[ExI] Deuteronomy Chapter 13/was Re: Mary Magdelene?

painlord2k at libero.it painlord2k at libero.it
Mon Jun 8 19:42:54 UTC 2009


Il 08/06/2009 19.31, Dan ha scritto:

>> "If you hear it said about one of the towns given to you to live
>> in that wicked men have arisen among you and have led the people
>> of their town astray, saying, "Let us go and worship other gods,"
>> then you must inquire, probe and investigate it thoroughly.  And if
>> it is true and it has been proved that this detestable thing has
>> been done among you, you must certainly put to the sword all who
>> live in that town. Destroy it completely, both its people and its
>> livestock.  Gather all the plunder of the town into the middle of
>> the public square and completely burn the town and all its
>> plunder...  It is to remain a ruin forever, never to be rebuilt."
>>
>> Are they?

> Someone responded off list that this was not from the Koran.  And
> that person was right!  It's actually from Deuteronomy:

What gave up the masquerade was the burning of the booty.
Allah never asked Mohammed and his followers to give up a booty taken 
from others. I suppose because Mohammed always taken a large share for 
himself.

> http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0513.htm

> (Of course, I used a different translation.)

> Does everyone agree that the passage calls for genocide against
> believers of other religions?

Not.
This is an order to the leaders for killing the people that ask a Jews
to SECRETLY serve other gods or of Jews that SECRETELY serve other gods
in the cities of the Land of Israel that was given to the Jews by their God.

Given the time and places when this was recorded, I suppose it was only
wise to distrust and punish people doing this type of stuff secretly as 
they probably would become spies and traitors. Given the time period, 
where genocidal actions were common, it is not strange to be strict on 
matters of national security. (*)

This is not a calling to exterminate any Gentile or Heaten there or in
any other place. Nor it ask to kill Jews that change their religion openly.

This would be in conflict with the following part, where he order to the
Jews to give to the stranger that is inside the city. Why do you must
give to a stranger if you must kill him also?

> 28 At the end of every three years, even in the same year, thou shalt
> bring forth all the tithe of thine increase, and shall lay it up
> within thy gates.

> 29 And the Levite, because he hath no portion nor inheritance with
> thee, and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are
> within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that
> the LORD thy God may bless thee in all the work of thy hand which
> thou doest.

> Is anyone here ready to use this passage -- part of both the Hebrew
> and standard Christian Bibles -- to tar all Jews or Christians as
> genocidal?*  I hope not!  And, if not, why not use the same logic
> with Muslims?

The problem is that in Islam there are so many and large contradictions
that is impossible to reconcile them.
First Quran is the "words of God" not a translation of the sense. Quran 
is uncorrupted and perfect.

If we start by the assumption that God is always right and then we add 
the assumption that a text is "the perfect and last revelation of God to 
the men" there is small to argue about his meaning.

> *  Granted, almost all members of both those faiths -- and their
> sects -- can use some form of interpretation to say that this
> passage is no longer in effect.

It is not enough that they say "it is not longer in effect", it is that 
they act swiftly and harshly with the people that argue it is in effect 
today and harsher with the people trying to applying it today.

Words are cheap, deed are not.

> My guess is most Jews and Christians
> are unaware of the passage -- or have not focused on it.

Or maybe they understand it better than you.


> (I bring up
> the latter because many a Bible-thumper I've met can quote quite a
> number of verses from the Bible, but usually don't put them together
> in any rigorous way.  This is why, e.g., the sort of parallel reading
> of the Gospels shows inconsistencies -- inconsistencies that any
> serious reader of the Bible would find, but that most simply are
> unaware of even having read the inconsistent passages.

But the inconsistencies in the Bible could be argued be due to the 
humans that wrote it and our inability to comprehend it fully.

The inconsistencies in the Quran can not be argued to be due to God, as 
it is his work and not the work of a man and he is always right.

Mirco

(*) Compare this with today laws that (in Italy - but probably in many 
other places) prohibit the creation or the participation in secret 
societies.

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