2 Nephi 28-29: A Bible! We have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible!

In the last chapter, Nephi revealed the Book of Mormon, 2400 years before Joseph Smith dug it up in his own backyard. Amazing stuff.

Now he tells us how it will be received by Christians everywhere.

But first he reminds us about how God views non-Mormon Christians.

Yea, and there shall be many which shall teach ... false and vain and foolish doctrines ... their works shall be in the dark. And the blood of the saints shall cry from the ground against them. ... Because of pride, and because of false teachers, and false doctrine, their churches have become corrupted ... They wear stiff necks and high heads; yea, and because of pride, and wickedness, and abominations, and whoredoms .... wo, wo, wo be unto them, saith the Lord God Almighty, for they shall be thrust down to hell! 2 Nephi 28:9-15

And that's the (more or less) good guys - the non-Mormon Protestants.

It's the Catholics that God really hates.

But behold, that great and abominable church, the whore of all the earth, must tumble to the earth, and great must be the fall thereof. ... the devil will grasp them with his everlasting chains, and they be stirred up to anger, and perish ... Yea, they are grasped with death, and hell; and death, and hell ... from whence they must go into the place prepared for them, even a lake of fire and brimstone, which is endless torment. 28:18-23

Which leaves the Mormons, Nephi's seed.


God will proceed to do a marvelous work and remember Nephi's seed, and the words of Nephi's seed will proceed out of God's mouth. They will hiss forth unto the ends of the earth, so to speak.

I shall proceed to do a marvelous work ... I would remember your seed; and that the words of your seed should proceed forth out of my mouth unto your seed; and my words shall hiss forth unto the ends of the earth. 29.1-2

And when God's words hiss forth in the Book of Mormon, many of the WASPs will say, "A Bible! We have a Bible; we don't need another Bible!"

And because my words shall hiss forth -- many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible. ... A Bible! We have got a Bible, and we need no more Bible. 29:3-6

But God says it's his goddamned Bible and he can have as many of them as he pleases.

I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another ... Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written. 29:9-10

God made the Jews write a Bible; he made the Nephites write a Bible; he'll make the Lost Tribes of Israel write a Bible; everyone on earth will write a Bible. God likes Bibles. The more the merrier, he always says.

Behold, I shall speak unto the Jews and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the Nephites and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto the other tribes of the house of Israel, which I have led away, and they shall write it; and I shall also speak unto all nations of the earth and they shall write it. 29:12

Before you know it the Jews will have the Nephite's Bible, the Nephites will have the Jews' Bible, the Nephites and the Jews will have the lost tribes' Bible, and the lost tribes will have the Bibles of the Nephites and the Jews. 

The Jews shall have the words of the Nephites, and the Nephites shall have the words of the Jews; and the Nephites and the Jews shall have the words of the lost tribes of Israel; and the lost tribes of Israel shall have the words of the Nephites and the Jews. 29:13

And God will show those that fight against the Book of Mormon that he is God and that he covenanted with Abraham and he'll remember his seed forever.

And I will show unto them that fight against my word and against my people, who are of the house of Israel, that I am God, and that I covenanted with Abraham that I would remember his seed forever. 29:14

Or something like that.

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Next Episode: 2 Nephi 30: They shall be a white and delightsome people.

The Numbers 15:32-36 Challenge to Bible Believers

Here's what the Bible says in Numbers 15:32-36:

While the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man that gathered sticks upon the Sabbath day. And they … brought him unto Moses and Aaron ... because it was not declared what should be done to him. And the LORD said unto Moses, The man shall be surely put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones ... And all the congregation ... stoned him with stones, and he died; as the LORD commanded Moses.

And here is the NonStampCollector challenge:

Christian believers, you have a choice: either defend the story of this man's being killed by having an angry mob of barbarians pelt him with rocks as being the holy justice mandated by a fair and just god of perfect love,...
or join the rest of the world in rejecting any deity's involvement in the story as a piece of insane fiction dreamt up by savage people hoping to convince somebody that their barbaric cruelty was mandated by a holy and unquestionable moral authority. It wasn't: it was fucking sick, AND YOU KNOW IT.
The bible is bullshit. Look elsewhere for perfect love.

Is there a Bible Believer who is willing to take the Numbers 15:32-36 challenge?

If so, I'd like to hear about it. You can even do a guest post here if you like.

Hamor: the best father in the Bible (Greater love hath no father than this, that he cut off his own foreskin for his son.)

In a previous post, I listed 15 of the best fathers in the Bible. I wasn't entirely serious, of course, as each of the fathers on the list behaved about as badly as any father could possibly behave. None of them could serve as a good role model for fathers on Father's Day. And yet there is nothing in the Bible itself that shows the slightest disapproval of any of their bad behavior. They are, in fact, about as good as fathers get in the Bible.

But, surely, there must be some good fathers in the Bible. Maybe, but there's only one that I can honestly recommend for fathers on Father's Day.

His story is found in Genesis 34 and his name is Hamor.

The story begins when Dinah, the daughter of Jacob, goes out to meet her Hivite neighbors.

Dinah the daughter of Leah, which she bare unto Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land.  Genesis 34:1

While she was visiting, a young Hivite man named Shechem saw her and immediately fell in love with her. (Well, maybe not immediately, but after he had sex with her, anyway. The Bible doesn't say whether it was consensual or not.)

And when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the country, saw her, he took her, and lay with her, and defiled her. And his soul clave unto Dinah ... and he loved the damsel, and spake kindly unto the damsel. 34:2-3

Shechem told his father that he'd like to marry Dinah.

Shechem spake unto his father Hamor, saying, Get me this damsel to wife. 34.4

So Hamor went to talk to Jacob about it.

And Hamor the father of Shechem went out unto Jacob to commune with him ... saying, The soul of my son Shechem longeth for your daughter: I pray you give her him to wife. 34.6-8

Hamor suggested that the Hivites and the Israelites live together in peace, trading and intermarrying with one other. 

And make ye marriages with us, and give your daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you.  And ye shall dwell with us: and the land shall be before you; dwell and trade ye therein, and get you possessions therein. 34:9-10

Jacob didn't seem to care much about it, one way or another. But his sons did. It was all about the Hivite's penises.

The sons of Jacob answered Shechem and Hamor his father deceitfully, and said, ... We cannot do this thing, to give our sister to one that is uncircumcised. 34:13-14

The problem was that little flap of skin at the tip of the Hivite's penises. If they'd just cut that off, then they could all happily live together in peace.

But in this will we consent unto you: If ye will be as we be, that every male of you be circumcised; Then will we give our daughters unto you, and we will take your daughters to us, and we will dwell with you, and we will become one people. 34:15-16

Hamor agrees to this. He, along with his son and all the male Hivites, will cut off that little flap of skin at the end of their penises as a sacrifice for peace. (Greater love hath no father than this, that he cut off his own foreskin for his son.)

And Hamor and Shechem his son ... communed with the men of their city, saying,  These men are peaceable with us; therefore let them dwell in the land, and trade therein; for the land, behold, it is large enough for them; let us take their daughters to us for wives, and let us give them our daughters.  Only herein will the men consent unto us for to dwell with us, to be one people, if every male among us be circumcised, as they are circumcised. ... Let us consent unto them, and they will dwell with us. 34:20-21

So Hamor, Shechem and every male Hivite cut off that little flap of skin that offends God so much.

And every male was circumcised. 34:24

And Dinah and Shechem were married and everyone lived happily ever after.

Just kidding.

Here's what actually happened.

And it came to pass on the third day, when they were sore, that two of the sons of Jacob ... took each man his sword, and came upon the city boldly, and slew all the males. And they slew Hamor and Shechem his son with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah out of Shechem's house, and went out. The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and spoiled the city, because they had defiled their sister. ... And all their wealth, and all their little ones, and their wives took they captive, and spoiled even all that was in the house. 34:25-29

But at least Hamor died for something worthwhile -- the happiness of his son and peace in the world. And thereby set a great example for Father's Day.

Sending body parts in the mail: The Biblical way to send a message

OK, this is going to be another grisly post. Sorry about that.

But, hey, I am, after all,  blogging about the Bible. If you don't like disgusting stories, you're not going to like the Bible. Or my posts.

So here goes.

You've probably heard by now about the Canadian body part messages. If not, here's a summary:

Last week the leaders of the Canadian Liberal and Conservative parties received some body parts in the mail.

Now that's pretty disgusting, isn't it?

Well, not to the Biblical God it isn't. It's one of his favorite ways of sending a message. And if you believe in the Bible, you should consider sending messages yourself that way.

Take Saul, for example.

The spirit of the Lord came upon Saul and he chopped up a couple of oxen and send the pieces to all the leaders of Israel.

And the spirit of God came upon Saul ... and he took a yoke of oxen, and hewed them in pieces, and sent them throughout all the coast of Israel. 1 Samuel 11:6-7

Which makes you wonder. Did the spirit of the Lord come upon Luka Rocco Magnotta when he chopped up Jun Lin and sent his body parts to the Canadian leaders? 

And then there's the story about the Levite and his concubine.

You know the one where the Levite and his concubine are staying at a guy's house when a mob comes and asks to have sex with the Levite, and the host says no you can't have sex with him but I'll give you my virgin daughter and his concubine instead, so the Levite gives them his concubine and they rape her all night and she crawls back to the house and dies the next morning, and then the Levite puts her body on his donkey and goes home and chops her body into 12 pieces and sends a piece to each tribe of Israel? 

Yeah that one. (You can read all about it in Judges 19.)

Well, God didn't seem to have much to do with that, at least not directly. But he approved that message. Because in the next chapter God personally arranged a holy civil war between the Benjamites (the tribe that happened to include the town of Gibeah where the incident with the concubine occurred) and the other tribes of Israel, each of which received a concubine body part message in the mail.

So maybe Magnotta sent the body parts to the Canadian political leaders to call for a holy war between the province of Quebec (from where the body was sent, and probably hacked up) and all the other Canadian provinces. Maybe that's what God had in mind.

If so, then, the Canadian leaders should read the end of Judges and go and do likewise, by killing every man, woman, and child in Quebec, as the Israelites, under God's direction, did to the Benjamites. 

Or something like that. 

It's hard to know what God, the Great Communicator, had in mind when he inspired Judges 19-21.

Eugene's Bible: Did the Bible inspire the naked face-chewing cannibal?

Rudy Eugene is a firm believer in the Bible.

He attended a Bible study just two days before the face-chewing episode, he was called "the preacher" by his friends, and his mother said that he never left home without his Bible. And he had it with him at the time of the attack. It was, in fact, the only thing he had, as he was otherwise completely naked. 

So it seems reasonable to ask: was there something in the Bible that inspired the attack?

Of course it's hard to say, but there is plenty in the Bible that might encourage similar behavior. 

Take his nakedness, for example. God seems to like his prophets to run around naked. Here are God's instructions to Isaiah.

At the same time spake the LORD ... saying, Go and loose the sackcloth from off thy loins, and put off thy shoe from thy foot. And he did so, walking naked and barefoot.  And the LORD said, Like as my servant Isaiah hath walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and wonder. Isaiah 20:2-3

God told Isaiah to walk around naked for three years as a sign and and wonder. Maybe Eugene was just trying to do likewise.

And here is what Saul did when the spirit of the Lord came upon him:

Saul ... went thither to Naioth in Ramah: and the Spirit of God was upon him also, and he went on, and prophesied ... And he stripped off his clothes also, and prophesied before Samuel in like manner, and lay down naked all that day and all that night. Wherefore they say, Is Saul also among the prophets? 1 Samuel 19:21-24

The spirit of the Lord came upon Saul and he "lay down naked" all day and night. Maybe the spirit of the Lord came upon Eugene, too.

And then there's this from Micah:

Therefore I will wail and howl, I will go stripped and naked: I will make a wailing like the dragons, and mourning as the owls ... roll thyself in the dust ... having thy shame naked. Micah 1:8-11

I don't know if Rudy Eugene wailed like a dragon, but I'm pretty sure he had his shame naked.

But what about the face-eating behavior? There's nothing in the Good Book that could inspire activity like that, is there?

Well, how about these passages?

And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they shall eat every one the flesh of his friend. Jeremiah 19:9

Therefore the fathers shall eat the sons in the midst of thee, and the sons shall eat their fathers. Ezekiel 5:10

I will not feed you: that that dieth, let it die; and that that is to be cut off, let it be cut off; and let the rest eat every one the flesh of another. Zechariah 11:9

Who pluck off their skin from off them, and their flesh from off their bones; Who also eat the flesh of my people, and flay their skin from off them; and they break their bones, and chop them in pieces, as for the pot, and as flesh within the caldron. Micah 3:2-3

There's plenty there for a naked, face-eating, bible-believing cannibal to choose from.

Perhaps Eugene thought that Ronald Poppo was his long-lost father or friend  that God wanted him to eat, in accordance with Ezekiel 5:10 or Jeremiah 19:9 .  Or maybe that Poppo was just "another" whom God commanded him to eat in Zechariah 11:9. Or that Poppo was one of God's people and, therefore, it was Eugene's job to eat him, as prophesied in Micah 3:2-3.

It's hard to know what God had in mind when he inspired these verses. But I suspect that Rudy Eugene might have a good idea. He and God seem to think pretty much alike.

Finally, a Christian who is not ashamed of Leviticus 20:13

In his sermon last Sunday, Curtis Knapp of New Hope Baptist Church in Seneca, Kansas had this to say about homosexuals:

They should be put to death. That's what happened in Israel. That's why homosexuality wouldn't have grown in Israel. It tends to limit conversions. It tends to limit people coming out of the closets.

But he says it's not our job to kill them. It's the government's.

Oh, so you're saying we should go out and start killing them? No, I'm saying the government should. 

Then he did what Bible believers are rarely willing to do: he quoted Leviticus 20:13.

If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, then they have committed a detestable act, and they shall surely be put to death.

 He then finished by saying something really puzzling.

I don't think homosexuals have anything to worry about. I don't think the government is going to do that. They don't have anything to worry about from me. I don't believe I should lay a finger against them.

Leviticus 20:13 says nothing about government. And neither does the context. Here, for example, is how Leviticus 20 starts out.

And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, Again, thou shalt say to the children of Israel, Whosoever he be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that giveth any of his seed unto Molech; he shall surely be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones. Leviticus 20:1-2

"He shall be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones."

It was the people's job to throw the stones, not the government's.

God makes this point especially clear in the next few verses. Here's what happens to people like Curtis Knapp who refuse to cast the first stone.

And if the people of the land do any ways hide their eyes from the man, when he giveth of his seed unto Molech, and kill him not: Then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off.... Leviticus 20:4-5

God will "cut off" people who refuse to kill those that God says should be killed (like those who "give their seed to Molech", curse their parents, have sex with  animals, etc.).  Then when he's done with that he'll do the same to their families.

No, it's not the governments job to do the killing; it's ours.

The only question is how? In some cases (like the people who give their seed to Molech and wizards) it's clear enough: God wants us to stone them to death.

In other cases (like when a man has sex with his wife and her mother),  we must burn them to death.

But sometimes God just doesn't say how we should do it.

Let's look again at Leviticus 20:13.

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

All we can say for sure is this: God wants us to kill male homosexuals in a bloody way. "Their blood shall be upon them." Stoning would certainly be bloody enough, even for God. And it's one of God's favorite means of execution. So I think Pastor Knapp should go with that.

But if the good pastor "hides his eyes" from homosexuals by refusing to kill them as God commands, God will "set his face against him and his family" and "cut them off."

It's time for Pastor Knapp and other Bible believers to come out of the closet and do what God commands them to do in Leviticus 20:13.

It's their job, not the governments.