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| WW1 training trench unearthed in Sherwood Forest; a reminder of modern slaughters |
How the critics see it
Broadcaster and comedian Marcus Brigstock has said, “For me, that God [in the Old Testament] is a barbaric, inconsistent, jealous and murderous entity.”1 Renowned atheist Richard Dawkins wrote, “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all of fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser.”2
You can see their point in passages such as “Do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy them…as the Lord your God has commanded you” (Deuteronomy 20:16f). So, as two conservative scholars write: “We have a deep problem to grapple with”3 to which “there is no easy or simple solution”.4 Some explain the slaughters away as fiction and propaganda (the archaeological evidence for them is thin), but the attribution of them to God’s initiative remains. There may be better, if harder, ways to approach the problem while also acknowledging the historical framework of the Israelites’ invasion of Canaan.
The historical context
From 2000BC onwards the near east was a permanent war zone. Independent tribes vied for scarce living space, water and pasture. Immigrants were brutally repelled. Given that the loose confederation of 12 Israelite tribes were returning to the homeland of their patriarch Abraham, they had little choice but to fight their way in. It was kill or be killed. It is hard to see how they could otherwise have become a (relatively) cohesive community there.
How many they killed is debatable. The bald figures suggest about 100,0005 but no-one is entirely sure how large numbers were calculated centuries before Greek scholars got to grips with maths. As archaeology suggests that the population was smaller than the figures given in the Bible, the extent of the slaughter may be similarly exaggerated. That doesn’t, of course, justify any, but it may suggest that we’re not looking at such large-scale genocide.
Then there was a mental outlook we find impossible to identify with today. All peoples at the time believed that God (or, in most cases, the gods) determined the fortunes of the tribe which paid its religious dues. The Israelites were no different. Success was seen as divine favour; failure as divine disapproval. It was fatalism: what is, is what God decrees. The Israelites were immersed in their contemporary and brutal culture. God is a craftsman who can make silk purses out of sows’ ears. The raw material he began with was raw indeed.
The theological context
The OT isn’t primarily a history book; it’s a religious book. It contains a selective account of key incidents in the Israelite story but its primary message is that there is one God (most other tribes believed in multiple gods) who is “holy” (that is, he expects disciplined human lives not selfish indulgence). It traces the development of the Israelites’ theological understanding as it changed over time. This is crucial. God did not impose on or reveal to the early Israelites principles which were later explained by the prophets, Jesus and the apostles, just as he never imposes himself on people unwilling to believe or behave.
Conservative scholar Leon Morris wrote, “There is progression in the Bible. Earlier revelation is filled out by later. We must not expect to find the full revelation at the earlier time.” He refers to John Stott’s example of an artist’s preliminary sketch: “The sketch is not the final shape. But it is adequate at the stage at which it is produced.”6
This may be a matter for regret to us but it is consistent with the way in which God deals with individual people oin their journey to and in faith. He accepts us as we are (“Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling”) and sets us on a life-long path of discipleship in which we learn (often slowly) to implement the ideals of godly living as part of a transformation process. Most fail; some spectacularly and even scandalously (as did the Israelites), but God never gives up on us. Enter my recent reading.
Stephen Pinker’s tome on the history of violence comes to a surprising but statistically underpinned conclusion: “that violence really has gone down over the course of history”. He shows that as tribes settle into larger communities, as government becomes more centralised, and as legalised brutality (witch hunting, slavery, duelling etc) was outlawed, so violent deaths decrease.7 Even blips such as the First World War resulted in fewer violent deaths per 100,000 population than when tribal warfare ruled the world.
That tallies with the Old Testament narrative as early Israelite aggression under Joshua gave way to peaceful co-existence under Solomon, followed by periods of civil war and defence against invasions of superpowers who wished to control Judea as an important buffer and highway.
My second book was William Young’s novel The shack, the story of a man battling with God over tragedy and guilt. It has two key messages. One is that God neither plans nor initiates evil things, but is great enough to weave out of the chaos of human society something positive and good. The other is that we may not yet be able to see what that good is; God doesn’t answer all our questions (and our minds are too small to be able to comprehend the answers) but he asks for our trust that it is and will be so. Our judgement of his apparent actions and the cause and meaning of our circumstances is likely to be flawed.
So why did God apparently endorse genocide? He got hold of a group of tribes in their cultural context and began to shape them into something different over a period of centuries. He revealed that he is not an indulgent sugar-daddy but a parent who sets boundaries for his charges (as in the Ten commandments and ceremonial laws). Their battles showed that there is a spiritual war against superstition and wrong-doing (the Israelites had a paranoiac fear of the dilution of their faith by accommodating other gods). And he travelled with them on their error-prone journey from crude religiosity to the moral high ground of the sermon on the mount, from fearful nationalism to the warm embrace of all humanity through faith in Christ and reformation of manners through the Holy Spirit’s transforming presence.
Seeds of change
There is one more important matter to note. The OT is not “one long celebration of violence” as Pinker claims.8 There are signs early on that this was not God’s preferred way or ultimate interest. On the night before his successful defeat of Jericho, Joshua was confronted by an angelic warrior. Joshua asked whose side he was on; “neither”, came the reply (Joshua 5:13-15). Justice does not support “my country right or wrong”. Later OT history shows how God removed his support for the erring Israelites.
The Israelites also had rules of engagement they were meant to follow. They were to show compassion to foreigners and offer peace before attacking, neither of which were normal practice at the time (Deuteronomy 10:17-19; 20:10-15). They were to decommission captured chariots (the OT equivalent of fighter jets) by laming the horses that pulled them (Joshua 11:6-9) and to respect the environment when conducting a siege (Deuteronomy 20:19f). And like people everywhere, they looked forward to a time when war would cease and all humanity live together in peace (eg Isaiah 2:3-5).
In other words, the God revealed in the New Testament has left traces of his presence and purposes in the Old Testament. His ways are still beyond comprehension. But this hard question about the past need not be a barrier to faith in the present.
Think and talk
1. Look up these NT passages to see what they say about God’s progressive revelation:
Matthew 5:17-48 (notice the repeated references back to the law); Galatians 3:24, 4:3f (compare this to the sentiment of 1 Corinthians 13:11); Hebrews 1:1-3; 11:39f; 1 Peter 1:10f.
2. Progressive revelation does not annul the principles that can be found in the OT. See 2 Timothy 3:16 and 2 Peter 1:20. How might we distil timeless principles from the time-bound events of the OT – what questions should we ask of OT passages as we read them?
3. When tragedies happen, people often ask, “why has God allowed this?” From what you have read here, how might you begin to approach this issue?
4. God in the OT is sometimes depicted as stern, while God in the NT is pictured as soft. Look up Deuteronomy 7:7-11 and Hebrews 10:26-31 and discuss the similarities and differences.
References
1. Interview in Christianity magazine, March 2012.
2. Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, quoted by Giles Whittell, The Times Magazine, 7 September 2013
3. John Wenham, The goodness of God, IVP 1974, p.120
4. Richard Hess, Joshua, IVP 1996, p.42
5. Matthew White, Atrocitology, Canongate 2011, p.192
6. Leon Morris, I believe in revelation, Hodder & Stoughton, 1976, p.139
7. Stephen Pinker, The better angels of our nature, Penguin Books 2012, p.xx
8. Stephen Pinker, ibid, p.7
