Moderate Discontinuity

If the interpretation in the previous essay was primarily driven by liberal ideals and soft fundamentals, the essay on Moderate Discontinuity was driven by the mode of biblical interpretation called Dispensationalism. In my limited experience, it seems that one's beliefs are more driven by their mode of biblical interpretation than any other thing, yet it seems to remain one of the least understood bits of theology. Dispensationalism expresses the stark differences between God's relationships with different groups of folks at different periods of time. So, what is true at one period of time (say, under the Mosaic law) is no longer true in the time of the church (and vice versa).

That is the discontinuity...each dispensation is discontinuous from the next or the previous. So, the fact that God directs the Israelites under his theocracy to genocide the Caananites is okay, because that holy war was a part of God's relationship to Israel at that time. The author of this essay claims that genocide is neither good or bad, but rather the context in which it exists determines its morality. Since God prescribed it, it must have been good. He gives a few reasons he thought God might have employed genocide, such as to protect the Israelites from idolatry (did it work?) and to show God's justice on evil and grace on the Israelites, almost as a mode of evangelism (is genocide good evangelism?)

One response to the essay, i think sums up generally my feelings: "If the indiscriminate slaughter of human beings for any reason can be called a "good" and "righteous" act, and if the sanctity of human life established in creation, reaffirmed after the flood, reinforced in the seventh commandment, reiterated by all the prophets, and incarnate in Jesus--if this can be set aside by a supposed divine "authorization of genocide"--then all moral and ethical absolutes are destroyed, all distinctions between good and evil are rendered meaningless, and all claims about God's love and compassion become cruel deceptions."

So, what to make of this. It seem as though, where in the previous essay the author gave up on the bible, this author seems to give up on any cohesive picture of God. "Thou Shalt Not Kill, Love your enemies, genocide is okay when I say so". I find myself asking whether I am so comitted to a belief and a frame of thought that I am willing to justify the slaughter of an entire group of people? I am not sure.

Some of the responses reaffirmed the fact that we all deserve death due to our sinfulness, and that the culture of the canaanites received what they deserved. But, so did the Israelites deserve such a response, and so do we all. So, why destroy one people and honor another? It seems strikingly similar to the sort of moral dishonesty and lack of compassion present in the Calvinist system of thought. Besides, is God's passion not the salvation of all? Was Jesus not preoccupied by humility rather than self-promotion? Wasn't God so passionate about salvation of people that he came to earth to suffer a humiliating death? And if he is all of those things, how is the prescription of genocide of a people reasonably justified? It seems too severe of a contradiction.

As the author of this essay said himself, under this system of thought, "the moral and ethical dilemma of Yahweh war must also remain without satisfying rational explanation."