When the Bible is Wrong about God

There are several places in Scripture where we find worshipers of God ascribing rather shocking things to him.(1) Consider a few examples:

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me,
so far from my cries of anguish?" (Ps 22:1)

"O LORD, you have seduced me, and I am seduced;
you have raped me, and I am overcome." (Jer 20:7; see my blog on this verse, here)

"You [Yahweh] are to me like a deceptive brook, like a spring that fails." (Jer 15:18)

The Psalmist says God abandoned him; Jeremiah says God seduced and raped him, and elsewhere says God is deceptive and fails him.

In many other places in the Hebrew Bible, however, we are told that Yahweh's "steadfast love endures forever." We are told, "the LORD will not reject his people; he will never forsake his inheritance" (Ps. 94:14), and "he will not abandon you" (Deut 4:31). Not only will he never forsake or reject his people, but they cannot escape his presence. He is always near:

Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,
even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
and the light become night around me,”
even the darkness will not be dark to you;
the night will shine like the day,
for darkness is as light to you. (Ps 139:7-12)

This is just a brief sampling. So much of the Bible claims that God does not forsake his people. Furthermore, the Bible claims that God cannot lie or fail or do wrong. Jeremiah says Yahweh is "like a deceptive brook, like a spring that fails," but we are told elsewhere that Yahweh "does no wrong," "he does not fail" (Zeph 3:5), and "he does not lie" (Num 23:19; 1 Sam 15:29).

We don't even need these verses to know that God does not abandon, lie, fail, or do wrong. We understand that it may often seem like he has done so, but we know that we should recognize his unfailing steadfast love and faithfulness. As 2 Timothy 2:13 says, "If we are faithless, [God] remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself."

We can abandon God, lie to him, fail him, do wrong to him, but not the other way around. And yet some of God's followers stood before him and accused him of doing so.

When we encounter such passages, we instantly know what's going on. They feel like God has abandoned them. It seems like he failed them or lied to them. It seems like he did them wrong. That was their experience, and they were being honest about that experience. They weren't going to tone down their inner turmoil.

Those who lament in the Bible show us that doing so is not unfaithful to God, or sinful, but genuine and good. That said, in those examples we can see that their theology wasn't always 100%, especially when they started making claims about God that we know from other parts of Scripture (and they probably knew as well) were flawed.

I suggest this is how we should think about the violent portraits of God in the Bible.

Consider the following passages:

"When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations . . . and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy." (Deut 7:1-2)

"The LORD our God delivered [Sihon] before us; and we smote him, and his sons, and all his people. And we took all his cities at that time, and utterly destroyed the men, and the women, and the little ones, of every city, we left none to remain." (Deut 2:33-34)

"Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, and all their kings: he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God of Israel commanded." (Josh 10:28-29)

"This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.’” (1 Sam 15:2-3)

These are just a few examples. There is plenty more divine violence all throughout the Hebrew Bible.

When we think of God speaking in the Bible, we think of it as an audible voice penetrating the world and being heard by whoever God is speaking to. In reality, it was probably much more like it is depicted in Darren Aronofsky's Noah. That is, servants of God interpreting events and/or dreams, feeling and thinking certain things as a response, feeling nudged in one direction or another, but ultimately following a mysterious God whose ways, plans, and thoughts are ambiguous and unclear.

As Walter Brueggemann says, "I do not make a distinction between the two modes of speech [speech about God and that which is spoken by God in the OT], because even where God speaks, the text is Israel's testimony that God has spoken so."(2)

We Christians take for granted the special revelation that we believe was given through Jesus. Jesus is God revealed. Jews do not have that. To the Jews, God is very mysterious and ambiguous. As Rabbi A.J. Heschel said, "God was concealed even when He revealed, [so] that even while his voice became manifest His essence remained hidden."(3)

Thus, the Bible to Jews is not clear and unambiguous full-disclosure of who God is. For Jews, one seeks to know God through what Brueggemann calls "ongoing disputatious interpretation" of events, of experience, of tradition, and of biblical texts.(4) This allows for the possibility that certain interpretations of such things are wrong.

It is my contention that the ancient Israelites were wrong when they ascribed violent commands and actions to God. As Peter Enns claims, "God never told the Israelites to kill the Canaanites. The Israelites believed that God told them to kill the Canaanites."(5)

Ezekiel 33:11 says God takes "no pleasure in the death of the wicked." Jesus said, "it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that any of these little ones should perish" (Matt 18:14). 2 Peter 2:9 says the Lord does not want anyone to perish.

There are many verses we could go through, but the main point is that other parts of Scripture say God is not violent, that God is not one who would enact genocide, killing men, women, children and animals. A lot of Scripture, especially Jesus, points to God as an agent of peace, condemning violence and challenging people to commit to peacemaking as he does.

Because of this testimony--and especially because it is central to the teaching of Jesus, who reveals what God is like for Christians--I suggest that we read the texts that ascribe violence to God the same way we read the texts that ascribe lies, failure, abandonment, and wrong-doing to God, acknowledging their flawed nature.

We should not feel like we are being unfaithful, heretical, or un-Christian to engage in such disputatious interpretation. Jesus did the same thing:

"You have heard that it was said, 'Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.' But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also." (Matt 5:38-39; cf. Deut 19:21; Lev 24:20; Ex 21:24)

"He sent messengers on ahead of him, and they went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make arrangements for him. But they did not receive him, because he was traveling toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, 'Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?' But he turned and rebuked them, and said, “You do not know what kind of spirit you are of, for the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them." (Luke 9:52-56; cf. 2 Kings 1)(6)

We would do well to follow St. Augustine's advice to reinterpret anything in the Bible that cannot honestly be deemed good and true:

Anything in the divine writings that cannot be referred either to good, honest morals, or to the truth of the faith, you must know is said allegorically. . . . Those things . . . which appear to the inexperienced to be sinful, and which are ascribed to God, or to men whose holiness is put before us as an example, are wholly allegorical, and the hidden kernel of meaning they contain is to be picked out as food for the nourishment of charity.(7)

While his allegorical interpretation of the violent texts has been found wanting, his point here is that we should engage in disputatious interpretation with the biblical texts, so that if they ascribe horrible things to God, we shouldn't just accept them as right and true but should find another way of looking at them.

It is quite challenging to begin to read the Bible this way, but I think we must. If we don't, we have an unsolvable problem on our hands, the problem of a God who can be as violent, atrocious and obscene as some of the worst sinners in human history. As Heschel said, "there are a few passages in the Bible which lead one to feel that God is not present in them; passages either too commonplace or too harsh to reflect the spirit of God."(8)

God does not forsake us, deceive us, rape us, fail us, or do wrong to us. And God is not violent; he does not command genocide or kill people. God is always with us, always trying to guide us to the truth, always faithful, always good. God is always love and is always seeking peace and trying to lead us to peace (1 Cor 14:33).

Anything in or out of the Bible that suggests otherwise should be recognized as products of the flawed and sinful world in which we live, and in which interpreting God's actions is difficult, often resulting in conclusions that reveal our flawed and sinful nature more than they reveal the nature of God.(9)

"Now may the God of peace . . . equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." (Heb 13:21)

Notes:
(1) I don't like referring to God as 'he', but it's easiest and we don't have a widely used gender-neutral pronoun. 
(2) Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997), 117.
(3) Abraham Joshua Heschel, God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1955), 193.
(4) Walter Brueggemann, Divine Presence Amid Violence: Contextualizing the Book of Joshua (Eugene: Cascade Books, 2009), 10.
(5) Peter Enns, The Bible Tells Me So: Why Defending Scripture has Made Us Unable to Read It (New York: HarperOne, 2014), 54.
(6) On this passage, see Dale C. Allison, "Rejecting Violent Judgment: Luke 9:52-56 and its Relatives," Journal of Biblical Literature 121, no. 3 (2002), 459-478.
(7) St. Augustine, quoted in Kenton L. Sparks, Sacred Word, Broken Word: Biblical Authority & the Dark Side of Scripture (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2012), 47-48.
(8) Heschel, 266.
(9) For more along these lines, see Sparks, Sacred Word, Broken Word.

3 Things You Need to Know About Divine Violence in the Bible

For the past 8 months now I have been reading every book I can get about divine violence in the Bible. So far, I've read about 20, and I have 5 more to go. In my reading I have been noticing a trend that I think is important to acknowledge when framing one's discussion of this topic. I think the issue centers around 3 vital components, which often go unnoticed in debates (see, for example, my review of 4 Views on God and Canaanite Genocide, here).

1. This is first and foremost an issue of the authority of Scripture

Is all of Scripture God's self revelation? Does every portrait of God painted in Scripture perfectly depict his true nature? Does Jesus repudiate any Old Testament theologies? Did the Israelites get anything wrong about God? These questions need to be dealt with first. How you answer them will determine what the rest of your approach is going to look like.

If Scripture is infallible, then that means none of Scripture's depictions of God are flawed. If you believe Scripture has God as its ultimate author, that every part of Scripture was willed and determined by God, then that means all of Scripture's theology is really God's self-description, and none of it is wrong. What is your view of Scripture? That will be the biggest deciding factor in your understanding of the issue of divine violence in the Bible. As Thom Stark has said, "In the end, the way one looks at these things and the manner in which one interprets these matters depends completely on one's theology of sacred scripture" (The Human Faces of God, 2011, p.150).

Too often biblical scholars have neglected this issue in their discussions of Scripture's violent portrayals of God. None of the contributors to 4 Views on God & Canaanite Genocide, for example, discussed this aspect of the problem in their respective chapters.

2. This is an issue of the historicity of certain biblical books

Related to the authority of Scripture aspect of this problem is the issue of whether or not the OT books are historically accurate. Did God flood the entire earth, killing most of its inhabitants? Did God toss the Egyptian warriors into the Red Sea? Did God deliver Jericho into the hands of the Israelites so that when they marched around the city and shouted its walls miraculously came crumbling down? Did God hand the Canaanites over to the Israelites so that they could defeat them in battle? How reliable is the OT history? If it is indeed historically reliable, and the battles happened exactly the way the texts say they happened, then it seems that we would have to say that God actually did do those things.

Furthermore, when the OT says, "Thus says the Lord," does it reflect what God actually said? Are such speeches of God historical? If so, we would have to admit that God did command Saul through Samuel, "Go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys" (1 Sam. 15:3).

Are all the battle stories in the OT accounts of actual historical events? How you answer this question will be a significant determining factor in your understanding of the larger issue.

3. This is an issue of how to interpret the book of Revelation

Often in their arguments for the continuity between the theology of the OT and that of Jesus, Evangelical scholars will refer to the book of Revelation, which seems to portray Jesus in the same violent manner in which God is portrayed in the OT.

I think this one is so important because if we were to base our understanding of the God revealed in Jesus solely on his teachings and example described in the Gospels, I think most Christians would recognize a discontinuity between the theology of Jesus and that of certain parts of the OT.

For example, when his disciples suggest that they pray for God to strike fire on the Samaritans for refusing to let them into their village, Jesus rebukes them and says, "You know not what spirit you are of, for the Son of Man has not come to destroy the lives of human beings but to save them" (Luke 9:55). Also, Jesus repudiates the OT teaching of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" (Deut 19:21; Ex 21:24; Lev 24:20) and taught that we shouldn't be violent but should rather engage people peacefully (Matt 5:38-39). Rejecting the way the Israelites dehumanized and hated their enemies (for example, Ps 139:21), Jesus taught that we should love our enemies and pray for them (Matt 5:43-44). Indeed, I think the dominant Christian consensus would be that Jesus rejected the violent theologies of the OT, if it were not for passages in the book of Revelation like this one:

I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war. . . . He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. "He will rule them with an iron scepter." He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. . . . Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to wage war against the rider on the horse and his army. But the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf. . . . The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur. The rest were killed with the sword coming out of the mouth of the rider on the horse, and all the birds gorged themselves on their flesh. 

Revelation 19:11-21

How do we interpret this passage? Do we take it at face value and interpret it to mean that Jesus is the same as the warrior God in the OT? How you interpret passages in Revelation like this will determine whether or not you think Jesus affirmed the violent theologies of the OT.

Recommended reading:
On the authority of Scripture with regard to divine violence, see Kenton Sparks, Sacred Word, Broken Word (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2012). See my review, here. Also see Wesley Morrison, "Did God Command Genocide?: A Challenge to the Biblical Inerrantist," Philosophia Christi, 11, no. 1 (2009). Finally, see my blog, "God-Breathed: The Authority of Scripture According to the Greek Word θεόπνευστος," http://jdhollowayiii.blogspot.com/2013/11/god-breathed-authority-of-scripture.html

On the historicity of the Old Testament, see K. Lawson Younger, Jr., Ancient Conquest Accounts: A Study in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical History Writing (Sheffield: Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 1990). Also see Victor R. Matthews, A Brief History of Ancient Israel (Lousville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002).

For a fantastic bibliography on the book of Revelation, see Greg Boyd, "Revelation and the Violent 'Pride-Fighting' Jesus," Reknew.org, http://reknew.org/2010/09/revelation-and-the-violent-prize-fighting-jesus/

Book Review: "Violence in Scripture" by Jerome Creach

Creach, Jerome F. D. Violence in Scripture. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2013. pp.xi-286. ISBN 978-0-664-23145-3. ★★★★★

After WJK Press completed their Interpretation commentary series, dedicated to providing "Resources for the Use of Scripture in the Church," they jump-started a special themes series to go along with it. Jerome Creach's Violence in Scripture is part of that series, and after reading it I am looking forward to reading the others. Creach is a well-rounded scholar whose study is enriched by early church fathers as well as the best of modern biblical studies, which he brings together quite nicely in his treatment of violence in Scripture.

With regard to the flood story, in chapter 1 Creach posits that, given its genre, it "was not meant to be read as an historical account. . . . [So], although the story portrays God making 'an end to all flesh' (Gen 6:13), it does not intend to say that God actually made an end to all flesh."(1) He says the flood narrative "is really about God's struggle to maintain creation in the face of humanity's spread of violence. . . . [D]ivine judgment amounts to the return of the precreation state in an attempt to correct creation and reestablish the order necessary for life."(2)

He essentially says the same thing of the narrative of the plagues. He follows Terence Fretheim in saying that Pharaoh is the "anticreator" who with his violent oppression is destroying God's creation and moving it towards a state of chaos.(3) He also follows Fretheim's analysis of the plagues, which he reads "as 'signs' of creation's rebellion against the Egyptians."(4)

In chapter 2, Creach addresses the warrior theology of several Old Testament texts. He says, "the image of God as warrior . . . is closely related to the picture of God as judge and arbiter of justice."(5) Therefore, war is understood as one of the ways God establishes justice in the world. Furthermore, Creach says that by "assigning war to God, as part of God's judicial actions, war is taken out of the hands of humans as a tool at their disposal. Any use of war for selfish purposes then becomes illegitimate. If this perspective is taken seriously it makes war extremely difficult to justify."(6) But doesn't that leave it open for war to be justified at times as the necessary action against a people that are moving God's creation towards chaos and rebelling against God's justice? For such scenarios, it seems that there would be no reason to reject the use of war. Yet Creach still maintains that, "Far from empowering any human being to engage in war, [the Bible] denies humans the right to fight. The battle is left to God."(7) Lori Rowlett rightfully asks, "Why would a deity who commands pacifism for his people engage himself in the slaughter of thousands of other people?"(8)

It is when Creach talks about herem in the OT in chapters 3 and 4 that his argument starts to become pretty unique. Of the Israelite war with the Amalekites, he says,

Whatever "history" lies behind the story in 1 Samuel 15, that history is now used for a larger religious purpose. The Amalekites do not represent so much real historical foes as the forces of disorder that threaten to undo God's creation. Thus the promise to eradicate the memory of Amalek must be understood against the backdrop of order and chaos.(9)

Elsewhere he says the Amalekites are "a prototypical enemy that represent the forces of evil."(10) So, the emphasis in 1 Samuel is not on a historical people that have to be destroyed, but the spirit and way that those people represented which Yahweh will not tolerate. Creach quotes Avi Sagi who said that the "war against Amalek is waged with the book," the implication being that it was not waged with actual weapons and violence.(11) Furthermore, Sagi says, "the 'remembrance' of Amalek [that must be destroyed refers to] a memory that encourages a way of relating to and controlling others through violence."(12) 

While I certainly see the value of this interpretation--and I think this is the message that should be drawn from the story--I don't think it can reflect the actual purpose of the text, nor do I think it properly addresses the theological problem--that is, that Yahweh is the kind of God that commands the death of "women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys" (1 Sam. 15:3). Creach resurrects the allegorical approach of early church fathers like Origen in a sophisticated and well-informed manner. Unfortunately, it still comes off as a weak way of dealing with the issue.

He does the same sort of thing with the account of Canaanite genocide in Joshua.

The story of placing the people of the land under the ban seems to have served [Josiah's] reform movement largely as an emblem of purification, but was not meant to be taken literally.(13) 

Josiah was not dealing with Canaanites in the land, but with his own people, who often practiced the worship of their God with elements of the worship of Baal and other deities (2 Kgs. 23).(14) 

"Canaanite" in Judges is a code word for the kind of society that works against God's intentions for shalom. Thus the charge for the Israelites to drive the Canaanites out of the land is really a charge to establish justice and to reject the death-producing society the Canaanites represent.(15)

This reading is more plausible than his reading of the Amalekite story, but it still falls short in my mind. Though he's right when he says that the purpose of the story was to support Josiah's reform and not necessarily to record actual historical events, the text still reflects an ideology of war and a theology of a divine warrior.(16) Gerhard von Rad denied historical reality to the so-called "holy war" narratives, but he still maintained that something like holy war went on in ancient Israel.(17)

I think the messages Creach draws from these narratives should be embraced, but only alongside of an acknowledgement of the incomplete theology within them. I think it is still necessary to reject certain elements of the text's theology, but Creach is reluctant to do so. He speaks of those who "separate the presentation of God as a warrior in the text from the real God . . . [understanding] the text as a flawed work, a relic of the past that naturally presents God in ways that are imprecise and culturally conditioned." Of such people, he says that "the complete separation of the real God from the textually embodied God seems misguided. Such an approach also overlooks the potentially positive role [the image of God as warrior] plays in Scripture and in Christian theology."(18)

This is somewhat of a straw man. Fretheim distinguishes between the "textual God" and the "actual God,"(19) but he doesn't then say that the image of God as warrior never plays a positive role in Scripture or theology. There is nothing wrong with imaging God as a warrior, as long as we say he is a warrior "against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms," and not against flesh and blood (Eph. 6:12). Indeed, I follow Greg Boyd's "warfare worldview" in which Christ is always working as a warrior against evil,(20) but that doesn't mean I embrace all the images of God as a warrior in the Bible, particularly those which depict God as violent.

Creach's reluctance to reject certain OT theologies is made clearer when he talks about Jesus and the New Testament in chapter 7. He says, "Jesus did not offer a corrective to Old Testament ideas . . . , it is most accurate to say that Jesus presents for Christians a normative interpretation of the Old Testament, not a repudiation of it."(21) However, he seems to contradict himself on this point. He has a great discussion in chapter 6 about the relationship between 2 Kings 1:9-12, in which Elijah calls down fire from heaven upon his enemies, and Luke 9:51-55, in which Jesus rebuked his disciples for suggesting that they call to God to send fire to consume the Samaritans. He says that Jesus' message in Luke 9 is unambiguous: "Jesus seems clearly to repudiate Elijah's actions" (emphasis mine).(22) But 2 Kings 1 does not merely describe Elijah's actions, it describes God's actions as well. So for Creach to make this claim, he has to admit that Jesus is calling for his disciples to reject a certain OT theology. Creach instead claims at the end of the book that the OT does not contain "instructions and stories that have values that Jesus then rejected."(23) These are conflicting claims.

I wish I had space to cover some of the other topics Creach covers in the book. For example, he includes a phenomenal discussion of hell in chapter 6. In a well-rounded and nuanced manner, he makes the case that the Bible leaves the door open to the possibility that hell is not forever, and that Jesus will seek the reconciliation of its inhabitants after death. His presentation is not only compelling but also much-needed.

Overall, this is an incredibly informative book for a Christian studying violence in the Bible, particularly the OT. While the title is "Violence in Scripture," I was disappointed to find that it includes very little discussion of violence in the NT. Notwithstanding, I definitely recommend the book to those interested in the topic. It is a good resource for all readers--student, pastor, scholar, whatever--and its insights go beyond the topic of violence, as Creach supplies important and illuminating discussions of a number of biblical topics, accompanied by a fantastic bibliography.

Notes:
(1) Creach, 36.
(2) Ibid., 34.
(3) See Terence E. Fretheim, Exodus (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1991).
(4) Creach, 82. Also see, Terence E. Fretheim, "The Plagues as Ecological Signs of Historical Disaster," Journal of Biblical Literature 110, no. 3 (1991), 385-396.
(5) Creach, 56.
(6) Ibid., 58.
(7) Ibid., 238.
(8) Lori L. Rowlett, Joshua and the Rhetoric of Violence (Sheffield: Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 1996), 68.
(9) Creach, 93.
(10) Ibid., 89.
(11) Avi Sagi, quoted in Ibid., 95.
(12) Sagi, quoted in Ibid., 96.
(13) Ibid., 98.
(14) Ibid., 108.
(15) Ibid., 131.
(16) See Niels P. Lemche, The Canaanites and Their Land: The Tradition of the Canaanites (Sheffield: Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 1991), for the case that "Canaanite" is code for "Assyrian."
(17) See Gerhard von Rad, Holy War in Ancient Israel, trans. and ed. Marva J. Dawn (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1991).
(18) Creach, 48.
(19) See Terence E. Fretheim, "Is the Biblical Portrayal of God Always Trustworthy?" in The Bible as Word of God in a Postmodern Age (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998), 97-111.
(20) See Gregory A. Boyd, God at War: The Bible & Spiritual Conflict (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1997).
(21) Creach, 229.
(22) Ibid., 159.
(23) Ibid., 238.

Purchase Violence in Scripture on Amazon (here)

Book Review: "A History of Modern Scholarship on the Biblical Word Herem" by William Lyons

Lyons, William L. A History of Modern Scholarship on the Biblical Word Herem: The Contributions of Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., Peter C. Craigie, and Tremper Longman, III. Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2010. pp.i-219. ISBN 978-0-7734-3834-7. ★★★★☆

I should begin this review by stating that Dr. Lyons was a professor of mine at Regent University. I had four classes with him, and he was my favorite professor. Beyond that, he has counseled me on academic papers, as well as on the next steps of my academic career, and we have maintained a friendship since my first semester at Regent, one that continues to strengthen. He even guided my wife and I through marriage counseling and officiated our wedding. Given our relationship, it would be very easy for me to just sit here and pat him on the back with a 5-star review singing his praises. However, if you know me, you know that I can have a close relationship with people while also being openly, even harshly, critical of their views. And I think you'll find that Dr. Lyons--though his teaching was a milestone in my life and was monumental to the development of my thinking, my research and my writing as a student--is no exception to the honest scrutiny and criticism that I put into my analysis.

The purpose of Lyons' book is to provide an overview of the work of three evangelical Old Testament scholars, Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., Peter C. Craigie, and Tremper Longman, III on the issue of warfare in the OT, particularly that of herem. Their work, as well as the work of scholarly evangelicals in general, has largely gone overlooked, and so Lyons lends focus to them and their claims, as he himself is an evangelical OT scholar.

He starts the book by outlining the major claims of evangelicals, one of which is the unapologetic belief in the Bible as the infallible word of God. For example, Longman refers to "the fact that the divine Author stands behind all of Scripture" (emphasis mine).(1) Lyons also quotes Mark Noll, who said that for evangelicals, "where the Bible speaks, God speaks."(2) In this, all of Scripture is God's self-revelation, which leads Longman and other evangelicals to see the whole Bible "as a single writing that presents an internally consistent message."(3) I would like to ask him what leads him to think that the Bible has God as its author, since such a claim is not made anywhere in Scripture.

What I find problematic about the divine authorship understanding of Scripture is that by embracing it, a multitude of conclusions are automatically made about the text before dealing with the evidence. For example, when the Bible says that God told Saul, "attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys" (1 Sam 15:1-3), before studying, say, the other ancient near eastern cultures that claimed their wars were also divinely commanded, an evangelical will say that God did indeed command such horror, because he/she is already committed to that view of Scripture. The God revealed in Jesus Christ has to be exactly like he is described by the authors of the OT, because the Bible was written by God and offers a single, consistent theology. Thus, conclusions are made before examining the evidence (which probably has something to do with why evangelical scholarship has been overlooked).

Not only is this, to me, flawed investigation, but it also creates problems for the evangelical mind, as evidenced by the fact that Kaiser, Craigie, Longman, and Lyons all inadequately address the theological problem of divine violence. They all provide what I consider to be pat answers, as they essentially appeal to either mystery, God's wisdom and righteousness, or the evil of the victims of his violence. But what other response could they provide given their view of Scripture?

I find Longman's approach in particular to be troubling, as he seems to dehumanize the war narratives of the OT. Lyons criticizes him for not addressing the problem of divine violence in his book God is a Warrior (see my review here). Longman addressed this to Lyons by saying that the book was "an exercise in biblical theology, not ethics,"(4) as if God commanding genocide isn't a theological issue! What is troubling to me is that when he was asked by Lyons "Is herem moral?" he responded in the affirmative, because "If it is initiated and directed by God, it is moral. God defines morality."(5) If something is immoral, it shouldn't be moral just because God does it (I think of Nixon's words to David Frost: "If the president does it, it's not illegal"). Such a definition of morality makes morality completely relative, and thus meaningless. If we cannot say that something as terrible as genocide is immoral, then what can we say is immoral? Lyons would probably describe my assessment as a desire for a "kinder, gentle God." Sure, if all it takes to be a kinder, gentler God is to not kill women and children, then, yes, I do believe in a kinder, gentler God!

My favorite of the three scholars Lyons discussed is Peter Craigie, who acknowledged the unholy nature of war in the OT: "Can the ruthless requirement for the extermination of the enemy--men, women, and children--in anyway be regarded as holy? I think that it can not!"(6) Unfortunately, rather than letting this lead to questioning his expectations of Scripture, he settles for a strange dualism between God's activity and God's moral being, that essentially amounts to saying that God did and did not participate in the violence that is ascribed to him.(7) Lyons is right to critique his approach.(8)

With his book, Lyons points out what is being ignored in the OT academic community, that is, the scholarship of evangelicals. His overview is comprehensive and informative, and he includes insightful appendices and footnotes. For the evangelical studying the OT's war material, or for those interested in the overlooked sides of the topic of war in the OT, this is a great resource.

Notes:
(1) William L. Lyons, A History of Modern Scholarship on the Biblical Word Herem: The Contributions of Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., Peter C. Craigie, and Tremper Longman, III (Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2010), 128.
(2) Ibid., 13.
(3) Ibid., 134.
(4) Ibid., 158.
(5) Ibid., 154.
(6) Ibid., 107.
(7) Ibid., 117.
(8) See Ibid., 174.

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Book Review: "War in the Hebrew Bible" by Susan Niditch

Nidith, Susan. War in the Hebrew Bible: A Study in the Ethics of Violence. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. pp.3-180. ISBN 978-0-19-509840-4. ★★★★★

In War in the Hebrew Bible, Susan Niditch provides an overview of the diversity of ideologies and practices of war in the Hebrew Bible. Specifically, she goes over seven types of Israelite warfare:

the herem (placing under the ban, devoting to total destruction) as God's portion, in which total annihilation of the enemy is practiced as a sacrifice to God; 

the herem as God's justice, in which total annihilation of the enemy is necessary for the preservation of holiness in Israel due to the evil of the enemy; 

the priestly ideology of war in Numbers 31, in which virgin women are spared because they haven't been defiled/marked by the enemy; 

the bardic tradition of war, in which war and warriors are glorified as noble, and a kind of chivalry and respect towards enemies is developed; 

the ideology of tricksterism, in which the weaker community of Israelites use deception to outwit the more powerful enemy; 

the ideology of expediency, used by Israel when they possessed considerable power, is a more brutal war tradition in which violence knows no bounds and emphasis is placed on going to whatever lengths to get the job done; 

and finally, the ideology of nonparticipation is that in which the Israelites do no fighting, but Yahweh is the sole agent warring and bringing victory on behalf of Israel.

With these categories, Niditch offers a helpful schema for studying the Hebrew Bible's war traditions. Although, it might have been better arranged in a somewhat more chronological order, with regard to Israel's history. While I understand the difficulties of developing a timeline for Israel's development, and while the arrangement she has provided flows well ideologically, it might have been more helpful if Niditch provided a progression of thought in Israel's history. For example, she places the ideology of nonparticipation (in which the Israelites sit back and watch as God does all the fighting for them) at the end of her book, even though this war tradition is the kind found in the earliest textual example of war in ancient Israel, that of the victory at the Red Sea in Exodus 15.

While the book's sub-title is "A Study in the Ethics of Violence," it might have been better as, "A Study in the Israelite Ethics of Violence." I would have appreciated more input from Niditich's own approach to the ethics of violence. Hints of it are present in the text, but it mainly consists of Israelite approaches to the ethics of violence--which, of course, is absolutely necessary to the book, but I don't think it should have taken focus away from Niditch's own views.

That being said, this is an essential study for the student of the Hebrew Bible, and definitely the student of the Hebrew Bible's war material. Niditch's analysis offers a very informative and helpful overview of the war traditions of ancient Israel. While an even more thorough analysis would have been even more informative and helpful, what I found with War in the Hebrew Bible is the best overview on the subject I have read so far.

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Book Review: "God is a Warrior" by Tremper Longman & Daniel Reid

Longman, III, Tremper and Daniel G. Reid. God is a Warrior. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995. pp.7-224. ISBN 978-0-310-49461-3. ★★☆☆☆

In God is a Warrior, Tremper Longman, III and Daniel G. Reid provide an overview of the warrior theology in the Bible, particularly geared toward evangelical Bible students. The first half of the book is dedicated to describing the Old Testament's warrior theology, and the second describes the warrior theology of the New Testament. One has to read between the lines to get at what Longman and Reid are suggesting, but what one finds is a conservative evangelical take on the Bible's depiction of God as a warrior. Essentially, Longman and Reid provide that all of the Old Testament's claims about God's militant nature are echoed in the New Testament: "the Lord of the second covenant is the same as the Lord of the first" (p.188).

The most pervasive problem with the book is its lack of dialogue with opposing or alternative views. This is most likely due to the fact that the purpose of the book is to inform evangelical students about the Bible's depiction of God as a warrior. Even so, one should not teach by telling the learner what to think. In order for students to actually learn, they have to be presented with differing viewpoints.

An alternate view which Longman and Reid could have benefited from entertaining is that of T.R. Hobbs in his book A Time for War. He affirms that the New Testament echoes in a lot of ways the warrior theology of the Old Testament. The main difference is that Hobbs understands the New testament as transforming that theology, instead of simply affirming it: "the key to understanding [Jesus'] ministry, his message and his death and eventual resurrection, is the transformation which popular and traditional concepts undergo in his teachings."(1) To say that the New Testament utilizes a lot of the same warrior language that the Old Testament used is not to say that the NT affirms everything about the OT's warrior theology. As Hobbs suggests, it would be better to see the transformation that the warrior theology undergoes in the NT.

Ironically, Longman and Reid outline quite well the transformation, without acknowledging that it is indeed a transformation. In most of the discussion of the OT warrior God material, Longman and Reid go over the enemies of Israel that become God's enemies. In the OT, God was a warrior against flesh and blood. However, in all of their discussion of the NT warrior God material, God is a warrior against the principalities and powers, against evil, against chaos. I think an essential and radical claim that the NT dares to make is that Yahweh is not a warrior "against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms" (Eph. 6:12).

Another essential element that Longman and Reid miss is the new way of doing battle revealed in the NT. In the NT, victory is achieved through self-sacrifice, not coercive force. The Cross reveals the true nature of God's warrior activity, and it is echoed in Revelation, in which, "The Messiah has certainly won a victory, but he has done so by sacrifice . . . [and] the people of the Messiah . . . share in his victory, but do so similarly, by sacrificial death rather than by military violence."(2)

As an overview of the Bible's warrior theology, Longman and Reid's book is informative, but no more-so than other books on the subject. Furthermore, their lack of dialogue with opposing views, and their argument's (perhaps consequent) lack of nuance makes this book second-rate.

Notes:
(1) T.R. Hobbs, A Time for War: A Study of Warfare in the Old Testament (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1989), 230.
(2) Richard Bauckham, "The Victory of the Lamb and His Followers," in The Theology of the Book of Revelation, ed. James D.G. Dunn (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 74, 77.

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Book Review: "Sacred Word, Broken Word" by Kenton Sparks

Sparks, Kenton L. Sacred Word, Broken Word: Biblical Authority and the Dark Side of Scripture. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 2012. $13.51. pp.ix-180. ISBN 978-0-8028-6718-6. ★★★★★

In just over 150 pages Kenton Sparks has addressed the controversial topics of biblical authority and the dark side of Scripture. The result is a book I cannot recommend enough. His treatment of these topics is concise, well-informed, diverse in its considerations, and actually quite profound.

Sparks highlights the Bible's theological diversity, as well as the presence of divine accommodation in Scripture (one of the reasons for theological diversity). He also covers well the difficulties in moving beyond the Bible to theology, bringing one almost to despair, but then to revival with sagacious recommendations for how to construct theology realistically and wisely.

Sparks makes a good case for Christ's 'redemption' of certain Hebrew Bible ideologies, without falling into supersessionism, and without stinking of Enlightenment arrogance. The significant accomplishment of this should not be minimized. He also does a good job of backing his views with church fathers, rendering his discussion not only thought-provoking, but also historically enlightening, as he presented several quotes from several church fathers that most conservative evangelical Christians would be (at least somewhat) shocked to read. While certain comments of his might make him seem like a heterodox liberal, he again and again shows himself to be well within the bounds of orthodox Christianity.

Sparks establishes the problem of the dark side of Scripture quite well: "is it not a very deep paradox," he asks, "that the Shoah, in which Nazis systematically exterminated the Jews because of their religion and ethnicity, is mirrored so vividly by the Deuteronomic ban in Jewish Scripture, according to which Israel exterminated the Canaanites because of their religion?" (p.45). He goes on to say, "the Canaanite conquest would strike us as flagrant evil were it not a story from the Bible" (p.46). The severe problem we have with biblical stories like the conquest could not be captured better.

With this, Sparks suggests that "the problem of scripture is the problem of evil" (p.46). After summing up the problem of evil and its infection of God's creation, he exchanged the word 'creation' for 'written word' and 'Scripture', saying, "God's written word, which is good, nevertheless includes evil. But these flaws in Scripture should not be blamed on God but rather on humanity and its sinful, fallen state" (p.47). One should not go so far as to think that Sparks considers all of Scripture evil; but he does acknowledge that portions of the Bible reflect sinful humanity more than God's nature, because the Bible is a product of both God and humans; as Stephen Chapman said, biblical inspiration is "a cipher for a mysterious process of divine-human co-writing" (p.58). And wherever there are humans hands at work, there's a good chance the results will include imperfection and evil.

Included in the discussion of the effect of humanity's imperfection on Scripture was a list of Bible contradictions (pp.34-35), which could have benefited from diminution, as a few of them aren't that hard to explain, or aren't actually contradictions. He could have made his point perfectly well without those, or he could have included other, stronger ones. For example, he said, "We have a text that claims God is not willing for anyone to perish, and another that seems to say he predestines some human beings to eternal judgment (2 Pet 3:9; Rom 9:1-24)" (p.35). I rolled my eyes at this one, as it isn't an actual contradiction, like the differing accounts of Judas' death (Matt 27:3-8; Acts 1:18-19; see Sparks' assessment, p.33). The Romans passage does not say that God predestines some human beings to eternal judgment. It might 'seem' to say this to those who have had that interpretation presented to them, but the text itself does not imply it, so it in no way belongs in a list of Bible contradictions.

Also incorporated into Sparks' work was a fantastic discussion of epistemology in chapter 8, in which Sparks observes that "human capacity for knowledge is potentially adequate" (p.71)--humans can never actually know Truth with certainty. It was a chapter after my own heart, as I just recently wrote a blog making this same point (here). While it is a great chapter, the reasons for its presence were not made clear. Even when the discussion is referenced later in the book, the necessity of his elaborate assessment of epistemology struck me as without justification. It seemed like the chapter was part of a separate project that the author added in to this book because he felt it contributed to the discussion. However, Sparks did not explain this contribution adequately, as it did not not flow well with, nor seem relevant to, the rest of the book.

The last few chapters are not as captivating as the first chunk of the book, but they are still good chapters worth reading. They address practical matters of how we should approach interpretation and theology. While he provides fine advice in those three chapters, they end up being (perhaps inevitably) not near as interesting as the rest of the book, and one is left with an anti-climactic finish.

Sparks' assessment of the problem of the dark side of Scripture is by no means comprehensive, and he might be guilty of over-simplifying the solution. Much is still to be said about the nature of revelation, particularly with regard to the Hebrew Bible, as well as how we can deal with the utterly human and even evil parts of Scripture in a way that does not make the construction of biblical theology impossible, relative, or just too complicated. Much is also left to be said about what parts of Scripture should be considered the flawed results of sinful humanity. However, I do think Sparks has the right ideas that can guide further study. Out of all the books I've read so far that have wrestled with the dark side of Scripture, Sacred Word, Broken Word has the most to offer. I definitely recommend it.

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Book Review: Divine Presence Amid Violence by Walter Brueggemann

Brueggemann, Walter. Divine Presence Amid Violence: Contextualizing the Book of Joshua. Eugene: Cascade Books, 2009. $8.37. pp.ix-82. ISBN 978-1-60608-089-4. ★★★★☆

In Divine Presence Amid Violence, Walter Brueggemann tackles the question, "How could the God of the Bible mandate violence?" by talking about the nature of biblical revelation and using Joshua 11 as a case study.

Informed by Norman Gottwald's Marxist-like understanding of Israelite sociology, Brueggemann says that the city-states in Joshua 11 were "monopolies of socioeconomic, political power that [were] managed in hierarchal and oppressive ways" (15) and were propped up chiefly by their military power, their horses and chariots (Josh. 11:4), which "symbolize and embody oppression . . . [and] serve only to maintain the status quo in which some dominate others." So, he says, "Yahweh authorizes their destruction" since he is "the sworn enemy of such modes of power" (33).

Reading the book, this "contextualization" seems a little too easy. However, I think Brueggemann makes a pretty good case for this understanding of such cases of divinely sanctioned violence. That being said, I doubt it can be maintained throughout the Old Testament, for every instance of so-called 'holy war'. It also begs the question, Is violence justified if it disarms the powers of oppression? Or, better, Would Jesus condone violence if it disarmed the powers of oppression? For many, this is a simple question; but I think if we're honest enough, it isn't so easy. Brueggemann seems to think violence would be justified in such cases, as Yahweh's mandate was an "authorization for a liberating movement--which [was] sure to be violent, but only violent against weapons" (23, emphasis mine).

The question of divine violence is not the only one addressed in this little book; he also deals with the question of revelation, a topic about which he has a lot of insight. He says, "the canonical literature does not offer a settled, coherent account of reality; rather it provides the materials for ongoing disputatious interpretation" (10). The Israelites were also engaged in such disputatious interpretation, which Brueggemann says they did through memory (particularly that of the Exodus), a yearning for justice, and established leadership (27).

With this, he suggests that revelation in passages like Joshua 11 "is not self-disclosure of God," but a communal interpretation of events based on memory, yearning and leadership (35-39). Memory, because they learned from the Exodus that Yahweh is the enemy of oppressive powers; yearning, because Yahweh is the God of the liberation and justice that they so earnestly desire; and leadership, because of the chosen mediators of the presence of Yahweh, particularly Moses (see Josh. 11:12, 15, 20 and 23).

The question then becomes, Do we accept their interpretation of God's character? This is a question Brueggemann leaves open. He is not uncritical of Israel's theology, but he does provide a contextualized framework through which Joshua 11 can be studied that can make their theology seem less primitive. That this framework can be applied to all the holy war texts, as well as the other texts in which Yahweh sanctions violence, is what I doubt.

Overall, this is well worth the read. I recommend reading it before buying it to see if you want to keep it around; it's very short and can easily be read in one sitting. In fact, if one were to put it on normal-size paper, without the extra spacing between lines, it would be a long article rather than a book. I wish Brueggemann would have dedicated a more extensive work to this topic. He has the resources, and clearly doesn't mind writing (seriously, how does he write so many books?). It would have been beneficial if he had tackled several texts, instead of just the one. Nevertheless, it's a good read, and if Joshua 11 bothers you (and it should), Brueggemann can definitely help.

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Book Review: A Whirlpool of Torment by James L. Crenshaw

Crenshaw, James L. A Whirlpool of Torment: Israelite Traditions of God as an Oppressive Presence. Grand Rapids: Fortress Press, 1984. $15.26. pp.vii-128. ISBN 978-158983349-4. ★★★★☆

In this book, James Crenshaw covers five Hebrew Bible tales in which God subjects one of his creatures to a test that amounts to considerable oppression. These are: Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac, Jeremiah's confessions, the story of Job, Ecclesiastes, and Psalm 73.

The language used of God's activity in these stories is often over-stated by the author. For example, in assessing the "monstrous test" by a "fickle God" to his loyal servant Abraham, Crenshaw acknowledges that the story of Abraham and Isaac "stands at the liminal moment when human sacrifice ceases to commend itself as the proper means of expressing religious devotion" (p.26), but he doesn't entertain this as a possible motive for God's actions--instead, he resorted to making God out to be a monster. While the severity of the test has rightfully been emphasized, we should still be aware of the nuances present in the text.

Another example is that of his treatment of Job, which I found to be the least insightful section of the book. There, the story of Job is presented as purely between God and the man, where God is the enemy directly inflicting Job with terrible atrocities. Crenshaw severely downplays the presence of Satan (or 'the Satan') in the story, even referring to him as one of God's sons, who does nothing without divine approval (pp.58-59). He also leaves out any discussion of God's description of his battle with the chaos monsters. Surely in a section dealing with the theology of Job, Crenshaw would consider God's own response to Job!

Later in the book, in Crenshaw's assessment of Psalm 73, he says of v.22 ("I was stupid and unknowing; I was like Behemoth before you"), "Anyone who questions God's goodness presumes to know more than is accessible to mere mortals" (p.107). This is a concept I think he should have pursued further, especially in his treatment of Job, for this is the same conclusion Job came to after God unveiled to him the complexity of the universe, which is filled with cosmic warfare with chaos. The chaos monster theme is present in Psalm 73 as well, with the mention of Behemoth. Rather than fleshing out these vital portions of the texts, Crenshaw presents God as the main bad guy, the oppressive force in the narratives. In the case of Job, I think this is far from the truth.

The author of Psalm 73 learned in the process of writing the song that God is not the one behind everything. He starts out with an understanding that "faithfulness to God was rewarded by unrelenting suffering," that "God [had not been] good to the pure in heart" (p.103)--but then, his theology changes. Instead of God inflicting woe onto one of his pure-in-heart, now, "God was napping, for the world had fallen into the hands of violent people" (p.106). Then, another change occurs at the end with v.22, when he realizes that he, like Job, "spoke of things he did not understand" (Job 42:3), recognizing that the universe is more complex than he gave it gave it credit for. Crenshaw describes this process well, and I quite enjoyed this chapter.

The chapter on Ecclesiastes is probably the best scholarly work in the book, no doubt because Crenshaw is one of the leading scholars on biblical wisdom literature. His description of the spiritual state of the author was quite compelling and thought-provoking. As was his treatment of Jeremiah's laments, the brokenness and angst of which he captured quite well, and the content of which I never grow tired of studying.

Crenshaw also offers some good insights on moving beyond these stories to actual theology. He states, "the first principle of biblical faith is the assurance that God has crossed the chasm separating the finite and infinite, thus enabling creatures to recognize the holy," and the second is "the concession that all knowledge of God is partial" (p.77). For instance, he says there "is a fundamental difference between saying that God is an enemy and reporting that Job perceived God as an enemy" (p.116). With this, I wholeheartedly agree. Just because the experience of one of the Bible characters caused him to see God a certain way does not itself mean we should embrace that theology.

When this book was released, not a lot had been written about the intensely negative depictions of God in the Hebrew Bible. I think maybe Crenshaw wanted to break that spell by exploiting examples of such negative theology. What we find in his book is a pull-up-your-sleeves-and-dive-in treatment of such negative depictions. He is brutally honest--which might have been why he sometimes overstated his claims. Nevertheless, this book will force the reader to be honest about the text and wrestle with it, as he has done. I can't say it offers a resolution to the material, as he doesn't necessarily deny or affirm the theological truth of the oppressive traditions, but leaves the ambiguity there, settling for "a hidden God" (p.114). Such a conclusion does not lick the problem, but merely restates it.

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Book Review: "Yahweh is a Warrior" by Millard Lind

Lind, Millard C. Yahweh is a Warrior: The Theology of Warfare in Ancient Israel. Scottdale: Herald Press, 1980. $14.91. pp.11-232. ISBN 978-0-8361-1233-7. ★★★★☆

When I talked to a professor of mine about this book, he emphasized the fact that Millard Lind is a Mennonite and so, a pacifist. As a pacifist, he would only look at the warfare theology in the Old Testament in one specific light. While this might be true, it doesn't shine through completely in Lind's book. For the most part, Yahweh is a Warrior is an academic overview  and does not attempt outright to address the theological problem that the Ancient Israel's war material poses (except maybe in a comment here and there). Here, I will try to outline his overall treatment of the subject, and with that will provide what I think he might be suggesting as far as the theological problem is concerned.

First, Lind contends that the pre-Mosaic period as put forth in Genesis shows that early Israel was pacifistic (see chapter 2). I won't go into the specifics of his argument, but he basically provides that the violent historical events of this period are seen as wicked. Yahweh is not an agent of war or violence here. The exodus marks the drastic change in Israelite theology, where Yahweh becomes warrior and king; it "provides the fundamental paradigm of holy war in the Old Testament" (p.47). Furthermore, he shows throughout the rest of the book that the holy war narratives in the historical books (and probably the rest of Old Testament--he only covered the historical books) refer back to the exodus. The theology of holy war, then, was a theology inspired mainly by the exodus.

That being said, this was not without gradual changes. As Israel went along, more and more emphasis was placed on the human involvement in war; whereas, in the exodus, Yahweh was the sole agent. This shift in thinking comes to a particular fruition in the monarchical period:

The rebellion of Israel in demanding kingship was not that the people wished to take the next logical step in the chain of social development, but rather that the people wished to change their theo-political system of government for one that was 'like all the nations' . . . , towards autonomy from Yahweh. (p.127)

With this, human involvement in war started to overcome the theology of Yahweh as the lone agent of victory in battle:

In the old tradition a military crisis was responded to by a voluntary militia which depended for victory upon the intervention of the divine. Miracle was now [in 2 Samuel] replaced by professional army. The pathetic attempt to preserve the form of the ancient tradition only highlights the fact that this form was emptied of its real content--faith in the decisive act of Yahweh--and replaced by faith in the professional army. The shift is further emphasized by the fact that Yahweh is not mentioned once in the narrative. (p.118)

As an aside, his use of the word 'pathetic' is probably telling of his pacifism; he obviously doesn't approve. This can also be seen in a statement he makes early on: "If one truly believes in the promise of grace that God will give the land, then one has no need to take the way of works by fighting for it" (p.38). To use the word 'pathetic' is to not understand the way ancient Israel operated as a community. While he no doubt did understand this (and better than I do), we see here the pacifist talking and not the biblical scholar. While I agree with his general sentiment, I wouldn't say the attempt was pathetic. The nature of and the nuance present within Israel's cultural development does not support such a claim.

So, then, one could gather from Lind's treatment that Yahweh liberated Israel from Egypt by force, and from this, Israel developed a theology of warfare, in which Yahweh was always on their side fighting for them, looking out for their interests at the cost of the interests of others. Over time, maybe Israel became a little more honest with themselves, acknowledging that they were the ones waging war. Or maybe their priorities changed; they came to honor warriors above prophets, and armies above Yahweh. Whatever it was, we return to the initial pacifism that defined the pre-Mosaic period when we come to Jesus, whom Lind brings up in the very last page, probably to suggest a kind of supersessionism (p.174).

Lind's approach carries with it a few problems. 1) He relies too much on the historicity of many of the narratives he covers, including the exodus. 2) He relies too much on the documentary hypothesis, which, as far as I have come to see, is more ambiguous than he treats it. 3) He is too confident about the dates of events. His whole treatment of the warfare material basically relies on the timeline he has constructed, one that may or may not actually be accurate. 4) He does not address the question of Yahweh's actual involvement in the war stories of Israel. He doesn't seem to object to Yahweh's involvement in the exodus, and certain comments of his suggest that he does not accept Yahweh's participation in other war stories, like the conquest; but why not? If they are as historical as he treats them, why shouldn't we accept Israel's testimony?

Overall, I would not recommend Lind's book for someone casually interested in the topic of war in the Old Testament. Not that it isn't good, but it is very dense and quite technical. However, for the serious student of this material, do not overlook it. It offers a lot, not just for the study of Israel's warfare theology, but for several areas of Old Testament study.

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Book Review: The Problem of War in the Old Testament by Peter Craigie

Craigie, Peter C. The Problem of War in the Old Testament. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1978. $14.70. pp.7-125. ISBN 978-0-8028-1742-6. ★★★★☆

Working my way through books on the topic of divine war in the Old Testament, I come to Peter C. Craigie's classic work. Almost 40 years old, this book is still insightful and relevant. Craigie even makes note of the fact that Christians often teach their children the dire importance of abstaining from all things sexual, while war and violence are rarely stressed. Don't read Song of Songs yet, dear children, but reading violent war stories in books like Joshua is a-okay.(1) This observation of Craigie's is still quite apparent today.

The book is full of such astute observations, alongside a well-ground, well-nuanced, yet profoundly concise treatment of the Hebrew Bible's war stories. This is a breath of fresh air after reading Seibert's exhausting and repetitive 300+ page book (see my review here).

Craigie rightly emphasizes the seriousness of this topic, and of not taking it lightly. He wrote a good section on the abuse of the OT war tradition in Christian history, referring to many instances in which books like Joshua were used to justify horrid violence in the name of Jesus Christ.(2)

In his assessment of the divine war material, Craigie is honest about its implications, and equally honest about the the findings of scholarly research, like ancient near eastern parallels to the OT war narratives,(3) and even a striking comparison of the Israelite divine war tradition and that of Muslims.(4)

That all being said, I did not find all of his writing so well thought out. For example, in critiquing the progressive revelation approach to divine violence in the Hebrew Bible, Craigie says "the progression in revelation does not contradict or cancel out the earlier substance of revelation; it can only complement that substance."(5) This is not necessarily true. Sure, actual revelation could only be elaborated upon and complemented, but ancient Hebrew theology can be contradicted if their representation of God was not actual revelation of his nature. Given pieces of revelation to the mysterious puzzle of Yahweh, Isrealites could have filled in the gaps with their own ideology, no doubt shaped in large part by ancient Near Eastern culture. This is no critique of progressive revelation at all, because it doesn't deal with the actual claims of those who advocate the view.

Craigie's caricature of those who cannot accept the warrior portrait of God in the Hebrew Bible is also flawed, as he unfairly generalizes in a reductionist manner. He says,

the conception of God as Warrior may be said to be a primitive, pre-Christian notion; the Hebrews were simply identifying their God with war in the same way that other nations did at that time. They were, after all, an unsophisticated people (unlike ourselves!) with a course and lowly view of God, which was eventually to be outgrown in New Testament times.(6)

I cannot imagine a more simplistic over-generalization. He doesn't consider those that actually wrestled with warrior God images because genocide is a horrible thing to equate with the God of Jesus Christ. It often has nothing to do with being a superficial, chin-up, pseudo-sophisticated, pious aristocrat. Many of the ancient Hebrew portraits of God are simply terrifying, if we are honest with ourselves. Craigie does elsewhere acknowledge the need to wrestle with this material,(7) but his assessment of the people who wrestled with it and ultimately could not accept it is anything but sympathetic and nuanced.

Aside from an occasional statement, the book is overall quite solid, especially when he talks about ethics. His assessment of the problem the Hebrew warrior God presents to theology is not satisfying, but he himself said that he made no attempt to resolve the problem, but only sought to provide a framework with which further digging could be done,(8) and that he most certainly did. Even if one disagrees with aspects of that framework, it offers all useful tools for further study.

Easy to read, concise (I read it in 3 sittings), well-grounded and highly insightful, Craigie's work is essential to the study of war in the Old Testament. If you're interested in the subject, this is a fine place to start. 

Notes:
(1) See Craigie, The Problem of War in the Old Testament, 16-17 and 104-105.
(2) See ibid., 26-28.
(3) See his appendix, "War and Religion in the Ancient Near East," in ibid., 115-122.
(4) See Ibid., 25.
(5) Ibid., 37.
(6) Ibid.
(7) See ibid., 13-14.
(8) See ibid., 93.

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Book Review: Disturbing Divine Behavior by Eric Seibert

Seibert, Eric A. Disturbing Divine Behavior: Troubling Old Testament Images of God. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2009.
pp. xii + 347. $22.00. ISBN 978-0-8006-6344-5. ★★☆☆☆

I have recently started picking up every book that I can find about divine violence in the Old Testament (a probable Master's thesis). The first, thanks to my friend Matt for lending it to me, was Eric Seibert's Disturbing Divine Behavior.

Seibert does a good job explaining the importance of thinking rightly about God (or, at least, not thinking horribly about God), citing examples of people using violent depictions of God to justify their own violent purposes. He also provides a strong case that the ways of looking at disturbing divine behavior in the OT proposed in the past are inadequate and we are in need of a new perspective.

That being said, his suggestion does not provide us with anything better. He essentially makes the case that the narratives of divine violence in the OT are not actual historical accounts, and that Israel was operating under a flawed theological worldview; furthermore, Jesus shows us who God is, and that in many ways the way Israel thought of God is simply wrong and should be rejected.

I sympathize with this view to an extent. I understand the OT as consisted of the people of Israel trying to find out who God is, formulating different theologies as they go along. To the Jewish people, Yahweh is, in many ways, a mystery; and Jesus, for Christians, solves that mystery. So while I sympathize with this aspect of his argument, Seibert's perspective has problems.

For one, he spends too much time on the historical problem. The majority of his argument is spent defending a negative view of the "historical" narratives in the OT. This fails to address Walter Brueggemann’s focus, which is undeterred by historical criticism and deals mainly with Israel’s testimony about Yahweh.(1) Or as Peter Craigie says, "although the historical reality of the wars of conquest may perhaps be removed . . ., the theological ideal remains."(2) Saying it didn’t happen does not even begin to solve the problem.

I suspect he spent so much time with the historical question because of his audience, which clearly consists of undergrads and lay people; the way he writes, and the fact that most of the book consists of introductions to concepts, attests to this. He could imagine how difficult it would be for any normal, Bible-believing Christian to face his view of OT history. If this is a true assessment of his purpose, it is hard to imagine his attempt to be successful. In many places, Seibert is far too bluntly negative to inspire Evangelical Christians. Throughout the book, he says things that most church-goers would be shocked to hear. Peter Enns, in Inspiration and Incarnation, did a good job meeting Evangelicals at their level, and gently leading them to his understanding.(3) The same cannot be said of Seibert.

This leads me to the next problem with Seibert's perspective: his view is too minimalist to be adopted by even a good portion of Christians today. Does he really expect a lot of Christians to go along with a view that outright rejects most OT portrayals of God? They would be forced to discard views espoused in the majority of their canon. Seibert's perspective rides too close to Marcionism for it to be widely accepted in churches.

Another problem with Seibert's view is that it cannot provide anything for Jewish people. I can’t imagine a Jew being okay with any of the points Seibert makes, and I find it odd that an OT scholar like Seibert displays such a lack of regard for Jewish sentiments, as he demeans the ancient Jewish testimony about Yahweh, and is definitely guilty of supersessionism.

My final problem with Seibert's book is technical, rather than ideological. I can't tell if Seibert was, for lack of a better phrase, dumbing down his language, or if he just isn't a very good writer. I don't think I've read a book in which someone repeats phrases as many times as Seibert does. Also, he often included unnecessary asides to remind the reader of something that was not in need of reminding. For example, in a small section on the incarnation, he repeated again and again that Jesus was God incarnate, God in human flesh. At one point, I sarcastically asked my wife, to whom I was reading the book, "Hey, do you think he believes that Jesus is God incarnate? I can't tell." I often felt like this. (Also, he must have had a horrible editor; the book has errors on practically every other page.)

Despite its flaws, Seibert’s book does have many strengths: his recognition of the importance of facing violent passages instead of ignoring them, as well as the importance of addressing this problem appropriately, in a way that inspires good moral behavior and a consistent theology. Also, the fact that he faces the barbaric nature of many passages in the OT, rather than pretending that they’re not as bad as they are. He also assesses well the inadequacy of several other perspectives on this issue, and is refreshingly open to the findings of OT historical criticism (although, he may be going too far). Finally, I respect the amount of weight he puts on the need for a Christocentric hermeneutic. Disturbing Divine Behavior does not provide a bad assessment of divine violence, but it does provide another inadequate explanation. While this isn’t the most well-constructed argument, nor is it the most well-written book, it certainly offers a lot of good insight on this issue, and provides an angle that, at least, needs to be on the table.

Notes:
(1) See Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1997)
(2) Peter Craigie, The Problem of War in the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1978), 50.
(3) Peter Enns, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005).

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