A Christian Perspective on Capital Punishment and the Sanctity of Life - Part 2

Part 2 - Abortion and the Sanctity of Life

 

In Part 1 of this two part series I discussed the conditions when the Bible expressly allows a human to take the life of another.  We found that by Biblical standards the only time it is permissible to take another human life is in the case of self-defense.  In part 2 we will discuss the issue of abortion and what the Bible says about this divisive issue.

Does the Bible condone abortion?

Many have tried to use the text of Numbers 5:11-31 to say that God condones abortion. In the ritual described in this passage, the woman who is accused of infidelity is made to take and oath and drink "the water of bitterness".

 

Some translations (NIV 2011 edition and New Revised Standard Version) say that if she is guilty the woman will miscarry (effectively the drink causes an abortion).  The vast majority of translations, however, do not use this language and looking at the interlinear text, it is difficult to see how it could be translated as "miscarry" (another of the many mistranslations in the NIV)¹.

In fact, what this passage is taking about is a curse whereby the woman would become barren if she was guilty and would remain fertile if she was not.  The interpretation of "miscarriage" would also presuppose that the illicit extra-marital affair resulted in a pregnancy, which is not a given.

Similarly, some have also used Exodus 21:22-25 to say the value of the fetus is less than that of a born child.  The passage says this:

²² “Now if people struggle with each other and strike a pregnant woman so that she gives birth prematurely, but there is no injury, the guilty person shall certainly be fined as the woman’s husband may demand of him, and he shall pay as the judges decide. ²³ But if there is any further injury, then you shall appoint as a penalty life for life, ²⁴ eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, ²⁵ burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.(NASB)

The text does not specifically state that the injury in question should be to the mother or to the prematurely born child, however, in the absence of such delineation, it is reasonable to assume it applies to both.

 

Some try to interpret this verse as saying that if the baby is aborted and dies then it is only a fine, but if the woman dies then it is an "eye for an eye", etc.  There is no justification for this interpretation.

Once again, the NIV has a footnote equating "gives birth prematurely" to "miscarries".  And once gain, a look at the interlinear text shows no justification for interpreting this as a miscarriage or abortion, both of which imply the death of the child.

 

In fact, the only case in which a fine is levied is in the case that "there is no injury".  It is easy to interpret this text to mean that if the child is born prematurely, but there is no injury to the child or the mother then a fine can be levied as agreed by the husband and the court, but if there is harm to the child or the mother, then the "eye for an eye" principle is applied.  This interpretation puts the value of the child equal to the value of the mother and is the more reasonable one.

Since there are no other verses in the Bible which (even in poor translations) allude to intentionally causing a miscarriage or abortion, we can safely say that the Bible in no way condones abortion.

 

But does the Bible forbid abortion?

Some have said that since the Bible does not forbid abortion then it must be okay.  This is a ridiculous argument.  If this were true then the Bible would have to list all possible actions a human may take and specify if they are allowed or not.  Such a volume would be impossible to pen.  What does the Bible say about cyber crime?  If it is not explicitly forbidden does that make it permissible?  Of course not.

Therefore, just because the Bible does not say "Thou shalt not have an abortion" does not mean that it is a moral or acceptable practice.  So absent a specific ban on the practice, how can we know where the Bible stands on the issue?  We look to the more overarching issue of the sanctity of life.

What does the Bible say about the sanctity of life?

According to the Bible, individual humans (like all living creatures ) are created by and are a gift from God. He knows each of them individually and causes each individual to grow in their mothers' womb.

 In Jeremiah 1:5, God says he knew the prophet before He formed him in the womb.  His intimate knowledge of each individual begins before that person is even conceived.

David in Psalm 139:13-16 says that God knows every day of his life before he even has one.

This is a deeply personal God who cares deeply for his creation.  According to  2 Peter 3:9, God wants every single person to become a believer and partake of his goodness.

 Psalm 127:3-4 says that children are a gift of the Lord.

Is is not reasonable to infer from an honest reading of the Bible that God does not care about those whom he creates or is indifferent to the ending of a life which He created and is actively forming in the womb.

When is a fetus a life?

The verses above talk about God's love for each individual before they are even formed in the womb (conceived), which makes the discussion of when a fetus is "alive" moot.  God knows about and loves each person before they are even conceived.

 

But since an abortion cannot be performed before conception, the earliest time at which the fetus exists is when the egg is fertilized, has implanted in the uterine wall, and begins to replicate.  It is at this time that fetus is living human being.  At this time the fetus has DNA which is separate from that of the mother and father making it a separate individual human (not just a part of the mother or a parasite) and thus subject to God's love as is evidenced throughout the Bible.

 

Some have argued that God does not imbue a person with a soul until the baby is born.  It has been said that without a soul the fetus is no different than any other animal or plant which is considered "alive".  This argument depends upon the doctrine that the soul is added to a human at some point at or after conception, but this is mere supposition and is not supported by any biblical text that I was able to find.

 

The doctrine of traducianism says that the soul of a newly conceived child comes from its parents just like their physical body.  If this is the case, then the soul becomes a part of the child at conception.

 

Others have argued that the Old Testament says that "life is in the blood" and thus the fetus cannot be called "alive" until there is blood flow (about 21 days post-conception). Once again the NIV version is deceiving.  Notice the difference in the NIV and the NASB below.

¹⁴ because the life of every creature is its blood. That is why I have said to the Israelites, “You must not eat the blood of any creature, because the life of every creature is its blood; anyone who eats it must be cut off.” (NIV)

¹⁴ “For as for the life of all flesh, its blood is identified with its life. Therefore I said to the sons of Israel, ‘You are not to eat the blood of any flesh, for the life of all flesh is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off.’ (NASB)

The text itself (in the NASB) explains that "its blood is identified with its life".  This text gives additional detail on the previous statement that it's blood is it's life.  This text eliminates the possibility that a fetus is not a human beloved by God until its blood is flowing because before it's blood flows it is not alive.  This text clearly states (in reliable translations) that a life is "identified" with blood and is not synonymous with it.

Looking at the interlinear text, the verse literally says "for the life of all flesh the blood sustains its life" and not that the blood is its life.  The word "nephesh" translated as "life" here implies "soulish" creatures.

The blood of a creature is not synonymous with its life, it merely sustains its life and therefore, any reasoning which says the fetus is not alive prior to blood flow is flawed.

 

As an aside, in most US states (if not all), if a pregnant woman is murdered, the murderer is charged with two murders, one for the mother and one for the unborn child.  In those same states, however, that same unborn child can be legally killed by an abortionist at the will of the mother.  The only difference is whether or not the mother wanted the child to be killed.  There does not seem to be any debate as to whether the unborn child is alive and a separate human being unless the issue is abortion.  This is an egregious double standard.

Can abortion be justified for any reason?

There are a few conditions which can occur during pregnancy where the growing fetus, if allowed to continue to develop, will invariably result in the death of the mother.  A good example of this would be an ectopic pregnancy.

In an ectopic pregnancy, the fertilized egg implants somewhere outside the main uterus, often in the wall of a fallopian tube.  The fallopian tube will not stretch with the growing fetus like the uterus does and once the fetus becomes a certain size the tube will rupture and the mother will bleed to death (if surgery cannot be provided soon enough).  This is a true emergency which can cause the death of the mother in a matter of minutes and also results in the death of the fetus.

In this case, the previously discussed self-defense principle can be applied.  If the baby is not aborted before it gets too large it will most certainly kill the mother and then the baby will also die.  Removing the baby from the tube (which will result in its death) in defense of the life of the mother is preferable to both the baby and mother dying.

This makes protecting the life mother the only morally and biblically justifiable reason for intentionally aborting a baby.

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1. The NIV version is a less literal translation directly from the original texts created to make the Bible easier to understand. In the course of trying to make it easier to understand, however, some passages are more or less paraphrased using verbiage which cannot be easily justified by the original text and makes those passages subject to the biases of the interpreter.

   When the NIV was updated in 2011 many of the texts were made gender neutral which is in no way justified by the original texts and significantly alters the meaning of many verses.

   For these reasons the NIV is an unreliable translation and should only be used in conjunction with other more literal versions where the authors did not take so many licenses with unjustified interpretations (such as the NASB or ESV).

A Christian Perspective on Capital Punishment and the Sanctity of Life - Part 1

Part 1 - Capital Punishment

In recent weeks the issue of whether it is right for a person to take another person's life in any situation can be justified.  The news has been filled recently with the trials of Kyle Rittnehouse and the killers of Ahmed Arbery.  Prior to that were other high profile cases of lives that were taken which caused widespread rioting in the US.

All of these issues go to the central issue of the sanctity of life and the question: "when is it morally permissible (if ever) to take another human life"?

It is a polarizing issue and unfortunately it has also become a political one.  The political climate has become so charged that people on one side or another of the issue have ceased to look at the issue objectively.

The responsibility of the Christian is to look at these issues through the lens of the Bible and not through that of any particular political party.

What does the Bible say about the sanctity of life?

Brooklyn Museum
The Ear of Malchus (L'oreille de Malchus)
 James Tissot

Most Christians who support capital punishment do so because of verses like Luke 22:35-36 where Jesus tells his disciples to sell their cloaks and buys swords.

There are also a number of times in the Old Testament where capital punishment is prescribed by God Himself for certain crimes.

For instance, in Deuteronomy 17:1-7, God commands the Israelites to stone people to death if they have done "evil in the sight of the LORD" (NASB).

There are a number of other crimes which God makes punishable by death.

Doesn't this in and of itself mean that the Bible condones capital punishment?

For the answer we must understand that for the Israelites at this time there were three types of law: Moral Law, Ceremonial Law, and Civil Law.

In a nutshell, Moral Law is immutable and is the same for all people at all times and in all situations.  The Ten Commandments is the best example of Moral Law.

Ceremonial Laws are religious law and have to do with the relationship of the Israelites to God HImself.  The sacrificial system is a good example of Ceremonial Law.  Ceremonial Laws in the Old Testament all point to the coming of the Messiah in the New Testament.  This is the law Jesus was referring to when he said he came to "fulfill the law" (Matthew 5:17).

The last kind of law is Civil Law.  These are not unlike our civil laws today and can change based on time and circumstances.  For instance, civil law changed when the Israelites changed from being governed by the judges to having a king.  Civil law which was put in place in the Old Testament was never established to be Moral Law and be the same for all peoples at all times and in any situation.

In addition to the types of laws discussed above, there is also a significant difference between a "command" and a "commandment".  A commandment is a command that is given which should be obeyed by every person at all times and in all situations - for instance, the Ten Commandments.

A command, then, is a specific command given to a specific person or group of people at a given time and for a specific reason.  This is analogous to the difference in me telling my 14 year old "don't hit your brother" (a commandment) vs "mow the lawn" (a command).  It is common for people to mix up the two and to use one as the other whenever it suits their purposes.

What About Commands to Kill (or not to kill) in the Old Testament

First of all, we must address the fifth commandment "Thou shalt not kill" (Exodus 20:13).  The word interpreted as "kill" in the King James Version is interpreted as "murder" in most others.  This is an important distinction and there is little doubt that the latter is the correct interpretation considering the situations in upcoming days and years where God commanded the Israelites to kill.

The interpretation of "You shall not murder" leaves open the possibility of killing for other reasons (e.g. self defense).

Whether or not you agree that God should or should not have given the command for the Israelites to kill various peoples in the Old Testament (a subject for a different post), it cannot be denied that each of these instances were "commands" and not "commandments" and they were certainly not laws of any kind. This precludes the possibility that any of these commands can be used as justification for any kind of killing in the modern day.

There is no commandment or Moral Law (the only kind of law from the Old Testament which is still applicable today) which provides for murdering anyone.  Additionally, Old Testament revelation ended with the prophet Malachai (400 BC) and the New Testament ended with the various epistles (50 - 70 AD).  According to the prophet Daniel, there can be no new revelations whereby any new commandments could be given (Daniel 9:24)¹.

What does "murder" mean?

Numbers 35:9-29 gives a pretty good definition of murder.  Remember that this is civil law and not moral law and is given to the Israelites only.  The penalties described in this passage were not given to all people at all times which is clear from the text itself.

The bit we are interested in which describes what should be considered murder is:

"15 These six cities shall be for refuge for the people of Israel, and for the stranger and for the sojourner among them, that anyone who kills any person without intent may flee there.
16 “But if he struck him down with an iron object, so that he died, he is a murderer. The murderer shall be put to death. 17 And if he struck him down with a stone tool that could cause death, and he died, he is a murderer. The murderer shall be put to death. 18 Or if he struck him down with a wooden tool that could cause death, and he died, he is a murderer. The murderer shall be put to death. 19 The avenger of blood shall himself put the murderer to death; when he meets him, he shall put him to death. 20 And if he pushed him out of hatred or hurled something at him, lying in wait, so that he died, 21 or in enmity struck him down with his hand, so that he died, then he who struck the blow shall be put to death. He is a murderer. The avenger of blood shall put the murderer to death when he meets him.
22 “But if he pushed him suddenly without enmity, or hurled anything on him without lying in wait 23 or used a stone that could cause death, and without seeing him dropped it on him, so that he died, though he was not his enemy and did not seek his harm, 24 then the congregation shall judge between the manslayer and the avenger of blood, in accordance with these rules."

Clearly, the difference in a murder and a "manslayer" is intent.  If you read the entire passage you will find that merely not intending to kill someone does not absolve them of responsibility for their actions, they just cannot be killed for it by the "avenger of blood" as long as they reside in the sanctuary city until the current high priest dies.

From this passage we see that the definition of murder given by God here is very much similar to our modern sense of the word.  Interestingly, manslaughter, also is defined similarly to the modern definition of the word.

What about killing in self defense?

Exodus 22 describes a person's right to self defense:

2 If the thief is caught while breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there will be no guilt for bloodshed on his account. 3 If the sun has risen on him, there will be guilt for bloodshed on his account... (NASB)

Verse 3 is a bit ambiguous, but the way I would paraphrase this (in keeping with the sanctity of life espoused elsewhere in the Bible) "If someone breaks into your house you are justified in using deadly force to defend yourself, but if you wait until later, seek him out and kill him, then you are guilty of murder".

I interpret it this way assuming (as is specifically stated in other translations) that the thief has broken into the house at night and surprised the homeowner, vs someone broke in and stole something and the homeowner found out about it later and sought the perpetrator out and killed him.

The former is self-defense and the latter is not.

In the New Testament (Luke 22:36), we see Jesus commanding his disciples to sell their cloak and buy a sword (if they don't already own one).  This is in the Garden of Gethsemane just before Jesus is betrayed and arrested.

Importantly, these weapons were only for self defense.  In verses 49-51 of that same chapter we find Peter cutting off the ear of the slave of the high priest (an offensive gesture since the slave was unarmed) and Jesus rebuking him and then healing the ear.

We also find that Jesus teaches his disciples to "turn the other cheek" when being wronged by someone else (Matthew 5:38-40).  Note the difference in that here, he is talking about non-lethal offenses vs the situation in the garden later.

Clearly, both the Old and New Testaments grant a person the right to kill in self defense, but only when faced with a lethal threat, but not when in a non-lethal situation.  Life is precious and should only be taken as a last resort.

It is left to the reader to apply these principles to modern day events (Rittenhouse and Arbery) to determine which killing (if any) was Biblically justified due to self-defense.

I might also add here, that being legal does not make an act moral and vice versa.  Whether or not the current US law allows it, the Biblical record is pretty clear on which acts are morally acceptable.

What then about capital punishment?

An argument can be made that capital punishment is the justifiable killing of a person who cannot be rehabilitated.  It could be considered self-defense as the government is taking someone who cannot be rehabilitated and preventing them from ever taking another life.

As much as this kind of punishment is considered "justice" by a large number of American citizens, in fact, it seems clear that this is much more about "revenge" than justice.  Simply removing the perpetrator from active society (incarceration) removes the threat.  Capital punishment in this case seems to fit well into the category outlined in Exodus 22:3 "if the sun has risen on him, there will be guilt for bloodshed on his account".

In fairness, Exodus 22:3 is talking about theft and not murder, but I think the principle still applies for the following reason.

In Romans 12:17-19, Paul, referring to Deuteronomy 32:35 ("vengeance is mine, and retribution"), instructs Christians to "never take your own revenge... but leave room for the wrath of God" (NASB).

For the Christian, in a situation other than protecting one's self, family, or others from immediate lethal harm (self defense), the question when considering capital punishment must be: "Who is beyond redemption"?

The movie "Unforgiven" outlines the moral conundrum for Christians particularly well:

The Schofield Kid: It don't seem real. How he ain't gonna never breathe again, ever. How he's dead. And the other one, too. All on account of pulling a trigger.
William Munny: It's a h*** of a thing, killing a man. You take away all he's got and all he's ever gonna have.
The Schofield Kid: Yeah, well, I guess they had it coming.
William Munny: We all have it coming, Kid.

Regardless of whether the mechanism of taking a life is a gun, a lethal injection, or an electric chair, the end result is the same.  Regardless of whether the perpetrator is a serial killer, a thief, or a government, the end result is the same.

By taking a person's life you have taken from him everything he has and everything he will ever have, and, more importantly any possibility of him hearing about and coming to accept the saving grace of Jesus Christ.

Moses and Paul were both murderers and God forgave them and used them both in mighty ways.  There are other modern day examples of very similar conversions (See Nicky Cruz from the book The Cross and the Switchblade).

A bit less dramatic, but for equally as unlikely instances of the power of the saving grace of Jesus Christ, one need look no further than Kanye West, Alice Cooper, and possibly even Marilyn Manson.  These people were high profile anti-Christians whom many in Christian circles would have considered beyond redemption.

Based on the previously referenced verses in Deuteronomy and Romans, how can we as humans arrogate to ourselves the right to decide that a person is beyond redemption?  This is a right which is very clearly reserved by God for himself and none other.

The fact is, that given the right circumstances, there is no depravity that any of us is not capable of and none of us deserves God's saving grace.  More importantly, though, none of us is beyond God's saving grace.

According to the Bible (Old Testament and New) we humans have no right under God (other than self defense as defined above) to deprive another human of the chance to hear and respond to the gospel message of the saving grace of Jesus Christ regardless of what atrocities they may have committed.

Removing them from society by incarcerating them for the rest of their life?  Yes. Taking their life, and depriving them of the chance for salvation?  Absolutely not.  There is simply no room in the teachings of Jesus Christ for capital punishment.

In Part 2 we will discuss how this applies to the case of abortion.

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1. 24 “Seventy weeks have been decreed for your people and your holy city, to finish the wrongdoing, to make an end of sin, to make atonement for guilt, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the Most Holy Place.

   This verse is speaking about the results of the coming (and subsequent death) of the Messiah.  Later, it goes on to specify exactly when the Messiah would be "cut off" (martyred)..See How Do We Know Jesus is the Messiah? for more information.
   
   Of specific interest to this discussion is "to seal up vision and prophecy".  That means that the death of Christ (around 33 AD) ends the giving of any new prophetic gifts leaving only those who were alive at the time of His death to finish writing down the prophecies they had been given.

   Anyone who says they have a "new revelation from Christ" is a false prophet.
   

Lessons from the Book of Jonah

Lessons from the Book of Jonah

Introduction

The book of Jonah is a book of mercy and redemption.

As a child in Sunday School you are taught the rather fantastic story of "Jonah and the Whale" where Jonah is swallowed up by a whale and then spit out on the shore.  Unfortunately, this is the extent of what most of us know about Jonah.

In Matthew 12:38-42 and Mark 8:11-12 Jesus tells the pharisees who constantly want to see a sign (miracle) to prove that his is the Messiah, He tells them the only sign they will see is "the Sign of Jonah".

Jesus compares Jonah's three days in the belly of  the great fish to his coming three days in the belly of the Earth (the tomb) and says that the people of Nineveh would be counted as more righteous than the people of Jesus' generation because in Jonah's time, the citizens and king of Nineveh listened to Jonah and repented whereas the pharisees of Jesus' time heard His message and, rather than repenting, plotted to kill him.

What did Jesus mean when he said the only sign that generation would see would be the sign of Jonah?  The answer is a bit more complicated that it might seem and goes way beyond just three days in the belly of a fish.

The book of Jonah has four chapters and each of these four chapters has a different lesson to teach; all of them play a part in Jesus' reference to "the Sign of Jonah".

Jonah

Chapter 1: The story of redemption experienced by every believer.

The prophet Jonah lived around the same times as Amos and near the end of the ministry of Elisha and Elijah during the divided kingdom around 785 BC.  He lived in the Northern Kingdom (Israel) at a time of oppression by the Assyrians which had Nineveh as its capital city.  It was the people of this city of Nineveh to whom God called Jonah to go and minister.  The call of Jonah by God is a ¹typology of God's call to every person. The call to obey God rather than our own desires.

In verses 1 -3 we see God's Call: we find that God calls Jonah to do God's will.  Jonah knows the difference in right and wrong and chooses to do the wrong. Rather than going to Nineveh as God had commanded, he instead went to Joppa to catch a boat to Tarshish, as far away from Nineveh as he could go.

 

In verses 4-8 we see the results of Jonah's Sin in Disobeying God: the consequences of sin is God's judgement.

In verses 9-12 we see Jonah's Confession; Jonah admits his sin and owns up to it.

In verse 13 we see the need for God for salvation: the sailors attempt to save themselves, but their efforts are useless.  A person cannot work his way into salvation².

In verse 14 we see the Sinner's Prayer: the sailors pray to God for mercy

In verse 15a we find Obedience: the sailors understand that the only way to salvation is through obedience to God.

In verse 15b the result of obedience is Peace: the sea becomes calm.

In verse 16 the ultimate result of obedience is Salvation.

In Verse 17. as Jonah is drowning in the depths of the sea, he becomes a typology of Jesus, Himself and, just as Jesus is buried for three days in the depths of the earth, Jonah is buried in the depths of the sea for three days.

Chapter 2: The Sign of Jonah

In the second chapter, we find Jonah's prayer of dispair and obedience to God.  Like Jesus, Jonah becomes obedient God's calling to the point of death.

From the belly of the great fish Jonah cries out in distress much like Jesus did on the cross, lamenting the situation, but always calling on God as good.

In Matthew 26:39 we hear Jesus on the cross crying out "eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?" which means "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"  Many people have said that Jesus said this because God the Father turned his face away from him on the cross.  This, however, is an incorrect interpretation.  Rather, Jesus is quoting his ancestor David in Psalm 22 which begins: "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"

In Psalm 22, the author (David, originally) begins by lamenting the terrible situation in which he finds himself.

In Chapter 2 we read the following, 

 From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. He said:
“In my distress I called to the Lord, and he answered me.From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help, and you listened to my cry.

In Psalm 22:24 we read the similar sentiment:

For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted;Nor has He hidden His face from him;But when he cried to Him for help, He heard.

Jonah 2:8-9 says:

“Those who cling to worthless idols turn away from God’s love for them. But I, with shouts of grateful praise, will sacrifice to you.What I have vowed I will make good. I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’”

Psalm 22:29-31 then says:

All the rich of the earth will feast and worship;    all who go down to the dust will kneel before him—    those who cannot keep themselves alive. Posterity will serve him;    future generations will be told about the Lord.They will proclaim his righteousness,    declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it!

What has he done?  Achieved the pinnacle of God's grace for human kind - provided a means for eternal salvation from the consequences of our sin.

And in the last verse of the second chapter of Jonah, just as Jesus arose from the depths of the earth on the third say, God commanded the fish and it vomited Jonah out from the depths of the sea and onto dry land.

Chapter 3: God's Nature is Unchanging
... but he can change his mind

We know from many places that God is unchanging.  Some take that to mean that God never changes his mind, but the third chapter of Jonah directly refutes this clam.  What is unchanging about God is his mercy and his grace.

In the third chapter of Jonah, he preaches to the people of Nineveh and the people and the king repent of their wicked ways and beg for forgiveness. This is a common theme throughout the Bible.

Jonah 3:10 says, 

When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.

In Jeremiah 18:7-10, God further explains:

If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it.

James 5:16 brings it home to each of us:

The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

The lesson of chapter 3 is God's unrelenting mercy for His creation and His excessive grace shown for those who accept it and repent from their disobedience.

Chapter 4: God's Divine Mercy is Revealed

The last chapter of Jonah describes Jonah's frustration at God's saving grace.  After all, Nineveh has been attacking and oppressing the Hebrew people and according to Jonah's since of fair play, they do not deserve salvation, they deserve to be punished.

How grateful am I that my fate is in the hands of a loving God and not all the people I have wronged in my life.

In Ezekiel 33:11 God plainly states that he takes no pleasure in the death of evil people:

Say to them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live. Turn! Turn from your evil ways! Why will you die, people of Israel?’

The lesson of chapter 4 is that God's mercy is for everyone.  There is no way any human can be good enough to earn their way into heaven and there is no way any human can be bad enough that they are beyond redemption.

The Ninevites were exceedingly wicked and exceedingly violent and yet God spared them when they repented of their evil ways.

Conclusion

This is the true and full meaning of "the Sign of Jonah".  Not just that Jesus would be in the depths of the Earth for three days and then rise, but that his message of salvation is for everyone, everywhere, with no pre-conditions.

Romans 3:23 New International Version (NIV) 

for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Ephesians 2:8-9 New International Version (NIV)

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. 

Romans 10:9-13 New International Version (NIV) 

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.” For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

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END NOTES

1.   See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typology_(theology).

Lessons from the Book of Judges

INTRODUCTION

I heard it preached from the pulpit once that "Given the correct circumstances, there is no depravity that any of us is not capable of."  I have found that to be an incredibly insightful statement and have seen it played out again and again in my life and in the lives of others.

The book of Judges is an essay describing what even God's people are capable of when they reject God and refuse to obey Him.  These lessons which were hard learned by the nation of Israel are a typology of the life of every Christian as well as the entire world as a whole.

I've seen many of the scriptures in Judges quoted by atheists on various websites, in books, and in social media posts attributing the actions of the Israelites in the book of Judges as them following God's direction and then labeling God as evil.  This is anti-truth.  Understanding the context of the book makes this clear.

GOD AS KING

Genesis 15 describes God's covenant with Abram (later Abraham) and in Genesis 17:7, God promises to be Abraham's God as well as that of his offspring (which he had previously promised to make into a great nation – ultimately, the nation of Israel).

In 1 Samuel 8:7, God explains that the Israelites have rejected Him as king and have served other Gods:

"The Lord said to Samuel[1], “Listen to the voice of the people in regard to all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me from being king over them. 8 Like all the deeds which they have done since the day that I brought them up from Egypt even to this day—in that they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also."

In Judges 8:23 we see that Gideon understood that God was to be the king of Israel and he tells them in no uncertain terms:

But Gideon said to them, “I will not rule over you, nor shall my son rule over you; the Lord shall rule over you.”

God's ultimate plan was that He would be the king of the Israelites and His people would serve Him and govern themselves within the boundaries that he set for them through Moses (the moral law) during their trek through the desert after He freed them from bondage in Egypt.  

We see Israel’s rejection of God as their king described over and over in the book of Judges.  For Example[2]:

Judges 17:6 - In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes.

MORAL AUTHORITY

This is really the crux of the issue.  By saying there was no king in Israel, the author is showing that Israel had rejected God's kingship over them.  With no moral authority to guide them, each person "did what was right in his own eyes."

The is the place where much of the world finds itself today.  With a false God there is a false moral authority, with no God there is no moral authority and everyone does whatever they choose without regard to morality - each person defines their own morality.

I have heard or read many times people using the phrase "my truth" or "your truth".  Make no mistake - there is only one truth.  When people define their own truth society collapses into evil.  This is primary message of the book of Judges.

REBELLION

Joshua took the mantle of leadership of Israel after Moses dies on Mount Nebo.  In the beginning of the book of Judges, Joshua dies and the Israelites find themselves in chaos.

Judges 3:1-2 tells us that God allowed Joshua to die before fully driving out the inhabitants of the promised land because he wanted to teach the next generation about warfare.

Now these are the nations which the Lord left, to test Israel by them (that is, all who had not experienced any of the wars of Canaan; only in order that the generations of the sons of Israel might be taught war, [those who had not experienced it formerly).

The Israelites needed to be able to defend the land they had inherited as a result of God's covenant with Abraham and God left these nations to be conquered after Joshua's death to teach them military tactics so they could defend the land after it was conquered.

With no strong spiritual leader to remind them of their heritage and admonish them to keep the law, the Israelites rebelled against God.

Their first act of rebellion is described in Judges 1:27-34.  Not only did they not drive out the inhabitants of the land, but they either intermarried with them, or took them as slaves[3] and began to worship their idols and false gods.

JUDGES

In the book of Judges, the people do what is evil in God’s sight and to help them back to the correct path, He appoints a series of Judges whose job it was to settle disputes and provide spiritual guidance to the Israelites (including guidance from God as to how to conquer the rest of the land of their inheritance).  They needed no king to serve and create laws for them and tell them how to act because God had already provided that to them through Moses in the Torah (aka "The Law").

Each Judge was appointed at a time of repentance and crying out by the Israelites when they were being persecuted because God stopped protecting them when they rebelled.

Judges 2:11-23 gives us a good synopsis of what happens throughout the book:

¹¹ Then the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals,¹² and they forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed themselves down to them; thus they provoked the Lord to anger. ¹³ So they forsook the Lord and served Baal and the Ashtaroth.¹⁴ The anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He gave them into the hands of plunderers who plundered them; and He sold them into the hands of their enemies around them, so that they could no longer stand before their enemies. ¹⁵ Wherever they went, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, as the Lord had spoken and as the Lord had sworn to them, so that they were severely distressed.

¹⁶ Then the Lord raised up judges who delivered them from the hands of those who plundered them. ¹⁷ Yet they did not listen to their judges, for they played the harlot after other gods and bowed themselves down to them. They turned aside quickly from the way in which their fathers had walked in obeying the commandments of the Lord; they did not do as their fathers. ¹⁸ When the Lord raised up judges for them, the Lord was with the judge and delivered them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge; for the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who oppressed and afflicted them. ¹⁹ But it came about when the judge died, that they would turn back and act more corruptly than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them and bow down to them; they did not abandon their practices or their stubborn ways. ²⁰ So the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He said, “Because this nation has transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers and has not listened to My voice, ²¹ I also will no longer drive out before them any of the nations which Joshua left when he died, ²² in order to test Israel by them, whether they will keep the way of the Lord to walk in it as their fathers did, or not.” ²³ So the Lord allowed those nations to remain, not driving them out quickly; and He did not give them into the hand of Joshua.

As described in this passage, the Israelites only remained faithful as long as the divinely appointed Judge lived and then they quickly reverted to their evil ways and each time strayed further and further from God’s plan.  We see in the pages of the book of Judges the ever increasing violence and depravity perpetrated by “God’s chosen people” when they stop following God’s plan.

When they were delivered out of Egypt God admonished the Israelites to tell their offspring what He had done for them so they would remember and follow Him in the future[4]:

Genesis 10:1-2: Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the hearts of his officials so that I may perform these signs of mine among them ² that you may tell your children and grandchildren how I dealt harshly with the Egyptians and how I performed my signs among them, and that you may know that I am the Lord.”

We see in the book of Judges that many of them were not taught their history at all and even those who were taught, ignored it:

Judges 2:10: All that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel.

Over time we see that not only did Israel move further and further away from God, even his Judges were sinful.

ABIMELECH (Judges 9)

After Gideon died, he had 70 sons by many wives and one by a concubine (identified later as a slave girl).  The son of the concubine was named Abimelech and when his father died he decided he should lead Israel and murdered all 70 of his half-brothers and set himself up as king – reigning as king for 3 years.  Since he was not chosen by God, he was never considered king of Israel.

During his short self-appointed kingship, God planned his demise.  He stirred up the hearts and minds of the people of a town named Shechem against Abimelech.  Abimelech attacked the city, killed everyone in it, destroyed the city, and scattered salt over it so nothing would grow there again.

Some of the people of the town were hiding out and were not killed when the town was seiged and went into a stronghold of the local temple. Abimelech commanded his men to take branches from trees and put them around the stronghold and set them on fire burning those inside to death – about 1000 men and women.

When he was done there he moved on to a town named Thebez and laid siege to it.  Inside that town, however, was a tower and a woman on top of the tower threw a millstone off the tower and hit Abimelech in the head.  He has one of his men run him through with a sword so it couldn’t be said that a woman had killed him.

JEPHTHAH (Judges 11)

Jephthah was a Judge appointed by God to free His people after they had rebelled for the eight time.  Jephthah tragically made a vow to God that “if you give the Ammonites in to my hands, whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph… I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering”

Importantly, this is not a sacrifice that was demanded by God and God did not demand that he keep the vow.

When Jephthah returns the first thing that came out of his door is his only daughter.  He gives her four months to morn and then sacrifices here as a burnt offering.

DANNITES (Judges 18)

The tribe of Dan did not trust in God and did not take the part of the land that was promised to them leaving no place for them to go.

During their wanderings they came to a town where a disgraced Levite priest was working for a man as his priest, but to false gods which were idols fashioned by his employer.  The priest told them about a town far to the North which had no enemies, was not well fortified, and had no alliances with anyone for protection.

The Dannites went and spied it out and found the town just as the Levite said.  They came back to the house where the Levite was living and forced him to accompany them and become their priest and bring along all the idols from the house where he was living.

They then went to the city and destroyed it and killed everyone in it and rebuilt it and renamed it “Dan” and then setup a temple to these idols with the Levite as their priest.  They lived there and worshiped those idols until they were taken into captivity.

LEVITE and CONCUBINE (Judges 19)

Another Levite who lived in a remote area took a concubine from Bethlehem, but she was unfaithful and left him and went back to her father’s house.  The Levite then came back to get her.  After a number of delays the Levite left and came to a town named Gibeah in the land of Benjamin.

Nobody in the town would give him a place to stay so he and his servant and concubine were in the city square when a man came into town and offered to give him a place to stay and food for his animals.

While they were having some dinner, some evil men from the town demanded the man send the Levite send the man out so they could sodomize him.  The man begged them not to do that and offered his virgin daughters and the concubine to him instead. But the men would not listen.

So the Levite took his concubine and sent her outside to them and they raped and abused her throughout the night.  When they were done with her she crawled back to the place where she was staying and when the Levite awoke in the morning he found her dead on the threshold.

He then took her and chopped her into 12 pieces and put each piece on a separate donkey and sent each to each of the 12 tribes of Israel.

BENJAMITES KILLED (Judges 20)

All of the other tribes of Israel got the severed parts of the concubine and came to find out what had happened because they said nothing so evil had ever happened since they left Egypt.  When the heard the story from the Levite, they decided to purge the evil from the land of the Benjamites.

The asked for the men who did the act, but the Benjamites would not turn them over.  The rest of the Israelites then, at the Lord’s direction, attacked the Benjamites and killed 25,000 Benjamites and about 600 men fled into the desert.

The Israelites then went back to the land of Benjamin and killed everyone in every town including all of the animals.

WIVES FOR REMAINING BENJAMITES (Judges 21)

Because they still needed 12 tribes of Israel, the rest of the Israelites allowed the 600 remaining Benjamites to live, but they had all vowed to not give any of their daughters over to the Benjamites to marry. The tribe of Benjamin could not continue without wives.

So, the Israelites looked around for any town that was not with them when they made the vow to not let their daughters marry the Benjamites.  This is because, when they made the oath to kill the Benjamites and not allow any of their daughters to marry a Benjamite, they also made an oath that anyone tribe who refused to send representation to the meeting would be killed.

Once again, this is not an oath required by God, nor required to be honored by God.  They found a region where nobody attended and told the remaining Benjamites that they should go to the region and kill everyone there who was not a virgin female and take all the virgin females as wives.

Unfortunately, there were not enough women there for all of the men.  They then concocted a plan to let the remaining Benjamite survivors go to a town near Shechem and lay in wait outside the town in the vinyards and when the girls come out to celebrate the annual festival of the Lord, run down and kidnap enough of the girls to make them all wives.

Then when the fathers of these girls complains they will say they did not break their vow because they didn’t give the girls to them, they came and took them.

After this everyone, including the Benjamites went home.  The Benjamites rebuilt their towns and everyone continued to live in their own inheritance.

The final verse of Judges provides an exclamation point on the entire period of the Judges:

Judges 21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

CONCLUSION

Samuel is considered by many to be the last of the judges.  In the first Biblical book named after him (1 Samuel 8) we find God’s lament at the actions of the Israelites and their rejection of him as king and demand for an earthly king.

As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. ⁹ Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”

And so Samuel, at God’s direction gives them a king named Saul.

We think that perhaps things have gotten better in the world, but a thousand hears later we find Paul in Romans 1:21-32 explaining the same thing that God had said about the Israelites when they rejected God:

²¹ For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.²² Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools ²³ and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.

²⁴ Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. ²⁵ They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

²⁶ Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. ²⁷ In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

²⁸ Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. ²⁹ They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, ³⁰ slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; ³¹ they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. ³² Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.

The same conditions exist today.  It seems that there truly is nothing new under the sun.[5] 

Rejection of the moral authority of the God of the Bible has one inevitable result.  Society becomes more and more evil and the effects increase over time.  When those who oppose God want to remove all reference to God in all aspects of society they should not be surprise when people act godlessly.

There is no way to legislate people into morality.  You cannot take away every tool a godless person may use to do evil.  Evil people have been doing evil things since humans have existed on the planet.  An evil person will do evil with whatever he has at his disposal.

We, as a world, have forgotten what the God of the Bible has done for us and we are experiencing the evil that is the inevitable result. 

The cure for acting godlessly is God!  The way for people to know God is for someone to tell them.

Appendix A – Slavery

Some read in the Bible where God tells the Israelites how to treat their slaves and there are two kinds of slaves described in the Bible.

The first is really an indentured servitude in which a person could not provide for their family and so they would sell themselves into slavery for a period of time during which their master would take care of them and they would serve the master.  After a period of time, after the slave had served the time agreed upon, he could choose to be exonerated or, if he was treated well and liked the arrangement, could pledge to remain a slave for live.

In other cases, such as is described here, the Israelites would take slaves of the cities and nations they would conquer which was in direct contradiction to God’s commands.

The people living in these lands prior to the coming of the Israelites were exceeding evil.  When God made the covenant with Abraham, he told him that his offspring would not inherit the land for four generations because the “sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.”[6]

God was giving these nations the chance to repent (as he did for Ninevah, who did repent and God did not destroy them – at least not at that time) but God (being all-knowing) knew they would not.

Having become so unspeakably evil (performing child sacrifice and a number of other abdominal acts), God had no choice but to remove them from the Earth lest it return to the state it was in when God decided to cleanse it with the flood.

Since God promised to never destroy humanity with a flood again, He needed to purge the world of those who could lead it back to that state and replace them with a nation that had pledged to serve him as their God – Israel.

Appendix B – The Angel of the Lord

Throughout the Bible there are places which refer to “The Angel of the Lord” and others that refer to “an angel of the lord”.  There is a big difference.

When we see “The angel of the Lord”, this is the personification of the part of the triune Godhead that would later be born on the Earth through Mary – Jesus, the Son.

In the book of Judges, we see this clearly when “The angel of the Lord” comes to speak with Gideon in Judges 6.  In verse 11 we see “The Angel of the Lord came and sat down…” and as the conversation with Gideon continues converses with Him in verse 14 we read “The Lord turned to him and said”.

We also see “The Angel of the Lord” referenced a number of other times in scripture and in each place He speaks as, and accepts praise and worship as God.[7]

Conversely, we see “an angel of the Lord” in other places where the angel refuses to be worshiped as God or clearly cannot be Jesus – for instance in Matthew 28 we see “an angel of the Lord” at the empty tomb telling the women that Jesus is not there.

In Luke 1, when the birth of John the Baptist is foretold, “an angel of the Lord” appears to Zechariah[8] he later identifies himself as “Gabriel”[9].

When we see The Angel of the Lord referenced in Judges, we can know that this is the personification of Jesus coming to save His people, just as he does in the New Testament.

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[1] Throughout the Bible, God talks directly to prophets and the prophets give direction to the people. 

Moses and Joshua were both prophets and God spoke directly to them giving them directions.  In other places where the Bible says “God spoke to the people of…”, God is speaking through a prophet who then provides God’s words to the people.  The Biblical books of prophesy are God’s words spoken to the people through His prophets.

[2] Also see Judges 18:1; 19:1, and 21:25.

[3] See Appendix A at the end of this text for more about slavery in the Bible

[4] See also Exodus 12:12-14; 12:24-27; 13:14-16; and 15:25-26

[5] Ecclesiastes 1:9

[6] Genesis 15:16

[7] Genesis 16:7-12, 19:1-21, 31:11-13; Exodus 3:2-4; Judges 2:1-5, 6:11-23, 13:1-22; Zechariah 3:1-6, 12:8

[8] Luke 1:11

[9] Luke 1:19