The first five books of the Old Testament are written by Moses. I've read Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and part of Deuteronomy. It's been tough on my testimony.
Through the Abrahamic Covenant, God promises Abraham's seed a choice land flowing with milk and honey. First they spend hundreds of years in captivity in Egypt. Moses leads them out, and they journey towards the promised land. Through their journeys and acquisition of the land, they murder populations of other people at God's command (according to Moses).
For example, Numbers 31 - Israel (the name of Jacob's seed) camped near the Midianites. Some members committed "whoredoms" with some Midianite members. They committed adultery and worshiped false gods with them. This was excuse enough for Moses (through God's command) to have the Midianites destroyed. The men were destroyed, but the women and children were held captive. Moses became wroth with the army captains and told them to "kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves," 31:17-18.
Genocide at it's best.
The first five books are littered with God commanding Moses to destroy this group and that group (and these are left out of the Sunday school lessons).
(Where to begin?)
One of the reasons I became an atheist in my early 20's was because I was tired of people using God as an excuse to hurt each other. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of terrorists bullying in the name of God. I'm sick of religions fighting each other and bickering in the name of God. I'm sick of people fighting over land in the name of God. I'm sick of my holier-than-thou uncles belittling family members in the name of God. I could scream. I considered that maybe God didn't even exist and was invented as a way to control and abuse each other and get power.
Here's the thing: I have a testimony that my Heavenly Father loves me, and he loves each of his children, even the ones who don't know him, or know him and hate him. He loves us all. The loving God I have been taught about is NOT the god Moses speaks of.
God is supposed to be the same today as yesterday and tomorrow. (Malachi 3:6, "For I am the Lord, I change not...").
I have a hard time believing God commanded all of that murder Moses writes about. Honestly, I have a hard time taking most of what he writes as literal. The best I can do right now is accept that there is something Heavenly Father wants me to learn from these scriptures.
Every ancient society from every continent has its own story of how they began (where the people came from, how the land was formed, the opposing forces of good and evil, gods/spirits/powers). Isn't it possible the people of Moses' time were no different? Moses had a lot of time on his hands and wrote some great stories of how it all started. "Once upon a time..."
If I'm going to hold on to what testimony I have left, then I have to believe there's a middle ground, meaning, it's not my "once upon a time," all made up scenario I just mentioned, and it's not exactly how Moses wrote it, either. I think he embellished some details and threw in some allegories. He was God's humble prophet that got a taste of power and used God as an excuse to do haenious crimes against humanity for gain. His stories were published and used for centuries to this day as an example for extremists to do the same, unfortunately.
There's a reason a lot of these scriptures are left out of Sunday school lessons. It's deplorable. Families are sacred. Children are gifts. Yet, Moses's god has no problem ripping them apart.
Silver lining...
How thankful I am for the gospel of Jesus Christ to bring light and hope and love and humanity to a dark, dark world of the Old Testament (what I've read so far). I'm sorry. Right now I just can't believe the Heavenly Father I pray to is the same Heavenly Father Moses speaks of. Moses misinterpreted God. Either something is wrong with God, or something was wrong with Moses. I choose to believe something was wrong with Moses. Prophets are people, too, with temptations and weaknesses (Balaam, for example) and also susceptible to eccentricities and poor mental health. For reasons I'm not educated in, yet, his books were chosen over others' to be included in the Bible.
I can't let this trip me up. I love the gospel. I love this church. My life is better for it. Dang it, Moses!
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