Month: March 2010

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Old Testament

Unintentional sins can be forgiven by making the right sacrifice, but those who intentionally sin must be cut off from the community. I am not so big on the actual punishments, but I do like that the law differentiated between intentional and unintentional sin without letting unintentional sinners get off without consequences. I think that it is important to hold people for their actions, even if the harm caused by those actions was not intended, but I also think it is important to recognize that motivation does have an impact.

According to today’s bit of case law, those who violate the Sabbath should be stoned to death. I still think stoning is an unreasonably cruel death, even given the limited execution choices at the time. It is unreasonably cruel for the suffering it causes (as I have mentioned before), but also because it makes the whole community actively complicit in the killing. Now, this may have some advantages (it is easier to accept killing criminals if it is being done out of sight), but there is something deeply disturbing about the idea of a community coming together to kill one of their own members.

Speaking of killing, God murders more people. Korah, Dathan, Abiram, and On incited a rebellion against Moses and Aaron. 250 community leaders sided with them. Moses challenges them to come to the Tabernacle and let God choose who should lead. The men eventually agree to come. They lit incense before the Lord’s Tabernacle, and God’s presence appeared and was annoyed.

God, as seems to be normal, threatens to kill the whole community.

Then the glorious presence of the Lord appeared to the whole community, and the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Get away from all these people so that I may instantly destroy them!”

Moses and Aaron ask him not to, and he relents and decides only to kill the rebels. He burned the 250 men who were offering incense. However, for the men who instigated the rebellion, a worse fate was in store.

So all the people stood back from the tents of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. Then Dathan and Abiram came out and stood at the entrances of their tents, together with their wives and children and little ones.

…

[Moses] had hardly finished speaking the words when the ground suddenly split open beneath them. The earth opened its mouth and swallowed the men, along with their households and all their followers who were standing with them, and everything they owned. So they went down alive into the grave, along with all their belongings.

Not only does God kill the ring leaders and all their followers. He kills their families, including the children. Once again I ask, even if he exists why would anyone find such a God worthy of worship?

New Testament

Pilate tries Jesus. Pilate can see that Jesus has been set up by the Jews, but Jesus does not defend himself, so Pilate, it seems, can do nothing. Note that in this version, Pilate’s wife does not make an appearance.

I noticed something in today’s reading that was interesting. Both the two men crucified next to Jesus and Barabbas, the man the people chose to free instead of Jesus, are described as revolutionaries. Tradition, as far as I am familiar, has it that all of these men are criminals and/or murderers. The difference seems significant, especially in the case of Barabbas. It seems much more reasonable for the Jewish people to choose to release a revolutionary instead of Jesus than it seems for them to release a murderer. Especially since, I am guess, Barabbas would have been a Jewish revolutionary acting against the Romans.

After Jesus is sentenced to crucifixion, the Romans mock him, take him Golgotha (forcing some dude named Simon to carry Jesus’ cross), nail him to the cross, and divide up his clothes. The passers by mock Jesus as do the men he was crucified with.

Jesus’ death causes quite the commotion. Darkness falls across the land and the curtain of the temple is torn in two. The author of Matthew, unlike the author of Mark, does not mention earthquakes or zombies. This almost reaches the level of a contradiction. On the one hand, the author of Mark does not say there were not earthquakes and zombies, so it could have happened. On the other hand, it seems like a rather large omission.

The timelines of Matthew and Mark also seem like they might be inconsistent, but are not. According to Mark, Jesus was crucified at 9am. The sun went dark at noon, and he died at 3pm. The author of Matthew does not give a start time, but that book does say that it was dark from the sixth to the ninth hour. I initially interpreted these as the sixth to ninth hour of crucifixion, but I realize now that it probably refers to the sixth to ninth hour of daylight, which maps correctly.

After Jesus’ death, Joseph of Arimathea requests permission to bury the body. He gains permission and Jesus is buried in Joseph’s tomb.

Psalms and Proverbs

Same old, same old.

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Old Testament

Yesterday, scouting reports terrified the Israelites. Today, they continue to doubt God’s ability to help them conquer the land contemplate finding new leaders who will lead them back to Egypt. And we all know the God of the Old Testament hates doubt. God’s response to this doubt:

“How long will these people treat me with contempt? Will they never believe me, even after all the miraculous signs I have done among them? I will disown them and destroy them with a plague. Then I will make you into a nation greater and mightier than they are!”

God once again, I think for the second time, threatens to murder all of the Israelites and to make a new nation from Moses. Fortunately, Moses once again calms him down and mass murder is prevented. Moses used the same approach as before: appeal to God’s vanity.

But Moses objected. “What will the Egyptians think when they hear about it?” he asked the Lord. “They know full well the power you displayed in rescuing your people from Egypt. Now if you destroy them, the Egyptians will send a report to the inhabitants of this land, who have already heard that you live among your people. They know, Lord, that you have appeared to your people face to face and that your pillar of cloud hovers over them. They know that you go before them in the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night. Now if you slaughter all these people with a single blow, the nations that have heard of your fame will say, ‘The Lord was not able to bring them into the land he swore to give them, so he killed them in the wilderness.’

“Please, Lord, prove that your power is as great as you have claimed. For you said, ‘The Lord is slow to anger and filled with unfailing love, forgiving every kind of sin and rebellion. But he does not excuse the guilty. He lays the sins of the parents upon their children; the entire family is affected—even children in the third and fourth generations.’ In keeping with your magnificent, unfailing love, please pardon the sins of this people, just as you have forgiven them ever since they left Egypt.”

This passage also highlights how little we have actually been shown that God is slow to anger and has unfailing love for the Israelites.

Instead of killing all the Israelites, God decides to make them wander about in the dessert for 40 years. In the midst of that passage, we get this tidbit:

The ten men Moses had sent to explore the land—the ones who incited rebellion against the Lord with their bad report— were struck dead with a plague before the Lord

I personally am very glad that God no longer goes around killing those who work against him.

New Testament

Jesus is tried. The religious teachers cannot find any evidence against him. Fortunately for them, Jesus commits blasphemy:

Then the high priest stood up before the others and asked Jesus, “Well, aren’t you going to answer these charges? What do you have to say for yourself?” But Jesus was silent and made no reply. Then the high priest asked him, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?”

Jesus said, “I Am. And you will see the Son of Man seated in the place of power at God’s right hand and coming on the clouds of heaven.”

The casing on the “I Am” conveys that Jesus was using a phrase of self reference that was only considered appropriate for God. Jesus is essentially saying that he is equal with God. I do not condone executing someone over blasphemy, but I can certainly understand why the religious teachers were so deeply offended by his words. From their point of view, Jesus was one of many who performed miracles and taught. Maybe his teachings were more profound and his miracles more powerful, but unless the religious teachers had been at one of the events where God talked from the sky (John’s baptism of Jesus or Jesus’ transfiguration) or had heard about them from a source they considered reliable, they had nothing but Jesus’ claims about himself to go on. We have even read that Jesus tried to keep his identity as the Messiah rather hushed up from those outside of his inner circle. Would you, with their knowledge, believe someone’s claims to be the Messiah?

In today’s reading, we also read about how Peter denied Jesus three times before the cock crows twice (once before the first crow and twice more before the second crow). Minor contradiction: in the version of this story in Matthew, the prediction that comes true is that Peter will contradict Jesus three times before the cock crows even once. Oops.

Psalms and Proverbs

Repeat! And a rather annoying one at that. Today’s psalm, Psalm 53 is almost exactly the same as Psalm 14. This is the psalm that says that only fools say there is no God. I have already commented on why Christians should not quote this passage (in short, it makes them sound like jerks).

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Old Testament

Moses gathered 70 elders and the spirit of God descended upon them. This made Moses very happy because now he would not have to handle the whole load of dealing with the people himself. Hurrah for delegation!

Remember how yesterday God promised to send meat until the Israelites get sick of it? Today he does so. However, he loses his temper (again) in the midst of it all.

But while they were gorging themselves on the meat—while it was still in their mouths—the anger of the Lord blazed against the people, and he struck them with a severe plague.

Maybe God was mad at them because they were drying some of the quail. We know that he does not like the manna to be saved. Maybe he does not like any miraculous food to be saved.

Miriam and Aaron criticize Moses for marrying a Cushite woman. Are they complaining about Zipporah? But she was a Midianite woman. Are they the same thing? Or was this a second wife? How confusing!

In any case, God gets mad at Aaron and Miriam for criticizing Moses (Moses did not get mad because he is humble). God curses Miriam with leprosy which she has to suffer from for a week. Why did God punish Miriam with leprosy and not Aaron? That seems unfair.

But I think that the criticism against Moses and the punishment for it was not the real point of the story. The real point was to give God a chance to say this,

“If there were prophets among you,
I, the Lord, would reveal myself in visions.
I would speak to them in dreams.
But not with my servant Moses.
Of all my house, he is the one I trust.
I speak to him face to face,
clearly, and not in riddles!
He sees the Lord as he is.
So why were you not afraid
to criticize my servant Moses?”

This passage seems to attempt to explain why God never talks to anyone directly anymore even though he chatted with Moses nearly constantly. Moses was special!

A bunch of scouts investigate the land the Israelites are going to and find that it is wonderful and fertile and full of well established and powerful people. The scouts were scared enough of these people that they tried to spread the rumor that

All the people we saw were huge. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!

New Testament

Jesus offers bread and wine as his body and blood. He tells the disciples that they will deny him. He prays at Gethsemane. Judas betrays him. Jesus is arrested. The disciples flee. This is all very similar to Matthew’s version.

Psalms and Proverbs

The Lord detests the use of dishonest scales,
but he delights in accurate weights.

God is particular about measuring things accurately. He’s a nerd. =)

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Old Testament

Ack! It’s late.

God tells Moses to make some trumpets that can be used to signal the Israelites to resume their wanderings. The Israelites set out on the march again. The Israelites complain about their wandering. God gets angry, and reacts unreasonably:

Soon the people began to complain about their hardship, and the Lord heard everything they said. Then the Lord’s anger blazed against them, and he sent a fire to rage among them, and he destroyed some of the people in the outskirts of the camp. Then the people screamed to Moses for help, and when he prayed to the Lord, the fire stopped

Remember, they are screaming to death because God is burning them to death. I cannot help but imagine it, and it is sickening.

Despite God’s anger, the Israelites keep whining. They whine about how they have nothing to eat but manna. Moses calls out to God in frustration asking why he was put in charge of such stubborn people. God responds by helping Moses to find some assistants and promising the Israelites meat

Now the Lord will give you meat, and you will have to eat it. And it won’t be for just a day or two, or for five or ten or even twenty. You will eat it for a whole month until you gag and are sick of it.

God sure comes across as angry, cruel, and spiteful today, doesn’t he?

New Testament

Oh, such disappointment! I misread today’s reading in a way that I knew was immediately wrong, but my misreading was so much more awesome than the original.

While he was eating, a woman came in with a beautiful alabaster jar of expensive perfume made from essence of nerd nard. She broke open the jar and poured the perfume over his head.

If only it Jesus had been anointed with essence of nerd!

Also, Judas agrees to betray Jesus, and Jesus and the disciples partake in the Last Supper.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s psalm sounds very Christian, by which I mean that it is all about God’s forgiveness and mercy and man’s sinful nature. A small sample (the rest goes on in the same vein):

Have mercy on me, O God,
because of your unfailing love.
Because of your great compassion,
blot out the stain of my sins.
Wash me clean from my guilt.
Purify me from my sin.
For I recognize my rebellion;
it haunts me day and night.

In fact, out of what we have read so far, it is only in the psalms (and only in some of them) where we seem to get a glimpse of what seem to be presented as the core messages of modern mainstream Christianity. You can overlay such messages on the gospels (most of the time), but it is just an overlay, they do not, at least to me, seem to contain the message on the surface. As for the Old Testament readings, well, not so much.

We continue with the proverbs of the form, “The godly do X, the wicked do Y”. Since the proverbs seem to split the world along the lines of godly or ungodly, the proverbs just come across as annoying. Of course, if they split the world along the lines of good and wicked, they would just come across as tautological. That’s life, I suppose.

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Old Testament

Moses dedicates the Levites to serve in the temple; this, of course, requires many offerings and animal sacrifices. The Israelites celebrate the second Passover; those who are unable to celebrate at the proper time are told they may do so one month later. God settles on the Tabernacle in the form of a cloud (a fiery cloud at night); the cloud lifts and leads the Israelites whenever they should travel.

New Testament

Jesus talks more about the end times. Apparently,

“The day is coming when you will see the sacrilegious object that causes desecration standing where he [translation note: or “it”] should not be.”

If that makes sense to you, chime in. Is something lost in translation here or was it this unspecific in the original? [ETA: Qohelet points out that this is a reference to the Abomination of Desolation. So the problem was a translation one, kind of. My translation uses a different phrase than is traditional, making the reference less recognizable.]

When this, whatever it is, occurs the people must flee to the hills without stopping to pack. These will be terrible times, so terrible that everyone would die if God did not shorten them. Many false Messiah’s will try to fool the people. The sun and moon will be darkened, and the stars will fall from the sky (I am not quite sure how that last bit makes sense, but sure, we’ll run with it). Then the Son of Man (Jesus) will come and gather the chosen ones from all over the world. Very dramatic.

No one knows when this will happen except God. Not even Jesus. So Jesus’ followers have to stay alert.

Psalms and Proverbs

Our God approaches,
and he is not silent.
Fire devours everything in his way,
and a great storm rages around him.

More great imagery from today’s psalm. Goes rather well with the New Testament reading today. Also, we learn that God does not need sacrifices, just the sacrifice of thankfulness. In that case, why did we have to spend so much time reading about the rules for sacrifices? It was boring!

Proverbs continues the theme of “godly = good, wicked = bad”.

The question often comes up (both on this blog and elsewhere): Why do I insist on interpreting the Bible as if it were literally true? Don’t I know that most/many/educated Christians do no actually believe that the Bible is the inerrant word of an omniscient, omnipotent God?

I covered this a little in my introductory post,

My interpretation style will be mostly literal. By that, I mean that I will interpret my readings literally even though I realize that most Christians do not interpret the whole Bible literally. Since each group of Christians uses different criteria for choosing which parts to interpret literally, I cannot hope to make the “right” choices, so instead I will try to apply a uniformly literal interpretation to all passages presented as historical fact.

But I want to expand on this a little by looking at the discussion of inspiration in the chapter “Contemporary Theories of Revelation and Inspiration” in A General Introduction to the Bible by Norman L. Geisler and William E. Nix. According to this book, the contemporary views of the Bible are three (pg 188):

• “The Bible is the Word of God — orthodox” (i.e., the Bible is essentially the Word of God)
• “The Bible contains the Word of God — liberal” (i.e., the Bible is partially the Word of God)
• “The Bible becomes the Word of God — neo-orthodox” (i.e., the Bible is instrumentally the Word of God)

First, the non-orthodox views of inspiration do not fit the Biblical data. The Bible claims to be verbally inspired. For it is the writings (graphē) that are inspired (2 Tim. 3:16). … [more examples]… But all unorthodox views reject verbal inspiration. Hence, whatever else may be said in their favor, they are not biblical. (pg 185)

Fifth, the non-orthodox views ultimately deny any objective basis for divine authority. This issue revolves around the question of who will be the final arbiter — man or God. The Bible addresses this matter by saying, “Rather, let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, ‘That Though mightest be justified in Thy words, and mightest prevail when Thou art judged’ ” (Rom 3:4). Instead, man’s reason or subjective experience becomes the authority. For all non-orthodox views agree that the objective language of the Bible is not in itself the Word of God. That is, they deny the formula “What the Bible says, God says.” This being the case, even after one discovers what Paul (or Peter, or John, et al.) said in the text he must still ask the crucial question: “Indeed, has God said?” (Gen. 3:1). For once we drive a wedge between the words of Scripture and the Word of God, then after we discover the meaning of a passage it is left to our reason or experience to determine whether or not it is true. (pg 186)

Unfortunately non-orthodox views often confuse individual illumination (or even human intuition) with God’s objective revelation in Scripture. To do so is to shift the locus of revelation from the objective written Word of God to the subjective experience of the believer. In the case of the neo-orthodox view, it is claimed that the Bible is only a revelation when man is receiving it. Their claim that God is not really speaking unless man is hearing is clearly contrary to the repeated exhortation in Scripture to receive what God has spoken. (pg 187)

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Old Testament

Today’s reading covers two main topics. First, the regulations that must be followed when one takes the vows of a Nazirite. These include:

• Consuming no grape products
• Consuming no alcohol or anything derived from alcohol
• Never cutting hair for the duration of the vow
• Avoiding any dead bodies
• Giving a bunch of sacrifices

So the family went and lived in a town called Nazareth. This fulfilled what the prophets had said: “He will be called a Nazarene.”

Although the New Living Translation does not provide a reference for this supposed prophecy, some believe it refers to the birth of Samson in Judges 13:5-7.

You will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and his hair must never be cut. For he will be dedicated to God as a Nazirite from birth. He will begin to rescue Israel from the Philistines.”

The woman ran and told her husband, “A man of God appeared to me! He looked like one of God’s angels, terrifying to see. I didn’t ask where he was from, and he didn’t tell me his name. But he told me, ‘You will become pregnant and give birth to a son. You must not drink wine or any other alcoholic drink nor eat any forbidden food. For your son will be dedicated to God as a Nazirite from the moment of his birth until the day of his death.’”

As usual, it seems doubtful that this actually applies to Jesus. However, ignoring that, we can see that this use of Nazirite clearly referred to the vow, as in today’s reading. It does not indicate a city of Nazarene. Of course, the interpretation of Jesus as under the Nazarene vow from birth presents problems. For example, he was, according to Biblical reports, quite fond of wine.

The other topic covered in today’s reading is the offerings given by each of the tribe leaders at the anointing of the Tabernacle. Each tribe gave stuff. What is noteworthy is the amount of repetition is this description. Each tribal leader gave the exact same thing, and it was described as exactly the same way.

On the [Nth] day [so and so] son of [such and such], leader of the tribe of [whatever], presented his offering. His offering consisted of a silver platter weighing 3¼ pounds and a silver basin weighing 1¾ pounds (as measured by the weight of the sanctuary shekel). These were both filled with grain offerings of choice flour moistened with olive oil. He also brought a gold container weighing four ounces, which was filled with incense. He brought a young bull, a ram, and a one-year-old male lamb for a burnt offering, and a male goat for a sin offering. For a peace offering he brought two bulls, five rams, five male goats, and five one-year-old male lambs. This was the offering brought by [so and so] son of [such and such].

Repeat that 12 times and you have read the vast majority of Numbers 7.

New Testament

Today’s teachings:

Beware of the teachers of religious law who like to preach in public! Funny how prominent TV evangelicals never apply this to themselves (oops, still not talking about contemporary issues).

Those who give all they have give more than those who give a small amount of their surplus, even if the dollar amount is smaller. It is true, but we should remember that Jesus only said the widow’s offering was worth more, not that the offerings of the rich were worth nothing.

After Jesus predicts the fall of the temple (for versions of “predict” which take into account that this was probably written after the fall of the Temple), he talks about the end times.

“Don’t let anyone mislead you, for many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am the Messiah.’ They will deceive many. And you will hear of wars and threats of wars, but don’t panic. Yes, these things must take place, but the end won’t follow immediately. Nation will go to war against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in many parts of the world, as well as famines. But this is only the first of the birth pains, with more to come.

Now, either this is a very general prophecy, and not worthy of being called a prediction of the future or the end times have been going on for 2000 years. Either way, not terribly impressive.

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s psalm: God is great because someday the wicked will die and be forced to leave behind all the wealth they acquired in life. The psalm has several verses which imply that the wicked will just die and be dead, not be tortured forever.

The grave is their eternal home
where they will stay forever.
…
They will die, just like animals.
…
But as for me, God will redeem my life.
He will snatch me from the power of the grave.
…
But they will die like all before them
and never again see the light of day.

Proverbs also continues to talk about the terrible fate of the wicked.

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Old Testament

We learn about the different tasks assigned to the divisions of the Levites. God is very particular about how the various pieces of the Tabernacle are wrapped for transport (blue cloth and fine goatskin leather for all the wrappings).

Reading through all that, I figured it would be another boring day in Numbers. Then God tells Moses how to test a woman for faithfulness.

At this point the priest must put the woman under oath by saying, “May the people know that the Lord’s curse is upon you when he makes you infertile, causing your womb to shrivel and your abdomen to swell. Now may this water that brings the curse enter your body and cause your abdomen to swell and your womb to shrivel.” And the woman will be required to say, “Yes, let it be so.” And the priest will write these curses on a piece of leather and wash them off into the bitter water. He will make the woman drink the bitter water that brings on the curse. When the water enters her body, it will cause bitter suffering if she is guilty.

What the @#$!*? The test for marital faithfulness consists of forcing a woman to drink a poison and seeing whether or not she suffers from it. A poison that was believed to destroy her ability to have children. Superstitious, ridiculous, BS!

New Testament

Jesus does Q&A:

Q: A woman serially marries 7 brothers. Which man claims her as a wife in heaven?
A: None of them! (Sure, sounds reasonable.)

Q: Will the dead be raised?
A: Yes, because God once said “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob” after they had died. So obviously God is God of the living and they will be raised. (Really? I’m not buying the logic on this one.)

Q: What’s the most important commandment?
A: Love and honored God followed by love your neighbor. (I’ll take the second, but I cannot see how someone could love and honor a God who is supposedly the same as the God of the Old Testament.)

Q from Jesus: Why do you religious teachers claim the Messiah is the son of David?
A from Jesus: You’re like totally wrong you know. Because David in a psalm once called the Messiah “my Lord”. (I do not buy that David would never call a son of his “my Lord” nor do I think it is at all clear, to me at least, that the quoted psalm refers to what Jesus thinks it refers to.)

That said, we have a whole day’s worth of reading where Jesus does not get angry or annoyed at anyone. Hurrah!

Psalms and Proverbs

Today’s psalm: God is awesome because he defends Jerusalem.

Today’s proverb is great!

Lazy people irritate their employers,
like vinegar to the teeth or smoke in the eyes.

“Like vinegar to the teeth.” I love it!

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Old Testament

In today’s reading, we learn where all of the different tribes should camp relative to the tabernacle. To the east: Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun. To the south: Reuben, Simeon, and Gad. To the west: Ephraim, Manasseh, and Benjamin. To the north: Dan, Asher, and Naphtali. I like organization. It makes me happy.

What makes me less happy is this: Moses numbered the first born sons (age 1 month or older) among the non-Levite tribes. This number was 22,273. As we learned yesterday, the total number of men 20 years or older was  603,550. The number of first born sons gives the number of families with sons. This means that each family had at least 603,550 / 22,273 = 27 sons. This is not even accounting for the fact that the set of men age 1 month or older is actually larger than 603,550. Not feasible!

New Testament

Today’s New Testament reading contains more parables that we have read before. No interesting new twists that I noted, and I was not inspired with any new thoughts, so there’s nothing more to comment about.

Psalms and Proverbs

I like the start of today’s psalm:

Come everyone! Clap your hands!
Shout to God with joyful praise!

I think I like it because of the exclamation points.

Also, the proverbs still imply that one is either godly or wicked. Blah, blah, etc.