This doesn’t make Christianity a bad thing. The USA is too obsessed with guns, hatred of immigrants, and drinking from water hoses to even consider actually learning from the Bible. The Japanese have practical interests as well as religious beliefs.
Australian here.
Christianity is consistently a bad fucking thing. the amount of Christians who are either racist, transphobic, or homophobic is so annoyingly high that I cannot fucking describe it.
not to mention, the multiple genocides enacted in the name of their religion. that's what the Crusades were. it's just not as dense a kill count as modern day genocide cause of how many more folks there are now.
Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Pol Pot, and Mao were all atheists, just to name a few. Even in the 20th century, atheistic ideology caused the deaths of over 150 million people at the absolute very least. The Crusades happened because, yes, some genuinely wanted to reclaim the holy land of Jerusalem, but most were coerced into it by corrupt popes who shifted their own views from denouncing bloodshed to demanding it. Not for God, but for the power of warmongering. Over time, true Christians were able to realize this, and the Crusades ended when the power of the pope finally began to wane.
It’s not religion, but ideology and humanity’s innate greed, thirst for power, and in some cases, honest ignorance which is the driving factor for these problems.
Speaking as an African American myself — America can’t function because the hypocrisy here extends to not only religious beliefs, but everything else.
Also if we're going to play this game
1. These people all did what they did in the name of power, not atheism, not because of "atheistic ideology" because of power-hungry ideology which is actually encouraged in the bible, yknow, take the Holy lands, spread the word by the sword?
2. The nazis, just about universally considered the most evil people ever, were not only a Christian group but were put in power by Christian people, allied first with the Catholic Church, wore "god with us" on their belts, and I wonder why their most famously targeted group was a religious group that catholics are particularly known for hating? They fought in the name of religion, the crusades are supported by the bible, and as an African American you should know that slavery was upheld with the bible, which explicitly endorses slavery, exodus 21, Paul and a few places in leviticus
Oh and just to add on to that, even if you blamed it on just corrupt popes, that slaughter and rape and murder of the crusades (crusades being entirely justifiable biblically btw), the people doing that, what were they doing that in the name of? Why did they think that was okay? What was making them unafraid of death and consequences as they sexually abused children? (Something the bible also doesn't condemn and may even have encouraged during the slaughter of the caananites)
Why, pray tell, did they do that?
Also obviously, Hitler wasn't an atheist just a weird brand of Christian that was arguably not really Christian? Very different from his movement tho and he was Christian most of his life, I can't be bothered checking the rest but regardless, they used religious tactics to place themselves as gods to their people anyway
But yeah like the Catholic Church literally celebrated Hitler's birthday for a while
FInal edit and addition, athiestic ideaology doesn't exist, athiesm is literally just "I don't believe in a literal god" that is it, nothing else, no extra baggage, that is it, you're litereally just saying "ideaologies that don't happen to be my own"
No games here! Biblical writings reflect the cultural and social realities and limitations of their time, simply because they were written in that time. It was a time of war, and in all honesty, war shows no sign of ending as long as humanity is around to keep screwing things up. Wars can be fought for good as well as bad. It’s all history, and just how it is.
Hitler was raised Catholic, and completely denounced all of his Catholic and/or Christian views later on. This is the only constant. For in fact, his philosophical views flipped and flopped as he saw fit to change them, and depending on his speeches as well. He outwardly criticized both atheism and Christianity…because he was a liar and a hypocrite. (Big shock coming from a murderous dictator, I know.) He didn’t want to explicitly train people in atheism because he knew that the church was (and still is) used as a politically conservative influence on society, which he liked.
Knowing that Hitler had had a connection with the Catholic Church in his youth, the newly-crowned leader of the Vatican at the time (1939), Pope Pius XII, did initiate a celebration for Hitler’s 50th birthday, but only as an attempt to butter him up. To attempt to maintain normal diplomatic relations with him. This was well before anyone knew what was to come.
The Nazi Party promoted a nondenominational “positive Christianity”, a movement which ultimately made no sense, as the movement rejected most traditional Christian doctrines such as the divinity of Jesus, Jewish elements such as the Old Testament, and even dependence on "faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, upon which true Christianity relies. Another example of Hitler’s atheistic, flip-floppy, utterly nonsensical ideologies.
Why do people commit atrocities and believe that God approves or will forgive their actions? The same reason that any hypocrite would. They’ve got another thing coming, that’s for sure.
I won’t go into all of the ways that the Bible explicitly condemns sexual abuse of women, because there are far too many to list here, and this is already pretty long. So let’s discuss the children.
“But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe unto the world because of offences! for it must needs be that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence cometh!” Matthew 18:6-7
Now, while there is no direct mention of pedophilia in the Bible, the abuse of children is absolutely condemned in the Bible. Observe the numerous Biblical principles that apply to the sin of fornication. Fornication, translated, is the same general idea in both Hebrew and Greek. The Greek word is “porneia”, of course from which we get the English words porno and pornography. The word in Scripture refers to any illicit sexual activity, which of course includes pedophilia of all sorts. Physical, online, anything. Fornication is among the “lusts of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16-21) and among the evil things that come from the heart of a man apart from God (Mark 7:21-23). How far from God can you get, doing that to kids? Any attempt to justify that in His eyes, even in His name? Yeah, no. That’s not happening.
The word offend in the Greek means “to cause one to stumble, to put a stumbling block or impediment in the way, upon which another may trip and fall, to entice to sin, or to cause a person to begin to distrust and desert one whom he ought to trust and obey.”
Can’t the definitions of the word “offend” be applied to a wide range of abusive actions against children, especially the actions of a pedophile? You’re darn tooting. Matthew 18 sets the record straight against anyone who would dare to bring any type of harm to a child.
You say that the Bible justifies American slavery. That is incorrect, and unless you are also part of the African-American race, kindly refrain from telling me what I should say, or do, or know as a person belonging to that ethnic group.
Slavery in the ancient world was a part of everyday life. It was a sad reality. It was a given. It’s true that the Bible not only does not always seem to condemn slavery, but at times seems to endorse it. For example, in the New Testament, when Paul instructs slaves to “obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling” (Ephesians 6:5-6)? But here he continues:
“Don’t work only while being watched, as people-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing God’s will from your heart. Serve with a good attitude, as to the Lord and not to people, knowing that whatever good each one does, slave or free, he will receive this back from the Lord. And masters, treat your slaves the same way, without threatening them, because you know that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with Him.”
Do you know what he really means? The term “slave” in Ephesians 6:5 is better translated to “bondservant.” The Bible does not in any way fully support the practice of bondservants, who weren’t often paid too well. However, they were indeed paid, and therefore in a state more akin to a lifetime employment contract rather than “racial” slavery. Remember that Paul very clearly states that Christian “masters” are to treat such people with respect and as equals. Naturally, countless generations of slave owners and general racists chose to ignore this. They took these passages out of context to argue their case about slavery, as if it were a divinely sanctioned practice. They still do. It’s another huge part of what’s wrong in America.
Now, here’s where translation comes in. Interpretive work. Don’t forget that even translators of Biblical texts would twist things to bend to their personal bias. For example: “When you buy a male Hebrew slave [’ebed], he shall serve six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person, without debt” (Exodus 21:2 NRSV). Here, the KJV uses “servant” instead of “slave.” Of the hundreds of times the word ‘ebed appears in the Hebrew Bible, the KJV translates it as “slave” only once, in Jer. 2:14. In the New Testament, the KJV never translates the word doulos as “slave.” Only the plural, “slaves,” [sōmatōn] appears once in Rev 18:14.
Enslavement of African people and racism were spreading like wildfire, and it seems that translators rejected the idea of Paul or themselves as “slaves [doulos] of Christ” (Galatians 1:10; Col 4:12). They preferred, instead, the term “servant of Christ.” NRSV translators do this as well.
Because modern slave regimes saw Africans as chattel with no relationship to the enslaved of the Biblical text, even practices such as those described in Exodus 21:2, which explicitly limited slavery, would have been completely unthinkable with respect to the enslaved persons around them. So, such botched translations supported American slave regimes by ensuring that people of African descent would not find themselves in the text, not even as the enslaved of the Bible.
Thankfully during the same time period, African-Americans educated themselves. Knowing that this was all wrong, interpreters like Nat Turner and Sojourner Truth (among countless others) took to deep analysis of the Bible, particularly the book of Exodus, and were ultimately able to arrive at a different truth: because they were enslaved, God would rescue them. How did they come to that conclusion? By a belief in God’s ultimate advocacy of liberation. So, where the church failed to accept God’s teachings due to their prejudices, African-Americans discovered the truth. Because their faith resided in the God who explicitly affirmed their humanity.
What, who, and how were “Hebrew slaves”? Well, Slavery, or “the ownership of one person by another”, was an institution everywhere in the ancient times, including the Near East and Israel, and encompassed both fixed-term indenture of citizens and permanent slave status for outsiders.
An Israelite man might sell himself or his child as a slave (“eved”) to pay off debt (Leviticus 25:39), or a court might sell him for theft (Exodus 22:2). The Pentateuch has three conflicting (as laws are) sets of laws providing for the release of such “indentured” Hebrew slaves:
1. That indenture lasts six years (Exodus 21:2, Deuteronomy 15:12), or until the Jubilee (fiftieth) year (Leviticus 25:40).
2. The Hebrew slave leaves with nothing (Exodus 21:2), receives a financial grant upon being freed (Deuteronomy 15:13-14), or retakes his ancestral property (Leviticus 25:41).
3. Women are purchased permanently as wives (Exodus 21:7-11), or the same rules as for males apply to female indentured servants (Deuteronomy 15:12).
Periodic manumission (“anduraru”) of debt slaves was practiced in the ancient Near East. Hammurabi’s Code 117 assumes that a man’s family, sold to cover debt, would be released after a three-year indenture. The Sumerian king, Lipit-Ishtar, describes how he restored enslaved Sumerian citizens to their rightful place in free society (“amargi”, or “return to mother”).
Leviticus 25 requires Israelites to be freed from debt or extended bondage and to have their ancestral property returned to them in a process called “deror”. In ancient Near Eastern tradition, a king would grant this freedom sporadically. In Leviticus, however, manumission automatically takes effect upon the blowing of the ram’s horn on Yom Kippur of the Jubilee year since, as Leviticus 25:9-10 says, Yahweh, the King of kings, built manumission into the social order of Israel.
Now, how were Israelite slaves treated compared to African-Americans? Deuteronomy and Exodus allow the Hebrew slave to choose permanent indenture by submitting to a ceremony in which the slave’s ear is pierced at the doorway (Exodus 20:5-6; Deuteronomy 15:16-17). This marking of a slave may be related to the ancient Near Eastern practice of using hairstyles unique to slaves that barbers were forbidden to adjust.
Non-Israelite slaves were acquired either by purchase (Exodus 12:44) or captured during war (Deuteronomy 20:14) and remain so permanently (Leviticus 25:44-46). Foreign male slaves are allowed to participate in religious activities and rest on the Sabbath, which appeals to the sacred history of the Holy Land and also implies a level of integration. A master who knocks out a slave’s eye or tooth must let him go free (Exodus 21:26-27). Murdered slaves could be “avenged” (Exodus 21:20-21). Likewise, a woman taken captive during battle is given time to mourn her family before becoming part of the household, and her master/husband is prohibited from selling her (Deuteronomy 21:10-14). This protects women from becoming sexual chattel while taking wartime rape and forced marriage for granted.
These examples of Biblical laws show the harsh reality of slavery, and why they were designed for the slaves’ protection.
So is the Bible altogether comfortable with slavery? No.
The prophet Amos criticizes debt bondage, referring to it as “selling the poor for shoes” (Amos 2:6). Deuteronomy 23:16 forbids the return of a runaway slave to his master. 2 Kings 4:1-7 tells of a widow whose children that God and the prophet Elisha save from being taken away by miraculously producing olive oil, that she in turn uses to pay off the creditor’s debt.
Therefore, although the Bible takes slavery as a given, it’s like a revolutionary abolitionist manual for the time it was written. It’s full of recorded behavior, not just lessons. It both records and humanize the slavery institution (as it was back then) and yet continually expresses how the world would be a better place without it.
You say you can’t be bothered to read or check facts. If I were you, I would.
It’s worth it.
I said I can't be bothere to check the others, but lets start real easily, non hebrew slaves are to be kept, owned as property and passed down to your children, it is explicit about it, to use hebrew salves to go "see look man" isn't very useful, also no it is the word of god, that part is directly after the ten commandments, this isn't going "slavery exists" this is god explaining how to do so and also mentions that women aren't to go free ever and are to be kept at property, it does not record it, it is demanding it, and the "slave's bible" was a real thing given to slaves to keep them in line, as well as christianity and places like exodus 21 being used to explicitly justify and prolong slavery, it's a nice apologetic "oh it was only a thing at the time" "oh it was only servants" no, it was instructions, that was incredibly clear, it was used so and understood to be and still is be scholars today, however now that we understand that it's wrong, people are backpedalling, but prey tell where it says that slavery is wrong?
Also yeah so the god who condemns eating shellfish and homosexuality is going to be fine with slavery in his book and at no point say to stop that? Those werne't things of the time but slavery is? Why exactly would god not condemn it if he saw it as morally evil? Again, the non hebrew slave was not treated the same, was considered property, wasn't afforded the protections, I wonder why only those of the religion the book teaches about are protected? Practices in exodus 21 didn't limit slavery, only slavery for hebrew slaves, which the african americans weren't counted as, a lot of the laws infact for slaves and the way they were treated during the american chattel period came directly from the bible
Cool and all it talks about not abusing children but god does and excuses what he wants, the whole killing all the firstborns of isreal, or commanding the slaughter of the caananites, men, women and children, to slaughter the women who have known a man, and to take the others for themselves (no age limit mention you may notice)
Also you're right, why is there no mention of pedophelia in the bible? God condemned wearing mixed fabrics, eating shellfsh, homosexuality, sewing your field with two kinds of seed, no all of that is condemnable, slavery? Nah he gives instructions, pedophilia? Nah but there's a few passages that many have taken to be explicitly condoning it, when you say interpretation, what you mean is some people like to take the bible liberally or call anything they disagree with metaphor to protect it when it objectively says evil shit
Again, what about those non hebrew slaves, those non hebrew slaves which are referred to as property in multiple passages, those non hebrew slaves which don't have protections and are to be passed down to their children, what about buying a wife? Did the woman get a say in it? The answer is no, btw, her father sells her, and she is to "please" her man, again, most scholars agree that this is generally in reference to sexual pleasure, women were usually sold as sex slaves
Yes eventually the Nazi movement fell into "positive christianity" that doesn't change it's roots it's normal christianity or the fact it was believed by the majority of it's troops, used as a rallying cry, what got hitler in power in the first place and why they targetted jews
And yes, I can absolutely say, as an african american yourself, justifying the shit used to enslave and torture your ancestors is just deeply fucked up, the slaves bible was explicitly a thing, who gives a shit if a handful of people reinterpreted the bible in a way that they thought was better and supported them, of course they did, because you god couldn't be fucked to be clear enough that people wouldn't fucking enslave and kill others, all powerful and all knowing but not powerful enough to be clear and not all knowing enough to know of the confusion it would cause, of course
Again, Bible condemns many other practices considered normal at the time, it actively doesn't condemn slavery, instead changing how it was done to make people nicer to those that follow the bible specifically, the same book that condemns insane small shit refuses to condemn slavery and instead talks about it repeatedly in what is obviously a very encouraging way
What on earth would make you think that the piece directly after the ten commandments is suddenly, without any mention of it being so, switching from god's commandments to "oh just what was going on at the time, y'knowwwww"
It's excuses, and they're shitty, and this isn't even the end of the horrible shit that book does and allows, american chattel slaves were treated just about EXACTLY as non hebrew slaves were laid out to be treated in the bible and historically it's likely that american chattel slavery comes from older biblical practices
But I'll give you another chance, give me any good reason to read exodus 20 as god's divine command and suddenly read exodus 21 as some weird recounting, I've heard this plenty and it's absurd, it's just so obviously just trying to weasal around the reailty
And again, if it's all about misinterpretations and mistranslation, man what a mighty god that he can't even write a book coherent enough to make sense to those in the future or translate it himself, maybe come down and go "oi stop it" as he supposedly did for all sorts of other things, I mean he fucking tormented Job because of a dare from satan, but nah slavery, doesn't bat an eye
To begin with, because you desire so badly for your question to be answered, I will interact with you only this once, although I shouldn’t. After that, not again. You very obviously lack maturity, and I understand that. But no. As a nonblack person, you absolutely do not have the right to tell someone what they should know as an African-American person, and never will. Do remember that.
As a nonblack person, you should know that coming to my page to project that specific hatred onto me, under the guise of making a “moralistic” point completely makes you lose credibility. As you refused to take back this ignorant statement, I now advise you to leave me alone after this. This is me being nice.
Now. After making some effort to translate your grammar and spelling, I will answer your questions as well as I can.
Do you know what’s wrong with shellfish? Yes, eating it may provide an immunity boost, but shellfish is consistently known to cause food borne illnesses and allergic reactions. Do you realize how much energy the Israelites needed and used for their survival during their travels? They needed their food to be as fresh and as pure as possible. Nobody was punished for eating shellfish. Even, or especially now, it’s simply best to eat as little of it as possible.
Now. The Bible does prohibit slavery in its absolute form. Exodus 21:16 proscribes the death penalty for those who enslave others, and for those who buy the kidnapped victims of such slave traders. In his first epistle to Timothy, Paul reaffirms this by including enslavers in a list of denunciations. The thing is, sometimes God will give people what they want. Sometimes in order to let them learn the hard way, like the way the Israelites demanded a king instead of listening to the rightful advice from God and Samuel that kings were unnecessary. That’s another long story in itself.
Again, the “slavery” allowed for in the Bible is in no way equivalent to the absolute slavery imposed on stolen Africans in the New World. As I stated before, the laws of Jubilee (Leviticus 25) mandated that everyone in bondage be set free every seventh year.
What we have in Job is a confrontation between unseen, cosmic forces — the divine council, where ‘the Satan’ (and maybe not the devil as we often think, but rather an accuser or adversary) challenges the integrity of human faith. The key question here is: does Job serve God only because God blesses him, or is his faith genuine even when everything is his life is in shambles?
God allows Job to suffer, not to prove a point to Satan, but to reveal the deeper reality that faith isn’t about prosperity or comfort. It’s about loyalty to God in the face of suffering, when there’s no apparent reason for it. Job’s story tells us that our limited human understanding of justice and fairness doesn’t always align with the larger, unseen spiritual realities. The loss of Job’s children is tragic, no question about it, but the point is not that God is cruel or indifferent. Rather, we are reminded that God’s purposes often lie beyond our comprehension.
In the end, Job’s faith is vindicated, and God restores him. Not because he earned it, but because God is merciful. The story challenges us to trust in the goodness of God, even when we don’t get the answers we want or when life seems hopeless. Job’s story helps us to see beyond the surface and trust that God’s wisdom, though it seems hidden at times, is ultimately good. Job and his family will all be together in Paradise, more blessed than ever before.
Now this: in the future, try to prevent using race as a tool, or rather a weapon, in order to “prove” that you have the high ground morally. That may be the way things are done in America, but not with me. We are not here to pretend that the Bible, a document written through the historical hand of man is in any way less moralistic than one who would use the race card to prove such a point.
I leave it up to you now to either ask someone else any other questions that you may have, or try to learn on your own. God bless. 👋🏽
