From time to time, we'll have Christians going door to door in our neighborhood trying to sell their religion to everyone and anyone who will listen. One thing that surprises me is how often the proselytizers are women or young girls. This surprises me, because religion often treats women as second class citizens. Allow me to illustrate...
Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, “No, my friends. Don’t do this wicked thing. Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a
Go show that angry mob a good time while I entertain our guests.
man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.
-Genesis 19:6-8
So here we have a clear illustration of a man who is taught as being righteous, but is offering his two daughters up for rape, so that the crowd won't rape the male angels who just arrived. This is truly despicable, and illustrates that these poor girls were regarded with such little worth. So little that they would be offered up for rape so that men would not be raped.
Make the price for the bride and the gift I am to bring as great as you like, and I'll pay whatever you ask me. Only give me the girl as my wife.
-Genesis 34:12
In this passage we see girls/women being viewed as property that a father can simply sell into marriage. Women are living beings with their own thoughts, ideas, and feelings. Anyone that truly views women as equal to men could ever defend the selling of women into marriage. Yet the supposedly unquestionable Bible refers to women as if they were property.
If a man takes a wife and, after lying with her, dislikes her and slanders her and gives her a bad name, saying, “I married this woman, but when I approached her, I did not find proof of her virginity,” then the girl’s father and mother shall bring proof that she was a virgin to the town elders at the gate. The girl’s father will say to the elders, “I gave my daughter in marriage to this man, but he dislikes her. Now he has slandered her and said, ‘I did not find your daughter to be a virgin.’ But here is the proof of my daughter’s virginity.” Then her parents shall display the cloth before the elders of the town, and the elders shall take the man and punish him. They shall fine him a hundred shekels of silver and give them to the girl’s father, because this man has given an Israelite virgin a bad name. She shall continue to be his wife; he must not divorce her as long as he lives.
If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the girl’s virginity can be found, she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done a disgraceful thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you.
-Deuteronomy 22:13-21
Next we see the penalty for a woman marrying while not being a virgin. First, we see the insane
requirement that a woman has to stay a virgin until she is married. Additionally, there is no such (Biblical) prohibition for men. A sad sad double standard. But then we see that there is the drastic difference in punishment for the man and the woman. If the man makes a false accusation, he receives a simple fine of 100 shekels. In contrast, if the woman's virginity can not be proven, she is sentenced to death by stoning. Death for the natural action of having had sex?! Personally, I don't think there should be any penalty for a wife not being a virgin. Perhaps the husband can be cross, had she told him that she was a virgin, but death is simply barbaric.
If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay the girl’s father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the girl, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.
-Deuteronomy 22:28-29
More shocking Biblical marriage law. In the above verse, this poor woman would be forced to marry and spend the remainder of her life with the man that raped her. If this isn't a gruesome thought, I don't know what is. Again we see that the man's punishment (in addition to marriage) is to pay the girl's father 50 shekels. The girl is no longer a virgin, so the father loses the ability to charge a 'virgin price' for his daughter.It's like someone stealing a new car, being forced to pay the difference between a new and used car price, and getting to still keep the car. The next shocking aspect is that the marriage is a punishment for the man in this situation. I think that any rational person will agree that if that is punishment for anyone, it is punishment to the woman that was victimized by this man she is now forced to marry. So here we have an innocent victim being punished, seemingly for the 'crime' of being a woman and getting raped. Sickening.
If brothers are living together and one of them dies without a son, his widow must not marry outside the family. Her husband’s brother shall take her and marry her and fulfill the duty of a brother-in-law to her. The first son she bears shall carry on the name of the dead brother so that his name will not be blotted out from Israel.
-Deuteronomy 25:5-6
Once more, women being viewed as property. Here we see a woman being forced to marry and conceive children with the brother of her recently deceased husband. Again, woman are represented as transferable property. Additionally, this passage projects the purpose of women in a marriage as child bearing machines. Degrading no matter how you look at it.
If two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall cut off her hand. Show her no pity.
-Deuteronomy 25:11-12
Here we are presented with an odd situation... Two men are fighting, and one man's wife comes to his aid by grabbing for the genitals of the other man. So we have a woman coming to help her husband, yet the reward she gets for coming to his aid is that her hand must be cut off!?! How is that justice, or sensible in any regard? Additionally, there is no punishment mentioned for the men that are fighting, yet the punishment is listed for the one who attempted to break up the fight.
If a man marries a woman who becomes displeasing to him because he finds something indecent about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house, and if after she leaves his house she becomes the wife of another man, and her second husband dislikes her and writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house, or if he dies, then her first husband, who divorced her, is not allowed to marry her again after she has been defiled. That would be detestable in the eyes of the Lord. Do not bring sin upon the land the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.
-Deuteronomy 24:1-4
Yup, you read that correctly. The institution of marriage that just about any Christian will tell you is a lifelong commitment, and that divorce is not condoned, is not as squeaky clean as they would have it seem. I wrote in a prior post about the truth of 'Biblical marriage'. But the important aspect here is that divorce is not allowed unless the man finds his wife 'displeasing' to him. He doesn't like the sex, isn't happy in some regard and he can just throw her aside and claim to be displeased. Conversely, there is no pathway for the wife to dissolve a marriage, whether she be displeased, abused, or just wants to move on. Again, a double standard and the wife being viewed as an object to be possessed, rather than a living, breathing, feeling, equal person.
Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.
-Numbers 31:17-18
Yep, first you invade and kill an entire town, but then keep the virgin women as a war prize to rape and discard as you please. Sickening behavior that no moral person could ever allow. Yet here it is condoned and commanded in the Bible.
I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
-1 Timothy 2:12-15
This excerpt plainly and proudly proclaims it's misogyny. It comes right out and declares that men must have authority over women (so much for equality). Next it reduces women once more to child making factories under threat of eternal torment. Leading a good moral life is apparently not enough. Unless you bow your head to all men, and crank out child after child, the Biblical eternity on offer is to be tortured forever in the fiery pits of Hell.
Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.
-1 Corinthians 14:34-35
Once more, we see women being classed below men. Women can not teach. Women can not speak up in church. Women must ask all questions to their husband once home. This is all language for those who value women as second class... Who feel that they are inferior to men. An institution that cares not for the opinions of women, who doesn't want to hear from them, that feel they are incapable of teaching as if they posses a mind that is sub-par to a man's. So when I see so many women that are proud Christians, it surprises me. When I see the woman on my door step that is preaching and trying to teach her God's word, I can't help but notice how they are (ignorantly?) in defiance of what their holy book dictates.
Don't get me wrong, I celebrate that they feel they can do anything that a man can, and that they are equal to men. But the Bible disagrees. Are they unaware of this fact, do they not know of the passages listed here (and more), do they simply ignore the verses they don't like, or do they pretend that there is some rationalization that makes these ugly thoughts somehow more acceptable? My guess would be that it is a mix of all of the above.
But in my opinion, there is no way that a woman that is well versed Biblically, as well as a woman that is proud to be who she is and should be, should be a Christian. At the very least if they are still a Christian, they should be quite vocal in their opposition to the misogyny that the Bible teaches as divine law. But instead, it seems that most live in this fantasy where Christianity views and excepts all as equal with open arms and love. As I have shown in this post, equality is something that it certainly does not preach... as long as you're a woman that is.
-Brain Hulk
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