[I wrote this in 2021. At that time I was still a Christian. These were the beginning of the cognitive cracks that eventaully forced me to abandon my religion]
I am continually in a journey of wrestling with the Scriptures, and that is both exciting but also terrifying. Here are a few of my thoughts.
I was raised with this ingrained impulse to make the Biblical texts fit together. The rationale was that the One Spirit of God inspired the Scriptures, therefore they must ultimately speak with one unifying voice. That’s not a bad impulse to have if it’s true, but the more I studied the bible, the more I couldn’t escape the reality that the biblical texts just say radically different things at times — there appears to be an inspired plurality of perspectives in the Biblical texts. Sometimes, these perspectives are irreconcilable. I think of this phenomenon as differing “prophetic perspectives” within the Bible.
I will seek to show these differing “prophetic perspectives” most clearly in two examples: (1) Jeremiah and Ezekiel’s differing perspectives on child sacrifice and (2) the author of 1-2 Kings and Hosea’s differing perspectives on Jehu’s slaughter of the Omride dynasty.
Case Study One: Did God command child sacrifice or not? Jeremiah and Ezekiel
Did Yahweh command child sacrifice or not?
You might think the answer to that question is blindingly obvious, but it seems that not all Biblical authors agreed in their response. We shall see this with two contemporary prophets of the 6th century: Jeremiah and Ezekiel.
First, in Jeremiah 7:30-31, we see the prophet aflame with the Spirit of Yahweh proclaiming:
“For the people of Judah have done evil in my sight…and they go on building the high place of Topheth which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire—which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind” (Jer 7:30-31)
This prophetic condemnation from Jeremiah’s mouth is pretty standard. What’s fascinating to observe however is how Jeremiah overtly emphasized that Yahweh had never commanded this, nor did it ever come into his mind! This emphasis is so crucial that he repeats it three times:
“…they have gone on building high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire …which I did not command or decree, nor did it enter my mind!” (Jer 19:5)
“They built high places to Baal…to offer up their sons and daughters to Molech, though I did not command them, nor did it enter my mind…causing Judah to sin.” (Jer 32:35)
Why would Jeremiah have to emphasize that God never commanded child sacrifice so passionately and repeatedly? Simple: he was reacting to a specific situation in 6th century in Judah. The evidence suggests that a sizeable enough group of ancient Judeans shared the assumption that God had indeed commanded Israel to sacrifice their children. For them, child sacrifice wasn’t just a perverse Canaanite practice brought in from outside – it was a ritual that Yahweh himself had endorsed.
Jacob Milgrom draws out the same conclusion from the prohibition in Lev 20:2-3, where God says He will punish those who sacrifice children to Molech because such practices have “profaned Yahweh’s holy name” (Lev 20:3)
“The rational is specific: the worshipper’s crime against God is that he…desecrated his name (v.3b). The issue is that the Molek worshipper invokes Yahweh’s name, under the erroneous impression that Yahweh sanctions (or even commands) Molek worship.” (Milgrom, Leviticus: A Continental Commentary, pg. 246)
This historical reconstruction makes sense. One segment of people in Judah beleived that God had commanded Israel to sacrifice their children. Jeremiah was reacting against this assumption through his repetition: Yahweh never commanded child sacrifice.
But when we look at Ezekiel, he seems to have had a different perspective. While Ezekiel does agree with Jeremiah that child sacrifice is an abominable, defiling practice, he surprisingly disagrees with Jeremiah in the following point: For Ezekiel, Yahweh had commanded child sacrifice. The Judeans who believed this were correct, they simply misunderstood why God had commanded it.
We see this in Ezekiel 20 where Yahweh re-tells Israel’s exodus from Egypt. Ezekiel emphasizes that at this time God “gave Israel statutes and ordinances (the Torah), by which everyone shall live!” (Ezek 20:11), a theme repeated three times in the text (20:11, 13, 21). But Israel rebelled against these good commandments, and as a result, Yahweh did something radically different: he gave them commandments in order to defile them. These commandments involved child sacrifice.
“I (Yahweh) swore that I would scatter Israel because…they had rejected my statutes. Moreover, I gave them statues that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live. I defiled them through their very gifts, in their offering up all their firstborn, in order that I might horrify them, so that they might know that I am the LORD.” (Ezek 20:23-26)
This is a profoundly difficult verse for more reasons that one, but we seem to see here that Ezekiel was actively confirming a shared Judean assumption that God had commanded Israel to sacrifice their children. While various Christian scholars have given some explanatory interpretations for this passage [see footnote 1, 2], I unfortunately find their interpreters unconvincing. I really think the straightforward reading I’ve stated above is the most natural interpretation. Ezekiel wasn’t saying anything new to his hearers in stating that Yahweh had commanded child-sacrifice. They already shared that assumption. The new thing he was saying was the reasoning for why God had commanded it.
No matter what you do with that theologically, my main point is that when we compare Jeremiah and Ezekiel in this one issue, I can’t help see they just don’t agree, in fact, they fundamentally disagree on something rather important! Both prophets were ablaze with the Spirit of Yahweh, but both had radically different prophetic perspectives on something.
Can these prophets be harmonized? I don’t think so.
Can we hold that they both just had different, yet inspired, “prophetic perspectives?”
Case Study Two: Jehu’s Slaughter of the Omride Dynasty, Good or Bad? 1-2 Kings and Hosea
This next case study of differing perspectives involves how two distinct prophets (the author of Kings and the prophet Hosea) looked back on the same significant event (Jehu’s slaughter of the Omride dynasty) yet had two radically different assessments of the event.
So first, let’s talk Omrides.
The Omride Dynasty was a very powerful and prosperous dynasty in northern Israel that reigned from 885-841 BC. But their forty year rule was cut short by an Israelite general named Jehu who in 841 BC rode into the city of Jezreel (remember this city name) and slaughtered the last Omride king, King Joram (2 Kgs 9:24) as well as all the remaining descendants of the Omride dynasty (2 Kgs 10:7, 17). The Omride royal line was eradicated and Jehu established his own family dynasty called the Nimshide Dynasty which reinged from 841-752 BC.
So, here’s the question I want us to think about: was this event good or bad? Was it blessed by Yahweh or was it against his will? Well, interestingly enough, it depends on what prophet you ask.
Let’s turn to the first prophet, the anonymous prophet who wrote 1 and 2 Kings.
Scholars have long recognized that the author of the book of Kings was either a prophet (like Jeremiah) or someone within a prophetic circle. The reason they recognize this is because 1-2 Kings isn’t just a natural history, it is a prophetic perspective on history. The author was a prophet. Thus, the author of Kings gave God’s point of view on Juhu destroying of the Omride Dynasty. For him, the slaughter of the Omrides was God-ordained and blessed by Yahweh. This is made clear in the words the author has Elisha speak when Jehu is anointed:
“Elijah said, ‘Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, I anoint you king … and you shall strike down the house of Ahab (the Omride dynasty), so that I may avenge the blood of my servants the prophets…for the whole house of Ahab (the Omrides) shall perish, and I will cut off from Ahab every male, bond or free, in Israel.’” (2 Kgs 9:6-8)
So, for 1-2 Kings, the slaughter of the Omrides was God-ordained. In fact, the slaughter was God’s righteous judgment on the Omrides for murdering the prophets.
But when we turn to the earlier prophet Hosea, the perspective is completely opposite.
Hosea’s prophetic ministry in the 8th century involved marrying a prostitute and bearing children by her. Though odd for modern readers, these children bore prophetic names as signs for Israel. The first of these prophetic children was named Jezreel (the name of the city Jehu slaughtered the Omrides). God explains the meaning behind the name as follows:
“And Yahweh said to him, ‘Call his name Jezreel, for in just a little while I will punish the house of Jehu (the Nimshides) for the blood of Jezreel…and on that day, I will break the bow of Israel in the Valley of Jezreel.” (Hosea 1:4-5)
Wait a second, didn’t God instruct Jehu to slaughter the Omrides? Why is God now judging the Nimshide dynasty for their forefather Jehu doing what God asked him to do? Some commentators get past this difficulty by saying God’s not judging Jehu for slaughtering the Omrides, but for going too far with his bloody rampage. And as nice as this sounds, I unfortunately find it unconvincing. It’s just not the most natural reading of the text [see footnote 3].
It appears to me that the prophet who wrote Kings and the prophet Hosea just fundamentally had different prophetic perspectives on the same event. For the former, the slaughter was God-ordained, for the latter, it was deserving of God’s judgment (judgment that would transpire when Zechariah, the last Nimshide king, was assassinated in 2 Kgs 15:10).
I can’t harmonize these two perspectives. To do twists the texts too much from their clear meaning. Instead, I have to admit that I see here two different prophetic perspectives coming from two figures inspired by the Spirit.
Conclusion: Letting the Bible be the Bible in its inherent plurality?
I am not always certain where to go from here, but I really can’t get away from these two examples that I’ve shared above. And there are other examples of similar contraditions in both the prophets and apostles. I’m not trying to be rebellious in these conclusions, just honest with the biblical text we all have in front of us.
For me it appears that while the Bible is a collection of Spirit-inspired texts, they seem to show a plurality of perspectives on numerous given topics.
Another good example of this inherent plurality working itself out in community can be seen in how the post-exilic Jews in Palestine wrestled with what it meant to be God’s people in relation to gentiles. One group of Jews, epitomized in figures like Ezra and Nehemiah, pushed for greater ethnocentrism away from the gentiles (e.g. Ezra commanding a mass divorce from foreign wives, see Ezra 10). But then another group of Jews saw God’s vision for his people as involving greater inclusion of foreigners (such as in the post-exilic books of Ruth and Jonah, and prophets like Zechariah, see Zech 8:23).
Both groups were in conflict, yet both groups had their scriptural support in the prophets. The “exclusive group” likely leaned back on Ezekiel’s vision of God’s final temple where it was only the Zadokite priests who were exclusively permited to serve in the new temple (Ezekiel 44:15-16). But the “inclusive group” likely found support in Isaiah’s vision of an inclusive temple where not only Israelites, but even foreigners(!) would come from distant lands to serve as priests (Is 66:18-21).
The tension between these two variant prophetic visions of the future resulted in an ongoing tension of application among the post-exilic Jews, and the tension continued to rumble leading up to the time of Jesus. We see in the Bible different “prophetic perspectives” playing themselves in community tensions.
So, where does this leave me?
First, I don’t think I’m trying to be rebellious in this. But unfortunately, growing up in the church, this type of thinking can be perceived as rebelliousness. My view of the Bible has had to change over the years as I’ve studied it more and more. The Bible just doesn’t seem to fit nicely into the boxes presented to me in my youth. These days, I feel comfortable allowing a plurality of perspectives to be part of the symphony of revelation which the church has inherited in the Scriptures – a plurality of perspectives that should lead us to Jesus. And lest we forget, the Jesus we know comes to us preserved not in one unified story, but in a pluralistic tradition of four gospels that don’t always agree (did Jesus heal the blind man before entering Jericho, Luke 18:35, or after leaving Jericho, Marl 10:46? Well depends on which gospel you read, and both can’t be right historically.)
Plurality of perspectives is inherent within the church’s presentation of Jesus. I don’t think that should scare us.
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[Footnote 1] Christians in history have had different ways of trying to mitigate this problematic verse: For some, Yahweh gave Torah as a punishment. Irenaeus suggested Torah was given to bring Israel into slavery. For Old Testament scholar, John Walton, the “statutes that were not good” were “God’s judicial decisions regarding Israel [in response to rebellion to the covenant], which were not favorable to the unfaithful Israelites and were not done for their good” (Walton, The Lost World of Torah, 137-8).
[Footnote 2] Other scholars interpret the passage as not God giving the commandments, but as God “giving them over to” statutes that were not good. They write that God giving Israel “statutes that were not good” means “that Israel would choose to live according to the world’s ordinances that brought misery and death.” (IVP Bible Commentary: Ezekiel, pg. 171)
[Footnote 3] One commentary states: “although Jehu had done well in carrying out God’s directive, he had sinned in killing more people than God had intended. Jehu had probably done this more out of a desire for personal advancement than obedience to God.” (IVP Commentary: Hosea, pg. 61). I used to believe this, but I find it unconvincing in favor of a more straightforward reading of the text. While it is true that Jehu killed others in his rampage, most notably the Judean king Ahaziah (2 Kgs 9:27), he didn’t kill Ahaziah in Jezreel, but on the way to Beth-haggan at the ascent of Gur (2 Kgs 9:27). If not the Omrides but just Ahaziah was in view, why would Hosea specify the “blood of Jezreel” if it should really be “the blood of Gur”? Also, we should remember that Hosea was speaking to Israel, not Judah! For these Northern Israelites Hosea was speaking to, if they heard about Jehu’s dynasty being judged for “the blood of Jezreel,” the most natural conclusion would have been the slaughter of the Omrides, not the killing of another nation’s king (Ahaziah). If Hosea was wanting to make that obscure connection clear (negate from the most obvious conclusion to the more obscure one), he really should have specified more detail, especially since the Israelites didn’t have the book of 1-2 Kings to help them realize God had blessed Jehu in this. Therefore, I think it most natural to assume Hosea is referring to Jehu’s slaughter of the Omrides, not King Ahaziah of Judah.
Theological Musings of a Thirty-Something 
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