, insomuch as we all share[d] our part in the group punishment of the Curse, we all now share our part in the group Blessing of Jesus, the Good News. God had set all that was so morally wrong with the OT right/i>, making good on the covenant he made with Abe.
Again, ISTM that in the final analysis we struggle with the justice/fairness of God in the OT because we struggle with the facts of Jesus. I don’t blame the secularist for being offended at God after reading the OT because, after all, he doesn’t believe Jesus did anything about it in the NT.
Was it “fair” for Jesus to be ostracized, crucified and killed to save a people that brought the Curse upon themselves and, in effect, didn’t want his brand of salvation anyway? Yet, we all reap the benefits of a saved world, and mostly don’t think twice about it. How is that fair? It isn’t. But it is just.
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J.P.
I probably agree with most of your statement on Romans 9. I referred to that passage to emphasize sovereignty in a general sense which I believe that passage gives a strong foundation to.
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What about passages where God declares that he loves Jacob but hates Esau? And in those passages he’s not giving solid reasons other than that he reserves the right to love and hate whom he will.
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Which would seem to be the theological underpinnings of the first Adam and the second Adam.
Here’s a question:
Do we believe that God still operates this way?
Did Jesus’ death change our relation to God from group to individual?
If so, then was it really a change, or a revelation of the way God has always done things?
If it changed nothing in this area, then how does that work in history now?
ok…that was more than one question.
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Michael, you said:
So my counter-assertion, and other statements, was an attempt to offer what I would contribute. I assumed, because you talked about teaching through the Old Testament in a Bible class, that this was a discussion based on Christian presuppositions. How would I logically discuss this seemingly paradoxical idea with fellow believers? I would probably appeal to the need for consistency with the way we talk and think about these things, as well as the need for consistency with the biblical message.
You seem to have assumed that I (and the other readers) knew that you had non-Christians in the class, for whom a more apologetic approach would be necessary. In light of that, I probably would have approached it differently.
You later said:
Aha– well, this is, possibly, an altogether different direction than your initial post suggests.
If I were discussing/debating this topic– with that goal in mind– with a group of students, mixed in belief and unbelief, I would probably discuss the idea of justice and what it means. Who gets to determine what is just? Who gets to wage justice? Are there any absolutes in the matter? If not, how do we ever determine justice– and how can we look upon other cultures and epochs of history and declare the acts of those people and times unjust? If so, then what are those absolutes, how do we know them, and what do they imply about our culpability?
Next, let’s talk about responsibility: Do we bear any responsibility for our fellow man? If not, then why do we support institutions like hospitals, fire departments, and soup kitchens– why not just hoard our resources and erect ways to protect our own interests? If so, then what is the extent of that responsibility? Do my actions have impact beyond my own life? If not, then why do we impose a sentence of vehicular manslaughter on the drunk driver who kills a pedestrian child? If so, then how am I held accountable for my actions when they impose on others– and how do I bear a responsibility for the actions of others, whether their actions impose on me or benefit me?
Finally, let’s draw it all together: If we assert that there are no absolutes when it comes to justice, let’s face the facts that we live that claim out inconsistently every day. What does that imply about our supposed belief? If we claim there is no responsibility that we bear for others, then again let’s own our inconsistency.
But if justice is real, and the standards for justice exist beyond me, that at least leaves open the possibility that God, if He exists, holds the cards on justice. And if we acknowledge that we do share in responsibility for one another, at least to a degree– and that our actions at times impose upon others, and at other times benefit them, and vice-versa– then that opens the door to the possibility of all bearing the responsibility for the mistakes of the one, and all receiving the blessings for the sake of the one.
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closet fundy,
Be careful with Romans 9 – I can’t even count the number of times evangelicals have turned to Romans 9 to explain away things that they say God does, that Romans 9 never actually says God does.
Paul asks if we can blame God for making us sinful? No, we can’t. Does that mean that God indeed made us sinful? No, it doesn’t.
Paul asks if the potter has the power to make clay for both good and bad purposes? Yes, the potter does have that power. But does THAT mean that God created people for both good and bad purposes? No, it doesnt.
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IMonk said – “it is more coherent to say that killing children is always wrong than it is to explain why it’s sometimes right. I’d prefer to deal with my idea of the nature of scripture than actually have a theory of how I can tell my son that it’s ok to kill your child if God tells you too.”
I’m hearing a lot of people dissing the concept of fairness in this discussion. I think the Bible is clear that God is “fair” – Scripture declares that “there is no partiality with God.” Rom. 2:11 – the idea of being fair, of giving everyone fair play is inherent to Christianity. And it’s tied to God’s nature – God is fully just, fully good, and is fully merciful and fully loving. The Bible is clear on this.
So back to IMonk’s question (which is also a common reason that the honest atheist will give for not believing in the Old Testament God) – killing children is always wrong. Or, to put it even more succinctly – murdering the innocent is always wrong. If my son asked me if it would be ok for me to kill a child if God told me to, the answer would be that God would NEVER tell me to because it would be against His Nature.
well what about Abraham & Isaac? the story speaks for itself – well what about God telling the nation of Israel to slaughter every man, woman, & child of different Canaanite nations? I don’t know – there is obviously something in this story that I don’t understand. I do know that God is all just, all good, all merciful, and all loving – that is the God of the Bible.
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Great thread.
What is fairness?? Particularly God’s definition (presuming His is the one that really counts), not ours.
Rom 9:21 Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor?
Topher,
you had some interesting things to chew on. Does God get an exemption because He is God??
Yes, He does…. Do I comprehend it? No…… I do know God is beyond my understanding, but even that can be woefully inadequate. God has reveal only portions of His nature to us. I am forced to lean on those things that I do understand about God, all the while having to acknowledge the difficulty of the tension which these things bring.
I’m left with the choice of abandoning my faith, or cleaving to that whichI do know, at least with some certainty.
Deu 29:29 “The secret [things belong] to the LORD our God, but those [things which are] revealed [belong] to us and to our children forever, that [we] may do all the words of this law.
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Is group punishment or group blessing unfair? If it is then class-action civil suits are unfair. Declaring war on anyone would be unfair even if you thought the reasons were just. Declaring war on a culture that practices child sacrifice would be unfair. I know the primary question pertains to whether or not God’s use of group punishment or blessing is unfair but how could we have had a civil rights movement in this country for blacks or given women the right to vote if group punishment or blessing is unfair? Now we could discuss whether or not it is fair for God to use group action but I’m not sensing that people are discussing group action generally. Is group punishment or reward inherently unfair in itself or just the way people see it used?
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O.H. watch what archeologists you go by. Until recently some thought David a “Theological concept”, Now there is just too much proof.
Manichean rejection or any other gospel group is still rejection. Humanists have grounds for rejection as do communists and Hindus we can’t alter our Truth to suit. If St Augustine convinced a bunch of Gnostics on that one they would reject on some other grounds. Gandhi rejected as too many of his countrymen would go to hell. It is still rejection .
Inerrancy aside, do you know of any other more accurate historical document from the bronze age? It tracks.
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Kat said…
“According to whose rules? When we see God not performing according to our principles of justice, we judge God.”
But isn’t that the point? Several on this thread have spoken about our inability to understand goodness and justice because of the fall, but how can we say God is good or just if we do not understand what those words mean? If I cannot decide if an action by God is just or not then how can i say God is good? i have just a sort of fideism.
It seems to slip into a Divine Command theory of ethics, i.e. God orders people to kill babies, this is not a sin because God orders it. So really there is no objective right or wrong just whatever God says is right is right what He says is wrong is wrong.
I actually think that Divine Command Ethics was what the ancient Israelites believed and they justified their atrocities by saying that God told them to do it. (I am not a biblical inerrantist so I don’t think every word in the bible was dictated by God) Anyway just a thought.
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It’s been my understanding that archeological evidence doesn’t support the narrative of the Children of Israel sweeping in, wiping out entire enemy cities and populations, and taking over the land in a fairly short and decisive manner. I stand with St. Augustine in seeing much of the OT as meant spiritually and not literally, and I assume that there’s no real ethical problem here because it isn’t a flatly literal fact of history that the Israelites, in response to a clear and direct command of God, committed genocide. No doubt they committed other acts equally horrible (most peoples have, throughout history), but it seems unlikely they did this one, and is obvious (to me) that God did not command genocide.
So the question for me is, what is the real meaning of these passages? How is the Church to understand a narrative about the origins of the people of God in which there is a swift takeover of the land, and no tolerance for the enemies of God?
The Manicheans rejected the Church in great part because a literal reading of the OT made it intolerable for followers of Christ. St. Augustine taught against that, and I stand with him. These passages either are not cold, literal historical descriptions, or they describe a God who is not the one of the Old Testament and the Manicheans were right.
Donning asbestos overcoat….
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Kobra you sound like Michael
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What does it, group punishment in the OT, teach us about Christ, the redemption he has won for us, and the final judgment? Part of the struggle, or problem, is that there is a tendency to read the OT in a sort of vacuum. That is to say, there is a tendency to read it without redemption in view.
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ky boy but not now,
>Now consider the Balkans and much of the middle east. Many of the conflicts there date back centuries. And mothers raise their orphan children to remember their dead father in the war and expect them to exact revenge at some point or pass on the directive to their generations. This is a concept that’s alien to most of us with a western European background.
i think that’s a very valid point. so let’s say we modify the scenario a bit hypothetically and not only kill the men, but also the women, teenagers and youth. and let’s say that the age of the children spared is kept fairly young. what would you say to that? why would God command the killing of small children that could have been adopted and assimilated into the israelite community?
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By the way communal temporal punishment does not change eternal individual judgment, which will be highly personalized. Presumably innocent Amelikites may receive eternal life if they yearned for God but did not know of the requirement for Baptism (we call this “the Baptism of desire”) the presumption of righteousness may be granted them. Or true innocents like infants would be Baptized by Angels and afforded graces in that way. We only know part of the story. Further temporal group punishments and rewards still exist. I get to live in the US – a great worldly benefit given to me unfairly one might say. Innocents are caught in poverty, war etc all the time. Isn’t that “unfair”. Since God knows all circumstances when He judges those given less and put in trying circumstances will be judged less harshly than those given more (we are told as much). Therefore for those of us given much we must appeal to mercy, especially when we recognize how little we have done with the gifts He has given us.
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“God’s use of group punishment and group blessing in the Old Testament is inherently unfair.â€
According to whose rules? When we see God not performing according to our principles of justice, we judge God.
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@Steve: You’re gonna have to ask Michael. He’s the judge.
But let me take a (rather long) stab at this.
“God’s curse.” “God’s wrath.”
I’m assuming that when most of us are saying these things, we’re referring to the “God” fully revealed in Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ, who exemplified, embodied, and redefined (for us sinners) “Love,” and thus revealed that central characteristic of the One He called Abba.
And if it is that God to which I refer when I use the term “god” in a Christian context, and the more directly and consciously I do so, the more I get the sense, “in my bones” (a la Lewis) that phrases like “God’s wrath” and “God’s curse” are oxymorons. Either that, or the terms “curse” and “wrath” have developed such a different connotation today than from biblical times that they has since become oxymorons.
Don’t get me wrong. I wholeheartedly believe that God is grieved to the core of his being by our sins, both individually and collectively as a human family. But I can’t get myself to embrace the resultant reaction when it has historically been labeled “God’s Wrath.” What does it mean to say “Love’s Wrath?” “Agape’s Wrath?” The wrath of the Prodigal’s father in Luke 15?
And the more I think about it, meditate and pray about, the more I come the same recurring thought, which is this. Sometimes the best we can do, within the parameters of our limited and impoverished language, is simply the best we can do. But that doesn’t limit the immeasurable qualities of God to have to fall within those limitations. Failing to recognize this sometimes makes us slaves to that language rather than slaves of the Creator and Lover of the cosmos. The ancients spoke about “the heavens” as God’s realm because the mystery of that aspect of the space/time universe was the best analogy to the mystery of God’s realm of existence. But look where at the damage that such language has caused throughout Christian theological discourse over the centuries. And that’s but one example, leaving aside myriads of other areas where this danger has also been realized (“second coming” language, “salvation” language, etc.).
Here’s the thing. I think one of great contributions of Chesterton’s Orthodoxy was that it allowed us as a body to recognize that doctrinal statements that may appear paradoxical within the Western Enlightenment world were, rather, illuminations of a larger truth within the Kingdom of God. “First shall be last,” “He who wishes to find his life must lose it,” and many other “strange” utterances by our King are paradoxical, folly to those who are perishing, but they make utter sense within what Wright and Lonergan call “an epistemology of love.”
“God’s Wrath,” in my humble opinion, does not fall within that category.
Here’s what I think is going on with phraseology like wrath, curse, etc., that are categorically inconsistent with the God revealed in Jesus Christ, when such phrases appear in the Bible. In one, very narrow sense, they are true. God created this world, and because He loved His creation, He bestowed it with freedom, the dignity to choose His way or to choose otherwise. And here’s the catch. In so doing, God (and only God) knew the consequences of choosing the latter. Doing so would necessarily bring forth dire consequences, things that would appear to the flawed human eye as wrath, curse, etc., when, in actuality, these are simply the natural consequences of our own choices, as opposed to the ultimate paradox of the vengeful actions of (what we know, through Christ) to be a loving, faithful, God; a God who endures patiently the flaws and foibles of His children, respecting their dignity if they chose to foresake him, and consistently ready to embrace and forgive, in fact, to foresake His own dignity by running toward us to embrace us when we, even half-heartedly, choose to turn shamefully home, only to find that the best robes have been prepared and the fatted calf slaughtered to celebrate that return.
So did Jesus take on God’s wrath on our behalf on the cross? Absolutely!
Did a vengeful God appease his bloodthirst by requiring the sacrifice of His own son because he so loved us? Absolutely not!
Did Jesus, on the cross, exhaust the consequences of our collective, human sin by willingly and lovingly allowing those consequences to fall upon His person, His perfect image-bearing humanity, the exemplar of perfect humanity. I think that’s one aspect of what was going on, yes.
And like a legion of modern voices are striving to proclaim, that’s one aspect of what was going on. There are a myriad of others, old and new, and we forget any one of those aspects to our peril. But let’s also not forget to re-imagine not just the doctrines, old and new, but the language we have used to communicate them. “Confessing Jesus as Lord,” as but one example, means something very different today than it did within the Roman Empire under Caesar. Maybe it is precisely that language that has allowed some aspects of the gospel message to become marginalized in the first place. May God give us wisdom to recognize where that has occurred, and the imagination and courage to help change it, to His glory.
Grace and Peace,
Raffi
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If you guys think God was barbaric in the OT wait until the Return! Blood as high as the bridle of a horse, death on a level never seen.
Remember Abraham told his servant,WE will be back, that was faith.
Why do you worry about people’s fate here on earth, a span of only 100 years or so? God is in charge of eternity. Rest assured that the souls of the OT slaughters will have just as long to spend in their final abode either way. Next thing you know you will accuse God of sinning for the people in Hell.
Mants, if a parishioner asks a question about God telling Him to kill anybody, they need serious psychological help, not pastoral. We will sit and wait for the po-po.
All y’all need to go read some Dispensational writings or at least get a Scofield, maybe one of those chart things they are fond of.
Terri and Steve, Just God, He is a Just God, and only God is just.
When you get to Heaven make sure to give God this little ethics lesson, I’ll be the one with my face buried in the floor and smoke coming off the seat of my pants. After you get Him staightened out, say Hi!
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Group punishment does appear to be “unfair” but it is not unjust. Fairness is a child’s notion of justice the idea that all circumstances and tests should be equal. Life is incredibly unfair some are strong intelligent, rich and beautiful while others are not. Some are severely tested and others skate. I think the right answer has already been given by cey and others (I peeked at the others papers – I guess that’s unfair too!).
We have to be like Job. God does as He will, His reasons are not always given. His generosity to us post Incarnation is likewise mysterious. Doubtless I’m no better than those that perished as a group in the OT. Why I have been graced with a chance to know Christ and they were not is a mystery, maybe it is partly to teach us gratitude here and now. Just another reason to thank God for His generosity.
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My view:
God revealed Himself over time and in the context of what people comprehended at the time. Which is why, through our twenty-first century eyes God looks like an unfair or jealous God.
At the time of the Old testament people’s identity was through a group. When Joshua entered the Promise Land, time after time he conquered, killing every man, woman, child, livestock, salted the earth – all standard practice of the time. Seems horrific to us but normal mode of operation at that time. He was not conquering an individual but conquering a group.
We have grown – especially in the United States to be individualists. But God in the Old Testament dealt with people on a communal level whether that be Noah and his family, Abraham and his tribe, Moses and his people, Joshua and the Chosen, David and the Israelites.
Even in the New Testament Jesus calls out his woes, not on individuals but on cities, groups of people (Pharasees and scribes). In Luke’s version of the Beatitudes He calls out his Oracles and curses on all, not individuals. When Paul, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit went out to convert the heathen and share the Good news he also created or encouraged Churches so that Christianity would be a communal thing and not individualistic.
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I was recently listening to a debate between an atheist and a Christian about ethics. This concept came up near the end of the program and the Christian did not seem to have an answer for it.
The man representing the atheist position stated the that ‘if God’s outside command can transcend the ethical framework then that throws a monkey wrench into the whole machine of Christian ethics.
As imonk was saying how do you tell your kid that killing innocent people is always wrong except if God tells you to do it? Does anyone think God speaks in such a way (commanding specific actions) anymore? Was not God’s final word Jesus?
I would be very interested in how people answer these questions both theologically (as many in this thread have shared) but also in the pastoral sense (i.e., if I was a confused parishioner coming with honest questions that wouldn’t go away by stating that God did it so it must be ok).
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Steve in Toronto: “And this is supposed to make me feel better about the text?”
Maybe. There’s a big difference between a father being willing to kill a child and a father and willing son being willing to make that same sacrifice. Especially since 13 is the age of majority in Judaism.
But mostly I was just throwing out a different POV.
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From the standpoint of group blessing, the “new commandment” Jesus gave to us is to love “one another”. It’s new because it’s a commandment that requires obedience of BOTH of us to fulfill it.
The old commandments addressed individual behavior: love God and your neighbor, honor your father and mother, don’t kill, etc. I could try to obey these solo.
The ‘one-anothers’ that permeate the New Testament (especially Paul’s letters) require the obedience of the group: if you love me but I don’t love you, then we have not loved “one anotherâ€, and you will not experience the blessing (“by this all men will know you are My disciplesâ€) even though you have exercised your personal obedience to this command.
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Re: Obed
And this is supposed to make me feel better about the text? Søren Kierkegaard wrote a wonderful book about this story called “Fear and Tremblingâ€. Most evangelicals will recoil from the conclusions that Kierkegaard draws from the text (That the Christian faith is ultimately founded on a necessarily irrational “leap of faithâ€). But I am increasingly finding it impossible to escape his conclusions.
God Bless
Steve in Toronto
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The story of Isreal’s King Manasseh is instructive here:
Manasseh had promoted idol worship in the temple, burnt sacrifice of live children, all around horrific stuff (2 Kings 21:1-9). In 2 Kings 21:10-12, God pronounces judgement on the nation of Isreal “because Manasseh, King of Isreal, has done these abominationsâ€: Group punishment for the sins of Manasseh.
In 2 Chronicles 33:10-13 Manasseh himself was imprisoned in Babylon, “and when he was in great distress, he entreated the Lord his God and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers. When he prayed to Him, He was moved by his entreaty and heard his supplication and brought him again to Jerusalem to his kingdom.†Manasseh eventually dies and is buried with his fathers, and 2 Chon. 33:18-30 records Manasseh personal, individual repentance and restoration to the Lord.
After this, King Josiah leads the nation to great acts of repentance (2 Kings 22 and 23), including a thorough purging of idolatry and a restoration of the Passover. Here we see group repentance. After all this, “however, the Lord did not turn from the fierceness of his great wrath with which his anger burned against Judah, BECAUSE of all the provocations with which MANASSEH had provoked Him†(2 Kings 23:26)
So one the one hand, you have Manasseh, one of the worst kings of Isreal, who repents and experiences personal restoration and grace from the Lord.
On the other hand, God says that the nation of Isreal, after their group repentance and cleansing, must still be punished as a group in exile because of the personal sins of Manasseh.
Raffi, if this is worthy of an Amazon gift card, I’ll donate it back to Michael 🙂
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Regarding the Abraham and Isaac bit, for whatever it’s worth, the Jewish tradition is a bit different than the way we think of it. According to the Jewish tradition, Isaac was not a little kid but was a youth in perhaps his early teens. And when he’s asking about where the animal for the sacrifice is, he figures out what’s going on. Then as Gen 22:8 says “So then they went both of them together.” That is, Isaac knowing that he’s to be sacrificed goes with his father out of obedience to God and Abraham. In fact, Jewish tradition says it was Isaac’s idea to be tied up so that he wouldn’t in natural fear of death and pain struggle and either hurt Abraham or cause the sacrifice to be blemished.
Like I said, “for what it’s worth.”
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You and me both sister.
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Steve..I’m not disagreeing with you. The flood scares me…Hell scares me…Revelation’s punishments scare me.
“sinners in the hands of an angry God”..and all that
I have a hard time reconciling these themes with the themes of God’s love and forgiveness.
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I don’t know about you but the flood story scares me as well. The difference is that I can put my self in the place of an Israel foot soldier (or a puritan musketeer). What would I do if my leader told me it was God’s will for me to smash the head of a crying child? I hope and pray that I would tell my commander (King, Priest, President or Officer) to go to Hell.
What would you do?
Peace (and I really mean it)
Steve in Toronto
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Not sure about this one. I struggle with the “holy killing” concept the OT portrays.
The only thought I have had in relation to Saul and the Amalekites is that perhaps eliminating the people, animals, and wealth was to prevent Israel from being seen as opportunistic raiders, killing everyone, but keeping the spoils in terms of flocks, slaves, and possessions. Their mission would be seen as one of wealth-gathering as opposed to some sort of “cleansing” by God.
I think Saul’s story is so horrifying in its implications because it involves people taking action against other people. We don’t seem quite as upset when God floods the earth and wipes out men, women, children, and countless animals.
The difference is that we can “blame” God for that.
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In Sarah Vowell recent (very funny, informative and largely sympathetic) book on the New England Puritans “the Wordy Shipmatesâ€. She describes an episode in the Pequot War that has come to be known as the “Mystic Massacreâ€. On May 26, 1637 a force of about 400 pious God fearing Calvinist from Boston attacked a nebouring village of hostile natives. The European settlers light fire to the Pequot stockade and killed over 600 hundred men, woman and children as they fled their compound. In the wake of the blood bath the puritan settlers (also known as the Pilgrims) joyously celebrated God’s providence. Christians (especially of the Reformed persuasion) need to be very careful about we deal with these very problematic texts. I am afraid that we may be sowing seeds that will grow into future crops of violence and hatred.
God Bless
Steve in Toronto
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We first need to teach our children, “There is a God and He ain’t us.[or me]”
It is really hard to explain the mystery of God to people. I left a Methodist upbringing as a child and wandered lost because I was told about the God of the Old test. Vs. God of the new Test. You know He who is and was and will be world without end, Amen. How did God get a make over? This leads to comedians making jokes about God mellowing out when He had a kid.[How will that joke play at Judgment?]
Years later I came to understand God changed not, but His Covenant sure did. God doing or allowing or ordering something has nothing at all to do with what we should do. He is God and we are not. When we can create worlds, or at least calm storms, then we can entertain the question of God like decisions. Do you really have a problem with God taking out Sodom and then telling us we will be known by our love? I don’t. Not a little bit.
The first lie was that we could be like God. It still is a lie. Using the actions of All Knowing God to justify the actions of idiot man would be like asking gerbils to fly a plane. Jet plane, in the dark, in a storm.
God not only has affected nations negatively for the sins of the previous generation[s], He blessed and blesses based on the obedience of previous generations. If you think that unfair take it up with the management.
Is it possible the Amelikites had to go because they or one of them would have killed an ancestor of Mary, the Blessed Mother? Just a thought, I do not know but God does. See?
The minute we are all knowing we can go for exterminating. We can teach our children that exterminating people groups is wrong as we teach them the difference between God and Man. We can teach them God did what He had to do to bring Salvation to man. Temporal deaths vs. eternal life.
Raffi, call me collect about God and the individual, I will tell you where to send the $10 after I explain the individual relationship with God and His actions.
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I would say I’m half and half on the group punishment deal. Where God brought judgement is often difficult to understand, such as the amelikites, though to be fair isreal had suffered as a group under the amelikites for about 300 years before God judged them. I think that if the group has sinned then the group should be punished, it’s just when a group is punished because only one or a few have sinned. An example from today would be Islamic stereotypes because there are a few militant groups who use terrorism. Would we accept christianity being judged because of the KKK? Or do we like it when collections at church are all judged by televangelists who are raping their followers so they can buy their next leer jet?
There are group punishments as well as group confessions, and I am about the same on those as well. There was a time when america could have repented and confessed for their treatment of blacks, but to force a nation to repent for the sins of it’s fathers when those sins have already been expelled is a bit silly. It would be like expecting Germany to repent for Nazi Germany, or Japan to repent for the Empire. They were both judged as a group at the end of the war. America didn’t have a quick judgement and to be fair may still be going through it’s time of penance to this day, but the point is that it has left behind slavery, and segregation and most people today don’t have issues with race yet are still being judged. In some ways I think it’s fair and in others I don’t.
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iMonk
“… I believe I would be sinning if I killed women and children in any war for any reason. Therefore, there is a disjoint in ethics that has to be explained. My ethical sense to show mercy to women and children appears unreliable when compared to God’s commands in scripture.”
To expand on my cultural concept. In WWII “we” in general operated on your ethical concepts. And when the war was over most of the combatants got over it and got on with their lives. Heck, at my wedding rehearsal dinner my dad and mother-in-law got into a discussion of a bombing raid they both remembered. He was in a B24 and she was on the ground in Germany ducking the bombs. And look at us and Japan and Viet Nam.
Now consider the Balkans and much of the middle east. Many of the conflicts there date back centuries. And mothers raise their orphan children to remember their dead father in the war and expect them to exact revenge at some point or pass on the directive to their generations. This is a concept that’s alien to most of us with a western European background.
I think the OT era was taking place in an era where the mindset of tribe and extended family honor and loyalty was way more important than national loyalty or long term “lets bury the hatchet” issues.
Christ was a change.
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I don’t believe God sinned, but I believe I would be sinning if I killed women and children in any war for any reason. Therefore, there is a disjoint in ethics that has to be explained. My ethical sense to show mercy to women and children appears unreliable when compared to God’s commands in scripture.
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“Let us talk about it. Don’t take down names and turn us in for being heretics.”
OK. Did they have to kill off the women and children to prevent revenge killings down the road? And they road might be centuries long.
In the west we seem to have tended away from the concept of long term family / tribal based revenge. But it is alive and well in many parts of the world. Especially in the Middle East. At least to my untrained eyes.
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*does* anyone believe, I mean… it’s apparently too late at night for me to be typing! 🙂
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I’m curious– do anyone believe that God ordered Saul to *sin,* with the command to exterminate the Amalekites?
I guess we can call it “special pleading” to say that while we (Christians) should not exterminate whole groups of people today, God was right to command it in specific circumstances in the OT. However, doesn’t God inherently have the *right* to such “special pleading,” because He is *God*?
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The issue of the ethics of Abraham is an interesting one. Today we read about Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his son and react in horror that he would consider it, but in his day, child sacrifice was practiced to appease gods. So perhaps the point of the story of Abraham is God turning the ethics of the day away from that practice, and to point to God’s solution which involves a substitute to be reconciled to God. I doubt that those who followed Molech ever heard Molech say “you don’t have to sacrifice your child to me today”. So the story of Abraham is revolutionary, in the ethical context of the day.
The ethics of group punishment remains, however.
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The Chinese don’t think twice about group punishment or blessing. In fact, they think that individual salvation, blessing and punishment is illogical. I think it comes from seeing themselves as part of the greater whole and therefore influential toward the greater whole.
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My real tension in this issue has to do with the basis of ethics, particularly as we describe them to children.
Why was it right for anyone to raise a weapon to kill a child? Ever? How can we have coherent ethics if we actually attempt to explain that?
If Christian ethics are unreasonable and incoherent precisely because we’ve spent so much time explaining them and coming up with theological answers, I want to know how we answer a child’s question: would it be right for God to tell my daddy to kill me like he told Abraham to kill Isaac?
Note this is different than God killing Isaac. This is a question of the ethics of Abraham, and how you explain ethics.
Further, I’ll suggest- though I am not signing on to this- that it is more coherent to say that killing children is always wrong than it is to explain why it’s sometimes right. I’d prefer to deal with my idea of the nature of scripture than actually have a theory of how I can tell my son that it’s ok to kill your child if God tells you too.
Chew on that. This is the kind of stuff I love to toss out in discussions. Let us talk about it. Don’t take down names and turn us in for being heretics.
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I think God acts for individuals all the time, but that’s from the perspective of the individual. With the true Biblical perspective, God’s purposes are always beyond the individual, and in his “people.”
Ultimately, what God does is for himself, and this is why there is no conflict between God-centeredness and love.
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Perspective Question: When is God’s action ever not about “Group?”
Anyone who can point to one example where God acts, in any manner, solely for the sake of an individual wins a $10 Amazon gift card.
Michael can judge. He seems to like doing that 😉
Grace and Peace,
Raffi
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They will be debating this next week. I doubt they will have any scintillating insights, but you never know.
One non-Christian student really did have an interesting observation on the group punishment of Sodom and the mercy for 10 righteous that was pleaded by Abraham. I think that’s quite a hopeful story in all of this, because it juxtaposes God’s justice in punishing a group and his willingness to show mercy to individuals.
I think that a lot of Christians really want to “solve” this, and I don’t think you can. God is on the hook. He orders children to be killed. You can’t miss that. But you also have to ask “What is the nature of Biblical revelation?” and the answer is that it reveals Christ, a perfect balance of judging the world/saving the world, judging individuals and saving individuals.
Job put God on the hook and left him there. But Job also said he believed that the God who had permitted the death of his children, etc was also the God who would stand by him as an advocate.
He never solves this, but he moves to a kind of resolution on “What kind of God is there for me?” and clearly the answer to that is not the God who destroyed Achan’s family, but the God who sacrificed his own completely innocent son.
I think there’s an existential truth in the Bible that we need to grasp. God isn’t yearning to show us this side that kills whole cities or the whole world in Genesis 6. He is yearning, passionately, the lay all judgement on Christ and most of all to lay all of my judgement on Christ.
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The whole of Christian religion is focused on the fact that there has to be a “group punishment” of the human race. All are destined for Hell, except those redeemed by the Son of God. It is hard to say it, but otherwise we have the squishy “God is Love” argument that most of the world believes.
Now, that said, I think that group punishment of a nation only applies to the Biblical Israel in the OT. If people choose God, either through free will or election and Sovereign Monergism, then they are individuals and not part of the whole for a Nation. And it is obviously wrong and non-scriptural to do as many Fundies do and believe America is analogous to OT Israel.
Please share how your students answered your proposition!
Ironically, teenagers and politicians alike look at fairness in the context of groups. But it is always “unfair” for the group not to have the same things or opportunities, and only when they side with the downtrodden. No one or no group ever points out when they get the upper hand and have something that someone else doesn’t have – no one ever sees that as “unfair”.
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Just thought of this passage – Here we see Christ explaining why it is not a good idea to remove the tares before harvest time. I’ve always suspected that some of the tares become good seed during the growing season but there isn’t any good support for that suspicion in the text.
Couple more thoughts – One of the reasons given is to avoid damaging the good seed while it is growing which would affect the yield. Second application of this to combat is the number of lives changed, destroyed and ended, think for a minute of Europe’s lost generation, the men who died during WW 1, and again in WW 2.
Mat 13:24-30 KJV Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: (25) But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. (26) But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. (27) So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares? (28) He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? (29) But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. (30) Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn.
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Oh, and a little addendum. Can God change the rules again? The Moslems (and others) would say “yes.” But we Christians believe the canon is closed. No more changing of the rules while we’re on this plane of existance.
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I think this is definitely one of the areas where the reality of Jesus changes things. Hooray for progressive revelation.
In Genesis, God sends the Hebrews into exile partially because the sins of the Canaanite people hadn’t reached their full. The post-Wilderness conquest of Canaan was partially due to God’s promise to give the Hebrews that land and partially as punishment to those nations. The total holy war of the Conquest really was a one-time thing. In every other case, the Hebrews were supposed to be a “light to the world.” Granted, it takes several centuries (and another exile) before God really moves beyond being Israel-centered to being more universal.
By the time Jesus comes around, it’s revealed that the Kingdom isn’t (yet?) a restoration of the Davidic Monarchy, but is something spiritual. And the Apostles are eventually led to include all the nations in the Kingdom.
The point is, the rules changed. As Jeremiah says, the New Covenant is “not like the covenant I made with your fathers when I brought them out of Egypt.” Just because God commanded the Israelites to do something doesn’t mean he wants Christians to do the same thing. Different time, different situation, different Covenant.
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1 – first thing to comes to mind is the closest I can remember Jesus coming to the subject (in John 9), the disciples see a blind man and wonder if he’s blind because of God’s punishment on his family – Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.”
2 – group punishment/blessing is absolutely necessary in the physical reality that God created – a world where the actions of creatures can affect each other – picture the fantasy world where rain would only fall on half the people walking down the street (a world God could have created, but chose not to)
3 – “If the man were sure God did it, the thing he ought to say would be, ‘Then there must be something about it I do not know, which if I
did know, I should see the thing quite differently.’ But where an evil thing is invented to explain and account for a good thing, and a lover of God is called upon to believe the invention or be cast out, he needs not mind being cast out, for it is into the company of Jesus. Where there is no ground to believe that God does a thing except that men who would explain God have believed and taught it, he is not a true man who
accepts men against his own conscience of God. I acknowledge no authority calling upon me to believe a thing of God, which I could not
be a man and believe right in my fellow-man …
“The justice of God is this, that–to use a boyish phrase, the best the language will now afford me because of misuse–he gives every man, woman, child, and beast, everything that has being, _fair play_; he renders to every man according to his work; and therein lies his perfect mercy; for nothing else could be merciful to the man, and nothing but mercy could be fair to him. God does nothing of which any just man, the thing set fairly and fully before him so that he understood, would not say, ‘That is fair.’ Who would, I repeat, say a man was a just man because he insisted on prosecuting every offender? A scoundrel might do that. Yet the justice of God, forsooth, is his punishment of sin! A just man is one who cares, and tries, and always tries, to give fair play to everyone in every thing. When we speak of the justice of God, let us see that we do mean justice.”
– George MacDonald
4 – Last, but not least, there is the speculative explanation – I can’t say I believe it yet because I haven’t seen the Scripture explained clearly enough to me – but it offers a fascinating reason why Israel had to wipe out complete races (man, woman & infant) in the land of Canaan. Not something I’d try to defend in the public square at the moment but the references include (Gen. 6:1-4, Num. 13:13, 32-33, Duet. 2:11, Deut. 3:11, Sam. 21:19, II Peter 2:4, Jude 1:6-7). If the “sons of God” is defined the same as it is Job 1:6, & 2:1, then it would make sense that (a) if the devil could pervert Adam & Eve’s bloodline, then the promise of the Messiah would be impossible, and (b) if this was what was happening, God using his chosen people (and specifically using men like Caleb and David, both ancestors to Jesus) to completely wipe the “nephilim” off the face of the earth would make a lot of sense. (I’m not a conspiracy theorist really, I just went to a really wierd Sunday school class once).
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Michael- you asked
“I’m looking for how the Christian responds to the charge that our ethics are incoherent on this issue, but we play the God card to make them coherent.”
Frankly I am unsure that we CAN answer the argument. I think we Christians simply have to take the hit, because, in the end, our ethics really ARE conditioned on special revelation, aren’t they? If we say they aren’t, then where is New Covenant theology? (I’d like to hear your reflection on that question.)
I have empathy for the flummoxed unbeliever who asks this question, and I want to give them a soft, gentle and “coherent” answer, if I can. But the questioner’s heart has to be examined (however imperfectly) as well. It’s a two-way process.
At some point, “coherency” really does break down and I don’t know if it is possible to completely redeem it (by the world’s standards).
At some point, also, we have to introduce the concept of how GOOD GUYS get to suffer right alongside the bad guys.
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I haven’t read the other comments, so someone may have already said this, but I have noticed that most people are upset over group punishment, but not so much over group blessings. Most of us will not turn down rewards that we didn’t do anything to earn, but we scream bloody murder if we are punished and don’t personally deserve it.
Individualism is part of the American psyche, but even with that we aren’t totally able to get away from the group mentality. “WE believe in individualism here.” I think it is in the human spirit to want to be connected to others.
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Scott:
Maybe.
But I prefer the traffic 🙂
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iMonk – Rationale for not exterminating would start with something along the lines of
Mat 5:43-48 KJV Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. (44) But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; (45) That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. (46) For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? (47) And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so? (48) Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
Paul amplifies this idea in Romans:
Rom 12:14-21 KJV Bless them which persecute you: bless, and curse not. (15) Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep. (16) Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits. (17) Recompense to no man evil for evil. Provide things honest in the sight of all men. (18) If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. (19) Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. (20) Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head. (21) Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.
My personal thinking on the Old Testament is that the Israelites had a positive command from God to enter Canaan and subdue it for the Glory of God.
In our current era we have a positive command from our LORD and Savior not to use force to avenge ourselves, our families our church. In a modern context we as Christians are required to provide water and food even to someone like Osama bin Laden, if we encounter him thirsty, hungry or naked. See Mat 25:31-46
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Michael, are you going to share your answer to this question?
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What a great question. Group punishment and blessing runs throughout the scriptures from beginning to end. The first instance I see is when God punished the human race for Adam’s sin. Is this “unfair”?
How do we put aside our cultural lenses to answer this? Or do we need to put it aside at all?
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willoh:
So is there no rational coherence to Christian ethics? As in, a person can use reason and conclude that we should teach our children “It is always bad to exterminate a whole race of people.” Or we teach children to say “It is OK for God exterminate a race of people to bring Jesus into the world- even though God is omnipotent and didn’t need to kill anyone to bring Jesus into the world- but it is always wrong for us to kill a whole race of people, even if there are very bad people in that race?”
I’m looking for how the Christian responds to the charge that our ethics are incoherent on this issue, but we play the God card to make them coherent.
peace
ms
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ooh ooh! call on me! The OT is also a story of Jesus. God did what He needed to do to insure the branch of Jesse. God’s ways are higher than our ways. If we decide to exterminate a culture we are “Playing God” . If you chose to judge God that is up to you, but He will judge you, for sure, so keep your sword in the sheath so as not to go against His will. God’s judgment is good even when to us it seems wrong. We are not empowered to exterminate any one, group nor individual. He is empowered to do as He wills.
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North Korea practices Collective/Group Responsibility and Collective/Group Punishment. With a vengeance. Collective Responsibility is more common in Asian cultures than Western.
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tigger: What is the argument for not exterminating entire people groups today if they practice a non-Christian religion? I’m quite serious.
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For those who have problems with God commanding Saul to exterminate the Amalekites. Please flip forward to the Book of Esther, and examine the pedigree of Haman. You will find that he is descended from the surviving Amalekites, and from the cradle was fed by his mother with tales of the perfidy of the Jews. He grew up to plot the destruction of the Jews, and nearly succeeded.
That endangerment of the Hebrew patrimony is the true cost of Saul’s Sin.
1Sa 15:16-23 KJV Then Samuel said unto Saul, Stay, and I will tell thee what the LORD hath said to me this night. And he said unto him, Say on. (17) And Samuel said, When thou wast little in thine own sight, wast thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel, and the LORD anointed thee king over Israel? (18) And the LORD sent thee on a journey, and said, Go and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites, and fight against them until they be consumed. (19) Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the LORD, but didst fly upon the spoil, and didst evil in the sight of the LORD? (20) And Saul said unto Samuel, Yea, I have obeyed the voice of the LORD, and have gone the way which the LORD sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. (21) But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice unto the LORD thy God in Gilgal. (22) And Samuel said, Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. (23) For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king.
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Lets all keep in mind that The Bible is full of verses that says stuff to the effect that ‘God repents of the evil he would have done you’. So, the idea that God… doesn’t just bless or punish us, but also almost sort of punishes us and then doesn’t – is Biblical.
Remember, drinking this in through culture leads to an understanding of Scripture that explains things very differently than we Christians try to develop by isolating every verse we don’t understand and trying to find it instructive and personally meaningful to us.
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If any of us judged a family like Achan’s family was judged, we would be prosecuted for mass homicide. How do we defend the difference without special pleading?
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BTW- Those of you who believe our human notions of fairness are undependable guides to ethical decision making should help us understand what people were to do before they were able to consult the Bible.
How will the Mayan be judged? On his conscience- which has an undependable concept of fairness- or on God’s?
peace
MS
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Ed Eubanks,
This is a class exercise in debate, so I’m a bit confused by your suggested assertion.
Your assertion undercuts free and open debate and defends the Christian position. I have many non-Christians in the classes and I want the Christians to take the non-Christian position. It is a free and open debate on a major issue between Christians and their critics. Judging the opposition in the assertion to be debated seems inappropriate.
peace
ms
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I would suppose that God used mass punishment/reward with Israel as a group because His covenant was with Israel as a group. Therefore, their sanctification was in the context of their…uh…groupidness. His covenant with us is more one-on-one, methinks, as are His opportunities for sanctification. Although, not always.
A couple of years ago, my sister revealed something our mom had once told her about her discipline philosophy. My sis was always getting into trouble, and my brother wasn’t too far behind. I was the oldest, stable, good kid. Apparently, my mom was afraid of showing favoritism, so when one of us did something wrong, she resolved to be equally upset with all of us. As the “good kid,” it sure made for some conflicting messages throughout my childhood. Although, come to think of it, I seem to accept the general unfairness of life more easily than most!
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Glenda
“To me, group punishment and reward is inherently unfair. Maybe I’m just too individualistic to grasp this…”
Yes it is. God never said he was “fair”.
Yes you are. And so are we all. Which is why we need the cross. As MS points out every now and then.
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Topher,
Distinguishing between critical and non-critical issues when considering punishment is a valid distinction. From God’s perspective as it is presented to us in scripture, our situation is much more critical than we can ever imagine. We are engaged in a spiritual battle of epic proportions, and God pulls out all the stops to discipline and prepare his people to first of all become a people, and second to do what is necessary to fight the battle.
I can’t say that I fully understand what God was doing when he commanded the slaughter of innocents in the Old Testament. But it is clear with Christ that the terms of the battle are now to be fought through the weakness of the weapon of love. And it requires even more discipline, courage, and commitment to fight in this way. I would much rather take my sword and cut people in two. The stakes are every bit as high as they ever were I think, and the war never more dangerous, but we are called to confront it through seeking to become an earthly image of the heavenly community, and to die together if called to do so.
It is still together that we are blessed, and together we are punished, is it not? And fairness is not even something we can judge it seems to me. Either God is good or he isn’t. If he is good, then the fairness of his judgment will only be known when we are with him face to face.
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Dear Sir,
My response to your proposition would not focus on unfairness. Anyone who has lived long enough to observe life at any level would concur that ‘life is unfair:’ a slower seal swimming to the beach after sating its natural hunger is overtaken by a Great White primarily because the seal is slower than the next; an infant with a debilitating disease is born to a family with four perfectly healthy siblings; a pedestrian crossing a rain slicked street is cut down by a passing vehicle because the wet tires hydroplaned atop the water; each of these examples can be seen as ‘unfair.’ But most of us ‘get over the unfairness’ and continue on with life.
I think the rub occurs at two other points of your statement: 1) God – who, for those who prefer Him to be benevolent – is assumed to be ‘fair’ but in reality violates most human expectations of ‘fairness;’ and 2) group punishment/blessing. We exist in a culture that wants to believe that you should suffer for your sins, but I should not suffer for your sins. And, I should benefit from my righteousness, but you should not benefit from my righteousness.
But I think once we begin to grasp the truth of who God has revealed Himself to be, we stop expecting Him to maintain a human sense of fairness. God is sovereign as He is benevolent. Therefore He transcends human categories of fairness. As K.W. Leslie wrote: ‘. . . It’s grace that’s inherently unfair. And thank God.’
That leaves me to consider group punishment/blessing. Was it fair that Achan’s extended family died because of his individual sin at Jericho (Joshua 7.20ff)? No, it was not fair by the preferred human definition. But what group affect did it have? Lessons were learned; the fear of God was re-established; cleansing of the group occurred; historical precedents were set (e.g., Isa65.10/Hos2.15); God’s holy expectations for His people were maintained; etc. Was it fair that Joseph’s murderous, lying brothers should benefit from the wise insight granted him from God? No. But what group affect did it have? An entire clan – and therefore a nation – was preserved through an epic famine (Gen45ff).
At this point I would prefer to bring the Cross into the discussion, but you established the parameter of the proposition within the context of the First Covenant. Therefore, I think my cursory response to your proposition would be: ‘Its not about what is fair/unfair. It is about a sovereign God acting as He chooses to achieve His greater purposes through the groups He chooses to use.’
Now, after having participated in this group discussion, I have been individually punished with a headache, which is most unfair.
Yours,
Lee
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This question touches on a very troubling topic. Yes, it’s a given that whatever God does is right, just, and fair (depending on your definition of fair). So if he metes out group punishment, it’s just. But I have to take that completely on faith. To me, group punishment and reward is inherently unfair. Maybe I’m just too individualistic to grasp this…
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For the “punishment” end, I would suggest a careful reflection on Zephaniah 2:1-2 in context, using Luke 13:1-9 as an “intertext”. That could work, I reckon.
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I don’t like the question/assertion. I would offer the following counter-assertion:
“Your complaint about the inherent unfairness of group punishment and group blessing in the Old Testament is inherently individualistic in a manner that is contrary to biblical teaching.â€
Two other thoughts on the discussion:
I think it begs the question, “what do you mean by ‘fair’?”
By making this assertion, I think an equivocation is at play: an inappropriate overlap of the idea of “fair” as meaning “equal” (as in parity) or “impartial” (as in equity), with the idea of “fair” as meaning “just”.
If we mistake justice as being the same as parity or equity, then we don’t understand justice.
Taking another direction:
If, by saying “[that] is inherently unfair,” you mean that, if God were a just God then He wouldn’t do that,” then you have just undermined the possibility of atonement.
The greatest example of group punishment/group blessing in the whole of Scripture is the cross. If the righteousness of one man cannot “fairly” be applied to all that he represents, then Christ died for nothing and God cannot “fairly” accept the sacrifice of Christ on behalf of your sin.
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I think it’s quite possible that we’ve lost the necessary cultural context and force with which to interpret those stories. When they were written, when they were real lessons, there were certainly facts extant that were common knowledge about them that the stories didn’t contain – just like every book about George Bush won’t necessarily contain 8 years worth of jokes to the extent that he’s an idiot (all cross-referenced with facts and video and analysis), we shouldn’t expect that the cultural stories of a people so vastly removed from us in time, place, and semiotics are going to line up with our lives in some prophetic way.
For this reason, I think all attempts to explain them are fairly pointless, unless we start with the most ancient sources on them and develop a heuristic scheme of interpretations so we can see how understandings of these passages have changed. The best we can do is guess – luckily, if they mattered, God would preserved their meaning for us, right?
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1 Samuel 15:3’now go and strike Amalek and utterly destroy all that he has, and does not spare him; but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'”
Can any of the commenter’s honestly tell me that if they found this verse in the Koran they would be horrified and take it as evidence of the absolute barbarity of Islam?
I refuse to believe that the murder of infants is anything but a heinous sin (and yes I have been forced to adjust my doctrine scripture accordingly).
God Bless
Steve in Toronto
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Topher
“I have to take the opposing view on this. It seems incorrect, in my view, to split the hair between unfair and unjust. Group punishment is in our time generally viewed as unjust (remember we are not talking about making everybody do extra push ups or go without desert, it is one’s life on the line).
Group punishment is generally used when there is no time to met out individual punishment.”
Group punishment makes a team pull together. Employee of the month awards are a great example of how not to do rewards. If you have 20 people some will figure out they will never get it so why try. Which drags down the entire group.
I’ve seen the individual reward punishment model make a few people feel great and destroy the moral of the group over and over again. On factory floors, in programming teams, or just getting something done on a volunteer basis.
Again, life isn’t fair.
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I have to take the opposing view on this. It seems incorrect, in my view, to split the hair between unfair and unjust. Group punishment is in our time generally viewed as unjust (remember we are not talking about making everybody do extra push ups or go without desert, it is one’s life on the line).
Group punishment is generally used when there is no time to met out individual punishment. For example, one could stop the car and investigate and find out who really ‘started it’ with the kids in the backseat but this would take too much time and since the kids are not committing crimes (just being annoying) group ‘punishment’ is fine. Yet, in the case of actual crimes it becomes a more serious matter. No one, I think, would claim it to be just that the entire families of anyone guilty of murder should be sent to the chair. Or the entire hometown of a drug dealer should be sent to prision.
I have no doubt that the OT view of justice has a group element to it. I just think that we have developed better ways to punish crime than killing the entire family of the criminal.
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to Steve in Toronto:
I don’t say this lightly, but sin, and its effects, are absolutely horrific. It destroys and it would destroy everything if not for God’s grace.
I believe that this is where every believer needs to start, in the O.T. or at least they need to go there soon. The reason I believe this is that as one reads about the O.T. Law and Patriarchs one sees clearly what kind of punishment our sins actually warrant. Furthermore we see more clearly what Christ has truly saved us from and we see and understand the context of Grace.
We Western Christians tend to read the law in the O.T. that children who were woefully disobedient were to be stoned to death and we say “that is too harsh”. Instead we ought to say “yes, that is what I deserved when I was rebellious and nasty to my parents, but by God’s grace Christ has saved me from that punishment”.
In other words we judge God’s standards as being too harsh, when in fact we don’t understand how terrible sin and rebellion are, and how truly great God’s grace is. We take God’s grace for granted and think God wrong for punishing sin, when He has every right to do so.
As to the Amalekites, they were incredibly evil and for God to allow them to live and survive would have actually been unjust. Their presence in the land would have/was corrupting the Israelites and causing the downfall of many.
God gave the Canaanites over 400 years to live in the land, and they merely became more and more corrupt and evil. God even gave some of those tribes an extra 40 years as the disobedient Israelites wandered in the wilderness.
Don’t forget all the innocent ones who died at the hands of the Amalekites. Someone needed to speak for them. Saul failed to do so, and was punished.
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In secular endeavors group rewards and punishments will consistently produce better results than individual rewards and punishments. There are times when individualism wins but over the long haul it looses badly. This is true in military groups, industrial operations, even your local fast food outlet.
But we are wired to be individualists. (From the fall?) And so we keep wanting to implement the perfectly fair reward and punishment system for individuals. It never works.
As I’ve heard many times and told my kids many times. Life isn’t fair and never will be. Get over it.
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Interesting question and I’m looking forward to where this is going.
I think I heard Bill Maher raise this as one of his cornerstone questions in on of his trailers to his movie, “Religiousity.†I haven’t seen it as has not been playing north of Seattle. And of course the question of God’s injustice has been debated by every philosopher with statements like Voltaire’s, “If there’s a god, then he’s the devil.â€
But my question is there a difference between unfairness and injustice? I mean, can God be unfair and still be just? I think He can. There is an “overspray†of both His judgment and His grace. There are those who are evil that benefit from his mercy (like myself) and those who are good, but go down with the ship (meaning the family, nation or world). To the so-called “good” falling because the sin of others would certainly feel unfair.
There are some things that are in the mystery of God, which I can’t understand but I still trust Him. But I do believe the questions should be asked and discussed and not simply relegated to the nonbeliever. I’m looking forward to the great comments that I’m sure will come from those with more enlighten than myself.
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I wrote some about this earlier, in thinking about the ethnic cleansing in the book of Joshua.
If we cannot (and must not) give up our firm convictions on individual justice, we must at least try to understand the ancient notion of collective identity. Nations and peoples were defined in terms of the strong personalities of their archetypes – Jacob, Esau, Anak, Amelek, Midian, Hercules, Romulus & Remus, etc. Sometimes their founders were even worshiped as gods. The cultures were very conservative, with their distinct character being passed from one generation to the next.
I sometimes wonder whether there is more to this than we like to think. Isn’t it curious that so much of what see as our own personal tastes, ideas, and opinions seem to fit key trends and movements (or counter movements) of our time? Even our personal individualism is an expression of a key American archetype. Most other cultures even today understand this better than we do, and hold individual Americans accountable for the actions of their country. Why shouldn’t they? We certainly benefit from our country’s actions – why should we not share the responsibility?
I am haunted at times when I find an old Indian arrowhead on my parents’ land. These are the artifacts of the people who were once here – peoples all but destroyed today. I can say it’s not my fault, but like it or not, I enjoy the lush beautiful land that their great grandchildren will never see. Is this just? Were the former inhabitants wicked enough to warrant their dispossession? If not, is there to be a reckoning? Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner.
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This may be a bit of a stretch, but I’m reminded of an argument I heard not-too-long-ago for infant baptism. The idea was that in Acts and other parts of the NT, we see entire families becoming Christians at the same time and all being baptised. And that for pedobaptists, the family as the “little Church” is the basic unit rather than the individual. Granted, for pedobaptists, there is Confirmation for the individual. But you never find faith/salvation/etc. tied to Confirmation, though you do find it often tied to Baptism.
More on topic, though, it seems that community REALLY matters in the Bible (both OT and NT). Even though “the soul that sins shall die,” the prophet who refuses to call out the sinner has the sinner’s blood on his hands (to reference an Ezekiel passage).
Finally, I’m not sure God HAS to be fair. Is an unfair policy inherently unjust and unloving? I’m not necessarily sure it is.
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Mass punishment is entirely fair. Everyone sins; sin causes death; best thing to do is remove the sinner so that death doesn’t spread. It’s grace that’s inherently unfair.
And thank God.
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God, as the author and creator of all life, has the prerogative to take life when He sees fit to do so. A human life is precious because God has made it, but it is not so precious that it is above God’s authority. Human life is never “out of bounds” for God. Because of sin we are all going to die a physical death at some point. Why do we humans think that we have the right to arbitrarily draw a line wherein we declare that if a person dies on one side of that line then their death is somehow more natural, or understandable, but if they die below that line then their death is more “tragic” somehow?
I do not say this cavalierly at all. Death is painful, unpleasant and nasty, for those who actually go through it and for those left behind. However, that is not the question. The question is “did/does God do things that are unfair by using group punishment?”
I make the point because many associate pain and suffering with evil AUTOMATICALLY, and anyone who brings/allows pain and suffering is therefore evil (to people who think this way ).
But we are not talking about our feelings, or our desires, or what we would prefer, we are talking about facts, justice, fairness etc.
God is perfectly fair in taking anyone and everyone’s life if He so desires because He is the One and only author of life, and doesn’t HAVE to do anything (He is self-existant and does not need man to survive, but created man by His own choice).
It also was not fair that the Son of God, the spotless Lamb, should die in my place for the sins that I committed against God who is three times holy.
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1 Samuel 15 (Saul is sent to destroy the Amaleks and is then punished for not doing the job properly) is one of the most frighten and troubling stories in the entire bible. I have never been able to integrate it into any coherent understanding of character of God.
God Bless
Steve in Toronto
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When our family was traveling together in the car and our three girls were arguing in the back to the point where I reached my limit, I would say “I can’t resolve this in a way that will make you all equally happy. What I can do is to make certain you are all equally unhappy.” This almost always stopped the squabbling, because they didn’t like my way of establishing justice for all.
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Group punishment is common in basic training. Among its purposes is to create a sense that we are not alone in our duties and responsibilities, but share them with others we are in community with, even though we may not yet see these others as part of our community. Through our shared sufferings, we will learn to see them as such or continue to suffer even more. Pressure is thus brought to bear on the “slacker” by the community, encouraging him to get his act together.
There are other elements involved in this, but the fact that God called out a people who were not a people to become his representative community on earth surely connects with this purpose.
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