http://www.bay-of-fundie.com/archives/521/expelled-on-dvd

Cheesecake is the answer.

Ah. So someone had to interpret it for you. That makes it really clear. When it doesn’t make sense (common sense?) then you need a Master to spin it right for you so it does. Square pegs will fit in round holes if you just tweak it so…

Not to be totally dismissive, though, you are correct, it does require a certain background knowledge to really understand some of what is in the bible—but that just validates the fact that it has been added to, amended, interpreted, re-presented, tweaked, fiddled, and messed with by humans over the last 1800 years, which implies strongly that the same thing had been going on all along—prophecies rewritten to conform to current events, the ones that didn’t work out deleted, stuff forgotten. The fact that KJV misinterprets the word for unicorn suggests that other translations erred, too, and erred earlier, and got it wrong earlier.

In short, it is a flawed document. Hardly holy. Historically suspect. When we argue with you about translation errors and you come back and explain those errors even while acknowledging them AS ERRORS, you somehow manage to not make the larger connection that the errors—if they are errors—probably pre-date all post Yeshua translations.

In other words, not the word of god. Unless you choose to believe it is. But it is the belief that makes it so, not the document itself.

The justification of the Midianite massacre requires an incredibly tight circle of reasoning so that no doubt can creep in. God is perfect and just, and so wouldn’t demand the execution of innocent people, ergo, all those women, children and babies deserved to die. But don’t think too hard about what it might look and feel like to kill a guilty evil toddler, because the guilty might start looking innocent if you do that. And don’t think too hard about the fact that the justification for the massacre reads like the justification for almost every other massacre, pogrom, genocide or lynching in history.

Those of us who have read the Bible know that later on, in the age of the prophets, these same tribespeople who massacred the Midianites began groping for more universal ideas of justice. Later still a man named Jesus challenged them to stop feeling self-righteous for keeping to the law, and embrace even more demanding standards of compassion. Erik’s moral reasoning apparently remains stuck at the stage of tribalism and blood vendetta.

Wholesale slaughter isn’t justified by deceiving of a few people, or half a population, or whatever.

What god ordered was genocide, which is reprehensibly WRONG, no matter who orders it.

If any highly publicized atheist were to ask for the slaughter of all religious people, we’d rightfully pass him off as a nutcase.

When a religious person does it, we get thousands of people saying that it’s a good idea, stopped only by the laws of the land. Fred Phelps, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, just to name a few, blame all of societies ills on atheists, homosexuals, feminists, and basically everyone who isn’t like them.

Why the hell are people like that given any word on any official policies? People get killed, in the name of religion, far more often, and far more gleefully, than atheists who kill.

Don’t, for the last time, bring up Stalin or Hitler, because Hitler was Catholic, and Stalin had a cult of personality fascist regime. Atheism did not drive his murder, because atheists fell to his regime as well.

I expect a giant load of bollocks answer from you.

And see here, too. http://dangerousintersection.org/2007/04/24/chocolate-provides-more-of-a-physiological-buzz-than-kissing/

But there’s no reason to have fights about pie versus chocolate. After all, there is chocolate pie.

I see you are trying to explain away what is written in black and white. Leading people to worship idols leads them to reject God and brings terrible consequences (slavery to sin, death, wasted lives, etc). The warriors had seen it first hand, seen God’s plague destroying them (even the innocent, they suffer because of the sins of others). You are trying to add what is not there. What had the women done? Look at the sexual sin in chapter 25. Sexual sin destroys in a terrible way (and the innocent suffer). These are the women (in 25) who knowingly led the men of Israel into sin (the guilty being punished is not wrong). I would advise you to read chapters 22-25 in order to see the diabolic plans of the Medianites. Do not just look for what you want to see. Look at all that was happening. You are trying to make the guilty look innocent and become the victims here (notice YOU are doing it). By the way those same women (with their children) were the ones joining themselves with the Israelite men (many of them to be frank). The virgins were spared because they were not guilty of sleeping with the Israelite men. Look at the facts in the context.

Moses gives the order to kill all the women and male children. Really place yourself inside the scene now. The victims would have to have been killed by stabbing, strangling, or bashing brains out with a club or rock - no bullets or poison gas back then. Can you imagine the smell of blood, and of urine and feces as the victims lose control of their bladder and bowels - either after death or before, through sheer terror. Imagine the screams of the women as they watch their children die, the cries of children as they watch their mothers die. What goes through your mind as you raise your sword to kill a small boy crouched by the side of his dead mother? Are you filled with righteous indignation at the crimes of the Midianites? Are you filled with joy to be doing the Lord’s will? Do you let yourself go numb and try not to think about what you’re doing? Does the thought cross your mind that maybe Moses got Yahweh’s instructions wrong?

You don’t have to answer - this is not meant to be a “gotcha.” Just promise me you’ll think about it- really think about what happened that day.

This may be too hard, but you might also imagine yourself reading this in the Koran, with the names changed. What would be your reaction?

You wrote “Well, we’ve already talked about one: the massacre of the Midianites civilians - all the men, women who had had sex (and their unborn babies, presumably) all the male children. - slaughtered. All the virgin girls enslaved.”

I think you are a little confused. Are you speaking of the Midianites or the Canaanites? In Numbers God sends Israel to wage war against the Midianites because of their (the Midianites) actions. Also look at what the Midianite women did to the Israelites (please study the context of the situation. It is the same with the Canaanites, they were evil (offering up their babies as sacrifices, murdering, sexual immorality, rape, incest etc.). In other words you are blaming God for punishing the guilty. Strange, I guess you want the victims to be victimized twice, one by the perpetrator and again by not having the guilty punished.

If you will read the entire context and cross reference it then you will see that God tells them why they are to do it.