Love, Logic, and Leviticus

26. October 2009 by admin.

There are a lot of people, especially in Seattle, who like to pretend that the Old Testament and a lot of God’s laws don’t matter to modern people. They say this for many reasons, but mostly because they believe that they themselves are somehow morally advanced beyond Biblical law, and as such, the Bible is oftentimes culturally irrelevant.  Aside from the problems which accompany this kind of thinking (like how nobody can really be sure which portions of the Bible are divinely inspired), Christians employing this kind of “logic” generally forget about someone.  He’s called the Devil.  You may have read about him somewhere in the Bible.

If Yahweh is the author of truth and the Devil is partially defined as the author of lies, then anything in the Bible which we suggest is false or evil is from the Devil.  This includes “culturally irrelevant” stances on gender roles (oppressive and unloving!), ideas about submitting to authority (unAmerican, of course!), and keeping the Sabbath holy (before the modern consumptive economy!).  But the most important thing “modern” Christians enjoy painting as the Devil’s work is Levitical law, as they claim it is archaic and oppressive, having completely unacceptable standards for treating women, or unacceptable intolerance of idolators, homosexuals, and false prophets.  These people would claim that when Jesus arrived, suddenly God changed His mind about standards and started preaching a philosophy of hugs while throwing any sort of orderly function–and justice–out the window (”love your enemies” apparently means letting them do whatever they want). Read the rest of this entry »

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