Today I’d like to turn your attention to two tractates from the turgid tome of troubling tripe known to theologians and theists as The Good Book, wherein divine decrees descend into disturbing depths of depravity.
The first reading for today is from the book of Leviticus, chapter twenty seven, verses twenty eight to twenty nine:
Nothing that a person owns and devotes to the Lord
(whether a human being or an animal or family land)
may be sold or redeemed
Everything so devoted is most holy to the Lord
No person devoted to destruction may be ransomed
They are to be put to death
Whilst “the Lord” makes it sound as though the person speaking is somebody other than the Lord God, it is actually an example of the god of the Bible talking about Himself in the third person since this passage falls under the chapter introduction “The Lord said to Moses…”
I imagine that some folk might argue that whilst this verse does say that if you devote a person to God you have to follow through and destroy them by putting them to death, it doesn’t say that you should do that with anybody – that is, it doesn’t indicate that God would cause anybody to actually perform a human sacrifice… which leads us nicely into the next reading; please turn to Ezekiel, chapter twenty, verses twenty five through twenty six:
So I gave them statutes that were not good and laws through which they could not live;
I defiled them through their gifts (the sacrifice of every firstborn)
that I might fill them with horror so they would know that I am the Lord.
Questions for consideration:
1. Do you believe that the Bible is the word of God?
2. Do you believe that when the Bible says that God said something, God said that thing?
3. Do you believe that God caused human sacrifice to Him by fire?
4. Do you believe that God is good?
5. Would you burn your first child to death for God if He commanded you to?