God Hates You, Hate Him Back: Making Sense of The Bible (14 page)

Usually when Christian or Jewish friends comment, “People should be free to believe what they want,’ I often cite the above passage with the words, “Yes, you are free to believe what you want as long as it doesn’t entail killing me.”

What I find particularly noteworthy in this text is the suggestion that the founding fathers of Judaism were not monotheistic because they are acknowledging the existence of other gods. The biblical authors don’t write, “Kill all the crazies that are wearing a hammer around their necks in honor of a make believe god called Thor.” Rather it says worshipping other gods, and we can trace this belief back to the Ten Commandments, whereby God says to Moses, ”Worship no other gods before me”. God first, other gods second, rather than, “There are no other gods”.

And if you are looking for some further inspiration for performing acts of genocide and ethnic cleansing against your neighbors for worshipping Payton Manning instead of God Almighty look no further than this:

This passage paints the picture of a salivating sociopath watching from above, rubbing his hands together gleefully as those that express their freedom to follow other religious doctrine are mutilated in the streets with all their belongings torched as a token of worship to him.

It would be a harrowing exercise to calculate exactly how many villainous tyrants have interpreted the preceding passage as justification for murderous rampage?

I believe by now we have dismissed any misguided hope that the three Abrahamic religions are built on principles of racial and ethnic equality, human solidarity and peaceful coexistence. By shining the spotlight of truth on these dangerous biblical assertions, the bible, once again, becomes an indictment against itself. We must not delude ourselves any longer that these are religions of good, as the evidence presented thus far is proof to the contrary.

Violence is not only reserved for those that ignore God’s commands or take his name in vain, but also those that disrespect his earthly representatives:

It seems odd to me that God goes to some length to describe some fairly whacky and obscure laws in this chapter. One being in relation to marrying a captive woman:

So much for romance, huh? Arguably this could have been decreed by God with a little more romance with the inclusion of the words, “Subject to her being mutually attracted to you too”. Just a little more thought here by God, such as the inclusion of the word ‘consent’, could have helped mitigate the justification that so many invading armies in later days used in systematically raping the conquered.

In the very next passage, God stipulates the ownership of first born children of a husband who is married with two women. I think I just heard a distant shout of ‘woohoo’ from Utah, just now. Seemingly, God doesn’t have a problem with polygamy anymore, which contradicts his earlier commands:

This seems highly problematic and complex. Why not just say, “You can’t have two wives”? Problem solved. Who’d want two wives, anyway? I wouldn’t. I don’t need to increase my failure in the bedroom by 200%.

Moving onto parenthood, the Bible proves once more that it should never, ever be used as a reference guide for model child raising, as God dictates his disciplinary methodology for handling a rebellious son. Warning: Do not try this at home with your teenager, no matter how tempted you might be.

What? Purge the evil from among you? How about not savagely killing your own son by throwing rocks at his head until his brains explode all over the dirt, because he was suffering a little teenage angst? For mine, the only way to purge evil is to purge this kind of religious thought from our consciousness.

The following law of marriage I do not want to include as merely a bullet point as it is exhibit #425 that religion is male gender constructed:

To make sure we are all on the same page here, the law is this: If you marry a woman and she turns out to be an absolute dud in the rack, then you can accuse her of being a ‘slut’ and humiliate her in front of her parents and the citizens of your town. A strange ‘get out of jail card’ for a man, as this follows the logic that a woman be a better performer in the bedroom if she were a virgin, as opposed to a woman who pole-danced at a Gentleman’s club for a living. Hey God, as a matter of personal preference, please give me just twelve porn-starlets in heaven rather than seventy-two virgins. Amen. P.S: I hate you.

Further, according to this law, if the bride’s parents can produce evidence that their daughter was truly a virgin at time of wedding (how one does this I will never know!), then the husband is forced to pay a fine of five shekels of silver to his father-in-law and she must continue to be his wife and he is not permitted to divorce her. However, if her parents cannot prove her pre-marital purity:

I am at a loss to describe the indefensible vulgarity of this male dominated law. Not only a despicable process for eradicating so-called evil, is it not enough to kill this hapless already traumatized woman, but to butcher her at her parent’s doorstep.

The fingerprints of man (gender) are on this law too:

Isn’t it ironic that religious apologists talk about their religion being one of forgiveness, redemption and love? From Genesis to Deuteronomy we have seen absolutely no evidence of this, only evidence that if God were true, then he indeed hates us all.

There’s the slam dunk! How fortunate for the poor young lass that is brutally raped by a male attacker that she gains a husband out of it – the guy who raped her. Furthermore, what of the penalty for the rapist? Fifty shekels, that’s all? God commands in Leviticus that a man must be put to death for fucking a goat, but a payment of only a few dollars for raping a young girl? A woman’s value is less than livestock in God’s eyes. I could really swap my wife for two camels and a goat!

This truly wicked book of thuggish laws sets forth a number of equally ghoulish and absurd doctrines, with a majority of laws governing agriculture, including:

I particularly like God’s CSI methodology for solving a murder case, in which the Lord tells Moses that if a is found slain, the suspect unknown and the jurisdiction unclear then the city elders are to measure the distance between the city gate and the , the nearest city is to then bring a cow that has never been worked prior. The cow’s neck is to be broken and its blood poured onto the murder site as atonement for the crime. God then commands the elders to recite the following at the scene:

The final and third sermon of Moses, in Deuteronomy, goes on to specify the blessings for the obedient and the curses for the disobedient. I am sure having come this far, you are rightfully anticipating a little lopsidedness on the gain versus loss scale.

Moses tells the Israelites that the following blessings will come upon you if you obey your Lord your God:

That’s it, really. That’s what you get for a life of complete serfdom to a malevolent, capricious, celestial dictator. Maybe it’s just me, but I’d be wanting a little more details as to ‘what’s in it for me’ before I grovelled on my knees for eternity to this guy.

Compare the blessing against the list of curses for the disobedient and it becomes obvious that God prefers motivating with the stick, rather than with the carrot, as pages of maniacal tirades are forthcoming that spell doom for the wicked, as stated in Deuteronomy 28:15-68: