The God I Don't Believe in #4: The God of Violence

It probably started in 1095.  A pope, built for power and sure of the Turks anti-Christian elements, forcefully invited Christians to join in a war against those Turks.  His name was Pope Urban II, and he offered them an indulgence, thus on a major sin that would still allow them to get into heaven.  His offer brought about the first holy war, a crusade.

            Nearly 200 years later, and after the Muslims had taken Jerusalem, parts of Spain, lost part of Jerusalem, regained it, etc there had been eight crusades, many which costed thousands of lives on every side. And Christians, devote in their Biblical interpretation, remained sure that God would call for such violence in order to cleanse the world of those who are not Christian.

            Now of course that’s where religiously ordained acts of violence end right.  Oh no.  The Dutch, the Germans, the Swiss, everyone used religion as a mainstay of violence and war throughout the middle ages.  Then there was the 30 years war.  You know that war, the one that originally pitted Protestants and Catholics against each other for yes, 30 years.  It divested into a war that included almost all the European powers fighting over things that at times even they were unsure of, then ended up being the dividing line in Germany between Calvinists and Catholics.  But it had to be done.  God ordained it.  Violence, hatred, war.  That’s the God of the the Bible though right?

            Perhaps.  You could read that as the God of the Bible.  In fact, it’s quite easy to read this.  It’s very easy to see that there are moments in the book of Joshua where people come together and “cleanse the land” of all other peoples until well…until they are simply the only ones left on the block. They blow over walls, destroy towns and decimate kingdoms.  The only problem with this account is that it never happened.  What?  It never happened.  Nope.  In fact, archaeologists in the Middle East have been unable to find any evidence that anything like that ever happened.  In fact, what they and other Biblical Scholars believe is that the Israelites simply slowed moved their way into Israel and assimilated until there was a mixing of cultures.  The God of violence did not win that one.

            Throughout history, the story of the Bible is one that envisions a God who is both blood thirsty and violent.  This presumably masculine image of God is responsible for all acts of violence, including natural violence like Hurricanes, Tornados,  Earthquakes,  or even more simple ones like rain today and not tomorrow or getting your parking spot at the local shopping center.  Some people really do see this as a devastating thing you know.

            But something bothers me about all of this.  Yes of course there are dozens of places in the Bible where one can find the story of a God who does all of this.  But in reality, the question of context comes to mind.  Does God really bring about the flood, does God really allow for the destruction of entire towns, of modern day Katrina’s because of governments, or are we readying something into the Biblical story that really isn’t implied.  To do this, we need to go back in history, back to the time of the Israelites, and figure out just what they are thinking.

            To the way way back.  Further, yes even further.  Ok.  It is an age before science.  An age before wikopedia an the internet.  Yes before facebook and cell phones, even phones at all.  It is a time when the only thing one did when they looked into the sky was see a mystery.  In fact, it was so mysterious that the Israelites had no idea is the lights in the sky respresented people who had died or what.  They didn’t know.  The only thing they knew, that they were pretty sure of, was that a God, a single God, which of course was more powerful than all the other Gods of all the other peoples in the world, was in charge.  That God was in charge of everything.  And so, God brought them good fortune.  A good spouse, a plethora of children, the rains from the heavens in order to have crops and feed their families, all of these were God given. 

            But so was all of the other stuff.  You know, the droughts, the flooding, the scary weather, the bad times, the waring nations from afar.  These were simply signs that God was mad at them, that God wanted them to suffer.  And so, they prayed to God to spare them, and sometimes God did.  And when God did, they then wanted to protect themselves, so they used that idea that God controlled everything and asked for God to grant them victory to gain control of further lands so that they might be fortunate enough to extend their country and have more land.  And sometimes God granted such things, and others not so much.

            There was no science, only God.  Now I’m not going to tell you that these are two completely different things.  In fact, I believe honestly that science and God can and should co-exist because while some view it as divergence, surety versus faith, perhaps the thought of convergence is much more intriguing.    But if there was no science, God became the go-to for everything.  And sure enough, God then was the reason for and reasons against things.  In fact, God’s nature changed so dramatically because of this simply because people had no other place to turn to make sense of the world.

           

            Does this make sense, sure.  But does it make sense to continue to see God in this light with information we have nowadays.  That’s the big question.

            Here’s my thought.  One: we like a sexy story.  We like one that includes danger, a buildup of characters, an action filled adventures, and sometimes a happy ending.  So we pay attention to the devastation stories in the Bible.  Do we hear of the stories where God is shown to forgive, to not call for violence, where turning the other cheek means giving the other person to seeing your face when they slap you again.  This is the God we so often miss in our attempts to see the most action packed filled God in all mankind.

            And  Two: as for that modern day witness to the God of the weather…Well, sure, I think it’s ok to see God as being a person who watches over us, but I put this out there.  I don’t believe in a God who is playing a chess match with us, who is giving us bad things along with good things.  I think these things are happening though, and I believe that when it comes to the devastation much like Super Storm Sandy, Hurricane Katrina, tsunami’s in Indonesia, Earthquakes in the Pacific, Comets in Russia.

 I wonder if nature itself is rebelling against God much like we ourselves in our sinful nature may have rebelled against a loving God and used God to legitimize our wars and other acts of violence.

            Do you see what I mean?  We had crusades all in the name of God, because well, because we fall short of a God who calls for love and who really wants us to have a peaceable kingdom.  And we forget that we were created in the image of God. But wasn’t the natural environment created in the same image, just a different aspect?  Was nature created by a different God, are we really that different from the rest of nature around us, is it possible that nature itself, if we are to theologically argue that nature is a product of God like us, it is just a little possible, that nature itself has rebelled against God, becoming sinful in its character.  Could nature itself be deviant of its perfect image.  Could nature being sinning in the same way.  The story of Eden is of course a story in the way human kind ended up in our dismal state.  Toiling the land, pain in childbirth, all things bright and beautiful right. But maybe the search for Eden comes up empty because we are participating in a world where the nature around us has become just as deviant to God’s will as ours

            Maybe we could take a lesson in humility, in the need to see God as more than a God of bad and good things.  Maybe we could see God as a healer, a provider, one who calls us to something different, but can’t manipulate the weather, doesn’t want violence to befall one group and be used as a weapon of victory for another.  Maybe God is more loving, is waiting for us to wake up and reimagine that this God wants something better of us.

           

            No matter what, the God the Israelites saw is the same God we view, but we view it a different way…at least we could.  We could see God if we like as an abusive parent, a violent and hate filled God, a God of masculine image, a God of some get more, some get less, and a God of violence and hatred who acts out on God’s people using the weather, abuse, or many others things.  Or we can begin to hope and believe that context is everything in this discussion and our understanding of God’s nature can change.  We can use the Bible as a lens, but also remember that we know more about the world as it exists today than ever. We can see theology in our approach to the world, but perhaps we can see a different reflection of God in the world than our ancestors….Maybe, but that’s just one aspect of the God I don’t believe in.