Christadelphians Still Trying To Convince Selves That Human Sacrifice Totally A Normal Thing For A God To Require
To this end, it is recommended that Christadelphians continue to ignore the fact that human sacrifice was a thing throughout the times and cultures in which the biblical texts were written. The many correlations between human cultures and biblical contents can be rather inconvenient when trying to fool oneself into believing humans didn't come up with this stuff on their own.
Of course it's possible, as some argue, that God was simply adopting the language and customs of the day, which is another way of saying it may quack exactly like a duck, but it's really just God making duck noises. Or perhaps the real reason it was written in the iron age is because God, being all-knowing and all, realised that if he had waited until today to write his story about an all-powerful god requiring human sacrifice to rescue humanity from himself by exploiting a loophole in a law he invented, he might have struggled to find a publisher. Also the cycle of indoctrination works best if you start early.
It's unfortunate when your 19th century religion based on a collection of iron-age texts happens to hold human sacrifice as one of its core ideas. I am of course referring to the very important, fundamental Christadelphian doctrine known as "The Atonement", wherein God apparently had to kill one person in order to forgive other people. We're not supposed to ask why, or how that even makes sense.
It could be worse. Prior to the killing of that one person, the same god apparently required animals to be routinely sacrificed, which again somehow allowed him to forgive people. Again, don't ask! I guess we should be thankful that the ancient cults that required child sacrifice all died out - although it's not too difficult to see why. Who would have thought that systematically wiping out the next generation might not bode well for the future of your tribe?
Still, the biblical god appears to have dabbled with child sacrifice at least once, when he asked Abraham tomurder sacrifice his own son, only to suddenly change course. Of course Christadelphians will be quick to argue that God didn't really intend for Abraham to kill his son. No no, he just wanted Abraham to think that's what he intended. Tell me again how this makes it all better?
They say it was a test of allegiance, or "faith", but like many acts of faith it required a person to violate their sense of reason or morality (or both), and instead blindly and unquestioningly follow a command that no good, loving, rational person would otherwise follow. Let's be crystal clear. There is no hero in this story. It's a command to commit cold-blooded murder, followed by actual intent to murder, followed by praise and reward for the would-be murderer. A truly loving being would not issue the command and a moral being would not follow it!
As we go to press, spare a thought for Christadelphian parents bracing themselves for the day when their child starts asking questions about it all. Perhaps that's what the chocolate eggs are for.
It's unfortunate when your 19th century religion based on a collection of iron-age texts happens to hold human sacrifice as one of its core ideas. I am of course referring to the very important, fundamental Christadelphian doctrine known as "The Atonement", wherein God apparently had to kill one person in order to forgive other people. We're not supposed to ask why, or how that even makes sense.
It could be worse. Prior to the killing of that one person, the same god apparently required animals to be routinely sacrificed, which again somehow allowed him to forgive people. Again, don't ask! I guess we should be thankful that the ancient cults that required child sacrifice all died out - although it's not too difficult to see why. Who would have thought that systematically wiping out the next generation might not bode well for the future of your tribe?
Still, the biblical god appears to have dabbled with child sacrifice at least once, when he asked Abraham to
They say it was a test of allegiance, or "faith", but like many acts of faith it required a person to violate their sense of reason or morality (or both), and instead blindly and unquestioningly follow a command that no good, loving, rational person would otherwise follow. Let's be crystal clear. There is no hero in this story. It's a command to commit cold-blooded murder, followed by actual intent to murder, followed by praise and reward for the would-be murderer. A truly loving being would not issue the command and a moral being would not follow it!
As we go to press, spare a thought for Christadelphian parents bracing themselves for the day when their child starts asking questions about it all. Perhaps that's what the chocolate eggs are for.