Can Any Of The Ab Bible Quoters Help Me?

[Atheist]

I have a vague memory of Biblical quotes wherein Jehovah exhorts his chosen people to smite the Midianites and to destroy them and their cattle and their children and to spare only the women who please them so that they may do with them as they see fit.
I hope my memory is playing me false. Perhaps someone with more Biblical knowledge can put me right?

[Buenchico]

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Judges%206&version=KJV

[Buenchico]

and/or
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Numbers%2031&version=NIV

[Atheist]

Thanks, Buen. I don't see a confirmation of my memory, but I do see a picture of a violent and primitive community which enjoyed slaughter of innocent animals and a revenge-based way of life. Perhaps a more Bible-educated ABer can come up with something closer to what I thought I had read. I really hope that they will try to take my request as a genuine wish to learn more about the Bible, rathe than regard me as a Bible basher.

[Buenchico]

Possibly crossed posts there, Atheist.

From my second link:
"15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them.

16 “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people.

17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man,

18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."

[Atheist]

Buen thanks for your second post. It fits in better with my hazy memory. Can a Bible follower explain why such stuff is worthy of respect or worthy of being taken as a message from God that we should obey or be inspired by?

[douglas9401]

A disinterested observer might suggest that you're guilty of the same sort of cherry picking that 'our' faithful are so fond of.

I remain unworkedup.

[Tilly2]

It gets better as you go through the books.

[Atheist]

Douglas, if some people think that the Bible is the word of God, then I think they really ought to stand by all of it. If I find wicked stuff mixed up with decent stuff, then I'm inclined to think that it's not the word of God, it's just wicked stuff mixed up with decent stuff that didn't come from God at all.

[Atheist]

I must add that if the OT is anything to go by, then it doesn't seem that God is a God of love and peace etc (as claimed by the NT fans), more a God of protecting and supporting his self-proclaimed chosen ones and the rest can go hang - in other words, I think it was all written by men. Good luck to them, but why on earth modern people would want to follow this stuff is dificult to understand unless we believe that men just never learn.

[douglas9401]

Well, yes, it's a work of fiction by many authors, some more demented and bloodthirsty than others.

Try not to have nightmares.

[Atheist]

Thaks, Doug. Fortunately I don't have nightmares, just the occasional dream where I am trying to find my way round the Civic Center and everything seems a bit different and some of the stairwells don't have handrails, and some of the girls (sorry - 'young women') aren't interested in me any more..

[Tilly2]

Have you read the whole Bible, Atheist?

[Atheist]

Tilly, no I haven't, that's why I asked for advice from those more well-read than me. Sadly, I've only had replies from google-hunters rather than Bible experts.

[Atheist]

Just to clarify my position, I'm not looking for quarrels, just interesting conversation about the way people think about this sort of stuff.

[Tilly2]

Well, I'm no Bible expert and I don't actually have the time or the inclination for a discussion. My first comment was a joke but obviously it didn't go down at all well.
Hopefully, someone who is more erudite, and has the time, will come on and have the discussion with you.

Off to eat my dinner. :-)

[Atheist]

Bon appetit, Tilly. I know this is a bit of a boring thread, but I do have an appetite for people's thoughts on apparently tedious subjects. I suppose at my age I have suddenly discovered a taste for the future!

[Tilly2]

Have a nice evening, Atheist. :-)

[Atheist]

Thank you, Tilly. You shine like a lamp in the darkness of my soul. (Geddit!?)

[nailit]

Must admit, cant be arrisrd any more.
Could submit a thousand examples but whats the point?

Let the religionists fight amongst themselves.
This verse means that, that verse means this????

[Atheist]

Nailit, don't go soft on us all. We value your opinions. Do not go softly into that dark night! We need you to keep us alert. Life goes on and so do you.