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In reply to the discussion: It would be wrong to expect atheists or antitheists to answer for a murderer who used those labels. [View all]Htom Sirveaux
(1,242 posts)92. Those passages claim that the Canaanites should be destroyed because
they will tempt the Israelites to worship false Gods.
Read that text against Genesis 9:6 (NRSV):
"Whoever sheds the blood of a human,
by a human shall that persons blood be shed;
for in his own image
God made humankind."
Or the Ten Commandments, which reject both idolatry AND murder.
Or pair it with the entire Book of Jonah (in which the Hebrew prophet is an angry fool and the "evil foreigners" repent immediately upon hearing God's message, and thus avoid destruction).
Or with the redemptive vision of each nation walking with their own gods and everyone beating their swords to plowshares from Micah 4:1-5. Tough to do that if nations with other gods have been destroyed.
Or the Book of Ruth, in which a despised Moabite gentile, far from being destroyed, becomes an honored ancestor of King David.
-----
What I'm saying is not that the passage you quoted, read in isolation, doesn't have God commanding violence. It does. The interpretation I'm interested involves allowing the voices in the Bible that question and undermine the image of divinely mandated violence to speak, and privileging those voices.
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It would be wrong to expect atheists or antitheists to answer for a murderer who used those labels. [View all]
Htom Sirveaux
Feb 2015
OP
Clearly some people are very uncomfortable with this subject and they should not be.
hrmjustin
Feb 2015
#1
Simplistic, tunnel vision misses a larger picture. Equating theists with the KKK is a cheap shot.
pinto
Feb 2015
#15
I feel a murderer should be held personably responsible if convicted in a court of law.
pinto
Feb 2015
#6
Where are the ancient atheist texts containing exhortations to violence, part and parcel with
AtheistCrusader
Feb 2015
#7
I'm glad you agree, but then I don't see where I've committed a false equivalency.
Htom Sirveaux
Feb 2015
#13
Because there's no connection between atheism and any other ideology, violent or not.
AtheistCrusader
Feb 2015
#26
What were the websites general message? end all religion by force or argument?
hrmjustin
Feb 2015
#31
You may be right, but, that sort of speculation and the undoubtable 24x7
AtheistCrusader
Feb 2015
#63
Is it prejudice when the guy who these three religions claim as their founder was a monster?
Humanist_Activist
Feb 2015
#25
I understand that atheism is not functionally equivalent to an entire religion.
Htom Sirveaux
Feb 2015
#30
While I, in general, agree that individuals are not responsible for the actions of others...
Humanist_Activist
Feb 2015
#32
I don't like interpretations of religious texts that justify violence either.
Htom Sirveaux
Feb 2015
#35
Its not so much interpretation as it is what you decide to selectively focus on...
Humanist_Activist
Feb 2015
#46
Feel free to reinterpolate Deut. 7.1-2; 20.16-18 into something other than god-mandated violence.
AtheistCrusader
Feb 2015
#58
I will. My tolerance level for the personal stuff is very low after the past 24 hours.
hrmjustin
Feb 2015
#91
Would it be wrong to expect LGBT activist to answer for a murderer who advocated for
Warren Stupidity
Feb 2015
#80