JEHOVAH the barbarian?

  In this post I would like to treat with the issue of Jehovah's destruction of the Canaanite nations as recorded in the old testament of the holy bible see Deuteronomy9:1-6.This account is often advanced some as a defeater for the Bible's claim of divine inspiration the argument being that the Israelites were instructed to engage in conduct now universally (or at least largely) regarded as abhorrent and hence said instructions could not have originated from the morally superior being Jehovah God is proclaimed be in those same scriptures see exodus34:6,7.

  First I'd like to point to what I regard as a bit of a fudge on the part of most who advance this line of reasoning i.e their failure to treat the bible narrative as a united whole.Basically what happens in these rants is that parts of the account are rejected as unhistorical and then the remainder is attacked as immoral or senseless.If the consistency/morality of any narrative is to be properly appraised then that narrative must be examined as a united whole,to attack a watered down version of said narrative is to be misleading.

 We all know that morality is context specific.For instance if my neighbour is late on his car payments and the institution that is his creditor sends its agents to repossess his car both his creditor and their agents would be blameless before the law,if I however decided to take possession the same vehicle (though I may employ the same methods as the aforementioned creditors)I would be in breach of law.

 So then can we really properly evaluate the Bible's narrative while excising the main character and his actions from that narrative.The narrative begins by revealing Jehovah as the creator of life and all that is necessary to sustain and render it enjoyable see Genesis1.Hence Jehovah is the owner of life it is his property to give and to repossess according to his own righteous standards.

  So where does this leave us?Has the bible given a warrant to any self-styled religious teacher to call for the death of anyone who ruffles his feathers?

  The Bible's narrative tells us that Jehovah God revealed himself so spectacularly to Moses and Israel that even the nation's  enemies were forced to confess his superiority see exodus8:19.

 e.g deuteronomy4:32-34" “For ask now concerning the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether any great thing like this has happened, or anything like it has been heard. ³³ Did any people ever hear the voice of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and live? ³⁴ Or did God ever try to go and take for Himself a nation from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great terrors, according to all that the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes?"

  So we are not here talking about voices in anyone's head or long winded debates among academics.The epistemic warrant for Israel's and the surrounding nations' concluding that Moses and Israel were being led by the angel of the original God,the creator of the earth and sky was of a far higher order.The Canaanites made themselves the target of God's righteous wrath because their wickedness was regarded by him as a spiritual contaminant to the land he had designated as a sanctuary for true worship not because of their race see Deuteronomy9:5,6.That is why when the then prostitute Rahab and some the Hivite peoples decided to switch allegiances they became objects of Jehovah's mercy see Joshua2:9-13,Joshua9:3-9.

  Noteworthy here is the fact that the miracles wrought by Jehovah's angel through Moses were universally acknowledged.But only a minority were able get past their pride and stubbornness to realise that taking up arms against the deity amounted to collective suicide but those who did turn to Jehovah were not rejected on grounds of race.I also want to point out that the option of fleeing was also available so it was not even necessary to adopt the religion of the Hebrews if one found that unpalatable.

  The Canaanites of their own free will decided that that piece of dirt was worth dying for at the hands of its creator and real owner.

 When the Israelites turned around and adopted the same disgusting mores as the Canaanites they too were expelled from the holy land,as they were warned,see Leviticus18:25-28,2kings25:27-30,further demonstrating that Jehovah's actions are never ethnically motivated.So the Canaanites were given fair warning and the opportunity to avoid destruction.Jehovah is certainly not to blame for their poor decision making.