The atheist Richard Dawkins wrote that: „The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriously malevolent bully.” /Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion, Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Co., 2006), p. 31./
It seems to be a characterisation based on facts, but it is not, because it judges events on the basis of a superficial characterisation. If he thinks the person is evil, then obviously his actions are evil. And he does not examine the background! If we know the person is not evil, we allow for a background check, look for the reasons and the whys behind the actions and make an objective judgement based on that.
It seems to be a characterisation based on facts, but it is not, because it judges events on the basis of a superficial characterisation. If he thinks the person is evil, then obviously his actions are evil. And he does not examine the background! If we know the person is not evil, we allow for a background check, look for the reasons and the whys behind the actions and make an objective judgement based on that.
Why does God seem so loving in the New Testament, but angry, harsh and vengeful in the Old Testament? Our problem is that we think as sinners and not as holy people. Consequently, our value judgments are distorted and flawed and short-sighted. To claim that God is evil or harsh is an attack on God's character, and every believing Christian should be prepared to respond to such attacks (1 Pet 3:15).
The God of character manifested Christ
God has given the answer about his own character in Christ, who says: "... he who has seen me has seen the Father; ... I and the Father are one." (John 14:9; 10:30) But not only they, but also we, if we are in Christ: "That they all may be one; as thou art in me, Father, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us:" (John 17:21) Accordingly, the character of Christ is a reflection of the character of the Father, for He is "the image of God.... the reflection of his glory, and the image of his reality." (2 Cor 4:4; Hebrews 1:3)
Can it be, then, that if one loves Christ, one does not love God the Father, the Most High God of the Bible, just because He has judged people and nations in the past according to what they have done to deserve it? If we did, we would question the legitimacy of divine judgment based on our own value judgments, and we would also question the justice and righteousness of divine judgment for the future, which is the fulfillment of the authority vested in Christ. Then the inspired statement would not apply to us: „There is no one in the Father who denies the Son. He who confesses the Son has the Father in him." (1 John 2:23) So either we affirm both to be true, or neither!
Did Christ have no knowledge of the judgments of God in the Old Testament? He must have known them. And he said of God, "I have much to say and to judge of you: but he that sent me is righteous;... And this world has not known you, but I have known you" (John 8:26; John 17:25)
Let us learn from Christ, then, that God is just - in spite of His judgments - not unjust - as some people mistakenly or erroneously and puffed up in themselves see it!
Paul says in Romans 3:4, "God is true, even though all men are liars. Thus says the Scripture, "But you, O Lord, are righteous in your words and triumphant in your judgments [be victorious when you are accused]" ( cf. Psalm 51:6).
Why is God angry in the OT? In the Bible, God is angry at human violence. He gets angry at powerful leaders who oppress other people. And what angers God more than anything else in the Bible is Israel's constant covenant betrayal.
It was not by chance that the false prophets who schemed to turn the people away from the True God had to be cut off in Israel: „But the soothsayer or dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has declared against the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, and delivered you out of the house of bondage, to turn you from the way which the Lord your God commanded you to walk in. Therefore cast out the evil from among you... For this is what the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, says: Let not your prophets that are among you deceive you, nor your soothsayers, nor give heed to your dreams which you dream. For they prophesy falsely to you in my name: I have not sent them, saith the Lord." (Deut 13:5, Jer 29-8-9)
Refuting atheist criticism
In the Old Testament, people were punished for the way they behaved. But at the end of days, people get the worst punishment ever: they are condemned for not believing something! I find that unfair.
The answer is: this critical attitude is based on a very narrow interpretation. It is not the lack of faith that condemns one, but what lies behind the lack of faith, namely that there is only one possible way for the planet to survive if everyone is obedient to the perfect guiding value. Non-belief expresses that it prefers, puts its own control first. The last six thousand years have shown where this leads.
Ephesians 4:17-18 These things I say, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the Gentiles walk in the vanity of their minds. Darkness has fallen on their minds, and in their ignorance they have become alienated from the life according to God, which is in them because of the hardness of their hearts,
The atheists' brazen claim is a huge fraud and hypocrisy. For in the background is a spirit of disobedience, a spirit of self-righteousness, of following a path and a way of life that suits their individual tastes. They will decide what path, what philosophy of life, what worldview they choose. What's it got to do with anybody!
But just go down to the waterfront to go fishing, say, when the inspectors show up, what will they look at? Not your nice-sounding philosophy, but whether you are abiding by the rules and regulations in force at the time. And if not, then a warning, a fine and a ban! And there is no appeal!!!!
God Almighty has also set the rules for the existence of the planet and will hold it to account. From the moment the foundation of redemption is laid, God gives a period of grace for repentance, during which time He does not judge man. That in contrast, He is called by some "a jealous and prideful; petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; misogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticide, genocidal, infanticide, plague-ridden, megalomaniac, sado-masochistic, capriciously malicious harasser"? /Richard Dawkins/ And many would agree.
We can experience that this is the case. However, they are absolutely wrong. For they too live on what they receive from God. The possibility of enjoying life is programmed into their anatomy. They live on a planet whose ecological structure and balance is very finely tuned. Even the two-layered sphincter of the human rectum is programmed into its anatomy to get to the toilet in time, if the need arises. Doesn't it make a difference to evolution that one poops under oneself from time to time? It doesn't matter! Just because you can practice a self-conscious atheist worldview and have a stain on your trousers doesn't affect your materialist views.
But God gives us something else - love, care and a wonderful hope for the future. The idea of discipline is used throughout the Old and New Testaments. The Lord is not an angry God who is ready to destroy things, but a loving Father who brings restoration. (Cf. Jer 18:7-10) Is it worth risking this by carrying in our hearts the image of a sevenfold vengeful God? Absolutely not. So let us seek to free ourselves from this compulsion by reading edifying things and learning to pour out the love we learn from Christ to others, especially to God, from whom we have received the unmerited riches, beauties and wonders of life.
And the seed of redemption, when it ripens in us, will transform our hearts, and then the globe, when, after God's just judgment, the image of a beautiful, undisturbed home will blossom, where it will be worth being born, worth living, because it will be guarded by the love of the true God for an eternity.
Judgement of the Amalekites and lessons learned
Atheist lead-up
How can those who interpret the Bible literally worship such an evil, cruel god who specifically called for the murder of children in his genocidal commands? (1 Samuel 15:3)
This poses a serious problem for some in understanding God's goodness. And if someone refuses to accept something that they think conflicts with their logic or sense of justice, not only does it not solve their problem, but it leads to more contradictions for them. For example, the question "Is there a God? - The Grand Illusion of Religion”, Richard Dawkins concludes that the children of Israel have committed 'ethnic cleansing'. Let us examine how valid this conclusion is.
For the Amalekite nomadic tribe in the story quoted, Israel was not a threat, as they did not want to take their land. Nevertheless, they attacked Israel from the rear when they had just finished crossing the Red Sea, were at their most vulnerable and Israel went to war with them. Israel was forced to fight their very first battle, fighting for their lives against the Amalekites, led by Moses. This gives some idea of what the Amalekites' methods must have been like.
They preyed on the weak, killed them and exploited them. Because of this and their many other sins, God vowed to blot them out of heaven "And the Lord said to Moses, Write this in a book as a memorial, and let Joshua know that I will blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven forever. And Moses built an altar ... and said, The Lord hath sworn that the Lord will fight against Amalek generation by generation." (Exodus 17:14-16) There was no injustice in God when He commanded this.
Background:
"... and they set up camp in Refidim. But the people had no water to drink... And the people thirsted there for water... Why hast thou brought us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?... And the Lord said to Moses, Go before the people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel, and take thy rod, with which thou hast scorched the river, in thine hand, and go. Behold, I will stand before thee upon the rock in Horeb, and thou shalt blow upon the rock, and water shall come out of it, that the people may drink... And Amalek came and fought against Israel in Rephidim." (Exodus 17:1,3, 5-6, 8)
[But they also made war against them on other occasions: Israel had many wars between the days of Moses and Saul, but never once did they attack the Amalekites. However, the Amalekites attacked Israel several times. They expressed their implacable hatred not only at Refidim, but also when the Israelites entered the Promised Land: cf. Numbers 14:41-45.
In Judges 3:13, the sons of Amalek join the Moabites in attacking Israel. In Judges 6:3, they invade Israel "when the Israelites have planted their crops", and with the Midianites "devour the produce of the land... and leave no food in Israel, neither sheep, nor ox, nor ass" (6:4). Later in Judges 6 and 7, they are again attacked, and Gideon fights them. Psalm 83:8 mentions him among those plotting against God's people. They threatened Israel continuously for about 1000 years. The Amalekites show that they are at war with Israel and God generation after generation].
"Remember what Amalek did to you on the road when you came out of Egypt: How he came upon you on the road, and smote the LATEST OF THE PEOPLE, ALL THOSE WHO WERE FORCEFUL, when you yourself were weary and faint, and did not fear God. When therefore the LORD thy God shall give thee rest from all thine enemies round about thee in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance, that thou mayest possess it, thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it" (Deuteronomy 25:17-19).
Who were the people in the back? Women /including pregnant women/, children and elderly. Tired and thirsty. King Saul, who did not fully carry out God's command, says, "And Saul said to Samuel, I have obeyed the word of the Lord, and have walked in the way which the Lord sent me, and have brought Agag king of the Amalekites, and have destroyed the Amalekites." (1 Sam 5:20) ... "Then Samuel said, 'Bring Agag the king of Amalek before me. And Agag came to him with compassion, and Agag said, Surely the bitterness of death is departed. And Samuel said, As thy sword hath made women childless, so let thy mother be childless over all women. And Samuel cut Agag in pieces before the Lord in Gilgal." (1 Samuel 5:33-34)
God has the right to judge! God is omnipotent and omniscient. Not us. When He wants something, He knows what is best, because He knows EVERYTHING. He Himself is the moral standard, so His commands are not arbitrary, but flow from His good and perfect character. We do not even know ourselves. How much more so to decide the life issues of our fellow human beings!
What He has ordered is an act of war in a conflict that was not started by the Israelites and that has never been resolved by negotiation. Here Israel was the instrument of divine punishment. Ultimately, God's judgment was based on the actions of the Amalekites.
God creates the law, but He is not necessarily bound by His law. For example, governments can print money, but everyone else is forbidden to print money! The same rules apply when the police break down the door of a house for justifiable reasons, which civilians cannot do arbitrarily because they are committing trespass. /Criminal Code Book 221§/ By what objective standard does anyone judge God in the Bible, but not those who kill millions a year by abortion?!
It's interesting that when there is evil in the world, whether it's Hitler and the Nazis or ISIS, atheists are quick to ask the question, Why doesn't God remove the evil? But when God weeds out the wicked /after 400 years of grace/ atheists are quick to blame him. A whole genocide?! What kind of God is that?
If we read the Old Testament, we see that God is immensely patient; always giving us another chance and another chance. When God wants to punish Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham begins to bargain with God on behalf of the people there, and God agrees to spare the city, even if it only takes 10 righteous people in the whole city. When the prophet Jonah is sent by God to Nineveh, the mighty city of the Babylonians, to proclaim his judgment, the people of Nineveh strangely come to their senses and repent. Jonah called the Lord to account for the promised judgement, but God spared them, saying there were so many people and children there, and many animals to be pitied.
In God there is no ethnic hatred of any nation!
God gave the Amalekites 400 years to change, because they were already an abomination to their culture: their demonic pagan gods were thirsty for blood. They burned their children on an altar before the statue of Moloch, a pagan god, as a sacrifice. But these atrocities do not bother the enemies of God today, who accuse the Old Testament God of murder. They are not bothered by the human sacrifices of the Canaanites, nor of the later Greeks 1, 2, etc. They are bothered that God commanded the extermination of these /Canaanite/ scheming nations. However, the extermination of the Canaanites was not ethnically motivated, but theologically and morally motivated.
A renowned archaeologist (W. Allbright) once described the Amalekite belief system as the most degenerate religion that ever existed. Therefore, in many ways, their destruction was a reaping of what they themselves had sown. Their destruction was not an arbitrary killing contrary to God's nature and laws, but rather in harmony with God's nature (cf. Leviticus 18:21)
"Now therefore go and slay Amalek, and destroy all that he has; and do not favor him, but slay both man and woman; both child and infant; both ox and sheep; both camel and ass." (1 Samuel 15:3)
The primary reason why they had to be punished is that this people was corrupt and evil. The Amalekites had no morals and did not fear God. God saw things from the perspective of eternity, knowing the short and long term consequences of Israel's failure to completely destroy the Amalekites. He didn't just order their extermination, because it was cruel, but to prevent even greater evil from happening in the future.
It is typical that the Israelites were THEY DIDN'T LISTEN God and had pity on some of the people they were ordered to exterminate, and suffered the consequences. And the consequence was that God delivered them into the hands of their enemies, because they too became Gentiles.
To prevent this, why does God command the death of innocent children? Children are not innocent ( cf. Psalm 51:5, 58:3). Growing up, these children support their parents' bad practices and religion because that is what they have been taught. God says of the Gentiles, "... as they have taught my people to swear by Baal..." (Jeremiah 12:16), how much more so their own children!
[The blaspheming unbeliever makes no distinction between the worship of Baal and the true God, if Baal allows him the liberal lifestyle of free worship, he will be rapturously given the opportunity. And Baal to the man of the present age is that science which sacrifices to matter, glorifies it. As the god of the gaps, it derives from the fortunate confluence of chance and time factors the full range of life functions that pervade the universe and reflect intelligence.
According to their repertoire, all beings are self-organizing, self-existent - they need only to organize the information content of their unintelligent critique, for even dead letters are not willing to deny God on their own. It seems that raw matter can only spontaneously construct the universe, not blaspheme. The atheists must help you with that!]
A footnote in the Kaldian translation says: "The infants also deserved death, because they were conceived in sin; but death was to them a good deed rather than a punishment, because by it a better destiny awaited them, which they would not have obtained if they had followed in their fathers' footsteps during their lives."
God forbade Israel from conquering other neighboring nations, such as Moab and Ammon (Deuteronomy 2:9, 19) and Edom (Deuteronomy 2:4, 23:7), even though Edom had previously refused to help the children of Israel. God did not command that all the wars described in the Bible should be initiated. It is important to understand that what is written in the Bible does not necessarily mean that God willed it - many times the kings of Israel decided against their people and themselves, against God's will. While the Book of Judges and the days of King David (etc.) describe wars, the Scriptures do not glorify these wars, but only seek to highlight the fact of their existence.
So the commandment was not for all the nations of the world at that time, even though God could have used Israel to strike down all the nations of the earth, because no one could stand against it. But his purpose was not to conquer, but to bring the Saviour in Israel to the obedient people of the whole world - no matter to which nation he belonged.
Micah 5:2 But you, (Bethlehem) Ephratah, though you are the least among the tribes of Judah, yet from you will be born to me who will reign over Israel. Your origin goes back to ancient times, to times long past.
Israel was God's chosen channel of blessing for the whole world. In fact, the Amalekites had the opportunity to be there as well, being a descendant of Esau. However, Esau gave up his blessing and exchanged it for a bowl of soup, and Amalek continued to do so. They decided to oppose the very means God had chosen to bless them and all other nations.
Their fate stands as a warning to every created being who would foolishly think that he could be puffed up against God's finished plan, or who would blindly curse the one in whom /in Abraham/ God had blessed all the nations of the world: „I will bless those who bless you, but those who curse you I will curse. Through you all the nations of the earth will be blessed." (Genesis 12:3).
It is God who gives life as a GIFT. And a gift is something to which the receiver is not entitled. Our life /and everything else/ was given to us as a gift from God, we have no right to hold anything accountable based on our own subjective value judgement! He "has not left Himself without witness, for He has been our Benefactor, giving us showers from heaven and fruitful seasons, and filling our hearts with food and joy." (Acts 14:17)
Man has a choice: he can either suffer God's destructive wrath because of sin, or he can recognize God's plan for sparing him from his own wrath. For each of us there is Christ to cling to, who has paid the debt for all our sins and transgressions. Christ's suffering and death are not an act of vengeance, but of loving sacrifice. This is what we have accepted, and this is why we must proclaim it to those who have not yet accepted it.
One might ask, why didn't God stop them from attacking Israel in the back? He could have set crows with burning stakes around the people and no one would have dared even approach them. The answer is that God has given everyone free will to exercise, of course in accordance with, and not in opposition to, the built-in conscience that inspires good in all. (Cf. "As they show that the work of the law is written in their hearts,.." Romans 2:15)
If everyone were placed in a so-called sterile environment, no one would voluntarily do either good or evil, but would behave as a kind of puppet. Nor would anyone learn anything, but everything would be a monotonous monotony. The aim is not this, however, but to educate people to live consciously in the right way with things, not to abuse them. "And all these things fell by example upon them; and they were written for our learning, to whom the end of the age is come... What things were written in times past were written for our learning, that we might draw patience and comfort from the Scriptures for the preservation of our hope." (1 Cor 10:11; Rom 15:4)
If there is no God, then there is no standard by which we can know with certainty what is right and what is wrong, everyone has his own justice, everyone has his own morality, and everyone has his own concept of the meaning of "justice", of moral right and wrong. It is in this light that those who measure everything by their own standards dare to measure God.
As Sartre, the French existentialist philosopher, admitted: "If there really is no God, then everything is permissible - we are given no values or laws that can give legitimacy to any of our behaviour." /Sartre, Jean Paul, (1961), "Existentialism and Humanism", French Philosophers from Descartes to Sartre, ed. by Leonard M. Marsak (New York: Meridian/. A person who considers himself an atheist or agnostic does not rely on any absolute standard to make a moral distinction, but only on his personal opinion.
But who dares to qualify God's action, on what basis and from what perspective? Is it because he wants to live without God's guiding standards, and therefore prefers to deny the existence of any higher intelligence? Because that is the point and nothing else! It is about clinging to self-righteousness. It is the secret lust of the flesh, which is against the spirit (Galatians 5:17).
Literally speaking, the desire to enjoy the sinful things condemned by God, so that it may be indulged without restraint. /And if God does not exist for them, how can one accuse a non-existent one of genocide?/ Such a one should give an account of his justification, or keep silent! If the myriad wonders of the world you refer to can be explained without God, then explain them:
"Now gird up thy loins like a man, and I will ask thee, and thou shalt teach me" (Job 38:3).
The neuron and the code system
"On average, a single nerve cell is connected to 60,000 other cells." 3 Atheist, tell me specifically which of the nerve cell connections are useful to the body and which are useless, and give me the reason why? And in general, how did the cell /there are nearly 40 trillion genetically programmed life-sustaining cells in the human body forming a complex, organized network/ come into existence? If you have no idea, on what basis do you judge the actions of the one who created human cells? If you claim that chance is behind all this, then explain how the genetic code /the first disk and DVD player system/ came about by chance?
DVDs are rich in information, but you need a DVD player mechanism to read the disc, process the information on the disc and convert it into video and sound, otherwise the disc becomes useless. All the instructions needed to repair the first DVD player are on a single DVD disc. You can never read the information on the DVD itself to learn how to make a DVD player.
In living cells, the information-carrying molecules (such as DNA or RNA) are similar to DVD discs, and the cellular mechanism for reading this information and converting it into proteins is similar to that of DVD players. Without the necessary machinery, such as a DVD analogue, genetic information can never be converted into proteins. Even the machines needed to process the genetic information in RNA or DNA in cells are encoded, i.e. structured and controlled, by the same genetic molecules. This system cannot exist as long as the genetic information and the transcription/translation mechanism do not exist simultaneously, and both do not speak the same language. [See: https://evolutionnews.org/2012/12/top_five_probl/
DNA is double-stranded, so it must first be unwound so that the right strand can be copied onto the mRNA, /RNA polymerase/ in the sense of a photonegative. The instructions for building RNAP are themselves encoded in DNA. But DNA could not be transcribed into mRNA without the elaborate mechanism of RNAP. However, until RNAP is fully evolved, the coding will not work at all because of its inability to get past first base. so Darwinian evolution could not even get off the starting block. /Natural selection is not a response, because it implies differential reproduction, i.e. fully evolved self-reproducing entities that can pass on the information that codes for their traits./ [See - https://creation.com/more-marvellous-machinery-dna-scrunching]
The atheist who criticises God's actions gives the explanation of how the genetic code system and the nervous system network came into being? If he has no idea, on what basis does he criticize the actions of the one who created this system? An atheist has no basis to speak out, especially against God, on the basis of his absolutely narrow-minded subjective impulses and self-righteous value judgments!
No brain surgeon would consult the layman on the street about what to cut out and what to leave in during surgery /of the malignant tumour/, but the sober atheist would not even interfere with what is none of his business, how deep the scalpel should go, but would take note of things. He even thanks you for the life-saving operation!
The Amalekites were wiped out from among the peoples of the earth by God for a reason. But this foreshadows the greater, worldwide operation to come: 'For behold, the sun is coming, blazing like a furnace-oven, and [all] the proud and all the wicked shall be as the possum, and they shall be burned by the coming sun, says the Lord of hosts, which shall leave them neither root nor branch... For the wicked shall be cut off; but they that wait for the Lord shall inherit the earth. A little [time] more, and there is no evil: look in his place, and he is not there. But the meek shall inherit the earth, and shall enjoy great peace... These shall go away into everlasting punishment, and the righteous into everlasting life." (Malachi 4:1; Psalm 37:9-11; Matthew 25:46)
"For, behold, new heavens and a new earth are created, and the old are not mentioned for nothing, nor are they even remembered... Then I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, 'Behold, the presence of God among men! He will dwell with them and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor mourning, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away." Then he who sat on the throne said, "Behold, all things are made new!" Then he turned to me, "Write: these words are true and faithful." (Isaiah 65:17, Revelation 21:3-5)
Each one chooses his own destiny, God does not inherently condemn anyone to death, but pays each according to his own way! Rightfully and justly
"I will not delight in death," says the Lord God. Repent ye therefore, and live" (Ezekiel 18:32).
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source:
1 https://www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/arxaio_xali/Thisies1.htm
2 https://www.oodegr.com/neopaganismos/politismos/politismos.htm
3 https://utikalauzanatomiaba.blog.hu/2020/03/16/tudja_hogy_hany_sejtbol_all_az_emberi_test
