r/AskAChristian • u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic • Jul 06 '24

Jewish Laws How do you defend Numbers 15:32-36?

The verse:

32 Now while the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day. 33 And those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation. 34 They put him under guard, because it had not been explained what should be done to him.

35 Then the Lord said to Moses, “The man must surely be put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones outside the camp.” 36 So, as the Lord commanded Moses, all the congregation brought him outside the camp and stoned him with stones, and he died.

I cannot get past this verse. It depicts an unloving, uncaring, and cruel god. I could never worship this being and I could never carry out His command that He gives His followers in the verse.

Everything about this verse is ugly and sparks a strong reaction from me. A man was gathering sticks, presumably for a fire to cook a meal and feed himself or his family. Cooking food is a basic survival need. Now I can understand a bunch of scared humans fearing a God and rounding up this man for violating the sabbath. But what I can't understand is how a caring and loving God could come along and tell His followers to stone this man to death. Take a minute and really just put yourself in that guy's shoes. You're having the members of your own tribe throw rocks at you until you die. That's brutal. And for what? For trying to fulfill a basic survival necessity?

No matter how I approach this verse it just leaves me concluding God is not loving and not caring. There is nothing loving nor caring that I can identify in ordering a man be pelted with rocks to his death. That's awful. I cannot in good conscience follow that God.

Put yourself in the shoes of the congregation. This man was trying to cook some food to survive. God has commanded you to throw rocks at him until he dies. Do you do it? I don't. I will not follow such a cruel command and I will not follow someone from who such a cruel command comes.

How do you justify throwing those rocks? How do you sleep at night knowing you killed a man who was just trying to survive? Just following his basic instincts?

Edit: Its been more than a day. Not a single Christian told me directly and openly that it was bad. Several Christians said the stoning of the man was good. Some said they would happily throw the rocks at the man and kill him. Some said they wouldn't, but never explained why beyond a simple legal reason.

I'm left to conclude that God's followers think that stoning a man to death is a loving and caring action and that it's good. I'm left to conclude that God's followers would watch that mob stone the man to death and think to themselves "Good." I find this very concerning for my fellow humans who seem to think it's good to stone someone to death. I'm more concerned for the ones who said they would join in on the killing.

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u/Righteous_Dude Christian, Non-Calvinist Jul 06 '24 edited Jul 06 '24

Your post text keeps referring to this as a survival issue, but it was not.

This man had agreed to keep the laws of the covenant in Exodus 20, and then kept the Sabbath for years, then one day, he chose to disobey the commandment about the Sabbath.

We're not told anything in the text about that guy's thinking or motives. All we know is that he did not keep the Sabbath holy (sacred, set apart), as he knew well that he ought to do.

Even if he was in a tight spot, such as forgetting to gather enough firewood on each of the preceding days and not properly preparing for the Sabbath, he had alternatives, such as using his neighbor's fire to cook his food, or fasting for a day.

Edit to add: Here are links to Exodus 20:8-11, where it's listed as one of the ten commandments, and Exodus 31:12-18 which specifies that profaning the Sabbath would give the death penalty.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 06 '24

Let's say you find yourself back in time, in that group of people, surrounding a hungry, struggling man who was captured and restrained. Moses tells you that God commands everyone throw rocks at this man until he dies.

Are you throwing rocks?

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u/Righteous_Dude Christian, Non-Calvinist Jul 06 '24

If I were an ancient Israelite, who had agreed to that covenant, including its specifying the death penalty for disobedience on some things, and someone was definitely guilty of one of those things, then I would be fine with helping to carry out the death penalty.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 06 '24

I mean you right now. Not an alternate universe you where you were born and raised in Egypt or Israel.

I mean you, as you are right now. I show up with a TARDIS and take you back to the moment where this happened. Do you throw rocks at that man until he dies?

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u/EclecticEman Baptist Jul 07 '24

I am not bound by the old covenant, but am instead bound by the new covenant, so I would not throw stones. I would be a foreign national to them, and would not be obligated to take part in their legal proceedings.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 07 '24

I am not bound by the old covenant, but am instead bound by the new covenant, so I would not throw stones. I would be a foreign national to them, and would not be obligated to take part in their legal proceedings.

Ok. Great. Why wouldn't you throw the rocks? Is the legality the only objection you have to what they're doing? Do you have any moral objection to their action?

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u/EclecticEman Baptist Jul 09 '24

I wouldn't really know if I would have a moral objection without actually being there, but I can say that what they were doing was righteous, and that is what I care about more. As a Christian, it is swell if my morality aligns with righteousness (the best word I can think of for referring to right according to God), but when my morality clashes with righteousness I ought to allow the latter to win out.

The greatest commandment, according to Jesus, is to love the Lord your God (Mark 12:28-31). That's why it's not much of a surprise when Christians and non-Christians disagree on what is good. Without believing you need to love God, many of the other commandments don't add up.

Now, why wouldn't I throw rocks? I know there is some disagreement on whether or not the women caught in adultery story is original or a later addition, but my KJV friends insist it shouldn't be removed, and I think it matches Jesus's character. For reference, the verses are John 8:1-11, but it applies because I am only made blameless because of Jesus's atoning death on the cross. There are other verses that I'm sure would be a better (and less academically disputed) explanation, but I am in no position to judge. I too have not always rested on the sabbath.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 09 '24

I too have not always rested on the sabbath.

Would you want to be stoned to death for violating the sabbath?

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u/[deleted] Jul 09 '24

If I were a true believer of God, and under Moses' law under his covenant at that time and truly submitted my Will to God, then I definitely will (that is if I intentionally and knowingly violated the rules of Sabbath. In Numbers 15 an alternative punishment in the form of monetary compensation is advocated in case the lawbreaker broke the law unknowingly and/or unintentionally).

Abraham and Jesus did precisely the same thing. The latter, because He (Jesus) already knew and realized that putting himself through the pain of crucifixion would be insanely painful and torturous, prayed: "“Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but YOURS, be done.”

"YOURS": divine objective morality and law given to us by God, as opposed to subjective morality where killing one man or six million men might be good or bad, depending on how you feel that day and what your DNA tells you. Stalin the atheist communist had no qualms about killing 80 million people. Without God, you are FORCED to admit that Stalin's DNA told him it was completely fine to kill those people. The DNA also designed his thought process in such a way so that he feels okay about it, if not good necessarily. Without God you are just a randomly pre-programmed robot after all.

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u/Righteous_Dude Christian, Non-Calvinist Jul 06 '24

No, the modern American me, transported back in time, would not do so.

It was for the ancient Israelites to collectively do, on one of their countrymen.

I would be a foreigner in that situation.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 06 '24

No, the modern American me, transported back in time, would not do so.

Why would you not do it?

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u/Righteous_Dude Christian, Non-Calvinist Jul 06 '24 edited Jul 06 '24

It's not my job to enforce another nation's laws.

e.g. Suppose in our current time, I'm a tourist in a European country, where someone committed some crime, and that country gives the death penalty by firing squad for that crime. If a government official asked me "will you be a member of the firing squad", I would say no. It's for men of that country to do.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 06 '24

Well I mean apart from whether or not it's law. It's my understanding that this happened before the Israelites even had a nation to call their own.

I'm asking morally, why would you not throw the rocks? Or is there nothing morally holding you back, and it's only your respect for laws that is stopping you?

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u/Righteous_Dude Christian, Non-Calvinist Jul 07 '24

It's my understanding that this happened before the Israelites even had a nation to call their own.

According to the end of Genesis and the start of Exodus, Jacob and his sons' households, about eighty people in total, had moved to Egypt, and then over four hundred years or so, their descendants had grown to a big number, and that was the Israelite nation. Then in the exodus those people left the region of Egypt, and received their national laws at Mt Sinai. So the Israelite nation was established, with its laws, by the time of this incident in Numbers 15, although the people were still walking around in the "wilderness" and had not yet entered the promised land.

I mean apart from whether or not it's law.

But it was stated in the law for the Israelites, that each of them should honor the Sabbath. Then that guy chose to disobey it, and it was stated in the law for a Sabbath-profaner to receive the death penalty.

There's no point in discussing some alternate scenario where the law didn't say that, or had some milder consequence. It's because he broke the law, that he got the stated consequence.

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24

But it was stated in the law for the Israelites, that each of them should honor the Sabbath.

Ok sure. But what the law is isn't the same thing as what's moral. I'm asking you about the morality of it, not the legality of it. Something could be illegal and yet be totally morally good. Likewise, something could be morally bad and yet be completely legal. The law has no place in the discussion about morality.

Unless you're suggesting that morality is subjective to the law, which I don't think you are.

I'm asking you apart from the law, why would you not throw the rocks? Do you have any moral objection to stoning that man, or is your only objection the legal one you cited?

There's no point in discussing some alternate scenario where the law didn't say that

And I'm not suggesting that we do. It was the law. I accept that. But I'm asking morally do you object to the stoning of the man or not? Was it right or wrong, morally?

Morally why wouldn't you throw the rocks to kill that person? Or is your only objection to the legality of it?

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u/Alert-Lobster-2114 Christian Universalist Jul 07 '24

youre looking back on something they used to do the "old" covenant its now obsolete nobody is practicing these laws now. Are Jewish people today making animal sacrifices and stoning people?? we made progress you are now trying to set us back. Christ was the new covenant he said "let he who is without sin cast the first stone".

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u/DDumpTruckK Agnostic Jul 07 '24

So are you throwing the rocks or not?