What I Learned From Joshua and Judges

The best way to summarize what I feel about Joshua and Judges, and the entire Bible up to this point actually, is to share a little idea I had recently, which was inspired by the end of Judges. If I ever become a constant member of a church again, which is seeming more and more unlikely these days, but if I ever do I want to run an adult sunday school class entitled "Awful Shit From The Bible." See, this might be the wrong way to do things, but I've been approaching the Bible as I would a math text. Let me explain, I have my axioms, things we just have to assume before we even get down and dirty with this thing. Here's my axioms regarding the Bible: One: God exists, he created everything, and is a loving God, what "loving" means is up for debate, but all Christians would agree with this axiom, and before we can discuss any theology we have to assume it's true. Further it's something that cannot be proven in the traditional logical sense, hence it's an axiom. Two: the Bible is a God inspired text which is our ultimate moral handbook, whether God wrote it or not (he didn't) is up for debate, so is whether or not we should be read literally (we cant). All Christians would agree with this simple axiom as well, whether or not you consider the church a necessary institution for salvation, the Bible is the centerpiece of this institution. My whole life I was told this was our guide, our handbook, the word of God. Hell I was even told that if I had a problem in real life that I could find the answer in the "good book," in other words, many denominations feel that the Bible speaks for itself. So that God exists, is loving, and gave us a handbook (directly or indirectly) are really the only axioms that I have.

So what's the point of all this? Well with these assumptions, is it fair to assume that everything in the Bible is important? Many people would argue that it is, those who argue that the Bible is the pure unadulterated word of God would say that every single word in this thing is important. If you make this further third assumption then you have some hideous things to deal with. Hence the "Awful Shit In The Bible," if we believe everything in the Bible is important, then we have to have some serious discussions here. There's some awful shit in this book, and I refuse to sugar coat it, and I refuse to just overlook it and hope no one notices. No, if this is the word of God, and every little thing a part of our moral guide, then we have to attack these things head on, without fear, and without rose tinted lenses, it's our obligation. With these three assumptions, what is God telling us with the story of Lot and his daughters? What is God telling us with the Levite and his concubine? What is God telling us with Joshua burning, pillaging, and destroying all of Canaan for seemingly no reason?  There's some awful shit in this book, and if we want to be serious Christians then we have some serious talking to do about these things.

I personally don't make that third assumption, I actually can't, to me much of the Bible is a historical text, and like all historical texts a lot of it hasn't aged well, and like real life and any historical events, a lot of it is just awful and pointless (see World War One), and trying to find meaning in pointlessness is futile. The problem I'm left with now is what exactly can I take away as moral code in our modern world, and what is just pointless bullshit that can be shrugged off as a strange result of the times? Why should I follow the Ten Commandments when even Moses doesn't follow them? Oh and don't even fucking start, how is what Moses does ok? In my eyes it's still murder, the second you start making concessions for Moses the whole damn thing comes falling down and you start on that road to interpretation. Again I'm left with the same conclusion I've come to so many times before, and I'll share it again: You cannot take the Bible 100% literally, it's impossible. And if you do, then I have some very serious and very difficult questions for you.

Now I know what many of you are thinking, "Yes, the Old Testament is just historical and crazy, it's the New Testament where it's all about." That's nice, and I know that, but I'm approaching this without preconceptions (as best I can) and allowing the Bible to speak for itself. In other words, the Bible goes in a specific order and I imagine it's for a specific reason. And I can only base my thoughts now on what I've read so far in this book, hence the allusion to the math text earlier. I can only use the axioms and theorems already provided, I can't skip to the last chapter when I haven't even got the basics down yet.

What really kills me about all this is not even that I'm having to read through this awful stuff and that I have to deal with it personally. I'll get over it. I'm tough and smart, and I'll think and rant and discuss my way out of it (for better or worse). What really bothers me is that so many Christians out there wont even ask these tough questions. They're content to just believe what they're told, stuff they've been told since before they could even think for themselves, or before they could even think at all. Not only that, they've been tricked into thinking that even asking these questions is a sin. Hey, guess what, God gave us these big brains to use them, not to just let them waste away and fucking believe what we're told to. Asking questions is never wrong, never ever ever. If you've been tricked into thinking that even questioning your religion, your God, your priest, your church, or the Bible is wrong then you've been lied to, you've been indoctrinated. I believe that real religious beliefs come from some form of internal strife, if you don't struggle and fight with your inner self over these weighty topics then you're doing it wrong, and you're just a sheep believing whatever your preacher tells you is true. And you know what, if you go to hell just for asking tough questions, is this God really one you want to be associated with? Don't answer right away, think about that one for a while.

Now I know there's more to this than just fear of hell as far as the questioning goes. From what I've seen, so many Christians are scared to death of having their faith tested. Why? Every time I've wrestled with a crises of faith I've come back with stronger beliefs. An example of this is the number of times I've heard things like, "Oh I don't want to take Science classes because it will challenge my beliefs." So?! Challenging your beliefs is a good thing, and let me just say, you've really shown how confident you are in your beliefs by just saying that. I could go on all day about how science has strengthened my various other beliefs, how studying math has shown me evidence of some divine architecture behind the scenes (which is not to say that I believe in Intelligent Design, I'm with Evolution all the way). Now, I would have missed out on these profound beliefs if I hadn't taken science classes. But this isn't the post for that, maybe next time. Basically, not challenging your beliefs is a sign of weakness, a sign of not opening your mind to other possibilities, and a sign that deep down you're already certain that your beliefs are false. As if you can get tricked out of your life long beliefs by one Biology class, they might be challenged, you might actually have to fucking think about something for once in your life, but there's no tricks going on.

Ok, I've blathered on enough I think, and I haven't even talked about the violence yet, I guess I'll save that until some other day. So what did I learn from Joshua and Judges, and the whole Bible for that matter? Well I can answer that with a simple question: Is it ironic that the biggest crises of faith I've ever had has come from actually sitting down and reading the Bible? Funny that Science classes have, in the past, strengthened my beliefs while the actual word of God has soured them. Just something to think about I guess. Seems letting the Bible stand on its own doesn't let it stand very tall.