Joshua utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God commanded.

The title pretty much says it all on this one. It's kind of boring reading though.

Joshua took Makkedah, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof he utterly destroyed, them, and all the souls that were therein; he let none remain : and he did to the king of Makkedah as he did unto the king of Jericho. Joshua 10.28

The same thing happens in the same way seven times, all in about a dozen verses or so.

Then Joshua ... fought against Libnah: And the LORD delivered it also ... and he smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein; he let none remain. 10.29-30

The LORD delivered Lachish into the hand of Israel, which took it … and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein. 10.32

Then Horam king of Gezer came up to help Lachish; and Joshua smote him and his people, until he had left him none remaining. 10.33

Joshua passed unto Eglon … and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein he utterly destroyed that day. 10.34-35

Joshua went up … unto Hebron; and they fought against it: And they took it, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof, and all the souls that were therein; he left none remaining. 10.36-37

Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to Debir; and fought against it: And he took it, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof; and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls that were therein; he left none remaining. 10.38-39

So Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, and all their kings: he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God of Israel commanded. 10.40

And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel. 10.42

God delivers a kingdom and Joshua kills everyone in it "with the edge of the sword."

And you can't blame it all on Joshua, either. He was just following orders, destroying everything that breathed, "as the Lord God of Israel commanded."

(Estimated number of victims: 7000, 1000 from each of seven cities.)

God's next killing: The genocide of twenty kingdoms

Go up thou bald head: 1001 Cruelties in the Bible

Repost in honor of the SAB's 1001st cruelty in the Bible.

I've been revising the SAB as I blog God's killings, adding cruelties (and other stuff) that I'd previously missed as I go along. When I first wrote this post nearly two years ago, 907 cruel passages were highlighted in the SAB. Now there are 1001. I suspect that before I'm get to God's 90th killing, there will be several hundred more.

After posting this challenge to believers, I received a response from GotQuestions.org. They told me that they were writing responses to the SAB's short list of cruelties and asked if I would be willing to link to them. I happily agreed and added links as they wrote their responses.

Some time later, however, they removed them all. I was never told why, but all of the links that I had created suddenly died.

If any other believers would like to respond to the SAB's list of cruelties, I will add links at the SAB. I'd even consider adding their responses as guest posts on this blog.

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For several years now, I've encouraged believers to respond to the highlighted verses at the SAB. And quite a few have done so. I've provided links at the bottom of the appropriate SAB pages to all of the responses that I've found on the web.

Nearly all of the responses have one thing in common: they focus on the Bible's contradictions. Of course there are a lot of them (more than 400 are listed at the SAB), and I understand why they concern Bible believers. But contradictions are the least of the Bible's problems.

That's why believers like to focus on them. I've never seen a contradiction that a believer can't explain. They can always talk their way around it by saying, "That's what the Bible says, but that's not what it means" or "It could have been this way or it could have been that." And since the Bible is often hard to understand, it's hard to argue with them.

But as Mark Twain said, "It ain't the parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand."

I think that's true for most people -- or it would be, if they had read the Bible, which most people have not.

That's why I created the SAB. To highlight the things I understand well enough to be bothered by. And I'm not bothered much by the contradictions; I'm bothered by the Bible's cruelty.

So far I've marked 907 passages in the Bible that I consider cruel. Acts that were performed, commanded, or inspired by a supposedly kind and loving God.

Now it's true that some on the list are minor, and some might not seem cruel to everyone. Some passages are on the list for excessive violence, even when God may not have been directly involved. So let's focus on those that will seem cruel to nearly everyone.

To help with that, I've created a short list of 237 cruel passages from the Bible. In most cases the cruelty will be clear just from reading the passage. When not, I've tried to add a note to clarify it's meaning. But I think most people who read these passages will be bothered by them, though most believers will try hard not to admit it, even to themselves.

Here's one to get started with. (To be fair, I'll try to include some later from the Quran and Book of Mormon, too.) Here it is.

And he [Elisha] went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head. And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the LORD. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them. 2 Kings 2:23-24

Are there any Bible believers that are not bothered by this story? If so, I'd like to hear from them.

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I want one of these T-shirts

But shoot, did I mess up in my addition?

My latest count is God: 2,301,426, Satan: 10.

Did I miss 90,000 of God's victims?

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Note: I found the missing victims. I removed the estimated 90,000 from the Midianite massacre since I'm only including numbers that are explicitly given in the biblical text. (See the note at the bottom of How man has God killed?

Happy Blasphemy Day!

It's finally here: Blasphemy Day. So get out and blaspheme, gosh darn it.

But before you do, I thought I'd let you know what the Bible says about blasphemy.

1. Blasphemers must be stoned to death.

   And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying ... he that blasphemeth the name of the LORD, he shall surely be put to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him. Leviticus 24:13-16

2. If you cause others to blaspheme, God might just have to kill your child, like he did to David and Bathsheba's baby boy.

   Because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the LORD to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die ... And the LORD struck the child that Uriah's wife bare unto David, and it was very sick ... And it came to pass on the seventh day, that the child died. 2 Samuel 12:14-18

3. If you blaspheme against the Holy Ghost, God will never forgive you.
   (Fucking Holy Ghost!)

   All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men ... whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come. Matthew 12:31-32

   But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness Mark 3:29

   And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but unto him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven. Luke 12:10

4. If you blaspheme, you will be delivered to Satan who will teach you not to blaspheme.
   (Who knew that Satan teaches people not to blaspheme?)

   Hymenaeus and Alexander; whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme. 1 Timothy 1:20

5. A slave ("servant" in the KJV) that doesn't give her master all honor blasphemes God.

   Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their own masters worthy of all honour, that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed. 1 Timothy 6:1

6. To avoid blasphemy, wives must obey their husbands.

   Teach the young women to be ... obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed. Titus 2:4-5

7. And, of course, Jews are blaspheming members of the synagogue of Satan.

   I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan. Revelation 2:9

   

8. Someday there will be a beast that comes out of the sea that has seven heads with a blasphemous name (Jesus Fucker) written on each head.

   I stood ... saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy ... And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death. Revelation 13:1-3

   Here's what it will look like.

   

But don't let any of this bullshit stop you. Write 'Jesus Fucker' on your forehead and get out there and blaspheme!

Five kings killed and hung on trees

In his last killing, God got right in there and "fought for Israel." He "discomfited them ... and slew them with a great slaughter ... and chased them along the way." He "cast down great stones from heaven" and made the sun (and moon) stand still still so that Joshua could get his killing done in the broad daylight. God hadn't been so busy since he made all the stars in a single day.

But while God was busy chasing people, throwing stones, and stopping the sun and the moon from moving, the five kings got away.

But these five kings fled, and hid themselves in a cave at Makkedah. Joshua 10.16

When the Israelites found them, Joshua told them to roll some big stones over the mouth of the cave to trap them, and then chase and kill any of the Amorite soldiers that were trying to get away. He told them to "smite the hindmost of them" (kick their butts).

Pursue after your enemies, and smite the hindmost of them; suffer them not to enter into their cities: for the LORD your God hath delivered them into your hand. 10.19

So that's what they did.

And it came to pass, when Joshua and the children of Israel had made an end of slaying them with a very great slaughter, till they were consumed. 10.20

Then they opened up the cave and brought the five kings to Joshua. He and his captains then do something strange: they put their feet on the necks of the kings.

Joshua ... said unto the captains of the men of war which went with him, Come near, put your feet upon the necks of these kings. And they came near, and put their feet upon the necks of them. 10.24

While their doing this, Joshua says

Thus shall the LORD do to all your enemies against whom ye fight. 10.25

So I guess God does this to his enemies, too.

After Joshua withdraws his feet from the kings' necks, he does what he does best: he kills them.

Joshua smote them, and slew them. 10.26a

And hangs their dead bodies on trees until evening.

And hanged them on five trees: and they were hanging upon the trees until the evening. 10.26b

Then he took down their bodies, put them back in the cave that they were hiding in, and covered the entrance to the cave with a bunch of rocks. The rocks are still there to this day. No kidding.

They took them down off the trees, and cast them into the cave wherein they had been hid, and laid great stones in the cave's mouth, which remain until this very day. 10.27

(I put the death toll for the “very great slaughter” of Joshua 10.20 at 10,000.)

 God's next killing: Joshua utterly destroyed all that breathed as the Lord God commanded