Why do Christians ignore the atrocities of the Old Testament?

I'm talking specifically about 1 Samuel 15:2-3. God told Saul to slaughter men and women, infants and children. He called out infants (and children in most translations) specifically. This is not about god allowing anything. This is about god directly, specifically telling one of his devout followers to kill infants. And he and his army do just that. Do you think your god actually commanded that, or do you think that part of the old testament is wrong?

Edit: By the way, I have a toddler, and he understands perfectly well that fire is hot and can burn him. Maybe you should try a better analogy.

 

Hardly. Belief in those ideas requires input from the material senses, whereas knowledge of God's existence requires none at all.

I suppose not, but I can hardly be held responsible for your insistence on laboring under an ideological handicap.

 

The OT is not wrong in anything, only in the way the events and God is being expressed. I find the O.T.'s expression of God and His actions very Semitic in comparison to how we express God and His actions. By the same token, I find the translations of prayers from Latin very different than if they were translated directly from Greek, so it's all semantics. We have to make allowances for cultural differences.

Also there is a difference in how we understand God from the time of Jesus Christ, and how God was understood before Him. With Jesus came the full revelation of God, something that was not known before His advent.

 

?

???
God tells you right there:

2 Thus saith the Lord of hosts, I remember that which Amalek did to Israel,

He reminds the whole Gentile world again in Zechariah:

Zech. 14:12 And this shall be the (radio-active) plague, wherewith the LORD will smite all the people that have fought against (the New) Jerusalem; their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.


The reason is that:

Zechariah 2:8
For thus saith the Lord of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye.

 

The babies he ordered Saul to kill had done nothing to Israel. I can't believe you're defending the slaughter of infants.

 

"senseless killing"?????

Are you presuming that you know more, or are better fit to judge humanity, than God????????????

How do you know that God's killing is unjustified? God is perfect and so is His justice, retribution, and law.

 

Actually, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof ...." and Article VI specifies that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States."
That hardly seems like a government founded on religious principle...

In 1878, the Supreme Court was first called to interpret the extent of the Free Exercise Clause in Reynolds v. United States, as related to the prosecution of polygamy under federal law. The Supreme Court upheld Reynolds' conviction for bigamy, deciding that to do otherwise would provide constitutional protection for a gamut of religious beliefs, including those as extreme as human sacrifice. The Court said (at page 162): "Congress cannot pass a law for the government of the Territory which shall prohibit the free exercise of religion. The first amendment to the Constitution expressly forbids such legislation." Of federal territorial laws, the Court said: "Laws are made for the government of actions, and while they cannot interfere with mere religious beliefs and opinions, they may with practices."

- - - Updated - - -

Wow, way to prove the point of the OP...

 

Typical Atheist who believes he/she knows more than God.........................



Man's judgment is fallible. Judges condemn innocent men to death sometimes. God never condemns an innocent man. God's judgment is perfect.

 

Says who, you?

God sometimes speaks to men. These men are known as prophets. These prophets have been seen, known, and recorded throughout history.

Do some reading?

 

Yeah, it says that all right...so why the hell did you claim it says something entirely different? Hmmmmm?

So does "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" sound like it might be a declaration by a country founded on religious principle? Hmmmmm?

So what?

 

Oh, I see. So it is possible to understand the motives and judgements of God?
Great!
Please explain why an omniscient God created mankind via Adam and Eve, only to slaughter them all and start over again with Noah's family.

 

At least you are interested in God's motives. That's a step in the right direction.

Now, go ask a theologian about specific biblical interpretations.

 

Do you think god commanded Saul to kill infants, or no?

 

More precisely, the overwhelming majority of the Founders were professing Christians - which of course is what would be expected given an overwhelmingly Christian populace.

Which of course would be of no moment whatever even if there were any reason to consider Jefferson's personal view in the matter particularly compelling, seeing he signed the document as revised by Congress.

That is not quite correct, because as the Constitution itself implicitly affirms, it is America's founding document, which declares certain principles as foundational, and which therefore may not be justly contravened under any construction of the Constitution.

It states no such thing, any more than "[t]he US [] specifically stated in the Constitution that religion could not be used to determine the rights of the individual."

 

Actually it's nothing like that, but you are of course welcome to whatever misconceptions you find comforting.

 

See article 11 of the 1796 Treaty of Tripoli.

 

Really? Name them.

It certainly shows the intent of the founding fathers. Little did they know that some fanatics would have such a field day with somantics several hundred years in the future.

Right, which is why SCOTUS so closely reviews the Declaration of Independance rather than the Constitution when making legislative rulings... The Declaration sets the tone, but we are not governed by it.

Dude, I didn't make it up. Look up "Treaty with Tripoli" and read it for yourself.