Critiquing: How Could God Kill All the Firstborn Babies in the Tenth Plague?

July 18, 2024 | #STRask – Stand to Reason

Moral Authority — Justified Judgement — Innocent Suffering — Divine Sovereignty — Complex Theology

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Introduction

The content discusses how God could justify killing all the firstborn babies in the tenth plague, responses to accusations of genocide during the flood, and whether God still creates calamity today. The explanations aim to defend divine actions while addressing “moral” and theological concerns. This critique evaluates the logical coherence, identifying inconsistencies, unsubstantiated claims, and logical fallacies.

“Moral” Authority

The primary argument is that God, as the giver of life, has the right to take life:

“God is the giver of life and God can take life whenever he wants. All right.”

While the argument asserts that divine authority justifies taking life, it does not address why such authority should exempt human scrutiny. The claim is presented as self-evident without substantiating why divine prerogatives should inherently override human considerations of what is loving or reflective of divinity. This results in a circular argument where God’s actions are justified solely because they are God’s actions.

Justified Judgement

The content attempts to distinguish between genocide and divine judgement:

“The question is whether God had a good reason to essentially kill all those people. That’s the real issue.”

The reasoning here is based on the premise that God’s actions are always justified:

“And that’s the difference between justified judgment and mere genocide.”

This argument fails to critically examine what constitutes a “good reason” for mass killing. It presupposes that divine reasoning is inherently “good”, thus avoiding the burden of providing concrete justification. This is a form of special pleading, where divine actions are exempt from the standards used to judge similar human actions.

Innocent Suffering

The discussion acknowledges the suffering of innocents but rationalizes it as a necessary part of divine judgement:

“The fact is that innocent suffer for the crimes and sins of the adults.”

This justification relies on the appeal to tradition and inevitability:

“That’s just the way it is. When the Allies landed on the beaches of Normandy, June 6, 1944, 30,000 civilians died, including children, because that was the price that was to be paid.”

Analogies to war fail to justify why innocent suffering should be acceptable in divine actions. War casualties result from human conflicts with ambiguities about what maximizes compassion (a non-obligatory but very human goal), whereas divine actions are expected to reflect higher “moral” standards. This reasoning also implies a false equivalence between human wartime decisions and divine actions.

Divine Sovereignty

The content repeatedly asserts God’s sovereignty as a rationale for his actions:

“He’s the sovereign God. Okay. Now, I think the temptation is to believe that God is punishing these children.”

This leads to the claim that divine sovereignty absolves God of moral accountability:

“God can create life and he can take life and he needs no further moral justification for it.”

Such arguments rely heavily on divine command theory, positing that “moral” good is determined by God’s will. This approach creates a moral relativism where divine actions cannot be judged by human ethical principles or even notions of what is genuine compassion.

(This is not to suggest morality of any form actually exists.)

Complex Theology

The content introduces complex theological justifications to explain divine actions:

“He’s using this as a key moment in their history. And also it’s so that the Israelites would fear and respect him.”

While these explanations aim to provide context, they often involve appeals to mystery and vagueness:

“We don’t have to go into the details. We’ve talked about this in the past.”

Complex theological constructs can obfuscate rather than clarify the rationale behind an alleged God’s actions. They shift the discussion from addressing specific concerns related to the logical coherence of God’s depiction to broader, less tangible theological narratives.

Unsubstantiated Claims

Several claims lack substantiation and remain dubious:

“Those children, infants, youngsters that die before the age of any kind of moral accountability, those go right to be with the Lord.”

This assertion, while comforting, is not supported by explicit scriptural evidence, as admitted in the content:

“There’s not an explicit statement in scripture to that effect, but there is a scriptural argument that I think is pretty strong.”

Unsubstantiated claims require evidence to be credible. Without such evidence, they cannot adequately support the arguments made. Rational belief is a degree of belief that maps to the degree of the relevant evidence.

Logical Fallacies and Cognitive Biases

The content contains several logical fallacies and cognitive biases:

1. Circular Reasoning: Justifying God’s actions because they are God’s actions.
2. Special Pleading: Exempting divine actions from scrutiny.
3. Appeal to Tradition: Justifying innocent suffering based on historical precedent.
4. False Equivalence: Comparing divine actions to wartime decisions.
5. Appeal to Mystery: Using complex theology to avoid addressing specific rational/logical concerns.

Obligation to Substantiate Claims

Claims, especially those with evaluative and theological implications, must be substantiated. The content often relies on assumptions and theological constructs without providing sufficient evidence. This undermines the logical coherence and credibility of the arguments.

Testing Divine Promises

If any promises of God were alleged, they should be testable. Potential methods could include historical verification, empirical observation, and logical consistency. For example, claims about divine protection or judgement could be examined through historical records and contemporary events.

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This critique aims to highlight logical inconsistencies, unsubstantiated claims, and cognitive biases. The arguments presented often rely on theological assumptions and special pleading, which weaken their logical coherence. By scrutinizing these elements, the discussion encourages a more rigorous examination of “moral” and theological claims.

◉ Removing God from Scrutiny:

Redefining Love and Authority: A Dangerous Precedent

Imagine a woman from next door coming to your door, passionately defending her husband’s tormenting of their children in the basement. She insists, without any evidence, that he is wiser than you and has “sufficient and loving reasons” for inflicting pain on his children. When you tell her that her husband’s actions are nothing like what we understand to be loving, she responds that he has authority over language and can invert the definition of love if he so desires. This analogy is strikingly similar to how many religious apologists defend the actions of their deity—a defense that must be critically examined and ultimately rejected.

Redefining Love: An Arbitrary and Dangerous Justification

In the analogy, the neighbor woman’s defense of her husband’s cruelty rests on the arbitrary redefinition of love. She claims that because her husband has authority, he can redefine what love means. This is akin to how religious believers often argue that God’s actions, no matter how seemingly cruel or unjust, are inherently good because God is the ultimate authority and defines what is good.

Such reasoning is deeply problematic. It suggests that notions of compassionate behavior need not be aligned with human notions of compassion. Compassion, as humans recognize it, can be violated by the whims of the most powerful entity. This leads to a scenario where any apparently unloving atrocity can be magically deemed “loving” if perpetrated by a being considered authoritative, even without substantiation.

Authority Without Evidence: A Hallmark of Religious Defense

The neighbor woman defends her husband’s actions by asserting his superior wisdom without providing any evidence. Similarly, religious apologists often assert that God’s ways are higher than our ways and that we must trust in divine wisdom without requiring any tangible proof. This appeal to authority without evidence is a hallmark of religious defense and should be rejected on the grounds that it demands blind faith rather than reasoned trust.

Faith, as it is conventionally defined and as it is inferred in this analogy, becomes a tool for suppressing doubt and discouraging critical examination. It creates an environment where questioning authority is seen as a “moral” failing, a rebellion, rather than a necessary process for uncovering the truth.

The Inversion of Language: Manipulating Denotations of “Love”

In the analogy, the woman claims that her husband can invert the definition of love. This manipulation of language is a common tactic used to defend indefensible actions. By redefining terms to suit their narrative, religious apologists attempt to shield their deity from logical scrutiny. For instance, actions that would be considered unloving genocide, cruelty, or injustice if committed by humans are rebranded as righteous judgments or divine justice when attributed to God.

This linguistic manipulation is dangerous because it erodes our ability to coherently employ words conventionally defined by the language community. If terms like love, justice, and goodness can be redefined to justify any action, they lose their meaning and become tools of ideological control.

The Problem of Suffering: A Persistent Challenge

The defense of divine actions often fails to address the problem of suffering adequately. In the analogy, the woman’s justification for her husband’s cruelty does nothing to alleviate the children’s suffering. Similarly, religious explanations for why a loving God allows suffering often fall short. They may argue that suffering has a purpose or that it is part of a divine plan, but these explanations do not provide comfort to those who are suffering and do not address the apparent injustice of such suffering.

Rejecting Unquestioned Authority: Embracing Reason and Evidence

To accept the neighbor woman’s defense of her husband’s cruelty would be to abdicate our responsibility to scrutinize all claims we encounter. To accept religious justifications for divine actions without evidence is to surrender our capacity for critical thinking. We must reject the notion that authority, whether human or divine, is above scrutiny. Instead, we should embrace a worldview grounded in reason and evidence.

Conclusion: A Call for Rational Examination

The analogy of the neighbor woman defending her husband’s cruelty highlights the dangers of accepting arbitrary redefinitions of love and authority without evidence. It underscores the need for a rational examination of all claims, especially those that seek to justify suffering and injustice. By rejecting blind faith and embracing critical thinking, we can reject unsubstantiated or logically incoherent claims and build a more compassionate world.

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Thank you for reading. I warmly invite you to discuss this topic further in the comments section. Let’s engage in a thoughtful and respectful dialogue about the implications of the biblical notion of faith on our ideological landscape.