21st century law is NOT based on the Bible. Thank God.
For example, there are instructions in the Bible to stone certain people to death. Do you honestly think those orders were from God as well? Or the ones suggesting girls ought to be married to their rapists? Or that slavery is just fine? Try these:
The 14 Most Abominable Bible Verses
We have managed to get past those particular barbarites, so I am sure we can manage to lose a few more. There seems to me to be no argument which anyone could make to me to induce me to accept female genital mutilation; not even if they showed me a tablet from Mount Sinai itself. And having made this decision irt FGM I see no reason why infant boys can be mutilated (incidentally without anaesthetic) when clearly the girls ought not to be.
It is as simple as that, history and tradition notwithstanding. I am perfectly sure that Judaism and Islam would survive the change, and anyone wanting ritual circumcision can choose it for himself, once capable of doing so.
Pre-Judaism moved from child sacrifice to substitutionary sacrifice long ago; that is what all those doves in the temple were for. It can easily move again from child mutilation to a similar substitutionary token gesture. But for that to happen there needs to be enough people willing to say, actually, this is not an appropriate thing to do to a tiny baby.
Iceland is leading the way, and good for them.
Reading that article, it's clearly misrepresenting the Bible.
1. It was God's express command that people not look into the Ark. The people of Beth-Shemesh would have been well aware of this and chose to willfully disobey God. They suffered the consequences of their sin.
2. This is the one and only example in all the Pentateuch of mutilation as punishment. It's a very specific and rare sin that would lead to this.
3. Not sure what translation they use, but my bible (NKJV) renders "unjust" where the article uses "perverse". The point is explained in the subsequent verses.
4. This was to ensure that they were treated fairly and not abandoned. They could be returned to their families, but not sold. Slavery was for no more than 6 years, unless voluntarily longer.
5. Divorce and remarriage is committing adultery. Most Christian denominations still teach this.
6. This is never presented in a positive light. This quote is seriously twisting scripture to bash scripture. This is a simple reporting of what happened, not some command from God. It would be like accusing a cop of condoning murder after reading a police report about a murder.
7. This refers to intentional mutilation (Eunuchs), not to accidental mutilation (as the article misrepresents).
8. Again, absolutely misrepresenting the text. This is clearly intended to be a sin that Lot's daughters commit, not God condoning such behavior. The fact that the offspring of this unnatural union would be mortal enemies of God's people Israel (Moab and Ammon) illustrates this point.
9. Lust is a sin. How is that "abominable"?
10. Another example of the article misrepresenting the text. This account of rape is a bad thing that leads to other bad things. Read 2 Samuel 13:23-33 for her brother Absalom's revenge against Amnon (the rapist brother). Funny thing, you can tell the article is grasping because they cite the Douay-Rheims bible (a rare and obsolete translation even among Catholics) and use it's naming scheme when they quote 2 Samuel 13 becuase they call it 2 Kings 13. I knew from the quote that it was the beginning of the story of Absalom, but Kings is too late for that story. When I clicked the link is when I realized that it was the Douay which has the books of 1-2 Samuel and 1-2 Kings as 1-4 Kings.
11. How is being told to pray in private and not like a hypocrite "abominable"?
12. Er's wickedness is never specified, but Onan's sin was basically to condemn Er's family name to be blotted out because he refused to perform the marital act with his wife according to the Law (later codified in Deuteronomy 25:5-10). The firstborn son of their union would have been considered Er's son so that Er's line would not die out. If he did not want to fufill his duty toward her, he should not have married her (it wasn't required under the Law, though very much encouraged).
13. This one really is a hard passage, and not just a misrepresentation. Did God really cause this plague? Or did he simply allow it to happen and not intervene to stop it? Hard to say and far more saintly men than me have wrestled with these sorts of passages.
14. Sin leads to hell. But if you repent and have faith in Jesus, you will be saved.
Conclusion: the article is trash. Most of it is outright lies.
