Luke Muehlauser at Commonsense Atheism has written a review of my argument on the genocide of the Canaanites (Joshua and the Genocide of the Canaanites Part I and Part II). Luke’s comments are largely positive (and I appreciate that a critic of Theism and Christianity sees merit in my position) he does, however, raise a few issues I would like to respond to.
First, Luke summarises my conclusion as:
Perhaps instead the most genocidal phrases in Joshua were meant as hyperbole. Imagine a basketball team speaking of how they “totally slaughtered” their opponents like their coach told them to. In the same way, maybe the Israelites wrote in hyperbolic language about how they defeated their enemies. Indeed, this kind of exaggeration and hagiography on a nation’s own behalf is common in ancient literature.
This is not quite right; I did not state “perhaps” the passages are hyperbolic. I argued a hyperbolic reading best fits the context, as it explains why the author uses stylised phrases in some passages which, if taken literally, contradict what he affirms elsewhere in the text did literally happen. Furthermore, I did not suggest that such exaggeration and hagiography is common in ancient literature. I suggested it was common in literature of the same general time and place, which used the same literary conventions and rhetorical techniques as the Bible does in the Book of Joshua – namely Ancient Near-Eastern war and conquest accounts.
Second, Luke states that my position “agrees with the Biblical minimalism already espoused by most atheists, for it says that these events found in the Bible never happened.” This comment is intriguing because much of my research drew from the writings of biblical maximalists who were criticising minimalism. My repeated citation of Kenneth Kitchen is an obvious example. Minimalists point out that the archaeological record does not fit the picture of total conquest and genocide and hence conclude the Bible is inaccurate. Maximalists, such as Kenneth Kitchen and James Hoffmeier, respond by arguing that the text is not inaccurate because, having examined the literary conventions of Ancient Near-Eastern historiography, one finds it does not actually teach total conquest and genocide as it is written according to the hyperbolic and to some extent hagiographic rhetoric of Ancient Near-Eastern historiography. So I am inclined to think my position is a development of a rejoinder to minimalist challenges.
This is of course another area where my perspective has merit. It resolves not only some of the moral questions people have with the narrative; it also resolves the apparent contradictions within the text cited by critical scholars, answers the challenge of archaeology and fits what we know about the conventions of such literature. If we know that Joshua is written according to certain literary conventions and we know that these conventions frequently are hagiographic and hyperbolic, then to insist on a literal reading is implausible. This is particularly so when it makes the text contradictory, contrary to archaeological record and seemingly immoral. Luke goes on to ask,
If Matt did think these events happened literally as described in the Bible, would he then conclude that God was an evil monster to command them? Or would he, in the end, agree with Bill Craig that genocide is okay as long as God feels like it?
I will make two points in answering Luke’s questions.
One, it seems to me one could only conclude that Joshua actually carried out a divinely authorised Genocide if, in addition to taking Joshua literally one also accepts that the Bible is inerrant. But Joshua is not the only text in the canon, the Bible also in various other places teaches that God is good, just, and so on. So it’s hard to see how a person could coherently draw the conclusion Luke mentions. A person who concluded that God is evil, would have to conclude that much of what the Bible teaches about God is mistaken, but if this is the case then one has reason for doubting that it is accurate in its description of Genocide in the first place.
Two, Luke asks if I “agree with Bill Craig that genocide is okay as long as God feels like it?” It is important to note is that this is not Craig’s position. Craig claims that killing non combatants in war is permissible if a loving and just God commands it. He also contends that God in fact did not command this in the biblical narratives hence his view is about a hypothetical conditional.1 Once this is realised the issues are not as simple as Luke appears to think. Either it is possible for a just and loving omniscient person to command genocide or is not. If it is, then genocide would only be commanded in situations where a just and loving person aware of all the relevant facts could endorse it, and under these circumstances its hard to see how genocide could be evil.
On the other hand if it is impossible for a perfectly good omniscient being to ever command genocide, then the situation Luke mentions is one with an impossible antecedent. On the standard accounts of counter factual logic, conditionals with impossible antecedents are true. Of course this is a disputed point of modal logic, the debate however is technical and complex and certainly not one with an obvious answer. As I have argued elsewhere every ethical theory is such that under impossible circumstances it entails that genocide is permissible.
Finally, Luke argues that atheists are not “‘attacking a straw man’ or ‘taking things out of context’ as Matt sometimes says” but rather, “they are responding to the way that millions of Christian fundamentalists interpret these verses.” He states,
Atheists are not, as Matt claims, reading the Bible as fundamentalists. Atheists don’t believe the genocide ever took place! What we atheists are saying is this: If you think these events were literally commanded by God and carried out by the Israelites, then how can you call God “perfectly good”?
But here Luke is quoting me out of context. The argument I responded to was developed by Ray Bradley. Ray’s conclusion was not that fundamentalist Christianity is false but that theism is false, and that all forms of theistic ethics are false. This only follows if you assume either,
(a) that fundamentalist readings are the only defensible ones or,
(b) all theists as a matter of fact do make such readings.
To affirm (a) is to adopt a fundamentalist hermeneutic as correct interpretation.
To affirm (b) is to attack a straw man.
Of course someone might adopt a more qualified argument along the manner he suggests. But if he does, then it is not an argument against theism, nor is it an argument against Christianity, it is not even an argument against a form of Christianity committed to a strong view of inerrancy. It is an argument against anyone who accepts these things and also accepts an interpretation of Scripture which reads these passages as a literal description of what actually happened, as opposed to hagiographic or hyperbolic description. Now showing this combination of positions to be indefensible might be interesting and useful, but it is extremely limited in its conclusion. Anyone appraised of such an argument can respond simply by moving to a less literalistic hermeneutic and retaining every thing else. I suspect this is much less than atheists typically want and certainly less than they typically maintain this argument shows.
1. In Divine Command Morality and Voluntarism William Lane Craig writes “I’ve come to appreciate that the object of God’s command to the Israelis was not the slaughter of the Canaanites, as is often imagined.” The command rather was primarily to drive them out of the land.” He goes on to state “But I’m assuming a “worst case” scenario for the sake of argument.”
RELATED POSTS:
Joshua and the Genocide of the Canaanites Part I
Joshua and the Genocide of the Canaanites Part II
Contra Mundum: Did God Command Genocide in the Old Testament?
Tags: Canaanites · Commonsense Atheism · Genocide · Luke Muehlhauser · Old Testament Ethics · William Lane Craig25 Comments
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.
You are terrific. Thanks for this!
[…] Earlier, I wrote about Matt Flannagan’s apologetic strategy concerning the stories in the Bible which seem to depict the Israelites slaughtering other Canaanite tribes. Matt has now written an excellent response. […]
This is a really controversial issue. Upon reading your post, some questions arose in my mind. I was morecritical after I read this post. Thanks very much.
shocking really.
Hey Matt,
Are amoralism, sadism, and fascistic ethics legitimate amongst the options open to someone godless? Has there been a solid argument for life-stifling ethics to supersede life-preserving ones in a secular framework?
Thanks,
Alvin, your question is an interesting one, some have argued that the issue of amoralism does create a problem for secular ethics, the reason is that one can face the question “why be moral?”. If one offers a moral reason for an affirmative answer, the answer begs the question, the person is asking why they should adopt morality and take moral reasons as binding, and simply saying morality says they should is not really an answer.
To get a non question begging answer one needs to offer non moral or prudential reasons for being moral. The problem is, on a standard secular view of the world its not clear that doing the right thing is always in ones self interest, there appear to be cases where doing the right thing involves a sacrifice of self interest or where its in ones self interest to do the wrong thing.
Theological views of the world however can robustly link self interest and morality with an eschatological picture where by God orders the universe so that ultimately happiness and virtue are united. Kant argued something along these lines, as does Hare and Layman.
I am inclined to think there is something to this line of argument, but a detailed defence would require more research and work.
Do you have any evidence that suggests Joshua was a historical person? Or that conquest narrative is anything other than the perverted fantasy of some author from the late Iron/Hellenistic age? The most you can say is that the biblical authors wanted to believe in a vicious psychopathic god who slaughters humans by the million (the flood) and encourage his followers to do likewise (the conquest).
Your so-called argument that the Jews didn’t commit genocide on Yahweh’s orders because Canaanites are still around later is so fantastic, so far removed form any historical reality that it beggars the imagination. It is entirely masturbatory. Have you ever heard of Finkelstein, Lemche, or Thopmpson?
It hardly seems worth asking you what evidence there for this god person you keep talking about to begin with.
Thanks Matt for the answer,
However, there is an argument forwarded by the Randians I think.. that absolute selflessness, including acts and desires that can potentially forfeit the life of the benefactor is in itself practically useless, since the benefactor can no longer perform altruistic acts, as he/she loses existence. It seems to imply a challenge to theistic ethics that have a stronger basis for altruism by emulating God rather than the Ego (secular ethics have this as a possible option amongst others like Frank Zindler’s Enlightened Self-Interest) so that the focus is on God’s commands rather than the believer’s well-being
What do you think of this?
Helena, where the hell are the humanistic association members when Rwanda happened? Where was your little plush club of secular humanitarians when the holocaust happened?
At least God was bloodthirsty and got his hands dirty? whilst the humanists were in their arm chairs sipping latte complaining how evil the world is, without getting their hands dirty? which really is dirt cheap hypocritical
and please, Matt handled this objection already, how many more tired objections do you have?
Besides which Helena,
Some of your twisted cousins by the way like Hitler, who identified with a different god, but was a pragmatic atheist in every way, Mussolini, who identified as an atheist although a nominal Catholic and Mao/Stalin/Pol Pot, you know the dictators of the 20th century in addition to the indifferent presidents and prime ministers who didn’t give a damn about religion, aided/abetted and caused genocides.
God never wiped out a race because of ethnicity, so genocide is a wrong answer; nor where the Canaanites an internal group within a nation, but a strong, numerous out-group culturally and martially superior against Israel, so its not the holocaust by the way, since the Jews were an internal people group in Germany.
God even allowed Canaanites and non-jews to enter into the sanctuary through a generational limit provided they abandoned the worship of their gods to yahwehism.
Accuse God of cultural genocide and not modern genocide, and please get the terms right!
Helena. yes I have heard of Finkelstein, Lemache and Thompson, in fact in one of my discussions of this issue I cite Thompson who notes that the language of “devoting” whole populations is rhetorical and not literal discription. Have you heard of Kitchen, Hoffmieir, Wenham and others?
You ask
Do you have any evidence that suggests Joshua was a historical person?
Yes the book of Joshua is such evidence, you seem to be suggesting that if one has a historical narrative that reports X, one should believe it is false until X is confirmed by independent evidence. Unfortunately this method call into question a large amount of accepted history. Do you for example have any evidence that Socrates was a real person, outside of Plato there is very little. Do you consider him a myth.
“Or that conquest narrative is anything other than the perverted fantasy of some author from the late Iron/Hellenistic age?”
Well the fact that Joshua follows the same literary conventions that other ANE conquest accounts of the 2nd and 1st millenia BC ( as noted in the above post) tends to suggest its not a hellenistic document? Similarly the existence of a covenant in the text which fits the structure of a 13th century covenant, and not a latter 6th century one tends to confirm it. You could also compare the “conquest” account interpreted in light of ANE hyperbolic conventions and the archaeological record.
The most you can say is that the biblical authors wanted to believe in a vicious psychopathic god who slaughters humans by the million (the flood)
Again, I think an examination of the historical and literary context of the flood story might give a different conclusion here, actually the Babylonians believed in psychopathic gods who wipe out the human race capicrously, many scholars familar with the literary context suggest the Noah story is a polemic against this very idea.
and encourage his followers to do likewise (the conquest).
that’s if you ignore the issues I raised above, but asserting a thesis is not really a reason for rejecting an argument for the thesis.
Your so-called argument that the Jews didn’t commit genocide on Yahweh’s orders because Canaanites are still around later is so fantastic, so far removed form any historical reality that it beggars the imagination.
Unfortunately a string of pejorative terms is not really an argument at all. I take it you reject the judgement of Egyptologists that claims that Mitani was wiped out was not hyperbole, because Mitani were clearly alive afterwards. I take it you also do not consider the Moabite stele to be hyperbole when it states Isreal was “no more” or Merenthpath was not hyperbole when he claimed to have annihilated whole nations ( including Isreal) in the early 1200’s and so on.
It hardly seems worth asking you what evidence there for this god person you keep talking about to begin with.
Well if you were familar with the writings of people like Plantinga, or Alston, or others you’d know how problematic the assumptions behind this request are, but perhaps I can reply with a counter request.
Where is the evidence that objective moral principles such as “its wrong to commit genocide” exist. You keep appealing to them in your argument, so where is it?
Alvin you write It seems to imply a challenge to theistic ethics that have a stronger basis for altruism by emulating God rather than the Ego (secular ethics have this as a possible option amongst others like Frank Zindler’s Enlightened Self-Interest) so that the focus is on God’s commands rather than the believer’s well-being
Again to really do justice to this would require more, but a couple of quick responses. First, according to most divine command theories, God is understood to seek the happiness of his creatures, and so it would not be a case of following Gods commands instead of ones own happiness.
Second, I think the issue of the ego replacing God is interesting. Many accounts of human welfare point out that humans due to ignorance, and irrationality can desire to do things that are not in their self interest, self interest has to be understood in terms of what a person would seek if they were fully informed, fully rational and so on, hence the ego often becomes not our actual ego but a hypothetical ego which has godlike properties.
Third, I am not convinced egoism is correct, first I am inclined to think it leads to conclusions that non rational humans such as infants have no rights, second, it struggles with the fact that ethical rules function as guides to other people how to behave as well as our selves. Take the rule seek your own self interest, if you commend this to others as a rule you are telling them to seek their self interest, not to seek yours, but then you yourself seem to be violating the rule. So its hard to see how egoism can be rationally commended as a ethical system to others.
Biblical Studies Carnival – September Edition…
Matt Flannagan responded this month to criticism of earlier essays which sought to deal with the Canaanite massacre in the book of Joshua by appeal to the greatest use of hyperbole all time, truly, Flannagan absolutely murders all of his competition, m…
[…] Commonsense Atheism and the Canaanite Massacre […]
[…] no way to get around that fact, Matt Flannagan’s pious protestations (here, here, here, here, and here) […]
[…] Commonsense Atheism and the Canaanite Massacre I addressed a question put to me by Luke from Commonsense Atheism, “If Matt did think these […]
thanks
very nice article
“To get a non question begging answer one needs to offer non moral or prudential reasons for being moral”
The moment you provide prudential reason for acting morally, you abolish the very concept of morality! Are you thick?
If there’s a prudential reason for acting morally, then there’s ultimately self-serving reason for you to do so, hense your actions are not moral, but prudential. That’s why, on theism, morality is just prudence in disguise. Morality is only possible on atheism, where there is no rewarding God
Hi All
This may be of interest to you if you haven’t seen it already:
http://religionatthemargins.com/2010/11/the-joshua-delusion/
@gb
You will have to clarify what you are saying, because it’s not clear. Are you saying that atheists are more moral, because they have no motivation for their actions? All prudential means is acting with care or forethought.
@Paul Bennett
Thom only briefly discusses the pertinent issues to our discussion in this review, so it’s largely irrelevant to the topic. He makes claims about how the hyperbolic view of Joshua doesn’t work, and gives one argument in regards to the Benjaminites (from Judges), but that’s all.
You may or may not be aware, but Matt and Thom have discussed these topics in the past (along with Jeremy Pierce, Ken Pulliam and myself). You can read the thread here. I comment at the end with an analysis of the Moabite text.
Let me be clear as well. I’m not sure I agree with Matt/Kitchen and others on this topic, but I also don’t think Thom has adequately argued against it at this point. See the criticisms of Thom’s points by Jeremy Pierce in the other thread, who himself has no issue with taking the accounts literally, as well as the criticisms by Matt. You can also read my comments on his inaccurate use of a Moabite inscription, which show that Matt’s interpretation is correct.
“To get a non question begging answer one needs to offer non moral or prudential reasons for being moral”
First, ignoring a question and calling people thick really is not a response.
Second, your argument does not follow you state “If there’s a prudential reason for acting morally, then there’s ultimately self-serving reason for you to do so” Here you argue that if there is a prudential reason for acting morally then that’s the ultimate reason for acting morally. But its simply does not follow that because X is a reason for Z automatically means that X is the ultimate reason for Z. A reason is not the same thing as an ultimate reason.
Moreover if your argument were sound it would lead to all sorts of absurdities. For example it’s a fact that people have prudential reasons to not murder, one might get caught and go to jail. Does it follow from this that the only and ultimate reason people fail to murder is to avoid jail. Obviously not, if it did then your argument would entail that we should decriminalise murder in order to avoid undercutting morality.
Your argument does not really attack theism as such but rather any system which rewards good conduct and punishes bad conduct. Our justice system does this (imperfectly) the whole social practises of praising, blaming, censuring, feelings of shame guilt, forgiveness and so on are intertwined with positive and negative responses to conduct so if your argument were sound all these practises should be rejected as well as theism.
I note however you avoid the question raised which is this, can atheism or naturalism provide any plausible non question begging answer to the question “why be moral” why should a person buy into morality? One cannot answer this question by appealing to moral reasons because the whole question is about why one should accept moral reasons as binding in the first place. That’s why some naturalists like Sarte and Singer ultimately assert that being moral is an arbitary groundless choice.
I am sure if a theologian stated the choice to be religious was arbitrary and groundless we would hear all about it from you.
How about just the practicality of being moral? Moral behavior one could argue is a better behavior based just on this fact alone. If you aren’t doing drugs the night before, you are not hungover the next day and will be alert and accomplish more! If you aren’t having unprotected premarital sex, then you’ll stand a greater chance of not getting pregnant as a teen.
Matt you write “How about just the practicality of being moral? Moral behavior one could argue is a better behavior based just on this fact alone. If you aren’t doing drugs the night before, you are not hungover the next day and will be alert and accomplish more! If you aren’t having unprotected premarital sex, then you’ll stand a greater chance of not getting pregnant as a teen.” I agree there are many instances where doing the right thing is beneficial. The problem is this does not always seem to be the case, there are cases where in this life anyway, doing the wrong thing can benefit one and doing the right thing involves sacrifice. For example, a person can get imprisioned for standing up for whats right in some regimes, while those in power keep themselves in power by killing off the opposition.
These are ignorant, we all should be equal