April 27, 2021
hE WASN'T WORTHY YET:
Did God Command Genocide in the Old Testament? (Dr. Randal Rauser, 4/27/21, Strange Notions)
The heart and foundation of Christianity is belief in a God who is worthy of worship: in the words of Anselm, that being than which none greater can be conceived. And so, when the Bible depicts God as acting in a manner that appears to be less-than-perfect, this creates a challenge for the Christian reader. There is perhaps no more glaring an example of this problem than God's command to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 20:16-17:"16 However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. 17Completely destroy them--the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites--as the Lord your God has commanded you."The problem, to put it bluntly, is that it looks like God is here commanding genocide. Needless to say, genocide is widely recognized to be an unconscionable evil, a crime against humanity. And no perfect being worthy of worship would command people to carry out an unconscionable evil.
Posted by Orrin Judd at April 27, 2021 2:17 PM