I’ve been having an interesting time preparing for my study tonight, and I’m feeling the boundaries of a 1/2 hour study. Most people will probably be glad. In order to make this work, however, you’ll need to read the material suggested. In this case, the “Introduction” from Meditations on the Letters of Paul by Herold Weiss and “Becoming Galatian: Spiritual Practices for Reading Galatians,” and Lesson 1: Introduction and Background,” from Galatians: A Participatory Study Guide by Bruce Epperly. The scripture passage will be Galatians 1:1-5, but it would be a good idea to read the entire book—it’s only 6 chapters—and also read and compare the introductions to other letters of Paul, whether disputed or not. Just start at Romans and read the first verse or two of each book until you get to Hebrews.
I’m finding the idea of posting two or three times on this topic during the week difficult, but that’s not a reason to abandon it. It’s important to allow topics to percolate, and one of my bad habits is to study the material on Thursday morning. In this case, I have looked at it some before today, but not enough, and I intend to change that.
But for tonight we’re going to look broadly at what is contained in the reading material and then focus on what made Paul an apostle, what made his letters authoritative for the church, and the nature of these letters as evidence. I’ll also touch on why I’m using Galatians, besides the fact that I think Epperly’s study guide is the right sort of challenging material to get us out of a rut on how we read the book. I think Herold Weiss similarly challenges our standard approaches (read his article Paul Did not Teach Righteousness by Faith), but he does son on a broader basis. We’re going to use Epperly’s more focused book to get to Weiss’s broader understanding.
Note here that I don’t mean that we will necessarily agree with either one. Rather, I’m looking at the focus and at ways of getting us each to let Paul’s writings speak to us. We will never completely discard our background. Yet we can try to give the scriptures the greatest possible chance to change us. That is the goal of this study.
Paul was impacted by his mystical experiences and the intervention of God by a vision of light. (Source: Adobe Stock [licensed]).Tonight I begin my new series of Thursday night studies on the apostle Paul. My approach will be a bit different than usual. I’m more interested in developing the background, particularly in Israelite religion and Judaism and looking at the way Paul draws from his theological sources.
I’ll also introduce my approach to the subject. I’ll be working first with material from Energion Publications authors. I publish these materials and I’m acquainted with them. More importantly, I wouldn’t have published them if I didn’t consider them valuable.
I’m going to use Galatians as my basic guide. That wasn’t my first choice. I’ve often felt that Pauline scholars spend excessive time in Romans and Galatians and neglect books like 1 Corinthians or Philippians in developing their view of Paul’s theology. But I have come to believe instead that what I saw as deficiencies in building a picture of Paul from these letters is more a result of misreading Paul than of choosing the wrong letters. Of course, I will still maintain that in order to understand Paul and his theology, one needs to consult everything he wrote, but I doubt anyone actually disagrees with me on that point. It’s rather a matter of emphasis.
In studying Galatians, I’m going to start from a foundation of reading the book with Bruce Epperly’s study guide in the Participatory Study Series, titled creatively Galatians: A Participatory Study Guide. (The title is not Bruce’s fault. It’s standard for the series, and therefore my fault.) Besides the fact that I publish the book, my reason for choosing this is that it is written by a progressive theologian, also a process theologian, who is nonetheless very favorable to Paul’s writings. I would like to create a conversation here between evangelical and progressive approaches to interpretation and also to take a look at the way our existing theology impacts our reading.
As part of the resources for this study, I’m going to be interviewing scholars from our Energion Publications author list with a variety of perspectives. Because I’m using Bruce Epperly’s study guide, I’m starting by interviewing him. I completed it this morning, and I’m excited by the results and what he had to say. Bruce is always entertaining. He’s the first of several. I hope you will listen to (or watch) all of them. Here’s the video:
It’s not necessarily a bad thing for our theology to impact our reading. In fact, I think it would be quite shocking if it didn’t. I am only reading the Bible because I grew up in a Christian home and have a theology that suggests that this book is useful. My existing theology is also going to have an impact on the way I place the content of the book. In turn, Paul is himself impacted by his own background and theology. This doesn’t suggest that interaction with the book doesn’t have the potential to change or even totally revolutionize our existing thinking. Paul encountered God in a new and different way on the road to Damascus and his theology was revolutionized. Yet one can still see his background in his destination.
It’s easy to separate Paul from his own background. In fact, it’s easier to do so than not. So I’m going to emphasize the background. Now I’m not in search of some undiscovered country where I hear Paul 100% as he was. My theology will be in tension with his as I learn, and I hope yours will be there as well.
It’s my hope to provide additional video notes and some blog posts each week. Just as we have with the Energion Publications Tuesday Night Hangouts I’ve changed these to a half hour each. I also hope that you will pick up a copy of Bruce Epperly’s book and do a study of Galatians at the same time as I do.
I will be consulting the other books listed, and also providing a resource page with a list of available books. But another book will be with me for the entire study is Herold Weiss’s book Meditations on the Letters of Paul. Herold brings some impressive scholarship to his reading of Paul, and I will be making full use of his material. As a suggestion, pick up copies of both of these books and follow along. And yes, I will be interviewing Herold as part of my series asking “Who was Paul?”
Here’s the viewer for tonight’s presentation:
Note that if you want to participate in live chat you will need to go to my YouTube channel and watch there. I will be watching the live chat for questions and comments. Note that I have put the books involved on sale on Energion Direct. You will be able to see them on the home page.
No, it’s not the end of the world. It’s the end of my series. I went into my hiatus in presenting these studies one episode short of completing the series, so tonight I’ll be wrapping up the eschatology series and preparing for my next series which will be looking at Paul’s letters and their background, especially in Hebrew scripture.
A little over a week ago I reviewed the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible using the Olive Tree electronic edition. On Tuesday I received my hardcover copy from the publisher. (Note: I received this copy free of charge in exchange for an honest review. No other strings were attached!) This is not an extraordinarily new experience in Bible editions, but it is a good one.
The Bible is 6″ x 9″, so fits nicely on all my disorderly stacks of books. It’s about 2 1/4″ thick, which makes it substantial, but not the largest Bible I use. The picture at the top shows it in my (not necessarily its) natural environment. That’s my actual desk, and so you can see it in comparison to the other study Bibles I have around it. You can click on the image to see it in high resolution. These days I rarely carry a physical Bible to church, other than my Greek & Hebrew testaments (I have years of marking and marginal notes in them), so I don’t worry that much about the physical size of a study Bible.
These days I rarely carry a physical Bible to church, other than my Greek & Hebrew testaments (I have years of marking and marginal notes in them), so I don’t worry that much about the physical size of a study Bible. That said, I can say that I prefer working with the electronic edition of this Bible, even though I am not well-acquainted with Olive Tree software. There is a great deal of information to present, and the size of an edition is always a compromise.
In this case, the text is small (as is common with study Bibles). The image just below shows it by comparison with my own Revelation: A Participatory Study Guide, which is printed in a 12 point font. The notes appear slightly smaller, though I’m not good enough to say for certain, and the impression may be created by a different (sans-serif) font for the notes. This note on text size is not intended as criticism, but it is one of the major reasons I prefer to use an electronic edition in which I can set font size. This is a problem for just about every study Bible out there. There is so much information to be included that something has to give. Having done page layout on a large number of books myself, I understand this completely.
The biblical text is printed in two columns with reference notes in the center. This is a classical style of presentation, but not one of my favorites. Again, I should emphasize that nobody can avoid all criticisms for the layout of a text. Doubtless others would complain about a single column with notes on the outer margins, for example. The double-column format is so standard that I have only a couple of Bibles that don’t follow it. An excellent example is The Jewish Study Bible (JPS Tanakh Translation), which uses a single column for the text with notes consistently in a narrower column to the right. I find their edition quite friendly.
There are a variety of excurses and notes included directly in the text section, besides the standard notes which are in two columns at the bottom of the page. The notes supplement and follow-up on the introduction, generally providing information that is applicable on a wider basis, i.e. not to just the text in question. For example, just before the text of Isaiah we have an introduction to “The Oracles of the Prophets,” followed by a short introduction to the book of Isaiah itself. But about three pages in we have a nearly three-page section titled “The Historical Background of Isaiah,” which provides a great deal of helpful information that will also relate to others of the prophets.
But just after these sections, on p. 1122, is an inset titled “Dating Methods.” No, this is not for those of you interested in origins and how rocks and fossils might be dated. Rather, it presents the basics of how one tries to place a particular oracle at a particular date. This is a tightly packed, extremely useful essay. Everyone should read it, no matter what portion of the Bible you’re studying. That’s why I chose Isaiah for this brief tour!
I mentioned that I will comment on some more specifics regarding the book of Hebrews. I will do so, but this past week has been intense, and I didn’t yet get to it. Nonetheless, the picture to the left at this point is the introduction to the book of Hebrews. I will go through that introduction in more detail in a post I hope to publish by Saturday.
Having the physical copy of this Bible in my hands makes me completely comfortable in recommending it. It’s easier to scan the portions I’m not emphasizing. For example, in using an electronic version I rarely “leaf through” the book, and thus might have missed the excellent introductory material for Isaiah. My main concern with study Bibles is that people tend to take the word of the note writer as to the meaning of the text. It’s certainly appropriate and valuable to get the opinions of others, but when one doesn’t find out why the writer believes a certain thing, one is left with either accepting it on authority—surely the author of such a fine volume would have his facts straight!—or having to dig elsewhere for that background information. That’s the value of this type of explanation.
I believe that it’s easy to let our theology keep us from reading the Bible, especially the narrative parts. The Bible is filled with stories. One example is the story of the flood. When Genesis 6 says (using the KJV), “It repenteth me that I have made man,” the first reaction is to try to explain how God didn’t really repent, thus preserving doctrines of omniscience expressed particularly in foreknowledge. A vigorous desire to preserve one’s theology can prevent one from hearing the story as it is actually told.
Jonah is just such a story. It’s very easy to make this a story about obeying God. The story was explained to me when I was a child as an illustration of the bad things that could happen to you if you went against God’s will. Another lesson, often taught at the same time, is that God can and does work miracles. Many people have seen belief in the whale (really more like “great fish”) as a test of one’s belief in the truth of scripture.
But to spend our time on the reality of the great fish, whether to disparage the idea or uphold it, is to stray from the story.
I’ve been delighted to publish a couple of books by Bruce Epperly that deal with Bible stories from a less theologically defensive position. Bruce tends to let the stories speak and as such he gets lessons from them that we might otherwise miss. A few months ago we released Ruth and Esther: Women of Agency and Adventure. I commend that study to you.
This week we released another book about stories, Jonah: When God Changes. Just the subtitle is likely to unsettle a few people. I think it’s good to be unsettled. I think that Jonah was unsettling when it was first written and it was intended to be.
We often have to work hard to love and care for people who are actually very similar to us. We tend to discount the command of Jesus to love our enemies. But in Jonah we have a call to love people we now hate—and with good reason!—and to take God’s message to them. While Jonah’s message sounds like a “fire and brimstone” sermon, it becomes a call to salvation, just as Jonah feared it would (read the last chapter)!
Bruce really works this little book and calls to our attention things we might normally miss in pursuit of theological comfort. I suggest that you give up that comfort and read the book!
[ncs_ad pid=’0664239013′ float=’left’ adtype=’aer.io’]On page 238 of his NTL commentary on Hebrews Luke Timothy Johnson uses the word “interrupt” to describe the transition between exposition and exhortation starting in Hebrews 5:11. In a way I’m nitpicking here, and because I am, I must also note that overall I find Johnson’s commentary nearly the most useful I’ve read, and if I were just talking about theological reflection, I would call it the best.
I have a couple of objections to use of the word “interrupt,” however. First, it seems to me that calling the transition an interruption divides the text without consideration for the author’s purpose in writing. There is no exposition here which stands alone, and which can then optionally be applied to the hearers via an exhortation. Rather, the intention is exhortation and the exposition underlies the exhortation and is illustrated and illuminated by the nature of that exhortation.
Second, the exhortations also help raise questions for the further exposition that follows. In the case in question (Hebrews 5:11-6:12), the question of the faithfulness and reliability of God is raised, which will be answered in Hebrews 6:13ff. This is also the critical question of the entire book. God has provided the final High Priest (logically and temporally), who will offer the final sacrifice, and will provide the way back to the presence of God. Since this is all final, human beings are presented with this final choice, in the view of our author. If you reject this, what means can God provide for you?
Without exhortation, the exposition would be dry, pointless, and incomplete. The exhortation is an integral part of developing the topic.
I emphasize this because of some of my experience in studying Pauline epistles in college and graduate school. We would make it through the theological exposition in the beginning of the book, but when we got to the practical admonitions, those were treated as something of an afterthought by Paul. “Here’s your theology of salvation, and oh, by the way, there are a few things it would be a good idea to do …”
But for Paul those admonitions grow out of the theology he has presented. The practical elements are not appendices to letters that are otherwise theological treatises. It would be better to call the theological exposition introductory matter to the practical sections. Perhaps this explains why Galatians and Romans seem to get so much more treatment from a theological viewpoint than 1 & 2 Corinthians.
Sometimes I think the worst thing about biblical scholarship is that it is carried out by biblical scholars. Their interest is in extracting theological propositions and historical data. The writers, especially Paul, are writing pastorally. The two don’t always work well together.
At least that is the view from someone who took Romans (through chapter 8!) and Galatians (through chapter 4!) in school. As far as I could tell, the professors were happy with that.
I’m about to move from the section on Numbers in the Cornerstone Biblical Commentary and from there go on to reading Deuteronomy. I’m reading this in parallel with a reading of the Hebrew text.
I’ll first note that I find this commentary very helpful, and I believe it would be helpful to a person preparing lessons or sermons on these books (Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy), which are not that easy to work with. The authors of all three sections provide good theological reflections on the passages, which I find helpful despite the fact that they are somewhat more conservative than my own theology.
One of the keys for Christians reading the Pentateuch is being open to the questions and looking for the answers. It is much less important to have a set of “good” answers at hand when you finish. It’s OK to admit that the culture reflected is very different from modern culture, and is hard for us to apply. As I have noted before, and recently read in Luke Timothy Johnson’s NTL commentary on Hebrews, modern Christians don’t really understand the idea of sacrifice, amongst other things, and so see the entire tabernacle/sanctuary service/cult as a foreign land.
Numbers 35 illustrates some difficulties. Here we have the concept of the avenger who will kill the person who has killed (even accidentally) a relative. So the cities of refuge are provided. There the killer can find refuge provided the killing was inadvertent. (Just how “inadvertence” is defined is up for some discussion.) In this passage we find the rule requiring at least two witnesses for a capital charge.
So we have a mitigation of vengeance killing, yet even if the person is found innocent of capital murder, he will be restricted to the city of refuge. Having been found not guilty, he still suffers exile. But modern readers may miss what many commentators see as the reason he remains until the death of the high priest. The death of the high priest is seen as atoning. I find the argument for this latter point less compelling than some, but nonetheless a serious possibility, and one which might well impact our understanding of Jesus as both high priest and sacrifice in Hebrews.
Which leads backward, in a sense, to the idea that the land itself is polluted by murder and that atonement must be made in order to remove this pollution. The atonement for intentional, premeditated murder can only be made by the death of the murder, and no ransom can be accepted. There is no indication in the text of what happens in case of doubt, when two witnesses cannot be produced. There would be no atonement. Clearly, people are not expected to atone for a sin they cannot determine existed.
We have here a tension between what we would see as Christian principles and a society based on vengeance. There is mitigation, and yet there is considerable accommodation as well. I think it is a good example of how God works with people. It’s easy for us to say that God should make things absolutely right (as we see it) in an instant. But it is not that easy to change a culture and a society.
Yet if you look at Judaism today, you see an amazing edifice built on just this kind of material, and Christianity grew out of this same soil with some interesting outside influence!
Regarding Numbers 33 and the 42 stations on the route to the promised land, footnote #1 on page 420, (Cornerstone Biblical Commentary on Numbers), notes that “[p]atristic commentators compared these 42 stations to the 42 (3 x 14) generations in Jesus’ genealogy, but that doesn’t shed any light on ch 33 …”
It is quite true that this comparison sheds no light on chapter 33, but I doubt that there was any intention by the author of Matthew to shed light on Numbers. More likely, if he was making a connection, he was intending to have Numbers 33 shed light on his genealogy. Clearly he went out of his way to get 42 generations and divide them into three groups of 14. It’s very easy to make too much of numerology.
Despite that, I am more and more convinced that New Testament authors quite frequently intended to draw more of the Old Testament narrative into their writing than just what was quoted. One reason for this is that I have noted how the lack of knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures/Old Testament in modern audiences makes discussing certain passages more difficult. The corollary to this is that a greater knowledge would make discussion easier. New Testament writers could count on greater knowledge among their readers than we can today.
What might Matthew be drawing into the text here? I have argued that Matthew 2:15, when it quotes from Hosea 11:1, “Out of Egypt I have called my son,” is drawing the broader story there into his narrative. At first glance, one might accuse Matthew of taking something that is clearly not Messianic and making a prophecy out of it. Hosea 11 continues with telling us that the more YHWH called his people, the more they went away. My initial reaction to this, and the reaction of many, is that Matthew is grabbing a single clause out of context, and making a prediction of something that isn’t actually a prediction. But I’d suggest instead that Matthew is presenting Jesus as Israel doing it right. When God called Israel at various times, they went away, as Hosea is saying. Jesus, on the other hand, when called out of Egypt or when called to the cross, continues to come.
My suspicion is that the use of 42, besides being the numerologically comfortable grouping of three pairs of sevens (and there are so many ways a set of numbers can be presented!), is intended to point us back to the travels of the Israelites in coming to the promised land. I am in no way suggesting that these 42 stops were in some way predictive, nor am I suggesting that Matthew 1:1-17 gives some sort of new or special meaning to Numbers 33. Rather, I’m suggesting that Matthew uses 42 generations as an allusion to Numbers 33 and to Israel coming out of Egypt and to the promised land.
Nearly 20 years ago a waitress at a well-known breakfast chain messed up my order for hash browns by adding diced ham.
If you don’t find anything odd about that sentence, you are, perhaps, a candidate for counseling. But I digress.
I had wanted jalapeños, onions, mushrooms, and cheese. I got all of those. Plus ham.
As a vegetarian, I don’t eat ham. The waitress was very nice and got me a new order with what I wanted, but for years (yes, years) thereafter, I was known to remind the staff at that particular chain that I did not want any meat in my hash browns. None at all.
I was reminded of this last night when I asked Jody if she had done a certain thing, something that we had both forgotten a couple of months ago, but that I didn’t want forgotten again. She said she supposed she’d have to wear forgetting this one monthly task once for some time, considering how long it took me to forget about the ham in my hash browns. Well, I obviously haven’t actually forgotten it. I have quit mentioning it. One step at a time, you know!
I was reminded of it again this morning as I read Numbers 32. The story takes place after the Israelites have defeated a variety of enemies on the east bank of the Jordan River, and are preparing to cross into the promised land. The leaders of the tribes of Reuben and Gad really like the territory that has been conquered as it is good for their flocks, so they come to Moses and Eleazar and ask for this land rather than a share of the land across the Jordan. Moses is angry with them and reminds them of something that had happened nearly 40 years before. He calls them a brood of sinners. It’s really not a very pleasant conversation.
[ncs_ad pid=’9780842334280′ float=’right’ adtype=’aer.io’]They reply that they will certainly help their fellow-Israelites conquer the land, but that they like this land just fine. Eventually with that agreement, Moses agrees to grant them the land (somehow the half tribe of Manasseh gets in the mix toward the end), and we get an explanation of what cities they built and what territory each took.
In reading about this, I note that commentators try to decide whether the final decision was a positive one or not. Was it a good idea to let these two and a half tribes settle east of the Jordan? I don’t know of any way to determine the answer. I suspect that there would have been problems either way. But when interpreting stories one thing to remember is that some things in a story, even in a fictional one, happen because they happen. I think it is a mistake to always try to find a moral in a story, even a Bible story. Some things just happened that way, and there is not great moral in it.
Despite the fact that I’m unable to decide one way or another on the value of having some of the Israelites settle to the east of the river, I do see some potential questions, and perhaps resulting lessons in the story. One might be that there is no reference in this chapter to seeking the will of the Lord. It’s entirely a human decision. Given the frequency with which Moses consults with the Lord before taking action, is it possible that the writer here is trying to make a point?
But one of the values in stories is that they can connect to different aspects of our lives, and today Moses’s response connected for me. Here come these poor tribal elders, much younger than Moses, one of the few survivors from those who left Egypt as adults, and they are coming to one who is now a revered leader. I suspect there was a bit of fear and trembling going on. They ask what seems to be a simple question: Could we have this territory?
Now consider. The territory has been conquered. It’s going to go to someone. All the tribes are going to get some land. It might be a good idea to occupy the territory, in fact. On the surface, there is nothing wrong with their request. It’s perfectly reasonable. They don’t even say they won’t help with the conquest of the promised land. They just haven’t mentioned it.
The CBC commentary I’m reading right now calls the solution involving them joining the other tribes in the conquest while leaving their wives and children in fortified settlements a compromise. But I see no delay and discussion. It looks to me as though they already had that ready, but hadn’t managed to roll it out.
Moses reacts. Forty years ago other Israelites did this, and it’s right at the top of his mind. He remembers those people and those lessons, and he’s not about to let anyone forget the lesson.
About 40 years before some other people had sinned. In fact, their actions were only similar in a superficial way, but Moses had learned the lesson well. Perhaps too well. Someone could put ham in his hash browns once, but never again! He calls them a brood of sinners while reminding them of past failings.
It may seem that I’m being a bit disrespectful in my treatment of Moses, a man who spoke to God face-to-face. But if there’s anything we learn from the broader story of scripture it’s that every human being has weaknesses. Scripture is not afraid to take note of those weaknesses. Now Moses becomes a special case. I was working through Hebrews 3:1-6 this morning as well, and the argument that Jesus is greater than Moses. That argument must be made because of the great respect we grant Moses as Christians.
The thing is that having learned his lesson, he applied it where it didn’t really apply. The continuing discussion makes it clear that these elders are not opposed to conquering Canaan, nor do they want to shirk their responsibilities. They’re simply proposing a plan for making good use of this land.
Moses, to his credit, calms down, considers the situation, and they all agree to a plan. It’s a reasonable ending to a story.
But for me, it’s a reminder that sometimes we do need to forget the faults and failings of others. Our own as well! And we don’t need to fit everyone into the narrative of past failures. The failure Moses remembers was real and it was important. It was a failure that did not need to be repeated. But Moses misapplied it to these elders.
Brood of sinners? No, just looking for a good place to care for their flocks.
Since I have been reading the Cornerstone Biblical Commentary on Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy along with the text, I wanted to place a short note about the response to this passage in that commentary. (The author of the Leviticus portion is Dale A Brueggemann.)
He notes the command to slaughter all the males, including the children, and all the women who were not virgins, then on page 403 he says:
This slaughter was not the result of “collateral damage” in the heat of battle, or even an outrage committed in the heat of war’s bloodlust. It was purposeful judicial slaughter after the battle was already over. In fact, this action fits the modern definition of ethnic cleansing or possibly even genocide. The conquest was a holy war aimed at driving out an entire human population from Canaan (33:50-53), annihilating everyone there to purge idolatry and remove its temptations (Deut 20:16-18). …
He continues (p. 404) to note that Israel was promised similar judgment if they did not follow God and stay clear of idolatry. It’s interesting to note that at this point the chapter turns to the issue of ritual purity, specifying purification rituals for the spoils as well as for the warriors who, at God’s command, have come in contact with dead bodies. Dale Brueggemann notes (404):
… Even glorious battles fought and won with God’s blessing cause death, which doesn’t belong in the presence of the God of the living.
[ncs_ad pid=’9780842334280′ float=’right’ adtype=’aer.io’]Alright then …
It is here that I must note that this passage presents an interesting problem for those who want to quote the Qur’an and use texts, apart from their interpretation by representatives of any branch of Islam, to demonstrate that Islam is not a religion of peace. The Bible has similar passages which can be interpreted, and indeed have been interpreted by some, as justifying violence. Our commentator in this case calls this action a “holy war” and then a “glorious battle.” Apart from your particular means of reading this passage, could you blame someone not involved in your particular hermeneutic for concluding that Judaism or Christianity are not religions of peace either?
There are a number of ways of looking at this passage, some of which I enumerated in my article in Sharing the Practice, Preaching an Unpreachable Passage. Very few Christians would use this passage today as a justification for this sort of act of war. Reasons range from “that’s the Old Testament,” though it should be noted that few Jews would use it to justify slaughter either, to such violence is only at God’s specific and rare command, to noting that it was a violent time, and God worked with people as they were.
[ncs_ad pid=’1893729907′ float=’right’ adtype=’aer.io’]I must confess that I find the explanation give in the CBC on Numbers to be extremely unsatisfactory. The Canaanites were so wicked that the Israelites were justified in slaughtering everyone including the baby boys? Note as well that the women were not spared due to mercy. They were spared as spoils of war. I discuss my own responses in the article linked above, but I think that there is a requirement that we see a process of learning going on in scripture, that this was a way in which people behaved in the past in a world in which that behavior was standard, but that we have been told better (by the Prince of Peace, among others), and we have (I hope) learned better by now.
Most importantly, in our relations with other faiths, I would suggest that we need to “do unto others as we would have them do unto us.” We would object to the statement that Christianity supports genocide based upon this passage. We would reject interpretations by others that say this is so. We’d present our hermeneutic in support of our position. Just as we would like others to allow us to use our scriptures in our way, we should allow them the same privilege.
