Why is the bible so violent?

Question

I am a strong jew. But why is the bible so violent.

1.Exodus 31:15 .Those who break the Sabbath are to be executed. 31:14


Deuteronomy
2.Kill everyone who has religious beliefs that are different from your own. 17:2-7

3.Anyone who will not listen to a priest or a judge must be executed. 17:12-13

4.Kill those of other faiths. 12:30

5. If your brother, son, daughter, wife, or friend tries to get you to worship another god, "thou shalt surely kill him, thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death." 13:6-10

6. If you have a "stubborn and rebellious son," then you and the other men in your neighborhood "shall stone him with stones that he die." 21:18-21

7. If a man marries, then decides that he hates his wife, he can claim she wasn't a virgin when they were married. If her father can't produce the "tokens of her virginity" (bloody sheets), then the woman is to be stoned to death at her father's doorstep. 22:13-21


Someone please help.

Answer 1

the world is a violent place ... but besides that God laid out a covenant for the Jewish people and those were some of the conditions...

Answer 2

The Bible is partially a history book, telling the history of a tribe of people from the Stone Age, on. They weren't as "civilized" in some ways, as we are, hence the Ten Commandments.

Some say the Bible is a representation of the evolution of consciousness from the beginning (innocence), through selfish violence (Cain & Abel), to more mature patterns after the experiences in the foreign lands. Kind of a group version of the Hero's Journey.

Answer 3

God wanted a people to do His will so He gave His people His laws. Man couldn't keep God's laws so God gave His Son to take away the sins of the world and redeem man back to Him. Adam and Eve disobeyed God and brought sin into the world. Jesus obeyed God as a sinless Son of God and took sin and nailed it to the cross. For those of us who believe in Jesus, we have our sins forgiven. We have been cleansed as if we'd never sinned. We call it washed in the blood of Jesus and our sins removed from us as far as the east is from the west.

Sin is disobeying God. The Old Testament is Christ concealed. The New Testament is Christ revealed. From Genesis to Revelation it is all about Jesus Christ.

For instance if you raise a rebellious son who refuses to believe in Jesus Christ then you'd just as well kill him because if he rejects Christ, God will send him to eternal hell.

Mothers and dads today are raising a bunch of rebellious children. They are not teaching their children about the Lord and the pastors prefer not even to preach on this subject.
The Bible states, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." Everybody wants to shrug that off with the reverance of the Lord or acknowledging the awesomeness of the Lord, but the correct word is fear. People do not fear the Lord and Almighty God is to be feared because in one instant we can lose our breath of life or our blood of life. God is "Perfect Love" but He is also a Great Judge. The Bible states "that it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of Almighty God." Jesus said "I am life." If He is life then how easily can He take life. God has never beaten around the bush. God has always said there will be a White Throne Judgment. We must all be accounted worthy to stand before Him.

The blood of animals did not remove the defilement of sin it only covered. The sinless blood of Jesus Christ the Son of God once and for all took away the sins of the world. All we must do is believe.

Man still rejects the Lord just as the Israelites rejected God.

Answer 4

I'm not religious or spiritual, but I do know that the Bible was written in the days when violence was more acceptable. People really were stoned to death, and had their hands cut off for stealing. It makes sense that the Bible would reflect the time that it was written in.
Nowadays these punishments seem excessive because we live in a time when corporeal punishment isn't seen too much, but in those days it was completely normal.

Answer 5

I agree, the bible is very violent, we should ban children from reading it. At the very least there should be a warning label like they have for music, games, and movies.
There's plenty of violence in the new testament too.

eg Matthew 10: 34-36
"Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth. I have come to bring not peace but the sword.

For I have come to set a man 'against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;

and one's enemies will be those of his household."

Answer 6

BECASUE IT WAS WRITTEN BY MEN FOR MEN.
There is nothing godly about the bible.
Why putting so much faith into what a few ingnorant shepards wrote? I cannot understand why shepards would have more credibility that modern scientists.
People are so ignorant and stupid to believe that the bible is the word of God.

Answer 7

It was written during violent times. Remember it was also written in parable. We are to learn by what it says, not take it all literally. My choice is to pray for G-d to guide me in what he wants me to understand. I believe in a loving and just G-d.
Oh and by the way Steve, who answered earlier, Jesus was a Jew. He never said the Jewish beliefs were wrong.

Answer 8

the OT is referring to being under the Law.
it was impossible to keep all the laws of God there were sooooo many of them.

in the NT,
james 2:10 says, "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all."

the OT writings basically showed us that we are to live according to God's laws & if we don't, we will pay for our choice.
in the OT, when they didn't obey the LORD, HE struck them down & killed them, or brought plagues or some type of wrath against them.

the NT tells us that we are no longer under the law ...

gal 5:18 - "But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law."

in the NT, we are still to be obedient ... but to the Gospel of Jesus Christ ...
we are to obey His death, burial & resurrection.
this is how we are born again.
"Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." (john 3:5)

if we choose not obey the Gospel, we will not enter heaven... for we are not saved by works alone.

Answer 9

Because it was created by tyrannical monarchs in an attempt to keep their subjects in "order"... an early justice system.

(on a side note, I'm shocked at the responses of some christians to this question! I thought only mr. gibson felt that way...)

Answer 10

CHRISTIANITY

The views of Jesus Christ in his Gospel of peace are " The truth is that one who kills others, is, In fact, killing him. Whosoever eats flesh of an Animal after killing it, is actually eating his own flesh Himself. The death of an animal is the death of him who kills The animal because the revenge or punishment for this crime cannot be less than death itself "
. FORGIVENESS AND NON-VIOLENCE IN BIBLE

(i) If one slaps on your right cheek, give him left one also

202. ?17. Think not that I am come to destroy the law (Mosaic Law), or the prophets; I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.?

- Matthew, 5/17
(ii) Pray for those who persecute you
203. ?44. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;?

- Matthew, 5/44
(iii) If you expect forgiveness from God, forgive your fellow-beings
207. ?14. For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:?

- Matthew, 6/14
208. ?15. But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.?

- Matthew, 6/15
iv) A nation shall not draw sword against a nation
209. ?4?? and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.?

- Isaiah, 2/4

Answer 11

Humanity is violent. Have you watched the evening news recently? The Bible was designed to civilize humanity. But to do that, it has to start SOMEWHERE.