The Skeptics Annotated Bible (223 page)

33 And Eleazar the son of Aaron died; and they buried him in a hill that pertained to Phinehas his son, which was given him in mount Ephraim.

And when he was come into his house, he took a knife, and laid hold on his concubine, and divided her, together with her bones, into twelve pieces, and sent her into all the coasts of Israel.
—
Judges 19.29

Judges is a violent book, even by biblical standards. It begins by cutting off the thumbs and big toes of a captured king and ends with a genocide following the dismemberment of a concubine’s body. Along the way it describes, with apparent relish and approval, a gruesome “message from God” (a knife blade stuck deeply into a fat man’s belly); a tent stake driven through a sleeping man’s skull; a couple of severed heads delivered to Gideon; the killing of 69 brothers upon a single stone; a daughter killed by her father as a sacrifice to God; 300 foxes tied together by their tails and lit on fire; 1000 men killed with a jawbone of an ass; and, in what is probably the most disgusting story in all literature, the rape, death and mutilation of the Levite’s concubine. And I’ve left a lot out. Read it yourself, if you have a strong enough stomach, that is.

Be sure to check out:

• Cutting off the thumbs and big toes of a captured king.
  1.6-7
  
• Five massacres, a wedding, and some God-proof iron chariots
  1.9-19
  
• God sells the Israelites into slavery.
  2.14
  ,
  3.8
  ,
  4.2
  ,
  6.1
  ,
  10.7
  ,
  13.1
  
• Ehud’s message from God.
  3.20-22
  
• Shamgar kills 600 Philistines with an ox goad.
  3.31
  
• Jael drives a tent stake through her guest’s head.
  4.17-23
  ,
  5.24-26
  
• God takes Gideon’s fleece/dew test.
  6.36-40
  
• He finds a few good men with a dog-lapping test.
  7.4-7
  
• “The Lord set every man’s sword against his fellow.”
  7.22
  
• Two princes killed and their heads delivered to Gideon
  7.25
  
• Gideon tears the flesh of the elders of Succoth and kills the men of the city.
  8.7
  ,
  16-17
  
• Abimelech kills 69 brothers “upon one stone.”
  9.5
  
• A city is massacred and 1000 people burn to death because of God’s evil spirit.
  9.23-57
  
• Jephthah sacrifices his daughter to God.
  11.29-39
  
• 42,000 die for failing the “Shibboleth” test.
  12.6
  
• The Spirit of the Lord comes upon Samson and he murders 30 men for their clothes.
  14.19
  
• Samson catches 300 foxes, ties their tails together, and sets them on fire.
  15.4-5
  
• He kills 1000 men with the jawbone of an ass.
  15.14-16
  
• He kills 3000 in a suicide terrorist attack.
  16.27-30
  
• The massacre of the peaceful, unsuspecting people
  18.26-27
  
• Gang rape and dismemberment of the Levite’s concubine.
  19.22-30
  
• A holy civil war called by twelve rotting concubine body parts.
  20.1-48
  
• A God-approved genocide to provide wives for 400 of the 600 surviving Benjamites of God’s civil war.
  21.11-14
  
• 200 virgins of Shiloh are stolen to provide wives for remaining Benjamite civil war survivors.
  21.19-23
  

(1.2-7)
The Lord delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites
After Joshua died, the Israelites wondered who was going to do their killing for them. God told them not to worry; he had selected the tribe of Judah to kill the Canaanites and steal their land. The first killing was easy, since God delivered them into their hand, killing 10,000 Canaanites and Perizzites. After the slaughter, they capture Adonibezek and “cut off his thumbs and great toes” to pay him back for doing the same to seventy other kings. (Abonibezek fed his table scraps to seventy thumbless and big toe-less kings who lived under his dinner table.)
God’s 39th Killing

1
Now
after the death of Joshua
it came to pass, that
the children of Israel asked the LORD, saying, Who shall go up for us against the Canaanites first, to fight against them?

(1.1)
“After the death of Joshua … the children of Israel asked the LORD, saying, Who shall go up for us against the Canaanites first, to fight against them?”

2
And the LORD said, Judah shall go up: behold, I have delivered the land into his hand.

(1.2)
“And the LORD said, Judah shall go up: behold, I have delivered the land into his hand.”

3 And Judah said unto Simeon his brother, Come up with me into my lot, that we may fight against the Canaanites; and I likewise will go with thee into thy lot. So Simeon went with him.

4 And Judah went up; and
the LORD delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand: and they slew of them in Bezek ten thousand men.

(1.4)
“The LORD delivered the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand: and they slew of them in Bezek ten thousand men.”

5 And they found Adoni-bezek in Bezek: and they fought against him, and they slew the Canaanites and the Perizzites.

6
But Adoni-bezek fled; and they pursued after him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his great toes.

(1.6)
“But Adonibezek fled; and they pursued after him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his great toes.”

7 And
Adoni-bezek said, Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table
: as I have done, so God hath requited me. And they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died.

(1.7)
“Adoni-bezek said, Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table.”

8 Now
the children of Judah had fought against Jerusalem, and had taken it, and smitten it with the edge of the sword, and set the city on fire.

(1.8a)
The Jerusalem Massacre
The Israelites killed everyone in Jerusalem and set the city on fire.
God’s 40th Killing

(1.8b)
“The children of Judah had fought against Jerusalem, and had taken it, and smitten it with the edge of the sword, and set the city on fire.”

9 And afterward the children of Judah went down to fight against the Canaanites, that dwelt in the mountain, and in the south, and in the valley.

(1.10-25)
Five massacres, a wedding, and some God-proof iron chariots
After the Jerusalem Massacre “the children of Judah” go on a God-assisted killing spree, wiping out entire kingdoms “with the edge of the sword.” It’s hard to say how many cities were massacred, but there were at least five: three in Hebron, along with Zephath and Bethel. And there would have been a lot more, too, if it weren’t for those damned iron chariots (v.19). Some things are just too hard, even for God.
God’s 41st Killing