Christians: Kill family who mentions other beliefs to you?

[Meow Mix]

This will be a very broad look at this.

God has always wanted His people to seperate and distinct. It started with Adam and Eve, being the same, isolated in the Garden. Follow it to Cain where after he slew Abel, Cain was banished. Skip to Noah, God isolated His people on an Ark. Move on to Abraham, God summoned him to seperate from his people. Onward to the Children of Abraham. The Mosaic Law did specific things to try and seperate Gods children from the Gentiles and keep them pure in His eyes. This continues on through out the Old to the New Testaments.

At every change, though, as history progresses, God seemed to modify the severity of of His commands in order to make them usable, though diluted, for His disobedient children. Newer commandment such as, "Love your neighbor as yourself," would seem to supercede older commands.

So if God had control of the purity of his chosen what's all this stuff I hear Christians talk about free will?

Boy this Christianity thing is confusing to me...

God is good, but commands the murder of family for being apostates. God gives us free will, but heaven forbid if we interfere with his plans for us.

I'm deeply confused on how this god character is perceived as "good" in any sense.

 

[Meow Mix]

Sure. This was written in a time when the Jews were in exile, and they were trying to make sense out of their plight theologically. It was in exile that the Jews moved from polytheism to monotheism, and they thought that had they gotten rid of all the other religions in Israel that Yahweh would have been pleased with them and they would not have been defeated.

That's why we also have the command of God to exterminate towns, etc in the "conquest" of Israel - they did not do this, so they thought God was punishing them.

So, it wasn't God who commanded to kill apostates -- if I understand you right?

 

[Midnight Pete]

"If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth;

Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage” (Deuteronomy 13:6-10, KJV).

Can any Christians help me understand the context of this?

This doesn't really apply to Christians. It's Mosaic Law from the Old Testament. Churches today do not emphasize the importance of killing families who talk about other religions. We've never had any sermon series about this at my church, no meetings or bulletins about it.

Meow Mix, you're horribly insulting to Christians and people of faith in general. It's this passive aggressive thing you do, pretending to be dumber than you are. I really don't care for it.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

So, it wasn't God who commanded to kill apostates -- if I understand you right?

Exactly. It never was a command - it was a theological reflection.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

This doesn't really apply to Christians. It's Mosaic Law from the Old Testament. Churches today do not emphasize the importance of killing families who talk about other religions. We've never had any sermon series about this at my church, no meetings or bulletins about it.

Meow Mix, you're horribly insulting to Christians and people of faith in general. It's this passive aggressive thing you do, pretending to be dumber than you are. I really don't care for it.

It should be terrifying to us if we really believe that God would ever command such things. If God can do it once, he can do it again.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

So if God had control of the purity of his chosen what's all this stuff I hear Christians talk about free will?

God is not in "control" of the purity of His people precisly because He allows us free will. It is His desire that we obey His commandments. As man becomes more and more disobedient Godd offers up new directives whic lead us back to sanctification. Ultimately, His believers will be pure and sanctified at the ressurection.

I think that the reason God's goodness is misunderstood is that, ultimately, we misunderstand God's view of sin and the consequences (not the punishment) of it.

 

[Meow Mix]

This doesn't really apply to Christians. It's Mosaic Law from the Old Testament. Churches today do not emphasize the importance of killing families who talk about other religions. We've never had any sermon series about this at my church, no meetings or bulletins about it.

Meow Mix, you're horribly insulting to Christians and people of faith in general. It's this passive aggressive thing you do, pretending to be dumber than you are. I really don't care for it.

But don't Christians believe it's the same God that once commanded this thing? It's a legitimate question to me.

Consider if I found out that my father had a set of kids before me, and he convinced them to battle each other to the death for whatever reason.

But now he's really nice to me and does no such thing.

I would *still* be curious about why he was so evil during the time before. I think I'm asking a legitimate question, not playing dumb.

 

[Meow Mix]

It should be terrifying to us if we really believe that God would ever command such things. If God can do it once, he can do it again.

This is my point, thank you.

As for it not being God's command, I have to ask though: how do you know? What bits can you tell are from God and what bits are from humans and what's the method to tell the difference?

 

[Meow Mix]

God is not in "control" of the purity of His people precisly because He allows us free will. It is His desire that we obey His commandments. As man becomes more and more disobedient Godd offers up new directives whic lead us back to sanctification. Ultimately, His believers will be pure and sanctified at the ressurection.

I think that the reason God's goodness is misunderstood is that, ultimately, we misunderstand God's view of sin and the consequences (not the punishment) of it.

Ok, if I strain I can understand this. But it's sort of like straining to understand what a disturbed man is talking about on the street (not a jab at you Sandy, but at the concepts themselves). It seems to me there are easier ways though, and that it's entirely unnecessary to ever at any point command the killing of family for apostasy (and checking to see if other family would join).

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I would *still* be curious about why he was so evil during the time before.

If I can restate my position on this...

These verses (along with many others) are basically answering the question, "why did this happen to us" and the answer is "we displeased God [by not irradicating the worship of other gods from the face of the earth]."

 

[Midnight Pete]

It should be terrifying to us if we really believe that God would ever command such things. If God can do it once, he can do it again.

I'm not worried at all.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

This is my point, thank you.

As for it not being God's command, I have to ask though: how do you know? What bits can you tell are from God and what bits are from humans and what's the method to tell the difference?

For Christians, I think that it's best to approach the entire body of Scripture as "from humans" and let the word of God that it contains speak out to inspire and move the human heart.

So the biblical interpreter uses a wide variety of methods to determine what the text says and means on human terms, setting an interpretation within the constraints of human language, history, and anthropology. Then, the theology can be evaluated and we as a community can read the text from our various points of view, bringing out the richness of the tradition.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I'm not worried at all.

You should be.

 

[Midnight Pete]

You should be.

I have enough dread and anxiety in my life as it is. You don't get it.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I have enough dread and anxiety in my life as it is. You don't get it.

Dread and anxiety is nothing compared to falling into the hands of an angry God.

 

[Meow Mix]

Dread and anxiety is nothing compared to falling into the hands of an angry God.

Unless God is actually a good, benevolent God

But, benevolent gods don't ask you to kill your own family except maybe in self-defense...

Hence me bringing up this gem from the OT.

Your answer makes sense to me Angellous, I just don't think a lot of people are willing to say that even the tiniest bit in there isn't from God.

 

[Midnight Pete]

Dread and anxiety is nothing compared to falling into the hands of an angry God.

Fear-mongering? I didn't think you were that type.

 

[Meow Mix]

Fear-mongering? I didn't think you were that type.

I think he was just saying why it was important to understand why that passage was in the OT.

If it's there because God is a mean jerk, then there's everything to worry about.

If it's there because God didn't put it there, then nothing to worry about.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Your answer makes sense to me Angellous, I just don't think a lot of people are willing to say that even the tiniest bit in there isn't from God.

It's a long road for many people. I was brought up thinking that the Bible was inerrant and infalliable - but then I started studying the history of the Bible and saw the history of the Biblical texts.

This history is undeniable truth that the "word of God" is in the custody of human hands, and we have changed it significantly. If we can change the copies, the literal, written word of God is completely lost. That's why so many evangelical conservative Christians become atheist in seminary or in their doctoral work.

 

[Meow Mix]

It's a long road for many people. I was brought up thinking that the Bible was inerrant and infalliable - but then I started studying the history of the Bible and saw the history of the Biblical texts.

This history is undeniable truth that the "word of God" is in the custody of human hands, and we have changed it significantly. If we can change the copies, the literal, written word of God is completely lost. That's why so many evangelical conservative Christians become atheist in seminary or in their doctoral work.

I've heard of this phenomena where some people still work in churches as atheists. I have no idea how true it is or why they'd do it.