Misogyny in the old testament.

[Loveroftruth]

Most everything God has taught me had first started with Him showing me something that was NOT true.

I cant explain it but He will nudge me and not let me except something and then will show me the truth.

Most of what He has taught me has been later shown to be the truth.. the first time was when I was a new born christian and He showed me the tithe was false... that was the start of more and more so much so that I never became part of the "Church System"

Now, what has been written in this thread has shown an incredible freedom for people to discuss, ask questions, share all without a fear for our salvation...... I praise God for that.

Many things have opened my eyes and some things have confirmed what I am sensing, but the most important is that GOD in my life has taught me by showing me the false and allowing me to ASK, QUESTION and SEARCH and I have never sensed His displeasure from questioning the things that have been taught for hundreds of years and passed down as truth.

FAith is HEARING GOD, What He is saying and asking YOU or me to do personally and walking in it,. To me faith is not blindly believing what man teaches me... this is not faith.

I praise God for the freedom to ask and seek and allow God to unfold things and I thank God for this forum which has been a tool in allowing people to finally come out and share the things they had nowhere else to share

PEACE and LOVE :girlheart:

[Cardinal]

 :cloud9: Amen LT! And Amen Jack, we all serve at His pleasure....... :thumbsup:

[Kept]

I second that Amen LT  :girlheart:

you go girl! God doenst mind our questions! I am just sure of it.

:HeartThrob:

He knows we are part dirt haha

kept

[Michele]

Heya Kept......part dirt.........dumb as dirt eh? :grin:

[Hennessey]

too funny ..... give me a dirty lady anyday   :laughing7:

[Hennessey]

Today I am a eunuch and all the girls look alike.  They're all saints in my book.   :happygrin:

[Loveroftruth]

Today I am a eunuch and all the girls look alike.  They're all saints in my book.   :happygrin:

:flowerred:

[Dean]

Dean Wrote

That humans abuse other humans and BLAME God for it...is perfectly human and ALWAYS wrong. To abuse that which has been created in God's sacred image..a HUMAN BEING...is to miss the mark.

IMO...all proclamations that people use to credit their god for their killing, raping, plundering, stealing, abusing...other human beings are false. I'm hoping to be done... with minimizing and or jumping through theological hoops to defend...my own and others outrageous and disgusting human behavior, against other humans.

Dean, can you elaborate more about what you are saying here? more details!!!  i.e. what are you saying?...I am a bit slow :grin:
But really want to understand what your saying here :flowerred:

I no longer consider a book...the Bible...to be the word of God. Jesus...IS the WORD [logos]of God. My Religion turned me from the LIVING WORD of God...Jesus Christ...to Bible Idolatry.

IMO... Orthodox Christianity worships a book and has mistakenly given it QUALITIES ...that belong only to the LIVING WORD. Scriptures are purposed to be a witness of and towards the LIVING WORD, Jesus. Instead..men have said that Scriptures are a witness to a book, that becomes the word of God... and to the organized Churches... that they hold positions of power and leadership in.

The Gospel ..is the SPOKEN STORY of the LIVING WORD. Spoken and heard through God's greatest creation...human beings.

There is a story of a 3 year famine in a land a long time ago. The tribal leader believing he has heard from his God ...sacrifices 7 HUMAN BEINGS in order to end the famine. But, first...in accordance with his own position and agenda... he chooses who and who will not be HUNG. The story goes on to say that after he has sacrificed these 7 HUMAN BEINGS...[by the way...this HUMAN SACRIFICE was deemed necessary because of the blood thirstyness of the previous leader] that God heeded the prayer for the land.

Put that on tonights news as a current event...and the HUMAN response would be significantly different than RELIGIONS response to David's sacrifice of 7 human beings recorded in...  2 Sam 21.

LT..I have never met this god..that David said, told him to sacrifice those people so he could get it to rain.

Let the free for all ...begin.

Dean

[Loveroftruth]

Dean Wrote

Put that on tonights news as a current event...and the HUMAN response would be significantly different than RELIGIONS response to David's sacrifice of 7 human beings recorded in...  2 Sam 21.

LT..I have never met this god..that David said, told him to sacrifice those peolple so he could get it to rain.

I too do not recognize this God  :dontknow: :msealed:

Dean............My mouth is dropped...... you hit the nail on the head.......... and I just so agree with you!

How can we ignore it because we are supposed to ignore what it really says to see the spiritual behind it  :dontknow: :dontknow: :dontknow: :dontknow:

[Cardinal]

I no longer consider a book...the Bible...to be the word of God. Jesus...IS the WORD [logos]of God. My Religion turned me from the LIVING WORD of God...Jesus Christ...to Bible Idolatry.

IMO... Orthodox Christianity worships a book and has mistakenly given it QUALITIES ...that belong only to the LIVING WORD. Scriptures are purposed to be a witness of and towards the LIVING WORD, Jesus. Instead..men have said that Scriptures are a witness to a book, that becomes the word of God... and to the organized Churches... that they hold positions of power and leadership in.

The Gospel ..is the SPOKEN STORY of the LIVING WORD. Spoken and heard through God's greatest creation...human beings.
Dean

:cloud9: That's very true, Dean......

[Kept]

TY Dean you have the courage to say what I want to say

I no longer consider a book...the Bible...to be the word of God. Jesus...IS the WORD [logos]of God. My Religion turned me from the LIVING WORD of God...Jesus Christ...to Bible Idolatry.

yes I couldnt agree more and this is what is being beaten home to me lately within my spirit!

Bible Idolatry.......this is what is being so revealed to me as in, and some wont like this ok but Im just gonna say it anyways and get it out. Its burning in me to get out.

How cold I have gotten without realizing it that I would live on brutality to get spiritual truths! I feel as if Ive had a wake up slap to the face and I needed it. I feel like a drug addict that is being released from an addiction!

ok its out and I know it wont be popular but that is what is happening within me.

kept

I wanted to add that it also great humbles me to think that many many could have gone thru such horrors and here I sit and read and get all high spiritually. I think they would be blessed that we receive spiritual insights in such a way, but, it just so saddens me now and the insights I receive at their expense cause me to bow my knee and ask God why?

I just value human beings so much now, all human beings are so precious, my heart is being expanded and I just dont know if I can look on some things the same anymore

[Cardinal]

 :cloud9: God wants relationship with HIM, and until we can let go of the written word a little, we will never come to fully know the Word of God that is Spirit. What you find is, that the Spirit will teach, referring to the written as a confirmation of what was spoken by the Spirit personally. He has literally spoken things to me to look up in the Hebrew, and I am still in awe when I get in there and discover it's exactly what was being taught to me, right there in black and white, the principle hidden in plain sight, sometimes in only one Hebrew word, but multiplied and expanded in understanding, thru numerous scriptures.

If you really want to know someone you wouldn't read a book about them in their presence. That would teach you about them, but you wouldn't have a personal one on one relationship with them. But both experiences are necessary. If we didn't know what His nature was like, we wouldn't know Who it was that was speaking to us, in the beginning of our walk. It helps us discern His voice, and learn to hear Him. Blessings to you......

[Hennessey]

What you find is, that the Spirit will teach, referring to the written as a confirmation of what was spoken by the Spirit personally.

Yes Card, it is reversed from what we were taught in the org. church. Revelation by the Spirit to make the Logos, Living Rhema. My neighbor Christie who has the deepest walk and relationship with Christ has not picked up a Bible in two years at God's direction. Such heresy. lol

[Kept]

Thats so wild you would say that Jack.

I was sitting basking in the presence of God and I had the thought that what would it be like God to just put aside the book and lets say you and I go out and live more life together amongst people.


God and I are having a fun day today haha Im wondering where to venture to next, what group of people I might find myself in the midst of only to find Him in the midst of them!

He is so awesome!

kept

[Cardinal]

 :cloud9: Yep, Jack, been there, done that.......is there a denom yet called "Heretics Anonymous"? If not, maybe we should start one........you go first  :laughing7:  oops.......my bad........you already did on MyChurch, LOL.......I'm right behind you, buddy..... :thumbsup:

PS. Just making sure........you know I'm just kidding with you, right?

[Hennessey]

PS. Just making sure........you know I'm just kidding with you, right?

I think we're on the same page    :laughing7:

[Kratos]

Every "wave of God" has been out of balance in either the Word or the Spirit when it washed on the shore. It is like two oars in a row boat. You cannot go straight for long if you neglect either in favor of the other. I have been led away from God by a wrong understanding of the Word and the Spirit came in time and brought me back. But, I have also been deceived by what I thought was the voice of the Spirit and it was the Bible that brought me back from error.

Deciding to no longer stay in the Bible is just as dangerous as taking a break from listening to the Spirit. IMO

Whenever man follows a voice that starts to take them contrary to the Bible, you are faced with one of two paths. You can hold up and seek God until the Bible and the Spirit again agree. Or, you can join the crowd that no longer considers the Bible to be God's Word so you can continue in your error. The choice is always ours to make. (Oops, did I say choice out loud?)

We must test the spirits because all spirits are not of God. There are three that bear witness in Heaven and these three agree. If the Word (Bible) and the Spirit do not agree, we have misunderstood one of them and we need to wait upon the Lord until He comes and judges the matter.

John

[Kratos]

John

I dont know how to tell you this without it seeming to contradict you but I am stronger than ever in the spirit. I actually feel as if God has established me more lately, not less.

And this is important I just say this ok, not to you or to anyone imparticular but speaking for me what is really deep in my heart.

I love the spiritual word but until a person has a taste for it you must sit down where they sit, enjoy them, love them, spend time with them and if you do that you might just find they actually grasp much more then you thought and God will give you a way to commune

Paul said it so beautifully
to the jew I became as a jew, to the gentile...............

You and I see my time on that forum very different and I will stick with Gods view that I get

love ya

kept

Kept,

I do not worry about you in particular and you have admitted that it can be dangerous for someone not well grounded to listen to those who once knew God and walked away so far when they share how they got there. Does it surprise you that you have read the OT for so many years while not looking at the outward appearance and now you all of a sudden focus on the natural occurances and wonder about the righteous behavior of God to these people? You see this as a good thing and I am sure that it is for you.

I know that the Lord has you and will keep you there. I personally get concerned when I start agreeing with those who do not believe in God. I think the difference between us and many other Christians that have gone there is we do not go there to teach them. We go there to learn what they believe. I just want us to make sure that we know the difference between going to learn what they believe and going to learn from them.

I was always told that I am a product today of what I said yesterday which is a product of what I believed the day before which is a product of who I listened to the day before that. Jesus said that we must be careful how we hear. I think it is true that we are over there for different purposes and I do not want you to think that I do not think both are valid. Sharing our perspectives will speak to those who need to hear what whichever one of us God wants each to hear. Some need to hear you and get more free and some need to hear me and be more careful. This is the many membered Body in action.

Know that I love and respect you,

John

[Kept]

John

I dont see them the same way. Not all of them.

You can take yourself out of God or God out of you in your own understanding but its not that simple. God doesnt just leave us cause we get fed up. God has staying power. John try really looking for Him in the voices there.

I will NEVER leave you nor forsake you!

I am as close as your own breath

My words are in your mouth

I could go on John

I know that they dont see God in them, but I do find Him, in some in small seed form, in others there is a tree bearing fruit

Its ok with me if they call it something other than God

afterall, He doesnt seem to be all upset about it

He is no respector of persons

that is just what I see John

I look for God and that is whom I speak to and listen for

If they want to label Him something else and God hasnt seen fit to change that then thats between Him and them.

I dont call it God because it bothers them, I can actually respect that because I respect them.

kept

[Kept]

Does it surprise you that you have read the OT for so many years while not looking at the outward appearance and now you all of a sudden focus on the natural occurances and wonder about the righteous behavior of God to these people? You see this as a good thing and I am sure that it is for you.

No it doesnt suprise me a bit, God is always suprising me.

I dont discount all the spiritual truths Ive gotten from the brutal stories in the bible.
But I also dont want to just turn a blind eye to all the brutality especially when my daughter is 13, is about to enter public school with a lot of kids that werent raised living and breathing the bible as its been passed down to us. They are an internet educated generation that question everything. What answers will she have? What is she going to face? I am out there finding out John. And Im seeking answers.

When she is faced with the very real brutality of her God by her new athiest classmates what is she going to know and say? Will it be the first time she is faced with this? NO

This is one reason why I am seeking. This is what she will hear- well He is God you know, He can do what ever He wants and its not sin cause its HIM doing it. Yes He can order brutal rapes and murders and thats all fine and dandy cause He is God. Do as I say and not as I do kinda God you got there huh? (said in a mocking voice to her about how she believes) I could go on but that is the kind of stuff she will be faced with.

Christians for years have been too afraid to face these things and I dont want to be.

kept

[Kratos]

Kept,

You have read enough of my posts to know that  I do not believe in the form of God's sovereignty as some others here. I do not believe that if a woman is raped that God ordained it. There is an enemy that we are commanded to resist and overcome. But, I really do not want to start that one again. I also see God in some of them, but it is what they believe that is poison to our souls. But, God will lead each of us as He chooses.

John

[Pierac]

The spirit and the word are inseparable!  The Spirit is the mind of God!

It is quite evident that in the apostle's mind to be filled with the spirit is precisely the same thing as letting the word (teaching, message) of Christ direct our lives. This is simply to say that in John chapters 14 to 16, "the Spirit" that will come to help the apostles will be the post-resurrection revelation of Christ's message directed by the risen Christ to the world through the apostles.

The acid test as to whether I have "Jesus in my heart" is whether I have his words informing and empowering my life. If his Gospel-word is the motivating principle in my life, then I have the Spirit of God dwelling in me. Indeed, I have the Father and the Son. Hence Paul's vigorous warning that if anyone fails to demonstrate the presence of the words of Christ in his life, he is devoid of understanding (1 Tim 6:3).

So Kratos is correct, in that you need the word of God in order to obtain His mind. 

Kept you are also correct in that we do not need to shield people from Gods works with his clay!

CLV Ecc 1:13 I applied my heart to inquiring and exploring by wisdom concerning all that is done under the heavens:  it is an experience of evil Elohim has given to the sons of humanity to humble them by it.

Ecc 3:1 For everything there is a stated time, And a season (Time) for every event under the heavens:"

Yes, we like to talk about the times God gave us our spouse, or first child in this stated time!

Yet,  Is there a time for rape, a time for murder?  Ecc 1:13 is hinting that there is.  Ecc 3:1 is clear. There is a time for every event and it does not say only nice events!

I agree Kept

Christians for years have been too afraid to face these things and I dont want to be.

So just how far are we going to take Ecc 1:13 and 3:1?   :dontknow:

When I posted the following comment at the beginning of this thread I was talking about this issue.

Will Jesus look to us one day and say the same words he did to Peter?

Mat 14:31  Immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and took hold of him, and *said to
him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?"

Are we going to accept the rape of a child as stated as  'a time for every event under the heavens'?  If the answer is yes?  Then we have to have faith that the potter know best for his clay don't we?

Kept,  This is why Christians for years have been too afraid to face these things!  Are we ready to explore here?  :dontknow:  Because this will be a hard area to explore indeed!


Paul

[firstborn888]

This is why Christians for years have been too afraid to face these things!  Are we ready to explore here?  :dontknow:  Because this will be a hard area to explore indeed!

Paul

Rightly dividing between soul and spirit will make it easier.

  - b

[reFORMer]

 

Wasn't the all night rape a simple relating of facts of what happened and how the countrymen reacted when they heard of the crime? I don't see where God was condoning the home owners behavior. Are you saying the lack of any verbal condemnation is condoning the man's actions?

I'm saying the context of the entire OT (the law) condones this kind of behavior against women. They think it's ok because they are taught, seemingly by God (through the law), that a woman is worth much less than a man. The all night rape was a result of what the man thought was the right thing to do. The way it was written indicates it was considered a honorable course of action, for no blame is attributed to the man.

I know God too, and mine seems to hold a different opinion on how honorable it is.)

This passage quoted noted nothing from God, only human behavior, as also is true of 1 Sam 21 mentioned a little later.  Though all those nations were somewhat affected by the code of Hammurabi, the context of the people's actions was the very ancient Near East, not the society envisaged by Hebrew Scripture.  The "Province" of Benjamin had somehow become almost all males.  The probability of contact with other societies is high.  The nations surrounding Israel, while polytheists, were significantly into the goddess.  In the last quarter century or so some misinformed branches of feminists have proposed that the goddess worshipers exalted women, treating them like "goddesses."  They say it was the proponents of a male Yahweh who spoiled all this, bringing in male subjection and abuse of women.  Joseph Campbell, purveyor of myths with tenure at what was a women's college, Vasser I think, was also a popularizer of this as if it was fact.  There's a certain logical ring to it, but it's not history.  Women were mostly just property in the ancient world...except for Israel!

Not too distant in time from this event we find Deborah, a married woman, being raised by the anointing to "judge" all Israel.  There were plenty men.  God passed them all by, skipping her husband too.  God was so working with her that she functions as a "Seeress," a special form of prophet.  Some find in it a reflection of the apostolic.  Certainly every form of "ministry" the Bible records as done by women.  In the last chpt. of Romans, Andronicus, either a man or woman's name, and Junias, always a woman's name -- probably 2 women -- are called apostles; 4 out of 6 mentions of the evangelists Priscila and Aquila, the woman is mentioned first, which the early church interpreted to mean she was the foremost of the husband and wife ministry team; etc.

The last chapter of Proverbs, a thousand years later, is an idealization of the Ancient Jewish and Israelite Woman.  The family she inculcates with proper values and the home she oversees are significant enterprises, demanding much personal involvement and skillful labor; yet, she independently creates for herself additional profit making employment outside the home.

Isolating just one aspect of Mosaic law out of the context of a society produced by the whole of that revelation and then comparing that orphaned fragment to our own culture's contextualizing of that specific issue would be more acceptable if by merely doing something often was enough to legitimize it.  Many preachers sound like God came down on Mt Vernon and gave the laws of Moses to George Washington and now we're going to suffer the promised penalties for our disobeying that covenant.  I don't read history that way and I don't believe that describes God's relation to the United States.

Can you imagine a culture that had no police and no jails?  They were very urbanized, unlike the nations surrounding them.  As much as 70 % lived in cities.  Almost every man could read and write, something unheard of in the rest of the ancient world.  A great many of them were multi-lingual world travelers.  One of the great glories of their God was the care for the poor and needy.  About 3 % of the gross national product was spent on them.  As for the penalty of "taking a damsel" in this polygamous society being to take her as a wife if she allowed or she could opt for being set up to live as a single woman for the rest of her life...perhaps it's truer to the actual nature of the wrong.  Our culture has very odd Ethical standards.  Constant media bombardment with the idea that love is jumping in the sack as soon as possible on first attraction, never the path of courtship and marriage; so, the immature, after thousands of such scenarios drinks too much and...Here where I live in Georgia, I think the second rape conviction can result in the death penalty.  Perhaps a balance can be found if one considered some of the persons of note who were born of rape, if one could look in their faces to see the face of God.

The idea that "a woman is worth much less than a man" is something to consider in strictly biological terms.  A man can inseminate thousands of women, being the father to potentially as many.  With a little mechanical help, such as was even available in those antient days, he could have fathered yet thousands more.  Perhaps this matters more in our future out there where galaxies collide.  But...a woman can have on the average, what, maybe a dozen children?

Maybe somebody better in math can calculate the number of Israelites, God's priestly nation in the earth, if the rate they'd multiplied from when they entered Egypt until they entered Canaan had continued until the time of their first king Saul.  I encountered it once and I remember something in the several trillions.  By their failure to obey God's command to be fruitful and multiply once they got in the land, something He'd warned them of, they gave the world to the wicked.

---James

[Hennessey]

My neighbor Christie who has the deepest walk and relationship with Christ has not picked up a Bible in two years at God's direction.

I probably should clarify this which I shared above. Let me first say the Bible can be taken by the carnal mind to say everything and anything. There are many levels of  the Written Word  that bring forth anointed Life; from the letter, to allegory, to language study, to numerology/Bible Code, Rhema etc.

Christie and her husband were beat like few others by the letter of the law churches for a couple decades. She knows one day God will call her back into the Bible but she awaits His signal. I am very careful not to push writings or a lot of doctrinal stuff upon her. She also heard the Lord tell her not to have Bible curriculum with her homeschooling. Instead she and her husband were to be the children's epistles and God would cause the children to seek after Him with out the prodding of the parents. The two oldest 10 and 8 read their own bibles and thrill to do so and they ask questions of their parents which thrills every body.

Christie came into God's complete sovereignty before I did and it has been the great "resting place" of her life ......... knowing God is working all things for good. This young mother found God's sovereignty at her youngest daughters death bed when she gave up. (dughter recovered) I once mentioned to Christie that I had really struggled terribly with the "Jessica Lundsford tragedy" some years ago. I asked her how a mother of little ones, the same age as this little girl, deals with such. Christie told me "His grace is sufficient" She knew that little girl had God's grace in unexplainable terms.  I knew Truth was spoken by this dear saint that day and I shall never forget it.

Any way, in closing, I was once led to give Christie Gary's "Truth or Heresy" questionnaire and she read it and said she agreed with "all men save" but it wasn't in her heart yet. One day a half year later Christie and the ten year old girl were chatting in the car while driving. Eden shared with her mom that she believe God loved all people not just Christians. With that Christie said "UR" dropped into her heart.

This is the most beautiful family I have ever known bar none ..... never seen four children like theirs. They glow with God's love. How can that be done with no church services and a mother that doesn't read the Bible.

Ain't He  Just Grand!

Jack

PS. James I came back and read your post. Wow, wonderful knowledge and I copied it. The first blessing I had was this morn when I read your "My Church" profile and the last before bed is this one. Thank you!
Thanks brother.