That was Joshua, not Moses.
God didn't command Moses to slaughter the nations standing between Israel and the promised land? Get your facts straight. Due to the divine Voice, Moses had no delusions about his responsibilities. Here's but one example:
"The Lord said to Moses,
2“Take vengeance on the Midianites for the Israelites...Moses sent them into battle, a thousand from each tribe...They fought against Midian, as the Lord commanded Moses, and killed every man' (Num 31).
Afterwards, Moses was angry. Do you remember why? If not, I'll refresh you. Israel didn't do ENOUGH slaughter in his opinion. They killed every man, but spared the women and the children. Moses therefore commanded them.
"Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man,but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man."
Once again, the Philistines were Israels enemies and were constantly trying to annihilate the Jews as they are to this day (probably todays Palestinians) so it was in self-defense.
Strictly self-defense means that someone is CURRENTLY swinging a sword at your neck. In reality There are plenty of examples of Israeli-initiated military campaigns, as directed by the Voice. You're trying to dodge the argument, and it's not convincing. More examples:
"David enquired of the LORD, saying, Shall I go and smite these Philistines? And the LORD said unto David, Go, and smite the Philistines…Then David enquired of the LORD yet again. And the LORD answered him [again]…I will deliver the Philistines into thine hand (1Sa 23:2, 4, KJV).
Why a second inquiry? Either the level of certainty on the first iteration was less than 100%, or was indeed so but subsequently waned. Clearly this strategy wasn’t an aberration but a way of life for David. At 2 Sam 2:1 we read: David inquired of the LORD, saying, Shall I go up into any of the cities of Judah? And the LORD said to him, Go up. And David said, Where shall I go up? And he said, To Hebron (2Sa 2:1, KJV).
Three chapters later: And David inquired of the LORD, saying, Shall I go up to the Philistines? Will you deliver them into my hand? And the LORD said to 54 David, Go up: for I will doubtless deliver the Philistines into your hand (2Sam 5:19, KJV).
If you were in disobedience to God, sure. And if you wanted to suffer the consequences of not following His guidance go right ahead.
Non-responsive. You totally dodged the argument - but this is par for the course with you, isn't it?
As I said, there's consequences when you don't heed God's word. God doesn't tell you to do things arbitrarily, there's always a reason behind it and it's for your benefit. I think you need to be more specific if you want to discuss this further.
Again, non-responsive. Again, YOUR argument was that the reader was supposed to learn from Abraham's example NOT to obey voices commanding us kill people. This was part of your effort to avoid admitting the Voice to be self-authenticating for Abraham.
But Scripture begs to differ. When the Voice commands to kill, it is obligatory. When Saul failed to kill the king of the Amalekites, the prophet Samuel rebuked him thus, "Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the Lord?" (1Sam 15:19). And then the prophet hacked him to pieces with his own sword.
That would likely take a while to go into it so I won't do it here. What I will say is that there's probably (and I say probably) some merit to it but at the same time I can see some potential problems with it. TBH, I never really delved into it but what it sounds like to me (where it might make sense) that a believer who is indwelt by the Holy Spirit (which the Bible teaches) would be able to discern what's true and what isn't.
Nonresponsive. You can't legitimately critique my position if it's based on arguments that you refuse to address.
To me, this is probably the closest thing that you refer to as "self-authentication" but in actuality if in fact true, this would really be "God-authentication" since it would be the Holy Spirit revealing this to you. What I believe is that this is the confidence that a true believe has not only in the truth of God's word but in the assurance that He will perform what He says.
Ok now we're getting somewhere. You make a big show of disagreeing with me but you just conceded my major point - all you did is slap a different label on it! (Thank you, but I'll retain the label self-authentication as it suits me just fine, although feel free to use your own label). That concession is unavoidable, if we're going to be intellectually honest here.
You do realize, don't you, that this acquiescence of the Inward Witness:
(1) DESTROYS the notion of Sola Scriptura (the Bible as sole authority)
(2) Confirms Paul's claim in Romans 4 that we are all of the SAME FAITH as the prophet Abraham - a faith sprung from a self-authenticating inner voice DEFINITIVE, at core, of prophetic experience.
(3) Concedes this Voice to be the HIGHEST authority in our life - after all, we base our biggest decision on it, namely, our decision to accept the Bible as inspired and Jesus as our Lord. You wouldn't base your biggest decision on an element of lowest authority, would you?
(4) Concedes the INCESSANCE of self-authentication. Follow me on this point. As Calvin held, the Inward Witness had to be incessant - otherwise we could slip in and out of saving faith, thus losing our salvation.
NOW we are getting somewhere. Anyone reading this thread should recognize the mounting evidence for defining God's intent as a universal prophethood (1Cor 14:1). According to that verse, we are supposed to SEEK that gift - above all gifts. Historically, the church hasn't made such aspiration its primary focus, for failure to recognize God's plan. That's a problem I'm addressing here.
Doesn't refute anything of mine. You must be a prophet though (or at least believe you're one).
Not sure why you'd say that.
